Scenester Pick of the Day: Marijuana Deathsquads at Replay / Pretentious Literary Pick of the Week: Houellebecq's The Map and the Territory

Readers, chances are you are probably reading this at Dempsey's right now while sipping the much-anticipated second batch of Boulevard's annual Chocolate Ale. Most likely you'll be passed out in a stupor by mid-afternoon, but if you're up and around again by midnight consider taking in Marijuana Deathsquads at the Replay. There's a dude from Gayngs in it, apparently.

Here's the description from their record label : "Marijuana Deathsquads are comprised of multiple drummers, a slew of electronic instruments, and highly effected vocals, their live shows are a violent onslaught of improvised electronic-hardcore."

And Daytrotter says the band will "make you feel as if you've just been bit by a psychedelic rattlesnake." Is that good or bad?

Also, they have a song called "Ewok Sadness."

Larryville's Swanson is slated to open the show.




















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France's literary bad boy Michel Houellebecq has a new novel out that's getting high praise. The NY-Times says The Map and the Territory is "a weird air plant of a book." Is that high praise?

And James Wood in the New Yorker explains the author's work:

"Houellebecq has become famous both for the pornographic fervor of his writing and for the theorizing he likes to do around his sex scenes. Essentially, he argues that contemporary sexuality, though it sails under the colors of liberation and left-ish utopia, is just a continuation of the capitalist, neoliberal market, in which there are always winners and losers."

Chip: "I lost my boner at the word 'theorizing.'"

We're sold on the fact that the novel contains a character named Houellebecq and "devotes a page and a half to a close reading of the instruction manual for Jed’s Samsung ZRT-AV2 camera." Perhaps you'll see it in the hands of PBR Book Club members later this year.