This is the issue with the soundtrack. This soundtrack was composed by They Might Be Giants, landmark musicmakers of our time. There are also songs by Philip Glass, Doughty (of Soul Coughing), Roger Greenawalt and others. This soundtrack, it is something. Forty-five songs, ranging in length from 8 seconds to 3 or so minutes. It is something, this. It is weird and experimental and full of good. There are very strange audio fragments, and there are hits. Huge, huge hits. Huge. In most cases, the band took the issue's pieces — fiction, essays, art, etc. — and then composed music commensurate in duration and tone. In a few cases it worked the other way around. This book is a cloth-covered hardcover book. When you see it in stores it will be wrapped in plastic. Here are other things inside: Ian Frazier has written a brilliant and moving eulogy for Saul Steinberg. This piece is accompanied by a few very rare pieces by Steinberg. Ann Cummins has written a great story called "Billy by the Bay." On the CD, she reads this story (a truncated version thereof) with musical accompaniment. Similarly, Arthur Bradford reads a piece called "Roslyn's Dog." It is about a dog. Zadie Smith has written a great story called "The Girl with Bangs." Unlike most of the pieces in the issue, this one was written after the song had been composed. Ms. Smith responded, if you will, to the song called "Bangs," one of the disc's many bonafide hits. Doughty composed a new song for a series of sketches by comics masterman Chris Ware. The piece by Ware is a sketch meant for children but was rejected for its inappropriateness for children. You will see why. Doughty's song is truly amazing. In involves a frog and a banjo. Saskia Hamilton has written a piece about Robert Lowell's letters, particularly those including artwork. These letters, written just after he had been sent to prep school at fourteen and while in England away from his family, are very funny, very charming, and provide a revealing window into Lowell's beginnings. Mia Fineman has collected a group of postcards collected by Walker Evans. These are very strange postcards. We have a gorgeous group of drawings of rocks by the late artist Candy Jernigan. These drawings are accompanied by a piece by Philip Glass. There is a short piece by Lydia Davis called "Hiccups." It is not to be missed. There are short, soundtrack-ready pieces of fiction by Samantha Hunt, John Warner, Gina O'Mara, Mark O'Donnell, Roy Kesey, high schooler Tommy Wallach, Steve Featherstone, Judy Budnitz, Sheila Heti, and possibly others. There is a piece about Dave Ford, who makes art by driving an empty truck through Texas. There is a piece about Richard Erikson, a teacher of art to high school students. There is an updating of Sean Wilsey's well-loved piece about Marfa, Texas. There is a wonderful and weird essay by Breyten Breytenbach about what he calls The Middle World — not to be confused with Tolkien's. There are postcards from Barry Blitt, and art by Amy Sillman, and a long series of bizarre landscapes by Walter Koenigstein, and a series of photographs by Karl Haendel wherein he parked a minivan in front of locations around the country, with the van bearing slogans poignant and unsettling. This issue also involves Lawrence Weschler, who was in large part the engine behind the issue's art-gathering. We owe him as always too much. Finally, this issue also includes the surprising story of the real Timothy McSweeney. This story is much too weird to have been fabricated. - - - -
OTHER McSWEENEY'S STORIES:
Remarks Made at An Accredited University in New York City, or, Ask a Former Professional Literary Agent, Part X By John Hodgman Other Spy Troubles By Jeff Johnson My Dollhouse By Renate Robertson Magazine Ad Sponsored by a Reputable Trust Company By David Rossmann 32 1/2 Things I Learned on a Blind Date With a Pretty Girl Named Heather By Todd Zuniga |
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