sexy motherfucker

let us now praise purple men.



ahh, prince. another bright spot in this ever-darkening world. his performance during halftime at the super bowl on sunday was pure majesty. i mean, it started out with the whole stage bursting into flames. and mr. rogers nelson did his very best to up the ante for the entire rest of the show.

there he was, in the rain, wearing a teal two-piece suit with an orange shirt (an homage to the miami dolphins, perhaps, whose place they were in?). he had a black do-rag tied around his head, with a poufy pompadour sticking out the top. he proceeded to rip dolphin stadium to shreds, running through "let's go crazy," "baby i'm a star," CCR's "proud mary," dylan's "all along the watchtower," the foo fighters' "best of you" -- which really surprised me but sounded so great; it reminded me of greg dulli's talent for picking unexpected covers that work really well -- and finished up with a truly epic "purple rain."

i don't know how he stayed upright in his heels and those long pantlegs, swaggering around on the sopping stage with his guitar, dancing and at one point yowling a call-and-response with the audience. there was one moment during his solo on "best of you" where the camera caught him from the side, facing into the downpour and just whaling away -- a classic shot, if anyone had a camera. anyway ... his utterly fabulous playing ranged from pretty and melodic to dirty and raw. often he was flanked by a pair of black-clad, long-haired, wriggling dancers (who seemed less sure of their footing than he was of his). the florida A&M marching band came out during "baby i'm a star" and stayed the rest of the time, sometimes glowing in the dark due to fluorescent tape on their uniforms, filling the field with yet another kinetic visual element.

he was playful and knowing, singing the foos line "i've got another confession to make my friend/i ain't no fool" with what seemed to me at the time a meaningful sideways glance, captured by the close-up camera. although i didn't know what it meant, it seemed to convey ... something. and then he strapped on the guitar shaped like his male/female "symbol" and began to croon "purple rain." he whipped off the do-rag and made his musical protest that he never meant to cause any sorrow or pain. then he asked, "can i play this guitar?" and he did, against a billowing white fabric backdrop that accentuated an interesting silhouette: prince looked for a fleeting second as though he had an impossibly curving pointed penis ... like, a demon dick! that was fucking funny -- for soooo many reasons. and so i had to laugh. (and isn't that what he wanted? to see us "laughing in the purple rain"? happy to oblige, dude.) then the fabric went away and everyone was "oooo, ooooo, ooooo-oooo-oooooing" along with prince ... fireworks exploded ... rain speckled the camera lens ... prince beauty-queen kissed the whole audience ... and it was over.

sigh. it really was magnificent. and it certainly turned out a lot better than the game. i can't believe that whiner peyton manning is a super bowl champion. fuck!

living it up

sometimes there is magic, and i think i should cherish it more. and so...

i wrote the current citybeat cover story about rickie lee jones and her new album, sermon on exposition boulevard. it is a rockin', plaintive, and at times very intense, even difficult, work. but you can read about it if you want to.



anyway, i wrote about her, and it was really cool to interview her. for one thing b/c she's got a lot to say, and i didn't have to talk much (although i did at times). but really it's b/c she is one of those few artists i've liked since before i ever wrote about music for a living. when i was a teenager, my sister made me a cassette tape of her early albums. (she also gave me some pretenders. i still have both tapes. sisterhood rocks, indeed.) and the things that music made me think about and feel when i listened to it back then ... partly just the alien feel of the language, bulletins from far-off coolsville to my squaresville surroundings -- but also to imagine other places and ways of being, maybe. it definitely helped fuel that (100% accurate) sense that i did not belong where i was and had to find someplace else to be. which i soon did. whereupon eventually i came to meet and talk with rickie lee jones.

i dunno. that's just ... neat.

so ... i received much praise for this article, but best of all, rickie liked it. which is journalistically not supposed to matter, but frankly makes me feel kind of great.

50 ft. queenie

molly ivins, r.i.p.

she always made me scream with laughter, and learn something -- about politics, texas, feminism, and not ever taking shit from anyone.

she will be missed. especially now.

rescue me pt II

folks, it is a hipspinster first: photographs!

we'll be breaking out the shovels (and hired help) this weekend to dig the patio out. here's what we're up against:



that's the deepest part. but the other end is pretty gnarly too:



and we really must consider ourselves fortunate, despite this mess. ah, canyon life.

heavy duty

i really object to today's l.a. times story -- under the category head of "news analysis," no less -- about how gov. arnold schwarzenegger's body has deteriorated as he has aged. well, no shit, sherlock! know of anyone whose body hasn't?

as usual, this excuse to indulge in the type of pseudo-tabloid journalism that apparently brings in those coveted young eyes is flimsily justified as newsworthy. "ordinarily, a politician's body would not be noteworthy," allows staffer robert salladay. "but california is witnessing a singular moment: the deconstruction of one of the greatest bodies of all time."

gag me. i mean, just fucking GAG ME!!

anyway, having dispensed with the justification, salladay dives right into this deeply insightful "news analysis" by enumerating the governator's various infirmities, operations, and artificial parts, and arnold's attitude toward same. (incredible revelation: he's cranky about getting older and might be a little depressed about being on crutches and in constant pain after his skiing accident.)

"and in perhaps an even bigger blow to his ego," writes salladay, "photos from a vacation in maui a few years ago showed him in a swimsuit with a sagging chest, robust stomach and ashen chest hair." a few years ago?? this is news?

the times, of course, doesn't print any of those photos, b/c they are tabloid fodder and beneath the dignity of a major metropolitan daily newspaper.

just kidding! they totally printed one. in fact, a cropped version of it, in color, is shown as a thumbnail on the paper's home page today. isn't that great? such a very important story!! it really belongs on the home page.

and blah blah, he's more accessible to people now that he's more vulnerable, and blah blah he was once upon a time photographed by robert mapplethorpe and annie leibovitz. and blah blah, he's not a bodybuilder anymore. and blah blah, assertions that we are all so relieved to see he actually isn't the terminator, but a mere human like the rest of us, after all. there's even speculation on just how well he will age! wow, they have expert opinions for everything.

but don't worry, folks -- he's in excellent health. his doctor said so.

to clarify: i am not a fan of arnold schwarzenegger (at least not as a politician -- i liked some of his movies). i think he's an opportunistic jerk who lately has appeared to change his position on some things (like healthcare-for-all), but i am not buying it. he's been a total cock to some of california's most caring and self-sacrificing individuals, and he is an objectifying asshole when it comes to women. nevertheless, this article offends me in part b/c it is objectifying. i mean, isn't the point the state of a politician's mind, not his body? (oh, right -- robert covered that with the part about how arnie seems depressed.) this story reminds me somehow of the robin abcarian "sausage casing girls" bit of evil i ranted about some time ago. and i cannot imagine the times writing something like this about a female politician, regardless of how "fit" she might once have been. i was half-surprised they didn't run one of those tabloid shots of barack obama on the beach in hawaii and try to pass it off as some sorta "comparison/contrast" thing on politicians' physiques.

but also this story offends b/c it is fluff labeled "news analysis"!! yes, it's fluff, at best a "human interest story" (masquerading, let's not forget, as "news analysis" -- oh, sorry, did i say that already?). there are many more relevant and potentially interesting aspects of schwarzenegger's personality/persona to delve into. and even this one could have gained an ounce of weight by, say, talking about why it is that arnold's getting the best medical care. answer: b/c he can afford it! which way too many average folks -- you know, the ones who are now able to be so relieved that the guv is like them after all? -- cannot.

rescue me

life in the canyon is always an adventure, and this week was no exception. on tuesday night a fire broke out at a residence on kirkwood, just south of us. i was still at work; 00soul called to tell me that traffic was at a standstill. a friend of ours who was on his way over to listen to records with mr. soul got caught up in the chaos and took hours to get to our place. poor guy. a few hours later, when i made my way up the hill, the traffic had cleared out, but you could smell that burnt-structure smell, and when i passed through the intersection at kirkwood, fire engines were still parked up the street and a lot of water was running down.

as is often the case with stuff that happens in the canyon, there was no news report. but the next day i found the LAFD's blog and read all about how lucky we were. (click the link above to learn more.) a little more wind, a little less person-power, a little slower on the response -- and we might've been looking at a serious, serious blaze.

so, yay for the firefighters and yay also for their greatly informative blog.

ya'd think that would be enough with the emergency situations, but the canyon wasn't done with us yet. i am hoping we won't be hitting every type of major disaster, but, where tuesday night was fire, last night was flood.

somewhere around 11 or 11:30 p.m., i was sitting in the office at the back of the house, checking my email or somesuch, when i heard a sound that i at first took to be leaves blowing across the concrete patio, just on the other side of the wall/window. "is it really windy?" i asked rhetorically, and then went out the front door to check it out. it was sorta windy, but not blastingly so. around that time i heard a couple of fire engines go screaming up the street. "geez, not again," i thought, and returned to the office.

still with the sound, and then i realized it sounded like water running. rushed to the bedroom, flipped on the patio light, and what to my wondering eyes should appear but a stream of water pouring down the hillside onto the south corner of the patio! for a second i thought that our own spigot had somehow busted or been broken, but when i opened the door i realized the water (and mud) was coming from somewhere above our property.

i called to 00soul, who told me to call 911 while he pulled on his boots, grabbed a flashlight, and hurried out into the darkness to find out what the hell was happening. when i got the fire department on the line, they told me that they were just responding to a call from up on rugby place, something about a leak or a break in the water line. the dispatcher kept me on the line while he got information from the firemen at the site. he said they had arrived and were trying to find a way to shut off the water. "please hurry," i squeaked. "the water is really running down, and there's a lot of mud!" he told me to call back if it started getting into the house.

well, 00soul had disappeared into the darkness. i called to him but couldn't see him. i put on my boots and wondered what to do. our back patio runs the length of the house and is fairly narrow, maybe six feet wide? (maybe a little more.) a low cinderblock wall holds back the hillside, and there is a narrow trench around the house to deal with runoff -- but this wasn't just water, it was increasingly thickening sludge. it had begun pooling up in that south patio corner, where the ground is a little bit lower. much of it was running down the side steps to the street, but some of it was beginning to fill up the rest of the patio. it wasn't flowing super-fast, but steadily, and i got it into my head that if i took our pushbroom and got onto the dry side of the patio i could shove some of that water/mud down toward the south steps and let it flow into the street.

by the time i got back from fetching the pushbroom from the garage, however -- it might have taken a minute at most -- the sludge was pouring onto the patio at a much faster rate. so fast that the whole patio was now engulfed in mud and there was no chance of channeling any of it away from the house with my puny pushbroom. 00soul was saying "there's nothing we can do," and i had to agree. we stood there helplessly and watched the patio fill up, the pile of sludge at the south end rise higher and higher, and the whole mess slowly, inexorably advance upon that little runoff trench, which was not built to handle something this nasty.

when the mud got even with the back step onto the patio, i called 911 back. they connected me to the fire dispatcher, who said they had shut off the water. i was like, "but it's still coming down so fast! we are about to be flooded with mud." i was getting pretty freaked out, and began to wonder if i should start taking stuff off the floor, or what to do. he said he'd send someone out to take a look, but reassured me that the water had been shut off and the flow should stop soon.

i went outside to wait for the fire truck. the street to the south of us was flowing with a muddy mess of water, dirt, and leaves and twigs. cars were skidding and sliding. our trash cans -- put out b/c today is trash day -- were stuck in a gooey clot of the stuff. our neighbor across the street came home and walked over to see what was happening. around then the fire dept. showed up. they did go back and look, and one of them walked up the hill to check out the flow, but they told us they couldn't really do anything for us unless the water was "threatening the house." well, to my mind, it was, but the firefighter disagreed, and who i am to argue? 00soul talked to them for a while, we thanked them, and they left.

indeed the flow had slowed, and soon enough became a trickle, but the mud continued to advance a little before finally beginning to solidify. it stayed where it was and didn't come into the house. we crossed our fingers that the water wouldn't break out again.

this morning when i went out to get the paper at 8:45, there was already a card from an "insurance claims adjuster" with a note to call him about the flooding. i had an idle hope that this was actually the insurance agent for the people whose water meter broke (we were told by the firefighters), but it was just the disaster version of an ambulance chaser. the patio is totally engulfed in crud, and we will have to get it cleaned up. who's gonna pay for it? i don't see why we should have to. either the homeowners up there on rugby or the city must be responsible. now comes the fun part.

random

* lady sovereign played at the el rey w/o incident last wednesday. after the requisite too-much-buildup by her DJ and band, she came out on crutches and with her arm in a sling -- a joke on the last time she appeared here, when she was so sick she fell apart in mid-show. those props were soon cast aside, of course, and she offered up the fake-tanner diss "tango" along with "love me or hate me" and the party-combat tune "the broom," among others. a much better experience for everyone.

* but my game is off. i'm losing the two-person football pool to 00soul for the first time in ... a while. it sucks. i really thought the chargers would beat the pats. (it wasn't just b/c i wanted the pats to lose ... honest.) and we were both wrong about the ravens. oh, well. at least the saints won, although i didn't relish rooting against the eagles. i want the saints to go all the way, and i keep thinking it's going to be pats/saints at the super bowl. we'll see.

* finally caught up to the end of doctor who s2 and the departure of rose tyler. what is it about heroic blonde chicks that makes me cry, man? it was a fitting farewell to the intrepid shopgirl, but a fate worse than death in a way. i dunno. maybe that's just me. anyway, she's certainly not out of reach, so perhaps she'll return some day. like sarah jane did. in the meantime the UK already has the episodes with the new companion, i think. she has some big adidas to fill.

* actually, doctor who is a really weird and wonderful show. it's totally insane and juvenile and goofy, and sometimes i don't know why i bother watching it. yet it always has this current of darkness and loss that is truly seductive and strange ... a thread of true horror that befits the time lord's backstory as the last of his kind, survivor of a terrible war, etc. etc. but it's a little bit disconcerting how brief a window one gets in which to recover from, say, the permanent separation of rose and the doctor, before some freaky ghost-bride shows up on the bridge of the TARDIS and starts demanding to know what the hell's going on. forcing the doc to dry his tears and become eternally inquisitive once again. it's a renegade time lord's burden, i s'pose.

* i became obsessed with a song called "let's get rid of new york" by the randoms. i included it on this classic punk-rock compilation i made for my sister for christmas. which was on my ipod, so i could play it over and over and over. which i did. b/c it's a perfect, pogo-worthy, sarcastic word-bomb of a tune, absurd-yet-scathing. it's old, like from '78 or something? i couldn't find the lyrics online so i figured them out myself. all but one line. apparently yo la tengo covered it in the '90s or something. hah. that's funny for some reason.

right side of my mind

ok ... i surrendered to the new template. at least i got my archives back. i hate this new look a lot. let the modifications begin.

oh, well. maybe it is time for a change anyway. at least there is something new on this blog.

(i'm) stranded

stupidly, i accepted blogger at its word that they're "out of beta" and into the real deal with this new blogger whatever-the-fuck. not to mention i succumbed to the veiled threat that eventually it will simply port me over against my will.

yeah, well ... guess what? the new blogger sucks. oh, sure, everything went swimmingly when i ported over -- except you can no longer view my archives. there is nothing about not being able to view one's archives in the decidedly UN-helpful "help" section. in fact "archives" isn't addressed at all. indeed, rather than providing users with quick-n-easy ways to figure out and fix what (if any) template mods they might've made that are not translating, google/blogger tells you to choose a new template. i've looked at the code, and can't see anything wrong with it. in fact i don't think i ever even modified the "archives" part of my template. all the other parts that i have modified ported over just fine. great. happy fucking new year.

fuck you, google. and fuck you too, blogger.

EDIT: and it wants me to pick a new template if i want to do all i can do with the new blogger! and every single-motherfuckin'-ONE-of-them was designed by a man. (my old one was designed by a woman.) i repeat: FUCK YOU, GOOGLE AND BLOGGER!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

words

yesterday the doc and i were arguing about whether it is fall or winter. he maintained that, as it is cold and "wintery" out (in southern california terms, at least), it is in fact winter. but i say it's fall. and, as the calendar says the winter solstice isn't until december 21, i win.

i mean, don't sell this season short -- fall is a time of transition. sure, sure -- in some ways all the seasons are. but there is something curiously fleeting about autumn that makes me want to savor it. in the beginning it feels like summer, so that you scarcely notice the chillier evenings and sharper mornings. and at the end it feels like winter, so that folks, such as the doc, scarcely can tell the difference.

but right now to me it still feels like winter is coming. not yet here. the forces of cold darkness are massing along the borders, to be sure. for the moment, however, bright sunshine prevails, even if that wind is hella freezing. brrr.

and now that it's official -- after all, it's on tv -- and the situation in iraq has become an honest-to-broadcast civil war, i absurdly think of fall. a transitional time -- a season that lasts as long as any other season, leading inevitably to the next season. rather like the run-up to a civil war in a country as destabilized, brutalized, and fractionalized as iraq. people who know what they're talking about have been darkly hinting for some months now that civil war was imminent, was coming, was already there. all the signs, like the seasons, pointed that way. yet the bush administration denied the forces of nature. the mainstream media hedged its bets and went along with the white house's sometimes surreal rationalizing as to why the scene in iraq maybe looked kinda like a civil war, but really wasn't.

oh, yeah? what does this look like to you? i read this lead story in the l.a. times this morning with a sinking heart (although sometimes i don't think it can sink any further). now the ranks of the militias in iraq are growing and growing, as more and more iraqis -- spurred by the ever-increasing sectarian violence -- decide they can't trust either the iraqi army or the police. time to take up arms for themselves. sunnis and shiites car-bomb, shell, and roadblock one another ... these "unsanctioned fighters" (now there's a hip bureaucratic term) are multiplying so fast that neither the u.s. nor the iraqi government can deal.

while driving to work through the sweet little residential neighborhoods b/w my house and the miracle mile, i thought about the reports of bombings and bodies on the streets of baghdad. about how the authorities (whoever they may be) find corpses on trash heaps and side streets every day; at least 44 on monday. i thought about what america has done to iraq. an innocent country that did no wrong to us. the sun bathed my world in a golden light; i tried to imagine what it would be like to turn the corner and see dead people lying on the sidewalk in the bright sunlight. to be driving along and hear the whistle of a bomb overhead, an explosion in the near distance. to be stopped at a light and suddenly have the car next to me burst into flames with a concussive blast that shatters me and the beast to pieces.

and thinking those thoughts led me to wonder, what does this rapidly destabilizing situation mean for the troops? will they be expected to fight ... who? everyone who isn't in the iraqi army or police force? will this still be defending our freedom? or just defending their own lives? (and i am certainly not saying they shouldn't defend themselves; they absolutely should, if they have to.) and if it becomes a case of total chaos, how will they get out of there? will they be trapped in iraq? and how many will die at the hands of these "unsanctioned fighters"?

oh, but wait ... it's still business as usual. after all, the white house says there is not a civil war, according to msnbc.com:

National Security Council spokesman Gordon Johndroe said while the situation on the ground is serious, neither President Bush nor Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki believe it is a civil war.

so there you have it: situation, serious. but not a civil war -- oh, no. that's a whole different thing.

one season leads into another, like clockwork, like the calendar, like the turning of the earth on its axis. inevitable.

cactus

last night i caressed dan dority's cowboy boot. yes, i did. only for a second, but how could you not, as it was made of ostrich and lizard? and, besides, he said it was ok.

which is to say, coiledsoul and i met the actor w. earl brown in the HOB foundation room last night after the frank black show. (which included an awesome solo-acoustic set by frank at the beginning, featuring several of my favorite pixies tunes. also he played a lot of covers and some older solo stuff with the band, so it was an offbeat evening ... as befits the artist formerly known as black francis.) we were sitting on a plush velvet couch, enjoying our drinks, and the people next to us left. so this guy in a flowered cowboy shirt and a big turquoise medallion, lookin' real fermilyer, comes up and asks if he and his friends can sit there. we're all, sure. CS leans over all casual like and whispers to me who it is. i'm all, cool!

we chatted a bit about frank black and the pixies and texas and blah blah blah. they soon discovered their mutual love of steve earle, who is a pal of mr. brown's. then it was off to the races with talking about this artist and that, and soon enough w. e. was shyly saying, "i dunno if you know of a show called 'deadwood,' but ..." and we're like, hell yeah! and then he tells us many entertaining stories, including one about steve earle almost making it onto the show, but for a scheduling conflict.

so our new friend then indicated that some of his companions were pals of his from a band he's in called the sacred cowboys, who play at the knit about once a month and also have a gig opening for david allen coe at the key club next month. so we wrote down that info (yay for me for bringing my pen).

and, oh yeah. the cowboy boots. well, CS was wearin' her cowboy boots, as girls from texas do, and brown was wearin' some too, as he is originally from kentucky. we were admiring the dark-red-and-cream two-tone work on his boot. he told us where he got them. the right one was right there in front of my face, and i reached out my hand without even thinking (cuz ... drunk). i put a fingertip on it and then drew back. i looked at him. "is it ok if i touch it?" he nodded. "go ahead." so i traced the texture of the two different skins, the line of the seam where they were joined. gorgeous. then i pulled my hand away, lest it take god knows what sort of liberties (with the boots, people -- the boots). "nice," i said. he smiled.

we chatted a while more, and then the actor's friend, who is the drummer for frank black, came out and they all trundled off to see him. CS and i went to the restroom and then tripped off back to the car. we couldn't wait to get back to my place and tell 00soul all about it.

the power of orange knickers

is it a coincidence? or is someone at freepeople a tori amos fan?

white knuckles

in charles taylor's los angeles times review of a book called the female thing, written by laura kipnis, he writes this paragraph:

And her discussion of the troubled last days of radical feminist writer Andrea Dworkin allows Kipnis to address the way that the possibility of rape is ingrained in the female psyche -- even, Kipnis argues, as figures suggest that, thanks to America's burgeoning prison population, men are just as likely to be victims of sexual assault.

there are just so many things wrong with this paragraph. first off, he does not explain anything more about the "troubled last days" of dworkin -- hey, thanks for letting readers in on the details, dude. not one phrase to enlighten us as to how dworkin's last days are related to the way that the "possibility of rape is ingrained in the female psyche." i really do not know what he means or what the book's author might have meant. is it something to do with dworkin's writings about rape? about her allegations -- and the subsequent controversy over said allegations -- made in 1999 that she was drugged and raped in paris? but what would any of that have to do with her "troubled last days"? she died in 2005. so, color me confused. and i actually have an inkling of dworkin and her world. most readers would barely even recognize the name.

anyway, the real problem with this graf is the reviewer's apparent total belief in the author's bullshit notion that men are just as likely to be victims of sexual assault as women are. first of all, they aren't. even factoring in prison rape, the numbers don't add up to anything remotely approaching "just as likely."

but more to the point, once again we have a writer -- actually, two -- focusing on who is the victim of sexual assault, rather than who is the perpetrator. we can all agree that both women and men are the victims of rape. mostly women, of course. but just who is overwhelmingly most likely to be raping both genders? why, men! according to the NCICP report:

Most perpetrators of sexual violence are men. Among acts of SV committed against women since the age of 18, 100% of rapes, 92% of physical assaults, and 97% of stalking acts were perpetrated by men. SV against men is also mainly male violence: 70% of rapes, 86% of physical assaults, and 65% of stalking acts were perpetrated by men (Tjaden and Thoennes 2000).

this is important, b/c the only way to stop rape is to stop the people who commit it. who are, almost always, men. (yes, yes, i know: most men don't rape. but that doesn't negate the fact that most rapists are men.) the author also says this in the article:

"Obviously, I'm a feminist. I feel I know these debates fairly well and felt like there were certain things that don't get said because there is such a focus on saying the positive, saying the progressive thing. I would like to think I'm a progressive. But I also felt that there's an element of dishonesty and bad faith in only articulating what's progressed without talking about what's impeded."

hmmmm ... ya mean, like asserting that figures suggest men are just as likely to be raped as women are? thus impeding an increasingly essential discussion about how to stop men from sexually assaulting their fellow human beings? maybe the times ought to review a book about that.

garden party

last night we traveled to the edge of noho to attend a party thrown by a young couple we know. they are part of what i still always think of as the k-town kidz, although only coiledsoul still lives in k-town, and i am not sure E&A ever did. nowadays these young folks of my acquaintance are more concentrated in the hipster frontier town of north hollywood. but the noho kidz just does not have the same ring, convenient metro station or not.

anyway, so it was a mix of old friends and their friends, plus a couple of dogs just for extra knee-level activity. 00soul grilled us some awesome sausages, and later i had a cheeseburger. mmmm. CS had brought a tasty salad, and we had booze and soft drinks and snacks aplenty.

it was an indoor/outdoor party, mostly in the kitchen and backyard of their nice little house. the latter area was dominated by an enormous rubber tree whose spreading network of exposed roots was fenced off by chicken wire festooned with a string of lights. we sat on chairs amid swirly clumps of tall grass, and at one point some of the young folks engaged in nighttime badminton, which fit into the lynchian absurdity of it all.

in the kitchen i met some of their friends from san francisco. it was fascinating just to listen to them all talk. smart young folks with a deeper knowledge of the world around them than many might give them credit for. in some ways a lifetime away from me, but not that much different than me at that age. at one point there was a discussion of just what generation they belonged to: x? y? some other? the outcome seemed inconclusive. and at another point it was noted that three of the girls will be turning 30 next year, and they plan to go to vegas. one invited me to come along, enthusing that it would be girls only and loads of fun. i have never been to vegas; it doesn't seem like my kind of place. my luck at gambling is terrible, for one thing, and i hate musicals. anyway, but then i regarded this trio of bright, sparkly, energetic individuals -- who blithely mix up and enthusiastically consume new alcohol combinations based on something they heard was good, who sneak back to the blackjack table late at night and win big, who brave the jaws of fearsome beasts and call it a day's work -- and decided it was worth considering.

it was a lovely late-summer party, and although it is not surprising -- as i got pretty stoned and pleasantly mellow on wine -- i did feel somewhat distant from the proceedings. i am not always comfortable at parties. someetimes i think the best is just sitting and listening to all the different things going on at once. it's can be cacophonous, but it's like you are inside the party, which is kinda cool. or maybe i was just high.

anyway, i was among the handful of older people in attendance, and it was weird to realize how MUCH older. we tend to think of everyone as adults here in this twenty-to-sixtysomething land of the grownups. but 29 was rather a long time ago for me. i didn't feel superior or have condescending thoughts when the actual time span hit me, but it was sort of thought-provoking. and i love that i know these people, whom i lightheartedly call kids but are obviously functioning young adults with all of the attendant responsibilities, freedoms, anxieties, dreams, needs, wants, etc. i love listening to them talk about pop culture and the tv shows they adore. yet they also talk about politics and the state of the world, with liberal and progressive views that give me hope.

yay for the next generation ... whatever they wanna call themselves.

five years

i am sick of 9/11. so sick of it i waited until 9/12 to post this. i mean no disrespect to those who suffered and suffer still, but is their very real pain and trauma not worth some more dignified (and permanent) memorial than this bordering-on-unseemly deluge of hype and political opportunism and in-depth bullshit media analysis that the day inspired? than these renewed justifications for an unjustifiable war? bush begged us to stay united in the "war on terror" -- the very thing that is dividing us, increasingly against him, in the first place!

we had also the silly ABC 9/11 movie, best put in its place by jon stewart, who sardonically observed that tv movies are so well known as bastions of accuracy.

i think al queda made some threat today, or maybe that was yesterday, but it is nine-eleven, dammit (or it was), and for once the media will not be diverted from its course of serious delving into where-are-we-now? merely to trumpet some terrorist threat. besides, osama is always talking shit. anyway, it is FIVE YEARS LATER -- one of those magical numbers that demands special reflection. like, a whole half-decade. so eff the latest al q blather -- give the people war-on-terror reverie. a rumination on how 9/11 has forever altered (or not) pop culture. a strangely surprised report on americans' resilient capacity for denial. or ... come to think of it ... an almost presciently timed bit of garbage about justin timberlake's new pop paradigm; it is a new world indeed, in which songcraft and authenticity mean naught. which is why everybody in the world is covering gnarls barkley's "crazy."

if there's one thing we've learned from fantasy adventure films and modern socio-politics, it's that strange times make strange bedfellows. and if we were really serious about wiping out islamic extremism or whatever, we'd have hooked up with saddam hussein instead of invading his country and killing so many of the people, or making it possible for them to kill one another, which they have done in great numbers -- more than hussein himself, o the bloody irony. axis-of-evildoer or not, the man had no love for al queda and wanted nothing to do with them. bush et al were looking for a smash-and-grab in iraq -- loot the oil, etc etc -- and now i guess they are just stuck with it b/c they can't admit they were wrong. well, actually, cheney admitted he was wrong that the war wouldn't last long. but it was still the right thing to do.

oh, well. tomorrow this will all be over, and we'll be back to the usual lies and manipulations and celebrity obsession. b/c otherwise, don't the terrorists win?

the fun just never ends

there is a saying i've read among users of livejournal -- "teh stupid, it burns!"

by this point in the reign of the bush administration, we've learned that "teh stupid" is often the norm. but sometimes dubya comes up with stuff that makes you wish they'd script him all the time.

today he admitted that the CIA does indeed have secret prisons overseas. the AP story reports that "Bush said 14 suspects -- including the mastermind of the Sept. 11 attacks and architects of the 2000 bombing of the USS Cole and the U.S. Embassy bombings in Kenya and Tanzania -- had been turned over to the Defense Department" and moved to gitmo for trial.

then, as justification for its existence, i suppose, the prez offered that the CIA program "has helped us to take potential mass murderers off the streets before they were able to kill."

huh ... wouldn'tja think that the architect of the 9/11 attacks and the planners of the cole bombing and the attacks on u.s. embassies already qualify as mass murderers? and haven't they, then, been quite well able to kill indeed?

let there be rock

standing in the middle of the wiltern last wednesday night, engulfed in the maximum rock'n'soul inferno that is the motherfuckin' bellrays, i felt cleansed. bathed in the white-hot fury of their old-school spontaneous-rawk-explosion-style approach -- hallelujah! in true mc5 fashion, the music can go from driving funk-flecked rock to punk-powered intensity to freeform jazz that nearly falls apart before your very ears ... but always manages to make it back from the brink. main songwriter/guitarist tony fate, bassist bob vennum, and drummer craig waters shifted gears expertly -- and loudly, but never even approached drowning out lead singer lisa kekaula. a force of nature in a skimpy black halter dress and sparkly high wedge sandals, she belted out "tell the lie" and "pay the cobra" and other numbers from their new have a little faith -- which demonstrates their ever-widening musical vocabulary while reliably tearing it up -- along with detroit-soaked classics like "sister disaster" and "have a little faith in me." she prowled the stage like an impatient tigress, her massive afro towering over her head like the 13th wonder of the world. and she took us to church, kids, demanding that we enjoy ourselves -- for our sake. "it's not for us," she exhorted time after time, sweeping her arm to indicate all they had laid at our feet -- the band, the energy, the music. "it's for you ... help us help you let loose ... etc etc."

after a while, few resisted. she called, we responded -- it was as simple as that. ooo mah soul. i was renewed.

all of that was, to some, mere prelude to the main rockin' event, the first-ever u.s. show by australian punk legends radio birdman. in fact i was mainly along for that ride, as 00soul was reviewing the show for citybeat (out thursday). our pal kim cooper was really psyched, as were many other true believers and interested observers. while recognizing the significance, i didn't have as much invested in the show. but it is always cool to see a veteran band as vital as RB still is. the original, older members seemed leather-tough -- not hard or mean, but well-worn yet still standing up. sadly, for one unfamiliar with most of the tunes, such as myself, the muddy sound and other tech problems made some details hard to discern. but it was enough to be there to hear it, and i left feeling fairly giddy under the power of the rock.

let there be music

this eventful week actually started the day before, on tuesday, when we attended the first of the foo fighters' three nights of "afoostic" (groan) shows at the pantages. i'll be reviewing that in CB this week as well. but suffice to say that FF fans are so nice and polite, and the vibe inside the pantages was mellow and generous despite the cramped conditions in the lobby due to the crunch of converging lines for merch, drinks, and snacks.

rare though this configuration of the foos was, rarer still was a much smaller and more fleeting event that occurred outside. for the first time ever, i had a conversation with danny shades. a well-known figure to those who frequent concerts, he's often seen somewhere near a venue. anyway, i walked past him on my way to meet 00soul outside the theater, and he spoke to me, as he does to most everyone who passes by. hey, a guy's gotta advertise somehow. i politely replied and he reflexively said, "well, have a good time tonight. not that you need me to tell you to have a good time; you'll probably have one anyway." the light had not yet changed, and so i turned and said, "well, it is work, ya know." he didn't seem to follow, of course; how would he know what i meant? he said yeah or something, then added that i looked familiar. i said i thought he knew my boyfriend; he didn't know the name, but i'm sure he'd know the face. then he said he'd like to know me, y'know, just as a person ... huh. for some reason i simply shook his hand and introduced myself. now, i said, you know me. and then i think i surprised him a little by saying, "you're danny, right? i know you." he said yes, and i said, "everybody knows you, when they need to, right?" and he answered, "yeah, that's right." and then the light changed, and i took my leave and crossed the street.

let there be lunch

friday was 00soul's birthday, so i drove him to santa barbara for tacos at la super-rica, as is the tradition for 12 years now. we ended up having one of the best times yet. the weather was lovely, our pace was very leisurely, we indulged ourselves shamelessly, and we had no drama (as in vehicular) whatsoever. i was a little nervous beforehand b/c butch hasn't been on a road trip since the incident. it would be the first test of the new radiator as well -- a serious one, what with temperatures in the valley reaching near 100 at midday. we debated taking the scenic route but decided on the 101 and took off around 12:30. we could not have had better luck on the road. it was hot indeed, especially through the west valley, but traffic was merely slow at points rather than at a standstill, and we soon passed through the valley's oven and into cooler ventura county.

along the coast just south of SB we encountered some thrilling tendrils of chilly fog, ghosts of precipitation threatening a bright blue sky, temporarily blotting out the sun, but fading quickly as we neared our destination. we parked outside the restaurant at about 2:30, pretty excellent time. i was starving! the line was not too terrible, although it took a long time for the food to be ready. well, we ordered a lot; i had more tacos than ever and stuffed myself -- had to surrender the last marinated pork taco to 00soul, but i did it gladly. he had his fill as well, and then we rambled over to state street and the james joyce pub. we spent a pleasant afternoon imbibing -- him, various irish whiskies, me, cazadores & tonics -- and chatting with the bartender, munching peanuts, talking amongst ourselves, and people-watching.

we got some coffee across the street later on, sat on a bench and drank it in the deepening twilight, watching people pass by and also a hummingbird siphon nectar from some kind of spiny bright red flower on a nearby tree.

then it was back to the beast. top down, jackets on, we departed around 8. the trip back went even more smoothly and probably could've been made in under 90 minutes, except for a brief slowdown due to a pair of accidents outside ventura -- there wasn't much traffic, but it all had to merge first right and then left, which created confusion as well as congestion. but really, how fucking amazing is it that we managed to avoid anything like horrible traffic on the friday of labor day weekend?

let there be peace

then last night it was off to the gibson for a dose of hip-hop soul. mary j. blige sold out the house. my report on that will be in tomorrow's l.a. times, but i don't think it's revealing too much to say that i'm still thinking about the show and wishing i had a little more time to really crystallize my thoughts. i've written a lot of mjb album reviews, and other things, and i always find myself really respecting her style. not just her musical craft, which is often innovative and usually up-to-date, but her genuine way of weaving herself into her songs.

over the years, the "queen of hip-hop soul" has gone from sexy street urchin to serene spiritual seeker -- simultaneously inspiring fans to examine/fix/change their own lives and rallying them to support her in her darkest and brightest moments. she has attained a measure of balance, but, as she reminded us many times during the show, it ain't easy to keep an even keel. at one point she went off on quite a tangent in that regard, telling us it's hard work to stay centered, but she'd rather suffer in the process of getting better than suffer and stay the same. her emotions seemed to overcome her, and she even shed tears.

were they real? does she do that every night? it's hard to say. it certainly felt genuine in the moment, and maybe that's all that matters. so many pop stars of all stripes -- bands, vocalists, rappers, singer-songwriters, from R&B to metal -- seem to get over on the slimmest of "connections" to their listeners. sure, fans are always gonna love the objects of their admiration unconditionally, but mjb inspires a near-evangelical loyalty ... and she seems to deserve it more than most. the tropes of her genre are ubiquitous -- even she loads her albums with guest stars, skits, etc., etc., and the show was full of sing-alongs, guest turns, pyrotechnics, etc. -- yet somehow the cliches never touch her. despite all of the trappings, she is as real in her own way as the bellrays or dave grohl (except with more costume changes ... and better clothes!) -- and that counts for a lot in these soul-deprived days.

you just have to be crazy

deadwood is a show on HBO. maybe you've heard of it. it's an intermittent obsession of mine ... although i am only caught up as far as the end of season 2. (so no spoilers, please.) there is much to say about deadwood ... which is why it's the perfect subject for haiku.

and so, by popular demand (thanks, jenn!), i present my deadwood haiku. minimalism is not easy for me; that may show. they are untitled, come to think of it. (too minimal?) my favorite is number three. but number one is fun too.

hey you cocksucker
i ain't no inebriate
i'm a fuckin' drunk!

swidgen feeds my pigs
he's a warrior like me
but i don't trust him

does anybody
possess quite so stiff a back
as sheriff bullock?

wild bill saved my claim
i stayed for the child, and ... him
now i stay for me

war pigs

ever wonder what cable outlets like the discovery channel fill up their days and nights and days with? me, neither, but yesterday afternoon i got a lesson anyway.

on the traditional day of family get-togethers, 00soul and i got together with his family, for the traditional sibling joint birthday celebration. a ton of takeout chinese food and some delicious homemade dessert. but also, for much of the time, the discovery channel spewed a steady diet of war propaganda disguised as a show called futureweapons. in fact there was apparently a futureweapons marathon. this program, hosted by a former navy SEAL named, i swear to god, "mack," is all about superior firepower and intimidating your enemies into submission and just totally fucking jacking off in boy world. there was so much surrogate wanking going on, what with the missiles sliiiiiiding out of their tubes and bursting from their airborne shells and penetrating their targets with loving accuracy. lots of blowing stuff up real good and crowing about how this weapon or that weapon made the enemy give up before even engaging us. (which is of course why no more of our troops are dying in iraq ... .) the MOAB and the clusterfuck smart bombs that spin out of one missile, whose cute acronym for "kill as many motherfuckers as you can detect" escapes me right now, and erupt in black cloud columns worthy of saruman himself. and of course the very portable javelin shoulder missile, ooo-rah, and the bitchen high-tech tank, and the gun that sees around corners, and the gun that's "even better than an m-16" (now you know that's u.s. propaganda ... the m-16 is hardly the best fucking rifle in the world to begin with...).

it was nonstop sterile death-and-destruction. endless footage of the same field-test explosions, nice and neat, interspersed with grinning bespectacled white men talking about how "impressive" these weapons are. i mean, they just could not get enough of that lovin' stuff! but with all the euphemistic, sanitary ways of talking about the results of their little technological circle jerks, it was as though no actual killing is required. empty tanks, empty buildings, empty fields -- impotent targets taking the brunt of their brute force. oh, yeah, baby, right there. uh-huh-uh.

falling down backwards

it seems like just yesterday, or maybe only a year ago, but it was really almost two years ago that i reminisced about the clay idols and wondered whatever happened to steve schayer, the group's leader. after i wrote that i heard from a couple of people that he was still out there, and maybe on the verge of a comeback. but this did not come to pass ... until thursday night, when steve played a solo acoustic gig at taix, the french restaurant on sunset in echo park.

we dashed in from the parking lot at what seemed like the very last minute, as we were extremely late -- traffic sucked, echo park is far, blah blah blah -- but we actually ended up having plenty of time to get in and get settled. i met up with barbara mitchell, who had orchestrated much of this momentous event; basically, she's been encouraging steve to do another show since the last one, some 15 years ago. among other things she has a record label now, roslyn recordings, and so also was there with one of her artists, paul hiraga of downpilot, who closed the show -- with patria jacobs playing the middle set. i can't remember the last time i knew so many people at a show, man. and they all seemingly knew each other, and they definitely all knew steve.

the lounge/bar was set up with a small stage area ringed off with chairs, in front of the fireplace, where steve was fiddling fiddling fiddling with his guitars and the microphones ... technical difficulties. he looked the same to me, maybe a little thinner. i guess the equipment problems took up some time, but i don't remember that so well anymore. mostly i just remember when he started singing "porch," his voice that same resonant, agile instrument, his guitar playing animated and mystical (as in, what key is this?), the sound filling up a suddenly silent room: i have a house where i can go/when there's too many people around me... and we were off. he followed up with "you'll never know," and i think it was around then that barbara, black bangs framing a pair of sparkling blue eyes, said to me, "it's like grunge never happened!" i peered at steve for a beat and replied, "what's that?" "i don't know," she said, and we laughed, more heartily than the joke really called for -- laughing, i think, out of pure joy in the moment.

he played a new song called "do yourself a mischief" and then intended to end the set -- after only three songs? uh-uh. barbara was having none of it. we were by then standing at the bar just a few steps from the stage area, and she got him in a headlock next to the microphone; he finally succumbed, after extracting a jack and diet from her. so then it was, i believe the song is called "i wouldn't wish it on anybody else," but i could be wrong, b/c sometimes his songs don't have the titles you think they do. i think that was the one stew from the negro problem requested, but i'm not sure. many requests were shouted; few were honored. steve made to go off again after that tune, and again was thwarted by the persuasive ms. m. so he wrapped it up with "falling down backwards," which sounded totally amazing, and then the sound man helped him out by turning on the rolling stones right after the last notes rang.

the set was over and my head was buzzing and steve was enumerating the technical-problem bummers to barbara right next to me, when i spoke to him and he looked at me with "who's that?" in his eyes for a moment, then dawning recognition and a shout of my name, a bear hug, and that wide skull-cracking grin of his. there it was again, that sense of joy. he did fret, to my mind overmuch, about the sound problems, but they really did not matter ... though for a minute it seemed like b's and my insisting on this fact was not getting through to our dear neurotic mess of a singer-songwriter. soon enough, however, so many people had come up to kiss his ring that he was demanding another drink: from zero to diva in 60 seconds flat! hee. the next couple of hours were a happy blur, as we circulated, listened to the other players, drank, talked, laughed, and had ourselves a time. i was among, not just my peers, but people who remembered the same past i do -- a rarity. (or maybe i just don't spend enough time with people my own age.) steve handed me a CD of the last clay idols recordings, which were never pressed; finally, a replacement for my mouldering cassette copy. i discovered upon getting it home that it has some newer material ... but no song list. fucking musicians. (but he is coming back to play the echo next month, hurray!) barbara and paul ended up coming home with us, and we stayed up 'til three talking and drinking and such. they got up and got on the road just before 9 a.m. -- i don't know how they did it. old-school!

later i burned the disc steve gave me to itunes and worked on the song titles, playing different tracks over and over. man, the clay idols were a great band. the dust of memory fell away, and those songs came alive through my ibook's puny AM-radio speakers. that music was so rich and gorgeous, with its slightly gothic rattle and psychedelic ripple, stark and folky and lush, shimmering and shuddering. it really shared a kinship with grant lee buffalo, the band we consoled ourselves with after clay idols broke up.

anyway, this little journey down memory lane comes awfully fast on the heels of last weekend's time tunnel to the reader, which is where i was working when i first learned about the clay idols and really bonded with barbara. i used to visit steve when he worked at vinyl fetish on melrose; i scored some awesome punk t-shirts and buttons in there. and stickers, too. uhm, and also i just finished reading writer/artist joe sacco's palestine, a graphic novel about his experiences with the palestinian people in the west bank and gaza in the early '90s, as well as his new book, but i like it, a compendium of late-'80s comics, mostly including "in the company of long hair," his tale of being on the road in europe with the miracle workers, which just so happened to be one of my favorite local psych-punk bands back then.

i never know exactly what to think of these forced nostalgia marches. it's silly to imagine some cosmic convergence making all signs point to the years 1988-91, but on the other hand, there they are. it does put me in the right mindset to write this article about sacco's new book, so maybe i should just thank the universe for that and get on with it.