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Month: August 2018

The Aquabats Launch Kickstarter

The Aquabats
Jason Tate

The Aquabats have started a Kickstarter:

We hear you loud and clear: It’s time for The Aquabats to get to work, making more music and bringing back the Super Show! But the truth is we can’t make ANYTHING without you… and since we’re doing this for you, we wouldn’t want to do it without you!

With YOUR SUPPORT, we can record The Aquabats’ first NEW ALBUM since 2011, and shoot our first NEW TV SPECIAL since 2014. Not only will you get new music and television, you’ll be helping introduce The Aquabats to a whole new generation of Righteous Comrades and future Aquacadets!

Warped Tour is over. Will the culture it created reckon with its demons?

Warped Tour
Jason Tate

Taylor Telford, writing at The Washington Post:

Overlooking the sins of powerful artists has felt intolerable in the era of #MeToo, but at Warped, taste is tethered to identity, and what comes next for its audience is complicated. The tour has flourished because much of its music is confessional and intimate. It fosters a devotion in the young, marginalized and vulnerable that rarely fades with age. Now fans are wrestling with whether the culture can adapt and evolve, or whether its worst roots run too deep. […]

Until I got to college, I actively disliked female musicians. I was enamored with the myth of the tortured artist; I chased it not only in my taste but also in my personal relationships. Now I wonder if some of these failures can be traced back to the music that shaped me. In part, I want to scrub myself of its influence. The problem is that I wouldn’t know myself without it.

This entire piece is really good. I hope this music scene can learn from the mistakes of the past. Sometimes I see signs of progress, and sometimes I am at a loss for words.

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Johnny Depp’s Notorious B.I.G. Movie Pulled From Theater Release

Film
Jason Tate

The Hollywood Reporter:

Johnny Depp’s Notorious B.I.G. thriller City of Lies has been pulled from the schedule a month before it was set to hit theaters.

The movie, formerly known as LAbyrinth, was slated to open Sept. 7 in North America by Global Road Entertainment. No new date has been set for the film.

The move comes amid a series of woes for the actor, including a damaging Rolling Stone profile in June, that make any publicity campaign tough.

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A Quick Pitch for Becoming a Supporting Member

Jason Tate

If you’ve been thinking about upgrading your account and becoming a supporting member of this website, I’d love to encourage you to do so during the month of August. As we start moving toward fall, and the end of the year (holy-shit-time-goes-fast), it’s that time where I start thinking about finances and the sustainability of the website. I’ve run some of the math, and basically, if everyone reading this signed up for just one year, this website would be sustainable basically immediately for multiple years. If only a small fraction of the people reading this right now signed up, this website is viable for me to keep running as my full-time job for another year. And, that’s the ultimate goal.

When you upgrade your forum account you gain access to exclusive content, Dark Mode, an ad-free browsing experience, and the supporter forum.

Even if you don’t have a forum account but want access to Dark Mode and an ad-free experience on the main website, you can become a patron for only $3 per month (or $25 annually) and you’ll get the perks while also helping us maintain our independence as a publisher.

I’m making plans for next year right now and the goal is to re-launch Encore, continue improving and adding new features to the forums, and start writing even more long-form reviews/pieces here on the website. Thank you to everyone that’s continued to help make this dream a reality every single day.

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