The Bombast Transcripts: Rants and Screeds of RageBoy®

Rating:
Summary: A symphony of words
Review: Chris has an incredible way with words, weaving them into material that alternately sooths and savages. You read a passage that you find just doesn't leave you. You have go back and read and re-read it again. As you do, an incredible depth and richness unfolds before you. A symphony of words.

At the first read, you hear the violin, softly playing in the background. At the second reading, a trumpet cuts in, with high, harsh notes. Continued reading of the same passage exposes the deep and penetrating rhythm of the drum, the gentle melody of the piano, and finally the flute - playful and teasing.

Chris is funny. Sad. Tense. Shrewd. Warm. Antagonistic. Profane. Profound. Friendly. Devilish. Funny. Irreverent. And so's the book.

Note, though: This book is not for the faint of heart, and those who are looking for a simple, easy, moderate, and mundane read. It is for those who want to grab life by the neck and shake it for all its worth.

Rating:
Summary: Your duty as citizens...
Review: Chris Locke gets me moist.

Something about this man's extraordinarily vivid prose, salty vernacular and plangent intelligence just does it for me.

I'm freaking oozing here, just reading this thing. It's getting embarrassing.

The Bombast Transcripts will rip your head off and wee Veuve Clicquot down your neck.

It is your duty as a citizen of the world to buy this book right now - pay as much as you can for it and then forward all of your remaining money to Chris Locke immediately. The future health, freedom and sanity of the human race depends entirely on our ability to make Chris the richest human on the face of the planet, so he can buy up Microsoft, GE, Ford, Berkshire Hathaway - all of them - and bitchslap some sense into them before it's too late.

You know it makes sense.

Rating:
Summary: Not what you think....nor expect...
Review: I just finished Bombastic Transcripts, so if you have bothered to read this at all you're probably wondering so what did this monkeyboy think? Good question, honestly I am still pondering it mulling it over in my head and probably will for a bit. It is a quick read, it's an interesting read, but fundamentally it's not a light read. It takes a little time for digestion and pondering... I suspect I will read it again in the next month or two and reconsider, hell maybe throw this whole review out.

So here's my advice go buy the book, RageBoy needs the cash. If you like Tom Robbins, Hunter S Thompson, and the Gonzo style read away, you'll enjoy it. Perhaps you will find some stuff to digest, even without ingesting any substances on the Schedule I drug list.

If you didn't like Cluetrain Manifesto, Gonzo Marketing, or any Gonzo writing buy the book anyways, for the reasons stated above. Then hide the book in your bookshelf and wait until a really dark night, one in which your soul is screaming for mercy while the night rages in a Category 5 Hurricane and your only fresh reading material is a copy of Reader's Digest you have flipped through already 15 times. Your mind goes hungry, for something unanswered and unknown, and you will recall this book hiding in some dark corner of the bookshelf covered in dust and a three month old edition of Fast Company magazine. You will pull it off the shelf and find yourself drawn to the words expressed inside and the walls of illusion come crashing down inside your mind. Either that or you'll take a gun and pull a Hemmingway. Doesn't much matter to me, if you survive reading it you might even find yourself signing up for Entropy Gradient Reversals, but let me warn you the shotgun is alot quicker and painless, but it's not nearly as much fun.

Rating:
Summary: Billy likes this book
Review: I like how the words seathe with celebration. Rageboy's words leap to the eyes, swirl in the brain...and confuse, but amuse and seduce. I have reread a few times, and the closing is my top choice...Ok, so yeah, if you haven't red Chris' books, buy them NOW and do that...Laterz/Billy

Rating:
Summary: Genius at work. Chew on carpet while you wait.
Review: I only have one thing to say about this: "The Solution is Poetry". Excellent reading. Warning, you may not get it if you consider yourself too smart and significant.

Rating:
Summary: Genius at work. Chew on carpet while you wait.
Review: I only have one thing to say about this: "The Solution is Poetry". Excellent reading. Warning, you may not get it if you consider yourself too smart and significant.

Rating:
Summary: "You have GOT to READ this guy!!"
Review: That was my introduction just over a year ago to Entropy Gradient Reversals and the evil genius mind(s) behind it, Christopher Locke/RageBoy. From that first mind-blowing, breathless reading of his newsletter, I was alternately charmed, alarmed and disarmed by the decidedly unpretentious Chris Locke. His new book, the Bombast Transcripts, a collection of essays previously published to the Entropy Gradient Reversals mailing list, contains that first newsletter that caught my imagination, and so many more.

As I've read through this book, I have found myself again reacting to it in the visceral way that I had to become accustomed to as one of his faithful Valued Readers at EGR. While some may call him pompous and crass, I find him to be merely open and honest. Then again, I've always had a soft spot for intelligent, over-indulgent, semi-vulgar Don Quixotes. His chosen windmills are big business that don't have a clue (IBM et all, no small potatoes here) and, while a book about business practices would normally make my eyes glaze over while putting me in a semi-catatonic state, I find this book to be human and engaging at every turn. Each essay stands on it's own as either a rant or a screed, yet each could also be expanded into its own little book. Irreverent, engaging, transforming, contemplative, hilarious....and each page is more of the same.

While I read Locke's words, I get the feeling that I am a part of something much bigger and more important than anyone can guess, especially those that think the internet is nothing more than a collection of chatrooms and porn sites. No, I get the feeling I'm getting a glimpse of a creation, a rapturous inferno of truth and emotion, two key elements that, when exposed to each other under the heat of RageBoy's passion, cause a brilliant flash of evolution that could change the world as we know it. What a wonderful world that would be.

Idealistic? Maybe. Bombastic? Hardly. Evil Genius?? Indeed.

Rating:
Summary: Delicious Poetic Nonsense
Review: There are people who will swear by this book, there are people who will hate the book. There is no middle ground, i have checked and tried it out. Either you love it or you hate it. Poetic Nonsense in finesse and the finest form.

This will cure your longing of the cluetrain manifisto stuffs. Beautifully written and meaningless at some point, but you goona love it i guess, you gonna crave for more, and then subscribe the newsletter.

GO buy the book, and immerse yourself. I have read some part of the book more than 3 times. Amen.

Rating:
Summary: Beyond description
Review: This is the crash course in understanding the fundamentals of the necessity of change as seen through the eyes of the author, Christopher Locke. Everything you previously thought was lore is turned on its head in riotous fashion in The Bombast Transcripts. Each chapter takes apart some standard you thought was a given, an immutable and constant attribute of practically every aspect of life in the western world.

The best part is that Chris does it in so many different ways in one book. There's flat out ranting and there's cutting ridicule including interviews with himself, Rupert Murdoch and the famous one with Mr Ed. (Yes, the horse.)

Using those cliched critic's terms of rollercoaster ride or rollicking good yarn don't do this volume any justice whatsoever. In fact, this book defies any label you might care to ascribe.

In fact, I defy anyone to come up with a label for this book.

Rating:
Summary: repurposing free emails and selling it back to me
Review: Wow. Wow. Rageboy's ways are faster than America realizes. Blessed by more than a wit of words, Rageboy (AKA Chris Locke) steps three ahead in the market place. Who else would approach this strategy? Who else could get away with it?!? My prose aren't as jumpy as Locke's when it comes to surrounding your eyes and swirling your brain to confusion and delusion, so stop reading this review and read the book NOW!!!

...So yeah, buy Chris' book and read it NOW...Laterz/Billy