February 8, 2023
Stephen Graham Jones's Playlist for His Novel "Don't Fear the Reaper"
In the Book Notes series, authors create and discuss a music playlist that relates in some way to their recently published book.
Previous contributors include Jesmyn Ward, Lauren Groff, Bret Easton Ellis, Celeste Ng, T.C. Boyle, Dana Spiotta, Amy Bloom, Aimee Bender, Roxane Gay, and many others.
Stephen Graham Jones impresses again with Don't Fear the Reaper, a novel as unsettling as it is smartly written.
Publishers Weekly wrote of the book:
"Jones expertly blends snappy graveyard humor with nail-biting suspense, and he gives his characters distinctive personalities that distinguish them from the underdeveloped body fodder common to most slasher scenarios. This characteristically clever gore-fest proves Jennifer to be a horror heroine worthy of many more adventures."
In his own words, here is Stephen Graham Jones's Book Notes music playlist for his novel Don't Fear the Reaper:
The first novel I wrote, I wrote it to a single song playing on repeat. Ten months of that song, and I never got tired of it (Marty Robbins, “El Paso”). This was 1998. Since then, I’ve learned about playlists, and make a new one for each novel. This one for Don’t Fear the Reaper is the first time I’ve re-used a playlist. Reason I haven’t done that before is that the same songs will land me in the same emotional terrain as that previous book, and I need to be forging into new spaces. But, since Reaper’s the second book in a trilogy, dialing up that old playlist I’d lived with writing the first installment, My Heart is a Chainsaw, it dropped me right back into Indian Lake. It was like coming home. And, these are long books, so this is a tall playlist—how about I just annotate the first ten tracks:
“AbOriginal,” Frank Waln
How Scorcese uses “Gimme Shelter” over and over to pull the audience into the epic feel of this story he’s telling? Frank Waln’s got that same thing going on here, and it’s the perfect way to start a hundred writing sessions. I mean, if I weren’t Blackfeet, maybe I could take the same ramp up into a feeling by watching Braveheart. But, I am Blackfeet, so it’s “AbOriginal” all day long. And that chorus, If your skin is brown then you’re down for the old pain, Frank Waln really can’t say that enough times. This is one of those songs that keep playing in your head long after it’s over, one of those ones that just last and last, and make you walk into and against the world that much harder, because . . . today? Today the world doesn’t win. No matter what. That’s what I needed for the main character of this book.
“Time Off for Bad Behavior,” David Allan Coe
The live version, from Billy Bob’s, which has the best concerts. And, David Allan Coe, man. Dude’s a lot like Eminem, to me—they have this ability to phrase things such that they sound right. Not in the factual sense, and not in the sense that this line’s been sculpted and adjusted to death. I’m not sure how to say it better than that. What they do, it’s a little about syntax and word-choice, but it’s a lot about intonation and maybe elocution, and . . . something else, I don’t know what—I call it “phrasing,” for lack of a better term. And this song’s got it. And, no, David Allan Coe didn’t even write this one, I don’t think—in spite of what the song might say—but man does he inhabit it. That’s what Springsteen says is the most important, right? Some singers just have that. David Allan Coe’s one of them.
“Who Knew,” Pink
The tense and the point of narration in this song is endlessly fascinating, to me. The persona singing this is doing so from a point after this relationship’s already over (somebody’s dead, maybe?), but, in the present, this singer’s “going back”—in her head, in her heart—and saying she’ll punch anyone out who says it’s going to go over . . . I guess for that Garth Brooks reason of “I would have missed the pain / but I’d have also missed . . . the dance.” It’s beautifully complicated, twisting back on itself, and, man, if that’s not what it’s like to be a person, to exist on this earth, live this life, I don’t know what is. We don’t make sense, and why would we. But we feel just so intensely, so irrationally.
“Thunder Road,” Bruce Springsteen
I know “Born to Run” is the one you’re supposed to love and understand as emblematic of “America” and a generation, and it is that, a hundred times over. Still, for me? For me, it’s this song. There’s hope in this song. There’s rumbling up to the curb to pick your date up, and then blasting off into the night, and whatever it holds. These two lanes will take us anywhere. Riding in that car like that, man . . . this is why I love “The River,” too: “I remember us riding in my brother’s car / Her body tan and wet down at the reservoir.” In my heart I know that the Mary from “Thunder Road” is the Mary from “The River,” that this is a progression—we’re watching a couple of kids grow up. We’re watching ourselves grow up. And Reaper’s about that, some.
“Let’s Go Crazy,” Prince
I think this novel needed this song over and and over for that preaching up front. That organ. I like how dramatic and self-important and just ‘grand’ it is. But I think I also needed to feel like I was in sixth grade, driving cross-country with a friend’s family, the two of us in the backseat the whole way sharing a Walkman with a big sister’s Purple Rain tape in it. This is the first song on side 1. After listening to it one more time, we’d fast forward to the end, flip the tape, and listen to “When Doves Cry.” Those two songs, man. They’ll get you across the country. They’ll get you through sixth grade. And they’re pretty good for novel-writing, too.
“Mainstreet,” Bob Seger
Such a forlorn, nostalgic song, and a great comedown from the previous track. Like, Prince gets your senses all jumping, but then this one reaches right in for your heart. It’s a high school song, too, and Reaper’s got a lot of high school kids in it. And a Main Street as well. So, everything sort of ‘fit’ for this song. But . . . I’m really not that strategic. I just like where this songs takes me, where it leaves me. I think I could live there, I mean. Or, I guess I sort of do.
“Yankee Rose,” David Lee Roth
That back and forth at the front of the song between David Lee Roth’s vocals and Steve Vai’s guitar absolutely blew my mind, once upon a time. The generation before had had Frampton; I had this. I’d never heard anything like it. Think I was fourteen when it came out? This and Crazy from the Heat, man. If that wasn’t a good time to be alive and listening to the radio and watching music videos, then I don’t when’s supposed to have been.
“Horses,” Bonnie “Prince” Billy
The version in the playlist linked above isn’t the version I listen to, alas. But it’s the same song. And every time that opening line moans out, I’d be riding horses if they’d let me, man, I know again what it feels like to have a songwriter take words written in secret on my heart and put them to music. I so, so feel with the persona singing this song. Or, it’s not a persona: it’s me. I have all these dreams of what I could do, if they’d just let me.
“Oh Sherrie,” Steve Perry
Steve Perry can sing anything. He’s got that breathiness between words sometimes, he sometimes clips the first part of a syllable off to somehow make the whole word hit harder, he’s got range for days, and he’s not afraid to lean back and wail into that mic, just bring the ceiling of the arena down on us all. One of the big regrets of my life is I never saw Journey live, back when. I miss that so much that I wrote a novel about a guy named Steve Perry, even. And, this song, this song. Like the Grinch, every time I listen to it, my hearts grows three sizes. At least.
“Bringing on the Heartbreak,” Def Leppard
Years later, a lot of Whitesnake would sound like this song, to me. Which is probably why, when my Whitesnake ’87 cassette got stuck in my player for thirteen hours one drive, I wasn’t sad. This sound, I mean, it’s the good stuff. It’s the best stuff. I especially like how it has a couple places in here where it feel like someone’s placed the pads of their fingers on the record, to slow it down for a tenth of a second or so at the party, to see if anybody notices. I do. And I love it. Thank you.
“Your Latest Trick,” Dire Straits
Oh, horns. I’m forever a fool for anything with horns. Give me Morphine, give me Ides of March’s “Vehicle,” give me all of them, please. And always the Dire Straits. “Prehistoric garbage trucks,” right? Ever since hearing this line, I’ve never once seen a garbage truck as actually being from this era. And this song is one-hundred-percent why there’s sort of a garbage truck at an important spot in Reaper. Too, I was talking phrasing above, with David Allen Coe? There’s something to do with that here, with security was laid back and lax. It’s different than what Coe and Eminem does, and I think maybe it’s particular to the Dire Straits. You find lines like that all through their catalogue, though. It’s why I go back to it again and again.
And I guess this playlist goes on for eighteen more songs, I guess, a 131-minute affair, which is about a half-hour longer than I usually go for novel-writing stuff. There’s Tina Turner, Sheena Easton, Sir Mix-a-lot, Spandau Ballet, and, guess I was in a Springsteen-mode, which happens every few years, as there’s a few more from him. But? You can’t really ever have enough Bruce Springsteen, I don’t think.
I’ll try to come back here for the third Chainsaw book, too—had to whip up a whole new playlist for that one.
Stephen Graham Jones is the New York Times bestselling author of The Only Good Indians. He has been an NEA fellowship recipient and been recipient of several awards including: the Ray Bradbury Award from the Los Angeles Times, the Bram Stoker Award, the Shirley Jackson Award, the Jesse Jones Award for Best Work of Fiction from the Texas Institute of Letters, the Independent Publishers Award for Multicultural Fiction, and the Alex Award from American Library Association. He is the Ivena Baldwin Professor of English at the University of Colorado Boulder.
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February 8, 2023
Shorties (A Profile of Mieko Kawakami, A Profile of Screaming Females, and more)
The New York Times Magazine profiled author Mieko Kawakami.
SPIN profiled the band Screaming Females.
Screaming Females emerged from the nascent punk rock scene brewing in the quiet corners of a small town as a fierce firestorm of emotive fury, artisans at the helm of instruments they’re deftly able to wring every last hint of songcraft from. Drummer Jarrett Dougherty is precise and thunderous behind his drum kit, and Abbate serves as a keenly sharp needle of rhythm on bass keeping all things stitched tight. The heaviest of material all stitched together with seamless grace. Paternoster possesses a controlled demolition of an operatic and thunderous voice while being widely praised for her guitar work.
eBook on sale for $1.99 today:
Annihilation by Jeff VanderMeer
Tom Verlaine, book buyer.
Twitter Verse interviewed author Bethanne Patrick.
Paste reconsidered the Stooges' Raw Power album as it turns 50 this year.
The New York Times recommended books by Colette.
Bandcamp Daily explored Ecuador's alt-pop scene.
Book Riot and Literary Hub recommended the week's est new books.
Atwood Magazine profiled the band Personal Trainer.
Debutiful interviewed author Delia Cai.
Richard Evans discussed his book Listening To The Music The Machines Make: Electronic Pop 1978 – 1983 with SPIN.
Marisa Crane discussed her new novel I Keep My Exoskeletons to Myself with Electric Literature.
Stream a new song by Shalom.
Full Stop interviewed author Lawrence Millmam.
Barbra Streisand's memoir, My Name is Barbra, will be published in November.
Matthew Salesses talked to The Rumpus about his new novel.
Stream a new song by bdrmm.
StatORec interviewed author Erika T. Wurth.
JAR: What draws you to horror?
ETW: In some ways, it’s coming back to my nerd roots. I used to wander the library shelves at lunch, running from my bullies—and I’d come across books by Stephen King. I loved every one. The other part of it is that it allows me to express the darker parts of the gritty realism that I wrote in before, but it allows all of that dark magic that I adored as a child as well. Gambino, and my Indigenous brother from another mother Jones, are more into the slasher with some supernatural. Whereas I am more of a paranormal guy, I love the idea of a portal to another world.
King Tuff discussed the influences behind his new album with BrooklynVegan
Ploughshares interviewed author Deesha Philyaw.
EG: Your dialogue is just brilliant, so chiseled to precision. I especially loved “Dear Sister.” It’s in epistolary form, but it’s like eavesdropping on a family cast of high-style trash talkers. Can you talk about your process and aims in crafting dialogue?
DP: My characters make it easy because they are women who don’t mince words. There were Black women from my childhood who had a rhythm. Even when we are stuck in horrible situations, we are the queens of the pithy phrase that gets to the heart of things. Like “I’ll make a way out of no way”—words that can change your life, that can set a tone that tells you exactly what’s going on. So, I have to credit the Black women I’ve always known. Before I was a Black woman I was listening to Black women. So, when I immersed myself in the scenes, I could hear my grandmother with the filter of all the church mothers I’ve ever heard and how they’d talk about girls they considered wayward. So, it was a chorus and yet a common judgmental thread of religion as a weapon, but phrased in the most beautiful language, loving and concerned, but still ultimately a harsh critique. It’s a reality of people who love you, but say things that can cut you to the quick.
Stream a new song by TOLEDO.
Literary Hub shared an excerpt from Miriam Darlington's book The Wise Hours: A Journey Into the Wild and Secret World of Owls.
Stream a new song by Heejin Jang.
The Los Angeles Review of Books interviewed author Percival Everett.
Stream a new song by Purling Hiss.
Aquarium Drunkard shared remembrances of Tom Verlaine.
Stereogum interviewed Yo La Tengo's Ira Kaplan.
Stream a new song by Issei Herr.
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February 7, 2023
Shorties (Jennifer Maritza McCauley's Recommended Afro-Latina Writers, An Interview with John Cale, and more)
Jennifer Maritza McCauley recommended Afro-Latina writers you should read.
SPIN interviewed John Cale.
What drew you to the avant-garde side of things at a young age?
It was really exciting to do the avant-garde. I understood what the roles were for Aaron Copeland and a bunch of really European composers, and Europe has a documented history of advanced thinking in music. I thought it would be interesting to find out what other groups of people from different parts of the world and their idea of what avant-garde meant. What you’re really looking at is how people share conversations, in the sense that there’s a conversation going on between the composer and the audience. These generate other feelings and other ideas. I ended up paying attention to John Cage. They say that Le Monte was the most interesting American musical composer and that he was working and deliberating in different arenas than Stockhausen would. The whole European thing was hung up in intonation — in how melodic and chordal developments in the music were really stuck in one place.
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We Need to Talk About Kevin by Lionel Shriver
The Whole Five Feet by Christopher R. Beha
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Bandcamp Daily profiled L.A. experimental music label Dragon’s Eye Recordings.
In 2018, Novak implemented a policy to only accept demos from under-represented voices. The releases that have followed have all been from LGBTQ+, female/non-binary, disabled, and/or neurodivergent artists. “The big change was that I really tried to stop curating the aesthetics of the label,” he says. “I felt like, in order to uplift marginalized voices, I also needed to trust that they knew better than I did what was relevant in their community.” As a result, the sonics of the label have spun out in a ton of exciting directions.
Kirkus recommended books that offer hope for the climate crisis.
Stream a new Shonen Knife song.
The New York Times interviewed author Walter Mosley.
Erik Holt discussed recording Canto Ostinato by the late Dutch composer Simeon ten Holt at Vol. 1 Brooklyn.
Stephen Graham Jones discussed his new novel Don't Fear the Reaper with Paste.
Paste Magazine: So, the title Don’t Fear The Reaper —which is one of my favorite songs, by the way—I’m assuming that must come from Blue Oyster Cult.
Stephen Graham Jones: Well, it does come from Blue Oyster Cult, but really it’s that—in Halloween, Jamie Lee Curtis and her friend are riding in her friend’s Monte Carlo, and they’re listening to (Don’t Fear) The Reaper, and then in 1996 with Scream, a cover of Don’t Fear) The Reaper is playing over Billy and Sid, and so it seemed like that was a kind of momentum. I had no choice but to call it Don’t Fear The Reaper, I was going to honor my heroes.
Stream a new song by Penelope Trappes.
Electric Literature shared two new poems by Akhim Alexis.
Stream a new song by Barrie.
Laura Warrell wrote about writing while black at Literary Hub.
Stream a new song by Billie Marten.
Mariana Enriquez talked to the New Yorker about her story in this week's issue.
If you appreciate the work that goes into Largehearted Boy, please consider making a donation.
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February 6, 2023
Daniel Torday's Playlist for His Novel "The 12th Commandment"
In the Book Notes series, authors create and discuss a music playlist that relates in some way to their recently published book.
Previous contributors include Jesmyn Ward, Lauren Groff, Bret Easton Ellis, Celeste Ng, T.C. Boyle, Dana Spiotta, Amy Bloom, Aimee Bender, Roxane Gay, and many others.
Daniel Torday's novel The 12th Commandment is smart literary noir both poignant and lyrical.
Michelle Zauner wrote of the book:
"Mourning, godless, Zeke makes for an unlikely detective as he investigates the mysterious Dönme cult and its connection to the murder of a teenage boy in Ohio. The novel pairs the gripping mystery of Raymond Chandler with the existential inquiry of Philip Roth, then arms the two with AR15s and a kosher banquet of edibles. A rare, literary delight. Daniel Torday is operating in his prime."
In his own words, here is Daniel Torday's Book Notes music playlist for his novel The 12th Commandment:
This new novel, my fourth, is about a small cult-like group of adherents to a centuries-old mystical sect who outwardly profess to be Muslim, while in private practicing Jewish mysticism. In central Ohio. So I’ve had a lot of religion on my mind for the last four years of writing. But I’ve also had rural Ohio in mind—I’ve spent tons of time there over the years, and I love its billowy trees and senescent barns. So of course I listened to a lot of music with those themes:
“Presence of the Lord”—Blind Faith
I was not a Clapton fan early on, but I was a Traffic fan, and I learned to love early Steve Winwood, so when I found this perfect album with its perfect reluctant modern Psalm, it became one of my favorite songs when I was like 15. “Everybody knows the secret, everybody knows the score.” A real cry of faith.
“What’s Going On”—Marvin Gaye
Early on in 12th Commandment, the main character Zeke, a secular magazine writer, is a little terrified to be on a compound with a bunch of AR-15-toting, weed-smoking Hasids. But in an early scene he finds himself in one of their trailers with Marvin pounding in the background, and it puts him at ease. Me, too.
“Holland, 1945”—Neutral Milk Hotel
The best song on one of the best records of my lifetime. There’s this kind of crazy intense WWII story the song tells— of murder by Nazis and then reincarnation, and that’s in a song on a record that also has lyrics like “I love you Jesus Christ,” and “semen stains the mountaintops.” It’s a good song.
“In Tall Buildings”—John Hartford
I spent four glorious years in central Ohio as an undergrad, then went back to Kenyon College many times to teach in my 20's and 30's. My last year as a student there, I jumped off a wall, broke my arm, and walked around with a cast that got signed by John Hartford and Taj Mahal at shows I saw on successive weekends. This is also the saddest song I know about getting a job in New York City.
“Happy Just to Be Like I Am”—Taj Mahal
See “John Hartford” above.
“Corner Stone”—Bob Marley & The Wailers
To prep for writing in the voice of a self-proclaimed prophet, I read a lot of Hebrew, and the way to do that seemed to be to read a couple Psalms every morning. Marley quoted a ton from that book, and this one, generally taken to be a lament for the father he never knew, is such a beautiful reading of a verse from Psalm 118: “The stone which the builders refused is become the head stone of the corner.”
“From”—Dr. Dog
Philadelphia band Dr. Dog has quietly been the best Beatles-y rock band for a couple decades now (and sadly just played their farewell concerts at the end of last year), and my favorite record of theirs, “Fate,” has this amazing song on it. I think about this line a lot: “Oh my God, he listens to me, and I ain’t even talking out loud, Oh my God.”
“Anthem”—Leonard Cohen
I’m not sure you can write a book about religion and make a playlist for that book and not have at least one Leonard Cohen song. “Hallelujah” is so widely covered that I heard an actual prayer in an actual synagogue fall into the cadences of that modern prayer this year. For me, in the late Leonard songbook, it’ll always be “Anthem” and that crack he found in everything.
“Are You Afraid to Die”—Louvin Brothers
Are you? I am.
Daniel Torday is the author of The 12th Commandment, The Last Flight of Poxl West, and Boomer1. A two-time winner of the National Jewish Book Award for fiction and the Sami Rohr Choice Prize, Torday’s stories and essays have appeared in Tin House, The Paris Review, The Kenyon Review, and n+1, and have been honored by the Best American Short Stories and Best American Essays series. Torday is a Professor of Creative Writing at Bryn Mawr College.
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Shorties (An Interview with Isabel Waidner, An Interview with Belle & Sebastian's Stuart Murdoch, and more)
PEN America interviewed author Isabel Waidner.
Sterling Karat Gold deliberately blurs conventional boundaries between what counts as real and as imagined. For example, the Cataclysmic Foibles performances you mention don’t just provide entertainment or educational value; as you say, they’re actual sites where the ‘real’ narrative can develop and progress—or regress, as it were. Here in the UK, we have seen a sustained ideological attack on the arts and humanities by consecutive Conservative governments since 2010, so it’s almost as if these sectors or cultures were deemed to be dangerous for those in power… this perceived (and I’d wager actual) ability of art and performance to affect social change is played out in the novel.
Last Donut of the Night interviewed Belle & Sebastian's Stuart Murdoch.
To be a gentle soul was not, in the mid-90’s in the west of Scotland, a great look. [Laughs] But there’s plenty of gentle souls.
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Lady in the Lake by Laura Lippman
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Deep South by Paul Theroux
I Can Cook Vegan by Isa Chandra Moskowitz
In the Lake of the Woods by Tim O'Brien
The Third Policeman by Flann O'Brien
Paste interviewed the Go-Between's Robert Forster.
Farah Abdessamad recommended books that will change how you feel about art at the Atlantic.
Cover Me shared five covers of Television's "See No Evil."
Debutiful recommended February's best debut books.
PopMatters remembered Tom Verlaine.
Marion Turner discussed her book The Wife of Bath: A Biography with Weekend Edition.
It might seem strange to write a biography of a made-up character. But Turner, who previously wrote a well-regarded biography of Chaucer, puts the Wife of Bath in the context of actual women who found ways to prosper in the aftermath of the Black Death, which upended social norms and created new pathways for women to work and hold authority.
Stream a new Peter Gabriel song.
Alice Wong talked to NPR Books about her book Year of the Tiger: An Activist's Life.
Stream a new song by Crocodiles.
Can You Identify These Novels by Their First Sentences?
Stream a new song by The Album Leaf & Bat For Lashes.
Abhigna Mooraka talked teaching writing with Electric Literature.
The Chicago Review of Books interviewed author Marisa Crane.
Shondaland interviewed author Tracey Rose Peyton.
I came to some characters earlier than others, and then some characters came about based on the need to differentiate them from one another. I thought about the ways we typically contextualize a character set in contemporary novels — what do they do for work? What do they wear? And I realized very quickly that I wasn’t going to have access to those shorthands, given the time period. So, how would I distinguish characters that were interconnected? That we would meet as a group but also needed to have individual specificity. I needed to figure out ways to make them distinct, and what often makes you unique is your story and your experience.
Stream a new song by METTE.
Ars Technica explored the intersection of physics and literature in James Joyce's Ulysses.
The Quietus reconsidered Echo & The Bunnymen's Porcupine album as it turns 40.
Quan Barry wrote about writing across genres at Literary Hub.
I know there are some folks out there who think in terms of “branding,” of becoming known to the world as the writer who does X. But if that doesn’t sound like fun to you, then forget it. Instead, maybe try becoming the writer who’s unpredictable, who has fun wearing all kinds of hats. Don’t be afraid to make your hat collection your brand (though if you’re a one-hat writer, that’s cool too).
The Quietus shared an excerpt from Aug Stone's novel The Ballad Of Buttery Cake Ass.
Catapult interviewed author Matthew Salesses.
If you appreciate the work that goes into Largehearted Boy, please consider making a donation.
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February 3, 2023
Stephanie Burt's Playlist for Her Poetry Collection "We Are Mermaids"
In the Book Notes series, authors create and discuss a music playlist that relates in some way to their recently published book.
Previous contributors include Jesmyn Ward, Lauren Groff, Bret Easton Ellis, Celeste Ng, T.C. Boyle, Dana Spiotta, Amy Bloom, Aimee Bender, Roxane Gay, and many others.
Stephanie Burt's poetry collection We Are Mermaids dazzles both the intellect and the heart, a brilliant collection from one of our most talented poets.
Publishers Weekly wrote of the book:
"Burt’s imagination is rendered in mellifluous, energetic language in this memorable book."
In her own words, here is Stephanie Burt's Book Notes music playlist for her poetry collection We Are Mermaids:
These songs stand or swim behind the poems in We Are Mermaids in an unusually direct way: most of them, or the bands and artists that play them, are mentioned by name in the book, and some provided the seeds for the poems that contain them! I work in response to music that way as well as in the usual "what's on in the background, what inspires me" way. I also used to be a college radio DJ ("You're listening to the Record Hospital, WHRB 95.3fm in Cambridge, give us a call at 617 495 WHRB if there's something you want to hear") and that very 1990s experience backs up, perhaps alas, everything I do now-- especially when what I do involves poems that speak to my own past, to the songs long hanging around in my head...
Spinanes, "Spitfire"
Catchiest track on their catchiest record. This duo blew me away on their first tour, when the drummer played trumpet; then they headed back to our studio and blew me away again. Shhhh.
Small Factory, "What to Want"
Enthusiasm from Providence! And one of the bands on the bill for the most important single show I've ever seen: they, and the Velvet Crush, opened for Heavenly at the Middle East in the summer of 1991 and after that show I knew I was a pop kid. Though I wasn't quite ready to tell the world.
Shamir, "Gay Agenda"
I have a gay agenda. So do they.
Dead C, "Hell Is Now Love"
My favorite of the semi-improvisational, gritty, grimy, feedback-driven anti-musical acts I had to pretend to like for postpunk college radio. This band I really did and do like. You can also use their music to clean your sink or sandblast your storm windows!
Crown Heights, "Moving from the Small Room to the Big Room"
The last of the songs used or mentioned in my poem "My 1993," except that it's not: the unjustly near-forgotten 1980s Boston act Sorry, whose song "24" really ends the poem, cannot be had for love or money on Spotify, and the album Imaginary Friend is tough to find anywhere online, though you can find their wonderful bruised-indie, proto-emo second album The Way It Is on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6RQ3Uh2GMkM. You can read more about Sorry here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6RQ3Uh2GMkM. Jon Easley, the singer for Sorry, later brought his raspy intensity to Crown Heights, who released one grindingly beautiful album in the late 1990s before Easley passed on: this is that band's best song, itself an anxious protest about how hard it is to move away.
Kate Rusby, "The Mermaid"
The first of the mermaid songs. Because we are mermaids. This one's a pretty ballad, and like much of Rusby's work it feels contemporary as well as ages-old, like a faerie storyteller brought forward in time.
Blueboy, "Stephanie"
it's me! It's also an early acoustic track from the great duo Blueboy, described in one of my poems and remembered (since singer Keith Girdler is gone) in another. The band never quite identified as trans-- it was the 1990s after all-- but their songs gave me my first musical models for transfeminine joy.
Blueboy, "Imipramine"
The same great band in later electric mode. This one rocks. "They say that love could break a boy's heart/ I say there's no such thing." No such thing as a boy's heart? Or no such thing as love?
Galaxie 500, "Don't Let Our Youth Go to Waste"
This moody Jonathan Richman cover goes with my very free version of Jaime Gil de Biedman's "Himno a la juventud." You can read my doomed effort on behalf of the song in prose here: http://marchxness.com/round1-rundmcvsgalaxie
Brandi Carlile, "Mama Werewolf"
This one goes with my poem "Prayer for Werewolves," and both go with the wolfy Marvel Comics teen hero Rahne Sinclair. Teen wolves need mama wolves; both of them sometimes have trouble with silver bullets, and self-hatred, and finding real friends. (The solution might be the gay agenda.)
Holly Hobbie, "Over It"
Holly Hobbie was a popular image by a 1970s artist and then a line of dolls and toys and a board game and a cartoon and, most recently, a live action tween TV series with a lovely pop-country soundtrack: think Hannah Montana, but painfully earnest, and ineluctably connected to mostly white people in Americana-drenched small towns. My poem reacts to the boardgame, and to the tween girl, calico retro, yearnings and sense of safety that the board game and the rest of the mythos provides. This song is just catchy as heck.
Hayley Kiyoko, "Sleepover"
This quiet dramatization of gay teen angst belongs with the line "Let's make our sleepover plans." Raise your hand if you're gay and you had a crush on your best friend and you just couldn't say because you didn't want to Crush the Friendship. But you wanted to kiss him or her or them so bad. Especially when they spent the night. (Yes, this kind of things lands differently for trans girls who transitioned later in life: I had the experience but also I missed it. It missed me. We miss each other. Hayley Kiyoko is, as you may know, the Lesbian Jesus. https://www.nme.com/blogs/nme-blogs/who-is-hayley-kiyoko-2338444)
Lilith Ai, "Teenage Brain"
Another teen superhero crush song, this time from a bi point of view, and a lot less glossy: Lilith Ai should be a superstar. Like Hayley Kiyoko. This part of We Are Mermaids brings the teen angst.
Taylor Swift, "The Archer"
You knew this was coming. Goes with "Love Poem with Archery." Cupid's arrow, Kate Bishop, Cissie King-Jones, all the targets, all the young hearts.
MYLK, "Mermaid"
We are mermaids but we are also hyperpop fans around here, and this song is both: hyperpop is the most trans pop music genre ever to pop, or to trans, because in it everything is self-chosen, artificial, and also anxious and sped-up and maybe (don't tell the others) contagious. You can catch it. You can let it go. Hyperpop is literally a kind of pop music that emerges from other Net-based electronic-pop subgenres around 2018, and its most notable practitioners, like the late SOPHIE, Laura Les, and fraxiom, tend to be nonbinary or trans: its rapid, artificial beats allow singers to treat and accelerate their voices, which means it's the only kind of pop music where someone with my own natural vocal range can make herself, as a matter of course, not only a mermaid but a mermaid soprano. More on the transness of hyperpop, for example, from a youngish listener, here: https://www.cooperpointjournal.com/2021/04/29/hyperpop-transness/
Stephanie Burt is the author of five poetry collections, including Advice from the Lights and Belmont, and several works of criticism, including Don’t Read Poetry and Close Calls with Nonsense. She teaches at Harvard University.
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T Coles' Playlist for Their Book "Death Metal"
In the Book Notes series, authors create and discuss a music playlist that relates in some way to their recently published book.
Previous contributors include Jesmyn Ward, Lauren Groff, Bret Easton Ellis, Celeste Ng, T.C. Boyle, Dana Spiotta, Amy Bloom, Aimee Bender, Roxane Gay, and many others.
T Coles' Death Metal is a fascinating and compelling history of the genre.
In their own words, here is T Coles' Book Notes music playlist for their book Death Metal:
Death Metal was written over the final part of the UK's lockdown, and was finished as things were starting to open up. My year of writing was spent in Zoom calls with musicians, picking over music books I bought a decade ago, and reckoning with something I loved as a teen. With fresh eyes the main challenge was how to communicate its awesome power to newcomers, and to explain why I still enjoyed it over a decade later. These are many of the songs that went into the book, tracks from the genre and those that have been inspired by it. They kept me together over a few difficult years.
Possessed - Death Metal
Lots of art concerns death – the only thing that everyone will eventually experience – so it's not surprising that heavy metal would catch up. Earlier styles solidified the bombast of heavy guitar music, the theatrics and warrior aesthetic, and by the mid-'80s death metal channelled that into darker territory. Now the voice was distorted and ugly, a far cry from Iron Maiden or Judas Priest, all the better for describing botched surgeries and zombie rituals. Possessed's Seven Churches is the genre's ground zero, and Death Metal is a rallying cry, featuring hordes of the freshly risen dead reanimated with malicious intent. Death is not only inevitable, its advance has been accelerated.
Cannibal Corpse - Hammer Smashed Face
It's difficult to describe songs like this without the help of industrial machinery. This song is like being pounded by meat hammers, or ground into a pulp. Every snare beat compels the body to move like animals trapped in a slaughterhouse. The bass solo is a tiny moment of calibration before the machines start up again. This song moves in disgusting movements – it drags its arms behind it, grinds like rusty saws dragged across the ground, and then oozes back into its hiding holes. I love every inch of it just as much as when I was 13.
Napalm Death - You Suffer
"You Suffer" is the world's shortest song, on an album which has a fascinatingly strange history. The whole band – bar the drummer – quit after the first half was recorded, leaving stalwart percussionist Mick Harris to put the project back together, in time for it to suddenly balloon in popularity thanks to John Peel's assistance. The record is dour but completely self-aware, the rapid songs eventually leading to sly self-parody. You Suffer is a mercilessly sharp shock, which surprises and delights every time I add it to a playlist and forget about it. It's ugly, stupid, and completely magic.
The Mountain Goats - The best ever death metal band out of Denton
In 2010, having just started university, a cooler older pal told me about the Mountain Goats. I was very keen to make new friends so I searched for them immediately. This was the first thing that came up and I was never quite sure if it was on death metal's side or not. It felt earnest, but at the time I assumed death metal was a joke to everyone. I later learned that John Darnielle was a bona-fide metal fan, not only writing his own 33 1/3 on Black Sabbath's Master of Reality but de-railing his podcast I Only Listen To The Mountain Goats to talk about Summoning. This song is about the elemental power of heavy music, yearning for the future, and delighting in obscurity when no-one else is around who gets it.
Carcass – Heartwork
One of the mysteries of death metal is that it works with melody. The people who made it will tell you they were simply listening to Iron Maiden and Thin Lizzy as kids, and wanted to make music like that when they were older, tinged with the malevolent power of extreme metal. On one level it works because it's still about death, which is complicated – we can imagine someone recalling fond memories as they slip away, or the sweet almond taste of cyanide. To me, this communicates a point a little better, marking the point where death metal got bored with sounding as horrible and muddy as it could. It is a contrast, and maybe one that contradicts itself, but from that tension comes vital tracks that I happen to quite like.
Venom Prison - Perpetrator Emasculation
Early death metal owed a lot to horror movies – Possessed literally covered The Exorcist theme on their debut record. There simply wasn't much material that covered these bases – you were limited to Venom records, wrestling, or horror films. This meant that a lot of the tropes in horror which have aged poorly are present throughout, which sadly includes a deeply-ingrained misogyny. 'Perpetrator Emasculation,' performed by Venom Prison, whose singer Larissa Stupar takes a prominent voice through the end of the book, reimagines this violence as a revenge taken against a rapist. There is some debate as to whether this is an ideal outcome. But as a song it is starkly ferocious, and hits deeper than a lot of the material it's reacting to, one of the darkest death metal tracks to release over the past decade.
Death – Painkiller
Death's Sound of Perseverance is an astonishing end to a fruitful career. It swings from musings on sensuality in "Flesh and the Power it Holds," the depths of isolation and mental illness in "Spirit Crusher" and steely-nerved stoicism in "Bite the Pain." The Judas Priest cover that rounds off the record is disarmingly silly, a sly nod to how daft death metal can be and a course readjustment after an album of very serious material. The last scream of “pain!” is lots of things – overwrought, anguished, mawkish, it's an almighty moment to end on. Ultimately this was the cap to their studio albums, a sly nod that they weren't taking everything seriously all the time, a little parting gift to us in case we start reading too deep into everything.
KLF vs Extreme Noise Terror – 3AM Eternal
At the 1992 Brits, the KLF appeared with "Extreme Noise Terror." Their collaborative version of the staggeringly popular dance track mangled it beyond recognition, stripping back the layers and mysticism of the KLF and reducing – or elevating – it to a sledgehammer stomp. The KLF's own history is baffling, and a collaboration with extreme metal is perhaps not surprising. What is significant is that, for 27 years, this moment signalled the end of their career as musicians. This is best experienced with the live footage of the awards crowd completely baffled. I like to think that as the KLF tanked their career, ENT picked up at least a few fans.
Job For A Cowboy - Entombment of a Machine
JFAC came up at a time when everyone thought death metal was largely dead, making use of newly-emerging social medias like MySpace. I completely glossed over this in the late 2000s when it dropped, and found myself deeply engaged in the whole thing. This is a testament to being a fool and coming back to something excellent, to live it for the first time all over again.
Full Tac and Lil Mariko - Where's my Juul??
Death metal is very old, and its influence can be found everywhere. This two minute track features rapper Full Tac berating her partner for losing her vape, an immediate death sentence. As her anger increases, so do her vocals get distorted. It got a mention in the book because it shows that death metal is everywhere – it's not popular, but it's not confined to the shadows either, no longer hidden behind apocryphal knowledge but available for anyone with access to Youtube, a spare afternoon, and a fascination with the morbid. The bubbling throb of the bass that explodes as her rage mounts did it for me, and I am morbidly fascinated how far up my Spotify list for this year it got.
T Coles is a writer and music journalist from Somerset, UK. They have worked as a contributing writer for the print magazines Terrorizer, Zero Tolerance and Discovered and websites The Quietus and Cvlt Nation. They play drums for Sail.
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February's Best eBook Deals
eBooks on sale for $1.99 this month:
Assassination Vacation by Sarah Vowell
Babel-17 by Samuel R. Delany
Broken Monsters by Lauren Beukes
The Casuarina Tree by W. Somerset Maugham
The Chicago Guide to Grammar, Usage, and Punctuation by Bryan A. Garner
Devil in a Blue Dress by Walter Mosley
Diary of a Madman by Brad "Scarface" Jordan
The Dirty Version by Buddha Monk and Mickey Hess
The Hippest Trip in America by Nelson George
The House of Mirth by Edith Wharton
Memories of the Future by Siri Hustvedt
Only Love Can Break Your Heart by Ed Tarkington
Quilting the Black-Eyed Pea by Nikki Giovanni
Revival Season by Monica West
See a Little Light by Bob Mould
Tuesday Nights in 1980 by Molly Prentiss
The Turner House by Angela Flournoy
Winterlong by Elizabeth Hand
eBooks on sale for $2.99 this month:
100 Years of the Best American Short Stories edited by Lorrie Moore
The Annotated Godfather by Jenny M. Jones
The Big Nowhere by James Ellroy
A Black Women's History of the United States by Daina Ramey Berry and Kali Nicole Gross
The Boo by Pat Conroy
Brilliant Orange by David Winner
Coming Up for Air by George Orwell
Confessions by Kanae Minato
Cured by Lol Tolhurst
Dead Boys by Richard Lange
Death with Interruptions by Jose Saramago
The Designer's Dictionary of Color by Sean Adams
Do You Feel Like I Do? by Peter Frampton
The English Teacher by Lily King
Great Expectations by Kathy Acker
The Hungry Tide by Amitav Ghosh
The Last Neanderthal by Claire Cameron
The Life All Around Me by Ellen Foster by Kaye Gibbons
The Love Object by Edna O'Brien
The Man in My Basement by Walter Mosley
The Mayor of MacDougal Street by Dave Van Ronk
Ministry by Al Jourgensen
The Muralist by B. A. Shapiro
On Agate Hill by Lee Smith
The Outlaw Album by Daniel Woodrell
A Parchment of Leaves by Silas House
Searching for the Sound by Phil Lesh
Soccer in Sun and Shadow by Eduardo Galeano
Tehran Noir by Salar Abdoh
This Wicked World by Richard Lange
The Three Christs of Ypsilanti by Milton Rokeach
Time Is Tight by Booker T. Jones
Troubling Love by Elena Ferrante
Trout Fishing in America, The Pill versus the Springhill Mine Disaster, and In Watermelon Sugar by Richard Brautigan
Tupac Shakur by Tayannah Lee McQuillar and Fred L. Johnson
We Are Watching Eliza Bright by A.E. Osworth
Whatever Happened to the C86 Kids? by Nige Tassell
Woe to Live On by Daniel Woodrell
X: The Erotic Treasury edited by Susie Bright
The Yellow Birds by Kevin Powers
eBooks on sale for $3.99 this month:
Dolly on Dolly edited by Randy E. Schmidt
A Natural Woman by Carole King
On Time by Morris Day
Party Music by Rickey Vincent
Rust in Peace by Dave Mustaine
Sing Backwards and Weep by Mark Lanegan
Stamped from the Beginning by Ibram X. Kendi
Truman by David McCullough
eBooks on sale for $4.99 this month:
Confess by Rob Halford
Do What You Want by Jim Ruland
Gotham Writers' Workshop: Writing Fiction
Jerry on Jerry edited by Dennis McNally
The Nasty Bits by Anthony Bourdain
The Pull of the Stars by Emma Donoghue
Silver Sparrow by Tayari Jones
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Shorties (Martin Riker Interviewed, Jason Diamond on Jazz Books, and more)
Martin Riker talked to Electric Literature about his debut novel, The Guest Lecture.
When you find a writer who you sort of who means something to you, that’s a very special thing. But I think a really, really good publisher is more important. Because a publishing house creates a space in the culture, which seems to me a more crucial and larger gesture than a single writer’s voice.
Jason Diamond explored the world of jazz books.
eBooks on sale for $1.99 today:
The Gunners by Rebecca Kauffman
The Prophet: The Life of Leon Trotsky by Isaac Deutscher
eBook on sale for $2.99 today:
Murder on the Orient Express by Agatha Christie
eBook on sale for $3.99 today:
The Stories of Ray Bradbury by Ray Bradbury
To celebrate Largehearted Boy's 21st birthday this week, I shared a 21-song playlist of songs featured on the site, a song from every year.
The New York Times recommended the week's best books.
Stream a new song by Black Belt Eagle Scout.
Town & Country, Shondaland, and InsideHook recommended February's most anticipated books.
Pitchfork profiled the band caroline.
Llewllyn, to his bandmates’ regret, once gave an interviewer a perfect tagline for caroline’s tender, declamatory style: “sadboy triumphalism.” Their earthy emo/post-rock hybrid is a scrappy meld of Low and the Dirty Three, pairing self-aware melancholy with the camaraderie of campfire song.
Alex Prud’homme talked books and reading with the New York Times.
The last book I read straight through — one way to define a “great book” — was Susan Orlean’s “The Library Book,” a deceptively simple tale of the Los Angeles Central Library, the people in its orbit, books, family and arson.
Stream three new songs by Dick Stusso.
Batja Mesquita discussed her book Between Us: How Cultures Create Emotions with Public Books.
...culture is not an independent variable that somehow predicts or causes emotions. One way to understand culture is as patterns of emotions and emotional practices. There are emotion cultures that actually come very close to each other too, which is probably the case for different families in the same area or in the same neighborhood. But even then, they are not quite the same. The reason I am interested in comparing cultures that are further apart is that it allows me to observe how different the psychological processes can actually be
Stream a new song by Jonnine.
Literary Hub shared Tiphanie Yanique's essay from the anthology So We Can Know: Writers of Color on Pregnancy, Loss, Abortion, and Birth.
Stream a new song by Fatima Al Qadiri.
J.J. Anselmi talked about writing oral history at The Millions.
Stream a new song by @.
Literary Hub shared an interview with Toni Morrison from Sarah Ladipo Manyika's book Between Starshine and Clay: Conversations from the African Diaspora.
Bandcamp Daily examined Bristol's quiet psych scene.
Nyani Nkrumah recommended novels about women fighting against racism and classism at Electric Literature.
Tropical Fuck Storm covered Jimi Hendrix's "1983 (A Merman I Should Turn To Be)."
Ben Okri shared how he wrote his novel The Famished Road with The Booker Prize.
Stream a new song by New German Cinema.
Stereogum reconsidered My Bloody Valentine's m b v album on its 10th anniversary.
If you appreciate the work that goes into Largehearted Boy, please consider making a donation.
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February 2, 2023
David James Keaton's Playlist for His Novel "Head Cleaner"
In the Book Notes series, authors create and discuss a music playlist that relates in some way to their recently published book.
Previous contributors include Jesmyn Ward, Lauren Groff, Bret Easton Ellis, Celeste Ng, T.C. Boyle, Dana Spiotta, Amy Bloom, Aimee Bender, Roxane Gay, and many others.
David James Keaton's novel Head Cleaner is a fast-paced, genre-defying literary thriller.
Nick Mamatas wrote of the book:
"This is the sci-fi crime novel for Generaton X. A quirky, multigenre journey through the VHS era, but you can’t rewind and dare not skip ahead to the end."
In his own words, here is David James Keaton's Book Notes music playlist for his novel Head Cleaner:
In order to settle some grudges (mostly with myself), the three main characters in my new novel Head Cleaner are, for the most part, representative of Gen X, Gen Y and Gen Z. As a representative of Gen X in real life, I decided to immerse myself in the music of these newer generations. Initially, I thought this would to help me get a handle on the book, and the Gen Y songs rang some nostalgia bells, but the Gen Z tunes were rough road on these ears, borderline unlistenable. Maybe you can’t teach an old dog new tracks, I don’t know. But this turned out to be a blessing in disguise anyway, since enduring the terrible music of younger generations was the perfect way to calibrate the media-related arguments in the novel after all. “No wonder!” I’d marvel after each tune, finally sympathizing with their suffering for the first time in my life. Okay, it’s not really that grim. I mean, Billy Eilish, the foremost Gen Y ambassador, whisper-sings her way through a James Bond theme song for godsake. Zoomer meets Boomer. If that can’t bring us all together, nothing can.
Beastie Boys – “Get it Together”
I think of this more as a Q-Tip song than a B-Boys song (and it led me directly to A Tribe Called Quest’s high point, The Low End Theory), but Ad Rock effectively reclaims this song with by far the most memorable verses (see: “She’s the cheese and I’m the macaroni” and “You know I’m getting silly/I gotta grandma Hazel and a grandma Tilly.”) One, two, oh my god.
Pixies – “Monkey Gone to Heaven”
Though Gen Xers are required by law to be into the Pixies, particularly if you’re in college, I missed the boat until the end credits of Fight Club, which makes me more of a Millennial when it comes to this band, I guess. And since humming “Where Is My Mind?” is considered a serious red flag these days, I’ve pivoted to enjoying this song instead, which was their only hit, which has gotta be an even worse red flag, right?
Geto Boys – “Mind Playing Tricks on Me”
It was when I was working in a Blockbuster/Family Video/Hollywood Video hybrid that I heard this song for the first time, except I didn’t know it was a song. There was this customer who would drift around the shelves looking for movies while repeating the chorus, which is more like talking than rapping. So I just thought he was seeing ghosts or something. When I finally bought the album later in life, I realized this is apparently what’s happening in the song too.
Rod Stewart – “Maggie May (extended)”
This song sort of has a double intro, and the first intro is usually left off when it’s played on the radio, and the second intro is also shortened in most versions, so it wasn’t until I dated a girl named Maggie that I realized there was much more to this song. She also told me that every guy she dated thought this was “their song,” and she was a little tired of it, but still liked the long intro version, since it wasn’t so overplayed. Like a fool, I decided to use the chorus of this song as her ring tone, which meant I shortened the song even further. I’m not usually superstitious, but I’m convinced this also shortened our relationship.
Pure Prairie League – “Falling In and Out of Love/Amie”
Proof that history repeats itself, I never realized this song also had a long intro until I started dating someone named “Amy.” She told me every guy she ever knew sang this chorus to her, like they were the first ones to think of it. So, of course, I made this her ringtone. It’s like I’m incapable of learning.
Lou Reed – “Sweet Jane (extended)”
The novel is sort of Lou Reed-heavy, due to a character’s obsession with his fake death announcements on Facebook, and this song is probably my favorite, even if it’ll forever remind me of Natural Born Killers.
Lou Reed – “Metal Machine Music Part 1”
This song (?) is (so far) the closest representation I’ve found to the glorious and surprisingly inspiring static between radio stations. (see also: Mike Patton’s Adult Themes for Voice)
The novel details a visit to a Facebook-esque campus, a place I’ve visited on several occasions (Palo Alto is real close to Santa Clara, where I teach), and one of the things I noticed (besides offices with full-size hockey nets and free Smart Water) was how they had all these bikes lined up and ready for anybody to hop on to zip around their huge headquarters or the nearby duck pond. And there were also these employees whose sole job seemed to be wiping off the seats of these bikes. So I tried to imagine this accommodation taken to its logical conclusion (this chapter, entitled “Endless Bicycle,” was also published separately in the Lou Reed tribute anthology Dirty Boulevard.
Pantera – “Walk” (Official Live/100 Proof version)
The Gen X guy in the novel has an annoying habit of imitating lead singer Phil Anselmo’s energetic but idiotic stage banter, which is featured heavily on this album of microphone-mouthing classics. He’s right up there with Paul Stanley (aka Dr. Rockzo) when it comes blowing your car speakers.
Massive Attack – “Teardrop (Tool ‘Stinkfist’ remix)”:
When I was a volunteer DJ for WYEP in Pittsburgh, this mash-up was my unofficial theme song. And instead of a “weather report,” I had a mosquito report, and for that I used the theme music from Magnum P.I., which made sense at the time. So at one point I’m at a party and talking to someone who loved that station, and I told them I was the overnight DJ. They said they loved my show, but the guy who was on after me “was more than a little disorganized, always talking about mosquitos.” I quickly realized that she thought I was “David Dye” from The World Café, which was on both earlier and later. I didn’t correct her. David Dye is a pretty cool name, and I kept it all week.
Bruce Springsteen – “The River”
There’s quite a bit of driving in this novel, as well as in my daily commutes, and this double album contains approximately 629 songs about cars. Weirdly enough, I gravitate towards the title song, which in spite of the central image being Bruce and Mary swimming in the titular river, also contains at least a half dozen references to driving, and a “brother’s car.” This dynamic also features heavily in Head Cleaner’s climax during an “Atmospheric River Event,” which sounds exactly like the site of an endless Springsteen concert.
The Toadies – “Possum Kingdom”
I’m still convinced this song is about vampires, as are the characters in Head Cleaner (the proof is there, just listen!) Fun story, when The Toadies played Toledo, my friend Steve and I went to see them, and they were at the bar real early just hanging out. We wanted to talk to them and didn’t know what to say, so Steve asked the lead singer if he could borrow five dollars, then had sort of laughing attack, and everyone was super annoyed. The lead singer also told me the song is not about vampires, merely murder. But lucky for all of us, authorial intent should never be implicit, and this song is definitely about vampires.
David James Keaton is the author of three collections of short stories, including FISH BITES COP! Stories to Bash Authorities, which was named the 2013 Short Story Collection of the Year by This Is Horror, and Stealing Propeller Hats from the Dead, which received a Starred Review from Publishers Weekly. He is also the author of three novels, The Last Projector (a thriller), Pig Iron (a western, which has been optioned for film), and She Was Found in a Guitar Case (a mystery). He is the co-editor, along with Joe Clifford, of Hard Sentences: Crime Fiction Inspired by Alcatraz, and the editor of Dirty Boulevard: Crime Fiction Inspired by the Songs of Lou Reed. He teaches composition and creative writing at Santa Clara University in California and can be found on Twitter @spiderfrogged.
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Shorties (An Interview with Wendell Steavenson, New Music from Bonny Light Horseman, and more)
Wendell Steavenson talked to the OTHERPPL podcast about her novel Margot.
Stream a new Bonny Light Horseman song.
eBook on sale for $2.99 today:
The Best American Noir of the Century
To celebrate Largehearted Boy's 21st birthday this week, I shared a 21-song playlist of songs featured on the site, a song from every year.
CLMP shared a Black History Month reading list.
The Creative Independent interviewed musician Bartees Strange.
Electric Literature shared a short story by Asja Bakić.
Pitchfork examined the new weird jazz scene.
The New York Times, Washington Post, and TIME listed February's most anticipated books.
Stream a new song by the Tallest Man on Earth.
Kai Thomas recommended novels about Black characters in the 19th century at Electric Literature.
Stream a new song by ANOHNI.
Emma Straub recommended her favorite New York City books at Time Out.
NPR Music profiled composer and saxophonist Patrick Shiroishi.
Debutiful interviewed author Jeffrey Dale Lofton.
Stream a new song by NOVA ONE.
Joan Didion's NYC apartment is for sale.
Paste previewed February's most anticipated albums.
Keen On interviewed author Annalee Newitz.
Aquarium Drunkard interviewed Nina Persson and James Yorkston.
Christy Edwall listed the top imaginary journeys in literature at the Guardian.
Stream a new song by Neggy Gemmy.
S.E. Hinton reflected on his novel The Outsiders at Smithsonian Magazine.
Slaughter Beach, Dog covered The The's "This Is the Day."
The New York Times Magazine interviewed author and scientist Robin Wall Kimmerer.
Stream a new song by La Luz's Shana Cleveland.
Haruki Murakami's first novel in six years will be published in Japan in April.
Stream a new song by TV Star.
Ducks Ltd. covered the Feelies' "Invitation."
SPIN examined the high cost of touring for musicians.
If you appreciate the work that goes into Largehearted Boy, please consider making a donation.
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February 1, 2023
Annalee Newitz's Playlist for Their Novel "The Terraformers"
In the Book Notes series, authors create and discuss a music playlist that relates in some way to their recently published book.
Previous contributors include Jesmyn Ward, Lauren Groff, Bret Easton Ellis, Celeste Ng, T.C. Boyle, Dana Spiotta, Amy Bloom, Aimee Bender, Roxane Gay, and many others.
Annalee Newitz's The Terraformers is a smart and imaginative space opera set in the far future.
Booklist wrote of the book:
"Newitz’s latest is far-reaching and ambitious but also surprisingly cozy and warm. . . . Newitz has a true gift for exploring the tweaks, movements, and decisions that keep history moving forward centuries ahead, and for digging into weighty issues while maintaining light humor, a delightful queer sensibility, and pure moments of joy."
In their own words, here is Annalee Newitz's Book Notes music playlist for their novel The Terraformers:
The Terraformers takes place 60,000 years in the future, on a planet that a group of workers are trying to turn into a version of Earth. These workers include humans, robots, sentient flying moose, cyborg cows, naked mole rats, and even a sentient train who joins a public transit collective. Their struggle is to find freedom on a world that is entirely owned by rapacious real estate developers. They try to build new governments; they fall in love; they find friends they never expected; and they do a lot of environmental science. I listened to a lot of music as I wrote – especially songs that combined styles from different eras, or different genres. This novel was all about trying to imagine a distant future that looks, at least in some ways, like our distant past. Even though my characters are locked in a sometimes-deadly struggle for sovereignty, they never forget to dance and sing and party. Every good uprising needs joy.
I listened to this mix a lot while I was writing this novel. It captured the blend of retro and futuristic aesthetics I wanted to bring to Sasky, a planet that is both extremely high tech and completely natural. I could imagine my characters listening to this, as the robots kicked back and charged their batteries, the moose talked about politics, and the Homo sapiens networked with the ecosystems to make sure everything has remained carbon neutral.
Many of the characters in The Terraformers are cowboys in the same way Li’l Nas X is in this song. They’re queer as heck, and turning old timey ideas into something completely new.
At the Purchaser’s Options, by Rhiannon Giddens
This mournful song about slavery and its legacy is absolutely gorgeous. I thought about it a lot as I was writing, because the threat of corporate enslavement looms over my characters’ lives. Many of them are outright owned by their employers, and don’t have much control over where they’ll be sent to work next.
There is an intense war scene in my book that involves volcano weapons, and this was the piece I listened to as I wrote it. Even though the scene itself isn’t long, it took me days to write – it’s really hard to get all the details right in a complicated action scene, while also raising the stakes emotionally. I hope I captured some of the chaos and violence of Carl Orff’s composition.
I was lucky enough to hear this song played in a venue with a huge number of speakers hung from the ceiling in a circle around the audience. Sounds moved around us, zapping from one speaker to the next, and it was magical. When my sentient trains decide to get together and sing a song, this is what I imagined they would sing.
SOPHIE’s tragic death came far too soon, and I miss her brash, gonzo compositions. I listened to this song as I was writing a scene set in a burlesque club of the far future, on another planet. It’s exactly where SOPHIE would feel right at home.
DJ Shub combines indigenous songs and melodies with contemporary EDM beats, and this is exactly what I imagine the characters in my future world dancing to. They live 60,000 years in the future, but some indigenous traditions from North America have survived in their world.
This Land Is Your Land by Woodie Guthrie
The Terraformers takes its inspiration partly from one of the verses in this song that kids aren’t taught in school:
As I went walking I saw a sign there
And on the sign it said "No Trespassing."
But on the other side it didn't say nothing.
That side was made for you and me.
Annalee Newitz is an American journalist, editor, and author of fiction and nonfiction. They are the recipient of a Knight Science Journalism Fellowship from MIT, and have written for Popular Science, The New Yorker, and the Washington Post. They founded the science fiction website io9 and served as Editor-in-Chief from 2008–2015, and then became Editor-in-Chief at Gizmodo and Tech Culture Editor at Ars Technica. Their book Scatter, Adapt, and Remember: How Humans Will Survive a Mass Extinction was nominated for the LA Times Book Prize in science. Their first novel, Autonomous, won a Lambda award.
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