Palms & Runes, Tarot & Tea: A Michael Penn Collection

I picked up Palms & Runes, Tarot & Tea: A Michael Penn Collection this past week in Nashville and listened to it all the way to North Carolina. I was as impressed with it as I was with Mr. Hollywood Jr., 1947 [see post below and listen at http://www.myspace.com/michaelpenn]. This is a sort of greatest hits but includes a number of new versions of those hits. If, as I mentioned below, Jr. seems too dark for you, this would be a great option for getting to know Penn's music. It's a lot more relaxed and fun, but still has plenty of layers.

http://www.amazon.com/Palms-Runes-Best-Michael-Penn/dp/B000NJISH0

(Not Just) Children's Books

I was at Walmart the other night and came across a recent reissue of Madeleine L'Engle's A Wrinkle in Time. I had already boxed up my old copy, and this was only $5, so I bought one to read it again. (When I've finished, I'll give it to some lucky reader.) I first came across what was then the "Time Trilogy" when I was in fourth grade. I read and loved all these stories about the Murry children and their adventures across the universe. (The others are A Wind in the Door and A Swiftly Tilting Planet.) I read them again when I was around twenty and remained impressed. (By that time, there was a fourth book in the series, which I read but found less interesting. I didn't know it then, but there was also a fifth, which is part of the reissue group I saw the other night. I suspect I'll read it soon.)

At thirty-two, I'm enjoying this third reading of Wrinkle, and I thought I'd share a few of my all time favorite so-called children's books--a few works I loved as a child and still find a strong read as an adult, as well as some new favorites I've read in recent years.

(One of the nice things about being in my thirties is that people don't look at me askance when I buy a children's book. They just assume it's for my kids. In some ways, they're right, of course. If I ever have kids, I'll be sharing these books with them and hoping they'll enjoy them as much as I do.)

The Chronicles of Narnia--I read this C. S. Lewis series for the fourth time last year, and it hadn't lost its charm. These stories are not strictly allegorical, but each teaches a strong lesson without being preachy or pedantic. They're also good fun and will occasionally make you laugh out loud. One of my all time favorite opening lines comes from The Voyage of the Dawn Treader: "There was a boy called Eustace Clarence Scrubb, and he almost deserved it."

Frindle--A friend who was teaching young kids at the time introduced me to this Andrew Clements book about three years ago. The story centers on Nick, a boy who one day decides to call his pen a "frindle." Chaos ensues. The book is light, fun, and teaches kids (and adults) an awful lot about etymology (one of my favorite subjects) in the process. If you have kids, they probably have heard of this book and others from Clements. I've now read most of his novels, and they are all worth the time if only for the way he manages to capture the thought processes of children.

Harry Potter and...--Sure it's so popular it's cliche, but these are great books. All of them. The first two are truly children's books, and if your reading habits are even remotely like mine you'll blow through them in a couple of hours. After that, this series takes a darker, more layered direction. If you've seen the movies and think you get, you don't. (The first two films are okay, the third excellent, and the fourth complete crap.) Start now, and you'll have all six read by the time the finale comes out this July.

Goodbye, Veronica

As I mentioned in a post below, I'm a huge fan of Veronica Mars. I also predicted the show would be cancelled in that post, which happened today. Instead of writing a long post on the joy and wonder that is this great show, I'll just say go rent or buy the DVDs. You'll be glad you did, and you'll likely be as annoyed as I am that the show didn't get another season.

Mr. Hollywood Jr., 1947

Like nearly everyone else who knows the name (and many who wouldn't remember it), I first heard Michael Penn in 1989 when his "No Myth" was all over pop radio. I deeply hated that song for about ten years; it's hook line "What if I were Romeo in black jeans" rubbed my anti-fad streak in every wrong direction. In 2000, however, I suddenly fell in love with it when I heard it again on an '80's compilation disc I had borrowed. Word plays like that of the line "If I dig a hole to China, I'll catch the first junk to SoHo" had missed me when I was a teen, and the song's basic issue--post-romance relationship--was not part of my experience then. I didn't rush out and buy a Michael Penn record, but I became willing to hear him. Trouble was, I didn't get the chance for several years.

In a spring episode of House (one of the few shows I love which has a fan-base broad enough to avoid the fate described in the post below), Penn's "Walter Reed" served as soundtrack to a pivotal scene. I didn't recognize the voice, but the lament of a returning soldier stuck in my head for days. "For platform and for passerby," he says, "it's the same routine: I'm ranting while I'm raving... Tell me what more do you need? Take me to Walter Reed tonight." Finally, I tracked it down and bought the album it leads off, Mr. Hollywood Jr., 1947.

A concept album, each track exists in the world of Post-WWII America. Like "Walter Reed," many of these songs reflect a disillusionment of the era. The speaker in "Pretending" admits to his lover, "the words that I say are not for you but for that costume," and that of "Denton Road" confesses, "I don't need another speech to know I'm out of reach."

In songs like "Mary Lynn," however, hope rises to the surface. "If you'd only stay the night," the speaker implores, "you'd see it's not so black and white." "On Automatic," the final proper track (there are one or two hidden extras, depending on the release) leaves all worry behind: "Maybe I'm about to tank, but everything'll turn out fine. Things are looking up."

Penn manages this range of emotions with a voice I can only describe as layered. These aren't the pretty vocals (from a prettier face) of an American Idol, but those of someone with enough depth to actually write a song and then shape it with his soul. Each character in the conceptual cross-section is made real, believable, and distinct as Penn manipulates his tone from the defeated bitterness of "You Know How" to the manic carelessness of "Room 712, The Apache."

Admittedly, this is a dark record, but it's darkly beautiful and speaks to the heart of much which is as relevant to our time as to the era it purports to inhabit. We, like Penn's characters, are struggling with the unintended consequences of war. We have won victories at great cost and sustained defeats to which we don't know how to react. Of course, this is always true of a dynamic society, and that's why I expect I won't grow out of this record the way I grew into Penn's earlier work.

If all this sounds just too darn depressing for you, I also recommend Penn's Free-for-All. I recently picked up a used copy for a buck, and I'm slowly coming to love it. It has all the musical delights of Jr., but it's content is far more pop/upbeat. Its "Now We're Even" also contains one of my new favorite lines, "Crow tastes like chicken meat."

The Demise of Studio 60

Once in a while--okay, once every couple of days--I'm reminded I don't think like the average American. I try to forget this as best I can, to feel like I belong, that these are my people, my compatriots, that I'm part of an "us." But in ways big and small, I'm simply not. I refuse to drive a vehicle that gets less than 30 mpg in the city and have done since gas was $.69 a gallon. I like Barry Bonds, never cared for Michael Jordan, and remain convinced O. J. is innocent (don't ask unless you really want to know). I think American Idol is a microcosm of everything that's wrong with this country, and Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip was a microcosm of everything that's right.

This week, NBC announced the people have spoken (by not watching) and Studio 60 is no more. I want to say I'm baffled by this, but I'm not. I expected it. The shows I love the most never last. (See also: Misfits of Science, Stingray, Freaks and Geeks, Cupid, Love Monkey, Firefly, and the incomparable Ed.) The demise of Studio 60 was inevitable; I loved it too much. Not since Ed have I been so excited to watch a show each week. I laughed out loud--my big, wake-the-neighbors, call-the-men-in-white-coats laugh. I shouted, "YES!!!" and pumped my fist in the air. Aaron Sorkin's writing got me out of my seat like the sweetest Magic to Worthy dish-and-dunks of the 1980's. The show was insightful on the culture wars, how atheists and people of faith can love and respect each other without respecting each other's beliefs, insightful on partnerships, how the right friend can be the difference between complete failure and spectacular success, insightful on relationships, how giving in to other people's expectations can mean giving up something that's worth more than their respect. This was great television. But America did not care.

Americans, by and large, would rather watch Simon be cruel to the foolish, clueless, and crass. They would rather watch seventeen versions of Law & Order and CSI rehash the same mysteries Perry Mason, Columbo, and Quincy solved when I was in kindergarten. Meanwhile, they're ignoring the one crime-solving show on television with a fresh take on the genre: Veronica Mars. Mark my words, that show will be gone soon, too. It's too good to survive. I dare you to watch it, Tuesdays 9/8 Central on the CW.

[This rant is brought to you by the letter "S" and the number "60."]

1491

This week, I finished reading Charles C. Mann's 1491: New Revelations of the Americas Before Columbus. The book essentially summarizes the major historical, archaeological, and anthropological research of the last fifty years related to Native American history and cultural development. "New" is a relative term, of course, but I found a great deal of the information not only new but fascinating. The two most astonishing revelations were:

1. Many researchers believe smallpox killed ninety or more percent of the Native American population in the first century or so after European contact. I had known smallpox was an epidemic, but these numbers are staggering. By the time Europeans began to settle in significant numbers, what had once been complex, thriving, sophisticated societies had been reduced to shadows of their former selves.

2. There is substantial evidence that Native Americans, particularly in South America, fundamentally reshaped the landscape to suit their own purposes. They planted vast forests, rerouted rivers, and constructed miles of causeways. What Europeans believed to be a vast, untamed wilderness was likely a series of the world's largest orchards and gardens.

Unlike most works of history, Mann's book is very readable. He never seems to get bogged down in jargon or tied up in academic minutia. I have no doubt professional historians take issue with some of his simplifications, but as a lay reader, I found it to be clear, concise, and as I said, fascinating. If you're at all interested in Native American history or culture, read this book.

The Aleph

So I've decided to join the twenty-first century and start a blog. Everyone else is doing it, and since I like to think I write a good sentence now and again, I thought I should go ahead and participate. (I do, however, have the bad habit of beginning new items with the conjunction "so.")

I'm not sure how often I'll be posting, but the content will be my thoughts on cultural and political events and stories from my daily life. I haven't gotten around to reading the user agreement, but if I'm comfortable the kind folks at Google won't be claiming any sort of copyright on material posted here, I'll likely post some of my fiction.