Sorry, bro
We got a number of comments on Lee DeVito's review of DJ Jamie xx's show at the Majestic Theatre last week, which featured a photo of attendees he characterized as "bros." Reader Graham Kahuna Parks wrote:
Alright, so let's talk about this. My name is Graham, and I'm the kid on the left that you're calling a bro, and this little review you did offends me on a personal level. I go to these shows for the music. Purely for the music. I don't go to pop Molly (although every "hipster" type that you're talking about was gumming both MDMA and coke out of dime bags during the entirety of the show), I don't go to fist-pump or headbang, and I certainly don't go to hit on girls like you see from the actual bro-types at festivals and headliners alike. I go for the music, because it's what I love. I've been listening to the xx since their self-titled album, and subsequently started following Jamie on his solo venture after hearing We're New Here with Gil Scott-Heron. Once he dropped In Colour, I was listening to the album in its entirety at least once or twice a day while working.
So for you to come out and call me a bro — going to this show to only rave to those "club bangers" that you assume I've heard once before and not to appreciate the wonderful production and effort that he's put into his music — is kind of an attack on my own integrity as a consumer of these tunes. Sure, the music industry is becoming overhyped and even "underground" shows such as this are becoming more and more saturated with people that are there not for the artist or their skill, but as an excuse to take Schedule I drugs and get trashed with their buddies. However, there are those of us that still go in order to appreciate the music of the artists we love, regardless of whether or not we fit into your "hipster aesthetic."
Don't call us Delray
Michael Jackman's profile on "Delray's best-kept secret," Carbon Athletics Club, continues to get comments. One reader who grew up in the area sent an email saying that the CAC does not, in fact, reside in Delray:
I recently read your article on the Carbon Athletics Club and would like to add my two cents. First, let me say I was raised in the neighborhood around the CAC. Our family lived on Barron Street. That area was known as Carbon Works — to call us Delray would have meant fighting words. I know we fought the Delray boys in the early '70s. The tracks [that] border I-75 [were] the dividing line. We went to different schools than Delray kids, and walked the couple of miles to Wilson Jr. High by Springwells and West Vernor. Wilson Jr. High was probably the coolest school in the city during the '60s and early '70s, and just held their annual reunion.
Also, there were a few Mexican and Cuban families that lived in Carbon Works. My brother (a Vietnam vet, two tours) painted that cannon originally. There was a pig slaughterhouse across the field on Barron, which stunk every summer. National Guard troops drove through our hood during the riots. The grown-ups formed a militia during the riots, but 12th Street seemed like a world away from our little enclave. During the snowstorm of 1965 (us old-timers remember that one), all of Carbon Works turned out to shovel the streets. No, we are not Delray, although there was a lot of shopping in Delray, and that's where we went to the barbershop. I wish people knew how good it was to grow up there, with the melting pot of nationalities that lived in "Delray Heights." During the '60s the streets weren't paved. Gravel roads — it was like a time warp, more like the '40s. The sheeny man still used a horse and flatbed to pick scrap in our alleys. We had a store called the Carbon Huddle — a football reference — where you could get a hot chocolate for 15 cents. I picked up the Hungarian and Polish words there. I could go on and on, but what's the use? Like the article, maybe you could do one on Wilson Jr. High, cool school. (Sorry for the spelling, DPS gave us kids from the '60s enough education to work in the factories, mills, and foundries.)
Poo-pooing on Planned Parenthood
In his Aug. 5 column, Jack Lessenberry wrote about the Center for Medical Progress' attempt to smear Planned Parenthood with a distorted video suggesting they were "harvesting" and selling fetal tissue. Reader "Harry Palmer" wrote:
Just another example of what happens when you elect tea partyers/right wing extremists to office.
And it's hard to believe there are that many people falling for this "O'Keefe"-style fraud (and a myriad of other bullshit, from Birtherism to Benghazi) to elect clowns like Cruz, Paul, et al.
Reader "Bob Connely" wrote:
It seems sad (and despicable) that the dead lion gets more airtime on the networks than do the facts of this story. Thanks for the reporting, Jack.
