By Patrick Michalishyn
I read on some music blog that Oh Sees guy John Dwyer was contributing to some book coming out on some imprint in the U.S. Being the geek I am, I checked out the site, got in touch and ordered not one, but all three volumes of Penny Ante, a “mag/book” out of California . What a gateway I walked though. In Three, John D. only has one page; a picture of him at a young age and a piece of art, and it took me all of ten seconds to absorb it. But while I was looking for the Dwyer page, I saw that there was an interview with Billy Bragg that I went back to and read, but not before I happened across of few pages of artwork by Jad Fair (of Maryland rock outfit Half Japanese). There’s a goofy self-portrait of Mission of Burma’s Roger Miller, followed by a good five pages of his writing and some art. Robert Pollard and Billy Childish answer an interviewer’s questions and load me up with music trivia tidbits which I’ll be able to hack up on the spot when trying to out-nerd one of my own. That only covers maybe four percent of this book. It’s full of artists, photographers, and musicians that a lot of people probably never knew existed (but I’m glad I found), like: Julian Hoeber with bronze busts of gunshot (headshot) victims, the kaleidoscope head-trip of owleyes’ collages and the bloody, morbid photography of Dawn Kasper. I could go on and on listing works that made me stop and think, or stop and smile. Flipping through, something will always catch your eye and keep you going back and forth, giving a Choose Your Own Adventure reading experience. After I flipped through Three (as well as Book #1 and Book #2), I started carrying these books around in a backpack and showed anyone I exchanged more than a sentence with. The cliché “something for everybody” couldn’t apply more. These books are portable art-houses, not a page wasted on filler garbage. I recommend picking up all three since they’re pretty much continuations of each other. A world opened up through a looking glass and enough bathroom reading to last a good third of a year. If that wasn’t enough, Three includes a bonus CD of some-unreleased material from three issues’ worth of contributors; Jad Fair, the Chills, Mount Eerie (covering Old Time Relijun), Robert Pollard (surprise), Billy Childish, TV Ghost and a whole load more. Now that’s just spoiling us. Go, buy now! If enough of us do, we might just get a Four.
Patrick Michalishyn