HIGHLY RECOMMENDED W/ JEFFREY SILVERSTEIN
* Providing the A's to the 5 HIGHLY RECOMMENDED Q's today is Jeffrey Silverstein — a writer-musician-teacher out of Portland, Oregon whose first EP of solo material ‘How On Earth’ will be dropping on Driftless Recordings in early 2019 (but the first single is up on Spotify & was also recently featured in the ongoing HI54 ‘420 ≠ ALL DAY’ mix cd).
#1 - WHAT IS THE ONE ALBUM (OR EP OR SONG) THAT YOU THINK SHOULD BE THE VERY NEXT MUSICAL THING THAT EVERYONE PRESSES PLAY ON THE NEXT TIME THEY FIND THEMSELVES THINKING “WHAT SHOULD I LISTEN TO NOW”?
Ted Lucas - It’s So Easy.This is my favorite cut from the sole-published album from Detroit’s Ted Lucas.
Thanks to a Yoga Records reissue, the album is now more readily available on wax. It’s a damn near perfect folk/psych record. Favorite lyrics - “We’ve got to trust each other blindly / only then will we have eyes to see / what we make of love it never comes easy / our hearts are tempered by adversity.”
#2 - WHAT IS THE ONE MOVIE OR TV SHOW THAT YOU THINK SHOULD BE NEXT IN EVERYBODY’S NETFLIX QUEUE (OK, DOESN’T HAVE TO BE NETFLIX, WE’RE ALL INTERNET ADULTS HERE AND KNOW HOW TO FIND ANYTHING ONLINE, ONE WAY OR ANOTHER)?
Going to cheat here and do one movie and one TV show.
TV - “The Deuce” on HBO. I’ve always been a huge fan of Maggie Gyllenhaal’s and she is incredible in this show created by David Simon (“The Wire” and “Treme”).
Movie - “Leave No Trace”. Always nice to watch a movie that’s shot in your city. This film follows a father and his teenager daughter who have lived off the grid for years in Portland, Oregon. Beautiful soundtrack and legendary PDX folk singer Michael Hurley even makes an appearance!
#3. I (AND BY “I” I MEAN “THE PERSON THAT IS READING THIS”) AM GOING TO THE BOOK STORE (OK, PROBABLY AMAZON) TO FIND THE VERY NEXT BOOK THAT I WILL BE PUTTING SOME EXTREMELY VALUABLE ‘ME-TIME' ASIDE FOR. WHICH BOOK WOULD YOU GET, IF YOU WERE ME (AND, I SUPPOSE, YOU HADN’T ALREADY READ WHAT YOU’RE ABOUT TO SUGGEST)?
Stoner by John Edward Williams. Beautiful novel first published in 1965 that is often heralded as a lost classic.
The book follows the life of William Stoner, born at the end of the 19th century into an extremely poor Missouri farming family. Stoner is set the the state university to study agronomy however winds up falling in love with english literature and embraces a scholar’s life, more or the less the opposite of what he’s known. From there, a series of misfortunes (failed marriage, estrangement from family, etc) all force Stoner to take a deeper look inward. I love the simple prose and the beauty Williams can adhere to even life’s most mundane moments.
#4 - WHAT IS THE ONE WEBSITE (OR JUST ANY OLD INTERNET THING: APP, GIF, SERVICE, WHATEVER) THAT YOU WOULD GET REALLY DOWN IN THE DUMPS ABOUT IF IT WERE TO SUDDENLY GO AWAY?
Any of the political videos from Bad Lip Reading. My partner and I have a good chunk of them memorized. Never gets old to me.
Also - the Creative Independent is a current favorite of mine. They give practical and concrete advice for creatives from some of the brightest minds across film, music, visual art and so much more. Wish more sites were as proactive as they are and less reactionary.
#5 - AND FINALLY… PLEASE GIVE ONE COMPLETELY UNAIDED RECOMMENDATION THAT YOU THINK EVERYONE SHOULD START DOING / USING / WATCHING / EATING / THINKING / QUITING / ETC-ING TO MAKE THEIR LIVES A LITTLE BIT MORE BETTER AND/OR BEARABLE.
At least just once, if you are making art of any kind, share it with other people. Play a song you wrote for a friend, read your poems at an open mic, it doesn’t matter what form it takes. I’m realizing more and more the powerful connections that can happen when people are vulnerable, open, and share their work.
‘What Light’ off of Wilco’s Sky Blue Sky album sums it up best. Tweedy sings, “If you feel like singing a song, and you want other people to sing along, just sing what you feel, don’t let anyone say it’s wrong.”
OK folks, there you have it. Things that Jeffrey Silverstein thinks you should consider incorporating into your day/life. Before you log off and go show somebody that thing you’ve been secretly working out, make sure to follow Jeffrey on the Twitter & Instagram and go pop over to Spotify to listen to the solo single (or pop over to Bandcamp to listen to Jeffrey’s other musical project ‘Nassau’).
