This time out, the time and space edition…

Deaths, Studs Terkel: Lived a good, full life. We should all be so productive and engaged. Heartfelt respect.

Books, Rip it Up & Start Again: Postpunk, 1978-84: An absolutely lively and (even) quick read, with the 400 pages going by in no time. During that reading, you’ll find yourself digging into your collection for some PIL, Pylon and Pere Ubu. Got a feeling that the rush of nostalgia will last for a little bit, too. Such good music!

Blogs, Confluence City: Be careful around Chris King. I recently purchased a sketch of his, intending it as a gag Xmas gift. But then Chris blogged my purchase, and the intended recipient read the piece; though he didn’t know the gift was coming, per se, it sorta knocked out the surprise factor. So, see, you gotta watch it when you’re around Chris, because he’s a Gladwell-like maven and connector, possibly a bit of a salesman, too, the ultimate “Tipping Point” trifecta. Not only do my onetime boxing days appear in a recent King posting, so does my ’90s kinship to Enormous Richard. It’s all very complicated.

Books and sketches, lost: Tying up this trio of items… for several years, I passed around a sketchbook. Don’t know why it was gifted to me, at all, but in short order, I turned it loose on St. Louis. Expats like Jenna Bauer and Alan Brunettin drew in it. Still-locals like Bradley Bowers and Jeff Miller added to the book. In time, Eric Woods of Firecracker Press added a new cover. After years of salting it here-and-there, sometimes for a week, once for half-a-year (Bowers!), the book’s disappeared. I don’t know who last had it, or who might now be in possession of it. So, STL-ers: if you see a well-worn, thick, sketchbook with dozens of Don Beasley drawings inside, please know who to contact.

Biodiversity, axolotls: My very favoritist film, “Another Girl, Another Planet,” features axolotls in several, key scenes. Sadly, fish tanks are about the only spot to find the Mexican “water monsters” these days, according to Yahoo. Bummer!

Event, The Kick Ass Awards: The fifth annual event, hosted by the editors and friends of 52nd City magazine, will be held on Thursday, November 13, with an evening event at Joe’s Cafe in the Skinker/Debalivere neighborhood. More propaganda in this event, here, in the very near future, no doubt. Who’s won it in the past? We’ll tell you.

TV child star, Butch Patrick as Eddie Munster: Was just thinking about him. Don’t know why.

Election nuggets, Salon’s War Room: Two more days. Read up!

Festivals, St. Louis International Film Festival: A year ago, I was clocking hours as the overwhelmed volunteer manager of the St. Louis International Film Festival. This year, I’m not. But it doesn’t mean that I’m not going to thoroughly enjoy the SLIFF this year, though I have absolutely no inside track on what’s hot and what’s not. Guess I’ll just have to read the schedule and do some calculations, like all the other folks. Fair enough.

Pizza, The Wedge: Haven’t been. Hearing about the pies, that they’re good. Blake Brokaw’s making them, so how could they not be?

Throwback concert of the month, The Great Crusades: The veteran Chicago band, by way of Collinsville, returns to the metro east for a show at the Stagger Inn on November 8. Nice. Stream a touch of their Myspace music and I hope you’ll agree.

Radio show names, Silver Tray: So I say, “the show’s called Silver Tray.” And they say, “like the drug tray?” And, so, I’m like, “a drug tray?” And they’re, like, “yeah, a tray that you’d do cocaine on.” And I’m all “Really?” So, like, really? Am I the last person to know that I named a radio show after a drug reference? Apparently!

Embeds, Vincent Price on SNL: I mean, it’s funny. Very funny. Oh! This is why I was thinking of Eddie Munster.

Tonight: Halo Bar, 10 p.m. – 2:35 a.m. (Please, no one call me before 10 a.m. tomorrow.)

Saturday: Art Attack at Koken Art Factory, before and after Steve Smith’s painting gets nuked.

I’m sitting here on the last day of fall break, thinking about all the wonderful times and activities I’ve had over the past week-and-change. Ah, joyous days!

My thought is this: with my divorce from cable TV and with my television going into the shop for repairs, I’ve been left with inordinate amounts to time to do… well, real things. Like going to the theatre. (Four shows in the past three weeks, some sort of personal record.) Attending art shows. Reading books. Supporting South City coffeehouses, $2.90 at a time. Hittin’ that Instant Netflix.

What I need to continue this head-freshening is your input, taken in the comments section below. I’d like your recs on: a) a piece of music; b) a book; c) a film, all worthy of investigation. I know there are a million-and-one social networking applications I could subscribe to, for the same purpose, but let’s go digital old school here.

For me:

Album: Maps, “We Can Create.” Lovely, shoegaze-y, droney, yeah. Found Maps through Wikipedia, oh my.

Book: Thomas L. Friedman’s “The World is Flat.” Took more than a month to fully read, but worth every minute. Breathtaking in scope, yet completely readable. Admittedly repetitive, at over 600 pages, but what a dissection of modern culture’s reliance on new technologies. And the analysis of: how the next crop of American workers are going to get their economic hats handed to them, compliments of every English-speaking, computer-savvy kid in India.

Film: “Downtown 81” starring Jean-Michel Basquiat. A strange little work that I’d never heard of until scrolling the Netflix Instant section. Basquiat, portraying himself (more or less) mopes around the cityscape of New York in a fictional “day,” spray-painting walls and making women fall in love, as he attempts to sell a painting for rent money. Only too cool and very Jarmusch-like. Download it tonight.

Thanks to the three of you who’ll take the time for your input!

This is troubling. It’s as if someone is trying to invalidate my entire mid-to-late-20s existence. Next, someone’s going to tell me that Kill Creek and Paw records are going out of print. Or police will come to my door, demanding my entire collection of Pagan Kennedy books.

The sad news: Zima’s being cancelled.

The end result: I’m laying in a stockpile worthy of 1950’s-era “nuclear cupboard.”

It is time to act…

As something spending time with plenty of youth folks, I found this episode of Frontline a really, really interesting view. If you’re in teaching or coaching, this balanced hour of video is well worth the time. Here’s the preview clip.

This Monday, October 13, Tim Collins will be the guest on the KDHX talk show Topic A. For this month, the show’s theme is “Good” and Collins is featured in a one-man show called “A Fire Brighter than Heaven.” The production, which Collins wrote and stars in, is being performed at the Gaslight Theatre through this coming weekend, part of the St. Louis Actor’s Studio’s “Power and Politics” season. Topic A airs Monday night at 7:30 p.m.

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On Friday, October 17, Silver Tray host Thomas Crone will be joined in-studio by Padraig “Packy” Reynolds, frontman of the legendary punk/mod band The Nukes. That group will be reuniting at the Blueberry Hill Duck Room on Saturday, October 18, playing alongside local faves LucaBrasi. Crone and Reynolds will discuss the group’s history and impact on the local scene, playing several cuts from their albums during the show’s second hour. Silver Tray airs on KDHX on Fridays, between noon – 2 p.m.

Friday, October 10, Royale, 6-10, final early spin at the old joint; boo-hoo!

Friday, October 24, Royale, 10 – 1:15

Wednesday, October 29, Halo Bar, 10 – 2:30

(Looking ahead, it’s possible that Jim Utz and I will be spinning there after Pale Divine’s set on December 29. Oh. Yeah.)

And there’s always radio. In fact, this week, I’ll be appearing on Double Mayhem, pledge pitching between 10 – 12 midnight on Thursday; the next day, I’ll be on Silver Tray at noon, with guest Doug Morgan, drumming up the lucre. Please consider a membership, of course.

As the election draws near, the friends-and-associates-of-friends-and-associates game is being played, discrediting candidates through their allegiances with the controversial among us. And I’m not so naive as to think both sides don’t play this game; knowing local Democratic politicians and their circles, I’m convinced there’s plenty of similar jackassery among that crowd. That said, the recent chipping away at Barack Obama through his board service with one-time Weatherman and SDS-er Bill Ayers is Classic Republican Chicanery, linking Obama to someone that right wing radio types are already surely casting as “an American terrorist” or “a homegrown terrorist.”

Sometimes, you feel as if you get the measure of a person in a very short amount time. Maybe that’s naive, but in 2003, I had the chance to interview Bill Ayers at Left Bank Books. He was sitting in the cafe space (R.I.P.) that sat alongside Left Bank and we discussed all manner of things political in the hour before his lightly-attended lecture and reading. The notes, in small part, were punched up for The Commonspace’s website; in retrospect, I wish I’d committed the entire audio tape to the screen.

Having just run across some comments by Sarah Palin attaching Obama to Ayers, I remembered the interview and the piece, which had otherwise long slipped from active memory.

I can say this confidently after re-reading the notes: there are people you’d be lucky to have as a teacher, a mentor, a neighbor or a friend. I can’t say I qualify as any of those in relation to Ayers, though I was lucky to have had an hour to sit and chat with him. While I’m sure I didn’t agree with every word spoken by him that hour (only about 96.7%), I had (and have) much respect for the man. And I hope that Democratic lifers have the same respect, understanding that time and distance separate us from our youthful thoughts and actions.

An interview with Bill Ayers.