A personal diary keeping people abreast of what I am working on writing-wise.

Friday, June 30, 2006

MUSIC IS POWER

There is now an iMix available covering the first half of Permanent Records.

Yup, we're halfway there.

This is my first mix for iTunes. I found it to be kind of afrustrating experience. Beyond the things that weren't available, I had do spend a lot of time trying to make sure my file names matched their file names. In three cases, I actually gave up and bought songs I already owned on CD just because I got tired of trying to make them match. In a couple of cases, I chose songs by later projects of certain artists, as the band I was writing about was unavailable; in the case of the Divine Comedy, only one album was online, so I picked one that matched stylistically to A Short Album About Love. Three entries had no songs available at all. Most frustrating was the case of Love, today's selection in the series. Obviously, "Revelation" would have been the best choice, but it was listed as "Album Only." What the hell for?

More frustrating was the inability to edit once the list was posted. I discovered I had linked to the wrong blogpost. Live and learn. I hope to do these for my books in the future.

Current Soundtrack: ER: The Complete Fifth Season, DVD #3

Current Mood: annoyed

PERMANENT RECORDS: AND YES, MY HEART WAS BEATING...OR WAS IT JUST REPEATING?

Permanent Records is a year-long project. Each Friday (or thereabouts), I will post a new entry about one specific album, chosen due to its significance to myself as a fan. Though the list is numbered, a particular record's placement should not be considered a ranking. There will be 52 albums in all.

This endeavor is based on a concept started by Chris Tamarri at Crisis/Boring Change. It has since been expanded as a concept, as Neal Shaffer takes on a study of album covers over at Leftwich.

27. LOVE - DA CAPO (1967)
Personnel: Arthur Lee, vocals, harmonica, guitar; John Echols, lead guitar; Bryan Maclean, rhythm guitar; Ken Forssi, bass; Michael Stuart, drums; Alban "snoopy" Pfisterer, organ, harpsichord; Tjay Cantrelli, flute, saxophone
Producer: Paul Rothchild / Label: Elektra



From Wikipedia: Da Capo is a musical term in Italian, meaning from the beginning, often abbreviated D.C.. It is a composer or publisher's directive to repeat the previous part of music. In small pieces this might be the same thing as a repeat, but in larger works D.C. might occur after one or more repeats of small sections, indicating a return to the very beginning. Sometimes the composer describes the part to be repeated, for example: Menuet da capo. In opera the repeated piece is often adorned with grace notes.

It's an interesting choice for a title for a second album. What did Arthur Lee, the main brain behind Love--a band name so simple and so flower-power it's amazing it was available in the mid-'60s for this whacked-out Sunset Strip psych band to adopt for themselves--intend to say when he settled on it? Was he intending to tell us it was business as usual, or that he was starting everything over from scratch?

To modern ears, I'd say whatever the intention, the result is a little bit of both. Love hadn't gone so far away from their eponymous first album that they were no longer recognizable to their fans, and there was enough of a sense of growth that there were already signs that they would morph into the band who would release Forever Changes, their finest slab, later that year. The case I will make is that the things that do happen on Da Capo, these intermediary songs bridging album one and album three, are revolutions in their own right, indicative of a time when just about anything could go and often did. Da Capo is what happens when you convince artists they are libertines. Tell them they can do whatever they want, and they will likely try to meet that bet.

"Stephanie Knows Who" opens Da Capo. The first sound we hear is Snoopy Pfisterer's harpsichord tinkling serenely before an onrush of drums stampedes across the scene and Arthur Lee unleashes his gravelly howl. Amusingly, the song was written for a girl who had been dating Bryan Maclean and then switched over to Lee, and the resulting lyrics were Lee's taunt at his guitarist. Only, as the anecdote goes, Stephanie had already turned back to Maclean before the recording was finished. Given that Lee's vocal insistence on the track has about as much frustration as it does pomposity, perhaps he subconsciously knew it was not to last.

The second song immediately establishes the main dichotomy of Love. Following the raucous pounding of "Stephanie Knows Who," Maclean's "Orange Skies" is more pastoral. Its colorful references suggest it is from the softer side of psychedlia, inspired by the drugs that keep us mellow rather than the ones that inspire us to rage and party. Love was good at both sides, and their best work tosses up both with equal aplomb. "¡Que Vida!" is another example of this, a melancholy ramble that goes between the personal and the global. A verse like "I once had a girl/ She told me I was funny/ She said in your world/ You needed lots of money/ And things to kill your brother /But death just starts another" is perhaps a little portentous of the dark comedown that would end the decade of l(L)ove. Even as we lie together, we know death and violence await us from without--and perhaps is caused by what lies within. A couple of songs later, on "The Castle," Lee would dig around similar themes. The lyrics don't refer to anything like a castle, but more speak of leaving, of going to safer pastures. Leaving what is the question. Thus, the title looms over everything, this structure we must get away from. The tension of the music, between the baroque acoustic guitar and the low-end throb of electric bass lays the backdrop, playing out the central conflict.



"Seven & Seven Is" is another cracking rock tune (a minor hit, many know it now as a track in Wes Anderson's overrated Bottle Rocket). The choral yawp of "boom bip bip, boom bip bip, yeah!" should really be more iconic. Lee sings with anger and disappointment, broken promises and unfulfilled dreams, while the band stands behind him like a threat.

"She Comes In Colors" rounds things off, a classical romantic spirit evident in the mingling of organ and flute with a regular rock beat. It's a sweet song, tinged with love and regret. It is said to be where Mick and Keith nicked "She Talks to Rainbows" from. In fact, the Rolling Stones are alleged to owe a huge debt to Da Capo. A regular at Love's now infamous live shows, the Glimmer Twins were scribbling down notes in hopes of beating Lee and his cohorts to the punch--something they would manage by slipping out "Going Home" on their Aftermath album before 1966 was through.

"Going Home" was cribbed from what would be Da Capo's most audacious moment. It began life as "John Lee Hooker," a live jam that would sometimes go on for two hours, musicians coming and going from the stage, and something that would prove a bit tricky to reproduce in a studio. It ended up being the entire second side of the Da Capo vinyl, retitled "Revelation." By all accounts, it is nowhere near the glory of what it started out as, with producer Paul Rothchild regularly blamed for restructuring its bits and pieces to create the final product. Even so, with "John Lee Hooker" lost to the ages, it's worth examining this piece of musical hubris for what it is, not for what it might have been in other people's memories. Like I said, this is a product of anything goes, and in some ways, "Revelation," clocking in at just under nineteen minutes, turned it into everything went. Even the title tells us to expect something. Whatever it is, it will be revealed. (Make it plural, and it becomes a reference to the end of everything. Biblical.)

Remember how Da Capo opened with the harpsichord on "Stephanie Knows Who"? So does "Revelation" begin. Again, it's a clash of the classic and the modern. Snoopy's noodling is reminiscent of the renaissance, but it is soon met by a blues guitar (early 20th century) and a skiffle beat (later 20th century). That's three ages of music in under a minute. At 1:25, the proceedings go into top gear, the pace speeding. The guitar gives itself over to chaos and random sounds, relentless picking as bells ring.

A minute later, we hear our first voice. (According to the liner notes, it's Echols, not Lee, doing the singing here; it's also the only song on the record with writing credits for all the band members.) The lyrics turn out to be one big come on: "So good...Get it on, Baby." Echols takes control as soon as he opens his pipes, dictating the pace of the sexual rhythm of the backing track. When he coos, the music does, too; when he escalates, the band escalates.

Lee joins on harmonica as we pass three minutes, moaning and thrusting through the appropriately nicknamed "mouth organ." At this point, the guitars take several steps back, maintaining a point position as an anchor wrapped up in blue, returning as a new, chiming instrument ninety seconds later. (Yes, I am mapping out the changes as "Revelation" plays; pen and paper in hand, stereo on.) This becomes the status quo until we reach the lucky 7th minute, when everything drops down, almost disappearing. Echols returns to the microphone, intoning "Everybody" over and over. "I said they need somebody to love, to love, to love...ALL THE TIME!" Is it an insistence? A lament? A pleading? From whispers to howls, "All the time I feel ALL RIGHT." Can we believe him?

Once again, Echols' voice eases the song back into sexual enticement, the up and down of his words mimicking the obvious connotation of my phrasing. In that sense, a climax is nearly reached at 8:50, as he bellows, "I wanna scream!," his vocal chords sounding as if they are rubbed raw--but before he does, he holds. It's only a momentary burst, he's got more to go. Delay brings pleasure. "I feel so good."

Ten minutes have passed and we're over halfway there. It's marked by an explosive, "YEAHHHHHH!" The music rises again, the tempo quickening, and it continues to rise and fall with more and more velocity, the lyrics and the instruments both starting to speak in gibberish. Minute eleven sneaks in a little French horn before the harmonica insists itself a second time, played high at first and then low, something akin to a cow braying. The horn holds back until around 13:00, bringing a buddy and striking out with a jazzy riff, dueling wind instruments twisting the melody of a snake charmer. Close your eyes and imagine this live at the Whisky A Go Go; see the rolling bodies, the sensual dance being acted out. It's all movement now, all physicality. There are no words.



Around here, I started to wonder who had done this first, Love or the Doors? A quick look makes it appear that "The End" emerged sometime in '66, as well, as it was August of that year that Morrison got his band fired from the Whisky for getting too dirty in a performance of that song--and it's no coincidence that it was Arthur Lee who had just gotten the Doors signed to Elektra. The reason I asked was because at 16:00, when the music of "Revelation" dipped back down, the bass taking over, the guitar reduced to a distant ring, I started to imagine Martin Sheen dancing to this in Apocalypse Now. Only this time his Vietnamese hooker is still in the room. Maybe Coppola and Bertolucci could have teamed up, made "Revelation" the soundtrack to mash-up of Apocalypse Now and Last Tango In Paris.

The rest of the instruments eventually halt, giving it all over to the drums. Michael Stuart doesn't attack his skins violently, yet he does play with a celebratory urgency. Where earlier Echols' guitar had succumbed to chaos, here Stuart captures that chaos and tames the unpredictable. And he does it for two solid minutes! He ends it all with the cymbals crashing at 18:17 before letting Snoopy come back on the harpsichord, and we have our true sense of Da Capo, right back to not just the beginning of the song, but the beginning of the entire record. Full circle. It's not a triumph of classicism, but a melding of everything. It's all the same: classical, blues, jazz, rock. It's the whole of music in nineteen minutes, it's copulation and emotion and dancing and man's frustration. You name it, it's in there.

"Revelation" is the revolution of Da Capo. It reaffirms Love's mission while tearing it down to start on a new patch of ground. Forever Changes would be next, but that title could have just as easily been applied to "Revelation," with its dense plot that took a twist at every corner. Just when you think you have a handle on it, it becomes something else.

It's hard to imagine any band getting away with this today. To sneak it by the critics, you'd already have to be considered off your head, such as when the Dandy Warhols did their "Fast Driving Rave-Up" on their first album, or Spiritualized's empiric "Cop Shoot Cop." But those bands were off the beaten path, they weren't necessarily making a major-label bid for mainstream success. Could you imagine Fall Out Boy returning with a new album that closes with a twenty minute track about sex and music? There's no ringtone to be had here.

Then again, that's also probably why Arthur Lee and Love pull it off. There is no precedent, no forethought. Nowhere do they accept even the possibility of failure. Da Capo as the life cycle of music, the band, the person: birth, death, birth.



#52 #51 #50 #49 #48 #47 #46 #45 #44 #43 #42 #41 #40 #39 #38 #37 #36 #35 #34 #33 #32 #31 #30 #29 #28



Reminder: As always, this post is full of links to Amazon. Click on any one of them when shopping, and Amazon will shave a few pennies off their take to give to me. So, if my reviews make you all hot and bothered and you just have to own one of the things I'm talking about, use my link and contribute to buying me more stuff to review. (Those reading a Live Journal feed will likely have to click to the actual blog page first before heading over to Amazon, though.) Either way, thanks for reading.

Current Soundtrack: classic rock radio

Current Mood: indescribable

golightly@confessions123.com * The Website * Live Journal Syndication * My Corporate-Owned Space * The Blog Roll * "Can You Picture That?" * DVDTalk reviews * My Books On Amazon

[to leave comments, click on the time-stamp below, then scroll down on the new page] – All text (c) 2006 Jamie S. Rich

Thursday, June 29, 2006

THE CRITICS WHO CAN'T BREAK YOU, SOMEHOW THEY MAKE YOU

[NOTE: If you came here via iTunes, the wrong link got published: Permanent Records starts here.]

* * *

Some more reviews of Love the Way You Love vol. 1:

* Marc Mason at the Comics Waiting Room: "Rich has long been comics’ hippest and slyest cat, with a knowledge of music matched by few. His novel work, like CUT MY HAIR, demonstrates his mastery of this sort of tale, so you’d expect no less than a comic that not only has a twinge of real heart to it, but also makes you feel like the coolest kid in the room for reading it." (more here)

* Greg McElhatton at iComics: "[Ellerby's] figures are lively and animated, and he's able to bring out the human, emotional side of Rich's script. I also have a good deal of appreciation for Ellerby having actual fashions and different outfits throughout Love The Way You Love. It's nice to read a comic where you get the impression that the artist knows what people are wearing and gives a nice visual variety to the characters." (more here)

* Vroom Socko at AICN: "I’m seriously ambivalent about this particular book...[but] the final page does have an interesting hook to it, and the second half has a lot more verve to it than the first." (more here)

Vroom is local, so I may sneak up on him in public and give him a real pinch.

If you've read it and want to give feedback, leave your thoughts here, drop me an e-mail, or come by our thread at the Oni message board.

Currently Reading: Lady Snowblood vol. 3 by Kazuo Koike & Kazuo Kamimura

Current Soundtrack: Girls Aloud, "Whole Lotta History;" My Latest Novel, "The Reputation of Ross Francis;" The Pipettes, "Pull Shapes;" Belle & Sebastian, "The Blues Are Still Blue;" Muse, "Supermassive Black Hole"

Current Mood: grateful

golightly@confessions123.com * The Website * Live Journal Syndication * My Corporate-Owned Space * The Blog Roll * "Can You Picture That?" * DVDTalk reviews * My Books On Amazon

[to leave comments, click on the time-stamp below, then scroll down on the new page] – All text (c) 2006 Jamie S. Rich

Wednesday, June 28, 2006

THE HARDEST BUTTON TO BUTTON

Sent to the badge makers today, three buttons for San Diego:


Love the Way You Love by Marc Ellerby


The Everlasting designed by Steven Birch


12 Reasons Why I Love Her art by Joëlle Jones, color/design by Steven Birch

My love, she comes in colors...

Current Soundtrack: Love, Da Capo

Current Mood: predatory

golightly@confessions123.com * The Website * Live Journal Syndication * My Corporate-Owned Space * The Blog Roll * "Can You Picture That?" * DVDTalk reviews * My Books On Amazon

[to leave comments, click on the time-stamp below, then scroll down on the new page] – All text (c) 2006 Jamie S. Rich

WHAT YOU WAITING FOR?*

It's here.



And there's a very nice review of it out there, too, courtesy of Mark Fossen at Focused Totality. "Jamie S. Rich hits all the marks, and starts to develop some interesting characters in this first volume...Marc Ellerby's art is wonderful, almost a streamlined Matt Groening, and he is able to swing back and forth from comedy to romance on a dime...I'd especially recommend this to fans of Nana, who might be looking for something else working that delicate balance of music and romance and comedy." (Complete blurb in link.)

Need to buy it online? It should be listed here shortly.

Marc is pretty much done with vol. 2, vol. 3 is written, and I have the beginning of the script for vol. 4.

In other comics news, Joëlle Jones is inking her heart out on 12 Reasons Why I Love Her. I should have a good chunk of it to show off at SDCC. We are looking at an August completion date and an October pub date. It will definitely be available for Stumptown, but we're thinking of trying to have it for SPX, as well, in which case I would be attending. The book is going to be gorgeous, and the cover should knock your socks off. Last I heard, Lee Loughridge (Human Target immediately springs to mind as one of the awesome books his name graces) will be coloring it.

Yesterday I read through where I am at on Have You Seen the Horizon Lately? and it was one of those pleasant, "Who wrote this? Because he's good" experiences. It's amazing how much I forget, and how the stories sneak up on me when reviewing them. It doesn't feel like it's me, but more like I am merely the bodily host of some strange presence that sleeps all fetal-like in my dome. Only did a little bit of new writing on it last night, but it's going to be the focus for the next couple of months.

* The awesome Gwen Stefani song has re-emerged in the form of an awesome Franz Ferdinand cover.

Currently Reading: Summer Crossing, by Truman Capote

Current Soundtrack: Andy Bell, "I'll Never Fall In Love Again" EP; Nouvelle Vague, Bande a Part (they should record "That Joke Isn't Funny Anymore" because it would be ironic in more than just an archly cool way)


Current Mood: ready

golightly@confessions123.com * The Website * Live Journal Syndication * My Corporate-Owned Space * The Blog Roll * "Can You Picture That?" * DVDTalk reviews * My Books On Amazon

[to leave comments, click on the time-stamp below, then scroll down on the new page] – All text (c) 2006 Jamie S. Rich

Monday, June 26, 2006

WHEN ROMANCE IS DEAD

Look out, world. I'm back on the case.

Last night I managed to produce 2,300 words of Have You Seen the Horizon Lately? despite an unbearable heat and the laptop attempting to turn the underside of my arms a golden brown.

Additionally, over Saturday and Sunday, I completed the first draft to the English script for Chocolat vol. 4. The curious can read a preview of 1 here.

And, of course, you're all going to the comic book shop on Wednesday, yes?



Current Soundtrack: The Beautiful South, Superbi

Current Mood: hot

golightly@confessions123.com * The Website * Live Journal Syndication * My Corporate-Owned Space * The Blog Roll * "Can You Picture That?" * DVDTalk reviews * My Books On Amazon

[to leave comments, click on the time-stamp below, then scroll down on the new page] – All text (c) 2006 Jamie S. Rich

Friday, June 23, 2006

ALL LOVERS MAKE THE SAME MISTAKES

Yesterday was a spontaneous road trip. Good buddy Sarah Grace McCandless is on tour to promote this:



It's her second novel, and it's hella good, to use the phrase of a couple of years ago. For fans of her first book, Grosse Pointe Girl, I think you'll be impressed by how much stronger her prose has become. The book is the story of a fourteen-year-old girl in the early '90s whose world is starting to crumble with the onset of maturity. Sarah really captures that seasick time, where you aren't really sure how to keep your feet flat on this thing we call Earth, as childish things and adult disappointment play tug-of-war with your changing body. Her writing is evocative while also using great economy. In chronicling a family who discuss their problems by talking around them, she developed a style of expression that inspires the reader to come to his or her own conclusions by how carefully the root of those problems are withheld. To classify The Girl I Wanted to Be as some kind of simple young adult novel would be to do it a disservice. It's a far more mature work than that, shedding light on foibles and personal treacheries that have no age restrictions.

Anyway, we left at 5:00 am and drove up for her first appointment, a radio interview (haven't these people ever heard of a phone?!). We were met by her in-town escort, Tracey, and we had a day of traveling to bookstores so she could sign their stock, as well as encountering lots and lots of traffic. At the University Bookstore they had a section called "Arty Comics," which I found funny. They had a copy of I Was Someone Dead, so I gave them my scrawl, too.

The capper was her reading at Third Place Books, which was sparse but still seemed to go pretty well. I even talked to their event coordinator about maybe doing a reading there this summer.

We got home around 12:30 am or so. Sadie was pretty heavily irritated with me.

Tonight is Sarah Grace's reading at Powell's. It starts at 7:30, so if you're in the Portland area, come on down. And for any New York readers, check her event page for info on her reading next Wednesday.

*

Also, any Mike Allred fans? Check this post from his message board for information on the limited edition Golden Plates hardcover. Tell Mike you heard about it here when you order. He'll get a kick out of that.

Current Soundtrack: Q: Best Of 86/06 compilation of new bands covering old songs

Current Mood: exanimate

golightly@confessions123.com * The Website * Live Journal Syndication * My Corporate-Owned Space * The Blog Roll * "Can You Picture That?" * DVDTalk reviews * My Books On Amazon

[to leave comments, click on the time-stamp below, then scroll down on the new page] – All text (c) 2006 Jamie S. Rich

PERMANENT RECORDS: YOUR ENDLESS PLACES SO ENDLESSLY OBSCENE

Permanent Records is a year-long project. Each Friday (or thereabouts), I will post a new entry about one specific album, chosen due to its significance to myself as a fan. Though the list is numbered, a particular record's placement should not be considered a ranking. There will be 52 albums in all.

This endeavor is based on a concept started by Chris Tamarri at Crisis/Boring Change. It has since been expanded as a concept, as Neal Shaffer takes on a study of album covers over at Leftwich.

28. SUEDE - SINGLES (2003)
Personnel: Brett Anderson, vocals; Bernard Butler, guitars; Mat Osman, bass; Simon Gilbert, drums; Richard Oakes, guitars; Neil Codling, keyboards; Alex Lee, guitars
Producer: Ed Buller, plus Stephen Street, Steve Osborne, Tore Johansson, Jim Abbiss, John Leckie/ Label: Nude



This is the second and probably last appearance of a compilation on this list. I prefer to stick mainly with album albums, but have made exceptions first for the Until the End of the World soundtrack as a way to look at the bringing together of like-minded music for a common goal, and now for this, the greatest hits of Suede, to discuss the prospect of listening to the best songs of a particular band in one go.

There is also a second motive to this choice. It's the only place you can get "Love the Way You Love," the single that never was, and the title inspiration for my comic book series Love the Way You Love. The first issue of that series is on sale this coming Wednesday. I market in my sleep.

Interestingly, Suede did not call this album Greatest Hits, they called it Singles. The G.H. tag suggests the band can pick and choose; if single 5 off of album 3 didn't crack the top 40, no need to include it. There is also the option of calling this kind of career retrospective Best. This allows further cultivation, and that album cut that the label wouldn't let you release as a 7" is now resurrected and dubbed one of your top tunes.

Making your mandate be that you will put on all of your singles, all 21 regardless of reception or chart position or how the band may feel about it (yes, even "Stay Together" made the cut), is pretty gutsy, because in general, most bands fall off at some point. Most of them need that edit option. Discs of this kind that are blisteringly good from start to finish are rare. The Jesus and Mary Chain pulled it off (also at the fine drinking age of 21), so did the Smiths (at 18, they can't drink, but they can go to war and they can vote).

And now, Suede.

Extra points to them, too, because they included two new tracks, usually the unsightly blight on any overview. Not only did the two new tracks act as a signal to a revitalized passion in Suede's career (albeit a passion that was never to be consummated), but by shuffling up the tracks and running them out of order, they pulled the biggest magic trick of all: if you don't know the group's history, your ears would never spot them.

Let's dig through this track by track:



1. "Beautiful Ones": There was no better choice for the lead song on Singles. Suede was a band who loved its anthems, and all of theirs celebrated the dispossessed. "Beautiful Ones" was the quintessential example, a laundry list of misfits and crazies, "shaved heads, rave heads, on the pill, got too much time to kill, get into bands and gangs." Singer and lyricist Brett Anderson announces, "Here they come," and he ushers in the parade. The fact that the paraders march over a ridiculously glam guitar riff and a monster of a drum beat, and that the chorus drifts on synthesized strings and tambourine, like that moment in a movie where time slows down and you see just how much debauchery is going on--well, that's just a bonus. An absolutely irresistible song.

2. "Animal Nitrate": Though "Beautiful Ones" is about the group experience, the collective of Suede fans, most of their songs are about the individuals, the obsessions. Notably, this is the first Suede single I ever heard. It sets a certain standard. Their 45s seem so often to be about proclaiming something. If "Beautiful Ones" is a later regrouping, a rally cry for the stragglers, then "Animal Nitrate" is the early challenge. "What does it take to turn you on?" Brett demands, as if he's promising to meet it. Let Suede know what it's going to require to get you out of your seat, and they'll play it. Bernard Butler backs it up with one of those famous licks of his, the kind that when he plays it live he has to keep lurching forward as he strikes his strings, and if you're in the front row, you could lose an eye. The whole slab is positively smutty, with Brett's crypto lyrics and its references to drugs, incest, bestiality, and possibly nothing like that at all. Another tambourine in the chorus, too. Two tracks in, and we have trends!

3. "Trash": The yin to the "Beautiful Ones" yang, this was single one off of Coming Up, the day-glo victory of those left holding the bag after Butler's departure, and "Beautiful Ones" was single two. Again, this one is about the personal. As if our loving couple broke away from the party to be together, two outcasts in love. The melody undulates like the "litter on the breeze" Brett sings about, creating a feeling that is ironically airless. Each cymbal smash Simon Gilbert perpetrates sounds like jumping in a puddle with both of your big black boots on, and Richard Oakes proves in the bridge that he can noodle with the best of Butler. I honestly can't find a sense memory of feeling more alive than when I hear this song. It continually replenishes itself, I can replace the things that make me smile from listen to listen, think of the "you" in "you and me" as whoever my crush is at the moment. (Hello, are you out there?) It's also part of a grand tradition of lead singles, the one the boys would chase on every album to follow.

4. "Metal Mickey": The big second single, the one that would prove if they had it in them, if "The Drowners" was a fluke. It's so audacious, even more than a decade on, with Brett in full falsetto and cockney. Gilbert keeps a constant time, and Butler is savage. The lead up is all bang bang bang, but then the bridge comes, and it's like his instrument submits, letting him have his way with it, and then there is the "oh face" that comes with that pause. Kee-rist, there is nothing like a rock-'n'-roll pause. I want one to appear at all the best moments of my life. It's getting good, it's getting good, all right stop--there it is! "She sells heart...!"



5. "So Young": So many tangents come to my mind for this song (fourth single, last off the first album, but track 1 on that album). First, the opening shouts, "She can...start...to walk out...if she wants!"--later the refrain of album track "By the Sea." I had a poster with the cover of this single, one of those big UK subway posters. It was the first thing I purchased when I moved to Portland, the first thing on my wall in my first apartment. It's now on Lance's wall in The Everlasting. If I still have it, I wish I knew where it was; I'd hang it back up. Anyway...the song. This is so much better than the fourth single off any album deserves to be. It's a screamer--as in you scream along with it. Forget the heroin-flecked imagery, this is the feeling of being at the cusp of life, standing on the rooftops, and shouting at the sky about all the things you know you're capable of.

6. "The Wild Ones": Oh, God. How can I not get weepy over "The Wild Ones"? Many a Suede romance was made over this song. Lyrically it's about being in love in a broken world, and how music soothes us and brings us together. There is talk of poverty and dead-end jobs, and can we just last as long as this record plays? As a boy, I want to sing this to every girl, to let them know what I am capable of. "And oh, if you stay/ Well, I'll chase the rainblown fields away." It aches of the tragic, you just feel she's not sticking around. Thus the closing chant, over and over, "oh, if you stay." This song is in eight million different places in The Everlasting (and, yes, Marc, I know this is meant to be about Love the Way You Love). The music swells with the heartbreak, from acoustic guitar all soft and warm, to electric riffs that are melancholy and confused, and then strings as large as those rainblown fields.

7. "Obsessions": The last single off an album proper, one of Brett's catalogues of all that is wrong with a lover and why that is exciting (see also: The Tears, "Imperfection"). The chorus is not the most original of sentiments, "I'm obsessed blah blah I know it's dumb blah blah," but it's the other bits, the lines about the faults of this lover. Is there another band who could deliver "It's the way you don't read Camus or Bret Easton Ellis"? I mean, come on! Big points on the harmonica solo, too. A good harmonica line can't be trifled with.

8. "Filmstar": Freaking single five off of Coming Up, and it's so stompy, so mega, the guitar like a thresher, the filtered vocals, the tambourine. The lyrics repeat like a mantra of sin, and we nearly pass out when the chorus hits, all swirls and Neil Codling hitting, like, a million keys at once.

[Pause: Have you noticed how I have yet to mention a bass line? I don't hear bass lines, for the most part. I don't know why. It's something to do with me. I apologize, Mr. Osman. I know most of the time when Bernard Butler or Richard Oakes are running up and down the neck of their guitar, your fingers are sliding over those fat bass strings and you're actually propping them up. I'm just shallow and I notice those flashy bits. I see the cleavage and not the nice material of the shirt.]

9. "Can't Get Enough": Fitting name, because if "Filmstar" is me getting drunk like a fool, this single is my evil friend who keeps buying me more. Famously, for the sessions of Head Music, Brett Anderson was out of his mind on substances, and this glam racket has that sensation all over it. "I feel real now/ Talking like sugar/ And shaking that stuff." There's a wild Neil Codling sound underneath the verses here, like he's popping bubbles with a hammer. Then there are the shout-along background echoes, the woo-ooohs, the handclaps, the bridge where Oakes dances over the guitar and then back, AH-ONE TWO!, and Gilbert must be shattering sticks all over the place. But the real star of "Can't Get Enough" is that cool little guitar twist Oakes pulls every third line or so, like he's just tweaked it just enough to make sure it's alive. That's what I can't get enough of.

10. "Everything Will Flow": A break in proceedings. Those last two tracks, you've just come off the roughest night in your life, and you need a little spirituality, boy. This is one of my favorite Suede songs, and it's a little underrated in the canon. It has one of Brett's smoothest vocal melodies, a perfect vehicle for the very simple lyrics. For all of his fancypants neo-urban imagery, Brett settles down here to appreciate the ease of life. One thing flows to the next, it'll all come out in the wash--that's the sentiment. Take a pause, step back, "see the pretty people play/ hurrying under the light." There is a wonderful string section on here, the bows gliding over the instruments like water to emphasize that sense of flow. It's a cheer-yourself-up kind of single. Put this on, let it play, hug yourself, and just drift.



11. "Stay Together": It's a shame, actually, that the full version of this isn't here. What was it, eight or nine minutes? This song is infused with paranoia and insanity, and is the sound of a band that has been told they can do anything and are going to prove it. Released during the first and second albums, this was a stand-alone. Released on Valentine's Day, "Stay Together" was a love affair to the music world. Though in a lot of respects it sounds like the band is going mad, I remember it coming out and playing it in my car at full blasts and being astounded. All those layers, those sounds, the bizarre images, and then the horns--the Kick Horns, what a great name--blasting through the murk clear as sunlight. Sadly, not on this edit, but then, maybe hearing the truncated version is good, as it rescues "Stay Together" from the dustbin. Suede would rubbish it later, but broken down to the length of an average single, you can hear that this really was a contender. The frayed edges are missing, only showing in the fade when it sounds like Butler is trying to wrench the strings from his guitar. So ironically titled, too, given what was to come. But out of context, no history, other bands dream of this being their top song, not the one they can later dismiss.

12. "Love the Way You Love": Ah, here it is. How horrible that this never got to be a single. It was to be the second release off the comp, but then Suede split and called it a day. Oakes plays the guitar here like one of those perpetual wave machines for executive desks, first one way, then the next. Brett's lyrics travel in circles, too: an ode to obsession, unrequited love, being stuck in your apartment and wondering where that person is that you ache for so much. "I watch the sky and I watch the rain/ I count the drops dripping down the drain/ Takes 30 seconds to talk about my day." It's the kind of intensity I wanted for the comic, the feeling of being in love with the process of love itself, a romance with romance.

13. "The Drowners": Where it all ended is here followed by where it all began. "Do you believe in love there?" the band inquires, and we can only respond in the affirmative. "Slow down, you're taking me over." For a lot of us, they were taking over, and listening now and thinking back, how different was this to everything else going on in 1992? It's weird and serpentine. Kurt Cobain and Krist Novoselic kissed onstage to wind people up, but it never felt dangerous. They could probably still sit at the bar and have a beer with the frat dudes who bought their records, but those same guys would hear "The Drowners" and see Brett in his blouse tied up to show his bellybutton, and they'd not be sure if this skinny boy was one of the girls. Talking about love "wrote right down my spine" and "we kiss in his room to a popular tune" (music and love intertwined yet again) and it was like, "You know, I would." And I still just might.

14. "New Generation": Brett at his most spacey, with astral planes and psychic messages. Yet, there is some amazing production here. Butler gives us a couple of plucks before giving it over to the horn section for a pumping pre-chorus, and Simon Gilbert as always steadily pushing it all along. Plus, what an outro, Bernard Butler finally letting loose and having a go, and then a little whistling, all alone in an echo chamber. The way it all comes together, it all starts to make sense, this talk of transcendence and losing myself. Transcendence!

15. "Lazy": The prototype of a summer single. Just bright and fun and about being bright and fun.



16. "She's in Fashion": I remember the pre-release on this was that it was tipped to be the ultimate Suede song, with a title that had been just waiting for them to pick it out of the ether. Another list song, the attributes of a lovely object Brett admires. The song rolls on a chilled Codling synthesizer, but I'd be remiss if I didn't notice the funky wah-wah bass Mat Osman rolls out. (At last!) There's something elegant about the whole thing overall. In fact, this brings to the fore something that keeps creeping up. It's there in "Everything Will Flow," "So Young," and "Can't Get Enough," the breezy elements of "Trash": Suede's best singles match the sound of the instrumentation to the theme of the lyrics, creating an onomatopoeic backing track for whatever Brett Anderson is getting on about. So, elegant music for a song about an elegant lady.

17. "Attitude": What turned out to be the last single, the second new song on Singles, "Attitude" is a reassertion in the way the query of "Animal Nitrate" was an early come-on. This song does it again, it brims with attitude. It's funky, with drums like tap-dancing elephants. There's the falsetto, the counting off, the pauses. After the softness of A New Morning, the band was planting its flag once more. There was life in them yet. It's a shame they didn't pursue it.

18-20. "Electricity/We Are The Pigs/Positivity": Interesting sequencing here, a run of three lead singles (from albums 4, 2, & 5). "Electricity" and "Positivity" are part of that lineage that would run from "Trash" and on into "Refugees" by the Tears, these anthems of lovers alone against the world, and really, "We Are The Pigs" introduces that, only in a much darker way. It's one of the angriest Suede songs, the comeback after "Stay Together" and the entry into their real sophomore effort (and the only song mentioned in this paragraph that was not the first track on its record). It's a menacing song, full of images of a world gone wrong, of suicide and pillaging and executions. There's a paranoia that this could be the end, and yet it's also a shoring up of the resources. We are the pigs, and we're in it together. It fits a little askew between the other two, but that was probably intended. "Electricity" heralds the studio wizardry of "Head Music," and it gives off sparks, another glittery current of skuzzy romance; "Positivity" is the sunshine of A New Morning, a smile at the end of the long dark night. It's actually quite brazen in how UP it is. "Yes, the air is free/ and yes, the world spins for you" is a lot different from "We are the stars of the firing line." Yet it's all of one piece: the power to fight, the strength to win, and the enjoyment of victory.

21. "Saturday Night": Points off for closing with this, only because it was already an album closer in its initial run (it's the last song off of Coming Up, of which it was the third single). What to put here instead? Hmmm...maybe "Stay Together," just to shock the doubting fans. Or how about "So Young," to take it all back to the front, cue up your copy of the self-titled debut? Then again, I guess why mess with perfection. This is a great song to ring everything out on. (And it's no near as bad a cheat as Blur uncreatively opening their Best of with the first two tracks of their most popular album; they also jettisoned five of their up-to-that-point 22 singles.) "Saturday Night" is a perfect slow dance of a song, full of longing and love as warm as that felt on "Positivity." A bit like Depeche Mode's "Black Celebration," actually, and even Suede's own "The Wild Ones," in its desire to take the one you care about out of the doldrums of her day. I've actually listened to this on more actual Saturday nights then I could even try to recall, as my final inhale of good feeling before stepping out for my own night on the town. (My own, yes...sadly alone. Boo-hoo for me. Are you out there?)



And there you have it. I listened to all of Singles again, writing my reaction in real time as each song played. I could listen to this disc over and over. In fact, the true testament to how good of a collection Suede have is that I have left it in its entirety on my iPod, even though I have three of the regular albums on there as well. For other bands, I edit their hits comps to take out songs I have in album context on the iPod drive. Not so for this. I want to be able to cue it up whenever I want and run through all 21.

To tie this all back into the comic book at hand, I hope Love the Way You Love can ultimately have this many greatest hits, can last long enough to cover as many moods, and that plot and dialogue sync up with art to bring the emotion to bear so that they are of one mind: the music goes with the lyrics goes to our hearts and our feet so we can feel and dance. Borrowing the title from Suede is a lot to live up to. If I can even touch the dangling thread at the hem of the band's garment, I'll consider myself lucky.



NOTABLE B-SIDE: The "Attitude" single had three formats, each with two songs, a mixture of new tracks and old material that had been in the vault. When they came out, I wrote on this blog about my love for the song "Heroin," an outtake from the Head Music sessions that was a little too raw even for that bleak record. I considered writing about the futuristic Bond theme that is "Golden Gun" or the cosmic lovesong "Oxygen," but I can't escape the pain of "Heroin." It's so nakedly honest, the sound of a man out of touch with even himself. He knows his heart is breaking, and yet he can't feel it, can't put his hand over it and hold it together. The music is distant and plaintive; as Brett Anderson wrote elsewhere, it's like a song playing through another wall. It comforts as it devastates.

(You can also read an older review of Singles here. Pardon that a lot of my old pictures were wickedly hot-linked and are now rightfully gone.)

#52 #51 #50 #49 #48 #47 #46 #45 #44 #43 #42 #41 #40 #39 #38 #37 #36 #35 #34 #33 #32 #31 #30 #29



Reminder: As always, this post is full of links to Amazon. Click on any one of them when shopping, and Amazon will shave a few pennies off their take to give to me. So, if my reviews make you all hot and bothered and you just have to own one of the things I'm talking about, use my link and contribute to buying me more stuff to review. (Those reading a Live Journal feed will likely have to click to the actual blog page first before heading over to Amazon, though.) Either way, thanks for reading.

Current Soundtrack: Sugababes, Taller In More Ways; Richard Hawley, Coles Corner

Current Mood: exhausted

golightly@confessions123.com * The Website * Live Journal Syndication * My Corporate-Owned Space * The Blog Roll * "Can You Picture That?" * DVDTalk reviews * My Books On Amazon

[to leave comments, click on the time-stamp below, then scroll down on the new page] – All text (c) 2006 Jamie S. Rich

Tuesday, June 20, 2006

FALLING IN LOVE WITH MYSELF AGAIN



New DVDTalk Reviews:
* Jasmine Women, starring Ziyi Zhang & Joan Chen
* Kuchu Teien (Hanging Garden), directed by Toshiaki Toyoda (Blue Spring)

* * *

Oni now has an Everlasting page on their site. Click through and see it.

Speaking of Oni, today I went to their offices to use their photocopier and long-arm stapler to make my preview ashcans for 12 Reasons Why I Love Her. I am going to give them out at San Diego. It's a four-page preview, the whole of chapter 4. It came out really well.

They also had a surprise waiting for me: the first sample of a printed issue of Love the Way You Love! It was fresh out of the box. The printer sends copies in advance so that it can be checked over before it ships out to stores. The comic printed beautifully. I am so excited to see it in on the stands next week.

I also got my first piece of fan art ever for one of my books. My friend Terry Green, who previously did this awesome Audrey, did a quick sketch of Tristan for fun. Check it out:



In other firsts, Love the Way... got its first review last week. I post it in interest of offering all sides, because it's sadly mediocre. It's by Chris Allen, and you can read it here. I accept some of the criticism as a fair reaction, but in total, I think he's a bit off the mark in how much time he spends comparing us to Scott Pilgrim. I love Scott Pilgrim, but it's not really what Marc and I were trying to emulate. We may share some genre similarities, but it's like comparing The Matrix to Serenity because they are both sci-fi movies and complaining the former doesn't spend enough time on other planets.

But this is the risk, right? I know you're all going to love it, anyway.

Current Soundtrack: Sparks, Kimono My House

Current Mood: happy

golightly@confessions123.com * The Website * Live Journal Syndication * My Corporate-Owned Space * The Blog Roll * "Can You Picture That?" * DVDTalk reviews * My Books On Amazon

[to leave comments, click on the time-stamp below, then scroll down on the new page] – All text (c) 2006 Jamie S. Rich

Sunday, June 18, 2006

PERMANENT RECORDS: ALMOST ALWAYS TRUE

Permanent Records is a year-long project. Each Friday (or thereabouts), I will post a new entry about one specific album, chosen due to its significance to myself as a fan. Though the list is numbered, a particular record's placement should not be considered a ranking. There will be 52 albums in all.

This endeavor is based on a concept started by Chris Tamarri at Crisis/Boring Change. It has since been expanded as a concept, as Neal Shaffer takes on a study of album covers over at Leftwich.

29. ELVIS PRESLEY - BLUE HAWAII MOTION PICTURE SOUNDTRACK (1961)
Personnell: Elvis Presley, with the Jordanaires & the Surfers (backing vocals); Hank Garland & Tiny Timbrell (guitars); Bernie Lewis (steel guitar); Bob Moore (bass); Floyd Cramer & Dudley Brooks (piano); D.J. Fontana, Bernie Mattinson, & Hal Blaine (drums); Boots Randolph (sax); George Field (harmonica); Fred Tavares & Alvino Rey (ukulele)
Label: RCA



Surprisingly enough, we never listened to music in my house when I was growing up.

Part of the problem was that my mother had a puritanical hold on how we spent our time. A lot of popular entertainment was strictly forbidden. For instance, we never went to movies until I got old enough to be aware that other kids were experiencing things I was not and made myself a nuisance until my parents relented. When it came to records, she would play Jimmy Swaggart albums daily. His stuff was almost entirely what we owned. The only anomalies were one LP by the Four Seasons, and four by Elvis Presley.

This made listening to music a little subversive to me. It was also something that became associated with my father. He listened to the country and western station in the car. Somehow, that was his domain, and he got to break the rules in there. Interestingly enough, he also used to sneak me off to the college to watch movies. This was before I was even in school, so I guess times he was assigned to entertain me in the day. I have very vague memories of seeing some kung-fu flicks, as well as Animal House. We would sit in the very front row, which seems like a conspicuous position for the local pastor catching a matinee on the sly.

I remember driving in the car and imagining that the music we were hearing was being played right at that moment. I often had these visions that we would turn a corner and there would be the Statler Brothers harmonizing on somebody's lawn. Since records weren't commonplace in the Rich home, I guess it makes sense that I wasn't entirely clear on the concept of pre-recorded broadcasts. Funnily enough, in these fantasies, the performers were usually animated puppets in the style of the old Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer cartoon.

It's hard to say what music then became associated with for me. Was it movement? Freedom? Defying authority? My impulse is to write that I didn't really like the station my father listened to, but that wouldn't be true. Sure, later I would come to hate a lot of it, but then I would also come back around to liking some of it. (I had to rebel. The man said the Beatles ruined music!) Certainly, riding along with my father would have been the first time I heard Johnny Cash, sitting in the backseat, driving to wherever. It was my father who always knew the words, who always sang along. The car was never silent.

Eventually, I would inherit the Elvis records. Two of them were gospel albums, but the other two were early '60s rock-'n'-roll. I suppose at that point when I was rebelling and hating my old man's tunes, Elvis was the common ground. It was ludicrous to think I would not like Elvis. The King was always cool.



I still have those records. Blue Hawaii is almost more interesting to me as an artifact than for the music. It has its original interior sleeve, which is just an endless line of pictures of other Elvis records. It also has a hand-scrawled note on the front cover. In smudged red pen, it says, "To Scott, From Kent--Merry Christmas." I never met this Kent person. If memory serves, I was told he was a college roommate. This makes Blue Hawaii like some kind of time capsule out of my father's past. It's a sliver of his memory, my connection to the boy he was before I was born, whom I could never know. I can put the record on and imagine who he might have been in 1961.

The general mood of the record is light-hearted. It was a soundtrack for a musical-romantic-comedy, after all. A lot of the songs are goofy riffs on the tropical theme, like the rhythmic "Rock-A-Hula Baby" and the near rave-up "Slicin' Sand," a song about dancing on the beach. "Ito Eats" still cracks me. The tale of some hapless island boy, we are informed that "Ito eats like teeth are going out of style," Elvis attempting to deliver the line in an approximation of the lilt of a Hawaiian accent. "Almost Always True" is classic pop.

Buried midway through side 1, though, is my favorite Elvis song of all time: "Can't Help Falling in Love." You know how in Wild at Heart Sailor won't sing "Love Me Tender" to anyone but the woman he is marrying? That's how I feel about "Can't Help Falling in Love." It's an amazing song, naked in its avoidance of metaphor. Its message is simple: no matter what, you are the one for me. I defy all odds just to adore you. I've been obsessed with that song for years. I even like cover versions of it--Lick the Tins did the best one, as anyone who has seen Some Kind of Wonderful can attest--and Spiritualized the most notorious, having worked it into the title track of Ladies & Gentlemen We Are Floating In Space, only to have it rejected by the Presley estate. Now you can only find that version on bootlegs.



Naturally, I would have found "Can't Help Falling in Love" somewhere along the way of my musical journey. It's rather ubiquitous, as are any of the big Elvis songs. One can't really argue that it would have taken on the same meaning for me, though, had it not been for my hand-me-down Blue Hawaii. It's impossible to speculate. Once you've reached a signpost in the road, you can't retrace the map to make a guess of where else those markers could have been.

"Can't Help Falling in Love" embodies a romantic spirit I can't shake. It's always been a part of me, even when it was to my detriment. Is it possible that as a young man listening to his vinyl copy of Blue Hawaii in his dorm, putting the scratches on it that would later be the hisses and pops on my stereo speaker, it touched my father in the same way? Perhaps it was the source of the resolve that made him the sort of guy that got up and tried again no matter how many times love returned his kiss with a kick in the teeth. It's one of those things you never think to ask your parents, because let's be honest, that would be icky; yet, it could be there just the same.

Regardless, thanks Pop for passing your Elvis collection along. For all of you out there who think my books are sappy, and all of the girls who have had to run from me as if I were Pepe Le Pew, I'm more than willing to let this man shoulder the blame.

Happy Father's Day.



NOTABLE B-SIDE: In breaking with convention, I'm not picking the flipside to one of Elvis' singles off of Blue Hawaii; instead, I have dug up the first song I can remember my father telling me was his favorite. "He Stopped Loving Her Today" by George Jones.

It's a maudlin song sung by a classic screw-up. George Jones was a drunk who chased away his soul mate, and "He Stopped Loving Her Today" is about a man who lost his greatest romance. The pain in Jones' voice is raw and honest, probably because he felt it himself. Was he imagining Tammy Wynette when he recorded it? Possibly. I find it interesting now to hear the line about the love letters the "He" of the title obsesses over. Dated 1962, they were a year after Blue Hawaii. That seems significant to my ponderings above.

The narrative of "He Stopped Loving Her Today" is that Jones is singing about a friend who swore to never care for another woman after the love of his life walked out on him. The first line is, "He said, 'I'll love you till I die'," and the rest of the song is the fulfillment of that promise. It's sung as a eulogy. He did keep loving her, and he only quit when his heart gave out on him. It's funny, because as a kid--the song was released in 1980, so I was eight and my parents would be married for two more years--I thought it was the woman who died, and so there is a strange relief that she is finally gone. Perhaps I was lacing in the marital troubles that surrounded me that I didn't fully comprehend. Now it's obvious to me that it's the man who died, and it's a story of a romance that would not go away.

The production is mammoth. A simple slide guitar backs Jones up on the verses, but a string section kicks into full swell on the choruses, and Jones lifts his deep croon to match it. It's heartfelt and sad. How interesting to think this was my father's favorite song then. This mere weeks after writing my own little shadow play wondering where my romantic spirit comes from. If this is the sort of emotion that was placed on a pedestal for me to study at the mere age of eight, can there be any further wonder?

#52 #51 #50 #49 #48 #47 #46 #45 #44 #43 #42 #41 #40 #39 #38 #37 #36 #35 #34 #33 #32 #31 #30



Reminder: As always, this post is full of links to Amazon. Click on any one of them when shopping, and Amazon will shave a few pennies off their take to give to me. So, if my reviews make you all hot and bothered and you just have to own one of the things I'm talking about, use my link and contribute to buying me more stuff to review. (Those reading a Live Journal feed will likely have to click to the actual blog page first before heading over to Amazon, though.) Either way, thanks for reading.

Current Soundtrack: Blue Hawaii

Current Mood: nostalgic

golightly@confessions123.com * The Website * Live Journal Syndication * My Corporate-Owned Space * The Blog Roll * "Can You Picture That?" * DVDTalk reviews * My Books On Amazon

[to leave comments, click on the time-stamp below, then scroll down on the new page] – All text (c) 2006 Jamie S. Rich

Friday, June 16, 2006

NO ONE'S GONNA TAKE ME ALIVE


Or is it me, for a moment...?

Too young to die, but too old to survive

I’ve spent too long trying to write this song
The tune is ok, but the words are all wrong
Maybe it’s time for a change

I’ve lived a lie since the day I arrived
Building my dreams, grand romantic schemes
Now I’m 28 34 but I’m still in my teens
Maybe it’s time for a change

Now it’s time to say goodbye
To my suit, my shirt, my tie
My youth seems to have passed me by
And I’m too young to die

I will not weep for what we leave behind
I must break free from that part of me
That values the art over the humanity
I think it’s time for a change

I thought that I was doing fine
But now I’ve changed my mind ‘cause...

Now it’s time to say goodbye
To my suit, my shirt, my tie
My youth seems to have passed me by
And I’m too young to die

Maybe it’s time for a change...?

* * *

Lyrics by Neil Hannon, performed by the Divine Comedy

Two songs: Too Young To Die/Tonight We Fly

Artwork taken from this blog.

Current Soundtrack: The Divine Comedy, A Secret History: The Best of... (please buy their music, it's marvelous)


Current Mood: meditative

golightly@confessions123.com * The Website * Live Journal Syndication * My Corporate-Owned Space * The Blog Roll * "Can You Picture That?" * DVDTalk reviews * My Books On Amazon

[to leave comments, click on the time-stamp below, then scroll down on the new page] – All text (c) 2006 Jamie S. Rich

Thursday, June 15, 2006

THE OFFICIAL END OF IT ALL

The Everlasting is all approved and ready to be uploaded to the printer. The sound you will hear next is me breathing a sigh of relief, followed by much snoring as I go to sleep.

The book is going to easily ship on time for San Diego Comic Con International, and then be in stores in August. You can preorder at Amazon, or through you local comic book store. Their advance orders are due on June 27, and they can use the order code JUN06 3301.

And don't forget, this week's Permanent Records will be uploaded on Sunday instead of Friday. The reason will be apparent when it happens. (That's all written and ready to go, too. No rest for the weary!)

Current Soundtrack: The Simpsons

Current Mood: relieved

golightly@confessions123.com * The Website * Live Journal Syndication * My Corporate-Owned Space * The Blog Roll * "Can You Picture That?" * DVDTalk reviews * My Books On Amazon

[to leave comments, click on the time-stamp below, then scroll down on the new page] – All text (c) 2006 Jamie S. Rich