Archives : all posts by Dan

Laura Rivers - "That's Alright (Since My Soul Has Got a Seat Up in the Kingdom)"

The doorbell rings, the view is just hips and backs in the distance, a mumbled exchange at the door. Meanwhile, the television talks on:

People ask why I'm a scientologist, but I don't really think that's a fair question. I mean, it's like asking someone with a stroller why they chose to have kids. There's a thousand answers, and there's also no answer. It just feels like the right thing to do, the completely right thing for me in my life. I mean, like, driving home in the New England countryside, in the rain at 4am because I was visiting a sick friend, mentally sick, and getting struck head-on by a two-seater. The driver was high and drunk and what did I do, I was a visiting a friend, and then an angel came by and saved my life. He was happening along that same road, and in the driving rain, the rain we were driving in, he pulled me out of the car and saved my life. I don't like to say it, but I'm proud of it, and I hope he's proud of it too, it was Tom Cruise. And ever since then you can really see what it's about, you can really feel a purpose and a drive and a perfect kind of goal; to raise up the species. So don't ask me why I'm a scientologist, ask me how close I think you are to being blessed the rank of scientologist.

[Buy]

Son De La frontera - "Bulería Negra Del Gastor"

"I'm up, ma," only 14 and already he talks to his mother this way. He comes down the stairs for breakfast, but what does he really eat. A few bites of a grapefruit and a glass of milk and he's out the door. He barely looks me in the eye, his head down and his big hulking grunts just dismiss any effort I try to make. He's all I have, and he knows that. All too well, he knows that. Because as much as he's all I have, I'm all he has, I know that for sure. He doesn't have no friends, he doesn't have a girlfriend, I would be able to tell if he had a girlfriend. He would shower more than once a week, that's for sure. And he would shave that mess off his face. Maybe he hates me because he doesn't have a father, he doesn't believe me that he's better off without his father. Much better. This darkness, whatever it is, is nothing compared to the hell that he'd be living with that man around. Today I will finish his portrait and he will come home from school and I will give it to him, and we will have a cake and sing a song. If that doesn't work, at least for tonight, I don't know what I'll do. He thinks I forget about him but I don't. I know everything he thinks about me, he thinks I'm stupid, he thinks I don't understand him, and I wouldn't even if he told me. But he doesn't need to tell me. I understand, he is my son, I understand. I understand that I may die waiting for him to grow up and realize that I love him more than anyone else does in this cold and lonely world. That he needs to take advantage of my love in order to be happy in this life, and with every day that chance is slipping away. I understand that he may move away before admitting that I put everything else aside for his benefit. I understand because I did the same thing and to look at the politicians and the garbage yards and the sad stray dogs in the streets, it is clear that we are in a giant rotating wheel, stained with those caught under its weight, coming back around to get those it did not crush the first time. Ah! There is the sun. A glass of wine, I think. [Buy]

Brother Willie Blue - "I'm Pressing On"

When unemployment is on a ten-week bender and your bicycle rides like a shivery twig, don't let it get to you. When they cancel the mail because the front step is broken, and you can't get out of bed to see the sun because you ran out of coffee a whole string of days ago, don't let it get you down. When your boots are more like sandals and your best girl won't text you back, when your jeans are ripping a big yawn in the knee and all your shirts look like they were worn by a fire hydrant, don't beat yourself up. When you can't afford to eat and your hair is all sideways falling off your head, when the cold around you is warmer than the cold inside you, you know it's time to sit down, but don't let it drag on you. Just take a minute, breathe deep if it doesn't hurt too much, and try saying all the words you think it's impossible to say. [Buy]

(image source)

Idiot Glee - "All Packed Up"

In the glowing shade of an evening nap this song floats in the open window. Between sleep and awareness, this shapeless thing is like second-hand smoke, like practiced violin, like curry. In a closed courtyard, with rugs out of windows and soccer games playing, this song swims lazily up where the sky starts, floats up past the rooms like laundry steam, and swirls up the silence like a ribbon of colour. [MySpace]

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Elsewhere: I wrote a couple of pieces for the always-impressive Moss Bailey. My thanks to her for inviting me to join. (check out the whole site at http://sowehere.com)

And:

Alvin Band - "Tijuana"

"The beach is the most vulnerable place, but it's the place of most access. It's horrible to think about attacking a beach, about war on a beach. About all those people with their hot dogs and portable stereos and colourful towels and suits, and sunglasses and lotion and near-nakedness, getting attacked. Do people bring portable stereos to the beach anymore, or maybe did they ever? But I suppose that attacking that part of the land makes the most sense, it's the softest place. Like they know the dark truth of the matter, and they exploit it. I feel that way about my love, like he attacks the beach of my heart. The beach of my body. The softest place, the most vulnerable, innocent, reckless, and unexamined. I am devastated, bent on revenge, but understanding that strategically, it was the smartest move."

[Buy new record]

(image source)

Neko Case - "Never Turn Your Back On Mother Earth"
Sparks - "Never Turn Your Back On Mother Earth"

The name of the game was "Gotta Do It". The rules were simple: someone would name a deed (it could be something normal like "eat grass" or it could be something weird like "climb up Dead Dog's Tree and scream the name of your True Love") and point to a person and then the rest of the watching group would whisper "Gotta do it!" over and over until they, the chosen boy or girl, did it. Dickie had watched many a game of Gotta Do It from afar, and would watch with curiosity, thankful separation, or unbearable envy, as the various "do its" were acted out. He came to school that morning with a very particular "do it" in mind. He spent all of science class unable to focus his microscope, his hands were shaking and his eyes felt sweaty, blurry. He couldn't eat breakfast that morning, he dumped his oatmeal in the toilet after his parents left for work. "Take off your jacket, Dickie," said Mrs. Greg, the wiry science teacher, he hadn't noticed he'd left it on, "you're not outside yet."

At the bell he flew out the door and stood in the center of the field, the usual location for a good game of Gotta Do It. Since he had never actually played a game before, the other children all cast glances at Dickie standing on that spot and thought there must not be a game today, since Dickie was standing there and no one else. He started shouting, "Hey! Game time! Hey guys, game time!" A few straggled closer, with furrowed brows. "Bring Walter! Hey guys, game time, bring Walter!"

Walter Hannigan, 8-and-a-half years old, was a regular player of Gotta Do It. He had brilliantly thought up the "do it" of "steal Mrs. Greg's cigarettes", which was one of the all-time greatest do its the game had ever seen. Mrs. Greg kept her outdoor cigarettes (she had a pack for indoors and outdoors, depending on where she was doing duty that day) inside a little metal door meant for a water pipe, a small tap covered in a hinged metal door that had just enough resting place for a pack of cigarettes. Tina Dion had stolen them, and everyone smoked one each, they coughed and laughed and did Mrs. Greg impressions.

The gang gathered, skeptical of Dickie's idea to play Gotta Do It, but they gathered nonetheless, including Walter Hannigan. A few do its got handed out (stand on your head and say the alphabet backwards, do the stupidest voice you can think of, say "fuck" as loud as you can) and then it was Dickie's turn. He glanced furtively around, and then pointed at Walter, "This one's for Walter," his hand shaking in the wind. "Kiss me." The group fell silent. No one laughed. They all seemed to think about it, pause, look at Walter, think about it, pause, and then whisper. "Gotta do it. Gotta do it. Gotta do it. Gotta do it!" The whisper-shouting was deafening, Dickie's head was throbbing and his blurred vision was getting blurrier. Walter looked around easily, shrugged, stepped closer to Dickie, held his breath and planted a kiss on him. His lips hung there, and all Dickie could see were all the things he hated: the light-up shoes, the expensive clothes, the sugary lunches, the hundreds of girlfriends, all start to fade to white like they were covered in light instead of covered in pitch darkness. He almost made it out, he almost just got a kiss from the most popular boy in school, but then he remembered his plan. It was too devilishly good, thought Dickie, he was unable to control the completion of his plan. Having Walter finally this close, he snapped out his teeth and bit down on Walter's cheek. For what seemed like an hour, Dickie hung there, teeth sunk deeply into Walter's face. When they were finally pulled apart, Dickie had a fair chunk of Walter's cheek left in his mouth, and as he emerged from his cathartic stupor and the gravity of the situation began to dawn on him, embarrassed, he swallowed it.

[Buy Neko Case's Middle Cyclone]
[Buy Sparks' Propaganda]

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trailer for Episode 5 of The Bitter End
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Sparks - "Sherlock Holmes"
The Dirtbombs - "Sherlock Holmes"

Dick Colford, at 8 years old, and Walter Hannigan, at 8-and-a-half years old, were life-long enemies. Dick Colford, Dickie to his mother and teachers, was short, with his head stretched up he would just press against the flexy membrane of 4' tall. Dickie wore penny-loafers and ugly sweaters and jeans with an elastic waistband. He had no television or video games, he had only the radio and his thousand-piece puzzles of The Strand and Presidents in Time. Walter Hannigan, however, had everything. He had flatscreens and ergonomic joysticks and sugary after-school snacks (literally a cupboard with every variety from Mimis to Jackson's Jupes to Hollywagons to Jelly Turnstyles). He wore light-up shoes and fitted jeans with patterns on the pockets and t-shirts with on-purpose rips in them. He even had those God-given gifts, an extra 6" of height, and an extra 6 months of life, proof that even God favoured the favourites.

These two were life-long enemies. In a sense. In fairness, it must be said that Walter Hannigan did not know that he had a life-long enemy.

Dickie would watch Walter from the shadowy and lonely parts of the schoolyard. He would spit on the ground and step on it. He would draw pictures in the air with his finger, pictures that started with the outline of Walter, traced from watching him juggle a soccer ball in the distance for a group of girls, and then a stabbing motion. He would laugh and mutter and he was genuinely happy to have a secret punching bag for his many-pointed and overflowing energies. On the bus he would count all the times Walter said "man" or "cool", and would slap his knee loudly every time they crossed a multiple of 10. Walter would get off first, and Dickie would watch him walk past the yellow sports car to his door every single every single every single day. Dickie, turning his back to the sting of a cold September wind, had a dark glimmer of an idea.

[Buy Sparks' Angst in My Pants]
[Buy The Dirtbombs' We Have You Surrounded]

Frozen Bears - "Tape Eater"

In every society, even one as small and fluid as a city bus, there is an alpha creature. A being who, given a drastic change in circumstances, would rule. If this bus were to take off into space or suddenly bury miles underground, and we all had to live the rest of our lives together, one person would be, at least at first, in control. Sometimes it's not obvious, if the bus is filled with people who normally look furtive for a leader to follow, but sometimes it's deadly obvious. He stood at the back of the bus, in a slick canvas duster, hair down to his heart, with hands like heavy talons. Standing his bike made of body parts on its heel, he was dripping wet from a rain that no one else seemed to have experienced. As if his entire being were wearing sunglasses, he had turned himself into a reflective spirit. To look at him was to see yourself, weak and shaking and submissive by comparison. So struck by his aura, his stark, commanding presence, I turned to the woman next to me, pointed and said, "He'd be in charge for sure." She took out the white earphone on my side, <<'scuse-moi?>> [Buy]

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Parethetical Girls - "Doughnut In My Hand" (go to "news", scroll down to stream "Doughnut In My Hand")

"In order to cull a sense of satisfaction from having lived, then there must at some point be a list of requirements needed in order to garner that satisfaction. In this sense life becomes a sort of 'preparing to die'. But the very idea that one could prepare mentally for the totally physical act of dying is absurd (you can't mentally put on a seatbelt or make your consciousness duck-and-cover). And subsequently, any kind of physical preparation, besides loading the gun or tying the noose, will not make death any easier or more appropriate. So the satisfaction brought about by a doughnut is perfectly serene, cynical, hilarious. I raise my glass and let it fall to all the wondrous poets who explain life through example where I cannot."

[Previously on StG][Parenthetical Girls guest post][Buy this new EP][Buy the extremely underrated Entanglements]

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