Book Review: The Lioness of Boston by Emily Franklin

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Author: Emily Franklin
Title: The Lioness of Boston
Publication Info: Boston : Godine, 2023.
Summary/Review:

This historical novel details the remarkable life of a real life woman, Isabella Stewart Gardner.  Originally from New York, Isabella marries her friend’s brother from Boston and finds herself isolated from the stuffy, stratified society of the city’s elite.  Not only is Isabella an outsider but her interests in science and nature and her eccentric tastes further isolate her.  After the tragic death of her only child, and extensive travel in Europe and Asia, Isabella determines to chart her own course in Boston society. This builds up to her creating her gift to the city, a unique museum of the artwork she collected over the decades.

Isabella acquires her own coterie of friends including many intellectual luminaries of the Athens of America as well as figures known worldwide such as Henry James, John Singer Sargent, and Oscar Wilde.  There’s a lot of name-dropping in this book! From what I know of Gardner’s life, the novel follows her basic life trajectory.  The text includes a number of letters between Gardner and her correspondents and while her real correspondence exists in great quantity, author Emily Franklin made these letters up to serve her narrative.  Even better is the dialogue among Gardner and her famous friends which no one could know precisely, but I believe is true to life if not strictly factual.

Recommended books:

Rating: ***1/2

50 Years, 50 Albums (1990): Hindu Love Gods

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50 Years, 50 Albums

I will turn 50 in November of this year, so my project for 2023 will be to listen to and review one album from each year of my life, 1973 to 2022.  The only qualification is that it has to be an album I’ve not reviewed previously. 

1990

Top Grossing Albums of 1990:

  1. Step By Step – New Kids on the Block
  2. No Fences – Garth Brooks
  3. Please Hammer Don’t Hurt ‘Em – MC Hammer
  4. Mariah Carey – Mariah Carey
  5. I’m Your Baby Tonight – Whitney Houston

Grammy Award for Album of the Year of 1990:

  • Back on the Block – Quincy Jones & Various Artists
  • …But Seriously – Phill Collins
  • Mariah Carey – Mariah Carey
  • Please Hammer Don’t Hurt ‘Em – MC Hammer
  • Wilson Phillips – Wilson Phillips

Other Albums I’ve Reviewed from 1990:

Album: Hindu Love Gods
Artist: Hindu Love Gods
Release Date: October 5, 1990
Label: Giant/Reprise/Warner Bros. Records
Favorite Tracks:

  • Walkin’ Blues
  • Raspberry Beret
  • Junko Pardner
  • Mannish Boy
  • Battleship Chains
  • Vigilante Man

Thoughts:

Dug back to my college years to excavate an album that was on heavy rotation for me back in the day, but not one I’ve listened to in a long time.  Hindu Love Gods was a side project of R.E.M. members Bill Berry, Peter Buck and Mike Mills with Michael Stipe replaced on vocals by veteran rocker Warren Zevon.  Their only album resulted from a drunken, late-night jam session in the studio that was never intended for release but I’m glad they did. The majority of the album features interpretations of classic Blues tracks by the likes Robert Johnson, Willie Dixon, and Muddy Waters.  It also includes some more contemporary tracks including a famous cover of Prince’s “Raspberry Beret” and (my personal favorite) The Georgia Satellites’s “Battleship Chains.” Hindu Love Gods have definitely earned their spot as one the great one-album bands of all time.

Rating: ****

Song of the Week: “ETA” by NewJeans

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NewJeans – ETA

This is probably the first K-pop track to appear in Song of the Week, but I couldn’t resist the bouncy electronic dance sound of the all-girl quintet’s latest tune. This is one of 6 tracks on the band’s Get Up EP.

Songs of the Week for 2023

January

February

March

April

May

June

July

DEEP DIVES – Album Review: Graffiti Bridge by Prince

~ Liam ~ 1 Comment

I am doing a deep dive into the work of the musical artist Prince.  Each week until December I will post my thoughts on albums released by Prince (and his bands and side projects) focusing on one year of his career. 

This week I’m focusing on the soundtrack for Graffiti Bridge from 1990.

Album: Graffiti Bridge
Artist: Prince
Release Date: August 20, 1990
Label:  Paisley Park | Warner Bros.
Favorite Tracks:

  • Can’t Stop This Feeling I Got
  • Release It
  • The Question of U
  • Round and Round
  • Shake
  • Thieves in the Temple
  • Melody Cool
  • Graffiti Bridge

Thoughts:

A new decade, new band, new movie, and new soundtrack. Is it also a new sound for Prince?  Kind of.  Prince embraces the New Jack Swing popular at the time but flavors it with his own brand of funk and rock.  The album is spangled with guest artists including the Time, Tevin Campbell, George Clinton, Elisa Fiorillo, and Mavis Staples, not to mention Prince’s new band New Power Generation.

I’m not sure what it says that I like the songs from Prince’s guest artists more than the Prince tracks. The positive interpretation is that Prince is still excelling as a producer and a songwriter, and the man who so long worked as a one-band is becoming more comfortable as a collaborationist.  This sprawling album looks backward more than forwards, channeling the sound of Prince’s earlier works as well as soul/funk/rock classic of the 60s & 70s.  But this album also sounds like a transitional work. What exactly Prince is transitioning to I will discover in the upcoming weeks.

Rating: ***1/2

 

For You 1978 ***
Prince 1979 ***1/2
Dirty Mind 1980 ****
Controversy 1981 ****
1999 1982 Prince and the Revolution *****
Purple Rain 1984 Prince and the Revolution *****
Around the World in a Day 1985 Prince and the Revolution ****
Parade 1986 Prince and the Revolution ****
Sign “☮︎” the Times 1987 ****1/2
8 1987 Madhouse ***
16 1987 Madhouse ***1/2
Lovesexy 1988 ***1/2
Batman 1989 ***
Graffiti  Bridge 1990 ***1/2
Diamonds and Pearls 1991 Prince and the New Power Generation
Love Symbol 1992 Prince and the New Power Generation
Goldnigga 1993 The New Power Generation
Come 1994
The Black Symbol 1994
The Gold Experience 1995
Exodus 1995 The New Power Generation
Chaos and Disorder 1996
Emancipation 1996
Kamasutra 1997 The NPG Orchestra
Crystal Ball 1998
The Truth 1998
Newpower Soul 1998 The New Power Generation
The Vault: Old Friends 4 Sale 1999
Rave Un2 the Joy Fantastic 1999
The Rainbow Children 2001
One Nite Alone… 2002
One Nite Alone… Live! 2002
Xpectation 2003
N-E-W-S 2003
Musicology 2004
The Chocolate Invasion 2004
The Slaughterhouse 2004
C-Note 2004
3121 2006
Planet Earth 2007
Indigo Nights 2008
Lotusflow3r/MPLSound 2009
20Ten 2010
Plectrumelectrum 2014 with 3rdeyegirl
Art Official Age 2014 with 3rdeyegirl
HITnRun Phase One 2015
HITnRun Phase Two 2015

20th Anniversary Film Festival: Interstella 5555: The 5tory of the 5ecret 5tar 5ystem (2003)

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Title: Interstella 5555: The 5tory of the 5ecret 5tar 5ystem
Release Date: 28 May 2003
Director: Kazuhisa Takenouchi
Production Company: Toei Animation | Daft Life Ltd. | Wild Bunch | BAC Films
Summary/Review:

I found Interstella 5555 on a Letterboxd list of great animated films.  It is, in fact, a promotional film for the Daft Punk album Discovery.  A band on a planet with blue-skinned people are abducted by a spaceship from Earth.  They are transformed into a human appearance and given false memories of a past on Earth and forced to tour the world at the behest of a manipulative industry mogul.  Fortunately, a hero named Shep who is in love with the band’s bassist Stella, follows them.  The band then needs to escape and recover their real identities.

The movie feature a charming limited style reminiscent of 80s TV animation, albeit still very inventive.  There is no dialogue in this movie and limited sound effects.  Instead the tracks from Discovery as the score.  The music doesn’t always fit the action although at other times the characters are singing along.  Nevertheless, it is a fun science fiction story with a satire on the exploitation of music business.

Rating: ***

 

Book Review: Bet On It by Jodie Slaughter

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Author: Jodie Slaughter
Title: Bet On It
Narrator: Angel Pean
Publication Info:  [New York] : Macmillan Audio, 2022.
Summary/Review:

Sex, anxiety, and bingo!  This novel has it all!  Aja Owens suffers from panic attacks and has recently relocated to the small town of Greenbelt, South Carolina hoping a quieter existence will help her deal with her anxiety.  Walker Abbott suffers from PSTD due to his troubled childhood and has only returned to Greenbelt to help is grandmother when she is injured.  Aja and Walker meet at a bingo game and form a connection.  But with Aja needing to stay in Greenbelt while Walker has an equal desire to return to the big city once his Gram is well, there’s no time for a long-term relationship.

They strike a deal that they will only act on their mutual desires when one of them wins a game a bingo.  This helps build the tension for the steamier aspects of this novel.  But there’s a lot more going on in this story.  First, it offers great insight into mental health issues and how people adapt to them. Second, Aja and Walker are really good about talking about their feelings and getting consent.  Finally, while not an overt theme, the book deals with interracial relationships in the contemporary South.

Recommended books:

Rating: ***1/2

Book Review: Intimations : Six Essays by Zadie Smith

~ Liam ~ 1 Comment

Author: Zadie Smith
Title: Intimations : Six Essays
Narrator: Zadie Smith
Other Books I’ve Read By The Same Author: White Teeth and Swing Time
Publication Info: [New York] : Penguin Books, [2020]
Summary/Review:

English author Zadie Smith wrote these essays in 2020 during the stay at home period of the COVID-19.  Teaching at New York University, Smith saw the devastating effect of the pandemic on the city.  These essays reflect on inequality (exacerbated by the pandemic), isolation, creativity, and the other infection: white supremacist beliefs exposed in new ways during the Black Lives Matter protests of Summer 2020. This concise collection is an insightful reflection on our troubled times.

Recommended books:

Rating: ****

50 Years, 50 Albums (2020): A Hero’s Death by Fontaines D.C.

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I will turn 50 in November of this year, so my project for 2023 will be to listen to and review one album from each year of my life, 1973 to 2022.  The only qualification is that it has to be an album I’ve not reviewed previously. 

2020

Top Grossing Albums of 2020:

  1. Folklore – Taylor Swift
  2. Fine Line – Harry Styles
  3. Map of the Soul:7 – BTS
  4. After Hours – The Weeknd
  5. WHEN WE ALL FALL ASLEEP, WHERE DO WE GO? – Billie Eilish

Grammy Award for Album of the Year of 2020:

  • Folklore – Taylor Swift
  • Chilombo – Jhené Aiko
  • Black Pumas – Black Pumas
  • Everyday Life – Coldplay
  • Djesse Vol. 3 – Jacob Collier
  • Women in Music Pt. III – Haim
  • Future Nostalgia – Dua Lipa
  • Hollywood’s Bleeding – Post Malone

Other Albums I’ve Reviewed from 2020:

Album: A Hero’s Death
Artist: Fontaines D.C.
Release Date: 31 July 2020
Label: Partisan | Rough Trade
Favorite Tracks:

  • I Don’t Belong
  • Oh Such a Spring
  • Televised Mind
  • A Hero’s Death
  • Living in America

Thoughts: Fontaines D.C. are an Irish band I’ve only recently become aware of.  From listening to this album I’d describe their sound as sort of Billy Bragg mixed with Echo and the Bunnymen, but really it sounds like a lot of post-punk/indie rock acts that have a certain moodiness and gravitas. From what I hear on this album, Fontaines D.C. is a band I’d like to hear more of.

Rating: ***1/2

Friday Fictioneers – Good Breeding

~ Liam ~ 7 Comments

PHOTO PROMPT © Amanda Forestwood

The older one shouted over the traffic to his companion in the other rickshaw.

“Enjoy the ride! The locals have a special talent for providing a smooth trip.”

“I see,” said the young one, “But don’t they tire? Or dream of something more?”

“Nonsense!  They are bred for labor just as you and I are bred for intelligence!”

Just then the drivers pulled off to the side and started walking away.

“What the devil are you doing?” shouted the older one.

“We’re going on strike!” they said.

“But how will we get home?”

“You’re ‘bred for intelligence,’ figure it out!”

Friday Fictioneers is a weekly photo prompt flash fiction challenge on Rochelle Wisoff-Fields’ Addicted to Purple blog.  See additional stories from the prompt by other writers here!

20th Anniversary Film Festival: Mystic River (2003)

~ Liam ~ 4 Comments

Title: Mystic River
Release Date:
Director: Clint Eastwood
Production Company: Village Roadshow Pictures | Malpaso Productions | NPV Entertainment
Summary/Review:

In the late 1970s, three friends are playing in the streets of their fictional Boston neighborhood of Buckingham when one of the boys is abducted by two men in a car.  He escapes four days later but is forever changed by the sexual abuse he suffered.  In the present day, the three adult men have only passing interactions.  Jimmy (Sean Penn) is a successful corner store owner with a criminal past,  Sean (Kevin Bacon) is state police detective, and Dave (Tim Robbins) is married with a child but still haunted by his past.  When Jimmy’s 19-year-old daughter Katie (Emmy Rossum) is murdered, Sean is on the case, and Dave is a major suspect.

This movie works because it’s only a crime thriller and police procedural on the surface.  At it’s heart it is a character study, especially an investigation of masculinity and how prescriptive ideas of manhood can cause harm.  The strong lead cast is boosted by Laurence Fishburne as Sean’s tactless partner, Marcia Gay Harden as Dave’s people-pleasing wife, and Laura Linney as Jimmy’s surprisingly enabling wife.

Author Dennis Lehane created Buckingham as an amalgam of several white working class neighborhoods in Boston.  Appropriately, the film is shot all over the city although in a way that different areas are given closer proximity than they have in reality.  Because they’re close to the titular Mystic River, Charlestown and East Boston are featured prominently, but I was surprised that a lot of the locations in this movie are in my own neighborhood of Jamaica Plain.  (When I last saw this movie in 2003, it was before I moved to JP). This is a top notch Boston crime movie, up there with The Friends of Eddie Coyle, a movie that clearly influenced Mystic River in some ways.

Rating: ****