Nothing Worth Noting

2011-11-10T08:22:00.001-08:00

If you're looking for dark laughs, you simply cannot do better than Doug Stanhope. Deadbeat Hero, the hour embedded above, pokes fun at killing babies, democracy, and terrorism. And other things I'd rather not have google search attach to my name while I'm looking for a job. Plus, it was recorded live here in Seattle, so there's a nice bit of hometown flavor there too. Hit play and listen.

READER: Houdini speaks

2011-11-01T19:19:00.000-07:00

Houdini speaks:

In this recording from 1914, Harry Houdini talks about his Water Torture Cell trick.

The audio was recorded on an Edison wax cylinder; one of six used that day by Houdini and now the only known recordings of his voice to exist.

(via ★thoughtbrain)

Tags: audio Harry Houdini

READER: Los Angeles Plays Itself (2003)

2011-11-01T16:37:00.000-07:00

Los Angeles Plays Itself (2003): history of L.A. in film, made almost entirely from existing film footage [via]

This will not stay up long. I'm surprised it even made it this far. Watch it now while you can.

The Psychotronics take over the Moon!

2011-09-28T15:04:00.000-07:00

The Blue Moon, that is. We join Twitch and The Januariez for an evening of rock and roll, attitude, and general debauchery. You should join us. We might make you King of the Moon!

Blues & Bluster gets to work

2011-09-01T16:06:00.000-07:00

Tonight Blues & Bluster gets to hustling with songs of professions, labor, and love.

Deep cuts from John Zorn/Naked City, Tom Waits, Johnny Adams, Wilbert Harrison, and so much more.It's Blues & Bluster!

Another fabulous two-hour block of the old, the wondrous, the odd, and you. Only on Hollow Earth Radio. Every Thursday from 11pm - 1am PST!

P.S. As of today, I am unemployed. If you have any opportunities or networking possibilities, please send them my way. You'll have my great thanks and probably some baked goods. Hey, it's possible!

Blues & Bluster celebrates Summer

2011-08-25T15:41:00.000-07:00

Blues & Bluster is in service to Summer this evening, my wonderful partner and all-around awesome woman, whose birthday is today, and whose birthweek is this week.

So tonight, all songs played will either be ones she loves (or that I think she does) or which reference summer in some way. Fer instance:

It's Blues & Bluster! Another fabulous two-hour block of the old, the wondrous, the odd, and you. Only on Hollow Earth Radio. Every Thursday from 11pm - 1am PST!

A B&B 3fer

2011-08-21T13:24:00.000-07:00

Thanks to Mike, Drew, and my mom, Blues & Bluster last week featured these three requests back to back (to back):

•Marvin Gaye -- Whats Going On (rhythm and strings)
•PAUL ROBESON -- Ol Man River
•Public Enemy -- Fear of a Black Planet

So wonderful! Surprisingly, HER didn't have any of those in their library, so it was Youtube to the rescue, now embedded here for posterity.

Blues & Bluster Sighs Mightily

2011-08-18T12:55:00.000-07:00

Blues & Bluster has a slight case of the melancholy sighs this week, and instead of trying to deny it, pushing it down to the flats of our feet so that we might walk all over its face, we have decided to embrace it with our long limber limbs like a scarecrow blown around a fencepost.

So phooey on this fantastic summer weather, we make our way toward Low, Antony, Nina, Neko, and maybe a roundtable discussion on the nature of the blues.

It's Blues & Bluster! Another fabulous two-hour block of the old, the wondrous, the odd, and you. Only on Hollow Earth Radio. Every Thursday from 11pm - 1am PST!

Blues & Bluster Melts Down William James

2011-08-11T09:22:00.000-07:00

Blues & Bluster has a two-fold purpose this week, above and beyond our usual sound adventure mixmastery:

We say goodbye to poet William James, as he steps out of state into Oregon; and
We give a few sets over to the musicians of Summer Meltdown, the multi-day outdoor music and camping festival up in Darrington this weekend.

It will be a sweltering mix of poetry and long-form jam, mashed by bare feet and cooked in the sun.

It's Blues & Bluster! Another fabulous two-hour block of the old, the wondrous, the odd, and you. Only on Hollow Earth Radio. Every Thursday from 11pm - 1am PST!

Via Seattlest: Where I Live

2011-08-10T08:59:00.000-07:00

From Seattlest:

Tyson and Summer were kind enough to give me a tour of their spacious apartment, and show me some of the adorable antique and salvaged accents they've added to this ultra-modern space.

The Long Walk Back

2011-08-04T16:07:00.000-07:00

Cascadia by moleskin
the trails are there someone has to
put their foot down.

- Paul Nelson, from his poetical recap of The Long Walk

The King County Regional Trail System spans over 175 miles, bounded by Bothell, Auburn, Seattle, and the Cascades. It is one of the nation's largest trail networks, with paths for travel by hikers, equestrians, and walkers alike. And this past weekend, I and 50 other folks covered a not insignificant portion of them.

The brainchild of artist Susan Robb in conjunction with 4Culture, The Long Walk is many things: an reframing of time and space, a glowing love letter to our parks and trails, an experimental venue for site-specific pieces of art, and an exercise in endurance, because 50 miles is actually quite a distance when taken on foot.

Between 5:00 a.m. last Thursday at Golden Gardens and coming to a blistered rest Sunday afternoon at Snoqualmie Falls, we walkers explored Magnuson Park from beach to hangar, met the people of Duvall in a decommissioned train depot, discussed the nature of landscape by a re-purposed barn in Carnation, and tried to spot the bottom of the falls by Salish Lodge. The entire weekend was spent in engaged constitutionals, thoughtful meanders, intentional pacings.

For me—someone who does not take hikes and who had not, before this, walked more than one mile of the Burke-Gilman, even though I live in Ballard—the Walk was transformative. I did not know the extent of the trails, nor how they connected the city and the county, and I had little desire to find out. Why would I? This is why I have a truck.

Now, I'm struck by the possibility of going cross-town via tree-shaded trails, scheduling extra time to get where I'm going, devoting weekends to hikes and undirected rambles. Why wouldn't I? This is why I have a bike. Feet. Access.

And access, turns out, was a contentious word during the Walk. Articles from Josh Feit at Publicola and Mike Seely at Seattle Weekly went live Thursday and Friday, decrying the use of public funds on The Walk, especially since the group of Walkers themselves numbered only 50. What Seely and Feit seem to be most concerned by is whether a percentage of the public constitutes The Public and, if so, what that percentage should be.

Seely, in particular, seems particularly chuffed by it, calling me (not specifically or anything, just the Walkers in general) an "in-the-know urban scenester". Which is true, I guess, in that I read about The Walk in The Stranger last year and saw the open call for applicants that 4Culture put up this year. It's true in that I was familiar with and interested by the project. There is a degree, I must allow, to which the audience for this is self-selecting, but seems to me there's a saying about forest and trees that might be applicable.

Personally, I think most art is not for all people. The only difference here is that the size of the audience for this piece of art is specific and known. Your interaction with The Long Walk is my telling you about it. At least this year. But maybe what you read here will excite you in the same way I was excited when I read Jen Graves' coverage in The Stranger. Maybe next year, you'll keep an eye out for The Long Walk's call for walkers. And maybe you'll be as surprised as I was by the expanse and accessibility of these trails, their beauty and adventure, and without needing to wait for someone to lead you, you'll take off on your own.

walking up to the bicycle choir on the night of day 2 of the long walk by disconnecteddot

This post appeared first on Seattlest.

A Night of Mischief and Music

2011-03-28T12:44:00.000-07:00

HONK! Fest West invites you to join us for a Benefit Extraordinaire! Delight to music, twitterpate to burlesque, and support the 4th Annual HONK! Fest West!

Featuring:

Titanium Sporkestra!

Mouce Manouche!

Chaotic Hearts!

Movitas Moving Orchestra!

Purty Mouth!

Miss Mamie Lavona The Exotic Mulatta & Her White Boy Band!

With Burlesque By:

Boom Boom L'Roux!

Madisun Avenue!

Trojan Originale!

and their announcer Ben Jammin' Esq.!

Saturday, April 16 at 8:00pm

Pre-sale tickets can be purchased today by donating $25 to our Kickstarter page.

All proceeds benefit HONK! Fest West and help us bring bands from all around the US straight to the streets of Seattle!

Little Red Studio
400 Dexter Avenue North
Seattle, WA

The Little Red Studio is an All Ages Space. Please be aware, however, that burlesque is a part of the evening's line-up, and therefore may not be appropriate for all families. If you have any questions, please contact Tyson at info@honfestwest.com.

2011-03-21T10:52:00.000-07:00

HONK! Fest West returns to Seattle for its fourth year! A traveling festival, HONK! this year is excited to visit Georgetown on Friday, May 13; Gasworks on Saturday, May 14; and Seattle Center on Sunday, May 15th.

We are pleased to announce that we will once again be joined by hundreds of musicians from across the country and Canada. Take a look at this line-up!

Artesian Rumble Arkestra (Olympia)
BeatCrunchers (Eugene)
Bolting Brassicas Marching Band (Lasqueti Island, B.C.)
Bucharest Drinking Team (Seattle)
The Carnival Band (Vancouver, B.C.)
Chaotic Hearts (Seattle)
Environmental Encroachment (Chicago)
Firebrass Village Blasting Club (Phoenix, AZ)
Garfield High School Bulldog Drumline (Seattle)
Garfield High School Bulldog Marching Band (Seattle)
HBC Brass Band (Stanford, CA)
Movitas (Seattle)
Orkestar Zirkonium (Seattle)
Samba Ja (Eugene)
Seattle Seahawks Blue Thunder Drumline (Seattle)
Seattle Sounders FC Soundwave (Seattle)
Soulaphone Brass Band (Missoula, MT)
Titanium Sporkestra (Seattle)
Tubaluba (Seattle)
Vamola (Seattle)

HONK! Fest West is a free, three-day, community-supported music festival devoted to marching bands, drum corps, samba lines, and anything acoustic and mobile that makes a ruckus. We are also partial to street performers, dancers, and professional appreciators.

If you'd like to help support HONK!, please consider donating to our Kickstarter or contacting our Volunteer Coordinator at volunteer@honkfestwest.com.

If you have any questions about HONK! Fest West, please contact Tyson at info@honkfestwest.com.

Saturday at the Underground Events Center

2011-03-18T15:34:00.000-07:00

SUPPORT HONK!: HONK! Fest West is a free, non-profit, and community supported music festival devoted to marching bands, drum corps, samba lines, and the like. This year will be HONK!'s fourth, and even though the Festival isn't until May, the work has already begun to raise the necessary funds to cover permits, venue rentals, food for the musicians and volunteers, travel costs, and all the other line-item details that come with putting on a music festival. Not only can you contribute to their Kickstarter, but you should attend their first fundraiser this Saturday with performances by VamoLà, Tubaluba, Bucharest Drinking Team, The Garfield High School Drumline, and Orkestar Zirkonium. Drink and dance for a good cause.
Saturday 8:00 p.m. // Underground Events Center // $10 - $20 Sliding Donation

Read the rest over at Seattlest.

Support HONK! Fest West!

2011-03-16T12:13:00.000-07:00

Some of you may know that I help organize HONK! Fest West. It's a three-day, non-profit, community-supported music festival that focuses on marching bands, drum corps, samba lines, 2nd line New Orleans Brass, and anything acoustic and mobile that can make a ruckus (we also love jugglers, magicians, dancers, and street performers of all stripes).

We are a volunteer-run festival. We draw no salary. We do it out of love for the music, the moment when the audience melts into the performers, and--of course--dancing in the streets.

This year will be the fourth time we've held HONK! in Seattle, and the first time we've run a month-long fundraising campaign through Kickstarter.

We're looking to raise $5,000 over the next 30 days. This money helps cover our permits, venue rentals, food for the musicians and volunteers, travel costs, and all the other line-item details that come with putting on a music festival. If you can, please consider supporting us. Every dollar helps. (And I wouldn't say no to you forwarding this on to others you might think interested.) Would you like to see our video? Yes? Well, good, cause I was gonna put it here anyway.

As you might imagine, putting on a festival requires help of all sorts. If you can dontate a service--food, printing, venue, transportation, and so on--or your time or work for an organization that would like to table at our event, please get in touch with me at info @ honkfestwest . com.

I am extremely excited to put this event on again in Seattle, see old friends and meet new, and--of course--dance in the streets. Hot damn do I love dancing in the streets. I hope you can come out and join me.

So, do you?

2011-03-07T07:56:00.001-08:00

HONK! Fest West is approaching! May is not that far away. And we're hosting two fundraisers before it! Hot damn! Want to be part of this crazy adventure? Get in touch!

Sharpening the Point

2011-02-21T23:47:00.000-08:00

Ed note: this has been sitting in my drafts folder FOREVER.

Yesterday, I used the word sisyphean. Wasn't trying to be pedantic or anything, it just felt like the best descriptor of my general environment and obligations at the time. Last year came to a close with a hard December finish, and 2011 kicked off directly into my bathing suit area, and it all has seemed more difficult than usual. I tell you this not to complain or make a play for your sympathies, but because sometimes it can be helpful to think about the choices you made at some point that got you to your present location. A Recognize Your Agency exercise. And this brings me to a fabulous woman named Deirdra Kiai.

I met Deirdra through HONK! Fest West. She plays sousaphone in Orkestar Slivovica, a mighty fine balkan band out of Vancouver, BC. In addition to her bouncy anchor work in the OS, she's also a programmer who recently leveraged kickstarter to fund an independent game called Life Flashes By:

Charlotte Barclay, a novelist of moderate success, one day finds herself in a car accident while on her way to the next leg of her book tour. She then wakes up in the hazy world of her own memories and, accompanied by an impish pixie-like creature called Trevin, finds herself whisked away on a whirlwind journey to relive various vignettes of her life so far. In doing so, Charlotte attempts to make sense of who she is and who she’s become, as well as who she could have been had she done things differently.

Life Flashes By is a video game about success and failure in following one’s dreams, about finding love and losing it, and about feeling isolated and out of step with the rest of the world. It is a story that is at times clever and fun and at times melancholy and introspective. Most notably of all, however, it is a story best told non-linearly, which lends itself uniquely to the interactive nature of games. As a player, you won’t just be watching a plot unfold, you’ll be shaping and affecting it in a way unique to you alone.

She sent out a call for voices a while back and I responded with an audition tape for several characters. I was selected for Dr. Stewart. That's right. Somewhere right now I'm giving a very dry reading as a snobbish therapist in a game about life choices, and if I was a person who believed in signs it would be very hard indeed to ignore this one. Mostly though I'm glad for the opportunity to be a poor man's Dr. Katz.

Many thanks to Deirdra for that. Give her game a whirl and the next time you're up in B.C. go see Orkestar Slivovica. They're amazing.

Valentine's Day Hangover

2011-02-15T01:21:00.000-08:00

Like most, Slap & Tickle celebrate the day after Love by shaking it off like a begging dog. We kid! In fact, we are excited to have one more chance to celebrate romance in all its forms. Moreover! We are absolutely pleased to be doing so at the Little Red Studio, a fabulous venue full of dark corners and high-backed booths, the kind perfect for stolen embraces and furtive kisses.

Speaking of soft touches, Landlord's Daughter and Honeybear are joining us sandwhich-style for a sweet-meats reuben, heavy on the sauce. No wonder that dog keeps staring at us, drooling.

8:30 p.m. // Little Red Studio // $5 (All-Ages)

Slap & Tickle Tonight

2011-02-11T09:33:00.000-08:00

This post will go live on Blue Note in about an hour, but you, faithful blogger reader, you get to read it early. That's the sort of premium rewards we traffic in here at NWN.

Tonight, Cafe Racer will host "A Night of Romance" with acoustic performances by Landlord's Daughter, Pillow Army, and Slap & Tickle. Not only can you swoon to the music, but artists Billis Helg and Carl Nelson will be on-hand to draw pictures of your love, a ring, or as many roses as you would need to close the deal. (Remember the rule for imaginary flowers: take the number you would usually buy for your partner, double it, then start buying drinks and hope for the best.)

It's a promising beginning to Love Season. Remember to only shoot within your weight limit.

8:00 p.m. // Cafe Racer // FREE

P.S. Slap & Tickle will also be at Avanti Art & Design around 6pm, if you'd like to catch us twice or have an early night.

Wherein I link elsewhere

2011-01-14T11:10:00.000-08:00

Didja know I occasionally write for Seattlest? It's true. I'm going to start linking there to here every so often, just so youse don't forgets. In today's edition, I play up important events of the weekend!

YOU SPOON FORK: Local heavies Titanium Sporkestra are a renegade marching band featuring members of Infernal Noise Brigade and TchKunG!. They're planning a trip to the great state of Texas for the first ever HONK!TX in March. (Look for Seattle's own HONK! Fest West in May.) Since the cost of getting a score of musicians and a ton of drums across the country is not inconsiderable, they're throwing a party to raise funds and announce their Kickstarter campaign. They've invited Brownstone, DJ DubTek, Aqueous, and k¥Le bija to stir up the floor and you to get stirred.
Saturday 8:00 p.m. // Fonda La Catrina // $10-20 sliding scale donation at the door (21+)

Read the rest here.

Now, don't you feel informed?

It's Christmas (in July in December)

2010-12-14T13:27:00.000-08:00

It's that time again. The holiday season in its many guises, the frenzied time of year where we turn our focus to family, friends, food, drink, debauchery and gifts.

And what better way to combine all these things than at the most epic house party of the year. We call it Christmas in July in December.

When we did this party last year, The Stranger's Party Crasher showed up.

We like the idea of picking one's family during this time, and creating a tradition that's uniquely ours. We figured the best way to do that was to make some delicious food, invite our friends, and play some music. Speaking of,

The Bands!

The Psychotronics are a brashly tuneful instrumental three-piece that specialize in three minute surf songs tinged with noise.

Hey Marseilles and Pillow Army mark their fourth year with us. They both use eclectic instrumentation to explore unexpected rhythms. We think they’re fabulous.

The Donner Vixens features members of Desperado, the Seattle Sugarplum Elves, The End Times, Pillow Army, and The Pyschotronics. We’re tackling a selection of nontraditional Christmas covers from artists like Voxtrot, Magnetic Fields, Casiotone for the Painfully Alone, Rankin & Bass, and more. We will also be performing at the Nog for the Needy at The Comet on 12/21, the XMas party at The Tiger Lounge on 12/23 (with KEG!), and the 7th Annual Blue Moon Tavern Christmas Pageant and Midnight Mass.

Seattle’s Yellow Hat Band plays loud, fun music from all over the world using horns and drums. They are a mobile dance party and we are honored to have em.

Please know that you and yours are cordially invited. If you'd like details, do get in touch.

The Donner Vixens on Hollow Earth Radio tonight

2010-12-09T13:19:00.001-08:00

The Donner Vixens are unlike any Christmas band you've ever heard, performing originals and knowing covers of songs that document the hard times of the holidays.

Tune in to Hollow Earth Radio tonight at 11pm for a caffienated set from The Vixens! You'll hear your favorites from Casiotone for the Painfully Alone, Mojave 3, Voxtrot, The Youngsters, The Orchids, The Andrew Sisters, Rankin / Bass, The New Pornographers, and Rosemary Clooney.

Formed in 2007 under the name The Christmas Belles, The Donner Vixens are now an annual holiday event highlighted by the Christmas In July In December luau and a Christmas Eve performance at The Blue Moon Tavern. Featuring members of Pillow Army, The End Times, and the Seattle Sugarplum Elves, The Vixens like to disseminate the season's feeling of peace and love through raucous chaos and tight harmonies.

I invite you to log in at, and turn it up to, 11 tonight on Blues & Bluster. But if you can't, maybe you'll consider joining the Vixens at one of their shows this season:

Christmas in July in December luau
Where: Private Residence. Get in touch for details.
When: Saturday, December 18 at 7:30 pm
Featuring: Yellow Hat Band, Pillow Army, Santa Daddies, The Psychotronics, and The Donner Vixens.

Nog for the Needy
Where: The Comet
When: Tuesday, December 21 8:00 p.m.
Featuring: The Santa Daddies, The Seattle Sugarplum Elves, Hollow Earth Radio's DJ Tyson Lynn, and a special guest! Admission and nog sales will be donated to Noise for the Needy.

Tiger Lounge X-Mas Special #2
Where: The Tiger Lounge
When: Thursday, December 23 9:00 pm
Featuring: KEG!

The 7th Annual Blue Moon Tavern Christmas Pageant and Midnight Mass
Where: Blue Moon Tavern
When: Friday, December 24 9:00 pm
Featuring: Billy the Fridge (performing and playing Santa!), Buffy the Trickslayer, DJ Country Mike, Et Ceteras (a Peter Cetera cover band!), and guests. There will also be appearances by both Jesus and Satan, and a Midnight Mass officiated by the Rev. Darnell Jenkins.

Elliptical Habits

2010-09-22T22:27:00.000-07:00

Unless you've been reading this, or this, or this, or listening to this, I haven't been putting much out there lately.

It's been a weird year. Been a spate of those recently. But this year especially, articulating my life to myself has been difficult. Figuring out how to show it to others? Impossible. So any kind of writing of a...personal nature, let's call it?...gets locked down as soon as it's produced. To the average observer, I've been piping my diary into dev/null.

Every so often though, it's nice to fire up the skywriter and spell it out in long, graceful arcs. Given the weather lately, I figured I should take any clear day opportunities and make the most of them.

Most of my free time over the past six/seven months has been devoted to one of the following projects:

1) The Psychotronics.
A destructive instrumental surf band devised and birthed by documentarian Jeff Myers, he of past projects like The Christmas Belles and Desperado. We take our first real steps on September 30th, when we play live on Hollow Earth Radio's Blues & Bluster. Listen in at your own peril.

2) The Christmas Belles.
You may remember a Christmas party so epic that the Stranger covered it? We're coming back. This year, we're making some changes: new songs, new venues, new member(s). More information to come as we figure it out.

3) HONK! Fest West.
Man, one year ends and the next starts up, just like that. The pace can be punishing. Thankfully, the reward has (so far) always made up for the hours of work necessarily tied to any venture fully run by volunteers. We already know a fair bit about 2011's Fest: it will be May 20-22 in Georgetown, Fremont, and West Seattle. Still to come: bands, schedule, volunteers, food, general logistics. You know, the small stuff.

4) Strange Tales of Preston Stagger.
He's a magician who solves crimes. He's also the title character of Simon Astor's two-act play. I'm writing some of the music, and will be in the pit during performances. Later in October, most of you can look forward to an invite to the theater.

5) Slap & Tickle.
I am not actively propositioning you. (although you are rather darling in that outfit. The color is really good on you.) Slap & Tickle is me on washtub bass and vocals with my good friend Kate on ukulele and vox. At the moment we're doing covers of old lovely songs that some people vaguely remember. It's just like writing a new pop song, but much, much easier. And you can tell we're serious about it because we made some videos.

Tonight You Belong To Me

You're Sixteen

Five Foot Two

We play next at Trolloween, Sunday October 31st at 7pm. Invites sure to be issued at some point closer to the actual date.

On top of all that, there's everyday life and a full-time job. A loving and wonderful partner and an amazing circle of friends. There are time I am nearly swallowed by my schedule, but I wouldn't have it any other way. What I'm trying to say, I suppose, is to please not worry if you don't hear from me here that often. If I have a spare moment, I'm most likely sleeping.

HONK! Fest West is this weekend. Tell me you'll be there.

2010-04-05T23:35:00.000-07:00

For the past six months, I've been organizing a little thing called HONK! Fest West. Only it's not so little anymore.

It's huge. Sprawling three days and four locations.

It's open. Almost every performance in the street and every single one all-ages.

It's raucous. Over 20 bands--that's over 250 musicians--will play over 19 hours of scheduled music (see:1, 2). God knows what they'll be doing when we're not looking.

It's free. We are accepting donations, but all money raised goes to either the bands or festival activities. I am a volunteer. Everyone involved with HONK! is a volunteer. You should be a volunteer!

But that doesn't really get to the nut of HONK! Fest West. Although I'd be foolish to believe there's only one.

Honk! Fest West, so sayeth the thing, "is a street fair dedicated to bringing marching bands, samba lines, horn players, drum corps, and every manner of rhythmic and melodic noisemaker we could find right to the Seattle streets."

Which is to say HONK! is loud, energetic, stylistically bold, and always on the move. Samba lines, 2nd line New Orleans jazz, drum corps, Balkan folk, and anything and everything in between.

That was nut the one.

Nut the two is our community focus. HONK! events use music to remove the line between professional and novice, audience and performers. The honkers' ultimate goal is to have fun, to relish the art of making fun as a form of individual and collective transcendence, and to encourage others to see and do the same.

We love that idea. So this year we made some changes to support that vision. In 2010, HONK! is officially in the streets and all-ages!

(And as a partner with the City of Seattle and The Vera Project, we think it makes a lot of sense.)

FRIDAY: We'll be in Fremont (pic) on N. 35th St at Phinney Ave. N. from 5-10pm.

SATURDAY: HONK hits twice! From 10am-4pm, we'll be in the Central Area (pic), headquartered in historic Washington Hall. From 6-10pm, we join our good friends the Art Attack down in Georgetown (pic).

SUNDAY: We are stoked to be sharing the streets with the West Seattle Farmers' Market. From Noon-5pm, marching bands will have the run of West Seattle. You'll probably notice a difference.

That's HONK!

It's this weekend. Tell me you'll be there.

The End Times are Confirmed

2010-01-28T13:00:00.000-08:00

via Fred:

We've confirmed ... The End Times will perform at The Mix in Georgetown (Seattle, WA) on April 16, 2010 to herald the release of THESE ARE THE END TIMES. Possibly another NW date or two as well, but don't quote me. There are still no-cost downloads available at the website, but only for a limited time ...

2009-12-17T23:00:00.000-08:00

One picture says 1,000 words, so I hung three. I'm still not sure that will be enough to explain why I'm so excited for the weekend.

Back in 2007, I joined a mysterious outfit called The Christmas Belles. Our mission: provide relief from the forced joy and hallmark sentiments that surround this time of year like hardened special forces. We were successful. And then, like the smart operatives we were, we went sleeper.

As we eased back into the mainstream, each of us found new pursuits. Some of us became prophets, others took up arms, and some drifted away.

But this year, the need was too great. We have re-grouped and assembled a set to decimate audiences as we sweep through the coming week towards Christmas. Our various dates are listed below, but it elides one very important one: our anniversary date at the very venue that birthed us.

The Belles will be joined by Hey Marseilles, Pillow Army, Yellow Hat Band, and The Seattle Elves. There is also a small matter of meat. Further information is available from me through usual channels.

three times yearly

2009-09-29T12:22:00.000-07:00

I had no intention of really talking about it, but then The Stranger's Eric Grandy went and pulled a dick move. So, yay, I guess I will. However, I want to say up front that I still support KEXP (literally, actually, and we'll get to that) and will continue to volunteer my time there.

Early last week, I received the 2008 Annual Report to Contributors. As I understand it, the report is publicly available for your perusal here. The report lists funding initiatives and revenue reports alongside the names of everyone who contributed last year. My name is right there on page 25:

It'll be there next year too; I re-upped my membership about 10 days ago. (A long story, but in a nut: I dropped in on someone's blind date and ended up having a drink. A couple days later, I realized the card I got back was someone else's, so I had to cancel mine and update the info on all of my automatic withdrawals, one of which was KEXP. I had a staffer in membership on the phone, my year was up, and it seemed the thing to do.)

As a member in good standing, I was excited to receive the report a few days later. It also names staff and their positions, and here I am again:

I'm going to be super optimistic here and say I hope to be there again by next year. But you never know. I remain a production assistant at KEXP, and with my newly available time I'm angling to increase my duties there.

At the moment, I won't lie to you. I'm bummed. At the time I was let go, I'd been board-opping for a year and five months. This coming May, I'll have volunteered there 5 years. I have, you might say, some investment. And so do the people who run the station.

Speaking of, let me show you the letter from Tom Mara where he outlines where KEXP has been and where it's going. It's interesting for sure. I can't imagine the juggling of motivations and goals that goes into running a non-profit organization, especially one as large and public as KEXP.

You may notice Mara mentions strategic planning towards a new home for KEXP. If you've never visited the station--and right now is a fabulous time to do so--you're missing out: it's an old bank building, with exactly the right mix of character and business. They keep the swag in the vault, which always tickles me. At the same time, they outgrew the building about a year ago. I can't begrudge them wanting to move. And won't, as long as they don't begrudge me wanting to stay.

I tell you all this as a reminder that today begins KEXP's fall pledge drive. I've given. Will you? I'm not naive--the station meeting its goal changes nothing about my status there--but for the next few days, when you find yourself voluntarily listening to KEXP's DJs cajoling you for cash over whatever godforsaken thing The End is playing, please realize I might be a canary, and you need their song.

Bumbershoot

2009-09-06T20:53:00.000-07:00

I'm tired as a motherfucker (because, in that situation, wouldn't you be physically and psychically exhausted? All I can do is be thankful my mom's not a tri-athlete), but I've seen some downright amazing things this weekend. I've got one more day to go, but here's a sampling of where I've been:

Iglu & Hartly:

The Whore Moans:

Os Mutantes:

Kay Kay and His Weathered Underground:

Hey Marseilles:

Parenthetical Girls:

U.S.E.

Raphael Saadiq:

Tonight!

2009-07-28T10:47:00.000-07:00

lay my passion down

2009-07-24T20:27:00.000-07:00

While I suppose I always knew it was never for forever, I always hoped that The End Times would occupy space in my life, give structure to my week and be the promise of honest work rewarded. I've said most of what I wanted to (since I regard this band much as I do the man behind it), but this show marks the end of a long and fruitful period for me.

It's been a great and rewarding thing, this. I will miss it terribly. At the same time, I can't wait to see what adventures will ambush me in the future.

Tonight The Rendezvous hosts The End Times' last performance. After 3+ years of practice, performance, and recording, we thank you, each other, and beautiful luck for what was a wonderful time together.

I'm glad we're going out at the Rendezvous; it's my favorite venue we've played by far, quiet and intimate and old, always with a half-warm case of rainier in the greenroom fridge and the feeling that even a subaural desire has weight. My family is coming, many of my friends as well, and it would be lovely--should you find youself in neither of those groups--if you came too.

We play promptly at 7pm. Don't be late.

Necessary redundance

2009-07-16T10:07:00.001-07:00

Blue Notes is throwing a hissy this morning and refusing to post. So here's the piece that will probably maybe end up there. It's all about the good people of Pillow Army.

Pillow Army celebrates the release of their new EP, To Comfort and Destroy tonight at the High Dive, and you know I'm gonna be there.

I've had a damn hard time writing this, for two different reasons. Reason the first: I love, love, love this band and its creative force, Tim Franklin. An East Coast transplant, Franklin moved to our fair burg just under two years ago and has since assembled around him a remarkably talented group of players to give his songs depth, movement, and weight. Now six members strong, PA is wily and agile, a division of scouts for a mysterious military operation. Which brings me to the second reason: Pillow Army is not easily categorized.

Featuring cello, violin, and flute (along with the more traditional guitar, bass, and drums), the songs of Pillow Army's new EP To Comfort and Destroy organically explore the possibilities of melody, explaining and requiring what for other bands would be wild shifts in temperament and style. If that sounds like high-falutin academic/critic faux-speak, let's ground it in the evidence presented.

Happy opens the EP as a deceptively bouncy pop song about a church social. It starts simple with a rolling tom lick and assertive guitar figure before expanding the coda into an expressive orchestral wash. With clapping hands, hollered choirs, and the sweet addition of flautist Kaitlin Morrison's harmonies, Happy more than lives up to its name.

Model Citizen introduces social criticism to the mix via Franklin's pure tenor--"another dull suburbanite, born to drain the world's resources, I eat and sh-t and throw away"--and the result is an ominous tension/agreement between lyrics and the hard gnaw of strings. A graduate of Berklee College of Music, Franklin's ability to separate and arrange voices (which, here, refers to all instruments) keeps the song's narrator from sinking, bashing and buffeting him with waves of conformity and expectations until it or he must simply stop.

The subject matter is revisited in The Price, a song darker still and one reminiscent of The Starlight Mints and/or The Pixies, with barely controlled feedback, skulking cello, and the first big example of genre shift: the bridge guides the arrangement from its trollish habitation out along the Irish countryside and then into the drawing room of an intimate manor. That its lyrics discuss pop culture's fascination with celebrity flameout ("perhaps an overdose will boost your cred the most, and every word you said will turn to poetry") shades the full cost of The Price.

Now we're four songs in and fully prepped for death. And while it's not completely fair to say You're Not Here Anymore is a meditation on the idea--the lyrics shy away from settling on death or break-up, which, I suppose, is an elegant way of saying there's not much difference between them--the plucks and squeals of string are too harrowing to be focused on much else. The resolution hinted at in the final lines ("you're not here anymore, but if you were, you'd want me to be happy") is left to drift away.

And then alights fully formed in Codeine. A love note, a warning, and an explosion, Codeine deftly wraps confusion around acceptance both lyrically ("I couldn't make it without you. Without you and codeine.") and musically, as the grounding riff is eventually obliterated beneath waves of distortion and the high song of violin. It's the perfect end to the EP: an overwhelming climax of intention as melody says what words cannot.

However, that's not how the EP ends.

Included as conclusion is a cover of Neutral Milk Hotel's Oh Comely. A great many people don't know who NMH are and I consider it a great shame. In The Aeroplane Over the Sea, the album from which this song comes, is a new classic and one of my desert island choices; the song itself belongs to an elite collection of compositions that were recorded right the first time and simply do not need another go-round. So I'm probably a bad person to judge this cover.

That said, Pillow Army believes in it the way I do. They do not futz with the presentation. Utilizing a stripped-down set-up--only Franklin and strings--they shift and tear at the unrequited love that fuels the song, growing into the cracks and up into the light.

This is what it sounded like at the Tractor (if you listen close, you can hear me yelling "holy sh-t" at the end. Just like they do on the record!):

Eventually, I realized a couple of things: 1) I need to let go, put my vinyl copy of ITAOTS away and get on with my life; and 2) I should think of it as encore. If Pillow Army did a five-song set that blew my mind like this EP did, said thanks, and stepped off stage, I'd be whooping and stomping until they came back out. If Oh, Comely was that encore I would never stop talking about it.

In fact, that's kinda what happened at The Tractor and I still haven't.

So, in summation, To Comfort and Destroy is amazing and as complete a realization of Pillow Army's talents as I could hope for. I can't wait to hear the full-length. I can't wait to see them again.

Things change

2009-07-10T15:26:00.000-07:00

Tonight I'm going to do something I've never done before, and--to answer your question--I don't think it's going to be of the sort where I have regrets tomorrow.

For an hour or so, I'll be busking outside Avanti Art & Design and then heading inside to perform. The difference between the two will be minimal, probably with slightly more heckling at one. If you show up, you get to decide which one.

Why am I doing this you ask? Because my good friend Brian Enriquez asked me.

He's releasing Ayasofya, his newest chapbook and recorded readings of the same. From design to content, it's a beautiful collection. I'm pleased to have an opportunity to support him.

Speaking of, we did an interview for Hollow Earth Radio about the release, the art of creation, and the delightful swoosh of procrastination. It's already aired, but a lucky few of you might be able to download it here.

If you're looking for something to do tonight, I believe this will be an awesome event. It's beautiful out, the Greenwood Artwalk will be in full effect, and I'll be singing songs I love (including one or two of my own).

The End Times

2009-07-06T08:28:00.000-07:00

One of the first gigs I ever had in this city was for a little arts&culture mag run outta Wallingford. It always seemed on the verge of falling over, the magazine I mean, issues coming together in a haphazard fashion as writers delivered or didn't, and ideas got proposed or abandoned or refashioned under rules of order that involved dice, somehow. I wrote some stuff I loved there. And met more than a few people who affected me greatly. One of them was Fred.

Most of you know the story, I think, but what happened was Kate, one of the aforementioned few and the books editor, put up an ad as singer for hire. Fred found it, recognized the author and approached her at a bone-throwing editorial meeting. I can't say with any sort of certainty how I got invited along but it was probably because, as intern, they figured I'd take minutes. Instead, Fred allowed and encouraged me to play lapsteel slide as the odd rehearsals became thrice-weekly regular and the tiny project evolved into The End Times. I could not be more thankful he did. That was three plus years ago.

Because of T.E.T., I've traveled to Detroit and back, recorded with garage legends, done shows in tea kettles and movie theaters and lesbian bars, sung Capt. Beefheart at the Blue Moon, taken part in two choirs, laughed a lot, drank more, learned how to play slide so I could say something I meant, and then said it on songs and with people I loved and believed in deeply.

I've known for a little while, but Fred officially gave word: He and Lori will return to Michigan in August, in a move I'm sure augurs good things for them both. I can't begin to say how much I'll miss both of them. I feel a little bit lost already and they're still in-state.

This also means, for those of who have come and supported us over the years--you fervent and lovely lot you, thank you thank you thank you--the upcoming show at The Rendezvous will be our last for some time.

In one of those cosmic hilarities, our full-length should be done just in time for us to hand out copies to those interested. We've been recording for the past few months. I think you'll love it.

Meet Quimby.

2009-07-05T22:08:00.000-07:00

He's new to my apartment. And already attacking the fish, that scamp.

Sums and I put this up over the weekend. The design's been kicking around for a while now, but I could never fix the medium. Canvas and (some kind of) paint was my last inclination. Thanks to a Summer suggestion, Quimby is contact paper of a wonderful pattern picked up from FM for a song, freehand drawn and cut by Summer and myself, and situated between art gifted me by Lui (the small oil in the top-left corner) and Jen (the evocatively painted fish in the lower right).

I like him already.

This Sunday

2009-06-18T11:05:00.001-07:00

For My Wife

As it happened

2009-06-06T19:42:00.000-07:00

I was in Vegas the other day and a couple on either side of it, looking for adventure in a town more than willing to sell you as much of it as it can manufacture and market. A town where it's possible to get a stumbling buzz and a sunburn before noon. Where you can ask police officers to pose for photo ops. Where you can smoke indoors and drink outside. More a hedonist's daydream than a town, really.

We (my girl, my brother, and I) left early on a Friday and came back late on a Sunday because that's what you do when you're not quite flush, and you're trying to draw to one. Us and the town did not break even.

SEATTLE, Friday 2:30AM - The streets are mostly empty. You can easily stand in them and watch for your bus. Sure, people might get irritated at driving up on an unexpected manslaughter charge, but it's your right as a Person Awake at that Hour.

And once the bus arrives, sit wherever amuses you. Fer instance, we all sat in the back, a tactical mistake. Even at that hour the airport bus fills up, and it's very difficult to move away when the most odorous man you have ever encountered sits beside you. He's got a smell you'd characterize as malevolent and liken to an inquisitive octopus. Open windows and you'll still have to hold your breath at red lights.

After a couple of long stops without one, the flight was a breeze.

Our first meal was in the Steakhouse at Bill's Gambling Hall and Saloon, a little two and a half star joint on the strip. Dark wood walls, red upholstery, sassy waitress. Nice place for a mobland whacking. We had tried to hit the "street" cafe in Paris because they serve eggs benedict there that play staring roles in Sums' dreams, but only until 11am. So: Bill's.

For the ubiquity of liquor, some casinos still have unusual restrictions on access. Our waitress--who was keeping us up to date on the passing drama of her coworkers--could not take our drink order. She had to call in one of the cocktail waitresses from her regular path around the slots to serve us. At least they pour strong in Vegas. No use in thinking clearly here.

With food in our bellies, we headed out into the sun to wander proper. The city is an oddly sprawled theme park, where working escalators run 50%, and people in costumes populate the crowds. Honestly, we didn't do much the first day. The early morning was the evening's cooler. We slept and woke with enough time to eat some eggs bene de Paris.

Then, dismissive of the flash and jazz, we headed down to Fremont Street, Old Vegas. I don't know how long ago they did it but two entire blocks are covered with a giant lcd screen, which they use to tell you empowering parables about the corporate sponsor, but also makes for neat backdrops in memories.

While my brother quickly made the switch to blackjack, Sums kept at the slots. Neither did better than the other, although both were up at one point. I'm not much of a gambler--I don't get the buzz of feeding money to a blank face hoping I irritate its stomach enough that it shits credits--so after my initial $20 was done, I was too. After a good couple hours gambling, we were all ready for something else. Naked women were decided on as the perfect palate cleanser.

I've never gone to a strip club before. I have a girlfriend. The money I spend on her gets me full access, not just promising but short back rubs and repeated hard sells of dances in backcurtain rooms. But there we were, up on the bar, while old and busteds followed cleveland jerseys up and down the pole, and anonymously costumed girls sat in the shadows behind us like extras in the speakeasy scenes of Miss Saigon.

The sixth girl up was the first one with any kind of music in her body, slapping her ass and clacking her lucite heels to the beat (aside: why is strip club music generally so terrible? Is it because the meatheads who are most often in to leer have no taste?). She could wink her buttock over her brown eye like the charmer she was. After closing in on us, she took possession of my hat.

My hat worked the crown of her head like a sloshed sorority girl on amateur night for the next half hour or so, as I sat there and kept tabs and drinking. It should not surprise you the drinks were strong. Weak drings and strong lights are strip club kryptonite, but, ah, the reverse! The intersection of imagination and inebriation is nothing short of magic.

Back out on the family-friendly streets, we returned to our previous pursuits. Slots, blackjack, drinking. It wasn't to last. The alcohol had finally tricked its way past Sums' senses, and was making its escape in 15-second sprints. We had come down on the Deuce, LV's bus system, but since that would be slow murder, we hailed a cab home to Imperial Palace.

Slumped in bed, Sums assured me she'd be fine and sent me back out into the night. My brother was already back in the cards. I wandered up and down the boulevard until 4am. In the two hours I was out, I was offered weed ("finest cush in from L.A."), a free limo ride to a strip club (by a guy who began his spiel with: "Have you ever stuck your entire hand in a woman's vagina?", which I guess he uses because it sorta demands a response, and when I demurred) a prostitute delivered straight to my room, anything ("I'm your candyman, I've got what you want" said the guy as he approached), and another limo to the strip club by two jaded women ("we thought you might like to go because you're so HANDsome"). In the meantime, I saw a lot of little human drama, the kind that always happens when a long day of drinking winds down: arguments, unclear relationships hurtling towards closed doors, and the police rounding up the worst offenders.

Somehow, we woke up in time to check out before they charged us another day, and we snailed our way to brunch at Planet Hollywood, where unlimited champagne only costs another three dollars. Waitresses walk around with pitchers of mimosas and top off glasses as you eat steamtable delicacies. We decided to let our stomachs settle by riding the roller coaster at New York, NY. Then the monorail, then Speed: The Ride at the Sahara, where they shoot you 60mph through a few loops and then again backwards.

After a short stop at fashion show mall--it has its own runway and backstage area that rises out of the floor and then disappears again, taking the models with it--we were on our way back to the airport. By the time we were home, it was Monday, work was imminent, and the whole thing had the feeling of deja vu centered on a leg that's fallen asleep.

2009-05-27T13:08:00.000-07:00

It’s been a minute. One my favorite sayings, it points directly to the elastic nature of time. In reality, it’s been over a month since I’ve written anything here. To me, it feels like ten. To you, it maybe felt like, what, a couple years? I know you await my word like a faithful hound.

During a whirlwind weekend--which you can read about here--I bought a stylish straw hat. I know what you’re thinking: writing “stylish” is completely unnecessary. What can I say? Specificity never hurt anyone but those who don’t know what they want.

I’ve come around to wearing hats, now that I’ve figured out what styles work for my face shape: flat caps and fedoras. Obviously, my career has been circling around becoming a number runner and/or newsie for some time. This is the next step.

As I get older, so do my sartorial proclivities. I already enjoy wearing vests and am on active lookout for a pocket watch. By the time I’m fifty, I’ll be wearing tunics and philosophizing in public. Thinking about what I’ll sport when/if I hit 90 worries me, but then again most of you will be dead (probably. It’s nothing personal) and if I can’t run around with only my accumulated filth and hoarsely-voiced epithets to protect my decency then, well, when can you?

So, what have you missed? Honk Fest for one. That shit was off the hook, as the kids inexplicably say. I’ve never expressed waste so compact it would hang on a nail longer than 20 minutes tops. Honk Fest went three days, had over 200 performers and a fantastic reception. That’s a lot of hammering.

The End Times are back in the studio, hard at work on an album. It’s coming along nicely, with a fuller sound than ever before attempted. There are drums on this thing, and a cello. We’ve never been closer to living up to our name.

Desperado—which we have apparently adopted as the name of our previously untitled Linda Ronstadt tribute band—has a gig at the Wildrose next month as part of a benefit for For My Wife. Unless I’m greatly mistaken, it’s the same night Pillow Army headlines Neumo’s. Will this night be awesome? Do I have brown nails in my walls?

I bought some flowers yesterday and repotted them. They’re on my windowsill now. I hope they flourish. No worse omen than something in your care dying, unless it's something in your bed.

Volunteer for Honk!

2009-04-03T08:15:00.000-07:00

Honk! Fest West is coming! I've been involved since September and finally--finally!--we're just one week off.

Honk is bringing in some fantastic street bands, tons of horns and drums, from around the Pacific Northwest, across the nation, and out of Canada. Bands like: Orkestar Zirconioum, Titanium Sporkestra, Leland Stanford Junior University Marching Band, Samba Ja, Environmental Encroachment, March Fourth Marching Band, and Emperor Norton Stationary Marching. They'll take over Georgetown, Ballard, and Gasworks park. From venues and into the streets and vice versa.

It's gonna be badass and we want everyone to know.

But knowing is only half the battle. We need your help!

Multiple volunteer positions are available, from working the door to providing security to glad-handing bands. As a thank you for your time, you'll be welcome to enjoy the rest of the night's festivities on us.

Come out to Honk! and shake your shit with us!

The low end

2009-03-23T10:24:00.001-07:00

apropos of my last post

2009-03-02T21:33:00.000-08:00

You can put curlers in your hair, but they'll want to bring their brooms

2009-02-25T12:02:00.000-08:00

According to noted clown Phillipe Gaulier, Bouffon is an art form which originated with the 'Ugly People' of France. Gaulier was referring specifically to Ugly French People circa the Renaissance, but try as they might, the French still breed ugly now and then. Anyway, Gaulier noted that the excessively ugly--lepers and the like--were expected to remain unseen except when the class system dictated they entertain the upper 1%. You know, festival season. Bring out the gimps!

Says Gaulier:

The ideal performance for a bouffon would be one where the audience is wildly entertained, and then go home, realize their lives are meaningless, and commit suicide. This of course is a theoretical ideal instead of an anticipated outcome.

I bring all of this up to tell you that The End Times is playing The Comet this Thursday.

Once we finish, I’ll rush to Hollow Earth Radio for a sweet two hours of Blues & Bluster. This week: Nilsson and Seger Liberation Army, Linda Rondstat and Tori Amos, among others.

And if that wasn’t enough, Friday brings not one, but three shows you should really consider checking out:

Our wonderful singer Abi is playing at the Kiss Cafe in Ballard;
Our friends Pillow Army are holding down the High Dive;
and Honk Fest West presents Titanium Sporkestra, The Fremont Phil, The Yellow Hat Band, The Northwest Choro Collective, and Tits & Brass as part of a benefit gig at Lo-Fi.

Saturday should be spent contemplating the end of yet another month, something I'll accomplish by finally recording my cover of They Might Be Giants' seminal tune We Want a Rock on that cute ukulele my brother gave me for Christmas. After which, as I expect many in the vicinity to garrote themselves mirthlessly, it feels a little cruel to bring up March.

In other words

2009-01-22T11:08:00.000-08:00

There’s a couple of things in the hopper today, items I will illuminate with bright words and active verbs to better capture the nearly unfathomable scale of their awesomeness, and then fed, as all things placed into a hopper are, into that thresher we keep out back. Watch your hair and mind your hands.

The End Times has, through backchannel deals, been selected as tonight’s King of the Mountain, KMTT’s focus spot on local music. Proof. Which means, at 9:20pm tonight, we’ll officially be co-opted by the man, held tenderly by him, and then dropped on a corner in our neighborhood, our clothes askew and a Djarum shoved halfway between our lips. You gotta light?

Back at my flat, I’ll collect some vinyl and hoof it down the street to Hollow Earth Radio, where I’ll bring you Blues & Bluster from 11pm – 1am. There’ll be a lot of horns tonight, a few covers, and several gems from upcoming Seattle shows, mixed with whatever requests you or others bother me with. My friend Yas will be joining me, so I must assume he’ll provide some direction as well. We’re men, we’ll figure it out.

Something is probably happening on Friday, but I’ll be buggered if I know what.

Saturday, though, sees me in Olympia, where The End Times will infiltrate Le Voyeur with a sassy ploy stolen straight from a 50s screwball comedy: we got booked. Last year, Le Voyeur treated (u(s)o) nicely that we had to do it again. If you’re in the area, and reading this, you belong to an unlikely populace and should join us.

Summer gave me Fragile Things, a collection of Neil Gaiman’s short stories, a week or so ago, and I read to the end: woody, opaque, with a bittersweet finish. Gaiman’s one of those names I know, but never read anything by, which I realize now was a mistake. Like any good book, I’m loathe to let it go, but now I have 20 years of his output to work my way through. Right after I finish the shelves of sheafs of manuscripts and letters in my possession and still now unread.

Right after.

TONIGHT

2009-01-16T16:46:00.000-08:00

With friends Hurricane Chaser and Justin Roeser. With enemies too, if you're looking.

@Mars Bar
9 p.m. $6.

Definitions: Need a Napkin

2009-01-13T16:17:00.000-08:00

Need a Napkin (V. phrase):

1) To realize you need something just before it is brought to you.
2) To give off the air of an unspeakable request.

Here ya are, you looked like you needed a napkin. Those ribs are messy. Can I get you anything else?

Hey there, baby. You need a napkin? You're drooling. Come on in the backroom. Sugah knows what you want.

Blues & Bluster

2009-01-08T08:17:00.001-08:00

Up in Everett, in a modified doublewide curiously placed downtown, was the last time I was on the radio proper. The format was poor, but inoffensive: local artists mixed with world music, with heavy doses of BBC canned programming. It was run by a sweaty mess of a person I didn't care for much and his underling, who I liked only by comparison.

But I loved it all the same, being sequestered in a closet, surrounded by antiquated equipment, pushing buttons and talking to no one. Missle defense with music.

It's been nearly four years since that gig, so I'm inordinately excited for tonight.

The best of the Sound, older and ill-remembered performers, and readings from poets of all stripes, tied together with the straight truth and good-natured fibbing. Revering the familiar and rescuing the rest, it's Blues&Bluster.

Is it necessary to say I host? I do. Tonight we're gonna get into some XTC, Touabab Krewe, new Antony and the Johnsons, and The Stooges, among many others.

Live from 11pm - 1am on Hollow Earth Radio

The end of the month

2008-12-12T11:55:00.000-08:00

The Decemberists played last month; another fantastic show by them, opened by Loch Lomond. El squared will never be, contrary to some hype, the next big thing out of Portland. In their current incarnation, they are too mannered and quiet. I say this recognizing how close it is to the faint praise heaped on Colin Meloy, back when he was a meloncholy unknown. And look what he's become:

Just a big ball of ham with an orphan's voice. What I find most fascinating about Mr.Meloy is the way he's evolved his onstage persona, toying with the fine line between hilarious pomp and bastardry. And, you know, if the songs weren't so good, he wouldn't be able to get away with as much as he does; a fact I'm sure he's aware of.

Anyway, halfway through the show, some kid yells Colin, can I ask you a question? That question turns out to be: will you videotape yourselves for me, since security won't allow me to do it? This is the answer:

Aw. Adorable. And look at those hamhock chops!

Singer, Song, Shows

2008-12-09T09:35:00.000-08:00

On the first day of this year, walking off the drunk and towards the truck I'd convienently parked at an elementary school, I found a note tucked beneath my windshield wiper. It read: "Fuck 2007. 2008 is going to be awesome! xo, Louise"

(Louise, it should be noted, is currently staging Othello at Balagan Theater. I'm a jerk and haven't made it out and probably won't be able to, but I'm sure YOU can.)

For all sorts of reasons, for me and others, 2007 was a tough year. I wanted 2008 to be better. Needed it to be. You could argue the reason Louise's note turned out so prophetic is because I fought to make it so; I prefer to believe that Louise has magical powers--strange, mystical forces she cannot necessarily control, only summon. Either way, I know better than to touch her magic wand.

Whatever the reason, though, things got good this year: steady and successful employment, rewarding friend and relation ships (with reinforced timber hulls and everything), more writing, better health (and related choices), crates upon crates of music, and the re-emergence of The End Times.

On the 18th of this month, at local fave The Blue Moon, we'll play live for the first time since March, and for the first time ever with our new singer Abigail.

After that, you can catch us at the Skylark Cafe on December 23rd at 9p.m., and at Tacoma's Java Jive on January 30th. We'll also be hopping back into the studio to record some new tracks (some of which you can already hear on our MySpace).

Not only that, but our EP These Are The End Times is up for consideration on KEXP's Top 90.3 of 2008. If you like our style, you can vote for us (and nine others; may I suggest Hey Marseilles and The Moondoggies?) by clicking here.

Of course, for all the triumph, I was sailing in the eye. Many others had the dubious pleasure of testing their resolve, health, and security under unfavorable conditions. I'm proud and relieved to report many made it. And for those who are still in the midst of a tough year, I'll tell you this: Fuck 2008. 2009 is gonna be awesome!

xot

I probably would have cried

2008-10-20T20:48:00.000-07:00

Neutral Milk Hotel - Engine - 10/18/2008 Brillobox, Pittsburgh PA from Engine on Vimeo.

Reduction

2008-09-24T13:29:00.000-07:00

Historically, making the jump from print to tv requires a complete abdication of tone, humor, and intent. Especially cartoons. For every Charles Schultz, you get ten Scott Adams. It's the law. So imagine my surprise at the above. Sure, it's pointed and mean and accurate, but so is the originating strip; in fact, since they wisely decided to keep the episodes under 2 minutes* instead of dragging the joke behind a truck for 22, the strip feels like the secondary creation, not a cash-in really (as I'd be surprised if there's a lot of money in political cartooning) but the spin-off.

And now that we probably won't see Sarah Palin answer any questions, ever, for anything, I don't even mind the meanness.

*All comedy scenes should be under two minutes. Anything more and you've done one of two things: 1) missed the point, messed up the logic, or fallen in love with your own voice; or 2) hit the joke and then hit the joke again, for laughing at you.

the necessary notes

2008-09-19T11:11:00.000-07:00

In the house next door, the one with the missing shutter, the old woman had begun dancing again. Adi could feel it, the woman’s feet shuffling across the floor, along the run of his back. A thousand steps in an old softshoe shoving him further into the sheets as he lay in bed, waiting for her to stop, flip the record, again begin. Sometimes it felt like there was no end to her dance; she went on for hours, playing god knows what as her toes walked the valley of his ribs.

This was Thursday.

Friday, Adi awoke to an odd hambone in his lungs. It was a step- a stomp, rather, he corrected himself, that kept knocking about in his chest. He coughed twice, involuntarily. Twice more, voluntarily, hoping to dislodge it, but the stomp, which had now transitioned into a stately promenade, didn’t waver. His breaths, when they came, fluttered rhythmically; his abdomen felt full of shoes.

For one brief moment, Adi considered telephoning the old woman who was dancing inside him at her residence on his left, but decided against it. Once, some months ago, when the dancing had continued for hours, eventually reaching a tempo that made Adi too nauseated to stand, he had called her. It took minutes longer than he would have liked; information was hesitant to release her number based solely on her address and although Adi hadn’t her name or the wish to argue, he also could no longer stand the leading steps that slid into his throat.

When she answered, the dancing stopped. Adi nearly cried.

“Yes?” she had asked. Her tone was reedy, featherlight and flexible. “Hello?”

He hadn’t considered what he’d say to her, this woman whose legs kicked at his heart. The unanswered query hung between them on a breaking thread; his answer, his request unspeakable. She hung up. Muttering, he followed suit and began to wait for her to begin.

Today, Friday, he looked at her number hanging on his wall where he had pinned it above the phone and called in instead to work.

“No. I’m sorry. Terrible cough. I can’t,” said Adi to his supervisor once she had been fully apprised and picked up the phone. It was as little a lie as he could possibly tell. Soon, possibly tomorrow, they would fire him for his absences. He could hear it in her voice, the “Feel better, Adi” closing the call.

Around nine, after almost an hour of quiet, he could feel her stretching, preparing for another go with her infernal music, the counterpoint he never heard. The dance came quickly, a rough tarantella that softened up his kidneys with pointed execution. He felt vomitous and quickly dashed to the bathroom to make space for her.

For two hours it went, the steps a mixture of slows and quicks, a sketch of the dance’s line wound between his organs and through his bones. Adi lay completely still on his bed, dressed in clothes of two days ago, his bare feet straight, and his eyes open. He tried to picture her, this practicing coryphée.

She was beautiful, her face only slightly weathered with age, wrinkles of concentration and laughter; her arms and legs strong from a thousand days danced beneath the ceiling of his skin; her body clothed in a dress of simple cut that emphasized her length.

On his bed, the mattress sponging sweat, Adi closed his eyes and gave himself the escape of the vision.

Before him now, beneath red draperies and beside the tall unmarked columns, she stood, a model of poise and grace. He could see her in his head, standing motionless and ready. Ever deaf to what moved her, he could tell when the music began only by the fragmentary smile that broke through the wall of her face and the flutter, the involuntary seize, of his diaphragm.

Then she moved. Fluid, strong steps that took her away and then back to him as he watched. She hopped nimbly across the floor, flinging her hands up over her head, her dress billowing softly. Sometimes she moved out of the light into the darkness at the edges of the floor; he could only feel her then, moving in spectral precision, but he waited patiently for her return. And there she was, in front of him again, her hands on his. This dance was for him, if he wanted it.

Adi escorted her to the center of the floor and waited for the music to begin.

Definitions: Sunflustered

2008-09-14T21:54:00.000-07:00

Sunflustered (V): To receive a burn, primarily from the sun, of an insignificant degree. Martin was sunflustered, like an unprepped undergrad flummoxed by an instructor's question.

Definitions: Guilty

2008-08-03T21:01:00.000-07:00

Guilty (gill tea) adj.

1. To be so bad that you've objectively been judged so by peers. Cred. Didja hear? Jasper put two in Kerry after he mucked on the docks. That's some seriously guilty shit.

2. Doing time to earn one's due. Respect. Seattle, WA--The newly resolute John "Jasper" Phillips pled 'Guilty', officially ending the State's chances of implicating alleged crime boss Alex Boskevitch in the recent wave of break-ins at popular chain electronic stores. Trevor Abilglass, lead counsel for the State, has implied, but been unable to prove, that Phillips is taking the fall for Boskevitch.

3. Hip. Look at this ink I got to commemorate my brother Jas! It's guilty.

2008-07-08T13:33:00.000-07:00

I was shaving the other day around the latest outcropping of acne on my chin, cursing my life's good luck to get my mom's bad skin, when a phrase popped in my head like an aggrieved blood vessel. This is not unusual. Things bubble up all the time. My brain will cobble together some words into a phrase fraught with emotional resonance and, often, an abundance of assonance before lobbing it at the world like a spaghetti plate at a wall. This is what teachers call brainstorming.

From there, I try to concoct a vignette that might properly frame those words, imbuing them with the feelings and tensions I had in saying them. Some angst, some pain, and a month later, it's a first draft so ugly you consider keeping it in a burlap sack until you can find a bat or a stick or something with which to beat it to death. On the plus side, if you're lucky, it's an honest little thing, with no refinement or pretension to trip up its blaring declaration of THE TRUTH.

And then you must revise THE TRUTH, pushing it forever up until you abandon it or it crushes you, hopefully somewhere near where you started. This is where I often get stuck, sitting at mountain bottom on top of my boulder thinking how godawfully hard it'll be to begin. To get rid of all the parts that don't work and replace them with other things that are marginally better, intelligent design in metered lines, evolution in essay form.

For me, the problem is affect, that need to be bigger than the moment and say a little something to everyone; my symptom: sarcasm, a knowing eye roll of the tongue. The funny thing is observing how that same wrench gets in everywhere. The man who dances around his stiff spine like a church-approved maypole, biting at his lip as hardens his elbows into crooks? Afraid to simply shake his shit. The woman who tries to sing Houston when she should just loosen up and belt out some Jett? Scared of her own inherent power. You gotta let the audience find you, not the reverse, and I've a glut of projects that I need to clear out of my barn.

With your fingers curled in the beach

2008-05-19T22:03:00.000-07:00

Tomorrow--improbably--The End Times has a show. We'll be gracing the stage of our favorite little house/bar Cafe Racer right around nine and will play for as long as the gin and whisky fuels us. This is perfect preparation for our upcoming recording session, sure to be available on our MySpace sponsored shop within a fortnight.

Speaking of recording, The Irrelevant Prophets recently visited the Fairhaven recording studio and put four future singles to DAT tape. The results are fiery, focused affairs, except for the one about the solar system, because there is no fire in space. You can hear (and download) them here.

As for me, I've traveled out of open-ended days (oftentimes known as the "musician lazies") into highly-structured weeks. I'm maintaining three jobs in as many disciplines: one catering to my years of tutoring the hard scrawls in writing centers, another that pays me to listen to fresh world-heavy mixes, and the last, the newest, which is full-on office work, surrounding my clerical obsessions with a positive, supportive environment.

An environment you can experience the essence of, even if the methods are much much different, tomorrow at Cafe Racer. We'll be in the rumpus room, but we'll meet you in the bar.

I roll deep

2008-04-17T09:11:00.000-07:00

Before I forget.

Definitions: Speaker Crackle

2008-04-14T21:42:00.000-07:00

Speaker Crackle: (noun) Hiccups.

"I can't understand a thing Sarah's saying on this message. Her speaker crackle is fierce."

Something about this

2008-04-11T14:15:00.001-07:00

The two following poems appeared in Garrison Keillor's Writer's Almanac and stuck with me for a couple of months; something in the way the form intersects with the thought, the thrust. Instead of having these kick around my inbox forever, I'm placing them here.

Aftermath
by George Held, from Grounded
Finishing Line Press, 2007

It's not the storm itself—wind and rain lashing shore,
uprooting trees, toppling poles and dousing lights,
flooding cellars and roads, capsizing boats—
but the aftermath—the bright calm, the pair
of drowned cats crumpled against the picket fence,
the parlor of Izzy's shack open for inspection,
the walls fallen flat on all sides, your own
roof filling the front yard, covering your car,
and your own twin daughters dazed by Nature's
petulance—that makes you reconsider
your life and weigh your possessions and the cost
of putting down stakes too near the coast
as the globe warms, and storms grow worse

~

Montana
by Gary Johnson

A great many small failures have brought me to this
Dark room where, against the teachings of the church,
I lie in the forgiving dark with you and we kiss
And loosen our clothing and feel the hot urge
Toward nakedness, man's natural destination,
The slow unbuttoning, unclasping, until at last
We lie revealed. The fine sensation
Of you on my skin. A slender woman as vast
As Montana and I am now heading west
On a winding road through the dark contours
Of mountains and into a valley, coming to rest
In a meadow that I recognize as yours.
This is what I drove across North Dakota to find:
This sweet nest. And put all my failed life behind.

The End Times Jive

2008-04-10T21:41:00.000-07:00

When we arrived, it was closed.

The giant plaster tea pot--made of the same material those roadside dinosaurs were poured, general American hope and plaster, probably able to withstand a nuclear blast--was shut. It and roaches will be all that remain when we're dust. Teapots and dinosaurs and roaches.

We saw old friends (Hi Pat!) and made new, saw great bands and also rans, and generally had a time.

If you joined us then, or at Cafe Racer, thank you. Your support is everything.

This coming Wednesday, we play a show at the one venue in this city perfectly suited to our stylistic and acoustic desires: The Jewelbox Theater. We will assist Pillow Army and Hardison. The latter of which opened the Jive for us, like thus:

Hardison

The End Times

Paul and Deborah Paige

Aurora Roarers

things I thought filing

2008-04-10T21:23:00.000-07:00

With long tendon flexes sunk subdermally along the length
of a spindle puppet construction, a dutiful judyless punch
pulls low threads of voice from his decantered cork ear

and, following dusty graphs and glyphs, hearthewn,
knits etymological maps under dusty overhangs,
pressed wood cabinet sausage planks,

hermetically cased with the key cardinal scarlett
his slender flesh peninsulas, shanks of purpose
building alphabetical totems.

Infinity flirts again

2008-04-05T10:59:00.000-07:00

Troops

Please join The End Times this Saturday night, April 5 2008, for a
free performance at our beloved Cafe Racer in the University District
of Seattle, WA. Cafe Racer is a very small, relatively intimate and
utterly friendly space that we can't endorse enough. Don't worry,
there's liquor there.

Also performing will be Mostly Dimes.

CAFE RACER
5828 Roosevelt Way N.E.
Seattle, WA 98105
(206) 523-5282

Thank you for your attention.

The End Times

Definitions: Company Picnic

2008-04-03T12:25:00.000-07:00

Company Picnic (noun): Sexual activity with (potential) coworkers.

"That boy in accounting is cute. You should invite him to a company picnic."

wooden winter porch

2008-04-03T12:22:00.000-07:00

calm night you remarked
your head against the nighttime
your feet heeling dirt

I've eaten here so many times

2008-04-01T19:33:00.000-07:00

The Seattle Department of Health has ordered Rancho Bravos Tacos truck—on 2nd Ave North and North 45th—to close after inspectors found several health violations, including improper food storage and inadequate hand washing facilities.

Found on Slog and mentioned here (among many other things).

The truck is open again tonight, like a meat-scented mirage. I know I'll eat there soon, but where it always felt like an ill-advised idea before, now it seems like I'm actively courting e.coli.

Up in the Belly

2008-03-25T19:32:00.000-07:00

Thanks to the good folks (and you, of course, forever you) at Fantasia Coffee in Bellingham, Irrelevant Prophets played to small but vocal crowd this past Wednesday, deafening those closest and amusing the barristas. Coming after an all too brief practice (literally, after), the performance was nothing short of a success on any number of levels. For instance, I received a free chai shake for playing bass.

The Prophets will head into the studio soon to record their debut EP, the better to bring you our thoughts on racism, immigration, and Dungeons & Dragons.

And we will practice before perfomance. Promise.

Doom-folk

2008-03-25T15:13:00.000-07:00

Seattle Sound, this city's premier music clearing house, has selected The End Times' song "Days of Plenty" as their Ditty of the Day.

Read what he has to say right here.

Matt Pond PA

2008-03-23T21:43:00.000-07:00

Is really great live, it turns out.
Sent via BlackBerry from T-Mobile

This is what I was thinking of

2008-03-23T03:16:00.000-07:00

Ethos

2008-03-21T21:01:00.001-07:00

Farewell, profit, and be indulgent.

- Johann Joseph Fux

Mornings are worthless

2008-03-21T09:01:00.000-07:00

Like most kids who grew up on comics, I always assumed my keen senses would alert me when in danger of attack. Villians, minions, henchmen, haters, whatever. Of course, I also thought it physically possible for special powers to develop over time. There were a lot of lies when I was a child.

Turns out my senses suck. I took the bus this morning to work, as I often do, and woke up nearly in issaquah. The QUAH. Where there's nothing but gas stations and places Isaac Brock has fallen down blackout.

The worst part (the worst part! As if waking up early to show up late doesn't bite enough) is that I'd rather be at work. I'D RATHER BE AT WORK. What kind of mixed up life am I living?

In conclusion, mornings are worthless.

Bellingham becomes Irrelevant

2008-03-17T22:48:00.000-07:00

Prophet-style, that is.

Irrelevant Prophets, that banging face of truth, are going to be playing a show this Wednesday, and we want you there, shaking what your mother gave you.

We are the sole hip-hop act in a hard rock/metal show, so we're going on first. We'd like you to hear what we have to say, THEN get your head pounded in with 100 pounds of moving air.

Some sources say FREE SHOW, others $3, but either way, cheap date. This, a ten spot and a kiss might get you in her knickers.

Fantasia Espresso
Wednesday, March 19th
7pm sharp!

Irrelevant Prophets
Lung Panther
Ghost Dad
Into the Storm

Definitions: Thatched

2008-03-17T17:06:00.000-07:00

Thatched (adj, noun):

An effective, homemade repair. "Bobby pins and electrical tape? That's thatched."
Chemically altered, as in plugging a hole where the rain gets in. "Irving, obtain the vial. We shall grok the contents by getting terribly thatched."
In reference to a person, a fixer. "Get James. He's thatch."

another day of de

2008-03-17T16:31:00.000-07:00

My coworker takes
little pink capsules
gobbling by the handful
the cakepastepack from her kitty
like a grooming monkey
picking its mate

The monotony of filling
icecube tray text boxes
lifting names from pamphlets
wrapping them in electric ubiquity

I earn keep misreading
veiny ink on the forms

So today, you are Grizwial Custudio,
outdoorsman and janitor,

And you will be Elony Pritchard,
lonely housewife in an empty studio
raising your kids and voice in fear

You, Meep Masterson III,
from a long, proud line
of onomonopoetic masters
hailing from Dollar Street, Mabton
fallen into ruined drink now

I know I've filled out similar
forms, hastily dashing information

Somewhere, there's a better me
with scribbled signature bones
holding a job squarely and money
in his pockets and thoughts instead

Of naming and packing
these fantastical appellations
in little white boxes

My coworker is behind me again
closing that container in hollow gulps

Another job of mindless levering.

While on the subject

2008-03-04T23:44:00.000-08:00

Some time ago, in a little town called Seattle, a band put together a press packet (several, in fact) and sent it off to that last bastion of independent music known as KEXP.

They had hope, determination, and years of craftiness on their side, but still they were fighting against artists with cred, ubiquity, and fame.

Well, damned if KEXP didn't add that scrappy little band, whom we might now reveal to be our heroes The End Times, into rotation and then play us a few times.

If you'd like to hear us there more, click here to make that a reality.

Commercial

2008-03-02T20:22:00.000-08:00

So, for most of you, this will be of little interest, but in the off chance you want to spend money on something we offer for free (well, the stream anyway. These are high quality mp3s we're talking about here) on our page, we've finally made that possible. Take a gander at our Myspace sponsored band store and tremble in your high-backed chairs with the sheer heat of commerce:

In other End Times related news, we played a nice, tight set at Le Voyeur in our capitol city a little over a week ago, resulting in some new fans among the fine Olympians who made it all the way into the back to witness and a handful of artfully lit shots like this one here:

Swank, right? And since I'm talking about music and good times, Hey Marseilles rendered another stellar performance at High Dive in Fremont the other day. Some new songs made their way into the set and a few older ones were carefully rejiggered to expose some fascinating melodies. They're playing the 13th at the Tractor, and I could not be happier about the fact that they're slowly conquering larger stage strongholds with bags full of doorknobs and beauty.

I should mention that Phil, pianist and accordian player for the Marseilles men (i.e. that guy in the middle up there), serves time in another band you might have heard of: Man Down Medic. They took 3rd overall at EMP Soundoff! yesterday, a feat I'd call righteous if it wasn't so blatantly obvious they deserved 1st. Hannah: The audience clamored for New Faces; what could you as judge, or we as a culture, do but give it to them?

Stand against the wall and let me grab a pencil.

2008-02-11T16:49:00.000-08:00

This hit the presses earlier today, and while slightly contentious, should come as no surprise to anyone, really:

Beginning on March 24, 2008, Radio Liberation will air KEXP-produced programming Monday through Friday on Radio New York 91.5 FM. The programming will feature a three-hour drive-time eclectic music show followed by three simulcast hours of The Morning Show with John Richards, a nightly world music show and a weekly music variety show hosted by KEXP DJ and senior director of programming Kevin Cole.

People who are shocked probably haven't noticed the funding trend at the station: greater and larger donations are coming out of state, with significant contributions and recognition coming from the terribly hard to impress NYC. It's just like that teen movie where the poor ostracized outsider is recognized for his/her talent/looks/plot contrivance by the cool crowd, and then he/she has to re-evaluate how much they liked being uncool and hot/talented/a McGuffin versus how much they like being cool. You know the one.

Maybe it's a taboo subject to discuss market cache when it comes to non-profit member-supported organization, but to ignore the part that money and a role as taste-maker play in its eventual success is to simply ignore all the moves KEXP has made since it was KCMU. They've curried favor and asked for money for years (three times a year; the next pledge drive is in two weeks) to expand their listenership, and there's a limit to what terrestrial broadcast stations can do. So they took it to the web, where it took off exactly like it should. KEXP runs a tight, perfectly-soundtracked ship. Their programming is original, riddled with grooves and supremely listenable.

Now, they've seen the extent of the web (and ignorant, regressive copyright laws like the DMCA probably limited that horizon faster than anyone planned) and are re-establishing themselves as a tangible piece of entertainment. For New York residents, KEXP no longer floats in the clouds, it's a thing that exists in a time and place on an actual station. It's the next logical step: not a change in programming, but a packaging of it, a commoditization.

They've moved out of WMFU territory and into branding. And, hey, I've already got the mug.

We are better than flowers.

2008-02-11T16:05:00.000-08:00

Please be advised that on Valentine's Day 2008, The End Times will celebrate this most precious of Hallmark holidays with a performance at Seattle, Washington's legendary Blue Moon Tavern. We have prepared a unique program of romantic/heartbreak songs to satisfy lovers, the lovelorn and everyone in between.

THE BLUE MOON
712 NE 45TH ST.
SEATTLE, WA 98105
2.14.2008

The End Times open the show early, so meet us by 9:00pm and then stay to enjoy Zoe Muth and Sazerac and Derby.

For our friends who find themselves alone on this grim Thursday, please don't despair. Rely on your memories of past loves and revel in your fantasies of future entanglements -- these are always more potent than reality. No condition is permanent, and that special person is probably already standing right next to you. Stop your search, and you shall find.

To those who are already happily paired off, don't take your partner for granted, for life is unpredictable and usually cruel to those who know true love. Treasure the embrace.

And for those who treat love like a joke, who callously use the hearts of their fellows as fuel for ego and pride, who deliberately disguise their lust to gain entry and steal from purer souls -- we are on to you. Feel free to join the rest of us at the Blue Moon on February 14th, but be forewarned, your powers will be useless there.

Thank you for your attention. We love you all.

The End Times
www.thesearetheendtimes.com

I drank a lot of gin that night

2008-01-31T17:32:00.000-08:00

Browsing through some of my old writing, I found this post that I wrote while on the East side of the state and never finished, revised, or posted. So let's--here, now--do one of those things:

I'm writing to you today from the wilds of Kenniwick, at a meeting of the WNPA, the Washington Newspapers Publishing Association, where I am in the process of learning about how to adapt to a changing publication focus, audience, and technology.

The gist of the meeting I'm in now (entitled: Web sites: Static, Active, Boring?) is that websites--specifically, here, the community newspapers' websites; perhaps even more specifically, my community paper's website--need to be interactive and reflect the community to which it belongs. It needs constantly changing content, a consistent voice, and the ability for the township's citizens to increase their involvement in what gets reported and how.

I read the USA Today this morning, followed by a couple chapters of Lester Bangs' Psychotic Reactions and Carburetor Dung, sitting out by the foot deep pool situated octagonal, listening to Old Crow Medicine Show. You know which was more interesting? Exactly. You know why? 'Cause Lester had soul, and you'd be hard pressed to find someone who could compare in any journalistic endeavor, let alone at the USA today.

What I'm getting at--haphazardly, interrupted as I've been by roundtables, awards, and trappings of power--is that any paper, every paper, is better when you give it all you've got, when you believe in what you do< and say, when you want to (and when you can) be artistically satisfied, personally vindicated, and emotionally fulfilled. That's not just journalism, that's anything. Master craftsmen are those who have dedicated their lives to perfection, to their art, to themselves, to their audience. They leave nothing behind.

That's the benchmark. That's high-water. It's the acme, the apogee, the zenith. It's the goal towards which we strive. What I'm slowly learning here is that the first step towards that goal is to post dynamic content to your webpage to drive up page views and better serve the ad reps. The devil, as ever, is in the details.

Illusions, Michael.

2008-01-16T01:20:00.000-08:00

Today, for the first time in what feels like forever, but what is probably closer to three years, I did a magic trick. What's more, it worked. It's true, I thought, I can still amaze a child.

The trick is called the French Drop (named for its inventor, Albert French), and its purpose is largely utilitarian: to make something disappear out of your hand as if it had never been, to extinguish its form from the realm of the visible. What actually happens, of course, is that you pretend to take it (the "it" today being a coin) from one hand to the other, but don't. Magic, and the awesome subclass known as prestidigitation, is both essentially the art of make believe and completely useless on a resume.

Or so I thought. I may have happened upon the only job in this fair city where the ability to vanish a quarter can net me steady income without requiring that I dress up as a clown, or undress as one.

I'm tutoring, or to be more specific, I'm watching people tutor. There was a time, and that time was called college, where I tutored a lot: in writing centers, for Junior Achievement (I taught kids about the economy, which is hilarious as I am both unemployed and ignorant on the subject. Thank goodness they had a teacher's packet), and for random roommates and acquaintances. There's a real joy to be found in helping someone figure out what they want to say, study, or write; It's a good feeling, like successfully hiding a fugitive from the police.

That said, I'm still in the job market (It's right next to the Farmer's market on 42nd; apparently, they grow these things organically). I'm not watching enough tutor sessions to make rent yet, so I'm maintaining a lookout for job postings that might be right for me. So, keep your fingers crossed, and I'll keep out of the greasepaint.

Beanface is my new compliment.

2008-01-09T22:07:00.001-08:00

This, perhaps irrationally, gives me hope for our future:

This strange phenomenon is given some context by the artist (Bean-arranger) here.

New years are beautiful. Let's have another.

2008-01-07T17:34:00.000-08:00

Things I broke in 2007 by using them too hard:

1. A toothbrush.

Girlfriends and close relations can attest to my ability to brush my teeth so hard that even freshly purchased Bill Addis instruments will yield to my will. Do you know the kind of pressure it takes to bend the bristles on a brush? Neither do I, but I'm sure it takes uncommonly manly strength because I am: A) the only person I know who does that and B) uncommonly manly.

2. A glass slide.

Last year was an amazingly productive one for me in the realm of music. The End Times, Irrelevant Prophets, and The Christmas Belles all played shows to receptive and--dare I say--adoring audiences, and while no money was made (a trend I expect to continue throughout this year) in the doing, the creation and stage recreation was overwhelmingly fulfilling on the sort of levels talked about only in self-help books and heroic ballads.

Early on in ought seven, I was playing electric lapsteel with a glass slide and broke it, the bottom of the medicine bottle flopping like an impotent coin between the strings. I thought immediately that this would be the perfect anecdote to relate to an interviewer when the projects I was involved in got big. I'm, of course, a fool, a big one, but I still have the slide. My only regret is that my scrapbook has no place for broken pieces of glass.

3. My heart.

Jesus. I didn't know that thing even ticked anymore.

Being hardcore, we knit our own stockings

2007-11-15T12:44:00.000-08:00

Improbably (or inevitably, depending on your disposition), the holidays are nearly here; that frenzied time of year where we turn our focus to family, friends, food, drink, debauchery and gifts.

You may already be planning out your days off, carefully constructing a card list for associates and relatives, deciding exactly what present you should get for that special someone. You may already be fussing about schedules and family dust-ups and seating arrangements. You might feel the cold hand of time pressing on the back of your neck in reminder of what still needs doing. We're here to tell you: Stop. There is a solution for you.

It's a little thing called The Christmas Belles.

Born of an off-hand thought, this little outfit that could has gained steam, talent, and a repertoire that is sure to please even the most jaded. Consisting of talent culled from the underground, the office, and the internet, The Christmas Belles is a perfect (and perfectly adorable) encapsulation of the spirit of the holidays, wrapped in pop melodies, girl group harmonies, and an understanding of what Christmas is actually all about: imposition.

Sure, others will tell you it's about giving, or love, or togetherness, or some other goodnik emotion decorated in tinsel and treacle, but we know that's a lie. Christmas is a hassle, and we have the songs to prove it.

Eschewing time-honored (and thus mind-numbingly familiar) songs, The Christmas Belles have selected pieces from the true artists of our time: Casiotone for the Painfully Alone, Cathy Saint, Mazzy Starr, Mojave 3, Captain Beefheart, Voxtrot, The Silver Bells, Badly Drawn Boy, and Hanoi Rocks.

As we dash madly towards the end of the year, we would like to invite you to join us this December. If you would like a formal invite (like, on paper) for the Christmas in July in December Luau to be held on the 23rd, please submit your address to Kate.

Come out, enjoy the holidays with us and create a tradition worth keeping.

I'm big time

2007-11-05T11:24:00.000-08:00

Last week, I saw The Hives. Yesterday, I saw The Hold Steady and Art Brut. Today, reviews appear of both in separate venues, both boldly penned by me. Check it, Kasparov.

Seattle Weekly: The Hives
Seattle P.I.: Art Brut and The Hold Steady

Is it any wonder that as I pass by, all the ladies scream, "Oh, Tyson, you man you!"? I think not.

This is what Halloween looks like.

2007-10-31T14:41:00.000-07:00

You have no idea how tired I am

2007-10-29T11:37:00.000-07:00

Yesterday was my birthday. I celebrated in the usual fashion: cake, Thanksgiving, shopping. There was band practice and brunch, then, later, a perfectly-sized gettogether (pronounced: ghetto leather). Earlier this weekend there was another party, this one a themed costume soiree, which I attended without bothering to dress up, a fact of no small concern to several.

I also saw the Tiger Lillies and sang Monday, Monday at a karoke bar.

Today I should be sleeping. Sleeping the sleep of the unslept. Jesus.

Thanks, though, to everybody for everything. It was great.

The refresh rate was periously low

2007-10-22T13:24:00.000-07:00

Over the weekend, I went to Whiskey Creek, which really ought to be a euphemism (feel free to start) but is actually a place located on the far edges of the state. It was beautiful there, the setting untouchable; the company was glorious, old and new friends all; and the cumulative effect of both was, for those that believe in such things, a clean aura or, for those that don’t, a refreshed mind and body.

I drove out through heavy rains. Many people don’t like piloting through wet sheets, but I’m the anomaly; there were points, however, on the two lane roads that ink Washington’s lesser traveled paths, where I started to re-think my position, as driving with little to no visibility is a flight plan to disaster. But as a trained pilot I had little to fear.

It was midnight when I pulled up outside the cabins. It was morning one day later when I left. Here’s a smattering of what happened in between.

The rest of the pictures are here.

Hate/Love

2007-10-18T14:29:00.000-07:00

Things I hate:

Pants with a button fly. I do not need a puzzle box for my privates. On the other hand, these trousers do make me look thin, tall, and suave. An effect that will surely be ruined the very moment I have to spend three minutes in the men’s bathroom staring at my crotch trying to close my pants.

Faucets with no knobs, only motion sensors. Running my hand around the lip of the sink looking for the recessed button to turn on the hot water not only defeats the purpose of the motion sensor, but infuriates me as to the progress of motion sensors in these United States. We are the greatest nation of lazy people ever and if this is the best we can do to eliminate the need to twist on and off a knob, well then folks, I don’t want it.

The rain when I have to stand in it. My birthday is on the way, someone buy me the kind of bubble technology the Jetsons used to keep Elroy dry. Doesn’t exist? Invent it.

Mass transit. Why can’t I decide where we go and who we pick up? This bus would be so much awesomer if we had a fat, judgmental man working the door, keeping all the uggos on the street where they belong. Those dumb drivers let anyone on.

All of these things impact me at my new job, which is Meg’s old job. I’m the new Meg, which is one misplaced finger away from being a whole new me.

Moving. I’ve done a shitton of this lately. I’m no longer down. Although I own a truck, I must now already owe you a favor before I am willing to schlep anything I cannot keep. If you are willing to risk loosing possessions to me, I am more than willing to take your things anywhere you like.

Things I love:

The End Times. You know, that band I play in? Yeah, well, we’re playing again Monday at the High Dive. Please come and bring friends. The High Dive is cavernous if empty.

My new apartment—which also used to be Meg’s—is amazing: a huge studio with a view of the skyline. I’ve been lighting it at night with candles and listening to women’s choirs and falling in love with being in the city. It’s quite beautiful and I’ll invite you all over for a drink once I get all the rest of my things—the forgettable ephemera of my existence—off the floor and into the back of my newly christened storage closet.

Christmas songs. If you had asked me two months ago, in what would surely have to be the tertiary stages of the clap, if I like Christmas songs, I would have said to you: no. No, I do not like Christmas songs (Except for Carol of the Bells. That song is crazy beautiful, like Kirsten Dunst on a Latino boy). But somehow I’ve found myself in a Christmas cover band (with girl group harmonies and everything) and we’re set to play the Blue Moon Tavern on Christmas Eve. Please come and bring friends. The Blue Moon is horribly depressing if the only friendly thing there is a PBR tallboy.

You. Yes, you, my friends, dear readers, and humble hitch-hikers on this low-traffic backwater two lane. I’ve been incommunicado for a while, but I’m working on re-establishing ties and returning calls and all those other things that normal, functioning people do. Please do not abandon all hope in regards to me yet.

Seriously

2007-09-01T16:52:00.000-07:00

2007-08-28T02:30:00.000-07:00

To everyone who was there on Saturday night, thanks. I don't think we've ever had such a wondrous reception; perhaps packing the place with friends and relations really was the way to go.

Many many thanks to KEG for filling Kate's living room with high kicks and kickass badassery and to Hey Marseilles--or, more specifically, Phil, Nick, and Matt--who figuratively filled the house with song. It was literally awesome.

In the weekend's wake comes fresh and exciting news: The End Times is pleased to announce they will take the stage this Saturday, 9 p.m. sharp at The Mars Bar alongside Hazelwood Motel, Tucson's own The Golden Boots, and Mike Dumovich.

Furthermore, The End Times accepted KEG's gracious offer and will appear before him, you, and God at the Rendezvous on October 3rd. If that wasn't enough (and it isn't), The End Times will play The High Dive on October 22 as part of Nadamucho's New Music Mondays. Please mark your calendars accordingly.

Those of you in Bellingham who might fear that I've forgotten and forsaken you, quake not. I'll be appearing as part of this little piece o' brilliance:

As a proud member of Irrelevant Prophets, I'll be there to lend a bit of class and a bass line or two. Come and check it, yo. Do.

And then we drove.

2007-08-23T09:09:00.000-07:00

Sitting behind Jim Diamond, I can't help but envy him. Teen nymphs cavort beneath his fingers as he turns the pages of the pornographic magazines we've brought him as part thank-you gift, part gag (the reflex of which these girls apparently don't have). Over the monitors, Kate is singing, overdubbing her "scratch" vocals from the first run through. She sounded good the first time and now, after a couple belts of whiskey, is deeper into the song, pushing back as it pulls her forward. If you do it right, music makes a first-rate seasickness.

Ghetto Recorders, Jim's studio, is behind a non-descript door right around the block from what was, up to three weeks ago, the State Theater, but is now the Filmore, having been bought out by LiveNation, a proud if quiet member of the Clear Channel conglomerate. Actually, the door is not so much anonymous as it is forbidding, death black paint chipped and graffitied. Terribly metal.

The studio is up a flight of stairs, through what might best be described as a Green Room punctuated with a fish tank, past a conference room/dining hall and a kitchen pulled straight from the '50s, up another five steps and then into the recording room proper. A former chicken processing plant, the room itself is huge, its edges filled with a random assortment of instruments, amps, and music ephemera.

Outside the control room Kate has reached the end of the song, her voice a leaf in the chill wind of Fred's and my guitars. Poetics aside, it sounds rather spectacular, especially when run through a few vintage compressors onto 2" tape.

While listening to playback, I consider seppuku, the ancient Japanese art of saving face by killing yourself. Playback is tortuous, like losing an argument by having your own words tossed back at you, all snide and poorly said. The band is taking notes on what slide sounds best; my opinion is, in general, neither, but since, you know, we have to choose, the second attempt continues to be the better.

I need to stop smoking cigarettes. But how can I, when they taste so good? Also, between yesterday and the narrative now, I've finished most of a fifth of vodka, and nothing peaks the experience of an enjoyably woozy drunk like the filtered chemicals of a Camel 100. It is not fancy, the things I do.

Maybe I should stop drinking instead. But cold turkey is such a noonday dish, and it's Friday night in Detroit.

It was Chicago that welcomed me first. Having taken off work early (I make bookmarks, by the way. I used to be an Editor, but this pays more; I'm moving either up or down in the literary world, but I think I'm too close to judge the direction), I got dropped off at the airport three hours early, time I spent behind sunglasses, between headphones, and with mouth full of pizza. Sbarro. It was...carbohydrate rich.

Southwest, it turns out, actually offers decent snacking materials: a Nabisco sponsored box of peanuts, raisins and, the cherry, crackers and cheese. Topped off with a styrofoam eight-ounce of gram-ground coffee, it's less the usual threat than an implied taunt.

To land at Midway--an airport consistently overshadowed and overflown by O'Hare--we have to travel against the sun and through a thunderstorm. As a former Midwesterner, it's thunderstorms I miss most; after the turbulence, all I miss is flying through them. Thunderstorms are awesome in the biblical sense: bigger and more dangerous than you, ready and possibly deitically willed to smite you. If you can't respect them as beautiful natural occurences, at least fear them as spirit guides more than willing to steer your knife-wielding hand toward an ungrounded socket.

I landed in my suit (which, in case you were wondering, I was wearing when I got on the plane), insuring that my fellow travelers gave me commensurrate space and due dilligence, which is to say that no one gave a shit. Midway is in the middle of one of the poorer neighborhoods of Chicago -- Dave Chappelle: "Liquor store, liquor store, gun store, liquor store...yo, man, where we going?"

Into Lillydale was the answer, as that's where my friend Sarah lives with her roommate Amy. Two in the morning is not a high traffic time for Illinoisian commuters, so we arrive twenty-some minutes later at a familiar-looking apartment building two turns from a Jewel Osco.

The next day, Sarah gives me the tour. We pass through eight suburbs within six city blocks before we park in Naperville's posh downtown. Naperville, so Sarah tells me, is the Nation's safest city. They perform background checks before they allow anyone to move in, a gated community without the fence. One of the reasons why people move and feel safe there is the riverwalk, a five mile walkabout around the local river. The river itself is shallow, carpeted with rocks and frequented by ducks.

Nobody has ever attributed to me that charm they call "grace", so it shouldn't be too surprising that I punch Sarah in the nose as I run forward to fake tackle her. I roll the phrase "fake tackle" over my tongue like a clouded glass marble while I silently thank God for inventing coagulant. And baby animals.

And again it's her that drives me to her house, past forgettable subdivisions that resemble the ones from Normal, the town two hours South where I used to live. There is no part of the Midwest that is not Platonic, pulling from those same cave shapes throughout, making them perfectly familiar.

We ride a train into the windy city. It's the first time I've been on a train since seven years prior, when I rode one with my parents on Easter Sunday. The day previous (Easter eve), I had been secreted away from my house by friends after arguing my mother into such a huff she had to leave the house, on the phone to my father. Classic perspective issue: my mother saw me choosing the sinful pleasures of alcohol, drugs, and rock and roll; I saw my mother stopping me from looking cool in front of my friends. If Coldplay had disbanded after Parachutes, I'd probably respect my decision more today to see them then, and even then I had to hide in the bushes outside my house until my perennially late friends arrived.

Sarah and I arrive on time in the Metro's terminus located in Chicago's Southside. Matt meets us. Dill--what Sarah has shortened his last name "Diller" to--is my oldest friend. I met him in seventh grade at Chiddix Junior High. We were on the eighth grade wrestling team together and it was he--along with a few, nerdy others--who serenaded my leaving of Illinois in the midst of sophomore year with a spirited rendition of "Normal view, normal view, normal VIEW" from MST3K: The Movie. It probably goes without saying that girls were a mystery to me then.

Now, it takes twenty-seven blocks to travel a half hour. We finally settle on a pub called Timmy O'Tooles, some Irish drinking hole that Sarah knows by reputation and whose hostess offers us a choice between smoking and non. Dude. You can smoke in this bar. Right on.

Non-smoking section: we sit, talk, eat. Eventually we finish and head to the street. As we retrace our steps back to the train, we grab two rounds of $3 margaritas that are better than their price suggests. Pictures are taken. Hugs are exchanged. I wonder when I'll see Matt again. It's been five years since the last time I came back to Illinois.

Then we drive. I like driving, but not passengering. Driving gives me a purpose. If I'm not talking or paying attention to others in the car it is because I am driving. If I ask my co-pilot to adjust the radio or temperature to my liking they will do it because I am driving. Passengers respect the driver. The driver tolerates the passengers. I like driving.

Kate is driving. I am passengering. Chicago to Lansing is about ten hours, most of which we spend listening to a Houdini audiobio. Did you know he set up his own secret service, going so far as to purchase a nearby barbershop to secure the employ of one of his operatives, whom he had sent to Barberschool, all so he could give orders under the auspices of a trim? Houdini was badass.

Along the way, at a Bob Evans, I have the first in becomes a series of uncomfortable omelettes.

In Lansing, we rest, smoke, bullshit with Deming and his wife. I fear cigarettes and myself for wanting them. We do Detroit, listening to The Flaming Groovies on the way in and our demo and Neil Young on the way home.

Then we leave. From Washington to Illinois, up to Indiana and Michigan and then back through, back West, up into Wisconsin, Minnesota, and then through North Dakota, Montana, Idaho, and back home. Taking shifts, Kate and I make it from Minneapolis to Seattle in 24 hours, some 1665 miles. We feel this number is good enough to break out in conversation should the subject of bad ideas seen through come up.

I spend my last paper money in Bismark, Montana. Coffee. We're marathoning it home, the sun spurring us on. I've got work to get to, which I do, on time and with no sleep. Monday.

The End Times.

The End Times play this Saturday at Kate's house in the Montlake district of Seattle. Keg, Seattle's premier metal man, will open proceedings with spirited cries for more rock. It is also an unbirthday party. Something for everyone, really. For directions, please contact me. Come around 7p.m., leave when we kick you out.

Listen to cuts from the new demo on our Myspace, or visit Thesearetheendtimes.com.

while we await the perfection of the lunch gun

2007-05-15T01:09:00.000-07:00

When:
20 May 2007, 09:00 PM

Where::
The Mars Bar
609 Eastlake Ave. E.
Seattle, WA 98109
United States
View Map

The End Times at The Mars Bar.

a little trivia

2007-04-25T07:47:00.000-07:00

On Saturday, Sally and I stopped by an estate sale tucked into the backroads of Fremont. There wasn't much there of note, but I did end up purchasing some wonderful old books, mostly things I've been meaning to read but haven't got around to yet.

I thought it would be fun (because I, apparently, have no concept of what fun actually is) to blank out the titles and authors and let you take a running stab at what I purchased.

There are no prizes for getting any of these right, and clicking on any of them will take you to my flickr page where the answers are, but hey! it's Wednesday. What more of a diversion do you need?

The Answers

Many thanks!

2007-04-24T10:52:00.000-07:00

Once again, the End Times came and went this past Friday. Many thanks to all that bore witness, especially those who traveled from out of town. Y'all my peeps.

The End Times play next at the Mars Bar on Sunday, May 20th with Song Sparrow Research, Matt Menovcik (Rope, Inc.), and the The Love Lights.

9 p.m. $6.

But until then, here's some pictures to tide you over.

well, finger my button

2007-04-19T14:02:00.000-07:00

For as long as I can (or care to) remember, I've been attending concerts. In fact, one of my first memories is watching the Mamas & the Papas at Hershey Park in Pennsylvania.

This was, of course, after Mama Cass had died, but I was a wee one yet and had not yet developed the killer hipster sense that would have told me one of the 60's greatest pop bands playing to a half-filled amphitheater in a theme park devoted to chocolate was perhaps a sad thing.

It's only been over the last couple of years that I started taking pictures at the events I attend, only a little over a year since I began posting those pictures to Flickr, and just a smidge under six months since I started my music blog at the P.I.

And it was yesterday that I finally received the recognition I so richly deserve.

Hi Tyson,

I work with Fox Searchlight Pictures here in Seattle and they are the studio that is putting out the upcoming film ONCE starring Glen Hansard of “The Frames.” They saw the photos you posted on the Seattle Post-Intelligencer blog and are looking to gain permission to post those same photos on the Fox Searchlight official website on behalf of the upcoming film and that band.

Oh yes. Oh, hell yes.

I asked them for many things -- credit, tickets, (hookers) -- but we finally reached an equitable agreement (no hookers).

So, the pictures I posted on my Seattle P.I. blog can now be found here on the Fox Searchlight site.

Rock on.

One step closer to the end

2007-04-10T16:54:00.000-07:00

4/3
Day Shift
Angry, the teenage son of the mother driving the vehicle jumped out at the car near the intersection of SR 525 and Harbour Pointe Blvd. The son was upset because he was enroute to a drug test and no one believed him regarding his drug use. He ultimately agreed to go with his mother to get the test. There were no further problems.

4/3
Night Shift
A mother reported that her son was out of control and possibly on drugs. Upon arrival, officers located the son outside. He was shirtless, incoherent and rolling in the mud yelling for help. Officers were eventually able to communicate with him and he admitted to taking insulin. He was transported to the hospital via a medical unit.

In other news…
Officers were dispatched to the 5100 block of 104th St. SW for a 911 hang-up. It was determined that the mother had argued with her son because he would not do the dishes There was no evidence of an assault.

4/4
Day Shift
What do you say to that
A mom reported that sometime yesterday an unknown actor took her child’s Radio Flyer pedal go-kart.

4/4
Night Shift
Wait, what?
A neighbor reported what sounded like a domestic disturbance with one male reportedly kicking on the front door. Another caller at the residence reported that her daughter was with her and was the respondent in a no contact order, which made the man outside the protected person. Officers contacted the parties. The male said he was at the residence to speak with the mother about the previous theft of some of his personal property. He said he hadn’t known the daughter was present. No contact occurred between the two, but mom did reportedly push both males away from her door. No order violation appeared to have happened and the male was advised to report the theft to the appropriate LEA.

4/5
Day Shift
He loved food, officer
Photo albums and cook wear went missing from her house, reported a woman. There was no sign of forced entry and she had not changed the locks after her ex-husband moved out. The case is under investigation.

A postal employee said there were two males at the post office holding political signs and passing out pamphlets calling for the impeachment of Vice-President Cheney. The employee said they were not blocking anyone from coming or going and were not causing a disturbance. The worker was informed that the First Amendment allowed them to continue.

4/6
Day Shift
A caller requested officers check on a male in a Subaru that was sitting in his vehicle near the intersection of 107th Pl. SW and 56th Pl. W. According to the caller, the male was “reading” and it appeared suspicious. The vehicle was gone on arrival was registered to a subject out of Bothell.

4/7
Day Shift
A woman called 911 to report that her father was in an argument with an unwanted subject outside their residence. When officers arrived, the unwanted subject had already left. The father told officers that he was leaving the house this morning to go on a motorcycle ride only to find the subject outside his residence. The subject has been a contractor for the business and started arguing with the father over money. The subject pushed the father off his motorcycle then grabbed a reciprocal saw and took a swipe, cutting the seat on the cycle. Officers advised Snohomish County S.O. to check the subject’s residence in Arlington, but he wasn’t there. There is probably cause for Assault 2nd degree.

4/7
Night Shift
Three days ago, reported a woman, while shaving her legs, someone above her head hit her, causing distress. Upon arrival, she told officers that she felt a pinch in her legs and they were now swollen. The fire department responded and checked her.

At least three people reported hearing a loud explosion in the area of the 12300 block of Harbour Pointe Blvd. None of the witnesses saw anything. An area check was done but nothing suspicious was located.

Sleep screaming
Neighbors called police after the woman who lived above them started screaming in her sleep and banging on the walls. Upon arrival, officers could her screams from the parking lot. She told officers that she had been asleep, but agreed to try to go back to sleep and keep the screaming to a minimum.

4/8
Day Shift
Still screaming
After receiving two more complaints from different neighbors, police were forced to arrest the woman who was screaming and banging on the walls in her sleep. She was arrested for Disorderly Conduct under the city code. On this last occasion, she had opened her sliding glass door so the entire complex could hear her screaming. She was booked into the county jail.

Because I don't have cable

2007-04-09T12:43:00.000-07:00

Curiosity is good, but remember — there are a lot of things out there that, if you go research them, will stick in your brain. Forever. Like "bukkake." So be cautious. Once some shit like bukkake gets in there, it ain’t never coming out. You could be in the middle of a job interview or something, and your brain might start whispering, "Bukkake. Bukkake. Bukkake."

Ever since Fred did this, I've been remembering to note the videos I find fascinating. What follows is a smattering of those delightful discoveries. What we need, obviously, is a tv station and a license to broadcast whatever we feel like.

Speaking of Fred (and television): a long time ago, the good Doctor loaned me a copy of Psychotic Reactions and Carburetor Dung by Lester Bangs. There's a screed in there entitled The Incredibly Strange Creatures Who Stopped Living and Became Mixed-up Zombies or, The Day the Airwaves Exploded (because while Bangs was ostensibly writing about music, more often than not, he was actually writing about the way things should be. And, god love him, he was, more often than not, right) about the public retaking ownership of the airwaves.

FCC Commissioner Susskind said today that the recent outbreaks of violence and vandalism against TV stations in every state of the Union were the actions of a vast conspiratorial network "whose extensiveness staggers the imagination of any reasonable man." The Commissioner stated further that the network was populated mainly by heroin addicts, students driven psychopathic by hallucinogenic drugs, politicized shakedown artists, and prostitutes of both sexes-"junkies, sickies, trickies, and quickies," as the Commissioner quipped-led by an elusive cabal of disgruntled dropouts from the Weathermen on special orders from Red China.

Which, of course, could and will never happen, but goddam, ain't it fun to think about?

At last report, the station in Paw Paw was showing nothing but old "Popeye," "Bugs Bunny," and "Donald Duck" cartoons interspersed with 1952 episodes of "Dragnet" and "Inner Sanctum."

...

In Nome, the commandeered station was reportedly showing nothing but old commercials and newscasts run backwards, with a soundtrack comprised of Redd Foxx records and old rhythm and blues "party" (sex-oriented) songs superimposed on them.

Stations in other parts of the country are showing propaganda films from Communist countries and groups and broadcasting readings from Chairman Mao by hirsute under-thirties. Others screen nothing but Andy Warhol films, or "home movies" or "underground films" made by the guerrillas themselves. In San Francisco a rock group called the Grateful Dead has been playing an uninterrupted concert for ten days and, even more amazingly, a song entitled "Turn on Your Lovelamp" for the last four straight days, around the clock. One channel in Los Angeles is currently featuring a gentleman of indeterminate age named Kim Fowley, engaged in unprintable acts with a girl who doesn't look older than 14 and a boa constrictor, while "singing" in a warbling monotone.

When Bangs wrote this, he knew it would never happen. Mass media is media for the masses, not by the masses. What Bangs couldn't possibly have foreseen (at least not in its current incarnation; Bangs was a prophet, not a prognosicator) is Youtube's ascendancy to that ideal. What Lester Bangs was wishing for was what Youtube is slowly becoming: a mass media format for and by the people.

So let's commandeer a tv station; I've got the playlist figured out.

(Also: for those among you who know and/or care: Kat, that delightful minx of a person, and Nathan, the magisterial bear of the summer's night crowning, are engaged. That, plus the fact that they own a cafe in Anacortes officially makes them the most ridiculously cute couple ever.)

It's arty. It's ridiculous. It's in black and white. It's one of my favorite movies.

Richard Thompson doing Beeswing. This is a wonderful song; too bad his playing is for shit.

The only thing that would make this better is if they had done this on Springer. They could have brought in the horse!

One of the few people still living whom I would love to see live and probably never will: Jeff Mangum.

Because sometimes the best way to kill a man is to strangle him with your penis. Not everytime, mind you, just sometimes.

Roy Smeck is the master of the strings.

John Scarne explains some things.

Ferrofluid is some crazy manna. By drinking a dram of this highly magnetic fluid, you gain the power to shit magnets and die horribly, as your upper intestine attracts itself to the lower.

Finally out on DVD. Now I'm just waiting for the next season of the Muppets.

I don't know why this exists, but the fact that it does makes me...scared? Ecstatic? Lubricated? I'm so confused.

Comedy at its best.

Fucking Jacques Brel.

The fact that you can't buy this for American DVD players is one of the biggest travesties in the realm of media, right after DRM and the RIAA.

Someday I'll be this good. Or I'll be dead. One or the other.

Lenny Bruce.

Oh, Tracy Ullman.

Back when commercials ruled.

My favorite DJ.

Goddam, I miss MST3000. At one point in my life, I used to be able to spend Saturdays watching the Mike Nelson era. And while I'll always be partial to Joel, this show was the tits regardless of who was hosting (but once they headed into outer space with the monkey and the watcher, it truly jumped the shark).

Hell yes.

Qi. This, like most British television, would never fly here. Not because it's risky, sexy, or violent (you know, selling points), but because it bothers to be smart and funny, open and wide-ranging, and doesn't talk down to the audience.

Bill Hicks speaks openly and honestly about Hitler.

Hobo with a shotgun.

Culling the log

2007-04-03T10:26:00.000-07:00

3/26
Day Shift
Officers responded to the 5700 block of 105th Pl. SW to check on the welfare of a resident. She had called her previous employer, thinking she still worked there. She acknowledged that she was confused and was waiting for her husband.

3/27
Day Shift
A caller reported that about one hour prior he observed a possible vehicle prowl. He saw an adult male, wearing a ski mask, near a vehicle. He appeared to have an item in his hands. The officer checked the area but did not locate the suspect or any vehicle that appeared to have been prowled.

A suspicious vehicle was spotted "cruising the neighborhood". The officer located the vehicle and found it was delivering phone books.

3/27
Night Shift
A gentleman called 911 saying he had been told to call a Mukilteo officer regarding his vehicle speeding through a school zone or disobeying a flagger. The officer who took the call was unable to determine who wanted to speak with the caller and advised him he would be called back if additional follow-up was necessary.

3/28
Day Shift
Sometime yesterday, reported a caller, someone entered three portables and took several overhead projectors. The caller ended up calling back to say there was some miscommunication: a maintenance worker moved the projectors to the East Campus, so they were not stolen. The case number was cancelled.

SnoCom advised that an elderly female had called 911 and was complaining about neck and shoulder pain but refused an ambulance and sounded confused. SnoCom requested an officer check on her. One did and found her fine, except she was reporting that the neighbor who lived upstairs had a machine that was causing her neck and shoulder pain. The woman's son was contacted and he said he would handle the problem.

Officers received a third party report of a child living in the woods near the playground area around the 11100 block of Chennault Beach Rd. The child was reported to be covered in mud and had "snake bites" all over her. There was no age, race, name, or any other information on the child. Officers checked the wooded area but did not see any evidence of anyone living in the woods.

3/28
Night Shift
A mother reported that she got into an argument with her son. Her other son attempted to step in and was assaulted by his brother. The offending son fled on foot before officers arrived and was not located. Case will be sent to the prosecutor for charges.

3/29
Night Shift
The officer signaled a car to stop for a traffic violation; the driver stopped the car, then fled on foot. He was apprehended a few blocks away and identified. His driving status was Driving Without Licensing Second Degree for Vehicular Homicide. He was charged with DWLS and refusal to give information and cooperate with police and was booked into the county jail. A tow company impounded his vehicle.

A caller reported a large amount of water coming from the 900 block of 10th St. Officer checked the house and determined that the homeowners were draining their swimming pool.

3/30
Day Shift
The officer responded to the corner of 5th St. and Lamar for a report of a dead animal in the roadway and transported a deceased squirrel to PAWS for disposal.

He does this everyday
A father reported his son had runaway. He later called to report that his son was located and was at school. He was removed from runaway status.

Officers responded to the 8400 block of SR 525 for a two-vehicle collision. Vehicle #1 failed to yield while attempting to turn left in front of vehicle #2. The driver of vehicle #1 was arrested for DUI. He was processed, cited, and released to his father.

3/30
Night Shift
Officers were dispatched to an area check for a subject wearing a ski mask and dark clothing walking through the neighborhood. An officer identified the subject as a local resident out for his nightly walk.

A burglary was reported in process by a homeowner after his basement alarm activated. Officers determined that a raccoon had likely activated the alarm.

4/1
Day Shift
Officers responded to the 12300 block of Harbour Pt. Blvd. for a male possibly "having a fit" in a van. The officers contacted a male who was not having a medical condition but did have an outstanding warrant for theft. He was booked into the Snohomish County Jail.

4/1
Night Shift
Officers observed a green 1995 Honda Civic 4-door being driven through a parking lot; a check of the plate revealed the vehicle had been reported stolen out of Bothell yesterday. The car was stopped and the driver arrested. He acknowledged that he had assumed the vehicle was stolen when an unknown acquaintance had loaned him the car the previous day, there was no key for the ignition and the steering column was torn apart. He was also in possession of a methamphetamine pipe and vehicle prowling tools. He was booked into the Snohomish County Jail. The Honda was impounded at the owner's request.

4/2
Day Shift
The Animal Control officer headed to the 4300 block of Harbour Pt. Blvd. for a report of an injured duck. The duck did appear to be injured, but the officer was unable to catch it.

4/2
Night Shift
April…fools?
Report of "loose peacocks flailing about" along the 4300 block of 78th St. SW. They were not located.

Multimedia message

2007-03-29T18:07:00.001-07:00

From the trenches

2007-03-26T13:43:00.000-07:00

3/12
Day Shift
A woman reported that someone broke into her car and installed courtesy lights. She also went to her doctor and reported that her Oxycodone had been stolen. The doctor told the officer that she had prescribed 120 Oxycodone pills only six days prior and she would not be issuing a new prescription.

He reported the same thing
An officer met with a woman in the police department lobby who reported seeing a man in Lynnwood and then again in Mukilteo. She thought that he might be following her.

3/12
Night Shift
Not going anywhere
Officers received a report from a woman saying that her boyfriend was threatening to take the motor out of her vehicle. The unhappy couple said they were breaking up and he was moving out. Their primary dispute involved a puppy dog. The officer referred them to dispute resolution and advised them to seek legal advice regarding any disputed property ownership issues.

3/13
Day Shift
Deemed too fabulous
A 30-year-old man on roller skates along the 10800 block of Harbour Pointe Blvd. prompted a concerned citizen to ask for an area check. According to the caller, he "seemed out of place."

3/13
Night Shift
A 16-year-old girl assaulted her 15-year-old sister by punching her in the face, prompting a call to the police. Denny Youth Center would not accept the suspect for booking as the crime did not meet the mandatory requirements. Arrangements were made for the suspect to stay at the Evergreen House in Everett.

3/14
Night Shift
A fraud in name only
Officers responded to an in-progress fraud. Upon arrival, it was determined that a 16-year-old girl gave the clerk a $50 bill that she thought was fake. It was determined that the bill was real, but very old.

3/16
Day Shift
While on patrol, an officer saw a juvenile male smoking. The male originally gave the officer a false date of birth. He was arrested for Obstructing and released to his parents. The case will be referred to the prosecutor.

A patient who threatened suicide brought officers to the parking lot in which he was sitting. As officer approached, he reached inside his car and brought out a handgun in a carry case. He was subdued, disarmed, and transported to the hospital by the aid crew. The 9mm handgun and two fully loaded magazines were booked into evidence for safekeeping.

3/17
Day Shift
Caaal-vin!
A caller reported that she was a nanny for a 12-year-old boy that had locked her out of the house and would not let her back in. The boy opened the door for the officers who promptly arrived. The nanny further reported that before her charge had locked himself in, he said he wanted to kill himself. He was transported to the hospital for a mental health evaluation.

3/17
Night Shift
Officers were dispatched to a report of a fight in a parking lot involving a group of subjects. The police later received calls about a "half naked" male walking barefoot into traffic and blocking cars. He was also reported to be threatening others and yelling loud obscenities. Police located him nearby. Extremely intoxicated, the
male became belligerent with officers, making several more threats and continuing to yell loudly. He was arrested and booked for Disorderly Conduct and Minor in Possession.

On a related note
An officer was dispatched to the intersection of Paine Field and SR-525 for a white male, possibly on drugs, that was walking in the middle of the road and "pulling at flowers" in the center median. The subject was gone on arrival.

3/18
Night Shift
Officers were dispatched to a fight in a parking lot along Harbour Pointe Blvd. A man and his son were involved in a physical confrontation; the son was arrested for assaulting his father and booked into the Snohomish County Jail again.

3/19
Day Shift
The reporting party requested a phone call regarding a sexual assault that happened three days prior. When the officer called, he learned that there was no sexual assault; a 15-year-old had consensual sex with her 16-year-old boyfriend.

3/19
Night Shift
Well, why not?
While on patrol, an officer ran a check on a blue 1990 Ford Mustang. The vehicle returned stolen out of South Everett. The officer turned on the vehicle and it fled southbound on the Speedway. The officer did not pursue.

This morning

2007-03-23T12:42:00.000-07:00

This morning I woke up drunk on the possibilities of the band I'm in. Also: the three Mac & Jacks I had with my parents, the Joost I drank during band practice, and the gin I downed once I got home.

So I woke up drunk on possibilities and, uh, alcohol.

Speaking of The End Times; our next show has been scheduled: April 20th. West Seattle. Pacific Rim Brewery. With the Bug Nasties and Green Handshake. Be there or be resigned to wait until the next one.

My new favorite metaphor

2007-03-20T15:26:00.000-07:00

"You've got a camper van."