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Archive for the ‘Books about writers’ Category

Douglas Coupland–Polaroids from the Dead (1996)

Posted in Big Dirty Band, Books about writers, Canadian Content, Canadian Music, Consumerism, Corporate skewering, Dead Kennedys, Die Mannequin, Douglas Coupland, Essays, Fables, Flash Fiction, Grateful Dead, Greed, James Rosenquist, Nostalgia, Photo Essays, Rheostatics, Rush, Short Story, The Clash, The Future, The Inbreds, The Tea Party, Threats, Travel, Video Games on February 28, 2011| 2 Comments »

SOUNDTRACK: BIG DIRTY BAND-“I Fought the Law” (2006).

I just found out about this “supergroup” which was created for the Trailer Park Boys Movie.    The group consists of Geddy Lee and Alex Lifeson from Rush, drummer Jeff Burrows from The Tea Party and three people I don’t know: the singer from Three Days Grace, the singer/guitarist from Thornley and on lead vocals Care Failure from Die Mannequin.

I have to say that I’m not that excited by this cover.  The song has been covered so many times (some very good: The Clash, some very clever: The Dead Kennedys, and some terrible: many others).  And frankly there’s not much that you can do with this song.  It’s simple in structure with potential for shouting (which everyone likes), but little else.

For Rush fans, you can’t tell that Geddy or Alex are even on it.  So really it’s just a kind of metal-ish version of this old song.

Oh well, they can’t all be zingers.  You can hear it here.

[READ: February 1, 2011] Polaroids from the Dead

After reading Shampoo Planet, I wanted to see if I remembered any of Coupland’s books.  So I read this one.  It’s entirely possible that when I bought this book I was disappointed that it was not a new novel and never read it.  Because I don’t remember a thing about this book.  (This is seriously calling into question my 90’s Coupland-love!).

But I’m glad I read it now.  It’s an interesting time-capsule of the mid-90s.  It’s funny to see how the mid 90s were a time of questioning authority, of trying to unmask fame and corporate mega-ness.  At the time it seemed so rebellious, like everything was changing, that facades were crumbling.  Now, after the 2000s, that attitude seems so quaint.   Reading these essays really makes me long for that time when people were willing to stand up for what they believed in and write books or music about it (sire nothing changed, but the soundtrack was good).

So, this collection is actually not all non-fiction.  Part One is the titular “Postcards from the Dead.”  It comprises ten vignettes about people at a Grateful Dead concert in California in 1991.  As Coupland points out in the intro to the book, this was right around their Shades of Grey album album In the Dark, and huge hit “Touch of Grey”, when they had inexplicable MTV success and it brought in a new generation of future Deadheads.  He also points out that this is before Jerry Garcia died (which is actually helpful at this removed distance).

These stories are what Coupland does best: character studies and brief exposes about people’s lives.  The stories introduce ten very different people, and he is able to create a very complex web of people in the parking lot of the show (we don’t see the concert at all).  As with most Coupland of this era, the characters fret about reality.  But what’s new is that he focuses on older characters more (in the first two novels adults were sort of peripheral, although as we saw in Shampoo, the mother did have millennial crises as well).  But in some of these stories the focus is on older people (Coupland was 30 in 1991, gasp!).  And the older folks fret about aging and status, just like the young kids do. (more…)

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Jane Urquhart–L. M. Montgomery (2009) [Extraordinary Canadians Series]

Posted in Anne of Green Gables, Biography, Books about writers, Canadian Content, Canadian Music, Children's Books, Culture Shock, Death, Depression, Extraordinary Canadians, Jane Urquhart, Lucy Maud Montgomery, Sarah Harmer, Short Books, Weeping Tile on February 10, 2011| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: SARAH HARMER-Oh Little Fire (2010).

I found Sarah Harmer when she had a left field hit (“Basement Apt”) in the states.  I went back and discovered her band Weeping Tile (who are quite good and recorded a version of the song on their EP Eepee) and have been following her continued solo career.

Since that first record, she released a killer second disc, followed by a re-release of an intimate 1999 record she made for her dad which let her revel in her country roots.  She followed this up with I’m a Mountain, a very country, but very catchy album.  Finally, four years later, she put out Oh Little Fire.

Although she hasn’t lost her country roots, this album returns to more of the rock sound that first attracted me to her.  It’s not hard or heavy by any stretch, but it’s moved beyond the country of I’m a Mountain.

Sarah and I listened to this album a lot at night when it first came out, and it slowly seeped into my system.  I had kind of forgotten about it for a while, and upon rediscovering it I was delighted to hear that the melodies were fresh and still with me.  The album seems like a simple indie folk or the work of an adult alternative singer songwriter, but the thing with Harmer is that she has that wonderful background with Weeping Tile, a band that was always slightly off-center.  So, she writes beautiful melodies but puts little grace notes into them to keep them from being disposable.  And yet they are still super catchy.

The only hard thing about this disc is wondering which song will be stuck in your head after listening to it.

[READ: January 7, 2011] L. M. Montgomery

I’ve never read any L. M. Montgomery (although I’ve seen the miniseries of Anne of Green Gables) and I’ve never read any Jane Urquhart (but I love her name!).

This biography is so radically different from the other three I’ve read so far.  I wondered immediately if it was because Montgomery (and Urquhart) are women.  It deals with subjects that the other books didn’t at all: lost loves, mental incapacitation, family crises.  But it becomes clear through the book that these issues were THE issues that a woman at Montgomery’s time would have dealt with.  Unlike the men in the other books, Montgomery did not have a professional life (outside of being an author, which she did at home).  She was hardly a public figure, and since she was a woman, she was always in danger of losing what she had.

This biography is also vastly different from the others in the way it is constructed.  You can tell by some of the chapter headings: Her Death (the first chapter), Orphan, Sorrow, Madness.  You can also tell by these chapter titles that Montgomery did not have a happy life.

Indeed, between a husband who believed he was destined for Hell (he was a preacher!) and children whose life choices she disapproved of, not to mention terrible insomnia coupled with nightmares, her late adult life was nothing but torment.  But, sadly for her, her early life was nothing but torment either.  Her mother died when she was two, she was sent to live with her aunt and uncle (which was never a happy place).  But the most depressing of all of these events is when she lost her dearest friend at a terribly young age, a death she never really recovered from.

So how is it possible that Montgomery wrote such charming stories?

The answer to that (and the basis for most of this biography) is in her diaries.  Montgomery kept meticulous diaries (which she wrote and rewrote and then rewrote with posterity in mind).  She wrote about her childhood and her life as (sort of) an orphan.  She wrote about the places where she lived and the beautiful outdoors which impressed her.  She wrote about the sadness and the happiness.  Nothing was lost on her, and she saved it all (she also took photos of everything she loved, which are a beautiful and sometimes contradictory records of her diaries), and there are many published volumes that we can read to learn even more about her.

To me, the most fascinating (and horrible) part of the story was when she finally had Anne of Green Gables published.  The publishers took complete advantage of her.  They forced her to write sequels that she didn’t want to (although they are still quite good) and even compiled a final book from castoffs of the previous books (Return to Avonlea) that they published in her name.  Eventually the case was settled in her favor, phew, and she was able to write new characters that inspired her.

Montgomery had a rough life, and as her diaries come to an end, she stopped writing about things.   It’s hard to know exactly what she went through towards the end, but it doesn’t seem very positive.  And yet for all of her disappointments in life, she left us with some engaging and memorable stories.

The last chapter is a fascinating personal account of how Montgomery’s stories impacted Urquhart’s family.  It was incredibly touching and convinced me that Urquhart’s fiction would be enjoyable too.  Some day, some day.

This was a really enjoyable (but major downer) biography.  And, more than anything it has really inspired me to read Montgomery’s stories (and even one or two or Urquhart’s).

And, here’s a shameless plug to the folks at Penguin Canada–I will absolutely post about all of the books in this series if you want to send me the rest of them.  I don’t know how much attention these titles will get outside of Canada, but I am quite interested in a number of the subjects, and will happily read all of the books if you want to send them to me.  Just contact me here!

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Margaret MacMillan–Stephen Leacock (2009) [Extraordinary Canadians Series]

Posted in Books about writers, Canadian Content, Canadian Music, Extraordinary Canadians, Funny (ha ha), Language, Margaret MacMillan, Set at School, Short Books, Stephen Leacock, The Weakerthans on February 9, 2011| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: THE WEAKERTHANS-Live at the Burton Cummings Theatre (2010).

I’ve enjoyed The Weakerthans for a few years now, so I was pretty excited to see they had a live album out.

This live album works like a greatest hits.  All of the songs are great catchy pop songs–why aren’t The Weakerthans huge?  Maybe because their songs are literate and clever (and have weird titles (like “Our Retired Explorer (Dines with Michel Foucault in Paris, 1961)”).  In fact that song is one of only two songs that I know of that mention Jacques Derrida (the second being Scritti Politti’s “Jacques Derrida”).

Admittedly, The Weakerthan’s songs are simple and catchy and these live versions aren’t radically different from the originals.  There’s no extended jams or maniacal freak outs or anything.  But the album is very charming (John Samson is unfailingly polite) and the one big surprise is quite a surprise!

On the track “Wellington’s Wednesdays” Samson introduces a guy: “This is Ernesto.  He’s from Mexico.  He’s going to play a guitar solo.”  While listening to the disc I couldn’t imagine this peculiar introduction for a band member.  My version of the disc comes with a concert DVD of the show.  I didn’t get to watch the DVD until recently and… mystery solved:  Ernesto is a fan in the front row.  Samson talks to him mid-song, pulls him up on stage, introduces him and gives him his guitar to play the solo!  Then Samson jumps into the front row to watch.   How cool is that?

The video doesn’t deviate from the audio, except for leaving in a few moments of patter from Samson. In fact, I found the video to be somewhat choppily edited.  When Samson plays “One Great City!” (solo…which wasn’t obvious from the audio.  I mean, you can tell he’s solo, but it’s much more dramatic in the video) at the finish of the song, it immediately cuts to the next full band song, rather diminishing the return of the band.  (Although I do like the jump cuts to the audience which reveal what appears to be a room full of teenagers–it’s adorable!)

The other confusing thing is that the recording notes say that it was recorded over two days, and yet the video appears to be one night’s show. And the audio matches it, so who knows.

But those are little quibbles.  The music is great, the sound quality is fantastic and the song choices are great.  There are some cool surprises on the disc (like the horns and violin), but mostly what you get is an enjoyable evening at a small hometown concert with fans who love to sing along to the chorus of “One Great City:” “I hate Winnipeg!”

[READ: December 18, 2010] Stephen Leacock

What I’ve really been enjoying about this series of Extraordinary Canadians is how the writers of the books (at least the three I’ve read so far) are writing in such very different styles.  Obviously Coupland did his own thing.  Vissanji is a novelist, and he wrote his in a more novelistic way (its not like a novel at all, but it’s constructed in a kind of narrative style).  Macmillian is a historian, and I suppose for that reason, this biography feels more like a history (of Leacock, but also of economics) than a simple biography.

The strangest thing about this book is that although MacMillan obviously likes and respects Leacock, a surprising amount of the book is taken up with her talking about things he either said or did wrong or about his books that really aren’t that funny.  This is surprising because Leacock is a noted humorist. (In 1947, the Stephen Leacock Award was created to recognize the best in Canadian literary humour).

This biography looks at his life, but mostly it focuses on his academic and humorous works.  Leacock was an economist although he seems to generally disapprove of economists.  He had begun by teaching high school but found it incredibly stifling.  Eventually he found his niche at McGill University where he was well-respected and highly regarded by students and faculty alike. (more…)

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M.G. Vassanji–Mordecai Richler (2009) [Extraordinary Canadians Series]

Posted in Barney's Version, Biography, Books about writers, Canadian Content, Canadian Music, Demons, Depression, Extraordinary Canadians, Gord Downie, M.G. Vassanji, Marriage (Happy), Marriage Trouble, Mordecai Richler, Religion, Short Books, The Apprenticeship of Duddy Kravitz, The Tragically Hip, The Walrus, Travel on February 8, 2011| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: GORD DOWNIE AND THE COUNTRY OF MIRACLES-The Grand Bounce (2010).

I knew I was going to write about Canadian musicians for this series of Extraordinary Canadians, but I wasn’t sure who would get matched to whom. I figured I’d match Gord Downie to Mordecai Richler, but when I saw this in the liner notes to this disc, I knew I’d made the right choice:

Thank you to the Richler Family for the font you are presently reading.  The Richler font, not publicly available, was created and named for the great Mordecai Richler.  It was commissioned by Louise Dennys, designed by Nick Shinn and graciously made available by Florence Richler.  I am grateful for this honour.

So Gord Downie is the driving force behind The Tragically Hip.  I’m always curious when a guy who pretty much runs a band needs to do a solo album (or three).  And in this case, since the last Hip album was much more mellow and almost country, it seemed like he got some of his less rocky side out on that disc, so what’s the need?  Unless, of course, it’s just the need to play with some other folks once in a while.

Well, whatever the reason, this disc finds Downie in incredible form.  In fact, I think I like this disc better than the last Hip disc (which I did like, but which was a little too mellow overall).  The songs are all great, from the simple folk tracks to the more elaborate rockers.  And, yes, while the disc never rocks as hard as some Hip songs tend to, this is not a simple acoustic guitars and solo vocals record.

“The East Wind” is a wonderful starter.  It’s fairly simple with awesomely catchy lyrics.   I learned that the lyrics are from a quote by Todd Burley.  And they are an awesome way to describe a hostile and violent wind: it’s lazy, because “it doesn’t go around you, it goes right through you.”  Fantastic.

“Moon Over Glenora” sounds a lot like a Hip song.  Downie’s lyrics are almost mumbled and understated until he gets to the end of each verse when he raises his voice an octave for maximum effect.   The stops and starts in the bridge are also great.  “As a Mover” is also smoothly catchy with a wonderful rising chorus.

“The Dance and the Disappearance” is another great conceit.  This song is inspired by a quote from Crystal Pite: “Dance disappears almost at the moment of its manifestation.”  It is suitably dramatic with some great verses.  “The Hard Canadian” is a gentle acoustic number that would not be out of place on the more recent Hip records.  “Gone” feels like a continuation of “Heart,” almost like the slightly more rocking second half of it.

My favorite track is “The Drowning Machine” (I seem to like anything that Downie writes that’s about the sea).  It’s a minor chord wonder, dark and mysterious and wonderfully catchy.  The rock comes back on the rather simple “Night is For Getting.”  It’s probably the least essential track on the disc except that once again the chorus/bridge is really great and memorable.

The last three tracks bring on the mellow, which is a fitting ending for the disc, although since the three t racks take up about 12 minutes, it makes the end drag a bit.  “Retrace” is a country-tinged (steel guitar) mellow track (again, Downie’s voice brings out the excitement) .  “Broadcast” has an extended outro of gentle guitars and piano that for all the world sounds like the end of a disc, so I’m always surprised that there’s a final track after it.   And so the final track “Pinned” feels like filler.  It has a movie projector clicking sound and gentle piano with almost inaudible vocals.  It’s actually a pretty song, but it feels almost discarded here.

One of things I’ve always liked about Downie’s lyrics is that they are atypical of rock songs.  They’re not “about” sex or rock or drugs or swagger or anything like that.  In this case they are about locations and events.  And it really paints a picture.  And speaking of painting, Downie painted the cover art.  The beautiful simplicity of the painting is not unlike the beautiful simplicity of the music on the disc.

Oh and my copy is autographed too! (although I wasn’t there when he autographed it, so it could have been anyone who scribbled on the cover).

[READ: November 15, 2010] Mordecai Richler

I don’t know a lot about Mordecai Richler, although I feel like whenever I read about him it’s in hushed tones (a neat trick, that).  Nevertheless, for a number of reasons I have wanted to read him for many years but have just never done it.  Now, the stars are aligning with me for Richler.

There’s this book, there’s the cover of the October 2010 issue of The Walrus and the recent filming of his book Barney’s Version (the filming of which is discussed in the same issue).  And then a patron asked for the film of The Apprenticeship of Duddy Kravitz.  So, it’ about time to read one of his books.  But here’s the rub…do I start with the great books or do I start at the beginning and work my way through his career?  And, there’s also a huge new biography coming out (the review of which mentions a wonderfully offensive event in which Richler absolutely dismisses his Jewish audience).

This book was written by M.G. Vassanji.  I feel that I’ve heard of him but I’ve never read him.  And yet listen to this incredible biography:

M.G. Vassanji was born in Kenya and raised in Tanzania.  He attended University in the United States, where he trained as a nuclear physicist, before coming to Canada in 1978.  Vassanji is the author is six novels and two collections of short stories…and he has twice won the Giller Prize.

Damn.

Since I read this right after Coupland’s McLuhan it’s tempting to compare them.  And yet, as I said in that review, it seems quite apparent than Coupland’s book will be like no one else’s, so I won’t say much about that.  Instead, Vassanji opens the book by talking about the similarities between himself and Richler and their few awkward but pleasant meetings.  (In this respect yes, it is sort of like Coupland’s book in that the author puts himself into the text). (more…)

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Douglas Coupland–Marshall McLuhan (2009) [Extraordinary Canadians Series]

Posted in Annie Hall, Biography, Books about writers, Canadian Content, Canadian Music, CBC Radio 3, Consumerism, Death, Depression, Douglas Coupland, Extraordinary Canadians, Marshall McLuhan, Shad, Short Books, Technology, The Future on February 7, 2011| 1 Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: SHAD-TSOL (2010).

I first heard Shad on CBC Radio 3 online.  The track was “Yaa I Get It” and I really enjoyed it.  I haven’t listened to a lot of rap in the last few years; I’ve more or less grown bored by the genre, especially all the violence.  So, I was happy to hear this track, which was boastful but funny.

I decided to get the whole disc, and I wasn’t disappointed.  “Rose Garden” features a sample of “I Never Promised You a Rose Garden” which sets some of the tone of the disc.  But it’s on the next song “Keep Shining” that Shad’s uniqueness shines through.  This song is about women.  But not in any way that I’ve heard in rap before: “I can’t speak for women.  We need more women for that.”  And the inspiring final verse:

My mom taught me where to keep my heart.
My aunt taught me how to sing two parts.
My sis taught me how to parallel park,
and tried to teach me math but she way to too smart.
My grandma in the 80’s is still sharp.
My girl’s cousin is in activism in art.
They taught there’s no curls to tight, no mind too bright, no skin too dark to keep shining.

Later on the disc is “We Are the Ones” an oddball jam that sounds like one of those bizarre Atlanta rap tracks (funky vocals and all) and an amusing line about being Lost like Matthew Fox.  But his name checks aren’t all pop culture (Moredcai Richler gets a mention as does Glenn Beck (he “better duck like foie gras”).

And of course, there’s the wonderful “Yaa I Get It.”  With great horn blast samples and all kinds of noise competing for our attention.  Yet, throughout the lyrics stand out: “Maybe I’m not big cus I don’t blog or twitter…Dawg, I’m bitter.”  And there’s this wonderful couplet: The precision of my flows in terms of tone and diction/Is akin to that of the old masters of prose and fiction.”  Or take this lyrics from “Call Waiting,” “But what they say is hard for a pimp is harder for a man of faith.”

“Listen” has some great scratching on a heavy rocking track.  It’s followed by “At the Same Time.”  This is a mellow, sad song, which I don’t really like, yet which I find very affecting.  And lyrically, it’s great: “I never laughed and cried at the same time… Until, I heard a church pray for the death of Obama.  And wondered if they knew they share that prayer with Osama.”

The disc ends with “We, Myself and I” another noisy rocker and the one minute “Outro” an acapella rant.

Shad is a great rapper, doing interesting things and trying to make a difference.  He’s worth checking out.

[READ: November 1, 2010] “Marshall McLuhan”

I learned about this book because I’m a fan of Douglas Coupland.  And, as it turns out I’ve always had a vague interest in Marshall McLuhan, so it seemed like a sure thing. The problem was that the book was not readily available in the U.S.  So, I had to order it from Amazon.ca.  And, since you can’t get free shipping to a U.S. address from amazon.ca, I thought it would make sense to order 6 titles in the series, all of which I’ll post about this week.

So, here’s a shameless plug to the folks at Penguin Canada–I will absolutely post about all of the books in this series if you want to send me the rest of them.  I don’t know how much attention these titles will get outside of Canada, but I am quite interested in a number of the subjects, and will happily read all of the books if you want to send them to me.  Just contact me here!

Each book in the series has an introduction by John Ralston Saul, in which he explains the purpose of the series and states globally why these individuals were selected (“they produce a grand sweep of the creation of modern Canada, from our first steps as a democracy in 1848 to our questioning of modernity late in the twentieth century”).  It also mentions that a documentary is being filmed about each subject.

Perhaps the most compelling sentence in the intro is: “each of these stories is a revelation of the tough choices unusual people must make to find their way.”  And that’s what got me to read thee books.

This volume was probably a bad place to start in the Extraordinary Canadians series if only because it appears that Coupland’s volume is markedly different from the others.  Coupland being Coupland, he has all manner of textual fun wit the book.  The other authors seem to write pretty straightforward books, but you know something is up right away when you open the book and the first six pages comprise a list of anagrams of “Marshall McLuhan.”

On to Marshall McLuhan.  The Medium is the Message.  That’s about all anyone who has heard of McLuhan knows about him (and that he has a hilarious cameo in Annie Hall).

When I was a freshman in college, I took a class in Communications which focused an awful lot on Marshall McLuhan.  I didn’t like the teacher very much, but the message stayed with me all these years.   And so even though I’m not a student of McLuhan or anything, I was happy to relearn what I should have known about the man and his ideas.

(more…)

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John Edgar Wideman–“Always Raining, Somewhere, Said Jim Johnson” (Harper’s, December 2010)

Posted in Books about writers, Harper's, Huh?, John Edgar Wideman, Portlandia, Short Films, Sleater-Kinney on January 31, 2011| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: PORTLANDIA: “Dream of the 90’s” (2011).

This is song that I think of as the theme song for the show Portlandia. (I’ve only seen the one episode so far so I don’t know if it is or not, but if it isn’t, it should be!).  This song is so indicative of the show that, if you like the video, you’ll likely enjoy the show too.  Portlandia is written by and stars Fred Armisen and Carrie Brownstein (of Sleater-Kinney).

Although this song is meant to be evocative of the 90s (the chorus is “The dream of the 90s is alive in Portland”), musically, it’s not a 90s-era song (despite the comment that flannel still looks good in Portland).  It is actually a keyboard-only song, kind of discoey (dare I say Pet Shop Boysish?).  It’s a simple musical motif, with a catchy chorus and spoken verse, but really you listen for the lyrics:

Remember the 90s when they encouraged you to be weird?

Portland is the city where young people go to retire.

It’s like Gore won, the Bush administration never happened….  Portland’s almost an alternative universe.

It’s all tongue-in-cheek (with a surprisingly catchy chorus).  But, oh to dream.  Sleep ’til eleven…

Watch the video here.

[READ: January 24, 2011] “Always Raining, Somewhere, Said Jim Johnson”

This second Harper’s story suffered from a similar problem as the previous one.  This story felt like several snippets that never tied together.  In any way.

We see a student at the Iowa writer’s program (this sent up red flags immediately for me–not a story about being in  writing program).  And we read a lengthy section about rain.  Except it’s not really about rain, it’s about a pub in Iowa City.  And the concreteness of it is very cool.  You can really see and smell the bar.   The bartender’s routine is so exact you can win bets on when he’ll finish.   He ensues that everything is tidy and that everyone gets the hell out.  Cool, I’m with you.

Then there’s more rain and the narrator and a guy named Rich crash at Rich’s place.  Rich’s wife, Liz is also there and we learn a word or three about her.  And then the narrator starts really checking out Liz, who is completely naked on the bed with Rich.  And there’s some interesting intense moments where he thinks he’s caught.

Then we jump to another bar scene and some pretty funny comparisons between Liz and Gayle Sayers.  These come from the titular Jim Johnson who is apparently dead by the above scene.  (You don’t have to know who Gayle Sayers is to get the joke, I don’t think.  But if you don’t know who he is, he was a football player).

(more…)

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Javier Marías–Voyage Along the Horizon (1972) [translated 2006]

Posted in Books about writers, Death, Javier Marias, KEXP 90.3 FM--Seattle, WA, Kristina Cordero, Los Campesinos!, McSweeney's, Meta, Short Books, Translation, Travel, Unreliable narrator, Violence on January 27, 2011| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: LOS CAMPESINOS! Live in studio at WEXP, July 31, 2008 (2008).

For this brief in studio performance Los Campesinos! play four songs from their debut album Hold on Now, Youngster.  The band sounds great in this setting.  I don’t have this album, so I don’t know if they deviate at all from the originals, but the live versions are tight and very effective.

The interviews are informative and rather gushing (I’ve never heard a DJ kiss the ass of a performer in such a nice way before…and the band seems really flattered by it…it’s all very sweet).  The DJ also has a funny conversation about their tendency to scream in their songs.  (It’s cathartic).

What I didn’t notice so much on Romance is Boring was how many different lead singers the band has.  With these four songs, there are enough lead vocalists to show a lot of diversity (and a lot of screaming, too–“don’t read Jane Eyre!”).  And, as one might expect if you know their later disc, the lyrics are smart, funny and wicked.

The difference between Romance and Hold On, seems to be that the band were much punkier on this early disc, and that all comes out in these live tracks.  And the songs are all short: 3 minutes and under.  They really pack a lot in here.

[READ: January 13, 2011] Voyage Along the Horizon

Most of Javier Marías’ books are translated and released through New Directions. But for reasons I’m unclear about, this book, Marías’ 2nd novel, was published by Believer Books (an imprint of McSweeney’s).   I haven’t read any of Marías’ other novels, so I have no idea if this is similar to any of the others (there’s a Q&A at the back of the book which suggests that this is typical of his earlier novels), but it absolutely makes me want to read more by him.

What I loved about this story first off was the sense of distance we received from the main story itself.  (Marías is Spanish, but this is a technique employed by Roberto Bolaño (Chilean) extensively…. Obviously, others do this as well).

The set up of the story is this:  1) An unnamed narrator has a party at his house.  At this party, two individuals, Miss Bunnage and Mr Branshaw (or is it Bragshawe?–he never learns) discuss author Victor Arledge.  Miss Bunnage is a scholar of Arledge and Mr Branshaw has in his house an unpublished novel that investigates the disappearance of Arledge and why he stopped writing.  And so, Branshaw invites Bunnage and the narrator to his house the next day to have the novel (called Voyage Along the Horizon) read to them.

2) So, the next morning, the two go to Branshaw’s house where he does not let them see the book, preferring rather to read the novel aloud (which gives us essentially 3 levels of remove from the action of the story).  That’s a long way to go before you even get to the meat of the book. (more…)

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Roberto Bolaño–The Return (1997/2001) [translated 2010]

Posted in All Songs Considered, bolanobolano.com, Books about writers, Chris Andrews, Culture Shock, Death, Drinking, Dungen, Fears, Funny (ha ha), Funny (strange), My Bloody Valentine, Neurotics, Poets, Pornography, Pregnancy, Prison, Prostitution, Roberto Bolaño, Sex, Short Story, Tame Impala, The Beatles, The Who, Translation, Unreliable narrator, Violence, War on January 16, 2011| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: TAME IMPALA-“Lucidity” (2010).

I heard this song on the NPR’s 5 Artists You Should Have Known in 2010.  The album, Innerspace, is only available in Australia (imported on Amazon for big bucks) but I guess that’s why people download music.

This song is really cool. It feels very My Bloody Valentine to me.  However, inevitable comparisons to The Beatles abound, but that’s mostly in the vocals (which is kind of funny since they are Australian).  But it’s really a very sixties British vocal sound–not unlike early Who).

The big difference comes in the music which is psychedelic and wild in ways that The Beatles never quite managed.  There are great big washes of noise, and the sound quality sounds retro, even though it obviously isn’t.  Comparisons to the great Swedish band Dungen are not misplaced either.

I’ve listened to a few more tracks by them on YouTube, and I think this album could easily be one of the best of 2010 if only more people could hear it!

[READ: January 3, 2010] The Return

With the completion of this collection of short stories, I have now caught up with all of the published works of Roberto Bolaño (in English of course).  [The next book, Between Parentheses, a collection of nonfiction, is slated for June].

So The Return contains the 13 short stories that were not published in Last Evenings on Earth.  That collection inexplicably took shorts stories from his two Spanish collections Llamadas telefónicas (1997) and Putas asesinas (2001) and combined them into one collection in English.  It wasn’t quite as evident in Last Evenings, but it seems more obvious here that the stories in Putas asesinas are grouped together for a stylistic reason.  So, to have them split up is a bit of a bummer.  And yet, having them all translated is really the important thing.  And, again, Chris Andrews does an amazing job in the translation

This collection of stories was very strong.  I had read a few pieces in Harper’s and the New Yorker, but the majority were new to me.  Bolaño is an excellent short story writer.  Even if his stories don’t go anywhere (like his novels that never quite reach their destination), it’s his writing that is compelling and absorbing.

This collection also had some different subject matter for Bolaño (it wasn’t all poets on searches). (more…)

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Roberto Bolaño–Amulet (1999) [translated 2006]

Posted in Adrian Belew, bolanobolano.com, Books about writers, Caifanes, Chris Andrews, History, Natasha Wimmer, Roberto Bolaño, Short Books, Supernatural, Translation, Universities, Unreliable narrator, Violence on January 2, 2011| 1 Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: CAIFANES-El Silencio (1992).

Caifanes was another of the Rock en Español bands that I bought back in the 1990s.  I bought two of their records, El Silencio and El Nervio del Volcan.  In retrospect I’m not sure why I bought two from Caifanes and only one from Tijuana No! as I find Tijuana No! to be much more satisfying overall.  But El Silencio is a fun album as well.

As with a lot the rock en Español bands, the album starts with a really heavy track.  “Metamorfeame” is a raging, screaming punk blast.  But it’s followed by a Latin-infused mellow second song “Nubes” with a great weird guitar solo.  “Piedra” rocks, and Saul Hernández’ voice soars over the heavy bass work (he was meant for stadium rock).  It also ends with a little mariachi music as a coda.

“Nos Vamos Juntos” showcases some more great guitar work and “No Dejes Que…” practically sounds like the Alarm or some other stadium rock band.  “El Comunicador” is an interesting understated minor key song with interesting production.

The production is by Adrian Belew and you can tell as it seems very much like what I know of Adrian Belew: gleaming and bright and well polished.  And, like Belew himself, the album jumps from style to style.  Depending on your tastes, this is either great or tiring (and sometime both).

Wikipedia tells me that this album is considered one of the most influential albums from the most influential band to come out of Central Mexico.  Well how about that.

[READ: December 16, 2010] Amulet

This book is an extended version of an episode in The Savage Detectives.  InDetectives, Auxilio Lacouture has a ten-page story in which she was hiding out in the bathroom of UNAM (Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México) in 1968 during the military takeover (in real life, this is known as the Tlatelolco Masscare).  She hid in the bathroom for thirteen days, reading and writing poetry (Auxilio is the mother of Mexican poetry).

The episode in Detectives was  pretty exciting recollection.  She was in the bathroom when the soldiers broke in.  She could see the tanks outside and she could hear the gunshot.  So she hid with her feet in the air while the soldiers searched the premises.  She promised herself she would not to make a sound until she was discovered. So she read poetry and wrote poetry on the only paper available. (more…)

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Roberto Bolaño–The Insufferable Gaucho (2003) [translated 2010]

Posted in Aterciopelados, bolanobolano.com, Books about writers, Chris Andrews, Death, Essays, Foreign Books, Funny (strange), Harper's, History, New Yorker, No Doubt, Roberto Bolaño, Sex, The Dead Milkmen on December 28, 2010| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: ATERCIOPELADOS-El Dorado (1995).

One of the other Rock en Español bands I bought in the 90s was Aterciopelados (the hardest to pronounce).  Aterciopelados come from Colombia and they play a variety of styles of music.  They also feature a female vocalist (Andrea Echeverri) who has a great voice in a variety of styles.

The opening song “Florecita Rockera” is a heavy blast of punk.  “Suenos del 95” is a kind of a lite pop song.  “Candela” is a latin-infused song that sounds not unlike a more psychedelic Santana track.  And “Bolero Falaz” is a winning acoustic ballad.  Meanwhile “Las Estaca” is a sort of county/cowboy song that breaks into a fun rocking chorus.

“No Futuro” starts as a slow balald and builds and builds to a heavy rocker.  I would have liked this song to go a bout a minute longer to get really crazy.  The rest of the disc works within this broad framework: ballads that turn into heavy rockers (“De Tripas Corazón”), hints of punk and latin accents.  And then there’s a song like “Colombia Conexión” which reminds me a bit of The Dead Milkmen: simple sparse verses with heavy punk choruses.  Meanwhile “Pilas!” is straight ahead punk.  The final song “Mujer Gala” has some ska-lite aspects as well (and I have to say that it seems like No Doubt may have been inspired by them).

Although for all of the different styles of music, the disc is really a venue for Echeverri’s voice.  She’s not a rocker or a screamer and she could easily sing pop ballads, but because she chooses to sing over so many styles, she really showcases the multifacted nature of her voice.  She can hold a note for quite a while and although she never really shows off, it’s clear that she’s got a powerful voice.  She even sings beautifully over the punkier tracks, never devolving into a scream, but never losing her edge either.

Aterciopelados is a hard band to pin down (especially with this one disc).  Of the rock en Español bands, Aterciopelados had one of the longer lifespans.  They released several albums with very different styles.

El Dorado suffers from weak production, some more highs and lows would really makes the listening experience better, but it’s a solid disc overall.

[READ: December 10, 2010] The Insufferable Gaucho

This is a collection of five short stories and two essays.  Two of the short stories appeared elsewhere (which I read previously).  This is the first time I’ve seen the essays translated into English.  The fabulous translation is once again by Chris Andrews, who really brings Bolaño’s shorter books to life.  They are vibrant and (in light of The Savage Detectives, this is funny) visceral.

“Jim” is a four page story which focuses very specifically on a man named Jim.  As the story ends, we see Jim locked in an existential struggle.  For such a short work, it’s very powerful.

“The Insufferable Gaucho” (which I had read in The New Yorker) was even better after a second read.  I find this to be true for much of Bolaño’s work.  He tends to write in a nontraditional, nonlinear fashion so you can’t always anticipate what is going to happen (quite often, nothing happens).  In this story, a man in Buenos Aires, feeling that the city is sinking, heads out to his long neglected ranch in the country.  He spends several years there, slowly morphing from a cosmopolitan man to a weather-beaten gaucho who doesn’t shave and carries a knife.  But there is much more to the story.  The countryside is virtually dead: barren, wasted and overrun by feral rabbits.  The rabbits offer an interesting metaphor for the wilderness as well.  His interactions with the few other people he encounters are wonderfully weird, and the ending is thought-provoking.  It’s a wonderfully realized world he has created.

“Police Rat,” is that strangest of Bolaño stories: a straight ahead narrative that works like a police procedural.  I assumed from the title that it would be something about a metaphorical rat in the police force.  Rather, this is a story about an actual rat who works on the rat police force.  Bolaño spends a lot of time setting up the story (details are abundant) making it seem like perhaps there would be no plot.  But soon enough, a plot unfurls itself.  And although the story is basically a police story, the underlying reality behind it is fantastic and quite profound.  The story is beyond metaphor.

“Álvaro Rousselot’s Journey” was published in The New Yorker.  This story was also better on a second reading.  In many ways this story is a microcosm of Bolaño’s stories: a man goes on a quest for an elusive man.  Unlike the other stories, he actually catches up to the elusive guy.  But, as if Bolaño were commenting on his other stories, actually catching the guy doesn’t really solve the crisis.

This basic premise is that a writer believes that a filmmaker is stealing his ideas for his films (even though he is from a different country).  But more than just the simple plot, when Álvaro Rousselot leaves the comfort of his homeland things change fundamentally within him.

“Two Catholic Tales” is, indeed, two tales.  I had to read this piece twice before I really “got” the whole thing.  There are two separate stories (each story is a solid block of text but there are 30 numbered sections (which don’t seem to correspond to anything so I’m not sure why they are there).  The first tale is of a young boy who desires to be like St. Vincent, with designs for the priesthood.  As the story ends, he is inspired by a monk who he sees walking barefoot in the snow.  The second tale (we don’t realize until later) is about the monk himself.  It rather undermines the piousness that the boy sees.  On the second reading I realized just how dark of a tale this turned out to be.  It’s very good.

“Literature + Illness = Illness”
This is the first non-fiction by Bolaño that I have read.  It is a meditation about his terminal illness.  The essay is broken down into 12 sections about Illness. They range in attitude from the realization that when you are gravely ill you simply want to fuck everything to the fear that grips you when you finally accept your illness.  Despite the concreteness of the subject, the essay retains Bolaño’s metaphorical style.  Each subdivision is “about” an aspect of illness.  “Illness and Freedom,” “Illness and Height,” “Illness and Apollo,” “Illness and French Poetry.”  But it’s when he nears the end and he’s in a tiny elevator with a tiny Japanese doctor (who he wants to fuck right there on the gurney but can’t bring himself to say anything), and she runs him through his tests showing how far advanced his liver failure is, that the reality of his illness really sinks in.

“The Myths of Cthulhu” is the other essay in the book and I have to say it’s the only thing in the book that I’m a little frustrated by.  About midway through, he reveals that this is a speech and I wish that an introductory note would have given context for this speech, or indeed, indicated whether it was really a speech or not.

One of things that struck me about it (and also about “Literature +Illness=Illness” is how frequently he is unspecific about his research (and just never bothered to go back and fix it).  For instance:

For books about theology, there’s no one to match Sánchez Dragó.  For books about popular science, there’s no one to match some guy whose name escapes me for the moment, a specialist in UFOs.

Because I don’t know his non-fiction and I don’t have context (and I’ve no idea who Sánchez Dragó is) I don’t know what to make of that unspecific recommendation.  As for Sánchez Dragó, in the speech he’s noted as a TV presenter (Wikipedia confirms this).  But why the uncertainty in a written piece?  Laziness or deliberate commentary?

This essay has many elements of local information that are completely lost on me.  However, by the end, he brings it back to folklore and literature.  He also makes some biting criticisms of George Bush, Fidel Castro, Penelope Cruz (!) and Mother Teresa. Actually, I’m not sure if he’s mocking Penelope Cruz, although he is definitely mocking Mother Teresa.

The ending is general moaning about the state of Latin American fiction.  Even though I didn’t follow all of what he was talking about, there’s something about his delivery which is so different from his fiction. It’s honest and fast and kind of funny and enjoyable to read.

——

This may be something of a minor work, and yet the stories are really wonderful and are certainly a treat to read.  The essays definitely need more context, but it is interesting to finally have a chance to read the “real” Bolaño.

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