To paraphrase and recontextualize an observation by humorist Fran Lebowitz: Journalism is all about discerning between a mere fad and an actual trend. This is especially true of arts journalism, and as for music journalism (the bastard at the family picnic), it's doubly true. Arts criticism and journalism fall into two main categories: the culturally attenuated commentary of high culture, or else breathless fandom/sneering dismissal of glossy magazines. Then there is the smudgy off-radar world of zines, with their misspelled love and hate and obsessions scrawled out. They can be quite good or really bad. They are deeply felt if not always deeply thought. They are communal but sometimes so clannish as to be absurdly funny and hermetically sealed.
All of which leads me to this: My friend Megan Thompson played a great mix CD for me at the beginning of the summer. It turned out to accompany an arts journal called Yeti that combines the fevered fan heat of samizdat zines and the offhand polish of so-called serious criticism, alongside great interviews and essays. The bands, illustrators, artists, and writers included cover the waterfront stylistically, and even more heartening, Yeti doesn't care about mere fads or actual trends, even if the bands and artists included have hipster cachet. The subjects covered aren't necessarily current and Yeti isn't just a cog of the publicity machine, covering bands with new albums to push or authors with new books to flog.
Mike McGonigal is the editor and powerhouse behind Yeti. He talks about books like they are music and about music like it is literature. There's a vernacular style to Yeti's approach that is part geek, part cultural archaeologist, and always engaging. Like a mutt cranny-nosing under the refrigerator, Yeti digs to find more of the things it loves. It's like talking to McGonigal himself, where the conver- sation free-ranges between avant literati such as Lynne Tillman and Gary Indiana to bands such as Iron & Wine and Arkade. McGonigal has been a music journalist and reviewer for years, living in New York and eventually setting up shop in Seattle (besides Yeti he runs the record label Sad Robot). He's been a voracious fan for even longer, and that's the glittering secret behind Yeti.
Yeti's subhead says it all: Enthused Art, Music, Writing & Other Stuff. The second issue's cover is graced with an illustration by Jordan Crane of two women at a bus-stop bench with their eyes cast out of frame to the right, waiting. Inside the bright orange-and-gold cover the piñata breaks open: There is an astute interview with poet Amy Gerstler followed by four of her excellent poems; interviews with comics artist Ben Katchor, artist Kinke Kooi, filmmaker Lodge Kerrigan, illustrator Marcellus Hall, and musicians Laura Cantrell, Aceyalone, Steffan Basho-Junghans, and Richard Thompson; an article on the origins of Alfred Jarry's "Ubu"; Rachel Jackson's photos; an essay on "The Birth of the Blues" by esteemed writer Luc Sante; artwork by Mat Brinkman, Blair Wilson, and Brian Chippendale; and an essay on motorcycles by Rachel Kushner. What brings all these diverse things together is the circus tent of Yeti's passion for art that has the handprints of its makers on it.
The accompanying CD is an extension of that aesthetic. It's full of rare, unreleased tracks, including songs by the Terror Sheets, Pell Mell, the Shins, Califone, the Frames, Iron & Wine covering Stereolab's "Peng 33," Carissa's Wierd, and Death Cab for Cutie covering the Stone Roses' "I Wanna Be Adored." The sensibility is subtle and shifting, reflecting McGonigal's tastes and refined ear. A majority of the music is of the quiet and melancholic variety. There are also rock and experimental flourishes. It's like a truly inspired mix tape by a smart friend who isn't afraid to show a sensitive side.
The CD opens and closes with compositions by Steffen Basho-Junghans that are described as "fucking beautiful" in McGonigal's liner notes. It's a succinct and rocker-like description. And it's also true. That is the sensibility that runs through Yeti: Whip-smart criticism by Sante as well as musicology worthy of Greil Marcus rub shoulders with unbridled enthusiasm, proving that the two, rather than being opposites, are complementary, keeping one another honest. McGonigal isn't afraid to let his peas touch his potatoes.
