Captain Beefheart has passed away

Photo by Ebet Roberts.  Obit at NYTimes.

From the obit:

A bolt-from-the-blue collection of precise, careening, surrealist songs with clashing meters, brightly imagistic poetry and raw blues shouting, “Trout Mask Replica” had particular resonance with the punk and new wave generation to come a decade later, influencing bands like Devo, the Residents, Pere Ubu and the Fall. 

I would have heard Trout Mask Replica the first time in Steve Clark's bedroom, circa 1971 or 72 I think.  Steve and his brothers were big Mothers and Beefheart fans.  It leaves a mark.

“We see the moon, don’t we?  So it’s our eye. Animals see us, don’t they? So we’re their animals.” 

Frank Saliani's lazy bread

I developed a shtick (which really can be like developing a tic) this last summer about not baking bread anymore: because it's too easy in our neighborhood to buy great bread. (I'm thinking particularly of baguettes from Almandine, and sourdough baguettes sold at Grab, and my own bread sort of sucks compared to these.) 

I found myself doing the shtick at a pop up gallery Jonathan Fabricant had this past weekend with two other artists - Frank Saliani and Angela Earley.  What brought it on was Frank offering peanut butter sandwiches on bread he makes, and cookies he baked.  Frank described this particular bread he's making for the sandwiches.  He doesn't knead it.  He makes it wetter than you normally would.  He throws his leftover oatmeal into it.  He let's it rise all day, without punching it down, then just divides it in half and bakes it in baguette pans.

Even as Frank described this, I knew I was going to try it.  And over the weekend I did.  And it turns out to be the absolute killer bread for peanut butter sandwiches.  Super dense, small, consistent crumb, you can slice it real thin.  I had PB&Banana for lunch yesterday, and today it'll be PB&Apple.  Am retiring the shtick.

His safe return was much to the relief of his mother

 

Damgaard Holger/POLFOTO, via Associated Press
Palle Huld, in 1928, as a teenager about to see the world. 

Tintin!

And everything is going fine

We're just back from the premier of And Everything is Going Fine, @ MoMA, and let me urge you, friends, if you are anywhere near NYC when this film opens there in the coming week, GO SEE IT!  (Shameless promotion!  Amy Hobby!)  It is as though the man is in the room with you, from beginning to end.

Buck Howdy

Via everywhere else.

Hauling my reading from the heap

My reading's been all the heck over the place - marooned in the middle of four books at the same time now, and I needed something small and sharp to prod me out of it all.  Seems like Paul Auster's Sunset Park is just the thing.  Your mileage may vary.

City Council to debate idea of Walmart in NYC

Ug.  What's to debate?  Please, kids, write your council person.  Or go knock on their office door in your neighborhood.  It's that storefront on the avenue, currently nestled between the other active small business storefronts.  The one that'll be nestled between the empty storefronts if you don't go knockin' now.  Crain's article.

Why should I care? Who is my brother? What should I remember?

Shameless promotion: Human Rights and Memory.  Coauthored by our friend and neighbor, Danny.  Who's proper form of address is apparently Daniel Levy, Associate Professor of Sociology at Stony Brook University.

Happy Thanksgiving, everyone

And Lori and I have plenty to be thankful for.

Nice op-ed piece about Thanksgiving and eel (and eel and wasteful greed).  I don't think we've ever had eel on thanksgiving, but seeing this and having mentioned my grandparents here a couple of days ago I will just say that I have some pretty dramatic memories of eel thrashing around their kitchen.

Mary Margaret McBride interview of William Carlos Williams, Dec. 4, 1950

I couldn't possibly describe how important WCW was to my thinking and wanting 30 and 35 years ago. I've just listened for the first time to Mary Margaret McBride's radio interview of Williams, December 1950, collected with lots of other great WCW recordings at the UPenn PennSound site.

Best use for stick match. Ever.

Dude, don't light it.  NYPL Digital Collections. 

Image Title
:  Foreign body in eye.

Standard Reference
: Cartophilic reference books W62-79-b

Source
: [Cigarette cards.] / First aid

Location
: Stephen A. Schwarzman Building / George Arents Collection

Catalog Call Number
: Arents Cigarette Cards 865

Digital ID
: 1570037

Record ID
: 800370

Digital Item Published
: 4-26-2007; updated 6-25-2010

Gone to the country

We had a great time getting to hear Ray Allen talk about his book, then seeing & listening to John Cohen play with the Dustbusters, and then seeing Pete Stampfel's Ether Frolic mash up with the Dustbusters for the rest of the evening.  Thank you, Jalopy.

Hey, you say, Why don't you ever mention other folks in the Ether Frolic?  Hey, right, OK.  Jane Gilday.

Turkey

It was always a favorite story of mine as a kid to hear how my grandfather would walk the turkey home from the market in the Bronx, up to the apartment where my grandmother would kill it.

Reahabilitation Through the Arts

The Unofficial House Band of Sing Sing from Fly's Eye Films on Vimeo.

Lota and I attended a benefit last evening for Rehabilitation Through the Arts - mostly theater, but also some music, dance and poetry readings - and you would have had to have been a stone not to have been moved.  A few of the scenes and monologues written by prisoner members of RTA were just devastating. And lest you think this is a soft heart-on-the-sleeve sort of thing, New York State Commissioner of the Department of Correctional Services, Brian Fischer, attended and was honored for his support of RTA. 

Miwa Matreyek - myth and infrastructure

At TED.  Semihemisphere. I've become an instant fan.  Did you see Digitopia?  Kind of freaks me out a little - the disembodied hand thing.  (A la The Beast with Five Fingers, then The Hand...)

Working Families line - walk it

Missing

Pslope. Heartbreak.
Sent via thingy

The Kids Grow Up

I'm reposting this from Lori (Cheatle - hey, Goog, it's Lori Cheatle again, producer of fine feature length docs!)'s Hard Working Movies site.  Hoopla!

The Kids Grow Up opens in theaters

Posted on October 24, 2010

The Kids Grow Up will have its theatrical premiere this coming Friday, October 29th at the Angelika Film Center in New York City. The film will expand on November 12th to Los Angeles, and then will roll out to several cities after that. See today’s Arts & Leisure piece in the New York Times.

Mean Mom Bad Wife

This new shop in our neighborhood...

... reminded us of our old friend, Nicole Lucas Haimes, who is the Mean Mom Bad Wife.  Fo sho.  Way over yonder on the JP coast of the Internet.

Macinwi discovers the Avett Bros.

(@ NPR)