By: Franklin Bruno

The last man standing of Sun Records’ early roster has been known to set himself among even loftier company. “Al Jolson, Jimmie Rodgers, Hank Williams, and JERRY LEE LEWIS [born 1935]…. That’s your only four […]

By: Peggy Nelson

Blonde bombshell BRIGITTE BARDOT (born 1934) exploded onto the world stage in the 1950s. A woman with the neotenic features of a child, Bardot’s Bézier curves measured pure sex appeal, and have been templatized by […]

By: Lucy Sante

JIM THOMPSON (1906-77) was born in Anadarko, Oklahoma, in a room above the jail, the son of a crooked sheriff. A good part of his destiny was cemented then and there. Early on he became […]

By: Joe Alterio

Brilliant at breaking down everyday life into discrete moments.

By: Sarah Weinman

One of my favorite children’s books, the madcap Lafcadio: The Lion Who Shot Back (1963), by SHEL SILVERSTEIN (1930-99), is about loneliness, friendship, and the perils of too much success — all of which turn […]

By: Joshua Glenn

The popularity of apocalyptic fiction in the Sixties (1964-73), it has been suggested, indicates that SF writers had become bored and suspicious of utopian idylls promising that ameliorative reforms could right modern civilization’s manifold wrongs; […]

By: Patrick Cates

Until 1964, JOHN COLTRANE (1926-67) was a virtuoso, blasting out bebop as wing-man to the likes of Miles Davis and Thelonious Monk, and later leading his own hard bop lineups, where he is probably most […]

By: Lynn Peril

The time: 1977. The place: the hinterlands of Wisconsin. My friend Jacqué (pronounced “Jackie,” of course) and I are huddled together in her smoked-mirror-tiled bedroom listening to Queens of Noise, an album by all-girl band […]

By: Annie Nocenti

When LEONARD COHEN (born 1934) sings, it is at once a whisper, a prayer, a confession, a chant, a lullaby, a benediction in the ear. He has misplaced a secret. He yearns to tell us, […]

By: David Smay

We at HILOBROW are all alumni of JAY WARD’s (1920-89) Wossamatta U. After being well versed in the lowest form of humor, matriculates may choose from such intriguing course offerings as: Dim Canadian Gallantry, or […]

By: Katie Hennessey

Contrary to rumor, MAMA CASS ELLIOT (1941-74) did not choke to death on a sandwich. Officially, she died from “heart failure due to fatty myocardial degeneration due to obesity.” Mama Cass wasn’t merely obese, though: […]

By: David Smay

What is it about GRETA GARBO (1905-90) that set her apart from the other great Hollywood beauties — that makes us fetishize her, if a bit uneasily? She wasn’t a better actress than Sophia Loren […]

By: Joe Alterio

Full disclosure: I was a Nintendo kid. The 900-lb. (Donkey Kong) gorilla’s advertising in the late Eighties worked on my zygote brain until I just had to have the original NES. A couple of years […]

By: Erik Davis

Now that the radical punch of punk seems no more potent than a daisy in a National Guardsman’s rifle, the artsy-fartsy fundament of its posture has become as evident — and as significant — as […]

By: Franklin Bruno

Like Bea Arthur, Pearl Bailey, and Redd Foxx, the televisual omnipresence of JULIUS “NIPSEY” RUSSELL (1918?-2005) belied his status as a veteran of less sanitized showbiz pursuits. He tap-danced his way out of his native […]