Bowie in Japan, 1977. Editor’s note: This piece was originally published three years ago, prior to the release of David Bowie’s 2013 album, The Next Day. I very rarely have felt like a rock artist,” David Bowie used to say. “I’ve got nothing to do with music.” More than 40 years on, we see now he was dissembling on both counts. But as with any great act of self-creation, there was an element of truth in the obfuscation, and the roles he was playing in addition—some species of musical-­theater provocateur, a high-art celebrity indulging in a low-art mechanism, a transgressive social poet manipulating a pop-cultural moment—seem plain.

David Sedaris. Around this time 31 years ago, David Sedaris was working as a Christmas elf at a New York City Macy’s; 28 years ago, he read his story about the experience on NPR’s Morning Edition, and it changed his life. This holiday season, Sedaris has released The Best of Me, a greatest-hits collection that includes that story as well as many others from his career as the most prominent humorist of a generation.

Dead to Me You Don’t Have To Season 2 Episode 6 Editor’s Rating 5 stars ***** «Previous Next» « PreviousEpisode NextEpisode » Dead to Me You Don’t Have To Season 2 Episode 6 Editor’s Rating 5 stars ***** «Previous Next» « PreviousEpisode NextEpisode » There’s so much joy in the final scenes of this episode that it almost doesn’t look like Dead to Me.

Death and Other Details Rare/Sordid Season 1 Episodes 1 - 2 Editor’s Rating 3 stars *** Death and Other Details Rare/Sordid Season 1 Episodes 1 - 2 Editor’s Rating 3 stars *** Not to be dramatic or anything, but cruises are actual hell on earth. Like, Cruise People, what are you doing with your lives? Paying money to have someone send you off to the middle of the ocean — its own separate hellscape of unknown mysteries — on an unnaturally large boat with thousands of strangers where you are forced to play bingo and manhandle food from shared buffets and listen to the same playlist of music over and over and over again no matter what “club” you go to that night?

She chose lung health. Did you know that there’s a missing vape in Rio de Janeiro? Lana Del Rey recently performed a full concert set for the first time in over three years as the headliner of the MITA Festival in Rio, where fans were treated to both the live debut of songs from her new album Did You Know That There’s a Tunnel Under Ocean Blvd and Del Rey’s onstage banter.

Digable Planets will return to Earth for a reunion tour (and yes, that is a pun on both “digable” and “planets”). The band teased a reunion tour at their New Year’s Eve shows in Seattle, and today, they have announced a summer tour for July and August with 13 dates so far, including the previously announced Sasquatch and Pitchfork festivals. Snatch your tickets up now, while the planets are aligned in your favor.

Last week, the Transformers Hall of Fame — which is, believe it or not, a real thing — inducted two fictional robots, but only one human: a 60-year-old Los Angeles resident named Stan Bush. When the emcee uttered that human’s name, cheers and applause erupted from the throngs of Transformers fans in the audience at the Pasadena Convention Center. Bush was brought on stage and he wore a grin of elation and surprise.

In Monica Heisey’s new piece in The Guardian about Amy Schumer and her insanely good year, the writer praises Schumer’s unapologetic feminist stances, but also criticizes the comedian for racial insensitivity: For such a keen observer of social norms and an effective satirist of the ways gender is complicated by them, Schumer has a shockingly large blind spot around race. Her lacklustre stint hosting the MTV Movie awards (a rare misstep) featured lazy jokes about Latina women being “crazy” that left Jennifer Lopez as unimpressed as the online commentariat.

Emily In Paris Bon Anniversaire! Season 2 Episode 3 Editor’s Rating 4 stars **** «Previous Next» « PreviousEpisode NextEpisode » Emily In Paris Bon Anniversaire! Season 2 Episode 3 Editor’s Rating 4 stars **** «Previous Next» « PreviousEpisode NextEpisode » Technically, this episode is about Emily’s birthday, but I choose to believe it was, in fact, a present to moi.

Did that ice scraper in the snow look familiar to you? Last night’s episode of FX’s Fargo began in 1987, when a young Stavros and his family run out of gas along the side of the road. He asks God for help and then spots a lone red ice scraper standing in the snow. Beneath it, he finds a briefcase that by then we know is filled with exactly $920,000 in cash.