San Francisco Bay Guardian | Johnny Ray Huston

The Mantles Keep it in the Family and Create a Cali Pop Classicnew

Fueled by friendship and romance, the Mantles are relaxed enough to enjoy absurdity, whether it arrives in the form of a shirtless dude in a Yoda mask or entails playing the role of "psychedelic band" and "mid-tempo downer" at a sweltering garage rock party where people are doing cannonballs into a pool.

San Francisco Bay Guardian | Johnny Ray Huston | 09-16-2009 | Profiles & Interviews

Tags: The Mantles, indie pop

Catching an Elusive Icon's Drift As He Sings About Pasolini and Mussolininew

Time stood still yesterday in the music Scott Walker made, and it stands still today when 30 Century Man languishes in the songs from Walker's quartet of self-titled Philips solo albums from 1967 through 1970.

San Francisco Bay Guardian | Johnny Ray Huston | 01-21-2009 | Reviews

Tags: Scott Walker, documentaries, Scott Walker: 30 Century Man, Stephen Kijak

'Barf Manifesto' is So Great You'll Wanna Pukenew

Not a rant so much as a pair of roiling bursts of text, Bellamy's book has feminist intent, but ultimately it presents an artistic credo, in the manner of Andre Breton's paeans to Surrealism.

San Francisco Bay Guardian | Johnny Ray Huston | 12-04-2008 | Nonfiction

Tags: pop culture, visual arts, Barf Manifesto, Dodie Bellamy, vomit

Why My Bloody Valentine Isn't Anything to Dismiss: A Fan's Sonic Memorynew

I don't even know if I'm going to see MBV this week. If I don't, I suspect I'll still hear their noise, or feel it, from across town. If I can touch that instrumental passage of "You Made Me Realise," I'll grab on to a point within it. That point will be my nostalgia. It'll levitate, compress, and then shatter.

San Francisco Bay Guardian | Johnny Ray Huston | 09-24-2008 | Music

Tags: indie rock, shoegaze, reunion tours, my bloody valentine

'Love Songs' Steps Out From Under An Umbrellanew

Love Songs proves few movies are entirely terrible or terrific. Its crushworthy final half-hour is touching and sometimes magnificent. But much of its initial hour is maddening.

San Francisco Bay Guardian | Johnny Ray Huston | 06-04-2008 | Reviews

Tags: Christophe Honore, Love Songs, love, Songs

Big Books on Tiny Topicsnew

It seems that one surefire way of selling a nonfiction tome is by focusing on a very specific subject. For evidence, one need only look at recent efforts such as Pierre Laszlo's Citrus: A History, Henry Petroski's The Toothpick: Technology and Culture, and Andrew D. Blechman's Pigeons: The Fascinating Saga of the World's Most Revered and Reviled Bird.

San Francisco Bay Guardian | Johnny Ray Huston | 03-12-2008 | Books

You Can Judge This Book by its Covernew

This catalogue of what United Kingdom censors called video nasties proves visually and verbally lively. And for a book bathed in blood and drawn to depressing and despairing expressions of murder such as the infamous Maniac (1980), Nightmare USA is surprisingly and endearingly warmhearted.

San Francisco Bay Guardian | Johnny Ray Huston | 01-23-2008 | Nonfiction

Tags: Nightmare USA: The Untold Story of the Exploitation Independents, Stephen Thrower, Nonfiction Reviews

Sorcerer Shows His Magicnew

The 11 tracks feature fluorescent glimmers and surprising melodic nuances signal a major album-of-the-year contender at a time when such claims aren't just Baby New Year gibberish.

San Francisco Bay Guardian | Johnny Ray Huston | 08-29-2007 | Reviews

Tags: White Magic, Sorcerer