About Charlie Bertsch
All That Is Rock Melts Into Hope
Fifteen years ago, the alternative music press was fixated on the idea of “post-rock.” Whether that label was applied to artists that featured guitar, bass and drums – like the Chicago band Tortoise, whose excellent new album Beacons of Ancestorship … Read More
The Noise of Middle Age
Advance word on Sonic Youth’s latest record The Eternal was mixed. Some listeners praised it for picking up where its predecessor Rather Ripped left off, disciplining the band’s tendency for extended improvisation in single-length, propulsive tracks that pay sufficient tribute … Read More
American Mizrahi
Considering the religious allusion in the title of Inbar Bakal’s debut album and the fact that this child of Yemenite and Iraqi parents was raised in a traditional househould that had little in common with the faux Southern Californian cultural … Read More
Enterprise Solution: Star Trek and President Barack Obama
Long before the promotional campaign for the new Star Trek film started in earnest, commentators had already discerned an uncanny similarity between the personalities of Spock and Barack Obama. Calm in the face of anger, collected when others are scattered, … Read More
A Binational Solution
When a group that hasn’t achieved big mainstream success releases a compilation record, they’re usually trying to capitalize on a sense that their time has come. That makes the decision to lead off Carne Masada: Quite Possibly the Very Best … Read More
Infinite Playlist
Discussing the 2008 film Nick and Norah’s Infinite Playlist for Nextbook, Stuart Klawans noted a discrepancy between the way the film was advertised and what it actually contains. “The promotional campaign for Nick & Norah mostly wants to sell you … Read More
Moving To the Beat
Let’s Stay Together The receptions held at scholarly conferences tend to be short and not too sweet. They serve more as a staging ground for splinter groups that will head out on the town later than as celebrations in their … Read More
Monotonix, live at Club Congress, Tucson, Arizona, 3/25/09
“L’chai-im!,” the boozy voices blare, “L’chai-im!” The surging mass is a sea of open mouths and raised arms. But the solidarity is overwhelmingly cheerful. Even those who came reluctantly or in a mood to judge have succumbed. No matter how … Read More