The Culture Gabfest “The Brio of the Buoy” Edition
Slate’s Culture Gabfest on Mr. Turner, Lee Daniels’ new show Empire, and D’Angelo’s new album Black Messiah.
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This week on the Slate Culture Gabfest, the critics discuss Mike Leigh’s biopic of the groundbreaking painter J.M.W. Turner, which stars Timothy Spall. Perhaps biopic is the wrong word—portrait is better. Next, Lee Daniels’ new series Empire self-consciously riffs on Shakespeare, but might it actually be something … new? Finally, Carl Wilson joins the critics to discuss the album we have waited 14 years for: D’Angelo and the Vanguard’s Black Messiah. It’s obviously excellent, but can anything match 2000’s Voodoo?
Links to some of the things we discussed this week follow:
- D’Angelo’s Voodoo
- The Soulquarians
- The video for “Untitled (How Does It Feel?)”
- Philip Hoare defends Ruskin in the Guardian
- Hustle and Flow
- Precious
- The Butler
Endorsements:
Dana: The ambient sound site RainyCafe, and intern Josephine’s essay on rain sound at the Awl.
Julia: The highly alliterative Kenn Kaufman’s birding memoir, Kingbird Highway.
Carl: Shane MacGowan’s “For the Dancing and the Dreaming,” from the How to Train Your Dragon 2 soundtrack.
Steve: Raymond Williams’ Culture and Society.
(Almost) every product recommended on every Slate podcast since the dawn of creation.
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This podcast was produced by Ann Hepperman. Our intern is Josephine Livingstone.
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