As exposed in a recent Salon report on PEN America’s tracking data, censorship groups are no longer even pretending to target "inappropriate" material

Originally released in 1973, Dylan features recordings from sessions completed in 1970. The album includes "Lily Of The West," "Mr. Bojangles," "Sarah Jane," and "Spanish Is The Loving Tongue." Track ...

Acoustic instruments and a wonderful sounding room led to my most rewarding Dylan experience with a set of favorites new and old performed with wonderful nuance and subtlety

Some investigation around the soundtrack to 'The Lowdown' dominates, while Joe Brainard, Jack Gilbert, P.S. Eliot (by way of Snocaps), and Cornelius Cardew (by way of Brian Eno) also pop up

YouTube video by Cyrus Pireh - Topic

Some 40 years ago, my mother donated a 1915 landscape plan to the State Historical Society of Iowa’s library in Iowa City. The plan, a rare surviving hand-painted sketch by […]

Taking a look back on 12 months worth of 'Take Fives' with a sort of best-of that showcases the jazz, poetry, rock, writing, and pop philosophy I have shared each week

We are on a Crazy Train of sorts, but we can view some beautiful art by Kandinsky, learn from PBS, explore wonderful poetry with Fanny Howe, laugh at a comic, and crank some Ozzy (or The Bad Plus).

There was someone there in the shadows on July 18, 2021, and it was Bob Dylan with one of the least spontaneous (but one of the most satisfying) productions of his career, 'Shadow Kingdom'

After last week's 'Take Five' stop with Hell's book, 'What Just Happened,' I dug up this interview with Hell from 2010 where we discussed his project to 'repair' his flawed yet wonderful sophomore LP

Four decades ago today, some of the biggest names in rock joined to raise money to combat famine in Africa. Here is a look back at some sets that blew my teenaged mind, and a few I missed

Bruce Springsteen just released, 'Tracks II,' a box set with 7 unreleased albums. As you would expect, there is some sublime music and some forgettable tunes, and I'm here to weigh in on all of it.

Curiosity and connections led me to Terence Blanchard, Danny Gatton, Mick Ralphs' work with Mott the Hoople, the murals of Diego Rivera, and, yes, yet another Beach Boys tune

Another week of connections: Alice Notley to Ted Berrigan to Joe Brainard, Charles Mingus to Jeff Beck, and Four Tet to Mazzy Star

The King ushers in a week of surprises with a Bill Fox interview, a Sylvia Plath-Joe Pernice connection, an '80s slow dance with Jimmy Barnes and Neil Finn, and flirty lumberjacks with Torrey Peters

Take it from good old Bill Faulkner: Thanks to YouTube, the past isn't even past. You can relive my past with Robyn Hitchcock, INXS, Passengers, Peach & Lee, and the Ponys

Nick Cave prays, Shara Nova provokes, Jean-Michel Basquiat bebops, Natural Information Society drones, and Davy Graham strums in an eclectic week even by my standards

It's difficult to keep from evangelizing about Cave's live performance, which is as much worship service as concert, as the one-time dark prince of sinister rock soars toward a higher calling

Don’t miss MusicIC Festival’s one-night only presentation of Penelope—a multimedia song cycle with Grammy-nominee Shara Nova, 4/26 at The James Theater!

From serious to silly and everything (if by that I mean hard bop jazz and '80s indie folk rock) in between, with Fady Joudah, Kenny Burrell, the Silos, Kenny Dorham, and Illuminati Hotties

Looking at a handful of books of collected lyrics and musing on their value to a listener

Exploring the power of art with Brian Eno's book, Vertifacts' microtones, Unrest's manic jangle, Iowa's checkered history, and Flore Laurentienne's lush songscapes

The 83 year old is playing a similar set every night, but it is surely his love of the material and not an end-of-the-road rut that yields such consistency. Thoughts from Davenport's Adler Theatre

The singer and songwriter announced a boxed set featuring 83 songs, of which 74 have never been officially released in any form.

Revisiting an early attempt to critique Dylan as a poet and to respond to the songs through photography, which led to an off-putting modern classical reinterpretation of his work

The Trump administration says it mistakenly deported an immigrant with protected status but that courts are powerless to order his return.

Sorry for the Pavement bait and switch, just a post with some older songs and a couple of newer things that made me think of older things.

The new administration’s cuts to cultural programs, research grants and Voice of America represent a shift in America’s relationship with the rest of the world

Which assumes, of course, that we survive today. Music from Rachel's, World Party, Bonnie 'Prince' Billy, and Sly and the Family Stone are joined by wise words from Nick Cave to weather another week.

In fact, at this point it might be the only thing we can count on that will, and Heather McGhee is a great place to start. Nobel Prizes, Jackson Pollock and some bright tunes round out the week

YouTube video by BrooklynVegan

John Kenyon: No one is being protected here. The real objective is to control what we access and how we think about the issues of the day.