But ah my foes and oh my friends / I make a lovely light

What's on TV? Oh, the usual sci-fi fantasy, read by women in bed: "They've put a lot of imagination into appearing to be foolish." [via skreidle]

Best poster ever. [via tirani]

United States ex. rel. Gerald Mayo v. Satan and his staff [one-page PDF]: "We note that the plaintiff has failed to include with his complaint the required form of instructions for the United States Marshal for directions as to service of process." As an added bonus, the judge finds that damned Stephen Vincet Benet story as judicially improbable as I do. [via Making Light]

Rhino Records puts out some damned fine compilations. Their sadly out-of-print Seducing Down the Door is almost all the John Cale you'll ever need (it's inexplicably lacking anything good or famous from Sabotage), and I'll Sleep When I'm Dead is the definitive pre-2000 Warren Zevon compilation. (This in addition to all the Tom Lehrer there is.) So when I say that they've put together the greatest Nineties boxed set ever, you understand that I'm not just saying that for effect. (Seriously, folks. Any compilation with They Might Be Giants, Jesus Jones, and M.C. Hammer gets mondo bonus points for covering all the bases-- and that's just the first disc.)

( Better than fading away )

Idlewild / Music for a New Society

After some serious data corruption a couple months ago I've given up on a coherent booklog. So, just the things that strike me. Which makes more sense anyway.

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Nick Sagan, Idlewild

Very neat. The first half feels cribbed from Zelazny's Amber books: the protagonist with amnesia, the world-warping, the limited number of siblings of comparable power. Halloween's a much more developed character than Corwin, though, and events diverge pretty sharply from Amber about midway through the book. Oddly, the second half isn't quite as good as the first . . . I suppose that might just be personal preference. The resolution works out well enough. I understand there's a sequel; I'll be checking that out.

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John Cale, Music for a New Society

By the end of side one I was cowering under the kitchen table. -- Tim Bradstock

I reflexively describe this album as "unlistenable" when I go through my CDs, but that's really unfair. I mean, the man tends to descend into screaming at the end of his songs, what's the bar for unlistenable here?

Listening to MfaNS is like watching someone else slit your wrists with a very cold, ivory-handled silver-bladed straight razor.

"Thoughtless Kind" is about your friends. The main character in "Chinese Envoy" might as well be a ghost. The music quietly drifts around the words, synthesised somethings, except when the piano crashes down around "Damn Life" or "Risé, Sam, and Rimsky-Korsakov." Beautiful, haunting.

I couldn't listen to this every day, but at times it's the right music.