Roundup: Ann Arbor Blues Society, Poet Keith Taylor & Washtenaw Reads

Tue, 01/24/2017 - 8:10am by christopherporter

SINGING THE BLUES AGAIN: "Ann Arbor has an incredibly rich history and tradition when it comes to the blues," James Partridge told MLive -- and he's right, from the Blind Pig's regular booking of big names in its early years to the establishment of the Ann Arbor Blues Festival in 1969. Partridge's new nonprofit, the Ann Arbor Blues Society, is trying to continue A2's blues tradition by bringing the music to senior centers, schools, and local venues, but its long-term goal is downright grand: to revive the Ann Arbor Blues Festival, which was last held in 2006. (➤ MLive)

FOR THE BIRDS: U-M adjunct Keith Taylor and Ann Arbor artist Tom Pohrt have teamed up for a new book of poems and illustrations that meditate on nature. The 49 poems that comprise The Bird-while, which is part of Wayne State University's Made in Michigan Writers Series, is Taylor's 16th collection of verse, though not his first to explore the natural world. Nature has always been an important part of Taylor's work; check out "The Day After an Ice Storm." Literati will host the book launch for The Bird-while on Friday, January 27 at 7 p.m. (➤ Wayne State University Press)

200 CENTS OF SENSE: This year’s Washtenaw Reads book selection is $2.00 a Day: Living on Almost Nothing in America by Kathryn J. Edin and H. Luke Shaefer. The authors are coming to Rackham Auditorium on Tuesday, February 7, and the Ann Arbor District Library is hosting several events related to the book. Get the full scoop here: (➤ AADL)

Christopher Porter is a Library Technician and editor of Pulp.

Roundup: Nomo, Washi Con, A2 Monster Record Show

Fri, 01/20/2017 - 9:15am by christopherporter

YES, ’MO: It’s been 7 years since the Ann Arbor-formed band Nomo released its last album, Invisible Cities (Ubiquity Records), but a few photos posted to the avant-Afro-gamelan-funk band’s Facebook page in August indicate a new record’s been made. We reached out to the band for info on when it might be released and haven’t heard back, but perhaps all secrets will be revealed when Nomo plays the Blind Pig on Saturday, January 21. And even though Nomo has been quiet for a long while, the band's core nine musicians have kept busy. Most prominently, saxophonist-leader Elliot Bergman moved to Chicago and released two pop-dub albums as Wild Belle (which includes his sister, Natalie) and formed the experimental Metal Tongues, whose sound is built on his hand-made kalimbas with synths and drums. Meanwhile, trumpeter Justin Walter has released a number of recordings under his own name, including the great 2013 LP Lullabies & Nightmares (Kranky), and saxophonist Dan Bennett leads his own jazz groups. (➤ Blind Pig event) (➤ Nomo)

FURRIES & FRIENDS: Sometimes dressing up as a fuzzy animal and pretending you’re an anthropomorph is the only way to deal with dark days. Thankfully, Eastern Michigan University recognizes this and on Saturday, January 21, it's hosting the second annual Washi Con, which celebrates all things anime, gaming, and cosplay, from 9 a.m. to 9 p.m. with an after-party at the Ypsi Ale House. Whether it’s Pokemon training or Animal Crossing meet-ups, Washi Con has something for the escapist in all of us. (➤ Washi Con events list)

MONSTER SOUNDS: Don’t have enough physical media clogging up your home, office, and storage sheds? Add to the piles this weekend when Ann Arbor's Monster Record & CD Show hosts the first of its four events this year on Sunday, January 22, at Weber’s Inn, 3050 Jackson Rd., from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Admission is $3, but for $15 you can get in at 8 a.m. in case you’re worried someone will buy that super-rare CD Monster by REM before you can get your paws on it. (➤ A2 Monster Record & CD Show event page)

Christopher Porter is a Library Technician and editor of Pulp.

Roundup: Matthew Dear, All Hands Active & Tanner Porter

Wed, 01/18/2017 - 6:25am by christopherporter

NEW KICKS: When a musician gets asked to compile a mix for the DJ-Kicks series, it’s like a baseball player making the All-Star Game. Since 1993, the German !K7 label has had some of the world’s biggest electronic music artists, including Carl Craig, Hot Chip, Actress, and 54 others create DJ-set albums -- ones that still sell really well even though virtually every music website offers approximately 273,000 mixes to download for free.

Now it’s Matthew Dear’s turn to boot-up a mix, and the Ann Arbor artist and co-founder of Ghostly International is celebrating his DJ-Kicks album with a party at the Blind Pig on Friday, January 20. (UPDATE: Fellow Ghostly star Shigeto has been added to the gig.)

Dear will be DJing and dropping cuts from the 57th DJ-Kicks comp, which includes his new song, “Wrong With Us,” plus 24 more jams from the likes of Simian Mobile Disco, Pearson Sound, and Audion (aka Dear’s more dance-oriented alter ego).

Not familiar with Ghostly International or its sister label, Spectral Sound? If you’re an Ann Arbor District Library card holder, you can download almost everything the labels have released, free of charge, including many Dear and Audion classics. (➤ !K7) (➤ Blind Pig) (➤ AADL’s Ghostly/Spectral collection)

AHA! BRAINS ON NETFLIX: The Ann Arbor makerspace All Hands Active appears in the debut episode of White Rabbit Project, a new Netflix series starring the Mythbusters team. Greg Gage, co-founder of Backyard Brains -- an A2 company that provides affordable neuroscience experiment kits for kids -- uses All Hands Active tools, teaches show host Kari Byron how to build a Cyborg Cockroach, and takes her into Kerrytown to show how she can control someone else’s body with her ... BRRRRAAAAAIIIINNSSSSS. (➤ Netflix) (➤ All Hands Active) (➤ Backyard Brains)

SUMMER SOUNDS: Tanner Porter is a U-M grad and a member of Ann Arbor’s Ensoleil quartet, which blends classical training with Irish/Scottish/Québécois/New England-inspired melodies. But the cellist/singer’s solo work recalls the experimental fringe-pop of Joanna Newsom and Jenny Hval, with hints of Kate Bush and Joni Mitchell. Last August, Porter released her second album, The Summer Sinks, and her new video, “II,” just debuted on I Care If You Listen.

The multitalented Porter also animated the video: “The images are done with pencils, fabric, and watercolors, created in layers by hand and put together on the computer.” (➤ I Care If You Listen) (➤ Tanner Porter)

Christopher Porter is a Library Technician and editor of Pulp.

From Rubik's Cube to Roller Coaster: Penny Stamps Speaker Series, Winter 2017

Wed, 01/11/2017 - 10:20am by christopherporter

For the last 12 years, Chrisstina Hamilton has been working out a puzzle of sorts for thousands of people to enjoy. As director of visitors' programs for the University of Michigan's STAMPS School of Art & Design, Hamilton organizes the school's popular Penny Stamps Speaker Series.

"It's sort of like this 3-D Rubik's Cube kind of thing when you're trying to put it together, and it's incredibly difficult because you lose pieces here and there," Hamilton said. "People want to line up, and you think, 'We can't have this come after that.' But somehow, miraculously, it ends up all coming together."

The free guest speaker series takes place Thursdays at Ann Arbor's Michigan Theatre (with a few exceptions) and features artists that represent a spectrum of media, backgrounds, and viewpoints.

The winter 2017 season gets underway this week and follows on a successful fall 2016 run, which included a surprisingly chatty Mark Mothersbaugh (Hamilton had been told the artist, composer, and Devo frontman could be shy in front of crowds, but not so here: "He just told story after story," she said. "We could barely get him off the stage") and the series' first foray into hosting satellite events in neighboring Ypsilanti.

Hamilton said the big challenge every season is making it "incredibly diverse" in terms of mediums people work with and perspectives they offer, as well as gender, and race.

In addition to breadth, the series goes for depth, Hamilton said, poking at the big questions of gender issues, race, science, and technology, and how those affect all of us, "so we can have a conversation about it, before all of a sudden we find ourselves in the middle of everything."

For example, the biohacking work of artist Heather Dewey-Hagborg, who creates portrait sculptures based on analyzed genetic material left behind in public spaces, like old gum or cigarette butts.

"This work using people's DNA is really sort of cutting edge and making people start to think about things they haven't thought about before in terms of what we're unlocking with all of this," Hamilton said.

And then there's stuff that's just really cool, like Jonathan Barnbrook, the graphic designer best known for his work with David Bowie over the last 30 years.

Barnbrook designed the critically acclaimed art for Bowie's last and final album, Blackstar, which was released on Bowie's 69th birthday, January 8, 2016. The iconic rockstar died two days later from liver cancer.

"I'd actually been talking to him before Bowie passed, but in that moment, all of a sudden the whole thing takes on a whole nother meaning," Hamilton said.

Blackstar's artwork is nominated for a Grammy, and Barnbrook's talk is the Thursday before the awards ceremony.

"We always love it when those kind of things line up, and it feels like the Penny Stamps season has got the pulse of the moment here," Hamilton said. "Some things are planned, and others are just serendipity."

Another serendipitous moment comes this month, when comics journalist and graphic novelist Joe Sacco talks about "Galvanizing Social Justice Through Comics" on the eve of president-elect Donald Trump's inauguration.

Best known for his foreign correspondence in the Middle East and Eastern Europe, Sacco teamed with author Chris Hedges for 2012's Days of Destruction, Days of Revolt. Documenting the plights of America's Indian reservations, inner cities, manufacturing centers, farmworkers, and coal miners, the book could have been a collection of headlines from 2016.

Hamilton said a similar, unexpected connection was made by chance last November, when Stamps hosted three events by Athi-Patra Ruga, all during election week. The South African performance artist's playful, colorful, work explores themes of cultural identity, utopia, and dystopia.

"It ended up that Athi was sort of the perfect antidote to all of the topsy-turvyness of what happened at the election," Hamilton said. "I think people that attended those events really got a lot out of that."

For some lesser-known names that shouldn't be overlooked this season, Hamilton points to Andrew Logan, an art scene veteran and something of a creative guru to the likes of Bowie, Brian Eno, and several other musicians and celebrities over his long career.

"He's really just an incredible, eccentric individual who has lived a very creative life in art and has inspired a lot of people to follow their creative path, and I'm super pleased and honored to have him on the season," she said.

By chance, Logan's talk is followed by Saya Woolfalk, who Hamilton sees as a sort-of spiritual successor to him. The New York-based artist is said to "create worlds" using science fiction and fantasy to reimagine societies.

More surprises and unexpected connections are sure to come, but you may have to forgive Hamilton if you put her on the spot to name them when the season's wrapped, especially with a new one around the corner to tend to.

"Once a season starts it's like a roller coaster," she said. "By the time you get to the end of it, you feel like you've got whiplash or something."

Penny Stamps Speaker Series, Winter 2017
Events are free and held at Michigan Theatre on Thursdays starting at 5:10 p.m. unless noted otherwise; each speaker's name below is hyperlinked to the Stamps' page for the event:

➥ Jan. 12 - Robert Platt, interdisciplinary artist and STAMPS assistant professor of Art & Design,
➥ Jan. 17 - Meredith Monk, composer, singer, director, choreographer, and filmmaker (Tuesday)
➥ Jan. 19 - Joe Sacco, graphic novelist and comics journalist
➥ Jan. 26 - Hank Willis Thomas, photo conceptual artist
➥ Feb. 2- Sara Hendren, artist, designer and researcher
➥ Feb. 9 - Jonathan Barnbrook, graphic designer
➥ Feb. 16 - Ping Chong, director, playwright, and pioneer of media use in theater
➥ March 9 - Andrew Logan, artist and "scene maker"
➥ March 16 - Saya Woolfolk, multimedia artist and "world builder"
➥ March 20 - Tracey Snelling, installation artist (Monday, at UMMA Helmut Stern Auditorium)
➥ March 23 - New Negress Film Society
➥ March 30 - Karim Rashid, product and commercial designer
➥ April 6 - Heather Dewey-Hagborg, transdisciplinary artist and educator
➥ April 19 - Doug Miro, screenwriter (Wednesday, at Museum of Contemporary Art Detroit)

Eric Gallippo is an Ypsilanti-based freelance writer and a regular contributor to Concentrate Ann Arbor.

Roundup: Michigan Theater's Japanese Noir, Ypsi's Grove Studios & MTV Interviews AADL

Tue, 01/10/2017 - 1:00pm by christopherporter

FAR EAST SHADOWS: The Michigan Theater just announced a new film series: KURO: The Dark Edge of Japanese Filmmaking. Starting January 16 and running through March, every Monday night the movie house will screen a Japanese noir film. The lineup includes:
➥ High and Low (1963) [Jan. 16, 7 p.m.
➥ Tokyo Drifter (1967) [Jan. 23, 7 p.m.
➥ Branded to Kill (1967) [Jan. 23, 9:30 p.m.
➥ Zero Focus (1961) [Jan. 30, 7 p.m.
➥ A Colt Is My Passport (1967) [Feb. 6, 7 p.m.
➥ Pigs and Battleships (1967) [Feb. 13, 7 p.m.
➥ Pale Flower (1964) [Feb. 20, 7 p.m.
➥ A Fugitive From the Past (1965) [Feb. 27, 7 p.m.
➥ Dragnet Girl (1933) [March 6, 7 p.m.
➥ Ichi the Killer (2001) [March 13, 7 p.m.
➥ The World of Kanako (2014) [date & time TBA
Plus, there might be a few more films added in the future. While it's always best to see movies on the big screen, don't fret if you can't make every flick; many of these movies are in the library's collection. (➤ Michigan Theater)

BLOOMING GROVE: A new 6,500 square foot rehearsal/artist/performance space is now open in Ypsilanti. Grove Studios (1145 W. Michigan Ave.) aims to be "clean, secure, safe, inspiring, climate-controlled, and convenient," founder Rick Coughlin told Concentrate Ann Arbor. While Coughlin is more focused on Grove being a rented rehearsal space, the venue has already hosted a couple of events since its soft launch in early December. The concert schedule is ramping up, too, thanks to the Ann Arbor-Ypsilanti Music and Arts Guild, which has booked several concerts at Grove this month {link}, including performances by Gruesome Twosome (Jan. 13), Annie Palmer (Jan. 20), and Doogatron (Jan. 27). (➤ Concentrate Ann Arbor)

SONIC LENDING: MTV's The Stakes podcast interviewed Josie Parker, director of the Ann Arbor Public Library, about why AADL lends things like synthesizers, effects pedals, drum machines, guitars, amps, and mics (as well as telescopes, metal detectors, dinosaur skulls, and those thingies called "books"). Check out what we have in our Music Tools collection as you listen; the interview starts at the 11:30 mark. (➤ MTV's The Stakes)

Christopher Porter is a Library Technician and editor of Pulp.

Ann Arbor District Library 2016 Staff Picks: Books, Movies, Music & More

Thu, 01/05/2017 - 11:30am by christopherporter

The Gregorian calendar rules most of the world, but time is a continuum. That's why our 2016 Ann Arbor District Library staff picks for books, music, film, and more include items that go back as far as 1865. Our list is comprised of media (and a few other things) that made an impact on us in 2016, no matter when the material came out.

Libraries have always acted as curation stations, helping sort through the vast amount of media released every year. On our website, we have more than 50 staff-curated lists of recommendations, but we don't just advocate for things digitally. We share our "picks" in person every time you step into the library. Books with prominent positions in our spaces, whether facing forward or on shelf tops, are chosen by staff members because they want you to pick up those pages.

Consider the massive post below featuring 55 books, 25 films and TV shows, and 20 albums -- plus a few odds and ends -- as a continuation of those curated lists, those forward-facing books, and the Ann Arbor District Library’s ongoing mission to bring high-quality art, entertainment, and information into your lives.

So, ready your library cards: Most of the recommendations below are in our collection; just click on the {[AADL]} link at the end of each pick to be taken to the item's page on our website.

Josie Parker | Director
📖 Book
➥Lila by Marilynne Robinson (2014) {AADL}

Eli Neiburger | Deputy Director
📖 Book
➥Ancillary Justice by Ann Leckie (2013) - Any fans of Iain M. Banks Culture novels will feel right at home with Ann Leckie's Imperial Radch series. Breq was once a powerful ship, but now she's just one body on a 20-year quest ... for JUSTICE. The Radch is a predominantly female galactic empire struggling to hold itself together. Such outstanding writing, pacing, and worldbuilding makes it hard to believe it's a debut novel. All three Imperial Radch books are available at the library. {AADL}

Amy Cantu | Librarian
🎥 Film
➥A Canterbury Tale (1943) - This strange and magical movie filmed in 1943 is at once a tender homage to the English countryside and threadbare mystery that barely holds its thematic scenes together. It’s also now one of my favorite films. During a blackout in a small southeast English village, three modern-day Canterbury pilgrims -- a classical music student, an American soldier, and a Land Girl from London -- are thrown together to solve a mystery involving the infamous “glue man,” an eccentric nocturnal who pours glue on the hair of British women who date American soldiers. It’s a shaggy dog of an odd movie, with lovingly filmed asides about English myths, history, and moments of sublimity unique to the legendary filmmaking duo of Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger -- made perhaps all the more poignant because it was filmed during the dog days of World War II. {AADL}

Laura Pershin Raynor | Librarian
📖 Books
➥Among the Living by Jonathan Rabb (2016) - This compelling novel tells the story of a survivor who lands in the strange world of Jewish Savannah after WWII. Through Yitzhak's eyes, we see the tenuous relationships between black and white, reform and orthodox, men and women. The combination of American innocence, greed, and racial divide makes fascinating reading as we watch young Yitzhak traverse the new world. {AADL}
➥Full of Beans by Jennifer Holm (2016) - Bean Curry and the Diaper Gang have hilarious little escapades in this kid's book that is getting lots of buzz. This is the story of a struggling Key West during the Clutch Plague and what happens when the "New Dealers" come to town to spiff it up and turn it into a slick tourist attraction. {AADL}
🎥 Film
➥Half Japanese: The Band That Would Be King (2000) - These friends of mine, from my college days, leave me speechless. Their wonky, wacky courageous style made me go back and view Half Japanese again this year and it brought me great joy. {AADL}

Erin Helmrich | Librarian
📖 Book
➥Barbarian Days: A Surfing Life by William Finnegan (2015) - Youth, recklessness and the need to find the next wave, the best wave, the unsurfed wave mixed with gorgeous and literary descriptions of water, living and traveling define this memoir. Those with surf stoke and without will enjoy the barbaric adventure. {AADL}

Mariah Cherem | Librarian
📖 Books
➥The Girls by Emma Cline (2016) - I've long been fascinated by group dynamics, cults, charismatic leaders, girlhood/girl-crushes, and LA spiritual-subcultures. So, the second I read about this book, I knew I had to give it a shot — it was basically a checklist of topics that interest me. Cline is an observant writer who includes a lot of perfect details. You'll hear this book described as a fictionalized account of the Manson family. While I can see those connections, I think that's a bit too obvious. I found the writing about coercion, influence and control between and among young women/girls just as compelling and identifiable as that by the main male figure. The Girls has a lot of things to say about girlhood and those times when we aren't sure if we're attracted to someone or want to be that person. {AADL}
➥Gold, Fame, Citrus by Claire Vaye Watkins (2015) - Last year, Watkins expressed her complex feelings about Battleborn, but I adored most of it, which lead me to pick up Gold Fame Citrus. It took me a few chapters, but once I was in, I was in. The future looks very, very arid, and the physical, cultural and social shape of California and the United States is vastly different, but all of this is really just the setting for the journey of a small family. There is no easy path to safety or redemption, but a few significant surprises, and writing that's bleak and beautiful. {AADL}
♫ Music
➥My Woman by Angel Olsen (2016) - I might have listened to "Sister" on repeat a dozen times when I first heard it. My Woman is a sweeping masterpiece, with such production, arrangement, and tone. This record shows off the power of a voice -- of a writer's "voice," sure -- but also just the sheer visceral power of a literal, sung voice -- that wild thing of Olsen's that swings from whisper to contemplative question to exuberant holler. {AADL}
➥Downriver by Kelly Jean Caldwell Band (2016) - One of my favorite songwriters, one of my favorite voices from around here. I know a good handful of these songs almost by heart. So thrilled that this album, recorded a few years back, is finally out in the world. Before this, getting to aKJCB live show was really the only way to get these sometimes twangy, always true songs stuck in your head for days. Available at Wazoo and Encore.
➥FRKWYS Vol. 13: Sunergy by Kaitlyn Aurelia Smith & Suzanne Ciani (2016) - Warm synth swells and burbles from an original master and a newer Buchla experimenter, collaborating. Especially recommended: playing it LOUD on great headphones -- it rattles my brain into a peaceful place. {Bandcamp}
🎥 Film
➥Gimme Danger (2016) - If any director could do the story of the Stooges justice, it would be Jarmusch. His task was tricky, but he kept the interview circle tight to focus on the internal logic/world of the Stooges without getting sidetracked or lost in their legacy/relying on interviews with all the musicians and bands they've influenced. So glad this was made about some of the 734's favorite weirdos, and so thrilled I got to catch this. {Film Website}
➥Holy Hell (2016) - I was lucky enough to catch this as a part of Cinetopia this last year. In the ‘80s, Will Allen, a 22-year-old, joined a guru-based community in L.A. on the invitation of his sister. He remained in the community as both a member and its main documentarian, for over 20 years. Dark, and in a lot of ways tragic, but interesting and ultimately a triumph with Allen's return to the outside world. {Film Website}

Andrew MacLaren | Librarian
📖 Book
➥We Have Always Lived in the Castle by Shirley Jackson (1962) - The best novels leave you questioning the very nature of storytelling. Shirley Jackson doesn't leave you that way, she gets you there in the first ten pages. But once you think you've figured out what's going on (or at least how we got where we are), you are still questioning, questioning everything, right up until the end. Another incredible narrative voice from Jackson, author of perhaps the greatest ghost story (or not?) ever written, "The Haunting of Hill House." {AADL}
♫ Music
➥Absolutely Free by Frank Zappa & the Mothers of Invention (1967) - I haven't listened to Frank Zappa in about 20 years but something made me decide to start again. Most of my old favorite albums didn't click with me (16-year-old me was clearly a different person with different tastes), but this one I'd never gotten to did. Zappa touches on so many different styles of music in this 44 minutes that it should be a chaotic mess, but it flows so perfectly you don't notice until several listens in. Zappa's editing skills are also on display here as he reuses multiple snippets to different effect within the same work. Some of the themes don't work for 2016 sensibilities, but the importance of vegetables will never fade. {AADL}
🎥 Film
➥Don't Look Now (1973) - Honestly, I picked this one up because of the great artwork Criterion has created for their restoration, and, man, am I glad they make such nice covers. Tense and sad at the same time, the film is more than the thriller it advertises itself as, dealing with the effect the loss of a child has on a family. Donald Sutherland and Julie Christie both turn in masterful performances that are worth seeing and the ending does not disappoint. {AADL}

Elizabeth Pearce | Library Technician
📖 Books
➥11/22/63 by Stephen King (2011) - I was a Stephen King novice when I picked up this hefty book, and I tore through it in a week. The story of a time traveling high school English teacher who returns to the mid-twentieth century to attempt to stop the Kennedy assassination. Crazy suspenseful, surprisingly romantic, and in general just fascinating. {AADL}
➥A Little Life by Hanya Yanagihara (2015) - Mind-blowing. A man tries to create a successful and healthy life for himself after suffering devastating abuse throughout his childhood but comes up against his memories and the long-term effects of his abuse so that every step forward seems to lead to two steps back. The support and unconditional love of his friends and family make for a powerful secondary storyline about the challenges of dealing with a loved one's mental illness and, beyond that, the enormous strength of human connection. {AADL}
♫ Music
➥Real by Lydia Loveless (2016) - Awesome country-punk-rock from the Ohio-based Loveless, who tours quietly around the Midwest with her own special brand of blue-haired swagger. She combines badassery, wit, and heartbreak into killer songwriting. A great album for us Michiganders... there's even a particularly relatable song called "Midwestern Guys" on it. {AADL}
🎥 Film
➥Manchester by the Sea (2016) - A powerful, beautifully shot movie that tells the story of a man struggling with the demons of his past in a tiny New England town. Not the film to watch if you're seeking a redemptive story, but oddly hopeful nonetheless. (In theaters now, but it’ll be in our collection when it hits DVD.)

Amanda Schott | Library Technician
📖 Book
➥Be Frank With Me by Julia Clairborn Johnson (2016) - A reclusive author needs to put out another book for monetary reasons. To help keep the author on track, and keep an eye on her 9-year-old son, her publisher sends an assistant out to help. Twenty-something Alice is excited for the chance to work the famous author but finds a great challenge and eventual delight in working with her eccentric son Frank who dresses for breakfast in a tie and tails and has very specific needs regarding where he goes and how he gets there. The dialog is divine! {AADL}
🎥 Film
➥Hunt for the Wilderpeople (2016) - 14-year-old foster child Ricky Baker is dropped off at his next placement, which is the home of Bella and Hec, who live off the land on a remote farm next to the bush in New Zealand. Tender Aunty Bella and curmudgeonly Uncle Hec end up being not so bad after all. But after tragedy strikes, Ricky is given the news that he’s headed back to child services. This is unacceptable, so he runs away into the bush, soon to be joined by Hec. The fellas are at odds and end up on the run and subject to a nationwide manhunt. A funny and tender movie with such lovable characters. {AADL}
♫ Music
➥Lemonade by Beyoncé (2016) - A phenomenal album by the queen, with a world tour that was one of the best live shows I've ever seen. The visual album is a must-hear, must-watch. It's Beyoncé, enough said. {AADL}

Toby Tieger | Book Processor
📖 Book
➥Chasing the Scream by Johann Hari (2015) - This brief sketch of the War on Drugs looks at what has worked and what hasn't when dealing with various drug addictions around the world. It's well-researched, readable, and surprisingly hopeful. {AADL}
🎥 Film
➥Don't Think Twice (2016) - Six 30-somethings in a Chicago improv troupe start to realize that some of them will make it as artists and others won't. One of the most thoughtful coming-of-age films I've seen in a while. {AADL}
📺 TV
➥W1A (2014-2016) - A British sitcom about the inner workings of the BBC, which excels at dry lunacy as only British television can. Focuses on the protagonist in his position as the "Head of Values" and his coworkers, including the "Director of Better." {Amazon}
➥Crazy Ex-Girlfriend (2015-current) - A feminist musical dramedy about a woman who moves across the country to follow her crush. It's significantly smarter and much more imaginative than the summary can possibly make it sound; winner of the 2016 Golden Globes for Best Actress. {AADL}

Kathy Randles | Building Supervisor
📖 Books
➥Small Great Things by Jodi Picoult (2016) - I normally don't read this author but was glad I read this one. {AADL}
➥Nobody's Fool by Richard Russo (1994) {AADL}
➥How to Read Water by Tristan Gooley (2016) {AADL}

Beth-Ann Campbell | Desk Clerk
📖 Book
➥Boy: Tales of Childhood by Roald Dahl (1984) - The first autobiographical book by British writer Roald Dahl. It describes his life from birth until leaving school, focusing on living conditions in Britain in the 1920s and 1930s, the public school system at the time, and how his childhood experiences led him to a writing career. {AADL}

Matt Gauntlett | Media and Events Producer
♫ Music
➥Paradise Gallows by Inter Arma (2016) - Building on the same weird, doomy, spacey, old-West-y brand of heavy metal that they did so well on previous records (2012’s eye-opening Sky Burial and 2014’s 40-minute meditation The Cavern), this record is undoubtedly one of the heaviest and greatest releases of 2016. These guys sound like a wild thunderstorm at their heaviest (think Neurosis, or a more upset-sounding Black Sabbath), and have odd similarities to Pink Floyd and Thin Lizzy at their most out-there and moody. If nothing else, listen to this for the drummer, who sounds completely unhinged at all times, even in the simplest moments. {AADL}
🎥 Film
➥The Nice Guys (2016) - Shane Black flexes the writing/directing muscles we know him for rather neatly here, weaving a serpentine story of two bumbling private eyes investigating a missing girl, and the surprising twists and turns as the scope of the case unfolds. Sound dry and by-the-numbers? It's NOT. Russell Crowe breezily reminds us why he has an Academy Award, while Ryan Gosling absolutely steals the show in one of the great comedic performances of 2016. Oh, and did I mention that all the kid actors are great? What more do you need? {AADL}

Joe Harris | Systems Specialist Desktop Engineer
♫ Music
➥Awaken, My Love! by Childish Gambino (2016) {AADL}

Tim Grimes | Manager, Community Relations and Marketing Dept.
🎭 Theater
➥The Humans by Stephen Karam (2016) - The absolutely best play that I saw last year sadly closes in New York in just a few weeks. This comedy-drama is a brilliant ensemble piece, focusing on one family -- three generations -- as they gather in a rundown two-story Manhattan apartment for Thanksgiving dinner. Filled with heartbreak, humor, and poignancy, the play features a remarkable set, a series of haunting, unsettling noises, and lights that get dimmer and dimmer as the play progresses. The Humans was a finalist for the 2016 Pulitzer Prize for Drama and won the 2016 Tony Award for Best Play. The script is available in the library. {AADL}
🎥 Film
➥Don't Think Twice (2016) - The story of a struggling improv troupe in transition when one of their members captures a spot in a national SNL-type television show. The film is both funny and bitingly honest as the group faces the realization that one of their friends may become famous and leave the others behind. {AADL}

Molly Jones | Desk Clerk
📖 Book
➥God Help the Child by Toni Morrison (2015) - Bride, a beautiful woman with blue-black skin, grew up negotiating a world where skin darkness affected her family relationships, self-worth, and choices. Now, a successful and self-assured professional woman, she tries to make amends for a lie she told as a child, setting off a chain of events that lead her to northern California, an orphaned girl named Rain, and a magic reliving of her not-so-magical childhood. {AADL}

Lucy Schramm | Desk Clerk
📖 Books
➥Making Toast: A Family Story by Roger Rosenblatt (2010) - The final book I read in 2016 also turned out to be one of my favorites. Making Toast chronicles the period of time after Rosenblatt’s daughter -- a pediatrician and mother of three young children -- dies unexpectedly. Rosenblatt and his wife move into his daughter’s house to help their son-in-law and the children with their grief and the work of daily life. What could be a heartbreaking book is instead at turns funny, wise and poignant. Rosenblatt never resorts to sentimentality and his spare words lingered with me long after I’d finished this book. {AADL}
➥When Breath Becomes Air by Paul Kalanithi (2016) - Astounding. {AADL}
➥Underground Airlines by Ben Winters (2016) {AADL}
➥Moonglow by Michael Chabon (2016) {AADL}
➥Sweetbitter by Stephanie Danler (2016) {AADL }
♫ Music
➥Hamilton: Original Broadway Cast Recording (2015) - I have spent a large part of 2016 listening, like the rest of the world, to Hamilton -- and for good reason. Each time I listen I encounter something new, and often unexpected, from a character, lyric or instrument. {AADL}
➥We Got It From Here ... Thank You 4 Your Service by A Tribe Called Quest (2016) - Their sixth and final album. Well worth the 18-year wait! {AADL}

Evelyn Hollenshead | Librarian
📖 Books
➥Symphony for the City of the Dead: Dmitri Shostakovich and the Siege of Leningrad by M.T. Anderson (2015) - This is an absolutely amazing book aimed at teen readers, but I think it's perfect for anyone who is interested in the Siege of Leningrad but doesn't want to dive into a huge academic text. The audiobook is also amazing and it includes parts of Shostakovich's symphony. {AADL}
➥Ada Twist, Scientist (2016) by Andrea Beaty - The third in a series, this picture book featuring a spunky young scientist and her experiments is one of my new favorites. {AADL}
🎥 Film
➥Ghostbusters (2016) - It was amazing to see a cast of all women in this remake. It’s hard to articulate how much it means to see women taking the lead in movies like this. I loved it from start to finish, and I’m glad my son will grow up with lady ghostbusters and lady Jedis (looking at you, Rey!). {AADL}
♫ Music
➥Hamilton: Original Broadway Cast Recording (2015) - If all musicals were mainly like this, I would like musicals a lot more. {AADL}. I also loved The Hamilton Mixtape {AADL}.

Rachel Yanikoglu | Librarian
🎥 Film
➥Durrells in Corfu (2016) - I discovered this DVD set on New Year’s weekend and I did not want it to end. In 1935, when dreary English weather and four miserable children challenge the spirit of their widowed mother, she decides to sell everything and move the family to the sun-drenched Greek island of Corfu. As they find new ways to do everyday things, they find peace in paradise without much money. By the final episode, I was working out a list of who I needed to recommend this treasure to. {AADL}

Laura Van Faasen | Desk Clerk
📖 Books
➥The Wright Brothers by David McCullough (2015) - This concise, exciting and fact-packed book sees the easy segue between bicycling and aerial locomotion, which at that point was mostly a topic for bird fanciers and dreamers. Brothers Orville and Wilbur, with their unyielding resolve, changed the course of history. A totally fascinating read that helped me recall many other highlights of our history. {AADL}
➥Skyfaring: A Journey With a Pilot by Mark Vanhoenacker (2015) - Marvelously literate. This 747 pilot takes you along over mountains, oceans, deserts, and conveys his experiences in a way that makes you appreciate the details of flight, the men and women who pilot the machines, and gain a unique and poetic view of our world from the sky. {AADL}
➥The Shepherd’s Life: Modern Dispatches From an Ancient Landscape by James Rebanks (2015) - It’s a book about a way of life essentially unchanged for centuries in an era that’s all about change and flux. Beautifully and intelligently written by an Oxford graduate who returned to the Lake District in northern England, with a determination to continue to farm where generations of his forebears had done so. {AADL}

Audrey Huggett | Library Technician
🎥 Film
➥Song of the Sea (2014) - A young boy named Ben must go on a journey to save his sister, who is one of the fabled selkie - a human able to turn into a seal. A modern day exploration of Irish folklore wrapped in stunning animation and supported by a captivating story. {AADL}
📖 Book
➥Paper Girls by Brian K Vaughan and Cliff Chiang (2016) - Set in 1988, Paper Girls has it all, fantasy, aliens, and some phenomenal characters. I love it when girls get a chance to kick some butt, and this graphic novel gave its characters numerous chances to shine. {AADL}
🎲 Game
➥Dungeons & Dragons, 5th edition by Wizards of the Coast (2014) - Most people are familiar with D&D, which has been around in various incarnations since the '70s, but the most recent version is probably the most accessible to new players. I highly suggest giving your imagination a workout and trying out D&D in the new year. (D&D rulebooks are coming to AADL soon, but you if can't wait, you get them locally at Vault of Midnight!)

Emma Garrett | Desk Clerk
📖 Books
➥The Girl With All the Gifts (2014) - It's a zombie/post-apocalypse story where the "good" guys are lead by the small zombie child who has somehow become a hybrid zombie/monster/human, her humanity is tested to by her schoolgirl crush on her female teacher. It's amazing how much coming of age in a school where you are strapped to a chair and bathed in chemicals so you don't devour the people around you has in common with coming of age in a regular high school! I hadn't read many zombie or apocalypse stories before this one and I didn't anticipate the beautiful descriptions of clouds of zombifying fungus sprouting through the land. M Carey is a pen name for Mike Carey, of Guardians of the Galaxy fame, but he writes these really stunning and intricate female characters. {AADL}
➥The Mothers by Brit Bennett (2016) - It's easy to say that this is a book about an abortion, and it does show the complexity, conflict, and loss of people faced with that decision. Bennett has written about abortion in a way that both pro-lifers and pro-choice advocates can tolerate because the story transcends political ideology. But I actually think that the novel is more about friendship, in the vein of Sula {AADL} and Truth and Beauty {AADL}. Two women grow up in each other's shadows, borrowing each other's courage and beauty, and unfolding their life stories together. {AADL}
➥Thank You for Your Service by Dave Finkel (2013) - I'm also not usually a fan of military stories, but honestly the second season of serial got me thinking about the daily challenges of fighting in Afghanistan. Thank You for Your Service follows the returns of several marines and the ways they try to piece together their lives. It's journalistic feature writing at its best -- insightful, compassionate and unsparing. {AADL}
➥Evicted by Matthew Desmond (2016) - Talk about great participant observation journalism! Neither the landlords nor the tenants emerge unscathed from this portrait, but neither do they lose their dignity. Desmond weaves the context of deteriorating housing stock in Milwaukee and the way police charge landlords for "quality of life" complaints at their properties, all of which pushes thousands of residents out onto the streets. You see the lines waiting at housing court, the way poor and homeless neighbors take care of each other, and the personal travails of speculators trying to profit from the ghetto. Like "thank you for your service," this is a depressing book, but worth wading through. {AADL}

Katrina Shafer | Desk Clerk
♫ Music
➥My Woman by Angel Olsen (2016) - Olsen's influences on this album range from ‘60s girl groups to Fleetwood Mac, but her voice is entirely her own. I discovered this album while sick, but I couldn't resist singing along to "Shut Up Kiss Me" in the car. The sore throat was worth it. {AADL}
📖 Book
➥Shirley Jackson: A Rather Haunted Life by Ruth Franklin (2016) - Shirley Jackson was never content with the ordinary. The author routinely created detailed stories about inanimate household objects to occupy herself while performing chores, was a self-described amateur witch and a true believer in ghosts. This biography details the imagination behind her writing along with the struggles of her rocky marriage with New Yorker critic Stanley Hyman, the expectations of raising four children and running a household in the 1950s, and her desire to write with little time to do so. All this adds up to Jackson's veiled theme of discontent with domesticity in her horror writing and the still modern battle of working mothers trying to find a balance in her comedic family tales. {AADL}
🎥 Film
➥Green Room (2016) - This horror film about a punk band trapped by a group of neo-nazis (commanded by Patrick Stewart) after they witness a murder is a thrilling, head-spinning maze that leaves you on edge as the band desperately attempts to escape. It also showcases a stunning performance from Anton Yelchin, which is now tragically one of his last. {AADL}

Heather Shell | Desk Clerk
📖 Book
➥The Elegance of the Hedgehog by Muriel Barbery (2008) - This is a book of great subtlety and significance. It traces the growth and impact of the friendship between a reclusive concierge and the precocious 11-year-old girl who lives in her building {AADL}. The 2009 film adaptation is also excellent {AADL}.
🎥 Film
➥Only Yesterday (1991) - With animation by Studio Ghibli, this film was made in the early '90s but only released in the U.S. in 2016. The movie examines the power of memory the reverberations of the past in the life of a 27-year-old woman, who stands at a crossroads in her life. The engaging animation and the charming storyline make this a must-see for anyone who enjoys Japanese culture or animated films. {AADL}
♫ Music
➥The Rhythm of the Saints by Paul Simon (1990) - This album is a masterpiece. Simon brings his characteristically profound lyrics to life with Latin American rhythm and instrumentation. Though you may be familiar with a few songs, the album as a whole is the kind you can listen to on a loop and still be captivated by new layers of meaning and musicality. {AADL}

Lucy Roehrig | Librarian
♫ Music
➥Blackstar by David Bowie (2016) - The final work by the late, great artist incorporates jazz and pop sensibilities with Bowie's crooning -- at times haunting and always memorable {AADL}. Also, check out the soundtrack to Bowie's critically acclaimed Broadway musical play, Lazarus, which also features his music. The lead singer on the soundtrack is Michael C. Hall (Six Feet Under, Dexter) who sounds incredibly like Bowie {AADL}.
📖 Book
➥Are We Smart Enough to Know How Smart Animals Are? by Frans de Waal (2016) - A fascinating study by biologist de Waal of animal intelligence and cognition. He discusses various experiments that show the incredible approaches scientists are using to better understand animals that go beyond traditional lab experiments. Given the right tools and settings to work with, these scientists are introducing us to animal intellects that will surprise and amaze everyone. {AADL}
📺 TV
➥Detectorists (2015-; 2 seasons so far) - A funny, very original, and award-winning show from England that stars Mackenzie Crook (who played Gareth on the British version of The Office) and Toby Jones (Infamous, Frost/Nixon) as metal detector enthusiasts ("detectorists") and the day-to-day goings-on in the small village. Will they ever find that buried Saxon treasure? Watch and find out. {AADL}

Amanda V. Szot | Graphic Designer
♫ Music
➥Apocalypse (2013) and Where the Giants Roam EP (2015) by Thundercat - I was first introduced to Thundercat in 2016 and his albums have been on constant rotation ever since. The special jazz-funk-fusion-type-substance on these two albums makes them complex and worth many, many listens -- songs range from quiet and introspective to dance floor inspiration. Stephen "Thundercat" Bruder is a freakishly skilled bassist with a unique style (in both sound and aesthetics) and has been featured with other musicians like Flying Lotus, Kamasi Washington, and Kendrick Lamar. AADL doesn't have either of these albums in the collection, but the library has 2011’s Golden Age of the Apocalypse {AADL}. You can also check for Thudercat’s music at Wazoo, Encore, Underground Sounds, and PJ’s.
🎥 Film
➥Hell or High Water (2016) - Amazing modern western crime drama was directed by David Mackenzie and written by Taylor Sheridan. This is a slow-paced and brooding film with superb acting and storytelling. Plus, I'm a sucker for any movie that is filmed on location in the stark and gorgeous landscapes of New Mexico. {AADL}
📖 Books
➥Pretty Much Everything by Aaron James Draplin (2016) - If you're a designer, this really needs to be on your bookshelf. It's a truly remarkable book that is jam-packed with the work of graphic designer Aaron James Draplin -- a Michigan native who works out of Portland, Oregon. AADL was really fortunate to host Draplin in October 2016 as he embarked on his official book tour -- and watch this space for the video from his talk! {AADL}
➥Hour of Land by Terry Tempest Williams (2016) - I've always been a fan of Terry Tempest Williams' writing, and this book, released in the centennial year of the National Park Service, was an important release. Williams explores the lands and landscapes of 12 National Parks with a very personal perspective through her signature approach to environmental writing and social commentary in an age of climate change and pressures on our wild lands and open spaces. {AADL}

Liz Grapentine | Desk Clerk
📖 Books
➥Cinder (The Lunar Chronicles) by Marissa Meyer (2012) - If you like cool twists on old fairy tales, then this sci-fi reimagining of the classic Cinderella tale is for you. Cinder, a cyborg mechanic in a futuristic earth, works for her harsh step-mother to pay the bills left by her deceased adoptive father. But when a mysterious, handsome stranger comes to Cinder's shop with an old robot, and a hard drive with a potential conspiracy theory that could affect the relations between the lunar kingdom and earth, Cinder has to get to the prince before the ball! This tale is more than just a story of a servant with a missing shoe after a night of dancing. Meyer has created a whole new world: a kingdom from the moon, with a Queen who's more ruthless than royal, and more depth to each character than I could ever have imagined myself. The first of a fantastic series in this world, the following tales follow Meyer's adaptations of Red Riding Hood, Rapunzel, and even Snow White -- each with their own space-age twist! {AADL}
➥Daring Greatly by Brene Brown (2012) - One of the more intuitive and inspirational texts I've read, this book is a great way to feel more connected to the gladiator in you. The book's title comes from the Theodore Roosevelt speech "The Man in the Arena," which sets up the rest of the book -- and if you haven't heard it already, the speech is a good one. This text speaks about the trend in this time to guard against vulnerability, but also why vulnerability is necessary to connect -- to yourself, to others, and to a life of fulfillment and joy. If you want to tap into deepest self, find your vulnerable side, and find how to unleash the power that is being your most authentic self, then this is a book you need to read! {AADL}
Film:
➥The Jungle Book (2016) - An adaptation of a classic Disney cartoon, this reinvented, live-action film is well-worth seeing. This film pays great homage to the old children's classic, featuring some of the same great songs and iconic scenes that we all know and love, while still remaining fresh for a new audience. There's more plot given to the scenes, and more meaning is given to each character. With an outstanding cast, featuring Ben Kingsley, Bill Murray, Idris Elba, Scarlett Johansson, and many more, this new twist on the old Disney classic - based on Rudyard Kipling's most famous tales - will be a wild time and a great movie night. {AADL}

Anna Benson | Desk Clerk
📖 Book
➥Wild by Cheryl Strayed (2012) - Traces the personal crisis the author endured after the death of her mother and a painful divorce, which prompted her ambition to undertake a dangerous 1,100-mile solo hike that both drove her to rock bottom and helped her to heal. {AADL}
📺 TV
➥Broad City (2014) - This Comedy Central show follows two women, played by Ilana Glazer and Abbi Jacobson, throughout their daily lives in New York City, making the smallest and mundane events hysterical and disturbing to watch all at the same time. {AADL}
♫ Music
➥Blood by Lianne La Havas (2015) - With a voice that is at once magnetic and soulful, Lianne La Havas mesmerizes in her second studio album. {AADL}

Kayla Coughlin | Library Technician
📖 Book
➥The Tale of Despereaux by Kate DiCamillo (2003) - This is a sweet little tale sure to win the hearts of readers young and old about a small mouse with a whole lot of courage. It's masterful storytelling at its best! {AADL}
♫ Music
➥Greatest Hits by Earth, Wind & Fire (1974) - This well-rounded album stands the test of time with punchy brass hits and killer vocals as well as jazz ballads to complement the funkiest tunes. {AADL}

Kelsey Ullenbruch | Library Technician
🎥 Film
➥The Martian (2015) - Full disclosure I am a huge Matt Damon fan, and this movie does not disappoint! Astronaut Mark Watley is presumed dead and left by his crew on Mars. Luckily, he is also a botanist and figures out how to survive until he can re-establish contact with NASA. The plot is equally comedic and gripping, with a balance between "reality" and science fiction that was extremely entertaining and engaging. {AADL}
📖 Books
➥Leaving Time by Jodi Picoult (2014) - A young girl is obsessed with finding her mother, and enlists a psychic and alcoholic PI to help her find her. Chapters switch from Jenna's search for her mother Alice, and Alice's experiences of researching and caring for elephants in Africa and New England. I've put off reading any Picoult novels before because I (wrongly) assumed they were all tragic, tear-jerking fiction with a focus on a dramatic female lead. Leaving Time was recommended by a friend and I was initially interested because one of the characters studied grief in elephants, which is a main theme in the book. I enjoyed the enchantment of elephant facts based on Alice, but I also enjoyed the book on the whole thanks to the cast of characters and how Picoult weaved the plot together. {AADL}
➥Americanah by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie (2013) - A young woman shares her experiences as a college student and writer through her travels from Nigeria to America and back to Nigeria. This book made headlines soon after it's release and had my interest from the start, but by page 2 I was in love with Adichie's writing. Her mix of intellect, introspection, and cynicism created a gritty and accessible approach to one woman's view of race in America as a non-American black living in America. {AADL}

Tom Smith | Library Technician
♫ Music
➥Paul’s Boutique by Beastie Boys (1989) - I live in both love and fear the day my 9-year-old brings this home instead of a Harry Potter book, but I love the fact we at the library make it an option. {AADL}
🛠 Tool
➥IKAN FLY-X3 PLUS Smartphone Video Stabilizer - This thing is rechargeable And will make you a better person. {AADL}
📺 TV
➥The Returned. The Complete First Season (2014) - This has been out for a while, but the library just got it in pretty recently. Creepy as hell, well acted, and so atmospheric I was Airbnb-ing the town it was filmed in after the first episode. (Unfortunately, season two is a travesty on the scale of True Detective season two.) {AADL}

Beth Manuel | Library Technician
♫ Music
➥Good Will Prevail by Griz (2016) - Our family had the pleasure of attending GRiZmas in December at the Masonic Temple. Our son wanted us to experience this musician, so he bought the family tickets and GriZ didn't disappoint. This 25-year-old from Southfield, Michigan, samples the funkiest, bassiest beats and layers it with soulful, deep funk on his saxophone. It was a huge dance party and a lot of fun. {Griz}

Graham E. Lewis | Desk Clerk
🎥 Film
➥Spotlight (2016) {AADL}
➥The Danish Girl (2016) {AADL}
➥Remember (2016) {AADL}
📖 Books
➥The Puffin Chalk series encouraged me to re-read some classics, Alice's Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carrol (1865) {AADL} and The Wizard of Oz by Frank L. Baum (1900) {AADL}.

Ira Lax | Library Technician
📖 Books
➥The Sibling Society: The Culture of Half-Adults by Robert Bly (2016) {AADL}
➥LaRose by Louise Erdrich (2016) {AADL}
➥The Idiot by Fyodor Dostoyevsky (1869) {AADL}
➥The Adolescent by Fyodor Dostoyevsky (1875) {AADL}
➥Dostoevsky: The Miraculous Years, 1865-1871 by Joseph Frank (1995) {AADL}
♫ Music
➥Jazz Sahib: Complete Sextets Sessions, 1956-1957 by Sahib Shihab (2008) {AADL}

Christopher Porter | Library Technician
♫ Music
➥Blackstar by David Bowie (2016) - Written and recorded while Bowie was dying of liver cancer, the record came out just before he succumbed -- and before anybody in the public knew he had been sick. So, the first wave of almost universally positive reviews for Blackstar were written based on the strength of the material, not because people were mourning a legend. If this is Bowie’s “cancer album,” it’s mine as well. When Blackstar came out on January 8, 2016, I spent two straight days listening to it on headphones as my own mother was dying of cancer. But I kept returning to Blackstar based on its stunning artistic merit, not for comfort during my vigil. But when the Starman died on January 10 and it was revealed to be from cancer, the album took on a whole new meaning for me, with the sometimes oblique lyrics suddenly revealing themselves as clear meditations on mortality. Now, Blackstar truly is a source of solace for those of us who have been affected by cancer -- which is most everybody -- and I consider it an amazingly generous parting gift from an artist who has soundtracked my life. {AADL}
📖 Books
➥Seven Story Mountain (1948), No Man Is an Island (1955), New Seeds of Contemplation (1957), Thoughts in Solitude (1958), and Contemplative Prayer (1969) by Thomas Merton - After my mom died, I dove into reading about grief, from C.S. Lewis’ A Grief Observed {AADL} to David Ferry’s poem “That Now Are Wild and Do Not Remember” from Bewilderment {AADL}, which uses the neologism “dislanguaged” to describe the feeling when you lose someone you love -- for there are no words. But the author who made the biggest impact on my coming to terms with grief was also the least likely, at least on the surface. Thomas Merton was a Catholic monk who belonged to the ultra-strict Trappist order -- none of which means anything to nonreligious me. But in Merton’s numerous books, he reveals an Eastern mindset, coming across more like a Buddhist philosopher rather than a Catholic priest. His clear prose and confident declarations feel like paths to healing, but his prose is also laced with self-doubt -- especially in his journals -- lending even more power to his writings since we get to see this “man of God” as someone who routinely struggled with very human things. Really, any Merton book in our collection is worth investigating; his humanity is that universal, no matter your religion -- or lack thereof. {AADL}

Say Qua?! New DVD Features the Best Shorts From 2016's Ann Arbor Film Festival

Mon, 12/26/2016 - 12:57pm by christopherporter

Remember back in October when Saturday Night Live did a parody of the kinds of artfully shot and totally nonsensical movies you often see at film festivals?

SNL called its film qua -- which was being screened at the, ahem, "Ann Arbor Short Film Festival" -- and it had Emily Blunt running through a forest dotted with the number 3 and ended with her being forced to face her own self ... with her own self.

After the screening, the audience bolted to the stage -- since the crowd was made up entirely of the movie's huge cast and crew, save for one unlucky woman who was forced to ask qua's makers multiple questions about their terrible film.

Awkwardness ensued, comedy was had.

Sadly, qua did not make it onto the new DVD featuring 10 highlights from the actual Ann Arbor Film Festival's 2016 expansive short-film program. But this 9th collected edition of the festival’s best works includes films by:

~Chintis Lundgren, Life with Herman H. Rott (11 mins.) This short is about “a rat who enjoys heavy drinking, loud grind music and chess.” And he doesn’t like when a tidy female cat with a vacuum cleaner and classical records move in.

~Zhou Tao, Blue and Red (25 mins.) A luminescent meditation on light and how it illuminates the shared skin of humanity.

~Susanna Wallin, Two Clothespins in an Envelope (14 mins.) Two brothers, over the course of four days, clear out their mom’s house after she died. Does archive equal identity? Or is it just a reminder of what you left behind?

~Marcin Gizycki, Sto[nes (2 mins.) From the AAFF description: “The English word STONES contains two Polish words: STO = ONE HUNDRED and STOS = PILE. A pile of stones was used to create this abstract extravaganza of moving stripes and circles.” Say qua? No, it’s cool; think of it as a moving painting.

~Elizabeth Lo, Bisonhead (10 mins.) How do you feel about hunting? Now, how do you feel about a Native American family’s legal culling of a bison herd in Yellowstone, a tradition that precedes the time before Europeans colonized North America?

~Wrik Mead, Summer 1975 (10 mins.) Animation, stills, and film combine to explore a 13-year-old’s sexual awakening in Toronto.

~Julia Yezbick, How to Rust (25 mins.) The forced Europeanization of Africans is examined through Detroit’s postindustrial landscape and how something that was once considered “progress” by some can decay in unimagined ways.

~Terri Sarris, Our Last Hurrah (8 mins.) A lifelong, annual family Fourth of July gathering spent at a northern Wisconsin lake is examined through the lens of tradition, change, and loss.

~Ji Young Grace Shin, Phantasmata (5 mins.) Insomnia, dreams, and hypnagogia conflate into a waking life.

~Joel Rakowski & Terri Sarris, Drive In (2 mins.) A pastoral video-landscape painting of a bygone era featuring Michigan's oldest drive-in theater, the Ford Wyoming in Dearborn.

The best of the 2016 Ann Arbor Film Festival’s short-films DVD can be purchased for $15 from here.

But you can enjoy qua for free ... forever. “333 333 3 3333333 33333333 3333. C’EST MOI!”

Christopher Porter is a Library Technician and editor of Pulp.

Michigan Movie at the Michigan: "The Pickle Recipe"

Mon, 12/19/2016 - 1:00pm by christopherporter

Fermented foods are a form of pickling, but pickles can just be ... pickles, straight up.

See, sauerkraut and yogurt are fermented foods that engage in a form of pickling, with the preservation caused by lactic acid fermentation.

But straight-up pickling is the process in which a vegetable -- in this case, a cucumber -- is preserved by vinegar, an acidic.

In the The Pickle Recipe, a new film set in Detroit, whatever secret ingredients have been added to Grandma Rose's pickling process -- whose dill-icious concoction has had patrons flocking to Irv’s Deli for years -- is the driving force behind Joey Miller’s desperate attempt to steal the recipe from her.

In other words, this ain't no straight-up pickle.

Miller is a DJ/MC for weddings, bat mitzvahs, and any other party that needs its roof blown off. But Miller (played by Jon Dore) is in debt and he loses his only source of income when all his sound and lighting gear gets destroyed by accident. He turns to his sneaky Uncle Morty (David Paymer) for a loan, who agrees to give Miller the dough -- on one condition: That he steal Grandma Rose’s (Lynn Cohen) pickle recipe, a secret creation she’s long sworn to take to her grave.

Hijinks ensue and viewers are treated to comedic caper flick with more than a touch of heart.

Director Michael Manasseri and writers/producers Sheldon Cohn and Gary Wolfson are Michigan natives, and nine of the cast/crew members attended the University of Michigan. The Pickle Recipe is playing at the Michigan Theater through December 22, and we caught up with Manasseri, Cohn, and Wolfson in an email interview, whose questions they answered as a group.

Q: I know many of the film's makers are from the Detroit area, but are pickles a THING around here in the Jewish / Eastern European communities?
A: I would say that pickles here -- and not the ones that are sides with burgers because they are "kosher style," unless you're in a deli -- are part of the deli scene in Detroit and the great Jewish food scene here. I don't think we are an intense pickle state, but we have some great delis, the best bagels in the U.S., and a great and vibrant Jewish community. Gary's grandma was from Russia and she made incredible kosher dills that her family just loved. But she never gave anyone the recipe and when she died she took the recipe with her. About 5 years ago when Gary told me the story is where the idea for the film was born.

Q: I understand that in the pickle-tasting section off the movie, Sheldon and Gary wrote a rap song to score the scene. Why rap -- when you originally wanted to use a Neil Diamond song! And why didn't the cast take to it?
A: The "song," if you could call it that, was a fairly easy song to write since that's all my sons listen to and rap is such a part of Detroit. Because that's the setting of the film we thought it fit, especially since the deli crew each had some lyrics. Since Neil Diamond was out and neither Gary and I are songwriters, we felt we could do a pickle rap. Well, we wrote it, Gary's cousin put a beat track behind it, and I recorded it on my iPhone. Michael had listened to it and said don't send it to the cast, but I did anyway. And I'm glad I did because the song and my rendition, Jon Dore just hated. He felt it was very dated and said he wouldn't do it; the rest of the cast thought it was lame and corny, and this was on the morning of the day we were supposed to shoot the scene. Since [Dore] was a comedian and also played guitar, he asked if he and the cast could try to come up with something, and we are so glad they did because the rap was so bad. The “She's Tasting Pickles" song saved the scene.

Q: How was it for Sheldon and Gary to make the leap from the advertising world, where they worked together, to feature-length filmmaking? Did the former inform the latter to a degree, or did you discover that selling things versus telling a story were different enough that you had to figure out more things than you thought as the film progressed?
A: In terms of our advertising experience, it was great preparation for movie making. I made short films in college, and advertising -- at least good advertising -- entertains viewers as it sells. Gary and I worked on many commercials and a lot of humorous ones for which we won a lot of awards. Funny spots and emotional tearjerker spots, which was great training. Our directors and crews were very accomplished, with some feature directors and Academy Award-winning cinematographers. We worked with good actors, and spent many hours editing the commercials since in our world the directors didn't edit the spots; we did with editors we hired while the directors went off to their next projects.

One interesting side note is that we hired [legendary documentary filmmaker] Errol Morris for his first commercial years ago, a whacked-out idea called "Mobile Judge" for 7-11 about a judge whose courtroom is on a flatbed and drives around town judging convenience stores. Errol went on to be huge, with a very strong and successful commercial career.

What we weren't prepared for was the pace of a low-budget film. We spent a week filming a 60-second commercial, but here was a 90-minute film in 22 days. There was so little time to play with lines or do alternate reads. But not having to sell something and not having a client and a stopwatch was great. Our best commercials had the sell woven into the story, so the viewer was being sold a product in a subtle way and not with a sledgehammer.

We had the luxury of time to perfect the script, which was 100 drafts over 5 years, and a good amount of time to edit. But one thing that was tough is that when you make a 30-second ad, you can watch it 10 times in a row and make changes. You can't do it with a film. And you get so close to it, it's hard to keep your perspective. But all in all, it was a blast and I was very sad on the last shoot day. I'd love to do it again and I know it won't take 5 years. At least I hope.

Christopher Porter is a Library Technician and editor of Pulp.

Preview: December Documentaries

Wed, 11/30/2016 - 8:17am by christopherporter

Do you have a God complex? Then documentary filmmaking might not be for you.

“In feature films the director is God; in documentary films, God is the director,” said the deity Alfred Hitchcock.

But the seven documentaries being shown in Ann Arbor this December had directors who put aside any supernatural ambitions they may have to tell real stories.

How to Let Go of the World (And Love All the Things Climate Can't Change)
Thursday, December 1, 6:00 pm - Free
Ann Arbor Downtown Library - Multi-Purpose Room
Josh Fox’s 2010 documentary Gasland, about the dangers of fracking, was nominated for an Oscar. His new film, How to Let Go of the World (And Love All the Things Climate Can't Change), also looks at the interactions between humans and the environment, but it’s not a call to arms. Climate change is here; it can’t be reversed. And rather than remind you of that depressing thought for 127 minutes, Fox talks about the things “climate change can’t destroy. What are those parts of us that are so deep that no storm can take them away?” How to Let Go of the World celebrates the human spirit that carries on in the face of a threat that cannot be denied. The screening will be followed by a brief discussion on global warming.

The Eagle Huntress
Friday, December 2 to Thursday, December 8, various times - $
Michigan Theater
For more than 1,000 years, nomads in the Altai Mountains have used golden eagles to hunt. But during all that time, it’s strictly been a dude thing: a father passes down the tradition to his sons, never his daughters. The Eagle Huntress follows a 13-year-old Mongolian girl named Aisholpan as she attempts to break the patriarchal tradition and become the first female eagle hunter in her family’s 12-generation history. The film’s rated G and it's only 87 minutes, so bring the kiddos. Your jaws can drop as a family when you see the stunning cinematography.

All Eyes and Ears
Monday, December 5, 6 pm - Free
Museum of Art - Stern Auditorium
The relationship between China and the United States is one in need of perpetual marriage counseling. In All Eyes and Ears, director Vanessa Hope explores the nations’ complex ties through the lens of two personal stories: U.S. Ambassador to China Jon Huntsman and his adopted Chinese daughter, Gracie Mei, and the plight of blind legal advocate and activist Chen Guangcheng. While Huntsman was the ambassador, Guangcheng went from house arrest to asylum in the U.S. embassy, and the film tracks the tensions between the countries during this time. Director Hope will introduce the film and hold a Q&A after.

Citizen Architect
Tuesday, December 6, 6:30 pm - Free
U-M Taubman College of Architecture & Urban Planning
When you say the word “architect,” it conjures the image of a person who designs a giant office building or a fancy-ass mansion. Sam Wainwright Douglas' 2010 documentary follows the work of southern architect Samuel Mockbee, cofounder of the Auburn University Rural Studio program, whose students work with the extremely poor people who live right nearby. The movie shows how the citizens and architects worked together to rebuild their community one finely designed structure at a time.

One: The Movie
Thursday, December 8, 6:30 pm - Free
Ann Arbor Downtown Library - Multi-Purpose Room
For this 2006 doc, co-directors Scott Carter, Ward M. Powers and Diane Powers went around the world and asked spiritual gurus such as Deepak Chopra, Father Thomas Keating, Ram Dass, Thich Nhat Hanh, and others the same 20 questions about the meaning of life, including:

What happens when I die?
Can you describe God?
Is a hot dog really a sandwich?

OK, perhaps that last question is only of real concern to me, but the people in this documentary undertake the responsibility to interpret the meaning of life with earnestness and graciousness. Co-director Carter, a local yoga instructor, will hold a Q&A after the screening.

Warren Miller’s Here, There & Everywhere
Friday, December 9, 7:30 pm - $
Michigan Theater
Since 1950, Warren Miller has been kicking out inventive films that show the beauty, adventure, and danger of snow sports. His latest trick captures glorious scenes everywhere from Squaw Valley, Calif., and Greenland to Switzerland and ... Boston’s Fenway Park? Did somebody get rad on the Big Green Monster? Check out Warren Miller’s 67th slopes film, Here, There & Everywhere, to find out.

Design Disruptors
Monday, December 19, 7:00 pm
Ann Arbor Downtown Library - Multi-Purpose Room
The art of design isn’t just about putting a drop shadow behind a letter or creating a beautiful object. It’s about creating an experience that can connect with humans on an emotional and physical level. And in today’s hurried society, if something doesn’t grab a user right away, it’s likely abandoned. That’s why companies are paying so much attention to the design aspects of their products now, not just the underlying engineering. Design Disruptors, a new documentary from InVision and directed by Catalyst, highlights the most innovative design approaches by 15 of the world’s biggest companies, including Uber, Netflix, and Twitter.

Christopher Porter is a Library Technician and editor of Pulp.

Review: Gimme Danger

Wed, 10/26/2016 - 7:55am by mariah

When Ann Arbor punk pioneers the Stooges played a tribute show for their deceased guitarist Ron Asheton at the Michigan Theater in 2011, arthouse director Jim Jarmusch was in the house. Having announced that he was beginning work on a documentary about the Stooges just the year before, one might have guessed that the Cuyahoga Falls-born director behind Night On Earth and Broken Flowers was planning to include the Ann Arbor show in his film.

But the amusing stories of Jarmusch's terse interactions with townies are the only real creative legacy the director left behind from his Ann Arbor visit. There's no footage from the Asheton tribute in Gimme Danger, Jarmusch's Stooges documentary, which will open in Detroit on Oct. 28. And in many ways, that's for the best.

Jarmusch was at the Asheton tribute, and presumably has been around for other moments in the lives of Iggy and Co. over the past decade-plus, as a friend and casual observer, not a documentarian. Jarmusch first worked with Iggy Pop, the Stooges' legendary and arrestingly bizarre frontman, on a standout scene from Jarmusch's 2003 narrative film Coffee and Cigarettes. In 2010 Pop personally requested that Jarmusch make a documentary about the band. The resulting film plays not like a staid rock biopic but like an intimate conversation between friends, a fun, loosey-goosey retelling of the tumultuous tale behind one of the most influential bands in rock.

Jarmusch begins the film in 1973 with one of the band's apparent endings. At the time, the Stooges had already released their three seminal albums The Stooges, Fun House, and Raw Power, but as a title card puts it, "They were dirt." Critically maligned and dragged down by Pop's drug abuse and increasingly unmanageable behavior, the band called it quits in 1974. From there, Jarmusch jumps back to the Stooges' childhoods, examining how they got to that low point and how they bounced back in 2003 to begin touring extensively in response to broad recognition from a host of younger artists. The stories, from the tale of Pop calling up Moe Howard to request his permission to use the name "The Stooges" to Pop's explanation of Soupy Sales' influence on his minimalistic lyrics, are outrageous and often hilarious.

Jarmusch's focus is relatively narrow. He interviews almost no one other than Iggy and the Stooges themselves (including Minutemen bassist Mike Watt, who toured with the band throughout the 2000s). The interview settings are almost laughably casual; Pop gives one of his interviews in a laundry room, and he idly plays with his bare feet as he talks. Guitarist James Williamson appears to have given his interview in a public bathroom, guitar in his lap.

The director doesn't attempt to editorialize or add much of his own flair to the material. Compensating for the lack of archival photos or footage of the band, he frequently makes amusing use of period-appropriate stock footage and even a couple of animated sequences to illustrate the Stooges' tales of their misadventures. But overall he seems to revel in the entertainment value of letting the Stooges tell their own stories. When you've got the gaunt, bug-eyed, slightly anxious Pop alongside the gaunt, hood-eyed, utterly deadpan drummer Scott Asheton (now deceased), what better method than to just wind these two characters up and let them go?

The relatively straightforward documentary may seem to fit oddly into the oeuvre of the director who made such visually striking and idiosyncratic films as Mystery Train and Only Lovers Left Alive, but in a way it also occupies its own very singular territory. The tale told here is unlikely to throw Stooges aficionados any new curveballs; Jarmusch himself has noted the difficulty he had finding any new footage of the band to include in the film. And the film's relative modesty (especially given its frequently outrageous subjects) seems unlikely to cause enough of a stir to attract many Stooges newbies to the theater. Like any of Jarmusch's other films, Gimme Danger is perfectly happy being exactly what it wants to be – a thoroughly fun, no-frills, firsthand account of the story behind one of rock's greatest bands – and nothing more.

Patrick Dunn is the interim managing editor of Concentrate and an Ann Arbor-based freelance writer whose work appears regularly in Pulp, the Detroit News, the Ann Arbor Observer, and other local publications. He ain't got time to make no apologies.

Gimme Danger premiered last night, October 25th, with a special screening at the Detroit Film Theater (DFT) featuring Iggy Pop and Jim Jarmusch. It opens officially Oct. 28 at the Detroit Film Theater, and will expand to a wider release on Nov. 4.