1 Sean Lennon
A Good Year?
Issue #30
We asked various artists to talk about their favorite music, films, and life experiences of 2006. We also asked them to reveal what they’re looking forward to in 2007.
By Sheba White & Amy Schroeder
Published: December 1st, 2006 | 9:09am
SEAN LENNON
I’m a real fan of Blonde Redhead. I think they’re really beautiful artists. … Man, sometimes I feel like an old curmudgeon because I’m going out and watching Goddard movies when they’re still playing at the Film Forum. That’s what blows my mind — the old stuff, even if I’ve seen it before. I’m definitely a fan of re-watching the master works, like Felleni, and listening to the Beach Boys over and over. But in terms of new stuff, I guess I’m relatively unhip, although there’s a band called Deerhoof that I really dug at Coachella.
COLIN MELOY
Front man of the Decemberists
Arthur & George by Julian Barnes really knocked my socks off, as did Elise Blackwell's Hunger, though the latter actually came out a few years ago. I also read a book called Hotel California that detailed the lives and loves of the Laurel Canyon crowd in the ’60s and ’70s but immediately had to heave out Pevear and Volokhonsky's translation of Tolstoy's Anna Karenina to serve penance for such an (enjoyably) trashy read.
As for albums, Neko Case's Fox Confessor Brings the Flood has rarely left my CD player/car stereo/record player/iTunes playlist, as have My Brightest Diamond's Bring Me the Workhorse and Lily Allen's Alright Still. I adore Espers' record, II, and I must shout the praises of Joanna Newsom's knock-down, drag-out gorgeous record, Ys. However, I must concede that the first four to six months of 2006 belonged wholly to Anne Briggs for me, particularly her self-titled debut record. Ye gods! What a voice!
As for films: I have to say, being a new dad, I didn't really get out to the movie theaters much this year, but I saw Wordplay and loved it. By and large, my movie-going experiences have happened at home, watching DVDs. My babymama Carson and I have a certain penchant for renting those fantastic new HBO TV series and slowly trudging through them week after week. Recently it's been Rome, which I love and which is trashy. I imagine I'll be watching a lot of Mike Leigh movies as penance.
As for what I’ll remember most about 2006, oh jeez, that's an easy one: the birth of my son, Henry, February 24. The very coolest thing that's ever happened to me.
SOOK-YIN
actress & director
Favorite band: The Gossip. There's nothing I love more than a girl with pipes who tells it like it is. When you've got a combination of talent, attitude, and style, you're onto something big and they've got all those things in spades!
My favorite fashion designer this year is Gareth Pugh. His clothes are over-the-top freak wear, and I love them.
If you want to read a good book, try Tom Spanbauer's Now Is the Hour. It's a beautiful, romantic coming-of-age story that deals with how hateful religion can make people — not that anyone with a brain doesn't know that already.
2006 was a big year for me. I finished my MA, starred in Kiki and Herb Alive on Broadway — which I co-wrote and directed with my collaborator Kenny Mellman — and I have a featured role in John Cameron Mitchell's Shortbus. But I think the thing I'll remember most is the fun I had hanging out with the Shortbus cast in Cannes. It was our first time, so we just ran around getting drunk on champagne and eating the free food because none of us had any money.
As for 2007, I’m looking forward to resting and falling in love.
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