CaitVD

Learning about archetypes across dreams and myths across cultures is so so interesting. Jung is a master of showing us how interconnected we all are, whether we want to acknowledge it or not.

This was an incredible deep dive into the world of black metal in the 90s, but it took me a long time to get through because it was both troubling (the murder, crime, racism, and complete detachment of it all) and intensely frustrating (largely a group of people who have some elevated intelligence but lack the larger context and feel superior to all that do not think like they do). As someone who listened to some of this music in the 90s but without the kind of connection to the news we have now, I had NO IDEA how insane all of this was, I only heard rumors of church burnings. If you have a stomach for true crime (I no longer do) and maybe have an interest in fringe groups and/or unconventional music, you may enjoy this. As most of these interviews and information was compiled in the late 90s, I only wish there was a follow up to this book in current day.

This is a short read, but denser than I even know as I do not have first hand familiarity with Amparo Davila’s work (if i could read this for the first time again, i would read her short stories first). I definitely advise, if you are reading the English translation, that you read both the Afterword and Translator’s Note as they offer more context if you did not research prior to or throughout the reading. The atmosphere she creates and the absolutely perfection of surreality, yet logic within it, is striking. I wish this was longer so that I could stay in her world, but luckily she has more books I have yet to read.

This one.. surprised me. It’s a slow, deliberate, pained account of a woman who has only known neglect and abandonment, full of dissociative absences and silences. The pace of the book and the immersive nature of the writing made this a difficult read for me. I felt an uncontrollable transformation to existing inside of San, the protagonist, each time I picked up this book. It was painful and it was beautiful, just like San.

The author has been a music journalist for 40 years and was in the thick of the scene, I expected a lot of this book and it delivered. A pleasant surprise that it was not limited to only the US and UK, as so much punk content tends to be. This was decades of female artists (cis and trans, also including transmen because history and present are sometimes different) are included, some widely celebrated and some hardly known at all, one suppressed by an authoritative culture, all celebrated and elevated for their part in a necessary and beautiful and messy movement based (usually) in progress and truth. Oh! And the PLAYLISTS she includes!! Wonderful!

I’ve read a lot social science books focused on race and I almost didn’t read this thinking it would be more of the same. In some ways it was (in a boiled down kind of way), in many ways it was not. This has been illuminating to get a statistical exploration fleshed out in a comprehensive way, calling on multiple sources and studies, that is also new in the way it’s presented. The wide context with which all of the statistics and information were considered without forgetting to point out the shortcomings or inability to explain fully with the findings presented.. this is the kind of content I could eat up all day every day.

The first 3/4 of this book were really, really great. Really deep dives into the world and the characters and who they and their struggles are. The last bit felt very different because it was much more chaotic and fast paced than the rest of the book. All of the reflections had a different feel to them because of where we were at in the story and where the character was at in life. Ultimately, I thought this was a great witch/dystopian/social commentary mash up of a book!