Author: Hans Eisenbeis

  • Rake Appeal { Object Lust

    It’s been a few years since Montblanc, the German jeweler, brought out the Meisterstück, the world’s grandest fountain pen. In fact, it was an old design going back to the early twentieth century, but through some kind of marketing alchemy, the pen suddenly became ubiquitous in American malls and upscale catalogs in about 1988. I…

  • So Not Not Funny

    A couple of notes to add to yesterday’s gathering fumes. I see my old friend Chris Lehmann has written at length about the Colbert routine, and as usual it’s a smart and biting essay worthy of his best work back in the day at Suck. Still, I think he’s wrong. So is this guy. It…

  • Everyone's A Critic. Thank God.

    Stephen Colbert’s relentless standup at the White House Correspondent’s Dinner would have gone unremarked, if not for the power of the internets. This is understandable. When you shit on everyone in the room, they tend not to run outside and brag about it. And given that the shit-sandwich was cut in half and shared in…

  • I Guess I'll Never Work In That Town Again

    I was holding off on commenting about the relative mess at the Village Voice in New York. But since no one came around begging for my opinion (the way they do all the time, y’know), I selflessly offer it here. Only the cruel and the masochistic cheer when the lions of our so-called profession are…

  • Truth-Mongering

    The other day, we were surprised to see a certain advertisement in Newsweek and the New Yorker. It was a bold yellow page that made a startling claim: Everything you’ve heard about mercury poisoning in fish is false. According to the ad, published by a mysterious organization identified only as FishScam.com, all the claims about…

  • For White People

    You probably didn’t notice, but due to a bureaucratic mix-up, there was no Shortlist Music Prize awarded this year. The “Shorty” was a newish but well-respected award that tried to recognize serious pop and rock bands for doing important new work, regardless of popularity. The main symptom of doing important work was selling less than…