1. "Tony Millionaire's Sock Monkey: Uncle Gabby"
It was a slow library day, so on spec I borrowed the above, being a short graphic novel / sequential pictorial narrative story / comic book written and drawn by Tony Millionaire (coloured by someone else, and colour is an important part of its charm, but still). I had seen Millionaire's name around the traps, but if he is also millionaire by nature it is no thanks to me. Well, I read it and was staggered. It is really, really good. Most solo graphic novelists work in a kind of alchemy which allows them to offer a finished product that is greater than you would expect from considering just their individual story-writing and drawing skills. Adrian Tomine, for example, as much as I like his stuff, still has a way to go as a writer. But it is good enough to allow him to become a fine graphic novelist and not just a purveyor of gorgeous New Yorker covers. Seth, of course, is a genius at both drawing and writing; so is Kevin Huizenga; but such is rare. Even Dan Clowes and Chris Ware, wonderful though they both are, would perhaps seem less than that if their writing and their drawing both had to stand up on their own. (None of this is meant as individual criticism. Those of us who can neither write nor draw can only look on in awe at these freaks of nature.) But this simple little book, about the adventures of a few old stuffed toys, demonstrates real talent in both the writing and drawing departments. Being the good scientist, I tested my theory. It was a delight to look at. It was a pleasure to read. Together, hey, it was unstoppable. I need to dig further.
2. Gillian Welch
Yesterday I fluked upon an iTunes-only live EP by Gillian Welch, released early 2006, about which I previously knew nothing. $5.07 (Australian) later, it was on my hard drive. And was money well spent, not only but including because it reminded me of the hauntingly perfect show they put on in Canberra a couple of years back. Their version of "Pocahontas" is a beautiful take on a beautiful song, and ties in scarily well with my current Neil Young obsession. (Presumably I wasn't the only obsessive to be eluded by this: it isn't mentioned in Stylus's extraordinarily thorough runthrough of Neil Young covers.)
3. Life Without Buildings
Straight to the top of bands I can't believe I never knew existed. Their sole studio album, "Any Other City", comes at me from the place where all the great albums come from. Which, I'm not sure exactly where that place is, but to be simplistic about it (if only because this record gets me in a way that is too personal for words), they sound not unlike if you combined, say, Television and The Feelies, and threw a female Mark E Smith in front (in that the singer declaims rather than sings, and seems as interested, in a lovely way, with the sounds words make as with the words themselves), if Mark E Smith were ever to sing about matters of the heart. None of which does this magnificent record justice. And to think, if they hadn't released a posthumous live album called, I think, "Live at the Annandale Hotel", and if the Annandale Hotel, in Sydney, wasn't a name I associate with another group that still mean more to me than I can put into words, The Cannanes, then I probably wouldn't have given Life Without Buildings a second thought other than to note that their name sounds like a couple of Talking Heads songs mashed in a blender.
