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In Depth Profile of CBC Radio’s Jian Ghomeshi

July 19, 2012/4 Comments/in Canada, Media, Blogging, Internet, Music, Bands & Radio /by Philip Turner

July 25 Update: Jian Ghomeshi of CBC Radio’s ‘Q’ has now also been the subject of a NY Times profile, and here’s a link to it. I’m really pleased to see Jian and his program making so much headway in New York City, and throughout the States.

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CBC Radio One’s morning program ‘Q‘ is one of my favorite shows on any radio network. Though normally produced at CBC’s headquarters in Toronto, host Jian Ghomeshi and his producers occasionally take their show on the road, which allowed my son Ewan and I to attend a live taping held in WNYC’s Greene Space in 2011. That night Jian interviewed guests Joy Behar and Fran Leibowitz and the band The National played too. He was very personable when we talked afterward, and pleased to meet U.S. listeners like us. That visit to NY was a prologue as the show has a spot on WNYC’s evening schedule this summer, 10 PM on the FM frequency, 93.9. I still listen on the Internet most mornings while at my desk, but it’s also great that I can hear it in the evenings if I missed it earlier.

Last month, during the NXNE festival, when fans of CBC Radio 3, the indie rock outpost of CBC, got a tour of CBC HQs, producer Pedro Mendes and Radio 3 host Grant Lawrence brought Jian out to meet the group. He was charming, and when I (re-) introduced myself he remembered having met me and Ewan in NY more than a year ago. That afternoon I took this photo of Jian, in the soccer jersey, and Grant, in flannel.

Today I was glad to read a profile of Jian in the Globe & Mail from last weekend. Reporter Brad Wheeler adopts a somewhat snarky tone, but overall, it’s a good article, with info like this:

“Last month, Ghomeshi won the Gold Award for best talk-show host at the New York Festivals International Radio Awards. Q, the popular daily arts, entertainment and culture magazine he hosts with aplomb and a soothing baritone, air[ing] on 120 public radio stations south of the border, including in major markets such as New York, Chicago and San Diego. . . . Q’s unprecedented American victories are explainable. The show takes pop culture seriously, attracts A-list guests, engages in lively debate and manages a rhythmic flow of its varied content. You have a host in Ghomeshi who comes with an exotic cultural background, a radio-friendly baritone, and who’s cocky and well-read enough to take on a variety of issues and interview subjects in an in-depth way. ‘The type of show Jian does draws on a lot aspects of the host’s personality,’ says Robert Harris, long-time CBC personality and producer. ‘It stretches your brain power, and the audience reacts to it.’ . . . . Some of the new listeners no doubt react to Q’s hip list of musical guests. Moreover, the artists and labels themselves are on board. Would rapper andQ guest Jay-Z have done Radio One five years ago? No chance. ‘American managers are reaching out to me, wanting to know which shows they should do,’ says Patrick Sambrook, a prominent artists’ manager whose clients include Kathleen Edwards and Sarah Harmer. ‘Q is on the top of the list for international artists coming to Canada. It’s the show that you want to be on.’”

To this I would add that ‘Q’ broadcast a nearly one-hour interview with Neil Young and Daniel Lanois, when “LeNoise” was released last year, a rare bit of media access that Neil chose to give ‘Q.’ More recently, Jian interviewed Chinese dissident artist, Ai Weiwei, who chose to appear on ‘Q’ despite continuing threats to his freedom by the Chinese government. I haven’t heard Ai WeiWei on any NPR programs. Clearly, ‘Q’ has become a go-to show for artists, authors, and many public figures. If you enjoy filling your day with intelligent talk radio, I recommend you listen to this terrific program. Being nowhere near Canadian air waves doesn’t matter, as it’s easy to listen to CBC on the Web.

Jian, whose family comes orginally from Iran, moved from England to Canada when he was fourteen is writing a book, 1982, about his teenage obsession with David Bowie, which will be published in Canada, and he told me, the U.S.

New Bob Dylan Album Due Out in September

July 17, 2012/2 Comments/in Music, Bands & Radio /by Philip Turner

Bob Dylan’s still at, a long way from hanging up his guitar or microphone. Timed to mark his 50th anniversary as a recording artist, Columbia Records has announced on www.bobdylan.com that in September Bob Dylan will be releasing a new album, “Tempest.” Columbia writes that it will feature “ten new and original Bob Dylan songs,” and that its “release. . . coincides with the 50th Anniversary of the artist’s eponymous debut album, which was released by Columbia in 1962.”

Sheldon Adelson’s Terrible Horrible No Good Very Bad Day

July 16, 2012/1 Comment/in Media, Blogging, Internet /by Philip Turner

Pro Publica and PBS’s Frontline are out today with a joint blockbuster report on suspected corrupt dealings that casino magnate Sheldon Adelson–the largest donor to pro-Republican and pro-Mitt Romney Super Pacs–may have engaged in to get his largest gambling parlor built, in the Chinese territory of Macau. An executive and a senior attorney in Adelson’s company warned against trying to unduly influence the decisions of a Chinese government official with large payments, but according to the story, more than $700,000 was paid to the official anyway. Now, Adelson and his company are under investigation by the Justice Dept. and the SEC for possible violations of the Federal Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA). I heard reports about the Pro Publica/Frontline scoop on “All Things Considered,” with Lowell Bergman, one of three reporters on the piece, the others being Matt Isaacs, and Stephen Engelberg. On The Rachel Maddow Show, Engelberg was a guest.

But that strong dose of traditional investigative reporting is the least of what is about to hit Mr. Adelson, not by a longshot: The irrepressible Sarah Silverman has prepared some new comedic and political mischief for her co-religionist Sheldon Adelson. According to TechPresident’s Nick Judd, in a piece headlined, “Sarah Silverman Uses YouTube, Bikini Bottoms to Kickstart an Online Anti-Adelson Campaign“

“Sometime in the next two or three days, an ankles-in-the-air Sarah Silverman will probably appear in your Facebook news feed with a political stunt video designed to hijack the 21st-century media cycle as we now understand it. If casino mogul Sheldon Adelson would just stop giving money to super PACs supporting Mitt Romney’s candidacy, she says in a new video, she will put on bikini underwear and perform a sex act with him that is so far out of its normal context—the video hypes it up with the tagline “traditional lesbian sex”—as to make it almost-but-not-quite acceptable to describe to a family audience.”

For those who recall Silverman’s 2008 campaign video, “The Great Schlep,” this latest effort promises to inject a welcome hit of serious humor in to the presidential campaign. I can’t imagine that Pro Publica/Frontline and Sarah Silverman coordinated their efforts, but I bet they couldn’t be happier with the coincidence of their two efforts coming out within days of each other. Regarding Adelson’s free-spending efforts to elect Mitt Romney, it must be said that a Romney victory in November would probably spell be the end of the investigations and possible prosecution of wrongdoing at Adelson’s company. That’s quite a way to potentially buy yourself a stay-out-of-jail card–by yourself a new president and a new justice department. For all her bawdy humor, Silverman is clearly trying to influence the public discussion over this, as the website for her effort, http://scissorsheldon.com/, also includes a page headlined, Who is the $100 Million Man?

Library Voices, Kicking it up in Quebec City

July 16, 2012/0 Comments/in Canada, Music, Bands & Radio /by Philip Turner

I love the music of Canadian power pop septet Library Voices, and in the past year have twice had the pleasure of hearing them play live. The first time was last November when they played the Knitting Factory in Brooklyn with the six-piece outfit Ohbijou*, a show I wrote about in the early weeks of this blog. The second time was this past April when they played Pianos on the Lower East Side with Yukon Blonde, when the photos accompanying this post were shot.

Library Voices play their power pop with an exuberant intensity that I’ve found a great joy to take in. In my post last fall, I wrote they have “a brash, fun sound with vibrant catchy hooks, bookish song titles and literary-minded lyrics by synth player Mike Dawson (‘Reluctant Readers Make Reluctant Lovers,’ ‘If Raymond Carver Were Born in the 90s,’ ‘Prime Minister’s Daughter’), and a very athletic performing style.” Among the foremost of the athletes on stage is bassist Eoin Hickey-Cameron, a big man with a great personality who in a photo shown here utterly dwarfs me! Eoin jumps in place while playing his instrument, which he does with great abandon. It is for good reason that Library Voices got a lot of votes in last year’s CBC Radio 3 Bucky Awards in the “Best Live Band” category, including mine.

I was delighted to read today that over the past weekend Library Voices played a festival in Quebec City, far from their prairie base in Regina, Saskatchewan. And, according to Mark Teo of Exclaim magazine, the show they played at the Festival d’été was one for the ages. Teo writes their “eager energy — more befitting of a hardcore act — translated into scintillating pop, converting ‘If Raymond Carver Were Born in the ’90s’ and ‘Generation Handclap’ into insta-memorable shout-alongs. And when they closed with the Misfits’ ‘Where Eagles Dare,’ it became official: Library Voices owned the funnest set of the Festival d’été.” About Eoin, he adds, “Bassist Eoin Hickey-Cameron pogoed as if he were in Youth of Today.” Teo’s terrific review is only a few paragraphs, and really worth reading at this link.

* Ohbijou is a great band too. In my post last November, I described them as playing a kind of “space jam with soaring notes and lyrical interludes with great vocals by sisters Casey and Jenny Mecija, who also play guitar and violin respectively.” In the last photo in the gallery along with this post, I’m pictured with Jenny, who happens to be Eoin Hickey-Cameron’s girlfriend.

Alamo Drafthouse Cinema Coming to NYC!

July 15, 2012/3 Comments/in Art, Film, TV, Photography, Fine Printing & Design, Media, Blogging, Internet, Urban Life & New York City /by Philip Turner

July 17 Update–A Note to Great Gray Bridge Readers: A reader of my blog saw the post below and thought it’s possible that Alamo Drafthouse Cinema may not come to the Metro Theater in NY after all, that it may not happen. I agree there’s certainly been no improvement to the site yet and I concede the news was reported in Huff Post more than 4 months ago. There’s a possibility something could go wrong, but I doubt it. I’ve found the Huff Post story was triggered by a blog post on the Alamo site. I just don’t think they’d have announced the Metro renovation without a proper deal. We shall see soon, if they really are planning to open in 2013.

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I was excited to discover that Austin, TX–based Alamo Drafthouse Cinema–an innovative chain of movie houses that combines film and food–are going to renovate and reclaim the handsome Metro Theater on Broadway at 100th Street in Manhattan, which has been neglected and empty for nearly a decade. This is great news for the Upper West Side! Coincidentally, the Metro Theater marquee is featured in the series of urban marquees that my wife Kyle Gallup has recently been painting, as seen here. Following Kyle’s piece is shot of the Metro’s Art Deco facade, in a photo borrowed from the Alamo Drafthouse Cinema Facebook page, which you may ‘like.’

Alamo Drafthouse Cinema is also opening a location in Yonkers, just north of New York City, so they’re clearly aiming for a major presence here in the metropolitan area. On the web page for the Yonkers location, they are already soliciting local applicants for positions with the company.

Brave Woman Fends off Grizzly Bear

July 15, 2012/1 Comment/in Personal History, Family, Friends, Education, Travels /by Philip Turner

Over at the Great Gray Bridge tumblr, I’ve posted an article and a photo of an Alaskan woman who, brandishing only with a walking stick and a spray bottle of insect repellent, prevented an aggressive grizzly bear from attacking her, her nieces, and her husky dog. H/t journalist @BrendanKoerner who first tweeted about this story. From the amazing story by reporter Tim Mowry:

“If somebody had told me I would hold off one or possibly two bears with a walking stick and a can of natural insect repellent I would have told them they were crazy, but you do what you gotta do,” she said. “I wasn’t going to let that bear eat my dog and I definitely wasn’t going to let it eat my nieces.”

Mitt’s Friday the 13th TV Adventure–Weak Talk & Condescension

July 14, 2012/0 Comments/in Media, Blogging, Internet /by Philip Turner

In the round of network interviews Mitt Romney sat for yesterday, which he and his campaign doubtless hoped would quell the growing demands that he reveal more about his Bain years and his opaque finances, he uttered some really weak stuff that remind me of the moment in the primaries when he suggested people should talk only in “quiet rooms” about his business dealings. This is what he said to Wolf Blitzer yesterday.

“I know there will always be calls for more. People always want to get more,” Mr. Romney said on CNN. “And, you know, we’re putting out what is required plus more that is not required. And those are the two years that people are going to have. And that’s–that’s all that’s necessary for people to understand something about my finances.”

“People always want to get more.” Such blazing condescension! “Understand something about my finances” Is that all the media and the people are entitled to learn, something?

Do Mitt and his advisors really believe this weak talk is going to quiet the demands for more information? They may wish it were so, but it ain’t gonna happen. Surely, over the next four months, other issues will take center stage but I predict that between now and Election Day this is going to be a continuing feature of the campaign. It will hover over Mitt’s campaign like a dark cloud continually threatening a downpour, and the people underneath it will never know when they’re going to get drenched.

Best TV Ad of the Campaign Season

July 14, 2012/1 Comment/in Personal History, Family, Friends, Education, Travels /by Philip Turner

The most damaging thing a candidate can to his political opponent is make him seem ridiculous, teasing him in such a way as to reduce his gravitas. We’ve seen that Mitt Romney always tries to maintain his gravitas, and this new ad by the Obama campaign utterly punctures that veneer of seriousness, using Mitt’s singing voice, not to mention making a fair point about Mitt’s business dealings.