Mother, Brother, Lover: Selected Lyrics (2012)

Author: Jarvis Cocker | Page Count: 192

"If nobody's listening you can say whatever you want."

A selection of lyrics (sixty-six in all) penned by Meister Cocker over the span of three decades. They're mostly from his time in Pulp, but his solo work is well-represented, too. Each one is accompanied by notes that act as illumination and commentary on the themes and allusions made in the songs themselves; which will be helpful to people outside the UK or those who were born too late.

Before you get to the main event, there's an introduction from Jarvis that's so beautifully constructed and insightful that it's worth the asking price alone. He speaks of the profound things that occur in everyday life, the things that don't stand out until later, and he speaks of them in common language for (ahem) common people. It's from a point in time that enables experience to lay tender hands on and memory to whittle away anything superfluous. Without meaning to demean anything that comes after, the intro is the highlight of the work.

With regards the lyrics, despite Jarvis' insistence to the contrary, they're intrinsically poetic, and therefore I'm labelling the book as poetry. (He's never going to read this, so I think I'll get away with it.)

They're narrative-based, so work just as well when written on the page as they did when put to music. I could go into depth about why I think that is but I'd need twice the word count I have, and you'd probably not care anyhow. I will say, though, that the lyrics of songs I've not heard sung were more enjoyable to read than the ones I know well. I found myself breaking up the words of the familiar ones into their metre structure, attributing qualitative and quantitative, and because I was hearing the music in my head I was putting pauses in places that a pause would be better left out. It was a very odd experience.

I'm not appraising with blind bias. I'm a Pulp fan, yes, but that fact doesn't influence the score. I only own two Pulp albums and one Jarvis solo album. I'm interested in the others but just haven't got around to purchasing them yet.

4 less obvious places out of 5

Touching From a Distance (1995)

Author: Deborah Curtis | Page Count: 212

"...he was reading Dostoyevsky, Nietzsche, Jean Paul Sarte, Hermann Hesse and J. G. Ballard. ...It struck me that all Ian's spare time was spent reading and thinking about human suffering."

Ian Curtis found a way to say the things that the post-punk generation were so badly in need of. It doesn't mean he was a hero. He was as much an asshole as the rest of us. This book tells his tale from his wife’s point of view. It also tells her tale, and it’s one that for me was worth reading. It strives to find a balance between the emotional stance of a wife and mother deifying her husband out of love and duty, and the equally emotional dejectedness of a devoted partner left out in the cold during her husband’s greatest triumph. Mostly it succeeds.

While Ian tried to hold himself together after a medical diagnosis that threw his life into a maelstrom of uncertainty, Deborah tried to hold everything else together, house, home and family. She never succumbs to the ‘pity me’ attitude (in fact, that seems to have been exorcised quite intentionally). Even though the book is about Ian Curtis, it reveals a lot about the author in the process. I applaud her strength of character in exposing herself so openly. It’s neither sensationalist nor cashing in on a tragedy; it simply is what it is: an honest and often heartbreaking piece of prose. It’s the work of someone wanting to give the truth of a situation, truth being something that she herself was denied at the time.

The end of the book reproduces Ian’s lyrics, some previously unseen, half finished or abandoned. The cynic in you may think this an easy way to fill out page count, but Ian’s words are worthy of inclusion. Having them here is the perfect way to end the story. He was a real poet that touched upon things someone so young shouldn't have had such a deep understanding of; luckily for us, if we learn by example, he left us enough instruction so that we don't have to.

3 band-mates who were blind to the truth out of 5

Qi: The Book of General Ignorance (2006)

Author: John Lloyd and John Mitchinson  |  Page Count: 320

Qi (Quite interesting) is a television series hosted by the always entertaining and rather dapper Stephen Fry.  It’s a panel game / quiz show that'll make you laugh while presenting some obscure fact about jellyfish or bread rolls.  If you’re lucky it'll have a story involving jellyfish and bread rolls together that'll cause funny-man Alan Davies to bring great shame upon his curly head... bless his follicles.

The book is co-authored by the creator of the show, so it’s not just a quick cash-in, it’s the real deal.  It collects together a wealth of trivia about all things unusual, some wickedly cruel and some very mundane things you didn't know you wanted to learn more about.  It’s broken up into digestible chucks.  Each topic is typically just one page in length.  Some are only half a page but still manage to squeeze in enough info to justify their inclusion.  Topics are the usual general knowledge categories: history, science, religion, food, geography, geology, etc.  It even sheds light on whether or not a Jaffa Cake is really a cake or simply a biscuit.

It’s written for people who speak the Queen's English, so Americans may well get a little lost at times.  I make no allegations.  If you’re not convinced you need a book of general ignorance, ask yourself this question: Who wouldn't want to know which insect has a penis that snaps off in times of stress?

Buy it.  Eat it.  Regurgitate the trivia at your friends during lunch break.  They'll love you from afar.  Leave it in the shitter and learn while you birth a log.  It has exactly 101 uses.  It’s really Quite Interesting.

5 slices of French Toast (but is it really French?) out of 5

The Boy Who Kicked Pigs (1999)

Author: Tom Baker | Illustrator: David Roberts | Page Count: 124 

“Robert withdrew himself in preparation for the kick of a lifetime.  And then he burst into life and delivered a marvellous kick to Trevor’s arse.”

A subversive fantasy novella told in the style of a kid’s story.  The language used is purposefully simplistic and childlike, and for the most part wasted on the lack of anything interesting to convey.

The story moves from one event to the next with little regard for cohesion.  The first half feels like it was written simply to make up the page count, so that it could be considered a novella and not a short.  The second half has a focus that improves the narrative greatly, the light of which throws the first half into an even darker pit of pointlessness.  It's a shame as it’s a beautifully presented book.  It’s the size of a paperback but bound in an attractive, slick hard binding.  The paper is thicker than usual and serves the illustrations well.

Every second page has a black ink sketch to illustrate some part of the story detailed on the adjacent page.  The pictures are on the left side and the text on the right, and quite often were depicting something half a page ahead of where I’d read, so there were dozens of mild spoilers.  The illustrations will please fans of Tim Burton’s sketchy nightmare style; they're very obviously inspired by him and are the reason it's still in residence on my shelf.  Overall, it's a quality presentation for a work that I don't feel tries hard enough to really deserve it.

2 yes, it is that Tom Baker out of 5