are there people who have fun

Music For Morons 29: Long Solstice

00:00 The The - Electric Moonlight 
02:20 Walter Schnaffs - I Am Germany 
05:13 Sonic Youth - (She's In A) Bad Mood 
10:28 Black Dice - Pigs 
13:50 Amon Tobin - Lost & Found 
16:30 DJ Jazzy Jeff & The Fresh Prince - Summertime (Reprise) 
18:28 completion

Morrissey Albums Rated & In Praise Of Southpaw Grammar

I surprised myself with how highly I rated Southpaw Grammar. I've always liked the album, but listening to it with a critical ear with the idea of attaching a number to it gave me a new appreciation for it. It excels as a complete piece, the only Morrissey album for which I'm tempted to break out the cliche "greater than the sum of its parts." All Moz albums have great moments, but a lot of them are terribly uneven. Southpaw Grammar also stands out in striking me as his least personal work. He barely uses the first person lyrically, and the subjects of the songs sound to me like fictional creations, fitting for a literary dude like Moz. I wish he'd do more "story" songs and fewer about his own pathos. Another unique element of Southpaw Grammar is the musicians being allowed to breath and flex their chops. Mozzaball has usually had enjoyable backing bands and composers, but the music is also generally secondary to Morrissey's personality, lyrics and vocals. Not so on Southpaw Grammar, on which music and voice work together as equal partners (sort of like they did in The Smiths). Taken in the context of his solo career, it's a very weird album. It's also a surprisingly great one.

(While listening to all this Morrissey, I put my favorite songs in this Spotify playlist.)

Vonnegut In Retrospect: Jailbird

Jailbird (1976)

Ugh. I may have reached Vonnegut overload after reading his biography and first eight novels in short order. I had to force myself to get through Jailbird. I honestly cannot tell how much of the struggle was the fault of a poor book or just my head space not being compatible with it. If I pick it up again in a few years, maybe it would strike me as worthy of Vonnegut's catalog. It took me close to three months to finish it, and there would be long periods where I didn't pick it up, and I had a hard time remembering what had already occurred. Now that I've finished it, the story remains murky. There are themes of labor vs. ownership, communism vs. capitalism, the Watergate scandal, the idealism of youth...but little sticks with me. There were a few lines and passages in the book that resonated, and were enough to make the slog worth it in the end. But I'll be taking a little break before diving in to finish the last five Vonnegut novels.

5.0/10

Radiohead Albums Rated

Birds Flying Away

Vonnegut In Retrospect: Slapstick

Slapstick (1976)

The man who wrote in 1959 (through a character) that "a purpose of a human life...is to love whoever is around to be loved" writes in the intro to Slapstick that love "does not seem important to me." Vonnegut was mired in a prolonged separation and divorce at this point in his life, so perhaps it is not surprising his opinion of love had degraded. He also says that Slapstick is "the closest I will come to writing an autobiography." It does not read anything like an autobiography to me. Perhaps the most personal element is the relationship of the main character Wilbur Swain and his sister Eliza. When they were together, they were brilliant and happy, and when separated, mediocre and melancholy. I wondered if Vonnegut felt that way about his own sister (who had been dead for 18 years when Slapstick was published).

The most interesting part of the book is the creation of a government program to end loneliness in America. Every citizen is issued a new middle name, with resulting groups of around 10,000 persons who share a middle name and are now family. As the parent of two young children, I could get behind the idea of having lots of family caretakers around to share the child-rearing duties as portrayed in the book. In addition to fleshing out this social experiment, the book also features the collapse of the US government and ensuing wars between states. Though there is little science-fiction to be found in Slapstick, it still reads as one of his most inventive/imaginative.

This is the hardest book to rate so far for me...Anywhere between 6.5-9.0 really, but I'll go with 7.8/10.