Stuff To Buy: Words & Music

This just came in over the transom! The fabulous Jilly Dybka has decided to self-pub a collection, Trouble and Honey, through Lulu.com. You can download the PDF version for FREE or purchase a copy for just $7.77! Now that's a bargain. Great blurbs from Major Jackson and Rebecca Loudon and Jilly has a manifesto about why she decided to get out of the cycle of contest abuse at her blog, Poetry Hut. I applaud Jilly for taking this step. The taint of "self-publishing" continues to disappear as great poets give the middle finger to the system and take control of their work and how it's presented to readers.

Like Kate Bush, Portishead shall not be rushed. The UK band took 11 years to make this new album, Third, and it was worth the wait. The trip-hop pioneers have eschewed the genre they created and have gone for a more stripped, industrial sound, but Beth Gibbon's ethereal voice still floats over the proceedings like a torch singer trapped in a well. Here's the link to Machine Gun, and leave it to them to pick the most difficult track to be the first single.

Dusty Springfield meets Lulu on Welsh singer/songwriter Duffy's debut album, Rockferry. The songs and arrangements could have easily been released in 1965, but there's a decidedly modern mood to the lyrics. This will have you up and dancing, then mooning over your lost love. Yeah, baby, yeah. Watch the Rockferry video at this link.

Cecilia Woloch's new chapbook, Narcissus, is now available to purchase. It won the Tupelo Press Snowbound Series Chapbook Award. Love and longing from LA to Paris weave there way through these brilliant poems. You can get a sample in the new issue of Limp Wrist. 

Barbara Jane Reyes follows up her bestselling and award-winning collection Poeta en San Francisco with this limited edition chapbook, Cherry, available for order now at Portable Press at Yo-Yo Labs. BJR is one of the finest poets writing today. Don't miss this. 

And you can also pre-order Jenni Russell's new chapbook, Strip, from Finishing Line Press. And while you're there, buy mine, too, if you haven't already. Support your fellow bloggers and the press. Pleaseandthankyou.