Sweetness and Light

2004-08-11T12:15:00.000-05:00

There's more where that came from

2004-08-11T12:01:00.000-05:00

It sucks when you're shitty

My fans wanted a taste / so I told them to bite me

har har

"I can do a really neat trick with a dollar bill. Let me see that one," the husband said to his wife. I only have a five dollar bill, she said. "That will work perfectly."

"Don’t look," he said. He turned away from his wife and silently contorted the bill by his hip. He presented her with a five dollar bowtie and she laughed. She put it down on her side.

The couple sat on the bench together. They looked out onto the beachfront and smiled. He leaned in and kissed her.

The rotted wood ran into their clothes and she complained of a splinter in her bottom thigh. "Let the doctor take a bit of a look," he said. Pulling out his sunglasses, he again kissed her. He moved his hand toward her skirt. "That tickles," she said. Her leg twitched and she laughed, cocking back her bright teeth. "But I think you’re getting there."

He looked up at her. She was drinking an iced tea and staring at children running in and out of the water. One small girl dipped her toes in only before her brother pushed her in. She came up from the water crying, sobbing for her mother, Mommy, mommy, I don’t know where you are, and throwing wetsand at her brother. He ran away, covering his eyes with his hands and wailing. The pink-clad sister sat back down in the shallow ocean.

"I haven’t found it yet, have I?" She nodded, still looking ahead. "Well, maybe this will help." He took her hand and kissed it, slowly moving up her arm.

"Please, it sort of hurts."

"Yeah, I can make it hurt more, sweetie."

She pulled away and put her drink on the cement. "I actually have a splinter. You were close before—" She grabbed his hand off of her back and placed it on her thigh. "It’s here." He took his sunglasses off and scratched his chin before looking up at her. "Pull it out of my thigh." She lifted up her skirt. He pulled out a small piece of wood and she picked her drink off of the ground. She thanked him and offered a taste.

"Yes, I do." She handed him the glass.

"You just want to stay here, right?" She was watching the brother and sister again.

"What do you think they’re doing?"

The sister was running with a cup of water to her brother, digging a hole and instructing her to bring more water bring more water faster bring more I hate you could you stop you’re not the one building it I’m much smarter than you because you’re a girl get water—

"If you could answer, you know," he said, "every so often, it’d be nice."

"I’m sorry. I just don’t have anything to say."

They remained silent. He looked off at the line of benches like theirs that surrounded the beach. They were empty and chipped. He sighed and laid on her stomach.

"Come on." She tapped his shoulder. "Let’s go. Get up."

The two of them held hands on the boardwalk, watching mothers suntan and stopping in beachside food stands.

"I’d love some lemonade." She wrapped herself around his arm and looked up.

"I don’t see a lemonade stand."

"It’s right in front of you."

"I still don’t see it."

"Look." She took his hand. "There."

He paused. "Yes, I see it."

"No, you don’t!" She laughed and pushed him. He put his sunglasses on and laughed. "I’m trying, honestly." They walked into a stucco-set restaurant. The door was chipped and written on in blue marker Spanish. "Read it in English!" she said.

He put his sunglasses on her head and bought her a cup of lemonade. "Sir, that will be one dollar and fourteen cents." Customers were playing video arcade games and eating french fries in their greased booths. Children ran across the room in a variety of sandals and red bathing trunks. He kissed his wife and walked out, draping her in his arms, forgetting to pay the Spanish attendant in a yellow apron. An old woman in the back of the line clutched a brown purse to her chest and watched the two of them leave without paying.

"I think we’re being called back in," his wife said.

They walked back, through the chipped door and the throng of red bottoms. The attendant held the cashier’s box open.

"Sir, you haven’t paid me." The husband cut through the long line of families and frazzled older women. He told his wife to stay in back.

The husband dug into his pocket. "I’m really sorry. This won’t happen again."

"Of course it won’t happen again. If it did, I’d report you."

"I’ll come back here," the husband said. "This isn’t necessary."

He shoved both hands farther into each side of his jeans. He called for his wife. I have nothing, she said. Nothing. "You can’t do this. You don’t have one dollar?"

"And fourteen cents." The woman clutching her purse raised her hand from the front of the line.

His wife emptied her bag on the counter. Sunscreen splattered on the attendant. "You better have my money."
Cigarettes, lighters, crinkled pictures of her husband, sand, tampons, her sunglasses. She threw her bag on the floor, getting on her knees to climb through the remains.

"I don’t understand. We had five dollars before."

"We don’t have it now, though. Don’t you remember?" She was sobbing on the floor of the restaurant. Boys stopped running and watched her writhe below them. Their mothers turned them back to their tables and milkshakes. "You made that bowtie for me. It’s gone. You took it back and put it somewhere."

The husband ran his hand through his hair. He paced in front of the counter. "Sir, I’m really sorry, we’ll find this money for you.

"Excuse me," he shouted. "If anyone has one dollar and eighty-two cents, I’d be most grateful." Her walked down the line. Each mother hid her handbag behind her flowing skirt. Each scrawny teenage boy waiting for milkshakes nodded silently, mouths agape. It’s my mom’s money. She’s on the beach right now.

He yelled at the attendant. "I’ll come back later. Is there anything you can take of mine until I come back with three dollars? We don’t even want that lemonade. It tastes like shit."

"I need this money. The customers want their lemonade. Please find my money. I don’t have time for this."

2004-07-08T16:01:00.000-05:00

Policy of truth

We sat on the balcony during the orientation. He asked me about music I liked and we shot the shit for a while. I discovered he played bass guitar. "So you're in a band, then," I said. He told me about the dazzling variety of Long Island bands that he was in. His eyes widened.

"My friend and I, you know, we actually built a guitar." No shit. "Yeah, we just were really bored a week ago, so we bought the stuff and it took us a while, but we made it. And here's the best part. We wrote 'soul power' on it, just like Tom Morello of Audioslave. How awesome is that." I wish I knew how to do shit like that.

2004-06-09T00:15:00.000-05:00

That last one wasn't so good, which is a shame, because I'm better than all of you.

I really want the merits of trusting the narrator in that last chapter to be discussed by smokers in hushed tones.

2004-06-08T23:48:00.000-05:00

Crooked Rain, Crooked Rain

One week later, I ran into Blonde at the bus stop. As I rode my bike past, I was hoping he wouldn't notice me: he was reading the Times and his headphones covered each side of his bulbous head. Thinning hair and his awful dance music pressed out from under each ear.

I watched him as I came closer. He suddenly looked up as if he'd heard something startling, still fiercely crinkling the corner of his half-folded Science Times. He saw me and threw off his headphones immediately.

"Hey! Hey! Sam, buddy! Here!" He ran towards me with a stiff arm, almost begging me to stop. I obliged.

"I haven't seen you in a few days, man." He was out of breath. "So what are you listening to these days? Doing any writing?" He was in his Tuesday business wear, I in my bike shorts, and we were standing in the middle of sidewalk traffic. I looked down at the ground.

"I was just reading this utterly fantastic thing here-- did you know that by the year two thousand and forty-seven, New Orleans will be completely--"

"Yeah. My dad told me that this morning."

Blonde's mouth hung agape. He looked up and squinted at the sky. He was still panting, though slowly and pronounced as though he had some sort of mission.

"You really aren't fooling me. That 'looking-at-the-sky' shit," I said.

"What are you talking about ... " He was still looking up, now shielding his eyes with his newspaper.

"You're not looking at anything. It's kind of pathetic, the whole 'play to the teenager, then once he's on top, act hard and make it seem like I'm thinking about things above him' business." I really could have said that. "I haven't written anything, no."

Blonde was old enough to be my father. He put up with so much of my "teenaged venom," as he called it, because he let me.

"Yeah, look, Sam." He put his hand on my shoulder. "I've got to go. My bus is here." He pushed his glasses back up. "You have a good day, yeah?"

The bus pulled away. I picked his Science Times off the ground and biked back home.

2004-05-31T02:02:00.000-05:00

South side, south side, we gon set this party all right

I slept in my basement for the last time on Friday. We talked about colleges and Neil Young.

2004-05-09T00:36:00.000-05:00

Slanted & Enchanted

Sometimes real men don't know. And as much as they'll pledge their authenticity to you, it's hard to know to accept that they're wrong: it's simply disorienting to find your fallen heroes clinging to desperation.

"You could be great," Blonde said.

I sort of looked at him and laughed. I felt sorry for him, having invested so much in me and he was still lost as ever. He cupped my chin and pushed me up, eye-to-eye. "You insolent wreck," he said. "You're just teenaged, after all." It was rather unfortunate to later find out he still lived with his parents and sent girls nude pictures over the internet.

"I'm more grounded than you'll ever be," I said. "I have sex every night and ... well, with a girl. Don't treat me like a kid." I spat in his face.

He rolled his eyes, slowly dragging his fingers over the spit. Rubbing it in his hand, he wiped it back on my face. "So do I."

I went back home that night and found a message from Blonde on my answering machine. "Hey there," he said. After a long sigh and some disingenuous stuttering, he broke down. "I just don't want to see you mess up." He only got out "you really ought to take care" before his call suddenly ended.

I called him the next day and asked him if he knew I had Caller ID. "Yeah, what do you think, I'm stupid?" He had called fourteen times last night before I'd gotten home.

Blonde, Br 312-491-0020 x 14

"Well, no, I just think that you ought to slow down a bit." He was biting his nails and hanging on every word I said. "You know?"

"Hm? Oh, yeah, absolutely."

I sighed. He sighed. "You're thirty-four years old. I don't get it."

"Yeah," he said. "I don't see what there is to get. You need to think about others," and I walked out of the room.

2004-05-03T22:58:00.000-05:00

Brown University 2004 Pre-College Summer Program: Creative Writing

Jet - "Cold Hard Bitch"

If there was a music video for this song, I’d be the old codger standing up front with my arms crossed and eventually doused in a pitcherful of beer by nubile, scantily-clan tan coeds.

2004-04-27T07:37:00.000-05:00

Heroes to zeros, indeed

The Beta Band
Heroes to Zeros
Regal / Astralwerks
2004
{4}

I don’t know many hippies—the ones I do know are seventeen years old. But a few of them are really smart; they do their reading and are sort of idiot savants at a few things, be it the Civil War or Daoism or moe. or pot butter. The Beta Band hate being called hippies, but I mean, dudes trade instruments onstage and jam.

Now, the good thing about hippies is that they never have anything to say—so it’s really easy to ignore what they say in favor of how they say it. This one kid I know delivers the facts with such verve, looking me straight in the eye and gesticulating just so, hammering his fist directly into the cusp of his hand. He holds it and it unfurls in his hand, twisting and pulping until it’s just three fingers, edging toward my face up and down as he tells me exactly what he means. He is brilliant and lost. But he has these blinding moments of vitality that assure me he knows exactly what he’s doing. He’ll be a public speaker one day, or someone so invested in that perfection he’ll become unapproachable.

The Beta Band, however, don’t know what they want to say yet. Their returning single, “Assessment,” is one brilliantly divisive tune: instead of playing to the ‘eclectic’ field they’ve laid stake to—hip-hop dub psychedelia jam fry egg hopscotch blend—their three-year absence is ended by an entrance into surefooted rock par excellence. Guitars abound in a plain Jane rock anthem and they spew some dribble about feeling things. But then they stop the song and drop the guitars for a minute of chest-pounding horns. You gotta give them credit for trying!

The group’s uncertainty couldn’t be found in a better album title than Heroes To Zeros. Because where “Assessment” finds The Betas becoming too confident—trying to cover every base really obviously and embarrassingly in one slapdash opener—the rest of the album is too unsure of itself to climax with a single piano note (see: “Rock and Roll”). Each song works in that timid shell, in reverb-laden Godrich space for the rockers and reverb-laden Godrich space for the naive folkies. The band is as direct as they can be, in that songs have discernable beginnings and ends.

It’s unfortunate that this band is so unsure of themselves, least of all lyrically. It’d be nice if I could believe this is a concept record about lost love, but like his permanently dazed forefathers, lead singer Steve Mason gives up in his sea of hackneyed love epithets. “Start is the end / More or less / The Milky Way results from the crowding / Of extremely faint stars”, he sings in “Space”. His soporific voice, yearning for some sort of honesty in the emptied world—rather, the universe, or some shit, and maybe he has a toss at Blair—isn’t content. Hippies need a mate, too, don’t they? “I’m so blind, I can’t see / What’s going on behind me”. The band thinks about reading up on Spiritualized and makes love in space on “Pure For”: “I’m so glad you found me”. Mason just points his fingers at me in a million lost directions.

And sure, they can really swing. But every track that they should be doing more of—the bullshit party jam “Easy,” or the indie rock Basejaxx—Heroes indulges itself equally elsewhere. Inexcusable songs about cloying heartwrenching trouble (“Troubles”) and being alone like a simple man (“Simple”) manage to pop up next to hugely climaxing rock attacks about being outside (“Out-Side”). Too often The Betas lock into that time-tested groove of theirs—uneasy moodiness with a pinch of messy kick-drum here and many, many harmonized voices for good measure—which is really unfortunate; the hippies I know are all about breaking conventional rules, like homework.

“Homework this,” the motherfuckers say! “Liquid Bird” might be the greatest thing they’ve ever done for the same reason this album ultimately bores me: it’s like everything they’ve ever done, but louder, meaner, faster, slower—it’s genuinely surprising. Chunks of the song start and stop, guitars bake like those aforementioned hippies, vocals are muddier than usual. For the first time on this album—ten tracks in—they fly into the danger zone and don’t crash like Goose.

Like that other band they toured with back in 2001, The Beta Band’s new album is a “synthesis of all the band’s previous ideas”. For a band whose sound changed so much from album to album—jam folk to orchestral pop to hip-hop folk, they said!—it’s disappointing to find that they haven’t changed much since I was in the eighth grade. I would rather die than go back to the eighth grade. I assume that you would too.

2004-04-21T23:33:00.000-05:00

Chicago public high school teacher spills the beans. Fantastic read. Sounds like a whiny teenager.

Courtesy of my Stylin' replacement, David Drake, of I'm So Sincerr.

2004-04-16T12:03:00.000-05:00

He put his hand on my shoulder. "It's fine."

I rolled my eyes. He handed me a key.

"Look, I'm going to step out for a minute. Can you watch over here? It's really simple." Earl gestured at the ping-pong paddles. "If new people come in, just ask them where they're staying. Give them their key," he said, and pointed to the back of the desk. He said customers always pay, so only worry about two things: ping-pong and room keys.

"Yeah. Thanks, Earl. Where will you be?"

He walked towards the door. "Over there."

2004-04-01T00:27:00.000-06:00

Floridamn WIP

I woke up the next morning in a hotel in Southern Florida. I barreled through my sleep—living the next morning in a daze, I listened to records on the beach, squinting my eyes and flailing my arms, asking passerby where I was. A young woman in a black one-piece suit was the first to answer me. She told me I was in Sarasota and I yelled at her and told her to fuck off. The rest would laugh at me or stare straight ahead.

One man in leather-skinned sandals and aviator sunglasses took particular offense when I asked him: he took down his sunglasses and stared at me. Sick decadent fuck, he said, got no sleep and got no idea, or some sort of anti-capitalist spout. I don’t really remember. I looked down at my blue jeans and ran my hands through my tousled hair. More perceptive than not, I thought.

The beachfront was wildly crowded: obnoxious pastel bathing suits washed such a starkly iridescent sand into an utter mess, like some sort of idyllic Floridian picture. Loud music and louder clothes; beautiful and obese people; cloudless sky beating the swimming kids into a watery pulp. Mothers would run to the ocean tip and howl like a stubbed toe when they’d touch it, yelling for their skinny, pale boys to come closer to them. One blond kid with a toothy grin dove farther in, leaving his rather plump mother to shout to his tight red swim trunks. I asked her where I was. Her jowls clenched and she turned back around, continually yelling at her disappeared child.

I wandered off of the beach and into the hotel lobby. I walked past the palm trees surrounding the pool and through the boardwalk, where two old men stood with cigars. Covered in midday sweat, I took my shirt off as I opened the doors to the inside of the hotel. The two silent men fell deep into hush-toned conversation as I walked in.

I sidled up to the counter. The receptionist looked up from his desk.

Both of us waited for a moment: I with my mouth agape; he, smiling and blinking. I laughed uncomfortably and looked around the room for some sort of guidance.

“All right, look,” I said. He rolled his eyes and went back to work.

“I mean—oh, God, I mean, I’m sorry, I ...” He clicked his mouse. “Do you ...”

He pushed his chair out from behind his outdated computer. He revealed his thinning grey hair and his nametag, adorning his proud purple hotel shirt.

“Excuse me, sir,” Earl, Assistant Manager of Customer Services, said. “Would you mind putting that shirt back on?” I nodded and threw my shirt back over my head. “Your tan’s making me a bit jealous.”

“Yeah. Well, I’m sorry if this is a weird question, but—well, where am I?”

Earl laughed and got out of his seat. “I think you know damn well where you are,” he chuckled. He ambled over to the counter, folding his hands across and leaning in. “And if you’re on some drugs, well, I certainly don’t——”

“No, no,” I said. “It’s not that at all. It’s just ... I don’t know where I am, really, or what day it is, or even the month.”

“Could you tell me what year it is, then?” Earl straightened his name tag.

“Of course, it’s ... what, it’s 1998, isn’t it?”

Earl coughed and wheezed. “Fuck if I know. You want to, uh ...” He was still fidgeting and hadn’t looked up since he walked over. “Yeah, you know your name?”

I assumed he wasn’t paying any attention. I grabbed a box of matches, hopefully adorned with some sort of information. “Yes, I do.”

We looked up at the same time. “Do you want to tell me your name?”

“I would, but ...” The box of matches were blank. “What the fuck.”

“What was that?”

“Look, fuck you, all right? Where am I?”

“Sir, I’d appreciate it very much if you just told me your name.” Earl, at this point, was probably right about me, though I couldn’t decide whether I was hungover or just really high. I was stiff-arming the desk and staring straight down.

“These matches, Earl. There’s nothing written on them. See, if I wasn’t in Shitsville, or wherever I am, they’d say something like ‘welcome to the Los Angeles Marriott’ and have a phone number, and like ...” I wildly gesticulated the motion of reading a matchbox that said ‘Los Angeles’ on it by using my finger as a sort of pen. “Fuck, Earl, maybe they’d even say the date. I don’t know.” My proverbial pen lashed and blotted on his face. “Oh, God, I didn’t mean that either. Sorry, Earl.” I scoffed and kicked the floor.

2004-03-24T22:42:00.000-06:00

Franz Ferdinand - "Take Me Out"

Hell. Jess Harvell, when prompted on ILM to come up with a nice, curt nickname for this bunch -- The Ferds? Franzes? FF? Franzinand? -- has got a name for them: shit. Lyrics about murdered archbishops and political figureheads and then they tell Spin Magazine they're too good for pedals. They're like this friend of mine: fuck all the production noise. "If you don't got the tunes," lead singer tells us, "no point in using them pedals!" Or as Coxon told us: can't polish a turd! Then we're told what they sound like: Interpol meets The Rapture! A car crash between The Strokes and Radio 4! Nevermind that Jules is the only of the bunch that writes songs about honesty and gets to the point -- what the fuck, Obstacle 1? -- and that the gang cheats using kool production -- by spliffing fancy pedals! Guitars vs the keyboards! Well of course we'll be nifty with the latter -- because even though that's exactly what this Scottish lout wish they did, it's intrinsic in their very nature to never be able to. They'll never make it anywhere with that attitude: like the director who tells you that he's been cheating all his life and now it's time to make movies without sets, Franz Ferdinand wants to be the next real thing. In no way is the only song I've heard of theirs malicious ("Take Me Out"), and they even make a nice job of lending sweet-sounding chord changes vs the standard-issue blues progression (a bit on that in a bit). But they've gone about it the wrong way: dance-punk! Let's make it honest and real again! Thifty to throw in a tempo breakdown and squiggle about the blues -- black folks' music! They were the ones who suffered! (Funny you mention that, boys; the first World War began when your namesake got blow'd up and then the bluesmen got press'd into service without the faintest equal pardon from the big men) -- and make it all work, especially, ooh, especially with none of those synthesizers. Dancing is simple again. Dancing -- ultimate liberation! -- and now anyone with a few Rickenbackers can be part of the new community, too. To hell with good intentions! Get a life you sonsofbitches. Look at me, listening to your music, eye to eye, tell me this is what you want.

I don't hate this band because the NME likes them and they're rich. I hate this band because they're brilliant tunesmiths who are still awful cunts. "Take Me Out" is fucking catchy like syphillis, and hence negates the previous four hundred words.

2004-03-20T01:49:00.000-06:00

Boston University, eat this shit for breakfast

I don’t have a favorite place. Whenever I make new friends and the normal initial conversation topics come up—GPA, rock and roll, alcohol—yes or no questions give way to the more personal subjects: SAT scores, supposed guilty pleasures, and pot. Conversation splits like a fork and then you’re presented with two more options: you’ll deem them worth your time—act unattached and discuss equally fashionable things like how you cheated on your SATs and how you stole the pot from your mother—or begin innocuous discussion about the more wholesome commonalities. I’d watch idly as the rest of the group starts talking about their toothpaste and the coolest place they’ve ever been, and shift uncomfortably like some put-upon pedant when it comes to me. Colgate. God, I don’t know. My bed.

Not two months ago I went out to San Francisco for my cousin’s Bat Mitzvah. My father’s entire extended family convened for a few nights at a sprawling Best Western; stucco-set apartments wrapped around a never-ending parking lot, where all of our rented sedans would systematically dock for the night in a single file line after saying l’chayim over a few bottles of Manishevitz at my aunt’s house. My cousin Ben and I stayed in a room together, and we proceeded to try to abuse this power as much as we could. He schemed about trying to pick up girls from the ceremony’s afterparty—holy God, Sam, this could be so awesome—and I tricked my grandparents into letting us order School Of Rock on hotel-serviced television. Ben’s plans never materialized; I fell asleep twenty-five minutes into the movie.

We only stayed at the Best Western for two nights, but Ben—New York University freshman Ben, fake ID-carrying Ben—was adamant about inaugurating my hand with a beer. Dude. Sam. Don’t even worry. This weekend is gonna be so titties. My grandfather gave us fifty dollars and told us to buy a few beers down the street from the grocery store. Ben cocked his head back and bobbed up and down as the widest smirk opened across his face. Titties.

So we walked down to the grocery store. Ben asked me if I wanted Heineken or Tequizas.

“God, I don’t know. Tequizas.”

“No, look man. We can get like forty Heinekens. This is gonna be so good.”

“I guess I’m more of a Heineken man myself, anyway.”

We all went into the city and got lobster at Fisherman’s Wharf. Then a trolley to Ghirardelli and a boat to Alcatraz, after which the nine of us found the largest street drop we could. Our parents leisurely straggled behind us as we raced back to the top.

“Hey—Sam.” Ben and I ran just ahead of our cousins. “You excited about tomorrow?”

“You mean, the service?”

Ben stopped me immediately. He peered his head in, close enough so that his bent baseball cap brow briefly swiped my forehead. He looked straight into my eyes. “Dude. The party.” Silence. “Sarah’s hot friends, remember? Dude, we’re going to bring them back and ...” I obsequiously nodded, demonstrating to him that I was, in fact, completely appreciative of efforts to show me what he called “the Californiass.”

“Wait, hold up—you throw hotel parties back home, don’t you?” Ben’s voice is curious—a sort of cocksure machismo informed by the throes of puberty. His voice still squeaked and despite his stories of long hours at the gym, baby fat punctuated his cheeks. “Oh, yeah. Yeah, all the time. I’m so totally down with that shit.”

Ben screamed into his pillow when we got back the next night. “This would never happen in New York, dude. You know Sarah was totally cockblocking me. Like. She knew my friends were all up to hit on this, but that was straight up out of her jurisdiction.” Ben repeated that last word to himself. Like that, jurisdiction.

“Come on Ben. Let’s order a movie. School of Rock?”

“Anything you want, Sam. I’m ready to kick it.”

I got under the covers and hoped the airport would be struck with a rash of anthrax tomorrow. I wasn’t going to come back to San Francisco until Sarah got married.

Ben cradled a beer and sat upright, his face bathed in warm television glow.

“Yo, yo Sam! You just missed the best part! It was ... oh man. Titties, dude.”

This hotel room was my favorite place.

2004-03-09T23:11:00.000-06:00

Yar ending please

He mulled over using contact lenses every so often, but whenever he’d work up the nerve to go to his eye doctor, it just couldn’t happen. He’d sit at a desk next to the same weathered public servant since the third grade, grabbing his hand tightly and wrinkling the wristband of his pristine blue doctor’s coat. The two of them would keep talking as he’d desperately try to stick his finger onto his eyeball—all you have to do is remind yourself that it doesn’t hurt—but he’d just squeeze tighter and never finish. In the eighth grade, the left lense did catch. The two of them pulled it out, successfully, but Ben never let himself put the other in. His mother asked him how it went. He shrugged and asked for some more popcorn.

——————

Pacing around his hardwood table, he’d occasionally skip or jump a chair. New stainless steel and floodlights bore down on him. His kitchen was remodeled not two months ago; it was nice not to have errant nails from the floor running into his feet. Ben liked to pretend that he preferred the older model. This is so tacky, mom. It’s awful.

——————

The two of them smiled and said Hello as the door opened. A nondescript white girl in plaid and a blue headband led them inside and grabbed William’s hand. Loud music blanketed her immediate whisper and giggle in his ear.

Ben wiped his feet and turned back out. The gorgeous white living room was stripped of all furniture but a few fold-out chairs and the grand piano. Replaced instead by able bodies and red-tipped running shoes, the crowd was too busy holding hands to their ears to hear the girl next to them to notice Ben in front. William was already lost amidst the throng, probably slumped against the hardwood floor and NWG’s lap. A stick of dynamite could go off in a case of beer and people would probably keep going about their conversation: “Did you hear anything? Well, that girl next to me is so obnoxious.” And bless their stars she couldn’t hear him. Not that their momentary companion could, either.

He took an unopened beer can off the floor and walked back to William’s car. He shook the can and threw it through the hole in back. He saw the whitecrested foam land first, splattering against the side window; the beer itself, immediately washing away any inconsistencies in a sea of curded brown; the whole drink sliding down the window; finally, a thin brown sheet tinting the window. William would drive through an underpass with brown instead of orange lighting and get hit by a brown Toyota. And die. Asshole.

2004-03-02T23:05:00.000-06:00

Enon
Hocus Pocus
Touch & Go
2003
{3}

"The Power Of Yawning" is the reason why I still have faith in myself to be a successful songwriter, I think. This is a pastiche of Ray Davies and blazing strut, start-and-stop slack-jawed anger boiling over every so often while that strangled guitar pops into Telecastered fuzz and Matthew Schemersal moans about some old shit. It’s not terribly interesting on the surface as it’s taken apart by section: subdued guitar here, bass solo here, high-hat ride, crazy guitar solo, etc. Actually, that’s not why I love my guitar at all: it’s because I hear what’s missing. Where the fuck is that wailing guitar solo after his drawl, leaving big old holes of sound waiting to be colored in by me.

Hocus Pocus is comprised mostly of fleeting moments of brilliance where it all just coalesces for a moment, and then returns to its MOR state of undeveloped garbage. So if it all magically becomes great every so often, I can do that too, right? Or how about when I hear what they’re doing wrong—that helps, surely! It’s so easy to get caught up in a mess of guitar, as in "Yawning," and pretend that the next song, by chopping momentum in half, is actually the right move. I’ll be a rockstar one day! I promise!

Conversely, Enon make me want to shoot myself in my head whenever I listen to "Disposable Parts," off of their previous album High Society. I will never ever write anything this good and that sucks—I’d never have thought of a vocoder or whistles and bass, so I’ll steal the drumbeat instead and cobble together some "urgent dance-punk" and cry myself to sleep because I suck and this guy, this fucking New York loser who thought he was cool when he was nineteen because he listened to Echo and the Bunnymen, can write great songs while I write retarded reviews for Gaylus Magatard.

Most of the other songs trudge along with occasional electronic flourishes to try to make the sound anemically quirky—you know, they could just give us some fat Halen keyboard, but that’d be too much, I suppose, for an aggressively "offbeat" group. But it’s no coincidence I like the first two songs best: quirky melodies wear out quickly, especially if there’s nothing else but strands of songs underneath, and if the hooks are all the same. Which they are. The bassist, though, is this hot Japanese girl, and whenever she pops in, she can fall back on her heavily-tempered accent, cooing breathlessly with an air of indulgence. Bollocks! She’s just too damn bored to write the songs!

Just like I’m too bothered to give this any time. It all sounds the same and basically bores me. Worst of all it makes me think I have to learn MIDI processing to write good songs. Please, Matt, don't tell me it's time to put the guitar away and hit them books. What am I but a discontented youth who wants to rock?

2004-02-27T10:50:00.000-06:00

"and you, you can be mean, and i, i'll drink all the time"

quiz created by neondisease

Which David Bowie single are you?

2004-02-17T00:16:00.000-06:00

Here's what I would've preferred to have seen on Stylus today.

Phantom Planet
Phantom Planet
Epic
7.2

So we come to Phantom Planet! Such an unassuming name to be such a wildly unoriginal lot! PP’s last album, The Guest, emphatically embodied that unoffensive sunny California pop from all those years ago, and they scored the theme to The OC. Cool.

But somewhere along the line, they decided to make music that didn’t sound just like The Beach Boys. Why this happened, I do not know. Maybe Max Fischer (Jason Schwartzman, PP’s erstwhile drummer) was the driving cornball influence in the group, despite being, you know, the drummer. Maybe lead singer Alex Greenwald’s latest pretty thing is some hip East Side socialite (he’s also a model/actor in addition to being a rock star). Maybe the group just stopped leaving the room whenever the bassist started talking. But I would like to refer to Spin writer Sarah Lewittin, who conjectured that they found an iPod with loaded with The Fall and Blur lying around the studio, which proceeded to change their pretty faces once and for all.

And if you stumble upon their official website, they’ve decided that they sound like "a fight between My Bloody Valentine, Fugazi, Wire, Guided By Voices, The Who, The Cure, A Certain Ratio, A.R.E. Weapons, Blur, Chik Chik Chik, The English Beat, Sean Paul, Magnetic Fields, Led Zeppelin, and whoever your favorite band is." Despite the utter pretension—and sadly pathetic perfidy—of throwing Mr. Paul in the mix, the unnecessarily long list is not all too untruthful. Surely more could be said here, but these are the reasons why kids start bands; they are the greatest of our generation and there’s certainly worse to steal your hooks from. Lead single "Big Brat" is all Mark E. Smith vocals, "Rudie Can’t Fail" saxophone, "Heartbreaker" riffing, and "I Am The Fly" pub chorus, and if you’re white, that’s the best song you’ve ever heard.

Now I can’t say that some music is worse than others because it steals or borrows or lifts or plagiarizes or whatever—especially in this e-age of broadening our tastes—and our readership follows these rules. But while we/they danced in complete pride when De La Soul sampled Johnny Cash, the same group merely smiles when they see that new ~~Jesus and Mary Chain~~ Raveonettes video on M2, roll their eyes when Elastica nicked Wire, what the fuck fuckign bithces Jet why do you suck and steal Iggy Pop fuckign suck my dick you fukcing cutns. Phantom Planet has made a fine "record collection" album.

Even with the strategic omissions of the aforementioned Strokes and Fall from the list, the latter’s on-off chord switches, tempo breakdowns, and self-aggrandizing lyrics meet the former’s rowche rumble of noise ‘n blare with the most obviously dissonant ease. What results is an utterly precocious mess, which, like an eighth grade theater production, is unable to be taken seriously and still manages to pull off the guise of a stable product. "After Hours," a handclap ballad posing as an oasis in the middle of chaos, apexes coherency simply by reigning it in. I could’ve been told this when I was directing Liberte back at Julian Junior High.

The fracas aligns itself every so often under Greenwald’s steady songwriting, still unafraid to venture outside of predicted verses and choruses; and his wonderfully rediscovered voice, a salacious tribute to the great pretender voices of Casablancas and Smith, leering at you with their fingers crossed. "The Happy Ending" begins with bass and disjointed drumming and then Greenwald steps in with a leather jacket and a wall of tinny Stratocaster chords—and the guitar solo is just feedback! I could go on—"Just A Scratch" is the most beautiful din this side of "Hard To Explain;" "1st Things 1st" is ... all that shit. I suppose it’s up to you to decide whether or not such genre-pillaging is a virtue or a hindrance; I expect Jet fans to understand.

And this becomes one of the album’s virtues—each song wildly varies from the next, revealing thirty-five minutes of noise and pop that extends far beyond the surface into a slowly decaying singalong monster. By "You’re Not Welcome Here," organized noise unmasks itself as a sheet of white noise and start-stop verses, a knowing yap climaxing into chopped up screaming. And sure, it might sound a little bit like Blur ca. 1999 or My Bloody Valentine ca. 1989, but for 211 seconds, Phantom Planet complete grip the listener without a trace of a wink.

Hooks pile on top of each other and it’s all fun and lively on Phantom Planet. Maybe as an aspiring songwriter myself, it’s just disconcerting to find out that even the pros are just really good at picking and choosing, if not for the same reason that it burns a hole in my heart to find out that bands don’t magically conjure songs up without building around riffs. So it’s all a mess, but in the end, it doesn’t even matter.

2004-02-07T17:51:00.000-06:00

"This is such shit. Stop playing that fucking shit."

"This is fucking shit? At least I write songs that aren't, like, the blues scale."

"Every rock song is in the blues scale! You don't know what you're talking about, at all."

"You're .... so ... just please turn off your volume for right now. There's too much static."

"This is just like the last time. In two weeks we're going to be having full-scale fights."

"Well. Maybe if you'd turn down."

"And what? Still play your shitty songs?"

"At least I'm writing songs."

"They sound like metal! Anyone could write that shit."

"You don't know what metal is. Name one fucking metal band."

"Yeah ..."

"'Yeah'? What the fuck?"

"Well, they're not what I want."

"—are you retarded?"

"This is not the band sound."

"Oh, right. Sorry. We're clearly new wave. Not jangle ... noise ... post-fucking pop. I'm so sorry."

"Just ... this isn't ..."

"Isn't what? Not good enough for you? Write a song, then talk."

"I have! Tons of them!"

"Play them! Go ahead! They have to be better than mine."

"Well, like, here ..."

"I'm waiting."

"This is bullshit. No."

"The band sound is silence. Cool."

"Fuck off."

"You fuck off."

"It's my house. Fuck your way out of my house."

"Fine. Maybe you need some time to write a song, you know?"

"Here's your guitar. I think there's a party at Charlotte's. Call me when you get home."

"Yeah, see you then."

2004-02-02T22:47:00.000-06:00

"Fuck, man. Fuck. This is not the way it would've turned out back in New York."

"Yeah. Bummer. I'm going to bed."

—————————

"Man, come on. I can look at this a couple of different ways. Well like, first, I got a girl at home that I'm kind of dating, right?"

"Mmm."

"Exactly.

—but like, she had the biggest tits, dude. They were so nice."

"Yeah."

"Shit, man. She was all up on me, too. What the fuck was her name again? Yeah, Danielle. Dude, there was a redhead named Danielle, too, right? Fuck. They both looked really good. Even that tall girl, she was—so with the blond one, like during the dance—dude, this sounds really lame, but I just made this real effort to dance with every single one of Sarah's friends during the snowball, and then we just started dancing. She's got such a nice ass."

"I dunno, man. Bummer."

"Yeah, so I would just go up to her, and touch her hip, just to be all, 'what's up, you know I'm here,' then she'd be totally up on me. She looked like such a slut, too. You know that's good shit."

—————————

"But like, this doesn't usually work out this way. At NYU—I got with this 23-year-old at China Beer. I was just like, 'let's go,' and so we went outside and made out. Then she sucked my dick back at my place.

Remember how, yeah, you know Danielle wanted to come back here. And dude, dude, the fucking kicker was when in the car—yo, Sam, you aren't—"

"Sucks, man. Bitch. That's just ... bitch."

"Right, so then her and Annie are like, 'yo, why don't we just party at your hotel,' and then I was like, 'you guys don't have hotel parties?' Shit. We were so close. This is so fucking pants. Sorry if I keep saying that. But like, 'yo, free beer, our own room.' Actually, like, even if one of them just came back. Cause like, you got a girlfriend, right? Well yeah, you got your good thing going. Shit. This is the pants.

—Man, we were just too fucking close. The worst part is, Sarah was all cockblocking me, you know? Like—'I'm her cousin, don't get with me,' you know? Which I guess is understandable. But ... those titties, man. She wasn't even wearing straps.

But then I was all—if they really were just gonna sleep over at Bailey's, then I guess that's okay. But they said some guy was having some house party, but then it got cancelled, or something."

"Maybe they were ... lying to get ..."

"Dude, bitch. No they aren't."

—————————

"Remember when they played our song? Our theme for the weekend? Yeah, Ice Cube. Shit that was awesome. And that's I started grinding with her.

And to think this is probably the last time we'll ever go out to San Francisco, dog. Fucking Mollie's Bat Mitzvah."

"You just gotta ... give some up for ...

"What?"

"... the titties, Ben. You got that shit."

"Man, I know."

2004-01-27T16:01:00.000-06:00

So this might go up in three months:

AR Kane - "A Love From Outer Space"

I guess it’s because it just sounds so superhuman. Gurgles and orchestras and bass and piano playing the same blues and all the same pick-up beat rhythm. Vocoders and exclamations of "eeh!"—alien love, surely—and pedal-filtered whoopee cushions. And even when the throng of mutated bongo slaps drops out and the production bullshit (it's world music, you know) gets destroyed if just for a moment, it’s this ridiculous ode to the best love of all, and that is the love from outer space. But then it’s always been this way, since P-Funk’s odes to shaking asses in spaceships and Sun Ra’s declaration that he was from Mars, and not—what, Arkansas, yeah?

I don’t think I really want to go down that route at all, actually—"the black Jesus and Mary Chain" earned their place among indie white people and probably didn’t have to worry about getting shit blow’d up at then; "A Love From Outer Space" probably isn’t about meeting your consummate mate in a place where race doesn’t exist. I don’t know what it’s about. We’re told, over and over, "she loves me, she loves me, she loves me—a love from outer space," but it’s repeated so often and as the tide changes from ecstatic dance to punctuated horn blasts and minor key changes ...

And his love echoes in the background, cooing like a muted Eastern goddess of his/our/my dreams. She disappears and leaves holes like the resonance of a teardrop in a pond inside of a maelstrom, then, of light and sound and drum machine bongos. You must imagine Rudi dancing inside his recording studio with his headphones and laying down vocals as he’s overtaken by such glee—round choruses of his own voice wash rise as the song ends and trumpets blare louder than ever as the volume slowly dips. Too proud to leave the song, too blissfully in love.

I suppose I could just say that girls wouldn’t understand this shit. Rudi Tambala called his girl equal parts winky girl and bitch and killed her on "Lolita" and then came back with this. With this, this fucking pop ditty and two chords and Pharrell—for real—falsetto, this time nothing can go wrong. Love is the fight between machines and people and aliens? "She’s come from Milky Way / she’s come to earth on my birthday." Struggling with a girl that he can’t ever know but has to be with, surely—right?

A dance-pop song, then, that predated Pills, Thrills, ‘N’ Bellyaches and seemed to have all the world with it with lazy vocals and not-so-lazy shit everywhere all around it. And it fucks with formula so brilliantly, chimingly abiding by that looped back, back, back forth stomp and ridiculing it simultaneously by placing choruses at the beginning of the song, in the middle of verses and bridges, after the bridge, everywhere—and dropping out of the dulcet-toned delivery for a hallucinogenic—rap?

Are we in love? Is he pulling our leg? Love vs the techno machine? What? Is this all just a bullshit party jam? Arthouse danceirony? The aforementioned bridge where all the rapturous mirth of noise drops out for an 'honest confessional'—I know where she’s coming from! Space is where we both belong!—restores our faith in the narrator’s perfidious nature with such unblinking urgency—'means no.' Sweet cries are eased into a venal admonition—this time nothing can go wrong, I’ve got to tell her in this song—which in turn descends into mumbling about guests and caresses and hearts and communication and we’re poised for some decadent noise jam like they’ve always don with pianos and twittling bongos and feedback and gorillas shouting and Rudi growls and then—"I say sha la la la, hey!" Finger snaps, dance drums and a bit of scat singing. Fucking hell. She loves me.

2004-01-20T19:33:00.000-06:00

This is rather embarrassing, but for fuck's sake, there's like 700 hits on this site every day, and I've only gotten responses from like 5 people. I'd appreciate it so much if you just sent me an e-mail -- samuelbloch@yahoo.com -- telling me exactly what you thought of this story that I posted a week ago. I know there are phrases that need to be absolutely destroyed, but -- fuck, this is embarrassing -- I'm feeling really quite low, and any response, any -- actually, I'd prefer negative comments -- would be most appreciated at this moment.

Come on. It's like 2600 words. You can do it. Four minutes. Two minutes to write an e-mail. samuelbloch@yahoo.com -- Please. Please. Please.

2004-01-13T16:02:00.000-06:00

So here it is, in nearly final form. I'm submitting this to my school's literary magazine. I might have like one day to do more revisions and shit, so if there's anything that sticks out, please e-mail me at samuelbloch@yahoo.com or AIM okpinkerton. That's my writing pseudonym.

Loveless
Mark E. Smith

My grandfather told me that afternoon that the ocean was a monster, and I glanced at his lips, drained of a youthful red, waiting for a grin. I stood on the porch of his fifteenth floor beachside condominium, watching a satellite through the clouds on a dampened Floridian night when the screen door opened.

“Look at it,” he said. “I’d hate to be in those waters right now.” A long pause. “Just a while ago it was so beautiful ... now it’s an ever-churning beast.”

I just sort of smiled. I couldn’t tell whether or not he would say this to anyone with a straight face to whom he wouldn’t have to patronize—he’d say something like that to my father or even his wife ... especially his wife ... but probably not to a business partner. His eyes gleamed in the night, a straight face and a dead stare.

I watched the waves peak and land, one after another, gusts of wind flopping my hair into my face. Like most things my grandfather said, words were pitched with equal parts old-man outdated rhetoric—old wives’ tales from a veteran—and an ounce of truth. I hoped he meant what he said, sighing in a sort of monotonous despair. But the ocean couldn’t be romanticized to me, I reasoned, any time I was straight.

And not two hours later, I was sipping a beer, watching intently as the rest of my cousins followed suit. There we were, the five of us, huddled around a Tiki hut-like contraption on a placid beach, each grabbing drinks off the center of the table. Our oldest cousin Ben had bought them for us using his nifty fake ID. I’d seen one of them before and wasn’t as impressed as he thought I’d be.

Ben was a college kid, a real-life New York freshman with a big smile and an incapability to harbor any sort of maliciousness. He began every story that year by bobbing his head in knowing satisfaction that he was about to utter the six coolest words in the world—So I was really drunk, right—and announced during our tennis games that he was going to notch his game up to Level Four; this constituted the removal of his shirt. Ben would ask me if my girlfriend had gone down on me and respond with “okay, player pimp”—his standard-issue response to anything amusing or arousing, but clearly these two were not mutually exclusive.

It was a beautiful night—the full moon bore down on us as we gazed, slack-jawed and drunk, up into the sky. We watched the moonlight meet on the horizon and widen into a forever changing sliver at water’s edge. It split the clouds and stopped at our feet, a symbolic Red Sea appropriate enough for these God-spurning Semitic pubescents.

We weren’t really allowed to do this—what began as parental-consented night walks on the beach just two years ago had quickly turned into downing Coronas in the light of beachside condominiums—and we were well aware of the fact that when we allowed our drunken eyes to wander to our left, we could see our hotel in plain view. Hell, we were crouched underneath an umbrella in front of our grandparents’ building, spitting distance from the back door. So every so often, one of us would get a pang of fear—Shut up or Dudes, serious, the volume’s at nine, we need it to get to two; typically, I would not be reciting the latter—and scurry three feet out to chuck our bottles into the ocean.

“That shit’s good, isn’t it?” Ben asked me. I looked at my empty bottle—my seventh; Ben was just so proud and shit—and sort of chuckled. Our other three cousins were rolling in the sand, whispering to each other and immediately blowing up in laughter.

“Well, of course it is. Shit’s ... hella tasty.” I threw it high into the air. It’s too late to find a clear bottle in the sky, but not to see the splash in the water. It landed sort of far, I guess. I didn’t watch for the landing, so I assumed as much. “Beat that.”

I thought of my grandfather on his porch, standing on tiles far above the melee down below. He’d probably yell at us and berate us for being disruptive and lying, and he’d probably warn us of being drunk on the beach at night. Would we even stop ourselves from——

——anything? We were young. We’re going to live forever. I thought of telling my
cousin Sarah to stay back a bit, of taking the fatherly role. I was on the waters’ edge, but I was exempt because it was my duty to pass on what he’d told me, to convey the fear he surely has. They’d laugh—what the fuck?—and I would too. As if this wisdom would be of any use. What does he know, anyway.

“Okay, player pimp.” Likewise, Ben threw his beer in and forgot as much immediately, so he picked up two more beers from his side. He placed one in my hand and winked at me. Top, bottom, pound, and we were off. It hurt—my eyes started to water and I just pretended it was milk in the bottle. My mind wandered and I briefly mulled over the possibility of jealously towards his impossibly high SAT score.

We finished at the same time; an improbable feat, as I’d have guessed. Back home I would take three shots of hard liquor and pass out in my girlfriend’s arms on the floor before midnight, but it was nearly 2 am here—the moon, I conjectured, was in the pre-early morning quartile of the sky, hence the early time—and I felt great. Waves crashed and rendered what was surely a congratulations from Ben completely inaudible. I pretended I heard him and laughed. “This is great,” and the water edged over our feet.

I took a step back. “Come on. Let’s move a bit.” And so the five of us did, settling just a few more feet down at a group of chairs. We settled here. Ben, Sarah, and Hannah went for a walk, leaving Rachel and I for a bit.

Rachel is small. She stands about six inches under me, and, despite just three months between us, she’d just crossed the triple digit weight barrier this summer, as she relayed it to me. But she’s got a keen wit and, like her brother Ben, is highly intelligent without the faintest hint of effort. Slowly we slipped out of our long-spread chairs, sliding until we laid next to each other, backs to the earth, eyes to the sky. The wind blew harder and Rachel zipped up her jacket. “I ... have ... to pee,” she said, making such a task seem like her life’s largest nuisance. In her drunken state, it probably was.

After a moment’s pause, I realized it was expected of me to say something.

“Do it, then.”

Another pause.

“No.” Rachel’s head nodded side to side, the ‘no’ recognizable only by the sound of sand crunching underneath. She slapped me on my stomach and rolled over, face buried in sand.

I realized I was still clutching my beer. I reclined against the tanning chair and took a sip. Ten hours ago, plump Polish grandmothers had been there, assuming Rachel’s position of ass-in-air, face-in-chair, but waiting for their tans to arrive—we’re in Florida, God dammit, we want our money’s worth—and not tomorrow morning—I’m just so tired—though both in a silent stupor. Pop magazines were picked up and bodies were shifted as the sun set in a wash of pink. They lumbered back to their beachside resorts and drank with their husbands and watched the stars come out and wondered why they weren’t happy anymore. They’d watch television when they got bored of standing outside without a sweater on, and fall asleep next to their Solitaire-playing husbands. The remote would drop from their clutch and their head would nestle in the couch and we’d come out and drink. We’d run onto the beach; a curious role reversal though just for a while. Gray clouds were piecemealed together from both sides, cobbled around the most positively iridescent moon, but we couldn’t give a shit that it was the most beautiful thing we’d ever seen.

“Rachel?” She was asleep and I was elevating the same beach we’d been to every winter for the past ten years to dizzying levels of self-aggrandizing ennui. My grandfather was asleep, too, both of them eased away by that constant of crashing waves.

I sighed and waited. I’d be back home in four days, back at my school in six and I’d be drinking more beers in ten days. “What a stolid existence,” I said to her. Drool seeped from her mouth into a small plot of wetsand.

I stood up and walked down towards our hotel. An old woman sitting on a neighboring hotel’s beachfront pool met my stare after no more than a minute and watched me drag my feet through the sand, losing a sandal every few paces to the muck of tide-receded beach. I’d bend down with the most precise and fey of movements to put on a show for the woman in the pink onepiece and swim cap; her haunches splattered onto the rim of the pool and in between her legs, and beady, chastising eyes moved with the most idiosyncratic of ease to catch up with my annunciated bending. Like precise staples they were, light shining and nearly obscuring her darted glances as they’d latch onto one bit of information—my calve flexing for a moment as I dug my foot in—and wait far too long before catching up to the next—my hand already burrowed into the ground—and connecting the two bits together. I assumed that she’d fill in the fluidity of young action and the country life on her own.

And as I slid my foot out on the surface she suddenly flailed her leg, sharply kicking the water just enough for a small splash. I paid no mind and she kicked again, with both feet as an upbeat to the assailed pronunciation. I stopped and pivoted with a most undignified club-footed stomp.

“Come here.” Her voice was one hundred years deep, a zest for self-serving attention and cigarette marks down her throat under a guise of paunchy old age. I walked ten feet over, back into the spotlights of the pool deck and past the mild shrubbery—weeds crawling out without the faintest regard into the sand—over towards the white picket fences. A nice juxtaposition of modest, three-foot reality and a towering condominium, and I was standing across the pool from her.

“So why aren’t you with that girl?” Her frumpy knees had surely once been slender and part of tan legs that stretched for cool miles into her torso, but she was sitting alone now, making intimations towards a boy not born until her first husband left her. She dipped her toes in and smiled. Her beaming lips were deceiving under a cunningly perspicacious gaze. She eyed me up and down with her still-startlingly stunted gaze as she held out girl. I was left to decide if she was insinuating anything.

“How did you know that ...” I leaned over and past the fences I saw my cousins and moonlight flickering on bottles. “She’s my cousin.” I submerged my legs.

“I have to say, I was more than marginally surprised when you let such a cute girl like her fall asleep without doing any sort; and then you left her, all by herself there.” The former point, moot, not withstanding, gave way to the bite of the latter, in which I instantly realized I left a frail teenaged girl passed out alone on a beach. I stared at my feet beneath the water, and hers, furnished with a spring luster. But it was clear, and these were beautiful, pale legs, far beyond how they should have been, if just for a moment. I looked back up at her and she waited, bemused, for an answer. “I knew my cousins would be back soon enough,” extemporaneously trying to cover up for my drunken wanderings. I considered Rachel’s well-being as I managed to watch her from a distance, still laying in the sand.

“Do you ever worry about tidal waves hitting the deck?”

She laughed. “Do you mind if I smoke?” and she grabbed a pack of cigarettes from behind her. Her lighter flickered in the wind. As I started to get up, she quickly cupped the flame with her hand and succeeded in lighting.

We sat on opposite sides and watched the water for another minute. Her legs corresponded with the rest of her aged body and a thick gray mane slightly protruding from under her bright swim cap.

“Do you know Ted over at Seagate?”

“Yes, actually. You look like him—is ...” Her voice petered out after initial excitement and prematurely waited for my response.

“Grandfather, yeah.”

“No shit?” She placed her hands on her knees and continued to smile at me. Her eyes quickened and spastic clips were nearly fluid.

“No shit. How do you know him?” I stopped and stuck my hand under water to scratch my thigh. “I mean, other than living a half-block down from him ...”

“We’ve gone fishing together a few times. I’m not good at all at it, but I moved in here about fifteen years ago and needed some help moving. He’s a real gentlemen, your grandfather is. He was walking by and saw me dragging several bags into the building, so he came over and helped me bring them all back up to my room.” She flicked her cigarette gracefully over the fence. “He put his hand on my shoulder and said in a real stern voice”—she puffed out her chest and pursed her bottom lip—“‘now look, honey, if you ever need anything, just call this number,’ and handed me a little slip of paper. I couldn’t tell if he was trying to pick me up or not.”

“He does that to every girl he meets. Restaurants. Stewardesses. It’s sort of ridiculous.”

“It’s sort of charming ” she blurted out. She laughed to cover herself up, clasping her hand to her mouth. “I’m sorry, but it is rather fetching of him.”

“I suppose so.” I sheepishly grinned at my feet.

“Whenever we’d be on the boat, he’d always refer to the water as an ever-churning beast.”

“No shit.”

“No shit.”

“Do you think he means it when he says that?”

“Excuse me?”

“You know, do you think he’s making it ...” Her once agone blue eyes shut, nosing at me purposefully. “No, never mind.” That stuttered gaze was now a graceful watch, smoothly easing her eyes into mine own. Her legs were fully underwater and returned to their earlier stage of grandeur. I half-expected redemption.

“That girl you asked me about—my cousin, Rachel ...”

“Yeah?” The sparsely lit pool dampened her face, eroding away all but her brilliant eyes and lips.

“Do you think she’ll be okay over there? I mean, she sort of fell asleep and my cousins aren’t even ...”

“Your cousins aren’t even there.” I looked over and she was right. Rachel was laying alone on the ground. “But she’ll be fine. It’s just like your grandfather said.” She was under the surface, swimming towards the other side. The pool lights shut off for the night and I watched her as I sank in. Her pink outfit of youth had disappeared and her head arose from the water just in front of mine, moonlight as a guideline.

Self-interest was ephemeral as she held onto me and refused to release. Her hands snaked their way down my back and she leaned her head onto my chest. I held onto the poolside as she breathed softly on my shoulder. She was frail and young in my arms and we waited.

She pulled her head back and found my illuminated eyes. “I’m still here, aren’t I.” The ocean refused to be romanticized, even when I was drunk. It held no significance to me other than another church of me; just as Ben was a conduit for exploitation, self-adulation via pity for both of us.

I turned Rachel over. Eyes closed, head limp, I held her up and projected my face onto hers and asked her where she’d be tomorrow. She smiled and offered me a sip of her drink. I accepted her offer.

2004-01-06T23:51:00.000-06:00

I like this, I think. More than most of my other shit. It's the thing from Sunday totally updated and whatnot.

-------

Loveless

My grandfather told me that afternoon that the ocean was an ever-churning beast. I was standing on the porch of his fifteenth floor beachside condominium, watching a satellite through the clouds on a dampened Floridian night when the screen door opened.

“Look at it,” he said. “I’d hate to be in those waters right now.” A long pause. “Just a while ago it was so beautiful ... now it’s the ever-churning beast.”

I just sort of smiled. I couldn’t tell whether or not he would say this to anyone with a
straight face to whom he wouldn’t have to patronize—he’d say something like that to my father or even his wife ... especially his wife ... but probably not to a business partner. His eyes gleamed in the night, a straight face with a long, dead stare.

I watched the waves peak and land, one after another, gusts of wind flopping my hair into my face. Like most things my grandfather said, words were pitched with equal parts old-man outdated rhetoric—old wives’ tales from a veteran—and an ounce of truth. I hoped he meant what he said, sighing in a sort of monotonous despair. But the ocean couldn’t be romanticized to me, I reasoned, any time I was not drunk.

And not two hours later, I was sipping a beer, watching intently as the rest of my cousins followed suit. There we were, the five of us, huddled around a Tiki hut-like contraption on a placid beach, each grabbing drinks off the center of the table. Our oldest cousin Ben had bought them for us using his nifty fake ID. I’d seen one of them before and wasn’t as impressed as he thought I’d be.

Ben was a college kid, a real-life New York freshman with a big smile and an incapability to harbor any sort of maliciousness. He began every story that year by bobbing his head in knowing satisfaction that he was about to utter the six coolest words in the world—So I was really drunk, right—and announced during our tennis games that he was going to notch his game up to Level Four; this constituted the removal of his shirt. Ben would ask me if my girlfriend had gone down on me and respond with “okay, player pimp”—his standard-issue response to anything amusing or arousing, but clearly these two were not mutually exclusive.

It was a beautiful night—the full moon bore down on us as we gazed, slack-jawed and drunk, up into the sky. We watched the moonlight meet on the horizon and widen into a forever changing sliver at water’s edge. It split the clouds and stopped at our feet, a symbolic Red Sea appropriate enough for these God-spurning Semitic pubescents.

We weren’t really allowed to do this—what began as parental-consented night walks on the beach just two years ago had quickly turned into downing Coronas in the light of beachside condominiums—and we were well aware of the fact that when we allowed our drunken eyes to wander to our left, we could see our hotel in plain view. Hell, we were crouched underneath an umbrella in front of our grandparents’ building, spitting distance from the back door. So every so often, one of us would get a pang of fear—Shut up! or Dudes, serious, the volume’s at nine, we need it to get to two; typically, I would not be reciting the latter—and scurry three feet out to chuck our bottles into the ocean.

“That shit’s good, isn’t it?” Ben asked me. I looked at my empty bottle—my seventh; Ben was just so proud and shit—and sort of chuckled. Our other three cousins were rolling in the sand, whispering shit to each other and immediately blowing up in laughter.

“Well, of course it is. Shit’s ... hella tasty.” I threw it high into the air. It’s too late to find a clear bottle in the sky, but not to see the splash in the water. It landed sort of far, I guess. I didn’t watch for the landing, so I assumed as much. “Beat that.”

I thought of my grandfather on his porch, standing on tiles far above the melee down below. He’d probably yell at us and berate us for being disruptive and lying, and he’d probably warn us of being drunk on the beach at night. Would we even stop ourselves from——

——anything? We were young. We’re going to live forever. I thought of telling my
cousin Sarah to stay back a bit, of taking the fatherly role. I was on the waters’ edge, but I was exempt because it was my duty to pass on what he’d told me, to convey the fear he surely has. They’d laugh. “What the fuck?” I would too. As if this wisdom would be of any use. What does he know, anyway.

“Okay, player pimp.” Likewise, Ben threw his beer in and forgot as much immediately,
so he picked up two more beers from his side. He placed one in my hand and winked at me. Top, bottom, pound, and we were off. It hurt—my eyes started to water and I just pretended it was milk in that bottle. My mind wandered and I briefly mulled over the possibility of jealously towards his impossibly high SAT score.

We finished at the same time; an improbable feat, as I’d have guessed. Back home I
would take three shots of hard liquor and pass out in my girlfriend’s arms on the floor before midnight, but it was nearly 2 am (I think) here and I felt great. Waves crashed and rendered what was surely a congratulations from Ben completely inaudible. I pretended I heard him and laughed. “This is great,” and the water edged over our feet.

I took a step back. “Come on. Let’s move a bit.” And so the five of us did, settling just a few more feet down at a group of chairs. We settled here. Ben, Sarah, and Hannah went for a walk, leaving Rachel and I for a bit.

Rachel is small. She stands about six inches under me, and, despite just three months between us, she’d just crossed the triple digit weight barrier this summer, as she relayed it to me. But she’s got a keen wit and, like her brother Ben, is highly intelligent without the faintest hint of effort. Slowly we slipped out of our long-spread chairs, sliding until we laid next to each other, backs to the earth, eyes to the sky. The wind blew harder and Rachel zipped up her jacket. “I ... have ... to pee,” she said, making such a task seem like her life’s largest nuisance. In her drunken state, it probably was.

After a moment’s pause, I realized it was expected of me to say something.

“Do it, then.”

Another pause.

“No.” Rachel’s head nodded side to side, the ‘no’ recognizable only by the sound of sand crunching underneath. She slapped me on my stomach and rolled over, face buried in sand.

I realized I was still clutching my beer. I reclined against the tanning chair and took a sip. Ten hours ago, plump Polish grandmothers had been there, assuming Rachel’s position of ass-in-air, face-in-chair, but waiting for their tans to arrive—we’re in Florida, God dammit, we want our money’s worth—and not tomorrow morning—I’m just so tired—though both in a silent stupor. Pop magazines were picked up and bodies were shifted as the sun set in a wash of pink. They lumbered back to their beachside resorts and drank with their husbands and watched the stars come out and wondered why the fuck they weren’t happy anymore. They’d watch television when they got bored of standing outside without a sweater on, and fall asleep next to their Solitaire-playing husbands. The remote would drop from their clutch and their head would nestle in the couch and we’d come out and drink. We’d run onto the beach; a curious role reversal though just for a while. Gray clouds were piecemealed together from both sides, cobbled around the most positively iridescent moon, but we couldn’t give a shit that it was the most beautiful thing we’d ever seen.

“Rachel?” She was asleep and I was elevating the same beach we’d been to every winter for the past ten years to dizzying levels of self-aggrandizing ennui. My grandfather was asleep, too. They were both eased away by that constant of crashing waves.

So I chucked the bottle in, half-hoping that the ocean would rise up in a catastrophic wave, grabbing and shaking me until I admitted every one of my mistakes. The bottle wouldn’t even hit the water, but the entire waterfront would stand up on its own and assimilate it. I’d sit in horror, shaking Rachel but realizing that I was ultimately too late; grabbing my last glance at the waterfront civilization and the palm trees and boardwalks and nearly empty cases of beer; maybe then my self-interest would be ephemeral. How could I care what was happening to me—why—at life’s end? That it was happening would be enough, surely.

Naturally, this didn’t happen. The ocean refused to be romanticized, even when I was drunk. It held no significance to me other than another church of me; just as Ben was a conduit for exploitation, self-adulation via pity for both of us.

I turned Rachel over. Eyes closed, head limp, I held her up and projected my face onto hers and asked her where she’d be tomorrow. She smiled and offered me a sip of her drink. I accepted her offer.

2004-01-04T23:22:00.000-06:00

WIP WORK IN PROGRESS> Yo.

My grandfather told me that afternoon that the ocean was an ever-churning beast. I was
standing on the porch of his fifteenth floor beachside condominium, watching a satellite through
the clouds on a dampened Floridian night when the screen door opened.

“Look at it,” he said. “I’d hate to be in those waters right now.” A long pause. “Just a
while ago it was so beautiful ... now it’s the ever-churning beast.”

I just sort of smiled. I couldn’t tell whether or not he would say this to anyone with a
straight face to whom he wouldn’t have to patronize—he’d say something like that to my father
or even his wife ... especially his wife ... but probably not to a business partner. His eyes gleamed
in the night, a straight face with a long, dead stare.

I watched the waves peak and land, one after another, gusts of wind flopping my hair into
my face. Like most things my grandfather said, words were pitched with equal parts old-man
outdated rhetoric—old wives’ tales from a veteran—and an ounce of truth. I hoped he meant
what he said, sighing in a sort of monotonous despair. But the ocean couldn’t be romanticized to
me any time I was not drunk.

And not two hours later, I was sipping a beer, watching intently as the rest of my cousins
followed suit. There we were, the five of us, huddled around a Tiki hut-like contraption on a
placid beach, each grabbing drinks off the center of the table. Our oldest cousin Ben had bought
them for us using his nifty fake ID. I’d seen one of them before and wasn’t as impressed as he
thought I’d be.

Ben was a college kid, a real-life New York freshman with a big smile and an
incapability to harbor any sort of maliciousness. He began every story that year by bobbing his
head in knowing satisfaction that he was about to utter the six coolest words in the world—So I
was really drunk, right—and announced during our tennis games that he was going to notch his
game up to Level Four; this constituted the removal of his shirt. Ben would ask me if my
girlfriend had gone down on me and respond with “okay, player pimp”—his standard-issue
response to anything amusing or arousing, but clearly these two were not mutually exclusive.

It was a beautiful night—the full moon bore down on us as we gazed, slack-jawed and
drunk, up into the sky. We watched the moonlight meet on the horizon and widen into a forever
changing sliver at water’s edge. It split the clouds and stopped at our feet, a symbolic Red Sea
appropriate enough for these God-spurning Semitic pubescents.

We weren’t really allowed to do this—what began as parental-consented night walks on
the beach just two years ago had quickly turned into downing Coronas in the light of beachside
condominiums—and we were well aware of the fact that when we allowed our drunken eyes to
wander to our left, we could see our hotel in plain view. Hell, we were crouched underneath an
umbrella in front of our grandparents’ building, spitting distance from the back door. So every so
often, one of us would get a pang of fear—Shut up! or Dudes, serious, the volume’s at nine, we
need it to get to two; typically, I would not be reciting the latter—and scurry three feet out to
chuck our bottles into the ocean.

“That shit’s good, isn’t it?” Ben asked me. I looked at my empty bottle—my seventh;
Ben was just so proud and shit—and sort of chuckled. Our other three cousins were rolling in the
sand, whispering shit to each other and immediately blowing up in laughter.

“Well, of course it is. Shit’s ... hella tasty.” I threw it high into the air. It’s too late to find
a clear bottle in the sky, but not to see the splash in the water. It landed sort of far, I guess. I
didn’t watch for the landing, so I assumed as much. “Beat that.”

I thought of my grandfather on his porch, standing on tiles far above the melee down
below. He’d probably yell at us and berate us for being disruptive and lying, and he’d probably
warn us of being drunk on the beach at night. Would we even stop ourselves from——

——anything? We were young. We’re going to live forever. I thought of telling my
cousin Sarah to stay back a bit, of taking the fatherly role. It was my duty to pass on what he’d
told me, to convey the fear he surely has. They’d laugh. “What the fuck?” I would too. As if this
wisdom would be of any use. What does he know, anyway.

“Okay, player pimp.” Likewise, Ben threw his beer in and forgot as much immediately,
so he picked up two more beers from his side. He placed one in my hand and winked at me. Top,
bottom, pound, and we were off. It hurt—my eyes started to water and I just pretended it was
milk in that bottle. My mind wandered and I briefly mulled over the possibility of jealously
towards his impossibly high SAT score.

We finished at the same time; an improbable feat, as I’d have guessed. Back home I
would take three shots of hard liquor and pass out in my girlfriend’s arms on the floor before
midnight, but it was nearly 2 am (I think) here and I felt great. Waves crashed and rendered what
was surely a congratulations from Ben completely inaudible. I pretended I heard him and
laughed. “This is great,” and the water edged over our feet.

I took a step back. “Come on. Let’s move a bit.” And so the five of us did, settling just a
few more feet down at a group of chairs. We settled here. Ben, Sarah, and Hannah went for a
walk, leaving Rachel and I for a bit.

Rachel is small. She stands about six inches under me, and, despite just three months
between us, she’d just crossed the triple digit weight barrier this summer, as she relayed it to me.
But she’s got a keen wit and, like her brother Ben, is highly intelligent without the faintest hint
of effort. Slowly we slipped out of our long-spread chairs, sliding until we laid next to each
other, backs to the earth, eyes to the sky. The wind blew harder and Rachel zipped up her jacket.
“I ... have ... to pee,” she said, making such a task seem like her life’s largest nuisance. In her
drunken state, it probably was.

After a moment’s pause, I realized it was expected of me to say something.

“Do it, then.”

Another pause.

“No.” Rachel’s head nodded side to side, the ‘no’ recognizable only by the sound of sand
crunching underneath.

2003-12-26T02:11:00.000-06:00

DELETED Drunken cheers on a very merry Christmas.

2003-12-24T02:04:00.000-06:00

Ha aha ha I'm back you greasy motherfuckers Is that whole post-Jane bit too disjointed/shit/not logical/etc/bad? Are my words not big enough?
----

He rang the doorbell, dead-eyed watch shot through the white door and into that crowd inside. William stood at his side, shoegazing at his feet, pivoting back and forth. They were silent until the door opened. Their visible breath in that piercing winter cool; the only sign of life amidst such isolation—

There was Jane, eyeballing the two boys breathing into their gloved hands. Her knee-length black dress fluttered with the breeze.

Her lips widened for a moment and her stare froze. “It’s certainly fucking cold.” Ben looked into her eyes and cursed himself.

“Do you two want to come in?”

“Well yeah, I’ll be—yeah, yeah, that’d—well, of course, we are invi”—William rolled his eyes—“thanks.”

Jane laughed. “Come off it, don’t be nervous.”

Still holding the door open from the inside of her steps, Ben and William walked in. He opened his mouth to ask if he should wipe his shoes, but thought better.
No pretense.

“Let me get you two some beers—or, come in back with me.” She grabbed Ben’s hand and pulled him through the sea of people. He floated through the family room—dimly lit friends compressed together, mutual party conversation as a wonderfully comfortable social buffer, nodding at friends playing the piano, not having the moment to respond to a random hello—and into the kitchen—boys dispersed as fluorescent lights buzzed below the music and they clung to the sides of the room, beer in one hand, girl in the other. Farther back they went, Jane opening the American white refrigerator—and the magnets clung such helpful reminders for Jane’s lost weekend like “room number at hotel: 513-247-2838, mom cell: 477-2605" and several bills clipped together to purchase groceries with a reminder to call at night—to pull out something for Ben.

“Hey, come here.” She turned around and met Ben’s stare. She took a step closer and lowered his hand to her hips.

“She’s not here yet.” Ben let her lips lay on his for a moment.

“But there’s so many people here. I mean, William, what’s he going to”—

Jane smiled at him. “I know,” she mouthed, and placed a beer in his hand. “We’ll talk in a bit, I’m sure.”

I’m sure. He wanted to punch her in the mouth. “You fucking presumptuous bitch,” he would’ve said, but God no. What would that have done? With such perfect timing, Ben knowingly chuckled to himself. It was met with complete misunderstanding as Jane chuckled too.

“Now go in back and talk to some people. I’ll be hosting and shit.”

He looked into her watering blue eyes for just another moment. But she’s so petite and pretty and she’s probably less to worry about than mine is.

“I can do that." He sipped his beer and walked out of the light and into Evelyn’s arms. His worries only began to metastasize and, well, there's no use fighting it, now is there?

I've not the time to even think of what she's wearing. Of course she's what I need.

She's so completely doting! Her body was just so warm. He could talk to her about self-esteem deficiencies. She made him feel good. She made him feel worth it. She was like him. She was just like him, down to the failed ambitions they'd already conjured up for themselves.

She was intelligent. She asked him how he was doing and she genuinely meant it. He was everything to her, surely. And they got on quite well, too. In fact, they'd probably have sex that night.

As if I've not anyone who can do all of that for me.

He bit his nails and looked at her shoulder. Please don't be overzealous, just for this moment.

"Evelyn," he said, "what do you want"—she smiled and leaned in to kiss him. He sighed and leaned back—"tomorrow."

2003-12-23T11:55:00.000-06:00

NME (on Jet): "Cester has riffs for five new songs, but the band are likely to wait until they get into the studio before putting them together."

That's not how bands are supposed to write songs. I mean, I'm sure that's how it starts and all -- but you aren't supposed to let us know that. It's supposed to be a mystery! You are rock and roll gods, and now you let us know you don't have songs, but just some 'riffs'? Fer chrissakes.

When bands go into the studio, they're supposed to magically come up with new songs and then shuffle them out to you in this brand new package a year or so later, because they are brilliant, and you aren't.

Damon Albarn magically conjures up whole songs on the spot. Julian Casablancas sits there and thinks really hard and a song pops up thirty minutes later. Mark E. Smith stabs his collective of folks that is a band and then a song emanates from their dead bodies.

They do not tell the fucking NME that they have riffs.

2003-12-22T00:56:00.000-06:00

I looked down the road. The streetlights converged into the end of it all and I looked right back at them. I sat in my car, refusing to budge at that green light.

Don't you have to be home soon?

It's nice at 12.30; there's nobody out there. The pedestrians we hate have completely disappeared and here we are, finding solace in the world that looked right back at us. They told us to fuck off but we're the only ones standing.

For once, we are the most important people here. We are who they care about.

I have places to go.

2003-12-13T00:49:00.000-06:00

What do you do when you get something like this?

I should be writing about how Ben goes back to reality and has more of that honest discussion with Evelyn that ya'll like so much before I talk about gayrape, etc.

2003-12-08T00:50:00.000-06:00

I DID A BIT OF EDITING/CLARIFICATION. LESS GAYPORNY. MORE PAGETURNER/BAD WALGREENS NOVEL TRASH. NOT MUCH. BUT SOME.

Hahhaah this is fucking weird -- but then, I've decided, this isn't really a novella. I mean, I'd like to think it is. But it's mostly an exercise. hence, this shit has yet to become fully coherent.

I plan to either scratch this or totally rewrite it later. I just wanted to get the narrative out, I think. PS if yall are really really smart you can pick up on some metaphor/transcendentalist/surrealist character shit here going on with Willy and Evelyn. Sort of. HAHAH AGAY PORN

William reached deep into his coat pocket, arching his back up as he dug for a cigarette. He dumped a pack and a lighter into Ben’s hand without eye contact. A fumbled guttural grunt accentuated the docking of William’s head; Ben quickly cranked the window down an inch and lit a cigarette. The Volvo’s deep blue had faded after many cold winters, seasons of William’s parents refusing to replace the ragged transmission or fix the brake pads. The car was loud as shit. Speaking was conducted at a shout and not a mumble. William could have fixed the car a long time ago—but it rendered silence socially acceptable. This was ideal.

Cigarette firmly dangling on his lip, William's thousand-year stare bore all the way down the empty street. The empty street where slush lined up alongside the curbs for ages and green lights stretched until the snow obscured all vision into a green haze. He pulled his cigarette out and handed to Ben, again without the slightest hint of gratitude or ... acknowledgment. The car sputtered and William slapped the dashboard. "Fuck." The car was dying. Ben glanced at him.

And they drove with the bright car dealership lights and glowing Mexican restaurant marquees illuminating that deafening silence. He took me out for this?

William turned to Ben. He pulled over and put his hand on Ben’s shoulder. And his eyes scanned his body; a final check. Ben couldn't move. He looked straight ahead as William's hands slipped under his shirt.

They were cold—but against his warm stomach, it seemed natural. William shifted the car into park and crawled over into Ben’s seat. They continued to kiss, tongues wrapping around each other and spit cresting around their tips. Ben’s eyes were wide open. He saw William’s eyes, comfortably closed in a state of perpetual bliss. They opened and met Ben’s—he touched Ben’s forehead and slid his two soft hands down his face, closing his eyes as though Ben were a corpse.

William knew Ben’s body as though it were his own. Ben’s arms would run amiss with goosebumps and William would be there, kissing up and down his now-warmed limbs. His neck would itch and William’s hand would find itself rummaging back and forth, soothing away the pain. Ben would scarcely think before William’s hand plunged between his legs.

Time was of no consequence—Ben didn’t care about running late; he couldn’t care. Small reminders persisted—he would open his eyes and see ice melt and slip down the windows; he would see people walk by, crossing the street in clear vision; not a moment of conscious recognition. He had slipped away; rather, Ben may have slipped into a state of complete ambivalence. It happened to him without a single instance of non-objective diagnosis. He felt William's lips bob back and forth onto his, his hands climbing up his back, his glasses aggravating Ben's acne as they dug deeper into his face.

William’s pulse grew faster, beating directly onto Ben’s chest. William had gone to work on him. Ben lifted up his hand off of William’s back; he soothed William's off of his chest, holding it gently and slowly moving it down to the seat. It was time to get going. He stroked the back of William’s hair. Running his hand over his head, he leaned back. Delivering a concluding kiss, he nudged William back and smiled, hunching into the concaved seat.

His eyes scanned Ben's face, a smirk as he found Ben’s dark brown eyes all the way down to his scarred chin. Ben watched as William encountered a brief moment of calculation -- amalgamating Ben's forehead, then his lovely, anunciated cheekbones, his lush lips -- a brief moment of processing as much of Ben's face as he could. William's hair dangled behind Ben's glasses, his breath bore down on him.

“We should go.” He leaned back in and kissed Ben’s neck. Ben pushed him back off. “Come on, really. We can do it a bit more at the party.” William leaned in and whispered in his ear. I love you. His hands plunged back into Ben’s pants.

His cold hands felt horrible between Ben’s legs. He pushed at William. “Please. Come on.” William’s passion grew. He was furiously kissing Ben’s neck, moving down slowly. Pushing at him, Ben started kicking his legs. He tightened his thighs together, his blue jeans rubbing against William’s hands as he feet locked together underneath the seat, his body tucked into a knot. These once luscious instruments had become icy and sharp, his lips acquiescing all over Ben’s stomach. Ben felt his stomach churn.

“William—what the fuck?” His arms were flailing at this point. He grabbed William’s neck and pulled him off, pushing him against the glove compartment and arching his hand up against the window. He saw William’s hand rub off the melted ice in front of him. A skidded line was left, burning Ben’s eyes. Condensation was all over William’s right hand. He leaned back in and stuck his head directly in between Ben’s thighs. His hands were dripping all over Ben’s hips. He squirmed and yelled.

Ben grabbed William’s hair. He pulled his head off of his member and rammed it into the car door. The front seat grew closer to the front, closer to William, who was still all over Ben. Hands were everywhere. Saliva dripped over every pore. Ben kicked harder and pushed William continually against the window, again and again. Every time, William was forced into a corner by Ben’s extended foot. He stayed there, frozen in the corner with a smirk still attached to this face—this face that kept returning. More, and more. The black coat. His bony, cold fingers. Everywhere. Ben curled up into seat and flailed. William was everywhere. He would tuck his head under his arms and see that grin—the comfortable smile of a friend. He would feel him everywhere. He would feet his mouth sucking on his toes, on his penis, on his neck, feel it slowly assailing away at his very human ability to assess that very human physical stimuli.

Surely there were not fourteen Williams in this seat, all over Ben's frail, shivering body. The harder he pushed, the futility increased. Counterattacks became reproach. But Ben saw his hand wrap around William's throat, desperately, desperately hoping for an end. Adrenalin pumped from his pituitary and his grip tightened, hearing William sputter and choke and sinking. His body heat returned, legs loosened, heart pumped quicker. In a fleeting moment, Ben had looked down to see his hands comfortably folded in his lap—

A pang ran down his spine—utter realization; but this all was not in futility! William had receded, but—but his hands—he felt them—he couldn't see them. Ben's ears bled and glasses shattered, wire frame covered in blood slipping down his face. The ice stiffened the tangled mess and Ben felt William's hands slowly invading his body once again. They kissed with the passion that those churchgoers had before they had their first child, Ben's hand snaking under William's. He yelled to stop. He yelled to himself, for Chrissakes! Moaning in agony as blood slipped between their opened orifices, drawing deeper inside of his mouth as William pushed harder. He grabbed William again and his hands remained in his lap. The luscious draw leaning into the end of any recognition. He could taste only blood. He could feel only William—

—his hands were in his lap—he was licking his lips—he was staring out the window—he was biting his nails—he was thinking of Evelyn—

Ben reached for the door handle and his hands grasped. His hands were in his lap. The door opened and he felt the draft pull him out, out onto that cold, snowy sidewalk. He fell out of the car and hit his head on the parking meter. He passed out.

2003-12-07T17:46:00.000-06:00

Fuck all of you, I give you 17 hours and you give me shit

Well all of you except Ruth, and maybe Leon, cause he'll tell me anyways, and maybe Nick, cause he gave me the idea

But Todd, DJ Martian, Matthew Perpetua, Akiva, Emma, Lisa, Unterberger, Thomas Inskeep, Chiansan Ma, Robin Lacey, Pebbles732, Dan Emerson [note- only half these people read S&L regularly, maybe this is why], and the rest of you chicken mctesticles -- fuck you.

Evelyn and Ben win. 1 to 0. I'm glad they won. I was going to continue that exercise instead of poetry anyway.

fuck simon reynolds
fuck simon reynolds
fuck simon reynolds
fuck simon reynolds
fuck simon reynolds
fuck simon reynolds
fuck simon reynolds
fuck simon reynolds
fuck simon reynolds
fuck simon reynolds
fuck simon reynolds
fuck simon reynolds
fuck simon reynolds
fuck simon reynolds
fuck simon reynolds
fuck simon reynolds

2003-12-07T01:20:00.000-06:00

This one goes out to the fanclub

Alright team, here's the plan, either I continue the story about Evelyn and Ben and take it to some Murakami next level shit where weird shit likes fucks their shit up, or I try to write some poetry for ya'll.

What's it gonna be?

Seriously I want five e-mails by 6PM CST tomorrow, either "1" (Evelyn and Ben) or "2" (rawpo etry``1~!!). If you read this fucking website, it's your duty to send me an e-mail. Otherwise I'll track all eight of you down and ask me why you didnt'

WOOP WOOP YALLRE THE GREATEST!

2003-12-04T00:47:00.000-06:00

The problem is that there's like ... no fucking direction. I'm not really saying anything. Like Leon said ... well, this is my exercise. But I gotta have something to say, don't I. Like Phil Prale.

———————

He washed his hands and put on his coat. William was waiting outside, blowing air into his hands and looking hurriedly about the front steps.

Ben opened the door.

“Hi.”

“Hey.”

He slammed the door shut behind him and bounded down the three brick steps. He watched William, not four steps ahead, slide across the front walk into the pedestrian sidewalk. The light winter ice—the first of the year, Ben marked—ended where his front walk was no longer his own. The brick inlay was state-facilitated for just a bit, a hanging indent into the curb that separated his own and the street ahead of him. Guests would park in front of his house, opening their doors and they’d trip, oh, every time on that epic valley on that walk. His mother’s friends would be holding wine bottles.

“Shit!” His aunt had done this once before. The tip of her heel dug itself into this miraculously huge street dimple—it must have been that big, surely, or any fucking idiot could walk over it, couldn’t they? She threw that bottle in the air like a bowling ball, both hands hurling it straight above her as she tipped back to catch herself and forward into a thankfully dense patch of grass. Ear to the earth, legs perpendicular to her body, Malka laid for a second. She was a nice lady, not flamboyant in her adoration as one expects a Jewish older relative to be, nor smothering in supposed concern for that wonderful piano practice. She quietly asked Ben about the exorbitant number of lights left on in his house as he helped her up.

“I don’t know, Malka. Because we’re lazy, I guess.” Ben held her veined palm as he crouched above her. He hoisted her up to her knees, one up at a time, avoiding the perfectly angular wine bottle next to her until they stood at eye level, holding hands. Her white slacks were without a smudge.

“Oh, Ben. You’ve got no pretense on you. Don’t worry at all,” she’d say, and he’d try to believe her.

The ice stopped directly before William’s car tonight. He did not fall like Malka had. Not at all.

“Watch this, Ben.” William slid gracefully parallel along the walk until he reached the side door of his mother’s station wagon. One leg cocked in the air, he laughed.

“Oh,” and he turned just three feet from the car door, just three feet from that chasm of death between the curb and the street. He faced Ben with one foot placed on the car window, and his hands spread as the ice skater he feigned. “That is wonderful.”

“Fucking wild. Come on, let’s go.” William ran around the front and unlocked the car. Ben wandered up the door where his friend's foot had just rested, and he tripped his way inside. He looked up at William, who hadn't even noticed the slight fall Ben took getting in.

No pretense. None at all. "So where is this party? Where does this girl live?"

William pulled off the side and began to drive down the orange hum of a city road at night. Snow dotted his windshield. He didn't say anything.

"Hey, William, are you going to turn on your wipers at least? That's gonna pile up soon, and you're going to have to ..." William wasn't saying anything. His grin pierced the silence, though, light bouncing off his perfectly aligned mouth and piercing the monotony of his black winter jacket and black knit hat atop his head.

"Ben. Ben, man, look. Let's just drive for a bit."

"Wait, what ... what are you doing? I mean, is there something we need to—"

"No. Ben. No." He came to a red light and looked at Ben. Ben just wanted to kiss a girl tonight.

"Don't be afraid." William's eyes were huddled in the dark. He couldn't see Ben's, either—but the two of them started laughing. "Are you afraid?" Ben smiled and rubbed on William's hat.

"Honestly, though, let's just drive. We can be late."

Ben nodded. "We can be late."

2003-12-02T23:46:00.000-06:00

Nov. 30

And there he sat, running his hands through that thick brown mane—unkempt, sure; certainly obviously—and bumping his glasses. He saw the non-existent second shoelace on his left foot, the optical shadow caused by the discrepancy between his poor vision and corrective lenses. He smoothed over an acne stump on the way back down, and plunged his hand into his mouth.

“Please stop biting your nails. It’s just disgusting—shit, let me see those.”

It was dark in the back of that church. And that dark mahogany bench where many churchgoers had been in—

they couldn’t have been anxious, he reasoned! Not like me! They’re married. They don’t have to worry about schoolwork—

just eight hours ago—

do you know what I was doing eight hours ago?—

and many of them were, too, wearing dress slacks and biting their nails. He deducted they were surely anticipating when they would get to leave their service and get something to eat. As he was.

“Why do you do that? How do you even get them that deep?”

He’d heard it from many people before. He was able, somehow, to bite his nails into a frenzy, digging a three-dimensional groove that peaked and chipped like ice caps of excess calcium into his right middle finger. He couldn’t explain it, he just ... bit his nails a lot. At least that's what he told people.

But Evelyn; she had never asked him. Why now? She rubbed her arms over his shoulders, his abrupt though rounded shoulders, that, he deducted, were pretty nice to run your hands over. Always deducting, never crediting. Her hands fell into his, and she kissed him on the cheek.

“You’ll do fine.”

She laughed. He did too. For all of his brooding, especially his public appearance when, you know, he must act curt and serious and his deadening stare’s gotta make you weak in your knees, he wasn’t unhappy in the least. Not here. Because he wrote a few pretty good songs on his guitar—and he knew it. He slipped his right hand—the ice-cold fingered hand—out from under her two soft, feminine hands. He continued to bite his nails.

“Stop it!” Evelyn yanked on his arm. Their eyes met.

“Evelyn—you know, you’re fucking great.”

“I should hope so.” She let go, and his hand immediately found itself on her hip, under her white shirt, and they kissed, stuffing tongues inside each other with the passion that those churchgoers had before they had their first child.

He opened his eyes to check on her. Ben was immediately lost inside of himself.

She is so beautiful.

The truth was that ... she was. Ben knew he didn’t deserve her. She had the prettiest legs in the whole world, smooth and lean as she wore tasteful knee-length skirts. They first kissed over a bottle of vodka after a party nearly four months ago. And he was smitten; rightfully, of course.

That light is too bright.

Does my jacket look cool.

Mr. Smith doesn’t care if I look cool.

Why do I care about what I wear to school.

That should be extra. First I should be getting an A in Physics.

God, what’s going to happen if I don’t?

Am I going to go college?

I hope they remember the bridge after my falsetto.

I hope that she stops kissing me soon.

I hope that Jane kisses me on my cheek after the show.

I hope that I don’t think about something else while I’m up there.

Evelyn opened her eyes, too. They had this sort of frenzied rush after extended kissing—you try to look for as much of the other’s face as possible—that they never openly remarked about to each other. They both did it, though. Neither of them knew if others did it. But it was coopted this time.

She smiled at him. He followed suit.

——————

Dec. 1

The set, naturally, was outstanding—the four of them walked out onto the stage, a plot of floor bounded by amps and a drumkit in a church basement. They slagged on their guitars and fancied themselves a bit important when Ben took out a vintage synthesizer and hunched over like his esoteric musical heroes.

“Hey—let’s do alright, you know?” The other three smirked at him and sort of rolled their eyes. Of course let’s do alright. Why would you say that? But they understood. They high-fived and ran out from behind.

Ben gazed at the floor as he slowly walked over to his amplifier. He could get a bit of a look at the audience—too many kids. So many he didn’t know, a few he found a bit boring, Evelyn standing to the right, talking to her friends—but wrapped in her coat was Jane. His heart raced for that very instant, the instant where connections were overridden in thinking of her, but rather, that of holding her and staring deep into her eyes for a long time.

His pensive walk halted. He waltzed the final four steps over to his microphone. Jane was not, unfortunately, returning the stare in which Ben again briefly flashed towards her. He remembered he had to get ready to sing songs he’d composed, songs that sprung from sitting on the toilet with an acoustic guitar thinking about why he could get every pretty girl but not her. How he met her one night in the cold and he went home with Evelyn instead.

Ben bent down, plugging a cord into his instrument. E-F#-A, and he swivelled on his right foot. His bandmates nodded at him.

“Most of you are our friends,” he said.

Ben wrapped his hand around the microphone, the other cradling his fretboard. He took another quick census. Jane’s big blue eyes pierced his gaze from the middle of the audience.

“And that’s all right." He took another breath. "But pretend for a bit that you aren’t," and he looked her in the eye.

They played the songs, homages to their musical idols, tiny masterpieces, strutting onstage as snare hits bounced into each other and chords bled into chaos. Ben struck piano keys without the faintest reproach—perhaps the four of them couldn’t hear each other; but perhaps the knowledge that pretty girls punctuated the audience was more than enough. This one goes out to you. One hundred and twenty-seven kids stood in the darkness ahead of them, the musical brethren that could go forever for them. A cascade of lights illuminated the instruments and twinkled in their pupils.

Evelyn stood directly in front of Ben, dancing and smiling at him the whole night, as if to extend possession. People would come and talk to her, and she’d put her fingers up to their lips. He could see hers move. “That’s my boyfriend,” and she’d laugh and keep moving.

Ben moved his head about looking for Jane, and found Evelyn along the way. She thought it for her. Bright eyes met one another and her lips moved again. “I love you.”

——————

“I’ll be over in eight minutes. Please don’t be late.”

“Am I ever?—yes. Yes, I am, never mind. See you in a bit.”

William was the same year as Ben. He took all the same classes he did—though at different times of the day—and wore the same clothing—typically a bit nicer and more organized than Ben’s, four blue jeans instead of three—and listened to the same music—they’d met when William noticed Ben had scrawled Pavement in a variety of styles all over his school folder in the eighth grade. It was the third day of school.

“Hey. Ben.” It was math class, and they were taking out their books in preparation for the year’s inaugural homework check. Ben had just unloaded his math folder.

Ben looked directly behind him. William Brown was hunched over his desk with a bit of a grin on his face. He’d found a kindred spirit. But as soon as Ben turned, the hopefulness of William’s wide eyes shut and his smile dropped.

“Pavement ... nice.”

“Do you like them?”

“Yeah, yeah I love—I mean, I used to. They’re pretty good, though.”

William was cool. Ben was not. And he couldn’t risk talking to someone else. Ben sat for a moment—an eternity—trying to formulate an adequate response.

“Crooked Rain, man. That’s ... that’s really ...”

“Yeah, yeah. I like Slanted and Enchanted best, though.” William deflected infringing opinion deftly, with this confidence of someone who'd been doing it all their life. And at this school, he had been. His brow was still raised in anticipation. “That is really cool you like them. I never knew anyone else did.”

“Me too!” Ben was visibly excited at this point, and was not aware class had begun. His teacher glared at him. William was already in his seat, pencil in hand, posture slumped once more. Ben quickly took out the rest of his supplies, and spent the rest of the period elaborately etching “S+E 91" into the other side of his folder.

Dec. 2

They spent the rest of the year attempting to extend friendship beyond the guise of common musical interests. And they succeeded, seeing each other every day as they walked home from school together. They’d see each other every weekend and ask about how long they made out with their girlfriends the night before. Grades, girls, indie rock. A bit of camaraderie when they’d laugh at other people and make jokes that only the two of them would find funny, confounding everyone else. It was them against the world.

They told each other things that you could tell your coworkers.

The mutual facade was never put down. They never told each other how they really felt about anything, anything personal that belonged to solely themselves. They could not breach comfort—to infringe upon this construct in which they pretended to live in with honesty. Not malicious in the slightest—the two of them fully understood exactly what they had done—but it simply wasn’t worth the confrontation that would surely ensue. They were best friends, and everyone else was jealous of the connection that they saw. It must have been weird to have been so close.

Ben laced up his shoes and masturbated really quickly. There was nobody home that night, so he was free to do it in the downstairs bathroom with the door wide open. His foot tucked inside of the door wedge as his eyes wandered to lit-shot ceiling, droll white accentuated by freshly replaced lightbulbs. He thought of Evelyn’s warm body on his. She softly caressed him. His foot extended. As he came, his thoughts turned to Jane. Where he should have experienced wonderful release for just seven seconds he instead found himself shaking. He immediately let go and grabbed the side of the toilet bowl. His eyes, briefly shut out of such masculine intensity, forced themselves open, as to remind himself he was in his fucking bathroom and not with ... not with her.

Why? Ben weighed the possibility of seeing her tonight. Evelyn would surely be at the party, waiting with a beer in her hand as he opened the door. Her face would light up with the glow of a thousand Christmas tree lights in the deserted night. And she'd say Excuse me as she ran from the living room to the entrance, politely pushing people aside. Ben would see her and grab her extended right hand, pulling her closer. She'd lay down her cup.

He washed his hands and put on his coat. William was waiting outside his door.

2003-12-02T23:45:00.000-06:00

To my fanz!

Sorry you're reading this novel shit backwards. But if you're with me, this'll just be a daily update for you. Thanks.

2003-12-02T00:32:00.000-06:00

...

2003-11-30T22:49:00.000-06:00

...

2003-11-30T14:55:00.000-06:00

Sean Paul, Hot Hot Heat, Nelly f/ P. Diddy, The Darkness, The All-American Rejects, Blink-182, Basement Jaxx, Dizzee Rascal, Justin Timberlake, The Libertines, The Postal Service, Girls Aloud, Sugababes, Sum 41, OutKast, Ludacris, The New Pornographers, Fountains Of Wayne, and a host of others: my apologies.

20. Panjabi MC f/ Jay-Z - "Beware Of The Boyz"
19. Broken Social Scene - "Stars and Sons "
18. t.a.T.u. - "Not Gonna Get Us"
17. Phantom Planet - "Big Brat"
16. M83 - "Run Into Flowers"
15. Bubba Sparxxx - "Deliverance"
14. Electric Six - "Danger! High Voltage"
13. British Sea Power - "Remember Me"
12. Missy Elliott - "Pass That Dutch"
11. OutKast - "Flip/Flop Rock"
10. Beyonce - "Crazy In Love"
09. Kelis - "Milkshake"
08. Coldplay - "Clocks"
07. Junior Senior - "Move Your Feet"
06. Justin Timberlake - "Rock Your Body"
05. OutKast - "Hey Ya"
04. Justin Timberlake - "Cry Me A River"
03. !!! - "Me and Giuliani Down By The Schoolyard"
02. R. Kelly - "Ignition (Remix)"
01. The Strokes - "12:51"

Edit: British Sea Power. Where have you been all my life.

2003-11-24T00:02:00.000-06:00

Any responsible driver should pay attention. I should have my eyes on the road. They were. My dead-eyed stare shot through any obstacle in front of me. I stopped the car because the car stopped. I made a left turn because I turned left.

“Because if it all works out the best for us, we’ll be English teachers. This’ll be on the side.”

I park the car and wait. I am consciously aware that in forty seconds, this next track will start, and I’ll have to go. I can’t. Headlights—one, and back, and again—passing through on my left. Hands on the wheel, my transfixed gaze watching. The car is in drive. I begin again.

I desperately roll down my window as to prevent the fogging in my windshield. I could have turned on the air conditioner. Where am I going?

2003-11-19T23:26:00.000-06:00

"Big Brat"

af;klunh bw54y7nb qyiubqn [9qmiy by mq5b-u9qn4b90 8uy0yv9mnby6n what how what the fuck how did fucking phantom planet fucking make this

2003-11-18T17:32:00.000-06:00

This was supposed to be my review of the new Enon album. Too bad I don't really have anything to say here.

-----------

I’ve not heard High Society, nor Believo, nor Braniac before—this review, then, could be ill-equipped to discuss this album, the latest offering from Enon. This is simply irrelevant—

It was raining outside just a bit ago. I sat in this very chair looking at a disarray of musical instruments as a oscillating rainsheets dropped onto the windows on the left, the slight drops louder than the entirety of Hocus Pocus. Computer speakers are always soft.

The room is a wash of brown; guitars, desk, couches, blanket boxes, wastebaskets, lampshades—and in the middle, this information superhighway box. Black as the very night outside. The rain pressed on.

The ancient work desk is a thick brown, littered with forty years of coffee stains and scissor mark. The pale, near-teal computer monitor, squarely in center, eases in with the backdrop of modern American white. Additional Ikea halogen lamps and a computer printer on the right follow suit.

This is the color of the floor—the long-standing wealth indication that is my third floor—in which furniture is hastily thrown together, size-shifted far removed from the rest of the idyllic upper-mid class suburban Victorian.

The floor involves climbing stairs into a hallway no bigger than the very stairwell. Three rooms splinter. To the west lays my room in which a Graham Coxon poster adorns the southeast wall. Ikea desks mold with the empty wallpaper. To the south is the similarly-colored bathroom and a blue bath towel on the floor. All inner dialog takes place as I leave the shower in the morning. Transparent panes open onto a predampened bath towel. I grab the towel sprawled across the dewed tiles. Huddled in this sheet, I bend over on the balls of my feet. Hands cross over knees, tucked together. Wrapped in my material abyss and I hope for a better tomorrow.

The western door is within close proximity of the other two. Two long strides from each, brown door to brown door. Open this door. White computer paper sheets, telephone numbers, unfinished homework, German pocket translators, computer packaging boxes, diskettes, Post-it notes, lip garnish with the yellow cap, thirty-one piano keys. Beckoning. White computer paper sheets are everywhere. The once deep brown desk is no longer visible. And over the papers, the corroboration testament to every agenda I’ve set out to and ceased—design, homework, musical arrangements, oh, false diaries—

It is not fair to describe a room in terms of the sheer amount of random white shit lying around; but of course there will be purple and yellow and green and a leopard skin rug on the bottom. And from my dark computer box springs a darker phone and a darker microphone and a darker pencil cup and a darker guitar amp and twenty-five darker piano keys ...

And rain slight is on and off, with each finish bringing a bit of remorse—music is again pushed to the forefront. The outer din is gone—now the only bit to focus on is myself.

I was supposed to call my girlfriend tonight. I laid in bed with my legs tucked into the corners, wedged against where the mattress meets the wall. I returned to writing this review after I called her approximately three hours too late.

"Jane."
"Hey Sam," she said.
"How are you?—"
"I’m on the phone with someone else right now. Can you call back in ... God, I don’t know why I’ll be done. I like talking to him, a lot."
"A half an hour?"
"Yeah, sure."

The storming returned. I called her back and arranged to meet her at her house. I slipped on my shoes and tiptoed through the house, delicately cracking against the stairs, as to give my parents the impression I was coming downstairs for a snack.

Forty minutes later, I carefully entered the house again. An elongated creak, surely waking them up—but no mention of it as I crawl back up those very stairs into that very white room. I continued my monolog. Blue jeans were sopping wet—I had ran through the rain, through four blocks of empty street, of midnight solitude. Every step I exhaled, Nikes squishing against fragile earth.

"I just hate feeling lonely. And it’s not that you didn’t call me. I just can’t stand ... this." Kicking her feet against the ground, I was at my lowest. How could I possibly say anything? I held her.

It is still raining. My back is still wet, and I shiver. Rain glistens on the window, my vision filtered by a tangle of trees directly outside—a pastiche of dimmed city lights and angular rain. I stare blankly at a computer screen. I have to wake up in six hours and go to school.

Perhaps it’s not that Hocus Pocus has suddenly made me question if I’m a fit human being. But perhaps it is a realization—singing the title track, a meta-narration as I tucked my hands in my sleeves. I raced down the slowly descending street, anticipating the curve that lay en route to my back door. This album is certainly not an emotional effort—a new wave quirk that draws from The Kinks a bit more than "Disposable Parts."

As I ran through carless road and under occasional dry pockets beneath tree limbs, it’s not to say that I could instantly recall the album.

But perhaps pop music does not need to be deconstructed. Perhaps this really is fine background music. It is fine enough.

I wish that I wasn’t a fuck-up.

2003-11-17T18:28:00.000-06:00

Oh, what a modern rock kick I'm on. "Big Brat" by Phantom Planet is just the coolest. I'm just a sixteen year old kid who likes vodka and Blur. Why does it have to be a big deal for me like modern rock songs? It's odd, the dichotomy of indie -- of course I'm not too good to listen to the radio. But I still listen to it and judge it on a completely different level from ... The Rapture, Leon. I can say there isn't -- I just like catchy songs -- but of course I'm writing about why I love Phantom Planet and not Prefuse 73 right now.

Shit, I know why I love it -- because it sounds like "Hit The North"! ... is there any reason for me to be ashamed I like that song?

As such, I feel ashamed when I blast Pitchfork, because in the end, it's sort of hypocritical, attacking this very theology that I try to shake, and can't. And Stylus (oh Stylus god bless you, I'll write you an Enon review tonight) does the same thing, to an extent -- but it can't simply be that "Stylus means it."

Or maybe I'm just really, really excited by good pop songs these days.

And today is the day where I stop playing guitar and do my homework. Is it perhaps not any more sobering to have the very person who shares your rock star wet dreams to tell you that they absolutely won't happen? Because of course I know I'm not going to be a rockstar. But it's fun to try until you realize that you're actually hurting school work -- it's really embarrassing, that I can't stop playing guitar because part of me keeps egging myself on.

Why does Darius practice piano so much? It can't be because he wants to be a pianist when he grows up -- as such, why is it excusable for him to play Chopin and not for I to play Lush? Maybe it's that he gets good grades across that board -- but fuck, pop songs certainly mean just as much to me as piano does to him.

I am supposed to write him a bit convincing him why I like pop songs so much. Is there a more substantive reason than those obvious -- that as a sixteen year old boy, I want to dream to achieve what they have? That I want to live vicariously through their artistic expressions by, fuck, singing along and playing power chords?

"They make me feel good" would be far more curt and acceptable, I think.

Leon and I wrote a song called "Fantasy Gangsters" about six months ago. It didn't mean anything. We put down our psychology books and picked up a guitar. I couldn't play guitar, so he whipped up the chords and we sort of struck up a melody. And it was fun for a bit -- playing a song outside of the constructs of analytical thought -- you know, just because I can make this blog doesn't mean I have to. A pop song should be fun. It was.

Listening to music shouldn't be a moral hassle, really, but perhaps it's easier to draw lines from the fact I like Beyonce singles as mean-nothing mementos -- which I would argue I don't -- to my self-hatred ... yeah, yeah, of course ...

The more pressing question is whether or not I should start keeping a real diary and not feel obligated to talk about rock 'n roll on here.

2003-11-16T23:26:00.000-06:00

Do you have something to express?

Blogs are self-expression -- what are the intentions of linking news tidbits on yours?

2003-11-12T00:05:00.000-06:00

Ima Robot - Dynomite:

Here's a story for the kids!

I don't really get this part. Is this Alex Ebert character serious? When I saw them open for Hot Hot Heat, we missed the beginning of their set, but the last half was no more than Ebert skunking around the stage, hunced over and leering into invisible audience members' eyes. He also had highly intentional tattered clothing and a fucking disgusting mullet. "Dynomite" features at one point, four different vocal tracks on top of one another, consisting mostly of "ah, ah-ah," "wo-ah-oh!," "yah!," and real lyrics. Said character really wants to be a rockstar. So do we buy into his preachings of his glory -- or realize that he could be alluding to the fact that the melody is simply "This Old Man." Continuing on.

This old man
He come a lot
It’s in your hair
And I don’t care
I’m not all right
I’m not all right
It’s in your hair

Shots to the face. How cute. That awesome bass slide is still pushed up front, which makes up for posturing.

No, I want to wait for someone like you

Ah. I think this is what punk rock should sound like -- this base realization that computers and subversion of normality are basically the same thing? Yeah that guitar crunch is huge. And it's obvious that the lilting guitar riff is the most important part here. But this wonderful sound -- Ebert and his cohorts sitting over a synthesizer, plugging in different cartridges until they find that sound -- "yeah, yeah, I like that, let's put that in somewhere" -- of ridiculous computer Devo shit pops up for a second. Cool. Next.

This old girl
She plays tricks
It takes my sex
To get a fix
She’s not all right
She’s not all right
She’s not all mine

No, I want to wait for someone like you
No, I want to wait for someone like you

Whatever. Bass is subverted for that dinky-shit guitar, apparent nervous hope. Of course this isn't a single. Not because of those laser noises or whatever. But this isn't confident at all. There's certainly more palm muting and bass breakdowns that triumphant guitar -- certainly not a solo -- but it goes nowhere, floundering until much needed support from chord-based squiggles that don't even ... shit, they're just obnoxious. The chorus:

To make my life so dynamite (Ah ah ah ah ah ah)
Turn this dark life into light (Ah ah ah ah ah ah)
Make my world so shiny bright (Ah ah ah ah ah ah)

You got me burnin' both ways, ima ex-plode!

A bonanza of stunted un-Go4 punk guitar and some ol shit that I can make my mini-Casio do, throwing in dulcet toned blips simply to fill some space up. But fuck. This song is supposed to be "fun" or whatever, and I'm not sure how this chorus succeeds. A quavering voice maybe? Where this goofy fuck-up can't carry a song, in comes everything they can get their hands on to follow palm-muted guitar; it's wonderful where the song veers on cockrockdom but is pulled into ... into this, simply because -- Ebert knows he's hot shit? -- The only way to get a record contract in LA is to do something that doesn't buck the trend? But that can't be.

What it comes down to is the fact that I'm analyzing a track that people call Devo-like simply because Ebert just wants everyone to love his "freaky weird" self -- is that why there's so much on this two-minute punk rocker? Because God frobid. You do something that stays true to you and succeed. Fuck, how did Gary Numan ever do it?

Of course he gets up every morning and drinks soy coffee or whatever the fuck he is; or doesn't believe a word he's saying; but I don't really actually believe a word I'm saying either; I just want to know how to be a rockstar.

2003-11-09T00:21:00.000-06:00

2003-11-09T00:04:00.000-06:00

2003-11-08T17:20:00.000-06:00

2003-11-05T00:00:00.000-06:00

2003-11-03T23:36:00.000-06:00

Conjecture -- Darius likes to talk to me because he recognizes our shared qualities. Perhaps dualism -- that I'm an arrogant, loud, and kind of charismatic character who freely admits to faults and laps up his own victories; and he too does, to a lesser extent. He knows we're both smart. Maybe he likes to see where I've fucked up -- that I could have turned out like him and vice-versa.

Perhaps its just camaderie. Because you have faulted along the way, too, right? Maybe beginning to, now? Missed opportunity that I have taken -- in recognition of our similar talents and ambitions?

This feels really good not talking about myself.

Perhaps that he can see through my bullshit -- not that I'm apined on the inside -- but that I accept things, perhaps? Fuck, I'm just rather blunt with him. It could boil down to the fact that he maybe just doesn't have many people he can coverse with as such.

2003-10-31T18:49:00.000-06:00

2003-10-27T22:49:00.000-06:00

So, what the fuck is this?

This is not a review, but it certainly is condescending and out-of-touch, and oh, it doesn't even talk about the album. Keith Harris -- your attempt to look cool sucked! Choice bits:

"What about the new record? S'great, better even than the last." -- the only line to directly address Room On Fire

"Assuming lines like "I was a train moving too fast" aren't about little Julian's ejaculation time"

"Money might buy you love, after all, but eternal youth's not on the market. Yet."

And of course, the choice nugget, setting the tone from the outset of the "review":

"The Strokes were invented in 1998 on a mythical island in the Aegean by a wicked demiurge. While busking at Euro Disney a short while later, they decided to discover Manhattan and form a prominent rock band, no matter if Marcello and Alistair and D'Artagnan had names better suited to sporting eye patches and blackmailing Erica Kane."

2003-10-20T14:31:00.000-05:00

Sam Bloch - Give Me My Soul Pt. 2 f/ The Auspicious Fish

Sam says: you have no soul
Nick says: ehehehehehe
Sam says: alright nick
Sam says: im gonna head out.
Nick says: i don't believe in such a thing as soul
Sam says: well
Sam says: whos your favorite band
Nick says: you ought to ahve picked up on that ny nopw
Sam says: okay lets say the roses
Nick says: roses, orbital, talk talk
Sam says: and i know you dont believe in a soul, neither do i — why do you love the roses so much
Sam says: how do you feel
Sam says: just one, two sentences
Sam says: how do they make you feel
Nick says: they're msuic makes me feel like i've dissolved and disappeared and when you're as solipsistic as i am
Nick says: that's a good thing
Nick says: that'sd what i look for inmusic
Nick says: the stuff that makes me forget myself
Sam says: but, its impossible to dissolve and reappear, right?
Nick says: into ultimate possibility
Sam says: the real world.
Sam says: right nick?
Nick says: um
Nick says: no
Nick says: it's only social construct and consensus that amkes us think that
Nick says: if we'd been rasied ina different culture we'd be quite happy with the idea
Sam says: wait nick so how do you not believe in a soul but believe that we can physically disappear
Nick says: but western monotheistic culture teaches us to pride the self
Nick says: i don't believe physically
Sam says: okay
Sam says: but then
Nick says: i'm talking emotionally/mentally/spiritually
Sam says: right!
Sam says: its physically impossible to have a soul, right?
Sam says: but nick
Sam says: doesnt music make you feel
Sam says: like something that hasnt really happened
Sam says: has happened to you?
Sam says: that disappearing shit
Sam says: i feel the exact same way
Sam says: and i dont believe in soul either
Nick says: aye
Sam says: but nick.
Sam says: it doesnt matter whether you believe in or not, or whether it exists
Nick says: yeah
Sam says: but that you feel like its happened to you
Sam says: and when i listen to great music
Sam says: when you listen to great music
Sam says: it happens, right?
Sam says: hence, soul.
Nick says: hmmm
Nick says: i see what you're getting at
Nick says: not sure i agree, though
Nick says: eeheheheh
Sam says: how could you not agree?
Sam says: theyre sort of one and the same
Sam says: the way you and i feel
Sam says: the way all of us feel
Sam says: cause obv
Nick says: we can never know how anybody else feels
Sam says: i dont believe in god or that shit
Nick says: we can just ahve a guess
Nick says: i mean
Nick says: i might read a book or watch a film
Nick says: and i might identify
Nick says: with the characters and events
Nick says: or i might just enjoy the sensation of engaging with the text
Nick says: (text in the multitextural, multimedia sense, not meaning actual printed words)
Sam says: yes.
Sam says: but that enjoyment nick
Sam says: it makes you feel something that obv cant happen
Nick says: but does it?
Sam says: nick you cant fucking disappear
Sam says: i mean
Sam says: socially, yes
Nick says: what is this thing you sense that cannot happen?
Sam says: but thats not what you mean
Nick says: well
Sam says: the way we describe things.
Nick says: this disappearing i'm talking about
Nick says: is quite well documented across loads of cultures
Nick says: including our own
Sam says: its not necessarily, nick ,that i feel like my soul is burning. but i have this wonderful sensation that surely must be equivalent to, or can only be expressed as that. like my think tank review, its not actually about god. but that was how it made me feel, that sort of ... thing beyond myself, beyond me
Sam says: what sort of disappearing
Sam says: what do you mean
Nick says: transcendental meditation
Nick says: "lost in prayer/song"
Nick says: johnny greenwood
Nick says: the english rugby player
Nick says: who practices meditational breathing techniques
Nick says: and transfers those techniques to his rugby kicking
Nick says: to empty his mind
Sam says: but nick
Nick says: before he takes a kick
Sam says: its all in his mind.
Nick says: and is the best kciker in the world
Nick says: it's about emptying your mind
Nick says: it's NOT in your midn, that's the point
Nick says: it's about ridding yoruself, for a moment, of all the stuff IN your midnt hat makes up YOU
Nick says: the expectations and hopes and neuroses and fears and desires and ideas
Sam says: but nick
Sam says: this emptying of your mind
Nick says: and once they're all gone
Nick says: you can do whatever you want
Nick says: it's like when peopel who are really good at their job
Nick says: and i'm talking people who to all intents and purposes are artists, geniuses
Nick says: in whatever field
Nick says: could be stonemasonry, writing, footballing, playing music
Nick says: could be fucking cataloguing books in the library
Nick says: people who are really good at their job
Nick says: talk about "becoming the task"
Nick says: once you get rid of
Nick says: lets call it ego
Nick says: that sense of self
Sam says: well right!
Nick says: then you can just get on and do it
Sam says: that sense of self nick!
Sam says: isnt that sort of--
Sam says: well
Nick says: now obviously you have to know the task first
Sam says: once youre rid of self
Nick says: and YOU have to learn it
Sam says: what do you have left?
Nick says: nothing
Sam says: tright!
Sam says: but
Nick says: blissful absence
Sam says: right right right
Sam says: couldnt that be quanitified as soul--
Nick says: um
Sam says: ignore religion, nick
Nick says: i see what you mean
Sam says: just think of soul as that essence
Nick says: i know what you're getting at
Nick says: and i thi8nk we agree
Sam says: becoming the job, as you say
Nick says: BUT
Nick says: i fucking hate the word soul
Nick says: BECAUSE of the connotations
Sam says: whats in your mind when youre making that field goal--its gone, and whats left is
Sam says: right, right.
Nick says: it implies something different to your body
Sam says: when i write with it though.
Nick says: it impklies a divide
Sam says: i completely ignore those connotations
Nick says: it implies somethign better than your body
Nick says: and i think that's evil
Sam says: i think of soul as whats left after ego is shed.
Sam says: like
Nick says: becausde it encourages peopel to become disassociated with teir own bodies
Sam says:
those fucking shows i go to, nick
Nick says: aye
Sam says: of course theres no ego there. all you have is each other and the music. that soul
Sam says: but wait
Sam says: dissociation
Sam says: again
Sam says: that is a word that could be interpreted
Nick says: the word soul is semantically tied up with issues of spirit and substance thoyugh
Nick says: so it's the wrong word
Sam says: either as a split --- something thats higher than you
Nick says: and people's understanding of it is ingrained becaus eof thousands of years of language
Sam says: but this dissociation---what do you have left?
Sam says: right, right.
Nick says: so you have top get past that
Nick says: cos otherwise the fucking idiots and asshats will think you're talking about fucking otis redding
Nick says: about 'emotion'
Nick says: it's not
Nick says: it's the absence of emotion
Nick says: it's the purity of not having emotion
Nick says: which is
Nick says: of course
Nick says: an emotion in itself
Nick says: BUT
Nick says: it's not fuckign greed or hate
Nick says: which are essentially the main emotions we experience
Sam says: right
Nick says: because we live ina society that prides material wealth and simultaneously tells us that it's our souls that matter
Sam says: but nick cant we agree that souls are the absence of all that shit
Nick says: which is why 50% of western society will find itself suffering from depression at some point
Sam says: AND THATS WHAT THEY MEAN!
Sam says: no nick it makes sense
Sam says: take away religion
Sam says: soul is the absence of ego right
Sam says: and that is quantified, in itself
Nick says: but most people dont think that, sam
Sam says: no, but they do whether or not they realize it
Sam says: thats why theyre depressed
Sam says: "what am i once i rid myself of this shit"
Sam says: their soul. the absence of.
Nick says: in that sentence though
Nick says: you've got two self-singular pronouns
Nick says: so you defeat your own argument
Sam says: but thats the very thing~
Nick says: it's not though
Sam says: soul is the absence of.
Sam says: and people want to know
Nick says: the very thign is the absence of the 'i'
Sam says: how thats possible, what is beyond themselves
Nick says: sam
Sam says: right!
Nick says: have you ever considered
Nick says: that it's only in the english language
Nick says: that the self-singular pronoun ("I") is made more impirtant than the pronouns for you, ior we, or us, or them, because it is capitalised?
Sam says: no it isnt.
Sam says: its most important
Sam says: because the only thing people care about are themselves
Nick says: language comes first
Sam says: in west. culture.
Nick says: language forms consciousness
Sam says: shit we learned about this guy last year.
Sam says: fuck whats his name
Sam says: chomsky
Nick says: f the bulding blocks of cosnciousness, which is what language is, tell you that the self is more important than the other
Sam says: no, whorf, linguistic relativity
Nick says: then that fucks you up
Sam says: wait
Sam says: nick
Sam says: no
Nick says: i was thinkign more of sausure and althusser and marx and barthes
Sam says: go back to the time before language
Nick says: there is no time before language
Sam says: no, but whorf had that whole language shapes perception shit
Sam says: yes there is nick
Sam says: cavemen, etc.
Sam says: who did they look out for?
Nick says: not for US though
Sam says: fuck nick who do animals look otu for
Nick says: why do mother animals sacrifice themself for their babies?
Nick says: why will a bear attack you of you go near i's cubs?
Sam says: good point.
Sam says: but then.
Nick says: if the selfish gene thing was totally true then they woudln't give a shit
Sam says: well
Sam says: its because
Nick says: richard dawkins
Sam says: they belong to them, nick.
Nick says: evolutionary anthropologist
Sam says: these babies belong to them.
Nick says: it's about survival of the species
Nick says: furtherence of the gene-line
Nick says: but when survival is assured
Nick says: as in western culture
Nick says: then your priorities are changed
Nick says: BUT
Nick says: because of the shape of our consciousness, as defined by the language we useSam says: one second
Nick says: we are actually now MORE selfish than we were 1,000,000 years ago
Nick says: or whatever
Nick says: japanese peope live in tiny boxes because they're language, and therefore their semiotic understanding of themselves
Nick says: doens't encourage them to covet space aroudn themselves
Nick says: what kidn of fucked-up world judges a mna by how much space he commands?
Nick says: rather than by how he treats his felloow man?
Sam says: well nick
Sam says: if we knew the answer to that
Nick says: we do know the answer to that
Nick says: we just all fuckign ignore
Sam says: why then
Nick says: it
Sam says: language?
Nick says: i ignored it when i bought new shoes and jeas the othwer day
Sam says: ah.
Sam says: because we can?
Nick says: everybody knmows a way out
Nick says: everybody can opt out
Nick says: few people have the bollocks to
Sam says: right
Nick says: we are social animals sam
Nick says: social and tactile animals
Nick says: we need contact with others
Sam says: but nick!
Sam says: its because thats what pleases us most.
Nick says: physical and social and cultural
Sam says: its because we can do this.
Sam says: in japan, they cant.;
Sam says: because thats the way socially they are arranged
Sam says: I <<<< us
Nick says: i'm not talking about japan really
Nick says: that was just an example
Sam says: no, but a v good example
Nick says: eric fromm
Nick says: sartre
Nick says: heidegger
Nick says: winnie the pooh
Nick says: lao tzu
Nick says: luke rhinehart
Nick says: robert pirsig
Nick says: post this conversation on your blog, sam
Sam says: i was thinking about it.
Nick says: why is cocaine more popular than lsd?Sam says: but why wouldnt you post it on yours
Sam says: because its gaudy and makes us selfinvolved?
Sam says: instead of misperceiving what teh outside world is
Sam says: why is coke more pop than lsd
Nick says: coke reaffirms the ego
Nick says: lsd dissolves it
Sam says: thats sort of what i was getting at,wasnt it
Nick says: aye
Nick says: but consider your reaction to mushrooms
Nick says: you became incredibnly self-involved
Sam says: yes. and i hated it.
Sam says: but nonetheless
Nick says: exactly
Sam says: but i think
Sam says: i hated it for different reasons that yore getting at
Nick says: aye
Sam says: why do you think i hated it -- and how does it prove your point
Nick says: i dont know why you hated it
Nick says: and i dont think it proves my point
Nick says: cos i dont have a point as such
Sam says: well
Sam says: why do ytou think i hated it
Nick says: i dunno
Nick says: i've only got that conversation to go on
Nick says: and, frankly, that conversation puts you across as the biggest dick in the world
Nick says: which i know you're not
Sam says: exactly.
Sam says: i hated it, then---
Sam says: because i became so selfinvolved
Sam says: so selfinvolved to a point
Sam says: where i couldnt really tell what was reality in terms of what i was thinking
Sam says: i mean
Nick says: it took a part of you and accentuated it to a distorted degree
Sam says: i knew the world was concrete, etc.
Sam says: exactly
Sam says: its just makes everything so exponential.
Sam says: its why i could not stop for the life of me.
Nick says: what do you mean by exponential?
Sam says: like
Nick says: cos exponential means
Sam says: well
Sam says: it was though
Sam says: because i would think about one thing
Sam says: and then faster,
Sam says: i would think about three other things.Nick says: "more and more rapid growth" or some shit
Sam says: and i would try to think about all of them---exponential
Sam says: but i could only focus on one
Sam says: which led to, as you said
Sam says: "more and more rapid growth"
Sam says: of ... myself
Nick says: you becomign an asshat for a while
Nick says: aye
Sam says: but i mean
Sam says: by nights end
Sam says: it was just that
Sam says: i was like
Sam says: OH GOD I HATE MYSELF
Sam says: myself, nick.
Sam says: and were back to ground zero
Sam says: soul -- absence of self.
Sam says: i had so much of myself that i couldnt stand it
Sam says: what did i want at that v moment? because i was so depressed?
Sam says: less of myself.
Sam says: Soul.
Nick says: aye
Nick says: i'd still rather not use the term 'soul'
Nick says: ehehehehe
Sam says: thats cool
Nick says: soul to me
Nick says: uergh
Nick says: it's fucking sonny tremaine
Nick says: talking about how sad a fucking montgolfier brothers record makes him feel
Nick says: asshat
Sam says: exactamundo
Nick says: it's not a term i wanan claim back though
Nick says: i wanna come up witha new term
Nick says: that describes it better
Sam says: ahahha and disseminate it to 7 billion people
Sam says: or at least the english language speakers
Nick says: well the term i like most
Nick says: is german, actually
Nick says: you'll like it
Nick says: in fact
Nick says: you'll fucking love it
Nick says: "dasein"
Nick says: it means
Nick says: "being there"
Sam says: fuck whats it mean
Nick says: in german
Sam says: hahaha
Sam says: awesome
Sam says: holy shit
Sam says: im taking that
Sam says: dasein
Nick says: wilco = existentialo enlightenment, man
Sam says: psh no
Sam says: being there kind of sucks.

2003-10-15T00:19:00.000-05:00

The beginnings of a Strokes review I want to write:

yeah the lyrics to 12:51
okpinkerton: holy hell
okpinkerton: the end
okpinkerton: slays me.
okpinkerton: Oh really, your folks are away now?
Alright I'm coming,
I'll be right there
OneVanBeethoven: oh shit, that's great.
OneVanBeethoven: i didn't really hear that
okpinkerton: are you being sarcastic?
OneVanBeethoven: no no n on o
OneVanBeethoven: that is great
okpinkerton: oh man
okpinkerton: that is so good!
okpinkerton: the last album
okpinkerton: was all about waiting. and expectation.
okpinkerton: it was all sort of nervousness and being afraid
OneVanBeethoven: and this one is too though
okpinkerton: but hes embracing it all so much
It's so childlike. On the first album he was so nervous and worried -- "can't you see I just lied to get to your apartment" ... "trying to remind her, I'm not like that" -- now he's so confident. As if he knows he is in absolute command. He's come into his own, and it's so wonderfully -- 'oh, this is pretty cool. I guess this awesome situation that fell into my hands is pretty great' -- well, teenaged. He's tapped into his basest, loving emotions. That joy.
And I feel it, man. I feel it so much.
OneVanBeethoven: yeah
okpinkerton: I WANNA BE FORGOTTEN AND I DONT WANNA BE REMINDED
okpinkerton: i mena
OneVanBeethoven: "please dont slow me down if im goin tooo fast"
okpinkerton: what was the first lyrics of the last album?
okpinkerton: right, right!
okpinkerton: it was
okpinkerton: "cant you see im trying / i dont even like it / i just lied to / get to your apartment"
okpinkerton: what a difference.
okpinkerton: and the music shows it too.

2003-10-05T13:28:00.000-05:00

Mushrooms: a paragon of completely exponential self-involvement.

At the time, I was so convinced I was on to something. Now look at me:

okpinkerton (2:40:01 AM): youre th eone person in the
world
okpinkerton (2:40:03 AM): i want to taljk to roght now
okpinkerton (2:40:05 AM): beacause
okpinkerton (2:40:09 AM): fuck todd, i dont know whyt
okpinkerton (2:40:20 AM): because. youre not in the
rreal world.
okpinkerton (2:40:26 AM): todd im on mushrooms right
now.
okpinkerton (2:40:35 AM): abd its the worst feeling
ive ever had.
okpinkerton (2:40:48 AM): Fuck, todd!

okpinkerton (2:40:51 AM): its a black hole
okpinkerton (2:40:51 AM): todd
okpinkerton (2:40:59 AM): i cant reallyu piece ogether
whats going on.,
okpinkerton (2:41:06 AM): because m body is okay.
okpinkerton (2:41:11 AM): My body is okay.
okpinkerton (2:41:12 AM): but
okpinkerton (2:41:16 AM): My mind is not.
okpinkerton (2:41:28 AM): like with pot, its the other
way around.
okpinkerton (2:41:33 AM): but no, not with shrrom!
okpinkerton (2:41:47 AM): why is my mind .... todd why
my mind, you might ask
okpinkerton (2:42:08 AM): SIDE NOTE INSTANT MESSEGNGER
INSTANT COMMENTING ON BEING ON DRUGS AS IT HAPPENS!
okpinkerton (2:42:11 AM): BECAUSE TODD
okpinkerton (2:42:14 AM): fuck
okpinkerton (2:42:24 AM): I WISH i could release a
dewfinite state,ent.
okpinkerton (2:42:33 AM): but, like Psychedeliuc
artista
okpinkerton (2:42:35 AM): just like
okpinkerton (2:42:37 AM): them
okpinkerton (2:42:42 AM): they have so much going
through their head.
okpinkerton (2:42:49 AM): i have this vbisual fuck i
hope i finish this sentence
okpinkerton (2:42:51 AM): fuck todd
okpinkerton (2:42:55 AM): no! come on
okpinkerton (2:43:00 AM): composure
okpinkerton (2:43:02 AM): wait fuckck
okpinkerton (2:43:06 AM): i fee; ;ole o can!
okpinkerton (2:43:09 AM): its right there!
okpinkerton (2:43:15 AM): THE VISION IS STAR TREK
okpinkerton (2:43:16 AM): ducck
okpinkerton (2:43:18 AM): !
okpinkerton (2:43:21 AM): todd
okpinkerton (2:43:28 AM): i want ot release a definite
statement
okpinkerton (2:43:32 AM): but what happens
okpinkerton (2:43:39 AM): my mind catches up tomyself
okpinkerton (2:43:52 AM): and then thinjkls ofall
these newwwwwww things to thuink about.
okpinkerton (2:44:08 AM): PSYCHEDELIA - LOTS OF SHITR!
DONT KNOW HOW TO QUANTIFY IT~!
okpinkerton (2:44:12 AM): THE END, TODD
okpinkerton (2:44:20 AM): its because the end is
everything thwy are not
okpinkerton (2:44:28 AM): THIS IS WHY THEY RAMBLE LIKE
IM DOING RIGHT NOW
okpinkerton (2:44:40 AM): because they cant coie up
with a definite statement
okpinkerton (2:44:50 AM): so they keep going and going
and get lost along the wau
okpinkerton (2:45:10 AM): todd i definitely ripped a
dollar bill in half with my teeth and i have bite
marks all over myself and i am definitely in love with
myself
okpinkerton (2:45:15 AM): WHICH I ALREADY KNEW!
okpinkerton (2:45:17 AM): todd
okpinkerton (2:45:22 AM): i dont want you to find this
tomorrow
okpinkerton (2:45:26 AM): and think one of two things
okpinkerton (2:45:28 AM): "Uhhh. Okay"
okpinkerton (2:45:31 AM): or two
okpinkerton (2:45:38 AM): "This kid is faking being
high.:
okpinkerton (2:45:41 AM): because todd
okpinkerton (2:45:44 AM): im in love with myself
okpinkerton (2:46:03 AM): and FUCK I WISH IT WOULD
STOP TODD. ITS LIKE A STAMPEDE IN HERE. LIEK TO
RELEASE A SENTENCE
okpinkerton (2:46:06 AM): right now
okpinkerton (2:46:10 AM): i have this image in my head
okpinkerton (2:46:12 AM): of
okpinkerton (2:46:18 AM): OH FUCK TODD I WANT TO SAY
IT BUT I CANT
okpinkerton (2:46:21 AM): fuck todd, its gonew!
okpinkerton (2:46:33 AM): todd, this is serious.
okpinkerton (2:46:42 AM): all the stoners in the world
would just be explained
okpinkerton (2:46:50 AM): if. we could get. to that
last thing.
okpinkerton (2:46:55 AM): because tomorro
okpinkerton (2:46:59 AM): todd this is important
okpinkerton (2:47:08 AM): YOURE GOING TO READ ALL OF
THIS AS STONER DRIBBLE
okpinkerton (2:47:15 AM): fuck! thought 1: it is
stoner dribble!
okpinkerton (2:47:16 AM): but then
okpinkerton (2:47:23 AM): why do i think its stoner
dribble?
okpinkerton (2:47:26 AM): uh, cause it is.
okpinkerton (2:47:28 AM): but
okpinkerton (2:47:30 AM): why do i even ask that?
okpinkerton (2:47:38 AM): because
okpinkerton (2:47:39 AM): todd
okpinkerton (2:47:42 AM): all night
okpinkerton (2:47:45 AM): ive been grabbing things
okpinkerton (2:47:49 AM): to try to hold onto them
okpinkerton (2:47:52 AM): ITS A EMTAPHOR
okpinkerton (2:48:02 AM): TO GRAB ONTO SOMETHING. TO
HOLDON TO SOMETHING TANGIBLE.
okpinkerton (2:48:12 AM): drugs are an escape, fuck,
todd, look at me.
okpinkerton (2:48:16 AM): i cant finish a though.
okpinkerton (2:48:20 AM): and then i get angry
okpinkerton (2:48:26 AM): then i go
okpinkerton (2:48:36 AM): Wait why do i care what i
twas thinkning isnt even that important
okpinkerton (2:48:38 AM): then i go
okpinkerton (2:48:40 AM): fuck, yes it is!
okpinkerton (2:48:47 AM): stoners keep going and keep
going
okpinkerton (2:48:53 AM): but i dont know why!
okpinkerton (2:48:55 AM): fuck, i get it
okpinkerton (2:49:00 AM): um, we kow why
okpinkerton (2:49:04 AM): because were just saying
eveyrhtign
okpinkerton (2:49:05 AM): dklfjflkv
okpinkerton (2:49:06 AM): sdfjglkrjglkwrg
okpinkerton (2:49:07 AM): er,mkjlrk;rrgv
okpinkerton (2:49:07 AM): wrw
okpinkerton (2:49:17 AM): Todd, I can't explain
anything. Which sucks for me.
okpinkerton (2:49:26 AM): Because I want to be a
writer.
okpinkerton (2:49:37 AM): And if I can't look back to
however many minutes ago
okpinkerton (2:49:44 AM): and explain it.
okpinkerton (2:49:49 AM): toddm why do i wanna be w
ritwrt?
okpinkerton (2:49:52 AM): im in love with yself!
okpinkerton (2:49:58 AM): wait why am i even
questionign that, i already knew that!
okpinkerton (2:50:05 AM): why cant i just stoip and
gettign a grip
okpinkerton (2:50:26 AM): OUTSIDE THOUGHT - im going
in circles here, that whole spiel about at0ones
okpinkerton (2:50:32 AM): never wanting to stop, etc.
okpinkerton (2:50:43 AM): INSIDE THOUGHT-fuck why cant
i finish one sentence
okpinkerton (2:50:47 AM): why am i going around in a
circle
okpinkerton (2:50:49 AM): circle
okpinkerton (2:50:49 AM): circle
okpinkerton (2:50:50 AM): todd
okpinkerton (2:50:55 AM): i want to kill myself right
now.
okpinkerton (2:51:00 AM): i hate everything that i am
okpinkerton (2:51:06 AM): RIGHT NOW
okpinkerton (2:51:23 AM): fuck, i know what im going
to do.
okpinkerton (2:51:35 AM): call a gir and asks if she
thinks im cute. in the real wprld
okpinkerton (2:51:37 AM): actually
okpinkerton (2:51:40 AM): she was there with me.
okpinkerton (2:51:46 AM): and i asked her AM I CUTE.
okpinkerton (2:51:52 AM): but i dont know if she was
too embarrased to answert.
okpinkerton (2:52:04 AM): todd in the real world i
pride myself on being attractive. but hwo do i know i
am/
okpinkerton (2:52:10 AM): WHY DO I CARE TAT RIGHT NOW
I CANT STOP?
okpinkerton (2:52:16 AM): wait, fuck, then theres this
whole spiel
okpinkerton (2:52:18 AM): about stroners
okpinkerton (2:52:21 AM): the beatles
okpinkerton (2:52:24 AM): spiritualized
okpinkerton (2:52:41 AM): they have so much to say
okpinkerton (3:05:29 AM): sorry burns.

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okpinkerton (3:05:35 AM): youve been replaced by leon
the last few minutes.
okpinkerton (3:05:41 AM): 1- i have no concept of
time.
okpinkerton (3:06:07 AM): 2 - the real world odens
tmatter wait fuk weeeee! im off again into crazy
okpinkerton (3:06:12 AM): i mean, heres what i was
getting at
okpinkerton (3:06:17 AM): ive been biting myself all
nihgt
okpinkerton (3:06:22 AM): NO JUST GIVE PHSYCIAL
DESCRIPTOOONS
okpinkerton (3:06:50 AM): i keep grabbing shit.
okpinkerton (3:07:05 AM): (we know why, or at least i
explained why earleir fuck here i go again i just want
to keep talking
okpinkerton (3:07:06 AM): todd
okpinkerton (3:07:07 AM): no.
okpinkerton (3:07:15 AM): I feel like so:
okpinkerton (3:07:30 AM): "If I wanted to talk about
____, I could, because I can get a grip on myself.
It's really easy.
okpinkerton (3:07:40 AM): Um, i keep swaying back and
forth
okpinkerton (3:08:09 AM): im putting and justin and
not asking why because i know why!
okpinkerton (3:08:43 AM): i keep twisting my hair
around
okpinkerton (3:08:46 AM): basically toff
okpinkerton (3:08:48 AM): -todd
okpinkerton (3:08:51 AM): ask me any kind
okpinkerton (3:09:10 AM): ITS EATING AWAY AT MY BRAIN!
I can fdeel information flying everywhere.
okpinkerton (3:09:19 AM): dude, they say that Shrroms
eat away at your brain.
okpinkerton (3:09:31 AM): i think i might have it--
metaphor?
okpinkerton (3:09:38 AM): everything youre losing.
being decayed away
okpinkerton (3:09:49 AM): bit by bit is flitering back
into you and shit
okpinkerton (3:09:51 AM): waiy
okpinkerton (3:09:55 AM): let me explain
okpinkerton (3:11:43 AM): Everything you're losing,
you're quickly, very quickly, or should I say,
questioning at an ezponential (that pretty much
explains it everythign im doign right now) very fast
pace a --- everything youre losing youre recapping, or
you're quickly, very quickly, or should I say,
questioning at an ezponential (that pretty much
explains it everythign im doign right now) very fast
pac
okpinkerton (3:11:45 AM): um like
okpinkerton (3:11:52 AM): that very IM.
okpinkerton (3:11:56 AM): fuck i have no concept of
time!
okpinkerton (3:12:00 AM): i want to say it took me
forever
okpinkerton (3:12:02 AM): but in actually
okpinkerton (3:12:10 AM): it was just 1 inm causde
justuns still playing
okpinkerton (3:18:03 AM): burns im havign convo with
leon
okpinkerton (3:18:04 AM): tomorrow
okpinkerton (3:18:09 AM): ill piece this all together
with you and leon
okpinkerton (3:21:54 AM): todd, how will i ever be
able to write a funny musical week in the life of from
tonight?

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Auto response from toddlburns (3:21:54 AM): I am not
available.
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okpinkerton (3:21:59 AM): 1) they didnt play Hey Ya
okpinkerton (3:22:08 AM): 2) peter made fun of my blog
okpinkerton (3:22:13 AM): cause hes jealous
okpinkerton (3:22:21 AM): 3) they did play Like I Love
You
okpinkerton (3:22:24 AM): TODD I CANT THINL
okpinkerton (3:22:33 AM): BUT I DESPERATELY NEED TO.
RIGHT NOW.
okpinkerton (3:23:32 AM): BECAUSE! etc etc in love
with self, and i cant stop, CANT STOP TODD
okpinkerton (3:23:40 AM): will you pull that away from
this conversation
okpinkerton (3:23:44 AM): like when someone says
okpinkerton (3:23:46 AM): whats
okpinkerton (3:23:49 AM): ]oh fuck off.
okpinkerton (3:23:58 AM): im not insightful.
okpinkerton (3:24:05 AM): i think this is awesome.
okpinkerton (3:24:12 AM): you think its lame and
obnvious.
okpinkerton (3:24:19 AM): fuck, im no insightful!
okpinkerton (3:24:24 AM): which i already knew
okpinkerton (3:26:06 AM): fuck todd, we all know i
want to combat that. so lets work on how to.
okpinkerton (3:26:12 AM): fuck otodd, i cant.
okpinkerton (3:26:14 AM): good night
okpinkerton (3:28:04 AM): its like this inside my head
okpinkerton (3:28:18 AM): "Sam, whjy do you care about
this shit. Who cares."
okpinkerton (3:28:20 AM): then i say
okpinkerton (3:28:45 AM): todd physically i feel like
i can do anything
okpinkerton (3:28:59 AM): because its not a wuaestion
of Can.
okpinkerton (3:29:05 AM): i just am doing it, i sall
okpinkerton (3:29:36 AM): anyways
okpinkerton (3:29:41 AM): then i say
okpinkerton (3:29:52 AM): \FUCK SAM WHAT A STUPUID
QUESTION
okpinkerton (3:29:54 AM): right now i todd
okpinkerton (3:29:59 AM): i want to explain it
okpinkerton (3:30:04 AM): but i feel like its righ
there
okpinkerton (3:30:13 AM): and this inability to
exolain it
okpinkerton (3:30:17 AM): jus makes enme angry
okpinkerton (3:30:21 AM): even though in my head!
okpinkerton (3:30:29 AM): THE ANSWER, WHICH I FEEL
LIKE IM SO CLOSE TO
okpinkerton (3:30:34 AM): i cany get to.
okpinkerton (3:30:46 AM): and then OH NO IM WORTHLESS
ETC ETC IM A SHITTY WRITER ETC ETC ETC
okpinkerton (3:30:58 AM): exponential.
okpinkerton (3:31:40 AM): im now saying to myslef
okpinkerton (3:31:49 AM): "just trust me. youlexplain
it tomorrow"
okpinkerton (3:31:55 AM): but my fear is that i can
okpinkerton (3:31:57 AM): twhatever todd
okpinkerton (3:32:00 AM): what i need right now
okpinkerton (3:32:02 AM): is direction
okpinkerton (3:32:07 AM): holy shit if yuw oduld
justsay
okpinkerton (3:32:23 AM): "Sam, tell me about
__[concrete subject]_____"
okpinkerton (3:32:26 AM): then
okpinkerton (3:32:33 AM): i would write the best
fucking thing
okpinkerton (3:32:35 AM): ever
okpinkerton (3:32:49 AM): tomorrow ill be able to
explain it
okpinkerton (3:32:52 AM): nmight todd.
okpinkerton (3:33:09 AM): NONO FUCK
okpinkerton (3:33:10 AM): TODD
okpinkerton (3:33:15 AM): OF COUSE I WONT BE ABLE TO
okpinkerton (3:33:16 AM): WAIT
okpinkerton (3:33:18 AM): IM JUSTIFYING IT
okpinkerton (3:33:21 AM): RIGHT NOW.
okpinkerton (3:33:23 AM): BECUAE TOMIORROW
okpinkerton (3:33:34 AM): UI WONT BE ABLE TO WRITE
ABOUT LAST NIGHT (RIGHT NOW) ... IN THE PRESENT TENSE!
okpinkerton (3:33:41 AM): WHICH SEEMS OBVIOUS
okpinkerton (3:33:47 AM): TODD I JUST WANT IT TO STOP
okpinkerton (3:33:55 AM): im putting all of this in my
boog, of course
okpinkerton (3:33:58 AM): IF ITS INSIGHTFUL!
okpinkerton (3:33:59 AM): FUCK
okpinkerton (3:34:01 AM): FUCK
okpinkerton (3:34:02 AM): FUCK
okpinkerton is away at 3:35:20 AM.
okpinkerton (3:36:43 AM): todd im like
okpinkerton returned at 3:36:44 AM.
okpinkerton (3:36:49 AM): checking my email and doing
normal things right now.
okpinkerton (3:36:51 AM): checking SOMB etc
okpinkerton (3:36:53 AM): but sindei
okpinkerton (3:37:01 AM): like knives ,todd, like
knives

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Auto response from toddlburns (3:37:01 AM): I am not
available.
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okpinkerton (3:37:04 AM): fuck
okpinkerton (3:37:08 AM): i cant explain that comment
okpinkerton (3:37:13 AM): i dont even know ifits true.
okpinkerton (3:37:16 AM): good night
okpinkerton (3:37:29 AM): dad dont check this please.
or imfucked
okpinkerton (3:37:30 AM): wait
okpinkerton (3:37:35 AM): itd be simpled juist to have
not said that
okpinkerton (3:37:37 AM): but wait
okpinkerton (3:37:40 AM): burns ihave to be funny
okpinkerton (3:37:41 AM): i have to
okpinkerton (3:37:45 AM): oh fuck. oh fuck
okpinkerton (3:37:46 AM): good night
okpinkerton (3:38:22 AM): fuck todd
okpinkerton (3:38:26 AM): i had a great musical idea
righ tnow
okpinkerton (3:38:29 AM): but
okpinkerton (3:38:32 AM): its not the psychedelic kind
okpinkerton (3:38:36 AM): im like havign a jam in my
mind
okpinkerton (3:38:48 AM): FUCK THATS HOW YOU WRTIE
SONGS YOU SHIT STOP JUSTIFYING IT
okpinkerton (3:38:50 AM): wait
okpinkerton (3:38:58 AM): psychedelic = im like havign
a jam in my mind
okpinkerton (3:39:06 AM): todd, mathematically, i
figured out
okpinkerton (3:39:07 AM): fuck s
okpinkerton (3:39:08 AM): ee
okpinkerton (3:39:11 AM): at that point
okpinkerton (3:39:15 AM): i had nothing knew ot tlak
about
okpinkerton (3:39:25 AM): but. thinking about it not
thinking about it.
okpinkerton (3:39:27 AM): mde me realize
okpinkerton (3:39:31 AM): that im just fucking tired
okpinkerton (3:40:18 AM): fuck todd
okpinkerton (3:40:24 AM): i cant unbutton my collar!f
okpinkerton (3:40:25 AM): fuck
okpinkerton (3:40:27 AM): its liek a prison
okpinkerton (3:40:39 AM): HSHAHA I GET IT THATS WHY
STONERS DONT CARE, WIA, IT SBECAUSE THEY CANT/RUFCK
FUCK FUCK
okpinkerton (3:40:40 AM): FUCKFUCK
okpinkerton (3:40:54 AM): WHEEW GOT IT OPEN EBAUTIFUL
NIGHT.
okpinkerton (3:40:59 AM): that was supposed to be
okpinkerton (3:41:02 AM): beautiful, night.
okpinkerton (3:41:08 AM): fuck i want to stop tlkaing
okpinkerton (3:41:15 AM): thats why peter told me to
shut up
okpinkerton (3:41:15 AM): SAM
okpinkerton (3:41:17 AM): SHUTY UPA
okpinkerton (3:41:26 AM): AHAH sam say someting funny
now
okpinkerton (3:41:29 AM): fuck i ruine the joke
okpinkerton (3:41:33 AM): thats soem metacognitive
shitw
okpinkerton (3:41:34 AM): wait
okpinkerton (3:41:37 AM): im being funniestnow
okpinkerton (3:41:38 AM): lijdfjojer
okpinkerton (3:41:41 AM): funny=insight?
okpinkerton (3:41:42 AM): fycj
okpinkerton (3:41:43 AM): fyc
okpinkerton (3:41:45 AM): fuuuuuuuuuuuuuck
okpinkerton (3:42:05 AM): when i say funny, i mean
insight, bnecauee 1-i know they both ar eto garner me
attention
okpinkerton (3:42:21 AM): fuck it feel s like it taks
soooooooo long to write a sentence
okpinkerton (3:42:27 AM): idid a lof walkign tdaot
okpinkerton (3:42:29 AM): like
okpinkerton (3:42:33 AM): when i started tripping
okpinkerton (3:42:36 AM): i just started walkign
okpinkerton (3:42:38 AM): FYCJ SHUT UP

2003-09-29T23:47:00.000-05:00

2003-09-26T06:47:00.000-05:00

2003-09-14T22:42:00.000-05:00

2003-09-12T18:16:00.000-05:00

There was this singular moment that nearly every American experienced almost two years ago.

I was playing my trumpet, "Nordic Sketches," taking a moment of rest. I licked my lips, taking a breath, preparing to venture back in. Blast after blast, we played on. And as we stopped for a moment—Mr. Jones prepared to tell all the Trumpet 2s of our lack of annunciation—there was a slight bleep and click over the public address system; and a deep breath, of someone else licking their lips, of preparing for that instant before telling us, sharply and with a deft precision. Telling three thousand people that something terrible happened, that our lives will be changed forever, and yeah, there were a lot of people dead—and it didn’t register. As if—something you take for granted is suddenly gone.

"So I’m not unsympathetic / I see why you've left."

I didn’t feel remorse at the time—just a massive confusion. What the fuck? I turned to the clarinetist, pensively staring into his sheet music, and we both sort of looked at each other and didn’t say anything, lips slightly parted as if about to make some whoop of disarray or anger or shock or wit or, or something, something completely unexpected. "Well," Peter said, "we can tell our kids where we were on September 11—playing ‘Nordic Sketches’ in fucking band."

"Sometimes I stand on my roof at night / and watch, as something seems to happen somewhere else."

Am I less of a human being, then, because I didn’t cry that day? Because I sort of wandered around, not really upset or emotionally unbalanced—but in wonder? That I still will really never be able to completely connect with three thousand people who are ... dead? It was a day of expectation for me, where I spent all of my classes watching CNN or listening to the radio, but ... that wasn’t it. I did not want a fucking answer to my problems—there was just more, is all. Teenage girls were crying all over the place—but not me, as if I don’t matter at all.

"The streets are silent like my lifeless telephone."

At so many places at that moment, it was. At that moment, I was out and over the iridescent grid, the parks laid empty like my unmade bed, I never had just whatever it is you want, and most of all, I’d never felt less at home.

"The City" is goodbye. "The City" is everything you love leaving, and coming back stronger than ever, the fucking unexpected pay-off that shouldn’t be there—it isn’t really, it’s ... it’s incredible. It can’t be something tangible, something I want or expect or need or look for.

"All I ever say now is good-bye."

Guitars? No—love. Pain. Yearning. The constant chime of the normality, the autonomy of guitars straight-ahead dead-faced. The monotonous thump towards a moment that changed so much. The sound of one man—or three thousand—leaving.

3:42.

2003-09-07T09:02:00.000-05:00

2003-09-01T23:32:00.000-05:00

2003-09-01T19:14:00.000-05:00

2003-08-27T23:04:00.000-05:00

2003-08-26T00:00:00.000-05:00

2003-08-25T10:18:00.000-05:00

2003-08-25T07:50:00.000-05:00

2003-08-23T03:03:00.000-05:00

2003-08-23T02:31:00.000-05:00

2003-08-08T23:58:00.000-05:00

2003-08-06T01:36:00.000-05:00

2003-08-05T10:35:00.000-05:00

2003-08-03T23:53:00.000-05:00

2003-08-03T21:04:00.000-05:00

So here's what it comes down to:

I could apply to Pitchfork. I might even have a slight chance (though, more than likely not) of getting in. But I'm not that good. And really, that's what I am: an untrained, loose cannon. There's a reason half of what I write is absolute shit, and not much of it is just purely gold.

Like when Andrew's buddies go Oh my God Sam your Think Tank was incredible, or when Southall tells me Kid one day you're going to be a great writer and praises my Mars Volta or when Todd tells me Sam whenever I read one of your reviews I feel like I have to hear this album or when Emmah tells me I write like an angel, it boils down to one fucking thing, that I have this one thing going for me - passion. And that's why I don't really believe them, or have doubts about everything, cause ... that's all I got. Passion.

--Apparently, that last parag. did not completely get my point across. People only tell me they like my writing 'cause I'm passionate.

--Andrew has also reminded me that a lot of the time, I'm not that outlandish. Well, that's cause a lot of the time I am ... and it gets rejected by Todd/Southall. Well, then I'm not passionate cause I gotta compensate ... and that's where I am again.

And perhaps that's what pushes me through. Everything I write is almost pure force, never understated, with a constant attack. I go and I push and I make fucking sure that you fucking get it when you read my writing (re: right now) and to be honest, I don't know if that's everything I want. There's a reason I admire Southall so much. Nick, you're reading this, it's cause he's figured it out, how to balance that complete and utter wild feeling, man, How do you feel right now?, and that understanding ... that you have to pick what's interesting. I'm getting there. Soon, I'll be able to pick out the latter. But as for right now, I just brim over with a wild passion, and to be honest, I love it and loathe it. Because there ain't too many people out there, to use that such eloquent word choice, the urgency in using a few ellipses, or italics, or whatever. To let them know that it is right now. And because I write like a nervous wreck, it's entertaining, funny, knowledgeable, beautiful, et al. But I can't go on like this forever, can I?

If I applied to Pitchfork, there'd be no Nick or Todd to help me. And that's what I need. Cause I'm hit or miss, and to be honest, I don't know when I'm which. That's why I gotta keep going. I have to become a brilliant writer.

2003-08-02T21:07:00.000-05:00

I finally got an acceptable review of Junior Senior into Southall. Fucking Junior Senior! took me three reviews to write. Fuck. I'm losing my edge, the kids are blah blah blah

2003-07-30T22:50:00.000-05:00

2003-07-30T18:56:00.000-05:00

So last Tuesday, Jim DeRogatis gets this call on his radio show, Sound Opinions, from someone who goes to the same school as me. He references this fact, and goes on to say "Jen here goes to the same school as the super-fan Sam, and she's still a great writer," to which Jen and Greg Kot [his co-host, writer for the Chicago Tribune] say "oh no, he's a very good writer" - to which Jim retorts, "no, you're much better than him."

Backstory: Jim DeRogatis dislikes me because I called him "fat" on a message board once, and I profusely apologized and explained why I was rash towards him. While calling him "fat" was a little unneccessary, I still stand by the fact I thought it was unfair he was making chit-chat with Wayne Coyne before a Flaming Lips concert, interrupting my talking with him, and holding up the line for seventy-five other fans dying to talk to Wayne.

He said he was being a journalist, but I heard everything they said. Jim was simply saying, Hey man, the fans love you! or Have you heard Sea Change? and shit like that. They briefly discussed Beck, but it was more like, 'we'll talk about that later.' There was no setting up of interviews, no writing down of notes to be used in the paper - just friendly talk. He says that he "could have been doing his job as a reporter." Bullshit.

And I am aware that Jim probably reads that message board still and notices my disliking of his writing, and the fact that I'm just really fucking critical of him. Well, that's unfortunate, because I stand by it. I think Jim has passion - which is just great for a reader (I should know, I follow this same sort of code). But he more often than not, he gets mired up in this rock critic gubbledy gook shit, using terms that don't mean anything, and going about his own agenda as a clearly biased writer.

It's kind of insane how often he references the Lips and Wilco in his writing - anyone who's ever read an article should realize this. But he never really talks about why he dislikes something. He describes it very well, but leaves it at that. Like in a recent Blur review, something like "Damon's wild experimentation with worldpop" or something like that. So? So what's bad about it? He left/leaves the reader to assume the connection for him - 'I won't explain it, I just don't like it.' It's like he doesn't even give it a chance. There are these certain touchstones that I think Jim has to see in a band to like it - witty lyrics? CHECK! Does it rock? CHECK! Is it catchy? CHECK! Maybe they aren't those exactly, but they're damn close. Look at his favorite bands. Wilco. The Flaming Lips. Wire circa Pink Flag/Send. They're all rocking, they're all making catchy music, they're all trying to push the envelope just a little bit. But Sigur Ros! Uh-oh! No hooks! SHIT!

I don't want to keep bringing up Blur - perhaps because I pay more attention to them then most bands - but when I called up the show, he wrote me off when I said that Damon doesn't have to write about English socialites anymore, and he's about love. Oh Sam!, Jim said, and hung up on me. Well, that explains why he doesn't like the record ... aside from the "Starbucks coffee-house" music.

Christ man, if you love "I Am Trying To Break Your Heart," why oh why does the dizzying fall of Manitoba not even merit a listen? Who is Mary Timony? Who gives a fuck about that? Why aren't you reviewing Four Tet? You pledge your love to psychedelia. What about this new fangled "electronia" psychedelia?

Up In Flames is perhaps the most astonishing "psychedelic" album I've ever heard, and a worthy addition to Kaleidoscope Eyes. Why do you harp on Wilco, when for someone who said they loved The Prodigy and Aphex Twin back in 1997, do you not try this out? Right. It's not rock and roll.

Why is "do you realize / happiness makes you cry" any better of a lyric than "I ain't go nothing to be scared of / 'cos I love you"? Why is "Are You A Hypnotist" any better a psychedelic haze than, say, "2 Rights Make 1 Wrong?" Why no post-rock? For me, that build is far more emotional and involving than anything the Lips do, simply because it's braver - it doesn't rely on tricky rhythms, nor heartfelt vocals, or fucking monk choirs, but a complex guitar build, and it grows and grows, and my God, it's gorgeous. Why is this not valid? Why are the Flaming Lips valid?

He writes off pop music without a thought. This just pisses the fuck out of me. Gawd Jim, *NSYNC must be awful if ten million people bought their album! Fuck that power in numbers shit! And suddenly, it sounds like he cozies up to Justin in an interview, once he plays with the Lips and the Black Eyed Peas. Yeah, "Where Is The Love?" is pretty awesome, dude ... ha. But what about "Rock Your Body"? I have never heard an indication that Jim has listened to Justified, despite his constant bashing of Timberlake.

Another thing - hip-hop. Again, these touchstones for him to like it. Look at the acts he's championing these days - Common, Jurassic 5, fuck, De La Soul, PM DAWN! They're all on the "positive tip," the psychedelic (I could see this in a few acts ... but come on! J5? What the fuck?) experimentation. Basically, the rockier acts. The acts that incorporate themes from the shit that Jim so clearly likes. Well, what about Jay-Z? He works with the Neptunes - who you supposedly love in NERD - but yet, write him off! His rhymes aren't worth shit! He's only talking about himself! He must not be imaginative, is he? And the Neptunes production - it's just throwback shit! Bang out a gritty riff on the keyboard, just like that old soul you love Jim ... with those lyrics that aren't about bitches! Ah. Contradictions. I get it now.

Mike Skinner is not Eminem! Listen to the fucking lyrics, man! If that's what you get hung up on in the first place, it sure doesn't seem like you listen to the man.

And what is this "stoner rock" shit? It's just metal, man. I hate the buying into the label of "stoner rock" like Queens Of The Stone Age ... oooh, stoner rock. It's just fucking heavy metal hard-ass riffs! And when you use the "electronica" label. Oooooh.

And you love Lester Bangs. And if you're reading this, or any of my writing, you might be able to tell that I probably love him too. But why do you ride on his horse all the time? Aside from this, Lester got deep down, you know, spiritual Astral Weeks shit. Why don't I see that from you? Can't you push yourself to write about what you feel, feel, feel, feel? What do you think about these new writers - Reynolds, Southall, the Pitchfork crew? Amazing. They take Lester's writings more to heart than it seems like you do, just 'cause they're so intense, and mean it so much, and take it all apart and back again, and are wonderful ... and where's that in you? You read like passionless drivel, just more MOR rock and roll 'criticism.'

And I know researching artists is hard - often I just dodge that bullet all together. But for a paid writer, wake up. Damon still isn't writing Tracy Jacks. And he calls himself a Blur fan! Rings Around The World is one disc, not two!

You have major discrepancies between the Sun-Times and Sound Opinions, and I genuinely wonder what's going on, if you're watering down for the Sun-Times, or beefening up and putting on your cool suit for SO. The Rising and Think Tank: 2.5 stars. Almost a positive 3-star review. Both "Trash It"s.

Hey, remember when you went back on the White Stripes, because you figured out that Jack White "meant it"? Shit. The Hives don't mean it! They're a joke! But you love them ... I dun get it. Again, discrepancies. Sometimes you have to 'mean' it, sometimes you don't, for Jim to like it.

Discrepancies: Slint and Pere Ubu ... but not Sonic Youth? Tortoise and Stereolab ... but not Jim O'Rourke? The Soft Machine ... but not Spacemen 3, instead, Spiritualized! I'd love for you to explain some of these sometime.

Interviews - I hate reading stock questions. I don't know if you make them, or if the Sun-Times pressures you into making the same old, same old, but it's killing me when you ask Justin some stupid questions like:

Q. She was also asked why she covered "I Love Rock 'n' Roll," and she said she'd always been a huge Pat Benatar fan. If the journalists weren't on mute and they could have asked a followup question, we could have found out if Britney knew that Elvis was actually born in Tupelo, Miss., and that it was Joan Jett, not Pat Benatar, who popularized "I Love Rock 'n' Roll."

A. Well, I think her answers were revealing!

Q. Fair enough. Other than that, I won't mention Britney again. I could care less.

A. I could care less, too!

He's just so close-minded about so much. And it frustrates me. If it ain't his ballgame, might as well just write it off. But - he is a rock critic. Not a pop music or R&B/hip-hop critic. That might explain some of it. But even in the world of rock - it just angers me that he will only write positively about something that will appeal to him, and not think outside his rockist mentality. It's Jim's way or the hard way. I wouldn't be surprised if he wrote his reviews before he heard the product.

I'd like to hear a response from him sometime.

2003-07-23T00:51:00.000-05:00

I read this disgusting teenage Livejournals, and I say to myself, Christ, is everyone so narcissistic in the real world? These fucking atrocious kids puking on a computer screen, and go through it to pick out the nastiest and smelliest bits of puke so people will notice more and feel sorry for them. It's just sickening.

Ooh, the delicious irony.

I feel like giving everyone a copy of Emergency & I. Just so they'll shut the fuck up and dance. 'Cause when you're dancing, everything's great. You don't care that you look like an ass - and everyone who ain't dancing wishes they were, and point out to you that you look like an ass. Well fuck that.

2003-07-22T18:00:00.000-05:00

I really don't wanna hear the new SFA. It will let me down so much, I fucking know it.

So instead I spin "Feel The Pain" all day. What a song!

To reiterate:

Rings Around The World is one of the reasons I love life. Every single song is a singalong, god dammit, every single word instantly quotable on its own, and an anthem. Just out-and-out joy bursting from each and every second. Even "(A) Touch Sensitive," if not for the female orgasm samples.

This one time at Unterberger's house, we put on my "(Drawing) Rings Around The World" 12". And we danced so fast. I threw my legs in the air back and forth, shifted from side, sort of a lurch in my back, a stagedive that will never happen. And those multitracked falsetto Gruff throws in there. "Ha, ha." And what sounds like a rocket blasting off in the background.

And the chorus! The phones ringing ... and the "I'm sorry - hello?" and the background wash of fuzz and shit everything possible to throw into a song ... "Ring ring! Ring ring!" ... I could sing so loud. "I am glowing radioactive." Or the snare intro to "Juxtaposed With U." Or the snare intro to "Receptacle For The Respectable." Or when you fuck robots on "Juxtaposed." Or when those strings just swallow everything that an entire album has been building up to - "I'll just binge on crack and tiramisu!" on "Shoot Doris Day."

Joy? Sorrow? Love. It's everything, a kaleidoscopic shit into the eyes of the collective pop music-listening world.

And when I listen to music, fuckit if I can't have that every time I listen. And I expect that from "Wherever I Lay My Phone (That's My Home)" or "The Man Don't Give A Fuck." "Golden Retriever" doesn't even come close. It's 'fun.' But so are The Cooler Kids. I want something else. And I just know Phantom Power is not going to be a religious experience for me. It's going to be samey. I've already heard before, I'm sure, in a variety of places. I cannot turn to a letdown after Rings. They can do so much. It has to happen.

Look at me, demanding that this pop group makes more absolutely brilliant and wild music. Look at me.

2003-07-17T22:51:00.000-05:00

Well, fuck, I interviewed Colin Newman on the phone for roughly 2 hr 45 mn today, taping the conversation using an elaborate system in which I microphonerecorded a cordless phone to my shit stereo, and listened in on another phone. I took up an entire C90, and almost all of a C60. Fucking hell. Where do I go in life? I know almost everything I will ever care to know about perhaps the coolest fucking bad-ass of all-time, my god damn musical idol, the reason I write songs.

And I sit here and write songs, one a hybrid of Pierce's "I Think I'm In Love," and the other Disco Inferno's "Summer's Last Sound." The other is The Charlatans' "The Only One I Know," "Search and Destroy," and Blur's "My White Noise." And I think about what Newman told me about how Wire works now - "I can't sit on my toilet and churn out songs on my acoustic guitar," he said - and how he curates/mixes/sort of producers "bits" that the band puts together. Hence the harsh, disconnected drive, I assume. And I think, Shit. Is that how I need to take my band? Almost fucking take over? He said in a sort of apologetic tone, as he kept saying he mixes "by default," and that the band trusts him to do it, and Wire can't be in the same room and jam and play together for very long because there's just too much fucking tension and I said Well, doesn't this mean Wire will one day just break up? He laughed and asked me to answer that myself.

Shit. And when I asked him about the earlier days - Pink Flag-era - mind you, I was reconnected/switching phones, so this part wasn't recorded, which is a shame, because it may have been important, so I kinda wasn't paying as much attention - he said that again, he sort of did it by default. That Bruce sort of gave him some term I forgot, as it would be based around him. And I think Is this how a brilliant copes? By focusing around one person so they don't fucking explode - which Wire did, and he said it was just far too much fucking tension during The Ideal Copy, which he walked out at one point, and that drummer Gotobed needed to have that role, and he just seemed to sort of shaft Lewis, who was grander pop compared to minimalists Newman and Gilbert out of the equation now ... not by calling him unequal, he said, but it just didn't happen for some reason or another. He did the backups on "The Agfers Of Kodack," and Colin said some more shit which I don't remember, cause he talked for almost three fucking hours, how expensive is that shit gonna be?

So. He said it was too much "politicking." I wanted to ask him if Wire was ever fucked up on drugs. Perhaps I'll re-email him. I feel like there was nothing of substance in that interview because he spent so long (probably only about 20 minutes) going on about Swim/Pinkflag, but that can't be true. He said so fucking much. I just can't remember a damn thing.

"Hot Hot Heat sound like the fucking Cure. I really like Black Rebel Motorcycle Club ... and though they sound like the Jesus and Mary Chain ... they were always sort of cool. The Cure, well ..."

Brilliant fucking man. Goes on about how he loved The Darkness 'cause they were so camp. I love his voice. Sort of fey, high-pitched. But at the same time, he's so gruff. I coulda listened to him go all fucking day. I can't remember so much, perhaps 'cause I'm listening to the Buzzcocks. I wanna e-mail him about My Bloody Valentine, too.

"Wire's not a pop band anymore. There's no fucking way we could just play 'Outdoor Miner'."

I'm flustered. Where the fuck do I go with all this shit? I can't transcribe 2 hr 45 mn about this. But I have to. Cause I love this man. And cause we talked about Blur - "I used to dislike them. Now I officially hate them."

I try to write these songs like him. Man's my idol in so many ways, but yet, he isn't. Married a nice Jewish girl. Good night Mr. Newman. And as you say, you have to be culturally relevant. Rock 'n roll can't be removed. And you can't analyze it. Cheers.

2003-07-16T03:44:00.000-05:00

Shit. I did not just fucking delete my first post.

Oh well. To summarize:

a) It is 3 30am. All-nighter? Perhaps. I'm doing teenager thinking. Girlfriend - why? Shouting at my mother and telling her she was a shit mother and that I hate her - because I'm a narcissistic teenage fuck, lower than shit? Perhaps. I'm 16.

a-i) Logically, I create my own acceptable form of a LiveJournal, a "Blog." Potential readership includes internet people, like Emmah Martin, Andrew Unterberger, and Nick Southall. This way, I don't have to face them in real life.

a-ii) I am slightly depressed for all of these reason, and because it is late, and I will not sleep. Hence, I have created a mix of pretty pop songs for no reason at all, because I like these songs, they make me feel happy, and I don't have any blank CDs. Most of them are indie pop singles. Fantastic. I love them all. Cheers - footnote: no Talk Talk or most of 69 Love Songs for obvious reasons.

01. Teenage Fanclub - "The Concept."
02. Felt - "Rain Of Crystal Spires."
03. Neutral Milk Hotel - "King Of Carrot Flowers Pt. One." footnote: I cram three brilliant opening album tracks consecutively. Ha! Indie rock! Nothing touches me!
04. Magnetic Fields - "When My Boy Walks Down The Street." I wish I could write words like Stephen Merritt. More on that later, I'm sure.
05. XTC - "We're All Light."
06. The Cure - "In Between Days."
07. The Stone Roses - "Elephant Stone [12" Leckie Mix]."
08. Boo Radleys - "Find The Answer Within."
09. The Stranglers - "Golden Brown."
10. The La's - "There She Goes."
11. The Jesus and Mary Chain - "Sometimes Always." Best JAMC single? Perhaps. Beautiful.
12. Manitoba - "Jacknuggeted."
13. Lush - "Sweetness and Light [My Bloody Valentine Mix]." The sound of fucking heaven to me. The name of the blog. The name of the beginning and the ending. Lovely. Beautiful. Shields' second-best remix ever. I love this song with my tears and heart.
14. Wire - "Map Reference 41N 93W."
15. Monaco - "What Do You Want From Me."
16. Galaxie 500 - "Isn't It A Pity."
17. Blur - "Badhead." I might as well just grin and bear it. Lovely. I want to kiss Albarn all over him. More on such later.
18. Mekons - "Where Were You."
19. The Flaming Lips - "Slow Nerve Action."
20. New Order - "Face Up."

Those closing two closed both bands' respective second-best masterpieces. And, ah, they are both highly underrated and each bands' best song.

Good night. I might sleep.

I feel like I could cry for no reason. I watched the shit Hugh Grant vehicle About A Boy tonight. I wish my life was that wonderful. God, I sound like a fucking teenager. You have to understand, I've never indulged like this quasi-publicly. Good night.