Journalist, Author & Syndicated Columnist
“See You in My 19th Life” delves into reincarnation. And as it does so, it drives home the point that even if you are assured of living more than one life, what’s important is that you live your best life, rather than muddling through and wasting time.
It is midnight in Seoul when Shownu and Hyungwon log on for our Zoom interview. Despite the late hour – which they chose, rather than asking western media to stay up late for them – the two members of the South Korean group Monsta X show no signs of fatigue. They are dressed in immaculate white T-shirts and easily riff off each other as they share their views about their music and life in general.
What follows is not only the story of Korean popular music, and how it birthed the K-pop business, but also how a small peninsula nation learned how to make art in the face of colonialism and political change, culled sonics from all corners of the globe, and keeps striving to find new ways of distilling the purest, most thrilling aspects of the human experience into four-minute packages of pop revelation.
For her upcoming novel “The Apology” (Little, Brown and Company) – which releases on Aug. 1 – Jimin Han culled on years of memories for parts of her book. “I’ve had fragments of it written out on my laptop for years but never knew what to do with them,” said Han, who resides with her family outside of New York City.
Playing Lollapalooza, recording with their friend Suga, and finishing their next album — The Rose are enjoying it all. My exclusive interview for Rolling Stone magazine.
I’m not an influencer by any means and I’m not a celebrity. But I have dealt with trolls, starting from the days when they had to mail their vitriol through the USPS — all the way through present day, when haters can harangue you nonstop on social media.
“Celebrity” tackles the ‘dark side’ of social media. When haters are anonymous, they’re emboldened to be cruel.
In the Netflix series “XO, Kitty” – which has been renewed for a second season – Peter Thurnwald plays the role of a high school teacher who happens to be a Korean adoptee who grew up in Australia. In real life, Thurnwald also was adopted from South Korea to Australian parents.
“Agency” tackles the old boys’ club. It also addresses the expectations placed on women at work and at home.
“The first show I did with the Go-Go’s was in 1978 at a legendary punk club called the Masque,” Belinda Carlisle said from her Mexico City home. “We played three songs – well, one song actually twice. The stage was about 12 inches off the ground. It was packed with kids. When we started in ’77, the punk scene (in Los Angeles) was small, but it grew really quickly. Everybody knew each other and was very supportive.”