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Archive for the ‘Magazines’ Category

*Five Dials 18: Sybille Bedford: On the Centenary of Her Birth (16 March 2011)

Posted in Aliette Martin, Books about writers, Death Cab For Cutie, Drinking, Five Dials, Food, Jonathan Safran Foer, Richard Todd, Stars, Sybille Bedford on August 20, 2011| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: STARS-Live at the 9:30 Club, Washington DC, October 20, 2007 (2007).

Thanks NPR for this unexpected concert.  Unexpected because Stars is a wonderful band but I think they’re largely unknown (I could be wrong about that, but it’s not like you hear them on the radio or anything). 

This show was during a tour for In Our Bedrooms After the War, which was one of the best albums of the year as far as I’m concerned.  

It’s an intimate album, with all kinds of styles in it: whispered confessions, dancey pop songs, synthy tracks and also some solid alternative rock.  The unifying theme for Stars is beautiful, often super catchy songs that are filled with melancholy and sadness (and occasionally, hope: “at least…the war is over”).  But the key to their beauty is the wonderful harmonies that the singers give us.

Musically the things that surprised me most during this show were the singers’ speaking voices.  Torquil Campbell’s speaking voice is quite a high register and yet his singing voice is low and soothing.  The opposite is true for the other singer, Amy Millan who has a kind of gruff peaking voice but whose singing voice soars to the heavens.  It’s fascinating.  Torquil is also a gushing frontman, thanking the audience so much for coming and even asking “Don’t your friends have bands that are playing whose shows you should be at right now?”  He also thanks Ben and the rest of Death Cab for Cutie for being so very nice to them.  A very nice chap it seems.

The bands sounds quite good live, but my only problem with the show is that as i mentioned, Stars’ music is very intimate, sometime whisper-quiet, and it doesn’t always translate very well in a live setting (even a relatively small club like the 9:30 Club).  Sometimes it feels like they’re singing too loudly to match the music.  Now, it’s entirely possibly that this doesn’t come across when you see them live, that this soundboard recording picks up every flaw. 

Despite that, there’s undeniable energy here and some really great moments where the bands switches direction at the drop of a hat.  And, overall, this is an excellent introduction to the wonder that is Stars’ music (or a big treat for established fans).

[READ: July 25, 2011] Five Dials 18

Five Dials 18 is unique in the history of the journal.  This entire issue is given over to the memory of SYBILLE BEDFORD.  It is written by ALIETTE MARTIN (there’s not even a Letter for the Editor).

Martin writes about Bedford’s love of wine and fine food.  It was pretty funny to read about her detailed love of meat after reading all of the vegetarianism promoted in the Five Dials news pages (Jonathan Safran Foer’s Eating Animals was just published by Hamish Hamilton). (more…)

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Douglas Coupland–Microserfs (1995)

Posted in Airlines, All Songs Considered, Canadian Content, Consumerism, Corporate skewering, David Foster Wallace, Death, Douglas Coupland, Environmentalism, Fears, Funny (ha ha), Gilligan's Island, Kate Bush, Marriage Trouble, Melrose Place, Pranks, Premiere, Ra Ra Riot, Religion, Technology, The Future, Travel, TSA, Video Games, Virginity (Loss of), Work on August 19, 2011| 2 Comments »

SOUNDTRACK: RA RA RIOT-Live at the Black Cat, Washington DC,  October 12, 2008 (2008).

I really like Ra Ra Riot’s album The Rhumb Line, and this concert is basically a showcase for that album.  There’ s an interview at the end of the show (all downloadable from NPR), in which the  band says that critics raved about their live show as much as their album.

I don’t really hear that the show is more energetic than the album (maybe visually they are wild), but it did sound fantastic.  It’s amazing to hear a rock band that is dominated by strings–the cello and violin are often louder than the guitar (but not in a competing/drown you out kind of way,  more of a strings do the melodies and the guitar adds bulk to the sound).

I always enjoy hearing a band that is grateful to their audience for showing up (this is most evident in young bands, who seem so much more genuine about their love of the audience) and Ra Ra Riot are certainly that .  They seem genuinely surprised at the turn out, and they play a great set accordingly.

There are two songs that aren’t on the album here “A Manner to Act” and the encore “Everest.”  They both feel like they came off the album, which bodes well for their second album, Orchard, which just came out in May.  Ra Ra Riot also do a great cover of the obscure Kate Bush song “Suspended in Gaffa.”  At the end of the show they tack on a cover of “Hounds of Love.”  Lead singer Wesley Miles has a wonderfully strong voice and he can reach some pretty high notes–not soprano or anything like that, just strong enough to be able to pull off a Kate Bush cover.

This is a great show.  And when you read about the tragedy they suffered just as they were starting to take off, their obsession with death may not be so surprising.  I’m looking forward to Orchard.

[READ: 1995 and August 18, 2011] Microserfs

After reading Life After God and thinking about Microserfs, I looked up Coupland’s bibliography and saw that indeed Microserfs came next.  And I was really excited to read it.  I have recently watched the JPod TV show and I knew that JPod was a kind of follow-up to Microserfs, so I wanted to see how much of it rang true.  And I’ve got to say that I really rather enjoyed this book.

While I was reading this, I started taking notes about what was happening in the book.  Not the plot, which is fairly straightforward, but about the zeitgeisty elements in the book.  And, since I’m a big fan of David Foster Wallace, I was also noting how many zeitgeisty things this book had in common with Infinite Jest.  I’m thinking of tying it all together in a separate post, maybe next week.  But I’ll mention a few things here.

My son also loved the cover of this book because it has a Lego dude on it and he has been really getting into Lego lately.

So Microserfs is the story of a bunch of underpaid, overworked coders who work for Microsoft.  The book is written as the journal of Daniel Underwood (Coupland still hadn’t really branched out of the first person narrative style, but the journal does allow for some interesting insights).  The story begins in Fall 1993.  I felt compelled to look up some ancient history to see what was happening in the computer world circa 1993 just for context.  In 1991, Apple released System 7.   In 1993, Windows introduced Windows NT, Intel released the first Pentium chip, Myst was released and Wired magazine launched.  In 1994, Al Gore coined the term Information Superhighway.  Yahoo is created.  The Netscape browser is introduced.  So we’re still in computer infancy here.  It’s pretty far-seeing of DC to write about this.

Daniel works at Microsoft with several friends.  Daniel is a bug tester, Michael (who has an office, not a cube) is a coder, Todd (a bodybuilder) is a bug tester.  There’s also Susan (smart and independent), Abe (secret millionaire) and Bug Barbecue (an old man–he’s like 35).  The five of them live in a house on “campus.”  There’s also Karla (a type A bossyboots who doesn’t like seeing time wasted) who works with them but lives up the street.

As the story opens, Michael has just received a flame email from Bill Gates himself and has locked himself in his office.  This leads to a very funny scene and ongoing joke in which the office mates feed slide two-dimensional food under his door and he vows to eat only things that are flat. (more…)

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Lauren Groff–“Above and Below” (New Yorker, June 13 & 20, 2011)

Posted in Air, Constellation Records, Huh?, Lauren Groff, New Yorker, Short Story, Tindersticks on August 18, 2011| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: TINDERSTICKS: Falling Down a Mountain [CST065] (2010).

Another Tindersticks album comes out from Constellation!  This one features a bit more dissonance than I’m used to hearing from them.  Not crazy noisy dissonance, just sprinkles of it that make the album feel slightly askew: horns that are abrasive, strings that are foreboding and even Stuart Staples usually mellow singing is filled with vibrato (!) at times.

The opening song is an unusual track: a six and a half minute mostly instrumental which ends with some repeated chanting/singing of the title.   Given that this is the Tindertsicks, a band which at this point is possibly known more for its soundtrack work than anything else, it’s not all that surprising to hear an instrumental from them, but there’s something about the structure of the song that sounds different for them–it’s a slow builder with lots of horns. It’s really cool.

“Keep You Beautiful” is a slow, quiet number.  A beautiful showcase of that side of Tindersticks–harmonies and melodies aplenty.  “Harmony Around My Table” is a beautiful shuffling song which sounds like classic Tindersticks.  The twist is that Stuart kind of vamps around the end of the song.  It’s a catchy number with lovely backing vocals and some cool lyrics ( “I found a penny, I picked it up / The other day I had some luck / That was two weeks last Tuesday / Since then there’s been a sliding feeling.” ).

“Peanuts” is a sweet duet with the elusive Mary Margaret O’Hara it has some very sweet lyrics: “You say you love peanuts / I don’t care that much / I know you love peanuts / And I love you / So I love peanuts too.”

“She Rode Me Down” is the best song on the album and one of their best songs in a long time. It features some great mariachi style rhythms (handclaps, castanets, a flute) and wonderful brass section.  There’s also a nifty bass string (viola?) that adds an unexpected melody line.   There’s also the fun to sing bridge: “she rode me, she rode me, she rode me.”

“Hubbards Hill” is an actual instrumental.  It reminds me a bit of an acoustic Air song, all moody and tense.  “Black Smoke” has some creepy violins and Staples’ slightly askew vocals–he seems to be really straining, and it ends up with a wavery vibrato.  “Factory Girls” is a slow, delicate piano song.  It’s similar to some of their older songs, but it seems even more quiet than usual.  The final track, “Piano Music” is a great instrumental.  It’s slow and melancholy with some wonderful piano sprinklings throughout.

Again it’s hard to be surprised by anything Tindersticks do, their output is so varied, but this disc has some real surprises to it.  It’s not unusual for Tindersticks to create instrumentals (they do all those films scores after all, but I kind of associate the band with Staples’ voice.  That there are almost three instrumentals here is unexpected.  It feels like a transitional record, as if perhaps their next one will totally kick ass.   But at the same time, this one is really good too.

[READ: August 1, 2011] “Above and Below”

This story was surprisingly long.  It just seemed to keep going and going.  And that was fine, except that the story was basically about a girl who seemed to fall hard on her luck and then find some kind of circumstance that picked her back up again. And then up and down and then up and down.  Dumb luck seemed to keep her from hitting rock bottom.

So anyway, the main character (unnamed as far as I recall) was until recently a TA in Florida.  When she lost her job, and her funding, she decided to say “the hell with it all.”  She took the last few items she had, piled into her station wagon and took off.  She called her mom and told her not to worry, that she’d call again when she got settled.  Of course, her mom is kind of spacey and unresponsive and the narrator hates her stepdad, so the actually calling part may not really have been that high a priority.

First, she stays in her car until she eventually shoved off by the police.  She finds a new beach and a hotel with a gym where she can shower.  She basically has no intention of doing anything.  She should hit rock bottom but then the first of the unreasonable coincidences occurs: “She was baking on the beach when a leaf slid up over her stomach.  She caught idly at it, and found that it wasn’t a leaf at all but a five-dollar bill.”  Really?  A five dollar bill?  We should all that happen to us.  My suspicions were immediately raised by that detail, although I let it pass. (more…)

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Colson Whitehead–Zone One (2011) [prepub]

Posted in Anarchy, Canadian Music, Colson Whitehead, Consumerism, Dave Eggers, Death, Depression, Dystopia, End of the World, Harper's, Kiss, Rush, The Future, Threats, Violence, Zombies on August 16, 2011| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: RUSH-The Fifth Order of Angels (bootleg from the Agora Ballroom,Cleveland, 26 August 1974) (1974).

I have mentioned this concert before, but I played it again today, and was struck by a couple of things.

1) According to the liner notes, Neil Peart had been in the band about two weeks.  How did they decide that their new drummer was going to be doing a drum solo during the show?  I mean, by now, everyone knows that the solo is its own song.  But, he’s been in the band two weeks.  It’s obvious he’s a good drummer, better than their original drummer, but a drum solo?  Is that just what rock bands did back then?

2) I’m struck by how much this show sounds like early Kiss.  I never really thought that  their first album sounded like Kiss, but in this live setting, a number of the songs, or perhaps just  the way they are recorded make me think of early Kiss.  In particular, during the crazy “one, two, three, FOUR!” of “In the End,” when the guitars kick back in, it sounds like a Kiss show from circa Alive!.

3) It’s amazing how guitar-centric the band was back then.  The mix is a little rough so it’s not entirely clear how insane Geddy is on the bass (when he gets a few solo notes, the bass sounds really tinny).  But the concert is like a showcase for Alex’s solos.  True, the whole first album really demonstrates what a great soloist he is, but it’s really evident here that Alex was the star.

4) Their earlier songs are really not very good.   I mean, every Rush fan knows that the first album is almost not even a real Rush album, but it’s shocking how pedestrian these songs are compared to even what would show up on Fly By Night.  Still, circa 1974 I’ll bet this show kicked ass.

It’s available here.

UPDATE: The missing content has been added!

[READ: August 9, 2011] Zone One

After reading the excerpt from Zone One in Harper’s I decided it was time to read the book (which is due to be published in October).

I admit I haven’t read Whitehead’s other works, but I have read excerpts, and I thought I knew the kind of things he wrote.  So it came as a huge surprise when the excerpt ended the way it did. I didn’t want to spoil anything when I wrote the review of the excerpt, but since the entire book is set in the dystopian future and since it explain what has happened right on the back, I can say that Zone One is set in the aftermath of a kind of zombie apocalyptic plague.  And I can’t help but wonder if the rousing success of McCarthy’s The Road has more or less opened up the field of literature to more post apocalyptic, dare I say, zombie fiction.  [I haven’t read The Road, so there will be no comparisons here].

Actually there will be one.  Sarah read The Road and complained that you never learned just what the hell started the end of the world.  Indeed, in this book you don’t either.  There is an event called Last Night, and after that, there’s simply the current state of affairs.  I suppose you don’t really need to know, and since the story is all about dealing with the zombies, I guess it doesn’t really matter how it all started, but I think we’d all like to know.

Now what makes this story different from the typical zombie story is that for the most part there aren’t all that many zombies (or whatever these undead people are called) in the story.  There are some of course, and they are inconvenient to the main characters, but unlike a story like Zombieland, (which was awesome) or the more obvious Night of the Living Dead, the story isn’t really about fighting zombies, it’s more about the rebuilding of the country in a post-zombie world. (more…)

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Arthur Bradford–various nonfictions (1997-2010)

Posted in Adventure, Alessandro Manzoni, Andrew WK, Another Magazine, Arthur Bradford, Avery Corman, Cathleen Schine, Charles Portis, Cheap Trick, Clive James, Daredevils, Dave Eggers, David Rakoff, Elizabeth Gilbert, Essays, Funny (ha ha), Funny (strange), Homelessness, How's Your News?, John Fowles, Luigi Barzini, Maile Meloy, Memoirs, Men's Journal, Miriam Toews, nerve.com, Powder, ReadyMade, Robert James Waller, Ryunosuke Akutagawa, Skiing, The Austin Chronicle, The Believer, The New York Times, The Portland Mercury, Travel, Vice, Weezer, Wells Tower on August 14, 2011| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: WEEZER-Raditude (2009).

I didn’t buy this Weezer album when it came out because I had heard really bad things about it (like the “guests”), but when I saw it cheap I decided to check it out.  This has to be the most polarizing Weezer album of them all.  I listened to it twice yesterday.  The first time I thought I had been too harsh on it.  The second time I thought it was godawful.  It’s amazing what a couple of hours can do.

It opens with a wonderful bit of poppy wordplay ala Cheap Trick: “(If You’re Wondering If I Want You To) I Want You To.”  It’s catchy as anything and is a wonderful start to the album, even if it is probably their poppiest song ever.  From there though, the album really degenerates.  And mostly it’s because it’s so dumb.  I mean the album title should tell you what you’re in for, but who would have expected the moronic sub-pop-metal of “The Girl Got Hot” or even the reprehensible lyrics of “I’m Your Daddy” “You are my baby tonight And I’m your daddy.”  It’s just creepy.  Or gah, a song about the mall?  “In the Mall.”  It’s not even worth mocking.  And really, try to picture Rivers Cuomo in a mall.  Any mall.

But nothing could prepare anyone for “Can’t Stop Partying.”  Unlike Andrew WK’s ouvre, which is so sincere about partying that you can’t take it seriously, this song really seems to be about the guys partying.  It’s laughable.  The anemic rap but Li’l Wayne certainly doesn’t help.

Even the collaboration with Indian musicians on “Love is the Answer” (yes, seriously) doesn’t really work.  It feels like they wrote the song and then said, “Hey let’s throw some sitar on it.”  It’s not enough to be exciting but too much to ignore.

This is not to say that these songs aren’t catchy.  I mean, geez, I still have “Can’t Stop Partying” in my head while I’m listening to something else.   Rivers knows how to write a pop trifle.  And the more he writes songs like this, it makes me thing that Pinkerton was the fluke.  Which is fine. The music world needs poppy songs, right?

[READ: early August 2011] various nonfictions

I thought about doing individual posts for all of Arthur Bradford’s non-fiction that’s available on his website (that’s right,  yet another author that I have read short uncollected pieces by without having read any of his bigger works–I’m looking at you Wells Tower).  Bradford has links to all of his nonfiction ( I assume) on his website.  There are 12 links in total.  One is to his blog (which I’m not reviewing).  The rest are for articles covering a pretty broad array of topics from a pretty broad variety of sources.  (more…)

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Five Dials Number 17: In Jaipur (23 January 2011)

Posted in Abha Dawesar, Arranged Marriage, Books about writers, Craig Taylor, Culture Shock, Death, Essays, Faiza Sultan Khan, Five Dials, Henning Mankell, James Kelman, Kamila Shamsie, Leila Abouela, Live from the Artist's Den, M.K. Gandhi, Manju Kapur, Namita Devidayal, Patrick French, Robert Johnsson, Roma Tearne, Simon Prosser, Tishani Doshi, Tori Amos on August 13, 2011| 1 Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: TORI AMOS-Live from the Artist’s Den (2010).

I think my relationship with Tori Amos has come to an end.  I haven’t enjoyed her more recent albums all that much lately, but I was excited to see that this live and intimate set was on PBS.  After all, it was just her with a piano and what turned out to be a really cheesy organ.

I was pretty thrilled by the setlist, which goes all the way back to her debut album (with “Girl” and “China”).  I was even more excited to hear “Bells for Her” one of my favorite songs by her and even “Concertina” one of her more mellow tracks that worked well for this show which was primarily mellow songs.

There were a lot of newer songs which I don’t know that well, and a few newer songs which I know okay.   I don’t love her newer stuff, but I was even disappointed with the presentation of her older songs.  She has definitely taken on a new technique where she reeeeeaaaaaalllllllllyyyyy streeeeeeeeeeeetches the songs out. And, as I’ve complained on other recent posts, she mis-pronounces or mis-enunciates words that she used to say perfectly fine.  I find it maddening.

It took me two days to watch this 50 minute show because I kept falling asleep.  Gadzooks.

Now I totally respect an artist’s desire to change her songs.  Indeed, there are some live versions of her songs that I have enjoyed more than the originals.  But there’s something about the way these are drawn out that it feels like the life has been sucked from them.  The melody of “Ruby Through the Looking Glass” loses its impact when it is slowed down so much.

I’m also really disappointed with the synth that she chose.  Synthesizers can make any sound in the world, so why did they program this keyboard to play utterly anemic strings?  The conclusion of “Girl” which is so dramatic on record actually sounds worse with the thin washes than it would if it were played on just piano.

And as for the way she sings words now…  “Bells for Her” to give just one example, has her mangling the word “you” so that when she sings “not even you” we get something like “not even yaow” which I don’t understand.  I mean, listen to the awesome live version on To Venus and Back–she didn’t used to do that.  So wha happa?

I used to think that I liked her solo better.  I always enjoyed the little quiet time section of the concerts when she would play a song or two by herself.  But I feel like now, when she’s by herself, she loses any sense of editing.  The band seemed to keep her on pace.  And it’s a shame to see her drift so much.

Because Tori was an important part of my music youth, I’ll give her one more chance–she has a new album due out reasonably soon, but I’m not holding out much hope for it.   I think we may just be on very different planes of existence anymore.

[READ: July 19, 2011] Five Dials Number 17

The brevity of the Christmas issue is followed up by the somewhat longer Five Dials Number 17.  (This issue also has 7 pages of photos at the end of the issue).  I admit I didn’t know where Jaipur was (it’s sort of north west-ish in India, not terribly far from New Delhi).

This is also the first issue of 2011 (I’m nearly caught up!).  So the issue opens with New Year’s Resolutions.  The letter is also from editors, plural, for a change.

CRAIG TAYLOR & SIMON PROSSER-Letter from the Editors
The letter opens with some enjoyably self-deprecating comments about resolutions (and how they made theirs now, instead of at the end of the year).  But what I enjoyed most was the collective list of resolutions that the entire staff made.  They are listed as one person, which makes for wonderfully contradictory resolutions.  I was particularly pleased by: “stop making that face when my brother makes a suggestion.” (more…)

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Robert Coover–“Matinée” (New Yorker, July 25, 2011)

Posted in Funny (strange), Huh?, Meta, New Yorker, Robert Coover, The Skinny Boys, Workaholics on August 12, 2011| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: THE SKINNY BOYS-“Jockbox” (1986).

I didn’t realize that the theme song from Workaholics was from a real song.  I loved the “I’m fresh” bit in the show, but I thought it sounded like it might actually be from something.  Sure enough, the internet led me to this.  The Skinny Boys (evidently a response to The Fat Boys) from the hip hop mecca of Bridgeport, CT put out this beatbox song (with that cool sci-fi keybaord) as a shocase for their member: The Human Jock Box.

This is a pretty bizarre track.  And I’m not even sure what they’re talking about.  But I love the hiccups around the three minute mark.  Note also how by the end of the song, the keyboard plays the riff from Herbie Hancock’s “Rockit” and then a little later “America the Beautiful” (with accompanying beatbox).  Wha??

The Workaholics bit is from 1:13 to 1:23.  You gotta be fresh!

[READ: July 25, 2011] “Matinée”

I’m not going to say how I just don’t get Coover.  Every time I read one of his stories I think the same thing: it’s clever but, well, so wha?  I know that Coover is an experimental fiction writer, but I just feel that there’s no emotional resonance to his stories.  Perhaps I like experiemntal art and music but not fiction.

There were some really cool tricks with this story.  All of the (unnamed–don’t get attached to them) characters are watching movies or are in the movies.  And so, in a series of what, infinite regresses? chance encounters? something, new characters are introduced, they watch a film (possibly of the people who were watching them?) they may or may not have sex and then the “camera” shifts to a new couple. (more…)

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Justin Torres–“Reverting to a Wild State” (New Yorker, August 1, 2011)

Posted in Buffalo Tom, Hüsker Dü, Justin Torres, LGBTQ, New Yorker, Sex, Short Story, The Afghan Whigs on August 11, 2011| 1 Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: BUFFALO TOM-Birdbrain (1990).

If Buffalo Tom’s first album was a kind of punky Hüsker Dü album (which I contend it was), their second album switches gears towards the Afghan Whigs.  In other words, they still have a raw punky feel, but they’ve added more textures and melodies to the proceedings.

And while Janovitz’ voice is still loud and bold, rather than the screamy sound of say Bob Mould, he’s got a more nuanced sound like Greg Dulli (for some of the disc, anyway).  I notice this especially on the second track “Skeleton Key” which sounds like it could be an outtake from an Afghan Whigs session (it’s not as a good as a typical Whigs song, however).  You can hear more of those Dulli-notes on “The Guy Who is Me.”

The songwriting is somewhat more comlex overall.  The title track “Birdbrain” is catchy not only in the verse, but the chorus is a wonderful surpise–really redirecting the momentum of the song.  Despite some variants in texture and pacing, the disc still retains that raw punk sound of the first.

The album feels kind of long to me, though (and not because there are two acoustic songs tacked on at the end).  At almost 5 minutes, “Enemy” is way too long.  And by the end of the album, some of the sameiness that was eveident on the debut has crept into this disc as well.  The last few songs in particualr seem to have a lot of that screaming voice over a fairly simple riff thing going on.

The cover of the Psyhedeclic Furs’ “Heaven” in a live aocustic setting is a nice change, but really should have been laced around track 7 or 8 to minimize redundancy.  The last track is a live acoustic version of the tenth song off their first album.  How odd to resurrect a very deep album cut in this way.  But, again, at almost 5 minutes (two minutes longer than the original), it just doesn’t hold up.

There are signs of change here, but they won’t become fully evident until their next album, Let Me Come Over.

[READ: July 29, 2011] “Reverting to a Wild State”

This story plays around with a timeline, but not in a crazy way–in other words, the story is out of sequence, but it’s not a gimmick.

In Part 3, we see the narrator “cleaning” a rich man’s apartment, in his underwear.  We have no real context for him or what he’s doing, but it’s an amusing little section, and ends with him seeming content.

In Part 2, we see the narrator fighting with Justin, the man who we learn was his boyfiorned.  They broke up, but are in a diner having what seems like a final hash-out. (more…)

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Colson Whitehead–“Last Night” (Harper’s, July 2011)

Posted in Colson Whitehead, Death, Excerpt, Gambling, Harper's, Primus, Set in New Jersey!, Zombies on August 9, 2011| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: PRIMUS-June 2010 Rehearsal (2010).

Just when I was convinced that Primus were a done deal, I learned that they were not only touring but had just released a free downloadable EP of their recent rehearsals.  It’s got 4 songs: two super oldies, 1 pretty oldie and one not terribly old one (these designations are in terms of albums releases, not length of time ago, as they would all be old ones by that reckoning).

The two oldies are my favorites: “Pudding Time” sounds wonderful–a few updates, and slight improv things, but basically that’s the song that introduced me to Primus.  “Harold of the Rocks” is the other one.  I love Harold, because it is such a weird, crazy song (even by Primus standards).  Lyrically, it’s about some guys who meet the fabled Harold of the Rocks.  Sometime later the narrator meets Harold again.  Harold is currently lit up like an old Christmas Tree and he tells the narrator that he doesn’t remember much about what happened that night.  And that’s pretty much it.  It even mentions Schooly D!  Great stuff.

The other two songs are “American Life” which comes from Sailing the Seas of Cheese.  It’s a deep cut as opposed to the more obvious single, “Jerry was a Race Car Driver.”  It’s nice to hear that song again, as it wasn’t very high-profile, although it is surprising to me that it’s 3 minutes longer than the original.  “Duchess and the Proverbial Mind Spread” is from The Brown Album, an album I don’t know all that well.  It’s got some good stuff in it, including a pretty good solo from Ler.

This EP features the drumming of Jay Lane, who was in Primus even before “Herb” (who I miss very much) and was in Sausage.  “Herb” by the way, was in A Perfect Circle and THE BLUE MAN GROUP!  Holy cowboys!

Primus sucks!

[READ: July 25, 2011] “Last Night”

This is an excerpt from Zone One, a book Colson Whitehead signed for me at BEA (I really must read it one of these days).

The story opens with something happening on Last Night.  It’s a little confusing, and since no context is provided, it doesn’t make all that much sense until the very end of the excerpt which (the end) blew my mind.

The story concerns Mark Spitz–not Mark Spitz the swimmer (or maybe it is Mark Spitz the swimmer–again, no context), –a teenager who goes to Atlantic City with his friend Kyle.  And for the most part, the story is pretty tame, almost dull (but Whitehead is a great writer and he invigorates what could have been a pretty typical Atlantic City gambling weekend).  The boys gamble, get comped and basically don’t leave the casino for the duration of their stay.

What I love about the story is that little things, meaningless sentences like, “They did not watch the news nor receive news from the outside” [when you are on a casino weekend with buddies you do not check the news] seem innocuous–like little details that would fill out any story.  It’s only later that… (more…)

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Five Dials Number 16: Things We Found in the Snow (20 November 2010)

Posted in 1984, A Clockwork Orange, Anton Chekhov, Canadian Music, Craig Taylor, Damon Albarn, Five Dials, Francesco Pacifico, Heathecote Williams, Holidays, Julie Doucet, Peter McDonald, Pink Floyd, Poetry, Short Story, The Dears on August 6, 2011| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: THE DEARS-Degeneration Street (2011).

I’ve loved The Dears for a long time now.  And yet with every new album I feel like I have to prepare myself for what’s to come.  And with every release I’m a little disappointed when I first play it.  Maybe for the next release I’ll realize what my problem is–The Dears do not stand up to cursory, casual listening.  They demand attention.  If you put them on as background music, you miss everything.  So when I finally gave Degeneration Street some attention, I realized how great it is.

The Dears write emotional songs that are fairly straightforward.  But the magic of their music comes in the layers of ideas and sounds that they put on each track.  And of course, there’s Murray Lightburn’s voice.  He sounds like Damon Albarn if Damon Albarn could sustain a note for a long time–could emote with his voice.  Now I happen to like Damon Albarn quite a lot, but Lightburn can really just out-sing him.  It’s wonderful.

“Omega Dog” opens with an electronic drumbeat, eerie keyboards and skittery guitars.  When the vocals come in–falsettoed and earnest, you don’t anticipate the full harmonies in the forthcoming chorus that lead to an almost R&B sound.  Not bad for the first 80 seconds of a song.  That the song is actually 5 minutes long and by minute 3, it sounds like an entirely different song is even more testament to the versatility of The Dears (check out the harpsichord solo that more or less ends the song).

“5 Chords” is a chugging anthem, a song with potential to be a hit (but which of course never will).  I find myself constantly singing the infectious chorus of “Blood”: “Since I was a baby I have always been this way; I could see you coming from a million miles away.”  Or the excellent chorus of “Thrones” “Plucking our eyes out, turning to stone, give up on heaven, give up the throne.”

“Lamentation” mixes things up with a slower pace and backing vocals that come straight out of Pink Floyd (any era really, but probably more of their later albums).  It adds an amazing amount of depth.  “Galactic Tides” has more Floydian stuff–the guitar solo (and the instrumental break) are really out of mid 70s Floyd–more backing vocals again).

Follow all of this intensity with the super poppy “Yesteryear”. It’s got an upbeat swing to it: happy bouncy chords and an inscrutable chorus: “What’s the word I’m looking for; It starts with ‘M’ and ends with ‘Y'”  It’s followed by the more sinister “Stick w/Me Kid,” in which Lightburn shows off his bass range.  There’s an awesome guitar riff in “Tiny Man,” simple and mournful that sticks with you long after it’s over.

The last couple of songs don’t really live up to the excitement of the first ten or so.  But the final song brings back the drama, with a swelling chorus and soaring vocals.  The Dears have managed to do it again, an emotional album that comes really close to being a concept album yet with none of the pretensions that that implies. 

[READ: July 13, 2011] Five Dials Number 16

Five Dials Number 16 is a brief Christmas Present from Five Dials.  The issue even seems longer than it is because the last ten pages are photos from the Five Dials launch party in Montreal.  The photo essay, titled In Montreal, includes local scenery and (unnamed) people photographed by ANNIKA WADDELL and SIMON PROSSER.

That leaves only 7 pages of text: The Editor’s Note, a look at London, a Christmas Poem and a short story from Anton Chekov.  And there’s another cool illustration from JULIE DOUCET

CRAIG TAYLOR-Letter from the Editor
Taylor thanks Montreal for their warm welcome (despite the crash course in what Wind Chill actually means).  He also hopes we enjoy the Christmas offerings contained within: the traditional Christmas poem and the Chekov story. (more…)

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