You're Invited

Who: tina f. Where: Chicago When: tonight What: my pity-party

::sob::

It looks like I am most likely going to miss tonight's Hold Steady show because of crazy-roommate drama and having to move and having to do it tonight. SUCKS. I sold my tickets to a co-worker and I doubt the show will sell out - but I also doubt it will be possible for me to make it there.

Everyone can feel sorry for me now.

In Best of 2005 news: Lou Barlow's EMOH was an album that has snuck back into my heavy rotation that may just make it on the Top Ten list yet. I got the new Wolf Parade last week and the reviews I've read got it right: at first it does sound a bit like a Modest Mouse ripoff (it was produced by Isaac Brock) but further listens reveal a unique sound, great lyrics and a beginning-to-end good album. Not sure it's Top Ten material though.

Two-second album reviews:

M. Ward Transistor Radio: love it

Robbie Fulks Georgia Hard: annoyed now

Many sympathies, Tina. Feel free to vent if you need to.

It looks like I am most likely going to miss tonight's Hold Steady show

Well supposedly they're going to be on an upcoming episode of Lost if that's any consolation...(sorry about the roommate drama! I hope you have smooth housing sailing from here on out.)

Many sympathies, Tina. Feel free to vent if you need to.

Aww - it's fine. What's life without a little crazy-roommate-grows-intense-cat-fear and kicks-you-out drama? Missing a show because I was being swept away to a romantic Italian villa by some rich guy would be better though.

For a second I thought I had gone to the Onion instead - but was it yesterday that I posted the thing about five new Ryan Adams' albums? [link]

I guess that's not a prediction you're likely to ever be wrong about though. They also mention a new Neko Case album coming soon. Woot!

ETA:

sorry about the roommate drama! I hope you have smooth housing sailing from here on out.

Thanks. I heard about the Lost thing, too. Craxy!

I heard about the Lost thing, too. Craxy!

so funny! Evidently they have a friend on the writing staff or something.

I had a roommate who got a girlfriend with a cat phobia and she was terrified of my tiny and awesome (very lamented now). As much as I tried to be symbathetic about her having an actual fear she couldn't control I just couldn't help but think it was a ploy on her part to get attention for herself. Fortunately she had no say over what happened in our household so I didn't have to move or get rid of the cat or anything. When she came over she'd literally walk down the hall hiding behind her boyfriend and they'd hole up in his room.

tina - that so sucks!

But at least your living situation will be resolved.

erika sent me a review of Peter Guralnick's new bio of Sam Cooke. Sam Cooke was a badass:

The horrors and humiliations of the road might have been enough to impress themselves on anyone. Cooke's upbringing ensured they did. Cooke was the son of a conservative preacher, so it might be supposed that Cooke -- who gave up sacred music for secular, who loved his women, who enjoyed all the advantages that money and being a truly beautiful-looking man brought him -- was a rebel. In truth, he took his father's advice to heart. "Respect your elders, respect authority," Guralnick recounts it. "But if you were in the right, don't back down for anyone, not the police, not the white man, not anyone." It's possible that what protected Cooke in some confrontations was the astonishment he provoked in others by being a black man who did not back down. Guralnick tells a story about Cooke's running out of gas on tour in Memphis. Waiting for Charles to come back from the service station, Cooke was approached by a white cop who told him to move the car, to push it if he had to. "His name was Sam Cooke, and he didn't push cars," is what he told the cop, before finally saying, "You push the fucking car. You may not know who I am, but your wife does. Go home and ask your wife about me." The unmistakable sexual nature of that taunt makes you gasp, as does the fact that Cooke got away with it.

Wow, you hadn't seen that? Impressed with myself now. And may I say "Damn!" about that last quote(although we white folks don't quite make that word say as much as most black people do, ime. I'm sorry...don't have as many inflections) No wonder there are so many rumors about people deciding he had to, well, "get got." and, shall we say, inadequate investigation.

The Meter column in the Chicago Reader last week was on Guralnick's exhaustive research for the Cooke bio... just a sec.

Ah. Here: [link]

Good luck, Tina. Crazy roommates are really stressful. Home is usually a refuge, but when you live with a loon you dread going home - an untenable situation.

I printed out an article about the Guralnick Cooke bio but haven't read it yet. Sam Cooke may be my favorite singer (pick hit "Jesus Wash Away My Troubles" -- either the intro Jesus or the one near the end, right before "take me on to glory," could be his peak) so I'll probably read it but every Guralnick book I've read has underwhelmed me. "Sweet Soul Music," "Feel Like Going Home," "Lost Highway," the reaction was always the same: is that it? I love understated. I love measured tones and assessments. (Robert Palmer's "Deep Blues" is wonderful; Martin Williams is my favorite jazz critic.) His subjects include many of my favorites, but even as my expectations dropped with each volume he still managed to underwhelm me.