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Archive for the ‘Authors’ Category

Jon Haynes and David Woods–The Eradication of Schizophrenia in Western Lapland (2014)

Posted in Bill Hicks, Built to Spill, David Woods, Jon Haynes, Noises Off, Play (Drama), Psychiatry, Ridiculusmus, Violence on October 13, 2015| Leave a Comment »

SschizoOUNDTRACK: BUILT TO SPILL-There is No Enemy (2009).

330px-There_is_No_Enemy It took only three years for Built to Spill to release this, their seventh full length.  I have mentioned this disc before, and I loved it then.  And I love it now.

“Aisle 13” starts with some echoed sounds and then big echoing chords which quickly resolve into a great BtS song.  And after the lengthy songs of the previous records, it’s amazing to hear a song (or several) tha are under 4 minutes.  The album is also full of some great (if odd) lyrics like: “one day I’ll come home to find you covered with ants because you are so sweet.”

“Hindsight” has two separate great riffs in it (and the great line: “is that grass only greener because its fake”).   “Nowhere Lullaby” is a slow ballad with a great vocal line (and strings).  “Good Ol’ Boredom” is almost a dance song—a fast drums beat and echoey guitar intro (although there’s a signature BtS guitar riff over the top).   I like the slide guitar solo in the middle and the lengthy jam section which trades off guitar solos (this song lasts 6 and a half minutes). “Life’s A Dream” slows things down and even includes a section of “ahhh”s and “la la las” in beautiful harmony.  And then there’s a surprise inclusion of horns.

“Oh Yeah” opens with a slow picked guitar and slowly builds up with more instrumentation, although it never really gets any faster.  But it has some great lyrics:

And if god does exist
I am sure he will forgive
Me for doubting for he’d see
How unlikely he himself seems

“Pat” zooms out off the gates with one of the fastest, most punk songs they’ve ever done (live it was even more so). And at under 3 minutes it’s a nice blast of excitement.  “Done” is a slow song with one of my favorite end soloing sections—tons of echo (once again, this was amazing live).  It seems like it should end the disc, but “Planting Seeds” comes out of that song with a great catchy riff.  And as the bridge comes in there’ an even more catchy riff.  It also has some great lyrics:

when bullies grow up they get meaner
yeah they really get it down

they think that they get it but they always get it wrong
they’ll play your favorite song
just to sell shit to you

I’ve heard that they’ll sell anything and I think they might
I think Bill Hicks was right
about what they should do

and just because you love something doesn’t mean it’s yours to buy
been selling it so long that no one even knows the reason why
you’ve been messing with our minds
gettin’ rich wasting our time

“Things Fall Apart” slows things down and even adds a trumpet solo before unleashing a lengthy guitar solo.  “Tomorrow” ends the disc slowly with keyboards. It seems like a downer ending but this 7 minute song has a lot packed into it. After about 90 second the guitars kick in and the song builds.   At 2 and a half minutes the song takes a sharp turn into a slower, darker section with a great solo. It jumps back and forth and ends with a lengthy solo that fades just as some interesting feedback squalls start to build.

This continues the progression of great Built to Spill records.

[READ: August 30, 2015] The Eradication of Schizophrenia in Western Lapland

This play was created by a theater group called Ridiculusmus, who I know nothing about.

The premise of this play was quite interesting.

Audience members are seated on either side of a wall.  Act One and Act Three are performed simultaneously on either side of the wall.  So you can watch Act One and hear Act 3 or vice versa.  The Acts overlap and are connected, so it’s not like a nonsensical experience.

Act One is between a mum and her two sons, while Act three is is between a psychiatrist and one of the sons, set some years in the future.  That’s pretty interesting.

But what happens is that after you see Act One/Three, the audience switches sides and you listen to it all over again, this time seeing what you missed last time.  But unlike a farce like Noises Off, where what you see is all the stuff that’s going on behind the scenes, you can hear everything that is being said behind the wall, I don’t think there’s anything new visually that will change the fact that you have just heard all of this dialogue a few minutes ago. It feels terribly redundant to me.

After both of these performances, act two is staged. (more…)

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Robert Massey–Chancers (2013)

Posted in Brett Netson, Built to Spill, Dublin, Ireland, Funny (ha ha), Irish Writer, Lottery, Neil Young, Play (Drama), Robert Massey on October 12, 2015| Leave a Comment »

chancers SOUNDTRACK: BUILT TO SPILL-You in Reverse (2006).

reverseI love the audacity of coming back from a five-year hiatus and opening your disc with an 8 minute song that has lots and lots of instrumentals and solo sections.  And man is “Goin’ Against Your Mind” a good song (the band opened with this when I saw them and it awesome).  At around 5 minutes the songs slows down for a quieter section and then it builds back up again. I particularly love the roaring guitars in the back of the song (which I think are from Brett Netson—it is confusing that the band has a Brett Nelson and a Brett Netson in its line up).

“Traces” slows things down.  It has a simple but really catchy riff.  “Liar” is a bouncy, rather fun song with some pretty guitar work (two guitars in the middle) and a super catchy vocal melody. “Saturday” is a slowish ballad that is only 2:24.

“Wherever You Go” has a kid of Neil Young stomp to it, but it’s “Conventional Wisdom” that really opens up the beginning of the second half with a great riff and a fun chorus. The dual guitar solo that starts around 3 minutes in is fantastic.

I also love the guitar riffs in “Gone” and how at 3 minutes it turns into something else entirely with a big organ sound.  “Mess with Time,” which they played live, has a great staccato riff and a really interesting (to my ear Middle Easternish) guitar riff.   I also like the way it sounds like perhaps a circular saw blade is being used as percussion.  And how at 3:15 it turns into an entirely new song—an almost ska song riff with great bass lines.  “Just a Habit” is a mellow song with soaring electric guitar lines.   The disc ends with “The Wait,” a slower song that I don’t usually love.  But they played it live and in the live setting it took on a new vitality was really enjoyable.

This is an album I can put on an enjoy from start to finish.

[READ: August 7, 2015] Chancers

Chancers is a short three-act play set in Dublin after the collapse of the Irish economy.

There are four characters: Aiden and Dee who own a small shoppe; Gertie, an older lady who comes in regularly and never has a nice word for anyone and JP, Aiden’s mate.

In the first scene, we see that Dee is getting dressed up for a job interview.  She doesn’t imagine she’ll get the job, but they desperately need the money.  Aiden reveals that they have stopped offering certain services because they weren’t profitable enough.  When Gertie comes in, she mocks the two of them for trying, and for overreaching.  Gertie is nasty, undermining everything that Dee or Aiden says.

In the second scene, JP and Aiden are talking about a lottery ticket.  It seems that Gertie has bought a ticket that has won a huge windfall.  But when she brought the ticket in for him to check, Aiden instinctively told her it was a loser.  JP says that the first step has been taken now all they need to do is get that ticket for themselves so they can cash it in. (more…)

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Jack Hunter–Tokyo Grindhouse: volume one: pinky violence bad girl cinema (2012)

Posted in Bad Angel, Delinquent Boss, Delinquent Girl Boss, Female Gambler, Female Prison Scorpion, Gambling, Girl's Junior High School, Jack Hunter, Kill Bill, Meiko Kaji, Quentin Tarantino, Reiko Oshida, Sex, Sexism, Stray Cat Rock, The Doors, The Mops, The Red Peony, Violence, Zero Woman: Red Handcuffs on October 10, 2015| Leave a Comment »

tokyoSOUNDTRACK: THE MOPS-“Goiken Muyo (Ilja Naika)” (1971)

mopsThe Mops were a Japanese psychedelic band who were inspired by American psychedelia.  They appear in one of the films below (Stray Cat Rock: Wild Jumbo from 1971) in a really weird scene in which the band is playing on the back of a flatbed truck (in the middle of another scene that has nothing to do with them).  They play their song and then drive away.  Weird.

Anyway, the song is pretty great.  There’s all kinds of interesting percussion (the film clip shows them playing stuff which most likely is not what they are playing).  But the studio version (linked to below) has great audio quality and a lot of depth in the bass and cool screaming guitars.

The band released possibly 9 albums (it’s a little hard to tell from their Wikipedia page).  With their first album being pretty psychedelic and this one (I assume their third) being much heavier and fuller sounding.

I had found a clip of the band from the movie.  Then I lost it and cannot find it anywhere.  But here’s the studio version dubbed over the movie clip

But really, check out the whole album, it’s pretty great.

[READ: October 10, 2015] Tokyo Grindhouse

The life cycle of a book at my work is pretty straightforward.  If I see it at all, I usually catalog it or send it on its way to someone else.  But for some reason this book came back to my desk three times.

I didn’t know a thing about Tokyo Grindhouse, I’d never heard of pinky movies, but if something keeps coming back you gotta check it out.  So it turns out that this book has about ten pages of text and the rest is pictures.

And the book is about “classic” exploitation films made in Tokyo from 1960-1970 (or so).  The text by Jack Hunter explains that women and violence have been in Japanese exploitation films since the 1950s.  Evidently there were some landmark films in the mid-fifties about topless pearl divers that set off a craze for topless women in films.  This morphed into movies where women were the victims of violence with translated titles such as Nude Actress Murder Case: Five Criminals. (more…)

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Jen Calonita–Flunked (Fairy Tale Reform School #1) (2015)

Posted in Brett Netson, Built to Spill, Children's Books, Fairy Tales, Funny (ha ha), Jen Calonita, Sam Coombs, Supernatural, Unfinished series on October 9, 2015| Leave a Comment »

flunkedSOUNDTRACK: BUILT TO SPILL-Ancient Melodies of the Future (2001).

ancientAfter their live album, Built to Spill returned with Ancient Melodies of the Future.  For many fans, this album concluded their first trilogy of great records.  The album is similar in style to Keep It Like a Secret, but there are some new elements added.  Sam Coombs, who supplied keyboards on one song on the previous album is back on this one with prominent keyboards on three tracks (which adds a rather different vibe to the Built to Spill sound).

“Strange” is yet another stellar leadoff track.  It’s got an interesting riff with some great lyrics and what evolves into a stupendously catchy chorus.  It features Sam Coombs on Rocksichord, which has a rather unique sound.

“The Host” has strings, which is quite a departure.  The song is mellow with a simply great vocal line for the verse. “In Your Mind” has an interesting acoustic guitar line with some wild backwards guitar effects over the top. I really like the way the vocal line gets loud and high when he gets to the “in your mind” part.

“Alarmed” slows things down with bigger, louder strings. There’s a lengthy crazy keyboard solo from Sam Coombs

“Trimmed and Burning” gets a little heavier sounding   “Happiness” has a slide guitar—a very unusual sound for BTS. The song picks up pretty quickly and rumbles along.  “Dont Try” comes in with a much louder fuller guitar sound (Brett Netson contributes guitars to this and 3 other songs).

“You Are” is probably my least favorite BtS song, it doesn’t really do anything.  But it’s followed by the up beat and wonderful “Fly Around My Pretty Little Miss” which has really fun guitar solo and is just so catchy.

The disc ends with the acoustic guitar ballad “The Weather.”  It builds to a slightly bigger sound by the end of the song, with interesting effects on the guitars.

I tend to overlook this disc somewhat when I think back to my favorite BtS music, but there are some real gems here.  It might be a little more mellow and introspective than some of the other discs, but it’s still great.

[READ:June 1, 2015] Flunked

I brought this book home because I thought Sarah would like it.  She never got around to reading it, but I decided it might be fun so I read it pretty quickly.  Calonita has written a number of YA books but this is her first series for younger readers (so says the blurb at the back, under her strangely unflattering author photo.  This is a new series (unclear how many books, but the next one is due out next year).

It’s another book that twists around the ideas of fairy tales (which I like).  The premise behind this series is that Cinderella’s stepmother Flora is really, really sorry for what she did to Cinderella (now Princess Ella).  And in order to make it up to the land of Enchantasia (nice) she decided to convert her old castle into Fairy Tale Reform School.  The school is designed to teach bad kids, villains and delinquents the ways of righteousness.  Some teachers include the Big Bad Wolf (Xavier Wolfington), the Sea Witch (Madame Cleo) and the Evil Queen (Professor Harlow).  More than five hundred gnomes, trolls, dwarfs, elves, mer-folks and other fairly tale students have been admitted in the past five years and there is much praise for the school. (more…)

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Julie Birmant & Clement Oubrerie–Pablo (2012-2014) [translated 2015]

Posted in Alice Toklas, Art, Biography, Brett Netson, Built to Spill, Clément Oubrerie, Edward Gauvin, Fernande Olivier, Georges Braque, Gertrude Stein, Henri Matisse, Henri Rousseau, Julie Birmant, Love as Laughter, Max Jacob, Neil Young, Pablo Picasso, Sex, The Halo Benders, Vincent van Gogh, Violence on October 8, 2015| Leave a Comment »

pablo SOUNDTRACK: BUILT TO SPILL-Live (2000).

btsliveSoon after releasing “Carry the Zero,” Built to Spill released this, their first (and so far only) live disc.

This disc shows a jamming side of the band that their records up to now hadn’t really displayed (sure there was some evidence of the jam band within, but who would have guessed 2 songs on this disc would stretch to 20 minutes?).

The live set also shows a rather contrarian spirit in that there are only 9 songs in 70 some minutes and only 5 of the songs are actual Built to Spill songs.

The disc opens with “The Plan,” a great version of their most recent disc’s opener.  Then they jump right into Perfect from Now On’s  opening track “Randy Described Eternity.”  That song has a lot of parts and sections, and they do them perfectly.  They follow it with another song from Perfect, “Stop the Show” which also has multiple parts and again, they nail it.  These three songs were recorded in New York.  Brett Netson joined them for “Randy,” and “Stop” which really helps to flesh out those songs.

The next song is a cover of The Halo Benders’ “Virginia Reel Around the Fountain.”  And if it sounds very fitting for Doug, he was in The Halo Benders with Calvin Johnson before he started Built to Spill.  Then comes the centerpiece of the record–a 20 minute version of Neil Young’s “Cortez the Killer.”  And it is amazing.  He sounds enough like Neil to be totally respectful, without just being a rip off.  It’s probably the best version of this song I’ve heard (until I saw Neil do it this summer).

They switch gears to their first single, “Car,” a delightful 3 minute song.   And then, to fill out this almost all covers section, they play “Singing Sores Make Perfect Swords” a song originally done by Love as Laughter.  I don’t know the original, but it fits in with Doug’s style.  These four songs were record in Seattle.

There’s one song that was recorded in Denver, “I Would Hurt a Fly,” which is yet another song from Perfect, and is one of my favorite songs of theirs.  It does not disappoint.

The final song on the disc is a nineteen minute version of the song “Broken Chairs” (which is 8 minutes long on Secret).  They do the whistling section and a ton of solos.  Indeed, the way they stretch out the song out with guitar solos and noise (and the way the song ends with feedback) is really cool.  Netson joined them for “Fly” and “Broken Chairs” (which is why that ending solo is so intense.

It’ s a great live collection of songs and the sound is outstanding.  You’d never know it was recorded in different venues, either.

[READ: October 4, 2015] Pablo

Judging this book by its cover you would be correct in assuming that it is about Pablo Picasso.  But rather than being a simple history of the Art Master (the title of the series), this is a thorough recounting of Picasso’s life.  And what’s even more interesting is that the story is told from the point of view of Picasso’s lover and model Fernande Olivier.

And Fernande’s diary entries make up the bulk of the story and allow for a very personal look into the man and the stylistic choices that Picasso made over the years.  As the book says on the back, the authors show “how Picasso’s style developed in response to his friendships and rivalries.”  And of his rivals none was greater than Henri Matisse.  (The book also covers Picasso’s life before she met him too, of course).

The original work was published (in French) in four volumes.   This edition was translated by Edward Gauvin.

I especially like the way the book begins from the point of view of Fernande as an old woman, still alive and reminiscing about her life. (And yes, it’s amazing to realize that Picasso died in 1973…in my lifetime!).  (more…)

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Réal Godbout–Amerika: Based on the Novel by Franz Kafka (2014) [translated 2014]

Posted in Built to Spill, Franz Kafka, Graphic Novel, Helge Dascher, Luck, Réal Godbout, Sex, Translation on October 7, 2015| Leave a Comment »

godboutSOUNDTRACK: BUILT TO SPILL-“Carry the Zero” (1999).

zeroI loved “Carry the Zero” so much that I immediately bought the CD single (that’s what you did back in the 90s).

The Ep contains 6 songs.  There’s two tracks from Keep It Like a Secret (“Carry the Zero” & “Sidewalk” which is good in itself), 2 new songs (“Forget Remember When” and “Now & Then”) and 2 live songs “Kicked it in the Sun” and “Big Dipper.”

The two unreleased songs are good, but neither one is quite as immediate as anything on the album.  Of course, if you’re looking for extra BtS tracks, these are just waiting for you.

The real gems are the two live songs.  Both of them are solo acoustic guitar recordings recorded in a tiny setting.  They are quite different from the album.  I feel that “Big Dipper” fares a little better since the song is simpler.  There are some complex chord changes in “Kicked It in the Sun” which lose a little of their immediacy in the stripped down version.  Which is not to say that it’s bad–the first half of the song sounds great–it’s when it gets to the middle that it feels a little cumbersome.

So this is certainly a die-hards only release, but if you’re looking for some unusual BtS recordings, this is a great place to start.

[READ:October 2, 2015] Amerika

This is a graphic novel version of Franz Kafka’s Amerika.  And it is really well done.  The artwork is fantastic–clean lines, distinctive characters and wonderfully detailed background scenes.

I don’t know the original story at all, so I assume that Godbout was faithful to it (the back of the book says he was). Actually, this graphic novel was translated by Helge Dascher, so I wonder if she translated Godbout of Kafka?

Unlike so much of Kafka, this story isn’t really “Kafkaesque.”  There is some darkness to it and there are machinations of trouble for the main character, but it is not a perpetual state of nightmarish life.

Karl Rossmann is a young immigrant to America.  (Kafka had never been to America, but he gets quite a lot right).  He was sent to America because of an embarrassing sexual incident (which is rendered rather humorously).  When he arrives in New York harbor, he disembarks from the ship but forgets his umbrella.  So he races back on the ship.  But instead of finding it, he runs into the ship’s engine stoker.  The hulking man is suspicious if him, but after they talk for a few minutes Karl convinces the stoker to air his grievances about his supervisor to the ship’s captain. (more…)

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Noelle Stevenson, Grace Ellis, Brooke Allen–Lumberjanes: Beware the Kitten Holy (2015)

Posted in Adventure, Boom! Box, Built to Spill, Funny (ha ha), Grace Ellis, Graphic Novel, Noelle Stevenson, Unfinished series on October 6, 2015| Leave a Comment »

lumberSOUNDTRACK: BUILT TO SPILL-Keep It Like a Secret (1999).

keepitThis was the first Built to Spill album I ever bought and from the opening notes of the “The Plan” I was immediately hooked on the song, the album and the band. Doug’s voice is high and strong and it has a great ringing guitar riff and big chords to open the song.  Then comes the excellent third section that seems to have nothing to do with the rest of the song but which sounds great. And then it’s capped off with the crazy guitar solo that is wild noises and seemingly out of tune notes that all gels together.

Like many Built to Spill albums, the whole disc works like this. The sound is a bit more open and ringing, dare I say orchestral than the previous album (which always felt a bit claustrophobic sounding to me). And most of the songs have multiple distinct parts.  But also unlike the previous record, the songs are mostly much shorter (with “Center of the Universe”) turning in at under 3 minutes even.

“Carry the Zero” was the first song I heard by them, and it was the real impetus for me becoming a huge fan (I have put this song on so many mix tapes/CDs).  “Sidewalk” continues with another fantastic, surprisingly catchy song.

“Time Trap” stars off with wild and crazy guitars and then mellows out for the verses.  And I love that the super catchy chorus comes more than 3 minutes into the 5 minute song.  I have about 6 or 7 favorite songs on this record, although “You Were Wrong” tops them all, with its lyrics of clichés from other songs: “You were right when you said all that glitters isn’t gold; you were right when you said all we are is dust in the wind.”  Hilarious, but also right on (and amazing musically too)

“Broken Chairs” is the only long song on the disc running almost 9 minutes long. It even includes a section with a whistle solo.  It’s cool that on a relatively poppy album full of super catchy songs, Doug wasn’t afraid to jam out a little bit (the song is amazing live).

[READ: October 1, 2015] Lumberjanes

I love the premise behind Lumberjanes.  The Lumberjanes are a kind of Girl Scout/Wilderness Adventure group.  They have been around for a long time and the Janes must follow the manual to achieve their various badges.  I love the way the book is set up around an “actual” field manual from 1984 (tenth edition) which has been

Prepared for the Miss Quinzella Thiskwin Penniquiqul Thistle Crumpet’s Camp for [written in] HARDCORE LADY-TYPES.

This graphic novel has received glowing reviews so I was pretty excited to read it.  And for the most part I really enjoyed it.  The story was funny and adventurous.  And, of course it’s cool that all the lead characters are girls.  My daughter (age 7) loved the book and couldn’t wait to show me the last page and wondered when the next book was out.  Since she loved it I guess my opinion is irrelevant, but I didn’t love it as much as that. There were some quibbles I had with the book, but that’s mostly because I wanted it to be awesome!

The first one came on the first page.  The book feels like you’ve missed a whole bunch of pages.  I know all about starting in medias res and all that but it never really catches us up to the action. There’s not really a fair introduction to the story.  And while you don’t really need an introduction necessarily, I feel like a great opportunity was lost in not having one. (more…)

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Charles M. Schulz–The Complete Peanuts: 1955-1956: The Definitive Collection of Charles M. Schulz’s comic strip masterpiece: Dailies & Sundays (2005)

Posted in A Charlie Brown Christmas, Baseball, Built to Spill, Charles Schulz, Comic Strips, Ding Dong School, Fantagraphics, Figure Skating, Football, Funny (ha ha), Matt Groening, Peanuts, Walter Cronkite on October 2, 2015| Leave a Comment »

1955SOUNDTRACK: BUILT TO SPILL-Perfect from Now On (1997).

330px-Perfect_From_Now_OnBuilt to Spill moved to the major labels and everything changed. No that’s not true. The band (well, Doug mostly) just sounds more serious about their music. What’s impressive is that there are no obvious  singles since each song is over 5 minutes long (except for one).

This is considered a classic 90s album but fans of the band and others.  And while I like it, it’s not my favorite.  A few of the songs are a little too drifty and anticlimactic.  But at he same time there’s some really amazing stuff here.

It opens with “Randy Describing Eternity” a cool song with a great riff and an interesting lyrics.  My favorite song (most days) on this record is “I would Hurt a Fly.” It has a fairly quiet intro with more intriguing lyrics: “I can’t get that sound you make out of my head/ I can’t even figure out what’s making it.”  The song waxes and wanes and even adds some cello. And then at 4 minutes, the song shifts gears entirely, stopping to add a brand new fast section with some great guitar work and wild noisy soloing.

“Stop the Show” is another favorite.  It opens with a slow meandering guitar section and then jumps to a great, frenetic set of verses. After about 5 and a half minutes the song turns into a crazy noisy fest and then switches to an amazingly catchy guitar instrumental solo outro, which could frankly go for five more hours. “Made Up Dreams” has several different elements in it. And even though it’s only 4:52, it still packs in a lot of music.

“Velvet Waltz” is over 8 minutes long. It has slow parts, and a lengthy middle section with strings (in waltz time of course). It builds slowly adding some cool guitar sections and a great long solo at the end. “Out of Site” is one of the shorter songs on the disc.  It has an immediate, fast section that is very catchy. It then mellows out to a slow cello-filled section. “Kicked it in the Sun” is kind of trippy.  At four and a half minutes a noisy section overtakes the music, but behind the noise is a beautiful, pretty guitar/keyboard melody.  Then it shifts out of the noise into a more rocking catchy section.

The final song is the nearly 9 minute “Untrustable/Part 2.”  It begins loud with great lyrics “You can’t trust anyone because you’re untrustable.”  Like the other songs it has several parts.  Around 4 minutes it turns into another song altogether. This continues for a bit and then at 7 minutes it shifts gears entirely into a keyboard dominated romp.

There’s so many interesting melodies and changes in this album, and it clear that it was completely influential on late 90s indie rock.  But I think what’s even more impressive is that each album get a little bit better.

[READ: September 29, 2015] The Complete Peanuts 1955-1956

Moving on to volume 3 of the Complete Peanuts.  Stylistically things are advancing towards the Peanuts characters we know now.  Yet they haven’t quite gotten there.  I think the kids’ faces (not their heads, just features) are still much smaller.  And Snoopy still looks like a real dog, although his nose grows year by year.

In the beginning of the year, there’s a funny line from Lucy, attacking commericalism. Charlie is reading her a book.  He says “Once upon a time they lived happily ever after.  The end”  And Lucy says “What’s on the rest of these pages, Advertising?”  Much later there a joke in which Lucy asks Schroeder how much a musician makes, and he relies “Money?  Who cares about money?  This is art. You Blockhead.”  It is ironic of course that Schulz went on to become so staggeringly wealthy–but maybe that just shows what good art can achieve.

Another one of my favorite sophisticated jokes comes when Lucy is flying a kite.  The joke is all about perspective. It’s hilarious. (more…)

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Mark Millar & Frank Quitely–Jupiter’s Legacy Book One (2015)

Posted in Built to Spill, Frank Quitely, Graphic Novel, Mark Millar, Superheroes, Supernatural, The Incredibles, Violence on October 1, 2015| Leave a Comment »

jup[iterSOUNDTRACK: BUILT TO SPILL-The Normal Years (1996).

btsnormalIn 1996, Built to Spill signed with a major label.  In the meantime, K Records, released this collection of early singles and rarities (not bad for a band with two albums out).

It’s not a bad collection, but it’s also not terribly essential.”So & So So & So from Wherever Wherever” is a very good song, with a weird almost seasick guitar intro and then some big heavy guitars in the chorus.  It, like most of the songs here, is pretty lo-fi.

“Shortcut” is a fast and simple song and is only 90 seconds long.  “Car” is the original version of the song from Love.  This one has no strings and is “Some Things Last a Long Time” is a Daniel Johnston song.  It opens slow with “ah ah” backing vocals and slow guitars although at 90 seconds the guitars kick in and pick up the noise.

“Girl” is done on an acoustic guitar song.  It seems very honest and confessional with the lyric that he would like “someone I can talk to; someone I don’t have to talk to.”

“Joyride” is like the opposite of “Girl.”  It’s probably my favorite song here–sloppy and funny, with a great line: “I screwed her and she screwed me but we never once had sex.”  And the whole second verse talks about the structure of the song, including which chords are being played.  It even includes a car crash.   “Some” is a live recording that opens with slow pounding drums and a long solo to start.  It mellows out by the end.

“Sick & Wrong” is an early single with a surprisingly funky bassline.  “Still Flat” comes from the Red Hot & Bothered collection, so it sounds better recorded than the other songs.  It also has a trombone.  The final song, “”Terrible/Perfect” starts slow but builds big and ends with a long mellow instrumental section.

While there are certainly some good songs here, it’s really for the die hard fan.

[READ: September 29, 2015] Jupiter’s Legacy

Jupiter’s Legacy Book One collects books 1-5 of the Jupiter’s Legacy series.

I didn’t love the artwork of this story.  There was something about it that I found disagreeable.  And it made my initial impression of the story less than great, too.  There is a bunch happening all at once that needs to be unpacked and I was a little distracted by the art.

But the story is so good.  It takes ideas that have been bandied about recently–What do superheroes do if there are no more super villains?  What do the children of superheroes do?  And what would happen if superpowers become illegal–and adds a personal drama (and a very elliptical storytelling style).

The story opens in 1932.  A group of people are requesting transportation to an island which the ship’s captain says simply isn’t there.  The leader, Sheldon, has had a dream about it being there and everyone (including his brother William) trusts his visions completely.  And they do find the island just as Sheldon imagined.

Then we flash forward to 2013.  We see two young people who look a bit like the earlier men and women.  It turns out that they are the son and daughter of the 1932 folks.  They are celebrities living in Los Angeles, and they looks somewhat the worse for wear.  Meanwhile in Vermont actual superheroes are battling Blackstar.  And that’s when we see Sheldon is one of those superheroes.  He has gray hair but, well, he’s a superhero–in tights a cape and he is known as Utopian.  He is super string and has a cool ability of removing a person’s mind from their body and putting it in a safe place while that person’s body is getting pummeled.  This prevents them from fighting back. (more…)

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Mark Millar & John Romita, Jr.–Kick-Ass (2010)

Posted in Built to Spill, Caustic Resin, Graphic Novel, John Romita Jr., Kick-Ass, Kicking Giant, Mark Millar, Superheroes, Violence, Yuck! on September 30, 2015| Leave a Comment »

kickassSOUNDTRACK: BUILT TO SPILL CAUSTIC RESIN (1995).

caustic This is one of those CDs that I used to see all the time back when I shopped at Tower Records in Boston.  Either they had a lot of copies of it or it was always at the front, or something.  But I never forgot the title of this EP, which I only purchased a few years ago.

The title is funny because it is indeed a merging of Built to Spill and Caustic Resin.  But it’s not a split single with the two bands playing.  Rather, it is Doug Martsch from Built to Spill playing with the three guys from Caustic Resin James Dillion on drums, Tom Romich on bass and Brett Netson on guitar and vocals on “Shit Brown Eyes.”  (Remember how Doug was planning to have different musicians on each album?).

The EP has four songs totaling about 25 minutes.

“When Not Being Stupid Is Not Enough” is over 9 minutes long.  It opens with a lot of instrumental stuff until about 3 and half minutes when the title lyrics come in as does the organ.  By 5 and half minutes the song doubles in speed and builds with some great soloing.

“One Thing” has loud and screamed vocals from Martsch (probably the only BtS song like that). There’s a lot of wild psychedelic keyboard work in the middle of the song which alternates with a lengthy guitar solo.  They pack a lot of jamming into five minutes.

“Shit Brown Eyes” was written by Caustic Resin.  It’s a fairly conventional sounding song.  There’s lots of guitar work and dual vocals.  It’s a little chaotic, but there’s more beautiful soloing toward the end.

The final song is a cover of Kicking Giant’s “She’s Real.” The song is also fairly conventional (I don’t know the original) but they stretch it out to 8 minutes.  It has a slow and mellow opening.  There’s a lengthy fairly quiet guitar soloing section and then the end has a rocking section repeating “be my, be my baby” (but not a cover of the original).

This is an interesting EP, and might serve as an introduction to Caustic Resin (who I don’t really know) more that Built to Spill.  It’s certainly not their best album, but “When Not Being Stupid Is Not Enough” is really fantastic.

[READ: July 20, 2015] Kick-Ass

I really enjoyed the movie of Kick-Ass.  I knew it was from a comic book but I’d never seen the book before.  And then I walked right past it in the library and had to check it out.  This book collects issues 1-8 of the first series.

The movie is changed in different ways (made more “upbeat” mostly) but the story line is pretty consistent.  Dave Lizewski is a fairly  normal kid.  He’s not a jock, but he’s not picked on either.  He likes comic books but isn’t a major geek.  He crushes on a hot girl and she won’t give him the time of day–pretty standard fare.  But he wants something more.  And he wonders why no one has ever tried to become a super hero for real.  Obviously there’s no magic or superpowers involved, just a costumed avenger helping people?  Why not?

So he decides to do it.  He puts on a scuba suit an and a mask and heads out. Now, unlike every superhero, he has no major back story.  His mother is dead, but from an aneurysm, so there’s no revenge.  And his dad is pretty cool, so there’s no struggle there.  He just wants some excitement.  And he finds it.  He runs into some kids spray painting on a wall.  He has no fighting skills, and he gets the crap beat out of him.  And as he flees, he is hit by a car.   He winds up in the hospital, barely alive. (more…)

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