Haruki Murakami ~ The Elephant Vanishes
Just finished reading an early collection of Haruki Murakami short stories, The Elephant Vanishes. The volume begins with the story that would eventually become the opening chapter of The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle (worth rereading, certainly) and a bouquet of his most riveting miniatures. My favourites included the darkly exuberant Sleep, The Dancing Dwarf, Slow Boat…
Haruki Murakami ~ Dance, Dance, Dance
Every book in my Haruki Murakami binge instantly becomes my new favorite. and so it is with the dream/fantasy/mystery/philosophy of Dance, Dance, Dance. the writing is so beautiful, the obvious love of food, music, sex, life, death/depth palpable, the insight and empathy unequaled in our time, and no one writes a climax to a book…
Haruki Murakami ~ Hard-Boiled Wonderland and The End of The World
Just finished reading, as part of my full-fledged Haruki Murakami binge, Hard-Boiled Wonderland and The End of the World, a Through the Looking-Glass for the modern day, with cyberpunk leanings far more poetic and humane than anything in similar spirit by William Gibson. worlds of mind, memory and of course, music. magical. i know at…
Stephen Graham Jones ~ Not For Nothing
Just finished reading the latest and greatest from Stephen Graham Jones, his lately-published Not For Nothing, as perfect a piece of West Texas noir as we will ever witness in our lifetimes, or until SGJ decides to remake this genre in his own image again. i hope it’s soon. SGJ owns more styles than most…
Haruki Murakami ~ The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle
Just finished reading Haruki Murakami‘s masterpiece, The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle, a book I’d initially not warmed to (I bet I know why, now: back in my David Foster Wallace-immersive days, Murakami’s name came up with the same reverence and regularity. That it didn’t read like DFW to me was, i guess, anathema to me at…
Haruki Murakami ~ Norwegian Wood
Just finished reading this iconic coming-of-age novel by Haruki Murakami, Norwegian Wood. a beautiful story about the striving for intimacy and knowledge in the face of distance, dissolution and delusion. a must read, like i’m getting to know all Murakami’s works to be. going to start The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle now. I’d tried it years…
Beach House ~ Lazuli@FTT, Cincinnati, OH_2014.04.02
the idea to do this great Beach House song came to me suddenly. had a first draft in a day, performed it first a week later. recorded a take of it for your enjoyment on the day of our From the Top live taping at Corbett Auditorium in Cincinnati, OH on 2014.04.02
Haruki Murakami ~ Kafka On The Shore
Just finished reading one of the Perfect Books ever: Haruki Murakami‘s Kafka on the Shore. the perfect prose incarnation of the Border of the World: the cusp of fate and experience, of the timeless universality of musical creativity, of the resonance of our dreams through the archive of Time, or the boundaries and extremities of…
Philip K. Dick ~ Second Variety (The Collected Stories of Philip K. Dick, Vol. II)
Just finished reading this volume of Philip K. Dick short stories from the 50s. Gollancz publishes the complete stories in five beautiful volumes, chronologically. i was pretty astonished at how matur these early stories are from the 20th Century’s greatest metaphysical writer. hadn’t read but one of them (A Small Town) before, and this volume…
Kris Saknussemm ~ The Humble Assessment
just finished reading Kris Saknussemm‘s brilliant absurdist drama, the horrifying and hilarious play, The Humble Assessment. Kris was kind enough to invite me to compose music for his latest novel, Reverend America. No one had previously asked me to write anything original for a book before, but Kris is so musically astute in a variety…