“Scorching hot desert sand.”

John Darnielle often sends his listeners on a quest of sorts; those listeners who want to plumb the depth of every reference on his hyper-literate albums which have featured brief quotations from diverse works of fiction. The latest literary trace that has resurfaced with my own reading came from Elfriede Jelinek’s “Wonderful, Wonderful Times.” See if you can spot the quotation, recalling on which album it might be found:

She goes on drifting among great, sterile, transparent jellies. Nothing keeps her steady and stable, but the glass-bright mass keeps her in a constant state of suspension, she doesn’t touch the ground. Sophie too will be like that one day, if something isn’t done to prevent it in good time, now. Love will prevent it (p. 91).

Filed under: Stuff I've Been Reading

Project 1: Create the most ultimate sad fucker* mix CD ever.

What would a SF Mix be without this damned beauty of a song about mutual self-destruction and the will to burn it all down. 

Dear John Darnielle,

I fear that I’ve patterned the worst parts of my relationships after your songs, perhaps desiring to be one  of those desperate narratives in my own self-consciously tragic way. I suppose it all goes back to Nick Hornby’s eternal question: Do we listen to pop music because we’re miserable, or are we miserable because we listen to pop music?

See you on the 18th, we’ll talk about all of this then.

Sincerely,

J.C.H.

*thanks to Karen for this particular nuanced revision of my long held contention of being just a “sad bastard”

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