Author: zachary.hoskins@gmail.com

  • Jheri Curl June: Dayton’s “Krackity-Krack”

    Two years ago, we admitted that Bootsy Collins is probably not the first name that comes to mind when thinking about Jheri Curl Music. And while that may still be true, in the early 80s he definitely dipped an entire platform boot into the jheri curl juice. Here, he joins fellow Ohio funkateers Dayton on…

  • Introduction: Jheri Curl June VIbe

    It’s a little hard to believe that we’ve reached our sixth consecutive Jheri Curl June, our annual celebration of all things wet and silky in ’80s post-disco R&B; yet here we are, kicking off Jheri Curl June 6–which, since we’re using Zapp naming conventions, we’re calling Jheri Curl June VIbe. Our criteria for what qualifies…

  • Dystopian Adaptation Party Podcast: The Dirt

    It isn’t every day that an Official Dystopian Book Club selection gets adapted into a movie; so, for the first and quite possibly last time, we’re reconvening after just one week to discuss Jeff Tremaine’s biopic version of Mötley Crüe’s The Dirt. Spoilers: we liked it! But then again, we’re also garbage people, so maybe…

  • Podcast: Dystöpian Böök Clüb vs. Mötley Crüe’s The Dirt

    After almost three years of ripping on trashy rock biographies with Dystopian Book Club, it was only a matter of time for us to get around to the trashiest of them all: Neil Strauss’ and Mötley Crüe’s masterpiece of filth-wallowing, The Dirt. The two-hour conversation we had doesn’t even begin to cover everything in the…

  • Podcast: Dystopian Book Club vs. Mark Paytress’ Bolan: The Rise and Fall of a 20th Century Superstar

    September is kind of our unofficial Marc Bolan month at Dystopian Dance Party; so for this installment of our Dystopian Book Club podcast series, we thought we’d read the excellent 2006 biography Bolan: The Rise and Fall of a 20th Century Superstar by music journalist Mark Paytress. This one goes a little bit long (sorry ’bout…

  • Dystopian Dance Party Mailbag!

    As we’ve mentioned on the podcast, we’ve been cultivating a vibrant fan community on our YouTube page, so we decided it was high time that we shared some of the love. Here’s a video of us sharing some of our favorite comments from some of the dumbest members of the KISS Army; and if you…

  • Podcast: Dystopian Book Club vs. David Lee Roth’s Crazy from the Heat

    Heard ya missed us, we’re back! After a year-long absence, the Dystopian Book Club returns with an extensive look at Crazy from the Heat, the memoir/literary classic/deranged, barely coherent rantings of former Van Halen frontman, raconteur, and assless pants aficionado David Lee Roth. So limber up, slip into your comfiest Spandex, and maybe treat yourself to…

  • Jheri Curl June: Jeffrey Osborne’s “One Love – One Dream”

    Somehow, despite his over-decade-long tenure as lead singer for the proto-JCM group L.T.D., we still haven’t gotten around to covering Jeffrey Osborne for Jheri Curl June. But as we say goodbye to our fifth annual celebration of all things Jheri Curl, it feels right to end on the title track from Osborne’s 1988 solo album One Love…

  • Jheri Curl June: Bobby Brown’s “Don’t Be Cruel”

    As we’ve mentioned before, by the late 1980s, the sound of mainstream R&B was developing into what would become known as New Jack Swing. We’ve been writing about this for five years now, so if you don’t get it by now, let me explain it in Pokémon terms: your starter Pokémon is Disco. With love,…

  • Jheri Curl June Special: André Cymone

    It’s a poetic fluke of the cosmos that so many Jheri Curl Music innovators’ birthdays fall in June, the genre’s holiest month. So far, we’ve highlighted Prince (June 7), Jimmy Jam (June 6), L.A. Reid (also June 7), and Jesse Johnson (June 1)–as well as Michael Jackson, who passed away on June 25, 2009. Now, on…