Published by the Students of Johns Hopkins since 1896
April 23, 2024

Arts & Entertainment



Hopkins Symphony Orchestra concludes its season

You could say that I was raised on classical music. Growing up, classical music was the only music that my dad ever played on the radio whenever he drove me places. Since my dad was my main chauffeur (sorry, mom, but dad gets this one), I spent a lot of my life listening to Mozart and Beethoven on repeat. 


Despite good production, Hunters falls morally flat

Amazon Prime released its highly-advertised new series, Hunters, this past Friday. The show follows a nefarious plot going on amongst 1977 Nazis, who plan to take over the United States and re-found the Nazi party (or something along those lines). The show also features an FBI agent played by Jerrika Hinton, who is herself discovering and following that very nation-wide Nazi conspiracy.



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BTS' new album, Map of the Soul: 7, celebrates the band members' longstanding friendship.

BTS returns with even more stunning choreography

Much of Korean pop music (K-pop) makes more sense as a performance than a music genre. It seems necessary to watch the music video and live performances to grasp the whole experience in its entirety. The satisfying synchronization of the members, amazing choreography, well thought-out backdrops, cool outfits and collective stage presence are crucial elements that add to a song’s success. 


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The 2018 California wildfires left Tame Impala no choice but to leave behind thousands of dollars of equipment.

Tame Impala’s album is a Slow Rush of emotions

In order to fully appreciate The Slow Rush, I think it’s important to take a moment to look back on the long journey that has led to this album’s release. When Tame Impala was announced as a Coachella headliner in late 2018, the anticipation for their follow-up to their immaculate 2015 album Currents came to a head. But as the months passed without a release date or first single, fans became nervous. 


COURTESY OF EUNICE PARK
The Peabody Wind Ensemble performed 20th-Century classical works.

Peabody Wind Ensemble shows off musicianship

The Peabody Institute’s Wind Ensemble rotation gave a stunning concert with conductor Harlan Parker in the Miriam A. Friedberg Concert Hall on Thursday, Feb. 20. The principle performers played beautiful solos alongside Kirkland Moranos on flute, Ellen Gruber on oboe and Chae Yoon Baek on clarinet.



COURTESY OF RISHABH KUMAR
John Clark Mayden’s photo exhibition reflects on Baltimore’s history. 

Peabody exhibit honors Baltimore neighborhoods

The George Peabody Library held a City of Neighborhoods celebration on Sunday as part of the closing week of the exhibition of City People: Black Baltimore in the Photographs of John Clark Mayden, an exhibition of Mayden’s photos. The event involved a variety of activities encouraging Baltimore residents to share their experiences of the city, interact with past figures who inhabited it and highlight diverse, artistic voices in the city while focusing the ideas of community and home through the specific realities of Baltimore. 



EDEN releases experimental new album, no future

EDM. Electronic Dance Music. In the modern age of music, the majority of us first heard this abbreviation associated with the likes of Skrillex, a dubstep musician who makes music in the form of novel and strange bass, synths and samples. However, in an interview with Pitchfork, Skrillex himself has said that EDM is a broader term than it has been made out to be.


To All the Boys Sequel falls prey to tried clichés

When Netflix released the movie To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before in 2018, it immediately became a huge hit. Capturing the attention of young girls and hopeless romantics, the uprise of the movie’s fans led to the recent release of its sequel, To All the Boys: P.S. I Still Love You. Based on the original book series by Jenny Han, it provides a loaded glimpse into the labyrinth that is young love, confusion and teenage awkwardness. Now it’s time for the full inside scoop of the new movie (spoiler alert ahead). 



COURTESY OF BINYAMIN NOVETSKY
Blind date with a book is the brainchild of library specialist Lily Kowalczyk.

MSE offers students a “blind date with a book”

While some students spent Valentine’s Day this past week with their significant other, others spent it alone or with friends. This year, the Milton S. Eisenhower Library (MSE) provided a fourth option: spending V-Day with a book. Not just any book, though: a book you were set up with blindly by someone else who you’ve probably never met.


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Williams talked about BB Kind’s wide-ranging influence in Blues Music.

Author explores legacy of BB King at Red Emma’s

On Feb. 13, artist and author Diane Williams presented a talk at Red Emma’s Bookstore on the life and legacy of BB King, one of the most influential blues musicians of all time. As a wide-ranging retrospective, it dealt not only with the life and music of BB King, but also with the history of blues itself, from its conception to its current space in the music world. 


COURTESY OF JANAYA BROWN
Ren is a multifaceted artist experienced with collages and Adobe Illustrator.

Artist Spotlight: senior Grace Ren, a proponent of messy art

Grace Ren is a senior majoring in Public Health and minoring in Visual Arts. With a rather conspicuous Instagram handle, @graceren.art, it is quite impossible to dissociate Ren from her amalgamation of creative mediums, which she calls a “multimedia brain barf” in her single-line biography. 


COURTESY OF BENJAMIN EVANS
Students wrote, directed and acted in Witness Theater’s four new plays.

Witness Theater presents new plays centered on the dynamics of office life

 Witness Theater presented its annual Intersession Showcase at the Swirnow Theater this weekend. The show featured four new student-written plays all tied together by the theme of office life. Junior Dominique Dickey was the executive producer, and sophomore Aparajita Kashyap was the stage manager for the show. 



MARIA EKLIND/CC BY-SA 2.0 
Season 24 of The Bachelor returns with even more dramatic indulgence.

The guilty pleasure in watching The Bachelor

It’s been just over a month since I’ve started following Peter Weber on the season 24 premiere of The Bachelor. There are two parts of that sentence that truly freak me out. First: that The Bachelor has had 24 seasons. Huge accomplishment for ABC, Instagram handles and the few couples that continued their love off-screen. Big loss for America, which treats this like a reigning cultural phenomenon.



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