There was but one rock-star poster in a bedroom otherwise dominated by sports paraphernalia. It showcased Ian Anderson, leader of the rustically progressive band Jethro Tull, looking like Rasputin or Rumpelstiltskin or some other hairy, wild-eyed R character with flute poised for boureeing and codpiece poised for whatever it is that a codpiece is supposed […]
Rick Cornell
Posted inNews
A true American giant
A former coworker used to have a massive poster of Johnny Cash in her office. It was a photo obviously taken during the same session that yielded the cover shot for 1994’s magnificent, Rick Rubin-produced American Recordings, Cash’s musically spare but potent comeback album. The poster was practically life-size, but for a larger-than-life figure such […]
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Being Don Dixon
The station was WQsomething-something in Albany, N.Y. It was a good one too, introducing me to everybody from the Bangles and Tommy Keene to the Rainmakers and Guadalcanal Diary during my eight years in Albany in the ’80s. It was on that station I heard a song about a praying mantis, and I still recall […]
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An effervescent festival
Mike Nicholson has to laugh when he thinks about the initial musical gathering he organized back in 2000, a celebration of power pop and melodic rock. “Stupid me, who does not listen to radio at all, named the first fest virtually the same thing as a local radio enormo-conglomo names their huge festival,” he recalls. […]
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Man, boy and dog on the trail
It was an awfully nice way to start a Saturday. A little after 7 a.m., my dog Cal (while he is indeed a gamer, he’s not named after Ripken) and I parked in front of the Durham Bull’s Athletic Park and hit the American Tobacco Trail at mile marker 0. The trail is a “rails-to-trails” […]
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Crossing the Chatham County Line
It’s been awhile. The last time that I experienced live music in Chatham County was at a party held at a friend’s house every summer in the semi-wilds near Pittsboro. On that night, I saw the Backsliders (an outfit that, along with Whiskeytown and 6 String Drag, was at the forefront of the Triangle’s alt-country […]
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In radio
Almost 40 years before the White Stripes, the Hives, the Forty Fives, and all those other “the” outfits, there were a whole bunch of bands garage-birthing music that was primal and raw, psychedelic and frequently psycho (cue the Sonics). Mind you, these ’60s groups weren’t doing this as a form of homage–you can’t exactly pay […]
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How you mend a broken heart
Martin Stephenson was 15 the first time his heart was broken. It, however, wasn’t at the hands of a teenage flame. Instead, the damage occurred when he was thrown out of a band for being, in his words, “too young and giddy”–at least in the eyes of the long-in-the-tooth 19-year-old who led the outfit. With […]
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In whites-of-their-eyes intimacy
When it comes to house concerts, you’re in excellent hands with Greg Trooper. He’s already done three living-room shows in the Triangle, and the one he did in the summer of 2000 was even recorded and released as the album Between a House and a Hard Place: Live at Pine Hill Farm. When I was […]
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In getting your money’s worth
“Odd name, good causes”–that’s how the T-shirts for Tilty Farm Hoedown 2003 could read. This gathering, taking place this Saturday, July 12 from 1 to 11 p.m. out Saxapahaw way, promises 10 hours of top-shelf music created by an impressive list of acts, with the proceeds benefiting the Piedmont Wildlife Center (www.piedmontwildlifecenter.org/) and the Gaden […]
