All too rarely do the people in the Las Vegas television and film industry get together. We do have an annual Christmas party, which was created in honor of an untimely death of a fellow co worker, this reason generally tends to be the only rallying point of people lately, shameful though that none of can find the time to hangout, granted we are all out there on the hunt for some work in a city that has undergone a serious economic recession, so maybe people feel like they are in competition, hopefully that is not the case, though I asked a few people at last night's rememberance of a video engineer who passed away last weekend at all too early of a time and the fact he was partially key in my education in this industry made the evening a bit more sad. I stared at the photo of him and it just did not fully set in that he would no longer be walking out of the video portion of the television truck praising me for a job well done. Thankfully, his wisdom and guidance will live with me, so in my mind he is still alive, a bit of him in all of us here tonight, discipline, focus, and attention to detail. Those lessons came over a decade of being thrown in over my head, where he was my immidiate superior, shaking his head as I did everything wrong, still mistakes were only made once, after a dressing down that left my ears stinging with a look as if I just fell from the sky unable to process his command without looking dumbfound.
Over time, I just shut up, observed, and paid attention gaining lifetimes of experience. it has served me well. After talking to a few more co workers it seemed unamious in the realization that as a community we were pretty distant, spread out, and factioned, this could be due to generational differences, social circles, and personal tastes, yet why should these things seperate us, maybe living in Vegas has made people somewhat transient. I can remember last weekend when everyone on a television shoot found out the news, the sense of loss was complete and irrefutable, total shock, I was hanging out with him the weekend before, then boom, gone, no more, everyone moves on, goes about their business, thankfully though last night his memory would not be lost, so Riceman shall be a wealth of knowledge, eternal, purposeful, and a legacy of the personal desire for perfection.
Sunday, September 19, 2010
Neon Reverb
The underground music scene of Las Vegas has come together this weekend to showcase a great cross section of artists who might otherwise have not toured through this city or remained locally underdiscovered. With a bit of research in the weekly city magazine I found that there happend to be a number of bars and nightclubs who put on nightly music lineups. Must be honest, it has been quite a few years I have had any desire to investigate the indie band showcases, especially in an era of self promotion via such internet tools like MySpace, Facebook, Twitter, You Tube, and a host of other less recognized mediums of sites which allow bands to post their music and bio information on the webpage. After some further research of Neon Reverb I decided to head down to the Beauty Bar to watch a number of acts perform. For some reason, the synthesizer has made a resurgence in a number of bands, a hybrid of the Killers/Muse vibe with dreamy lead vocals, retro 80's dance beats, moody bass lines, and an aluminum shell to generate that self conscious distance so prevalent in art pop.
The Beauty Bar looks like a hair salon, all the booths double as the back bar area where all the bottles of alcohol have been setup in a loose assembly with the upmost effort of random precision. After grabbing a drink I went outside to a backyard picnic area, listeners hung out in loose pockets, talking amongst themselves, others probably friends who were more intent, more passionate, singing along with the lead singer who did his best to become more motivated, twisting, jumping, then rolling around on the stage, while slyly looking over his shoulder to see if anyone really cared about his antics. A group of twenty continued shouting and screaming motivating the band to increase their tempo driving into a lathered frenzy of ear piercing distortion and manical bashing of the drums, the drummer looked intent on turning his drum set into pile of wooden rubbish. Damn, this band is loud, forgot how painful listening to music in club can be, had to go to the back of outdoor area to lessen the fierce overwhelming sonic assualt, but if its too loud, you are too old, guess that is the case now. It took a few beers to get past the earache until nothing but a dull thud remained. I stood near the audio mixer he did not seem too concerned with the distortion, in fact the band complained between songs that it was not loud enough.
People watching became the routine for the night, started up a couple of discussions with a few photographers covering the event. gone are the days of paper based rock and roll magazines, they exist, but these photographers covered this event for various music websites, blogs, and various Vegas nightlife guides. At times, it appeared that the number of people snapping pictures and rolling video outnumbered the fans in the audience. This did not have a noticable effect on the bands who in total looked excited to be playing their material in front of more than their friends and family, I could sense the personal satisfaction resonanting out of the speakers, whether punk rock or hip hop, the pursuit of showmanship poured out into the Beauty Bar, song by song, band by band, it got me excited about music again and about hanging out in public, attempting to socialize once more, even though I am some old geezer now, others find a weird sort of wisdom in the experiences of my life and they offer me some insight in negotiating life in an era of uncertainity, no one seems concerned, only more motivated to express what is on their mind, might be love or the pain of seeking employment. This is just the kind of message everyone needs, otherwise we'll be sailing down a sea of alcoholic abuse, drug binge consumption,
and an unfathomable depression. We already went down that well in the early 90's of self destruction with a bit of art to show for it, but also a generation who refutes praise, support, and brotherhood. I count myself among them, yet to hang out with a new crowd gave me a sort of revival, now if I can keep the drinking down to minimum there is a chance of getting some real work done, back out into the field.
The Beauty Bar looks like a hair salon, all the booths double as the back bar area where all the bottles of alcohol have been setup in a loose assembly with the upmost effort of random precision. After grabbing a drink I went outside to a backyard picnic area, listeners hung out in loose pockets, talking amongst themselves, others probably friends who were more intent, more passionate, singing along with the lead singer who did his best to become more motivated, twisting, jumping, then rolling around on the stage, while slyly looking over his shoulder to see if anyone really cared about his antics. A group of twenty continued shouting and screaming motivating the band to increase their tempo driving into a lathered frenzy of ear piercing distortion and manical bashing of the drums, the drummer looked intent on turning his drum set into pile of wooden rubbish. Damn, this band is loud, forgot how painful listening to music in club can be, had to go to the back of outdoor area to lessen the fierce overwhelming sonic assualt, but if its too loud, you are too old, guess that is the case now. It took a few beers to get past the earache until nothing but a dull thud remained. I stood near the audio mixer he did not seem too concerned with the distortion, in fact the band complained between songs that it was not loud enough.
People watching became the routine for the night, started up a couple of discussions with a few photographers covering the event. gone are the days of paper based rock and roll magazines, they exist, but these photographers covered this event for various music websites, blogs, and various Vegas nightlife guides. At times, it appeared that the number of people snapping pictures and rolling video outnumbered the fans in the audience. This did not have a noticable effect on the bands who in total looked excited to be playing their material in front of more than their friends and family, I could sense the personal satisfaction resonanting out of the speakers, whether punk rock or hip hop, the pursuit of showmanship poured out into the Beauty Bar, song by song, band by band, it got me excited about music again and about hanging out in public, attempting to socialize once more, even though I am some old geezer now, others find a weird sort of wisdom in the experiences of my life and they offer me some insight in negotiating life in an era of uncertainity, no one seems concerned, only more motivated to express what is on their mind, might be love or the pain of seeking employment. This is just the kind of message everyone needs, otherwise we'll be sailing down a sea of alcoholic abuse, drug binge consumption,
and an unfathomable depression. We already went down that well in the early 90's of self destruction with a bit of art to show for it, but also a generation who refutes praise, support, and brotherhood. I count myself among them, yet to hang out with a new crowd gave me a sort of revival, now if I can keep the drinking down to minimum there is a chance of getting some real work done, back out into the field.
Friday, September 17, 2010
The Brood
Three generations of 20 something partiers have past through the well worn battle grounds of Las Vegas nightlife, since the golden age of late 90's pre bottle service VIP booth corporate fleecing of the casinos came to pass. A friends birthday as well as the interest of a girlfriend compelled me to go back on my somewhat recent rigid stance of staying out of the nightclubs for an extended period of time. Not to fear, due to a recent resurrenge in the local party scene a fresh crop of off strip underground spots had began to flourish once more bringing with it an entire new scene of youngsters eagerly spilling out of their SUV's and luxury sedans seeking a sancutary where they could conduct drug experiments upon themselves in the proximity of cool revelers, liberal security, and non oppressive dress code that turned many places on the strip into more like graduation festivities than a open minded, come as you are, be yourself, type of house party.
As I got out of my friends luxury sedan, legions of youthful adults lingered around their automobiles down in the parking lot from the bar where they played a variety of dance music tracks, absorbing that repetitive, deep, seductive nature of house music and with each proceeding song becoming more and more committed to the cult of the midnight sun, who live from dusk till dawn, sometimes longer, until the drugs wore off or they found another afterparty with complementary ride, might be a hotel suite, a cabana at one of the hip casino properties, or possibly a McMansion decorated in a tropical themed backyard, the pool, slide, wetbar, booze, drugs, and the potential for sexual exchange.
There are moments when my age ceases to exists as the decades of adventures in the excessive celebration come back to life pulling the inanimate digital files of debauchry off the shelf, then back into play. It all arrives so naturally, nothing forced, as if I happened to be conducting masters classes on how to go completely insane while having fun at the same time, the naunces of pushing the boundaries with no limits, walking along the line of extreme behavior and death, fearless, empowered, determined to outperform, over glutton, as well as lead the charge in the night time crowd pushing themselves in series with the ever intensely increasing sounds of the dance music coming from the speakers in the room, had a flow to it, a rythmn, which over time became ingrained into the DNA of the listener so no matter this person might be in the world, once that familiar pulsation of bass could be heard in the distance, a bee line rush in drone like fashion would be made to the source of that vibe until the person was enveloped in the subtlities of latin flavor, sped off to distant regions while reconnecting with various like minded brothers and sisters on the dancefloor.
The brood has been split into two camps. The early crowd that prefers a more mainstream sound, music that played again and again on the public airwaves until it achieves a subliminal state, a comfortable space where they can feel, cool, accepted, and unique while not undergoing a phase of self consciousness when the DJ begins playing vocal less techno music that only becomes more aggressive, uncomfortable, unstable, and erotic, setting off a nueral impulse inducing death cult, hyper sexuality, along side inexplicable indecent acts that make people unaccustom to such performance exceedingly distressed. Yet that is their personal issue which these types have to come to terms with in order to be considered amongst the true batch new brood who roam the neon streets nightly in conquest of fresh kicks, unyet imagined hedonism, and brain serum extracts that get the user higher than anything else known to the human race.
By 3am, the early crowd is gone, the music is proper, and the people in the place have no qualms in regards to race, sexuality, and distate, the foundation is being laid to maximize personal pleasure while sprinting through a drug stimulated time warp. The friend of mine wanted to go old school after being offered some exstacy tablets by a person we had be talking to throughout the night. I personally passed on the tablets for years after finding the powdered MDMA which always was purer and uncut without the sort of knockoff, easy to find, cheap, synthetic narcotics that gave the user a different ride everytime, could be good, but ocassional the chemicals in the pills only magnified an undercurrent of paranioa or smacked out emotions. Yet, how could I say no, when all the other 20 somethings around me were already high off their tits giving me the subconscious thumbs up, as if to say, hey old man, we hear all this talk of your reputation over the decades from this party to that party across the globe, well teach us something we don't already know, can you do it? Make a believer out of this crowd. Now my new place in the club is as elder statesman, motivating everyone around me to get mental, fall into the music, the fury of the beat, to throw everything away, self, ideal, any sort of hope in attaining all the lofty well placed goals of society, discard them, they no longer apply to anyone on the dancefloor right now, if you hang around past 5am, then the gods of the eternal evening succeeded in converting your soul into a lifetime participant, no matter what age, when the call is made, you will respond, take you rightful place amongst the new camp, to teach, to observe, and most of all to listen to the new camp, who seek wisdom, reassurance, and compassion from a life that at best sometimes feels volatile. The youth danced on, track after track, 5am arrived, as my age and unexercized will took control once more, daylight was upon us, not again, I thought, not another sunrise, the brightness of the sun would have to be postponed one more day, return to the isolation of my darkened room, let the afternoon pass, seek shelter with a familiar friend, let her soothing seduction calm nerves, give me the strength to go another day without real sleep, eyes dialated I look in the mirror, such a familiar sight, but the thighs of a fresh warm woman await, a delicacy one such as myself finds immense comfort and pleasure in with which to keep the horrors of a drug induced comedown far away.
As I got out of my friends luxury sedan, legions of youthful adults lingered around their automobiles down in the parking lot from the bar where they played a variety of dance music tracks, absorbing that repetitive, deep, seductive nature of house music and with each proceeding song becoming more and more committed to the cult of the midnight sun, who live from dusk till dawn, sometimes longer, until the drugs wore off or they found another afterparty with complementary ride, might be a hotel suite, a cabana at one of the hip casino properties, or possibly a McMansion decorated in a tropical themed backyard, the pool, slide, wetbar, booze, drugs, and the potential for sexual exchange.
There are moments when my age ceases to exists as the decades of adventures in the excessive celebration come back to life pulling the inanimate digital files of debauchry off the shelf, then back into play. It all arrives so naturally, nothing forced, as if I happened to be conducting masters classes on how to go completely insane while having fun at the same time, the naunces of pushing the boundaries with no limits, walking along the line of extreme behavior and death, fearless, empowered, determined to outperform, over glutton, as well as lead the charge in the night time crowd pushing themselves in series with the ever intensely increasing sounds of the dance music coming from the speakers in the room, had a flow to it, a rythmn, which over time became ingrained into the DNA of the listener so no matter this person might be in the world, once that familiar pulsation of bass could be heard in the distance, a bee line rush in drone like fashion would be made to the source of that vibe until the person was enveloped in the subtlities of latin flavor, sped off to distant regions while reconnecting with various like minded brothers and sisters on the dancefloor.
The brood has been split into two camps. The early crowd that prefers a more mainstream sound, music that played again and again on the public airwaves until it achieves a subliminal state, a comfortable space where they can feel, cool, accepted, and unique while not undergoing a phase of self consciousness when the DJ begins playing vocal less techno music that only becomes more aggressive, uncomfortable, unstable, and erotic, setting off a nueral impulse inducing death cult, hyper sexuality, along side inexplicable indecent acts that make people unaccustom to such performance exceedingly distressed. Yet that is their personal issue which these types have to come to terms with in order to be considered amongst the true batch new brood who roam the neon streets nightly in conquest of fresh kicks, unyet imagined hedonism, and brain serum extracts that get the user higher than anything else known to the human race.
By 3am, the early crowd is gone, the music is proper, and the people in the place have no qualms in regards to race, sexuality, and distate, the foundation is being laid to maximize personal pleasure while sprinting through a drug stimulated time warp. The friend of mine wanted to go old school after being offered some exstacy tablets by a person we had be talking to throughout the night. I personally passed on the tablets for years after finding the powdered MDMA which always was purer and uncut without the sort of knockoff, easy to find, cheap, synthetic narcotics that gave the user a different ride everytime, could be good, but ocassional the chemicals in the pills only magnified an undercurrent of paranioa or smacked out emotions. Yet, how could I say no, when all the other 20 somethings around me were already high off their tits giving me the subconscious thumbs up, as if to say, hey old man, we hear all this talk of your reputation over the decades from this party to that party across the globe, well teach us something we don't already know, can you do it? Make a believer out of this crowd. Now my new place in the club is as elder statesman, motivating everyone around me to get mental, fall into the music, the fury of the beat, to throw everything away, self, ideal, any sort of hope in attaining all the lofty well placed goals of society, discard them, they no longer apply to anyone on the dancefloor right now, if you hang around past 5am, then the gods of the eternal evening succeeded in converting your soul into a lifetime participant, no matter what age, when the call is made, you will respond, take you rightful place amongst the new camp, to teach, to observe, and most of all to listen to the new camp, who seek wisdom, reassurance, and compassion from a life that at best sometimes feels volatile. The youth danced on, track after track, 5am arrived, as my age and unexercized will took control once more, daylight was upon us, not again, I thought, not another sunrise, the brightness of the sun would have to be postponed one more day, return to the isolation of my darkened room, let the afternoon pass, seek shelter with a familiar friend, let her soothing seduction calm nerves, give me the strength to go another day without real sleep, eyes dialated I look in the mirror, such a familiar sight, but the thighs of a fresh warm woman await, a delicacy one such as myself finds immense comfort and pleasure in with which to keep the horrors of a drug induced comedown far away.
Monday, September 13, 2010
Deep in the Heart of Texas
1am, time change means another night without proper sleep, not much of a bother only when proceeded by a weekend all nighter, very little sleep the next day, and an early flight the following morning. Just have to be satisfied with the well trained routine of catching a few hours during the plane flight to Austin. Maybe it is the jet engine noise, my dark shades or the highly confined space of the airline seats, either way heading off to work out of town becomes a series of obstacles to be avoided that only result in more restlessness, had to turn off the television a few hours ago as the combination of bad food, light beer, and over salted snacks has given me an awful stomach ache provoking the rest of my body to fight off the terrible feeling. With such a diet today it is no surprize that everytime I belch, the mixture of sandwhich meat, Miller High Life and Ruffles potato chips make we want to heave, which would probably serve me better than holding the food down, still putting my head in the toilet for the next fifteen minutes to clear my guts does not resound so well with me at this time, nothing more than a downward slope to feeling bad the next day, only thing to do is ride out the mild food poisoning, drink a bit of water, listen to some relaxing music and let my body unwind.
Already 1am have to be up at 8am, the balancing act between rest, being productive, without enacting a sense of self imposed guilt for laying in bed while watching streamed tv on internet has grown tougher to stay happy with lately, might just be my age, hitting 40, now all of a sudden I have held down a job for over 20 years, a series of shit jobs, up until my current one which is ever evolving, so learning new things is actually very cool, the politics suck, but that could be said about any job, the toughest thing is staying focused, have been allowed to live with little structure as a child, teen, and young adult, maintaining concentration, goals, and direction are all to easy to brush off to the side with some alcohol, a bar stool, and a couple of other friends who really don't care about the future outside of being able to survive, an entire life of survival is not much of a life, luckily thanks to traveling the world, I have been given some perspective, yet this past year, a relationship breakup cancelled my usual yearly travel plans, coupled with my mother moving to town and finally buying my own place, the chains are really on me now.
It is not just my work equipment, but a 20 percent downpayment on a condo, bad economic conditions, watching a lot of my friends exist on unemployment checks, my mother as well, part of me wants to get out of Las Vegas now, go anywhere, start over, away from all the drugs, booze, and partying there is nothing else here, accept fresh reinforcments of youth staying out all night repeating the same mistakes I made, year after year, pissing it all away for some imaginary and most of all temporary pleasure that fades with the first night of proper sleep, but for some like myself that slumber would never arrive, going out again and again, hungry for the fix, to burn out the fun meter, break the glass cover, either the sanitarium or exit ramp to infinity, where have I been going with all these antics? The lifestyle is fun for 20 somethings fresh out of college attempting to find themselves through the hedonistic sewers of Vegas, but there is nothing tangible, nothing redeeming, all is empty, vague, useless, and life numbing. The treasure at the end of the rainbow in Las Vegas resembles a lake of fire, where demons prod victims with their pitchforks into the turbulant seas of liquid magma to tread on its surface for eternity, without reason, physical movement as an illusion of survival when in fact all of the sufferers experienced death many decades earlier. I am amongst them existing in a dream without purpose, functioning as no more than a robotic servant, memories implanted to follow a lifetime of segmented distractions which culminate in a reactor of energy to fuel the next generation of broods who will look upon my actions will revulsion, disdain, and an overwhelming craving to immerse themselves into my digital hallucination construct of Pleasure Island, where the fun never ends, the drugs are always pure, and the high last forever.
Already 1am have to be up at 8am, the balancing act between rest, being productive, without enacting a sense of self imposed guilt for laying in bed while watching streamed tv on internet has grown tougher to stay happy with lately, might just be my age, hitting 40, now all of a sudden I have held down a job for over 20 years, a series of shit jobs, up until my current one which is ever evolving, so learning new things is actually very cool, the politics suck, but that could be said about any job, the toughest thing is staying focused, have been allowed to live with little structure as a child, teen, and young adult, maintaining concentration, goals, and direction are all to easy to brush off to the side with some alcohol, a bar stool, and a couple of other friends who really don't care about the future outside of being able to survive, an entire life of survival is not much of a life, luckily thanks to traveling the world, I have been given some perspective, yet this past year, a relationship breakup cancelled my usual yearly travel plans, coupled with my mother moving to town and finally buying my own place, the chains are really on me now.
It is not just my work equipment, but a 20 percent downpayment on a condo, bad economic conditions, watching a lot of my friends exist on unemployment checks, my mother as well, part of me wants to get out of Las Vegas now, go anywhere, start over, away from all the drugs, booze, and partying there is nothing else here, accept fresh reinforcments of youth staying out all night repeating the same mistakes I made, year after year, pissing it all away for some imaginary and most of all temporary pleasure that fades with the first night of proper sleep, but for some like myself that slumber would never arrive, going out again and again, hungry for the fix, to burn out the fun meter, break the glass cover, either the sanitarium or exit ramp to infinity, where have I been going with all these antics? The lifestyle is fun for 20 somethings fresh out of college attempting to find themselves through the hedonistic sewers of Vegas, but there is nothing tangible, nothing redeeming, all is empty, vague, useless, and life numbing. The treasure at the end of the rainbow in Las Vegas resembles a lake of fire, where demons prod victims with their pitchforks into the turbulant seas of liquid magma to tread on its surface for eternity, without reason, physical movement as an illusion of survival when in fact all of the sufferers experienced death many decades earlier. I am amongst them existing in a dream without purpose, functioning as no more than a robotic servant, memories implanted to follow a lifetime of segmented distractions which culminate in a reactor of energy to fuel the next generation of broods who will look upon my actions will revulsion, disdain, and an overwhelming craving to immerse themselves into my digital hallucination construct of Pleasure Island, where the fun never ends, the drugs are always pure, and the high last forever.
Cretins in the Supermarket
Bred by the nearby neighborhood park located in the indentured servant sector of Las Vegas, the cretins of the supermarket follow a tractor beam of confusion and self imposed misery to lose themselves in the aisleways amongst gluttonous supply of basic food needs that their drug filled bodies no longer require in order to function as living organisms, but to call these mindless zombies functional is a stretch. Many decades of abuse have rewired their central nervous system resulting in a total realignment of nueral paths throughout their bodies. Communication channels are nothing more than red alerts in a heightened state of paranioa. As I push my shopping cart around the store, young kid is walking behind me wearing a baseball cap with embroidered Philiphine national flag, mirrored shades and cutoff shorts. It looks like he just came from a week long poker tournament where sleep, meal breaks, and intensive focus had worn this kid down to his basic motor function of walking, but now had found himself lost in the supermarket like a rat on LSD and PCP unable to decipher any sort of spatial parameter, left to wander around the store aimlessly until death or a means of reasonable exit present itself.
The young kid followed behind me until I quickly stopped and turned around in his direction causing the guy to jump right out of his shoes as if approached by a murderous preadator seeking to tear him to shreads, the delusional being assumed a reactionary pose of innate self defense, ready to battle to the finish with arms out stretched, awaiting the first strike like a diseased rat fearing for its life, who was put in a corner with two choices to either fight or die and this primitive animal looked intent for self preservation, all I could do was redirect my cart down another path, while laughing to myself about the incident. Young children in far off corners of the marketplace yell for their mother, just like the kids I remember in grade school who had no parenting, any sort of discipline, left at home by themselves to fight amongst their siblings for microwave pizzas, scraps from the dumpster, and the occasional stolen goods from the local convenience store. Dad was not far behind, he did not seem to care about the kids loud, brash, and unruly behavior, he looked distracted, as if calculating a plan of escape from his current predictament as father to these children, maybe he was dreaming of life a single man, far from the impending responsiblity of raising kids who were so full of energy that they had already lapped their father while search the frozen food section for the elusive mother who by now probably was on her way to the downtown Greyhound station with what ever cash and belongings she had on her at the moment, attitude growing more cheerful with each step as she boarded that bus toward wherever, putting the family in the rear view mirror as she hyperventilates knowing each breath gives her more and more clarity, more confidence to carry forward, burying the past like fresh wooden casket into a grave, doused with kerosene, then set on fire and finally covered in a rain of animal fecal matter.
Time along with economic well being has not erased these memories of my childhood where I lived in such an exact setting with so many displaced misfits of society, today in 2010 over 30 years later the same apparitions walk the same unkept, crumbling, infrustructures of inner city metropolis, babbling amongst themselves, searching for innocent people to prey upon, fixing on drugs in broad daylight unconcerned with how the rest of the world percieves their general actions. Everyone has come to expect everything for nothing and when the promise goes unfulfilled sets off a series of crushing blows of confidence to the psyche inducing a loss of consciousness while invoking virus like symptoms dissolving these people into blood thirsty retribution driven carnivorous beasts who will kill every living human around them without, emotion, senitment, or regret, as the bodies pile up to be fed upon by those who are either too weak, too lazy, or fully addicted to the taste of tainted flesh and the hallucingenic rush it brings. Navigating all these landmines, obstacles, and potential aggressors, I make it back to my van, all the time watching my back as my surroundings quickly close ranks in the hunt to erradicate the planet of thought forever.
The young kid followed behind me until I quickly stopped and turned around in his direction causing the guy to jump right out of his shoes as if approached by a murderous preadator seeking to tear him to shreads, the delusional being assumed a reactionary pose of innate self defense, ready to battle to the finish with arms out stretched, awaiting the first strike like a diseased rat fearing for its life, who was put in a corner with two choices to either fight or die and this primitive animal looked intent for self preservation, all I could do was redirect my cart down another path, while laughing to myself about the incident. Young children in far off corners of the marketplace yell for their mother, just like the kids I remember in grade school who had no parenting, any sort of discipline, left at home by themselves to fight amongst their siblings for microwave pizzas, scraps from the dumpster, and the occasional stolen goods from the local convenience store. Dad was not far behind, he did not seem to care about the kids loud, brash, and unruly behavior, he looked distracted, as if calculating a plan of escape from his current predictament as father to these children, maybe he was dreaming of life a single man, far from the impending responsiblity of raising kids who were so full of energy that they had already lapped their father while search the frozen food section for the elusive mother who by now probably was on her way to the downtown Greyhound station with what ever cash and belongings she had on her at the moment, attitude growing more cheerful with each step as she boarded that bus toward wherever, putting the family in the rear view mirror as she hyperventilates knowing each breath gives her more and more clarity, more confidence to carry forward, burying the past like fresh wooden casket into a grave, doused with kerosene, then set on fire and finally covered in a rain of animal fecal matter.
Time along with economic well being has not erased these memories of my childhood where I lived in such an exact setting with so many displaced misfits of society, today in 2010 over 30 years later the same apparitions walk the same unkept, crumbling, infrustructures of inner city metropolis, babbling amongst themselves, searching for innocent people to prey upon, fixing on drugs in broad daylight unconcerned with how the rest of the world percieves their general actions. Everyone has come to expect everything for nothing and when the promise goes unfulfilled sets off a series of crushing blows of confidence to the psyche inducing a loss of consciousness while invoking virus like symptoms dissolving these people into blood thirsty retribution driven carnivorous beasts who will kill every living human around them without, emotion, senitment, or regret, as the bodies pile up to be fed upon by those who are either too weak, too lazy, or fully addicted to the taste of tainted flesh and the hallucingenic rush it brings. Navigating all these landmines, obstacles, and potential aggressors, I make it back to my van, all the time watching my back as my surroundings quickly close ranks in the hunt to erradicate the planet of thought forever.
Spreading the Disease
She likes to walk up and down Karen Avenue during the midday hours. offering herself while wearing the most seductive attire her status in life can afford. Part militant, part predator, and all expliotation, the prostitution routine has the allure of a tragdic comedy, a multiple car crash of clown filled automobiles, when stared upon inducing a sense of grotesque fascination remininsant of an autospy or horror film mutilation initating feelings of nausea as well as curious desire to investigate this traveling sex machine a bit further. There is no sense of shyness with this street side performance carried out along the sidewalk corners and strip mall alcoves where she can hide from detection. The local authorities do not seem to care, relagating her existence to nothing more than that stray dog you might spot walking down the rural shanty dirt road, covered with mange, delusional, barking at imaginative object invisible to the human eye, no real harm or possibility of rabid acitivity, just an organism slow deteriating, heading to the compost heap of life, a small space in a lonely desert alleyway filled with rusted broken window automobiles on wooden blocks, phone books, and cement bricks, just another victim of consumer culture.
Still, there does not appear to be any shortage of willing participants who cruise these streets searching for her brand of sexual satisfaction. Are they offering valet service tonight, as a stream of vehicles form a single file line inticing regional ladies of the night with promises of fast cash, free drugs, and the romantic illusion of breaking free from the chains of servitude over into the realm of socially accepted middle class suburban subdivisions where they could tend to their physical and emotional wounds with the promise of rehabilitation which never quite develops or takes, transformation from the hustle to a somewhat percieved humane facade ends up being nothing more than entertainment for upper class movie goers. These veterans of body givers wear their past like a surgical scar from a botch operation, a low grade reattchment of the limb carried out in some fourth world country. But for today, this woman will show a smile behind a pair of dark shades, waving customers over like those halfway house convicts washing cars for Jesus in order to maintain an early release, the disease will spread as long as need remains our primary objective, each john taking another cut of already withering soul, dissolving into sand blown away by the wind of the night.
Still, there does not appear to be any shortage of willing participants who cruise these streets searching for her brand of sexual satisfaction. Are they offering valet service tonight, as a stream of vehicles form a single file line inticing regional ladies of the night with promises of fast cash, free drugs, and the romantic illusion of breaking free from the chains of servitude over into the realm of socially accepted middle class suburban subdivisions where they could tend to their physical and emotional wounds with the promise of rehabilitation which never quite develops or takes, transformation from the hustle to a somewhat percieved humane facade ends up being nothing more than entertainment for upper class movie goers. These veterans of body givers wear their past like a surgical scar from a botch operation, a low grade reattchment of the limb carried out in some fourth world country. But for today, this woman will show a smile behind a pair of dark shades, waving customers over like those halfway house convicts washing cars for Jesus in order to maintain an early release, the disease will spread as long as need remains our primary objective, each john taking another cut of already withering soul, dissolving into sand blown away by the wind of the night.
Saturday, September 11, 2010
Lag
This is how one gets behind, falls short on their commitments, I use to have one to the blog in a sense as far as posting every day, but sometimes other things get in the way, such as work, drinking excessive amounts of alcohol and the always reliable multi-day drug binge, nothing like that last one to put a person in a non-productive mood that is one part time ally who shall never let me down. In my profession, there are periods of ebb and flow, during the ebbs are the times to do mundane things like, reciepts, invoicing, purchasing of new gear, while surfing the internet as well as the cellphone attempting to drum up new business or continue with projects in the process of completion. However, I can't seem to get away from my favorite hangouts during down time for more than a day or two, any excuse is a good one, it does not take much to coax me from my one bedroom condo and the laptop screen. For someone who appears to detest the human race as much as I do, being around them is necessary, almost like a biologist or anthropoligist studying groups of either animals or humans, maybe both. There is no refuting that my existence remains well outside that of everyday people, my likes, dislikes are only tempered in the constant desire to be cool, even though it seems my daughter's generation is getting into all the music I liked at their age, which is fairly shocking, to see all these late fourty and early fifty hipsters back out on tour after going into hibernation for the past 15 years.
It was as if the 2000's became this big vaccum which sucked out anything geniune, anything unique, replacing it with mock heros, false truths, and a cancer of shallow existence that has an entire generation living on a respirator. I have completely forgot that 2010 has ushered in a new decade, another chance, a time to remember, forget, then move on, my fifth decade, the 70's drugs, disco, the 80's drugs, new wave, the 90's drugs, grunge, the 00's drugs, hip hop, and what is to become of the 10's drugs and ? The chemicals may change but the need stays the same, for the most part music forms quite a few opinions as well as nature amongst the younger generations, for the older folks, if the Eagles, Paul McCartney, and Bruce Springsteen concerts are any indication, they like to hold onto the music of their youth. Until recently, I was of the same faith, clinging to those Stone Roses, Mudhoney, Oasis, New Order, and Public Enemy CD's through a dozen moves throughout the world. Thankfully, with the rebirth of the multi-day concert extravaganzas my curiousity for new music has grown, feeling like a bandwagoner, some of my teenage fan obsession has returned culling the webpages of the internet to hear the lastest indie rock darling, what all this has to do with lag I am not sure at the moment, adherance to distraction, put that on a t-shirt, we have built an empire of distraction, creating art as such a thing has made paupers into kings, while melting the minds of an entire planet, still the 10's drugs, distraction rock, so it has been crowd, distraction rock will be the trend for the oncoming decade, to get out amongst the people, take drugs while disconnecting with society, the self, and the physical being, total annhilation, something the public can readily embrace. Inside the goo of posted concert outtakes, unreleased tracks, behind the scenes photos, until the fans and the band become one entity, absorbing the band's humanity to infuse into their own, for better or worse, as mode of change or commodity, feels like commodity when a concert ticket costs over 100 hundred dollars. Matador Records and indie rock label from the late 80's, early 90's, is turning 21, so they are throwing a bash to celebrate the ocassion with a roster of all the art alt rockers from yesteryear, now that this generation of fans is supposedly in their prime earning years, the promoters, et al, find it appropriate to charge anywhere from 150 dollars to 250 dollars for a 3day pass to the event. It feels so ironic, first of all to have the show in Vegas, the label is 21, I get it, legal and all that, but never back in the early 90's when I paid 5 bucks to see the label bosses Superchuck play would I have concieve such a rebound for fringe music, music drop outs listened to high on LSD, painting at their friends house, while playing in a noise rock band that people would embrace today, but loathed back in the early 90's, time is weird, it either validates or nullifies, which is one thing that keeps me alive, a real important one.
It was as if the 2000's became this big vaccum which sucked out anything geniune, anything unique, replacing it with mock heros, false truths, and a cancer of shallow existence that has an entire generation living on a respirator. I have completely forgot that 2010 has ushered in a new decade, another chance, a time to remember, forget, then move on, my fifth decade, the 70's drugs, disco, the 80's drugs, new wave, the 90's drugs, grunge, the 00's drugs, hip hop, and what is to become of the 10's drugs and ? The chemicals may change but the need stays the same, for the most part music forms quite a few opinions as well as nature amongst the younger generations, for the older folks, if the Eagles, Paul McCartney, and Bruce Springsteen concerts are any indication, they like to hold onto the music of their youth. Until recently, I was of the same faith, clinging to those Stone Roses, Mudhoney, Oasis, New Order, and Public Enemy CD's through a dozen moves throughout the world. Thankfully, with the rebirth of the multi-day concert extravaganzas my curiousity for new music has grown, feeling like a bandwagoner, some of my teenage fan obsession has returned culling the webpages of the internet to hear the lastest indie rock darling, what all this has to do with lag I am not sure at the moment, adherance to distraction, put that on a t-shirt, we have built an empire of distraction, creating art as such a thing has made paupers into kings, while melting the minds of an entire planet, still the 10's drugs, distraction rock, so it has been crowd, distraction rock will be the trend for the oncoming decade, to get out amongst the people, take drugs while disconnecting with society, the self, and the physical being, total annhilation, something the public can readily embrace. Inside the goo of posted concert outtakes, unreleased tracks, behind the scenes photos, until the fans and the band become one entity, absorbing the band's humanity to infuse into their own, for better or worse, as mode of change or commodity, feels like commodity when a concert ticket costs over 100 hundred dollars. Matador Records and indie rock label from the late 80's, early 90's, is turning 21, so they are throwing a bash to celebrate the ocassion with a roster of all the art alt rockers from yesteryear, now that this generation of fans is supposedly in their prime earning years, the promoters, et al, find it appropriate to charge anywhere from 150 dollars to 250 dollars for a 3day pass to the event. It feels so ironic, first of all to have the show in Vegas, the label is 21, I get it, legal and all that, but never back in the early 90's when I paid 5 bucks to see the label bosses Superchuck play would I have concieve such a rebound for fringe music, music drop outs listened to high on LSD, painting at their friends house, while playing in a noise rock band that people would embrace today, but loathed back in the early 90's, time is weird, it either validates or nullifies, which is one thing that keeps me alive, a real important one.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
