Hi there! We’re pasting in the May e-mail you’ve probably received if you’re on our mailing list. But if it the message didn’t cooperate for you. Enjoy!
May day may day! Howdy there! This month’s monthly e-mail is back to the basics! The past few months we’ve had some fancy graphics for ya’ll but we thought we’d do it old school this time around, all old fashioned and old timey! To skip the events and see about some new awesome stuff, scroll to the bottom.
But first! Announcements!
This coming Saturday (the 2nd, as in tomorrow) is Free Comic Book Day. We might have a few to give away but they’re more for, er, the over eighteeners if you know what we’re saying. Supply is quite limited. But! Our sister store, Chicago Comics, is participating in Free Comic Book Day, so get your rump over there and get your free comic. Chicago Comics is at 3244 N. Clark. Hassle ’em on the horn if ya hafta: 773-528-1983, or check ’em out on that there webbernet at www.chicagocomics.com .
But enuffa that! Here are May events!
*****FREE MAY EVENTS AT QUIMBY’S*****
To stay informed about events at Quimby’s, see our blog at:
http://quimbys.com/blog/store-events
HANDMADE ELECTRONIC MUSIC : THE ART OF HARDWARE HACKING RELEASE PARTY
WITH NIC COLLINS
SAT., MAY 2, 3:00PM
Yes, yes, yes, we know we pimped this event in last month’s e-mail but we are so excited to welcome Nic back that we’re yodelin’ it from the mountaintops! Here’s the scoop:
Handmade Electronic Music: The Art of Hardware Hacking provides a long-needed, practical, and engaging introduction to the craft of making as well as creatively cannibalizing electronic circuits for artistic purposes. With a sense of adventure but no need for prior knowledge, the reader can subvert the intentions designed into devices such as radios and toys to discover a new sonic world. At a time when computers dominate music production, this book offers a rare glimpse into the core technology of early live electronic music, as well as more recent developments at the hands of emerging artists. In addition to advice on hacking found electronics, the reader learns how to make contact microphones, pickups for electromagnetic fields, oscillators, distortion boxes, and unusual signal processors cheaply and quickly.
This revised and expanded second edition is extensively illustrated and includes a DVD featuring 87 video clips and 20 audio tracks by over 100 hackers, benders, musicians, artists and inventors from around the world, as well as 13 video tutorials demonstrating projects in the book. Further enhancements include additional projects, photographs, diagrams, and illustrations.
What might happen at this event? Maybe some and/or all of the following: an anarchic hacking orchestra composed of multiple uncoordinated performances distributed around the store, each performer using individual small sound systems? Speakers amplifying bent toys, battery-operated mini-amps, video, and demos of a few projects? Who knows?
Nicolas Collins, an active composer and performer of electronic music, and has worked with John Cage, Alvin Lucier, David Tudor, and many other masters of modern music. Dr. Collins is Professor of Sound at The School of the Art Institute of Chicago, and has led hacking workshops around the world. Since 1997 he has been editor-in-chief of Leonardo Music Journal. For more info: http://www.NicolasCollins.com
That’s this Saturday, as in TOMORRW folks!!! Bring your battery-operated noise-makers for some circuit-bending action!
BOOK RELEASE PARTY WITH JOE MENO & FRIENDS FOR MENO’S NEW NOVEL, THE GREAT PERHAPS!
THURS., MAY 7, 7:00PM
In his new novel, The Great Perhaps, local Chicago writer Joe Meno continues to employ his keen observations of human nature, this time exploring the tumultuous landscapes of a contemporary Chicago family. The narrative rotates between members of the Casper family, giving each time and space to dig into their respective quirks. Jonathan, the father, is a scientist caught in a quest for a prehistoric squid and is prone to seizures at the sight of clouds. Madeline, Jonathan’s wife, also a scientist, studies the behavior of her murderous lab pigeons and is distressed by the growing distance between family members: elder daughter Amelia is a teenage anticapitalist crusader already becoming weary of the fight; youngest daughter Thisbe’s desire to find God is met with much concern from her atheist parents; grandfather Henry’s sole desire is to make himself disappear. As the family’s preoccupations rattle on and bang up against one another, the recently begun war in Iraq provides background noise and another dimension to the intricate and intimate tale. Meno’s handle on the written word is fresh and inviting, conjuring a story that delves deeply into the human heart.
Joe Meno is the best-selling author of the novels Hairstyles of the Damned, The Boy Detective Fails, How the Hula Girl Sings, and Tender As Hellfire. He was the winner of the 2003 Nelson Algren Award for short fiction and is a professor of creative writing at Columbia College Chicago.
Also performing: Jonathan Messinger, Timeout Chicago Books Editor and author of Hiding Out! Jon Resh, author of Amped and musical accompaniment by The Astronomer!
KEVIN CHRISTENSEN SIGNS THE CHAIR
SAT., MAY 9, 1:00PM
A psychological thriller set on death-row, The Chair focuses on Richard Sullivan, an inmate that has spent the past 10 years awaiting execution for crimes he claims he never committed. But lately strange events have started occurring in the prison, including a piling body count of tortured inmates, a viciously sadistic warden, and enough twists and turns to make Sullivan question his own sanity. At its core, The Chair is a book about the choices we make in life and how they can affect everything and everyone around us. Written by Peter Simeti. Artwork by Kevin Christiansen and Peter Simeti.
Kevin Christensen is a freelance cartoonist, currently living in Chicago, Illinois. He graduated from The Savannah College of Art and Design with a BFA in Sequential Art in 2004, and is currently pursuing a second bachelors degree in art education, from the University of Illinois at Chicago. The Chair is his first graphic novel.
Go to www.alternacomics.com for more information.
MICHAEL ROBERTS & JASON MCBETH
MON., MAY 11, 7:00PM
Touring America through the spring and summer of 2009, The Lightning Bug Romantics are 2008 Individual World Poetry Slam runner-up Jason McBeth and Michael Roberts, author of the Puschcart Prize nominated collection No More Poems About The Moon (Write Bloody Press).
As a pair, these two touring performance poets are polar opposites, peanut butter and jelly and siamese twins. Michael Roberts is trustworthy, heroically humble, and a recognized saint in seven different religions in 32 languages. He has been the opening act for indie rock bands at the famous Troubadour in Hollywood, has shared the stage with such spoken word legends as Buddy Wakefield, Derrick Brown, and Beau Sia, and recently toured eastern Europe, performing in Prague, Czechoslovakia; Budapest, Hungary and Split, Croatia.
Jason McBeth is currently the second ranked performance poet in the world and among the many venues at which he has performed are London?s Globe Theater, The Kennedy Center in Washington D.C., The Oregon Shakespeare Festival, Nuyorican Poets Cafe, The Western Regional Poetry Slam in Big Sur, and Hollywood’s Da Poetry Lounge.
In addition to No More Poems About the Moon, Roberts contributed to the Write Bloody anthologies The Last American Valentine and The Good Things About America. McBeth also contributed to The Good Things About America and his first book, The Cities Under Your Tongue is to be published this spring by Write Bloody. For more information: www.myspace.com/lightningbugromanticstour
www.thehopemeat.com
www.writebloody.com
CHERYL WAGNER READS FROM PLENTY ENOUGH SUCK TO GO AROUND:
A MEMOIR OF FLOODS, FIRES, PARADES, AND PLYWOOD
SAT., MAY 16, 7:00PM
The saying about New Orleans getting into people’s blood happens to be very true, just not always convenient. For Cheryl Wagner (along with her indie-band boyfriend, a few eccentric pals, some ne’er-do-wells, and two aging basset hounds) abandoning the city she loved wasn’t an option. This is the story of Cheryl’s disturbing surprise view from her front porch after she moved back home to find everything she treasured in shambles and her determined, absurd, and darkly funny three-year journey of trying to piece it all back together again. In the same heartfelt and hilarious voice that has drawn thousands of listeners to her broadcasts on the public radio program This American Life, Wagner shares her unique yet universal story of rebuilding a life after it’s flooded, dried, died and then the copper thieves moved in.
Cheryl Wagner is a contributor to public radio’s This American Life, and her work has also been featured on the Canadian Broadcast Corporation’s The Current and Definitely Not the Opera. Her work has appeared in many print and online publications. Her cover stories for the The Times of Acadiana won first place for best continuing coverage of Hurricane Katrina or Rita from the Louisiana Press Association. She lives in New Orleans.
For more info:
www.cheryl-wagner.com
DAN GLEASON AND FRIENDS READ FROM PIECES OF PAPER, AMONGST THE WORDS THAT REST UPON THEM
SAT., MAY 23, 7:00 PM
Chicago-based weirdo Dan Gleason once again graces us with his presence and brings some friends to entertain us. Like who else? These fine folks:
Marc Arcuri: poet/advocate
Thax Douglas: author/scholar
Greg Jacobsen: painter/songstress
Meg McCarville: autobiographer/leading lady
Mike McPadden: writer/musician
Dave Tortuga: artist/mover
Well, what will happen at this event? Here is what Dan told us:
Chewing tobacco will be provided.
(Chewing tobacco will not be provided.)
Large chunk of melba toast accidentally placed in ear.
Together we transform into one being that possesses a lot of the same power as that recently cancelled Michel Gondry.
People should drink.
Ingrown hair in my left nostril.
You dont want to miss that, do you?
JOEY COMEAU READS FROM OVERQUALIFIED
WED., MAY 27, 7:00PM
“Dear Sirs or Madams . . . I wrote a series of letters, many of which appear in the book, and sent them to real companies. I really sent them, and I never got one response, until one day the police came to my door. They’d been called by the HR department of a company that received one of the letters.”
Joey Comeau’s startling new novel Overqualified (ECW Press), is told through job application cover letters. But these letters have very little to do with finding work. Joey’s anger and hopes and fears become the focus as he tells jokes when he should be outlining his relevant job experience; he tells stories about his childhood when he should be talking about his education. Over the course of this series of letters, a narrative emerges. The reader comes to know Joey through confessions of family secrets and embarrassing sexual experiences. And there’s been a terrible car accident involving Joey?s younger brother.
QUIMBY’S WELCOMES JAMES DANKY,
CO-AUTHOR AND CO-CURATOR OF UNDERGROUND CLASSICS:
THE TRANSFORMATION OF COMICS INTO COMIX
THURS., MAY 28, 7:00 PM
The impact of American underground comix is profound: They galvanized artists both domestically and abroad; they forever changed the economics of comic book publishing; and they influenced generations of cartoonists, including their predecessors. While the works of Robert Crumb and Art Spiegelman are well-known via the New Yorker, Maus, and retrospective collections, the art of their contemporaries such as Gilbert Shelton, Trina Robbins, Justin Green, Kim Deitch, S. Clay Wilson, and many other seminal cartoonists who came of age in the 1960s is considerably less known.
Underground Classics: The Transformation Of Comics Into Comix (Abrams) provides the first serious survey of underground comix as art, turning the spotlight on these influential and largely underappreciated artists. Essays from the book’s co-writers and co-curators James Danky and Denis Kitchen, alongside essays by Paul Buhle, Patrick Rosenkranz, Jay Lynch, and Trina Robbins, offer a thorough reflection and appraisal of the underground movement. Over 125 original drawings, paintings, sculptures, and artifacts are featured, loaned from private collections and the artists themselves, making this book indispensable for the serious-minded comics fan and for the casual reader alike.
In 1974 James Danky published his first book, Undergrounds, a bibliography of alternative newspapers. He is on the faculty of the School of Journalism and Mass Communication at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, where he also founded and directed the Center for the History of Print Culture in Modern America. In 2007 Danky retired from the Wisconsin Historical Society after building their nationally renowned collections for thirty-five years. He lives in Madison, Wisconsin.
*****NOTABLE NEW STUFF AT QUIMBY’S*****
Wanna always be on top o’ new stuff here? Check out blog for weekly updates: http://quimbys.com/blog
Nine Ways to Disappear by Lilli Carre (Little Otsu) $12.95 – Wonderful, beautiful comics, from this local Chicagoian.
Wholphin #8 $19.95
Banksys Bristol Home Sweet Home: Unofficial Guide to Banksys Early Years by Steve Wright (Last Gasp) $24.95
Shortcomings by Adrian Tomine (Drawn and Quarterly) $14.95 – Now in soft cover! Collects issue #’s 9 through 11 of Optic Nerve.
Requiem For a Paper Bag Celebrities and Civilians Tell Stories of the Best Lost: and FOUND Items From Around the World, edited by the Editors of FOUND Magazine (Fireside) $15.99
Fifth Estate vol 44 #1 Spr 09 #380 $4.00
Myster Theater Episode #1 The Human Brain – New comic from Julia Wertz of Fart Party fame
Artists Sessions at Studio 35 1950 edited by Robert Goodnough $10.00
Literary Review vol 52 #2 $7.00
Junk Pirate #17 $3.00
Stolen Sharpie Revolution vol 2 A DIY Resource For Zines and Zine Culture by Alex Wrekk $6.00 Now with more zine-y info!
In Practice Stream of Consciousness DIY $.50
Inner Swine vol 15 #1 by Jeffrey Somers $2.00
RFD #137 $7.75
50 Years of Hot Rod by the editors of Hot Rod Magazine (Motorbooks) $24.95
I See It All by Deth P Sun (Rowan Morrison Publishing) $20.00 – Beautiful drawings of the fantastical (and possibly Potter-ian)
Guerilla Art by Sebastian Peiter and Goetz Werner (Laurence King) $19.95
Tales Designed to Thrizzle #5 by Michael Kupperman (Fantagrphics) $4.50
Teens at Play Winter Break Special by Rebecca (Eros) $4.95
Juxtapoz #100 May 09 $5.99
Compleat Motherfucker A History of the Mother of All Dirty Work by Jim Dawson (Feral House) $13.00
Studs Terkels Working A Graphic Adaptation by Harvey Pekar and Paul Buhle (New Press) $22.95
World of Wonders by Jimmy Katz and Dena Katz (PowerHouse) $39.95 – Beautiful circus/midway book!
Ride The Lightning (mini comic) by John Isaacson $3.00 – based on the Metallica album!
Beyond Illustration: Finest in Contemporary International Art and Illustration (Pro-Actif) $39.95 – Check out some cool international stuff, with a Juxtapoz-y feel to it.
Untitled: Street Art in the Counter Culture by Gary Shove (Pro-Actif) $34.95 – If you’re into Banksy and artists of that ilk, this is for you.
Heeb #20 Spr 09 $5.99
33 1/3 Series: Celine Dion’s Lets Talk About Love: A Journey to the End of Taste by Carl Wilson (Continuum) $12.95 – It had to happen eventually!
33 1/3 Series: Nas’ Illmatic by Matthew Gasteier (Continuum) $10.95
The Eternal Smile by Gene Luen Yang and Derek Kirk Kim (First Second) $16.95
PrOnnovation Pornography and Technological Innovation: monochroms Arse Elektronika Anthology by various (Re/Search) $24.99 – New Re/Search books are rare. Get this one before it goes outta print!
Boody The Bizarre Comics of Boody Rogers by Craig Yoe and Boody Rogers (Fantagraphics) $19.99
Mother Come Home by Paul Hornschemeier (Dark Horse) $22.99 – Reprinted hardcover graphic novel collection from local comics superstar. Its soft cover incarnation has been out of print until now!
Ho: the Morally Questionable Cartoons of Ivan Brunetti (Fantagraphics) $19.99 – The work of local artist Brunetti makes us cough on the food we?re eating, the operatve word here being gag. As in one panel! Gag! The joke is always funny when you have to explain it!
Bunny Yeagers Bouffant Beauties (Schifer) $24.99 – Yes!! As in the famous photographer?s photos of pin up cuties with awesomely bouffant-y hair. And strangely, a lot of them have big ariolas. Who knew? And who knows how to spell that?
Conspiracy Journal #27 $3.00
Supermen: The First Wave of Comic Book Heroes 1936-1941 by Greg Sadowski (Fantagraphics) $24.99
DIY Guide to Drums by Lisa Ann Schonberg $18.00
Famous Hairdos of Popular Music Vol 1 James Brown $2.00 – Hilarious mini comic!
Duplex Planet #184 $2.00 – Still going strong in the 3 digits!
Aero Through the Ages by Hal Rammel $15.00 – A graphic novel published by the Chicago gallery folks Corbett Vs Dempsey!
Brains Brilliancy Bohemia Art and Politics In Jazz-age Chicago $8.00 – What a way cool researched zine. And nice and fat! You get what you pay for!
This Little Light of Mine: Novenas For You by Moe Bernstern of Xtra Tuf< zine. $3.00 Also here from Moe: Second Set Out: Stories
Snake Pit 2008 by Ben Snakepit (Microcosm) $5.00
CHIRP Jeffrey Brown Shirt $20.00 – Designed for the CHIRP record fair! Pretty nifty! And we have a whole mass of sizes.
In Search of the Lost Taste by Joshua Ploeg (Microcosm) $8.00 – Two words: Lavender soda. Who says vegans only eat grass?
Handbook vol 3 #2 2009 $6.00 – Let?s hear it for independently published porn!
Pinups #6 $14.00 – See above!
Visionary Field Guide to Mushroom Magick by various (including among others Erik Davis and Daniel Pinchbeck) (Abrams) $19.95 – Arty shrooms! What?s not to love?
Snuff by Chuck Palahniuk (Anchor) $13.95 – Sniff the Snuff out now in soft cover!
World War 3 Illustrated #39 Worldless Worlds $5.00
Also! Check out these CRAZY children?s books from Australian publisher Love Police!!:
M Is For Metal: The Loudest Alphabet Book On Earth $23.50
and
Never Mind Your Ps and Qs: Heres the Punk Alphabet $23.50
Both books by Paul McNeil and Barry Divola.
Show Me the Money #29 $2.50
Giant Robot #59 $4.99
Burning Man Live: 13 Years of Piss Clear Black Rock Citys Alternative Newspaper (Re/Search) $24.99
Collected Doug Wright Canadas Master Cartoonist 1949 to 1962 vol 1 (DQ) $39.95
Blazing Combat by Archie Goodwin (Fantagraphics) $28.99
The Timewaster Letters by Robin Cooper (Chicago Review Press) $11.95