Yet Another Green World
This week, as previously mentioned, I’ve been listening to Brian Eno’s Another Green World. This is generally considered one of Eno’s “song” records, though it’s halfway to being an ambient album. In truth it’s a mutant that’s not quite like anything else he or anyone has ever done.
Geeta Dayal’s 33 1/3 book was a good read but at barely 100 pages only scratched the surface. One thing she never talked about was the title, which is an absolutely perfect three-word distillation of the album’s contents. It’s an alien planet to be sure, but a lush and verdant one, so you feel safe there.
You could say the same thing about Discreet Music, which was recorded around the same time. And here I’m talking specifically about the title track, a piece of “automatic music” where Eno set up a couple of slightly-out-of-sync tape loops and let them run. Shortly after starting, he says, “people started knocking on the door, and I was answering the phone and adjusting all this stuff as it ran. I almost made that without listening to it.”
read more…On the Rack
Saw this in front of Eureka Books, where they have a shelf of used stuff they’re just trying to get rid of. Somebody had a thirst for knowledge, and a few issues to deal with, and I guess a desire to cloud the minds of men and/or women. I wonder how that all worked out for them.
On Eating a Peach
You don’t eat a peach just because you’re hungry.
I mean, sure — the hungrier you are, the better that peach is going to taste. But that’s the wrong reason to do it. The right reason is that it’s time for the peach to be eaten.
You can’t just pick up a peach and stuff it in your mouth. There is a process — equal parts art and science. There are elements of seduction and of mutual consent. Many are the times I have let a promising-looking specimen go bad because I waited too long. (Story of my life.)(I like to think that when I die, all these lost peaches will be restored to me, sort of like the 72 virgins — which, I know, aren’t real either, don’t @ me.)
Do I regret this? Well, what do you mean by “regret”? Certainly I wish things would have worked out better. But in this as in so many areas of life, decisions must be made, and the results are not always the desired ones.
And when it does go right — ideally a peach should be eaten outside, in the blazing sun, with the juices trickling down one’s bare chest — few things in life are better. There’s one on the table in front of me right now. Later.
Reading Report, July 2026
Acquired:
Our Friends from Frolix 8, Philip K. Dick
We Can Build You, Philip K. Dick
Murmurs of Earth, Carl Sagan
Offloaded:
Night Soldiers, Alan Furst
The Undying Fire, H.G. Wells
The Nuns of Sant’Ambrogio, Hubert Wolf
Progress Made:
Another Green World (33 1/3), Geeta Dayal
Deus Irae, Philip K. Dick & Roger Zelazny
Nocturnes, Kazuo Ishiguro
Finished:
The Russian Girl, Kingsley Amis
Flow My Tears, the Policeman Said, Philip K. Dick
Night Soldiers, Alan Furst
Once again I find myself in the awkward position of writing about a book kindly recommended by a friend, not to mention a reader, and having to say that I found it… well, not disappointing exactly. Alan Furst’s Night Soldiers is elegantly written, impeccably researched, a class act all around, and I do not regret the time spent reading it. After a bit of a slow start, it moved right along. It just didn’t scratch that special itch the way Eric Ambler’s books do.
Fortunately there are a dozen or so Amblers I haven’t read. I got a bit bogged down in Here Lies, his autobiography, especially in a section about his time in the lamp manufacturing industry; but I am persisting and should get through it this summer. I must say I’ve been surprised at how much Ambler, whose novels are lean, mean, suspense machines, has let this thing meander. Editing your own life is hard, I guess. Hopefully we will get to WWII soon and things will pick up a bit.
Flow My Tears was, I believe, PKD’s last book before his religious experience/breakdown of 1974. So it’s still relatively “normal” sci-fi by his standards, though a weird-ass piece of work by anyone else’s. Reality-bending, drugs, paranoia, showoffy classical allusions, an ending that leaves you scratching your head — all the trademarks are there. It went down quick, and like Voyager slingshotting around a planet, I went right on to Deus Irae. Which, I just now learned, had a strange and tangled history:
Dick started the novel, and then he realized that he did not know enough about Christianity to finish it. He asked science fiction editor and author Ted White to collaborate on the manuscript with him, but after reviewing the manuscript, White never began the work.
Zelazny found the manuscript in White’s home in early 1968, read it, and then contacted Dick about working on the project. Work proceeded sporadically over several years as each author, in turn, forgot about the book. The novel was completed quickly, though, in the spring of 1975, after the publisher, Doubleday, demanded either the manuscript or repayment of the advance paid to Dick. The editor discovered that Zelazny had sent photocopies of a number of the manuscript pages and demanded the originals according to Doubleday’s policy; much to Zelazny’s chagrin, he was required to send in pages stained with cat urine. Zelazny said later that he always wondered what the editor made of these pages.
And finally there is the Eno book, which has been fun to read and has gotten me back into listening to Another Green World, an absolutely unique and wonderful album. In case you haven’t heard it lately:
Unborn on the Fourth of July
I have mixed feelings about the 4th of July this year, to say the least.
This is a big anniversary for my home country — they are calling it the “semiquincentennial,” which I eventually figured out means “half of 500.” Which is a weird way to measure time, but the Romans were like that.
Speaking of which, America feels awfully Roman lately, don’t you think? Gladiators brawling on the White House lawn, decadent oligarchs running roughshod over the land…. And how about those orgies where toga-clad senators stuff themselves with the finest meats and cheeses, gorging and vomiting, gorging and vomiting, stopping only to bugger pretty young boys?
OK that last bit hasn’t happened yet. But is it really that far off?
Today finds me in Edgewood, WA awaiting the birth of my second grandson. The fact that I now have grandchildren after never having children is a continual source of amazement and confusion, but in a good way.
read more…Reading Report, June 2026
Acquired:
Night Soldiers, Alan Furst
Offloaded:
The Razor’s Edge, W.S. Maugham
Against the Country, Ben Metcalf
Progress Made:
Here Lies, Eric Ambler
The Russian Girl, Kingsley Amis
Martin Amis: The Biography, Richard Bradford
The Courts of the Morning, John Buchan
Flow My Tears, the Policeman Said, Philip K. Dick
The Secret Lives of Somerset Maugham, Selina Hastings
Finished:
Cause for Alarm, Eric Ambler
A Scanner Darkly, Philip K. Dick
Only an idiot believes that he can write the truth about himself.
—Eric Ambler
I have been simultaneously reading biographies of three authors, and you might well ask, isn’t that confusing? It is, but this approach fits my short attention span. And I have been learning things.
read more…Official Statement on the 2026 World Cup
The World Cup is starting — started yesterday, actually — but I for one will not be watching. There are a few reasons for this.
For years and years and years I tried, out of a desire to be cosmopolitan and not be a slave to my short attention span, to train myself to care about this tournament. But the truth of the matter is — and it feels good to finally say it — I find soccer boring. I know this makes me a provincial American yahoo who needs action in his sports, but so be it. I’ve spent my last two hours watching a scoreless tie that ends in a shootout.
Also FIFA, the organization that runs this thing, is cartoonishly corrupt. Now, I know the NBA — my chosen source of sporting entertainment — isn’t perfect. It’s mostly quite groovy on social issues, but it’s also a corporation, and for instance actively suppresses criticism of China for business reasons. But it’s never given a made-up Peace Prize to a lunatic who turned right around and started a war in the Middle East.
I would think that even actual soccer fans would want to starve FIFA of attention in hopes that it would go away and be replaced by something more like, say, the IOC. (Which has its own problems, I know. You can only hope for so much.)
Having said all that, I am of course curious about the train-wreck aspects of this international event meeting the Orwellian horror that is 2026 America. Will there be empty stadiums, ICE raids, riots? I wish only the best to those who attend the games, but given the morons in charge of national security these days, how likely is it some sort of Bad Shit will go down? I hope it doesn’t, but I wouldn’t be surprised.
Anyway, no shade on those who want to watch the games — you have to get your jollies where you can. I will be looking for other forms of entertainment. Which reminds me, we’re pretty much caught up on all the TV shows. Anyone have suggestions? See you in the comments.
Lulu
Today I decided that it’s time for me to finally listen to Lulu, the album Lou Reed made with Metallica back in 2011. At the time the buzz on it was so uniformly brutal that I gave it a pass — that being the pre-streaming era, at least for me, I would have had to secure the actual CD, which seemed risky.
In the intervening years I’ve heard some people say it’s not that bad, and a few even claim it’s a lost masterpiece. But I’ve never had the guts to actually tackle it. Then I heard Laurie Anderson’s recent live album, which includes a version of one of the songs using isolated tracks of Lou’s vocal, so now I am Curious.
As with my valiant but doomed tilt at Metal Machine Music, I figure the only way is to write my way through it. The 10 tracks clock in at an intimidating 87 minutes, but it’s a rainy afternoon in Humboldt, so what the hell. As I click the Play button it’s 2:12 PM PDT.
Out of the gate, it’s briskly strummed acoustic guitars. Nothing too scary. And here’s Lou talking about Boris Karloff and… boom! Here comes the noise. It’s getting a bit hairy, but this first song is only a little over 4 minutes, how bad can it be? Sheets of noise now, pounding drums, and someone singing the phrase “smalltown girl” over and over.
Not a real promising start.
read more…My 10-Word Review of “The Mandalorian and Grogu”
I’m sorry, but why does a Mandalorian need a moustache?
Reading Report, May 2026
Acquired:
Here Lies, Eric Ambler
Passage of Arms, Eric Ambler
Martin Amis: The Biography, Richard Bradford
The Secret Lives of Somerset Maugham, Selina Hastings
Vigil, George Saunders
Absurdistan, Gary Shteyngart
Offloaded:
The Intercom Conspiracy, Eric Ambler
Sometimes a Great Notion, Ken Kesey
Cloud Atlas, David Mitchell
The Emperor of Ice Cream, Brian Moore
Pagan, W.F. Morris
Progress Made:
Cause for Alarm, Eric Ambler
The Courts of the Morning, John Buchan
The Secret Lives of Somerset Maugham, Selina Hastings
Finished:
The Intercom Conspiracy, Eric Ambler
Other People, Martin Amis
The Razor’s Edge, W.S. Maugham
The Woman Who Married a Bear, John Straley
“D’you remember how Jesus was led into the wilderness and fasted forty days? Then, when he was a-hungered, the devil came to him and said: If thou be the son of God, command that these stones be made bread. But Jesus resisted the temptation. Then the devil set him on a pinnacle of the temple and said to him: If thou be the son of God, cast thyself down. For angels had charge of him and would bear him up. But again Jesus resisted. Then the devil took him into a high mountain and showed him the kingdoms of the world and said the he would give them to him if he would fall down and worship him. But Jesus said: Get thee hence, Satan. That’s the end of the story according to good simple Matthew. But it wasn’t. The devil was sly and he came to Jesus once more and said: If thou wilt accept shame and disgrace, scourging, a crown of thorns and death on the cross, thou shalt save the human race, for a greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends. Jesus fell. The devil laughed till his sides ached, for he knew the evil men would commit in the name of their redeemer.”
Isabel looked at me indignantly.
“Where on earth did you get that?”
“Nowhere. I’ve invented it on the spur of the moment.”
—W.S. Maugham, The Razor’s Edge
The Razor’s Edge is an odd duck of a book. It’s structured like a memoir, with Maugham narrating in the first person, but all the other characters are either composites or wholesale inventions. W.S. himself was coy about which it was, and who if anyone might have served as models, with the result that several people have made dubious claims of serving as the basis for the pivotal character of Larry.
read more…