Julian Casablancas

Cute story! When LA Record sent out their perennial and never regularly scheduled Who Wants What Show email, I jumped to go see Julian Casablancas. Like, wriggled and writhed like the obnoxious know-it-all in class that's waving their hand in the air because they know the answer to the teacher's question. Except, I didn't know the answer to the question. Because in my head? I was thinking Jose Gonzales, who is amazing and wonderful and I'm dying to see. Have you heard his cover of The Knife's "Heartbeats"? Amazing. But uh. It was actually Julian Casablancas. Hahaha, I'm a silly bitch! Aaaaaaaaanyway, I had actually been wanting to see a show I wouldn't normally see and review it. This would be one! But I went, dressed to the tits and with an open mind. Here is the review.

For the record (haha, get it?!? GET IT?), the final lines as I wrote them were:

If one were to compare, say, Daft Punk, LCD Soundsystem, The Knife, or Ratatat in a live setting, I would say, humbly, that Julian Casablancas is in a whole other game now. And if he wants to keep up, then he needs to do just that.

But whatever. Editing!

Writeup for LA Record here.

The Keepers

The Keepers were and are a band formed in Long Beach somewhere in the late 90s/early '00s, but who the hell remembers. Three dudes, some of my favorite boys of all time, and 3 of the most sickly talented musicians I'll ever know. Patrick Butterworth and Ed Kampwirth can be seen presently as the (completely amazing) rhythm section for Dios. Fred (Dirt Clod) Fight can be seen biking down mountainsides in Oregon with his bro Phil fight. He also recently finished his Master's Thesis on the Long Beach punk scene, which, yes, has enough material in its history to merit an entire Master's Thesis.

New Dios here.

Article for LA Record here.

Gag Order

I have wanted to keep this, here, free of my usual political rants and raves, but given this past week, and the weeks leading up to it, I'm lifting my own self-imposed gag order.

In light of the passing of Howard Zinn, may his great soul truly rest in peace, I recall a few gems. "Most wars, after all, present themselves as humanitarian endeavors to help people. " Sound about accurate? But my all time favorite and a constant go-to for this liberal is his saying about how, in America, they're always telling you that you can make anything out of yourself, you can do anything if you just work hard enough. They don't tell you how easily you can fall. One pink slip, one family member getting sick is all it takes to wipe everything out. He added "I saw my parents work their fingers to the bone every day, and they never made it out of the tenements."

Watching the State of the Union on Wednesday, his words coursing through my mind, several things occur to me, as they usually do. As much as I'm not only an Obama supporter and cried the night he was elected, and again during his inauguration, but I'm a huge admirer of the man and his abilities and his audacity of hope. Now, having said that, I also concur with my patriots in arms, other liberals who feel like this particular president has a pretty golden window and perhaps isn't doing as much as maybe is possible, or that somehow has lost that audacity.

I'm also fully aware that after the past 8 years and a Machiavellian (at best), idiotic, jingoistic, and criminally reckless Administration, whoever won the '08 election was going to be inheriting a pile of shit.

But watching the SOTU, it just smacks of empty rhetoric, doesn't it? Doesn't it make you just wanna give it all up? I realize there's a distinct difference but I wanted to hear at least a twinge of the kind of speech we heard at the Dem convention in '04 that blew everyone away. Instead, per usual, you have POTUS speaking and half the room acting like kids who got their candy taken away. But this year in particular really fucking pissed me off. Just looking at John Boehner's petulant smirk on his over tanned face (it's January in DC for christ's sake) was making me insane. And the man's constituents are in Ohio. OHIO. Not South Carolina even. O. HI. O. So, I get it, this is politics. You're either with us or against us.

Everyone has known that even just bringing up health care reform is touching the third rail. Not only that, it's potentially a career killer. It happened to Hillary just, like, a few years ago really. But then again, as my darling Gore Vidal always says, the country we live in is more like the United States of Amnesia. Look I had to really rack my brain just yesterday to remember the neighbor's cat's name, but I still remember that knock down drag out career (almost) killer that the Clintons went through when they approached health care. But even then, maybe behind closed doors it was happening, but we didn't have the level of public - oh, we'll just say "debate" that's been happening. People taking to the streets in protest and talking about socialism. There we go. Bing! The button. Drop the S bomb into an idiotic constituency and bam. They're your zombie soldiers arguing vigilantly for...

For....?

What are they arguing for? Nobody can answer this for me. These people, these tea partyers, these Fox News watching terrified idiots, what are they fighting for? Honestly. I don't get it. Is it really just change? Is it that simple? Is the theory of Occam's Razor in full effect here? That the simplest explanation is the answer here?

The number one mistake in American history is not letting the South secede. Don't get me wrong, I love the South. Love it. Most of our great American writers and a good majority of our best music comes from the South. But we shoulda let them go, you know what I mean? But the biggest mistake of American politics for at least a century is the bipartisan system. Sunday after Sunday after debate after debate I am absolutely sickened, mollified, indignant at the binary level of discourse. Who will take back Congress. Which team will win. How will the Reps battle the Dems, vice versa.

All these years of supposed evolution, and we end up in the Coliseum watching Jersey Shore, I mean, Gladiators fight, standing and applauding or sitting and smirking at every well rehearsed and focus grouped line of the State of the Union.

Welcome to the vomitorium, my friends.

Binge, purge, the excelsior elixir of the end of the Empire.

It's not a fucking Super Bowl game, god dammit. There are people's lives at stake here. And all it takes for everything, everything they've worked so hard to earn to be taken away is one pink slip, one natural disaster, one family member getting sick. Are these people protesting, now I'm not specifically talking about the politicians yet, but the Fox Newsers, the people in the streets, are they seriously telling me they don't have a single family member that has a health problem? Or that they're so set they can afford to put Mom through chemo without worry? In the words of Bill Hicks "I dooooooooooooooooubt it."

But then! It's a bird, it's a plane! President Obama went into the lion's den, the Republican Retreat (wait a minute, they have retreats? Did anyone else know that they camp out together and have team building retreats???) in none other than Body More, MD and intelligently and cogently and passionately argued (of course, per usual) his case for, let's all say it together, bi-partisan cooperation. Normally this is the stuff of barfdom (see: vomitorium) but there is so much at stake here, now, especially with healthcare, that this one act was truly an act of heroism. Truly.

I'm not sure how long this link will be active, but here it is for as long as it stays up. Obama at the House Republican Retreat.

And to end this highly charged political week is our old standby, the always great SNL Weekend Update. Seth Meyers said of the Republicans inviting Obama to speak and argue his case was like "inviting Aquaman into the water. You guys do know that's how he got the job, right? By debating? It's like in Indiana Jones where the guy waves a bunch of swords around and Indy just pulls out a gun and shoots the guy." Or something like that. That link, for as long as it's up, here: SNL Weekend Update.

Not that I'm pulling for any team or side on this thing. But well played, Sir. Well played.

Pogues

Maybe my pervasive and eternal draw to Ireland, my people, or my recent poetry reading spree, or my almost innate, instinctive desire to drink whiskey and indulge in said poetry and break out into sad yet cheery song, or just because I hadn't put anything up in a while...here is my writeup for LA Record. Pogues, Halloween. One of the best. Hopefully one of the memories that will flash through my mind at the end. Whenever that may come. Here's to you, Jean Paul. Cheers.

For LA Record.

The Look In The Eyes

Haven't posted anything in a while, so I'm puttin this one on, with the caveat that maybe this might not be the best venue for this voice. But, here you are.

More rock to come, my international friends.

Hope you enjoy.

The Look in the Eyes

The Man looked at The Lady from a little bit above her. The Lady said “I know what that means. I can see that look in your eyes.”

She wondered what she could see in His Eyes. Alls she could see were just eyes.

“I know what that means. I can see that look in your eyes.”

What look? What was in the eyes? Alls she saw was a look. And eyes. She looked as close as she could to see the look. In the eyes. But alls she saw was just eyes. Pretty eyes? Was that what was ‘the look’?

“Elzie, Honey. We have to go. Shut the T.V. off. Time to get ready.”

Her Mom had the peaceful nature of a lawnmower over the carpet, ironing in her bra and skirt, scuffling to get ready.

“C’mon. Here you go.”

She picked Elzie up like a koala and took her up to her room.

“OK. One armie in…”

Elzie was compliant. One army in. Nother army in. Now both army, both armies are in.

“There we go,” her Mother heaved with a sigh. “You ready?”

She wanted to know what the look meant. She wanted to know what was inside of the eyes, besides just the eyes. She looked at her Mom as hard as she could, in they eyes. Do you look at the black part? Do you look at the eyelashes? What part tells you what That Look Means?
The Mean Teacher Lady was there and seemed to be as hard as the piano seat. Hard and unshufflable. Unpronounceable. Un-doable. The Lady With the Clipboard was a bumblebee saying names.

“Elzie? Elzie Dunn you are up next. Elzie, like ‘Elzie Fitzgerald?”

Elzie Fitzgerald. What a dumb name.

She walked out on the clickity clock stage and took the liquid looking flat black bench and slid around until she could at least reach the keys ok. Mmm k. The middle finger goes on the black key like this. Uh kay.

She started. But the keys were thicker, they were heavier than her normal piano. They were like walking heavy dogs. The heavy dogs kept wanting to lie down but she had to keep playing them. She had to press really hard to get the dogs to play the note. Dumb dogs. Stupid seat you can’t even sit in. Stupid black and white. The sound was thicker than she knew. She didn’t like it. It sounded hollow in the school auditorium. Audio-torium. Come on, dogs. Don’t be so dumb. Note after note thicker and thicker, until the dogs started licking her fingers. What does it mean, inside of the eyes? Do you change your eyes? How do your eyes change?

“I know what that look means. I can see it in your eyes. I love you too.”

How can she see the Love? Is it in the part in the eyes? Which part?? How do you see it? What does Love look like? If you scratch the eyes, can you get the love part out? Can you just hold the eyes in your hand and see the loving part? Where is the loving part? Is it in the eyes? How come she couldn’t see it? She looked and looked, and all she saw were eyes. She saw frantic, darting eyes. She saw eyes that wouldn’t look at her. She saw eyes that were too busy. She saw eyes that saw something else, something around, something behind her, something in the way, not her but something around it, but she never saw into the eyes. She wanted to see into the eyes. Where in the eyes do you look?

She finished the ending chord and stared at the keys. Can’t even reach the pedal. Stupid dogs. Slow dogs. Lazy dogs. Hateful dogs. I wonder what’s in their eyes, she thought.

The Clipboard Woman came over and spoke to her.

“Elzie, take a bow!”

Elzie stood up, still angry at the black and white key dogs and the pedal so far away. And courteseyed. It was hard to courtesey like her Mean Lady Teacher had told her with her shoes from her sister. But the shoes were pink and her dress Both Armies In was blue so the shoes had to come too. She looked over and saw the Mean Lady Teacher and saw something. It wasn’t happy because one time she and Misty both licked an ice cream at the same time and met tongues and giggled so hard they didn’t know when to stop, and that was happy and so that wasn’t it but it wasn’t sad either even though Mean Lady Teacher kind of had red eyes. Is that the look? Is that what love looks like? It was something she didn’t know. How come the eyes can do so much? Alls she did was try to put her fingers on those keys that would not play, thank you very much.

Afterward in the hallway she ate her treat that tasted like milk but frozen and was supposed to be chocolate but Elzie was pretty sure this paper cup didn’t know what chocolate was supposed to taste like. Her Mom got down and looked Elzie In The Eye.

“I am so proud of you, Honey. So. Proud.”

Proud. Hmm. The Prouders That Be. Proud. Elzie wondered if that was like walking heavy dogs? Or was it like when you catch a moth in a jar? Or was it like when you break your pencil taking the test but you chew off the wood to get the lead part back so you can keep taking the test? Or was it like when you get both Armies in? Maybe The Look in the Eyes could tell.

“Elzie!”

Gahhhh, Missess Gallaalaaway. Allaalaaways in my face.

“Elzie. That. Was. A. Mag. Nificient. Beethoven.”

Elzie nodded and wished someone would take the melting milk from her hand and also the paper part which didn’t taste as good as the paper promised it would look.

“Really.”

And Missess Gallaalaaway had a look in her eyes that was wet and red too.

Elzie quietly said thank you and chewed on her wooden spoon tasting of frozen milk that didn’t even taste like chocolate. And smiled. She felt like the situation could use a smile.

Elzie watched her mother’s legs in her skirt and shirt that shirt that took longer than even Elzie to get ready.

Beethoven, Elzie thought looking up to the lights in the ceiling.

I wonder if he knows what Love looks like. In the eyes.

All Hallows Eve

Halloween, or Hallow's Eve, is a Celtic tradition called Samhain.

Samhain is the annual fall tradition, when the weather changes from warm to the bitter cold. It is when you bring in the flocks, the herds, the family. All of them. Spirits have passed. Time has passed. You are still here.

Where are the ghosts?

You bring them in, by lighting candles. You ask for them to join you.

The mask between what is living and what is dead is lifted. For one night.

Samhain.

Come on in. We miss you.

All the ghosts, all the spirits, of what has passed. Of what is Past.

You can wear a costume, if you want.

We recognize your spirit.

We lift the veil.

Come in.

Happy Halloween, to all my ghosts. All my spirits. All my kindred.

All my souls.

10.15 (on a Saturday Night)

Best. Birthday. Ever.

Voices and bodies and wishes and strong arms where I haven't felt them for so long. Benedictions and nods, looks and longing quiet speechless sentiments from those so dear to me. Never near enough, and never very far away, no matter where they are. His way of walking off saying "goodbye, Toots" without looking at me, but when we sit and talk like actors do to one another, it is The Truth, and we deep sea dive with looks and expressions like hand gestures in a near black depth of sea. His eyes say everything. When he says "amazing," He really means it. When he takes the camera, he knows what he's shooting and how. When he takes me out for a walk, it's just to listen: to the earth, the moan and pounding whoosh of the ocean. When he opens the door for you and checks you out, head to toe, even though you're not alone: you think, you gorgeous dark thing you, I fucking love you for doing that on me birfday. When she brings you a homemade candle and mozes around in ballet slippers, you are honored and loved just for the relaxed, knowing company. And when she texts, you go. Because: There Will Be Fun. Shooting photos for the first time in ages, remembering.

I sat in that dark theater, hearing that which has brought me back since I was 16.

I could have watched those laser horses run for hours.



A dream for too many years come true. All doubts eradicated; every single negative thought that's ever crossed my path, entered my mind. Eradicated.

I heard and felt Bonzo like I never have before. And for me to say that? Is fucking saying a LOT.

Top it off with Roscoe's at 2am with your Hunee, and my dears: fuck the rest. You got put thru and still found love and joy.

Oh and one more thing:


She was 36 when this photo was taken. Sometimes, maybe, it's just getting started. Scratch that maybe.

It was a kiss of betrayal, you fucking whore.

He43 came by after teaching one of his final English courses at the university, to pick up his watch and tell me that he wasn't going to fuck me anymore, so I guess that's it.

Guess that's it.

I had shown him some truth and he43 ran, like they all run. They run like rats from truth, like rats from a sinking ship. He43 came by just to pick up his watch.

When we were half an hour early for the movie we sat in his car and listened. Listened to each other's sighs, new but pleading for familiarity, his music shown to me like a child with a new guest in the house: hey look also I got a lizard. Here look look it's sleeping. Yeah. It's my lizard. He43 turned his head and looked at his back seat which he43 had heretofore not noticed until someone with fresh eyes as they say had pointed it out to him and he43 widened his eyes in boredom, he43 was excited to know someone new, someone he could talk about anything with, a girl. An attractive girl. A girl he could fuck.

He1 used to show me. On the clock. He1 knew I'd pick it up eventually and I did. 10:15. My birthday. I only told one person. Didn't get it. I would be going about my business and cleaning my room, racetrack thoughts jockeying to the forefront of my head, and I would glance at the time and there it would be, not a minute before, not a minute after. Not 10:34. Not 10:11. 10:15 because that's my birthday and he1 knew I would get it eventually.

He37 came into the bar, the first time he looked me in the eyes, that straightaway look. I remembered that look in the eye. I didn't know where from. In between there were jobs at offices, trips to cities, dozens of shows, shows of all kinds, hundreds of acquaintances, jobs in restaurants, jobs in bars, dozens of clients, 'guests,' roommates, roommates mates, girls and their boyfriends, boys and their friends. I didn't remember where from. He37 remembered.

There's one of them. He58 works in a bank and at Starbucks but his real money comes from selling ecstasy. The silent brooding type. Thinks he58 knows who he is but he doesn't. He58 is what he thinks he should be. He58 thought he wanted me. Everything I said seemed to fit into his box labeled "What I Want." He used to say, "Ciao, bella," and he knew it would charm me. Me. Bella. Ha. I had to tell him I wasn't going to fuck him. I told him the first time I could, when it was just us, not accompanied by the party. He took me to lunch and I told him straight out. I was just, last week, understand seeing your friend. Understand? I'm not like that. I'm not that kind of girl. He threw a drink at me, later, when the party was there to witness the outburst, to see how offed he was. Didn't mean to but did it. To spite me. To show me he was hurt. I was the heartbreaker. Running around breaking boy's hearts. He gave me Ondaadje for V. Day. Signed the inside in French, told to him no doubt over the phone by a smoking Michele. I knew what he meant. Not the French. The, you're the one, I picked you out so you're the one. Because I picked you. I picked you after I decided you were perfect and there's no going back now, your saying no doesn't fit. See? It's in this novel, this kind of love. I picked you and you're it. Got the novel to prove it.

And I did get it. I saw the clock, each time after that and giggled. Daddy. You imp. Stay alive, he was saying. You were born on this day: remember? For a reason. It was for a reason.

The movie was called: The Day I Became A Woman.

The next time I saw him43 walking down the avenue towards the bar and I smiled and said hi grabbing a bottle of pear cider, through the window that opened onto the street. I didn't quite remember who or how or why but I knew I should know him so I said hi. And he43 looked good. He43 looked like a tall dark English Professor. My age. A person my age could be a professor. Of English. This means James, this means Nabokov, this means Shakespeare. And he knew me from college. I would take his I.D. at the computer lab counter, reading my poli sci textbook, and he would look me in the eyes and say: thanks. I told my college roommate about him. I had a crush on him. I had a crush on a few guys. He was one of them. I was in college. And this time he was meeting a friend. The rest of the bar was discussing T&A and pool and other drunk nights and they were discussing commerce and the death penalty. He thought I didn't remember him, and I didn't but then I did. I remembered him too well. I was in college then. I didn't fuck anyone. I didn't know I could.

We dated for a while and he attempted to tell me who ee cummings was. The poet I first read when my 2nd grade teacher pulled me aside after I wrote my first poem, to learn Japanese and postmodern poetry privately with the Japanese 3rd grade teacher, whom he7 no doubt was fucking. Dating. As he43 went right in explaining who ee cummings was without first asking if I even knew...I waited to hear how he43 would explain cummings then had to cut him off quietly, femininely, sweetly...with a smile on my face..."I know who ee cummings is." With a smile on my face.

All these ghosts and not a single door blown open. No one standing in the doorway, a face from the past, a familiar body to hold, not a single knowing check in -- how's it goin? Years, months, nights, ERs, fights, drinks, quick saves, all the minutes spent, holding sobbing girls in my long arms, all the secrets I know, the secrets nobody else knows. Secrets that would make men cry. Secrets that would make rats run. All the times I chased the boys and the calls and the creditors away like a tiger with fire in her belly. The driving, the drives, the drugs, the drinks, the diseases, the delirium, the derelict nights. Not a single face in the doorway. Remember me? How you been. And then it stopped. Lost everything. Again. After only gaining the essentials. Bare essentials. Bear essentials. A little food to eat, some new friendly faces, something to improve my standard of living. Small things a bear needs. Lost. All gone. And he43 came by to pick up his watch and tell me that since he wasn't going to fuck me, he wasn't going to come around at all.

And then it stopped. Even if I waited at the clock, from 10:09 on, not blinking, it would go right by like it wasn't even a time to begin with. It would go straight to 10:16. He1 stopped just when I needed it. He wanted me to learn it for future reference but I couldn't. I need it now.

He43 back-handedly "complimented" me by emphasizing how very, very attracted to me he was. He should have just back-handed me.

And he43 stood on the back steps hoping to leave before anything worse happened (what worse?) and I couldn't say anything just wanted to cry. Nobody wants off this sinking ship more than I. What do you do if you are the sinking ship? I nudged him with my foot at his shin like a guy’s guy who just lost a game of horse to the better player and said it was O.K. He43 said no it isn't but he left anyway. All four steps.

He43 only came to get his watch.

I slammed the door before I could see him descend the steps and I ran upstairs before anyone could interrupt the onset and I tried to shut off my ears before I could hear him drive off. The way they all did. The way they all do. They want to be excused from class.

He said, I don't know what to do and I'm afraid of what you might say.

The movie was called: The Day I Became A Woman.


- written 1999

The Hoof & The Heel

A while back I wrote about the absolutely loverly, incredibly talented and ridiculously productive Christine Hale.

She's in a new band with two other boys based in Montreal. They are really very good!

On U.S. tour now, hear them @myspace.

Let Me Clear My Throat.

So I've been chewing on an essay I read recently quite a bit over the last few days. It is titled "Misogyny, up close and personal." I'll just let you sit with that for a minute. Holy Hera, did this girl get it right.

I have sat with boys that I love and heard some truly unspeakably offensive things about women, been in situations where a boyfriend (not just mine) didn't say anything when his guy friends said something offensive about women and ha ha bloody fucking ha, ain't that the truth, take my wife please, been at work in offices, and heard things said about women, in front of women, to women, and all that I couldn't begin to possibly repeat because I reached my saturation point so damn long ago I can't even contain them anymore. Rape is one thing, domestic violence another, knowing what it feels like to enter a public bathroom - say, at your university - and look under the stalls to see if an attacker might possibly be waiting, to walk by yourself in a dark lot to your car trying to not look like a target and just get in the fucking car and then check the back seat to make sure no attacker is there...all of these things are what we as women deal with. Every. Day.

Pile on top of that the thing that gets me the most: the ordinary, quotidian misogyny, the seeming innocuous 'joke' or comment or marketing campaign or come-on when you're just fucking hanging out at a party or going to work or buying milk. It is all the time, every day, day in, and day out, for a woman.

I get cat called every time I leave the house. Every time. Every day, every time. Honked at, cat called, whistled at, and I have been followed, yes, followed, by a male, more often than I can count - I would say it happens on average about once a week. I get hit on at the store, at the dmv, in the elevator going to work, walking to lunch...you get the picture. None of the invitations were invited or welcome or flattering (one guy friend once told me, "it's your fault for being so pretty." huh? um, no? no.). I'm a private, quiet person by nature although I'm overly effusive and garrulous with my friends, and I learned somewhere in shooting up to about 5'9" at first and then up & up to about six feet not to ever, ever make eye contact with anyone when I walk into a room. It's a trick I learned somehow out of a survival instinct - not to ever invite any vampires in. My life, my body, my pussy, my rules. Right? (Just say 'right.')

Along the lines somewhere in there, I got mad as hell and wasn't going to take it any more. If my guy friends wouldn't let someone call them a faggot (how awful to be that right? sigh.) or punk em out, and they would throw blows to make that point - then I certainly had a fight too. It was never a decision. It was that I wouldn't take it anymore. I have only ever punched men. And every last one of them had it coming. I go easy too. Most of them are - well I'd say pussies but we all know pussy is the strongest sweetest thing there is, now don't we? I've had my crotch grabbed (my guy friends intervened when they thought I would actually kill the guy when I had my hand around his neck, up against a wall), my skirt lifted up, my breasts fondled, been cornered and followed and otherwise physically threatened and objectified by men, and not just a handful of times. A lot. Often. Daily.

And I'm one of the lucky ones. That, my friends, is a teeny, tiny fly in your chardonnay compared to the other horrific, appalling, unspeakable things that are perpetrated on women, all the time, every day, all over the world.

So, yeah. I'm a Feminist. I certainly hope that won't be a fucking problem for you.

And then, the guys that think they want to help, that want to try, will tell you this. "Well violence happens to men too. Men are objectified by women too." Like, well, you're not alone.

No.

NO dude. It pales, it does not even begin to prepare you for what it might possibly be like to be a woman, and just for one day. You do NOT know what it is like, you simply do not have the first fucking inkling of what it is like to be followed, objectified, in constant threat, treated like a second class citizen even when you're one of the smartest in the room. At. All. You, my friend, have a different pair, and so you could not possibly, possibly begin to know what one second, one minute, one full, long day in the life of a girl or woman feels like. You will never, ever begin to possibly know or understand. Until you start to listen to us. And really hear.

I bet on your Momma's best dress that if you were to get dressed as a woman A. You wouldn't look so good, B. You would immediately realize how inadequate you looked as a woman (welcome, little dears, to our world, and don't cry Sweetie), and C. Shit is rough for us.

All day.

Every day.

And I'm not saying we don't all have our challenges but this is my time to say my thing, I got the mic, and I'm going to say what needs to be said, listened to, and understood, somehow.

You got all that, you have all of that, and then you pile on the seemingly innocuous comments, the random laughing at an inappropriate, offensive, lots of times downright violent joke about women (the two black eyes, told her twice already? love that one), in a room full of men that want to alpha dog each other into oblivion (and of course it's the theta dogs doing this trying to jockey to the forefront), and sitting there, as a woman, and sighing. Thinking - are they really not human to you? Women? Really?

Let me clear my throat.

The difference between the Civil Rights movement and Feminism is that sexual politics is just that - sexual politics. The Civil Rights movement never entered the bedroom. Thus the implicit threat that if you're a feminist, you hate men, and therefore He will never get laid again. And He sure as hell isn't going to let that happen. But wanting equality regardless of gender, not wanting to be objectified, not wanting to hear jokes that aren't funny, about women, when we all know you have mothers and sisters and grandmas and maybe girlfriends, simply is not mutually exclusive to liking men and most of the time enjoying their company. It's that we want equality. We want to be seen and heard. We should be treated as human. At least. It isn't a threat to say "stop raping us" or, "you know what, this is my ass, not yours to grab" or "I work here too, as an equal, just like you." It is at a very minimum, our right. At a fucking minimum. Gore Vidal once wrote that men are afraid of giving women any power, because then women might treat men as horrifically as men have treated them. He is right. He pretty much always is.

So gentlemen, I say to you thus: you are either with us, or against us. You have every chance to fight the good fight along with us. Because it happens to us. Every. Day.

I once sat, late one night in SF, at a diner, with 3 of my best boys, one of them my dear boyfriend at the time. And the girl that took us out, well her male roommate came to the table to join us after the parties and the bars. He seemed like an intellectual, he seemed cool and inadequate and nerdy, and maybe too self-aware. So late toward the end of enjoying our french fries and gravy at 4am, he said "I hate Feminists." I think to this day that maybe what he meant was "I hate bitches" (fair enough), or "I hate it when people act irrationally and yell at me" (also fair) but it seemed to be targeted directly at women, and particularly those that are aware of a need for equality? I guess? So I kind of understood his point and I pick my battles, so I just sort of shook my head rather than choosing once again to be That Girl that makes waves and points out What You Just Said and How is That OK?

My guy friends laughed, including my boyfriend who probably thought I was going to crucify the poor guy, said, without even looking at me, "you picked the wrong table to say that at, man." I didn't even have to say a word.

That was a good night.

So now, I give you this. Woman, I love ya, high five, I'm here fighting the good fight too. One of the best things I've read in a very long time.

Misogyny, up close and personal, by Melissa McEwan. Bless you, Girl.

Jail Weddings

I fucking love these guys. It's seeming on here that I love every band. This is not true! You would be wrong to think that! I'm a critical bastard. Maybe I just want to keep it positive? On here? For now. Till I feel the pull of Misanthrope tugging at my skirt and soul. Because my blog can ruin you! (My blog cannot ruin you. My blog has five viewers. Hi guys!) But I keep it up, because: love. Is rly truez. Which is exactly and precisely what they bring to every show. Their EP is finally, finally due out soon(it's hard getting 147 band members together. JK. It's more like...I dunno, count the heads in the pic), so I thought I'd lay some internet flowers out for them here. Not that they need my help. Or my Michael Jackson style internet flowers.

So I love these guys, and want not only the best but basically just food and rent for every one of them.

This guy knows what I'm talking about, and he absolutely knows what he's talking about. I know, because I know. He even gives it up for Brainiac. Let's all give it up for Brainiac.

Original review for LA Record. Original preview, which we used to do more but now not so much. It's a bit redundant, I know I know I know (get it? redundant?) but eh. Whatever! Have fun! Enjoy!

Jail Weddings music and website.

UPDATE: Record release 8.21.09 @ Legion Hall in Highland Park. Dance yr Ass off!

Entrance

I first saw Entrance on the night that I wrote about them for LA Record, having come to see my lovely boys/soul brothers/friends in Grand Elegance. They blew. Me. Away. My fucking jaw was on the floor. I couldn't take my eyes off of them and there wasn't a single insincere moment or musical mis-step the whole set. This band is tighter than a James Brown backing band, no shit. They blew me away. And still do, and every time I get to see them. They seem to get better and crazier and, just, better. I really do love and dig and admire most every band I've ever written about for the Record (not all, for sure, and I pull no punches when I don't) , because those are the shows I see and want to be at, but there is something truly deeply unhinged and powerful and possessed about the particular kind of Rock n Roll that The Entrance Band play so damn well. If you haven't had the chance to see them or don't live in LA, now's your chance.

They will be releasing their self-titled album on September 1st (Pitchfork news and album stream here) and will begin their tour today starting off with a stop in the impossibly gorgeous Santa Cruz and then on to Big Sur to play the (in)famous Henry Miller (get it? cus he shagged a boatload of laydees, or at least he claims to have) Library. That show should be pure off the hook psychic energy, for realz.

Entrance Band myspace with artwork, pix, and tour dates here.

OH, and here is an interview with the unbelievably good bassist Paz for Long Beach's The District by fellow LA Record cohort Alex Roman. She describes guitarist Guy Blakeslee's playing as 'like a punk rock flamenco guitarist.' Perfect.

Blonde Redhead

Blonde Redhead are currently writing and recording their latest music / inspiration, and all Good Love willing, we'll hear it soon as it's ready. In the means times, it just feels appropriate to post something for them. I wrote the below in March 2006 and the above was of course rewritten on a bit of a less personal note for the Weekly. I thought I'd republish the personal one here, now. Here it is.

Blonde Redhead have been there for me literally through every love, every breakup, every crush, and every crushing time I thought I wouldn't make it through and did somehow. The album Mi Via Vida Violenta sang me thru a love I could never have, In An Expression of the Inexpressable was my first, and I'd never heard anything like it. It blew me away. That one got me through, I think, myriad others, Fake Can be Just as Good is just plain great and always will be, and I can't even listen to Melody of Certain Damaged Lemons because it was an album that sang to me through the darkness of hell, watching someone I loved get sucked away from me and become unrecognizable in their drug use. When Misery is a Butterfly came out I was in Portland and was already living with enough ghosts. Blonde Redhead came through town and I went, by myself as usual, down to the Crystal Ballroom on 13th & Burnside. I saw Kazu through the second story window and she saw me, and we looked at each other in mutual solitude and thoughtfulness for a long few moments before someone called her inside the room and I had the light to cross the street.

Portlanders were their usual passive aggressive not hip enough to actually just be cool, trying so hard not to care while furtive eyes dart around at one another without words, and I got a Jameson and looked at the albums while kazu, simone, and amodeo tuned and warmed up onstage, checked their connections and setup one last time, and went and changed. I hadn't listened to the album because some part of me felt that there was a lot that needed to be left behind, and Blonde Redhead are about memories, to me. But the music started and I heard these songs that have sang me through so much, when they played 'Misery is a Butterfly' I realized at that moment that these ghosts are MY ghosts, and that if I had made it this far, I had nothing to fear looking back on. And as the three of them looked at each other and connected with each other, making some of the most beautiful music I've ever heard, I hung my head a little and started to tear up because I knew that even though I was a stranger in a room full of people I didn't like, because of these three and what they have given me, because of all the amazing art that has been given to me, I was not alone, and never would be again.

A love song, for Frankie

I called him my bit of messican golden sunshine. And he was. I think we both infused each other with so much joy, so much happiness, it became a white star. Some thrive on the dragging down, the mutual destruction and misery, and we laughed and loved with every fiber of our being. Everything was funny to us. Everything, we shared. I ruined every surprise he tried to arrange for me, and he would shake his head as if he could barely tolerate me and we would laugh like hell because we adored each other. It had never occurred to me that someone might go out of their way to plan something for me, nobody ever had, and there he would sit in his Armani suit and shake his head. And instead of driving one another crazy with 'why can't you just ----' we laughed and understood and brought each other gifts and had amazing times and loved each other with the tending burning ferocity of two people who genuinely care about one another.

He had been going out of town for business, Japan a lot, calling me at the office in four in the afternoon quietly going 'woooo!' drunk as hell at what must have been 3am, in his hotel room as I tried to keep my composure at my desk and giggling my ass off. He bought me a body cuddler and then laughed with his amazing joy when I wouldn't let it go. I kept it forever. He ran like a baseball player, on his tippy toes, and cycled like a maniac. You couldn't rip him away from the seat on Saturdays. He thought I was the most beautiful, amazing thing, and while he felt that and thought that, when I felt like it was time to leave, because I was 22, and needed to go out into this great world, on my own, he let me go with such tenderness and tears, that I still can feel the love to this day.

When my Dad died, he was there. I can't tell you what you go through. He pulled me in and I tried to process it, because you get confused. You're so angry and confused. And he walked me through it, and gently put me through the airport and called and said if you need me to come out, I will. I didn't know that this was a thing you could do for another person. I didn't even know that you could say 'yes. i need you. please come out.' And then he did. He showed up with no hesitation, just to sit with me. He cried at the funeral. I was out of my mind and he sat, and just gave me support. When we were arranging for my father's funeral, my brother and sisters, and I, were at the mortuary. I went to go to the bathroom and got blocked, in the doorway by the undertaker. He said "you have your father's height." His body was below. This is what I was dealing with.

We will always have that house made from a tree struck by lightning, we will always have bagles and lox. We will always have those times, those incredible times. New York with Perrier and Baileys and cafe con leche. Central Park. We will always have that time we rented a pedaler bike in Santa Barbara and you fucking wanted to take it, and of course we did, offroading back to the hotel for you to pick up something. You were my golden sunshine, and I was your good time girl. And we loved each other something crazy.

I'm forgetting what it feels like to be that loved. That adored. That understood and forgiven.

So Frankie, my darling darling wonderful you, wherever you are, I hope that you have happiness. Because you have given me more than I ever thought I could possibly deserve.

A Writer Writes.

So I like, love, to visit one of these sites listed on the right, here. I won't name which one. And I comment, because the writing is provocative, hilarious, incredibly well done, and uh, yeah it's like one of my favorites. And so I read this one comment and I'm already all "brevity. soul of wit, dude. loooook at how loooooong this post is! we don't care. we don't have time to read your 1,000 word [essay] comment. Keep it simple stupid, KISS." But it was this successful lawyer, and he sometimes thinks, on his way home or maybe his lunch hour or whenever, that he would like to be a writer, because reading the primary blogger is a fucking LAFF factory, so he wonders should he be thinking about becoming a writer?

NO.

YOU SHOULD NOT BE THINKING OF BECOMING A WRITER.

And here it begins.

You don't 'think' about becoming an artist. One writes because one has a voice, hopefully, and something they want to say with that voice. The painter paints because s/he sees something that needs to be put out there, the musician hears a song. The artist expresses their Self, because they have to. If they do not have these outputs, these expressions, they go crazy and a lot of the time very well do anyway.

You 'want' to write?

Then. Write.

I'm serious. I'm not trying to shoot this dude's dreams down, and I won't even discuss the sheer lunacy of thinking about quitting a job that took years of school and thousands of dollars and that made you successful and that you, actually, quite like. And in this economy. But here's the thing. You don't 'think' about 'wanting' to 'write.'

A writer writes. Period.

Go! Do it! Live the dream. Write away! Learn the guitar, then. Do it, and I mean that. Because then you will see how fucking diffcult it is. Because the reason this guy thinks this blogger has such a great life is because this blogger is a sheer fucking genius with words, but if you were to even attempt to put out the amount of content with that level of quality, thoughtfulness, and hilarity, every day, you will see how fucking difficult it becomes. Rock stars. They really have the life, huh. Sex, drugs, rock n roll. Don't have to do a thing. Well you too, my friend, can learn an instrument and get a band together and starve on the road for years to get on stage and just fucking hope that one person likes you, and likes your music, and maybe, maybe if you get lucky, that band will stay together and you might cut a few albums. And if you're really, truly meant to do it, and you're really fucking lucky? Maybe you're John Bonham. But there is maybe one of those every couple of decades and even then, pretty much nobody can take on Bonzo.

Because, here's the thing. For as long as I can remember, my life has been devoted to art in one form or another. I have always loved the written word. I have always been silenced by the power of, and sheer infinity of possibilities in, photography. I can't even begin to express what music means to me, to all of us, and I try every time I write about it. Everybody that does not write or paint or sculpt or act or play music thinks doesn't it look fun and wouldn't that be nice, and what a cute little fucking thing you do, and sit on the fucking sidelines and say you like it or don't, or, even better, it's good. Or it's not. And what does [insert movie star here] do? They get to be rich and gorgeous and famous and all the award shows...you know what? You, too, can learn the craft of acting for a giant price both financially and emotionally and you too can go on audition after audition for years and years and years, and maybe if you're lucky? You are another DeNiro. But you have to work reeeeeeally fucking hard to be that.

But you don't write. You haven't. You might have tried. Maybe that post was your one attempt. And again, I'm not shooting it down. I'm saying: it is fucking hard. And the people that choose to express themselves creatively, the good ones, the ones worth their salt, learn their skill and they work their asses off and they barely make any money and they do it anyway because a writer. Writes. Period.

The fear from someone who hasn't tried anything creative is that they don't have any talent. My sense is that if you're even asking the question, the answer is no, you don't. But hey. Maybe you do, maybe you don't. A lot of very untalented people make their money in creative pursuits. Lots. But even the truly exceptionally gifted ones? They don't know if they're any good either. Because why? Because. It's. Fucking. Hard.

So you wanna write? Then go do it.

I'm a writer, it's what I do. And as the wondrously talented writer and director Billy Wilder wrote, "I'm a writer. But then again, nobody's perfect."