Gäy Band Member Fashion Shoot at Vice Fashion

Gäy band member Thor Pederson

 Whelp, I don't know what you have to do in this day and age to get people to actually guy your record, but getting band of the week at NME and then following it up with having one of your members do a full on photo shoot for Vice Fashion seems like at least two positive steps.

The Maltese Falcon (1930) by Dashiell Hammett

Humphrey Bogart as Sam Spade in the 1941 John Huston directed film version of the Maltese Falcon

Book Review
The Maltese Falcon (1930)
by Dashiell Hammett

  The most interesting aesthetic phenomenon of the 20th century is not the parallel development of "high" and "low" culture, but rather the related event of specific works crossing from the "low" side of art to the "high" side.  It is a phenomenon that is not exclusive to the 20th century- you could argue that some of the earliest novels crossed from low to high art before such a distinction existed, but the 20th century, with an explosion of media and exponential growth of Audiences for all sorts of art and art products, really brought the movement from low to high (and vice versa) into focus.

 The Maltese Falcon is a strong, early example of something published as "low" art becoming "high" art over a very  short period of time.  Hammett himself made claims even prior to the initial publication of The Maltese Falcon in serial form (a year prior to it being released as a novel) that "future" critics and audiences would regard it as a great work of literature.  Hammett was assisted by the 1941 film version, starring Humphrey Bogart and directed by John Huston, which turned out to be one of the greatest films of all time AND adhered relatively closely to the language of the actual book.

  Although Hammett worked in genre fiction, and inspired decades of sequentially released detective fiction paper backs starring the same detective in re-occurring episodes, he himself did not dillute his genius with successive sequels.  Perhaps some of the "high art" status accorded to The Maltese Falcon was due to Hammett having the biographical attributes of other famous novelists- he was sickly, had limited productivity, and didn't right much after the fertile period of the 1930s.

 In fact, the investing of the main character with a name and personality (Sam Spade) was itself something of a departure for Hammett himself, whose main character in his short fiction was a nameless man called "the Continental Op."   Hammett's work is, of course, a model of tight, economical prose and his influence is visible on several generations of artists working both inside of literature and outside, It's hard to even imagine film noir existing without The Maltese Falcon- novel or book.

Blindness (1926) by Henry Green

Book Review
Blindness (1926)
by Henry Green

  Oh yes Henry Green is what you call a "writers writer."  In other words, he didn't sell many copies, but had an outsize influence on young writers.  It's the literary equivalent of the famous (and false) saying that the Velvet Underground may have been unpopular, but everyone who bought the first record went on to start a band.  Henry Green was the nom de plume of Henry Yorke, an Oxford man and Etonian who quietly worked in his families' engineering firm and wrote novels in his spare time.  He was essentially forgotten in his life time, a 60s era revival brought him to the attention of a new generation of fans.  Herman Hesse was another author of the 20s who benefited from one of the many 60s era revivals of semi-forgotten literary figures.

  Blindness was his first novel and it's a delicate tale about an Oxford student who loses his sight in a freak accident (young boy throws a rock through a train window while the guy is sitting there, and the glass blinds him.)  Like other enduring Novelists of the 1920s,  Green incorporates stream of consciousness narrative with more conventional omnipotent third person narrative and a kind of early 20th century understanding of human psychology to create a character portrait that is unusually delicate.

  He also uses the third person in dialogue, "One simply can't bear it, can one." As a character talks to his or herself.  It's mannered to the point of being distracting, and I can't think of a single other novel where the third person is used so frequently by characters to refer to themselves.  Blindness is also notable for being a very early novel with a disabled character as the protagonist- it's also one of the first to give any kind of non-comic depth to a romantic relationship between classes.  Green's blind young gentleman is a far cry from the rakes and bounders that exercise their predatory wiles on women from the lower classes in every other novel of the period.

Crocodiles (band) Announce Summer 2014 US Tour Dates

   Crocodiles announced their 2014 US Summer tour dates (via Brooklynvegan)

Crocodiles -- 2014 Tour Dates

Thurs 7/24 - Brooklyn, NY - Death By Audio
Sat 7/26 - Lakewood, OH - Mahall's &
Sun 7/27 - Toronto, Ont. - The Garrison &
Mon 7/28 - Detroit, MI - Lager House &
Tues 7/29 - Chicago, IL - Empty Bottle &
Wed 7/30 - Milwaukee - Cactus Club &
Fri 8/1 - Edmonton, AB - Pawnshop
Sat 8/2 - Calgary, AB - Palomino
Mon 8/4 - Vancouver, BC - Fox Cabaret
Tues 8/5 - Seattle, WA - Sunset Tavern *
Wed 8/6 - Portland - Bunk Bar *
Fri 8/8 - San Francisco, CA - The Chapel *
Sat 8/9 - Los Angeles, CA - Los Globos *
Sun 8/10 - San Diego, CA - The Casbah *
Mon 8/11 - Phoenix, AZ - Last Exit *
Wed 8/13 - Laredo, TX - Old No. 2*
Thurs 8/14 - McAllen, TX - Simon Sez *
Fri 8/15 - Austin, TX - Mohawk (Inside) *
Sat 8/16 - New Orleans, LA - Siberia *
Sun 8/17 - Birmingham, AL - Bottletree *
Tues 8/19 - Jacksonville, FL - Underbelly &
Wed 8/20 - Gainesville, FL - The Atlantic &
Thurs 8/21 - Orlando, FL - Will's Pub &
Fri 8/22 - Tampa, FL - Crowbar &
Sat 8/23 - Miami - Churchills &
Mon 8/25 - Atlanta - 529 #
Tues 8/26 - Raleigh, NC - King's #
Wed 8/27 - Richmond, VA - Strange Matter #
Thurs 8/28 - Washington, DC - Comet #
Fri 8/29 - Baltimore - Metro #
Sat 8/30 - Philadelphia, PA - Boot & Saddle #
Sun 8/31 - Brooklyn, NY - Baby's All Right #

& w/ JAILL
* w/ TWEENS
# w/ SISU

Haunted Hearts Initiation LP Bows to Positive/Mixed Review

METACRITIC HAUNTED HEARTS INITIATION LP REVIEWS
ANY DECENT MUSIC HAUNTED HEARTS INITIATION LP REVIEW

   If someone wants to review a record I've released, give it a "5" out of 10 and call it a "crowd pleaser" then by all means, go ahead.  The history of the music industry is littered with the corpses of artists who tried to change audience expectations mid career, and the list of artists who have done that successfully is small.  If you are working with an artist who already has an audience, the initial critical response is much, much less important then the initial Audience response.  Critics can be "brought around" to a commercially succesful record, but if critics like it and the Audience hates it the artist (and label) are well and truly screwed.  So yeah, I would have liked to see higher marks, but personally, I never had a high GPA, and if I did, I'd probably be working for some soulless corporation or law firm, and not running my own business and record label.

  More important to me is the place of Initiation on the Revolver/Midheaven sales chart, where it is currently number one on the "Weekly" top 50, number 6 on the monthly top 50, and 40 on the three month top 50 chart. Also, I personally sold 120+ records direct to mailing list subscribers, which is the best response I've had for a record since I was involved in the Art Fag Recordings Best Coast 7".

  Something I've learned over the past several years is that the relationship between critical acclaim and commercial success is somewhere between weak and non-existent.  Hardly an original observation, to be sure, but it's one I'm making from personal experience, not from the experience of others. 

L'Atalante (1934) d. Jean Vigo

Dita Parlo- not pictured in L'Atalante

L'Atalante (1934)
 d. Jean Vigo
In The Complete Jean Vigo: Criterion Collection #578

  I dunno I guess this Jean Vigo is like a lost genius of pre-war French Cinema, but man pre-war French Cinema is some obscure shit.   L'Atalante was the only full length feature of Vigo's brief career (untimely death while still a young filmmaker.)  Obscurity aside, it is a remarkable film in light of the fact that he made it in the 1930s.  L'Atalante remains entertaining 75 years later.

  Vigo can be seen as of the early film makers to bring a self consciously artistic style to the mechanics of film making.  Often called "poetic realism" Vigo is both poetic and realistic in advance of his contemporaries in 30's film making, French or otherwise. L'Atalante is the story of a young couple, a steam ship captain Jean, played by Jean Daste and his young wife from the countryside, Dita Parlo.

  The steam ship has a salty first mate (Michel Simon in a memorable performance) and the story evolves via the arrival of a flirty Showman who makes eyes at his wife.  They fight, she leaves, they get back together. It is low key but artfully done.

Decline and Fall (1928) by Evelyn Waugh

Without Evelyn Waugh there would be no ab fab.

Book Review
Decline and Fall (1928)
by Evelyn Waugh

  Decline and Fall is Evelyn Waugh's first novel. Waugh belongs to the "comic" strand of the novel, a strain of literature that is present in the creation of the novel itself and in a certain sense is a constituent element of the literary elements that preceded the novel proper.  Waugh draws from different comic sub-traditions- contemporary critics claimed that Waugh was simply aping Voltaire's Candide.  If you are looking for French inspiration closer in time, the characters of Guy de Maupassant in Bel Ami come immediately behind.

 At the same time, Waugh is a quintessentially English writer.  Although his books are perhaps not particularly popular in 2014, his influence in mediums like television and film is omnipresent. The whole idea of a dry, sarcastic, archness in dialogue seems to originate with Waugh himself.  Compared to other "light" authors of the teens and twenties- Edith Wharton, I'm looking at you- Waugh's satire cuts with a knife and would not be considered "gentle."

  There can be no question that Waugh is NOT for everyone.  I'm sure J.K. Rowling has read everything Waugh has ever written, but I bet none of her Harry Potter fan base have even heard of him.  When you take Waugh's influence on other light lit franchises- Bridget Jones diary would be a not so distant grand child.  Television shows like Absolutely Fabulous- these are all made possible by Waugh.

The Garden Party (short story)(1922) by Katherine Mansfield

Katherine Mansfield wore a strong blazer and had bangs.

Short Story Review
The Garden Party (short story)(1922)
 by Katherine Mansfield


  True confession: I despise the short story as an art form.  Example:  I've been reading the New Yorker since junior high and I have NEVER read a SINGLE short story in the New Yorker. EVER.  It's not a rational thing but I don't want to engage with a work of fiction that tops out at 20 pages.  If I'm going to read something 20 pages long, I'd rather have it be something challenging, not a story.  By the same token, I don't want to read a 500 page book on a challenging non-fiction subject, but I'll read a 500 page story all day.

  After reading 90% of the 1001 Books to Read Before You Die published in the 18th and 19th century I was under the impression that they didn't include short stories, because there are maybe 5 out of 250 titles.  Like...there are no Anton Chekhov short stories on the 1001 Books list.  I've never read Chekhov, but I kinda thought that was the whole point of 1001 Books.  If you are going to include short stories, why not poems?  I mean, T.S. Eliot's The Wasteland seems like it really might be one of the 1001 Books to Read Before You Die.

  Mansfield got in because I don't think she has a novel, and she scores high on the diversity meter, not because she's a woman, but because she was born in New Zealand.  That makes her the first author from Australia OR New Zealand to make the 1001 Books list.  Virginia Woolf was a fan, but The Garden Party isn't particularly cutting edge in terms of technique.  It does combine the "Garden Party" title/plot with the prospect of a care free young maiden contemplating the horror of death in explicit fashion.

  The level of acuity in terms of the depth of psychological observation and the economy (obviously) of the prose are to be admired, but still it hardly seems worth the time to read.

Mrs. Dalloway (1925)by Virigina Woolf

Virginia Woolf: Modernist icon

Book Review
Mrs. Dalloway (1925)
 by Virigina Woolf

   Fair to observe that the whole "1001 Books project" has been leading up to the great Modernist explosion of the 1920s.   To be sure, James Joyce was first out of the gate with Ulysses- fully published in 1922, but Woolf had actual hits.  She had a publishing imprint- one that published Joyce.  She had a literary circle in Bloomsbury inside London.  She killed herself in 1941.

  Woolf wasn't just a writer, she was an economic actor, a market maker, and a "rock star" in terms of the development of her public image.  All that said, I see Mrs. Dalloway as a triumph of narrative technique.  Mrs. Dalloway combines a fully developed stream of consciousness- for multiple characters- with seamless transitions to a more traditional third-person narration.  She also moves backwards and forwards in time.  The central events all take place during a single day, where Mrs. Dalloway is having a party and getting ready to have a party- buying flowers.  An old boyfriend of hers, freshly back from fucking up in India, is back in town.

  Other characters include a shell-shocked World War I soldier, Septimus Smith, married to an unhappy Italian woman, Mrs. Dalloway's younger sister and her husband.  It's hard not to compare Mrs. Dalloway to Ulysses- and I haven't even READ Ulysses.  The full development of stream-of-consciousness narration was such a seminal event in 20th century art history that it took several authors the course of decades to really understand the power and limits of this novel narrative technique.

   This is also the exact point where "high art" begins to distinguish itself from popular art by creating art with a limited or even no audience.   The successful trailblazers created works that are read today, but for contemporary readers the experimental techniques of the early modernists relegate them to the margins of public consciousness.

  It's possible that the high point for Mrs. Dalloway in terms of an Audience came only after The Hours film- based on Mrs. Dalloway, was released in 2002 and grossed more than 100 million world wide. It seems to me that no casual reader would get much out of the Mrs. Dalloway experience, whereas it essentially required reading for an undergraduate majoring in literature and maybe any undergraduate taking a survey course in 20th century literature.  After all, unlike Ulysses, Mrs. Dalloway is only 200 pages long.  You know which title is going to get read as an example of narrative technique development in the 1920s.

Summer (novel)(1917) by Edith Wharton

Movie version of Summer by Edith Wharton. Lucius Harney, you such a cad.

Book Review
Summer (novel)(1917)
by Edith Wharton

   Besides the main character taking a trip to an abortionist, there's not much in Summer to distinguish it from a novel from the late 19th century. Summer does sound out from Wharton's other novels, in that it is set in New England, among "the little people" instead of dealing with Wharton's preferred set of upper-crust New Yorkers.  Charity Royall is the 18 year old adopted daughter of a lawyer living in a small town in rural New England.  She was rescued, at birth, from a colony of white-trash types who live "up the mountain."

  When the novel begins, she is working in the library in her small town, bored and dreaming of a bigger life.  At the library she meets visiting architect Lucius Harney, in town to sketch various buildings of interest. At the same time, Royall's ward and adopted father, Lawyer Royall, clumsily announces his intention to wed her.  She rejects his (somewhat creepy and definitely  incestuous) advances, and begins a sexual affair with Harney, which ends in a) her finding out he's engaged to a different girl in town and b) her getting pregnant. It's hardly an unpredictable plot twist.

In fact, I distinctly remember clucking my tongue on the very first page of the Harney/Charity interaction.  There are just certain things you KNOW will happen in ANY novel where a young, naive, "country" girl hooks up with a sophisticated guy from the city.  She will be seduced, and she will be abandoned.  The pregnancy/abortion is a 20th century twist to be sure (even for novels written in the 20th century but set in the 19th century) but the underlying pattern remains the same.

 Charity reacts to her dilemma by visiting a folksy lady abortionist, and then retreating to her ancestral home, where she discovers that 'her people' are just as degraded and vile as everyone said they were.  Wharton is hardly going to win any 20th century points for her depiction of the impoverished, she is thoroughly bourgeois in her outlook and sympathies.

 Yet, Summer remain memorable among her work simply because, like Ethan Frome and The Bunner Sisters, of what it isn't: A novel about New York society bitches.