Overrated/Underrated: Which comeback do we need less — ‘American Idol’ or a (rumored) Led Zeppelin?
UNDERRATED
‘World Spirituality Classics 1: The Ecstatic Music of Alice Coltrane Turiyasangitananda’: Previously available only to collectors, this recent Luaka Bop release of rare cassette recordings made by jazz composer Alice Coltrane at an ashram in Agoura Hills in the early ’80s offers a profound continuation of her rich legacy. Like her husband, John, Coltrane’s music often explored where the musical met the spiritual up to her death in 2007. This soaring, trance-like album of Sanskrit chants and group percussion led by her vocals, organ and synthesizer swells comes together to approach the divine.
‘Buster’s Mal Heart’ (2017): This film starring Rami Malek is far from perfect — it barely makes sense, the psychotic break of its main character is as heavy-handed as it is vaguely explained, and Malek’s character is so close to his performance on “Mr. Robot” you half expect Christian Slater to show up and offer a conspiracy theory or two. But for all its flaws, this multi-layered story of a man struggling to support his family amid warnings of a Y2K-inspired cosmic “inversion” that shatters his reality leaves a strange, defiantly enigmatic impression that few independent movies approach anymore.
OVERRATED
A possible Zeppelin at ‘Desert Trip’: A rumor-hungry Internet briefly went haywire last week when the as-yet-unannounced second edition of the classic-rock-tilted “Oldchella” festival was said to be close to booking a reunited Led Zeppelin. While you’d have to be dead inside to not feel at least a twinge of excitement at the idea of seeing one of the last titans of rock again swing the hammer of the gods, isn’t part of the band’s greatness that they reached a logical ending and stuck to it? More to the point, at what age is it off-putting to see someone sing “squeeze my lemon” in public?
An ‘American Idol’ comeback: It seems like a dispatch from another time, doesn’t it? Contestants gathered from across country to sing for fame under the judgment of industry veterans and the wider nation back in the heady days of . . . 2016. While Hollywood doesn’t need nostalgia to fuel recycling an old idea, it’s hard not to feel the desperation in the news of this onetime ratings warhorse reappearing on another network in the 2017-2018 season. If waning influence and declining ratings lead to a show’s finish, isn’t a little more time required to justify a reboot? Don’t make us vote this thing off again.
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