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Archive for the ‘Essays’ Category

Mary Miley Theobald–“A Cup of Hot Chocolate, S’good for What Ails Ya” (Colonial Williamsburg: The Journal of the Colonial Williamsburg Foundation, Winter 2012)

Posted in 18th Century, 19th Century, Colonial Williamsburg, Essays, History, Mary Miley Theobald, Quasi, The 3Ds on April 3, 2012| 4 Comments »

SOUNDTRACK: QUASI-“Beautiful Things” from Score! 20 Years of Merge Records: The Covers (2009).

I’ve had this CD for a pretty long time just waiting for me to devote some time to listening to it.  The collection is a compilation of non-Merge label bands covers songs by Merge bands.

Quasi was a great band (I guess they are still together, so they are a great band).  I have their records from around the turn of the century (I love writing that!).  Sam Coombs and the wonderful Janet Weiss comprise the band (there’s a bassist, Joanna Bolme, added in 2007). And they sing wonderful, political alt-pop.

This is a cover of a song by the New Zealand band The 3Ds.  I don’t know the original (although I do know (and like) a few songs by them–mostly from the Topless Women Talk about Their Lives soundtrack.  This version has heavy keyboard prominence, but he sweet verses (sung largely by Janet with Tom doing backing vocals) are interspersed with some cool buzzy guitar solos.

  I just found the original online, and the cover is pretty accurate–although the Quasi version is a bit more dynamic.  Nevertheless, it makes me want to listen to The 3Ds a bit more.

[READ: March 15, 2012] “A Cup of Hot Chocolate, S’good for What Ails Ya”

Have you ever wanted to read about the history of hot chocolate?  No, of course not.  No one has.  And yet, when I started flipping through this article, Theobald introduced plenty of ideas that I found not only interesting but compelling.

Theobald explains how the Aztecs called this (at the time) very hearty, spicy and bitter) drink cacahuatl.  The Aztecs got the drink from the Mayans, who got it from the Olmecs.  The first Europeans to try this drink loathed it (one even called it a drink for pigs).

It was the conquistadors who mixed cacahuatl with sugar to make what we now know as chocolate.  Chocolate was a luxury back then–time consuming and difficult to make.

The Spaniards found the drink very hearty–hearty enough to be considered a meal.  This put Catholics in a tizzy about the state of the item.  They feared that if it was food it could not be consumed on fast days–it was ultimately deemed a drink.  The drink made its way through Europe and into England.  The first known English recipe called for sugar, long red pepper, cloves, aniseed, almonds, nuts, orange flower water and cacao. (more…)

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Rivka Galchen–“Into the Unforeseen: A romance of César Aira” (Harper’s June, 2011)

Posted in Books about writers, César Aira, Essays, Figurines, Harper's, Mercury Rev, Rivka Galchen, Short Books on March 31, 2012| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: FIGURINES “The Air We Breathe” from Viva Piñata! (2008).

Figurines are from Denmark.  This song has a very distinctive Mercury Rev feel (late-period  Mercury Rev) with high pitched vocals and delicate intertwining melodies.

The verses are done on simple piano and the bridge has some nice harmonies.  This is a cool alt rock song that stands up to repeated listens.

[READ: March 28, 2012] “Into the Unforeseen”

The timing of this article is quite amazing.  Having really enjoyed Galchen’s short story, I decided to see what else she had written.  It’s not a lot, but she has written three things published in Harper’s–two essays and one short story.  This first essay is all about César Aira.  I didn’t even know who Aira was when it came out in 2011, but now, I get to read it again having just finished another of his novels.  (The essay concludes with information about Varamo, a novel that was just recently translated into English which I picked up at the library, yesterday).

This essay is about the week that Galchen spent with Aira in and around Aira’s home (but not his birth town of Coronel Pringles which he kind of jokingly forbids her from seeing.  Galchen loves Aira’s writing (and has a kind of crush on him, although they’d never met before).  She doesn’t say in this article but she was a Spanish language major, so she has clearly been reading his books in Spanish.

She lets us know that the day before she met Aira, her ten-year relationship ended (she hints at the reason but is quite discrete).  She brings this up because of an emotional moment later in the article.  And that’s what I loved about this article–it was personal and really invited the reader in to experience this meeting with her.   (more…)

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P.W. Wilson–“Sea-Seprents and Scientists” (The North American Review, Vol. 237, No 3, March, 1934)

Posted in "Weird Al" Yankovic, Canadian Music, Essays, Laura Barrett, Loch Ness Monster, Oddities, P.W. Wilson, Religion, Research, Scientists, The North American Review on March 28, 2012| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: LAURA BARRETT-“Deception Island Optimist Club” from Viva Piñata! (2008).

This is a musically simple song–it appears to be played entirely on, I gather, a thumb piano or kalimba.

The melody is complicated, however.  And Barrett’s voice is beautifully naked.  I especially like the way her voice doesn’t follow the musical melody exactly–she plays around with sounds and ideas a little bit.

I also just found out this neat little piece of information: Her first public performance was a cover of “Smells Like Nirvana” at a “Weird Al” Yankovic

kalimba

tribute concert.  Okay, who even knew there were “Weird Al” tribute concerts?

I’m very much intrigued by this woman, and you can hear a whole bunch of her stuff at her CBC Radio 3 site.

Oh, and that Weird Al song?  You can hear it (there’s no video) right here:

[READ: March 20, 2012] “Sea-Serpents and Scientists”

This was the second archived article that my company sent around for enjoyment.

I like any article about sea serpents, especially The Loch-Ness Monster.  But I was really surprised at the attitude taken in this article.  It actually seemed like it might be a joke, although upon further consideration, I believe it is entirely serious.

As the introductory line says, “The emergence of a fabulous monster in Loch Ness is greeted with debatable reserve by men of science.”

The first paragraph taught me something i did not know: The Loch Ness Monster’s name is Bobby!  And while Wilson says he is not going to “offer a belated biography of Bobby, the sea serpent of Scotland, as he swims like a submarine in Loch Ness,” he is sure going to take scientists to task for not investigating him.

Wilson does not argue that Bobby exists, indeed he claims not to be an expert, “All my life I have abstained strictly from the alcoholic inducements which on these occasions are said to contribute to what around Loch Ness, is called ‘perfect visibility.'”  Although I gather he does believe in him.

Rather, his point is that scientists have dropped the ball by not even looking into “by far the most interesting event in the modern annals of natural history.” (more…)

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Albert Boime–“Roy Lichtenstein and the Comic Strip” (Art Journal, Vol 28, No 2, Winter, 1968-1969)

Posted in Albert Boime, Art Journal, Canadian Music, Comic Strips, Essays, Roy Lichtenstein, Talking Heads, The Acorn on March 27, 2012| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: THE ACORN-“The Flood Pt. 1” from Viva Piñata! (2008).

The Acorn are a folk band from Ottawa.  This song sounds a lot like later Talking Heads.  Talking Heads are not really a band that many other bands sound like.  And yet they have such a distinctive sound that when a band sounds like them it’s hard not to think “another Talking Heads.”

Having said that, this is a fun and interesting song.  It has a world music feel in the rhythms.  And the vocals are in the vein of David Byrne (but not aping him or anything like that).  The big difference from the Talking Heads comes near the end of the song when a second voice (who sounds a bit like Bono) comes in to do harmonies.

All in all it is a very satisfying song.

[READ: March 20 2012] “Roy Lichtenstein and the Comic Strip”

This is the first of three new articles that my company send around as samples of interesting articles that we have archived.

I’ve always enjoyed Lichtenstein’s comic-book-style art.  It’s kind of pop and very commercial, and I’ve always appreciated it, even if I didn’t really like the comics that he took his inspiration from.

Despite my enjoyment of his work, I never really bothered to investigate how he did it.  I wasn’t sure if he just took a comic page and blew it up or added color or what.  But it turns out that he did actually recreate the pictures from scratch.  This article shows side by side some original cartoon panels and then Lichtenstein’s version.

In most of them he keeps things relatively the same.  But even in those it is quite clear that he is redoing the art with his own lines and style–he is not copying the faces, he is simplifying them even further in some cases or making them more beautiful in others.  You can see that he has changed little things to make them more artistically satisfying–stretching out a window to connect characters, removing background images or zooming in more in a frame to make the image more striking–although the are always recognizable as the original.   The most drastic change, and the focus of the article, is his use of the balloon quote. (more…)

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Michael J. Lombardi–“ΦΒΚ: Love of wisdom, the guide to life” (Colonial Williamsburg: The Journal of the Colonial Williamsburg Foundation, Winter 2012)

Posted in 18th Century, 19th Century, Ben Folds, Colonial Williamsburg, Essays, History, Michael J. Lombardi, Set at School, War on March 21, 2012| 3 Comments »

SOUNDTRACK: BEN FOLDS-Free Folds Five E.P. (2011).

With the purchase of Ben Folds’ Imitation of Myself, I received a free download of this E.P.  It contains five tracks: three demos and two live tracks.

The demos are for “Underground” (1992), “Stevens Last Night in Town” (1994) and “Song for the Dumped” (1994).  Demos are a strange thing.  For fans of a song it’s interesting to hear an original version, especially if it is radically different.

These demos are not radically different although there are certainly some differences.  “Underground”‘s opening spoken bits sound more comical and less sung (it’s clearly just not mixed well).  And “Steven” has a strange spoken word section during the instrumental break.  It’s also less manic than the official release.

The most drastic change is in “Song for the Dumped” in which the chorus ends not with the humorous “and dooooooon’t forget my black T-shirt” but with the more abrasive (and Ben said harder for him to sing) “you fuuuuucking whore.”  So these demos are interesting for knowing that these songs were pretty much always meant to sound a certain way (and that even Ben has limits for how much he’ll curse).  But the official releases are better.

The live versions are both from solo shows.  “Narcolepsy” (1999) and “Dr Yang (2008).   Ben live is always a fun prospect.  He puts on a fun show and often stretches the songs out with fun jams.  “Narcolepsy” is notable for the incredibly buzzy bass guitar that they’re playing.  Neither one of these songs features any jams, but they both have a heavier, more intense feel than the studio versions.

Since the Imitation of Myself included live songs and demos, these make a nice addition to the set.  Although they’re certainly not essential.

[READ: March 15, 2012] “ΦΒΚ: Love of wisdom, the guide to life”

My family has traveled to Colonial Williiamsburg for our last few vacations.  We don’t spend all of our time there (Busch Gardens is just down the road, after all), but we have really enjoyed the history.  So last year I sent them a nominal fee and got some kind of membership coupon.  And then about a week ago, we received this magazine.  I don’t know why it took so long to get to us and I don’t know how many more we’ll receive.  I wasn’t even sure if I was going to read anything in it (I like Colonial Williamsburg, but probably not enough to read a whole magazine about it).  But I was delighted by the content of the magazine.  And I’ll mention a few of the other articles in the near future.

This one is about the origins of ΦΒΚ, Phi Beta Kappa.  It’s something I never even thought about, but once I started reading it, I found it really interesting. (more…)

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Jonathan Franzen–“A Rooting Interest” (New Yorker, February 13 & 20, 2012)

Posted in Anachronisms, Book Reviews, Clinic, Edith Wharton, Essays, Jeffrey Eugenides, Jonathan Franzen, Stereolab, Technology, The Who on March 13, 2012| 2 Comments »

SOUNDTRACK: CLINIC-Funf (2007).

I received this disc when it was donated to our library.  Clinic is an art-punk band from Liverpool.  This is a collection of B-Sides (that’s an unusual place to start when you’ve never heard a band before). As such, it’s hard to tell if this is what the band sounds like or if these are crazy experiments (because the songs are pretty crazy).  Even if they are experiments, they’ve got me very interested in hearing what the rest of their stuff sounds like.  And since these songs are all over the map I’m still not sure what their albums may sound like.

There are twelve songs on the record: only three are over 3 minutes long, the rest are just over 2 minutes (with a couple under 2 minutes).  This whole collection is under half an hour.  And yet it feels like they take you all over the place, music-wise.  The collection covers from 1999-2007, but they’re not in chronological order, so you can’t even tell if any of this is a progression in musical styles or just a bunch of experiments.  The willful obscurity is quite exciting.

“The Majestic” is a grand, building monstrosity.  It is full of pomp, which is immediately deflated by the slightly off-key organ.  “Nicht” is a 180 degree turn—a blistering hardcore song. It’s played very fast and yet it is not sloppy (and it’s 90 seconds long).  “Christmas” flips the sound again, with a delicate, slow song about, yes, Christmas.  “The Castle” has a lot of organ sounds, which reminds me of early weirder Who songs and even Stereolab.  “You Can’t Hurt You Anymore” is an instrumental (with cowbell!).  “Dissolution” has a distorted guitar and tribal drums.  It breaks after a few riffs to showcase some bizarre distorted spoken words.

Speaking of lyrics.  A lyric sheet is included which is very helpful because the lyrics are utter nonsense: “Pork pie had to know uncle now you can elope” “Diktat no fat fun eyebrow shhhh for the one and the one with horrors”  “Cheat the bored, cheat thee sup at the toast.”  I suspect they are just making sounds while they play and then figuring out what the words might be later.

“Magic Boots” returns to that punk sound with distorted guitar solos at the front (and distorted vocals in the back).  “The Scythe” has a kind of western guitar feel (simple, but interesting).  “Lee Shan” is the slowest song on the disc (spoken/chanting vocals are low in the mix).  “J.O.” is a slow keyboard song.  “Circle I” is another blistering noisy punk song. The collection ends with “Golden Rectangle” which is a slowish surf-sounding song, but with keyboards.

It amazes me that this band has so many full length records out.  They must have a cult following, even though I’d never heard of them before.  I’d really like to check out what their main releases sound like.

[READ: March 11, 2012] “A Rooting Interest”

Hot on the heels of Jonathan Fraznen saying he hates Twitter, I get to read how much he loves Edith Wharton.

It’s no secret that Franzen is a curmudgeon–he is an emotional guy who believes in authenticity; there is absolutely no surprise that he would hate Twitter.  And, while I think Twitter is good for some things, he is absolutely correct when he says, “Twitter stands for everything I oppose…it’s hard to cite facts or create an argument in 140 characters…it’s like if Kafka had decided to make a video semaphoring The Metamorphosis.”  [Actually I’m not sure that that simile is apt, but I get the point.]

He may be a little overstepping with the rest: “Or it’s like writing a novel without the letter ‘P’…It’s the ultimate irresponsible medium … People I care about are readers…particularly serious readers and writers, these are my people. And we do not like to yak about ourselves.”  I think there is some fun to be had yakking about ourselves, but the point is well taken.

It also seems quite appropriate for this article in The New Yorker in which he lauds a writer who wrote almost one hundred years ago. (more…)

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Colson Whitehead–“The Way We Live Now: 11-11-01; Lost and Found”

Posted in Alec Baldwin, Colson Whitehead, Essays, History, The Future, The New York Times on February 16, 2012| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: ALEC BALDWIN reading “Lost and Found” (Selected Shorts September 10, 2011) (2011).

Alec Baldwin’s reading of Whitehead’s “Lost and Found” is really great.  His delivery is perfect and he strikes the ideal balance of humor and pathos, even if his inner-Boston peeks through this New York tale once in a while.  You can hear it for free at soundcloud.

[READ: February 12, 2012] “The Way We Live Now: 11-11-01; Lost and Found”

I didn’t know who Colson Whitehead was in 2001 (at the time of this piece, he had written two novels, neither of which have I read even now).  I read a lot of things about 9/11 after the attacks; however, I didn’t read everything (and really I didn’t want to try).

Strangely, the only way I found out about this is because my brother-in-law’s wife linked to the soundcloud page on Facebook the other day.   (I’m not sure what made her link to it now, either).

The amazing thing about this essay is that it was written less than a month after the attacks and yet it is it is humorous and wise (but not silly or light-hearted).  It strikes a perfect balance.  And in fact, doesn’t even mention the attacks by name.

The piece is more of an ode to New York City and how “No matter how long you have been here, you are a New Yorker the first time you say, ”That used to be Munsey’s’ or ‘That used to be the Tic Toc Lounge.'”  Your first memory of the City is how you will always think of the City.  Whether you were dragged there at Christmas time as child or to help a friend move. (more…)

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Max Barry–“Blog This” (maxbarry.com, May 2005)

Posted in Books about writers, Essays, Funky Web Sites, Funny (ha ha), Gogol Bordello, Max Barry, Punks on February 11, 2012| 2 Comments »

SOUNDTRACK: GOGOL BORDELLO-Live from Axis Mundi (2009).

This is a strangely-named disc collection.  The CD is actually live shows from the BBC as well as a few demos and other sessions.  The DVD that comes with it is actually a 2007 show live from Axis Mundi (Irving Plaza NYC).  For this review I’m only talking about the CD.

The BBC Sessions, as always, sound great.  The band is wild and spirited although a little less than in a typical concert setting.  They plays “Ultimate,” “Wanderlust King,” “Mishto”, “Alcohol,” “American Wedding,” and “You Gave Up (Roumania)” (all of which come from Super Taranta except “Mishto!” (from Gypsy Punks Underdog World Strike) and “You Gave Up (Roumania)” which I believe is exclusive to this disc.

The band is clearly having a lot of fun with the songs (the nine minute “You Gave Up” is a great jam) and they are perfectly in sync with each other.  At the end they even do a couple of promos shout outs for Radio One.

“Stivali E Colbacco” comes from something called the “Super Taranta Sessions” and was recorded by Steve Albini (his presence isn’t really evident, except maybe when the aggro guitar kicks in, but the song sounds great).

“Troubled Friends” comes from the “Gypsy Punk Sessions” and was recorded by Victor Van Vugt (who did the Super Taranta album).  It’s the first thing that slows the album down and feels like a B-side or a tack-on.  Mostly because the music is too minimal and meandering (and at 6 minutes is too long).

“60 Revolutions” makes up for the previous song with some solid songcraft.  At 6 minutes this is also a bit too long.  But it’s good exploration of Gogol Bordello’s flirtation with Spanish lyrics.

The last two tracks are a demo of “Immigrant Punk” which sounds different but not radically so (the lyrics seem clearer) and probably the least essential track of all, an instrumental version of “Immigrant Punk.”

The BBC stuff certainly makes this worth tracking down.  The rest is filler; but it’s pretty good filler.

[READ: December 31, 2011] “Blog This”

This is the final blog post from Max Barry’s website that I’ll be talking about (yaaay)–there’s two short stories left after this.

Like all good blog posts, this one is about the creator of the blog.  Barry was searching the web when he found a post called “Writers Who Blog.”  Barry posted a link to the article but the link is now dead and a very cursory websearch came up empty, so alas, there will be no confirmation of sources here.

So Barry says that this article about Writers who Blog totally trashes him.  He was going to let it go until he saw that a) the author was the same guy who wrote the worst review ever of his book Jennifer Government (this link is also down…I guess Barry really got to him!) and b) the critic was going by a lame pseudonym for the review but now he has revealed himself.

This post revealed to me that Barry created something called NationStates, a nation simulation game (which I would love to explore but don’t have time, which appears to be thriving).

Anyhow, the critic, Todd Bunker criticizes Barry’s blog posts, claims barry lies about his number of visitors and calls his readers sycophants.  Harsh cries indeed.  I think some of the many comments for this post include deliberately sycophantic comments.

Bunker also looked at Neal Pollack and Wil Wheaton’s blogs.  I happen to like Pollack, although I’ve never seen his blog.  But I have to say I have been following Wil Wheaton on G+ for a while now and he is a delight. I’ve never seen his blog, but I am never not amused by him (little shout out to the guy who inspired Wesley Crusher.die.die.die).  (more…)

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Max Barry–“We’re Not in Redmond Any More, Toto” (maxbarry.com, February 22, 2005)

Posted in Corporate skewering, Ella Fitzgerald, Essays, Funny (ha ha), Linux, Max Barry, Mitchmatic, Scott Joplin, Technology on February 4, 2012| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: MITCHMATIC-“Ella MPC” and “Joplin MPC” (2010).

I haven’t quite figured out what the MPC stands for, but I really like these two short songs.

In “Ella MPC” Mitchmatic takes some Ella Fitzgerald scatting (I don’t know the source) and makes a new song out of it.  After 30 seconds or so, he throws a simple drumbeat over the whole thing and off it goes. I love that he even makes different “parts” of the song with different scatting sections.  It’s very clever.

In “Joplin MPC” he takes a Scott Joplin rag (I can’t tell which one, but there’s a plunger-trumpet on it) and loops it around on itself.  It creates an entirely new song that sounds nothing like a Joplin rag.  Indeed, if it weren’t  titled that way, it may not even be obvious that that’s where  the music is originally from.  It’s also very clever.  Especially when the drumbeats turn it into a much faster dance song in the middle.

Both of these songs come from the Two Weeks Off album, and frankly I should have just reviewed the whole thing by now, but these two songs really stand out as a cool experiment.

[UPDATE: Mitchmatic just left a comment on my About me page (cool!) and he gives me the answer to the mysterious MPC question–it’s the name of an AKAI sampler.  I’m including this video where you can watch him play “Joplin MPC” live.  It blew my mind]

[READ: December 31, 2011] “We’re not in Redmond Any More, Toto”

This post is all about Barry’s switch from Microsoft Windows to Gentoo Linux.  He explains that it was “a lot like moving to another country, both in the sense that I didn’t know where anything was or understand the local language.”  But Barry is not looking back.

He makes eight statements contrasting Linux and Microsoft.  I’ve never used Linux so I can’t really chime in, but I will say that this blog post had the most comments of any one of his by a huge margin.  (34!–Computer geeks are passionate, man).

1. Linux is a religion.
And practitioners have a born-again look in their eyes.

2. Windows thinks you’re an idiot; Linux thinks you’re a genius.
I agree with the first half, although I do like that you just hit ENTER to install stuff.  While I like to do my own tech repair, letting the machine do the obvious stuff is nice. (more…)

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Max Barry–“Wolves at the Door” (maxbarry.com, October 26, 2004) and Jeffrey Frank (New Yorker, January 23, 2012)

Posted in All Songs Considered, Canadian Music, Essays, History, Jeffrey Frank, Language, Max Barry, Mitchmatic, New Yorker, Political Humor, Politicians, Richard Nixon, War on January 28, 2012| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: MITCHMATIC-“Why Don’t You Know” (2012).

This song reminds me in spirit of the old Fresh Prince songs–buoyant and fun, funny and a little silly.  And although it doesn’t sample I Dream of Jeannie, the mood is the same.

The track opens with a great sound of an old rotary phone.  When the music comes it, it’s completely loungey: strings and easy music propel this song to the heights of Cool.

The delivery style is gentle but fast and the lyrics are funny “I’m gonna tell you some reasons that you wanna date me.”

Mitchmatic is a Canadian rapper and his record is coming out soon on Old Ugly records.  Listen to the track at NPR and explore his stuff at his bandcamp site.

Darling I would like you so much more if you loved me back…

[READ: December 31, 2011 and January 24, 2012] “Wolves at the Door” and “Comment”

This is a blog post from Barry that deals with politics.  Although it was written in 2004 it is completely relevant to the current state of affairs in American politics.  I suppose it was ever thus, but it sure seems worse now.

He opens, “Stop me if I ‘m getting too cynical, but I think elections are won by the guy with the stupidest policies.”  He explains that it’s not because people are dumb; rather, it’s because when you are marketing to an entire country, “your best strategy is to scramble straight to the bottom of the barrel and start groping around in the muck there for the lowest common denominator.”  This is very true.

But I think the perfect summary for politics is (as Barry writes): “smart is complicated, but dumb is catchy.” (more…)

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