We\u2019ve got some new recommendations for you, courtesy of our staffers Drew Gillis, who recently pondered Who Is The Sky\u00a0with David Byrne, and Danette Chavez, who goes looking for some more Loot\u00a0on Apple TV.\u00a0<\/p>\n
David Byrne blurring the line between concert and theatrical performance is nothing new; Stop Making Sense<\/a> remains one of the gold standards for this, and American Utopia<\/a> saw Byrne blend the two without the rest of the Talking Heads. His Who Is The Sky Tour is of a kind with these, especially American Utopia. But where that 2018 tour (and subsequent 2020 filmed performance, which now lives on HBO Max) stripped back the music and the set, Byrne\u2019s latest turns toward color and light and electricity. Swapping his signature giant gray suits for a blue boilersuit, Byrne performs surrounded by mobile musicians and giant LED screens, the latter of which consistently bring the outside world into the theater.\u00a0<\/p>\n Throughout the show, Byrne displays footage and photos that correspond\u2014sometimes very literally\u2014to what he\u2019s singing about on stage. The tableau that accompanies \u201cAnd She Was\u201d depicts floating above a suburban housing tract. \u201cMy Apartment Is My Friend\u201d takes us inside Byrne\u2019s New York City apartment after he reflects on the time he spent there during the COVID lockdown. Some of the scenes are striking; \u201cEverybody Laughs\u201d features footage from John Wilson that lands with his usual offbeat beauty. \u201cLife During Wartime\u201d is both literal and striking, bringing in footage from anti-ICE protests in Los Angeles as the song climaxes.\u00a0<\/p>\n Staff Picks: A Bollywood Studio chaser and a potent video game remaster<\/a>Staff Picks: Big Thief’s new direction and a Swedish blast from the past<\/a><\/p>\n I didn\u2019t expect to find myself so moved, and moved so often, at Byrne\u2019s first show at Radio City Music Hall. Even when Byrne wasn\u2019t directly addressing what was happening in the world that particular day, the show\u2019s optimism rang out. Quoting the actor John Cameron Mitchell, Byrne said at one point, \u201cLove and kindness are kind of the most punk things you can do right now.\u201d It\u2019s the kind of message I\u2019m wont to find overwrought more often than not but Byrne and his band embodied the sentiment through their artistry and forthright performance. Looking around at the crowd of people easily 30 years my senior, there with college buddies or teenage relatives, also felt special. Everyone was there to have a good time, and Byrne gave us one. Beyond that, he showed you can still have one without totally shutting out the outside world.<\/p>\n \u00a0Danette Chavez:\u00a0Loot\u00a0season three (Apple TV)<\/p>\n As Paul Thomas Anderson wages One Battle After Another<\/a>, Maya Rudolph finds herself in decidedly cushier surroundings in season three of Loot, Alan Yang and Matt Hubbard\u2019s breezy comedy. Rudolph leads the series as Molly Wells, who, after her divorce from a tech mogul played by Adam Scott, becomes the third-wealthiest woman in the world. Season one<\/a> saw the suddenly unmoored Molly throw herself headfirst into philanthropy, but the years of living in a haze of wealth eroded any competence she once possessed, making her the latest in a string of useless TV bosses. In the second season, once Molly\u2019s mission came into clearer view, so did the series<\/a>.<\/p>\n The road through season three, which premiered October 15 on Apple TV, remains paved with good intentions\u2014and rocky. Molly\u2019s campaign to give away her billions and inspire other wealth hoarders to do the same was dealt a devastating blow in the season-two finale, so when the new episodes kick off, she\u2019s in \u201cBye-Bye Mode,\u201d i.e., licking her wounds on a not-so-deserted island. Thankfully, her self-pity quickly gives way to new love, new shenanigans, and new obstacles, but things really pick up once the rest of the ensemble\u2014including Michaela Ja\u00e9 Rodriguez, Joel Kim Booster, and Ron Funches\u2014is back in the mix.\u00a0<\/p>\n Aside from the occasional pointed statement about how billionaires shouldn\u2019t exist, Yang and Hubbard have always taken more of an \u201ceat with the rich\u201d approach\u2014the redistribution of wealth will definitely not be televised via their frothy workplace show. But neither are they afraid to confront the vile roots of empires both national and corporate; in one of the best episodes of the new season, Molly comes face to face with a scion laundering their family\u2019s sordid history through charitable works. Loot isn\u2019t really looking to meet the moment, though\u2014the series is still rooted in a \u201cgood-yet-ridiculous people trying to do better\u201d ethos instead of satire, and proving that every single pairing of cast members can deliver great chemistry and humor. D\u2019Arcy Carden\u2019s imminent arrival only drives that point home further.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"We\u2019ve got some new recommendations for you, courtesy of our staffers Drew Gillis, who recently pondered Who Is…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":233998,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[53],"tags":[88,216],"class_list":{"0":"post-233997","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-music","8":"tag-entertainment","9":"tag-music"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/233997","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=233997"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/233997\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/233998"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=233997"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=233997"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=233997"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}