A review in tabs—excerpts I found noteworthy in Carson Mell‘s—who as far as I can tell is a young independent writer—writing about Bobby Bird, “a classic rock star who’s been producing rock albums of greatly varying quality since the early 60s”, 2006 (second edition 2008; ordered directly from Mell and his apartment in LA).
Page 7
“But here I was, the kids at school loving my songs, the adults disturbed by them, and that’s all I needed to keep going. That’s all I needed to make a start.”
Page 13
“And like when you look at any one thing too long, it turns inward and you end up looking at yourself, learning something about yourself.”
Page 16
“‘Cynics make the mistake of assuming everyone else shares their faults,’ and ‘Only being strong allows you the privilege of being kind,’”.
Page 33
“Me, I don’t think there’s anything worse on this planet than someone with a bigger brain than their personality…”
Page 61
“See, I’m telling you all this not as an excuse, but as a warning. You think you’re above becoming an asshole? Then you’re the same kind of guy who thinks he can smoke without becoming addicted, and you’re the most prone to become an addict.”
Page 86
“The same way when you break up with a girl you say, ‘Dear God, I hope she gets over me,’ when deep down you know you want to break that heart a little bit, put a good crack in it at the very least.”
Page 100
“Then she told me that she’d always hated her birthmark too, but that when she was eighteen she’d gotten completely naked before her mother’s vanity to try and give herself an honest appraisal. It was then that she realized it was beautiful. ‘It was like somebody flipped a switch,’ she told me. And when the thing that had held her back for so long suddenly became a source of pride, an unstoppable and completely unique accessory unmatched by a thousand shimmering handbags and a million stupid diamond necklaces, things changed for her. A diamond, next to a real woman’s smile, may as well be a chunk of turd.”
Page 149
“I’m all covered in tattoos, everyone knows that. Back when I was an asshole I wrote my whole history on my flesh. A bunch of names and cartoons all over me. I look like a Formula One race car sponsored by nonsense.”
Bonus: For a limited time on YouTube’s featured artists, Mell’s short film and extended backstory to Bobby Bird, Chonto.
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