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Archive for the ‘War’ Category

Tom Bissell–3 book reviews (Harper’s, February 2013)

Posted in Ben Folds Five, Biography, Book Reviews, Charlie LeDuff, Consumerism, Corporate skewering, Culture Shock, Depression, Drugs, Eyes Wide Shut, Frederic Raphael, George Saunders, Harper's, Religion, The New York Times, Tom Bissell, War on October 19, 2013| Leave a Comment »

febSOUNDTRACK: BEN FOLDS FIVE-The Sound of the Life of the Mind (2013).

bffThe first Ben Folds Five album in over a decade opens with a big noisy sound and then quickly shows the diversity of the band by pulling back and showing a mellow verse with Ben’s piano and occasional bass.  But then the chorus comes in and Robert Sledge’s bass is once again masterful.  While Ben is clearly the leader of the band, there is something about the BFF’s bass that is so notable.  And this album rocks in BFF’s unique way–rollicking piano, and noisy buzzy bass.

“Michael Praytor, Five Years Later” has some great harmonies (the kind that BFF do so well).  “Sky High” is the kind of social commentary ballad that Ben excels at. And the title track is a fast moving rocker that has more great harmonies.

“On Being Frank” is a Sinatra inspired song with strings.  While “Draw a Crowd” continues Ben’s humorous vulgarity in a very unexpected way: “if you’re feeling small, and you can’t draw a crowd…draw dicks on a wall.”  “Do It Anyway” the single, which inexplicably wasn’t huge, gets more and more fun with each listen–to scream along with “OKAY!” is very cathartic.

“Hold That Thought” is one of those mellow but speedy numbers that I love from Ben.  And when then bass plays that high solo bit near the end (oh that bass), the song kicks into new levels of excellence.  “Away When You were Down” is another string-filled mellow song.  The final track “Thank You for Breaking My Heart” reminds me of “Boxing”, a mellow piano ballad which is, obviously, heartbreaking.

This is a great return to form.  There’s some heavy rockers and some pretty ballads. It’s nice to hear the Five back together again.

[READ: October 5, 2013] 3 book reviews

This month Bissell reviewed three books.

The first book is a biography of Flavius Jospehus called A Jew Among Romans jar by Frederic Raphael (who also wrote the screen play for Eyes Wide Shut).  I had never heard of Flavius Jospehus but evidently without him we would have no historical accounts of time from around the beginning of the Common Era.  His writings are pretty much the only works that have survived.

And his story itself is interesting too. In 70 A.D. the Romans destroyed Jerusalem. This attack has had more impact on current life than can be explained.  Judaism lost the Second temple, Jewish Christianity soon disappeared beneath the waves of Gentile Christianity, even Islam was shaped by this because a Mosque now stands where the Second Temple was.  And nearly all modern forms of anti-Semitism can be traced back to this attack in some way.  Flavius Jospehus chronicled this time as a Jew in a reasonably impartial way (which led many to call him a traitor).  His books Jewish Antiquities and The Jewish War are the sources for almost all of our knowledge of that era, including about Pontius Pilate. (more…)

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Robert Coover–“The Colonel’s Daughter” (New Yorker, September 2, 2013)

Posted in Death, Modest Mouse, New Yorker, Robert Coover, Short Story, The Kids in the Hall, Threats, Typhoon, Violence, War, Wolf Parade on September 19, 2013| 1 Comment »

CV1_TNY_09_02_13Viva.inddSOUNDTRACK: TYPHOON-“Artificial Light” (2013).

typhoonartSince I mentioned “Artificial Light” the other day, I thought I’d link to it today.

The song opens with a pretty guitar melody punctuated by horns.  The singer’s vocal style is dramatic and often unexpected–especially the way he gets louder mid sentence and then drops to a whisper at other times (reminds me a bit of Wolf Parade or perhaps even Modest Mouse).

There are very pretty moments in the song (especially when the orchestration fills in).  But the horns also give it a kind of Spanish feel, which rides on top of the heavier guitars in the verses.

At about two and a half minutes, the song drops out completely.  It is picked up by some gentle guitar and horns as it builds back up.  By the end the chorus of voices builds the song to new heights and widths.

It’s interesting what you can do with so many band members in five and a half minutes.  This song really runs a breadth of ideas but remains quite pretty throughout.

[READ: September 12, 2013] “The Colonel’s Daughter”

The Kids in the Hall once made a sketch in which there was no beginning or ending, just a middle.

In the sketch, a man in a tutu slaps a man in a scuba diving suit saying.  “Stop it. stop it. I’ve got to stop you and your revolutionaries from taking over this country.”

This story is like the inverse of that sketch.  It has a beginning and an end but no middle.  Interestingly, since it is also about revolutionaries taking over a country, I now just insert that sketch into the story (I’m sure that makes Coover very happy.  I wonder if anyone else mentions this sketch in the review of this story).

I have mixed feeling about Coover’s work in general.  It often feels more style over substance.  And I fear that this one may have been playing with that somewhat. Interestingly as well, there is a lot of substance, but it is played in such as way as to make it almost seem meaningless—unless you are willing to really unpack it (which I wasn’t).

So, the Colonel is intent on overthrowing the President (the country is unnamed).  He has chosen the group of men sitting in the room with him.  Some of them know each other but not all do.  They look around and size each other up.  Indeed, 5/6 of the story is the men sizing each other up.  To me, the men are interchangeable.  I don’t know if that is lazy reading on my part or if it is indeed on purpose.

Each man gets a brief biography—the Deputy Minister, the Police Chief, the biplane pilot, the business man, the professor, the doctor and possibly someone else.

We learn a little about each man and why the Colonel would have chosen him.  We learn about his fears about the mission and who he mistrusts the most.  We also learn that one of the men is a double agent, working for the President.  Like a game of Clue, pieces of information are given that would let you know who the man is, but again, I didn’t feel like doing the work to figure it out.  I am curious to know if you can tell who it is from the story, but not curious enough to do the work (so I should not be rewarded). (more…)

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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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Tom Gauld–Goliath (2012)

Posted in Art, Bible, Black Sabbath, Comic Strips, Death, Drawn & Quarterly, Fables, Myths, Short Books, Tom Gauld, Unknown Mortal Orchestra, War on July 30, 2013| Leave a Comment »

goliathSOUNDTRACK: UNKNOWN MORTAL ORCHESTRA-“No Need for a Leader” (live at the Rock and Roll Hotel in Washington, D.C, May 23, 2013) (2013).

umoI have been hearing about the Unknown Mortal Orchestra for a little while now  The name is intriguing and really could indicate so many different styles of music.  With the internet, it’s very easy to hear a sample of a band, but I like to happen upon them a bit more organically.  So, here was a track from a recent live show that NPR was sampling for us.

UMO is from New Zealand and they have a kind of psychedelic-meets-Black Sabbath feel.  The song isn’t really heavy so much as just riff-based and speedy.  The song has an appropriate Sabbathesque quick riff at the end of each verse and a boatload of flange and vibrato tossed on, too.

But I don’t really care for the vocalist, who seems kind of pinched and tight–almost exactly the opposite of what this expansive song is crying out for.

So this song is ultimately a mixed bag–I like the vibe of the band, but I don’t feel compelled to hear any more from them.

You can watch the video (and groove on the singer’s shirt) here.

[READ: July 5, 2013] Goliath

I enjoyed Gauld’s You’re All Just Jealous of My Jetpack enough to track down Goliath, his previous book.

Although Jetpack is a collection of strips, Goliath is a telling of the story of David and Goliath (which everyone knows is the great underdog story).  The big difference here is that we see the story from Goliath’s point of view (which I believe we do not ever see in the Bible–it’s been years since I’ve actually read it).

In this version, Goliath is a simple man.  Despite his size, he would rather do office work than fight.  Indeed, when given the opportunity, he jumps at the chance to do administrative paper work rather than practice with weapons.  But the Philistines are at war and everyone needs to help.

That’s when one of the soldiers gets an idea.  Goliath is to go into the valley and proclaim to all who can hear: “I am Goliath of Gath, Champion of the Philistines.  I Challenge you: Choose a Man.  Let him come to me that we may fight.  If he be able to kill me then we shall be your servants.  But if I kill him then you shall be our servants.” (more…)

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Rebecca Makkai–“Other Types of Poison” (Harper’s, July 2013)

Posted in Biography, Birds, Books about writers, Death, Eddie Vedder, Essays, Harper's, Marriage Trouble, Memoirs, Pearl Jam, War on July 16, 2013| Leave a Comment »

julySOUNDTRACK: PEARL JAM-“Mind Your Manners” (2013).

mannersAfter Eddie Vedder released an album of ukulele songs, it seemed like perhaps he was putting aside his heavier ways.  Well, nothing could be further from the truth.

This new song (album out in October) plays up their faster side, with short fast chords (think “Spin the Black Circle”).  It starts out heavy, and when the verse proper starts the band really kicks in.  The chords are heavy, but the bridge is fairly light and breezy.

The end features some chanted vocals (seldom used by Pearl Jam but effective here).  But to me the real standout moment comes from Mike McCready’s solo.  It is noisy and weird–he seems to be experimenting with all kinds of sounds in these 20 seconds or so.  It’s unexpected from him and very interesting.

I do not like how the song ends, which seems almost abrupt by accident.  Perhaps the released version gets cut off a few seconds early.  Nevertheless, I’m pretty excited about the new album (and tour).

[READ: July 11, 2013] “Other Types of Poison”

This is credited as memoir.  It is three short “stories.”  All of which I enjoyed immensely–but especially the first.

The first is called The Ink.  In this tale, Makkai’s  ancestors were hiding out in a little lake house when soldiers came to the door.  I loved that no one can remember the details of whether the soldiers were German or Russian or if that even mattered.  The important part is that the soldiers hung around and made themselves at home.  (The old lady was too old and scary to try anything with and the boy was too young).

Then they ran out of booze and one of the soldiers, noticing an inkwell, said he would drink that.  The inkwell was a gift to the boy, because the old woman was a writer.  And although the cost was dear, the soldier drank the whole thing.  Then he stumbled out of the house, face completely blackened.  From then on, the old woman claimed that had she killed a soldier with ink.

I love Makkai’s ending: She says she doesn’t of the details are correct, but “If this were your family legacy—this ridiculous assertion of the might and violence o ink , this blatant and beautiful falsehood—could you change it? Would you dare?” (more…)

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Tom Gauld–You’re All Just Jealous of My Jetpack (2013)

Posted in Art, Books about writers, Comic Strips, Consumerism, Death, Demons, End of the World, Fables, Fantasy, Funny (ha ha), Funny (strange), Golems, Meta, Myths, Nature, Neurotics, Noir, Short Books, Smarty Pants, Surreal, Technology, The Future, The Guardian, Time Travel, Tom Gauld, Travel, UFOs, Video Games, War, We Were Promised Jetpacks on July 14, 2013| Leave a Comment »

jetpackSOUNDTRACK: WE WERE PROMISED JETPACKS-“Quiet Little Voices” (2009).

jetpacksWhen you have a book with “Jetpack” in the title, the appropriate band is We Were Promised Jetpacks, no?  I’ve heard a lot of good things these guys.  But all I knew for certain was that they were Scottish.

I listened to their debut EP, The Last Place You’ll Look, which I liked a little.  But I didn’t care for the sound of the EP itself, it was rather flat.  A few listens got me enjoying the melodies and such but it never grabbed me.  Especially when I compared it to “Quiet Little Voices,” the lead single from their debut full length, These Four Walls.

The vocals are a bit stronger, the guitars and bass are both more clear.  The overall feeling is just brighter.  Now this may be a sign of selling out (is that something bands still do?), but really I think it’s just a better production for this song.  Which has a big chorus (and good backing vocals).

I listened to a few more tracks from These Four Walls and they are all good too.  I guess start with the albums and save the EP until after you’ve absorbed the band.

[READ: July 5, 2013] You’re All Just Jealous of My Jetpack

Gauld makes comics like no one else I know.  Most of his people are silhouetted or are the most rudimentary designs–simple triangle-shaped clothes, circle heads with dots for eyes and little else–maybe a nose if it’s profile. (Okay, there’s a bit of Chris Ware, but more like a much more relaxed Chris Ware).  And the wonderful thing is just how much he can convey with these painstakingly simple drawings.

The content of his comics is usually quite clever and often literary.  While I admit there were some I didn’t get (Like the Eric Gill cartoon–shame on me?–Aha: “[Gill’s] personal diaries describe his sexual activity in great detail including the fact that he sexually abused his own children, had an incestuous relationship with his sister and performed sexual acts on his dog.”  Geez, now the comic is very funny.).  There were some in which I liked the set up but would have preferred something funnier (like the Tom Waits comic–shame on him?)

But overall this collection was really enjoyable.  And I laughed a lot. (more…)

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Maile Meloy–The Apprentices (2013)

Posted in Adventure, Communists, Culture Shock, Ebony Bones, Magic, Maile Meloy, Ofra Haza, Supernatural, Trilogy, War, YA Books on July 10, 2013| Leave a Comment »

apprenticesSOUNDTRACK: EBONY BONES-“I See I Say” (2013).

ebonyI don’t really know what to imagine about this album from this one song.

The song opens with a skittery sampled vocal chant of “I See I Say” bouncing around.  It has a vaguely Indian sound to it (and reminds me of Ofra Haza).

After a bout a minute the voices slow to a halt which made me think something new was afoot.  But no, the voices start again, with more layers of keyboards and what is more or less a lead vocal keening away.

Then there are some actual sung words (and people chanting I See I Say), making the song sound fuller and fuller.

At first it didn’t really sound like a song so much as an introduction to something, but after a few listens, I can hear that there’s a lot more going on than I realized.   I just can’t imagine what the rest of the album will sound like.

[READ: June 30, 2013] The Apprentices

This is the second book in a trilogy (what is it about trilogies?) that began with The Apothecary.

This book is set two years after the action of the first book.  The kids are 16 now and have not seen each other since. (The book helpfully fills in the things that we have all forgotten since we read the first book, like that Benjamin’s father gave Janie and everyone a forgetting potion so that they would stay out of danger).

Now Janie is back in America, attending a private school (on a scholarship) while her parents are back making movies.  I would have loved to see more of Janie’s school, believe it or not, but the little we do see if enough to set the action in motion.  Janie, a very smart girl and a whiz at math, is accused of cheating by her roommate and (sort of) friend.  The friend is jealous of Janie because her dad keeps talking about how smart Janie is (and consequently how un-smart his own daughter is).

Obviously Janie is upset, but she is more upset because she has been working on an experiment in the chemistry lab.  She has been trying to remove the salt from salt water.  She has been getting memories of her time with Benjamin and one of the things she remembered was the desalinator.  She has been piecing together the formula and has just had a breakthrough.  But what will happen to her stuff (which is actually the school’s stuff?)

Benjamin has also been sending Janie cryptic messages.  She finally realizes that there is a code in which he is letting her know where he is.  It turns out Benjamin and his father are in the jungle saving people. Benjamin’s father has been using his apothecary skills to create some healing potions that are saving lives in the war-torn jungle.  But their mission is secret and Benjamin’s father doesn’t know that Benjamin is communicating with her. (more…)

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Jhumpa Lahiri–“Brotherly Love” (New Yorker, June 10 & 17, 2013)

Posted in All Songs Considered, Arranged Marriage, Death, Drug Church, Excerpt, Jhumpa Lahiri, Marriage Trouble, New Yorker, Pregnancy, Racism, Short Story, Soundgarden, Travel, War on July 9, 2013| 1 Comment »

CV1_TNY_06_10_13Schossow.inddSOUNDTRACK: DRUG CHURCH-“Deconstructing Snapcase” (2013).

drugchurchYesterday I commented about another Drug Church song by saying I liked this one better.  What’s interesting is that this one is thirty seconds longer but seems shorter.

The song opens with big loud aggressive guitars (kind of early Soundgarden), but the vocals, which are screamed, are brighter that their other song, providing a  nice contrast.  But the thing that made me like this song more than “YouTube” is the fast bright guitar bridge, in which the guitars ring out in contrast to the heavy opening chords–it gives the song a lot of dynamics.

There’s a guitar solo, which surprised me for some reason, but it breaks up the song and reintroduces some of the earlier riffs.  It’s a good heavy song.

[READ: June 18, 2013] “Brotherly Love”

Lahiri has the last and longest story in this New Yorker issue that’s chock full of stories.  This one is some fifteen pages and is part of a novel.

I was gripped instantly by the story.  But I am glad that it is part of a novel as I feel there were parts of the beginning that seemed extraneous without more story to follow.  Or should I say, if it was just a short story, it could have been shorter.  The story is about two brothers, Subhash and Udayan.  Subhash is older by fifteen months but Udayan is the far more daring one.  Subhash is cautious and does everything his parents say, while Udayan flouts the rules at every opportunity.

The first transgression we see is when they climb the wall into the country club, where locals are pretty much excluded.  They were told they could get golf balls, so they hopped the fence and took what they could.  They also marveled at the manicured lawns and the beauty around them.  They returned regularly until they were caught–but luckily for them they were not turned in. (more…)

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McSweeney’s #38 (2011)

Posted in Adam Levin, Adventure, Alia Malek, All Songs Considered, Ariel Dorfman, Bisi Adjapon, Books about writers, Boredom, Canadian Content, Chanan Tigay, Culture Shock, Dan Guterman, Dave Eggers, David Henne, Death, Essays, Francois Mauriac, Jack Teagle, Jason Polan, Jen Statsky, Joey Latimer, John Moe, Jon Wurster, Marriage Trouble, McSweeney's, Morality, Nathan Englander, Nathaniel Rich, Paul Curtis, Peter Meehan, Peter Orner, Rachel B. Glaser, Religion, Roddy Doyle, Rory Douglas, San Fermin, Short Story, Sloan Schang, Steven Millhauser, The Mountain Goats, Violence, War on July 5, 2013| 1 Comment »

38SOUNDTRACK: SAN FERMIN-“Crueler Kind” (2013).
sanfermin-91f624c3b893c51669028614cc4bbf4973704a7c-s1

This was the final song that NPR played in their summer new music collection.  It was a band that Bob didn’t know, but he liked the song and then saw them live and put the song here.

It opens very simply, quietly with beautiful harmonies over a simple synth.  After about 45 seconds, the drums and horns (!) kick in and the backing harmony vocals take on more of a choral sound (AHHHH!) that punctuates rather than accompanies the vocals.

The main riff stems from that horn—a bass saxophone?  And yet during the verses, everything resorts to that pretty, mellow sound.

It’s a very interesting mix of musics, and it reminds me of some of the more experimental bands of the 1990s.  I’ll bet they would be fun to see live.  And I’d like to hear more from this album.

[READ: June 20, 2013] McSweeney’s #38

And with this book, I have now read all of the McSweeney’s issues (except that Mammoth Treasury which I will get to, probably by the end of the year).  This one was a great collection of fiction and non-fiction, it also had an inserted comic.  The book itself was paperback, with a nice, textured cover and a cool design for the numbers. In looking for a picture I learned that it came in two colors (the yellow that I received and a black cover with white lines).

It continues with the later issues’ less frivolous style (in that there’s nothing weird about the book) and throughout, the quality of the work is great.  I really enjoyed this book.  It opens with letters and contains color pictures, too.

Letters (more…)

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Jeff Alexander and Tom Bissell–Speak, Commentary: The Big Little Book of Fake DVD Commentaries, Wherein Well-Known Pundits Make Impassioned Remarks About Classic Science-Fiction Films. It’s a Gas! (2003)

Posted in Aliens, Anachronisms, Brad, Fantasy, Funny (ha ha), Jeff Alexander, Lord of the Rings, McSweeney's, Pearl Jam, Planet of the Apes, Political Humor, Religion, Short Books, Star Trek, Star Wars, Stone Gossard, Tom Bissell, Violence, War on June 17, 2013| Leave a Comment »

speakSOUNDTRACK: STONE GOSSARD-“I Need Something Different” (2013).

stonegossardmoonlanderStone Gossard is the rhythm guitarist for Pearl jam.  He’s also one of their major songwriters.  He has one or two songs that he sings with the band.  This is a solo effort which indicates that he might be a heavier influence on the band.

Stone Gossard last released a solo album 12 years ago.  There’s a new Pearl Jam album in progress and Stone’s other band Brad put out an album not too long ago, so why not release a solo album?

I don’t know how much Gossard does on this song, but I rather imagine he plays everything (the solo is fine but not amazing and the drums are solid but don’t really standout).  And while that sounds dismissive, it’s not meant to be.  Gossard creates a solid sound of simple rock.

The guitars are loud and bouncy.  Stone’s voice is rough and workmanlike—there’s a reason he’s not a lead singer.  But his voice works great for this aggressive slice of rock.

The riff is continuous and non stop, while he sings I need something different.  And then at the mid way part the keyboards start—perhaps this is the something different.  The keys break the propulsion with a poppiness that you wouldn’t expect in the song.

Then the song returns to its original style.  It’s not a terribly original song, but it would be a fun bar anthem.

[READ: June 10, 2013] Speak, Commentary

When this book first came out I was pretty delighted.  What a funny concept—overblown writers and political pundits do DVD commentary about films they had nothing to do with.  It seemed like it would be very funny indeed.

And here’s the thing.  It is. For a few pages. But each one of these things feels as long as the actual movie they are commenting on.  Alexander and Bissell have done their research—they know what these figures will say.  And say.  And say.

As I said the premise is awesome, check out these wonderful combinations:

  • NOAM CHOMSKY & HOWARD ZINN on The Fellowship of the Ring
    ANN COULTER & DINESH D’SOUZA on Aliens
  • TERRY DWIBBLE & STEVEN McCRAY on Start Trek II: The Wrath of Khan
  • JERRY FALWELL & PAT ROBERTSON on Planet of the Apes (1968)
    WILLIAM BENNETT & DICK CHENEY on Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace

[Terry Dwibble & Steven McCray are (presumably) fictional characters—die hard Trekkies who are thrilled to be able to add this commentary and, frankly, this is the best one of these pieces.]

I think part of the problem with the book is the sequencing.  The first piece is incredibly dry.  I recall reading this when I first got it.  I don’t know if I read all the way through Chomsky and Zinn.  And I know I didn’t make it through all of the second one (Coulter and D’Souza)—my d0g eared page failure still lingers to this day.

But I finished this time. (more…)

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