Oh Hey There

tomewing:

I reviewed this for Pitchfork. It’s the most satisfying reissued ABBA album because the bonus tracks are all absolute killers (on most of the reissues the bonus tracks are Swedish-language versions of the singles: not quite so vital) (unless yr a Swedophone). If it weren’t for the bonuses, song-for-song I reckon Super Trouper and Arrival are better, but they don’t have The Visitors’ thematic clarity. Short version: the critics are right and this is The One You Need.

Anyway, it’s a little tricky reviewing reissues. For records and bands you already know are in the readers’ canon it’s fine, and the trouble is finding something new to say about them. If not, you usually end up having to spend a lot of time doing set-up work and it can feel quite defensive. I’ve seen Donna Summer pieces today, for instance, which feel they have to apologise for disco, or frame her in terms of rock or punk to ‘prove’ her importance.

So with The Visitors, I was more or less trying to write from the same perspective and tone I’d use for talking about a My Bloody Valentine or Smiths reissue: the excellence and importance of this group is a given, now let’s get into working out what makes the record tick. I don’t know if that makes the review better - there’s a risk it might seem baffling or irrelevant to the non-fan - but there we are.

(And thanks Mark for asking me to review it - it’s not the sort of thing I’d have thought to pitch!)

I got excited when I saw an ABBA reissue with your name on it. What a lovely, mature album. “Like An Angel Passing Through My Room” sounds pretty creepy now that I know that it grew from “Twinkle Twinkle Little Star”

thetinywivesclub:

These are the jokes and insults for the year 2007. There weren’t as many direct threats at Tom this year, but there was a number of running jokes and themes like being asked to “Define” something or the continual mispronouncing of words. Check out the list for 2008 here and for 2009-2011 here.

There can be no doubt that James Buchanan was gay, before, during and after his four years in the White House. Moreover, the nation knew it, too — he was not far into the closet.

Today, I know no historian who has studied the matter and thinks Buchanan was heterosexual. Fifteen years ago, historian John Howard, author of “Men Like That,” a pioneering study of queer culture in Mississippi, shared with me the key documents, including Buchanan’s May 13, 1844, letter to a Mrs. Roosevelt. Describing his deteriorating social life after his great love, William Rufus King, senator from Alabama, had moved to Paris to become our ambassador to France, Buchanan wrote:

I am now “solitary and alone,” having no companion in the house with me. I have gone a wooing to several gentlemen, but have not succeeded with any one of them. I feel that it is not good for man to be alone; and should not be astonished to find myself married to some old maid who can nurse me when I am sick, provide good dinners for me when I am well, and not expect from me any very ardent or romantic affection.

Despite such evidence, one reason why Americans find it hard to believe Buchanan could have been gay is that we have a touching belief in progress. Our high school history textbooks’ overall story line is, “We started out great and have been getting better ever since,” more or less automatically. Thus we must be more tolerant now than we were way back in the middle of the 19th century! Buchanan could not have been gay then, else we would not seem more tolerant now.

(via ericmortensen)