September 2, 2010
Book Notes - Andrew Ervin ("Extraordinary Renditions")
In the Book Notes series, authors create and discuss a music playlist that relates in some way to their recently published book.
Andrew Ervin works literary magic in his novel Extraordinary Renditions. Vividly exploring Budapest's past and present in three linked novellas, Ervin's true mastery of the language becomes apparent as the stories converge.
Novels consisting of linked stories tend to disappoint me, in fact in recent history only Josh Weil's The New Valley has impressed me as much as Extraordinary Renditions.
Publishers Weekly wrote of the book:
"With dexterous sensibility and fluid prose, Ervin’s protagonists find liberation from the onerous strictures of Budapest’s Nazi and Communist past."
In his own words, here is Andrew Ervin's Book Notes music playlist for his novel, Extraordinary Renditions:
Here's a short look at the musical life of Extraordinary Renditions.
Béla Bartók, "Konstrasztok"
If there's any one piece of music that can explain how the three parts of Extraordinary Renditions fit together, this is it. Bartók completed his "Konstrasztok" in 1938, a tumultuous time in his native Hungary to say the least. It's scored for piano, violin, and clarinet, three instruments that don't always play nicely together here; the contrasts, as the title suggests, are clearly more important than the harmonies. There's an amazing recording from 1940 with Bartók himself on the piano, József Szigeti on violin, and Benny Goodman of all people on clarinet. Even if Szigeti appears to shit the bed every once in a while, or maybe because he shits the bed every once in a while, this recording has meant a great deal to the development of this book as a whole.
"14 Bagatelles"
Béla Bartók, "14 Bagatelles"
The first novella in the book is named after another Bartók composition. The protagonist is an elderly Hungarian composer named Lajos Harkályi who survived the Holocaust. In a flashback to the infamous Terezín ghetto, he transcribes the original piano piece for solo violin. This section of the book has fourteen chapters and they correspond with the time signatures ("andante," "grave," "vivo" and so on) in various ways. The only recording I've heard—though there are certainly others out there—is by the pianist Zoltán Kocsis.
Henryk Górecki, Symphony No. 3 ("Symphony of Sorrowful Songs")
There aren't many recordings of contemporary Eurocentric art music that sell a million copies the way this once did, and the way Harkályi's Symphony No. 4 ("Musik Macht Frei") does in the world of Extraordinary Renditions. In my first apartment in Budapest, back in 1994, my girlfriend (now wife) and I lived next to a man who had survived several concentration camps. We gave him a copy of David Zinman's recording, which we could hear just as clearly through the walls.
Pavel Haas, String Quartet No. 2 ("From the Monkey Mountains")
That Terezín really did have such an amazing musical life is still almost impossible for me to fathom. For example, Hans Krása's opera "Brundibar" was performed there more than fifty times. The CD "The Music Survives" will make an excellent For Further Listening compilation for people interested in the music of the Holocaust. For me personally, Haas's String Quartet No. 2, composed in 1925, exemplifies all too clearly what was lost during the greatest horror of the 20th century: Haas was murdered at Auschwitz in 1944.
"Brooking the Devil"
Pubic Enemy, "Black Steel In The Hour of Chaos"
"Brooking the Devil" is about a black U.S. soldier named Brutus who is stationed at a NATO base in southern Hungary. "They wanted me for the army or whatever/ Picture me giving a damn I said never/ Here is a land that never gave a damn / About a brother like me and myself…" Chuck D deserves one of those MacArthur "genius" grants. He's an invaluable American voice whose influence will be felt for generations, in large part because Public Enemy managed to work within the system in order to critique it.
Fela Kuti, "Mr. Grammarticologylisationalism Is The Boss"
The spoken-word intro to this track gets right to the burning heart of colonialism: "They called our languages 'vernacular.' So English was the real language you had to speak in schools, so everything was in English." And while everyone talks about the rhythms in Kuti's music, and his radicalism, it's the keyboard tones here that just floor me. They carry the authority of a church organ, but the song preaches something I feel like I can actually buy in to. Then those horns…
The Roots, "I Will Not Apologize"
As far as I'm concerned, there isn't a better band in America right now. In a few years we will look back at the records they're making today the way we do Monk's from the nineteen fifties or Coltrane's from the sixties. More importantly, though, the Roots simply rock. "I Will Not Apologize" samples Fela Kuti and it's the best of both worlds, Afrobeat and hip-hop. I'm honored that I got permission from Tariq "Black Thought" Trotter to quote from this song, which is on the Rising Down record named, yes, after William T. Vollmann's Rising Up and Rising Down.
"The Empty Chairs"
Poni Hoax, "Budapest"
The French band Poni Hoax captures the atmosphere of Budapest here as well as anything I've read since Tibor Déry's Love and Other Stories (New Directions, 2005). The song, like the city, combines many different styles into something unique. There are references to "Transylvanian guns" and even a "burning synagogue," both of which figured into the book. I can see my characters Melanie and Nanette grooving to this at the birthday party on the Danube.
Craig Elkins, "This House"
The former frontman for Huffamoose now lives in California and is working on a solo record. There isn't a more brutally honest songwriter in America. You know how when you're reading Roth or Yates you sometimes find your innermost thoughts—thoughts you didn't even consciously know you had—getting exposed to the entire world? "This House" does that. "We are doomed / Then we got nothing left to lose / Might as well take a shot at honesty." It's the perfect song to describe the disintegrating relationship between Melanie and Nanette. It's devastating.
Das Racist, "Chicken and Meat"
Das Racist's self-released mixtape Shut Up, Dude is an hour of post-colonial theory you can dance to. I'm a sucker for any hip-hop that references Gayatri Spivak. Once a day or so I catch myself singing (terribly) lines from "Chicken and Meat." "People eating bacon all across the nation!" It would make a great soundtrack for the newly cosmopolitan Budapest.
Billie Holiday, "Strange Fruit"
What can you say about "Strange Fruit"? If you don't get goose bumps every time you hear this song you're just not paying attention. Finishing Extraordinary Renditions in the deep South gave me a whole new appreciation for this song, which is as powerful as any work of art ever created on this landmass. Those funeral-dirge block chords can stop your breath, sure, but it's that little guitar part throughout that make me question what I'm doing with my life. In Extraordinary Renditions, a remix of this song that keeps popping up, but Holiday's version is where it all begins.
Andrew Ervin and Extraordinary Renditions links:
the author's website
the author's blog
the book's website
video trailer for the book
The Black Sheep Dances review
The Longest Chapter review
New York Journal of Books review
Publishers Weekly review
Believer book reviews by the author
HOBART interview with the author
HTMLGIANT guest post by the author
also at Largehearted Boy:
other Book Notes playlists (authors create music playlists for their book)
52 Books, 52 Weeks (weekly book reviews)
Antiheroines (interviews with up and coming female comics artists)
Atomic Books Comics Preview (weekly comics highlights)
Daily Downloads (free and legal daily mp3 downloads)
guest book reviews
Largehearted Word (weekly new book highlights)
musician/author interviews
Note Books (musicians discuss literature)
Shorties (daily music, literature, and pop culture links)
Soundtracked (composers and directors discuss their film's soundtracks)
Try It Before You Buy It (mp3s and full album streams from the week's CD releases)
weekly music & DVD release lists
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September 2, 2010
Note Books - Dean Wells of Capstan Shafts
The Note Books series features musicians discussing their literary side. Previous contributors have included John Darnielle, John Vanderslice, Mark Olson, Mac McCaughan, and others.
Dean Wells records under the moniker Capstan Shafts. His songs are short, powerful, and lyrically interesting lo-fi indie pop gems.
The Capstan Shafts' latest album, Revelation Skirts, was released last month.
Wells is the first Note Books participant to contribute an original poem as his entry in the series.
In his own words, here is the Note Books entry from Capstan Shafts' Dean Wells:
richard brautigan
the problem with most people is 'post office'
bad job accomplishing little outwardly ....big genius of write it down later
justifies everything and there is the romance of the delusional alcoholic that you either love or join al qaeda
no points for loving bukowski anymore
a very good looking woman once told me a lot of shit bands referenced her
she didn't say shit bands but they were....touchpoints are tricky
i have no idea why anyone likes anything past new skin for the old ceremony but beautiful losers
is almost as fantastic a novel as a night of serious drinking; by rene something between the wars in france
fantastic in expletive sense as well as descriptive (kerouac implied though my sweetest thought is borrowed
he hears beethoven and wants to be a genius..not a writer strickly speaking
but a genius.......rarefied air.....that he was an nfl prospect amplifies the love of ...
well all non hippie......jack was pals with william f. buckley....technically a superior writer
and likely a better mayor were it to come to that
...dont let kids read burning in water etc
its bad for them and you.....is being a poet good for anyone
the pinnacle of self indulgent nonsense that has been perverted by the total awareness agenda
.....you just cant poet anymore.....even god's a verb now.....edit me willy nilly
i'll smoke it's almost three...i had completely forgotten about smoking and 3 a m from this side
as a shy boy i love internet pornography, though even faceless i remain timid
i'm not sure how i got here
"rommel drives on deep into egypt"
as pure as it can be as far as put whatever the fuck you want on a page and its the poem
or whatever between 001 seconds and however many it goes
and we all want to marry her
that chick on the cover
we all want to write those poems ....if you don't ....well then you are stupid
and i'm sick of it...the sex is good ...but that's true of anyone that lets me have sex with them
you assume any guy can get you off that way...and hey i hope that's the case
i'm just saying.............
Capstan Shafts links and free and legal mp3s:
the band's MySpace page
the band's Wikipedia entry
"Heart Your Heart Out" [mp3] from Revelation Skirts
free and legal Cretin Flowers EP [mp3]
free and legal Halaluah Moancoaxers! EP [mp3]
also at Largehearted Boy:
Previous Note Books submissions (musicians discuss literature)
52 Books, 52 Weeks
Antiheroines (interviews with up and coming female comics artists)
Atomic Books Comics Preview (highlights of the week's comics & graphic novel releases)
Book Notes (authors create playlists for their book)
daily mp3 downloads
guest book reviews
Largehearted Word (highlights of the week's book releases)
musician/author interviews
Soundtracked (directors discuss their film's soundtracks)
Try It Before You Buy It (mp3s and full album streams from this week's CD releases)
weekly music & DVD release lists
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Shorties (Stream the New Extra Lens Album, Neal Stephenson, and more)
Merge Records is streaming the new Extra Lens album, Undercard (by John Darnielle and Franklin Bruno, out October 19th)).
Neal Stephenson talks to the New York Times about his new digital book, the serialized The Mongoliad.
Underwire shares a "A Syllabus and Book List for Novice Students of Science Fiction Literature."
Exclaim interviews Jennifer Herrema of Royal Trux about the band's legacy and reissues.
Writers on Process interviews Jessica Francis Kane about writing her new novel, The Report.
The Santa Barbara Independent interviews singer-songwriter Tift Merritt.
As a songwriter you have a great ability to float around a scene and get inside of other characters. Is that something you work for?
Yes, because for me it’s all about point of view. I started out writing short stories, and that’s how I learned that even when you are getting under someone else’s skin and writing from there, you’re still going to put yourself in it somehow. It’s like I find myself by going out of myself.
At Slate, Marisa Meltzer reviews Kristin Hersh's new memoir, Rat Girl.
Kim Deal talks to C-Note about her band, the Breeders.
KCRW's Bookworm today interviews poet Paul Muldoon.
Jenny Lewis and Johnathan Rice talk to the San Francisco Chronicle about their new album, I'm Having Fun Now.
The Yewknee Summer Mix Series 2010 has finally stopped taking new submissions, but there is a wealth of music over a wide variety of genres to download.
Thought Catalog interviews author Blake Butler about networking in the literary scene.
Apple introduced Ping yesterday, a music social network inside iTunes.
Stereogum lists the 40 best new bands of 2010.
Paste magazine is suspending its print publication.
All Things Considered profiles singer-songwriter Ryan Bingham.
Win all three books in Suzanne Collins' Hunger Games series (The Hunger Games, Catching Fire, and Mockingjay) in this week's Largehearted Boy contest.
Follow me on Twitter and Stumbleupon for links (updated throughout the day) that don't make the daily "Shorties" columns.
also at Largehearted Boy:
previous Shorties posts (daily links from the worlds of music, literature, and pop culture)
Atomic Books Comics Preview (highlights of the week's comics & graphic novel releases)
daily mp3 downloads
Largehearted Word (highlights of the week's book releases)
Try It Before You Buy It (mp3s and full album streams from this week's CD releases)
weekly music & DVD release lists
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Daily Downloads (Blue Water White Death, Telekinesis, and more)
Every day, Daily Downloads offers 10 free and legal mp3 downloads, plus free and legal live sets from around the internet.
Today's free and legal mp3 downloads:
Blue Water White Death (Jonathan Meiburg & Jamie Stewart)\: "Song for the Greater Jihad" [mp3] from Blue Water White Death (out October 12th)
other Blue Water White Death posts at Largehearted Boy
Brent Amaker and the Rodeo: "Man in Charge" [mp3] from Please Stand By (out October 19th)
Brent Amaker and the Rodeo: free and legal Pink EP [mp3]
other Brent Amaker posts at Largehearted Boy
Delay Trees: "About Brothers" [mp3] from Delay Trees (out September 29th)
other Delay Trees posts at Largehearted Boy
The Delfields: "Justine" [mp3] from Bedroom Girls
other Delfields posts at Largehearted Boy
First Aid Kit: "Hard Believer" [mp3] from The Big Black and Blue
other First Aid Kit posts at Largehearted Boy
Jay Bennett: free and legal Kicking at the Perfumed Air album [mp3]
other Jay Bennett posts at Largehearted Boy
Mike Midwestern: free and legal Everything's a War EP
other Mike Midwestern posts at Largehearted Boy
The Postelles: "Everyday (Buddy Holly cover)" [mp3]
other Postelles posts at Largehearted Boy
Telekinesis: "Gotta Get a Record Out (Green cover)" [mp3]
other Telekinesis posts at Largehearted Boy
Free and legal mp3s of live performances at other websites:
Kelli Scarr: 2010-08-21, Brooklyn [mp3]
other Kelli Scarr posts at Largehearted Boy
Mynabirds: Daytrotter session [mp3]
other Mynabirds posts at Largehearted Boy
also at Largehearted Boy:
other daily free and legal mp3 downloads
2010 Bonnaroo downloads
music festival downloads
Try It Before You Buy It (mp3s and album streams from weekly CD releases)
weekly CD and DVD release lists
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September 1, 2010
Book Notes - John Reimringer ("Vestments")
In the Book Notes series, authors create and discuss a music playlist that relates in some way to their recently published book.
In his gripping debut novel Vestments, John Reimringer lyrically depicts the struggles of family, the decay of neighborhoods, and most importantly, crises of faith, and his priest protagonist is as human and genuinely portrayed as any cleric in modern fiction.
Booklist wrote of the book:
"Through his thoughtful themes and lyrical prose, Reimringer effortlessly restores a measure of dignity to the priesthood even as he pays tender homage to the working-class roots of St. Paul."
In his own words, here is John Reimringer's Book Notes music playlist for his novel, Vestments:
Writing a playlist for Largehearted Boy was intimidating. I'm tragically unhip. My wife Katrina offered to help, in which case we'd've had a very different list. But my characters come out of a background roughly contemporary with mine, so they wouldn't have known what the hell we were listening to.
1. Bruce Springsteen, "Adam Raised a Cain"
This song gets to the heart of the book: "Daddy worked his whole life for nothing but the pain/Now he walks these empty rooms looking for something to blame/You inherit the sins, you inherit the flames… ." James Dressler, the Catholic priest narrator of Vestments, is reaching for the sacred, and Joe Dressler, his barfighter father, is the profane world he's trying to leave behind.
2. John Prine, "Angel from Montgomery"
James' brother plays this on the jukebox in a bar in chapter 2, and the speaker in the song could be James' mother complaining about Joe Dressler: "How the hell can a person go to work in the morning/And come home in the evening and have nothing to say?"
3. Bruce Springsteen, "She's the One"
Priests aren't born priests, and in high school James has a lover, Betty García. "She's the One" is a sexy song about a lost, long-haired lover. It has angels and lies and "That thunder in your heart/At night when you're kneeling in the dark… ."
4. Johnny Cash, "Sunday Morning Coming Down"
Joe Dressler would be a fan of Johnny Cash, another man who's lived on the rough edges of life and found solace in religion, even though Cash's Southern fundamentalism was very different than Joe's Saint Paul Catholicism. This song might just sum up Joe's life.
5. Bunny Berigan, "I Can't Get Started"
James hears this at his grandparents' house after a dinner at the Lexington Restaurant in Saint Paul celebrating his acceptance into seminary. This version is on a 78, recorded in 1937, around the time the Lexington was founded and James' grandparents fell in love, a romance that, like many, has faltered with the best of intentions. The Lex, meanwhile, is an old haunt of generations of Dresslers and Reimringers, as well as innumerable Saint Paul priests and politicians.
6. John Fogerty, "Centerfield"
Once he becomes a priest, James is stationed in rural Pretty Prairie, Minnesota. His best friend from seminary, Mick Shankland, is pastor of a nearby parish. The two of them met in college on the Saint Thomas baseball team, and they play town ball in River County. This is a joyous song, as a baseball song should be, and Mick is the "brown-eyed handsome man" rounding third and heading for home.
7. Frank Sinatra, "One for My Baby"
James joins a group of priests who dine and drink and play poker together, all ways of sublimating the frustrations of celibacy. This isn't helped by the fact that, unlike the bartender in the song, the bartender at the priests' favorite watering hole is Diana, the goddess of the hunt.
Still, I learned while researching priests that the frustrations of celibacy are about more than the lack of sex. I tried to reflect that in the novel, so I was happy when a priest who read the manuscript told me I'd gotten it right: "The intimacy is a huge void," he said, "it's not the sexual part as much as it is the intimacy."
8. R.E.M. "Superman"
This is Mick's song. The son of a Mayo Clinic surgeon, Mick is cocksure and confident, a womanizing priest who believes he can get away with anything. "I am, I am, I am Superman." As the priest mentioned above said of Mick: "Every now and again you meet a guy who doesn't have a conscience." By the way, Mick would like Katrina's playlist better than mine. She's the green-eyed girl he eyes in O'Gara's early in the novel.
9. Bob Dylan, "Tangled Up in Blue"
Late in the novel, Joe Dressler claims to have broken Bob Dylan's nose in Dinkytown around 1960. Hard to tell if it's true; Joe's not the most reliable source. But here's the story behind that scene. While I was writing Vestments, Katrina published her first book of poetry. In the last poem, she had used seven words from "Tangled Up in Blue," and she asked Dylan's publisher, Ram's Horn Music, for permission to publish them in the book. "Sure," Ram's Horn said, "that'll be $200." Eventually, she talked them down to $100. That was a lot of money for us then. Still is. I was ticked, and thought, "The hell with it, Dylan's words may cost $100, but I can break his nose for free." Dylan and Joe Dressler could've been in Dinkytown at the same time. And breaking Bob Dylan's nose, or making up a story about it, was perfectly in character for Joe. So the scene's motivation is completely gratuituous, but it worked for the book and I had fun writing it.
10. The Rose Ensemble, "Maria Magdalene"
From the album Seasons of Angels, this song captures the sensual tapestry of Catholicism that underlies the novel. The choice is also a commentary on the Betty García character. She's a smart, tough-minded young woman, and what happens between James and Betty in high school is something both of them want. So it's interesting that some readers—usually deeply Catholic—see Betty as a seductress and James, the future priest, as her innocent victim. He ain't.
11. "I'll Be Seeing You," from the Broadway musical Right This Way, music by Sammy Fain, lyrics by Irving Kahal
At his brother's wedding dance, James has a vision of generations of Dresslers, living and dead, "maiden aunts and drunks," brought together by Catholic ritual.
When I moved to Saint Paul in 2001, I didn't have any living relatives in the city—they're all in Calvary Cemetery. But my family has been a part of Saint Paul almost as long as it's been a city. My great-great grandfather became an American citizen here in 1856, two years after the city was founded, and owned a saloon downtown. My great-grandfather was married in Assumption Church in 1880, and died at the second-ever Saint Paul Winter Carnival when he got drunk, fell off the back of a sleigh, and cracked his skull. My grandfather and father and brother were born here.
So, although the novel isn't autobiographical, it is in some ways an attempt to recapture my family's past. I'm looking for them in all the old familiar places, and the book is a love letter to the city of Saint Paul: its glittering winter light, its Catholic neighborhoods and bars, its union-Democrat culture.
12. Bonnie Raitt, "Something to Talk About" James gets a black eye on his brother's wedding day. His mother covers it with makeup, and after saying the wedding Mass, he washes his face, going to the reception dinner and dance with an obvious shiner. When someone questions this, he says, "It'll give 'em something to talk about." An upbeat song to end everything.
John Reimringer and Vestments links:
the author's website
the author's book tour events
excerpt from the book
Booklist review
Meredithdias.com review
Publishers Weekly review
eric forbes’s book addict’s guide to good books interview with the author
Pioneer Press profile of the author
also at Largehearted Boy:
other Book Notes playlists (authors create music playlists for their book)
52 Books, 52 Weeks (weekly book reviews)
Antiheroines (interviews with up and coming female comics artists)
Atomic Books Comics Preview (weekly comics highlights)
Daily Downloads (free and legal daily mp3 downloads)
guest book reviews
Largehearted Word (weekly new book highlights)
musician/author interviews
Note Books (musicians discuss literature)
Shorties (daily music, literature, and pop culture links)
Soundtracked (composers and directors discuss their film's soundtracks)
Try It Before You Buy It (mp3s and full album streams from the week's CD releases)
weekly music & DVD release lists
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Largehearted WORD Books of the Week - September 1, 2010
In the Largehearted Word series, the staff of Brooklyn's WORD bookstore highlights several new books released this week.
WORD is an independent neighborhood bookstore in Greenpoint, the northernmost neighborhood of Brooklyn, that celebrated its third anniversary this March. Our primary goal is to be whatever our community needs us to be, which currently means carrying a lot of paperback fiction (especially classics), cookbooks, board books, and absurdly cute cards and stationery. In addition, we're fiends for a good event, from the classic author reading and Q&A to potlucks and a basketball league (and anything set in a bar). We're a small operation, just 1000 square feet and four people, but we read too much, so it all works out. If a weekly dose of WORD here isn't enough for you, follow us on Twitter: @wordbrooklyn.
The Awakening
by Kate Chopin
A beautiful new edition of one of our best novellas.
The Chosen One
by Carol Lynch Williams
Now in paperback, the riveting story of a thirteen-year-old girl brought up in a polygamist Mormon community who has to decide what to do when she is suddenly promised in marriage to her elderly uncle.
Apparently, all Dante needed was some fedoras. Delightful!
Freedom
by Jonathan Franzen
What can we add? Has already sold out. (Don't worry, more coming today.)
The Odious Ogre
by Norton Juster, illustrated by Jules Feiffer
From the same set of geniuses who gifted the world with The Phantom Tollbooth.
Skippy Dies
by Paul Murray
A solid, often hilarious novel. The prose is surprising and imaginative, much like the story—just when you think you have it sorted, it'll surprise you. Don't let Freedom completely overshadow this deserving book.
Star Wars Millennium Falcon YT-1300: A 3-D Owner's Guide
This amazing book is being displayed in the children's section, but we have a suspicion that we know who most parents will be buying it for.
When The Game Was Ours
by Larry Bird and Earvin Magic Johnson with Jackie MacMullan
The rivalry between these two epitomized almost every clash possible in the game of basketball. How can you not want to hear what they thought of it?
WORD Brooklyn links:
WORD website
WORD blog
WORD on Twitter
WORD's Facebook page
WORD's Flickr photos
also at Largehearted Boy:
other Largehearted Word Books of the Week (weekly new book highlights)
52 Books, 52 Weeks (my yearly reading project)
Antiheroines (interviews with up and coming female comics artists)
Atomic Books Comics Preview (weekly comics & graphic novel highlights)
Book Notes (authors create music playlists for their book)
guest book reviews
musician/author interviews
Note Books (musicians discuss literature)
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Atomic Books Comics Preview - September 1, 2010
In the weekly Atomic Books Comics Preview, Benn Ray highlights notable new comics and graphic novels.
Benn Ray is the owner of Atomic Books, an independent bookstore in Baltimore. The Mobtown Shank is his blog, and his comic Said What? is syndicated weekly in the Baltimore Sun's B-Paper.
Atomic Books was recently named one of Bizarre Magazine's 51 geekiest places on the planet.
A.D.: New Orleans After the Deluge
by Josh Neufeld
On the 5 year anniversary of Katrina, Josh Neufeld's acclaimed epic is not released in softcover. Originally a webcomic, A.D. compiles 6 real accounts of the destruction from those who survived it.
The Amazing Screw-On Head and Other Curious Objects
by Mike Mignola / Dave Stewart
Perhaps you saw the cult classic animated short starring Patton Oswalt, Paul Giamatti, and David Hyde Pierce? Now check out the original source as it's available in this beautiful new edition with a bunch of other oddball comic ephemera from the Hellboy creator. This book won an Eisner Award for Best Humor Publication
Dante's Divine Comedy
by Dante Alighieri / Seymour Chwast
Chwast's first graphic novel is an adaptation of Dante's classic, but his illustrations result in a fascinating modern revisioning moreso than just a comic adaptation.
Norman Pettingill: Backwoods Humorist
by Norman Pettingill
Norman Pettingill is an underground cartoonist's underground cartoonist. His obsessive linework, his out-of-control hillbilly wonderland - and even his medium - wood, all make for a fascinating experience. And yes, the cover of this book is plywood.
Wild Kingdom
by Kevin Huizenga
Kevin Huizenga is the rare cartoonist whose subject matter is every bit as well-crafted as his artwork - which results in a comic you enjoy reading and thinking about as much as looking at. His main character, Glenn Ganges, is a modern-day suburban Dagwood Bumstead.
Questions, concerns, comments or gripes – e-mail benn@atomicbooks.com. If there’s a comic I should know about, send it my way at Atomic, c/o Atomic Books 3620 Falls Rd., Baltimore, MD 21211.
Atomic Books & Benn Ray links:
Atomic Books website
Atomic Books blog
Atomic Books on Twitter
Atomic Books on Facebook
Benn Ray's blog (The Mobtown Shank)
Benn Ray's comic, Said What?
also at Largehearted Boy:
other Atomic Books Comics Preview lists (weekly new comics & graphic novel highlights)
52 Books, 52 Weeks
Antiheroines (interviews with up and coming female comics artists)
Book Notes (authors create music playlists for their book)
guest book reviews
Largehearted Word (weekly new book highlights)
musician/author interviews
Note Books (musicians discuss literature)
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Shorties (Jenny and Johnny, Jonathan Franzen, and more)
Vanity Fair interviews Jenny Lewis and Johnathan Rice about their duo, Jenny and Johnny, and new album, I'm Having Fun.
There seems to be a revived interest in the last few years in the duet format— She & Him, Pete Yorn & Scarlett Johansson have had recent success—what’s unique and fun about this approach?
Jonathan Rice: To me, selfishly, I find it more interesting, than hearing just myself.
Jenny Lewis: I never intended to set out and be a singer-songwriter. I just sort of became one, because I put out my own record. But it’s very difficult to do everything all on your own; to stand up there and sing all alone and having to field questions. It’s a lot easier when you’re part of a gang, or a duo. And we feel happy to be a part of the ampersand-band movement.
SoundSpike also interviews the duo.
The A.V. Club interviews Jonathan Franzen about his new novel, Freedom.
The Christian Science Monitor reviews the novel.
Stuff profiles Sleigh Bells.
"I think the music we make is reflective of the atmosphere we want to create in a live setting ... We want the crowd to be hot and sweaty and dancing. We want this to be the type of record people blast in their cars really loudly when they're driving to the beach, or dancing in a club."
NYU Local lists the 20 best songs of the summer.
The Chicago Tribune previews fall's top album releases.
A Blog Supreme recommends five jazz albums for hip hop fans.
Capital New York profiles Antony and the Johnsons.
Jeph Jacques (the cartoonist behind the webcomic Questionable Content) lists his favorite albums of 2010 (so far).
Flavorwire lists 10 essential hip hop films.
At Fast Company, Ryan Marshall explains how he used social media to promote his charity album, Do Fun Stuff: Vol. 1 (and land it the top spot on iTunes' children's charts).
The New Yorker features new short fiction by Nell Freudenberger.
Aquarium Drunkard shares a Mondo Boys, Tidal Wave mixtape of summer music.
Cartoonist Hope Larson talks to Robot 6 about adapting Madeleine L'Engle's A Wrinkle in Time into a graphic novel.
On sale at Amazon MP3:
Ryan Bingham's 13-track Junky Star album for $3.99.
Jonsi's 9-track Go album for $3.99
The Guardian talks to artist Catherine Anyango about adapting Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness into a graphic novel.
Invisible Oranges has a classically-trained voice teacher analyze five classic male metal singers.
The Guardian lists the top 10 books about UFOs.
Morning Edition talks to Alex Cohen about her new book, Down and Derby: An Insider's Guide to Roller Derby.
An excerpt from the book is also shared.
At All Songs Considered, filmmaker Jim Jarmusch previews the All Tomorrow's Parties music festival.
Win all three books in Suzanne Collins' Hunger Games series (The Hunger Games, Catching Fire, and Mockingjay) in this week's Largehearted Boy contest.
Follow me on Twitter and Stumbleupon for links (updated throughout the day) that don't make the daily "Shorties" columns.
also at Largehearted Boy:
previous Shorties posts (daily links from the worlds of music, literature, and pop culture)
Atomic Books Comics Preview (highlights of the week's comics & graphic novel releases)
daily mp3 downloads
Largehearted Word (highlights of the week's book releases)
Try It Before You Buy It (mp3s and full album streams from this week's CD releases)
weekly music & DVD release lists
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Daily Downloads (Margaret Cho, Damien Jurado, and more)
Every day, Daily Downloads offers 10 free and legal mp3 downloads, plus free and legal live sets from around the internet.
Today's free and legal mp3 downloads:
Damien Jurado & Richard Swift: free and legal Other People's Songs: Volume 1 covers album [mp3]
other Damien Jurado posts at Largehearted Boy
Deer Tick: "Piece By Piece, Frame By Frame" [mp3] from The Black Dirt Sessions
other Deer Tick posts at Largehearted Boy
J Minus: "Congratulations, You Suck" [mp3] from Devil Music
other J Minus posts at Largehearted Boy
Jupe Jupe: "Something About Love" [mp3] from Invaders (out October 5th)
other Jupe Jupe posts at Largehearted Boy
Kisses: "Bermuda" [mp3] from The Heart of the Nightlife (out October 19th)
other Kisses posts at Largehearted Boy
Lovetones: "City Meets the Stars" [mp3] from Lost
other Lovetones posts at Largehearted Boy
Margaret Cho: "Intervention (featuring Tegan and Sara)" [mp3] from Cho Dependent
other Margaret Cho posts at Largehearted Boy
Noah's Ark Was a Spaceship: "Warm Eyes" [mp3] from Warm Eyes
other Noah's Ark Was a Spaceship posts at Largehearted Boy
Sunset: "Moonlight" [mp3] from Loveshines But the Moon is Shining Too (out September 7th)
other Sunset posts at Largehearted Boy
The Vita Ruins: "Seven Suns" [mp3] from A Day Without A Name
other Vita Ruins posts at Largehearted Boy
Free and legal mp3s of live performances at other websites:
The Beets: Daytrotter session [mp3]
other Beets posts at Largehearted Boy
Imperial Teen: 2010-07-22, West Hollywood [mp3]
other Imperial Teen posts at Largehearted Boy
Peter Wolf Crier: HearYa session [mp3]
other Peter Wolf Crier posts at Largehearted Boy
also at Largehearted Boy:
other daily free and legal mp3 downloads
2010 Bonnaroo downloads
music festival downloads
Try It Before You Buy It (mp3s and album streams from weekly CD releases)
weekly CD and DVD release lists
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August 31, 2010
Try It Before You Buy It - August 31, 2010 Music Releases
Try It Before You Buy It features free and legal mp3 downloads and full album streams from the week's music releases:
American Bang: American Bang
full album stream
Brothers Young: Good People
Brothers Young: Brothers Young: "Good Deeds" [mp3] from Good People EP (out August 31st)
Carl Broemel: All Birds Say
full album stream
Carl Broemel: "Heaven Knows" [mp3]
Continue reading "Try It Before You Buy It - August 31, 2010 Music Releases"
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Book Notes - Monique Truong ("Bitter in the Mouth")
In the Book Notes series, authors create and discuss a music playlist that relates in some way to their recently published book.
Monique Truong impressed both readers and critics alike with her debut novel, The Book of Salt, one of my personal favorite literary debuts in recent history.
Bitter in the Mouth is equally impressive. Truong has fashioned a truly unforgettable coming of age story featuring a young girl with synesthesia who tastes words. As a narrator, Linda Hammerick is unique and relatable, and Truong's brilliant depiction of her interaction with her family, friends, and the rest of the world makes Bitter in the Mouth of the year's most clever and poetic novels.
Publishers Weekly wrote of the book:
"Truong's mesmerizing prose beautifully captures Linda's taste-saturated world, and her portrait of a broken family's secretive pockets and genuine moments of connection is affecting."
In her own words, here is Monique Truong's Book Notes music playlist for her novel, Bitter in the Mouth:
I'm a writer of fiction because I can't sing. If I could sing, if my voice was capable of carrying a melody that could pierce your unsuspecting skin and your most vital organ, I wouldn't spend so many of my days alone, moving unwieldy words around on a screen like they were puzzle pieces from different and incompatible sets. I would serenade you, beckoning you from your high window. I would lullaby, power ballad, and hymn my way into your heart. I would Patsy Cline, Dusty Springfield, Dolly Parton, Etta James, and Khanh Ly you (yes, I'm using all those names as verbs), and then I would leave you and do it all over again to someone else.
At the very core of what I try to do with what I've been given—a "voice" on paper, if not in throat—is the desire to create that chill, that sudden weather system, that complete feeling of being embraced from outside and within that I experience whenever I hear a really good song.
So when I think about a playlist to accompany my second novel, Bitter in the Mouth, I think about two separate lists: first are the songs that helped me to shape the emotional form and content of the narrative (the writing songs), and second are those songs that are included within the narrative itself (the written songs), of which there are many. Linda Hammerick, the main character of Bitter, has a neurological condition, auditory-gustatory synesthesia, that causes her to taste words. She learns early on though that "when strapped to music, words fired blanks." So songs, for Linda, become an oasis where words bring with them only what she allows, where she is in control, which she tells us is one definition of "happiness." The playlist below is my writing songs. For a list of the written songs, check out my website, and, umm, read my book.
The Writing Songs
"Just One Thing," My Morning Jacket
I was listening to this song when I wrote the first line of Bitter in the Mouth: "I fell in love with my great-uncle Harper because he taught me how to dance."
My second novel is set in the small town of Boiling Springs, North Carolina, circa mid-70s. There is nothing about this song that evokes that musical era, but there is something that evokes longing and desire, vague and intangible but certainly in the air like the smell of a rainstorm, heading your way. That emotional atmosphere is to me just another way of saying a "coming-of-age" novel, which I didn't realize that I was writing until many pages and years into Bitter.
Lead singer Jim James's (the artist now oddly known as Yim Yames) honey-toned declarations—"Baby, we'll find a way"—also found their way into my book in another way. The great-uncle in the opening line of my novel, within a matter of pages, would be nicknamed "Baby Harper."
"Waiting for the Sun" (live recording), The Jayhawks
I needed a lot of music, seven years worth in fact, to get me from that first line to the final edit of Bitter. As I was often writing in places far from the rural south (Brooklyn, Whidbey Island, Donnini, and Bogliasco, the latter two are small towns in Italy), I wanted to listen to bands whose singers had the cadence and rhythm of the American south and, therefore, could bring me back there. (I don't have a southern accent though I did learn how to speak English in Boiling Springs, where my family lived when we first came to the U.S. as refugees in 1975.) I'm not a fan of most contemporary country music though. I favor Patsy Cline, Skeeter Davis, and early Dolly Parton. I love these old school gals, but I also wanted to hear a modern take on the south. I found it with The Jayhawks, a band from of all places Minneapolis. The Jayhawks channeled a kind of strip-down alt-country that sounded as if the members all grew up in small southern towns but then moved away to the big city. (In fact, members of The Jayhawks were for the most part mid-western boys, born and raised).
With The Jayhawks, I prefer their live recordings (in the studio, their songs too often become over-produced and over-complicated). In "Waiting for the Sun" (on Live from the Women's Club), Mark Olson's acoustic guitar and vocals have just the right amount of laidback southern twang, never verging on parody or caricature. It was exactly what I needed to hear as I was trying to imagine the voices of my southerners.
"Pick Up the Change," Wilco
Like The Jayhawks, Wilco on their first LP, A.M., is a band from the mid-west that is evoking an ersatz south. Jeff Tweedy's drawl when he sings the word "darling" in this song really opens up those two syllables, until they become like a wide porch where you could sit and catch the occasional breeze.
"You Belong To Me," Patsy Cline
This song is on both my writing and written songs playlists. Cline has the kind of sturdy female voice that I adore. Sure she's loved and lost, but her shoulders are pulled back straight and her head is held high. I "hear" that in her voice, no matter how sad and lovelorn the words are that she sings. "You Belong To Me" is a fine example of the interplay between the two. Also, the lyrics are so lush with the tantalizing allure of travel and the promise of all that what awaits you upon your return. The woman singing this song understands the impulse to do both and wants you to know it too.
"Dancing in the Dark," Cannonball Adderley
His name alone should recommend him to you, but if you need more incentive then start with the six songs on Somethin' Else. These are early Adderley recordings, when his alto saxophone was smoky and languid, especially on this track. I listen to it whenever I needed to take a deep breath. "Dancing in the Dark," is the musical equivalent of one (or, perhaps, a long drag on a cigarette).
"Glad Girls," Guided By Voices
This song says "high school" to me. Not my actual high school experience, as I was already practicing law and working on my first novel when this song came out on the last Guided By Voices LP, Isolation Drills. There's something infectious, carefree, and ultimately elegiac about the simple, repetitive lyrics, and then out of nowhere the prediction that "there will be no coronation, there will be no flowers." The song, in essence, grows up, during the 3:50 minute that it takes to get from the first to the last note. I like that kind of concision. I aim for it in my own writing.
"Everyday I Write the Book," Elvis Costello
I admit it. It's my writing anthem. Although as a writer, I must point out that Costello uses the word "everyday" incorrectly in his title (it should be "every day," as those words joined together is an adjective that means common or quotidian). I sing along to it, and it always makes me smile. Costello is totally right: in the perfect world "I'd still own the film rights and be working on the sequel."
Monique Truong and Bitter in the Mouth links:
the author's website
the author's book tour events
BookPage review
Herald Scotland review
Library Journal review
Los Angeles Times review
Moonwishes Reads reviews
Ms. Blog review
O review
Oregonian review
Publishers Weekly review
Time Out New York review
Poets & Writers profile of the author
also at Largehearted Boy:
other Book Notes playlists (authors create music playlists for their book)
52 Books, 52 Weeks (weekly book reviews)
Antiheroines (interviews with up and coming female comics artists)
Atomic Books Comics Preview (weekly comics highlights)
Daily Downloads (free and legal daily mp3 downloads)
guest book reviews
Largehearted Word (weekly new book highlights)
musician/author interviews
Note Books (musicians discuss literature)
Shorties (daily music, literature, and pop culture links)
Soundtracked (composers and directors discuss their film's soundtracks)
Try It Before You Buy It (mp3s and full album streams from the week's CD releases)
weekly music & DVD release lists
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Shorties (Stream the New Justin Townes Earle Album, Jonathan Franzen, and more)
NPR is streaming Justin Townes Earle's new album, Harlem River Blues (out September 14th).
Jonathan Franzen's new novel, Freedom, is finally in bookstores today.
All Things Considered examines the critical controversy surrounding the book.
The Chicago Tribune explains why Freedom is "another great Midwestern novel.
Drowned in Sound interviews Avi Buffalo's Avigdor Zahner-Isenberg.
DiS: A lot of bands mentioned alongside you are older acts such as Neil Young or The Byrds. Do you see it as a compliment to be compared to them?
AZ-I: I love Neil Young and The Byrds, so that's really nice to hear. I got REALLY into Neil this past year, especially this record called Chrome Dreams from 1977. I haven't ever gotten super into the The Byrds but I love The Flying Burrito Brothers. Bands I was really into writing these songs and recording were Jim O'Rourke, Elliott Smith, The Flaming Lips, Prefuse 73, Wilco, Nels Cline, John Coltrane and Sonic Youth.
Three Monkeys Online profiles author Jose Saramago.
DC9 at Night interviews Titus Andronicus frontman Patrick Stickles.
Creative Loafing Atlanta previews this weekend's Decatur Book Festival.
Flavorwire lists the 10 musical acts who will "save 2010 from chillwave."
Moviefone lists the top comic book characters still available for movies.
The National Post profiles singer-songwriter Luke Doucet.
NY1's One on 1 interviews Gary Shteyngart about his latest novel, Super Sad Love Story.
The Arcade Fire have a technologically impressive new video for "The Wilderness Downtown," produced with help from Google.
3:AM interviews author Tony O'Neill about sex and drugs.
Pop & Hiss lists five ways for indie musicians to get their songs played on KCRW.
The Guardian is taking nominations for its annual Not the Booker literary prize.
The Quietus reviews the new Antony and the Johnsons album, Swanlights (out October 12th), track-by-track.
The Morning News excerpts from Kevin Guilfoile's new novel, The Thousand.
The Guardian examines how live music festivals are changing the music industry.
Gizmodo lists the 10 greatest fictional inventors of all time.
At the A.V. Club, the Walkmen cover R.E.M.'s "Driver 8."
NPR is streaming Junip's new album, Fields (out September 14th). Junip is singer-songwriter Jose Gonzales's latest project.
NPR lists three books for surviving graduate school.
NPR is streaming the Walkmen's new album, Lisbon (out September 14th).
Vol. 1 Brooklyn reviews Grace Krilanovich's new novel, The Orange Eat Creeps.
Krilanovich is borrowing elements here from pulp horror, but it’s key that an unseen killer is far more sinister than either the gang of vampires or an ominous street that resurfaces throughout the book. Her novel shares a disorienting quality with the final section of Brian Evenson’s The Open Curtain, in which time, character, and action collapse in on themselves. That actions are horrific isn’t the only thing at work here — there’s also the way in which actions begin to blur and lose cohesion, which is in its own way even more horrific.
A Blog Supreme taste tests Bitches Brew ale, a beer produced by Dogfish Head brewery to commemorate the 40th anniversary of Miles Davis's Bitches Brew album.
Win all three books in Suzanne Collins' Hunger Games series (The Hunger Games, Catching Fire, and Mockingjay) in this week's Largehearted Boy contest.
Follow me on Twitter and Stumbleupon for links (updated throughout the day) that don't make the daily "Shorties" columns.
also at Largehearted Boy:
previous Shorties posts (daily links from the worlds of music, literature, and pop culture)
Atomic Books Comics Preview (highlights of the week's comics & graphic novel releases)
daily mp3 downloads
Largehearted Word (highlights of the week's book releases)
Try It Before You Buy It (mp3s and full album streams from this week's CD releases)
weekly music & DVD release lists
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