|
November 2010
The Archives
-
11.29.10Darkness reprisedBruce Springsteen & the E Street Band The Promise: The Darkness on the Edge of Town Story (Sony) For many Bruce die-hards, Darkness on the Edge of Town is the holy grail. Born To Run had the grandeur and got the glory, but there was something about the stark anger and alienation of its follow-up that struck a chord which resonated way deeper than pop music should. The record's only flaw was that it was too short. As is pointed out in Thom Zimny's DVD documentary, Bruce wrote nine songs for Born and dropped one. For Darkness he wrote 70-odd and picked ten. The ...
-
11.29.10Leslie Nielsen 1926-2010Yea verily, he was some kind of a man... Leslie Nielsen, RIP. [kml_flashembed movie="http://www.youtube.com/v/Vl39lR4CnKk" width="425" height="350" wmode="transparent" /]
-
11.28.10Let us now praise famous men… Again.Tom Waits and Michael O'Brien to collaborate on Hard Ground, a book of poems about and portraits of homeless men and women. http://www.utexas.edu/utpress/books/obrhar.html [kml_flashembed movie="http://www.youtube.com/v/QMZVZ5NBkpw" width="425" height="350" wmode="transparent" /]
-
11.27.10Dali Unbound"It is good taste, and good taste alone, that possesses the power to sterilize and is always the first handicap to any creative functioning... Mistakes are almost always of a sacred nature. Never try to correct them. On the contrary: rationalize them, understand them thoroughly. After that, it will be possible for you to sublimate them." [kml_flashembed movie="http://www.youtube.com/v/KHTWDNii87k" width="425" height="350" wmode="transparent" /]
-
11.27.1020th Century GhostsThe local fleapit is integral to the mythology of the small town childhood. The kind of place that's decked out in tatty red upholstered seats, holds two hundred people maximum and smells of rat droppings when the heating's turned on. The kind of place where the films slips out of sync with the soundtrack and you have to yell to get the projectionist's attention. The kind of place where the reels are shown in the wrong order, resulting in a sort of inadvertent William Burroughs cut up narrative effect. My local cinema in Enniscorthy was such a place. My big ...
-
11.27.10Walking To HollywoodWalking To Hollywood is the third -- and possibly final -- book in Will Self's series of psychogeographic adventures (its predecessors Psychogeography and Psycho Too derived largely from his Independent column, illustrated by Ralph Steadman). Somewhere between Iain Sinclair's extrapolative rambles and Hunter S's absurdist journalism, the book documents a sometimes deranged, sometimes melancholic expedition that takes him from the streets of LA to investigate the death of film as the predominant popular 20th Century art form, to the eroded Holderness coast of East Yorkshire. It is a very strange book, even for Self, one that seems split on whether ...
-
11.23.10Ballard’s CarnivalI believe in the power of the imagination to remake the world, to release the truth within us, to hold back the night, to transcend death, to charm motorways, to ingratiate ourselves with birds, to enlist the confidences of madmen. I believe in my own obsessions, in the beauty of the car crash, in the peace of the submerged forest, in the excitements of the deserted holiday beach, in the elegance of automobile graveyards, in the mystery of multi-storey car parks, in the poetry of abandoned hotels. I believe in the forgotten runways of Wake Island, pointing towards the Pacifics of our imaginations. I believe in the mysterious beauty of ...
-
11.15.10J the R nominated for IMPACWe are pleased to announce that John the Revelator has been nominated for the 2011 IMPAC Award, the world's largest literary prize. Many thanks to Limerick City Library for the vote of confidence. http://www.impacdublinaward.ie/ http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/ireland/2010/1115/1224283324648.html
-
11.09.10Jinx’ll Fix ItJinx Lennon National Cancer Strategy (Septic Tiger) Welcome back to Radio Lennon, Jinx's emergency broadcast network, beamed from the heart of the national breakdown. If 2009's Trauma Themes, Idiot Times was a sandwich board scrawled with songs warning of imminent spiritual, mental and financial collapse, this album takes the form of 13 iodine pills to relieve the symptoms, chief among them being 'Respect Yourself This Year', the most unlikely self-empowerment mantra of the decade. Jinx Lennon is a ranter yes, but he starts with the man in the mirror. In 'Fight Diabetes' he fulfills last year's quote about Caliban pointing the dirty finger ...
-
11.07.10The PromiseHere in the Revelatorium we reckon Darkness on the Edge of Town is Bruce Springsteen's masterpiece, and one of the greatest, darkest and most intense records ever made. Can't wait for the imminent release of The Promise box-set which documents the Darkness sessions. Here's a taster. [kml_flashembed movie="http://www.youtube.com/v/2KDVodpdADk" width="425" height="350" wmode="transparent" /]