Dan Charnas

Opinion | Kendrick Lamar Can’t Save the World. Why Do We Expect Him To? Now that he’s performing at the Super Bowl, it seems like he’s inherited a no-win situation for all the conflicted expectations that await him.

"We raise young performers up, call them prophets when they validate our worldview, then scan their work for inconsistencies and blast them because they don’t deploy the privileged vocabulary, expertise or nuance of a graduate student."
- @dancharnas.bsky.social

www.nytimes.com/2025/02/09/o...

The Song of the Summer Is Actually the Song of 1982 Sabrina Carpenter’s “Espresso” is one of several recent hits bringing back the genre that never got a name.

Hey @dancharnas.bsky.social, this rich story you expertly tell is revelatory, maddening and sad—even as it highlights hidden gems that evoke joy and nostalgia.

Hopefully, today’s villains will be less impactful in reversing cultural and racial progress.

slate.com/culture/2024...

The value is in the telling, not the tale.

Very excited to host author @dancharnas.bsky.social on October 24 as part of a speaker series I do at UMich called Diasporic Dialogues. He’ll be in conversation with my colleague Stephen Ward, talking about Dilla, Detroit, and hiphop…Roll through if you’re around the way!

Fiorello La Guardia, in his *current condition*, would be a better mayor than Adams at this point.

Do you remember? Why 'September' Sustains It begins, "Do you remember?" — and we supply the memories. Dan Charnas tells the origin story of the Earth, Wind & Fire hit that still unites generations on the dance floor.

It’s the most. Wonderful time.
Of the year.

www.npr.org/2014/09/19/3...

New Yorkers do a lot of looking at the sky on this day.

I don’t ever want to hear this man talk again.

A number of folks have asked what I think. First, Ezra Edelman’s film must come out. Over the years, in talking to folks he interviewed, and to those who’ve seen the film, it’s clear he understands Prince’s story in a way few do, far beyond the myth that the man made. That’s a good thing. And…

Few combinations of words make me more viscerally happy than “big pot of coffee.”

Something about that first scene in Breakfast at Tiffany’s always chokes me up… seeing a New Yorker in the 50s with a cup of coffee and a pastry and a paper bag… and thinking both how similar and how different we are from that time.

There is nothing so triggering for me as hearing an album’s worth of incredible beats for an artist I signed who never finished their album.

Of all the vices and weaknesses I have, I feel quite fortunate that “industry event FOMO” isn’t one of them.

Respectability Politics and Authenticity Politics are two sides of the same counterfeit coin.

Opinion | Marriage has a monopoly on legal benefits. It shouldn’t. Marriage isn’t always forever — or for everyone. Our policies should protect a wider array of committed relationships.

This is the way. If low marriage rates are denying people the benefits of marriage, the answer is not coercing or shaming people into marriage--it's granting those benefits to support the many ways people do build community, stability, and family.

Nothing makes me feel the beauty of the urban experience like Ash Wednesday in New York.

Does me slipping into using Garamond again simply reveal my deeply internalized elitism?

Legend.

Cease.

Crack epidemic.

Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1978) still the best movie with the city of San Francisco in a leading role.

JD50

Opinion | Hip-Hop Is the Music of Vinyl Librarians Hip-hop tracks became a retelling of parents’ and grandparents’ histories; each discovery of a sample source was like finding an ancestor.

Dug this pitch by @dancharnas.bsky.social for hip hop's early DJs as librarians granting "access to specific records [sometimes from parents' collections], both on the airwaves and in those temples of music, discotheques, a portmanteau, en français, literally meaning 'record library.'"

“Listen to this shit!" Those were the only clear words that Ahmir "Questlove" Thompson could make out from the voice message sent to his pager by Q-Tip and D'Angelo over the distorted, thumping beats playing behind them. On tour in Europe with his band the Roots in early 1997, Ahmir called them back at the recording studio from his hotel phone. What the hell was that? he asked. Tip and D'Angelo were rocking, they informed him, to the new Slum Village album. "What's Slum Village?" Ahmir asked. "Jay Dee's group!" Q-Tip played the entire first side of the Fan-Tas-Tic cassette over the phone for Ahmir, at hotel international rates, running up a bill of more than $300 and getting Ahmir in deep trouble with the Roots' formidable manager, Richard Nichols, who docked the money from his weekly pay. Ahmir decided the expense was worth it.

I’m reading Dilla Time by @dancharnas.bsky.social and it’s great. There are so many good stories, like the time @questlove.bsky.social ran up a $300 phone bill listening to Slum Village’s album on a transatlantic call

Join me + @dancharnas.bsky.social for a discussion of my book 𝙊𝙡𝙙 𝙏𝙤𝙬𝙣 𝙍𝙤𝙖𝙙 about the Lil Nas X song of the same name—we’ll be at Housing Works bookstore Tue 14 Nov. Bring my book to be signed or buy one there—purchases support HW’s vital mission. 🎤📚🐎
RSVP: www.eventbrite.com/e/book-launc...

So many of these guys are the same guy.

Green and yellow autumn leaves on dark hexagonal pavers.

Colors of the day.

Teen is making us scrambled eggs for breakfast, using more eggs that usual. Comes in and wants to know if he can use more butter than usual. I give him an important life lesson: "Asking 'Can I give you more butter?' is like saying 'Can I give you more money?'"

Yo I am a recent convert.

Hello @walterspot.bsky.social