Feb 21, 2010 Video Games Web Exclusive

The original BioShock did two things right. It told a brilliantly atmospheric story that borrowed heavily from Ayn Rand's dystopian novel Atlas Shrugged. And it married that story to a first person shooter, a genre that was hitting its peak in 2007. There was really no way that BioShock 2 could match the originality and surprise that the original possessed, but it comes close. More

Feb 21, 2010 Music Web Exclusive

The second in Hip-O's The Costello Show campaign of live Elvis Costello releases is a concert from June 4, 1978, documenting the then 23-year-old Costello and his recently formed Attractions three months after the release of Costello's classic sophomore album, This Year's Model. More

Feb 19, 2010 Books Web Exclusive

Though he's widely known for The Ten Cent Plague, his 2008 book on the U.S. government's 1950s war on comics, David Hajdu has long been a music critic for The New Republic. Heroes and Villains is primarily focused on the musical end of things, but as its full title notes, contains explorations into music, movies, comics, and the broader cultural landscape as well. More

Feb 18, 2010 Comic Books Web Exclusive

The realistically drawn and emotionally written, Secret Origin, retells the beginnings of the Silver Age Green Lantern known as Hal Jordan. Geoff Johns (Action Comics, The Flash: Rebirth) and Wizard 2007 Artist of the Year Ivan Reis (Infinite Crisis, Rann-Thanagar War) deftly revisit Jordan's childhood, Air Force recruitment, his fateful encounter with Abin Sur, and eventual training on Oa under the tutelage of Sinestro. More

Feb 18, 2010 Music Web Exclusive

I've always been obsessed with Europe—particularly its compact countries that allow citizens to step from border to border at will. It's blessed geography that allows them to indulge in mini-bouts of wanderlust in the span of a single weekend, forcing them to expand their comfort zone with multiple languages, cultures, and cusines—all a stone's throw from home. On his third album Everyone Knows It's Gonna Happen Only Not Tonight, Belgian musician Dieter Sermeus (The Go Find's bandleader) perfectly evokes this pocket-sized yearning, fine-tuning electro-spattered folk that could take up residence in any number of indie rock "countries."  More

Feb 17, 2010 Music Web Exclusive

Brian Jonestown Massacre was a force to be reckoned with in the late '90s, churning out album after album of stoned, '60s-flavored garage rock that was retro in the best sense of the word and always beholden to frontman Anton Newcombe's peculiar anachronistic vision. But the 2000s saw Brian Jonestown Massacre on a consistent downward slide, it the apparent victim of both Newcombe's creative eccentricities as well as his own self-destructive urges. More

Feb 17, 2010 Live

At 20, Laura Marling possesses more grace and professional polish than I, at my decidedly more than 20 years, will ever have. However, with work that speaks for itself, shining amidst the London-based nu-folk scene that includes Noah and the Whale and Mumford & Sons, and hinting at a record collection filled with 1960s troubadours, age is a non-factor. Even if a post-gig drink during her recent North American Tour was out of the question. More

Feb 17, 2010 Live

I go to a lot of shows. But rarely—if ever—am I as fired up about an opener as I was about seeing Wildbirds & Peacedrums open for St. Vincent. Lighter already aloft (metaphorically anyway) but the end of their eight song set I was ready to quit my job and start following them around in a van. More

Feb 17, 2010 Comic Books Web Exclusive

Featuring his comic feature of the same name and storyboards from the associated animated IFC series, Dash Shaw's The Unclothed Man In the 35th Century A.D. is a hell of a way to be introduced to a very special creator. More