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July 27, 2012
Shorties (The Best Bronte Novels, Ryan Adams Albums Ranked from Worst to Best, and more)
Juliet Barker, author of The Brontes: Wild Genius on the Moors: The Story of a Literary Family, ranks the Bronte sisters' novels at Publishers Weekly,
Stereogum ranks Ryan Adams' albums from worst to best.
The Quietus interviews former Stereolab singer Laetitia Sadier about her new album, Silencio.
Guardian readers recommend songs about running.
Browbeat suggests entry points to Blur's discography, along with a streaming Spotify playlist.
Ben Gibbard wrote a song, "Ichiro's Theme," to honor baseball player Ichiro Suzuki.
The Guardian profiles author Tana French.
"The thing about being a mystery writer, what marks a mystery writer out from a chick lit author or historical fiction writer, is that you always find a mystery in every situation."
The Humble Music Bundle is a collection of six albums available on a "pay what you want" model, with all proceeds going to charity.
Claire Zulkey interviews author Chad Harbach about his novel The Art of Fielding.
It’s interesting because while the book is about baseball, it’s also not. My dad was the one who got me to read it, but when I tell my friends that, they’re very impressed by him for being so open-minded about championing a book that also has this gay love story in it.
That's one reason why before the book came out, I was pretty well convinced that nobody was going to buy it because you have these two potential audiences that could cancel each other out. The people who want the baseball book won’t want to read this gay romance and vice versa. The whole time I was writing it, I was like, "This is a bad strategy." I've heard from a lot of people who were drawn into it despite themselves and wouldn't have picked something up that had that storyline. I've also seen the opposite where people were like, "I thought this was a baseball book but instead it's a horrible sinful piece of trash."
The Guardian profiles the band Yeasayer.
The new album in question, their third, is called Fragrant World. If their debut, 2007's All Hour Cymbals, might unkindly be described as The Lion King soundtrack rewritten by apocalyptic hipsters, and if their second, Odd Blood, might have been their stab at incorporating a sleeker sense of pop into their art-rock – especially with the breakthrough single Ambling Alp – then Yeasayer's new album is their state-of-the-musical-union address.
The Gameological Society interviews Gene Yuen Yang about his graphic novel, Level Up.
JT Waldman talks to Haaretz about illustrating Harvey Pekar's last graphic novel, Not the Israel My Parents Promised Me.
Drowned in Sound interviews Belle and Sebastian's Stevie Jackson about his solo album, (I Can't Get No) Stevie Jackson.
The Guardian profiles author Nell Freudenberger, who explains the inspiration behind her novel The Newlyweds.
Deceptive Cadence pairs classical music pieces with beers.
Fresh Air interviews Christopher Beha about his debut novel Whatever Happened to Sophie Wilder.
The Guardian interviews Peter Gabriel about his Womad festival and mixing music with politics.
Win seven books (featured on this site's Book Notes series in the coming week) and a $100 Threadless gift certificate in this week's Largehearted Boy contest.
Amazon MP3
Amazon MP3
Also on sale at Amazon MP3 for $2.99: 25 "rock that goes to 11" albums.
Follow me on Twitter, Google+, Tumblr, Pinterest, Facebook, and Stumbleupon for links (updated throughout the day) that don't make the daily "Shorties" columns.
also at Largehearted Boy:
previous Shorties posts (daily news and links from the worlds of music, books, and pop culture)
100 Online Sources for Free and Legal Music Downloads
Atomic Books Comics Preview (the week's best new comics & graphic novels)
daily mp3 downloads
Largehearted Word (the week's best new books)
Try It Before You Buy It (mp3s and full album streams from this week's CD releases)
weekly music & DVD release lists
