Word: strikingly
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: during 1990-1999
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...host, a tall, bespectacled fellow with a wry expression and fidgety body language, bounds onstage to the beat of the house rock band. He grimaces when jokes don't work, makes small talk with the nerdy bandleader, obsessively repeats words and names that strike his fancy. Sitting at his desk, a nighttime cityscape in the background, he stops periodically to take a sip from a glass of tap water. Each time, he offers the same exaggerated show of pleasure: "I say yes to German water...
...young performers provides part of the answer. There's pop singer Diana King with her new release, Think Like a Girl (Work Group); the hip-hop-charged star Capleton with his album I-Testament (Def Jam); and trip-hop-tinged newcomer Finley Quaye with his debut CD Maverick a Strike (550 Music). A much more established star, South African traditionalist Lucky Dube, also has a new CD out, Taxman (Shanachie). The fact that reggae, like a nation secure enough to welcome new immigrants, is able to nurture such a varied group of up-and-comers is a sign...
Finley Quaye's inventive, off-kilter debut, Maverick a Strike, is also bursting with freshness and new life. His music has a sinuous reggae groove twisting through it, but it is laced with folky acoustic guitars and trip-hop electronic doodles and flourishes (he's an uncle of trip-hop maverick Tricky). It's easy for music this arty to forget about heart, but not here; on the song Even After All, Quaye turns in a tender, haunting ballad...
...Such telegenic stunts have replaced any serious attempts at diplomacy in Iraq's 20-day standoff with the United Nations. With most Arab countries ? even Kuwait ? expressing opposition to a U.S. air strike, Saddam is evidently maneuvering himself into the position of anti-American leadership he always sought. Deputy Prime Minister Tariq Aziz is pushing the image for all it's worth: In Morocco Sunday, he warned of a backlash by "Arab masses" in the event of military action...
...only question now is whether Madeleine Albright's whistle-stop weekend tour of surrounding Gulf states ? Qatar, Bahrain, Kuwait and Saudi Arabia ? has drummed up any support for U.S. action to punish Iraq. Without it, Saddam will turn an air-strike into the greatest pro-Iraq propaganda...