PRGHHR Show Ep4

I am the cat stuck in the middle, cleaning his balls

There is little as boring

As a room full of people all

On the same page

A group with the same ideals

In agreement about the world

About styles and politics

And books and art

Jesus if that doesn’t kill

Every last atom of creative thought

What a waste of fucking time to be there

Yet this is what so many strive toward

Like-minded friends

A band to belong to

            I just want someone on my level…

I am still better in an argument

Or better than that

Just alone

The comfort of retreating will never leave me

And I like that

Wilson said that the group is a grammatical fiction

As it is made up of individuals

And here they are

The individuals

All trying to be like their friends to

Feel that inclusive lie of belonging

I have never understood this desire

And don’t think I ever will

That’s why I find it so hard to work

In the hard labour sense

Everyone committing to the team

Yet another group that will always exist

Within an even bigger collection of nobodies

A circle of dogs chasing tails

Happily ever after.

Quote of the week

The thing about trendy marketing, though, is that it never lasts. Skateboard companies are posting losses for the first time in half a decade. The Tony Hawk Pro Skater games are likely not long for this world; the consumers of the game will forget about skateboarding the same way they forgot about the XFL. But some people will still love it so much that they won't know what else to do with themselves.  Ocean Howell 

The illusion of security

I lay my neck back

Awkwardly and as comfortably as the upright sides of

The tub would allow

Almost five years

And I have not had a handful of use out of this

Goddamn thing

I lay the hot flannel across my face

Breathed the steam in with closed eyes 
And soaked my old bones

The door goes

As it always does when you’re in the bath

And I call out for her to answer it

I hear formal chit chat

Feel the cold air up my back from the hall

And under the bathroom door

That doesn’t close properly since I fixed it

After the click I find out it was a (nice) police lady

Explaining that the neighbour had a break in over Christmas

And we should check the window locks and all that

We have very little but what we do have

To quote a great man

Is gold

To me at least

I’m barely a Buddhist about it

            I sometimes think the Buddhists are scared of life entirely

Scared of experience and just plain living

And that their relinquishing of material goods just

Eases the transition into being a spiritual hobo

Anyway

We check the locks and know we need more

Go through the motions that the world requires of you

Whenever you need to ask someone above you for things

That should in any polite society

Be offered freely in the first instance

And I sit and pour one

And then two

And think shit

I know I’m not exactly Christian about it

But

These people come back home at Christmas

And some motherfucker has been in there going through

God knows what

All to make some quick cash

Christmas time – right

And I think there seems to be some justification if

Something happens to you on the street

Out there in the concrete and neon wild

Fish gotta swim birds gotta eat

But even among the underworld there should be

Some kind of ruling on a home

The other side of that being

If you caught them in there – well

Anyway

And so now most of our stuff is locked away

And there is no fear really

None that wasn’t there already

Fear for us and fear for our child

That the big bad world has no soul

No conscience or memory

It is a new year and here we are

Leaving no footprints

No marks on the walls

Still just passing through it all

And yet

With every passing day I feel something

Like a warm light on the back of my skull

Maybe it’s the sun telling me to

Never mind my bullshit

And to not forget that

It still comes up every day.

Joy to the world, etc

According to many scholars, the events of the nativity took place around 7 BC. Given that “BC” stands for “before Christ [was born]” and the nativity is the story of the birth of Christ, this means that Christ was born around 7 years before Christ was born.

This is actually one of the least illogical things to happen during the birth of Christ.

This

free gig

Crimbo

 

(this is the 'I have no good posts these past few weeks, so just to keep the blog running...' post)

QOTSA

COLE

Quote of the day

I'm a romantic; a sentimental person thinks things will last, a romantic person hopes against hope that they won't. F. Scott Fitzgerald

what we do is fall, all the time - and we get back up...

punkrockghettohiphophour show pt3

A small life

I stole two bananas this morning

In broad daylight

From under noses

After walking in, under the half moon

Over a pile of old coleslaw on the curb

To which someone had helpfully added

A small plastic knife and fork set

After screaming into the night

Over things that really don’t matter

The gods covering their ears

The cats listening from rooftops unimpressed

It’s good to keep yourself on your toes

Touch life

Test the world from time to time

Make sure it’s all still there

Still tangible

The rules of the everyday

Do not apply as much as you’d think

Even if you don’t do anything of note

Even if you are not regarded by others

And just go about your small life

Content and happy and just getting

By

That’s ok

That's alright

Just don’t forget to

Keep tasting the fruit once in a while.

punkrockghettohiphophour show pt2

Zizek

punkrockghettohiphophour show

11th hour

A sober epiphany

It is the night before

It is a walk into battle without a rifle

I find myself suddenly needing to play catch up

The masks drop for long enough for me to

Remember and

        long enough is not long at all

And I am fragile and I am small

I carry a deck of 52 aces

Black hearts every one

They have got me this far and now refuse to

Serve me any further

A Bösendorfer sends me down the rabbit hole

The sinking feeling nourishing and deadly as

I hold my breath and decide whether to ever

Let go

And it is almost time

Almost tomorrow

Then I see it again

The film still

The portrait

Bleached out

Morning country

Winter air

Mountains

The opposing blade to here and

Now

And what would once have been hell to me

That being the fault of wise elders

The conditioning by family

Who knew better

Or were just scared to death themselves

And wanting to protect a child

The white keys begin their fade

And I know the end is due

It comes without fail

Without surprise

And silence remains

And the image remains

Secret desire

An infamous chill

Then the small face

Two eyes ready to be filled with

Whatever I choose…

Cold water from the streams

Runs down my back

Smooth rocks underfoot unsteady me

For the first time I question

What I have done

Everything again a divers weight on my chest

Taking me down and

I am encased in cotton wool and silken thread

Forced toward an ever long metamorphosis

I am not running out of time

I am immortal and unwilling

I have all the time the gods hand out

These days I just have no idea what to

Do with it

And I am fragile and I am small

And I carry a deck of 52 aces

All black hearts

53 if you count the one that keeps me

Running

So I break out the claws

And turn my back on myself

Sit, sip, wait to get pulled into the whirlpool

It is almost time

Almost tomorrow

My journey to the centre of the earth.

KRKD

Hem

Old short story.

Busenitz

Ken Norton

 

“Ali defeated everyone mentally first. With Frazier, Ali had him so mad Joe was trying to kill him with every shot. With Foreman, he tried to kill him with every shot. Mentally, Ali could not defeat me and physically I felt I was as much a physical power as Ali was. He couldn't upset me in any way.” RIP

Sirens

Hesitation (high) Marks

 

After a few days of solid listening, I can’t think why many people are calling this Nine Inch Nails album underwhelming or in some cases, boring. If you’ve pretty much created – and then reigned over – a music genre for 10 years, you have the ‘right to do what you want’ card. Maybe some people wanted a Downward Spiral follow-up? That would be equivalent to late-career hip hop albums made my millionaires, still rhyming about shooting people in drug deals… fuck those records. 

Among other achievements, Trent Reznor is sober, older and a parent and goddamn if the latter two alone aren’t enough to change your outlook and output. There is still an underlying bleakness to the record, partly due to the production being a tad sparse, closer to Pretty Hate Machine than say With Teeth, though obviously much more refined than the former. 

Which leads back to the point of Hesitation Marks being an evolution… if this was a How to Destroy Angels release, everyone would love it I’m sure. But putting that NIN logo on the cover creates a huge expectation from most ‘fans’ and less importantly, music critics. The album as a whole is admittedly pretty ‘mid-tempo’ and also more electronic/less organic than others, but so what? It’s not a Downward Spiral or a Fragile because those records regardless of how ‘timeless’ they were, are, like all art in one respect, a snapshot of their time and of the mind of their creator. Also from a personal point of view - you buy the vinyl and get a free CD version with it. #winning.

It’s about everything, as usual.

The radiators click and whine

As the air bubbles slip around inside the pipes
And I bury my head under a mound of feminine pillows
Rub my feet together a few times
To warm my cold bones

The outside world has begun its annual attack
The front door creaks while the glass in the windows
Quietly vibrates from the coming storm
I force myself up to find clothing, armour

Then I can see for miles - across the city one way
And over houses and hills to the back
There are great cracks and holes in the darkness
Blue light shining through here and
There

The real turns to abstract
Turns it back on you
Like walking through a mirror
From the other side

Any sense of control is lost
You are caught in a silent maelstrom 
Carried on the wing of all your anxieties
And so you swim with it
It is instinct to not fight

Then a moment
Grey and formless
You see a razor slip of white light
Passing and then gone
And that moment of clarity keeps you in check
Sane and grounded
Charged and ready and waiting for the next go round

And the sky begins its descent as you look up, face it and
Breathe and breathe and
Breathe
It
In.

Dr Hfuhruhurr..?

 

Once you know what it is, this apparently innocuous picture of a blob assumes a terrible gravity. It is an adult human brain that is entirely smooth – free of the ridges and folds so characteristic of our species' most complex organ. We can only imagine what life was like for this person. He or she was a resident of what is now North Texas State Hospital, a mental health facility, and died there in 1970, but that's all we know. While the jar containing the brain is labelled with a reference number, the microfilm containing the patient's medical records has been lost. From NS.

The flux of white butterflies

He said the world was full of white butterflies

And footsteps of blood

He said

Bigger did not mean better and that

White walls and obvious juxtaposition

Though useful to the artist,

Should never be considered art

He said we were never meant to live beneath the sun

But rather, burrow deep within ourselves

Consume and ultimately become eternal fire

He said the world was full of words

Masquerading as images and vice versa

That

Some of those words were made up of colours

Only ever seen at the

Heart of an exploding star

And some images, seemingly deep

Were in reality wading pools of bleach

On white canvas

Of all these things, all I could find to

Convince myself anything was true -

Were the butterflies in the sky and

Blood red tracks

On the staggered concrete behind me.

countdown (again)

 

Off to Brixton next week to see these lads. At least this time we'll be indoors out of the rain... 

'I feel big...'