The perception of Muslims in the media, the Colorado River tops the list of endangered rivers, new music from Calexico, Tal National and Spirit Family Reunion.
How Muslim Americans are portrayed in the media
A judge in North Carolina on Monday ruled that Craig Stephen Hicks can face the death penalty.
Hicks is accused of fatally shooting three young people two months ago near the University of North Carolina Chapel Hill. The victims were Muslim and their families are adamant that they were targeted because of their religion.
News coverage of the incident raised questions about how Islam is portrayed in the media.
Joining the conversation on how we talk about Muslim Americans is Ani Zonneveld, founder and president of Muslims for Progressive Values, Mustafa Umar, director of education and outreach at the Islamic Institute of Orange County and Ali Haider Mir, former director of Muslim Student Life at the University of Southern California.
Colorado River tops list of America's Endangered Rivers
Sinjin Eberle with the Colorado Basin speaks about a report that declares the Colorado River is the most endangered in the country.
Metro Water District to consider cuts in Southern California
Due to the ongoing drought and dwindling water sources, the agency that provides drinking water to nearly 19 million people in Southern California is considering rationing the supply to local districts.
Metropolitan Water District of Southern California, a consortium of 26 cities and water districts, could decide at its board meeting next week to put in place the cuts, pending a vote.
The new plan would go into effect in July.
For more, Take Two is joined by Brandon Goshi, Metropolitan’s manager of water policy and strategy.
Tuesday Reviewsday: Calexico, Tal National and Spirit Family Reunion
This week on Tuesday Reviewsday, music journalist
joins Alex Cohen in the studio to talk about the best in new music releases.
Steve Hochman
Artist: Calexico
Album: "Edge of the Sun"
Songs: "Falling From the Sky," "Cumbia de Donde"
Notes: Not long ago we talked about Mariachi El Bronx, the L.A. punks who had embraced mariachi music right down to the outfits. Well, Calexico doesn’t go in for the sartorial touches so much, but for much of its 20-year existence, the Tucson group has mixed ace alt-Americana with Mexican-style street-band horns for one of the most distinctive, winning sounds in modern rock. It’s never been a gimmick, but on the new "Edge of the Sun," the elements are integrated into a bracing, sun-bleached sound. "Falling From the Sky," for example, with its combination of yearning and desolation, would be a compelling song even without the horns. With them, even rather subtly utilized, it becomes a compelling mix of worlds, and of tones both happy and sad — straddling borders artistically and emotionally as much as the band name suggests it geographically.
"Edge of the Sun" is, in fact, the band’s most border-straddling album yet. Singer-guitarist Joey Burns and drummer John Convertino, the founding and core members, here supplement their regular cohorts with guest appearances by Iron & Wine's Sam Beam, Band of Horses' Ben Bridwell, Neko Case, L.A.'s Gaby Moreno, Baja California-born singer-songwriter Carla Morrison and even Greek folk instrumental group Takim.
And there was literal border-crossing, with most of the album having been written in Mexico City and production taking place at home in Arizona. The Latin American influence is particularly strong on "Cumbia de Donde," a new take on a traditional style featuring Carla Morrison. Heck, the song's title is about being between places, the lyrics about being on the way somewhere, a bit lost. But it's all about the journey, and Calexico is a perfect soundtrack.
Calexico will be at the Regent Theatre in downtown Los Angeles on July 7.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?t=21&v=mGLy6Vb0jwQ
Artist: Tal National
Album: "Zoy Zoy"
Songs: "Claire," "Tenere"
Notes: A stamp on the back cover of Zoy Zoy, the new album by the band Tal National, reads "Recorded in Niamey, Niger, W. Africa." It is an indicator of authenticity, but also one of resolute determination — a we-are-still-here statement.
And with it is another The radical religious factions that tried to ban music in Mali and surrounding Saharan seems to have failed. Recent months have seen a rush of powerful new music from that region. Debuts from young Malian acts Songhoy Blues and the Bamako's BKO Quintet offer innovative, spirited twists on tradition. And Tal National, from neighboring Niger, brings a fiery dynamic to desert blues. Zoy Zoy, the title referencing something very sweet, is only the second Tal National album released outside of Niger, culminating a decade of the band gigging constantly, crisscrossing the country, often on dirt roads (at best) to play sets stretching more than five hours through the nights.
While Tal National's music rocks and swings with electric edge, it draws on a number of Saharan styles. Many of the songs are in the tradition of West African troubadours recounting tales of life and love, lyrics divided between the local Zarma and Hausa languages. The title song is about a young married woman grappling with physical changes after giving birth, while "Claire" (in Zarma) pays tribute to a group of the band's young female fans.
Throughout the music is a sense of history, culture and attendant fortitude, befitting a band whose leader, known only as Almeida, has served as a judge for more than 20 years. That's all captured powerfully in the song "Tenere," a Hausa-language commemoration of a tree in the desert that for generations had served as a landmark for nomad caravans until it was destroyed by a wayward truck driver. Now it’s been replaced by a metal sculpture, a monument to resilience. That's exactly what Tal National is as well.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SVf_0GQFPS4
Artist: Spirit Family Reunion
Album: "Hands Together"
Songs: "Put Your Hands Together When You Spin the Wheel," "Skillet Good and Greasy"
Notes: Coney Island may not seem like a natural home for folk music. But Woody Guthrie lived there for a few years, and if it was good enough for him, it's good enough for Spirit Family Reunion. For its new album, the New York band found that perfect old-timey vibe in a makeshift studio set up somewhere between the Cyclone roller coaster and the Nathan’s Famous Hot Dogs stands.
Well, there is some roller-coaster rush and a good deal of hot-doggin’ with the banjo-and-washboard hoedowns behind the folk-gospel tunes and harmonies, chops they built busking the subway and farmers markets, as well as the festival circuit right up to the top, having been a buzz act at the Newport Folk Festival a couple of years ago.
Now, there’s a built-in hokeyness to the whole thing, vintage and rural affectations in the performances and thrift-store attire — the kind of stuff we’ve seen and heard with Old Crow Medicine Show and others of recent, uh, vintage. Of course, there's also some tradition in that, back 50-plus years to the oh-so-earnest Greenwich Village folk scene. And now, as then, there's a fine line between folk and faux. Fauxlk, if you will. What keeps Spirit Family Reunion on the right side of the line is, well, the spirit. But more importantly the songwriting, while sounding authentic enough in places to pass as the real thing, though all except one song here are band originals, has a currency to it. The songs "It Don't Bother Me" and "Put Your Hands Together When You Spin the Wheel" are almost Zen in their outlook.
It helps a lot that guitarist-singer Nick Panken doesn't affect a fake drawl or anything. Even Maggie Carson's banjo doesn't overdo it with devotional Earl Scruggsisms. And when they do tackle a traditional song with "Skillet Good and Greasy" (which may not be entirely about cuisine), they add a gritty, urban blues touch, just as it's done deep in the ol' Coney Island hollers.
LA's environment report card shows average results
Los Angeles' new environmental report card is out, and the results showed average results.
Researchers at UCLA spent two years assessing L.A.'s sustainability efforts in key areas such as energy conservation and air quality.
Mark Gold, acting director of the Institute of the Environment and Sustainability at UCLA where the study was conducted, joins Take Two.
LA County Supervisors to vote on housing for former prisoners
A roof over one's head is a basic necessity for all of us. Yet for prisoners returning to the outside world, access to affordable public housing can be a real challenge in Los Angeles.
But this could soon change, thanks in part to a vote happening at the L.A. County Board of Supervisors on Tuesday.
Susan Burton, founder and Executive Director of A New Way of Life Re-entry Project, joins Take Two.
Death Cab for Cutie's Ben Gibbard tells why he sort of hates LA
The band Death Cab for Cutie got its start in Bellingham, Washington in the late 1990s, but their new album, "Kintsugi," reflects all of the time they spent in Southern California.
Singer Ben Gibbard recently sat down with Alex Cohen at KPCC's studios to talk about the new album. Below is an edited version of their conversation.
To begin by talking about the name of this album, "Kintsugi," which refers to a Japanese art form, can you explain it to us? What is it?
"It's a Japanese technique of repairing broken ceramics... Normally when we repair things in the West we want them to look exactly like they did before they were broken, but in this technique actual gold is infused into the enamel and then used to kind of fill all of the cracks and fix the item... The damage is visible, but it's also very beautiful."
How did you find out about this particular art form?
"It was something that Nick Harmer, our bass player, brought to our attention and immediately we all really related to it and thought it was a really beautiful thing... A lot of people have assumed that the title's meant to refer to our guitar player Chris Walla leaving the band, which is not the case at all...
The term really connected with me because I feel in some ways that's what I've been trying to do as a songwriter all these years, is to take the... broken pieces of the situation or relationship or friendship or whatever and kind of reconstruct them in a way that is... not in keeping with their true form, but hopefully make something beautiful out of it."
What for you artistically speaks out about embracing the fractures and the breaks, I guess, and you could say making a show of them so to speak?
"I think just aesthetically, when it comes to music it is very easy now to make everything sound perfect. You know, the drummer can play the drums. One pass through the song and you can ostensibly construct a perfect take. You know, I think what pop music has kind of turned into, at least in some ways, is it's somewhat human and recognizable, but it also has very little soul to it. And I think that it's one of the many appeals of someone like Jack White and all of the work that he's been doing over the last 15 years."
Even if "Kintsugi" isn't about your relationship with former band member Chris Walla, he was with the band for 17 years or so, I would imagine there's got to be some thought about identity and reforming. Where are you at on that front?
"The band will never be the same without Chris in it. And whether or not that... will be a death knell or will be a rebirth is to be determined in the music that we make from this point out... And these kind of founding member leaving a band situations always have one of two outcomes. There's outcome one, where founding member leaves, the band is never the same, they're terrible, they break up a year later.
And then there's a band like Wilco.
There are bands that... already have a fairly kind of wide skill set, but when they bring in new players and new ideas... the music kind of goes to another level and becomes something that is still very much of the band, but is something new and exciting. And that's what we're going for. That's the idea, of course."
What did you think of L.A. when you first came here?
"I really didn't like it... I think the vastness of the sprawl and the grid, it makes me very nervous. This just isn't my home... Whether it's this song that I wrote when I was 24 about how much I hated Los Angeles [ED NOTE: "Why You'd Want to Live Here" ] or some of the songs on the new record... that Los Angeles is very much a character in, I'm older now to kind of recognize the grey area between good and bad...
But I mean, I have to say, California continues to be an incredibly inspiring place and it's interesting to me for so many reasons. I mean, certainly in Los Angeles, there are very few other places in this country that have such immense wealth and such destitute poverty living right next to each other. There is so much success and so much failure. And I think that's what keeps me coming back to it as a character for a subject for song, because there's so much beautiful contradiction... And I think that's why so many people write about it and so many people come live here and immerse themselves in it because it's an unknowable place."