Lodestar

I'm nervous that the Victoria crowd will be superlame, a la Vancouver 2004

There's a fair bit of buzz about the show already from what I can tell, but I share that sentiment. I'm not one who generally needs or wants to move around a whole lot during a show, but I get distracted if I suspect the band (especially Wilco) is bored or annoyed. I was at that 2004 show as well and remember Jeff's crack about Glenn painting the guy, and I remember hating the idiots in Seattle 2006 who kept shouting about the Seahawks (they were in the Super Bowl that weekend). The crowd at the Royal for Band of Horses was pretty tame, if I remember correctly -- but then again, they'd played here twice already in the last couple years.

Anyway, hopefully people (and the band) understand that this is a big deal for Victoria, and the show is a memorable one.

 

Also, I feel like I'm the only person who prefers Cassadaga to Wide Awake. Maybe it's because I've only listened to Wide Awake, like, thrice, and it never grabbed me.

I can't staaaaand Cassadaga. I mean, there are parts of every Bright Eyes album (and song, really) that piss me off, but that whole record grates on me like no other.

I've been planning on writing a little top 50 piece for some friends, but it'll take some time. Here's my current top 30 (disclaimer: I was a teenager for much of the 2000s, and a big part of the criteria is how much I listened to each album, how it affected me, how it still makes me feel now, etc.):

30. Gillian Welch - Time (The Revelator)

29. The Hold Steady - Separation Sunday

28. Broken Social Scene - You Forgot it in People

27. Feist - The Reminder

26. Sun Kil Moon - Ghosts of the Great Highway

25. Whiskeytown - Pneumonia

24. The Shins - Chutes Too Narrow

23. Metric - Old World Underground/Where Are You Now

22. Josh Ritter - The Animal Years

21. Wolf Parade - Apologies to the Queen Mary

20. Bright Eyes - I'm Wide Awake, It's Morning

19. Sufjan Stevens - Greetings from Michigan

18. The Weakerthans - Reconstruction Site

17. The Arcade Fire - Funeral

16. Ryan Adams - Cold Roses

15. Sarah Harmer - You Were Here

14. Songs: Ohia - Magnolia Electric Co.

13. Wilco - A Ghost is Born

12. Ryan Adams - Gold

11. The Decemberists - Castaways and Cutouts

10. The Wrens - The Meadowlands

9. Joanna Newsom - Ys

8. Sarah Harmer - All of Our Names

7. Bon Iver - For Emma, Forever Ago

6. The National - Boxer

5. Ryan Adams - Love is Hell

4. Pilate - Caught by the Window

3. Damien Rice - O

2. Ryan Adams - Heartbreaker

1. Wilco - Yankee Hotel Foxtrot

Either Da Tandoor or Spice Jammer. Probably not Mahajara on Johnson, unless you're thinking amazing-by-association to Ditch Records next door.

what I really wanted to include was Fucking Amal [show Me Love], which I saw in 2000 but technically was released in the U.S. in '99).

I really enjoyed that, too. Stuck with me a long time after watching it.

Has anyone mentioned City of God? It's been a while since I saw it, but there are few films that have moved me emotionally like that one.

"At Least That's What You Said," English to Spanish to French to German to Russian back to English.

(Non-English words deleted, likes I particularly like bolded)

When I at once have sat down in a bed?

Whether you have you??

To cry, whether circulation can?

If I proceed, you to me? What?

I shall arrive to the house,

About, whether can? all means you,

just the leaf me only

at least is, that you spoke

They? Yours it is mad?

when you you? At you?

Your sad steps I am free, what I have pens?

What does it have? Tons?

around of you to k?

The violet eye purple though I took it you

I, still thinks, that we are at least serious,

who is it That you spoke

Victoria presale -- 2nd row center. Mmmm yes...I think that will do.

Me too! I got BB 15/16, right between Jeff and Nels!

After much soul-searching, delaying leaving for a month is probably a wise decision for me regardless... and now I get to see Wilco in Victoria!

The last not-so-good book I finished was The Riders by Tim Winton. POV-wise, I thought it was a mess. He did, however, also write one of my all-time favourites, The Turning.

Any word on a Victoria presale? I'm buying tickets anyway, eff it.

Edit: WilcoWorld says Wednesday at 10am via FrontGate... Is it generally better to do presale or general onsale?

But the prose:

 

And the answer, said the judge. If God meant to interfere in the degeneracy of mankind would he not have done so by now? Wolves cull themselves, man. What other creature could? And is the race of man not more predacious yet? The way of the world is to bloom and to flower and die but in the affairs of men there is no waning and the noon of his expression signals the onset of night. His spirit is exhausted at the peak of its achievement. His meridian is at once his darkening and the evening of his day. He loves games? Let him play for stakes. This you see here, these ruins wondered at by tribes of savages, do you not think that this will be again? Aye. And again. With other people, with other sons.

 

I'm too dumb to not need heart as well.

It's been over two years since I weened myself off Carver, so I'm allowing myself to re-read Where I'm Calling From for the next little bit. I'm also putting together MFA applications this month, so it's helped get me going.

You are dead to me – so very fucking dead.

I tried. I really did. But I can't enjoy a book where the author appears not to care about a single character. As I read and read, I would continually forget what I'd learned only a page or two earlier... as if none of it were significant.

Sorry, Cormac.

At this risk of catching all kinds of flak...

 

I’m roughly a third of the way through, but unless it takes an unforeseen (and at this point, almost unimaginable) lurch into shitty territory, Lethem’s latest is shaping up to be my favorite novel of the year. If you’re not familiar with Lethem’s work, I’d start with Fortress of Solitude, one of my all time favorites.

I read You Don't Love Me Yet by Lethem earlier this year, a gift from my dad, and it was one of the worst books I've ever finished. I haven't read anything else by him, but it soured me pretty bad.

Aaagh, I can't believe how conflicted I feel. I don't think I can reasonably postpone moving to Barcelona another month and not hate myself, but I've been waiting so freakin long for Wilco to come to Victoria. Then again, I've seen them four times, and what if it was somehow cancelled? It would have to be the most amazing show ever to make that extra month worthwhile... GAH.

Oh my God. I have the biggest fucking pit in my stomach right now.

I live in Victoria, have been waiting for this forever, and I've been planning for the past year to move to Barcelona in January.

How pathetic would it be if I delayed leaving a month just to see Wilco?

I don't know, I feel like they have numerous receviers who can step up. I think Walter could carry the team for a while. I don't know the status of their roster though, as pertains to injuries, etc.

Obviously Johnson is among the NFL's elite wideouts, and in years past could probably have been considered the most valuable in the league, but I think you're right. That offense is something else. Walter and Jacoby Jones are weapons, Owen Daniels is maybe the most underrated tight end in the league, and Slaton's been doing most of his damage out of the backfield this year.

Anyway, Johnson was a full participant in today's practice, so he'll likely play. I've got him and Slats on my fantasy team as well.

Texans need Johnson to be healthy or they really, really won't make it.

The news on Johnson has been pretty good all week. It looks like he'll play Sunday.

Very excited to see the direction they're taking with this. Van Occupanther is a great record IMO.

I'd say Jonze's first responsibility is to stay true to the spirit of the book--and I would argue that he does, brilliantly--not cater to the expectations of viewers who just want another Ice Age.

But he abandoned that the second he decided to adapt it for screen, right? The spirit of the book is in the way it encourages kids to use their imaginations, barely even giving written clues. Staying true to that might have entailed a five-minute silent film. Instead, what you've got is Jonze and Eggers' interpretation of the book, with a lot of their own psychological analysis forced in there. And it was that bulk of the movie -- the stuff on the island -- that seemed incomplete and inconsequential to me.

The creatures are integral to the story of Max's psychological arc, which is tangible and readily understandable. And I think criticizing the movie for choosing to emphasize psychological turmoil rather than conventional plotting is rather like trying to shove the movie into a box where it doesn't belong.

But that's not what I'm arguing. My favourite film of all time is a slow burn from Russia called The Return, which has next to no discernible plot, and which is built almost entirely on psychological turmoil. (Actually, it's a bit similar to the premise of WTWTA: two boys travel with their mysterious father to a remote island and fight with each other.) It's not the "conventional plotting" or "bright highs" I'm missing in WTWTA, but simply the notion of change, or that any of the its events matter.

If you're willing, I'd love to see a breakdown of Max's psychological arc. You say it's tangible and readily understandable, whereas I found it non-existent. I don't believe he's any different at the end of the movie than he is at the beginning, except maybe he's a bit sadder, and maybe he's sorry. A single interaction between him and his sister might have told me more about where he's headed than his entire confusing 90 minutes with the monsters.

And I think kids, especially, are primed to understand what Jonze is up to. They may not get the metaphorical stuff, but they will latch onto the emotional truths.

"Understanding" isn't really what made me take issue this film; it was the lack of any kind of narrative or character arc. The monsters may work on some psychologically representative level, but that doesn't mean they tell a story. When I asked a friend's 8-year-old daughter what she thought of the movie, she said it bored her and she didn't understand what any of the monsters' problems were.

Ryan Adams - "Writing the Hits With Stupid"

Travis - "Writing to Reach You"

I'm burning through Northline by Willy Vlautin. I loved Motel Life, I love Richmond Fonrtaine, and I'm loving this one too.