I’ll get this out of the way: I’m not a fan of Frank Ocean, nor am I really familiar with his music. Ocean’s return to the stage wasn’t some long-awaited moment for me as it was for many festival-goers on the final night of Coachella’s first weekend. But that didn’t matter one bit as I dived into Jeff Weiss’ fantastic dispatch from the festival, in which he transports the reader into the desert as the crowd waits for the singer’s headlining performance. Ocean puts on a shaky, underwhelming, and chaotic show, which Weiss masterfully describes, but what makes this piece so good is the perfect encapsulation of the collective experience that is Coachella, which — for someone like me, who experienced its earliest iterations in 1999 and the early 2000s — is an insightful read not just on this specific performance, but a look at how the festival has evolved over the years, and a deep, thoughtful critique on the music industry, performance and artistry, and our culture today.
But this is all slightly hyperbolic. It’s reductive to describe it as a complete failure. There is something inherently compelling about watching a preternaturally talented artist struggle to stitch his vastly disparate ideas together. It may make for poor entertainment, but it’s fascinating as a document of unmet ambition. He appears trapped in something that we can’t understand, hounded by demons we can’t see. What most in the crowd are responding to is the death of something that Ocean cannot control. The outsized expectations that had made him infallible, a timeless avatar of their vanished youth, the dark reality that what comes unglued cannot always be repaired. For Frank Ocean to no longer be the same Frank Ocean who held them emotionally hostage for a decade meant that they would realize what Andre had told the previous generation: Heroes eventually die, horoscopes often lie.
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You might recall Thai Stick and Maui Waui from your misbegotten youth, but today, the legalization of marijuana has spawned an infinite number of strains, all with, it seems, a wacky name. For Esquire, Bill Shapiro goes behind the scenes of the weed industry to learn about naming practices and participate in a naming activity by partaking in some products.
But that was then and this is now, and the cannabis space has entered a fascinating, fast-flowing moment where legalization—which begat commercialization, which begat corporatization, which begat commodification—has created today’s modern dispensary where the choices for consumers can be dizzying. As it turns out, there may be no better gauge of the changes rippling through cannabis culture than the humble menu at your local dispensary. Weed names have always added to the fun and intrigue (as a teen, even the relatively straightforward Thai Stick sounded entrancingly exotic), but today, as the power dynamic shifts from seller to buyer, and as growers and retailers find themselves strategizing to make their products stand out on increasingly crowded shelves, the names are taking on even more importance.
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This week we are featuring stories from Renata Brito and Felipe Dana, Jeff Weiss, Maddy Crowell, Stephen Rodrick, and David Jenkins.
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In today’s edition, our editors recommend:
The tragic story behind one of the many boats that wash up to shore carrying the bodies of desperate migrants.
A profile of a Southern California rap legend with an underappreciated talent.
A glimpse into the life of a cybersecurity expert who rose to the top of her game.
Time in class with an Indian guru who boasts nine million social media followers.
The joy of soaking up the sights and sounds while walking in a desert.
Renata Brito and Felipe Dana | The Associated Press | April 12, 2023 | 4,355 words
People call them “ghost boats,” the small vessels — at least seven in 2021 alone — that have washed up in the Caribbean and Brazil carrying dead bodies. The boats come from West Africa carrying desperate people bound for Europe via the Canary Islands, a complex, treacherous route. Somehow, somewhere the boats were forced off course and drifted out into the Atlantic, all but ensuring the deaths of the people on board. But who are those people? What are their stories? Who back home is missing them? This years-long investigation uses a handful of clues — a SIM card and scraps of clothing, for instance — to identify the dead found in one ghost boat in Tobago. Renata Brito and Felipe Dana do an impressive job situating a sensitive story about the impacts of global policies and politics within the framework of a mystery. A moving feature, and beautifully designed too. —SD
Jeff Weiss | Los Angeles Times | April 17, 2023 | 3,271 words
One of hip-hop’s greatest conflicts, and I’m speaking for myself here, lies in the pimp persona. Careers have been built around it. National sweethearts have leveraged it. (Looking at you, Martha Stewart’s best friend!) Undeniable artistry has flowed from it. But it remains deeply discomfiting, a strain of misogyny that you can never quite unhear. That paradox lurks deep inside Jeff Weiss’ profile of Southern California rap legend Suga Free, a man whose prodigious talent couldn’t guarantee quantitative success. Suga’s impact and influence are undeniable; every time you’ve heard a hustle-culture tech bro say “if you stay ready, you don’t have to get ready,” this is where it came from. But other than a few indelible (and NSFW) guest appearances here and there, he’s all but disappeared. For him to pop up in a feature-length profile — happy, healthy, and seemingly finally at peace with his life and his creativity — is an unanticipated joy. One of Weiss’ great gifts as a music writer is evoking the intangible aspects of an artist’s style, and here he manages a near-perfect characterization of Suga’s silky breakneck patter: “He didn’t rap, he glided like a swan at the Player’s Ball, inventing his own unquantized, improvised rhythms,” he writes. But Weiss also doesn’t shy away from confronting the outlook that suffused Suga’s lyrics, and gnaws even more insistently at the listener’s ears and brain 20 years later. That conflict never takes center stage, thankfully, but to ignore it would be equally contrived. And so it sits there, peeking out from Suga’s aphorisms and overstuffed closet. It’s part of the art and part of the artist. What it means for his legacy is for you to decide. —PR
Maddy Crowell | Columbia Journalism Review | April 17, 2023 | 4,553 words
If my observations of people and their digital habits are any indication, most tend to have poor security and password hygiene. I suspect I wouldn’t pay as much attention to computer security practices if it weren’t for my job inside a tech company. “Being hacked is not just a possibility but a likelihood,” says cybersecurity expert Runa Sandvik. Simply existing on the web comes with risks. In this piece for CJR, Maddy Crowell gives us a glimpse into Sandvik’s work and focus on internet privacy and freedom: She advises reporters and other individuals at risk, like activists and lawyers, on how to protect themselves and their data online. Growing up in Oslo’s hacking community in the 2000s, when privacy wasn’t yet a thing, Sandvik found a job in ethical hacking, and later fell into her niche as a privacy and security researcher. (Crowell recounts Sandvik’s brush with a guy who simply introduced himself as “Ed,” and would later go on to rock the very foundations of the surveillance state.) I appreciate Crowell’s look into Sandvik’s fascinating life, and her path to becoming one of the world’s top information security experts. —CLR
Stephen Rodrick | British GQ | April 11, 2023 | 5,892 words
I clearly don’t spend enough time perusing influencers on TikTok, because I had never heard of this Indian guru with more than nine million followers. Luckily, Stephen Rodrick’s editor did know of him, shipping Rodrick off to Sadhguru’s Inner Engineering class to learn more about the media-savvy mystic. Rodrick arrives at the center in McMinnville, Tennessee, with a healthy dose of skepticism (and contraband caffeine pills and prosciutto), so it is perhaps unsurprising that inner peace remains elusive. However, the guru’s oddly harsh approach and occasionally inaccurate statements seem worthy of Rodrick’s questioning. While a picture of a strange and stubborn man emerges, Rodrick also recognizes how Sadhguru’s language and tone “appeals equally to the TED talk crowd and the climate-anxious suburban parent.” Some of this crowd are with Rodrick at the center and the characters he describes and secret alliances he forms create a highly entertaining read, whether or not you’re convinced about the guru’s message — or even sure what it is. —CW
David Jenkins | High Country News | April 17, 2023 | 1,343 words
When I run or walk alone outdoors I almost always listen to music, a podcast, or an audiobook. In this thoughtful piece for High Country News, David Jenkins remarks upon passing a runner while on a 10-hour walk in western Colorado, the man’s ears “clogged with headphones.” The word clogged stopped me short. How true that even in solitary pursuits we compromise the peace we seek by inviting others’ words into our heads. “I puzzled over the need to listen to something other than wind and raven, the scuttle of a lizard, the skittering of small rocks underfoot,” he writes. Less is so much more, and while you’ll revel in soaking up every sight and sound the desert has to offer, the greatest beauty of Jenkins’ piece is that because he’s fully present during his walk, you can’t help but be, too. —KS
Monica Potts | The Atlantic | April 6, 2023 | 3,436 words
This excerpt, from the forthcoming The Forgotten Girls: A Memoir of Friendship and Lost Promise in Rural America, captures how heartfelt Monica Pott’s exploration into small-town America is. By focusing on the women she grew up with, a story that is the same across many places becomes personal — and thus deeply resonates. —CW
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In this profile of the yogi Sadhguru — spiritual adviser to Hollywood celebrities and the ultra-rich — Stephen Rodrick takes a skeptical look at what Sadhguru offers. Rodrick may not find inner peace, but he does discover some interesting insights into both Sadhguru and those who surround him.
Just then came the hellish noise of an engine, and a motorcycle rose over a crest. It was the guru. He rode toward us, his blue robe and white beard flowing behind him, and brought his Ducati to a stop so that it would be perfectly framed behind him on camera. He adjusted his brown felt fedora and spoke to his publicist for a moment. He then positioned himself in his seat, checking that his robe and scarf were aligned. His hair was perfect.
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We’re just going to say it: April 20 is exhausting. Thirsty brands. SEO farms masquerading as “media brands.” The seventh-grade edgelord who owns Twitter. What started as a wink-wink holiday built on a wink-wink teenage ritual has officially become as commonplace (and inescapable) as any other greeting-card tradition.
Which is fitting, if you think about it. “There’s a surreal cultural transformation happening across the country,” wrote Livia Gershon in 2019, “from dime bags bought and sold in avoidance of the police to meticulously packaged extracts and edibles in plain view at shopping centers.”
Big business brings big changes. It also makes for some conflicted feelings. As Peter Rubin pointed out in 2021, “the stories of post-legalization America are in many ways the stories of the nation itself.” In fact, that goes for any story about cannabis in the U.S. — money has always been lurking in the background, like a sight gag in a Cheech & Chong movie. Legalization has simply erased the distinction between background and foreground.
Thankfully, that flattening hasn’t diluted cannabis’ stature in the world of journalism and essay. It remains a potent force for introspection and comedy, as demonstrated in Jen Doll’s “Edible Complex.” With its newfound legitimacy, it’s become a fertile breeding ground for science writing. And there’s always the economic angle. So no matter how you choose to celebrate this year, take some time to revisit our many 420-friendly original pieces and recommendations.
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If you’re not a hip-hop fan of a certain age — or an Angeleno — then the name Suga Free may not ring a bell. Which is, to be clinical, a damn shame; the man is one of rap’s great unsung regional heroes. Thankfully, the Los Angeles Times saw fit to commission a full feature profile on Pomona’s finest, and Jeff Weiss does it justice, giving Free his well-deserved flowers while not shying away from his music’s conflicting nature.
There is a YouTube video from around 1995 that goes viral just about every time someone posts it on social media. It’s alternately known as the Suga Free “Pen and Nickel” or “Kitchen Table” freestyle. Filmed with a handheld camera at a Compton dope house, Suga Free performs the rap equivalent of hitting a full court shot backward and following it up with a 720-degree slam dunk. Using a nickel as a kick drum, a pen as a hi-hat, Suga Free floats like he had never experienced gravity. He’s Gregory Hines in alligator shoes, Cab Calloway on a mission to make money with Minnie the Moocher. The voice pirouettes and crip walks, flows and bends like alien cadences from an advanced civilization where “Dolemite” is revered as sacred text. When Questlove posted the clip last month, the reactions were typical: thousands marveling at the level of difficulty, describing it as the pure essence of hip-hop creativity. Or as A$AP Ferg chimed in: “Unbelievable 🔥.”
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When Bob Lee was killed in San Francisco in early April, that tragedy almost immediately birthed a second one: people turning his death into a political cudgel. The true circumstances becoming known (and Lee’s alleged killer being arrested) has undone some of that craven weaponization, but not all of it. Now, Scott Alan Lucas speaks to Lee’s friends and associates — some of whom are far more sympathetic than others — take the measure of a man who, by all accounts, was loved dearly.
It’s not that Lee’s friends don’t think the city has its challenges. They do—and they want the city to address those problems. It’s more that they don’t want the memory of their friend to get lost in the process. “There was a sense that all of us have that San Francisco has seen better days,” said Schultz. “Now isn’t the time to talk about where San Francisco will go. I want it to be about what Bob was about. This is the only time that the vast majority of the world is going to hear about Bob and the only impression I want to leave is what we’ve lost.”
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