www.gehkacken.de

Blog

Bücher, schnell gelesen: Teil 1.304
William Boyle – Gravesend (Polar Verlag, 2018)

Gelesen: 18. – 21.02.2018, netto 282 Seiten

Ja, der Polar Verlag hat da eine ziemlich gute Reihe am Start. Period. Und neben Taschenbüchern gibt es endlich auch Hardcover, das freut mein Sammlerherz.

Gravesend ist ein cooler Name für ein Buch, zu cool um ausgedacht zu sein: Es handelt sich um einen kleinen und alten Bezirk in Brooklyn, NYC. Und dort hat Ray Boy Calabrese vor 16 Jahren einen schwulen Jungen in den Tod getrieben und damit das Leben für sich, für die Familie des Opfers und für alle anderen nachhaltig verändert.

Und als er aus dem Knast kommt will die Familie des Opfers nichts als Rache. Und ab da wird dieses Buch ein echtes Kunstwerk. Was für Helden:

Ray Boy Calabrese – ein Mörder der nichts lieber machen würde als … zu Sterben. Conway D’Innocenzio – ein Bruder auf Rache, der aber keine Rache nehmen kann. Alessandra Biagini – hat es aus Gravesend raus nach Hollywood geschafft und kommt als angehimmelte Heldin zurück (und ist nichts davon). Eugene – der durchgeknallte Neffe von Ray Boy will auch gerne ein Gangster sein und geht … den Bach runter.

Atmosphärisch schon dunkel und sehr dicht, dazu extrem nah an den Gefühlen der Charakter. Dazu mit der notwendigen Härte und dem notwendigen Elend. Denn so richtig klasse ist es in Gravesend nicht, ist ehr so run-down. Und das an allen Ecken und Enden.

Es gibt nur einen Weg und der ist down-hill. Ein Weg, der in diesem Buch dann auch mit einer wunderbaren Spannung untermalt wird – was genau passiert ist auch für den erfahrenen crime connaisseur nicht wirklich zu erraten.

Wow – das ist ein echter Hit. Nicht wirklich pure Crime sondern eine eiskalte Draufsicht auf eine kleine Gemeinde. Gravesend we are, ain’t we? Unbedingt lesen. Jetzt! Sofort!

Und was hat William Boyle so zu sagen?
```
Knowing how much film and music mean to you, I wanted to ask what it is the novel allows you. Money and melody aside, what is it we get from novels that we can’t get from stories told through cinematography and song?


Man, that’s a good question, and it’s something I think about a lot. 

I’m not a musician and I’m not a filmmaker (though I sometimes wish I was), so fiction is the only way I know to tell stories and the novel is my preferred form because, as much as I love tightness and economy, I also love being able to stretch my legs out. 

But as someone who is constantly consuming films and albums and books, I’d have to say it’s just more of a feeling: I live inside books the way I don’t live inside movies or albums, even favorites like Badlands and McCabe & Mrs. Miller or In the Aeroplane Over the Sea and Magnolia Electric Co. Or maybe it’s just a different kind of existence within the work. I don’t think watching films or listening to music is passive, it’s not that. 

The best books work their way into your blood in a way that’s so full, so mystical. I just read Willy Vlautin’s newest novel, The Free, and it was my life for the two days I was reading. It’s the same with other favorites – Ironweed, Jesus’ Son, The Easter Parade, The Death of Jim Loney, too many more to name. These books just hammer their rhythms into me, and I’m creating things in my mind even as a world is being presented to me. 

That’s how I feel when I’m writing too, like I’m inside of something big, like I’m tiling a world into place.

Source: http://fictionwritersreview.com/interview/it-belongs-to-the-neighborhood-an-interview-with-william-boyle/
```
Yep, der hat eine gute Sicht auf die Welt! Da hoffe ich dringend auf mehr und genauso sehr hoffe ich auf eine Verfilmung!

Soundtrack dazu: Mindless Self Indulgence – Revenge, was sonst?
2018/03/02
… 61 and still a lot to say: When the fast pace of the youth almost ruins the beauty of the age old songs!
Timothy Smith aka TV Smith (of The Adverts fame) has been around on solo trips for quite a while, lashing our songs with loads of energy paired with an acoustic guitar. For this years visit to Hamburg he paired up with some Spanish friends to back him … once they called themselves Suzi & Los Quattros, for this occasion then went under the moniker The Bored Teenagers, something sure more meaningful.

First on where G31 from Hamburg and they looked like this…

G31 (Hafenklang, Hamburg, 16.02.2018 (c) gehkacken.de)

.. and they sounded like … mmhhh … errrr … one of me mates said “Deutschpunk” and spat it out in a way that his intentions where quite clear. I had an immediate dislike of the optical setting on stage (and yes, i took offence mainly on the one that would look and sound better in a metal band) and i really did not dig their mu-sick.

They had some good moments though they lasted not very long and most of their songs where ruined by what i call complexity. Simple is more, in my humble opinion. But they had fans and got some support as such i did not feel as bad.

And next on TV Smith & The Bored Teenagers and they kicked off like this:

Wow – what a contrast. Both the visuals (TV Smith in white, rest of the band in black and the lights only on TV Smith) and the mu-sick where hand-in-glove and just perfect in delivery. Wow – did not expect that power, that energy and that drive. And what stuns most is that he still has this crystal clear voice that almost pleases yer ears.
```
TV Smith & The Bored Teenagers (Hafenklang, Hamburg, 16.02.2018) (c) gehkacken.de)
```
And the audience in the well packed Hafenklang went all quiet and all attentive, just like an audience receiving a play in a Theatre. And once the all-time hits came about then audience went from shy appreciation into full time sing-a-long, just like here on one of the greatest ever Adverts songs – The Great British Mistake (a song that you better check the lyrics out, so relevant still today):

And now that hand-in glove thingy got a little rupture. That was too fast paced and actually crushing the simple punk style of the original and in fact crushes the vocals that actually carry the song (and the message). This song in style relies on less speed and more drums Mr. Smith! Remember?

(and that one is too for all those punks who where in love with Gaye Advert, one of the neatest female bass players of all time).

And fast paced it went on, this time in a much more fitting mode getting one of their signature songs across – indeed we where all Bored Teenagers!

And bored triggers another memory from that memory lane leading down to 1977 – The Adverts had a minor success in a German cinematic youth movie called Brennende Langeweile in 1979 (and where seen by Mr. Stickel of Channel Rats fame at the Markthalle in 1978, he’s got footage from the Bravo to proof it!):

It with all these annotations and memories it was a very worthwhile evening with lovely people on stage and in front of the stage, thought it was not really a run down of the first two Adverts records like some people did think it would be. And that is another great reminder: Whilst Crossing the red sea with The Adverts is one of the definite punk records (though 1978 not 1977) the follow up Cast of Thousands remains an industry ruined overproduced something that never gave the band the chance to capitalise on their success.

And that is why TV Smith ended up going solo and playing with everybody and anybody (almost). But he is still able to pen down hit’s, be it for himself or others. So here are his encores – first No Control, a premiere and and a song with a simple but so well fitting message. Listen up youth!

And they ended the rather long set with a song he penned down for Die Toten Hosen – let’s hope that stuff like this helps him to pay the dues and allows him to have some money saved up (so that he won’t fall victim to the NHS if he gets older and weaker).

Did i like it? Oh yes, i liked it. Mr. Smith is a splendid friendly chap and – given he has got an audience out here in Germanistan – well able to converse in German. And his backing band brings the power that nowadays is needed (though they should get some speeding tickets). Some of me mates had a bit more reservations but that was ok. Given that the show was followed by some mu-sick from the platter people stayed on for beer and chats … overall a perfect Friday after a week of being plagued with a cold.

And Suzy & Los Quattro? They did a fucking great job some time back transporting another gem of Crossing the read sea with The Adverts:

And that by all means is another worthy cause and effort!

PS: In case you want more about Mr. Smith then check out this BBC documentary (though you need a VPN via the UK to see the full one hour):

The full video is here!
2018/02/18
Bücher, schnell gelesen: Teil 1.303

Wallace Stroby – Fast ein guter Plan (Pendragon, 2018)

Gelesen: 14. – 17.02.2018, netto 304 Seiten

Ein guter Plan wäre es, die Heldin weiterzuentwickeln. Das gelingt Wallace Stroby im dritten Crissa Stone Krimi leider nicht so ganz. Crissa ist immer noch auf der Suche nach schnellem und billigem Geld um immer noch ihrem Liebsten (im Knast in Texas) zu helfen.

Und billiges und schnelles Geld ist am einfachsten bei anderen Kriminellen zu finden, die schalten nämlich auch selten die Polizei ein. Ärgerlich nur wenn der eigentlich einfach Job schief geht, der Partner stirbt und die Kriminellen zwar nicht die Polizei einschalten aber einen korrupten ex-Bullen mit besten Verbindungen zur Polizei und einer guten Spürnase.

Und wenn dann auch noch die eigentlich harte Carissa wegen dem Kind des toten Partners alle Vorsicht fahren lässt, dann kommt es zu einem erwartbaren Showdown.

Nicht ganz so brutal wie die anderen beiden Teile, nicht ganz so gelungen hard-boiled. Vor allem nicht, wenn das Buch mit einer Widmung an den großartigen Elmore Leonard beginnt – das Niveau wird leider nicht erreicht.Jetzt bin ich auf Teil 4 gespannt, bekommt Wallace die Kurve?

Soundtrack dazu: Negative Approach – I’ll Survive, was sonst?

2018/02/18