j e s r u s h . c o m

What follows are assorted notes on books, movies, music, poetry, etc…

This overlooked film comes out of nowhere and sucker punches you were it counts. Joan Allen plays a mother of four teenage daughters who is abandoned by her husband when he runs off to Sweden with his secretary. She and her children struggle to cope with the subsequent chaos while Allen becomes increasingly angry and slips into a deep depression. It’s a really well done study of the stranglehold which anger can put on human life and of the importance of perception. We saw this in the theatre and folks were so moved that they actually clapped out loud when the credits rolled. That doesn’t happen often. A must see!

Finding good new music has gotten really hard lately. Sometimes I feel like I’ve heard everything, like there is nothing new left to discover (or at least nothing I would actually like). Enter CD Baby. This site is different from iTunes and all the rest: it’s all brand new independent artists which you’ve never heard.

But it gets better. Anybody who has taken a dive into independent music knows what a mess it can be… you’ve got 10,000 bands and no idea what they sound like. There might be some stuff you would like, but how do you actually find it?!? CD Baby has finally solved this problem. On their main page, click the sounds like button, and you get a huge lists of known bands which in turn lead you to bands which sound like them. iTunes, Amazon, and everybody else have been doing “You might like” recommendations for years, but this is the first time I’ve seen it done with independents.

For example, I went down the ’sounds like U2′ road, and stumbled on this band Signal Goodbye with this track which you can listen to. And you get instant MP3 downloads. Brilliant.

I don’t pay much attention to children’s poetry, but I heard a segment on NPR about Calef Brown’s new collection, Flamingos on the Roof, and it was too good to pass up. I can’t really explain it, but I love this stuff. A sample:

10-Cent Haiku

I sat down to write a haiku
it seemed like the right thing to do
I wouldn’t need very much time
no need to bother with making it rhyme
I reached in my pocket and pulled out a dime
this is my 10 cent haiku:

shiny, silver friend
i will never let you go
Look!
An ice cream truck!

Listen to the story and several more poems at NPR, and hear what might be the best title for a poem *EVER*: “Biscuits in the Wind.”