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Archive for the ‘Authors’ Category

Téa Obreht–”Twilight of the Vampires” (Harper’s, November 2010)

Posted in 20 Under 40, Built to Spill, Essays, Gustav Flaubert, Harper's, Leptirica, Lydia Davis, Téa Obreht, Vampires, Violence, William T. Vollmann on December 15, 2010| 1 Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: BUILT TO SPILL-There is No Ememy (2009).

I’ve liked Built to Spill for quite a few years (I first encountered them on Perfect from Now On), but they always hang just below my radar when I think about great albums.  Nevertheless, many of their songs have landed on compilations I’ve made.

I listened to this disc a few times when it came out and when I popped it in again today I couldn’t believe how well I knew the whole album and how much I really, really liked everything on it.

This may in fact turn out to be my favorite BtS disc.  It isn’t radically different from other releases of theirs, but there’s some ineffable quality that seems to raise the whole disc above the fray.  The total package is fantastic.  The first few songs are quite short, just over three minutes each (which is surprising after the release of the live album which had so many extended songs and solos (a 20 minute cover of Neil Young’s “Cortez the Killer”).

Of course there are a few extended jams as well.  Four songs are over six minutes long (and three of them make up the last four tracks, so the disc does to tend feel a little heavy at the end–although “Things Fall Apart” has a horn solo (!) and “Tomorrow” has some unexpected time changes).  But the first long song, “Good Ol’ Boredom” has a great chugging riff that hold ups to the six minutes very well.  The nearly seven minute “Done” has a wonderfully effects-laden end section. The solo is pretty lengthy, but the backing music/sounds keep the whole thing interesting.  Of course, there’s also “Pat” a two and a half-minute blast of punk abandon.

Doug Marsch has a pretty high voice, but it never grows whiny or annoying, and in fact, it has a kind of gravitas to it.  And it is more than matched by the full band sound on the disc.  Martsch’s lyrics are also wonderfully unexpected [“Is the grass just greener because it’s fake?”].

BTS has made a great album and I’m going to have to revisit their back catalog too.

[READ: November 14, 2010] “Twilight of the Vampires”

This was a banner issue of Harper’s (I’ve felt kind of down on the magazine lately, but it made up for itself this month).  We have the Lydia Davis/Flaubert stories, a lengthy piece by William T. Vollmann and the cover story about Rupert Murdoch (which I won’t be posting about).  In fact, normally I don’t post too much about non-fiction (recent obsessions notwithstanding), but this particular piece was by Téa Obreht, one of this year’s New Yorker 20 Under 40.  Obreht had barely had anything published when they selected her, and so I figured it would be easy to keep tabs on her.  So here’s a nonfiction to add to her two stories.  (And it’s about vampires!)

Obreht is originally from Russia (her family is apparently still there).  As the essay opens, she is going to meet her mother in Belgrade for their trip to Serbia.  Their ostensible reason to travel to the Balkans is to find out about vampires.   (But when her mother injuries herself before the trip is about to commence, it convinces her mother that the whole trip is possessed by devils).

But why travel to the Balkans in search of vampires when her adopted homeland of America is overrun by vampires right now?  Because as she relates, our vampires are rather different from theirs. (more…)

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Lydia Davis–Five Stories from Flaubert (Harper’s, November 2010)

Posted in Death, Fears, Flash Fiction, Funny (strange), Gustav Flaubert, Harper's, Lydia Davis, Prefab Sprout, Record Labels on December 14, 2010| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: PREFAB SPROUT-Let’s Change the World with Music (2009).

This album was unreleased back in 1992 (it was supposed to be the follow-up to the wonderful Jordan: The Comeback).  Record label confusion left it shelved for many years.  It’s been released now because lead Sprout Paddy McAloon has been having health issues and won’t be releasing any new Sprout music anytime soon.  So he has released this album in what is essentially demo form.

Unlike many demos, though, this one is pretty fully realized.  It’s full of keyboards (where there might be strings for instance) and there are no backing vocals (or any other musicians), and yet for all of that, it doesn’t sound like a scratched out demo or a home-recorded cassette (and Paddy sings his heart out).  There are certainly moments (most evident in the drums at the beginning and end of songs) that sound kind of sparse, but the bulk of the disc is fully formed and quite well realized.

The opening is pretty odd, with Paddy (who normally has a soaring tenor voice) speaking a deep almost rap over a funky beat.  In fact, as the song continues, with Paddy’s voice returning to “normal,” that funky beat continues.  Nevertheless, but the time the sweeping dreamy chorus kicks in we’re back to less funky, more smooth sounding Sprout that I know and love.

Like Steely Dan, Prefab Sprout is not really meant to be enjoyed by the young.  It’s borderline treacly, it’s very sweet and earnest, an my high school self would have scoffed at my enjoying them at all.  And yet for all of that, the songwriting is really magical.  There is religious imagery all over the disc, but it’s there to convey the magical power of music.  And it’s entirely authentic.

And when you combine that with Paddy’s voice its adult contemporary music that is still interesting (certainly too interesting to be played on pop radio).  I think the real key to the success of the disc is the unpretentious, unforced and completely unironic joy that Paddy gets from music.  And there’s nothing wrong with that.

[READ: November 14, 2010] “Five Stories from Flaubert”

I really enjoyed Madame Bovary many many years ago when I read it.  Recently, writer Lydia Davis translated Madame Bovary and her translation is supposed to be exceptional, light years above the translation that I read.  One of these days I plan to read her version.  In the meantime, I’ve got these little short short stories.

I had a hard time deciphering what these little stories were, exactly.  The introduction says that they are “adapted from letters Flaubert wrote to his lover.”  So I guess Flaubert gets a co-writing credit?  There’s a couple more stories online at The Paris Review (but you need to buy the issue to get all ten). (more…)

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More Things Like This: 289 Drawings with Funny Words Also on the Same Drawing (2009)

Posted in Amy Jean Porter, Andy Warhol, Art, Big Books, Dada, Dave Eggers, Edward Gorey, Frank Zappa, Funny (ha ha), Funny (strange), Jean-Michel Basquiat, Man Ray, McSweeney's, Peter Saul, Raymond Pettibon, René Magritte, Salvador Dali, Shel Silverstein on December 13, 2010| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: FRANK ZAPPA-Does Humor Belong in Music? (1995).

Frank Zappa made money and found fame by writing dirty, funny songs.  Yet he was really a great guitarist and a serious composer.  But hey, when you need the money to make your studio, you write songs about “Penguins in Bondage.”  When I was in high school my friend Al introduced me to Shiek Yerbouti, and I was hooked.  I’d never heard songs that were so intentionally funny.

So, this live collection is kind of an odd assortment, given the title.  I mean the first song is an instrumental (ie. not funny at all except for the title “Zoot Allures”).  “Tinseltown Rebellion” however is pretty darn funny.  The mockery that goes on (and the call-outs range from The Scorpions to Culture Club and The Tonight Show) is nasty and offensive, but never really wrong.  And this is when you find out how good a Zappa stage show was.  The band was tight, they could play all kinds of crazy things and, as in this song, they were always in sync even when improvising.

This disc is a collection of songs from a 1984 tour.  I rather like this incarnation of the Zappa band (Ike Willis is pretty amazing at any time).  And they play tracks from across Zappa’s output.  Although there’s times when the disc sounds really abrasive (some of the solos–like on “Bondage”–are really piercing and not very smooth, and the drums can be very electronic sounding).

Of course, that’s the kind of music that Zappa wrote (“What’s new in Baltimore” is very electronic sounding–beautiful but mechanical–which is why it’s so amazing to hear it live–even if it doesn’t sound human, exactly).

And just so you know it’s not only Zappa showing off (although he kind of is since he hired all the musicians) in “Let’s Move to Cleveland,” everyone gets a solo…keybaords, drums…everyone.  And the final track “Whipping Post” sees his son Dweezil taking the lead guitar solo (which feels really human and rocks the dickens off the place).

For many of Zappa’s later “live” records, he compiled songs from all over the place (a very common practice for live records).  On some of the collections he even mixed a tour from the 70s with one from the 80s.   Now the thing that I just recently realized (even though it’s spelled out in the liner notes) is that these songs are cribbed together from different songs (!) (on “Cleveland” the piano solo is from St. Petersburg, the drum solo is from Vancouver, and the guitar solo is from Amherst College…weird, eh?  And what about the backing music, where does that come from while the solos are spliced in?)).  So, they’re not really live, except they kind of are.  And, heck that’s kind of funny too.  If you care about things like that it kind of ruins the “authenticity” of the recording.   But if you don’t, they sound pretty darn good anyway.

So this is not his funniest stuff, but it’s still an interesting live collection.

[READ: November 12, 2010] More Things Like This

I don’t know where I learned about this book, but I recently found it used for about $4 and I was pretty psyched to both find it and to pay a pittance for it.

As the subtitle indicates, this book is a collection of drawings that have words on them and are funny (but which are not “cartoons” (although some kind of are)).  The impetus for the book was a show at apexart of exactly this sort of thing.  The book expands on the show and includes many artists who were not in the show (including several very famous artists).

The Foreword by Dave Eggers offer the rationale behind the show & the book: Image + Text (usually referring to the image) + Humor = Good enough for us.  And it also asks pertinent questions: Why is it that so many of these artists can’t spell?  And why is it that when they screw up a word, instead of starting over, they just cross the word out and write it again?  Why is it important to some of the artists that the drawings appear casual, even sloppy?

And more. (more…)

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Dave Eggers–It is Right to Draw Their Fur (2010)

Posted in Animals, Arrested Development, Big Books, Corporate skewering, Dave Eggers, David Cross, Drugs, Funny (ha ha), McSweeney's, Mr Show, Religion, Running Wilde, Yuck! on December 12, 2010| 1 Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: DAVID CROSS-Bigger and Blackerer (2010).

I’ve liked David Cross for years, both in Mr. Show and everywhere else he’s been (I love comparing his nebbish character in Arrested Development to his obnoxious hippie in Running Wilde). And his standup is just fantastic.

This new(ish) CD (which has the same name but different content as the DVD) is wonderfully obscene and profane and all around hilarious.  What’s particularly fun is the nonsensical “titles” he gives to his bits (although these are more accurate than on his previous disc): “REALLY Silly Religious Crazies, I mean, Double, Triple Crazy!!” and “Random Goofabouts”

The disc opens with a song(!), a swinging song ala Tom Jones which Cross sings (his voice isn’t very good, but he’s never off key, which is something) which actually features some cool time changes and a bit of pathos.  But the jokes are very funny.  He opens with an extended bit about drugs (mostly about drugs he has taken).  It’s a bit long, but the details are hilarious and the payoffs at the end are wonderful.  I also enjoyed that the drug bits are a cautionary tale, yet he never turns preachy, in fact, he inverts expectations throughout.

The race jokes are really great too, especially the MLK license plate bit.  But indeed, Cross really shines when it comes to religion.  I’ve never really heard a riff on Orthodox Jews before, and his dismissal of Catholicism is brutal and short, but it’s the Mormons who get the bulk of his abuse (mostly because of the awesome power they wield), especially since the religion is a sham.

He’s also not afraid to make observations that will offend some (although no one who listens to him) but are spot on.  There’s an excellent bit about Obama haters who bemoan the state of the country but who will immediately fight any “elitist” who bemoans other aspects of the country.  And it very funny, indeed.

Cross has spent some time in England (filming The Increasingly Poor Decisions of Todd Margaret) and his British accent is quite good now (it’s used to excellent effect in heaven).  He also has great rapport with the crowd, who are exuberantly noisy.

This CD is an excellent introduction to Cross’ standup.  The jokes aren’t really timely (although the health care yelling bit will date it somewhat, except that the debate itself will go one for years to come, so maybe it won’t), so even if it’s five years from now, the jokes will still be funny.

Cross is not a delicate comedian and his jokes are not for the faint of heart, but, man, is he funny.

[READ: November 9, 2010] It is Right to Draw Their Fur

Polymath Dave Eggers is back with another fascinating (and fascinatingly bound) title.  This time, the collection contains a series of drawings.  Most of the drawings are of animals and they all feature words on them.  (This sort of thing: Picture + words + humor (from many different artists) is presented in a book that I am currently enjoying called More Things Like This).  Similar items also appeared in McSweeney’s 27 (you can see my Post about that issue here)).

Eggers explains in the introduction that he went to art school.  He was an aspiring painter and then a cartoonist and illustrator.  And in his down time, he spent a lot of time drawing animals.  And they are quite good.  Eggers’ art has an odd quality to it that I can’t quite put my finger on.  All of his pictures seem off in a small way.  It doesn’t make them bad at all, in fact, it actually makes you want to look at them more to see what is off about them.  (I think some people call that “compelling”).

The project comes in a hugely oversized cardboard sleeve (14 inches x 19 inches).  There are 26 large sized posters (they are folded and their unfolded size reaches something like 27″ x 37″).  There’s also a booklet which features even more of these drawings.  The booklet has an appendix with some drawings that are not animals (well, they are humans, so yes, they are animals).  And, the most peculiar part, there’s a bibliography.  The bibliography goes on for four pages and includes all manner of things from Sartre’s Being and Nothingness to Auel’s Clan of the Cave Bear to Gara’s The Presidency of Franklin Pierce to The Collected Poems of William Carlos Williams to Saint-Saens’ Le carnaval des animaux.

You can see two examples here.  In my opinion these are not the best combination art/words in the book (although the drawings are very good).  There are some other ones where the juxtaposition appealed to me much more.

The package is quite expensive (and justified–it is a lot of stuff and beautifully put together), but I have a hard time believing someone would spend $42 on it.  (I received mine as part of the McSweeney’s book club, so that’s nice.)

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Sam Lipsyte–”The Dungeon Master” (New Yorker, October 4, 2010)

Posted in Air, Daft Punk, Dungeons & Dragons, Humiliation, New Yorker, Phoenix, Sam Lipsyte, Set in New Jersey!, Violence on December 11, 2010| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: PHOENIX–Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix (2009).

It will soon be unsurprising to say that a great album has come from a French band (no offense to the French, but you never used to hear cool music coming from there).  Then we had Air and Daft Punk and now Phoenix.

The first single and leadoff track, the preposterously catchy “Lisztomania” features guitars and keyboards (just so we know they’re not another techno band).  It has a simple but infectious riff as it opens , and it never lets up in catchiness.  “1901” has a chorus that ends with some ayayayayayays that I dare you not to sing along with.

“Fences” has a pretty classic disco feel to it.  It’s followed by “Love Like a Sunset.” Part 1 is a five-minute atmospheric instrumental, and Part 2 follows along similarly.

“Lasso” follows with some more simple background keyboards topped with grinding guitars.  Like “Countdown,” it’s simple and hard not to like.  “Girlfriend” opens with great swaths of keyboards and lots of repeated words in the verses and chorus, making for yet another great single.   In fact, all of the songs are super catchy.

Despite the simplicity of the melodies, the songs are always interesting.  And that’s hard to beat.  There’s no surprise that this album was on many lists as one of the best of 2009.

[READ: October 28, 2010] “The Dungeon Master”

Reading this short story reminded me that I really want to read Lipsyte’s new book The Ask, which is supposed to be very good indeed.

The title of the story immediately made me think it would be about Dungeons & Dragons, and I was pleased to see that it was.   The story concerns a group of boys who have their own D&D club after school (as opposed to the school sanctioned D&D club).  Their game meets at the Dungeon Master’s house and there is no, repeat, no touching of the DM’s manual.

We quickly learn that the DM is a sadistic bastard.  He has killed off his younger brother’s character at least 30 times (and the brother keeps making a new character in his place: Valentine the 19th, Valentine the 20th etc).  But unlike in real D&D where you die from ogres and dragons, Valentine has died from, for instance, rectal cancer (how do you roll for that?).

There’s a lot of speculation about just how crazy their DM really is (rumors abound: he flashes some girls at the ice rink, he set his own feces on fire).  And, of course there’s talk that he spent some time in Bergen Pines.  And just where is his mother anyway? (more…)

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Jonathan Franzen–“The Retreat” (New Yorker, June 6, 2005)

Posted in Dar Williams, Drugs, Essays, Funny (ha ha), Jonathan Franzen, New Yorker, Nostalgia, Religion on December 10, 2010| 1 Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: DAR WILLIAMS-“Teen for God” (2005).

Dar Wiliams has a new disc in which she revisits her old songs (by herself and with guests) and which includes a bonus Greatest Hits disc.  I have listened only once to the disc, but it includes this song which fits perfectly with this story.

Williams has always been an excellent lyricist.  Her rhymes are strong and her descriptions and ideas are first-rate.  Normally, her songs are emotional and intimate, although this one is less so.  It’s serious and funny at the same time.

It begins with a teen at the Peach Branch Horse and Bible Camp where she’ll “pray for the sinners and their drunken car wrecks and vow that I’ll never get high or have sex.”  It’s interesting to compare this song and the implications of the teens for God circa 2005 vs what Franzen is talking about circa the early 1970s.  And it’s fascinating, and rather depressing frankly, how much more conservative times have gotten since then.

What really sells “Teen for God” are the final few verses, where we realize that we shouldn’t take too much of what the teens pledge to be long-lasting (like so many things that teens believe). “You gotta help me, God. Help me know four years from now I won’t believe in you anyhow and I’ll mope around the campus and I’ll feel betrayed all those guilty summers I stayed”

And all of this existential religiousness is set to a perky folk rock song.  The “Teen for God” chorus hits a perfect delayed chord, and is a wonderful singalong.  Perhaps even at a campfire.  On a retreat.

[READ: November 18, 2010] “The Retreat”

This essay is about Franzen’s childhood (always a good source for his stories) when he joined the hippie “Fellowship” at First Congregational Church.  Franzen is older than I am by a  few years, so a lot of things that he writes about from his childhood are things that I knew a little about or caught the tail end of.  So, in this case, I recall my church having Saturday night folk masses, where everyone played acoustic guitars.  I loved it and my parents hated it; when I recently asked a neighbor if they still do that she laughed at me and said they’d stopped it like 25 years ago.  Which explains a lot.

Anyhow, the article discusses an upcoming retreat that the ninth graders would be taking with the other older Fellowship students.  Franzen was a big fish in the 8th grade Fellowship but was a little nervous about the older group.  He loved retreats and wanted to go but didn’t think his parents would approve.  Luckily for him, his parents were in Europe at the time.  [This seems to be some kind of thing that parents did in the 70s–go to Europe for an extended period while the kids stayed home.  My parents never did, mind you, but some seemed to.] (more…)

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Jim Shepard–”Boys Town” (New Yorker, November 8, 2010

Posted in Death, Jim Shepard, Kids Are People Too, Military, Neurotics, New Yorker, Patti Smith, Short Story, Violence, Wonderama, Yuck! on December 9, 2010| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: PATTI SMITH: “You Light Up My Life” (Live on Kids Are People Too) (1979).

While browsing YouTube, I found a bunch of fun videos from the kids’ programs Wonderama and Kids Are People Too.  And that’s where I found this video of Patti Smith, of all people, singing this dainty pop confection.

Her introduction to the kids is weirdly wonderful (she says she wanted to be a missionary).  And the kids ask some pretty good questions (I would think she was too scary to be on this show back then, but no one says anything remotely risqué).  And she seems to genuinely want to inspire the kids.  It’s really quite cool.

I listened to the original just now for the first time since the 70s, I’m sure.   Although the first verse doesn’t sound drastically different from Patti’s version, once the chorus kicks in, Patti transforms this song into an angst-filled song of loss.  And man, can Patti sing.

Check it out here.

[READ: November 7, 2010] “Boys Town”

When I first saw this author’s name I thought it was Jean Shepherd author of In God We Trust…All Others Pay Cash (otherwise known as A Christmas Story).  And  I thought that maybe it was going to be a quaint look at growing up.

It isn’t. (more…)

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T.C. Boyle–”What Separates Us from the Animals” (Harper’s, October 2010)

Posted in Animals, Belle and Sebastian, Gilmore Girls, Harper's, NPR/PRI/PBS, Susan Faludi, T.C. Boyle, Unlikable main character, World Cafe Live on December 8, 2010| 2 Comments »

SOUNDTRACK: BELLE AND SEBASTIAN-World Cafe Live [downloaded from NPR] (2006).

This is a live in-studio session promoting The Life Pursuit.  David Dye conducts an interview between songs (we learn what “Funny Little Frog” is about and how “Seymour Stein” came to be).

Stuart and Stevie are animated and in good form and the band sounds excellent.  On “Funny Little Frog” in particular they sound like they’re really enjoying themselves.

The session is only 25 minutes long, but they play 4 songs: “Funny Little Frog”, “Meat and Potatoes,” “Seymour Stein” and “Sukie in the Graveyard.”  It’s worth a listen and it’s available here.

[READ: November 6, 2010] “What Separates Us from the Animals”

For some reason I always put off reading T.C. Boyle stories, even though I invariably enjoy them.  And this was no exception.  I saw that it was a fairly long story and I waited to read other things in this issue of Harper’s (Susan Faludi–where has she been all these years? and another NASCAR article–my second one in a few months after the article in McSweeney’s, which is pretty surprising since I’ve never seen more than a second of a race).

But back to Boyle.  I loved the technique involved in this story.  The narrator is a critical woman who makes claims towards being reasonable about her criticisms.  And the thing is, her criticisms are entirely justified and yet her attitude makes you want to disagree with her. It’s a very cool conceit–an unlikable narrator whose opinions happened to be your own.

What she’s critical of is the new doctor who arrives on their island (I’m gathering it’s Nantucket).  He was picked out of a couple of applicants to be the island’s only doctor, handling basic problems and issues (especially during the summer tourism season) but always with the understanding that serious problems would have to go to the mainland.  In addition to his salary he would receive free lodging in an older, historic house.

She met him on the night of his arrival in order to get him set up in the house.  She immediately invited him to dinner. He accepted for the following night and arrived at their own beautiful house in paint-spattered jeans and dirty work boots.  He ate well and then fell asleep on their couch.  Obviously, this did not set things off on the right foot.  But what was worse was that this dirty demeanor spilled over into the rest of his life: his car has a flat tire for two months and worse, his examination office is filthy too (something I’m totally on board with criticizing).  They’re also concerned with the state of the historic house, which no one has seen yet–what no invitations to cocktails? (more…)

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Jonathan Franzen–”The Comfort Zone: Growing up with Charlie Brown” (New Yorker, November 29, 2004)

Posted in A Camp, Charles Schulz, Consumerism, Corporate skewering, Essays, Funny (ha ha), Funny (strange), History, New Yorker, Newspapers, NPR/PRI/PBS, The Cardigans, WFUV 90.7 FM--New York City on December 7, 2010| 1 Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: A CAMP-Studio Sessions on WFUV [available on NPR] (2009).

I rather enjoyed A Camp’s latest album Colonia.  I discovered this session while browsing through NPR’s archives.  There’s a pretty lengthy (and amusing) interview with the band and then they play three acoustic songs: “Love Has Left the Room,” “Stronger Than Jesus” and “I Signed the Line.”

Nina’s voice sounds fantstic, and in such a simple acoustic session it’s her voice that really sells the music.  But this is another instance where an acoustic, stripped down session reveals the strength of the songs themselves.  The album has a lot of production, but when it’s just bare bones guitar and bass, the melodies still hold up.  And again, Nina’s voice just soars through these meloides.  Anyone who got sick of The Cardigans needs to hear what Nina Persson can do in other settings.

Check it out here.

[READ: October 29, 2010] “The Comfort Zone”

The subtitle gives the foundation of the article: Franzen loved Peanuts when he was growing up.  This article was timed to coincide with the release of the awesome Fantagraphics collection of original Peanuts cartoons. I’ve only read the first of these Peanuts books, but it was really eye-opening and quite fascinating to see that such odd thoughts were published on a daily basis on the comic section!  And, I hate to sound curmudgeonly (that’s Charlie Brown’s job) but Franzen is right, the original Peanuts cartoons are far more existentially dark and satisfying than the fluffy Snoopy & Woodstock cartoons of the late 70s and 80s.

Anyhow, Franzen loved these early comics (and he makes a wonderful comment about spending a lot of time (probably age-inappropriate time) with talking animals: Snoopy, Narnia, A.A. Milne).   But as with all of these longer Franzen articles, it’s about much more than just Charlie Brown.   One night when he was a young boy, his older brother Tom had a huge fight with their parents and stormed out.   Franzen sets this up in the context of generation gap that was sweeping through the country in the late 60s/early 70s.

And it’s this unsettledness that also explains the popularity of the Peanuts cartoons. Despite all of the differences between generations, everyone agreed that they loved Peanuts (except for Franzen’s parents, evidently–his dad never read the funnies, and his mom only liked a strip called The Girls, which sounds like a prototype of Cathy).

The other angle that this article takes is about losers.  Charlie Brown was a loser, there’s no doubt.  But Franzen himself was a winner.  He was the king of spelling bees in his school. (This relates to Charlie Brown misspelling “maze” as MAYS, a perfect misspell for a sports fan).  And when a new kid comes to challenge him he steps up his game…and makes the kid cry.

This, of course, leads to guilt. Charlie Brown one said, “Everything I do makes me feel guilty.” And now Franzen feels guilty about the boy in his class, and about being mean to a frog as a kid and about the wash cloths at the bottom of the closet which don’t get used enough (Sarah and I have jokey guilt about that too) and even about the stuffed animals who don’t get cuddled enough. (more…)

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Stephen Marche–“Lucy Hardin’s Missing Period” (The Walrus, November 2010)

Posted in Beck, Bjork, Canadian Content, Charlotte Gainsbourg, Funky Web Sites, Pregnancy, Sex, Short Story, Sinéad O'Connor, Stephen Marche, Stereolab, Technology, The Walrus on December 6, 2010| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: CHARLOTTE GAINSBOURG-IRM (2009).

Charlotte Gainsbourg is Serge Gainsbourg’s daughter.  Segre is, of course, known for his risqué songs–although Charlotte doesn’t fall into that same camp.

This is her third album.  Her first was released when she was 13.  The second was recorded with the band Air.  This album was written by and recorded with Beck.  And it’s a fantastic forum for her wonderfully complex voice and also just a great album of varying styles and textures.

IRM is the French abbreviation for MRI (she had a life threatening accident and was subject to many MRI’s). In fact, track two, called “IRM” is an electronic workout with sounds not unlike what you might hear in an MRI.  But the album is very diverse, from whispering vocals to soaring altos.  She has some scary/creepy songs as well as some sultry tracks.  Gainsbourg is also an actress and I like to think that her skills in film have allowed her to inhabit so many characters in these songs.

“Le Chat Du Café Des Artistes” (written by Jean-Pierre Ferland) is the only cover on the disc, and man is it great.   Whether it’s the French lyrics, which add a cool Stereolab-ish feel to the proceedings or the outstanding keyboards which are creepy and alluring at the same time, I don’t know, but this song alone makes the disc worthwhile.

Luckily there’s a lot more great songs here, too.  “Heaven Can Wait” is a duet with Beck (although really, Beck takes the lead).  It sounds like a great Beck track with a stomping acoustic guitar feel.

“Me and Jane Doe” follows with a sound like it belongs on the Juno soundtrack.  It gives Gainsbourg a great opportunity to show of her vocal tricks, since she sings with a flatly American accent.  “Vanities” is a beautiful string-filled track which emphasizes Gainsborugh’s voice (and has a kind of Bjorkian symphonic sound to it().

“Trick Pony” is a heavy electronic dance track, bringing an amazing sonic change to the proceedings of the disc.  And “Greenwich Mean Time” is a nasty sounding song where Gainsbourg is not afraid a to sneer at the listener.

The disc ends with “Dandelion,” a kind of slow blues, “Voyage,” a tribal track  (sung in French) and “La Collectionneuse,” which is not sung in French, but which is a piano based song that kind of creeps along on the edge of sinister.  The end of the song has spoken French words at the end and it sounds not unlike an early Sinéad O’Connor song

It’s rare that you hear an album full of so much diversity which actually holds together so well.  Gainsbourg doesn’t have an amazing voice or a voice that makes you go “wow,” but what she has is a really good voice that she can manipulate to convey a lot of styles, and I think that may be more impressive than an eight-octave range.

[READ: November 4, 2010] “Lucy Hardin’s Missing Period”

It’s hard to talk about this story as a story because of the gimmick that is attached to it.  This is a choose your own adventure story, albeit for adults.  In the magazine itself, there are two paragraphs.  You have to continue the story online here.  The technology involved is superb (you can save your story so that when you come back you can pick up where you left off) and each time you click to go to a new section, it fills in right after the section where you were reading so that the finished story looks like a complete (printable) story.

I tried two different stories and it became obvious that there are hundreds of story segments to choose from.  I’m rather amazed at the author’s ability to create what appears to be so many different stories parts out of these few characters (although I suppose realistically there can only be a half a dozen or so outcomes, no?).  And yet for all of that, I didn’t find the story all that interesting.

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