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April 7, 2007
Shorties
The New York Times posted the eleventh chapter of Michael Chabon's serialized novel, Gentlemen of the Road.
NPR's All Things Considered examines the ideas behind today's political thrillers, and asks authors David Ignatius and James Church about the books that inspired them.
David Ignatius: "The Spy Who Came in from the Cold is a perfect, small diamond. It established the gray color palette of the modern spy novel — the world where each side's professed ideals are compromised by the cynicism of its intelligence operations.
Singer-songwriter Patti Smith talks to the Scotsman.
"You know," she says, "I never wanted to be a rock'n'roll singer. I wanted to be an artist or a poet - that's what I studied, what I knew, and even now it's hard for me to say I'm a singer. I'm intermittently good as a singer, but I know I'm a good performer. Not a musician. So my self-esteem does not rely on my participation in rock'n'roll. I'm proud to have a connection with the evolution of rock'n'roll, but when I think of myself it's as a worker and writer and mother."
The Telegraph has dinner with CocoRosie's Casady sisters.
"We recently hired our mom to manage us," Sierra announces. "She sent us a message today to tell us she got us our first contact in the record industry, a producer."
"Rick Rubin," Bianca says, questioningly. "What records did he do?"
STLog offers outtakes from yesterday's interview with loquacious Long Winters frontman John Roderick.
"For instance, the Dave Matthews Band has a violin player, and so you have to assume that when they go into the studio to make a record, they feel some obligation to have some freaking violin on every track that they do, because otherwise the guy is just gonna be sitting backstage eating all the hospitality for half the set. We don’t have that problem – we don’t have a violin player so we don’t have to use a violin. By the same token, just because we don’t have a violin player doesn’t mean we won’t put a violin on something that feels like it needs.”
B-52's singer Kate Piersen talks to the Times-Herald Record about the documentary, Before the Music Dies.
“They talked a lot about branding in the movie and you’ve just never heard that term that much before. The band as a brand. It’s just a weird way that musicians have to be partly business-people now. You have to be aware of what’s going on, and I think that’s a good thing because before musicians were like, ‘Oh, we just wanna play music’ and let someone else take care of it. Musicians now, especially older musicians, realize we’ve gotta know what’s going on. A lot of it’s positive.”
Ireland's Event Guide interviews singer-songwriter-artist Tara Jane O'Neil.
Q: You're in the middle of writing a book at the moment. What it’s about?
A: It’s actually a book of images, 96 pages of drawings and paintings I’ve made in the last three years published by the folks who do Yeti magazine.
Q: How would you distinguish/differentiate the needs you have, which music and painting exercise for you?
A: Each activity exercises a totally different part of my being. Keeping up with them both maintains a balance. The more I do them both, the more I am beginning to see where they overlap. That discovery is still pretty abstract, but exciting.
Forbes Traveler lists ten famous literary bars.
The Guardian excerpts an essay on Hemingway from Mario Vargas Llosa's new book, Touchstones: Essays on Literature, Art and Politics.
WXPN is streaming a performance by singer-songwriter Jonatha Brooke.
Minnesota Public Radio has in-studio performances by Owen and Thomas Dybdahl.
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