Video: Amgen Tour rolls through Bakersfield

Bakersfield put on its best face today for the Amgen Tour of California time trials. I was out at the event and will be posting some photos in the coming days. But here's a nice video from The Californian's Louis Amestoy that summarizes what was a fun day, and even catches a TV star hanging in the background. 

Quick review: 'I Want My MTV'

My first memories of MTV are sitting in my friend Ed's living room in Fresno and watching then-unknown Scandal perform the invigorating "Goodbye to You." I had seen music videos before but the idea of an all-video channel was nirvana for me, a musician, music geek slowly entering adulthood. These were the glory days, when MTV programmers played whatever they wanted before the algorithms got involved. 

I have many great memories of MTV so it was with great delight that I jumped into "I Want My MTV: The Uncensored Story of the Music Video Revolution."

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'The Symphonic Boom'

The Wall Street Journal has published an enlightening review of the book "Site and Sound," a history of symphonic concert halls that is to music geeks what stadium histories are to baseball aficionados. 

And like so many cities that overspend to keep or attract sports teams, author Victoria Newhouse tells us that a recent spate of exotic concert halls were the result of similar civic dreams. 

The book's formal title -- "Site and Sound: The Architecture and Acoustics of New Opera Houses and Concert Halls" -- comes across as stilted but Ada Louise Huxtable's review would suggest there's more than a few fascinating stories about how audio quality -- so critical to classical performances -- sometimes takes a back seat to architectural priorities as desperate locales go for form over function in pursuit of love, attention and, ultimately, revenue.