Author Archives: rustindodd

#MusicMonday: VI

Every Monday morning. Music so good… it must be shared.

This week: “Heart to Hang Onto” — Pete Townshend and Eddie Vedder, live on David Letterman

It took me a few months, but I finally saw “Pearl Jam Twenty”, the Cameron Crowe project about the band’s first 20 years. Plenty of great stuff — some of the unseen footage from the early 90s might have been the most compelling part — but there was also a great moment where Eddie Vedder is talking about the first time he met Pete Townshend.

Vedder, he recalls, was paralyzed. This is Pete Townshend. His hero. What do you say? And then, (and I’m paraphrasing here) Townshend spoke.

“I’ve waited so long to meet you,” he said.

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Unsolicited Endorsements: V

Because sometimes you just want friends to tell you about cool things… the Brew House team offers up its weekly mix of author-supported goodness.

Album: “Nothing is Wrong” — Dawes

Ever since the first time I heard the first few riffy bars of “If I Wanted Someone”, I’ve tried to place Dawes in a certain time and place. By most contemporary definitions, they are not purely indie rock — at least, if we determine that a band can be classified as indie if a music director at a college rock station would want to put their album into rotation. And they don’t quite fit in with the stringy acts that have proliferated today’s alt-country scene — the Avett Brothers, Mumford & Sons, the Devil Makes Three — or even the kings of the indie/alt-country world, Wilco. Continue reading

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December

Here comes another month. Holidays and Christmas trees and drives down Ward Parkway with the fountains iced over. Kansas City becomes a different kind of city in December. Darkness comes early. And the people in this town focus on the good parts, forgetting about the long winter ahead.

Continue reading

#MusicMonday: V

Every Monday morning. Music so good… it must be shared.

This week: “Knotty Pine” — Dirty Projectors and David Byrne, off the compilation album “Dark Was The Night

Thanks for stopping by The Brew House

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Unsolicited Endorsements: IV

Because sometimes you just want friends to tell you about cool things… the Brew House team offers up its weekly mix of author-supported goodness.

It isn’t often you come across a story in one of the three best NYC-centric publications — The New York TimesThe New YorkerNew York Magazine — that doesn’t mock life outside of the five boroughs (alas, East Coast provincialism, ignorance and brainlessness is a topic for another day), so this touching, thought-provoking and incredibly real portrait of life in tiny Nucla, Colo., was especially and pleasantly unexpected. Continue reading
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#MusicMonday: IV

Every Monday morning. Music so good… it must be shared.

This week: “Two” — The Antlers, off the album “Hospice

Honorable Mention: “Never Let Me Go,” — Florence and The Machine; “Det Haster!” — CasioKids

Thanks for stopping by the Brew House. 

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Unsolicited Endorsements: III


Because sometimes you just want friends to tell you about cool things… the Brew House team offers up its (new) weekly mix of author-supported goodness.

Album: “Hello Sadness”, by Los Campesinos!

In this post-Postal Service era of guitar-free indie pop music, Los Campesinos! dares to be different. The seven-piece band from Cardiff, Wales, is making some of the biggest, most dramatic and best indie of the past few years, and doing it without the use of pulsating synth bass lines or precious computer-generated percussion.  Continue reading

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On Baywatch, telenovelas and family

Earlier this month, June Thomas wrote an interesting piece  for Slate on the somewhat amazing success of Univision, the Spanish-language television network most people know for its flashy soap operas as well as being the source material for The Simpsons’ Bumblebee Man (I think.)

Univision, according to the piece, has become one of the most-watched networks in the U.S. (It’s been No. 1 among all viewers on Friday nights for four seasons.)

Now, to be honest, this post has really nothing to do with Univision — at least, not in a concrete or tangible way.

But… one of the reasons Thomas cited for Univision’s widespread popularity reminded me of a part of my life I hadn’t thought about in years.  Continue reading

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#MusicMonday: III

Every Monday morning. Music so good… it must be shared.

This week: “Morning Thought” — Dale Earnhardt Jr. Jr., off the album, “It’s a Corporate World

Honorable mention: “Before You Cry” — Camera Obscura

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Unsolicited Endorsements: II

Because sometimes you just want friends to tell you about cool things… the Brew House team offers up its (new) weekly mix of author-supported goodness.

Song: “My Best Friend”, by Annie

I’m clearly not breaking ground with this endorsement, maybe stirring up something from the dirt that we might have forgotten about. A couple years before Pitchfork, rightfully so, hailed Robyn as the queen of pop, a fellow European made her mark when Annie released 2004’s Anniemal, an album recorded shortly after the death of her producer and boyfriend, Tore Korknes.  Continue reading

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