big big love
g i g a n t i c
yes indeedy, the pixies rocked the magenta socks right off my little feet! holy crap! if i hadn't just recently seen spoon (3x) i would have to say the pixies show is the best i have ever seen. EVER seen! all i could think while watching the show - when not in blissful reverie of the joey santiago's guitar playing - was how much i LOVE rock music!
frank black may be a chunkster, and kim deal the cutest, sweetest, yey frumpiest, middle-aged bassist. joey santiago is the new love of my life (especially when he is yielding that gorgeous gold les paul! britt daniel watch out!*), and dave lovering is the most elegantly dynamic drummer in the universe. they rocked so hard it was shocking and exhilirating. i danced like a mad person and screamed "joey" like a 15-year old at a bon jovi concert.
it was a beautiful night in the wee 'ville, about 50 degrees and clear. there were so many people out on the mall and around the ampitheater. the show wasn't too crowded - although the percentage of falling-over drunk middle-aged fucks was way too high. (i really think alcohol should be prohibited at rock shows.)
i was surprised how successful the new ampitheater was for viewing. the ground is nicely sloped to allow for a clear view of the stage. there was a beautiful banner hung behind the stage. i wish i could find an image of the graphic. it had pixies superimposed over a stylized stingray. it was gorgeous.
they played for about an hour and a half. they covered neil young and the jesus and mary chain (that was the best!). of course they played all the favorite songs and they sounded as brilliant as the first time i ever heard them years and years ago. the pixies may be aging, but their sound is as new and fresh as ever!
*i do find it interesting that britt played a gold les paul during his brief stint in golden millenium.
this is my want list for books
here is the list of books (with links) that i currently desire:
wickett's remedy by myla goldberg
rising tide: the great mississippi flood of 1927 and how it changed america by john barry
row: trajectories through the shotgun house by david brown and william williams
walking the high line by joel sternfeld
anonymous: enigmatic images from unknown photographers by robert johnson and william boyd
landscape and images by john stilgoe (my hero)modern garden design: innoavation since 1900 by janet waymark what are you reading?
the wee pixies
so who ever thought that i would be seeing the pixies in charlottesville va? not me, that's for sure. holy crap, i am so excited. coran capshaw and the starr hill mafia suck in so many ways, but they score big points for bringing this show to our wee little 'ville! the wee pixies in the wee 'ville, crazy.i just walked through the ampitheater where they are setting up and saw joey santiago! not that i'm star struck or anything (he's no britt daniel!), but man, that's cool.i am so glad that i got a hook up through wtju cos i couldn't bring myself to pay the 80 bucks for two tix. 8o bucks! that's such an unreal amount of money. but i know that i would be so regretful tomorrow for not going. so now, it's all working out! hooray!in any event, this is a very remarkable year for shows for me: from unrest and versus to pylon to spoon (3x) to the pixies to echo and the bunnymen and all the goodies in between like teenage fanclub, of montreal, crooked fingers, caribou, the clientele, orenda fink, and many others that i can't recall. on another note: i have been trying to post about a bunch of books that look really cool to me, but the blogger photo loader isn't cooperating. maybe i'll just post a list and you can look them up if you're interested! i bet you will be!pixies here i come!
auction art!
this is the silkscreen. it's signed moore '70.
this is the watercolor. it's teeny, only 2 by 3 or so. i love tiny pieces of art, they are like little treasures. it's signed illegibly and titled landscape 1969.
this is gears III by lee adler, numbered 4/55.
i like gears. it sort of looks like a strange projector of some sort.
sold!
on saturday i went to an auction and boy, did i ever have fun. i made some fantastci purchases as well. harlowe-powell, a local auction house, had it's first dedicated "mid-century modern" auction (although the accuracy of that description is arguble). usually, i think, their auctions are a mish-mash of various estates and periods. but, i heard, that there is a concerted effort bring more mid-century pieces to the market and this was their first effort. i scored three pieces of art - a small watercolor, by an unidentified painter; a print, presumably made from a photo negative, also unidentified; and an original signed and numbered lee adler print of gears, aptly named gears III. adler is an aesthetic realist whose work is currently in the metropolitan museum of art, british museum, and the whitney museum of american art. his piece was my real prize of the day, but the other items i scored are fantatsic too. there was an amazing collection of pottery - most of which i could not afford - but i did get two neat pieces. i scored a neat piece of streamline moderne silver designed by norman bel geddes, who was a fantastic industrial designer. i bid on an amazing pice of pottery designed by raymond loewy - also a favorite industrial designer - but it shot way out of my price range very quickly. there were two prints on which i wish i had bid higher, alas. also, i would have loved to score the single eames DCM chair, but it wasn't in great shape and the other bidder clearly had more money to spend than i did.all in all, though, i had a great time, made great deals, and found really cool art. buying art has become a new obsession. i have read that, when buying art, you shouldn't think twice about the artist or the value of the piece. buy art that speaks to you, not for its appreciable value - which is not much unless you're buying monet or some other such crap. now, if we could just stop demolishing walls in the house we'd have some place to hang the art!
friends of the high line
i am becoming obsessed with friends of the high line. i can't quite remember where i read about it - maybe dwell - but i can't stop thinking about it, for many reasons. one reason is that it is an amazing project. the one and one-half-mile-long elevated rail corridor was built in the thirties to separate freight rail traffic from street-level traffic, thus ensuring the safety of pedestrians and, more importantly in that era, the efficiency of goods delivery. i'm not quite sure when the line was closed to rail traffic, but it seems clear that the high line structure sat abandoned for quite some time. friends of the high line (fhl) was formed to promote the preservation and reuse of the elevated structure as a promenade of open space, providing a welcome swath of greenery in an otherwise very densely developed industrial part of NYC, a unique vantage point from which to view the city, and a history lesson on the prior industrial land use in a rapidly changing urban landscape. friends of the high line drew precedent from another amazing preservation and reclamation project, the Promenade Plantee in Paris, which achieved the same end for an elevated rail line through that city in the early nineties. fhl has successfully enlisted the architects diller, scofidio + renfro (check 'em out, they're amazing) to reinterpret the high line as a pedestrian oriented public space. you can see their winning competition entry at thehighline.org.i think the highline project is really a testament to the power of grass roots organizing and the importance of preserving liminal spaces. spaces like the high line, but not just rail lines, have a relevance that so far exceeds, but of course includes, their original use. they must not be removed from our cities and towns. rather, they should be preserved and reinterpreted. friends of the high line provide us with a usuable model - why isn't this happening across the country? i feel inspired to take on a project such as this one in my town.
shame on you
this post is to shame all those readers to whom i send emails and don't receive responses. email me back, damnit!
hello again
the best thing about getting a coffee from the blue ridge store is that when you pick up an empty cup it is smooth and when you fill it with hot coffee it blisters in your hand. it's an amazing sensation and an ingenious solution to the scalding hot paper cup which requires a ridiculously-named "java jacket" or a second cup. this, and the cheapness, motivate me to get coffee at the blue ridge store, not the quality. definitely not the quality.
i was on the radio on saturday; well, no, it was sunday actually, 1-3am. what fun! i was on so that i could train a new dj - a girl who was relocated here from tulane university in new orleans. i felt that in some small way i was helping out. of course, this girl was hardly stranded on the roof of her house for days...
it was fun being on the radio again. i should really do it more often.
work on the house has stalled for the moment. the weather has just been too nice here and i can't stand to be cooped up in the house. i did transplant 3 rose bushes to get them out of the most ridiculous spots in the yard. i hope they survive the transplant.
all of the clematis i found in the spring have bloomed into the most beautiful plants. the vines are covered, literally blanketed, in tiny white, star-shaped blooms that have a light scent. they are stunning! i think it is called sweet autumn clematis (clematis paniculata). it looks like this - all over our yard!
my elephant ears and caladiums are doing great as well. the elephant ears are so big they have to be supported in order to keep them upright!
my caladiums are so varied in their coloration and fill in the space underneath the very tall elephant ears. i wish i were a landscape architect.
looks like i might become a published author... i was asked to write an afterword for a photography book that will come out next spring, i think. i'm quite pleased with my afterword and would be pretty proud to see it in print. then maybe i could convince taunton press to let me write updating the classic american foursquare as a result. i should really work on a proposal for that.
that's it for this post. i'm pretty bored at work, so maybe i'll come up with something else soon!
CMJ Top 30 9/5/05
Top 30 for September 5, 2005:1) NEW PORNOGRAPHERS / Twin Cinema / Matador2) KINSKI / Alpine Static / Sub Pop3) ROSEBUDS / Birds Make Good Neighbors / Merge4) QUINTRON AND MISS PUSSYCAT / s/t / Rhinestone5) STOOGES / Fun House / Elektra/Rhino6) DUNGEN / Ta Det Lugnt / Kemado7) SUFJAN STEVENS / Illinois / Asthmatic Kitty8) FRUIT BATS / Spelled in Bones / Sub Pop9) SONS AND DAUGHTERS / Repulsion Box / Domino10) V/A / Broken Flowers / Decca11) A BAND OF BEES / Free the Bees / Astralwerks12) FREE DESIGN / The Now Sound: Redesigned / Light in the Attic13) WOLF PARADE / s/t / SubPop14) PEARLS BEFORE SWINE / The Complete ESP Disk Recordings / ESP15) DEERHOOF / Green Cosmos / Menlo Park16) ARIZONA AMP AND ALTERNATOR / s/t / Thrill Jockey17) JOHN VANDERSLICE / Pixel Revolt / Barsuk18) KALLIKAK FAMILY / May 23rd 2007 / Tell-All19) PELICAN / The Fire in Our Throats Will Beckon the Thaw / Hydrahead20) HOLOPAW / Quit +/or Fight / Sub Pop21) LUNGFISH / Feral Hymns / Dischord22) ALIAS AND EHREN / Lillian / Anticon23) ORANGE JUICE / The Glasgow School / Domino24) BLACK DICE / Broken Ear Record / Astralwerks/DFA25) COCOROSIE / Noah's Ark / Touch and Go26) RICHARD HELL / Spurts / Rhino27) CLAP YOUR HANDS SAY YEAH / s/t / self28) CHIN UP CHIN UP / s/t / Flameshovel29) T.RAUMSCHMIERE / Blitzkrieg Pop / Nova Mute30) SYBRIS / s/t / FlameshovelADDS1) ARIZONA AMP AND ALTERNATOR / s/t / Thrill Jockey2) SUPER FURRY ANIMALS / Love Kraft / Beggars Banquet3) IRON & WINE/CALEXICO / In the Reins / Overcoat4) FREAKWATER / Is Thinking About You / Thrill Jockey5) M83 / s/t / Goom
so sad
i feel so overwhelmed by sadness for what has happened on the gulf coast. i'm not really sure how to process my feelings. i am surprised at how significant the damage is.i'm shocked at how little i am hearing about collecting/sending aid to the region. countries around the world rushed to mobilize assistance for tsunami victims. but now, in the midst of our own disaster of (what i see to be) comparable magnitude, is no one rushing to help us?i am appalled at the violence being carried out by people still in the city. steal food if you have to - that can't even be considered stealing. but don't steal guns, ammunition, and electronics, or shoot those who are trying to keep you from doing so. sure tradgedy brings out the best and worst in people, but senseless violence like this is simply unfathomable.is there anything anyone can do to help? will my meager donation to the red cross help in any way? it sure seems unlikely.we cancelled our cable on saturday, right before the storm hit. i am thankful that i can not watch video of the recovery on cnn 24/7. gas was 85 cents when i first started driving, and i was shocked when it passed 1 dollar. a gallon of gas for three dollars was never even in my imagination. not to mention the skyrocketing price of natural gas - i think it'll be pretty cold in my house this winter.where will all the residents of gulf coast towns resettle? how could they even conceive of returning.?what happened to all the pets? this might make me more sad than anything else. they are so helpless.
