I am subject to brief flashes of intense cruelty and/or unshelter, most definitively inflicted on those the closest to me and who I love

Didi Menendez did a portrait of me for her American Poet Portraits series, it is from my YouTube shaving video, it is really nice, wild colors, thank you Didi for the inclusion. Check it out in full size and with her other works on the site.










Last night saw David Byrne at Chastain in Atlanta, it was pretty incredible, he played songs from the three Talking Heads collaborations with Eno, the setlist included:

I ZIMBRA, HOUSES IN MOTION, HEAVEN, CROSSEYED & PAINLESS, ONCE IN A LIFETIME, LIFE DURING WARTIME, TAKE ME TO THE RIVER & THE GREAT CURVE

He also played HELP ME SOMEBODY from the MY LIFE IN THE BUSH OF GHOSTS record, which was really interesting to hear done live, as that album is mostly all samples, and instead Byrne sang the sampled vocals himself, and the music translated really well, it sounded like a REMAIN IN LIGHT b-side or something, that was the only track from that record they did.

They also played a lot off the new Eno/Byrne record, which has some cool stuff but overall wasn't as exciting as the old. Still nice to hear, and better than most.

I was really surprised with how strong the band sounded, the set up was pretty much exactly as the band was in STOP MAKING SENSE, albeit with new musicians, who were on point.

Everyone on stage was in all white, including Byrne, the musicians, a set of three backup soul singers, and a crew of people who did weird choreographed dances all through the set, which often tended to include Byrne, it was fun.

Byrne seemed really happy and upbeat, in fact they extended the 2nd encore when the crowd wouldn't stop screaming, Byrne seemed amazed and was laughing, said, 'Well, this isn't the song you'd usually play in this moment, but it's the only other one we know' and they did another from the new record.



The crowd was weird, it's an 'old people' venue, there were a lot of grandparents there sitting and nodding along or staring, there were a lot of drunk fratboys yelling for Psycho Killer, there was a lot of electronic device use and talking. After we got up a lot closer to the stage it was really nice, it felt like a huge street party.

Right next to me, during HEAVEN, there is the line, 'When this kiss is over it will start again' and the dude who had been trying unsuccessfully to rub his junk up on this girl in between beers goes, 'Man that would be awesome,' referring to the lyric, and the girl said 'Huh?' and he goes 'If the kiss was over and then it started again. That would be awesome' and then he kind of leered at the girl in his khaki shorts and button up as if this would do the trick, as if she'd want him now, and the girl went back to text messaging.

Overall a really good show, I imagine it was almost like seeing Talking Heads.

Overall also, though, probably the last 'big' show I will ever go to. My list of people I want to see before I die is pretty much all X'd off. I'd still like to see Michael Gira but he rarely seems to tour.








I don't know, something

I have a semblance of a beard now, I don't like it

What the fuck is going on











Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable Something palpable

Alligator Juniper 2008 & Why People Don't Read

Hey um well there's a new issue of Alligator Juniper out for 2008.

I folded my dick in the pages a little. On the cover there's a photo of dead fish. I think they are dead.

I'm in this thing, another list, in a section called 'Genre Blur,' where we like blur genres. It's on yellow paper in the back of the magazines instead of on white like the rest, caused we are blurry.

Also here is Aaron Burch, who won the 6-word story contest they had for the issue, and others are Joshua Leavitt, Rachel Toliver, Margot Singer, Justin St. Germain, Matt Mendez won a contest judged by Benjamin Percy, a ton of other people. There is nice photography.



This is a really nicely designed magazine. Thank god for nicely designed magazines. I've been really confused lately by a proliferation of magazines that seem to either not know much about design or don't care, which is really confusing, considering it costs so much to put these out, and people aren't going to buy an ugly magazine unless their sister or bonk-partner is in it? Some journals at AWP, they couldn't give their shit away, I remember one who actually had old women standing in front of the table trying to force people to take it and no one wanted to? I took one. I don't think I ever read it.

There are presses, too, I've seen that have the damn ugliest books. Are you looking at your covers? Are you seeing that they aren't nice looking? Really, if there's any definitive self-controllable point-to on the whole 'why don't people pay attention to indie books so much?,' well, there you go.

There are even more ugly online journals, where the question of design really is inexcusable. They've got words everywhere, messy tables, weird glaring images like from the early days of the internet, with the author's work kind of wedged among the other eyesores. I really can't figure it out: is it laziness? I don't think so, they started a journal, they must care. Is it lack of taste or know how? I guess. There are so many design people out there now, though, and so many easy editors to make simple webpages instead of Geocities style transom, I don't think there's an excuse for having at least a very simple, eye pleasing site.

All of this, though, is preaching to the choir mainly. There was a lot of talk recently about 'why don't people pay attention to independent books as much as they pay attention to independent music and film?' People wondering why the guy wearing the Dirty Projectors t-shirt doesn't buy books from Fence or Calamari Press? A lot of people seem to think it's a question like the one I'm talking about above, units being produced that don't have as much aesthetic appeal, that don't bring the ever important function of post-Apple design into their game. And that certainly does effect the small #s already coming in: journals like Ninth Letter and McSweeney's sell more for a reason, because they are gorgeous objects, and also because they have hype behind them and they are put in stores more, but at the core of it, this is something people want to touch.

But really, and maybe I'll be pegged as Negative Nancy here, I think the real answer is that people like music and film because they are easy. It takes no work on the part of a person to listen to the new Liars record, it takes them 45 minutes to have a full enough tidbit to bring it up for their friends, to justify wearing the shirt, there is no 'work' involved, it is an instant stroke of culture on their back. They can read about the Cramps or Wolf Eyes on a blog, download an album, hear it, buy a shirt on ebay, then they are a certain kind of person to those who see them in the shirt with the mussed hair. I know tons of kids in Atlanta who don't know shit about where their music came from, how it's made, what it maybe is about, to whatever extent you can say that, but who will show up at the bar looking pretty with their indie shirt on, and have the cd in their car that they listened to on the way to the bar from home. Instant culture. Instant art. In hipster scenes, everyone wants to be an artist without doing shit. 'I'm a DJ. My taste is art. I like Cut Copy and Deerhunter and I also like Debbie Gibson ironically. I hide the Pitchfork bookmarks on my iBook.' Likewise 'I saw the Godard retrospective at Midtown Art last night.' What about it? 'I saw it.'

Maybe part of this is why I lost my interest in music. Yes, I like it as wallpaper, but for the most part it feels like an easy in, a way to have something to say without having anything at all to say. Your playlist speaks for you, all you have to do is accidentally let your friend see it, or turn on your iTunes shuffle loud in the house so all your roommates know how cool you are. The personal side of music, the one that kept me going for so long, in me has pretty much been flattened, so there's no need for it anymore.

When it comes to books, the blank looks on people's faces who absorb so much 'art' in other venues is one that probably will remain there.

People don't read because it's work, and most people don't like work, even for their art.

Of course, there are the thousands that do care, and do build, tons of journals who pay close attention to their design as they do with content, and do keep things moving in a way that has independent publishing, I think, doing more than it ever has, but if you're wondering when will books catch on like wildfire, well, I think you can thank shitty reading lists in public middle and high schools for people associating the pleasure of reading with the equivalent of running a marathon.

Want to save books? Read Peter Markus to a little kid. Play Allen Ginsberg or Dean Young reading mean poetry to a room full of high school english students. Give Robert Lopez or Donald Barthelme or Tao Lin to a undergrad who you see carrying Harry Potter. Tell your counterculture friend who worships Hunter Thompson all the ways Gordon Lish makes him look normal. And if you edit a journal/press/lit website, make sure the objects you are putting into the world look like something you'd want to see if you hadn't made them.

GHOST PORN

Brent Owens does 'Ghost Porn'.

GOLDEN APPARITION


BELLOWS


SALAD TOSSER


GHOST HOOKER AND JOHN


I am buying one of these.