free stuff

[jfb]

Here are some CDs:

Bowery Electric, Vertigo. Like electronica remixes of My Bloody Valentine.
Nicholas Payton, Payton's Place. Young Lion jazz. Promo copy.
Sandy Denny and the Strawbs, s/t. Folk-rock.
Björk, Homogenic. Uh, weird electronic pop music? You know, Björk.
Allette Brooks, Silicon Valley Rebel. Bay Area (surprise) singer-songwriter. Environment, love songs, modern life.
Sharon Bousquet, Mirror, Mirror. Another one. Rootsier.
Gary Burton and Makoto Ozone, Virtuosi. Vibraphone and piano jazz arrangements of classical pieces.
Ella Fitzgerald Sings the George and Ira Gershwin Song Book. Arrangements by Nelson Riddle.
Kenny Barron, Wanton Spirit. Great pianist, with Roy Haynes and Charlie Haden.
Pet Shop Boys, Disco 2. Remixes, mostly from Very and Behavior, plus "Absolutely Fabulous".
Pet Shop Boys, Bilingual. I like "A Red Letter Day" a lot, and "Discoteca" and "Single" are catchy.
Pet Shop Boys, Somewhere. I get it, but taking on Leonard Bernstein was probably unwise. Also "A Red Letter Day" again and two bonus tracks.
Pet Shop Boys, Nightlife. Their first album that didn't really want you to dance.
Pet Shop Boys, Release. How did they make a record so dreary? If this is growing up, I hope I never do.
Michael Penn, MP4: Days Since a Lost Time Accident. More Michael Penn.
Arto Lindsay, Prize. Off-kilter electronica-ish obscure samba pop.
The Be Good Tanyas, Chinatown. Old-timey.
Billy Barber, Shades of Gray. Solo piano.
Pierre Favre, Window Steps. ECM jazz. With Kenny Wheeler and Steve Swallow.
Ponga, s/t. Bobby Previte, Wayne Horvitz, Dave Palmer, Skerik; improvisation, with turntables.

I'm not really selling the Pet Shop Boys, huh?

Here are some books I've read recently, or decided not to:

Philip K. Dick, The Variable Man. Pulp SF, including "The Minority Report".
Geoff Dyer, Yoga for People Who Can't Be Bothered to Do It. Dyer is gifted, but his book on travel seems mostly to be about getting high in exotic places.
Edward Hirsch, How to Read a Poem. Made me want to write poems. That's a recommendation.
I bought the first issue of The Believer in Boston, I think, because it looked interesting, but I couldn't finish the long first article about book reviews, and it took me until now to realize I could just skip it. The rest of it is pretty good, including Jim Shepard on Badlands and machismo, Matthew Derby on Interpol and the '80s, and Salman Rushdie and Terry Gilliam in conversation.

Here are some books I've kept for a long time:

Jane Mendelsohn, Innocence. "A modern gothic coming-of-age story," says the dust jacket. I like the writing.
Joan Didion, Slouching Toward Bethlehem. Classc essays from the '60s.
Raymond Carver, Cathedral. To quote marm0t: "Lots of fidgeting with cigarettes and car keys and engaging acquaintances in seemingly banal conversations with heartbreakingly profound undertones."
Nabokov, Lolita. Well, you know. A book about America.
Tom Stoppard, Rosencrantz & Guildenstern Are Dead. I can't help feeling I've read something like this before.
Harold Bloom and David Rosenberg, The Book of J. Bloom argues that one primary author of Genesis, Exodus, and Numbers was a supreme ironist, and also a woman. But what's really great is Rosenberg's beautiful translation.
Geoff Dyer, But Beautiful. This is why I say he's gifted. One of maybe two good books about jazz.
The WPA Guide to Massachusetts. New-Deal-funded book about the state circa 1937. Somewhat dated, but very well written.
The WPA Guide to New York City. Likewise.
Walter Murch, In the Blink of an Eye. The great film editor, on editing. Thoughtful, lucid, well observed.
Sidney Lumet, Making Movies. One of the better books on filmmaking by a practitioner.
Jon Boorstin, The Hollywood Eye. What can I say? Another good one.
McSweeney's #3. I don't remember any of it, but, you know, stuff Dave Eggers likes.
Colson Whitehead, The Colossus of New York. Short essays on the city he loves. Notable for its POV, which flits from person to person in the crowded streets.
Jeffrey Eugenides, The Virgin Suicides. Dreamlike, or maybe I'm thinking of the movie, but I liked this a lot too. Another unusual POV (first-person plural).
Douglas Coupland, Generation X. Clever people adrift. Social observations abound.
Douglas Coupland, Microserfs. Ditto, in the software industry.
Mary Daly, Gyn/Ecology: The Metaethics of Radical Feminism. As you'd expect, a light-hearted romp.
Kathleen Norris, Dakota: A Spiritual Geography. Living on the Great Plains.
James McCain, Double Indemnity. Noir.
Ian Shoales, Not Wet Yet. Humorous social commentary, 1982-1996.
Rebecca Goldstein, Strange Attractors. Intellectuals in love and in other kinds of passion. "Pleasure, for the reader as well as the protagonists, is chiefly cerebral"--that's a diss from Publisher's Weekly. I liked it a lot.

This is probably about it for the giveaways, at least for now. The books are pretty much gone, and I'm sure there are still plenty of CDs I don't need, but it's time to stop listening and deciding, and start packing and shipping.

Comments

[morganology.livejournal.com]

Virgin Suicides and Homogenic. (Please.) :)

[jfb.livejournal.com]

Sure thing. I may be coming through LA next week; depending on timing, I could drop them off in person.

[morganology.livejournal.com]

Let me know when, because I've been dying to try http://www.leafcuisine.com/ and we could check it out together. It would be lovely to see you!

[jfb.livejournal.com]

My reactions to Leaf Cuisine, in chronologial order: "Sounds flaky" (live foods?); "sounds good" (mock salmon nori rolls!); "sounds cheap" (compared to Real Food Daily, my last LA vegetarian experience). It's a deal.

Still no ETA.

I have another Philip Glass CD, the 1998 re-recording of Koyaanisqatsi. Want it?

[morganology.livejournal.com]

Absolutely. I am a fan of everything and anything Philip Glass.

P.S. for all of this free stuff, I am undoubtedly going to treat you to Leaf Cuisine.

[jfb.livejournal.com]

In that case, DOUBLE mock salmon nori rolls!

Er, I mean, hey, thanks!

[greyaenigma.livejournal.com]

Variable Man, McSweeney's, Slouching Towards Bethlehem, Generation X, Lolita, and MP4, please.

[jfb.livejournal.com]

The Didion's going to a local, and I think I gave Smarry MP4. Otherwise yes.

[dougo.livejournal.com]

I totally want that Bowery Electric. I'm not sure why I don't already have it.

I'm also not sure why I've never actually read any Philip K. Dick. If that collection is a good place to start, maybe you'll pity me and let me have it instead of greyaenigma. On the other hand, I already have a huge pile of books I haven't read yet.

[greyaenigma.livejournal.com]

I've claimed enough stuff that Doug can have the PKD. I've got various collections of his anyway (PKD's, not Doug's) so there might have been some redundancy there.

[jfb.livejournal.com]

I'm not sure, but actually I think it's a pretty lousy place to start. All I read was the story Minority Report was based on, and, well, it was pretty clunky. So I'll probably send it to Glenn just to protect you from a bad first PKD experience.

[tombking.livejournal.com]

Pet Shop Boys please.

[jfb.livejournal.com]

Clever. You get the PSB that greyaenigma and juliansinger didn't ask for.

[juliansinger.livejournal.com]

I think I have Dakota. If no one else wants it, though, I'll take it.

I'd quite like the Daly because I gave my copy away in a fit of irritation.

Also, Boorstin, Munch, and Lumet, and the WPA Guides. (The WPA Guides, I really quite want. If other people want the Boorstin, Munch, and Lumet, they can have them.)

And if no one else wants the Fitzgerald and the first two of the Pet Shop Boys you list, I'll take 'em.

I'll come back later and look and see if there's more books I want that other people haven't claimed.

Also, I got the comics & etc. Thanks! (There wasn't any Tom Tomorrow in it. Just FYI.)

[jfb.livejournal.com]

Solomonically, I'm giving the NYC guide to someone who lives in NYC, and the Massachusetts guide to you. The Fitzgerald goes to Seth. I think you get the rest of your requests, although if you already have Dakota I'd rather not bother shipping it.

It's been surprising to me that of all the people who've requested stuff, I've only had one taker for the movie books. They're good books, too!

[juliansinger.livejournal.com]

That's cool. I have some Fitzgerald already. And your Solomonesque wisdom is, well, sensible. And, having looked more carefully, I do have Dakota.

Though now that the dust has settled, I don't think anyone took the Goldstein, so can I defeat your good shipping intentions and take that? It sounds like you enjoyed it. (I'd be perfectly willing not to have it, if the shipping gets annoying, though.)

[jfb.livejournal.com]

Your timing is great--I just came into this room to get a box to ship your stuff in. There's more than enough room for Strange Attractors, and I hope you enjoy it too.

You requested some Pet Shop Boys, right? Do you want Behavior, too?

[juliansinger.livejournal.com]

Heh. If you hadn't already shipped it, I would have said yes, but as it is, I'll say no. 'Cause I'm pragmatic like that.

Thanks again-- this's been fun. If I ever, like, see you again, I'll have to stake you to some food item or other. (Being as I don't buy people drinks.)

[artname.livejournal.com]

Strawbs, please
Oh please please! How to read a Poem!
Didion, but it'll be shelfware for me, probably, too. Something I should read but ..

[jfb.livejournal.com]

The concept of having Slouching Toward Bethlehem and not reading it is completely foreign to me.

[rollerboogie.livejournal.com]

Whoa, can I totally rock that WPA guide to NY?

And if the Stoppard isn't gone, I'll eat that too. Mmm, Stoppard.

[jfb.livejournal.com]

Yes, you can rock it.

If you like, I can also throw in Stoppard's Jumpers. (I already gave Travesties to a local.) And probably David Ives's All in the Timing, while we're in the clever/funny/linguistic/philosophical theater section, although I'd have to finish rereading it first.

[rollerboogie.livejournal.com]

That sounds wonderful. I haven't read Jumpers, and I'm really looking forward to the Ives plays.

Those cookbooks arrived last week and Ted totally freaked over the prospect of home-cooked Indian food. Mission accomplished. Time for dahl.

[jfb.livejournal.com]

Hooray! If I can help freak out just one person, I feel like I've done my job.

I'll send the plays along as soon as I finish the Ives.

[blackbriar.livejournal.com]

I'd love the Ella Fitzgerald, and the Book of J. (I haven't got enough packages at the new house!)

[jfb.livejournal.com]

Anything I can do to help....

I'm glad someone requested The Book of J, I really like it.

[blackbriar.livejournal.com]

If you want to send me stuff, go for it.

Seth I. Rich
345 Harrison Avenue
Elkins Park, PA 19027

[pobig.livejournal.com]

I'll take the Michael Penn, and I can make your going away thing after all!

[jfb.livejournal.com]

Did I bring MP4 last night? (I'm not home so I can't check the shelf.) If not, I can still get it to you.

[pobig.livejournal.com]

It looks like you didn't. I can get it from you at the Palo Alto show if that's convenient.

[jfb.livejournal.com]

Er, I forgot again. At this point I think I'm just going to add it to the batch I'm taking to Goodwill. Sorry about that.

[pobig.livejournal.com]

No worries. I already have plenty of others from you!