Saving the World One Story at a Time: January 2020

Thursday, January 30, 2020

Succession

I recently began watching HBO's Succession and have found myself completely enthralled. I feel like it's been quite some time since a drama has captivated me to this extent. It's been mostly sci-fi or fantasy shows that have dominated my interest. This show gets everything right, starting with the excellent cast and terrific acting. They really make the intricate dynamics of family life feel real, while also entertaining.

The show follows the Roy family, a fictional combination of every powerful family in America. The family empire is a part Rupert Murdoch's FOX, part Disney. Logan, the patriarch and builder of the empire, is right bastard who finds himself at odds with his grown children who are poised to take his place.

While the show incorporates the intrigue of wealth and business, at the core it's about generational gaps, sibling competition, and dealing with parents when you are no longer a child.

I absolutely love every flawed character on this show, and that quite a rare thing. None of the characters get short changed when it comes to their plotlines, and none of the actors shortchange the viewer with their delivery.

Given that I'd heard very little about this show, I felt the need to share my thoughts.

Sunday, January 26, 2020

Weekend Music Roundup

The weekend is here and so is the Roundup. Last week I did a 70's theme, so this week I decided to mix it up as much as possible. We got some new albums, so recent re-releases, and a cult classic. There's a couple of country inspired albums and some lo-fi gems. I'm about to start my first swing into 2020 albums and should have some of those for next week. Hopefully there's something here for you to check out. Enjoy.

Bear Hands - Fake Tunes: The forth album from the Brooklyn indie band, released last spring, is kind of the album I've been waiting for from them. I've heard all their previous records and thought they were getting better with each one. This album sees them further develop the style they've been working on and it all comes together to produce songs that are catchy, interesting, and thoroughly enjoyable.

Elvis Presley - The Hillbilly Cat!: While initially released '82, this album was reissued last year. The original album was a bit of rip-off with very little music. The newly remastered album cuts all of the talking and replaces it with 18 tracks, some of Elvis best rock-a-billy tunes. I've always found Elvis best when he embraces his country side.

Guided by Voices - Warp and Woof: As is typical of Robert Pollard, his relatively new incarnation of the legendary lo-fi band released three albums last year. Having already hear "Zeppelin Over China," I delayed listening to this one and "Sweating the Plague" for a few months. I like to space my listening to the band more than they space their releases. Part of the reason for that is because their albums are all very similar, and all consist of basically song fragments that can take a little longer to sink in. Due to the high output, there have a few albums that have suffered from being too long, but this was not one of them. This is actually a great example of the band's blueprint and the first in some time that I would like to add to my permanent collection on vinyl.

Nirvana - "The Red Album": Released n 2017, this limited edition bootleg features mostly old radio broadcasts of pretty frequently bootlegged unreleased tracks. But it opens with a Courtney Love demo of "Live Through This" with Kurt on vocals, a track I hadn't heard before and was the deciding factor in my decision to purchase it...not to mention that I'm a sucker for Nirvana bootlegs and have tons of them. This is great stuff, and a beautiful package with, you guessed, red vinyl.

Lee Hazlewood - 400 Miles From L.A.: This archival release features recordings from '55-'56 from the country pop crooner, recordings made a full 7 years before his debut, "Trouble is a Lonesome Town." Many of the recordings here are demos of songs that would later be on that spectacular debut. This is country in the old style, think Johnny Cash if you don't know Lee. This is a wonderful collection of country folk stories about a little town called Trouble.

Fleetwood Mac - Kiln House: This the 1970 album, the band's first without founding guitarist and vocalist Peter Green, but unlike the few albums that followed, this one kept to the blues format of the Peter Green records. It actually has an early Beatles feel to it, especially when they try out old fashioned Buddy Holly type tunes. This was album that I'd been wanting to hear for a while, having really enjoyed the transitional albums of the early '70s. This is better than the two that followed, and up there with the best of their early work.

Friday, January 24, 2020

(Non)Fiction Friday (98)

Those who follow my blog know that I don't typically read non-fiction. There are several reasons for this. The first is that I have limited time to read and what time I do have, I choose to spend in the imagination. I've always said that the world of the imagination is far more interesting to me than the world we live in. However, every now and then, I do pick up a book that is based on the real world. This was one of those occasions.

The Secret of 1945: Memoir of an American Girl Held in a a French Prison by Barbara Freer
(Binnewa Publishing, 2017)

There has been so much written about the second World War that it's hard to imagine there are still segments of that period in history that have yet to be uncovered. But when you think about the scope of that event and its impact on our world, I suppose it's not all that surprising that there are still stones left to be turned over.

Bobbie is a young girl living in Germany when the war ramps up. Though she is an American, born in New York, she is living with her grandparents while her parents are establishing their lives in America. She was never meant to stay there, but once the war started, it became impossible to leave.

History has always been dictated by the victorious side in any conflict, and because of that, the experience of people in Germany is often overlooked in favor of stories of the victims who suffered at the hands of the Nazis. However, it is important to remember that there were millions of non-Nazis in Germany who were caught under the wave of a fascist government. Bobbie's family is one such family, a family that did what was necessary to survive, a family that was extremely lucky to make it through the war intact. Intact but not unscathed.

The real horror for Bobbie comes after the Allies reclaimed the disputed Alsace Lorraine region where her family had relocated during the war, believing it to be safer than the cities which were devastated during the war. Upon liberation, her entire family was imprisoned by the French. And despite being an American, Bobbie, as a ten year old girl, was imprisoned for months, forced to live in horrid conditions that nearly killed her.

The effect of this memoir is to force readers to think about how innocent people on both sides are punished for the acts of those in power. As we continue to demonize groups of people based on the beliefs of few, this story remains important and powerful. When we look at families on our own border forced into prisons, everyone should ask themselves, what crimes did these children commit? The crime of wanting a better life? The crime of wanting to escape peril? Their story is similar to Bobbie's and when we stop to actually think, we should all know better.

Saturday, January 18, 2020

Weekend Music Roundup

Welcome to the first music round-up of the new decade. Sorry I missed last weekend, but I did want the albums of the year and the decade to sit with people for awhile. However, the result is now that I have a ton of albums to review and a ton more that I'm dying to listen to. Since I've spent most of the last few months focusing only on new releases, I've decided to slip into the past for this Roundup and put together a collection of albums from '70s that I've been rocking out to lately. Lots of glam and hard rock on here. Enjoy.

Brett Smiley - Sunset Tower: This 2019 Record Store Day release was limited to 1000 copies, 200 random red vinyl mixed with 800 black, with no way to know which you have...I got red. The hype sticker says that Brett was handed $200,000 in 1973 to make a glam rock epic. He succeeded, but sadly the album was never released (until 2003). Some of these recordings are from that album, others pre-date it. This is long last gem of the glam rock era. "Space Ace," "Queen of Hearts," and "Lying in the Sun" are my personal favorites.

Budgie - Squawk: The second album from hard rocking Welsh band was released in '72 is one of the pioneering albums of heavy rock. I was turned onto this band early last year and I can't for the life of me figure out why they were never as big as Led Zeppelin or Black Sabbath. While the first album, the self-titled release from the prior year, was solid, this album is blistering. Definitely belongs in the collection of anyone into '70s heavy rock.

T. Rex - T. Rex: The 1970 album sees Marc Bolan transforming from the folkish Tyrannosaurus Rex moniker to the better known glam name of T.Rex. This is one of the earliest glam albums and it's pretty killer. As with Bowie's early glam albums, there's still the folk style holdover, but the mixture with glam guitar is something that at the time was new and special. Over the past few years, I've been converted to the genius of Marc Bolan and this was an album that had been missing from my collection.

Ian Hunter - You're Never Alone With a Schizophrenic: Released in 1979, this is the fourth solo album from the Mott the Hoople singer. This album also features Mick Ronson on guitar, John Cale on piano, and Max Wienberg on drums. It's a brilliant record that perfectly mixes his glam roots with the emerging New Wave sound. It definitely has a E-Street Band feel, but fronted by Bowie instead of the Boss. "Just Another Night," "Cleveland Rocks," "When the Daylight Comes," "Life After Death," and "Bastard" are brilliant tracks...but basically, every track is kind of brilliant.

Stories - About Us: Released in '73, this is the second album from NYC pop rock band. This has the '70s groovy jangle sound that was the upbeat side of rock at a time when rock was growing darker. It's a continuation of the late 60's hippie sound and quite good. They are definitely a glam-lite band, existing in a lesser realm than Mott the Hoople and T.Rex. "Hey France," "Changes Have Begun," "Top of the City," and "Brother Louie" are stand-outs.

Silverhead - 16 and Savaged: The second and final album from the London glam rock band was released in 1973. They play blues rock influenced clearly by the Stones, but have more of the bar sound of The Faces. There is definitely a glam sound that shows through mostly on the guitar work, with blues based rhythms and vocals. A real nice find for a few dollars. "Hello New York," "Heavy Hammer," "Cartoon Princess," "This Ain't a Parody," and the title track are standouts.

Bad Company - Straight Shooter: The London hard rock band's second LP was released in 1975 on Led Zeppelin's Swan Song label. Despite being British, there is something incredibly American about this band's hard blues rock sound. It reminds me a lot of Lynyrd Skynyrd minus the obvious Southern connection. This is solid 70's rock and roll with lots of quality tunes on it.

Monday, January 13, 2020

Stealing Trinkets...

I first heard about this Netflix original series over the summer through a YA book blog service that I belong to through work. Based on a YA novel, I thought it would definitely be worth a look. After all, Netflix has positioned itself as one of the leaders in translating kid and teen lit into quality television.

The story follows Elodie as she moves to Portland from New Mexico after her mother tragically died in a car crash, a car driven by Elodie. Oh, and if that wasn't enough, and in YA it rarely is, Elodie also has a bit of a shoplifting problem.

It turns, there are two other girls in her new school with a similar problem, two girls who Elodie would probably never be friends with if they hadn't found comfort in this shared problem.

The show starts off pretty slow, and pretty catty. It feels a little too formulaic in the beginning, but once the story brings these three characters together, it really begins to click. The story of their friendship is stronger than the story of their problems, which is the way it should be.

A solid show that got better over time. A second season is already in the works.

Friday, January 10, 2020

Fiction Friday (97)

I've always been fascinated to me how different things in life connect in odd ways. I recently wrote about the film Yesterday which imagines a world where The Beatles never existed, and at the same time, I started reading this book which imagines a journey John Lennon would take in 1978 and a resulting album that he would make from it. Out of nowhere, I was engulfed in historical Beatle fiction, and it was a nice place to live for a bit.

Beatlebone by Kevin Barry
(Doubleday, 2015)

It's 1978 and John Lennon is on a quest to find a small uninhabited island in Clew Bay that he'd purchased a decade before with the intention of making it a paradise of isolation. Having abandoned those dreams years before, now he's simply looking for a place to be alone for a few days so he can scream until he empties his soul and can start anew.

As with all things in life, John's plan doesn't turn out according to plan. The existential experience he was search for on the island turns into an existential journey to get there. Hiding from the press, getting lost in the confusing maze of islands, he ends up traveling through the stages of his life, and fighting off the stages of insanity, to come through clean on the other side.

The star of this story is the language and the writing. Kevin Barry's style is reminiscent of other writers that I've admired in the past. He breaks convention, finds lyricism and rhythm in the words, and engulfs the reader in a beautifully fragile world that feels like a thin bubble that could burst at anytime.

Monday, January 6, 2020

His Dark Materials

When Game of Thrones ended last year, like most, I was wondering what HBO would come up with to replace their epic series. To my surprise, they came up with two brilliant ideas that peaked my interest. The first being Watchmen and the second being a full adaptation of Phillip Pullman's fantastic Middle Grade fantasy series, His Dark Materials.

The first season of the show follows the plot of the first book, The Golden Compass. It's been more than 20 years since I read that book, but from my recollection, it follows the plot pretty faithfully.

My expectations for this show were sky-high, as opposed to lower expectations for Watchmen. This is probably due to the movies of each that came out several years ago. I disliked the Watchmen film, but enjoyed The Golden Compass. That meant, this had more to live up to.

I'll admit that the first two episodes were a little slow. And for anyone unfamiliar with the books, they were a little confusing (as my Missus can attest to). But come the third episode, things started to pick up and the show found its footing. The results are a stunningly visual fantasy with pretty great acting.

I really like how this show captures the darker aspects of the books. Unlike the film, which rarely made you feel Lyra was in danger, this constantly makes you believe that she faces threats far greater than she truly understands. And the casting of Lyra, surely the hardest role to cast, turned out to be great. She feels real. So many adaptations of children's books make the character feel like a movie version of a kid, while the books do not. They got this right, and thereby got the series right in my opinion.

Wednesday, January 1, 2020

Weekend Music Roundup (BEST OF THE DECADE)

One of the most impossible things is to compile a list of albums that spans a decade. The problem is that this list will continue to change throughout my life. But as a snapshot of my current self's taste, here is a list of not necessarily the best albums of the last ten years, but the albums that collectively would represent my grand takeaway of the '10s. Now, I didn't include any albums from 2019, because, well, it takes more than a year to get in there, but Lana Del Rey's Norman Fucking Rockwell was debated, but I went with her Ultraviolence instead. I also didn't include multiple albums from one artist, otherwise it would be an O'Death, Uncle Acid, Electric Wizard, Ruby Throat list. But here it is, for what it's worth. Enjoy.