What’s in Our Queue? Jon Pardi and More
I’m a deputy editor on The Times’s Culture desk. I’ve been taking a prestige TV break and enjoying other realms of entertainment lately.
Here are five things I’ve been watching, listening to and more →
Songs about drinking dominate country radio these days, but the ones by Jon Pardi stand out. I’m still waiting for one to come along that’s better than “Heartache Medication,” where every lyric is a keeper. Change the instrumentation slightly and it could pass as a Magnetic Fields song.
The last two years in D.C. have been a celebration of one of the city’s greatest artists, who created most of her abstract color field paintings toward the end of her life. A small new exhibition at the Smithsonian American Art Museum is a great primer in just three rooms.
Ever since the Twitter algorithm changed, this pop culture aggregator has come to dominate my X feed, and I couldn’t be happier. It’s lightning fast on breaking news, has introduced a delightful phrase into our lexicon (“Sabrina Carpenter looks beautiful in newly shared photos”) and shares absolutely useless milestones (“14 years ago today, 3OH!3 released ‘Starstrukk’ featuring Katy Perry”).
Harry Crews’s masterpiece of Grit Lit will have you feeling the humidity of small-town, midcentury Enigma, Ga., from its very first pages. If you’re looking for a satire that’s thematically similar to “The Righteous Gemstones” but delves into very dark corners, spend a weekend with this book.
The most gifted comic actor of our time? His signature role is the perpetually doomed-yet-optimistic caterer Ron on “Party Down,” but he can hit every comedic note. (Scour streaming services to find him on the “Bachelor” sendup “Burning Love.”) This fall he’ll break out some beloved characters on tour with his ’90s sketch comedy pals “The State.”
