Month: April 2012

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‘How do musicians communicate emotion? Performers have often answered this question in terms of what the performer should think and feel. According to the eighteenth-century keyboardist C. P. E. Bach, “a musician cannot move others unless he too is moved.” For nineteenth-century pianist Johann Nepomuk Hummel, emotion came from the performer’s “ability to grasp what the composer himself has felt, expressing it in his playing, and making it pass into the souls of the listener. This can be neither notated nor indicated.”

‘Musical performance emerged as an object of scientific study around 1900, when for the first time physiologists and psychologists were able to record the fleeting processes of performance. Of course, you might think, that’s when the phonograph was becoming available. But it wasn’t the phonograph the early scientists of musical performance turned to. These scientists wanted to analyze not sound, but touch – the magical touch of the expert pianist.

‘To analyze pianists’ touch, Parisian psychologists Alfred Binet and Jules Courtier developed an apparatus that registered the time and pressure at which the pianists pressed the keys, recording this information in the fashion of a seismograph. Binet and Courtier used their graphs to show that the best pianists had the greatest regularity in execution. Around the same time (the 1890s), pianist-turned-research Marie Jaëll developed another method for register touch: covering the keyboard with strips of paper and coating the fingers with printing ink, she recorded the placement and quality of the fingers’ touch upon the keys.

‘Then, in the 1900s, the player piano hit the market. The player piano changed everything by introducing piano performance without keyboard touch. At first, piano rolls contained only metrically exact renditions of the notes of a musical score. Such performances were considered mechanical and soulless. Soon, timing, dynamics and pedaling too were automated with the piano rolls of a new type of instrument: the reproducing piano. Unlike the player piano, which played piano rolls generated straight from the score and had no mechanism for automated dynamics, the reproducing piano played piano rolls made from actual performances, complete with the performer’s temporal and dynamic nuances. The result was a new scientific instrument for the study of musical performance.’ — Spooky & the Metronome

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Conlon Nancarrow
‘Composer Conlon Nancarrow was a dedicated socialist, which made him politically unacceptable in the United States. This was brought plainly home when he applied for a passport and was denied. Angry at such treatment, he moved to Mexico City in the early 1940s, becoming a Mexican citizen in 1956. He died there in 1997. Nancarrow composed for the player piano partly because of Mexico’s extreme musical isolation. Another more compelling reason was his long-standing frustration at the inability of musicians to deal with even moderately difficult rhythms. He goes so far as to say that “As long as I’ve been writing music I’ve been dreaming of getting rid of the performers.” With the advent of the phonograph, the player piano has been relegated to the status of an object of nostalgia. But not so for Nancarrow, who since the late 1940s composed almost exclusively for the instrument.’ — Other Minds

‘Study for Player Piano No. 21’

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Black Sabbath (on Synthesia)
‘Black Sabbath are cited as pioneers of heavy metal. The band helped define the genre with releases such as quadruple-platinum Paranoid, released in 1970. They were ranked by MTV as the “Greatest Metal Band” of all time, and placed second in VH1’s “100 Greatest Artists of Hard Rock” list, behind Led Zeppelin. Rolling Stone called the band “the heavy-metal kings of the ’70s”. They have sold over 15 million records in the United States and over 70 million records worldwide. Black Sabbath were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2006, and were included among Rolling Stone’s list of the 100 Greatest Artists of All Time.’ — Wiki

‘Iron Man’

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Bill, Brian and Stefan of Olin College of Engineering
‘Much of Olin College’s curriculum is built around hands-on engineering and design projects. This project-based teaching begins in a student’s first year and culminates in two senior “capstone” projects. In the engineering capstone, Senior Consulting Program for Engineering (SCOPE) student teams are hired by corporations, non-profit organizations, or entrepreneurial ventures for real-world engineering projects. In the Arts, Humanitie
s, and Social Sciences (“AHS”) or Entrepreneurship (“E!”) capstone, students work on a self-designed project relating to their focus. Olin College allows students to receive funding and non-degree college credit for “Passionate Pursuits,” student-defined personal projects that the college recognizes as having academic value. Until 2009, the college offered full tuition to all students.’ — Students Review

‘Chopsticks’

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Tom Johnson
‘Tom Johnson is an American minimalist composer, a former student of Morton Feldman. His pieces are most often based simply on mathematical and logical processes, such as tiling, which he attempts to make as clear as possible. His works include: The Four Note Opera, An Hour for Piano, Rational Melodies, the Bonhoeffer Oratorio,Organ and Silence, Riemannoper, and Galileo. Johnson received the French “Victoires de la Musique” prize for contemporary composition (the French equivalent of the “Grammies”) in 2001 for Kientzy Loops. He lived 15 years in New York, but in 1983 settled in Paris, where he lives with his wife, the artist Esther Ferrer.’ — lovely.com

‘Study for Player Piano #1’

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Batman
‘The Dynamic Duo are tied to a conveyor belt of a hole punching machine that creates paper music rolls for player pianos. Batman observes how the machine operates, and deduces a clever way of evading perforation by calculating the notes necessary to make the plunging punches miss and then overpowering the sound of the piano. When he and Robin capture Harry, Harry squeals that a guy named Fingers is the ring leader. Batman deduces that Fingers and Chantell are the same man, and soon unravels the rest of the evil plot.’ — TVRage

‘The Dead Ringers’

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Annie Gosfield
‘Annie Gosfield lives in New York City and divides her time between performing on piano and sampler with her own group and composing for many ensembles and soloists. Her work often explores the inherent beauty of non–musical sounds, and is inspired by diverse sources such as machines, destroyed pianos, warped 78 records, and detuned radios. She uses traditional notation, improvisation, and extended techniques to create a sound world that eliminates the boundaries between music and noise, while emphasizing the unique qualities of each performer. A 2012 fellow at the American Academy in Berlin, and the recipient of the 2008 Foundation for Contemporary Arts’ prestigious “Grants to Artists” award, Gosfield’s essays on composition have been published by the New York Times and featured in the book Arcana II. Active as an educator, she has taught composition at Princeton University, Mills College, and California Institute of the Arts.’ — anniegosfield.com

‘Shoot The Player Piano’

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Györy Ligeti
‘Gyorgy Ligeti was, along with Karlheinz Stockhausen, Iannis Xenakis and Pierre Boulez, one of a group of composers which revolutionised postwar music. Rejecting classical musical forms and creating often sparse and atonal works, they continually withstood the derision heaped upon them by generations of critics. Like Bela Bartok, Ligeti was fascinated by folk music and initially produced a number of arrangements in that idiom. Perhaps his most notable, certainly his most famous, piece was Atmospheres from 1960. This work featured, along with Ligeti’s Requiem and Lux Aeterna, on the soundtrack of Stanley Kubrick’s film 2001: A Space Odyssey.’ — BBC

‘Étude pour Piano No. 9’

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Trimpin
‘Trimpin, a sound sculptor, composer, inventor, is one of the most stimulating one-man forces in music today. A specialist in interfacing computers with traditional acoustic instruments, he has developed a myriad of methods for playing, trombones, cymbals, pianos, and so forth with Macintosh computers. He has collaborated frequently with Conlon Nancarrow, realizing the composer’s piano roll compositions through various media. In describing his work, Trimpin sums it up as “extending the traditional boundaries of instruments and the sounds they’re capable of producing by mechanically operating them. Although they’re computer-driven, they’re still real instruments making real sounds, but with another dimension added, that of spatial distribution.”‘ — Other Minds

‘Ratatatatatt’

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Mario Bros. (on Synthesia)
‘Synthesia is a video game and piano keyboard trainer for Microsoft Windows and Mac OS X, as well as Linux using Wine, which allows users to play a MIDI keyboard or use a computer keyboard in time to a MIDI file by following on-screen directions, much in the style of Keyboard Mania or Guitar Hero. It was originally named Piano Hero due to the similarity of gameplay with Guitar Hero; however, Activision (the owners of the rights to Guitar Hero) sent a cease and desist to the program’s creator, Nicholas Piegdon. Synthesia was originally an open source project, but seeing the potential commercial value of the program, Piegdon decided to stop releasing the source code (version 0.6.2), however leaving the most recent open-source release available for download. While the basic functionality is still currently free, a “Learning Pack” key can be purchased to unlock additional features, such as a sheet music display mode.’ — synthesis.eu

‘Medley’

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Marc-André Hamelin
‘Marc-André Hamelin began his piano studies at the age of five. He has made recordings of a wide variety of composers with the Hyperion label. He is well known for his att
ention to lesser-known composers especially of the late nineteenth and early twentieth century (Leo Ornstein, Nikolai Roslavets, Georgy Catoire). Hamelin has also composed several works, including a set of piano études in all of the minor keys, which was completed in September 2009. Although the majority of his compositions are for piano solo, he has also written three pieces for player-piano (including the comical Circus Galop and Solfeggietto a cinque, which is based on a theme by C.P.E. Bach), and several works for other forces, including Fanfares for three trumpets.’ — guardian.co.uk

‘Pop Music for Player Piano’

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Dan Deacon
‘Dan Deacon is a Baltimore, Maryland-based electronic music composer/performer. He attended the Conservatory of Music at Purchase College in Purchase, New York, where he played in many bands, including tuba for Langhorne Slim and guitar in the improvisational grindcore band Rated R. Dan Deacon’s compositional style is best classified in the future shock genre along with videohippos, Santa Dads, Blood Baby, Ecstatic Sunshine, Ponytail, and other bands in the growing Baltimore music scene. Since 2003, Deacon has released eight albums under several different labels. Deacon also has a renowned reputation for his live shows, where large scale audience participation and interaction is often a major element of the performance.’ — discogs.com

‘Demonstration’

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Minecraft
‘Minecraft is a sandbox-building independent video game written in Java originally by Swedish creator Markus “Notch” Persson and now by his company, Mojang. Minecraft is focused on creativity and building, allowing players to build constructions out of textured cubes in a 3D world. Gameplay in its commercial release has two principal modes: Survival, which requires players to acquire resources themselves and maintain their health and hunger; and Creative, where the player has an unlimited supply of resources, the ability to fly, and no concept of health or hunger. A third gameplay mode, named Hardcore, is essentially the same as Survival, but the difficulty is locked on the hardest setting and respawning is disabled, forcing the player to delete his or her world upon death.’ — minecraft.org

‘Ode to Joy’

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Igor Stravinsky
‘The Russian-born American composer Igor Stravinsky identified himself as an “inventor of music.” The novelty, power, and elegance of his works won him worldwide admiration before he was thirty. Throughout his life he continued to surprise admirers with transformations of his style that stimulated controversy. Stravinsky died on April 6, 1971, in New York City and was buried in Venice. His approach to musical composition was one of constant renewal. Rhythm was the most striking ingredient, and his novel rhythms were most widely imitated. His instrumentation and his ways of writing for voices were also distinctive and influential. His harmonies and forms were more elusive (difficult to grasp). He recognized melody as the “most essential” element.’ — igorstravinsky.com

‘Étude pour Pianola’
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p.s. Hey. ** Wolf, Hi, W. Oh, I see. Yeah, do your best to get your relatives on board. It’s kind of scary. Sarkozy is already pandering like mad to the FN voters. It’s really grotesque. I read this thing yesterday by some guy who’s supposed to be a big expert on the FN, and he said Le Pen’s goal is to destroy the UMP and then take up the mantle of the French right, and that she wants Sarkozy to lose, and he thinks she’ll ask her people to abstain in the second round, but it’s all speculation, and it looks like it’s going to be really close, so, yeah, it seems important that people vote for Hollande, misgivings and everything. Ugh. That Krasznahorkai novel is pretty fantastic, yeah, and I’m going to start another of his soon, I think. Good question about Hungary. You got me. Right, about the Proust pooh-poohing. There is a certain punkish fun to it. Anyway, lots of love to you on this gloomy looking (Paris) morning. ** Kiddiepunk, Yes, sir. Great seeing you yesterday, and more of that any minute, yeah? ** Cobalt91, Hi! Thanks about the posts. It does mean a lot when people acknowledge them and say that they find them interesting, of course, so hugs. Well, better to have problems sticking to genre writing’s outlines than the opposite, I guess, but of course I would say that, ha ha. That story you’re pitching to ‘Outside’ sounds fantastic, as a piece and as a real world adventure too. Here’s hoping they’re wise. I find it helpful to think of only writing one more novel, but I won’t know if that’s the deal until I write it, so right now it’s just part of the scheme, I guess, and it feels right at the moment. Mm, no, I don’t kill my internet off when I’m writing, but there definitely is a lot of discipline involved in making internet surfing into more kind of a little reward or a ‘lunch’ break or something. The thing that was really hard for me was writing a novel while maintaining this blog. “TMS’ was the first one I’ve written since starting this project, and I think trying to figure out how to write and do this at the same time is one of the reasons it took me years to start ‘TMS’ but I managed to do both, although in hindsight I don’t know how the hell I did that. Yay about you getting back to your novel this weekend. I’ll be interested to hear how that goes and about anything in the process that you’re interested to share. My phone is finally back, thanks. No, I haven’t seen ‘Shame’. I’m interested to hear that you like it ‘cos I’ve heard so many bad reports, and I think that’s why I haven’t made an effort to see it yet. Bon day and love to you. ** David Ehrenstein, Ha ha, yeah, I guess I’m kind of a bit with Wolf in that I kind of like pooh-poohing Proust just to be mischievous or something, but I’m basically positive that he must be great. It’s just that when I was a young writer hanging out with the big, older dogs like the Violet Quill guys and James Merrill and so on, they were always like ‘Proust, Proust, Proust’, and it instigated my rebellious side, I guess. One of these years, I’ll read him. Oh, so I saw ‘Twixt’. Mm, see what you think, but I thought it was really lame and mediocre, sort of like a subpar episode of ‘Tales from the Crypt’ or something. I haven’t seen the recent Coppola films, so I don’t where this one stands in relationship to them, but I came away thinking, What the fuck happened to him?! It was just kind of an artsy, cliched supernatural film, as far as I could see. ** Chilly Jay Chill, Thanks, Jeff. Totally, about that piece being by James Wood.
I did a serious double take when I checked the byline. Weird. I think ND is putting out ‘Satantango’ quite soon. That’s exciting. Oh, I see, about the short pieces. Right, I remember when you were struggling to shape the novel out of a lot of material. Anyway, cool. During the Cycle, like you said, yeah, I used castoffs as places to begin the next novel in Cycle quite a bit. Since then, no, ‘cos I’m determined to totally reinvent my voice with each new novel now. The castoffs can be useful for short pieces. A bunch of stuff in ‘Ugly Man’ was either novel castoffs or experiments for a new novel that I liked but which didn’t have legs. ** Killer Luka, Ouch, ugh, sorry about the diligence of your illness. Reading ‘Period’ when sick … it just might work, ha ha. Sounds like you’re ‘in danger’ of eclipsing me as the world’s biggest VK fan among notable figures in contemporary culture. We can be his King and Queen, or his Court Painters or whatever they were called. Okay, I’ll try to download ‘Mr. Nobody’ even though watching Jared Leto act is a lot to ask. Sure enough, that Youtube full-length version you linked to is blocked in France. Wtf?! I hope we block stuff from you guys. ** Ken Baumann, Ken! Oh, the festival was at USC? What is that? They do one now too? Crosstown rivalry stuff? Yeah, the UCLA one is the one I know. LA is becoming a literary hot spot? Book festival hot spot, I mean? Weird, I just read Blake’s thing about Twitter not ten minutes ago. Gosh, I still feel like I need some time to start reading Bolano. I’m still feeling a trendy chip on my shoulder when I see his name. That’s irrational, I know. I mean, I will, if nothing else for the same reason I want to see ‘Hunger Games’. He’s kind of the ‘Hunger Games’ of the bright new writers set, if nothing else. Still, saying ‘I haven’t read him’ can only get one so far. Dude, I so incredibly dig that Kickstarter link thing, holy shit! I so want to go to see those events. I so believe in what those guys are doing. I so think I’m going to fork over a little moolah. Thank you! You know me way too well. ** Steevee, Hey. I’ll go look for that download. You’ve intrigued me. That’s weird about the library-only status. Why? Does that mean they only have one copy or something? Do they have more than one copy of most books? It’s not like that book is rare or delicate to handle or something. I have not seen that Riff Raff video, but you can bet that I won’t be able to say that tomorrow. Thanks! ** Misanthrope, I tried that joke on three people, and they didn’t even roll their eyes. They stared for a second then crinkled up their noses as if to say, Why? Yes, I like that you ate Mexican, motherfucker. There, are you happy? Can’t wait for ‘The Avengers’. New Whedon! Maybe the Wines got the rapping gene instead. Have you tried? You could form a kind of like Osmonds of the rap world maybe. I don’t think that’s been done yet, has it? That could be money in bank maybe. Oh, nice, now that song is back in my mental treadmill again. I’ll be singing it in the shower in a few minutes. I actually got the singing gene. Did you know that? I was the lead singer for three bands before I hung up my vocal cords. If I started singing to you, which I will never do, I would break your heart, man, even if I was singing ‘Firework’ You’d be bawling like a big motherfucking baby. ** Sypha, Hey, J. Yeah, I actually think ‘Firework’ is kind of a masterpiece of the fascistically catchy crap pop genre. I could even write an essay proving its mini-genius if I wanted to, which I don’t. It’s overplayed here too, which is why it keeps getting stuck in my head. Westerns? Hm, any good? I hope the psychiatrist visit goes interestingly. You know that I dug my time in therapy. See what you think. Cool about ‘Grimoire’! Everyone, Sypha aka James Champagne’s marvelous novel ‘Grimoire’, much lauded in these parts, is now available in hard copy/book form via Amazon and Barnes & Noble if you haven’t gotten your copy yet. If not, choose your conglomerate. Here’s it at Amazon, and here’s it at B&N.; ** 5STRINGS, No, I didn’t. It wasn’t me. But I’m all about being your comrade re: Blanchot and R-G. I am your French echo with an American accent. James Jones? Hm, truly? Don’t know. A painter’s flat and a hole in the wall are the same thing here. That’s why you never hear about contemporary French painting. I agree that you’re ready. I don’t think there’s much doubt about that. Me, I’m not ready. Teach me. It’s hard to fuck a different boy every night unless you have really wide standards, so I think writing might be the option. There are writers who claim they do both, but never trust a writer. ** Frank Jaffe, Hey Frank! Yeah, one week, whoo-hoo. I saw Oscar and Kiddiep yesterday, and we were counting down the days as well. Blast, here we come! Ugh about Luke not getting into the schools. I’m sorry. But you don’t need school when you’re a writer. That’s just an old wives’ tale. On Malick, well, he has a very particular style — pacing, the acting, the camerawork, and especially his use of voiceover. All his films share it, but, within that, there is a lot of variety, and I would say that ‘The Thin Red Line’ and ‘Tree of Life’ are quite different. You have to like what Malick does to get into it. But I’m not wildly objective because he’s my favorite living filmmaker, and ‘The Thin Red Line’ is in my top 10 all-time favorite films, so … Great about ‘Cabin in the Woods’. It opens here the day after you arrive, I think. Excited. Sure, we can plan stuff. I’m pretty free when I’m not doing the blog, which is most of the time. So, let’s plan. How should we do that? What do you absolutely for sure want to see/do? ** Rewritedept, Yeah, I think the new Spiritualized is definitely the best one since ‘Ladies and Gentleman … ‘. It’s pretty stellar. I could diagram those sentences today if I wanted. But I’m good at diagramming sentences, not on paper but privately in my ether. Hope your sleep took total control, man. ** All right. I ask you to consider the player piano as an unexpected font of very interesting things today. That’s all I ask. See you tomorrow.

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‘Holland is a land of wooden shoes, windmills, and tulips. Famous paintings and music have come from this land and it played a role in the field of World War II. If you think of the Netherlands at all you likely never express fear of the land, people or symbols of this European nation. But for some the fear known as Dutchphobia is a real and present worry.

‘What Causes Dutchphobia? The question itself seems almost strange. Why does anyone fear someone from another culture? The feelings can be personal. For example they might have experienced issues with someone of Dutch descent that caused them to fear. I suppose the fear could be related to World War II, but in most cases the fear of any culture is lodged in a lack of understanding about the culture.

‘This may include language barriers, regional customs, music, history or even location. The fear can be derived from the input (intentional or otherwise) of someone in your past. A family member may have routinely said they mistrusted a neighbor of Dutch descent. While you never knew why they weren’t trusted you may have concluded they weren’t to be trusted. That mindset can lead to a lifetime of fear. As with most phobias the easiest ‘out’ is to simply avoid that which you fear. In the case of all things Dutch they can be somewhat easier to avoid than more common fears such as spiders, mice or dogs.

‘When phobic individuals can take the time to rationally explore the potential of understanding the object of their fears they may be able to see a phobic response isn’t really required. Knowledge is powerful in turning fear, but there may need to be a therapist who can help turn the fear. This is true because the brain of a phobic is wired to always respond emotionally to the object of their fear. If it can be retrained to consider the object rationally then at the very least the intensity of the fear may be greatly reduced.’ — Fear of Stuff

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p.s. Hey. Oh, if anyone is reading this in Paris, I want to give an alert about a recommended reading event happening here tomorrow, the 5th, at the great literary event space Storie in Montparnasse. Specifically, the author Gerry Hadden will be doing a reading and presentation re: his memoir ‘Never the Hope Itself’, which details his time as NPR’s correspondent for Latin America and Haiti over five years. It’s a pretty terrific book, and the event itself should be very good. Here’s the info you need. ** David Ehrenstein, Hey. Yeah, I figured you knew Boy Culture well. I think I had a brain scramble. ** Kyler, Hi there! How are you doing? I don’t know that Richard Mason book, no, but it does look very interesting, and I’ll investigate it further thank you! ** Cobalt91, Hi. That new piece you’re working sounds really interesting. ‘Experiment with obsessive structure’ are magic words to my ears. And the novel you’re working on sounds extremely up my alley too. Very cool. The third person is really tricky, or I think so. I mean, it’s the go-to voice for the great majority of fiction writers, but I’ve always felt like it needed to be bombarded by the first person and other stuff to keep it awake or something. I’ve ended up working exclusively if really variously with the first person ever since I finished the Cycle. For some reason, it seems to have so much more room within it in which to work, and I feel like you can shift and fluctuate tone and distance so much more easily and maybe effectively there. I’m curious to see what you do with that third person voice. I’m trying to mess around with one right now re: something new, and it still feels like I’m playing with a rock or something. I love hearing about your work and how you work. Thanks! ** Bernard Welt, Hi, B. We’re only in Strasbourg for two full days, and I think we’re going to use one day up by taking a shuttle tour of the villages and castles and wineries and stuff in the surrounding area, so I figure we’ll just do the medieval area — the hotel we’re staying in was built in 1560, and is pretty amazing looking in photos at least — see the famous cathedral, blah blah. Thanks for the tips, man. ** Paul Curran, Thank you, Paul. All great about you novel. Yeah, of course, I’ve been aching to read that thing for what feels like forever. ** Alan, Hey. You think it’s sad? I guess I think of the apartment not really as a tomb but more as a personalized perfect eternal space for himself, and I find that idea kind of really dreamy. And, with the photos, since he shot them himself, I have this idea that they’re probably layered wi
th private levels of fetishization and obsession and consequent meaning that no one else but him could see. ** Sypha, I like how you’re very loyal to your favorite bands. I think I’m more of a hard ass with mine. Shape up or ship out, and that sort of thing. ** MVdA, I’m glad you thought the post was okay. Oh, right, you haven’t been there, I remember that now. Anyway, thank you again for the turn-on. I hope your project and book are going really well. ** L@rstonovich, Thanks a bunch, man. Aw, for some reason it does my heart good to hear that you returned to the airwaves, even as a guest-pilot. Well, I guess the reason isn’t so mystifying. Naturally, I’ll be listening to that podcast imminently. And your cheery tone when talking your writing and painting makes me very happy. Yes! Everyone, d.l. L@rstonovich is a d.l./artist of many talents, as I believe you know. One of them used to be DJ back when he did the late, lamented radio show Skullcrushing Hummingbird, and now he has briefly returned to the airwaves to guest spin on DJ Sonik Attack’s show, and you can hear the result sans any problem whatsoever, and I suggest you do that, and here’s where. ** Popzeus, Hi Pz! Yeah, that’s totally right and great: ‘ … kind of shrugging their shoulders in a really complicated and stylish way.’ I think that’s really the key right there. I think you cracked it. Nice. And I don’t think a shruggy tone is anywhere near as easy as it sounds like it would be. I mean, there’s a kind of lackadaisical tone that’s very popular right now among some younger writers that could be mistaken for a shrug, but it’s very different. It’s still full of attitude, and its self-deprecation is very self-conscious and is even about that very self-consciousness, and it’s kind of a sponge, whereas Brainard’s and Pym’s shrugginess kind of floats wittily and shyly but very attentively over content or something. I don’t know. I’m rambling. Like you said, it’s a hard thing to articulate, like most great things tend to be. But, yeah, good eye, Zeus, good eye. I bow. ** Steevee, I haven’t seen that Minaj vid, but I’ll check it out today. Pizzazz sounds good. That’s all I really want from her. Cool about the Alex Ross Perry interview, and I’m most curious to hear your thoughts on ‘Bully’ ‘cos, yeah, the hype, whoa. ** Ian Tuttle, Ha ha, right. As a self-imposed Proust virgin, I like Mollino’s angle. I got your email. I’ll send you my phone # today. Great! Mm, I don’t think I’ve read that Seymour Krim piece, no. I’ll see if it’s online somewhere. That kind of ‘day ruining’ sounds refreshing at the moment. Thanks for the tip, man. ** JoeM, It wasn’t actually so dark where you were stabbing. I think maybe you found the right mood lighting. Anyway, I’m grateful, and I’ve been running through what you wrote in my head in a kind of reverie. Do you know that band Luv’ who’s in the gig post today? I didn’t before I made the post, but I thought you might. ** _Black_Acrylic, Thanks, Ben. MdVA gets a lot of credit. ** Chris Cochrane, I had this momentary brain freeze where I thought you were referring to Mark McGuire the baseball player, and I thought, Now that’s an interesting turn. But of course, the MM of whom you speak, *heart*. I hope your weird ass week has pivoted. ** Bill, Too long, that’s my Bill! It did look awfully long when I picked up a copy in S&Co.; the other day though, yeah. ** Zack, Would be awesome if you did a post for your blog about those Detroit happenings and your current reading. I would be serious traffic there. I don’t know that Sherl book. Duly noted. I loved ’80s jangle pop a whole lot too, and, well, I still do, but I haven’t made an appropriate playlist yet, which your comment yesterday has already put on my agenda. Oh, a question: what’s your opinion on The La’s? I like them, but I’ve never quite gotten what the mega-reverence re: them is about. Same goes with Stone Roses for me, to mention a different kind of beast, other than those two great singles. Yeah, I think surrendering is often the way to ‘get it’. I think (and talk) a lot about charisma, and how creating charisma is a really important tool/power to try to use in writing, and charisma is all about ‘how the fuck did he/she/it do that?’ and ‘what the fuck am I feeling?’, etc. ** Misanthrope, Oh, that’s why you freaked. I didn’t think you’d freaked. Maybe I’m too freaky to notice when other people have their freak on. I haven’t seen that Lynch video yet. I had the option yesterday, but I wasn’t in the mood for some reason. Surely by the time I see you tomorrow. So, do you think the WWE pays the wrestlers more when they’re assigned to a match where bruises and blood and stuff is required? I think they must be given bonuses or something in those cases, no? This is the choice of the all time #1 WWE match by that guy I mentioned. ** Okay. Off you go into the sound of the Netherlands as hand-picked by your truly, and I hope there’ll be some toe-tapping and fist pumping around here today. Would be cool. See you tomorrow.