Sun. Jan. 17 

 Gary Jarman, his twin brother Ryan. and their younger brother Ross had been playing as a trio, the Cribs, since 2001. The brothers, all in their 20s, made three albums and were highly regarded as one of England’s top indie-punk. A very self-contained unit, a family business.
    But several years ago, the Cribs finished a US tour, and bassist-singer Gary was back in his adopted hometown, Portland, Ore. He was invited to a barbecue and met this pleasant, slightly older, chap, who was also from the UK..
   “At first it was a little weird,” Jarman says, from his home by phone. “I couldn’t figure out who this guy was, why was another Englishman was there. Then the penny dropped. It was Johnny Marr. He said how much of a fan of the band he was. That would have been enough for me because he was such an influence.”
     Marr, of course, had been the guitarist-songwriter for the Smiths and later Electronic. He was in Portland, playing with Modest Mouse.
      Jarman excitedly called Ryan, the guitarist-singer, and Ross, the drummer, where they still live, in England. Gary became friends with Marr. When the two traveled back to England, they joined the others and played some Cribs concerts. They also began to write together.
   “We wrote 12 songs in one weekend,” Jarman says, “and we had this creative burst. We would find any excuse to play together on a low-key level. Once we had enough songs to make an album, we thought it’d be a shame not to. There was never that moment of ‘Oh, we should make this permanent.’ It was a gradual thing. The fact that it might be a good career move never factored into it.”

Thurs. Jan. 14

   singer-guitarist Joe Pernice decided to write the novel that became “It Feels So Good When I Stop,” he approached it with this premise: “I wanted to purposefully stay away from music, because I didn’t want to be seen as just a musician taking a crack at writing. I wanted it to be a serious book. But then I realized music is such a big part of my life, it’s going to find its way into these characters lives. So, the songs started entering the book.”
    Much as it does in the work of Nick Hornby or George Pelecanos. The struggling characters in Pernice’s Cape Cod-based novel set in the mid-‘90s re constantly referencing songs and artists – from Nick Drake to Del Shannon to Todd Rundgren. Once Pernice committed to including music in the book, he decided to record 10 of those on a companion CD.
   When he performs at the Lizard Lounge Thursday Jan. 14  he’ll read and play music. For the regular set, the music will come from the new CD. For encores, Pernice may draw upon his days with the Scud Mountain Boys, the Pernice Brothers and his solo efforts.

Oh my god ...

The horrors of the world have happened, oh, for many, many centuries. I just saw Eddie Izzard perform and he, comedically, made that point ... and that maybe there was no grand "God" pulling the strings. I'm agnostic, so I'm part of that flock, but I think if there is or was a God, he kicked things into play billions of years ago and said, "Right, it's yours now, whatever you want to do ..." Hence, Hitler, Pol Pot, Stalin, South Korea, Iran, Iraq, Bush I and II, Supreme Court decisions about presidential elections, Colonialism, the Spanish Inquisition, the Crusades ... and so on. Now, we have Pat Robertson, who no one should pay attention to, blaming the devastating earthquake in Haiti on the country's pact with the devil. Yes, that makes sense, just like we called 9/11 on ourselves because of godless homosexuality or whatever the scapegoat for the self-righteous Christian right was then. It doesn't matter. The smug bastards proclaim ... and the media reports it as news! All we can do is urge what our friend (in Facebook and real life) Lili Dennison (former manager of the Del Fuegos, many others) urged: Call Pat's 700 Club number 800-759-0700 and make 'em spend a dollar every time they answer. I talked to a "prayer counselor" or whatever they are called, recently. It's a real hoot to get 'em off script and they open the door to prayer and then you ask them to pray for guidance for Pat to become less hateful and xenophobic and all the rest, but they get flustered and it all dissipates. Still, it's fun and you cost 'em a buck. Do it. (Note: On my second call of the day they referred me to www.cbn.com for a semi-apologia and backtrack. Right. Go to www.youtube.com and see the video for yourself and judge.)  Do it. For a more positive effect, you can contribute through www.clintonfoundation.org/haiti or www.WorldVision.org/HaitiRelief or www.redcross.org.  There's surely a bunch more being set up as I type ... My wife and I, we're rounding up spare clothes to be sent down south ... 

Tues. Jan. 12

 "I was born in a dump/My mama died/My dad got drunk." Surely, you remember those immmortal opening lines to "Tobacco Road," whoever's version rocked your world. For me, it was Edgar Winter's White Trash. John D. Loudermilk wrote it in 1960 and Lou Rawls, the Nashville Teens, Jefferson Airplane, Eric Burden and the Animals, Spooky Tooth, Status Quo and Southern Culture on the Skids have, among others, done it. Why bring up those opening lines now? Well, that sounds like the start 21st century memoir. It seems like drinking factors in every single one of 'em, and then there's the sidecars of parental abuse, drugs and, well, a whole lotta low self-esteem.

Got some of that? Well, maybe you, too, can be a memoirist. In our backyard, the rather self-absorbed late Phoenix writer Caroline Knapp struck gold, as did Augesten Burroughs, Carrie Fisher and (once again) Mary Karr. If you've messed up, don't mind shining a light on that mess and are good with words ... Well, this is a long lead-in to

Tues. Jan. 12 

Listen to British comic Eddie Izzard and you’ll find him riffing Heon Hitler, Stonehenge, the history of the Catholic Church, Pol Pot, attack badgers, as well as a few more current affairs. He’d often start a joke, gleefully veer off course and wander down a side road, ending up, perhaps, at the intended punch line. Truth is, there’s many a punch line, and you never know quite when it’s coming. Izzard, 47, relishes pauses, delays, real or apparent improvisation.
     Izzard – whose “The Big Intimacy Tour: Stripped Too” lands at TD Bank Garden Jan. 12 – has also developed a parallel career as a serious stage, TV and film actor, but remains committed to stand up. And committed to doing in on the grandest scale possible: In arenas. We did an interview with the Boston Phoenix that’s on newstands now or accessible on line at www.thephoenix.com . We thought we’d provide some of the expansive out-takes. A half-hour of Eddie doesn’t 800 words and just about everything he says has entertainment value. Sometimes educational. And, when you get to the end of this, you’ll find, very emotional. There’s also a comprehensive, warts-and-all documentary out called “Believe” which should be available at your finest video stores and is well worth a rental. The TD Banknorth Garden show is 8. Tickets: $75-$45.
 
Your tour is subtitled “Stripped Too,” meaning I gather there’s a lot of material from the first “Stripped” tour. You caught flak from a TV program in England for doing a show that used, gasp, familiar material. 

Yes, that was a curious thing. The program normally dealt with crooked insurance companies and bad vacuum cleaners and I was on it. And the weird thing is, in America or Britain, the variety thing was you got your show together and you did the same show. This was the same in standup. Alternative standup began in 1979, so by 1990 it was still the same. You had 20 minutes and you stand on that 20 minutes. I was one of frontrunners who said “Let’s turn it over more quickly.” So I started doing new shows and now you’ve got to do a new show every time you go out. I just revolve material.