Hannah Kent - Burial Rites

Stark and beautiful. The sense of setting is strong - geographic (bitter northern Iceland), period (19th century) and character-wise (in line with the associated struggle to survive) - and doesn't get in the way of the story being told. It's involving at the level of character and plot - although we know going in that it will end with Agnes's death - and the reinterpretation of the events surrounding Iceland's last execution is gracefully done.

Mitski - Laurel Hell

Despite significantly upping the synth-pop vibes compared to the outstanding Puberty 2 and even more outstanding Be the Cowboy, Laurel Hell comes across as low-key. It's good though, sustaining a sulking mood and sharp perspective across both its quieter songs and the brighter ones like "Working for the Knife" and "The Only Heartbreaker".

Bleachers - Take the Sadness Out of Saturday Night

There are only two pretty good songs here - "Chinatown" and "Stop Making This Hurt". "Chinatown" features Bruce Springsteen, but the whole record basically unsuccessfully attempts to channel him - starting from the album cover. 

Daniel Abraham - The Dagger and the Coin series

Neatly put together high fantasy series which appears as if its author knew where he was going with it from the beginning. The main characters - Cithrin, Geder, Marcus, and first Dawson then Clara Kalliam - are given plenty of time and, apart from Marcus, mostly avoid fantasy stereotype. And the big picture is put together nicely - the world-building of course, but also the way finance is used to wield power. It's not quite as vivid as the very best of its kind - which, in this category, probably means A Song of Ice and Fire before it lost its way - but that's mostly a reminder of how rare that 'very best' is.

The Dragon's Path, The King's Blood, The Tyrant's Law, The Widow's House, The Spider's War

NGV International (permanent collection)

What I think of as the pictorial part of the NGV's 19th century European collection isn't one that I'd usually spend much time in, but it does hold many of the paintings that have been there the longest for me, going back to whenever it was that I first began visiting the NGV. And the other day, visiting, I found my attention caught in the large room that's been set up in a 'salon' arrangement for a while now, with dozens of paintings covering the four walls.

The one that gave me pause - for the first time - was Jules Bastien-Lange's "October" (1878). It's closer to my usual tastes than most else of what was in the room, particularly the way the fields and horizon in the background are done.

The ones that are most quintessentially part of the NGV for me - and I know for many others - are all large format and all, to me, suspiciously allegorical, sentimental or both. But they have a directness and a force that makes them memorable.

August Friedrich Albrecht Schenck - "Anguish" (c. 1878)

Lucy Kemp-Welch - "Horses bathing in the sea" (1900)

Briton Riviere - "A Roman holiday" (1881)

St George Hare - "The victory of faith" (c1890-1891)

Jules Lefebvre - "The grasshopper" (1872)

And three other discoveries from this latest visit - probably I've seen them all before but they've never registered:

William Quiller Orchardson - "The first cloud" (1887) - not sure what's going on here but I like the expression the man's face and the staging of the scene in general

Walter Sickert - "The Rise of Lazarus" (1928-29)

Keeley Halswelle - "Green-robed senators" (c. 1880)

Flag Day: Original Soundtrack

When eminently good and tasteful musicians come together, the results can sometimes be eminently tasteful and underwhelming. In this case, where the musicians are Eddie Vedder, Glen Hansard and Cat Power what emerges is instead a pretty charmful folk-rock-pop record with each of those three distinctive voices coming through clearly. 

Chan Marshall does what she does well, and in more organic vein than the glossily orchestrated albums she's been releasing more or less since The Greatest - particular grace notes are the patented simplicity of "I Think of Angels" and the "fuck y'all" refrain of "I Am A Map". 

Eddie Vedder's wordless "Rather Be Home" is fairly lovely in its own right, and all the more so for summoning some of Ten's most atmospheric moments all those years past. Indeed, Vedder's gentle folk-inflected contributions are a consistent highlight, bringing to the fore impulses that have been there all along, across Ten, Vs, Vitalogy and so on; "I'll Be Waiting" reminds me of those latter day Robert Plant records. Also there's a faithful cover of R.E.M.'s "Drive". 

Best of all is Hansard and Vedder's stately duet "Tender Mercies", though - surprisingly, maybe - the two on which Vedder's daughter Olivia sings, "My Father's Daughter" and "There's A Girl" are up there too.

Dune

I made the effort to see this in a cinema despite the current circumstances because it seemed likely to be very good and worth seeing on a big screen - Villeneuve has an unignorable track record with science fiction via Arrival and Blade Runner 2049 and more generally (ie Sicario). And maybe anticipation was my enemy here, because while I thought it was good, it didn't completely immerse me or have the depth that I'd hoped for. On the other hand, it was persuasive in both its showier and smaller moments, and in its overall conception, and while its themes - environmental exploitation, colonialism, the hero's journey, and perhaps family - may be familiar, they're also cleanly drawn and married to a satisfying sense of heft. Chalamet good as always. As I said to someone recently, I've seen him in a few things now but it always feels at first thought like I've only seen him in Call Me By Your Name.

Olivia Rodrigo - Sour

Some dynamic, memorable songs - mostly front-ended ("Traitor", "Drivers License", "Deja Vu", "Good 4 U") - and some others without that same zest.

Spencer

Heavy and at times heavy-handed, Spencer isn't a conventional film but it succeeds in depicting a version of Diana's suffocating experience of being of the royal family. It was the combination of Kristen Stewart and director Pablo Larrain's previous Jackie that got me to watch it. For me, the happy ending, with Diana and her children breaking free, would have felt unearned were it not for my (and everyone's knowledge) of how the real Diana's story ended - which turns it instead into a sad ending, or at the very least bittersweet one, and not of the type to romanticise. (Also - neat jazz soundtrack courtesy of Jonny Greenwood.)

(w/ trang)