Marvelous Music: Lisa Papineau

We have Lisa Papineau to thank for one of the magical songs from the film Pina, you can hear it in this post. But she's done more of course!

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Both her voice and her music are very peculiar, but in a (at least I think so) good way! She doesn't seem to feel any pressure as to how her music should sound. She pretty much created her own genre, because I wouldn't have a clue where else she'd fit. Even her videos are unlike anything I had ever seen before.

She's also part of a group called Big Sir, which seems to be a tad bit louder and more electronical than the things she does by herself, but it's still very Papineau-y.

Hope you liked it!

the Order of Odd-Fish

I'll admit I bought "the order of Odd-Fish" because the cover was pretty. I often judge a book by its cover and I'm often right, so I took the plunge and ended up in the most bizarre world I'd ever been in. Now I read a lot of Murakami so you can't say I'm not used to the bizarre, but this really was truly bizarre. Think talking cockroaches, crazy villains, silver kittens of deceit and knights that devote themselves to useless tasks.

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The first 50 pages intrigued me, the next 50 pages had put me off a bit, but after that I was hooked! I was suddenly completely emerged in the world James Kennedy had created and was really anxious to find out what would happen to Jo and the story in general.

I don't really want to get into the entire story here, but the bottomline is: Jo lives with her aunt Lily in California. Lily is a bit of an eccentric, but all is fine until in comes Sefino the talking cockroach and a few other characters. Before you know it they're chased by villains such as the Belgian Prankster, all the way to Eldritch city where all the Odd-Fish reside.

The problem is that Jo has the ability to destroy the entire world. She has to keep this knowledge to herself as everyone in the city would probably want to kill her for it. Everything is, of course, very new and strange to her too and she'll have to work hard to understand as well as survive this adventure.

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It's a very fun read once you get to the point where you can surrender to the bizarre and just take it as it comes. Despite everything being very strange it's somehow very human too. The characters are lovely and you feel like you really get to know them.

If you are into realistic novels this book probably isn't for you. But if you like weird stuff you are in for a real treat!

Also, there will be a sequel! But this book is great by itself too. There are definitely characters that can be followed further than we have now, but there aren't any cliffhangers either. So you don't have to read the sequel if you read this one, but I think I will.

Pretty Paintings

This is one of my latest finds in the art department and I have to say I'm very excited about it. Alex Gross' art is a combination of Mark Ryden and Frida Kahlo's work with a bit of Isabel Samaras mixed in.

Apart from the bizarre scenes, what I noticed first was his use of color. When I paint I often stay away from primary colors and use similar colors to these works instead. I love how, even though a lot of his paintings seem to be a bit sepia-toned, the colors are still so vibrant.

The skulls and flowers and positions of the models are a lot like Frida Kahlo's paintings.

(He even included an owl!)

But the landscape, symbols and composition reminded me more of Mark Ryden.

You know how much I love creepy and cute, but the same often goes for bizarre and beautiful. And this certainly does!

(Wouldn't this make a perfect cover for a Murakami book?)

I'd love to know the ideas behind every work, because it seems like there's a lot of thought behind it. It is all so very intriguing, I can't wait to find out more about it.