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CHRIS FARAONE
A new addition to the Phoenix staff, I grew up in Queens. I attended Hobart College in upstate New York, until I eventually graduated and moved to South Florida where I worked as a dorm-to-dorm vacation cruise salesmen and moonlighted as a stand-up comic. To sharpen my writing and further delay life, I enrolled at New School University’s Graduate Faculty, where I was the biggest dope in the program. No regrets though; it was there that I daydreamed up the counter-intellectual philosophy – which I dubbed roastmodernism© . Following some foreplay on New York’s then-burgeoning on-line literary scene, I enrolled at Boston University’s College of Communication in 2004 and I’ve been here in Boston ever since. I’ve had been published by the Boston Herald, Boston’s Weekly Dig, and Boston Magazine, Elemental, Spin, and Columbia Journalism Review, and still regularly write for The Source, Antenna, and Yellow Rat Bastard (YRB).
Latest Articles
Thanks to the global economic collapse, which has stalled initiated construction projects, Boston’s rat population is surging
Residents say that if you jam a leaf blower in the earth virtually anywhere in Allston, furry bottom feeders will be blown out of every crack and hole in sight and rain down like unsavory screeching meatballs. North Enders joke that something similar would happen if you detonate a Parmesan wheel in an alleyway off Hanover Street.
Brother Ali is more than just albino
The only thing less common than Brother Ali–caliber MCs are profiles that don’t credit dude as “blind” and “albino” in the first graf.
Coalmine (2009)
Bekay is that chip-shouldered scumbag from down the block whom your mom banned from the house after she caught him sodomizing your little sister’s Teddy Ruxpin.
Horrorcore salutes Ice Cube and Alice Cooper
Depraved hip-hop is the biggest thing to hit trailer-trash America since sliced meds.
Kiss and Sell Dept.
In their quest to land one of Boston’s four at-large City Council seats, the eight remaining candidates have shaken more hands and kissed more behinds than anyone probably should in swine-flu season.
. . . or undead, rather — just ask Zombie Death Squad
Depraved hip-hop is the biggest thing to hit trailer-trash America since sliced meds — and not just in redneck pockets, where rap music hardly reached before, but in suburban enclaves where acts like Twiztid and Tech N9ne sell out shows with ease.
Smooth hustler
Humble and nonchalant as ever, Warren G is cooler than Miles Davis smoking an Alaskan cucumber.
Taking on Boston’s biggest bully
The most feared man in Boston isn’t a crazy-eyed killer or a brutal street thug — he’s an elected official. Evidence? When was the last time you heard a disgruntled Boston businessperson publicly criticize Mayor Tom Menino?
Partisan politics rain down like meatballs
Five-year-olds who attend MoveOn.org rallies in between tee-ball and bath time are sure to love the new David Bowers–directed interpretation of Osamu Tezuka’s flagship character.
Brain on Drugz (2009)
Jaysaun is my best proof that Jay-Z is mediocre, as well as the first MC I play for hoodlum friends who accuse me of favoring white-boy art rap.
It's the Red Sox, stupid
You don’t need a fancy political-science degree to predict voter turnout in Boston city elections. All you need is a Red Sox postseason schedule (when applicable).
It's the Joint
Here’s a new way to tell when college kids are back in Boston: shelves at the Joint — a new Comm Ave head shop near Packard’s Corner — resemble electronic-store aisles during the Los Angeles riots.
Brick (2009)
Here’s one way to interpret the title of the debut disc from Boycott Blues: on one paw, he’s a street cat who says “fuck it” for a fast ducat; on the other, this Roxbury beast laments the residual effects that come from poisoning his people and advancing cyclical oppression in the “concrete Congo.”
Bill Maher's new rules to live by
"If liberals act like pussies, then they are pussies."
No underdog tale here
If you’re looking for an insufferable-underdog tall tale, then avoid director Tom Hooper’s soccer (er, football) drama.
Masta Ace and Edo G pair up to tear down
Del the Funky Homosapien and Tame One. Canibus and Keith Murray. AG and OC. Buckshot and KRS. Masta Ace and Edo G. These aren’t comments on a Facebook thread asking for hip-hop dream duos. They’re real pairs of united legends who are giving disenchanted heads unprecedented reasons to put aside the throwbacks and enjoy music recorded this millennium.
Think busing was a problem in this town? Some are labeling charter schools as Boston's newest educational battleground
At the Edward W. Brooke School in Roslindale — a kindergarten-to-eighth-grade public charter school — the push to advance graduates to elite secondary programs begins in fifth grade.
Rest in Beats
By the time this goes to press, DJs and designers will be mixing and manufacturing mix-tapes and shirts commemorating Mr. Magic, the seminal New York radio jockey who died of a heart attack at 53 in Brooklyn this past Friday.
David Cross is not cross
"When people thought of stand-up in 1987, they thought of a guy with a skinny red tie and a jacket saying, 'What's the deal with blah, blah, blah?' "
Esoteric drops reality rap on Saving Seamus Ryan
Hip-hop is faker than Vince McMahon's business plan and tan combined. Pussy-whipped MCs who sling Whoppers rhyme about bagging blow and smacking ho's; even cats who actually do poison their communities exaggerate their hood credentials.
