Ed Sanders grew up in western Missouri, in the small farm town of Blue Springs. After briefly attending the University of Missouri, he hitchhiked to the East Coast in 1958 to attend New York University. “I soon was enmeshed in the culture of the Beats,” Sanders recalled in his memoir, Fug You, “as found in Greenwich Village bookstores, in the poetry readings in coffeehouses on MacDougal Street, in New York City art and jazz, and in the milieu of pot and counterculture that was rising.” He also began volunteering at the Catholic Worker, a newspaper founded by activist Dorothy Day that was dedicated to social justice.
New York
Posted inArts & Entertainment
Richard Hell’s New York City
Richard Meyers landed on New York City’s Lower East Side in late 1966. Within a few years he had reinvented himself as Richard Hell and transitioned from poetry to punk rock. This blending of art forms was not unusual among the residents of the city’s dilapidated downtown neighborhoods, a topic that he and writer, photographer and actress Lisa Jane Persky will discuss during Making a Scene: A Conversation About Downtown New York City, a free event that I will moderate at the Englert Theatre during the Witching Hour Festival.
Posted inArts & Entertainment
Mountains
w. Cocoon Wednesday, March 30 – Wherehouse – $8 New York duo Mountains often receive comparisons to the founders and boundary pushers of ambient composition: Eno, Jeck, Niblock, Fennezs. These are not unfounded or unflattering relations, but they undercut the true pleasure of Koen Holtkamp and Brendon Anderegg long-form compositions. The two created and operate […]
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Books: Out in the Ordinary
Iowa didn’t mean anything to gay rights six years ago when novelist Nick Burd was in New York writing The Vast Fields of Ordinary. The presidential candidates vetted here didn’t tend to favor expanding gay rights. And while most of the state’s bigger towns were generally tolerant–for the Midwest, at least–same-sex unions seemed destined to […]
Posted inArts & Entertainment, Prairie Pop
Mix It Up
[audio:Double_Dee_Steinski_-_Lesson_1_The_Payoff_Mix.mp3] Double Dee & Steinski – The Lesson 1 – The Payoff.mp3 [audio:Double_Dee_Steinski_-_Lesson_2_The_James_Brown_Mix.mp3] Double Dee & Steinski – The Lesson 2 – The James Brown Mix.mp3 [audio:Double_Dee_Steinski_-_Lesson_3_History_of_Hip_Hop_Mix.mp3] Double Dee & Steinski – The Lesson 3 – History of Hip Hop.mp3 The most unlikely outsiders to make a distinct, lasting impact on hip-hop were two ad […]
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A Disco Less Traveled
Arthur Russell was straight outta Oskaloosa, an Iowa native, born and bred. He died of AIDS in 1992, leaving behind a sprawling and obscure body of music that hops through genres—sometimes imploding them, and other times inventing new styles along the way. After escaping the Hawkeye state to join a San Francisco Buddhist commune in […]
