Zero Bldg.
Okay, okay, a quick terrible joke. Here goes:
Q: If Kafka was a musician, what kind would he play?
A: Prague-Rock.
Today's Recommendation of the Week
Best Morning-Getting-Ready-For-Work Song:
"This Is The Day" by The The.
Actually, this whole album (
Soul Mining) is sunny and hopeful.
Have a
good day.
[addendum: following a long day at work]
Okay, perhaps I was a bit hasty in calling
Soul Mining "sunny" and "hopeful." Sure, the music is plenty nice to listen to. Matt Johnson sounds here like Bowie fronting, if not the Smiths, then definitely Tears for Fears (none of your lip, Morrissey fans). The lyrics though...let's give them a closer look. "This Is The Day" is more a self-dilusional hangover anthem than what I'd previously claimed:
Well, you dind't wake up this morning
Because you didn't go to bed
You were wathing the whites of your eyes turn red
The chorus of "This is the day/your life will surely change" hints at the last-ditch hope people in deep trouble often clutch before they hit the wall, the one only they can see. The second (and last, and I'm becoming very fond of songs with only two) verse(s) drives it home:
You couldn't done anything if you'd wanted
And all your friends and family
Think you're lucky
But the side of you they'll never see
Is when you're left alone with the memories
That hold your life together...like glue
The real musical trick here is that the whole mood of the song is exactly like watching the sun coming up through the window of your fucked living room. Some deft brushstrokes of harmonica, accordion and fiddle turn this into a rather pretty--may the genre gods strike me down if I steer ya wrong--zydeco ballad.
After that, of course, is more sunny-side-up pop songs with choruses like "I'm just a symptom of the moral decay/That is gnawing at the heart of the country." Then on what I assume is the B-side of the album, the mood goes noticeably darker, as if the album was approaching a vice-filled night not meant for sleep.
Futility Watch: 2
The second in my string of expected lit mag rejections arrived today. This one from Phoebe at George Mason U in Fairfax VA (that's
Travis Morrison territory). I'd never heard of the school before I submitted work to them, but I found their journal's site (I'm not linking it here, if you want to deal with them, you can look them up) and thought it and their content were pretty hip.
I didn't write about it last time (the first rejection came very promptly from
Salt Hill), but this letter is even smaller than the first.
Salt Hill's was on a nice piece of 3 X 5 25# natural linen paper that had likely been in a pad. No signature or anything, but that they had gotten back to me within three months was shocking enough that the actual rejection hardly registered.
Phoebe's is a little slip of 20# white that looks like it had been printed four up on a sheet and cut apart for mailing. Again, no signature. It took them about five months to reply, which is, all considering, normal--even prompt in some circles.
To Salt Hill, I'd submitted (is that passive voice? Oh well) a short story titled
Negatives. Simultaneously submitted, actually, to them and to
Quarter After Eight. Still waiting on their reply. Phoebe got (and actually returned my copies of) two poems: "Family Icons" and "broke."
I don't feel at all perturbed about the rejections--both received and imminent. I submitted work because I finally had work I felt was worthy of publishing somewhere. University affiliated journals are convenient and can garner a modicum of recognition, but in the end, few people outside of the academic world ever read them. Unless the journal's huge (Paris Review) or local (around here, the Atlanta Literary Review...I think that's the name), no one's gonna see it at their local Barnes & Noble. Some writers have chosen the carpetbomb approach and have stuff published in half the journals you're ever likely to come across (I'm referring namely to
Virgil Suarez, and fer reel, this dude's fucking
everywhere, look him up). But they are decidedly more talented than I am so bully for them.
Anyway, I know this is really fiddling and silly to go on about, so here's one of the rejected poems in question. If this actually sounds good to you and you'd like more, I have a chapbook called
Fear Is Fashion available in limited quantity for $2.50 at Soulshine or directly from me if you happen to be in the Milledgeville area (writers gotta eat too). If you ain't local, email me and we can work something out. On with the reads:
Family Icons
There is so much more of them than me.
My mother's slight frame
the same that birthed me, nursed me
could rail through home.
Sent silk screens crashing
down flights of stairs.
Dad, six feet
of father figure,
stature matching Santa to a son
who learned his silence
was a safe defense.
And wrapping my arms around my mother
I feel the weight I put on her back,
play with the hair where she has dyed
away my gray.
And pulling on my father's sweaters,
my arms find their ends now,
past the borders
we have both crossed
in so many years.
Their names on all my papers,
mother's calligraphy
father's capitals,
blurs what was given
what was taken.
There is so much more of either
to be done.
After silk fluttered
to the end of our stairwell
and father found words again
I took comfort
and was given one ounce
of the strength
they had to clean it all up.
Now my father
prostrate, robed
face down on a cathedral floor,
my mother pinching me awake,
makes me desperate for some sort of belief.
My mother and father have already
outlived God.
I stare, whisper nothing, and
finger rosaries that are not
the notches in their spines.
(Copyrights? 2003. Please don't rip me off, thanks)
Heart Full of Napalm
Did another open mic tonight. Terribly disappointing, but got free beer.
My acquisition of a CD-R/W drive for Christmas has me burning all manner of mixes for peoples. GC&SU's doing a play called
Illusions and they'd been looking for incidental/between scene music and had found nothing forthcoming. Melissa suggested I tear apart my collection to find some appropriately creepy, preferably Eastern-tinged sounds. Came up with the following:
Johnny Greenwood: "Moon Trills" from
Bodysong
Brian Eno & David Byrne: "The Carrier" & "A Secret Life":
My Life In The Bush Of Ghosts
Set Fire To Flames: "Omaha" & "Esquimalt Harbor":
Sings Reign Rebuilder
Muslimgauze: "Hindu Kush Opium Crop" & "Believers of the Narcotic": not sure of the album(s) here, but thanks to
Derick for putting these on my computer.
John Cale: "Kiss - Movement 4":
Eat/Kiss: Music for the Films of Andy Warhol
Material: "End Of Words":
Seven Souls
Sigur Ros: "Ny Batteri" & "Avalon":
Agaetis byrjun
There was a whole lot more I wanted to put on that which would not fit but would have allowed me to feel satisfaction in vicariously making innocent theatre-goers listen to, say, John Zorn, Glenn Branca, Mogwai, Merzbow, John Coltrane etc. etc. etc... If it were up to this theatre department, plays would be soundtracked solely by Pearl Jam and John Williams film scores. Sad.
Apart from that one instance, most of my mixes are geared toward suggesting my tastes upon my friends. Just did one for a guy who's really into Ryan Adams, the White Stripes and Nirvana--apparently stuck in some mid-'90s time warp. I included the Wrens (but of course, everyone should love the Wrens), Television, Spoon and the Mountain Goats. It's sort of akin to getting someone to shed their flannel in favor of some Kenneth Cole.
No no no no, not everyone should be a hipster fer fuck's sake. Hell,
I probably shouldn't be. There's not(much)hing wrong with Pete Yorn. It's just...hm. Perhaps an anecdote would illustrate how important music education is to me.
This past New Years, I was attending a bumpin' party at a friend's house. I'd polished off and been polished by a bottle of vodka (couldn't help it, screwdrivers are tasty) and I was drifting in and out of consciousness on the couch. My girlfriend was trying to encourage me to drink water, eat saltines, not close my eyes and all that, but to no avail.
Then someone in the room asked "what's emo?"
I sobered up enough to explain that it's a truncation of "emotional hardcore," which started in DC in the '80s with bands like Rites of Spring, was appropriated by more theatrical acts like Sunny Day Real Estate and brought to prominence by folks like Texas is the Reason and Jawbreaker, then totally fucking ruined by Jimmy Eat World, The Get Up Kids, Dashboard Confessional and about a million other bands I didn't care to name.
From that point, I was about to launch into a serious discussion about the lineage of
shoegazer acts to
"post-rock" before a handful of saltines was forcibly fed to me.
Well I've rambled about as much as I did that night, so I'll just stop
here.
Stand (In The Place That You Are)
I took the
Political Compass test. Apparently, I fall into the Libertarian Left. More specifically, I'm Economic Left/Right: -5.62, Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -5.44 (turn ons: freedom, turn offs: corporate globalization). I'm kinda nuzzled amongst Gandhi, The Dalai Lama and Nelson Mandela. Not bad company, but if that's not a cliche, I don't know what is. I suspected as much would be the case though.
Also, I seem to be politically aligned with Bartok and Schoenberg, so it's off to the classical section for me...
I Ain't No Goddamn Son Of A Bitch
My CD collection has sprawled beyond any means of foreseeable control. Jewel cases, digipacks and various low-budget cardstock sleeves have spread to the seats of my car. They pock my desk and floor and threaten to topple from the haphazard stacks in my cabinet. At this moment, loose CDRs hang from my wall, hide in the cabinet, and secret themselves in the visor of my car. Brian Eno's first two pop albums snuggling with a rap/hip hop mix I made. The thought makes me all fuzzy inside.
This kind of disarray leads to Easter egg-type surprises...like the one I experienced this morning.
I was leaving for another day of work and just grabbed the first CD that popped into my head, Death Cab For Cutie's
Something About Airplanes. Seemed like it would be good, unobtrusive morning drive time music. A little young bastard music before work you know. Seemed appropriate.
What I found when I opened the case was an unlabeled CDR nestled atop the Death Cab. Whatever could it be?
It could be my goddamn savior, is what it could be.
When I worked at the music store in the mall last year, there was a guy named Brian working a jewelry booth right in front of us. On slow nights, and of that there were many, we'd dick around and talk about music. He was a brilliant tall bastard, seemed more suited to be working in a pawn shop than fixing silver all day. He was a metal head and we'd complain about Metallica's new album (which, you should know by now is woefully terrible) and just eke through the retail way of life. One night, he brought me a mix CD to throw into the in-store play, and that's what I'd found.
Oh. My. God.
I drove to work to Glen Danzig encouraging me to die die, my darling. I'd had no idea, but it was exactly what I needed, not this fuckin' indie shit. Bring the rock!
I went out for lunch and an unrecognizable [reformed minus Danzig] Misfits crooned "Saturday Night" for my delighted inner ear. Was the original lineup better? Undoubtedly. But this song is pop metal perfection. It's anthemic, heavy and melodic and made me feel like the seventeen year old I never was. You need this song in your life. I mean, check the first verse:
there's 52 ways to murder anyone
one & two are the same
and they both work as well
I'm coming clean for Amy
Julie doesn't scream as well
and the cops won't listen all night
That the song doesn't blow its wad there is a feat. The all-important chorus takes the B-movie setting the verses set up and actually manages to make an ode to prom murder universal:
but the back seat of the drive-in
is so lonely without you
I know when you're home I was thinking about you,
there was was something I forgot to say
I was crying on a Saturday night
I was out cruising without you
they were playing our song
crying on Saturday night
I'm breathless. But up next on the mix is my favorite Misfits song, "Where Eagles Dare," whose chorus, in its entirety, is as follows:
I AIN'T NO GODDAMN SUNUVABITCH! YOU BETTER THINK ABOUT IT BABY!
And I can't think of any better sentiment to end this post on than exactly that.
