Hungry Tigers Unleashed...

I submit that it's not what you do, but what you think that counts. Scary prospect I know...considering what we think at times, but it might be a more honest road. A road fraught with fear, pain, animal urges, as well as hope, love, and a need to be loved...what we really are, not what we want to be.


I think that to deny existence of our most inner terrible, demented, fucked-up thoughts is a poison. We poison ourselves everyday. If we can acknowledge to ourselves that these thoughts, no matter how embarrassing they are, we have a real chance of confronting them. A real chance for introspection and maybe a resolve. To finally let go some of these mental tigers, let them run free and take their place in the nature of ourselves. There, they might die, or make new cubs. In any case...an answer.


To know oneself is to acknowledge every dark thought and as well as our shiny-sparkly-bright ones. I say let it begin! Maybe we'll find out we are not the person we thought we were, maybe we'll find out we're exactly the person we thought we were, more surely a little of both...and that's okay. The sooner we get real with ourselves, the sooner we can fix, heal, and embrace within.


I don't know about you, but my tigers are foaming-frenzy-famished-tigers. Only time will tell if I shoot them or let them live..."Born free! As free as the wind blows! As free as the grass grows! Born free to follow your heart!"

Ursa...

It's Fall. The falling. The smell of burning and last breaths. A linger of life before the big quiet. Soon I will turn unto myself. I sleep to dream. I wait.

I'm a Lousy God...

I'm a lousy God. I usually have dreams with people I've never met in real life, but they will re-occur in different dreams I have later. After a while I forget about them. Time goes by. Then I'll be sitting in the car and I'll remember them. What we did and maybe talked about. When things are a memory they seem like they really happened. I mean...that's how we live our lives, going though the now and the memory of the past. What happens when our memories get mixed up from what happened in reality and in our dreams? Are they any less real? What affects us, becomes real. We make it real. In a sense, we create worlds in our reality. I've created people in my dreams. I think about them. Maybe more than people who live in my "real" life. Do they exist? I think they do....at least in some misty swirling way. They have become real to me. I created them. I created them and I rarely think of them. I'm a forgetful shitty God, who doesn't give them hardly anytime to live. I don't listen nor answer a single prayer of theirs. I hope they will forgive me for bringing them to life and only letting them live in the occasional short moments of my dreams...forgive me. I love you.

Talking With My Inner Dialog...

Outer: I need to go to bank. I gotta get ready for my Nashville trip. Shooting my Atom Orr video for my song "Friends Fur Life".

Inner: I wanna rob the bank. I've always wanted to rob a bank. Not in the daylight, but at night. Stealthily. In the shadows. Breaking and entering. Safe cracking. Diamond heists. Oooh! Yea diamond heists! Better than a bank. Gotta find a good fence though...

Outer: It'll be great to see my friends. I'm only there a week. It's gonna go by fast.

Inner: Whiskey! Lots of whiskey! So much I'll wake up in my own piss on the wooden floor of the bar. No...wait...I'll wake up in a seedy motel room 80 miles outside of town. I'll have no memory of how I got there, but there is a blue flower in my hand. What kind of flower is it? I haven't a clue...

Outer: Scouting out locations, thinking of some fun camera angles...

Inner: Prince's Hot Chicken Shack! Extra Hot! So hot my ass will flame out for 3 days. Pickles. White Bread. Potato salad. A slice of Chess pie. I wonder if that old black lady is still there? She was kinda sweet on me. *smile*

Outer: Green...Trees. Humidity. I love Tennessee. Home.

Inner: Going to clubs made from old laundromat's and basements. Late night diners and soul food that will smoke and cure you into a walking salted ham. Bonfires, more whiskey, weed and psychedelics...

Outer: Maybe I can get some writing and reading in. I wanna read some of works by Harlan Elliot and Richard Brautigan.

Inner: Yea! Write something. None of this hamby-bamby political correctness. Better to be banned than to be accepted I always say. Though I'm not too out there really. I'm not into rape, incest, little children, or have homosexual tendencies. I'd fuck all female ethnicities in the cunt or ass, but still...nothing too shocking...hmmm...even kinda blasé... *frown*

Outer: I'm so glad no one can hear my inner dialog...

I'm Not Talking Truth, But Crazy Truth!

I'm not talking about truth, but "crazy truth". There is a difference you know. The truth we all equate to is fact. 2 + 2 = 4. Crazy truth is 2 + 2 = 6. "Oh...I thought I saw that last number as a 4." Our perceived truth. It's not factual, but just as strong. More often than naught, we choose crazy truth over truth. Most of the time because we don't think there is a difference, and others because we know there is a difference but we like the crazy truth better.


In this sense we are creators of our reality...like when we dream. Ever read "The Circular Ruins" by Jorge Luis Borges? It's a short read, you should take a gander. He was heavily influenced by Miguel de Cervantes...you know the author of "Don Quixote". Another proponent of the alternate reality of crazy truth. 


The question is...should the crazy truth be encouraged? Are we just fooling ourselves? And if we are, is it a bad thing? I like to claim myself as a realist most of the time, except in my flights-of-fancy-creative-whack-out-moments. I do this, because a lot of the time it is helpful. Though I must confess, being a 100% realist is too much of an observist point of view and not taking an active role in defining our lives, but simply pacifying. There is something to being a "leaf in the wind", accepting the lack of control we have in our lives, but to murk up the waters further, I believe we need to take an active role in our acceptance. That is to say, it is a team effort. We are holding hands with fate, free will, truth, and crazy truth. Did y'all need to take a break and smoke some of that awesome medical marijuana before continuing to read this blog? On a side note, blogs are so damn one-sided. I'm sure many of you would have some highly emotional discourse on this. I'm sure we could figure out the universe and how to save the world in a few hours if it was late enough and we all have our favorite libation and munchy food at our sides.


I prefer a really good whiskey or magically laced brownie/cookie items, along with some kind of protein/dairy/fat/caffeinated/chocolaty/sugar goodness and lain into some comfy contraption that points me towards the heavens. We'll continue this and meet up around 3 a.m. okay?

Swing and a Miss! Or Vacuum Cleaners Unite! Or Ignore Him It Was The Cheerleaders

No....I'm not talking about a tree swing and Little Miss Muffet who sat on something eating curds. Nope. I'm talking about missing....you know...the opposite of hitting. Why all the accolades for hitting? I think there is some credit due to all the wild swings out there that people make every day. I say go out there and strike out! Swing away! Let loose all this conservative life stuff. Sure...you may miss, probably miss a lot. Maybe even every single time. Better than to get hit by the ball and walk to first base. Sure in baseball that's fine, but in life, that's an awful way to get around...even painful. Don't be afraid to strike out! I'll be there standing up and cheering for you! I'll do a one person wave. I'll hit the beach ball down to you. I'll buy you a beer and some cracker-jacks.


You think Reggie Jackson ever struck out? Hell yea he did. All the great hitters have. All the great artists, philosophers, do-gooders, world-shakers, world-changers have struck out. They got those hits by swinging and being unafraid to miss. Missing is as important as hitting. Maybe more, because you can learn a lot from a failure, and almost learn nothing from a success. So go out there and dare to suck! I've been sucking for years and plan to continue sucking until I can't suck no more. Get your head out of the gutter! Granted I have a huge deficit in my moral fiber, but you know what I'm laying down, so pick it up and start swinging!


You hear that? No...it's not a large vortex making a large sucking sound...it's the universe cheering.


Hmmmm...I'm way too positive today. I think it was the baton twirling scene from "A Face In the Crowd" I saw today...it got my juices flowing...

Digging In the Dirt...

All I do is not enough. Nice, normal people. What is exactly that? Proceed. Proceed Cady/Christopher/Atom. We never know what "will ruin everything". "Oh it's you! Hey you! You're the one that will ruin everything! Cool..."

Opposites. Diametrically opposed forces...and I'll agree with both. Take for instance the ideas of Ayn Rand and the idea of the individual, the creator...and conversely the idea of "to be of service" to others. I feel that I must be both at the same time. Maybe I just have a propensity for all encompassing mind-fucks. *laughing*

Maybe to better be of service to others you gotta get your own stuff worked out first. Hmmm...not first. That would mean we'd never do anything for others for 50 years or we walk into the desert for 40 days alone. We can do it whilst we're still under-construction. I have a lot more construction needed. A week in the stockade won't help me. "Yes...I did it. I touched your woo-woo..." We all have woo-woo's...and they all must be touched. We gotta eat, breath, squint when it's too bright. I am fucking with you. Really...I'm not. I'm both! This is the point.

I'm digging in my dirt and when that happens I might find almost anything. This isn't the usual nothing. There's nothing and then there's nothing and this isn't nothing because it is nothing! Damn it! I did it again! This is evidence for my banishment proceedings. Banish me. I've been bad...I will continue being bad and will continue being good and trying not to be a selfish asshole in this whoreld...this world.

I'm not gonna hit delete. Delete is for pussies.

Down the Rabbit Hole...

Unicorns having three-way penetrative sex whilst vomiting rainbows and farting magic...this is in my head...oh dear... It's is amazing what can be found on the Internet. Every perversion known to man and few man didn't know it had. Like UniPorn. Porn with unicorns. I won't list these links for you, because it is simply too easy to find it yourselves.

How disturbing can we get? Not enough apparently. I'm sure I could type the most vile and f*cked up thing and put it into Google and I'd find a link or website devoted to it. The Internet has become our collective conscious, no matter how dark and disturbing...and I like that.

I think in acknowledging our darkest thoughts we have an opportunity to vanquish them. This may take some time though. *laughing* It will take a long time for my mind to let go of the UniPorn imagery...but I'll have a many a good laugh getting rid of it. Many things out there are not as funny or funny at all. Putting a light into the darkness shows us what's really there and gives us the chance to not be scared and find that the noise we heard was just a hungry cockroach, not the Devil and all it takes is a few carefully placed footsteps...

You Are In My Movie...

You are in my movie. Yep. That's right. My movie. I didn't pick you, the casting director did. Stupidly, I assigned myself to be the director, lead actor, co-writer, and even the DP! No wonder I'm always exhausted! *laughing and coughing*

Notice I'm not the producer and a "co-writer". Yep, the producer can pull the plug on the production of this puppy anytime. I'm always battling with the other script writers...."Really? Do I have to be broke all the time and get sued by creditors? Really? Can't we write in a break somewhere? Like a song placement? Or maybe a fan base larger than 50 people? No? Okay..."

It a movie that is a work in progress. The plot is typical Hollywood. Guy struggles to be a man, an artist, makes dumb-ass choices sometimes, adventures, near-death events...with a twist of indie film scenes thrown in laced with boredom and malaise. You know...the kind of indie film you watch nothing happen at all. That's my movie. Thank goodness I'm the DP, at least I can choose what lenses to want to look though, wide screen, 120 mm, rose colored...

Some people I want taken out of my picture, but they're under contract, so I'm stuck with them. Others I want put in my movie...it may happen, or I may have to fight for them to get put in, or I can't afford them or they are in another movie and they can't do mine. There are so many actors it's like an Robert Altman film. Which means a good chance it will get critical acclaim and be a monetary flop....but that's alright. You can't take it with you, right? *grin*

I don't know how big a role you will play, it's up to you, me, the other writers and the producer...but hopefully you'll want me in your movie. I need the work! Hell, I'll work for the catering food!

Furry Friends and Walmart...

Furry friends and Walmart. This is what is on my mind today. I'm planning a video shoot with my super-woman-friend-DLW-Stacie Huckeba for my song "Friends Fur Life" from my Los Feliz EP in East Nashville. All I will say is that I'll be laughing my ass off the whole time. Images of bear and bunny heads, a little seediness, and little 70's and a lot of....well...you'll just have to wait and see.

Now add those images with images from the website of www.peopleofwalmart.com and you'll have an inkling of what is swirling around my head. It is scary, very scary. Please help me. Someone please wash my brain out with soap. Anyone stupid enough to mix Fluffies with Walmart is fucking crazy and I stand guilty. I plead the Fifth! I plead the Fizzy! Fifth! Hawaii FIVE - OH I plead the Fizzy!!! Jesus! Jesus! Jesus! Do I hear a Hala-fallujah?!!

See..this is where anti-psychotic medication would come in handy.

My Magic 8-Ball and the Chaos Theory...

I love my Magic 8-Ball. All life's questions can be answered in a quick shake. Maybe not the best answer, but an answer none the less! I decided to take a whole day and only let my Magic 8-Ball make any choices I had to choose. It was awesome! I laughed at every shake. Talk about a stress free day, my Magic 8-Ball had me cancelling plans with good friends, watching old movies, eating food I didn't want but liked, hanging out with a virtual stranger, and drinking rose flavored lassies. It wasn't what I had in mind at all. That's the point! Putting a day of your life on random.

I enjoyed that day so much, I have a web page that had a Magic 8-Ball program on it that I get to from my phone. I've been using it out occasionally. Talk about pulling the trigger, taking a shit or get off the pot, choosing a side of the fence and fall off, stab it and steer, hit it or quit it...you get to doing or not doing fast! I will say that when it gives me the non-committal reply it is a little frustrating...they need a Robert Mitchum version that gets rid of all that "Maybe" crap.

See....we can't do random. We need external forces to give us random. Hence flip a coin, roll some dice, close your eyes and let your finger fall randomness that we use all the time. Random should not be confused with chaos, chaos is a powerful force in nature. Random is kind of like a bounded chaos. It has set number of variables like my Magic 8-Ball.

● As I see it, yes

● It is certain

● It is decidedly so

● Most likely

● Outlook good

● Signs point to yes

● Without a doubt

● Yes

● Yes - definitely

● You may rely on it

● Reply hazy, try again

● Ask again later

● Better not tell you now

● Cannot predict now

● Concentrate and ask again

● Don't count on it

● My reply is no

● My sources say no

● Outlook not so good

● Very doubtful

Chaos Theory is the science of how things change. Acknowledging the chaos in our lives can be scary and unnerving, but can do us a world of good. Accepting we really have little control over our lives and the world, does not go down easily. We simply need to let many things go and swallow a chaser.

*cough* *cough*

"Whew! That's some strong but smooth stuff!"

"Hello officer, yes...I am under the influence of random and chaos and I just rolled past that stop sign, crossed the double yellow line, did a donut in the parking lot and urinated on the Wells Fargo bank ATM machine..."

"Yes officer...it was completely random's fault, not me. See this Magic 8-Ball? Yea...those old toys...yea...that one...see...hold on I'll show you. Should I flip off this officer and haul ass out of here?"

*shake* Yes - Definitely

"Bye-bye mother fucker!" SCREEEEEEECH!!!!!

(2 hours later in jail)

"Ummm...Magic 8-Ball when will I get out of here?"

*shake* Ask Again Later...Much Later

Hot and Sweaty Bars...

Aaahhh...hot and sweaty bars. I love performing in them. Packed with people, low oxygen, high humidity, swimming pheromones, estrogen, testosterone, whiskey, little on light, heavy on sound...mmmm!!!!

We started late. Our drummer whilst owning a bitchin' '78 Ford two-tone truck that he bought from me and I bought from an old man in Memphis, Tennessee, is after all a '78 Ford truck. It didn't wanna start. She finally relented..."Velma" is her name. She's a solid gal that needs a little coaxing once in a while. A twenty-four volt spanking from another truck battery was all it took, and off she went to meet us. Waiting for her. Everyone was waiting for her. Us, the other band, the people in the bar, and the angels and devils.

Finally when we got to go and we went! Jumping, laughing, fucking up, nailing it, doing stuff we never had done, and stuff we've done for years. A show. A sound system that can't take all we were giving it and everyone forgiving it for something the poor P.A. couldn't deliver. Hell, we're in a small sweaty bar, we have our icy drinks, our friends, our soon-to-be-new-friends, former friends and lovers, current lovers and wish-we-could-be-lovers. This is the reason we go out. This is why we spent what little cash we have and relinquish what little left the week hadn't taken from us. Even the angels and devils weren't fighting. "Ah hell..." they say, "Let's dance, then go outside for a smoke and grab some fresh air." Only to get back inside, fill up and let it loose all over again.

This we were are a part of, the human experience. Looking for those small, rare out-of-body experiences we pay good money for, through illegal drugs, alcohol, prescription drugs, lack of sleep, lack of sanity, lack of propriety, lack of a fucking filter that we use most of the day. Thank God and the Devil that in these small moments we can put down the war flags and have a good time for a little while until the newspapers, television, family, preachers, politicians, friends, salesmen, bosses, and lovers tell us what's wrong with us in the morning...

Once Upon A Time...

Once upon a time, a long, long time ago, there was a hunter who lived in the Black Forest. He had no idea how he got there, or whether it was really a forest or just the dark crevices in his mind. But one thing for sure, he got lost in it. After a few years he started to know pathways and trails. He started to be able to get around enough that he kinda liked this Black Forest. Even with all the wild animals, enchanted tree stumps, and crazy maidens that made his days quite adventurous indeed.

One day he came upon a sword. A sword with seven deadly edges. It was so sharp he accidentally cut himself just picking it up. "Damn" he thought..."One could do quite a lot with this sword..." Yes Hunter, you could do quite a lot. And he did. He slain many a beast and monster...almost a maiden or two, but good fortune and quick thinking on both their parts saved unnecessarily injure and harm. It can be tough in the Black Forest, and lonely too. Sure, the elves are fun, but they get on your nerves after a while. The occasional old witch would knock on the door, but he'd just pretend to be not home. If that didn't work then it's just off with her head. That's how it is in Fairy Tales. Lots of violence with seldom meaning or moral. Most everybody here in this forest are just crazy. Good crazies, bad crazies, and pure and simple delusional crazies. All crazy because that is the price to admission to be in this forest. The normal people live in the village and the way-beyond-lunies live in the castle.

Every once in a while some giant or dark wizard will come into the land and everyone would band together to vanquish their mortal enemy...but that rarely happens, so everyone just bickers between themselves and gossip about who's doing who and who said what. Aaahhh...just stuff to pass the time away.

The princess was found convorting with the hunter and the whole Kingdom was out talking about it at all the wells, written on walls and whispered at the fences. The heralds would tell and retell the stories so much that the stories grew into stories of other stories. That's where fairy tales came from, and this one too. Complete and utter bullshit because we're just kinda bored...

To be continued on another quiet and mischievous night...There will be XXX fairies, violent ogre blood baths, magic, and comedy from the village fool...me.

Sent from the Black Forest.

Rambling About Future Histories...

Our future history is now. No wait...now! Right then! And now! I say now to signify the time's past, it's ending. It's history. But what is history? Is it what we write down? Or is it as it really happened? Or does that even really matter?

In the truest sense, it is as it really happened, but until we can gaze unclouded by skewed perception and prejudices, we rely on what's written. A very scary proposition, especially in these days of unchecked facts and Wikipedia. Though I must say, I had extreme misgivings for Wikipedia and it's public entered information without the prerequisite of fact-checked data, and while I know there is a lot of misinformation, if you look at it statistically, the longer the Wikipedia pages are updated, the more true the information becomes. The extremes get slowly overwhelmed by the middle, and a better more honest representation is shown through. Granted extremes are a natural part of life and deserve their moment in the sun, but as in all things, extremes are a much smaller part of the whole.

The next question is, is the middle the truest path? No. In fact there is none. It seems that at the end of the day, all paths seem to lead to it. Of course, that is the inherent problem with linear thinking. It always gives way to circular movement....and give that a multidimensional framework and you're on to something else entirely. One that we can visualize, but cannot really express easily. We have put it to words. Religion, Philosophy, and Poetry. We have put it to equations. Math and Science. The best way to get a handle on it, is to FEEL it.

Have I lost you? What am I talking about? I am saying that we know all our answers inside ourselves. We just either don't want to pay attention to them because it might be painful, or we deny it's existence because it would shatter our core beliefs. We want to look to others, or outside of our world for answers that we already have inside us. Sometimes those answers are ugly....but in that ugliness, if we acknowledge it, we can overcome it and grow from it, into something greater than we have ever been.

Why is it that we want our "outlaw heroes" to escape capture and live, and our prophets/teachers to die? You can say "It's not me.", but we all have to take credit for the good and bad in this world. There are ugly answers to this question. Going against the grain/status quo is highly revered as long as you don't force people to deal with their ugliness. We don't want to truly improve our world. We are scared, lazy, selfish children. If we can acknowledge this, we are on the way of overcoming it. When I see all the fear, greed, and hatred some people have, I feel sorry for them. I cannot change their minds. You cannot change their minds. It must be found within themselves to be extinguished.

Our future histories depend on us to take a real hard look inside and bring all that ugliness out in the open, expose it. Us and the light will kill it. This world has always had the greatest expectations and abilities in it, we just have to let them out.

Speaking for one's self as only anyone can do, I know that I know very little of this world and out of it. I know I am scared. I can be selfish. I can be immature. I am weak. I am just smart enough to rationalize anything, making my thoughts dangerously illogical. I am a man, proud, humble, good, bad, intelligent, ignorant, strong and fragile...always on the verge of breaking...because someday I will break, and be set free.

Go South...Go North...Go East...Go West...

Why is it that when I want to escape I wanna go South? And when I wanna find something within myself I wanna go North? I go East to find the past and I go West to find the future. I am a product of movies. Too many damn movies. My life compass. The "Wild Bunch", "Jeremiah Johnson", "King Solomon's Mines", "Tarzan", "The Man Who Would Be King", "How the West Was Won", any of those really bad Genghis Khan or Marco Polo movies...yea too many damn movies.

I better head south and cross the Rio Grande into Mexico to out run the posse that's after me from robbing that bank in San Rafael, Texas only to find out the gold was only bags of steel washers...ugh.

I'm gonna head due North to the Rocky Mountains and grow a big ass beard, live on my own in a log cabin I just made with my knife and my .50 caliber Hawken rifle...and learn the ways of the mountain. "You can't cheat the mountain pilgrim! Mountain's got a way...shhh! Ya here that?!"

I'll head East to where the world began...Africa...the Old Mother going down the river in a small steamboat meeting up in Mogambo to capture gorillas, crossing the Nefud Desert with Lawrence through the great Mesopotamia, then to the far, far East on the Mongolian tundra plains to where the struggle for life happened every second of everyday in battles and taking wild Tartan women because my "blood wills it". *laughing*

West...I'll go west...ummmm...no...I'm already there. I came here for a future hope...a dream I had of divine providence...telling me to go here to make my way...to become a man. Not like Zeb Rawlings but my version of it.

I better get a compass. Oh wait...I have GPS on my phone...oh wait...that'll mean real service everywhere. Yea...I better get a compass and hope the Earth doesn't switch magnetic poles on me and screw up this stupidly fun way of thinking of the world and which direction I go to get there...

Where's my paper back book I used to carry around with me all the time... "How To Survive In the Wilderness"? It's a good read...especially if you plan on getting lost in Northern Canada. Yea...getting lost to find yourself. Kinda sounds like a movie or something...

The Magic Shuffle...

I have an iPod. Like all old-schoolers I resisted for a while. Then I thought the stupidest thing is to resist the new age. The Digital Age. The Analog Age is dead and anything on that analog vine is gonna die eventually. Vinyl will die too. I love vinyl. But it only lives through nostalgia...and nostalgia is made from a generation of people who romanticize "how it used to be". When this generation is gone, so will be the nostalgia for it.

Now enough of the old days. What's going on now? The same thing that was always going on. Portability and convenience. That's right, the same old stuff. First you had to see live musicians or make music yourself. Then came cylinders and records. You could play that band or orchestra in your house! Then came the radio. You play in your house, outside, or in your car. Then 8-tracks and cassettes, smaller and even more portable and convenient. Sound? Who cares? Nobody minded AM radio in mono versus a real band when you could listen to it anywhere. Walkman and small crappy headphones were the newest best thing. You could jog to AC/DC! The came CD's, the lie of better sound, but really it was convenience again. It lasted longer, took less space. Then came digital files like mp3's. Again, much more portable, worse in sound but the trade off? Thousands of songs in the palm of your hand.

I have my entire record collection in my iPod except for my out of print vinyl. I can even put that on there if I want to spend the time. I have the old 160 gigabyte model. I have all my songs on the mp3 highest quality of 320kbps. Over 10,000 songs and movies, tv shows, cartoons, language books, all my lyrics in case I forget them on tour...*laughing* everything.

Do I hear a difference? Yes. I'm an engineer and producer. Do I care? Yes, but convenience wins and 320kbps sounds pretty darn good, at least better than a radio station going in and out and all those crappy commercials. When storage becomes even smaller, we won't even need to compress all the data, and eventually we'll be able to expand to 24bit sound rather than 16bit. It's all gonna happen in its sweet ol' time.

Now here's my favorite part of the portable player. "Shuffle". Having 10,000 songs doesn't mean you listen to all of them. We are habitual creatures. We play favorites. Shuffle/random play means anything goes. The Minutemen to Russian Orthodox Vespers by Rachmaninov to Loretta Lynn singing duets with Conway Twitty to Slayer to Captain Beefheart to Blondie to Bernard Herrmann to King Tubby to Serge Gainsbourg to The Stranglers to Candi Staton to Deerhoof to Herb Albert and the Tijuana Brass to Sonny Boy Williamson to Ice-T to Neil Diamond to...you get my point. I hear songs I might never hear if I was left to pick 'em. Some songs honestly I've never even heard, or remember. Amazing gems that make me go "Who the heck is that?! Awesome!!" Some songs that make me go..."Okay...when I get home I'm deleting that awful song!" In time, my music collection will just get better and better, finding beautiful obscurities like Les Baxter or odd happenings like a Bukowski reading a poem.

Yes! Everyone let's do the Shuffle! Skip the song if you don't want to hear it, but you might be surprised what you will want to hear. It might not be in your favorites. *smile*

Get Off My Lawn!!!!

"Get off my lawn!!!" Remember that? You know the grumpy old neighbor that would yell at you for running across his lawn? That sad mean old bastard. Now. Now I occasionally have that same inclination. Damn. I'm turning into that mean old man all of us kids used to despise. Damn his eyes! *laughing* I say this knowing full well I'm not him, but I understand him now. The whole "empathy requires understanding" thing.

Kids lack the much more complex theme of respect. They confuse fear with respect. We adults still do. They immediately level the playing field and make everyone equal. The lines of property blur. Awareness of others feelings are drowned out by their own selves yelling out to the world "I'm here! Look at me!" This is being a kid. Self discovery. Triple underline the word "self".

It's not really about others until the teenage years. Then we become hyper aware of how others see us and having the conflicting feeling of wanting to be approved and assimilated by our peers and yet needing to rebel at authority to assert our individuality and our specialness. A balancing act hard to achieve with many stumbles along the way.

It was wondrous Hell being a kid. I couldn't wait to grow up. Getting control of my life. Or so I thought. Finding for myself that control is just an illusion to make us feel safer in this beautiful and sometimes cruel world.

I want my inner kid to live and thrive. I want my inner adult to lighten-up but still rule. Growing up diminishes the selfish tendencies and adds the understanding of others, re-enforcing the true reality of our connectedness with everything. To hurt someone or some thing hurts ourselves too. That we are not alone, nor can we every truly be alone, even though our bodies and physical reality seems to deem it so.

Yep. I want to hold on to the magical discovery and wide-eyed wonder of a child, and the wisdom and understanding of being a part of something much greater than ourselves.

September, Yucca Street, and Tree Living Punkers...

Sitting here sweltering at my computer transports me to 1985 Hollywood, Dire Straits - "Money For Nothing" came out, I'm seventeen years old, and my first studio apartment. It was hot like this, hovering around 100 degrees, my air-conditioning unit would ice up and I would have to chisel away the ice to get the cooled air out an into my 300 square foot room. In these "olden" times, Hollywood was much skankier on the strip. The day I moved in, there were all these women at my apartment complex. Lots of smiles and stare-downs headed my way like arrows at Little Bighorn, while I was unloading everything I owned in Chevy S-10 pickup. I thought to myself "Wow! I haven't even moved in yet and adventure is already swirling around me!" I started to talking to one girl, we were laughing and getting along pretty good, when more women came into the complex...then it hit me...internal dialogue-"Hookers!" Oh Hell...this isn't the adventure I thought it was. Embarrassed and feeling really dumb, young, and full of...I quickly unpacked my truck and stayed inside. Alone. You have to understand, that up to this point in my life, I stayed in my room playing guitar and never left but to eat, take out the garbage and mow the lawn. My social skills and worldly knowledge were of the pre-school age. *laughing*

Living in Hollywood at this time I grew up quickly, someone was mistakenly killed at my front door by a gang. It could have been me. My life threatened on two occasions by drugged out psychos, and someone else pulled a knife to take my candy apple red Gibson Flying V Heritage guitar from me. You know how many lawns I mowed to get that guitar? "Fuck you! You're gonna have to take it from me!" I pulled out my own knife that I always had cupped in my hand when walking the streets for this very occasion. Fortunately the guy found it to be too much work, so he just walked away cursing. Yes...I know...a Gibson Flying V...it was the 80's. I was in a metal band. I had just played the Rainbow Bar, I was underage, so when I to played, I had to wait outside most of the time except when and only when I was on stage. It was the time of Depeche Mode vs. Megadeth. You were on one side or the other. This is very funny to think about now. It was also when I saw the movie "This Is Spinal Tap" and when I seriously thought about jumping the metal ship and going to blues. Teenagers...

When you're seventeen, you think that because maybe you're smart, you know everything sans experience. It is in experience that life reminds you that you don't know shit no matter how many books you've read. I was humbled in Hollywood. Watching dumpster diving for food, drugs take over people's minds, whores puking up their job they just finished 5 minutes ago. Humbled.

One morning I went to my truck to go to the grocery store and my truck hood was all dented in and scratched up. There was a small group of punkers who practically lived in the tree above my parking spot. One of them apparently fell asleep and fell out of the tree and on to my truck. They were really sorry about it and they pooled their money together and bought me a case of Keystone beer. I was really mad, but I couldn't be mad for longer than a minute. I realised these guys had nothing. Not even a place to live. If you take the money they spent on the beer for me, it probably was 60% of what they had. Damn. That's a lot. In my mind that case of Keystone was one of the biggest offers of restitution and compensation from someone in my life.

I still think about those guys every time I see a parking lot and a big tree looming above the spaces. You never know what might drop out and change the way you look at things forever...

The Grand Illusion...

Art and Money. The grand illusion, and the great mind fuck. We need to stop trying to put them together. Money is made by a lot of things, but art isn't one of them. It's by demand. You wanna chance at making money? Be popular. Of course you can't decide to be popular. You are chosen. Popularity by itself does not even guarantee financial gain. Hence, the mind fuck. Artists should just try to make good art, art from within, truth or anti-truth, make their own way, and acknowledge art is for people. Money may or may never come. That is the true fact.

The idea that good art will bring you money is wrong. We all know a lot of bad art makes huge amounts of money. The idea that hard work will bring you money is wrong. Full time artists and coal miners can attest to this fact. Pure popularity alone will not bring you money, but it helps. The reality is that when the light shown upon an artist making him or her known to the populous, them being accepted and demanded by others increases the artist's worth in the monetary sense. Demand. Build demand and they will come. Pure economics.

Economics tell us that too much supply makes a lower demand and short supply makes a higher demand. If we go further...it's not just the amount of demand but the amount people are willing to pay. That's why some people see subscription service as the future. Small amount to pay but huge amount of people. Verses the other model of high amounts sold to fewer people.

However you wanna play it, it comes down to demand. That is the mysterious quotient, the hidden ingredient, the mystical mumbo-jumbo that is just what it is, like Nature, we don't have any control over it. Some people say you can, but these are the same people who will tell you about it for $39.99. *laughing*

If we as artists can just accept this like we do about many other things in life, we can get back to doing what we do, let the people decide what they want, and finally see who the "man is from behind the curtain".

You'll find it's your Uncle Vito, your niece Petunia, your neighbor Mrs. Feldman, and that damn asshole who almost hit you when you were crossing the street.

Remembrance and Residue...

The next morning from last night's show is always an extra hazy one. A happy hazy one. A slow moving 8mm movie morning that might even run into the afternoon. The strong urge to not really do a damn thing and just be.

So much happens during a show. It's like riding a roller-coaster and then trying to describe it. Hell I don't know what happened, but the next day, when everything is in slow-motion I can remember...and feel the residue. If you are quiet enough you can feel the residue running through your veins and mind. Of course it might be just the magic brownie/cookie I ate the day before, *laughing* but seriously, going deep inside I can replay everything. When I mean everything, I mean the "feeling", not the events so much. Movement is the facilitator of emotion for me. How I move, walk, or jump will push my emotions up or down.

I know you might be thinking "Dude...it's just a show. Some songs...and it wasn't even a big show. Why all the hubbub?" True. Though for me to perform a show I have to get emotionally involved and to connect with whomever is out there or on stage with me. It affects me greatly. Putting out all that energy weakens me a little the next morning, hence my dazey-hazy ramblings and perception. I get a second rush of endorphins the next day. Happy doing what I'm doing, even if I don't know how I'll be a able to go to the grocery store or pay my bills. I am crazy? Most definitely. I am humbled to be a full-time artist and I am grateful.

Record and Release...

Record and release...inhale and exhale...that's how I liken it. I'm beginning the next EP "Paper Sun" today. I'm in no hurry, heck my newest EP "Los Feliz" won't be officially released unto the world until this Sunday...August 23rd. No physical copies will be made. It's a first for me. I'm an old-school music man...I like physical mediums. I don't like it, no matter how much it makes sense financially. I need to bone up on my financial skills though, however feeble they may be, it's about surviving now. So no Limited Edition Vinyl, no CD's in any packaged format. The people have spoken (most of them anyway) and they couldn't care less about it being in their hands, couldn't care less about large high quality graphics, even sound quality. It's about convenience these days. Portability. It used to be radio took care of the music portability. That's dead. The lack of a music loving DJ has turned a once personal and creative endeavour into a spew from the highest bidder. It's down to us. We are our own DJ's.

It is word of mouth now.

"World of Mouth" actually. It is quite exciting in these Wild West Days of the Digital World. The Old Analog World has fallen, and in the little gap between worlds is high adventure! What's gonna happen? Up until even a few months ago I didn't even have a glimmer of what might be. I do now...and it's exhilarating to be at the beginning of a movement!

I must kill my old ideas of "how it used to be". The only thing that will remain from my old way of thinking is to try to make everything I do the best I can. No short cuts. Art is about people, not technology nor accounting techniques. The mechanisms have changed but the art shouldn't. I'll use technology as a "tool", not the maker. The rest is to the wind!

Okay...now I'm gonna warm up my recording gear...yes...it still needs to be warmed up. I am from another world, making my way into the new one...

Record and release...

Ineffable...

Here I am trying to express the inexpressible...all things ineffable. Leaving me tongue-tied. Some words that have vastness of emotion are easy to talk about...Hate for instance. It's simple to me. Perhaps it's my idea of it. I cannot say that I truly hate anyone. The thing that stops hate in its tracks is empathy and understanding. Not matter how vile and depraved someone can be, I see the humanity in them, the confusion, ignorance, and self-loathing that brought about their downfall. If I believed in the Devil I'd feel sorry for him too. What kind of man am I? Is this inescapable empathy for all things one of my many great weaknesses or my saving grace for my other "all too human" shortcomings? Hate is too simple. It simply doesn't exist in me.

But its apparent (I say apparent, because I do not subscribe to this fancy.) reflection, its opposite that so many equate to... is Love. So cliche'. So true. Hence cliche'. No words. So much passion and violence done in its name. Worth living for. Dying for. What can one say without continually waxing poetic over it so much that the meaning is lost and only clever words are left in its wake. Ineffable.

For me there is only Love and no opposite exists for it. For to be truly opposite it must have the same depth, power and scope...and I have found nothing to equal it, opposite or otherwise.

Simon Cowell I'm not...

So...my friend Edwin Decker sent me a message asking if I might fill in for him as a judge for the Viejas Casino Country Band Contest. I have never judged anything before and I'm always game to a new experience, so I told him in no uncertain terms "Hell Yes!".

Now here begins the quandary. I don't wanna be a poison-pen critic who slices up their artists for the mere pleasure and power to do so, at the same time I don't wanna be a milk-toast writer who just white washes everything until it's so bland you can't sink your teeth into anything. To further things, I am an artist. I'm on stage all the time. Stuff goes wrong, even badly wrong. I've walked in these band's shoes a thousand times over. I know. I empathize. That being said, I can criticize because I've been doing this thing for 20 years and I've seen it all. So here goes, the evening progressed as follows:

I met my Judges Cathryn and Richard at the Judges table. I've known Cathryn in the San Diego music scene for quite a few years, but Richard I just met. An old pro like myself, I instantly liked him. The judges table itself is smack-dab in the middle of the room, on a riser 3 feet high with spot lights highlighting every move and expression we make and microphones, for our commentary after each band plays a 30 minute set. Simon Cowell immediately comes to mind. Ugh...the man everyone loves to hate. Well...I ain't no friggin' Simon Cowell. I'm not a pure critic. I am an artist, but please don't let me sound like Paula Abdul! *laughing* We searched around for pens and the first band is announced "Ward James and the Ramblers".

Ward comes up to the mike a proceeds to tell everyone that this band has only been together for four days. He had a "disagreement" with his former band. Okay Ward. We now know. They start playing and it's immediately obvious they haven't been a band long. Very jittery beginnings and endings. The Wramblers are young. A lot younger than Ward. It turns out they were all 18 except Ward. I liked the bass player, he had good energy and a solid bass player. The guitarist was good too, he just needs to season and age and he could be a great guitarist. All of them do. They could be a really good band in time. Just not tonight. Ward has a good voice, especially when he went to the Johnny Cash baritone. He traded solos with his guitarist, which was not a good idea. He seemed to have his mind on other things and was very sporadic and unmusical. Leave the solos to the lead guitarist and sing your butt off and get some crowd rapport going Ward. It will serve you well. The crowd was excited. Mainly because they brought out a bunch of fans, a good idea. There's power in that, and they needed all the support they could get. When it came to myself commentating on their performance I could've easily drew blood with all the criticisms, but why? They knew everything already. They were on stage. They knew how it was supposed to be. So I just accented the positives and told them it takes moxy for a young/four-day band to get up on stage and try to win a contest.

Next up is Justin Newman.

It's just Justin. No band. Wasn't this a "band" contest? This can either bode well for him or not. Solo acts can be a double-edged sword. Truly powerful or disastrous. Well...it was disaster.

Justin decided to use a loop machine and a heavy metal guitar pedal for his acoustic guitar. Always a bad idea. Use an electric guitar for electric guitar sounds. Use an acoustic for acoustic ones. Hello?! Technology isn't that wondrous yet! I couldn't hear his voice because of the metal acoustic-guitar was too loud. He didn't have the guitar chops for that type of guitar sound either, and is this supposed to "Country" music? I know it's good to push the envelope, but it's just not appropriate in this genre. Even the Blues Brothers had to adjust so they wouldn't get anymore glass bottles thrown at them! The next song...more fiasco. This time he changed the song he was gonna play and forgot about the different tuning he needed to do it. So rather than stop and tune, he proceeded to continue completely out of tune and tried to fix it mid-song. Bad idea Justin. Just stop...say "I'm tuning 'cause I care" and start the song over. Better a false start than four minutes of nausea inducing out-of-tuneness. Is that a word? Nope. *smile* Now hears the kicker, when he turned off all his loop and metal effects and just sang "Wicked Game" on his acoustic, he kicked ass. If he would'a just let himself be himself with out all the wiz-band-doo-dads, he might've won this contest. His voice was that good. But no. He didn't. He lost me, lost me, had me, and then lost me again with his final fiasco of a White Stripes tune with the metal guitar. White Stripes? In a country show? With a metal guitar? Really? Okay...

City Limits hit the stage. Slowly. Really slowly. "They don't tour" is what I thought to myself. They took forever setting up. Weekend warriors with some corporate party experience under their belt. I was a bit wary when I saw the singer/guitarist plug in his glowing LED electric guitar. Thankfully there wasn't a fiasco, fireworks, Pantera solos or such. They were a very competent band. The sound guy should've been shot, but it wasn't the band's fault. The sound guy thought it would be a good idea to have the kick drum be the loudest thing in the room and that it should sound like it should be on a Motley Crue album. Yes...sound guy...I'm talking to you! This is a Country band show and its the snare/rim shot you should here prominently, not the kick for rock/house music. Anyway...I digress. This is the thing. You know when you tell someone "Yea...that guy is a really nice guy." ? It isn't so much of a complement as an insult. This band was a nice band. Granted, no fiascos, but they're are walking the fine line of mediocrity. Nice. A nice band. I'm just saying...put some more life into your show guys. Take some chances. Have some fun, not just hitting all the right notes and the right time. There is more to music and performance. The audience liked them, many danced. Of course the audience would like them. They are a good band.

Oh...that reminds me...what's up with not being Southern and singing with a Southern accent? I'm from Memphis. The South. I've lived out here for a long time. Even I don't have a accent anymore. Why is it that this really thick drawl comes out when the song starts? The thing about country music is that it needs to be sincere. Sincerity is what makes a good country song. When I hear someone impersonate a Southern accent, all of the sincerity goes out the window. You use your own voice that you were born with and sing the truth...and the people will listen.

Lastly...Tequila Rose comes out for their set and the final band of the night. They are tight and relaxed. The singer Rachael is a good singer, not amazing, but she used her sass and woman power to her advantage. If you got it, use it I say. No southern accent and doesn't sing with one. More honest I think. The harmonica player is good too. They played "A Thing Called Love" which was the best song of the night. Good blues harmonica and electric slide. Being from Memphis...this helped win me over. Their bass player was rollin' and ramblin', laying down the groove solid and free. Free...yea...this band was actually having fun on stage. This is what's its about! Fun. The audience participation was less than the previous band. Perhaps they didn't really bring many people? But in the end the crowd yelled for them the loudest, and I agreed with them.

Side note - Ed. Ed you brotha-from-a-different-motha! Thank you for the Patrone shot that Colleen (I believe that was here name) gave me last night. Colleen, if that is your name...you're a too-cool-for-school-trouble-maker-lady and I thank you for the welcome you gave me for my foray into the land of Simon-Al-Paula-Freak-Show.

I'm gonna go back to sleep now....