Philosopher Thomas Hobbes once famously stated, “The life of man (is) solitary, poor, nasty, brutish and short.” If you are a political science student like myself, it’s more than likely that one of your professors has asked or will ask you to ponder the meaning of these words. Read more...

Brian Wilson “SMiLE” Warner Music Group Rating: Hype is relative. For instance, using it in reference to, say, Franz Ferdinand is one thing. But when discussing “SMiLE,” it can’t quite convey the mythic expectations heaped upon rock’s now-legendary great lost album, Brian Wilson’s abandoned follow-up to “Pet Sounds” and response to the Beatles’ “Revolver” ““ both usually seen standing side by side at the top of most greatest albums lists. Read more...

For directors Joel Juarez Sanchez and Alberto Barboza, both UCLA alumni, box-office success is the last thing on their minds. Their films received numerous awards this summer, including a shared award for Best Short at the Los Angeles Latino International Film Festival. Read more...

She’s capable of packing a stadium of 30,000 people back home in South America, but now vocalist Eva Ayllon is looking to fill a venue that holds fewer than 2,000 people in the United States. Read more...

The first time Michael Alden saw the music video for his group’s country Billboard chart single, he was in Dykstra Hall. Alden, a third-year music student, along with his sisters, identical twins Lauren Mills and Dana Burke, who graduated from UCLA in 2002, make up Malibu Storm ““ a country group whose success has snowballed in the past few months. Read more...

Reading music reviews can get tiresome for me. All too often, reviews of the same album will use identical angles and language, and, over time, reviews by a specific publication start to look interchangeable (e.g. Read more...

In a world obsessed with photography and its technology, UCLA’s Hammer Museum is now presenting an exhibition showing the revival of representational painting called “The Undiscovered Country.” While many have forgotten or ignored painting as an adequate means to depict reality since the popularization of photography, the Hammer Museum hopes to dispel such thoughts by displaying works representing modern reality in ways photography can’t. Read more...