I'm starting to get into a sprint with my Detective novel, and I love it so. It's so goddamn weird. I can't wait to hear some people's reactions to it... Also I really want to get back onto Eating the Ram's Head and Fig Leaf and having a first draft I can start editing for the send off to the publishers that will hate it. It's just such a monster. So much going on. Don't ever be thinking I'm giving up on this thing. She's gonna see the light of day if its the last thing I do.
I'm also starting a-writing a massive analysis on the Barenaked Ladies Anthology that I'm naming Buck Naked, after their first little independent tape release. This one's been a dream project of mine for a while, trying to toe the line of that ever unpopular opinion of mine: "The band that did the 'I just made you say underwear' song wrote some of the best music ever." I'll be damned if they're forgotten or just go down as that chickity china the chinese chicken band with a couple one hit wonders (oxymoron?) while the thousands of artists a million levels beneath them are remembered and praised in Rolling Stone as the best songs of the same era BNL were making music. It'd really be against the odds for me to be a part of that, the likelihood of this reaching paperback form being slim, but you don't always write for publication. If I did half of the stuff I wrote wouldn't exist and I'd be a much worse writer on account of it.
Speaking of: I'm going to be continuing my Max on Musics dealio. Just as a joke, I gave it album art and a title: "PSYDUCK AND ME" for all the songs I cover in my little fake album. I've got plenty of music I'm thinking about doing and not just Barenaked Ladies songs too! Here's a link to my first Max on Musics, wherein I sing and write an analysis of the song I sing, in case you haven't checked it out yet and want to know what I'm tawkin about:
The five year anniversary of the death of one of my favorite musicians is coming up in December, and I hope do an epic Max on Musics of his songs and write about them and him in general as a memorial type thing. His name was Logan Whitehurst. He was and continues to definitely be among the best of the best in the Geek Rock genre, and died of brain cancer in 2006 when he was 29. He was just really goddamn good, with music ranging from silly little songs about a lizard and fish escaping a pet store and noodles dueling to the death, to deep introspections on non-existance, working a dead end job that drives you crazy, saying goodbye to music because it can't earn you a living, and saying goodbye to living itself. And keep in mind that all of the death stuff and every song I'm referencing was way before he was even diagnosed with cancer. His stuff just varied that much just because that was the kind of guy he was; not stuck in any sort of mold, just writing and performing great music.
He's one of those very rare artists that can make you both laugh your ass of and seriously cry like a goddamn baby. I can't think of any other artist anything like him, and hopefully I can pay fair tribute to him on here in the upcoming month. Either way, he's well worth checking out, and most of his music is free on his website. If you're interested, I'd suggest first looking at How Does an Electrostatic Motor Work? onward to Earth is Big and his unreleased stuff, and if you don't mind spending ten bucks on itunes, buying Logan's magnum opus, Goodbye My 4-Track:
(Archive of most of his work, compiled by the great Jason Steele)
(Goodbye My 4-Track)
Sew. I hope to be doing that soon. I'm thinking of posting some excerpts from Detective Antipathy, and maybe some finished bits from Ayn and I after she's all drafty. Maybe it's time for me to do an update on all my various projects, like I did in one of my first posts... Also I found this thing on my seat in my English 101 class that I'm writing about. 50 bonus gets for the lucky lad or lady that guesses what that is.
