September 22, 2009

sometimes I get so sad
sometimes you just make me mad
it's a sad and beautiful world



Robert Frank, Sick of Goodby's

* Lou Reed on Robert Frank's Sick of Goodby's:

"I was looking at Robert Frank's photograph Sick of Goodby's in his book The Lines of My Hand. Moments before I had been listening to a Johnny Cash song called I Wish I Was Crazy Again. Then I thought of the goodbyes in the book to old friends caught once and for all and never again to be seen in life, and I was struck by the intensity of the sadness of life and its redeeming qualities as reflected in these moving photos. With Johnny Cash as well, the desire to see it all again, to go out one more time into the wild flame only to be burned up forever and never be seen again except in these farewell photos, is moving beyond description. The photos speak of an acceptance of things as they are. the inevitable death of us all and the last photo - that last unposed shot to remind us of our friends, of our loss of the times we had in a past captured only on film in black and white. Frank has been there, and seen that, and recorded it with such subtlety that we only look in awe, our own hearts beating with the memories of lost partners and songs.

"To wish for the crazy times one last time and freeze it in the memory of a camera is the least a great artist can do. Robert Frank is a great democrat. We're all in these photos. Paint dripping from a mirror like blood. I'm sick of goodbyes. And aren't we all, but it's nice to see it said."

* NPR recorded Yo La Tengo's fantastic set at DC's 9:30 club last Thursday. Worth a listen or three. I'd say "Tom Courteney" into an extended "Pass the Hatchet" (beginning about an hour in) were highlights, but as Malitz says "There's simply no other group that would cover Black Flag ("Nervous Breakdown"), Half Japanese ("Firecracker Firecracker") and the Beach Boys ("Farmer's Daughter") during the same show." NPR has also posted a bunch of great photos from the performance.

* "When I split an infinitive, god damn it, I split it so it stays split." -- Raymond Chandler

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