All posts in “review”

A small milestone

Posted 279 days ago ·  Tagged: , , · 0 Comments

As you may know, I’ve been playing around with writing reviews. Up until now, I’ve been doing it only for myself, posting them here, at LibraryThing, and at Amazon. It’s fun, but I’ve been wanting to get them into some other venues.

Well, I’m pleased to announce that that has now happened. My first quasi-professional review–that is, written for a real-live, honest-to-goodness editor–is now available for the world to see!

It’s for The Future Fire, a small SF/fantasy site that runs both original stories and reviews. I got wind a few weeks ago that they were looking for reviewers, and contacted them. Looks like a good place to start getting my name out there.

The review is here, if you’d like to read it. I have to admit, I didn’t care much for the book. But the process of reviewing was great fun, and I can’t wait to do it again.

(Who knows, maybe someday somebody will be crazy enough to pay me…)

 

The divine madness of a collector

Posted 294 days ago ·  Tagged: , · 0 Comments

And now, the first repost from my defunct alt-history/steampunk/retrofuturism blog, Leaves of Brass: my review of The Thackery T. Lambshead Cabinet of Curiosities, edited by Ann & Jeff VanderMeer.

And as before, I wish to offer my thanks to Mr. VanderMeer for the opportunity to review this fascinating volume. This originally appeared on November 13, 2011.

See you over the fold!

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Publicity

Posted 299 days ago ·  Tagged: , , · 2 Comments

Well, this is a nice New Year’s present. I just now discovered that my essay about Lou Reed’s and Metallica’s Lulu has attracted the attention of the guys themselves (or at least their publicity people), who put a link to it on the Press page for the album. Yikes!

Apparently the link’s been there since November 15. However, it seems to have been broken by my recent site move. It can now be found here.

While I haven’t actually been in contact with Lou or Metallica, I’m gratified and humbled at the possibility that they might have actually read my ramblings, and that they know that, after all, some of us don’t think the album sucks.

Thanks, guys.

 

Feedback on Lulu

Posted 316 days ago ·  Tagged: , , · 1 Comment

Ever since I posted my little review of Lulu by Lou Reed and Metallica, I’ve gotten a fair amount of feedback. Most of it has been surprisingly positive; it appears that my review has made its way to people who appreciate what they were trying to do, even if the majority of Metallica fans don’t. I couldn’t be happier about this.

Most of the responses have been as comments on the story itself, but I’ve also gotten some good stuff privately via email. Many of these have been thoughtful and passionate; all have treated the material with respect and taken it seriously. With the permission of the authors, I’ve decided to post a few messages here.

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Lulu addendum

Posted 361 days ago ·  Tagged: , , · 0 Comments

Just a quick note, about my review of Lulu: I’m glad to see that my essay has gotten some attention, and in particular that it’s reached people who agree with me about the album. It officially comes out today, so now we get to see how it all hashes out. (I was gratified to see a fairly positive review in Rolling Stone; however, that was more than balanced by horrible reviews in the Atlantic, Pitchfork, and the A.V. Club.)

However, it also occurred to me that if I had devoted as much time and effort to my fiction writing as I did to this, I would have been published a long time ago.  :-)

Anyhoo. Back to the usual whining and blathering.

 

Review: Lulu by Lou Reed & Metallica

Posted 365 days ago ·  Tagged: , , , , · 32 Comments

Okay, so as promised, here is my review of Lulu, the new collaboration between the rock singer/songwriter Lou Reed and the heavy metal band Metallica. It’s ended up being much longer than I intended, but there’s a lot to talk about here; the origins of the project, how it fits into their bodies of work, and why Metallica’s fans have reacted as they have. Hopefully my thoughts are interesting and enlightening.

(tl;dr: I love it, and I know most people hate it, and they’re wrong.)

So, let’s go. Join me over the fold, won’t you?

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