On 11 August 1973 an 18-year-old DJ Kool Herc (aka Clive Campbell) performed at his sister Cindy Campbell’s back-to-school party in the rec room of their apartment building located at 1520 Sedgwick Avenue in the South Bronx. That event—where Herc isolated portions of funk tracks, switching between one record and the other (emphasizing the breaks)—is widely accepted as the birth of hip-hop. While Herc is …
When London’s rave scene began in the late ’80s, it ignited a culture around uninhibited style, the Roland TB-303 synthesizer and blissful hedonism. More than wild revelry, the scene—dubbed acid house—became a meeting place for people across genders, sexualities, class and race. That unity is revealed in former The Times editor and photographer Dave Swindells’ book Acid House As It Happened. Swindells, who followed the …
From journalist and beloved cultural critic Evan Ross Katz comes Into Every Generation a Slayer Is Born: How Buffy Staked Our Hearts, a celebration of fandom and a study of one TV show’s continued influence on popular culture. Katz, an avowed Buffy the Vampire Slayer fanatic, speaks to influential figures from the program—including the cast (from Sarah Michelle Gellar to Seth Green), creators and crew. …
