Sabatini Posted June 26 Share Posted June 26 I just finished Children of the Neon Bamboo (5 stars, cannot recommend enough) and I want some more fiction that takes me to awesome, fictional music worlds. Concerts, scenes, musical diatribes. What would you recommend? Children of the Neon Bamboo: B. Glynn Kimmey: 9798988054115: Amazon.com: Movies & TV Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
David Emm Posted June 26 Share Posted June 26 https://www.amazon.com/Metallic-Muse-Lloyd-Biggle-Jr/dp/0809531674 I've posted this before, but its brilliant fun and very creative. Biggle is a musician himself and it shows. You'll probably see yourself in part of the stories. Quote Do what makes you happy this week. So long as it’s not eating people. Eating people is bad. People have diseases. ~ Warren Ellis Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Polychrest Posted June 27 Share Posted June 27 Whale Music by Paul Quarrington. The promo blurbs say “loosely based on the life of Brian Wilson of the Beach Boys”, but the weird and wonderful story of Desmond Howl is much bigger, inventive and illuminating than that. Whale Music won Canada’s most prestigious fiction award the year it was published and was later turned into a successful Hollywood film, for which Quarrington wrote the screen play. Founder and lead vocalist for Toronto blues band Porkbelly Futures, Quarrington described himself as a “musician who wrote”. He died way too young. Everyday tragedy and irresistible humour are incestuous siblings in the best of his work. 1 Quote "I like rock and roll, man, I don't like much else." John Lennon 1970 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nowarezman Posted June 27 Share Posted June 27 These novels I admire hugely: 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stokely Posted June 28 Share Posted June 28 This would be way, way less highbrow (appearing) than anything posted already, but I'm a sci-fi/fantasy reader just about exclusively, and enjoyed the Spellsinger series from Alan Dean Foster. A not-so-ambitious not-so-successful rock musician gets transported to a world where sung lyrics can literally be magical, and all he happens to know are rock tunes, which give some interesting results Again, while some sci-fi/fantasy can indeed be called "good literature" this is much more on the fun pulp side, though Foster does like his really obtuse "nobody ever uses that" word on occasion.... Don't let the pic fool you, it's not for kids. There's a fair bit of fighting, death, sex and expletives from humans and animals alike More on the serious side of fantasy, this one features music a fair bit though it's not the central point. Very well written, but fair warning Rothfuss is taking freaking forever to finish the 3rd and supposedly last book in the series. I knew I was going to love this one when I read the prologue. Quote The Waystone Inn lay in silence, and it was a silence of three parts. The most obvious part was a hollow, echoing quiet, made by things that were lacking. If there had been a wind it would have sighed trough the trees, set the inn’s sign creaking on its hooks, and brushed the silence down the road like trailing autumn leaves. If there had been a crowd, even a handful of men inside the inn, they would have filled the silence with conversation and laughter, the clatter and clamour one expects from a drinking house during the dark hours of the night. If there had been music…but no, of course there was no music. In fact there were none of these things, and so the silence remained. Inside the Waystone a pair of men huddled at one corner of the bar. they drank with quiet determination, avoiding serious discussions of troubling news. In doing these they added a small, sullen silence to the larger, hollow one. it made an alloy of sorts, a counterpoint. The third silence was not an easy thing to notice. If you listened for an hour, you might begin to feel it in the wooden floor underfoot and in the rough, splintering barrels behind the bar. It was in the weight of the black stone hearth that held the heat of a long-dead fire. It was in the slow back and forth of a white linen cloth rubbing along the grain of the bar. And it was in the hands of the man who stood there, polishing a stretch of mahogany that already gleamed in the lamplight. The man had true-red hair, red as flame. his eyes was dark and distant, and he moved with the subtle certainty that comes from knowing many things. The Waystone was is, just as the third silence was his. This was appropriate, as it was the greatest silence of the three, wapping the others inside itself. It was deep and wide as autumn’s ending. It was heavy as a great river-smooth stone. It was the patient, cut-flower sound of a man who is waiting to die. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nowarezman Posted June 28 Share Posted June 28 5 hours ago, Stokely said: This would be way, way less highbrow (appearing) than anything posted already, but I'm a sci-fi/fantasy reader just about exclusively, and enjoyed the Spellsinger series from Alan Dean Foster. A not-so-ambitious not-so-successful rock musician gets transported to a world where sung lyrics can literally be magical, and all he happens to know are rock tunes, which give some interesting results Again, while some sci-fi/fantasy can indeed be called "good literature" this is much more on the fun pulp side, though Foster does like his really obtuse "nobody ever uses that" word on occasion.... The terms "highbrow" and "lowbrow"(originally coined in the context of the erroneous "science" of phrenology) became commonplace in the publishing industry to denote specific markets for books. As more and more of the population became educated and developed reading habits, it was only natural that new kinds of writing could serve the expanding literate audience outside of academia, with a more popular bent. There's room in the world, and even in the individual reader's life (assuming enough spare time) to read around all the various genres and "levels" of literature. Why just read all the "serious" stuff all the time? I hope I never become that serious of a person - that would be a very incomplete person. nat Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Threadslayer Posted July 13 Share Posted July 13 On 6/28/2024 at 12:21 PM, Nowarezman said: As more and more of the population became educated and developed reading habits, it was only natural that new kinds of writing could serve the expanding literate audience outside of academia, with a more popular bent. 👍 Quote Whenever you find yourself on the side of the majority, it is time to pause and reflect. -Mark Twain Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GovernorSilver Posted July 13 Share Posted July 13 Picked this up at a thrift shop recently and read it. Fun, light reading. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pinkfloydcramer Posted July 15 Share Posted July 15 Just finished reading the Grapes of Wrath. Steinbeck talked a lot about music and it was interesting to see how large a part music ( mostly guitar based string bands) played in the lives of the Okies. What got a LOL out of me was when a string band started playing for a dance. A fiddler took the 1st ride and then 3 (!) harmonica players joined in. That sounds like music hell to me, but harmonica was a very popular instrument then. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
David Emm Posted July 15 Share Posted July 15 1 hour ago, pinkfloydcramer said: What got a LOL out of me was when a string band started playing for a dance. A fiddler took the 1st ride and then 3 (!) harmonica players joined in. That sounds like music hell to me, but harmonica was a very popular instrument then. Oh, I dunno. Sometimes the most non-traditional settings bring out an instrument's hidden strengths. Check out Alexander Glazunov's Saxophone quartet, op. 109 (1932). 24:18. Sax is generally seen as urban or pop material, but this work shows off its real depth. I've always wondered why it didn't make it into the standard orchestra. I've never found any clearly stated historical reason. I love this piece. 1 Quote Do what makes you happy this week. So long as it’s not eating people. Eating people is bad. People have diseases. ~ Warren Ellis Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Polychrest Posted July 20 Share Posted July 20 The Commitments by Roddy Doyle. The literary inspiration for one of the great rock band films of all time. The publisher's blurb highlights the book's themes with only a little over-the-top bloviating: Quote About The Commitments: In the first volume of the Barrytown Trilogy, Roddy Doyle, winner of the Booker Prize for Paddy Clarke Ha Ha Ha, introduces The Commitments, a group of fame-starved, working-class Irish youths with a paradoxical passion for the music of Sam Cooke and Otis Redding and a mission—to bring Soul to Dublin. Doyle writes about the band with a fan’s enthusiasm and about Dublin with a native’s cheerful knowingness. His book captures all the shadings of the rock experience: ambition, greed, and egotism—and the redeeming, exhilarating joy of making music. The Commitments is one of the most engaging and believable novels about rock’n’roll ever written, a book whose brashness and originality have won it mainstream acclaim and underground cachet. Quote "I like rock and roll, man, I don't like much else." John Lennon 1970 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Philbo King Posted July 20 Share Posted July 20 I've been working my way through the SciFi on gutenberg.org (free ebooks with expired copyrights) for some years now; I'm up to the E's in an alphabetized title list. Anyway, here is one with a music related plot that I encountered recently: https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/51622/pg51622-images.html Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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