Mini List Time!

My personal choice for the Top Five Best Songs to Sing in the Shower:


1. Hounds of Love - Kate Bush
2. Love Machine - Girls Aloud
3. I Bet You Look Good on the Dance Floor - The Arctic Monkeys
4. No One Knows - Queens of the Stone Age
5. The Big Sky - Kate Bush


These songs were chosen through an organic process judging by which songs had lyrics I could actually remember, and what just felt right.

Equally Cute

CUUUUUTE.

So I feel terrible about putting a poll up on my blog asking who is cuter, Tegan or Sara. What a terrible thing to do. I mean, obviously they are both awesome and so is their music, I guess I was envisioning some kind of desert island situation?

Well, you all agree with me, because everyone voted for "Abstain so as not to create a rift between the two". You are good people.



In further T&S news, they just released the album artwork and track listing for their new album Sainthood on their website. I have to say, I am not so keen on the front cover, below. It just looks like Tegan has a big balloon head. It's weird. Oh well, I am excited to hear it anyway. I will just not look at the cover.

Sainthood - good album cover or bad album cover?

anyone can happen

Loathe as I am to step on the robot blog fun, I think we all need to admire this piece of newly-released Dollhouse artwork.


Look, it has hottie Eliza Dushku, and fancy typography!! Everyone knows this is what the future will look like: lower-case letters scattered about willy-nilly, clean black-on-white spaces, and leather pants. It's like you're living inside a sexy ipod, and Eliza Dushku is there. Let's all take a moment to think about that.

ROBOTS

Well, this entry pretty much does what it says on the tin(man).

Apologies for that terrible pun. Sometimes I just can't help myself.

These were all drawn on thick watercolour paper a selection of Faber-Castell brush pens, if anyone is at all interested.

Summer is Ready When You Are

Y'all want to experience my secret summer anthem?

Saints - The Breeders

It's only a secret because I have only just realised that these lyrics have been rolling around my head the entire summer, and I think during previous summers too... It is my newly realised summer anthem.

I like all the different people
I like sticky everywhere
Look around, you bet I'll be there

Hot metal in the sun...

A lot of face
A lot of crank air...

Summer's ready
Summer is ready when you are

I like all the different people
I like every kind of fair
In the crowd, you bet I'll be there
Walkin' around
Going nowhere

Summer's ready
Summer is ready when you are

These lines expresses all the things I think encapsulate summer, and what I totally hate about summer too! I hate stale air, air conditioning, people all over the places, stickiness! Gross!

At the same time I tend to romanticise these things, I don't know why. Probably because I totally love The Breeders.

Luckily I live in England, when it rains most of the summer, and luckily it is almost autumn.

...

Those were some random thoughts to blog about at this time of night. I apologise.

Plane Reading

As as most of you probably already know, I am moving out to the States next month. Yep, I am heading back to Portland, Oregon, to the city and the woman I love, following the dream, that kind of thing. It's pretty damn exciting.

If you did not know that already, you may instead be aware that I am not great at big announcements, and will hopefully forgive the fact that instead of properly informing you all of my life-changing plans I would rather talk about what books I am planning to read on the plane.

So here we go! I think that choosing what to read on a plane journey is a decision that needs time and consideration. You need something that will hold your attention, soothe a restless and frustrated spirit (because airports and airplanes can be frustrating places) and not ask too much from a tired mind. Funny is good, easy reading is excellent, and an engaging and busy plot is a plus.

Here are my reading choices so far:

When You Are Engulfed in Flames - David Sedaris

How heavy (contents-wise, not in terms of excess pages) does this book appear? What with the skeleton and the title and the serious font and the oil painting. But David Sedaris is a deft comedic writer, he talks about events from his life in a high-larious way. I don't find him laugh-out-loud funny, but wryly amusing, and very quick reading.

Dead as a Doornail - Charlaine Harris

Call this my personal antidote to Twilight, only not appallingly written, and with actual plot and actual grown-up sexy stuff rather than twisted abstinence porn. Plus I am a big fan of True Blood, the tv show based on the novel series.

American Gods - Neil Gaiman

Thank you, Waterstones 3 for 2 offer! (Is that product placement? Apologies.) Various people have been at me for years to read this book, so I finally will. Even the woman who sold me this in Waterstones (there I go again) said I should read it. I have a feeling you're supposed to read it when you're fifteen, though?

Cool For You - Eileen Myles

This is my wild card choice, I guess. I loved a volume of Myles' poetry I bought in Powell's, so I thought I would give this a crack. It seems to be an autobiography. It looks cool (for me).

Tell you what I'm missing, though: some Terry Pratchett! Always the best thing for a plane journey. One more thing: I am not going to repeat the Marion Keyes disaster of last time.

EnthuZINEasm: Part IV

Well kidlings, it's that time again! Yes, the time for your lives to be brightened by the appearance of a new and exciting installment of your favourite zine, Enthusiasm.

We have some excellent things to offer you in Enthusiasm Issue #4. Including, but not limited to: lesbian subtext, webcomics, sandwiches, children's tv, movies star making out, cats and dogs living together, and interesting maps. (Not the bit about cats and dogs living together. That would be CRAZY.)

Here's Tim's intro to put this zine into a suitably grandiose context:

(Click for full view.)

So if you would like a copy, just drop a little comment in the box down there, or else contact me or my fellow zinester Tim via email, facebook, text, phonecall, carrier pigeon or semaphore. You won't regret it.

Cover Me

Terry Moore, Strangers in Paradise #65

My first ever issue of Strangers in Paradise. The cover caught my eye and compelled me to buy it instantly. I don't think the pin-up girl is a major character, and if it is who I think it's supposed to be she doesn't even look like this on the inside, but the image is so striking and happily reminiscent of OTT romance comics, not to mention as well-drawn as the rest of Moore's stuff, that it remains my favourite cover of all 90 issues.


Loads of people have been linking lately to this here list of the 100 Best Comic Book Covers, at 1979 Semi-Finalist. (Which is a neato blog in itself from a girl who really knows her stuff about comics.) It's a pretty good list, and I found myself admiring nearly every one of her choices.

I'm not huge on comics, to be honest. I think I peaked during my art school days, through my association with Lauren, Amy and Orville's comic book shop in Leeds. (His name is not really Orville.) These days I just keep up with a few currently-running comics titles, together with a steady stream of graphic novels.

But I did make an effort to round up some of my fave covers, or those I could recall liking off the top of my head. Hope you like.

Terry Moore, Strangers in Paradise #29

Terry Moore, Strangers in Paradise #53

Terry Moore, Strangers in Paradise #55

Three more Strangers in Paradise covers that I think work well. Overall I find Moore's covers to be a bit clumsy and melodramatic, and the melodramatic, lyrics-quoting side of SIP is really not my bag. I prefer the quippy, people just hanging out character-study scenes.

Jim Rugg, Street Angel #1

Jim Rugg, Street Angel #4

I've mentioned my undying love for Jim Rugg and Street Angel before, and I still totally mean it. All six of the covers for this short run are genius. They each employ this block pink background, which becomes pretty ironic once you know the character (she's not just some little girl, and she ain't no angel) and each is innovative, intriguing, and adapts the typography to the design.

Cover by Frank Miller, The Escapists #1

Cover by James Jean, The Escapists #2

This mini series spin-off from The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay by Michael Chabon had some kickass covers, each by a different artist. Great story, too, but I only got the first four issues out of six. Boo.

Jaime Hernandez, Love and Rockets #30

Jaime Hernandez, Love and Rockets #24

I should write some more about my love for Jaime Hernandez, because boy do I love his stuff. Not Gilbert Hernandez, his drawings give me the heebie-jeebies, but I do admit Gilbert makes good covers also. A couple of classic Jaime images, I especially love that monochrome punk scene above. That's Hopey in the background there playing the bass, quite badly by all accounts.

Cover by Jo Chen, Buffy Season 8 #10

Cover by Jo Chen, Buffy Season 8 #11

Cover by Jo Chen, Buffy Season 8 #14

Yeah, so I've been reading Buffy comics, and I don't care if you think I'm a nerd. Buffy season 8 comics, which are supposed to follow on from where the tv show ended, have some really great covers (and some sucky variant covers). The likenesses to the tv actors, SMG and all, are impressive, but they're also great designs. I like that they're painterly, rather than more traditional comics styles like the insides. (The art within these comics often sucks, by the way. You can't tell the characters apart. But the writing is usually good, it's the same folks who wrote the show, King Joss included.)

Cover by Kano, Hero #1

Finally, an issue of Hero, which I never heard much about but I picked up a couple of issues and the covers were great. The end.

Saturated Colour

Some photos from the luminarium we had a wander through when it was located in the Chapelfield gardens as part of the Norwich and Norfolk Festival back in May. Gorgeous colours, ha?

This luminarium is called Levity III, it was made by Architects of Air, people who construct many such structures and hire them out at arts events. If you are not entirely sure what a luminarium is, or want to know what one looks from the outside, (why did I only take pictures on the inside?) I would recommend a quick peek at their website. You can see photos of all the giant crazy things they've been making lately.

I would describe a luminarium as a huge, complex, funny-shaped bouncy castle, only you walk around inside instead of bouncing on top. The light filters through the different colours of plastic, creating very intensely coloured curved spaces. There's usually some calming music too. The saturated colours become mood-altering (blue is very soothing, red makes you antsy, yellow is surreal) and generally the whole thing is novel and very fun.