Small. Slight. Dismissed. Imagine you’re a megaton bomb born to look like just a firecracker. Juliana Hatfield imagines that the world wrote her off as a riot grrl from the 90s and that she’s permanently afflicted with Lilith Fairitis. She plays guitar, writes songs about jerk boyfriends, comes from Boston, and has a naturally girly voice. She is so pissed off about that last detail that her throat gets unfairly abused and a lot of guitar amps regret being born. She’s tried chain smoking and thrashing her vocal chords to grind off the sweet sheen of her voice, but all she needs to do is hear herself for once and see what a big stick she carries. Continue reading →

My earliest memories of listening to a record was on an 8-track tape. You could click between the 4 channels of the narrow band of magnetic tape and take it with you on the road encased in a plastic package. I’m sure back in the 70s there was still some serious thought going on about how to take a vinyl LP with you to the car dashboard. Imagine trying to flip to the B side on the freeway without wrecking your needle or your car. I am not doing much better now dialing in my playlist whims with my iPod. I won’t be surprised to see a factoid statistic roll across the bottom of Headline News of traffic fatalities directly related to motorists distinguishing between Radiohead and REO Speedwagon on their iPods. Continue reading →