Agent Palmer

Shopping in Jail: Ideas, Essays, and Stories for the Increasingly Real Twenty-First Century by Douglas Coupland is eye-opening. While the writing and delivery is very Coupland, the medium this time is unique.

This collection of essays isn’t random. It all belongs together and reflects where Coupland and we as a human species were when this was published in the fall of 2013.

Portnoy’s Complaint was published in 1969 to controversy and acclaim alike. The book was fought against due to censorship of the language and sexual portrayals. While the swinging’ sixties were in full effect upon release, the publishing world wasn’t swinging to the same tune, nor was everyone onboard with the quite irreverent Jewish image.

I had no real clue what I was getting into when I cracked the pages of the book for the first time.

If you’re ever in need of some inspiration, documentaries can be a good place to find some. Art and artist documentaries often carry the weight of the inspiration that inspired those artists and their works.

And so here are five I’ve recently watched that may be worth your time if you’re in need of a little inspiration.

Are you Canadian? Do you know The Tragically Hip? Odds are the answer to both of those questions is probably the same, but there are some of us from south of the border and from other parts of the globe who know Canadians and have been introduced secondhand to this wonderful Canadian music treasure. Now, a four-part documentary on Amazon Prime tells the story and importance of The Tragically Hip.

My friend Chris Maier, host of the Our Liner Notes podcast, invited me on the podcast to both introduce me to The Tragically Hip and as a tribute to Gord Downie…