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(05/08/09 8:50pm)
It's questionable as to whether Time Magazine has any influence of its own nowadays, but that hasn't stopped them from continuing to publish their annual list of the world's 100 most influential people. The feature is one of those cute, marketable gimmicks that ensure a (certainly much-needed) boost in sales, but it does provide for some interesting fodder as to what qualities enable the quantification of an individual's influence. Apparently, whatever this logarithm involves, it doesn't look kindly on fiction writers.
(04/21/09 4:00am)
Kanye West's G.O.O.D. Music label (the acronym stands for Getting Out Our Dreams) is gathering a pretty impressive stable of artists. A glance at the roster shows long-established names like Common and John Legend alongside up-and-comers like Kid Cudi and Fonzworth Bentley. And right at the top (alphabetically) of these names is Big Sean, known for having featured on two songs from Mike Posner and the Brain Trust's mixtape A Matter of Time. Well, at least at Duke he is.
(04/15/09 3:59am)
Of Montreal hit Cat's Cradle Monday night with one of their trademark shows: Kevin Barnes in a dress, people in black bodysuits and red masks playfighting mid-song, pig and tiger masks and absolutely limitless energy.
(04/06/09 12:18am)
Photos by Kevin Lincoln
(02/21/09 1:22am)
Junot Diaz made a successful appearance at Duke's White Lecture Hall on Wednesday evening (if you missed it, check out this feature). Besides his reading from excellent debut novel (and Pulitzer Prize winner) The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao and sophisticated, humorous story "The Sun, The Moon, The Stars", the entertainment value came largely from his urban intellectual humor and obvious lack of reservations. The man was clearly comfortable behind the podium, and here are some of the highlights from his banter that didn't make it into the story (often because they would've been unprintable in The Chronicle):
(02/05/09 5:00pm)
Here is the third entry in our ongoing analysis of the most coveted categories in the Academy Awards. For more posts, check here. Today, the category is Best Original Screenplay.
(12/18/08 1:15am)
Believe it or not, music isn't the only thing that compels people to to publish year-end lists. Here are some of the more notorious year-end lists (regular Playground readers already know to expect Bolaño on these):
(12/07/08 3:45am)
(11/25/08 11:56am)
10. Estelle featuring Kanye West. "American Boy." Leave it to a girl from overseas to sing the best song about Americans this year. And leave it to Kanye to only make it better.
(11/13/08 11:17pm)
Pictured: Roberto Bolaño (left), 2666 (right) Courtesy: villagevoice.com
(10/24/08 12:27am)
Pictured: Horace Engdahl. Courtesy Aftonbladet.
(04/22/11 9:00am)
The accomplishment of my academic career that I’m probably most proud of is really just a bit of stunt work, or maybe not: I wrote a 5,000-word sentence that, comprising the second chapter of my tripartite senior thesis, took me hours and hours to create, hours I received credit for and spent bent over like a scrivener a coffee table purchased from TROSA in downtown Durham for a comically low price, maybe twenty dollars, I know it was at a discount—my roommate and I grabbed it along with a plaid couch, ironic in its college ugliness and an octagonal, yessir, octagonal nightstand, upon which sits a pile of overdue novels checked out from Perkins Library where, in case you didn’t know, a fantastic selection of fiction has been collected, books of comic obscurity that they’ll get to you in a couple days at most; I swear, if you haven’t checked out a novel or book of poems from the library before, you should go ahead and do so just for the sheer esoteric challenge of it, try and decide on the most rock-covered forgotten book of some literary value you can and I bet you they’ve got it barcoded and stacked away in the Library Service Center—and bent over this table I’ve downed with the faith of a monk Mr. Coffee-brewed coffee out of a white ceramic mug as I hammered together clumsily and slowly a short novel, my thesis for distinction in creative writing; this 5,000-word sentence might have been mere stunting and goofing around because surely I didn’t need to write something so long, I could have broken it up with periods and made it far more readable, but then, this is the point, the point of the sentence and the point of me being here at Duke and the point of what I’m going into the world stumbling and unmoored to try and do—if I had just written that second part like I did the first and the third then that sentence would be only a brick wall in my brain except, instead of a wall, it would be a pile of bricks, it would be unbuilt, untried, it would be a stutter-step toward my own end zone, a move that I’ve pulled more than once after getting too enchanted with my own tiny quickness like I’m some sort of fleeing cat, catching the football and dodging laterally then trying to curl around, running straight into one of my bigger fraternity brothers because they’re all bigger than me, except for maybe one, and he’s not stupid enough to play tackle football, which by the way is one of the most enjoyable things in the world along with playing pickup basketball even though just a couple weeks ago I launched a shot over the backboard, I’m just inconsistent is all; but writing that 5,000 word sentence became the most challenging and enjoyable and satisfying thing I’ve ever done, even if it doesn’t stand on its own but is instead an integral part of the crowning achievement of what I largely studied here to do, which is try and write a book, try and write in general whether I’m writing shorter sentences or longer ones like this that The Chronicle would never, ever otherwise let me publish, and I know I mentioned the point already but I think I got a little off track, the point of this is this: Figure out what your long sentence is, everyone has their project that they don’t necessarily have to complete before they graduate but, let’s face it, if they don’t at least give it their best try then they are deserting an unfinished act, not only whatever the unfinished act might be but also their time at Duke, the opportunities here, the chances they—you—have that might not ever be as easily achievable again; so part one, figure out the manic or stupid or idiosyncratic thing you want to do, part two, work hard and develop the skills and knowledge you need to pull it off well and part three, get it done and then graduate like you know it’s time to go.
(04/20/11 8:00am)
Your bus pulls in late, and you and your eighth-grade classmates are split hastily into three groups, everyone trying to make up for lost time. Meanwhile, you’re taking in the enormous church that stands above you, the wide grassy spaces, the buildings of mismatched stone. You’ve come all the way from Charlotte to see Duke University.
(04/14/11 9:00am)
Final Editor’s Note of the year. Although without any cash prize, trophy or recognition so to speak of, Lincoln winners can take comfort in knowing that I probably talk about them far too much.
(04/14/11 8:00am)
There are tremendous titular possibilities for a sci-fi film on the kudzu vine.
(03/31/11 8:00am)
Mad Men has been delayed.
(03/31/11 8:00am)
Almost exactly two years after debut Looking for Bruce, the second LP from Durham’s own Hammer No More the Fingers, Black Shark, comes out April 5 on Churchkey Records, with a release show tomorrow at Motorco Music Hall starting at 9 p.m. Recess’ Kevin Lincoln spoke with bassist/vocalist Duncan Webster and guitarist Joe Hall about the new record, having fans in England and their pride in being part of the Triangle music scene.
(03/24/11 8:00am)
“I can’t be bothered with paying homage to forefathers.” That’s how Pusha T starts Fear of God.
(03/17/11 10:01am)
Everyone loves lists. Fact. Why do you think XXL, a magazine that fights for eyeballs with hip-hop blogs like NahRight and 2DopeBoyz and HipHopDX and WorldStarHipHop for most of every year, is on to their fourth annual Freshmen grouping of the annum’s best new rappers? Because people love lists.
(03/17/11 8:00am)
There are two years that are important in the saga of composer Steve Reich’s WTC 9/11, which will be premiered this Saturday by Kronos Quartet during a concert hosted by Duke Performances.
