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‘Last spring there was a smart, rambling letter from a guy in Kent, Ohio, with a smart, rambling album to match–on Water Bros., by a group that seemed to call itself 15-60-75 the Numbers Band. A month or two later the group played Trax, of all places; sorry, I told the letter-writer on the phone, I’m going on vacation, if you mean it you’ll be back. A month after that there was a handsome, exquisitely stoopid single, on Booji Boy, by an Ohio group called Devo, short for “De-Evolution.” I liked the misogynist Dead Boys’ album, on Sire, more than I wanted to; their bio claimed they’d been unable to commence their homage to Iggy in their native Cleveland, and I wondered why.
‘Gary Storm of the Oil of Dog show on WBFO, Buffalo–“If all you love is money you’ll hate our guts”–gave me a playlist that included records I thought no disc jockey had heard of and records I hadn’t heard of myself. One was an album called From Akron, on Clone, by two different bands, the Bizarros and the Rubber City Rebels. I wrote away for it and loved it, although I didn’t relate to the EP by Tin Huey I got with it. Devo showed up at Max’s with a movie of themselves, a hilarious version of “Satisfaction” that omitted the hook, and David Bowie. They were also from Akron, it appeared. The letter-writer began sending me (blank), a mimeographed “Ragazine of High and Low Art” dedicated to the proposition that “anybody doing anything at all against our gray Midwestern nothingness deserves attention.” The first signing on Blank, Mercury’s new punk label, was rumored to be Pere Ubu, from Cleveland.
‘It was long about then, in early December, that I looked at a map and ascertained that Akron was about 40 miles south of Cleveland and 10 miles west of Kent. Something was obviously going on out there. Musically, I think of Akron-Cleveland as one place. The two Cleveland bands that interest me–Pere Ubu and the Dead Boys–do seem a little more sophisticated conceptually than the ones from Akron, but not enough to support any big theories. Nor does it matter much that Akron is a satellite of Cleveland in such crucial matters as radio, or that people in Akron don’t have easy access to Cleveland’s excellent library, art museum, and (why leave it out?) symphony orchestra. In most ways the cities are quite similar. Both have long borne the impress of a large white industrial working class that now faces the removal of rubber and steel manufacture to the South; both also support many corporate headquarters and a large managerial and professional class. Both suffered major race riots in the ’60s. Both experienced intense counterculture conflicts as well.
‘Ohio is a big place, of course, but it does seem to turn out more rock musicians than most big places. But Pere Ubu, Devo, Tin Huey, the Dead Boys, the Bizarros, and the Rubber City Rebels all respond to a more curious quirk of Cleveland taste–an attraction to weird, arty rock and roll. I’ve been stubborn about the term “punk,” applying it mercilessly to the new New York and English bands because even the artiest of them owned a clear formal debt to avant-punk godfather Lou Reed. “New Wave” struck me as a pretentious evasion. But Akron-Cleveland is so clearly influenced King Crimson as well as by Uncle Lou that it’s broken my will.’ — Robert Christigau, 1977
Rocket from the Tombs
Rubber City Rebels
Dead Boys
Pere Ubu
electric eels
Robert Quine
The Pagans
Devo
Peter Laughner
The Pretenders
The Styrenes
The Cramps
The Bizarros
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Formed in Cleveland OH in the summer of 1974, Rocket From The Tombs existed for less than a year, never released a record, played fewer than a dozen shows, and was heard and/or seen by no more than a few hundred people. Rocket From The Tombs blew apart in August 1975. David Thomas and Peter Laughner went on to form Pere Ubu, taking along rock classics such as “Final Solution,” “Life Stinks,” and “30 Seconds Over Tokyo.” Cheetah Chrome and John Madansky formed the Dead Boys, taking “Sonic Reducer,” “Ain’t It Fun,” “Down In Flames,” and several others. Through word of mouth and a frenzied trafficking in bootlegs, Rocket From The Tombs acquired an international status out of all proportion to its brief existence.’ — ubuprojex
Rocket from the Tombs ’30 Seconds Over Tokyo’
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‘Akron, OH’s Rubber City Rebels were yet another hot, terrific punk-era rock & roll band circa 1977 that suffered from the total lack of independent labels back then. Lacking a strong connection to New York, they never got a Sire, Warner Brothers or Mercury deal like a few other great Ohio contemporaries (Dead Boys, Devo, and Pere Ubu, respectively) until they moved to L.A. and scored a deal with Capitol so much later, in 1980, when this sound was no longer au courant. Their sound was nails-tough garage punk, part New York Dolls, part Dead Boys, and most of all part 1973 Stooges.’ — Sons of the Dolls
Rubber City Rebels ‘Somebody’s Gonna Get Their (Head Kicked In)’
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‘From the depths of industrial Cleveland the Dead Boys found infamy on the New York scene around the club CBGB’s. Led by their irrepressible Iggy aping lead singer Stiv Bators, the Dead Boys merged the UK punk look with a tough US street punk sound and nihilistic lyrics at odds with the artier sounds of Television and Patti Smith and gave high octane performances to boot. However, like The Ramones, they suffered from the Punk tag they lived up to and achieved poor record sales both from their debut Young Loud & Snotty and their second album, the poppier more commercial, We Have Cum For Your Children. The Dead Boys split up in 1980. Some lay the roots of US hardcore at The Dead Boys door.’ — punk77.co.uk
Dead Boys ‘Sonic Reducer’
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‘Although New York and London are generally credited with spawning what came to be known as punk rock, Cleveland band Pere Ubu has a fairly good claim to planting many of its seeds in the early ’70s. In its first incarnation, Ubu combined disorienting, often dissonant, rock and urban blues in a stunningly original and outlandish mix, but never lost an urgent, joyous party atmosphere. Lead singer David Thomas’ plebeian warble, the band’s most noticeable sonic feature, colors all of Ubu’s proceedings in a bizarre light; casual listeners might, as a result, overlook the powerful, polished musicianship. One of the most innovative American musical forces, Pere Ubu is to Devo what Arnold Schoenberg was to Irving Berlin.’ — ubuprojex
Pere Ubu ‘Caligari’s Mirror’
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‘The electric eels played only five public shows, but during their brief existence they earned a reputation locally for being angry, confrontational, and violent. They were notorious for starting fights with audiences which drew police attention; members were also abusive to each other off-stage. Their style was a dischordant, noisy amalgam of hard garage rock and free jazz that was generally considered to be very obnoxious. Stiv Bators, the singer of The Dead Boys was particularly influenced by the vocal styling and stage presence of Dave “E” McManus. The electric eels featured unconventional instrumentation initially, with no drummer nor anyone who was technically competent on any musical instruments. Their rare performances did feature at various times, sheet metal hit with sledgehammers, anvils, a power lawnmower and fist fights. This led to the description of their act as “art terrorism”.’ — Scat Records
electric eels ‘Cold Meat’
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‘To those in the know, Akron, Ohio’s Robert Quine is one of the most original and influential guitarists of the past 25 years. A founding member of the groundbreaking punk rock ensemble, Richard Hell & the Voidoids, Quine has gone on to collaborate with a diverse array of musicians during his career, including: Lou Reed, Brian Eno, John Zorn, Matthew Sweet, Tom Waits, Lloyd Cole, They Might Be Giants, and Marianne Faithfull. Quine’s guitar speaks with a distinctive and versatile voice that immediately identifies him. Shrieks of feedback, throbbing drones, fractured chords, and keening lead lines are all part of Quine’s sonic vocabulary – one that often leaves the listener feeling assaulted, yet enlightened.’ — RobertQuine.com
Robert Quine (w/Lou Reed) ‘Waves of Fear’ (excerpt)
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‘While Pere Ubu and other Ohio cousins were offering only cerebral dissonance, the 1977 punk explosion visited Cleveland in the form of The Pagans. Picking up where the departed (for NYC) Dead Boys left off, the Pagans were younger, louder and, if not as snotty, better in other ways. Led by raspy-voiced Mike Hudson, this slam-dunk garage quartet produced a small stack of classic singles: “Not Now No Way,” “Street Where Nobody Lives” and “What’s This Shit Called Love” (later covered by the Meatmen) are all down and dirty, glorious three-chord excursions into the filth and the fury. The Pagans broke up in late ’79 without ever issuing an album. The band’s first longplayer (informally known as The Pink Album was in large part the result of a 1983 reunion gig (only Hudson and guitarist Tommy Gunn are holdovers from the old days), pressed as a limited-edition (500 copies) live LP.’ — Trouser Press
Pagans ‘What’s This Shit Called Love’
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‘Devo formed in 1973 consisting of members from Kent and Akron, Ohio. Devo first gained fame in 1976 when the short film The Truth About De-Evolution by Chuck Statler won a prize at the Ann Arbor Film Festival. Devo caught the attention of David Bowie and Iggy Pop, who championed the band and enabled Devo to secure a recording contract with Warner Bros. Records. After Bowie backed out due to previous commitments, their first album, Q: Are We Not Men? A: We Are Devo! was produced by Brian Eno. Their music and stage show mingle kitsch science fiction themes, deadpan surrealist humor, and mordantly satirical social commentary. Their often discordant pop songs feature unusual synthetic instrumentation and time signatures that have proven influential on subsequent popular music, particularly New Wave, industrial and alternative rock artists.’ — clubdevo.com
Devo ‘Too Much Paranoia’/’Praying Hands’
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‘Peter Laughner was an important, and still overlooked, figure in the birth of American punk and new wave. As a singer, songwriter, and performer in numerous Cleveland bands, he was probably the single biggest catalyst in the birth of Cleveland’s alternative rock scene in the mid-’70s. Roughly speaking, Laughner’s work melded the street-life aesthetic of Lou Reed and the Velvet Underground with folk, roots-rock, art-rock, and even singer-songwriter influences. His legacy is difficult for the masses to appreciate, however, and not just because his premature death of acute pancreatitis, brought on by drug and alcohol use, in June 1977, while still in his mid-20s meant that very little recorded material emerged during his lifetime. It’s all because his talents were too disparate to be easily pigeonholed and, until recently, repackaged for the CD era, despite a wealth of unreleased material.’ — allmusic
Peter Laughner ‘Life Stinks’
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‘Chryssie Hynde is the daughter of a part-time secretary and a Yellow Pages manager. She graduated from Firestone High School in Akron, Ohio. While attending Kent State University’s Art School for three years, she joined a band called Sat. Sun. Mat. (which included Mark Mothersbaugh from Devo). Hynde also developed an interest in the UK music
magazine NME. She eventually saved enough money to move from Ohio to London in 1973. With her art background, Hynde landed a job in an architectural firm but left after eight months. It was then that she met rock journalist Nick Kent (with whom she became involved) and landed a writing position at NME. However, this proved not to last and Hynde later found herself working at Malcolm McLaren and Vivienne Westwood’s then-little-known clothing store, SEX. Eventually, she tried to convince a very young Sid Vicious (who used to hang around at SEX) to marry her, just in order for her to get a work permit. Hynde then attempted to start a band in France before her return to Cleveland in 1975.’ — Wikipedia
The Pretenders ‘I Can’t Control Myself’
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‘The Styrenes are precursors to many of the precursors of the bands that you are listening to now. They have their origins in the burgeoning 70’s Cleveland scene that spawned such classic bands as Pere Ubu & Dead Boys. With a style best described as jazzy agro-pop, the Styrenes were a bit “off,” a bit too weird, even by CLE standards, kind of like Syd Barret backed by Pavement. The Styrenes experimented with almost every song. The result is indescribable, chaotic, often catchy, and always on-edge. Adventurous and exciting- punk/agro-jazz w/ a tinge of hostility. The Styrenes proved to be a crucial missing link between Sixties punk grunge and Eighties avant-rock. A retro-salute is long overdue to the Styrenes’ rarefied smashup of ragged-ass psychedelia, proto-No Wave guitar noise, corkscrew jazz & pummeling freak rock.’ — David Fricke
The Styrenes ‘Drano In Your Veins’
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‘The Cramps formed in Akron, Ohio in 1976 and were active until the death of lead singer Lux Interior in 2009. Lux took his stage name from a car ad, and Ivy claimed to have received hers in a dream (she was first Poison Ivy Rorschach, taking her last name from that of the inventor of the Rorschach test). The Cramps’ sound was heavily influenced by early rockabilly, rhythm and blues, and rock and roll like Link Wray and Hasil Adkins, 1960s surf music acts such as The Ventures and Dick Dale, 1960s garage rock artists like The Standells, The Gants, The Trashmen, The Green Fuz and The Sonics, as well as the post-glam/early punk scene from which they emerged. They also were influenced to a degree by the Ramones and Screamin’ Jay Hawkins, who was an influence for their style of theatrical horror-blues. In turn, The Cramps have influenced countless subsequent bands in the garage, punk and rockabilly revival subgenres, and helped create the psychobilly genre.’ — The Los Angeles Times
The Cramps ‘Human Fly’/’Teenage Werewolf’
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‘From the streets of the Akron rubber factories to center stage at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, The Bizarros have proven that they can, in fact, fight their way uptown. Fueling the Akron music scene in the late 1970s with songs like “I, Bizarro” and “Laser Boys”, the quintet meshed raw punk energy with new wave. Lyrics range from more lighthearted pop culture references – comic book villains and white screen movies – to more introspective and philosophical verses. Their music first materialized in the form of an album in 1976 on Gorilla Records. Nicholis went on to create the independent label, Clone Records, through which the next two releases were distributed. Four subsequent releases followed, the last in 1981, and the Bizarros took a 23-year hiatus from studio.’ — thebizarros.com
The Bizarros ‘White Screen Movies’
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*
p.s. Hey. I’m starting this on late Sunday afternoon during a work break because I found out over the weekend that I need to be at the Pompidou to work on ‘TEENAGE HALLUCINATION’ at 8:30 Monday morning. Rather than just cancel Monday’s p.s., I’m going to get to as many of the weekend’s comments as I can today and early Monday, and then I’ll get to the ones that arrive later when I return ‘full force’ on Tuesday. Also, I’m going to have be kind of quick-ish even now because today is pretty busy for me as well. Sorry about all this. ** Rewritedept, Hey. Cheers on the shared hardcore memories and love. I don’t know the Gorillaz dub album, no. It’s good? Really? Okay, I’ll have a listen then. Thanks! ** Randomwater, Hey there! Your weekend doesn’t sound bad at all. Poetry, making out, pals … what else is there? My weekend was totally lacking in razzle dazzle, or at least anything that words could render entertaining. Random sample: ‘No, move that painting a little to the left. Now, just a smidgen back to the right. A smidgen more. Okay, now up a centimeter. Good.’ If only there was some video game company out there that was wild and financially reckless enough to throw millions of dollars at a ‘Wild Boys’ game. Or if only games didn’t cost so much to make that there could be little indie video game companies out there doing cool things. Oh, you’ve already read Lautreamont. I should’ve figured. Hm, I’ll see if I can think of another suggestion. You do look mesmerized in that photo. Is it even possible to jack off without being mesmerized? I guess so. Oh, is it possible to read your poetry somewhere? I’d like to. ** David Ehrenstein, Hi, David. Hope your birthday was joyous in some fashion. Oh, circuit parties … I think I went with some friends to one in NYC, but there was such a specter of death about it to me that I just got depressed and unnerved and left very soon. ** Syreearmwellion, CM Punk! He is pretty cool. I haven’t kept up with the WWE over here like I try to do when I’m living in LA, but … I don’t know, there’s something very charming in that overblown charade even I can’t finger it. ** Pilgarlic, Hi! I’ll go look for your email. I’m even more scattered than usual. Yeah, the tons of coins from the French ceiling story got a lot of play here, as you can imagine, with half of the population of France now fishing around in their ceilings. Awesome Steely Dan track from my favorite SD LP, ‘Katy Lied’! ** Ultra VGA, Hey. You don’t seem like you’re so different from me, really. I’ve even got a serious case of procrastination-itis, even though I imagine it doesn’t seem that way. But you should see the things I would have done, ha ha! You earn a living as a traitor to language … how so? If I’m being nosey, ignore. I did read Drew Daniels’ ‘queer sound’ piece in The Wire, and I totally agree with you. I actually was going to try to scan it and put it on my blog, but, guess what, my aforementioned procrastination foiled that plan. I guess I still could. Thanks for filling me in. Keep it up. It’s cool having you here. **
Sypha, Well, same with me and my rave period. I adored it from the sidelines. Yeah, as DE pointed out, that Christopher Bram book is more about historical guys, and it only goes up as recently as Edmund White and his older than my generation. I didn’t know those Ballard books were even out of print. Well, that’s terrific news. Believe it or not, I love reading you talk about prog and detail your interest in its mythologies. It’s cool. ** Alan, Hey. Okay, mm, I’m not entirely sure if the difference in terms of resolution that Mike points out between my stuff and the stuff of younger writers exists or not. The kind of resolution I’m talking about is not any kind of gotcha or ‘Aha!’ or anything like that. I think maybe when most writers make a novel which is a mystery that can be solved or which deliberately goes against readers’ expectations of a resolution, the way to either solve it or to discover that it’s not solvable is through the story and characters in which/whom clues are littered and hidden, and the resolution or lack thereof is essentially if not entirely narrative-based. In, say, ‘TMS’, that is not the case. The novel is filled with secret tunnels constructed around individuated themes and resemblances and so on that are created by the novel’s form and structure, and the narrative’s clues are indications of where the secret tunnels lie and where they intersect and lead and so on. If one wanted to take the novel apart by identifying and locating each secret tunnel and then create a map of the novel’s architecture, one could enter the secret tunnel system and find one’s way into the deepest part of the novel where the tunnels end. There is something there, and traversing the tunnels and discovering it will increase one’s understanding of the novel, but it’s not a twist or ‘the truth’ or anything like that. It is an ideal vantage point that causes the novel to coalesce in the truest way. Now, I’m not sure that it would be possible for a reader to do that even if he or she wanted to, but I designed the novel so that such investigation is as possible to undertake as I could. Does that help clear things up at all? ** Nipper Dog, Hi! Oh, that’s okay. Other than the p.s., I am the correspondent from hell, so I understand. I’m glad you liked the Christopher Knowles stuff. You doing good? Tell me what’s going on with you, if you feel like it. ** Jeff, Hi, Jeff. That job sounds really good. Congrats and fingers crossed if you need any. You’re a Fad Gadget fan, awesome. Strange how few and far between we seem to be these days, although Im hoping the post will draw out any closeted FG fans. I think, if I’m remembering correctly, that I had a hard time with Gottfried Benn too. I don’t think I got very far with him. ** A.r., Hi, A. No wonder they’re aflurry. Such a great seeming show. I’m in a bit of pain that I’ll likely miss it. Thanks about Monday. I’ll give Ossian and Stephen a big howdy-do from you. Love, me. ** Bernard Welt, Thanks a lot for the link, B. I bookmarked it for a peaceful moment. That scene sounds way amazing, for sure. ** Killer Luka, Hey. Oh, yeah, I have the deepest respect for your interest in and employment of beauty in your work. I was just joshing. I’m glad you’re blowing faces off. I want that Kiddiepunk book! Gosh, you communicated wonderfully. Your tiredness lost the battle. ** JoeM, Hi, Joe. Oh, it’s a cartoon TV thing. Hm. What a strange idea since the original is actually kind of great in its own way. Well, I only hope he wouldn’t bother to do that unless he has some twist up his sleeve. I don’t know you if ever saw Ralph Bakshi’s brilliant remake of the ‘Mighty Mouse’ cartoon series back in the, hm, 70s, early 80s? It was a model of remake goodness. I’ve heard that story about the girl bringing her fetus to a show as the inspiration for ‘Bodies’ so many times in so many contexts from the mid-70s until now that I think it might be the real deal. ** Kyler, Hi, K. You know Christopher Bram? I think I only met him briefly a few times over the years, but I think we were on a gay fiction panel together once. You good? ** Chris Goode, Oh, thanks, Chris! I’m glad you thought it turned out okay, and that’s huge thanks to you. I tried to do a Knowles Day a few years ago, and there was so little online that I abandoned the plan, but it seems that someone or someones who are into him have been stocking up the web more recently. Very best of luck with the memory cramming. Is it a thing where you memorize it word for word, or do you memorize more like talking points and then rely on a bit of improv in the performance? Or both? ** Steevee, Thanks a lot for the link! That’s great of you! Thanks much! ** Misanthrope, Hey. Footing it in LA is pretty unrealistic man, kind of surrealistic even. Maybe they can find a sack of money somewhere and be able to afford taking taxis? I get a neck pain vis-à-vis sleeping thing too sometimes. Could be the pillows, yeah. Or it could be my organic clothes! ** Dungan, Hi, Sean. Cool about the email. I’ll go get it. It’s a cavern? How trippy! They have lighting in there, right? I mean, it could look unbelievable. Yes, photos of the show are a must. I, of course, like the idea of you being interviewed onstage with mics at the opening. You’re all kind of LA suave/casual and you give off this relaxed vibe, and people will love you, man. ** William Keckler, Mr. Keckler! It’s a great honor, sir. Thank you so much. And yes, yes re: CK. Everyone, William Keckler does many amazing things including one of my favorite blogs/sites in the whole world, the sublime Joe Brainard’s Pajamas (The Sequel), which you simply must visit whether you have before or haven’t. Again, a great pleasure to have you here. My very, very best to you. ** Postitbreakup, Thank you, Josh. Hope your weekend ruled. ** Jax, Hey, pal. Awesome thoughts, history, take, and memories re: the old punk days, thank you. The LA punk scene wasn’t wildly arty, though. A bit, at times, but not compared to the NYC scene, for instance, which, well, I suppose was probably pretty queer friendly too in theory, even if I can’t think of too many queer early NYC punk band members, come to think of it. The pianist in Patti Smith’s band is the only one to immediately spring to mind. Strange. Oh, wait, The Mumps, Lance Loud’s and Kristian Hoffman’s punk band, of course. I think maybe the Bush Tetras were queer. It took me a long time to hear disco without having an accompanying mental image of a room packed with mustaches, but, yeah, even that has a nice melancholy about it now. Rave, however, sigh. I do seriously miss those days. Oh, gosh, on your query. Hunh. ‘Smoking the peace pipe’, ha ha? How strict are those censors? ‘Doing the Jethro Tull?’ Uh, hm, I hope others are of more help. I’ll keep thinking. ** _Black_Acrylic, Enticing about the ‘YnY’ futurisms. Yes, news when appropriate, thanks, Ben. ** Chris Dankland, Hi, Chris. Cool, glad it effected you. That sound/vid with the jeering is really intense. It was from an event at the dawn of Wilson and Knowles’ collaboration, and the audience thought Wilson was forcing Knowles to perform the text, not aware that Knowles had written it, and basically exploiting the poor lad. I guess that’s probably obvious just from listening. Very nice Burns quote. Hope all’s well with you. ** Statictick, Hey. Ugliness rather than filthiness, yeah, okay, that makes sense. My stuff still gets called hard-boiled sometimes too. If they only knew, right? Interesting about ‘Minus’. And sorry to be so random today. It’s now 7 am on Monday, and I’m trying to get a last few comments addressed before I split, and I am quite far from fully awake yet. ** Chris Cochrane, Hey. Wonderful! Yeah, send me he flight info when you can. Air France, good, that’s the easy terminal vis-à-vis getting the train back to Paris. ** Okay. I’ll continue tomorrow morning if need be. In the meantime, do your best to enjoy my Ohioan 70
s punk transitioning into post-punk oriented gig, if you will. See you in a few.
wow, great post. the "Gig" series is my favorite on the blog these days. in so much music journalism the focus on individual artists loses context and sacrifices real insight. there needs to be more scene archaeology, people to figure out what exactly was in the water in certain places at certain times to produce such wild strains… great!
Killer gig D!
Dennis, Hahaha, your organic clothes. But look at mine! I wear the same thing almost every day myself and I don't have allergies! 😛 When I go to NYC or someplace, I have this one friend who's always like, "So are you gonna wear your blue jacket, polo, jeans, and black Skechers?" That is truly scandalous.
Well, for this section of the novel that's in LA, I'm confining it to one very tight-knit, so to speak, section, so I don't think the footing it will be too unrealistic. They basically hit town from the north, abandon their stolen car, and stay in one little part for a day/night before they're off again. Or is that still too unrealistic?
Funny you mention the bag of money. I don't have that necessarily, but one of the things throughout is that the one fellow is actually carrying a large sum of cash that the other's unaware of. So while the one's got all this "We've got no fucking money!" stress, the other one's always playing it cool. It's just one more of the many facades he's built up around himself and their trip. So really, if I wanted to, they could take taxis. But I'd prefer just to have them stuck in a bar/club somewhere for a night where they'll meet the guy that'll take them to their final destination.
Wow, I just typed a hell of a lot more about that than I thought I would. Hahaha.
Yeah, I think I'm sleeping too high up. I've been putting, like, 4 pillows under my head. It feels great when I snuggle into them, but I think it's fucking me up once I fall to sleep. I'll try going flatter tonight. Not quite as flat as Alfonse, though… 😛
Oh, and good luck today getting everything done that you need to get done.
dennis-
here, i'll move it forward so you don't have to backtrack or answer two comments. also, today's post and this weekend's posts were AWESOME! super stoked especially on this one. so many great bands.
god, what a weekend. how do you tell someone you care about that you get what he's going through and you want to be there for him but everyone gets panicky and everyone feels overwhelmed most of the time and that's not a reason to be miserable to everyone who cares about him? i dunno, just more roommate drama. i don't want him to hurt himself, but goddamnit if i don't want to hit him myself half the time. sorry.
so this week is the 'finish reading everything from the miles cycle' week, and i was going to say the other day that i think 'try's my favorite thing of yrs that i've read so far, but then i got most of the way into 'guide' and kinda changed my mind. maybe. but they're both amazing. (update, finished guide and am most of the way into period now)
hopefully things will settle into some semblance of normalcy this week so i can get the final draft of that boris post done for you. the strummer essay hangs in a weird sort of limbo between a written outline in my journal and actually getting transcribed to a full piece that i can edit. we'll see what happens. i started work on this semi-autobiographical thing today too, but i'm not really sure where i'm going with it yet. mostly phrasing things in my head to see if it's something worth writing out.
this was like probably the best thing i did all day. i call it 'nobody move or the whisky gets it: a self-portrait.' the model for the photo bled out a couple hours ago, but i am keeping his corpse around as a reminder of the good things we shared. miss you, little buddy!
i did take this other self-portrait the other night, but it was a drunken bathroom mirror sort of thing. i was mainly just fascinated by how low my jeans could hang but still be on, so i documented it for posterity.
also, i think a couple of the soccer players at work today were into me, but that could just be me projecting.
i've blathered on enough i suppose. isn't today the first day of TH? well i hope it as awesome as it should be and you have lots of fun and of course that everyone heaps tons of praise on the show, and the bits you were in and the bits you picked and mostly just you for making such an awesome project happen!
-me.
oh, re: yr conversation with alan. you just confirmed a longstanding theory that i've been harboring re: TMS. i'm really excited to start dissecting it now.
Coop! D-day, yay! I hope it goes awesomely. Well, it will, i'm sure. Meanwhile, i'm off there later today. Byyyee! I shall see you in a big week, with a dumbass partial facial tan and hopefully unimpaired physical capabilities…!
X
Marvelously obscure stuff as always, Dennis.
I loved The Mumps — and All Things Lance Jeez but I miss him. The first person toturn ADD into Performance Art.
The notion of you being frightened off by the spectre fo Death at Circuit parites is pretty funny Dennis. I can see the headline now: "CIRCUIT PARTIES TOO MUCH FOR PUNK ART QUEER KING DENNIS COOPER!"
But I know exactly what you mena. They were all about the same people taking the same drugs to the same effect. Underneath all the fenzy there was an essential jpylessness to them.
Had a great Brithday. As I believ I mentioned Bill and Jai got me a digital camera — which I'm just starting to use. It's very different in feel from my old camera (which broke down three years ago) but I'm sure to get used to it.
Best of all it's quite tine and I can carry it in my shirt pocket.
Here's My Favorite New Website
Hey we were just talking about this!
andHi Dennis, thanks for the Christopher Knowles post; it's a vey nice discovery and I think I'll look for some books on him. I knew the Einstein on the Beach opera and some of the lyrics have always remained in my head. I didn't know the person behind those words. But it's also nice to discovver him because the art-centreof which I'm part 'Etablissement d'en face' in Brussels opens a show with Karl Holmqvist at the end of this week. I don't know if you know him (I guess you will). I would akwardly introduce him as a sort of contemporary concrete poet, if that term is still valuable. I'm not at all a specialist on poetry -not even an amateur- so I wouldn't compare them iediatly but he triggered a certain affinity. Anyway it was a great discovery. All the best, M
That Dead Boys video is cool.
I didn’t get your reference to “younger writers” at first. I just looked back at the interview and I think I found the reason we seem to keep talking past each other. MIke uses the word “descendants” but I think he really means “precursors.” At any rate that was what I was asking about. OK, I know it’s not something like “Bruce Willis is dead” but do you agree that the existence in your novel of an ideal vantage point that a reader can theoretically discover is sort of unexpected in a work of avant garde fiction? (I’m not saying you’re not avant garde.) Is that something you thought about at all? Are there any novels you know of that work in a similar way? Or were you more inspired by other forms of art in this respect, like movies or video games?
funny things going on here in g-land. your hopes re: merkel being weakened have come true. now the guy she didn't want at all will become president after her coalition partner bonded with the opposition against her. the really funny thing is that this stupid affair, which doesn't have any real impact on governmental decisions since the president in germany has no institutional power at all, might actually damage her public image, whereas one catastrophe after another during her current term had left her as popular as ever with those crazy germans that keep living around me. it's really ridiculous.
after i fell sick with a cold i didn't get to see the kawashima film on saturday, sadly. i did make it to "koi ni itaru yamai" last night, however, which, as i learned, refers to "shii ni itaru yamai," the japanese translation of kierkegaard's 'sickness unto death.' this japanese 'sickness unto love' was…well, partly funny but mostly annoying, and my gf and i had a little debate on our way back home whether it was annoying on purpose (my opinion) or just very bad (hers). she may even be right, to be honest. the actors were permanently over-acting, and either they just sat somewhere sulking or staring at a beetle pinned with seven pins onto the bottom of a collector's box, or they were screaming and kicking at each other. i thought the whole story was an illustration of the kind of stupid hysteria that often governs you in the years of your puberty, where you find yourself totally upset about something without even knowing why. but the whole thing admittedly was closer to japanese tv drama than to a fassbinder movie, so perhaps it was just the director's idea of being 'intense.' long story short, i'm really clueless, and reika really hated it. a few weeks ago we went to a performance by chelfitch, which was kind of similar in its giving way to infantilism und stupidity. i enjoyed it, while her face was red with anger. guess i shouldn't drag her along to come and see japanese stuff for a while, haha.
ohio huh? wow. color me surprised.
hi there. yeah oh i know u were joshin. when u call me filthy or perverted or compare me to a slutty gay man, i find it empowering. haha. i'm honored. My mom even called me a perverted man the other day. nothing wrong with knowing how to stimulate the prostate. i just felt like saying all that crap about neo-platonism, just to try to round out my personhood more on the stultifying internet. Did you know now it is officially illegal to stare at anyone for longer than 10 minutes at the Minneapolis airport? Oh Bill T Jones was just here at The Walker performing his new piece. I wanted to go but didnt. I want to save up to go to New York in April for Alex's show. blahblah.
hope u had a good, satisfying day today as the godlike creator that you are. It's very hard work. xx.
Wow, that awesome video of The Cramps (which I’d never seen before) almost brought a tear to my eye. Funnily enough, my latest blog featured a mini-tribute to Lux because earlier this month marked the third anniversary of his death: he died 4 February 2009.
hey dennis. the excitement builds – kind of sick i can't be in paris for the big reveal. hope you enjoy.
i just shot you an email with a question that i somehow seem to think you'll be able to answer at this time when you can probably barely make a window to pee. it's kind of cheeky, but hopefully something you can give a pretty quick yes/no/maybe/are you nuts? answer to and then go about your day. if you could get back to me one way or another it would be super helpful.
anyway – i'm gonna go listen to sonic reducer on repeat and eat a kilo of chocolate biscuits now.
hope all's great, l xx
Yea Ohio!
Hey Dennis, sounds like you are busy. Hope all goes well. I've been feeling stressed but I think I'm overcoming it. Or I think I think I am.
Take Care,
Mark
Yeah, I think you always owe it to yourself to be at least half-way mesmerized. Weekend was pretty fun, like to dazzle myself more often but what you did sounds way more productive. Whatever company made Limbo could do more stuff like that, it was trying a lot of odd things but in a mass-appealing way. Maybe others will follow soon. Frank Jaffe and Luke Munson put me in their recent zine (::which was super awesome::), I did some drawings for it too.
Dennis,
Well, the job's okay. Like I said, I'd rather spend my time reading, dreaming and taking drugs, but I think it would be better in the long run to take the job.
What I'd like is to live alone and be more or less self-sufficient. I can't express how goddamn much I want that. Taking this job is a step in the long term towards that, hopefully, so that is a good thing about it.
It's way better than going to college, as far as I'm concerned.
Most of the time, when I've told people about my woes about not being able to get a job, they suggest "why not go to college?" It's like I'm saying "I'd like to live on my own and not be dependent on other people, as much as I can manage", and they're saying "I hear what you're saying. Here's an idea: Go to college on your parents' dime, so you can financially destroy them, and be beholden to them for the rest of your life, or, if you don't want to do that, you can bury yourself in student debt and spend the next twenty years crawling out of it."
Gee, thanks. Great advice. Instead of solving my current problem, I can make it exponentially worse.
I know they mean well. I don't think people understand what a world of shit going to college would be for me at this point. I'm past the point where I would think of college as some adventure.
I dropped out of high school, and don't regret it a bit. I have dreams almost every night where I am trapped in a class, and the work doesn't make sense, and all I want is to escape out there, into the wide open space.
I guess I see it as a trap. I'd be caught in a life of debt and career.
I guess working at a job is a kind of trap, but a temporary one, and one that accrues savings instead of debt. It at least has the promise of escape.
Anyway, recently, college has been put forth as my only option by the college recommenders, because I supposedly wouldn't be able to get a bearable job without it, so now that I have this opportunity, I'm going to seize it.
Long story short, this job > college. For me.
Anyway… yeah.
Gottfried Benn. His poetry is highly rated by people with good taste in poetry. I think I was just not in a receptive mood, or the essay I read was one of his lesser works. I want him to be a great lost pessimist philosopher. I skipped ahead and didn't read the introduction, and I think it might help if I went back and learned more about him. He seems like an interesting character, in any case.
hey dennis!!
how's it going?!?! man all that buzz about the pompidou thing is so freaking cool!! wish i could be there!
florida has been pretty good recently, i reprinted the first issue of the zine which i'm excited about! Lots of people were bugging me, so I decided to do it 🙂 It really is amazing revisiting it, because i really do feel like issue 2 is a huge step up 🙂 But i love luke's writing and a lot of the stuff in the first….
speaking of luke, we're still anxiously awaiting the college decisions,,, he's busy finding a job to save up some money for the move and he might end up working at waffle house!!! Which is like a dream come true for me! Man can you imagine a trained waffle house chef being your boyfriend?!?!? I mean he'll be the best egg cooker ever!!!! Not to mention what he could do to a pile of hash browns 🙂
gives me the chills just thinking about it!
i've been talking to this kid lee that is really cool and goes to school in MA. he might post on here soon because he has a cool idea for a "day"… he's a writer and is gonna contribute to issue 3! He's super into music and might do a piece on queer music… i've been helping him with his work on a piece on the evolution of queer cinema!
anyway i really do hope the fest is going great, i can't wait to see all the pictures!!!
xxfrank
I'm no longer sure how I would classify Curtis politically after seeing ALL WATCHED OVER BY MACHINES OF LOVING GRACE. He's scathing about global capitalism and attempts to improve it (whether by Ayn Rand or Bill Clinton, although I sense a tinge of sympathy for the latter), but he seems deeply skeptical about attempts to find alternatives to it, whether they be hippie communes, Christian charity or revolts in Eastern Europe, Central Asia or Iran. The film seems extremely pessimistic about the possibility of overthrowing the human race's inclinations towards hierarchy. Anyway, as an anarchist, I think you'd find it quite interesting even if you disagree with Curtis' conclusions.
Jeff, It’s sad but I agree with you that college seems to have become a debt trap. Personally I blame capitalism. Good luck, and congratulations!
Dennis, my dad used to brag that in the 1970's he had 4 speakers set up in his room so that, at the very end of the third part of ELP's song "Karn Evil 9," when you head these weird computer noises going back and forth from speaker to speaker, he could hear it, like, in quad or something. I guess it was strange that I was listening to prog rock in the 1980's, when it was so unfashionable. Though my mother would often play albums by Sting and The Police for my brothers and I.
Jeff, yeah, I don't think you missed much by not doing college. Hell, it took me 5 years to graduate, I've done jackshit with my diploma (a degree in English), and I'm still paying off my student loans! Last year I considered going back to college: some vague idea of "studying computers." But then I thought, "fuck it." One of my biggest regrets in my life is that I've never lived on my own, that I'm not self-sufficient. But these last few years, what with my poor health and, more recently, the fact I don't even work full-time anymore: I've just been in a state of constant despair recently.
Recently my dad suggested I become a theologian. That's an idea I've toyed with for awhile, but in today's job market theologians aren't in big demand. And it's the kind of thing you have to go to school for, naturally.
We can't stop whip lashing our heads with our neck handles!
i hope 'teenage hallucination' is going well (i'm really impressed that you managed to fit in such a brilliant post and p.s. in your 'work break' – wow!!) thanks so much for the lovely p.s. the other day – no news from me really; i'm still completely sleep-deprived but loving being a mummy more than anything in the whole wide world; i'm on research leave for a year so that's making things a bit easier, i'm dreading going back to the 2-hour commute each day on top of no sleep. i'm so sorry that you've been feeling down, though, dennis; i really hope that you start to feel better soon. all my love to you and take lots of care xx