Grand Opening!

In addition to all the links in reviews, there is now a browsable Elysian Fields Store which offers a selection of music, movies, and books I have selected.

There's a section on there with great guitarists in a variety of styles of music, and another with classical pieces that I find critically important. There's a page of fantasy films, and another of horror/suspense. The book section has a page with kids books that are adult-safe. I'll be adding more to the store as time goes on, as well as shifting content on the first two categories, which contain some of the most highly recommended items as well as whatever I'm currently listening to, reading, or watching.

The store - shopping cart, transactions, and all - is managed through Amazon.com, so it's safe and secure.

Let me know what you think!

Recently Read: Silk

Silk by Caitlín R. Kiernan

Sometimes you read an author's first novel and it screams "Hey, new guy here! Yep, gawsh, this is my first try at this sort of thing. I'm going to be a real writer when I grow up!" and that's usually accompanied by a whole bunch of warnings in the jacket copy and quotes: "Newguynewguynewguy!" Sometimes, in those works, the words don't quite reach out to the story; other times the story sits back and its eyes go all blurry and it wonders if those words have anything to do with it.

This is greygirlbeast's first novel, but you wouldn't guess it from anything except some of the jacket copy and quotes and such, or from researching a timeline and publication dates, and realizing this was it: the first novel.

I suppose you could compare this to some of her later works - and as I'm reading the novels in order, I've only got one other under my belt thus far - and discover certain stylistic changes, but there's none of that first-novel awkwardness that needs to be grown out of.

The characters are drawn quite realistically; I'm fairly sure I've met some of them in other guises, wandering around city streets or in dark places where music happens. Caitlín mentions that the music fits a time and a place, and that some have asked for it to be updated, and I'm not quite sure if that fixes me to a time and a place as well, as, even looking for it, I could not find any tune or band that seemed wrong.

This is an excellent, intelligent read - and the only thing I can say as to why it isn't much more widely read would be to go off on a tangent regarding lowered reading levels, expectations, and perhaps intelligence of the average modern reader. So prove me wrong, if enough people are above that average, it will raise the bar. Go, get a copy or two of this (and Caitlín's other books, as well) and enjoy an excellent, dark, unsettling read!

Kraken and Bass Guitars

I have determined that if you play The Kraken's Theme (from Pie Rats of the Carob Bean Too, which co-stars one of the Monkees, looking slightly worse for the wear since his glory days on television) on an acoustic guitar - with a palm mute - the first phrase sounds an awful lot like the Peter Gunn Theme.

For reference, that would be: D-D-F-D D-C1-B1

If you transcribe it to E, it sounds reasonably low and spooky. I suppose if I had been more ambitious, I would just tune the low E down to D and taken it from there. It works well on bass as written (because the bass has it in the right octave, which is to say, low.)

Of course, if you play it on bass, and you add the triplet accent on the D pedal, and you don't do that sort of thing often, you get a blister on the tip of your index finger that says to you "Yeoww!" and "I really wish you played the thing as a slap bass line everytime." And, days later, it is no longer a poufy skin-colored bit, and is, instead, a reddish-orange blotch of skin that no longer hurts. Much.

Reanimated!

The Contour, she lives again!

$550 dollars later, and, after a handful of fits, she started. May not start in the morning, but we shall see. As the battery report came back good (and the battery was definitely good when it came back after drifting slowly to sleep along a highway and side road) it should recover well. The battery light did go out, as did - miracle of miracles - the check engine light.

So, maybe it will be okay.