Tim Riley
NPR critic, Emerson College professor and author Tim Riley reviews pop and classical music for NPR's On Point and Here and Now. His reviews appear widely in the New York Times, http://truthdig.com, the L.A. Review of Books, the Huffington Post, on National Public Radio, and the Washington Post.
Tim earned degrees in classical piano from Oberlin and Eastman. Since 2009, he has taught digital journalism at Emerson College in Boston. Brown University hosted Riley as Critic-In Residence in 2008, and his first book, Tell Me Why: A Beatles Commentary (Knopf/Vintage 1988), was hailed by the New York Times as bringing "new insight to the act we've known for all these years..."
Tim's television appearances include the PBS Newshour, CBS Morning and Evening News, MTV, and the History Channel. Riley gave a keynote address at Beatles 2000, the first international academic conference in Jyvaskyla, Finland. Since then, he's given hundreds of lively multi-media lectures on "Censorship in the Arts," and "Rock History." His current projects include the music metaportal, the Riley Rock Index, and a major new Beatles multimedia textbook (What Goes On: The Beatles, Their Music, And Their Time, Oxford, 2019).
27 articles
List of articles in the library
Comment by Tim Riley, The Boston Phoenix, 27 July 1990
DEFENDING 2 LIVE Crew's right to party feels more like a chore than a privilege. Graphic slapstick writ large, As Nasty As They Wanna Be ...
The Beatles: Mark Lewisohn: Tune In: The Beatles – All These Years, Volume 1
Book Review by Tim Riley, The New York Times, 6 December 2013
APPROACHES TO retelling the Beatles' story slice in two distinct directions: narrow or wide. Some authors choose a single figure and bore down deep, which ...
Book Review by Tim Riley, The Boston Phoenix, February 1990
WHEN PAUL MCCARTNEY announced his $8.5 million promotion deal with Visa at a recent press conference, he was challenged to explain how his new sideline ...
The Bottle Rockets: Songs Of Sahm
Review by Tim Riley, Public Arts, 3 January 2002
YOU MAY NOT have heard of Doug Sahm, but might recognize his voice from 'She's About Mover', the oldies linchpin. Those who did know him ...
Review by Tim Riley, The Boston Phoenix, 20 October 1989
Boxing Bowie: Sound + Vision puts it together ...
Live Review by Tim Riley, The Boston Phoenix, 2 February 1990
Let's get improvisational ...
Elvis Costello: The Elvis Costello Show: King of America (Columbia)
Review by Tim Riley, The East Village Eye, April 1986
ALONGSIDE ALL the "detritus" that Greil Marcus writes about on Elvis Costello's King of America, there's an inventiveness despite the way it turns on itself. ...
Bob Dylan, Bruce Springsteen, X, Neil Young: Rock Of Middle Ages
Comment by Tim Riley, The Boston Phoenix, 9 February 1990
The new traditionalism looks for its roots. ...
Essay by Tim Riley, The Boston Phoenix, 7 April 1989
Why The Fall continue to rise ...
Book Review by Tim Riley, The Boston Phoenix, October 1990
THE BRITISH have always tried to claim Hendrix as their own. This argument falls apart right away not only because he was an American, but ...
Essay by Tim Riley, Rock's Backpages, November 2006
LONG BEFORE "POST-MODERN" became pure jargon, Buddy Holly put quotes around his "normalcy" to disarm rock machismo. Holly, the "King of the Sixth Grade," hiccupped ...
Jim Keltner: His Time Is Tight: Jim Keltner
Profile by Tim Riley, publicbroadcasting.net, January 2002
Jim Keltner has drummed for everybody from Bob Dylan to Steely Dan to Ry Cooder; he drives a lot of the better rock albums you ...
Led Zeppelin: Lead Zeppelin: Led Zeppelin (Atlantic box-set)
Review by Tim Riley, The Boston Phoenix, 21 December 1990
Dead Zeppelin: New Led box is full of hot air ...
The Lemonheads: Getting In Their Lick
Review and Interview by Tim Riley, The Boston Phoenix, 26 May 1989
Who needs coherence? ...
Van Morrison: Orpheum Theatre, Los Angeles
Live Review by Tim Riley, The Boston Phoenix, 27 April 1990
Soul to burn — the spirit moves Van Morrison ...
Profile by Tim Riley, The Boston Phoenix, 25 May 1990
Parsons's Grievous Angel returns ...
Review by Tim Riley, The Boston Phoenix, 1990
Take it to the bridge — Prince's funky graffiti ...
Public Enemy: Fear of a Black Planet (Def Jam/Columbia)
Review by Tim Riley, The Boston Phoenix, 22 April 1990
Their Own Worst Enemy? Fear of a Black Planet; seductive music, muddled message ...
Live Review by Tim Riley, The Boston Phoenix, Spring 1989
Bonnie rebounds with the blues ...
The Replacements: All Shook Down (Sire/Warner Bros.)
Review by Tim Riley, The Boston Phoenix, 21 September 1990
Refining the metal – The Replacements shake it down ...
Sonic Youth: Will Sonic Youth Keep Rock Honest?
Comment by Tim Riley, The Boston Phoenix, 16 March 1990
EVER SINCE punk failed to explode rock's dysfunctional excess with red-faced ire, hardcore noisemakers have been wrestling with the problem of how to be outrageous. ...
Comment by Tim Riley, The Boston Phoenix, 18 August 1989
Does Ringo have too many friends? ...
Wipers: Turning the Sage: Boston says goodbye to the Wipers
Live Review by Tim Riley, The Boston Phoenix, 27 January 1989
THE WIPERS, a seasoned punk trio from Portland, Oregon, are headed up by singer/songwriter/guitarist Greg Sage, an electronics wizard offering yet more proof that techies ...
Yo La Tengo: Fakebook (Bar None)
Review by Tim Riley, The Boston Phoenix, 14 September 1990
Yo La Tengo's pop mother lode ...
List of genre pieces
Guide by Tim Riley, The Boston Phoenix, 7 December 1990
The perfect party tape ...
Simon Frith: Music For Pleasure/Facing The Music/Art Into Pop
Book Review by Tim Riley, The Boston Phoenix, May 1989
AS A SOCIOLOGIST who draws on Marxist principles to make sense of the Byzantine channels through which pop flows, Simon Frith was the first British ...
Book Review by Tim Riley, The Boston Phoenix, May 1990
IN A CLIMATE where the Reverend Louis Farrakhan can make a comeback on Donahue proposing a separate black state as a God-given right, the void ...
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