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Category: readings
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Mike Edison Brings Music & Mayhem to Quimby's for You Are a Complete Disappointment 6/3
Author, musician, and raconteur Mike Edison brings his unique blend of mayhem to Quimby’s to read and perform from his new book You Are a Complete Disappointment: A Triumphant Memoir of Failed Expectations. Joining him will be “World’s Greatest Piano Player” Mickey Finn, and his own Rocket Tone Theremin!
For anyone who has ever suffered from parental bullying, this often-hilarious yet intensely heartbreaking memoir from the former High Times publisher will provide both solace and laughter.
YOU ARE A COMPLETE DISAPPOINTMENT is a warped suburban odyssey that pulls no punches when it comes to the adversity and adventures of growing up in the 1970s. His story is a potent, positive lesson in growing up to be the person you want to be, not the person you were told to be.
SUBURBAN DYSFUNCTION! THRILLS! FREE ATOMIC FIREBALLS!!
An excerpt is available here:
http://www.largeheartedboy.com/blog/archive/2016/04/excerpt_mike_ed.html
“Smart, filthy, and funny, Mike Edison is no ordinary author… Edison brings the stories from his book to life with the performance chops of a seasoned rock’n’roller.” — Spin Magazine
The COMPLETELY DISAPPOINTING AFTER PARTY will be at Dimo’s Pizza. Edison and Finn will perform a very special set of dirty blues and stories featuring very special guests and lots of surprises. MIKE EDISON DIRTY PIZZA – named after Edison’s book Dirty! Dirty! Dirty! — will be on the menu.
MIKE EDISON is the former editor and publisher of High Times magazine. His books include the celebrated memoir I Have Fun Everywhere I Go, the sprawling social history of sex on the newsstand, Dirty! Dirty! Dirty! and the deliciously filthy political satire Bye, Bye, Miss American Pie. More recently he collaborated with Joe Bastianich on his New York Times bestselling memoir, Restaurant Man, of which writer Bret Easton Ellis has said, “The directness and energy have a cinematic rush . . . not a single boring sentence.”
Edison has worked as a foreign correspondent for Hustler and was a high-paid gun-for-hire of the legendary Penthouse letters. He has contributed to numerous magazines and websites, including Huffington Post, the Daily Beast, the New York Observer, Spin, Interview, and New York Press, for which he covered classical music and professional wrestling. In addition, he is an internationally known musician and ferociously dedicated storyteller, and can be heard every Sunday on his show Arts & Seizures on the Heritage Radio Network. Edison lives and works in Brooklyn.
Invite your friends! Here’s the Facebook invite: https://www.facebook.com/events/1020491838032105/
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Quimby's Welcomes The Pirate Book launch: Nicolas Maigret & Maria Roszkowska 3/24
The Pirate Book offers a broad view on media piracy as well as a variety of comparative perspectives on recent issues and historical facts regarding piracy. It contains a compilation of texts on grassroots situations whose stories describe strategies developed to share, distribute and experience cultural content outside of the confines of local economies, politics or laws. These stories recount the experiences of individuals from India, Cuba, Brazil, Mexico, Mali and China. The book is structured in four parts and begins with a collection of stories on piracy dating back to the invention of the printing press and expanding to broader issues (historical and modern antipiracy technologies, geographically specific issues, as well as the rules of the Warez scene, its charters, structure and visual culture…).The Pirate Book, a compilation of stories about sharing, distributing and experiencing cultural contents outside the boundaries of local economies, politics, or laws.
Nicolas Maigret is an artist and curator based in Paris, his works have been presented in international exhibitions and festivals such as Transmediale (Berlin), File (Sao Paulo), Museum of Art and Design (New York), Chaos Communication Congress (Hamburg), China Museum of Digital Arts (Beijing), The Pirate Bay 10th Anniversary (Stockholm). Maria Roszkowska is a Polish graphic designer based in Paris. Between 2010 and 2014 she joined Intégral Ruedi Baur, a cultural graphic design studio in France. In 2013 she designed and coordinated Don’t Brand my public space, a 3 years research on the issue of cities applying branding strategies.
Published by Aksioma – Institute for Contemporary Art, Ljubljana Co-published by Pavillon Vendôme Art Center, Clichy, Kunsthal Aarhus, and Abandon Normal Devices
For more info: thepiratebook.net | http://peripheriques.free.fr | http://printityourself.org
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Josh Cotter Celebrates the Release of Nod Away 2/27
In Josh Cotter’s new book Nod Away (Fantagraphics Books), deep-space transport has been developed to take a small crew to a habitable planet in a nearby system in an attempt to begin colonization/repopulation. The Internet is now telepathic and referred to as the “innernet.” When the hub is revealed to be a human child, Melody McCabe is hired to develop the new nexus on the second International Space Station. The intersection of human psychology and the ethics of progress is examined through a sci-fi graphic novel that takes place in a not-so-far away future, while hitting home with the realities of consequence and consciousness.
“Cotter is pure cartoonist, in the truest sense,” explains Fantagraphics Associate Publisher Eric Reynolds. “He has such an intuitive grip on the language of comics that he makes it look easy, creating these fully realized characters in a fully realized world.”
Cotter garnered international acclaim in 2008 with his original graphic novel Skyscrapers Of The Midwest, released by AdHouse Books. For the past seven years, comics fans and critics alike have been calling out to Cotter for a new book. Nod Away is shaping up to be the most highly anticipated graphic novels of the year. Joshua Cotter lives in rural northwest Missouri with his wife, child, cat, and an astute sense of impending mortality. They keep him making comics.
For more info:
Facebook event post here. Invite your pals!
http://fantagraphics.com/flog/events/chicago-josh-cotter-at-quimbys/
Saturday, February 27th, 7pm – Free Event
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Daniel Makagon Reads From Underground: The Subterranean Culture of DIY Punk Shows With Photographers Patrick Houdek and Craig Kamrath 9/15
In Daniel Makagon’s new book Underground: The Subterranean Culture of DIY Punk Shows (Microcosm), he writes about DIY punk shows in the USA. The book focuses on the development of a DIY punk touring network, the emergence of punk house shows, and the establishment of volunteer-run community punk show spaces. Makagon describes how DIY punk shows provide opportunities for punks to form communities and enact social and economic alternatives to top down mainstream music industry practices. Underground weaves interviews with punk band members and show promoters to flesh out an argument about the reasons why punk shows are at the core of doing DIY.“Daniel Makagon was there, and he’s likely forgotten more about DIY than many of you will ever know.”
-Adam Pfahler, JawbreakerPatrick Houdek has been photographing punk shows for nearly three decades. He founded the P&S Productions cassette compilation label in the 1980s and was involved with early show promotion at Lost Cross house in Carbondale, IL.
Craig Kamrath has been photographing punk bands in the Midwest for the past ten years. He’s documented long-lasting and short-lived show spaces in Chicago as well as some of the most important DIY spaces in the Midwest.
Patrick’s photos and Craig’s photos are featured in Underground.
For more info contact Daniel Makagon: dmakagon(at)depaul(dot)edu
Facebook event post for this event is here.
Tuesday, September 15th, 7pm – Free Event
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AL BURIAN Reading at Quimby’s – Burn Collector 20th Anniversary 8/22
Al Burian, best known as writer/editor of BURN COLLECTOR zine and as a musician with the band MILEMARKER, returns to Quimby’s for a rare North American public appearance. The former Chicagoan and current Berlin ex-pat was a columnist for PUNK PLANET and more recently has contributed to VICE.com. This year marks the twentieth anniversary of BURN COLLECTOR, and Burian will celebrate by presenting a panoply of zines from all eras of his publishing career, including some new publications and mini-comics heretofore unavailable in the USA. Al Burian is known as an engaging, thought-provoking, and fearlessly funny spoken-word performer. This is his only midwestern date!“Dark and smart and weirdly simultaneously heartfelt and cynical and journalistically ambitious, too.” – Wells Tower, Everything Ravaged, Everything Burned
“Burian is one of our generation’s great storytellers, a wily and insightful observer of the human condition.” – Davy Rothbart, Found magazine
Al Burian began self-publishing in the early 1990’s. He has published numerous books in the USA, including Burn Collector: Collected Stories from 1-9 (2000) and Natural Disaster (2007) as well as the novel Sämtliche Niederlagen (2013) in Germany. His writing and comics have been anthologized by PM Press, Microcosm Publishing, Pegacorn Press, Ventil Verlag, and Stickfigure Publishing.
More info: alburian.com
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8/1: Caseen Gaines presents We Don’t Need Roads: The Making of the Back to the Future Trilogy!
Great Scott! Come celebrate the 30th anniversary of Back to the Future along with award-winning author Caseen Gaines. He is returning to Quimby’s Bookstore to discuss and sign copies of his brand-new book, We Don’t Need Roads: The Making of the Back to the Future Trilogy, which has been featured in Vanity Fair, The Hollywood Reporter, People Magazine, Vulture, and positively reviewed by NPR and Library Journal.
We Don’t Need Roads includes original interviews with Zemeckis, Gale, Christopher Lloyd, Lea Thompson, Huey Lewis, and over fifty others who contributed to one of the most popular and profitable film trilogies of all time. It’s the ultimate read for anyone who has ever wanted to ride a hoverboard, hang from the top of a clock tower, travel through the space-time continuum, or find out what really happened to Eric Stoltz after the first six weeks of filming.
Complete with rare and previously unreleased photographs, fans of the timeless can learn all they didn’t know about Back to the Future – by those who caught lightning 30 years ago.
“Caseen Gaines has written a very compelling and enjoyable history of our trilogy. Reading it was like going back in time. And – Great Scott – there were even a few anecdotes that I’d never heard!” – Bob Gale, co-creator, co-producer, and co-writer of the Back to the Future trilogy
“The most enlightening and informative book I’ve read since Grays Sports Almanac. Every true fan of the Holy Trilogy should own a copy. It’s your density.” – Ernest Cline, bestselling author of Ready Player One
Invite your friends with the Facebook post for this event!
For press inquiries, contact Mary Pomponio, mpomponio(at)penguinrandomhouse(dot)com
Saturday, August 1, 2015 at 7:00pm
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Bob Suren reads from Crate Digger: An Obsession with Punk Records 7/17
Crate Digger: An Obsession with Punk Records is a funny, honest and personal memoir of thirty years in the D.I.Y. punk scene. There are stories about touring, recording studios and record stores. There are stories about success, failure, disappointment, self-actualization and heartbreak. There are 60,000+ words, 192 pages and 39 photos. The story takes place over three decades in nine countries on four continents. There are nine deaths, two basset hounds and one love poem. There are special appearances by Jello Biafra, Ron Reyes (possibly), Tesco Vee, Joey Shithead, Cheetah Chrome and one very serious FBI agent."Really brings to life the early days of the American punk scene as it spread slowly across the country, through turntables, fanzines, and word of mouth. His vivid vinyl recollections illustrate how good record stores and adventurous college radio stations were so essential in bringing startling new music into the lives of many previously isolated kids. It follows the trajectory of a kid as his passion for music became all-consuming."
– Jeff Nelson, Minor Threat and Dischord Records
"A fun, easy-to-read, personal narrative of 30 years of living through "Punk Rock" - finding records, going to concerts, making discoveries, and a myriad of other experiences - that help the reader "make sense" of a still-inspiring cultural revolution and breakthrough "philosophy of life" that spawned the current "entrepreneurial culture" (where everybody wants to start their own "start-up"). D-I-Y, indeed..."
-- V. Vale, founder of SEARCH & DESTROY and RE/SEARCH Publications
Bob Suren has written for numerous underground music magazines over the decades such as Maximum Rocknroll, Engine, Seven Inches to Freedom and published his own magazine, Heavy Rotation. Crate Digger is his first book.
For more info: microcosmpublishing.com or surentime(at)gmail(dot)com
Fri, July 17th, 7pm -
CAKE Presents . . . A Conversation with Eleanor Davis, John Porcellino, and Keiler Roberts Moderated by Hillary Chute 6/5
What better way to usher in CAKE weekend than a conversation with three of the most innovative cartoonists working today? If there’s a graphic narratives supergroup—the Emerson, Lake, & Palmer of American indie comics—this is it.Eleanor Davis’s Fantagraphics collection How to Be Happy was just nominated for a 2015 Eisner Award. Keiler Roberts’s series Powdered Milk is a consistently stunning example of why so many of us fell in love with autobiographical comics in the first place. John Porcellino’s The Hospital Suite was one of the most critically acclaimed comics of 2014. With King-Cat Comics and Stories now 25 years old and going stronger than ever, John remains one of the guiding lights of the indie comics scene and for CAKE itself. Hillary Chute, comics scholar extraordinaire, author of Graphic Women: Life Narrative and Contemporary Comics and Outside the Box: Interviews with Contemporary Cartoonists, will moderate this exciting roundtable.
Please join us for a rocking, inspiring kick-off event for CAKE 2015! For more information on this event & on the Chicago Alternative Comics Expo, visit cakechicago.com . CAKE is June 6th-June 7th. Quimby’s is proud to be a co-sponsor.
Click here for the Facebook invite for this event.
Friday, June 5th, 7pm – Free Event!
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Jessica Hopper Reads From The First Collection of Criticism By a Living Female Rock Critic 5/29
Featherproof is proud to announce the publication of legendary rock critic Jessica Hopper’s newest book, The First Collection of Criticism by a Living Female Rock Critic, in Spring 2015.
Jessica Hopper’s music criticism has earned her a reputation as one of the firebrands of the form, a keen observer and fearless critic not just of music, but the culture around it, revealing new truths that often challenge us to consider what it is to be a fan.
With this premiere volume, spanning from her punk fanzine roots to her landmark piece on R. Kelly’s past, The First Collection leaves no doubt why the New York Times has called Hopper’s work “influential.” Not merely a selection of two decades of Hopper’s most engaging, thoughtful and humorous writing, this book serves as a document of the last 20 years of American music making and the shifting landscape of music consumption.
Through this vast range of album reviews, essays, columns, interviews, and oral histories, Hopper chronicles what it is to be truly obsessed with music, the ideas in songs and albums, how fantasies of artists become complicated by real life, and just what happens when you follow that obsession into muddy festival fields, dank basements, corporate offices or court records.
PRAISE FOR THE FIRST COLLECTION OF CRITICISM BY A LIVING FEMALE ROCK CRITIC BY JESSICA HOPPER
“Jessica Hopper’s criticsm is a trenchant and necessary counterpoint not just on music, but on our culture at large.” —Annie Clark, St. Vincent
“In this crucial book, Hopper schools us all on the art of criticism. You’ll be reminded, as I was, why you care to read and write about (and listen to!) music to begin with. Hopper’s relationship with music is a joy to behold.” —Tavi Gevinson, Editor-in-Chief, Rookie
“I read Hopper’s book with a sense of bewildered gratitude. She concedes nothing to the idea that it is dumb to care so much. The excitement in her work is that these things are worth scrapping about.” —Rob Sheffield, author of Love is a Mixtape
About Jessica Hopper:
Jessica Hopper’s music criticism has been included in Best Music Writing 2004, 2005, 2007, 2010 and 2011. Her first book, The Girls Guide to Rocking, was named one of 2009’s Notable Books for Young Readers by the American Library Associa- tion. She is Senior Editor at Pitchfork and the Editor-in-Chief of The Pitchfork Review. She lives in Chicago with her husband and two young sons.
Click here for the Facebook invite for this event.
For press inquiries: Dana Meyerson dana(at)biz3(dot)net
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Josh Simmons Reads From Black River 5/7
Josh Simmons returns with his first full-length graphic novel since 2007’s acclaimed House. A group of women, one man, and two dogs are making their way through a post-apocalyptic world in search of a city that supposedly still has electricity and some sort of civilization. Along the way, they go to a comedy club, take a drug called Gumdrop, and encounter gangs of men who are fools, lunatics, or murderous sadists. In other words, all manner of terrors.
Simmons is one of the field’s most distinctive voices in the genre of horror, (The Furry Trap, House) and this full-length graphic novel is his best work yet – echoing director John Carpenter’s perfect tick-tock pacing, as well as Shirley Jackson’s ability to transcend genre and turn it into literature.
“Josh Simmons has concocted a hellish world in which madwomen roam a post-apocalyptic landscape – but its battlescars are nothing compared to the self-obliterating hell of their own minds. A horrifying, unforgettable vision.”
– Kier-La Janisse (House of Psychotic Women)
Josh Simmons was born in Connecticut in 1977. He is the creator of the graphic novels House, Jessica Farm Volume One, and The Furry Trap. He currently lives in New Haven, CT.
For more info:
http://www.fantagraphics.com/blackriver
Click here to see video of pages from the book.
Facebook event invite for the event.
Thursday, May 7th, 7pm – Free Event
