Book Review: Your Favorite Band is Killing Me: What Pop Music Rivalries Reveal About the Meaning of Life, by Steven Hyden

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Book, Book Review, Music, Non-Fiction, Reading, Steven Hyden

This next read was a welcomed departure from my previously scheduled reading list which, given the current state of the world, was looking a bit too heavy at the moment.  I needed something to lighten the mood a bit and this 2016 release seemed to be just what I needed. Its author, Steven Hyden, certainly had some interesting credentials as well, having worked as an editor and writer for Grantland and AV Club, as well as appearing in Rolling Stone, Slate, and Saloon.

Music rivalries don’t matter until they matter to you personally.  When that happens, it’s as vital as protecting your own sense of identity.

The book is divided into sixteen chapters, each more or less a standalone discussion about how a particular musical feud (real or imagined) between artists and/or their fans speaks to larger philosophical and psychological issues in our society and what the sides we take reflect about our sense of identity.  Drawing examples from American popular music of the 1970s through early 2010s, Hyden’s topics include the likes of Eric Clapton vs. Jimi Hendrix, Roger Waters vs. Pink Floyd, Prince vs. Michael Jackson, and Nirvana vs. Pearl Jam along with what is considered requisite coverage of The Rolling Stones vs. The Beatles, Biggie vs. Tupac, and Kanye West vs. Taylor Swift.

This book covered so much ground no musically and culturally I’m not going to even attempt trying to unpack it all in this review.  I will say, however, that I found it to be an incredibly fun and enjoyable read that was both lighthearted and insightful. My opinion is undoubtedly swayed by the fact that I am perhaps squarely in the book’s core demographic by virtue of being roughly the same age as the author, having a similar worldview, and sharing at minimum a passing familiarity and connection to nearly all of the artists covered.  Not surprisingly, I most enjoyed those sections that focused on artists that I had the deepest connection to, though I was nonetheless captivated by Hyden’s humor and knowledge throughout. To offer up some sort of recap, here are a few of the highlights for me in no particular order:

1. As a big fan of Nirvana, I really enjoyed the sections in which Kurt Cobain appeared.  Most notable of these included a chapter on the somewhat one-sided rivalry between Nirvana and Pearl Jam which served as an excellent reminder of Cobain’s humor and, well, occasionally righteous snark.  That Cobain’s dismissal of Pearl Jam’s music as inauthentic fueled a segue into Bruce Springsteen’s repeated public dismissals of Chris Christie was an added bonus.  There was also much discussion throughout the book about the absurd confrontation between Cobain and recurring villain Axl Rose at the 1992 Video Music Award (more on this later) and was enthralled at the lengths the author went to in unpacking it all.

2. I likewise was very interested in the chapter featuring Billy Corgan.  Despite having loved them as a teenager, I find it incredibly difficult to re-listen to the Smashing Pumpkins.  Part of it is getting over a lot of that angst, but it’s mainly on account of Billy Corgan’s distinct voice making it nearly impossible for me to separate his “real life” descent into the alt-right from the music.  While he was likewise repulsed by the singer’s politics, I found the way the author framed Corgan’s lunacy as that of an awkward, insecure Midwestern guy trying (and failing) to fit into a scene he was otherwise a star of.  He concludes, however, after a lengthy and surprisingly not entirely unsympathetic comparison to Richard Nixon that:

It’s not the system, it’s him.  His insecurity over cool people believing he’s awful has made him awful.

3. Finally, the author quickly succeeded in selling me on his unrestrained love of the  1992 MTV Video Music Awards by finding a new way to bring it up in nearly every chapter.  I’m officially inspired to do a YouTube dive for it at some point during the Great Quarantine of 2020 by endorsements like this:

The ’92 VMAs are just the best.  You had Nirvana vs. Guns N’ Roses.  Nirvana vs. Pearl Jam. Dana Carvey as Garth Algar playing drums with U2.  You had Bobby Brown performing “Humpin’ Around” and Elton John performing “The One” on the same show.

The one place where I really disagreed with the author was over his thoughts on Kanye West, though in fairness I will say that this chapter simply did not age well.  At the time of his writing in 2016 he assumed it was over and done with. How could he imagine Kanye going completely off the rails of sanity, good taste, and ego to keep this tire fire burning?  That said, I do still think Hyden was overly charitable about both Kanye’s intentions and musical abilities. His perspective did, however, bring remind me of a point long since lost in the whole debacle about how it was originally perceived:

For those inclined to view awards shows as fundamentally prejudiced against artists of color (an impression supported by the historical record) Kanye interrupting Taylor…seems like a righteous “fuck you”….For those inclined to view awards shows as fundamentally prejudiced against female artists (another impression supported by the historical record) [it] seems like another instance of a man saying “fuck you” to a woman…

And I could easily go on.  If you have any interest at all in American popular music from the 1970s through early 2010s I highly recommend giving this a read.  It’s fun, irreverent, insightful, and full of fantastic stories about some of the biggest musicians and rivalries of those eras.

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Book Review: October, by China Mieville

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Bolshevism, Book, Book Review, China Mieville, Communism, Non-Fiction, Revolution, Russia

For my next review I am taking on a nonfiction book, and a rather timely one at that.  Perhaps better known for his fantasy novels, author China Mieville is also a devoted socialist activist in the United Kingdom and in a nod to his real world interests released this account of the 1917 Russian Revolution a few years backf.  What interested me about this title was that not only is it by an author I have enjoyed in a very different context, but he (like myself) has political sympathies that lay with the ideals and aspirations of the revolution despite being critical of its outcomes.  I also happen to know quite a bit about this topic from my university studies and was curious to see his take on it.

The book details the events leading up to the Bolshevik uprising on October 26, 1917 that ultimately paved the way for the creation of the Soviet Union.  It began, as these histories often do, with the 1905 uprisings against tsarist rule, the resulting period of reform and brutal counter-reform, and culminates in a month by month recap of the tumultuous year of 1917 that includes the abdication of Tsar Nicholas II in March and the Bolshevik-led uprising at the end of October.  Centered in the capitol city Petrograd, the action focuses primarily on the events there and the struggles between and within the various groups vying for control and influence. To note, Mieville acknowledges in the introduction that while he has his “villains and heroes” in this story he does strive to be fair in order to present a valuable story to people of all persuasions.  

The style and substance of this style was honestly quite impressive.  Given the scope of the topic this was by necessity a rather breezy account, limited as it was to 300-something pages, but he definitely made them count.  Mielville was able to cover all the highlights enough to give the casual reader an understanding of the events and its players while establishing a historical context that captured the chaos, confusion, and often zealous optimism of the times.  That he kept this coherent while moving the story forward at a consistent pace is truly commendable. While not intended to be a source for scholarly endeavors, this work was nonetheless quite thoroughly researched and based entirely upon events and quotation within the documented, historic record.  (As an aside, his reference section is quite extensive and contains several sources I recognize and have cited from my own studies). The author’s goal was to provide a resource for readers seeking a more casual understanding and by this measure, the book was most definitely a success. I would also say that most readers (with the predictable exceptions) would say that Mieville was indeed fair in his account.

As for my more personal impressions, I really enjoyed this read and found that I was still able to get a lot of it from a philosophical and historical perspective despite being well versed in the subject matter.  One of the biggest points of interest here for me was some of the more personal glimpses into the people involved. The well known figures like Lenin and Trotsky are always endlessly fascinating individuals to read about, as was Alexander Kerensky and his desperate attempts to navigate a power sharing arrangement between the Provisional Government and Socialist dominated Soviet committees.  What really inspired my side reading for this book, however, were two women about whom I knew considerably less; Maria Spiridonova and Alexandra Kollontai.  In brief, Spiridonova gained prominence following her 1906 assassination of a reviled security chief know for his brutal policies and affiliation with a far-right group defined by their embrace of the Tsar’s more authoritarian tendencies and enthusiasm for pogroms.  The act itself, followed by harrowing tales of her abuse and torture in police custody, made Spiridonova a celebrated and influential figure in the growing anti-tsarist movement for many years to follow. Kollontai, on the other hand, was a prominent Bolshevik activist, member of the Petrograd Soviet’s Executive Committee, and one of the first in the party to openly endorse Lenin’s radical positions regarding opposition to the Provisional Government and Russia’s ruinous involvement in World War One.  She is also considered an influential figure in shaping contemporary concepts of feminism, sexuality, and women’s liberation.

And that is where I am going to start wrapping up my review before I get carried away on historical tangents on the significance of WWI in arming the revolution and the morbid fascination of seeing the ways in which all aspects of the Russian society and state splintered into heavily armed rival factions.  Suffice to say, this was a really engaging read for me and an excellent refresher on a topic that I was once very much immersed in. I suppose this isn’t necessarily a book for everyone, especially those more interested in the author’s fantasy novels and less so his politics, but I most certainly would recommend it to someone seeking an approachable source for learning about this part of history.

 

Book Review: When They Call You a Terrorist, A Black Lives Matter Memoir, by Patrisse Khan-Cullors and asha bandele

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asha bandele, Black History Month, Black Lives Matter, BLM, Book, Book Review, Non-Fiction, Patrisse Khan-Cullors, Reading

In recognition of Black History Month I wanted to make sure that I did some reading to properly observe the occasion.  With one eye set towards the future, this next book tells the story of someone currently in the process of making history.

Published in 2018, this intimate memoir looks at the life and a activism of Patrisse Khan-Cullors, a woman praised in the introduction for her work towards pushing the boundaries of black, left, feminist, and queer activism.  In these pages she describes the hardships of growing up poor, black, and queer in Van Nuys, CA during the 1990s. Often deeply personal, she provides an account of how growing up in these conditions shaped the lives of her and her family and motivated her to pursue work as an activist and community organizer.  In the final chapters, she brings it all together to tell the story of how the acquittal of Trayvon Martin’s killer in the summer of 2013 set off a chain of events that led her to co-found the Black Lives Matter movement alongside colleagues Alicia Garza and Opal Tometi.

This was an intense read.  The conversational tone of the book combined with its emotional mix of sincerity, pain, frustration, anger, love, and faith made it a powerful experience.  It speaks much to the author’s strength as a person that she could share such a personal story, particularly in regard to her father’s struggles with addiction and her mentally ill brother’s mistreatment and literal torture by the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department as real life examples of the issues she discusses.  I couldn’t possibly hope to sufficiently cover all the details here, but alongside her personal story she offers a pretty spot-on analysis of the ways in which race and class can stack the deck against people living in poor, predominantly black communities like the one she grew up in. She talks a great deal about how a lack of proper public amenities and infrastructure, social services, and economic opportunities work in combination with a disproportionately intense, and often unaccountable, police presence puts people on track for failure, prison, or violence at an early age by “normaliz[ing] expectations of criminality” and creating a stigma around these individuals and communities that can last a lifetime.  She ties to this an analysis of the prison system and how the “prison industrial complex” benefits from the high levels of incarceration resulting from the dynamic above.  Prisoners, she observes, are a valuable source of cheap labor for the state and corporations alike while the jails themselves offer lucrative contracts to the people who operate and stock them while simultaneously providing employment opportunities to replace lost rural jobs in poor white communities.

As for myself, I was left with a lot to think about after reading this.  In short, this book made me angry; angry to live in a society where the sort of systemic oppression the author describes not only exists, but is considered right and just by a significant enough portion of the population that questioning it can be spun as a controversial or radical idea.  Many times throughout this story I found myself thinking back on events from my own life and how they might have played out differently had my circumstances and socio-economic status not been what they were. I won’t go into details, but I can readily think back on several events (some innocent, others less so) from my teen years spent living an affluent, mostly white town where the type of police scrutiny and automatic assumption of guilt could have easily altered the course of my life for the worse and that is a sobering thought indeed.  

In closing, I want to say that I found this a powerful and educational read that I would recommend to anyone interested in these issues.  Although I didn’t really get into this part of the book above, I also came away from this read with a much deeper appreciation of what Black Lives Matter seeks to accomplish and learned a lot about how influential feminist and queer activists play in the movement.  There is without a certainly a lot more to those stories than what most people hear in the news, and in this book Patrisse offers an important voice that needs to be both heard and taken seriously.

Book Review: Barrel Aged Stout and Selling Out: Goose Island, Anheuser-Busch, and How Craft Beer Became Big Business, by Josh Noel

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AB-Inbev, Beer, Book, Book Review, Chicago, Goose Island Beer Company, History, Josh Noel, Non-Fiction, NonFictionNovember, Reading

Once again my interests in beer and books unite!  Recently published in June 2018, this book was written by Chicago Tribune writer Josh Noel who, over the course of its 400-plus pages, guides the reader on a behind the scenes look at how Chicago’s Goose Island Beer Company became one of the country’s top craft breweries and how its sale to the Brazilian/Belgian conglomerate AB-Inbev, the parent company of Anheuser-Busch, Grupo Modelo, and many, many other breweries across the world, in 2011 shook the American beer industry.  For any readers that may not know, this was huge news in the beer world at the time as Goose Island was one of the first major American craft breweries to be acquired by Inbev, and many consumers and craft brewers alike loudly accused Goose Island and its founders of selling out to the bad guys in Big Beer.

I found this to be a really interesting and informative read as Noel presented a thoughtful and engaging narrative about Goose Island and the people behind it.  I’ve had my share of their brews over the years, highlighted by a visit to the Wrigleyville brewpub before going to a Yankees-Cubs game several years back, and appreciated getting some additional background about the company’s beers and history.  In the earlier chapters that focused on the brewery’s origin story, what I most enjoyed reading about were the difficulties the owners faced introducing their brand of beer to consumers who, in the mid-80s, were for the most part conditioned to think that the yellow, mild lagers pushed by Budweiser and Miller were the be all and end all of beer.  It is amazing to think about how far the American beer scene has come in that time and it was fascinated to read about the changes Goose Island helped usher in.

As for the second part of the book, in which Noel examined the cultural and economic impact of the brewery’s sale on the American brewing industry, I particularly enjoyed how he framed the concerns about this, and subsequent acquisitions by Inbev, in the context of production and distribution.  I felt made for a very tangible and compelling argument against Big Beer. These are probably the aspects of the industry most consumers think about the least, but they are so vital to understanding what is at stake here. The threat to the craft beer industry, and by extension its consumers, from AB-Inbev is that it can use its vastly superior finances and (often borderline illegal) clout with distributors to muscle in and push smaller breweries off of shelves and taplists.  This, in conjunction with purposefully obfuscating ownership of their umbrella brands, puts them in a position to deceive consumers into thinking they have a choice of brands when in reality they might not. To cite an example from the text:

Few people would recognize a draft list of Goose Island, Elysian, 10 Barrel, Widmer, Stella, and Bud and Bud Light as the absence of choice.  Yet, quietly, that’s what is was.

And that’s only a small sampling of the possibilities, especially as AB continues to acquire new brands.  This strategy, combined with a disingenuous campaign urging consumers to focus solely on the beer in the glass as opposed to who puts it there shows the lengths Inbev will go in order to cash in on America’s love of craft beer.  While there is certainly some merit to this argument, its real aim is to distract consumers from the fact that AB is spending a whole lot of money in an attempt to be the only company putting beer in your glass.

Again, I really enjoyed this book and learned quite a bit of new information about the beer business.  It also gave me with a few things to think about next time I am out and looking for a drink, especially with the annual release of Goose Island’s popular (and undeniably delicious) Bourbon County Brand Stout lineup coming up on Black Friday.  People are, of course, free to drink what they like, though I think I personally may take a break from that beer for little while knowing what the money goes to. I know it’s ultimately not the most serious of issues facing the country at the moment, but it is one that I do have interest in.

Book Review: Summer of ‘68, by Tim Wendell

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1968, Baseball, Book, Book Review, History, MLB, Non-Fiction, Reading, Tim Wendell

 

Crossing another non-fiction book off my TBR list, this reading again combined history with another one of my favorite things: baseball.  I also just so happened to pick it up at the perfect time to carry me right into the start of Spring Training!

One of the things that I like about the baseball season is that it serves as a steady constant throughout much of the year, providing daily news and entertainment throughout the spring, summer, and (hopefully) most of the fall.  This is a sentiment shared by the author as well, who from that perspective looks at what happens to the fun and distraction of the game when it is being played in a time of historic unrest and change.  In Summer of ‘68, he uses the 1968 baseball season, in particular the paths of the league champion Detroit Tigers and St. Louis Cardinals, as a lens through which to look at the tumultuous events of the year and highlight some of the drastic changes occurring in society, sport, and media at the time.

I really enjoyed this book and found it very informative without being overly dense.  I’ve actually spent a good amount of time studying 1968 from various historical and activist perspectives, but never really thought about any of that as contemporary to what I knew of the year’s baseball season. Having not been there I lacked the context needed to put these two worlds together, and providing this connection was something at which the author excelled.  His use of anecdotes and interviews throughout the narrative gave clear voice to the people who were there and really drew the reader into the scene, regardless of whether that scene was stepping into the batter’s box against Cardinals’ ace Bob Gibson or watching the police riot at the Democratic National Convention in Chicago.  Easily the most moving part of this book for me was the lengthy recollection of Martin Luther King’s final hours followed accounts by the outrage that erupted in streets across the country several weeks later when Bobby Kennedy was assassinated.

Setting aside the historical events, what surprised me the most in this reading was how directly the players were affected by everything that was going on in the world.  It was common for players, journeymen and stars alike, to miss games weeks at a time to train with their Army Reserve units, a frustrating distraction for some and for others a very real reminder about the potential of serving in Vietnam.  Also, in these days before free agency, players were, for both better and worse, more closely tied to their teams and cities than they are today.  This was particularly true for the 1968 Detroit Tigers, a team that featured several players who grew playing with and against each other in the Detroit area.  Hanging like a dark cloud over their season were the events of the previous summer, during which they saw their city erupt into one of the worst riots in American history while playing a doubleheader.  In scenes nearly unimaginable today, two Tigers were themselves drawn directly into the chaos.  Pitcher Mickey Lolich, the eventual 1968 World Series MVP, in the course of a day went from pitching for the Tigers to guarding a radio tower with his reserve unit.  Elsewhere, outfield Willie Horton rushed from the stadium and, still in uniform, drove out towards his old neighborhood to plead with rioters from atop his car for them to go home peacefully.  There was a very real sense in the Tigers clubhouse that the team had an essential part to play in  keeping their hometown together through another summer.

On the baseball side of things, I was really fascinated by how much the game changed after this season.  Dubbed the “Year of the Pitcher” because of the many dominant starting pitching performances throughout the league, officials were concerned that the lack of offense would drive fans away to football, a sport deemed more favorable for viewing on TV and rapidly rising in popularity.  As a result, the strike zone was tightened for the following season and the pitcher’s mound was lowered five inches to its present day height of 10 inches.  The structure of the league would change in the next season as well, as four new expansion teams were added and the American and National Leagues were for the first time divided into Eastern and Western divisions.  Finally, it was during the 1968 season that the seeds of two concepts that would revolutionize the game were planted.  The first was Pitcher Tommy John suffering the shoulder injury that would ultimately lead him to get an experimental surgery that bears his name to this day.  The second, and even more dramatic, change was set in motion by the Cardinals’ owners, who after losing the World Series, began dismantling their roster, typically something players have little control over.  However, when they tried to move outfielder Curt Flood to Philadelphia a few seasons later, he resisted and instead sued Major League Baseball for Free Agency.  Although he lost, his case did pave the way for a successful challenge shortly thereafter that would forever change player salaries and how teams were assembled.

I could go on and on about all the interesting stories and bits of information I got out of reading this book.  As it is I feel like I only managed to scratch the surface in my discussion above.  The author provided an interesting and engaging account of the 1968 season and I highly recommend this book to anyone out there with an interest in baseball or American history.

 

 

Book Review: Over-the-Rhine: When Beer was King, by Michael D. Morgan

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Beer, Book, Book Review, History, Michael D. Morgan, Non-Fiction, Ohio, Over-the-Rhine, Reading

I am stepping outside of my science fiction and fantasy worlds for a bit to read something that touches on two of my favorite real world topics – history and beer.  This book had also been on my TBR pile for quite some time so there was the added satisfaction of crossing it off that list as well.

This book offers a brief look at the storied history of a Cincinnati neighborhood called Over-the-Rhine, a once vibrant district that fell on hard times in the early 1900s and never quite recovered.  Over-the-Rhine rose to prominence in the mid-1800s after a huge influx of German immigrants forged a proud, hard-working community that played a key role in Cincinnati emerging as important trade center.  Celebrated as a little piece of Germany in America, Over-the-Rhine captivated locals and tourists alike with its Germanic charm and the locally brewed lager that flowed readily in its many beer gardens and saloons.  Unfortunately, these characteristics would ultimately serve to attract the wrong kind of attention as the rising tide of Prohibition and anti-German sentiments following the entry of the US into World War I would ultimately forever alter the characteristics of the neighborhood.

I enjoyed this book and made short work of its 170 or so pages.  It provided plenty of interesting information about brewing in the late-1800s/early-1900s and the influences it had on both the architecture and social fabric of the Over-the-Rhine community.  I also found myself fascinated by the politics of the day and how the temperance movement leveraged its unlikely alliance of divergent groups (ranging from suffragettes to klansmen) to relentlessly pressure and gerrymander local elections to achieve their goals.  The factors the author most strongly attributed to the rise of the Prohibitionist movement (religions zealotry, classism, racism, and rural resentment of the urbanization of American life) were all used at various times to target the German community in Over-the-Rhine and effectively organized it into a powerful, though occasionally controversial, voting bloc for any political candidates that valued individual liberty over temperance.

As for the present, what little survives of the old Over-the-Rhine neighborhood sounds like an absolutely fascinating bit of history, especially all the old architecture and unearthed felsen tunnels used to age beer before the rise of artificial refrigeration.  Bockfest sounds like a pretty good draw as well, though we probably won’t be taking any family trips there in the near future.  Regardless, I had a good time reading this book and certainly recommend it to anyone with an interest in either American or beer history.

Book Review: Radio Free Boston – The Rise and Fall of WBCN, by Carter Alan

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Book, Book Review, Boston, Carter Alan, Massachusetts, Music, New England, Radio, Reading, WBCN

I picked up this next book looking for a bit of local history.  WBCN was my go to radio station during my middle and high school years and in many ways helped set the soundtrack of my youth.  On car rides, in my room doing homework, or even late night in bed when I probably should have been sleeping, “The Rock of Boston” was there.

The book was written by Carter Alan, author and former WBCN DJ.  Chronicling an oral history of the station from its founding in 1968 to the final sign off in 2009, the book’s narrative guides the reader through the history of the station by infusing the author’s own insights with a generous mix of quotes and stories from the people who were there.  What emerges is an interesting portrait of everything from the station, the evolution of the radio business, and, of course, the music.

I had a great time reading this.  The author’s enthusiasm was infectious and the story was well crafted and interesting throughout, though undeniably reverential.  For me there were two distinct parts to this story, the first of which being the history of the station from before I was alive or listening.  Going into this I knew very little of the station’s past or how it had grown into the local institution I knew it to be.  I found the idea of it starting as a fledgling experiment in freeform radio really intriguing and had no idea how political the station was originally, having taken an active voice in opposition to US involvement in Vietnam and advocating on behalf of a variety of social justice issues as part of its regular programming.

The second part of this story began for me once the book got into the late-80s and 90s.  It was around here that my own feelings of nostalgia took over as I was able to recognize more of the bands and on-air personalities.  I found myself recalling many of the sounds of those years; from vague memories of the station’s 1988 anti-Apartheid campaign, complete with on air calls to boycott Shell Oil, to the infamous “Lunch Song” parodies and even the old station IDs.  It was also a lot of fun getting the backstories of some of the hosts I used to listen to like Oedipus, Bradley Jay, Juanita, Melissa, and (my favorite) Nik Carter, which in many ways felt like catching up with old friends.  I’ll admit I even got a bit fired up recalling the mid-90s feud between BCN and Worcester-based WAAF (a big part of which was fueled by WAAF shock jocks Opie and Anthony attacking on air one BCN DJ for being gay and another for being black).

It was during this time period that I started going to concerts and I have BCN to thank for more than a few of my most memorable shows; including my very first one (Gravity Kills at the Middle East in Cambridge), an intimate evening with the Smashing Pumpkin at the Orpheum Theater in Boston, and Cypress Hill at an all day festival in the Foxboro Stadium (the predecessor of Gillette Stadium).  Unfortunately it was also during this era that the seeds were sown for the station’s eventual demise.  The radio business was changing and several programming decisions began to slowly alter the audience, tone, and direction of the station.  I can’t help but feel slightly vindicated in that the programing decisions I hated the most as teenager (namely picking up the Howard Stern Show and airing New England Patriots football games) were ultimately contributing factors despite being huge financial boons at the time.

Even though it ended with the station’s eventual demise, I thought this book was a great trip down memory lane and I read it with a smile on my face the whole time.  If you’ve ever spent any significant amount of time in Boston and regularly tuned into the station, this book is for you.

Book Review: Communion – A True Story, by Whitley Strieber

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Aliens, Book, Book Review, Communion, Fall, Halloween, Non-Fiction, Reading, UFO, Ufology, Visitors, Whitley Strieber

At just over two weeks into October it’s only natural for one’s thoughts to turn towards Halloween.  In keeping with the spirit of the season I thought it would be appropriate to get in at least one spooky story this month.  Since I’m not really into horror or thrillers, I decided to go with something a bit out of the ordinary.  I don’t recall the exact circumstances in which the internet led me to this book, but here we are.

The book is told from the perspective of its author, horror writer Whitley Strieber, and details his struggle to make sense of, and cope with, his extreme physical and psychological responses to two traumatic, but largely repressed, incidents that occurred on October 4 and December 26, 1985.  After a period of severe mental anguish he enters therapy and begins to suspect something truly out of the ordinary happened to him and perhaps his family as well.  As the course of his therapy sessions ultimately turns toward hypnosis, he begins to recall specific details of terrifying encounters with non-human beings he refers to as the Visitors.  Through this process, he gradually uncovers more memories of not only the two events towards the end of 1985, but rather a lifetime of such experiences in which he has been observed, taken from his home or car, and experimented upon.  The story alternates between the author’s, often disjointed, analysis of various events and transcripts of his hypnosis sessions.  For good measure, partial excerpts of his wife’s hypnosis and a transcript of a meeting with other abductees is included as well.

This is a story that would fit right in as an episode of the X-Files (though its publication in 1987 predates the hit series by a good six years).  While the author does not assert that the Visitors are necessarily aliens (he leaves open a list of possibilities including time travelers, interdimensional beings, or an as yet undiagnosable imbalance in the brain), the events he describes are more or less consistent with the stereotypical alien visitation/abduction narrative.  Regardless of one’s thoughts on these matters, the story presented was not only really creepy and chilling, but also a thought-provoking look at the human mind.  As far as classifying this as a Halloween-worthy novel, I suppose that’s also up for interpretation, but I certainly found plenty of scary moments in here.  Despite the author’s eventual assertion that the Visitors may not mean him actual harm, the experiences described in general are pretty terrifying.  The parts that weirded me out the most, though, were probably those involving the author’s young son.   Without knowledge of his father’s beliefs, the boy spoke of recurring dreams about being carried away at night by “the little gray doctors” and wrote a variety of journal entries describing other strange events he was witness to.  This led Strieber to believe he was being visited as well, which from the perspective of a new father strikes me as particularly horrifying.  More personally, I was also a little unnerved when shortly after I began this book (and finished a section wherein the author discusses strange coincidences), a lingering shot of the cover appeared in a random episode of The Game Chasers that popped up in my YouTube suggestions list.

The fact that these events are presented as true, however, adds an extra element to this read.  The story told is rather extraordinary and controversial; not to mention that the subject matter tends to inspire a great deal of skepticism as misinformation and hoaxers abound.  Not knowing the author or having been witness to any of the events, I have only the words written on each by which to evaluate his claims.  I suppose the hardcore skeptic could just say that it’s all pure fiction and be done with it, but that would make for a pretty boring post.  Besides, I am more inclined to read this with an open mind and share the author’s convictions that claims such as these should be taken seriously and subjected to the appropriate level of analysis that they merit.

I’ll start with the argument for his position.  Speaking on an entirely personal level, there’s a part of me that can’t so easily dismiss his story.  The author’s actions in his personal life support the idea that at the very least something happened and for him to be making this all up means he’s running a very long con with no clear motive other than literary infamy.  He has apparently maintained his claims over a period of many years and seems like a credible, though admittedly very imaginative, individual.  He took a very rational and analytic approach to the situation, first exploring the possibility of mental and/or physical illness as the cause of his trauma and disturbing memories.  Only after passing a wide variety of physical and psychological tests does he begin to seriously consider the possibility that the Visitors are real.  Another thing in his favor is that he has corroborating witnesses; accounts given by a pair of house guest staying with the family on the night of October 4 lend support to his claims something highly unusual happened that night, and additional insights provided by Strieber’s wife and son also support the visitation pattern he alleges.

On the other hand, despite being Team Mulder back in the 90s, there’s a significant part of me is of the opinion that I don’t want to believe this terrifying tale.  However, not wanting to believe something is not the same as that thing being false so we’ll have to dig a bit deeper.  It’s not too hard to imagine that an accomplished author, particularly one that specializes in horror, could create a compelling abduction story.  It’s always dangerous to fully trust somebody trying to sell you something and indeed the author acknowledges similarities between the Visitors and various creatures from his novels (though he offers the explanation that those characters were influenced by his subconscious reactions to said Visitors).  Again, having not been there, it’s on his written word only that I must accept (or not) his experiences, the reports of corroborating witnesses, the accuracy of professional opinions and hypnosis techniques, etc.  Even if taking it all at face value, I will say there were a few points where I heard Scully’s voice yelling in my head about certain conclusions drawn.  I would also have been interested in hearing some dissenting opinions on his views to get a better sense of perspective.  Surely he couldn’t have only dealt with medical and psychological professionals sympathetic to his story?  I also wish that we were provided with more details about what his friends perceived about the October 4 incident as well as what his sister thought about incidents from his childhood said to involve her.  Despite all the efforts to describe the scientific thoroughness of coming to the Visitor conclusion, all the data and perspectives offered were a bit one-sided.

So, what do I conclude from all that?  I’m afraid the best answer I can give is something of a cop-out.  On the subject of aliens/Visitors, I am mostly agnostic.  I do believe that life, probably even intelligent life, exists somewhere out there.  Whether or not we are in the right place or time to encounter it, however, is a serious question for me; as is the question of whether or not we would even possess the sensory or mental capacity to even perceive that life should it cross our path.  I’ll add here that I also think that UFOs are literally that – unidentified.  Could be aliens, could be military, could be something in between.  I think it is important and understandable to want to explain them, but I draw no firm conclusions I’ll put to print.  Getting back to the book, I do believe that the author’s mental anguish was genuine and caused by some traumatic event(s) I am not in a position to expand upon further.  I’ll make the leap and say that I believe that he believes the Visitors are real which is something that should be taken seriously; if not by the reader then at the very least by those caring for and about him. 

Bottom line is that I guess I believed this enough to have been seriously creeped out reading the book but not enough to endorse it as 100% true.  I will admit that despite my sympathy to Strieber’s position, he did lose me a bit towards the end in his analysis of the Visitors and the history of their sightings.  I think here he slowly crossed a fine line from valid theorizing into pure conjecture and conspiracy theory which made rethink some of the previous chapters.   If you’re into this sort of thing, go ahead decide for yourself.  The truth is out there, I just can’t tell you what it is.

Book Review: Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail ‘72, by Dr. Hunter S. Thompson

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Book Review, Books, Democratic Party, Donald Trump, Fear and Loathing, George McGovern, gonzo, Hillary Clinton, Hunter S. Thompson, Politics, presidential election, Reading, Republican Party, Richard Nixon

This book ranks among my all time favorites and has been an election year tradition ever since I found my copy at a San Francisco antique store back in 2003.  Told through a series of articles, field notes, diatribes, and ultimately taped conversations with his editor (following a nervous breakdown in November), Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail ‘72 is a narrative of Thompson’s experiences and impressions covering the 1972 Democratic primaries and Presidential election for Rolling Stone magazine.  True to the author’s style, it contains a lot of colorful language, strong opinions, and several misadventures.  Frank Mankiewicz, campaign director of eventual Democratic nominee George McGovern, once called the book “the least factual, most accurate account” of the process; which given Hunter’s huge emotional investment, not to mention penchant for wild tangents and exaggeration, sounds about right.  If you’re at all interested in American politics or government this book is a must read.

For a general overview, the story begins in December 1971 and follows the path of South Dakota Senator George McGovern en route to winning the hotly contested 1972 Democratic Presidential nomination.  By appealing to the more liberal wing of the party and mobilizing an enthusiastic following among young voters, his campaign’s superior grassroots network allowed him to defeat a pair of old-guard establishment favorites while fending off a surprise challenge posed by a far-right demagogue.  After surviving an “Anyone But McGovern” challenge at the party convention, he seemed poised to deny Richard Nixon a second term in office.  Shortly following the nomination, however, the wheels began to fall off the campaign.  A scandal over an unpopular Vice Presidential selection with a history of shock therapy and lukewarm support from the defeated party establishment killed enthusiasm among new-found supporters and traditional Democratic voting blocs alike.  As a result McGovern suffered a crushing defeat, winning only in Massachusetts and Washington, DC, as Nixon cruised to reelection following a historically low voter turnout percentage.

Reading this again made me wish that Hunter was still alive to give his thoughts on our current political situation.  Having boasted of writing “some of the most brutal and hateful caricatures of Richard Nixon ever committed to print, in this country or any other (399),” what would he have to say about this year’s crop of Republicans?  Would he have felt the Bern despite his misgivings about the Democratic Party?  With these thoughts in mind, I will close with a few quotes that struck me as particularly relevant this year.

Speaking to my own Fear and Loathing about the candidates we’ve been offered for this November, the specifics might be different, but the sentiments are eerily similar:

How many more of these goddamn elections are we going to have to write off as lame but “regrettably necessary” holding actions?  And how many more of these stinking, double-downer sideshows will we have to go through before we can get ourselves straight enough to put together some kind of national election that will give me and the at least 20 million people I tend to agree with a chance to vote for something instead of always being faced with that old familiar choice between the lesser of two evils?  (55-6)

How long, O Lord. . .How long?  Where will it end?  The only possible good that can come of this wretched campaign is the ever-increasingly likelihood that it will cause the Democratic Party to self-destruct.  A lot of people are seriously worried about this, but I am not one of them.  I have never been much of a Party Man myself. . . and the more I learn about the realities of national politics, the more I’m convinced that the Democratic Party is an atavistic endeavor – more an Obstacle than a Vehicle – and that there is really no hope of accomplishing anything genuinely new or different in American politics until the Democratic Party is done away with. (125)

As for Donald Trump, these next few lines instantly made me think of the Republican nominee.  Again, the names may be different, but the personality disorders are apparently nothing new:

…it is Nixon himself who represents that dark, venal, and incurably violent side of the American character almost every other country in the world has learned to fear and despise.  Our Barbie doll President, with his Barbie doll wife and his box-full of Barbie doll children is also America’s answer to the monstrous Mr. Hyde.  He speaks for the Werewolf in us; the bully, the predatory shyster who turns into something unspeakable, full of claws and bleeding string-warts, on nights when the moon comes too close… (416-7)

The main problem in any democracy is that crowd-pleasers are generally brainless swine who can go out on a stage & whup their supporters into an orgiastic frenzy-then go back to the office & sell every one of the poor bastards down the tube for a nickel apiece.  (127)

The root of the Wallace magic was a cynical, showbiz instinct for knowing exactly which issues would whip a hall full of beer-drinking factory workers into a frenzy – and then doing exactly that, by howling down to them from the podium that he had an instant, overnight cure for all their worst afflictions…The ugly truth is that Wallace had never even bothered to understand the problems – much less come up with any honest solutions…(275)

Jesus! Where will it end? How low do you have to stoop in this country to be President? (414)

Book Review: Summer of Beer and Whiskey, by Edward Achorn

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Baseball, Beer, Book Review, Books, Edward Achorn, MLB, Philadelphia, Reading, St. Louis, Summer

No, this isn’t a beverage post, nor does it reflect in any way on how my summer is going so far.  Newborns tend to discourage that sort of thing.  Rather, this is a book about one of my other summertime favorites: baseball.  

Summer of Beer and Whiskey tells the story of the American Association, a short-lived professional baseball league that played from 1882 to 1891.  It provides an extensively researched narrative covering the Association’s founding and the thrilling 1883 pennant race between the St. Louis Brown Stockings and the Philadelphia Athletics.  As an upstart rival to the National League, the Association sought to re-popularize the sport after a long string of embarrassing scandals caused the general public to lose faith in the integrity of the game and its players.  Standing in stark contrast to the perceived elitism and puritanism of National League President William A. Hulbert’s iron rule, the Association would revolutionize the sport at the professional level by lowering ticket prices, playing games on Sunday, and allowing the sale of beer in stadiums.  These changes did not come without controversy as critics dubbed the Association the “Beer and Whiskey Circuit,” on account of most team owners having interests in saloons, biergartens, malting, and breweries, and accused them of soliciting “hoodlums” and “riffraff” as fans by making games affordable to the workingman.  However, despite this skepticism, the American Association successfully expanded the game’s audience and helped rescue the sport from financial collapse before eventually folding and merging into the National League.

I found this book fascinating and had a hard time putting it down.  I knew pretty much nothing about this part of baseball history and really enjoyed reading about it.  One thing I found interesting was the reign of William A. Hulbert and the absolute power he had over the sport as National League President.  From imposing the Reserve Clause, which would prohibit Free Agency in Major League Baseball for nearly 100 years, blacklisting players from all levels of professional baseball for transgressions against the League, and expelling big market teams for not following his edicts, most notably the Philadelphia Athletics and New York Mutuals in 1876 for having to cancel games and the Cincinnati Reds in 1880 for refusing to stop the sale of beer, he was certainly an interesting figure to read about.  It makes you really see how much power has shifted to the players and the player’s union over the last few decades.

I also enjoyed reading about how much the game on the field has changed in the last 130 or so years.  As a modern fan, many aspects of the game back then may seem nearly incomprehensible.  On the field, things like the absence of fielding gloves and protective gear were probably the most striking examples of these differences.  Needless to say injuries were common and many careers came to unfortunate ends as a result.  There were also a lot of differences in the rules governing gameplay that drastically changed the dynamics of an at bat.  One such rule that particularly amazed me was hit batsmen not getting a free base, a loophole some pitchers would dangerously exploit to their advantage.  These differences, however, are just the tip of the iceberg and there are plenty more that come up as you read through the book.

It was a different world statistically as well.  Just take a look at some of the American Association’s leaders in pitching statistics at the end of the 98 game 1883 season (as listed in the book’s appendix):

Wins: 43

Innings: 619

Complete Games: 68

In today’s era of 162 game seasons, 43 wins is a lofty goal for two years.  Pitching 619 innings is a milestone that would require a combination of exceptional health, skill, and willing management to reach in three seasons.  As for complete games, today’s specialized bullpens have made those a much rarer feat.  According to Baseball Reference, you’d have to go back to 2011 (James Shields with 11) and 2008 (CC Sabathia with 10) for the last two times a Major League pitcher even broke into double digits.

If you are a fan of baseball and its history, definitely consider checking out this book.  Edward Achorn tells a highly entertaining story that does an excellent job bringing this period of baseball history to life in a manner that is both interesting and informative.