Hey y’all,

Here are 10 things I thought were worth sharing this week:

1. A little pep talk from Laurie Anderson.
2. I enjoyed Jan Swafford’s new introduction to classical music, Language of the Spirit.
3. I revisited Jason Fried’s post, “Give it five minutes,” after being reminded of it in my advance copy of Alan Jacobs’ How To Think.
4. The Atlantic reprinted Annie Dillard’s classic essay, “Total Eclipse,” also found in her recent collection, The Abundance. Reading it actually made me not want to experience a total eclipse at this particular point in my life. (I already feel darkness rushing towards me. See: Ross Andersen’s terrific piece, “The Eclipse as Dark Omen.”)
5. Sarah Manguso, author of a recent favorite of mine, 300 Arguments, recommends singing in a choir, as does Brian Eno, who says it’s the key to a long life. Here’s Eno, Michael Stipe, and Stephen Colbert singing “Lean on Me.” (Bonus: Douglas Wolk on what makes Brian Eno’s early albums special.)
6. Poem: “To ask the hard question is simple… / But the answer / Is hard and hard to remember.”
7. Worth watching: I Called Him Morgan (streaming on Netflix), a documentary about jazz trumpeter Lee Morgan, his wife, and his untimely death. Here’s video of his trumpet solos and playing with Art Blakey.
8. Ear candy: An online trove of 25,000 digitized 75RPM records.
9. Austin’s new central library (photos here) is finally opening in October and I am pumped.
10. How my son is helping me learn how to learn again.

Thanks for reading! If you like this newsletter, forward it to a friend, buy a book, or tweet me some love.

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xoxo,

Austin

Hey y’all,

Here are 10 things I thought were worth sharing this week:

1. Drawing is part of a cure.
2. RIP writer Denis Johnson. I’ve only read two of his books—Jesus’ Son and Train Dreams—but they were both superb. For a great introduction to his work, I might recommend Tobias Wolff reading his classic short story, “Emergency.” Near and dear to my heart is this essay Johnson wrote about homeschooling his kids, which expresses so much of how I’m feeling these days. (“I tried to raise my own kids to be ignorant savages, but they rebelled and got college degrees.”) Johnson had great influences — he said he considered this part of Walt Whitman’s preface to Leaves of Grass to be “a sort of personal manifesto.” (Influenced heavily by Emerson’s “The Poet.”)
3. 101 books about where and how we live.
4. Last week I mentioned I was trying to learn more about classical music, and y’all sent me a TON of stuff, too much to even check out in a week, but I wanted to share it all here: BBC’s Soul Music, Classical Classroom, Exploring Music with Bill McGlaughlin, Keeping Score, TED talks by Benjamin Zander and Michael Tilson Thomas, and this epic series of Leonard Bernstein lectures. (Listening to his Children’s Classics CD with my kids is what set me off on this quest in the first place.)
5. Flipbooks help prisoners stay connected to their loved ones.
6. Before the president became president, I said it seemed he had discovered the exact recipe for remaining a horrible person forever. Here’s Rebecca Solnit, author of Hope In The Dark, saying it much better than I ever could.
7. A video of Danny Gregory, author of Art Before Breakfast, going through his collection of old diaries.
8. Ear candy: I was very skeptical about the new remix of The Beatles’ Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band, but it sounds awesome. Tomorrow PBS is airing a documentary about the making of the album — here’s a clip about how McCartney crafted “Penny Lane.” For more reading, I’d highly recommend recording engineer Geoff Emerick’s memoir, Here, There, and Everywhere: My Life Recording the Music of The Beatles. (Here’s Emerick on how Paul got that amazing bass sound.)
9. Eye candy: Best Picture winner Moonlight is now streaming.
10. A heartwarming item to end on: cartoonist Jeff Keane drew cartoonist Lynda Barry into her favorite childhood strip, Family Circus.

xoxo,

Austin

Hey y’all,

Here are 10 things I thought were worth sharing this week:

1. Creative work has seasons.
2. My notes on Daniel Pennac’s book on the pleasures of reading, The Rights of the Reader.
3. My notes on Ben Shahn’s classic book about the artist’s education and place in the world, The Shape Of Content.
4. Klaus Voormann on creating the cover for the Beatles’ Revolver… for a whopping 50 pounds.
5. Great resource for fellow parents: my friends at TinyBop have put up their newsletter archives. Don’t miss their recommendations page, either. (Oh, and it’s pretty vulgar [as are we], but my wife and I laughed a lot at Ali Wong’s comedy special she performed while seven months pregnant.)
6. Don Winslow on the secret history of the heroin crisis. (I really want to read his books The Power of the Dog and The Cartel.)
7. Eye candy: it was a bit long, but Mike Leigh’s movie about the painter J.M.W. Turner, Mr. Turner, was gorgeous.
8. Like everyone else in my demographic, I really liked the Netflix show Stranger Things. I especially liked the soundtrack, which was scored by two members of local Austin band S U R V I V E after the show’s creators used their song “Dirge” in the trailer they pitched to Netflix. (Here’s an interview with the composers.) If you like their creepy synth stuff, check out another Austin local, my friend Xander Harris.
9. More ear candy: a new Lambchop song, a new Cass McCombs song, and a mix from the band Deerhoof. (Now where’s that danged Frank Ocean record?)
10. Go for a walk: demons hate fresh air.

Thanks for reading! If you like this newsletter and want to support it, buy a book or a piece of art or just forward this email it to a friend.

xoxo,

Austin

PS. Pieces from my show at Mule Gallery are now for sale online!

Hey y’all,

Back to it! Here are 10 things I thought were worth sharing this week:

1. I traded my marker for an x-acto blade.
2. Blowing my mind: the work of the late Margaret Kilgallen.
3. Some remixed Georgia O’Keeffe paintings.
4. Toru Iwatani shows off his original designs for Pac-Man. (Falls in the venn diagram of two of my interests: famous notebooks and Show Your Work!)
5. E.B. White’s 3 New Yorks.
6. Why “do what you love” is often a fairy tale.
7. The work of art.
8. Lovely paintings of Iceland by Matt Forsythe.
9. From the archives: why you’ve gotta be okay with being bad until you’re good.
10. The amazing Last Bookstore in LA, one of the stops on my fall tour to promote The Steal Like An Artist Journal! (Here are all the dates we have booked so far.)

xoxo,

Austin