Required Listening: L.A.M.F.
In the mid-1980s, my dad’s friend and sometimes coworker Dicky flickered in and out of our lives, leaving town to avenge some loss, attend…
Pop Culture
Required Listening: Native Son
Like your favorite season, The Judybats 1991 debut Native Son conjures moments of exploding possibility or reassuring melancholy– perhaps a Spring that sends you…
Required Listening: The Velvet Underground & Nico
According to author Martin Amis, “It is the summit of idleness to deplore the present, to deplore actuality.” Here, Amis reminds us that reality,…
Required Listening: Bill Jerpe
The legends surrounding a cult classic often outstrip the music’s realities. Perhaps an album remains a “Best Record You’ve Never Heard” mainstay simply because…
Required Listening: Liliput
Formed in 1978, the year of punk’s supposed death, the girls of Liliput (formerly known as Kleenex) apparently forgot to read– or more likely…
Required Listening: Get Tough
In 1998, I moved away to attend college but found my new home as lacking in culture and kicks as the whistle-stop I had…
Required Listening: The Days of Wine and Roses
A mention of Los Angeles in the 1980s might conjure images of The Decline of Western Civilization II: The Metal Years, but the city…
Required Listening: Philosophy of the World
In the late 1960s, three teenage sisters– Betty, Helen, and Dorothy Wiggins– each took up an instrument, and under the “guidance” of their father,…
Required Listening: Dirty Dancing
“The Dirty Dancing soundtrack?” I can hear the record needles scratch, highball glasses shatter, and partygoers and readers alike demand refunds… But hear me…