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Frank Turner recommended First Four Years by Black Flag in Music (curated)

 
First Four Years by Black Flag
First Four Years by Black Flag
1983 | Rock
(0 Ratings)
Album Favorite

"I was aware of who Black Flag were and I had heard people talking about them. I was in Exeter at a family funeral. I would have been about 14. I nipped out to a record store which was near to where the cathedral where the funeral was and I walked in as a nerdy little dickhead in my suit that I was wearing for the church service. The guy gave me a bit of a look and I asked him if he had anything by Black Flag and he pretty much fell off his chair. I loved that album to death. The beginning to Revenge is still the best start to any song written ever He sold me this album and I kind of knew I was looking for something that sounded like that at that point. It was becoming apparent to me that hardcore was the area of punk that I was particularly interested in. I loved that album to death. The beginning to Revenge is still the best start to any song written ever. I think about Black Flag a lot when I’m writing, in the sense of brevity is the soul of wit. Fix Me is my favourite Black Flag song and it's 42 seconds long. Every time I write a song that is longer than 42 seconds, which is all of my songs, there’s part of me that thinks I’m wasting my time or dawdling."

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Sullivan's Travels (1941)
Sullivan's Travels (1941)
1941 | Action, Classics, Comedy
8.0 (2 Ratings)
Movie Favorite

"I saw this for the first time at CalArts [and] since then I’ve become a big fan of all Preston Sturges films. Again, I [had] already chosen what I wanted to do for a living but [this] story touched me so deeply. Here’s a guy who makes comedies during the Depression and he’s so isolated in Hollywood [that] he sets out to learn what’s going on with people. He becomes a hobo. And he ends up way in the South and [is] put into this work prison. And everyone in Hollywood believes that he’s dead, that a hobo stole his coat and was killed by a train. And so he’s there and [he can’t] get word back that he’s still alive. It’s a horrible situation. For Christmas Eve, at the depth of his misery, a black church in the segregated South invites all the prisoners out. And they sit there and what they watch is a Pluto cartoon. It’s the famous scene of Pluto getting the flypaper stuck on him and he can’t get it off. And [the audience] starts howling with laughter. Howling with laughter. People who you wouldn’t think would still have laughter in their bodies. And Sullivan came out of this and gets back to Hollywood and everyone’s like, “Oh, you had this horrible situation, you must make a great drama.” And he goes, “No, I’m going to make a comedy. Because that’s what the world needs.”"

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Sparrow
Sparrow
L. J. Shen | 2016 | Contemporary, Romance
6
6.0 (1 Ratings)
Book Rating
I've had this one on my Kindle for a few years now, putting it off for one reason or another so it's about time I read it.

This starts with Troy Brennan going to church confessional to kill the priest who gave private information to someone who then went and killed Troy's dad. Fast forward three years and we meet Sparrow who is suddenly finding herself marrying Troy but doesn't know why and isn't happy about it.

When I decided to read this, it hadn't registered with me that it was going to be a little dark. It isn't that bad, really. We see Troy kill the priest at the beginning but other than that he doesn't really do anything that bad. It's just it's Christmas and reading something like this at this time of the year feels a little wrong - and I think after the "All for the Game" trilogy I read that I'm done for Dark books for the rest of the year.

I didn't entirely understand the romance in this one, either. Half the time Troy wasn't even interested in her and she was pretty much just a way for him to have sex so I wasn't really feeling it. Not even towards the end when everything came out and they mellowed towards the other. Maybe as I mentioned above, I just wasn't in the mood.

This is something like my sixth or seventh book by the author but it isn't my favourite.