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Archive for the ‘Memoirs’ Category

T. Cooper–Real Man Adventures (2012)

Posted in Chris Pureka, Dynasty Handbag, Eminem, Fears, Geo Wyeth, Girls Against Boys, Hem, Indigo Girls, Marriage (Happy), Marty Cooper & The Rifters, McSweeney's, Memoirs, Our Lady J., Peg Hambright, Rick Moody, Rocco Katastrophe, Sarah McLachlan, Scott McCloud, Scott Miller & The Commonwealth, Sexism, Short Books, Soce the Elemental Wizard, T. Cooper, The Julie Ruin, Threats, Thunderegg, Transgender, Violence on May 16, 2014| Leave a Comment »

tcoop-realmanSOUNDTRACK: REAL MAN ADVENTURES: A Collection of (Mostly) Original Songs by (Entirely) Original Artists–All Inspired by the Book. (An Album! A Book! A Shark!) (2012).

realcdThis soundtrack came with my copy of the book, although it can be ordered separately as well.  It is a varied collection of music in many different genres.  The one thread is that many of the performers are either transgendered or are openly gay or some variation in between.  And lyrically the songs are based on chapters from the book (some literal and others use the book as a jumping off point).  No one can be expected to enjoy the whole disc (the musical styles are just too different), but there’s some really enjoyable and interesting music here.

 OUR LADY J. “Picture of a Man” (live)
I’d never heard of Our Lady J., but she is a transgendered classical singer and has worked with some of the greats in theater. The song opens with a piano solo for one minute.  It acts as an introduction to this theatrical piece (with big backing vocals) about what a man “really” looks like. I love the diversity in this song. It gets really big and quite over the top.

RICK MOODY-“The Closest I Ever Came to Writing a Poem”
Yes, writer Rick Moody wrote this thoughtful song. The music is simple, stark piano with Moody singing gently. It’s quite pretty.

SOCE, THE ELEMENTAL WIZARD-“He Will”
This is a rap song (in the style of Eminem), which addresses Cooper’s troubles with  getting a passport (the lyrics are taken mostly from the book). The rapper has fast flow and the lyrics are complex and interesting, although I don’t really like his delivery that much.  Still, it’s a great lyrical song. Soce is one of the few openly gay rappers.

T. COOPER & PEG HAMBRIGHT-“Interlude: high School”
A 34 second piano, well, interlude with words from the book.

HEM-“The Beautiful Sea”
This is a pretty song, reminiscent of Sarah McLachlan. Hem have a bit more oomph than Sarah, but are equally as pretty. This song was way too short.

THUNDEREGG-“The Guest Star of the Rest Stop”
This is a country(ish) song, with a vaguely out of tune guitar and slow droning vocals. I’d not heard of them before but I see they have dozens of records out. At 5 minutes, I found this one a little long.

T. COOPER & PEG HAMBRIGHT-“Interlude: College”
Another simple piano melody with words from the book.

SCOTT MILLER & THE COMMONWEALTH-“12th Man”
Another country song, this one about (not) playing football (always being the 12th man). It’s a sweet and sad song. Miller also has a number of albums out even though I’ve not heard of him either.

GEO WYETH-“Target Practice”
This song starts as a weird electronic track with sampled voices and then it morphs into a spare keyboard track with Wyeth’s kind of high vocals. It reminds me a bit of the Mountain Moats, but with keyboards instead of guitar. And I don’t like it as much.

CHRIS PUREKA-“Old Photographs”
Pureka has a lot of albums out too (and I thought I knew music). She is a delicate folksinger (until she really starts belting out the words at the end) reminding me of one half of the Indigo Girls. This was a really good, rather dark song.

DYNASTY HANDBAG-“One Man”
This is a sinister electronic/rap song detailing the fears of violence in the trans community.  Dynasty Handbag seems to be a loose cannon with some very interesting videos out there.  Definitely check her out.

T. COOPER & PEG HAMBRIGHT-“Interlude: My 20s”
This interlude is done on accordion.

THE JULIE RUIN “Girls Like Us” (Vag Vocal Version).
This is Kathleen Hannah’s band The Julie Ruin with special guest Vaginal Crème Davis (possibly not her given name) on vocals. Davis’ vocals are way over the top, but surprisingly not that different from the originals’ mocking tone (and cheesy synths).

SCOTT McCLOUD-“On My Darker Days”
McCloud is in Girls Against Boys.  This song is dark electric guitar (very processed) with virtually no percussion. The vocals are whispered as well.  I enjoyed the beginning but then felt it was a little samey and felt a little long even though it’s only 3 minutes.

ROCCO KATASTROPHE-“F.E.A.R.”
Katastrophe is a rapper (one of the first openly transgendered). His flow is strong and his lyrics are great. I don’t care for his backing music that much.  For although it is appropriately ominous, it feels a bit anemic.

MARTY COOPER WITH THE RIFTERS-“May You Always Ride in the Sunlight”
This sounds like an old timey cowboy song (I can’t find much else about Marty Cooper).  It’s a sweet song that would fit well at the end of any mix cd of good feeling songs. Even if you don’t like the genre, it’s hard not to like this song.

So this proves to be an interesting mix of songs, with a lot of ne (to me) artists.

[READ: May 1, 2014] Real Man Adventures

I didn’t know T. Cooper before receiving this book from McSweeney’s.  Cooper has written several novels although I didn’t recognize any of them when I looked them up (Lipshitz 6 sounds familiar though).  This book is a memoir.

What’s interesting is that Cooper talks about trying very hard to avoid reviewers referencing his past, and yet with this memoir he has completely outed himself.  I was going to try to not write about his past out of deference to his preferences, but since this memoir is all about his past it’s impossible not to.

So, if you know T. Cooper’s writing and you don’t want to know anything about his past, stop reading this and don’t read the book.

I know that I’ve made that enticing, which I didn’t mean to do.  And who knows, maybe fans of his writing already know this. (more…)

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Amy Fusselman–8 (2007) [reissued 2013]

Posted in Amy Fusselman, Babies, Black Ox Orkestar, Canadian Music, Constellation Records, Godspeed You Black Emperor, Marriage (Happy), McSweeney's, Memoirs, Short Books on May 13, 2014| Leave a Comment »

8 SOUNDTRACK: BLACK OX ORKESTAR-Nisht Azoy [CST038] (2006).

cst038webOn the second (and so far final) Black Ox Orkestar album, the songs are longer and the whole disc has a more polished feel.

It feels less like friends gathered on a night for music (which is what the first one seemed like) and more like a band playing the music in the studio.  There’s more precision in the instrumentation and more instrumentation overall.  The voices,  like on “Bukharian” are layered, bringing in bass voices that didn’t appear before.  The album also feels a bit more like a GYBE type of project–more building, more epicness.  “Tsvey Taybelakh” [Two Doves] is over 7 minutes long.  And even though a song like “Az Vey dem Tatn” [Sad Is the Father] is clearly Yiddish (the vocals are the big giveaway) they sound like more than folk songs, they sound bigger, more “important.”

“Violin Duet” has a slow mournful piece and then a sprightly fun dance piece.  “Ratsekr Grec” is a big instrumental dance piece that  sounds familiar but is not the song I’m thinking of (which is from a movie, I believe).  The 7 minute song actually has elements that feel a bit like Led Zeppelin’s “Kashmir” (with clarinet).  And the final song “Golem” begins like an epic with slow guitars and strings in a very traditional melody.  It has a number of false endings at around 3:30 and again at 5 minutes.  And since album has some translation of the lyrics, (which are still sung in Yiddish) we can see the lyrics move beyond traditional Yiddish yet are firmly grounded in them:

“We made a new golem/ We created our guard/ Without soul and without mercy/ He watches the gate/ Like the cameras on the fence/ Like the barbs on the wire/ Like the concrete barricades/ He becomes landscape/ But no. It can’t go on/ No. It can’t go on/ Not like this…,”

Again, if you don’t like traditional Yiddish music (or vocals sung in Yiddish) you won’t like this, although the adventurous may want to give it a chance.

[READ: May 6, 2014] 8

The cover above is actually not the cover of the version I read.  The McSweeney’s Two Books in One does not seem to have this cover for 8 anywhere (which is a shame because I like the way the covers of each book parallel each other (and make the infinity loop as well)).   Interestingly, the original version of the book featured the subtitle: “All True, Unbelievable.”  And that might be useful to include here too.

Amy Fusselman’s 8 is a sequel of sorts to The Pharmacist’s Mate.  In that book, she wanted to get pregnant.  In 8, she not only successfully gave birth to the boy from that first book, she has also had a second child.   And like many new parents, she understands that no matter how much you wanted children, sometimes for your own sanity you need to hide from them to have a few minutes to yourself.  It’s refreshing to read a normal person write about her children.  Especially when she and her husband try (and fail) to do sleep training.

But fortunately, that is not all Fusselman talks about.  She also talks about when she was raped as a shockingly young girl.  This tragic story is dealt with in a variety of ways and, surprisingly, never in a particularly dark or somber manner.  She calls her assailant “My pedophile” and spends a lot of the book working with alternative healers to come to grips with what happened to her.  And while this story is obviously hugely important in her life, it doesn’t seem to cloud everything she does.  (more…)

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Amy Fusselman–The Pharmacist’s Mate (2001) [reissued 2013]

Posted in Amy Fusselman, Black Ox Orkestar, Constellation Records, Marriage (Happy), McSweeney's, Memoirs, Pregnancy, Short Books, War on May 12, 2014| Leave a Comment »

pharm SOUNDTRACK: BLACK OX ORKESTAR-Ver Tanzt? [CST029] (2004).

cst029webBlack Ox Orkestar play traditional Yiddish music in a somewhat untraditional manner.

There are half instrumentals and half songs with vocals sung in Yiddish (which means I don’t know what they mean).  According to the Constellation website they are a: blend of originals and new arrangements for pieces pulled from various Eastern European songbooks.  And since the members come from “punk-rock, free-jazz, and other liberation musics,” it’s an approach to this music that may interest people who don’t normally like traditional music (and may turn off those who do).

.  I can’t really speak to the music, as I’m quite unfamiliar with it.  I prefer the instrumentals because I like the way the music tends to interweave.  Like “Cretan Song” which is a rollicking fun song like the Yiddish equivalent of an Irish seisún.  And yet. some of the vocals songs are really enjoyable too, like “Toyte Goyes in Shineln” which has a great melody and feels very familiar to me.  While “Ver Tantz?” begins as a slow melancholy song and turns rambunctious–almost chaotic.

Enjoyment depends on an appreciation for tradition Yiddish music, of course.

[READ: May 5, 2014] The Pharmacist’s Mate

I read this book a few years ago.  I read it again because McSweeney’s reissued it with Fusselman’s other book 8 on the flip side.  I wanted to read 8 and decided that since Pharmacist was so short I would read it as well.

And I’m glad I did because while they are not related exactly, they both work as a form of non-fiction and 8 is a nice postscript to what she talks about in Pharmacist.

As with most genre defying books, this is more or less a memoir, although it is written in a somewhat strange format–each small section is numbered (and eventually all the numbers turn into 1s because she realizes that she is starting anew with each section.

The Pharmacist’s mate of the title is her father, now deceased.  She includes notes from his time in the war as a sort of parallel to what’s going on with her own life. She very much wants a baby.  And through the book we see her engage in multiple ways of conceiving from natural to in vitro.  And then we read her angst about becoming a parent  And losing a parent. (more…)

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Alexander Theroux–The Strange Case of Edward Gorey (2000)

Posted in 1-Speed Bike, Barbra Striesand, Biography, Bobby Deerfield, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Constellation Records, Exhaust, Glenn Close, Godspeed You Black Emperor, Gold Diggers, John Waters, Julia Roberts, M, Matlock, Mel Brooks, Memoirs, Meryl Streep, Metropolis, Robert Altman, Sunrise, Suspiria, The Golden Girls, The Town That Dreaded Sunrise, The X Files, Women of Straw, Woody Allen on April 15, 2014| Leave a Comment »

gorey SOUNDTRACK: 1-SPEED BIKE-Droopy Butt Begone [CST014] (2000).

1speed1-Speed Bike is a remix project by Adian Girt who has played in Godspeed You Black Emperor and Exhaust for Constellation Records.  This is his first release as 1-Speed Bike.  He has released several more on other labels but I haven’t heard any of them.

The most interesting thing about this disc are the titles of the songs.  And those titles are so clever that it gives one high hopes for the album.  I don’t know who Mauro and Elwy are (track 1) but the rest are certainly interesting if not confrontational.

1. The Day That Mauro Ran Over Elwy Yost
2. Seattle/Washington/Prague 00/68 Chicago/Nixon/Reagan Circle-Fighting Machine
3. Yuppie Restaurant-Goers Beware Because This Song Is For The Dishwasher
4. Just Another Jive-Assed White Colonial Theft
5. Why Are All The Dogs Dying Of Cancer?
6. My Kitchen Is Tiananmen Square
7. Any Movement That Forgets About Class Is A Bowel Movement

But what’s disappointing is that the album is comprised almost entirely of a drum machine and some other sounds.  The drums are very very loud in the mix, and there’s very little variation in each song (which befits a remix, I suppose).  And yet, the “musical” section is largely nonexistent.  There’s a lot of spoken word stuff, which is fun, but it also seems randomly thrown on there. The disc opens with him asking someone to be quiet because he has to flush the toilet.  There’s a lengthy declaration of love for his family and war against capitalism.  And that everyone else can fuck off if they don’t want to hear him talk politics.

There are samples sprinkled around the disc, but most of them are inaudible or played with so much that it renders them hard to figure out.  There are some interesting sounds in “My Kitchen is Tienanmen Square,” but the rest is kind of dull.  The end of the last song offers a voice mail message that gives you the title of the album.

Overall, not an exciting debut for 1-Speed Bike.

[READ: April 12, 2014] The Strange Case of Edward Gorey

I bought this book many years ago when I was on an Alexander Theroux kick (which actually means I wanted to read some of his books but did not, although I do hope to).  Anyhow, this book has been staring at me for some time so I decided to just dive in.  I actually know precious little about Theroux except that his novel are supposed to be weird or difficult or something.  I know slightly more about Edward Gorey, although little more than his drawing style (which I love) and his sense of humor (which I share).

So this book is a sort of a biography of Gorey by Theroux.  Theroux was one of Gorey’s close friends.  This is saying something because as a rule Gorey was rather a recluse and didn’t much like people (he did like cats, though).  The book is not a proper biography–a biography of his works or even of his life.  It is more of a biography of the man and his quirks.  There’s very little about his childhood, and not a lot about his books (except for Theroux’s admiration).  But mostly its about what it was like to hang out with Gorey–and to delight in the baroque and fun turns of phrase that Gorey used.

We learn a lot about what he liked (soap operas, classic movies [Metropolis, M, Sunrise, Gold Digger series], obscure horror films [The Town That Dreaded Sunrise, Women of Straw, Suspiria (at least I’ve heard of that one)], TV shows [The X-Files, The Golden Girls, Matlock, Buffy the Vampire Slayer] and of course, classic literature [he was well versed in many original languages].  We also learn what he most assuredly did not like.  He did not like Star Wars, he did not like Mel Brooks, he did not like Robert Altman or Woody Allen [Gorey was a film critic for a time].  And as for our foremost actress, Meryl Streep, he has this to say:

“Oh please!” said he, every time she opens her mouth, the critics insist Dostoevsky’s speaking!” He paused. “And who’s even dippier is Glenn Close. Sexless as a teabag. Neither man, not woman, nor in-between! Julia Roberts’s face looks like it’s made of rubber — remember those Snap, Crackle and Pop cartoon faces? And of course Streisand. God help us, I won’t even go to see.”  Gorey loathed her with a passion, even more than John Waters does.  I once heard him fulminate for a good half-hour on the impossible stupidity of her 1962 hit, “People,” a song that, with its mawkish, politically correct soul-sharing, shrinkingly embodies to a T everything that Edward Gorey utterly loathed:  “Pee-pull, pee-pull who need pee-pull are the luuu-kiest pee-pull in the wooooooorld!.”  I cannot honestly think of a single sentiment that would have driven Edward Gorey battier faster than the flaccid lyrics of that song with its, to him, canasta-closeness, hideous interconnectedness, and ultimate meaninglessness.

He also hated Andrew Lloyd Webber, the Marquis de Sade’s writing, right-wing talk show hosts, every movie Al Pacino ever made [Of Bobby Deerfield he cried out during the movie, “oh for Christ’s sake…what is this in aid of?”] and Martha Stewart.  And while he had great disdain for Barbra Walters and Maya Angelou, he was especially appalled by “the invincible vulgarity of the preposterous Kathie Lee Gifford and the host of miniature faces she was constantly pulling” (20) saying: “her facial contortions would be excessive on Daffy Duck” (44).

One thing to note about the book.  As you can see form the page numbers above, similar sentiments about Gifford are on page 20 and 44.  Theroux tends to circle back onto the same topics a number of times.  So the same names tend to pop up three or four times (Buffy comes up at least 3).  It feels like Theroux (who published this soon after Gorey died) wrote it in fits and just needed to get down as much as possible.  And while the book feels repetitive, it never feels flaccid or like it’s full of padding.  It just feels like a huge outpouring of information.  Or like an essay collections by a person who tends to revisit similar material.

Interestingly, the book isn’t necessarily for fans of Gorey.  I honestly haven’t read any of his works in years, but I found this book funny and strangely cathartic (if you like bitchy, opinionated scholar-types).  If any of the above appeals, you’ll get a kick of out Gorey, whether you like his drawings or not.  The book is also full of Gorey’s drawings (although nothing new), from his books and from some of his posters.

I was also intrigued by the fact that Gorey, clearly no friend of people, did not shy away from the outside world.  He lived on Cape Cod and New York City where his number was in the phone book the whole time.  He walked around Manhattan in a big beard and fur coat (until he gave up the coat for animal rights reasons).  When he moved full time to Cape Cod, he lived in a residential area and did not turn away any fans (he always had manners even if he knew the whole thing was kind of silly).  And apparently his house was simply chock full of fascinating geegaws and gimcracks.

For all of his proclamations about others, he did not have a large ego about his own work.  And the book gives the impression that he was just an opinionated guy who knew what he liked and was happy to share his thoughts with others (or his cats).

I just found out that Theroux reissued this book in 2011 and updated it from 68 pages (my version) to 168 pages.  I don’t know how much has changed.  In looking online it seems like maybe all he has done is make the original pictures larger, but there may be other textual changes as well.

 

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Norman Rush–“On Nudity” & Barbara Ehrenreich–“The Trees Step Out of the Forest” (Harper’s, March 2014)

Posted in A Zed and Two Naughts, Alternate Reality, Barbara Ehrenreich, Carrington, Drowning By Numbers, Essays, Funny (strange), Gattaca, Harper's, Man with a Movie Camera, Memoirs, Michael Nyman, Morality, Norman Rush, Poker, Sunshine and Health, The Claim, The Diary of Anne Frank, The Draughtman's Contract, The End of The, The Piano, Valentina Lisitsa on April 8, 2014| Leave a Comment »

march2014SOUNDTRACK: VALENTINA LISITSA-Chasing Pianos: The Piano Music of Michael Nyman (2014).

Inym,an don’t listen to a lot of classical music, but I do like it. I also enjoy some modern composers, in particular I have a strong fondness for Michael Nyman. Yes, yes, he’s a soundtrack composer, blah blah, but I find his music to be very pretty and often delightfully eccentric.   His music reminds me of Phillip Glass, in its repetitive nature, but he goes beyond the minimalism that Glass was trying to create by implementing inventive melodies and expansive sounds.

 Valentina Lisitsa is a 44 year old Ukrainian pianist and she tackles music from throughout Nymans’ soundtrack career.  Nyman came to prominence with The Piano, which is a beautiful score.  And this is where this album starts out.

I’m not going to talk about each piece.  Rather, the album overall has a consistent feel–piano versions of Nyman’s music.  Nyman isn’t the most difficult composer, but he has his own style and so the entire album has a nice flow (although it does get a little slow by the end).

She plays songs from eleven of his soundtracks (which I’ve listed at the end).  Many of them get only one track, but Wonderland gets two and The Diary of Anne Frank gets 5 cuts.  I actually don’t know either of those two scores.  The bulk of the disc is, unsurprisingly, from The Piano which has ten cuts here.

I actually know his older soundtracks a lot better, so it was interesting to hear these piano versions of many of these familiar tracks.  Like “Time Lapse” from A Zed & Two Naughts and “Chasing Sheep is Best Left to Shepherds” (ne of my favorite pieces by him) from The Draughtman’s Contract.

Stripping down Nyman has an interesting effect because you can really hear how pretty the melodies are.  Although the real pleasure I get from his songs is the weird embellishments he puts on them, like the interesting sounds (horn and didgeridoo?) in “Here to There” from the Piano (which are absent here).

Although it has the feeling of a piano concerto the end (with several songs from The Piano in a row) is a bit samey.  It was smart to end the disc with a reprise of the opening.

There’s also songs from Drowning By Numbers, Carrington, The End of The, Man with a Movie Camera, The Claim and Gattaca

[READ: April 3, 2014] “On Nudity” and “The Trees Step Out of the Forest”

I am linking these two essays because I read them very close to each other and they are almost diametrically opposed in their content. And I thought it would be an interesting contrast.

“On Nudity” is a very simple essay about nudity. When Norman Rush was a kid–9 or 10–his father was really into nudism. He always wanted to go to nude beaches, he was very lax with nudity around the house and he tried to get his wife to join him. She was reluctant. Indeed, she didn’t really seem to like her husband very much and it seems they only got married because she was pregnant (and he may not have thought that was a good enough reason, to be honest).  She tried her best to make him unhappy because of this, and that seemed to involve declining his nudity bug.

So there were copies of Sunshine and Health (the premiere nudist magazine) hidden in the house (although Norman knew where they were), and yet, despite this access, he couldn’t get enough.  Rather than sating his needs, he was more obsessed than ever.  He wanted the real thing, whether it was getting his cousin to play strip poker or trying to spy on women in changing rooms.  He talks about the various hings he did just to get a peek of flesh.  And as the essay comes to close he apologizes to the two women whose privacy he invaded by spying on them.  The guilt about what he did to these women made him stop, although the women likely never knew what had happened to them. (more…)

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Gordon Lish–“The Boys on the Block: My personal memoir” (Harper’s, January 2014)

Posted in Beck, Gordon Lish, Harper's, Memoirs, Short Story on April 4, 2014| Leave a Comment »

harperjanSOUNDTRACK: BECK-“I Won’t Be Long” (2013).

iwontbelongThis was Beck’s second single in 2013.  I did not like this at first as you can see here, but as I predicted, it grew I me. Interestingly, listening to it now, after having heard it a few dozen times, my observations about the song are the same, I just find it more appealing.  And listening with headphones showed me that there’s more to it than the radio listens showed me.

The verses are actually kind of fun and while I initially found the chorus to be way too slow, it has really grown on me. And there’s a lot more music in the track than I initially realized. It’s quite a full and satisfying song. Including a very noisy guitar solo at the end which makes this song less soporific.  In fact, some of the guitar notes hearken back to 80s guitar sounds very nicely.

So, yes I’ve become a fan of this song.  And having listened through his catalog I find that it’s not as out of place as I initially thought.

[READ: April 1, 2014] “The Boys on the Block”

The only other thing I’ve read by Gordon Lish was in Harper’s in January 2013 (perhaps this is an annual thing).  That story was a tale in which Lish was the narrator and the main character and it was halting and complicated but generally enjoyable.

This story is actually listed as a memoir, so the self-referential nature is to be expected.  What is not expected (although maybe that is how Lish writes) is the halting, stumbling narrator.  In this piece, Lish looks back at the kids on his block and the games of one-upmanship they would play.  And it’s funny that he can spend several paragraphs correcting himself and addenduming himself all to talk about the boys on his block playing paddle ball

the paddle and the ball and the string–are you with me?–the paddle and the ball and the string, which the whole idea of the game was for you to grab the paddle in your hand and see if you could toss the little red ball up a little bit and then smack it with the paddle and then keep on smacking it with the paddle until you missed it altogether or, you know, you just didn’t smack it right and it went all crazy in the wrong direction and then it was the other boy’s turn… [the sentence continues for longer than I have written so far].

Naturally there were boys who were good at it–Gordon was not one of them, but the Stanleys were–they were two boys named Stanley.  But Gordon, oh Jesus, did he fear taking his turn, especially after the Stanleys were so good at it.  But at least there was Bobby–he was the worst at everything.  Gordon couldn’t wait for Bobby to take a turn.  But lo, Bobby was amazing at it, almost as good as the Stanley’s and that could not be. (more…)

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Lucy Knisley–Relish: My Life in the Kitchen (2013)

Posted in Adventure, Big Sugar, Canadian Music, Cook Book, Culture Shock, First Second :01, Food, Funny (ha ha), Graphic Novel, Lucy Knisley, Marriage Trouble, Memoirs, Rheostatics, Travel, tagged on March 5, 2014| Leave a Comment »

relishSOUNDTRACK:RHEOSTATICS-World Next Door Festival, Winnipeg, MB (September 5, 1998).

wndI was pretty excited to hear this outdoor festival version of the Rheostatics.  I knew the show would be short (and it is at about 45 minutes), but i imagined the entire feel of the show would be different in this setting.  What surprised me is that the recording is taken from a CBC radio broadcast of the show (which in and of itself is pretty cool).  But the recording is terrible!  The sound is bad and there are dozens of stops in the tape.  Bummer (especially when Aliens gets cut off).

Perhaps the most enjoyable part is when Dave says there’s going to be a double neck guitar war between Martin and Gordie Johnson (he was the front man for Big Sugar, a band I don’t know.  They apparently headlined the festival and he plays a mean double neck guitar).

Strangely enough I can’t find out anything about this festival which apparently doesn’t exist anymore.

[READ: March 5, 2014] Relish

Sarah read and really enjoyed this graphic novel. She said I would like it too and she was right.

This is a collection of memories from Knisley.  She writes about growing up in a family of foodies and how at a very young age she at anything.  She even began to crave unusual foods (in one short piece, she says that as a child she craved sautéed mushrooms).  But what’s cool about the story is that although she was raised in a snobby food way (you she see her father’s reaction to McDonald’s and her mother’s reaction to ketchup) she still appreciated junk food. She says, “Anyone who can fail to rejoice in the enticing squish/crunch of a fast food French fry or the delight of a warmed piece of grocery-store donut, is living half a life.”

At the end of each chapter is a recipe for something from the book.  The recipes are pretty simple, although some of them have extravagant ingredients (like her Chai Tea which sounds amazing, but is frankly too full of expensive ingredients for me to ever make–cardamom pods, star anise? No way.).  However, her recipe for marinated lamb sounds delicious and uses only the most basic ingredients. (more…)

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Tom Bissell–2 book reviews (Harper’s, June 2013)

Posted in All Songs Considered, Book Reviews, Clive James, Dante Alighieri, Death, Essays, Harper's, John Zorn, Memoirs, Stephen Rodrick, Tom Bissell, Translation, William S. Burroughs on October 13, 2013| Leave a Comment »

harper juneSOUNDTRACK: JOHN ZORN-“The Dream Machine” (2013).

dreamThis is the title track to the third installment of instrumental albums by composer Zorn (as opposed to wild sax-player Zorn).  The new album is called Dreammachines.  Evidently this trilogy is somehow related to William S. Burroughs (sure, why not).  The first was called Interzone (and was three 15 minute-plus suites), the second was Nova Express (which was shorter pieces) and now Dreammachines (which is also shorter pieces).

It’s impossible to know what Zorn will throw at us next, but this song proves to be a beautiful jazz piece with the quartet of pianist John Medeski, bassist Trevor Dunn, vibraphonist Kenny Wollesen, and drummer Joey Baron.  It opens with a quick but pretty vibraphone melody.  The melody shifts keys but stays in the same pattern until the main melody kicks in.

Variations on the theme continue until about 2 minutes in when Medeski gets a big piano solo and this sounds more like traditional jazz than most Zorn pieces.  Then there’s a very cool vibes solo.  It’s pretty standard jazz and it’s really quite beautiful.

[READ: September 20, 2013] 2 book reviews

Bissell reviews two books this month.

danteThe first is Dante’s Divine Comedy as translated by Clive James.  James has decided that since Italian is so easy to rhyme “For an Italian poet it’s not rhyming that’s hard,” rather than following Dante’s linked terza rima rhyme scheme, he chose the rhyming quatrain.  Bissell expects that academics and traditionalists will be very suspicious of the book because of that, but he says that for the average person (the average person who wants to read Dante, of course), it will be more fun and enjoyable.  Especially, James popularizes the book.  I have always resisted The Divine Comedy but this one sounds like it might be a bit more fun, and isn’t that what reading is all about?

magicalThe second book is The Magical Stranger by Stephen Rodrick.  When Rodrick was 13 his father died in a military plane crash.  His carrier was en route home when it was told to reroute to help with the hostage crisis in Tehran.  But his plane was destroyed.  The hardest part for Stephen was when he read that the accident was deemed “pilot error.”

This book is Stephen’s attempt to learn more about his father.  Through the course of the book, he discovers more and more unpleasant facts about his father—from the lies his father told his mother to a pilot who knew his father who calls his an asshole.  Bissell finds this part of the book very moving but not quite warranting a novel length treatment.

But there is a secondary story about the man who now commands his father’s squadron James Hunter “Tupper” Ware.  Bissell says that this part of the story is far more engaging (Stephen is a journalist and this section is more investigative).  Stephen more or less tries to live his father’s life through Ware, a man who finds the same level of difficulties in his job and his life as Rodrick’s father did.

This is definitely not the kind of book I would read, but for those with an interest in the military and pilots its sound like a good warts-and-all investigation.

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Rick Bass–In My Home There is No More Sorrow: Ten Days in Rwanda (2012)

Posted in Africa, Amini Ngabonziza, Anne-Marie Niyiransanga, Bonaventure Iyamuduhaye, Books about writers, Death, Dieudonné Niyonizera, Essays, Gorillas, McSweeney's, Memoirs, Phish, Rick Bass, Short Books, Travel, Uganda, Unlikable main character, Violence, War on August 4, 2013| Leave a Comment »

rickbassSOUNDTRACK: PHISH-LivePhish 01-20 (2000-2002).

livephish To my dismay, my friend Lar recently informed me of a terrible thing that is happening to Phish’s LivePhish series of CDs.  This series came out from 2000-2002 and consisted of 20 CD sets of full concerts.  The “nifty” thing about them was that they were packed in plastic sleeves (4 discs to a sleeve) which had three holes in them so you could store them in a binder (the LivePhish binder with secret pocket for your stash).

Well, it turns out that whatever material they used in the plastic sleeves leeched out of the sleeves and onto the CDs.  For many CDs, it left a goopy residue that wiped off with a little effort.  But on other CDs, the goop actually ate through the paint and, apparently (although I don’t know how) through the music.  When you look at the discs there are clear “holes” in the paint, so you can see right through the disc.  When you play the discs, it ate away at the music as well.

Since this was over a decade ago and Phish is no longer with Elektra and the collections are long out of print, it looks like fans are simply shit out of luck.  I have at least 8 sets that have at least one disc that was eaten away like this.

The shows are available for download at the Phish Dry Goods Store, but then you’re paying $10 for something you already own.

Those sleeves seemed like a great idea, but they clearly weren’t tested for long term durability.

I don’t believe there’s any recourse for this, but if you know of any, do pass it along.  I’m sure fans must have the concerts online somewhere too, but that’s not the point.  Seeing as how the sets are fetching as much as $300 on eBay (which I’m sure no one is paying), there was the possibility that these would have collector’s value.  But clearly not anymore.  Major buzzkill.

[READ: July 29, 2013] In My Home There is No More Sorrow

This book came with McSweeney’s 40.  It is a book unto itself, hardbound and with its own ISBN, so I didn’t feel compelled to read it right then (especially given that the subject was Rwanda and it didn’t seem like an especially happy book to be reading).

But I decided now I was up for it and so in I dove.  And it’s not an especially happy book to be reading.

Bass is a writer with many books to his credits (although I didn’t know him).  He was sent to Rwanda on an assignment.  I gather that as part of the assignment he was sent to teach a writing workshop to local writers.  (The actual purpose of the trip, as far as logistics goes, is a little vague I must say).

At any rate, bass and his family (his wife and teenaged daughter) went to Rwanda for ten days.  And the first few days are as harrowing as one might expect.  I was familiar with the atrocities in Rwanda, but only insofar as I had heard bits and pieces of the story from the news.  I had no idea about the extent of the violence–millions of Tutsis killed by Hutus.  Nor the extent of the way the survivors have dealt with the atrocities in the seventeen years since they happened.  Which is: they have created shrines to the dead and in many cases have not cleaned up or in any way hidden what happened.

And so , we have churches with blood on the walls where people were murdered (I will spare some of the details of the way the children were killed, but I will certainly never forget it).  The family also goes to a shrine where the bodies were exhumed and placed in this area for fuller viewing.  And the creepiest thing about this shrine is that the bodies were packed so tightly in the mass grave–with no oxygen and with quicklime poured on them , that they did not really decompose–they were more or less mummified–their skin just sort of shriveled.  These bodies are practically like living skeletons, left ion their death poses.  That’s another image I will not be able to expunge from my mind any time soon. (more…)

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Nick Hornby–Songbook (2002)

Posted in Aimee Mann, Ani DiFranco, Badly Drawn Boy, Ben Folds Five, Bruce Springsteen, Concert, Decadence, Essays, Marcel Dzama, Mark Mulcahy, Marriage Trouble, McSweeney's, Memoirs, Nelly Furtado, Nick Hornby, Paul Westerberg, Rod Stewart, Rufus Wainwright, Sex, Short Books, Soulwax, Suicide, Teenage Fanclub, The Bible on July 19, 2013| Leave a Comment »

songbookSOUNDTRACK: songs from Songbook (2002).

songbook2Songbook came with an 11 song CD.  I’m curious, given the way he speaks so lovingly of the songs in the book how come more bands/labels didn’t want to be included on it.  The proceeds went to charity and it would just be more exposure for the artists.  There were a lot of songs I didn’t know and would love to have heard (or would love to hear while I was reading).  And frankly I see no downside to throwing a track on a compilation which is a collection of someone’s favorite songs.  Of course, things were very different in the music world in 2002.  Now, someone will just make a playlist on their iPod of theses songs, and post them to Spotify.

PAUL WESTERBERG-“Born for Me.” I’m much more of a fan of Westerberg with the Replacements, as he got a little too polished as a solo guy.  But this song has a fun, shambolic quality to it (it doesn’t even sound like Westerberg singing).  It wouldn’t be a favorite song of mine, but it is a nice one.

TEENAGE FANCLUB “Your Love is the Place Where I Come From” and “Ain’t That Enough.”  I really like Teenage Fanclub a lot.  They are one of my favorite jangly pop bands.  So these two songs rank pretty high for me.  Although I admit to liking their slightly more rocking songs a bit more, “Your Love” is a very pretty ballad and “Ain’t That Enough” is just gorgeous.

THE BIBLE- “Glorybound” Hornby says he knew these guys.  It’s an okay song, a little too slick for me and very of its time.

AIMEE MANN-“I’ve Had It”  I like Aimee Mann very much.  I can’t say that I paid a ton of attention to the lyrics of this song (I didn’t know it was about touring) but I’ve always liked it—the understated yet beautiful melody and chorus are very nice.

RUFUS WAINWRIGHT-“One Man Guy” I like Rufus a lot.  I don’t own any of his music, but I really like everything I hear from him.  His delivery is so louche, it makes me smile every time.  This song is actually one his father wrote and sang many years ago (very differently).

ROD STEWART-“Mama You Been on My Mind” Hornby’s essay on Rod Stewart is hilarious.  And his defense of early Stewart is wholly believable.  I, of course, know Rod from his later, laughable stuff, so I never considered his early work  But this track is pretty good.

BADLY DRAWN BOY-“A Minor Incident” Sarah and I love Badly Drawn Boy, and this soundtrack in particular.  Hornby’s discussion of how he Damon got to do the soundtrack is very interesting.

BEN FOLDS FIVE-“Smoke” I’ve liked Ben for years now (going to see him in two weeks).  This song has always been a favorite both for the lyrics, which are great and because that weird harp-type sound is him playing the strings of his grand piano with a pick.

MARK MULCAHY-“Hey Self Defeater” I don’t know Mulcahy at all.  This song has a beautiful wavery guitar and gentle vocals (it’s funny to read about Hornby rocking out when most of this disc is quite mellow).

ANI DIFRANCO-“You Had Time” I was a huge Ani DiFranco fan back in the day, but this song is unknown to me, or should I say unfamiliar to me.  It’s on one of her very early albums.  Perhaps it’s more that I must have ignored the piano opening, which Hornby pays close attention to and really explains it in a useful way, showing how it is more about a beautiful melody being born from chaos.  And now I respect the song a lot more.

[READ: 2002 and July 1, 2013] Songbook

I can’t tell you how many times I’ve written this very book in my head….  A list of favorite songs and why they are so important to me?  How cool is that.  I have no idea how come Hornby got to write it (I know, High Fidelity), but still, what a nice cozy assignment.  And to have this book illustrated by Marcel Dzama is even cooler.

This book came out in 2002 after About a Boy (and in the year that About a Boy was being turned into a film).  Hornby had recently hooked up with the McSweeney’s gang and began writing for The Believer in 2003.

I had no idea that the book was released in the UK under a different name (31 Songs) or that they also released an accompanying CD (A Selection of Music from 31 Songs) with 18 songs on it (see my comment above about CDs).  Although we got fewer songs on the disc in the US, at least ours came with the book. (more…)

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