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The Boston Phoenix has been covering the trends and events that shape our times since 1966. These selections, culled from our back files, were compiled by David Sims.

The great divide

5 years ago: July 7, 2000

Franklin Bruno profiled Belle & Sebastian.

"In the opening scene of the film High Fidelity, we see shy, music-obsessed record-store clerk Dick (Todd Louiso) put on a tape — all acoustic guitars, shimmering string, and Donovanesque vocals — as the workday begins. Enter obnoxious music-obsessed record-store clerk Barry (Jack Black), a few minutes late. ‘What is this?’ he asks suspiciously before ripping out the tape and declaring, ‘I don’t want to hear any of your sad-bastard music.’

"The ‘sad-bastard music’ in question? Belle & Sebastian — an advance track from the Scottish pop septet’s fourth album, Fold Your Hands, Child, You Walk Like a Peasant. The filmmaker’s choice may be the result of an indie-rock in-joke, or perhaps music-supervisor machinations, but it’s telling nonetheless: B&S divide listeners. For the extroverted Barrys of the world, the band’s elaborately low-key arrangements and wispy boy-girl vocals are the antithesis of rock and roll. But for the world’s oh-so-sensitive Dicks, the songs’ melodic sweep more than compensates for their lack of volume."

Sinful pleasures

10 years ago: July 7, 1995

Matt Ashare praised Frank Miller’s Sin City graphic novels.

"Sin City, which debuted in 1991, has kicked open the doors for a new, quick-selling genre that draws on the stark hyperrealism of crime fiction and the oppressive atmosphere of film noir for narratives aimed at a more sophisticated, literate audience. Popular titles like Sin City, Stray Bullets, and Andrew Vachss’s Hard Looks have all the action and suspense of the old-fashioned superhero comics, but their heroes sweat and bleed, their villains are never up against undefeatable, indefatigable keepers of law and order, and their writers can’t rely on death rays and remote-controlled Batcopters to get their man out of a jam."

Kerry bashing

15 years ago: July 6, 1990

Jon Keller scrutinized Jim Rappaport’s senatorial campaign against John Kerry.

"In the few short months of its aggressive pursuit of John Kerry’s senatorial seat, Rappaport’s campaign has shown a proclivity for posturing of a more serious and disingenuous nature, interspersing traditional stump activities with a series of exaggerations, misstatements, and outright falsehoods that shows no signs of abating, reaches beyond the boundaries of acceptable and credible political rhetoric, and threatens the viability of the candidacy it purports to serve.

"Yet in a Phoenix interview this week, Rappaport dismissed a litany of incidents — ranging from a broadside on [Republican US Senate candidate Dan] Daly’s war record to a pair of John Kerry attack ads — as a minor consequence of his campaign’s need ‘to get our message out aggressively.’ "

Blast from the past

20 years ago: July 9, 1985

Michael Sragow reviewed Back to the Future.

"All those who feel that the ’80s are a replay of the ’50s will feel justified by Back to the Future. True, Marty McFly discovers that an aerobics school has reverted to a malt shop, that rock and roll has yet to hit it big, and that farmland still covers the acres where his tract home will be. But the high school is still the same stolid monument to conventional behavior, with the same dumb domehead running it. It’s an adolescent testing ground where 90-pound weaklings must face up to their bullies and their own furtive dreams of glory or remain wimps forever. The town outside is a place where what matters in every walk of life, from the workplace to the home to the Lover’s Lane, is aggressiveness, confidence, and the ability to use these abilities to achieve success."

Battles in print

25 years ago: July 8, 1980

Charles P. Pierce reported on Chicago’s ongoing newspaper wars.

"For several months now, the Sun-Times and the Chicago Tribune have been at war. This has involved raiding each other’s personnel, taking up specific positions regarding the current city administration, and missing no opportunity for the well-placed snipe at the opposition. All this is sometimes to the good, sometimes to the detriment, but always to the entertainment of the citizenry, which has begun to separate into Sun-Times and Tribune camps.

"In the three days I was in town, for example, the following happened: the mayor tried to evict the Tribune’s City Hall reporter; and arrogant Cub outfielder lost his column in the Tribune; the mayor relented, then said she hadn’t; and so much chortling came across the printed page that you began to feel that you were paying your quarter for some sort of folded Elks smoker."

Assassination tango

30 years ago: July 8, 1975

R.D. Rosen covered the Boston Globe’s investigation into the assassination of JFK.

"The Globe’s decision to cover the assassination story may have aroused hope among conspiracy students that the events in Dallas in 1963 might receive further clarification, but [Globe staffer Jack] Thomas’s lengthy feature story in the Sunday Globe of June 29 makes it clear that the issues, as far as that paper is concerned, will only be further obfuscated.

"In his lead story to the two-page spread titled ‘Who Killed John F. Kennedy?’, Thomas reports, quite rightly, that ‘another difficulty in analyzing the Kennedy assassination is the volume of information and the fact that misinformation about the assassination is growing faster than information.’ "

Partied out

35 years ago: July 7, 1970

Damon Ricki covered the Republican State Convention.

"Every time a candidate’s name was placed before the delegates — about 1900 of them — in would troop a band, miniskirted girls carrying appropriate placards, and a bunch of delegates. They would march around the auditorium a couple of times and then, at the direction of US Senator Edward W. Brooke, who presided, file out of the halls.

"At one time, demonstrations were seen as a method of encouraging enthusiasm for the candidates. The idea was to drum up a bandwagon groundswell. It worked for Wendell Willkie in 1940 at the Republican National Convention. It almost worked for Adlai Stevenson in 1960 at the Democratic National Convention (but the enthusiasm there was due more to the presence of Eleanor Roosevelt than to the marching bands). And it didn’t work at all a week ago Saturday."

Where are they now?

Franklin Bruno is a recording artist and occasional music critic. Matt Ashare is music editor for the Boston Phoenix. Jon Keller is a daily commentator for WBZ-AM radio. Michael Sragow is a film critic for Salon. Charles P. Pierce writes for the Boston Globe Magazine. R.D. Rosen is the author of the Harvey Blissburg novels.