Your Weekly Mr. Littlejeans

Jeans in his study.

Usually It's Nothing

We're in NYC right now on a quick trip to do our taxes--we have a crack team of accountants in Queens, it's worth the trip--but I wanted to note that today is the one-year anniversary of this here blog. Thank you for reading, I hope I have provided you with some enjoyment. I like blogging and I'm going to keep doing it.

Sent from my BlackBerry® smartphone with SprintSpeed

S words

Hmmm... I'm not sure about this album cover.

I like the various elements (color, type, car, styling...even the sword is okay), but something about the light-gray background bothers me. Looking forward to the album though – it's in stores March 3rd.

Neko Case People Got A Lotta Nerve mp3 (via Anti-)

More info here.

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An addendum:
I highly recommend reading this great piece on Neko Case in The New York Times Magazine. It's an incredibly morbid thing to note, but just about anyone who grew up in the Northwest around the same time as me will identify with her comments on the inspiration for one of the new songs:

“It’s based on the Green River killer,” she says. “When I was a kid in Tacoma, we were all scared all the time. I actually carried a knife to school with me. The ‘you’ in the song is one of his victims. They were all prostitutes, but we didn’t know that. They could have been anybody; they could have been us.”

Man, I remember that feeling – I was scared too as a little kid, even knowing that the victims were all women. Such a strange thing to grow up with. I wonder if the sword on the album cover references the knife she carried. Anyway, it all makes me look forward to hearing the rest of the record.

Train of Thought

While we're on the subject...

Red Gay & Jack Wellman Flat Wheel Train Blues mp3
courtesy Mr. Bussard
Feist & Ben Gibbard Train Song mp3
buy their stuff everywhere
José Gonzalez Untitled (Train) mp3
from Visionaire 53 SOUND (buy it)
Don Thomas Train Keep Moving mp3
(extension courtesy Hugswon)
Reflection Eternal Train of Thought mp3

Photo: near The Dalles, Oregon, May 2007

Blue Train

Emily knows me really well. For our January Xmas, as I mentioned before, she got me a set of maps for finding all the ghost towns of Washington State, and she also got me the beautifully packaged Criterion DVD Two-Lane Blacktop. But I think the coolest thing she came up with was this first paperback edition of Paul Fusco's self-published book RFK Funeral Train.

Fusco, a staff photographer for Look magazine, traveled with Robert F. Kennedy's body as it made its way from New York to D.C. in 1968. Fusco documented the journey with pictures of the people who stood at the side of the tracks to pay their respects. (Click to enlarge.)

Aperture published a new version of the book last year, including many previously unpublished photos – you can get it at aperture.org for $35.


Check out this New York Times Magazine article for more info and a slideshow.

Stuff we forgot we owned, Part 3

When I was a kid I ordered a list from the back of a comic book that had all these free things you could send away for. I don't remember what else I got, maybe some stamps and stuff, but I was pretty psyched about this trucker dictionary.

Comin' out the Woodwork

A lot of telephone poles around Seattle have this cool-looking typography chunked into them.

Unrelated: Hobo Junction Woodwork mp3