Blaxploitation Movies and Music Are the Story of the 1970s
Blaxploitation signaled the moment ghetto culture and the Black vernacular hit the American mainstream, paving the way for rap, hip-hop, disco, and modern sports.
David Pike
David Pike writes regularly on medieval literature, modernism, film, neo-Victorianism, subterranea, urban fantasy, global urban culture, and Paris and London, and is the author of half a dozen books, most recently Cold War Space and Culture in the 1960s and 1980s: The Bunkered Decades (Oxford UP). He teaches in the Department of Literature at American University.
For more on his writing, please visit his author pages at american.academia.edu/ and Bright Lights Film Journal and his faculty profile page at American University at american.edu/cas/faculty/dpike.cfm
2 Tone: Race, Music, and Pop Culture in Thatcher’s UK
2 Tone found a sweet spot between punk anger and pop sensibility that mirrored the myriad poles they were trying to bridge in their band members and audiences.
Rosali’s ‘Bite Down’ Sounds Classic
Rosali’s Bite Down is a deceptively smooth ride that threatens to pull you under at any moment. Its classic sound draws from Fleetwood Mac and 1970s music.
Yard Act’s ‘Where’s My Utopia?’ Suits Our Post-Pandemic Moment
Yard Act’s Where’s My Utopia? is a mother lode of cool sounds, critiques of late capitalism, meditation on fame’s futility, and a forecast of apocalyptic change.
Disillusion and the Glimmer of Hope for American Suburbs
The familiar image of the American suburbs has not changed much since the 1950s. Benjamin Herold’s Disillusioned both updates and counters that image.
Cymande Are Possibly the Most Sampled British Musical Artists of All Time
Cymande were foundational in the creation of hip-hop, disco, house, drum and bass, and rare groove, passed through generations like so much underground music.
The Enduring Mystery of the Jaynetts’ “Sally Go ‘Round the Roses”
The Jaynett’s ’60s pop single “Sally Go ‘Round the Roses” is equal parts all surface and inscrutable depth, which is why a range of artists cover it to this day.
Brian Eno’s ‘Here Come the Warm Jets’ After 50 Years
Brian Eno’s approach captured the best of what we wanted from punk, new wave, prog, glam, and classic ’60s pop and channeled their excesses by relying on chance.
For the Love of the Crappy Cassette Tape
The peculiar technology of the lo-fi, crappy cassette tape exemplifies the inherent contradictions of popular music better than any other medium.
C. D. Rose’s ‘Walter Benjamin Stares at the Sea’ Plays Familiar Games with Time
Walter Benjamin Stares at the Sea plays with postmodernism, autofiction, philosophy, and a short story canon peopled by writers from Augustine to Raymond Carver.
Teju Cole’s ‘Tremor’ Records a Post-COVID Landscape of Art and Rage
If there is any consolation to be had in Teju Cole’s slippery and sinuous Tremor, it’s not found in art or literature but in the music that permeates its pages.
In the Wake of the Grateful Dead in 1973
Looking back after 50 years at the Grateful Dead’s pivotal year of 1973, including Wake of the Flood and three November nights at Winterland.