Picks of the Week
Best Albums
Glitch Mob – Love Death Immortality
Los Angeles-based three-piece the Glitch Mob drift even further from their name on their second album Love Death Immortality, an album that suggests they be renamed the EDM Mob, the Big Room Mob, the Bass Drop Mob, or maybe even the Totally Accessible Yet Utterly Awesome Mob. Whatever they choose, fans will drink up this meaty and chaotic album.
iTunes – $8.99
Speedy Ortiz – Real Hair
Following up on last year’s well-received LP Major Arcana, Speedy Ortiz is kicking off the year by releasing four new songs on their Real Hair EP. You’ll find the same introspective exuberance and deep lyrics that highlighted the last album, in a more snackable size.
iTunes – $2.99
Sun Kil Moon – Benji
Despite having released six albums as an outfit already, some music critics are calling Benji Sun Kil Moon’s best album to date thanks to Mark Kozelek’s raw, heartbreaking lyrics. Each song focuses around a central character or theme combined with tightly woven narratives and sparse musical arrangements to form a masterpiece of reflection.
iTunes – $9.99
Best Books
The Book of Jonah
by Joshua Max Feldman
For his literary debut Joshua Max Feldman chose to reimagine the biblical tale of Jonah in a modern setting. As a young Manhattan lawyer, Jonah Jacobstein is a lucky, healthy, and handsome man with two beautiful women ready to spend the rest of their lives with him, but just as he’s celebrating a deal that will make him partner, a bizarre biblical vision at a party changes everything in this funny novel that moves from New York to Amsterdam to Vegas.
iTunes – $14.99
The Race Underground: Boston, New York, and the Incredible Rivalry That Built America’s First Subway
by Doug Most
Before the convenience of modern mass transportation, the cities of Boston and NYC were suffering from congestion problems at the turn of the 19th century, so two brothers from one of the nation’s great families—Henry Melville Whitney of Boston and William Collins Whitney of New York— set off on a race to dig America’s first subway. Doug Most’s new book, The Race Underground, relives the competition between Boston and New York played out in an era not unlike our own, one of economic upheaval, life-changing innovations, class warfare, bitter political tensions, and the question of America’s place in the world
iTunes – $14.99
The Martian
by Andy Weir
Sci-fi doesn’t get featured as prominently in our picks, but Andy Weir is here to bust through with his excellent debut novel about a mission to Mars that goes wrong as a dust storm leaves astronaut Mark Watney stranded. Injured, carrying limited supplies and presumed dead, Watney has to use his intelligence and grit to work to stay alive.
iTunes – $11.99
Best Movies
Gravity
Gravity was without a doubt the most visually spectacular movie to watch in 2013. Now that its available to view on your TV screen the enormity of space might not feel quite as vast as in the theater, but Sandra Bullock’s plight from the space shuttle back to Earth is no less captivating. And don’t forget about George Clooney ready to smother you with charm.
iTunes – $19.99
The Summit
On August 1st 2008, 18 mountain climbers reached the summit of K2. Just 48 hours later, all but 7 were dead. The Summit documents the deadliest day on the world’s second tallest mountain, but it’s not all doom and gloom. Expect some incredible mountain cinematography and jaw dropping reenactments based on testimonies from those that survived the horrific climb.
iTunes – $14.99
The Counselor
The Counselor didn’t blow up the box office quite as expected last year, despite boasting a cast that includes Brad Pitt, Michael Fassbender, Javier Bardem and Penelope Cruz, but now can judge it for yourself as Fassbender plays a savvy lawyer who gets entangled in a treacherous drug.
iTunes – $14.99
