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If Outkast hadn’t come along and blown up the entire landscape with Speakerboxx/The Love Below – the pieces from which are yet to land, by the way – then the funkalicious potpourri of positivity that is the Black Eyed Peas’ Elephunk would have easily been the hip hop-oriented album of …

Far-flung '80s icons are returning home to roost. The new Tears For Fears album is their best ever - really.

Based upon what the Love Sponge imposed upon the airwaves of Florida, I’m sure it’s good riddance; and neither do I think his case is one of free speech – the airwaves are finite and correctly regulated for content. But leave it to Clear Channel to respond with nukes to …

Mel Gibson’s highly controversial film on the last 12 hours of the life of Jesus opens today, Ash Wednesday. Reaction to the film is about as varied and passionate as such things get – we have reviews, news and thoughts collected here: Mel Gibson’s The Passion of the Christ: A …

My absolute favorite AND the most important reissue of 2003? The Harder They Come soundtrack, deluxe edition, which includes a second disc, the complete Crucial Reggae 1968-72 collection, in addition to the glorious soundtrack. Together they ably cover the most beguiling and artistically important period in reggae history, the very …

Recorded live in her native Athens, Terra Nostra, by lovely Greek diva (in the best sense) Savina Yannatou and her Primavera en Salonico ensemble, romps in a wildly entertaining manner across an international traditional music landscape over twenty songs and 74-minutes, from the lightest Enya-like levitation to ululating Mediterranean passion, …

Wow, you don’t often see reviews this passionately disparate and disparately passionate, and the line – I guess predictably – seems to be drawn between believers and nonbelievers: “One of the cruelest movies in the history of cinema,” says the New Yorker’s David Denby in a negative review that also …

Ooh, the staff isn’t going to like this: A report commissioned by Britain’s opposition Conservative Party calls for the British Broadcasting Corp. to be broken up and gradually weaned away from dependence on license fees paid by television viewers. The BBC’s charter expires at the end of 2006, and the …

The NY Times is collectively pondering mightily the meaning of the million-selling success of Norah Jones’s new album Feels Like Home. First, in an unsigned editorial published yesterday, they spend most of their words trying to get around damning sweet Norah with faint praise: Norah Jones is a lovely young …

Checking out a gritty s-f manga series. . .