Friday, January 10, 2020
Remembering as an Act of Resistance: Apache Skateboards and the Mystery of Now
Saturday, December 7, 2013
Darby Crash September 26, 1958 – December 7, 1980
33 years ago today Darby Crash snuffed it. Suicide is a motherfucker... Glad I'm not there anymore. Today we celebrate life, celebrate struggle and celebrate punk rock. Fucken rage'r.
Wednesday, December 4, 2013
Richard D. Wolff : Economic Update November 2013
Awesome. As informative and engaging as ever and this one has been especially entertaining.
I would suggest showing it to everyone you know...
More info here...
Monday, November 4, 2013
Choose to Choose, Choose to Go.
It was
in my 18th or 19th year, now further back in time than it
actually feels. I was in the thick of an ever evolving process of
self-isolating that truly begun in
earnest, just a few years prior. I’d picked up a Sunday evening shift at a
local college radio station as a favor to a friend, who was a station manager
there, to help fill out the summer hours. Each week for an hour or two, during
dusk, I’d turn the station into my own version of a broadcasted mixtape to long
lost friends and lovers. It was a perfect outlet to communicate everything I
was feeling without having to actually interact with others or use my own
words. Without any theme I let the songs speak for themselves and complement
each other. Releasing them into the
atmosphere, with the possibility that somewhere, someone’s receiver would pull
them in. Of course I also offered to take requests on the studio hotline. I
only received one call the entire summer.
What was that song? The really
soft one you just played, the really beautiful one?
I’m not sure do you remember
anything else about it?
He was singing about someone’s
eyes…
I noted
the death of Lou Reed yesterday by not really processing it, I just let it roll
off me. After all, older people tend to die and though the Velvet Underground
had meant a lot to me at one point they now were just an occasional thought.
The market for artistic influence in my life had expanded and as I met others I
saw that in some ways the Velvet Underground had over saturated parts of
it. In many ways the beatification of
the band had turned me off to them. So many folks who discovered them and then
set their heart’s compass to their art and legacy just soured me on taking them
too seriously anymore. They became a phase I grew out of. Then a friend
commented on Lou’s passing yesterday “This hits hard. All I ever wanted to be
in high school was Lou Reed.”
I first
heard the Velvet Underground when I was 16 it was a greatest hits compilation
CD of a friends. I recorded it onto a blank tape and listened to it non-stop
until I could afford the box-set. The
song that made me sit up and pay attention was “Stephanie Says.” I was
fascinated with the line in the chorus “She’s not afraid to die, the people all
call her Alaska.” I still have no fucking clue what that means but I developed
a thousand expansive theories that summer and over the following years. What I
loved about that lyric was, it wasn’t just druggy gibberish to me (like a lot
of the lyrics from many of the bands from that era tend to be) it was a
thoughtful attempt by to convey a meaning that was too broad and intangible to
fit into words or melody so it had to be reduced to koan snapshots. Let the
listener wrestle for an external truth by exploring the internal. So much of
their work was like that, a foggy window to a much broader undefined theme.
The
message in other songs was more straightforward and possessed a narrative. All
of the work of Lou Reed from this period and I’d say until his death held a
spirit of being resigned to the darkness but appreciating the light. Similar to
the work of Townes Van Zandt, the artist is holding on to a spirit of hope but
more grappling with this truth of a darkness. In essence it’s all about struggling
with control. Something happens to some of us, most of us, all of us, during
that time between being a child and learning the truth of it all. I think with
Lou (like Van Zandt) the ability to reconcile the two and allow them to
coexist, is the main undercurrent in the work. Even in songs like “I’m Waiting
for my man” there’s a jumpy, childlike excitement about journeying into the
black neighborhoods of 60s era New York in order to score some heroin. The
situation is very sketchy on so many levels but the energy of the song is a
living energy, jumpy and driving, with a youthful mischievous tone. That great
duality of humor and sorrow really appealed to a presence already within me.
Besides being very dark, Lou Reed’s music was also a testament to how powerful
humor and rock n roll can be as tools for beating back despair and keeping you
inspired.
What was
interesting at that time too was that, living in rural Vermont it’s like I got
to develop a relationship with the music in a vacuum. Sure friends and others
knew about or liked the band but it wasn’t the same as discovering them in
college or Art School or working at a coffee house or record store. I didn’t
ask for and no one really offered their opinions on the music, so I had the
space to investigate it and embrace it on my own terms.
That’s
why it struck me when I heard that line from my friend about wanting to be Lou
Reed. I realized I was shrugging it off, Lou Reed’s death; like it was a
childish hobby that I could appreciate but had long since outgrown. He’s no
messiah and a lot of the solo records were pretty bad, but he was always
honest. The music of the Velvet Ground was so incredibly honest that it meant
the world to me for that period when it was all I was listening to. It touched
a place in me filled with simultaneous joy and sorrow and provided it with a
voice I didn’t realize existed. Songs like Sunday Morning, All Tomorrow’s
Parties, Jesus, and Pale Blue Eyes. That’s how heartbreak, loss, craving and
fatigue sound and all of those experiences ultimately give you a deeper
appreciation of the joy, love and beauty that you experience. In one of his
later solo albums he has a line about hanging around in a relationship and
feeling not wanted that states, “ I’m a New York City man, you just say ‘go’
and I’ll be gone.” I can’t even tell you how many times I thought that line in
crumbling romantic and non-romantic situations. I’d feel unwanted and just
split. You just say ‘go’ and I’ll be gone. No bullshit, just be honest.
Lou was
an astronaut to me. He had gone out there into the unknown and come back. His
honesty gave him a quality of integrity that I saw disappearing from all around
me as I grew up. So it hit me today, re-listening to those old albums and
remembering the experience of that music and the world they described; how
important it was for me to relate it to my own life and observations. How I
wanted to aspire to those heights and depths. The passing of Lou Reed deserves
a real, artistic reflection on my part; and it felt important for me to
remember and pay tribute to the Lou Reed I knew and not the one defined for me
by others. Life is gonna go fast, it’s important to take time to remember the
words, the sounds and the spirit, to stand in the shadows and remember the
light/ heat.
Sunday, November 3, 2013
"God Will See That You Die, Pig..."
Henry Rollins on John Macias.
Circle One - Highway Patrolman.
Mental illness is a motherfucker.
Here's a nice article about John that I found on the There's Something Hard In There blog (which is pretty killer in general...)
enjoy...
Friday, November 1, 2013
Wednesday, October 30, 2013
Thursday, October 24, 2013
A History Of English Football Violence
2012
Early '80s.
1989
2002
The only stuff I know about Englad's football (futbol?) culture are things I learned from Oi! records... That said, here are a few interesting documentaries on hooliganism and violence... Add it to my growing mental encyclopedia of British youth culture... Interesting to see how the police tactics are theorized and later implemented throughout these documentaries...
Tuesday, October 15, 2013
Richard D. Wolff economic update 10/13
Wealth inequality, the decline of the American left in the 20th century, explaining the debt ceiling...
Wolff killing it... enjoy.
Wednesday, October 9, 2013
Friday, October 4, 2013
The New Wave Of British Heavy Metal
Another reason why the late '70s and early '80s were thee best era for rock and roll... Punk rock, punks getting weird, synth music, nasty disco music, early rap, hardcore, industrial, noise and fucking metal... All of the stuff I like the best for the most part being done the best it would be done or at least laying down the foundation for it...
NWOBHM to me at least; is when punk and metal crossed over... It's like crossing priest with motorhead or something... Shit is faster and cleaner than it used to be but not super fucking fast yet... just mid-tempo headbangers... and that is my fucking jam.
throw in some shit about satan and I'm there, dude...
this documentary/tv show kindof scratches the surface of it and probably the episode before and the one after would give it a more complete view, but it's a decent start anyway... when I think of the NWOBHM I pretty much think of diamond head. They are in here a bit, but mostly this is about iron maiden. Fucking killers, for sure- but we already know all about iron maiden... I'm surprised that they hated punk so much... I saw an interview with paul di'anno where he was talking about how much he loved punk rock... so... maybe that was part of the split...
Maiden live in 81 (killers era with di'anno)
Anyway, here are a few more fucking ragers...
diamond head / motorhead / saxon / holocaust / grim reaper / judas priest / venom / mercyful fate (were danish, I know... this playlist isn't strict on anything but having sweet metal jams from that general era... whatever...)
ps. you should totally get that first diamond head record. it is killer.
And finally, here are the Brats who would later became Mercyful Fate. It's as perfect a mix of punk and metal as one can find in the world and it's cool to hear how some of these riffs later became mercyful fate parts. fucking killer. If you like this you should look for "1980" because it slays. The lost tapes and the 1981 demos are great too...
enjoy...
Wednesday, October 2, 2013
fuzz
A documentary about guitar pedals and the people who build them.
For those of you who know me; posting this will be of no surprise... For those of you who don't- I am a huge fucking guitar nerd. If you are into that type of stuff you will probably enjoy this video...
Dunno what to say about it other than that.
enjoy...
Tuesday, October 1, 2013
Sunday, September 29, 2013
R2C video mix september 13
dead boys / stranglers / pop group / who / telefones / the fall / rollins band / nirvana
yarp.
Friday, September 27, 2013
Wednesday, September 25, 2013
Burroughs and Cronenberg on making the movie adaptation of Naked Lunch
A few cool interviews with Burroughs that I hadn't seen... Always welcome...
enjoy.
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