The one hundred and fourty-eighth book: #87 The Nose - Nikolai Gogol
The Nose was a quick read - a short story that took me about half an hour to read through, which felt right for the tone of the story. In short, a barber finds a nose in a loaf of bread, which turns out to be a commissioner's, and the missing body part lives a life of its own for some time. It's a commentary on class and vanity and how society reacts to it, with there never been an explanation. It's a fun read, though, even if some of the satire doesn't fit our current experience.
The four hundred and ninety-second album: #492 Bobby Womack - The Poet
The Poet is a more modern soul album, which means it manages to avoid the pitfalls that annoyed me in earlier tracks - with disco on the way out, the long dance breaks are gone and instead there is a longer real rhythm section in each of the tracks that's still quite enjoyable, and just a lot more variety in a track. I really felt myself bopping along to the music several times as I was listening.
The one hundred and fourty-seventh book: #86 Father Goriot - Honore de Balzac
The tragedy of Father Goriot builds through the novel, only becoming clear at the end. The titular Father Goriot is seen throughout the book as an odd father figure, somewhat destitute and made fun of by those around him, even as some of our protagonists take more to him. Only slowly do we find out about his daughters, who he spent his wealth on to give them good marriages, but who desert him when the money runs out. It's sad, a comment on the social mobility of the time, and quite a sad read. It's not always the easiest read, but the observations of Honore de Balzac ring true here in a wait that still feels quite accessible.
The four hundred and ninety-first album: #491 Bauhaus - Mask
While I certainly don't mind dark tracks or more depressing music, gothic rock is one where it pushes it too far for me. Mask is very theatrical in its darkness and sound and it's too much for me. A track like Hollow Hills strikes the balance into being creepy, but the title track Mask takes it so far, for example, that it's almost farcical. It feels like it goes for a specific audience, at least for a modern audience, and just isn't as engaging of a sound now
The one hundred and seventy-sixth classical recording: #435 Johannes Brahms - Symphony no. 3
As much as I talk about the more aggressive, wilder pieces in here, it's also nice to have a piece like this symphony, one where it's less about the bombast, but it feels more stately. It's quick, it's formal, but it's still big without going extremely loud with these sounds. The lack of loud brass instruments creates a more striking sound, one that gets you listening more intently and keeps it more in depth. It still retains its majesty.
The one hundred and ninety-third TV show: #681 Lost
Apparently I forgot to post a write up after watching this a while ago! In short, the mysteries weren't compelling, the outcome not satisfying and ruining in advance what was there, and we just didn't care about most of it. Event TV at the time, but that impact is gone watching it now
The four hundred and ninetieth album: #490 The Gun Club - Fire of Love
There's something that never quite worked with me on Fire of Love - it's decent punk rock, with a heavy blues influence, but it didn't really reach the point of having an impact. It's not loud, it's not big, it just feels like it never quite went anywhere engaging. Not bad per se, there's just not as much to it as I would have hoped.
The one hundred and ninety-second TV show: #412 Red Dwarf
Because I had to get to the best seasons before writing this up (or so I was told), I watched the first five seasons and started the sixth season of Red Dwarf before starting my write up. It's been worth the wait - the first season focused a bit too much around the antagonistic relationship between Lister and Rimmer, while being more of a workplace comedy in an odd, deserted setting. As the show progresses, our protagonists are more capable, they work together better and instead the series focusing on proper SF comedy. It's not hard to draw the comparison to Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy - if only because the same design lineage is clear with the BBC design department doing similarly good model work - but also because it starts to apply the sci fi conventions and takes it to its comedic extreme, while telling some interesting stories with them you couldn't quite do otherwise. Once it starts properly, around season three or so, it really seeks out its options and becomes a must watch a lot of the time. I've been waiting a long time to watch this, and it has been worth it.
The four hundred and eighty-ninth album: #489 The Human League - Dare
It's always odd when an album's most known track closes the album - Don't You Want Me is track ten out of ten, but it feels bigger. Not that the remainder of the album doesn't meet the same poppy vibes, but it does sound that much darker - the lyrics can be incredibly nihilistic and some of the tracks go for a slow, dark sound that becomes quite threatening. It still doesn't feel like it's a divergence - the sounds mesh well together - but there's more to their tracks here than I expected based on what I knew of the band beforehand.
The four hundred and eighty-eighth album: #488 The Psychedelic Furs - Talk, Talk, Talk
Between yesterday and today, it feels like we've reached a point in the list where we get some good examples of their genres, rather than giving you something outstanding. Talk, Talk, Talk is the standard post punk sound, some new wave influences on top of that, but I never get any real satisfaction or specific moments mixed in the track - a bit too much by the number to be exciting.