Michael Gold
Michael Gold
Recent Stories
Timbaland tops pops, drops raps
If last year’s charts are any indication, Timbaland did for pop music what Justin did for sexy. Though his behind-the-scenes swagger got a little old after the umpteenth time we saw him roly-poly his way through some resurgent pop star’s otherwise ripped-abs video, we generally forgave and forgot — huge hits, huge hitmaker, right? On “Shock Value,” his second album of solo material and his highest-profile release to date, Timbo squeezes out an hour’s worth of beat juice for his guest
Boob tube catch-up fest
Scripted is the new real. While “American Idol” still walks that impressive populist-pipe-dream-meets-perennial-whoopee-cushion tightrope, reality TV officially went out with Reege’s failing heart. I like to envision today’s slate of TV serials as the latest in a grand tradition of crack-o-tainment stretching back to Dickens — weekly fix in exchange for time/money — only with more sex, violence and smoke monsters. And for us busybody college kids, newly-launched webisodes from ABC an
Too Close for Comfort - The Great Gay American Novel
A Yale senior pops the cork on gay love, queer clichés, and a uniquely literary coming-out experience.
New Fallout Boy gets ‘High’ but the joke-band crashes
It’s hard to tell if the whole joke-band trend is going strong or getting tired. Fall Out Boy may not be the absolute last holdout of a dippy genre, but they certainly think they are, and their fourth release, “Infinity on High,” is a heartfelt yet desperate album that precariously straddles the line between artistic peak and bombastic burn-out.
‘Late’ will satisfy your (Norah) Jones
Everyone thought Norah Jones was an absolute visionary when she burst onto the scene, mostly, of course, because she was so old-fashioned. Her museum-piece songs, buoyed by that bleary-eyed voice and a songwriting team from the New York Jew school of N’Orleans jazz, were like catnip to a generation of push-pin music fans.
Top of the pops (and indie and rap)
Despite the unstoppable YouTubing of pop culture, trends still arise from the intersection of art and commerce, and D.I.Y. chaos doesn’t reign supreme quite yet; in short, proclaiming the death of the album as musical form is so 2005.
God, the Devil and Richard Dawkins
Richard Dawkins may be a brilliant scientist and a talented writer, but will his critique of religion The God Delusion really evolve the ongoing discussion of human spirituality?
Gwen’s post-‘Baby’ pop fest
Are blond chicks the only good things topping the charts nowadays? Rock sucks, rap blows, Dave Matthews apparently ate all his talent in a wicked burst of the munchies — these are frightening times. How lucky, then, that Gwen Stefani didn’t go all Britney on us after churning out her second most significant release of the year, son Kingston, back in May.
Black Belt
Too Close for Comfort
What do martial arts and repressed suburban youth have in common with alien abduction? In this personal essay, Mike Gold explains how he utilized Tae Kwon Do to both comfort his innter aggression and fight off freaky X-Files alien scum -- in his dreams, that is.
‘London Bridge’ is falling, and Fergie can’t download enough
Hits may come and go, but the summer pop anthem is a yearly staple. This year, however, a seismic shift is underfoot, largely thanks to the influence of legal and convenient music downloading services. The summer anthem — indeed, the enduring pop hit — may soon go the way of bell-bottoms and love beads.