PLUG: If you're in Portland today, see Matos and Douglas and Mike (and Colin) read at Powell's!

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So! Douglas Wolk, Mike McGonigal, Colin Meloy, and myself will be appearing at Powell's City of Books in Portland (1005 West Burnside; 503-228-4651) TONIGHT (Monday, Jan. 10) at 7:30 p.m. We'll be discussing our volumes in Continuum Books' 33 1/3 series. I've talked about these books a lot on ILX already so I apologize for doing it again, but the reading should be really fun and the books are too. (McGonigal's, on Loveless, is due out in spring; the other three are now available.) Anyway, thanks for putting up w/yet another shameless plug, and we'll see you there!

― Matos W.K. (M Matos), Monday, 10 January 2005 23:37 (twenty years ago)

Man. Can I attend in spirit?

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Monday, 10 January 2005 23:44 (twenty years ago)

You are actually plugging an unplugged show, aren't you, Matos?

(Too damn bloody far away for me anyway, alas :(

― t\'\'t (t\'\'t), Monday, 10 January 2005 23:49 (twenty years ago)

actually the reading's gotten lots of plugs! it's in both alt-weeklies and there are signs up around town on the Willamette Week dispensers about it, plus from what I understand Powell's is excited about it, so it should be pretty cool.

― Matos W.K. (M Matos), Monday, 10 January 2005 23:55 (twenty years ago)

You are welcome to do a cover version of pi for an encore if you choose. ;-)

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Monday, 10 January 2005 23:55 (twenty years ago)

This turned out to be an excellent show. And I finally got to meet Douglas!

Everyone should go out and buy their books now.

Afterwards, we went to karaoke with a live band, and Matos did a great rendition of "Love Is A Drug". And I did nothing.

At night, the ice weasels came.

― Casuistry (Chris P), Tuesday, 11 January 2005 11:46 (twenty years ago)

I thought that Keenan was doing the MBV book. Is that a typo or something?

― NickB (NickB), Tuesday, 11 January 2005 11:50 (twenty years ago)

Whoever was originally going to do MBV didn't do it fast enough, or something.

― Casuistry (Chris P), Tuesday, 11 January 2005 18:37 (twenty years ago)

I think our Estonian friend meant "unplugged" like you didn't plug in your electric guitars. :-)

― jaymc (jaymc), Tuesday, 11 January 2005 18:39 (twenty years ago)

Somebody needs to do a 33 1/3 book on "20 Jazz Funk Greats.

― Drew Daniel (Drew Daniel), Tuesday, 11 January 2005 18:44 (twenty years ago)

matos already did ;)

― chaki in charge (chaki), Tuesday, 11 January 2005 20:26 (twenty years ago)

Somebody needs to do a 33 1/3 book on "20 Jazz Funk Greats.
-- Drew Daniel (mces...), January 11th, 2005.

Good idea, Drew. But I pitched Continuum on Kraftwerk's Computer World and got rejected, so I dunno if the publisher's ready for Throbbing Gristle... So far the series has not shown much of an interest in electronic music. I hope that changes.

― Dave Segal (Da ve Segal), Tuesday, 11 January 2005 21:14 (twenty years ago)

Drew, you should do it!

― ken taylrr (ken taylrr), Tuesday, 11 January 2005 21:14 (twenty years ago)

Hey Dave!

― ken taylrr (ken taylrr), Tuesday, 11 January 2005 21:14 (twenty years ago)

How does one pitch ideas for the "33 1/3" series? Are the books in the series already chosen, or do the editors accept proposals? Many thanks for any info!

― Joseph McCombs (Joseph McCombs), Tuesday, 11 January 2005 21:24 (twenty years ago)

(jaymc -- yep-ah! :)

― t\'\'t (t\'\'t), Tuesday, 11 January 2005 21:52 (twenty years ago)

Whoever was originally going to do MBV didn't do it fast enough, or something.

(resisting obvious joke that will surely enrage Ned.)

― donut christ (donut), Tuesday, 11 January 2005 21:54 (twenty years ago)

(resists temptation to replace donut's "that" with "which")

― t\'\'t (t\'\'t), Tuesday, 11 January 2005 21:58 (twenty years ago)

(resisting obvious joke that will surely enrage Ned.)

*arched eyebrow*

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Tuesday, 11 January 2005 22:00 (twenty years ago)

Albums that need 33 1/3s (by me): Max Tundra Mastered by Guy at the Exchange (tales of girlfriend-stealing, with one chapter about Don Caballero and one about how the song "Lysine" allowed me to give excellent advice to a friend with a cold sore); XTC's Skylarking (finally unpacking the obvious life-cycle composition and sequencing of songs, plus 90 pages about how "Mermaid Smiled" is better than "Dear God").

So was there Q&A, then? How'd it go?

― nabisco (nabisco), Tuesday, 11 January 2005 22:02 (twenty years ago)

Well, I think we're all overlooking the obvious next 33 1/3 candidate... The Gerogerigegege's Tokyo Anal Dynamite! *hits hand on forehead* like, duh!

― donut christ (donut), Tuesday, 11 January 2005 22:04 (twenty years ago)

(do be careful with that forehead, donut!)

― t\'\'t (t\'\'t), Tuesday, 11 January 2005 22:12 (twenty years ago)

"I'm from France"

― donut christ (donut), Tuesday, 11 January 2005 22:15 (twenty years ago)

There was Q&A. Matos & I had expected all the questions to go to Colin, but it wasn't like that at all, and the Q&A went well. One of the organizers of local shallow experimental organization 2Gyrlz asked why no women were writing for the series, ignoring the fact that (a) women have written for the series, and (b) these were not the editors of the series. But other than those qualifications, it was a good question.

― Casuistry (Chris P), Wednesday, 12 January 2005 12:07 (twenty years ago)

"Gyrlz"? Oy vey mashish.

― Joseph McCombs (Joseph McCombs), Wednesday, 12 January 2005 16:10 (twenty years ago)

That said, I think Dave Segal on this thread, and myself and others in person during dinner last night did bring up a really good point... not enough classic electronic albums and classic R&B/soul albums for the series, respectively... Douglas's and Matos's books being possibly the only exceptions! That said, apparently the 33 1/3 publishers get 20 full-fledged pitch packages a week, so one would think they're just being flooded right now, and they're just currently concentrating mostly (and I stress "mostly") on one market niche of music -- that most familiar to college radio -- at a time and will hopefully branch out as time goes on...

I can see good reasons to do it this way, actually... it's probably a good idea to get people sold on the idea of a good solid series of books that target one section of music aficionados to help spread the word on the series initially (and they *are* relatively new still), whereas having books on "Computer World", "Let's Get It On", "Unknown Pleasures", and "ABBA'a Greatest Hits" coming out simultaneously to begin with would be "Wow, that's broad.. but WTF" by many people. NOT US. We're aficionados of a concentrated kind here, mostly. But we're not "the public". Not really defending the editors here as much as trying to see the benefits of their decision-making for books they commission as they stand now, and guessing what THEY'RE guessing how the public would react. Sales are sales, after all.

― donut christ (donut), Wednesday, 12 January 2005 20:37 (twenty years ago)

I pitched a Kraftwerk book too, and wasn't exactly rejected, just told that the first series was all booked up, but if there were more maybe it could be revisited. We shall see!

― Sean Carruthers (SeanC), Wednesday, 12 January 2005 20:40 (twenty years ago)

Hm. Now I feel inspired to pitch a review of the Speed Limit comps (at least the first five or so).

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Wednesday, 12 January 2005 20:41 (twenty years ago)

Can I attend in spirit?

http://massassi.yavin4.com/sw_img/d6dego2.jpg

Like this?

― Leon the Fatboy (Ex Leon), Wednesday, 12 January 2005 21:11 (twenty years ago)

Hey, I'm not replaced in any of the new editions, so why not?

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Wednesday, 12 January 2005 21:15 (twenty years ago)

Can't believe I still haven't read any of these. Doesn't seem like the distro is too good -- never see them when I'm in the bookstore ready for an impulse buy.

― Mark (MarkR), Wednesday, 12 January 2005 21:19 (twenty years ago)

Well there's this thing called Amazon, see...

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Wednesday, 12 January 2005 21:23 (twenty years ago)

Shhh, Ned! You'll give it away!

― Leon the Fatboy (Ex Leon), Wednesday, 12 January 2005 21:24 (twenty years ago)

Yeah...I'm kind of anti-Amazon. I like to hold a book in my hand before I buy it.

― Mark (MarkR), Wednesday, 12 January 2005 21:25 (twenty years ago)

For shotput purposes.

― Ned Raggett (Ned), Wednesday, 12 January 2005 21:26 (twenty years ago)

from what I understand they're receiving 20 pitches a week for the series at this point, so I'd be surprised if they've got any more planned for the time being.

― Matos W.K. (M Matos), Wednesday, 12 January 2005 21:30 (twenty years ago)

What was also discussed was that 33 1/3 should dedicate a small subseries dedicated to the first eight Black Sabbath albums... now to decide who belongs to each album:

Black Sabbath ......
Paranoid ......
Master Of Reality ......
Vol. 4 .......
Sabbath Bloody Sabbath .......
Sabotage .......
Technical Ecstasy .......
Never Say Die! ........

Unanimously, J0hn Darn13ll3 gets Never Say Die!... Henry Rollins MUST get one of the first four albums, probably Master Of Reality. I'd nominate Ian Christe for Black Sabbath, and Chuck Eddy for Sabotage.

― donut christ (donut), Thursday, 13 January 2005 00:20 (twenty years ago)

Actually, if i could, I would shift Rollins over to Vol. 4, and have Jon Fine (Coptic Light, Bitch Magnet) do Master Of Reality.

― donut christ (donut), Thursday, 13 January 2005 00:21 (twenty years ago)

― gygax! (gygax!), Thursday, 13 January 2005 00:26 (twenty years ago)

I <3 Jon Fine, long live VINELAND

― gygax! (gygax!), Thursday, 13 January 2005 00:26 (twenty years ago)

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