Moving is hard. I mean, like, REALLY hard. But it's one of those things in life you just have to do, so I put my head down, charge through night after night packing (endless, endless) and drink. But maybe beer isn't enough...
New Afghan Whigs! How Do You Burn is out September 9th (My Mom's birthday!). Pre-order your copy HERE.
Watch:
Over the last few years, I've actually become quite a fan of the John Wick flicks. Sure, Part III wasn't quite up to snuff with the first two, but you can tell every shot of this series is executed in a way that lovingly expresses a weird, violent beauty. Now, part IV:
On my birthday, no less. Will it live up to the others? Well, with Keanu, Ian McShane, and Lance Reddick returning, it will at the very least scratch the itch the other entries in the series instigated.
Read:
When I did my NCBD post this week, I forgot about the new Daniel Warren Johnson book I didn't even realize was out.
I have no idea what this book is about, and I don't give a toss about wrestling, but it's DWJ and in picking up the first issue on Butcher's recommendation, of course, it's f*&king GORGEOUS. I don't know what it is exactly about Johnson's art that connects with me so much, but I feel like he definitely grew up with similar influences, and those influences come through in everything he does, whether it's Beta Ray Bill or this.
Acceleration. No shit. Tearing the house apart, going through every single thing we own. Convincing a family member to get rid of things that sat in a storage space for 40 years. And I'm driving out of LaLaLand NEXT SUNDAY!!! So yeah, things are moving really fast.
New Afghan Whigs! 'Nuff said. Pre-order How Do You Burn, out September 9th, HERE.
What a gorgeous video.
NCBD:
Playlist:
Jim James - Eternally Even
Rammstein - Zeit
Def Leppard - High 'N' Dry
Ozzy Osbourne - Ordinary Man'
Blut Aus Nord - Memoria Vetusta I: Fathers of the Icy Age
Ozzy Osbourne - No More Tears
Testament - The New Order
Sepultura - Chaos A.D.
Card:
Remember last Friday when I drew the Four of Swords: Truce?
This was the result. It pays to temper your outrage and anger with time and distance. And it also pays to have a good amount of humility and admit when you've kinda been a dick.
These words fit with the image of Greg Duli at the time, and it fits with where I was mentally. Not that I was angry and ready to hurt somebody, but I was ready to blow up my old life and start a new one. And that's exactly what I did.
I used to listen to The Twilight Singers' Powder Burns every day, compulsively. I probably had a low-grade addiction to cocaine by the time I left Chicago in 2006. It wasn't an everyday thing, but it was around me every day I worked at the bar where I tended, so things were moving in that direction. When I moved to the West Coast, I effectively shut that down. (Who moves to LaLaLand to stop doing blow?). A lot of the artists who affected me the most after this all had public personas that included similar pastime pursuits. Duli was one, plus, there was this additional melancholy attached to falling in love with his music, as my friend Brian had always heralded Duli's first band, The Afghan Whigs, as a major influence, and I just hadn't been there at the time to share that with him. I never bothered to take Brian's suggestion seriously because I had not yet encountered anything in my life that prepared me to fall in love with Greg Duli's music yet. Shortly after Brian died, I moved. By the time I did, I was hooked on the Whigs' Gentleman, and soon after 1965, and then, in 2006, Powder Burns.
This album is epic. I honestly believe that about every facet of it, from the songwriting, arranging and playing, to what Duli was going through in his life at the time, to the fact that the band recorded the album in a studio in New Orleans in the wake of Katrina. If you read interviews with him from the time, you'll hear him discuss how the feeling of being in the wreckage of a major culture center crept into the feel of the record. It's there, oh yeah. Everything feels like it's lying in a pool of rubble, the ceiling's split open and falling, the wind is howling just outside, and you're trapped with your demons by the light of a single, solitary candle.
When I fell back into Powder Burns recently, I realized it's been a long time since I really listened to it. I still dabble with old pastimes when I return to the city I fled, although it's been a few years. I don't know if this re-engagement with the album is my inner demon fixing to make a phone call for the five days I'll be in town at the end of September, or if I'm just reclaiming the entire dejected persona for something I'm writing. That's the thing with this craft, you never really know who you are when you're working on something that puts you in the driver's seat by utilizing your life experiences. I guess only time will tell...
I've been so consumed by work lately that I've not had the time or gumption to do much other than come home at night, write for an hour or two and then watch Bates Motel, which despite my initial knee-jerk assumption would be drivel is actually quite amazing. Aside from Bates in the visual medium, musically I've been cycling back through a lot of stuff I already have but haven't listened to in a while. Celebration, older TV on the Radio and Underworld to name but a few. But new music... I've just not been there right now (gotta get that Crystal Fairy record I'd been looking forward to for so long). Then Brown sends me this link and I just gush.
Can't wait until the new album's release on May 5th via Sub Pop.
A little hot under the collar after dealing with american airlines - don't fly them folks, trust me, just don't - but this is helping smooth out those rough edges. A few weeks ago Bob Odenkirk of all people let slip that his good friend Greg Dulli informed me the Whigs have an album coming out on April 15th. We all knew there had to be a new record on the horizon after the Whigs' come back tour last year and the two free-download singles on their website, we just didn't know when. Well, since news of the record left good ol' Saul Goodman's mouth I've had to keep myself busy as the almost infinite stretch of time between life in the moment and 4/15/14 has, on more than one occasion thus far, nearly driven me mad. Of course when news like this comes down the wire I run straight to my CD's and pull out all my Whigs, along with anything I have by the Twilight Singers and The Gutter Twins, but all that really does is further add to the frustration - frustration that makes waiting for the fabled date is more akin to watching a kettle boil that is on a burner that continually goes out. And now today the band, as if sensing its fans' madness ("Sixteen bloody years and NO I can't wait another two months") has released the first single/video from the forthcoming Do To the Beast.
Thank you Greg Dulli and fellow Whigs. You've helped sooth an otherwise frustrating day.
