Seven Years of Magic-al Thinking: The Com-plete Book Club ListHere are the book club titlesfrom 2000-2004 (plus editorialcomments). An asterisk meansI didn't have time to read the tit-le in question. For a history ofthe group, please click here.***** ***** ***** ***** *****11/00: Cormac McCarthy - Blood Meridian* [I'd like to read this]12/00: Mikal Gilmore - A Shot in the Heart* [And this, too]2001 2001 2001 2001 2001 2001 2001 2001 2001 02/01: Larry McMurtry - The Last Picture Show [So good I read it twice; great movie, too]10/01: John Updike - Rabbit, Run and John Cheever - "TheSwimmer" (short story) [Depressing, but I liked thembot

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Turn On, Tune In, Drone Out...The Black Angels, Passover, Light in the AtticEmblazoned with a quote from epic miserablist Edvard "The Scream" Munch--"Illness, insanity, and death are the black angels that kept watch over my cradle and accompanied me all my life"--Passover emanates from a very dark place indeed. The lyrics describe death and destruction ("You kill, kill, kill, kill / Kill what you can") and the sound is heavy and forbidding (tribal drums, "drone machine," and a twin guitar attack that alternates between superfuzz and bad-trip blues), but this Austin quintet never falls into the goth-rock rabbit hole. In the liner notes, they acknowledg

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Reviews: Scandinavia CallingMagnet, Tourniquet, Filter US Recordings/AtlanticHailing from the same rainy city as wistful troubadour Sondre Lerche, Magnet's Even Johansen trods similar stylistic ground. The Bergen-based singer/songwriter's second US full-length, after 2003's On Your Side (2000's Quiet and Still was issued under his full name), also brings to mind such romance-obsessed chaps as Rufus Wainwright, Badly Drawn Boy, and Aqualung. In other words, Tourniquet is pleasant stuff, although more than a little generic. Throughout, Johansen croons in a gently keening tenor about love and loss atop a pillowy bed of acoustic guitars and keyboards. It'

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Party Crasher, or the Axman's Annual Top 10 Party and MeHappy anniversary, baby! Last night marked my fifth year as an attendee at Sean Axmaker's annual Top 10 party (I was first invited by Jeff Shannon). Every January, we get together to go through our top 10 lists, starting with number one and working our way down to 10. Who are "we"? A cadre of Seattle crit-types, some of whom write for daily newspapers, alternative weeklies, and the like. Then there's me. I don't really fit in, but I'm honored to be included, since I write mostly for the Web (Amazon, siffblog), various alt-culture pubs (Resonance, Tablet), and local non-profits (SIFF, NWFF).As usu

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New Reviews for a New YearHere's some of the stuff I've been working on this month.Amazon: How to Lose YourLover [okay indie with PaulSchneider, Poppy Montgomery, and Fred Willard], Love, Ludlow (better indie with David Eigenberg, Alicia Goranson, and Bren-dan Sexton III), The Thing About My Folks (lackluster indiewith Paul Reiser, Peter Falk, and Olympia Dukakis), SNL - The Bestof Alec Baldwin , John Ford Goes to War (Kris Kristofferson-nar-rated documentary), The Mill on the Floss (1979 BBC miniseries),and Lie with Me (arty soft-core starring Eric "The O.C." Balfour).Resonance: Wrote a review of local band Hypatia Lake's "...And We Shall Call Him Jo

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When the ShillelaghMeets the HoodPart Four: Maybe It's Because I'm IrishI would like to start with the seemingly trivial item that inspired this inquiry. A couple of years ago, I stumbled across a news item stating that Ireland's Jim Sheridan would be directing the 50 Cent biopic Get Rich or Die Tryin'. Not only that, but the movie would be filmed, at least partially, in Dublin. I immediately forwarded the notice to a few friends who write about film. Jeff Shannon, a contributor to The Seattle Times, wrote back with a message that said something along the lines of, "I can just see it now—'Fiddy' strollin' down the mean streets of Dublin with a shillel

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