867 raymond carver

on cross-medium references

I spent a lot of 2024 sponging; I watched more movies and read more books than in previous years, by a lot. A fair chunk of that number was made up of rereads and rewatches. I probably spent a lot of the time I usually use to make things instead intaking them. I saw a TikTok about how you should always create more than you consume, but I think the worst art is the product of making something when you’ve got nothing to say. Last year, I was all but speechless.

Already this year I feel more sensitive to the outside world, more ready to contribute to it (if it will have me). I’ve also been thinking a lot about my identity as an artist, as opposed to a musician or a writer, and how my various mediums talk to each other. I think (I hope) that my time spent becoming more well-read and well-watched has made me a better songwriter, and my time listening to music has made me a better writer, and so forth. I can’t say exactly how, but I feel like development of well-rounded, cross-medium taste is beneficial to the quality of the art you produce, like drawing energy to increase the brightness of a lightbulb.

In the lead single for her new album, Samia opens with a line about author Raymond Carver. Carver’s most popular work is his book of short stories, What We Talk About When We Talk About Love. I personally love the realist style, the sifting through to separate the profound from the mundane, and I think the reference is incredibly apt in Samia’s music, as she does something very similar with her songs. I like to think that Samia was heavily influenced by Raymond Carver’s tonal ambiguity.

Michelle Zauner, one of my favorite all-around artists working today, recently released a single called “Orlando in Love.” After the music video came out, I was sure that the song is a reference to the title character in Virginia Woolf’s book Orlando, about an Elizabethan nobleman who changes sex and lives for hundreds of years.

Michelle Zauner also told a story while on tour for her book Crying in H-Mart about how when she once met Taylor Swift, she asked her if a line from “invisible string” was a Hemmingway reference. Taylor apparently didn’t answer the question, but the title also potentially references Jane Eyre and the line about the red thread. Regardless of intentionality, the richness of this tradition of metaphor, across generations of writers, speaks to the universality of the sensation it evokes.

I’ve written about how I appreciate when musicians explicitly reference the music that shaped them, like Easter eggs. These literary references are similarly satisfying, indicating that artists are taking influence from the worlds they construct around themselves via media. This year, I want to experience more visual art and determine whether I’m truly tasteless or if I just haven’t seen enough to know what I like. I hope that endeavor shows up in my writing, both here and for Bike Lane.

Let me know what you’re reading and watching, as well as what you’re listening to.