Category Archives: Music

“Awhileaway”

Posted on March 29, 2023 by Walter Biggins

For John Drake and Ashley Stephenson. Cheers to two friends making the leap, at middle age, into new love. Because love is always new, right? Even when the feeling is familiar, or the people are long familiar to each other, … Continue reading →

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50-word reviews (semi-recent, semi-jazz edition, fall 2022)

Posted on September 26, 2022 by Walter Biggins

Last year, I bought my first turntable. It’s given me an excuse to explore Philadelphia, seeking out vinyl shops and garage sales looking for my fix. The searching and crate digging has inspired patience and an appreciation of serendipity in … Continue reading →

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“A Spring in My Step”

Posted on April 21, 2021 by Walter Biggins

To welcome in the spring season, I made a little movie. It was shot (mostly) in Philadelphia and Atlanta, with a snippet from rural Maine. I hope you enjoy it. Credits: Direction, photography, editing: Walter BigginsWhen: April 2021 (more or … Continue reading →

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50-worders: Phish figures it out, together and “alone”

Posted on September 25, 2020 by Walter Biggins

Trey Anastasio is almost as prolific as Guided By Voices’s Robert Pollard, and just as experimental as the lo-fi stalwart. Since Fall 2019, it seems that Anastasio’s bandmates have caught the productivity bug as well. The band hasn’t played live … Continue reading →

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Top 10 finale (#13): Phish, 7/25/1997 (Dallas, TX; Starplex Amphitheater)

Posted on June 7, 2020 by Walter Biggins

This is the final piece of this Top 10 experiment that has become, by design, a baker’s dozen. I set things up this way because my favorite band, and the one that has most affected my critical ear and capacity … Continue reading →

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Top 10 #12: Geoff Dyer’s But Beautiful: A Book About Jazz (1991)

Posted on June 6, 2020 by Walter Biggins

But Beautiful effectively begins in a car, and often returns to it in interludes. Harry Carney is driving, headlights cutting through the deep night, while Duke Ellington sleeps fitfully in the passenger seat. Occasionally, Duke wakes up, and the duo … Continue reading →

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Top 10 #11: Stop Making Sense (1984), starring Talking Heads, directed by Jonathan Demme

Posted on June 5, 2020 by Walter Biggins

This is the first of three extra pieces for this Top 10 experiment, bringing it all up to a Baker’s Dozen.  These last three concentrate on items outside of the strict parameters of “album.” Here we go. Sure, I love … Continue reading →

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Top 10 #10: Paul Simon’s Graceland (1986)

Posted on June 4, 2020 by Walter Biggins

My dear friend Daniel Couch and I share deep, complicated love for two albums that bind us to each other. One, Bob Mould’s Workbook (1989), is so interwoven in us that we ended up writing a book precisely about the … Continue reading →

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Top 10 #9: Bedhead’s WhatFunLifeWas (1993)

Posted on June 3, 2020 by Walter Biggins

The Argo was small, ratty-carpeted, packed with about 300 teens. I was one, along with three friends who came with me. Christmas lights hung limply above the stage. If I remember correctly, because it was an all-ages show, there was … Continue reading →

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Top 10 #8: D’Angelo and the Vanguard, Black Messiah (2014)

Posted on June 2, 2020 by Walter Biggins

NOTE: Parts of this piece cannibalize and remix an essay I wrote for Glide Magazine upon this album’s original release. * * * * * * A soul man is only as good as his collaborators, since a soul man … Continue reading →

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