LIGHTNING STRUCK ITSELF

Hey 1977, you might not have realized it then, but Aja and Marquee Moon were really hand in glove...

OUT ON THE TILES

I have three letters left on my rack: W, T, and F...

KYZYLPYXM

A couple of weeks back I made a Stereolab mix disc, and named it Mxyplyzyk. It was heavy on the kraut:

Anemie
Escape Pod (From the World of Medical Observations)
French Disko
Heavy Denim
John Cage Bubblegum
Klang Tone
Laissez-Faire
Margerine Rock
Pop Molecule (Molecular Pop 1)
Revox
Stomach Worm
Super-Electric
Transona Five
Transporte Sans Bouger
We're Not Adult Orientated

I figured I'd listen to this for a day or two, but I'm still playing it every day.

All of which says a few things about me.

(1) Stereolab still resonates.
(2) I'm a full-grown natural man, yet I still make mixes.
(3) I name my mixes.

I'm geek like that, bitches...

WOOLLY BULLY

New feature debuting on the tongue: Sliced Tongue Discusses Eight-Year Old Movies That No One Gave a Shit About Even Eight Years Ago.

Today: Bully, directed by Larry Clark.

I think I’ve probably seen this whole movie now, in a few different sittings.

Teen sex, teen drug use, teen anomie, teen creeps? Oh, it's all here baby.

But at it's core the movie is both reactionary and naïve. It confuses bullshit and bravado for biblical truth.

The poor little movie is scared.

And the way it uses gay sex as an easy signifier for deviancy would make proud even the most top-flight bigots...

SHAME SHAME SHAME

• Dietary manipulation: Substituting liquid meal replacements for solid food.

• Nudity: Used to cause psychological discomfort.

• Walling: Slamming detainee into a wall.

• Facial slap: Slapping detainee's face with fingers slightly spread.

• Abdominal slap: Striking the abdomen with the back of an open hand.

• Wall standing: Forcing detainee to stand with feet spread, arms outstretched, fingers resting on the wall, not permitted to move.

• Water dousing: Cold water is poured on detainee.

• Sleep deprivation: Detainee is deprived of sleep for more than 48 hours.

• Waterboarding: Pouring water over face of detainee, who is lying at an angle on his back, head lowered.

To the architects of this mess, I don't think that I can wish upon you anything worse than the rot that has overset your souls already...

CVILLE NO EVIL

Went down to Charlottesville on Monday with my sister and her kids.

We hit Plan 9, and I put a used copy of I Can Hear the Heart Beating as One in my sister's hands. Even offered to pay for it.

I fielded some questions from my 13-year old niece:

“Is The Cure good?”

“Um, sure, sometimes. What do they have?”

She pulled out three used discs: Wish, Wild Mood Swings, and Kiss Me, Kiss Me, Kiss Me.

I took the first two from her, and put them back in the racks without a word. I handed her Kiss Me, Kiss Me, Kiss Me.

“This is OK. This'll do.”

She then made the mistake of presenting me with a My Chemical Romance disc, while her mom was within earshot.

“Nah, that's emo. You don't want that. You'll just start piercing crap and wearing black eyeliner.”

My sister caught this part of the conversation and promptly vetoed the purchase. I felt like such an inadvertent bastard.

Next time I'll buy my niece a copy of Hissing Fauna and tell her mom that it's about “nature”...

ASHES TO ASHES

So now that Stereolab have thrown in, what do I find myself reaching for but Sound Dust.

It's kind of a Sean-from-Good-Will-Hunting I-miss-the-smell-of-my-dead-

wife's-fahts thing, I suppose...

DRIVE-IN SUNDAY

Happy (Mitch) Easter, y'all!

SAFETY IS SAT BY THE FIRE

Last night I was kicking at a curious bedding of straw in the backyard of an open house, and I uncovered a dead frog.

Which felt particularly, um, biblical. Especially given that it was the first night of Passover.

So I dumped a couple of buckets of lambs' blood on the kids and got the hell out of there.

We won't be making an offer...

DAVY WHO'S STILL IN THE NAVY

Last week, after visiting another house with living conditions you never would have suspected, I turned to Taeko and said “Every real-estate agent should be a novelist.”

It wasn't until a couple of days later that I realized I had validated a fooking Billy Joel lyric...

THANK YOU FOR THE MUSIC

Well, Stereolab announced they are "on hiatus," and it sounds pretty permanent.

Au revoir, les enfants...

DEAR SIR OR MADAM

I’ve never made a big effort to share my writing with the world. In general, I have not stretched beyond the dear horizon of some indulgent friends.

This blog is really no different. The audience is made up of friends, and the occasional misdirected soul in search of further info on body modification and/or deli meats.

I have always made the fairly safe assumption that there is not a defined audience for anything I’m comfortable doing.

I’m not making a show of being self-critical here. Nor am I applying for status as a misunderstood genius. It just is what it is.

For example, very little in the history to date of this blog has given me more pleasure than working through the first 10 chapters of Halo, and very little likewise tested the gentle reader’s patience to a comparable degree. And I get that.

Gladiola Dialog represents one of my only dalliances with the larger world. Some years ago, the John Lennon Songwriting Contest (which carries Yoko’s imprimatur) included a lyric-writing category.

So, I had the title “Gladiola Dialog”— I liked the way the words looked next to each other, more than anything else— and I decided that a well-selected and well-arranged listing of different types of gladiolas was the best lyrical fit for that title.

I thought this was in good creative communication with Yoko’s roots in the Fluxus movement, and with how that influence cross-pollinated with John’s pop sensibilities.

I wrote a $40 check for the entrance fee, and sent Gladiola Dialog on its way.

When the winners were announced months later, I saw that the grand prize went to a lyric that was a sturdy and able paean to the blues.

I did not expect to win.

But to this day, I don’t know exactly what I did expect…

LOOKING FOR THE FUCKING FLOWERS

Gladiola Dialog

Amberglo
Antique rose
Aztec gold
Blue beauty

Blue symphony
Bombay
Bridal veil
Calliope

Candy cane
Carved ivory
Creation
Daydream
Devotion

Elegance
Emerald
Empire yellow
Eventide
Flamenco

Grand illusion
Isle of fire
Majestic star
Meteorite

Midnight moon
Nectarine
Obsession

Opaline
Painted lips
Peachy keen
Phantom

Rare jewel
Red alert
Red dandy

Regal robe
Saxony
Sheer poetry

Smokestack
Solar flare
Summer rose
Tall dark blue
Top honor

True love
Violence
Visual arts

FAUNING HISSER

You know how I can tell that Hissing Fauna is a genius album? It basically ends with 1/4 of a Pink Floyd song (Labyrinthian Pomp), 3/4 of a Franz Ferdinand song (She's a Rejecter), and about 1/3 of a Cure song (We Were Born the Mutants Again With Leafling), yet still manages to be brilliant.

Winning!

THE SILENCE OF ICE

Next in our series of Broadcast/of Montreal connections: the reference to “Valerie and Her Week of Wonders” from St. Exquisite's Confession.

"Valerie" is a very weird Czech film from 1970, which led to a very beautiful Broadcast song from Haha Sound.

Here's two great tastes that taste great together...

AT HOME HE'S A TOURIST

You know what's the perfect soundtrack for when you put in an offer on a house you really love, only to get outbid by someone else? Entertainment!

And I was listening me to some Gang of Four today...

FEARNLEY, FINER, STACY, RANKEN, HUNT, CHEVRON, WOODS

I'm going to forgo praising Shane for being ambulatory, relatively coherent, and well, alive.

Instead: All hail the Pogues (the band)! I mean, those old buggers are furious, maudlin, and festive, and can change course at the drop of a die.

Can they be sloppy, and fall out of sync just as easily? Well fuck yes, but they're kind of predicated on that, you know...

I THOUGHT OF TOMORROW

If you had told me 20 years ago that on St. Patrick's Day 2009 I'd be suiting up for my third original-lineup Pogues' show in four years, I would have called you daft.

So glory be to god for improbabilities and shit...

TODAY’S THE DAY THE BE@RBRICKS HAVE THEIR DISCO

I finally figured out a suitable place to put my electronic disco ball.

It hovers in the corner of my desk, spinning like a fabulous planet. The motor groans like a fish-tank filter.

And now my Be@rbricks and their friends have a reason to cross the bridge into Brooklyn.

Currypanman and Kappa Anpanman stand in their dance cages and survey the crowd. Crystal Jelly Be@r downrocks like a mutha. Escher Be@r and Blue Gumby Girl do the robot in mirror form. Qee Keychain Bear checks out their moves, while Saw the Movie Be@r goes full-on Manero.

Brothers and sisters, how deep is your love?

THE LETTER

OK, Post Alpha-Bits no longer resemble letters for shit.

They should call it Post Ankhs 'n Twigs, which is a fairer description of what ends up in your bowl.

Man, if America can't recapture its cereal-making magic, it is a doomed empire for certain...