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Archive for the ‘Books about writers’ Category

Ben Schott–Schott’s Miscellany 2009: An Almanac (2008)

Posted in Aesop Rock, Airlines, Art, Authors, Barack Obama, Ben Schott, Bible, Bill Fox, Bob Dylan, Books about music, Books about writers, Canadian Content, Collecting, Comedians, Consumerism, Contests, Death, Dip-in Books, Drinking, Drugs, Explosions in the Sky, Film & TV, Food, Foreign Books, Games (Non Video), Grizzly Bear, History, Holidays, I'm from Barcelona, Language, LGBTQ, Lightning Bolt, Magik Markers, Military, Morality, Nature, Nico, Of Montreal, Oxford Collapse, Poetry, Prison, Racism, Religion, Reykjavik!, Roger Federer, Sex, Smarty Pants, Sports, Sufjan Stevens, Technology, The Future, Travel, TSA, Violence, War, Word usage on December 15, 2009| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: The Believer June/July 2007 Music Issue Compilation CD: Cue the Bugle Turbulent (2007).

The 2007 Believer disc smashes the mold of folkie songs that they have established with the previous discs in the series.  The theme for this disc is that there’s no theme, although the liner notes give this amusing story:

one decaffeinated copy editor (“the new guy”) made a suggestion: “The Believer CD should be composed of eight a.m. music/breakfast-substitute jams, like that commercial from a while back with the guy who gets out of bed over and over again while ELO plays over his morning routine. You should tell all of the bands to write/contribute songs worth listening to within three minutes of waking up.”

So, without a theme, they just asked artists for some great songs.  There’s one or two tracks written especially for the disc (Sufjan Stevens, Lightning Bolt).  There’s a couple B-sides.  There are some wildly noisy raucous songs: and three of them come from duos!  No Age offers a very noisy blast of feedback.  Magik Markers play a super-fast distortion-fueled rocker, and Lightning Bolt play 5 minutes of noise noise noise.  Oh, and there’s even a rap (Aesop Rock)!

Tracks 3-7 are just about the 5 best songs in a row on any compilation.  Oxford Collapse plays a catchy and wonderfully angular song with “Please Visit Your National Parks.”  It’s followed by a song from Sufjan Stevens that sounds NOTHING like Sufjan Stevens, it’s a noisy distorted guitar blast of indie punk.  I’m from Barcelona follows with a supremely catchy horn driven song that would be huge on any college campus.  Aesop Rock comes next with a fantastic song.  I’d heard a lot about Aesop Rock but had never heard him before, and he raps the kind of rap that I like: cerebral and bouncy.  This is followed by Reykjavik! with a crazy, noisy surf-guitar type of song.  It reminds me of some great college rock from the early 90s.

Of Montreal, a band I’ve been hearing about a lot but who I’ve never heard (and didn’t think sounded like this) plays a wonderfully catchy two minute love song that sounds ironic, but which likely isn’t.  The melody is straight out of the Moody Blues’ “Wildest Dreams,” and yet it is still fun and quirky.

There’s a couple instrumentals as well: The Clogs do a cool, mellow instrumental and Explosions in the Sky do one of their typically fantastic emotional tracks.  Also on the disc, The Blow contribute a delightfully witty song and Bill Fox, a singer I’d never heard of (but who has a great article about him in the magazine), really impressed me with his Bob Dylan meets Nico delivery.  The disc ends with an alternate version of a song by Grizzly Bear.

This is definitely my favorite Believer disc thus far.  See the full track listing here.

[READ: Throughout 2009] Schott’s Miscellany 2008

This year’s edition of Schott’s Miscellany is very much like last year’s edition (see that review here).  I mean, it is an almanac after all.  However, it is a wondrous testament to Schott that even though I read every word of the 2008 edition, I was able to read every word of the 2009 edition and not feel like I was duplicating myself very much.

Obviously the news, facts and events of 2008-09 are different from last year.  And since Schott’s writing style is breezy and fun with a hint of sarcasm and amusement thrown in, you don’t get just a list of facts, you get sentences with subtle commentary on the facts.  And it’s a fun way to re-live the past year.  Plus, the Sci, Tech, Net section discusses science stories that sounded really impressive and important which I can’t believe I didn’t hear about at the time. (more…)

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Donald Barthelme–Unspeakable Practices, Unnatural Acts (1968)

Posted in Books about writers, Boredom, Demons, Donald Barthelme, Funny (strange), Harper's, History, Kate Bush, Language, Marriage Trouble, Military, Neurotics, Political Humor, Short Story, Smarty Pants, War on December 1, 2009| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: KATE BUSH-Aerial (2005).

This was Kate’s first release in 12 years!  There’s a part of me that would expect unparalleled genius to emerge from a 12 year hiatus, but realistically, what we get is a more mature and confident singer, and songs that sound very much like Kate Bush songs. There’s not a lot of experimentation, although there is a song cycle (two in fact) to hold the disc together.

The first disc (for there are two, totaling about 80 minutes) is listed as “A Sea of Honey”

It opens with “King of the Mountain” a great upbeat single.  Next is “Pi” a fascinating song in which Kate sings out the decimal places of Pi (3.14…).  It’s airy and ethereal, and pretty neat.  “Bertie” is an adorable ode to what I assume is her son. It’s a very sweet love song to a child.

“Mrs Bartolozzi” opens with a piano sequence that sounds very uncomfortably close to a Phil Collins.  And, later in the sings she sings a “sloshy sloshy” part which is pretty odd.  But despite all of this, the song is closest to the Kate of old.

“How to be Invisible” has some really cool choral effects (and is a very neat concept lyrically).  It also features a very nice guitar line that sneaks out of the musical tapestry from time to time.  “Joanni” rocks in Kate’s inimitable way (and it’s about Joan of Arc).  It has also got some fun and funny parts the reflect the Kate of old (screaming vocals way down in the mix and “Mmm Hmms” that are kind of silly).  The disc ends with the gorgeous ballad “A Coral Room.”

The second disc “A Sky of Honey” is more of a complete song cycle (It starts with a Prelude AND a Prologue).  There’s a couple of short songs (90 seconds each) thrown in the middle.  My favorite is the final track, “Aerial” which has a cool dance rhythm (that seems so unlike Kate) which propels the song almost magically.

Overall, this disc doesn’t overwhelm me as much as say Hounds of Love, but it’s a really solid disc and I’ve found myself listening to and enjoying it a lot over the last few weeks.  It’s nice to have Kate back.  I wonder how long it will be for her next disc.

[READ: November 27, 2009] Unspeakable Practices Unnatural Acts

After reading (the incomplete) “The Balloon” (see the post), I decided to give the entire collection a spin.  I didn’t really enjoy the short stories I had read in Harper’s, but I did enjoy “The Balloon,” so I thought it would be worth investigating Barthleme (a little) further.

This collection is a mix of utterly absurdist stories (many of which seem to have multiple vantage points that I found rather difficult to keep track of ).  One of the most noteworthy things about the collection is that it seems to me to be very topical circa 1968.  And I think I’m missing a lot of what is happening in the stories.   I’ll cite examples below, but oftentimes I assume that I’m just not getting something that I should be getting (more…)

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Periodical: Prospect (update)

Posted in Art, Books about music, Books about writers, Brian Wilson, Essays, History, Political Humor, Prospect, Racism, Research, Violence, War on November 29, 2009| Leave a Comment »

I received my second issue of Prospect magazine just in time for the Thanksgiving holiday.  I’m pleased to say that this issue not only confirmed my suspicions of the magazine, it actually impressed me a little bit more.  And it sort of made me wish I had done something similar with all the magazines:  do a write up and then see how the latest issue compares (but I won’t).

I’m not going to go into extravagant detail with this issue, since I just wrote about the previous issue, but I wanted to mention the article that I was not only fascinated by, but that made me wonder why I had to cross the Atlantic to read about them. (more…)

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Periodical: McSweeney’s

Posted in A.M. Homes, Art, Books about music, Books about writers, BritLit, Consumerism, Contests, Corporate skewering, David Foster Wallace, Death, Essays, Fables, Fantasy, Flash Fiction, Funky Web Sites, Funny (ha ha), Funny (strange), George Saunders, Graustarkian Romance, Hollow Earth, Irish Writer, Joyce Carol Oates, Language, Legendary Saga, McSweeney's, Meta, Michael Chabon, Music, Postmoderism, Roddy Doyle, Short Story, Smarty Pants, Socratic Dialogue, Stephen King, Suicide, The Believer, The Collins Library, They Might Be Giants, Wholphin, Whore Dialogue, Word usage on November 25, 2009| Leave a Comment »

17Many many years ago, I discovered Might magazine.  It was a funny, silly magazine that spoofed everything (but had a serious backbone, too).  (You can order back issues here).  And so, I subscribed around issue 13.  When the magazine folded (with issue 16–and you can read a little bit about that in the intro to Shiny Adidas Track Suits) it somehow morphed into McSweeney‘s, and much of the creative team behind Might went with them.

The early volumes (1-5 are reviewed in these pages, and the rest will come one of these days) are a more literary enterprise than Might was.  There’s still a lot of the same humor (and a lot of silliness), but there are also lengthy non-fiction pieces.  The big difference is that McSweeney’s was bound as a softcover book rather than as a magazine. And, I guess technically it is called Timothy McSweeney’s Quarterly Concern as opposed to Timothy McSweeney’s Internet Tendency. (more…)

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Douglas Coupland–Souvenir of Canada (2002), Souvenir of Canada 2 (2004) & Souvenir of Canada [the movie] (2006)

Posted in Books about music, Books about writers, Boredom, Canadian Content, Canadian Music, Collecting, Constellation Records, Consumerism, Corporate skewering, Douglas Coupland, Drinking, Drugs, Essays, Fishing, Foreign Books, Funny (ha ha), Funny (strange), History, Hockey, Hockey Night in Canada, Memoirs, Nanaimo Bar, Nature, Nostalgia, Oddities, Photo Essays, Poutine, Rush, Souvenir of Canada, The New Pornographers, Tindersticks, War on November 20, 2009| Leave a Comment »

socSOUNDTRACK: TINDERSTICKS-The Hungry Saw [CST055] (2008).

hungryIt was the releases of this Tindersticks disc (their first in 5 years) on the venerable Constellation Records (in North America) that inspired my trip through their back catalog. I was completely surprised to see them released on Constellation, as the band doesn’t exactly fit with the label’s stereotypical style (although, realistically with the last dozen or so releases, Constellation has really expanded the kind of music they release).

And this is a fantastic Tindersticks release!  There’s not a bad song on the disc. And, even though nothing is as immediately gripping as say “Can We Start Again,” the disc contains some of the band’s strongest songs.  “The Hungry Saw” is simply amazing, both lyrically and in its catchy (yet creepy) chorus.  But the highlight is probably “Boobar, Come Back to Me,” a song that begins slowly and builds gloriously, including a call and response segment that makes this song really swagger.

“Mother Dear” features a strangely comical musical episode.  In an otherwise very mellow piano based track, right in the middle of the song, come slashing, somewhat atonal guitar chords.  It’s as if a more rocking song is trying to overtake the mellow track.  (The coup is rebuffed, though).

The biggest thing to note about the disc is that longtime co-songwriter Dickon has left the band.  And so, some of the co-writing duties have been taken up by David Boulter.  While it is obviously sad that Dickon has left, Staples seems revitalized on this disc, and Boulter’s additions (especially his quirky instrumentals) bring a new point of view to the proceedings.  Also of note is something of a return to the orchestral style (albeit a much more understated version).  However, different songs emphasize different aspects: horns on one, strings on another, but always underscored by the ubiquitous Hammond organ.

It’s not a radical departure or anything like that.  It’s more of a continuation after a well earned vacation.  And it’s certainly their strongest release since their first four.

[READ & WATCHED: October 2009] Souvenir of Canada, Souvenir of Canada 2 & Souvenir of Canada (the movie)

I got the first Souvenir of Canada when it came out.  (I was on a big Coupland kick and may have even bought it in Montreal).  I didn’t get #2 when it came out, probably because I didn’t really invest a lot of effort into the first one.  But after recently reading City of Glass, I wanted to get a little more involved in Coupland’s visual art.  So, I picked up #2 and, while investigating this second book, I discovered that he had made a film of the books, too.

Coupland explains in the introduction that this book is his personal vision of what Canada is like. It is designed for Canadians as something of a nostalgia trip, but it is also something of an introduction to unseen Canada for non-Canadians.  And so, what you don’t get is pictures of mounties and Tim Hortons and other things that fit the stereotypical Canadian bill. Rather, you get things that are significant to Coupland (and maybe the average Canadian born on the West Coast in the 60s). (more…)

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Alice Munro–“Too Much Happiness” (Harper’s, August 2009) & Charles Foran “Alice in Borderland” (The Walrus, September 2009)

Posted in 19th Century, Alice Munro, Books about writers, Canadian Content, Charles Foran, Don H. Kennedy, Dreams, Essays, Harper's, History, Marriage Trouble, The Walrus, Tindersticks on November 12, 2009| Leave a Comment »

harpersaugSOUNDTRACK: TINDERSTICKS-Donkeys 92-97 (1998).

donkeysDonkeys is a collection of singles, rarities and unreleased recordings.  It came out just before Simple Pleasure, and has tracks from the era of the first four discs.

With the reissue of those first four discs (and all the bonus tracks therein) and the Greatest Hits collection, it’s not really necessary to get this for these rare tracks.  (I admit that I haven’t actually checked to see if all of the tracks here are now available elsewhere…there seems to be a number of different mixes and versions of songs, so I’ll let someone else do the legwork).

However, if you’re disinclined to get the reissued discs for whatever reason, this is a great collection of songs that are worth having for any Tindersticks fan.  And, interestingly, it works quite well as an introduction for the newbie: it features several of the most accessible songs from the first few discs.  But, for fans, the highlights include their great cover of “I’ve Been Loving You Too Long.”  Also “Plus de Liaisons” a French version of  “No More Affairs.”  It also has the fabulous duet with Isabella Rossilini (“A Marriage Made in Heaven”) and another version of “For Those”  (I’m not entirely sure how many versions of that song exist, but there’s got to be about 3 or 4.

This disc is probably easy to track down cheaply since all the tracks are available elsewhere now (although my copy came from my friend Lar and has the Euro symbol on the Used sticker to prove it). Or, maybe it’s now totally rare and out of print and is hugely expensive.  Either way, it’s still a great collection of tracks.

[READ: November 5, 2009] “Too Much Happiness”

It’s a little lame to lump these two pieces together, but the Charles Foran article isn’t something I would review on its own.  Nevertheless, it is a very interesting look at Alice Munro’s hometown, and the Self-Guided Tour of Points of Interest in the Town of Wingham Relating to Alice Munro sounds like a fun thing to do if you’re in Ontario.  (Even if Munro herself is never actually there).

But onto Munro’s story.

I’ve only read a few stories by Alice Munro (they’ve all been reviewed here).  And yet, I’ve come to think of her as writing a certain type of story.  And this one does not conform to any of my notions of a Munro story.

First, it’s rather long. Second, it’s not set in Canada.  And third, it’s a historical piece about a real person.  There’s an author’s note at the end of the story which informs us that she learned about Sophia Kovalesky when she was looking up something else in the Encyclopedia Britannica (which I find charming in and of itself).  So, all of this seems to be something of a departure for her (at least from what I’ve read). (more…)

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Periodical: Prospect

Posted in Airlines, An Education, Art, Book Reviews, Books about music, Books about writers, Brian Eno, David Hockney, Essays, Frank Auerbach, History, Lucas Cranach the Elder, Martha Wainwright, Monty Python's Flying Circus, Nature, NPR/PRI/PBS, Political Humor, Prison, Prospect, Technology, The Daily Show, The Wire, War, Warehouse 13, Word usage on November 9, 2009| Leave a Comment »

propsectI recently received an e-mail from a nice person at Prospect (a British magazine).  The email asked if I’d like to review their magazine.  After being completely flattered, I said, “Of course!”  And then I waited nervously hoping that the magazine was good and that I wouldn’t have to say anything mean about it, because I would.  Oh yes, I would.

ctBut I don’t have to. They grabbed me right off the bat because the c & the t in the title are connected by a little filigree doodad.   I love typography, so that little flourish was a selling point (okay a superficial one, but I liked it immediately).

The “subtitle” of the magazine is “Good Writing About Things That Matter” and it is a totally apt description.  Prospect is a monthly magazine that covers all aspects of society: British, European, American and the world.  And, indeed, the writing is quite good.

In many ways it reminded me of The Walrus, a favorite magazine of mine.  (It’s a weird comparison since The Walrus has only been around for a few years, while Prospect has been around for about 13 (the November issue is number 164, so I’m guessing here), but it’s an apt comparison for its coverage: politics, culture, arts and more.

Because this was a new (to me)  magazine (and because I knew I’d be reviewing it), I decided to read every article.  There were a few that I thought I wouldn’t care much about.  But the writing totally grabbed me.  For instance, the article about Princess Diana (about whom I am indifferent) was fantastic.  It was cynical and funny and totally engaging.  And the same was true for just about every article in the magazine.

Normally I like to have at least two issues to refer to when reviewing.  So there may very well be things about this issue that are different from the others.  So, forgive, please, if I generalize incorrectly. (more…)

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David Foster Wallace–comments in The Oxford American Writer’s Thesaurus (2004)

Posted in Books about writers, David Foster Wallace, Essays, Funny (ha ha), Infinite Summer, Language, Smarty Pants, Tindersticks, Word usage on November 4, 2009| 3 Comments »

oatSOUNDTRACK: TINDERSTICKS-Trouble Every Day [soundtrack] (2001).

troublThis is the second soundtrack that Tindersticks made for director Clair Denis.  This disc is rather unlike Nenette Et Boni, in that this soundtrack is much more stark.  There are several moments on the disc where there is nothing but silence for several seconds.   “Core on Stairs” features a bass note or two and then even more silence, then one more note and more silence.  On “Room 231,” there are times when the only sound is a gently shaken maraca.  It’s rather eerie (and I’d like to believe it suits the film well).  But predominantly this is a string laden affair, highlighting the sadness of the movie.

The title track, however, contains the full band, including Stuart Staples’ singing.  And it’s a moody, evocative song.  Strings are plucked as Staples croons about trouble.  Actually the title song is broken up into the Opening and Closing Credits.  But they rather thoughtfully include the whole song at the end of the disc as well.

This is not an essential Tindersticks disc (you can get the title song elsewhere).  But if you like your music moody, this is a good one.  It may be a bit too sparse for casual listening, but it certain conjures up some interesting ideas.

[READ: October 27, 2009 ] DFW’s comments in The Oxford American Writer’s Thesaurus

According to the Howling Fantods I have read all of the uncollected DFW pieces (except for the ones from the Pale King), and so this is my final piece (hooray!). It’s not really anything major.  As you can read from the Fantods’ summary below, this excerpt contains DFW’s comments inside this 1100 page Thesaurus.  Several authors contributed comments to the Thesaurus and all of their comments appear after the entry for the word.  They rest in boxes and are capped off by their initials.  The PDF that you can click on below is 85 pages long.  But if you search for DFW there are only 24 entries.  I copied and pasted them into a Word document that came out to 8 pages long.  So, it’s not unmanageable to read just DFW’s entries.

I’m not sure that this is the entirely of his contribution to the book.  (I assume it is, as I wouldn’t imagine The Fantods would skimp on us, but I’m also not going to find the book to confirm either.

“The Oxford American Writer’s Thesaurus”. Compiled by Christine A. Lindberg. Oxford University Press; October, 2004. [NOTES: This is an actual (1100-page plus) thesaurus for writers. Scattered throughout are ‘Word Notes’ wherein various authors, DFW among them, discuss usage and that forever quest for the perfect word. Read selections featuring DFW here.]

Basically what you get here is DFW’s knowledge about word usage.  Anyone who has read his work knows he’s practically memorized the OED.  And with his familial love of grammar, he is  stickler for using words correctly.  Which makes him kind of a prig, except that he’s not a prig; he’s very funny.  And the examples he cites are great! (more…)

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Created in Darkness by Troubled Americans: The Best of McSweeney’s Humor Category (2004)

Posted in A.M. Homes, Aaron Naparstek, Amy Fusselman, Ben Greenman, Books about writers, Chris Bachelder, Christopher Monks, Clay McLeod Chapman, Corporate skewering, Daniel Handler, Darin Strauss, Dave Eggers, Demons, Denis Johnson, Digression, Dip-in Books, Dreams, Ezra Pound, Funky Web Sites, Funny (ha ha), Humiliation, J.M. Tyree, Jake Swearingen, Jim Stallard, John Hodgman, John Moe, Jonathan Ames, Jonathan Lethem, Keith Pille, Kurt Luchs, Lawrence Krauser, Margaret Atwood, McSweeney's, Mike Bullard, Myla Goldberg, Neal Pollack, Negativland, Neil Gaiman, One Ring Zero, Paul Auster, Political Humor, Postmoderism, Rick Moody, Sci-fi, Sean Carman, Sex, Smarty Pants, Sports, Stephany Aulenback, Summer, Supernatural, Technology, They Might Be Giants, Tim Carvell, Todd Pruzan, Violence, Zev Borow on October 29, 2009| Leave a Comment »

createdSOUNDTRACK: ONE RING ZERO-As Smart as We Are (2004).

orzI had this CD sitting around my house for about 4 years.  I had received it as a promo disc from Soft Skull Press (along with several other books on CD) and I just never put it on.  Then one day I was going through all these promos to see if any were books I wanted to listen to.  It was then that I actually read the disc label and saw that it was a band with lyrics written by some of my favorite authors.

I liked the disc so much I wound up buying it because the packaging is truly cool.  It’s a little booklet and it features an interview with the band and some really cool insights into how the songs came about, how they got the writers to submit lyrics, and the cool fact that One Ring Zero became McSweeney’s house band, accompanying writers during their weekly readings.

One Ring Zero is comprised of two guys (and guests).  And for this disc they split the tracks in half and one of them wrote melodies for 8 songs and the other guy wrote melodies for the other 8.  I’m not sure that I could tell the song writers apart by their styles, though.

But sure, the lyrics are probably great, but what does the band sound like?  Well, in the introduction, they are described as specializing “in the sort of 19th century, gypsy-klezmer, circus-flea-cartoon music you mainly hear in your dreams.” And, yep, that is a good summary of things.  The band uses water pipes, claviola, slide whistle and a theremin (among other homemade instruments).

And so, as with other McSweeney’s things, I’m going to list all of the lyricists with their titles.  But lyrically it’s an interesting concoction.  The authors were asked to write lyrics, but not necessarily songs.  So some pieces don’t have choruses.  Some pieces are just silly, and some pieces work quite nicely.  But most of them are really poems (and I can’t really review poems).  They’re fun to read, and it is fun to see what these authors made of this assignment.

PAUL AUSTER-“Natty Man Blues”
A rollicking opening that lopes around with the nonsensical lyrics, “There ain’t no sin in Cincinnati.” This one feels like a twisted Western.

DANIEL HANDLER-“Radio”
A supremely catchy (and rather vulgar) song that gets stuck in my head for days.  “Fucking good, fucking good, fucking good…”

DARIN STRAUSS-“We Both Have a Feeling That You Still Want Me”
A Dark and somewhat disturbing song that is also quite fun.

RICK MOODY-“Kiss Me, You Brat”
A delicate twinkly piece sung byguest vocalist Allysa Lamb *the first female vocalist to appear) .  Once the chorus breaks in, it has an almost carnivalesque tone to it.  This is the only song whose lyrics were written after the music.

LAWRENCE KRAUSER-“Deposition Disposition”
A twisted song that works as a call and response with delightful theremin sounds.  It has a very noir feel.

CLAY McLEOD CHAPMAN-“Half and Half”
This is a sort of comic torchy ballad.  Lyrically, it’ a bout being a hermaphrodite (and it’s dirty too).  Vocals by Hanna Cheek.

DAVE EGGERS-“The Ghost of Rita Gonzalo”
This has a sort of Beach Boys-y folky sound (albeit totally underproduced).  But that theremin is certainly back.

MARGARET ATWOOD-“Frankenstein Monster Song”
This song begins simply with some keyboard notes but it breaks into a very creepy middle section.  It’s fun to think of Margaret Atwood working on this piece.

AARON NAPARSTEK-“Honku”
This song’s only about 20 seconds long.  It is one of a series of haikus about cars, hence honku.

DENIS JOHNSON-“Blessing”
The most folk-sounding of all the tracks (acoustic guitar & tambourine).  It reminds me of Negativland, somehow.  It is also either religious or blasphemous.  I can’t quite be sure which.

NEIL GAIMAN-“On the Wall”
A tender piano ballad.  The chorus gets more sinister, although it retains that simple ballad feel throughout.  It’s probably the least catchy of all the songs.  But lyrically it’s quite sharp.

AMY FUSSELMAN-“All About House Plants”
An absurdist accordion-driven march.  This is probably the most TMBG-like of the bunch (especially when the background vocals kick in).

MYLA GOLDBERG-“Golem”
This song opens (appropriately) with a very Jewish-sounding vibe (especially the clarinet).  But once that intro is over, the song turns into a sinister, spare piece.

A.M. HOMES-“Snow”
This song opens as a sort of indie guitar rock song.  It slowly builds, but just as it reached a full sound, it quickly ends.  The song’s lyrics totally about twenty words.

BEN GREENMAN-“Nothing Else is Happening”
This song has more of that sinister carnivalesque feel to it (especially when the spooky background vocals and the accordion kick in).  The epilogue of a sample from a carnival ride doesn’t hurt either.

JONATHAN AMES-“The Story of the Hairy Call”
This song has a great lo-fi guitar sound (accented with what sounds like who knows what: an electronic thumb piano?).  It rages with a crazily catchy chorus, especially given the raging absurdity of the lyrics.

JONATHAN LETHEM-“Water”
This track is especially interesting. The two writers each wrote melodies for these lyrics.  So, rather than picking one, they simply merged them. It sounds schizophrenic, but is really quite wonderful.  The two melodies sound nothing alike, yet the work together quite well.

[READ: Some time in 2004 & Summer 2009] Created in Darkness by Troubled Americans

This was the first collection of McSweeney’s humorous stories/pieces/lists whatever you call them.  Some of the pieces came from McSweeney’s issues, but most of them came from McSweeney’s Internet Tendency.

The humor spans a great deal of categories, there’s some literary, some absurd, some nonsensical and, most amusingly, lists.  The back of the book has an entire selection of lists, but there are also some scattered throughout the book as well (I don’t know what criteria was used to allow some lists to be in the “main” part).

As with the other McSweeney’s collections, I’m only writing a line or two about each piece.  For the lists, I’m including a representative sample (not necessarily the best one, though!)

Overall, I enjoyed the book quite a lot (which is why I re-read it this year).  There are puns, there are twisted takes on pop culture, there are literary amusements (Ezra Pound features prominently, which seems odd).  It spans the spectrum of humor.  You may not like every piece, but there’s bound to be many things that make you laugh. (more…)

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Comic Book Tattoo (2008)

Posted in Adventure, Books about music, Books about writers, Canadian Content, Demons, Fables, Fantasy, Funny (ha ha), Funny (strange), Gods, Graphic Novel, Hope Larson, LGBTQ, Magic, Marriage Trouble, Military, Nature, Neil Gaiman, Oddities, Religion, Romance, Sara Ryan, Sex, Short Story, Tori Amos, Wikipedia on October 28, 2009| Leave a Comment »

cbtSOUNDTRACK: TORI AMOS-Abnormally Attracted to Sin (2009).

aatsIt’s been almost a decade since I was blown away by a Tori Amos album.  I feel like she has really been so engaged in the concept of her albums, that she has lost track of the tunes.  And while I don’t hate anything she’s done in the last few years, I was seriously getting to the point where I wasn’t sure it was worth getting her new releases.

But I was pleasantly surprised with Abnormally Attracted to Sin.  The opening track “Give” reaches back to some of the cool trip-hop stuff from from the choirgirl hotel.  And, the wild guitar work is such a welcome change.  It’s followed by “Welcome to England” which has a cool bass line that also makes me think of choirgirl era Tori (I saw her about three or four times on that tour).  “Strong Black Vine” is middle eastern tinged,  with a cool percussion-filled bridge.  But my favorite part is the dirty-sounding “baby” that opens the chorus.  The chorus also calls back to Boys for Pele era stuff where she used multiple backing vocals (from herself) in the choruses.

“Flavor” brings in some mellowness (and sounds like she was recorded in outer space).  “Not Dying Today” is definitely a silly song (and the one that mentions Neil) but the weirdo bassline is so catchy I am totally hooked by it (I’m also not sure if it says something about me or her that I thought the line was “Neil is thrilled he can say he’s Canadian” (when in fact he’s thrilled that he can say he’s mammalian (I’m not sure which is weirder)).  This also leads to a weird little spoken bit.  The whole thing feels very 80s to me.  But in a good way.

“Maybe California” is one of her piano songs.  When listening to it by itself, it’s quite enjoyable.  But I think it kind of slows the album down after those openers.  Tori has a lot of gorgeous piano ballads (“Northern Lad” still blows me away), and this one is good but not great.  “Curtain Call” is kind of a dud, but it has a great chorus.  And that’s what a lot of the rest of the album feels like for me.  Each song has one part that really hooks me, but it’s usually not a whole song that keeps me.

“Fire to Your Plain” is another bit of a dud.  The little keyboard hits don’t do this song any favors.  “Police Me” has cool guitars and weird sound effects and could have been a choirgirl B-side.  (Although, again, there’s a part after the chorus which is very cool).  And then comes “That Guy.”  I want to like this song so much.  The lyrics are fun, the sound is very torchy and music hall, but I just find it to be ultimately as nondescript as the title.

The title track has a great weird sci-fi keyboard sound, with cool guitars.  But this is yet another example of “Why does she pronounce words like this now?”  If you listen to her earlier records, she had a full command of the English language.  So, why does this song start out with her saying “Impeccable Pec-a-dell-o” (when we all know it is pecadillo).  And what on earth happened to the words in the chorus?  This is the title song.  Why does it sound like she’s singing “I’m marmalade. I trah yak toosee.”  Sure, once I realized it was the title track I could figure it out, but Jesus, woman, what happened to you? (That aside, the song is pretty cool, especially the quiet but bitchin guitars in the way back).  “500 Miles” is a cute song. I sort of don’t like it but the chorus is so frikkin catchy that I can’t turn it off.

The end of the disc feels kind of tacked on to me.   “Mary Jane” is a weird one.  It sounds like an extended version of “Mr Zebra” from Pele, (which I loved, but it was only a minute long), with all kinds of weird lyrics getting tossed around.  It does seem odd to hear her singing about pot, but whatever.  “Starling” sounds great but just never really catches me.  And “Fast Horse” starts out so great: the riff is very cool, but I don’t care for the direction of the chorus. (And the Maserati bit more or less kills the song off).  “Ophelia” has awesome potential of being one of those affecting piano songs, but rather than pulling out all the stops with a kick ass chorus, it just sort of wanders around (I wonder if I’d change my mind about this song if it weren’t so close to the end).  And the disc ends with “Lady in Blue.”  This is definitely one of the weirdest songs she’s ever done.  And I sort of love it.  The sounds she’s twisting out of her organ are insane.  It sounds like her speakers are at the bottom of a pool.  And the chord choices are unexpected.  She really stretches this weird sound for all its worth (including the most egregious of her pronunciations problems: “What es layuft is right.”  Really, Tori, emphasis is one thing, but it’s not cool to make the words wrong).  But anyhow, this undersea adventure stretches out for over 4 minutes, and I’m just about to throw the disc against the wall because it seems like it will never end, and I’m in some kind of trippy suffocating nightmare (in which you kind of like what’s happening at first and then you realize that the pillowcase they put over your head is really a plastic bag) but then she kicks in a solid piano riff and the song absolutely rocks out for the next three minutes.  It’s confident and infectious and ends the disc on a fantastic note.  If that early section were about 2 minutes shorter this would be one of my favorite Tori songs ever.  But I keep reaching that take-the-disc-out! moment before the greatness kicks in.)

My biggest problem with the disc is that (as with past discs) at 75 minutes  it’s just too damned long.  Again, I can’t pick a least favorite song because they all have parts that I really like, I would just like to put the cool parts together and get rid of twenty minutes of the blahs.

The other problem is that I really don’t know what Tori is singing about half the time.  When I first got into her, I was drawn by her lyrics, which were weird but also evocative.  I didn’t really know what she was singing about exactly back then, but I had a pretty good idea.  However, lately it’s just all weird abstractions and general concepts.

I know that I fell for Tori back when she was writing emotionally naked songs.  She was sexually honest and was a breath of fresh air in 1992.  And, sure I wish she would make albums like she did back then, but I know artists need to grow and expand.  And it would be frankly creepy to hear 2009 Tori, wife and mother, singing about guys who can’t make her come.  Right?  I mean, I found her “MILF” line on a recent album to be rather disturbing.  And, I also don’t think I want to hear about the highs and lows of motherhood and parenthood.  So, personal stories are out, I guess.  Alas.  I just hope she can get a little back down to earth (and not necessarily need to be so “wicked” all the time).

The final gripe relates back to what I said in the beginning.  This disc is littered with pictures of Tori in various costumes, evidently acting out scenes from her songs.  The bonus DVD is full of videos for each song.  But each video is basically just her in some outfit and wig wandering around in various places.  It’s a strangely egomaniacal video collection even for a musician.  But so yes, she clearly enjoys this role playing exercise that she’s been on since Strange Little Girls, but it seems like so much extra time is being spent on these “personas.”  I don’t care which personality wrote the sing, I just want it to be good.   And I just miss the old Tori.

I also don’t like to criticize people physically, but I feel like she also looks less pretty than she used to.  After watching 70some minutes of those videos of pretty much just her, I felt like she was too harsh or angular or, dare I say it, old looking.  And I only mention it because she seems so focused on presenting these characters with wigs and make up and the whole shebang, but I think she doesn’t look nearly as pretty as she when she was just Tori, piano player.

But that’s no way to end a music review.  Abnormally Attracted to Sin is certainly her best disc in a decade.  It’s got some great songs and some great sections of songs.  With a judicious editor and someone who can keep her on track when her words start drifting away from what they should properly sound like, (maybe it’s time to look for a producer other than her husband?) Tori could be well on her way to making another totally stellar album.

[READ: October 2009]  Comic Book Tattoo

Sarah gave me this book for Christmas and I’ve been reading it on and off for about 10 months now.  I finally finished the first read through and decided to give it a second go before writing about it.  It took so long not because I didn’t like it but because it is a very awkward book.  It is HUGE.  It is the size of a vinyl LP, but is as thick as about 15 of them.  And it’s heavy!  I had to store it under the bed so I wouldn’t kill myself on it.

What I’m getting at is utter value for money ($30 retail).

But what is it?  Okay, so it is a collection of comics that are “inspired” by Tori Amos songs.  But let’s be clear, these are NOT IN ANY WAY illustrations of the songs.  The stories that are created here have virtually nothing to do with the lyrics, in most cases.  They seem to be inspired by the titles and maybe (sometimes) the mood of the songs themselves.  In many cases, it’s hard to even see what the stories have to do with her at all.  And, I have to say, it makes the whole collection that much stronger.  Even if I love most of the songs that they draw in here, I wouldn’t want to “see” Tori’s songs.  Rather, taking them as a jumping off point lets the authors and artists use what inspired them and ignore the rest. (more…)

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