33 1/3 Series of books

Live And Shave... Party Out of Bounds mentions Stipe being in a couple of shortlived noise/art bands Stipe. Might be that.

B-52s would make a fantastic 33 1/3 on so many levels. Obviously the retro-futuristic trash aesthetic is fascinating, the queer sensibilities etc, but they're also hugely undervalued for their unusual musicality and sonics. If you want to get super geeky, there's an interesting Gearslut thread where his guitar tech talks about his unique approach to tuning: putting each guitar in a weird tuning, getting them at concert pitch and then tweaking them a touch sharp by ear.

sorry, Ricky Wilson's unique approach to tuning I mean.

There's a nice article in the new Pitchfork Review about being queer in Georgia and loving The B-52's.

Just the ticket, I'll check it out. Thanks!

I've never read anything that goes into very much detail on Byrne's dismissal from the Mesopotamia sessions. I always just chalked it up to differing personalities and working styles, and the old adage that if you can't say anything nice about someone... (xpost)

the one sort of expanded piece on it I saw vaguely alluded to 'differences', but as for the sessions with Byrne, they remixed all his stuff and used the other handful on Whammy!.
They didn't throw him under the bus but it wasn't too hard to read between the lines.

Some more early B-52s stories from one of their pals

Yeah, that's a wonderful reminiscence.

I'm getting a 403 forbidden page for that link...

http://pitchfork.com/features/articles/9676-the-33-best-33-13-books/

maybe I'm the only one but I thought the one on Born in the USA was terrific. I think a lot about things I read in that book every time I listen to that album now.

Still need to read that one. The volume on Dangerous is the one I missed the most from the list, though I have to wonder if the writer's feelings towards the albums in question had a lot to do with his selections; the one on Loveless, for example, I thought was fine but hardly revelatory.

just an update to say that thanks to recommendations here i got franklin bruno's volume on 'armed forces.' it's by far the best one of these i've read and i came away thinking i had learned something and that bruno is very sensitive to the right things: nuances of arrangement and lyric, interaction of elvis costello's public profile and his music, etc. that said, the organization of the book--pretty much an "alphabetical," but really more or less random, assemblage of mini-essays--was a bit of a cop-out. i thought t hat bruno had a few threads in there that would have made really excellent, linear arguments that would have been much better served by a traditional structure that provided some context, walked through the album's production and discussed the songs one by one, then talked about relevant subsequent developments, then some kind of summary. maybe that's a little square of me, but it seemed like bruno had so many great observations but failed to develop a structure that wouldl show them off to best advantage.

i'm a nonlinear thinker and i often get a lot out of nonlinear writing (and franklin bruno is just awesome to start with).

i think writers have to make a lot of tough decisions in doing a project like this, where there are space constraints and no real compensation for all the extra work that would go into chasing those more interesting tangents.

i just finished the Tusk one and it sucks so bad i want to throw it away

i'm a nonlinear thinker and i often get a lot out of nonlinear writing (and franklin bruno is just awesome to start with).

― A Smedley Adoption (get bent), Wednesday, July 1, 2015 3:08 PM (20 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

i'm not sure what it means to say someone is a "non-linear" or "linear" thinker (don't we all think more or less the same way, broadly speaking?) but in any case, i wasn't making a general claim about the efficacy of non-linear writing, just that i thought /in this particular instance/ his points would have come through with more force and clarity had he hammered them into a more traditional argumentative structure.

Linear thinkers are often very logical and cite information that they have found useful in the past to solve problems. Because of this approach to the world, linear thinkers often excel in the fields of mathematics, accounting and other technical fields. A linear thinker will likely prefer consistency and be predictable, which makes her excel in jobs that involve processes that are repeated regularly. You will be able to count on the linear thinker to get her work done when it is supposed to be done.

Nonlinear thinkers are creative, emotional thinkers. They will think of different ways to do things and come up with new, innovative ideas. Nonlinear thinkers can use their passion for originality to produce transformational products or services. If you run a business that's looking for fresh ideas that will break established patterns and challenge competitors, consider a nonlinear thinker.

i don't think "linear" vs. "non-linear" is the best way of characterizing the distinction you're making. it sounds like pop psychology to me. kind of like the whole "chinese think this way, europeans think that way" stuff that used to be really popular.

but this is an argument for another thread, i guess!

i'd like to say that i'm a linear thinker with over 8 hours of sleep, non-linear without :)

i think it's my way of saying that i get restless with the "and now we cover this, and now we cover this" rigidity of a lot of nonfiction, and the storytelling i relate to most doesn't always make its motives or dot-connecting that obvious. i respond to finding the answers in unconventional ways. but some people really like rigid conventional narratives!

i just finished the Tusk one and it sucks so bad i want to throw it away

― Cory Sklar, Wednesday, July 1, 2015 9:14 PM (2 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

otm

Someone gifted me the Beach Boys Smile one and it was so bad/useless I did throw it away! It didn't even deal with the music for some mysterious and thoroughly incomprehensible reason -- only the band's career up to that point!

I've been having trouble getting into the SAWII and Fear Of Music ones, even though I love these albums. Much as I admire and like the idea of the 'personal take' form of book, it only works well every so often.

Yeah, I can't imagine getting much out of the SAWII one. Seems like a really strange choice for the series.

cool idea, but some stuff is better off not being interpreted

I have not read the SAWII one yet but the author is an excellent writer and thinker IME

i just got a copy of Look! Listen! Vibrate! Smile! you ever see that thing? that thing is a whole lotta Smile action. put out by Last Gasp in the 90's.

it's really good. don't really see the point in a 33/3 book about Smile when so much has already been written about it in such vast detail.

The SAWII one is the only one I've felt like tossing out a window.

I know I'll know it, but I'm drawing a blank on what SAWII stands for.

http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51R45E26TVL.jpg

took me two googles, just add 33 third to the search

selected ambient works 2

i bought The Gray Album book, read maybe 40 pages. then put it aside. then accidentally ruined it while mopping and thus threw it away. no great loss.

about to finish Matthew LeMay's book on XO by Elliott Smith, I really enjoyed it. John D.'s Master of Reality novella was fantastic.

gonna order this surefire classic, will report back

http://333sound.com/2014/05/20/new-33-13-title-koji-kondos-super-mario-bros/

i just finished the Tusk one and it sucks so bad i want to throw it away

― Cory Sklar, Wednesday, July 1, 2015 9:14 PM (2 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

otm

― just sayin, Wednesday, July 1, 2015 5:48 PM (3 days ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

OTM X2 except I think that's the only one I started and didn't even finish.

I don't know about the rest of you, but I'm going to be pretty pissed off if the Shlomo Carlebach proposal doesn't get green lighted...

NEW THIS FALL FROM BLOOMSBURY'S 33 1/3 SERIES:
Out Sept. 24, 2015:
Miles Davis’ Bitches Brew by George Grella
Beat Happening’s Beat Happening by Bryan C. Parker

Out Oct. 22, 2015:
Metallica’s Metallica (The Black Album) by David Masciotra
Phish’s A Live One by Walter Holland

This book, structured in abecedarian fashion, breaks down the fundamental components that defined Beat Happening’s self- titled album. Organized in a light-hearted yet incisive format, each of the book’s chapters details a particular facet of the record—band members, historic shows, recording sessions, songs, and ideologies—parts reflecting the album as a whole. These alphabetic ingredients constitute a recipe book for feeding your creative spirit

pretty bummed that it's the black album that got the nod but hopefully the book covers the Cliff years too

just an update to say that thanks to recommendations here i got franklin bruno's volume on 'armed forces.' it's by far the best one of these i've read and i came away thinking i had learned something and that bruno is very sensitive to the right things: nuances of arrangement and lyric, interaction of elvis costello's public profile and his music, etc. that said, the organization of the book--pretty much an "alphabetical," but really more or less random, assemblage of mini-essays--was a bit of a cop-out. i thought t hat bruno had a few threads in there that would have made really excellent, linear arguments that would have been much better served by a traditional structure that provided some context, walked through the album's production and discussed the songs one by one, then talked about relevant subsequent developments, then some kind of summary. maybe that's a little square of me, but it seemed like bruno had so many great observations but failed to develop a structure that wouldl show them off to best advantage.

― wizzz! (amateurist), Wednesday, July 1, 2015 7:01 PM (1 month ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

mm i mean i think it's meant to be mirroring the object of enquiry? in that (as bruno states repeatedly iirc) costello doesn't really have a 'thesis' or an 'argument' , just a whole bunch of stuff going on. i think that book is p great tbh

this pitchfork article though:

At the time of its release in 2005, this title was the only book-length examination of Neutral Milk Hotel

I've really enjoyed several of these books, but as the catalog gets deeper I'm having a harder time distinguishing this series from a tall pile of MOJO.

http://333sound.com/2015/09/29/open-call-2015-the-shortlist/

Lulu (JM)-Lou Reed and Metallica

is this one of y'all

No Shlomo, no credibility. Seriously, it could be the best book in the entire series by miles.

One of the Pinkerton proposals on the list is from a writer who identifies as "non-binary transgender". Who knows if that has anything to do with the proposal, but it could make for an interesting perspective.