In Sorte Hurin
For Father's Day, my lady bought me the new Tolkien book The Children of Hurin [wiki]. So far, this is the best post-Lord of the Rings [wiki] volume I have read. While the others were splintered and littered with editorial notes, this appears to be a cohesive and uninterrupted tale. It was nice to take a break from tech gifts and bring myself back to the analog world for awhile. Coincidentally, I bought Dimmu Borgir's [wiki] new release In Sorte Diaboli [wiki], which provides the absolute perfect soundtrack for this book. This is likely the most dark and somber tale of Middle-Earth [wiki] that Tolkien has told, fitting the mood Dimmu generally sets forth. What shifts the match into alignment is the concept behind In Sorte Diaboli. From Wikipedia's In Sorte Diaboli page:
"...a story located in medieval Europe. It is about a priest who begins to doubt his faith, and then ends up taking the place of the Antichrist. 'There's this dude that works as a priest's assistant, and after a while he just discovers that he has nothing to do with Christianity,' Silenoz says. 'He just sort of has this awakening and realizes that he has different abilities and different powers and is leaning more to the dark side.'"
While The Children of Hurin has nothing to do with Christianity or turning to The Dark Side [wiki], the medieval European feel to Tolkien's world eases the two together.
I suppose then I am not really dropping into an analog moment. The mix of two formats (0 and 1!) is quite digital, especially the music most often coming to me through my iPod Nano. Oh well... it was worth a shot.