I Just Read About That…

SOUNDTRACK: OPEN MIKE EAGLE-Tiny Desk Concert #687 (January 3, 2018).

I had seen Iron Mike Eagle’s album on a lot of Year End Best of lists, but I hadn’t heard of him before.  Well, I absolutely loved his Tiny Desk Concert and I’m ready to get his album as well.

I love that the “(How Could Anybody) Feel at Home” starts with a live trumpet and the rest of the band is there playing live, too–two synths, a live bass and Mike on some kind of techie gadget.  But the great thing about this Concert is Mike’s delivery.

He sings/raps and he’s got an uplifting style of rapping combined with the spare but cool/weird music that fit with the lyrics.

And it’s really the lyrics that won me over.

Everybody’s secrets inspire all of my scenes
I write in all of my fantasies and I die in all of my dreams
My superpowers I maintain
I take control of my scene

and the hook:

I done told
Some goofy shit that sounded like a poem
I spun around in circles on the globe
So who the hell could ever feel at home

I could tell that  the lyrics were pretty interesting, but I was surprised to read:

Open Mike Eagle may have released one of the most political albums of 2017, but Brick Body Kids Still Daydream is also among the most personal. It comes across best in his live performances. For only the second time during his recent tour cycle, the LA-based artist played a set aided by the live instrumentation of musicians Jordan Katz (trumpet, keys, sampler), Josh Lopez (keys, sampler) and Brandon Owens (bass) for his Tiny Desk debut.

He performed two songs from the stellar Brick.  The title comes from:

It’s been a decade since the last brick fell from the Robert Taylor Homes, the old Chicago Housing Authority project personified on the record. Yet, when it comes to excavating the politics of place, and all the racial implications inherent in cultural erasure, there is no project released in recent years that comes close.

“Daydreaming in the Projects” is, like the other songs, political but warm:

(This goes out to)
Ghetto children, making codewords
In the projects around the world
Ghetto children, fighting dragons
In the projects around the world

and then this seemingly nonsensical rhyme that speaks volumes

Everything is better when you don’t know nothing
I’m grown so I’m always disgusted
All these discussions online is mayonnaise versus mustard
Mayonnaise people think French can’t be trusted
Mustard people think eggs is all busted
But fuck it
We in it for the pattern interruptions

I love that it is accompanied by a simple but pretty trumpet melody while Jordan is also playing keys.

The set ender “Very Much Money,” from his 2014 album Dark Comedy, is tremendous.

What a great verse:

My friends are superheros
None of us have very much money though
They can fly, run fast, read Portuguese
None of us have very much money though
They know judo and yoga, photography, politics
Some of them leap over buildings
Writers, magicians, comedians, astronauts
None of it mattered when niggas was hungry

All to a catchy, cool beat that is in the spirit of bands like De La Soul, but far more modern and powerful.  Great stuff.  And if “Very Much Money” is representative, I need to check out his old stuff too.  And maybe even the other three (!) bands he’s with: he is a member of the hip hop collective Project Blowed. He is also a member of Thirsty Fish and Swim Team.

 

[READ: October 20, 2017] If Found

Tabitha had this book and I thought it looked really cute so I grabbed it not really knowing what it was.

Basically, it is the blank notebook of Montreal artist Elise Gravel.  She says:

At night, when my daughters are asleep, I draw in my blank notebook.  I draw complete nonsense   Whatever comes to my mind.  When I draw in my black notebook, it feels good–it’s as if I let out all the ideas that are bouncing around in my head.  I never critique the drawings in my black notebook. I give myself the right to fail.  To mess up, to create ugly drawings.  I’m kind to myself.

And so this is a book of weird wonderful and often cute creatures.  Most of them are small and roundish and cuddly.  They have big eyes, big noses and lots of appendages.  There’s Albert, a huge monster who eats anything (with a crazy under bite).  There’s his friends ridiculous monster Donald who sings off key, Jonas who likes spinach and Amadeus who can count to four.

There’s a whole page of grumpy things: Grumpy peanut, grumpy toothbrush, grumpy water drop, grumpy Elise Gravel even a grumpy fart.  And then there The Fart Festival: “farts make me laugh even though I am an adult.”  Everything on the page is farting (the mouse farts very loudly).

She loves drawing Mushrooms, hence the mushroom page–some are nonsensical but then there’s a two page spread of various kinds of real mushrooms.

She show us how to draw hedgehogs with an ultra secret and easy-peasy technique.  We meet Marvin, a man with lots of things in his beard (cat food, underwear, a worm).  She draws a page of kiwis (really cute) and wiener dogs as well as bunnies dressed in punk, rock and heavy metal t-shrts.  And a page of foxes (one speaking Arabic). How about a page of vampires?   Vampire muffins, vampire butterfly, vampire puddle.

She offers a page of real advice to be illustrator:  Draw all the time. Draw anything and everything.  It’s okay to copy–it’s a great way to learn.  Don’t be afraid to make mistakes!  The secret is practice.

She even relates the true story of Crow Girl–the girl who fed crows and was given presents.  I think of this story often and want to get crows to give me presents too.

And then finally near the end of the book she confesses.  “I cheated a little.  I chose the most beautiful drawings from my blank notebook to put in this collection.  But in reality I swear to you that I do a lot of ugly drawing.”  She gives us a page of pretty bland stuff.  But it ends with some good pages as well:

Weird animals that really exist: the red lipped batfish, the dumbo octopus, a yeti crab and a sea pig.

And then she tells us it’s our turn.  We could draw anything: pirates, spiders, food, space, love, castles, fish.  Anything!

I love this attitude and only wish my kids would draw more too.

I had thought her style was particularly European especially French.  It was the big-nosed Mimus that really convinced me an made me check the copyright to see that she is indeed French Canadian.  This book was translated by Shira Adriance.  That’s also when I discovered this was released by Drawn & Quarterly. Cool!  I love that they release cool books for kids, too.