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Pussy Riot member Maria Alyokhina denied parole

Thu, 23 May 2013 18:11:00 +0000

Maria Alyokhina, one of the two members of Russian punk activist group Pussy Riot still in prison, was denied parole on Thursday. Alyokhina declared a hunger strike after she was denied the right to attend her parole hearing in person, originally scheduled for Wednesday.

The court ruled in favor of the prosecution, who argued that the anti-Kremlin activist has "systematically disobeyed prison authorities and failed to repent for her crime" according to reports of Russian media.

The ruling from the Russian court comes despite a plea from Paul McCartney to release Alyokhina and fellow member Nadezhda Tolokonnikova, who was denied parole last month.

Paul McCartney backs Pussy Riot

Thu, 23 May 2013 11:42:00 +0000

MOSCOW (AP) — Beatles frontman Paul McCartney has asked a Russian judge to release members of the Pussy Riot punk group from prison.

In letters dated Monday and posted online by the group's supporters, McCartney asks for parole to be granted to Maria Alekhina and Nadezhda Tolokonnikova, currently serving two-year sentences for an impromptu protest in Moscow's main cathedral.

McCartney wrote that he was making the request "in a spirit of friendship for my many Russian acquaintances who, like me, believe in treating people - all people, with compassion and kindness."

Alekhina went on hunger strike Wednesday in protest at not being allowed to attend her own parole hearing in Perm province. The judge in Mordovia province to whom McCartney addressed both letters denied Tolokonnikova parole last month.

“No Pakistanis”: The racial satire the Beatles don’t want you to hear

Sun, 14 Apr 2013 11:00:00 +0000

Imagine that a popular American rock band – say, the Black Keys – wrote a song about immigrants. There are too many of them, the lyrics suggest, and they take jobs away from native-born workers. The chorus recommends that they go back to their countries of origin, where they really belong. Though the song was meant to satirize xenophobia, “No Mexicans” could be easily interpreted as an anthem of racism.

This was the situation that the Beatles faced in 1969, when they first concocted the song that would become “Get Back.” Better known as a playful take on counterculture, starring the gender-bending Sweet Loretta Martin and the grass-smoking Jo-Jo, the song originally dealt with South Asian immigration to the United Kingdom. The strange story of "Get Back," its politics, and its bootlegs tells us much about the limits of what musicians, even hugely popular and politically engaged ones, can say in popular music -- and what's at stake in the battle over file-sharing and free culture today.

The ballad of John and Yoko — and Paul — continues more than 40 years later

Sun, 03 Mar 2013 20:00:00 +0000

In 2000, a New York-based architect named Cass Calder Smith was helping his father move into a new apartment, when he discovered a tremendous inventory of interview tapes — hundreds of hours of conversations with the biggest rock legends. His journalist father, Howard Smith, had enviable gigs as both a New York City radio personality (for WABC, later WPLJ) and a star columnist at the Village Voice during its heyday, in the late 1960s and early ‘70s, when every revolution — sexual, anti-war, civil rights, gay liberation— was not only at its height, but converging. Unflappable, immensely knowledgeable, and sharp-witted, he earned the confidence of his subjects — people like Mick Jagger, Dennis Hopper and Peter Fonda (freshly returned from Cannes, after the premiere of "Easy Rider"), Frank Zappa, Eric Clapton, Lou Reed, John Lennon and Yoko Ono, and Jerry Garcia (though Howard admits to John Lennon in an interview that he's not a fan of the Dead) — who spoke with him, on repeat occasions, often at a crucial juncture in history, or in their lives, and opened up at length and with rare candor. These original reels from the interviews, which were conducted for Howard Smith’s column and radio show, were packed away in boxes, untouched for 40 years, in the back of his West Village loft. Howard Smith, now 76, and fighting cancer, confessed to Ben Sisario in the New York Times in November that he’d kept them around, half-hoping to use them for his memoirs, thinking they would be “a good memory jogger. Things were happening every day that were just incredible.”

Check out these never-before-seen photos of the Beatles

Fri, 01 Mar 2013 21:18:00 +0000

Photographer Henry Grossman, who has taken classic shots of celebrities like Elizabeth Taylor, Jimi Hendrix and seven presidents, is releasing a collection of over 1,000 mostly never-before-seen images of the Beatles in his book, "Places I Remember: My Time With the Beatles."

Unprecedented in its scope and intimacy, "this is among the most significant collection of Beatles images in existence, both artistically and historically," said book co-editor Kevin Ryan.

Grossman first got access to the band in 1964, when he first photographed them during their first performance on "The Ed Sullivan Show." By 1965, he was traveling with the group as a companion, and continued to capture private moments for the next three years. "From private moments at home with their loved ones, to late-night parties and recording sessions," the press release states, "Grossman took more photos of The Beatles over a longer period of time than any other photographer."

Nirvana without Kurt is not Nirvana!

Mon, 17 Dec 2012 20:45:00 +0000

Of all the bands that seemed ripe for reunion, Nirvana had to be near the bottom of the list: The death of Kurt Cobain in 1994 left the trio without a singer, songwriter or guitarist, and replacing him, really, was unimaginable.

And yet there were Dave Grohl, Krist Novoselic and touring guitarist Pat Smear, onstage at Madison Square Garden last week with substitute frontman Paul McCartney, storming through a new song called “Cut Me Some Slack” — the first time the surviving members of Nirvana had performed together in public since Cobain’s suicide. And there they were again, on “Saturday Night Live,” in what seemed more like a plug for Grohl’s upcoming documentary “Sound City,” about the beloved (defunct) Los Angeles recording studio of the same name. (“Cut Me Some Slack” is on the soundtrack, don’t you know, and — what a coincidence! — available for purchase right now.)

“SNL” has a blue Christmas

Sun, 16 Dec 2012 14:00:00 +0000

The specter of Sandy Hook looms heavy this weekend, but "Saturday Night Live" proves time and again that they are at their best when they have to put on a show for a grieving nation. The somber cold open, with the New York Children's Chorus singing "Silent Night," paid quiet tribute to the 26 lives lost on Friday while providing a necessary buffer for the episode that followed. It acknowledged, tastefully, how uncomfortable it can be to laugh in the wake of incomprehensible violence. But after the song finished, the screen faded to black and it was back to business as usual.

Actually, better business than usual.

SNL brought the winning combo of having a beloved alum Martin Short host the year's penultimate "SNL" (or the last one ever, if the Mayans are to be believed), and a Beatle! And the writers and cast really brought it. Alum shows tend to have a gaggle of surprise guests anyway, but with every celebrity on Earth in New York for the 12-12-12 Sandy relief concert, this one packed heavier than usual star power.

Paul McCartney to front Nirvana reunion

Wed, 12 Dec 2012 16:15:00 +0000

The Sun newspaper is reporting that Paul McCartney will replace Kurt Cobain and lead a Nirvana reunion this evening at the Hurricane Sandy benefit concert in New York.

It would be the first show that the surviving members of the pioneering alt-rock band in almost 20 years, since Cobain's 1994 suicide. They will reportedly debut a new song.

McCartney told the paper he called Grohl recently, and the Foo Fighters frontman invited him to “jam with some mates.”

According to the Sun:

Macca had suggested they “just make something up” and found himself playing with Grohl on drums, bassist Krist, 47, and unofficial fourth Nirvana member Pat Smear, 53.

He said: “I didn’t really know who they were. They are saying how good it is to be back together. I said ‘Whoa? You guys haven’t played together for all that time?

“And somebody whispered to me ‘That’s Nirvana. You’re Kurt.’ I couldn’t believe it.”

Pussy Riot’s victorious defeat

Fri, 17 Aug 2012 15:18:00 +0000

In a decision as predictable as it was stomach-churning, three members of the Russian feminist punk collective Pussy Riot were found guilty Friday of hooliganism for a protest in a cathedral last winter. The judge declared that they had engaged in "homosexual propaganda" and "imitated demonic attacks." The women, Yekaterina Samutsevich, Maria Alyokhina and Nadezhda Tolokonnikova -- who have already spent six months in jail -- received a sentence of two years imprisonment.

The case, which has gained the attention of the world as a litmus test for freedom of expression in Russia, began in February, when the band mounted an unauthorized action at one of Russia's most sacred spaces, Moscow's Cathedral of Christ the Saviour. Performing in their trademark tights and face-obscuring balaclavas, they belted out their "Punk Prayer" to "Mother Mary, please drive Putin away." They were swiftly accused of a "criminal act which violated public order" and "went against tradition and is a great insult to the church and people." All three women pleaded not guilty to the charge of hooliganism, but apologized for their "ethical mistake."

Meeting Elvis

Sat, 04 Aug 2012 18:00:00 +0000

President Richard M. Nixon awards a bureau of narcotics and dangerous drugs special agent badge to Elvis Presley

The White House, Washington DC

December 20th 1970

As 1970 nears its end, Elvis Presley is riddled with worries about assassinations, anti-war protests, a lack of respect for authority, and the prevalence of drugs. His paranoia about the abuse of drugs by young people is exacerbated by the quantity of drugs he himself consumes.

Shopping proves a reasonably effective method of allaying his fears about everything else. He particularly enjoys buying guns, cars and jewelry, not just for himself, but for friends and employees, and sometimes total strangers. Over the course of three nights he spends $20,000 on guns at Kerr’s Sporting Goods in Memphis; the following week, he buys two Mercedes, one for himself and another for a girlfriend; the week after, he buys a third Mercedes for an aide, plus a new Cadillac as a wedding present for a Palm Springs patrolman with whom he has struck up a friendship.

When his father first warned him that he was spending too much, Elvis tried to calm him down by buying him a Mercedes. But on December 19th, his father and his wife Priscilla confront him: his spending is getting out of hand.