Tom Lennon • Freelance Writer: comedy and pop culture

Freelance writer specializing in comedy and the geekier end of the pop culture spectrum.

Latest Stuff

A mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam.

I went to see comedian Robin Ince at Birmingham's Electric Cinema last Thursday. He was performing his new one-man show - Robin Ince vs. the Moral Majority - as part of this year's Birmingham Comedy Festival. The bulk of the show consisted of a vicious yet hilarious attack on the so-called quality press and - in that respect at least - it was not unlike the final season of The Wire, albeit with more punchlines and less drive-by shootings. Ince was on remarkably good form and I've written a glowing review about it and everything. I'll tell you about that [...]

Deface Value

Seamlessly following on from my previous post, this appeared on The Guardian's Music Blog back in 2007: Opening this Thursday, a new exhibition at London's Art Vinyl gallery, entitled De-Face Value, will showcase hand-painted re-workings of [Phil Collins'] No Jacket Required LP sleeve by artists and musicians... No explanation required.

Arse Gratia Artis

"Art for art's sake Money for God's sake" - 10CC From BBC News: Artist Tracey Emin has said she is thinking of leaving the UK in protest about being overtaxed. In a Sunday Times interview she said she was "very seriously considering leaving Britain," adding: "I'm simply not willing to pay tax at 50%." Far be it for me to undermine your significant cultural significance here, Tracey, but doesn't this behaviour - technically speaking, of course - put you in the same category of artist as, say, Jim Davidson, Paul Daniels or Phil Collins? Phil, as you might remember, was [...]

When Worlds Collide

My wonderful six year-old stepdaughter, Lily, is a currently a big fan of Tom Waits, The Three Amigos and Zac Efron. While I'm naturally proud of her Tom Waits/Three Amigos allegiances (who wouldn't be?), I was always a bit sniffy about the whole Zac Efron thing. I mean, he's the basketball-playing, song-and-dance pretty boy from High School Musical. That sort of thing doesn't really chime with my Uncut Magazine-reading demographic. Tonight I discovered that Zac Efron will be appearing in a Richard Linklater period film called Me and Orson Welles. I'm a massive Orson Welles fan. It looks like the [...]

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