SOUNDTRACK: LCD SOUNDSYSTEM-LCD Soundsystem (2005).
What’s a metal/prog guy like myself listening to LCD Soundsystem for? Even though the music of this genre (techno/electronica/ whateveritscalledthesedays) is not very complex…most songs in fact repeat the same motif for the entire 5 minutes of the song, and yet, damn if it’s not catchy. I tend to get excited by rave reviews of records, and there were some great reviews of the newest LCD record. I wound up getting the first one instead on the excitement of “Daft Punk is Playing in My House,” a ridiculous song that’s basically three notes repeated for 4 and a half minutes, but the conceit of the song, that Daft Punk is playing at his house, makes the song not only catchy, but also singable. Great good fun. Overall, this genre of music can get repetitive, which is great for the dance floor, but can get tiresome when just listening for pleasure (see the Hackers Soundtrack for an excruciatingly bland listen, and for a hilarious picture of Angelina Jolie when she was like 12 or something). But after a couple of dance floor tracks, he mixes it up a little bit with what is almost a ballad “Never as Tired as When I’m Waking Up.” This is a strong collection of songs. I can’t recommend it to anyone who doesn’t care for this type of music, but it is very solid if you want to bop around. There’s also a bonus disc of singles and B-sides. “Losing My Edge” is great, the rest are basically B sides.
[READ: June 17, 2007] Born on a Blue Day.
I read an excerpt of this book in The Week about two months ago. It sounded awesome! The basic gist of this book is that the author, a 26 year old man, has a highly functional type of autism called Asberger syndrome. In the excerpt I read, he talked about how he can’t help but associate words and numbers with colors, hence, born on a “blue day.” He uses this remarkable “gift” to facilitate great recollection of numbers and words, including the ability to learn foreign languages and memorize digits of pi. How interesting is that? Very! But then, you read the book.
The first chapter is basically the part of the excerpt that I read, so it is a great chapter. However, from there the author recounts his life as a child and adolescent with autism. The problem is that absolutely nothing happens. And, because of his autism, he is naturally reticent to hang out with other people. So he doesn’t. In two chapters, he explains that he stayed in his room to [play with cards, stack coins, stare at the ceiling] for hours at a time. But he tells us this every few pages. I used to theorize that the most boring thing in the world is watching someone else play a video game. The second most boring thing, I’ve now decided, is reading about someone not interacting with other people. I don’t want to sound like I was rooting for terrible things to happen to him; I’m no sadist. But it’s hard to remember that he has triumphed over adversity when the only adversity seems to be that he didn’t hang out with other kids–but he didn’t really mind that he didn’t hang out with other kids.
In fact, his childhood made me want to read the really amazing story of his parents’ lives. By the time he was grown, his parents had 8 children. And, given how difficult his first two years were for them (he cried almost constantly) it is amazing that his parents wanted any more children at all. He rightly says that they are his heroes, and indeed, they are pretty amazing.
I think a great deal of the problem is his writing style. He says he does not enjoy reading fiction, and I think as a result he has not learned how to write very effectively. He spends many many pages describing events which seem like they are building to a suspenseful situation, but in which, again, nothing happens. A tumultuous first airplane ride leads to nothing eventful. A subway ride leads him to get panicky from all of the people, but he gets off the train and is fine. Now, I realize that these are HUGE events for him, and I applaud his decision to tackle these concerns, but really as narrative they are severely lacking.
I suppose that I am going to hell for these criticisms. I do acknowledge that as a person with autism, he should be applauded for all of his accomplishments, and I do applaud them. In fact, I am in awe of most of the things he has done, especially the section of teaching English in a foreign country, something that I, as a non-autistic person, would find too intimidating to do. However, it still doesn’t excuse boring writing. And perhaps it’s the publishers’ fault for allowing the book to go to print as it did. But rather than be inspired by his accomplishments, I kept feeling underwhelmed by them. It was only after rethinking about what he did that I realized what an exceptional man he is.
So, my recommendation is to read this first chapter, skip everything until after the Falling in Love chapter, and then be amazed at his staggering accomplishments as an adult. Because if you read the whole thing, this 200 page book will feel like about 700 pages. Oh, and skip the last two pages about him becoming a Christian.
Because I feel mean about my review I want to list some of his really cool accomplishments: He and his partner created a language learning website that looks really amazing. Here it is: http://www.optimnem.co.uk/tutorials.php . He has broken the record for the memorization of the digits of pi. And, most amazingly, he learned conversational Icelandic in a week. There’s also a TV show produced about him, Brainman, which sounds fantastic! So, enjoy his marvelous achievements, just be judicious when reading about them.
I Just Read About That... 
Daniel had more friends than I did at school! I must admit I do think my own long-term memory is exceptionally good and certainly far better than Daniel’s. I can, for instance, recall our first encounter in the school playground and virtually every major detail about all the times we’ve met since and exactly what was said. I can recall entire conversations, sometimes weeks after I’ve had them. I know and can recite thousands of lines of poetry by heart and can usually remember them after having read or heard them the first or second time. So some of what for Daniel may be gargantuan accomplishments were second nature to me. But it is Daniel who has brought out this realisation of such abilities within me and I am sure for many others who perhaps do all their thinking as children and then grow up avoiding it like a danger.
Daniel loves, as Plath (and Chesterton) did ‘The thinginess of things.’ However, in his case it is an extreme form of thinginess (and not meaning to get overly biographical here), this can be described as a kind of Positive Capability that one finds actively at work throughout the years (at least) in which I have known him. This seems to be all the backdrop to his flat melancholic feelings. Feelings that he is doomed to the limits of logical thinking, of the physical mortality of man and of the immortality of true (and in his case numerical) art. He sees the beauty and truth that he knows he himself lacks the means to possess and it is obviously this which brings on feelings of Positive Capability – The exact opposite to the Keatsian Negative Capability.
He has to learn, if he is to enjoy life, that his crisis of identity ought to result in a passion for a duty to be happy and to create the fleeting joy around him from the principle of Beauty as Truth as Keats’ does in his ‘Song of Opposites.’ He explains elsewhere.
He must remember that beginnings do not always precipitate endings but endings always beginnings and that as one adventure ends, another begins. He must realise that after all joy is fleeting and cannot be grabbed at greedily as a butterfly. He is exceptionally fortunate in that he has parents who have encouraged and nurtured his talents and made him feel something special and unique instead of discouraging, insulting and demoralising him, and that whatever else remains to be corroborated, Daniel will now find his name on a library book.
Thanks for the insight. I’d like to add that someone at the library requested the book today and I was pleased to see that there are still many holds on it.
I have to thank you Daniel Tammet for your insight into a mind that can only be described as “extraordinary”. My son is Autistic and I never really thought of what was going through his mind till recently and after reading your book. My son loves computers and without schooling can take them apart and put them back together with absolutely no problems. If we have a problem with our computers, we don’t call in a tech. We call Matthew, my savant. I now, thanks to you, am thinking more of what is he thinking and how does he perceive all of his surroundings. Thank you for allowing us to enter your world, for without allowing us into your world. I truly wouldn’t be opening my mind to the possibilities that are endless for my son.
Of course, I am not Daniel Tammet. But if he ever reads this post, perhaps he will see your thoughtful response to his book. I have no way of getting it to him, I’m afraid.