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Sundries

Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrel:
I try to avoid any book that I see people reading on the train. It's not so much a stance against popular culture as it is an egomaniacal need to feel above whatever it is others are interested in (I should probably take this up with a therapist sometime). When Susanna Clark's massive tome made its US debut, dozens of readers lugged it around for months. I wrote it off as an extension of the Harry Potter phenomenon and thought nothing more of it. A pity, really, as now that I'm lugging the book around myself, I find it quite engaging. With lots of characters, side-stores and footnotes (that go on for pages) Clark has crafted a pleasant world to get lost in.

A Young Adult Novel that I Cannot Mention:
A dear friend just signed a two book deal with a respected publisher. I was honered to read the first draft and offered lots of suggestions and notes. Fortunately, the book really is good. There's nothing worse than having to tell a friend that their book, band, artwork, poetry, or similar expression is . . . really great! No, really, you're totally talented!

I've been in that position more than once. It's hard to maintain a pleasant countenance when, deep down, you feel rather nauseous about the whole thing. This experience was pleasantly different. I'll plug it when it's actually in book stores. For now, I've been sworn to secrecy.

Chris Thomas King
In college, I spent countless hours listening to old, scratchy recordings of blues and folk music. I'd scores of albums, many of them from the amazing Smithsonian Folkways catalog. Sadly, in the days before albums were easily ripped to hard drive, I sold the entirety of my collection to (a very happy) used record store. I needed the cash to support an incredibly stupid relationship. Chris Thomas King, with his extraordinary rendition of the classics, has reunited me with the music that once meant so much to me. I've more or less forgotten about the girl.

His Name is Alive
Fuzzy, geek-synth, electronica from Michigan. With sexy vocals. I downloaded Detrola the other day but have yet to listen to it extensively. I think it's good, but it requires a certain situation (and headphones) to be properly appreciated.

Information Aesthetics
I've been on the job interview circuit for the last couple of months. In countless conversations I'm asked "What sites to you read regularly? Where do you draw inspiration?" The answer, inevitably, is Information Aesthetics. It's the sort of site that looks great to prospective employers and has the benefit of actually being a source of great inspiration.

Journal

Tuesday, June 6

COLA DARK & LIGHT
The bottle, with its classic Coke curves, is feminine. Alluring. Yet it stands tall, a black cap proudly atop the shrink wrapped glass; a phallic symbol if there ever was one. It’s an androgynous thing designed (undoubtedly by a small army of marketing experts) to send fops and popinjays (antiquated terms for the more modern “metrosexual”) to new heights of flippancy. It is Coke Blāk, and I love the stuff.

This mixture of cola, high fructose corn syrup and coffee doesn’t taste particularly good. Imagine the dregs of the office percolator mixed with the remnants of a flat two liter and you’ve more or less got it. But the buzz! It’s a beautiful thing. The Coke execs have taken the college student’s desperate formula for wakefulness (if they really want to do it right, they’d throw a few NoDoz tablets in there) and made it fashionable. They’ve polished it into the stuff of celebrity club excursions and private yachts.

Any hipster who’s read his Naomi Klein gets a little sick at such flagrant commercialism and marketing voodoo. But, due to post traumatic stress brought on by the cola wars of my childhood, I’ve a soft spot for new and experimental beverages. In the early 90’s I ran to the grocery store - repeatedly - for a clean, refreshing bottle of Crystal Pepsi.

Pondering this, I realized that I’d come full circle with the carbonated soft drink industry. Together, we’ve experienced the clear, Crystal® days of youth and the dark, Blāk®, sultry nights (would that it were so) of a man just shy of 30. All of it accompanied by sugared, fizzy water.

POST SCRIPT
I’ve no doubt that the demographers and marketing gurus spent countless hours coming up with the wholly manufactured word Blāk. The macron accent conjures up unwanted visions of Mötley Crüe and Mötorhead. Can you imagine the controversy and outrage that would have ensued had they simply called the stuff Coke Black?