FLYING SOLO (2022)

May 29, 2023

As a fan of Linda Holmes — a mainstay of the delightful media discourse NPR series POP CULTURE HAPPY HOUR — I’d been meaning to get around to reading her first novel EVVIE DRAKE STARTS OVER and her latest novel FLYING SOLO.

It wasn’t until I saw Linda Holmes reply to a tweet extolling her description of a library as a church, a spacious place to worship words, that I felt the need to immediately prioritize FLYING SOLO.

In my youth, I lived close enough to our local library that it was a five-minute walk. I’m not exaggerating: it would’ve taken longer to drive there than to walk.

For many years, it consisted of a small cottage house, wall-to-wall shelves with books crammed up to the ceiling. It was comfortably cramped, and it was overseen by a woman named Susan Overfield, who was the exact image of what you’d expect her to look like: short in stature, unkempt salt-and-pepper hair, but so passionate about books and knowledge and she knew exactly where everything was and would always give you recommendations for texts you never knew you needed. Essex, Vermont’s patron saint of libraries.

I’d walk out with an arm full of books and come back a week later to return them and repeat the process.

Time passed and it was suggested that the library had outgrown the cottage, so they decided to move to a more spacious building. I fretted when I heard the news, worried that they would move as far as possible from my home, fearful that it’d disrupt my weekly pilgrimage.

Instead, they moved into an abandoned church, on the same corner as the old cottage and, as Holmes alluded to: if you believe in a higher being, books get you there. If you don’t, well, consider it a temple to unbound delights.

(I’ve since learned that libraries moving into churches is pretty common in New England, so it’s nothing exclusive to my town.)

This is a very long-winded way of saying: I feel very seen by Holmes. Not only did I prioritize FLYING SOLO because of the library :: church bit, but also because, well, it’s right there in the name: flying solo. While, yes, I’ve spent more of my life entangled with people than not, I’m a loner at heart. I love solo walks and I love reading by myself and watching films by myself and I absolutely love traveling alone.

Again, all of that is rather antithetical for someone who has been partnered up with folks for longer than not, but it’s true. Introversion and anxiety is a hell of a bad combination, not to mention a delicate balancing act, and I see that all over the protagonist of FLYING SOLO: Laurie, the sole daughter who grew up among three brothers.

FLYING SOLO centers around Laurie, 39-going-on-40 (yes, actually — it’s not an ‘I’m always 39!’ joke), whom is tasked with returning to the small New England hometown she left for the Pacific Northwest to sort through her dead great aunt Dot’s house and clean it out. She stumbles over two objects of note: 1) a wood-carved duck carefully preserved and hidden amongst Dot’s belongings and 2) the sweet ex she broke up with because she knew she wanted a life elsewhere and he did not.

While I thought FLYING SOLO would mostly focus on the will-they/won’t-they of the latter facet, it leans hard into the first. It turns out that the duck may have been crafted by a famous artists, and Laurie unknowingly offloads it before realizing that it may be worth quite a bit. What follows is essentially very soft heist, the softest, but it’s still quite fun and beguiling, and then matters unfurl.

I’ll note: this is a very specific book, despite straddling a number of genres. It’s all about the nerds and weirdos and misfits. It’s not a traditional romantic novel — Holmes draws that line in the sand very quickly — but it traffics in all of the comforts of everything from rom-coms to melodrama to thrillers to action — however on a much smaller scale.

It’s a fun and substantive ride, and the end payoff with Dot and the duck is expertly handled. If you are one who keeps people at an arm’s length in a warm way, this is for you.

SNOG – “Old Atlantis” (1999)

May 27, 2023

This was it, this was the song. The first dance at our wedding, but also one of the first songs I danced to my with my future wife. I convinced a DJ friend of mine at the club, while I was with my girlfriend/future betrothed frequented to play it, despite it being a total floor-killer. We slow-danced, entangled together. I felt we were alone, luxuriating in the club’s limelight.

It was magical.

You can’t ask for a better moment than that.

(Yes, I realize that we were dancing to a nihilistic anti-capitalism song in a queer club that didn’t prioritize cleanliness, and that was perfect for us.)

“Old Atlantis” — via the album Third Mall From the Sun — is absolute bittersweet melancholy with amazing vivid imagery. The build is incredible; it’s an intensely emotional song. I’ve never heard anything quite like it, and I doubt I ever will again. It’s a singular work, something that works with the cadence of a quintessential prom song but also feels like it shoulders the weight of the outside world.

I cannot emphasize how much this song means to me or the feelings it evokes in me. The aural punctuation — the fire — in the latter third of the song devastates me every time. You’re encircled in an audio attack while the two of you are holding each other tightly, protecting each other through the aural maelstrom. It’s exhilarating, and then the clocks descend and the house lights flicker awake, and you can let loose your breath.

For as sensitive as this song is, Thrussell himself? Not so sensitive when initially dealing with fans. SNOG performed at a tiny-ass club just a stone throw away from us in Chicago many years later, and while buying merch, my wife and I gushed to him as to how much “Old Atlantis” meant to us, how much we loved the song, how we knew immediately that it would be our first dance for our wedding, and how formative his work was for us. He essentially hand-waved us away, which hurt, but we rolled with it because we knew this kind of shit can be tiring when you’re on the road! One of these days I’ll recount our times as bookies.

However, his partner later elbowed him into seeking us out before the show and he did apologize and thanked us for our kind words, which meant the world to us. Also, he is a consummate performer, and the show was incredible.

It’s not often you get to meet the artists who move you, who create indelible life moments, much less get to personally interact with them and, while that experience was a bit of a rollercoaster, it’s a memory I’ll always cherish, although not as much as our first dance.

“Let’s do it. You and me. Let’s do it. Together. Let’s. Burn it. All. Down. Again.”

I’ll close this out by noting that one of the most often exclamations I hear from folks are: “You used to be a DJ?!” I don’t know why, because hasn’t everyone considered themselves a DJ at some point in their life? (That said, unlike most, I was paid for the privilege.) Anyway, every time I’m like, just wait until you find out my wife and I had our own club night for years, and that we both helped to set up a collective to book underrated electronic bands. We’ve done a lot! We spent our twenties exactly how you should: by throwing around money you don’t have and shouldn’t be spending on efforts that very few folks will appreciate but will be extraordinarily memorable for those who do attend!

I’d be lying if I didn’t say that SNOG wasn’t a major impetus for that; I wasn’t exaggerating when I said SNOG was a formative work for us. We earnestly and honestly wanted to bring the same feeling we had with “Old Atlantis” to others, and we did all that we could to do so.

SNOG – “Cheerful Hypocrisy” (2015)

May 26, 2023

While SNOG can compose devastating works — see “The Ballad” and “Old Atlantis” — “Cheerful Hypocrisy” from the album “Compliance” aurally bounces. It’s pure bubblegum until the lyrics pop.

While the songwriting is quite progressive, although it does contain satirical use of slurs that I’m not too keen on, I’m not sure I can say the same for the video, which seems like a bit too much fetish well-wishing.

I’ll be honest: Despite the obvious STARSHIP TROOPERS riffs, I don’t love some of the phrasing, and I hate some of the lazy ALICE IN WONDERLAND tropes, but it’s still one hell of a song. Just be glad I didn’t extoll the song where he’s basically being spanked for four minutes straight.

“WAR GOING GREAT!”

SNOG – “The Ballad” (1997)

May 25, 2023

You may have noted that all of these music-themed weeks have included at least one spaghetti western-themed work, and this week is no different.

“The Ballad”, from his album (aptly named) Buy Me… I’ll Change Your Life – is certainly the most melancholy track, and could easily be slipped into any western. It’s expertly executed, and the depth of his voice only exacerbates that. It’s a brilliantly evocative work that made me realize that Thrussell was more than just a musical engineer.

“When the working day is done, I refuse to belong to anyone.”

SNOG – “Corporate Slave” (1992)

May 22, 2023

I first heard this song as a young teenager, well before I had any knowledge of the Paddy Chayefsky-penned film NETWORK that Thrussell liberally samples from, and it lit a fire in young socialist me.

From his album Remote Control, lyrically, it’s soothingly provocative and musically it has a confident swagger that you don’t hear much with political musical screeds. It’s at odds with itself, which makes sense given the push-and-pull of capitalism.

This is, sadly, more relevant than ever, although a number of the corporate names have changed over the years.

SNOG – HOORAY!! (1998)

May 21, 2023

What sounds like a peppy electro song is a surprisingly dour and nihilistic track, which is SNOG in a nutshell. Nonetheless, it’s immaculately constructed and perfect to sway to.

(I’ll note that there’s an entire remix EP of the song, which is how I’m justifying posting this as well as “The Ballad”, both of which are on “Buy Me… I’ll Change Your Life.”)

“Hurry on madness. Hurry on, disease. Hurry on insanity. Hurry on, please.”

SNOG Week

May 20, 2023

SNOG is an Australian-based electro band that, like FOETUS, has been a major fixture in my life for years, although the man behind the name — David Thrussell — is barely known in the states. His work is amazingly multi-faceted, but always delightfully nihilistic.

Because I’m a big idiot, I dreamed of dancing to one of their songs as the centerpiece to whomever I’d marry, and found someone who felt similarly.

So, welcome to SNOG week.

LIFE IS STRANGE: TRACKS / COMING HOME / SETTLING DUST (2022)

May 19, 2023

I do not like Tristan. (If you can see the cover, he’s the dude on the far right, next to Max.)

He’s a gothy blasé teen that immediately bonds with Max & Chloe, but feels like a fan insert, which echoes my prior gripes that the first volume of this comic book series has a whiff of fan-service. LIFE IS STRANGE’s second half features him being glad-handed by Chloe & Max and it feels abnormal; like a burr, an oddity that shouldn’t exist, and perhaps he shouldn’t, but he does.

That’s is a strange thing to say about a series that features a protagonist who shouldn’t exist where they are, but Tristan? He doesn’t fit. The work already has the holy trinity: Chloe, Max, and Rachel. (Even if I grouse about Max and Rachel meeting. Chloe can’t have two besties at the same time. She isn’t wired for that.) It feels unnecessary, and very strange (no pun intended) that they would be so quick to befriend him.

Also: I’ll note that my Max would never get a tattoo. I can’t imagine any universe in which she would. (Although I’d be lying if I said I never thought about getting a blue butterfly tattoo, because I certainly have and I’m dumb like that and love these games that much.)

I realize I’m back-tracking a bit, based on the Vol. 1 writeup but it zigged where it could have zagged.

I rationally understand that these comics are meant to portray others’ interpretation of the work, and it’s a well-meaning work, for sure! However, it doesn’t resonate for me in the same way the games have. While the intricacies of the choices are intriguing, it feels less cohesive, which is a shame because there’s a lot of great groundwork laid here. It’s still worth reading and it accomplishes what it wants to accomplish but, depending on the choices you made in the original games, it may leave you feeling slightly sour.