Listen, Learn, Read

Dirk Gently’s Holistic Detective Agency

2012-01-20T23:00:00.001Z

by Douglas Adams

By some reason, I never read this book before we moved to Fuerte.

Now I did. I really think the writing is the Adams’s best.

Know what, Cambridge is not that bad after all. Monty Python, Pink Floyd and DNA — I mean, of course, Douglas Noel Adams — are more than enough to vindicate the place. And now I learned that St. Cedd’s even used to have a time machine.

“But that can’t work, can it?” said Richard. “If we do that, then this won’t have happened. Don’t we generate all sorts of paradoxes?”
Reg stirred himself from thought. “No worse than many that exist already,” he said. “If the Universe came to an end every time there was some uncertainty about what had happened in it, it would never have got beyond the first picosecond. And many of course don’t. It’s like a human body, you see. A few cuts and bruises here and there don’t hurt it. Not even major surgery if it’s done properly. Paradoxes are just the scar tissue. Time and space heal themselves up around them and people simply remember a version of events which makes as much sense as they require it to make.
“That isn’t to say that if you get involved in a paradox a few things won’t strike you as being very odd, but if you’ve got through life without that already happening to you, then I don’t know which Universe you’ve been living in, but it isn’t this one.”

Tramp

2012-01-15T19:30:00.002Z

by Knut Reiersrud

Sorting through the box of unclassified CDs. Where did this one come from? Most likely from Oxfam, about ten years ago. Can’t really say what caused me to buy it, for all the liner notes are in Norwegian. The only name that rang a bell at the time was that of organist Iver Kleive. I listened to this album once, then I firmly lost the track of it.

So here it is. By now I recognise the names of a few more musicians here: Paolo Vinaccia (djembe, talking drum, bolambata, bass kalimba), Juldeh Camara (the very same Camara who plays with Justin Adams), and all four of Five Blind Boys of Alabama: Clarence Fountain, Jimmy Carter, George Scott and Curtis Foster. As intercontinental collaborations go, this one is not as unlikely as it sounds (and I heard unlikelier ones). In fact, when you listen to the songs, they all sound very organic. My favourite song is seven-and-a-half minute Jarabe, sung by Gambian griot and kora player Alagi M’Bye. I still can’t read Norwegian, but one can get a satisfactory translation of these liner notes online:

Utgangspunktet er et muslimsk basert tradisjonelt tema som Alagi og jeg har brettet ut. Alagi har skrevet ny tekst og jeg har harmonisert i mer europeisk tradisjon. Den godeste Alagi sang med så mye trøkk at mikrofonene i den lille trekirken på Rauland fikk problemer med å fange opp noe som helst annet. Stemmingen på gitaren er stjålet fra en av mine favoritt kassegitarister — Joni Mitchell.

The Million Dollar Hotel

2012-01-08T18:50:00.002Z

a film by Wim Wenders

Somehow, I never heard about this film until last night. Once again, kudos to laSexta’s Todo Cine channel for showing it. Co-written and co-produced by Bono, of all people, the movie did poorly at the box office when released in 2000. It was not appreciated by the critics either, in spite of some top-quality acting, photography and music. Peter Stormare is great as an “ex-Beatle” Dixie, and his rendition of I Am the Walrus easily beats the 1967 original. One day I want to watch it again (with English subtitles, ’cause I didn’t understand half of things Tom Tom was saying).

Tom Tom (Jeremy Davies) tries to strike up a conversation with Eloise (Milla Jovovich). According to IMDb, the book that Eloise carries around is One Hundred Years of Solitude.

Timur’s Artwork

2012-01-07T20:25:00.000Z

by Timur Kulikov

As Timur keeps producing drawings (mostly with Adobe Illustrator) at rather alarming rate, I’ve helped him to set up his website with Weebly. Now he updates it on his own.

Abattoir Blues / The Lyre of Orpheus

2012-01-05T22:00:00.002Z

by Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds

This double album set comes in a cute canvas-bound slipcase, with CDs in cardboard sleeves and a lyrics booklet — a lot of lyrics in these songs, you know. Top quality lyrics too. I love every song here. Especially Get Ready for Love, Hiding All Away and The Lyre of Orpheus.

The well went down very deep
Very deep went down the well
The well went down so very deep
Well, the well went down to hell

Ah, brilliant. Who else could have thought of rhyming Orpheus with orifice?

Belly Dance Fitness

2012-01-04T22:10:00.000Z

by Aerobics Oz Style

First published 4 January 2012 @ zumbafuerteventura

Just as in case of The Samba Reggae Workout, I ordered this DVD on the strength of the Amazon reviews. This time, however, it was rather a miss. I did not learn that much new, apart from some useful moves during the cool-down (called here “warm-down”). There is about 55 minutes of workout (including warm-up and cool-down) and quite a lot of utterly disposable bonus features, like Behind the Scenes or Team Profiles (where one of the instructors is showing her kitchen and another is going through her collection of hip scarves). The music is really boring. And what is “Oz Style”? I think it means that all the demonstration takes place on the beach, somewhere in Australia I presume. I quite like that — you almost expect a great white shark or something among the bathers on the background — although the camerawork is not that great. Apparently, the cameraman is rather fond of Dutch angles, which, according to Wikipedia, are

often used to portray the psychological uneasiness or tension in the subject being filmed.

Not the best choice for a dance fitness or, for that matter, any instructional video (unless it is the one on Dutch angle techniques). As much as I enjoy looking at the girls with very little clothes on, it would be better if the camera stayed focused on the instructors. Also, as the DVD is aimed at the beginner, one would expect a bit more of basic movement breakdown.

Stratvs Rosado 2010

2012-01-02T20:45:00.002Z

This beautifully presented rosé comes from Bodegas Stratvs in La Geria, Lanzarote. The bottle has the words “El Vino del Fuego de la Tierra del Viento” in raised letters on it. The Stratvs’s own tasting notes say:

Aromas of red fruits — strawberries and mulberries, fresh herbs, fine patisseries and red caramel.

I am not sure about all that but it went down nicely anyway. At €8.50 per half-litre, it is not the cheapest beverage around. Still, now and then I feel the urge to support the local economy while having a good drink, and this is a very decent wine for the purpose.

More photos of rosé wine @ Shutterstock.

Finn Family Moomintroll

2011-12-30T19:13:00.005Z

by Tove Jansson

This was the very first Moomin book I ever read, originally in Russian. Imprinting or not, I consider the Russian translation of this book superior to the English version (which I just finished reading). To start with the title: Finn Family Moomintroll — any book featuring Moomins could be named like that, right? The Russian title Шляпа волшебника is the correct translation of Swedish Trollkarlens hatt — literally, “The Magician’s Hat” (not “Hobgoblin’s Hat”). Снусмумрик sounds almost exactly as Snusmumriken (why Snufkin?), just as the names Тофсла и Вифсла are almost identical to Swedish “Tofslan och Vifslan” (in English, they are named Thingumy and Bob). The language these two latter creatures speak is translated to Russian more consistently. Or take this sentence:

О, какое счастье быть муми-троллем, который только проснулся и уже пляшет среди зеленых волн на восходе солнца!

Oh, to be a Moomin and to dance in the waves while the sun gets up!

And so on.

Never mind that, even in this translation it is still a magical book.

The Twelve Days of Christmas

2011-12-29T23:23:00.001Z

by John Julius Norwich, illustrated by Quentin Blake

Whether or not you are still looking for that belated Christmas present... look no further. I imagine this one-way correspondence read by Hattie Hayridge (as female Holly in Red Dwarf).

2^nd January

Look here Edward, this has gone far enough. You say you’re sending me nine ladies dancing; all I can say is that judging from the way they dance, they’re certainly not ladies. The village just isn’t accustomed to seeing a regiment of shameless hussies with nothing on but their lipstick cavorting round the green — and it’s Mummy and I who get blamed. If you value our friendship — which I do less and less — kindly stop this ridiculous behaviour at once.

Emily

Juno

2011-12-25T16:10:00.000Z

a film by Jason Reitman

After reading a review of this film in The Big Issue at the time, I fully intended to watch it... that never happened. Until now, that is. They were showing it on Spanish telly in the small hours of Saturday. Ellen Page shines in the title role, with some exceptionally good (I mean it) support of the fellow actors. The soundtrack features several songs by anti-folk singer-songwriter Kimya Dawson — what a treat.

Bizzaramente

2011-12-24T00:00:00.021Z

by Debski’s String Connection

Slowly, slowly, the best of Polish jazz and rock start to appear on CDs. String Connection was the greatest Polish jazz band in 1980s. I was lucky enough to see them live in Moscow Olympic Village in mid-’80s. (Incidentally, it was the first “foreign” band I ever seen live. Those were the days.)

Now Bizzaramente was recorded by a rather different band. The two original String Connection members, Krzesimir Dębski (violin, keyboards) and Krzysztof Przybyłowicz (drums), are joined here by Dom Um Romão (percussion) and Peter Szalay (tabla). Frankly, I was expecting a more interesting result from this collaboration. There’s not much of string connection — the sound is dominated by Dębski’s keyboards (rather than violin), and it must have sounded dated even back in 1988. The absence of a real bass player is pretty obvious. I wouldn’t call it jazz either. At best, it could be a movie soundtrack. The music is well-crafted and pleasant but there’s nothing, really, bizzarramente about it — except, perhaps, Paysage à la Balthüs 2, which is my favourite song on the album.

秒速5センチメートル

2011-12-23T00:00:00.003Z

a film by Makoto Shinkai

As beautifully crafted as The Place Promised in Our Early Days but shorter (which is always a plus), this anime consists of three episodes. The first one, Cherry Blossom, is really the best, what with all the snow and trains. Cosmonaut reminded me of Yoko Ogawa’s The Diving Pool. The final episode, 5 Centimeters Per Second, is rather weak, although could be vastly improved by cutting out that song.

Torres De Casta Rosado 2010

2011-12-22T18:10:00.002Z

It is the shortest day of the year, nearly Christmas, and still warm enough to enjoy some rosé outdoors! De Casta is a very decent bottle of wine and, at under €4, an absolute bargain. Life is good.

More photos of rosé wine @ Shutterstock.

The Beauty and The Sea

2011-12-16T02:22:00.000Z

by Mor Karbasi

Four months after it was packed, our stuff finally arrived to Fuerteventura. The stuff includes books, CDs and DVDs. Now I started unearthing the music that I did not listen to for a while. The Beauty and The Sea was among them.

As it was explained a while ago, back in 2008 I missed Mor Karbasi’s Cambridge gig because Uriah Heep were playing next door. That won’t happen next time, I promise, but nobody knows when this next time will be. According to her website, she plays two dates in Spain next week, 21st December in Malaga and 22nd in Madrid. I hope some of my Spanish friends can catch her!

Back to the album: it is a beauty. The songs are all beautiful. (Do I use this word too much? Unavoidable here.) My favourite is Fuego, with guest musicians Kai Eckhardt and Trilok Gurtu. And then the story by Shoshana Karbasi, which links the songs together. I only wish it had the original Ladino or Spanish lyrics there.

“Tell me kind old lady, what is the name of this street?”
“This street has no name, my child.”
“Does this street lead to the sea?” I ask.
“All of the streets around here lead to the sea, my child.”
“Have you seen my beloved?” I ask.
“Is she pretty, my child?” she replies.
“Yes, very pretty.”
“A red flower in her hair?” she asks.
“Yes! Oh yes!” I answer, “Have you seen her?”
“Your beautiful has gone to the sea... She has gone to the sea.”
“And how would you know kind lady?” I ask, “How do you know?”
“All lost loves go to the sea”, she says with great sadness. “This is how it is with loves.”

José Pariente, Rueda DO 2009

2011-12-10T17:00:00.003Z

Finally, a bottle of decent Spanish Sauvignon Blanc, even though on a pricey side (about €9). It comes from Valladolid; now I know what to ask our friends to bring here when they come to visit.

More photos of white wine @ Shutterstock.

Beautiful Losers

2011-12-05T14:45:00.004Z

by Leonard Cohen

According to Wikipedia, “Beautiful Losers is considered a masterpiece of Canadian literature”. If I didn’t know better, I’d say that Canadian literature must be dead boring. I spent more than two months wading through this murky stream of (un)consciousness and it is a little miracle that I actually finished the book, mostly out of respect to the author (who surely is doing much better as a singer-songwriter than a novelist). I didn’t enjoy it.

To be fair, there are some lovely poetic passages, and the strange story of Catherine Tekakwitha on its own would make a decent novella. Then there are some other passages that are positively disgusting. But even if they were not there, I doubt that as a whole the novel would ever work.

Is All The World A Prayer To Some Star? Are All The Years Of The World A Catalogue Of The Events Of Some Holiday? Do All Things Happen At Once? Is There A Needle In The Haystack? Do We Perform In The Twilight Before A Vast Theatre Of Empty Stone Benches? ... ..... ... May I Unfasten My Loneliness And Collide Once Again With A Beautiful Greedy Body? May I Fall Asleep After A Soft Happy Kiss? May I Have A Dog For A Pet? May I Teach Myself To Be Handsome? May I Pray At All?

The Universe Museum

2011-11-30T21:00:00.001Z

by Timur Kulikov

At long last, Timur is reunited with the PC and Adobe Illustrator. This drawing is an idea of the video game he is designing. One part of the game takes place in The Universe Museum: some creature (naturally, created by a villain) takes control of the clock and then you have to fight it.

The tree in front represents life, the red atom represents matter, the goblet represents water, the black orb represents space and the clock represents time.

Veiga Serantes, Rías Baixas DO 2010

2011-11-27T18:00:00.009Z

I bought this limited edition Veiga Serantes Albariño (bottle no. 0457 — of one thousand?) in Marumba. And it was a nice bottle of wine. At 13%, it is a bit stronger than Oro Valei, although twice as expensive, so probably not the best value bottle of vino blanco. The search for truly great Spanish white wine continues...

More photos of white wine @ Shutterstock.

Lucía y el sexo

2011-11-20T16:30:00.002Z

a film by Julio Médem

Last night, I watched this film on Spanish telly, without any subtitles, whether English and Spanish. I can’t say that I followed all the dialogue, but when you see the movie for the fourth time it’s not that important. What is important then? I don’t know. This time I paid more attention to the beautiful score by Alberto Iglesias. I was expecting the film being re-edited for television (as many features shown here are, and rather heavily), but it was shown in its entirety, except for the end credits.

Sex and Lucía is not exactly an erotic movie, but the love scenes between Lucía (Paz Vega) and Lorenzo (Tristán Ulloa) are both funny and touching and as erotic as could be.

Zelig

2011-11-13T22:00:00.001Z

a film by Woody Allen

Last night, or rather in the small hours of Sunday morning, I watched Zelig once again — this time, with Spanish subtitles (which amused me a lot). I find the protagonist of this “mockumentary” more touching and, well, more believable than other Allen’s characters.

The clip below contains one of my favourite scenes in the movie, viz. the escape of Zelig and Fletcher from Nazis on the airplane upside-down.

Zwei fanatische, idiotische, amerikanische Dummköpfe, kriminelle Schweinehunde, die Zelig und Fletcher heißen, ruinierten in einer wichtigen Rede unseres Führers Adolf Hitler den besten Witz...

~~Das ist fantastisch.~~ Absolutely brilliant.

iriver iHP-140 jukebox

2011-11-05T20:00:00.001Z

by iriver

First published 5 November 2011 @ zumbafuerteventura

I bought this amazing piece of kit seven years ago and it is still alive! I even have a few gigabytes of its (40 GB) disk space left. Back in 2004, this was probably the best gizmo of its kind. Granted, even then it did not look as sexy as iPod, but it can do so much more. Most of my music there is in OGG format. It also is a surprisingly good-quality dictaphone. There is a (still unreleased) recording of a bass/drum/guitar trio (eventually becoming a duo as the drummer left the building) in the basement of my old workplace. (When I grow old and famous, I may want to release it to raise some cash.) Also, from time to time I used it just as a portable hard disk that it is.

And here’s a problem: where to get a replacement when (or, better, before) it crashes? iHP-140 is not available in shops any longer. According to Wikipedia, this player is discontinued and succeeded by iriver H300 series, which is also unavailable. Most of affordable MP3 players for sale now have no more than 8 GB memory. In the meantime, I hope it does not die a sudden death just before my Zumba class.

Brunus Rosé, Portal de Montsant DO 2009

2011-10-23T21:45:00.004+01:00

Things are positively improving here. After finishing our kilo of Maragogipe and half-way through a kilo bag of Lavazza (bought via Amazon!), I was relieved to find that now we have the source of quality coffee beans in Corralejo. They could be found in the Marumba store in C.C. El Campanario. During our last visit there (yesterday, to be precise), I bought a bag of Costa Rican beans and a bottle of this delicious rosé from Catalonia. Try it if you can find it.

More photos of rosé wine @ Shutterstock.

Mister Pip

2011-10-15T15:15:00.001+01:00

by Lloyd Jones

This beautifully told story is set on Bougainville, the Melanesian island of which very existence I was ignorant until now, during the 1990s civil war. I loved the book, but be warned. When the “redskin” soldiers appear in the village for the first time, you know it is not going to end well. Still, nothing prepares you to the horrors of their final visit.

My favourite chapters are the ones where Mr Watts, the only white person in the village, invites the parents of the children to come into his classroom and “share what they knew of the world”.

‘There is a place called Egypt,’ she said. ‘I know nothing of that place. I wish I could tell you kids about Egypt. Forgive me for not knowing more. But, if you care to listen, I will tell you everything I know about the colour blue.’
And so we heard about the colour blue.

‘Some islands have beautiful names for different winds. My favourite is the wind that is known as “gentle as a woman”.’

Gilbert’s uncle, a big man, round as an oil drum, black as tar from toiling out at sea, came to speak to us about ‘broken dreams’. He said the best place to find a broken dream is on the wharf. ‘Look at all those dead fish with their eyes and mouths open. They can’t believe they are not in the sea and never will be again.’

‘At night the blimmin’ dogs and roosters chase after dreams and break them in two. The one good thing about a broken dream is that you can pick up the threads of it again. By the way, fish go to heaven. Don’t believe any other shit you hear.’

The Samba Reggae Workout

2011-10-14T23:32:00.003+01:00

with Quenia Ribeiro

First published 14 October 2011 @ zumbafuerteventura

I bought this DVD on the strength of the Amazon reviews — and was not disappointed.

Quenia starts with Welcome and, in just two minutes, introduces the samba reggae Basic Steps. These look easy; that’s encouraging.

To my fellow Zumber@s, Quenia’s Warm-Up may seem more like “cool-down”: a lot of stretching exercises, some of them rather impressive. At 12 minutes, it is a bit longer than your typical Zumba class warm-up/cool-down. But you can’t have too much of a good thing. You will be sweating by the end of it.

In Workout #1 (about 37 minutes) Quenia builds up, well, a “routine”: shows a step, repeats, adds a new step, repeats “from the top”, shows a new step and so on. Non-stop. (Speaking of stops: the great thing about the DVD is that you always can use the stop button to catch your breath. I had to do that a few times during Workout #1.) “Routine” may sound boring, but actually it is a good fun. OK, I found Quenia’s verbal cues rather redundant and did not exactly fell in love with her voice. So what, I know how to turn the volume down, so it really is not a problem. It would be perfect if there was a way to quick-jump to particular steps, because the only way to navigate within Workout #1 is the good old fast-forward (or fast-backward).

Workout #2 (about six minutes) is basically the same routine as we learn in Workout #1 but danced at the higher pace. As by now we should know it more or less by heart, it goes without any commentary.

I love how Ms Ribeiro introduces her band and dancers and explains the role of each instrument. Once again, quite unlike Zumba Fitness Anonymous.

One day, I hope to learn how to dance samba properly. I can start with making good use of Quenia’s moves.

The Botany of Desire

2011-10-02T13:10:00.001+01:00

by Michael Pollan

Are we selecting the plants we want to grow, or is it the plants who make us to spread their genes far and wide? Michael Pollan invites us to take the plants’ point of view. He is telling the stories of four plant species: the apple, the tulip, marijuana and the potato, with an emphasis on their co-evolution with Homo sapiens.

At times, Pollan’s writing gets too florid for my taste, but it is the fascinating read all the same, no doubt helped by the author’s first-hand experience of (mostly successfully) growing the protagonists in his garden.

The magic plants were, and remain, a gravitational force pulling us back to Earth, to matter, away from the there and then of Christian salvation and back to the here and now. Indeed, what these plants do to time is perhaps the most dangerous thing about them — dangerous, that is, from the perspective of a civilization organized on the lines of Christianity and, more recently, capitalism.

Christianity and capitalism are both probably right to detest a plant like cannabis. Both faiths bid us to set our sights on the future; both reject the pleasures of the moment and the senses in favor of the expectation of a fulfillment yet to come — whether by earning salvation or by getting and spending. More even than most plants drugs, cannabis, by immersing us in the present and offering something like fulfillment here and now, short-circuits the metaphysics of desire on which Christianity and capitalism (and so much else in our civilization) depend.

Joneeba!

2011-09-30T01:00:00.001+01:00

by A. Djoniba Mouflet

I already mentioned this book on my other blog. It is a curious mix of African dance history, actual work-out techniques (frankly I’d prefer a DVD), shameless self-promotion (with some bits repeated more than once) and ethical principles (e.g. those of student/teacher relationship, to which I subscribe wholeheartedly).

In Africa, you are taught that no matter how much you pay your teacher, you can never repay him or her for the lifelong knowledge and secrets passed to you.

Your first teacher — the one who taught you the basics — becomes your mother-master or father-master. It is imperative to give credit openly, remain loyal, protect and give gratitude and support to all of your teachers, and especially to your first teacher, regardless of whom you may study with later.

Even after you’re no longer studying with your first master teacher, you should pay him or her a visit and take a class there once in a while.

Joneeba is taught by its creator, Djoniba Mouflet (and probably nobody else) at the Djoniba Dance Centre in New York. In theory, one can become a certified Joneeba™ instructor; now do a Google search and try to find any. It simply could be that no one can sit through the three-day exam, let alone afford a live African drummer band in their fitness class.

The Vicar of Dibley

2011-09-23T14:00:00.002+01:00

by Richard Curtis and Paul Mayhew-Archer

I can’t believe I spent all these years in England without actually watching The Vicar of Dibley. (Wait... I remember seeing a part of one episode in some hotel during school holidays. But that was it!) I had to move to Fuerteventura to correct this oversight. This is the first sitcom we watched with kids from the beginning to the end, and they loved it.

As a whole, the series is not as brilliant as, for example, Father Ted. Some episodes are all over the place. But with fellow chocoholic Rev. Geraldine Granger (Dawn French) that close to unattainable ideal — at least, shape-wise — I really shouldn’t complain.

Curiously, all but the last of six DVDs in The Ultimate Collection do not have any subtitles.

Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress

2011-09-16T01:16:00.001+01:00

by Dai Sijie

‘What you are about to hear, comrade, is a Mozart sonata,’ Luo announced, as coolly as before.
I was dumbfounded. Had he gone mad? All music by Mozart or indeed by any other Western composer had been banned years ago. In my sodden shoes my feet turned to ice. I shivered as the cold tightened its grip on me.
‘What’s a sonata?’ the headman asked warily.
‘I don’t know,’ I faltered. ‘It’s Western.’
‘Is it a song?’
‘More or less,’ I replied evasively.
At that instant the glint of the vigilant Communist reappeared in the headman’s eyes, and his voice turned hostile.
‘What’s the name of this song of yours?’
‘Well, it’s like a song, but actually it’s a sonata.’
‘I’m asking you what it’s called!’ he snapped, fixing me with his gaze. Again I was alarmed by the three spots of blood in his left eye.
‘Mozart...’ I muttered.
‘Mozart what?’
‘Mozart is Thinking of Chairman Mao,’ Luo broke in.
The audacity! But it worked: as if he had heard something miraculous, the headman’s menacing look softened. He crinkled up his eyes in a wide, beatific smile.
‘Mozart thinks of Mao all the time,’ he said.
‘Indeed, all the time,’ agreed Luo.

Of course this was hardly a laughing matter during the author’s own “re-education” stint in 1970s, but Dai Sijie can make you laugh all the same. I really enjoyed Mr. Muo’s Travelling Couch; I liked Sijie’s debut novel even better.

The Travelling Hornplayer

2011-09-09T14:14:00.001+01:00

by Barbara Trapido

I am a sitting duck here, being a homebound worker, and they see no reason at all why I should not take control of the ‘Telephone Cascade’ until I tell them I consider Neighbourhood Watch to be a bourgeois vigilante organization; a smuggies’ club for people with too much stuff.
‘You were shouting at him,’ Katherine says. ‘You looked as though you were going to hit him.’
She says she had to ‘drag’ me away and that when the twerp had thrust his right hand at me on parting and had said, ‘No hard feelings, old man. Will you shake me by the hand?’ I had behaved really badly.
‘Well, I shook him by the hand, didn’t I?’ I say.
‘Plus,’ Katherine says, spitting the words, ‘plus, you said, “Sure I’ll shake you by the hand. I’ve shaken hands with all sorts of arseholes in my time.” ’
I confess I am rather pleased with this reminder.

The Travelling Hornplayer continues the Goldman family saga started in Brother of the More Famous Jack and is as brilliantly written. But. But. Too many buts.

The oft-mentioned “Shakespearean” qualities of Trapido’s novels are abound here: the heroes bump into each other a tad more often than is necessary and/or believable. Of course, all of them are congregating for the grand finale at the snooty college feast in Oxford. The whole Schubert connection (including the German chapter subtitles) is annoyingly artificial. Worse still, the likeable characters from the first book got much less likeable here.

ION Block Rocker

2011-09-07T22:22:00.005+01:00

by ION Audio

First published 7 September 2011 @ zumbafuerteventura

Hooray, my new sound system has arrived! I went to collect it from the Correos today. I thought I managed to buy it for reasonably good price from Amazon UK— VAT-free and free delivery, because it was qualified for a free delivery in the UK... wait, that couldn’t be true? Maybe it ain’t. At the post office, they charged me €20 (twenty euro) before handing it over.

Still, I am a happy bunny now. Block Rocker comes with a microphone “to make announcements or sing” (nice try) but the 3.5 mm headphone jack to RCA adapter was not included. That is the only essential thing I really need, to connect it to my MP3 player. (Not iPod. I don’t have iPod. Block Rocker is advertised as a “Battery Powered Speaker System for iPod” but in truth you can plug in anything, provided that you have the right cable.) So I did cycle to the town in the afternoon to get the adapter. Check! Apparently, the batteries allow the system to blast at the full volume for 12 hours. We’ll see about that. I did not listen to “the full volume” properly yet. It’s getting too loud for our kitchen but maybe won’t be that loud for my, er, Zumba class when the time comes.

No more excuses: let’s rock!

El Duque De La Bachata

2011-09-05T02:00:00.003+01:00

by Joan Soriano

I learned about El Duque and his music earlier this year, once again thanks to Songlines and we7. However, it was not until last week that I got the real thing. It is a beauty.

The bonus DVD features the documentary by Adam Taub. Or at least it is called “the documentary”. The Duke with his (very large) family; the Duke going to America; the Duke getting lonely in New York. And so on. All very nice, although about forty minutes too long. Never mind that: I was really after the CD, which is just getting better and better with every listening! This is “simply” bachata and merengue, as fresh and authentic as they get. The liner notes in both English and Spanish give a short history of each song. How else would I learn what the word mamandela stands for?

A Short History of Tractors in Ukrainian

2011-08-28T20:20:00.001+01:00

by Marina Lewycka

In Corralejo library, there is a small section of books in English. Most of them are the cheap paperbacks that one buys in the airport and then happily leaves behind once the holidays are over. Still, I was able to find a great book to read: A Short History of Tractors in Ukrainian.

As an elderly engineer decides to marry a woman almost fifty years younger, his two middle-aged daughters have to act. Vera and Nadezhda (now Mrs Divorce Expert and Mrs Flog-’em-and-send-’em-home of Tunbridge Wells) put aside their differences and unite in face of a common enemy; that is, their new big-bosomed stepmother and her wunderkind from a previous marriage. Absolutely brilliant.

My sister and I will take no chances. I draft a letter to the Home Office Immigration Department at Lunar House, Croydon, setting out the story of Valentina’s marriage to our father and her relationship with Bob Turner. I don’t care about being a good liberal any more. I want this woman taken away. I describe the living arrangements — separate beds — and the fact that the marriage has not been consummated, because I believe the Establishment will take the view that penetrative sex is what marriage is all about. I am pleased with the primness of the letter.

Zeno’s Conscience

2011-08-23T23:00:00.004+01:00

by Italo Svevo

My friend, colleague and bandmate Sergio presented me with this book when we last met on occasion of my leaving for Fuerteventura. He said that it is kind of classic and it comes from Trieste. Trieste!

I had an uneasy relationship with this place. Until 1993, the only thing I knew about Trieste was that it was the name of bathyscaphe that reached the bottom of the Mariana Trench. I was not even sure in which country Trieste the city was. The history of Trieste suggests that I was not alone in that. Then I spent most of 1994 right there. During that year, I discovered Italian food, Italian coffee, proper gelato, Jovanotti, Cab Calloway, the World Wide Web, the naturist beach, Dolomiti, Venice, Milan, Sardinia, Hungary and, finally, Leeds. That’s right: as soon as I set my foot in Trieste, I was trying to get away from there. And as soon as I left it for good, I started missing it. The phrases I brought from my time in Trieste include piccoli problemi and pozor na psa. Where were we, anyway?

Ah, forget that. No special Triestine connection is actually needed to enjoy Zeno’s Conscience. The style reminds me of Kharms. The (anti)hero is a really lovable type. And who would have thought that sixty tons of copper sulfate could be made into a running gag?

I have never suffered from miserliness, and Giovanna immediately had her glass filled, to the brim. Before she could finish saying thanks, she had drained it, and she immediately cast her bright eyes on the bottle. So it was she herself who gave me the idea of getting her drunk. But that was no easy undertaking!

I couldn’t repeat exactly everything she said to me, in her pure Triestine dialect, after she had drained all those glasses, but I had the profound impression of being with a person to whom, if I hadn’t been distracted by my own concerns, I could have listened with pleasure.

First of all, she confided to me that this was precisely the way she liked to work. Everybody in this world should be entitled to spend a couple of hours every day in just such a comfortable chair, facing a bottle of good brandy, the kind that doesn’t cause any ill effects.

Dragons and monsters

2011-08-22T18:45:00.001+01:00

by Timur Kulikov

Paper, gel pens.

Dragons

Monsters

The artist at work

ZumbaFuerteventura

2011-08-16T11:30:00.002+01:00

I must admit that, since I moved to Fuerte, I was a bit neglecting this (and my other) blogs. So why on earth did I start another one? To promote myself, that’s why. Also, to give Posterous a try. (Sorry Blogger.)

With Posterous, one can easily create blog posts by email. I tried this and it works like magic. Of course, it’s always possible to come back and edit this post with web editor.

So people, if you have nothing better to do, please visit http://zumbafuerteventura.posterous.com/ and maybe even share the link with your Zumba friends!

More photos of Fuerteventura @ Shutterstock.

036

2011-08-10T19:19:00.001+01:00

a film by Juan Fernando Andrés Parrilla and Esteban Roel García Vázquez

You don’t need to have any experience in dealing with Spanish bureaucracy to appreciate this short film starring Carolina Bang and Tomás del Estal. If you had such experience, you will love it.

Qawwali Flamenco

2011-08-05T23:55:00.000+01:00

by Faiz Ali Faiz, Duquende, Miguel Poveda and Chicuelo

This 2 CD + DVD box, which looks more like a hardback book, was not fitting in my media storage boxes. (These latter now should be in a container, hopefully moving towards Fuerteventura). So I took it with me in a bag, along with a few other difficult-to-replace CDs (such as SBB Anthology).

For the most part, the qawwali—flamenco fusion works beautifully. Of course, it is debatable whether such things as “pure” qawwali or “pure” flamenco exist. And yet, if I had to choose my favourite song of this set, it would be “pure” qawwali (in context of this record), Mast Qalandar.

In addition to an hour-long live concert footage, the DVD contains the 17-minute “making of” documentary, which I watched for the first time here in Corralejo.

Maragogipe coffee

2011-07-29T16:00:00.002+01:00

William H. Ukers wrote in his book All About Coffee:

Maragogipe. This is a variety of Coffea arabica first observed growing near the town of Maragogipe on All Saints Bay, county of Maragogipe, Bahia, Brazil, where it is called Coffea indigena. The green bean is of huge size, and varies in color from green to dingy brown. It is the largest of all coffee beans, and makes an elephantine roast, free from quakers, but woody and generally disagreeable in the cup. However, Dr. P.J.S. Cramer of the Netherlands government’s experimental garden in Bangelan, Java, regards it very highly, referring to it as “the finest coffee known”, and as having “a highly developed, splendid flavor”. This coffee is now found in practically all the producing countries, and shows the characteristics of the other coffees produced in the same soil.

I don’t really know what Ukers meant under “elephantine roast”. Maybe it was a joke of some sort: Maragogipe (also spelled Maragogype) is sometimes referred to as the “elephant bean”, but this is due to the size of the bean, not its taste. (I never tried a roasted elephant though, so I may be wrong.) I discovered Maragogipe coffee a few years ago, thanks to Chisnall’s Delicatessen in Saffron Walden. It quickly became my favorite variety. I bought a kilo of beans from Chisnall’s just before I went to Fuerteventura. This packet should last for a while, hopefully until I find a source of good coffee beans here.

More photos of coffee @ Shutterstock.

Oro Valei, Rías Baixas DO 2010

2011-07-27T12:00:00.004+01:00

I don’t think I ever tasted any Galician Albariño wine before, so I may miss a reference point here. But now I did, and this one was not bad at all. Fresh, dry, with just right alcohol content (of 12%), and, at about €5, a good value. If you read Galician, you may, or may not, appreciate the poem on the label. Otherwise, just open and enjoy. Eight points (out of ten) on my scale of gluggability.

More photos of white wine @ Shutterstock.

Sex, Drugs & Chocolate: The Science of Pleasure

2011-07-11T00:00:00.000+01:00

by Paul Martin

A book about pleasure: mmm... what a great topic. Just like Counting Sheep, it is a pleasure to read. Don’t be discouraged by the word “science”: according to the author,

There are good biological reasons for believing that the brain is engineered to reward us with pleasure for acquiring and understanding new information.

So there you are. I hate to give away the ending, so... I’ll give you the last paragraph without the last line. Check it out.

There is no single golden key that will unlock huge new realms of pleasure, nor is there a single golden path to escape addiction. Nonetheless, science and everyday human experience point to some simple tactics that should help the wily hedonist to derive more and better pleasure from life. They include adopting a little-but-often policy of favouring frequency rather than intensity of pleasure; searching for pleasurable experiences that have a good ending; having plenty of recreational sex, preferably with someone else; napping, sleeping and dreaming to your heart’s content and not feeling guilty about doing it; smiling, if necessary with the help of a pencil; eating chocolate made from at least 60 per cent cacao solids.

The Big Issue

2011-07-07T16:45:00.000+01:00

As you may have guessed from some of my posts, I learned a great deal about books, movies and music from The Big Issue. Oh, and festivals. Shame I did not attend any of them. TBI is the only periodical I am buying. Whenever I go up North, I am trying to get The Big Issue in the North (very different from the “main”, mostly London-orientated version). From it I learn about more books, music and (still unattended) festivals up North.

When “my” vendor, who usually sells the magazine near Waitrose, is not there, I start to worry. But why should I? Maybe he found a home and moved on. I should be happy for him, right? And then he is back. By the way, I did not see him for the last few weeks. I really miss the magazine. I am going to miss it in Spain.

Kung Fu Panda 2

2011-07-03T21:30:00.001+01:00

a film by Jennifer Yuh Nelson

Ah, the trailers nowadays. “From the creators of Toy Story 3: Cars 2.” Really? Very exciting.

Still, Kung Fu Panda 2 is a very decent sequel to the great 2008 animation. And this time, in glorious 3-D. This is a directorial debut for Yuh Nelson who, according to Wikipedia, “is the first woman to solely direct an animated feature from a major Hollywood studio”. Less famously, this is probably the last film I watched in the cinema in this country.

Le Bal

2011-07-02T13:51:00.001+01:00

a film by Ettore Scola

I remember seeing Le Bal in the cinema when it was just out, back in 1980s. And then going to watch it a few more times. It was — still is — unlike anything else I’ve seen.

I watched the DVD yesterday. The film has lost none of its tragicomic charm. Who needs a dialogue?

The collaborationist (Marc Berman) is the only person willing to dance with a Nazi officer (Jean-François Perrier).

Still Got The Blues

2011-06-28T23:00:00.003+01:00

by Gary Moore

So long, it was so long ago,
But I’ve still got the blues for you

On his 1990 album, Moore is accompanied by such rock greats as Don Airey, Bob Daisley and even George Harrison (on That Kind Of Woman). My favourites are All Your Love, As The Years Go Passing By, and, of course, the title track, but the whole album is an absolute classic. Normally, the “absolute classic” status of a rock LP would imply that it is complete and final. That’t why I usually don’t listen to the bonus material on classic rock CDs. Now, this 2003 CD has five bonus tracks: The Stumble, Left Me With The Blues, Further Up The Road, Mean Cruel Woman, The Sky Is Crying, all of them totally worth to be included here. And so they are, complete with lyrics.

The Island at the End of the World

2011-06-24T18:15:00.000+01:00

by Sam Taylor

Like A History of the World in 10½ Chapters, this is a variation on theme of Noah’s Ark. The similarity ends right there though. It is just over 200 pages but it took me about three weeks to finish. I was especially struggling with the bits narrated by eight-year-old boy, due to curious spelling which quickly becomes irritating. Call me old-fashioned but I prefer to read books that actually are readable. As is the case with so many novels, this one would greatly benefit from abridgement.

Megabus UK

2011-06-22T23:30:00.001+01:00

Last month, I started to look at the public transport fares to Liverpool. Man I was for a surprise. If I were to believe the National Rail website, the cheapest single fare from Great Chesterford to Liverpool is £151.50. It occurred to me to check out Megabus which I never used before. More surprises were to follow.

First, the only Megabus destination from/to Cambridge is... Oxford. Well that makes sense. Where else people from Cambridge need to travel? But wait. What if I check the travel from London?

As it happens, Megabus offered me rail tickets for £5 each. (Apparently, they are in partnership with Virgin Trains!) Plus I paid 50 pence reservation fee, in total £10.50 the return journey from London Euston to Liverpool Lime Street. Not bad, I say.

So I thought I was sorted for my trip to Liverpool this Monday 20 June. However, my brilliant plan was almost thwarted by our excellent rail system (since the privatisation of British Rail, I am never sure who is responsible for this or that particular railroad atrocity). Monday morning, the trains to London Liverpool Street were not running. Thankfully, Tamara gave me a lift to Cambridge, but I was mentally preparing to say goodbye to Megabus plan — if I were to miss my train from Euston, I would have to buy a full price ticket from Virgin (at least £35).

At the ticket office, I asked what is the fastest way to get to Liverpool. The answer was, to take a train via... Euston. The one-way fare was more than £80! The alternative was to take the Birmingham train and change at Nuneaton. That would cost me sixtysomething quid. The train to Kings Cross was about to depart in a few minutes; I bought the ticket (£20) and boarded it.

From Kings Cross, it takes less than ten minutes to walk to Euston station. I had about half an hour to spare, so I walked (£0).

To summarise. Travel to/from London cost me four times as much as travel from London to Liverpool. Still, at £50, the whole journey is cheaper than anything on offer from the helpful Cambridge ticket office. Thank you Megabus!

Alex Acuña El Palo timbale sticks

2011-06-16T16:55:00.003+01:00

by Vic Firth

I bought this pair of sticks nine years ago in Copenhagen, purely by aesthetic reasons. They were gathering dust until I started to play caixa with Arco Iris. After all this heavy hitting, the purple paint started to fall off. I have sanded and decorated them with acrylic paints just before the Luton Carnival.

Vic Firth World Classic^® Alex Acuña El Palo timbale sticks, acrylic paint. More photos of drumsticks @ Shutterstock.

The Solitude of Prime Numbers

2011-06-14T22:40:00.002+01:00

by Paolo Giordano

In my post from two years ago, I have mentioned this book. Last week, I actually have found time to read it (in English).

Prime numbers are divisible only by 1 and themselves. They stand in their place in the infinite series of natural numbers, squashed in between two others, like all other numbers, but a step further on than the rest. They are suspicious and solitary, which is why Mattia thought they were wonderful.

In his first year Mattia had studied the fact that among the prime numbers there are some that are even more special. Mathematicians call them twin primes: they are pairs of prime numbers that are close to one another, almost neighbours, but between them there is always an even number that prevents them from really touching. Numbers like 11 and 13, like 17 and 19, 41 and 43. If you have the patience to go on counting, you discover that these pairs gradually become rarer.

Mattia thought that he and Alice were like that, two twin primes, alone and lost, close but not close enough really to touch one another. He had never told her that.

Of course, the tragic loneliness of the two protagonists is nobody’s fault but their own. Yet the author made me to empathise and sympathise with Alice and Mattia. Especially with the latter who must be simply unbearable in the flesh. Instead of an unlikely happy end, Giordano gives us a much better thing: hope. Highly recommended.

Leeds

2011-06-05T23:00:00.003+01:00

I first visited Leeds in 1994. The place did not look welcoming. It was raining for three days and I saw a bit of sun on the fourth day, when I was about to go. All in all, the visit was a success: I got my first job in the UK. I came back in 1995 and spend three years there. Yuri was born in Leeds. Also, I learned a thing or two about samba and guitar-making. I saw John Abercrombie, Julian Argüelles, Django Bates, Carla Bley, the late Michael Brecker, Juan Martín, Barbara Thompson, Keith Tippett and Stan Tracey playing live. I even bought the tickets to see Stéphane Grappelli, but the maestro got ill and the concert was cancelled. After Leeds, Cambridge seemed to be a deep province. All gigs of interest were elsewhere.

Leeds is an amazing city. It was transforming almost daily when I was there and it keeps changing. Day or night, it is busy with life. It still does not look welcoming though. The pedestrianised area aside, it is not pedestrian-friendly. Come to think of it, it is not motorist-friendly either. As far as cyclists are concerned, it is plain hostile.

Leeds is not an easy city to live in, let alone love. Do I miss Leeds? Sure I do. I miss being called “love” by strangers. (At the petrol station: “Number four, love? Ta.”) Live there again? Probably not.

Central Leeds boasts a bewildering array of shops, bars and restaurants, but it is not easy to spot anything, um, idiosyncratically Leodian. Here is a good one: Pickles & Potter deli cum sandwich bar in Queens Arcade. A welcome relief from Starbucks; cash only.

I saw these pearls of Yorkshire wisdom in a shop window in Grassington. I made note of them for our very own Yorkshireman, Yuri. He especially liked the “pay nowt” bit.

’Ear all, see all, say nowt.
Eat all, sup all, pay nowt.
If tha ever does owt fer nowt, allus do it fer thissen.

Tha can allus tell a Yorkshireman, but tha can’t tell ’im much.

Moon Island

2011-06-03T18:30:00.000+01:00

by Rosie Thomas

The characters are overdeveloped for a ghost story, not too developed enough for a novel, and generally far too passive. Things just happen to them. I thought I will like Leonie, the only person strong enough to escape gravitational pull of Marian the matriarch; in the end, she irritated me the most. Excerpts from 19th-century Voyages of the Dolphin are probably the best parts of the book.

‘Sarah, if you do find who you are searching for, what do you truly believe will happen?’
‘I will make him marry me.’
‘And if he will not? Or cannot?’
Her wide eyes never wavered. Matthias felt a shiver touch him like the first intimation of a fever.
‘Then I will kill him like a venomous snake.’

The men stood together watching as the boat carried her towards the shore.
‘Do you imagine that she will find him?’ Matthias musingly asked.
‘I am certain she will.’
‘And then?’
‘I would not be in that man’s shoes for any money.’

Priceless.

Luton Carnival 2011

2011-05-30T22:00:00.000+01:00

Just like a year ago, the weather could have been better. At times, it was just pouring. Otherwise, a great day out, and, in spite of rain, very decent performance from Arco Iris.

One thing that bothers me is that, once again, we did sport the same old garb as for any other gig. This is so un-carnival-like. It looks as if we don’t really care. Which is not the case, I can assure you.

Another thing that bothers me. I did not realise it until today, but this may have been my last gig with Arco Iris.

More photos of Luton Carnival @ Shutterstock.

Soft-Fibre Advance Trek Towel

2011-05-25T00:00:00.005+01:00

by Lifeventure

By now everybody should know that a towel is about the most massively useful thing a hitchhiker can have. That’s why the annual Towel Day was established ten years ago. Let’s celebrate it!

It’s been a while since my last hitchhiking attempt; still, never say never again. In any case, a towel is a great thing to have about, and the best towel I ever owned is this one.

(You may have recognised this photo as it was used in my Lolita post.) It’s lightweight, it’s compact, it’s soft and it dries in minutes. After a day on a sandy beach, shake it out couple of times and... a miracle: all the sand’s gone! Now wrap it around yourself any way you like and go home.

Cancan

2011-05-21T17:00:00.005+01:00

by Jacques Offenbach

I was browsing through my LilyPond posts and noticed that all the examples I gave so far are in “common time”, i.e. 4/4. This is default time signature in LilyPond, so we had not worry about it — until now. But even now we should not worry much about it.

To add any other time signature, use \time command, for instance \time 2/4, \time 3/4 and so on.

For the annual Members Concert at Duxford today, Timur played two pieces with Beginner Violins and Beginner Guitars; Yuri played two short pieces with Improver Violins; I played That’ll Never Happen No More by Blind Blake (customised lyrics) with Advanced Guitars; and, as Beginner Trombones, we did that pièce de résistance, Galop Infernal aka Cancan from Orphée aux enfers. (As I am the only remaining trombone student and the other player was my teacher, we also could have been called Advanced Trombones.) I think it went rather well, I managed to hit most of the notes.

Technically, the most difficult part for me was the one which involves rapid jump from sixth to second position and back:

Here are a few more LilyPond commands I used to write my part down:

To add tempo, use a metronome mark \tempo, e.g. \tempo "Allegro", \tempo 4 = 160, etc.
To add dynamics, use the dynamic marks such as \p (piano), \mf (mezzo-forte), \f (forte), \ff (fortissimo), \sfz (sforzando) and so forth.
Crescendo is started with \< and terminated with a dynamic mark, e.g. \ff.
To indicate a fermata (hold), place \fermata after a note.

The complete LilyPond file:

% ****************************************************************
% Cancan (Jacques Offenbach)
% ****************************************************************
\version "2.12.3"
\header {
 title = "Le Galop Infernal d’Orphée aux Enfers"
 composer = "Jacques Offenbach"
}
\score {
  \new Staff 
 {
  \clef bass
  \key f \major
  \time 2/4
  \tempo "Energico" 
  \repeat volta 2 {
   f2\mf 
   g8-. bes8-. a8-. g8-.
   c'4 c'4
   c'8-. d'8-. a8-. bes8-.
   g4 g4
   g8-. bes8-. a8-. g8-.
   f8-. f'8-. e'8-. d'8-. 
   c'8-. bes8-. a8-. g8-.
   f2
   g8-. bes8-. a8-. g8-.
   c'4 c'4
   c'8-. d'8-. a8-. bes8-.
   g4 g4
   g8-. bes8-. a8-. g8-.
   f8-. c'8-. g8-. a8-.
   }
   \alternative {
   { f8 r8 c4 }
   { f8 r8 f'8\sfz r8 }
   }
   c8-.\p g8-. g8-. a8-.
   g8-. f8-. f8-. a8-.
   bes8-. d'8-. f'8-. d'8-.
   d'8-. c'8-. c'4
   d'8-. e8-. e8-. d'8-.
   c'8-. f8-. f8-. a8-.
   a8( g8) a8( g8)
   a8( g8) a8( g8)
   c8-. g8-. g8-. a8-.
   g8-. f8-. f8-. a8-.
   bes8-. d'8-. f'8-. d'8-.
   d'8-. c'8-. c'4
   d'8-. e8-. e8-. d'8-.
   c'8-. f8-. f8-. a8-.
   a8( g8) a8( g8)
   g8( f8) f8 r8
  \repeat volta 2 { 
   a4->\f f4->
   d4-> c4->
   c'8-.\p g8-. a8-. bes8-.
   a8-. g8-. f8 r8
   a4->\f f4-> 
   d4-> c4->
   b,8\p( c8) d8-. e8-.
   }
   \alternative {
   { f8-. c8-. f8 r8 }
   { f8-.->\< c8-.-> e8-.-> c8-.->
     f8-.-> c8-.-> e8-.-> c8-.->
     f8-.-> c8-.-> e8-.-> c8-.-> 
     f8-.-> c8-.-> e8-.-> c8-.->
     f4\f f8. f16\<
     f4 f4
     f4 r4 a4 r4
     f2(\ff
     f2\fermata) \bar "|."
   }
  }
 }
}

The best (unintentional) joke today was “As you can see, we are not the Cello Ensemble. We are Beginner Bassoons and we’re going to play All Through the Night”.

The Last Brother

2011-05-19T21:00:00.001+01:00

by Nathacha Appanah

Inspired by a little-known page of history but deeply personal tale of a brief childhood friendship, told by a man in his seventies. (How, may I ask in parentheses, could this young author write as if she grew during the Second World War and lived a long life after that?) Profoundly moving book, sympathetically translated by Geoffrey Strachan.

I pictured her back in our house in the forest, her shoulders hunched, as if forever prepared to receive blows, I pictured her with her mixtures, her potions and her magic formulas. I pictured her falling over, battered by my father, and I felt the sudden weight of her in my hands. I pictured her with the red parakeet and I heard her burst of laughter at David. I thought about those long months when every morning and every evening she massaged my legs to heal me. And there, this little scrap of a woman, smiling on the balcony, in full, bright sunlight, this was her and at the same time it was not her, and, on the return journey I always ended up in tears over it, this illusory happiness at the end, over all the things that had come much too late to erase everything else.

Dub Side of the Moon

2011-05-18T18:00:00.002+01:00

by Easy Star All-Stars

Bold concept, brilliant implementation. Released 30 years after the Pink Floyd’s classic, this respectful tribute album by now should also be considered a classic in its own right. And, just like the original, has to be listened to in its entirety. Ignore the bonus tracks though.

Disability Sport & Arts Festival @ Chesterton

2011-05-15T21:00:00.001+01:00

According to my records, I have been playing with Arco Iris for two years already! Is there a better way to celebrate this than with a gig like today’s? AI played two sets for the Disability Sport and Arts Festival at Chesterton Sports Centre (11:30—12:15pm and 13:30—14:30). As venues go, this one was a bit strange (basically, we were playing in a car park), but then we’ve played stranger locations. During both sets, the audience (including the mayor of Cambridge on agogô) joined in!

Cookin’ in Bonn

2011-05-14T22:00:00.003+01:00

by Emil Viklický

Back in 1980s, I was lucky enough to buy couple of Czech LPs. One was called Together by James Williams and Emil Viklický. Another one was Dveře (Door) by Viklický (also featuring Bill Frisell, whose name did not mean anything to me at the time). These two albums showcase the amazing diversity of Viklický, from acoustic jazz piano duets on Together to jazz-rock of Dveře’s A-side to neo-classical Suite for Piano No. 2 on the B-side.

I have no idea what happened to these vinyls. So far I did not come across much of 1980s Supraphon’s production transferred on CDs. In fact, I did not see any.

Now, quite by chance, I got hold of the promotional copy of 2006 live album of Emil Viklický trio, with František Uhlíř on bass and Laco Tropp on drums, released by the never-heard-of label, Dekkor Records. Sixty-eight minutes of amazing music. My only reservation is the title, for I would never describe the trio’s lyrical playing (refreshingly free of showing off) as “cookin’”. Aspen Leaf, Desire, Lover Come Back: to sit down and cry.

Games at Twilight

2011-05-13T21:40:00.001+01:00

by Anita Desai

It is one beautifully written book. Not a single dull story here. Still, one’s got to have favourite ones, right? Here: Pigeons at Daybreak, a day (and night) in life of a middle-age Indian couple. Pineapple Cake: a Catholic wedding in Bombay as seen through the eyes of a young boy. Scholar and Gypsy: adventures of the young American couple in India — he loves it, she hates it — then they go on holidays, with an unexpected and humorous role reversal.

One of his worst afflictions, Mr Basu thought, was not to be able to read the newspaper himself. To have them read to him by his wife. He watched with fiercely controlled irritation that made the corners of his mouth jerk suddenly upwards and outwards, as she searched for her spectacles through the flat. By the time she found them — on the ledge above the bathing place in the bathroom, of all places: what did she want with her spectacles in there? — she had lost the newspaper. When she found it, it was spotted all over with grease for she had left it beside the stove on which the fish was frying. This reminded her to see to the fish before it was overdone. ‘You don’t want charred fish for your lunch, do you?’ she shouted back when he called. He sat back then, in his tall-backed cane chair, folded his hands over his stomach and knew that if he were to open his mouth now, even a slit, it would be to let out a scream of abuse. So he kept it tightly shut.
When she had finally come to the end of that round of bumbling activity, moving from stove to bucket, shelf to table, cupboard to kitchen, she came out on the balcony again, triumphantly carrying with her the newspaper as well as the spectacles. ‘So,’ she said, ‘are you ready to listen to the news now?’

Pigeons at Daybreak

The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy: The Primary Phase

2011-05-11T11:05:00.003+01:00

by Douglas Adams

I have started to pack up my CD collection for a move, with a concomitant release of hundreds of jewel cases. Now, where did I last see that 3-CD box?

The introduction begins like this:
“Space,” it says, “is big. Really big. You just won’t believe how vastly hugely mind-bogglingly big it is. I mean, you may think it’s a long way down the road to the chemist, but that’s just peanuts to space. Listen...”
and so on.

Yes, exactly, “listen and so on”, for this one is the original and the best. More popular than the Celestial Home Care Omnibus, better selling than 53 More Things To Do In Zero Gravity, and a life-saver on a long car journey with or without kids. Proven!

The Sexual Life of Catherine M.

2011-05-07T22:45:00.000+01:00

by Catherine Millet

Judging from the Amazon reviews, a lot of readers took an offense at (a) the book being dull (as in “I read this book twice, it is so boring, why did I even buy it?” dull) and (b) our sexually liberated Ms M. being there for no other reason but to please her men.

I know. The modern reader wants to see the heroine being strong, independent and having plenty of orgasmic sex on her own terms. But that would be fiction. This is a memoir, and I applaud Ms Millet’s honesty. If you find this book dull, try memoirs of British politicians, or their wives.

When you write a book in the first person the latter becomes the third person. The more I describe my body and my actions, the more I leave myself behind. Who recognises themselves in those magnifying mirrors which show cheeks and noses as vast fissured landscapes? Because sexual pleasure brings you outside your own limits, it can impose the same sort of distance. Perhaps there is even a structural relationship, and the distance governs the pleasure as much as it is governed by it, at least for the category of creature to which I belong. Because, and this is the point I wanted to make, the same woman whom I described as uncomfortable under someone’s insistent gaze, and who hesitated to wear suggestive clothes, the same woman in fact who partook blind in sexual adventures with faceless partners, this same woman, then, takes indisputable pleasure in exposing herself on condition that the exposure is distanced at once, by a narrative.

No Earthly Connection

2011-05-06T21:21:00.002+01:00

by Rick Wakeman and The English Rock Ensemble

It is a great shame that, for an artist as talented and prolific as Wakeman, so few of his solo efforts are actually worth listening to.
No Earthly Connection is one of these few; musically, probably his best album. Years ago, I had it on the tape (for the record, its other “side” was occupied by Criminal Record).

This Japanese paper sleeve CD looks exactly like the 1970s vinyl (although it’s way more expensive). It even has a square bit of mirror plastic that you are supposed to roll into a cylinder and look at the sleeve as shown here. Magic!

Super Bass Solo Technique

2011-05-03T21:21:00.001+01:00

by Victor Wooten

The electric bass legend Victor Wooten definitely has super bass solo technique, but I guess you wouldn’t be able to pick much of it from this DVD. As a lesson it is next to useless if you are anywhere below advanced level. To be precise, Wooten demonstrates two techniques: double-thump slapping and two-hand tapping, both of which I hope to master one day, but I guess I can find better material on YouTube.

Musically, it is top-notch stuff, and the backing band is amazing, especially Victor’s brother Regi who apparently is doing double-thumping on his guitar. I’d love to see more of that; however, the camera is focusing on Victor most of the time. The video was shot back in early 1990s, which explains the low-resolution picture and strange angles.

Rango

2011-05-01T20:30:00.003+01:00

a film by Gore Verbinski

An enjoyable, if rather predictable film (that we just watched in Saffron Sreen). Johnny Depp is voicing a typical Johnny Depp character. Rango even looks a bit like Victor from Corpse Bride. My favourite scenes invariably include the four-piece Mariachi band. Especially the one where they go electric.

The Anonymous Novel. Sensing the Future Torments

2011-04-28T22:09:00.000+01:00

by Alessandro Barbero

Written in Italian as Romanzo russo. Fiutando i futuri supplizi and translated into English by Allan Cameron, it does read as if Bulgakov authored it. (Mind you, I am not the only one who noticed that. Look no further than the caption on the cover, which I kept ignoring until today.) Also, the book’s very appearance is that of samizdat. The action begins in Moscow on 7 November 1987. (How remarkable, I thought, I remember all too well what I was doing on that very day.) The events develop in the course of the next three years in Moscow and Baku. At one point, we follow the heroes to the Krasnaya Presnya bath house. (Insert here my memories of that place back then. No, I don’t miss those times or places. Actually I do a bit, safe in the knowledge that I am not going back. Shudder.) Authentic. (Authentic? Yes, authentic.) Gripping. Well-crafted. (Insert more clichés here.) Thoroughly recommended.

It’s time we left the Yugo-Zapadny district and went to the Lenin Library. We’ll take the underground, of course. The end of the line is right here — just a short walk away. Why not take the same carriage as Tanya. Here she is seated in a corner: a chubby, well-built girl with a bagful of textbooks and notebooks on her knees... What was that? No, you cannot sit beside her. The train is packed at this time of day; it is her good fortune that she managed to find a place. However, we can get inside her head and listen to her thoughts. This is no problem from a technical point of view, and if we don’t exploit this possibility to the full, what the hell are we doing here?

Fado Tradicional

2011-04-25T20:20:00.001+01:00

by Mariza

I never was a big fan of fado as a genre. I find its over-the-top drama and affectation incredibly annoying. And if there was a single fadista who has managed to annoy me even more than any traditional fado singer, that would be Mariza. It is true that she is constantly pushing the boundaries of fado — to the degree of complete unbearability. (I like her hair though.)

Her latest album, however, pleasantly surprised me. No strings here, thank goodness. Here she is accompanied “only” by the guitar trio (Ângelo Freire, Diogo Clemente and José Marino de Freitas: my respect), so her voice is given plenty of space. Several up-tempo songs, such as wonderful Dona Rosa, provide a welcome change from the standard “oh, this pain of mine” fare. The drama is still there but now Mariza sounds more in control of her emotions. Last but not least: at only 35 minutes, it is over before it starts feeling samey. OK I have to admit: I loved it.

Songlines places Fado Tradicional “in a class all of its own”. I wouldn’t know that — I’d have to listen for some more fado first and I am still not convinced I really want to.

Сантехник, его кот, жена и другие подробности

2011-04-17T21:21:00.006+01:00

by Слава Сэ

Some people think that blogging is intrinsically inferior to the Big Literature™. Well. The plumber, his cat, his wife and other details is a testament to the fact that a good blog can be published as a best-selling book. On good paper. And I was thinking there was no humourous Russian literature anymore.

У Ляли в попе дырка. Это ужас. В молодости её не было. Но вчера Ляля выросла и пошла мыть попу сама. И нашла в себе ужасную новость.

Раньше-то хорошо жилось с весёлой, а главное, целой попой. Форма, цвет, аромат, звучание — всё было безупречно. Персики считали этот зад лучшим среди себя и старались подражать во всём. И вдруг, в самом центре датского королевства находится дырка, тревожная, как свист в ночи.

Lyalya has a hole in her bottom. It’s a horror. She had no such thing in her youth. But yesterday, Lyalya grew up and went to wash her bottom all by herself. And found the terrible news.

It was a good life before, with a cheerful and, most importantly, intact bottom. The shape, the colour, the aroma, the sound — everything was perfect. The peaches believed this arse was the best among themselves and tried to imitate everything it did. Then, all of a sudden, bang in the middle of the State of Denmark there is a hole, alarming as a whistle in the night.

Urban Gypsy

2011-04-14T22:00:00.001+01:00

by Shukar Collective

What a band! With founding members named Napoleon Constantin, Tamango and Clasic, the greatness is guaranteed, don’t you think? Just wait till you hear the music. At sixty-five minutes, Urban Gypsy could be a tad long to listen in one go, but hey, there always is a pause button.

K: The Art of Love

2011-04-12T22:00:00.003+01:00

by Hong Ying

Based on “the true story”, if one can call that an affair between a young English poet, Julian Bell, whose main claim to fame was to be the son of Vanessa Bell and nephew of Virginia Woolf, and a married Chinese woman, K. This is how Julian referred to her in letters to his mum; in the novel, K is given a name, Lin Cheng. I don’t care that much about the true identity of K, or the truthfulness of the events in the book. What I have in front of me is a curious but rather mediocre piece of fiction. How, how could Lin, a prominent writer as well as master of the Taoist Art of Love, possibly fall for this arrogant, cowardly Westerner? I don’t know whom to blame — the author or her translators — for the missed opportunity. This could have been a great erotic novel. (No, this one is not erotic.)

I would not bother to write this post if not for several free-verse poems in the end of the book: “Lin’s poems to Julian”. I thought they were good.

Our self-portraits

Can’t you see what I see
in this twig foaming with plum flowers?
A whole quarry-load of granite eyes
have cracked, waiting for it to blossom —
but now the explosion is finally happening,
as your words light the fuse to my heart:
‘Till old, we sleep.’

I look away to a winter vase-landscape
thinking: that’s where I lived before I met you.

Then I rub two plum petals together,
their dried blood dripping from my fingers
into a frozen stream.

I still see precisely how things stood
when your own heart burst into flames.

Golden

2011-04-09T21:00:00.005+01:00

by Kit Downes Trio

Whitney Balliett famously described jazz as “the sound of surprise”. And the more conventional the format, the greater is the surprise. Take jazz piano trio. By mid-1990s, I thought that Keith Jarrett's Standards Trio, prolific as they are, said all there was to say piano-trio-wise. Then I heard E.S.T. and thought, maybe not. And now, these youngsters: Kit Downes (piano), Calum Gourlay (bass) and James Maddren (drums). Definitely not.

For me, the stand-outs here are Jump Minzi Jump, a lively jazz waltz Tom’s Tune, and ever-changing A Dance Took Place — is it a tango? jazz ballad? swing? But there are no weak links on the album, and a lot of surprises. To quote Peter Bacon,

I urge you to buy this disc – it really is not only the bee’s knees but the bee’s ankles, hips and all the other bee-like joints, too.

Acer Aspire One A150-Aw Netbook

2011-04-08T20:00:00.003+01:00

by Acer

I bought this cute netbook two years ago. Almost all of this blog’s posts were created on it. I took it with me to Fuerteventura three times, and it was priceless: a lot of eating and drinking places have free Wi-Fi, and it even fits in teeny weeny safe deposit boxes. Since it came with Linux, I was leading Microsoftless life with a little (or not so little) help from Macles, which is a great source of wisdom on Acer Aspire One.

Apparently, this particular netbook is discontinued by Acer. The new models are as compact but have the 10.1 inch display (mine is 8.9 inch) and longer battery life. However, I am yet to see the newer Aspire One/Linux combination.

The photo above shows the correct mode of operation in the garden at the ambient temperature of 295 K or higher. The red picnic blanket that I got in South Africa proved to be even better buy than the netbook. I am determined to put it to good use this weekend.

Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance

2011-04-05T17:15:00.003+01:00

by Robert M. Pirsig

I borrowed this book from the reception of a hotel where I was staying during my last visit to Corralejo. This was probably the only book in English there. I heard so much about this work before but never bothered to look it up, although the full text is available on the web. Now I had my chance to read it while relaxing on the beach. I honestly intended to return it there on my day of departure, which was Sunday. Alas, it turned out that the reception was closed until 9 am — but I had to go. Never mind, I will bring it back next time.

I am not sure that it is any good as a travelogue. True, I never travelled across the States on a motorbike. But it seems that it wouldn’t be much different if it was Canada or Australia or any other big and mostly empty country where you can drive a motorcycle. The only geographical link to the narrator’s past, some godforsaken Montana town where Phaedrus used to teach in a college, even that is totally interchangeable with any other place. Curiously, some important philosophical points are cross-referenced as made “just after Miles City” or “back in South Dakota” instead of, say, chapter numbers. Maybe this was done on purpose, to remind the reader that the journey was real.

On the other hand, Pirsig’s meditations on the nature of Quality, care, gumption ring all sorts of bells. Whether you work in industry or academia, it is quantity, not quality (areté, dharma, excellence) that your employer is after. How many papers are published, how many people are employed, how many hits that corporate website gets, this sort of stuff. Finally, there is motorcycle maintenance. Pirsig says about his book: “It’s not very factual on motorcycles, either.” And yet I feel that this is writing of a master of this art. I would trust him to look into my motorbike if I had one.

This is the most poetical book on philosophy (or motorcycles) I ever read.

It was some years ago that my wife and I and our friends first began to catch on to these roads. We took them once in a while for variety or for a shortcut to another main highway, and each time the scenery was grand and we left the road with a feeling of relaxation and enjoyment. We did this time after time before realizing what should have been obvious: these roads are truly different from the main ones. The whole pace of life and personality of the people who live along them are different. They’re not going anywhere. They’re not too busy to be courteous. The hereness and nowness of things is something they know all about. It’s the others, the ones who moved to the cities years ago and their lost offspring, who have all but forgotten it. The discovery was a real find.
I’ve wondered why it took us so long to catch on. We saw it and yet we didn't see it. Or rather we were trained not to see it. Conned, perhaps, into thinking that the real action was metropolitan and all this was just boring hinterland. It was a puzzling thing. The truth knocks on the door and you say, “Go away, I’m looking for the truth”, and so it goes away. Puzzling.
But once we caught on, of course, nothing could keep us off these roads, weekends, evenings, vacations. We have become real secondary-road motorcycle buffs and found there are things you learn as you go.
We have learned how to spot the good ones on a map, for example. If the line wiggles, that’s good. That means hills. If it appears to be the main route from a town to a city, that’s bad. The best ones always connect nowhere with nowhere and have an alternate that gets you there quicker.

Tais-toi!

2011-04-04T23:50:00.002+01:00

a film by Francis Veber

A hilarious French film about unlikely friendship of Quentin (Gérard Depardieu) and Ruby (Jean Reno). Enough said.

11:11

2011-04-02T11:11:00.000+01:00

by Rodrigo y Gabriela

The third studio album by the Mexican dynamic duo is quite remarkable. Not only give they a rest to Metallica (or any) covers. For the first time, Rod y Gab came up with something like concept album. Each of the eleven original compositions is dedicated to a musician or a band — OK, that could have been boring if it were not so frighteningly brilliant. I don’t know if they still maintain that “we don’t play flamenco” attitude but it is awfully nice of R&G to pay respect to the artists who influenced them. In the liner notes, they even list their favourite albums! Like this:

Paco de Lucía
We have met people that still don’t know who he is! The worst part is that a lot of them “work” in the music industry... Shame on them... Paco de Lucía is the music itself.
Recommended albums:
All of them!!!

The deluxe edition comes with a bonus DVD which, frankly, adds very little, especially if you saw Rodrigo y Gabriela playing live. And the tutorial for Buster Voodoo? Good luck with that one.

Curse of the Pogo Stick

2011-03-31T17:10:00.001+01:00

by Colin Cotterill

If anyone needed another proof that it’s perfectly acceptable to judge a book on the basis of its name, here’s the one. I saw this book in the library and thought it may be good. (With chapter titles like “Non-practicing atheists” and “Coitus interruptus”, it must be.) It turned out to be exceptionally good. I don’t read much crime fiction but this one is something else. Guaranteed to make you smile all the way till the reasonably happy end.

Some people just die. Siri had come to that conclusion after many years of careful observation. They don’t necessarily die of anything, they just get old, everything gives up, and they pass away. It’s as simple as that. There are those who describe it as dying of old age but that puts old age in the same category as bubonic plague and the Black Death. There really is nothing dangerous about old age and there's no reason to be afraid of it. It certainly hadn’t done Dr. Siri any harm. He’d been passing through its hallowed halls for some years and it hadn’t killed him.

Comrade Singsai had passed away in his sleep during an excruciatingly long speech discussing the allocation of cattle. It was rather sad that his last memory on earth might have been how to encourage bulls to increase their semen count. But he was old and he’d endured a full life. He hadn’t been able to summon the energy to pull himself out of a pleasant dream and back into that never-ending conference. Who could blame him? Siri was sorely tempted to write ‘He just died’ on the death certificate but he knew that wouldn’t satisfy anyone.

Van der Graaf Generator @ The Junction

2011-03-29T20:00:00.001+01:00

Did I mention already that there are no venues in Cambridge suitable for rock concerts? If not, then this is the moment to reiterate: there are none. Unless the audience is less than a hundred people, that is. I went to see Van der Graaf Generator yesterday at The Junction 1. Man it was crowded. Well, maybe it only was couple of hundred people, but that’s exactly my point: even that is more than enough to block your vision. There are no seats except for a few bar stools to perch upon. And beer is expensive too.

There was no support band and VdGG started just as advertised, precisely at 20:30, and were playing non-stop till 22:15. In its current incarnation, VdGG consists of Peter Hammill (piano, guitar, vocal), Hugh Banton (organ) and Guy Evans (drums). I always fancied the idea of rock trio with an awesome drummer and two keyboard wizards sitting there outwizarding each other, and that was how the show started. (Evans’s drumming was consistently magnificent throughout the whole evening.) Wonderfully dark, mysterious, full of odd time signatures... I would love it if not for singing. No, I did not like Hammill’s vocal (whether meant or not, singing out of tune irritates me) and, on rare occasions when I was able to discern the lyrics, I did not enjoy the lyrics either.

If I was in a position to hand out any stars, this is how I would do it: musicianship, four and a half stars (out of five); singing: two stars; venue, two stars.

Raiders of the Lost Ark

2011-03-27T19:00:00.000+01:00

a film by Steven Spielberg

What a film! Han Solo with his sidekick Gimli and a heavy-drinking old flame against Professor Moriarty and quite a lot of Nazis. It became an instant classic when first released; 30 years later, it is still a classic. It may have been perfect if Spielberg & Co. spared us the rather embarrassing part where the supernatural powers of the Ark are unleashed. Still, great entertainment for all the family. The iconic gun vs sword scene is imaginatively re-created in the LEGO version of this epic (5:45 to 6:00).

Ball of Whacks

2011-03-26T22:16:00.003Z

by Roger von Oech

Arriving to Boston Airport two hours early was a mistake. Apart from shopping, there is precious little to do, and shopping at the Terminal E is dismal. Finally, I wandered into Brookstone’s where I was able to get rid of some of my traveller’s cheques (another mistake, acquired some nine years ago and still not quite spent) to get Ball of Whacks® for Timur, another magnetic toy for Yuri and a universal power adaptor for Tamara’s new camera.

This little spot of retail therapy cheered me up. Timur enjoys playing with his rhombic triacontahedron and from time to time insists on us taking pictures of the models.

Red Dwarf Anniversary Edition

2011-03-23T22:30:00.001Z

by Rob Grant and Doug Naylor

All right, dudes. Believe it or not, but I have managed to spend 16 (sixteen) years in this country without ever watching a single episode of Red Dwarf. How is that? And then, having run out of funny stuff to watch, I’ve ordered this DVD box. It didn’t disappoint.

The presentation: all eight series on ten discs in a A4-sized “photoalbum” complete with Polaroid-style photos. There are no extras, just the original shows. If you are looking for a perfect gift for a British comedy lover, look no further.

The show itself: man, it is fantastic. There’ll be time for explanations later, but now, if you did not see it yet, start watching.

Black & White

2011-03-22T00:00:00.006Z

by Нино Катамадзе & Insight

Now I know: Suliko is a bossa nova. Why didn’t I think about that myself?

My brother sent me these CDs last month as a gift. Until that, I never heard (about) the Georgian jazz-rock singer Nino Katamadze. On White, she is accompanied by Gocha Kacheishvili (guitar) and Ucha Gugunava (bass). On Black, they are joined by David Abuladze (drums and percussion). Both albums were recorded in 2006; the difference between the two records is striking. White is soft, chill-outey electronica. Black is hard, aggressive rock. (Compare the “black” and “white” versions of I Came, I Will Come As a Snow and Olei and you’ll see what I mean.) That’s why they complement each other perfectly.

Blue Dragon

2011-03-21T15:30:00.001Z

by Timur Kulikov

Paper, felt-tip pens.

The White Woman on the Green Bicycle

2011-03-18T21:00:00.002Z

by Monique Roffey

In 1956, the young couple arrives to Trinidad from England. He falls in love with the island. She hates it. His secrets are outdoors. Her secrets are inside.

I like the premise and I loved the book. It could have been great, perfect even. But I found a few things quite irritating. The (chronologically) last part comes first, the beginning and the rest of the story later. Although these are arguably the better read (no doubt, because of the first-person narrative), one may wonder what’s the point of reading when we know how it all ends. (Tragic, that’s how.) Perhaps the structure makes it easier to gloss over the 36-year gap between the last and the first parts?

Also, the word “steupsed” is used far too often. I reckon by its third appearance in the book the reader should get that Trinidadians do it a lot.

‘How old are, you, Venus?’
‘Twenteh.’
Five years younger than me. But she could have been any age. Eighteen, thirty-five.
‘Do you live far?’
‘Just up so, in Paramin. I walk there. I does like to tek a walk. It good fuh de blood system. Good to keep slim.’
‘I ride my bicycle.’
‘I see you, Miss. Everybody know you already.’
‘Who?’
‘Everybody. I tell dem I go fine a job with de white lady on de green bicycle. Nobody believe meh. But is true. I see you ride pas’ every day. With de basket in front.’
I blushed.
‘You is famus, Miss.’

Jasmine

2011-03-16T23:23:00.000Z

by Keith Jarrett and Charlie Haden

Unhurried. Hardly ground-breaking. No pretence. No showing off. Almost none of that (in)famous Keith Jarrett Moaning™. Just two friends playing a few standards. And, for a change, a jazz album which has true soul in every tune.

The Men Who Stare at Goats

2011-03-14T19:00:00.002Z

a film by Grant Heslov

Could there even be such a thing as a light-hearted Iraq War film? Well, here’s the one. Fantastic acting from George Clooney as Lyn Cassady (finally, a drop-dead gorgeous Jedi Warrior); better still, Jeff Bridges as his New-Agey mentor, Bill Django. All we are saying is give LSD a chance.

Orgasms for Two: The Joy of Partnersex

2011-03-12T23:00:00.002Z

by Betty Dodson

Betty Dodson is a sex-positive feminist. Instead of focusing on gender equality, she embraces sex diversity. She’s got her Ph.D. in sexology for research that she modestly calls “working in the field” (as opposed to questionnaire-based “research” media presents us every day). She left behind romantic heterosexual love, a failed marriage, group sex, adventures in lesbian and bisexual SM community only to embark, at the grand young age of sixty-nine, on a sizzling love affair with a boy in his twenties. But what about masturbation, I hear you asking. Fear not, it is not forgotten. Quite the reverse: Ms Dodson shows us the many ways of incorporating it into, or rather, making it central in the experience of partnersex — absolutely guilt-free. Separate chapters are devoted to sex toys, anal eroticism and sex for older lovers.

Not exactly sequel to Sex for One but a self-sufficient book. True, it does repeat the relevant bits of the former. But it is because they are worth reiterating. Unlike Sex for One, it features pen and ink drawings. Just like Sex for One, it is a fun and often hilarious read.

This is not a book about how to get a man, how to keep him, or how to get rid of him or kill him after the relationship is over.

⚤ ⚢ ⚣

Towards the end of the last year we were married he came home one night and announced he was taking up golf. I blurted out: “That’s good, because I’m taking up sex.”

⚤ ⚢ ⚣

Freud and Reich never got to read the Kinsey report, which put America’s national average time of thrusting with full erection after penetration at two and half minutes. That’s barely enough time to get me interested in sex, let alone have an orgasm.

⚤ ⚢ ⚣

Most young women today are getting their sex misinformation from women’s magazines, in articles written by young, sexually inexperienced writers who get their information from experts who are basically talking about what they have read in books or tested with a Ph.D. thesis that relied on a questionnaire.

⚤ ⚢ ⚣

Just when I thought the clitoris had been reinstated, men and women started digging around inside vaginas searching for some magic spot.

⚤ ⚢ ⚣

Kim has a marvelous sense of humor. She can squirt anywhere, anytime, and loves doing it. While I badger her about peeing on my rug, she laughs and tells me I’m jealous.

⚤ ⚢ ⚣

Group sex could easily take a whole chapter, but I’m saving all those delectable details for my memoir.

Marqués de Cáceres Rioja Crianza 2006

2011-03-10T23:32:00.004Z

Could it be that I’ve finally found an agreeable Rioja? Last week, I had a dinner at Waikiki just before the late night performance of de lo Flamenco. It was a chilly evening calling for a red wine. I’ve ordered a half-bottle of this wine and was not disappointed. The end.

More photos of red wine @ Shutterstock.

Психоз

2011-03-09T18:00:00.003Z

by Tatiana Solomatina

Why should I care about a young and attractive woman psychologist who leaves her boring husband, acquires two equally boring New Russian lovers neither of whom she loves, then finds another man with whom she falls in love? No reason whatsoever. But here I was, finishing this book in a transatlantic flight (Boston—London), worrying about its hapless heroine instead of having a well-deserved nap.

Not bad, not bad at all. I like the style. Not perfect though. If the author reads this, here’s my free and completely unsolicited advice: next time, lose the poetry.

I came across just one typo in a whole novel — for a post-Soviet book, a small miracle!

So long, just some words

2011-03-02T19:00:00.011Z

As I wrote somewhere else, last year I started yet another blog called just some words. You see, I wanted to have a non-Blogger blog. But why Maneno? First, Maneno is multi-lingual, and I want to have an option to publish in more than one language. Second, Maneno is African.

It allows those with limited or narrow-bandwidth internet to use a system that is lightweight and straightforward in functionality.

I thought, I will need this when I move to Africa! Last but not least: “maneno” means “words” in Swahili, and just some words is all about words. From different languages.

To my big disappointment, Maneno stopped hosting blogs. Fair enough, they gave an advance warning last Summer. And this very morning, I received an XML dump of justsomewords. I was able to recreate it at sólo algunas palabras (justsomewords.wordpress.com was already taken). So much for getting away from a major blogging platform.

Fish and flowers

2011-02-27T00:00:00.004Z

by Tamara Kulikova

Early to mid-noughties. Paper, watercolour.

More watercolours by Tamara Kulikova @ Shutterstock.

On Black Sisters’ Street

2011-02-26T00:00:00.029Z

by Chika Unigwe

This book traces the stories of four African prostitutes working in the Antwerp’s red light district. It has everything that Bonjour Tristesse does not: real women (that I end up liking, not just sympathising), real life, real sadness. (You understand, the only reason to oppose these two books here is that I happened to read one after another. Sorry, Ms. Sagan.) And, to quote the oldest of the “sisters”, Efe, ‘it make me tink’.

The three women laugh.

At the end of it a thoughtful silence swallows them up again. When it spits them out, it is to hear Efe say that she always wanted to be a writer.

‘It was my biggest dream. I was going to write books and become famous.’ She laughs. ‘At school na so so cram I dey cram my literature books.’ She stands up and begins to give a performance.
‘It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had everything before us, we had nothing before us, we were all going direct to Heaven, we were all going direct the other way — in short, the period was so.
‘I like the way incredulity and epoch dey drip commot from the mouth. I like the way things wey dey opposite, salt and pepper, dey side by side. Best of times. Worst of times. Light and Darkness. It make me tink. Tink say how dat for happen? And when I read am, I jus’ wan’ write like dat. Words wey fine so like butterfly, fine sotay person go wan’ read am again and again and again.’ Her voice dims and she sighs. ‘But dat one no go happen now.’

Bonjour Tristesse

2011-02-25T20:00:00.001Z

by Françoise Sagan

The best thing about this book is its title. But then, it is a line from La vie immédiate by Paul Éluard. Great poem; so-so novel.

Airplay

2011-02-10T20:50:00.000Z

by Northern Lights

One day, Timur asked what was the music played in the car. There was no easy answer to that because the car’s MP3 server was showing “Unknown Album by Unknown Artist”. Funnily enough, I knew what it was, who the musicians are and where exactly the CD is buried at home; and yet I couldn’t remember neither album’s title nor the name of the band.

Back home, I took the album out. Here it is. I say, what an utterly unremarkable name for a most remarkable collaboration: that of jazz trombonist Annie Whitehead and Alistair Anderson, the master of English concertina. Now last.fm says: “Northern Lights can refer to at least four different groups”, after which five different bands are described, none of them refers to Whitehead—Anderson project. As for the title, just check how many albums are named Airplay and you’ll see what I mean.

I wish British jazz/folk/experimental music was better promoted. I’m sure the musicians can do that themselves. Is it that difficult to put a couple of (complete) tracks on MySpace? (That would really help me to illustrate why this is such a brilliant record, by the way.) But no. After searching the web for a good few hours, I give up. The only professional review of the album I could find is at All About Jazz Italia (in Italian). No review at allmusic. Pathetic.

Oh well. I suppose you just have to trust me: it is wonderful. My favourite songs are In All Languages and Midnight Reel; Timur’s (so far) is Dark Blue.

The Deportees

2011-02-09T18:50:00.003Z

by Roddy Doyle

There’s a love story, a horror story, a sequel, sort of, to The Commitments. Almost all of them have one thing in common. Someone born in Ireland meets someone who has come to live here.

Roddy Doyle, Foreword to The Deportees

The thing about short story collections is that there always is a couple too many of them; one or two I’d happily live without; the literary equivalents of those orphan chocolates on the bottom of the box. Not here. Eight stories here are all in their places. The title story, a happy-ending remake of The Commitments, is almost as good as the original. Less believable, sure, but hey. I’ve always admired Jimmy Rabbite’s musical taste. Surely he deserves a great band to manage.

They were married nine years and in all that time she’d brought exactly six albums into the house, and that didn’t include Nick Cave’s Murder ballads, which he’d given her for their anniversary.
But it did include the Titanic soundtrack.
Jimmy had refused to file it in the Soundtrack section.
—Why not?
—I’m giving it a section of its own, he’d said. —Utter shite.
She’d laughed.
—You’re such an eejit.
And they’d made love on the kitchen table, while Celine Dion rode the vast Atlantic.

Fretless Jazz Bass

2011-02-06T01:00:00.005Z

by Fender

I bought this bass one warm May Saturday in 2000, in Boston, MA. Or was it in Cambridge, MA? I can’t say for sure now. It was a second-hand music shop about to close in 30 minutes. It was a perfect timing and it looked like somebody left there a perfect instrument waiting for me. I think that, ten years later, I can repeat this: a perfect instrument.

The thing about Fender Jazz Bass is that there is nothing superfluous to start with. Fretless Fender JB has even less than that. And in this case, less definitely is more. My instrument (made in Japan) also feels significantly lighter than some of American Deluxe basses I was allowed to touch, even though I have no clue how much does it really weigh. I was using Rotosound Tru Bass black nylon strings until couple of years ago when I switched to Jazz Bass flatwounds. Both are excellent strings but I would like to go back to black nylons at some point. (Just added a set to my wishlist.)

More photos of fretless electric bass @ Fotolia.

Mkutano

2011-02-04T21:00:00.003Z

by Taj Mahal and The Culture Musical Club of Zanzibar

Howlin’ Wolf; Muddy Waters; Blind Somebody; Big Someone Else Entirely — that’s how the real bluesmen are named. Not Taj Mahal. Until a few years ago, I thought it to be too ridiculously ostentatious a name to give Mr Mahal a try. In fact, I still think it is ridiculously ostentatious. And I am glad that I’ve discovered his music.

Mkutano means “meeting” in Swahili. Simple as that. It is a meeting of friends, not a competition. Listen to Catfish Blues and hear for yourself: the taarab orchestra sounding as if it were the most natural accompaniment to Delta blues.

From this review, I learned something that was not in the album’s liner notes.

Some local heroes also took part. Female singer Bikidude is well into her nineties and a living legend — the most famous musical ambassador from Zanzibar. Next to her musical prowess, the myth of Bikidude is based on a number of real-life incidents. At the age of thirteen she fled from an enforced marriage into Tanzania, where she crossed the country barefoot. She left a second unhappy marriage and took a traditional dhow sailing-boat to Egypt. It was there she became a singer. She took off her veil and shaved her head. Thus, she created an alternative and somewhat provocative new role model for Islamic women in Zanzibar. Bikidude drank and smoked, she flirted and danced, she sang and played the drums. A major artist from Zanzibar still and singing on this album.

Enjoy the meeting.

A History of the World in 10½ Chapters

2011-02-03T17:17:00.005Z

by Julian Barnes

The incredible (although more believable than the Bible’s version) testimony of a Noah’s Ark stowaway, Anobium domesticum.
The uninvited visitors board the Mediterranean cruise ship, with shocking consequences.
Hitherto unpublished bizarre 16th-century legal case of Mamirolle villagers vs the very same A. domesticum.
Young woman survives the nuclear holocaust on board a boat somewhere off the Australian coast, in company of two cats.
The story that inspired Géricault’s The Raft of the Medusa, followed by the story of Géricault’s The Raft of the Medusa.
In 1840, two Irish ladies undertake an expedition to Mount Ararat.
Author’s encounters with Lawrence Beesley, a survivor of the sinking of the Titanic; the legend of James Bartley, 19th-century Jonah; the 1939 voyage of St. Louis.
A film crew goes into the Venezuelan jungle to re-enact the adventures of two Jesuit priests there couple of centuries ago, with almost as disastrous a result.

love

An American astronaut takes a few steps on the moon and hears the voice of God instructing him, guess what, to find Noah’s Ark.
The author wakes up and spends some years or millennia in paradise, polishing his golf skills.

I wouldn’t call it a novel; nor does it provide a history of the world. Who needs a history of the world anyway? A masterful book worthy of Borges and Lem, this one.

That was the grapefruit of my dreams, I don’t mind telling you.

Like an emperor, I pushed aside the gutted hull and lifted a silver dome from a crested plate. Of course I knew what would be underneath. Three sliced of grilled streaky bacon with the gristle and rind removed, the crispy fat all glowing like a bonfire. Two eggs, fried, the yolk looking milky because the fat had been properly spooned over it in the cooking, and the outer edges of the white trailing off into filigree gold braid. A grilled tomato I can only describe in terms of what it wasn’t. It wasn’t a collapsing cup of stalk, pips, fibre and red water, it was something compact, sliceable, cooked equally all the way through, and tasting — yes, this is the thing I remember — tasting of tomato. The sausage: again, not a tube of lukewarm horsemeat stuffed into a French letter, but dark umber and succulent . . . a . . . a sausage, that’s the only word for it. All the others, the ones I’d thought I’d enjoyed in my previous life, were merely practicing to be like this; they’d been auditioning — and they wouldn’t get the part, either.

Drumming for LGBT History Month — again

2011-02-01T22:00:00.002Z

Today — just like a year ago — Arco Iris (renamed “Arco samba band” by Cambridge City Council) were supporting the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender History Month by playing at the Market Square from 12:00 to 12:30. We had a good, tight (even if I say so myself) 20-strong band, and freshly painted over the weekend drums (some of them still wet). And this time, we were announcing the raising of the rainbow flag with a drum roll! During and after the gig, scores of local paparazzi were clicking away, so I expect at least some photos and movies in Cambridge News.

Megamind

2011-01-30T18:18:00.004Z

a film by Tom McGrath

Of course, baddies make better heroes than goodies, but still: two supervillain 3-D animated features in a row? Can’t they think of anything else? Despicable Me was not terribly original. Now imagine an even less original movie.

So what? It turned out to be unexpectedly good. It could have been better, of course. My main problem is with the soundtrack: I mean, why two AC/DC songs? And Michael Jackson’s Bad — man, that’s what I call evil.

Color and Light in Nature

2011-01-28T21:50:00.002Z

by David K. Lynch and William Livingston

Speaking of Saffron Walden library. A few years ago there was a book sale and I bought this book for something like two quid. (Now, Amazon sells the very same book for $218.) It is one of the best and prettiest science books I’ve ever held in my hands, let alone owned. It holds the answers to many if not all questions one can ask about the world as seen by naked eye. And then some more.

Why the low sun is flattened?
What are the “ghostly, indistinct little bits of ‘something’ drifting lazily across your field of view”? (Floaters)
How to photograph spider webs?

It has exactly the right amount of physics — mostly diagrams, a few tables and, refreshingly, no equations; beautiful photographs throughout; and very accessible writing, with occasional gems like this:

Well-chronicled in the (difficult to find) little book Die Dämmerungserscheinungen, the explanation of alpenglow is straightforward.

You just can’t make this stuff up.

Genuine Negro Jig

2011-01-25T22:22:00.003Z

by Carolina Chocolate Drops

I spotted this album (or rather, its cute cardboard sleeve) in the Saffron Walden library. It has a modest CD section; even so, CDs are divided into categories (presumably made up by the music industry). This one was in the “country” section. Frankly, I don’t care that much about country music, it’s just happen to be located over the “folk” and that one is over the “jazz and blues”. I though it was misplaced. No prizes for guessing why: look at the cover picture, the title, and the name of the band.

What a lucky discovery. Of course Carolina Chocolate Drops ain’t no country act. They are old-time string band. Nominally it consists of Dom Flemons, Rhiannon Giddens (the beauty in the centre) and Justin Robinson, but five tracks on Genuine Negro Jig also feature Sule Greg Wilson. And their permutations. On a beautiful rendition of Why Don’t You Do Right? it is Giddens (vocal) and Flemons (guitar) plus Wilson providing “leg” percussion. On a title track, it is Giddens (fiddle), Robinson (hand clapping and foot percussion), Flemons (bones — wait, bones?) and Wilson (computer hard drive “triangle”). On Reynadine, Giddens sings unaccompanied. And so on. All wonderful through and through, but my favourite song here is an “acoustic hip hop version” of Hit ’Em Up Style.

More trombone harmonics

2011-01-24T15:30:00.003Z

On trombone, you can take the same note in more than one position. For instance, F3 can be played in both first and sixth positions, C♯4 (D♭4) in both second and fifth positions. Here’s the chart of trombone pedal tones and first five harmonics in seven positions:

The harmonic series go further than that but for a moment I constrain this chart only with those I can play.

Yesterday, I modified my blog template layout to enable the JavaScript-based SyntaxHighlighter by Alex Gorbatchev, with help of these instructions. SyntaxHighlighter does not understand the LilyPond syntax, but it is still useful. For one, it allows you to copy the code to clipboard in one click. Here's how the LilyPond input for the above harmonic series chart looks like:

% ****************************************************************
% Trombone Harmonic Series / Positions
% ****************************************************************
\version "2.12.3"
\layout {
  ragged-right = ##f
}
\header {
 title = "Trombone Harmonic Series"
}
\score {
  \new Staff
  \transpose g bes 
 {
  \clef bass
   g,,1 g,1 d1 g1 b1 d'1
 }
  \header {
  piece = "1st Position"
  }
  \layout {
    \context {
      \Staff
      \remove "Time_signature_engraver"
      \remove "Bar_engraver"
     }
   }
 }
\score {
  \new Staff
  \transpose g a
 {
  \clef bass
   g,,1 g,1 d1 g1 b1 d'1
 }
  \header {
  piece = "2nd Position"
  }
  \layout {
    \context {
      \Staff
      \remove "Time_signature_engraver"
      \remove "Bar_engraver"
     }
   }
 }
\score {
  \new Staff
  \transpose g aes
 {
  \clef bass
   g,,1 g,1 d1 g1 b1 d'1
 }
  \header {
  piece = "3rd Position"
  }
  \layout {
    \context {
      \Staff
      \remove "Time_signature_engraver"
      \remove "Bar_engraver"
     }
   }
 }
\score {
  \new Staff
 {
  \clef bass
   g,,1 g,1 d1 g1 b1 d'1
 }
  \header {
  piece = "4th Position"
  }
  \layout {
    \context {
      \Staff
      \remove "Time_signature_engraver"
      \remove "Bar_engraver"
     }
   }
 }
\score {
  \new Staff
  \transpose g ges
 {
  \clef bass
   g,,1 g,1 d1 g1 b1 d'1
 }
  \header {
  piece = "5th Position"
  }
  \layout {
    \context {
      \Staff
      \remove "Time_signature_engraver"
      \remove "Bar_engraver"
     }
   }
 }
\score {
  \new Staff
  \transpose g f
 {
  \clef bass
   g,,1 g,1 d1 g1 b1 d'1
 }
  \header {
  piece = "6th Position"
  }
  \layout {
    \context {
      \Staff
      \remove "Time_signature_engraver"
      \remove "Bar_engraver"
     }
   }
 }
\score {
  \new Staff
  \transpose g e
 {
  \clef bass
   g,,1 g,1 d1 g1 b1 d'1
 }
  \header {
  piece = "7th Position"
  }
  \layout {
    \context {
      \Staff
      \remove "Time_signature_engraver"
      \remove "Bar_engraver"
     }
   }
 }

As you can see, I simply wrote the pedal tone and first five harmonics for 4th position (lines 065 through 081) and transposed it six times. The only new LilyPond trick here is \layout { ragged-right = ##f } which makes the staff length to be stretched to equal that of the line width.

See photos of trombone @ Shutterstock.