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In The Gasoline Age, F.M. Cornog (East River Pipe's lone member) has crafted a melancholy collection of haunting pop songs, many of which touch on automotive themes. From the simple overtures of "Shiny, Shiny Pimpmobile" to the driving, insistent "Down 42nd Street To The Light," Cornog has created a quiet, yet cohesive evocation of everyday life on the road.
You probably didn't even know his name. But chances are, you hate William Atherton's guts. Don't worry. It's perfectly natural. In film after film, he plays the smarmiest, weaseliest, oiliest guy on screen. But that's what makes him so much fun to watch. Though he began his career as a leading man (Sugarland Express, Day of the Locust), Atherton soon found a niche playing brainy bad guys and unctuous jerks (Ghostbusters, Die Hard). People might go to the movies to see big stars, but it's the character actors like Atherton who keep things interesting.
No sweeping history of Rome, The Twelve Caesars is a focused study of character and action, offering the outrageous lives of the first-century Roman emperors in all their racy detail. After reading about Tiberius's sexual improprieties, Caligula's orgies, and Nero's gross extravagances (not to mention innumerable vicious murders), you may view our current leaders' peccadillos in a whole new light.
[Editor's Note: This volume was translated by Robert Graves, who also wrote an excellent collection of Greek myths.]
Peter Sellers gives a nuanced and moving performance as a childlike gardener who inadvertently becomes a Washington insider. Jerzy Kosinski's adaptation of his own novel touches on themes of death and rebirth, the emptiness of political rhetoric, and the power of television. This sad and funny movie serves as a fitting coda to the career of its star, who would make just one more (sadly forgettable) film before his death the following year.
Full of June moons and crooned tunes, this three-disc set is an excellent introduction to one of the most prolific songwriters and lyricists of the twentieth century. Here are standards that everybody loves to swing to and sing along to, from Billie and Ella to Bing and Bird. The first disc, Blues in the Night, highlights Mercer's melancholy side, Trav'lin' Light takes a more upbeat path (don't miss Sarah Vaughan's luscious "Moon River"), and, finally, Too Marvelous for Words offers joyous instrumental confections that seem to melt in your mouth.
The poem "Lost in Translation" is a distillation of all the virtues of James Merrill's work: density, brilliance, and eloquence. It's about a lost translation, loss through translation, loss, and translation, but it's also about the loneliness of a little boy whose parents are going through a divorce. I've read this poem a dozen times, will probably read it a dozen more, and never tire of it. The verse was first published in Divine Comedies, which also contains "The Book of Ephraim," and while it's currently out of print, the collection is well worth tracking down.
Since the late '60s, Joey Skaggs has been perpetrating elaborate hoaxes on the media. Take 1976's "Cathouse for Dogs," where it was rumored pet owners could bring their dogs for sexual fulfillment. After the hysteria died down, Skaggs calmly revealed the hoax, much to the dismay of the many reporters who had conveniently neglected to confirm the basic facts of the story. More recent Skaggs stunts include "Fish Condos" and last year's "STOP BioPEEP," which described a virus that could addict consumers to any product. Whether you love him or hate him, the self-proclaimed "media activist" inevitably makes you stop, take notice, react, and maybe, just maybe, consider the world a little more clearly.
Ben Affleck and Matt Damon star as angels gone awry, heading for a close encounter with George Carlin as a New Jersey cardinal selling cut-rate Christianity. Add Chris Rock as an apostle named Rufus, Linda Fiorentino as a lapsed Catholic, and Bud Cort as God in disguise. It's Mall Rats meets Life of Brian meets Up in Smoke, but it's definitely not for devout Catholics or anyone who likes their humor measured, mature, or sanitized.
Previously unrecorded lyrics by Woody Guthrie are given new life (and new music) by British punk folkie Billy Bragg and American rockers Wilco. Though Guthrie himself was an advocate of musical simplicity, one can't help but imagine he'd be pleased with the textured full-band arrangements and the quieter solo tunes. In this disc and its follow-up, Volume 2, Bragg and Wilco honor Guthrie's talent and time without denying their own. (TR)
New York Press columnist Jim Knipfel has bad luck, bad eyesight, and a bad attitude. Thankfully, he's got a wry, direct writing style and the uncanny ability to simultaneously exude corrosive pessimism and basic likability. Slackjaw covers Knipfel's early years in Wisconsin, struggles in Philadelphia and New York, and his first grudging steps as a blind man.
