Brian Doherty profile picture

Brian Doherty

I'd Give It All Up, For Just a Little More---Montgomery Burns

About Me

Senior Editor, Reason magazine Author of the following books: This is Burning Man (Little, Brown, 2004; paperback from BenBella, 2006; Radicals for Capitalism (PublicAffairs, 2007; Gun Control on Trial (Cato Institute, 2008). Member of the following performance troupes: Art of Bleeding; Banned Rehearsal. I'm pretty sure I am the only author on earth to have three or more bylined pieces in all of the following five periodicals: Mother Jones, Weekly Standard, Chronicles, Spin, and Reason. I cover the waterfront.

My Interests

Writing a book about something requires a fair amount of immersion and interest. Thus, my social life and general mindspace are occupied, unsurprisingly, by situations and people that arose from my (ongoing) Burning Man experience and the world of libertarian thought and activism. I spend almost all my time reading, writing, and listening to my records when not camping in strange places and helping my beautiful and fascinating friends build attractive and bizarre devices and artworks and making amusing noises. Showering and eating, a little bit of that in there as well.

I'd like to meet:

Anyone ready to throw down and help build fundypants mountain. Old friends I've lost through unforgiveable carelessness. Pel Torro. The holder of the anti-life equation. Ritchie Blackmore. Craig Finn. Castor Oyl. The Man Who Shot Liberty Valence. Gene Wolfe. Denny Colt. G.K. Chesterton. Richard Shaver. Lindsey Buckingham. Any ancient master who can teach me the power to cloud men's minds.

Music:

My own bands include/have included Banned Rehearsal, Satellyte, Sawdust Caesars (single on In the Red), The Jeffersons (single on Cherry Smash), Turbo Satan, and Target Practice. I ran Cherry Smash Records in the 90s and put out 30 or so CDs, singles, LPs and cassettes by bands I liked with people I liked. They are mostly all still for sale, thanks for asking. Fanatical record collector, former record label magnate and record store clerk, over 4000 records and CDs amongst favorites acts include Beach Boys Bob Dylan The Fall Miles Davis Velvet Underground Meringue Neil Young The Chills the Ramones Jefferson Airplane Grateful Dead The Cowsills Led Zeppelin The Who The Kinks there are bands I have more than 10 albums by that I'm not even sure I like very much. The three musical acts taking up the most space in my mind lately have been Deep Purple, the Hold Steady, and Storytime with Roadkill, all of whom I've had the (not coincidental) pleasure of seeing perform live.

Books:

Five (out of 20 or so) books I'm currently reading: THE REST IS NOISE by Alex Ross; CLASSICAL ECONOMICS by Thomas Sowell; SHOWCASE PRESENTS JUSTICE LEAGUE OF AMERICA VOL 2 by Gardner Fox and Mike Sekowsky; REMEMBRANCE OF THINGS PAST by Marcel Proust; G.K. CHESTERTON'S COLLECTED WORKS VOL XXXIII: THE ILLUSTRATED LONDON NEWS 1923-25

My Blog

Me in today’s NY Post

Being in mad finish a book world, I've done very little outside writing this summer (or spring), but here's a little book review by me in today's New York Post, of the book WHO CAN SAVE US NOW?, an ed...
Posted by Brian Doherty on Mon, 28 Jul 2008 08:04:00 PST

Proud media moment: I make the ONION

Not my words per se. And I guess you are going to have to take my word for it that it's NOT a coincidence that, in this week's ONION phony man in the street interview segment "American Voices" (it's i...
Posted by Brian Doherty on Fri, 18 Jul 2008 10:23:00 PST

Doherty talking guns on the AM dial tonight

I'll be appearing on LA's KFI-AM 640 tonight at 9 pm pacific talking about the Heller Supreme Court decision. I'm supposed to be on 15-25 minutes. Those outside the LA area (and what's yr problem?) ca...
Posted by Brian Doherty on Sat, 28 Jun 2008 12:05:00 PST

Wanna see me talking about Heller and guns?

Then lookee here! On reason.tv. Tapes yesterday in a park a few blocks north of my home. How's my neck look?...
Posted by Brian Doherty on Sat, 28 Jun 2008 04:18:00 PST

In my hometown paper today...

...the humble li'l LA TIMES,writing on the topic of the book I'm writing this year, due out by November, about the Heller case and gun control.See my op-ed in today's LA Times: http://www.latimes.com/...
Posted by Brian Doherty on Fri, 27 Jun 2008 01:22:00 PST

The paperback of my RADICALS FOR CAPITALISM is out

I got my copies today. Big day! Light and lively and lovely! Buy it!Also, a good excuse for you all to check out the comprehensive blog and link selection of all the many wonderful reviews, excerpts, ...
Posted by Brian Doherty on Sat, 07 Jun 2008 09:49:00 PST

40 Publications for 40 Years

As I turn 40 on Sunday, I compile this partial list of 40 publications that I've written for professionally in my career. Reason; Washington Post; Wall Street Journal; Los Angeles Times; USA Today; C...
Posted by Brian Doherty on Thu, 29 May 2008 03:18:00 PST

Many more new photos

Mostly from recent travels to Austin, Indio, San Francisco, Port Costa.
Posted by Brian Doherty on Fri, 16 May 2008 06:37:00 PST

More new photos

It’s true: I like looking at good photos of myself and loved ones taken by other people. The Internet, it turns out, is full of ’em! Try it! Go Flickr yourself sometime! See many new photo...
Posted by Brian Doherty on Fri, 21 Mar 2008 05:34:00 PST

Some more non-Reason stuff

Review in the New York Post of a new graphic novel, SHOOTING WAR.And the presitigious Financial Times picks my book RADICALS FOR CAPITALISM one of the best political books of the year. (Number three o...
Posted by Brian Doherty on Tue, 11 Dec 2007 04:35:00 PST