“Thunder Road” essay by Nick Hornby based on the song by Bruce Springsteen
It really doesn’t seem that long ago when my friend Mark approached me to help him out on a project involving Nick Hornby and Bruce Springsteen. Mr. Hornby had written a terrific essay on Mr. Springsteen’s seminal rock song “Thunder Road”. Mark had already approached both men and secured approvals to publish the proposed book — with the stipulation all proceeds went to charity.
Mark put up the materials, and I put up the labor and went to work.
I had constructed a book called Friends and Enemies using a dos-a-dos structure to compliment Tim O’Brien’s two short stories, and I felt the same structure would work for “Thunder Road”.
My work on Thunder Road took way longer than it should have — for which I am 100% responsible — and eventually I handed it off to Mark. He saw the book to its completion. Lead Graffiti and my friend Bill Roberts from Bottle of Smoke wrapped it all up into one beautiful package.
There’s not much more to say about this on my end, other than Mark produced a terrific book, and all that’s really important is the book is complete. I’m quite certain Thunder Road will stand The Test of Time.
And I still consider Mark a close friend.
Here’s Mark’s words on the book, as well as all the information you need to purchase a copy. The book was oversubscribed upon publication, and there will be no reprints. 100% of the proceeds from this project went to TreeHouse.
The Girl in a Motorcyle Helmet
They’ve got a couple of boxes filled with hundreds of photographs; one box houses the tame, weird stuff, while the other features mostly hard-core smut. I like to rummage through both.
I pull an old Polaroid of a girl wearing a helmet. It’s a motorcycle helmet, but it looks almost like an astronaut’s. Upon closer inspection, I’m not even sure it’s a girl. I’m pretty sure she’s a she, but who knows for sure. I set it aside, but I wasn’t ready to commit my 25 cents for it.
Deeper into the box, I pulled a second pic from the same sitting. This time, she’s looking away in this sort of arty-farty way that intrigued me. I wondered if she had the camera on a tripod and was taking a self-portrait. I wanted to know if she worked in a lab — or if she might have been a doctor. I wanted to know why she was sitting for a picture in her helmet, and why she chose to look away on the second take. I wanted to know why one picture was developed in January, while she waited another month to get the other one developed.
I flipped the second picture over, and since it was priced at a dime, how could I put them back in that box?
Some time later — just a few weeks ago, actually — I bought a new scanner, and the first two things I decided to scan were the pictures of the girl in the motorcycle helmet. And when I started messing around with the two scans in Photoshop, it became clear to me what she was doing in the second picture.
Well, not so clear, really.
But something’s about to go down, and it might not be good.
And at that second, when it dawned on me there was a second person living in this picture, and how that second person radically altered the mood of both pictures — it really startled me. So much so, I’m thinking of printing something featuring the two images…cause that’s how I roll.
New pics of Wild Whispers by Roxie Powell
Venezia. Another Day.
Venezia. Day 1.
Happy Birthday Mr. Lennon.
Me n’ Pat.
I got there right when the shin dig started, cause I didn’t want to be out late…cause that’s the way I roll: early to bed and late to rise.
The cool thing about being the first person there was getting to spend a few minutes talking to Mr. Sansone. I’m gonna refer to him as Mr. Sansone — as opposed to “Pat” — cause I’m not gonna try and come off like I know the dude now, or after spending 15 minutes with him that I somehow left some sort of indelible impression on him and now we’re all BBF’s n’ shit.
Nope.
I did, however, buy a couple books off him.
I didn’t let him know what a geek-boy fab I am for Wilco, the gig he does for a paycheck…or that I like The Autumn Defense, the gig he does cause he loves playing music…or that I really, really like the pictures he makes with his SX-70.
Well, I did praise his work — but not in a worshippy, sloppy, silly way.
The evening was exciting enough to blog about, cause really, I haven’t had shit to say since I made my contribution to Bagazine #4, which was last spring.
All work and no play makes Jim an Average Boy.
If you want to grab a copy, I’d do it right away, cause there’s some of the limited edition (150) still online over at The Wilco Store.
You can check out some of Pat Sansone’s work from the show at a Flickr gallery curated by a dude named Michael Raso.
I have no idea who Michael Raso is; perhaps I should check him out.
Finally, here’s Mr. Sansone’s Flickr page.
Oh, and did I mention all work and no play makes Jim an Average Boy?
Wilco @ La Blogotheque
Marketing to Men.
People are as creepy and perverted and weird as they’ve ever been — it’s human nature. The only difference between now and, say, 1956, is the dissemination of information. Which is to say our times are no more depraved or sick or twisted than any other time in history — it’s just that CNN wasn’t around to broadcast it 24/7; in fact, I think we have it all pretty good, for the most part. Sure the economy sucks, and there’s no cure for HIV or cancer, and the Earth is getting warmer and over-populated, but I’ll certainly take living in The Present over The Past.
Marketing to Men is my contribution to Bagazine #4, and it conveys my thoughts about just that — our creepy, pervy past.
There’s eight ads from the back of various mens’ magazines (all mid-century), and they’re hawking everything from fake cop badges to cheap firearms to porn to vanity products. My favs are the how-tos: how to make one-way mirrors and listening devices that take “ordinary materials” and turn them into a “Super Directional Mike [sic] that amplifies sound 1000 times. YES, YOU CAN ACTUALLY HEAR CONVERSATIONS THRU WALLS A BLOCK AWAY.”
There’s a guide to street fighting, and if you’re a “Man & Wife team with a camera”, you could “earn the kind of money you have always dreamed of.”
The first forays into amateur porn?
Who knows — but if you sent a buck to “Artek” in Hollywood, CA, I think you might have been surprised at whatever advice they offered.
Or not.
100 copies signed and numbered, gocco print and a good, old-fashioned hand stamp for title and colophon (am I contradicting myself?); 3 proofs marked “A/P”; concertina fold.
