Articles by Jeff Spevak

As culture continues its inexorable downward slide, the value of the well-written word escalates: A clever turn of phrase can find a place in your heart: And it beats forever. I’ve spent four decades telling the stories of people, bands, cities and essential home furnishings such as the Ottoman, with grace and humor. I can do that for you.

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Jeff Spevak has written 131 articles for AdTalk

Jeff Spevak

The Critical Mass

I read The Sunday New York Times, so you don’t have to: May 13 At 4:33 a.m., I heard the familiar coat-hanger-suspended muffler of my delivery guy creeping down the street, then the satisfying, heavy slap on the front stoop: The New York Times had arrived. And following a few weeks of time-consuming chaos that [...]

The Critical Mass

The planet Mercury is too damn hot for writers Three hours isn’t long, after you’ve spent two years wrestling and cajoling a project into shape. It had been two years since I first sat down with an old sailor – Ernie Coleman was 93 at the time – talking about his life, then taking his [...]

The Critical Mass

Finally: It’s my first book, “Chasing the Wind” People – Mom, that’s you – have been asking me, “When are you gonna write a book?” OK, I’ve got one. It’s probably not what most folks familiar with my writing were expecting. That novel of an evil jazz band in a dystopian world is half finished. [...]

The Critical Mass

I read The Sunday New York Times, so you don’t have to: April 22 Today’s coffee, a simple Colombian. First music of the day: Townes Van Zandt’s At the Window, on vinyl acquired yesterday at National Record Store Day. 1, “Vast Mexico Bribery Case Hushed up by Wal-Mart After Top-Level Struggle,” is the lead story [...]

The Critical Mass

Low-effort thinking in the 21st century Al Franken’s re-election campaign has just introduced high-level satire of the first order. Franken, the former comedian, now serious senator, retains a sense of satire as dangerously sharp as David Sedaris swinging a scythe at a church picnic. “Hello, I’m Woman Picking Out Fruit In Supermarket,” read an e-mail [...]

The Critical Mass

I read The Sunday New York Times, so you don’t have to: April 15 Today’s coffee is the last of the Mexican Oaxaca. Sigh. First music of the day: The late jazz drummer Paul Motian’s Flux and Change. 1, “White House Opens Door to Big Donors, and Lobbyists Slip in,” is the lead story today. [...]

The Critical Mass

Grandma Spevak’s ghosts Grandma Spevak’s house on Wheelock Avenue had a few ghosts in it. Not in any poltergeist sense, but in the way that long-gone, often unknown relatives lingered on the walls, and in the conversations among the adults. I remember hanging on one of the walls was an old, oval-shaped portrait – I [...]

The Critical Mass

Dr. Strangelove and the 1 Percenters For those of us who believe that Dr. Strangelove: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb is one of the finest films of all time, this week’s news out of Salina, Kan., is further proof that truth mimics fiction: Tucked deep beneath the Kansas prairie, luxury [...]

The Critical Mass

The irony of Dick Cheney and the Affordable Health Care law So…. Dick Cheney does have a heart. The former vice president received a heart transplant last week. Let’s set aside all of the ill feelings that he seemed to revel in creating when he was Bush’s right-hand man and wish him a successful recovery. [...]

The Critical Mass

I read The Sunday New York Times, so you don’t have to: March 25 This morning’s coffee is Mexican Oaxaca, imported last week from Austin. Is that a hint of vanilla? First music of the day: A three-CD set of Townes Van Zandt. 1, Last fall at Ruidoso Downs Race Track in New Mexico, “a [...]

The Critical Mass

SXSW: Where’s my Springsteen and Veg-Head Nachos? At this stage in my life, I avoid standing in lines. If you’re not Bobby Flay, last week that meant hanging with 5,000 people at 9:30 in the morning outside of Stubbs’ BBQ in Austin, Texas. Somehow, one of the biggest events of the South by Southwest Music [...]

The Critical Mass

Live at SXSW: On line with the homeless You bump into all kinds of interesting people at the South by Southwest Music Conference, in Austin Texas. Yesterday, it was Thomas Dolby. Dolby…? Dolby…? Yes, the fellow with the huge ’80s MTV hit “She Blinded Me With Science.” I had just stepped out of a club [...]

The Critical Mass

I read The Sunday New York Times, so you don’t have to: March 11 The coffee is the last of the Guatemalan. First music of the day: This One’s For Him: A Tribute to Guy Clark. My friend Jed gave me this great, great record. Thirty great Clark songs (”L.A. Freeway,” “”Worry B. Gone” and [...]

The Critical Mass

Andrew Breitbart and the party of family-friendly, neo-Nazis A 64-year-old insurance salesman who organizes family-friendly, neo-Nazi events around Adolph Hitler’s birthday is running for a seat in Illinois’ 3rd Congressional district. Arthur Jones of Lyons, Ill., said last week that the “Holocaust never happened.” “As far as I’m concerned, the Holocaust is nothing more than [...]

The Critical Mass

Something for the 1 Percenters to think about A woman was talking on her cell phone as she got on the bus this morning. “I CAN’T BE THERE,” she said in that phone-bellowing voice that I guess I’m supposed to pretend I can’t hear. “I’LL BE OUT DRINKING FRIDAY NIGHT.” She sat down heavily a [...]

The Critical Mass

I read The Sunday New York Times, so you don’t have to: March 4 I’m in a rut. For the third Sunday in a row, today’s coffee is Guatemalan. It’s a good rut. And I’m listening to The Monkees. 1, This tune sounds familiar. A Middle Eastern country is trying to acquire nuclear weapons. We [...]

The Critical Mass

I read The Sunday New York Times, so you don’t have to: Feb. 26 Today’s coffee is, once again, Guatemalan. First music of the day: The elegant Massachusetts indie-rock band Winterpills. 1, Perhaps you remember the 2010 State of the Union address, when Barack Obama castigated the Supreme Court for the Citizens United ruling that [...]

The Critical Mass

The morning walk It snowed last night, a rare event here this winter. My hearty congratulations to the coal industry, and the inventors of the internal combustion engine, for keeping our streets eerily clear. This latest snowfall wasn’t much, just an inch. Enough for the 80-pound Weimaraner Abilene to pull me like a sled down [...]

The Critical Mass

I read The Sunday New York Times, so you don’t have to: Feb. 19 The coffee is Guatemalan. First music of the day: English folk singer Michael Weston King. I saw him last night at a house concert. 1, Concerns that gas prices might hit $4 a gallon could become a campaign issue as Republicans [...]

The Critical Mass

Dead Skunk in the middle of the 21st century Loudon Wainwright III was nearing the end of his show when someone in the audience shouted out a request: “Dead Skunk!” “I need more money for ‘Dead Skunk,’ ” Wainwright said, shaking his head with mock disapproval. No, he rarely plays his novelty hit from 1972, [...]

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