Shinies: Beautiful things
Friday, July 22nd, 2011The summer deadlines are upon us at work. Publication deadlines have been moved up, new projects have been added, and of course, everything is due at the same time. Also there’s the heat wave thing that’s making people melty and crazy, which is just all sorts of helpful when you’re working with students who are in the midst of their own mini-meltdown.
So, today will be a post about beautiful things.
Remember that band I mentioned a couple of weeks ago, The Moulettes? I found a copy of their CD from a British-based second-hand seller off Amazon. Think piratical back-room chamber musicians, dingy wigs askew, getting paid under the table in gin and cigarettes. The vocals remind me of the Andrews Sisters, or maybe a mellow incarnation of the Ditty Bops, with Jill Tracy’s wicked sense of humor and lovely harmonies (no Rasputina-style vibrato warbles here). The main instruments are cello, violin and bassoon, and they shift tempo on a dime.
My only real complaint is that a few of the songs occasionally plummet into the so-soft-as-to-be-impossible-to-hear territory — “Devil of Mine” is particularly prone to this — but that’s a minor irritation compared to the otherwise delicious feast. DoM has an interesting video, too, the sort of imagery that reminds me of someone being lured to a faery party that disappears at dawn and leaves them lying in a muddy grove.
I’ve just discovered the John Barleycorn Must Die blog, chronicling the creative process and tomfoolery of the writer and artist as they bring a graphic novel to life.
WHAT IS ’JOHN BARLEYCORN MUST DIE’ ABOUT?
This graphic novel is about the end of the reign of the sky gods and the birth of humanity.
Since time immemorial, the sky gods, aided by earthly Fraternities, have impregnated mortal women, producing demigods who have influenced humanity in their favour. In the 17th century, Elizabeth Cromwell (Oliver Cromwell’s mother) created a Sorority of mortal women to kill these demigods before they generate ‘sky fall’.A magician, John Barleycorn, is charged by a mysterious woman to expose the last demigod before he can bring about the enslavement of humanity….
The writer (editor/artist/writer Terri Windling’s husband, Howard Gayton) and the artist (Rex Van Ryn) start with an old folk song and spin it out into a modern story. Which doesn’t end well for poor John Barleycorn, as we all know. They’re posting pages of the novel as they go, so I’ll have to go back and read from the beginning.
Also: I am in delighted awe of Brittney Lee’s papercut art. I really have nothing more to say except that I’m incredibly envious of her talent and creativity. And I’m hoping she does post a tutorial at some point, because I would love to give that a try at some point, if only for my own amusement.
In other news, I admit I laughed out loud the first time I saw the new local Crimestoppers/SBPD commercial that insists graffiti is not art. It shows local children dutifully painting over tags on a building, and is a painfully obvious, panties-officially-bunched, political pissing match response to the CAD article the Tribune ran a few weeks back (which is apparently no longer available on the SBT site, so huzzah for Google cache!).
The second time I saw it, it only succeeded in pissing me off.
Yes, it is art. You may not agree with its method of delivery, or its message, and those are valid and arguable points. There is a moral gray area there. But it is art. It’s the only interesting thing about being stuck watching a train go by. It’s a splash of color on forgotten buildings, and utility boxes no one ever notices otherwise, and deadly dull bridges with failed scrubby landscaping. It’s an unexpected glimmer of creativity in a landscape that is unmitigated boredom. And as far as I’m concerned, it resides firmly in the realm of beautiful things.
