April 2020 Roundup
Posted: 02 August 2020
The pandemic has led me to stop reading and writing, but I’m going to try to write about the music I’ve been listening to again. I originally wrote this pretty early on in April I think? And maybe stopped updating it because I really didn’t want to read Aristotle, which is what I had picked for myself to read next.
Books
Gertrude Stein’s America - Gertrude Stein, ed. Gilbert A. Harrison
Gertrude Stein is magnetic and I have fallen to her charm. Her writing style is fun and engaging and her thoughts and observations are meaningful and engaging. I’m looking forward to reading some of her work in full. That being said, this is a bizarre collection of writing. I’m not really sure why it exists. It’s a collection of excerpts from various works by Stein, but limited to a small collection of short passages that are about America. There’s a little bit of preface to each section, and there’s an introduction, but they don’t lay out much of a thesis. I can’t help but feel like someone did a bunch of research and wanted to write a long essay, but either changed their mind or gave up and decided to publish all of the references they were planning on using instead of uniting them in a paper. I’ll revisit this thought after reading some of the original texts, it’s possible that Harrison just took out the good bits and the rest of the writing isn’t too hot, although I doubt that this is the case.
Music
Remember Sports - All of Something
I really like this kind of indie pop, like Forth Wanderers and Snail Mail and so on. It’s great! Sports also features a friend of mine from high school, Catherine, on guitar - I thought she was really talented musician back then and it’s great to see her making circles. The songs seem like they’re really fun to perform, and the album is really snappy and flies by.
Remember Sports - Sunchokes
I like this album the same way as All of Something.
Remember Sports - Slow Buzz
I didn’t like this as much as All of Something or Sunchokes. It sounds a little more… sanitized? And doesn’t seem as spirited for it.
Television - Marquee Moon
A lot of early punk doesn’t land for me (I really don’t like The Clash!!!) and I don’t love post-punk but I thought this ruled. I got some Violent Femmes-ey vibes and in general it felt very comfortable and familiar in a difficult to describe way. It felt like an album where I would love it if I heard any song come up on the radio while driving. It was really pleasant to listen to and had cool stuff happening throughout. I really really liked this album.
Spurts: The Richard Hell Story
I feel about this the same as I did about Marquee Moon, except this was even more familiar sounding - a lot of the stuff has really classic rock-y vibes with a more punk sensibility.