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Archive for the ‘Drinking’ Category

J.D. Salinger–Three Early Stories (2014) [stories from 1940 & 1944]

Posted in Blondie, Bruce Springsteen, Cigarettes, Drinking, Example, Funny (ha ha), J.D. Salinger, Michael Nyman, Pet Shop Boys, Short Books, Short Story on October 22, 2014| Leave a Comment »

jdSOUNDTRACK: PET SHOP BOYS-Electric (2013).

psbAfter the sombre, more reflective Elysium, Pet Shop Boys came back with the far more upbeat and dancey Electric.  Right from the start, you know this is back to high energy fun (with of course sardonic lyrics). The opening track, “Axis,” is a major dance song with processed vocals and a great riff–I love how the song goes very electronic and artificial sounding around 4 minutes in.  “Bolshy” has a classic PSB sound–dancey keyboards and Neil Tennant’s ageless voice.  I don’t really quite know what the song is about but it is really fun to sing along to. It is followed by “Love is  Bourgeois Construct” (I sense a strangely political theme here–and I love that the follow-up line is “just like they said at University” ), I love the way the song gets really muddy while the synth line plays and that it emerges bigger and better than ever–the sound reminds me of the synth songs in A Clockwork Orange and the riff is on Michael Nyman’s “Chasing Sheep Is Best Left to Shepherds.” The way the music is so epic-sounding for such a simple idea of a song is great,

“Flourescent” is a darker song, with big synths and cowbells ringing in the song.  It’s got a steampunky wheeze as the drum beat and a echoey synth note which all coalesces before Tennant’s vocals which come in–two minutes into the song.  It’s a very moody piece and even at 6 minutes doesn’t feel overly long.

“Inside a Dream” is a dancey song with a fast melody.  “The Last to Die” is a Bruce Springsteen song from his album Magic (I had no idea) which they electrify and make synthy, but not dancey exactly.  They do a very good job of capturing the Springsteen vibe in their own way.  “Shouting in the Evening” is a very dancey song, one of may favorites on the record–I love the way Chris Lowe distorts his keyboards on this track.  “Thursday” has a great vocal line–“It’s Thursday night, let’s get it right.  I want to know you’re gonna stay for the weekend.”  It’s a catchy song with the repeats of the days: “Thursday Friday Saturday Sunday.”  I could do without the rap (by Example) which reminds me way too much of Blondie’s rap in Rapture–stiff and kind of forced.

The final song “Vocal” I find odd in the lyrics.  It’s about songs that he likes, which is fine, but the line, “every track has a vocal, and that make a change” is weird–do dance songs not have vocals anymore?  Well, how would I know, i don’t listen to a lot of dance music.  Anyhow, it’s super catchy and dancey.  I like the way it builds to the big chorus even if the song isn’t very complex.

While I enjoyed the introspective Elysium, it’s great to have a big loud Pet Shop Boys album as a return to form.

[READ: October 22, 2014] Three Early Stories

I found this book on the shelf at work.  I had no idea that a) Salinger had written so many stories that have yet to be collected (according to Wikipedia there are about a dozen) or that these three had been collected in this very strange edition.  The book collects three stories and includes illustrations by Anna Rose Yoken.  The illustrations are fine, but not worth getting the book for (and feel a bit more like a children’s book illustration than a Salinger story).  The other strange thing is that the text is only on the right side pages, so although the book is 69 pages, there’s really only about 35 pages of story.

I had never read any of these stories, so I was glad to find this book.  They were written before Catcher in the Rye, and it’s interesting to see what was on his ind before he created Holden Caufield.  These stories seem to focus on college-aged women and the way they behave.  The portraits of these women are not flattering, but they are fairly realistic.

“The Young Folks” is set at a party (I can’t believe how many cigarettes are smoked in these three stories).  At 11PM during the party, Lucille Henderson, (the college-aged host) sees that her friend Edna Phillips is by herself, still.  So she introduces her to William Jameson.  Jameson is more interested in the laughing (and presumably drunk) blond girl who is sitting amid three guys from Rutgers who are hanging on her every word.

As soon as Jameson is introduced to Edna, he starts making excuses that he should leave the party–he has a theme due on Monday.  But Edna clings to him  with conversation. She asks about his theme, she tells him about the guy who was too forward with her–she’s no prude, but come on.  She offers him cigarettes and invites him to the balcony.  He is too polite to tell her off, but he is giving major signals that she must see and is perhaps saving up as ammunition for later. (more…)

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Eliza Robertson–“Who Will Water the Wallflowers?” (The Walrus, June 2014)

Posted in Battles, Blonde Redhead, Boredoms, Canadian Content, Cats, Don Caballero, Drinking, Eliza Robertson, Gary Numan, Helmet, Huh?, Natural Disasters, Short Story, The Walrus on October 17, 2014| Leave a Comment »

june2014SOUNDTRACK: BATTLES-Glass Drop (2011).

220px-BattlesGlossDropI didn’t know anything about Battles before I heard the single, “Ice Cream.”  Battles are an experimental band comprised of the guitarist from Don Caballero (one of my favorite post-rock bands) and the drummer from Helmet.   And they write music that is very angular, with lots of stops and starts and direction changes.  There’s some story about their first album (which I have not heard) having a singer who left just before the recording of this album.  And the remaining trio’s solution was to have outside singers sing on certain songs.  And it all works very well.

The majority of the album is instrumental though.  And the songs feature a very distinctive sound that I feel is close to a steel drum, but which I know is actually a keyboard–but that echoing sound is so drumlike, that when the drummer’s pounding is added, the whole album feels like a percussive explosion.

“Africastle” opens the disc with ringing guitars and a melody that uses those steel drum sounds.  After about 2 minutes of slow intro, when the ferocious drums kick in, the song rockets to life in a frenzy of activity and counterpoints.  It’s really quite something.

“Ice Cream” is the song that introduced me to this album.  The guitars are modified to once again a steel drum sound, but the melody and rhythm are so fast staccato that it removes any sense of steel drum especially when the notes are clearly electronic. This song features vocals (no idea what they are saying) by Matias Aguayo.  They compliment the sound of the music.  Despite all the overlapping disparate elements the song winds up being strangely catchy. The way the chaos ends with a simple Dum duh duh dum dum… is very cool.

“Futura” continues in that staccato style but it features an aggressively catchy melody.  “Inchworm” has a fun almost reggae feel amid the staccato noises.  “Wall Street” brings the drums to the fore again as it propels the jumpy melody along.  “My Machines” has a guest vocal from Gary Numan. I have never liked Gary Numan (I need to never hear “Cars” again) but his voice (he actually sings…sort of) works well with this cacophony.

“Dominican Fade” adds some heavier bass and wild percussion notes to this 2 minute track. It even has hand claps and cowbells at the end.  “Sweetie and Shag,” has vocals from  Blonde Redhead’s Kazu Makino.  She adds a whole new element to the album with her high pitched yet breathy vocals.  A definite highlight.

“Toddler” is a 1 minute sng that feels like a transition into the manic and bouncy “Rolls Bayce” (which Dave Konopka describes as almost wholly an experiment).

“White Electric” start slow with some echoed notes. Then a martial beat keeps time as the notes seems to swirl around. The song builds and builds with more layers until it crashes apart at around 5 minutes.  At which point the song slowly rebuilds itself into a pretty coda.

The final song sounds like a reggae singer but it is actually Yamataka Eye from The Boredoms.  Konopka says that Eye sent vocals and told them to do whatever they wanted with the track.  The band thought “he was speaking Japanese, but he’s just making up his own stuff and he’s repeating stuff that he’s making up.”  The backing noises sound like a whale song.

Despite the weirdness of the album, there’s a lot of poppiness to it, and I think it is a great release.  It also is a great headphones release, if you like that sort of thing.  I need to check out their debut as well.

[READ: October 15, 2014] “Who Will Water the Wallflowers?”

I don’t quite know what to make of this story.  It seemed to me to be full of individual incidents that were all wiped away by the flood that is mentioned in the very first line.

I enjoyed the details of the story quite a lot.  In it, the girl (unnamed) looks after her neighbor’s cat Cha-Cha while Ms Feliz is away.  Cha-Cha is a a Turkish angora, a delicate breed.  And there is an interesting description of the cat after he has gotten wet in the rain.  Sometime the girl sleeps at Ms Feliz’ house (her mom doesn’t mind since they live across the street).

The girl finds sanctuary in Ms Feliz’s house.  Except for Mr Bradley.  Mr Bradley is an enigmatic neighbor–he seems to be home all the time, dressed in work clothes and slippers. It is clear that the girl is uncomfortable around him, but he seems to always be around.  He seems pleasant enough.  He sees her almost every day and always asks “learning something?” to which she doesn’t know what to say.  She tries to avoid him by looking for Cha-Cha, but he doesn’t leave (and Cha-Cha doesn’t show up).  She tells him that she watched a film about geysers .

He replies, “I know a joke about geysers….it probably wouldn’t be appropriate.” (more…)

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This is How You Die: Stories of the Inscrutable, Infallible, Inescapable Machine of Death (2013)

Posted in Aaron Diaz, Ada Hoffmann, Alexandra Douglass, Alice Duke, Anthony Clark, Becky Dreistadt, Ben McSweeney, Bill Chernega, Braden Lamb, Brigita Orel, c. billadeau, Cancer as plot device, Carla Speed McNeil, Carly Monardo, Chandler Kaiden, Chris Schweizer, Claire Hummel, D.L.E. Roger, Daliso Chaponda, Dana Wulfekotte, Danica Novgorodoff, David Malki, Death, Demons, Diarrhea Planet, Disease, Drinking, Drugs, Dustin Harbin, Ed Turner, Emily Partridge, Erika Hammerschmidt, George Page III, Gord Sellar, Grace Seybold, Graham Annable, Greg Ruth, Hollan Lane, Horror, Humiliation, Indigo Kelleigh, John Chernega, John Takis, Karen Stay Ahlstrom, KC Green, KEXP 90.3 FM--Seattle, WA, Kris Straub, Kyle Shoenfeld, Law, Leela Wagner, Les McClaine, Lissa Treiman, Liz Argall, M. Bennardo, M.J. Leitch, Mad Scientists, Magic, Marleigh Norton, Marriage (Happy), Marriage Trouble, Martin Livings, Meredith Gran, Mike Dawson, Mike Peterson, Nathan Burgoine, Nick Abadzis, Ramón Pérez, Rebecca Black, Ren Warom, Rhiannon Kelly, Richard Salter, Ryan Estrada, Ryan North, Ryan Pequin, Sam Bosma, Sarah Pavis, Shari Chankhamma, Short Story, Threats, Toby W. Rush, Tom Francis, Tony Cliff, Trudy Cooper, Tyson Hesse, Violence, Yuck! on September 13, 2014| Leave a Comment »

how you dieSOUNDTRACK: DIARRHEA PLANET-“Lite Dream” Live on KEXP (2014).

dpHow to pass up a band with a name like this?  Well, it’s pretty easy, actually.  Who would even want to say their name?

The name conjures images, no, let’s not go there.  The name conjures music that is just abrasive and rude–ten second punks songs.  But in reality, their music is pretty traditional old school heavy metal.  They have 4 lead guitarists after all! (There’s 6 guys in the band altogether, surprisingly, there’s no women).   One of the lead guitarists even plays with his teeth (for a few seconds).

This song is about heavy metal, although I’m not sure what about it.  There’s some big riffs, solos galore.  There’s even a classic 80s style dual lead guitar solo.  There’s big loud drums.  There’s feedback.  It’s everything you think of as heavy metal, with a seeming wink and nod thrown in.

This is basically a goofy feel good band, playing fast heavy metal.  Shame about the band name, though, really.

Watch it all here.

[READ: spring and summer 2014] This is How You Die

It is quite disconcerting to open a Christmas present from your wife and have the first thing you see be the words “This is How You Die.”  To then look at her confusedly and try to interpret the look of excited delight on her face as she wonders why you’re not excited.  Then she explains that it is a sequel to the interesting collection Machine of Death that you both had read several years ago (but which I evidently never posted about).  Sighs of relief and then Christmas can proceed with more merriment.

So over the course of the new year I read these stories and I enjoyed most of them quite a lot.

The premise of the book is that there is a Machine of Death.  This machine states how you will die, but it does not give you a time, place or real definition of what it means by hope you will die.  Statements seem obvious but may in fact be different in some twisted way.  As it says on the back of the book, OLD AGE could mean either dying of natural causes or being shot by an elderly bedridden man in a botched home invasion.  The book revels in the irony that you can know how it’s going to happen , but you’ll still be surprised when it does.

The way the machine works is that you insert your finger, it takes a blood sample and gives you a card with the way you die printed on it.  No matter how many times you do it you will get the same result.  These are the guidelines, and each author made a story with just that set up.

Pretty cool right?  The first collection was really great.  And so is this collection, done by writers and cartoonists that I had never heard of before.  There are 34 stories and 12 comic strips (it’s a hefty collection).  Because each story is basically about how a person dies, I had to think about how best to review the book–without giving away any twists.  So I think the title and a very brief plot will have to suffice.

There’s even a funny promo video for the book (at the end of the post). (more…)

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Mimi Pond–Over Easy (2014)

Posted in Andrew Hewitt, Drawn & Quarterly, Drinking, Drugs, Graphic Novel, Humiliation, Marriage Trouble, Mimi Pond, Roz Chast, Sex, The Double on June 25, 2014| Leave a Comment »

over easySOUNDTRACK: ANDREW HEWITT-“A Boy Held Up with String” (2014).

Yhewittesterday I mentioned the soundtrack to The Double.  The score was composed by Andrew Hewitt, and this is one of the more popular pieces from the film.

It opens with some fast violin runs that seems to be racing each other, until about twenty seconds in the piano takes over the runs, but with a high note that keeps the pieces grounded (in the air somewhat).

The end of the song is primarily the piano with violin swirling around on top of the melody.

It actually feels like an introduction to something epic, but as with most scores, 75 seconds is all you’re going to get out of this cool, dramatic piece.

You can hear it here.

[READ: June 5, 2014] Over Easy

I saw this book at work and more or less ignored it.  Then a few days later I saw a review of it in somewhere and decided to read it.

This is a graphic novel about a young artist making ends meet at a diner in Oakland, California in the 1970s.  The back of the book says this is a fictionalized memoir (which I hate because, well, let’s just call it fiction, huh?).

Margaret is an art student.  As the story opens, she is in a diner, the only one there, when a guy named Lazlo starts talking to her. He is funny, cleverly dressed and probably high.  (He claims his full name is Lazlo Meringue).  Margaret is broke and knows that most waitresses hate poor students, but Lazlo is willing to take one of her drawings in exchange a meal.  And a friendship is born.

A flashback shows us that Margaret grew up in San Diego.  When she graduated high school, she didn’t want to do anything, but was forced to go to college–so she chose Art school at San Diego State.  Then she moved to Oakland, and got mired in the art scene.  In which punks were starting to push out the hippies.  And the center of it all was the Imperial Cafe (the diner in the first scene).

She says that you can discern the various culture who came into the cafe by the drugs they took: Professional crowd (cocaine); punks (speed); hippies (pot).  And since she could no longer afford school, she felt that she could do worse than working at the Imperial.  Lazlo says she has to tell him a joke or a dream and if he likes it, she’s hired.  Her joke is quite vulgar and she is welcomed as Madge.  Her first job is washing dishes and scrubbing out all the shit.  It is backbreaking and strangely satisfying. (more…)

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Pascal (MEZZO) Mesenburg & Michel PIRUS–King of the Flies: 2. The Origin of the World (2005) [translated 2010]

Posted in Black Flag, Boredom, Cian Nugent, Cigarettes, Dag Dascher, Death, Drinking, Drugs, Foreign Books, Graphic Novel, Helge Dascher, Humiliation, Kim Thompson, Marriage Trouble, Michel Pirus, Pascal (MEZZO) Mesenburg, Revenge, Sex, Short Story, Tiny Desk Concert, Translation, Violence, Yuck! on June 8, 2014| Leave a Comment »

flies2SOUNDTRACK: CIAN NUGENT-Tiny Desk Concert #353 (May 3, 2014).

cianCian Nugent is from Dublin.  In this Tiny Desk Concert, he plays two guitars, including a crappy no name electric guitar with a great raw sound.  For the first song, he plays a pretty acoustic guitar instrumental called “Grass Above My Head.”   It has a slow melody that turns into a ragtime jaunt over the course of 6 and half minutes.

The next two songs are on that electric guitar and are both rather different (he says the songs comes from “incoherent range of the mess that is my musical career”).  Before playing “Hire Purchase” he tells a very funny story about getting a pencil from a garage (and that he uses it to keep his string from detuning–does that work?).  This is an electric guitar instrumental, bluesy and mellow with some great riffs.

The final song, “Nightlife” has words.  It’s a simple blues song. Nugent has a nice delicate voice.  I’m not a big fan of bluesy songs, but he does a great job with this and the other two styles.

He also wrote a song called “My War Blues” which is variations on a Black Flag song (I don’t recognize the original in his version, myself).  But you can hear that here.

[READ: June 4, 2014] King of the Flies 2. The Origin of the World

This book picks up right where Book 1 left off.  This edition was also translated only by Helge Dascher although it says she had help from Dag Dascher and Kim Thomspon (I didn’t notice any change in quality).

As this book starts, Eric’s mother is making serious advances with Francis–the man whom she just met but who she is already calling her fiance.  Eric fantasizes about killing him (his dream sequence mother says this is the 13th time he has killed Francis).  Marie and Eric are still together and, through a strange series of events, Ringo is asking Eric to hold on to a cool looking elephant bowling bag.

By the end of this first story, Eric has saved Becker from drowning.  And yet neither Becker nor Karine bothers to thank him.  Indeed, Karine seems even more angry at him.  But this blow off makes Eric want Karine even more.

In a later story we finally meet Karine’s family who are just as freaked out about her “dating” this old guy.  And, by the end of the story Becker has a heart attack and dies.  When she returns home after the funeral she sees Eric and she confides in him that she is pregnant.

The newest development in the book comes in the next story in which we learn that Damien is a ghost and that he visits everyone that he knew.  Some people who are receptive to seeing him can actually talk with him.  He’s obviously pissed about Eric and Sal, but he has come to terms with a lot of things.  He even forgives the man who killed him (by accident).  He also winds up meeting ghost Becker at some point. (more…)

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Pascal (MEZZO) Mesenburg & Michel PIRUS–King of the Flies: 1. Hallorave (2005) [translated 2010]

Posted in Boredom, Cigarettes, Death, Drinking, Drugs, Foreign Books, Graphic Novel, Helge Dascher, Humiliation, John Kadlecek, Marriage Trouble, Michel Pirus, Pascal (MEZZO) Mesenburg, Public Service Broadcasting, Revenge, Sex, Short Story, Tiny Desk Concert, Translation, Violence, Yuck! on June 7, 2014| Leave a Comment »

flies1SOUNDTRACK: PUBLIC SERVICE BROADCASTING-Tiny Desk Concert #354 (May 5, 2014).

indexI heard about Public Service Broadcasting via NPR and I loved their song “Spitfire,” a rocking instrumental with interesting samples scattered throughout.  Well, it turns out that live, the rock just as hard.  Even though there’s only two of them.  There’s J. Willgoose, Esq. on guitar, banjo and electronics and Wrigglesworth on drums. The samples come from British public-service films from roughly the 1940s through the 1960s.

Watching this video, I was stunned at just how much Willgoose is doing, and just how much noise these two guys can make.  There’s even a video going on behind them.   The only problem here was that the samples were not loud enough.

 “Signal 30” opens with samples and samples and then a rocking guitar and solid drums. It amazing watching Willgoose do some many different things while playing the guitar. The change of tone at the middle of the song is great and I love watching him just bang the guitar to keep the notes going (while he is playing the keyboard).

 After the song, there is a sample of “Thank you very much” in an arch British voice (the duo don’t speak during the show).   “Spitfire” also sounds great hear–the song is surprisingly complex for an instrumental, and for what seems like it might be a novelty band, the song is really solid.  After this song, Willgoose had to fetch something and the talking sample said “talk amongst yourselves!” The final track “Everest” has a very catchy riff and some really great drumming.  But I love most watching Willgoose play the guitar with one hand and play a solo on the keyboard with the other.

This is definitely a band to check out live.

[READ: June 4, 2014] King of the Flies 1. Hallorave

Hallorave is a dark, violent, sexual comic series written by Pirus and drawn by Mezzo.  Both artists are French and have worked together before.  This book was translated by Helge Dascher and John Kadlecek (and it was translated very well–I didn’t realize it wasn’t American until they started talking about Euros sometime in the middle of the book.

So this is actually a series of short stories narrated by different people.  They seem unrelated, but after a couple of stories, you see the connections.  And there proves to be a core collection of characters all living in this suburb (the location is really irrelevant).

The first story starts with Eric (who proves to be the main protagonist) drinking, reading magazines and sitting on a couch on the (dried up and dead) lawn of his mother’s house.  He is also jealous of his best friend Damien because he is very hot for Damien’s girlfriend Sal.

That first story introduces us to a visual that will run through the book: Eric sitting with a giant fly head on.  The three are going to a Hallorave for Halloween.  Eric is King of the Flies, Sal has a giant cat’s head on and Damien is a skeleton.  By the end of the party, they are all high (you can seem them feeding each other drugs in the picture below).  Eric pledged his love to Sal in front of Damien, and Damien is in a foul mood.  He gets in a fight with some other party goers. By the end of the short story, Eric and Sal are having sex (with their costume heads on) and Damien has been hit by a car and killed.  That’s the kind of stories we’re getting here. (more…)

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Roddy Doyle–“Box Sets” (New Yorker, April 14, 2014)

Posted in Drinking, Dublin, Ireland, Irish Writer, Marriage Trouble, New Yorker, Roddy Doyle, Simone Dinnerstein, Tiny Desk Concert on June 6, 2014| Leave a Comment »

CV1_TNY_04_14_14Blitt.inddSOUNDTRACK: SIMONE DINNERSTEIN-Tiny Desk Concert #362 (June 2, 2014).

simoneSimone Dinnerstein plays several of Bach’s two-part inventions.  And my jaw hits the floor.

I like Bach–I like his elaborate arrangements and the way he makes the piano (or harpsichord) sing.  But I never really thought about how hard these pieces are.  Watching Dinnerstein play these–simply watching the amazingness of her fingers–has blown me way.  And if I may say, her fingers aren’t long slender graceful things, they look a lot like mine.  So she doesn’t seem to have that advantage of an octave and a half reach or anything.  I am amazed that her two hands can work so independently.  And it sounds beautiful.

She groups them together into three segments and between each segment she talks a little about Bach and about playing these difficult pieces.  Her story about learning these as a child and then teaching them to children is really fascinating (and funny).

I have no idea how many Inventions Back wrote, but this set list is: Inventions Nos. 1, 6, 8, then Inventions Nos. 9, 10, and finally Inventions Nos. 12, 13, 14.

Check this out.

[READ: June 3, 2104] “Box Sets”

How can Roddy Doyle, who does funny so well, also do domestic unhappiness with such verisimilitude?

In this brief story, just as Ireland is getting through the worst of the economic depression and Sam and his wife Emer are feeling like they can exhale, Sam is let go from his job.  Now he’s been on the dole for three months.  And he is miserable.  The only good thing is that he has been watching box set seasons of all of the really good TV that everyone’s been talking about.  He feels foolish watching it all after the fuss about them has ended, but he’s still glad to watch it.  And Emer is great through the whole thing, always cheerful, always trying to make him feel better.  Always with a smile.  But Sam is getting darker and darker.

Then one night when Emer says they’re going to a friend’s house on Friday, Sam says he’d rather not.  He reminds her that at their last get together he was stumped when someone asked him what he did.  He just doesn’t want to go out anymore.  Emer tries to comfort him but fails.  He just gets madder until he throws a coffee mug and it shatters.  He takes the dog for a walk down to the seaside to cool off. (more…)

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Thomas McGuane–“Hubcaps” (New Yorker, April 21, 2014)

Posted in Baseball, Drinking, Humiliation, Juana Molina, Marriage Trouble, New Yorker, Parenting, Short Story, Thomas McGuane, Tiny Desk Concert on June 5, 2014| Leave a Comment »

SCV1_TNY_04_21_14Brunetti.inddOUNDTRACK: JUANA MOLINA-Tiny Desk Concert #361 (May 31, 2014).

juana I had heard of Juana Molina but had never heard anything she sang. In fact I didn’t really know anything about her. So, she’s from Buenos Aires and is 51 this year. She has released 6 albums. I don’t know if they all sound like this, but these threes songs are really cool and interesting. The sounds are wholly unexpected—weird effects on guitar and on keyboard. Interesting samples (played by all three members) and delightfully odd backing vocals all accompany Molina’s pretty voice (she sings mostly in Spanish).

   “Eras” opens with a stuttering guitar line that proves to be not a guitar at all. By the time the song moves along there’s a groovy guitar line, spare vocals (at one point counting mostly in Spanish uno tres cuatro cinco seis (yes there’s no dos)) and a very catchy chorus.

   “Wed 21” has an insane guitar riff that in addition to being unusual in itself is also crazily wobbly. Then there’s processed vocals which act almost as a percussion instrument.  All of this once again leads to a super catchy chorus.  When the strange noises reappear after the chorus it sounds even more peculiar.

Molina proves to be very familiar with the Tiny Desk Concerts.  She is excited to be there, which is always fun to see in a performer. She also says that now she knows what people are looking at when the scan the audience.

   The same odd vibrato guitar opens “Sin Guia, No” as well. After a slinky voice (Molina’s voice is delicate and whispery for much of the songs but can get big and loud as needed) with some interesting backing vocals (that sound like they are coming from a well), Molina adds a new guitar line to the mix.  There’s a lot of music coming from this trio.  And I like it a lot.

[READ: June 4, 2014] “Hubcaps”

Stories about 70s families are pretty much always sad.  In the decade of smoking and drinking parents and of neglected children, there’s never going to be happiness there.  Although there is sometimes comedy.  And yet for all of the sadness of the fictionalized decade, I often enjoy reading about it.

This story opens with Owen knowing that when his parents break open their first cocktails in the later afternoon, that’s pretty much the end of the night for them–and a chance for Owen to sneak out.  Mostly he goes to the homemade baseball field(!) of his friends the Kershaws.  The oldest Kershaw boy is a good athlete, the middle one is working on his paper route and the youngest is physically and mentally challenged.  But they all love baseball, especially the youngest, Ben.  And given his specialness, he is excellent at remembering statistics of baseball.  Owen finds his knowledge fascinating, so he hangs around with him on the bus and sometimes after school.  Ben is also pretty good at baseball, so he is always picked for a team.  As is Owen.  It seems idyllic, except for Owen’s family life.

But Owen manages to catch and raise some tiny turtles (don’t get too attached to them). (more…)

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Lyudmila Ulitskaya–“The Fugitive” (New Yorker, May 12, 2014)

Posted in Art, Bela Shayevich, Communists, Drinking, Elvis Presley, Lyudmila Ulitskaya, New Yorker, Roy Orbison, Short Story, Timber Timbre, Tindersticks, Tiny Desk Concert, Translation on June 4, 2014| Leave a Comment »

CV1_TNY_05_12_14Chast.inddSOUNDTRACK: TIMBER TIMBRE-Tiny Desk Concert #355 (May 10, 2014).

timberI wanted to like this band because I think their name is very clever. But I just don’t enjoy this kind of slow song.  Ten years ago I wouldn’t have even given this a chance, but since I have embraced the Tindertsicks, I have a lot more patience from this kind of music, but I just can’t get into this—it’s way too slow and meandering for me.  They play three songs, “Hot Dreams,” “Run From Me,” and “Grand Canyon.”  The second song “Run For Your Life” has a mellow Elvis vibe (I don’t like Elvis either), and when they break into the staccato guitar chords it sounds like Roy Orbison’s “Running Scared” (Nope, don’t like Orbison either).  I do like the way it builds but it’s not enough to sell the song for me.  And when you get to the lyrics, I’ll just say that the world did not need another song in which the singer calmly says “Run from me, darlin’, you better run for your life.”

[READ: June 4, 2014] “The Fugitive”

I really loved this story by Ulitskaya (which was translated from the Russian by Bela Shayevich).  What I liked about it was that there wasn’t a lot of plot exactly, because it centered on the mind of the “fugitive” who is an artist in Communist Russia and is persecuted for his drawings.

As the story opens, the police have come to his house and question his wife.  They are there for Boris Ivanovich (yes, there is a problem for me with compound Russian names, but I found this was pretty easy to get through after a few pages) because he has made some drawings that put Communism in a bad light (letters made of bologna that spelled out “Glory to the Communist Party” with a price tag of 2 rub. 20 kop.

Once the police leave (he presents a document that gives him temporary safety), he flees Moscow to the distant village of Danilovy Gorki–a tiny settlement of five houses.  He stays with his friend and fellow artist Nikolai.  The country life is a novelty as he does all of the things that country folk do.  And he feels largely safe because he is far enough away from prying eyes.  He doesn’t even write to his wife for fear of giving himself away.  This also means that he can have wild sex with a woman who is visiting for the holidays–Anastasia (“She’s so educated.  But such a slut!”).  Eventually he tells his friend that he loves this life because it is so anti-Soviet, but the friend replies that it is not anti-Soviet, simply a-Soviet.  (more…)

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Xu Bing–Book from the Ground: from point to point (2013)

Posted in Drinking, Funny (ha ha), Graphic Novel, Sex, Short Books, The Vestibules, Word usage, Xu Bing on May 19, 2014| Leave a Comment »

xubingSOUNDTRACK: THE VESTIBULES-“Boulbous Bouffant” (1995).

rfvThis is a fantastic comedy bit of euphonics.  It starts out a bit slow–without a clear point.  But once it picks up, it is outstanding.  And you’ll find yourself saying…oh all kinds of things for no reason.

[READ: May 15, 2014] Book from the Ground

Xu Bing is a Chinese artist.  He caused some stir several years ago with his exhibition Book from the Sky, a set of books, panels and scrolls on which were printed thousands of characters resembling real Chinese characters, but which were nonsense. Xu spent years hand carving the typesetting blocks used to make the prints according to traditional Chinese block printing methods. Each block was embossed with a unique but meaningless symbol and then used to make the prints for the exhibit.  It was controversial and he even lost favor with the Chinese government.

That project was conceived as a “book” that no one could read.  With Book from the Ground, he has attempted to create a book that literally everyone could read.

The entire story of this book is told with icons.  There are no words at all.

It is the story of a man as he lives his day from the time he wakes up until he falls asleep late that night.

The icons are mostly but not entirely universal–they depend upon the reader being familiar with contemporary technological life (icons for Amazon and GMail for instance might confuse some–or maybe they have saturated the market enough that they are universal by now).

The story opens with us zooming in on the man as he sleeps.  It is 7AM and he is awoken by a bird and by his alarm.  We see him wake up, use the bathroom, make (and ruin) breakfast and then head to work. (more…)

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