Troy Johnson

This week, Troy Johnson, long-time music editor at San Diego CityBeat, frequent guest on These Day's Weekend Preview, and scruffy but silver-tongued champion of the local music scene announced he was leaving his post at CityBeat. Why? He's going glossy, at least on the page. Troy will be the new senior editor at RIVIERA magazine. I chatted him up about the new post this morning over email.

Troy, congratulations on the new gig, but I have to say, I never really pictured you doing the modern luxury beat. What will you be up to at RIVIERA?

Funny, I used to think the same thing. When I first LOOKED at RIVIERA, my reaction was "oh god, bourgeois fluff." But then I actually READ the magazine. The writing is on par with national publications; they share writers with the Times and a few other nationals. And whereas some of these "high society" magazines can be nauseatingly sycophantic--like puppies at the heels of the elite--RIVIERA has an insightful, observational tone (which comes from Ed-in-Chief Gillian Flynn, who's a hardcore newsy vet of the Associated Press). I've always wanted to helm my own publication--eventually on the national level--but I took a fun little detour through TV Land. Now that I'm off the tube, I'm going pit bull at that goal.

Senior Editor at a glossy monthly is a good start--then a masters, a stuffy little PhD, the whole egghead parade. But I wasn't willing quite yet to head for subway life in New York. I surf every day and, trite as this may seem, I'm not willing to give that up. My beat at RIVIERA will be food/drink/art/culture. I'm the sort of geek who gets excited by good cookware, so I'm really looking forward to the gastronomy kick.

You wrote for CityBeat for five years. What will you miss most?

There's a lot to miss about CityBeat. That's a small paper built on chewing gum, bailing wire and severely passionate, severely talented, severely underpaid editors and writers. I'll miss the unfiltered edge of it. I'll miss making up words because they feel right, flipping the bird to AP style and spell check. The hardest part about making this switch was being willing to give up my post as "the music guy." I dedicated a good portion of my life to San Diego's music scene, for which I've been respected and detested. But I was bored. I didn't have the desire to be out in rock dives four nights a week anymore. And when you lose that, you gotta hand over the reins. I didn't want to end up the creepy 40-year-old taking notes in the corner of The Casbah. It's a crisis in music journalism that I wanted no part of--the aging rock critic who never goes out except to "marquee shows," but occupies space as a Music Editor because that's all they know. I'll still be at places like The Tower Bar because I still intensely love good, underground music--it just won't be my job. With RIVIERA, I'll get to handle food, drink and the arts (not music, that's Seth Combs' beat, and he does it well), which will make me a bit more human and a more well-rounded editor.

The short is set to found audio of a message recorded on an answering machine. The caller identifies himself as someone "Josephine" knew 21 years ago. He goes on to describe his plans for a Quantum Computer Emulator - whatever that is. Kennedy takes a bizarre, convoluted, yet strangely endearing phone message and attaches imaginative and playful visuals. I love the whole thing.

Composer Philip Glass

Here's the best of what I've discovered this morning - although there seems to be lots of lustable items today, so check in later this afternoon....

Composer Philip Glass has a new opera about the Civil War called Appomattox. It debuted in San Francisco this Friday and it's getting mixed reviews. The San Francisco Chronicle says it's uneven, while other reviews have called it one of the best new operas in years.

Apparently, Glass greatly admires Generals Grant and Lee, and much of his inspiration for the opera derives from that admiration. He recently said "In public life today, there are scarcely any men and women of that quality. You know there is this misconception of Grant as some kind of alcoholic. In fact, he was a man of tremendous stamina and moral courage."

Glass will be in San Diego on November 3rd and 4th when the La Jolla Symphony, under the leadership of new music director Steve Schick, will premiere Glass' Cello Concerto. That's not to be missed.

More Radiohead: everyone from ex-Smith's guitarist Johnny Marr to Oasis is supporting Radiohead's sales model of pay what you can for their new album.

Judd Apatow: I've really been enjoying Judd Apatow's rise to fame and, in some circles, reverence. I was an obsessed Freaks and Geeks fan and loved Knocked Up. Still haven't seen Superbad, which is totally lame, I know. Apatow and his panel were the best thing about Comic-Con this year - hilarious and smart and adept at working that crowd, which is why I've been interested to see how he would do at the New Yorker Festival. I've been following his appearances there and... by many accounts, he's a hit! But here's why I now like Apatow even more, why I think he may have been a visionary from birth -- his childhood hero was Steve Martin! Read this account of the young Apatow trying to get Martin's autograph.

You know who wasn't a hit at the New Yorker Festival? David Milch! Go here to read how Milch went off while participating in a festival panel on television. His targets were both network and cable television, as well as the shows of his fellow panelists. Milch also repeatedly insulted his host, The New Yorker. Apparently, he then launched into a tirade on Jews in Hollywood. After Deadwood and John from Cincinnati, I'm trying to figure out if Milch is just some crazed but cranky genius. Can't wait until he wins his next Emmy - surely his acceptance speech would be worth sitting through two hours of Ryan Seacrest.