A view of Port Ferdinand’s marina (photo by Shaula Clark)
This one represents a special milestone for me: The first time I’ve ever traveled outside of New England for a story. As part of Boston magazine’s 2017 travel issue, I flew to Barbados and spent a few whirlwind touring the tiny island—while getting to experience a few other notable personal firsts, including watching a polo match and eating flying fish.
This piece was originally published in Boston Magazine’s January 2017 issue.
Tom & Jerry at No. 9 Park (courtesy photo)
Boston winters may be merciless, but at least they come with an excuse to drink copious amounts of spiked hot chocolate. Here’s a toast to the local bars that keep us toasty.
This piece was originally published via Boston Magazine on December 24, 2015.
Bread at Loyal Nine (photo courtesy of Loyal Nine)
Fun fact: December 8 has been declared “Pretend to Be a Time Traveler Day.” Since Boston is awash in living history, I decided that this obscure holiday would be a great opportunity for a roundup of Boston eateries that commune with the past—including an opportunity to feast on “Roasted Sweet Meat of Swine†at the Boston Tea Party Museum.
This piece was originally published via Boston Magazine’s blog on December 8, 2015.
Once upon a time, I helped introduce an audience of fitness fans to the concept of cricket flour. (Or at least I’d like to think so.) As an editorial manager at AMP Agency, I contributed to a blogging initiative to mark the launch of RAP Protein Gummies—fitness snacks made with whey isolate—by writing many wonky articles about protein. Eventually, this strange little writeup (along with the others I did for RAP) disappeared into the ether following a website redesign. But it remains one of my favorites of the bunch.
This piece was originally published on rapproteingummies.com, via AMP Agency, in September 2014.
Behold, the Rapture Issue: yet another example of an office joke spiraling so far out of control that it becomes a full-on print issue. (As I recall, editor Carly Carioli was hesitant to green-light this … until he realized that this was his chance to do the Weekly World News cover he’s always wanted. That sold him instantly.) In addition to the brainstorming and general content wrangling, my major contribution to this package was the headline “God Hates FAQs.” (Also, I co-wrote “Rapture Pets,” which is basically Muppet Babies meets Left Behind, with a cameo appearance by Christopher Hitchens. It all kinda makes sense, promise.)
Despite this blasphemy, the entire editorial staff got raptured somehow — which someone (one of damned and earthbound, apparently) documented for posterity.
In the runup to the 2010 elections, while the country was gripped by Tea Party madness, what started as a joke between me and my colleagues turned into the Phoenix‘s “hot, throbbing election special”: an issue featuring bespoke political slash fiction. Our pairings? Palin/O’Donnell, Kerry/Brown, and Stewart/Cooper/Maddow (oh, yes).
You can read them all here — if you dare.
Writing these was like going into a fugue state. Basically, I remember typing the words “petal-pink Versace power suit,” blacking out, and then waking up with 600 words about Sarah Palin seducing Christine O’Donnell into her first lesbian witch experience. (Which involved rune-inscribed dildos, moose entrails, and a bikini made of skinned wolf heads.)
Just another day at the office, doncha know.
From the occult-infested mind of Dead Snow director Tommy Wirkola comes another craptastic orgy of gore — one that’s way better than it has any right to be. Continue reading
On the cover of the newest issue of Lemon magazine, Michael Jackson’s cold, unseeing eyes stare out from his decapitated head. His cheeks and brows are peeled back, a bloodless autopsy scene that reveals the sleeping circuitry coiled underneath his metal face. Once, that head starred in the finale of the 1988 anthology film Moonwalker, where the flesh-and-blood Michael Jackson defeated his tormentors (and saved some adorable street urchins) by transforming into a flying robot; more recently, the mechanical prop was put on the auction block. Now, it again has a starring role — but not one its creator ever intended.
The strange brainchild of advertising veterans Colin Metcalf and the Boston-based Kevin Grady, Lemon is a mag on a mission to unite vintage pop phenomena with “21st-century hyper-culture.” With previous installments tackling such themes as ’60s espionage pulp, A Clockwork Orange, and Ziggy Stardust, every issue is a Fabergé egg of freakishly exquisite design. This time, they’ve resurrected the dead.
Issue #5, “King of Pop,” pays homage to the memory of Michael Jackson with mind-boggling flair. With the mag coming out in a year that marks the 30th anniversary of Thriller (originally dropped on November 30, 1982), they tracked down Ola Ray, who played MJ’s love interest in the “Thriller” video, to re-create the pop milestone with a Brooklyn fashion shoot starring “a cast of zombies in bespoke wardrobes.” Plus, there are cameos by La Roux, Chromeo, and several Jackson impersonators (showing the faux Gloved Ones doing mundane chores in full regalia). Oh, and in case you thought we were being hyperbolic about that resurrection bit, avail yourself of Lemon‘s Q&A with psychic medium Elizabeth Baron, who answered questions on MJ’s behalf.
Three years in the making, #5 is perhaps Lemon‘s most ambitious work to date. So what’s next? “It’s always very difficult to imagine doing the next issue when the pain of the most recent issue is so fresh in our minds,” says Grady. “The personality-based themes in our past issues — Stanley Kubrick, David Bowie, and Michael Jackson — have worked well, but I’m wondering if it’s time to change things up again. It’s also a little difficult to think of someone with the same pop-cultural gravitas of those three names. Lady Gaga doesn’t cut it.”
From “This Is It”: Tim Young poses for photographer Kara Kochalko (costume design: Veronica Padilla).
From “Men in the Mirror”: Photo by Peter Funch.
Ola Ray poses for a “Thriller”-inspired shoot, photographed by Baldomero Fernandez.
Pick up a copy of Lemon at a well-stocked magazine rack near you, or visitworldoflemon.com.
We totally get why the Globe chose to frontload yesterday’s profile of Brown University assistant research professor Seth Horowitz with his accomplishments in the field of neuro-fuckery — after all, we’re mighty intrigued by the notion that you can use sounds to “hijack the auditory system” to improve concentration, cure insomnia, and make your boss vomit. (And yet not a single “Brown note” joke, Globe? For shame.)
But that’s not nearly the best part of this article. As far as we’re concerned, the lede has been buried, and here it is:
Horowitz works at Brown University’s bat lab, strapping lasers to small brown bats to learn how their hearing helps them orient themselves in the air. (He subtitled a recent grant proposal “Bats with Frickin’ Laser Beams On Their Foreheads.’’)
Science doesn’t get much better than this, folks.
Seth Horowitz, in a blurry iPhone snapshot of the photo that ran with the Globe’s story. Yes, that is a bat in his pocket.
But back to the noise thing: the upshot of this story is that Horowitz and composer Lance Massey have teamed up to sell their brain-hacking bio-music to the public, under the aegis of RealSleep and NeuroPop, whose logo we find more than a little disturbing. Actually, their whole mission — to manipulate your helpless thinkmeats via sound waves — is kinda terrifying. We’ve seen this idea play out before — most recently in Joss Whedon’s cult flop Dollhouse, where it brought about the end of the world. So, how far is Dr. Laser Bat from robo-calling his way to our own thought-pocalypse? Better stock up on tinfoil hats now.
This blog post originally appeared in the Boston Phoenix’s Laser Orgy blog on February 23, 2010.
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UM7BDNbHatc
On the Twelfth Day of DregNog, Laser Orgy gave to thee: the mother lode of silly Batman Christmas clips. Continue reading
