he's the best. in the u.s. there are none better. at what he does.
― scott seward, Monday, 24 September 2012 14:00 (eleven years ago) link
nobody even comes close.
He just wrote a good essay on Cuba.
― taking tiger mountain (up the butt) (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Monday, 24 September 2012 14:04 (eleven years ago) link
link? i'm up for reading a good essay on Cuba.
― Mordy, Monday, 24 September 2012 14:09 (eleven years ago) link
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/09/23/magazine/where-is-cuba-going.html?pagewanted=all&_moc.semityn.www
― taking tiger mountain (up the butt) (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Monday, 24 September 2012 14:13 (eleven years ago) link
Uh, I thought that Cuba article meandered and ultimately did not say too much new and insightful (I got bored with it and may have missed something. Although admittedly I was trying to read it after having finished the David Carr interview with Neil Young in the same issue, so maybe I need to give it another shot).
― curmudgeon, Monday, 24 September 2012 14:31 (eleven years ago) link
i didn't finish the cuba thing either. will finish later. though yeah not my fave thing by him. i read the neil young thing the other day and thought it was really boring. neil is kinda boring.
― scott seward, Monday, 24 September 2012 14:33 (eleven years ago) link
I liked it a bunch, especially the interaction between him and the in-laws.
― taking tiger mountain (up the butt) (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Monday, 24 September 2012 14:35 (eleven years ago) link
Yeah, seemed like a good collection of illustrative anecdotes; I also liked his description of wondering what his daughter would think of being Cuban and what that would mean for difference between them.
― Ned Raggett, Monday, 24 September 2012 14:37 (eleven years ago) link
I suppose I can't separate my feelings from it.
― taking tiger mountain (up the butt) (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Monday, 24 September 2012 14:40 (eleven years ago) link
How dare you be Cuban. (Loved your blog response to it.)
― Ned Raggett, Monday, 24 September 2012 14:41 (eleven years ago) link
aw thanks!
― taking tiger mountain (up the butt) (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Monday, 24 September 2012 14:43 (eleven years ago) link
he kinda blamed cuban exiles in miami for inadvertently keeping castro in power, no? the whole thing is ridiculous. this country is ridiculous.
no, the family stuff was good, and if you have roots there i can definitely see it being illuminating. i just don't think its his strongest piece. and it DOES meander and ramble.
― scott seward, Monday, 24 September 2012 14:57 (eleven years ago) link
link to blog here, als.
http://humanizingthevacuum.wordpress.com/2012/09/23/our-men-in-havana/
― taking tiger mountain (up the butt) (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Monday, 24 September 2012 14:59 (eleven years ago) link
Nice.
The photos of Cuba in the NY Times piece were gorgeous.
― curmudgeon, Monday, 24 September 2012 15:05 (eleven years ago) link
^^^ yes
― taking tiger mountain (up the butt) (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Monday, 24 September 2012 15:07 (eleven years ago) link
As long as we're talking Cuba -- and this has to do with music too!
http://gawker.com/5943543/the-punks-on-g-street-tracking-cubas-rebellious-youth-50-years-after-the-revolution
― Ned Raggett, Monday, 24 September 2012 15:28 (eleven years ago) link
http://oneweekoneband.tumblr.com/post/38958539772/one-direction-little-things-did-you-know-that
― lex pretend, Thursday, 27 December 2012 18:08 (eleven years ago) link
what i love best about this is her mastery of the tone of mingled disgust and desire and delight, of hyperbolic ambivalence, WHAT IS THIS I DON'T EVEN, #everythingisembarrassing: it's a language i've only seen women use, on tumblr (and before that, a little, on livejournal). I've heard it spoken a bit but only by people already familiar with the internet use. That feeling of being personally affronted by your own reactions - whether to a song, a band, a person - of being aghast at yourself and overjoyed by it, of something that requires high-flown and/or extreme description that's simultaneously 100% serious and 100% facetious.
a language in which you can describe a person as wearing "gravely upsetting tank tops"! a language in which it is possible to express the fact that a song that you kind of despise is precisely the song that affects you the most.
― c sharp major, Friday, 28 December 2012 04:28 (eleven years ago) link
yeah isabel's one of my favorite writers, i wish she did it professionally or regularly in some capacity. whenever she tries it's just O_O
― passive-aggressive dn change (zachlyon), Friday, 28 December 2012 05:05 (eleven years ago) link
this piece on pfork from years ago has turned into something fairly influential on the direction of my music interests ever since, and by proxy my life.
shoutout to nitsuh. i know they used to post here. definitely one of the best pieces i've ever read.
― ''can be prusuaded to show gayness'' (Austin), Thursday, 16 March 2023 15:59 (one year ago) link