Neil Diamond

A Celebration of Boston, in Santa Monica

When I was 16 years old, about a week or two after the planes crashed into the twin towers in 2001, I went to a Red Sox game with my father and my little brother. My father refused to give the tickets away, even though the Sox weren't playing well and fear was high. On Yawkey Way, the famous street ... More >>

Don Kirshner

Occupy Karaoke: 25 Days of Drunken Lyrical Lunacy (No 'Bohemian Rhapsody,' Please)

Karaoke maxim: There's more to life than karaoke, you know, but not much more. --Occupy Karaoke participant Ti, with help from Morrissey "So, have you heard of these kids who are doing karaoke for 25 days in a row? Occupy Karaoke?" we ask a fellow bar patron. We're in the Atwater Village watering ... More >>

Jonathan Gold Reviews Son of a Gun

Top 10 Most Recycled Women of Rock (Only Three Call Themselves Groupies!)

Jena Ardell​ Everyone has had a crush on rockstar before, but these woman actually pursued and conquered rockstars. In order to make our Top 10 Most Recycled Women of Rock list, these ladies had to have dated (or bedded) six or more famous musicians. There's one musician who appears on four o ... More >>

Jonathan Gold Reviews Son of a Gun

First Bite: Son of a Gun, or What Would You Want To Change Anyway?

F. FriesemaJonagold apples​ Whatever the current style in Los Angeles restaurants ends up being named, all of it -- from the small-plate thing to the fixation on local, organic produce; the off-center proteins to the international palette of flavors; and the resistance to even modest customer ... More >>

Rock & Drool!

Top 10 Songs to Annoy Your Neighbor

Allied Artists Pictures​Freshman year in college, the albatrosses living next door would squawk into the wee hours of the night over their latest conquests or sorority happenings. And while, being night owls, we normally wouldn't take issue with the noise, every so often the ladies would play ... More >>

69 Things for Music Lovers to Do In L.A. on Valentine's Day

Timothy Norris​ Don't sacrifice your Monday night music excursions into our fair city of Los Angeles, just to be a slave to the grueling whip of commercialized love. You can have your cake and eat it too, especially if that cake comes with a plethora of "ingredients" that help you get your ro ... More >>

Rock and Roll Hall of Fame 2011 Inductees Leaked?

​A much less momentous version of Wikileaks has interfered with the mysterious selection process for the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Website Hits Daily Double apparently got hold of the list of Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductees for 2011 a few days early (the official announcement is tomorro ... More >>

Sammy Davis's porno, Linda Evans's androgyny & other jewels from Rona Barrett's cavalcade of celebrity non sequiturs

​Each Monday, your Crap Archivist brings you the finest in forgotten and bewildering crap culled from basements, thrift stores, estate sales and flea markets around Los Angeles. Rona Barrett's Gossip Super Special Summer Annual Author: Rona Barrett and, presumably, her staff Date: Summer, ... More >>

Guest Bloggers: The "Jews on Vinyl" Project

​Roger Bennett and Josh Kun are the masterminds behind the amazing Jews on Vinyl project, where they have digged deep to retell "the history of Jewish recorded music from the 1940s to the 1980s, weaving an account that begins with sacred songs and ends with the triumvirate of Neil Diamond, Bar ... More >>

U2 Producer Steve Lillywhite Debases Himself To Be the Next Simon Cowell

Esteemed producer Steve Lillywhite makes an 'Idol' plea and embarrasses music nerds

"Wait! Who's That Singing????": Top Ten List of Major Stars Covering Other People's Music

Bowie also waited for his man​Pitchfork reports that Peter Gabriel will be releasing an album of covers, in which he will tackle hits and more obscure cuts by David Bowie, Paul Simon, Elbow, Bon Iver, Talking Heads, The Arcade Fire, Regina Spektor, Radiohead, Lou Reed ("The Power of the Heart" ... More >>

Neil Diamond Exhibit

Over the Weekend: Perry Farrell and Macy Gray Surprise at L.A. Weekly's L.A. Weekend, Plus We Get Krafty at the Grilled Cheese Invitational

Other than the term "swine flu," we learned several very important things over the weekend: Bea Arthur (RIP) made a damn good leg of roast lamb, there is definitely a limit to how much grilled cheese one can consume, and that the Belvedere vodka served at our L.A. Weekend festival -- yeah, that stuf ... More >>

Grammy Week: Magical Music Moments All Over Town

Ticketmaster LiveNation: Take the #4 Bus from HQ to HQ

View Larger Map Well, it makes sense on a practical level. All you have to do is zip down San Vincente from Ticketmaster's WeHo HQ on Sunset, hang a right on Santa Monica and bingo, a few blocks past the Troubadour is LiveNation's Beverly Hills HQ. Or, in these lean times, executives can just catch ... More >>

At Tomorrow Night's Tribute to Neil Diamond Downtown, An Unlikely Tejano Band Gets Tapped by the Man Himself

Tomorrow night at the Los Angeles Convention Center downtown, the MusiCares Foundation will honor Neil Diamond with its Person of the Year award, and a bunch of superstar bands will take the stage to celebrate The Action Man and his music. Among them will be the Foo Fighters (of course -- is there ... More >>

Psst: Grammy Week Parties with MGMT, Black Eyed Peas, New York Dolls, Chelsea Girls, DJ AM and (maybe) Whitney Houston

The Grammy telecast might be a snooze, but during awards week its host city is anything but. Surprise stage jams and DJ sets, official and unofficial shindigs and a overall anything-can- happen/anyone-might-show vibe and excitement takes over LA's clubs and events... You don't need to be Jay-Z and B ... More >>

Rock Picks: Detour Music Festival, Dandy Warhols, David Byrne, Die Rockers Die

Also, Henry Butler, Deerhoof, Eagle Rock Music Festival, Global Drum Project

F Yeah: Frickin' Yes in the Summertime

This weekend's fest offers a glimpse into the future of rock & roll

John McCain's Favorite Songs of the Past 100 Years

Blender recently posted a list of John McCain's favorite songs. Sure, you could make fun of him for choosing kinda gay stuff like Perez Hilton did, but the more telling fact is that the most recent song on this list is more than thirty years old. Think about that. Thirty-one years have come and ... More >>

Good Times Never Seemed So Good: Snapshots From Coachella

From the express train to the Gobi Tent to the VIP and beyond

Coachella Day Three: Neil Diamond's Amazing Performance Opening for Justice

Sunday at the Empire Polo Field is softer than Saturday, more like Seurot than the previous day's Van Gogh, a little hazy and lazy and everybody's sleeping off last night's feast. Sunday = day of rest, except that at Coachella that's not true, at least in the Sahara tent, which is packed with LA's k ... More >>

The World According to Björk, Aoki, Tweedy and a Gaggle of Teenage Guitar Girls

Weekend Theater Reviews

Including Altar Boyz, Bent, Kimberly Akimbo and more

Sweet Val-en-tine (Bump, Bump Bahhh!)

What to do in Los Angeles this week

Run, DMC — Run!

The Knack get nasty; “Weird Al” conquers all

Help!

The Beat Goes On

Rick Rubin

Soy Good for You

Hipsters Must Die

10 signs of the (Yindie) apocalypse

Busking for Stardom

What matters for buzz bands these days is becoming the next blog thing

Two Great Tastes that Taste Kinda Awesome Together . . .

Go! Go! Giant Robot!

How can you have a Neil Diamond concert that’s neither cheesy nor sincere?

San Grove-ero Fest And Mo Cheese

Ironic Chef America

He Can Hear Music

Pop genius Jeff Barry on love, songwriting, Phil Spector and the art of just doing

Rebel Yelp

American Idolatry

Word Unspoken

You and me and Richard Thompson

Like a Rhinestone Preacher

Nick Cave survives and surpasses

Guerrilla Public Service: The Man Who Would Be Caltrans

Great Walls

Chinatown revisited

Be Bop a Blood Feast

Edited by Kateri Butler

The Body Never Lies

Films from Jane Campion and Michelangelo Antonioni