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Posts Tagged ‘reseña’

because you’ve got better things to do: Quicken Medical Expense Manager

Posted in paterfamilias, reseña, tagged , on September 26, 2007| Leave a Comment »

This year I initiated an HSA with a high deductible insurance policy and an FSA. I threw myself into this particular lunacy on the grounds of liking the idea of people taking responsibilty for something that costs society (you ‘n me) as much as medical care does. I’m still glad I did, but man does it get complex! (more…)

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mediocrity has its virtues: Bicycling magazine

Posted in paterfamilias, reseña, tagged , on September 25, 2007| Leave a Comment »

Publications like Bicycling practically define narrow-casting. Aimed at a modest population that throbs with interest in their shared pursuit, a magazine like this one has to meet elevated expectations and yet recruit enough advertisers to pay the bottom line and maintain an accessible price.

The result is almost doomed to be something of a hybrid. (more…)

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what they died of: The Lady Killers (The Sunday Times Music Collection DVD)

Posted in reseña, tagged , , on September 25, 2007| Leave a Comment »

Back in the 90s, London’s Sunday Times flogged a music collection on a week-by-week-delivery basis at a ridiculous loss leader price. The results were magnificent overall.

One of the disks in the collection’s ‘Contemporary’ genre was titled The Lady Killers. It is an uproariously eclectic collection of tunes, held together that they’re all sung by blokes. Fronted by a photo of the bare-chested and youthful Rod Stewart, rarely was there ever a strong argument for obligatory waistcoats. The Victorian Age seldom seemed so allluring. (more…)

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startin’ to learn: Bob Seger and the Silver Bullet Band, Greatest Hits 2

Posted in reseña, tagged , , , on September 25, 2007| 2 Comments »

Ah, Bob, Bob, Bob, you do it so well.

Rock-and-roll troubadour of the male soul, there is nobody quite like Bob Seger for a night at home after some manly task has been accomplished. (more…)

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pure grace: Point of Grace (1993)

Posted in reseña, tagged , , , on September 24, 2007| Leave a Comment »

This oddly named female band opened their Big Career with this eponymous 1993 release. It was of course not all that they would become, but it was an audacious start. (more…)

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entre sombra y luz: Luz Casal, Como la flor prometida

Posted in reseña, tagged , , on September 22, 2007| Leave a Comment »

It would be possible for music lovers who do not know this Spanish diva-of-sorts to mistake Como la flor prometida as just another B-class Iberian cd whose best moments ought probably not fly too far from the Iberian peninsula. That would be dead wrong.

Luz Casal virtually stuns with an eclectic zig-zag from track that could almost be considered bizarre but which succeeds at every moment in revealing yet another facet of the lady’s artistry. Luz is a force to reckoned with. (more…)

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mais que palavras bonitas: Ricardo Arjona, 12 Grandes Éxitos

Posted in reseña, tagged , , , on September 22, 2007| Leave a Comment »

This superb collection of the Guatemalan singer’s hits does justice to a musician whose fiercely loyal fan base considers that he sings more than just pretty words. Arjona’s presentation is often spare, which makes it all the more powerful when his orchestration pulls in the big guns (‘Si el norte fuera el sur’). (more…)

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You … and reality: Tracy Chapman, Telling Stories

Posted in reseña, tagged , , on September 21, 2007| Leave a Comment »

For Tracy Chapman, ‘you … and reality’ are not synonymous. Rather, the aggrieved architecture of her lyrics claims that ‘there is fiction in the space between you .. and reality.’ (more…)

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This is how Uncle Herbie used to play Beethoven: Karajan, Berliner Philharmoniker, Symphonies 2 & 7 (Deutsche Grammophon, Galleria)

Posted in reseña, tagged , , , , , on September 21, 2007| Leave a Comment »

One feels sometimes as though the presence of the great ones still lingers about the house, bumping into things and taking their place at the family dinner. Having grown up with the music and images of Herbert van Karajan in the mix, it is not too difficult to allow the imagination to see the diminutive Austrian assuming an avuncular place in the proceedings. (more…)

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a gripping look at racism’s multiple victims: Athol Fugard, ‘Master Harold’ … and the boys.

Posted in reseña, tagged , , on September 21, 2007| Leave a Comment »

Hally does not know who he is. The single white character on stage in South African-born playright Athol Fugard’s one-scene work is the friend of his mother’s two black employees when they tend to St George’s Park Tearoom in her absence. But he is also their ‘Master Harold’-reluctantly but inevitably-when the stress of his crippled, alcoholic father’s homecoming impels him into an emotional space that one simply does not share with black folks. Perhaps is it the burden of dealing with human beings on the multiple levels that racism forces upon those who resent but ultimately accede to their required roles that embitters Hally beyond redemption. (more…)

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