““A sombrero fell out of the sky and landed on the main street of town in front of the mayor, his cousin, and a person out of work. The day was scrubbed clean by the desert air. The sky was blue. It was the blue of human eyes, waiting for something to happen. There was no reason for a sombrero to fall out of the sky. No airplane or helicopter was passing overhead and it was not a religious holiday.””
Sombrero Fallout is a novel of genius by the American author, Richard Brautigan. He’s the best writer you’ve never read, so it seemed fitting to name the site after him.
Here you can get hold of Ian Deeker Forth’s podcasts and read a short blog on any episode you like. Each one develops an hour of music around a central theme, punctuated by some ruminative mansplaining, which may even be of interest.
The aim is to play some music I know you’ll like, some music I think you’ll like, and some music I think you may like. The themes are many and various - female post punk icons, the legacy of Kraftwerk, a city themed episode, and so on. Maybe in time listeners can nominate a theme themselves.
At some point you’ll also be able to get hold of my novels here, as well. One of them's pretty good, so I'll start with that. In fact there are only two, and the other one is distinctly ho hum.
The site is dedicated to my friend Andy Bell (1963-2017), who, like Richard Brautigan, died alone in America, but who also vastly enriched the lives of everyone who knew him.
““I will be very careful the next time I fall in love, she told herself. Also, she had made a promise to herself that she intended on keeping. She was never going to go out with another writer: no matter how charming, sensitive, inventive or fun they could be. They weren’t worth it in the long run. They were emotionally too expensive and the upkeep was complicated. They were like having a vacuum cleaner around the house that broke all the time and only Einstein could fix it. She wanted her next lover to be a broom.”
”