mushinnoshin

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My gear sits piled up in the corner beneath a nearly five year accumulation of dust. It calls me, it cries out to me.

I need to write again. I’m almost there, I think I am at least. But not here, not in this apartment. I need the change of scene. this place is like a threadbare coat that no longer suits, and I can’t create — hell I can’t even find comfort, I just mill around the place, biding my time. I need the space I’ve been imagining, I need to build the studio I’ve always wanted. Basically I need to buy a fucking house already.

Well I’m almost there. Lease is up in October. Just a few more months.

Meanwhile, what do I want to write? I think I’m beyond the “band” thing. I think it’s time to write my — I don’t know what to call it. Too orchestral for rock music, too industrial for classical. A rock opera, but maybe no plot, maybe no lyrics. A rock symphony? Well a symphony would require there be, umm, a symphony orchestra. How about “Concerto for Synthetic Instruments and Sampled Noise”? Well, maybe something like that.

But then, maybe there should be a plot. A genuine modern underground opera? I do like the sound of that, if it’s not more than I can chew. I have been hanging at the Darkhorse a lot, maybe there’s a reason… Hey Agonyzer, think you’re up for writing a libretto?

Perhaps a little tease is in order… here’s some of what I worked on the last time I toyed with it — about ten years ago. The working title, as borrowed from Hermann Hesse — “Tsing Tse (The Music of Decline)”. Just fragments, unfinished, unpolished, just a sense of the direction.

• Intro / Overture
• 1) Process Flow 2) Recover & Awaken 3) Spread It
• The End of Time

I usually try to stay out of the “Israel vs (Enemy D’Jour)” debates, because I recognize that fundamentally, the conflict is one of land ownership, and as such cannot be solved so long as we hold to the land-as-property paradigm under which our world still suffers. For one example of how a geolibertarian might solve the conflict, Fred Foldvary gives us his take here.

Well, he seems to want to run, if the LP has the balls to nominate him.

Unfortunately I don’t think they do. The same weak kneed mouth breathers that passed on Aaron Russo because he was too extravagent will shit their pants over Stanhope. The mushbrains are already coming out against it in the comments here, the gist of the opponents being “sure, we’ll support him, if he learns how to act like a used car salesman”. Morons.

• So last night I saw the Actors’ Bridge show Faith/Doubt at the Darkhorse. (Aunt B, I would have said hi this time if I’d seen you — just too many people in that sold-out crowd!) Excellent show, it addressed a wide range of beliefs and lacks thereof — everything from the traditional big ones on down to Voodoo and Tarot cards. Of course I most readily identified with the soliloquy from the character who had taken bodhisattva vows (and who was struggling with that whole “I have to be nice to everybody?????” bit). The most touching one to me was the piece from the muslim immigrant — when she talked about the way she saw her father treated, and how she begged him to take off his turban — damn.
• So Thursday night I finally got my car back. On the one hand I can’t much complain about $1400 parts & labor for a new-used engine. On the other hand it’s not such a great deal when you add a $700 20-day car rental to the tab. So I’m thinking when I do get a new car, I may not even trade this one in, just keep it on hand as a spare for such occasions. Anyway it’s nice to finally be at a point in my life where a $2100 repair bill doesn’t bankrupt me. It still hurts like hell, but at least I can handle it. Meanwhile I’m finding out it’s weird going back to the old car after driving the rental so long — all those little quirks that I’d previously just been used to suddenly drive me nuts. Ah well I suppose I just have to get re-acclimated.
• In case you didn’t notice, I added a picture of Courtney in her car to the article below. To answer the usual question — she gets it up to 75MPH.
• My season ticket to the opening season of the Nashville Symphony at the Schermerhorn finally arrived. This is sorta cool, I’ve never had “season tickets” to anything before. I don’t know if I’ll splurge again next year but it’s nice to treat myself at least once.
• Finally, any ideas for something to do tonight? I haven’t found anything yet. I might do the midnight Clerks at the Belcourt, but the prime-time offereing is Drawing Restraint 9 which doesn’t look much like my cup of tea. I’m not really a Bjork fan and Ridley’s review lines up pretty well with what I would expect based on the trailers. Still I could be talked into it if anyone is planning to go & wants to drag me along. Or if there are any bands playing tonight that don’t suck, etc, lemme know…

So I needed to spell my grandmother’s maiden name. I thought I knew it, but wanted to make sure because it didn’t look right. So I started googling some family names to see if anything came up on old real estate documents, etc. Well, it seems I have a distant cousin working up an online geneology! Cool or creepy? Both I think. I like creepy so that’s ok. But damn, google really does know everything!

I’m the first to admit that I’ve got ivory tower intellectual elitist tendencies. I’m working on it, really. But meanwhile you’ll understand that I find it both inexplicable and painfully embarrassing that almost everyone else in my family is an auto racing nut.

But I don’t just mean they gather ’round the tube to watch NASCAR every week or something. No no my friends. I suppose I can find some level of pride in knowing at least that they’re the real deal. My dad, my sister, and my likely-future-brother-in-law all work part time at the Music City Raceway. My brother builds dragsters & races them all around the region, as does his whole family of in-laws. And my brother’s daughter, my ten year old neice Courtney (pictured here a few years younger), races in the junior dragster division.

And so the news I’m getting to — well I’ll just let my dad tell it:

N E W S F L A S H !
Bristol, TN, July 15, 2006

Courtney Wright, incredibly talented and beautiful granddaughter of Paul Wright, Wins NHRA Junior Drag Racing League World Championship for her age division! This feat will be broadcast nationally on ESPN2, August 3, 2006, at 3:00 PM. Her spoils of victory include an NHRA Champions trophy, an NHRA Champions jacket to be awarded at the NHRA Division 2 Champions Banquet in January in Gainesville, FL, (just like the ones John Force wins), an NHRA Gold Card, which entitles her to free entry fees at all NHRA sanctioned races in 2007, and a $5000 savings bond, which will make a sweet addition to her college fund.

CONGRATULATIONS COURTNEY!

Indeed. If my family is going to insist on revolving their lives around auto racing, I’m glad to know they’re at least breeding champions … though I still think I’ll be holding Talladega Nights over their head for a very long time : )

Heh. This is sorta cool. It says my “real age” is 31.6 (in actuality I’ve seen the earth take 34.3 trips around the sun) — and it says I’m getting younger. Of course I might not be as tickled if the results came out the other way…

The funny part is, one of sensei’s long running ongoing jokes has been that we get to start counting backwards, that every year we study the martial arts is a year we get younger — and so according to this, his calculation is pretty spot on!

…My soul is yearning.

One of the primary teachings of Buddhism is that the root of all suffering is desire and attachment. I am currently in a place where I desparately need to remember and apply this teaching. My soul quakes with a desire the likes of which it hasn’t felt in years; this desire goes unfulfilled for reasons I don’t comprehend, and attachment — to the desire, as well as to the need to comprehend the obstacle — is leading as it always does to a heart and head full of suffering.

But none of that is the point. The point is music time. I bring up both the teachings and the sufferings because they happen to coincide well with the song I’m posting:

Man Made Hell

This was the flagship song of the Acid Fist X days, our standard show closer. Of all the pieces I’ve written or recordings of which I’ve been part, this is probably the one of which I’m most proud. This was one of which the whole band could be proud, it was a true collaboration; everyone brought their part to the table and it all came together beautifully. And though we weren’t necessarily going for “Gothic Buddhist Anthem” or even suspected at the time such a thing would make sense — well here we are.

Addedndum: OMFG. I’ve been listening to that ending over and over. I think the whole song is good but to me it’s all about the ending, the last just-about-exactly-one-minute, that last chorus and especially the controlled chaos that errupts on the second round. The raw emotion that surges through me when I hear it, I wish I could impart it. The song is but a meager attempt to do so.

I wish at least the recording were cleaner, there are things going on that ring out clear to me but that I fear others might not hear, getting lost instead in the distortion. Just details, like the way some of my clank & scream samples play off Jim’s guitar harmonics and Pogo’s cavernous bellow, the interplay between the unflinchingly rigid insistance of the drum machine & the tribal fury of Mark’s human drumming, or the way the horns sneak in to provide a foundation — oh those horns alone — to me they connect this crazy music the kids are making to more ancient traditions, pointing out just how much older Hell is than any impermanent emo nonsense these 5 punks were gong through — oh shit shit shit shit shit.

I swear if it’s possible for the ears to orgasm, I do so every time I hear it.

Jackson has inspired me… so here goes…

100 Things About Me

1. I have a short attention span

So OK as I mentioned, this past Saturday I went out to see The Devil & Daniel Johnston out at the Belcourt, and well — wow.

The link tells you all about it so I won’t go too far into the detail, but basically Daniel Johnston is a musician, songwriter, and artist who’s been plugging away at it since the 80s or so. The catch is he’s a manic depressive who’s been in and out of mental institutions over those years.

So you can see why Ridley made the Syd Barrett connection, though I think it’s sort of a weak one. Syd’s musicianship and artistry were much more developed & skillful in the traditional senses, and his problems really didn’t kick in until after making the music (at least the Pink Floyd music for which he’s really known), and were largely made worse by his own LSD abuse.

Back to Daniel, it would be very easy to fall into the novelty trap, over-appreciating his work because of the illness or his “outsider” status. I’m sure some of his fans are guilty of doing so. And certainly his genius isn’t going to leap out to most people on a cursory listen. But I *do* think he is a genius. Between what I saw in the film & what I’ve encountered elsewhere, to me it’s like this –

He has produced VOLUMES of work. MOUNTAINS. And in so doing he’s produced an awful lot of crap. But the gems are there buried inside the crap. It’s just that, probably due to his illness, he has lacked one functionally critical ability, the ability to edit. MOST artists produce mountains of crap on the way to giving us the gems, they just know how to sort & fiter the work for themselves. Daniel has needed someone from the outside to go through his music, his lyrics, his spoken word, his artwork, his films, and even his very life itself, to compile it all and assemble it into one cohesive work.

Someone did, and that work is a movie called “The Devil and Daniel Johnston”.

A lot of his material seems to be available on CD now, and I’ve got the Welcome to My World compilation on its way to me from Amazon. I guess I’ll see how well it holds up outside the film context.

Your picture is still on my wall, on my wall
The colors are bright, bright as ever
Red is strong and blue is pure
Some things last a long time
Some things last a long time

It’s funny, but it’s true
And it’s true, but it’s not funny
Time comes and goes
All of the while, I still think about you
Some things last a long time

Your picture is still on my wall, on my wall
I think about you often, often
I won’t forget all the things we did
Some things last a long time
Some things last a lifetime
Some things last a long time
Some things last a lifetime

Personally I’ve had enough first hand experience with just mild symptoms of ordinary clinical depression to know that we’ve gotta give this man props simply for surviving. That he managed at the end of the day to actually accomplish what he set out to do is absolutely inspiring.