From The New Yorker comes this tale of an old fashioned book scout beating the scanner guys at their own game.
Old School Book Scouting
March 12th, 2012Howard Waldrop and I Review John Carter
March 12th, 2012Over at Locus Online. I liked it more than Howard did…
Shoegazer Sunday: Mazzy Star’s “Fade Into You”
March 11th, 2012Mazzy Star’s “Fade Into You” is the music Bruce Sterling would put on at the end of the party after every Turkey City Writer’s Workshop held at his house, mainly so people would leave. It worked too, not because it was bad, but because the waltz tempo, echoey steel guitar and smoky vocals make it the perfect “chill out at the end of a long day and feel your eyelids getting heavy” song. I bought the single off iTunes, but I think I might need to pick up the entire album, So Tonight That I Might See, as I’ve developed a craving for Hope Sandoval’s voice, which combines that smokey, chill tone of a classic jazz/blues chanteuse with peak-period Sinatra’s last-second, end-of-the-measure timing.
Is Mazzy Star shoegazer? I think they’re more sui generis, but I’ve seen “Fade Into You” on several Best of Shoegazer lists, and that’s good enough for me…
The Eye of Sauron (Stavanger Division)
March 6th, 2012While the weird herons were far and away the most interesting art I saw in Stavanger, I did find the installation in my hotel (the Radisson Blu Royal) of a large tapestry I called “The Eye of Sauron” sort of interesting:
This was evidently by an artist named Randy Naylor and was for sale. Which makes me wonder exactly who he thinks will buy a four story piece of interior hanging art in Stavanger.
There was also a similar painting behind the breakfast buffet tables I called “The Eye of Sauron Jr.” that was probably more practical for the average art buyer.
Philip K. Dick -30-
March 4th, 2012Philip K. Dick died 30 years ago, on March 2, 1982.
Dick was already a major science fiction writer before he died, but since his death he has come to loom over popular culture in a way that other near contemporary SF writers of similar stature (say, Roger Zelazny, Samuel R. Delany, Harlan Ellison, and John Brunner) have not. Dick’s themes of paranoia and unreality continue to resonate in a world where almost every human action is permanently recorded, an where so many of us live lives half in a world of unreality (said a man typing in his blog).
Dick’s prose may often have been workman-like, but his vision and voice were unique, and his sheer productivity was staggering not only for its quality, but also it quantity. Between 1961 and 1966, Dick wrote:
That’s in order of composition. Some of those are minor works, and many were only published later or after his death, but five or six are considered classics. Had an otherwise unknown SF writer written just one Dr. Bloodmoney or Ubik, they would still be remembered today as the one-hit wonder of a minor classic. To think that Dick cranked them out in six years (and was just as productive writing short stories earlier in his career) is pretty mind-boggling.
I recently read Clans of the Alphane Moon on the way back from Stavanger, and I hope to have a review up in the not so distant future.
(Also, I have a few Dick firsts and paperback reprints available through Lame Excuse Books.)
Skynet Now Has Its Own Band
March 4th, 2012Flying robot quadrotors perform the James Bond theme:
This was done at Penn’s School of Engineering and Applied Science‘s Vijay Kumar, Daniel Melligner and Alex Kushleyev. The quadrotors are under computer control.
It’s not a particularly good version, but I’m sure they’ll have time to improve before the final enslavement of humanity. Now you’ll have to excuse me, I have to write a quadrotor heist novel…
(Hat tip: Derek Johnson)
Shoegazer Sunday: Slowdive’s “Machine Gun”
March 4th, 2012I’m not nearly as big a fan of Slowdive’s Souvlaki as I am of their debut album Just For A Day, but “Machine Gun” is my favorite off of Souvlaki.
Random Monkey Gorilla Business
March 2nd, 2012
First up, from the world of auctioning, comes the offering of the exceedingly rare issue of June 1926 Zeppelin Stories pulp containing Gil Brewer’s “The Gorilla of the Gas Bags,” a holy grail for gorilla and zeppelin fans everywhere.
This issue formerly belonged to SF writer and pulp collector Frank M. Robinson. Bidding is currently up to $2,000, which does rather take it out of the impulse purchase range for me. Assuming, of course, that Rick Klaw, Jess Nevins and Mark Finn didn’t all chip in together to purchase it. But really, it’s a comparative bargain right now, since one just sold for $6,572.50…
Second, as seen on Fark, a giant mechanical gorilla was found abandoned in Witchford, Cambridgeshire, UK.
Insert your own gorilla in the mist joke here…
A List of the Top 25 Noir Films
February 29th, 2012Haven’t seen a lot of these, but the ones I have are all worth watching. Though I still think Sunset Boulevard is a bit of a stretch as Noir. It’s sui generis..
Shoegazer Sunday: Soliness’ “Skygaze”
February 26th, 2012This piece has a lot going for it, even beyond the alteration, though I could do without the bit of black metal growling in the middle. Solines evidently hails from Denmark.
It reminds me a bit of the half of System of a Downs’ “Toxicity” that didn’t suck.