Rock critic Ken Tucker reviews the No Speak record series, all-instrumental albums brought out by the producer Miles Copeland. The artists are Pete Haycock, formerly of the Climax Blues Band, William Orbit, Stewart Copeland, guitarist for the Police and the group Wishbone Ash.
Cartoonist P.S. Mueller. His one-frame, absurdist work appears regularly in alternative newspapers around the country. His new book of cartoons is titled Spread of Terror.
Classical music critic Lloyd Schwartz reviews a reissue featuring the Kolisch Quartett, a little-known but innovative European ensemble that played in the 30s and 40s. They recorded sparingly, but two of their works have just been reissued.
Jan Harold Brunvand explores the urban legend about the skier who stops to relieve herself, slips and breaks her arm. As she's leaving the hospital meets other skiers with broken limbs who say when they saw a woman skiing with her pants down they laughed so hard they lost their balance.
Philippine journalist Ninotchka Rosca. For years, she worked as a journalist in the Philippines. After imprisonment by the Marcos regime, she went into political exile in the United States. She returned to the Philippines just as Marcos was losing power. She recalls that period in a book titled Endgame.
Rock historian Ed Ward profiles The Buzzcocks, a British punk group that had more influence on the British punk scene than better-known bands like The Sex Pistols. The band was based in Manchester and had an even grittier veneer than that of the notorious London punk bands.
Jazz Critic Kevin Whitehead reviews a reissue of a 1964 session featuring pianist Paul Bley. In the early years of his career, Bley worked closely with pianist Charles Mingus and saxophonist Ornette Colemen. Since the 60s, he's led his own small groups.
Author Kate Simon. Simon is best known for her travel books (Kate Simon's Paris, New York: Places and Pleasures) and for her two vivid memoirs of coming of age in the New York City of the 1920s and 30s. The first, Bronx Primitive: Portraits in a Childhood, portrays the immigrant neighborhoods just after World War I. In the second, A Wider World: Portraits in an Adolescence, Simon recalls her tumultuous adolescence as she discovered the world beyond the neighborhoods of her youth.
Television Critic David Bianculli previews the 20th anniversary reunion of "The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour." While the show features some clips from the original programs, it is composed mostly of updated skits featuring comics from including Steve Martin, Leigh French and Pat Paulson. The musicians include Glenn Campbell, John Hartford, Jennifer Warnes and Mason Williams.
Actress Zelda Rubenstein. After being cast as one of the little people in the film "Under the Rainbow," she played the clairvoyant in "Poltergeist." She now stars in the new horror film "Anguish."
Novelist Joseph Heller, author of Catch 22, Something Happened and No Laughing Matter, his 1985 account of being stricken with Guillain-Barre Syndrome, a neurological disease in which the peripheral nervous system is attacked. Within two weeks of the first symptoms, Heller could hardly breathe or swallow. It took him two years to relearn his basic motor functions. Heller's best known work is still his first, Catch 22, a satire of the military bureaucracy and the madness of war.
Banjo and pedal steel guitar player Winnie Winston will perform several pieces. A four-time world champion on the banjo at the country's top bluegrass competition, the Union Grove Old Time Fiddler's Convention in North Carolina, Winston has played with Bill Monroe and the Bluegrass Boys, Dave Bromberg and the late Steve Goodman.
Ken Tucker reviews the home video release of "The Adventures of Tintin," a European comic strip that featured a boy reporter accompanied by a wire-haired terrier. The strip, which first appeared in 1929, captivated children and adults alike, winning the praise of Winston Churchill and Charles DeGaulle. In 1962, the strip was made into animated cartoons by the American producer Charles Shows.
Canadian author Jane Rule, one of the best known and most widely read lesbian writers. Rule is best known for her 1985 novel Desert of the Heart, which was later adapted into the movie "Desert Hearts." Her new book is titled Memory Board.
Exiled South African singer Miriam Makeba. At 20, she became the lead vocalist for a top South African band. And when her performances brought her international acclaim, she used her forum to speak out against Apartheid. She was subsequently banned from her native country, and then later from America for her marriage to the radical Stokely Carmichael. For the past 20 years, she's toured with her mentor, singer Harry Belafonte, and last year she toured with Paul Simon's Graceland Tour.
Autobiographical monologist Spalding Gray. Gray is best known for his monologue "Swimming to Cambodia," about his experiences during the filming of the movie "The Killing Fields." "Swimming to Cambodia" was produced as a film last year, and Gray appeared in the David Byrne film "True Stories," as well as a recent installment of the PBS comedy series "Trying Times." Gray is wrapping up a 10-month residency at the Mark Tapper Forum in Los Angeles where he worked on several new monologues.
