THE USUAL SUSPECTS / STAFF PICKS, PIQUES, & PIX PICTS,

Books: Terra Nostra, Carlos Fuentes (translated from the Spanish by Margaret Sayers Peden), Introduction by Jorge Volpi, Afterwards by Milan Kundera, Dalkey Archive, 786 p, $15.95—Fuentes reclaims the legacy of Spain & of Latin America, with Christian & Indian god, kabala & Queztacoatl, prophet & pro teer, vying for spin control as civilizations die & are reborn. We move from millennial Paris to 18th C. Spain to pre-Cortéz Mexico to… millennial Paris. Philip the Second’s wife morphs into Queen Elizabeth, Celestina travels centuries, Don Juan & Don Quixote swap identities, Ludovico discovers Mexico & then  nds himself in Roman Palestine, & reappears with Celestina in mythic millennial 1999 Paris. As has been said, Terra Nostra isn’t so much a historical novel, as a novel against history; the echoes can be found in everything from Rushdie’s Satanic Verses to William Vollmann’s North American histories.

The Fortress of Solitude, Jonathan Lethem, Doubleday, 511 p, $26.00—If Jonathan Lethem doesn’t quite do for gentri cation, Brooklyn-style, what Pynchon did for conspiracies, he does come close. & with Dylan & Mingus, his two young protagonists, he takes on class & race relations; he evokes a time & place beautifully, observes its rites & argot & ergot, captures the angsts of adolescence, & bears witness to the birth of the terrible twos: hip-hop & punk culture. There’s an ebullience & verve, which brighten its ever darker corners.—rvb

Raymond Pettibon, Dennis Cooper, Robert Storr, Ulrich Loock, et al, Phaidon Press, 2001, 160 p, $34.95—This is a great sourcebook if you’re a fan of Pettibon’s drawings, often characterized by juxtapositions of comics-in uenced sketches with stream of consciousness prose & obscure texts by writers such as Henry James, Proust, or St. Augustine. In

Staff PicksPiquesPictsPix #4-5 1 1/22/04, 10:49 PM the pop imagination, Pettibon is probably best known for his album work for several Black Flag LPs & Sonic Youth’s Goo. Among other things, there is an interview by Dennis Cooper, a retrospective survey by Robert Storr & another essay by Ulrich Loock, who curated the artist’s  rst retrospective in 1995, focusing on Vavoom, a loudmouth cartoon character who appears frequently in Pettibon’s art. Oh, did I mention it also has tons of artwork reproductions? That should be your  rst reason to pick this book up!—Mike Rinaldo

My Flashlight Was Attacked by Bats, Marty Christensen, 115 pgs, Lorna Viken Books, $12.00—Marty Christensen is Portland’s greatest unknown poet, gifted with a highly concentrated form of lunacy; this modest little book represents a quarter-century of engagement. Not only does he write poetry as if he were Samuel Beckett grafted onto Richard Brautigan, but he gets the best line in Gus Van Sant’s  lm Mala Noche (Van Sant wrote an introduction to this collection). A sample of his poetry, “Homage to William James”: I walked out of my room today/& looking down at my shoe saw/that my shoestring was a snake//but being very late to work I/just tied it up in the usual way. No genius was ever so mad, nor should he go unread—cue the organ in, Professor. —Douglas Spangle

Music: David Bowie, Reality, ISO/Columbia—The Thin White Duke turns into Dorian Gray & enters another decade of solid work. Heathen was over-rated, but still a cold & ef cient rocker that got the job done, with a new band & canny covers of Neil Young, Black Francis & Legendary Stardust Cowboy songs. Reality is more relaxed, & the moods vary from amused to bemused to wistful & winsome—after giving him a free pass on his last album, the reviews have been very mixed for this one. If you’re a Bowie fan you’ll listen & decide for yourself; he’s brought his core band of Gabrels, Dorsey, & Garson back, & the songs are his strongest since Earthling or Outside. Again, it’s the covers you  rst notice. Jonathan Richmond’s Pablo Picasso (never got called an asshole), & ’s Try Some, Buy Some are sonic delights. Reality, Never Get Old, Fall Dog Bombs The Moon, and Bring Me The Disco King are current standouts, but I’ve only been listening a couple of weeks.

The Carla Bley Big Band, Looking for America, Watt31/ ECM—Carla Bley updates her European Tour 1977—the times demanded it. Someone once described her music as Kurt Weill Meets Ornette Coleman. & with players like Gary Valente, Lew Soloff, Andy Sheppard, Wolfgang Puschnig, & Steve Swallow, you’re in for a wild ride. On European Tour 1977 there was a twenty-minute suite, Spangled Banner Minor & Other Patriotic Songs, where Flags, King Korn, Deutschesland Über Alles, the

Staff PicksPiquesPictsPix #4-5 2 1/22/04, 10:49 PM Marseilles, Dixie, God Save The Queen, & The Internationale duke it out as if at a half-time football riot. That album was recorded during something called the Cold War; this one is, I think, a response to the current state of things. Song titles include The National Anthem (OG Can UC?, Flags, Whose Broad Stripes?, Anthem, Keep it Spangled), Step Mother, Fast Lane, Los Cocineros, Tijuana Traf c, Old MacDonald Had A Farm. I just wish they’d included a cover of I’m Afraid of Americans.

Britta Phillips & Dean Wareham, Sonic Souvenirs, Jetset—A remix album, taking six songs from Phillip’s & Wareham’s L’avventura,  ve reworked by Sonic Boom & a sixth by Tony Visconti. Call this a 3:00 A.M. remix album, a late night, early morning work with half-dreamy textures, lush vibes, keyboards, & raindrops (songs from L’avventura reworked by Sonic Boom & Tony Visconti), & Britta & Dean duet like Lee Hazlewood & Nancy Sinatra, Sonny & Cher, or Bowie & Marianne Faithfull. Beneath all the remix & production is a bittersweet album. My only complaint is that it’s only 30 minutes long; but everything on the album works, played sequentially, or with the CD player’s random button.

Quasi, Hot Shit!, Touch and Go—The John Steed & Emma Peel of indie rock return to chew gum or kick ass & they’re all out of gum. “I just came back here to say goodbye,” the latest offering from Steve Coomes & Janet Weiss begins. Clever bastards. This one’s more guitar-oriented & roots-bluesy than the usual baroque rococo a go-go, & there’s a great envoi to Bush & Co. on White Devil’s Dream. Steve & Janet play everything except cello & viola, handled by Brent Arnold & Ollie Glazer. Sam’s lyrics often split the difference between Robert Hunter & Edward Lear, with a dark sarcastic wit. Master & Dog is a terri c song, but Good Time Rock & Roll perhaps best sums things up: “You got your crocodile boots, I got my John the Conqueror root/We got beaver hats, purple spats, & a checkout time at noon.”—T. Warburton y Bajo

Various Artists, Hava Narghile: Middle Eastern Raga Rock Ala Turquie ‘66-’75, Dionysus Records BA1162 (PO Box 1975 Burbank, CA 91507)—I cut my teeth on Ankara, Turkey’s street scene in the late 60s, & a crustier, more dangerous locale could not be imagined. The music was great, though—mostly- competent Turkish & American bands combined with bad liquor, plentiful drugs & street- ghting. The styles on this collection range from Anatolian Surf (Siluetler’s “Lorke Lorke”) to a sort of bathetic Middle Eastern Emo (Erkin Koray’s “Anma Arkadas”) or the Pink Floydy “Agit” by Yabancilar. In all its glory, it sounds a lot better than I’d thought it would—if I’d

Staff PicksPiquesPictsPix #4-5 3 1/22/04, 10:49 PM thought about it at all at the time. It’s a boon that someone captured this fertile collision of Garage, Europop, Psychedelia & native Mideastern genres. I listen to this CD with grateful paroxysms of nostalgia. —Douglas Spangle

DVDs:

Fritz The Cat, Ralph Bakshi, MGM/UA Studios, DVD, 79 minutes, $19.98—The world of animated movies has undergone a revolution in the last decade, but adult-oriented animation is nothing new. On the raunchier side of the scale is Fritz The Cat, a veritable orgy of sex, drugs, & politically incorrect humor. Based (loosely) on the comix of R. Crumb, Fritz The Cat at times plays like an adolescent boy’s wet dream, but is also funny, shocking, & a surprisingly insightful look at America in the 1960’s. Fritz The Cat is not meant for kids (its original ad read, “He’s X-Rated And Animated”), & those easily offended by sex, drugs, & violence should stay away. (Then again, those easily offended by sex, drugs, & violence won’t read this magazine.) For everyone else, Fritz The Cat offers a little bit of everything; raunchy humor, social commentary, & an off-beat style that straddles the boundary between obscenity & inspiration.—Steve Tune

Dark Habits, Pedro Almodóvar, Wellspring, DVD, 115 minutes, $19.98—When singer & junkie Yolanda lies low to avoid dead boyfriend & drug problems, she  nds refuge in the Convent of Humble Redeemers. Meet the original Sister Act: Sister Rat writes porn, the Abbess is torn between Yolanda & heroin, Sister Manure is classic acid-damage, & Sister Sin (Carmen Maura) raises tigers & wrestles them. Add to that a production of My Fair Lady. nearly come to blows over whether to use Cecil Beaton’s designs. Blasphemous and reverent, leave it to Almodóvar to come up with the best screwball comedy since Bringing Up Baby.

Images, Robert Altman, MGM/UA Studios, DVD, 101 minutes, $19.98—One of Altman’s more puzzling & intriguing 1970s movies features Susannah York as a schizoid writer of children’s books who is haunted & vexed by ghosts of lovers, & even her husband, & makes plans to kill them. Or does she? Wind chimes, windows, eyeglasses, mirrors, lenses, binoculars, cameras, & carving knives feature prominently. Vilmos Zsigmond’s camerawork manages to be lucid and hallucinogenic, without tricks or gimmicks; Stomu Yamashta & John Williams dream a minimalist-ambient score utilizing wind chimes, gongs, glass harps, & classical guitar.

Naked Lunch, David Cronenberg, Criterion, DVD, 115 minutes, + bonus materials, $39.95—Peter Weller plays

Staff PicksPiquesPictsPix #4-5 4 1/22/04, 10:49 PM Burroughs alter ego, Bill Lee, & Judy Davis plays his wife, killed in a game of William Tell, only to be brought back to life in the  ctional Interzone & meet a stranger fate. Sinister Dr. Benway is played by Roy Scheider, & Ian Holm is as a thinly-veiled Paul Bowles. Lee seeks asylum in Interzone, an odd totalitarian junkie gulag, & becomes a spy, writing reports with insect typewriters who literally talk out of their asses & hatch conspiracies, & comes to terms with his homosexuality while trying to cope with the Nova Conspiracy. Cronenberg combines plot threads from the novel with corresponding scenes from Burroughs’ life to form a sort of meta-Burroughs movie—not unlike what the makers of the recent American Splendor did with their source material.

Apu Trilogy: , Aparajito, ; , Columbia Tristar, DVD, 113, 113, & 106 minutes, $29.95 each—If you only know Apu from The Simpsons, then you’re in for a treat. This trilogy is Dickensian in its scope & moods, following a family through three generations, from village to city, & from innocence to bitterness to a hard-earned wisdom. & boy does shite happen, both good shite & bad, & lots of it—yet things never get melodramatic. The smallest of acts become matters of life & death. & the score on all three really ragas.

Sunday Bloody Sunday, John Schlesinger, MGM/UA Studios, DVD, 110 minutes, $19.98—Man & Woman love Boy, who loves them each in his own fashion, but loves his career more, so Boy pisses off to America, leaving Man & Woman in sleepy London-town. This Brief Encounter for the 1970s has aged very well, especially since the gay angle was handled so matter-of-factly that people then, & now, get over the mechanics & get on with the story. Penelope Gilliatt, the other New Yorker critic, wrote the script, & Schlesinger kept his tricky editing to a minimum. Peter Finch & Glenda Jackson are heartbreaking. Murray Head (the original Judas in Jesus Christ Superstar) disappeared after this impressive debut. The drama is that very English drama of people getting on with it, moving on, living their lives, getting over it. Results can be pinched & reactionary, or bracing & refreshing.—T. Warburton y Bajo

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