Tag Archives: 1980s

Two good pieces on the recent Keith Haring bio

Posted on April 22, 2024 | Comments Off on Two good pieces on the recent Keith Haring bio

If you didn’t know much about Keith Haring other than what you read in the recent piece in the New Yorker (which I criticized, here), you might a poor impression of this great artist.

Fortunately more prominent writers than myself have written good things on Haring and the biography in the New York Times and The Guardian. I think they provide the right context for the artist and his times too. Plus they hold him in high esteem. Highly recommend you check them out if you were a fan of the painter or want to know him better.

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Remnants from the 80s stick out my feed that lead to other good things.

Posted on October 8, 2023 | Comments Off on Remnants from the 80s stick out my feed that lead to other good things.

Every so often remnants from the 80s pop up in my feed. When something does stick out like a thread and I pull on it, more good 80s things appear.

For instance, things like this story on Angelina Jolie taking over Basquiat’s former NYC studio  that  lead me to a good post on Jean Michel Basquiat’s notebooks which is JAM PACKED with good stuff on him.

Or this thing in Martha Stewart on how 80s decor home trends are back that led me to this piece on one woman’s home  full of Memphis design (so 80s!)

Same with tech. I went from this excellent interview on Robert Longo where he talks about many things such as the remaking of  Johnny Mnemonic into black and white, That led to me reading how modern software is bringing back the timex datalink, a device I loved, to this great video of this guy living with 1980s tech for a week! Awesome.

Other great threads that came out of my 80s unravelling was this piece on how Sinead O’connor changed Ireland, these fantastic photos of  Blitz Club in London by Andrew Holligan, and this interview of the singular Debbie Harry who says sex is what makes everything happen and more. This blog by Jamie Bradburn on Toronto in 1980s is a whole rabbit hole in and of itself.

The number of times the 80s appears in my feed is less and less. So whenever I find a bunch of them, I will of course be writing about them. 🙂

(Top image from the story on Memphis; bottom image from the substack on Basquiat’s notes)

 

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Forty things that have changed in IT and IBM in the last forty years (from 1983 to 2023)

Posted on October 3, 2023 | 2 comments

If you were to ask me, on this day, what has changed with regards to computers and IT and IBM in the last 40 years, I would say it’s this:

  1. Access: Very few people had access to computers 40 years ago. Those folks used mainframes, minicomputers and the occasional personal computer from Commodore or Radio Shack or this new start up called Apple. Now everyone has access to a computer they carry around in their pocket. (We call it a smart phone, but it’s really a powerful computer that makes calls.)
  2. Ubiquity: Back in the early 80s the vision of everyone having a computer / terminal on your desk was just that: a vision. The few that did have these big monster 3277 or 3298 metal terminals or if you were lucky, a 3279-color terminal. People worked on paper.
  3. email: One of the drivers of having a terminal on your desktop was to access email. Back then IBM’s email system was called PROFS (Professional Office System) and it meant you no longer had to send you three-part memos (yes people did that with carbon paper between the memo paper, so you could give the cc (carbon copy) to someone else). You sent electronic mail instead. Everyone thought it was great. Who knew?
  4. Viruses: Viruses were new. My first was called the CHRISMA exec. In those days every Christmas people would send around runnable scripts (ie. Execs) and they would be the equivalent of digital Christmas cards. Digital Christmas card came from outside IBM. It read your address book and send itself to all the people you knew. Sounds like fun. In fact it overwhelmed the IBM networks and IBMers around the world had to shut most things down to try to purge the network of this thing. It took days. Not fun.
  5. Networks: Companies sometimes had their own networks: IBM had one called VNET. VNET connected all of IBM’s computers worldwide, and it had connection points with outside networks like BITNET too, which is where the CHRISTMA exec was. There was no Internet per se.
  6. Network size: IBM’s VNET had over 1000 VM computers all connected to each other. All of them had an id called OP which was what system operators used to sometimes control the VM mainframe. Once on second shift another system operator and I wrote a program to messages all 1000+ ops in the world the equalivant of “hi hows it going”. To our surprised many of them wrote back! We manually started messaging them back and even became friends with some of them over time. It was like twitter before twitter or gchat before gcchat, etc.
  7. Documentation: Computer documentation was hard to come by, and if you had any, you might hide it in your desk so no one else could take it. The operators had a special rack of documentation next to where they worked. I was thrilled in the 90s when you could walk into a bookstore and actually buy books that explained how things worked rather than having to get permission from your manager to order a Redbook from IBM publishing in the US.
  8. Education: In the 80s you could get a job in IBM operations with a high school diploma. Universities in Canada were just ramping up degree programs in computer science. By the start of the 90s most new hires I knew had at least a university degree and more likely a comp sci or engineering degree.
  9. Software: We take Microsoft’s dominance in software for granted, but back then Lotus’s 123 was the spreadsheet program we used, and others used Wordstar or Wordperfect for word processing. Microsoft worked very hard to dominate in that space, but in 1984 when the ads for Macintosh came out, Gates was just one of three people in the ad touting that their software ran on a Mac.
  10. Minicomputers: In between the time of the mainframe and PC, there was the rise of minicomputers. DEC in particular had minicomputers like the VAX systems that gave IBM a run for the money. IBM countered with machines like the 4300 series and the AS/400. All that would be pushed to the site by….
  11. IBM’s PC: The first truly personal computer that had mass adoption was the IBM PC. A rather massive metal box with a small TV on top, it could run the killer apps like Lotus 123. Just as importantly, it could run a terminal emulator, which meant you could get rid of old terminals like the 3270 series and just give everyone a PC instead. Soon everyone I worked with had a PC on their desk.
  12. Modems: modems in the 1980s were as big as a suitcase. If a client wanted one, an IBM specialist would go their location and install one for you. In the 90s people got personal modems from companies that sent data at 9600 bps or 14000 bps or even 56 kbps! Today people have devices the size of a book sitting at home and providing them with speeds unthinkable back then.
  13. Answering machines: The other thing people used to have on their desks besides a PC was an answering machine. Before that every office had a secretary. If you weren’t at your desk the call would go to them and they would take the message. If you had been away for a time you would stop by their desk and get any slips of paper with the name and numbers of people to call back. Answering machines did away with all that.
  14. Paper planners: Once you did call someone back, you would get out your day runner / planner and try to arrange a meeting time with them. Once a year you would buy new paper for it so you could keep track of things for the new year. In its heyday your planner was a key bit of information technology: it was just in paper form.
  15. Ashtrays and offices: it may seem hard to believe but back then smoking in the office was common, and many people smoked at their desk. It was a long and hard process to eliminate this. First there was smokeless ashtrays, then smoking areas, then finally smokers had to smoke outside, then smoke in areas well away from the main door. Likewise people worked in cubicles. It was miles away from working at places like Google or WeWork, never mind working from home.
  16. The rise of Microsoft and the decline of IBM: The success of the IBM PC lead to the success of Microsoft. The adoption of MS-DOS as the operating system for the IBM PC was a stroke of luck for Microsoft and Bill Gates. It could have easily been CP/M or some other OS. With the rise of Microsoft and the personal computer, IBM started to lose its dominance. IBM’s proprietary technologies like OS/2 and TokenRing were no match for DOS / Windows or Ethernet. IBM did better than some computer companies like Wang, but it’s days of being number one were to be over.
  17. The role of the PC: for a time in the 80s you could be a company and not have computers. Paper and phones were all you needed. We used to say that companies that used computers would beat any competitors not using computers. And that became the case by the end of the decade.
  18. The rise and fall of AI: now AI is hot, but in the late 80s and early 90s it was also hot. Back then companies were building AI using languages like LISP and Prolog, or using specialized software like IBM’s Expert Systems Environment to build smart tech. It all seemed so promising until it wasn’t.
  19. LANs: all these PCs sitting on people’s desks needed a way to talk to each other. Companies like Microsoft released technology like Windows for Workgroups to interconnect PCs. Office had servers and server rooms with shared disks where people could store files.
  20. The rise of Ethernet: there were several ways to set up local networks back then. IBM had its token ring technology. So did others. It didn’t matter. Eventually Ethernet became dominant and everywhere.
  21. Email for everyone: just as everyone got PCs and network access, in the 90s eventually everyone got mail. Companies ditched physical mail and FAXes for the speed and ease of electronic mail, be it from AOL or Compuserve or someone else.
  22. Network computers: one thing that made personal computers more cost effective in the 90s for people was a specialized computer: the network computer. It was a small unit that was not unlike a terminal, and it was much cheaper for business than a PC. To compete, the prices of PCs soon dropped dramatically and the demand for the network computer died off.
  23. EDI: another thing that was big for a time in the 90s was EDI. IBM had a special network that ran special software that allowed companies to share information with each other using EDI. At one point IBM charged companies $10/hour to use it. Then the Internet rose up and ISPs charged companies $30/month and suddenly EDI could not compete with a PC using a dialup modem and FTP software provided by their ISP.
  24. Electronic banking: with personal computers and modems becoming common in homes, banks wanted to offer electronic banking to them. Some banks like the Bank of Montreal even established a specialized bank, mbanx, that was only online. Part of my job in the 90s was to help banks create the software they would give out to allow their customers to do banking via a private network. While most banks kept their branches, most day to day banking now happened online.
  25. The Internet and the web: if the PC changed everything in the 80s, the Internet changed everything in the 90s. Suddenly ISPs were springing up everywhere. Even IBM was an ISP for a time. People were scrambling to get software to allow them to connect their PC and US Robotics 14.4 kbps modems to access FTP sites and Usenet and more. No sooner did this happen than the World Wide Web and browsers bust on the scene. For many people, the Web was the Internet. So long Gopher; goodbye WAIS.
  26. Google: finding things on the Internet was no easy thing. It only got worse as web sites shot up everywhere. Google changed the Web and made it usable. They changed email too. Sites like Yahoo! Wanted to make you pay for more storage: Google gave people more storage than they could ever need.
  27. From desktops to laptops: with home networks in place, people wanted to be able to bring home their computers to work remotely. I used to have a luggable computer that weighed 40 pounds that I would bring back and forth daily. As more people did this, computer companies got smart and made the portable computers smaller and better. Apple was especially good at this, but so was IBM with their Thinkpad models. As time went by, the computer you used at work became a laptop you use to work everywhere.
  28. The Palm Pilot: the Palm Pilot succeeded where Apple and others had failed. They had come up with a device you could use to track your calendar, take notes, and more. All you had to do was put it in a cradle and press the sync button and everything would be loaded onto your PC. Bye bye paper planners. Hello Personal Digital Assistant.
  29. IBM Services: One time IBM gave away its services. By the 90s they had a full one line of business devoted to providing their people to clients to help them with their business. People like me moved from helping run IBM’s data centers to going around to our clients helping them run their data centers and more.
  30. Y2K: if Y2K was a non-event, it was only because of the countless hours put in by techies to make it one. Even me. I was shocked to discover that EDI software I wrote for a Quebec bank in 1992 was still running on PC/DOS computers in 1999. It was quickly rewritten before the deadline to keep running on January 1, 2000. Just like countless software worldwide.
  31. E-business: if PCs changed business in a big way in the 80s, e-business changed them in a big way in the 90s. Even with the dot com era crash, there was no going back. With e-banking your retail branch was open 24/7; with e-business, the same was true of your favorite local (or non-local) business.
  32. The resurrection of Apple and Steve Jobs: two things transformed IT and made it cool: one was the Web and two was the return of Jobs to Apple.  Boring beige boxes were out: cool colored Macs made for the Internet were in. People were designing beautiful web sites with red and yellow and blue iMacs.And the success of those iMac led the way to the success of the iPod, and the success of the iPod led to so much more.
  33. Blackberry and dominance of smartphones: if the Palm Pilot got mobile computing started, the Blackberry accelerated that. Email, texting, and more meant that just like online banking and e-business, you were reachable 24/7. And not just reachable the way you were with a pager/beeper. Now you could reply instantly. All the computer you needed fit in your hand.
  34. The decline of analog: with the rise of all this computing came the decline of anything analog. I used to buy a newspaper every day I would commute to work. People would bring magazines or books to read. If you wanted to watch a film or listen to a song, it depended on something physical. No longer.
  35. The rise of Unix/Linux: you use Unix/Linux every day, you just don’t know it. The web servers you use, the Android device you make calls on, the Mac you write emails on: they all depend on Unix/Linux. Once something only highly technical people would use on devices like Sun computers or IBM pSeries machines is now on every device and everywhere.
  36. Open Source: in the 90s if you wanted software to run a web server, you might pay Netscape $10,000 for the software licence you needed. Quickly most people switched to the free and open source Apache web server software to do the same job. This happened over and over in the software world. Want to make a document or a spreadsheet? You could get a free version of that somewhere. For any type of software, there is an open source version of it somewhere.
  37. Outsourcing/offshore: if people could work from anywhere now, then the work that was done locally could now be done anywhere. And it increasingly was. No one locally does the job I did when I first started in the computer industry: it’s all done offshore.
  38. The Cloud: if work could be done anywhere by anyone, then the computers needed to do it could be the same. Why run your own data center when Amazon or Microsoft or IBM or Google could do it better than most? Why buy a computer when you only need it for an hour or a day? Why indeed?
  39. The return of AI: finally, AI has returned after a long time being dormant, and this time it’s not going to be something used by a few. Now everyone can use it and be more productive, smarter. Like the PC or the Internet before it, AI could be the next big thing.
  40. Web 2.0/Social Media: One thing to insert in between the Internet and AI in terms of groundbreaking changes in IT is Social Media. Both public social media like this and private social media like Slack and Microsoft Teams. Without social media I couldn’t share this with you.

In 40 years the devices have gotten smaller, the networks have gotten bigger, and the software has gotten smarter. Plus it’s all so much cheaper. If I had to sum it up, I’d say that sums up all the changes that have happened in the last 40 years. And we are just getting started.

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Revisiting Toronto’s Festival of Festivals (what TIFF was before it became the thing it is now)

Posted on September 18, 2023 | Comments Off on Revisiting Toronto’s Festival of Festivals (what TIFF was before it became the thing it is now)

There was much discussion about the Talking Heads being at TIFF this year for the reissue of their great concert film, Stop Making Sense. What people might not know was that it was also at TIFF in 1984, back when the Toronto International Film Festival was known as the Festival of Festivals.

TIFF has changed a lot since then. Back then the Festival was smaller, centred in a different location (Yorkville) and played films in midtown theatres like the Varsity, Uptown, Backstage and the Cumberland. (Also the Bloor for the awesome Midnight Madness series.) It was casual and fun.

I think I went to my first Festival film — my Beautiful Launderette with a bright new actor named Daniel Day Lewis —  in 1985.  In a few years I was hooked, going from one film to many films like these from 1987 listed here. It was easy in the 80s: you got tickets (or a pass), lined up for your next film, and hopefully you got in! (Holding seats for a person, never mind many people, was frowned upon.) For a surprising number of films this was easy to do, and people would even show up and buy a ticket at the last minute. Some days you would be heading to a certain film and you would run into a friend going to a different film and you would go with them instead. Or you’d get up in the morning to watch a film in a small theatre at the Cumberland and four films later you end up going to bed after seeing a late night screening at one of the gigantic spaces in the Uptown.  A great time was had by all.

Perhaps too great. More and more people started going and it got harder to wander around and see great films. As it grew, the Festival of Festivals dropped that name, left Yorkville, and became the behemoth it is today.

I still think it’s a great thing, and I am glad it is big and bold. But back then it was small and intimate. I loved that, and I miss how it was.

P.S. More on Talking Heads with Spike Lee at TIFF in 2023 in Vulture and the New York Times. Spike Lee started at the Festival too. I remember him being in town to promote his first film, She’s Gotta Have It. Like Talking Heads, he was fresh and new and like them he changed our culture with his work and life.

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Before there was “Stop Making Sense”, there was Talking Heads on Letterman

Posted on September 16, 2023 | Comments Off on Before there was “Stop Making Sense”, there was Talking Heads on Letterman

Somewhere in between June 1st, 1983 when the album Speaking in Tongues was released and December, 1983 when “Stop Making Sense” was filmed, Talking Heads and their extended band went on David Letterman to perform two of their songs: “Burning Down the House” and “I Zimbra”.

If you are a fan of the film, you’ll enjoy these two performances. Already you can see echoes of what will you will see in the show. Indeed, other than Dolette McDonald being replaced by Edna Holt, everyone on stage at Letterman appears in the film.

That was televised in the beginning of July, one month after the record was released. Already the band is pretty tight. They had months of shows to do before Jonathan Demme started filming. No wonder the performances in the film were superb.

As for “I Zimbra”, if you think you hadn’t seen it in the original concert film, you’d be correct. The band did perform it, and it was intended to be in the film, but it was taken out. Good news, it is included in the recent rerelease of the film (which I wrote about, here).

Here’s “I Zimbra”

and here’s “Burning Down the House”

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Stop Making Sense! (Some thoughts on the newly released classic)

Posted on September 15, 2023 | 1 comment

“Stop Making Sense” is making a comeback this September, 40 years after it’s initial release. There’s an expanded audio album out today, and a new version of the film premiered at TIFF this Monday.

To some it may seem like a comeback, but for many like me, it never left. This film has meant so much to me in my life: it’s like a good friend I met in college who stayed close to me four decades later. I can watch it any time, anywhere, and I often have since it first came out. Unlike me, it’s timeless, even four decades later.

But don’t just take my word on it. Read this great piece by Jon Pareles in The New York Times, Talking Heads on the Return of ‘Stop Making Sense’, and you should see why I think so highly of it.

One thing he seems to bypass that makes the film great is the fact that it was directed by Jonathan Demme. Demme was coming into his own when he filmed it, not unlike Martin Scorsese was when he made “The Last Waltz” with the Band. His talent is what transforms a great show into a great film. Later Demme went on to make other concert films of Neil Young and Justin Timberlake, but neither of those had the impact that “Stop Making Sense” did. You need a groundbreaking show for that.

And it was groundbreaking. Before the cameras start, David Byrne already had a vision of what it would be like. He had been gathering ideas from other artists like Robert Wilson (whose lighting designer, Beverly Emmons, he used) and Twyla Tharp (worked with her on The Catherine Wheel), not to mention Japanese Kabuki theatre (where he got the idea for the Big Suit).  He had a vision of how everyone should look on stage (dressed in drab grays). He had a storyboard for each song performed. And while he didn’t have a choreographer, he had a ton of talented performers who brought their own moves to the performance. All that, combined with the narrative of the film, makes it compelling to watch.

Pareles believes the narrative is…”of a freaked-out loner who eventually finds joy in community. The concert starts with Byrne singing “Psycho Killer” alone, to a drum-machine track, with a sociopathic stare. By the end of the show, he’s surrounded by singing, dancing, smiling musicians and singers, carried by one groove after another.” And that is partially the narrative.  But it’s also a narrative of the band itself, a story of a small stiff group of “slightly angsty white” art school students that grew into a large ensemble capable of fluidly and energetically incorporating punk, funk, new age, world, R&B…you name it…onto one stage for 90 minutes of eclectic dance music. It’s smart, it’s gotta beat, and you can dance to it.

If you think of “Stop Making Sense” as a documentary or an art piece, you’ll be missing out on the fun. And fun it is. It’s been playing off and on at the Bloor Cinema / Hot Doc cinema on Bloor near Bathurst in Toronto since the time it came out, and everytime people go they treat it as more like a concert than a film. If you ever have the chance to see the it in that theatre, grab a ticket and an adult beverage and you’ll see what I mean.

I think the film is best described by the second song in the film, “Heaven”. Just like in song, the band in this film plays your favorite song. Everyone is there. When the film is over, everyone leaves, only to return to the next showing of it. It plays again, exactly the same. It will not be any different. Byrne wrote, “It’s hard to imagine that nothing at all, could be so exciting, could be so much fun”. And yet it is. The film is heaven to me.

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The Wham! documentary is surprising and good and watch it you should

Posted on July 29, 2023 | Comments Off on The Wham! documentary is surprising and good and watch it you should

Like Austin Kleon, I found the Wham! documentary a “delight”. He adds (and it’s true) that it is “tight, light, well-edited, and stylistically coherent”. It’s also 90 minutes, and on Netflix. If want to watch something good to watch this week, make it that.

There’s no spoilers here but I must say I found the documentary surprising in several ways. Surprised at how different the men were than I thought they were. Surprised they achieved fame well before fortune. Surprised how lots of things I thought about their career and their music were very different than I imagined.

The documentary also cleared up one of the biggest mysteries I had about the band, which was what was the point of Andrew Ridgeley in Wham. I just thought he was some weird side performer that managed to get stuck to George Michael. After watching this, I can see there would be no George Michael without Andrew Ridgeley. The evolution of Michael from shy guy to major star would not have been possible without Ridgeley and Wham.

There’s been a number of good reviews of the documentary. This take at the New York Times I found interesting, especially this comment: “born during Motown’s ascent in the early 1960s and, in adolescence, bonded to each other as disco was handing the party baton to new wave and rap. They synthesized it all (plus a little Barry Manilow and Freddie Mercury, and some Billy Joel) into a genre whose only other alchemists, really, were Hall and Oates.” Once that thought is stuck in your brain, you can clearly hear all the influences Wham! bleeding into their music.

Besides that, this piece from the San Francisco Chronicle really understands the two men. This review at rogerebert.com was the one I most agreed with. Here’s something from the Guardian for those who like that sort of thing.

I’m glad Ridgeley is having a moment. He seems like he deserves it. More from him, here.

All that said, go watch it. You’ll be glad you did.

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Everything but the Girl, in three times

Posted on May 5, 2023 | Comments Off on Everything but the Girl, in three times

After 24 years, one of my favorite bands has released a new album. It’s incredible that not only has this happened after a quarter of a century, but that it has managed to do so well. It’s incredible and fantastic.

Leading up to the release, they’ve received some great reviews and lots of good press. You can read some of that here in the New York Times, or in the Guardian (here and here), or Pitchfork.

With the release of this new album, I can think of them as being of three times. One time is Now, of course, in the 2020s. A second time is the 1990s. In that time they were at their peak. Here you can see them performing in 1999, just before what I thought was then end (as no doubt many people did):

The third time – the 1980s – is the time I remember them most fondly. That was the time they were just starting. Here’s some rare footage of them from then:

Pick up Fuse when you can. Meanwhile, if you are a Spotify user, here’s their Complete Discography, I believe. Give Fuse and more a listen, there.

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Who’s excited about the restored 4K version of Stop Making Sense?! This guy!!

Posted on March 29, 2023 | Comments Off on Who’s excited about the restored 4K version of Stop Making Sense?! This guy!!

I’ve been a fan of David Byrne and Talking Heads for many a years and have written about them often. (See those links.) And I am writing about them again, because according to Pitchfork,  the “1984 concert film, Stop Making Sense, is going to get restored in 4K and re-released theatrically by A24”. Not only that, but “a deluxe edition of the Stop Making Sense soundtrack will come out on vinyl and digitally on August 18.” This got me very excited!

When I was younger, I would love to wander up to the Bloor Cinema in Toronto and watch Stop Making Sense. As a rep movie theatre, it would often play it on the weekend. Even when the Bloor was renovated and turned into the HotDocs theatre, it still plays the film from time to time. And I still love to go see it. I’ve lost track of how many dozens of times I’ve enjoyed it. And now you and I can soon enjoy it in 4K! Woo!

P.S. For people who don’t know of the film, see this: Stop Making Sense .

Here’s the YouTube trailer for the re release…it’s great:

I love that the music for it is Naive Melody…my favorite song in the film.

Click here if the video doesn’t appear.

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On gaining an appreciation for London

Posted on March 1, 2023 | Comments Off on On gaining an appreciation for London

Over that The New York Times, Joshua Bell speaks of London:

“The first time I came to London, I was 17,” the violinist Joshua Bell, now 54, told me. We were at dinner together following a recent performance of his at Wigmore Hall, a small but renowned concert hall. “I came with my parents to make my first album,” he continued. “This was in the ’80s, and I remember thinking there wasn’t a lot of variety in food. Now, of course, it’s great.”

Like Bell, I first went to London in the 80s and did not appreciate it. I thought the food was limited, the hotels were terrible, and concluded it was historically wonderful but not a place I’d visit again.

But I’ve returned in the last year thanks to people I love and I’ve gained a whole new appreciation for the city. Like Bell, I agree: the food now is great. The hotels are great, too. And the things that always made London worthwhile are still there. Plus, it’s relatively cheap compared to what it used to be. (Thanks, Brexit, I guess).

I highly recommend reading his appreciation of London. Better still, go there and appreciate it for yourself.

As for me, if I was going again, I’d make sure I revisited St. JOHN, Brutto’s, and Noble Rot. In between going to the British Museum, The Tate, the National Gallery and of course Flying Tiger Copenhagen. 🙂

(Photo by Gabriel Isserlis of Fidelio Cafe: a link to the image in the story)

 

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A quick peek on what Philippe Starck is up to

Posted on February 27, 2023 | Comments Off on A quick peek on what Philippe Starck is up to

If you love the work of Philippe Starck as much as I, then I recommend you head over to Uncreate and search on his name (or click here). It turns out he’s still doing cool stuff. Not surprising.

For example, this is cool: B&B Italia x Philippe Starck Outdoor Sofa. It reminds me of the great furniture he did for hotels like the Royalton in the 80s:

And this LaCie Blade Runner Hard Drive reminded me of how at the names of his older furniture often were borrowed from Philip K. Dick novels:

Love it! I wish I could find one of those hard drives. They look awesome.

Speaking of awesome looking, check out this, the Aeklys by Starck Payment Ring:

Finally these Phillippe Starck Log Knives are very gift worthy:

Nice to see one of my favorite designers is still creative, and creative in many different ways.

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Whatever happened to Pascal (the programming language)

Posted on February 4, 2023 | Comments Off on Whatever happened to Pascal (the programming language)

In reading and writing about The Lisa computer yesterday, I was reminded of the Pascal programming language. As part of the development of the Lisa, one of the engineers (Larry Tesler), who was working on the user interface…

 …created an object-oriented variant of Pascal, called “Clascal,” that would be used for the Lisa Toolkit application programming interfaces. Later, by working with Pascal creator Niklaus Wirth, Clascal would evolve into the official Object Pascal.

Likely very few if any devs think about Pascal these days. Even I don’t think about it much. But back in the 70s and 80s it was a big deal. As Wikipedia explains:

Pascal became very successful in the 1970s, notably on the burgeoning minicomputer market. Compilers were also available for many microcomputers as the field emerged in the late 1970s. It was widely used as a teaching language in university-level programming courses in the 1980s, and also used in production settings for writing commercial software during the same period. It was displaced by the C programming language during the late 1980s and early 1990s as UNIX-based systems became popular, and especially with the release of C++.

When I was studying computer science in the early 80s, Pascal was an integral part of the curriculum. Once I started working at IBM, I moved on to develop software in other languages, but I had expected it to become a big deal in the field. Instead, C and then variant languages like C++ and Java went on to dominate computer programming. I’m not sure why. My belief at the time was universities had to pay big bucks for operating systems and Pascal compilers but they did not have to pay anything for Unix and C, and that’s what caused the switch. I can’t believe they switched from Pascal to C because C was a better language.

Forty years later, if you search for the top 20 programming languages, Pascal is towards the bottom of this list from IEEE, somewhere between Lisp and Fortran.  It’s very much a niche language in 2022 and it has been for some time.

For more on Pascal, I recommend the Wikipedia article: it’s extensive. If you want to play around with it, there’s a free version of it you can download.

(Image is an Apple Lisa 2 screenshot.  Photo Courtesy of David T. Craig. Computer History Museum Object ID 500004666)

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Friday night music: the sultry sounds of Sophisti-pop

Posted on January 13, 2023 | Comments Off on Friday night music: the sultry sounds of Sophisti-pop

Wait, what is sophisti-pop, you ask? Let me let Wikipedia explain:

Sophisti-pop is a subgenre of pop music which developed out of the new wave movement in the UK during the mid 1980s. The term has been applied retrospectively to describe acts who blended elements of jazz, soul, and pop with lavish production. Music so classified often made extensive use of electronic keyboards, synthesizers and polished arrangements. Artists also utilized cutting-edge studio technology and perfectionist recording methods.The genre has been described as mellow, romantic, and atmospheric.

Sounds right. Sophisti-pop was made by artists like ABC, Aztec Camera, Bryan Ferry, Haircut One Hundred, Joe Jackson, Prefab Sprout, Simply Red and Spandau Ballet. Add to that list three of my favorite: The Style Council, Sade and Everything but the Girl (EBTG).

EBTG captured the genre recently when they wrote: “We were a band who listened to Chet Baker but also Buzzcocks, who loved Getz-Gilberto but also The Doors, whose lyrics were intimate but also political”.  The same could be said for many of the bands listed above.

If you want to know what was some of the best of it, check out the 10 of the Best Sophisti-Pop albums. If you’re a Spotify user, they have an entire section devoted to that sound. Also EBTG put together their Complete Discography 1982-2005 on Spotify.  They have a new album coming out soon: meanwhile go back in time and listen to what you may have missed.

Finally, here’s a song I’ve listened to a million billion times since it came out. A great song for walking alone at night in the rain:

 

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On Queen West in Toronto, then and now

Posted on January 11, 2023 | 2 comments

I walked along Queen West and West Queen West recently. The bones of the neighborhood that I first walked around in the 80s remain. Places like The Queen Mother, Peter Pan, the Rex, and the Horseshoe are still going strong. The Rivoli is there too, if anything fancier than ever. Same for Cameron House. It was comforting to see them all, like old friends at a reunion.

Of course many other places have long gone. The Bamboo Club for instance. It’s location is occupied with some other business, though what occupies it is not as great as it was. Also long gone is Pages. It was a must visit on those trips to Queen West long ago. Now nothing exists in its former spot, just a vacant store.

I don’t want to weep and wail too much about changes to Queen West of my youth. People have been complaining about the its transformation “into the brand-saturated retail corridor it is today” since at least 2010, if not earlier.  I do want to note something ironic though. The same brands that transformed Queen West, brands like “The Gap, GUESS, Le Chateau, RYU, EB Games, NYX, several major fast food joints” have all left in the past five years because of rent. Perhaps in five more years it will just be banks and dentists offices there.

As for me, I prefer West Queen West to Queen West now. I’m happiest taking a streetcar past Bathurst and heading over to Type Books, the Spice Trader, Cocktail Emporium, the Swan and Trinity Bellwoods Park. When you combine that strip with Ossington and parts of Dundas West, you really have some of the best of Toronto, I think, and the places I most frequent lately.

Queen West will always be a destination for many and I will no doubt head there from time to time. But there are so many other great places to head to, even on Queen, and that’s great too.

P.S. The quotes above were from this piece on the closing of H&M on Queen West. The photo of the Queen Mother is from that piece, which is a good review of the place and its history. Also a good review is the Wikipedia entry for Queen West, which includes the entire street, but has a special section on Queen West.

Finally, here’s a great snapshot of Queen West in 1986, as captured in this video of the song “I’m an Adult Now” by The Pursuit of Happiness. Needless to say, it’s a very different street!

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If something cost $1 in the 1980s, what does it cost now?

Posted on January 6, 2023 | Comments Off on If something cost $1 in the 1980s, what does it cost now?


If something cost $1 in the 1980s — or the 1990s, or 2000, etc — what does it cost now?

I used to use a calculate this by using a rough 1:3 ratio in terms of 1980s dollars:today’s dollars, but there is a better way. You can go to the site in2013dollars.com and enter your information and it will spit out an answer. For example, what cost $1 in 1980 would cost $3.62 today, according to this: $1 in 1980 → 2023 | Inflation Calculator

I used that site because I was reading that in the early 80s Jim Jarmusch had an apartment in Manhattan that cost $170 a month. I wondered: what would that cost now? Well according to the site above, in 2023 that same place should cost $615. Of course the idea that ANYPLACE in Manhattan cost $615/month is hilarious. But you get the idea. 🙂

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On restaurants (deeply) loved and lost: Grano’s

Posted on December 30, 2022 | Comments Off on On restaurants (deeply) loved and lost: Grano’s

Grano’s was not just a restaurant to me. For much of my adult life it was my second home. When I walked in, I felt like I lived there. Like I belonged there.

Starting from the late 80s (when I was in my 20s) until just before the pandemic, it was the restaurant I frequented the most. I celebrated some of my most cherished moments there. I ate often by myself there too. When I did not know where to go, I went to Grano’s.

When I first came to Toronto in mid 80s, I started to learn how to eat proper Italian food in places like Masianello’s downtown in Little Italy. Toronto is a great Italian city, and to live in such a place, you should learn to eat proper Italian food. I did, and I loved it. This love led me uptown to Grano’s, which was then a simple one room place. Over the years it expanded in width and depth, filling up with its maximalist Italian style and food as well as patrons wanting to devour it all. I was always one of those people.

Grano’s was as much a feast for the eyes as it was for the belly. Bright Mediterranean colored walls, prints of classic artwork, vintage ads and plenty of pieces from the Spoleto festivals could be seen everywhere. It paid to walk around slowly (or to sit quietly) and take it all in. It never got tiring to behold.

If you wanted — though why would you? — you could rush in and buy some bread or some Italian delicacies and go home. You could stay briefly and have a glass of Italian white and some grilled calamari (one of my favorites). Best of all, you could invite dozens of friends and loved ones and have the servers bring you bottles of Italian wines and plates and plates of antipasti and pasta that was always on hand for you and your guests. Whatever you needed, Grano’s would provide. And when it was finally time to end the meal, you could savour a plate of biscotti and a perfect cappuccino before you went home happy.

As you can see, Grano’s the place was great. But what made it especially great to me was Roberto Martella, the host. No matter when I came, he always treated me like I was his favorite customer. No doubt he made everyone feel that way, but it was still appreciated by me. I even took Italian classes there once, and years afterwards he would speak to me a little in Italian and I would try my best to reply back with the little I knew.

After going there for decades, I had hoped Grano’s would last as long as I would. But sadly Roberto had a stroke, and the restaurant limped along without him for awhile before closing in 2018. You can still see the remnants of Grano’s today in 2022, though it’s been divided up into new places that lack what I loved about it.

It’s sad to lose your home, especially one you loved for so long. That’s how I felt, and continue to feel, about Grano’s. I live nearby to where it was, and I often have a pang to wander over for a plate with the ease I used to. I don’t know if I ever will get over that feeling. Sure, I can get great wine and bread in others places, but “non si vive di solo pane”. Mille grazie, Roberto. Mille grazie, Grano’s. Thank you for everything.

P.S. For lots of good photos of it when it was at its best, see here: Foto. The photos I have linked here are from there.

This is their old home page on weebly. It has a short history of Grano’s, here: 1986. 

There’s only a few images, but this is their IG account.

Finally two pieces on them: The culinary influence of midtown’s Roberto Martella – Streets Of Toronto, contains a good history. This is also good: The fall and rise of Roberto Martella, Toronto’s ‘vibrant’ don of dialogue in The Globe and Mail.

 

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Big hair, don’t care: more good links on the best decade, the 1980s

Posted on November 20, 2022 | Comments Off on Big hair, don’t care: more good links on the best decade, the 1980s


The 80s come back in vogue from time to time, such as when current works like Stranger Things delve into it.  Mostly the decade is seen historically. That’s fine. It was a good decade, at least for me, and I love to think and write on it. One of the great things about having your own blog is you can write what you want about whatever you want. 🙂 So here’s more things on that era that I found worth reading lately…

Much of the music of the early 80s started at the end of the 70s.  Take the music of bands like Talking Heads. Or the Ramones. Speaking of them, here’s some great bootleg footage of the Ramones in concert before the person filming it got caught!

As for other artists of that time, here’s a good piece on Blondie.  Like  punk and new wave, another trend of the time was Blitz.  This piece covers the Blitz era and all the music that was associated with it. Moving from the English music scene to Canada, here’s something on Rebecca Jenkins, an artist and musician who was involved with so many other performers I loved at the time, from Jane Siberry, to Holly Cole, to the incomparable Mary Margaret O’Hara.

Another incomparable artist from the time is Richard Grant. I will never forget him for his great turn in the film “Withnail and I” back in the 80s. Nowadays he has suffered a great loss but still keeps going and is inspirational on twitter and elsewhere. This is a good piece to catch up on him: Richard E Grant on grief fame and life without a filter.

Finally, gone but not forgotten, here’s a fine piece on Ruth Polsky Who Shaped New York’s Music Scene in that era. Recommended.

(Image from the piece on Blitz)

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What do Brad Pitt, David Salle, Steve Keene and Diane Arbus have in common?

Posted on October 11, 2022 | Comments Off on What do Brad Pitt, David Salle, Steve Keene and Diane Arbus have in common?

What do Brad Pitt, David Salle, Steve Keene and Diane Arbus have in common? They all are artists I’ve been reading about over the last few weeks and months. Now you can too.

In addition to reading about those four, there are additional pieces below on other artists of note. Most of them are painters but there are some sculptors too. Quite a mixed bag! Enjoy!

(Images linked to those in the Washington Post and Colossal).

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Andy Warhol, or thinking about when an artist is influential and young vs when they are older

Posted on September 29, 2022 | Comments Off on Andy Warhol, or thinking about when an artist is influential and young vs when they are older


Watching the Warhol Diaries documentary on Netflix, I started thinking about when an artist is influential and young vs when they are older. Like many, I am aware of the early Andy Warhol. If you think of Andy at all, you likely have some of these  Warhol works in mind. When I read references to Warhol and his influnce, these are many of the works cited.

One of the things I liked about the documentary is that it spent time on his later works. Two later commissions in particular I did not know much about. One of these was his Last Supper paintings. And the other was a group of portraits he did called Ladies and Gentlemen.

In both commissions, the Netflix documentary dives into the complexity of Warhol’s life at the time and how it affected the creation of these works. The religious nature of Warhol and his thoughts on death in the era of the AIDS crisis really comes through in the Last Supper works. While with Ladies and Gentlemen, the paintings take on more layers of meaning when you think of all the things going on in Andy’s life at the time, from the commercial celebrity portraits he was producing to the increasing openness of being gay in NYC in the 70s to his desire to be a model.

In some ways, I prefer these later works to the paintings and sculpture he made in the 1960s. There’s a depth to what came after later, a richness. They aren’t as influential as the Brillo Boxes or the Marilyn Monroes, but they are better.

Perhaps that is the case with many great artists. Even someone like Rembrandt. There is more of the artist in the later works,  but the works that made them famous are the earlier works, and those are the works that are mostly remembered. It makes sense in some ways, and is a shame in other ways.

It makes me wonder what would have happened to Basquiat or Haring if they had survived into the 1990s and beyond. What works they would have made. How they would have matured. Perhaps we can look to Warhol for this. Warhol too should have died when he was gunned down and almost killed, only to be resurrected on the operating table. We know how he turned out. I’d like to think of Haring and Basquiat doing the same.

If you have the time, watch the Warhol Diaries on Netflix. It’s a good series.

For more on this, the Tate has a good piece on the people who modelled for Ladies and Gentlemen. The Guardian has more on Ladies and Gentlemen, here. Finally Christie’s has something here on the Last Supper paintings.

 

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(Sunday) Night Music (one of the best music shows you never saw)

Posted on August 14, 2022 | Comments Off on (Sunday) Night Music (one of the best music shows you never saw)

In the late 80s, Lorne Michaels (of SNL fame) produced this show called “Night Music” that was seen in Canada as well as elsewhere. For a show that only ran from 1988-1990, it featured a wealth of musicians. (You can see the list here.)

One of my favorite episodes was #208 which featured Sting and Mary Margaret O’Hara as well as many other fine musicians. If you have 40 minutes, you can see it here:

What I like about that episode, like most episodes, is that you get a wide range of musicians, old and new, all doing challenging or interesting music. You didn’t just see the latest artists performing their hits. You didn’t just see one style of music. You never knew what to expect, other than it would be good.

So check out that video while you can. I’ve posted Night Music videos before and they get pulled sooner or later. See it while you can, and see why it was so good.

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In defence of the 80s against current day philistines

Posted on August 14, 2022 | Comments Off on In defence of the 80s against current day philistines

I try not to write too much here on my love of the 1980s, but sometimes the world forces me to do otherwise.

It started recently when in this piece on John Lurie and his Downtown Confessional book, the reviewer compared him to Pete Davidson. I mean, I’m sorry, but that is an egregious comparison, even in the slightest of ways. John Lurie is cool in a way Davidson could never be.  Comparison aside, that’s a good review and I recommend it and anything to do with Lurie, including his book and his work with Jim Jarmusch.

Meanwhile there are people who are in the fight to save New York’s Extravagantly ’80s Subway Entrance. (shown above) Thank god. Someone wants to replace it with some banal all glass neutral atrium or something like thousands of other places. No way. Let’s hope they save this.  It’s a small sliver of 80s goodness.

Finally, here’s a piece on Devo who were truly ahead of their time.

(Lnk to the image of Gabby Jones for The New York Times)

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On the Basquiat work at the AGO in 2022

Posted on August 13, 2022 | Comments Off on On the Basquiat work at the AGO in 2022

The AGO had a good show called “I AM HERE” packed with a great many works, including the one above. There were some other works like these…

There were even some drawings of food

For a Basquiat fan such as myself, it was all very exciting to see so much of his work here in Ontario.

It wasn’t until sometime later that I noticed the fine print besides the work:

That doesn’t mean to say that these are forgeries. It just says his family doesn’t vouch for them.

I can’t say one way or another. Basquiat was known to draw on all sorts of things, which made the food drawings seem real enough. To me only the head / portrait painting seemed a bit off. Not his typical pallet. But I think it seems like him in many other ways.

Given how much his work goes for and how much he produced, I think we might see more potential issues with works of Basquait on display. something to keep in mind the next time his work is on display.

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Issey Miyake was more than a designer of turtlenecks for Steve Jobs

Posted on August 10, 2022 | Comments Off on Issey Miyake was more than a designer of turtlenecks for Steve Jobs

An outfit of Miyake

I’ve been a fan of the late great Issey Miyake since the 1980s. No one at the time was doing anything as wonderful with fabric as was. Perhaps Armani, but Armani’s cuts seemed conservative in comparison.

It’s an odd thing, but this week when he died, many of the news articles kept mentioning how Miyake designed the classic turtlenecks that Steve Jobs wore all the time. And it’s true, he did make those black tops of Jobs. However, those were among the least interesting thing he designed. To get a sense of just how beautiful his clothing designs could really be, see this: Issey Miyake’s best celebrity fashion moments at the Daily Mail. As well, Vogue has some highlights. (This piece in the Guardian is the best by far in recognizing his greatness.)

It’s quite a legacy. And right up until the end, he was making beautiful clothes.

Besides the clothes, he has always been associated with great fragrances. Next time you can, pay your local fragrance shop a visit and see if you can get some. You may not be able to wear his garments, but you can wear his scents.

(Image: link to image in Daily Mail piece)

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On General Idea at the National Gallery of Canada

Posted on July 16, 2022 | Comments Off on On General Idea at the National Gallery of Canada


One of my  favorite Canadian artists are General Idea. Living in Toronto in the 80s and 90s, there work was often on display and often on my mind. If you want to see how great they are for yourself, the National Gallery of Canada in Ottawa has a big exhibit of their work that is running until the Fall of 2022. Well worth a visit to take that in.

For details on it, go here: General Idea | National Gallery of Canada

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On Basquiat and Recent Crimes

Posted on June 9, 2022 | Comments Off on On Basquiat and Recent Crimes

Basquiat has been in the news this week on account of two alleged crimes: theft and fraud. In the first instance, this “Brazen” Couple Tries to Walk Out of Manhattan Gallery With a Basquiat. Nice try, brazen couple.

The other alleged crime is fraud, although the owners of these works deny that in this instance: Is the Orlando Museum of Art Displaying Fake Basquiats?

All I can say is to anyone buying these “new” Basquiats: caveat emptor.

(Image from this tumblr, which has quite a few good images of the man, including the one above.)

July 1, 2022: update. Looks like the FBI have decided to step in and deal with the works at the Orlando Museum. You can read about that here and here.

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Basquiat 101

Posted on May 25, 2022 | Comments Off on Basquiat 101

People in New York City have the great pleasure of having not one but two exhibits dedicated to him at the moment. (Not to mention his works being on display at MoMA.) If you are not familiar with him or would like to know how to better appreciate him, this piece, How to Look at a Basquiat in The New York Times is worth a read. It’s like Basquiat 101.

Better still, read it and then go check out the shows.

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On the Smiths and those album covers

Posted on May 22, 2022 | Comments Off on On the Smiths and those album covers

The Smith’s were (are?) great for many reasons. One reason in particular was their album covers. Looks like the folks at NME agree, because they put together

an exhaustive guide to each and everyone of their 27 single and album releases’ sleeves, and what they mean

You can find here. Fans of the band will enjoy that. I did.

Speaking of the Smiths, this piece by Doug Coupland, Morrissey will never be cancelled is worth a read.

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The history of the 80s as it first appeared in Usenet groups

Posted on March 26, 2022 | Comments Off on The history of the 80s as it first appeared in Usenet groups

Images from the 1980s
Before the Web, there was Usenet. And like the web, it had everything. Just in text form. 🙂

Someone has mined Usenet to find the first cultural references in the 1980s to famous events. It’s an fascnating list of when things first started to gain prominence. For example:

  1. May 1981 First mention of Microsoft
  2. Dec 1982 First thread about AIDS
  3. Jul 1983 First mention of Madonna
  4. Nov 1989 First post from Berlin after the wall came down

Check it out for some major 80s flashbacks.

PS. If all you are thinking while you read this is “what the heck is Usenet??” then read this.

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On Philippe Starck, now and then

Posted on February 15, 2022 | 1 comment

Philippe Starck has been tied to my life since I was a young man in the 80s, staying at his hotels and buying what i could afford of his. Chances are you have sat in some of his chairs or seen his hotels and didn’t even know it.

He and I parted ways some time ago: my hotel staying days died down and I settled for more modest chairs. I would occasionally wonder what he was up to.

Turns out he is still making great things. Case in point, those wooden armchairs that fit together brilliantly. The chairs are…

…The first collaboration between designer Philippe Starck and Spanish furnishings manufacturer Andreu World … Their Adela Rex walnut and oak plywood armchairs are made from three molded shapes that fit together without hardware. (Take that, IKEA.) Part of World’s 100% pure wood project, the chairs are FSC Certified.

Beautiful. Perhaps one day I’ll have a chance to relax in one.

P.S. I am happy to say that not only is his career continuing, but so is his web site. It used to be a bit of a disaster from a UX perspective, but it seems to have improved. Here’s a link to part of it: Royalton hotel, New York. That hotel, like many he designed in the 80s, no longer sports his designs. But at the time it was a dream to visit and stay in.

Pop over and take a look. Perhaps the next hotel you stay in will be one of his.

P.S.S. More things on this blog about Starck, here.

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The 80s were cool. Don’t believe me? Ask the kids

Posted on February 2, 2022 | Comments Off on The 80s were cool. Don’t believe me? Ask the kids

It’s easy to mock any era for its excesses – and the 80s had those – but it still had much good about it. Perhaps that’s one reason why some Zoomers are so wistful for that era. Your mileage may differ, but I think the kids are alright.

One of the things about that time that was great was Giorgio Armani. I love his clothes and his look then, and I still do. Here’s a good piece on what makes it great: Permanent Style.

Finally this is fun: New Yorkers and Their 80s Routines, Block by Block (NY Times)

Top image from the Armani piece, bottom from the Times piece.

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On Barbara Kruger and her 2021 show

Posted on November 19, 2021 | Comments Off on On Barbara Kruger and her 2021 show

Barbara Kruger

There is a new show of Barbara Kruger’s work called: “THINKING OF YOU. I MEAN ME. I MEAN YOU.” It’s playing from now through to Jan. 24, 2022 at the Art Institute of Chicago.

I had a few thoughts on it. One thought: I believed I had two favorite artists from the 80s (Basquiat and Haring) but it turns out I have three (Kruger).  I had mistakenly not placed her in that era. But as the Times shows:

Since the early 1980s, the engine of her work, and its effectiveness, has been formatting — the candy apple red bar containing white sans serif type, rendered in Futura Bold Oblique, conveying aphorisms that could be taunts or pleas.

also

(her work started) much more humbly, as paste-ups made by hand, an extension of Kruger’s work as a graphic designer at Condé Nast magazines. Twenty of her 1980s originals are displayed in a suboptimally lit walkway. Up against the room-size works, they feel like modest afterthoughts. But up close they are deeply moving, almost innocent. Each juxtaposes a gnomic phrase with a stark black and white image, but at this scale, they scan more as private entreaties than global dictates — rave fliers for young agitators.

Second thought: just like Basquiat and Haring took their art from the street to the galleries and museums, so did Kruger.  And just like the two men, she is now a dominant part of our culture. Back to the Times:

And that underscores the complexity of revisiting Kruger at this moment in image dissemination: Her strict-rule paste-up approach to interrogating groupthink has become so defining, so signature that her innovations are now core grammar. Her art is recombinant. It exists whether or not she’s present.

Which brings me to my final thought. Sure it is easy to use elements of her work to mimic her (waves to the folks at Supreme). But looking at the work on display I can see it has power in a way that those who copy her do not. The scale, the colour, the composition: they all demonstrate the qualities she has as an artist that has made her influential and deserving of such a show.

For more, see the Times piece: Barbara Kruger: Infinitely Copied, Still Unmatched – The New York Times. Better still, go to Chicago and see the show while you can.

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On places loved and lost: the Canada Square Cinema

Posted on October 30, 2021 | Comments Off on On places loved and lost: the Canada Square Cinema


I’m sad to see that the pandemic has claimed another victim: the Canada Square Cinema at Yonge and Eglinton. I’ve been going there since it opened in the 80s, and especially so since I moved into the neighborhood in this century.

It’s always been a lovely theatre. One thing I loved about it was how little it changed over the years. Those gray panels on the wall, that red carpet, the cup holders from eye weekly: it was like going into a time machine every time I went there. While it was frozen in time, it was well kept up. It showed good movies. (The last film I saw there was “Parasite”.) It had decent crowds. It was great to see films that had been out for awhile but missed. (It was almost like a rep theatre in that way).

Still, with so many theatres closing over the years, I was expecting it to close too. Instead it was recently upgraded. I thought: great! I will have the luxury of having two big theatre complexes in my area. Then the pandemic hit.

I’m sad to see it go, but happy for all the good movies and good times I had going to it. Go see some movies in theatres as soon as you can. We still need that experience, and we need those theatres. May the theatres that you love last for a long time.

P.S. For more on the theatre, go see BlogTO’s write up, here.

 

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Friday Night Music: Paris Match (Style Council with Tracey Thorn vocals)

Posted on October 8, 2021 | Comments Off on Friday Night Music: Paris Match (Style Council with Tracey Thorn vocals)

If you are a fan of the Style Council, as I am, I highly recommend this: Long Hot Summers: The Story of The Style Council (2020) | SHOWTIME

It’s an excellent review of the career of the musicians that made up the band, and a fine reminder of how great they were.

While there were many people interviewed for it, Tracey Thorn didn’t appear, sadly. I would have loved to hear more about how she crossed paths and became a Councillor for a time.

Watch the documentary: you’ll be glad you did. Meanwhile, check this out:

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Old parts of Toronto: the 80s

Posted on August 26, 2021 | Comments Off on Old parts of Toronto: the 80s

To close off Toronto week here on the blog, here’s two pieces on what it was like to grow up in Toronto in the 1980s. First,  Toronto Life has 15 signs you grew up in Toronto in the 1980s. Not to be outdone, blogTO doubles that and shares 30 signs you grew up in Toronto in the 1980s 🙂

(Image from the Toronto Life piece. I loved going to Toby’s when I was in Toronto in the 80s. They were everywhere and they had good burgs. )

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More on New York in the 80s

Posted on July 4, 2021 | 2 comments


Here on my blog I like to write about one of my favourite places (NYC) and my favorite eras (the 80s). So I am happy to highlight this piece on an exhibit on the music of New York at time: New York, New Music: how the city became a hotbed for music in the 80s | Music | The Guardian.

New York then was a hotbed not only for music, but for art. After almost dying in the 60s and 70s, it started it’s Phoenix rebirth in the 80s. I was happy to be a part of it, and I often like to highlight it. That Guardian piece does a good job of capturing the place and the time.

(Photo by Bryan G. on Unsplash.  I don’t think it is of the 80s, but it is a photo of the Lower East Side and it is reminiscent of it.)

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Barcelona saves Haring

Posted on June 23, 2021 | Comments Off on Barcelona saves Haring

I love this story. In the 80s, Haring went to a club and painted the mural you see above. To prevent it from being demolished, Barcelona City Council Steps in to Preserve a Little-known Keith Haring Mural.

Good for them! Something similar was done for a painting by Basquiat.

Here’s to the preservation of great works by great artists from the 80s.

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On something being ugly but something you’ll miss when it is gone

Posted on November 28, 2020 | Comments Off on On something being ugly but something you’ll miss when it is gone

For me, it’s this bridge which according to BlogTO is going to be demolished:

When I first moved to Toronto in the 80s I lived near this area and used to pass under this bridge all the time. There’s nothing attractive about it, save the murals, which weren’t there when I lived there.

Still, I will miss it when it is gone, ugly or not.

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Basquiat – the big book from Taschen

Posted on September 1, 2020 | Comments Off on Basquiat – the big book from Taschen

The good folks at Taschen are celebrating their 40th Anniversary. One way they are celebrating is by releasing this fantastic book on the great artist, Basquiat. 

 

I picked it up on the weekend and I love it. It is packed with more images of his work than I have seen anywhere else. All for a very reasonable price.

You can order it directly from Taschen, or get it wherever fine books are sold.

P.S. For more Basquiat, you can see many of his images online,here, at wikiart.org.

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On the passing of filmmaker Alan Parker

Alan Parker just died. If you grew up in the last quarter of the 20th century, odds are very good you’ve seen one of his films, if not several. You may not even realized you did. He wasn’t a fan of the auteur idea of being a director, and that likely resulted in him not making films in a consistent way. Which is fine, since he made many a good film. The New York Times has done a wonderful thing and put together a list of some of his most well known films and where you can watch them online: Where to Stream Alan Parker’s Best Movies – The New York Times.

If you haven’t seen any of his films, now is your chance. Grab that list and go stream. I may rewatch “The Commitments”, one of the more enjoyable films from that time.

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Posted on August 1, 2020 in film, new!

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The Restaurant That Has Helped New Yorkers Feel Famous Since 1984 and other links to NYC


For fans of NY back when, or people just curious about a very different New York then the current one, here’s a bunch of links worth reading:

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Posted on July 19, 2019 in new!, newyork, nytimes.com

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