Book Review: Sounds Like Titanic, by Jessica Chiccehitto Hindman
I still remember walking through Midway Airport a few years ago, and seeing the cover for this book staring back at me in the window of a bookstore. The intriguing title immediately took me back to early 1998 when I would blast James Horner’s film score from my Jeep in small-town Iowa, the weird actions of a teenager who surely was not going to end up having a life that involved working on a farm.
Sounds Like Titanic is a memoir from author Jessica Chiccehitto Hindman. Growing up in West Virginia to middle-to-upper-middle-class parents, hearing a particular musical piece in an animated film when she was young soon had her wanting to play the violin. She eventually stopped playing following high school, when she went to New York City to study at Columbia University.
It was here when trying to pay for college, that she answered an ad looking for a violin player to do several gigs. This led to her meeting several people who were under the employ of a figure Hindman refers to only as The Composer, whose music they played.
This is where the title of the book comes into play. What Hindman and several others play “sounds like (the music from) Titanic,” but is not. The group doesn’t even play the music, but “plays along” as the album music blasts from speakers, convincing numerous people that they are in the presence of incredibly talented musicians, who want to bring hope and joy to millions!
Eventually, Hindman “playing” and selling CD’s of The Composer’s music at malls and fairgrounds around New York, leads to her being chosen for a multi-city tour across the country in 2004 with The Composer and a couple musicians.
When I started reading the story, I had expected the entire thing was just going to chronicle the God Bless America tour Hindman was a part of. Instead, the story soon began to weave in other elements as Hindman begins to analyze her life, and who she is/was.
We get remembrances from her youth of 3-hour drives to get to the closest violin instructor, how New York and Columbia became unexpected goals for her, as well as her brief stint enrolling in the armed forces to pay for her tuition.
In reading over her background, I could draw some parallels to my own life. It was due to Schroeder playing Beethoven on his toy piano in the Peanuts specials, that led to 6-8 years of piano lessons by the time I was in high school.
In Elementary School, children could play instruments as part of the band or orchestra in fourth and fifth grade. I remember the allure of considering the viola, before deciding to hold off, and went with the trumpet in fifth grade. Why? Because of the regal, booming fanfares those instruments made in the John Williams scores for the likes of Star Wars, and Raiders of the Lost Ark! While Williams did weave orchestra and band elements into a musical whole, the trumpet was an instrument that seemed to command attention…and like some kids, I had that egotistical need to be loud, and heard! I still recall getting some chances to shine in high school marching and jazz band, before the laissez-faire atittude of the marching band in a college I attended, finally made me retire the last of my musical talents.
Hindman does also bring up the feeling of her instrument giving her an identity, as she struggles through her teen years in the face of a changing body, depressive middle-school dynamics, and earning praise from those around her for her playing (while she does work to be good, she doesn’t see it as a professional career move). Plus, I soon realized that she was chronicling these elements from the same time period that I grew up in! There were some instances of pop-culture that made me recall commercials or the ways of a world that I had almost forgotten, let alone that feeling of escaping a small town world, and going off to make something of oneself far from the norm.
That introspection was something that soon had me turning pages, as she chronicles her views of an America several years after 9/11, a time where many were mostly convinced of the war rhetoric that shifted focus from Afghanistan, to Iraq. At one point, Hindman’s study in Middle Eastern culture (she was in Egypt at the time the Twin Towers were hit) makes her feel that her experience and study could lead to a lucrative career covering the war from the battlefront. What she finds instead, is fascinating and frustrating. This even extends over into some other small jobs she takes upon returning to America (one of them involving the development of the MTV reality show, Teen Mom).
As for the God Bless America tour, this is the through-line of the story that the book’s 272 pages focus on. Crammed into an RV with The Composer, a few other musicians and a voluntary driver who is obsessed with The Composer, she sees an America beyond her youth in Appalachia, and college years in New York City. The tour plays in malls, fairgrounds and concert halls, all while The Conductor smiles like a frightening (but sincere) Velociraptor, and seems hell-bent on making the PBS-loving audiences forget their troubles, while selling CD’s of his “not quite Titanic” music.
The tour overall does make one wonder just what is going to be encountered. I’ve seen plenty of road trip films to expect the unexpected, but what happens here is not the movies, but a more “humanized” view of a person trying to earn enough money to survive, let alone seemingly living a lie while being highly-praised for her skills by people she’s never met.
At first, I questioned her storytelling bouncing around at times. Instead of an early start and leading into the aftermath, we have little story “detours” along the way, that worked out surprisingly well. She even finds ways to reference James Cameron’s film in a few instances, and tries to decipher just what it is about The Composer’s music (let alone some other similar-sounding music at that time), that was making people so emotionally connected to it.
Sounds Like Titanic is a memoir that chronicles a most unexpected journey in one person’s life, that leads to events, opportunities, and instrospection as its writer moves from one century to the next. Her observations lead her to observations and introspection of the people who she met at this time, along with the state of the world she lived and grew up in. There’s quite a lot crammed into the books 272 pages, and it is a journey I think many others who lived through those times, can get something out of as well.
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Book Review: Batman 89’
In 1989, Tim Burton’s Batman changed the way some people felt about superhero films, and gave actor Michael Keaton one of his most iconic film roles. Needless to say, the films success brought about a sequel that was more in line with Burton’s sensibilities, but strained Warner Brothers’ thoughts on profitability with a story that was darker, and much less family-friendly.
As the the film series gave way to recasting, garish neon lighting, and Arnold Schwarzenegger, some wondered what might have happened had Burton stayed on for another film.
In the fall of 2021, DC Comics released a six-issue miniseries titled Batman ‘89, that was meant to follow in the continuity of Burton’s films. What was most notable, was the storyline was written by Sam Hamm, who did story work on both of Burton’s films. A year later, the mini-series was collected into a graphic novel format.
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It’s been almost a year since Batman took on the Penguin and Catwoman, and crime has continued to worsen in Gotham City, leading to the National Guard eventually being called in to assist the police force in the city.
District Attorney Harvey Dent soon decides something must be done, and feels the blame lies with police commissioner Jim Gordon, who seems content to rely on the Batman to take care of things. Also on the case is sergeant Barbara Gordon, the commissioner’s daughter and fiance to Harvey. At Dent’s request, she begins to look into what the GPD has hiding in their evidence locker in regards to the masked vigilante.
The story also shifts to Burnside, a rundown area of Gotham where Harvey grew up. The high-profile DA soon finds himself reconnecting with some old and new faces in the neighborhood, but an arson fire changes his world, and not for the better.
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In reading through the mini-series, I began to get an uneasy feeling that Hamm seemed to have overloaded the story with a few too many characters.
One can almost imagine a stronger focus on Harvey and Barbara given what we see in the first issue, but the story seems to keep piling on so many characters, you might feel it is competing with the 1997 Batman and Robin film as it struggles to support all of them.
The main draw of the story is Harvey Dent, based on the character as briefly portrayed by actor Billy Dee Williams in the 1989 film. Of all the characters, it feels like Hamm gives the most time over to him, but his descent into madness as he becomes Two Face, gets a bit muddled in the process.
Barbara Gordon has been aged up for this storyline, but it never really feels like she’s given much to do in a substantial way. While she does help Harvey and seems to never waiver in her support of him, it never feels like she is anything more than a supporting character.
The same could be said for the return of Selina Kyle, wearing a somewhat familiar outfit, and sneaking her way back into Bruce Wayne’s life. Even so, it feels like Hamm is just hitting familiar story beats we saw in Batman Returns, while giving reassurance to her fans that she’s alive and kicking.
Aside from Harvey, the only new character that seems to get some more focus, is Burnside resident Drake Winston, a young mechanic who has his own, “theatrical” methods for trying to keep Burnside safe. An encounter with Bruce Wayne ends up changing his fortunes, but the way these two team up feels a bit flimsy, on par with how in every film, someone ends up finding out the Batman’s secret identity.
After his character seemed to be tempered in his last outing, the story attempts to bring Bruce Wayne back to the surface regarding a notable role here. We see grey creeping into his hair, and an incident that leaves him with a large amount of guilt, brings about the philanthropic side of him, along with a hint that maybe one day, he can let go of the Batman.
For this story’s setting, the architectural visuals of Gotham are sidelined as the story moves to Burnside, a neglected area of the sprawling cityscape. While I do commend Hamm for trying to do something different storywise, what he focuses on feels like a far cry from where a third Burton Batman film might have gone. Having Harvey back could have shifted the story focus away from the “big-name actor in makeup” the films became known for, and shown more about political and mob corruption in the film. This story hints at this, but treats its focus as an afterthought.
A highlight of the series, is the art from Joe Quinones. He is able to draw and render the characters to closely resemble their real-world counterparts in a number of ways, along with adding in some new faces.
One element that is both a blessing and a curse, is how he tends to swirl in some of the Batman: The Animated Series and some action figure concepts from the Burton films of the time, into the story. This can definitely be seen in the blue-skin and white hair for Two-Face, which are distinctive colors of the Animated Series character. This is a little fun to see, but I would have liked to see more effort put into a what-if regarding what a Burton-inspired Two Face might be like (maybe a green-grey face with staples or stitches in Harvey’s scarred face, shades of Frankenstein’s monster?).
While the character imagery is good, the action sequences and page layout in several cases comes off as “muddled.” There aren’t a lot of action sequences, but it feels like Quinones is forced to limit his action, which caused me to go over several sequences a number of times to make sure I understood where things were heading.
I was intrigued by the concept of Batman ‘89, and went in with an open mind. There’s a decent story buried in here, but it feels like Sam Hamm needed someone to help him steady his focus, and maybe trim the fat in certain areas.
Joe Quinones artwork is definitely pretty to look at, but there are some narrative areas that needed some work visually.
Not a bad story, but it just feels like there was potential for something that could have felt more like a Burton film that would have been seen in the multiplex in the summer of 1995.
*Note: this link will take you to Amazon.com, and product(s) pertaining to items and/or content mentioned in this blog post. As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases.
