The Sternal Centennial Best of the Rest!
All of the other things I've recommended over 100 issues
Est. Read Time: 8 minutes. Read Time brought to you once again by the Ashburton Energy + Hair Logistics Group, in association with the Bradley Hills Bureau of Corrections.
If you like the Sternal Journal, forward it to a friend. They can find the Best of 2020 list here.
Hello Sternal Journalists!
First up, I had a blast with my first real week of being back to stand-up shows. I felt like The Rock at the end of that new Tech N9ne music video:
The next show is October 28th at Mama Shelter. Costumes encouraged! Grab your tickets today.
Second up!
If you missed last week’s issue, I announced that we have hit 100 ISSUES of the Sternal Journal. I thought it would be fun—and did not realize how tedious it would be—to compile and share every single thing I’ve ever recommended in the world famous Sternal Journal Recs section.
Last week, I shared all 67 the music recommendations, as well as this representative nearly four hour long spotify playlist. It’s got everything from Drake to Bach, Tony Bennett to Flo Milli to Willie Nelson to Jewel.
This week, everything else.
Between the music category and all of the ones shared below, there were a total of 245 recs spanning articles, podcasts, movies, tv, comedy, poetry, fiction, a few miscellaneous, and even one beer (I do love that beer still).
While I did at one point recommend everything you’ll find on the lists below, I would caution that this is not a best-of list, thought it’s also not not a best-of list.
It’s really a zoomed out snapshot of the things that were capturing my attention one week at a time. And full disclosure, some of them are authored by friends or by me(!) because, after all, the Sternal Journal has always been about tasteful self-promotion, so sometimes in the past, I was recommending a tall drink a’ me.
So take little scroll through our shared history of culturing ourselves (or if you’re a newer subscriber, maybe find some new things to enjoy!).
Next week, we’ll be back to our regularly scheduled programming as I hopefully finally go off on NBC’s Ordinary Joe, and Hollywood’s dedication to unoriginality.
~RECS~
ARTICLES
E Unibus Pluram: Television and U.S. Fiction. David Foster Wallace, Review of Contemporary Fiction. 1993.
The Golden Voice - Interview with GV of Partners In Kryme. Werner von Wallenrod, Werner von Wallenrod’s Humble, Little Hip-Hop Blog. 2008.
Snoop Lion Spends Our Cash. Julian Stern, Maxim, 2013.
The About Us Page of Every Digital Media Agency. Julian Stern, McSweeney’s, 2017.
Gritty’s Evolution from google-eyed hockey mascot to meme to Leftists avatar, explained. Emily VanDerWerff, Vox, 2018.
How Playbills became social media must-shares. Ashley Lee, LA Times. 2019.
How TikTok Holds Our Attention. Jia Tolentino, The New Yorker. 2019.
A good deal? Or a nice deal?. The Darling Axe. 2020.
Beethoven for pandemic times: How Opus 132 is journey through illness and healing. Mark Swed, LA Times. 2020.
Gordon Parks: Seeing Color in Black and White. Sarah Meister, MoMa Magazine. 2020.
'I hate everybody including you.'Shaun Usher, Letters of Note. 2020.
She sang ‘Killing Me Softly’ before Roberta Flack. Now she just wants you to hear her side of the story. Geoff Edgers, Washington Post. 2020.
SterJour Notable Moment of Sport #1: Jesse Owens! Julian Stern, The Sternal Journal. 2020.
The Clean Version of WAP is Actually So Much Filthier. Kathryn VanArendonk, Vulture. 2020.
The Rabbit Outbreak. Susan Orlean, The New Yorker. 2020.
The Week Old Hollywood Finally, Actually Died. Ben Smith, New York Times. 2020.
The Underground Movement Trying to Topple the North Korean Regime. Suki Kim, The New Yorker. 2020.
Zombie philanthropy: The rich have stashed billions in donor-advised charities — but it’s not reaching those in need. Will Hobson, Washington Post. 2020.
How a Daddy Longlegs Grows Such Strange Legs. Veronique Greenwood, New York Times. 2021.
How Coffin Flop’s Coffins Got Flopped. Anne Victoria Clark, Vulture. 2021.
Slow journalism: Something to add to your summer reading list. Doyle McManus, L.A. Times. 2021.
The Fight for Echo Park Lake: Fences and Neighbors. Jamie Loftus, KnockLA. 2021.
PODCASTS
A Conversation with a Border Patrol Agent (Ep. of The Daily)
A Memorial for the Living [Ep. of Revisionist History]
A Special Episode for Kids: The Fear Facer. [Ep. of The Daily]
“Is A.I. the Problem? Or Are We?” [Ep. of Ezra Klein]
“The Birth of American Music” [Ep. of 1619]
Lord of the Rankings + Project Dillard [2 Eps. of Revisionist History]
Madness (Endless Thread Miniseries)
The Editors (Ep. of Catch and Kill)
Wilco’s Jeff Tweedy Wants You to Be Bad at Something. It’s for Your Own Good [Ep. of The Ezra Klein Show]
The Lessons of 2016 (Ep. of The Daily)
MOVIES
American Funeral [SCRIPT] (2021)
Another Round (2020)
Bill and Ted’s Bogus Journey (1991)
Citizen Kane (1941)
Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald (2018)
Crip Camp (2020)
Cruella (2021)
Cultural Humility: People, Principles and Practices (2012)
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004)
Happiest Season (2020)
High Hopes (1988)
Holding (2018) *short
In The Heights (2021)
Judas and the Black Messiah (2021)
Little Women (2019)
Ma Vie de Courgette (2016)
Mentally Al (2021)
Minari (2020)
My Octopus Teacher (2020)
Nomadland (2020)
Pain and Glory (2019)
Parasite (2019)
Paris is Burning (1990)
Senna (2010)
Soul (2020)
Tenet (2020)
The Eyes of Tammy Faye (2021)
The Father (2020)
The Forty Year Old-Version (2020)
The Great Mouse Detective (1986)
The Last Black Man in San Francisco (2019)
The Present (2020) *short
The Red Balloon (1956) *short
The Verdict (1982)
Two Distant Strangers (2020) *short
Waves (2019)
Zola (2021)
TELEVISION
American Crime Story: Impeachment (2021)
Atypical Season 3 (2019)
DARK (2017)
Dave (2020)
Deaf U (2020)
Detroiters (2017)
Devs (2020)
Dickinson (2019)
Feel Good (2020)
Gossip Girl (2021)
Hilda (2018)
Mare of Easttown (2021)
Ordinary Joe (2021) [RETRACTED]
Perry Mason (2020)
Pretend It’s A City (2021)
Shrill (2019) [but specifically Season 3 Episode 3, more specifically the ending where Jo Firestone screams and says “Oh, no. It finally happened. Pussy so good, he died.”]
Search Party Season 3 (2020)
Sex and the City pilot (1998)
Shadow and Bone (2021)
Squid Game (2021)
Stath Lets Flats (2018)
Supermarket Sweep (1990)
Ted Lasso (2020)
The Crown Season 4, Episode 5 “Fagan” (2020)
The Mole (2001)
Years and Years (2019)
BOOKS
All Girls, Emily Layden (2021).
Are Prisons Obsolete?, Angela Davis (2003).
Bleak House, Charles Dickens (1852).
Don’t Read Poetry. A Book about How to Read Poems, Stephanie Burt (2019).
Nobody is Ever Missing, Catherine Lacey (2014)
Pew, Catherine Lacey (2020)
Robot. Black Belt. Champion., Joe Cabello (2021)
The Book of Emma Reyes, Emma Reyes (2012)
The End of Policing, Alex Vitale (2017)
The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August, Catherine Webb (2014)
The Intuitionist, Colson Whitehead (1999)
The Plotters, Un-Su Kim (2010)
This Is How You Lose the Time War, Amal El-Mohtar & Max Gladstone (2019)
Timequake, Kurt Vonnegut (1997)
Generally any book that a movie or show you love is based on.
YOUTUBE VIDEOS
Bobby Laughed at Black’s First Move, Chesstube
CORSO, Tyler The Creator Music Video.
GAMES
7 Wonders (board)
7 Wonders: Duel (board)
Spice Road (board)
Zelda: Breath of the Wild (video)
SOCIAL MEDIA
LittleRicky001, Street Artist
_emilife, Artist
Katy Fishell x Theo Henderson webcomic about being unhoused during the pandemic.
ARE WE SURE IT’S LUCK???, iconic video.
A TikTok about how many times “Uptown Funk” was sued that I can’t find anymore.
COMEDY
The Golden One, Whitmer Thomas (2020).
Julian Stern, As Per Usual, Blows You Away, Julian Stern (2021).
When Does the Club Shut?, Alex Hooper (2020).
Killin’ Them Softly, Dave Chappelle (2000).
Inside, Bo Burnham (2021)
Matching Tie and Kandkerchief, Monty Python (1973)
POEMS
Ozymandias, Percy Bysshe Shelley (1818).
Collisions, Ben Kassoy (2021).
Control, Ben Kassoy (2021).
SHORT STORIES
Story of Your Life, Ted Chiang (1998).
Message in a Bottle, Nalo Hopkinson (2004).
What We Talk About When We Talk About Love, Raymond Carver (1981).
BEER
Hammerland, El Segundo Brewing Co.
APPS
Clubhouse (lol)
PAINTINGS
Party Hat, Jeff Koons (1995)
MISC.
Grapes, fruit.
Freemarket, gallery (ATL).
Officiating a wedding, life activity.
The Broad, museum (LA).
Water, good stuff.
And with that, Sternal Journalists, I wish you a tomorrow full of that good stuff, water. If anything on these lists piqued your interests and you wanna know more, I’d love to recommend them further! Hit me up directly or in the comments!
Much love,
Julian