Daily Newsletter, January 23, 2023

Except where the sun shines

In the third volume of Michael Posner’s oral biography of Leonard Cohen, friends, lovers, spiritual kin, musicians, and business partners all tell stories of the besuited poet and singer-songwriter. This final segment begins in 1986 when the singer Jennifer Warnes, his sometime lover and collaborator, releases Famous Blue Raincoat, an album of Leonard Cohen songs that helps revive his reputation, and runs all the way through Cohen’s widely noted death in 2016. Cohen’s late-in-life resurgence as a recording and touring musician receives well-deserved attention but the most impressive episodes in this volume show us Cohen, in the 1990s, turning 60 and confronting the chaos inside himself while carrying on with his life’s work. It’s a crowdsourced redemption story with graying flecks and a dramatic soundtrack.

Scathing.

The Beach Boys mastermind Brian Wilson talked in a post on his social networks about how much The Beatles album “Rubber Soul”, released in 1965 influenced him. The musician had already listed the record as one of his favorites of all time and said it was a crucial album to influence him to write the […]

David Crosby, one of the most misunderstood famous musicians of our time, has died at age 81. Co-founder of the Byrds, co-founder of Crosby, Stills &

Another week, another batch of books for your TBR pile. Happy reading, folks. * Janice Hallett, The Twyford Code (Atria) “[I]ngenious… Filled with numerous clues, acrostics, and red herrings, this …

In a movie filled with memorable quotes, it’s Casablanca’s final line that lingers.

Still: A Michael J. Fox Movie, 2023. Directed by Davis Guggenheim. Starring Michael J. Fox. SYNOPSIS: Follows the life of beloved actor and advocate Michael J. Fox, exploring his personal and professional triumphs and travails, and what happens when an incurable optimist confronts an incurable disease. It’s incredibly rare for an actor who has stepped […]

This week's playlist includes new music by boygenius, Wednesday, Yaeji, MSPAINT (ft. Militarie Gun's Ian Shelton), Screaming Females, The National, and more.

Lynette Yiadom-Boakye's mysterious paintings of people who never existed are "outside of history and beyond geography", writes Kelly Grovier.