My man @charleshughes2.bsky.social writes up some of his favorite cuts from the late Jimmy Cliff. Fantastic close listening here at No Fences Review.

I see this every day — real rural Arizonans, meaning those of us actually living full time in food-medical-service desert rural Arizona, bear no resemblance to popular portrayals. Like…none.

Those $300 yeti coolers and ford 350s erasing whole counties that dont have a grocwry store but got 6 dollar generals

This is so true and is part of why works like, say, Kingsolver’s Demon Copperhead, or the novels of Jesmyn Ward or the late Daniel Woodrell have struck me so powerfully—they not only depict but value whole rural, working class worlds that most art, including most country music, overlooks entirely

credit to NYT for not sanewashing the appalling bigotry we saw today in the WH "Even for Mr. Trump — who has a long history of insulting Black people, particularly those from African countries — his outburst was shocking in its unapologetic bigotry."

thread of newsletters to support on Black Friday (for yourself or get them as a gift and look cool). ppl giving you great stuff when AI slop is trying to beat you down: first: Don’t Rock The Inbox ( @natalieweiner.bsky.social and @marissarmoss.bsky.social) www.dontrocktheinbox.com

Effectively there is no *one* person performing the duties of President of the United States right now. We are in an interregnum with an occupied throne.

for this week’s My Time Back i wrote about Raymond Carver’s short story collection Cathedral. it’s probably my favorite thing i’ve written this year. would love if you took a dive in and read mytimeback.beehiiv.com/p/cathedral?...

Wrote about some of our favorite songs by the late Todd Snider at No Fences Review, w/ @charleshughes2.bsky.social and special guest @jonbern.bsky.social

Movie set where I'm from...

"War is peace. Freedom is slavery. Ignorance is strength"

We are not a serious country, at all.

Once again beating the drum that @manruss.bsky.social is one of our great 21st Century philosophers. Pick up a copy of Thanksgiving from @ahoycomicmags.bsky.social and bring it to dinner next week for when the conversation turns dreadful.

attn: all the people freaking out over jesse welles you can't trust smug; you can't trust galaxy brain tiktok bait maker joe rogan appearing guys. you *can* trust don't rock the inbox to steer you towards all kinds of great country/roots/folk protest music www.dontrocktheinbox.com/put-a-record...

This 2013 parallel history novel has Fox News rebranding as Fox Faith & Freedom News. It also has America becoming an authoritarian Christian theocracy.

For decades, scholars have argued education’s hidden curriculum is about disciplining and socializing children as future workers, and they just….tweeted it out

The Beatles celebrate the thirtieth anniversary of their archival trawl by adding a fourth disc to Anthology. The new Anthology 4 highlights the structural problems with the entire project. My review: sterlewine.substack.com/p/the-beatle...

90 more 1975 country albums worth checking out + 98 more that i take a pass on. Too bad for you Dolly, Tammy and (twice!) Mr. Man in Black. (W/ @charleshughes2.bsky.social at No Fences Review)

Trump calls for Democratic members of Congress to be hanged

Resharing my 22 Best Country Albums of 1975 list. Ahead of Part 2 on its way in a few minutes—accounting for (yikes!) 232 more

Mother Jones has been on fire on the John Roberts beat and, man, I'd love to see our national press pick up this ball. "It’s impossible to imagine today’s crisis without the Roberts court having first undermined the foundations of our democracy." www.motherjones.com/politics/202...

when we talk about efforts to "erase DEI" can we be more precise and say "efforts to re-segregate workplaces and schools"

man we should bring back the pamphlet

LOL. We live in KC, visit St. Louis across the state often, and my wife now uses "like flying to St. Louis" as shorthand for all things that SEEM like they'd save time/effort or be more efficient but in reality... (Instant pots and select-a-size paper towels, for ex's, are like flying to St. Louis)

The primary fascist base is not rural whites. It is your local car dealers.

Alice Wong, a writer and activist who was born with muscular dystrophy and who fought relentlessly for equal rights and access for people with disabilities, died on Friday. She was 51. nyti.ms/4r9WqEr

Have felt, since I read this piece in its moment that Christgau shares below, that he was the critic who really understood Todd Snider. (Or maybe it was just that I felt the same ways... )

I'm very sorry to report that the great alt-country singer-songwriter Todd Snider has died at 59 of undiagnosed walking pneumonia. I stick by what I wrote about him in 2012. www.robertchristgau.com/xg/bn/2012-0... Here's Rolling Stone's coverage. www.rollingstone.com/music/music-...

Todd Snider was sneaky good, among the best songwriters of my lifetime minus the self-seriousness. He abided, like the Dude + laughs + another round. A humanist artist unafraid to mock himself. Also: His "regional leaders of sales" might be the smartest/funniest lyrical punchline I've ever heard.

RIP Todd Snider. Sad for selfish reasons (hoped for decades more great music, shaken when anyone around my age dies) but also because his last days were so troubled. There's a war goin' on that the poor can't win. Sometimes you rise above it, sometimes you sink below.

Hey all, I contributed this entry to editor Josh Glenn's month-long ska tribute, "Skank Your Enthusiasm," at HiLoBrow. www.hilobrow.com/2025/11/15/s...

Give a man a fish and someone with a thousand fishes is going to bitch about people getting free handouts. Teach a man to fish? Yeah, that person with a thousand fishes is going to bitch about that too.

Another terrible and terrifying attack on speech and academic freedom (Though my first thought was that the teaching materials need updating because MAGA's white supremacy ain't been "covert" in a minute)

Busy day today but note the U of Michigan consumer sentiment survey just reported its lowest reading in its 65 year history. Well done Donald!

Rape is the distillation of the far-right worldview that Trump embodies: a gleefully sadistic act of domination carried out as fulfillment of a supposedly natural hierarchy. It would be weird if Trump wasn’t a rapist, given his ideological commitments—which is before you get to all the accusations.

I second that emotion

bumping this; being a parent is not inherently like better or worse than anything else but i still think it's kinda cool that now don't rock the inbox might be the world's only mom-run music newsletter. we'd love to have you as a paying subscriber so we can keep putting out free stuff like this!

New music from Rissi Palmer and Automatic, a tribute to Donna Jean Godchaux-MacKay, Mahalia and Mavis sing "Satisfied Mind" and more. Turn It Up at No Fences Review (w/ @charleshughes2.bsky.social )

Sen. Angus King: “So I said, Let’s try totally caving to Trump.”

Chuck Schumer Helps Pull Democrats Back From Brink Of Courage

US Capitol switchboard 202-224-3121 to express your views on this to your home state Senator.

Kyle Kingsbury is not a journalist. He is not an op-ed writer. He is a computer safety researcher. And he has written one of the most compelling, comprehensive accounts of the ongoing hell in Chicago that you could possibly imagine. In under 1600 words. aphyr.com/posts/397-i-...

i think this is key. taking the deal would amount to taking the blame. it would turn a clear political victory into an unambiguous defeat.

They do not have a plan, they’ve never had a plan. They’ve also never had the votes to repeal the ACA which is *OVERWHELMINGLY* popular, nor have they been able to get the Supreme Court to overturn it, so instead they’ve just shut down the entire government to try forcing Dems to stop funding it.

From @jamellebouie.net and, hopefully, more of this from everyone else too

& a good counterpart, David Cantwell's look at the great country records of '75: nofencesreview.substack.com/p/the-best-c...

800+ flights cancelled today because Elon took a chainsaw to the federal government and Trump won’t pay the remaining airport personnel. Elon’s on his way to becoming a trillionaire. Trump’s net worth has more than doubled inside a year. Glad everything worked out for them. How about you?

People younger than Gen X didn’t live through even the remnants of the red scare but they have lived through the collapse of the middle class and the birth of a new Gilded Age. It’s been honestly funny watching the socialism and communism scare-words fall flat after working for three generations.

"the revolt of the bosses" is a good way of framing the elite reaction to woke 1. what's particularly interesting is that this isn't a reaction to an attack on profits--it's a reaction to changes in workplace culture-- which is to say, the psychic wage of hierarchy

I’ve wondered for a while if the strategy was to let Trump do WTF he wants by temporarily staying any injunctions limiting him, then when it came time actually to decide a case, check to see which way the wind was blowing…