averyfineline

From the comments:
Those were the days. It was edgy. Now it’s just plastic.

From reader EF:

There is an old saying that says, “some do, and some teach.” You do neither. Anyone, even those with extreme mental health issues, ( I work with the mentally ill ) can set themselves up as critics. You should hear some of the stuff I hear almost daily. Your opinions are just that: […]

I’ve spent the day reading … the Sunday papers, a stray magazine or three, a new novel by Richard Ford, and then the last few hours an academic book I’ve been assigned to review for a journal. It’s week overdue and yet I’m already fleeing from it, after only a few chapters, the writing so […]

NQC is struggling. The good news is, there’s evidence (as I noted Thursday night) of an attempt to think differently. This being sg, the innovations are often too nearsighted to have much of a felt impact right away, but the innovative impulse is essential if NQC wants to save itself from obsolescence. The bad news, […]

The only showcase I attended last week was the songwriter’s thing that Phil Cross hosted, mostly because I’m always curious to hear about and see a little into the creative minds behind songs. So often the way a songwriter writes or imagines a song is simply nothing like the way it’s sung and though the […]

A friend of mine who attended the Friday afternoon Brooklyn Tab showcase was kind enough to write up some reaction to it. Obviously, she’s a real fan, so feel free to quibble. But I did hear from several people that it was pretty good stuff.

Friday’s Brooklyn Tabernacle Singers’ performance was one of the […]

An anticlimactic conclusion to three long days, with a long weak lineup at the center, tonight was both interminable and largely tiresome, to the extent that I simply could not make it all the way to Legacy 5’s final set (which would have meant wading through the Dove Brothers). So tonight’s report will be brief(er). […]

Tonight’s concerts were a strange mix of the mundane, the magnificent, and the mediocre all jumbled together. If, as I suggested last night, NQC feels different this year, it is equally true that NQC Friday and Saturday are no longer the climax days for the convention. I can remember when I first started attending 15 […]

So color me ignorant, but during the course of a conversation at lunch today, the topic of radio interviews with artists came up and I discovered that it’s a common practice for radio stations to charge an artist for an interview. $100 for 15 minutes on a prominent sg radio station. $900 to be featured […]

*You know, I regret my use of the phrase “fairly innocuous” in the post below to describe Gerald Wolfe’s remarks. The reality is, the history of race and race relations in our society makes comments like this wrong, despite intentions. Period. Situation and contexts matter to some extent, of course, and this is what I […]

Good morning from Louisville. It’s been illuminating waking up to an inbox of comments commending me for my mellower commentary about last night’s music. That was not what I expected. I spent a good hour after I went to bed wondering if I had been unnecessarily harsh. Guess it could be MNP’s absence throwing me […]

To begin with: three notes.

First, a shout out to dear MNP, who normally travels with me (or I with her) to NQC but who couldn’t make the sojourn this year. I’m lost without her (literally: I was half way to downtown this afternoon before I figured out how to get back to 264E), […]

I only touched down in Kentucky within the hour and already Avery sightings - caught on camera - are popping up online. Chuck Peters has the goods, such as they are. It’s a decent likeness, I think.
Update: Ok, for real this time: here. Let the stalking begin.

Let us now praise free wireless in airports. I’m in the Orlando terminal waiting for my connection to Louisville. Looking at comments traffic, I think it’s safe to say the NQC’s live-video feed has the makings of a success (if it, like the exhibit hall, can be debugged). Sixty bucks seems a little steep, but […]

Smartest gimmick of the week, from Danny Jones’s blog:
I’m not quite sure who is responsible for this (either the Hoppers or Canaan Records), but they are making fans and friends for life: they have a small fleet of golf carts transporting patrons to and from Freedom Hall and the exhibit hall. Sure, it’s shameless promotion […]

A friend whose taste is “pert neer” (as my grandmother used to say) impeccable just texted from NQC to say: “The Florida Boys are freakin’ incredible. Too bad.” Indeed. Like a beautiful sunset, I guess.
Gene McDonald’s back on bass for this the group’s farewell stand. I hope the FBs don’t get KingsGolded on Saturday night […]

Of all the new stuff out right now (and there’s a lot, doesn’t it seem?), I gotta say I’m most interested in the Perrys new album. If men are from Mars and women are from Venus, Daniel Mount may be from Pluto, at least judging by the astronomically outlandish way he’s prone to enthuse, gush, […]

Anticipating the bloggers roundtable later this week at NQC, I’ve been thinking a lot about the progression of averyfineline from the anonymous upstart pariah it was when I began, to … well, the not anonymous upstart pariah it is today. In some ways, I’m a little anxious about this gathering. For starters, Marty Funderburke could […]

A clean space to report back from NQC, free from other diversions that sidetracked the last open forum. Post away.

Has the SN been down all day for anyone else besides me? And if so, didn’t this happen at the beginning of NQC not too long ago? No matter if my memory’s faulty or not (and it may be) what’s up with the prolonged downtime?
Update: According to the comments and a subsequent note from Danny […]