The U.S. Food and Drug Administration’s outright prohibition of the practice of aging cheese on wooden boards has sparked strong reactions, revealing a newfound interest for traditional, fermented food.
Tag: united states
KINGMAN — The road to Seligman, Arizona, carries a famous name — the roadside sign reads Historic Route 66. This is the right moment to slide the CD into the Harley-Davidson Electra Glide’s music player. “Well, it winds from Chicago to L.A., more than 2,000 miles all the way. Get your kicks on Route 66,” […]
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Introducing Minimalist RnB With ‘Divine’ SZA
Photo: Arangoalejandra New Jersey-based singer SZA released a new song called “Divinity” last week. The seven-and-a-half minute track, made up of minimalist elements of R&B, features a collaboration with the soul and funk singer Jill Scott. SZA is part of the new wave of artists coming to light in what has been labelled as “alt […]
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Seriously Texan
In France, from the early 1980s until rather recently, you basically couldn’t turn on your TV without stumbling onto an episode of the American series Dallas. And though I have never actually watched the show, when I went to Beaumont, Texas, it all looked vaguely familiar.
In case you missed this last week and forgot (or can’t afford) to book any music festivals this summer, you needn’t worry. The online music platform Music Vault has uploaded five decades of remastered live concerts in more than 13,000 videos on its YouTube channel. Between ten-second extracts, songs and whole concerts in high-definition, is […]
There are signs of ‘Denglish,’ a German (Deutsch)-English brew becoming fashionable in American culture. Some of it is crossover from Yiddish, some of it is über hipster posing.
LA JOYA — Juan Castro is trying to keep it together as he tells me this story, but the tears well up in his eyes. “There was this 11-year-old girl from Guatemala who had been raped. I had to ask her how, where, by whom, why and every single detail that could help build her […]
Cover songs can sometimes sound surprisingly better than the original — or at any rate, become significantly more popular. Take Jeff Buckley’s “Hallelujah”, Jimi Hendrix’s “All Along The Watchtower” for example — but there are dozens of other such intelligent covers that have made it to the shelves of musical classics. Over the past few […]
So-called lifeloggers track and record their personal data, often sharing it with the world. Why? To make connections that can improve health and sleep…and maybe avoid oblivion.
Notable deaths of the past month.
Below are some of the songs currently topping charts around the world. But first … Worldcrunch Pick To the great delight of neo-psychedelic rockers worldwide, the Texas-based band Black Angels confirmed this week the release of their new album Clear Lake Forest, on July 21. On Record Store Day (April 19), the authors of last […]
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Old Square, New Orleans
One of my biggest regrets in life is to never have learned to speak English — my comments here are translated by my grandson. This means that over the years, we had to find solutions to visit English-speaking countries: In 1992 for instance, we travelled with the France-Louisiane Association, and were guided in French through […]
Below are some of the songs currently topping charts around the world; but before that: Worldcrunch Pick Jack White performed two tracks — “Temporary Ground” (watch below) and “Alone In My Home” — from his new LP Lazaretto on Conan Wednesday. Cover photo: Incase
Below are some of the songs currently topping charts around the world. Worldcrunch Pick This week, one of the most misunderstood songs of all time turned 30 years old. Bruce Springteen’s “Born in the U.S.A.” was released with its eponymous album on June 4, 1984, before becoming one of the Boss’s most popular songs. With […]
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The Cruel Art Of Unfriending
GENEVA — It used to be that friendships ended in all sorts of ways. But these days, we simply “unfriend” instead. From the playground to Facebook, the process has evolved. You put the cursor on the name of the person you want out of your life, you slide over to the “Friends” button, let the […]
A young tennis champion, a controversial Polish general and an influent author were among those to whom we bid farewell this past month.
NEW YORK — The terrace offers one of New York City’s most exclusive views. Perched on the 57th floor of the new World Trade Center complex, it overlooks the Manhattan skyline to the north, and the Statue of Liberty and New York harbor to the south. Offices complete the rest of the panoramic view, their […]
Some bits and bytes of news in numbers…
-OpEd- PARIS — Before the end of 2014, China will have become the world’s largest economy. For the first time since 1872 — when China overtook Britain — the United States will not top the list. This news amid data published last week by the International Comparison Program, a respected institution hosted by the World […]
The recently botched execution in Oklahoma is the just the latest sign that this ‘quaint and cruel’ form of American justice is not worthy of a democracy.
Below are some of the songs currently topping charts around the world. Worldcrunch Pick On May 19, the American band Brian Jonestown Massacre will release their 14th studio album, Revelation. After an almost 25-year career in shoegaze, folk and even experimental music, Anton Newcomb and his crew haven’t finished exploring and playing with the 1960s […]
The current President of the Republic mulls whether to stand against his old ally Prime Minister Erdogan in upcoming direct presidential elections. Turkey’s political future is at stake.
We all know how ubiquitous Coca-Cola“s red-and-white logo is around the world. But together with its archrival Pepsi-Cola, these U.S.-based cola giants have had to fend off smaller, locally-produced alternatives. Call it the alter-cola revolution. Let us take you on a fizzy little tour of the new regional and national cola brands springing up everywhere. […]
Below are some of the songs currently topping the charts around the world. Worldcrunch Pick Jack White broke a record last week when he recorded the title track from his forthcoming album Lazaretto just hours before selling it to eager fans who queued up outside his studio. Fans could buy a vinyl 45 of the […]
Some see signs that the world’s tectonic plates are positioned in such a way to set off “the mother of all quakes.” Seismology has made advances, but is still not a perfect science.
The International Monetary Fund could be crucial providing aid in Ukraine and elsewhere, but much is on hold as the U.S. Congress blocks much needed IMF reforms.
As Hillary Clinton took to the stage for a speech Thursday night in Las Vegas, a woman threw a shoe at the former Secretary of State. It whizzed just past Clinton, who quippied afterward: “Thank goodness she didn’t play softball like I did.” A spokesperson for the recycling institute, to whom Clinton was speaking, said […]
WASHINGTON — Calvin is discovering a new popularity in America. No, not the character from the Bill Watterson comic Calvin and Hobbes, but John Calvin, the 16th-century French Protestant Reformer. The rise of this latest wave of neo-Calvinism, which follows another revival at the beginning of the 20th century, is all the more surprising because […]
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A Disney Hairy Tale
Looking at slides of the 15th anniversary parade at Walt Disney World in Florida, it occurs to me that change is often for the best. Flashy tracksuits, visors and the hair. And yes, that’s a keytar.
Below are some of the songs currently topping the charts around the world. But first, our Worldcrunch Pick A previously unheard song by cult singer-songwriter Nick Drake, entitled Reckless Jane, has appeared online, almost four decades after the English musician’s death. Drake began writing it with his friend Beverley Martyn two months before he died. […]
An Armenian-born American businessman has been paying to book Europe’s finest concert halls so he and his orchestra can play for tiny, unimpressed audiences. Who is this mystery man?
Below are some of the songs currently topping the charts around the world. Worldcrunch Pick “We’re making a single-sale collector’s item. This is like somebody having the scepter of an Egyptian king.” This is how Wu-Tang Clan’s RZA, in an interview with Forbes, described the hip-hop collective’s surprise new album, Once Upon A Time In […]
A Latin American writer describes a single moment in time in Miami, where the sad contradictions of American culture were on full display.
Images that made news, the news in images … around the world.
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A Forest Without A Tree
Fires caused by people are thankfully still relatively infrequent in the vast Yellowstone National Park, with just six to 10 per year. Most wildfires, such as the 1988 blazes that destroyed almost 40% of the park, are instead caused by lightning. In 1994, driving through a recently burned patch, we could only imagine what that […]
Restrictive U.S. entry requirements deprive talented people of work opportunity but also drag down the competitiveness across the Americas.
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Two Plus Two
Three are gone.
The crisis in Crimea says more about Russian ambitions and European foot-dragging than it does about indecisiveness in Washington.
A quick look back at notable deaths of the past month