Would you like to write a book?

You may be interested to know that, as of RIGHT NOW, we’re accepting proposals for future 33 1/3 books, to be published in 2010 and 2011. Please read the information below carefully – I’ve tried to outline the process as clearly as possible.

You can send in one proposal, about one album. Multiple submissions will not be accepted. Draconian, but true!

The “one book per band/artist” rule no longer exists. Therefore, we’ll consider proposals for books about any album that hasn’t already been covered in the series, or isn’t already under contract.

You can find a list of titles already published in the series here, and the books listed as “Coming 2008” and “Titles Announced for 2008 and 2009” are also off-limits. On the “Unknown Status” list, none of these are under contract any more (some of them never were!), with the exception of the books about Kate Bush, Lucinda Williams, and the Clash. So, just to be clear – if you send in a proposal for a book about Pink Flag or Loveless, it’ll be ignored. But if you send in a proposal for a book about The Basement Tapes or Chinese Democracy or Kid A, we’ll absolutely consider it.

The deadline for submission of proposals is midnight on Dec 31st. So you have until the last minute of 2008 (New York time). Any proposals received after that time (and I’ll be watching – drunk, but watching) will not be accepted.

If you have written a book for this series already: we love you, but we’d like to give others a chance. Spreading the wealth, kinda.

If you have submitted a proposal before, but have been turned down, you’re very welcome to have another go.

Regarding your choice of album: this is entirely up to you. I don’t, sadly, have the time to answer emails asking “would album X stand a better chance than album Y?” – so use your best judgment here. My advice would be this: we are looking to sell some books. That’s the bottom line. If you are absolutely convinced that we could sell 4,000 or 5,000 copies of a book about your chosen album, then go for it.

All proposals must be submitted via email. The address for submissions is as follows:

Submissions33@yahoo.com

The subject line of your email must use this format: “Proposal for Big Country’s The Crossing”. (This will really help me keep it all organised: thank you in advance.)

Please don't send proposals to my regular work email. And if you have any questions about this process, ask them in the comments section below. We’ll do our best to answer them.

Your proposal should take the form of a Word document attachment. Don't include it in the body of your email.

All proposals that we get at the yahoo account will be acknowledged within a few days of receipt – except towards the end of December, when I may be offline for a little while. I’ll acknowledge those ones as soon as I’m able.

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All proposals need to include these simple things:

Your name and contact details;

An outline (up to 2000 words) of how you would approach your album of choice. (This is key. Don’t assume, just because you’ve chosen a no-brainer record, that you don’t have to convince us about it. The best proposals have a real clarity to them, a purposeful angle, and a sense of determination. Why do you love the record? What’s fascinating about it? Why will thousands of people want to read about it? In this section, include any details as to whether you would contact the band/artist in question, or other people connected to the record in some way. Artist involvement isn’t essential, but it can certainly help.)

Up to 500 words about yourself, outlining why you're qualified to write about this record;

A couple of paragraphs on how you would help us promote your book: we do everything we can, but an active author makes a huge difference;

And finally, which book in the series would you hope to emulate, in terms of style and content?

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A few more random details…

Absolutely anyone can submit a proposal, except for authors already under contract for the series. You don’t need to be a professional music writer or a legendary rock flautist to be considered.

Will we accept proposals about compilation albums? Yes. About live albums? Yes. About jazz albums? No. (Nothing personal!) About an album that hasn’t been recorded yet? Go ahead, convince us.

The books themselves are between 25,000 and 35,000 words. Almost invariably, this sounds easier than it is. So please only submit a proposal if you’re serious about writing one of these, and if you’re able to commit to it.

Also: I'd advise against doing this for the money. We can’t pay very much – there’s a modest advance against royalties. But if your book ends up selling nicely, you’ll get some decent pocket money for several years to come, and we try to supplement that with translation deals, audiobook deals, etc.

This is hard to predict, but I’d hope to have a yes/no decision for everyone who sends us a proposal by some point in March. It really depends on how many we receive.

Last time around (in early 2007), we received about 450 proposals, and ended up offering contracts to about 20 of them. So the odds aren’t great, when you think about it. If you bruise easily, you might want to think twice about trying this. On the other hand – go for it – it’s fun!

I sincerely hope this covers everything. If you have any questions, leave them in the comments section to this post, and we’ll do our best to answer them. As we discovered previously, this system isn’t perfect, but we’ll do everything we can to make it fair, and as open as possible.

Oh, and if you want to share this posting on message boards, facebook, other blogs, go ahead and link to it. Thanks!

"Reading is a very fresh way to learn"

This is going to be a long one, so I would like to begin this post by reiterating that Franklin Bruno will be talking about Elvis Costello's Armed Forces at Barbes in Park Slope on Sunday, November 2nd at 7pm. See you there!
More on that here.

Powell's Books' latest installment of their Indiespensible program is available and is appropriately themed for the season. The October installment features a slipcased edition with a signed bookplate of Iain Banks' Crow Road, a CD of original songs about death and dying (more here), AND a booklet of Graeme Thomson's top 40 death songs of all time from his book I Shot A Man In Reno. It's not too late to order a copy of the whole package on the Powell's site.
And, if you are one of the first 5 people to forward me your order confirmation at jmboling (at) continuum-books (dot) com, I will send you a free copy of I Shot A Man In Reno for your very own. I'll also burn you an mp3 CD of Graeme's top 40.

We are extremely excited to announce that Drew Daniel, one half of Matmos and the author of the 33 1/3 on Throbbing Gristle's 20 Jazz Funk Greats, will be at Housing Works Bookstore and Cafe in Soho on Saturday, November 15th to read, talk, sign, and make some beautiful noise music on his computer. The reason we're giving you 2 weeks' notice on this is that tickets are $10 and benefit a wonderful charity.
Get some before they fill up!

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Now some messages from your local literacy council... First we have Glenn Danzig on the topic of books. You have no idea how often we hang around bookshelves with our shirts off here at the office. The water cooler is highly overrated.

Next up is Stevie Wonder on Sesame Street.

And finally Run DMC on Reading Rainbow.


For fans of the music video, it should be noted that Mtv has gone and made its whole library available online through the imperfect medium of pixellated streaming video at their new website called Mtv Music. I guess by calling the site Music Television Music, they really want to drive home the point that it's all about the Music Music. At any rate, that site has more awkwardly choreographed Van Halen, Huey Lewis, and ZZ Top dance moves than you can shake a stick at.

Franklin Bruno at Barbes Nov. 2

The next installment of the 33 1/3 Multimedia Reading Series at Barbes in Brooklyn is this coming Sunday Nov. 2nd at 7pm. If you're in the area and haven't made it out for one of the readings yet, you've been missing some good times. Last reading included awesome footage of Stevie Wonder dressed in full cowboy gear donning his Songs in the Key of Life albums in his holsters instead of guns. Enough said.

This week's reading:

Elvis Costello’s Armed Forces

Franklin Bruno

Elvis Costello and the Attractions' 1979 album Armed Forces was perfectly timed to comment on the rising tide of "emotional fascism"-- the album's working title-- in what was about to become Thatcher's England (not to mention Reagan's America). Join us for a timely pre-election look at the musical and political roots of Costello perennials like "Oliver's Army," and "(What's So Funny 'Bout Peace Love and and Understanding)," with like "illustration" by author Franklin Bruno and special guests, including this-performance-only cover versions.

Critic and musician Franklin Bruno has been called a "true Tin Pan Alley scion" by Los Angeles Times. He founded and fronted the So. Cal. pop trio Nothing Painted Blue and has since recorded as a solo artist, in collaboration with The Mountain Goats' John Darnielle (as The Extra Glenns) and singer/activist Jenny Toomey, and with his current "flexible branding medium" The Human Hears. As a critic, his writing has appeared in Slate, The Believer, Village Voice, and in Da Capo's Best Music Writing series.

Barbes

376 9th Street at 6th Ave

Park Slope, Brooklyn

Nov. 2nd 7pm

If Things Were Perfect

Fingers crossed, we'll be announcing an open call for proposals in the next couple of weeks, here on the blog. As happened last time, I'm sure we'll manage to piss off a few people, but we'll do everything we can to make the process as transparent and democratic as possible.

In the meantime, here's a clip for you. We had a song by James at my Dad's funeral last month ("Ring the Bells") but for obvious reasons I can't listen to that any more, right now. Instead, here's the wonderful "If Things Were Perfect", which I first saw performed at the Royal Albert Hall on April 6, 1985.

Vol. 60: Rum, Sodomy & the Lash

I'm thrilled that Jeffery T. Roesgen's book about the Pogues is now available from your local 33 1/3 vendor, as well as all the usual online places.

We've had, up to now, quite a few "making of" books in the series, and a handful of fictional treatments. This is the first book to combine the two approaches - interspersing track-by-track analysis of the album (and interviews with most of the band) with a miniature epic that places those same bandmembers on a fateful sea voyage from France to Senegal in 1816.

Here's the back cover copy:

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"The band heaped their cases and bags into the corner of a small tavern and came to rest around a table. Some of them continued to sing, while others put their brows to the table and slept. After some time Cait, the sole woman in the band, rose and nodded to her group. She collected a bag and a bass and left with a man in glasses and a black hat who'd been standing along the wall. Voice by voice, the band's songs diluted into the commotion of the tavern room. Soon, there'd be more songs to sing, but for now there'd be rest; the kind that all trodden men must indulge."

To listen to Rum, Sodomy & the Lash is to be taken on a sea voyage with a cast of rabble-rousers, rovers, dreamers and revolutionaries. Released in 1985, the Pogues' second album seamlessly bounds between oceans and centuries, composing and culling stories of common people - their vices, suffering and urges, their misadventures and victories. With the vital ode of Celtic folk music and the abandon of punk, the Pogues frame their tales with a spirit that's at once firebrand and solemn. Through the epic imagery gracing the cover to the cast of souls introduced in the songs to the Pogues themselves, Jeff Roesgen's celebration of Rum, Sodomy & the Lash intertwines a seafaring fictional narrative with band-informed accounts of the creation of this unique and enduring album.

Jeff Roesgen writes fiction and about music for tinymixtapes.com. He lives in Cincinnati, Ohio, with his wife and two children.

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Bob Dylan Encyclopedia in Paperback

Gerry Smith, editor of the esteemed Dylan Daily website, has some very kind words about our Bob Dylan Encyclopedia, now available in paperback - and highly recommended if you're already thinking about some festive shopping...

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Updating his Bob Dylan Encyclopedia for the new paperback edition, Michael Gray took the opportunity to add entries on recent product as varied as a CD - Modern Times, an art show - Drawn Blank, and two major DVD releases – I’m Not There and The Other Side Of The Mirror.

For the new material, Gray continues to employ his well-established technique of mixing factual description with robust critical opinion. You won't always agree with him, but his combative tone challenges you to think through your own views.

Apart from its intrinsic value, the new edition – which should be on any Dylan fan’s bookshelves - serves as a reminder of its author's pre-eminence as a Zim commentator.

Long before it became fashionable, Gray demonstrated, single-handedly, why Dylan is a great writer, to be considered alongside the giants of serious literature. Song and Dance Man, Gray’s ground-breaking study from 1972, showed the first wave of Bobfans that Dylan was special, and why he was marching well in front of the trailing line of rock musos with whom he’d hitherto been lumped. For this, countless Dylan fans are indebted to Michael Gray.

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Community Care

Thanks to David Hemingway, we've had our first review in the UK's Community Care magazine - a great review of John Darnielle's Master of Reality book in the series.

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John Darnielle is an acclaimed singer/songwriter, a columnist for rock magazine Decibel and a former US-based psychiatric nurse who dedicates his first book to "all the children to whom I have ever provided care". Each book in the ongoing 33 1/3 series considers a solitary album - previous contributions have ranged from Radiohead's OK Computer to Celine Dion's Let's Talk About Love.

Here, Darnielle explores Black Sabbath's iconic third album Master of Reality, in the voice of Roger, a 15-year-old boy being held in an adolescent psychiatric ward in southern California. Roger's music cassettes have been taken away from him due to the belief that their content is part of his problem. His subsequent journal entries are, in part, an attempt to convince his "captors" to return his Walkman and cherished tapes to him, in particular this blunt album that sounds as if it's "made by four guys who have never once danced at a party in their lives".

Darnielle writes with necessary directness - Roger's first journal entry reads simply "Fuck you all. Go to hell" - and in doing so manages to articulate more about Ozzy Osbourne et al than a more traditional recording history or biography as well as providing a vivid description of what it might be like to be incarcerated on an adolescent psychiatric ward.

Darnielle's novella is not only a touchstone in the series, it is a powerful and potent book in its own right. Utterly compelling.

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Review by David Hemingway, mental health worker and a contributor to XLR8R and Record Collector magazines

The second installment of the 33 1/3 Multiamedia Reading Series at Barbes on Sunday with Zeth Lundy on Stevie Wonder's Songs in the Key of Life went swimmingly. Below are some photo highlights for those who couldn't make it. My favorite part? Footage of Stevie Wonder in full cowboy gear with Songs in the Key of Life albums slung in his holster....

Remaining readings in the series:
Sunday Nov. 2nd @ 7pm Franklin Bruno on Elvis Costello's Armed Forces
Sunday Dec. 7@ 7pm Joe Harvard on Velvet Underground's Velvet Underground and Nico
Sunday Jan. 4th @7pm Michael Fournier on Minutemen's Double Nickels on the Dime

Get it while you can

KEXP in Seattle (90.3FM) is counting down the top 903 albums of all time (as voted on by their staff and listeners) as part of their fall fund drive. As I type this right now they're on the Smiths' "That Joke Isn't Funny Anymore" from Meat is Murder (#444, if you were curious).

The folks at KEXP are very into long, intimidating lists--they are also reviewing every single volume of the 33 1/3 series on their blog, most recently, Slayer - Reign In Blood.

Stop by in the next couple days, see who's playing, maybe even donate some money to one of the best radio stations in the country.

"One of the Great Music Biographies"

I know I've plugged Joe Bonomo's wonderful, wonderful book about the Fleshtones on here several times before, but we just got this great review by Kris Needs in Mojo, and we wanted to share it with you.

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Pursuing an unquenchable lust for life, music and partying since forming in a debauched Queens basement, the Fleshtones have paid homage to Archie Bell and the Drells, Standells-era punk and also plugged into the hedonistic energy of the "New York experience" at gay club The Cock Ring. Dismissed by one critic as a "mindless twist band", the Fleshtones weren't feted like their contemporaries but, undaunted, have released some 20 albums and have gigged relentlessly, remaining undimmed of spirit and happy that Suicide are fans. Bonomo's beautifully written, band-assisted account is both hilarious and tragic. There's heroic excess, dogged obsession, personal tragedy and slapstick situations, and even if the Hall of Fame never beckons, the Fleshtones can at least count their name on one of the great music biographies.

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The series in Spain

Keeping the international theme going for the week, great to see some positive coverage of the series on the excellent Hipersonica site.

Here's the article's closing paragraph below, and you can read the whole piece here.

En sí, la colección es una gozada para los que no se cansan de leer sobre música, aparte de escucharla. El único problema es que, de momento, nadie se ha animado a traducir ninguno de los libros, pero el esfuerzo de leer en inglés merece la pena por la fantástica recompensa de conocer más y mejor discos como Pet Sounds, Meat is Murder, If You´re Feeling Sinister, Led Zeppelin IV, Reign of Blood o Forever Changes. Muy recomendado.

And yes, we'd love to see the series translated into Spanish, too!

Pet Sounds in Japan

It's a real honour when one of the world's great writers translates one of our humble little books into his/her own language - so I'm thrilled to announce the Japanese publication of Jim Fusilli's book on Pet Sounds, translated by Haruki Murakami.

Mark yer calendars

D.X. Ferris (33 1/3 Slayer's Reign in Blood) will appear at the Mentor Borders Books & Music (17200 Royalton Rd, Route 82Strongsville, Ohio 44136, Ohio) this Saturday, September 27. Ferris will sign copies, answer questions, and give away free bonus material. The event is free, and runs from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. Ferris is scheduled to appear at 2.

Roll Carnival also features authors Carlo Wolff (Cleveland Rock and Roll Memories), John Gorman (The Buzzard: Inside the Glory Days of WMMS and Cleveland Rock and Roll), Mike Olszewski (Radio Daze), Marc Lee Shannon (Any Ordinary Man) and Murray Saul (Get Downs Vol. 1). Also appearing will be artist David Helton and T-shirt entrepreneur Daffy Dan.

AND....

33 1/3 Guided by Voices' Bee Thousand author Marc Woodworth will be reading at the Paradise Lounge in Boston on Tuesday, September 30th at 6pm right before Robert Pollard's Boston Spaceships/ Big Dipper show (beginning at 7pm at the Paradise).

The event will incorporate randomly chosen interview cassette minute (usually at the expense of the author’s dignity), the collective making of a found poem from Bee Thousand lyric fragments using the Tzara Dada method of anti- lyric composition, the playing of a few Bee Thousand-era rarities, and a full-size anagram contest (prix d'honneur for the winner), sing-alongs, and giveaways of home-made, lovingly decorated, lo-fi indexes to those who buy the book or bring their tattered, smudged and dog-eared copies.

All Tomorrow's Parties live on WFMU

A couple of weeks ago we gave away 2 free tickets to All Tomorrow's Parties to a lucky reader. For those of you who can no longer physically withstand 3 consecutive days of music no matter how awesome it may be, have an aversion to standing on lines for hours at a time, have a hard time justifying $8 for watery domestic beer, or are just feeling bitter and angry because you didn't win the free tickets, we have a consolation prize for you...

WFMU will be broadcasting a very sizeable chunk of the goings-on over the airwaves and online, including Yo La Tengo, Polvo, Dinosaur Jr., Growing, Harmonia, Om, Mercury Rev, Lightning Bolt, Bob Mould, Low, Wooden Shjips, Silver Mt. Zion, Brian Jonestown Massacre, Spectrum, and more!

They haven't yet worked out an agreement with My Bloody Valentine, but you know how that goes.

UPDATED! Here's the broadcast schedule: http://blog.wfmu.org/freeform/2008/09/atp-sets-broadc.html
Sweet.

Last Minute Weekend Event

Tomorrow Slayer's Reign in Blood author D.X. Ferris will appear at the Akron/Fairlawn Borders Books & Music (3737 W. Market St., Fairlawn). Ferris will read from the book, sign copies, answer questions, and give away free bonus material. Ferris is scheduled to appear at 3.

The appearance is part of Borders’ Rock & Roll Carnival, which also features authors Carlo Wolff (“Cleveland Rock and Roll Memories”), John Gorman (“The Buzzard: Inside the Glory Days of WMMS and Cleveland Rock and Roll”), Mike Olszewski (“Radio Daze”), David Giffels (Are We Not Men? We Are DEVO! and All The Way Home: Raising a Family in a Falling-Down House), Jonah Koslen (“Telling on Myself and Jonah Koslen and Breathless 1978-1981,” former Michael Stanley bassist), Marc Lee Shannon (“Any Ordinary Man”) and Murray Saul (“Get Downs Vol. 1”). Also appearing will be artist David Helton and T-shirt entrepreneur Daffy Dan.

The event is free, and runs from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m.