Bunch o’ stuff

1. First of all we have a collection of strange accidents from widelec.org via growabrain.

2. Second, and obviously very much unrelated to the above, is an interview with crime novelist Robert Parker which gives good reasons for why his books are so goddamn bad; he admits to never revising his first draft. I have never understood why he continues to receive acclaim. This article follows on the heels of the Telegraphs’s 50 Crime Writers to Read Before You Die, and calls Parker “an unrivalled pulp stylist who may be the best crime writer you’ve never read”. What crap!

It is really one of the worst best lists I have ever read. I can only imagine it was put together by someone who went to the library and simply wrote down the first 50 authors in the mystery section. And it appears some misfiling was going on at the library as well since Charles Dickens ends up on the list.

3. And over at Conscientious, J.M. Colberg has a provocative discussion of portraiture and what we might be looking for. One of the examples used is the Avedon photo of Cat Power below. And the article will illustrate why I picked this picture over the other one discussed.

4. And moving on with more music, a recent write-up in Newsweek regarding music and race and authenticity which reminded me of Faking It by Yuval Taylor and Hugh Barker which is worth looking at for anybody interested in music history and the concept of authenticity. According to the book, in the early days of the blues, musicians then like now, traded music and there was not much of a race difference. Blacks were singing protocountry, whites protoblues, and it all was aimed at what people wanted to hear. When the musicologists descended into the backwoods looking for roots they imposed the color bars, disregarding those who sang across lines, looking for kind of a noble savage authenticity rather than what really had happened.

5. And what better excuse for this Kids in the Hall video of Mark McKinney as Mississippi Gary:

Donnie Darko: Modern Classic

Great article at A.V. Club on Donnie Darko. Its the first in a projected series entitled The New Cult Canon to be followed with discussions on Morvern Callar, Irma Vep, Miami Blues and Babe 2: A Pig In The City. I have to admit that other than Donnie, the only other one I am familiar with is Miami Blues. And are you like me thinking Babe?

The article is good because it is one of those that, at least for me, pointed out a few things that I hadn’t entirely picked up on, and most of all, because it made me want to see this film again. (And I just happen to have a copy so that will be happening soon).

In the meanwhile here is a great clip, which is, as pointed out in the article, introduces almost every major character in the film in the space of a song. And what great use of Tears for Fears Head Over Heels.

One of the reasons I really liked this film is that it captured that wonderful balance of cynicism and idealism that pervades this time of life. Yet overall it is one of those films where you can point out this and that, the note perfect performance of Mary McDonnell, of everyone really, the convoluted yet purposeful story line, the sheer intelligence of every part of it, but where it ends up really as just a film where it all works, where a true world has been created, and where possibilities remain after the film is done. This is one of those rare movies that leaves you stunned and silent for some time.

And then sometimes you see a movie on a particular day on which your life takes a turn, and this was one of those. It could have been a mediocre movie and perhaps it still would have been a special day but it wasn’t and that made it a hell of a day.

I have a fear that this may be one of those one shot deals where the director, though obviously gifted, was still lucky more than anything. I so hope I am wrong. The Gyllenhaal siblings have gone on to other good films: Jake Gyllenhaal to Zodiac, and Maggie Gyllenhaal just perfect in everything, a wonder in those small engaging parts that enliven and often outshine the rest of the films.

Late Saturday Gatherings

This is an image courtesy of another interesting post by deputy dog. Go see for more views of this astounding housing development in Nezahualcoyotl, Mexico.

And now here we have one out of a collection of videos featuring a man who makes instruments out of vegetables and plays them. Below is Angels We Have Heard on High played on a broccoli ocarina. Its quite lovely. (I have to credit GrowABrain for unearthing this treasure).

Valentine’s Day: A Song and a Card

This morning on the way to work, heard this song on CKUA, the original commercial free radio, and one of the better reasons for living in this city. Never been a fan of John Prine but this is a nice piece of writing…

In Spite of Ourselves…

She don’t like her eggs all runny
She thinks crossin’ her legs is funny
She looks down her nose at money
She gets it on like the Easter Bunny
She’s my baby I’m her honey
I’m never gonna let her go

He ain’t got laid in a month of Sundays
I caught him once and he was sniffin’ my undies
He ain’t too sharp but he gets things done
Drinks his beer like it’s oxygen
He’s my baby
And I’m his honey
Never gonna let him go

In spite of ourselves
We’ll end up a’sittin’ on a rainbow
Against all odds
Honey, we’re the big door prize
We’re gonna spite our noses
Right off of our faces
There won’t be nothin’ but big old hearts
Dancin’ in our eyes.

She thinks all my jokes are corny
Convict movies make her horny
She likes ketchup on her scrambled eggs
Swears like a sailor when shaves her legs
She takes a lickin’
And keeps on tickin’
I’m never gonna let her go.

He’s got more balls than a big brass monkey
He’s a wacked out weirdo and a lovebug junkie
Sly as a fox and crazy as a loon
Payday comes and he’s howlin’ at the moon
He’s my baby I don’t mean maybe
Never gonna let him go

In spite of ourselves
We’ll end up a’sittin’ on a rainbow
Against all odds
Honey, we’re the big door prize
We’re gonna spite our noses
Right off of our faces
There won’t be nothin’ but big old hearts
Dancin’ in our eyes.
There won’t be nothin’ but big old hearts
Dancin’ in our eyes.

Wednesday smatterings

1.

Three chapters into the best book I’ve read in a year…a first novel from Jacqueline Baker (her previous book is a good collection of short stories called A Hard Witching) called The Horseman’s Graves.
The novel is set in the Sand Hills of Saskatchewan. I was there once and its a remarkable landscape. Prairies and scrub and suddenly just off the highway there is this narrow strip of sand dunes as far as the eye can see. And big Lawrence of Arabia sand dunes.

Anyhow, the book begins with the settling in of the misbegotten Krauss family in 1909 and the ongoing friction between the sadistic father and the neighbors and the lasting legacy of his mistreated children. The father is one of those characters that is so richly and truly drawn that you become upset by the trials of all those who must deal with him (not unlike the feelings that can arise from similar circumstances in David Adams Richards’ novels) but rather than distancing you from the book, it draws you in.

She’s an author from my neck of the woods though she lives in British Columbia now. I’ll post a fuller review once I finish the book.

2.

I sent this out to a number of people and everybody seemed to like it, and a few of us have watched more than once. And I thought I’d put it up here just to keep it handy. Its an appearance by Sarah Silverman, one of my heroines of political incorrectness, on Jimmy Kimmel. Discovered it on Ticklebooth.

From others

Gatherings from my blogrolls today; mostly visual diversions:

From Ticklebooth, two videos worth watching.

This wonderful short film is directed by Chris Vincze.

Sam Bisbee’s Oxygen via Antville

From Right Some Good, an art blog:

From artist Xiaoqing Ding, new to me, and now, an artist I have always loved, Tamara de Lempicka.

There was a different picture posted on the blog but I nosed around and found this Adam and Eve of hers. And for some reason, this brought to mind Man Ray. I was thinking of his Solarized Nude which isn’t available but here is one of his more striking figures.

From 60 Second Science:

Chicago cops sleep with more prostitutes than they arrest
Ted Alvarez

Those Freakonomists are at it again: Steven Levitt teamed up with Columbia sociologist Sudhir Venkatesh to measure the economics of prostitutes in Chicago. After surveying various pimps, whores, and Chicago Police Department incident data, they discovered that street prostitution yields an average of $27 an hour. That’s a lot better than Mickey D’s, but then again, you don’t have to worry about getting beaten to death when you’re washing heads of lettuce.

But what’s most shocking is that 3 percent of all tricks performed by prostitutes who fly solo without a pimp are “freebies” given to cops to keep from getting arrested. This bargaining tactic leads to prostitutes only getting arrested once every 450 tricks or so, which convinced the authors to conclude that “a prostitute is more likely to have sex with a police officer than to get officially arrested by one.”

Ouch, Chicago’s finest.

And from Antville:

Great video for that cool song from Feist.

Best Cds of 2007; Best music videos of 2007

Best Music of 2007 Lists

1. AV Club Top 25

Top three are Arcade Fire, The National and Radiohead. List has mp3s for a song from each pick.

2. Exclaim Magazine

Canadian magazine that breaks down the best into eight different categories. Eclectic to say the least. Top three in the Pop Rocks category are Battles, Arcade Fire and Caribou.

3. Guardian’s 2007’s best albums

Short list with short writeups but with interesting blog comments following. Top three are LCD Soundsystem, Radiohead and Hold Steady.

4. Metacritic Best 30

Its a cool list but this is more of an aggregator than a primary source. Top three are Burial, The Field and Radiohead.

5. Rolling Stone’s Top 50

As to be expected a tamer list. Top three are M.I.A., Bruce Springsteen and JayZ. A song from each pick is available to listen to.

6. Slate’s Best Music of 2007

Not a list but a free form discussion from a number of music critics.

7. National Public Radio’s Top 25

In total a pretty good list. Top three are Radiohead, Arcade Fire and Feist.

8. Pitchfork Top 50

Yes, they are a little pretentious but nicely detail writeups and a very interesting list. Top three are Panda Bear, LCD Soundsystem and M.I.A.

9. Times Online Best of 2007

Quite the whacky but entertaining lists with critics starting with a little music of the year sort of passage followed by a single pick.

Best Music Videos of 2007 Lists

1. Best Music Videos of 2007 - various year’s end lists from Antville

If you don’t know antville yet they are a very cool source of unusual music videos.

2. Director File: 10 Best Music Videos

Don’t know who these guys are but here you go.

3. Pitchfork’s Top 50 Music Videos

And again the precious longwinded lads with their picks of the year.

Saturday morning music musings…

Been revisiting Luke Doucet and a few of his were worth a post; the first a good video, the second a live performance:

It’s not the liquor I miss:

Broken:

To get a little harsher now, this I heard just a couple of days ago for the first time. I was down at the salon playing Narcissus to my hairstylist named Echo,

I was the only one left in the shop, we’d been talking about Costa Rica and snakes, and the Gulf Islands; the last other person was sweeping up and a tune came on, and I had to find out what it was..

From the Desert Sessions, a spinoff project of Josh Hommes, featuring numerous performers such as P.J. Harvey and various previous members of Screaming Trees, Soundgarden and of course Hommes’ own Queens of the Stone Age. It surprised me because I never really liked QotSA except for the Mark Lanegan contribution but I had only heard Songs for the Deaf, and now I’ve got a later one in my car and I am liking it. Just goes to show, that not only one song, but one cd might not be enough to get you the proper perspective on an artist. This is actually the song on the cd after the song I heard but I couldn’t find a youtube for it. But this is close enough.

Other than this on the player mostly has been The Doors (you do forget how fucking good these guys really were, and not just St. Jim), and still the New Pornographers.

One last story for you folks. I had just brought from the library Sloan’s Never Hear the End of it. The first song was playing and it seemed to go on forever, and when I checked, yes, it was still on 1 so I jumped to the next one and the same thing happened. I thought “that’s annoying” and looking at the title wondered if this was the hook, that every song would play endlessly and you would “never hear the end of it”. Intrigued and yet pissed, I took it off and put on a Joe Jackson compilation and the same thing happened. Then in response to my increasingly vocal protestations, my daughter asked if maybe it was on repeat (a setting I know about but have never used). Arrrgh! It was thanks to my daughter playing her Hanna Montana with friends and there went my brilliant analysis of the Sloan record. (This had happened with a film once on my computer, where the dvd setting had been faulty and showed the movie in successive stills but the topic was such that I could imagine this being on purpose.)

And in the recent issue of Beatroutes, a sort of local music paper, ran across a howler that had me in stitches. It was a review of the latest LedZep release and the writer referred to one of the records as being their Heidelberg…and here my brain paused and started thinking oh neat, how are they going to compare this with an ancient German city with a castle and river, that I had lived in, and then the next phrase was”the great ship coming down in flames” and I realized the guy meant Hindenberg and I laughed out loud…now either he was an idiot who really didn’t know and wanted to sound good, and it really was an inappropriate reference anyway, or he just made a mistake and actually knows better…I was thinking that people should check their references but why would you if you “knew” you were right? Like I’m not checking. I know.

Time to ring the changes again….

Like a hypersensitive claustrophobe in a stalled and crowded elevator at a perfume convention with a Mexican buffet, I just cannot seem to get comfortable. I’ve gone through a couple of name changes already, and looks, and once again its time for a change. For those who have me bookmarked it really doesn’t affect you; you’ll just see a different banner spring up. And with the format, though I was enjoying the black background, a certain photographs looked great against it, the template cropped pics severely and I found that more than a few lines of text weren’t really all that fun to read. So we’re back to an older, friendlier, though more sedate format.

Keep hearing Madonna’s Like a Version going through my head…”like a version, being read for the very first time”…ouch, and I really don’t like having her anywhere near my gray matter. Kind of like Mr. Michael Jackson.This is the 25th anniversary of Thriller and as plentiful as the penis enlargement entreaties in my email are the plaudits proliferating about this supposedly seminal work. Some might even go back to his critically acclaimed Off the Wall when he first was revealed as a young black man.It wasn’t to last.We know he went white, and the man bit seemed to flee as well, as he not only seemed to get younger, to become a boy, but I swear he actually got smaller. Why anyone liked this record in the first place I don’t know. The across the culture praise for this record has always been another clue that my tastes are not everyone’s.They call it groundbreaking but consider that this came after Prince (he was already partying like it was 1999). And it wasn’t as though 1982 had nothing else to listen to; Elvis Costello released his masterpiece of both song and lyric Imperial Bedroom. We already had punk and rock and roots and blues and all sorts of alternatives to mincing about like frightened cats in a bowling alley.Really.

And you know I hate the music, not the man (did I say man?). Though I did enjoy Jarvis Cocker disrupting the Brit Awards (an clear argument against the British having taste (yes, plenty of great artists, but their mainstream taste is among the worst on the planet; could it be that they have so many artists because the amount of shit they have to swim through?)) when Michael was trying to do his Jesus with the small children diorama. You see, for me looking at him, I believe its quite possible that he really does just want to literally sleep with children; seems rather asexual to me. The man is a freak but that is not why I have problems with his pap; its just bad. Even the picky folk at Pitchfork in their review of the best albums of the 80s liked the cd:

I don’t care what kind of music your promo bait covers; any 80s list without Thriller is kidding itself. Thanks to a twenty-year campaign waged by Jacko to completely incinerate his artistic integrity, revisiting Thriller is a revelation, cutting through the tabloid baggage with its crisp, sharp-edged Quincyproduction. “Wanna Be Startin’ Somethin’” is sweltering dance-floor Afro-funk highlighting Michael’s abhorrence for personal criticism; “Billie Jean”’s paranoid bass and hiccup histrionics are still cooler than its video’s illuminated sidewalks; the breakdown in “PYT”, with its ecstatic call-and-response and sultry panting, remains the funkiest goddamn thing since James Brown’s “Hot Pants”. Though the audio equivalent to Star Wars in that it can be held responsible for inspiring perhaps more crap than any other release of its time, Thriller permanently ziplocked the sound of era so that it might forever remain as fresh and vital as the album itself. –Rob Mitchum

Don’t agree but hey, what do I know.

And speaking of sexual ambiguity, I just became aware of Lady Jaye and Genesis. Have you heard of these two?

The one on the left is Genesis. They are a couple whose relationship has become a kind of performance art. Undergoing surgeries to make them look more and more alike, more him going over to her, as in this taken after their breast implants. (He has retained his bottom bits). They got the same size of implants but the result was off because his wider shoulders skewed the proportions so he went back to get larger ones.
She recently died of a heart condition which may have been related to her ongoing battle with stomach cancer.
What I find interesting is the more you resemble each other, what is it like to look in the mirror? And now, with her gone, is that the face he wants to see, or will he now be a living memorial to her? Most of the body mod out there has the opposite purpose of futher distinguishing yourself from others. Will we eventually see a Borg type group emerge?

So still with me here? The name, the name.

I’ve considered a number of dog related monikers and now with Revenge of the Castanets being up there for so long, I’ve got a bit of a tilt toward Mexico as in Sombreros for Everyone!

Or the Broken Pinata. Or The Blind Man and the Pinata. Then there is the Wandering Agoraphobe or Flyless in Gaza or Stop Me Before I go Blind. So many names and so little decision making apparatus at hand. Bunuel’s Dilemma? Dreaming of Reykjavik? The Golden Compress? The Honest Masseuse? (If anybody out there really wants one of these, for the price of a link and attribution, its yours.)

Have to just grab the easy one and think about changing again later. So the Andalusian Hound it is.

For now.

What I’m listening to and what I saw..

I wasn’t able to respond to a recent itunes related tag simply because I just don’t do me-tunes. But the two cds that have been on for the last week are Nathan Wiley’s The City That Destroyed Me and Joel Plaskett Emergency’s Ashtray Rock.

Nathan’s have remarkable lyrics and the album is a kicker from beginning to end. Kind of alt-country crossed with a blues/jazzy groove. He’s from Prince Edward Island, younger than you’d think, and here’s a couple. The first Bottom Dollar Baby is from his first cd. And it is a slinky sly song and a very cool video.

This next one is from the cd I’m listening to. It was shot in Cuba and kind of reminds you a little of the documentary about the Buena Vista Club.

Here’s Joel Plaskett (another Maritimer, this time from Nova Scotia and also with pretty good lyrics). Its one of those boring album cover videos but beggars and all that. Just listen to it; you’ll be singing it to yourself later.

That’s the me tunes. What I was watching on television last night was the viewer’s choice of Grammy moments or something like that. What viewers and the audience seemed to like for the most part was overwrought and self centred perfomances such as the one by Mary J. Blige. I must admit I’ve always found her lacking. Her performance which apparently exploded out of personal setbacks and had the audience to a standing ovation seemed to me like a controlled tantrum, a cry for attention. And then watching Bruce Springsteen perform Philadelphia I realized the difference was, and why I liked him so much more, is that he was a vehicle for the song and not the other way around. It wasn’t about him. It was about the world, and everyone in it. And it respected the song itself rather than prostituting it for cheap effect. Later in the show there was a tribute to The Clash with Springsteen, Elvis Costello and Dave Grohl and all let the music onto center stage. Any one of them could’ve commandeered their moment and restyled it into their version but they paid homage to the band and its music, became them as well they could, and I swear Springsteen even looked like Joe Strummer. A great moment.