Two Albums, a Book, and a Pizza Place (The Pizza Place Will Be Dropped Next Season)

Let's see how much of these I can tackle.

First, as I mentioned in my last post, I was reading The Gum Thief by Douglas Coupland.

Well, I finished said book, and I really rather enjoyed it. I like Coupland's detached style – he's part of that middle-generation between the baby-boomers and what I guess is my generation, people whose formative years were in the late 70s and 80s, and he's clearly a voice for people who thought they were inheriting the future, but instead found themselves inheriting the past's problems.

He might come across as a little cynical.

But his cynicism has a sweetness to it – a glass-is-half-full kind of cynicism. As such we get the story of Roger and Bethany, an unlikely friendship as you'll probably ever come across. Roger is a forty-something alcoholic who is divorced, depressed, and working in Staples (which seems more like a cause rather than a symptom, for any of you who may have worked retail – by the way, if you have, and you want to check out a perfect representation of that life, check this out; Clerks works, too, although less box-storey). His life is shit, and when his journal finds itself in the hands of the 19-year-old Bethany, it is also the subject of ridicule.

Except Bethany is a bit of a pain-queen, a Goth-chick with enough suicide in her life, Sylvia Plath would be jealous. So while she has initial scorn, she quickly realizes she's found a kindred-spirit. What begins is a series of journal entries back-and-forth, as Roger and Bethany form a tenuous alliance to stave-off the direction their lives are moving in.

It is the format of the book that is the strongest feature. The use of journal entries, and then later letters, e-mails, and novel excerpts, combines to create a cohesive story. Roger's novel in particular, Glove Pond, is an exercise in metafiction that, in turn, is an exercise in metafiction. The layers Coupland stacks in this novel are very intricate, at one point writing a novel about a novel about a novel (which, in turn, is almost a re-telling of the primary novel). What's amazing is that there's nothing exceptionally intricate about the plot – it moves inexorably forward, the characters grow in an organic manner – nothing that happens is really extraordinary.

But it's funny and natural and sad. Roger is an anti-hero, but he's not a villain. Rather, he's a loser who is not only bad at the game, but doesn't seem to even know the rules. The same goes for Bethany – what you realize is not that losers find their own, but that trying to find yourself is an activity that knows no age. In the end, Roger isn't filled with redemption, but he isn't beyond finding it, either.

I think if you like Eggers or Foster Wallace or Lethem or Safran Foer, than you might find this a little lighter. But that essence is there, that bit of snark, bit of swagger, that makes those other readers enjoyable. This is what I think writing should be. It tells a story in an amusing and accessible way, staying intelligent without losing the reader in style or vocabulary.

You know – it's great to be able to actually understand the books you read, is all.

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I just bought two recently released, wildly different albums, and I haven't been able to stop listening to either one. That is, um, except when I'm listening to the other one. Screw you, logic!

The first one – and boy, I don't know how else to say this without being covered in shame – is the self-titled album, Day26.

Now, I know what you're thinking: Who the hell is Day26 (and why isn't there a space between “Day” and “26”)? The second question I don't know the answer to, but the first can be answered by the powerful words: “Making the Band 4.”

Yeah, they're a put-together band, manufactured for look, sound, style. Their songs are written for them and their voices are honed to be commercially viable. They epitomize the very worst of what pop music stands for.

And I loved every minute of it.

I've mentioned my unnatural love for reality TV (“The Hills” is back! Lauren was in Paris, and she almost ruined 2 dresses!). Well, “Making the Band 4” sucked me in – especially once I heard the first song they had to learn. Sung a capella, the song “Exclusive” has a melody that is perfectly soulful. When the five guys put their heart into it, I get that tingly feeling.

Not that tingly feeling!

It's just that, for me, good music makes an emotional connection. I don't care if it's technically good, I care that I feel compelled to listen to it. Whether it's making me want to dance, or making me want to sing along, or just making me react positively, music means a lot to me, and I don't care if others think the music I listen to is crap.

So when I say Day26 is a great album, I mean that. I always say (always – I've said a few times) that if an album starts off strong, that can cover a lot of ills. This album is on exception. The first song, “I'm the Reason,” is a fun opening number, and it leads right into the first single, “Got Me Going.” After that you get solid hip-hop/R&B straight through, the possible exception being “Ain't Going” featuring the other “Making the Band 4” members, Danity Kane and Donnie, but even that has a great beat.

It's fun, danceable album. I could listen to it many-times over, and it didn't get old. I say check out the first three songs I mentioned, and, if you like them, you'll like the rest of album. Otherwise, you might be suffering from bitchassness, which is a terrible, terrible disease.

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The second album, as I said, is really, really different. Not only is different from hip-hop and R&B, it's different from what the band is known for: overly verbose emo.

I've waxed rhetorical about emo before, so I won't bore you. But I will say that as much as I enjoyed Panic! At the Disco's first album, I also found it a bit wearing. Musically, it was fun, but lyrically, it was just too much. Arrhythmic (and that's a weird word to see capitalized, right?) sentence structures are a little hard to listen to.

So on their new album Pretty.Odd., Panic at the Disco (yeah, they dropped the exclamation point, although they took their punctuation to their album title) goes to a very new place. At least, new to them. And, like those old NBC promos: “If you haven't seen it, it's new to you.” Well, if you're like the members of Panic and you haven't gone to college yet, then listening to The Beatles will seem crazy. “Dude, have you ever heard of this rock & roll shit? It's crazy!”

I love The Beatles, though, so I have no problem with a band emulating them. And that's what they do. Pretty. Odd. is an accurate summation of the eclectic nature of this album. While never really delving into the harder rock of Sgt. Pepper's or The White Album, there is definitely a great mix of lyrical and musical content. These guys have grown up and discovered their parents listened to music, and said music was pretty good.

I highly recommend “Nine in the Afternoon,”



and “Northern Downpour,” but once again, this is another strong album. Like My Chemical Romance's Welcome to the Black Parade, this is a sophomore effort that can easily make a claim for being one of the best rock albums of their respective years.

Make a bolder claim than that, suckers!

Third Place in my Book

Top three favorite book? Definitely.

Microserfs, by Douglas Coupland, has made the case to enter into that arena, coming right in under Ender's Game and the as-yet discussed White Teeth, by Zadie Smith.

I think what makes this book so great for me is the style. Written as journal entries, this was blogging before it got popular (the book was published in 1995). Our knowledge about everything comes from the narrator, and everything therefore comes from his perspective. Clearly, Coupland is not the first person to use this narrative-style, but I think he does so exceedingly well that it’s easy to forget that the narrator is also a character in the book. If it wasn’t for him quoting other people saying his name, you might think that this is an omniscient third-person, instead of someone experiencing everything and then telling you about it.

To me, this is a good thing. Why? you ask. Because remember, this is supposed to be someone’s journal. I use “I”, not my name, when doing these blogs. It at once keeps you in the story, and keeps the story personal.

Other good things:

* It is a journal. He talks about everything. And yet, his (Dan’s, the protagonist) thoughts are really interesting. If he hasn’t had a grand insight, someone else around him did. In a way, this is how other people wished they could blog. It helps Coupland that he can make the stuff up. Because, in the end, it is also a story, and a story that has climax and resolution and is therefore satisfying. I don’t feel like this story in any way lets me down. The pieces are presented, and in the end, they fit together to form a great picture.

* It’s a fascinating look at both 90’s tech culture and culture as a whole. As the title implies, the main characters all start off working for Microsoft. So throughout you get an in-depth look at the corporate culture of that company, and then of Silicon Valley and it’s plethora of companies. Dress, speech, products, social interactions: Coupland inundates you with details that somehow seem fascinating. Coupland is writing for my age group (I’m a little too young), but at the same time I still grew up during all the changes he writes about, and so I can easily connect. Throughout the book, all the characters philosophize about various segments of life, and although you might think: Who actually has conversations like these all the time, but then Coupland is careful to remind you that these people are, in fact, highly intelligent/creative people. So nothing they say is really out of character.

* The product they are designing is so cool, that I wish it was real and that I was playing with it right now. Essentially a digital Legos program (Legos feature quite prominently in the story), it just seems like the kind of computer game I would have played when I was younger and would try to play now if I could find a version that worked on today’s computers. I am a Legos nerd (check this out: http://www.mocpages.com/), so this only helped urge my fascination with this book. The fact that there are Legos on the cover is one of the reasons I bought the book in the first place (Because, as people, it is clear that we do judge books by their covers. You have to. At some point, the only way you can know if you want to read something or not is to let it past that first, sometimes crucial, litmus test: what does the cover do for me?)

(By the way, for some reason Microsoft Word recognizes "Lego," but not "Legos." Is there a plural to "Lego" that I am as yet unaware? Should it just be "bricks" and "beams" and such? The first person to give me a satisfactory answer at eyeoflondon@hotmail.com wins a prize).

One insight that the book brings up is that Starbucks has apparently found a way to keep water liquid above 212 degrees Fahrenheit. Now, I don’t drink coffee, but I do occasionally stop in there for hot chocolate or tea, and I am convinced this is true. (Remember, this is written in 1995, so at the time this idea was probably very insightful).

Overall, I completely recommend this book for anyone ages 25 to 40. If it does not awaken something inside of you, then you either didn’t have a very creative childhood or you are completely dead inside.

Which makes me (modestly) wonder why you’re reading my blog in the first place.

I’m also curious to know how many people read the book and then try to start their own sub-conscious file (as Dan does – again, read the book).

Enjoy.