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Archive for the ‘Violence’ Category

Martin Amis–“Laureate of Terror” (New Yorker, November 21, 2011)

Posted in Book Reviews, Charles Dickens, Christian Bok, Corporate skewering, Death, Don DeLillo, George Eliot, James Joyce, Jane Austen, Martin Amis, Natural Disasters, New Yorker, Sex, Short Story, Ulver, Violence on December 13, 2011| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: ULVER-A Quick Fix of Melancholy (2005).

This EP came two years after Teachings in Silence (with a movie soundtrack and “greatest hits” collection in between).  This first track, “Little Blue Bird” is a simple soundscape with echoey keyboards.  When Garm starts singing, his most emotional side comes through (even if I really can’t understand him most of the time).

“Doom Sticks” belies its name and the EP title by being somewhat upbeat.  There are kind of squeaky keyboards that pulsate through the track.  After about a minute and a half, distorted drums keep a martial beat.  But it quickly morphs into a twinkly section that makes me think of the Nutcracker or some other kind of Christmas special.

“Vowels” is similarly upbeat (the music on both of these two tracks has a vaguely Christmastime feel somewhere in there–not that anyone would think these were in any way Christmas songs, or maybe it’s because I’m listening in mid-December).  For this, we get a return of Garm’s choral voice: deep, resonant and hard to understand (although I undertsand the lyrics are from a poem by Christian Bok).   But the poem quickly makes way for some dramatic staccato strings. 

“Eitttlane” begins with some menacing keybaords and staccato notes, creating a feel of a noir movie.  But when the vocal choir comes in, it gets even more sinister.

These Ulver EPs are really true EPs–stopgap recordings for fans.  Their larger works tend to be more substantial, but these EPs allow them to play around with different styles.

[READ: December 1, 2011] “Laureate of Terror”

Two authors I admire in one article, how about that!  In this book review, Martin Amis reviews Don DeLillo’s first collection of short stories and gives a summary of DeLillo’s work.

Amis opens the article by undermining my plans for this blog.  He states point blank than when we say we love an author’s works, we “really mean…that we love about half of it.”  He gives an example of how people who love Joyce pretty much only love Ulysses, that George Eliot gave us one readable book and that “every page of Dickens contains a paragraph to warm to and a paragraph to veer back from.”  Also, Janeites will “never admit that three of the six novels are comparative weaklings (Sense and Sensibility, Mansfield Park and Persusaion).  [I still hope to read all of the books by the authors I like].

Amis says he loves DeLillo (by which he means, End Zone, Running Dog, White Noise, Libra, Mao II and the first and last section of Underworld).  And he also seems to really like The Angel Esmeralda: Nine Stories,(well, much of it anyway), DeLillo’s first (!) short story collection

His main assement is that these pieces are a vital addition to DeLillo’s corpus.  (more…)

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Periodical–The Washington Spectator [UPDATE]

Posted in Book Reviews, Free Speech, History, LGBTQ, Military, Nature, Newspapers, Political Humor, Prison, Religion, The Future, The Washington Spectator, Threats, TSA, Violence, War on December 3, 2011| Leave a Comment »

I have been getting The Washington Spectator for years and years.  I was delighted with it in the beginning when the editor had the wonderful name of Ben Franklin.  I am delighted now that publisher’s name is Hamilton Fish.  But aside from these two fascinating details, I have always enjoyed the content.  It was thoroughly researched and detailed.  And the little 4 page leaflet always looked like a newspaper in design and style, and it gave it a kind of gravitas–no flashy colors or pictures.

Well, here it is, Vol 37, Issue No 21 and they have finally changed the format.  And not only that, they have created a website and have a Facebook presence!  Welcome to the 20th century!

I say that jokingly because despite these changes (which look great by the way), The Spectator has not abandoned its old school journalism practice.  21st century news is pretty much all flash and brash–style over substance–quick reporting with no concern for accuracy and very little attention brought to retractions (can anyone say “climategate” (I wish they wouldn’t call it that)).  But The Spectator is exactly the opposite, and I am delighted to say that although they are now a lot more accessible, they have not lost any of their tenacity or thoroughness.

The redesign is quite nice.  There’s an image on the front page and now there are pull quotes in red, which stand out nicely on the pale paper.  Although I always liked the pull quote box in the middle off the front page, this new format allows for a couple of different pull quotes as well as an opportunity to mix things up a bit.  (more…)

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McSweeney’s #9 (Late Summer Early Fall 2002) [We Feel This One is More Urgent]

Posted in A.M. Homes, Adventure, Culture Shock, Death, Denis Johnson, Doug Dorst, Ellen Moore, Essays, Eugene O'Neill, Fears, Funny (strange), Gabe Hudson, Gods, Harper's, History, Humiliation, Isaac Babel, Jeff Greenwald, K. Kvashay-Boyle, Liudmilla Petrushevskaya, Masturbation, McSweeney's, Mikhail Zoshchenko, Military, Nathaniel Minton, Nikolai Leskov, Play (Drama), Political Humor, Racism, Religion, Roy Kesey, Scott Greene, Sex, Short Story, Skaz, Sufjan Stevens, Threats, Translation, Travel, Val Vinokurov, Violence, War, William T. Vollmann, Yuck! on November 14, 2011| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: SUFJAN STEVENS-The Age of Adz (2010).

Sufjan Stevens has released a bunch of albums of beautiful orchestral rock.  It is multi-layered and complex with classical elements and all kinds of cool instruments.

And this album starts out with a beautiful acoustic guitar melody and Sufjan’s delicate vocals.  Although it is a far more stripped down song than usual, “Futile Devices” seems like it is heading in the standard direction.  But anyone who heard Sufjan’s Christmas album number VIII knows that he has been having some fun with electronics.  And they show up with a vengeance on track two, “Too Much.”

All of the multilayered noise that was once orchestral and (some might say) precious has been replaced by a cacophony of gorgeous electronic noises.  The beginning of the song reminds me of the sounds in Skinny Puppy’s “Stairs and Flowers” (how many Sufjan Stevens reviews mention Skinny Puppy?).  The song is nothing like Skinny Puppy once the vocals kick in–it’s catchy and delicate–but those electronics underpin the whole thing, bringing his pastoralia into the twenty-first century.  When I first reviewed this song I didn’t like it but once you get absorbed by Sufjan’s world, it’s an enticing place to be,

“Age of Adz” takes this electronic nonsense even further with an 8 minute brew of strange sounds and choral voices.  But he always manages to throw in some catchy parts, no matter how strange the song gets.

For me one of the highlights of the disc is “I Walked” it features one of my favorite Sufjan things–falsetto vocals in a beautiful but unexpected melody.  And this song has them in spades.  “Now That I’m Older” has a very disconcerting sound–his voice is slowly warbled and mournful.  It’s a beautiful melody that is alienating at the same time.

“Get Real Get Right” returns to his earlier style somewhat (there’s more layers of music, although the electronica is still in place).   “Vesuvius” is a beautiful song and “All for Myself” is another of those great falsetto tracks that I like so much.

“I Want to Be Well” eventually turns into a manic electronic workout in which he repeats the chorus “I’m not fucking around.”

But nothing compares  to “Impossible Soul” a twenty-five minute (!) multi-part suite of electronic chaos.  It’s a fantastic song complete with autotune (used to very cool effect), repeated swelling choruses (it’s like a Polyphonic Spree tribute), electronic freakouts, and acoustic comedowns.  All in a positive, happy message.  I can’t stop listening to it.  “It’s not so impossible!”

Sufjan continues to impress me.

[READ: November 10, 2011] McSweeney’s #9

After the excesses of McSweeney’s #8, I was excited to get to the brevity (and urgency) of McSweeney’s #9.  This one is a paperback and looks like the first couple of issues.  The cover is mostly text with a hodgepodge of phrases and pleas.  You get things like: Thankful, Emboldened, The (Hot-Blooded/Life-Saving) Presumption of (Perpetual/Irrational (or More Likely, Irreducibly Rational) Good Will, Efflorescence, Our motto this time: We Give You Sweaty Hugs,” Alternative motto: ” We Are Out Looking,” GEGENSCHEIN (no more), and the promise: “We will Do Four This Year.”

This is the kind of issue that makes me love McSweeney’s.  There are some wonderful short stories, there are some nice essays and there are some dark moments all centered vaguely and tangentially around a theme.  There are some great authors here, too.

The back cover image is called Garden Variety by Scott Greene and it’s a fantastic painting.  You can see it here (navigate through the 2000-2004 paintings, but I have to say I really like the style of all of his work.

There are no letters and no nonsense in this issue.  So let’s get to it. (more…)

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Junot Díaz–“Wildwood” (New Yorker, June 11 & 18, 2007)

Posted in Ace Frehley, Cancer as plot device, Culture Shock, Excerpt, Gene Simmons, Goths, Junot Díaz, Kiss, New Yorker, Paul Stanley, Peter Criss, Punks, Racism, Travel, Violence, Virginity (Loss of) on November 5, 2011| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: KISS-Unmasked (1980).

It was hard to like Unmasked, but, being an 11-year-old boy, who loved Kiss, I never doubted its awesomeness.  Despite kids in school telling me Kiss sucked and, peculiarly, even the cover of this album telling me they stink (whose idea was that?) I knew in my heart of hearts that Kiss was the best.

In a stroke of marketing genius, this album teased the audience with the idea of finally seeing who was under these “masks” (which is weird since everyone knew they weren’t wearing masks, but whatever).  There’s even a poster that came with my vinyl copy!  Yahoo.

I just recently found out that “Is That You?” is a cover.  I always liked the high-pitched part of the song (“you always get the boys you like”), although in retrospect it’s really not very good–simplistic in a way that Kiss songs weren’t but then became.   I always joke about Kiss doing a tour and playing “Shandi.”  It’s such a cheesy ballad and yet I think it’s really good (for a cheesy ballad–Paul sings this type of song so well).  I constantly have the “there’s another mess I’ve got myself in” line in my head all the time.

I liked “What makes the World Go ‘Round” but even I can acknowledge that the song is pretty poor.  “Tomorrow” sounds like another song off of Paul’s solo album and probably should have been a huge hit.  In fact, they could have re-released it in the 80s and it would have fit right in with their non-makeup success–Paul’s soaring choruses are always a hit.  “Easy as it Seems” is kind of the album encapsulated in one song–very sleek, very soft, lots of choruses vocals and really kind of bland.   There’s even a wimpy keyboard solo (gasp!).

Ace was the star of Dynasty, and he gets three more songs on Unmasked.  “Talk to Me” is one of his repetitive songs that drives me a bit nutty (never liked that “talk to me-e” part).  It’s interesting how much Ace moved into prominence on these albums, especially since he was headed for the door soon.  “Two Sides of the Coin,” is a decent rocker, but listen to those crazy synth drums during the instrumental break.  “Torpedo Girl” is the most interesting track on the disc.  It has the cool opening “man battle stations torpedo,” a really funky (!!) bass line from Gene (who knew he had that in him) and a cool weird riff at the opening.  It’s then got a very catchy chorus (although honestly, “c’mon get your feet wet”?).

Gene has a bit more prominence here.  “Naked City” has a pretty menacing riff to open with, but Gene turns in one of his more melodic turns (with some pretty high notes in the chorus)!  The solo, while not blistering, is pretty great (as with Dynasty, the solos are too short).  “She’s So European” aside from being a really stupid title and lyric is the song that really puts this album over the edge–the twinkly keyboards, the “you ought to see her” falsetto, and, basically the same chord structure as “Living in Sin” on the verses.  Gene ends the disc with “You’re All That I Want,” a rather uninspired song that reminds me of the songs on side 4 of Alive II.

You’ll notice that Peter doesn’t get a vocal turn on this album.  In fact, he didn’t play anything on it at all (Anton Fig on drums again), but he was contractually obligated to appear on the cover (perhaps that’s why they did a cartoon).

No matter how much I listened to it back then, I can still admit that this album isn’t really very good.  Although interestingly, some of the songs and sonmg styles foreshadow the kind of music they’d play on Lick It Up: simple songs without a lot of substance, and that album was huge!

[READ: November 2, 2011] “Wildwood”

After reading “The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao” in the New Yorker, I saw that they had also published Lola’s “Wildwood” adventure as an excerpt from Oscar Wao the novel.

As you can see, this excerpt came out around the same time as the novel.  And as far as I can tell, this excerpt is exactly the same as the novel except for one line that was in the excerpt but not in the novel (the part in italics):

Hija de Liborio she called you after you picked your tia’s winning numbers for her and when you guessed correctly how old to the day she’d been when she left home for the U.S. (a fact she’d never told anyone).  You assumed….

The only other noticeable difference is that the first section of this excerpt is not really separated from the rest of it.  The first section is told in the second person, while the rest is in the first person.  In the novel, the second person section is set off by itself, so it’s a little less jarring when you jump to first person, but I think any reader could cope with that pretty well. (more…)

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Junot Díaz–“The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao” (New Yorker, December 25, 2000 & January 1, 2001)

Posted in Ace Frehley, Culture Shock, David Foster Wallace, Death, Demons, Detroit Rock City, Dominican Republic, Drinking, Excerpt, Fears, Fukú, Gangsters, Gene Simmons, Junot Díaz, Kiss, New Yorker, Oscar Wilde, Paul Stanley, Peter Criss, Religion, Short Story, The Rolling Stones, Travel, Video Games, Violence, Virginity (Loss of), Word usage on November 4, 2011| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: KISS-Dynasty (1979).

I was pretty excited to buy this album when it came out–a new Kiss album that wasn’t solo albums!  Woo hoo!  And the fact that it was disco?  Well, even though I said I “hated disco,” I didn’t really know what disco sounded like then (and really, aside from the middle “I Was Made for Lovin’ You” it’s not really a disco record) and plus my other favorite band was the Village People (and really, that makes a lot of sense–tw0 bands in over-the-top costumes talking about sexuality that I totally didn’t understand).

So, this album is hard for me to be critical about because it was such an essential part of my childhood, especially “I Was Made for Lovin’ You.”  I love it, and yet I can listen critically and appreciate that it’s really not that good.

But I’ll move on to the other songs.  “Sure Know Something” and “Magic Touch” really don’t seem that out of place chronologically with, say, the Kiss solo albums–they sound an awful lot like something off of Paul’s album.  So, despite the sort of slinky 70’s bass on “Sure Know Something”, they can’t have been that much of a surprise.  The guitar solos are short but have some interesting Ace sounds (I like the harmonics on “Magic Touch”).  It seems that while the other guys were embracing disco, Paul was keeping the Kiss sound alive.

Then there’s the Ace songs.  “2,000 Man” made total sense as an Ace song. I had no idea it was a Rolling Stones cover until fairly recently (and I like Ace’s version much better).  “Hard Times” feels like the sequel to “New York Groove.”  Not the music so much although maybe a little, but the lyrics–now that he’s in the city here’s what happened–the gritty reality. It’s one of Ace’s great, lost songs.  And check it out, Ace sings on three songs here!  (Guess having a #1 hit wasn’t lost on the Kiss powers).  “Save Your Love” has a cool descending chorus and a nice bass feel to it.  Ace certainly wins on this record.

Peter got only one song, “Dirty Livin'”.  In fact, this is the only song that Peter had anything to do with (his drums were re-recorded by Anton Fig).  It reminds me (in retrospect) of the Rolling Stones disco era even more than “2,000 Man,” the backing vocals remind me of something like “Shattered.”  I always liked this guitar solos on this (cool feedback).  Although I liked the song (along with the rest of the album), I don’t think it holds up very well.

Gene only gets two songs.  It amuses me how little he has to do with these late 70s albums even though he is always the leader of the band.  I always liked “Charisma” (I had to look the word up back then) even though it is, admittedly, rather discoey and really not very good.  It is fun to ask “What is my…charisma?”  But “X-Ray Eyes is the better Gene song on this record.  It harkens back to earlier Kiss songs and even has a bit of menace in it.

So, Dynasty was a huge hit for the band.  And they even got to mock it in Detroit Rock City the movie.  Cynical marketing ploy or genuine fondness for disco?  Who would ever know.

[READ: November 1, 2011] “The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao”

Readers of this blog know that after finding an author I like, I will try to read everything that he or she has written.  Close readers will know that if a writer is reasonably young and reasonably unpublished, I will try to read his or her uncollected work as well.  Well, I really enjoyed Oscar Wao the novel, so I decided to see what else Díaz had written. There’s really not a lot, to be perfectly frank.  There’s his short story collection Drown and a few fiction pieces published here and there (mostly in the New Yorker) and a few non-fiction pieces as well.

So this “short story” from the New Yorker (with the same title as the novel) is in fact an early, mostly the same, version of the Oscar story in the novel.  The thing here is to note the date: 2000(!).  The novel came out in 2007.  So, Junot had been working with this character for easily five years (giving time for the publishing industry to get a book out and all). The remarkable thing the is just how accomplished and polished this piece is and how much of it was used in the novel.

I’m curious to know whether this was written as a short story (it’s quite a long short story) or if it was always intended as a part of a novel.  Interestingly, when you read this story by itself and you realize that it is pretty much all of Oscar’s story in the novel, you realize just how little of Oscar is actually in the novel.  The novel is about Oscar, obviously, but it is really about his family and the fukú that was placed on them by the Trujillo clan.  Oscar is sort of the touchstone for the fukú, and the person whom the narrator knows most intimately but his story is also brief. (more…)

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John Layman & Rob Guillory–Chew: Volume Two: International Flavor (2010)

Posted in "Weird Al" Yankovic, Adventure, Death, Flight of the Conchords, Food, Graphic Novel, Jack Black, John Layman, Justin Timberlake, Lonely Island, Rob Guillory, Saturday Night Live, Violence, Yuck! on November 2, 2011| 1 Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: LONELY ISLAND-Incredibad (2008).

Since I enjoyed the second Lonely Island album, I figured I’d check out the first one as well.  I mean it had “Lazy Sunday” on it after all.  But in this case my initial instincts we pretty correct. There are a  few songs on here that are funny and worth the time–and you’ve heard them all already.  The rest are filler–mildly funny songs that are too long by half (even when they are under two minutes).

The opening song, “Who Said We’re Wack” is only a minute and change and it overstays its welcome after about fifteen seconds.  Although, as I’m finding with a lot of the tracks, there are little bits that are funny, like the “raise your hands in the air” bit of this song.  “Santana DVX” is an amusing little skit about Carlos Santana making his own champagne.  Again, kind of funny, but not that funny.  And worse yet is that they keep reusing the joke throughout the disc.  “I’m on a Boat” is like the demo version of “I Just had Sex.”  It’s the same premise, with the same repeated joke, but you can get a lot more mileage out of having sex than about riding a boat.  At this point I have to wonder how many of these songs were skits (I don’t watch SNL as a rule) and I wonder if they are funnier with visuals added.

“Jizz in My Pants” is the first really funny thing on the disc.  The best part is that it starts out so seriously and then the absurdity gets faster and faster.  It’s very clever.  Although musically it sounds like The Flight of the Conchords might do it better.  “Sax Man” features the mighty Jack Black, and it’s funny, but I have to say that having the sax man play more bad notes (and not synthesized ones) as opposed to all that silence, and maybe having Black get even angrier would have been much funnier.

“Lazy Sunday” is still a highlight, a funny track with, and I think this is the key, new lyrics in every verse, not simple repetitiveness as humor (the old SNL standby).  And of course, “Dick in a Box” is still hilarious (oh, Timberlake, I can’t hate you).

However, that repetitiveness is a problem on “Like a Boss” (although parts of it are very funny) or “Boombox” (is boiled goose supposed to be funny?) although at least the chorus is catchy.  “We Like Sportz” is amusing but I feel like they aren’t dorky enough.  

Then, why does “Dreamgirl” turn into an ad for Chex Mix?   I know it is “sponsored by Chex Mix” but why?  It seems lazy.   And I simply don’t understand “Punch You in the Jeans” or “The Old Saloon” they just seem like stupid filler or in the case of “Jeans,” an attempt at at catchphrase generator or something.   

As on their follow-up, the skits are lame: “Normal Guy” is awful and “Shrooms” is boring.  But at least there’s only two skits.

Finally “Space Olympics” seems like a funny concept but what happens to the song?  It has potential to be a really amusing concept about actual space olympics, but it drifts off into a completely different direction.  Where’d the focus go? 

“Natalie’s Rap” on the other hand is focused, brutal and unexpected.  It is really, really funny.

All in all, this is an excellent place to hear a few good tracks and a whole lot of filler. I’m really happy that the sequel was so much better as it speaks to the possibility of even better stuff in the future.

[READ: October 30, 2011] Chew: Volume Two

As Sarah wrote in her post, I was pretty happy to have Volume Two of Chew in the house after finishing up Volume One (I’m only bummed that I don’t have Volume Three!!).

Volume Two continues the adventures of our favorite cibopath (see the previous entry for the explanations of all of these awesome ideas).  As the book opens we see that Tony Chu’s former partner, John Colby is back.  We knew he was still alive, but we didn’t know how alive he might be–after all, he had a cleaver in his face last time we saw him.  But he has been repaired, with the latest in technology, by the FDA.  And now Chu and Colby are back together, bickering as ever with new superpowers (the scene where Colby shows off what he can do is awesome). 

Chapter Two (Issue Seven if you’re keeping track), introduces Lin Sae Woo.  When I mentioned last time that Guillory draws grotesque characters, I had her in mind.  Lin Sae Woo is an aggressive, angry woman and she is drawn to reflect that. But she also has an absurd body shape.  Her breasts are preposterous–not even superhero large, stupidly large and the rest of her can barely keep up.  I can’t even decide if she’s supposed to be sexy, she is so ridiculous.  But she makes a formidable foe (even if she’s on the same side as Chu). (more…)

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John Layman & Rob Guillory–Chew: Volume One: Taster’s Choice (2009)

Posted in "Weird Al" Yankovic, Adventure, Death, Food, Graphic Novel, John Layman, Justin Timberlake, Lonely Island, Rob Guillory, Saturday Night Live, Snoop Dog, Violence, Yuck! on November 1, 2011| 1 Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: LONELY ISLAND-Turtleneck & Chain (2011).

I liked “Lazy Sunday” quite a lot, but I didn’t feel compelled to get the album.  Then, when I heard Samberg on NPR, it made quite a compelling case for this second album.  So I decided to check it out.

Most comedy albums are juvenile, so let’s get that out of the way.  This is juvenile.  And, as with most SNL-derived humor, it’s a one note joke that gets stretched out.  The good news is that very few of the songs stretch too long (only one is more than three minutes) and the music itself is quite good–which allows for repeatedly listens.

The opening, “We’re Back!” is really quite funny.  It’s all about how the three guys have really tiny penises.  Ha ha, but it’s delivered with such great gangsta rap style that it is very, very funny.  “Mama” is a wonderful tribute to the singers’ Moms.  The song is interrupted by said mother over and over.  On this one, the joke might go on too much, but overall, it’s very funny.

The longest song is “Jack Sparrow” and it is one of the best ones on the disc.  It features Michael Bolton (!) singing his heart out about his love for the Pirates of the Caribbean movies–which is funny enough, but the guys are rapping behind him about something else entirely.  They keep trying to stop Bolton from hijacking the song.  It’s very well done (and man, say what you will, Bolton can belt out a song).

“Attracted to Us” goes on a bit too long (and at less than 2 minutes that’s a bad sign) and “Rocky” in which one of the dorky guys talks about fighting Rocky (ala The Fresh Prince) is a super long SNL skit (which is not a compliment).

“Turtleneck & Chain” features Snoop Dog and is just fantastic–I love hearing Snoop Dog rap this geek shit.  “Shy Ronnie 2: Ronnie & Clyde” also works very well with Rihanna on vocals.  The song itself is catchy and the joke, when it finally comes, is really good.

“Motherlover” is a sequel to “Dick in a Box” (“this is the second best idea we ever had”) and Justin Timberlake continues to impress me in his new role as a funny guy.  This is a gross song but it’s really crazy catchy (Timberlake must have written the chorus).

One of my favorite songs on the disc is “Threw It on the Ground.”  Musically, I think it’s fantastic and lyrically it is pretty funny.  I wish that they had had some better examples of things to throw on the ground (the cell phone joke is lame and they get kind of lazy by the end), but I get this song stuck in my head a lot.  Another song guaranteed to stay in your head forever is “I Just Had Sex,” a childish and silly song that is outrageously catchy.  And if it’s in your head it won’t leave.  (And yes it’s funny).

“Japan” is a crazy and funny look at Japanese culture while “After Party” is a bit one note.  “No Homo” on the other hand brings in a full circle hardcore joke that is at once offensive and hilarious. 

“The Creep” is pretty unsuccessful even with the help of Nicki Minaj–the video helps a little, but not enough.  As with most rap albums, the skits are the weakest link.  Without a song behind them the skits are good for one or two listens and some not even that (“Falcor vs Atreyu”?  “My Mic”? these wouldn’t even be funny if they were improvised, and yet they seem very deliberately planned–boy I hope there wasn’t more than one take).

Overall, this is a funny rap parody/tribute album.  It’s obvious that the guys love rap and they are quite successful in their stylings.  None of it works as well as “Weird Al”‘s “White and Nerdy” but honestly whatever could?  But “Weird Al” is PG, and Lonely Island fills in as the adult pranksters.

[READ: October 28, 2011] Chew: Volume One

Sarah gave me this book after reading the recommendation on The Hub.  She said it was really good but it was really gross.  And that’s quite an accurate assessment.

One thing that I liked about this book was that it had not one but two really cool ideas that run through the series.  Either one would be a compelling-enough premise, but putting them together makes for an excellent story with lots of possibilities.

The story is about Tony Chu, who is a policeman.  He is also cibopathic, which means that when he eats anything (except beets for some reason), he instantly knows the history of that food: eating fruits and vegetables shows him the tree it grew on and how it was harvested;  eating meat, well, just let your imagination go on that one.  That’s a pretty great premise.  But when he gets a murderer’s blood on his lips and he instantly knows the names and locations of all of his victims, well, that ups the intensity (and the grossness).

The second great premise is that the government has outlawed chicken because of the avian flu.  Millions of people died from the flu and now only chicken-substitutes are used.  There is now a black market for real chicken, including speakeasys, and the FDA is hot on the heels of all traffickers.  And yet, there is a small group of rebels who believe that the whole avian flu thing is a sham (including Tony’s brother Chow).  They don’t postulate why the sham was created, but they are out to set the record straight. 

Put these two ideas together and you get a hell of a story. (more…)

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Arno Camenisch–“Sez Ner” (Harper’s, November 2011)

Posted in Arno Camenisch, Death, Depeche Mode, Donal McLaughlin, Erasure, Harper's, Short Story, Translation, Violence, Yeasayer on October 25, 2011| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: YEASAYER-Odd Blood (2010).

Sometimes albums have a single that is nothing like the rest of the album.  So you buy the album and hate everything but that one song.  This album is almost the exact opposite.  It opens with a song that is so odd–noisy and with massively manipulated vocals, that you would never guess the rest of the album is like some of the best Depeche Mode-friendly pop in the last thirty years.

That opening song, “Children” is creepy, with lots of percussion and atmosphere.  And it gives you no expectation for what comes next: “Ambling Alp” a bouncy track with a super catchy chorus.  This track reminds me of Erasure at their heyday.

“Madder Red” seems to be comprised mostly of (rather nice) backing vocals) with lead vocals done in a mellow Depeche Mode style.  “O.N.E.” sounds pretty much exactly like a keyboard-heavy alt-radio hit from 1991 (it’s fantastic).  And “Love Me Girl” with its tremendous dual-vocals sounds like one of the best pre-guitar Depeche Mode songs ever.  It’s amazing. 

And yet for all of  this talk of sounding like mid 80s alt rock, Yeasayer adds enough new ideas–recording techniques, fullness of sound and current studio tricks that they don’t sound dated.  Or like a rip off.

The frantic keyboard lines of “Rome” propel that song, while “Strange Reunions” slows things down considerably.  Things pick up again with the chanting and the cool keyboards (and great post chorus riff) of “Mondegreen.” 

The disc ends with “Grizelda.”  It continues with this current groove.  Not the best song, but a decent ending to a great disc.  Just don’t let that first song scare you off of what’s inside.

[READ:  October 21, 2011] “Sez Ner”

Sez Ner is evidently a place.  And this story is a snapshot of a day or two of that place. 

Sez Ner has a swineherd, a cowherd, some other farmhands and a priest.  This snapshot shows the men in their daily lives: accepting the fate of the dying animals, pushing the living animals to the edges of abuse and/or not really caring that much about them.  Some animals escape.  Some die.

The priest blesses everyone, takes his bounty and leaves. (more…)

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Wells Tower–Everything Ravaged, Everything Burned (2009)

Posted in Anachronisms, Cheerwine, Circus, Death, Harper's, Hellbender, Marriage Trouble, McSweeney's, Metallica, New Yorker, Short Story, South, The Blues Brothers, Violence, Wells Tower on October 10, 2011| 3 Comments »

SOUNDTRACK: HELLBENDER-Hellbender (1993).

Hellbender is a band that Wells Tower was in before he became a professional writer.  He played guitar and sang backing vocals (and wrote some lyrics, but not on this album).  The drummer, Harrison Hayes is now the drummer for Les Savy Fav and the bassist and singer Al Burian is most notable for his zine Burn Collector (for a time he was the most famous former Hellbender, although I’d never heard of him).  They were always pretty small time, although their third album did receive some attention.

This first album is pretty rough–quickly made and cheaply mastered and yet there are good dynamics, cool breaks and a whole lot of punk.  Al Burian’s voice is in shouty punk mode (lyrics are not all decipherable) and although his voice works it’s a bit samey throughout the disc.  The drums don’t always sound great, but there are often cool drum breaks.  And the guitars are quite assured.  Despite the punk attitude, it’s not all flat out speed.

There are some dynamic breaks, like in the second track “Housebroken,” which has some cool moments when the drums highlight an unexpected tempo changed.  “Clocked Out” was the single they released prior to the CD and it has some real production values (and a very funny intro from a local DJ).  The guitar highlights the trebly end in a kind of ska riff which is quite different from the rest; there’s also some discernable bass lines and a cool bass/guitar solo (punk, yes, but branching out a bit).  It’s a great track.

“Two Twenty Two” made it onto a couple of local compilations.  It has a slightly less heavy feel, with some interesting guitar lines.  “Aisle Ten” has verses that end with some really heavy (reminding me of Metallica) riffs that really punctuate the vocals.  “Peeling” has some cool backing vocal chanting (as well as what sounds like an answering machine message) that sets it apart from the other songs.  “Clarence” has a really long instrumental opening (1 minute out of a 2 and a half-minute song) that shows of more of Burian’s bass lines.

“Couch” was the B-side to “Two Twenty Two” and it has better production values as well–and lots more dynamic parts.  The final song, Retread” is a sorta political song, “Do you remember when we were young–revolution seemed like fun.  I thought I could get things done by yelling at the top of my lungs.”  Not mind-blowing lyrically but a good sentiment nonetheless.

The band is very tight–their breaks and starts and stops are right on–many of their songs end suddenly and the band pulls it off very well.  When I first listened to the album, I thought it was kind of pedestrian, but after really listening, I realized this is a very well-formed debut. It’s an interesting addition to any punk fan’s collection and an interesting footnote for any fan of Wells Tower.  You can find a copy of the disc at Metro/Sea.

[READ: September 30, 2011] Everything Ravaged, Everything Burned

After talking about Wells Tower for a while and reading all of his uncollected stories and nonfiction, I finally got around to reading his short story collection.  And I think I have an interesting perspective on the book because at least two of the stories were totally reworked from their original release.  Not simply updating a thing or two, but totally revamped.  In my experience, aside from the David Foster Wallace essays that were truncated in their original form, this is the only book I know where the stories inside were totally rewritten for the compilation.

There are nine stories in the collection.  And I have to say as an overview to this book, I can’t get over how much I enjoyed them.  I mean, I knew I liked Tower from what I had read before, but I didn’t expect to enjoy this book quite so much because Tower writes a very manly kind of story.  He usually writes about tough guys and men who have a hard time interacting with their fathers and other situations that are out of my ken.  But Tower upends many conventions in his stories and his prose is tight and succinct and his stories are very quick to read and really enjoyable. (more…)

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Callan Wink–“Dog Run Moon” (New Yorker, September 26, 2011)

Posted in Callan Wink, Consumerism, Dogs, Futility, Ironweed, Marriage Trouble, MST3K, New Yorker, Poetry, Short Story, Threats, Tom Waits, Violence, William Kennedy on October 3, 2011| Leave a Comment »

SOUNDTRACK: TOM WAITS-Small Change (1976).

Half-naked woman on the cover and all (Wikipedia say that this might be Elvira, before she was “Elvira”), this is what people thing of when they think Tom Waits: That gravelly voice is in full form here, with poetic rants and bluesy, drunken musings.

The opening track, “Tom Traubert’s Blues (Four sheets to the wind in Copenhagen)” (I love that many of these titles have parenthetical additions) features the repeated chorus from “waltzing Matilda” which is kind of cheating, but which certainly makes this song potent and memorable.  “Step Right Up” is a skit and scat sales pitch for a miracle product.  It’s a wonderful piece of snark aimed at hucksters (this actually makes sense given that nearly 40 years later he still hates advertising (according to this interview on NPR)).

“Jitterbug Boy” is a mournful piano ballad.  It makes me think of William Kennedy’s Ironweed (of course, Waits was in the film of Ironweed, so maybe that’s got something to do with it).  “I Wish I was in New Orleans (In the Ninth Ward)” has a very Louis Armstrong feel to it (I never noticed how close this early style is to Armstrong until I started playing “What a Wonderful World” for my kids (no Tom for them yet). And of course, the Ninth Ward was really devastated by Hurricane Katrina, so maybe they should have used this as their anthem.

“The Piano’s Been Drinking” is forever etched in my mind from Mystery Science Theater 3000–Tom Servo does a wonderful Tom Waits impersonation.  Incidentally, Waits himself had been drinking, quite heavily at the time.  The track “Pasties and G String” is a scat-fueled description of the lady on the cover, more or less.  It’s accompanied by simply drums and a cymbal and is not too dissimilar from “Step Right Up.”  “Bad Liver and a Broken Heart” begins and ends with the melody of “As Time Goes By” and ends with a confession to drinking too much.

A song like “The One That Got Away” is Waits rambling around with his poetry in his gravelly, slurry followed by a sultry saxophone.  It sets a mood faster than anything I know.  Of course, if you don’t want that mood, you won’t want this album.

Of his first four albums, this one is my favorite (just ahead of Closing Time).  I’m not a huge fan of his early work, and I don’t listen to it all that often, but it’s a perfect treat when the mood strikes.  Waits also was beginning to get into something of a rut.  Despite his varied styles per album, all of the albums were beginning to blend a little.   There are still some great songs coming, but it would take until Swordfishtrombones before he went really far afield from this comfort zone.

[READ: September 21 2011] “Dog Run Moon”

This is one of those stories that seems so pointless that you can’t stop reading.  The good thing is that it was so well-written and engaging that its pointlessness is part of its charm.

As the story opens, Sid is running stark naked through a desert landscape–his feet are bleeding, he is covered in the red dust from the ground and there is a white Spaniel running alongside him.

Essentially, the entire story is that Sid has stolen this dog from Montana Bob and his friend Charlie Chaplin.  They caught him and he ran away with the dog through the desert.  As I say, it’s kind of pointless because he’s running naked and barefoot and they are chasing him on ATVs–he’s obviously not going to escape.  But what makes the story worth reading is the way the plot is irrelevant (except that it tells you a lot about Sid), because it’s really the impetus for his actions that comprises the story. (more…)

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