March 19th, 2009 7:53am
What’s No Longer There
Lotus Plaza “A Threaded Needle”
The Lotus Plaza album comes out in stores next week, but I’ve had a copy for months now. I’m not saying this to brag — in this era of leaked records, who could possibly care? — but to explain that I’ve been living with this music for a while now, to the point that I’ve already got nostalgic memories attached to the songs. The cd arrived in the mail on a snow day, and not long after, I remember walking around in Brooklyn at night in late December. It wasn’t quite a blizzard, but it snowing, windy, and bitter cold. My vision was blurred, everything seemed slow, and I felt perfectly in synch with the general vibe of Lockett Pundt’s solo tunes. Maybe he wasn’t going for snow per se, but I’m sure he had some form of disorientation in mind when he wrote this material.
Lotus Plaza isn’t a far cry from what Lockett does in Deerhunter, but the balance of hookiness and haziness is adjusted much more in favor of the latter. His best compositions foreground a particular bit of instrumental melody and texture while the rest of the track blurs out, sorta like a musical version of rack focus. The effect is a bit like trying to remember something, but only being able to fully recall seemingly minor details and sensations with any sort of vividness. It seems right that this music would end up associated with exactly this sort of memory in my mind — I can perfectly visualize glimpses of particular street corners as seen through wet glasses, but I kinda struggle to recall much more of the context.
Buy it from Amazon.
3/19/09 1:44 pm
That X-Men panel is fucking awesome. Is Uncanny X-Men good again? I was really into X-Men when I was younger but I stopped following it when I was like 14 around 2001 when they had boring stories about aliens and the art was horrible. I remember my favorite story arcs were Onslaught and Opertion: Zero Tolerance. Remember Joe Madureira? That was like the best artist ever.
3/19/09 2:03 pm
Okay, you asked for it, man.
Uncanny X-Men is reasonably good, about as good as it can be given that a few years ago there was an editorial mandate that basically ruined the basic concept of the entire franchise. Long story short, but thanks to the Scarlet Witch, there are less than 200 mutants on earth, and all of them are superheroes or supervillains. Basically, Marvel Comics is currently run by people who have a minimal investment in the X-Men, and basically just want to get the mutants out of the way so that they can tell certain types of Avengers and SHIELD et al stories without the logistical issue of a world with mutants. Anyway, ever since Grant Morrison departed in 2003 and the no-more-mutants thing took effect shortly afterwards, the various X-Men writers have been forced to do their best with a terrible status quo that limits their options considerably and more or less guts the central premise of the series. Seriously, I have some friends who can tell you — this “decimation” thing can set me off on some very bitter rants. It’s super insulting, particularly when the editors/writers try to sell it in a way suggesting that the reason people persecute minorities is because uh…there are few of them? There’s no logic to it, and it’s insulting to virtually anyone for whom the series would have any meaning.
Soooooo, in that context, I think Matt Fraction is doing the best he can with what he’s got. Same goes for Peter David over on X-Factor. Fraction’s opening arc with Ed Brubaker is not very good, but he’s been on a roll now that he’s writing it by himself. It also sucks that he’s saddled with Greg Land on alternating arcs, as he is truly one of the most awful and hackish artists currently working in the medium.
You know what’s funny? If you quit in 2001, you just missed the beginning of Grant Morrison’s run, which I think is most certainly the all-time high for the franchise.
3/19/09 2:50 pm
Wow! Thanks a lot, dude! Yeah, man, I kinda quit comics in general back then. I remember I quit right when Marvel came out with the Ultimate lines. I was pissed that I had invested so much time reading these storylines and then they decide to come out with alternate “modern” universes. I said, “Fuck you, Marvel.” Admittedly, I never read any of the Ultimate books but it, along with other things at the time, just felt like a ploy to take my money, but I’m going to find some back issues to check out Morrison’s run. Every now and then I’ll hear about a good story arc and I’ll cop the paperback that collects the issues, but with exceptions like Lawless most of it seems to come from DC, like Batman: Hush, The Exterminators, Seven Soldiers of Victory, and DMZ. Local, Runoff, Pyongyang, and City of Glass were also great. I heard good things about The Stand, but I hate Stephen King, so I’m kind of wary. I also got all five volumes of Scott Pilgrim waiting to be read on my desk. BTW, what do you think of Michael Cera playing him? Also, is the new Uncanny X-Men #507? I’m trying to cop on eBay.
3/19/09 2:54 pm
Dude, that issue of X-Men came out YESTERDAY. No need to get on eBay. If you’re nowhere near a comic book store or newstand that would carry it, just get it from midtowncomics.com or similar, or wait for the trade, which will be out in a month or two.
I think that if Michael Cera is willing to play the part, he’ll do a good job. He can’t just be George Michael. But I know that dude loves the comics, and I think he’ll do his best.
3/22/09 11:47 am
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