In the first line of "Whip My Hair," Willow Smith quotes Soulja Boy: "Hopped up out the bed/turn my swag on," she sings, not only introducing her club banger about head−banging, but cementing Soulja Boy's place as Important Rapper Who Matters.
Up until this point in history, what it means to be an art museum has essentially been straightforward and unchanging: Ornate buildings, sweeping galleries and large crowds tend to be consistently present across the board. Lovers of art museums expect these features and may be wary of museums that present themselves in a different light.
A Ouija board, stacks of books, pinecones, mushrooms, glass boxes and a refrigerator — an endless stream of objects inhabits the walls and floors of the Tisch Gallery in the current exhibit, "Renovating Walden."
Sometimes the most mundane things make for the most compelling stories.
Passion Pit burst onto the electro-pop scene in 2008 with the release of their EP, "Chunk of Change." Originally passed from friend to friend, this dreamy and danceable record included their soon-to-be incredibly popular single, "Sleepyhead," penned by Michael Angelakos (vocals/keyboard) and performed by the band's current lineup of Ian Hultquist (guitar/keyboard), Ayad Al Adhamy (keyboard/samples), Jeff Apruzzese (bass) and Nate Donmoyer (drums). Cementing its thick, synthesized vibe in its full-length release, "Manners" (2009), gave the band a chance to tour internationally.
We're now a little over a month into the fall TV season, which means the networks have had just enough time to evaluate how their new series are performing and can start making some decisions about whether or not to order additional episodes. Most new shows start off with a 13-episode order, with the option for a back nine if the ratings are good enough.
Now that 9-year-old Willow Smith's catchy debut single, "Whip My Hair," is garnering explosive popularity, where does that leave Justin Bieber? We Google- and Twitter-stalked this just-displaced baby of the music industry to see how he's handling the disappointment. He seems to be doing fine. In fact, Bieber has been very productive lately. Here are his top ten accomplishments of this past week.
In a tradition that hearkens back to the oft-romanticized gladiators of Ancient Rome, mankind has found simple, sadistic pleasure in watching men confront treacherous obstacles. Now, centuries after these armored slaves struggled for their lives against skilled swordsmen, ravenous lions and other exotic beasts to entertain a bloodthirsty crowd, the boys of "Jackass 3D" are making human pain capitalistic once more. But don't worry, folks: The fact that the "Jackass" crew members actually survive their "professional stunts and activities" gives audience members the right to raucous laughter in our warped society.
Lil Wayne's newest album, "I Am Not a Human Being," is appropriately titled.
The "Shahnama," popularly known as the national epic of Iran, celebrates its millennial anniversary this year. Written by Persian poet Abu'l Qasim Firdawsi around the turn of the last millennium, the "Shahnama" records global history, starting with the creation of the world and ending with the Muslim conquest of Persia. The lines of the poem provide a rich textile of characters and plots that has given birth to some of the most beautiful manuscript illumination from the region, with images as colorful and complex as the story itself.
When the curtain rises on Paul Bowles' "Yerma," based on the play of the same name by Federico García Lorca, it reveals the titular character, played by Chelsea Basler, asleep on a chair. A man and a young girl walk down the stairs of the theater to gaze at her motionless body.
First off, I want to apologize for what I'm about to write in regard to "Sex and the City" (1998-2004). I understand that the show generated a very large, loyal fan base, and seeing as I did not watch it in its entirety, my expertise isn't truly complete. Therefore, I can only be pseudo-confident when I claim that "Sex and the City" is to the fashion industry as "Mein Kampf" (1925) was to the Nazis: inaccurate, yet absurdly effective propaganda.
I could be mistaken, but it looks like that girl's wrist is deformed or disfigured in some way. Yes, I know it now; there is definitely something goofy happening on that wrist. There are squiggly bumps and lines snaking halfway up her arm. Call me nosy, but I have to know. What kind of horrific injury turns a girl's forearm into a lump of pink, yellow and teal?
It takes a true genius to find beauty in utter tragedy. In "The Inferno," Dante rendered a sweeping, breathing Hell that glowed with a beauty that stood at odds with the suffering it contained. In "Blood Meridian," Cormac McCarthy brings the same desolate aesthetic to the U.S.−Mexican border in the mid−19th century. The book follows a group of American scalp hunters in their efforts to exterminate as many Apache tribes as possible. Despite the grotesqueness of this premise, McCarthy delivers an intensely beautiful novel with a cultural relevance even greater on its 25th anniversary than its original publication in 1985. Any reader would be hard−pressed to find a better American novel from the 20th century. To put it simply, "Blood Meridian" exceeds almost all of its peers in lyrical virtuosity, thematic richness and expertly written dialogue.
Sam Taylor−Wood's "Nowhere Boy" is a surprisingly low−key drama about larger−than−life icon John Lennon's adolescence in Liverpool. While watching the film, it is easy to forget that this troubled kid will become one of the most influential musicians of all time; the movie feels like a simple family drama that could be about the lives of any of the hundreds of teens dealing with similar growing pains.
This is not Joshua Radin's album. At least, that's the impression you get when you hit the play button. Radin's new album, "The Rock and the Tide," is like nothing he has produced before — and not necessarily in a good way.
Whoever said that South African-horrorcore-ninja-zef rap is dead has clearly never heard of Die Antwoord. Stuck somewhere between Internet meme and pure genius, Die Antwoord — Afrikaans for "The Answer" — has exploded from being a relatively unknown South African hip-hop group to signing a major label record deal and touring the world.
Bostonians turned out in droves on Saturday despite the strong October winds for the second annual Boston Book Festival. The completely free, non-profit book festival brings together authors from all over the country to participate in different panels over the course of the day at over ten different locations around Copley Square.
Seth MacFarlane's animated series "American Dad!" has made it to six seasons and almost one hundred episodes and yet has never found a way to escape the enormous shadow of "Family Guy."
