Sometimes I have a planned track for an upcoming Monday Music and a thing comes along and knocks it to the side.  Thanks to...

Cable TV was a new thing for me somewhere around 8th or 9th grade. Growing up, we could never really afford pay television.  I don't...

I just got around to watching the new J.J. Abrams' Star Trek: Into Darkness.  I know it was the blockbuster, must-see movie of our now...

I would have gone home, but then, that's the guy I've always been. Not that I didn't want to stay, that I would have turned down a chance...

It was April 20th, 1997 when I saw my first concert. I suppose there was another event that could take that title, but being dragged with...

The Critic had its say.  He's a harsh one, that guy.  Still, I've been tumbling with him my whole life.  I know his game. The Critic made...

The following was written as part of a group gift for my friend Jason's 30th Wrigleyville Rooftop Birthday Party.  We all have our...

DISCLAIMER The following is an exercise, one shared with fellow blogger (and awesome girlfriend) KillerB (see her post on the matter...

It starts with the screen door slam. Not in a sun's going down, the kids coming inside, summer fun kind of way. No, there are no visions...

I recall sitting in my mother's bedroom at the far end of my childhood home.  Big picture windows flooded sunlight down on a cardboard...

The intimate concert hall was mostly dark.  The first performer, Erland (amazing, check them out), was lighting the room from the front...

The Avett Brothers have a way with lyrics, always managing to achieve something poetic and emotionally impacting without coming off as...

"You never know these days." An often uttered, rarely accurate line indicating that, indeed, the entire world is going to hell.  That no...

Who has the time to stay involved, what with the kids and the work and the new season of Game of Thrones (Sunday SUNDAY SUNDAY!)? It can...

November 14th, 2008 I admit, going into the show, to having little interest in The Hold Steady. In spite of years of discovering...

The entire affair was my responsibility. As of late, it had occurred, there had not been enough nights out. Enough letting loose....

It was the era of sitting on the floor of my childhood bedroom, a room covered in movie posters and concert bills, an ancient laptop...

Japandroids. Let's put aside that they've got the best band name ever (though, really, why would you?). The House The Heaven Built is an...

Author's note: this piece was originally written in July of 2009.  I'm posting this here for the first time in Anywhere The Needle Drops...

678. To make negative statements about an individual for attempting to expand their profession (for example, an actor giving a try to...