Uhm, far out. Like.
Heather‘s been invaded by a confused bird.
Hilarious! Perhaps next time, the male of the species, loong feathers and all!
No Nostalgia Updates
No Nostalgia has updated their site this week.
They are the label-side of both the Mysteries of Life, whom I’ve written about at length here, and the Vulgar Boatmen, whom I’m overdue to write about.
As with most things, it’s just a matter of sitting down and doing it.
But.
Not tonight.
Instead, I’ll call your attention to the No Nostalgia hosted Dale Lawrence article, “On Mashups“, which Eric Sinclair noted to me when it appeared in the Chicago Reader a few weeks back; Dale is writing about his appreciation for the form which is currently best known for propelling Elvis back to his proper #1 place on the charts with “A Little Less Conversation”. Dale does not write about this record however, but rather about more obscure remixes which combine two disparate tracks to create a new work, frequently completely unauthorized. He digs the crazy kids, baby.
I’ll also point out Dale’s recounting of An Extra Week in New Orleans this spring, when he made time, among other things, to attend the Mystic Kights of the Mau-Mau‘s First Annual Ponderosa Stomp.
The Stomp was a nearly-unbelievable lineup of greats and obscurities from the heydey of American regional rock, which I encourage you to learn about both from Dale’s article and from the Mau Mau site.
Dale is the reason I love rock music, no bones about it: his music taught me everything I know and believe on the topic, so reading his account of watching Scotty Moore play “Heartbreak Hotel” in a small-club setting had special meaning for me (Moore was Elvis’ guitarist on most of his early records, including that one).
Too bad Buddy Holly lies in his grave lo these many years, as I nurse the thesis that Holly stands to Dale as Dale stands to me (with the caveat that I’m not in the same musical league, mind you; matters of taste and theory only, uh, theoropositated).
Anyway, at least one good pal of mine was involved in getting the Stomp together, and it pleases me greatly that some sort of dialog should result. In a way that’s not too far fetched, Dale’s music helped make the Stomp a reality, and helped conjure Scotty Moore there in front of him.
It’s a conjure town, they say.
Ihnatko
Ihnatko on some bands from the sixties.
See, I told you that you didn’t have to be a Mac techie to find him amusing!
(Dear God, I can spell the man’s last name without checking now.)
THE CARTOON HISTORY OF THE UNIVERSE VOLUME III
My review of THE CARTOON HISTORY OF THE UNIVERSE VOLUME III is up at Cinescape now.
If you haven’t read Vols 1 & 2, by all means do! Allan Bloom is crying becasue of YOU!
(What? you don’t think he was referring to these books in his hearty cries for more history in the curriculum? Could be. In that case, let him cry, cuz you should still read ’em. They might even lead you to gen-u-wine classics: I wouldn’t ever have paused for Herodotus if not for these books.)
Volume 3 is more good stuff, with less of the funny bits, I thought. The central narrative of the book is, in fact, the rise of Arab civilization and the period in which it held sway over the Mediterranean.
Lots of ground covered here that I don’t recall from History 101. Well hell, just read that review.
Sunday's a day of rest, innit?
Aargh, sorry this entry isn’t up til now. Guess I got too involved on Friday and Saturday. So: howzabout some mixed notes?
First off a big YEESH to Mr. Baruz for hooking me up to mainline a dang wordgame: Bookworm will keep me from my household chores for days. Weeks, even. I got NOZZLES with some bonus or something.
Next, I went overboard on the research for what’s gonna be an 800-word piece on the IMAX re-releases of “Attack of the Clones” and “Apollo 13,” and went and saw “Space Station 3D” and “Apollo 13” back to back last week. Or maybe the week before. I forget. Go see ’em both.
“Space Station 3D” was in un-headachy, polarized-lens-headset 3D and boy was it neat. It was very interesting to compare and contrast the static, information filled framing of the 3D movie to the artful, you-only-get-to-see-what-we-show-you approach of what is an excellent Hollywood flick, A13.
I’m working on another oversized project to spring on y’all soon. It’s neat, If I do say so myself. It’s not as convoluted as the KGP.
Hey-HEY RAM is cheap again. $50 for half a gig. Get it now before the port closings start messing things up good.
We have two successive waves of guests arriving shortly; Hotel Perez-Whybark will be booked until November.
blogroll reorg impends
I have let my blogrolls get out of hand.
Somehow, I must impose order.
Time for musing.
Some new folk
I’d been thinking I needed to point out some of the new links over in my sprawled out collection of blogrolls over there, and the latest of Paul’s occasional summarization entries reminded me of this.
So, to wit:
Griff’s ultramicroscopic generally publishes the harebrained reflections of this funny Texian designer. Since I’ve read him, he’s, among other things, proposed that toilet seats are the cleanest surface in the house, noted that his proper nickname may be “Tater-Head”, and of course, offered a reflection on the particular value of olfactory stimuli with regard to bacon cheesburgers. I’d hazard a guess that he’s a big Farrelly Bros. fan. (How’d’ya spell that?)
Do not drink Coke while reading lest you suffer the dreaded snort-attack.
Scott Chaffin’s The Fat Guy (another Texian) has been noted previously here, I think. I enjoy reading it because Scott is prone to neanderthal outbursts of conservatism which he immediately doubts, in smaller type, beneath them. He’s also very funny. The tension between his dead-set certainties and immediate uncertainty absolutely humanizes his presentation, makes him a better read than, say, The Economist or P. J. O’Rourke.
I’m interested in what Scott has to say precisely because he shares his process of perception, whereas when I make the effort (it’s rare, because I get so worked up) to read one of the professional conservatives, I just want march over to their house and punch them repeatedly in the face. I don’t learn anything from that experience, while I do from Scott’s writing. How can I put this? Scott’s writing is lower-case-d democratic, and in my book, that’s a good thing.
He also subscribes to the “leave it be” blogging school, so you can, for example, follow his experience of and reactions to the supposed discovery of weapons-grade nuclear materials by the Turks last week. He’s cooled off a bit here, and then gets the news there were no radioactive materials involved.
I understand he’s in the market for a good tin-foil hat.
Back when I was unfolding that tragedy for y’all, I was happy to find that well-known Macintosh funnyman Andy Ihnatko had revivified his website with a creaking, clanking homebrewed blog apparatus. He’s been posting semi-reg’lar since then, and boy is he funny. I think he’s even funny of you’re not a Mac techie. But how the hell would I know?
Also added that week was Brian Sobolak’s Planetary Delight, in which Mr. Sobolak reflects. Brian was the first person I did not know to write in response to my work that week. His writings reflect what I take to be some wrestling with intermittent depression, something I’m familiar with. It’s interesting, to me, to read his entries because of the familiar ring they have on the subject. The experience of looking at the world and seeing nothing in it that renders pleasure, only reminders of suffering, while at the same time simply shrugging about the perception, is, well, familiar.
Finally, Brian recommended the Amazing K’s Driving through Nebraska, which I heartily second. While K’s compositional style is a bit unpolished for the web (no short paragraphs separated by white space here), his writings are densely allusive and frickin’ laugh-out-loud HILARIOUS.
The density of the postings is such that the effect is overhearing that kind of nutty bohemian-of-all-trades who mumbles in the corner at your favorite coffeeshop. It turns out he’s not so nutty, he’s just had a LOT of espresso, and his stream-of-consciousness runs to, among other things, comparing his dog’s waste-voiding practices to the compositional techniques of Gustav Mahler and Wagner. In fact, his essays tend to be too dense to easily cite, and he’s absurdly prolific (on the day I post this, for example, he’s posted eight entries between 11:26 am and 2:17 pm).
Although there are others in the “new” section, they are clearly better-known and longer-established, so I’m not gonna fret about describing them.
So, ta-ta to you, and see you tomorrow.
Googlefight
Googlefight: hours down the drain. Endless fun. A new gambling opportunity.
via MeFi.
Ken kicked my ass six ways from sunday, btw, the bastid: Mike Whybark v. Ken Goldstein.
On the other hand, this is obviously a conventional wisdom meter: Rolling Stones v. Beatles.
So what on earth should I make of quality v. quantity?
I suppose I’ll take consolation in the knowledge that discernment v. popularity at least provides a sensible result.
I can rest my case with the inevitable Macintosh v. Windows.
Drummond & Son
Drummond & Son, in the October 7 ish of the New Yorker, spins a sodden tale of my town, and I thought it was nailed. The geography is right, for example; and while Mr. D’Ambrosio locates his typewriter shop in Belltown, there was just such a shop about four blocks from where I live, that’s now become a fine drinking establishment specializing in European beers.
I read the story in my living room, on the couch, as a fine fall rainstorm lowered our famous clouds above, a down comforter. I should have shouldered into a tweed and stepped outside, just to get the smell right as I read.
While I did not note any specific pop-culture clues to the time-setting of the story, I’d guess it was just about the time I moved here or a couple of years after. The city felt like the story feels – isolate, wet, distant, a reserved neighborliness – even chilliness – in the place of the yammering aggression that fuels most American cities.
If our recession stays the course, that’s something that might return, I hope. I liked it here then. I liked the fact that buses were expected to be a part of the middle-class landscape and that poets and musicians could bump into one another in used book stores. Maybe that city’s still out there.
Our air is noticeably fouler now than it was five years ago. As I’ve written here before, our governmental apparatus is in a state of paralysis, preferring to close libraries and launch smear campagns at various wings of themeselves than to support good ideas and execute them well in the public interest. Perhaps that listless stupidity is, as the story implies, Seattle’s child. I hope not.
Mr. D’Ambrosio is interviewed here. Oh, look. A quote:
“Writing about the Pacific Northwest is a funny phenomenon, particularly being from Seattle. The Seattle that I have an allegiance to was a desperately unhappy place. It’s not the Seattle that over the last ten years has evolved to become a place that, at least in the States, has a kind of national prominence. Particularly grunge music has focused attention on the place. It’s really the Seattle of the 70’s that I grew up in which had the highest unemployment rate in the country; it was a dump. There was a big sign above the freeway saying, “Will the last person leaving Seattle please turn out the lights.” People were leaving in droves. Boeing [airplane manufacturer] had laid off a huge amount of people and the real estate market was totally depressed. Nothing was going on. And that’s the city that I actually still look for in a way, even though it has become hidden by the coffee shops. ”
UPDATE, Father’s Day, 2016. Fixed bitrotted NYer link.
mo' kats
nameneko, or something.
Yes, more cats.
Damn, I should tell my wife that this is turning into a, uh, cat-egory on the blog.
I remember seeing this genre of animal pics all over Nippon when visiting circa 1978. I found it perplexing.