Voting

My wife and I voted, not that there was much to vote for this off year. I got my "I Voted" sticker and put it on. My wife gave me hers. I put that on too.

All day at the library I work at people said "You voted twice!"

"The first time was so easy." I replied. "But the second time was hard!"

From the school of...

My first day back from our trip to Florence and Rome (it was lovely, thank you so much. Oh, you'd like to hear about it in exhaustive detail? Well, I mean, if you insist. Visit here daily for the next month or two then and that should do it) I was shelving some James Patterson books in our teeming James Patterson section of our library, when i noted that he collaborates, a lot. Scads of people are constantly writing with him, dozens, maybe hundreds. I suppose one needs a bit of help if one is going to churn out a couple of books every month (or is it a couple of books every week?). But he is by no means alone in this. There is a whole vein of bulk bestseller authors, like Janet Evanovich or Clive Cussler, who constantly team up with people you never heard of to keep their writing empires churning along.

Of course this has been going on for awhile in publishing, and I have been aware of it. But two weeks in Florence and Rome suddenly cast it in a new light: This is not remotely new to the arts! Back in the 1400's and 1500's and so on, many of the big time artists whose work my wife and I were seeing in churches, palaces, and museums (sometimes a bit of all three at once) were running their own little private art industries. They called them workshops and as far as my limited understanding of them goes they were probably a combination of apprenticeship schools and maybe a decent living for less entrepreneurial and less brilliant artists. One of the most uneven excellent artists I have seen ran a large workshop in his successful career: Titian. The huge quality variation on his paintings I suspect stems from how much he painted on a painting. I'm pretty sure there are more than a few "Titians" that involved him coming on to an almost finished painting, worked up by some stalwarts of his studio, in order to do a few final highlights. He might be a bit of an exception in terms of how good he could occasionally be though. The exception that proves the rule. Ghirlandaio might be a better example, a very fine painter with a thriving workshop in Florence, who produced much wonderful work that, despite having just seen several million examples of in Florence, I can't for the life of me remember any of. For the most part the really great artists, burning up with creative energy, have a slightly smaller body of work, and it's pretty clear that geniuses like Leonardo and Michelangelo (briefly apprenticed to Ghirlandaio!) not only have that more modest body of work (with loads of it unfinished), but they're also the sort of people who simply can't abide help. These Van Goghs and Caravaggios of the world tend to work alone, very, very alone.

So I use this to explain the James Pattersons of today. He's not working with people exactly. I figure he's more like throwing his "co-authors" a quick outline, maybe a few guidelines, and a couple characters. Then these sort of studio assistants are writing the books according to it all as best they can. Then ol' James comes in to add a few highlights, some signature flourishes of the master, so to speak. 

It pays the bills. Many, many, many, many, many bills.

But it's not the kind of thing you'll see Kafka doing. 

Chopin's Nocturnes Vladimir Ashkenazy

Yes, we're back to the series I was working on before my trip to Florence and Rome. This series is the 100 greatest albums of all time. These being of course each the single greatest album ever and not a ranked list. Today, excitingly, marks the greatest album ever made, and also our first classical album, Chopin's Nocturnes by Vladimir Ashkenazy.

This one is beyond me.

These nocturnes are too good for words. This music is too much for words.

I am riding in the snow, in the woods at night 150 years ago in a horse drawn sleigh. I pull my jacket close around me. Chopin wrote snow and ice and night every bit as well as god. And he just needed a piano for it, god needed a Universe.

I'll never get there trying to explain Chopin and these essential renditions. If we let a picture be worth a thousand words, but then a nocturne is worth a thousand pictures.

I would have to write a million words. I could write all night with this music falling all around me and I won't have said the first note.





Nocturne No 1 in B flat minor.

Simple expectations

Though I am writing this well ahead of time in preparation for a two week trip to Italy (mostly Florence), today in real time, according to this blog post, I will back at work with my vacation timebank emptied out until there's just fumes (hey, it smells like wine!). But I'm not worried about it because I will be refreshed, recharged, and raring to go. Also I am expecting everyone will have sorted out most things in my absence.

Please don't feel like you're personally responsible for any of this if it didn't happen, but I am thinking everyone will have worked together to bring about the following things while I was gone:


1. Library now works on a flat, cooperative non hierarchical structure. 

2. We got pay increases. 

3. The forks I ordered came in. 

4. Everyone stopped messing with the staplers and air fresheners.

5. Barcelona won all their soccer games in my absence and are now sponsored by my local Kopplin's Coffee.

6. The Internet's heart grew three sizes, like in The Grinch Who Stole Christmas.

7. The people of Hong Kong got a little love from the world.

8. Trump is, or Trump was, um, he finally put... 

oh, never mind, it's all hopeless. Hopeless.

The winding down of vacation blogging

Well, I have spent the day writing blog posts. As you know, because I keep telling you, I have to cover all my posts while I am gone on my trip. So I sat down and wrote a lot. Now I have to write another one. I refuse to not give it my all! You didn't ask me to box myself into a corner. You aren't interested in my schemes. You probably just thought you'd pop over and see if anything funny happened at the library today. And I don't want to let you down. So yes, yes, don't worry. Of course something hilarious happened at the library today. 

I don't know what it is, but oddly I can live with that.

Florence generic panini place review

By the time you read this my wife and I will be in Florence.  I am reading a lot of reviews in preparation for this trip. I find these compelling, occasionally useful, contradictory, truly pointless, and addictive. Along with the travel vlogs I watch I feel I have a sense for the collective tone and quality of these reviews as a kind of ur-review, the ultimate review that sums up each category of establishment. Today we will continue with the generic panini place review.



Generic Florence Panini Place Review


5 Stars


This is an absolutely legendary panini place. Just look at its review average. I have never seen such a high average of reviews. They are through the roof. Some people say this is the single greatest sandwich shop on the face of the Earth. I have never been so excited to eat at a place as I am to eat here. I can hardly believe that this afternoon I will be eating one of their paninis! If I could give them six stars I would! 

I hope they're good.

Florence generic rooftop bar review

By the time you read this my wife and I will be in Florence.  I am reading a lot of reviews in preparation for this trip. I find these compelling, occasionally useful, contradictory, truly pointless, and addictive. Along with the travel vlogs I watch I feel I have a sense for the collective tone and quality of these reviews as a kind of ur-review, the ultimate review that sums up each category of establishment. Today we will continue with the generic rooftop bar review.



Generic Florence Rooftop Bar Review



5 Stars




The view of the duomo in Florence is extraordinary, and where better to gaze upon it than from this amazing rooftop bar with a bottle of wine. It was an incredibly beautiful and romantic evening. Our bottle of wine was very reasonable at 180 euros, considering, and it came with a free bowl of marcona almonds. We ate them all but became too shy to ask for any more! The piano player focused primarily on the work of the Carpenters, Morris Albert, and Henry Mancini which made me cry. I didn't know how to tip him, but there's a lady who hangs out by the piano wearing purple and with flowers appliqued on her bag and she showed me how. Apparently you have to give money to the waiter first, then you can give money to the piano player at which point he'll sadly accept it.

I will never forget that magical evening.

Florence generic cafe review

By the time you read this my wife and I will be in Florence.  I am reading a lot of reviews in preparation for this trip. I find these compelling, occasionally useful, contradictory, truly pointless, and addictive. Along with the travel vlogs I watch I feel I have a sense for the collective tone and quality of these reviews as a kind of ur-review, the ultimate review that sums up each category of establishment. Today we will continue with the generic cafe review.



Generic Florence Cafe Review



5 Stars




If you are looking for an Italian coffee place look no further than this. This is a classic, old school, order an espresso and knock it back at the counter kind of place. We loved it here and adopted it as our neighborhood place and before you knew it we were pals with Luigi and the gang. We went here many mornings and I would almost always order their omelette with avocado, which was delicious. They had full American breakfast too, which is nice for a taste of home. We got pasta here once and it was quite tasty, and their pizza is to die for. You can get it by weight to go! A couple times we dropped in later and they had live music and great cocktails. We actually clubbed it a bit there because it's kind of a happening scene, though maybe a young crowd for us. 

It would not be right to not say that their gelato is amazing. It's super rich for gelato, and they have this great hazelnut chocolate sauce people line up for in the mid afternoon cause it's homemade and they always run out. If you go for dinner (very recommended) definitely get reservations, that is unless you go early or late, but if you get in you won't regret ordering the bistecca. And don't forget to bring your swim trunks because their swimming pool's a surprise, but it's pretty cool.

Also they make their own beer which is great, because there aren't a ton of microbreweries in Florence yet. We definitely plan on checking out their dart tournament. It's also a good place for Karaoke. 

They sell some really nice shoes too, so check that out.

Such a great cafe!

Florence generic museum review

By the time you read this my wife and I will be in Florence.  I am reading a lot of reviews in preparation for this trip. I find these compelling, occasionally useful, contradictory, truly pointless, and addictive. Along with the travel vlogs I watch I feel I have a sense for the collective tone and quality of these reviews as a kind of ur-review, the ultimate review that sums up each category of establishment. Today we will continue with the generic museum review.



Generic Florence Museum Review



5 Stars



Well, if you're going to Florence you really can't miss this. It is an amazing place and even though I am not much of an art person it took my breath away. These paintings and sculptures are just so beautiful! It is super crowded but worth it! We got reservations online, which is easy to do, and for only 60 euros we got to go through a special line instead of waiting in the huge line outside. I don't think I could have taken that. My feet were so tired from all the walking!

But as much as I adored the gorgeous art there was just so much of it. I am definitely going to have to go back. We missed the amazing Michelangelo that's here just because there is so much to see, and it's all amazing.

Also, be sure to check out the fancy cafe (expensive cappuccino anyone?) which is worth it for the fantastic views. We shared an espresso that cost a small fortune, but we have no regrets.

I do regret that we only allotted half an hour for this incredible monument to the best humanity has to offer. If we could have blown off our lunch reservation we would have, but we were meeting friends, so the rest will have to wait for another trip. I already long to gaze upon these powerful paintings once again. This museum is a don't miss indeed, and it's a reason on it's own to go to Florence, which already has so many other reasons.

Florence generic restaurant review

By the time you read this my wife and I will be in Florence.  I am reading a lot of reviews in preparation for this trip. I find these compelling, occasionally useful, contradictory, truly pointless, and addictive. Along with the travel vlogs I watch I feel I have a sense for the collective tone and quality of these reviews as a kind of ur-review, the ultimate review that sums up each category of establishment. Today we will continue with the generic restaurant review.


Generic Florence Restaurant Review



5 Stars



This was easily one of my three favorite Florence restaurants. In fact, this was my third favorite and I would eat here every night if I could!

It is a real authentic neighborhood kind of place, located in the Oltrarno, which means across the river. This is where the real Florentines live to hide out from us tourists. I don't blame them! I like to spend as much time as possible over here, and the restaurants are way better in this part of town, and more reasonably priced too. The night I was here it was just us and locals. Although I guess some of them could have been from other places too. We were ignored for 45 minutes and were starting to get mad, but then for some mysterious reason they got really nice to us, so all was forgiven. Vasily, our waiter, was really proud of their food which came from their family farm in Piedmont. It was delicious. You must try their bistecca, which is a huge chunk of beef that's still raw practically in the middle. I like my beef, and though I wasn't in the mood that night we are definitely planning on going back for it!

We had the house red wine and it was delicious. Vasily said it was the right choice and that their house red is every bit as good as some of the nice wines on their wine list. I know a good deal when I hear one so I drank a lot of that wine! I had pasta and it was maybe the freshest pasta I have ever had. It was so tender, and the sauce was perfect. Vasily said it was made with sheep's milk cheese! I asked him why the pasta was so good. He said they grow their own wheat, but I think he was kidding me. I'm not sure. I was pretty drunk by then.

I don't remember whether we had dessert or not, but I do know that it was delicious!

Florence generic gelato review

By the time you read this my wife and I will be in Florence.  I am reading a lot of reviews in preparation for this trip. I find these compelling, occasionally useful, contradictory, truly pointless, and addictive. Along with the travel vlogs I watch I feel I have a sense for the collective tone and quality of these reviews as a kind of ur-review, the ultimate review that sums up each category of establishment. Today we will start with the generic gelato review.




Generic Florence Gelateria Review

5 Stars


They say you can't get great gelato right near the city center, but this legendary place is the great exception. Just make sure you don't go into the nearby gelateria, also called a gelateria, as it's not nearly as good. 

This place is amazing. I love gelato. I could eat it all day! But when the gelato is this good you want to take your time with it. Except not too much time or it melts! 

Anyway this gelateria (place that sells gelato) is a little family owned gem, where they make their own gelato from real ingredients they get from people who sell it to them. It's super authentic, owned by a family of just the nicest people. Giuseppe was fantastic, so friendly, and he talked to us for hours about the local soccer team in Italian, which, sadly, is not a language I speak. He knew enough English though to translate all the flavors for me. Four of them were chocolate and I love, love, love chocolate. There were exotic flavors too, like pistachio, which supposedly tastes nutty, and lemon sage. Weird, but intriguing! Try that one out!

You can get gelato in a cup or a cone and they have about 15 different sizes and varieties so just point vaguely at something and they'll talk to you in Italian for awhile and then give you one of them full of ice cream. Except it's not ice cream, it's gelato, which apparently is a little different than ice cream (though not much, it's like halfway between soft serve and ice cream).

I think this is by far the best gelateria in Florence, and maybe in all of Italy, although I've only been to two of them altogether, and because I was still full from lunch I didn't have any gelato at this one.

Do not miss this if you go to Florence!

Theme revision

Yesterday I set forth a scheme for writing a lot of blogposts in a short time for a long trip. The scheme, or theme, or rule was: Only one sentence per post.

It took three hours to write the first one. It just went on and on. It was long and packed with confusing commas. I kept having to figure out where I was in it and how not to stop. Plus, I like sentences. I love them! Look, here's one. Here's another! Sentences are like breathing. It's way easier to do them regularly than to do one big one for a long time. 

Hemingway knows. So does Michael Phelps.

So I have a new theme. It's to write as many sentences as I want!

No, that can't be right. Isn't that just regular blogging?

I guess I can try that. Not that there's much of a market for it.

Ah well, someone's gotta put these Easter eggs into the Internet. Might as well be me.

Exciting theme announced!

Yesterday, right here, in this very space, where you are right now, metaphorically at least, though you might actually be in the same exact physical space, like, on a computer at the same desk or something, unless of course you read these in batches, in which case instead of yesterday it was a minute ago, though if it was that you are surely in the same space, but anyway, yesterday, or a minute ago, I teased the exciting new theme that, unlike the challenging, demanding theme of writing about the greatest albums ever, a theme I've now put on hold, would allow me to write the necessary 11 remaining blogposts that would keep my blog going while my wife and I were off, detached from the Internet, exploring the little known Italian city called Florence, and though I teased this new theme yesterday, or a minute ago, and at the time didn't know what it was going to be, in the course of writing this I have indeed discovered the perfect theme that will facilitate the quick, effective, and winning writing of nearly a dozen new, exciting, interesting, easy to read blogposts, all written under the same surprising, unifying theme that this post itself has already employed, that is the theme of, well maybe not "theme", more like rule, but I mean the same thing by either of them, and that theme or rule is: 

Only one sentence. 

The Florence plan

In the great unbroken streak of this blog (thousands of days in a row with a new post every day) I have had to contend with a few large vacation trips. My strategy has generally been suited to my personality. I have crammed, writing 10 or 15 or even 35 blog posts over the course of a few days, arranging them to steadily release during my vacation. To do this I usually come up with a scheme, like an imagined account of my trip ahead of time, or getting drunk, or a theme like the hundred greatest albums of all time.

That last one is my current device. As you have been reading over the last several days I have listed off albums, each one the greatest album of all time. It has taken me all the way to today, October 25, sadly a mere four or five days into our trip to Florence. And then I realized: 

These take a long time to write! 

They take longer than the posts with no theme whatsoever!

I have to remember these albums, listen to these albums, research them, compose thematically in harmony with them, think about what they mean in relation to the other albums, all music, life on earth, I have to edit them into sensibility, and I have to explain why why why. It's complicated.

In short I need a new scheme!

I've got to get moving. I have mere hours left. I need a scheme, a plan, an approach so fool-proofed that each successive blog post writes itself.

Oh, you thought these already write themselves?

No, I write them. That's why I keep mentioning me in them, hoping I can have just a tiny bit of the credit.

But it's easy to miss, I guess. They're all just so natural and free flowing, like a beautiful cool breeze flowing through the Internet. The faint sent of flowers and lemons edging around your computer as the clouds billow and...

What's that?

Oh, sorry. Right. We rather drifted off there, didn't we?

We're here to announce our exciting new theme. It's perfect. You will be amazed and full of delighted wonder. No, seriously, it is a great theme.

I'll tell you tomorrow when I think of it.

Blues for Allah

The first time I saw the Grateful Dead I was young, high on mushrooms that had hideously been blended into a milkshake, and high as well on windowpane acid. It was enormously exciting from the time we lined up at Oz records to buy the just released tickets (waiting with Barry Manilow fans whose tickets were simultaneously releasing, an appealing and unusual pairing), all through the car ride in a blue station wagon, the daring magic kool-aid test drugs, and all the way to the start of this first independent (on our part, we were 16 or 17), fabled, long-awaited concert.

Which I hated.

Totally hated.

Uncomfortable, lonely, abandoned by friends who fit naturally and blissfully into the scene, all my Grateful Dead Concerts were the same- alienating, making me feel wrong and left out, lost. I don't like dancing in public. I couldn't relax enough to hear the music which always tended to be of mixed quality anyway, and seemingly made for dancing. It took me awhile to realize I had picked the wrong team. I was just me.

And so I have always loved the joke, defying an old refrain about the Grateful Dead, in which I said "They weren't much live, but they sure had some great albums."

Ha ha ha ha ha ha!

No, seriously.

I'm not saying those noodly bootlegs don't have their moments, but I mean listen to this:

Franklin's Tower

Everything about this is too delicate, gorgeous, to survive the wild. It is not a party or a dance. It is all delicacies, woven of twigs and flowers, grass and stones. A quiet place in the woods, a deer looking up, silence. A riffle of wind in the tree leaves weaving into the sound of a creek bubbling down a gentle hill.  This sweet voice full of gentleness and care. The perfect interlacing and syncopation of instruments, impenetrable and unmissable, words that mean nothing, quietly spoken and full of sense, and a guitar of impossible complexity spilling out without effort. It's too good. It's so lovely. A spell that will break under the first movement, like that deer dashing off into the trees never to be seen again. Everything will ruin this. 

The greatest album ever made is so little and sweet and strange. There really isn't anything like it.

Grapesongs

To my delight, as I have begun compiling a list of the hundred greatest albums ever (being 100 albums that are in and of themselves the single greatest album ever made), my choices have leaned slightly more... obscure. Oh, not wildly obscure, Dylan, Neil Young, and Miles Davis are all there, but it's not the notable things like Blood on the Tracks, or Harvest, yet (though it is Kind of Blue). And Lucinda Williams has appeared, along with the maybe not wildly known Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan. This has not been by design. It just worked out that way. So it's a nice learning experience for everyone, albeit one without serious challenges.

Until today!

You cannot hear this album. It is not commercially available. It never made the radio. There are no YouTubes of it. I can't link it for you. You have not heard it. You probably never will.

My friend made it, like, 25 years ago! 

Go ask him for it.

Because it is the greatest album ever.

Seriously.

Today is my friend Grape's birthday. I like to say a thing or two about him here on that day. But I won't cheat. I have written before in this space about Grapesongs. Grapesongs is not gratuitously included. It would make its way to my list regardless of dates. I doubt anyway it will do any favors to my friend. My 20 regular readers won't be catapulting Grape to fame. Grape has a middle reader book that just came out that I quite like, called, get this, Grape, and I'm sure he'd be far more keen in anyone's interest in that over some ancient foray he took into singer/songwriter glory. I don't even know if he can play the guitar anymore. It's history. Maybe it's just an old dream to my friend now, curious, a mysterious disappointment he made peace with.

But when I get tired of using my own blog as the poster child of everything wrong with the Capitalist winner-takes-all art system, of the stupid Internet that managed to shock everyone by being even more hostile to art than the world it replaced, there is always Grape and his lovely masterpiece of an album, never published, sitting in my family's music drawer to bear the brunt of our cultural disasters. Let it stand for all the things unsung, to marketing over content, to the quiet way that the best things in life are not destiny, they are moon shots and prayers in the dark. They are triumphs one at a time.

Like in my heart.

One is enough, isn't it?

Because this is a beautiful album.

It is a serendipity for me to realize, hey, I can include this album on Grape's birthday. But it is not disingenuous or convenient. I sing these songs all the time, to this day. More than 20 years on I will wake up with these songs. I live my life with this soundtrack. Witness I Can't hide is as part of my consciousness, elevating, informing, leavening, as much as, say Homeward Bound, or Oh Very Young. 

"Just come and walk with me. It ain't so heavy when we talk it through." 

That's all I'm doing with this blog.

World Gone Wrong

We wouldn't get too far on my list of the hundred greatest albums of all time (with each individually being the greatest single album ever made) before we ran headlong into Bob Dylan, bashing our heads into him and saying "Huh? Hey, where, what." 

And Bob Dylan says...

Watch where you're going, man. You'll hurt yourself.

Bob Dylan is the single greatest songwriter in the history of music. Not every album of his will be one of the hundred greatest albums ever, but I can come up with seven of his like I'm rolling a rock down a road. I mean, as I said, he's the greatest songwriter in the history of music.

So isn't it weird, isn't it a little funny that the greatest album ever made, by the greatest songwriter, is a bunch of covers?

Maybe you're thinking "You just like to pick the weird ones."

I do! I like it sooo much! But what does it matter. That's apocrypha, a side note, irrelevant.  Because I mean it. Oh, I mean it. Oh I mean it so bad. Oh. Oh. World Gone Wrong is the greatest album ever made.

And it's all mine. It's all mine! It's ragged and dirty, broke and hungry too.

All the friends it ever had are gone.

Dylan, past his pure, incendiary relevancy, put out an album of folk blues covers called Good as I been to You. People liked it. "That's nice" they said. And it was, I guess. Then he put out another one and people said "Oh, another one." And they turned their heads.

And gave it to me! Dark blues so gorgeous, so torn apart and dark, and so minutely understood that the man who alchemically, musically, lyrically, reinvented western civilization out of them can set them down and present them graciously. They are the 20th Century,  his source material in an act of shuddering respect, understanding, revelation, and homage.

He also finished his record contract with it.

It's a piece of work set down by a master. No one bothered to pick it up until I came along. I was shocked to find it just lying there. But believe me, it suits the album. 

It's mine. So I give it to you. We can share it.






Blood in My Eyes

Nirvana Unplugged

Look, I'm not going to bring you out of the saddest album ever made without care. The heartbreaking Lucinda Williams Live at the Fillmore needs a baby step out. In this case another live album, this one sung searingly by someone who shot themselves a few months afterwards.

That's about right.

Not only would I rather not jar you with an upbeat album, I'm not sure I have any on my list. 

It's no bed of roses here on earth. If you're reading this god, you might want to think about what you've done.

From Wikipedia:

Cobain suggested that the stage be decorated with stargazer lilies, black candles, and a crystal chandelier. Cobain's request prompted the show's producer to ask him, "You mean like a funeral?", to which the singer replied, "Exactly. Like a funeral."


I'm pretty sure Kurt Cobain's voice is the last great reinvention of Rock n' Roll. I didn't know you could tear a voice. And just keep tearing and tearing and tearing and keep going without destroying it.

All the way to 27.

This is my generation.

This is the greatest album ever made.







Plus it includes the greatest cover ever recorded by a human being:




Where Did You Sleep Last Night

full of history, America, builds like a religious chant, sucks you in, then explodes and destroys all life on earth. It's personal.

May we all rest in peace.

Live at the Fillmore

Fine. Yesterday we hearkened back to the beginning; We asked, what was for us the first greatest album ever made. And we found a "best of" album, by the Beatles, called the Red Album. And that's all well and good. You read my description, wept, listened to the album, went to the library and got a copy, listened to it, and said "Oh yeah. These. These are good songs." Like it was a surprise.

Well it was a surprise to me too in in 1978.

But what is the most recent album I listened to where I said to myself:

Holy shit. This is the greatest album ever made!



This is the subject of today's thrilling blogpost!

It's our first live album too.

The Live at the Fillmore of our title refers to Lucinda Williams Live at the Fillmore. It is the greatest album ever made.

Oh, you think that's a device now, don't you?

It's going to get ugly then.

In my first of the 100 greatest albums of all time I extolled Neil Young's On the Beach as possibly the saddest album of all time. It's not. This is. This is. Her voice is more broken. She's older. More dreams have fallen. She doesn't expect them to come true. This is not a disaffected rock star, as gorgeous as that can be. This is a person! You! You can count on your blessings. I'll just count on blue.

Take Ventura, please.

But first we must talk about Caravaggio. We must talk about magic. 

Caravaggio paints a collar bone, a shoulder, and your heart melts and it makes no sense. A bit of cloth, a moment, a splash of light. Well here it is. What does Lucinda Williams write about here?

Fucking soup. She makes fucking soup. She sings about fucking soup and I'm crying.

Driving. Showers. Watching waves. Throwing up in a toilet.

Being purified.

This is the greatest album ever made.

She puts Neil Young on and turns it up.

No, seriously, it's in the song. She knows where she comes from. Everything required is here.

The sort of cool Minnesota radio station where I first heard Lucinda Williams did a poll of the best 893 songs of the 2000's.

Ventura didn't make.

You can count on your blessings. I'll just count on blue. Fuck Minnesota.




You choose:




Blue


Ventura


and...


Literally the most exquisitely unbearable song to listen to ever written (at your own risk):

Bus to Baton Rouge

The Red Album

Seriously?

The Red Album by the Beatles?

A "best of" album as the greatest album of all time?

Yes. To my exceedingly minuscule shame, yes!

"But, your choices have been obscenely sophisticated. Dark, mildly obscure Neil Young, the strange internationalism of Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan. Even Kind of Blue came with the humbleness of choosing perfection, classicism. But a best of album, by the Beatles, whose catalog is already practically all greatest albums of all time?"

Look, all I said is that I was going to write about the 100 greatest albums of all time, each being something I thoroughly felt as the single greatest album ever made. It's not objective, it's subjective.

Except, fuck it. It is objective. It is all objective. Everything everywhere is objective. Don't be fooled.

The Red Album is the greatest album ever made.

We have to start at the beginning. This is my fourth album out of a hundred. But we're starting at the beginning. We have to start at the beginning.

For my Bar Mitzvah, I think in 1978, as it slightly lagged my birthday, I received from someone (thank you) a present of the double album 1962-1966 known colloquially as The Red Album.

I listened to it.

Oh.

I cannot say where other people mark the moment they were no longer a child. I suspect there is no rule for it. Maybe many people don't even have a moment like that. Maybe some people never made a real transition. But I did in a complicated way. And it was at the moment I heard John Lennon sing Nowhere Man.

I did not even know what love was before that, what art was, what it meant to open one'e eyes. 

Jesus.

Each of the songs on "The Red Album" were enthralling: Michelle, Girl, Paperback Writer, but I was being primed. Kindled. Stoked. When I hit Nowhere Man everything blew apart- the meaning of love, the wrongness of God, the horrible error and beauty of being. 

This is an old memory, but I heard Nowhere Man and I had to go out to the front lawn, to the right of our driveway, at my family house on Paul Revere Drive, and just... deal with it. I had too many feelings. I had way to many feelings. I had to play it in my mind over and over. I never recovered.

I was, in that moment, created and ruined.

I suspect the world was too.





Nowhere Man