Amoeba, music lover's paradise

Amoeba's logo. Photo: Bloodbuzzed

Now that I've been able to post the pictures of our trip to Southern California it's also time to unveil our several visits to another must-see on L.A.: the Amoeba store. What an incredible place!Who cares about walk of fame's, Hollywood stars, chaotic cities and traffic jams where there's such a paradise awaiting for you?

Heaven, I'm in heaven...
Photo: Bloodbuzzed

So, it's time for a question I always wanted to solve.
What's in my bag?

My bag, "deconstructed"
Photo: Bloodbuzzed

To begin with:
Sleater-Kinney- Dig Me Out & One Beat
Seapony- Falling
Adam Green- Friends of Mine
Dum Dum Girls- End of Daze EP

On happy collector's mode
Photo: Bloodbuzzed

Ex Cops- True Hallucinations
Rose Melberg- Portola
Fanfarlo- Rooms Filled with Light

Plus three collector's gems from personal favourites:
R.E.M. - Up and New Adventures In Hi-Fi special editions
The Divine Comedy- A Secret Story special edition

"West of Rome", the dog of John Fante

West of Rome- John Fante

I know that I will end reading everything published by John Fante and his son Dan. It's just a matter of time. So here's another one. John Fante's "West of Rome" is composed of two novellas, "My Dog Stupid" and "The Orgy". Both are excellent pieces of Fante's prodigious, straightforward, stormy prose, but they don't fit together. The book was a posthumous release, so I guess the idea, from an editorial point of view, was offering something longer (and then more expensive) than just one short book with less than 150 pages. What a sad decision from a literary perspective.  

Because "My Dog Stupid", the first and longer story is a wonderful piece of literature. Urgent, passionate and cathartic as his best novels, but adding an humorous and heart-warming edge that is refreshing and compelling. It is not that age mellowed Fante, the bitterness and drama-fated is there, but the older writer is capable of laughing about himself.

Make no mistake, reading this tale of Fante's new alter-ego Henry Molise battling against his children and sons in laws, the neighbourhood and their big dogs, Hollywood parasites and growing old while he dreams to escape to Rome is like reading another chapter of Arturo Bandini's story. The frustration and anger is intact, but our weary and tired anti-hero is also wiser, ready to look life in the eye, from time to time, and laugh about it. With the help of Stupid, his very peculiar and amusing dog, that is. What an excellent novella. 

With "My Dog Stupid" rating so high, "The Orgy" is quite a let-down by comparison. It is just a short tale that grabs you like a hurricane with a terrific start "His name was Frank Gagliano, and he did not believe in God. He was that most singular...", but never delivers. Only the immediacy of Fante's prose and the inevitable sense of danger along its pages saves it from being a conventional story about the lost of innocence of a kid. 

Anyway, "West of Rome" is a must read thanks to its first novella, where you will find all what makes reading John Fante essential: an uncontrollable passion channelled through words, a unique voice forged by toughness and a hunger for living that is bigger than life itself. Meet the dog of John Fante, you won't regret it. 

SCORE: 7/10

"Chump Change", John & Dan Fante: father to son

Chump Change- Dan Fante

We believe that dying is hard, but dying is not important. What is difficult is to live as everything dies around us.

After making a post about U2 songs that served me as an excuse to go back to some personal favourites from the Irish band, I finished this book. And I can't help thinking how much it reminds me to their tune "Dirty Day" from Zooropa.

"Chump Change" is the first book translated into Spanish of Dan Fante, the son of John Fante, the fantastic American writer, who was completely neglected on his time, long forgotten and surprisingly (thanks to writers like Bukowski who praised his work) recovered and recognized as he deserved only recently. This first book of his son doesn't hide a bit its nature (replacing Fante with Dante): an homage to the lost father, an a gut-wrenching tale of redemption.

Entertainment might be an option for some, but to be called real literature, to me it has to grab you. Literally. I do believe that John Fante would agree with me. And I bet his son does too, 'cause "Chump Change" doesn't need more than a couple of pages to have you diving in the story. From starters, you might want to surface, because what you under the dark waters is freaking scary, but at the same time you know you will keep reading. Even more knowing the story is real.

A big part of the impact of the book resides on how Dan Fante's writes. It could be defined as minimalism, but his prose seems effortless while at the same time is so powerful and clear. Think on his father, or on Bukowski, and you'll be close. Think on the so-called "dirty realism". But on the roughest, merciless version of it. Fante's talent to put into words this monstrous drunk nightmare is mesmerizing. Smell the booze, breath Los Angeles. Or better said, feel his suffocation in L.A.

Yet what makes the book stand-out is the ability of Fante of being compelling despite being so unbelievably raw. "Chump Change" doesn't create an heroic literary alter-ego, but a coward, one that might prefer self-destruction instead of confronting its fears. A very human coward, one that is scared of death, and that is afraid of, and going back to U2's "Dirty Day", "hold onto something so tight/You've already lost it". But time doesn't give second chances. John Dante's time is running out, and Bruno, the son, despite the bitterness, the failure and the disappointment they both shared ("there's no blood thicker than ink"), will have one last opportunity of showing his feelings and start life again. I would only add four more words to this: chapter 17, real emotion. Quoting U2 one last time:

A work that's never done
Father to son

Superb book

SCORE: 8/10