Wed., Aug. 23, 7 p.m., free, Big Jar Books, 55 N. Second St., 215-574-1650

It's totally appropriate that Ian F. Svenonius wrote The Psychic Soviet to read like some Manifesto-esque screed. In word and design, with its compact size and blaring pinkness, PsySo is the perfect hot pocket rant. And so apt for a man who has written 19 Soviet essays on things like Tinseltown's misogyny and nouvelle caste systems.

Svenonius has been biting at all manner of cultural flotsam since kicking it hardcore D.C.-style as a singer/shouter with The Nation of Ulysses. Unlike many a punk, though, Svenonius would eventually show his adoration of all things Chocolate City by making his eventual bands (like Make-Up and Weird War) more R&B-oriented and even punk-funk-jazzy on a zigaboo gospel tip. But whether slam dancing or disco prancing, Svenonius likes his liberationist texts anti-American in tone—mostly. Anarchistic radicalism sounds best when rambling hard and fast, and it reads pretty hot too.