My new column Tuned In is up on Nextbook! With a Sholom Auslander-like digitized picture and everything.
When I first got into Judaism (read, betrayed my secular family and Conservative synagogue and became a religious zealot) I was convinced that Jewish culture was never going to replace secular culture in my life. During some of my first Shabboses as an observant Jew, I went to They Might Be Giants and Fugazi concerts, buying my ticket beforehand and manufacturing excuses, if only because, well, the Miami Boys’ Choir was next to impossible to slam-dance to, and I’d be damned if I was going to listen to any one-man synthesizer band just because we have a God in common.
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Also, this is only going to affect about three people in the universe, but it's so great that I need to scream it: the first band I ever loved, The Dead Milkmen, are getting back together. So far it's just a one-off show -- while I'm doing a reading in Los Angeles, no less -- but, for the moment at least, it makes the world feel like a better place. At first I got scared that it would change what I wrote about them in Losers. but I think it makes it even MORE relevant. you know, to today's kids.
