SOUNDTRACK: ULVER-Shadows of the Sun (2007).
I really wanted to like this album because of the cover–which is striking. I know, I know, never judge… My initial reaction to the disc was kind of poor. I’ve followed Ulver’s progress through their many incarnations, and it’s not entirely surprising that they should make an entirely ambient record. It just strikes me as an odd release–mellow and almost lullaby-ish but also a little creepy (the voice mostly).
But at the same time, musically it’s quite pretty. And while it wasn’t a very good listen for a car trip to work, it was actually really perfect for listening to at work–where headphones allowed for hearing so many nuances.
There’s not much point in a song by song listing, as the songs are similar–washes of music with slightly distorted, deep vocals. But there are some interesting musical choices that make each song unique, and consequently better than a lot of ambient in which all of the songs use the same musical palette. “All the Love” employs piano and come cool electronic sounds near the end.
“Let the Children Go” is a much darker song (with drums!). “Solitude” is the most melodic song of the bunch. It reminds me of Black Sabbath’s “War Pigs” (which should tell you something about the overall tone of the album). It has a noticeable vocal line (and really audible lyrics, which are quite melancholy and more emotional that I would have expected: “You just left when I begged you to stay. I’ve not stopped crying since you went away.”
Another observation. At times when he actually sings, the vocals sound a bit like XTC–“Shadows of the Sun” in particular. And since that song has pianos it’s not inconceivable that this could sound like XTC (although not really).
With the right atmosphere, this record proves to be a very impressive listen. Kristoffer Rygg’s vocals really suit the mood and, all in all, it does reflect the album cover rather more than I initially thought.
[READ: March 18, 2012] The Marriage Plot
I had put this book on hold a few months ago. And I was ninety-something on the list, so I didn’t think too much about it. I looked the other day and I was 10. Yipes. How was I going to read this 400 page book in three weeks while also reading Gravity’s Rainbow??
Well, amazingly, The Marriage Plot worked as a nice foil to GR. It is a supremely easy read. It is completely uncomplicated. And, it actually has some unexpected parallels to GR–specifically, two of the characters travel to Europe, one on a pilgrimage the other on a honeymoon, and they travel to Paris, Geneva, Spain, Zürich, and even Nice. There is literally no connection between these two books (although Mitchell does bring Pynchon’s V along with him), but it was fun to see new people go to the cities that Slothrop has been traveling to for very different reasons.
I powered through the book, reading large chunks and staying up way too late both because I liked the book and because I wanted to get it back on time (beware the library police!). And there really is something about finishing a book quickly, it really keeps the story and characters fresh and makes the experience more enjoyable.
But on to the book.
This book centers around three people in a kind of lover’s triangle. The woman at the center is Madeleine (and yes there are wonderful tie-ins to Madeline the children’s book series). The two men are Leonard and Mitchell. All three of them are graduating from Brown in the mid 80s.
I identified with the book immediately because Madeleine is an English major (as was I). She studies the Victorian era [and I had just read the piece by Franzen about Edith Wharton] and is on track to write her thesis on this era. The title of the book comes from this section–novels written at that time were especially focused on marriage–if a woman did not marry, she was more or less doomed, and so the plots centered around her quest to find a suitable mate. As Franzen noted in the above article, Wharton and some of her predecessors sounded the death knell for the “marriage plot” and Madeleine was going to do her thesis on that.
As the pieces of the triangle fall into place we learn (skeletal at first with much detail added later) that Madeleine and Mitchell were very good friends initially. So good, in fact, that she invited him back to her parents house for a vacation. He was head over heels in love with; however, out of fear (mostly) he never acted on the opportunities she gave him, and she thought that he wasn’t interested in anything more than friendship. Basically, he blew it (although he doesn’t learn this until much later–I can relate to this all too well). As the story opens, she has just woken up, hungover, smelling of a party, with a mysterious stain on her dress. She knows she did something with someone last night but she’s not sure what. Not atypical college behavior. But the kicker is that it is graduation morning and her parents are ringing the doorbell of her dorm right now. (more…)
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SOUNDTRACK: SONIC YOUTH-Sonic Nurse (2004).
I Just Read About That... 