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In the past decade or so, it’s become fashionable to talk about creativity as the result of freedom, relaxation, and “flow”—that ineffable point where the artist connects with the sources of inspiration deep within the human soul. I, for one, believe in this idea. Art is really about connecting with the spiritual subconscious, and all…
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The grunge era of rock music began around 1991, when bands like Soundgarden, Pearl Jam, and (especially) Nirvana began to get massive play on FM radio. I remember how earth-shaking the sound seemed to me, at the time, when I first heard “Smells Like Teen Spirit.” Even playing on the tinny speakers of my old…
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There is a cool website called My Book, The Movie where authors can describe their dream movie production of their book. The gentleman who runs the site invited me to post, and here is the result… https://mybookthemovie.blogspot.com/2024/05/ash-cliftons-twice-trouble.html
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Not long ago, I read a very fine biography called Furious Love: Elizabeth Taylor, Richard Burton, and the Marriage of the Century by Nancy Schoenberger. I picked it up not only because I am a huge fan of Richard Burton but also because of my growing interest in Taylor, who was surely one of the…
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I’ve long harbored the secret hope that someone, someday would refer to me reverentially as a bad-mother-hush-your-mouth, but I don’t think it’s ever going to happen. Oh, well. This week’s Friday Night Rock-Out (okay, it’s more a Friday-Night Funk/Soul-Out) is dedicated to the late, great Isaac Hayes. Hayes was a musical genius, as well as…
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The great B-Movie director Roger Corman has died. As a kind of tribute, I’m reposting an essay I wrote some years ago on my old blog. Enjoy! Ever since I turned forty, I find myself going to see fewer and fewer movies. It’s only natural, I suppose. The less time you have left, the less…
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When U2’s Achtung Baby came out in 1991, critics joked that it was the album that saved the band from itself. After the enormous success of 1987’s The Joshua Tree, U2 too fell into an abyss of self-indulgence and ego with their follow-up album-and-movie extravaganza Rattle and Hum, which alienated some of their fans. Fortunately,…
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It’s hard to believe that 32 years have passed since Neal Stephenson’s Snow Crash was published. Not only is it one of the best books of the 1990s, it’s also one of the definitive novels of the cyberpunk genre. In retrospect, one of the most surprising things about Snow Crash is that it’s not really…
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The good people at Shepherd.com invited me to post a “5 best” list on their site. I had a lot of fun with it. Thanks to Ben Shepherd for making this happen. Here’s my list. Check it out… https://shepherd.com/best-books/literary-novels-masquerading-as-crime-novels
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Back in the 1980s, I took a Humanities class during my freshman year of college. The professor was really good, and she supplemented her lectures by showing up a few episodes of Robert Hughes‘s BBC series Shock of the New, which covered the history of Modern Art as seen through Hughes’s own discerning, sardonic lens. …
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Ash Clifton, Writer 