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Archive for the ‘Library Related’ Category

Haruki Murakami–The Strange Library (2014)

Posted in Chip Kidd, Funny (ha ha), Funny (strange), Haruki Murakami, Library Related, Mark Z. Danielewski, Rheostatics, Short Story, Ted Goossen, The Buttless Chaps, The Jam, The Tragically Hip, Translation, tagged on August 16, 2015| Leave a Comment »

murakamiSOUNDTRACK:  RHEOSTATICS–The Media Club, Vancouver, BC, (October 23, 2004).

media clubEvery year, the Rheostatics would perform what they called Green Sprouts Week in Toronto.  In 2004 they did a West Coast version. Five nights in a row at The Media Club (with each show being crazier than the last).  There aren’t always recording available for these shows, but on this leg there are recordings from the third, fourth and fifth nights.

This recording is the best of the 3 available shows.  Although in the notes, Tyson reveals that he had technical difficulties and was only able to record about an hour of the show.  In addition to the songs he missed for technical difficulties, there were also some quieter acoustic songs “Don’t Say Goodnight and “Joey” which he couldn’t get.

And yet, this is an amazing set of music–outstanding by any barometer, with great sound quality (aside from a few drop outs) and an amazing collection of songs. The final night of a run is usually really long, so it’s fun to imagine how much more they would have thrown into this set.

The 7 songs included are “Shaved Head” which is slow and amazing.  A raw and raging “Feed Yourself” with a dash of The Jam’s “Eton Rifles” and The Tragically Hip’s “Bobcaygeon” thown in.  “Saskatchewan” is broody but also great.  “Horses” is intense and goofy at the same time, with someone on the voice modulator doing a computerized “Play that funky music, white boy” recitation.

Torben Wilson from the Buttless Chaps plays drums on “Claire.”  “A Midwinter Night’s Dream” is one of those rare songs that the band throws out once in a while, and it sounds great here.  They invited the crowd on stage to sit around campfire style.

And “Fan Letter to Michael Jackson” is great here too.

It’s a fantastic collection of songs, leading me to think the entire show must have been amazing.

[READ: May 11, 2015] The Strange Library

I saw this book when we were in a bookstore in Denver.  I mentioned it to Sarah and she clearly bought it then and gave it to me for my birthday.

It wasn’t exactly risky because it is by Murakami with art direction and design by Chip Kidd (how could you go wrong?) but the book was shrink wrapped in the store, so you couldn’t flip through it.

Imagine my surprise when the slipcase proved to be not a slipcase at all, but a double flip cover that does not get removed but opens up like a secret document.  And every (or every other) page is chock full of art from Kidd.  My guess is that all of the art is found (rather than created) by Kidd as it appears to be old Japanese pictures and designs.  And they reflect (more or less) the action of the story.

The story itself is one of Murakami’s more surreal ones. (more…)

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Chris Grabenstein–Escape from Mr. Lemoncello’s Library (2013) [audiobook 2014–Jesse Bernstein ]

Posted in Audiobooks, Big Books, Children's Books, Chris Grabenstein, Contests, Funny (ha ha), Games (Non Video), Library Related, Mystery, Technology on November 15, 2014| 1 Comment »

lemocello[LISTENED TO: November 5, 2014] Escape from Mr. Lemoncello’s Library

We were looking for an audiobook for a recent trip and I decided to get Escape from Mr. Lemoncello’s Library.  I didn’t know anything about it, but the title sounded fun, especially for two librarians.

Well, I had no idea how much fun it would be for two librarians (and for others, too, I assure you).

So Mr Lemoncello is a game maker.  He has hundreds and hundreds of board games and in this universe, everyone loves playing them.  In the very first scene, Kyle Keeley and his brothers are playing Mr Lemoncello’s Indoor-Outdoor Scavenger Hunt (which is just what it sounds like).  In an attempt to finally beat his brothers, Kyle tries to sneak back into his house through a basement window (thereby saving the time of going down the stairs.  He inadvertently breaks the window and is grounded or a week (although he did win, so that’s something–and it shows just how intensely they play games in that family).

The next chapter opens up on the finishing touches of the brand new library in Kyle’s town.  Alexandriaville, Ohio has not had a library for 12 years and Mr Lemoncello’s gift to the town is the coolest most state of the art library ever built.  (Seriously, it is practically every librarian’s fantasy library with books and books and books (rooms coded by dewy number) and all kinds of high tech gadgetry to go with it.  I would love to see this place built).

Kyle is bummed about being grounded.  And to make matters worse, he forgot about the extra credit essay contest “Why I am excited about the new public Library.” At the last minute he throws together a lousy essay (which consists of “Balloons. There might be balloons,” and he is laughed at by just about everyone.  But when the essay winners are announced (12 of them), he is the final winner–how could that be? (more…)

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Jason Shiga–Bookhunter (2007)

Posted in "Weird Al" Yankovic, Funny (ha ha), Gangsters, Graphic Novel, Jason Shiga, Kanye West, Library Related, Pharrell Williams, Short Books, Threats, Violence on July 15, 2014| Leave a Comment »

bookhuntSOUNDTRACK: “WEIRD AL” YANKOVIC-“Tacky” (2014).

altacky“Weird Al’s” newest album comes out tomorrow.  In preparation he has created 8 videos, which will be released one a day for 8 days.   The fact that the release day is the same day as the second video bothers my sensibilities, but what does that matter, honestly.

I have pre-ordered the CD, but because of a shipping issue, I likely won’t get it until all of the videos have been released, so I’m going to keep media silence except for the videos.

This is a parody of Pharrell William’s “Happy,” the most ubiquitous and catchy song in recent memory (my son recognized the parody from the opening drum beats).

The video is a star-studded extravaganza all done in (I believe) one take.  The guests include: Aisha Tyler, Margaret Cho, Eric Stonestreet, Kristen Schaal and Jack Black.  All of the stars are dressed crazily as they sing some very funny lines about being “tacky.”  We wondered of course who dressed the stars (was it Al, or did they bring their own–we like to think they brought their own).  There are some very funny lines in the song (the pregnant line, the Kanye West line, the resume in comic sans), and of course, the melody is spot on.

Now that my kids are in school and they are exposed to pop music, I had to wonder if they will know more of the original songs than I do.  We’ll see.

[READ: July 2, 2014] Bookhunter

I enjoyed Shiga’s other books, but I loved this one.

Bookhunter is about a member of the library police.  He doesn’t go after fines, he goes after serious book criminals.

Set in the 1970s (and drawn in a wonderful brown and tan style, Special Agent Bay seeks out those who would censor or steal books.  In the opening scene, Bay and his agents have tracked down a man who has stolen all eight copies of the Oakland Public Library’s “The China Lobby in America.”  After a detailed plan (involving radioactive ink), the agents storm the culprit’s building,  When the suspect threatens to immolate himself and everyone else, Bay hatches a crazy plan straight out of an action movie.  It’s very exciting

The main part of the book though, concerns a book that has been stolen.  Copyrighted 1838, it has been on special display at the Oakland Public Library.  But something’s not right about the book and the library is sure it is a forgery. (more…)

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Henry Bromell–“Honor Bound” (New Yorker, October 11, 2010)

Posted in Agalloch, All Songs Considered, Henry Bromell, Library Related, New Yorker, Set at School, Short Story on January 17, 2011| 2 Comments »

SOUNDTRACK: AGALLOCH-“Into the Painted Grey” (2010).

For this week’s music I ‘m going to look at the Top Ten albums picked by  Lars Gotrich (Viking) on NPR’s All Songs Considered.  Viking loves black metal and drone music, so most of these albums aren’t on a lot of Top Ten Lists.

Agalloch’s Marrow of the Spirit was his number one album of the year.  This is a fascinating song full of ambient guitars and rather beautiful melodies (in the intro).  It is a song of longing and distance.  The guitars intertwine and are quite nice.  Then at almost 2 minutes in (of a 12 minute song), the drums kick in and work as an introduction to the dark metal chords that are forthcoming.

At almost 3 minutes, the vocals come in and this is where they’ll lose most listeners.  The vocals are barely audible demon growls.  And yet they are low in the mix and don’t overpower the song (I have no idea what he’s singing about).

Indeed, the vocals are almost spoken (sounding not unlike Gollum) setting more of a mood than an actual story.  It’s a shame that the vocals are going to turn people off because the rest of the song is rather majestic in scope and tone.  Back when black metal first started, vocals like these were matched to equally sludgy music, but when they’re matched to this kind of progressive, epic music, they feel like another instrument, another addition to the melody.

And the rest of the song is so much more than just standard black metal.  Especially at the five and a half minute mark when all of the noise pulls back and a beautiful guitar riff comes to the fore.  Another great melody break comes again at the 10:30 mark.  They really transcend the genre.

I’ve never heard Agalloch before, but their sense of melody and composition is really top-notch, and even with the vocals, this is a pretty stunning piece of music.  Not for everyone, obviously, but a good choice for Viking’s song of the year.

[READ: December 29, 2010] “Honor Bound”

This is the first of five one-page anecdotes/stories/histories in this issue of The New Yorker that come under the heading of “Something Borrowed.”  I read all five because two of them are by Zadie Smith and Jonathan Franzen.  I haven’t read Henry Bromell before, so I don’t know how representative this story is of his other works.

This anecdote concerns Bromell’s time at a boarding school in Wales.  The school was an old castle (it sounds awesome).  Their library was structured around an honor system; the boys were supposed to write their name down on the list, keep the book for two weeks and then return the book to its place on the shelf.  Since his life had very little structure (he was an army brat and didn’t have a “home”), Bromell began keeping the books from the school’s library (carefully hidden on…the shelves in hid bedroom(!)).  He even put his name on the title page of some of them.

(more…)

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Periodical: Public Libraries

Posted in Authors, Books about writers, Essays, Free Speech, Graphic Novel, LGBTQ, Library Related, Poetry, Public Libraries, Research, Romance, Sci-fi, Short Books, Smarty Pants, Technology on October 25, 2009| Leave a Comment »

pla

Although entire issues are available in PDF, I could find no cover images online.

Public Libraries is the magazine you get when you belong to the Public Library Association, a division of the American Library Association.  As you might gather, this division is for public librarians.

Like American Libraries, this magazine starts with a letter from the President of PLA.    But it’s the Tales from the Front section that I look at first.  This section discusses interesting events at public libraries around the country (Libraries using solar panels or digital bookmobiles, or even successful programs that other may wish to emulate). (more…)

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