Derek Bridges
21 Min Read

Joseph Crachiola is from a small town outside Detroit that got swallowed up by the suburbs (same story for me, except replace Detroit with Chicago). He worked 15 years for suburban Detroit newspapers and 22 years as a corporate photographer before he got bought out and decided to move to New Orleans about 2 years ago. He recently served as road manager for the Pinettes Brass Band in Turkey, and photographed the Umbria Jazz Festival in Perugia, Italy.

John Hicks
3 Min Read

A friend of mine just posted a cool link on Facebook.

Stop the presses!

No, this really is cool. It’s audio from a 1969 Velvet Underground show in Boston, accompanied by images from Godzilla movies. Thanks, Dangerous Minds dot net!

I should also thank my friend Chris in Austin for posting the link. Thanks, Chris!

This particular clip happens to feature “What Goes On,” a nifty tune from the VU’s third album, The Velvet Underground. According to Dangerous Minds, someone put a microphone in Lou Reed’s guitar amplifier that fateful night. The recording is Godzillian, indeed.

No vocals are audible here. Behind the din of Lou’s majestic flailing, you can hear Maureen Tucker playing the drums, and that’s about it.

1 161
4
Sam Jasper
4 Min Read

I have always had vivid dreams. My mom remembers me regaling her with them over breakfast. Her usual response was a smile, a shake of the head and the comment, “You have some real weirdies, honey.” I still do.

I woke up this morning after having had a dream about the St. Roch Market. First I need to tell you that I have never been there, not seen it as a seafood and Chinese food place prior to the storm. I have stood staring at it many times since and the building itself has a presence, a personality, one that reaches out wanting to be useful and vibrant. It misses people and voices and laughter. At least that’s what it seems to tell me.

 


John Hicks
4 Min Read

I was on a state highway in Texas. It was about 10 PM. I listened to the radio for the last 40 miles into Denton.

It sounded like the Texas I knew, all right. Twang, metal, hype. How ‘bout them Cowboys!

I was going to Denton to shoot some videos and record some songs with Bob Hate and Stephen Thomas, roughly two-fifths of The Eddy Band.

Stephen’s first band nickname was so obscene it actually became cool over the years. It was succinct and entirely filthy.

It cannot be written here. But sometimes words you leave out are just as good as words you leave in, I think.

Jimmy Gabacho
2 Min Read

Being cheap has backfired on me a couple of times when my family has left me to deal with all of their luggage. The worst experience came after a fateful night in the Children’s Hospital in Florence, Italy. I wasn’t the one that was ill, but rather it was my youngest daughter who, in spite of my suggestions to drink more water, became dehydrated from the Mediterranean heat and sun. The heat had a disastrous effect on her digestive system, which at the time was swollen with cheap tourist pizza. The more she ate, the less she digested. The situation came to a head the evening before we were scheduled to catch a train to Rome.

B2L2