EDITION: U.S.
 
CONNECT    

James Rotondi
GET UPDATES FROM James Rotondi
 
James Rotondi is a New York musician, actor, journalist and critic; he's the former Editor-in-Chief of Future Music magazine, and his interviews and essays have appeared in Spin, Rolling Stone, Guitar Player, Mojo, and The Boston Phoenix, among others.

As a musician, he has played with the rock groups Mr. Bungle, the French band Air, jazz-hop pioneers the Grassy Knoll, and NYC band The Cringe. He also sings, plays and composes for albums and television; Rotondi’s debut solo album, “Summer Home,” under his artist alias "Roto," is currently available on iTunes, Amazon.com, CDBaby.com, and other digital outlets, on Volumnia Recordings.

Raised in a political family, Rotondi is the grandson of three-term Massachusetts governor and former Ambassador to Italy, John A. Volpe. He has lived in Paris, Rome, San Francisco, and Boston, and currently rabble-rouses in New York City, where he plays soccer a few times a week with guys much faster and younger than him.

Blog Entries by James Rotondi

Sex, Sin & Zen: Brad Warner and the Lust for Enlightenment

Posted June 9, 2011 | 19:38:51 (EST)

With bare-knuckle book titles like Hardcore Zen and Sit Down and Shut Up, author Brad Warner is not your hippie Aunt's idea of a tranquil, exotic spiritual master. With a pedigree in punk rock and garage-psychedelia, and a two-decade stint in the trenches of Japanese monster movie marketing, the 47-year-old...

Read Post

"Rain" On Their Parade: Why the NY Times review of "Rain: A Tribute to the Beatles On Broadway" is All Wet

Posted October 29, 2010 | 13:43:22 (EST)

In his hugely condescending review of the newly opened show, Rain: A Tribute to the Beatles on Broadway, ("Another Long and Winding Detour," Oct. 26, 2010) New York Times reviewer Charles Isherwood--who, though he freely admits that he "can't claim to be an expert in the intricacies of...

Read Post

The Revolution Will Be Televised: Oscar-pick Burma VJ Airs on HBO

Posted April 26, 2010 | 15:02:58 (EST)

If the totalitarian nightmare portrayed in George Orwell's 1984 strikes you as an implausible portrait of state control and repression, a single viewing of the Oscar-nominated documentary Burma VJ; Reporting From A Closed Country will quickly jerk you into reality. Using raw, eyewitness footage captured by underground, internet-equipped...

Read Post

Vinyl Is Forever: In Praise of Indie Record Stores

Posted April 20, 2010 | 18:02:06 (EST)

This piece was originally posted at the MTV Music Blog

For those who only buy their music on iTunes, Amazon.com, or other online digital music services and retailers, the idea of walking into a "brick-and-mortar" record store and plunking down cash for a physical, mechanical reproduction of a...

Read Post

Buddhist Backlash: Stephen Batchelor Braves The Storm

Posted April 1, 2010 | 12:43:08 (EST)

Stephen Batchelor does not look like a man at the center of a storm. But the calm, bespectacled 57-year-old Englishman is in the eye of a hurricane of controversy taking place in the global community of Buddhism.

Batchelor is a former monk in both the Tibetan Geluk and Korean...

Read Post

Pretend It Like Beckham, Pt 2: The LA Galaxy Soccer Fantasy Camp Gets Real

Posted December 14, 2009 | 14:56:10 (EST)

This is the second installment of a piece that begins here:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/james-rotondi/pretend-it-like-beckham-i_b_389880.html

Making sure that this motley crew of small business owners, actors, financial types, musicians, students, graphic artists and blue-collar workers begin to gel into an actual soccer team is the job of Coach Ralph Perez. With...

Read Post

Pretend It Like Beckham: Inside the LA Galaxy Adult Soccer Fantasy Camp, Pt 1

Posted December 12, 2009 | 13:53:13 (EST)

"The dream is still there," says the Frenchman, pulling on his official LA Galaxy game jersey, emblazoned on the back with his name and his favorite number--in his case, #10, the number associated with soccer greats like Zinedine Zidane and Diego Maradona. We're sitting in the LA Galaxy locker room...

Read Post

Same-Sex Marriage: "A Basic Civil Right"

Posted December 8, 2009 | 11:28:37 (EST)

Last Wednesday, as the New York State Senate voted down a bill that would have legalized same-sex marriage in New York, they were, in essence, voting to require discrimination in the State of New York. That they did it, in part, with the guiding hand of the Catholic Church--who called...

Read Post

Obama's Catholic Baptism By Fire

Posted May 19, 2009 | 18:10:25 (EST)

"The Day the Dome Was Tarnished Forever."

So read the backs of T-shirts worn by some number of anti-choice protesters during President's Obama's visit to the Catholic University of Notre Dame over the weekend to deliver a commencement address, one which took a typically civil, sensitive and conciliatory stance...

Read Post

We're in a "Repression": The Economics of Shame

Posted December 8, 2008 | 12:38:16 (EST)

If the current recession started last December, as the latest findings from the National Bureau of Economic Research clearly indicate, then it stands to reason that, considering things have gotten a lot worse since then, we're a lot closer to a depression than anyone has realized. Perhaps we're not quite...

Read Post

Bush and Obama: What Really (Might Have) Happened

Posted November 11, 2008 | 11:56:07 (EST)

"Yo, Barackulator -- you want a brew?"

President-Elect Barack Obama looked up at George W. Bush, the lame-duck 43rd President of the United States, who'd just ushered him into a private meeting in the Oval Office while their wives continued a tour of the White House. On this, his first...

Read Post

The Tears Were Real; Palin Was A Pawn

Posted November 6, 2008 | 12:57:32 (EST)

Maybe I'm just a sucker, or perhaps some misplaced machismo makes me want to defend damsels in distress (even ones who can take down a moose), but watching Sarah Palin tear up during John McCain's concession speech Tuesday night, I actually felt a twinge of sympathy. "Nonsense," my tough, liberal-fighter...

Read Post

Thanks for the Warning GOP; We'll Keep That in Mind!

Posted November 2, 2008 | 13:44:47 (EST)

You've got to give real credit to these sensible, noble Republicans, who, forced to watch their presidential candidate's campaign begin an ignoble nose-dive, have been gracious enough to warn American voters against the dangers of letting the Democrats gain control of both houses of Congress as well. Just this...
Read Post