Bill is a bunny

The Blue Mickey

2006-04-05T23:08:00.000-07:00

If you want to talk about my sister and me you have to mention my brother. He was about seven years older than us and seemed like the biggest kid in the world. Gigantic in everything he did for us and said to us. There aren't too many memories left now, but the ones that are there resonate through my brain like fading chimes from a church bell.

We would all wrestle on the floor of our old house after dinner. He was much bigger than us but we never got hurt. He even let us win. Sometimes. Mostly I ended up at the bottom of a dogpile, screaming, "Momma. they're turning me into a sandwhich!"

We would take baths together, three in the tub. The bathroom in the old house was a warm pink that matched the water in the tub. Our brother told the most amazing stories about the world around us. Details we never could see from our vantage points behind our mother's skirt. We were stunned by the freedom he commanded on our trips with her to the grocery store. It seemed like he cold go anwhere and do anything. Seeing him on his bike on the weekends leaving the carport was like watching a ship leaving port. I always wished I could go with him on his travels around the neighbor. What did he do out there? What did he see? And why wasn't he scared of that great big world he moved through with such ease?

Once during one of those end of the day baths he produced two plastic balls from his pants laying on the tiles next to the tub. He handed one to my sister and one to me. After fumbling with the slipper things for a minute trying to open them he took the domes back and popped off the bottoms. Inside one was a pink, rubber Minnie Mouse which he gave to my sister. Inside the other was a blue rubber Mickey Mouse he placed in my hands. It wasn't our birthdays. It wasn't Christmas. He just felt like getting us soemthing. I couldn't have loved him more.

He was killed in 1983. He was on his bike, riding back to tell our mother he was going to the levee with some friends. He didn't want her to worry. A truck backed out of a driveway and knocked him off the bike and onto his head. They kept him aive in the hospital for a couple of days then pulled the plug. I don't know what happened to the guy driving the truck. I used to want to know but now I don't. I used to want revenge or some kind of confrontation with the man who killed my brother. My feelings changed about that. But I still miss him very much.

In the years following our brother's death, my sister and I tried to understand why he was taken away from us without much success. It seemed so meaningless, so pointless to have him removed from our lives that way. We both developed an interest i the supernatural. We read about the lives of the saints and the connection between this world and the world after this one. Maybe we could see him again before we died. I even believed I did see him occasionally in my bedroom . He would never say anything, no matter how many questions I asked. My brother would just smile.

I was eventually given his old room to sleep in but had a lot of difficulty doing that. My sister's room across the hall had a view of a baseball field and I would often join her there to watch the games rather than sleep in his old bed. I had nightmares that there were large crawfish at the foot of the bed where the covers were tucked in that would drag me down and eat me. I slept for years in a little ball across the pillows. I recently found a place mat in my parents' kitchen with a close up photograph of a crawfish in clover that probably gave me the crazy idea. At least part of it.

My world view became very fearful while my sister seemed to become more daring. She learned to ride her bike at six and embraced her newfound independence. She loved summer camp and sports. She slept over with friends and became very outgoing. I regressed into a world of television and homesickness at the very thought of leaving my mother. Camp was a nightmare for me, filled with tears and longing for the security of home. To look at my sister you would think she never wanted to leave.

As different as we were, my sister and I grew very close. She took over our brother's role as protector and confidant. She comforted me when my parents took vacations and soothed my nightmares. Whenever my father would come upstairs after hearing me crying out in the middle of the night he would always ay the same thing. "All the doors and windows are locked. Sugar (our golden retriever) is outside. (Your sister) is down the hall. Nothing can hurt you." Knowing that she was down the hall was always the most comforting thing and was always saved for last.

In our new house my sister and I shared the upstairs. There was an intercom installed by the previous owner that became a symbol of our parents omniscent prescence. There voices would boom over the speakers in the ceiling telling us to be quiet and get to bed. We rallied together to repeal bedtime. Sneaking back and forth to each others rooms was a daring adventure, every creak in the floorboards a potential revelation of our disobedience. We began to pretend we were in hiding like Anne Frank and her family in the attic. We shared secret knowledge from the school yard. We confessed the inner workings of our contemporaries. We found each other fascinatingly alien yet somehow the same.

We fought often. My sister was twice my size for most of our childhood and her natural predispoisiton to sports gave her the advantage. She was more of a biter and a scratcher, thank God. Frequent bruises would have been to revealing. The thick red lines on my arms could be attirbuted to cats and the dog. I think our battles came from my sister's frustration with our parents. She fought with them often, making me quite terrified. I was also in awe of her bravery. Refusal to eat aspargus seemed unthinkable to me, but she would sit defiantly at her place at the table, staring at her plate for an hour rather than give in. She was a freedom fighter in our cause. She was a hero.

One Christmas our parents gave us a small, plastic Chistmas tree to put upstairs and decorate. We did so with gusto, hanging all manner of things upon its wire branches. We didn't have much money for presents to put under our tree. There really wasn't any need, since our parents would be littering the floor around the real tree downstairs with gifts. But we wanted something for each other. After some consultation we decided to wrap our rubber Mickey and Minnie up and give them to each other again. And we did just that. I still have that blue mouse, but I don't just think of my brother when I look at it anymore.

Start at the beginning. It's a very good place to start.

2006-04-03T22:40:00.000-07:00

Walking downstairs in my parents' house is an emotional experience for me. Invariably, I flash on myself, five years old, rushing downstairs with a carefully selected group of stuffed animals wrapped in my blanket. I meet my mother in the kitchen and ask if we can play the "game" now, please.

"Yes, baby. You go set up."

I rush to the front room of our new house and spread out the blanket on the carpet by the window. The sun comes in from the front yard so brightly you have to squint your eyes. As I wait for my mother, I do just that, making the sunlight refract and shift like the the red brakelights of the cars on the highway as they fly by through the night. I wish I could make my mother see what I see then, see the sunlight through my squinted eyes. If I could do this to the light for her she would know just how amazing I really am, just as amazing as she is. We will be able to understand the secrets we've kept from each other and share them at last.

When my mother arrives she asks me what I am thinking about, looking out the window. I tell her I am not looking out the window. The first time she asked me what I was thinking I was getting a haircut. She looked up at me in the barber's chair and asked me what was wrong.
"Nothing's wrong, mom."
"You just looked so serious. What were you thinking about?"
"I wasn't thinking about anything."

But I was. I was thinking about her.

Deciding not to push her question further, my mother sits on the floor next to me and we begin divying up the animals. The stuffed rabbit, Hippity-hop, always goes to my mother. She can make his voice perfectly. Whenever she and my father go away on vacations I try to make Hippity-hop talk to me and remind me not to cry, that everything will be fine as soon as they get back. And they are coming back. I can't believe him when I know its my voice and not his voice. Not the voice my mother makes for him, gives to him.

We begin to play the "game" now. The animals move through a world on the blanket comprised of our street, the school, the foreign places my grandmother visits, space. Heaven and earth together on a square of cloth. We talk to each other through our animals, exploring this world together and inventing it at the same time. I have a similar game that I play with my grandfather when I visit him. But I always bring action figures for that game. I would never bring my grandfather a stuffed animal to give a voice.

As my mother and I play our game, I steal looks at her to gauge how much longer we have. Once breakfast comes we have to stop, she has work and I have school. But this time together feels like forever with my mother, my best friend, the only person in the world who knows something of how amazing I am. Everyone must know how incredible she is, but I am far too small to pay much attention to. But they'll see one day. And when they do my mother will say to everyone, "I knew he was amazing. I knew because he shared it with me first."

But now it's time to put away the blanket, roll up the world and everything and everyone in it. It is time for breakfast.

The project for next week.

2006-03-31T15:56:00.000-08:00

So, it's like this: I'll be posting here all of next week about the women in my life. My mother, my sister, friends and (here's the juicy part) my ex-girlfriends. I hate to pull the leash on y'all so soon after a pitch like that, but don't expect me to tell tales out of class about what we got up to in the bedroom or how they all fucked me over so bad that I became the misanthropic shithead you know today. If anything this is supposed to be a reevaluation of what I have and had in the opposite sex. So, there will be more soul bearing than ass bearing. Hopefully, this will be a binge and purge kinda thing, but without the messy vomit all over the bathroom. It'll just be in my heart. And now it will be out there for all of y'all to scrutinize and dissect. I'll give you one heads up: I'm a bit of a prick to my women. Of coure I don't mean to say that I OWN them. "MY women", sheesh, who do I think I am?

Here's to you, Mr. Robinson.

2006-03-20T12:21:00.000-08:00

Today was the first day of LEAP testing for Monroe City Schools and my first experience with it ever, discounting whatever the hell I did when I was in 7th Grade. Since I have no proper teaching credentials I got to be a hall monitor, which basically means I sat in the hallway and read Patrick McCabe's The Butcher Boy for about five hours without a cigarette. Occasionally I got to watch a tracher's class while they went to the can or whatever but pretty much all I did was read. Which was kind of nice. Except for one moment...

The school's custodian came onto wing 4 and started to shoot the shit with me. Just regular stuff about what a nightmare this week was going to be, yadda, yadda. Then the conversation turned to marriage and children. I said I didn't have any children and had no intention of getting married anytime in the near future.

"I understand that."

I mean, we spend more time with these kids than their parents do in most cases and I can't imagine having one of these guys myself.

"Yeah, I drive the bus in the afternoon and there's one little guy that just acts the fool everyday. He's the same little guy that drew that painting on your shirt there (we all had to wear these Lee Eagles Always Pass ["LEAP", get it?] t-shirts to school today to motivate the kids. The painting on the front shows three bald eagles sitting in desks taking the LEAP and thinking about their diplomas) You know what I didn't know that thing the eagles was thinking of was supposed to be a diploma. I thought it was a cigarette and what kind of cigarette you going to pass? But this kid that drew that he is just a handful. Just talking and playing and acting out on that bus. Everyday. And his parents won't let you do anything to him. I've turned that kid off the bus five times but it never does any good."

Yeah, you got that right. I mean what do they expect us to do with these kids when they won't do what we say? Talk it out with them? You can't reason with a 7th grader.

"Uh-huh."

I'm not saying that I'll never have kids of my own but it just seems like a full time job and I wouldn't want to do it halfway the way I do some of the other things in my life.

"Yeah, you know my wife died this past year?"

No, sir, I didn't know that.

" We was married 23 years but was together longer than that. We thought about splitting up, too. I even left for a couple of nights once but came back. I thought about all of it and said I need to get back and be with my wife. A marriage is hard work. And we was married whe we was 20."

My parents got married when they were 18.

"Uh-huh, December 9. I will never forget that day. We was going to Houston to see her family. She has family in Houston. And we was fussing at each other about when we was going to go. I told her to take the day off work and we could drive over during the day, 'cause I've gotten to the point where I don't like to drive at night anymore. And I was fixing to just go on ahead without her but then decided I'd wait until she was off work, you know. And she was ready and packed and all so we drive over and met with her brother. And everything is fine that night and the next day. We went all over Houston doing our Christmas shopping; going to that mall that they got there. And I'm talking with my brother-in-law and having a fine time. That night we getting ready to eat supper and she's going to get her plate and sit at the kitchen table and I'm sitting at a coffee table in the living room and I tell her to come on in here and sit with me. And she comes to the table and sets down her place and it's like something pushed her over. Bam! Just like that she's out on the floor."

He took off his sunglasses and began to wipe his eyes and kinda takes deeper breathes and quicker too.

"Well, I did the CPR on her and got her breathing until the paramedics arrived and we get to the hospital and they kept her alive long enough to take a chest x-ray. They knew there wasn't nothing they could do for her because her heart had gotten so big. And the medicine they was giving her wasn't going to work. She had this enlarged heart muscle. And she died that night. But she never complained about her heart all the trip. We all knew she had trouble but we didn't know it was that bad."

I'm awfully sorry that happened.

"And I got a 14 year old at this school that I got to look after now. Do all the things that his momma did for him. Make sure he's eating and has clothes to wear and all that. If I can just get him out of here this year I know he'll be okay. He's got to do well on this test, you know?"

Yeah, well, I'm sure it'll be fine. I know this won't be any comfort but at least she died sudden like that. It could have been something like cancer that takes forever to do it. I mean, no one wants to go but there are better ways of going than others.

"And I'm worried about myself now. I go to the dentist and the doctor and all. Got me these new glasses. But I got to go see the doctor about that prostate and I don't want to do that."

Yeah, but you got to do that. It's really important to try to catch that early if you can. They can fix that.

"Oh, yeah, but it is mighty uncomfortable. You know?"

Yeah, I know.

We both laughed about this for a while.

"You start doing that when you hit 40?"

I'm 26.

Much more laughter.

Fade out.

Yes, I am still a bunny

2006-03-13T10:18:00.000-08:00

I feel like my head is going to explode. No, no, I'm not hungover. I just feel very put upon at the moment. Knowing the right thing to do is sometimes very difficult. In fact, I would say it is often difficult. But you make your decisions and you stick by them. I've got my back against a wall. I feel like I put myself there and then I feel like I was forced there. I reckon it's both.

But change is inherent, I suppose. Change is a booger. Change is scarier than hell but you can't avoid it. I've never been one to strike back when I felt someone struck me. Always was a turn the other cheek sort of guy. But after a while you feel taken adavantage of and confrontation has to occur. Now, whether I am in the right or the wrong in this particular situation, I can't really say. If you start judging those things for yourself you're headed for a mess of trouble. But you have to make stands too, especially when you are defending your own. This must seem pretty obscure to most of you and that's deliberate on my part. I guess a couple of y'all know what it is I'm saying here but not many. I hope.

Put up those dukes, son! Fight all those bastards off if they're coming at you. And when you lose, well, you fought, didn't you? I'm sick and tired of feeling I can't say something because other folks know better or I need to be political in my decision making. Just plain sick. I mean, you don't have to like everything I say, but I'm going to go right on and say it anyway. You don't like it, don't listen. In fact I'd guesstimate that most folks don't listen to what I have to say anyway. Just take it as stupid, old, drunk Billy, shooting his mouth off at something he doesn't know anything about. Well, fine. I ain't listening to you either.

I've spent more than half my life feeling sorry for things I realize now I had no cause to feel sorry for. I'm not to blame. You are. Deal with that. Swallow that. Feel that and make that part of yourself. I've been doing it for years; it's your turn. Doesn't feel so hot, does it? I didn't like it all those years, either.

So, am I suppose to be the bigger man and say "I'm sorry."? I've done that enough, thank you. It doesn't do any good anyway, just seems to make folks think your weak. And I'm tired of being seen as weak. Because, you know what? I am not weak. I'm strong. Stronger than you. You think it's been a free ride for me? You think I've had all the breaks and pissed them away? Man, get with it. You don't know me. Maybe you never did. Maybe you never wanted to. But I always wanted to know you, get closer, share something that went beyond the body and got closer to what we were here on this planet to do. And you chucked me in the potato wagon when you got what you wanted. Well, I'm not one to be fooled with no more. Watch it.

Spring time for Billy

2006-03-08T10:14:00.000-08:00

Spring is up, man. I love this time of year! My juices is flowing again, fellows. Writing more often in my notebook, sketching, talking to girls and sitting in the sun. Years ago I used to hate spring. I felt unattractive and useless in the sun. I missed winter and the coats and sweaters I would use to hide my body from the world. My pores would discharge as much sweat and oil as possible leading to some of the worst acne you ever done saw. Well, I still get the occasional pimple but I don't let that stop me, nosirree. Hot weather and wet leather, yeah I can dig it. No more crouching around the heater, drinking vodka and chain smoking. Now its whiskey in the shade and chainsmoking. Wish you were here, darling, really I do. How far away can one person be? How long a distance left to run until you are back in my arms. Cowboy boots made of elephant hide, long dead and inherited from his grandfather rest on the floor as he stares at the ceilingfan, lost to the world and alive in his thoughts of a girl. Her smile dissolves as the phone rings and it cannot be her. She couldn't be calling him. And she isn't. It's time to practice and duty is duty. Dragging as much as possible through the sheets he moves to the stereo and plays a song as he gets dressed. Maybe he plays a love song. Maybe not. He dresses slowly and smokes a cigarette, trying to make it all last as long as he can. The song ends and he is out the door and down the steps. The car moves easier under his hands in the warmth of the evening. The headlights arc through the descending night and he smiles to himself thinking of the girl again. This is as happy as he ever gets. And he is happy, though not to jump a handspring or dance a jig. There is something complete about the thoughts tonight as he makes the two blocks to the practice room. A place has been found for the pieces that winter has scattered through his mind and the sense of a whole taking shape is comforting and empowering. The engine in the car is power, the sun that dips behind the clouds is power and the cock that has become snug against his inner thigh is power. His hand sneaks down to explore the burgeoning hardon in his pants. The smile diminshes so as not to call attention to this most personal of investigations. A grinning man spanking his monkey in his car would terify a pedestrian. The drive ends too soon.

Make mine with Critters!

2006-03-06T10:16:00.000-08:00

I used my copy of Cormac McCarthy's Blood Meridian to teach the kids about quotation marks today. If you've ever read Mr. McCarthy then you know what I mean.

I'm more pleased tha usual with the outcome of the Oscars last night. Sure, Grizzly Man got snubbed and Terrence Howard was excellent but what can you do? At least they spread the awards around this year instead of letting one film walk away with everything. Those are the best years and usually only happen once a decade.

EXCELLENT weekend. No shows but good times and great oldies were had by young Master Vidrine, thank you very much. Missed the Stadanko Brothers last show which makes me a bit sad, but then again one of them recently councilled me to break up The Vidrines as quickly as possible and begin another band. Um, no thanks, but glad you showed the interest in what we do.

Didn't watch the Oscars last night. Instead I sat down with a copy of Critters from 1985. This was the first PG-13 movie I ever saw and is still one of my guilty pleasures. Little rolling alien furballs with big appetites and bad attitudes. Ah, the 1980's! A time when aliens were lethal and jokes were purient. Well, actually that's still the case today but I was younger then so it seemed fresher. The Critters (or CRITES as they are known on their home world) escape from an intergalactic prison and head to Earth where they attack a farm house and attempt to eat the family inside. Alien bounty hunters with melty faces come after them and destroy even more stuff than the creatures they are supposed to be stopping. Of course these alien bounty hunter guys really don't give a toss about Earth or humanity. Tehy're just doing their jobs, which makes the dry humor in their scens extra sweet. The Critters speak in this kinda hyper-roadrunner talk that is subtitles occasionally for "witty" comments on the action. The guys who did the FX for this baby were the Chiodo Bros. perhaps most famous for giving the world Killer Klown from Outer Space . another of my favorites from the 1980s cable box. Oh yeah, and Dee Wallace Stone is in this. You're a long way from ET, sweetheart!

I'ver run out of time. Maybe later this week I'll post a review of The Hills Have Eyes (the original) in preparation for the remake. I'm actually looking forward to this one. Alex Aja did a great job with Haute Tension.

My Arrogance

2006-03-01T10:07:00.000-08:00

I'm fuming a bit right now because someone called me arrogant recently. Well, actually they called The Vidrines arrogant but that means me by reflection. At first I thought, "Hell, no! I'm the least arrogant fella you could ever lay eyes upon! I'm riddled with self-doubt, terrified of the world around me and insecure in my role in the band." But then I got to thinking maybe there was truth to that. Maybe I am arrogant. Hang on a second. I'm going to go look the word up in the dictionary...

Overbearing pride or self-importance. Yep, that's me. In fact that's anyone who ever picked up a pen to tell a story. If I am not important to myself then who else will make me so? My mother? You? If I did not write then what would I do, stand around with a hand full of holes, a thumb up my ass and a big grin to pass the time of day with? Abe Licoln was arrogant, Gandhi was arrogant, the fucking Buddha and Jesus Christ were arrogant. And so am I. Want to make something of it?

Arrogance is the trait that moves mankind forward. If we were meek and mild as a honey child you think we'd risk it all for glory? And that's what I want: glory and fame and all that go with it. And I'm sure there's more that goes with it than I know.

Do you come with it? Can I get you if I stay in my place and keep my feet on the ground? Hell, no! I'll win you and your heart with my spectacle, my sincerity of pride, my heart on my sleeve. And when I win you you will laugh and dance with me outside my apartment in the moonlight under a pink sky dotted with birds returning from their winter hideaways. And they have returned as surely as love has returned to my lousy little corner of this lousy little world. But the world doesn't seem so little or so lousy with you and me holding each other in the moonlight with the sky above us and the world within us. God! I haven't felt like this since the last time my heart broke and you know it was worth it then too. It's always worth it to risk, to dare, to fail and fall. Such spectalular trajectories are seen in the air when we fall. Will you fall with me? Of course you will! Because I love you and that is enough and important and true. And truth has been in short supply not only in this country but in this world and I am Prometheus come down from the mountain with that fire which will burn you and set the gods upon me with chains and birds and my liver is already spotty but maybe it will grow back. And maybe it won't but what does that matter. My self is important and that is enough. If it wasn't would I turn to God or prayer or you? Does the question matter if my self is important to me?

King Hippo runs this shit!

2006-02-27T10:08:00.000-08:00

Back from the sunny climes of Shreveport with a saddle bedcked with scalps. Sorry, I've been rereading Blood Meridian and the prose style is infectious. We had a grand old time playing Saturday night with The Big Positive. Our set was shorter than usual on account of us opening which actually turned out to be a good thing. By cutting out some of the fat I think the songs held together better and the energy was as high as it could possibly be. Reve even complimented me after the show, saying it was one of the better ones we have played recently. Sadly, it was the last show Justin would be playing bass for. I'll miss him. At least we sent him off with a bang and kinda recharged our batteries as far as motivation and commitment to the band. Losing one of the first members of the band can be a killing blow and I think we've sidestepped the axe on this one. At least I hope so.

Before the show I went to Java Junction to watch the Great American Crossover show which was very great and very American. Chris was there in full King Hippo mode and it was uber-cool watching him work his magic. Chris has a weird charisma that is some combination of deprecating humor and dead serious pride of place in what he is doing. The other rappers there seemed to love that crazy white boy for being so off the wall and unafraid of making a fool of himself while somehow making the audience take what he says as gospel truth. That's one of the coolest things for me about watching Chris grow as a performer and artist-his sense of humor never takes over completely and reduces what he is doing to the level of a mere joke. I would like to think we have that in common.

Sunday I stayed over at Chris's place and went with him a Sara Hebert to the Highland Mardi Gras Parade which was a trip to say the least. They throw hot dogs from the floats. Frickin' hot dogs. Many of the floats were on the threadbare side which added to the fun. Lots of drunks and children sharing public space in the sun. I drank too much and started to get cranky so Chris took me back to his place and let me sleep it off. But not before going to a park and seeing local favorites Dirtfoot seranding the crowd with their weird Emmet Otter on acid songs. Lovely stuff, seeing the young freaks dancing in the streets. It was very '60's. I even got a shout out from the lead singer, who told the folks to go shake my hand. And some of them did which was a bit strange. I felt almost like someone famous. Then I decided to go pass out.

Picked up Randy Newman's Good Old Boys and T.Rex's Electric Warrior albums. God, those records are boss! Electric Warrior just kicks my ass in every way imaginable and Good Old Boys plays like a short story collection more than a concept album. Chris and I spent a little QT listening to them and giving our two cents on their finer qualities. Gotta love being young and geeky in the city.

That's all for now. Take care of yourselves, guys, because God knows I can't.

Masked and Anonymous

2006-02-23T10:16:00.000-08:00

I'm getting over a cold so forgive me if there are some typos ahead.

I was reading some of the comments made here previously and began wondering if I am perhaps a bit too sensitive when receiving criticism regarding my writing. "Anonymous" was a bit snarky with his or her comments and I didn't take them too well. But there is truth to them. I mean, if I don't care enough about my writing to check it why should anyone care enough to read it? By the same token, these posts are made during my lunch hour and I don't really have a great deal of time to do much proof reading. For stuff that's shot off in 30 minutes or so I would say that the quality of the writing and spelling is pretty good. But that's just my opinion. I still wish I knew who wrote those comments though. It's hard to take someone seriously when they don't sign their comments.

I've been sick the past few days and it's beginning to take its tole. I've blown my nose so much that there isn't any snot left, just water. Yuck! The kids think I'm pretty funny at least. But they can't understand why I don't take their bullshit with the usual laconic ease. Just tired and cruddy. Hopefully I'll be over this by tomorrow when I go to Shreveport (hey, "Anonymous", I didn't spell it "SHreveport". Happy?)

Chris wrote a nice piece on Nine Inch Nails for famousforfifteen.blogspot.com today so I think I'll briefly weigh in on that band and its cannon. I first heard NIN on MTV when Pretty Hate Machine first came out. I was kinda scared of them. To a Catholic School Boy this band looked and sounded like a sure fire way to go straight to hell. Years later, I rediscovered them in high school and fell head over heels. High school pretty much was hell so I wasn't as concerned about going there when I died anymore. Fond memories of huffing Glade and listening to Broken on my headphones as the world shimmered and faded in and out. Trent Reznor also created two of the greatest soundtracks of the 1990s, Natural Born Killers and Lost Highway. These two tapes were staples in my hatchback for much of the decade. Glade luckily ceased being my drug of choice long before the end of those ten years. It's amazing I survibed, I tells ya!

Well, that's all the time I have for today. Not the most interesting stuff in the world but it was there by God. And that's enough for me. Take care of yourselves, guys, because God knows I can't.

"Who Killed Laura Palmer?" (spoilers for folks who ain't seen Twin Peaks ahead)

2006-02-21T10:12:00.000-08:00

Boy howdy, this weekend was a cold one, guys and gals! My bright idea of distributing flyers along the parade route in Monroe came to nought as most everybody stayed the heck home. Luckily the Dimestore Troubadours did not feel this way and got to the show in one piece (though they did get pulled over by the same cop twice on the way up). Both bands played great sets and the show was as well attended as could be expected considering the weather conditions. The Troubadours stayed at my place that night adn we had a rolicking good time (all things considered). The next day Joseph (the lead singer) and I went out and about in the wilds of Monroe to forage for more beer then took the rest of the band shopping for suits and other sundries in the metropolis. They left glad that they had come. Hooray!

Tensions continue to mount regarding Justin's imminent departure for Arkansas. I think we'll stay the course and replace him but that doesn't keep some negative Nellies from speculating that this is the end of the band. Well, one way or another I ain't quitting this new show biz lifestyle of mine. I've developed a taste for it.

Domino comes out on DVD today. I was mistaken in stating that it would be released this past week on Valentine's Day. I'll be stopping by the mall (shudder!) to pick up a copy after school today. Let me reiterate that this was one of my favorite films of 2005 and I highly reccommend it to one and all. The Tom Waits commentary track is worth the price of rental alone, I'm sure.

I got a wild hair across my ass to rewatch some Twin Peaks this President's Day. Viewing it again, I was struck by how frickin' sad all of it is. The first time I saw this stuff I thought it was pretty silly and more a goof than anything else. But now I see Lynch trying to expose something rotten at the heart of the American landscape (in the trees even!) that eats away at our innocence and heart. Laura Palmer is raped and murdered by her father. How do you explain a thing like that? Lynch created "Bob" as a supernatural motivation for these crimes but in reality there isn't any "Bob". It's just Mr. Palmer. "I always thought you knew it was me." "I never thought you knew it was me." Ugh. I feel for you, Laura. There are probably more of you out there than any of us know.

Thinking about images and repetition quite a bit lately. I want to take the old camera and find a good landscape or something to take "moving stills" of and repeat the process a few times to create-what? Eh, I think the action of doing it will be enough. I cull meaning from it later. In any event, I hope to see some of y'all at our show in Shreveport this Saturday. Take care of yourselves,because God knows I can't.

Fighting and voting...

2006-02-17T10:15:00.000-08:00

Another swell day in junior high. This morning before the bell rang in homeroom was pretty typical. The kids were running amok, talking to each other excitedly about what they were doing with their long weekend and ignoring me and the teacher as we vainly tried to get them into their desks. A young fellow named Chris was over on my side of the room showing off some pictures from the Valentine's Day Dance we had last week. My kid, Justin, jokes around with Chris quite a bit and thought it would be funny to throw a paper ball at him. He hit Chris on the cheek and Chris's face went very dark.

WHACK! Chris slaps Justin across the face and Justin is out of his desk ready for war. I leap between them and tell Chris we need to go to Mr. Nat (the assistant principal) and sort this out. I put my hand on Chris' sholuder to lead him out and he twisted around and pushed me away. I looked at him with total disbelief and put my hand back on his shoulder. "March!" Chris starts protesting his innocence in the affair saying that Justin hit him and we aren't going to do anything to him, are we? I tell him that he needs to shut his mouth and we'll settle with Justin in a minute. But he is taking priority.

He burst into tears as we stood outside of Mr. Nat's office waiting for him to arrive. Another teacher passed by and opened the door for me with a look of complete empathy for this situation. When we got inside CHris began bouncing around the room calling me every name in the book. All I can think of doing is telling him to calm down. We'll sort this out. Tears are streaming down this kid's face and I don't know how to feel at all. I realize that my hands are shaking from the adrenaline. I'm kind of scared and can't form words or clear thoughts. Mr. Nat came in and wanted to know who Chris ahd smarted off to now. I explained the situation and Mr. Nat's face gets very grave indeed. I go fetch Justin and Mr. Nat and I give him a good talking to about throwing things and tell Chris to watch his temper. Since there wasn't really a fight I convince Mr. Nat and the homeroom teacher that the incident does not need to be written up and the day proceeds on its regular course.

Violence just freaks me out. I mean I love violent movies and stuff just as much if not more than the next guy. But real violence even violence between children makes me very very afraid. Not that I could get hurt but that I could contribute. I mean, did I let this happen? Did I make it happen by not doing my job? Afterward, did I handle it the way it should have been handled? Should we have suspended the boys? What did they learn from this if they learned anything? And what have I learned?

The kids went to a play today for Black History Month but naturally not all the kids could pony up the $5 to go. I stayed in school with them while Justin went to the play with his classmates. Figuring that they needed a dose of Black History themselves I brought a copy of Chisolm '72: Unbossed and Unbought for them to watch. I'm not going to tell you that they were riveted by the story of this middle aged, homely woman taking on the power structure of elctions in the 1970s but I'm glad I turned them on to it. Some of them watched. And some of them will register to vote when they turn 18. When I asked them about voting the class said "We'll vote for you, Mr. Dunn!" I laughed, but it made me feel really good inside. As good inside as the fight made me feel bad inside. I am trying.

I need your help, guys...

2006-02-16T10:24:00.000-08:00

Mien Gott, will the stress never end? Our bassist, Justin, put in his two week notice yesterday, the jerk. He'll be off to Little Rock and some sort of new career. Can't say as I blame him but it puts a bit of a strain on us to find a replacement. Doesn't it amaze you that we have nevr broken up after losing so many members over the past year? We must be driven or something. Ah. well, it is hard to dance with a stick up your ass.

We're having a big ol' show this Saturday for Monroe's Mardi Gras. Dimestore Troubadors will be coming into town and hopefully bringing goodies with them. Candy, kids, just candy. So I can look forward to that while dreading the outcome.

Yesterday I was trying to take a nap after school when George Detor showed up at my doorstep. We shared a drink and some smokes and watched Marat/Sade which kicked ridiculous ass (I can't believe it was made in 1967!) George then decided he was tired and tromped off to the guest bedroom andf went to sleep. I of course could not return to dreamland for fear of messing up my sleep cycle even more than it already is. Lucky bastard.

That's really all I have right now. I've been thinking a lot lately about the nature of truth and writing and this blog and all that. I mean, this isn't ALL of the stuff that I do. If I wrote all that down I would be fired and arrested and probably lose whatever pathetic readership I have as of now (well, maybe not all of you, but there wouldn't be any other comments on these suckers) Is this a boring blog? Do I need to jazz it up with "fictional" accounts of sex drugs and rock and roll? Let me know!

Diamonds at your feet...

2006-02-15T10:11:00.000-08:00

Well, I survived the dread beast Valentine and even ended up getting a few e-cards from some of y'all. Thanks bunches. I really do appreciate it when you guys read all my angst and don't dismiss it out of hand. I mean, we all got angst right?

I'm reading a book Chris Jay lent me called No Country for Old Men by Cormac McCarthy. You may recall that I posted it was being made into a film by the Cohen Bros. earlier this month. Well, the book has Cohen Brothers written all over it. It really doesn't resemble anything else McCarthy has written before. It is much more straight forward than any of his other novels, with very little of the flights of prose he normally takes. It's also the first book of his I have read that I can say I enjoyed on a pure, cool-story level. He isn't really interested in telling a story so much as creating a mood. This newfound narrative strength makes other parts of his writing style suffer. The run on sentences that dot the pages don't have the same impact when they are simply conveying exposition. It feels like lazy writing more than anything. But he knocks it out of the park with the interludes within the mind of SHerrif Bell. There is a laconic ease to the prose in these passages that is a joy to read. I know Sherrif Bell, I may even be related to him. It was nice to see him in a novel. I can't wait to see how this works on the big screen.

Speaking of movies-the Peckinpah box set is truly amazing. With the exception of The WIld Bunch I had never seen any of the movies inside in widescreen. Peckinpah really Knew how to compose his shots and the grand natural world he captures in these Westerns is not diminished on your TV. If you don't like Westerns you'll like Peckinpah. If you do like Westerns you'll like Peckinpah. Folks used to think he was a nutjob with a camera, foaming at the mouth for more blood and booze but time has been kinder to him than a lot of those other so-called great directors from the 1960s. I'm just glad they put this sucker out for all the world to see.

It's a funny thing about all these rereleases of cult films on DVD. I used to scour the video shelves or pour through catalogs trying to find the weird and wonderful amidst Jurassic Park and JFK. Now anyone can find these things by looking online or trotting over to Blockbuster (where I recently picked up Marat/Sade on DVD. How cool is that?) I'm not as special as I used to be. Nopt that there is anyone I know outside Ryan Sarnowski who can touch me when it comes to film obsession. But the movies I watch used to be treasures I hunted for. When the diamonds are just lying on the ground for you to pick up are they any less precious? That analogy doesn't really work when you discuss the nature of "Art". The value should be intrinsic to the piece (in my opinion) and just because you have twelve Picasso's doesn't mean you have to love him less. I don't know exactly what I'm getting at here. So let's leave it at that.

Lunchtime is almost over and I wnat to get back to my book. Take care of yourselves, 'cause God knows I can't.

From Hell's Valentine I Stab at Thee...

2006-02-14T10:09:00.000-08:00

You know what? I hate this stupid holiday. I feel like Jim Carrey at the beginnning of Eternal Sunshine for the Spotless Mind, walking on the beach, bemoaning his lack of Valentines. Or Charlie Brown going out to his mailbox and finding zilch there. Every attempt I made to set something up for tonight has been met with failure and rejection. I mean, yeah, there are plenty of fish in the sea, I'm a catch, blah, blah, blah. But right now I just feel lousy.
I started feeling lousy last night and got the bright idea to call my ex-girlfriend, Helen, in CHicago. Thought it would make me feel better. Nope. She spent the majority of our talk describing what a swell guy she's dating now and all the fun they have together. Fun we never could have had together in Monroe. I had to nip the conversation in the bud and claimed I was sleepy and had to get up the next morning.
The latter part was true but I ended up drinking until past midnight watching my favorite moments of crumminess from Deawood and the "Love makes you fat..." speech from Gangster No.1 (a great movie by the way, probably my favorite British crime film) These small comforts didn't really help much.
I got up in the middle of the night and drove to Wal-mart. It was full of folks getting last minute stuff for their sweethearts. I bought Valentine's Day cards for my Mom and Dad and a half dozen pink tulips in a pink pot. I gave it to them this morning and they were happy I guess. Surprised that I thought of them is more likely. I can be such a rotten son sometimes.
Justin, my student, brought a little girl a bunch of flowers and a white stuffed monkey. I felt like telling him not to waste his time but got hold of my senses and offered him council on the affairs of women. You know the rag: chicks dig confidence, there's never any harm in asking a girl out the first time, the worst she can say is "no", etc. I mean, all that stuff is true, but...I don't know. It jsut sucks to be alone on this day.
Tonight I want to drink in, watch Domino on DVD and try not to think about how lonely I feel right now. I wish I was in another country with someone special. I wish I could be there tonight.

59 looks like 88

2006-02-13T10:14:00.000-08:00

To explain my last post a bit more: the Battle of the Band's in question occured at Centenary College for the radio station, KSCL. Chris and I were last minute additions to the solo performing acts category because someone else had pulled out. Chris and I spoke the afternoon before the show and I suggested I be his "hypeman", y'know, Flavor Flav to his Chuck D. He thought it would be a funny idea and agreed. We listened to the tracks he would be performing at his house beforehand and then got up on stage and did what we did. When they got around to announcing the winners I wasn't really listening because I figured I had completely spoiled any chance Chris had of winning. Someone tapped me on the back and said "Congartulations!" to which I responded, "For What?". I walked on sunshine for the rest of the evening, went to Lil Joe's and got glared at by the guys in Squint and was basically just really happy to be in Shreveport when I was. Chris and I got some QT in the next day, watched Sympathy for Mr. Vengance and discussed his screenplay a little bit (I wish I had done more of that with him). Chris as usual had a ton of cool graphic novels for me to read and there was a great game of drunk Scrabble that I did not participate in because I began to get VERY tired after eating Saturday night. I got up Sunday and drove back to Monroe. That's it in a nutshell except that I also picked up the new Sam Peckinpah Legendary Westerns DVD box set which has made me a happy clam. I watched Ballad of Cable Hogue last night and got all stroppy watching Jason Robbards galavanting around the desert. Interesting fact: Peckinpah died when he was 59 but looked like he was 88! The more you know!

Breath underwaterus with me

2006-02-11T11:08:00.000-08:00

Chris Jay and I won the KSCL battle of the Bands solo act category last night. I am a proud peacock strutting around town today. Do you see my plumeage? Do you like it? Yours is nice too. But mine is the best!

Don't touch her...

2006-02-09T10:11:00.000-08:00

I had a wonderful talk with Kaycee last night. It amazes me that she can call me from Japan and sound like she is across the street. Technology! I sing your praises. We talked for quite a while, until the battery on my cell phone died actually, and I worry that the cost of the call could have gone toward her college loan payments or something. But I am glad she did it.

Things are a might bit stressful around here lately as you may have gathered from yesterday's post. Time heals the wounds but care must be taken not to let them be reopened. We'll see how that goes...

Chris Jay sent me his screenplay this week in a format I can download and print and -surprise!- it is excellent. He has been trying to convince me and others that it is really rough and not anywhere near completion, etc. Well, if this is rough, bring on the fine tuned Cammero version. Chris' writing has improved leaps and bouinds over the past couple of years and he's on his way to becoming genuinely great. The characters are well motivated, complex and human. I was shaking when I finished my first read through and more than a little intimdated by the idea of acting in this thing. I've never been asked to do so much on stage or screen while doing so little. The feelings it evoked in me were eep and slightly disturbing. The best and most surprising thing I found in the script was the women's roles. Chris can write a woman (if only he could learn to make love to one-just kidding). That's harder to do than you think. Men in fiction seem to have clearly defined motivations while women can come across as cyiphers or stand-ins for a concept of femininity. Chris does not do that here. These are living, breathing human beings and reading about them is a very cool experience. I hope I can do the job it will take to translate them to the screen.

I hope Chris doesn't mind me writing about him here. I didn't give away anything about the plot or even the title of the film. My enthusiasm may have gotten the better of me. I imagine him reading this post and screaming at the screeen of his office computer, throwing chairs against the walls, breaking a window, sticking out his head and screaming something very Swearengen at the sky. Something about me and farm animals and my mother maybe. It's not important. What is important is this project he has invited me in on. I feel honored and genuinely excited to be a part of this thing. Chris, you stun me.

Practice tonight should be interesting. Lots of stuff to talk about and think about.

Does anyone know anything about Portland, Oregon?

My mom's whistle

2006-02-08T10:25:00.000-08:00

Have you ever had a conversation with a friend about yourself and from what the friend tells you it is obvious they have no idea what's going on with you and your life? It is a very sad, lonely feeling, especially if you assume the person has a lot of insight into you and your life. I feel like I did when I found a whistle on my mom's keychain as a kid. I asked her what it was for and she said it was in case she got mugged. I imagined a large man cornering my mother in a dark alleyway while she blew the whistle. And nobody came to help.

New movie central

2006-02-07T10:14:00.000-08:00

Yesterday I went to the mall (yuck!) and sold a few of my movies to purchase some new ones. Not to worry-nothing that will be missed terribly was lost. I picked up the Chan Wook Park film Sympathy for Mr. Vengance and the new DVD "extended cut" of Dune.

Any Dune fans out there? I hate the books and loathe the newer miniseries but David Lynch's original movie version still captivates me after all these years. I think it has a lot to say about the USA's current situation in the middle east (don't tell homeland security, they'd be bored to tears by this ponderous monster) and Lynch just makes my head spin with his visuals and characters. How many movies have copied this sucker's "look"? I mean, no, it doesn't make sense but that's half the fun. I don't know what's going on but it seems pretty durn important to the Fremen and Kyle McClauchlan (I know I misspelled that). Kyle's pretty good too. But none, I mean NOONE, beats the Baron Valdimir Harkonen. When I was a little Vidrine I had the worst acne on the face of the Earth. The Baron gave me hope that I one would be, if not beautiful, then a brutal despot. Too bad the face cleared up, eh? And Sting is sooooo cool in this thing. I ordinarily can't stand the guy (except that "Fields of Gold" song, it takes me back every time) but here he plays an all out bad dude. The special effects are those swell 1980s matt shots and models and yeah, I can see the wires and the catapults that launch the soldiers into the air during the big battles but I DON'T CARE! It's flawed but it's gorgeous. So there.

Sympathy for Mr. Vengance is a whole other kettle of fish. Mien Gott! There ain't no flaws here, darling, it's just brilliant. If you saw Park's follow up to this, Oldboy, then check out the original vision. It is 100% better in every way. I expected something more along the lines of Oldboy when I popped it in but no dice. This is a deeply funny, deeply moving story with dollops of gore and shock mixed in (but not to the degree I had been led to believe. It's saying something that I don't feel cheated). This is what I look for out there on the video fringe-something I have never seen before but when I do I know I've been looking for it my whole life. I love you Mr. Park!

Reve and I will be reviewing some footage of Vidrines shows to put together for a promotional DVD to send to clubs. This makes me one happy Billy. I've been recording songs with my pal, Jeremy Sparks (of killrockfans.com fame) and the results are pretty cool. He's going for a Frogs-improv vibe to all the stuff so no retakes of the vocals are allowed. We've recorded 6 songs so far and they keep getting better. It brings back fond memories of the BJs days (the BJs was the first band I was in with James Katowhich, if you never saw us you suck or were not in Monroe at the time) If anyone wants to hear these suckers let me know, I'll try to send you a CD.

That's all she (or I) wrote today. I love you guys!

Back from the weekend and still kicking...

2006-02-06T10:21:00.000-08:00

Great show this weekend at Einsteins in El Dorado. Not the best attended gig in the world (this is a disadavtage of working outside the homebase) but those that were there enjoyed themselves thoroughly and we played our little hearts out. The $xxx guarantee came in really handy too, allowing us to pay for all our expenses and still take home a little dough for ourselves. Good times.

We don't know how well the new keyboardist is going to work out. Many times he is spot on a integrates with the sound quite well. Other times he goes off on rather muddy tangents that have little to do with the songs we are playing. I hate to clip anyone's creative wings but it looks like Thad (that's his name) may need to come back down to earth in order to continue to play with The Vidrines.

I finally got my package from Kaycee on Friday. It conatain a really sweet note and a copy of the poster for Get Carter in kangi from 1973. Bizarre seeing Michael Caine surrounded by pop art graphics and Japanese characters. Thanks Kaycee! I love it (and you)

We've been taking my video camera to the shows with us recently and having a grand time with it. The footage has been swell as far as me being able to see what works with my movement onstage and what does not. I also love getting some mileage out of the damn thing. If only Reve's girlfriend would stop tilting it on its side when she shoots we'll be golden.

Ate a superb Superbowl dinner yesterday at a party "catered" by the fellow that runs the kitchen at Canard's a local restaraunt. Duck, lamb, corn, various casseroles and pheasant! What the hell is pheasant doing at a Superbowl party? No one was interested in the game so I turned over to TCM and watched FW Murnau's Sunrise. What a beautiful film. The other folks didn't know how I could be watching the film with the sound down until I explained that the movie was silent and Kanye West makes a fine soundtrack. They just looked at me like I was out of my mind.

Also got to habg out with Ronnie and Veronica a bit Saturday night which was swell. I had a mission and it was accomplished. But what it was is between me and my monkey. Sorry.

Proud of everything in my life right now, glad I've gotten back in touch with the people I got back in touch with and rabidly wishing I had access to Grizzly Man by Werner Herzog. That guy is a total nutjob!

Words cannot express the horror I felt...

2006-02-02T10:07:00.000-08:00

This morning I went ot my folks' place and saw that the new issue of Rolling Stone had arrived. I was delighted to see Kanye West in full Passion of the Christ regalia on the cover and rushed into my parents' bedroom to show my father. I was greeted by the sight of my father's naked proterior as he wandered to the bathroom for his shower. Yeesh!

Movie news that's pretty cool.

2006-02-01T10:04:00.000-08:00

After all the cruddola that has littered my blog this week I thought I would announce a couple of cool entertainment news items (Fangoria.com and aintitcool.com have bigger and probably better articles posted on these) First up one of my favorite authors is having one of his books adapted into a film by a couple of my favorite filmmakers. Cormac McCarthy's book, No Country for Old Men, is being adapted for the screen and directed by the Cohen Brothers. After the debacle that was Billy Bob Thorton's All The Pretty Horses (I still hold on to a ray of hope that there was a good movie in there that was left on the cutting room floor by the Brothers Weinstein) it will be cool to see how the Cohen's handle it. I watched Miller's Crossing again the other day and was blown away by the dialouge and attention to detail which seemed to have more in common with a novel than the average gangster yarn. Cool Beans.
The Next bit of news is a bit more problematic but could pay off in spades. The guy who created Samurai Jack for the Cartoon Network (I have no idea what his name is) is woking on a sequel to The Dark Crystal with original designer Brian Froud. Of course we'll get those groovy muppets back but they will be mixed with CGI ("Like Sin City" says aintitcool.com) which gives me cause for pause. One of the major attractions of the original is the relience on practical effects. I know Jim Henson was always up for using new technologies and would have been all about CGI if he was alive today but I love the idea of Gelflings and Skesies and Augra all existing somewhere. You could touch them, smell them feel the weight of their prescence. I never actually did any of that but I COULD have and still could if all the latex hasn't rotted of them yet. I showed the original film to my Reading class last year and they LOVED it. I had to explain again and again that they did not use computers to make any of the creatures or enviornments they inhabit. That sounds like the technique holds up pretty darn well. But if Froud is on board it may be a nifty return to a world I dearly loved as a child and that continues to fascinate me as an adult. The working title of the sequel is The Power of the Dark Crystal, by the way. Evidently the Samurai Jack guy does the new Star Wars Clone Wars cartoons as well and those a supposedly much better than the new prequels. I gave up on Star Wars a while back and still have not see that Sith movie. Please, God (or the Ghost of Jim Henson) don't let them cock up another of my childhood favorites. PLease.
In Vidrines news we ARE playing in El Dorardo this Friday. Sorry if there was ever any doubt.

2006-01-31T10:08:00.000-08:00

Yesterday I got to teach Justin American History on my own in the library. It was a lot of fun explaining Mormons to him as well as showing him a globe to illustrate latitude and longitude. "Don't call them Texicans, Justin. They would get offended."

Had a late night, kinda hung over today. It amazes me that I don't lose my temper with the kids on days like this. For some reason I can't get upset with 7th graders making fun of me. Sure, it gets under my skin same as it would with anyone but they are, after all, just children. What a good attitude!

Sorry, I can't write about anything else right now, there's a ton of bullshit going on right now that I'll be sorting through for the rest of the week. If I can, I'll tell y'all about it.

Various updates: emotional, practical

2006-01-30T10:15:00.000-08:00

Sorry for the lack of updates last week. I was out sick for a while (vomit and I are not friends anymore. Of course we had been out of touch for a while...) Last week saw some major changes in my life. The most earth shattering: I officially broke up with my girlfriend. Most of y'all probably didn't even know I had one in the first place. There were reasons for that and no, you do not already know all of them even if you think you do. The reasons for me breaking up with her a myriad as well and no, I'm not going to dish on my blog. I want to remain friends with this particular girl and would rather not air our dirty laundrey in public. Suffice it to say that things had not been good in a while and we kept slugging away at it because we both cared about each other. Just not the way a girlfriend/boyfriend ought to.

Don't worry, I won't get all depressed about this and start reverting to teen angst mode. I'm pretty entrenched in 20-something-angst mode anyway. This was a very good thing that happened; it was painful but now it's over and we can move on, hopefully in a responsible and mature way. But knowing me, that is about as likely as seeing GW Bush manning the calls at a PBS fundraiser.

Other wacky stuff has been happening in my corner of the universe and unfortunately it does not solely involve my personage so I'm really not at liberty to divulge any details. Let's just say things got really complicated, really fast for a lot of folks in my sphere. My involvement in said complications was minimal (I think) and Hopefully won't result in any loss of life, limb or friendship. I did find out I could throw folks out of my house if I need to. That's kinda cool.

I watched a cool movie last week called "A Nation Without Women" from Bollywood releasing giant Eros Entertainment. How's that for a name? If you've ever seen any Bollywood films you know they are about as far removed from what that name implies to my Western ears as possible. But I love them never the less. I took a whopping five pages of notes on that sucker (in itty-bitty handwriting) so expect a good sized review from me sometime this week.

I'm getting psyched about the show in El Dorado this weekend (Friday, schleppy). Einstein's has treated us well in the past, let's hope they keep it up. The album continues to inch closer to completion. The artwork is the sole holdup now and Saratoga is working on some replacement artwork if the original stuff doesn't come back to us for reformatting. I kinda hope it doesn't because Sara Herbert is one hell of a designer and if she pulls off something as good as the work she did on The Pillage People EP then we're a lock for that "Best New Artist" Grammy.

Chris Jay continues work on a screenplay he says he want me to act in. I haven't worked onstage or film in a couple of years so this should be cool as fuck. I'm still pissed about not being tapped for The Dog Thief.

If you get the chance go over to famousforfifteen.blogspot.com and check out what's there. Sara and Chris really maintain that blog and I want them to know folks are reading it and caring about it. Liek that fern your mom gave you but you didn't water. I need to karmicly make up for that.

And I thought I was crazy (part 2)

2006-01-23T10:17:00.000-08:00

When last we left our heroes they were heading toward Baton Rouge for and aftershow party with the Dimestore Troubadors. Reve valiantly drove through dense fog and bad directions to arrive in Baton Rouge and rendevous with the Troubadors at a Circle K. I started feeling a bit uneasy when Joseph began yelling at a home;ess man panhandleing outside the store about the level of poverty he (joseph) lived in and how rude and borderline racist the man was to assume he had money. The homeless gentleman was enraged by these remarks and began yelling back (though I'm not really certain what he was yelling about outside of "positivity") Short story long, I gave the dude a cigarette (actually two cigarettes because he demanded them). Joseph continued to yell at him as we drove off.

We met up with the Troubadors at their bassist, Creighton's new apartment. OSme sort of Bergmanesque psychodrama was afoot inside as we could hear Creighton's girlfriend wailing as Joseph explained that we were going to party there. Creighton obviously had no problem with this nor did Brian (Joseph's brother and the band's banjo player/multi-instrumentalist). The girlfriend was not swayed by Joseph's overtures to peace and took it upon herself to liberate the air in Creighton's tires. Creighton displayed minor annoyance by emancipating the air in his girlfriend's tires. Two vehicles with flat tires later, we decide to leave. Moving a couple of blocks down the street we began to get down with it on an old school Tony Montana tip (interpret that how you wish, I ain't losing my job over this post). Conversations bounced around the room like pinbals, Joseph and I escaped to the curb with his acoustic guitar to discuss the finer points of songcraft and Creighton confessed his true love to his tirecidal girlfriend (romantic I thought). Jamie and I ran intyo the Amazing Nuns old manager while looking for breakfast around 7 AM. He kindly treated us to breakfast at Continental Coffee. The party was winding down when we goy back, the Troubadors eventually left, I drew a bunny smoking a cigarette on one of Brian's paintings and Reve drove us back to Monroe. I finally got to sleep around 1:30 PM Saturday, woke up two hours later, watched Astro Boy for three hours, wrote a review of Fudoh and DOA, listened to the Pillage People and Kanye West, went back to sleep, woke up again, smoked too many cigarettes and drank too many beers but STILL made it to the band meeting Sunday afternoon.

I am truly superheroic in my rock star excess. But I can't hold a candle to the Dimestore Troubadors. Those guys are the real deal and I love them for it. I have never seen a group of guys less afraid of confrontation in my life. And that's a compliment.

And I thought I was crazy

2006-01-23T10:09:00.000-08:00

Well, I consider the show this weekend in Lafayette a success though without a doubt it was the most poorly attended of any Vidrines' show thus far (not counting the KSCL show from almost two years ago). The drive down was as ardorous as expected and the crowd was thin to say the least (and the cover at the door was $2! I can't eat on $2!). But the folks who were there seemed happy to be present and accounted for. As an added bonus a local "Free" paper had written up the band in their "To Do" section which was surprising and cool (I had no idea my vocals were "Post-hardcore").

Best of all The DImestore Troubadors opened for us and were just...swell. I mean, the first time I saw these guys I thought Joseph, the lead singer, was leaning way too much on the Tom Waits crutch of making the voice all growly. But Friday night he sounded like himself which is really all you can ever ask of any vocalist (I am loathe to use the word singer in reference to myself or anyone else who doesn't do that screechy Mariah Carey thing). After we collected our pittance from the barkeeper ($45! Le bon tempe rolle) Reve and Jamie and I heaed over to Baton Rouge to party with the Troubadors.

Blasting the past

2006-01-20T10:12:00.000-08:00

Nothing is really happening here today (at least not until we hit the road for that Lafayette gig) so I thought I would indulge in a trip down memory lane.

When I was a sophmore in high school back in the 20th Century (still the best century in my opinion) I met this cool girl named Kaycee at Mardi Gras and we hit it off. She went to LSMSA with my sister and stayed over at my parents' house one night. Emalie was off doing something or other so Kaycee and I stayed up and watched The Streetfighter with Sonny Chiba. We started talking movies and it dawned on us both that we had very simlar tatses and interests. She was gone the next morning before I could say goodbye so I made her a collage book called "A Tale of Two Cleaners" (a reference to The Professional with Natalie Portman and Jean Reno). My sister took it to her at school and we began a correspondence of sorts by making each other new installments of our explots. I still have a bunch of these little books and pull them out every now and again when I want to feel good about my teenage years.

A year went by and I ended up going to LSMSA as well meeting lots of cool folks and having a grand old time. Kaycee was in a band with one of my friends named CHris Bloch call Princess Hattie. They played mostly in Alexandria and had lots of swell songs like "Kool Kids" and "Bad Touch". I dug them and I dug Kaycee too. Kaycee dug me as well and invited me to MC one of their gigs at an airforce base in ALexandria one weekend. I was nervous and excited to be in front of so many of my peers in a strange place. I got out there and did my thing for the crowd (rather awkwardly since I was 17 at the time) and introduced the first act (LSMSA kids who had been iunvited along for the ride, including renowned writer and musician Brad Demarest). I took the stage again after them with little to no idea how I would fill the 15 minutes before Princess Hattie was ready to come on. I had a bag of old paperbacks with me and began chucking them into the crowd (I did this badly as well, often missing the persons I was aiming for and bopping some innocent pixie in the head with Chaucer) I told a couple of gross stroies then proclaimed that I could shit in a bottle on stage, set it on fir and be paid for it. The crowd went berserk and demanded that I do just that. I dutifully hiked down my trousers (carefully so as not to expose my penis to the crowd, something I still refuse to do to this day) and squatted over an empty coke bottle someone had thrown on stage. I feigned a blocked bowel and asked for a cigarette from the crowd to help get my guts going. A hail of cigarettes flew down around me and I began shuffleing around the stage with my pants around my ankles scooping them up. At one point I turned around so that my back was to the audience and I heard an explosion of applause laughter and screams. I had shown Alexandria my ass.

It was one of those watershed moments in life where you taste something for the first time and immediately want more. Like crack. CHris Bloch's dad convinced the policeman on hand not to arrest me for public nudity, gave me a stern lecture about free speech and what smoking pot in Viet Nam was like (seriously!) and then sent me back to his place with his van and Princess Hattie's equipment. I had never driven something so ungodly HUGE in my life and almost slammed into a cop car on my way back. I narrowly avoided being put in prison again and soundly refused to back into the Bloch's carport after I ran over their pegonias. Kaycee couldn't understand why I was so tense when I walked into the living room at CHris' place and I stalked out of the house and walked around their neighborhood, not returning until I had my fill of drug dealers and come ons from homosexual black men. And of course I was in love.

We play Lafayette tomorrow

2006-01-19T09:48:00.001-08:00

The title speaks for itself.

It's all LIES!

2006-01-19T09:48:00.000-08:00

Over my vacation with Spencer this past holiday season I was exposed to a new writer by the name of JT Leroy who Spencer reccomended admantly. I was delighted to find out that Asia Argento had adapted one of his books into a film which was to be released in the US in the coming year. Long story short, I picked up a copy of his book "The Heart is Deceitful Above All Things" and began reading it voraciously. It was a collection of autobiographical short stories based on the author's life with his horrible whore mother who turned him into a teen prostitute and drug addict. I was stunned by the writing, especially when I considered that he was 18 or so when much of this stuff was written. Leroy had a nifty pseudo-drag persona and a swell webpage with merchandise including wiffleballs signed by the author and raccoon penises. I loved the book and hated the author for being so young. Oddly enough Spencer was reading the new Brett Easton Ellis novel "Lunar Park" which was a fake memoir. I've always envied Ellis' stature in the publishing world at such a young age as well.

With all the uproar recently about the fabricated memoir "A Million Little Pieces" Time Magazine decided to publish a full article on the controversy surrounding that book and its author. Tucked away in a sidebar was a smaller piece about JT Leroy called "The Boy Who Wasn't There". Turns out that Leroy did the fake "Million" one better: he never existed at all. The pictures Spencer and I saw online turned out to be the step sisiter of one of the real authors (that's right, it took two real adults to write for one fake teenager). Leroy was invented and marketed by a couple in the entertainment indusrty (whatever that means). All those stories I read were made up by someone else. Admittedly, "Heart" is labeled Fiction so I knew that everything in the book couldn't be true. But knowing the author's own troubled background (abusive mother, drug abuse, AIDS, redemption in a hospital for troubled youths) added meaning to the work that isn't there anymore. If I had known the book was fiction written by a middle aged couple would I have been as forging with the prose let alone knocked out by how good it was?

Spencer commented over the holiday that he was shocked JT Leroy could write so well considering he grew up in truckstops. The only thing he could have read between blow jobs was comics and Sports Illustrated. Nuts. What a pack of lies.

Movin' on up

2006-01-18T10:05:00.000-08:00

Life continues to rock and roll here in Monroe. I'm on my lunch break as usual and the kids are roaming the halls of Lee Jr. High like minature Godzillas. Sorry if I sounded a little down in the dumps yesterday. I wasn't. Just got a bit contemplative which is kinda funny when you think that a picture of meyself in a dog collar sparked all that introspection. I love that picture by the way. Anyone who knows me will recall my fondness for Iggy and the Stooges and that "look" is an obvious tribute. When I was 13 I saw the PBS "Rock and Roll" documentaries on TV and there was a good one on The Velvet UNderground, Lou Reed, The Stooges, and David Bowie that I just ate up. I was shocked by the footage of The Stooges performing back inn Detroit. Iggy was just some skinny guy going berserk on stage. I figured if he could do it why not me? At the time I weighed in at 110 (if that) and figured I would never get any girls the way I was. Iggy gave me hope. He still does.

I'm enjoying the mention on famousforfifteen.blogspot.com of Bonn Scott and AC DC as they influence my role in The Vidrines. Scott is indeed a role model of sorts for moi, but he has to take a backseat to Iggy. One way of thinking of the band is a collision of Tom Waits and Iggy Pop onstage. I dig that. "Coffee and Cigarttes-Somewhere in California" with the volume ratched up to 11.

It's been sorta starnge lately being back in touch with Kaycee Eckhardt. She's been in Japan for the past few years and is coming back to the states for a while. I'm going to plan a trip to see her in the near future. She and I used to get up to some pretty wild stuff back in the day (including my first brush with public nudity laws in Alexandria). I get the feeling that old magic may still be there. We'll see.

I'm going to eat some sushi with my father tonight since mom is out of town. I'm looking forward to sitting down with dad over a couple of bottles of sake and chatting about music and movies for a while. Dad and I have always been able to talk to each other about that sort of thing. I like to think we have a very open relationship though I don't go to him for too terribly much advice. If he knew half the shit I get up to he might want to have me committed again. So I'll bite my toungue and try to concentrate the conversation on lighter subjects.

Like Ryan Sarnowski's wedding. I recieved my invitation today and I'll do my damnedest to be there. We have a show the day before but it's possible I can get a flight to Tampa the next morning before returning to work the day after. We'll see.

Takaeshi Miike continues to mess with my head after all these years. For those not in the know he's a Japanese film director with a true ability to turn a genre on its ear while still delivering the goods. Excess is the key word here and if you know Billy you know he likes excess. Miike will never be a critical darling (the movies are uneven) but he fills me with joy after every flick he makes about the possibilties of cinema. Right now I'm watching (and rewatching) "DOA" a truly whacked out yakuza flick. This one was not as balls to the wall bizarre as "Gozu" (nothing could be) but it contains more starnge sights and sounds than I thought possible. By the end of the film I was breathless and immediately rewound to see it again. Currently my favorite in his cannon is "IZO"

A swell show and a swell review

2006-01-17T10:09:00.000-08:00

Howdy, everybody! Did y'all have a safe and happy weekend? I certainly did. We played at Sully's saturday night, which was a hoot. One of the problems I've been encountering lately at Vidrines shows is the familiar faces I see in the crowd. Not that I don't want folks to return to see us, I most certainly do, but I sometimes get the feeling we have a nitch audience that will never get any bigger than about 100 (317 if you count evryone who is a "Friend" at myspace.com). We did not have the largest crowd this Saturday in fact it was probably our smallest but it was made up by and large of folks I did not know. This makes me happy since I want new people and new reactions to the show.

Speaking of reactions Chris Jay wrote a very thoughtful review of the show at famousforfifteen.blogspot.com (with a very attractive photo of yours truly with no shirt and a dog collar at the beginning). I really dug the review and the fact that Chris would write about us in the first place. It nmade me a little nervous reading stuff like "Bill is going to take out his penis at one of these shows". I mean, Iggy Pop did this stuff first and did it better than I can ever hope to. The best thing I can bring to the mix is whatever writing ability I have. These worries are often compounded after a show because my voice is shot and the fact that I ain't ever gonna be a Dean Martin type singer starts making me itch. I watched the video we shot at the show and couldn't remember doing half the things I did on stage. I mean, I'm kinda in the moment and kinda fucked up, so whatever comes out of the dances comes out of the dances, right? But it makes me feel like less of an artist sometimes. Like, I don't write any music or choreograph any of the dance moves or anything. I'm not a very good singer. I'm out of shape and not the cutest boy on the block to begin with. I dunno, maybe it's got something to do with the action of doing whatever it is I do. Reve and I talk about the shamanistic aspects of my role in The Vidrines which sounds kinda pretentious (actually, it IS kinda pretentious). To some degree this band and the shows we play are my clearest form of worship. I don't go to Mass anymore. I don't claim any particualr faith. But there is a feeling that there is more than me at stake. I'm not saying I'm possessed by the "Magical Spirit of Rythm" or any of that nonsense but in the best case scenarios I am someone else onstage. Someone I could never be without the distance the stage provides me from my life (but not the audience). Whatever.

Show update

2006-01-13T14:57:00.000-08:00

We will actually be playing at Sully's tomorrow not Sharpies as previously posted sorry for any confusion.

Show in Shreveport

2006-01-12T10:16:00.000-08:00

The Vidrines will be back in HSrevport this Saturday at Sharpies (?) I think. For more accurate information go to myspace.com/thevidrines. I'm excited about playing a new club in one of my favorite cities (no, Noma, I am not moving there any time soon, unless Chris gets me a job at the new film center). It's been a long time no see for the band and its SHreveport audience. I can hardly wait.

Saw Hostel and Wolf Creek this weekend and can safely reccomend them to horror fans. Wolf Creek does not have any blood to speak of but the atmosphere is swell as is the fact that it was shot on digital video. There are of course a few gaping plot holes and weird pieces of motivation (would you stop and watch a home video while trying to escape a killer?) but overall it whet my appetite for the feast of fear that is Hostel. I saw the US premiere in Austin of Eli Roth's first film, Cabin Fever, and thought it stunk big time. If I had been 13 I probably would have dug that one a lot more but as a 23 year old (as I was at the time) I thought it was a bunch of dumb jokes loosely knitted to the side of a horror film. This has been remedied quite nicely in Hostel, giving us more well rounded characters that we can identify with (Josh was so close to home for me that I became a bit uncomfortable) and a heaping helping of gore that made the packed house screech in disgust and terror. One fella got up half way through and declared loudly, "I'm going to church!" You just know a movie is working right when that happens. I considered dressing up in a devil costume and giving away free tickets to people in line a la The Passion but decided against it. Instead I'll be dressing as a hasidic Jew and giving away tickets to Munich. Just kidding, though I really wish I could.

Well, that's about it. I'm psyched about the new Sam Peckinpah box set that just came out as well as the prospect of playing three shows this month. I wish I could play more often but to do that we would all have to quit our jobs and I'm the only one who would ever do that. I think.

What's Going On

2006-01-11T10:04:00.000-08:00

We've started a poetry unit in Reading this week and kicked things off with a round of song lyrics by Marvin Gaye, Fantasia (contemporary R&B singer, I think) and John Lennon. I brought in a copy of the Bob Dylan doc. Martin SCorscese did last year for the teacher (NOT for the students, I sometimes worry that y'all will assume we only show the kids videos in class). She's a nice lady from the New Orleans area who was displaced by the hurricane. I was a little scared of her at first as you generally are with new people who are sorta your superiors in the ranks but we've hit it off really well.

I'm reading Iceberg Slim's "Trick Baby" right now, "The Story of a White Negro". Some of the kids keep asking what it is about and I just say a con man. No one gave a sh*t when I was reading "The Long Goodbye" (by the way, Chris Jay, if you are reading this ask me about that book-it was excellent). I figure if the kids realize that there are books out there that are not jsut about how to eat fried worms and bios of football players then maybe they can start appreciating the whole modus operandi of reading. This is kind of a thorny path to walk upon, though. I mean these kids are, well, kids. Sure they have troubled home lives (in some cases) and are aware of the world around them in a way I was not at their age. But I feel a kind of responsibility to protect their innocence while educating (love that word!) them about the danger and beauty (and dangerous beauty) of the "real", adult world. I guess I'll figure this out as I go along.

Further advetures in Shreveport for our new celebrity

2006-01-05T10:03:00.000-08:00

Reve called me up yesterday and asked if I would like to drive over to Shreveport with him so he could get fitted for the movie Factory Girl. He and I got hired on as extras but unfortunately I can't work on it during the week so Mr. Carlson will have to represent our formidable acting abilities. After he was suited out by the Hollywood folks we met up with Carter and Chad for a drink (or two or three in my case) at Stray Cat, a little bar in dowtown Shreveport that supposedly stays open until 6:00 AM. It was nice seeing them and shooting the shit a bit. Reve and I decided to accompany them back to someone's mother's house and watch The Big Positive practice. They were actually really fun and would have made a swell opening act for our New Year's show. In fact those were my wishes, but The Vidrines being a democracy I was outvoted and Gatorbait won the honors. Gatorbait are a swell bunch of guys and played a hell of a set but I still wish we had the Big P out there to represent. Anyway, I had work the next morning and was proceeding to get myself good and drunk in another town so we left after a little cajoling from yours truly. The drive home was...interesting. Reve and I were both a bit toasted and traded up behind the wheel at least once. Have you ever driven with a drunk Reve? It ain't a cinch, kids, not by a long shot. If anyone can push my buttons it's that Daddy Carlson. We fussed at each other a bit but I don't think anyone got their feelings sprained (feelings? What feelings?). One thing it made me think about is the weird nature of friendship. I have and had friends that never said a bad word to me, called me out when I was getting ready to burn the silo, nothing. And I can't barely stand them. But Reve goes at me like a dog with a bone and I love him for it. Well, not all the time, espcially when he starts to get sanctimonious on my ass but I dunno, it works for me. I guess a friend is someone who cares enough to tell you when you're wrong (or at least when he thinks you're wrong) and not just give you the bullshit you wanna hear. I've had a few guys like that in my life (Ronnie, Chris and Spencer also come to mind) and I guess I'm grateful (like the Dead, a subject which Reve knows entirely too much about).
Neat huh? Anyway I can't hardly wait to see Wolf Creek and Hostel this weekend after a crummy wedding on Saturday. Ought to clear out the cobwebs, eh?

And...we're back

2006-01-04T09:50:00.000-08:00

Howdy, folks! Did the holidays treat everyone well? I'm pretty good, considering. Made up for all that lost drinking time, slept very little and dreamt constantly of being late for work and/or fired. My visit with Spencer went very well, had a blast and met some pretty swell folks in Houston. Spencer is the smae guy I left in Tallhassee all those years ago and I was gratifide to see that LA didn't corrupt him (anymore than he already is). I saw King Kong a total of three times over the break and would go see it again this weekend if I did not already have a double feature of Wolf Creek and Hostel to burn my retinas with.

The Vidrines had a great New Years show last weekend. We played for almost 2 and 1/2 hours which made me rather proud of my skinny ass. Corbin came back for the show and we all stepped back into the old line-up with nary a hitch. I did not get to see Chris Jay as much as I thought due to car trouble and tooth trouble, respectively. I recieved some swell gifts for Christmas including a DV camera which will hopefully get lots of mileage in the new year. Reve is on my ass about getting out there with it and anyone who knows Reve know he is not to be denied. But I try, oh, how I try.

I'm back at school and the kids are acting like fools, but I don't really mind. I missed them all quite a bit over the break. I was just happy I didn't get fired or replaced while I was gone. I guess they like me here for the most part. I guess I like being here too.

King Kong

2005-12-16T09:43:00.000-08:00

Okay, inspired by Chris Jay's remarkable review of CONTLTWATW I have elected to review the other big holiday blockbuster of the season: King Kong. Unlike Narnia Kong doesn't have the Red State/Blue State thing going for it nor does it contain uncomfortable situations involving adults (fauns) and children. However King Kong does contain one of the best love stories I've seen on screen since Punch Drunk Love. The fact that it takes place between a woman and a 25 foot gorilla doesn't detract an inch from its appeal (at least to a freak like myself).

What impressed me the most about the film (well, really this is a movie not a film, no matter what some of the more rabid fans would have you believe) was it seemed to be a true return to form for the director, Peter Jackson. I first discovered Peter Jackson when I was in fourth grade. There was an extensive production article on Meet the Feebles in the first issue of Fangoria I ever bought (it had a picture of a Gremlin from Gremlins 2 on the cover as I recall). I was blown away that someone halfway across the world could be making movies that we were talking about in the US for basically no money and involving some of the weirdest stuff I had ever heard of at the time (fourth grade, guys, fourth grade) I tracked down a copy of Bad Taste at the local Alfalfa Video Store (the chain was later taken over by Blockbuster but not before I bought my first GWAR album there)and proceeded to watch it with all my friends. I evntually bought that copy and still pull it out occasionally to remind myself why I loved Jackson so mch. He followed Feebles up with Braindead, still the most accomplished zombie comedy (or zomcom) ever made. It was certainly the goriest.

Then tragedy struck Peter Jackson's fans: he got a girlfriend. Fran Walsh moved in and basically ruined Jackson for his genre fans, pushing him to make films like Heavenly Creatures and something called Lord of the Rings. Oh, sure The Frighteners gave us a small taste of Peter's original charms but I knew it was over once I saw Fellowship of the Ring. Little fairies running about the New Zealand countryside trying to convince the audience that this really is cool. But I never bought it.

When I first heard that Kong was a go again I had some reservations. What if this becomes a neutered story of a devoted animal and his snuggle bunny blonde? I've already had a remake of Mighty Joe Young, thank you. Fran was on board again and I would be willing to bet that she is responsible for many of the new kong's more superfluous side tracks aboard the Venture as well as the mystifying subploy involving a black sailor and the young white kid he takes uder his wing. That subplot went absolutely nowhere and if his wife hadn't written it Jackson surely would have cut it.

But, but, BUT Kong works more often than not because Jackson is making a real monster movie here, not some ridiculous ode to middle earth.

When it rains it pours

2005-12-14T10:09:00.000-08:00

Rain, rain go the fuck away! My car's driver side window is stuck in the down position and it's raining outside. I tried to fix it with a plastic bag and duct tape but it did not work at all. This sucks wenus

Ah! Relief is mine!

2005-12-13T09:39:00.000-08:00

Well, I'm now out of the woods (I think) with regards to my crapulant sickness. The snot is still a-comin' but not with the full force gale it once was.

Yesterday I impressed one of the younger teachers here with my plans for Christmas. I'll be flying over to Houston to spend a few days with my ol' buddy Spencer and his family. Spencer and I went to Florida State University film school (at least I did for a year before being expelled from the university proper for my crappy grades in every other class not involving film). Spencer and I always seemed to be on the same page most of the time and I have missed him dearly. What impressed the young lady yesterday was Spencer co-host duties on one of her favorite programs "Design oon a Dime". I called Spencer with this news yesterday and he was less than impressed. I suppose I can understand. I imagine most of his "fans" are housewives he has little interest in meeting. But Spencer: she's hot! She's like the only hot teacher at this school! And she thinks you're cute (sadly, I am never the recipient of her affections). Ah, well, whatever.

To celebrate my new found health and vitality I drove over to Wal-mart on my lunch break and braved the crowds in order to purchase the extended cut of Sin City ( a movie I enjoyed thoroughly) and the King Kong Production Diaries. I'm intrigued by this last DVD set because the movie it details comes out tomorrow. All the material on the discs was once available online at the kongisking.net website. I watched a couple of the diaries online and found them to be pretty fun stuff. Just about anything involving Peter Jackson is pretty fun stuff actually. Last week I got The Frighteners on DVD and spent the better part of a weekend trying to watch it all. Peter Jackson is all over that disc and I'm beginning to look forward to his cherubic face on my TV. I still haven't fallen for the Lord of the Rings films. I saw them all and enjoyed them but don't particularly want to wade trhough 48 hours of extras regarding them, I just don't think hobbits are that cool. But giant apes? Brilliant!

Speaking of that giant monkey, I'm going to buy my ticket for King Kong after school today. I've been looking forward to this for a while (not as much as the Kill Bill movies but still quite a bit) I expect to cry my little eyes out when he climbs that skyscraper. Every man is that big ape with his woman swiping at biplanes in his heart. Every man.

From the depths of my illness-I snot at you!

2005-12-09T09:46:00.000-08:00

As you can gather from the above title line I am still sick. This has not kept me from merrily going on about my way in the world. Lately I've been trying to put together a list of movies to contribute to the school library here. I've decided on Dragonslayer, Jason and the Argonauts and Clash of the Titans so far with King Kong (the 1933 version) and Tron on the waiting list. I'll also try to locate some cheapo copies of Miyazaki films for a dash of anime flavor. The kids like the anime.

If all goes well I'll be going to Shreveport this weekend for the King Hippo Dirtfoot show at Sullies. We'll be enjoying the show and casing the joint for future gigs. Lil Joe's has become kinda interminable of late now that Benedict isn't at the helm. Too bad.

We auditioned a new keyboard player last night and he really clicked with the band. Good improvisation skills and a real sense of groove. It was cool to hear what he did with George's Daughter and Levee. He didn't have that genteel feeling I sometimes got from Corbin's playing (and he didn't tend to dominate the songs the way Corbin occasionally would). I'm digging The Vidrines without keys right now but it might be nice to have another whack at them.

It'll be good to see Chris Jay again. I miss that monkeyman.

Snot is fun!

2005-12-08T09:44:00.000-08:00

My illness has abated somewhat allowing me to return to work, however its symptoms continue to plague me. In the interest of making lemonade out of metaphysical lemons I have attempted to find new and clever ways of using my mucus for entertainment purposes. I really haven't gotten much further than marveling at the various qualities and quamtities of the stuff though I find I can still blow a fine snot rocket. My "mouth mucus" has a hearty consistency and rolls off the tongue like an Irish brogue (sp.?). My cats have had to remain on their toes to avoid my frequent volleys of projectile cruddola, since I miss the garbage can 9 out of 10 times. Ah, life! Glorious, don't you think?

Back in the saddle again...

2005-12-07T09:43:00.000-08:00

Gosh, it's been a while hasn't it? Sorry about the lack of updates lately, I've been battlieing a fierce December cold that had me bedridden for two days (three if you count the weekend, the crappiest days to get sickly). I spent the time reading a swell Spy Magazine (remeber those guys?) mock Cliff Note volume of 1980s "edgy" literature. You know, Lesss Than Zero, Slaves of New York, Bright Lights Big City all that hooey. I loved those books when I was in high school and early college but have since looked back at them and wondered "What the fuck was I thinking?" I still hold that this genre (Spy makes a good case for genre here, tying all of these books together with collegiate Yankee types doing drugs, behaving badly and mourning the loss of a dead mother. Seriously ALL of these books had a dead mother) is entertaining as hell and serves as cautionary fables for the unfeeling generation. But man they sucked too. I mean, EVERYTHING sucks on one level or another but these things really do suck. Hard. But that's why I loves 'em.

I also reviewed Romper Stomper still the best movie ever made about racist skinheads (I haven't seen The Believer yet) and Harmony Korine's early script effort Kids. Man, Kids (I'm not doing any more itaclics, sorry) still makes me a happy monkey. I know it's supposed to be a cautionary fable but I never bought that for a minute. It's a celebration of everything shitty about my generation in our adolescent years and it ROCKS! $7.95 at Target, it cannot be beat with a skateboard to the face. I need to find the soundtrack post haste. It brought back many fine memories. I just hope my students are having as much fun. And that they don't give each other AIDS.

Hmmm, what else? Hopefully THE VIDRINES will have a couple of shows before the big New Years Blow Out. I found a stash of old Vidrines shirts in my ex-roommate's closet and they will be on sale for $15 a piece. I know that sounds pricey but these are the last of their kind and will never be reprinted so deal with it. Front and Back, B&W, sizes Large and X-large. Rare Jason Byron Nelson print on each side. All y'all tubby bastards need one of these things to show how hip you are over the holiday season! Chris Jay, if you are reading this, please return my calls. I miss you and want to know why you hate me now.

On censoring Terry Gilliam's "Brazil" and the word "fuck"

2005-11-30T09:41:00.000-08:00

Well, we're almost done showing Brazil this week. The kids have been really into it though if you asked them anything about the movie they would tell you that it's "boring" and "stupid". Yeah, right. Then why are you staring at the screen wide eyed and constantly asking me what will happen next? Meh.

Brazil is swell for junior high school students for a lot of reasons. One would be it's pretty to look at and pretty funny in places. Another would be stuff blows up every 15 minutes or so keeping the little tykes engaged. And one more would be the frightening realities that it seems to predict with an ever more accurate eye. If this movie doesn't stir some citzenship in these brats by the end then I'll just have to pull a Shirley Chisolm on them.

We ran into a trouble spot duuring first perios when I did not mute the DVD soon enough and Sam Lowry tells Jill to "fucking move this truck!" The kids were immensely amused by this but the teahcer less so. When they showed Titanic in sciuence class (don't ask me why) there was copious swearing, sexing and shooting (as well as kissing and romancing which were less appreciated). Another f-bomb snuck out when our heroes drive through a road block. All this slipped by my usually studious eye and I resolved to remain in the classes showing the film in order to delete the offending (oddly enough "offend" was the word of the day in Reading today) words. No real problems after that. But I still feel like an idiot for having to do this. "Fuck" is not going to hurt anyone. These kids know the word and know it is not appropriate to use in certain situations (I still remember the first time I said "fuck" to my mother. It was also the first time she ever hit me. Ouch!) I can show all the violence I want to but if we sneak anywhere near sexuality, watch out!
What am I supposed to do show them Emmet Otter's Jug Band Christmas? Well, actually I might do that but anyway...you see my point? Meh. I say meh!

RIZE

2005-11-18T11:20:00.000-08:00

I've been showing the kids a film called Rize today since we're about to get out for a week of Thanksgiving vacation. Once again the students went bannas for a pick of mine. I'm developing quite a reputation around here (I also donated a copy of Napoleon Dynamite to the school library this week). We've had to skip over a brief section of the film that deals with the "stripper dance" because it's pretty suggestive and really doesn't do anything for the film and its deletion didn't hurt the flick too much (though I am censoring which makes me feel kinda creepy). If anything the deletion created a buzz amongst the kids about what we wpouldn't show them which will hopefully make them want to rent or buy the DVD and watch it themselves. If anyone out there is teaching inner city youth please consider showing this movie in class. Its really entertaining and upbeat while remaiining pretty firmly grounded in reality. Worthwhile for kids and adults.

One of the kids gave me a comic he drew about a monster called "The Vidrine" that is terrorizing a city. I almost cried when I read it.

Get Killed or Die Trying

2005-11-14T10:15:00.000-08:00

I went to the 50 Cent movie (this ain't no film, ladies and gents) this past weekend and came back sorely disappointed. When one goe to these modern day blaxploitation films one hopes for some transcendant moments of sleaze and posturing mixed with barechested macho behavior and violence by the bucket. Well all these elements are present and accounted for in Get Rich or Die Trying but it all rings so hopelessly self aggrandizing that you never once are allowed to lose yourself in this fantasy of a hip hop star's rise to fame and fortune. Some of the elements from 50's life are here, but get treated as reverential homlies from a man who has seen the error of his ways (actually that;'s not it at all; 50 is never at fault in anything he does in this movie but we'll get to that later). The gangster cliches come fast and furioous with lousy mugging from all the cast members except 50 Cent who spends most of the time looking like he would rather be somewhere else. In fatc that could be said of everyone in this turkey with the exception of Terrence Howard, who brings home the only decent performace in the entire picture (and one that was mostly improvised). Howard's intorduction in a shower room brawl is brave (he's full frontal in the entire this IN LONG SHOT, while 50 does his best to turn his back to the camera so his ding dong ain't flapping) is the one really great thing in this movie. It is GREAT. I wish it was in something else sop I could get the DVD and watch it again and again. But I'll never get this movie on DVD. EVER. You coulld not give me this movie. It sucks that bad.

One of the biggest problems in the movie is the treatment of crack dealers and crack itself. We have no clue from the ghetto world we see here that crack heads even exist or what they do to the communities in which they live. We see tow crackheads in the movie: one is a punchline and the other is a traitor to the great man, 50 Cent. Ja Rule gets some fake face time as a light skinned rapper who comes across as the piussy he is made out to be in so many of 50 Cent's songs. 50 Cent goes on for minutes at a time about how he wants to tell the truth in his music but all we get is self aggrandizment and so much more bullshit. Biggie Smalls (Notorious BIG) became renowned for his raps because he had a sense of himself. 50 Cent has a sense of his wallet. I gotta go teach some urban youth now. Bye.

"Hello, kiddies..."

2005-11-10T09:38:00.000-08:00

At school we have fifteen minutes of required reading twice a week in first perios. Naturally the kids hate this and wish they were watching Channel 1 and consequently never bring books. The teacher has a stack of old National Geographics and Sports Illustrateds for them to glance through but this just doesn't cut it for me (or her, honestly). I decided to dig through my parents attic last week and pulled down a box of my old EC comics reprints from the 1950s (well, the books were originally published in the '50s; I bought my copies in the late 1980s ealy 1990s). I hemmed and hawwed about bringing them to school for the rest of the week. I dreaded some parent getting pissed about their kids reading such filth, etc. or worse yet offending the teacher and losuing my job (which I love quite a bit, can you tell?) Well, I bit the bullet today and the kids LOVED the fucking things. They sat quietly ACTUALLY reading the things and grinning at the pictures all the while. It filled my heart with a kind of joy looking at these kids readin TALES FROM THE CRYPT and CRIME SUSPENSE STORIES for school instead of having a school sponsered bonfire of these little gems. I got permission at the same time to show Brazil after the Thanksgiving break for three days in class. I'm king of the world, pinches!

"What's Welsh for 'Fuck Off'?"

2005-11-07T09:41:00.000-08:00

Well, the John Cale show Friday was indeed spectacular. He opened with "Venus in Furs" and then proceeded to go through his vast backcatalog of solo work with a brief stop over in Johnathan Richman Country for "Pablo Picasso". The songs he played from "Walking on Locusts" were personal favorites because I've never really dug that album but live the songs were very moving indeed. I talked with all kinds of folks in line before the show (we got there at 5:00, excellent time in my opinion) including one of the co-founders of the Church of the Subgenius (Bob and I both need slack), Rev. Sterno. After the show I approached the stage with my clutch of CDs and his autobiography (written with Victor Bockris) What's Welsh for Zen? in the hope of getting an autograph or three. I was told Mr. Cale did not usually do the signing thing. He handed me a setlist (which is proudly hung on my wall in such a way that you can see "Guts", my favorite Cale song, in full display) and I begged him to ask Mr. Cale for me. If he did not want to sign anything, well, what's Welsh for "Fuck off". The road manager thought this was pretty funny and told me to wait by the tour bus and not tell anyone. Sure enough Mr. Cale came out of the theater and graciously spoke to me a a handful of others by the bus, signing things and asking how things were in Monroe(!). The fact that he was so kind and almost grandfatherly after playing for nearly two hours blew my mind. I rationalized that he must have seen me in the second row center bopping around joyously as the rest of the crowd sat there as dour as church mice. Maybe this ingratiated me to him. Maybe not. But I FUCKING LOVE JOHN CALE!!!

Stalking the wild Welshman in the forrests of Arkansas

2005-11-03T09:54:00.000-08:00

If all goes well I'll be going to see John Cale tomorrow in Conway, Arkansas. How weird is that?

Oh, shit, man...

2005-10-27T18:53:00.000-07:00

Well, I broke down and got it: the Grindhouse 2-disc version of Cannibal Holocaust. Everybody knows I love me them nasty movies, the ones everyone else looks at on my shelves and says, "what are you, a freak or something?" Yep, I sure am, and make no bones about it. I just picked this sucker up from the mall while putting up flyers for The Vidrines Halloween Costume Ball (this Saturday at the Olive Street Dancehall. Open past 3 am due to daylight savings time, bitch) so I haven't watched it yet. But I'll be posting a full review here soon enough. Beware...this movie goes all the way!!!

What next for the kids?

2005-10-26T10:46:00.000-07:00

I found out today that Terry Gilliams Brazil is on the list of reccomended films to show for the Science Fiction block of our literature unit. How's that for cool? Once I'm done these kids will be better versed in cinema than most folks in film school. Now if I can just work in that Cassavetes unit...

Still Scary After All These Years

2005-10-24T09:39:00.000-07:00

This past Friday I brought a couple of DVDs to show my first and second period 7th graders. One was a compilation of Simpsons Halloween episodes and the other was Poltergeist. I brought the Simpsons as a back up in case the home room teacher decided that Poltergeist was too extreme for the little tykes. I watched it for the first time in years the night before and found it to still be pretty intense stuff. Imagine my delight when Ms. Watson insisted on Poltergeist. I sat in the back of the room as the movie began and the kids began talking back to the screen (Eastgate, Monroe's $1 movie thetaer, closed years ago but watching movies with the kids always brings back fond memories of those particualrly noisy screenings). Nothing much happens in Poltergeist for the first twenty minutes or so, just the Freeling family doing family stuff in that uniquely Spielberg, 1980s kinda way. I was a bit concerned about the scene in which mom and dad share a joint while the kids are tucked in bed. But the kids took that as a matter of course. In fact one little girl said "That's just like my momma!" I have no opinion on that whatsoever.

So the kids think the movie is pretty stupid. They make fun of the clothes and the rich white people doing stupid shit that they would never do in a million years. Then the scary old tree outside grabs the son out of his bed and the shit hits the fan. I mean you could hear a pin drop in that classroom. We were retaking school pictures that day so I escorted a couple of the boys down to nthe gym and on my way back I could hear screams from the classroom. I rushed back to be greeted by some very excited young ladies. "Mr. Dunn, what you showing us?" "What is this movie?" "Where can I get me this?" I looked at the screen and Marty, one of the scientists brought in to investigate the haunting od the Freeling family was pulling off his face after a maggoty midnight snack. I never felt like more of a hero in my life.

I started over from Marty's midnight snack for the second period so the kids from first period that stuck in the classroom could finish the movie. Have you ever seen a classroom of too cool for school 7th graders jump out of their skins because of a movie that's more than twenty years old? Man, it is cool. Really really cool. I think I'm going to start digging into the backcatalog of 1970s and 1980s PG horror and action flicks to give the kids what they want from here on out. That shit works. And I can get away with a lot of shit that would be too intense for a PG-13 flick nowadays. Sometimes I love my job. And Friday was one of those special days. The little boogers...

Domino Darko

2005-10-19T09:45:00.000-07:00

Last night I decided to go to the movies and catch a light entertainment. This past weekend I went to see History of Violence by David Cornenberg and left that feeling sorely disappointed. The reviews for that movie made it sound like the second coming and all I got out of it was a rather slowly paced slice of tedium masquerading as social commentary. Just because you slow everything down in a film does not automatically lend the events "weight".

Anyway, I opted to see "Domino" because the reviews were almost 100% bad. I figured if all the cats that were falling over themselves to praise a film I thought was a bore then the bad reviews might point me toward something I would enjoy. And I was right on the money.

"Domino" was written by Richard Kelly, the fellow behind "Donnie Darko", and directed by Tony Scott, Ridley's younger brother and director of one of my all time favorite flicks, "True Romance". Scott always seems to benefit from a hip young screenwriter and he does here in spades. Kelly's script doesn't reinvent the wheel or anything but it is an interesting story well told. We have almost non-stop humor and vilence mixed with some of the wildest characters you'll see anywhere this year. I had FUN with this movie, a LOT of FUN. The cherry on top was a left field cameo by Tom Waits that seemed straight out of "Natural Born Killers". In fact there was an overwhelming vibe of mid-1990s cool about this movie that made me wax nostalgic. No, it ain't the greatest story ever told and it won't make you reevaluate anything in your life. But it will entertain you if you don't let the non-sensical plot make you gassy.

Most of the negative reviews I have read bemaon the fact that this movie doesn't follow the actual events of Domino Harvey's life. At all. Basically this is a fictional world filled with fictional events and fictional characters. Because it's fucking fiction. Fun, fan fiction at that. Kiera Knightedly doesn't set the world on fire as Domino but Mickey Rourke and Christopher Walken sure as fuck make up for that. Scott's directing style seems to be more and more influenced by the films of Wong Kar Wai of Chung King Express fame. In fact if "Domino" had been in Cantonese the film's reviews would have been glowing. For some reason Scott is continually lumped in with the McGs (CHarlies Angels for those who don't know or don't want to) when they could not be more different. Scott sustains hius thrills in ways that these hacks could never do. He throws everything at you and then slaps you with a carp for good measure. The violence and mysoginy run rampant through his films. And I love him for it.

Go see this movie in the theaters before it gets pulled. It DELIVERS THE GOODS, folks. It doesn't promise anything it doesn't give up on the first date. It makes the short list of Bill's favorite movies of 2005 (and 1995 for that matter). Also best credits of the year. Fucking great credits.

I have a frightening feeling...

2005-10-13T12:54:00.000-07:00

I have recently been experiencing a new emotion This new emotion scares the shit out of me. I feel paternal. How's that for a kick in the teeth? I've always been too fucked up or too self-involved (and I still am a lot of the time) to feel this way. Or to even entertain the notion of feeling this way. I have this sick feeling in my gut that the world is about to turn again under my feet; the way it did when I hit puberty, discovered sex, experimented with drugs, realized I could fail, realized the world did not revolve around ME. I would guess that much of the past five years has been spent running blindly from the last realization. I have accepted it more or less now and this new sensation begins stirring. Oh, Christ, don't let me become a father. I am still not ready, never will be ready. I swear.

Bringing culture to the unwashed masses...

2005-10-13T09:37:00.000-07:00

Tomorrow I'm showing my kids the conclusion of Hyao Myazaki's (I know I misspelled that name sorry) Nausicca of The Valley of the Wind. So far the kids have loved it, boys and girls. They dig the animals and insects and fights and animation AND the strong female heroine. Cool, huh? For English I'm supposed to bring in something else for Friday. I'm leaning toward Alfred Hitchcock Presents or The Tattle-Tale Heart (a marionette version of the Poe story). Murder and mayhem seem appropriate for the kiddy-pups after a long week at school. Sometimes I really love this job. Of course sometimes I'm not in a foul mood. *sigh*

Hot fun in the Autumn time...

2005-10-11T05:13:00.000-07:00

This past weekend The Vidrines had some great shows to fill the void in our otherwise dreadful lives. Friday night we headlined at the Blue Monkey which we haven't done in a very long time. The place was pretty much the same, lousy service, a Vidrine constantly watching the door guy to make sure he wasn't stealing and a decent sized crowd of folks who seemed to really enjoy the show. Hometown (sorta) heroes Squint opened for us and gave us the door in exchange for opening Saturday's show in El Dorado at a club called Einstien's (I think that is actually how they spell it). I have never been to El Dorado before but the guys at the club were a swell bunch of folks that got behind us 100% and made us feel very welcome (and in fact invited us back which I am really looking forward to). There's something about walking into a rock club through a gargantuan, gaudy electric guitar with neon lights running up the frets that makes you feel like you're in the right place to rock. The gentleman who owns the club spoke to me after the show and was very supportive of what we were doing, which was a great relief to me as I constantly have a fear that someone is going to punch me in the face for wasting his five dollars.

What else? I sweated through two new suits, drank waaaaaay too much, smoked waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay too many cigarettes, blew out my voice, got Ronnie and myself lost in the "bad" part of El Dorado while on foot, threatened to beat a homeless man with my belt if he did not leave us alone (he was not intimidated to say the least), danced quite a bit, talked to a bunch of strangers about a bunch of subjects, heard a couple of folks at the bar compare us to the Arcade Fire (huh?) and never once saw Brett Roman or Chadwick Vegas. Where the fuck were they? Are they okay? Why don't their cell phones work? I need answers, dammit!

And now the thrilling conclusion...

2005-10-07T10:21:00.000-07:00

Well, just to keep everyone who reads this ridiculously titled blog abreast (hee, hee, I said "breast"!) of the band situation, I have come clean with all my bandmates regarding the situation I had a hand in creating regarding my less than honest actions the other week (what a run-on sentence that was!) We all sat down during a break in rehearsals and I apologized for lying and promised to never do it again. The "business" we're in will contain enough dishonest people for us to deal with, I didn't need to compound the problem by being dishonest with a fellow Vidrine. The fellow in question was incredibly gracious about the whole thing, didn't rub my face in it and I think the hatchet has been buried, and not in one of our scalps! Things will likely continue to be a tad rocky between us but I have faith that time and improved behavior in the honesty department on my part will smooth things out butt (hee, hee, I said "butt"!) good. It's good to realize when you are wrong and I'm becoming pretty good at accepting it when it happens and moving forward. Is this "maturity"? Yuck! Fuck that shit, I need to go do some deliciously irresponsible things with the Ghost Town Flood boys this Saturday. Mmmmm, Brett and Chad, two great tastes that taste great together (in my butthole!).

Chris really IS gone...

2005-10-06T09:14:00.000-07:00

Well, there he goes, one of the finest folks this lousy webworld ever had the pleasure of meeting. Three years ago I discovered Chris Jay's blog, chrisisegone.blogspot.com, and began reading it voraciously. It was the most important site on the web for me for a long time (sure I had flings with channel101.com and filmthreat.com, but they were only flings) Chrisisgone was my one true web love. And its gone, thanks to what? Some assholes flaming him? A sense that he was misunderstood? I don't know and I don't care. I guess I could be pissed about it but that seems kinda stupid. I'll just remember the good times (most recently involving lengthy comments regarding his butt). How will I fill the void you have left me, Chris? I love you, man. You're beautiful, never forget it. I wouldn't be half of what I am without you. I appreciated the blog while it was there and now that it's not I appreciate it even more. More importantly I appreciate you (though I sometimes have a funny way of showing it). I'm not the easiest person to be friends with and you have been my friend longer than anyone. Thank you. Thank you so very, very much.

Patience...

2005-09-20T08:59:00.000-07:00

To continue where we left off earlier, I am trying to put myself in my bandmates shoes here. Initially this was pretty difficult as the barely contained anger of the previous post should indicate. I don't like being talked to the way I was being talked to last night. It did not seem to come from a constructive place. Just a "I-am-pissed-and-won't-listen-to-anything-else" place. Luckily, I tried my best to listen to what he was more or less yelling at me, rather than waiting to talk or tuning him out. I stand by what I did at the show Friday, I'm even rather proud of it from a performance aspect. Despite technical difficluties we persevered as an entertaining and challengeing rock act. I understand that my desire to push buttons and be confrontational can be hard to understand all the time (especially when you cannot hear what I'm saying. The addition of some choice Lenny Bruce quotes to "Hey Ma (I Ain't No Faggot)" were no doubt lost on my bandmate).

What he was trying to enphasize to me was a feeling of betrayal; one that I had not anticipated. His strong, and in my opinion misguidedly sensitive, opinions regarding the subject matter of the song in question blew this sense of betrayal out of proportion. I (basically) did something I (more or less) said I would not do. Something tells me there's more to this than meets the eye. Maybe there's some sublimation of another preceived betrayal going on here though what and who are involved are up to specualtion. And judging from my reaction last night to his speculations regarding me and my life it would be hypocritical of me to do to him what he did to me last night. I will go on the record here and now by saying my drinking and drug use have radically downsized in the last two months, particularly at shows. They certainly have not stopped but I do not believe that they are impairing my ability to perform my duties in this band. Whether or not that is appreciated is not the point. I know what I know and that is enough (Well, almost. Why would I be sharing this stuff here if my personal knowledge was all that mattered?)

In closing, I feel a tad ambushed by what occurred last night, a bit hurt and more than a little angry. But that won't affect the band . If he meant what he said about staying in the band, etc but no longer being my friend then so be it. The loss of this particular friendship won't change too terribly much in my life (the only "quality" time I've ever speant with this individual outside of band related endeavors would amount to playing Halo almost a year ago, which further exaserbates my irritation at some of his comments regarding my personal life). Life is good and life goes on. And I ain't changing.

Patience and its svelte figure

2005-09-20T05:21:00.000-07:00

Last night after band practice I was blocked in by one of my band members who proceeded to tear me a new one regarding a song we played at a gay bar Friday night. The gist of it was how pissed he was that I told him I would change the lyrics but did not (the name of the song in question is "Hey Ma (I Ain't No Faggot)", a clever use of double negative). He also proceeded to tell me how upset he was that I would use that lyric in front of a predominantly homosexual audience and that he was not upset because he had come to expect this sort of behavior from me. I say I'll do something and not do the exact opposite, etc. He did not want to hear a rebuttal from me and said we were no longer friends. We could be in the band together but that would be as far as it goes from here on out because he could no longer trust me.

Of course I was upset by all this and fumed for many hours afterward trying to come up with a rebuttal even if he would never hear it. Then I stopped. Honestly, I know I'm in the right here with the exception of the not changing the lyrics part (which I did in the verses, but of course I knew he meant the chorus of "Hey, Ma I ain't no faggot; The queers suck me" The lines come from John Water's film "Pecker" if you're curious). I figure to not do the song in front of a gay audience is hypocritical; like I wouldn't use the "What the river has done to these poor niggers, man" line in "Louisiana 1927" in front of an African American. I know where I stand. More later.

I had too much to dream last night

2005-09-15T09:38:00.000-07:00

Sorry about the lack of updates lately. I've been very busy at wok, etc. and the stress has been building. Which I suppose leads us to this post.

I woke up this morning at 5:00 absolutely terrfied by a dream I had just had. I was in Hot Springs Arkansas with Ronnie Vidrine for the documentary film festival. There was some kind of awards ceremony going on at one of the hotels downtown and I skipped out because I already knew that Mike Leigh's "Naked" would win ("Naked" is not a documentary by the way) I walked around town a bit and started to hear screaming in this residential neighborhood. Curious, I went to investigate and see if I could help. I saw fires burning in a row of town houses and heard poeple yelling about a virus outbreak and how they had to kill the infected before it spread. A ctrowd was beginning to form on the satreet so I ran back to the hotel to get Ronnie and get the fuck outta there. We started down a side street and all the lights went out. Like, street lights and everything. I grabbed Ronnie's hand so we wouldn't get seperated and we found ourselves in somebody's driveway. I saw a little girl and began to worry because I knew we couldn't leave her where she was (her parents were lying in pools of blood by the backyard swimming pool. You could see them through the carport) Then the little girl fell over in front of us without saying a word because someone had cut her throat too. We ran into the house looking for something, anything that coiuld help us get the hell out of whatever the fuck we had stumbled into. Then I heard a toilet flush in one of the bathrooms cloe by. Ronnie and I ran into a laundrey room and turned on a waher and dryer to cover our sounds then busted out a screen in a windo and leapt back out into the carport of this house.

Then I woke up. I was scared, man. Really scared. It felt really real, y'know? I almost couldn't get out of bed for fear that the apartment complex would be in ruins and I would have to defend myself against machete weilding mobs of-what? People? The worst thing about the dream was the "virus" or whatever was impossible to identify. I had never heard of it before the yelling and screaming. How were the killers identifying the infected? Did it matter to them? Just an excuse to kill other people.

I told my mom about my dream this motrning and she said it probably came out of this whole Katrina business and the images that are flowing through the media. She may be right. Watching the remake of Dawn of the Dead again I was struck by how horrifying such a situation resally would be if it was really REAL. When I was younger I could imagine nothing better than living through a zombie plague. Now I just don't think so.

And we continue...

2005-09-06T09:45:00.000-07:00

I've retreated to another classroom with a computer to finish my thoughts on this weekend in Shreveport. Mars Vegas (or Ghost Town Flood) were mucho fun. They allowed me to get up and introduce them which felt quite gratifying. Louisiana 1927 mixed with Orange Claw Hammer by Captain Beefheart. I clambered back onstage to howl during their last song too. Those guys are swell and I count myself lucky to have them as friends. Redshift were neato, Dirtfoot continues to be a reliable good time and there was a strange and beautiful bluesman in the front room at some point during the show. Carter was a superb host as always, buying me my first drink of the evening and making me feel like a guest of honor. The artwork upstair at the Soundstage was pretty cool too but my funds got depleted pretty fast and I couldn't properly bid on anything. Sara drove us back to Chris' house where I found that Chris Brown had discovered my Stooges CDs and was in the process of copying one of them. He didn't return it to its case so I left it there for his further enjoyment. But I want it back CB! I've got your copy of Let It Blurt the biography of Lester Bangs and am holding it for ransom until you make with the music!

We've got some new students from New Orleans here today and they seem kinda scared. Can't blame them really, junior high is a pretty frightening place when you already have friends. Imagine not knowing anyone and being in a strange city. I'll do my best to look out for them. But ultimately it's sink or swim. Oh God, I am so going to hell for that...

Great fun in SHreveport for a good cause

2005-09-06T09:36:00.000-07:00

Ronnie Vidrine and I went to Shreveport for a Hurricane Katrina Relief benefit concert Sunday night and had a smashing time. Shreveport is one of those enlightened cities in Louisiana that permits the sale of alchol on Sundays so we gt rip roaring drunk and danced our asses off and listened to the cream of the SHreveport music crop. I danced like a fool and got to chat up plenty of cool folks (including Noma!)

I want to go on the record here and say that The Vidrines would have been overjoyed t6o play but could not due to the prior obligations of our guitarist. We would have played for free. We didnot not play because we were not being paid. That's bullroar and anyone who says that is full of it. There! Now that's out of the way.

I got to hang with Jeremy Jay (Chris' brother) I had not seen him in years and it did my heart good to speak with him at length. I wish Chris' camera hadn't run out of juice before we completed the interview. More to come later. 8th grade just came into the library.

They're trying to wash us away

2005-09-02T09:25:00.000-07:00

I'll just echo Chris Jay's comments earlier today. I feel overwhelmed by the situation we find ourselves in after Hurricane Katrina. Many of my friends from the New Orleans area are back in Monroe now, sleeping on couches, in guest bedrooms or camped out in backyards. Many of them are feeling more than a little lost and my attempts at levity are misguided at best, insulting at worst. There really isn't anything funny about this situation and for a person who thrives on humor like yours truly it can be a bit disorienting to say the least. The Monroe City School system is about to be swamped with refugee children from New Orleans and the prospect of 200 new students on Tuesday is kinda frightening.

A song by Randy Newman from the Good Old Boys album keeps popping into my head and making me tear up. It's called "Louisiana 1927"

Something happened down here
Guess the wind has changed
Clouds rolled in from the gulf and it starts to rain
It rained real hard and it rained for a real long time
There are six feet of water in the streets of Evangeline

Louisiana
Louisiana
They're trying to wash us away
They're trying to wash us away

The river rose all day
The river rose all night
Some people got lost in the flood
Other folks got away alright
The river has busted through clear down to Placamine
There are six feet of water in the streets of Evangeline

Louisiana
Louisiana
They're trying to wash us away
They're trying to wash us away

President Coolidge came down on a railroad train
With a little fat man with a notepad in his hand
President Collidge said "Little fat man ain't it a shame,
What the river has done to this poor cracker's land?"

Louisiana
Louisiana
They're trying to wash us away
They're trying to wash us away
They're trying to wash us away
They're trying to wash us away

Work Hazards

2005-09-01T05:21:00.000-07:00

Well, it has happened: the little boogers gave me a cold. Yep I'm siffling, sneezing, coughing up multi-colored goo and my head feels like a junkie's used cotton swab. I figured this would happen at some point working with kids but I had no idea it would be this soon. Really couldn't have happened at a worse time either. It's almost Labor Day weekend and I missed band practice last night. I'll have to reap the whirlwind from Reve no doubt. Ug! That guy is a barrel of laughs most days but if you displease him it's like having my grandfather rise from the grave to twist my ear. We may or may not have shows this weekend and I don't know. We have new songs that I should have been there to rehearse. We had decisions to make dammit! And I dropped the ball. I woke up in my old bed and my folks place and could tell by the sun's place in the sky I had overslept. And said cold kept me snuggled under the blankets for as long as possible.

Well, nothing for it but to pull up my britches and keep and plugging away. I'll call Reve to take my medicine from him later today and get the scoop regarding our weekend plans. Hopefully he's not too pissed and will still feel magnanimous enough to help me dump the video of the Christmas interviews onto a DVD so I can start editing it at home. Then onward and upward to SHreveport for some Red Cross benefit shows and hopefully some fun. Wish me luck with this cold. And with the kids today. I'm feeling mean.

Unfinished projects...

2005-08-30T09:33:00.000-07:00

One of the comments on my previous post came down kinda hard on my unfinished projects of which there are many. My initial reaction was anger at being criticized. I guess that's kinda knee-jerk. But the comment absolutely true. There are TONS of things I started or talked about starting that never got completed. I wish I could say I was busy or emotionally distraught at the time but I think it really comes down to being lazy. Look at the blog entries from months previous. I've probably updated this blog more times in the past week than I have in the past three months. That's kinda a drag. What's worse is I involve other people in these projects (Reve ol' buddy I'm typing directly to you) and let them down. Well, maybe (MAYBE) these recent posts are a sign of things to come. If I could complete the Christmas project in time for December that would kick ass. Guys like Chris Jay inspire me to no end. I read his blog on a daily basis and he constantly has updates on his projects. Sure a lot of the updates are gripes regarding the difficulty he's run into etc. But no one ever said something worth doing would be easy. A game plan is needed. I'll work on that tonight and get back to y'all tomorrow. Thanks anonymous (though it's pretty obvious who you are) taking me to task is sometimes just what I need. Enough lipservice. I have thinking to do.

More details about the party

2005-08-29T09:49:00.000-07:00

I arrived around 7:00 and left the next afternoon around 5:30. Hot dogs were indeed served with more condiments than anyone deserved. There were wasabi peas on hand as well, which I love. A kind soul arrived later in the evening bearing ribs which were also consumed with glee. I got to see Chad and Carter which kicked much ass. I also got to remeet Sara's friend Sarah who I tried to make out with once two years ago and ended up scaring quite badly leaving Sara H. to man the kissing booth at the battle of the bands alone (sorry). I got to talk to Sammy of Midwest Caravan fame for A WHILE WHICH WAS LOVELY. hE'S A SWELL GUY AND ONE OF MY FAVORITE FOLKS. i HOPE aRKANSAS TREATS HIM WELL. nOMA AND cHRIS AND i TALKED ABOUT TEACHING THE HEARING IMPAIRED AND THEIR BAND lIQUIDROME AS WELL AS THE SUPERCOOL SOUNDING dAY OF THE dEAD EXHIBIT THAT'S COMING IN sEPTEMBER. sOUNDS COOL. nOMA GAVE ME A CD (fuggin' cap lock button) and I'll listen to it after practice tonight. My birthday gofts for Chris and Sara were well recieved. I played drunken crouquet (badly) and incurred the wrath of Io for breaking my whiskey bottle (empty) with my mallet. I want to go on the record for cleaning it up afterward. Many folks made fun of me for being drunk early in the evening then turned around and vomited all over the backyard later while I held their hands (HA HA amateurs!) and I praised Chris as he hosed off the vomit the next day. I went to Li'l Joe's around 3:30 AM with a strange Indian fellow (hereforth dubbed the "Dork of Delhi") and got to see Benedict which brightened my smile. I woke early and went to Best Buy where I purchased a DVD called "Bizarre" which is some weirdo sexploitation art film from England. The real value on the DVD were the two short films starring WS Burroughs Sr. and Brion Gysin called the Cut-ups and Towers Open Fire. I forced Chris Jay to watch them with a hang over much to his dismay and my amusement. Chris Brown came in after the Cut-ups and asked us if we were trying to drive ourselves insane. I said "Yes." Chris and I decided to make our ownb art film inspired by this but more an that later. I have to go back to work now.

Whew! What a great party!

2005-08-29T05:23:00.000-07:00

Well, Shreveport was wonderful as always. I got to meet lots of swell folks (Noma and Chris this means you!) and some not so great folks (the guys who puked in the bushes) Drunken crouquet, conversations that lasted hours and most importantly the SHreveport girls. I strongly suspect that SHreveport girls are the hottest girls in North Louisiana. Golly, I can't wait to get back there soon.

Hot dogs and hot lips

2005-08-26T09:35:00.000-07:00

Well, I'm psyched about going to Shreveport this weekend. I am going to purchase Chris and Sara's gifts after work today and I think they'll be mighty pleased with my selections. Chris is getting the lion's share because he's my brother from a different mother. Sorry Sara, I'll give you more hugs than Chris. Hot dogs and crouquet, oh, man, this will be fun!

A little change

2005-08-24T14:29:00.000-07:00

Now anyone can post on my blog. Feel free. You don't have to identify yourself or anything. Call me a dick, a selfish asshole, a total dillweed. I welcome any and all comments. Gosh, I hope this was the right thing to do...

School times at the OK Corral

2005-08-24T09:48:00.000-07:00

I'm at work right now and secretly updating my blog during lunch. I feel mad subversive! The kids are being surprisingly well behaved today. The A/C in the art room (where I'm typing this) is on the fritz so the sweat is collecting on my back and will no doubt cascade down into my buttcrack when I stand up. I shiver at the thought. I'm overjoyed that Mark Branch is back in state and just saw a wonderful film called OldBoy last night from Korea. It knocked my socks off. I thought it would be a gory fight flick but it turned out to be a swell combo of Amelie (the movie not my cat) and Fight Club (kinda). Check it out. I'll be in SHreveport this weekend for Chris and Sara's birfday bash and will bring presents from US-a-Dollar, the finest Asian dollar store ever! Noma-you kick ass!

As long as we're at it

2005-08-13T04:47:00.000-07:00

Grand times. Glad I could facilitate. Hope all y'all dig my honesty here. Wish we could get it from y'all elsewhere.

Okay

2005-08-13T04:29:00.000-07:00

So, nobody reads this, eh?

Well, I told some of the folks involved with some of the posts here that I was writing about them.

Why?

Well, I guess I want their attention, though I should probably direct my attentions elsewhere. Like the band. Or my new job.

But right now in my life I think that I would rather do this. I want you both (or all) to know how much I feel about what you have done to touch my life.

Hey! Nobody meant to hurt anybody. Right?

Nobody knows

2005-08-13T04:24:00.000-07:00

I've been trying to determine where the really real world and this blog ends. We'll see in the next couple of days.

Last show blues

2005-08-05T17:55:00.000-07:00

Well, I'm up at the computer lab making CDs as keepsakes for Corbin's last show with us. There are three tracks: Cannon in Despair, Presidential Candidate and an instrumental version of Casino with only Corbin's piano. Prior to this the Vidrines met at Corbin's house and loaded a real live piano into a U-Haul trailer (I hate U-haul, I've had far too much interaction with them this summer) and toted it up to Olive Street for the show. So I'm up here, sliding back and forth between two computers and writing a bit then taking another CD and putting it into the computer to burn our little EP. And I'm sad. Really sad.

But not just because Corbin is leaving. I mean I'm sad about that, no question, but there's something else. Let me try to explain. A young lady named K was nice enough to help us with the U-Haul trailer. She drove it over to Corbin's for us. Very kind. And when she gets there she trots up to Justin Vidirne and proceeds to rag on me about how I used to dress and look in High School. "We used to call him Ringo!" Much laughter. "Yeah, he used to wear these cute little button up shirts and sweaters and had floppy hair. He was so Mod!" Ha ha ha. I decide it's time to retort:"Well, I don't look that way now, do I?" "No, Bill, you're just slovenly now. You went from Mod to bum." Then she trots off to hug the rest of the band. This, folks, gives me the red ass.

Now there should be some background here too. A couple of summers ago I started using "M" quite a bit. I became Mr. M around my neighborhood and had a pretty steady supply. K also broke up with her long term boyfriend and I developed a grand crush on her. Like, high school all over again. I was a complete tool and did all the obsessessive crudola that coimes with a crush and a head full of cr**k. I won't go into detail here but maybe I will some day. Anyway, she didn't really respond to my advances, I pouted for a year or so and stopped using cr**k. I remained on relative speaking terms with K but never really tried to be close with her again. Same old story, right ladies? Guy gets the brush off and you can forget about the runner up prize of friendship. We offer up our hearts and you give us a pen to write to them with. Whatever. I like to think that's all behind me right? I mean, that was like three years ago. I'm older, I'm wiser, I'm slightly more mature. But when she lightly mocked me tonight I got pissed. I guess she won. She doesn't give two shits about me and I still care waaaaaay to much about what she thinks.

I wish I could just turn off my emotions sometimes. I wouldn't feel any way except the way I wanted to. Zoloft, maybe? Nah, I dig the mood swings. I even kinda dig being angry at K. It reminds me of that summer I loved her. Don't get me wrong, that summer sucked on many levels. But it felt really raw and alive in some way. Like the last bit of my high school heart was fighting for one more day in the sun before adulthood really began to creep into the marrow. I told her I would love her forever. And in a way I guess I will if only for a few seconds.

Adios, Corbin!

2005-07-28T15:28:00.000-07:00

Well, as y'all probably already know, Corbin Vidrine is leaving us for the greener pastures of Houston, TX. I wish him all the best and everything but cannot help but feel a tad pissed as well. Thing start going really great and the rug gets pulled out from under you. Don't worry, I spent a couple of days pouting then decided to get back up on the wyld stallion of rock n' roll and attempt to make her mine once more. We've got a ringer for Corbin that will hopefully be able to play gigs with us through September then we need a more permanent fix. Anyone know any keyboard players that are not shooting heroin or have excrutiating personalities?

Tensions are running high here in Vidrineland. We don't seem to know what to do regarding the album. Should we release it? Should we scrap it? I lean toward releasing it myself, if only as a memento of this lineup. It sure was a good one.

I keep hoping Corbin will suddenly change his mind about moving after we play our last two shows and decide to become a fulltime Vidrine. Not as much money as webdesign but the pay off in grace for the soul of man should make up for it. This is not going to happen though. Corbin is gone and leaves a big Corbin-shaped hole in our lives. But we'll try...to caaaarrrrrrrrrry ooooooooon!

26 and what have I learned?

2005-07-11T08:39:00.000-07:00

Sorry about the lack of updates around here. Just haven't been in the mood or something.

So, I turned 26 this past week and feel pretty good about everything more or less. I miss some people I have lost touch with but have gained new friends to make up for these losses. Or not. Some of these people (Shonali Kulkarni comes readily to mind) cannot be replaced. And one should not even attempt that with true friends. To those I have lost touch with: I realize I am at fault but please understand this was not intentional. I'm selfish, as you already know, and lose sight of what is really important. What is really important is up to interpretation.

This weekend was fantastic on many levels. The Vidrines played a couple of cities and traveled together without major incident. The differences in our characters came out over the 48 hours or so we were together but I feel these inconsistencies strengthened the whole of our resolve in this project. I love those boys, I really do.

A few problems arose on a personal (probably ego-driven) level. A few folks in Baton Rouge told me after the show I should consider going into acting. Like, really go into acting. I know they meant these comments as compliments but they kinda stung. Am I a good front man for this band? I know I cannot sing and this creates a large hole in my creative life. My voice is weak and sometimes in the past I have considered this a strength in terms of conveying narrative and emotional gravitas within a song. But what if I'm wrong? What if this is all just posturing bullshit from a silly 26 year old man-child? Maybe my talent is a lot more limited than I thought. Some guys even offered to sing back-up vocals for us in the future because they could see something good in The Vidrines but thought some real musical talent on the vocal side of things would make everything better. And they may be right.

But fuck them. I guess I'll live and die in this band by my own meager talents and anyone who can (presumably) do better should busy themselves in finding a group of musicians to collaborate with. Mine. Got me? This is MINE. Go get your own. I worked really hard on all this and don't feel shitty in telling y'all to fuck off. I know I'm not the only one working on this band but I worked hard too. So keep those comments to yourselves. It hurt my (admittedly senstive) feelings. Get your own band. Y'all might be better. Try it.

I also got a little jealous of Ronnie this weekend. He tends to get more attention from folks after the shows which kinda smarts as well. Specifically girls. I want cute blondes to talk to me after the shows in a flirtatious manner. I wnat geeked out coke heads to ramble on for hours about how cool they think I am and how I resemble a young Tom Waits (or some other respectable performer). I mean, this is all ego driven bullroar but I kinda mean it. But y'know what? Ronnie deserves it for all the work he's been doing for and in the band. Good for him. I'm just jealous. I should also keep in mind how nasty I look when I come off the stage, dripping with sweat and what not and I'm sure these girls would prefer a reasonably sane, dry and tall individual to compliment. Well, I'll never be any of those things and shouldn't sweat it too much.

The folks in Shreveport and Baton Rouge were really nice. Thanks everybody!

My shit is dope!

2005-06-08T08:23:00.000-07:00

Why doesn't my blog update instantaneously? It gets on my tits, man!

Whew! I need a break from the serious-time to get delerious!

2005-06-08T04:28:00.000-07:00

Well, Brett was right, my predictions regarding Deadwood were not entirely acurate. Maybe Tolliver will live to sleaze around for another season. I actuallly enjoy his character quite a bit and Powers Boothe deserve a great deal of credit for that. Loved him in Sin City even though he was only there for a few minutes.

Chris Jay continues to amaze me with his general goodness. Never was as good as him but that doesn't stop the love, fellas. Can't wait to see him rock the socks off some ninjas in Shreveport.

Didn't go to Shrevport yesterday as planned. Monday night became a little hectic and I needed a break. holed up with my mother for Tuesday evening and read a few Charles Beaumont short stories. What a swell writer! Most of the best Twilight Zone episodes were written by him.

Mom made red beans and rice with some good ham she had in the fridge. I took one of those Beano pills to keep the farts at bay but it didn't work. Farts to beat the band. Kinda fun actually especially since I didn't have to worry about offending anyone-just let 'em rip! Some had a deep timber that was satisfying in a very special way that I need not share with you. Like a tuba in my ass playing "Gloria" with Van Morrison on kazoo. Or maybe not.

Tired of the rain but know we need it. Want to eat crawfish and listen to jazz while wearing a three piece suit. Kirk Douglas kicks ass!

No cocksucker from Yankton is gonna blinker my interests

2005-05-17T10:19:00.000-07:00

Deadwood on HBO is one of my favorite things on this planet right now. Violence, sex, great acting, great writing and a swell historical vibe. I've always loved Westerns, particularly those by Sam Peckinpah. Deadwood feels like a Peckinpah TV show (actually Sam got his start in TV westerns way back in the Rifleman days along with Robert Altman). Todays Westerns mostly leave me cold. I find things to like about Open Range and all that but for the most part I think the characters are just too nice and squeaky clean. What we need are more characters like Al Swearengen. You know-the kind you hate to love or love to hate. One of the best aspects of Deadwood from a character standpoint is everyone, even the worst of the worst, remains identifiablely human. Sure I hate Cy Tolliver and can't wait to see him die a slow death at the hands of Hearst in the season finale but I empathize with him more than I would like to admit (except to you but that's only because I trust you so much). Shit even that Jack the Ripper sumbitch Wolcott comes across as human even if his actions don't. That's one of the craziest things about Deadwood: for all the cursing and blood it is one of the most Humanist works I have ever had the opportunity to enjoy. If only Warren Oates was still around to guest star...

About last night...

2005-05-13T12:21:00.000-07:00

So I wrote this song about my brother last night and performed it at the After 9 Show. It strange writing about things that are so close to you, they sneak up on you and curl in your lap like a cat or something. I'm not sad about the song or anything like that. I mean I've gone through the grieving process for a while now and this does not really hurt anymore, y'know? I feel, well, good. Justified or something. Like, this is what I want to do with my life, write about living and hurting and loving and surviving blah blah blah. I guess I just don't actually DO IT often enough. Chilly hairs on the back of the neck, y'know? I feel like I'm in motion again. And it is the most remarkable feeling in the world.

The L Word pisses me off

2005-05-13T11:58:00.000-07:00

Has anyone else seen this show? It swell in its own way: lots of pretty girls doing pretty things to each other, a Peaches cameo (really cool stuff there) and generally fine acting. Shit they even give guys a chance to share the spotlight. I'm just all depressed because Ossie Davis (JFK from Bubba Ho-tep) died in the last episode and I have to miss him all over again. What I great guy! Kinda like the preacher/grampa I never had. *sigh* I wish I was snorting coke off a strippers ass.

Aw! I'm touched (in the head)!

2005-05-12T12:20:00.000-07:00

Well, it means a lot to have all this action at the ol' homestead. Knowing some assholes I already know are reading this thing makes me all warm and fuzzylike. Inside. Outside I remain withdrawn and uncommunicative, the way the ladies like it.

Listened to the Pillage People advance CD again last night and I still think King Hippo has the most original ryhmes (is that what they are called?) I'm biased as I have known said Hippo for many moons but the turns of phrase hit home in ways I was not prepared for. I'll come up with examples later.

Psyched about the Shrevport show on the 21st as well as having Benedict and Chadwick staying over for Friday the 13th. With any luck there will be some Brett easton Ellis style excess that evening. Speaking of Mr. Ellis I read some of his short stories last night (The Informers collection) and was struck by how sad they made me. Perhaps it has something to do with the advance of maturity into the lifestyle but the excesses and drugs and music and products jsut seem so much MORE shallow than they used to. No fulfillment, money don't buy happiness, etc. What a drag. Needless to say I loved it.

Watched a documentary(?) called Africa Addio last night. Excellent. Find a copy and check out the wastage of European collonialism and mob politics as the Dark Conitent goes up in flames in the mid-'60s. Just like it does today. Glad I live in the USA where I have all the comforts of home. Or something.

Well, that's it for now. I've gotta figure out what I want to do for the After 9 Show tonight (song? story? both?).

"King Saul fell on his sword
When it all went wrong
And Joseph's brothers sold him
Down the river for a song
Sonny Liston rubbed
Some Tiger Balm into his glove
Some things you do for money
Some you do for love."
-the mountain goats

It's a hap-hap-happy day!

2005-05-10T07:44:00.000-07:00

Has anyone ever seen that Gulliver's Travels cartoon from the 1930s? It has a really creepy rotoscoped Gulliver and songs that make you want to smack your mother. God I loved it! Smacking my mother, that is.

I miss Brett Roman. I know he is homosexual and despite this sexual handicap he is a swell fellow who cannot hold his vodka. I imagine he's the sort you could drive around backroads with shooting ostriches on a cool spring evening before heading back to his bunglow for wine, cheeses and anal sex. Ah to be young and elastic again! Those were the days of wine and sodomy they were o yes indeed.

The new Ben Folds CD is as good as anything he has ever done. Favorite track: "Gracie" about his daughter. I hate all fo my friends children and wish they had never been born but I cannot help feeling misty when someone sings about their daughter. If (IF) I ever have kids they will probably all be girls and will break my heart and walk all over me. And I'll put up with it because I want their love so badly. Rotten skanks-to-be!

Band is argueing about this remix of a track we got from some fuck in Washington DC. I don't like it so much but I look forward to what he does with "Couldn't Find Carrie". If he hurts my baby I'll kill him I will I will. Actually anything that sounds oddball and different to me is just fine. I ain't no musician but I knows what I likes. And I don't like this.

Holding breath, counting to ten and rethinking my position.

2005-05-03T12:11:00.000-07:00

Well, what I wrote yesterday is a bit off. I left out the very important fact that if I am in a business then I have partners and this is something to consider. If I borrow money from the whole entity then the whole entity should be consulted. I suppose I was pissed about the tone of some comments that had been made to me about borrowing money (which will still be paid back) without consulting the other band members. And y'know? They're right, shoulda asked. Anyway...

Well, everyone makes mistakes...

2005-05-02T07:45:00.000-07:00

Hi there world, I'm a new blog and I'm ready to strut my stuff for you!

2005-04-29T10:52:00.000-07:00

Well, I really just started this blog so I could write mean things on Brett Roman's site but who knows? Maybe I'll actually use this thing sometime to reveal my innermost thoughts and feelings.