Indieoma: The Language of Independence

The Moneyless Man

2010-08-25T12:08:50-04:00

This week on Indieoma we consider if things might just be an awful lot better if there was no money, with an exploration of the freeconomy movement and a range of moneyless tips and tricks. Julia Indelicate talks about “no budget” D.I.Y in music, while while Artrocker’s Ric Rawlins takes a wry look at struggling as a penniless freelancer as well as checking out the other side. I review Mark Boyle’s freeconomist text; The Moneyless Man and offer advice on how to beat the tax man by brewing your own alcohol. And Chris T-T muses on whether cuts in arts funding might not be so bad, considering that the best art is often made when times is hard and right now, times is hard. All for free on Indieoma. Enjoy

Suddenly Moneyed

2010-08-18T12:06:49-04:00

As part of Indieoma’s double-feature about money, our fiction writers take the first look at what it means to suddenly find your idea of wealth overturned. Luck, indeed, is mysterious, and these stories look at it from all angles. Karim’s two landscapers trade dreams of making it big, only to find these perceptions challenged in the face of tangible wealth. Antoine tells the story of a man on the verge of a life-altering change as he contemplates his fortune. Next is Dann and the tale of a hunt through memory for the source of mystery and riches. Wrapping things up is Linda’s story of a young girl whose family is on the verge of financial ruin, clinging to her fantasies of the Beatles, faced with one chance for change. When Indieoma’s fiction gets you Suddenly Moneyed, remember the power behind dreams. Image source: activeminds.org

Gustavo Galindo: LA Dreams

2010-08-04T21:30:55-04:00

by Gustavo Galindo I once went to a poetry reading and heard a poem where the author was talking about Los Angeles and how for once she would like to hear a poem about L.A. without the word “dream”. I thought that was great because this is the city where dreams are inescapable. Every waitress is an actress, every busboy is in a band, and every 2nd prettiest girl from their small mid-west town comes, in search of quenching their ambition and testing their resolve on those famous boulevards. Six years ago I moved to L.A. after attending college in Claremont, CA to play with my band Blue Judy. We all got day jobs, we found a rehearsal space, we practiced and we gigged. We made the classic mistakes all young bands make including playing “pay to play” gigs at the Sunset Strip venues that survive on name alone, The Whiskey, The Roxy, The Viper Room. Only to discover that you made your friends pay for parking, drinks and to see you bash around for 20 minutes before you’re all out on the street going “What? Where? How did we get out here so fast?” So after wising up to the schemes, you start to understand that “the strip” isn’t L.A. it’s the “dream” L.A. and that if you want to find the true heart of L.A. you need to headeast. That’s where you discover places with more grit and vibe like Spaceland, The Echo, Silverlake Lounge and then into downtown at Bordello and the gem of La Cita. The game then is to build relationships with other bands and promoters who understand your music and help you build a fan base. I think that the best example of this is the Mucho Wednesday night at La Cita. Granted La Cita is not your traditional music venue since the stage is the size of a school desk,but the vibe and the bands that play all feel apart of something special and unique. Now 6 years later I find myself in a very interesting situation. I got the record deal, I got to work with one of my heroes, I shot the music video and have my first single coming out this week. Available digitally July 27th < Shameless-Plug). Although every dream has its little nightmares I consider myself very fortunate to be where I am. In part though I owe it to L.A. because although she is one tough mother, you learn and are subjected to so much music, so many venues, and so many scenes that you can’t help but come out of it a better musician and performer. Que viva Los Angeles.

Unmasking Art

2010-07-28T03:04:29-04:00

‘Nonetheless, all of our creative labors tend in the opposite direction: all human effort is object-oriented, and aims to create objects that stand apart from us with a kind of unique integrity.’ Graham Harman Open Ideas presents the second of its editions on Aesthetics as Graham Harman’s explains ‘why he likes Quai Branly’, the controversial French museum of indigineous art and cultures and Tom Gokey dialogues with Mike Watson on art’s political capacity.

Los Angeles Alternative "A State of Improvisation"

2010-07-25T12:11:15-04:00

by Gil Gastelum Regional Mexican music has taken over LA and the southwest. That is pretty obvious at this point. Alternative music made by latinos is in a state of improvisation- from the way they release music, to the places they are playing. Lots of venues have come and gone, venues experimenting, venues backing out. Downtown is basically holding court with places such as >WEDNESDAYS La Citaand East LA’S EAST SIDE LUV being the only weekly constants. Artists such as La Santa Cecilia and wait.think.fast are blazing a new trail that is all about being flexible, resilient and playing your ass off. Other artists such as Ceci Bastida, Monte Negro, Enhambre have moved beyond the land of Angels and have made inroads to places such as Mexico, Canada and beyond. Many new Mexican and Latin American acts such as Carla Morrison, Orlando, Bomba Estereo, Madame Recamier, and*Vicente Gayo* are using LA as their launching pad for the U.S. KCRW’s “Morning Becomes Eclectic”/Today’s Top Tune and KPFK’s Travel Tips For Aztlan remain integral to spreading the word around town of a actsarrival/presence to Tinseltown. The importance of all of this is that times are getting tougher for musicians to find an outlet to perform and to prevail- everyone has to band together and support places such as MUCHO WEDNESDAYS AND EAST SIDE LUV by going and supporting these acts and the countless others that are trying to make a wave. You don’t go, there won’t be a place to see them soon. Go see*Aterciopelados* at the Troubadour- one of the first alternative music shows featuring Latinos at this venue in recent memory. Los Angeles is the birthplace to one of the greatest rock n’ roll bands in history- Los Lobos and to one of the best live acts in recent history- Ozomatli. It would be a shame if they were the last. Gil Gastelum Cosmica Artists Management+Records

Eyjafjallajökull Remembered

2010-07-21T11:26:32-04:00

Lest we forget the fire, ash, and plane delays of this spring, Indieoma seeks to commemorate Eyjafjallajökull and the havoc it brought us. Indieoma’s fiction writers take inspiration from mythology and danger, and the words behind that hard-to-pronounce troublemaker (Eyjafjallajökull is, after all, the Island Mountain Glacier—see http://thelede.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/04/21/eyjafjallajokull-the-musical/ for an enlightening musical number) inspire characters to act. Farryl gives the story of volcano-jumping twins and one’s decision to leave behind their fame, while Racine continues the saga of her Barbarian when the citizens of Paradise come up with a plan to placate an apocalypse. Kathleen’s volcano is human in nature, an eight year old and her father and their volatile relationship. Dann takes on the glacier from an airship, and Antoine ends this edition with a heart-wrenching tale of time. Island, mountain, glacier, and air travel-stopper all rolled into one, Eyjafjallajökull gives us something to talk about…even if we can’t say its name.

A Done Federacy of Dunces

2010-07-12T06:43:56-04:00

We are probably at an historical high point in terms of ‘Conspiracy’. Even the most rational of people subscribe to a least one shady theory, aside from the obvious one’s; Diana, Kennedy, 9/11, Roswell, etc. These days we barely expect business, government and the media to behave themselves: This edition’s team of journo’s, writers and theorists asks ‘What becomes of conspiracy, when the whole world is crooked?’

Britain ConDemned

2010-06-24T18:01:00-04:00

The dust settles. Such an audacious move: an extremist, ideology-drenched budget, far further into the deep right-wing than even many sceptics had imagined, yet rolled out without a mandate, on the back of the governing party’s failure to win a majority at the election. The biggest businesses – without regard for those that caused or profited from the banking crisis and global recession with sheer voracious greed – given an easy ride, while the poorest, most vulnerable people in Britain – kids, the old, disabled people and single mums – are kicked in the nuts. It started with a lie that should’ve been more of a warning: long before Budget Day the mainstream media swallowed balls-deep Osborne’s cunning misuse of the word ‘emergency’, repeating the phrase ‘emergency budget’ onscreen over and over again, unexplained and unqualified in hard news headlines as well as op ed. They ramped up the fear, aligning themselves with the ominous statements coming out of the new government itself. Editors only eased off when Osborne himself found a preferable, less histrionic phrase and started calling it his ‘unavoidable’ budget instead. But the job was done; the public misdirected and the debate spun. Anyway, nobody was listening closely enough to question anything, we were too busy screaming at our footballers and tennis players. Is it any surprise that the press has spent the coming days scratching around the edges, discussing the controversies and intricacies of the political process, without remotely challenging the false core premises on which these fiscal decisions have been based? But that doesn’t matter. Don’t be fooled for a second: we didn’t vote for this. The Lib Dems increased their vote share by aggressively campaigning to stop exactly this from happening: during the campaign Cameron’s Tories denied that he had plans to raise VAT. Clegg’s Lib Dems called them liars and ran posters about the >VAT bombshell. Then in the end, they did it holding hands. But Liberal voters feeling tricked should look back to 2004 and read David Laws and Paul Marshall’s grandly titled The Orange Book: Reclaiming Liberalism, which made a case for a pro-corporate reinterpretation of Liberal politics. After Ming Campbell was unseated, both leadership candidates Huhne and Clegg were Orange Bookers, so it really was no contest. If you can be arsed, check out the contributor list and compare it to the senior Lib Dem party people who made it into the Coalition cabinet. But that doesn’t really matter either. They’ll meet their own punishment before too long. So what does matter? The majority of the coalition cabinet are millionaires, yet got their university qualifications for free. The 1,000 richest people in the UK have combined personal fortunes equal to one-third of our country’s entire national debt. You know, that national debt we’ve all been bullied into shitting ourselves about in recent weeks, as if anything other than the fastest payback possible would somehow snap the country. Over the past eighteen months, as the recession bit, the wealth of these super-rich has soared by over 30%. For example, hedge fund manager Louis Bacon is placed by the Sunday Times Rich List as the 49th richest person in the UK with a £1.1billion fortune. He’s a new billionaire, because in the past year, during these tough times, he’s soared upwards almost doubling his fortune from ‘only’ being worth £650million. It’s no secret, nothing illegal (by current standards), we know where his money came from. Mr Bacon, you could live in pampered, opulent luxury for the rest of your days on less than 0.5% of what you currently possess. In fact, if you donated all but one-thousandth of your fortune to your country, as a kind gift to help us out right now, you’d still never ever need to work again. Alan Howard is the founder of Brevan Howard, which is the largest hedge fund in Europe. The Sunday Times places him 66th, owning £875m, up from £375m. There’s no value pinpointing individuals though – the issue is a whole pile of hedge fund money jugglers have seen their wealth more than double. One more for fun though? Again according to the Sunday Times, Mr Richard Chenevix-Trench probably made £82m in one year. At least 170 people on the list made their fortunes primarily in finance and banking. 229 are on the rich list with entirely inherited wealth. The same point from a different angle: one of the people made a CBE in the new Queens Birthday honours list is Chris Hyman, the boss of Serco. As pointed out in Private Eye, this is the company that runs the appalling Yarl’s Wood detention centre, where as many as 1000 immigrant children are imprisoned each year. It’s been heavily, passionately criticised by the Children’s Commissioner, for example detailing “extremely distressing” detention routines and absolutely no mental health care for distressed kids. And by the way, the honours were signed off by both outgoing and incoming Prime Ministers. I think we are at the point where moaning about it, or demonstrating and striking, or relying on democracy, will simply not be effective. We’ve been fundamentally let down morally and ethically by lawmakers, corporations and the media combined. We’ve been robbed. For me, the welfare state is the reason for government. Not law, morality or defence. We – and they – disregard so much of the perceived normalcy at will, when it doesn’t suit our needs, that the result is just tangled mythology with no meaning. What is worthwhile is caring properly for the people at the bottom. Because wealth isn’t about meritocratic amassing; that is a skewed version of life and truth. Success measured just in fiscal terms is beyond a falsehood, it is an evil. I believe, without question, we have an absolute moral and ethical imperative to provide shelter, clean water, power, food, communication, education and safety to everyone – that is everyone – and only then may those with the skills to accrue luxury do so. They can have their capitalism afterwards. For me (even if they’d had a huge popular mandate such as this government couldn’t dream of) the government that dismantles the welfare state and taxes those at the bottom to prop up commercial industry has no moral right whatsoever to continue. Also, especially in an environment of instant, free communication, it is in dire peril. For example, for me it is without doubt now morally acceptable to steal from the rich to help the needy: where it is non-violent, we should encourage it, make heroes of those who find the courage to do it cleverly and outrageously, make glamorous stories of their escapes as we did in previous times of deep injustice. You know what I’m talking about, it’s not fucking rocket science: we need a digital Robin Hood. Or better an army of them. This is in no way an extreme view, by the way. The debate has raged in progressive media for the last few months about whether the illegal downloading of music, film and TV should be considered ‘theft’. Yet these are just leisure products, nothing to do with saving vulnerable people from destitution. So let’s see the experts and boffins and hackers and coders start working on an anti-establishment project with real value. Let’s call it non-violent morally-driven forced redistribution. Get on it, we’ll be proud. And of course, the law will have been cut so harshly, they won’t have a hope in hell of catching up.

World Cup

2010-06-11T22:30:49-04:00

Indieoma kicks off 2010’s FIFA World Cup with our own opening ceremony. Kathleen starts off with a family and their long-held tradition, watching the World Cup each time it comes along and cheering on Italia. Next, Indieoma is excited to introduce another new fiction contributor, this time Antoine with the story of a young boy shining shoes and selling souvenirs outside the stadium. Farryl tells how World Cup soccer defines one girl’s family, while Racine returns with another installment (illustrated by Bradley Laurie) of Barzillal the Barbarian, this time helping the team learn to appreciate differences. Finally, Karim gives us a group of college friends and their quest to out-laugh each other for tickets to the tournament. Whether it’s football or soccer to you, this eclectic collection of fiction examines the game and its impact on family and cultural relations. Welcome to the World Cup 2010.

Latin Alternative Line-up Debuts at Bonnaroo 2010

2010-06-01T17:09:31-04:00

Bonnaroo, first created in 2002, has grown from a “jam” band music festival to an eclectic international musical encounter. This year marks its first ever all “Latin Alternative” stage and tent. Curated by the folks at Nacional Records acts include Indieoma favorites such as Ozomatli and Mexican Institute of Sound. We got commentaries from Edson Sanchez of Rock en Houston() and Zuleny Garcia of Houston as well. Also La Banda Elastica guest commentator Cindy Casares, who is Guanabee Managing editor, weighs in Bonnaroo’s Latin line-up with the very sharp “Bonnaroo en Espanol; No Harm, No Foul.”

Imagine Me

2009-03-31T18:08:56-04:00

Imagine me: a 19 year old blind woman. I have a dog and his name is Patrick. Patrick is a standard guide dog in the sense that he is one of two predictable kinds of guide dog: Labrador Retriever or Golden Retriever. Guess which one. Go ahead, guess which predictable breed Patrick is. Actually try and guess. Seriously don’t read any further without guessing. Really, stop right now. Accept this as a challenge in restraint. Don’t read any further. I knew you couldn’t. Patrick is a yellow lab, but a very unusual yellow lab. See, he’s very much his own dog, he doesn’t fall victim to the chauvinistic socialization of what male dogs are supposed to be. I’m blind because of an infection. My eyes itch of it even though I’m told that they’re completely dead and shouldn’t. No light at all. Some blind people can still sense light; like when a sighted person stares at the sun with his or her eyes closed and orange bleeds through. For me orange is only a taste. If the itching had a sound it would be that of pop rocks or of hydrogen peroxide being poured down a sink. Or else it would sound like a thousand miniaturized, highly knit series’ of people crunching into freshly peeled carrots. One after another; thousands of them. Up until an hour ago I hadn’t broken down and rubbed my eyes for nearly three months. It makes me feel weak when I have to itch. Like the infection won, like it’s still haunting me even though the doctors say it came and went. I ask them where? Where did it WENT, doctor? And they just shrug their shoulders and repeat that it’s gone. I remind them of The Law of Conservation of energy: energy cannot be created nor destroyed. It’s somewhere, I tell them. Nothing just disappears. Things hide, compost, dissipate, fracture, get inhaled and exhaled, go thermal or kinetic, but they never just disappear. Most doctors are idiots, no, that’s not true; worse, most doctors treat me like I’m an idiot. Patrick’s tail feels very similar to a quazi-erect penis. A very big one, and slightly harder than it’s downward position would let on. I know because my ex-boyfriend, Dylan, was perpetually quazi-erect. Never fully soft, never fully hard, always quazi. Which, I suppose, for functionalities sake is the best stage to have one’s penis frozen in, I mean if you had to pick. Dylan was crazy about Patrick. That was the first thing that drew him to me. He came up to me and started asking all about Patrick while petting him. It bothered me that he couldn’t resist petting him. Patrick doesn’t even like to be pet all the time. He’s like me: interested in touching sometimes and not at others. Me, I’m never always anything even though sometimes I wish I was. Say that one again out loud: I’m never always anything, though sometimes I wish I was. Now shake it up: Was I wish I sometimes though anything always never I am. Am I never always anything though sometimes I wish I was? I’m annoying. Patrick’s not very “happy-dog” like. He’s definitely not what they call “a buzz light-year dog.” You know, those nauseatingly heroic Lassie types. Those dogs should be strictly reserved for muscular blond men who hunt and love football with their shirts off in a very yachtish kind of way. I learned that association from Dylan: yachts are to blond muscular men who drink martinis and speak insensitively about socio-political issues on deck, as guide dogs are to the blind. Dylan successfully doubled his adjective repertoire by adding “ish” “y” or “esque” to any noun he employed. At first it was a turn off, a constant reminder of his impoverished vocabulary, but after I fell in love with him I fell in love with it. And besides, it always worked, I always understood what he meant: it felt a little computer-ish; there was something pleasantly puppy-esque about him; it was a bit big business-y. See. And when you imagine me, imagine one more thing, imagine me as that 19 year old blind woman you imagined before, only now imagine her on a bus that she’s just gotten on after dumping her boyfriend, Dylan. And imagine her moments before, when she slowly got on the bus, listening carefully to everyone waiting a little longer than they need to as the blind, broken hearted woman slowly stepped aboard. People are willing to wait forever for a blind woman. I could have stood in between the doors for ten minutes if I wanted, and everyone would’ve stayed completely silent. And watch as another piece of me as simple as— I’m on my way to move in with my mother, Annie, to cry and eat a lot— adds to what you see. Here’s more: Patrick is laying underneath my legs. I’m wearing a blue track suit and a green backpack. Blue and green are words I’ve memorized for people like you, because you understand them, and I understand why you like them. And if you were on the bus you could see that I desperately want to satisfy an itch: my eyes are watering, and I’m exhaling loudly out my nose and distorting my mouth in a way that suggests the brink of explosion. I dumped Dylan because he cheated on me. He looks at pornography. Men are very visual you know. He touches himself, imagining that he is the one having sex with some poor hyena-screeching failed actress. The first time, I asked him what he would feel if I touched myself to the sound of another man breathing in my ear, imagining his pubes rubbing against mine, imagining him inside of me? Dylan told me that it would hurt him very much. Okay, now you’re getting it, I said. We hugged and kept on walking toward the airport. I’d never been to the airport and wanted to hear and smell it. The second time I caught him looking at pornography, he said, “Baby, it’s just that men have two sides. One of me is this stupid, hungry, dog-ish looser, and the other is your and only your lover. I love you and don’t love them. It’s not something that can make sense to you, it’s just that men and women are different like that.” “Dogs have nothing to do with it, Dylan.” I petted Patrick for emphasis. We stayed quite for a while. I was facing the window. We were at his house, in the kitchen, on the sticky floor, at the small round table, under the ceiling fan, next to the sharply buzzing fridge, and across from the open window with children playing nearby. Children old enough to have recently learned ugly words: Wigger, faggot, assmunch, pussy. I could hear that some of them were young enough to still be a little bit scared of those words. That’s why it excited them; that’s why they wanted to be around the slightly older, ugly word using boy. I hear all of this. The same way I heard that Dylan was still looking at pornography when I asked him. Patrick sighed. He was under the table, his chin lay on my naked foot. “I would never actually do it,” he went on, “it’s just something else entirely. Not personal.” “You support an industry that objectifies women. You pretend to fuck these women. It’s not personal. Now say what I just said back to me, Dylan, say, I objectify women; I pretend to fuck these women; it’s not personal.” He sighed. I screamed, “Say it!” in that burnt-shriek kind of way. After a minute, he mumbled, “I objectify women; I pretend to fuck these women; it’s not personal.” He sounded broken, not acting broken either. “Am I enough for you?” I asked knowing that Dylan could only say yes. I knew I was leaving anyway; I just wanted to hear his yes. I also wanted a little more drama, after the scream I mean. “Of course you are. Much, much more than enough.” Here he was acting. He felt something that I couldn’t ever feel, and he knew he just had to hide that part of himself from me. Words don’t mean anything at all. It’s their vibrations that resonate long enough to be understand. Vibrations that never leave, that ripple on forever. Vibrations that cannot be created or destroyed. Even while you’re reading this (even though I asked you to stop), you hear my voice. It’s all vibration. Maybe Dylan does love me, but not enough to kill his hungry “dog” self off. I wanted to explain to him the value of sacrifice, about how important it is to know when it was time to lose something in exchange for something greater. How restraint is strength. Instead I walked away. Maybe Patrick will attract another man someday that I can love. Maybe it’ll be a better man. Karim lives, plays, and writes in Paris, France.

THE TAQWACORES: Photographs by Kim Badawi

2009-03-04T15:46:01-05:00

powerHouse Books is pleased to announce the July 2009 release of The Taqwacores Photographs by Kim Badawi Just a few years ago the notion of “taqwacore,” a Muslim subgenre of punk rock, existed only as an inspired fiction. Writer Michael Muhammad Knight coined the term for his novel The Taqwacores, the story of a Muslim punk house in Buffalo, NY, which Knight initially distributed from the back of his car in DIY xerox format. In time, the book found legitimate distribution and garnered supporters, even inspiring the first woman-led prayer of a mixed-gender congregation in the United States in 2005. But something far grander was in the works; unbeknownst to Knight, a real Muslim punk scene was starting to emerge, based on the one he had imagined for the book. Photographer Kim Badawi first met Knight around this time, and bore witness as the taqwacore phenomenon began to take hold. Beginning in 2006, Badawi traveled across the U.S., chronicling the burgeoning subculture and the musicians who had been spurred to action by Knight’s creative vision. In 2007 he was invited to accompany the TaqwaTour, traveling to major cities across North America alongside bands including The Kominas and Secret Trial Five. As the genre continues to take shape and influence a rising generation of artists and intellectuals, Badawi’s The Taqwacores stands as a photographic companion to the original text and an indispensable document of the making of a movement. Born in Paris in 1980, Kim Badawi is American photojournalist and documentarian of French, Egyptian, and Slovenian background. He began his photographic career photographing the plight of refugee families from Mississippi to Texas in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, while still interning for Contact Press Images and Magnum Photos in New York. Selected for publication by the Center for Documentary Studies at Duke University, Badawi’s work appears in 25 Under 25: Up-and-Coming American Photographers (powerHouse Books, 2008). For more information, please visit: http://www.powerhousebooks.com/book/1015

THE GOSPEL OF HIP HOP: The First Instrument, Presented by KRS-One for the Temple of Hip Hop, An I AM HIP HOP Book

2009-03-04T15:44:36-05:00

powerHouse Books is pleased to announce the June 2009 release of The Gospel of Hip Hop The First Instrument Presented by KRS-One for the Temple of Hip Hop An I AM HIP HOP Book The Gospel of Hip Hop: The First Instrument, the first book from the I Am Hip Hop imprint set for launch in Spring 2009, is the philosophical masterwork of KRS-One. Set in the format of the Christian Bible, this 600-plus-page opus is a life-guide manual for members of Hip Hop Kulture that combines classic philosophy with faith and practical knowledge for a fascinating, in-depth exploration of Hip Hop as a life path. Known as “The Teacha,” KRS-One developed his unique outlook as a homeless teen in Brooklyn, New York, engaging his philosophy of self-creation to become one of the most respected emcees in Hip Hop history. Respected as Hip Hop’s true steward, KRS-One painstakingly details the development of the culture and the ways in which we, as “Hiphoppas,” can and should preserve its future. The Teacha also discusses the origination of Hip Hop Kulture and relays specific instances in history wherein one can discover the same spirit and ideas that are at the core of Hip Hop’s current manifestation. He explains Hip Hop down to the actual meaning and linguistic history of the words “hip” and “hop,” and describes the ways in which Hiphoppas can change their current circumstances to create a future that incorporates Health, Love, Awareness, and Wealth (H-LAW). Committed to fervently promoting self-reliance, dedicated study, peace, unity, and truth, The Teacha has drawn both criticism and worship from within and from outside of Hip Hop Kulture. In this beautifully written, inspiring book, KRS-One shines the light of truth, from his own empirical research over a 14-year period, into the fascinating world of Hip Hop. KRS-One is a philosopher, activist, author, lecturer, and emcee. Since founding canonical Hip Hop act Boogie Down Productions in the mid-1980s, he has released a granite-solid catalog of 19 full-length albums, along with a star-studded list of collaborations. In 1988 he founded the Stop the Violence Movement, a collective of artists, activists, educators, and entertainers exploring the roots of violence while working to promote the development of positive conflict resolution methods; he is currently producing an album celebrating the organization’s 20th anniversary, with contributions by Nelly, Method Man, Busta Rhymes, The Game, Hakiem Green, Grant Parks, Duane “Da Rock” Ramos, and many others. KRS-One is an accomplished public speaker who has delivered lectures at over 500 colleges, universities, and other venues. In addition to The Gospel of Hip Hop, he is the author of The Science of Rap (1995) and Ruminations (Welcome Rain, 2003). Currently, KRS-One is touring the United States with Stop the Violence, urging America’s urban centers to seek non-violent conflict resolution over revenge and war. For more information, please visit: http://www.powerhousebooks.com/book/1006

BUSTED: powerHouse Magazine Issue 5

2009-03-04T15:35:02-05:00

powerHouse Books is pleased to announce the June 2009 release of Busted! powerHouse Magazine Issue 5 Remember when you got grounded in 10th grade for coming home drunk and vomiting on the dog? Or the time you got caught selling fake ecstasy and were escorted out of that after-hours dive? Or how about the time your girlfriend got your password and broke into your Gmail account, only to discover you had an online honey? Man, if you had a dollar for every time you got busted, you’d be able to post bail right about now. To celebrate all that goes wrong when you’re up to no good, powerHouse Magazine introduces Issue 5: Busted, a sometimes serious, often hilarious look at failure and fiasco from around the globe. From manhunts to masturbation, friendly fire to robbing the mafia, trespassing to parking-lot madness, Busted promises the most eclectic mix of nogoodniks, anarchists, and frisky kids ever caught between two covers. Featuring the work of Keiji Ando, Patti Astor, Basty, Orkan Benli, Nora Bibel, Boogie, Nathan Brown, Negri Cabrini, Nicola Cairns, COPE2, Matthew Charles Crabe, Raphael Dellaporta, DJ Disco Wiz, Deborah Dragon, Meiko Elias, Michael Ellsberg, Ron English, Derek Erdman, Larry Fink, Yoav Galai, Jesse Gammage, Samantha Gainsborough, Michael Gonzales, Griddy Grimes, Roc Herms Pont, Steven Hirsch, Pinch Hudson, James Hughes, Idris Intifada, JR, Musa Kart, John Lurie, Narayan Mahon, Brantly Martin, Craig Mathis, Sarah McNeill, MISTA KGKASS, Caleb Neelon, New York Daily News, NOV as Loucious Broadway, ONE 9, Mark Peterson, Mia Petzall, Joseph Rivera, Joseph Rodriguez, Christophe Salet, Ivan Sanchez, Colin Simmons, Todd Solomon, Lila Szasz, Hank Willis Thomas, Maureen Valdes, Nathaniel Welch, Geordie Wood, Wooz, Meiko Xavier, and Joy Yoon. For more information, please visit: http://www.powerhousebooks.com/book/1017

Competition

2009-02-16T18:05:52-05:00

In the music industry you are faced with competition at every turn. From the illusory competition of record sales and chart positions (which are more a demonstration of one record company’s financial might over another and who has the best connected press officer and radio plugger) …to the kind of very real competition that you feel as a performer – a competition with yourself and with your band mates, the kind of competition to get out there each night and perform better than you did the night before. Sometimes, you feel the need to do justice to the history of a venue: The first time I felt daunted by playing a “hallowed” stage was at Oxford Street’s 100 Club. There was a sense that we were not only competing against the bands that had played there that week, or even that year, we were also competing against the memory of the 1976 iconic punk festival which saw The Sex Pistols supported by The Clash and Siouxsie And The Banshees. When playing some of London’s bigger venues, you also start competing against your own memories of seeing your heroes there. While I would never have imagined that one day I would play London’s 5000 capacity Brixton Academy or the 2500 capacity London Astoria, I have enjoyed countless gigs by some of my all time heroes there. Sometimes you are in competition with your support bands: Touring with bands you rate, definitely adds an edge to your own performances. It fires you up with a sort of nervous energy that is far greater than the kind you can get from, say, drinking copious jugs of red bull and vodka and, incidentally, it means that afterwards you can sleep soundly instead of waking up at 5am in a cold sweat, having just dreamt about a cartoon dog with your drummer’s head loitering by a pram (possibly containing your singer) in an alleyway in downtown New York. While some touring bands deliberately choose support acts that they have a poor opinion of, just so they can’t help but look good themselves, I’ve always preferred the element of competition that comes with touring with bands that are great. For a while, when The Rakes and The Paddingtons supported us at our early gigs, both became my “new favourite band”. Every night I could watch them play and every night I could see them getting better and better. It makes touring seem a lot less like “work”. However, I have also had to play with bands that I thought were truly awful (and which I am not going to name). I would hasten to add that this was not my choice and the fact that they were so very bad certainly was not the reason they were chosen – it was more a case of different band members having different tastes… But when there was nothing to compete against, I sometimes found that my own performance suffered too. It was even more profound if anyone in the crowd appeared to be enjoying the support band – what the hell were those people coming to see us for anyway? Competition in the band itself: Then there’s the in-band competition; the arguments, the disagreements and the egos. This can be good a thing if, for example, they are focused on the record you are making, but all too often, they have more to do with the fact that you have been cooped up with the same four people as you hurtle up and down the country in a sardine tin, you haven’t slept in your own bed for a month, you need a shower and you have the mother of all hangovers. It can involve bass players trying to throw drummers out of speeding vans at 1am, for reasons which currently escape me; guitarist’s attempting to jump into rivers to be “closer to the ducks” and singers lying down in the middle of busy motorways bawling their eyes out for reasons …that will only ever known to themselves. Competition certainly does bring out different sides of people. The rest of the Competing posts: Introduction Bassma: Too Cool for School Rik: Pulp Friction Karim: Something Like Winning Jay: Run Paul: The Way of the Humble Warrior Mike: Portrait of the Young Man as an Artist Leila: Two Brothers a Fable on Art

John Machado: Way of the Humble Warrior

2009-02-16T12:24:18-05:00

I have stripped myself bare. These past months call for a cleansing. A job lost, family members passing on or an unhealthy relationship, I have stripped myself bare. All that is left is what’s in front of me. Each day I train my body and mind. I unlearn old habits as I’m being smothered by new lessons. I compete only with myself. I’m a young blue belt in the art of Brazilian Jiu Jittsu. From the proximity of my opponent to chess movements I have in my head, life imitates art, and vice versa. Competition is a word, not the ideal, nothing to be afraid of, and something to celebrate. John Machado, 5th degree black belt master in Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu, knows what it means to compete and celebrate life. I got him on the phone to talk about competing and the Jiu Jitsu way. Me: John, you come from a famous martial arts family, some of the themes that I really loved in the film, that David Mamet wrote about were the ideas of staying pure and away from the competition, which is kinda odd. What is your feeling on that? John: The reason I think David did that is that he’s a student of Renato Magno, this inspired him to write the story. He saw people like us, teachers that didn’t jump on the MMA wagon, like everyone did. So the story talks about these kinds of ideals, of teachers. David said the main character was about teachers like us. Me: Tell us how you see “competition,” how does it help someone’s lifestyle? Especially thru Jiu Jitsu… John: When I was in my 20’s, I competed a lot in Brazil, and my first year in here the states. It’s a trap. It’s just external. I started many years ago, but I stopped because it didn’t make sense anymore. But, any competition in sport is good, to work your discipline to become an athletic. Competition can be work, life is another. Today people compete, compete, they give values to results, medals or title. So in martial arts if you look at yourself, you truly learn about yourself, every tournament has a purpose not about the medals. But, growing up in Brazil, it was always about the Respect, wanting to be the champion. Me: People would think that in Brazil, you’re by the equator, everyone is relaxed, that it’s the opposite. It’s not? John: The idea is all about respect, number #1. But, there is the other side, the lifestyle, the philosophy, that the father of Brazilian Jiu Jitsu,Carlos Gracie, taught us. He showed us the much larger picture than any competition, about health, about balance, using that to improve yourself. It’s for your whole life, more than winning medals and or competing for a few years…In life, like competing, you have to act instead of react, or sometimes you’ll be aggressive, sometimes you’ll wait, or do nothing like a rock, but you have to be humble, whether you lose a job or a match, it’s ok, you have to be humble. Like in an argument, you can’t win all the time, you have to lose, to “tap out” sometimes, it’s the progression of life, it’s beautiful, it teaches you to be humble. The rest of the Competing posts: Introduction Bassma: Too Cool for School Rik: Pulp Friction Karim: Something Like Winning Jay: Run Johnny: Competition Mike: Portrait of the Young Man as an Artist Leila: Two Brothers a Fable on Art

Shot by both sides at the Little Theatre Cinema

2009-02-16T11:58:09-05:00

Dirty bastards everywhere. This is the main ethos a man must confront as he shoots through his teens, realising that if he does not stomp, he will be stomped himself. By the time a man hits his mid twenties, he will have had the word ‘competition’ burned onto his psyche like a cattle-stamp, to the point where, if he’s the good boy society wants him to be, he’ll not just be stomping on brains, but he’ll be returning to the crime scene to squish his heel into the boney flesh and flick a cigar into the meaty remains. Kill or be killed boy… that’s the way it is. Or that was the way it was, in generations passed and passed onto us. Competition has always been a back-of-the-mind thing for me… something I’d rather not confront, but if it comes down to the ticket, I don’t seem to have any problems unleashing the machine guns. I recall kneeling at the starting point for the 1500m race at school, waiting for the gun to go off. What a terrible moment. The pause for thought… the time in limbo… a terrible moment when you had just enough clarity to realise that your superiors wanted blood, and your friends were no longer people you shared jokes with… they were apes with bones in their hands… gnashing their teeth together in the cool sharp wind. The gun always goes off, of course – and at least then you’re able to focus on your performance. This is always the best thing to do when you find yourself squirmed into a competition scenario. Screw the other guys, just keep your eye on the ball and breath steadily. Dig your thing and perfect it, no need for any weird peripheral visions. The moment when films and competition seemed to zip round the corner simultaneously and smash into each other like a couple of atoms came on 4th June 1994. I was a fourteen year old with a reputation to hold up, and anybody who was anybody was going down to watch Pulp Fiction. Now, this was easier said than done. It’d been barely a year since I’d gone in to watch Cliffhanger, my first 15 certificate. This alone had given us the fear. And so the nature of the competition became thus: who could look the eldest and sneak his way past the box office without being ejected? I spent several hours back at my folks place, applying crayon to my upper lip and adjusting my Dad’s spectacles onto my nose. I put a tie on and slicked my hair over my face as much as possible. In short, I must have looked like some kind of sinister pervert. But I got in – and certain others didn’t. The young and the innocent were picked off one by one, while others swaggered their way down the red velvet corridors, barely able to contain their pride. Which reminded me of something Charles Darwin had said about the survival of the fittest…. At least until the credits began to roll. But eh… where was I? Ah yes, I was getting to the idea that things aren’t exactly do or die these days – we’re not fighting for potatoes, we’re not all hunting the last cow on the planet, we’re not scrambling for the final life jacket on the Titanic… so competition has evolved to become more subtle, more ridiculous. This has strange manifestations. Witness my pathetic behavior as I pull my phone out of my jacket and hide it in the cup of my hand, only too aware that it’s a rusted old beast with half its innards missing. Witness my eyes sneaking from left to right to make sure no-one’s checking it out. Witness the sweat dribble down my lip as my best friend pulls out a £200 cyber-phone with motion tracking, a virtual jacuzzi and 20 billion movies stored on it, none of which will be out in the cinemas till 2050. Between 1999 and 2001 I attended a film school of sorts. There was certainly an air of competition in this place: too may of us had come too far at too great expense to drop at the final hurdle. But also, it should be said, my competition radar was somewhat perverted by my unexplainable decision to smoke as much marijuana every day as I possibly could. This had it’s bonuses, mind. 100 students were told that they could each propose a movie idea, but only 10 ideas would be chosen. People came down the front, explained their black and white vision of a Mike Leigh kinda social drama, and waddled off again. One after the other. Black and white. Social drama. Mike Leigh. I had been up very late the night before drinking a strange cocktail of absinthe laced with whiskey, and didn’t see anything strange about projecting a map of some twisted Middle Earth behind me, and addressing the students from the perspective of a warped hippie-wizard. “Join me on my quest to discover the magic flute that will set the countryside free of the evil influence of the Haemogoblin!” I hissed, from beneath multi coloured velvet robes. Of course, there were subtle whispers in the audience. I stood there, flapping my glittery cloak about, probably looking like some kind of madman. But the film idea got chosen, and it seemed like I’d entered the competition by the secret back door and won some kind of freakish victory. On the whole though… I’d say competition doesn’t have a lot going for it. My girlfriend watches a few of those ‘talent contests’ on TV and I can’t help but watch them through barely-parted fingers. No doubt backstage there are a team of moustached, sinister producers rubbing their hands together in glee as they force a bunch of complete retards to fight for their lives, all in the name of ice skating or tap dancing. When things get really climatic – say in the final for example – those producers probably have a knob with the word ‘HEATING’ above it, which they turn slowly to the right just to watch the retards get even more confused as they battle it out on stage. Just watch those ratings shoot up! Of course, if the competition was really interesting, I can’t say I’d sit back all placid casual. Put me up against the Daleks for example, and I’d probably grab my lazer-gun and blast the fuckers away quite merrily. In fact, anything that involves saving the entire planet, preferably with some kind of John Williams film soundtrack serenading me, I’d probably embrace with relish. Next time you see a meteorite approaching the Earth, gimme a ring and you’ll find me quite agreeable. “Ric?” “What the Christ do you want, you shit sucking mobile phone obsessive?” “We’re doomed Ric… there is a huge rock approaching the planet!” “Ok ok, calm down you mongrel. I’ll save us. Step aside.” “Anything you say!” Ah yes… Me VS The Meteor… that’s the kind of competition I could live with. Coming to a cinema near you, as soon as I can be bothered to get up and out of my psychedelic hippie den. The rest of the Competing posts: Introduction Bassma: Too Cool for School Karim: Something Like Winning Jay: Run Paul: The Way of the Humble Warrior Johnny: Competition Mike: Portrait of the Young Man as an Artist Leila: Two Brothers a Fable on Art

Something Like Winning

2009-02-16T09:05:00-05:00

It was 11am on my 25th birthday. I was sitting in an indoor tennis court in Geneva, watching my sister finish up her match. Her opponent was a Saudi Arabian woman that she works with at the U.N.–– Hala. Hala seemed to have a strong serve and vollyed quite well, but because she kept her veil on during play, her peripheral vision was significantly obstructed, causing her to miss simple groundstrokes. I was marked by the breathy “yes” my sister would award herself, accompanied by a discreet fist-pump, when her opponent would swing and miss the bright yellow ball as it slowly bounced passed her. It was the first time I’d seen my sister enjoy winning without earning it. Or maybe it was the first time I’d seen my sister convince herself that she’d earned it when she hadn’t. I was feeling a little deflated, pondering all that I hadn’t done with my life, and the moderately high probability of pondering the exact same thing on my next birthday. As my depressed thoughts bounced back and forth with the broken rhythm of the tennis ball, a tall, dark, handsomely dressed man of about 35 came up to me. He introduced himself as, Hassan, Hala’s big brother. He smelled of heavy cologne and hair gel, and had an incredibly soft voice that had little to do with his grand physique. We small talked for a while (something I was especially not in the mood for): when had I arrived, from where, oh, Paris, I’ve spent a lot of time in Paris, oh, really, that’s great, and so on. Then of course came the humdrum question of, “so––what do you do?” To my surprise, it was me that asked it. “I’m a teacher,” he said. “Oh, no kidding.” I was genuinely excited by our commonality, “Me too, where do you teach?” “Princeton.” Fuck you, I thought. I felt deceived. I had hoped we were teachers together, not a Princeton professor talking to a minimum wage earning ESL asshole that works for a business-English language school 14 hours a week. “How about you, where do you teach?” He asked. “I’m an assistant professor at the University of Minnesota.” I had heard people say wonderful things about the U of M. “Oh, I’ve heard wonderful things about the U of M,” he said. “Yeah, you know, it’s got its ups and down. The seemingly impervious bureaucratic wall being one of the biggest downs.” I heard myself slipping into a slight British accent. “I hear you,” he said. Then he looked over his shoulder and leaned in closely as though he were going to tell me the world’s biggest secret. He whispered, “The hope is that the deep absorption in whatever project your working on outweighs the force of that wall.” He winked at me as he backed back into his white plastic, bendy chair. “Cheers,” I agreed, not really knowing what else to say. We sat for a minute in silence, watching my sister destroy Hala with impunity. Then I decided that I was a little bit curious, “Okay, out with it, what deeply absorbing project are you working on.” “Well,” he leaned in again, “Me and a good friend of mine have been working to put an end to this Richard Dawkin trend. You know, this idea of humans having a ‘Selfish-gene.’ Anyway, the incredibly short version is that we’re arguing on behalf of kindness. We think that it’s equally as innate in humans as selfishness is.” “Really?” “Absolutely. It’s Liberalism that brings this so called ‘selfish-gene’ to the forefront and smothers our better half. Selfishness, like kindness, is something that is or isn’t nurtured.” “Interesting.” I cupped my chin with my hand like smart people do. “ See,” he went on, “from the victory of Margaret Thatcher in 79,’ to the blatant opposition to cohesion with the Reagan era and neo-liberal conservativism, to the individualism pushed on us by the New Labor movement, and of course, the unforgettable election of George W. Bush in 2000–– we have created this system that strictly survives off of egotism and competition.” “I see.” “We have ingrained self-sufficiency so deeply, that the very word ‘dependence’ is taboo. Work hard or go home, we’re told. Capitalism and all of its cut throat antagonism isn’t made for people with big hearts.” He was beginning to breathe hard now. “Mmm.” “The paradox, as philosopher John Gray notes, is that modern capitalism obliterates the very social institutions that gave it life–– family, solidarity, unity, collectivity––and now ‘business-culture’ is all that’s left standing.” He had a magnificent stock pile of dramatic speaker effects: jumping from a whisper to a shout, coming close and then backing up, firing his hands in every which direction, suddenly dropping into silence in the middle of a sentence for a couple beats and then picking it back up with surprising momentum. “And as solidarity is dissolving,” he went on, “and being traded in for this ‘may the strongest survive’ mentality, benevolence has become far too risky for the common citizen to indulge in. Being vulnerable, admitting that you don’t know something, inviting another with open arms, simply being kind to a stranger, is all being harangued out of us by the media and world leaders and ultimately by our selves. When you hear Tony Blair say that ‘The new state must encourage work, not assistantship,’ you begin to see where all this overwork, anxiety, and isolation is coming from. A society obsessed with competition, is one in which divides people between winners and losers…” That’s when I faded out completely. I continued looking at him with a furrowed brow and nodding my head to simulate enthrallment, but I was having a lot of trouble actually listening. I think I was genuinely interested in what he was saying at first, but then all of a sudden got tired. I started imagining the 11ft. tall poster of Raquel Welsh that’s in the metro station by my apartment back home. It’s part of a 50’s themed “cultural collage” that RATP is doing this month. Raquel was really something else. And then suddenly he stopped. “Jesus,” he said, “I’m so sorry, I can’t believe I haven’t even asked you what interesting projections you’re working on.” He shook his head and laughed at himself. Shit. I had to pick something that had nothing to do with whatever he was just talking about. “Gravity,” is what I came up with. “Gravity?” He leaned in close. “Yeah, gravity. How it works, what it does, how old it is, and so on.” He squinted his eyes at me for a minute, waiting for me to expound. But I could only squint back. “So how long has your sister been playing tennis for?” I changed the subject. “Um, since she was about ten I think.” He wasn’t sure where I was going with this. “And Yours?” “Oh, coming on about a year now. Geez, has it really been that long? Yeah, I’d say it’s nearly been a year.” Another vindictive lie. We stayed silent for a while. He knew what I had done. Eventually he stood up and said, “Well, listen, I’m gonna jet outta here. It was a real pleasure chatting with you.” He extended his hand with a big smile. I shook his hand and told him that I’d hoped to see him later. He walked off and I was overwhelmed by how pathetic I felt. Ten minutes later, the match was finished. My sister said bye to Hala and told me to meet me out in the parking lot. During the ride home, she talked to me about how she thought that her game was really coming along, and what a great adversary Hala was. The rest of the Competing posts: Introduction Bassma: Too Cool for School Rik: Pulp Friction Jay: Run Paul: The Way of the Humble Warrior Johnny: Competition Mike: Portrait of the Young Man as an Artist Leila: Two Brothers a Fable on Art

'Wardrobe' - Bonus Feature!

2009-02-09T12:41:21-05:00

Short Story. Text by Guest Writer Anouchka Grose. Introducing Anouchka Grose, a late addition to the ’L’Amour, L’Amour’ feature. I’m glad to welcome Anouchka, as I knew she’d write about something ‘a little off the wall’ on the subject of ‘love’… so here we have it; ‘Wardrobe-fetishism’, and our first short-story! – MW Jack loved the wardrobe because it didn’t know it was beautiful. It was completely un-self-conscious. It didn’t matter that it wasn’t wide enough to fit a coat hanger. He admired its dark, scratched veneer, the dodgy key and the door that didn’t quite swing on its hinges. He’d bought it for thirty pounds in the Holloway Road for a lodger who’d then rejected it. It stood empty in the hallway, visible from the bathroom, where he’d stand and look at it, entranced. It caught the light. It filled the space. It loomed geometrically like it thought it was in a Kubrick film. It seemed to do everything except be a wardrobe. Jack had grown up with a radical lack of freestanding wardrobes. In his family home the cupboard space was all built-in. That’s what you got when your dad was an architect. It was a strange form of deprivation. Jack wished he’d been the son of a miner. Not for the wardrobes particularly, just because it would have been better. And his mum could have been a housewife. But would these alternative parents have pushed him towards the stage? That was where it had all started. From the age of twelve Jack would go away with the youth theatre at weekends to a place with proper wardrobes. And there was Sarah. He’d spend hours fantasising about getting off with her in the dark wooden cupboard — the awkwardness, the secrecy and the slice of light round the edge of the door. He’d visit her bedroom every night. Nothing much happened. He was put off by her fat legs. Or maybe it started earlier. You’d have to ask his psychoanalyst. Perhaps around the time of his brother’s birth — which was Jack’s idea, incidentally. ‘You’ve got each other and I haven’t got anyone,’ he’d said to his parents. Stupid. The next thing he knew there was a whingeing infant in the house and he had chronic asthma (well, anything to win his parents’ attention back). He was interested in the pregnancy, although he resented his mother’s tiredness. He was at that age. Nothing anyone said could make sense of it; you had to think it through for yourself. It must have been dark in there, and a bit cramped. Where did the baby come out? How did it get in? Could it breathe alright? Where was this mysterious exit? And what was it? A flap? A tube? Did it let in air? And light? Jack’s own birth had been dramatic. He’d ripped his mother’s uterus in his rush to get out. (As he said to his analyst, he always hurts the people he loves.) His father wasn’t there to greet him. He’d nipped off to see Bobby Charlton’s last match for Manchester United, without even saying goodbye. Jack’s dad was epileptic. That was his excuse — the excitement of the birth might have set him off. Jack’s mother was still furious about it, more than thirty years later. Jack wasn’t like his dad though. He was good in a crisis. In fact he was better in a crisis than in his day-to-day life. Sometimes he hoped bad things would happen so he could get back to being his proper self. He wished people close to him would die so he could feel extremely sad about it. Wardrobes were like coffins. You could fit a body in one. He liked to imagine the wood rotting. Coffins always looked so solid at funerals but, actually, they were as impermanent as anything. He had a bookshelf decomposing in his garden. It was from Ikea. The wood was too new to be allowed in the house. He wished he could go to his own funeral. He envied dead people. They were interesting, maybe because they’d got something finished. His girlfriend’s ex had committed suicide. He’d hanged himself. That was especially interesting. Jack wanted to know the details. Did he piss himself? Which way did the neck snap? What was the expression on his face? His girlfriend didn’t like it. He’d pester her with questions until she got upset. As he said, he liked to hurt his favourite people. He’d been hurt too, of course. Lots of ways. But perhaps the first and most dramatic way was this: his father was naked in the kitchen, making tea. Jack was tiny, too tiny to open the kitchen door. So the teapot was balanced on top of the fridge while his dad managed his exit. It was a bad fridge for this sort of caper, curvy on top (unlike the wardrobe, which was perfectly rectangular) and wobbly on its feet. The hot tea fell on the tiny boy, blistering off so much skin that his mother was asked to donate some. Imagine. But the scars were perfect for frightening girls. ~ One day — or one split second if you want to be pedantic — Jack decided to photograph his beloved wardrobe. At some point. He often wondered what to photograph. What was worth plucking from the chaos, putting one’s name to, making permanent? Maybe it was enough to photograph something just because you wanted to, because you liked the look of it. Or maybe it wasn’t. Jack put it off for days, months, years. Why would he take the photographs today? The wardrobe wasn’t going anywhere. But then he might die. In which case, so what? Until then he could just stand in the bathroom and look at it. Him over here, the wardrobe over there; a private relationship between himself and his furniture. Perhaps that was all this was ever meant to be. But eventually it happened. Jack grabbed the camera. Before he knew it the photographs had been taken. After which the negatives sat in a drawer. More time passed. Maybe it hadn’t been a good idea anyway. Why would he make the prints today? The negatives weren’t going anywhere. But then he might die. In which case, so what? To finish would have been morbid. But giving up was morbid too. If only he could start by mistake. The beginning had to be invisible. And there had to be no end. By some miracle — let’s call it the translation of thought into motion — Jack managed to trick himself back into action. He could make a set of prints, as long as they weren’t final. Rough drafts were OK. They didn’t have to be perfect. In fact they had to be defective. They had to look as though there was room for improvement, something still to be done. Jack liked to see the black edges of the negatives sneaking into the frame, the squiggles of fluff, the long white scratches where lab technicians had used oil from their noses to wipe down the negatives after storage. Accidents happened. Things went wrong. He enjoyed seeing the layers of damage — the scuffed negatives used to make flawed prints of a tatty wardrobe. Scars were the proof that something had taken place. That was how you knew you were alive — things kept happening, you kept getting damaged. There was always room for improvement. Who had done that to the wardrobe? Who had done this to him? Some people say that time is money, but time is damage. Maybe money is damage too. But behind every bit of damage lies an event. Jack had made something happen. He’d ruined some photographic paper. It was painful. The prints went back in the drawer. Don’t ask what made him take them out again. He just did. Maybe he was tidying up — I don’t know whether he does that sort of thing. But he showed them to someone, a publisher, along with some other much more exciting photos. Pictures of people fucking, if you must know. The publisher liked the wardrobe. He thought maybe they could make a book. This was surprising to Jack. What could anyone else possibly see in those images? There was nothing actually there, just some rectangles in various shades of grey. They were pictures of the invisible. Of never getting off with that girl, of time spent in his bathroom, of unborn babies and accidents waiting to happen, of his own death and questions he should never ask his girlfriend. They were a criticism of his father, an attack on his mother, an insult to himself. A self-portrait in which he failed to appear. It was private really. What could they possibly mean to anyone else? No one could ever see what he saw. He left the meeting, confused. Jack put the photographs back in the drawer. Perhaps they had no place in the outside world. They simply existed. He’d think about what to do with them later. Anouchka Grose is a writer and psychoanalyst, based in London. Her book, ‘No More Silly Love Songs: a Realist’s Guide to Romance’ will be published by Portobello Books in February 2010. Wardrobe Photo by Jack Webb.

L'Amour... L'Amour: Intro

2009-02-04T12:14:14-05:00

Time was when courtship was all about films, paintings, songs, and talking about books as long as the bible, which were just as hard to get through. If you were really sucker-punched you might even talk about the bible, between long swigs on a mojito, or any one of those drinks you only drank to impress a lady. And it didn’t matter even if the lady liked you. If she didn’t you were either a literary or a bible nut, depending on how much you cared… Maybe you were even one of those flakey Fine Art guys who took girls back to your room to look at your prints, before taking them back downstairs to meet your mates… ‘OH, did you forget to bed her, again?!’ Children can be so cruel… You should have pipped for accountancy over the painting BA! There’s no way you were going to take her and have her look at all your printed money before you made noisy love. It would have to be the other way round, were you a City boy. She wasn’t sticking around long anyhow… If she did like you, well, she probably wasn’t listening that much, or, in any case, it wouldn’t have mattered if you mixed up Shakespeare with the guy who painted Sunflowers. Then art college finished, and you grew more refined, chatting about books only when she wanted you to. You tried light beers – for that brief period that they became fashionable, before the pub smoking ban came in – and your cultural talk was equally as airy… ‘maybe’, you said, ‘maybe, you just weren’t that great a genius… maybe friends, and being a good guy is what matters.’ And then you might have thought a protracted ‘Naaaaaah’, before finding a girl that also thought an even more protracted ‘Naaaaaaaaah; I believe this guy’s got something…’ One is maybe still unsure whether the greater protaction of her ‘Naaaaaaaaah’ implied a greater or lesser hesitancy, but things paid off all the same. And if it screws up, you’ve still got your art! So hopefully you’re glad now you never ditched the Fine Art or the writing, the design, or the philosophy, poetry or music, for that City job. I think we got a pretty mixed bunch of writers for this issue… Rik’s insomniac mind tells us there’s no way he’s not keeping it real, whilst all the time keeping his heart in the right place. Karim has one worried eye on the Parisienne ladies… the other eye, also fixed on the Parisienne ladies, is presumably not at all worried… Johnny reminds us to be good to each other, in general. Bill reminds us to cook now and then… a recurrent theme here. It was Bill that suggested we all talk about food a few issues back. If this recession kicks in, it’s all round to Bill’s for a slap-up menu, or maybe something simpler, and lets hope we’re not interrupting anything! Leila and Bassma keep the girls end up… there’s more to art and dating than we suspect, and although one rather gets the impression that they’d sooner have a competent artist-guy than a Sunday painter, or a moron in a slogan t-shirt, maybe its their own work they’re most fixated on! Which is a good thing. So love and art mix in various ways… probably innumerable ways… but I guess more than anything, this selection of writings shows that they’re not reducible to each other… just like the two halves of a couple… Aaaaah… L’Amour! L’Amour! The rest of L’Amour… L’Amour posts: Ric: The Sexorcist Karim: After Le Moustique Bassma: The First Date Faux Pas Bill: The Way to a [Wo]Man’s Heart Johnny: Be Nice to Everyone Mike: Literature and Dating – Don’t! Leila: Not A-muse-ed: Art and the Art of love