ONE of the liveliest voices on the pages of the New York Times Magazine has just released a beautifully observed and heartbreaking book. Stephen Rodrick's The Magical Stranger: A Son's Journey Into His Father's Life justifies the overused word "poignant." Rodrick is known to sharp-eyed readers for a wide range of stories in the Times magazine as well as Men's Journal; a recent story, on Lindsay … [Read more...]
The Return of Camera Obscura
WHY is it that so many of the band we like here at the Misread City -- a site dedicated to West Coast culture -- come from Glasgow, a city whose cold/rainy weather and Victorian/industrial cityscape is about as far from sunny coastal California as we could imagine?It may be because so many of these bands seem influenced by '60s West Coast pop -- Pet Sounds, the Mamas and the Papas, the Byrds, … [Read more...]
Chamber Group Salastina Society
THE other evening I saw a sextet performance of Transfigured Night. To say that I have mixed feelings about its composer, Arnold Schoenberg, is about the only way I can put it: The dude wrote some lovely and powerful music, but also left the state of western classical music, especially in the academy, a smoking ruin for about two generations after his 120-stone and serial systems. He was clearly a … [Read more...]
Sarah Polley, Director
SARAH Polley, the actress and director, has a new, very well reviewed film out. A few years ago, when her directorial debut, Away From Her, was released, I had lunch with her at the ArcLight. That film was based on an understated short story by the master Alice Munro, who I also spoke to.HERE is that piece, which I wrote for the LA Times.My main memory of that encounter was saying, somewhat … [Read more...]
The Web, Jaron Lanier and the Disappearing Middle Class
TODAY I have a long and I hope substantial Q+A with web visionary-turned-skeptic Jaron Lanier. Here it is. We get into some ideas that reflect on my investigation of the fate of the creative class in the 21st century, including the growth of a tiny digital plutocracy at the expense of the imperiled middle class.The piece is provoked by his powerful and odd new book, Who Owns the Future? … [Read more...]
Folk Duo The Milk Carton Kids
YOUR humble blogger caught a very good show at Largo last night by the LA folk duo The Milk Carton Kids. I've dug their Gillian Welch/Dave Rawlings-like songs on their recordings -- their mix of old-time vocal harmonies, smooth melodies, and bits of guitar dissonance -- but the show took it all to a higher level. (Others will hear the Everly Bros or early Simon and Garfunkel.) Beautiful … [Read more...]
Prog Rock Tales
YOU would have to look long and hard to find someone who felt less warmly about the movement known as progressive rock as your humble blogger. (If the genre was bad in its original appearance, it seemed doubly awful in its ‘80s AOR rebirth.) I expect a lot of us who came of age in the years after punk feel the same way, and preferred the concision of college radio or “modern rock” acts like R.E.M. … [Read more...]
Boston and "The Fading Smile"
BACK in the '90s, when I was at my most ravenous about learning about poetry, I read a number of very fine memoirs about poets. Eileen Simpson's Poets in Their Youth (with its unforgettable portrait of Delmore Schwartz) was one, Donald Hall's Their Ancient Glittering Eyes (Dylan Thomas!) is another. Both are classics, but my favorite may be Peter Davison's The Fading Smile, set in Boston/Cambridge … [Read more...]
Discovering Nick Drake
THE other day I spoke to Joe Boyd, the Britfolk impresario, because of his new tribute record, Way to Blue. The album is in honor of Nick Drake, who Boyd helped discover way back in the late '60s, and whose career was delicate, melancholy and all too short.Today, Drake is revered not only be neo-folkies but by the leading jazz musician of my generation, pianist Brad Mehldau.Boyd, of course, also … [Read more...]
Rachel Kushner’s "The Flamethrowers"
ONE of our favorite debuts in recent years is Rachel Kushner's Telex From Cuba. I was aware of this novel only because of a tip from New York literary agent Chris Calhoun, and once I read the galleys I was a bit abashed to see what a substantial talent was here in my city, until then invisible to me.In any case, Rachel is invisible no more. Here sophomore novel, The Flamethrowers, which came out … [Read more...]