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	Julien Prunet

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Septembre 14, 2002

Manson art I really like these sick paintings by Marilyn Manson. He's opening his art show on the 19th at the L.A. Contemporary Art Exhibition in Hollywood.

posted by on 08:52 du soir | link

Septembre 13, 2002

Beck-Prague link but no bridge

Just came back from my interview with Beck at the Château-Marmont. He is charming, obviously very smart, and looks you right in the eye. He speaks slowly but easily and he's quick to smile. And as Ken would say, "You could feed him a taco," because he's sooooo small and skinny. Oh, and he also has a healthy self-esteem. I tried not to show how moved I was to meet him, after all these years marvelling at his music.

During our conversation, Beck mentioned that he had a bunch of friends who went to Prague in the early 90s. He said: "I think some of them worked on a newspaper. This guy James Rowe (?)... and they stayed out there for like, 10 years, and I think a lot of those guys went back to New York."

As we were chatting, I told him about his Hungarian fans, and the Americans in Budapest like Matt and Ben and Ken, who introduced me to his music. I told him that at the time, I had the impression that Beck was their hard-working musician hero who was helping them indirectly to crush the popular Gen-X stereotypes ("look at those slackers bumming around in Central Europe"). It seemed that Beck and his songs were giving these Americans one of their best tastes of Los Angeles and home. Beck seemed to enjoy these stories.

We wrapped up the subject by talking about the American friends from Prague who had moved back to Los Feliz (the Los Angeles neighborhood where I've been living for 4 years.) Beck himself lived in Los Feliz (Franklin Avenue, Talmage), in Echo Park (Alessandro, Hoover) and Silver Lake. He told the LA Weekly that he grew up in a building (now destroyed) behind the Egyptian theater in Hollywood and moved later to an apartment at Hoover and Ninth, in a Salvadoran community that borders Koreatown.

Anyway, as I came back from this interview, Matt asked me: "Did you ask Beck about the bridge?!?"... er, which bridge? I learned that there were persistent rumours about Beck in Prague, that he had supposedly busked on the Charles Bridge. I guess he would have told me. He didn't make allusions to any period of time spent in Prague.

Most of the interview was about his new album, Sea Change, which I dislike violently, except for the wonderful "Sunday Sun," "Paper Tiger," (a tribute to Serge Gainsbourg's Melody Nelson) and "Little One."

And for those of you curious to learn if Beck really has embraced a certain sci-fi religion headquartered in Hollywood... he has. More to be published after I'm done transcribing. (In the meantime, check out comments on Beck and Scientology on Ken's site)

UPDATE for those who were in Prague: Ken B. writes about Beck's friend mentioned earlier: "James Rose. He was a friend of mine (and Steve's) -- when I went back in '95 I hung out with him for a while, and his girlfriend worked at the restaurant I managed (where Van Diamond used to play).

UPDATE 2: Kim writes: "I do believe that Beck was in Prague, probably in late 1992 or perhaps 1993. I have a cassette tape recorded at [Jiri] Podulka studio in Prague, a lot of friends' bands are on it, and there's a song by Beck on the tape. The song's called "Here comes that bus" or something like that, and the tape is called "From The Bridge" (maybe part II)." Mmm... Can't wait to hear this tape!

posted by on 05:26 du soir | link

Septembre 12, 2002

The lamest article ever published about blogs... where else? In the lame-o-sphere of the Los Angeles Times.

The story is illustrated with a big picture of my former editor at Online Journalism Review, whom I considered to be a great friend, before he scrapped his monkey blog and leaped back to the jungle without saying goodbye. Matt has a great rant (this is for you, Amy!) and Tony is the funniest blogger enraged by this joke of a story and the L.A. Times:
"The Blogger phenomenon is happening stronger in Los Angeles than in any other city in the world and you wouldn't know it if it slapped you in the face. By the way, I'm slapping you in the face."
Now, all the L.A. bloggers are on their way to a fun Press Club party in a Cuban lounge tonight, and the L.A. Times journos with mojitos in hand will hear about us.

posted by on 06:11 du soir | link

Septembre 10, 2002

Les réflections de Ken sur cette année passée m'ont donnée l'effet d'un coup de poing dans l'estomac. Je vous recommane aussi cet article d'une journaliste sportive du Los Angeles, qui avait réservé une place 4 rangées derrière Mohamed Atta sur le AA 11 Boston-Los Angeles et a changé de vol à la dernière minute.

Le logiciel Movable Type vient d'avaler un long texte rédigé en ces commémorations du 11 septembre. C'est sans doute mieux ainsi. Je voulais juste dire que ce fut l'une des pires années dont je me souvienne.

posted by on 11:28 du soir | link

Septembre 09, 2002

That's what happens when your friends Greg and Molli get real close to having a baby

Ken Layne draws their child on a cake; a couple of hippies sing that they'd love the boy to be named after a basketball wiz or a Star Wars character; very happy, teary-eyed people take a bunch of blurry pictures at the party hosted by the one and only Kim.