last night i saw an awesome show: the burdocks (from canada), a northern chorus (also from canada), and audubon park (featuring birthday boy stingy jones on a pavement cover). the burdocks were especially awesome and so i got their cd and added them to the latest mix cd that's been burgeoning in my brain. random-as-usual track listing:
1. hal--what a lovely dance
2. willie hightower--it's too late
3. work clothes--the new pop mafia
4. audubon park--esp territory
5. portastatic--truckstop cassettes
6. sun kil moon--tiny cities made of ashes
7. boduf songs--this one is cursed
8. pleasant--lowly
9. whirlaway--when i think of you
10. heavenly--smile
11. acid house kings--this heart is a stone
12. east river pipe--i'll walk my robot home
13. essex green--the rabbit
14. mirah (w/ the black cat orchestra)--si se calla
15. naw--canal lock swim lesson
16. mr. scruff--bobby's jazz pony
17. the rosebuds--hold hands and fight
18. the burdocks--we will all be ghosts
19. tenement halls--plenty is never enough
20. erie choir--pan-pan, where did you go?
21. yuka honda--i dream about you
speaking of audubon park, david tells me he and robert are both reading infinite jest. i've actually picked up this book at stores on several occasions and put it back down, not sure i have the patience for such a long book, or for such a long david foster wallace book (i've read girl with the curious hair and vaguely remember liking it, but thinking he was a little pretentious. at least i think that's what i thought. probably i should grab it off the shelf and give it a glance). however, now that i've hit my goal of 150 books, it seems like a good time to try and read a behemoth (and, oh my god, book club!!!! so cute!), in between end-of-the-semester paper-writing and during my few days off work at christmas. have any of my few readers read this book? can you offer some comments? is it worth the time commitment? (last night i claimed i could read it in a week, but that's not likely when i have so many assignments due. maybe a week at the end of december . . . i do love a challenge.)
8 comments:
I haven't read it, but I have a friend who has raved about it for years. He's also really big on Philip K. Dick books and is a mathematician at Princeton, for a little context. (MIke)
it goes without saying that I'd adore a copy of that mix* - I'd give you the blanks, even :-)
*if you felt like making one, of course.
pinky--i'll burn one for you tongiht! and don't worry, i have plenty of blanks cds. :)
mike--i'm not sure that's the best recommendation. j/k, math geeks rule.
i read "infinite jest" a few years back and enjoyed it... i seem to recall that it was all over the place at the beginning but somehow came together really well somewhere towards the middle/end...
i'd be very impressed if you read it in a week- if there's anyone that could do it, i'm sure it's you!
Yes, Burdocks were great. A Northern Chorus were great too. I felt that Burdocks would have done well to play in Raliegh with des ark and ANC needed to play memorial hall. That was some classy music.
And they were really nice. I have never had so much fun hanging out with out of town bands after a show. Big ups in my book.
RE: IJ. I think the key for me is going to be patience and focus. I need to not try and rush to the end. I need to not get interested in other books. I need to just read what I have, enjoy the moment, and not look to the end. I need to play one game at a time and not look ahead.
Really, when I was in middle school I read many books as long or longer, I don't see why I shouldn't do so now. "IT" was a big book.
i definitely have read my share of tomes too--the herman wouk war and remembrance two-volume set, the stand (i never read it though), whatever other nerdy things i was reading then. there is a great sense of accomplishment in making it through something so big! now i just need to get a copy of it. :)
I like David Foster Wallace very much, and if you want to read something shorter than IJ, I'd recommend the short story books "Brief Interviews with Hideous Men" (not all of which I would vouch for, some pieces more purely experimental than others) and "Oblivion" (most of which I would vouch for, for what that's worth). DFW certainly is pretentious but that's really just a dirty job that somebody's gotta do.
I was pleasantly surprised by the Burdocks, as well as AP's ability to play a song from collective indie-rock memory.
I saw one of those aged/weathered "cute" t-shirts someplace that says "Talk Nerdy To Me" -- is that funny?
RB
i don't know if anyone else would find it funny (people are so disillusioned with ironic things these days), but i defintiely would crack a smile and covet that shirt if i saw it. :)
i am determined to read IJ now, actually! (i mean, when i've done some of my final papers.) i have a library event at duke this afternoon and thought about stopping by the regulator to buy it, when i remembered i was driving two classmates who might not to run errands with me. sigh.
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