#autobiographies

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From Diane Keaton's scrapbook / visual autobiography Saved: My Picture World, 2022

Bye bye Bank Holiday, you were such fun Now it is Tuesday & I’m come undone Freshening up takes forever A poetry session, it’s now or never. Grace Lintzen takes us through our paces Prompts us with themes of people & places We jam together, the lines are flowing That sounds illegal but you know where this is going. Verses emerge, line by line, poetry in motion What’s coming next? We…

We got Jim, Jimmy and Jimi first up (all second hand)

I read The Doors one during lunch breaks while interning at a hospital. The book first sets the scene by re-establishing the political scenario of the time and then going song by song per album. The structure makes it so readable and the writing is gorgeous.

Hammer of the Gods is crazy because Zeppelin is probably my favourite band and it felt like being a part of their inner circle the entire time I was reading this. Also, the opening paragraph is pure insanity.

The Jimi Hendrix one opens up with a proper forensic investigation of Jimi’s death and it’s a crazy set up, because you get a piece of the writer’s mind as you go into the rest of the book. It’s wonderful.

Next up, 2 Stones books gifted by an acquaintance who was a musician. Haven’t read either, but appreciate it!

Next we got Mötley and Gn’R! I’ve read The Dirt and absolutely love it (it’s a prized possession because even the book’s got lore!) Haven’t read Slash’s biography yet but a friend who also bought his copy when I did let me know it was insanely funny. Anyway, I left a Marlboro Red in it for Slash :)

I also had Steven Adler’s book (My Appetite for Destruction) but I let a drummer who had invited me to his show have it because Steven was his hero :) But all 3 books are from people who were present when Nikki Sixx famously died, so I’m looking forward to read what Slash has to say about it.

Next, my very annotated copy of Just Kids by Patti Smith, a book I need to say nothing about. I am someone who has always found comfort in androgynous self-expression and Patti is an icon. And a biography of Pink Floyd by Nick Mason, the drummer, which I also haven’t read yet.

And last we got my current read, Brothers by Alex Van Halen. His humour is so refreshing and just based on the writing you know how much fun they had. And because this book came out recently it’s also quite modern. Either way, I got 60 pages left and I’ve enjoyed it so far.

Lastly, and yeah it’s not literally rock n’roll but very much so in spirits, a biography of Hunter S Thompson, author of Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, by Jan Wenner (a founder of Rolling Stone magazine). Hunter S Thompson was so rock n roll. (Also fun story: My friends and I went to see Avenged Sevenfold a few years ago and they played Bat Country which is based on Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, and later I made all my friends sign the first page which had a quote that the song also straight up borrowed for its beginning. So that’s double rock n roll.)

I’ve also got Pamela Des Barres’ I’m With The Band as an audiobook, which i finished a couple years ago and loved so very much.

Marbled Monday

We're jumping back in to Marbled Monday with a splash! This wavy teal, gold, and cream marbling was stumbled upon while we were doing some record clean-up in our compact shelving area. It is a Spanish Wave pattern that is created by wiggling the paper while putting it onto the surface of the water bath that holds the marbling pigments. This particular iteration of the pattern is quite wigglesome, suggesting that the person doing the marbling was moving the paper in a somewhat irregular way rather than in a steady back-and-forth motion.

The book is volume 1 of Memoirs of the Life and Writings of Benjamin Franklin. Our copy is a second edition from 1818 published by Henry Colburn. Volumes 1 and 2 are about the life of American printer and publisher, author, inventor and scientist, and diplomat Benjamin Franklin (1706-1790), while volumes 3 and 4 contain his correspondence, and volumes 5 and 6 contain "posthumous and other writings." We only hold volumes 1 and 2 of the 6. Most of Franklin's life story published here is an autobiography, with additional writing about his later years contributed by his grandson, who was the illegitimate son of Franklin's illegitimate son as well as a failed diplomat and real estate speculator, William Temple Franklin (1760-1823). Temple Franklin, as he was known, became his grandfather's secretary at the age of 16 and was named his literary heir.

View more Marbled Monday posts here.

And I really don’t want to feel this way because of the aforementioned facts, but I can’t help but find her annoying

Don’t misconstrue: I do not think that what happened to her should have happened to her. I feel very terrible, and if I could do something to take the pain away or ease the suffering, I would

But maybe because I’ve read so much fiction, it’s hard not to think “this character is annoying” before reminding myself that this is a person, not a character

I’d probably think she was a little annoying in real life, too, but I don’t know. I’m going to finish this autobiography