WASTED DANDY IN THE TIKI PARLOUR

a tortured hound

an eye in flames

the bucking wind

the illest game

a lame pink Jag

the dancer's sterling silver teeth

the mark of a fake pagan

a crippled laser

TRUTH OR HAIR: THE LOSER'S GUIDE TO BACKSTABBIN'S

hanging with the black
babes in lucifer's tent:

anything can be
a surf board

he says.

Hey

I'm from the state
ICP made famous

I know everything
is possible.

FROM THE ARCHIVES: PARTY BOY'S DEPOSITION

We always got real drugged out in Ted's basement -- one trip rolling into the next until we were living a sticky & slow wood paneled alternate universe. Ted's mother, once a skinny teenager pregnant with the baby of a touring Sam Kinison, didn't know what to think of Ted. At age 11, he poured beer onto the ground & sniffed at it for hours. At 13, he set shit on fire behind the shed to prepare "in case we go to war." At 15, he started wetting down the front of his hair into a greasy swirl with the condensation from a chilled wine cooler.

Often, we found ourselves rolling on the shag of the basement carpet, my fingers wrapped tight around his 17-year-old neck, his hands wrestling & slapping against my arms. He didn't make a sound as I kneed him in the nuts, slapped his face hard on the right & went upstairs.

It was wrong for a mother be excited by her own son & his best friend wrestling. She was watching Days of Our Lives when I walked in.

I ♥ LA

“I used to think the Imperial Valley was hot, flat and boring,” he explained. “But I crossed over here, stayed in a hotel and realized the place was full of secrets. You’d see a building that looked run-down and boarded up, but inside it was a place of coolness, darkness, life. That seemed like such a great metaphor for this place.”

UNTITLED

UNTITLED
by B. Thomas Hunter

Ronnie had just dropped acid for the last time. Tomorrow he would take a job at the bank and his life would officially be over. Sitting in the back seat of his car in the Major Magic's parking lot, he
contemplated his existence and what he had accomplished in his 28 years on the planet. This thought was brief as soon as his blue jeans, once tight and form fitting, turned into a soaring eagle and left his body.

His jeans grew and grew until they covered him in a shadow filled with the screech of goblins and beasts man had yet to discover. Soon they melted away into a sea of rainbows.

Ronnie began to fly. Once heavy with his strapping 145 pound body, his legs were now free. Free to fly into the heavens, where he would play chess with Zeus. His arms soon turned into flippers, as was to be expected, and the air turned into water.

Ronnie awoke from his trip, dripping in sweat, covered in his own urine, ready to take a nap. Tomorrow he would take a job at the bank.

EDWARD & ALEX

EDWARD & ALEX

by B. Thomas Hunter

Van Halen came through this Dust Bowl town like the cyclone that destroyed half of Houston. I never saw such a sight. Spandex and young girls for as far as the eye could see. The reverberation from their amplifiers destroyed the top soil and damaged most of the downtown. Of course we'll rebuild, but the question is: After all we've seen, why would we want to?

KISS

KISS
by B. Thomas Hunter

Peter Criss has traveled through time seeking the cure for the disease that has ravished his band mates. The pox on the band KISS was due to a run in with a voodoo priest on their tour of South America, and the cure was hidden far away at the dawn of time. As the cat-man traveled through time he pondered his own existence, and what he wanted to do with the rest of his life, his life after KISS.

“I could become a scientist,” he said aloud in the vortex that surrounded him, his face distorted by the wave of time that overcame his body. “Gene is always telling me that I’m really creative and I loved science as a kid... I bet I’d be a good scientist.” As Peter rambled on, he did not noticed that he had left the vortex. His feet were now firmly planted some where in the ancient past. But where?

 “Computer -- run an analysis on this time period,” Peter said firmly into his wrist computer that also served as a virtual tour guide to the slipstream of time. This wasn’t a KISS invention; it actually had belonged to Blue Oyster Cult.

“Sir, the time period is…”
“Repeat that computer”
“Sir, the time is…”
“Computer, what time am I in?”
“Sir, the time analysis is incomplete. I don’t show you being in any recognizable time period.”
“Dammit,” Peter snapped back.

If he could not trace his whereabouts, then he didn’t know where to go to find the cure. He looked at the ground, there had to be a clue somewhere. In the distance he saw what he thought resembled a city.

IRAG WAR MAKES WORLD MORE DANGEROUS

IRAG WAR MAKES WORLD MORE DANGEROUS
by B. Thomas Hunter

never make me go to rehab.
that would sux.

I'M PUTTING OUT A HIT ON YOU

"Sometimes some fucked up fate shit aligns and the planets are fucked in some beautiful way and that's how people meet and hang out, etc."

"You'd think for all the cool shit, people & drugs the Stones did, they'd have made way more really good music. But they only had that one album*."

"This is like the Wii of folk-y crust punk."


*Their Satanic Majesties Request

THE FUTURE or PERVERT'S DISPOSITION or THE COKE MINES OF FRANCE

1.
 "Good evening, gentlemen. Welcome to Man's Ruin. Please check your bad vibes with the clerk, have a drink, and don't forget to tip your server."

The doorman took our coats, leaving us in the anteroom with a man named Little Jelly. The club was warm, 80 or 90 degrees, befitting the red felt of the walls. We bowed to Little Jelly as he placed moodstones around our necks. Ezra, Peter, Micha & Ernesto's stones immediately turned deep green or a pale turquoise. As it often happens, mine turned deep red. Ernesto reached into his satchel and produced a blue gel to fit over the stone.

 "Jesus Christ, Franco -- cover your stone before someone sees you. You know, you'll be lucky if someone doesn't check it during the night anyway."

 The doorman returned and ran his fingertips across the edge of my lapel & pinched the fabric.

2.
 "Oh shit," she said, "her show is on." I looked to the ceiling tile I imagined her mother was just above. Marcia was down to just her bra and skirt when her the pounding began. She shut off the boombox, gathered up her clothes, and I'd have "Paul Revere" and "Brass Monkey" stuck in my head all day. "We should get out of here."

 My year was three articles of clothing away from being made.

3.
A $100 dollar bill peppered with cocaine arrived in the mail. The note: "I stood in the green-gray haze of the mold light & it was everywhere...!" It meant the harvest was good but we were over. When my boss heard, he tried to pimp me on any babe that came in. It was only when I burned the mood ring that I got off.

GHOSTS OF FOOD CAME BACK TO HAUNT YOU

1.
No, what I'm actually concerned with is the death of sincerity. Plus or minus plants. The efficiency of soul musicians. The cowbell's reminder.

A revisionist history had never been so beautiful. We, with coffee mugs in one hand & joints in the other, wondered just what evil was. The fangs of a deadly serpent spray apple juice. The mind was willing but the body couldn't stop thinking about some crazy shit it had read earlier.

They were all about the procurement of snacks but back at the apartment she watched him jerk off from the next couch cushion. It was not the strangest thing happening above a 7-11 that day. Sex with the professor is always out-of-the-body.

The forceful putting of the Mosrite string.
The easy buy of the drugged informer.

2.
The dog did not leap but instead fell under the table. It smelled like beer and it was certainly not going to be driving anywhere that night. The cats stood on their hind legs. "We must tell Rhonda about what happened tonight."  "Yes, but let them have their fun. They're already drunk & I'm hoping one of them takes their clothes off."  Someone puts on "Echoes" from Meddle.  "Forget it. Let's tell her now."

3.
The neck of the mask was soaking wet. He tapped it with two fingers. If it was blood, he couldn't tell. Why had he had picked red for the costume in the first place? He couldn't recall.

Turning to face the lake, he saw that everything had taken a soft blue hue. He was reminded of sitting on the beach with eyes closed, then opening them to see everything was a new, slightly blue version of the old everything. He kneeled, a sliver of pain in the gravel, then numbness.

The sensation of pins was fast & unreal, shooting through his limbs and dying out. The blue was darkening entirely past purple & turning black. Shadows took mass, obscuring the edge of his vision like the spiraled closing of a camera's shutter. Lying on his side, he folded his arms to keep the chill at bay, and said something as the waterfront became consumed with darkness.

Three bros skated by the body, laughing. The city planted a victory garden in the spot.

My sister unplugged the phone: "How about a moment of silence for a fallen hero?" Our father threw a shoe at her. "You pick some berries, you leave some behind!"

THE ARCANE GHETTO or SNOOZING & LOSING AT THE LATIN BATH

"Come now, this is a beautiful chair -- just as the Amish intended!"

SCUD MOUNTAIN BOYS

SCUD MOUNTAIN BOYS

by D.C. Berman

This time of year the light comes through the pines in flat beams and spark points, glancing off the frost that decorates the grounds of the light-studded medical cities. For a six-sided record I feel like I'm back in the haunted Piedmonts, a decorated major in the Japanese Inner Space Program, renewing my vow to bear down on the truth even if there is none for a hundredth time.

After the exodus of the Calm Reflectors I had started seeing the Scud Mountain Boys around town with their Baltimore haircuts, the guitarist's guitarist carrying his 1873 "trapdoor" Springfield rifle, the progeny of the muzzle-loading French Charleville muskets that had whacked so many Redcoats around these hills. I had heard it was the band's tradition to lay dinner on the table uncooked and then set the table on fire.

I was out for a walk with Mr. Fiddler the other night, when he turned to me and said, "this is the time of year when the region is at peace with itself." I turned to laugh in his face when the impulse subsided. He had been right of course. I'd already seen it happen in the slide projector's cone of lit dust: the November sky hovering over lives of dark employment like a televised clay bank, breech-loaders replacing muzzle-loaders, crows wired to the sky like marred pixels, portraits cubed into accordioned life while every single object of perception waited for us in the air conditioning. Yes, tennis crested in the seventies, killing Eddie Money and the last of the Holmby Hills Rat Pack, but how many times did we have to witness the L.A. fireplaces reflected in L.A. wineglasses before it ended?

You meet these suburban kids with Biblical names, but there are walls behind their eyes, strange mathematical mountains at whose base we sit playing our native keyboards and rinsing our teeth with digital snow. I'm starting to believe that the inscription above the portal describes this side, not the next.

Few people know that George Washington's favorite song was "The Darby Ram," or stop to think that before he was a statue he scratched his weld, got the hiccups, and danced alone in his room. All the "human things." He must have been scared when he fought in the woods, hiding in the dormant Christmas trees, his hand gripping the black walnut musket stock.

In those times and these we turn to the pacifics of a Gamelan orchestra for transport and release. We stand by the hind legs of a K car, listening to the new city cassettes, searching for some sign of human residence here beneath the justifiably uncelebrated Massachusetts sky.

This treasured early work brought calm forecasts and sad peace to our house. I hope you take it with you when you go.

COMEUPPANCE

Dang! The future looks brilliant, I'll tell you what. And this is just the half of it. Flyers to come!

7 August 2009

Ann Arbor Soul Club

Brad Hales & Breck Bunce play the very finest Northern Soul, r&b, modern, Motown, etc. you will never hear on the radio or pretty much anywhere else,. Always, always a good time. Robert Wells returns in September!

Blind Pig / 208 S. First, A2 / 9:30PM / $5

• Ann Arbor Soul Club on Facebook - www.facebook.com/pages/Ann-Arbor-Soul-Club/59084941493
• Ann Arbor Soul Club on MySpace - www.myspace.com/a2soulclub

9 August 2009

Our Brother the Native / Psychic Reality / Royalchord / Dark Matter DJs

Fatcat artists, Our Brother the Native, play with SF's awesome Psychic Reality (starring Ms. Leyna Noel, a member of Mirah's touring band) and Royalchord. The Dark Matter doods, Aaron Lindell & myself, will play records inbetween.

Yellow Barn / 416 W. Huron, A2 / 8PM / $5

• Our Brother the Native - www.obtn.biz
• Our Brother the Native on MySpace - www.myspace.com/ourbrotherthenative
• Psychic Reality on MySpace - www.myspace.com/realitypsychic
• Royalchord on MySpace - www.myspace.com/royalchordroyalchord

11 August 2009

Calvin Johnson & Hive Dwellers / City Center / Tyvek

The excellent new band from K Records head Calvin Johnson makes its Ann Arbor debut w/ Fred Thomas & Ryan Howard's City Center and the always great/sloppy Tyvek. I think Brett Lyman & myself will be playing records inbetween/after.

Yellow Barn / 416 W. Huron, A2 / 8PM / $5 / ALL AGES

• Calvin Johnson - www.krecs.com
• City Center on Blogspot - citycenternyc.blogspot.com
• City Center on MySpace - www.myspace.com/citycenternyc
• Tyvek on MySpace - www.myspace.com/tyvekmusic

SICK OF SICKNESS, HOORAY FOR POSITIVITY

This is it: the summer's lull. The slow part. The long part.

But I think it only feels like it's not totally great. Maybe I just have my own thing going on. Whatever the case, I'm happy to report that the response was pretty good to my first solo spoken word thing. The repertoire was basically a 'greatest hits' of this blog peppered with snarky comments & gross facial expressions. Nice! I think the soundman shut the monitors off within minutes of me starting which wasn't so nice.

Some recent picks:

Open Strings: Early Virtuoso Recordings From The Middle East, And New Responses (Honest Jon's). "A dazzling selection of virtuoso string-playing from Egypt, Iran, Iraq and Turkey, all recorded in the 1920s, and pretty much unheard ever since. In addition, Open Strings includes a disc of newly-commissioned responses to the themes in this music by underground luminaries." The first disc was so killer it killed the second disc which I thought I'd like more.

Blues Control - Local Flavor (Siltbreeze). "While past releases have been beauteous extrapolations into the miasmic core of psychedelia and billowing fog of ambient space, Local Flavor is the one where all the chickens have come home to roost." This is such a natural jam. Really blew my mind when I put it on the first time. From the hot, murky mix to the fine-tuned sequencing, it's so dang good.

Also excellent is the new Explode Into Colors 7" ("Devastating debut mastered for immense bass response...") on M'Lady's & the G Spots compilation ("The Spacey Folk Electro-Horror Sounds of the Studio G Library") on Trunk. I'm also slowly devouring the David Berman cartoon book.

I'd like to talk more about some shit coming out but I gotta' scramble!

MYSTERIOUS TRANSMISSION FROM NICK GEORGE/ZONE DOGS

I'll let you all know a little secret about tomorrow's show.

if you come at 5pm... you'll get a chance to chill a little bit harder than everyone who comes later... and you will be able to

HELL OF SUMMER

a shock of hair on the curb

of the 6900 block of Delmar

a grey flame

tanlines of copper

a corduroy knee

pressed into shag

wet with milk.

INTERVIEW: B. THOMAS HUNTER

Q: So, tell me a few basics about your new film. Apparently it's a sequel to an as-yet-unreleased film about models & modeling.

A: While it doesn't have a title yet, the film(s) are complete. Shot in 35mm black & white, it follows one of the models from the first film, Anna, as she makes the rounds in Europe.

Q: Tell me about Anna.

A: She is the child of a War Bride. Half-American/French, Half-Vietkong.

Q: This is unlike your other films, which were composed primarily of risqué youtube clips paired with peculiar music & found recordings to dichotomous -- and often humorous -- effect.

A: Yes, it's in a classic documentary style --

Q: Cinema vérité?

A: Yes, and concerns the racist underbelly of the modeling world. Have you seen Truth or Dare?

Q: Yes, of course!

A: Think Truth or Dare but with attractive people and not as much yelling or aging pop-stars attemping to rap.

SEE ALSO http://www.youtube.com/user/badmouthrising

A DAY OFF FROM GOING TO RAVES

He found the wolf's head

in the toilet

and began vomiting

a forest of black bile

blacker than oil.

The wizard turns his back

to the baseball diamond,

"There's nothing I can do here."

"All these manic-depressive kids

are great artists.

And they're in good company:

Orson Welles was bipolar.

Or... no, he wasn't.

I'm trying to think of

who I'm trying to think of."

HOTT LAVA COMETH

COUNTRY MUSIC

Late last night, a block from home at the end of a short walk with Chacho, I heard what at first sounded like cats fighting. Focusing on the sound, it became apparent that it was not a cat brawl, but two sounds that changed as I moved toward them. Chacho picked up on the sound and began racing toward it.

The pitch and timbre of the first sound was like a cat's cry but sporadic like the clucking of a chicken. The second sound was repetitive, like the same note repeating itself for different lengths, the pitch raising or lowering at the start and end of the note. The timbre of the second sound moved between a human scream and an analog synthesizer. It really sounded like a shriek one moment, music the next, and then back to a shriek.

When Chacho and I were close to the source, I scooped him up and waited. At this point, it was quite loud; I couldn't believe nobody in the neighborhood was out and wondering what the fuck was going on. Then I remembered it was after 2am.

Across the street from where I thought the sound was coming from, I stepped into the light of a street lamp and the sound stopped. Chacho and I headed back to the house, the sound did not start again.

BEAN STAIN

In the midst of taking a leak at the Lager House, a fellow patted me on the back to get my attention. "That was ART. It's awesome to see someone put their ART out there. It was spoken word art, kind of goth -- well, '80s goth, then it was a hardcore thing, then it was a punk thing. But it was art and it was so cool to see it out there. I love it when people put their art out there." And then he shook my hand, which I had not yet washed. It was hilarious & sweet. Here's the piece I read during the Skate Laws set:

A hot dog stand burning in a parking lot and you never felt such heat in your life. "My tits are burning," you thought and they were hot. And your thighs felt very hot. Your face was tanned. Eventually the car stopped smelling like burnt beef but the clothes from that night had been thrown out after a single washing.

When it became too hot, you walked back to your car and slowly, very slowly, edged around the fire and headed home. You thought you heard an explosion but later convinced yourself that you imagined that part.

The paper never ran a story on the fire. Someone did not want that hot dog stand there.

NIGHT MUSIC

You enter the shallow ravine and he follows. Along the floor of the ravine, the leaves of small plants are visibly wet. Urine, you think, as it is not raining and you have to urinate. You realize you should be watching the floor of the ravine as he is barefoot. You see no glass but much garbage, mostly plastic, and much detritus.

You would sit for a moment but there is no stool or chair to speak of. Since you were last there, all objects serving as seats have been removed. He is not interested in sitting and would become anxious.

Looking back to the top of the shallow ravine, you spot the lithe, slender frame of a black cat as it moves through tall grass. You leave the ravine but there is no black cat.

Searching the surrounding brush, you come to the conclusion that what you saw was an illusion. You strain to remember the last time you saw one so perfect and you remember. It was years ago; the circumstances and illusion are completely different.

He follows you out of the ravine and you both sit. He is not anxious but you are unsettled and, for the duration of one minute, your stomach feels ill. The minute feels very long and you wait for the nausea to pass and it does.

You are back inside, still unsettled. He moves to the floor behind the couch and lies down, placing as much of his body as close to the wood as possible. It is cool, you think, the floor must be cooler than the room.

You put on some music and begin to write about the illusion but the mood is wrong. The records ends and now she is here.

THE LIVING ROOM BUG

Here at Charles Atlas By The Fire Pit, entries of fiction should outnumber the day-to-day journal-y shit but since it's more "work," it's easier to crap out on. When it felt like I was falling behind in my creative duties, May successfully became the month of "lies" (save for that amazing gospel video). It's a super-busy time 'round these parts and I haven't devoted the time to writing that I'd like. Things are amazing -- organizing Hott Lava with Erin is extremely fulfilling and fun -- but I would change that one thing.

And as easy as whipping off this-is-what-I'm-up-to entries might be, in some ways I'm still slightly haunted by the snarky comments a former roommate anonymously posted to an old journal. He pretty clearly thought I was an asshole but couldn't have been more of a pussy about it. How does this shit get under my skin?

At any rate, James Murphy of DFA/LCD Soundsystem, an occasional asshole in his own right, ripped :

"When you're a kid, you have this impression that things like respected literary novels are going to be like Merchant-Ivory movies, full of precious subtle things. But when you actually read books, you realize that shit's really fucked-up and dark and much more complex than your childish notion of what art is going to be like."

Yeah, man, let's get back to darkness. I'm about to throw on a Burzum record. Motel money murder madness -- let's change the mood from glad to sadness.

COME OUT TONIGHT

COME OUT TONIGHT
by Steven Jesse Bernstein

Forecast in chrome and plastic, tyrants breathing out oil, slavery, planet hunger versions of Jackie-O. Sherry, Sherry baby, won't you come out tonight.

And the stars whisper like old blood at the edges of the body of night. She stood with one hand on the phone for four hours, poised as only a few seconds had passed. I watched her through the crack between the shade and the sill. She waited for a forecast in human trembling, together with other important women.

Come, come, come out tonight.

The world suffers for her. The clock hurries like a terrified animal and stops, dribbling saliva. She is eating chicken pie and bubble gum. For a month the Luftewaffe lived on raisins, same with the French after the war. Jackie-O received fresh oranges from John Kennedy. Silly girl!

She cannot put down the telephone reciever. She is waiting to receive my body of work. She wants to take it into her ear. A modeled flush builds under her cheeks. She eats Christmas candy while she waits. The telephone rings and rings. I am not at home. I am with Jackie-O. We are eating oranges from the President.

We are alone on the roof of a Park Avenue penthouse. Picture of Marilyn Monroe in my back pocket, molded by heat and sweat to the shape of my buttocks. You are gripping the phone, smiling, eating candy, crying, "I am with the important women now." I am secretly an
important man.

Hang up the phone, I can't dance with you anymore. Go to your freezer and get a popsicle. Go to your TV. Turn on your TV. You will see me and Jackie-O. She will be taking it in the ear, my body of work.

In the planetarium, you will receive a forecast: "I will always be more important than you. You will never be important enough. You will never be on the repent end of slavery, never be the one to wield hunger against humanity. Heaven will never be an extension of your body. Your body will always belong to someone else."

The picture of Marilyn Monroe flutters across the roof, steaming, shaped like me, shaped like my ass. The sky is filled with oranges during the war. We eat them. The President is alone in a room. He is unimportant. As we eat his oranges the sky grows blacker. The moon ripens and turns red. It rots and is swallowed by the darkness. You are still by the phone. It is ringing and ringing, dead.

Sherry, Sherry baby, won't you come out tonight.

It is completely dark. The earth freezes. You put down the receiver and go to the window.

Come, come, come out tonight.

MEDDLING ASSHOLE / NEW AGE NOODLES or BLOOD ON THE STRUDEL

Q: Did you enjoy boxing?
A: Does the axeman enjoy his job? Does a child grow up wishing to be an executioner?

Q: What did you think when they introduced the nude number girls?
A: I enjoyed it.

BLEACHED FLAG: WHAT YOU & I DON'T KNOW ABOUT THIS ROOM

Against the lime green wall of her bedroom he leaned, holding his gut which contained a bleeding hole that would not stop poisoning, smoke crept from his tongue:

shaving a few numbers off the board

like a hot knife cutting through a melon

"It's a favor to a friend

who got me out of a bad spot

before i got into a bad spot

again,"

he said.

"But the spot I'm in now

is my bad spot -

I own this.

No part of it is her's."

He paused, continued:

"With enough LSD,

you & your friends

will

eventually

become

psychic.

She tried to own that

too."

DELAY, LINGER & WAIT

No,
I am not talking
about efficiency,
the efficiency
of soul musicians.

Not
when there are gunmen
shaking their barrels,
beautiful mamas crying out
of second story windows.

Now
the B.O. counter
needs some manning
because deodorant
does not sell itself!

MP3 FOREST JUZIUK - Elementary Crapwater

DUMPING SPOT

She cried & cried

while carving the pumpkin,

like it was a basketball-sized onion. 

With cow tongue,

it was a very realistic Gene Simmons.

She put on her police uniform,

her real police uniform,

and drove

to the bagel shop

listening to old blues.

"Yeah,

this is pretty spooky.

All these guys are ghosts."

The bagel shop was covered

in T.P.

"Help us!

We can't get out!"

Yelled the employees.

HIGH ON RBC!

We must find a way to talk about what happened. As you weren't there, it won't be as difficult for you. For myself, on the other hand, I can barely find the words to discuss it, save for early details.

Two nights ago, Marco muted the television and cranked on the Bose. Without warning or introduction, he began rapping over a Sublime CD. It was what I refer to as the "complete opposite of comfortable." Some have said that describing it as "uncomfortable" would do but I don't think that's polar enough.

Between songs, he shouted: "Don't stop dancing until your heart blows up and blood comes out of your nose! Dance like you can't wake up because sleep feels so good but you're dancing in your sleep!"

HE WAS HIGH ON RED BULL COLA.

HOLY SMOKES

Rev Louis overstreet - Working on the building
by le-pere-de-colombe

IF YOU'RE UP THERE, DON, THE NEIGHBORS & I WANT TO KNOW WHAT HAPPENED TO THE DEER!

At first, we didn't understand. No one understood.

And I don't mean that in a pretentious way. You see, I had never heard of one before. Not a single person in the neighborhood had heard of... well....

One night, about a year ago, Don was late. Very late. He never missed dinner and the children were worried -- so was I! It was after 9pm when we heard him pull into the drive, chuckling like a joker! I thought he was drunk and went to meet him outside before the kids could see. He shooed me back in to prepare a bed of "old snot rags and what not" in a corner of the basement. I was confused but did as told. I had just finished making it and come upstairs when he walked in the front door holding a length of twine fashioned into a leash. On the other end of the leash was what he called a "miniature velour deer."

Now, Don was a beatnik when we started dating. This was something else.

The deer was beautiful. It didn't make sounds and was kind of retarded; it only responded to clicks and whistles. And it was soft. So soft! The kids absolutely loved it. Although, they were kids, and they lost interest in it after a couple months. Don, on the otherhand, God... he would sit in his chair and stroke it for hours, chuckling like the night be brought it home.

It didn't seem to age any and it certainly didn't grow -- it was a miniature deer! But, Don didn't seem to age either. Ten years went by and he didn't have a single grey hair to show even though things had long been sour at the office and our marriage wasn't... well, it wasn't getting better. I had plenty of grey though -- wrinkles too! Anyhow, when I came home and found Don in his chair, his mouth hanging open... boy, he looked so old. Older than when I'd left the house that morning. Much, much older.

There was no trace of the deer. There was not a single velour hair in the entire house. I imagine someone saw Don walking the deer and fell in love with it. Perhaps the theif didn't expect anyone to be home but was armed with an aging ray just in case. I doubt poor Don was much of a match. If that is what happened, I kind of wish I'd seen it.

Sometimes, in the basement, by the pile of snot rags that was once the miniature velour deer's bed (I never cleaned it up!), well, I swear I can hear that queer chuckling.

WE'RE ONLY IN IT FOR THE GRAVY

INTERVIEWER: "What do you think this piece is about?"

MARCIA: "He mind, he stuff and what he think about. It could be his chaos... or whatever."

THE ROOM WAS TIPPING

Several pages into this Kid Congo Powers oral history thing, I'm beginning to get some of that reading-on-the-internet-for-too-long feeling. Woof. Still, his most recent album, Dracula Boots, is so fucking good that I feel somewhat obligated to finish this thing tonight. A standout quote from his tenure in The Cramps:

"If something bad was happening, Ivy would snap her fingers and point and we’d have to go beat someone up. It was like being in a gang - like a juvenile delinquent band… and it was great! It was my juvenile delinquent fantasy come true."

Watching people go crazy over Congo's "Black Santa" and "Waterfall" by Quintron last night was really gratifying. At one of the last Dark Matters, I watched every person dancing leave the room the minute a surf track came on. These jams are close to my heart and it's painful to kill a dancefloor. Last night, the vibes were top notch and nobody blinked when the evening ended with "Exploration in Terror"* ("The Dark Matter Theme" Geoff called it).

It seems like Brian rarely comes to gigs so when he texted me beforehand to say that he was coming, that this Dark Matter had a "magic vibe to it," I was really pleased. A little over 500 people stopped through over the course of the night. Unbelievable. Erin, Mike Jones and Maggie were slammed at the bar; Galloway and Mike were killer doormen; Aaron, Raj and Geoff all slayed. It'll be a welcome return to Elks next month.

* Ventures in Space was the first LP I owned -- the copy I play out is the very same one I got back in junior high.

PC REBELLION

FROM THE ARCHIVES: (EXCERPT FROM MOBY DICK BY HERMAN MELVILLE)

"Put down your guns and give me all your stuff... or whatever. Put it all on the ground..." said the burglar. "Do it!"

The sun beat down on the men.

"'Now!" he shouted.

The policemen were too emasculated to make the arrest and unholstered.

WHAT IS TRUTH, REALLY?!?!?

So, I've been thinking about trying Red Bull Cola (RBC) for some time now but Red Bull is not something I've ever really liked (nor is cola now that I think about it). A couple weeks back, I bought a can of RBC along with a can of Purple Stuff on the way to Easter dinner, drank the Purple Stuff and forgot the can of RBC at Erin's mom's house. It's probably still there and I'll probably still drink it despite having just finished my first can which gets an emphatic two thumbs down! [Note: Red Bull Cola has nothing to do with the Tall Man.]

Erin and I have listened to Quintron every day since the show and I'm thinking about devoting an entire week to nothing but the Born Bad compilation series (subtitled: Songs The Cramps Taught Us). Someone asked me to play a show but I had to turn it down which stinks but got me thinking about putting a set together. A musical set, that is. Lots to be inspired by right now. 

Speaking of sets, here's a half-hour DJ set from last Saturday's Permanent Green Light. Thanks to Robert Wells for the second Donald Byrd track.

MP3 FOREST JUZIUK - Live @ Permanent Green Light

HONEST TRUTH

Disseminating this beautiful piece of work is doing the world a big ol' favor. Please enjoy. Repeat often.

DAP REDUX (FOR SHELLEY)

I take it back: the 10+ minutes of Psychedelic Horseshit screwing around with the sound guy should not have been the performance. It shoulda' been those 10+ minutes plus the eight-minute 'this is our last song but guess what we're going to drag it way the fuck out ha ha ha' breakdown (it's funny cuz I did guess! and I bet everybody else did too!). It wasn't free jazz -- it was free horseshit. It was the icing on the horseshit cake -- it may be the sweet part of the cake but it's still horseshit! I could go on!

Anyway, after P.H. completely decimated attendance, everybody came back to see Miss Pussycat's laugh-out-loud puppet show. It was shorter than expected but good. Quintron was everything I hoped for and the song choice was spot-on. Erin and I are incredibly anxious to visit Spellcaster Lodge as methinks that's the most choicest of spots to witness the damage/brilliance.

DAP

Last night, Psychedelic Horseshit opened for Quintron & Miss Pussycat at the Old Miami with what was one of the most amazing -- in its own way -- shows I've witnessed. Following 10+ minutes of screwing around with the sound guy (this should have been the performance!!), they successfully cleared the floor of all attendees save for Shelley. Alone and mere inches from the stage, Shelley busted out what was left of her Pita Kabob "sandwich wrap" and heartily chowed down. These doods are the lowest point on a measuring stick; your band will sound awesome next to them, eating a wrap next to the stage while they play will prove more entertaining.

Detroit has amazing powers. It's difficult not to feel invigorated in some way there, difficult not to feel like you could really let your freak flag fly. It's strange to me how many people see ugliness in Detroit.

MP3 FOREST JUZIUK - Grease Fantasy

SHIT LIST?????

Woof. "Satellite of Love." What a grooveless, herky-jerky piece of you-know-what. This isn't that. This is a mix I made for Erin last year, probably a few days before she left for Europe. You will find no Lou Reed on it anywhere. It's definitely more on the garage tip from what I can remember.

MP3 FOREST JUZIUK - Everything All This Yeah (For ENB) [right-click & DL, plz!]

LIPOSUX'D BUTT

Ohhhhhhhhhh shit! It's been a couple weeks since we last spoke, friend, and daddy hopes this finds you well. Last night, Raj & I DJ'd a German dining hall with no dimmer switch on the lights and it was bad in many ways. I can't figure out how I was strangely (sadly?) totally on, if not in my selections then at least my tt-skills (perhaps the light? the lack of inebriation?). Anyway, Erin, our friend Claire, and I scoped out spots for the next Dark Matter and it looks like we'll be in the old Leopold Bros space. Strange but cool, the place looks great without all the giant lame-oid picnic tables in there.

SF was a blast, Axelrod or not. My former underling, Lloyd, played host as we ran back and forth between Oakland (two thumbs up to Groove Yard) and San Fran (three thumbs up to Aquarius), doing impromptu DJ sets at his awesome apartment (1 of 2 mixes I did will find a home here post-haste), and forgetting records to play at a party in SF. Damon P was a true champ for hooking me up with... everything. Revolver USA let me scope out their warehouse which was overwhelming/exhilarating. All of it was so nice but my sleep schedule is fucked.

OVERTHROW COCKROCK AND IDOLIZE YOUR GIRLFRIEND

"What is Dr. Pepper if not some peculiar strain of root beer?" Terrence paused and stared at his last cigarette, willing it to grow. It was now almost gone and the process of smoking it was barely a specter in his mind. He continued:

"The world is composed of a beauty so wild, it's not difficult to imagine endless varieties of root beer, each flavorful and complex in its own way." Strains of an opera rose from the bushes. Terrence tried to relax his erection.

Nearby, Penny sat on the police bench with a pained look on her face. Terrence approached her.

"I'm sorry for not paying attention," she said. "I had another... vision."

"Tell me about your vision," said Terrence.

"It was the future. It was hip to have acne." Penny paused, removing a cassette from her Walkman and flipping it. "Sorry. Black mass."

"Go on, little one, go on" said Terrence.

"The trees looked different... but not too strange. Yet, all were concerned about the environment. Someone said, 'We have to begin thinking about what kind carbon footjob we're leaving for future generations.'"

"What else, Penny?"

"I remember a salad bar of locusts. I remember a lot of hoopla about an unearthed Doors demo with the working title 'The Crystal Pimp.'"

Terrence was silent. Shit, he thought, she thinks about way more interesting things than I.

TEN WINTERS (BECAUSE I MISSED OUR ANNIVERSARY)

you saw your nature

and you turned your back

like someone else I know

DAG! FUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUCK!

The most amazing girl in the world, Erin Nicole, bought me a roundtrip plane ticket to San Francisco so Lloyd and I could drive to LA for the David Axelrod show. Sir Wells just informed me that the show has been canceled. Egad. I'm crushed and bumming hard. Nonetheless, I shall soldier on with what will most definitely be an excellent trip to Cali... Cali... Cali. Can't wait. But dang -- it woulda' been great to see THE AXE!!

Moving on, clusterflock.org just threw up the most information I've seen yet about the upcoming issue of Minus Times although Drag City mentioned it in their news section as well.

Oof... I'm hurtin' about the Axelrod news. Oof -- it smarts!! Perhaps this unreleased Six Organs album will pick me up. Hm.

LOGGING ACCIDENT OR WAS IT???

"The register started singing this kind of ching-ching-ching song and that's when I knew the business was successful," he said. "That's the money song!"

The street assassins took a break to chow down on some turkey sammiches their honeys made. "I think I really love those gals," said Parker. Martin was enraged: "What the fuck are you talking about?! That kind of talk will mess you up. We're street assassins -- WE DON'T THINK!"

"We don't want to give up this spot," she said, pointing to a 1' square patch of grass in the crowded field. "It's for God in case he wants to come to Bonnaroo this year. If he's not here by Radiohead, someone can have it."

"It still feels like rejection each time a new booklet of Food Stamps shows up." His colleague interjected, "And I'm bothered there aren't Drink Stamps! Haha. Tell the government that I'm waiting!"

"Please, Mr. Edison, when you're through with those bagels and pepperoni, could you tell me more about this fascinating electric candle? It really... excites me," said Missy. "Why Missy, I'd heard that you were a bit of a starrrrrfucker."

FLU DRAFT

"Man... women want one thing: a wedding ring and then the rest of the world." Bart stopped blowing on his didgeridoo. Colby took off his beanie and scratched at the base of his hair wrap.

OVERHEARD: "I put a lizard in my mouth to get high but it started licking the roof of my mouth and bugging like it took a 'lude."

The angels stopped their singing and put their lutes down. A big gang of them went and hung out by the railroad tracks until the shit blew over.

Rogue "prince" kidnaps real princess and brings her back to cave lair: "Check this shit. It ain't King Arthur but we have some killer quaaludes -- way better than that shit he has."

CLASSIFIEDS: Looking for a killer thrash band to rent practice space behind A Wrinkle in Pizza. Call Lassiter for more info. Must have chops. ***-****

THE PEOPLE IN ME or THIS DAY 29 YEARS AGO or A NICER WOMAN

With one more day left to read D.C. Berman's "Self-Portrait at 28" while still 28, I've decided to put it off once more.

Wellllll... I did read "Self-Portrait at 28" twice in the last year. Once, bit by bit over the course of a few months beginning with a verse read online in April or May during my trip to Europe. I don't remember when I finished it but it was months before the second time when I read it in one sitting, kinda' drunk, late one night.

Actually, about that trip to Europe: it took so long to digest the experience that I've been at a loss as to what can/should be said about it until now. The best part of the entire trip was walking way way way way out to the edge of a cliff with my best girl and best friend, Erin Nicole. It was miles and miles of red Maltese dirt, sleeves rolled up, talking talking talking with the sun beating down hard but a big bottle of water and a bag of chicken-flavored chips keeping us going. It took hours upon hours and was exactly what I wanted to be doing with the one person I wanted to be with and I knew it at the time too, which is lucky because most people don't know how great something is until it's long gone.

That was the best part, to be sure, but I also marveled at the world there at the edge of the cliff, with the White Temple on one side and a couple smoking a j-bone on the other. The ocean (the Mediterranean Sea, actually) took up the entirety of my vision and I wanted to piss off the cliff like I didn't give a shit but was so worried someone might come up and push me off that I went back to our hotel afterward and dreamed about falling off the cliff over and over again, doing that falling-in-dream-leg-kick-thing (this was terrible). Later, back in Paris, I lied about pissing off the cliff anyway. But I digress....

Hm... trying to find my train of thought again. I wanted to write about how stupid I felt reading that poem whilst drunk, how off the experience was for something that always elicits an intense emotional response from me. I'd like to write about choosing to be sober but I feel really happy and in love with life and full of gratitude for my girlfriend who I love so damn much, Chacho, Mavis and Peta and want to pay a certain attention to that right now. It might seem a little precious or something but I've felt so bad for so long in so many ways and paid attention to too many other, false things when my immediate little family is amazing and I'm so fucking fortunate to have what I do.

Hobbling to work on a bum knee, even that felt so good out in that sun.

BLUE WATER BRIDGE TELEPATHIC BLUES

Wanting to look through some of my zines from the 1980s, it seemed serendipitous when I reached for Unreal Mindwarp Funnies and Unsound #5 was right below it. Flipping through the review section to get a feel for the era and content of Unsound, I came across this review I either didn't notice before or completely forgot about for John (North) Wright and the Young Losers - Welcome 1984:

"Another tape to add to my collection of John Wright brilliance. This man writes incredible lyrics and expresses feelings so clearly, it becomes an enlightening experience. This tape features John with members of Hunting Lodge and the combination of vocals, lyrics, and music creates a whole new type of sound, no category for this tape. Look forward to the next issue of Unsound, an interview with John Wright."

Several years back, I issued John North Wright's final album, White Widow. When John passed, my sister and I inherited a TON of his work -- books, tape reels, BETA tapes, 4-track cassettes, scripts, etc. -- and this has my appetite whetted to archive everything and track down whatever interviews and reviews I can. Check this tho':

• John Wright and the Young Losers - Welcome 1984 on Discogs
• John North Wright on MySpace
  

GOODBYE SWEATPANTS

Woof -- my Skate Laws set at The Moustashow is fast approaching and I'm starting to turn into a nervous nelly. People shouldn't see me in this state -- it's bad news. And since I've been on the wagon for a minute now (wellllll, for the most part), methinks I won't be imbibing beforehand. The ol' "liquid courage" thing, y'know. Anyway, here's the cover of my new book:

More info on that to come. Also, an Athens paper just hyped [the actually 48-page] Mr. Wiltoncroft just over yonder: 'Mr. Wiltoncroft' seedy, but benign. Interesting article title.

I've been listening to a whole lot of Golden lately. Just so damn good. Oh yeah -- I forgot to mention that the last Dark Matter at Elks Lodge went really well. I was anticipating something like 45 people and we got 90. Not our largest draw but probably the most people you could have there and maintain some semblance of comfortability. Ha.

CHOCOLATE LIQUIDATION STOREHOUSE

Ricki Tard -- "He's Chinese!!" -- Peanut Blaster from 2246.

The hooker gave him a Rhode Island Cheese Plate but a visit to the doctor cleared it right up.

The children referred to him as "the slave of Jay-Z."

The witch's blouse.

MP3 FOREST JUZIUK - Ricki's Theme (Still Nervous After All These Years)
MP3 FOREST JUZIUK - Ricki Tard And The Witch's Blouse

BURNING WHAT or SALLY'S EQUINOX

Fog covers the field, dew on the long grass. She takes off her beret and sprays an 'X' of Aquanet across the top. (She describes her ensemble as "punk-Italian" but neither look is discernible to me.) After the can falls to her feet, she pulls one of those long safety lights from her apron, lights the hat, and sends it across the field. The light disappears following a small sizzle. The dew.

From her bun, Sally removes a 5" hairpin and pricks the index finger of her left hand and squeezes three drops onto the starmap. The drops burn a dark green, the paper curls slightly. In the pen, the pigs begin howling, marking the arrival of warm winds from the east.

THE DOG IN THE YARD IS TIRED

He crushes a roach into the top of the nightstand with the bottom of his bourbon glass.

Tonight, the mayor is upset with power and parties. Tired of upper class alcoholics and white women snorting OxyContin at fundraisers. Of charging his make-up artist's paycheck to an untraceable credit card.

"The bones will splinter after the teeth have eaten away the flesh," he recites to the room after his wife has fallen asleep. How long is evil? How wide?

A charcoal cock shrinking to just the size of the Statue of Liberty now and holding. Any smaller and you have a solution to burglary, better rights for cripples. Mercenaries would get the night off. Hell, give them the year off!, he thinks.

In the yard, the dog lies just outside its house, ribcage balloons with shallow panting. The humidity is a cloud of lard but it's trying to be a nice night.

STARTED AS A ZINE, ENDED AS A DREAM

Dang -- I forgot to mention this pretty good article on Idolator: Touch And Gone: What It Means. When I wondered what could possibly follow the death of Lux Interior, I certianly wasn't expecting one of the greatest labels of all time! I can't even begin to explain the influence Touch & Go has had on me. Surreal.

SHOUTING BURGER MAN

Erin and I spent the morning contributing some voice work for the new Heavy Bleeding cartoon. Like any of the previous cartoons (The Transformer, Pink Maggie, etc.), it's pretty unreal. We worked on the second part of this gem:



It was a total blast and I kinda' wish I had an mp3 of the sounds to share. Anyway, I've been thinking about/inspired by both this and this of late so I'm putting together something called "L.A. 1992." Maybe I shouldn't say much else as this develops. The name could change anyway. Speaking of art, could these books be any better? Methinks not.

Also...

FROM THE ARCHIVES: SPACE IS NOT THE FUCKIN' A

We were floating through space. We were orbiting a large star (I can't remember which). Sampson and Frogurt decided to listen to hard rock and get wasted.

"Is that freedom rock?" Sampson asked. He let a big beer belch in zero gravity.

"No, dood, it's Thin Lizzy," said Frogurt. Sampson gave Frogurt a look. "It's a live album. It's good. I haven't heard Freedom Rock," said Frogurt. He was serious. Sampson gave Frogurt a look. I got bored hanging out with them so I went to my pod to read a book on snakes (Corn Snakes and Other Rat Snakes Book by Bartlett).

When I came back, Frogurt was in a different bay, passed out in a corner of the ceiling. Sampson was passed out and floating mid-room. Some food and liquid was floating near him; I think he barfed. Some of it was on the anti-spacial orbit device. He was burping. I found it gross. It made me wish I wasn't in space. At least not with these guys. But I would've felt stupid had I passed on the chance to go. I'm just sick of the doing the same shit every night.

BONDAGE RITES

Erection tie.
The pervert's disposition.
Nude in a place lower than the cloak.

We talked of taking microdot and watching the Oscars but went on tour instead. Without instruments to lug from date-to-date and no real music to speak of, our appetite for the dirt of dirt and sketchiness in all forms pushed us forward. Itinerary:

Hawaii: we paid a girl in wooden rubles to shake our hotel room into dust.
Chinatown (where??): the mayor's secret police dragged us from a peep booth by our chokers.
Helsinki: Annette took turns giving Shiva & I head in the clocktower.
Columbia: lost, we wore turbans to disguise our status as sexual diplomats.

At the rally, a telegram awaited us:
remember. you still have a mortgage to worry about.

CREATIVE IMPASSE

I started to write a story that went something like this:

Waiting on the Dark Lord.
Always so quiet and then it's like
"Whassup, Dark Lord!!"

Hm... don't really know where that could've gone. Only now do I realize just how Cthulhu it is AND THERE ARE POWERS APPARENT IN ALL CTHULHU TEXTS. Ehh....

Anyway, I'm much more inspired to write about the show Erin and I went to last night. Totally missed Child Bite which was a bummer but caught Mi Ami and Thank You. Holy smokes, after a good spell of not being amped about any new bands, I've got a major crush on those latter two. It's a relief too, I'll tell you what, when an existing band makes you wish you were back in a band as opposed to, say, an old Andre Williams single (although I suppose that's not a bad reference point for a new band). The jams were so direct, so natural in some way.

Been bad about blogging/writing lately and today will be no different. I actually don't know what the track below is save that it's an alternate version of the song I posted the other day. Enjoy!

MP3 FOREST JUZIUK - King Crab 3

HELLO, FORTUNE

The plan was simple. The speed trap near the woods.

The cop exited her vehicle and was speaking with the driver. Anna held a lighter one inch from the rag and waited. As soon as a break in traffic opened, Anna ran into the street, stopped in the turn lane and lobbed the molotov cocktail at the cruiser. A wave of flames wound around the driver's side and Anna ran back into the trees.

***

Simone watched her father throw $100 bill after $100 bill into the Blackjack dealer's hand. The father would not recoup, murdered in the parking lot after pissing into the casino's oil vat. "A low-life bleeding out his temple," she heard someone laugh. "Fingers all swollen like bruised bananas."

She would have better luck. Wracking up chips, winning on a horse named S.O.L., first place in the Hamburger Lottery, and eventually taking a church from a loan shark in a poker game.

MP3 FOREST JUZIUK - King Crab 1

RUBBER TITS & TROMBONE ACID: THREE WINNERS!

Born on a Satanic holiday, one was an ass-pinching doctor with a leopard-print tooth and the Maserati seat covers to match. Another, his twin, was a prankster in Hollywood, hired to spray "Bitch's Blood" in the eyes of guests. The brew left a scab on the face of a hotel heiress, which eventually developed into an impervious grey mole. The third, a prominent social critic said, "You are what you're sprayed with -- bitch!" He was later arrested for mercurial B.O. (a news anchor allegedly died after taking a huff on a dare). In prison, the critic was held down and farted on daily by cops and prisoners alike. "Do you know what we do to people with B.O.!?! Do you!?!?!" He later lead a prison riot to victory.

MP3 FOREST JUZIUK - Whipped Cream & Other Delights

FOR FUCK'S SAKE -- WHAT THE FUCK IS NEXT!?!

Holy smokes, world, it's not that I expected Eartha Kitt, Bettie Page, Ron Asheton, and Lux Interior to live forever, but c'mmmmon! An entire generation of influence is eroding and it is so bogue! How else can I describe it?

Flashback to 1992. My sister graduated from high school and skipped town in a disastrous attempt to make a life in Olympia, WA. She lived in a cabin without running water, sold pot to rednecks, and washed her hair in a homeless shelter. Back at our parents' house, I rummaged through her closet and found both a copy of an anti-school newspaper she helped assemble (The Purple Underground -- "the P.U." for short) and her cassette stash. The two most intriguing tapes were by Krokus and The Cramps. The P.U. inspired my first zine, Propaganda Trash, an anti-school newspaper (of sorts) which earned a 10-day suspension with possibility of expulsion for myself and two pals. Krokus (Alive & Screamin' maybe?) was discarded immediately. The Cramps, on the other hand, tore the roof off. I don't know if I'd heard rockabilly until that point but it spoke so deeply to my soul that I stayed up all night, playing that cassette over and over.

I don't listen to The Cramps so much now as the essential Born Bad series of compilations. Killer cuts through and through and most definitely some of the best, and strangest, songs I've ever heard. They call it pedigree, and Lux and Ivy surely had and have it.

PLAYING TAG IN THE AUTO GRAVEYARD

Hello, my baby! So, that Mi Ami show I've been talking about for a while is nigh! The talented Shelley Salant did the poster and is playing in Tyvek that night. Can't wait.

This Thursday is going to be a ballbuster: DJing from 5-8 at Cafe Zola, then from 9-midnight at Eve, then 12am-2am at Elks. Whoa nelly! I'm gonna' try not to repeat too many jams but this'll probably break the bank. On top of all that, Mike and I will be showing/selling some artwork at Elks along with Shades who's also hanging at Zola. Since we don't really have any hangable pieces ready, we're doing a mad dash to get something going. This may yield a zine or some large posters or both. Will let you know.

I know I linked to the man a couple days ago, but this story by my friend Bobby Wells is hilarious. Also hilarious: any page in the book Rumblefish by S.E. Hinton. Open at random and find gold!!

MP3 FOREST JUZIUK - Rumblefish (S.E. Hinton)

PEOPLE TALK, BABY, BUT FUCK IT -- THIS IS OUR FUCKING WORLD AND WE JUST LET THESE OTHER ASSHOLES HANG OUT

At a party Raj and I DJed last night, Mike and I somehow convinced a woman who owned something like 10 or 11 sports cars(!?!) that "Porsche" is the french word for "womb." She was intrigued and said she'd look it up. This was very shortly after claiming that the reason people always end up hanging in kitchens during parties is because the kitchen reminds them of home and their mothers so it's like kitchen = womb. Credit where credit's due: Bobby Wells has the best womb jokes in town. Or, he did.

MP3 FOREST JUZIUK - Overnighted

SPECIAL MUSIC REVIEW EDITION: MERRIWEATHER POST PAVILION

The collective hysteria and hyperbole surrounding Animal Collective's new platter, Merriweather Post Pavilion, was uncharted. Close friends behaved like members of the official AC Street Team. Supermarket mothers were overheard discussing the vinyl street date bump-up in relation to the internet leak. As much as I've never been a "joiner," -- I'll be the first to admit to oftentimes being infuriatingly contrarian -- I kinda' wanted to be in on this one. Maybe I missed something by not downloading it along with everybody else in the last days of 2008. Truth be told, I feel like a retard for not liking it.

Well, I do like it a little bit. That is, track #5, "Daily Routine." But I'll have to disagree with Google as to MPP's status as nothing less than THE ALBUM OF THE DECADE because the fact remains:

Not a song on the album is nearly as catchy as "Leaf House." Or "Did You See The Words." Or "Peacebone."
Not a single moment makes me lose my shit like the two-note bassline of Kanye West's "Love Lockdown"(!!!).

If we're talking about weird-goes-pop, which we kind of are, then for all claims that MPP is the group's most accessible work (shout out to Entertainment Weekly!), I was expecting the new AC to sound a tiny bit like West's fuuuuucking goooood single; after all, MPP was purported to be "bass-y" and many AC tunes shares the same tribal drum pattern of "L.L." Instead, MPP is an incredibly murky and tedious record to slog through. And you do have to fucking slog through it.

Strangely, for all it's unlistenability, I was not prepared for the ::coughkinda'gaycough:: euro-pop/disco touches inherent to MPP. Back to the weird-goes-pop thing, where Black Dice's "Kokomo" [MP3] is an Escalade ride through Willy Wonka's factory, "My Girls" veers dangerously close to... well....

Alright, picture this: you're in Ibiza (but more like Ibiza, Florida) and it's the release party for an As-Seen-On-TV club music compilation. You've just taken a bunch of herbal ecstasy and are dancing with your hands in the air and IT FEELS SO GOOD. That's "My Girls"!

Beyond the outright cringeworthy pop of "My Girls," there's nary a hummable moment on MPP. On the flipside, the weird moments aren't even that weird, just less quantized (an aside: if you know this musical term, you are a nerd).

In the end, I can't help but feel MPP is less the culmination-of-all-AC-records-etc. and more a "phoned in" effort. Yes, elements from all those other, better AC records are there but it sounds less organic and more like a brand. I'm not exactly complaining. We could use more brands like this -- something more original and peculiar than the (major label) artists that typically receive the kind of praise this album is getting. I just wish Merriweather Post Pavilion was better.

B HISTORY PART I

Twelve times. She'd done it twelve times that summer. So far.

He wandered behind the pool table and squatted, then rested his moist sockets in his palms. The concrete floor of the basement made his ass cold but he felt assured no one would find him unless they stumbled back there to puke or fuck around or actually play billiards. With his eyelids tightly closed, he moved his hands to the sides of his head and pressed his palms to his ears as if to stop a flow of steam from escaping.

Earlier, after he open-hand slapped at the window of her friend's car in a fit of terrible exasperation, she assured him from inside a plume of smoke that it wasn't a big deal. Fuck, he thought, it was a big deal. "I've only smoked pot twelve times in my entire life," he told her. He meant just the last two years.

Disaster marred every instance of his use. His last time stoned, two months ago, was the worst. On an otherwise sleepy residential street, he had been the cause of a car accident, a feat astonishing to everyone as he was driving about 12mph. Still, he insisted, it wasn't about him or her: an article on a marijuana-related death appeared in the paper that morning. It was a sign, a glaring signal to stop and stop her.

MP3 FOREST JUZIUK - B History

CREAM MADONNA

It's taken a minute to muster a feeling or something for 2009 but I remembered this is an odd year and odd years often seem to yield the best, don't they? Methinks it'll be a year of new, of larger learning. And I want to explain that but I'm not sure there'd be a point in doing it here, not for me or for you. As much as I want to see this as a conversation between us, I can't help but obscure the facts. So, without sounding too trite, I'll open up a couple veins and let out what more I can to give this thing some weight.

Musically speaking, seeing as my stray dogs have needed a home for a minute now and the physical realm doesn't seem to be the best place for a clearing house, Charles Atlas By The Fire Pit will be the spot for the old & new. And, shit, even ringtones:

MP3 FOREST JUZIUK - Chop Shop Ringtone

So, things are going incredibly well on this end. Erin's absolutely wonderful. Eating healthy. Feeling wealthy (er... kind of). It's sunny and 35, it feels so good to be alive. Another tune and the last bit of truth before I start lying again: I've been chipping away at a writing project, experimenting a bit... probably shouldn't say too much more.

MP3 FOREST JUZIUK - Hello Relief / Strange Fact [old]

See you in a minute.

WILD WIFE or SKIRT POSSESSION

JD Twitch's 60 Minutes of Fear mix -- a full hour of top notch early-'80s punk/post-punk/not-punk -- is superb save for one glaring stinker: Big Black's infamous child abuse indictment, "Jordan, Minnesota."

Shortly after the release of Atomizer, Steve Albini said, "We're all pretty interested in ridiculous extremes that people go to for no real reason, just because they have nothing better to do. That's a pretty extreme situation, where you have a whole town of people who are actively involved in kid fucking."

If unfamiliar with the incident, it eventually became one of several cases in which a single child sexual abuse complaint ballooned into mass arrests via hysteria and bogus questioning techniques on the part of the cops. Albini was pretty serious about the topic at the time, which is understandable, but knowing what we know now, the "suck daddy" refrain is so completely goofy and in poor taste that I cannot hear the (also now goofy, capital-o Ominous) opening chords without jumping up to hit fast-forward.


In other news, Tom Buckholz was just in town and as hilarious as ever. Alas, it was a loooong night and I'm feeling like turning in early despite all the joyful partying happening all over town. I'm in the midst of reading The Master and Margarita and listening to a whole lot of Yusef Lateef. Erin has been organizing something along the lines of something you might find on killtherestaurant.com and it's looking pretty effin' promising. Also, Mr. Wiltoncroft announcements coming shortly!

COLD IN HEAVEN/HELL

After the Elks Lodge gig I wrote about here, I felt I kinda' owed Nate Frick, a.k.a. DJ OrNate, for saving the night so I offered up my design services. The result is located to the left; the first poster for the newly-christened Shock the World, styled in the spirit of classic early-80s party posters. Mike did yet another smash job with the printing (final scan to come!) and the two of us attended with a recently-returned-from-London pal of his named Jennifer while Erin stayed home, sick in bed (total bummer). Brad and Steve didn't make it out from Detroit due to bogus weather conditions but it was much fun nonetheless. The year's first Dark Matter dates have been set!

The Slits are up there on my musical radar, perhaps a result of the massive amount of dub I've been consuming of late (great, great morning music for making food with your honey) and that same kind of looseness Mi Ami has. The first time I saw The Slits was on a PBS documentary about rock (that would be the one with the hilarious Jonathan Richman interview in which he talks about the university babes in their "big suede boots coming up to here and they had the guawaz [sp?] cigarettes, and they had the long hair and the brown suede jacket -- ooohh I was very impressed.").

In the doc, a segment of the "Typical Girls" video played and I was deeply struck & confused by Ari Up's look and sexuality. She was heavy heavy heavy and you need only to look at any piece of Slits artwork once to get that same feeling of heaviness from her, Viviane Albertine and Tessa Pollitt. And the jam was so sweet that, in at least two of my own songs, I cribbed the winding, delayed guitar part (which are not too dissimilar to the feverish zings of Notorious B.I.G.'s "Hypnotize").

MP3 Forest Juziuk (as Boro) - Ugly BS (demo)

THE SLITS - Typical Girls

BOOGIE ADMISSION

It was late December when the local junior high put on a play ostensibly about Madonna and Guy Ritchie's relationship during the course of filming the 2002 remake of Swept Away. Called Lucifer's Island: Do You Believe In Love?, the play featured neither the likenesses of Madonna or Guy Ritchie but was instead an hour-and-a-half of the school principal and a twelve-year-old Pee Wee Herman sitting in the Red Room of the Black Lodge from Twin Peaks. There was no music save for a dull hum which was either intentional or a boiler malfunction. Pee Wee appeared stoned and couldn't finish a single joke. 85 minutes into the play, the school principal stood up to deliver a spirited monologue on the hairstyles of the students he represented, tossing out phrases like "rich excess," "dreads of perspiration" and "you would never find one in a soup kitchen!" The stage curtains caught fire in the final minute of the play. '"Don't worry, " said the principal, "it's all part of the show." The crowd began filing out after the first stagehand fell from the flaming rafters. "Oh shoot," laughed the principal. "Well, Merry Christmas anyway!"

ANOTHER DREAM OF THE RAVE CUBE

It was a silent opera of glowsticks at Earth's 7,467,881st rave (the DJ failed to show) when a baldspot appeared on my hairjeans. Then I remembered the carnie sniffing at the child, a hex to be delivered: the future would hold a classic Jewish whipping and the ghost's surprise vajj.

A gift from Zeus, who had returned after so many years: a mighty cumbubble to replace the Epcot Center and the reanimation of Edie Sedgwick, who had no idea what to do with herself, spending her days sleeping in a pool again and her nights wondering "where did the gang go off to?"

A laser shone from the forest. They had returned as well.

STRANGE FACT

An LP of inspired-by-the-Batman-television-show mostly-instrumental r&b/surf jams recently came into my possession. While it was incredibly exciting to find that the band, The Sensational Guitars of Dan & Dale, was actually Sun Ra and The Blues Project, this was a wee bit more titillating:

"Several cast members recorded records tied in to the series. Adam West released a single titled 'Miranda,' a country-tinged pop song that he actually performed in costume during live appearances in the 1960s."

SLIPPIN' ON PEELS & REFUSING TO USE THE TERM "BOOM BAP"

The groom's father was a terror, cursing over the microphone about b-movie starlets, the tangent becoming more and more like free jazz with each lewd stammer. "C-C-C-Carolyn Brandt's butt... mmmmmmmmmmmm... mmmmmagic was made!" A genuine lawmaker but hardly a peacekeeper, Truman Nierestein has been sherriff 'round these parts for 40 years and he just cracked his mid-50s: crisis time.

His son, Kelley, was about to tie the knot with Marjorie Bierbauch, ultra-distant cousin of Kelley's, yes, but just too dang cute not to marry. If I just stand in this doorway for a bit longer, thought the groom, I can see reality for all its truths and untruths.

"Where is that boy?!" shouted Truman. An elderly man in the rear of the chapel halted spanking duties and shouted, "Tell us about Carolyn Brandt!" The groom bit into a gold coin. Strains of Keith Jarrett's moans and Basketcase gargles loomed. It was getting downright fucking weird feeling.

THE EFFIN' TRUTH

Whoa. Man. The first thing I read today -- literally, the first thing I read -- was "R.I.P. Ron Asheton." I called up Brian to tell him and he answered the phone: "NO FUCKING SHIT!" and then nothing. Our first band together, our first band, total damaged mutant teenage trash, lived in the ghost of "I Wanna Be Your Dog." We thought cover songs were impure but not, NOT now-i-wanna-be-your-dog-and-lose-my-heart-on-the-burning-sands.

We'd play it ourselves -- as loud as possible -- in my bedroom with no drums. We'd drive around Port Huron, flicking off old people, with "I Wanna Be Your Dog" booming through the brrroooooken speakers of a 1987 Mercury Tracer (a Port Huron car if ever there was one). Live, we muted the playing on the measures with vocals and ripped it wide open after each line. If Brian was ever a good frontman, it was certainly during that song, where he raged.

Once, we saw Sonic Youth and they brought Ron Asheton out to end the night with "I Wanna Be Your Dog." Who knows how long it went on. If felt like infinity. It was those three chords with one looooong blazing solo over top. We both went home with bruises. One of us lost a tooth.

You can hear a billion other bands in any solo on The Stooges. It's unreal. Cripes. Ron Asheton.

THE END, OF BLOWJOBS & EASY-FUCKING, THE END

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STRANGER IN THE MANGER / HOMEY IN CHURCH

How long have I given myself over to Satan? I have paid for lusty princesses in more ways than one. The silky tongues and velvety fingers of a sinful Sheba. A horny stoner girl burned her ass on the range in our palatial home. An erotic Halloween at Planned Parenthood. Someone named Dr. Lesbo with the DNA of a child who took a dump on some railroad tracks. Leonard Nimoy's harem. Stiff Little Fingers plays during a karate match. The censored breasts of an octopus.