Self-Proclaimed is a story of addictions and drug abuse and opening oneself up to the rest of the population. Ollie Magnum represents more than just a character in Self-Proclaimed. He's a human being unable to feel a connection with anyone, even the woman he's married to. The more he tries to communicate with his old friends, the more he resents his past and the more he destroys himself.

An inspiring, revelatory exploration of the genesis and impact of the fabled Elephant 6 collective and the baffling exodus of its larger-than-life luminary, Neutral Milk Hotel frontman Jeff Mangum Years after its release, Neutral Milk Hotel’s In the Aeroplane Over the Sea remains one of the most beloved and best-selling albums in all of indie music, hailed as a classic so influential as to be almost synonymous with the ongoing vinyl revival. But despite its outsized impact, a question looms even larger: why did frontman Jeff Mangum, just as the record propelled him to the brink of music superstardom, choose instead to disappear entirely? The mystery has perplexed listeners for decades—until now. In barely two years, Neutral Milk Hotel rose from house show obscurity in Athens, Georgia, to widespread hype and critical acclaim, selling out rock clubs across the country and gracing the tops of numerous year-end best-of lists. But just as his band was reaching the escape velocity necessary to ascend from indie rock success to mainstream superstar, Mangum hit the eject button. After the 1998 release of Aeroplane and a worldwide tour to support it, Mangum stopped playing shows, releasing new music, or even doing interviews. He never explained why, not even to his friends or colleagues, but thanks to both the strength of Aeroplane and his vexing decision to walk away from rock stardom, Neutral Milk Hotel’s impact only grew from there. In Endless Endless, Adam Clair finds the answer to indie rock’s biggest mystery, which turns out to be much more complicated and fascinating than the myths or popular speculation would have you believe. To understand Mangum and Neutral Milk Hotel and Aeroplane requires a deep dive into the unconventional inner workings of the mercurial collective from which they emerged, the legendary Elephant 6 Recording Company. Endless Endless details the rise and fall of this radical music scene, the lives and relationships of the artists involved and the colossal influence that still radiates from it, centered around the collective’s accidental figurehead, one of the most idolized and misunderstood artists in the world, presenting Mangum and his collaborators in vividly human detail and shining a light into the secret world of these extraordinary and aggressively bizarre artists. Endless Endless offers unprecedented access to this notoriously mysterious collective, featuring more than 100 new interviews and dozens of forgotten old ones, along with never-before-seen photos, answering questions that have persisted for decades while also provoking new ones. In this deeply researched account, Endless Endless examines not just how the Elephant 6 came to be so much more than the sum of its parts, but how community can foster art—and how art can build community.

"Hide your phone, stop hustling for a second, and read this passionate argument for the importance of unstructured pre-digital hang." —People Loneliness is an epidemic; it feels harder than ever to connect with others meaningfully. What can we do to remedy this? Sheila Liming has the answer: we need to hang out more. With the introduction of AI and constant Zoom meetings, our lives have become more fractured, digital and chaotic. Hanging Out: The Radical Power of Killing Time shows us what we have lost to the frenetic pace of digital life and how to get it back. Combining personal narrative with pungent analyses of books, movies, and TV shows, Sheila Liming shows us how the new social landscape deadens our connections with others — connections that are vital to both self-care and to a vibrant community. Whether drinking with strangers in a distant city or jamming with musician friends in an abandoned Pittsburgh row house, Liming demonstrates that unstructured social time is the key to a freer, happier sense of self. Hanging Out shows how simple acts of casual connection are the glue that binds us together, and how community is the antidote to the disconnection and isolation that dominates contemporary life. "The book conceives of hanging out as a way to reclaim time as something other than a raw ingredient to be converted into productivity." —New York Times “Rich with illuminating stories.” —Slate "We could all use more of that blissfully unstructured social time, posits Sheila Liming in the well-considered series of arguments found in Hanging Out." —Reader's Digest "Opens with a simple and expansive account of what hanging out is … Liming dedicates much of the book to stories from her past. She has lived an interesting life, and she tells these stories well.” —Washington Post "Sharp and vivid writing … a layered exploration of social dynamics that contains some textured literary criticism.” —Bookforum "More books about hanging out, less about productivity please. Sheila Liming sees the gap in our thinking about time, and the true worth in spending it in an unstructured fashion with members of our community.” —LitHub

Arranged chronologically from 1950 to the present, this accessible work explores the theological themes in 101 well-established figures and trends from film, television, video games, music, sports, art, fashion, and literature.

The unforgettable story of one woman who leaves behind her hardscrabble childhood in Alaska to travel the country via freight train—a beautiful memoir about forgiveness, self-discovery, and the redemptive power of nature, perfect for fans of Wild or Educated. “An urgent read. A courageous life. Quinn’s story burns through us and bleeds beauty on every page.”—Noé Álvarez, author of Spirit Run: A 6,000-Mile Marathon Through North America’s Stolen Land After a childhood marked by neglect, poverty, and periods of homelessness, with a mother who believed herself to be the reincarnation of the Virgin Mary, Carrot Quinn moved out on her own. She found a sense of belonging among straight-edge anarchists who taught her how to traverse the country by freight trains, sleep in fields under the stars, and feed herself by foraging in dumpsters. Her new life was one of thrilling adventure and freedom, but still she was haunted by the ghosts of her lonely and traumatic childhood. The Sunset Route is a powerful and brazenly honest adventure memoir set in the unseen corners of the United States—in the Alaskan cold, on trains rattling through forests and deserts, as well as in low-income apartments and crowded punk houses—following a remarkable protagonist who has witnessed more tragedy than she thought she could ever endure and who must learn to heal her own heart. Ultimately, it is a meditation on the natural world as a spiritual anchor, and on the ways that forgiveness can set us free.

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