Delusions of Psych-Rock Grandeur

For some strange reason (perhaps it is because I am slightly hungover) I feel that I'm on the verge of a breakthrough of some sort. It's an inexplicable feeling; I'm starting to get deja vu about things I know I've never done, like record with the Flaming Lips, f'rinstance.

Speaking of the Flaming Lips, if you go to their site, you can not only get educated about them, you can find pictures straight from the set of their upcoming feature film. It's called X-Mas on Mars or something like that. I'm excited about it, as I dig goofball science fiction movies and the Flaming Lips with fervid fervor. I'm assuming that the film will probably be less boring than Stanley Kubrick's 2001.

In Mercury Rev news: At the moment, I am listening to an archived concert of the Rev from a Swedish (I think) rock festival. I think you will be happy if you go here and listen to it. The site describes Mercury Rev as, "Dromerige gitaarrock uit de Catskill Mountains." If that doesn't convince you, what will?

Desperadoooo...

I wrote this review for the latest issue of Blender magazine, on sale next week, I think. It got cut, dammit.

The Langley Schools Music Project
Innocence & Despair
Bar/None Records/Basta
***

The Children of the Corn go to bandcamp

Nineteen covers of 60s and 70s pop songs performed by musically untrained rural Canadian school kids shouldn’t be this genius. Originally pressed as two small-run LPs more than two decades ago and now collected on one CD, The Langley Schools Music Project was once a cult obsession for a handful of collectors justifiably entranced by the spooky beauty of the records’ ramshackle, yet haunting, arrangements of a grab bag of hits. From David Bowie’s “Space Oddity” (Bowie himself calls it “astounding”) to Fleetwood Mac’s “Rhiannon,” as well as what is perhaps the finest recording ever of “Desperado,” (chillingly sung by Sheila Behman, age nine). Innocence & Despair inspires heartbreak... or the creeps.

Turkosis

The Thanksgiving holiday has passed, so now I return to actually waking up before noon. It's kind of a drag, but not as depressing as waking up at one o'clock in the afternoon on Sunday and realizing that you only have three and a half hours of decent daylight left. That's depressing.

Two interesting things: Robert Gordon's classic exhumation of the goonier side of the Memphis music scene, It Came From Memphis, is finally back in print (albeit with a much uglier cover than the first edition) and I scored a copy for eight bucks on my Sunday creepy-crawl around the neighborhood. It's a fine tome, especially if you dig the immaculate lowbrows and the beautiful knuckleheads of this world. Also, on Saturday, I witnessed the end of an episode of VIP, the Pamela Anderson action show, that featured a walk-on by one of my idols, filmmaker Jim Jarmusch. Fuck. I couldn't have made that up.

Deals are Everywhere, if You Know Where To Look

Page 32 of this week’s Village Voice, a newspaper I find only slightly more tolerable than the other free weekly rag we get here in New York, the New York Press: an ad with a pale and smooth neanderthal-looking fellow who I guess is supposed to be "hot" or something like that, with a headline that reads, "PERFECTLY SMOOTH ­ ALL SKIN TYPES." Ah, it’s an ad for laser hair removal. God knows everybody needs that! And what does the copy say under the headline? "As a result of recent events, we are offering a 20% discount on laser hair removal." Could they be referring to New York’s pesky problem with terrorists and the subsequent war? Well glory be! Thank Jumpin’-Jesus for the wizards of hair removal, who are letting us hirsute slobs catch a break by giving us a chance to clean up our stubbly acts at a discount! Lord knows getting my ass burned to freakish smoothness would cheer ME up. And at bargain rates, hell yeah!

Speaking of economics, I caught a bit of a newscast this evening regarding the current economic slump. Yeah, I know. You watch the network news, you get what you deserve. Apparently, this is the time to buy shit. The time to buy a LOT of shit. You’re familiar with the scam; come Thanksgiving, you’re supposed to prepare for the day after, because as everybody knows, that’s the biggest retail day of the year and you have to start buying Christmas bribes now blah blah blah. What a load of horsehit, right? Only this year, the pressure’s really on and I can’t help but feel guilty because I’m a broke motherfucker. I’m ALWAYS broke (even though what I consider ‘being broke’ would be considered a fortune by a bunch of folks). And even if I had money, I’d resist the stupid cowlike urge to spend money on the useless garbage that’s supposed to be cool: designer jeans, t-shirts with dumb slogans, athletic shoes, gold chains and so on. All crap. But that’s just me. And if you’ve gotten this far, I’d like a Nintendo GameCube for Christmas. Thanks, and have a good night.

Happy Thanksgiving, You Silly Sons-of-Bitches

Man, if there's one thing I truly dig amongst all the things I truly dig, it's Holiday Entropy. You know the feeling. It's pretty much the same thing as Last Few Days Before Summer Vacation Entropy. Let me break it down for you: For many in our corrupt and really fun Western society, the holidays are times when you don't have to do very much. People start taking trips to places they really don't want to go, and things just start breaking down in a gentle sort of way. Work to do? Fuck it. Let's watch a movie on the office DVD player. And so on. Anarchy in perhaps its gentlest form.

Listening to: The Best of Morrissey, the new comp from Rhino. I've anticipated your snappy comments, and you can go screw yourself.

In other news: My friend Paul Cullum wrote this sidebar to an interview he did with Chuck Barris, the legendary personality behind The Gong Show. It was originally printed in MEAN magazine, but screw it; MEAN's dead and Paul deserves more fame.

CHASING THE JARGON
By Paul Cullum

Chuck has that thing – I can't remember what it's called right now – where you can't remember proper nouns. I have that too. The thing with the thing. Which led to moments like the following in Chuck's favorite diner:

Chuck: I think I’d rather write the book than the movie. I remember this other book I wrote. This guy -- what’s his name… he’s the screenwriter of … what was that picture with … oh, I can’t think of any names now. Some big screenwriter wanted to make a movie of it, but it wouldn’t have been the book. And I don’t know where I would have fit in there. So I decided not to do that.

Paul: He wanted to make a movie of the book?

C: Of the manuscript. Yeah.

P: You can’t think who it was? If you can give me a clue, I can help you. I’m good at that.

C: Well, you'd know him if I could think of his name. Who’s the comedian … I’ll get it … This guy’s a great comic. He’s in a picture about a guy who goes to heaven. Who was that?

P: A guy who goes to heaven… Down to Earth; Chris Rock.

C: No.

P: A comic, who goes to heaven. Um, Albert Brooks; Defending Your Life.

C: Okay. What’s the movie out now with horses in the title?

P: All the Pretty Horses.

C: Okay. The guy that acted in that --

P: -- Matt Damon --

C: -- was in a movie where --

P: The guys who did Trainspotting. A Life Less Ordinary. Ewan McGregor.

C: The actor -- Matt Damon -- did a movie with this guy, and they went to --

P: Heaven. Kevin Smith; Dogma.

C: No.

P: Yeah! Where they’re angels.

C: No! Listen to me. Matt Damon was with this guy, where he was the professor -- forget heaven -- he was the professor, and Matt Damon played a dropout but brilliant.

P: Gus Van Sant. Good Will Hunting.

C: Who was the guy? The comic.

P: Robin Williams.

C: Robin Williams went to heaven in another movie.

P: Oh, I know. That special-effects thing ... What Dreams May Come.

C: Why we’re trying to think of this guy’s name, I have no idea now.

P: He tried to option your book.

C: Robin Williams was in a bizarre movie with … the two brothers who work in pictures --

P: The Quaids. The Baldwins. Many, many Baldwins.

C: Their father was an actor.

P: Lloyd Bridges? Jeff and Beau Bridges?

C: Jeff Bridges and Robin Williams did a movie together. It was a pretty good picture, about ten years ago. Offbeat. This guy wrote it.

P: I don’t think they’ve made a movie together.

C: Yeah, he’s a bum and a tramp….

P: Oh, oh, oh … Fisher King! Richard LaGravenese!

C: That’s the guy!

P: Excellent!

[Much celebration and high-fiving. Fellow diners are swept up in our enthusiasm.]

C: That was perfect. I couldn’t do this with anyone else. That was a wonderful thing.

Kinski Quote of the Day

"I believe there is no stench I haven't stunk of."
-Kinski Uncut p.37

Speaking of Kinski Uncut: I'm about halfway through it. It's definitely joining the small shelf of books that must follow me around no matter where my roamings take me next. Utterly horrifying and totally fascinating, it's good for a laugh and a kick. Kinski is one of those magnificent bastards that you can't help but admire, even though his way of life is completely foreign to you. In short: the motherfucker had big brass balls and he wasn't afraid to swing 'em. He was creepily admirable (in his creepy way). Hail Kinski.

In other news: I am far too impressed by my clever thoughts, yet I don't spare time to either recognize or write down most of what I think of as being "good stuff." Am I an idiot? Conceited? Lazy? I'll let posterity answer, because right now...I'm thinking about pinball. And Gary, Indiana.

Listening To: Nothing, actually. Hoping I can score the Rhino Records Best of Dr. John from my buddy Marcellus, as I'm in a "missin' New Orleans" kind of mood. The fact that Dr. John currently lives out on Long Island does nothing to damper the feeling.

Klaus Kinski Has Arrived and He is Pissed

The blessed day has finally come: my copy of Klaus Kinski's autobiography, Kinksi Uncut, has arrived. The front-cover blurb from Newsweek reads thusly: "Probably the most outrageous actor's biography ever--less a memoir than a hyperbolically pornographic performance piece." Now doesn't that sound a little more entertaining than The Corrections?

Back at work at Blender magazine. Yee-ha. Listening to the great Valentine's Day 2000 show from WFMU's Hova streamed over our fine internet connection, but thinking aboout Rufus Thomas singing "Memphis Train." Yeah.

Fucked-up Buckets in Chinatown

Saying you saw something strange being sold at a market in New York’s Chinatown is a bit of a lame thing to do. Of course you saw something strange; it’s Chinatown, you ignorant motherfucker. But today, I saw something really strange being sold at a market in New York’s Chinatown: frogs.

But wait! I know that selling frogs isn’t very strange. I’ve been around the block. But the presentation of the frogs was…wow, it was screwy. The unfortunate Kermits were being sold out of enormous barrels. Now picture it; a layer of stunned-looking frogs are on top, hardly moving, and beneath them…hundreds of fucking frogs, slowly suffocating under the weight of their brethren. And the funny thing was, the next store on the street had a barrel of frogs as well. Is it frog season? Does Doc Hopper know about this? Needless to say, there are a bunch of people in Chinatown right now feasting on sweet and sour frog, or frog with cashews, or even Kung Pao frog. Yum.

Vincent Price and Neil Hagerty, Cruising Around Town in a Rusty Old Car

On the TV in the living room, Vincent Price is battling vampire-zombies in The Last Man on Earth. His struggle is occasionally interrupted by ads for video collections of The Muppet Show and Christmas records. I could use a glass of water. I’m dehydrated and tired from a marathon drinking session yesterday with friends. Didn’t get out of bed until 2:30 today, and didn’t leave the house until 4, when I went over to the home of my buddy Brent Rollins, ace designer and all around gentleman. We rolled down to Chinatown for Vietnamese sandwiches, roast pork buns and pirated videotapes, then wandered Soho and the East Village, looking at girls and records, records and girls, talking smack and taking names. I discovered that the rumored Royal Trux comic book had finally been published ($4.95 for 64 pages ain’t bad), so I bought it. It’s now waiting on the couch, watching The Last Man on Earth without me. Off to get a glass of ice water. Cheers.

Where the Hell are My Hash Browns?

Things New York City Sorely Lacks:

Hash Browns: All the diners I seem to find in all the boroughs sell disgusting, soggy home fries. This is unpardonable. I would kill for a plate of hash browns from Poppy’s in New Orleans. If anybody can explain the origin of this peculiar regional foible, I’d greatly appreciate it.

Gravy and Biscuits: Hell, if you could find this dish in a restaurant up here, you’d probably end up getting charged $10.95. Same thing goes for chicken-fried steak, another dish I sorely miss. (Along with decent red beans and rice, po’boys, jambalaya…)

Damn. I’m whining aren’t I?

Decent Diners: Sacrilege, I know, but as far as I’m concerned, most of the Polish diners in NYC can’t even approach a decent Denny’s, or even a IHOP, for chrissakes. I take my pie and coffee seriously, dammit, and this city just ain’t cutting it in that respect.

So now, I think I’ll take a hike up to the nearest C-Town, buy a frozen apple pie, a bag of hash browns, some biscuits and other sundry items and wrap myself up in gastro-nostalgia.

As for today, nothing much happened. Woke up. Thought about girls, a new pair of shoes and cinematography, in that order. Went into the office. Got paid. Came home. Watched cartoons. And here I am.

Watched Wonder Boys yesterday afternoon for the second time (read the novel twice as well, both are fine examples of their craft). Thinking about writing a novel again, as well as another screenplay, but what’s the point? Every time I think about writing either, I’m reminded of two of my most detested types of human beings: young novelists and young filmmakers. Ick. And yet I persist.

Listening to: That same damn Royal Trux record. Boy, it’s good, but I think it’s about time I got up and rocked something else.

I Think I'll Go to Bed For a Week

Woo. It’s been over a week since I last updated this damn thing, a lapse that can be tied directly to one thing: my enforced vacation from work, which I love. Since I’m freelance, I get to take a few weeks off (sans pay, natch) whenever we close an issue. Since November 2nd, I’ve done not a whole hell of a lot—there’s been a lot of getting up at noon, walking around the house in boxers and t-shirts with a cigaretter dangling from my mouth, listless channel surfing, going out to the bar, climbing into bed at ungodly hours…you know the drill. When I’m at work, I’m in front of a computer most of the time, so therefore blogging (Eww. I just used "blogging" as a verb) is inevitable.

Interesting things: I’ve been to the movies FOUR TIMES in the last week and a half. Well, that’s probably interesting solely to me, but hey. I saw Monsters, Inc. (fun, but you know…), The Man Who Wasn’t There (being a huge Coen Brothers fan, I was a bit let down—found the film a bit too dry—but their minor films are put-you-eyes-out-their-so-beautiful masterpieces compared to the hackery that surrounds us), Mulholland Drive (a kooked-out nightmare with a, ahem, bodacious lesbian scene—hey, I’m a lowbrow!) and Donnie Darko (fucking fantastic, or fan-fucking-tastic if you want to get specific; my friend Jay Babcock called it "a John Hughes film with doses of Philip K. Dick every ten minutes," and if that pretty damn accurate summation doesn’t pique your interest, then what the hell can I do to persuade you?).

Damn, that was a long paragraph.

I also got my hands on promo tapes of the first four episodes of the HBO miniseries Band of Brothers. Hmm. Meaning to watch only one episode, I ended up watching all four hour-long installments twice in one day. War is entertaining hell.

Four days ago, Saturday, I guess, I had a dream. A crazy dream. (Cue Led Zeppelin.) No, seriously folks, this is kinda good. I was hanging out in my house, a big house on a suburban street, when the doorbell rang. I answered the door, and who was it but the Jackson 5, circa their Victory tour? (I know that they were known as the Jacksons at the time, but in the dream I thought of them as the Jackson 5.) Anyhow—I was stoked to see them (I wasn’t excited, or cheered, I was stoked) and invited them all inside. End of dream.

Overhead yesterday on 4th Avenue in Park Slope, Brooklyn, coming from one of a trio of teenage thug-types who were spitting on the ground: "Yo, I got mad phlegm."

Listening to: Cats and Dogs by Royal Trux (again!)

Reading over everything above, I realized I haven’t really told y’all how I’m actually doing nowadays, how I’m really feeling…

Ehh, I’m okay. Whatever. Better than a poke in the eye with a sharp stick.

Tomorrow: New comic book day, project organization (the occasional stock-taking day where I make a grand list of all the projects I’m working on in an effort to spur myself on), buying a book to keep a journal in (I fear I’m forgetting too much shit), and idling. Here’s to it.

In Ozzy-Metal Voice: I. Am. Repo. Man.

Like most kinda hipster guys my age, I love the film Repo Man with an irrational passion. Unlike most hipster guys my age, I believe I REALLY UNDERSTAND the flick because I grew up in the Inland Empire and Los Angeles, and I also like other Alex Cox films besides Sid and Nancy. (Walker features an amazing score by Joe Strummer, and El Patrullero would be a natural double-bill with this year's Amores Perros.) Anyhow, my point: go to the following link to read some of Alex Cox's Repo Man comic strips. Dig in. Enjoy the crudeness. Or is that crudity?

Robots for Breakfast

Rob Schrab, the creator of the pretty amusing comic book SCUD: The Disposable Assassin, has finished his short film Robot Bastard and it is now available for download at www.robotbastard.com. If you like your Dr. Who mixed in with a little bit of Evil Dead II and Hard Boiled, then it should be right up your dark little alley. If you don't like that sort of stuff, then what the hell is wrong with you?