Category: music

i go through all this

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Beeefooore you wake up.

Sorry. Bjork phase. I do like to get up early. I like the quiet. The alone time. If I can get that, and get enough things I want to get done before I engage with the world, the world and me are both infinitely better off for it.

I don’t go in rushed and angry, upset and falling behind. Frustrated and distracted.

And, the sense of peace is palpable.

That, of course, is not today. 

Target: 600 words
Written: 797 words, novella: The Mungk

Read: People Of The Deer, Farley Mowat
Comics: Monstress 31-34
Music: Vs., Pearl Jam (one of my all time favourites, I cannot believe it's been so long since I listened to it.  Indifference is my spirit animal.)

veruca

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It’s funny how this seminal alternative band from the Nineties has such an influence on modern pop, but no one seems to ever mention them.

I mean, if you can listen to Olivia Rodrigo’s Guts and not hear Veruca Salt channeled through her, I have questions about your hearing and your mental state.

I try to tell my nieces these things, but they’ll, like me, have to figure it out for themselves (although I went through phases growing up that exposed me to a lot more great classic stuff, as filtered through a modern lens, than they seem to. Big band, underground Seventies punk, classic 60s acid rock and the original Fifties jump rock – crooners, The Beatles, The Doors, hell, I even went through a Michael Jackson/New Kids On The Block era – though not after I heard my first alternative – INXS and R.E.M. are forever my gateway drugs, as is The Joshua Tree).

Anyway, great band. Listen to them more, if you can. L7 too – nobody rocks harder, except maybe Lemmy.

Target: 600 words
Written: 556 words, novella: The Mungk

Read: The Sword Of Shannara, Terry Brooks
Comics: Y The Last Man 53-56
Music: Voices Carry, Til Tuesday

one hundred

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A hundred days into this year and we’ve already had multiple collapses, blood issues and a totality.

Sometimes, I’d like there to be a totality inside me, either to end it all or to burn away all the shit. Blind it with a shining aura, a brilliance unendurable except with the darkest glasses.

But the world keeps turning, a disturbing number of people think a man who thought it was intelligent to stare directly at an eclipse is a genius and hate seems to creep further into our lives each and every day.

We need another revolution. Another love-in.

Where’s our John and Yoko? Our sexual revolution appears to revolve around people making sex tapes, where wearing bikinis on your social media is a viable career path.

Where’s our screaming punk? Where’s our Kurt Cobain, hitting the nerves of a generation so raw that it changes entire cultures?

Where’s logic? Where’s freedom? Where are hearts and connection and compassion and a basic understanding of kindness?

Where’s the less ineffectual left? Where’s the sober right?

Where the fuck is everybody?

Social media is madness. Our world is mad.

This has been your daily agonized howl into the void, unable to stand anymore.

Target: 500 words
Written: 191 words, novella: The Mungk

Read: High Hunt, David Eddings
Comics: Y The Last Man 21-24
Music: Villains, The Verve Pipe

some music

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Some music just moves you. I just finished writing and while James Brown and Night Train was cool, I definitely funked out more to Modest Mouse and Steam Engenius, because SO. FUCKING. GOOD.

My tastes range, and it’s fine. I don’t mind following up Minor Threat with Rihanna or Dean Martin with Henry Rollins. There’s nothing wrong with an Eminem and Beatles mix, or Pink Floyd and NOFX.

It’s all about being open, and enjoying the moment. Falling into it and letting it happen, letting it be what it is and letting go of whatever else is happening.

Music is the most powerful presence creator; there’s a reason we love it in all its forms. It speaks to something primal within us that just wants to live. Here, now, forever in the groove, connecting and commiserating with our fellow humanity, free from all the rest of the world’s shit.

Target: 500 words
Written: 209 words, novella: The Mungk

Read: High Hunt, David Eddings
Comics: Y The Last Man 5-8
Music: Vespertine, Bjork

t-swift

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I’ll admit: the girl can put on a production.

My niece made me watch the concert with her and I have to admit, that while I prefer music that’s not so overproduced, I was surprised by the sheer volume of hits the girl’s had, and the impressive stage show.

I mean, not teenage girl with tears streaming down her face, but hey, I’m not the target audience.

Still. Good for you, girl. Way to do it without being completely vapid.

Smart cookie, that Taylor.

Target: 500 words
Written: 278 words, novella: The Mungk

Read: Dead Until Dark, Charlaine Harris
Comics: Rat Queens v2 24-25, Rat Queens: Sisters, Warriors, Queens 1
Music: The Very Best Things (1995-2008), Filter

no longer cool

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It appears I’m not cool anymore. I mean, I was never really cool, but at least, I knew where the edges were, where the hip things were happening, even if I didn’t give a shit about them.

Now, I don’t care, more interested in exploring the expansive stuff of whatever scene I missed out on by virtue of era, location or the fact that I wasn’t cool enough to be invited in.

Or didn’t care enough to join.

Trends, fashion, these sorts of things never interested me. While a million morons rushed out to buy Stanley cups, all I could think is it’s not THE Stanley Cup, so who gives a shit?

Trends come and go so fast now online that the only way to stay on the bleeding edge of popularity is to spend all one’s time online, which is boring.

Plus, who cares? Spending time and money on shit that no one will give a fuck about tomorrow is just a good way to create clutter and miss out on time one could have spent actually enjoying one’s life.

It’s nothing more than a hyperspeed version of keeping up with the Joneses.

Fuck the Joneses. Who the fuck are they to set the standard?

Who are they to tell you what’s interesting or important in your life?

That’s the great thing about a real scene, real art, real cool – it remains that way no matter the age because it speaks to something fundamental inside us.

Cool is timeless; iconic is not just every random little thing; it’s the truly epic, the truly transcendent and emblematic. It’s crossing the bridge in Selma, it’s the Gettysburg Address. It’s the Velvet Underground. It’s Freddie Mercury at Live Aid. It’s Marilyn Monroe. It’s Caesar crossing the Rubicon. It’s Gretzky kicking his foot out as he lifts the Cup.

It’s real fucking Stanley, not some bullshit fad.

Stop using it for every little thing. It ain’t iconic if it’s old news tomorrow. Iconic is a state of being that speaks for itself, not a label for something you’ve been told is cool.

Target: 500 words
Written: 509 words, novella: The Mungk

Read: Dead Until Dark, Charlaine Harris
Comics: Rat Queens v2 20-23
Music: The Very Best Of The Smiths, The Stones Roses, The Who and Violent Femmes, by The Smiths, The Stone Roses, The Who and Violent Femmes (in which these are all separate albums by their respective bands and technically, the Who one is called My Generation: The Very Best Of The Who).

tegan and sara, part deux

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You know what? For only knowing a handful of songs, it was a pretty good show. They played well, good songs and the stage patter… well, I’m not sure if they were ever stand-up comics in their life, but they do a hell of an impression. I’m not used to my rock stars being so quick-witted.

Plus, it’s nice to see a community coming together. I’m not gay myself, but I’d wager a large portion of the county’s local lesbian population was at the concert, singing and being generally nice to each other, save a pair of dental assistant twins who were screaming so obnoxiously that even the band told them to shut the fuck up.

Seriously. How obnoxious must you be where your screaming at a rock concert is a little too much, for everyone, including the band?

Anyway, despite that, it was a good feel, lots of love and probably complicated feelings about love lives and things going around. At least no one got married, but the fervor that people rushing the stage to donate money for guitar picks and set lists (going to charity), damn. I’ve never been that stoked over anything but the middle of great sex with a very hot woman (my wife, for the record).

Anyway, long story short. Good time. Worth the trip.

Target: 500 words
Written: 1741 words, novella: The Mungk

Read: Gregor The Overlander, Suzanne Collins
Comics: Rat Queens v2 6-9
Music: The Very Best Of Cat Stevens, Cat Stevens (imagine that)

tegan and sara

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I don’t know a lot of songs, but I’m about to learn, apparently.

We’re off to catch Tegan & Sara tonight, so hey, limits.

Limited time. Limited energy. I’m sure I’ll enjoy it, but mostly, I’d like to sleep.

Target: 500 words
Written: 499 words, novella: The Mungk

Read: Gregor The Overlander, Suzanne Collins
Comics: Rat Queens v2 3-5, Orc Dave 1
Music: The Very Best Of Elvis Costello (I mean, it was shaping up to be a hipstery kind of day, anyway)

velvet

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There are some bands about whom I just don’t get the hype. I mean, I don’t get the hype on most pop stars; though I’ll say some of the modern pop singers have a surprising depth of lyrics these days, which is cool.

There was a period there where it felt like all pop music had devolved to simply repeating a catch phrase or inspirational snippet over a half-catchy beat. Some of it is still that. Fight Song sounds like it was written for a corporate retreat, for fuck’s sake.

Today, though, I’m talking about revered bands, bands that are held up as true legends and pioneers, almost indisputably.

And I don’t get it.

Pink Floyd comes to mind, as do the Grateful Dead. I’m not saying they’re bad bands or they make bad music, only that nine times out of ten, the person going on and on about them is demonstrating a pretentiousness that suggests maybe this is their godhead only because it allows them look cooler because of the shared myth of transcending music or culture we’ve created around these particular bands, and not because of actual artistic catalyst.

I’m not saying Kurt Cobain didn’t know what he was talking about, but the Meat Puppets are meh, most of the time.

The Velvet Underground, on the other hand…

That one I fucking get.

This is going to sound pretentious, but it’s one of those things. You hear Sweet Jane or Lou Reed’s Take A Walk On The Wild Side and think, this is pretty cool, and then, you listen to one or another and next thing you know, your whole brain is lost in the discord of Murder Mystery or Berlin or live concert footage of Alaska and you’re going, holy shit. This is the real deal.

Is every song amazing? No, of course not. Are they all good? Haven’t heard one yet I didn’t like.

The weird part is Andy Warhol. I’ve never really cared for Warhol’s own art, most of it being the kind of pretentiousness that turns me off, but as a facilitator of art, a discoverer of great artists?

I’m not sure there’s anyone better.

See? I can be pretentious too, motherfucker.

Target: 500 words
Written: 1101 words, novella: The Mungk

Read: Pride And Prejudice And Zombies, Seth Grahame-Smith
Comics: East Of West 40-43
Music: The Velvet Underground, The Velvet Underground (in case you're wondering what brought this up today)

dj got us

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I was thinking about the Super Bowl this morning. Not the whole Taylor/Kelce/who-gives-a-shit, but Usher.

The only song, in my opinion, worth being on that show, in fact, the one that probably could have saved that mostly homogenous and unknown set would have been DJ Got Us Falling In Love.

It would have sent the subliminal into the crowd, and maybe actually made that connection, instead of having most people thinking, “I’ve never heard this one” and wondering where the good songs are.

Personally, it’s the only song of Usher’s worth a shit, in my world, and one of his biggest, and he just skipped it.

I guess weird and dumb decisions always make me wonder. It’s one thing if you’re going for something different and you want to break out of a stereotype, but this is a pop star at the Superbowl.

Play your hits, dummy.

Like, if you want to get insanely arty or pretentious about it, then you need to transcend, like Cobain on MTV Unplugged or Lou Reed anything.

But a pop star? At the Superbowl?

Play your hits, dummy.

Target: 500 words
Written: 878 words, novella: The Mungk

Read: I Hope They Serve Beer In Hell, Tucker Max (I know, I know)
Comics: East Of West 9-12
Music: Knives Out, Radiohead