caring is creepy

recap of the last 6 months or so: i'm playing music, starting a band, going to rad shows, smoking weed, eating vegetarian, and all while i still manage to keep my day job at amoeba. don't hate me 'cos i have a life and am too busy hangin' out at shows like the jesus and mary chain, melvins, duke spirit, gang of four or health. or 'cos i get to hang out and meet rad people like johnny greenwood and tony hawk. mmmhhhmm

i got tickets to go see my bloody valentine this october. i'm about as psyched as it gets. aaaaannnnddddd, we're gonna go see nick cave/spiritualized/cat power at the hollywood bowl in a couple of weeks... STOKED!

speaking of amazing killer jams, i got my face melted off with some serious heavy doom drone experimental stoner rock with boris at the echoplex on august 3. seriously killer. earlier this year, i had the fortune of gettin' paid to take pictures of 'em at their special after-hours in store performance at amoeba berkeley in june. that show was the start of their US leg of the tour; the skull crushing stoner jams and distorted billowy drone blended together seamlessly in a gaussian blur unparalleled by any other band. just one look at their pedal board is enough to get any gear-head's dick hard.



got an hour? fuck, man. spend it watching this:




...dude.

stoner metal got it's first real kick in the nutsack in the desert, though, with generator shows. those dudes in kyuss would get AMPED and play for 17+ hours in the middle of NOWHERE for a bunch of desert rats who were all about getting FUCKED UP. awesome...



like josh homme said, "if ya weren't there, well... ya weren't." unfortunately, i wasn't counted among the lucky few that got to experience that kind of insane mind blowing rock. prolly 'cos i was like, 5, and eating fruit loops and drinking apple juice outta my sippy cup. so? wanna fight?

anyone wanna buy me a ticket to go see dylan play in santa barbara on september 7th? pleaaaaase? i'm so broke from buying gear that i can't even afford to buy a new pair of chuck taylors and my old ones are literally falling off. i don't care 'bout the soles on my shoes, though, just another chance at seeing dylan deliver his stories to an audience as diverse as his career catalog. at the very least, his new bootleg boxset "tell tale signs" that's coming out october 7 is enough to keep me satiated for a little bit. it's the eighth volume in the bootleg series that features rare cuts and unreleased demos from 1989 through 2006.

recently, i've been delving into the depths of rock 'n' roll, trying my hand at the whole "band" thing. given me a sort of drive to hope for better than just helping hipsters find neutral milk hotel albums on vinyl and crackheads who want donna summers cassette tapes. i love my job, for sure, 'cos i get to take rad pictures and listen to cool music all day, but having to deal with my latent control issues makes me wanna do something where i get to call the shots. 'cept in a band, that's not really the case 'cos we're all doing that. and yeah. money, schedules, equipment and creative issues occur ALL THE FUCKING TIME. we're trying to document the process on video and in pictures, and take advantage of the youtube phenomenon so everyone can watch as we flounder around on deranged synths and anti-climactic lead guitar parts. which then turn into petty squabbling and passive aggressive attitudes amidst frustrated kids just trying to get what we've got in our heads out on tape. YEAH! SHIT IS HARD.

last saturday, i went to the natasha shneider benefit show at the henry fonda. are you kidding? qotsa? pj harvey? jesse hughes? tenacious d? i was stoked, 'cos that's right down the street from where i live in hollywood, so i got fucked up ala "feel good hit of the summer" style before heading down without having to worry about the fuzz killin' my buzz. i knew the evening was gonna be laced with somber moments, but i wasn't prepared for the intense emotional outpour that came from every musician that graced the stage. i almost can't even put into words what it was like seeing pj harvey belt out some of my personal favorites from the desert sessions with queens of the stone age, the unofficially undisputed champs of rock 'n' roll. needless to say, it was one of the best shows i've ever experienced, and, like natasha shneider, won't soon be forgotten.

as seems to be the case when i update here, i'm going through some weird crazy shit right now. being grounded by dylan is always a huge comfort, but lately i've been listening to oasis, too. more specifically their sophomore album "(what's the story) morning glory." i've always loved and listened to them, but the time has now come where their music is starting to affect me. it's rad to be forging connections within the words and walls of sound. i've always been a "layers" kinda kid, really delving deep into a record and listening for all the subtle nuances that bleed through the more prominently featured leads. basically, i guess that means i value the production, and let's face it, oasis are fuckin' masters at it. it's those moments of lucidity where i really connect with something musically that makes all this shit worth it. my point? GET INTO IT. the truth is you gotta go back to go forward. if you can find out where you're coming from, you'll figure out where you're supposed to be.

cast no shadow - oasis (acoustic performance with noel doin' vocals, live on msn):



...

goddamnit, metallica, please release a good album this time around. i'm really sick of disappointment from you fuckers. st. anger sucked st. nuts. little less fisting each other one-off style, and a little more pissing each other off, yeah? thanks. even dave grohl's got your back on this one. i think nine inch nails is taking a leaf out of metallica's book, though, 'cos they used to SLAY it back in the day, but now, for the umpteenth time this year, they've released an album that no one really cares about. i don't know why people are always up on a high horse regarding sobriety, since some of the best shit i've ever heard comes from destructive substance abuse and chaos.

oh, and in case you are fucking blind and couldn't already tell just by lookin' at the guy, henry rollins will kick your ass:



spacemen 3 are wrapping me up in this song right now, so i'm gonna go burn a j and fuckin' get into it, bro. i swear. i'm gonna post more. ahhh, say it ain't so...

it's truly a lie, i counterfeit myself

so my laziness caught up with me and i haven't updated in about 5 months. shit's been kinda weird lately, and i kept meaning to update, but meh. i started smoking more weed than snoop dogg, and i can't remember shit these days.


i've been pretty fuckin' sick for the past month, in and out of doctors' offices battling my rapidly declining health. it's cool, just proves my theory that shitty people get what they deserve. yep, i'm admitting it folks, i'm a shitty person and i totally deserve whatever's comin' to me.


aaaannnyyyway, enough of my self pitying at the shitty hand that i've been dealt in life. the bed rest has given me lots of time with my 800+ cd collection and my rad little stash of totally sick bud, but naturally, as in times past, when shit gets to me, the only thing that i can identify with is dylan. i think i've watched "no direction home" at least 5 times in the last week, and listened to "blood on the tracks" at least 3 times a day for the past month. the music and the drugs, man. whatever gets ya through the night.


i guess nothing really cool has happened since i disappeared from the virtual world. manson and twiggy reunited, nick cave and the bad seeds got together and recorded another album, and amy winehouse is in worse off shape than any of us. yeah, i got tickets to go see manson at the wiltern in february. yeah, i'm stoked. yeah, i'm gonna totally goth out.


so lemme get down to brass tacks. there ain't nothin' left in this world for you or me, babe, and almost all record reviews are just a way to show the world how cool you are, or how much you know about something you don't even like. i thought that 2007 on the whole was a bust. i started off the year doing shit i didn't wanna do, and ended it with people i didn't wanna be with. least we got a couple of good records from it, and i personally learned that drugs (like psychedlics and weed) are cool.


so what was worth it for me?


era vulgaris - queens of the stone age

i don't care if josh homme calls mark lanegan over to come take a shit in tandem with him, records it, then adds a killer bass line to it and pow! releases another lil' nugget to the world for all us to hear. it's fuckin' killer. i saw 'em a bunch this year, hung out at a few shows, and talked mad shit on how rad this album was to anyone who would listen. plus, they added that dude from wires on fire to their ever changing rotation of bassists since nick went off to do lots of blow and create knock off qotsa renditions to a bunch of fat overheated porkers at ozzfest.

from the opening line of the opening track "turnin' on the screw" to the rollicking repetitice chorus in "sick sick sick" and the simplistic bass intro to "suture up your future," this record does little wrong and a lot of right. do yourself a favor, get fuckin' blitzed and blast "i'm designer" 'til your cunty neighbor bitches at you to turn it down at 3am. guess they don't teach rock 'n roll in the midwest, bitch. fuck yeah!

smokey rolls down thunder mountain - devendra banhart

i was late coming in on the devendra banhart love train. yeah, i'd heard of the guy, knew he had a hippie beard, weird tattoos, and sang about seahorses and sparrows, but other than that, he stayed off my radar. that soon changed when i heard this record and realized that there was more to this guy than hippie crystals and a mat of long hair. plus, the dude totally owned jim morrison's old couch and let a bunch of dogs chew it to fuck. how's that for rock and roll? do yourself a favor and get into this record. he's supposed to play a show at the hollywood bowl sometime around my birthday this year, anyone in?

health - health

what the fuck is this? it kinda sounds like throwing a pot full of hot water and silverware down a stairwell and recording the ensuing chaos. the songs are short and pointless, but fucking great. they sort of blend experimental with shoe gaze and straight up prog rock. plus, they're playing with autolux on feb. 1 at the el rey.

mirrored - battles

i had a weird discussion about this record with matt groening and his son. we all agreed it was a departure from their earlier records (duh, hey added vocals this time around), but more so than that, it was and evolution from their earlier work. see? i can name drop too. look at how fuckin' cool i am and the people i have cool discussions with. plus, the video for the song "atlas" was one of the best music videos of '07.

in rainbows - radiohead

duh. everyone loves radiohead, and everyone loves to contemplate suicide while listening to kid a on repeat. the progressive release of the album digitally made 'em even more popular amongst indie hipsters who like to think they're part of a bigger plan to make the world a better place by saying things like "well, it's a good thing they released it themselves and added the 'pay what you feel' diatribe to the world. they really are fronting a musical revolution." farrrrrt. hey, dickbag, your pants are tighter than mine and i think that's causing the blood to rush away from your balls and into your brain. if you ever wanna have little kids named after cities in europe, you better loosen the lock on your tighty whities and let those balls hang down. radiohead did what they felt like doing, and out of practicality for whatever reason, just threw the tracks up online for whomever wanted 'em and said "fuck it." yeah, record labels suck a fat nut now, but once upon a time, without 'em you wouldn't have heard a fraction of the bands you like out there 'til the advent of file sharing and myspace.

baby 81 - black rebel motorcycle club

this album helped me to realize that i like making out with girls AND boys. 'nuff said.

grinderman - grinderman

...and so did this album. i've been raving about this record all year, and i ain't gonna stop in 2008. nick cave slays it in whatever form he chooses to take. grinderman is just another continuation of the "nick cave: australian badass" saga. anything this guy touches turns to a deeply emotional river of dying, pain, and sorrow from the depths of your innermost soul. this is album is a little more "upbeat" at times than let's say, anything on boatman's call, but that's not to say it's lacking any depth or character. who hasn't felt the twinge of the "no pussy blues?" yeah, that's what i'm saying.

icky thump - white stripes

jack slays with his axe twice as hard as before, and meg pounds furiously on the skins, trying to keep up. fortunately, it works, and every bit of blues revival and southern influence on this detroit duo seeps through each track like oil sliding through the gears on a factory assembly line.


war stories - unkle

as if james lavelle didn't do enough for the music world by discovering and signing dj shadow to his label when the kid was only 18 years old, he starts his own band, and starts churns out rad collabs with bands like radiohead and queens of the stone age, too. if that wsn't enough, he decides to go out to the middle of desert, presumably do a lot of drugs, and call up a few folks you might've heard of, like the duke spirit, autolux, ian astbury (of "the cult" fame), and yep, you guessed it, everyone's favorite stoner rocker, josh homme to come out and jam. every second of this album is pure fucking gold. i had the fortune to see 'em a few times this year, since i'd heard that he'd added a full backing band to support him on tour. yeah, those shows blew my mind. i spent each time fully baked, so i might be a little partial when i say seeing them perform live was one of the single best musical experiences of my life.


so of course with the good must come the bad, too. since there was a particular lot of mediocre and all around basic garbage in '07, i've decided to water the "worst of" down to shit that could have been good, or was at least done by musicians that have more than proven themselves in the past to be talented and worthy of being defined as an "artist."


white chalk - pj harvey

we get it. you had a couple of abortions, nick cave wrecked your area for a while then stopped, and you got super bummed out and sat down at a piano to write songs about it while dressed up like a victorian seamstress. please go back to singing ambiguous songs about sex and love while screeching about the emotional pain you're subversively seeking and continually setting yourself up for. we liked that polly jean harvey much better than this third-rate tori amos knock off. blech.

year zero - nine inch nails

i'm sorry, i didn't hear this album. i was too busy farting. oh wait, i didn't miss anything? wait, you mean that wasn't me farting? that was the record? fuck.

back to black - amy winehouse

okay, so technically released in 2006, this album didn't get "big" until nme started writing articles about how she got so drunk that she puked on stage somewhere in london and stumbled around in a coke haze at coachella. i'm sorry, but shitty tattoos and songs about various substance addictions are soooooo 1994.

american doll posse - tori amos

in addition to being a contender for one of the worst album titles of 2007, when i stopped cutting myself in my twenties, i stopped listening to tori amos. somehow, she still manages to stick around and find the underground group of lesbians who are still anxiously awaiting another ani difranco album and a more intellectual form of "pussy power." over it. so, so over it.

eat me, drink me - marilyn manson

hey mr. superstar, please stop now. every step you take musically leads you further and further away from the brilliance of antichrist superstar. somehow, you've managed to make a parody out of yourself AND ruin any shred of "evil" servitude and anarchy on the world you once held. newsflash: no one's shocked, anymore, dude, so give it up. no thanks.


so there you have it folks. the best and worst of 2007. i am still alive, and i am still gonna post on here, deal. so here's to 2008; to the hope that we will finally see the release of gnr's chinese democracy, a new my bloody valentine record, another year of keith richards continuing to slay it despite all medical , oh yeah, and a much needed shot in the arm to rock 'n roll. come on, dudes, let's make this one a year to forget!

walk into the sea

this fall is shaping up to be the best concert "season" i've seen in a long time... there seems to be a never-ending train of rad bands that are out on tour right now. i'm really super stoked on seeing the jesus and mary chain again at the wiltern, queens of the stone age at the nokia ginorma-dome, pj harvey at the orpheum, u.n.k.l.e. at the echoplex, and a fucking ton of awesome bands at this year's vegoose festival... all in the course of two weeks at the end of october. fuck yeah! too bad i gotta miss richard ashcroft pulling his head out of his ass and laying down some cool shit live with the verve in november. ah well, there's always next time, right? RIGHT? whatever, i've got urban hymns on vinyl, so i'll just slap that mofo on and stare at the verve poster above my bed, and it'll basically be the same thing as being there. yeah, i'm really just that lame.

the verve playing "the drugs don't work" live on later... with jools holland



doesn't get much better than that...

...well, except for the rumor i heard that's been swirling around. the story is that my bloody valentine has been confirmed to headline next year's coachella fest. this is kinda bizarre to be hearing about right now since it's just the beginning of september... and i'm still not fully recovered from last year's desert activities. but if it's true that mbv is reuniting and playing, look for me hanging out at the polo field about 3 weeks before the festival actually starts.

btw, kevin, get on it and make a new record! at the very least work on remastering some of the original issues or something. $70 for the "out of print" you made me realise ep at amoeba is ridiculous, even if you're someone who works there and gets an awesome discount (see also: me). we don't wanna hear anymore non-mixes of bow wow wow's "i want candy," so please just get on with it by calling bilinda up to see if she's down with lubing up the ol' windpipes and laying down some new tunes with you (hint: she probably is).

anyone down to go see low at the troubadour with me? i got an extra ticket for their show on the 29th of september (saturday)... e-mail me if you wanna go.

check 'em out:



you can pay me back by buying me a rootbeer float, or by helping me deface bright eyes stickers:



i fucking hate bright eyes.

i was a teenage hand model

i've been bad. not just bad, but negligent. i'm sorry to the two people that are reading this. i haven't updated. though my excuses are just that, merely excuses, i can only say what i've said before: i can and will change.

busy as i've been, i've still managed to find time to attempt skateboarding, join the population of mac users crash b-list hollywood parties, and meet cool people... all while working at my incredibly rad job at amoeba and wasting every last cent on cd's, 7"s and books on the doors. by the way, yep, i got to see paul mccartney play live at the "secret amoeba show." yep, i was three feet away from him during his entire set. yep, i got to witness his soundcheck. yep, i got paid. yep, it was awesome. yep, i'm gloating.

more and more recently, i'm working on experimenting with creating a podcast. yes, just another pop-culturally infused idea that will soon fizzle into obscurity once i find something else to keep me occupied for a few weeks. stay tuned for that shit!

some celebrity just walked into get coffee at the cafe i'm hanging out at on the next block down from where i live. i have no clue who it is. whatsoever. i think it's victoria beckham because there's about 5 MILLION papparazzi buzzing around, and she's got a british accent. and she really looks like she could've been a spice girl. this is especially great because i'm huddled over here in a corner, it's barely 9am, and i literally rolled ut of bed to come down here and steal bandwidth. if you see me in us weekly please feel free to laugh at my ugly mug looking even shittier sitting next to some hot chick.

and since it wouldn't be an entry without some youtube action and a few of my shitty recommendations:

the only "new" album i've been stoked on recently is the bad brains "build a nation" record. check that shit out, dr. know and the rest have still got it, way over 20 years later. no burn out or fade away here, dudes!

other than that, i've really just been in regression: literally (click to see which albums i'm listneing to). i find comfort in my bob dylan bootleg series, the cream box set (ginger baker knew how to go off!), nick cave, black flag, the talking heads, and my bloody valentine. doesn't get much better than this.

being one of the few people left on the planet who actually still buys records and keeps them (is it weird i find comfort in seeing my 500+ collection all lined up on a shelf just waiting to be listened to?), i am continually finding tons of shit i feel the "need" to buy. i have literally cancelled plans because i wanted to have a listen at the original black sabbath box set i bought earlier in the day. fuck, dudes are right. i am weird.

watch this:



anyyyyyyway, as anti-pro-creation as i am, i really these two would've delivered the ultimate duet... a kid. totally would've oozed talent. or been completely useless. wait, it wouldn't have been american, so i'm gonna go with the former... unfortunately, rumour has it that the only biological present that nick the stripper ever gave the lovely polly jean was herpes. moral of the story: don't do dudes in bands, or you'll wind up getting some nasty shit. doesn't matter how cool they are.