F For Fake, Orson Welles

Neither a straightforward documentary or a fictional story, F For Fake is a unique kind of film essay, a meditation on the concept of fakery and forgery in art. It incorporates a great deal of footage from an uncompleted documentary about Elmyr de Hory, who made his living forging paintings. To this footage Welles adds his own narration and splices and dices his way through a fascinating tour de force of masterful editing.

The film asks the question: if no one can tell the difference between an original painting and a forgery, then what exactly IS the difference? If we can't ever know for sure what is real and what is fake, does it, ultimately, matter? Welles suggests several possible answers to this conundrum, without telling us what we ought to think. He subverts the viewer's expectation of a linear story by doubling back and revisiting the same events from different angles. He confronts us with the artifice of film itself — there are many shots of stacks of film reels and of Welles in the editing room piecing together the same footage of which the film is comprised. We are thus continually reminded that what we are watching is another kind of fake: an artificially-constructed reality. Almost miraculously, the film still manages to have a clear beginning, middle and end.

F For Fake is not only fascinating but extremely entertaining, mainly because the film's main character is Orson Welles. He narrates throughout and also appears on-camera in various guises, making mischief and wandering around in a magician's outfit and generally seeming to have a great time hamming it up and being serious and funny at the same time. A large part of the beauty and fascination of F For Fake comes from listening to Welles explain the convoluted story behind the film's origin.

This is mandatory viewing for Orson Welles fans, and highly recommended for anyone with a sense of humor and a love for adventurous filmmaking.

The Simulacra, Philip K. Dick

I confess: I've been reading science fiction novels all summer. But it isn't my fault: I was assigned to read Octavia Butler's Mind of My Mind in my penultimate undergraduate class at Pace this summer, and it all went downhill from there. Next thing I knew I was ordering out-of-print Isaac Asimov books for a dollar a piece at abebooks.com and unashamedly riding the subway while engrossed in paperbacks with titles like Foundation and Earth and Patternmaster. Yes, it was quite a descent into genre fiction from my lofty perch amongst David Foster Wallace and Haruki Murakami novels and .... oh let's face it, I've been reading more graphic novels than anything else for the past year. That and geeky nonfiction books by guys like Richard Dawkins and Antonio Damasio. I've been a very naughty English major, I admit.

And I would've gotten away with it, too, if it hadn't been for The Simulacra. This is the book that finally made me say uncle. The next book I read will be a bona fide Literary Classic, because Philip Dick has finally made me understand the limits of genre fiction. Dick was possibly unique among sci-fi writers of his generation, in that he fully embraced all the conventions of his genre—spaceships, aliens, advanced technology, parallel universes, and all manner of other weird things—but did not accept its limits. While most other sci-fi authors were content with writing neat little stories about how fancy gadgets would help humankind explore and conquer the galaxy, Dick wrote exclusively about dystopian future societies, viewing technology as the rope with which humanity would hang itself. Much more of a realist and more cynical than most of his peers, Dick's characters both conform to and utterly confound the clichés of sci-fi heroism. What makes them so wonderfully sympathetic is that they are almost always deeply flawed—even (sometimes especially) the central protagonist, presuming there is one.

Unfortunately that is where The Simulacra falls down. There is no central character in the novel and so, as the plot unfolds, it becomes increasingly difficult to decide whom to root for. This was seemingly Dick's intent, but he ends up leaving things in such a chaotic, ambiguous mess that by the time one reaches the end, no one seems particularly worth caring about. Perhaps the real problem is that there are so many characters that none of them really takes precedence over the others, either in terms of the amount of narrative devoted to them or the degree of sympathy with which Dick portrays them. To his credit, he avoids painting in black and white: while no one is truly evil, no one is particularly good either, and nearly everyone is simply concerned with the business of reacting to and trying to stay one step ahead of everyone else. In other words, this is a novel populated with selfish, neurotic schemers in a bleak world all but devoid of genuine caring about others.

In itself that does not invalidate the novel, but the story's lack of cohesion and unresolved situations don't build much of a case for its defense. When I say that there are limits to genre fiction and that Dick did not accept them, I am paying him a compliment: at his best, Dick transcended his chosen genre and elevated science fiction to literary, high-art status. Unfortunately, in writing this novel Dick fell prey to the perils of writing science fiction. He cleverly concocted a bunch of bizarre, fantastical situations, technologies and characters, but failed to imbue them with any real meaning or moment. Thus not only do we not know whom to care about, neither do we have any idea what the real point of anything that happened was. Perhaps that again was Dick's intent, but it's hard to understand what anyone else is supposed to get out of it. Ultimately the novel is frustratingly unsatisfying, lacking any real dramatic arc or climax—a dry hump of a narrative.

To try and summarize the plot would probably be an exercise in futility, but to give you the gist of things: the story takes place in a future America called the USEA in which the President is an android (simulacrum) called "der Alte," built by a huge, monolithic cartel called Karp und Sohn. A new der Alte is built every four years and "elected" by the people. The part of der Alte's wife Nicole is played by an actress. Meanwhile a secret, unelected Council actually runs everything and the people are kept distracted by the spectacle of der Alte and Nicole on their television screens. These are the secrets that separate the two segments of the society, the rulers and the general populace, called the Geheimnisträger ("secret bearers") and Befehlträger ("followers"), respectively. In the course of the novel, we follow "Nicole" and a host of other characters ranging from Richard Kongrosian, a paranoid, telekinetically-gifted Russian pianist, to Bertold Goltz, leader of a populist cult called the Sons of Job and ostensibly Nicole's nemesis.

Inexplicably, the novel ends with the implication that humanity is about to destroy itself and a new race of Neanderthaloid people (created accidentally through radiation damage during World War III) are ready and willing to take its place. Mind you, the first 200 pages of this 214-page novel give absolutely no inkling of anything relating to this theme whatsoever. Most of the novel is preoccupied with the internal and external struggles of the various characters and Dick's attempts to connect them, which are extremely artificial and make the author's role seem like that of a bio-engineer splicing genes together at random to see what happens. Perhaps the experiment was a success; I have a feeling only Dick knew for certain.

There is also a strangely persistent thread of paranoia relating to neo-Nazism which is of course never explained fully or resolved in any way. One is left uncertain as to what precisely Dick's point was: is the USEA a fascist government or are the "Sons of Job" led by Bertold Goltz the real neo-Nazis? And what in the world is the point of bringing real-life Nazi Hermann Goering into the story using time travel only to have him do absolutely nothing other than express horror at his own impending demise (revealed using the same time travel technology)? It simply doesn't make any sense.

With all that said, there are some redeeming qualities to The Simulacra. Dick's portrayal of his characters' mental flaws is, as always, one of the most ingratiating qualities of the book. His characters are always so beautifully flawed that we laugh at them and with them simultaneously, and try to pretend that we don't see ourselves in them. The book's tone, a mixture of paranoid dread and urgency with detached ironic observation, is also classic Dick. These elements are what makes the novel's failure such a particular disappointment. I have read several Philip K. Dick books but I've never been so dissatisfied after reading any of them. I can't recommend this book to general readers or new Dick fans, but if you're a hardcore fan and you're quite determined to read this, it will probably satisfy your craving for more Dick.

Personally, I'm off Dick for now. Yes, Dick has left a bad taste in my mouth. Okay okay, I'll stop with the Dick jokes. I'm just saying, don't waste your time with this one. Get a hold of one of his better novels, like The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch, The Divine Invasion or Martian Time-Slip; even VALIS, although some people hate that book—I happen to love it, but I can understand and sympathize with those who don't. Just be warned that none of his novels will turn out the way you expect. Of that I can absolutely assure you.

Sadhappy: Outerspaces

Sadhappy are not so much a band as a concept. Dating back to the late 80's, the band was originally a collaboration between Paul Hinklin and Evan Schiller, on bass and drums, respectively. Sadly (or happily), I can't tell you what Sadhappy sounded like back then, since I've only heard their latest CD, Outerspaces.

Happily (or sadly), I love this album and I'm going to tell you why. First of all, it features three incredibly talented musicians: Evan Schiller (drums and samplers), Michael Manring (basses) and Mike Keneally (guitars and keyboards). Secondly, it has some of the best track titles of any instrumental album not produced by Frank Zappa, including "Aerocar Vs. The Sweet Tines," "Nightmare At Guitar Center," "Wide Steaming River of Molasses," and my personal favorite, "Aunt Myrtle Ties One On At The Starlight Lounge." Thirdly, it is sonically and stylistically diverse enough that if you put the CD on, about 10-15 minutes later your friends will ask, "Is this still the same CD?" Fourthly, and apropos the previous points, it is FUN to listen to, something that is by no means guaranteed with instrumental music these days. Like Dweezil Zappa's recent Automatic, this is an album that displays formidable musicianship without taking itself too seriously or disappearing up its own ass. I recommend it for anyone who likes experimental, improvisatory music that isn't bogged down with heavy concepts or excessive wankery. And of course, it's mandatory for fans of Keneally, Manring and/or Sadhappy.

A very short guide to the eras of classical music

Medieval: Anything written in the Middle Ages, until around 1450. This is the one with all the monks chanting. Melodies are simple and writing is mainly sacred music for voice. Modern tonality had yet to be invented so the scales used in the melodies sound really "ancient." Since this era is so long and featured many transitional periods, it's hard to come up with a list of composers who typified the period.

Renaissance: By the 15th century, music theory was advancing and the forms were getting more complex. Polyphony (more than one melody being played at the same time) comes to prominence and the laws of harmony are relaxed a bit to accomodate the needs of the new music. Composers in this period include William Byrd, Giovanni Palestrina, Jacob Obrecht and many others.

Baroque: Dating from the 17th to midway through the 18th centuries, this is the stuff with the harpsichords. The Baroque sense of melody was quite different from our own: repetition was minimal and Baroque composers wrote long, ornate, endlessly flowing melodies. This was also the period in which opera was invented (in Italy, of course). Important composers of this era include Purcell, Buxtehude, Telemann, Handel, J.S. Bach, Monteverdi, Scarlatti and Vivaldi.

Classical: Though classical is a catch-all term for all "concert" music, the Classical era in European music is considered to last from the mid-18th to the early 19th centuries (1740-1820 is often used for the timespan). This is the era in which our modern sense of melody and form were invented, chiefly by C.P.E. Bach (J.S. Bach's #1 son) and Haydn, who are considered the founders of the Classical movement. Basically this involved increasing the dramatic potential of the music through the use of various rhetorical devices, such as repetition and contrast, to create tension and resolution (thus giving the music a dramatic arc). In the Classical style, these techniques became the modus operandi by which composers generated and sustained a listener's interest. Composers of note include Haydn, C.P.E. Bach, J.C. Bach, Mozart, and Beethoven.

Romantic: From mid-19th century into the early 20th century, composers generally followed Beethoven's lead in taking the Classical forms and expanding, loosening and personalizing them as they saw fit. Even as the methods of Haydn, Mozart and Beethoven became institutionalized in music schools, composers of this era usually felt compelled to come up with more and more idiomatic and personal means of expressing greater depths of emotion. The result was a looser, more chromatic sense of harmony and a general move toward larger orchestral forces and forms.

A sense of nationalism as well as increased reliance on extra-musical literary and pictorial references also characterize the Romantic period. This is the era in which composers wrote vast symphonic poems, gigantic operas and virtuosic sonatas and concerti. Since this period is so diversified with so many composers from different nations with vastly different styles, it is somewhat difficult to characterize the "Romantic sound." Wagner and Brahms were two equally Romantic composers, but they could hardly be more different from each other, and in fact they were de facto leaders of rival schools of musical thought. The list of great composers from this era is imposingly large: Schubert, Brahms, Schumann, Wagner, Bruckner, Mendelssohn, Tchaikovsky, Chopin, Liszt, Dvorak and Berlioz, just to name a few.

20th Century (pre-World War II): All bets are off as the available musical resources increase at a rapidly escalating rate. Composers take advantage of this bounty to come up with some of the most astonishly complex and diverse music yet written, in styles ranging from old-fashioned (neo-Romantic and neo-Baroque) to new and experimental (atonal, polytonal, serial, polyrhythmic). Important composers are too numerous to count but include Stravinsky, Schoenberg, Webern, Bartok, Verdi, Mahler, Sibelius, Shostakovich, Rachmaninoff, Prokofiev, Varese, Ives, Holst and many, many more.

20th Century (post-WWII): The rise to prominence of several forms of popular music outside of the classical tradition (notably jazz and rock n roll among many others) creates a problem for composers who choose to continue writing "traditional" music. Some choose to ignore the outside world and continue the developments of those before them: Pierre Boulez, among others, develops serial music and others follow suit. Other composers take advantage of new advances in technology in various ways, composing pieces for magnetic tape and using samples of "found sounds" and manipulating them in various ways (the technique is called musique concrete and is first used by Edgard Varese and Pierre Henry, later taken up by Karlheinz Stockhausen and many others). Still others follow more idiosyncratic paths: John Cage experiments with "prepared" piano as well as compositions mediated through the operation of chance, making explicit the heretofore unacknowledged random ineffability of musical performance; Krystof Penderecki and others write music utilizing micro-intervals to create new levels of dissonance; Steve Reich, Terry Riley and Philip Glass explore various aspects of minimalism in music; Frank Zappa uses the example of Varese's "blocks of sound" combined with his own love of rhythm & blues to create a savvy, satirical, heavily-ironicized music combining elements of rock, jazz, pop and 20th century classical. Other composers before and since WWII include: Harry Partch, Conlon Nancarrow, Olivier Messiaen, George Crumb, Gyorgi Ligeti, Arvo Part, and myriad others.

For much more detail on all of these eras, Wikipedia is your friend.

Bach: English Suites No. 2 & 3 and Scarlatti: 4 Sonatas; Ivo Pogorelich, piano; DG1986

It's probably foolish of me to recommend a recording of Bach's English Suites when it's the only recording I've listened to the whole way through, but I'm going to do it anyway, for a few reasons. One is that it's a cheap album that you can buy on iTunes and it comes with some bonus Scarlatti sonatas; another is that it's really, really good.

The recording in question is by Ivo Pogorelich, a Croatian pianist known mainly for his Chopin. It's a testament to his interpretive breadth that he is also able to play Bach and Scarlatti so convincingly. I think I remember reading an interview with Horowitz or some other old pianist saying that the best way to approach Bach on the piano is to pretend you're playing a harpsichord -- which is to say that the main problem with Bach on a modern piano is you've got to make it sound like it isn't a modern piano. It would be easy to succumb to the temptation to let the notes sustain and bleed all over each other into an Impressionistic mess. With Bach the most important consideration is clarity, since Baroque harmony is the result of the interweaving of separate melodic lines. When Bach was writing these pieces the pianoforte was a new instrument that sounded more like a clavichord than anything we'd recognize as a piano today. The dynamic range was much more limited, the strings weren't doubled, and the sustain pedal may not have even existed yet.

All that being said, it is very possible to play Bach on a modern instrument, provided you have an understanding of how to approach the music. Pogorelich clearly does and for that reason I wholeheartedly recommend this recording to anyone interested in exploring the music of J.S. Bach. This is a recording on Deutsche Grammophon from 1986 (presumably digital) and the sound is crisp without brittleness. I'm not sure where this was recorded but the ambience sounds quite natural and not overpowering or bone-dry, making it a pleasure to listen to and not fatiguing to the ears, even on headphones.

another tiny prayer to Father Time

Plans is the new album from Death Cab For Cutie. It's not being given the credit I think it deserves, presumably because it is the major-label debut of an established indie emo-pop group. No one is really bashing it (except people who obviously shouldn't be reviewing such material in the first place) but no one's quite singing its praises either. More or less the reaction across the board is a resigned "meh" of approval. This kind of apathy is disheartening but not unsurprising from professional critics who have to come up with something interesting to say in order to earn their living. As an alternative to world-weary criticism, I'm opening up my wordhole and exposing my earnest and embarrassingly naive opinions on music et al. I have an absolute commitment to better living through art and music and I stubbornly refuse to become jaded. That's about as close as you'll get to a manifesto out of me.

Some have compared Plans to X & Y, in an attempt to write it off as another fluffily soothing bit of background music with a crooning vocalist who writes esteem-boosting lyrics for his sensitive, primarily female audience. There might be some truth to that, but I think it's too facile. For one thing, while you won't catch me knocking Coldplay here, and I was very pleasantly surprised by their new album, Ben Gibbard makes Chris[t] Martin look like Robert Frost.

The poet analogy is deliberate, because some reviewers have been less than kind to some of Ben's writing on this album. But let's face it: in a world where critics quote Ashlee Simpson lyrics as though they were worth pondering over, at least he's trying to sing something memorable. And if he does err on the side of preciousness at times (e.g. the title of this post, which I have to admit I actually like), the lyrics are never less than solid and the imagery and subject matter is complemented nicely by the somber, polished arrangements. Speaking of which, an aside: I'm not one of those people who thinks great songwriting has to be accompanied by sonic murk -- perhaps because I listen to so much classical music. Yes, I'm a nerd. Yes, I'm one of those people who listens to Steely Dan and sings along with the guitar solos. And I realize that by admitting as much I've negated the value of my opinions for a good percentage of people out there. But don't say that you weren't warned!

To return to the subject at hand, Ben comes up with a few zingers throughout Plans. "What Sarah Said" conjures up a scene with which most of us are familiar, sitting in the hospital waiting room "that reeked of piss and 409," setting up a one-liner that made me smile: "And I looked around at all the eyes on the ground as the TV entertained itself." And in "Marching Bands of Manhattan" he picks up a familiar image (also used on the previous album, Transatlanticism):

Sorrow drips into your heart through a pinhole
Just like a faucet that leaks and there is comfort in the sound...

Comforting sounds are prevalent in Plans. Throughout, Ben Gibbard sounds comfortable enough with his own voice that he could pull off the old cliche and make the phonebook sound meaningful if he sang it. Since the sonic world in which that voice resides consists mainly of acoustic instruments, with lots of piano and organ along with the guitars, you may find as I do that this album sounds more like home than your actual home.

On the other hand, "Different Names For the Same Thing" has a deceptively old-fashioned piano/vocal intro, after which the song is rearranged and reharmonized to sound more like a Postal Service track -- lyrically the song is practically a haiku in its brevity, but musically the sense is of starting a lonely journey and arriving somewhere quite different, in a mood of elation, as though a battle has been fought and won, somewhere offstage.

I often think that the type of music we like reflects who we are as people. Your enjoyment of Death Cab For Cutie, and indeed the whole emo genre, probably is a good indicator of your level of introversion. If you're quiet and shy and spend a lot of time alone like I do, you'll probably find it easy to like this album. If your idea of a good time is club-hopping or you work in sales, Plans should be reserved for post-hangover recovery time only.

I'd appreciate feedback on this, my first review. FYI, I had to pee almost the entire time I was writing this. And I'm at work. So I have no idea if what I'm writing makes any sense, really.