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What's Gotten Into Alex Ross?
Filed under: Looked Into Tagged: Alex Ross, Justin Davidson, movies, music
I don’t mean to embarrass him, but he’s on fire lately, and read that aloud the way Peter Gallagher says it to Laura San Giacomo in sex, lies, and videotape. I just finished Ross’s piece “Appalachian Autumn,” which is wrongly not online, and that’s two in a row he’s knocked out of the park—and I don’t use baseball metaphors. This is not classical music reviewing. This is serious essay-writing almost not of this century, with enough pop-culture references woven in, like a subtle gold thread rather than crude paisleys of hey-kids-the-YouTubes, to satisfy the most egalitarian omnivore. If Justin Davidson can start doing more music-themed reporting for the magazine to complement Ross’s reviews and meditations, I’ll be playing very happy tunes on my new ukulele.
Also, since this is a special Alex Ross post, which I do less often than I should, I should mention that Farrar, Straus was handing out an advance pamphlet sort of thing at the BEA for the forthcoming The Rest Is Noise (smart thinking, to call your blog something that actually works as a book title!), and the book looks incredibly elegant. It goes without saying that the writing within will match the cover, but I’m in the business of looking at stuff like book covers, and yow, exciting, wow.
Unrelated: This seems like as good a place as any to say that I saw and dug Superbad (as did David Denby); when I saw it, the whole theater full of remarkably varied people of both sexes laughed delightedly almost as one. As regular readers remember, there was a wee debate here not long ago about all things Apatow, romantic comedies, and gender generally. And I’m here to say: Give me the Seth Rogen of Superbad over the Rogen of Knocked Up; give me the Jack Black of School of Rock over the Black of (shudder) Holiday. Let these guys be who they are in all their raunchy innocence, and don’t insult filmgoers’ knowledge of the world by tying bonnets on adolescent boys like piglet Wilbur in the baby buggy.
About us
Hello! We're a small band of media enthusiasts, culture addicts, and journalists based in New York, Chicago, and Los Angeles. Emdashes, formerly a New Yorker fan site, is our collection of conversations—mostly civilized—about magazines, movies, politics, design, punctuation, and other things that stir us.
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Tell me more
Dashes, some say, “are particularly useful in a sentence that is long and complex.” Emdashes—like an em dash itself—provides a thoughtful pause amid the hubbub.
Emdashes, founded in 2004, is written and drawn by Emily Gordon, Martin Schneider, Pollux, Jonathan Taylor, and Benjamin Chambers, as well as occasional guest contributors. All posts before October 2008 are by Emily Gordon.
The site was designed by House of Pretty with illustrations by Jesse R. Ewing.
Additional drawings are by Carolita Johnson and Pollux (author of our web comic, "The Wavy Rule"). The Emdashes pencil logo is by Jennifer Hadley, based on a 1943 Dorothy Gray ad.
Other writing by Emily Gordon
- Writing on theater: reviews (for Time Out Chicago; imperfect but workable search results)
- Profile: Valerie Casey, Designers Accord founder, is spearheading the design of sustainability (for SXSW World)
- Feature: Rea Irvin: visionary art director, bon vivant, New Yorker founding father (for Print)
- Slide show: the Coney Island Mermaid Parade (for NYCgo.com)
- Feature: Muslim immigration iconography in the Netherlands, and an interview with Ayaan Hirsi Ali (for Print)
- Review: King's Gambit: A Son, a Father, and the World's Most Dangerous Game by Paul Hoffman (for Newsday)
- Homage: Celebrating lindy-hop legend Frankie Manning (for NYCgo.com)
- Inquiry: Does a New Republic redesign mean a change of tune? (for Print)
- Interview: James Surowiecki on what's next for the wisdom of crowds (for Assignment Zero)
- Interviews: four up-and-coming designers under 30 (for Print)
- Profile: novelist and dance critic Laura Jacobs (for Newsday)
Blogroll highlights
- Box Office Boffo
- World of Pollux
- Jonathan Taylor
- Carolita Johnson
- Songs for blogroll lovers (more links)
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Comments
Hm. Appalachian Spring. I didn’t get all the way through this and I thought there was something a little “slight” about the history. But then, I was reading it while waiting to see if my laptop was dead dead, or just partially dead. It wasn’t him, it was me. My attention was elsewhere. Because you know I’m in the Alex Ross claque, for sure.