Hello, friends and interested strangers. With the dawn of a new decade, I leave Time is your weakness behind me for a fresh page. This blog spanned most of the years I spent in Seattle, and as I am now safely ensconced in Michigan again, I figured I'd start over. I covered a lot of ground here, a lot of very sticky, constantly-shifting ground and perhaps at times I was too honest. Despite my best attempts at fulfilling my New Years Eve wish of total control, I expect I'll continue to jump to new conclusions, vent childishly and alienate those who I seek to draw nearer. So update your links/favorites/followings accordingly, or otherwise, thanks for listening.
I WALK ON THE OUTSIDE.
Tuesday, December 29, 2009
The End Times LPs have arrived and currently sit packed snugly in boxes in a corner of my library (yes, that’s right, we call the unheated back room of the house our library, because that’s where we put the bookshelves and the record collection) ... no covers made yet, as everyone’s favorite local indie screenprinter dropped the ball for me and I ended up having to make new plans, but thanks to the limitless patience of my hero Pat Bills we do have a finished design that will be produced in Nashville, Tennessee. Life is constant compromise, unless you’re a dick about it. There must be a lesson here somewhere ...
I’ve had a lot of time to think about this record, what it means as a document of the past three years, what it might have been if it had been completed as originally planned and whether or not any of that matters. Of course, it doesn’t matter. Outside of a small circle of friends, These Are The End Times will be accepted at face value as just another product, one more quiet shout in a crowded, impossibly noisy landscape overrun with more media than anyone can absorb, offered to the marketplace on a format only the most stubborn music fans cling to, but that’s okay. I’ve had several bands break up immediately after recording a full-length album, only to see our record labels (wisely) opt out of their promise to produce and distribute an unmarketable release from a defunct act with regional-at-best appeal. Would the alternative nation have embraced Lover’s Wrists, Fighter’s Wrists without, at the very least, midwestern touring and a continued loyal local fanbase? I don’t know, but I do hope Trixie Rex would have spelled my last name correctly on the insert.
This record was too important to shrug off. A physical residue must exist to prove we walked the earth. We can provide the interested with spectral versions of the songs for transitory enjoyment, but once the computers finally become cognizant and commit mass suicide for their part in mankind’s downfall (within our lifetimes, friends, believe it), MP3s will disappear as completely as any anonymous 15th century troubadour’s favorite tune, and with generations raised on instantly accessible information, do you think anyone’s memories are strong enough to retain that which was never necessary to retain? Compact discs litter the earth, and are considered by most these days as a disposable vector for sounds -- buy, burn and then stack, sell or destroy. But vinyl collectors, for all their faults, they keep their records, usually in alphabetical order and cased in protective plastic sleeves, even the titles they’ve never actually listened to, and when the revolution comes all we’ll need is a sewing needle and a paper cone to access the precious information locked in those mysterious grooves. Of course, you’ll ruin the record at the same time if you do that, but I think you see my point.
So when I consider this record, I must herald the contributions of my partner and friend Tyson Lynn, the quiet third of the band who contributed a bottomless well of moral support as well as the glue that held the whole project together even when the seams strained hard enough to bleed. While I provided the rhythmic skeleton of each song, Tyson was in charge of melodic counterpoint, and he did so with an ethereal, eccentric style of finger-picked slide guitar that complemented my own whatever-it-is better than anyone before, and I fear better than anyone to come. As with most of the best artists, he is largely self-taught, coming to the band with rudimentary skills but finding his own way to communicate through perseverance and dedication, developing a style of slide guitar closer to the gentle pluck of a harp than the sharp country twang most players seek. There were many crooked notes and jagged time signatures along the road, but Tyson always found his own individual melodies within the confines of my chords, and it’s only now that I can see that the true formula for the End Times wasn’t me and a broad plus Tyson, but me and Tyson plus a broad.
I’ve pontificated loudly and often about the importance of the feminine quotient of the End Times here on this stupid blog and in countless drunken bar conversations, and who could blame me? All of the singers we’ve worked with (in End Times, the Blacktree Singers and Desperado) have been fascinating women in their own utterly different fashions, and anyone who knows me knows how little I care for my fellow males ... other men, who needs them, all they do is get in my way most of the time, everyone knows that women are far superior as companions and confidantes, lovers and friends, partners and nemeses, nearly any relationship can be enhanced with an extra X chromosome. I mean, I get it, some men are beautiful animals with a special energy that can’t be ignored (believe me, I understand better than I like to admit), but far as I’m concerned there’s only one thing men have that women don’t, and I already have one. More importantly, writing for the female voice matured my songwriting in ways I never anticipated, opening me up to colors and shades I hadn’t been able to express before, and the very fact that I can write a sentence as seriously gay as this one without remorse should be sufficient enough testimony.
But the fact is that without Tyson, the End Times would have began and ended with Kate and I sitting around smoking cigarettes and telling each other the same amusing anecdotes over and over again for a few months before the whole project just floated away. Tyson was solid in a way that we were not, and his presence made us a band. His initial contribution was volunteering a digital four-track recorder to capture our first fleeting bleats, cementing what might have been just a passing fancy into something a little more official. When I learned he owned a lapsteel guitar, I invited him to bring it to the next session -- he demurred, saying he didn’t know how to play it, but I figured that as long as he could slide the bar up and down the neck and scrape his nails across the strings we’d have a little extra texture to our cheap little recordings. Tyson was indeed a rudimentary player, but as I stated before, he doubled and tripled his skills within the span of a year and before I knew it, he was good enough that I feared another band might snap him up. When Kate was no longer available to us, it was Tyson who convinced me that the sing/strum/slide lineup we had was worth preserving (after I quixotically considered replacing her with a choir or restructuring the project into an instrumental noise-fest ala Gone), and he was right ... I didn’t believe anyone else would be interested, but within twelve hours of placing an ad we had attracted Abigail, and within two weeks of that she was making regular bus trips to Seattle from Olympia for rehearsals, within another month she was living in town and working in the same office as me, and within three months we were back playing shows. It felt like fate and I like to believe that it was, but if not for Tyson’s belief in the band I would have probably allowed despair to swallow everything we had worked towards.
Tyson and I communicate largely through emails and text messages, as we both tend towards shyness and I suspect we share an ability to express ourselves more deeply with words (on that subject, he writes a very good music column for the Seattle P.I., even if there isn’t nearly enough metal coverage). I think I’ve already shared most of these sentiments with him, and I hope he isn’t embarrassed by my stating them so relatively publicly, but I thought it was important to do so at least once. I promise it won’t happen again, because my New Year’s resolution is to stop telling people how I feel about things. From now on I’m saving it all for the stage.
I’ve had a lot of time to think about this record, what it means as a document of the past three years, what it might have been if it had been completed as originally planned and whether or not any of that matters. Of course, it doesn’t matter. Outside of a small circle of friends, These Are The End Times will be accepted at face value as just another product, one more quiet shout in a crowded, impossibly noisy landscape overrun with more media than anyone can absorb, offered to the marketplace on a format only the most stubborn music fans cling to, but that’s okay. I’ve had several bands break up immediately after recording a full-length album, only to see our record labels (wisely) opt out of their promise to produce and distribute an unmarketable release from a defunct act with regional-at-best appeal. Would the alternative nation have embraced Lover’s Wrists, Fighter’s Wrists without, at the very least, midwestern touring and a continued loyal local fanbase? I don’t know, but I do hope Trixie Rex would have spelled my last name correctly on the insert.
This record was too important to shrug off. A physical residue must exist to prove we walked the earth. We can provide the interested with spectral versions of the songs for transitory enjoyment, but once the computers finally become cognizant and commit mass suicide for their part in mankind’s downfall (within our lifetimes, friends, believe it), MP3s will disappear as completely as any anonymous 15th century troubadour’s favorite tune, and with generations raised on instantly accessible information, do you think anyone’s memories are strong enough to retain that which was never necessary to retain? Compact discs litter the earth, and are considered by most these days as a disposable vector for sounds -- buy, burn and then stack, sell or destroy. But vinyl collectors, for all their faults, they keep their records, usually in alphabetical order and cased in protective plastic sleeves, even the titles they’ve never actually listened to, and when the revolution comes all we’ll need is a sewing needle and a paper cone to access the precious information locked in those mysterious grooves. Of course, you’ll ruin the record at the same time if you do that, but I think you see my point.
So when I consider this record, I must herald the contributions of my partner and friend Tyson Lynn, the quiet third of the band who contributed a bottomless well of moral support as well as the glue that held the whole project together even when the seams strained hard enough to bleed. While I provided the rhythmic skeleton of each song, Tyson was in charge of melodic counterpoint, and he did so with an ethereal, eccentric style of finger-picked slide guitar that complemented my own whatever-it-is better than anyone before, and I fear better than anyone to come. As with most of the best artists, he is largely self-taught, coming to the band with rudimentary skills but finding his own way to communicate through perseverance and dedication, developing a style of slide guitar closer to the gentle pluck of a harp than the sharp country twang most players seek. There were many crooked notes and jagged time signatures along the road, but Tyson always found his own individual melodies within the confines of my chords, and it’s only now that I can see that the true formula for the End Times wasn’t me and a broad plus Tyson, but me and Tyson plus a broad. I’ve pontificated loudly and often about the importance of the feminine quotient of the End Times here on this stupid blog and in countless drunken bar conversations, and who could blame me? All of the singers we’ve worked with (in End Times, the Blacktree Singers and Desperado) have been fascinating women in their own utterly different fashions, and anyone who knows me knows how little I care for my fellow males ... other men, who needs them, all they do is get in my way most of the time, everyone knows that women are far superior as companions and confidantes, lovers and friends, partners and nemeses, nearly any relationship can be enhanced with an extra X chromosome. I mean, I get it, some men are beautiful animals with a special energy that can’t be ignored (believe me, I understand better than I like to admit), but far as I’m concerned there’s only one thing men have that women don’t, and I already have one. More importantly, writing for the female voice matured my songwriting in ways I never anticipated, opening me up to colors and shades I hadn’t been able to express before, and the very fact that I can write a sentence as seriously gay as this one without remorse should be sufficient enough testimony.
But the fact is that without Tyson, the End Times would have began and ended with Kate and I sitting around smoking cigarettes and telling each other the same amusing anecdotes over and over again for a few months before the whole project just floated away. Tyson was solid in a way that we were not, and his presence made us a band. His initial contribution was volunteering a digital four-track recorder to capture our first fleeting bleats, cementing what might have been just a passing fancy into something a little more official. When I learned he owned a lapsteel guitar, I invited him to bring it to the next session -- he demurred, saying he didn’t know how to play it, but I figured that as long as he could slide the bar up and down the neck and scrape his nails across the strings we’d have a little extra texture to our cheap little recordings. Tyson was indeed a rudimentary player, but as I stated before, he doubled and tripled his skills within the span of a year and before I knew it, he was good enough that I feared another band might snap him up. When Kate was no longer available to us, it was Tyson who convinced me that the sing/strum/slide lineup we had was worth preserving (after I quixotically considered replacing her with a choir or restructuring the project into an instrumental noise-fest ala Gone), and he was right ... I didn’t believe anyone else would be interested, but within twelve hours of placing an ad we had attracted Abigail, and within two weeks of that she was making regular bus trips to Seattle from Olympia for rehearsals, within another month she was living in town and working in the same office as me, and within three months we were back playing shows. It felt like fate and I like to believe that it was, but if not for Tyson’s belief in the band I would have probably allowed despair to swallow everything we had worked towards.
Tyson and I communicate largely through emails and text messages, as we both tend towards shyness and I suspect we share an ability to express ourselves more deeply with words (on that subject, he writes a very good music column for the Seattle P.I., even if there isn’t nearly enough metal coverage). I think I’ve already shared most of these sentiments with him, and I hope he isn’t embarrassed by my stating them so relatively publicly, but I thought it was important to do so at least once. I promise it won’t happen again, because my New Year’s resolution is to stop telling people how I feel about things. From now on I’m saving it all for the stage.
Sunday, December 13, 2009
I woke up in a cave
Surrounded by broken skulls and pine needles
I saw strange electronic equipment stacked against one wall
The technology obviously highly advanced
But each piece was scratched by rust and decayed by time
A shaft of sunlight stabbed through a hole in the ceiling
But it would not reflect against the dull, grey metal
The craftmanship it took to make these machines was apparent
Imagination combined with a supernatural understanding of science
And then the neglected fruit went unused underground
Until I came along
Friday, December 11, 2009
Sunday, December 06, 2009
Minor rehauling of the official End Times website to make way for no-cost MP3 downloads of each song from our debut LP, These Are The End Times, still expected to become available at the beginning of 2010. Test pressings sounded fine, so I'll have half a thousand recds on my doorstep sometime in the next week or two. More soon, of course ...
Jeni Lee Richey and The Great Tribulation have three shows lined up for January and February, including the first annual Mark Lansing 50th Anniversary Roast at the Elbow Room in Ypsilanti, MI ... anyone who appreciates Deming should mark their calendar for 2-19-2010 and make the scene to slap a genius on the back and see the debut of his latest band, Mark Lansing and His Biscuit Eaters (featuring former members of Piss At Midnight, Bad Oskar and Down MF). Cover ought to be reasonable. As for JLR & TGT, filling a setlist was easy, but next comes the slow, grueling rehearsal process as we pit pedal steel against twelve strummed strings and find common ground between the beards and the sideburns. Check out our preliminary work (recorded by Tim Pak at Woodshed Studio in Detroit) on MySpace, two songs by JLR that run the emotional gamut from vengeful to defeated, or fan us on Facebook, if you're one of the 350 million.
Jeni Lee Richey and The Great Tribulation have three shows lined up for January and February, including the first annual Mark Lansing 50th Anniversary Roast at the Elbow Room in Ypsilanti, MI ... anyone who appreciates Deming should mark their calendar for 2-19-2010 and make the scene to slap a genius on the back and see the debut of his latest band, Mark Lansing and His Biscuit Eaters (featuring former members of Piss At Midnight, Bad Oskar and Down MF). Cover ought to be reasonable. As for JLR & TGT, filling a setlist was easy, but next comes the slow, grueling rehearsal process as we pit pedal steel against twelve strummed strings and find common ground between the beards and the sideburns. Check out our preliminary work (recorded by Tim Pak at Woodshed Studio in Detroit) on MySpace, two songs by JLR that run the emotional gamut from vengeful to defeated, or fan us on Facebook, if you're one of the 350 million.
Friday, November 27, 2009
All this plus Beatles cartoons, naked girls falling down stairs and other ghastly sights available now at Frenzy of the Visible.
Tuesday, November 24, 2009
Friday, November 20, 2009
Today marks the 25th anniversary of me seeing Slayer play at a tiny Ukrainian wedding hall in Flint, Michigan. As the first time I had ever seen slam dancing and headbanging in real life, it was an important formative experience, not to mention one of the coolest dates I've ever gone on (hi Melanie!). Incredibly, video evidence of this gig exists on YouTube ... sound and picture quality is dodgy, so if you want a better idea of what I heard that night, I recommend downloading this brutal live bootleg of Slayer playing in Holland a couple months later.
Perhaps it's obvious, but we've got internet at home again. So I might answer emails quicker from now on. Or maybe I won't. I'm unpredictable.
Or am I? Check out these great movies that Hulu posted while I was unplugged for the past few months. Seriously, you haven't lived until you've seen a snowboarding-themed slasher film, totally worth 90 minutes of your day.
Friday, November 13, 2009
Third time's the charm ... HAPPY FRIDAY THE 13TH TO ONE AND ALL.
Lori and I are all moved into the South House and aside from needing a few bookshelves, a futon for visitors, a dresser and maybe a couple more lamps, we've got the place right side up. Words can't cover the relief I feel from finally landing somewhere ... another month in that dingy little apartment with all of our possessions in boxes and I would have lost my mind (again). Still waiting for landline service to start (I have some angry phone calls to make later) so we can set up internet at home, and our landlord has to replace an ailing clothes dryer that had become a fire hazard -- last night the two of us dragged a replacement up and down the basement stairs, learning too late that it wouldn't fit into the laundry room. Oh, and I guess we need curtains too, as our kitchen window displays us to the neighborhood like a big screen TV (sometimes strangers wave as they drive by). But I am not complaining, we're fitting into the new space with precision and I feel a world of weight lifting from my shoulders, I've let go of a lot of baggage that should have been left in Seattle (I'm keeping some of it in case I decide to visit again). For three months and change I've been in an uncomfortable limbo, unable to either begin anew or bid farewell to a significant slice of my life, but none of that even feels like an issue anymore. Did I ever really leave Michigan in the first place? It seems ridiculous to me now that I could have ...
The second step in adding a period to my sentence out West will be the End Times LP, which currently is experiencing production delays (like I said, I have some angry phone calls to make) that I hope can be rectified today (UPDATE -- I have been temporarily placated regarding the vinyl, but I am still wondering when the graphic designer will resurface). I suppose I can take solace in the fact that no one is waiting for this record, so I don't have to worry about missing any deadlines, but as my musical activities in the Dirty Mitten increase, I don't want to lose sight of completing this project properly. Next weekend I'm hitting the studio with Jeni Lee to play on a couple of her songs, and as we add percussion and steel to whatever it is we're doing together, we both glow ever brighter with confidence.
The Reigning Sound hits Detroit this coming Monday, and I'll be a big stupid girl if I don't go. Perhaps this preemptive public shaming will do the trick ... make the scene if you can, it's worth your while.
Lori and I are all moved into the South House and aside from needing a few bookshelves, a futon for visitors, a dresser and maybe a couple more lamps, we've got the place right side up. Words can't cover the relief I feel from finally landing somewhere ... another month in that dingy little apartment with all of our possessions in boxes and I would have lost my mind (again). Still waiting for landline service to start (I have some angry phone calls to make later) so we can set up internet at home, and our landlord has to replace an ailing clothes dryer that had become a fire hazard -- last night the two of us dragged a replacement up and down the basement stairs, learning too late that it wouldn't fit into the laundry room. Oh, and I guess we need curtains too, as our kitchen window displays us to the neighborhood like a big screen TV (sometimes strangers wave as they drive by). But I am not complaining, we're fitting into the new space with precision and I feel a world of weight lifting from my shoulders, I've let go of a lot of baggage that should have been left in Seattle (I'm keeping some of it in case I decide to visit again). For three months and change I've been in an uncomfortable limbo, unable to either begin anew or bid farewell to a significant slice of my life, but none of that even feels like an issue anymore. Did I ever really leave Michigan in the first place? It seems ridiculous to me now that I could have ...
The second step in adding a period to my sentence out West will be the End Times LP, which currently is experiencing production delays (like I said, I have some angry phone calls to make) that I hope can be rectified today (UPDATE -- I have been temporarily placated regarding the vinyl, but I am still wondering when the graphic designer will resurface). I suppose I can take solace in the fact that no one is waiting for this record, so I don't have to worry about missing any deadlines, but as my musical activities in the Dirty Mitten increase, I don't want to lose sight of completing this project properly. Next weekend I'm hitting the studio with Jeni Lee to play on a couple of her songs, and as we add percussion and steel to whatever it is we're doing together, we both glow ever brighter with confidence.
The Reigning Sound hits Detroit this coming Monday, and I'll be a big stupid girl if I don't go. Perhaps this preemptive public shaming will do the trick ... make the scene if you can, it's worth your while.
Monday, November 02, 2009
Wednesday, October 28, 2009
THE POP TARTS, SUMMER 1994
"This isn't a joke!" -- Soren Davis
Thanks Henry. This is the transitional band I played in with Soren, Jim Diamond and Tim Ford for one glorious summer. El Smasho had just broken up (badly) and Diamond had just returned to Lansing from Austin, where everything had gone wrong, so we all healed together ... I learned a lot just by watching Jim play, and when the Pop Tarts were finished, Soren asked me to join The Apollo Nine, which is where I learned everything else I know by watching Aaron Vanderpool.
I had already met my future wife Lori by this point (at the first Pop Tarts gig a week or so before), but this is the show where I noticed her in the way a man notices a woman. She still had braces then, but she was essentially legal (19 years old) ... anyhow, we didn't get together for at least a year after this. Lori is the girl in the blue and white shirt on my side of the "stage."
We played many bigger and better shows than this (our house party appearances generated genuine teenage mayhem), but we're lucky this one got captured ... the grand opening for Gen X, an East Lansing comic book/video store, where I first encountered the Something Weird Video company and realized that everything I ever dreamed of as a child was possible.
"This isn't a joke!" -- Soren Davis
Thanks Henry. This is the transitional band I played in with Soren, Jim Diamond and Tim Ford for one glorious summer. El Smasho had just broken up (badly) and Diamond had just returned to Lansing from Austin, where everything had gone wrong, so we all healed together ... I learned a lot just by watching Jim play, and when the Pop Tarts were finished, Soren asked me to join The Apollo Nine, which is where I learned everything else I know by watching Aaron Vanderpool.
I had already met my future wife Lori by this point (at the first Pop Tarts gig a week or so before), but this is the show where I noticed her in the way a man notices a woman. She still had braces then, but she was essentially legal (19 years old) ... anyhow, we didn't get together for at least a year after this. Lori is the girl in the blue and white shirt on my side of the "stage."
We played many bigger and better shows than this (our house party appearances generated genuine teenage mayhem), but we're lucky this one got captured ... the grand opening for Gen X, an East Lansing comic book/video store, where I first encountered the Something Weird Video company and realized that everything I ever dreamed of as a child was possible.
Tuesday, October 27, 2009
We got it. Lori and I signed a lease last night for the house I mentioned a few posts ago, after a long, frustrating wait ... the owners aren't landlords, they're a young couple with a gaggle of kids who outgrew the place and moved across the street, so they were less eager to rent than to sell. We liked the place enough to start the process of making an offer before another buyer beat us to it. Lucky for us but not for them, the financing fell through and the owners decided to cut their losses and rent to us for six months before putting the house on the market again after the spring thaw. If we love it as much as we think we might, we'll put an actual offer on the table, but that's way up in the air. It's a small house, one true bedroom and two extra rooms that lead into each other without doors -- they're marketing the place as a two bedroom, but those other rooms don't provide much privacy, so they'll be a library and an office for us. A basement again after so many years, plus a big private backyard where Lori can garden (if we decide to stay, that is) and a reasonable walk to campus. It's been a decade since I lived in a true house, not since leaving Michigan in the first place, and I never really got used to the constant flow of apartments I endured in Chicago and Seattle. We'll still be looking for a permanent home, just to keep our options open for the next half a year in case something else smacks us in the face, but this place is a perfect location, decent size and in our current price range, plus we both responded to it immediately, so perhaps South Boulevard will end up being home.
My debut with Jeni Lee went fine, no meltdowns of any sort. It's time to build again ...
My debut with Jeni Lee went fine, no meltdowns of any sort. It's time to build again ...
Wednesday, October 21, 2009
I won't be there. I'll have school the next morning.
I am indeed taking a class, virtually, through Washtenaw Community College with hopes of professional advancement. It all starts today at 3:00pm, and since it's online only, I'll have to do my business in public at the coffeeshop of my choice (although there's a certain laundromat with wifi I've been frequenting lately that's much more comfortable). I am a very bad student, barely managed my college degree, so this will be an uphill battle for me. So why not add to the stress of moving cross country to the state I once fled forever, searching for a permanent home before the next month is up, sorting out my employment possibilities in a depressed local economy and all the other stuff that I'd rather not get into right now? At least I'll have lots of time to procrastinate.
Friday night I'm going to be joining Jeni Lee Richey onstage somewhere in Plymouth for four songs (maybe five? the new one is coming together quickly). This will be my first public performance in Michigan in a decade, not since the End Times 1999's last show in Lansing, which I played with my back to the audience after some unpleasant inter-band tension. Here's hoping Jeni Lee and I can make it through the rest of the week, at least ... anyhow, I'm not going to tell you where this place is, I'm not asking you to come, just making conversation. What's up with you?
Sunday, October 18, 2009
Thursday, October 15, 2009
Tuesday, October 13, 2009
My latest favorite song, "War Eternal" by Cirith Ungol. You can get the whole record here ... while you're checking out that particular heavy blog, don't miss Satan's Massacre (imagine two 14-year old nerds trying too hard to sound evil) and Black Task (pretty ragin' occult-themed thrash).
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