The Sheila Divine >> I'd rather have a fatal than a life unstable

The Sheila Divine - "Back To The Cradle"

(Arena Rock Recording Co. [U.S.] / Rykodisc [Europe], 2002)

Sorry for neglecting this site yet again, but I'm back in the fuckin' saddle, baby, and all it took was thinking about this song.  The lyrics are about someone who is on life support due to being in a coma or persistent vegetative state.  (In the class on medical ethics that I took in college, the difference between a coma and a PVS was one of the most frequently discussed topics.  See the famous Terri Schiavo case.)  "If you were sent to prison, [and] prison was your mind, would you try escaping or would you do the time?" is a boldly chilling way to open a song.  For what it's worth, this song is similar in topic to Metallica's masterpiece "Fade To Black" (which is of course based on the book / movie Johnny Got His Gun).  The delivery of the line "WAAAAKE UPPPPP!" at the end of this song is the most stunning thing I've ever heard in music, singing-wise.  Singer Aaron Perino could've tried to end it with some sort of pretentious bit of phrasing, but the fact that he chose just those two primal words really makes his sentiment hit home.  He summoned up his internal passion and just let loose.  I'd pay to see video footage of him laying down this song's vocals in the studio.  One would never guess that Perino is a blond guy in a suit and horn-rimmed glasses.  Frank Black is rightly considered the gold standard for the shrieking style of vocals in indie rock, especially in the Boston scene, but I'd say Perino swiped his crown with this song (especially the very ending).  Though hardly anyone knows about it, of course.
This song gives me the energy of 7 PowerBars and 3 to 4 cans of Jolt cola.  And it is my personal fuck you to all the shitty imagecore "indie rock" bands of the '00s like the Strokes, Spoon, Arcade Fire, the Hold Steady, etc.  Those bands and most of their fans should pretty much be slaughtered after being sent to dig ditches for a few decades in Siberian prison camps, but that's another topic.  Search out better music and you shall find it.

I downloaded the EP Secret Society from eMusic in 2003, and was immediately knocked out of my chair by this song, especially since it comes a few tracks after the very cool, restrained and elegant "The Swan".  I had read about TSD going back to '99, when their album New Parade was released to somewhat frenzied acclaim in the music mags.  In fact, that album predated the whole Interpol / Editors suave Britpoppy post-punk revival thing by several years.  (Makes you wonder if Paul Banks & Co. ever caught any gigs by TSD in Interpol's formative days...)  Of course, the Sheilas broke up the same year I finally heard them, which was the same year that Interpol became international icons.  Not picking on Interpol, by the way.  TSD never played in the New Orleans area as far as I know.

AllMusic Guide's terribly-written review starts off by comparing the band to Weezer, then mentions "politely anguished vocals" and John Hughes soundtracks.  And of course, the author doesn't even mention "Back To The Cradle."  (Guess he was busy answering the door or hosing off his latte machine in the backyard when that song erupted onto his hi-fi.)

Fun Fact: The band's name is Aussie slang for "faggot."

Image I found on Tumblr that has been weirding me out / cracking me up for weeks

Some more songs that end with alarmingly tortured screams like this one does:

You Am I - "Embarrassed" ("Gonna tear it, you'll forGETTTTT ITTTT!")
Pixies - "Tame" ("TEHHHAAAAAAME!")
Nirvana - "Territorial Pissings" (A better WAAAAYY!")
Unwound - "Feeling$ Real" ("The world starts coming DOWWWWN!")
Helmet - "Murder" ([some yelling])

If you hate amazingly tortured screams, go to this concert on Thursday:

Planets with similar climates: Black Flag - "Room 13" (1981), Hole - "Violet" (1993), The Sound - "The Fire" (1981), Buffalo Tom - "Taillights Fade" (1992) & "Summer" (1995), U2 - "Like A Song..." (1982), Catherine Wheel - "Chrome" (1993).

Poem Rocket >> At the point of impact, don't rule anything out

Poem Rocket - "Levy 9 R.S.V.P."

(Magic Eye Singles, 1998)

So by now you know what Poem Rocket was capable of in terms of harnessing atonality and melody into oddly memorable and gripping songs.  What would happen if they really let their hair down and drifted off into the outer realms, like a non-sucky version of Hawkwind?

You have to admit that "At the point of impact, don't rule anything out" would make a great tattoo or Nike slogan, as would "If it hits us, we'll say 'I told you so' with no regrets."  Stick around until the last minute for some eerie, softly spoken vocals concluding with the epitaph "Deep in the dense layers of hydrogen."  This song's lyrics are presumably based on the comet Shoemaker-Levy 9, whose collision with Jupiter in July 1994 was a huge event amongst astronomers worldwide.  I don't personally remember it, but I vividly remember the Mars Pathfinder rover in '97 and Halley's Comet in '86.  I can't say whether Levy-9 was in the same general category of public excitement causation as those two, but I doubt it.

This song is from the Rocket's hard-to-find 1999 EP The Universe Explained In Six Songs.  According to the liner notes, it was recorded and mastered by the band itself, no small feat for such a sprawling, sonically-adventurous song.  The members of the band at this time are credited as: "Sandra Gardner (bass guitar, bowed bass, organ, violin, marimba, vocals), Peter Gordon (drums, piano, tape loops, harmonica, assorted mayhem) and Michael Peters (guitars, vocals, star shaker, drums)."  It comes in a cool mini clamshell (DVD-style) case with an interesting booklet.  I bought a copy ca. 2004, but the CD broke, so I bought another; I think I got both on eBay.  I have no use for the one containing the broken CD, so if someone wants it and is a somewhat-longtime reader of this site, drop me a line.

What you're looking at above is both of my booklets (front side; back side), the intact CD, the broken CD, and both cases (showing the white band / EP name stickers on the outside).

Inside the little Magic Eye Singles mailorder catalog (just one piece of paper folded in half) that came inside one of my Universe Explained CDs. (Pic added 2/23/13) Anything that contains the phrase "way better than Elliott Smith" gets a thumbs up in my book!

If you want to hear another Poem Rocket song in this spacey vein, check out "Contrail de l'avion" from their Into The Aether 10" (1994).  I actually was going to post that one instead, but opted for the longer, less hummable, more sui generis "Levy."

Illustration by Michael Peters from his book Vaast Bin; n Ephemerisi.  (The book has no page #s, but this pic is right in the middle.)

The happiest person on the planet right now has to be LL Cool J's manager.  His client just hosted the Grammys on Sunday, released (sorry, "dropped") a new single the next day, and is a dead ringer for the hopefully-late terrorist Christopher Dorner & is hence a lock to play him in the inevitable upcoming biopic.

Wed. 1/30/13: Saw Onuinu and Terrain at Siberia. I'm not sure if instrumental rockers Terrain are local, but the guitarist told the crowd it was their first-ever performance.  While Onuinu was performing (entirely solo) his catchy chillwave anthems-in-waiting, my sister and I kept telling each other "He's gonna be huge."  We bought a little too much merch after talking to him, just because of how nice and down-to-earth he is.

Thur. 1/31/13: Saw Chelsea Wolfe at the Spanish Moon.  Unfortunately, it was her "acoustic tour," and the crowd grew very antsy and belligerently talkative as it went on.  An actual quote I overheard: "It was amazing for the first 10 minutes, but after an hour I'm starting to hate it."  (It was an early show, with some sort of 80's Night beginning right afterwards at 10, so lots of obnoxious people were filling up the club.)  I was surprised C.W. didn't leave the stage due to all the talking and pool playing.  A local singer / songwriter named Erin Miley and her band opened with a set of post-Ani Difranco introspective pop.

Fri. 2/1/13: Termite treatment began.  Turns out one of the guys is a YouTube mogul who makes rap videos in New Orleans, but I forgot to ask for his YouTube name.

2/2/13: Went to the Mushroom for the first time since Nov. and learned my favorite employee and dear music buddy had quit.  Was crushed, speechless, etc.  I fittingly, and joylessly, bought Placebo's "Without You I'm Nothing" (one of my favorite songs ever) CD single for a buck.  Managed to go to the NFL Experience at the Convention Center with a bunch of my sister's friends and her fiancée right afterwards, but was sort of walking around in a depressed funk.  It didn't help that My Bloody Valentine released a dud of an album that night.  Was in much better spirits the next day on my birthday, though my prediction of Super Bowl tickets as a gift did not materialize.  Local product Jacoby Jones should've won Super Bowl MVP after setting the S.B. single-game yardage record, but he did earn a spot on the cover of Sports Illustrated.

2/8/13: Saw a sold-out show by the XX at House Of Blues with Em, Damion, Tace, and Alex, via free VIP lounge tickets.  I wore my School Of Seven Bells t-shirt, since their guitarist's cancer diagnosis was announced that day.  Opening act Austra went on at 9:30 instead of the heavily-advertised start time of 10:00, so we completely missed them.  I was looking forward to seeing them do their one good song, "The Beat And The Pulse," so I was pretty mad, especially since I missed a Toro Y Moi concert a few days earlier due to it being a sellout.  (In other words, I missed 3 bands on Wed. night, plus the opening band on this night, meaning I missed 4 of the 5 bands I ought to have seen in the week.)  After a long wait, the XX went on and delivered a very professional set with lots of cool lighting effects.  I'll admit I was skeptical about their ability to translate their hushed, "small" songs to the stage, but they really impressed me.  After hanging out in the posh upstairs lounge and listening to a DJ (forgot his DJ name, but it's 4 letters, maybe Flex?) spin such cutting-edge stuff as One Direction's "What Makes You Beautiful," Beyoncé's "Single Ladies," and Lenny Kravitz' "American Woman" on CD "turntables," and talking to Jenn Howard for the first time since high school, we bailed.  Met Oliver XX and Romy XX outside afterwards (since most of the crowd had dispersed to the Quarter to check out Mardi Gras madness) and got our posters signed.  This is one of my sister's top 5 fav. bands, so it was pretty momentous for her.  A girl from Baton Rouge named Emilie and a guy in a wheelchair named Fuji were both elated after meeting the band, and Emilie honestly looked like she needed a cigarette afterwards.  Oliver XX even climbed over the barricade to talk to us (well, mainly to talk to Fuji), and was later blatantly propositioned by a leggy fan wearing an all-white denim outfit.  Also talked to their tour manager after I noticed his Beak shirt and told him we (Em & I) had seen Portishead at this very club in 1998.  Turns out he was Portishead's manager or tour manger up until 2007.  A very cool guy. We saw Jamie XX carrying a bag of records he had just bought at Louisiana Music Factory directly across the street, but never found out what exactly he bought.  We walked around amidst the thongs on Bourbon Street for a while and went in some mediocre bar, then I spent about 45 mins. trying to catch a cab.  Saw an obese African-American woman in a Misfits skull t-shirt walking in front of the Joy Theater while I was waiting.  The increasing ubiquity / market saturation of early punk bands ceased to surprise me long ago, but I have to admit this sighting made me do a double-take, mainly because she was walking with some decidedly non-punk friends.  As usual, sorry for the excessively detailed descriptions; just trying to capture some of the little moments that make up a night like this one.

Planets with similar climates: Bardo Pond - "Rumination" (1996), The Church - "Chaos" (1992), Juno feat. Jen Wood - "A Listening Ear" (1998), Verve - "Butterfly" (1993), Sonic Youth - "Expressway To Yr. Skull" (a.k.a. "Madonna, Sean And Me") (1986), CAN - "Father Cannot Yell" (1969), Polvo - "When Will You Die For The Last Time In My Dreams" (1996), Morphine - "Down Love's Tributaries" (1993).

Poem Rocket >> I am creating you to be with you

Poem Rocket - "Appeal To The Imagination"

(Atavistic Records, 2000)

This song wastes no time in grabbing one's attention with a simple, Stones-y riff and Michael Peters' unmistakable yelp.  Sandra Gardner contributes a killer bassline and spooky feline vocals, as always.  At about 1:55, the song shifts into high gear, with speed-metal drumming and more emphasis on bass.  At 2:40 the bass just takes over the song, and the guitar briefly disappears at 3:30.

Note: I'll be taking this song down and putting up an edited (shortened) version of it at some point.

Most bands don't understand how important it is to stumble onto a simple lyric and repeat it over and over in an unorthodox way, since people have short attention spans.  "Appeal to the imagination" is an evocative phrase on its own, but the way Peters sings it is jarring and very memorable, since he puts emphasis on syllables that are not expected to be emphasized.  Black Francis / Frank Black was quite good – okay, masterful – at this, which rescued a lot of so-so Pixies songs from lameness and made them into classics.  Ditto for David Byrne.

I have this promo poster

On October 3, 2000, a band called Radiohead released an album called Kid A and a band called Poem Rocket released an album called Psychogeography.  One was full of sterile electronic noodling and lyrics of Caucasian ennui, and one had quirky, catchy, knotty Songs with a capital S (plus, to be fair, plenty of difficult meandering).  Guess which one went on to be voted the best album of the decade by an array of "reputable" music publications?

Undated live photo of Sandra that I found on Tumblr. Anyone know where this is?

This mp3 was given away on eMusic.com and (I think) on Atavistic's website, so it's presumably Poem Rocket's best-known song, and it should've propelled them to godlike indie mafioso status.  It's the song that got me into P.R. in spring of 2003, when I joined eMusic.  (I had read about them in '97/'98 in Alternative Press, and probably in Magnet too, but never actually heard them.)  Hearing this song was one of those "Whoa, where has this band been all my life?" moments.

Amazingly, this song was not released as a single, and there was no video for it.  The only video from the album was for the moody and slow-burning masterpiece "Dirigible":

The album title refers to the study of how urban environments shape the psychological lives of their residents.  I recently snagged a book at a thrift store about this topic called The Image Of The City by Kevin Lynch (M.I.T. Press, 1960).  I have another in a similar vein called Architecture In A Crowded World by Lionel Brett (Schocken Books, 1971).  As a plant geek / grower, I'm more interested in the psychological impact of landscaping than of buildings; for example, I refer to palm trees as "green Prozac."

In addition to the above pic, I found this cool description of Poem Rocket by Melody Maker on Michael Peters' website: "...a band with guitars and more than one idea. If Poem Rocket were English they’d probably be Flying Saucer Attack... a dense sonic fog of apocalyptic drones... dig the atmospherics and the vibes, piano and cello that creep out and back in again like audio leprechauns..."  He also has lots of rare photos of Poem Rocket there.  (Including the black & white one that I bragged about being the first to upload last month... Oops.)  Check out the amazing Abbreviated Poem Rocket Press Kit.  It's by far the greatest .pdf ever.  I was kinda shocked to see my review from Cold Comfort in there amongst all the reviews from "real" publications... It also shows a review of Psychogeography from Pitchfork which I never knew existed.  I dunno why Pitchfork purged it from its archives; presumably to make room for Arcade Fire dating tips or a Kanye West Twitter feud timeline.

In late 2003, Atavistic was taking preorders for Poem Rocket's upcoming 3rd album, and early buyers were promised a free CDEP as a bonus.  So I sent in a check for $18.00 and waited.  A year went by and no album.  Okay, so my favorite band is a bunch of perfectionists, no big deal.  Another year went by, still no album.  Hurricane Katrina had happened and I had to move away from New Orleans, so I wrote a letter to Atavistic asking for my money back, since $18 would go a long way for someone in such a situation.  I still had every intention of buying the album the day it came out, of course.  They never sent my money back or even wrote me back.  This, combined with the fact that they did little to no promotion for the album, left me with some choice words that I wanted to say to them.  I guess I thought they'd be somewhat grateful that I'd done an interview with this particular band (well, with its singer), which would of course help to get the word out about said obscure band, but they treated me like I was nothing.  I guess my $18 was needed for Lydia Lunch's mascara budget or something.  No, I don't think that record labels owe us fans anything; we in fact owe them for financing the recording of albums by bands that aren't very commercially viable.  But, as the bike path signs in Jefferson Parish say, "Courtesy Is Contagious."  If we're all in this battle against lame corporate music (or in my case, against lame indie music), we should look out for one another every once in a while.

Well, I think it's safe to say this is a really mediocre and disjointed post, but at least the song is good.

Mon., Jan. 7: Saw the movie Life Of Pi in "RealD 3D," which was my first-ever 3D movie.  It was quite breathtaking at first, but the effect wears off as the movie goes on.  Then watched as Alabama won a 4th national title for smug cyborg Nick Satan.  Fuming mad all night over this.

Last night: Saw True Widow with D.O.C. (Disciples Of Christ) and Glish at the Spanish Moon in Baton Rouge, in the little upstairs "Green Room."

Planets with similar climates: Bright Channel - "Final Stretch" (2004), Pixies - "River Euphrates" (1988), Orbit - "Come Inside" (1995), Drop Nineteens - "Delaware" (1992), The Black Watch - "Come Inside" (1994), Swervedriver - "Rave Down" (1991), A.C. Temple - "Miss Sky" (1988), Moonshake - "Spaceship Earth" (1992), Catherine Wheel - "Chrome" (1993), Smashing Pumpkins - "Quiet" (1993).

Poem Rocket >> Nothing is stopping me

Poem Rocket - "Small White Animal"

(PCP Entertainment, 1995)

Every great band has a song on which it eclipses its influences and creates an entirely new form of music, and for me this is that song for Poem Rocket.  The guitar feedback seems to levitate and take on a life of its own, like a cobra swaying to lull its prey to sleep.  A sinister, Ron Carter-esque bassline churns away underneath, and a robotic drum pattern forces the listener's mind into lock-step.  Michael Peters' lyrics are as confounding and dense as ever: "Thousands of incorporeal pieces / Fragments of the new form / So lucky you will never forget me."  It seems that he's singing about feeling insignificant in this big universe, and the cover art of the 7" (sort of a faceless take on Munch's The Scream) does nothing to dispel that.  The "small white animal" in question could be the moon, though, considering the line "I've seen the moon sink to the ocean."  Sandra Gardner's backing vocals add an element of disembodied coolness and mystery that most bands would kill for.  How has she not become a go-to vocalist for today's leading trip-hop bands?  There are no leading trip-hop bands today, but there could be, if only they would enlist Sand-Gar's services.

To see two short clips from the (apparently stunning) official music video, go here.  These clips should give us all impetus to pester the band to upload the full video (and the video for "Ka-boom") to its YouTube channel.  Even if this song is not your cup of tea, you have to take your hat off to the band for having the balls to actually release a song like this as a single, and to shoot such a cinematography-intensive video for it.  Though unthinkable to budding young noise rockers of today, back in the mid-'90s MTV would occasionally play videos by bands like this.  So I guess it was worth a shot for Poem Rocket to make several videos.

As for what I said about "an entirely new form of music," that might sound hyperbolic, and I thought about changing it until I stroked my chin and pondered the collision of space rock guitarscapes + industrial-style drumming + rubbery basslines + high-art lyrics + diametrically-opposed coed vocals.  This recipe is very different from the one used by most bands that could be classified as "noise rock."  If they had dumbed their sound down for the Neanderthal crowd, they could've easily become stars of the AmRep, Skin Graft, or Touch & Go stables, but instead they signed to PCP Entertainment, which was apparently a subsidiary of Matador Records that focused on NYC bands.  I'm not sure if PCP started off on its own and then was incorporated into Matador, or Matador created it out of thin air, but it had quite a varied roster.  Peters said he was a fan of The Church, which would explain his knack for cryptic lyrics.  The Church's Steve Kilbey is probably my favorite or 2nd-favorite lyricist ever, mainly because decoding his verbal webs is part of the fun.  The simple line "Nothing is stopping me" could be a high school football team's weight room motto, but if you look deeper into the phrase, it could also mean "The only thing that is stopping me is the concept of nothingness / insignificance."  Maybe I'm just reading too much into it and I should go back to rocking out on air feedback guitar while jumping up and down.  And that's the real beauty of a creation like this: Anyone, regardless of his or her care for, or knowledge of, specific types and subgenres of music, can just let his or her ass get rocked by a song like this.  It speaks in a primal, unspoken language, the one that impelled our amphibious ancestors to crawl out of the primordial ooze and head for higher land to build some sort of proto-life.  It has that visceral edge that the brain subconsciously craves in order to sharpen its fight-or-flight response.  Try getting that from a song by Guided By Voices, Clap Your Hands Say Yeah, Spoon, or any other Pitchfork favorites.  (My hatred of Pitchfork is deep and longstanding, as you might know by now.  That site has literally never printed a single thing about Poem Rocket, at least not since 1999.  Maybe they did sometime between 1996-98.)

This is such a great photo, and one of the few live pics of the Rockets that can be found on the web.  All I know is that it's from Brownie's in NYC, dated 1994:

I've been wanting a semi-hollowbody guitar like that, since they are notorious for their tendency to create unwanted (or wanted) feedback, and having three pickups rather than one or two would obviously help with feedback creation too.  Then again, maybe he used a totally different guitar to record this song in the studio.  Plexi's Michael Barragan is the only other guitarist I know of who had such a consistently abstract, feedback-laced guitar sound, and he always used Gibsons with P-90 pickups.

Here are my two invaluable Poem Rocket t-shirts, bought as a lot on eBay in late 2003:

I have recently been able to determine that the design on the left shirt is by Michael Peters himself, an accomplished visual artist (as well as singer, songwriter, guitarist, experimental author, college literature professor, biographer, etc.).  See / buy more of his art, and watch him give a rather intimidating book reading, here.  I miraculously stumbled onto & bought his incredibly bizarre book Vaast Bin; n ephemerisi at a bookstore in Houma earlier this year.

The shirt on the right is based on the striking cover art of the band's Into The Aether (a.k.a. Blue Chevy Impala) 10" EP.  And their old website uses a similar design for site navigation.

Noth'd Rookery by Michael Peters

Sorry to scatter out so much stuff about Poem Rocket, but like I said, any bit of info that can be shared about them is important, since this was not a band that practiced much self-promotion.  Those types of "secretive" bands, including many of my all-time favorites (e.g. Unwound, Hovercraft, Bailter Space, Bare Minimum) are the ones for which I am proud to take up the promotional mantle, to help "pay it forward" to the next generation of music fans.

Planets with similar climates: Live Skull - "Fort Belvedere" (1986), Bare Minimum - "Night We Streak, Divine Failure" (1995) & "Swim In Anxious Moment" (1997), Bright Channel - "Final Stretch" & "Night Eyes" (2004), Helmet - "Sinatra" (1990).

Poem Rocket >> I don't want to be your satellite

Note: In order to declutter this site and keep it more focused on the specific musical artist at hand, I'll be posting most of my personal photos, musings, etc. on a conveniently-URL'ed Tumblr page from now on.  This is just one of the many services that is provided to the Blowtorch Baby reader.  Subscribers of course get free landscaping advice (USDA climate zones 8 & 9 only) and the ability to stop time for up to four days.

Poem Rocket - "Flaw"

(Bear Records, 1994)

If you've been paying attention to the little "Planets with similar climates" sections at the bottom of every post for the last two years, you've seen this band pop up constantly.  And the previous post probably tipped you off to what was coming next.  I think the reason I haven't gotten around to posting anything by a lot of my all-time favorite bands yet is that I get sort of paralyzed by what to do, since I often have to decide between several photos, maybe a promo poster, a live pic that I took long ago and have on some disc somewhere, a review from some zine that's being stored in a closet, a music video that got yanked from YouTube, a tour t-shirt, etc.  The problem is that I want so badly to do a band justice that I don't want to leave any pertinent info out.  This especially applies to a band like Poem Rocket, about whom information & photos are quite scarce.  Any tidbit of information that can be unearthed about them is important.  So if you know of any review or live gig listing or photo, etc., please post it online somewhere so that it doesn't become buried beneath the mists of time.  This song is a great representation of Poem Rocket's quieter side.  It's the b-side to their "Period (Punctuation Or The Interval Of Time Required For A Cyclic Motion)" 7", which came on orangey red vinyl pressed at the audiophile-friendly speed of 33 rpm.  Like most of the band's chameleonic early non-album tracks, it can be found on the great compilation CD Felix Culpa.

Maybe due to the opening lyric "I'm waking up," as well as the sluggish tempo, this song makes me think of an alligator or capybara emerging from hibernation.  The drumming changes dramatically over the course of the song, and for what it's worth, Poem Rocket had a ton of drummers.  The core of the band was always singer / guitarist Michael Peters and bassist / singer Sandra Gardner.  They got married in 2003.  I think my online zine Cold Comfort was actually responsible for "breaking" that news in 2003, when I did an email interview with Peters, but for some unknown reason, it didn't shake the indie rock world to its core.  I'll post excerpts from that interview soon.  Peters' slide guitar brings a bluesy, desolate, wounded feel to the song, in an era when slide guitar was probably the most uncool thing on the planet.  (Juned also used it that same year in their great song "So White.")

As you can tell by the band's name, the cover art of this 7", and the use of a satellite as a lyrical metaphor, this band was kind of obsessed with outer space, but not in an overt or obnoxious way.  I think they viewed it as a good prism through which to deal with the subtleties of human relationships, e.g. the (real or imagined) distance between two people, rather than in a simplistic "Hey, let's jump on a rocket and go to Mars" way.  People who actually know about space know just how stupid most of those ideas are, mainly due to the fact that most cosmic distances are measured in a little thing called the light year.

Some publication called Sound Views praised this single's "guitar-powered concoctions that slowly bloom into atmospheric/noise-rock":

This came in my Into The Aether 10" EP. Flower was a mighty fine Wipers-esque band that evolved into Versus, by the way.

L-R: Michael Peters, Sandra Gardner, Andy Nelson (I think), someone (probably Dennis Bass, a.k.a. Dennye)

I bought this 8x10" promo pic on eBay about 5 years ago, and, amazingly, it seems that it has never appeared anywhere on the internet.  Way to go, Poem Rocket's publicity team / person.  I even asked the (really nice) guy at PCP Records mailorder for one in 2003 to use in my interview, and he sheepishly told me they didn't have any.  If that is indeed drummer Andy Nelson, the pic must be from the mid to late '90s, since he was apparently in the band from 1993 to '98.  I know this because I created P.R.'s Wikipedia page and lots of people proceeded to add lots of details that I never knew about, such as exact years of tenure in the band.

Check out this hilarious review I found in the April / May 1995 issue of the California skatepunk zine Flipside:
"These guys could take up a whole side just with their guitarist's introduction and just as his guitar work was approaching a solo on the level of Led Zeppelin, in jumps the singer who has a rather annoying style of purposely changing the inflection in his [sic] voice in a manner which makes him [sic] sound very off-tune.  In jump the other instruments as the songs play on and this whole scenario appears so overly self-indulgent as to make one want to vomit.  They bring new meaning to the word 'obnoxious.'"  The review was by their usually-reliable scribe Michele, who must've mistaken them for some sort of classic rock-influenced grunge band angling for a major-label deal.  (Flipside was obsessed with trying to valiantly sniff out and expose those types of bands.  If you thought that review was harsh, you should read some of their Lollapalooza reviews.)

Song credits from the inside flap of the Felix Culpa Digipak:

Planets with similar climates: Live Skull - "Bootcamp" (1986), Bardo Pond - "Tantric Porno" (1996), Opal - "Supernova" (1987), Bleach - "Crimson 'O'" (1990), Warpaint - "Warpaint" (2010).

Currently drinking: Three intriguing dark beers - Brooklyn Brewery Black Chocolate Stout, Sierra Nevada Narwhal Imperial Stout, Fuller's London Porter.

The Universal Chrome >> I'm in full control

The Universal Chrome - "Helium"

(self-released, 2000)

This is from the band's debut and only release, the CD EP Meet The Universal Chrome.  In my opinion, and I've said this since buying it in 2002, it's the finest disc ever released by a New Orleans rock band, and nothing else comes even remotely close.  I say this because it avoids all the clichés of "New Orleans music" in favor of the musical palette used by '80s / '90s Brit bands and their U.S. counterparts.  There's nary a trace of funk, zydeco, blues, etc. on this disc, which sounds like a dumb or naïve thing to even point out, but you'd be surprised at how heavy the peer pressure is in NOLA for rock bands to include at least some native signifiers.  After two crushingly dense opening seconds, "Helium" cruises along at sort of a moderate, dream-pop-y pace, sounding like nothing too special for its first two minutes.  But at the 1:55 mark, the weather suddenly changes and it becomes a white-knuckle ride into paranoia ("Suspect the one who knows everything") and fight-or-flight aggression.  With wah pedals alfutter in dramatic fashion, singer Zac Wilson announces very bluntly: "I'm in full control, so if you're fucking with me... Don't."  It's simply one of the most amazing vocal performances ever laid to tape, in my opinion.  I often like to say that certain songs "singlehandedly make the wah pedal cool again," and this is clearly one of them.

The CD and the inside of the booklet; took me 10 years to notice the naked lady.  The CD is actually totally grayish silver, in fitting in with the "chrome" theme, but the lighting gave it a pinkish cast that I couldn't fix:

The band was originally known as Flux, and my introduction to them was hearing a live interview on corporate alt-rock station 106.7 The End on a cold, dreary night in latte December 1996 while driving around uptown New Orleans.  I made a mental note to check them out, and I wish I had a recording of that interview.  I'm sure the band does somewhere.  A year or so later, they had to change their name due to a dispute by the group Flux, which was led by James Plotkin, who would later front the hilariously lame metal act Khanate.  I still don't know what the band's name means, but I've seen it used as the finish color for certain auto parts.  I had originally thought it was an homage to Catherine Wheel's classic heavy shoegaze album Chrome.  The album cover is an image of a car engine's drive belt, so the band's name is probably indeed a car reference.  Anyway, they opened for national touring bands like At The Drive-In, the Jesus Lizard, the Starlight Mints, etc., as well as big local bands like Burnversion, Rigid, and Weedater.  And of course they opened the killer Hum / Swervedriver show I went to in '98.  It has a hidden track, "The Last Resolve," which slays just about any song, hidden or non-hidden, in the history of music, and yes, I will be posting it someday.

I was overjoyed to find this flyer a few years ago at TUC's MySpace page, since I had never seen it back in the day:

Anyone who went to that concert (see ticket here) knows how the Chromies tore shit up and just about stole the show.  I mean, jeez, they sure ate their fucking Wheaties that morning, as I like to say.  They knew this would be one of the biggest moments of their lives, and they played like their lives depended on it.  The singer was a manic ball of energy with his eyes almost bugging out of his head, like Frank Black on speed.  And Melissa played her strong, Pixies-style basslines clad in her trademark red and white candy-striped leggings.  I even bumped into my Loyola ichthyology teacher, Frank Jordan, there.  (There was later an indie rock band named Frank Jordan, but I don't know if there was any connection.)  Dr. Jordan saw Sonic Youth in Florida in the mid-'80s, so you know he knew what was up.  I even lent him my Screaming Fields Of Sonic Love VHS around this time and never got it back.  About a year later, he admitted to me that he had never gotten around to watching it.

Back on topic... The Universal Chrome were one of the best-loved local bands of the late '90s, but I only saw them that one time.  Still kicking myself.  They moved to NYC in 1999 to make it big or somewhat big, and in a less douchey world they would have.  The most tantalizing fact: They recorded an unreleased full-length album, titled Closer To Shine, around the time of this EP.  Their Facebook page said they planned on releasing it digitally in August 2010, but I guess that never happened.  God damn.  I can only take so much suspense.  Luckily Meet has been released on iTunes.  In the '00s, drummer Keith Hajjar was a member of Rock City Morgue, along with former White Zombie bassist Sean Yseult and singer Rik Slave of Rik Slave & The Phantoms.  RCM had some success and garnered international interest; they even toured Europe in 2005.  Their sound was on the glammy, proto-punky '70s NYC side (NY Dolls, Dead Boys, etc.), very different from The Universal Chrome.  In other words, RCM was dedicated to recreating a bygone era, while TUC tried to forge something new, edgy, and dangerous.  So it's no surprise that I never saw RCM live or paid much attention to them.  Like anyone who was a teenage male in the '90s, I had a crush on Sean, and I have to say that White Zombie was one of the most fun and entertaining live bands I ever saw.  (Opening for Pantera at Lakefront Arena in '96.)

Tue. Oct. 16: Went to GW Fins, it was loud as hell, got some non-seafood, tried to block out the noise, great bread, great waiter, it got noisier, I got peeved.  Seemed overpriced, and the portions were on the small side.

Thur. Oct. 18: Went to Pelican Club for my sister's birthday.  Finally met her fiancée's mom, Mary, who immediately praised my palm paintings that she had seen.  Aunt Ann flew in from Savannah and Vanessa came too, along with mom and dad.  Afterwards we went to the Carousel Bar in the Hotel Monteleone briefly; was my first time doing so.  Definitely swank city.  Missed the second Obama-Romney debate due to all this, but Obama dispatched the creepy dude easily, based on highlights I saw and according to the general consensus of political pundits.

Fri. Oct. 19: Ann, mom and I went to the NOMA Sculpture Garden, had lunch in NOMA's café, then went to the Botanical Garden.  These things are all literally yards apart from each other, making for one of the most interesting couple of blocks on the planet in which to feed your brain and pass some time.

Sat. Oct. 20: Went to Kathleen & Jay's Halloween party for the first time.  This is a big-ass deal, and they even have cops close off the block to traffic.  They were screening The Avengers on the side of the house via a video projector outside.  I went as a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle in a shirt I had found at a thrift store the previous day.  Good clean fun, as Cat Power would say.  Stuck a bony hand decal / sticker thing on Ashley's face.  On WTUL's concert listings I heard that my favorite local jazz band (since Christian Scott no longer lives here), Tarik Hassan Group, was playing at AllWays Lounge, so I headed over there.  It was Hassan's birthday.  They were great, as always, and I was amazed to see the jazz singer I had met recently (Meghan Stewart) come into the club wearing a rather provocative red outfit.  I was hoping she'd sing with them, but it turned out she was there as a bellydancer(!).  So yeah, she danced / twirled / jiggled in rather stunning fashion to a few songs and really got the crowd going.

Sun. Oct. 21: I finally joined last.fm.  My username is a Magic Dirt song that I should've already posted on here by now.  Some other possible usernames that made the final round: HighwireDays (song by the P-Furs), FiresInMotion (lyric from Simple Minds' "Speed Your Love To Me), InvisibleKnife (lyric from Sand Rubies' "Drugged"), TheNewSunrise (song by The Joy Circuit), ExitBodyExitmind (lyric from New Fast Automatic Daffodils' "Music").

You may remember a few posts ago I pointed out the fallacy of the attempts by the Tea Party / Birther faction of Republicans to convince their peers that Obama would snatch up everyone's guns upon taking office.  And how paranoia has driven gun & ammo sales to record highs in the U.S.  Well, I had assumed everyone had come to their senses on this topic, but just the other day, I saw this ad in Baton Rouge's The Advocate newspaper:

Translation: "If the black guy gets elected again, you'll need something a little more powerful than that paltry shotgun or revolver that you have."  It's kind of chilling how the phrase "We lost a game, we didn't do enough" is right above this ad in the football recap.  And to answer the question asked in this ad, my answer is: Yes, as a matter of fact I am worried what you fucking rednecks will "bring" over the next 4 years.  (A bill is about to hit the Louisiana legislature that proposes automatically granting a concealed weapon permit to anyone who buys a gun.  Think about that for a second.)  Gun sales are already up around 70% between 2008 and 2012.

Mon. Oct. 22: Obama simply eviscerated Romney in their third debate.  He did so even though the debate focused on foreign policy, which means the challenger can simply lay into the incumbent on any little thing the incumbent has done overseas in the last 4 years.  In other words, the red carpet is laid out to the challenger, and the incumbent has to be on his heels the whole time.  I've honestly never seen anything like it, and I think it will be studied by future generations.  I mean.. wow.  This was just an all-out humiliation for Romney, in which he walked right into trap after trap that he set for himself, such as the topic of the outsourcing of jobs to China (a practice which Republicans all but patented) and the size of the U.S. military.  For an average person, I would worry that he or she would have major psychological issues for the remainder of his or her life after having such a thing done to him or herself on live television, but for someone as smirky and used-car-salesman-esque as Romney, I think he'll be able to shake it off on the strength of his utter inability to have any spine or sense of self.

Sorry for all this personal diary type stuff, but it's been an eventful month, and the next few will definitely not be.  Concert-wise, this may go down as one of my best ever, along with March '98 and March '04.

R.I.P. David S. Ware.  Even if you're not an Aquarius like I am, spark up his serenely hypnotic "Aquarian Sound", one of my favorite jazz tracks ever.

Diet soda is doing these 7 awful things to your body - "Downing just two or more cans a day increased waistlines by 500%."

Planets with similar climates: Catherine Wheel - "Waydown" (1995), Pixies - "Gouge Away" (1988), Quicksand - "Dine Alone" (1992), ...And You Will Know Us By The Trail Of Dead - "Prince With A Thousand Enemies" (1997), Unwound - "Stuck In The Middle Of Nowhere Again" (1992), Bailter Space - "Control" (1994).

Dub Sex >> Before things started spiraling down

Dub Sex - "Then And Now"

(Skysaw Records, ca. 1987/1988 / Cut Deep Records, 1989)

I got an excerpt of this song in the mid-'00s somewhere online, and quickly became pretty obsessed with it, then bought the actual 12" EP (self-titled) in 2008 on eBay.  This band was a favorite of John Peel, recording a whopping four Peel sessions despite never releasing a full-length album.  In fact, this song was performed on his show as early as January of '87, so it was surely written in '86 or earlier.  If I remember correctly, one band member did some time in The Fall, which would explain Peel's affinity for Dub Sex, since he had an inexplicable allegiance to Mark E. Smith's abominable band.

This song later appeared on a compilation of the band's material called Splintered Faith, which I have on vinyl rip and CD rip; the LP version has 15 songs, and the CD version has 18.  I'm intentionally uploading the crackly vinyl rip so that folks will be inspired to seek out and purchase the actual LP or CD.  Both are long out of print, so you'll have to buy secondhand, hence the band won't actually see any profit from your endeavor, but at least you can say you have something by a band called Dub Sex, whose sound is not remotely dubby and is definitely the polar opposite of sexy.  The singer's voice is one of the most unpleasant things I've ever come across, but I can't imagine anyone else singing "Then And Now" other than maybe Henry Rollins.  I also couldn't imagine the EP without its arrestingly unforgettable cover pic, credited to a photographer named P. Hoare:

I have no idea if Unwound were ever fans of Dub Sex, but their early, manic stuff sure seems to be in a very similar boat.  Early Swervedriver had some musical and geographical similarity to D.S.; coincidentally D.S. had a song called "Swerve," replete with a bare-bones, but professionally-shot, music video:

They had a slightly cooler video for "Time Of Life" in 1989, which shows bassist Cathy Brooks more clearly.  She had some pretty sweet basslines in many of their songs, such as "Voice Of Reason," "Man On The Inside," "Every Secret (That I Ever Made)," "The Underneath", and "Caved In."  So you could say she was the only one who contributed anything remotely resembling dub music to their sound.  Some interesting YouTube comments from "The Underneath": "I saw Dub Sex supporting the Stone Roses in 1989 at the International just after the Roses had released their debut album...two great bands" and "what happened to these guys? they are at least as good as Fugazi."  Your only chance to see the band members in living colour is probably this performance of "I Am Not Afraid" on Tony Wilson's TV show The Other Side Of Midnight.  (Wilson ran the club The Haçienda and co-founded Factory Records.)

Last week, after I loaded about half a ton of these white landscaping bricks into my car in 95º heat; note the chest sweat:

Best live bands I saw in the first half of 2012:
!!!, School Of Seven Bells, Whom Do You Work For?, A Silver Mt. Zion, Kindest Lines, The Neville Brothers (Jazz Fest), The Flaming Lips, Grimes (w/ Born Gold as her backing band), Tatsuya Nakatani + Helen Gillet + Rob Cambre, Tineke Postma (two shows in one night), Foo Fighters (Jazz Fest).

Good but nothing to write home about:
Alcest, EXITMUSIC, Shabazz Palaces, Magnetic Ear (French Quarter Fest), Dayna Kurtz, Sasha Masakowski (French Quarter Fest).

Ones I should've seen:
White Hills, The Weeknd (show sold out literally as I was about to buy tix online), Chairlift, Twin Sister, Har Mar Superstar (missed him twice so far this year; have still never seen him), No Joy, The darkness, Thurston Moore, Nautical Almanac, etc.

Atheist wins right to wear "religious pasta strainer" in i.d. photo

Speaking of the lyric "I used to live in this town before things started spiraling down," check out this YouTube video and/or this one.  Disclaimer: I'm a full-spectrum atheist, meaning I don't believe in any god(s) and am against all religions.  I have the least problem with "Far East" religions, since they're mainly centered on introspection and personal discovery.  I think any reasoned survey of the facts will show that Mormonism, Islam, and Scientology are cults, not just religions.  I like lots of aspects Arabic / N. African culture, and in fact I have over baby 100 date palms outside my window, have owned a Mali uromastyx lizard for 15 years, just noticed a CD called Moroccan Spirit on my desk, get chicken shawarma at a Metairie restaurant called Byblos on the regular, have The Kite Runner on DVD on my rack about 6 feet to my right, bought a copy of the Qur'an last year at a thrift store on a whim, etc.  And this is all despite having some Jewish blood on my mom's side.  I know that might come off as a "Some of my best friends are [black / Jewish / etc.]" type of rationale.  My point is just that I have no problem with Arabic people or culture, I just don't care for Islam, e.g. the fact that kids in the region are forced to join it from a very early age, that drawing Muhammed is punishable by death, that Jews are a mortal enemy, and other inhumane aspects.  From a broader perspective, I've long said that white people are the illegal immigrants in this country and that Native Americans and Mexicans have much more right to this land than we white people do.  I just don't know if this country can survive another wave of militant immigration, since the white influx of 1492 tore it apart pretty quickly.

Planets with similar climates: Venus Beads - "One Way Mirror" (1990), Unwound - "Lucky Acid" (1993), Prosaics - "Teeth" (2004), Hüsker Dü - "Lifeline" (1983), Live Skull - "Fort Belvedere" (1986), Quicksand - "Lie And Wait" (1992), Helmet - "Murder" (1990).

Bleach >> I'm a shotgun when you want to be a warm sun

Bleach - "Shotgun"

(Musidisc Records, 1991)

Since a teenage user on a music rating site that I use recently made a rant against Faith No More's supposed "rap-metal" stylings, repeatedly expressed misogynist beliefs, and said that I partake in "feminist bullshit," I figured I'd post a song with a female singer rapping over a shoegaze background, if only to see if his head would explode at encountering all these things he hates rolled into one pie.  I mean, one can insult me all one wants, but when Faith No More is brought into it, a line has been crossed and things shift to a different level.  This person apparently has no idea that FNM's original lead singer was black, and hence the Rock Police would thereby have granted him leeway to do some rap-style singing.  (Chuck recently put out a solo album cheekily titled Will Rap Over Hard Rock For Food.)  His favorite bands are Neutral Milk Hotel and Bright Eyes... No, really.  So one song immediately popped into my mind, since I already posted the other one ("Burn", also by Bleach).  The feral intensity of the guitars in this song will never cease to impress me.  The tremoloed guitar at the beginning adds a bit of surfy twang, but that is quickly massacred by a tsunami of drums and what I call "Godzilla roar" guitars.  I always looked at this as sort of a novelty track until about 5 years ago, when I realized how addictive and well-contructed it was.

This song apparently caused a minor stir in the U.K. indie scene when it was released as a single (on CD, 7", and 12") in 1991.  It was then wisely included on Bleach's sole album, Killing Time, in '92.  That's one of my top ten fav. LPs ever, but I'm sure I've mentioned that before.  If you don't know which version of "Shotgun" you're listening to, the single (indie) version is 3:51 long and the album (major-label) version is 3:42.  The versions sound identical, except that the album version has four drum taps at the beginning.  And on the single version, Salli ends the second stanza with "Spin me around," whereas on the album version she uses "Fucking around."
Salli's sharp-edged vocals in this song can be discussed forever, both pro and con.  Being someone who listened exclusively to rap / hip hop in that particular year (1991), I can say that she knew exactly what she was doing, and did it with zero hesitation or "Ha ha, check this out" sarcasm.  (If you want the latter, check out Sonic Youth's "Master-Dik.")  Her vocal starting at 1:55 is very badass, playing off the beat in a nimble way that noted clumsy rapper Kanye West should take notes from.  What I mean by that is that she slows down for a line, then speeds up and uses the bass drum hits to provide emphasis/punch underneath certain words near the end of phrases.  You can even hear her waiting a split second to say the second syllable of the word "homespun" right on the kick drum (bass drum).  It takes skilled breath control to be able to do this stuff; for someone who was known for her somewhat reedy / fey voice, she stepped up and really delivered the goods here.  I've spent years trying to figure out what she says at this 1:55 section; I know it contains "You do and say what you think I'm not supposed to" and "I don't say what I'm allowed to."

The single's cover art features a silver-painted foot with a blue string tied around it.  The string could either be for an i.d. tag in a morgue, or a way for a person to commit suicide by tugging on it whilst its other end is on the trigger of a gun.  Parasol Records was clearancing this 7" for 50 cents for several years, and I always swore I'd get around to ordering a bunch, but recently was miffed to discover they no longer have it.  The b-side is the extremely poppy and passionate "Bone," which should have also been released as a single.  I would recommend buying the CD or 12" version instead of the 7", since in addition to "Bone," those formats add the stunning 10-minute "First & Last."  An absolutely essential and groundbreaking EP, which I give 5 stars without any reservations.

A few days ago I discovered that Bleach made a video for "Decadence" in 1990.  This made my week.  The last third or so of the video has lots of psychedelically-tinted sea creatures:

This means that they had at least three videos, the others being the exuberant "Dipping" (1991) and the stylishly vertiginous "Surround" (1992).  Does anyone know if there was a video for "Shotgun"?  I also just found an ferociously spirited and bloodthirsty Peel session from July '91, which is neither for those who are faint of heart nor for those with flimsy computer speakers.  Fun Fact: This was the same approximate month that I bought Above The Law's Livin' Like Hustlers, an album that brilliantly combined rap with jazz & rock instrumentation.  I wouldn't even find out about Bleach until about a decade later.  Also in '91, Public Enemy and Anthrax were touring together after having done that (awful) "Bring The Noise" collabo with each other.

Here is a pic from the May 4, 1991 issue of Melody Maker, with Curve on the cover.  As far as I know, this image (photographer credit: Patrick Gilbert) has never been posted online before:

In 1993, a live version of "Shotgun" appeared on Bleach's Trip & Slide & Live promo CD EP, which I've been trying to get my hands on for years.  That EP's artwork also starred the dead silver foot, this time on a bed of red grapes.  In 2006, the song was included on an impressive and much-needed compilation called Like A Daydream: A Shoegazing Guide:

Tracks 3, 4, 5, 6, 12, 13 & 15 are among the best songs ever recorded, and most of the others are quite nice

It's been a record-setting week of heat across the U.S., with Denver over 100º for 5 straight days and the area near Colorado Springs ablaze.  It's said to be Colorado's worst disaster ever.  Tropical Storm Debby thankfully went to Florida instead of here last week.  No rain here for about 2 weeks now, with temps in mid to upper 90s.

Sat. 6/23: Went to two Louisiana Nursery locations in Baton Rouge, both for the first time. Was very impressed with their plants.

Wed. 6/27: Got a picturesque & hardy species of prickly pear cactus called Opuntia santa-rita at Home Depot to replace a flimsier Opuntia that I already have.

Thur. 6/28: Saw the Flaming Lips set the Guinness world record at HOB.  Grimes dropped off the bill with no notification or explanation.  She was replaced by the somewhat (intentionally or unintentionally?) hilarious MNDR, sort of a combination of Madonna, Har Mar Superstar, and Grimes.  She was decked out in slutty black and white mid-'80s Madge garb, letting her love handles jiggle provocatively, and ordered a guy and girl from the crowd to come up on stage to dance during one song.  MNDR played only about 15 minutes.  Then Wayne Coyne was paraded up Decatur Street to the front of the HOB, with local boys the Stooges Brass Band leading the way.  The Lips kicked off with their two biggest hits, "Do You Realize??" and "She Don't Use Jelly."  I was kind of jaded towards their stage prop tricks, having not seen the Lips since 1994, but I have to admit it was pretty transcendent.  I raised my can of Guinness Draught at the moment the Guinness record breakage was announced.  They played for about 70 minutes, despite averaging only 15 minutes at the previous seven stops.  Thanks for the free tix, Butch!  And thank you Ashley for making it through your terrible day (moving problems + flat tire) and coming out with us.  It was too hot and humid to walk around the Quarter, so afterwards we got some grub at Lucy's (Lucy's Retired Surfer Bar & Restaurant) afterwards, and my sister taught me what a well drink is.  I had my eyes glued to the NBA Draft.  In addition to the somewhat overrated Anthony Davis, we got human highlight reel Austin Rivers, as I'd been hoping.  I've also heard a rumor that Chris Paul wants to come back to the Hornets...

Fri. 6/29: My sister has been mad @ Grimes for canceling, so I texted her a self-deprecating Grimes tweet ("I'm not trying 2 be cute, I have a fucking speech impediment.")  Went to dad's surprise 60th birthday party at Pelican Club.  Tom, Ann, Kathleen, Shane, Ali, Roxanne, Preston, Sprague & wife, Jay & wife, and Jack & wife all came.  It was also Vanessa's bday so she was included too.  Emily cleverly wrote "You're sixty and you know it!" on dad's card, and dad actually crooned a bit of said LMFAO song.  Do not ask me how he knew about it...

Sat. 6/30: Went to Dat Dog's new location for the first time.  We had to sit outside in delightful 95º heat. I got the Guinness (beer) Dog again, but found it overbearingly greasy, so I probably would not get it again.  Got aunt Ann a little Stevia plant at Freret Street Nursery directly across the street.  We did not make it to the NOMA sculpture garden as I had hoped.  Shane ripped lots of my CDs (e.g. Ween [R.I.P.], The Church, Acetone, Gil Scott-Heron, Faith No More, Miles Davis) to his Mac on my recommendation, after quickly selecting Herbie Hancock's Headhunters on his own.  Roxanne decided that she and Shane should get a Uromastyx after she held mine and fed her by hand.  Went to get snowballs at Sal's with dad, Preston & Roxanne.  Used Sears gift card (received as collateral during garage door repair last summer) towards a little Sony HDR-CX190 Handycam, mainly to record bands in concert.  Overall, one of the most eventful & strange 48-hour spans I've had in many years.

Here is a painting I finished on Super Bowl Sunday 2012, whose silver and blue reminds me of the Shotgun cover art.  Yes, the palms are supposed to be leaning towards an implied ocean on their right, since the sand is always shifting / sinking a bit on the ocean side as compared to the dry land side.  And I guess it goes without saying that these are supposed to be coconut palms.  It's the first palm painting I've done on a circular or oval canvas (bought at Hobby Lobby, I think), and I will definitely be using them again:

That's the painting's info card; I try to remember to make one for every artwork I do, just in case I become famous in a few decades.  I posed it on the pot of my 'Blue Elf' aloe for no reason.  Some interesting tidbits are often buried in these cards, such as the fact that those are not black stripes.  The dates also remind me that that silver-coated oval canvas sat on my coffee table for almost a year while I thought about what to do with it.  Note that I only sign the backs of my paintings, never ever ever the fronts, since I grew up admiring album cover art, which essentially never have anyone's name scrawled on them.

Deciding whether I will go see a mediocre band with potential tonight called Widowspeak at Circle Bar, if only because I haven't been there in almost two years.  I don't know if they have A/C post-renovation; they never did before.  Widowspeak sound just like Mazzy Star's first two albums, down to the most minute detail, for better or for worse.  The problem is that they remind me of a more lightweight version of the band EXITMUSIC, and don't yet have Mazzy Star's knack for penning at least a couple memorable tunes per album.

5 greatest NBA Finals moments Legoized

10-year-long video game creates 'hellish nightmare' world - "He doesn't play every day but returns to what he called a 'hellish nightmare of suffering and devastation' when he has some free time.  Now in the year 3991, his world is down to three super-nations, each competing for dwindling resources, and a planet left scarred by multiple nuclear wars.  His Celts are locked in a 1,700-year war with the Vikings and the Americans.  All other nations have been destroyed or absorbed.  Because of the continual fighting, he was forced to abandon his democracy and adopt a communist state, because his Senate kept overruling him when he wanted to declare war.  Also, his cities are filled with starving people (90% of his world's population died from nuclear annihilation or famine from global warming) because, he says, he has to keep building war machines to sustain his combat efforts."

Planets with similar climates: A.C. Temple - "Chinese Burn" (1988), Lush - "Blackout" (1994), Poem Rocket - "Small White Animal" (1995), Bailter Space - "Pass It Up" (1997), Swervedriver - "Son Of Mustang Ford" (1990), Faith No More - "From Out Of Nowhere" (1989), Feverdream - "Vortex" (1995), You Am I - "Embarrassed" (1993).

Kill Laura >> If you could be somewhere, where would it be?

Kill Laura - "Unheeled"

(Klee Records, 1994)

I downloaded this EP, Unloverlike, last year after seeing it on an mp3 blog that I used to follow, despite my vehemently hatred of Kill [Female Name] band names.  The EP itself, released only on 12" vinyl, is long out of print.   It took me forever to decide whether to post this song or the passionate "False Dawn".  Singer Jane Weaver obviously has one of the most astoundingly awesome and versatile voices on the planet.  The best showcase for her voice on this EP is the delicate and almost hallucinogenic dream-pop ballad "Cinnamon Brow," in which she does some stunningly nuanced vocal gymnastics that only someone with operatic training should be able to pull off.  And the EP's title is a lyric in that song.  So just check out the whole EP, which is truly one of the lost classics of the '90s.  If it had been released on Creation, 4AD, or Too Pure, it would have the large cult following that it deserves.  The most simplistic overall way I could describe the EP's sound would be Lush and/or Bleach (U.K.) meets Sonic Youth and/or Poem Rocket, with a PJ Harvey lyrical style.

Info about the band is hard to come by; they were from Liverpool and released three EPs.  It's hard enough to know anything about these kinds of bands while they're still active, and almost impossible two decades later.  You can see a copyrighted promo photos of Kill Laura here, plus a live pic here.  On the live pic page, the photographer refers to Jane as "One of the tallest, most talented and nicest musicians I have ever met."

Promo pic by Tony Smith, "Taken in the Winnington Rec Snooker Room"

When I first heard this song, I immediately thought of PJ Harvey's classic "Rid Of Me", due to the abrupt soft-to-loud dynamic shift.  I think the word "unheeled" in this song means both untamed (as in, teaching a dog to heel), and its homonym, unhealed (as in, the singer's wounds).  And it could also mean poor, as in the opposite of "well-heeled."  So she could be saying that at that bad point in her life, she was reckless, injured, and poor, which led her to getting into some situation that she regrets.  "If you could be somewhere, where would it be?" is a chilling thought, in terms of it being something that an abused person probably spends a lot of time thinking about.  But the way she sings it is so gorgeous that it should be aired continually in Travelocity or Orbitz commercials around the globe, bringing vast royalties to the members of KL.  Just snip out that sentence and play it atop some slo-mo clips of parents walking behind their kids on a beach and you have instant advertising gold.  Or better yet, picture William Shatner fucking hang-gliding off of the edge of an erupting volcano to this song and watch the money roll right in.
Speaking of wounds, here's the cover art:

I buss'id my lip open playing basketball while wearing one of my Paul Pierce jerseys, on June 6th at the Annunciation Street court.  Also broke my glasses, jammed my thumb, and slit my palm up, but that's streetball, America's best pure invention aside from jazz.  Unfortunately, the Celtics lost to the cHeat in game 6 that night, and they lost in game 7 a few nights later, probably ending the Big Three's tenure in Boston, though Rajon Rondo has now eclipsed all three of them, so they can get to rebuilding.  This pic of my buss'id lip that I took the next day didn't show the injury too well, since the light reflection covered up the yellow pus, and since only my neck was in focus:

Wearing my terrific Macha shirt; will finally get around to posting a song by them soon

So, if I could be somewhere, where would it be?  A few off the top of my head:

The Faroe Islands in the summer
Anywhere in New Zealand
Nong Nooch Botanical Garden in Thailand (1100 different species of palms)
The famed palm groves of Elche, Spain
The famed coffee-growing mountains in Jamaica
Anywhere in Belize
Dakar, Senegal
Cozumel, Mexico (again)
The Canary Islands
Kew Gardens in London

Jane Weaver on ITV's This Is Music show in 2002; from her MySpace

75 awesome "Looking into the past" pictures

Driving like a jerk may cost you an extra $100 per month in gas

Planets with similar climates: PJ Harvey - "Rid Of Me" (1992), Juned - "Leeches" & "Pretty New Song" (1994), Bleach - "Hit On Me" (1992), Band Of Susans - "Mood Swing" (1993)