Archive for the 'Literature & Writing' Category

Wednesday 14 November 2007

Flow

By Gonzo | Literature & Writing ~ Music & Noise

excerpt:

I’m a few chapters into Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience, and while I continue to doubt that the credited author - Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi - is an actual person, for, surely, no real person could have such a thoroughly unpronounceable name, I am finding it a fascinating read.
Coincidentally, or perhaps not, I was just over [...]

more Gonzo | more Literature & Writing ∞ Music & Noise

Thursday 12 April 2007

R.I.P. Kurt Vonnegut

By Gonzo | Literature & Writing ~ Obits & Memorials

excerpt:

I tell you, we are here on Earth to fart around, and don’t let anybody tell you different.
–Kurt Vonnegut, November 11, 1922 to April 11, 2007
I tell you, Transcendental Floss simply wouldn’t exist if it weren’t for Kurt Vonnegut. Sure I had other influences, but it was, in this order, Cat’s Cradle, Slaughterhouse-Five, and [...]

more Gonzo | more Literature & Writing ∞ Obits & Memorials

Saturday 27 January 2007

good golly

By spaceneedl | Literature & Writing ~ News and Talk

excerpt:

molly ivins is a brilliant, acerbic, funny writer.
have you ever noticed that right-wing writers aren’t funny? most of them don’t even try to be, and those who do just come off sounding lame.
ivins has gamely skewered the bush administration throughout its epic ineptitude, and there have been many times i’ve thought, “i wish i’d written [...]

more spaceneedl | more Literature & Writing ∞ News and Talk

Saturday 11 November 2006

Floss Aid Updated

By flossblog | Film & Movies ~ Literature & Writing ~ Music & Noise

excerpt:

One of the chain reactions of the Democrats taking back control of Congress in this recent midterm election is that our crack team of Cerebral Hygienists has been inspired. Ever since, they have been hard at work in the Transcendental Floss labs, researching and developing their latest Floss Aid recommendations, appearing now in our [...]

more flossblog | more Film & Movies ∞ Literature & Writing ∞ Music & Noise

Tuesday 05 September 2006

Think about “The Plot”

By ejohnlove | Literature & Writing ~ Obits & Memorials ~ Pulpits & Soapboxes

excerpt:

In his last work, Will Eisner, the master comic book storyteller and key influencer on the development of the graphic novel format, lays out a carefully researched history of the fraud of a document known as “The Protocols of the Elders of Zion”.

more ejohnlove | more Literature & Writing ∞ Obits & Memorials ∞ Pulpits & Soapboxes

FlossQuotes

And where we are met with cynicism and doubt and fear and those who tell us that we can't, we will respond with that timeless creed that sums up the spirit of the American people in three simple words — yes, we can.
– Barack Obama

Sharon Jones & The Dap-Kings - Naturally
If anyone's been paying attention, I listen to a wide variety of music, only a fraction of which I've reviewed here at Transcendental Floss. I tend to go through phases when I'll be stuck on a particular artist or genre, really immersing in it for a few weeks at a time, and what I find so interesting and exciting is that during each phase I have this experience where I feel like there's no better music than what I'm listening to right then and there. Well, I've just discovered Sharon Jones & The Dap-Kings and I can say with complete confidence that this is the best music I have ever heard. Seriously, this is magical stuff. Brooklyn, New York's Daptones Records have managed to produce record after record of fine R&B/soul/funk music using vintage musical equipment and analog recording techniques in the ultimate homage to the legendary Motown and Stax catalogs. The Dap-Kings, serving as the Daptone house band, are the modern day equivalent of Stax's Booker T & The MGs, laying down the tastiest grooves, sweetest guitar riffs, and of course the horns that make this music so electrifying. Sharon Jones is the quintessential soul singer, able to capture moments of tenderness just as easily as moments of gritty passion. Enjoy!
— Gonzo

Van Morrison - His Band & The Street Choir
As much as I love the 1991 movie The Commitments, Van Morrison, some 40 years earlier, had already proven that the Irish have plenty of soul. Perhaps my favorite album of his, His Band & The Street Choir could easily be said to share some DNA with the music of Sharon Jones & The Dap-Kings (soulful crooning, grooves, horns, etc.), yet with a decidedly unique twist that is all Van The Man. This music simply makes me feel good on a deep, deep level. What's so great about Van Morrison is that he's covered such a variety of genres, from soul to blues to country to jazz to celtic to a kind of meditative, almost new age sound that is all his own, and so as I move from phase to phase of musical immersion he's very often right there with me.
— Gonzo

Be Kind Rewind
I was not prepared to love this movie nearly as much as I did. While I've liked a lot of Jack Black's work, he's a guy with limited range who I can easily see wearing out his schtick. However, teamed with a very sweet and funny turn by Mos Def, an equally sweet Danny Glover, and under the direction of the mad genius of Michel Gondry (Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, The Science of Sleep), Black's occasionally formulaic performance does nothing to keep this film from achieving success as a comedy and a bittersweet slice of life in Passaic, New Jersey. I was surprised over and over again how Gondry unapologetically went sentimental, eschewing so much of the cynicism that passes as gritty realism these days, which is music to my unapoligetically sentimental ears. I laughed. I cried. I learned that Mos Def is by far the best artist to crossover from music to acting that I've seen in a long, long time.
— Gonzo

Franny & Zooey - J.D. Salinger
I work at a university where I supervise a team of student employees. One employee, in painfully embarrassing hindsight, reminds me an awful lot of me, but before this hindsight came into focus he was a big, fat pain in my ass. Relentlessly sarcastic and arrogant, yet brilliant, this guy pushed my patience to the limit. Then, one day, I saw him sitting under a tree on campus reading Franny & Zooey and it hit me like a lightning bolt. I know this kid. I WAS this kid. So, I stopped to talk to him about the book and about Salinger in general. He'd read The Catcher in the Rye first, then moved on to Nine Stories, which, with the story A Perfect Day For Bananafish, introduces the reader to the inimitable Glass family. Franny & Zooey, then, becomes the natural next choice, with Raise High The Roofbeam, Carpenter & Seymour: An Introduction to follow, and this was exactly the same sequence that I followed 20+ years earlier. Ever since, while we're not buddy-buddy, there's been a new-found understanding between us, a sense that I'd been his shoes, that we shared some interests. Oh, and I went back and re-read Catcher, Nine Stories, and am currently falling in love all over again with Franny & Zooey.
— Gonzo

Lick your chops and chip through the nuggets of past Floss Aid recommendations.
— floss aid

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Archive for the 'Literature & Writing' Category

Wednesday 14 November 2007

Flow

Thursday 12 April 2007

R.I.P. Kurt Vonnegut

Saturday 27 January 2007

good golly

Saturday 11 November 2006

Floss Aid Updated

Tuesday 05 September 2006

Think about “The Plot”

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