Monday, April 28, 2025

RIP Joshua Clover

 









I was shocked and saddened to learn of the death of Joshua Clover.

I didn't know Joshua well but always enjoyed our encounters. Most of these occurred via the phone during a year when I worked at Spin mainly editing the albums section, to which Clover contributed a  monthly column. My memory is hazy but I believe that the idea was through this column Spin would dramatically expand the number of things covered in the reviews section - he would write about a huge number of albums - 12, 15, 20? - in what added up to less than the amount of words that a single album would get if it was that month's lead review. A rather labor-intensive gig, then, as a listening load.... but Joshua relished it - the compression required (just a few lines per record), the challenge of squeezing in polemical barbs and jokes, the opportunity to reflect  his wide taste and interests.. 

At that point Joshua wrote for Spin and Village Voice under the name Jane Dark. Perhaps the female alter-ego was meant to express his identification with  teengirl taste. He was in fact an early poptimist. (Early for America - in the UK we had anti-rockist provocateurs back in the early Eighties).  A few years later he started the blog jane dark's sugarhigh! - the name again making a pro-pop statement. 

From the spiky wit of the reviews and blogposts, and from his playful demeanor, I took Joshua to be a sort of dandy of the mind (if not necessarily appearance).  So it was a surprise to learn later that he was a Marxist -  a stringent one too, deeply steeped in economy theory -  and a committed and courageous activist. 

I did wonder how the anti-corporate politics correlated with his preference for the products of the entertainment conglomerates over the indie-alternative - I guess maybe the thinking was that the music of the masses would always be more vital than the milquetoast fare favored by bourgeois-bohemia, and also have greater latent political content. Stuff you could read, and where the sales and culture-wide impact ratified the significance read into it.  

As a result of these parallel passions, Clover's publications include a monograph on "Roadrunner" by Jonathan Richman and the Modern Lovers and 1989: Bob Dylan Didn't Have This To Sing About, a fascinating book about pop music and the so-called "end of history", but also a book for Verso about rioting as political praxis. 



On top of - in parallel to -  all of that, Clover was a celebrated poet, winner of acclaim and awards. 

And a professor at UC Davis's Department of English. 

Here is a tribute to Joshua Clover by Carl Wilson. 

And here at Verso is another completely different tribute from one of JC's Marxist comrades. 

Here's a video where Joshua talks about "Roadrunner" with Eric Weisbard and Elizabeth Nelson.


The conversation continues with Nelson here

And below is something rather extraordinary,  a relic of the days when Twitter was a creative, freeform space: the tale, told at enormous length and unsparing detail, entirely through tweets, of the strange circumstances in which Joshua quit his job at Spin.   The events told take place in September 2001; the telling is happening in 2015.

  

#HowIQuitSpin 1. I moved to France on the day GWB was inaugurated. Email was a little squiggly in 2001 but good enough.

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015


#HowIQuitSpin 2. So I kept my Spin gig. The contract details matter.

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

 

#HowIQuitSpin 3. Had a year contract that expected a certain # of words total (feat/review/column) & got paid monthly, direct deposit.

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015


#HowIQuitSpin 4. I have a cheap studio in Paris & I am getting CDs by FedEx & writing my fucking pieces & eating Berthillon. It's *the life*

 — Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015


#HowIQuitSpin 5. but bc I'm me I start to feel bad about it. My politics are clarifying in this period, intensifying, weighing on me.

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

 

#HowIQuitSpin 6. I start to feel like I am just selling stuff to kids and its not really what I want to be doing and it doesn't feel right.

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015


#HowIQuitSpin 7. Worse each week. Hypocritical. Also I am less connected to Spin since they fired Craig Marks. So I start to think I'm done.

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015


#HowIQuitSpin 8. I think this a lot. And finally, maybe in May, I decide that I will get myself fired, bc quitting seems onerous and dull.

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

 

#HowIQuitSpin 9. The world gives me a clear shot, Spin sends me a CD to review: Party Music by The Coup. Now this is a CD to get fired with.

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015


#HowIQuitSpin END OF CHAPTER ONE. Time to make dinner.

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015


#HowIQuitSpin 10. You know The Coup, Party Music. Ride the Fence. 8000000 Ways to kill a CEO. The best of RevLeft hiphop. I have 400 words.

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

 

#HowIQuitSpin 11. For 200 words I describe the album very conventional. But the second half of the review shifts gears.

 — Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015


#HowIQuitSpin 12. The 2nd half says, if u just listen to this album, yr a poseur. It's a 5. There's only one way to take the album seriously

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015


#HowIQuitSpin 13. thats to go down to the Spin offices & throw a brick thru the window. I give the address. If u do this, I write, its a 10.

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

 

#HowIQuitSpin 14. I assume they will fire me immediately. But if they don't I am ready to insist they print it which obvs they cant do...

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015


#HowIQuitSpin 15. & I will keep insisting & then they will fire me. Foolproof plan. Nonetheless Im anxious waiting 2 hear back from the ed.

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015


#HowIQuitSpin 17. He replies on schedule. It's Jon Dolan, sweet guy, They love it. They want to tweak a word or 2, totally minor, the usual.

 — Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

 

 #HowIQuitSpin 18. This is the moment of true despair. It is then that I know I have lost. Had lost long ago.

 — Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015


#HowIQuitSpin 19. They know what I have been busily not knowing: it's all perfectly wrapped in the cellophane of irony, lacking all salience

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015


#HowIQuitSpin 20. it's just show and if you think what you say means anything you're kidding yourself. I have 3 days of black depression.

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

 

#HowIQuitSpin 21. I decide I have to quit, even though its my only income. Spin's been good to me, paid me well, said nice things. But OK.

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015


#HowIQuitSpin 22. My weird feeling is this: that we have been gong out so long, I have to break up with Spin in person. It feels right.

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015


#HowIQuitSpin 23. But there's a problem: I don't really have the spare cash for a transatlantic flight. This is where U2 comes in.

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

 

#HowIQuitSpin END OF CHAPTER 2

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015


#HowIQuitSpin 24. so the problem is this: I need money to fly Paris>NewYork to quit Spin in person like the decent fellow I pretend to be.

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015


#HowIQuitSpin 25. I see that U2 is playing Parc Bercy the next month, August 18th.. So I concoct a plan. I arrange to get passes to the show

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

 

#HowIQuitSpin 26. and not just passes, but the kind that let you into the LITERALLY HEART-SHAPED closed off area stage front.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 27. usually this area's for, I dunno, Nelson Mandela and whatever, but I am (still) a Spin senior writer and I have some moves

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 28. I make the moves, I get the passes, I wait for the show, In the meantime, I read this piece in the Village Voice.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

 

 

#HowIQuitSpin 29. It says that Godard's Band of Outsiders, out of circulation for near 40 yrs, is being shown at Film Forum, end of summer.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 30. That seems like a good irony. I will fly Paris>NYC to see a French movie. Now I know my travel dates; just need the ticket

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 31. So Aug 18 rolls around. I walk down to Parc Bercy. It's warm and I am wearing a leather jacket, I don't know why.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

 

 

#HowIQuitSpin 32. outside Bercy there are many U2 fans milling, some without tickets just as I hoped. I hold my special passes in the air.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 33. Eventually I find a flight attendant for American who loves U2 so much that she has come from Dublin w/o tickets.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 34. Couldn't be better. She trades me 250 in vouchers for a ticket and a special pass. I keep one and see the show.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

 

 

#HowIQuitSpin 35. this is a terrible decision for I am heavy bored, "Kite" us the worst. Everything else is in a huge tie for second worst.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 36. I walk home sweating, reflecting on how U2 is probably the worst popular band in the world. I blame Jesus. Jesus and Bono.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 37. But the next day I take the vouchers to the AA offices and buy my ticket to NYC. It's during Band of Outsider's last week:

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

 

 

#HowIQuitSpin 38. I schedule it so that I will fly in, have one day and night to myself and then it's time to quit the only job I have.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 39. we have an appointment and everything, Tuesday morning, in the building whose address I have suggested for rock-throwing.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin they of course don't know why I have made the appointment. Until then I do my work. Nothing to do but wait.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

 

 

#HowIQuitSpin END OF CHAPTER THREE

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 41. so the day comes to fly off to NYC; haven't been back since GWB took office. 2 months since Coup review, 3 weeks since U2

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 42. I stay with a friend in Stuyvesant Town, 20th & First in Manhattan. It's near the best bagel shop in the world, now closed

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

 

 

#HowIQuitSpin 43. Head off to see Band of Outsiders, the only sixties Godard I have never seen. It is magical. I am filled with delight —

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 44. even though next morning I will have to trudge into the office of someone I don't like & say stuff that will aggravate her

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 45. but for now it's still Monday night and I am feeling good, a little jet-lagged. I walk east in the New York evening.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

 

 

#HowIQuitSpin 46. there are posters along all the scaffoldings for CDs out the next day. I am oddly excited for the Tori Amos covers album.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 47. but I realize w great sadness I will not getting all my music for free anymore. I meet a friend at a bar on St. Marks.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin48. we talk about the movie, about Godard & Ashbery & Dylan, the 3 great postwar artists if you only count white men.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

 

 

#HowIQuitSpin 49. we talk about friends & poetry (later we will start a small press) & then I get tired & there can be no more delaying.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 50. I go back to Stuyvesant Town & fold out the couch, woozy, my last night as an employed person. Strange Little Girls.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin END OF CHAPTER FOUR

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

 

 

#HowIQuitSpin 51. I wake early on Tuesday bc still on Europe time. I've been a journalist for 5 years. Before that I borrowed money for rent

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 52. I recall this keenly. I recall sleeping on the banks of the Charles River. It is unclear to me I will get another job.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 53. I remind myself the world doesn't let mid-class white guys starve, that this tightrope always has a net if yr in my shoes.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

 

 

#HowIQuitSpin 54. bc this is the terrible thing I have come to know. I try to let the terrible knowledge calm me down.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 55. its still a few hours before the meeting where I will quit Spin, it's maybe 7:30, so I decide to go for a run.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 56. I have a coffee, some water, hang around a minute, and I am ready to go. I have on this run many times.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

 

 

#HowIQuitSpin 57. I head over to the East River & down, past the softball fields & soccer pitch, along the promenade.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 58. Traffic to my right past the kids and idlers in the parky areas, it's sunny and blue, I have my headphones on.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 59. release day for Tori & Jay-Z & that very Coup record I reviewed at the beginning of this story. I run past Houston.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

 

 

#HowIQuitSpin 60. under the bridge & out into the sun, blue sky, pretty far dwntwn, running along. A plane hits the WTC. Then another one.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

END OF CHAPTER FIVE

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 61. theres nowhere to go from there but thats the thing, stories keep going when theres no place to go. A demoralizing fact.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

 

 

#HowIQuitSpin 62. The peak comes too early or too late, there's no denouement or too much, it's a dying fall either way.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 63. and for all that 11:00 comes an hour after 10:00 no matter what. Even when such things seem impossible.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 64. sure enough 11 comes an hour after ten. In that period my host (a good friend) and I watch the crashes a hundred times.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

 

 

#HowIQuitSpin 65. he doesnt have cable but theres that station w its antenna in Jersey. We watch from 11 to noon, noon to 1. We r transfixed

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 66. the same few seconds over & over. Periodically we try to reach my friend who works next to the WTC, but phones dont work.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 67. eventually we snap out of it a little, amid rumors of other attacks, planes unaccounted for. all air traffic is grounded.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

 

 

#HowIQuitSpin 68. we decide we will go downstairs to the market to get supplies, staples. it seems somewhat crazy to leave the apartment.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 69. but we do, we go down to the supermarket. line is out the door into the street and everybody is terrified and chatty.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 70. its sort of the famous communality every1 talked about. its sort of like nervous talking when you're a rookie shoplifter.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

 

 

#HowIQuitSpin 71. like just hoping it will smooth things over & you'll get home safe. Water is sold out; we get what we can & go back up.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 72. i havent even checked w Spin, theres no way to check,. I just assume our meeting is cancelled.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 73. like, holy shit, Al Quaeda *really* wants me to keep my gig as a music journalist.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

 

 

#HowIQuitSpin 74. eventually we hear fr missing friend, ok but shook, trapped on subway under WTC for 5 hours, walked home to the upper west

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 75. there r reports that the air dwntwn is toxic, all the vaporized plastic. we think about r friend walking 6-7 miles home.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 76. eventually we decide, wednesday, to stop watching the crashes on tv and walk up to my friend's dad's place also upper west

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

 

 

#HowIQuitSpin 77. it feels a but like an epic journey. we fortify ourselves at the best bagel shop in the world, which is open. in fact...

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 78. ...they are doing banner biz bc they r around the corner fr 13th precinct and all cops are on duty. it's *packed& w cops.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 79. everybody talks abt heroism of 1st responders but I feel the same, furious to be in a place filled w cops. still hate cops

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

 

 

#HowIQuitSpin 80. we get our bagels & walk uptown, it takes forever. the air smells funny but this could just be a fantasy. we move slowly.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 81. lots of people on streets, all a little out of it. lots of nodding, semi-verbal communication, no actual conversations.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 82. finally we arrive. ive never met freinds dad. he moved from Australia years before. teaches at CUNY. im shy to meet him.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

 

 

#HowIQuitSpin 83. but also we realize waiting for the apt door to open it will be the first real conversation abt the events we've had...

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 84. ...except w each other. Our discourse to this point has mostly been "holy shit holy shit holy shit holy shit holy shit."

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 85. Tony opens the door. Shorter than I expected, graying red beard. Long pause. My friend says to his dad, what do you think?

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

 

 

#HowIQuitSpin 86. This will literally be the first opinion we have heard not fed to us by the television. We have been utterly bewildered.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 87. Tony hesitates, smiles, a warm smile, a calming and infectious smile, says Well they had to come down sooner or later.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin END OF CHAPTER SIX

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

 

 

#HowIQuitSpin 88. After a couple days we head back downtown. The subways are running again. GWB has told us that we need to shop for America

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 89. the planes still aren't flying and I have to rebook my flight back to France. First I reschedule my Spin meeting.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 90. Breaking up is hard. I schedule the meeting for a week later and then rebook my ticket home.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

 

 

#HowIQuitSpin 91. I feel like the oddity of having flown into NYC on a caprice a day before 9/11 means I am probably a terrorist.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 92. this feeling will last for weeks, months. Its a time of paranoia. I miss four days of running, first time in a dozen years

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 93. when I start running again along the East River I keep seeing planes diving toward me from the corner of my eye & panic

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

 

 

#HowIQuitSpin 94. can't stop thinking about the air toxicity which is a real thing but also a figure for the ambient fear gripping people.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 95. i visit the memorials in union square above the closed zone but i dont find them moving, just disturbing.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 96. its a historical genre, right? The periods when the line blurs between the missing and the dead. i think about Chile.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

 

 

#HowIQuitSpin 97. People start to attack Muslims, possible Muslims taxi drivers shopkeepers people in turbans. Srsly fuck the human spirit.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 98. some days at least. Fiends go back to getting together, little dates, everything feels furtive, drinking starts at noon.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 99. it is a lost time. But the CDs come out, delayed a week. Tori, The Blueprint. But The Coup has its own special delay.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

 

 

#HowIQuitSpin 100. bc The Coup original cover shows them blowing up the WTC. That's what they sent me back in June. pic.twitter.com/S70YTnJGON

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 19, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 101. so the review is on the street saying The Coup and I want you to throw a brick through the window of Spin offices.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 20, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 102. But the CD is nowhere to be found bc they are having to print new covers and now finally it is time.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 20, 2015

 

 

#HowIQuitSpin 103. It is time for me to go into the offices I have suggested get bricked & walk into the managing editor's office and quit.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 20, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin END OF CHAPTER SEVEN

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 20, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 104. I go into the Spin offices. I sort of like the offices in the way you can if you have never had an office job.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 20, 2015

 

 

#HowIQuitSpin 105. Wave to the staffers I know in editorial. I don't know anyone in advertising. I know a couple ppl in art, a flight down.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 20, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 106. one is daughter to a great poet; weve had a couple conversations, Shes told me some things. I dont see her this visit.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 20, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 107. After a min I go into glass-walled office of the managing editor. There r some things u should abt how I started at Spin.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 20, 2015

 

 

#HowIQuitSpin 108. the 1st Spin staffers i met were a couple @ the time. They were visiting Bay Area. I had written sample column, thats it.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 20, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 109. I remember thinking how light-hearted + pleasant they were, I thought this specifically in comparison to the poets I knew

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 20, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 110. Later I would understand this was the affect that goes with having a well-paid job in media biz. But it was nice.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 20, 2015

 

 

#HowIQuitSpin 111. So that's one thing. Soon after that then-managing ed Craig Marks called to offer me my first contract.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 20, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 112. Id never had a contract for anything. Never bargained over pay, just took whatever the job offered.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 20, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 113. Craig asked how much I wanted; when I answered he laughed, sd "Do you want a Spin baseball cap w that?" Laughed some more

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 20, 2015

 

 

#HowIQuitSpin 114. it turned out I had asked for too little. He told me to ask for more. I did. He gave it to me. There was no baseball cap.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 20, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 115. Four yrs later I walk into the managing ed's office to quit but its not Craig, he was deposed the year before or so.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 20, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 116. In fact it's the woman fr that original couple I met. I think they had split up by then, not really sure. Lets say yes.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 20, 2015

 

 

#HowIQuitSpin 117. I liked her & was afraid of her, which I think was common; u want that in a managing ed. The best thing I can say is...

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 20, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 118. she was a better writer than her ex, who wrote 1 great piece, under the byline Jo Jo Dancer aka The Gay Rapper,

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 20, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 119. now she had the office & there I was, after the Coup review, after U2, after flying Paris>NYC, after 9/11, trying to quit

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 20, 2015

 

 

#HowIQuitSpin 120. It did not go well.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 20, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 121. Ive been saying managing ed but it WAS *executive ed*—that explains all the glass.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 20, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 122. perhaps a self-fulfilling prophecy but it was exactly like breaking up. I have my reasons. They were rejected.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 20, 2015

 

 

#HowIQuitSpin 123. I was told I was making a difference, That in thirty years people would read the words, not the ads that surrounded them.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 20, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 124. I remember thinking no one is reading any of this in 30 yrs. And thinking, the reviews are the ads anyway is my point.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 20, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 125. remade my case; exec ed not having it. She wove btwn flattery & castigation. I did the thing one does in this situation.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 20, 2015

 

 

#HowIQuitSpin 126. I said its not you its me.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 20, 2015

 

#HowIQuitSpin 127. well, a version. i sd Spin was great noble & good, it was my problem & I accepted all responsibility. She let me go.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 20, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 128. And that was the end of it. Or so I thought. I was horribly mistaken.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 20, 2015

 

 

#HowIQuitSpin END OF CHAPTER EIGHT

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 20, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 129. On the way back to France the airport was odd. You'd expect "tense" or "scary" but mostly it seemed out of focus.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 20, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 130. I was certain I would be asked how I came to fly into NYC from overseas on 9/10. This seemed obvious. I prepped an answer

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 20, 2015

 

 

#HowIQuitSpin 131. but no one asked. They just checked baggage emphatically. The Shoe Bomber hadnt gone down yet so we kept our shoes on.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 20, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 132. The last image I had of Paris was from seeing Band of Outsiders at Film Forum. Later I would write the DVD liner notes:

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 20, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 133. "It was just as Billy the Kid was dying in America that factories started appearing on the outskirts of Paris."

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 20, 2015

 

 

#HowIQuitSpin 134. But the Paris I got back to bore little resemblance to this. There was a strange inconsistency in people's reactions.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 20, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 136. on the one hand everybody wanted to hear my story, not story of How I Quit Spin but story of Jets Flying Into Buildings

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 20, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 137. on the other, people prided themselves on being unflappable and prepared. There was an amused + gentle chiding of the USA

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 20, 2015

 

 

#HowIQuitSpin 138. for having no experience w terrorism and going all spastic. In Paris everybody was all Yep, bombs in the subway, etc.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 20, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 139. In fact they had a protocol. By time I landed it had already been set in motion. It was called Plan Vigipirate. No really

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 20, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 140. Citoyens! It is important to be vigilant for pirates.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 20, 2015

 

#HowIQuitSpin 141. Plan Vigipirate involved a lot of portable metal detectors at the entrances to civic buildings a/o tourist sites.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 20, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 142. but mostly Plan Vigipirate involves doing away w the public garbage cans. Understand: Paris had beautiful garbage cans.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 20, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 143. Park green cylinders w details, stylish & compact & everywhere, one of best things abt Paris. But easy to drop a bomb in

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 20, 2015

 

#HowIQuitSpin 144. 1st thing that happens is the cans' mouths are sealed over with brass discs. The whole city. The discs are beautiful too

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 20, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 145 And effectively its like a garbage strike. Late Sept 2001 the Paris streets fill with trash. That's Plan Vigipirate.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 20, 2015

 

 

#HowIQuitSpin 146. It fills w trash so much that even late at night you can tell where people walk bc the trash is kicked to the side.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 20, 2015

 

 

#HowIQuitSpin 147. Negative space like a Rachel Whiteread sculpture, sort of clear where people go to & from work, trash everywhere else.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 20, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 148. So this is my life now. Unemployed, counting my centimes, walking thru garbage in Paris, recounting my NYC trip for wine.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 20, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 149. I go every day to the bookstore, now gone, Scottish clerk is obsessed w the bin Laden family, knows their Paris address.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 20, 2015

 

 

#HowIQuitSpin 150. I try to cut down on ice cream, to write poems. I get an email fr Spin. They tell me I owe them sixteen thousand dollars.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 20, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin END OF CHAPTER NINE

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 20, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 151. Reader I will tell you what I know about tragedy. I mean, imho.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 20, 2015

 

 

#HowIQuitSpin 152. Some say it is the misbegotten teen suicide pact, Bertha locked upstairs, Anna K throwing herself on the tracks.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 20, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 153. I say it is that a story might include the most extraordinary grand & immiserating episodes personal & world-historical

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 20, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 154. and for all that it will end by having to go through the details of a contract, the pettiest thing humans have invented.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 20, 2015

 

 

#HowIQuitSpin 155. Imagine a play which is just the attorneys for Creon, Haemon, Isme & Antigone meeting for two hours. That is tragedy.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 20, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 156. My contract w Spin, u will recall fr Ch 1, involves monthly pay for which I am to write a certain # of words per year.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 20, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 157. if u divide by 12 u can derive expected words per month in my 3 categories: features+reviews+columns. Not Rocket Science.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 20, 2015

 

 

#HowIQuitSpin 158. and reader I can assure you that as Sept ends I am exactly on pace. A tiny bit ahead. On this there is no disagreement.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 20, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 159. yet Spin, by which I mean the very exec ed who had so vigorously levied me to stay, says I owe them 16k or maybe 18k.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 20, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 160. lets recall that in 2015 dollars this is something like 2 million bucks. I mean if you are unemployed & broke anyway.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 20, 2015

 

 

#HowIQuitSpin 161. I explain theyve made a mistake, I have completed the work expected of me. I offer to do 1 more column and a lead review.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 20, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 162. She sez u owe us 16k bc u still owe us X # of words. But even if that were true that would only account for half the 16k.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 20, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 163. they are double counting. They are charging me for both the words not yet written + pay for the remaining three months.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 20, 2015

 

 

#HowIQuitSpin 164. this despite the fact I have not been paid for these months. I have been paid for what I have written and that's all.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 20, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 165. I tell her I have a lawyer. This is not strictly true. I have a friend who used to be in Salem 66 who has a law degree.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 20, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 166. I am in misery and terror every second. I can't bring myself to check my email. Paris continues to fill with garbage.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 20, 2015

 

 

#HowIQuitSpin 167. she writes to inform me Spin has quote "a big bad lawyer" ready to go. I think to myself this is the worst breakup ever.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 20, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin END OF CHAPTER TEN

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 20, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 168. Corporate scare tactics are in truth pretty effective. I am paralyzed. That it comes from a friendly face is even scarier

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 21, 2015

 

 

#HowIQuitSpin 169. I am at a loss. I don't feel like I am in an astonishingly beautiful city w 300 movie theaters where I gave museum passes

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 21, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 170. I feel isolated & nowhere, at a great distance fr the machine thats nonetheless churning w malice for me, far fr any help

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 21, 2015

#HowIQuitSpin 171. I understand that I am not being punished for an incomplete contract, for some imagined value to the company.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 21, 2015

  

  

#HowIQuitSpin 172. I am being punished bc I was holier-than-thou, that I intimated some ideal that put my former colleagues in a bad light.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 21, 2015

 

#HowIQuitSpin 173. as if I had come out & said Spin was not a culture industry niche for witty phrasemaking music nerds but a marketing tool

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 21, 2015

 

#HowIQuitSpin 174. basically I am being charged sixteen thousand dollars for being a buzzkill.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 21, 2015

 

  

#HowIQuitSpin 175. I go for walks. They replace the beautiful sealed public trash bins w little loop frames u can hang a see-thru bag from.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 21, 2015

 

#HowIQuitSpin 176. They look a little bit like gibbets, the kind you draw when you play hangman. They are still there to this day.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 21, 2015

 

#HowIQuitSpin 177. I listen to Incubus & Staind I listen to Kelis I listen to that Janet Jackson song w the amaze Ventura Highway sample.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 21, 2015

 

  

#HowIQuitSpin 178. I listen to lots of Aimee Mann & The Coup but mostly I listen to Bombs Over Baghdad & Destiny's Child. I am numb & stupid

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 21, 2015

 

#HowIQuitSpin 179. I only have one move to make and I make it.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 21, 2015

 

#HowIQuitSpin 180. As I mentioned earlier, I'd visited art department a couple times, a friend's daughter worked there. I'd heard a story.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 21, 2015

 

 

#HowIQuitSpin 181. Im panicked by my own plan. 1 thing gives me courage: I dont have 16 grand. I dont have point 5 grand. I write an email.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 21, 2015

 

#HowIQuitSpin END OF CHAPTER ELEVEN

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 21, 2015

 

#HowIQuitSpin 182. Let me tell you what the email did not say.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 21, 2015

 

  

#HowIQuitSpin 184. it did not say you let me walk out of your glass-walled office believing we had talked it through and were done.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 21, 2015

 

#HowIQuitSpin 185. it did not say we were friends we took molly together at the first Coachella & anyway you know I don't have 16 grand.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 21, 2015

 

#HowIQuitSpin 186. it did not say I know your lawyer could walk into a courtroom and snap my guitarist in half like a twig please have mercy

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 21, 2015

 

 

#HowIQuitSpin 187. it did not say these things bc I knew there could only be one answer to these & that answer is you owe us sixteen grand

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 21, 2015

 

#HowIQuitSpin 188. it said this: look, I dont think you want to be known as the magazine that sues its own writers. Moreover...

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 21, 2015

 

#HowIQuitSpin 189. I dont think u want to be known as the mag that sues its own writers over contract numbers when it lets its art direcrtor

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 21, 2015

 

 

 

#HowIQuitSpin 190. fly around Rio de Janeiro at New Years spending corporate money on helicopters & blow w/o suing them, y'know what I mean?

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 21, 2015

 

#HowIQuitSpin 191. Then the waiting.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 21, 2015

 

#HowIQuitSpin 192. While we are waiting let me tell you some things that are gone.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 21, 2015

 

 

 

#HowIQuitSpin 193. The cheap studio in Paris is gone. The World Trade Center is gone. The bar on St. Mark's is gone.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 21, 2015

 

#HowIQuitSpin 194. Village Voice Bookstore in Paris. The beautiful trash cans. Ess-A-Bagel at 21st. The apt in Stuyvesant Town. Gone gone.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 21, 2015

 

#HowIQuitSpin 196. the free CDs, free passes, some friends who didn't matter that much to me & some who did. Destiny's Child. All of this.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 21, 2015

 

  

#HowIQuitSpin 197. Its Autumn in Paris. The whole We Are All Americans vibe fades as the US goes long on bellicosity. pic.twitter.com/Ixrw92m1FW

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 21, 2015

 

#HowIQuitSpin 198. The executive editor writes back.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 21, 2015

 

#HowIQuitSpin 199. Its words in an order that dont say anything. Then she suggests that I write a column & a lead review & we call it even.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 21, 2015

 

  

#HowIQuitSpin 200. & we're done. The story is over. Column already written. They assign the new Creed for review & that's it. Except a funny

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 21, 2015

 

#HowIQuitSpin THE END

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 21, 2015

 

#HowIQuitSpin afterword a. I'd been thinking at Creed, the interesting challenge of xtian rock crossing over to a straight audience —

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 21, 2015

 

 

#HowIQuitSpin b. how it meant disguising love songs to Jesus as hetero love songs with some lyrical disguise & coded language.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 21, 2015

 

#HowIQuitSpin c. how this was basically same situation queer bands had been in for long time, how both had to draw on the same conventions.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 21, 2015

 

#HowIQuitSpin d. so obviously I began my lead review, last assignment ever received from Spin, with this lede: Oh my god Creed is so gay.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 21, 2015

 

 

 

#HowIQuitSpin e. and it is THIS, they decide they cannot print. They kill the review.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 21, 2015

 

#HowIQuitSpin f. I email the Voice who takes it, runs it, pays me. I never hear from my ex employer again. And that is how I quit Spin.

 

— Joshua Clov3r (@bookofriot) July 21, 2015




2 comments:

  1. This is an enormous loss. I'm very saddened to read this news.

    Clover was one of my earliest and greatest internet rabbit holes. I distinctly remember discovering Jane Dark's pop columns while trapped in a life-sucking cubicle job. I had a very visceral reaction, as one has in a cubicle when another cosmos suddenly loads into a web browser. Because he was opening a door to a new way of thinking about pop music, for me anyway, those first few online encounters with his writing were like full-body teleportation, the best kind of escapism. I was completely obsessed.

    Clover's criticism (rather like Neil Kulkarni's) hooked me because I was absolutely certain he loathed all the bands I loved. As a pop critic he typified the judgmental record-store clerk, the sort of person who makes your teenage hands shake as you bring your crappy middlebrow LP up to the counter to buy. But he wasn't judgmental out of snobbishness, and that was the hook. He relished vulgarity in pop music, in the best sense (tinged with his Marxist politics), and you got the feeling his favorite music was whatever was in the charts at the moment. All expressed in writing that was funny, conversational, and always mischievously booby-trapped ("Godard & Ashbery & Dylan, the 3 great postwar artists if you only count white men" is a perfect example).

    I bought all his books, including the poetry. "1989" is a masterpiece. I'll remember him as belonging to that wonderful period on the internet (maybe late 90's to 2007-ish?) when print publications were still strong, though on the wane, and social media hadn't really taken hold yet. It seemed as if there was a healthy overlap between print and digital, where the print stuff bestowed the traditional prestige on the writer but then, online, the same writer could put out stuff that was more casual and colloquial, broader in outlook, and usually more provocative when free of editorial constraints. Which makes me want to end by saying thanks for keeping your blogs going, Simon!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. You're welcome - but it's not like I can stop myself, the flow is involuntary!

      Yes it's very sad - I wish I had known him better. Such a lively mind. We did have a nice chat when he was doing his 1989 book and wanted to dig into the acid house and orbital raves moment.

      He was only a half-year or so older than me, so that is chastening in itself. I wish I could take this kind of way-too-early-departure - cf Neil Kulkarni - as a spur to stop wasting so much time.

      Delete