Author Archives: Joe Nolan
Considering Cassavetes
This year we mark three decades since the release of John Cassavetes’ last film, Big Trouble, in 1986. Truth is, I’ve never seen Big Trouble — Cassavetes stepped-in to helm the troubled production when the original writer/director bailed on the project. For most fans of Cassavetes, his last film was the 1984 marital drama Love [...]
Adam Curtis Comes Alive
I was recently reminded of how much I love Adam Curtis’s documentaries. Note to self: Where’s this boxed set? Looking through the bookmark where I dump lots of stuff that might be posted here or chatted-up on the podcast, I came across this cool video introduction to an artist who ranks among my favorite contemporary [...]
Legend Falls
I was taken by surprise over the weekend by the news of the death of Jim Harrison. Harrison was a Michigan literary legend whose poetry and championing of the novella form won him wide, high praise. Harrison’s Legends of the Fall was his best known work, earning big screen treatment with a script by Harrison [...]
Looking for Richard
This spring we mark 50 years since we lost Richard Fariña in a tragic motorcycle accident on April 30, 1966. The author of this great article at The Guardian assumes most readers will be familiar with Fariña as a literary figure who wrote the novel Been Down So Long It Looks Like Up To Me [...]
Professor Ginsberg
I love the Open Culture site and I’m always anxious to share a good find. The other day I fell down a Beat rabbit hole at the site before stumbling upon this set of recordings of Allen Ginsberg teaching the history of Western poetry at the Jack Kerouac School for Disembodied Poetics in 1974. There [...]
Candy-Colored Cult
I love fringe cultures and strange religious beliefs, and the world of contemporary cults is like the overlap of their Venn diagram. The Cosmic People of Light Powers have a great name, an out-of-this-world UFO-centric belief system, and a wild candy-colored aesthetic that’s on full display in their promotional videos. Here’s a bit about the [...]
Beggars Birthday
Today we celebrate the birthday of Rolling Stones producer Jimmy Miller who was born on March 23, 1942. Like the Stones, Miller was a little kid growing up during and after World War II, but Miller was an American born in Brooklyn. Miller made important recordings with Blind Faith, Spooky Tooth, Traffic, Motörhead, the Plasmatics, [...]
Vintage Strange
While comic book mavens and Benedict Cumberbatch fan girls are anxiously awaiting the release of the new Dr. Strange film, here’s an all-but-forgotten take on the doctor from 1978. Here’s the skinny from ComicBook.com… In the time of Nicholas Hammond as Spider-Man and Lou Ferrigno/Bill Bixby as the Incredible Hulk, Peter Hooten’s portrayal as Dr. [...]
Truly Hallucinating
Yesterday I posted about chimpanzees in Guinea who may be displaying certain worship behaviors involving ritualistic rock throwing and building little cairns out of stone all next to one particular tree. If you haven’t seen the post check it out and watch the video. The chimps might be in the throes of some mystical ecstasy, [...]
Rise of the Ape God
So just another Sunday night sitting down to get a post together for Monday morning when I stumble upon this science story that has researchers wondering if chimpanzees are worshiping a god in Guinea… The discovery defied explanation. A researcher studying chimpanzees in the savannahs of the Republic of Guinea was baffled by a strangely [...]
