The New Book is Out!

Kathi Georges' "Slow Dance at 120 Beats a Minute" (©2007, Three Rooms Press; 4.25" x 11", 24 pages, $10) is finally published! These books will go FAST, and will definitely be a collector's item, so if you want to be sure to get one, please email threeroomspress@mac.com and we'll save a copy for you.

The official book release party is June 8, 6 p.m. at Cornelia Street.

The unofficial book release party is TONIGHT! Why waste time? If you happen to be in the neighborhood, come to MeKong at King Street and 6th Avenue, just South of Houston, where we'll start the celebration at 5:30, immediately following the weekly Friday poetry group (varying locations, 4ish-6ish every Friday; this week: Amherst's own Madame de Sade, Emily Dickinson).

Here's what NY novelist/poet Susan Scutti has to say about Slow Dance:

The characters on Kathi Georges' dance floor spin and twist with lifelike spontaneity, abandon... Each of her poems speeds down the page yet leaves grooves that remain in your heart. Who isn’t familiar with these dancers, these dances? Isn’t her voice an upbeat, downbeat echo of your own?

Check out Scutti's excellent feminist suspense thriller, Second Generation which is available in print from Amazon and as a pdf download at Ebookmall. What a world!

You can't imagine how gorgeous Slow Dance looks, with our new high-quality printing esthetics! The poetry within explodes with all the energy of a new Big Bang. We're working on getting this available for purchase through PayPal--probably next week. Stay tuned, but if you want to acquire a first edition for yourself, send that email right away!

Wave Books Reading

Wave Books is a Seattle/New York based publishing company with beautifully-designed books featuring a stable of noteworthy cutting-edge poets. Last night, 3 poets from the imprint were featured in a reading at New School.

Funny, but the line between so-called "academic" work and "coffee-house" poetics is certainly become increasingly blurred, probably for the best. The three readers--Christian Hawkey, Matthew Rohrer and Eileen Myles--are all college-level poetry teachers. Hawkey's work most simulates and academic edge, with an metaphysical bent ("Even the walls are illusions;" "Close the eyes before looking a dream in the face"). His juxtaposition of oddball imagery with concrete knowns is interesting, and reminds me a bit of San Francisco poet Tom Stolmar. Rorher is an illusionist: writing seeming love poems to some domestic housefrau/sex object, when underneath it all (in my mind, at least), he seems to be addressing his muse. Myles is the Patti Smith of the bunch (and former St. Mark's Poetry Project director), with humorous poems that seem to lack humility, until you realize that everything she's laughing about is her way of showing the beauty of the horror (i.e., 9/11, friends dying of AIDS, being a lesbian from a conservative family).

Glad to know that Wave is publishing such a wide range of poetic styles. All I wonder now is: Do all their poets need to be college professors, or do all poets eventually become college professors?

Happy Birthday again the wonderfully inspiring Karen H!!

A Scorching Show! Iggy & the Stooges at United Palace Theater, NYC

Okay, I know I boasted that Iggy Pop was one of the greatest living live performers, but every time I see the man, it reminds me how right I am!

The absolutely gorgeous United Palace Theater, full of gold leaf sculpted plaster walls, intricate towering ceilings and velvet cushioned seats has been the home to Reverend Ike for the past 30 years, with lots of revival meeting "Hallelujah's" and "Praise the Lord's." But, the Reverend himself is quoted on the walls, "Don't trust anyone's opinion but your own," so--in a way--Iggy & the Stooges was a natural act to fill that gilded hall.

The crowd dribbled in, barely 1/4 made it to their seats in time to hear unannounced opening act, all female S.F. Bay Area power trio Sistas in the Pit. Intense at times, at other times looking to crash the dyke disco scene, they were the definition of "uneven." Still the good tunes outweighed the blad, and all-and-all, they were received positively.

By the time the Stooges took the stage at 9:30, nearly all 3,200 seats were full, but once the first note hit, hardly anyone was sitting down for a second. While a 12-song set (plus 5-song double encore) may seem a bit short in the age of 23-song Stones shows, every tune was delivered with such intensity, it was hard to believe no one had a heart attack (especially considering the largely over-30 age range of the crowd).

Following a couple of new songs, Iggy launched into a explosive version of his biggest hit "I Wanna Be Your Dog," crawling on all fours, launching himself off the stage into the crowd. His most popular new hit, the clever ditty, "My Idea of Fun..." (second line: "Is Killing Everyone") rocked the house, and proved clearly that fans had been tuning into the Stooges myspace site, since with minimal radio airplay and increasingly few places to buy offline cds, fans still knew the words (and the songs only been out for 3 weeks!).

A range of older favorites, including intense, extended versions of "TV Eye," "Dirt," "Real Cool Time," "No Fun" and "Funhouse" interspersed with other new songs provided a non-stop electric shock treatment show. Two hundred fans poured onstage for "Real Cool Time," with Iggy, like the genteel host of some Broadway benefit, doing his best to make all of them happy, and keep his low riding, skin-tight jeans on (at least for most of the show).

The four-song first encore opened with the classic "1969" and ended with what is sure to become a new classic, the brand new rocker, "I'm Fried" (which on the album, includes a 3-sax solo!!!). The final encore, with Iggy looking like he truly was finally "fried" included only "Little Electric Chair" of 2003's underrated gem Skull Ring.

The only other performer to really ever compare to Iggy is one of his favorites, Jim Morrison. He exudes sex, passion, energy, and the willingness to share in a mutual submission to a greater (raw) power. He is rock's ultimate showman--neither master nor slave, neither victim nor hero. His live shows are transformational, and perhaps that's the best reason of all that the venue he chose for his one-night-only NYC show was a church. Amen.

Moving Forward with Better, Brighter Books this summer

Three Rooms Press is on the move with 2 new books due out this month (Slow Dance at 120 Beats a Minute, and Punk Rock Journal by Kathi Georges), as well as mid-summer publication of a collected poems by Peter Carlaftes, including those previously published in his books Bar Essentials, Sheer Bardom, Nightclub Confidential and Barstool Backslide; and late-summer publication of Splinters, which features poetry by Karen Hildebrand and artwork by William Wareham. Thes e last two books represents our move into "legitimate" books, perfect bound with bright, shiny covers and (gasp!) ISPN numbers. More than this, these books are HOT! with incredible work by
some of the today's best American writers.

The book release party for Slow Dance and Punk Rock Journal will be held at Cornelia Street Cafe in New York City on June 8, 2007, at 6 pm. For those of you who are not in NYC, we will be having a special, almost-live PODCAST of Ms. Georges reading poems from her new book so you can join in the exciting event remotely!

Keep checking for more news at your favorite blog, ThreeRoomsPres.blogspot.com

Debut book of 96-year-old Brit is best seller

It's tough--but not impossible!--to pubish your first book at age 96. So for those of you who keep asking when Three Rooms Press' next poetry book, Slow Dance at 120 Beats a Minute will be released, remember: There's still time! Actually, it will DEFINITELY be coming out on Friday the 13th of April (and will be quickly followed up by a second poetry book, Punk Rock Journal by the same author, Kathi Georges, at the end of April).

If you are a poet, we invite you to contact Three Rooms Press through this blog to discuss publication of your own work. Whether you're 96 or 9+6, your work matters and should be seen by the world--during your lifetime. As a fellow publisher once told me, generating interest in posthumously-published poetry collections is about as easy as getting a kid with a cellphone to stop texting his friends. Unless you're Emily Dickinson, it just doesn't happen.

So stay alive and keep writing!

Juxtaposition

Easter is here again: the time of resurrection. In honor of the concept, I'm resurrecting my love for live music by going to see two of my favorite rock muscians of all time this month: Iggy Pop (Iggy and the Stooges) and Patti Smith. While Ms. Smith was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame this year, her predecessor -- and, certainly one of the most influential voices of the genre -- has been rejected yet again. Not that awards are necessarily important, but as long as you're honoring the greatest of a particular field, you may as well do it properly.

Here are some compelling reasons to give this man his due:

1. I&TS's "I Wanna Be Your Dog" is widely accredited as the first punk song ever (some contend it remains the best punk song ever.

2. Iggy is himself a model of resurrection, rising from the drug & alcohol infused gutter of rock stardom into which he descended, to acheive new artistic success with the help of David Bowie on 1976's "The Idiot."

3. Iggy continues to create with a new no-holds-barred album at least every three years. Lyrically, he continues to take on the pillars of society including TV, moronic group thought, politics, organized religion and American denial of the normalcy of aging and death.

4. As a live performer, no one tops Iggy. Though Patti Smith, live, is close to being an equal.

Spoken like an obsessed fan, you say? Hell, yes!--and proud to be!

The strangest thing about his upcoming show on Monday is that it will be held at the United Palace theater, at 175th and Broadway. It opened in 1930 as the elegant Wonder Theater and featured vaudeville and movies, then was purchased in 1969 by the Christ Community United Church (which still owns it). This is not a place that normally features rock concerts (or anything close). Hence, the juxtaposition of Iggy and the Stooges in this amazing venue should be interesting in itself. I'll let you know...

(photo courtesy United Palace Theater website)

(photo of Iggy performing in August 2004 at Little Steven's Underground Garage Rock Festival at Randall's Island, by Shelly Riff, courtesy of Richard and the Young Lions website)

Yankees Opening Day was great!

Baseball is back! No sport is more poetic! As usual, Three Rooms Press was on the job, checking out opening day of the Yankees on Monday, April 2nd. The injury-prone Carl Pavano--we call him Mr. Opening Day! took the mound, gave up a hit, then settled down and served up a stable, if not flawless performance through 4-1/3 innings. And the rest of the team came through, though 3 errors is a bit unpleasant considering the caliber of this team.

The field looked beautiful, and overall the Yankees were awesome. Check out more photos at the Yankees Opening Day website.