He is REAL!

RAMEN!

Why do you do what you do?

I just ran across Why Do You Do What You Do?. It's beautiful.

All Hallow's Eve: The King In Yellow

So I just found out that one of my favorite horror books is actually freely available as an audiobook online: LibriVox » The King in Yellow by Robert W. Chambers

Hallowe'en comes quick, kids.

Reviewing Mike Judge's Idiocracy. By Reihan Salam - Slate Magazine

Of course it's not going to be popular. The truth rarely is, even in farce.

Whatever: How to Make a Schadenfreude Pie

Whatever: How to Make a Schadenfreude Pie

Gotta love it. Gotta love it.

Even the rain bows down, let us pray

Tori performing "Cruel" live on Jools Holland.


I ran into this surfing. I first heard Tori listening to WVUM on the way to waste time somewhere. I don't remember much about it, just that it was on Bird Rd. and the song was "God" and I fell in love with the feedback guitars and the sweet and ethereal bitch-voice. I loved Tori from then on, and she remains probably the only musical act I've seen more than once (others being Tool and Smashing Pumpkins). Tori's the reason I'm good friends with LauraChikon; I posted on usenet's rec.music.tori-amos asking for a bootleg of the first show I'd seen (from '96's "Boys for Pele" tour) and she answered. We've been friends over ten years now. That show was the first time I met Cecie, one of the three times that music so touched me that I felt completely numb and the first time I saw girls kissing in public. I can still remember the girl a few rows in front of me, shaking and screaming "can you believe it? sick! sick!" during "Precious Things". And the guy dressed as a priest. Who showed up at the next show. I started losing interest in Tori's music after she got a half-assed band and started wandering. Maybe I got too serious for the music. Whatever. "From the Choirgirl Hotel" is possibly the last album I enjoyed, and I barely like half of it ... "Spark", "She's Your Cocaine", some of the b-sides ("Purple People") and this song, "Cruel". At the time I remember not getting it; I just didn't feel it, I guess. So I ran into this link for "Cruel" and I didn't even know what album that song was on but I listened to it and goddamn but I felt it. I can be cruel. A well-intentioned friend trying to fix a broken glass called me, cajoling me into trying to put the toothpaste back into the tube. quote-unquote: "I think you're being stupidly hard-headed about this". And I'm not just being spiteful, although that's there too. I don't feel it anymore. I don't want it anymore. The poison worked it's way in. The cynic inside wants me to say that Sterling just wants a peace accord so that things will be better, back to where they were. But I'm not being spiteful for the sake of it and I'm not going to be a chump either, and I have so far resisted temptation to be cruel even though I want to very, very badly. I'm done with having my friendship wasted and returned with feigned concern. I was lied to, lied about and hurt...and in the bullshit insincere apology, lied to again. I mean c'mon: Too bad, so sad. No rancor...I mean, would you blame a dog for biting you? That's just what a dumb animal does. You try to heal yourself, and maybe heel it (ha ha, only serious), but all crows under heaven are black, after all.

So don’t give me respect / don’t give me a piece of your preciousness
Flaunt all she’s got in our old neighbourhood / I’m sure she’ll make a few friends
Even the rain bows down let us pray / as you cock-cock-cock your mane
No cigarettes only peeled havanas for you

I can be cruel / I don’t know why
Why can’t my balloon stay up in a perfectly windy sky
I can be cruel / I don’t know why

Dance with the sufis celebrate your top ten in the charts of pain
Lover brother bogenvilla my vine twists around your need
Even the rain is sharp like today as you sh-sh-shock me sane
No cigarettes only peeled havanas for you

off your cross, son

So. I was recently very hurt, and got the opportunity to speak to the person-impersonator who did the hurt. She said, seemingly apropos of nothing, "I found my soul".

What. The. Fuck?

i have no mouth and i must scream

So, one of the most famous paintings in the world, Edvard Munch's "The Scream" has finally been recovered.

I don't want to like that painting, but you know, there's something comforting about knowing that even a long time ago, someone somewhere was feeling like that. There's a bit of solace in being able to say "yes, this is Not Fun, but it's completely normal."

I think that people are the greatest fun

Arthur Lee of Love passes.

Sadly, unless you were around in the late 60's or you're a music obsessive (like me) then you've probably never heard the greatest psychedelic album of all time, Love's "Forever Changes".



Rock, flamenco, pop, folk, soul and funk all mixed into one. Here's a good song-by-song dissection. The whole album is gold, and that's rare enough these days, but those first three songs, "Alone Again Or", "A House Is Not A Motel" and "Andmoreagain" are, simply put, genius.

RIP, Arthur Lee.

in your blue eyes, in your sly smile

Ever miss something you've never experienced? Then you'll probably enjoy Iron & Wine's "Your Blue Eyes", here, courtesy of passing afternoon.com.

An Effervescent Elephant

Rest in peace, Syd.

strangers when we meet

Sorrow, grief, rage, hurt, betrayal. Sadness. I have lost the very last person I trusted.

I have lately developed a nervous tic, wherein the upper left lip starts twichting and I find myself snarling involuntarily.

Pop and rock are helping me cope. Also, friends. God, I love my friends.

Coil - Bang Bang (live)

The Rolling Stones - Far Away Eyes

I got scumbagged today. [this post was edited to remove pointless angst. you can't blame an animal when it attacks, so why write about it?]

But enough of my angst, bring the noise:

So I bring you Cursive's "Am I Not Yours?" my most favorite recent find, topically handy and poignant and although it's not my situation, it's close enough that I can feel the truth behind the hurt behind the vocal.

Jealousy Jealousy
am I am I am I
not yours not yours not yours?
We stopped for some alcohol and you stayed in the car
The bars had gotten out that line was so long and
I saw you over on the pay phone well so I
was thinking who do you ever call at one a.m.?
I wondered who that was
Jealousy Jealousy
I am I am I am
not yours not yours not yours

Sonic Youth's "Shadow of Doubt" from EVOL:

I met a stranger on the train

I bumped right into him

I swear I didn't mean it

I swear it wasn't meant to be

must have been a dream

from a thousand years ago

kiss me
kiss me in the shadow of doubt

kiss me.

Ani DiFranco's "As Is":

I got no illusions about you

Guess what

I never did

When I said

When I said I’ll take it

I meant

I meant as is

And Dave Matthews Band's "Hallowe'en":

And in this dream,
Tell me,
Are you satisfied with fucking?
Don't walk away
I'm talking to you.

Odds and ends

Ubuweb has the coolest shit you didn't know you wanted to know about. Case in point. Momus (about whom I'll write more later, some other day,) moved to New York and made his album "Folktronic" (which imo is just OK, not nearly as good as 20 vodka jellies or ping pong) and in order to make enough money to live off of in the meantime, he made a documentary and sold it in a gajillion places. Out of print for years, find it now for the low low price of free over at Ubuweb.

Their People Like Us collection is great as well, including the hard-to-find-even-when-it-came-out People Like Us album "Hate People Like Us" which is basically a bunch of folks covering PLU songs. PLU is a one-(wo)man-band, run by Vicki Bennett who has turned PLU into a sound-collage assault that's very....unique. People Like Us' Hate People Like Us has songs by (and this is just my personal 'oh that's cool' list) Christoph Heeman (HNAS, Mirror,) Negativland, Coil, Death In June, Cyclobe, Dr. P Li Khan, Stock Hausen and Walkman. I love Coil's "An apology" wherein Balance calls to apologize for being so late with the mix they had promised Vicki.

Photo of Vicki Bennett from the peoplelikeus.org website.

But moving right along, ubuweb's even got Zappa reading from Burrough's "Naked Lunch" (the talking asshole section, if you're familiar).

Interviews (and the music of) Marcel DuChamp (yes, THAT Marcel DuChamp), Patti Smith reading stuff for Jim Morrison, Max Ernst, Burroughs, Gysin, Ginsberg, Abbie Hoffman (preparing gefilte fish of all things.)

more on the sexes later, as well as momus, and maybe hip hop