I put together a playlist of the best music of July (trying to stick to one song per artist/album was impossible, as you’ll see) and ended up with a sweet 101 songs. Feel free to skip around, skip songs entirely, or listen to just a few— there’s no rhyme or reason to the list. I simply listened to all the major releases I heard about and hit Like on the song I thought stood out after listening. Let me know what inspired you to listen further. [Spotify]
“In that way, Morrison is a lot like Lana Del Rey, another polarizing poet obsessed with death and glamour and messianic posturing and all-American decadence who sings her words in an artless but highly affecting croon. ‘No one’s gonna take my soul away / I’m living like Jim Morrison,’ Del Rey sings in 2012’s ‘Gods And Monsters,’ a title that perfectly captures Morrison’s duality. (I also suspect that all of those really long songs about the apocalypse on Norman Fucking Rockwell were inspired by Del Rey going through a ‘The End’ phase.) What separates LDR from Jim Morrison is that she had the benefit of learning from Morrison’s mistakes. She knows now that metaphors should be kept in their proper place. Jim Morrison was her rough draft. He was the rough draft for a lot of people.” [Uproxx]
Film
Shoutout to California Split (the best, and most affecting of 70s buddy comedies, touching on addiction, toxic masculinity, the male gaze, and the fact that no one knows the names of the Seven Dwarfs) and The Long Goodbye, the best private detective movie, both Altman-directed, both Elliot Gould-starring. Not really what this quickie article is about, but it is about Gould. [Esquire]
History
Anyone who cares about history, civil rights, the law, or just great anecdotes and storytelling must read this Stephen L. Carter profile of his mentor Justice Thurgood Marshall. [NYT Magazine]
Politics/Current Events
If someone in your immediate family has fallen this hard for the QAnon fraud, it’s time for family therapy. [Vice]
I’m sure I’m not the only one who noticed parallels between the AIDS outbreak and youknowwwhat. [NYT]
Bullied into silence by the right-wing noise machine and TV news enablers, Bill O’Reilly’s accuser finally spoke out recently... and most missed it. [Yahoo News]
Comedy
Phyllis Diller, like many standups in the golden age of comedy, typed up her joke ideas on index cards, which can now be seen in this free public archive. Don’t miss the one labeled Jun 75. [SI.edu]
See you in September, as they say. Let me know your fave jams from the Spotify list or which ones sent you down the rabbit hole of listening to the full albums.