More Moore part 17: Watchmen chapters 4-6

Watchmen chapters 4-6 (1986-87)

Even after the excellent first three chapters of Watchmen, chapters 4-6 prove to be a strong point, both in the novel and in Moore's oeuvre in general, with two incredible 'origin' chapters sandwiching a chapter that plays with the musical structure of the novel and provides us with a sudden...and suspicious...action sequence. The writing is top-notch, compelling and philosophical, and the characters waxing about the nature of time and evil will leave you thinking long after you close the pages. Like any novel, some parts of Watchmen are stronger than others, but when the word 'masterpiece' is thrown around like so much confetti, just thinking about chapters 4, 5, and 6 make me think that they're not too far off.

Things start off strong with chapter four, 'Watchmaker', the origin story of the atomic-powered Doctor Manhattan. The Doctor went into Martian self-exile the last chapter, and in 'Watchmaker' we experience his past, present, and future simultaneously, Manhattan's sense of time compressed to a quantum level where everything that has happened, is happening, and will happen occurs at once. From a narrative standpoint this is genius and in Moore's hands it works where a lesser writer might stumble, Dr. Manhattan alone in the Martian wasteland contemplating how it is he came to this point, experiencing the events for the first time even as he remembers them as distant memories, giving us contemplative, eloquent captions:

"The photograph is in my hand/It is the photograph of a man and a woman. They are at the amusement park, 1959./In twelve seconds time, I drop the photograph to the sand at my feet, walking away. It's already lying there, twelve seconds into the future."

To this reader, the main theme of Watchmen is one of powerlessness: all strata of the protagonists, from Rorschach breaking thug's fingers on the street to Ozymandias manipulating the world's events to force peace, are in the end totally unable to alter the flow of events (depending on your interpretation of the ending, at least. And that's mine). By having Doctor Manhattan experience time on a quantum level, Moore, in a very real, simple way completely depowers a seemingly godlike character; if he experiences all time simultaneously, Manhattan, for all his omnipotence, is unable to alter ANY events, as to him everything that will ever happened already has. Manhattan says as much to his girlfriend Janey Slater when confronted about not preventing the Kennedy assassination:

"I can't prevent the future. To me, it's already happening."

Around this time Moore showed his ability in humanizing omnipotent characters, both with Doctor Manhattan here and Superman in his "For the Man Who Has Everything", proving that you don't need to literally depower these characters to make them relatable, you just need to put them in situations where their powers are inconsequential, and that is precisely what Manhattan's situation does to him. When one knows the future to be unalterable, one really is trapped by the prison of fate, and for all of Doctor Manhattan's supreme powers, he's just as helpless as everybody else in Moore's world. The chapter ends with with the blue glowing Manhattan building a crystalline palace from the Martian sand, a scene which should bring waves of nostalgia to anyone who read through Swamp Thing's similar exile in Book V of that series.

After the quantum poetry of 'Watchmaker' comes chapter five, 'Fearful Symmetry', which is our 'plot-centric' chapter today. In it, Rorschach continues his investigation into The Comedian's death, Silk Spectre finds a temporary living situation with Night Owl, and Ozymandias is attacked by an assassin. The beauty of the chapter is in the titular symmetry: it's arranged like an artistic palindrome, with the panel layouts mirroring each other both in style and color, taking the alternatingly colored panels of the first few chapters to their natural, logical conclusion. The plot builds to the center of the chapter, where a gorgeous half-splash page takes up three panels on both pages depicting Ozymandias fighting back against his assailant. The fight scene feels like a release after four and a half chapters of buildup, and afterward it almost feels disconcerting: Watchmen deconstructs superhero tropes, it doesn't reenforce them, and a big flashy battle like this comes out of left field more than anything else so far. Compared to the grime and the grit surrounding it, a rich man beating off a thug in his glittering skyscraper feels so artificial, and in retrospect it's the first sign that something is rotten in the state of Mr. Veidt. The fight feels staged because, as we'll find out later, it is...nothing comes so easily in Moore's beaten-down world.

The other big scene in chapter five is Rorschach's bumbling attempt to flee the police after he's framed for the murder of small-time villain Moloch. Now this is more like a Watchmen action scene...despite his best efforts, Rorschach's attempt to flee the cops are doomed from the start, as unlike Ozy and his planted thug, Rorschach is just a man, and he's outnumbered and outgunned immediately. His fight is sloppy and flailing, the last ditch effort of a man who refuses to give in, a sentiment which will one day be taken up by Gail Simone in the wonderful ending of Secret Six as well. And like the doomed plans of Bane and Scandal Savage, Rorschach is quickly and handily taken into custody, his mask torn from his face, screaming like a madman, the panels mirror-images of the ones that began the chapter.

Rorschach's ordeal continues into the sixth chapter, 'The Abyss Gazes Also', his origin story with a framing story of a psychological examination. Rorschach is easily the most popular character in the series: as a moral absolutionist who refuses to give in, "even in the face of Armageddon", and it helps that his starring chapter is among the best in the whole novel. In it, we see the transformation from generic costumed crimefighter Walter Kovacs into the disturbed Rorschach. This has become a common trope since: The crimefighter witnesses a side of humanity so dark that s/he retreats into the costumed identity, supplanting the 'citizen' identity for the mask itself. I have no idea if Watchmen did it first, but it certainly perfected it; 'The Abyss Gazes Also' is a taut, enthralling chapter, the black heart of Watchmen, the center of the story that beats black blood into the veins of the other chapters. Rorschach's tale of the blackness in the human heart came out of nowhere in 1987, except maybe Marvelman, and even Marvelman dealt more with things beyond the sphere of humankind. 'The Abyss Gazes Also' is entirely about the human condition, and what happens when that condition goes down alleyways of darkness never thought possible, how damaged it comes out on the other side. Rorschach's psychologist doesn't make the trip either, and the chapter ends with him staring at a Rorschach blot in the darkness, unable to shake the black seed Rorshach's tale planted into him. Heavy stuff, indeed.

The backup to chapter six is the psychologist's file on Rorschach, and I bring it up just for a small mention at the end: in a paper entitled 'My Parents' from when Walter Kovacs was eleven, he mentions his respect for President Truman, because, "He dropped the atom bomb on Japan and saved millions of lives because if he hadn't, then there would of been a lot more war than there was and more people would of been killed." Seems that young Walter was more receptive to the idea of a few losses to save many, something that will turn out to not be the case with Rorschach later in the story.

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Best quote: "Live our lives, lacking anything better to do. Devise reason later./Born from oblivion, bear children, hell-bound as ourselves, go into oblivion./There is nothing else./.../This rudderless world is not shaped by vague metaphysical forces. It is not god who kills children. Not fate that butchers them, or destiny that feeds them to the dogs./It's us./Only us."

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Up next: "One-nothing. Your move."

More Moore part 16: Watchmen chapters 1-3

Watchmen chapters 1-3 (1986)

About a week ago, when I updated my Goodreads page with this book, I received a dismissive response from  a friend: "It's overrated," he said, "people don't really talk like that." The comment made me think about how we consider art and whether it really is as overrated as he thought, which is something I now can't agree with: for better or for worse, when Watchmen #1 appeared on newsstands in September 1986 it changed the face of comics forever, as radically as The Waste Land did for poetry and Final Fantasy VII did for video games, two other works that I don't think you can accuse of being overrated for the same reasons. Watchmen left an indelible mark on the genre and is now a bar that must be topped; I can think of no comic made after it that isn't indebted to it in some way. Any time there's a new novel or arc that comes out that is destined to be BIG NEWS, it will make a reference to Watchmen in some way, even Moore himself is guilty of this from time to time. I don't think the degree of what Watchmen has accomplished CAN be properly rated, so no, I don't think it's overrated. Overhyped though? That's possibly a more legitimate complaint. Let's see.

The very first thing to notice about chapter 1, before anything that lies within, is how rigidly workmanlike it is: a 9-panel grid, page after page, strictly sticking to its own internal conventions and meter. The grid creates a sense of internal momentum, of movement inexorably drawn to the end, which fits in well with the book's sense of nuclear fatigue and of the (much later) use of predestined fate. The second thing to notice is color: Tatjana Wood's color work in Swamp Thing was muted and earthy, it added to the darkness in the story from Houma to Pandemonium. Here, John Higgins' work is garish and clashing, very much by design. In the first chapter, the panels alternate sickly greens and blues with glaring, piercing yellows and reds, back and forth, from present to flashback like an 80s fever-dream, all shards of neon. With the rigid timing of the panels and the alternating of the color, the work becomes poetic, but only in a martial sense: each panel stomps along like boots on concrete, in perfect time from beginning to end.

The final thing to take in is the work's density: just holding the novel in your hands it feels heavier than usual, as if the clutter in the art is weighing the whole tome down. Every panel has something interesting to look at; photos in the background,  graffiti, newspaper headlines. When the Watchmen movie came out in 2009, a lot was made of it blowing the novel's nuclear scare message out of proportion, but it's still here, just hidden away in the backgrounds of panels, on barely-glimpsed newspapers on The Comedian's apartment floor, or written up in the backup story of Hollis Mason's autobiography. Where the movie offered panic, though, the book gives a crushing sense of fatigue, exacerbated by the hideous carnival colors: the world of 1986 according to Watchmen has been beaten into the ground. Rorschach is usually touted as the novel's 'protagonist' (as much as a story like this can even have one) and I think what sets him apart from everyone else is the minds of readers is that he still maintains a degree of life and movement, whereas everyone else, from Nite Owl to Silk Spectre to Dr. Manhattan to even the background caricatures like Nixon and Kissinger, look ready to lay down and give up.

It's old news by now, but a recap for those who would like it: Moore's original plan for Watchmen was to have lightning strike thrice in acquiring an old property and retooling it for modern audiences, as he did with Marvelman and Swamp Thing. Initially, Watchmen was to be populated by the heroes from silver-age publisher Charlton Comics, bought out by DC in 1985, but management balked at the idea of the characters in their new purchase ending up dead or crazy and convinced Moore to rewrite the characters as archetypes, which I think works much better in the long run. The characters in Watchmen work because they're blank slates, heroic archetypes that don't need huge backstories. Moore took the idea of a Batman character, split him into two parts, and thus we have Nite Owl (the campy techie who has an 'Owl Cave') and Rorschach (the lunatic who hides in the shadows and relies on criminals fear of him to get results), and both of them work because we understand the archetype they're coming from. We don't question that The Comedian is a gun-toting vigilante like The Punisher because we've seen The Punisher and Punisher-types time and time again before this. Watchmen is simply the graphic novel's answer to The Hero With a Thousand Faces. Interestingly, Moore drops his usual propensity for poetic, lugubrious captions and focuses on Watchmen as a story told through dialogue, with Rorschach's journal entries being among a handful of captions used, and then only sparingly. Of course Moore hasn't lost his knack for it, and the journal entries, with their clipped, awkward speech, are some of the best he's done.

At least initially, the novel splits itself from chapter to chapter, another example of it using meter to create that kind of martial poetry. Odd chapters further the story at hand, while even chapters are more concerned with flashbacks and telling the origin stories of the main players. I have heard that this design is a monetary choice first and an artistic choice second: Moore just didn't have enough story to fill up twelve issues, so we added the even chapters to kill time. Either way it's successful, and to this reader at least the even chapters are where the novel really shines, not that the odd chapters are slouches at all. Of course being an Alan Moore story it can't help but subvert itself immediately: chapter 2 flashes back to five events in the life of Edward Blake, The Comedian, a character who died before the story even started. Unlike every other character in the story, we only get a view of Blake through the eyes and thoughts of the rest of the cast, and what we see isn't pretty: to me, Blake is the only character completely incapable of redemption, a violent, misogynist sociopath who is seen murdering a pregnant woman, firing on rioters with glee, and instigating yet another Alan Moore rape scene (and probably the most problematic of them, as we'll see later). The Comedian is Watchmen's 1986 personified: brutal, destructive, and sadistic. He does get a gorgeous speech, blubbering and drunk, confessing his crimes to former nemesis Moloch in a flashback just before he was killed. The whole thing is shown from Moloch's point of view, trapped in his bed while Blake opens up to him, the room alternatingly bathed in harsh oranges and cool blues. And then, like a refrain, we return to the flashback of Blake, his whole world blood-red, being thrown to his death. We saw the scene once in chapter one, and we'll see it again before long, the thread that ties Watchmen together.

A special mention should be made of Ozymandias' memory of The Comedian, because I think that THAT is the exact moment the plot starts, not Blake's death. The Comedian ridicules the other 'costumed crimefighters' for their ineffectiveness, points out that now that the world has nukes, it has bigger problems that men running around in spandex can't solve. Like Delita Heiral in Final Fantasy Tactics being taunted and abused by Argath for his inability to change the world, you can see Ozymandias' plot have its inception at this one moment, the moment that he decides to take the reins on human destiny and do what he can to save the world. Ozy comes across as a villain in the novel (unsurprisingly) but if he is, he's the most realistic kind of villain: the one who is convinced that everything he does is for the greater good. More than anything I think he comes across as a dark mirror of Rorschach: they're both moral absolutionists who refuse to back down in the face of Armageddon. The difference is that Ozymandias is the head of a multinational conglomerate, and Rorschach is a maniac running around in a trench coat breaking thugs fingers. I still condemn Ozy's plan as needlessly vicious (especially since the end seems to hint that it won't work, but we'll get to that later) but one can understand where he's coming from, and to him he is saving the world, which is the epitome of heroism. Slowly but surely, comic villains change from interdimensional dark wizards and Superman-hating industrialists to something more realistic, more accepting. And that makes them more sinister than ever.

Chapter 3 introduces a second set of captions, the story-within-a-story Tales of the Black Freighter. Since Watchmen takes place in a world where superheroes are real, nobody reads superhero comics, and pirate adventure comics seem to be all the rage. Black Freighter tells a condensed version of the plot of Watchmen, with the main character taking the role of Ozymandias and attempting something grand without realizing how twisted it is. Honestly, I rarely read the captions unless I feel I have to, they're cluttered and distracting and don't really add much to the story. In the director's cut of the Watchmen movie, the Black Freighter segments were interspersed between scenes of the actual story instead of being captions within the panels, and that worked much better, letting you see the story without distracting you from the actual plot of the novel. It would have been better as a backup at the end of a few issues, but as-is, it's a failed experiment.

Chapter 3 ends with Dr. Manhattan, the only being with actual superpowers and the USA's tool to keep Russia in check during the Cold War, on a self-imposed exile to Mars. Russia immediately invades Afghanistan, and we see still-president Nixon in a war room meeting discussing how much of the Eastern seaboard they would lose if they launched nukes right now. Things aren't looking good, and they're only going to get worse.

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Best quote: "Heard joke once: Man goes to doctor. Says he's depressed. Says life seems harsh and cruel./Says he feels all alone in a threatening world where what lies ahead is vague and uncertain./Doctor says "Treatment is simple. Great clown Pagliacci is in town tonight. Go and see him. That should pick you up."/Man busts into tears. Says, "But doctor.../"I am Pagliacci."/Good joke. Everybody laugh./Roll on snare drum./Curtains."

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Up Next: "God exists and he's American."

NPM: William Blake

We finish up National Poetry Month with one of my favorites. I desperately try to emulate Mr. Blake in my own poetry, and of course nothing I do can get close to the grandeur of The Marriage of Heaven and Hell, one of my absolute favorites. I'd love to post the whole thing, but I'm not going to make you readers sit through reams of 18th-century mysticism, and besides you'd miss out on the art, which is half the beauty of Blake's work. Instead, I give you a link to view the plates here, and will just focus on "Proverbs of Hell", a subsection of the Marriage where Mr. Blake gives us a set of diametrical opposites of the Biblical Proverbs, extolling individualism, energy, and living for oneself, which certainly can't be a bad thing for many people. Enjoy the proverbs, go buy a book of Blake's work, and then go pick up some Milton, too. You'll be a better person for it. And see you with more poetry next time!

"Proverbs of Hell" (1793)

In seed time learn, in harvest teach, in winter enjoy.

Drive your cart and your plow over the bones of the dead.

The road of excess leads to the palace of wisdom.

Prudence is a rich ugly old maid courted by Incapacity.

He who desires but acts not, breeds pestilence.

The cut worm forgives the plow.

Dip him in the river who loves water.

A fool sees not the same tree that a wise man sees.

He whose face gives no light, shall never become a star.

Eternity is in love with the productions of time.

The busy bee has no time for sorrow.

The hours of folly are measur'd by the clock, but of wisdom: no clock can measure.

All wholsom food is caught without a net or a trap.

Bring out number weight & measure in a year of dearth.

No bird soars too high, if he soars with his own wings.

A dead body, revenges not injuries.

The most sublime act is to set another before you.

If the fool would persist in his folly he would become wise.

Folly is the cloke of knavery.

Shame is Prides cloke.

Prisons are built with stones of Law, Brothels with bricks of Religion.

The pride of the peacock is the glory of God.

The lust of the goat is the bounty of God.

The wrath of the lion is the wisdom of God.

The nakedness of woman is the work of God.

Excess of sorrow laughs. Excess of joy weeps.

The roaring of lions, the howling of wolves, the raging of the stormy sea, and
       the destructive sword are portions of eternity too great for the eye of man.

The fox condemns the trap, not himself.

Joys impregnate. Sorrows bring forth.

Let man wear the fell of the lion, woman the fleece of the sheep.

The bird a nest, the spider a web, man friendship.

The selfish smiling fool, & the sullen frowning fool, shall be both thought wise,
       that they may be a rod.

What is now proved was once, only imagin'd.

The rat, the mouse, the fox, the rabbit: watch the roots; the lion, the tyger,
       the horse, the elephant, watch the fruits.

The cistern contains; the fountain overflows.

One thought, fills immensity.

Always be ready to speak your mind, and a base man will avoid you.

Every thing possible to be believ'd is an image of truth.

The eagle never lost so much time, as when he submitted to learn of the crow.

The fox provides for himself, but God provides for the lion.

Think in the morning. Act in the noon. Eat in the evening. Sleep in the night.

He who has suffer'd you to impose on him knows you.

As the plow follows words, so God rewards prayers.

The tygers of wrath are wiser than the horses of instruction.

Expect poison from the standing water.

You never know what is enough unless you know what is more than enough.

Listen to the fools reproach! it is a kingly title!

The eyes of fire, the nostrils of air, the mouth of water, the beard of earth.

The weak in courage is strong in cunning.

The apple tree never asks the beech how he shall grow, nor the lion, the horse,
       how he shall take his prey.

The thankful receiver bears a plentiful harvest.

If others had not been foolish, we should be so.

The soul of sweet delight, can never be defil'd.

When thou seest an Eagle, thou seest a portion of Genius, lift up thy head!

As the catterpiller chooses the fairest leaves to lay her eggs on, so the priest lays
       his curse on the fairest joys.

To create a little flower is the labour of ages.

Damn, braces: Bless relaxes.

The best wine is the oldest, the best water the newest.

Prayers plow not! Praises reap not! Joys laugh not! Sorrows weep not!

The head Sublime, the heart Pathos, the genitals Beauty, the hands & feet
       Proportion.

As the air to a bird of the sea to a fish, so is contempt to the contemptible.

The crow wish'd every thing was black, the owl, that every thing was white.

Exuberance is Beauty. If the lion was advised by the fox, he would be cunning.

Improvement makes strait roads, but the crooked roads without Improvement, are
       roads of Genius.

Sooner murder an infant in its cradle than nurse unacted desires.

Where man is not nature is barren.

Truth can never be told so as to be understood, and not be believ'd.

Enough! or Too much!

Who Reads the Watchmen?

So unsurprisingly, as I read Watchmen I'm finding a lot of stuff to talk about (one of the first things I'll mention, I guarantee, is the novel's density). The book is waaaayy too in-depth to discuss in one article, so I'm going to split it up into four, three chapters apiece. Hopefully I won't run out of steam 3/4 of the way through.

More Moore part 15: The Ballad of Halo Jones Book III

The Ballad of Halo Jones Book III (1986)

With the dawn of 1986, Alan Moore and Ian Gibson began work on the third installment of The Ballad of Halo Jones, their saga of 50th century everygirl Halo Jones and her adventures on Earth and beyond. Book III comes as a shock to those who had read the first two Books; it picks up ten years after the conclusion of Book II. In that time, Halo has left her job aboard starliner The Clara Pandy and become a drunk on some off-beaten world, while General Luiz Cannibal still battles the inhabitants of the Tarantula Nebula in the name of Earth. After the first two Books being filled with entertaining fluff, the sudden stylistic turn comes as a tremendous shock: Book III of Halo Jones is exceedingly dark, and once Halo is picked up to join the army it gets the feeling of a Vietnam War throwback. But I honestly don't have too much negative to say about the Book- especially after Book II's benign dullity, Book III comes across as a much more interesting read, one that displays some thought-provoking moments, and even has a return to the snappy dialogue from Book I.

The entirety of Book III is about Halo's military service, sent down to various worlds in the Tarantula Nebula to quell the resistance to Earth imperialism. Not only is this a positive because Halo is, you know, doing SOMETHING, but her interactions with her platoon bring us that realistic, intelligent dialogue that was sorely missing from Book II. Everyone in Halo's bunk comes across as three-dimensional and interesting, and watching them go through hell together in the undergrowth of these unknown planets as a real treat. Halo is put into an uncomfortable position, there's no question that what Earth is doing in Tarantula is unethical, but as she says several times during the course of the Book, it's a job where none existed before. These uncomfortable monologues give Halo some much-needed depth and show that she is, in fact, a thinking, feeling character and not just a flat teenage caricature.

Since the story takes place in a war zone, the action is considerably more despondent and violent than before, with members of Halo's platoon being blown up and smashed by crushing gravity several times throughout the story. It's a testament to Moore's writing that the reader feels for these deaths, even though most of them were just introduced in this Book. But everyone is fleshed out, from the 'lucky' girl who survives the war without a scratch to the butch sergeant who is killed in a time dialation. Toy, Halo's roomie from Book II, ends up as part of her platoon, and there is a series of pages of dialogue between the two of them, Toy wounded and both stranded in the middle of the jungle, that really made me feel for characters that I didn't give a damn about just a few chapters before.

War is hell, even in the 50th century, and Moore hits the gut with his depictions of the Tarantulan rebels as a band of young girls fighting for their way of life. When the war ends in a cease-fire, Halo finds herself romantically involved with the massive General Cannibal, and by the last few pages of the Book it becomes clear that he commanded endless atrocities on the Tarantulans, not the least of which was lighting up an entire planet in a firestorm. That such a morally grey, nuanced story can come from the pages of a novel which prior had a bunch of teenagers going to the mall as a main plot point is pretty impressive.

The Ballad of Halo Jones Book III is far from the best of Moore's stories so far. Halo herself is still too inactive to be of much use, and Ian Gibson's art is still rather bland. Perhaps the worst thing about the Book is that it feels like too little, too late: Book I still isn't anything special, and Book II is downright bad. Book III is leagues beyond either of these, but The Ballad of Halo Jones still comes across as 2/3 of an uninteresting hiccup in Moore's career. The fact that he was doing Swamp Thing and Watchmen at the same time only hammers this point home, and shows that Moore had his thoughts elsewhere. The Ballad of Halo Jones is worth reading once, and perhaps you'll find you're one of the novel's many defenders, but in 1986 we had better things to read.

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Best quote: "The tribe were descendents of Lot. Lot was some guy whose wife turned into a pillar of salt because she looked back at something or other./I guess everybody has to believe something."

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Up next: “We're all puppets, Laurie. I'm just a puppet who can see the strings.”

Sound'a'Roundus: Sally Zybert's Top 13 Albums

Sally Zybert of Mordant Airhead has been a big boon to this blog since it was started, and was able to help me out by sending me several copies of Tom Strong and find me a trade of Swamp Thing Book IV when it was going for an obscene amount of money elsewhere. Check her blog out for thoughts on horror movies and children's programming, which is sort of the thematic equivalent of chocolate and peanut butter. She's written a pretty vicious novel, as well!

The Bonzo Dog Doo Dah Band – Gorilla (1967)

I grew up listening to the Bonzo Dogs and don’t really have anything to say about this album other than that I have vivid memories of listening to it when I was a child and, listening to it as an adult, it’s not only still fantastic, but I’ve grown a deeper appreciation for it.

Wall Of Voodoo – Dark Continent (1981)

This was one where I had to debate which album to include, though not as painstakingly as others on my list. Dark Continent and Call Of The West are pretty much neck and neck in terms of quality and, in fact, they were re-released together on one CD, which is what I have (and I highly recommend it because then you don’t have to choose) but I’ve noticed that I always seem to be paying more attention to the music during the first half of the CD than the second half, which means Dark Continent wins (although there are some brilliant songs on Call Of The West. Seriously, that two-album CD is the way to go).

Faith No More - Angel Dust (1992)

When I was a kid most of my taste in music came from my mom and my older brother. He and I spent hours every weekend watching music videos (ahh, memories) and we jumped onto the Faith No More bandwagon when everybody else did. I have a very vivid memory of my brother sitting by the VCR with his finger on the “record” button, waiting for MTV to premiere the video for Midlife Crisis when Angel Dust came out. All of Faith No More’s albums still hold up really well (I always scoff at The Real Thing because of the way Mike Patton sang on it but the songs on it are still really fucking good regardless of the iffy vocals) but Angel Dust was, I think, the one album that hit a perfect balance.

Nirvana - In Utero (1994) 

Fifteen years ago this album would have been my favorite on this list. Sadly, I don’t listen to nearly as much Nirvana as I used to but when I do, more often than not I’m putting on In Utero. It came out when I was at an impressionable age (young and naïve enough to be convinced that Kurt Cobain would totally marry me when I grew up) and the songs (Heart Shaped Box in particular) appeal to both of the largest dueling sides in my taste in music: the side that loves big, crunchy noise and the side that loves beautiful melodies. Sometimes I think Kurt Cobain had those same dueling music tastes, which is probably why I loved Nirvana as much as I did.

They Might Be Giants – John Henry (1994)

Choosing just one They Might Be Giants album was one of the tougher moments of making this list but I finally settled on John Henry because there isn’t a single song on it that I’m iffy about. John Henry is also the beginning of an era, The New They Might Be Giants, featuring a full band as opposed to Classic They Might Be Giants, featuring two Johns and a drum machine. When I was a kid, that was pretty exciting stuff. Of all the bands I’ve loved, TMBG is probably the one I’ve unwaveringly loved for the longest amount of time (about twenty three years) and almost every single one of their albums was in the running for this list. I think it came down to John Henry and Lincoln; this one won by virtue of having two more songs on it than Lincoln (and also the fact that one of those songs was Stomp Box).

Mr. Bungle - California (1999)

Choosing between Disco Volante and California was another month-long internal debate for me. I love their self-titled album, certainly (I carry a cassette of it in my purse), but I was torn between their last two albums because, while I consider Disco Volante their best work, California is the one I listen to the most. I hadn’t heard either album in quite some time, though, so I listened to them back to back and as soon as Retrovertigo began, I knew California had to be my winner. Sometimes there are songs that, even if you don’t fully understand what they’re supposed to be about they still affect you and speak to you in such a way that you understand what it’s about to you, and that it means a lot to you. That is what Retrovertigo is for me. I put that song on every mix tape I made for everybody I knew for at least a year; I wanted everyone to hear it because it meant so much to me. Also, California is another album that came out at just the right time to make a huge impression on me and it really sealed the deal on my being a lifelong Mr. Bungle fan instead of having it be a passing fancy.

Eels - Souljacker (2001) 

Eels is another band that would have been much higher on the list about a decade ago. Souljacker is probably the first impersonal album they ever recorded so it’s kind of sad that it’s my favorite but, honestly, E’s personal life might just be too much of a bummer for me. Electro-Shock Blues is a brilliant album that I almost never listen to because it’s just so sad. Daisies Of The Galaxy is what got me into Eels in the first place (and I almost chose it for this list), and Souljacker is just a fun, rockin’ collection of songs. This is the Eels just letting loose. There are a few missteps (what the hell is Jungle Telegraph doing here?) but the winners outweigh them so heavily they may as well not even be there. And after Souljacker it was kind of all downhill for me (Shootenanny was fun but forgettable, Blinking Lights was forgettable and not very fun and I just didn’t keep up after that, though my younger brother loves End Times a lot). Souljacker holds another interesting distinction: it was the album they were promoting at the show where I met the proprietor of this blog, Mssr. Ivan T. So without it, I wouldn’t be here talking about it right now.

Lovage - Music To Make Love To Your Old Lady By (2001)

Sexy music by sexy people. There’s not a lot else I can say about it. It’s all there in the title.

Sparks - Lil' Beethoven (2002)

More than once in my life I’ve heard a song playing overhead in a store and immediately gone to an employee to find out what the hell it is so I can go buy it. More often than not I get the album home and it’s a dud apart from the one song that sucked me in but Lil’ Beethoven is one of my two success stories. I’m not a huge Sparks fan. I always felt obligated to claim that I like them because I always liked the music video for Cool Places (and Faith No More did a couple songs on Sparks’ Plagiarism album) but for the most part they fall into the same category as Radiohead: I understand that they’re talented but I just don’t care (though I’d probably always choose Sparks over Radiohead). Lil’ Beethoven, though, is such a large, beautiful, bombastic album that may or may not have been recorded with a full orchestra (it sounds that way, but I think that can be faked) that I can’t help but completely love it. As far as I’m concerned a lot of rock music could benefit from a full orchestra. 

Tomahawk – Mit Gas (2003)

The fourth and final Mike Patton album to make the list, Mit Gas is pretty much a straight up rock record with a few bizarre touches (the electronic voicebox gimmick in Aktion 13F14, all of Harlem Clowns) but, like most of the other albums on this list, it was the right one at the right time. It was exactly the music I needed when it came out and it fills me with good feelings when I listen to it.

Gogol Bordello – Super Taranta (2007) 

The other album I bought because I heard a great song overhead in a store. I don’t even know what to say about it. Super Taranta is an album I bought, listened to, loved, got rid of for dumb reasons (I had a hard time singing along with it), saw the band live and turned into the diehard Gogol Bordello fan I am now. I chose Super Taranta because it was my first taste of Gogol Bordello, my gateway drug. It’s an album I can put on anytime, regardless of my mood, and within moments I am happy, enthusiastic and, funnily enough considering the reason I sold my first copy, singing along at the top of my voice.

Local H -  Twelve Angry Months (2008)

Local H is a band that I was always aware of (another one I listened to because my brother listened to them) but my interest never went beyond their singles (Bound For The Floor, Eddie Vedder, All The Kids Are Right) until I heard their twenty-five minute masterpiece What Would You Have Me Do (which is on Here Comes The Zoo, another great album). When I saw them live recently, it converted me from a casual fan to an ardent one. Twelve Angry Months is a bit of a concept album, a perfect (in my opinion) collection of breakup songs. Most of them are angry, heavy and sad. A couple of them are slower and pretty (and still sad) and lyrically it’s some of the best Local H stuff I’ve heard (even when I was only a casual fan, I related to their lyrics). The only downside is, because it is an album about a bitter breakup, it can leave you feeling really down.

Madness - The Liberty Of Norton Folgate (2009) 

So now that we’ve covered a couple bands I listen to thanks to my brother, here’s one I’m a fan of thanks to my mom. Much like Faith No More, Madness had broken up and recently (well, in 2000, I think) reunited but, unlike Faith No More, Madness are recording albums again. Norton Folgate is as good as if not better than anything they ever did back in the 1980s. A testament to how great it is: there is one song on the album (Sugar And Spice) that I’m physically incapable of listening to without crying, even if I’m not really paying attention to it. Later in the album another song (On The Town) covers essentially the same material (a marriage disintegrating) but it feels like a happy, boppy sing along. I love that duality. The Liberty Of Norton Folgate also contains my two absolute favorite Madness songs and is probably the best album by any broken-up-then-reunited band (though I really have no way of proving such a claim).

NPM: Czesław Miłosz

Goodness (2003)

A tenderness so great welled up in him that upon seeing
A wounded sparrow, he was ready to burst into tears.
Beneath the flawless manners of a worldly gentleman he hid
His compassion for all that is living.
Some people perhaps could sense it, but it was certainly known,
In ways mysterious to us, to the small birds
That would perch on his head and hands when he stopped
In a park alley. They would eat from his hands
As if the law that demands that the smaller
Take shelter from the larger,
Lest it be devoured, was suspended.
As if time had turned back, and the paths
Of the heavenly garden shone anew.
I had trouble understanding this man
Since what he said betrayed his knowledge of the horror of the world,
A knowledge at some point known and experienced to the very core.
I thus asked myself how he had managed to quell
His rebellion and bring himself to such humble charity.
Probably because this world, evil but existing,
He thought better than one that did not exist.
But he also believed in the immaculate beauty of the earth
from before the fall of Adam.
Whose free decision had brought death upon humans and animals.
But this was already something my mind didn't know how to accept. 


translated from the Polish by Anthony Milosz