Sitting in a homely bistro on Malcolm X Boulevard, music journalist Greg Tate is bundled up in a peaked beanie, bright yellow scarf, and plenty of padded layers. His threads offer protection from the chill setting down on the Harlem streets outside, streets that have offered a home to a galaxy of Black American icons—from Duke Ellington to Cam’ron—across the last century. When a little-known mixtape track by local rapper Vado starts to pour out of the speakers, Tate breaks from his salmon salad to shake from side to side. At 60, one of the most influential hip-hop writers to ever strut these curbs still keeps his ears wide open.
It was 1981 when Tate jumped on an Amtrak from Washington D.C. to New York City to cover Harlem rap group the Fearless Four’s show at the Roxy, his first assignment for The Village Voice. The following year, he moved to the city, accelerating a blistering career with the Voice that’s included dozens of lengthy columns on culture, politics and, of course, the snowballing hip-hop scene.
The nine stories in Anjali Sachdeva’s debut collection All the Names They Used for God aren’t your typical narratives. Each one provides a haiku-esque glimpse into the infinite mind of an individual while revealing how the seeming trivialities of life can reverberate with meaning. Throughout, characters grapple with predetermination as they experience the brutal clash between expectation and reality.
As a man deeply versed in religion (a former bishop of Edinburgh and head of the Scottish Episcopal Church), he’s familiar with notions of reincarnation and eternal life. But he thinks denial of death spiritually unhealthy. Even if our corpses did come back, suitably defrosted, what kind of reception would we get? Wouldn’t we be treated like freaks or illegal immigrants? And what about the social injustice of only the rich having the resources to outrun death?
“When his first request for an interview with former president George HW Bush was rejected, AJ Jacobs resorted to a desperate plea: “Couldn’t you do it for family?” – pointing out that they were (distant) cousins.
The plea worked. Bush gave him an interview and even posed for a photo – an image that sits alongside others, including Daniel Radcliffe, Olivia Munn, and Ricky Gervais, in Jacobs’ new book, It’s All Relative. The book examines the promise and challenges of the world family tree – the dream of some geneticists and genealogists to connect everyone who’s ever lived, be they Neanderthal or celebrity.