The OverCovers are a franchise—a frighteningly precise one.
The conglomerate exists to pump out a fixed repertoire of 214 current and classic, instantly recognizable pop tunes “by famous artists.”
The business model is a five-piece band where the keyboardist doubles as a saxophonist and triples as a woodblock percussionist.
It requires a blond male singer.
We have seen three separate OverCovers in action. On any given night, between two and five platoons are in the region, treating shallow listeners to stuff they’ve been forcefed by the mainstream radio stations pumped into their bland workplaces, a stultifying rock which they sadly crave even when they go out to drink and forget other aspects of their dismal day jobs.
We have talked this over with various OverCovers, who take the criticism with a bemused grin. After all, this is THEIR job, and not a bad one. If they work extra hard for the host company, Party Party Party Party Party Entertainiment, also DJing or doing a magic act, they can even get benefits.
We still find it sad. A waste. A shame. We like our shame to be original, and we like it to come in spurts of noncommercial rebellion, preferably bellowing out of the PA at the Bullfinch. When we are overcome with love for music, it is never because we have been OverCovered.

The Tower Treausure and Footprints Under the Window at The Bullfinch… Bombay Boomerang (a cocktail reference) and, looky here, The OverCovers (Model B) at Hamilton’s… Jungle Pyramid at D’ollaire’s, joined on this leg of the tour only by Sting of the Scorpion; other towns got Firebird Rocket…

Finally connected with family. They said when they figured I wasn’t coming they decided to “give me some space.”

Toby Goodshank, Truth Jump Fall. The prolific and propulsive former Moldy Peaches guitarist hasn’t quite distanced himself from that band’s immature fan base, but the sex jokes and nursery rhymes here are buried amid Procol Harum organ chords, classical guitar, thumping drums and harmonies that sound like drunk celebrants at church. Still loose and lively, just… growing up before your very ears.

I chanced upon the 18th issue of Irving Stettner’s literary journal Stroker. I see that it might fetch me thirty bucks or so on eBay because it’s one of the issues with Henry Miller. I’m more excited, frankly, that it’s got Seymour Krim in it. Krim’s one of my greatest lit heroes, an overlooked member of the Beat elite who’s more controlled, reflective and usefully argumentative than many of his famous writer friends. Krim was unarguably one of the greatest essayists of the 20th century. His contribution here, from Book of Fame, begins:

America is the cradle of modern fame; screw liberty for the moment, let’s concentrate on fame before it became such a popular commodity as it is now—don’t misunderstand, still rare by the percentages but far more of a string of popping firecrackers going up all over the place than it was in the late ‘20s when I was first hearing its majestic sound. America was fame’s babe because the very country was a fable compared to the rest of the toil-stained world. America itself is still the most famous word among the entire human race, everyone who has spent time outside our hectic shores knows the alternately sweet and sour burden of carrying the name American, and it was the the most natural and perhaps finally cursed thing in the world for her children to want some of that fabulous identity for themselves.

Irving Stettner, who was able to build a whole book out of his correspondence with Miller over Stroker and other shared interests, published Stroker from 1974 until his death 30 years later. For all its longevity and variety, the journal nonetheless looks and reads perpetually like a product of 1967. I find myself wrestling with the concept of Krim and Miller even being alive in 1980, though I know they were. The cheap offset printing, straight-from-the-typewriter design, inconsistent quality of photos and illustrations, all reek of when such journals were in their infancy. By ’80, punk zines had sprung up by the dozens and many were slicker than this. But Stroker’s ability to draw (and yet not pay) the likes of Miller, Krim, Georges Simenon, Mohammed Mrabet, Lawrence Durrell, Kazuko Sugisaki, Bertrand Mathieu and Tommy Trantino—all in this very issue—humanizes them, shows their passion to be printed anyhow and anywhere, demonstrates their loyalty and camaraderie. So it is a punkzine of sorts, but more a timeless journal of great writers of the past at sea in the present, contemplating the future.

We live downtown, which often behaves like a small village. We occasionally shop in the suburbs, which feels like an intense, overwhelming urban onslaught.
We were proud card-carrying CostCo members. After a few years, the fervor faded. We swore off big-box services and concentrated on supporting the new Stop & Shop in our neighborhood.
Then a coupon came in the mail and at a vulnerable moment, and next thing we know, we are beholden to BJ’s.
Like it so far. It seems about a third smaller than the Post Road CostCo, especially in the height of the ceiling, which makes it feel less Orwellian as a shopping experience. At CostCo, I used to clutch my cart as if I was steering a space module. It was an intense, disorienting experience. As a store, it felt like Tron.
We would recover from a CostCo shlep by eating at a Chinese restaurant down the road, or buying crafts at another shop, but nothing comforting was immediately nearby. The North Haven BJ’s, by contrast, has several comfort zones, including Barnes & Noble and the Rave cinemas, within walking distance.
Stop & Shop is still our neighborhood market, where we wave to friends and drop change in jars to support school sports teams. BJ’s (or CostCo, when we could handle it) is the fantasyland where a large bottle of vanilla costs just $7, where we can afford the charitable impulse of birdseed for the feeders in our garden, where we can buy a bag of frozen broccoli large enough to serve an icepack for an elk.
Downtown’s got scale. We use a bag or cart to shop. Further out, it’s madness.

Bliss raspberry meltaways
Bliss raspberry meltaways
Bliss raspberry meltaways
Bliss raspberry meltaways
Bliss raspberry meltaways
Bliss raspberry meltaways
Bliss raspberry meltaways
Bliss raspberry meltaways
Bliss raspberry meltaways
Bliss raspberry meltaways

The Mister Punches came to an outdoor “Polar Bear” show in a horsedrawn coach, which they said they borrowed from some Amish friends. They stayed in there and played a set to scare the horses.
Speakers blared out the back. The canvas roof billowed. They did 14 songs in 17 minutes. Then, having destroyed a couple of centuries of civilization, they were gone.
How can we remind ourselves this fantastical spectacle really happened? They left behind a scythe.

Larry at the Bullfinch, instrumentalizing… The Ten Eel ensemble, a hipster collegiate a capella group, at Hamilton’s, opening for Pont… The Foogahs at D’ollaire’s, with Eh? Shepherds…

Call home frantically all day, leaving messages. Watch a lot of kung fu movies.

The Essential Danzig came out on Sony’s The Essential… series Oct. 25. Glenn Danzig has had a good year, especially compared to that year when a zillion people viewed that video of him getting decked by the roadie of an opening band he’d pissed off. An all-new album, Deth Red Sabaoth, got positive reviews, his time in The Misfits and Samhain continue to inspire tributes, and… well, I never really could stomach the guy so I’ll stop right there.
I will, however, draw your attention to the 49th issue of Roctober magazine, which features two separate interviews with Danzig (a wide-ranging one from this year conducted by Roctober founder Jake Austen and one from 1999 with the cartoonish Canadian arts connoisseur Nardwuar), plus cartoons about Danzig, and lots of freaky love for the Misfits—all part of a much grander special “Livin’ in the ’80s” concept issue.
Roctober is one of the few remaining old-school fanzines of the sort which have filled my basement to bursting. There’s crucial, unique information to be found here, popcult factoids which aren’t well archived anywhere—including here, where updates on past articles or ongoing additions to such worthy projects as listing every Sammy Davis Jr. appearance of masked rock band or Alvin & the Chipmunks project ever can be crammed into filler space on random pages. Each issue carries hundreds of record reviews, dozens of rock-themed cartoons and interviews with talents so long-lost you probably haven’t heard of them. Where Danzig shares equal billing with The Knots and Boyd Rice.

Aaaaw to Zzzzzd: The Words of Birds—North America, Britain, and Northern Europe
By John Bevis (MIT Press, 2010)

There are several introductory essays and notes on methodology, then a closing article on “Other Methods of Collecting Birdsong” and a conventional list of dozens of birdsongs which sound like English phrases (such as the red grouse’s “go back, go back, go back” or the hermit thrush’s “why don’tcha come to me? Here I am right near you”). The main show is a 65-page list of spelled-out birdcalls. These include:
“Kik” (common term)
“Kik-ik-ik”(merlin)
“Kikikikikik-kik-kik-kik” (moorhen)
“Kik kek gep krui tik pit kviu kve tchif tchuf” (water rail)

That this book would be published in 2010, using the print medium where most birdcall enthusiasts would opt for field recordings on their cellphones, I find just charming. There are pained paragraphs about the inefficiency of the English alphabet in capturing the tone and precision of birdcalls. But “Why bother, then?” doesn’t ever enter into the endeavor. That’s because Aaaaw to Zzzzzd: The Words of Birds (the first call of the title coming from the black skimmer, the other from the lazuli bunting) makes a strong case for birdsong as music, as art, as poetry, open to special notation and interpretation. The book’s design, which sets the text in soft italics and illustrates it with zen-calm nature photography, clinches the concept.