The Gypsy Art Show

ROUND EARTH, OPEN SKY by Kirpal Gordon, reviewed by BL Kennedy

noreply@blogger.com (Belinda Subraman Presents / Gypsy Art Show) — Wed, 25 Jan 2012 17:08:00 +0000

Round Earth, Open Sky
Kirpal Gordon
Giant Steps Press
Freeport, NY
185 pgs
$14.95
ISBN: 978-0 615-47673-5

The memory of the nights I had drunk blood and eaten flesh under the full moon became firmly lodged in me: a compulsion, a menace always waiting there, a grief and a fare too ancient, a sorrow bred into the essence of the race, a lodestone too old for any individual to fight away from, or even to know and place accurately.

First off, let me say that I really enjoy novels that I cannot find in my local bookstore, and this was the case of Round Earth, Open Sky by Kirpal Gordon. The book reminded me of a partly mystical vision on a crash course collision with Robert Anton Wilson. I have never had the opportunity to read this author before, and to my surprise, found the book quite entertaining, somewhat magickal, lyrical and subversive, and all fun. Think Jack Kerouac meets Carlos Castaneda. Mr. Gordon is indeed a postmodern trickster, and if he is anything like this reviewer, was probably raised on comic books and Classics Illustrated before discovering grown up books. Don’t get me wrong: that’s not a put down, that’s a compliment. I really enjoyed Mr. Gordon’s novel and I feel that it should be read by connoisseurs of postmodern fiction. Gordon both illuminates and simultaneously entertains. I think its kind of sad that this novel, or better yet, the publishers of this novel, have not given it a wider distribution, because Mr. Gordon is like that photographer who steps out of nowhere to photograph a mysterious stranger in just the right light. And so I will highly recommend Round Earth, Open Sky. If you can find a copy, buy it. If you can’t, do some research, order it online.

THE WORDS OF A WAY WALKER by Nicholas Bylotas

noreply@blogger.com (Belinda Subraman Presents / Gypsy Art Show) — Sun, 22 Jan 2012 23:34:00 +0000

Visit the website way-walker.com to place an order and receive these 150 pages of life changing journey written by Nicholas Bylotas, fresh and hot off the press!

You'll laugh, cry, love, hate, admonish, gaze in wonder at, and most of all be entertained and inspired by Bylotas as he seeks identity and purpose in the coming of age story for the generation of Americans next at bat. This book is relevant not only to young adults, but also to adults with children, and even those without, but to any person who feels like they are navigating through a sea of mist called society. The way is clearer than you think.

The book is divided into 3 parts: The white words, the black words, and the blue words. The significance of such titles is evident by the distinct difference in the style of writing as it was recorded to paper, and a thrill to experience in it’s fullness.

The Words of A Way Walker not only chronicles his travels, but is also the journal of his soul. There were times of brilliant glory as he overcame the obstacles of life. There were also moments of dark strife as he confronted the demons of his own mind. This journal is his story, his friend, his lover, and his faithful companion, dedicated to you and to all.

Francois Girard's The Red Violin, movie review by Travis Hedge Coke

noreply@blogger.com (Belinda Subraman Presents / Gypsy Art Show) — Wed, 18 Jan 2012 23:55:00 +0000

After Rachel suggested we watch The Red Violin, we were engaged. That is a fine way to present the movie's effects to you. It carries emotion, time, a sense of inevitability... and if you think on it too long you might start tearing apart that moving presentation, dissecting it for parts that are terribly less interesting. This is the one significant flaw of a beautiful film, that it does not stand up to deep scrutiny, but director Francois Girard has utilized this flaw as an advantage for the right audience, in that the film is so nakedly structured that it encourages us not to analyze, but to breathe it in.

I contribute this film to Girard, though it is well-acted, divinely shot and processed, edited kindly, and features great sets, props, lighting and presentation. My assumption is that these talents did not conglomerate around Don McKellar's script (which was written with Girard, so) as though fish called by instinct, but were orchestrated the same as the stunt violinist mimes playing in the film standing behind various actors who cannot approximate well enough. As movies following an organic prop through various scenes of deleterious relevance go, The Red Violin, is remarkable. As films using symbolism and allusion go, you really are best off not worrying and if you do recognize something, to disregard it and enjoy the radiant colors or the clarity of the acting, instead. From locale to locale, age to age, we find this remarkable violin present for astonishing circumstances and impractical passions, but the people it touches and the violin, itself, touched, are all damaged, too.

The breaking of the violin, any violence committed to it, injures us more quickly, perhaps, than harm to humans in the movie, as we are encouraged to imbue the instrument with the lives of those who knew it. The Red Violin, so sought in the present day scenes, as we flashback to other lives now past, is an irrational conglomerate of time and love and pain and passing. The repair of the violin, the analysis it undergoes in the movie, the sampling and fact-checking, flag all its flaws and failings and yet, to those who feel its beauty, those facts are now ignored, the nature of the thing is disregarded more than once in the course of the movie, for a determined faith in the instrument. The violin called the Red Violin and the movie, The Red Violin, survive and thrive and climb and inspire based in faith, in forthright faith, not critical or survivalist consideration. As with the paintings that some shots homage, it is not the pigments and the paints that make it beautiful, but that we willingly disregard there are pigments and not purely experience.

This is not a Peter Greenaway movie. Just as robust spacefarers such as Captain James Kirk probably never did on science fiction TV, you don't wait for test results to come back and tell you the composition of the atmosphere, you beam down to that weird planet knowing romance, adventure, and inevitability await. You fill your lungs, feel the heady impact of too much too fast, hold it until you are near tingly and driven through with the urge, before exhaling and inhaling again in rhythm of necessity and pleasure.

Vindicated in the Blood of the Lamb by John Bennett, reviewed by BL Kennedy

noreply@blogger.com (Belinda Subraman Presents / Gypsy Art Show) — Mon, 16 Jan 2012 18:17:00 +0000

Vindicated in the Blood of the Lamb
John Bennett
Bottle of Smoke Press
Dover, DE
$10.00

On the Seventh Day

Another week
in the
tar pits

Here I
stand
with a
kerosene-soaked
rage,
ready to
clean myself
up for a day of rest

To say that John Bennett is one of my favorite writers is doing the man a great disservice. Bennett is one of those writers who pulls no punches. He is all gut and grizzle, and this small little book (and I do mean small) from Bottle of Smoke Press is an absolute charm, handsomely bound, and beautifully letter-pressed. It is one of those rare books of poetry and prose that you simply cannot put down. Bennett has been writing in the ‘shard’ mode since the mid nineties, and this book is nothing short of a labor of love, and if by any rare chance you have the opportunity to secure a copy form Bottle of Smoke Press, and if by any chance you succeed, you’ll be doing yourself a great favor This is one of those beautiful, hand bound collections of writings that will get into your head and nest. I highly, highly recommend John Bennett’s Vindicated in the Blood of the Lamb. So whatever you have to do to secure a copy, whether its selling your firstborn or your bicycle, I say do it. You can’t go wrong with this marvelous collection of shards.

The Map of Time by Felix J Palma, reviewed by BL Kennedy

noreply@blogger.com (Belinda Subraman Presents / Gypsy Art Show) — Fri, 13 Jan 2012 17:36:00 +0000

The Map of Time
Felix J Palma
Atria Books
New York, NY
609 pgs
$26.00
ISBN: 978-1-4391-6739-7

Andre Harrington would have gladly died several times over if that meant not having to choose just one pistol from among his father’s vast collection in the living room cabinet.

The Map of Time, in my opinion, recalls the science fiction of H.G. Wells and Jules Verne, then takes these early masters and turns them on their heads with a brilliant and breathtaking new voice. This is an inventive and luscious story with a core of unsettling weirdness. Listen, kids, I am a sucker for time travel movies as well as well as time travel stories, and with The Map of Time, Felix J Palma, in his U.S. debut, takes the reader on a journey filled with lyrical storytelling and rich attention to detail. I must point out that this is the first book in a trilogy of intriguing thrillers. It is though provoking and an entertaining read. Palma uses all the basic ingredients of Steampunk, Fantasy and Mystery genres, mixing it all in one big pot, adding a strange, grim spice and serving it cold. The result is a Victorian era, high tech adventure that borders on the weird and nightmarish. Palma is a master and a delight to read. And the story? Well, you know what: I’m gonna make you get off your ass and buy the book yourself. I was awestruck in reading this fine novel with all these plots, all these mysteries, and all this lovely, lovely writing. So go out and buy it.

The Exegesis of Philip K. Dick, Edited by Pamela Jackson and Jonathan Lethem

noreply@blogger.com (Belinda Subraman Presents / Gypsy Art Show) — Tue, 10 Jan 2012 19:48:00 +0000

The Exegesis of Philip K. Dick
Edited by Pamela Jackson and Jonathan Lethem
Houghton Mifflin Hartcort
Boston, MA
944 pgs
$40.00
ISBN: 978-0-547-54935-5

Reviewed by BL KENNEDY

4:1 In Ubik the forward moving force of time (or time-force expressed as an ergic field) has ceased. All changes result form that. Forms regress. The substrate is revealed.

Finally! After years of waiting, the estate of Philip K. Dick releases the closest thing we will ever have, as far as an insight goes, into this very original American author. For years, Philip K. Dick was labeled as “a science fiction writer”. But today, he is simply a writer, and an excellent one. So, with the release of The Exegesis of Philip K. Dick, there is much to celebrate. Editors Pamela Jackson and Jonathan Lethem have done an outstanding job in bringing the world a Philip K. Dick to the contemporary reader with understanding, compassion, and insight. This is nine hundred plus pages of pure genius: uncensored, raw, powerful genius, which has been selected from thousands of pages of typed and handwritten notes, journal entries, letters and story sketches. The Exegesis of Philip K. Dick is indeed the magnificent and imaginative final work of an author who dedicated his life to questioning the nature of reality, humanity, the perception of space and time, and the relationship between the human and the divine. This is the definitive presentation of Dick’s brilliant and epic work, which fully documents his “eight year attempt to fathom what he called 2-3-74”, a postmodern visionary experience of the entire universe “transformed into information” in entries that sometimes ran for hundreds of pages. His freewheeling voice ranges from personal confession to esoteric scholarship to dream accounts. I cannot find the words to tell you how delighted I am to hold this book in my hands. When you buy it, you will feel the same. This is not an option: buy it. If you are a poet, novelist, painter, cartoonist, if you are creative in ANY way, buy it. If you’re not creative and simply love a beautiful, engaging, sometimes sinister, always enlightening read, buy it. If you’re anyone, buy it. The Exegesis of Philip K. Dick will become the bible for the creative soul.

Beat Takeshi's Sonatine, movie review by Travis Hedge Coke

noreply@blogger.com (Belinda Subraman Presents / Gypsy Art Show) — Fri, 06 Jan 2012 13:37:00 +0000

Sonatine opens with an impaled blue fish against a red sky. Somewhere in the ninety-four minutes that follow, we may realize, as the characters understand at a remove, that the film is an impaled fish held into a sky colored as blood. Such is life, or at least, the life of these low-ranking gangsters.

A sort of casual arthouse picture, Sonatine is directed by its star, Takeshi Kitano, with somber succinctness reveling in both minimalism and flourish, juxtaposing the stark, Howard Hawksian cinematography of Katsumi Yanagashima and a soundtrack by Joe Hisaishi (who frequently scores children's films for Studio Ghibli). It's simplicity is always only surface deep and that surface is several times violently penetrated, torn open with bullet-wound ferocity so that the levels beneath bleed out.

Paying tribute to a long tradition of gangster films in Japan, Sonatine is respectful as it is irreverent and indicting. Many a “traditional” gangland film in Japan was fully funded and supported by criminals, by gangsters, and there is a sometimes unnerving tendency to humanize and excuse even the most vicious crimes. Sonatine doesn't bother. It humanizes only because these are human beings, but Takeshi makes it clear he knows that human is both humane and inhumane. That a filmed human, a movie man, is both real and unreal, flesh and symbol.

The tension in Sonatine – and there is continual tension – is not that of a man deciding his life, but of the trigger on a pistol being slowly pulled until the mechanism releases the hammer and a bullet is fired. Somewhere over the ninety-four minutes run-time, it may be realized that Sonatine is a firing pistol, a suicide shot, a murder in the round, but by then, what damage done?

Jack Kerouac and Allen Ginsberg: The Letters, reviewed by BL Kennedy

noreply@blogger.com (Belinda Subraman Presents / Gypsy Art Show) — Thu, 05 Jan 2012 16:39:00 +0000

Jack Kerouac and Allen Ginsberg: The Letters
Edited by Bill Morgan and David Stanford
Viking Press
499 pgs
$14.95
ISBN: 978-1-61129-305-0

Oh shit, another collection of letters from Jack Kerouac. I can’t say no; I mean, after all, I graduated the Jack Kerouac School of Disembodied Poetics at Naropa University in Boulder, Colorado. So you might say that my mind swells with Kerouac. You know, it wasn’t that long ago I was living in the Bronx and walking with my buddy the late Michael Dyson, who was a great writer and all that stuff. He was the first person to turn me on to Jack Kerouac. He did it because that week, he was excited that Ann Charters had just published the first biography of Jack Kerouac. So, like I said, I kind of have Kerouac in my veins. I mean, what is it we DON’T know about the writers of the Beat Generation? I once had a historian tell me that we can reasonably figure out how many times Jack Kerouac farted in one day. In other words, the Beat Generation proper is the most recorded literary movement in American History. But do we need another book of Kerouac’s letters? We probably don’t, but when you get one as good as this book, you get sucker punched.

Since that famed meeting in the Bronx with Mike Dyson, I’ve read everything that Kerouac has written which has been published to date. And I will be the first to admit that I get very dubious about the way editors approach the letters of any author. I was terrified of this one. But you know what? Sometimes, terror is a good thing. It means I still long to learn and discover what I can about any school of writing.

I love this book. I think it’s a living history of a remarkable correspondence between two very solid and endeared friends. I will recommend particular collection of letters between Jack Kerouac and Allen Ginsberg to any reader who has a curious itch to discover the contribution that these two men made to American literature. Hey, how much does this goddamn book cost? Fourteen ninety-five? Shit, even I on my rags budget can afford that. Look, guys, gals, whatever; I’m just recommending a very, very good book, and hoping that you will read this review and get a little bit inspired to purchase it. This is a fine collection of letters and should be respected as such. In other words, get off your ass and buy the book.

The Dime Detectives by Ron Goulart, reviewed by BL Kennedy

noreply@blogger.com (Belinda Subraman Presents / Gypsy Art Show) — Wed, 04 Jan 2012 17:45:00 +0000

The Dime Detectives
Ron Goulart
The Mysterious Press
New York, NY
247 pgs
$17.95
ISBN: 0-89296-191-0

The hare-boiled private eye, cynical, and yet often sentimental, made his initial appearance as a fully evolved character in the 1920s. His first showed up in the untrimmed pages of the pulpwood fiction magazines, but within a decade he was to be found between the covers of hardbound books issued by respectable publishers, on movie screens across the nation, and even in the funny papers.

I have a serious addiction to comprehensive histories of anything literary. I also have an addiction to the writing of Ron Goulart, and I also have an addiction to Mysterious Press. Add all those together, and The Dime Detectives is a junkie’s treat. This is a comprehensive book that takes its title from a school of literature found somewhere between the dime novels of the late nineteenth century and the paperbacks of today. And it’s a book I absolutely love. Here you have the history in rough cut pages of the pulp magazine, and that genre’s contribution to American Mystery Fiction, and the birth of the Private Detective as hero.

Goulart gives a beautiful overview of the wary new breed, wise-cracking, tough detective in such magazines as Black Mask; Detective Fiction Weekly; Crime Busters; Dime Detective; and Spicy Detective. And let’s not forget the dashing writers; authors such as Dashell Hammett, Raymond Chandler, John D. MacDonald, and John Jakes. All these guys first appeared in the pulps.

The Dime Detectives offers a scholarly overview of crime pulp history through the eyes of author and pulp magazine historian Ron Goulart. I love this book and will recommend it to anybody who has a love of literature and its history. Goulart’s writing has covered many critical works on American popular culture. Cheap Thrills: An Informal History of the Pulp Magazine, and his classic The Great History of Comic Books both successfully contribute to our current understanding of American literature.

So in the end, we have a very handsome edition and a book that will seduce any armchair historian of pulp fiction. I love The Dime Detectives and I highly recommend the book to be placed in the library of any serious student of American literature.

The Cabinet of What You Don’t See by Tantra Bensko, reviewed by BL Kennedy

noreply@blogger.com (Belinda Subraman Presents / Gypsy Art Show) — Tue, 03 Jan 2012 17:06:00 +0000

The Cabinet of What You Don’t See
Tantra Bensko
ISMs Press
Manchester, UK
$5.00

Drawer Seven

Notes to put under the dresses of the dolls. To pin in there, to their vaginas. To give birth to words. To give birth to the story. Cut into strips with little scissors.

These don’t glow in the dark. They lie there and do nothing. You can’t read them. You often believe you can read them in your dreams. They almost tell you the answer.

It is no secret that I have a soft spot in my heart for Tantra Bensko. The author holds an MFA, teaches experimental literature; she edits, writes, and coaches writing. Her chapbooks Watching the Windows Sleep and Swinging on the Edge of Day were published by Naissance Press. Her full length book Lucid Membrane I have already reviewed. She has over 170 publications of short stories, novellas, and poems, including several in magazines that have given her awards, like the Carolina Quarterly and Iowa Journal of literary Review. She has been nominated for a Pushcart, and in my opinion, she is one of the most exciting writers out there today.

The Cabinet of What You Don’t See is a handsome collection of prose poetry. I happen to like this writer and her microscopic view of language. In this book, she tells some fine stories that will keep you both entertained and begging for more. So what can I tell ya, kids? Wherever you can find a chapbook or book by Tantra Bensko, grab it! Trust me, you won’t regret the decision.

CAN'T STOP NOW by John Yarmus, reviewed by BL Kennedy

noreply@blogger.com (Belinda Subraman Presents / Gypsy Art Show) — Sun, 01 Jan 2012 20:50:00 +0000

John Yamrus
Can’t Stop Now!
Epic Rites Press
133 pgs
$17.50
ISBN: 978-1-926860-06-0

The Great Writer

told
him to
write about

what
and who
you know

which
made
him which

he
had more
interesting friends.

There has long been a problem with ‘contemporary’ poetry. The problem itself stems from too many young, untrained poets attempting to duplicate the poetry of Jack Kerouac, or any of the Beats, including the pedestrian scrawl of Bukowski. You heard right: I just called Buk pedestrian. Let’s hope I don’t get beat up tomorrow for it or the next time I walk into a bar or a poetry reading here in Sacramento (same thing, really.)

Now, let’s address the poems of John Yamrus. Once again, I find I have to point out the influence of such seasoned writers as Buk, John Bennett, Jack Micheline, and Kell Robertson. I hate wanna-be straight-lined conversational or narrative poems. I just do not have a nice place for them in my stomach. However, I’m going to make an exception here with John Yamrus. Can’t Stop Now! is an excellent collection of some 133 pgs, a giant amount poetry books, and I’m sorry, but rather unnecessary. John Yamrus has a talent; he need not flaunt it. I like a lot of the poems here, even with their sometimes show off references to names like Phillip Marlowe, and old radio shows. Look, the only radio show that I had the opportunity to hear in my younger days was the Broadcast of H.G. Welles War of the Worlds.

Still again, there is something here that draws me to the poetry of John Yamrus. The work stands in and of itself. It has a lyrical quality that I find kind of fits nicely in what I want in a poem. Granted, as I stated earlier, the book is a little bit too long at 133 pgs, but I’m gonna recommend it. I’m gonna recommend it because there are some poems in this collection that I’ve really enjoyed, and Can’t Stop Now is a handsome book which should fit nicely into anybody’s poetry library. And John Yamrus is, at times, a damn fine writer.

10 Significant Historical Events on New Year’s Eve

noreply@blogger.com (Belinda Subraman Presents / Gypsy Art Show) — Fri, 30 Dec 2011 22:15:00 +0000

1. The British East India Trading Company is chartered (1600)

2. Thomas Edison demonstrates incandescent lighting to the public for the first time (1879)

3. US President Harry S. Truman officially declares the end of the Second World War (1946)

4. The first New Year’s Eve celebration is held in Longacre Square (now known as Times Square) in New York City (1904)

5. Opening of Manhattan Bridge (1909)

6. The Central African Federation (Federation of Rhodesia and Nyasaland) dissolves, splitting into Zambia, Malawi and Rhodesia (1963)

7. Dissolution of Czechoslovakia results in the creation of the Czech Republic and Slovakia (1992)

8. The ERM (European Exchange Rate Mechanism) freezes the values of the legacy currency in the Eurozone, establishing the euro currency as the sole legal tender of the European Union (1998)

9. Boris Yeltsin, Russia’s first President, hands in his resignation, leaving Prime Minister Vladimir Putin as the acting President (1999)

10. Official opening of Taiwan’s Taipei 101, the tallest skyscraper of its time (2004)

History of New Year's Day

noreply@blogger.com (Belinda Subraman Presents / Gypsy Art Show) — Fri, 30 Dec 2011 17:18:00 +0000

With most countries using the Gregorian calendar as their main calendar, New Year's Day is the closest thing to being the world's only truly global public holiday.

January 1 st is considered New Years Day in today's society. But this is a fairly new concept because up until the time of Julius Caesar, the Romans celebrated the New Year in March because it was the first month in the Roman calendar. However, January 1 marked the time when the Romans changed their governmental figures and new consuls were inducted into office. And, they had games and feasting to help celebrate the new officials. But, they still used March 1 as their official mark of the new year and had a festival to their god, Mars (God of War).

It was Caesar who changed the Roman New Year's Day to January 1 in honor of Janus, (God of all beginnings and gate keeper of heaven and earth). Janus was always depicted with two faces: One looking back to the old year (past) and one looking ahead to the new year (future). One of the customs in the festival honoring Janus was to exchange gifts and then make resolutions to be friendly and good to one another.

When Constantine ruled the Romans and accepted Christianity as their new faith, they kept the Festival of Janus as the New Years Day ( Not March as before) and turned it into a day of prayer and fasting and not parties etc. It was a day for all good Christians to turn over a new leaf. However, the Romans may have accepted January 1 and Janus as the New Year, but many did not accept the turning over a new leaf, prayer and fasting part of it.

However, even in 1582, Great Britian and the English colonies in America still kept March for the beginning of the year. (Spring as a beginning?) It wasn't until 1752 that Britian (and it's colonies) adopted the new Gregorian calendar and January 1 as the beginning of the year. But many Puritans in New England felt Janus was an offensive pagan god and chose to simply ignore January 1 as a New Years Day. Instead they just made the entire month of January as "The First Month" of the months.

And, today no one really considers January 1 a fasting day. Ironically, for many it is a major day of feasting on junk food and watching football games on television.

How did New Year's Resolutions all begin?

Once again, we go back to the wild and crazy parties of the ancient Romans. :) They indulged themselves in alcoholic and sexual excess as a way of acting out all the chaos that they hoped a new year would get rid of. So, the New Year's festival was a way to start over. By purging yourself of all this so-called excess energy and confessing your sins, there was a hope that you would be much better in the next year ahead.

Now, the Puritans never did approve of all this New Year's hoopla. So of course they went for this religious renewal of cleanse, purge, fast, confess idea. So they encouraged young people not to waste the new year on foolish things but to use it as an opportunity to make a good change in their lives for the good. So, like some Christians, they made New Year's vows or pledges focused on overcoming their own weaknesses, to enhance their god-given talents and to make them better citizens to others.

The custom of making New Year's Resolutions came into vogue in the 20th century. But most of it was done with jest and an understanding that they would not be kept (for long anyway) since humans were naturally backsliders by nature to their naughty habits and ways.

The resolutions today are simply a secular version of the religious vows made in the past toward spiritual perfection. They are often made with good intentions and broken with a sense of humor and renewed annually.

FOOL by Christopher Moore, reviewed by BL Kennedy

noreply@blogger.com (Belinda Subraman Presents / Gypsy Art Show) — Tue, 27 Dec 2011 20:53:00 +0000

Fool
Christopher Moore
HarperCollins
New York, NY
311 pgs
$26.99
ISBN: 978-0-06-059031-4

“Tosser!” cried the raven.
There’s always a bloody raven.

Christopher Moore, the author of Lamb, A Dirty Job and You Suck, No Offense is at it again. Fool is a bawdy tale of shagging, murder, spanking maiming, treason, and all unexplored heights of vulgarity. There. This book will have you falling off the couch with laughter as you follow The Fool, a man of infinite jest and wisdom. Crazy Wisdom, that is. I have to admit, I am prejudiced: when a Christopher Moore book comes out, I am first in line at the bookstore. I cannot think of a more fun read than a new novel from this author.

I think Fool is currently available in a trade paperback edition. But if you’re lucky, you can probably find one of any number of sales tables at any major chain book store, and then you can ask yourself who is really the fool in that situation. Buy the book, do not pass this up. And did I mention, there’s a fucking ghost in the book. A fucking GHOST! In the middle of the book!

Yeah, this is an insanely funny tale of moronic delight. Think of when you first discovered the Three Stooges, or your introduction to the Marx Brothers. That is how important I think the writings of Christopher Moore are, and Fool is one of his best books to date.

The History of the Night Before Christmas

noreply@blogger.com (Belinda Subraman Presents / Gypsy Art Show) — Sat, 24 Dec 2011 22:55:00 +0000

According to history, the poem, The Night Before Christmas, also known by the name of A Visit from St Nicholas was written by Clement Moore on the eve of Christmas for his family in 1822 without any intention of publishing it. Miss Harriet Butler, a friend of Clement Moore, on hearing about this poem from Moore's children, copied the poem and after making it a part of her album, gave it to the editor of the Troy (New York Sentinel) The poem got published in the Troy (New York Sentinel) on 23rd December in 1823.

Later on this poem came to be reprinted in various magazines as well as newspapers. For the first time, the song appeared in the book, The New York Book of Poetry, in 1837 and Charles Fenno Hoffman was the editor of this book. Authorship of this poem was attributed to Clement Moore only in 1844 and was made a part his own volume of work entitled Poems.

The poem got published in the Troy [New York Sentinel} on 23rd December in 1823. Later on this poem came to be reprinted in various magazines as well as newspapers. For the first time, the song appeared in the book, The New York Book of Poetry, in 1837 and Charles Fenno Hoffman was the editor of this book. Authorship of this poem was attributed to Clement Moore only in 1844 and was made a part his own volume of work entitled Poems.

The Story of White Christmas by Jody Rosen

noreply@blogger.com (Belinda Subraman Presents / Gypsy Art Show) — Fri, 23 Dec 2011 16:28:00 +0000

When Irving Berlin first conceived the song "White Christmas," he envisioned it as a "throwaway" -- a satirical novelty number for a vaudeville-style stage revue. By the time Bing Crosby introduced the tune in the winter of 1942, it had evolved into something far grander: the stately yuletide ballad that would become the world's all-time top-selling and most widely recorded song.

In this vividly written narrative, Jody Rosen provides both the fascinating story behind the making of America's favorite Christmas carol and a cultural history of the nation that embraced it. Berlin, the Russian-Jewish immigrant who became his adopted country's greatest pop troubadour, had written his magnum opus -- what one commentator has called a "holiday Moby-Dick" -- a timeless song that resonates with some of the deepest themes in American culture: yearning for a mythic New England past, belief in the magic of the "merry and bright" Christmas season, longing for the havens of home and hearth. Today, the song endures not just as an icon of the national Christmas celebration but as the artistic and commercial peak of the golden age of popular song, a symbol of the values and strivings of the World War II generation, and of the saga of Jewish-American assimilation. With insight and wit, Rosen probes the song's musical roots, uncovering its surprising connections to the tradition of blackface minstrelsy and exploring its unique place in popular culture through six decades of recordings by everyone from Bing Crosby to Elvis Presley to *NSYNC. White Christmas chronicles the song's legacy from jaunty ragtime-era Tin Pan Alley to the elegant world of midcentury Broadway and Hollywood, from the hardscrabble streets where Irving Berlin was reared to the battlefields of World War II where American GIs made "White Christmas" their wartime anthem, and from the Victorian American past that the song evokes to the twenty-first-century present where Berlin's masterpiece lives on as a kind of secular hymn.

The Magicians: A Novel by Lev Grossman, reviewed by BL Kennedy

noreply@blogger.com (Belinda Subraman Presents / Gypsy Art Show) — Thu, 22 Dec 2011 18:34:00 +0000

The Magicians: A Novel

Lev Grossman

Viking Press

New York, NY

402 pgs

$26.95

ISBN: 978-0-670-02055-3

Quentin did a magic trick. Nobody noticed.

They picked their way along the cold, uneven sidewalk together: James, Julia and Quentin. James and Julia held hands. That’s how things were now. The sidewalk wasn’t quite wide enough, so Quentin trailed after time, like a sulky child. He would rather have been alone with Julia, or just alone period, but you could have everything. Or at least the available evidence pointed overwhelming to that conclusion.

I really want to make a stupid joke, but the joke would be in bad taste and offend too many people. I wanted to say “Move over, J.K. Rowling, and make room for Lev Grossman and The Magicians”. Oh what can I tell you about this book, people seem to like it, and people think it’s kind of a New Yorker’s take on Harry Potter. I mean, after all the protagonist finds himself very unexpectedly admitted to a very secret and strange college in upstate New York.

This is a complex and adventurous book that is bound to fill your appetite for fantasy and good writing; The Magicians is, in my opinion a book filled with all the enthusiasm of a drunk Irishman on St. Patrick’s day. I just loved the book, which is a great combination of both fantasy and mainstream fiction. I think that Lev Grossman is an up and coming talent, and I am recommending a lot of attention be given to this book. So if you like adventurous reading and magic and all those other things that walk between worlds, this book is for you. I highly recommend The Magicians. Let’s just pray they don’t make a movie.

Alejandro González Iñárritu's Biutiful, movie review by Travis Hedge Coke

noreply@blogger.com (Belinda Subraman Presents / Gypsy Art Show) — Mon, 19 Dec 2011 18:46:00 +0000

Starring Javier Bardem as a seriously damaged, dying, and lifelong criminal trying to do right by himself and his children, Biutiful is as cruel a sentimental film as can be. It wants to be nice, it drives its audience to want the world these characters inhabit to be nice, if only for awhile, but it rarely is. If not the cruelty of reality, the harshness of need, than the weight of guilt, the acid of guilt gets into everything and destroys any pure hope.

And, it it for that reason that it should be watched without ever hitting pause.

Biutiful is as terminally and centrally damaged as its title. “Biutiful” itself, the misspelling, comes from Bardem's character, Uxbal, attempting to help his daughter with her English homework, and instead revealing his own ignorance and inadvertently passing it down to that daughter. We all probably pass as much of our missteps and ignorance to the next generation, just as we are like Uxbal in his flawed evaluation of those around him from his boss to his brother, seeing our hopes as realities or our fears, but rarely acknowledging that both are part of the true existence. The movie is made more difficult for us to sit through because of its earnestness.

It is not that Uxbal does not love his children, his family, lover, and colleagues and acquaintances enough, or that he does not wish them all the best. The guilt that he has been raised in, occupied with, is so strong that his acts of love, his acts of aggressive optimism are greatly infected with that guilt, with a lack of perspective inspired by avoiding the pain and perhaps the lessening of love that such a perspective could bring. We love easier and more fully, perhaps, when we focus on parts of a person, moments in a situation, and not the entirety. We certainly sleep easier.

And, that is why the movie is worth watching, beyond the immense beauty of the cinematography, the thorough elegance of its pacing and direction, and the idiosyncratically lifelike acting, it is an anti-cathartic film. It is a movie that uses our hope for escapism and our desire for a righting of wrongs to move us in our own lives and not simply with a swell of music and cinematic cues to cheering.

The Atomic Angel Theory: Art by Donna Surles

noreply@blogger.com (Belinda Subraman Presents / Gypsy Art Show) — Sat, 17 Dec 2011 17:10:00 +0000

ON VIEWING A COSMIC THREAD

Long before I had a name, I was a Surrealist.

Long before I grasped reality, I was a philosopher.

Long before I held a brush, I was a painter.

Long before I felt the applause, I was an actor.

Long before I touched fire, I was a musician.

Long before I became human, I had a soul.

Long before I sang, I knew my song.

Long before I could speak, I began my journey.

I could go on and on…I will go on and on…I was taught by my father how to draw books and beer cans, all the while “looking” at reality in a curious way. As I work on a piece, I experiment with mediums, surfaces, found objects, and of course, color.

As I journey I study with magical artists and musicians. Each of them gives me a piece of the dream that holds my work together. In return I give them a true vision of the dream. My direct focus is on the Communications influence on what we know as civilization and the directions those influences are preparing us to journey. We are a small part of the entire structure, but the impact that we as individuals have on it is astounding.

My never-ending journey through visions of the dream brings me here the weave the universal knowledge on a canvas of space and time. As a writer…communicator…artist, I see in my past the paths that have led me here, and I will illustrate, words and images in a constant state of change, the force of life.

Thank you for subjecting yourself to this collection. “The invention of the game caused concern among the players, as this was the first time that live targets were used.” Please join us for supper. I learn, I teach and I reflect the passions of my identities.

(Check out Donna's website.)

The Book of Cthulu: Tales Inspired by H.P. Lovecraft, reviewed by BL Kennedy

noreply@blogger.com (Belinda Subraman Presents / Gypsy Art Show) — Thu, 15 Dec 2011 21:10:00 +0000

The Book of Cthulu: Tales Inspired by H.P. Lovecraft
Various Authors
Edited by Ross. E. Lockhart
Night Shade Books
San Francisco, CA
525 pgs
$15.99
ISBN: 978-1-59780-232-1

“The Black [words obscured by postmark] was fascinating—I must get a snap shot of him”.
--H.P. Lovecraft, Postcard to E. Hoffman Price, 7/23/1934

Okay, I admit it; I am addicted to everything about Howard Phillips Lovecraft, better known as the author of the Cthulu mythos, H.P. Lovecraft. You might say these are tales of tentacles, terror, and madness. And what’s even better, this book includes a whole bunch of mythos inspired stories that I have never had the opportunity to read, or stories I have read before, like Black Man with a Horn by T.E.D Kline, which still manages to crawl up my spine after at least ten years.

This book is handsomely put together, and edited by Ross E. Lockhart, and the stories are by the best authors in the genre, such as the late Michael Shea and the ever entertaining Joe Lansdale, what would a Cthulu anthology be without the work of Brian Lumley? I cannot tell you how much I truly enjoyed this wonderfully edited collection. If you have the chance to find a copy, either online or at your local bookstore, my advice is to grab it. It will be a secret between us. Happy horrors, babies.

The Return of the Sorcerer by Clark Ashton Smith, reviewed by BL Kennedy

noreply@blogger.com (Belinda Subraman Presents / Gypsy Art Show) — Sun, 11 Dec 2011 20:35:00 +0000

The Return of the Sorcerer: The Best of Clark Ashton Smith
Clark Ashton Smith
Edited by Robert Weinberg
Prime Books
347 pgs
$14.95
ISBN: 978-1-60701-209-2

We had been friends for a decade or more, and I knew Giles Angarth as well as anyone could purport to know him. Yet the thing was no less a mystery to me than to others at the time; and it is still a mystery.

Up until now, to find a collection of Clark Ashton Smith in any edition was a daunting task. Now a publisher called Prime has re-released some of Smith’s stories in this very handsome edition titled The Return of the Sorcerer: The Best of Clark Ashton Smith. I had first heard of Smith as a teenager reading the horror and science fiction of H.P. Lovecraft. I had heard of Smith through his association with Lovecraft, and there was the rumor that Lancer Books was going to publish four paperback editions of Clark Ashton Smith’s work, which indeed, they did. Copies of those collections are extremely hard to find today, even in some of the best used book stores.

But this edition of Smith’s work has some of his best stories. You can travel with the Return of the Sorcerer, and enter the City of the Singing Flame. You will meet the Enchantress. This is one of the best collections of Clark Ashton Smith’s work that I have ever seen. “During his lifetime (1893-1961), Clark Ashton Smith was best known as a poet and ladies man”: these are the opening lines of an excellent introduction by Author Gene Wolf. Throughout Smith’s life, we find that he was primarily known for his poetry and publishing a handful of short stories in pulp magazine such as Weird Tales. But these stories are so much more than mere horror and fantasy. The language that Smith employs is always poetic and illuminating to the sensitive reader. I cannot say enough as to how much I have enjoyed this collection. Whatever you have to do, get a copy.

New Frontera Bugalú CD by TJ-ENGLISH

noreply@blogger.com (Belinda Subraman Presents / Gypsy Art Show) — Fri, 09 Dec 2011 01:54:00 +0000

One year ago this week I had the pleasure of producing and hosting an event in NYC called the Irish-Mexican Alliance. The night was designed to call attention to the plight of journalists, both Mexican and American, who put their lives on the line while attempting to report on the narco war in Mexico. We raised money for the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ), which has set aside a special fund for legal representation of Mexican journalists forced to flee across the border into the U.S. seeking asylum from harassment, death threats and murder.

My interest in the issue came from reporting I had done in the Ciudad Juárez-El Paso borderland region for an article I wrote entitled NARCO AMERICANO that appeared in Playboy magazine (January, 2011.)

While in El Paso in the summer of 2010, at an outdoor plaza downtown, I happened to hear a local band called Frontera Bugalú. The band was relatively new, having been pieced together from a couple different local bands, but I was immediately struck by the originality and sabor of this band that mixed traditional cumbia (from Colombia) bugaloo (from New York City), and norteño music, which is specific to northern Mexico and the borderland region of South Texas and New Mexico. They also mixed in mambo and a few other Latin styles that were new to my ears. Led by the ubiquitous accordion of bandleader Kiko Rodríguez and the soaring vocals of Amalia Castro, they were fun and infectious, an eclectic mix of folkloric music, but with a sound and musical point-of-view that was very contemporary and hip.

MUSICAL INSPIRATION

I returned to NYC with the idea of devising a fundraising event that would call attention to the infernal narco war in Mexico. I also brought back the sounds of Frontera Bugalú in my head and in my heart. I knew that if we were to stage an event calling attention to the hardships being shouldered by people in the borderland of Northern Mexico and the Southwestern U.S., then it would need to have the appropriate soundtrack.

The Irish-Mexican Alliance event was sponsored by an organization called Irish American Writers & Artists, Inc, of which I am a co-founder and co-director. Earlier in 2010, we had organized a highly successful fundraising event for earthquake relief in Haiti. That event, called Island People Supporting Island People, created the template that we hoped to reproduce by using Irish and Irish American entertainers (musicians, bands, writers, and poets) mixed with the particular culture with whom we were interfacing for that event. For the Haiti event, we had some great Irish bands, both rock and traditional, on the bill alongside a muscular 20-member Haitian rara band that blew the roof off Connolly’s Pub in Times Square.

For the Irish-Mexican Alliance, again, we had some fantastic Irish music; a traditional Mexican mariachi band with members from around the NYC area; and, much to my delight, we were able to fly in all the way from El Paso the one and only Frontera Bugalú. Everyone in the room that night, which included not only Irish Americans but also activists from NY’s Latino Diaspora (Puerto Ricans, Dominicans, Mexicans, etc.) marveled at hearing what we knew was an authentic voice of a very unique region of the U.S that is rarely represented in popular American culture.

THE NEW CD

All of this is a very discursive and round about way to inform you, dear reader, that Frontera Bugalú now has released its first CD, entitled simply FRONTERA BUGALÚ. If you happened to catch this band in NYC at the Irish-Mexican Alliance event, or if you are a fan of Latin dance music in all its many shadings, or simply a lover a great percussive instrumentation and vocals, than you must check out the new 7-track CD. You will want to be among the growing number of people who can honestly say, “I discovered this group! I have their very first CD!”

From the opening track, “Sácame a Bailar,” the band announces itself as something fresh and original. A cascading piano solo by Joel Osvaldo leads in to a brief duet with the harpist, Adrian Pérez, and then – bam! – the band’s signature instrument, the accordion, played by Kiko. The vocals are spare, as the entire 8-piece band coheres around a sultry, sensual groove that continues through every song of the CD, regardless of tempo.

“Embarazar” is a classic cumbia, with lyrics written and sung by Amalia, whose voice ranges from the folkloric to jazzy, with an extended scat (yes, you can scat in any language) right out of the Ella Fitzgerald playbook. On this cut and others, the musical transitions are tight, based around the funky Latin bass of Ramón Villa-Hernández and smoking percussion by Jesús Güereca (congas and timbales), Mykol Nelson (guiro), and Louis Speaking Eagle Sarellano (bataría.)

BOOTY SHAKING, CHICANO STYLE

Frontera Bugalú is, above all, a dance band. It is nearly impossible to listen to their music without moving, the rhythm taking hold of the body like a spectral spirit, as was certainly the case at the Irish-Mexican Alliance event in NY. The dance floor that night was a rainbow-colored, multi-cultural mix. In some ways, to get the full Bugalú experience you need to see the band live, but, on the other hand, the CD – with the benefit of studio time and multi-track recording – is layered with instrumentation and depth of sound not present at the live shows. This is most apparent on a cut like “Rompe Las Cadenas” – my favorite on the CD – which is rooted in Cuban son, familiar to most New Yorkers as salsa (and I don’t mean the condiment!)

Without being preachy or pedantic, Frontera Bugalú is, by nature, a political band. Comprised mostly of Chicanos, they have chosen to preserve certain cultural traditions in their music, to honor those traditions, to promote and celebrate them, which is, by its very nature, a political statement. The fact that they can do this and still be, first and foremost, a contemporary party band dedicated to the principles of rhythm and booty shaking, is a testament to the power of the music. Frontera Bugalú is a celebration of life in the most universal sense, meditative music, hypnotic, designed to inhabit the spirit, work its way through the body, and bring about a physical expression on the dance floor that will leave you with the sweet kiss of human perspiration on your brow.

To listen to a few tracks and to purchase FRONTERA Bhttp://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gifUGALÚ, as a CD or a computer download, go to the following link: http://frhttp://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gifonterabugalu.bandcamp.com/

Check out T.J on Jon Stewart Show talking about his latest book:

http://www.myvidster.com/video/1311894/TJ_English_The_Daily_Show_with_Jon_Stewart_0

The Real Wizard of Oz: The Life and Times of L. Frank Baum by Rebecca Loncraine

noreply@blogger.com (Belinda Subraman Presents / Gypsy Art Show) — Wed, 07 Dec 2011 16:27:00 +0000

The Real Wizard of Oz: The Life and Times of L. Frank Baum

Rebecca Loncraine

Gotham Books

New York, NY

327 pgs

$28.00

ISBN: 978-1-592-4-449-0

Reviewed by BL Kennedy

In my memory, there isn’t a time before The Wizard of OZ. I still have my battered old copy of the book, which is illustrated with particular and unforgettable drawings. When I leaf through them now, as I did so often as a child, it’s as though the pictures are a map or a pathway back to childhood itself.

I am a fan of Oz; not the doctor, but Oz, the land. You know, munchkins, Tin Men, Scarecrows, Cowardly Lions, one shyster Wizard, and one annoying girl. So I guess what I’m saying is that I love the books of L. Frank Baum. So it was a real treat for me to be a library sale and find this biography The Real Wizard of Oz: The Life and Times of L. Frank Baum.

Up until now, I had only read the books, and knew some but very little of Baum’s actual life. So this book, for me, has been one of the most enjoyable reads that I have ever had with an author as subject matter. That is not to say I have not enjoyed other biographies of other writers; but this book, because of my love for Oz, holds a special place. So if you are so inclined to purchase an enjoyable read,I would suggest you find a copy of The Real Wizard of Oz. If you can find the book at your local bookstore, find a copy at the library. This is a must read for anybody who is curious of or a fan of the Yellow Brick Road.

Short Tails by Yuriy Tarnawsky, reviewed by BL Kennedy

noreply@blogger.com (Belinda Subraman Presents / Gypsy Art Show) — Mon, 05 Dec 2011 17:15:00 +0000

Short Tails

Yuriy Tarnawsky

Journal of Experimental Fiction

Geneva, IL

321 pgs

ISBN: 978-1884-0974-2-3

One day he closes his left eye and notices that he doesn’t see worse but, rather, better.

A body gradually shrinks to an eye that sees its own end. A man screams with pain as if singing and Indian Raga to entertain others for pittance. Another man tries to force his body to adapt the shape of a cube because it seems witty.

Short Tails by Yuriy Tarnawsky is another one of those fabulous collections from the Journal of Experimental Fiction, who, in my opinion, is sitting on the forefront of contemporary American literature. In these short prose pieces, Tarnawsky seems to seduce the reader in his performance of the absurd. I like this collection, and I truly like the writing style of its author. I do not know exactly how one finds books from the Journal of Experimental Fiction.

I highly recommend this volume. I think that Yuriy Tarnawsky is an author that you’re gonna have to watch for. I see many positive doors opening for him in the future. If you would like to purchase a copy of this book, the only way I know is to go to the website www.experimentalfiction.com , or even write the publishers at

The Journal of Experimental Fiction
12 Simpson Street, Apartment D
Geneva, Illinois 60134

Orange Sunshine: The Brotherhood of Eternal Love and its Quest to Spread Peace, Love and ACID to the World

noreply@blogger.com (Belinda Subraman Presents / Gypsy Art Show) — Sat, 03 Dec 2011 17:17:00 +0000

Orange Sunshine: The Brotherhood of Eternal Love and its Quest to Spread Peace, Love and ACID to the World

Nicolas Schou

St. Martin’s Press

New York, NY

206 pgs

$24.99

ISBN: 978-312-55183-4

Reviewed by BL Kennedy

Eleven years ago an unusual story appeared in OC Weekly, the alternative newspaper in Orange County, California, where I work as a staff writer. It concerned a three day rock festival in Laguna Canyon that began on Christmas Day 1970. The article “Laguna on Acid” by Bob Emmers, briefly noted that a mysterious group of hippie drug smugglers who were friends with Timothy Leary and known as the Brotherhood of Eternal Love had used a cargo plane to drop thousands of tablets of LSB over a crowd of twenty five thousand.

Okay, kiddies, it’s back to the sixties, and there are a few stories in the annals of American Counterculture that are as intriguing or dramatic as that of the Brotherhood of Eternal Love. These guys were dubbed “the hippie mafia”. The Brotherhood began in the mid 1960s as a small band of peace loving , adventure seeking surfers in Southern California, who, after discovering LSD, took to Timothy Leary’s mantra of “Turn on, tune in, and drop out.” They resolved to make that vision a reality by becoming the biggest group of acid dealers and hashish smugglers in the nation, providing the fuel for the psychedelic revolution in the process.

I dunno, call me kinda nostalgic, being the big time acid head in my youth, but Orange Sunshine reads so much like a classic Thomas Pynchon novel, filled with mind bending and hilarious tales of a secret society of mystic surfers who bombed Southern California with LSD. The book is literally a roller coaster ride through many of the Brotherhood’s smuggling adventures, and also provides hilarious details into daily life in Dodge City. Nicholas Schou has truly uncovered a bizarre piece of American History that seems to come straight outta easy rider, except this shit really happened.

So, in conclusion, if you wanna time travel, if you want to revisit those LSD days of your youth (and I’m primarily talking about my generation), I highly recommend Orange Sunshine. This is one hell of an ass kick and fun filled read. So buy it. In-joke has it that if you lick the third paragraph of page 143, you’ll get off.

Orange Sunshine Preview @ Kickstarter from William Kirkley on Vimeo.