The Two Weirdest Years in Music |
There is a moment in musical history, at the end of the '80s and the beginning of the '90s, that is not quite the former and not yet the latter. A formless, colorless span of time whose music can't be lumped in with the peppy, preppy pop and rock of the Reagan era nor the groundbreaking indie, R&B, and hip-hop of the Clinton years, and is thus in danger of being forgotten. It's not even a span of time as much as a silver. A slice: two or three strange years as one era evolved into another. This Slice is fizzy and sweet and ultimately not satisfying. It is the Diet Slice. The Diet Slice gets its name from the low-calorie version of Slice, a popular soft drink of the time which set itself apart from its shelf-mates by claiming to be somewhat natural; its can crowed "with 10% real juice," later downgraded to "contains real juice," and although I eventually stopped paying attention, I bet toward the end it was more like "is technically a liquid." As a beverage, it was refreshing and indistinct. Like the music of the time, you would consume it if it were there, but you are never thirsty for it. |
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| The Land Beyond the Drug War |
Fentanyl changed everything, Brandon told us. "I remember in the beginning, when it first started, it was super strong—up and down," he said. "People were dyin' like a motherfucker." Fentanyl powder is cropping up more and more, and Brandon mentioned his brother was injecting it for a stint. He thought that was crazy. Methamphetamine use has grown in tandem with opiates in the Northwest since 2019, according to urinalysis data from Millennium Health, a lab that as of late 2022 found that close to 60 percent of people coming up for fent in Oregon also test positive for meth. Every state and every town in this country has a fentanyl problem, because for distributors, fentanyl is one hell of a product. It's potent—up to fifty times stronger than heroin—so they can pack more highs per square inch into the back of a truck. It's cooked up in a lab with synthetic materials, so there are none of the agricultural headaches of opium poppies. All this makes fentanyl cheap and dangerous because the syndicates manufacturing it on an industrial scale south of the border aren't pharmaceutical companies, and they're creating highly inconsistent batches, sometimes pill to pill. One might be an 8 out of 10, another a 4, and they're often pressed blue with "M30" on the side to look like oxycodone (though few are under the illusion they're using anything other than fent). People have been dying all over, from West Virginia to Maine to New Mexico. It's more than fifty years on from our declaration of a war on narcotics, and people are getting higher on more destructive shit than ever. |
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Five Fits With: Dave 1 of Chromeo, aka David Macklovitch |
I met Dave Macklovitch—otherwise known as Dave 1, one half of Chromeo—about five years ago. I was photographing him and his brother, Alain Macklovitch—who also has an alias: A-Trak—at home in Los Angeles for Grailed. If you've seen photos of Dave, you know his style hasn't changed, well…pretty much ever. That consistency is rare and special. It's yet another entry into this index of style we call Five Fits With, once again expanding the boundaries of who and what we feature. In 2002, Macklovitch moved to New York on a French literature PhD scholarship at Columbia, which required him to also teach. At the same time, he started Chromeo with his childhood best friend, P-Thugg. During his time teaching and studying, they recorded three Chromeo albums—in 2004, '07, and '10—after which he felt burnt out. "I really didn't want to let go of academia because I really felt that it was my calling, but it became impossible for my health," reflects Macklovitch. "I chose music because it's authentic to who I am. It's funny but also super nerdy and serious, which is how I operate all the time. And I make music with my best friend from childhood. There's something that's pure about that and I wanted to celebrate that. I was like, 'Let's do this, P.' We went ahead and have been doing this full-time ever since." Below, Dave and I discuss the early influences on his sense of style, maxing out his daily ATM limit to buy a Dior Homme suit in cash, the power in finding a uniform, and plenty of other topics. |
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The Secrets That Split My Family in Half |
America was a year into its deepest economic fallout since the Great Depression. As most of my classmates watched their futures collapse, I had accepted an offer from a prestigious management-consulting firm. I worked as a business technology analyst, specializing in information management. I couldn't explain to Mummy, Papa, or my brother Yush what this title meant or what my job entailed, though, because I myself had little idea. Six months earlier, to celebrate that new job at the consulting firm, I planned a ten-day vacation to Prague, which I paid for with my signing bonus. A few weeks before the trip, I called to review my schedule with Papa over the phone. Instead, we fought. Then I did something I'd never done before: I hung up on him. It felt forbidden and scary. Good Indian Girls did not hang up on their fathers. Mummy called the next morning to say that Papa was up all night, really hurting, and said that I didn't respect him and that if he couldn't be a father to me then he would have to cut me out of his life. I didn't understand where any of this was coming from. |
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Is This a Taco Bell Party or Am I Having an Existential Crisis? |
There is not much that will get me out of my house on a Tuesday night, and there is even less that will get me out of my house and into a party at a club in Hollywood. But this was no ordinary Tuesday, and this was no ordinary party; this was the launch of Taco Bell's new menu item the Grilled Cheese Dipping Taco, dropping this Thursday at locations nationwide. I get that kind of invitation, and I shine up my Hollywood shoes, I reserve an Uber, and I go. You would, too. The invitation came from a guy named Rene Pisciotti, and what I am going to tell you about Rene Pisciotti around 75 words from now is going to blow your mind. I met Rene a couple of months ago, when Taco Bell did a collaboration with Yeastie Boys, a popular Los Angeles bagel-based food truck. Rene was working the line, handing out bottled waters to ease the long wait in the hot Valley sun, and because we are both talkers, we struck up a conversation. He was wearing a very official-looking apron, so I asked if he was one of the Yeastie Boys, and he said, "I'm the head chef of Taco Bell," and then everything sort of went blurry and white for a moment as a choir of angels sang. |
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How Does Jake Tapper Find Time to Write So Many Books? |
Jake Tapper was bellied up to the bar at his good friend Jimmy Kimmel's Idaho lodge with the late-night host and another pal, P.J. Clapp, aka Johnny Knoxville, shooting the shit. Tapper noticed that all around them were images of Evel Knievel. There were posters, an Evel-themed pinball machine, an autographed picture of his Rolling Stone cover, and, hanging above the urinal in the men's room, a New York Daily News cover from 1974 touting Knievel's failed attempt to jump Snake River Canyon. Kind of weird, he thought. Of course, Tapper knew about Knievel—a motorcycle-riding daredevil who'd made a living jumping over stuff, often unsuccessfully—but he didn't share in the fandom. So he turned to the pair and asked: "What gives?" Kimmel urged Tapper to see the documentary Clapp had made about Knievel, who died in 2007, called Being Evel. And then the two friends regaled Tapper with stories about the man. Now, Knievel is a character in Tapper's latest novel, All The Demons Are Here, the third installment in his series about Senator Charlie Marder and his family. The conversation in Idaho happened two years ago. That means Tapper—who hosts CNN's The Lead with Jake Tapper five days a week, co-hosts State of the Union every Sunday, tweets prolifically, writes nonfiction books, and raises two teenage kids with his wife—researched and wrote a 336-page novel in 24 months. How the hell did he do it? |
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