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Friday, March 27, 2009
 I'm glad that Leisure is using a lot of newer talent with its horror line, but I'm even more grateful that they continue to bring us the living legends of the genre. And April's releases are Bestial, by Ray Garton and The Golem, by Edward Lee.
Ray has been publishing in the genre for just about as long as I've been reading it. Like many of his older fans, I first discovered Ray with his landmark vampire novel, Live Girls. I went back and found darklings and Seductions, both of which are excellent.
There are some horror writers that have achieved greater fame than Ray Garton, but I'll hold up the consistent level of quality in his work with the very best of them. Ray's fiction can be traditional or radical or anywhere in between. Ravenous, which is the werewolf novel that preceded Bestial, was a more traditional tale from Ray. It reminded me of a good 80's horror novel. Which is never a bad thing.
I started reading Edward Lee somewhat late in the game. The first one I bought was Creekers, but I was instantly a fan after reading it. Ray's unique brand of high-octane sex and violence-drenched fiction is without peer. Many have tried to ape his style, but few or none have his solid storytelling chops. And it would be a mistake to simply call Lee a grossout writer. He tells a walloping story every time he writes a novel or short piece of fiction. The man is a pro at the writing game.
Two legends of the genre, both available at affordable prices. Don't miss them.
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Wednesday, March 18, 2009
McCammon talks about it in Boy's Life. How music helps to keep the magic of youth alive. How important it is to listen to new, young music. I try to adhere to that.
So many adults I know seem to have lost the passion for music that they once had. Maybe a lot of them never really had any passion in the first place. And I find that to be very sad.
I know so many people that live with their television sets on constantly. Never listening to music at home. Or if they do it's just generic radio or perhaps the music they loved when they were teens. That's fine. I still adore my teenage favorites: Todd Rundgren, Frank Zappa and The Tubes are probably the most predominant of them.
Times change and music evolves. Or, as the corporations continue to ruin any true creativity in the industry, it devolves. But it's a mistake to think that all new music is terrible. Even if your local 'modern rock' station may make you feel that way.
My tastes mutated as the years went on. I tried a lot of things and while I might have disliked a lot of it, I found miracles of melody too.
And many songs or albums take me back to great times of my life. I remember riding around with my best friends, listening to the Tubes obsessively. Discussing the meaning of the songs with the kind of intense passion that only geeky teens that are desperate to get laid and have a little buzz can do. I listen to White Punks on Dope or Talk To Ya Later (to name a couple of the more popular Tubes songs) and I think of hot, listless nights. in the late 70's and early 80's.
Recently my wife and I separated, but we later had a reconciliation. When I was visiting her and rebuilding the love, I bought a CD of David Byrne and Brian Eno's Everything That Will Happen Will Happen today. Not a great album by any means, but I played it this morning and the happiness that I felt when I was first hearing it came back in a rush. I know that this album will always have a deep resonance with me.
Or like hearing Oingo Boingo constantly as I drank furiously after working so much overtime in my new career as a machinist. Those songs by the band will always bring back that vital time when I was changing myself.
The list goes on and I will always try to keep it fresh. I think the heart demands music and part of us dies when we stop feeding it.
I'll always love my old favorites, but I keep trying new things. A recent obsession of mine is a young band called Miniature Tigers. They are supposedly an 'alternative' band, but whatever that label once might have meant is meaningless now. To me, Miniature Tigers is a pop band, but not like the miserable excuses for pop that make the top 40. The Tigers do smart, melodic songs that may not be great or brilliant, but damn if they aren't infectious. I've been listening to them so much for the last month. And these songs off of their TELL IT TO THE VOLCANO album will always make me think of these insane but wonderful times in my life.
In the past year or so I've enjoyed newer groups like Arcade Fire, My Morning Jacket, The Shins, Golgol Bordello and even that lovable little goofball, Bo Burnham.
You can fight your body's inevitable aging by exercising and maintaining a sensible diet. And you can keep your heart young with music.
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Sunday, March 01, 2009
I buy books. It's what I do. It's what I've always done. I do not intend to stop until the bitter end.
As far back as I could remember, I loved books. It began with Golden Books when I was a toddler. I was in love with them. I went on to Dr. Seuss and other children's literature and comic books. From there I moved on to science fiction and pulp reprints and media tie-ins.
You'll hear me bemoan my financial situation and I still buy books. I get behind on my bills and I buy books. When I was a kid, in middle school, I would starve myself and skip lunch when I had the will power. Two days of sacrifice and I could afford a Doc Savage paperback, or maybe a science fiction book. My mother would have been pissed had she known, but as far as I was concerned it was none of her business. As a parent I vowed that if my kids wanted to read, I would always provide them with books. Thankfully they do love it. I think it helped that I have taken them to conventions and signings where they've met authors.
I've cut back on the expensive limited editions. I do consider myself a collector, but I'm a reader first and foremost. But I did buy two Ronald Kelly books from Cemetery Dance recently. As usual, CD had a special offer with them that made them much more affordable than the average limited.
I've slowed down on all my book purchases, in fact. It's not like the early days of Shocklines when so many in the community seemed to have some sort of feverish dementia about purchasing small press editions.
I still buy on a weekly basis though. This week I bought the Leisure paperback of Richard Laymon's Dark Mountain and the Delirium trade paperback of New Dark Voices 2.
You've heard the cliche where someone impulse shops to help their depression? It's a little like that for me. Very little gives me as much joy as going out to a bookstore and making a purchase.
I know that the economy is in rough shape and that a lot of people are hurting. But if we love the genre. Worship at the alter of the printed word, as I like to call it, we've got to show our support at the source. That means buying the books. If a writer you like has a new publication out, it really helps to make that purchase within the first week that it's out. And the small press publishers really need our support the most. We all have our favorites and in order for them to survive and continue to bring us these lovely books, we need to at least occasionally patronize them.
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