Can a film about an immigrant father struggling to start a gardening business be a defining work of 2011? Yes. Who was best at amplifying workers' voices this year? Well, with everyone in pop culture pimping workers issues this year (see Jay-Z "Occupy" T-Shirt for sale but not...

Coldplay comes out swinging in LA with multiple stops in TV and Radio land. Here, they're at KROQ studios in the new boombastic Red Bull Soundspace there on the Kevin and Bean show....

So what exactly is a Trespass Parade, outside of being something blaring and whirring through downtown LA that is associated with the Pacific Standard Time initiative led by a madcap roster of artists, musicians, and dancers melding politics and art? For some, maybe that's all you...

Update 9/14: This concert (and others in the U.S.) has been cancelled, unfortunately, due to issues in processing the band's visas. From their agency: "...we are hopeful that we can bring them for dates next summer. Maybe we can reschedule for that time."

This...

Art at work? Well, art portraying work or workers' values and struggles has been going on for centuries, but portraying work in dramatic or readily accessible ways has not been fashionable of late. There are very few moments where a Rockefeller is hiring a Diego Rivera these days. But the...

What do they know about work in Hollywood? Good question. So this Labor Day week, we take a look at a listing of nominees for best films, tv shows, and other artistic expressions in what are called the "2011 Workers' Voice Awards" from PopWork USA, a blog dedicated to the...

His stage name should be Gnash Bridges. Because he brings together genres seamlessly with his viola from hip-hop to classical and will have you gnashing or gritting your teeth with his, ahem, mad orchestral skills. This Friday night shouldn't be any different for string man at-large Miguel Atwood...

Know that kid you saw doing a flip of his skateboard on the sidewalk? Okay, now imagine him on it screaming down an 80-foot wooden ramp, flipping his whole body for 50 feet in midair and landing on a 27-foot ramp. While television created ESPN X Games, it's...

It starts to sink in when you hear a gentle roar around Olympic Boulevard in downtown LA just before very tangible collective "oohs" and "aahs." It's ESPN X Games 17. Full of daring and delight, there were hundreds of amazing performances and aerial feats. From California and around the world....

Don't know much about hip-hop but like a good story? While sounding like a baby boomer droning on about how the Beatles were the greatest of all time and everything else an empty shell, I'm brought to that temptation about A Tribe Called...

Couldn't resist the pun in that headline, but in this case the stage is a car, so it works. In fact, the stage is 15 cars. Thats the number that sit in a parking lot you're escorted to as you wait for "The Car Plays" to start as part of...

Can a soapbox race be about creativity, the human spirit and tapping into the zeitgeist in addition to being an ultimate childlike thrill? Apparently so as today, absolute grown-ups participated in the 2011 Red Bull Soapbox Race with some 200,000 people watching in downtown LA. There's a fuller story and...

The film, "For Colored Girls", is gonna have sista girl flair for sure, but there are a number of reasons to peep it and especially watch how it unfolds in the movie market. Looking beyond the all-star cast, there are things at stake for non-traditional filmmakers, women, non-colored...

A beautiful giant collage art piece. A sea of people of every ethnicity. Danny Glover. Tom Morello. Young Poets. Wait, what's going on? And wasn't that TV's Rhoda? And aren't we in a parking lot near a driving range on a college campus? This is One Nation in LA on...

Wanna honor Labor Day but not work at it? Check out any of these pop culture expressions from the last year. Just in time for your nod to Labor Day, lets give props to those who have amplified workers' voices in one form or another this year.

THE LIST (*...

There's a blog to be written about Greatest Films of All-Time about Workers and work themes but for now, lets look at those made or released in the last year. Whether set in a grocery store, amusement park or airplanes, there's a DVD for everyone to watch this Labor Day...

If beauty is in the eye of the beholder, its even harder to spot when the beautiful object is something that illuminates the voices of workers today. Alas, today's art world is not where a Diego Rivera mural is easily found. Nor today's bookshelves (and Kindles) likely to...

Da Bomp bomp ba bomp da bomp bomp, Da Bomp bomp ba bomp bomp ba bomp bomp. This is the rhythm of work today. Whether getting your grind on behind a hot stove slinging French toast or click-clacking to get that powerpoint done, there is always a soundtrack to our...

I have a fantasy where Norman Lear gets in a room with Seth MacFarlane and JJ Abrams and Tyler Perry, does a roundhouse kick Billy Jack style and boom! Outspits some of the most badass popular television shows about working people since...well, All in the Family and

The ending credits of the recent Will Ferrell movie The Other Guys was a wonderful combo of how popular entertainment can help advance and promote the real facts and challenges for working people.

For everytime a speech or PowerPoint presentation from a labor or progressive leader about...