For nearly a century and a half, scholars and fans have puzzled over a mysterious line in Richard Wagner’s 1882 opera, “Parsifal.” During the first act, a wise knight named Gurnemanz describes the Grail castle to the fool Parsifal: “You see son, here time becomes space.” There’s a Quora…

Insert Foot Vs. The Freak follicles I was on a roll, writing this column, liking what I came up, and then … POOF. Gone. Kind of like life before a certain virus decided to kick down everyone’s front door and remind us Mother Nature, and coronavirus, is still boss.…

Destroy Boys, Courtesy: Kai Mosley. Editor’s note: Destroy Boys were supposed to support Against Me! this spring, but the tour was postponed due to coronavirus. Instead, the Bay Area band released a new single, “Honey I’m Home,” on Friday. The band has described it as being about the feeling of being trapped.…

Insert Foot and the COVID-EO. If I understand this right, live shots from a laptop pointed at your face is the new selfie, thanks to the Covid. That’s what I call it, and that’s what I’m going to call it. It’s not intended to be disrespectful. It’s just that…

Insert Foot and the hope for more great music. Last week I wrote about the Covid-19 pandemic creating opportunities for musicians to reconnect and remember why they became musicians in the first place. Remember? It’s so drummers and Billy Joel can attract women. No, I won’t get over it.…

As far as we know, Tony Hicks is only having one kind of baby as he passes time at home during the COVID-19 quarantine. Some good really can come from this coronavirus mess. In the middle of boring COVID-19 isolation, I just spent more than an hour with 10…

Editor’s note: Publicist Ken Weinstein shared this message with his friends last week, and has granted permission for RIFF to share it publicly. Adam Schlesinger passed away last week of complications from COVID-19, the illness caused by coronavirus. He was 52.   I can’t believe I’m sitting here again thinking…

From Candy Loving to the Queen, these are all the people Tony Hicks has wanted to be isolated with over the years. I once swiped one of my stepdad’s Playboy magazines. It probably happened (a lot) more than once … when I was a kid … not lately. I’m…

I didn’t know Bill Withers was black until I’d already come to know his music. As a kid, I constantly confused him with Van Morrison all the time. And I’d seen Morrison on television, so … That’s a huge compliment. To both of them. It was music sounding straight…

Frontier Airlines jet. Courtesy: Tomas Del Coro. I was going to miss SXSW by a week anyway, but then SXSW was canceled, sports were canceled and concerts were canceled, and it was best to cancel my family’s April vacation to Austin. I had a reservation with Frontier Airlines, and…