Weekend Bites: Proust Questionnaire, Bad Book Titles, Will Self, Jack Rose Remembered, T Rex’s Jewishness, and More

I didn’t think it was possible, but I think I may have found my favorite awful library book. Lit. The interactive Proust questionnaire over at Vanity Fair. NBA star Steve Nash and Cormac McCarthy discussed in this article. Appreciation for Alan Moore’s brilliant graphic novel, From Hell. Three Guys One Book show love for Emily St. John Mandel. Al Gore: Poet. The Hold Steady’s Craig Finn talks about writing the adaptation to Klosterman’s Fargo Rock City. Robert Birnbaum discusses Will […]

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Dusting off: John Berryman Interview in the Paris Review, 1972

Posted by Jason Diamond Former resident of the late John Berryman’s home turf (Minnesota), Craig Finn, dedicated a verse in the opening song of his band The Hold Steady’s 2006 album Boys and Girls in America to Berryman’s suicidal leap from the Washington Avenue Bridge in Minneapolis in 1972. A few months later, Will Sheff and his band Okkervil River gave us their own interpretation of Berryman’s last moments on planet earth, ending the song with a reworking of the […]

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Conversation: Franz Nicolay

It seems safe to say that The Hold Steady are the greatest American rock n’ roll band right now. Craig Finn and his Springsteen-esque observations on the punks and fuck-ups are a third of the holy trinity of rock scribes, along with John Darnielle (The Mountain Goats) and Will Sheff (Okkervil River) in the renaissance of hyper-literate song-crafting. However, I am sure there is an old adage that goes something like, behind every great songwriter is, well . . . […]

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