Skip to main content

Posts

Showing posts from February, 2021

"The Muppet Show" Finally Comes to Disney+: Five Episodes to Stream

Muppet fans have been begging Disney to put The Muppet Show on Disney+ since the streaming service started back in 2019. It's finally happening on February 19, when all five seasons will be available to watch! While the first three seasons got DVD releases when I was a kid, the final two seasons have never been officially released until now, so it's very exciting ("officially" is doing a lot of heavy lifting in that season).  To many fans, the variety series which originally aired from 1975-81 remains the high point of the franchise, which has since grown to include numerous feature films, specials, other TV shows (including the not very good Muppets Now ), internet videos, and much more. I'm sure there are folks out there who know of Kermit, Miss Piggy, and the rest, but aren't really sure why they are famous. The answer to that question is The Muppet Show - the wacky brilliance of Jerry Juhl's writing combined with Jim Henson and Frank Oz and Jerry Nel

"My Mind Turns Your Life Into Folklore": Why Taylor Swift's "Gold Rush" Is a Song About Songwriting

"My mind turns your life into folklore." That line, from the song "Gold Rush," is the only time the word "folklore" is spoken on either of Taylor Swift's 2020 records, Folklore and Evermore , the latter of which is where the song appears. The presence of the line indicates that "Gold Rush" is a pivotal song not only in Swift's lockdown duology, but in her maturation as a songwriter.  Swift's early albums often drew heavily from her own experiences, with fans and the media scouring her lyrics for clues as to which ex-boyfriend her numerous breakup songs referred. Her tumultuous dating life made as many headlines as her music, in part because it informed so much of the music. The discourse was often ridiculous and reductive, and thankfully, that period of her career is over (Swift has been in a relationship with the actor Joe Alwyn since 2016).  Both of her 2020 albums have their fair share of autobiographical songs, but they also see