Brianland

. Why this Deadhead Beatnik Beatlemaniac loves Pop’s Princess   I’ve been into Taylor Swift since a New York Times profile in 2008 talked about her confessional songwriting and use of social media — at the time, MySpace.  (!)  Her second album Fearless was set to come out, and she was still a teenager and […]

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Jack on Film: Take 2 at Lowell Celebrates Kerouac . Here’s a YouTube playlist with great video of the entire Jack on Film show — . =========================================== Here’s a riffing interview with WCAP in Lowell about all things Kerouac — and the new “Jack on Film: Take 2” show — with nearly a hundred photos […]

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Fireworks in Oakville or The Day Florida Moved to Canada . . . What a riot we had last weekend in Oakville! A buncha teenagers came to my little harbourfront neighbourhood cuz it has a corner Variety store that’ll sell anything to anybody including fireworks to kids.  We had a little to-do here a couple […]

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The Setting: The new Bob Center is in Tulsa Oklahoma because the Woody Guthrie Center is there, and because both were paid for by the OK billionaire philanthropist George Kaiser. Tulsa is remarkably like the midwestern town of Winnipeg I grew up in — flat farmland, low-rise, about a half-million people — and both with […]

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You wake up one day and your whole life changes just by the chance seeing of a picture. Much the way it might with a chance spotting of a poster on a bookstore wall. As Jack says, “My books are my children.”  And as Mama always preached — pregnancy can happen in an instant. Unlike […]

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The Beats, The Beatles & The Brotherhood . . This month I met a fellow Toronto-area author, John Arnone, who’s just written a book about The Beatles and Canada — Us and Them: Canada, Canadians and The Beatles.  In fact, in keeping with our Canadian heritage, we met after a ball hockey game and then […]

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Revival Revived   Klaus Voormann’s drawing of the 1969 plane trip   The most important musical event that ever occurred in Canada — and one of the most important concerts in history — took place at a university football stadium in downtown Toronto in 1969.  It’s true! London had The Beatles’ farewell on the rooftop, […]

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  Stories, videos and photos from the annual Kerouac hometown festival over the last several years I’ve been going. Edie Parker-Kerouac called and told me about the the initial commemorative dedication in July 1988 — which birthed LCK — saying that she, Henri Cru and “Big Tim” Moran were driving up for it, and that […]

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Here’s a little taste . . . My “script” notes for the first dramatic portrayal of Jack . . . . Pull My Daisy (released Nov. 1959) One of the Big Five to focus on MY THESIS HOW THIS IS THE GREATEST BEAT GEN CREATION. Filmed in their prime . . . . Kerouac’s best […]

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The Making of “Jack on Film” . . Believe it or not this whole thing started when I got a call on January 12th, 2021 — six days after the Capitol insurrection (!) and still deep in the pandemic lockdown daze.  A musician friend I’ve known since 1976, Will Hodgson, was home with his kids […]

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