Kurt
Hernon:
March,
2004

Liner Notes: A Real Life Guide to Independent Living

1. The Savage God: A Study of Suicide, The Biggest Game in Town: two books about as far apart as two books can be, but both absolutely riveting. A. Alverez is a British author/poet/card shark that knows poker as well as he knows poetry. And while the subject matter of Savage God seems depressing, Alvarez delivers his essays with as much beauty as sympathy, and in the end helps us understand that we may never understand man's relationship with death and violence. The Biggest Game in Town is, quite frankly, the best book ever written about poker (covering the 1981 World Series) - and thus the best ever written about the real Las Vegas.

2. "One Man Guy" - Rufus Wainwright: Sure it's his dad's (Loudon Wainright III) best tune ever. Yeah it's all about solipsism. But when a talent as large as Rufus' slurs the track out over a sweetly strummed acoustic guitar, it becomes the most sublime gay anthem ever recorded. Exquisite!

3. Echoes - The Rapture: I love this record. I've wanted to write a longer piece on this thing somewhere along the way, but I just couldn't find any better way to say, "I love this record". I suppose they heard New Order and wondered to themselves what it would have been like had Joy Division formed about five years earlier and got caught up in the disco wave. Throw in a little X-Ray Spex sax, some PiL groove, a dash of Robert Smith's coy I-know-this-music-will-get-me-laid confidence and viola! I am in love again with rock music.

4. Peanut Butter Cap'n Crunch - I gave up on candy long ago…too sweet. But this…this is heroic stuff! Tiny little peanut butter sugar balls that are not merely a tasty treat, but also a metaphor for our very souls. Don't ask me how that works, just eat, eat, eat!

5. Killer Country - Jerry Lee Lewis: He was a better country howler than rock'n'roller for sure. This collection of Mercury sides is utterly impeccable. His irreverent approach to "Me and Bobby McGee" (at one hundred miles per hour) is something to cherish; his drunken slurring "Who's Gonna Play This Old Piano?", as bombastic as it is true, is the Killer at his murderous best.

6. Rock 'n Roll - The Mekons: It is the record I turn to when I feel like rockroll has passed me by (which is often these days)…and it always works, reminding me of everything I've always loved about the art form.

7. The Beer Can: It is, perhaps, the great invention of the twentieth century! Sure, snobs prefer bottles (especially longnecks), but the beer can is light weight, portable, and a canvas for great (or lousy) art. And it feels so good in your hand when the aluminum is icy cold and sweating under a hot summer sun.

8. The Death and Life of Great American Cities - Jane Jacobs: Jacobs "thinking out loud" work stands as a sociological landmark to this day as she analyzes and explains human nature and the way it creates or destroys the environments we live in. Fascinating stuff you'd rarely otherwise think about.

9. Review of the movie Earthquake by Pauline Kael - she is, in my mind, the single greatest critic of anything in our lifetime, but her first few paragraphs of her review of the 1974 disaster film Earthquake stands as her absolute pinnacle. Funny, acerbic, brutal, and spot on - about the movie as well as our contemporary culture - it will not be surpassed as criticism in my lifetime…I promise you.

10. Ketel One Vodka - if you're a friend…a very, very good friend…this is the gift you'll give me to show you care. Ask the editor for my address please…thank you very much.

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