BruceH

Literally?

Indeed; some of his early stories ("For A Breath I Tarry," "The Keys To December," etc.) were so good that I could hardly credit some of the hacky novels he cranked out later.

So I'd heard. It made me rather glad that I never bought any of his books.

Very true, although I should point out that "Norwegian Wood" is a pre-Revolver song, not post. Fact is, that while the Beatles had very distinct early and late musical phases, they also had a very fecund middle period that on close examination can be further subdivided into two or even three parts. They crammed a lot into six and-a-half years of recording.

His lame-ass, flaccid stereo mixes are surely not part of that reason, unfortunately. The Beatles need to be heard in MONO! They tend to sound best in mono, that's for sure. I heard that one reason for that is that the music was engineered and initially mixed-down and mastered for mono, with the stereo mix being an afterthought. Apparently stereo was still considered a new (and perhaps passing) fad in some parts of the British recording industry at the time.

Babel-17 is the only novel of Delany's that I've ever been able to finish! It was back in high school, when I was reading sf almost constantly; I remember liking but not loving it, but don't recall many specifics. I've never been able to get far with Nova or Dhalgren or any of the big ones. Some swear by them though. You might want to give the early stories of Roger Zelazny a try, too.

Huh? Can you explain that one? Fifty bucks on "no"... Perhaps he found out that "fiction," by definition, means "made up." How devastating.

Indeed.

Hey Mr. Tambourine Man, play a song for me I'm not sleepy, and there is no place I'm going to...

They'll always be "Essential Music" to me.

Quite a surprise, this. He kept his cancer quiet; shocking how many people have been taken from us by cancer. The Andromeda Strain was on TV just a few days ago! I remember watching it on TV way back in the 70's. I also remember Westworld, which hasn't aged well.

What do you want to bet that, after the election, no matter WHO wins, the price of gas will start going up again?

Yeah, the oil companies really like to screw the cities.

The Eiffel Tower isn't useless architecture. It is used as a radio/television broadcasting attennae, covering metropolitan Paris (the same is true of the CN Tower in Toronto and presumably Seattle's Space Needle). All that and they look nice, too!

Hey, the St. Louis Gateway Arch may have been constructed mainly as a tourist attraction, and in many ways it's silly, but nevertheless I really like it a lot. If you reject the Arch, then you must also reject the Eiffel Tower, and I like that too. Useless but pretty pieces of architecture that actually add something to their home cities' skyline should be applauded. There are so very, very many edifices that add nothing or actively detract. (I like Seattle's Space Needle too.)

The Big Three.

You can be snooty about the rest, but you should be embarrassed about "Clerks" since that was kind of an early 90s phenom. That's like missing out on "Resevoir Dogs" when it came out. Or not being into Grunge. It was part of the Zeitgeist of the era. Edited for misspelling "Zeitgeist," which I can't believe I did. I think one can refuse to be embarrassed to have had the good sense and taste not to have been into Grunge. I will amend that statement to note that you should be embarassed to have been in your teens or twenties during the early 90s (as I was) and not have been into Grunge. It was just part of that moment, man. It was the perfect soundtrack to being just out of college and un- or underemployed. It would be like having lived through the sixties and not liking psychedelia... Or in high school in the late 70's and not getting into punk?

Gettin' up there!

???

He was older than Dan Schorr! And what a life!

Looking at the title of your thread, I was afraid you were going to say your cat died, or something.

There are two double CD's on Musicmasters of the 1954 Gramercy Five sides: The Last Recordings, Musicmasters 65071 More Last Recordings, Musicmasters 65101 And these are not complete, but they are close. Those are the ones I have, and they're great. (I'm still waiting for "The Absolutely FINAL Last Recordings" to be followed by "The Utterly, Completely Last Recordings, We PROMISE This Time!"

I'd jump at the chance to go there. (With or without the syndrome.)

It counts as a tragedy.

That used to be a great store when they still had vinyl! Come to think about it, I've had some dreams about the old Nuggets and Planet Records.