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Archive for the ‘T. Coraghessan Boyle’ Category

T. Coraghessan Boyle–“Ash Monday” (New Yorker, January 21, 2008)

Posted in Basia Bulat, Fire, Japan, Marriage (Happy), New Yorker, Rats, Short Story, T. Coraghessan Boyle, T.C. Boyle, Tiny Desk Concert on January 10, 2016| Leave a Comment »

S2008_01_21OUNDTRACK: BASIA BULAT-Tiny Desk Concert #106 (January 24, 2011).

basiaFor some sad reason, this video cuts off about half way through the second song, so you need to watch it on YouTube instead.  Basia Bulat is a Canadian singer of Polish descent.  She’s adorable and plays weird instruments.  What’s not to like?

The first song “The Shore” is done entirely on a pianoette–she may be the only singer to play one.  The pianoette is a zither-like instrument with a strummed section and a hammered section.  Her voice is low and breathy.  And when, during the second verse, her backing band’s harmonies come in, it’s quite breathtaking.

The second song is done on guitar. It’s a Polish folks song–she says it was a big hit in the 60s in communist Poland.  She sings it in Polish and says it was a great way to learn her Polish words and pronunciations.  “W Zielonym Zoo” means “In The Green Zoo.”  It’s cute how happy and smiley she is as she explains this song.  It begins with just her on guitar and it’s quite a delight when Holly Coish on ukulele, Allison Stewart on viola and Ben Whiteley on bass join in.

pianoetteHer brother Bobby Bulat joins her on percussion for “Heart Of My Own.”  This song is louder and more dramatic and a lot of fun. The final song  “In The Night” is one she normally plays on the autoharp (see, unusual instruments) but she didn’t have it so she plays a rollicking guitar version with the full band (there’s some great violin solos in it).  Just before it starts she says that if it sucks, don’t use it.  It doesn’t suck at all.

I really like Bulat’s music a lot and this is a great way to witness it up close.  And here’s a picture of a pianoette.

[READ: January 8, 2015] “Ash Monday”

I wasn’t sure how much I would like this story (same old intro from me) because I didn’t like the main character (or one of the two main characters).  Dill is a delinquent.  He’s 13 and with a car (well, he has the car, he just cant drive it).  And hes loves the smell of gasoline.

When his mother tells him to goes outside to light the grill (as he does most nights–his mom doesn’t cook in the house apparently), he puts gasoline in it to light it up.  On this night he discovers a rat in the grill, so he takes the opportunity to dose the rat with the gasoline and set it on fire.  (If you’re squeamish, there is also the death of hundreds of chinchillas although that is from natural causes).

We don’t learn much about Dill’s mother except that her husband is gone and she is looking to date someone new.

The scene cuts to the next door neighbor, Sanjuro Ishiguro (Dill calls him “Itchy-goro” and once called him a motherfucking gook).  Ishiguro is a respectable businessman.  He works long hours often getting to work before everyone else.  And although he gets along with his workmates, he is definitely not one of them.  They like to ask him about sports when they know he knows nothing about it. (more…)

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T.C. Boyle–“No Slant to the Sun” (Harper’s, March 2015)

Posted in Canadian Music, Harper's, Ian Anderson, Racism, Rheostatics, Short Story, T. Coraghessan Boyle, T.C. Boyle, Vacation, Violence, tagged on March 15, 2015| Leave a Comment »

harp marchSOUNDTRACK: RHEOSTATICS-Call the Office London, On (August 11, 2000).

calltheofficeCall the Office sounds like a great live venue.  It sounds small and intimate and, for this recording anyway, the sound quality is great.

The band is in great form with a ten minute version of “Fat.”   Then there’s a bunch of new songs: “In It Now” (the first time I’m aware of them playing it), “CCYPA” and a great version of “The Fire.”

Then they jump back to an old song and play “Torque Torque” with a very funny introduction about how they wrote this back in the early 60s and that it out-dorks the Doors (the Doors had no bass player).  Dave also says they’ll never play Full Moon Over Russia because it’s too hard.

There’s a lengthy introduction to “Satan is the Whistler” in which Martin tells about writing it–how it was originally going to be about Bigfoot (he used to read Bigfoot books as a kid) and the scariest thing about the Bigfoot stories was when people heard whistling.  The intro devolves into some funny talk about Whistler, the city, and extreme sports.  Someone eventually winds up describing the song as Ian Anderson skiing.

There’s a sadly aborted “Junction Foil Ball.”  Not sure if they just never played it or if there’s a problem with the recording.

There’s also an “off color” joke about Michael Jackson and Bubbles and Dave teases the jokester (Don Kerr?) saying that a guy with neck beard shouldn’t make off color jokes.

“Feed Yourself” a song they don’t play often enough sounds great here with some awesome soloing chords and effects in the middle.  And “Legal Age Life” also has some funny silly parts in the solos.

“Horses” (which the fans have been cheering for all night) sounds fantastic–a great version of it.  The middle section has Dave talking and ranting (all with his voice echoed).  It’s quite intense.  As is the final “Moon” high note at the end of “Dope Fiends and Booze Hounds” which they cap off with another fast run through “Satan.”

As I said this is a great sounding bootleg (and the notes on the site agree: “This is one of the best sounding Rheos boots I have heard. Listen to Don’s drumming. It is awesome. I loved seeing him play.”

[READ: March 2, 2015] “No Slant to the Sun”

I have read so many stories by Boyle, and they are all so very different that I never really know what to expect–or even where they will go.

This story begins with the title–“there as no slant to the sun–it was just there, overhead.”  It is about a man, Sten, and his wife Carolee on vacation.  They are on a cruise and are currently taking a day trip to an island garden path (although he seems unsure where they are–not Mexico or Guatemala or Belize–somewhere with a lot of rum where they listen to reggae).

They, along with everyone else, are on a bus, being driven maniacally by a man wearing earbuds (listening to reggae) as he flies over potholes and around harsh left and right turns.

Sten refuses to drink the water here even though everyone else does. And despite his thirst he sticks only to the rum based drinks (and so is a bit drunk and parched).  He will only drink bottled water, but he forgot his bottle.  When Carolee falls asleep he roots through her purse for her water (which he then drops and it rolls under another seat).

All the people on the bus (mostly older retirees) are unhappy with the driving.  Finally Sten gets up to say something to man and even flicks out his ear buds.  But the man ignores him, clearly disgusted by the white people on the bus.  He grudgingly says they can have a restroom break in five minutes, although it’s more like 15 before they get to the site of their hike–something that Sten now regrets given the heat and his thirst.

As soon as they settle in, a car roars up next to them and some local boys get out.  One has a gun.  And the boys start demanding everybody’s wallets and jewels.

It’s then that we learn that Sten was once in the military.   And he has to decide if he should react to this insolence.

The story went in a direction I absolutely did not expect.  I enjoyed it, especially the way the ancillary characters react to what happens.  I never intentionally seek out Boyle, but I always enjoy his stories (and I am astonished at how prolific he is).

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T. Coraghessan Boyle–“The Relive Box” (New Yorker, March 17, 2014)

Posted in David Foster Wallace, Fantasy, Hozier, Marriage Trouble, New Yorker, Parenting, Richard Thompson, Sex, Short Story, T. Coraghessan Boyle, Time Travel, Tiny Desk Concert on May 30, 2014| Leave a Comment »

CV1_TNY_03_17_14Liniers.inddSOUNDTRACK: HOZIER-Tiny Desk Concert #360 (May 27, 2014).

hozierI had been cataloging the Tiny Desk Concerts from the beginning, but in recent days they have had so many good bands that I didn’t want to wait until I caught up with them.  So, for the next few posts there will be current Concerts (I have no idea what number they are, but I hope to fix them retroactively).

Hozier is responsible for the insanely catchy song “Take Me to Church.”  WXPN plays this song all the time.  I didn’t like it at first but then when I really listened to it I was hooked.  Of course I had no idea that the guy who was singing this powerful soulful song was a soft-spoken Irishman.  Hozier is Andrew Hozier-Byrne, a 24 year old from County Wicklow.  And while he’s singing this song here he makes it seems so easy to belt out those big notes.

Although it doesn’t quite reach the gravitas of the recorded version in this stripped down live session, he sounds great and the keyboard, cello and drums (and backing vocals) really bring this song to life.

The next two songs Hozier plays by himself.  “To Be Alone” is a very old-sounding blues—the sound of his guitar and the way his plays combined with the way he sings really hearkens back to early blues.  Typically I don’t especially like early blues but I do like this song quite a bit.

The final song is an acoustic ballad.  (So he plays three different guitars in this set).  It has a kind of Richard Thompson guitar feel and is a rather touching ballad.

Hozier has only released two EPs thus far, but with this amount of diversity I am looking forward to lots of other things from him.

[READ: May 29, 2014] “The Relive Box”

This story made me think of what the “Entertainment” in David Foster Wallace’s Infinite Jest might actually be like.  In Infinite Jest, the “Entertainment” is a video so intoxicating, you watch it–ignoring all other needs–until you die.  In this story, the “relive box” is a machine that plays back any memory that you have in full 3D. And people get so absorbed in their past that they forget about the present.

Specifically, the narrator is so intent on reliving that he ignores his daughter and his job.  As the story opens, the narrator’s daughter Katie says she wants to relive.  They just recently got this new relive box–it cost a fortune–and Katie wants to visit with her mother.  Her mother left them and Katie seems to have lost friends and impetus to do much else, so she would like to relive some good times.  But the narrator was planning on reliving for several hours that night, so he can’t have her hogging the machine.  So he sends her to bed, crying heavily, so he can have the machine to himself.

And what’s so important that the narrator has to relive?  After reliving his best sex moments, he goes back in time to the night he met Lisa, his first girlfriend.  She was a goth girl in a club and the narrator had the nerve to buy her a drink and ask her to dance.  Which ultimately let to sex and eventually to a relationship. And he relieves all of the highlights of their time together–something he has done several times this week already.  In fact, he has been doing this so much that he has been late for work twice and when he’s there he’s bleary-eyed and pretty much out of it.  So he says he’ll only do it once more this week.  And just for a few hours. (more…)

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