Other Voices, Other Rooms

In the past couple of weeks I started doing some internet research on the artwork of northwest native Canadian culture. I don't really remember what started it. Oh, I guess it was a section in The Gift about the potlatch ceremony in Haida tradition and the copper engravings they would make and trade as gifts. (The book, by the way, is a fascinating piece of prescriptive sociology wherein the author compares systems of gift exchange with those of commercial exchange and then goes on to show how useful it would be, for both artists and their audiences, to think of artworks as gifts rather than commodities. Check it out if you have any interest in art or economics or anthropology.) The engravings reminded me about those interesting repeated shapes in totem poles and other artifacts of the Pacific coast, how they fit together like psychedelic poster artwork of the 1960s, and how they often depict mystical animals inside of or attached to other animals.

So that got me all excited for awhile, and then while I was looking at some mind-altering Haida comics online (who knew such a thing existed? The Japanese, apparently.), I remembered a really great Dover colouring book I had as a kid, of North American Indian art. And then I recalled also having a calendar of black and white Inuit art prints. I hadn't thought about it in a long time, and the pieces I could picture from it struck me as weird and magical.

So, soon I was at the library, borrowing a book called Dorset 75, a 1975 annual collection of graphics from Cape Dorset in what is now Nunavut, and it was just the stuff I was looking for. I didn't know it before, but the Inuit began printmaking only in the late '50s after being shown how by a guy named James Houston who was trained in the Japanese style. That partially explains the look of a lot of this stuff, but the Inuit also have this inimitably naïve style that is elegant, childlike, and otherworldly all at once. I soon fell in love with the work of Pudlo Pudlat and Peter Pitseolak. I also have to show you this piece, because it just happens to be titled "Our Igloo"!


And then I discovered that the National Gallery of Canada's website has tons of fantastic prints you can look at online, with plenty from the golden age of the 60s and 70s. I've made a little video here of my favourite stuff from the two sources. There are a couple of black and white pieces whose look I'm hoping to somehow adapt for my alleged comic-in-progress. Also see if you can pick out "Thoughts of the Walrus" by Pudlo Pudlat, "The People Within" by Jessie Oonark, "The Woman Who Lives in the Sun" by Kenojuak Ashevak, and "Joyfully I See Ten Caribou" by Pootoogook.



Last weekend Alison and I travelled to Fredericton to attend, with my family, a memorial for my aunt Chooch. I told you about her in November. We were kindly driven there and back by my dad's cousin and her family. The memorial was held in the Charlotte Street Arts Centre, a large school that has been converted into studio and gallery spaces, largely thanks to Chooch's long and relentless pushing for it. I'm not sure how many people were there, but it must have been over 500. It was quite inspiring to see the great effect she had had on the entire arts community there. Many many people had thanks to give and stories to tell, including the local MP and New Brunswick's lieutenant governor. My dad also did a great job with the closing words. Ali and I returned home determined to get our asses in gear and consciously connect with our own community, rather than just enjoying our lovable but insular igloo.

The Shape of Your Absence

Bring me the bitter and frightened tears
of those who loved you best;
replace my own, too subtle in their flavour
ever to toast you fittingly,
full as they are of opportunity
lost and memories of your dog.

Even the friends and artisans
whose works and lives you still inspire
with an honesty and love that already survive you
(and, yes, the voice I suddenly remember)
can't parallel their view with them
who now must look ahead
into a brutal world more sad and alien
than anyone's mother should contemplate
or any husband dare consider.

Let me just observe them in a spoon
if I might not taste their salt,
that sympathy may train my palate's grief
and pain expose my heart —
I will not shrink from the gift
of their pure sorrow.

- Andrew

The Life of a Consumer

Listen, I'm sorry to keep writing about pop cultural stuff, rather than more important things like what's actually going on in my life. I can see that it's not winning me any admirers. But I have a bit of a dilemma in that I'd like everyone to be kept regularly abreast of the fact that I continue to exist, while at the same time there is really nothing going on here worth telling about. Seriously. Alison and I are watching a lot of movies, listening to a lot of records, and reading a lot of books. Besides working at our jobs, that is, where you'll have to take my word that even more nothing is going on. It's winter; what do you want?

Last weekend, for instance, I spent a perfect Sunday with Ali which consisted of reading in bed with coffee for a couple of hours, getting up to do some yoga, having breakfast made for us by Krista upstairs and eating it with her while watching some weird and/or hilarious short films collected on the second issue of Wholphin ("Sour Death Balls" = genius), going out for a walk in the sun which led to a secondhand record store downtown where we purchased an armload of stuff including two Eno records I was missing and Closer by Joy Division, coming home to watch a documentary with Meg about a profoundly deaf female percussionist who "hears" with her whole body (and by whom Alison's parents saw an apparently astounding performance in Toronto), eating some of Ali's famous potato and carrot gumbo, and finally heading out for a band practice wherein we completely nailed two of the songs we've been working on. Boring to tell, maybe, but the actual living makes up for it tenfold.

So now I'll tell you that I'm in the middle of:

• Leaves of Grass by Walt Whitman,
• The Gift by Lewis Hyde,
• Making Comics by Scott McCloud,
• the latest (50th!) issue of The Believer,
• Infinite Jest by David Foster Wallace (only a regular-sized novel's worth left to go!),
• Time and Again by Jack Finney,
• Ruling Your World by Sakyong Mipham, Rinpoche, and
• Writing in General and the Short Story in Particular by Rust Hills,

and loving it all. I'll leave it to your imagination what that's like.

OK, OK, and I'm getting a haircut tonight. There.

- Andrew

Sorry, Jack & Meg.

In response to the overwhelming number of demands to know how The White Stripes' Icky Thump could possibly have been left off my list of 2007's best albums, let me just say that it is, in fact, a pretty good record. Right up there with their best work, in fact. Unfortunately, they chose to make the second track a complete and obvious ripoff of my own jingle for a car dealership, and are therefore automatically disqualified from the race. Better luck next time, Stripes!

- Andrew

Quick Inventory of Brain Contents

So far this year I'm tired and don't really feel like doing anything. Does anyone else feel this way? I'm hoping it's not from the furnace fumes coming out of the incongruous box that rises from the floor in our living room.

Lowlands are gearing up to play a show soon. We've been putting this thing together for over a year now. Stay tuned for details. I'm still not sold on the name, but am glad that the ten or eleven songs we've been working on are pretty much ready.

I didn't mention before that we saw Juno over the holidays. It was pretty good, but not great. The director relied a little too heavily on his indie rock soundtrack and hip pop-culture touchstones. And there wasn't enough of the hilarious Michael Cera. But Ellen Page, who's from Halifax, was really great. Very believable as an intelligent but self-absorbed and not entirely likeable teenager. We saw her dancing at the New Year's Eve show, by the way. She is tiny.

Because it was due back at the library, I quickly finished a book of Krishnamurti writings I'd been reading last week. I find him incredibly inspirational, but I guess not very uplifting. He was appointed head of some religious organization in India as a young child, supposedly the reincarnation of some great teacher or other, and went through all sorts of crazy spiritual training and saw weird visions and generally became highly enlightened, but then later renounced his position, as he came to realize that all organized religion is a waste of time, based as it is on tradition, which is the past, and therefore incapable of seeing the present in all its newness, which is what spirituality should be all about. Most of his teachings are about what NOT to think or do, i.e. follow any method or technique for self-awareness; believe in time; believe in yourself as an independent being; have any beliefs at all, really. Of course he has no advice for how to achieve this non-achievement, other than a Nikean "just do it," but still I think he has a lot of important things to tell the world about living in modern human society as a socially and emotionally adult being. His "teachings" mesh pretty well with both Eckhart Tolle and Alan Watts.

Now I've got the latest issue of McSweeney's (as mentioned in Juno) out of the library. It's a very happy surprise to me to find that they carry it, as I've missed every issue since the comics one, however long ago that was (a couple of years, I think), and they're pretty expensive. But they're also always full of great contemporary fiction, so I'm going to have a fun time catching up. Plus, we rented an issue of Wholphin, the filmic arm of the ever-growing McSweeney's literary hodgepodge, and it's been just as enjoyable as their other stuff.

- Andrew

So Long, Oh Seven.

Hope everybody had a New Year's Eve as fun- and friend-filled as ours was. I played a show with Al Tuck at the Bus Stop Theatre on Gottingen, opening for the Zumbini Circus. Our part of the show was frankly awful, what with nightmarish sound problems, no set list, and some very non-standard tunings, but luckily they cut us short after about five songs so that the great Zumbinis could make their spectacular appearance. They're a fairly large band who play Brazilian and afrobeat music, and they started their set by marching out through the audience thumping and shaking various percussion instruments. By the time they got onto the stage and really got down to it, the whole crowd was on their feet dancing. And they kept it up until the show was over at around 2:00 or so. Actually, I think there was even another small set after that, but Alison and I went home at around 2:30, getting to sleep by probably about four.







I'd like to offer some kind of 2007 retrospective roundup of personal themes and experiences, but all I seem to have come up with is my top ten music albums of the year. Very nerdy, I know. But anyway, you already know what happened to me all year, so why not find out what was playing in my head while it was going on? Here's my favourites, in no particular order.

The Shins - Wincing the Night Away
This band can do no wrong.

Radiohead - In Rainbows
Nor this one. For some reason, I put off buying this album over the internet, paying whatever I felt like paying, and when I finally got around to it a couple of weeks ago it was no longer available. I had to procure it by other, less ethical means, which was kind of ridiculous since I could have gotten it for free to begin with. Once I had it, I loaded it on the old iPod and Alison and I walked to our friends Charles and Kelly's house in the deep north end while listening to it in its entirety. A fantastic soundtrack to melting icicles in the late afternoon sunlight.

Arcade Fire - Neon Bible
Impossibly, even better than Funeral. More coherent, I guess.

Caribou - Andorra
He sings on pretty much every track, and it's weirdly pretty. Sometimes he sounds a lot like that guy in the Silver Apples.

Deerhoof - Friend Opportunity
Quirky and frantic and constantly changing, but somehow really catchy. Like it makes you mad that there's no way you'll ever be able to sing along to a whole song, no matter how hard you try. It must be terribly difficult to make a record that gets more enjoyable every time you listen to it, even after twenty or so times. And my friend Ron tells me they record all their albums using the free version of ProTools that you can download but you have to switch your computer over to an older version of the operating system and there are no plugins available and only eight possible tracks. Just like me! Choo choo choo choo, beep beep!

Interpol - Our Love to Admire
OK, even though these are not supposed to be ordered, this one's my number one favourite from the year. Critics didn't like it as much as their last one, but I think it's better because they've gone back to the dark Joy Division-derived sound that made the first album so great. I wish I could write basslines like Carlos Dengler.

Iron & Wine - The Shepherd's Dog
Call me an impurist, but I like some orchestration with my wimpy folk.

Neil Young - Live at Massey Hall 1971
I don't know whether this should actually count as a 2007 album, but that's when it came out and I'll be damned if it's not making it onto this list. It's just too good. Neil explains to the audience what "Old Man" is about, because they've never heard that song before! A fantastic solo acoustic show from the top of his game.

Sharon Jones & the Dap-Kings - 100 Days, 100 Nights
Just really, really fun. No one makes soul music like this anymore. Well, maybe Amy Winehouse, but Sharon's the real deal.

Blonde Redhead - 23
I missed seeing Blonde Redhead when I was on tour in Europe with Buck 65, because I'd slept through the alarm that morning and been rushed onto the bus in a groggy and foul mood, and we'd seen a ridiculous number of rock shows over the past few days and I just wanted some time alone. Everyone thought I was crazy going off into the woods surrounding the festival location somewhere in France while they all checked out these incredible Italian twins with a Japanese woman for a singer, and maybe I was in retrospect. But I could hear the music drifting toward me while I sat quietly under a tree, and I don't know if seeing them onstage could possibly have made me feel any better than that did. They've held a special place in my eardrums ever since.

Back to work tomorrow, and a regular schedule. I think I kind of need it. I'll be doing some recording with Skratch Bastid in a couple of days, and then my big resolution is to get Lowlands playing some shows. We've been working on this for a year now — time to spit or get off the cuspidor. Also, I'm going to more regularly do the things that are supposed to be done regularly, such as exercise and blogging, try to have fun doing the things I don't like doing, and eliminate distractions as much as possible. Ali says she's going to get her driver's license before the summer so we can go on a road trip. How about all a' y'all?

- Andrew

Ali in Her Kerchief and I in My Cap

... are just about to settle our brains for a long and well-deserved winter's nap. Not a creature is stirring, not even a mouse, 'cause everyone else has vacated the house, and the moon on the puddles of rain everywhere is producing what I would describe as a glare. Our Christmas tree's looming all sprucey and huge, and we seem to be too tired to even watch Scrooge, but we wanted to say, ere we turn out the light, happy Christmas to all, and to all a good night!



- Andrew

Christmas Shenanigan

This is good for a yuk or two, I hope. Sorry.

- Andrew

Self Portrait, ca. 1973

I took an art class when I was seven or eight years old. I'd mostly forgotten about it but my parents brought me my old sketch pad on their recent visit. This is me in my Cub uniform. I wish I could still draw like this.

Also, Uncle Scrooge.


- Andrew

First Big Blizzard

Crossing the frozen baseball diamond
Against the blowing snow, our eyes
Were drawn down
Out of the white that vanishes context,
Massacres colour and shape in an ever-changing blur,
And into the revealing white
Of pure, bright reflection.
It was strange to be so blind, lost.
We felt a little frightened,
I think,
And pictured ourselves on rubber yoga mats
Or home in bed,
Lying awake with closed eyes,
Dreaming ourselves here,
Showing up at your Christmas party
Already half drunk.

- Andrew

Been a Long Time, Been a Long Time

Been a long lonely, lonely, lonely, lonely, lonely time! Has anybody heard this guy's recent album of duets with newgrass starlet, Alison Krauss? I imagine it would sound like, "Rollin' rollin' rollin' rollin'! Aieeeeeee keep on rollin'! Oh my Jesus! Rollin' in mah sweet bay-EE-ay-EE-ay-EE! Ay-EE-ay-EE-aaaaaay-by's.... ... .... AAAAAAHHHRRRRRMMMS!" But from all accounts it's actually quite good.

Anyways, what's mostly been up with me is that I had a birthday last weekend. It was my fortieth, so kind of weird, but mostly really fun. The big surprise was that my parents flew in from Toronto on Thursday night and were already in the restaurant where Ali and I were going when we got there. Poor Alison was unsure how I'd take it, as I normally am against surprise parties, but this was not a party, just a surprise, and a really nice one, at that. We had a great dinner with them, then they came bowling with us and a bunch of friends the next night, and on Saturday we accompanied them to the Farmers' Market and wandered around downtown. I don't generally get to spend much time alone with my folks, and especially not on my own turf, so it was really sweet of them to do that. About the best birthday present I could get.






Cliff came out and bowled left-handed, on account of his broken collarbone. Didn't seem to prevent his team from kicking the other team's pants.




As usual, Ali's not in any of the bowling pictures 'cause she took them all.

So, other than that weekend of shenanigans there hasn't been a whole lot worth telling about. A rather disgusting amount of my time has been devoted to getting my computer working with the fancy new iPod Alison gave me. I had to get a new operating system (thanks, Apple) but the latest one won't work on my dinosaur of a three-year-old Mac, and then I didn't have a DVD drive,... Ugh, you really don't want to know, I'm tellin' ya. Plus, there've been shows and work and chores keeping us plenty busy, so I don't even have any great new music or movies to recommend to you. I did get an anthology of the year's best comics from Krista for my b-day and discovered plenty of mind-blowing stuff in there. It was curated by Chris Ware, creator of the Acme Novelty Library, so pretty much everything in there was fantastic. It got me all excited about comics again, and I've decided to try doing a comic story. When I was a kid I thought I'd end up drawing cartoons as a career. Right now I'm a graphic designer, which is not far off, when you think about it. It's all about a fascination with the communicative possibilities of words and pictures. Now if only I could actually draw...

And, oh yeah, speaking of comics, I received my first issue of The Shambhala Sun, Halifax's own internationally acclaimed Buddhist magazine, in the mail on my birthday, and whose illustration should grace the table of contents but Mark Alan Stamaty's? It's a very large piece that spans two pages in a fascinating article on the "new atheists" (Dennett, Dawkins, Hitchens, et al.) and how those interested in more contemplative, less dogmatic religious experiences might respond to their science-is-all-we-need attitudes. Just the kind of stuff I've been wanting to read, and as a bonus I learn that Stamaty's alive and well and still producing high quality work (though I thought the illustration could have used a few tiny little guys with fish coming out of their pipes).

As for Alison, she's been busy getting ready for her friend Alicia's wedding. It's next weekend and Ali's the maid/matron of honour. She's working like a maniac on this toast she'll have to make, and in fact I have to print out what she's got so far so we can go over it together and squeeze the maximum entertainment value out of it.

But let me just say before I excuse myself (Coming, Ali!) that we might get a second-hand piano. Very exciting. I'll tell ya more next time. Gotta run now!

- Andrew

P.S. Oh, now I'm really in trouble, but I forgot to ask whether anyone had heard that the real reason Celine Dion cancelled her show in Halifax was that her husband read some negative press about it in the Daily News and the two of them became very upset. They've decided that Halifax is not a "hip" (read "cornball") enough place for them, and the city has actually been taking some blows from entertainment media rushing to La Voix Abominable's defense. It's really just too funny. I can't understand how she could have gone this long without realizing that there are many, many people out there who think she stinks. No one could possibly be that sheltered, could they?

We're Here, We're Queer, We Still Don't Drink Beer

Well, Ali does occasionally. And queer in the broader, less euphemistic sense, it goes without saying. NTTAWWT. So many things to tell you about because it's been awhile because there are so many things to tell you about. But not yet. Soon. I promise.

- Andrew

Marvel's Newest Supervillain

In all my wise-assery, I forgot to mention that Ali got laser surgery done on her eyes yesterday! She won't have to wear glasses anymore. Pretty miraculous. But right now, she's supposed to use her eyes as little as possible, so the curtains are all closed and she's sitting around listening to music in sunglasses.

- Andrew

Marvel's Newest Introspective Superhero

Let's Hope It's Kenny G.

Celine Dion has decided not to come to Halifax after all. She was recently booked to play an outdoor concert on the Commons next summer, à la (aux?) The Rolling Stones. At first the powers that be just told us that some big act was going to be coming, causing massive-scale rumours and speculation about AC/DC, The Red Hot Chili Peppers, and just about any other exciting musical entertainers of whom you can think. Then they announced that it was in fact the big C, and the entire city fell into a cyclically tripolar mood of depression, hilarity, and anger. I had a fun preoccupation for a few days trying hard, with next to no success (except see post title), to think of an act I'd less like to see than The Francowhippet.

But now the fun's over. Her people say that the Commons, as a venue, cannot handle her "elaborate production needs" (e.g. a non-ironically interested audience). "'It's like Lucy pulling the football away from Charlie Brown,' said Mr. Adams, the councillor [and self-admitted non-fan] for Spryfield-Herring Cove." I.e. we are Charlie Brown and Celine is the football we can no longer hope to kick squarely and with all our might. Our reverse snobbism thus thwarted, there's nothing left for Halifax to do now but hang our heads and grumble about grapes whose sourness we never even got a proper chance to complain about before the point became moot. Except I guess we are still promised some large and popular act in The Smirk's stead. How camp will it be? How embarassingly melodramatic? How overall cringeworthy? These are burning questions only time can answer.

- Andrew

A Fantasy Story

One day, in a weird land beyond imagination, it was and will forever be snowing. But it was also not snowing. The great wizard, Falafla-Flarngio, unscrewed a lightbulb, and this was a sign that there were ghosts in his liver. It was just as the old woman had predicted.

- Andrew

It Is a Sad and Beautiful World II

A couple of weeks ago, my dad's sister died of cancer, which she'd had for a year. I haven't really known what to say about it, partly because I feel like I never knew her very well. Maybe that's just how you feel when someone dies and the chance to know them better is gone. But it's not entirely gone, because then all these people you've never met come out of the woodwork and tell you all these things you didn't know about the person, and it's kind of nice. Sad but nice that you learn how great someone was after their life is over.

Not that I didn't know my aunt Chooch was great. We all did, and were maybe a little intimidated by her greatness. We needn't have been, as she was a very warm and genuine person. But she was also a fiercely unique artist and a passionate advocate for the arts, with no time for foolishness while she accomplished wonderful things with her conviction and determination. Nothing done in any kind of half-hearted way — that sort of person. Very inspirational to me. I was inspired by the way she lived and by her art, but more specifically by the great birthday and Christmas presents she gave me. Books, mostly. I can probably ascribe a pretty large portion of my interests in nature, science, philosophy, and of course art to the just-challenging-enough-to-be-forever-fascinating books I got from her over the years.

There was a funeral for her in New Brunswick last Wednesday, which I didn't attend. I'll be going to a larger memorial service, probably in the new year. My dad has posted a bunch of links to articles about Chooch on his blog.

I was thinking about my aunt and life and death when we went to see The Darjeeling Limited, Wes Anderson's latest film. His movies always make me sort of sad in a pleasant, humanity-loving way, and this one was no different. It's about three American brothers who meet up in India to rebond by going on a vaguely spiritual journey by train. It's really good. Less far-fetched, plot-wise, than most of his films, but just as quirky and gorgeous and warm. Owen Wilson is great, as usual. I think the knowledge that he recently attempted suicide, coupled with my aunt's passing, left me a little sadder than usual. Greatness in our species is much rarer than we like to tell ourselves.

But here's some. I don't know if you remember, but a few posts ago I put up a scan of Mark Alan Stamaty's classic Village Voice comic strip, MacDoodle Street. Well, the other day in a comic store, Alison noticed a children's book called Who Needs Donuts? by Mr. Stamaty, and we immediately bought it. The pictures, being on large pages, are even more detailed than those in MacD St. I haven't even gotten halfway through it yet, because I'm savouring it, but so far it's just incredible. The more you look at it, the weirder it gets. I hope these scans give you some idea. Of course, you'll want to click on them for larger versions.




I recently discovered a Blogger blog that is nothing but scans of book illustrations, found elsewhere on the internet. It's fantastic. You could spend days just randomly poking around on this thing. There's really no rhyme or reason to it — just exquisite and/or fascinating pictures, mostly quite old. It's definitely going on the old links list.

Here's a slightly less exquisite illustration, featured on one of the more cynical billboards I have ever seen. There are at least eight of them around the city, and this one is just around the corner from our house. Many people have died in wars throughout Canada's national evolution, so think about it while you drink some vodka. Hmm? Connection? No, no, we're not honouring anyone monetarily or in any specific way like that, but we just thought it was our responsibility as a vodka company to remind people about the sacrifices that have been made for us all. And also parenthetically about drinking vodka, of course. Oh yeah, and John A. MacDonald was a Canadian hero too.

And finally, bowling. We did some. It was lots of fun. Went for the candlepin this time, which for any non-maritime readers means you roll five-pin-sized balls at ten pins that are close to cylindrical in shape so that there's lots of room for the ball and/or flying pins not to hit non-flying pins. For this reason, you get three balls to knock down the pins, instead of only two. Scoring is the same as ten-pin, only it's possible to get ten in a frame without getting either a strike or a spare.


There was plenty of victorious gloating...


... and defeated head-bowing.



And then Charlie's Angels showed up just in time for the Moonlight Bowling (lights out except for some blacklights and a disco ball).


Looking fine, ladies!

- Andrew

Happy Hallowe'en!

We had the annual pumpkin-carving contest at work again yesterday. This year each team was to come up with something related to the theme of witchcraft. Here were the results.


Far left was Dorothy's house landing on the Wicked Witch of the West, whose legs you can see sticking out beside the Yellow Brick Road. I guess the sparkler was just for added visual punch. The next one in was a very clever diorama of a woman being burned at the stake, with little sculpted pumpkin-flesh logs in a pyre shape over an LED candle simulator. My team did a Frank Sinatra pumpkin, complete with a recording of "Witchcraft" playing from within. And the winner on the right was a cauldron that didn't require any extra props and utilized all parts of the pumpkin in very clever ways, including the guts as ooze boiling over the side. A very successful contest, over all.

After work, Ali and I went out for Thai food and a movie, in celebration of our anniversary. Mystery Train was playing for free at the Dalhousie Art Gallery, as part of an ongoing Jim Jarmusch film festival every Wednesday night. It was as good as I remembered it, but unfortunately someone neglected to turn on the English subtitles which are meant to accompany the storyline of two Japanese teenagers who visit Memphis, comprising the first third of the movie. As a result, sometimes you could tell what they were talking about, but other times there were long soliloquies where you could make up just about anything. I asked esteemed Halifax critic, Ron Foley MacDonald, the man in charge of the event, about the subtitles afterward, and he claimed there are none, and, more ridiculously, that Jim Jarmusch never puts subtitles in his films and that's half the fun of them. Remembering parts of some of the more soliliquizational bits from when I first saw the movie in the theatre some twenty years ago, I called his bluff and had him check the subtitles menu of the DVD we had just watched, only to see the options: 1. Italian, 2. French, and 3. None. I still haven't figured out what the heck happened, but I hope the problem is solved before they show Night on Earth next week! (Explanation for non-nerds: Night on Earth takes place in five different cities and contains dialogue in French, Italian, German, and Finnish.
WUNH-waaahh!)

- Andrew

Right Back Atcha, Sweet Feet!

Happy thirteen and all those in between! Many more to come for Beauty and the Bum.

- Andrew

Happy Anniversary, HB!

I'm a lucky girl to have you by my side.
You're my favourite kook!

-Ali

Happy Birthday, Jason!

Rawk

Last week was the Halifax Pop Explosion, a big rock festival that happens in town every year at this time. Most of the good local bands played, and a bunch of acts from out of town and around the world came to show our little isolated peninsula the current state of international indie rock. It's usually a weekend-long event, but this year it ran for five days.

The highlight for me and a lot of other people I've since talked to was a loud and energetic performance by this Japanese band called Zoobombs. I didn't really know anything about them going into the show, but remembered seeing a video of theirs on MuchMusic's "The Wedge" about ten years ago or so and thinking it was pretty exciting and then not being able to find out anything about them and soon forgetting about them entirely until I found out that they were playing at this year's HPX. I was pleasantly surprised to find that the lead singer and guitarist, Don Matsuo, was basically a Japanese Matt Murphy, quickly whipping the crowd into a frenzy with his hot guitar playing and intense, frantic manner. "Everybody! Everybody!" he kept shouting, apparently seeing no reason to elaborate. Another surprise was that even though they often slipped into funk-inspired rhythms and riffs, it didn't make me feel gross like it does when white bands do the same thing (Talking Heads excluded, of course). Why is the funk somehow less offensive when attempted by a Japanese band? I'm not sure, but their apparent worship of manic energy over technical precision played no small part, I think.

Anyway, if you ever get a chance to see these guys (actually three guys and a girl, the latter pretty hot stuff on the distorted drony keyboard), you should definitely take it. Their live show is really inspiring and exciting and fun. I bought their latest CD from Matta, the parenthetically mentioned keyboard player, and it's a live album recorded in Toronto so the energy and excitement I witnessed is happily captured. Here's a sample. I can't help but suspect they've been somewhat inspired by legendary German 70s band, Can, though they're not listed in the influences on the Zoobombs MySpace page. But Don was definitely channeling Damo Suzuki at times. And it's not just a Japanese thing, because at other times he sounded like Malcolm Mooney, Can's original singer. Check out this Damo track for easy comparison.

In other music news, I was in HMV the other day, looking for a particular Jonathan Richman album (they had none whatsoever, surprise) and this song started playing where the main part was a really nice, harmonically simple but rhythmically complex electric piano line, and my ears perked up to check it out. It was quite groovy and I was enjoying it a lot before I realized that it sounded kind of familiar. In searching the corners of my brain, trying to figure out where I'd heard it before, I suddenly stumbled on the very weird feeling that it was actually a recording of me playing a melody I'd created on my own Wurlitzer. And then I realized that it was a track from the upcoming Buck 65 album and the weird feeling was accurate. It sounded great! Feels pretty good to be digging your own material without knowing that's what it is.

- Andrew

Happy Birthday, Eri!

I hope you have a great day!

-Ali

Happy Birthday, Eri!

Hope it's a great one! I'll call you tonight.

- Andrew

Happy Birthday, Dad!

Wish we could be there to celebrate it with you. I hope the day there is nicer than the meteorological mess we've got going on here. If so, I REALLY wish we could be there.

In case you happen some time in the near future to come into the possession of a potential, but thoughtlessly unspecified, piece of literature or music, and are wondering how this potential should best be actualized in a birthday-appropriate (i.e. enjoyable, entertaining, fun) manner, here's a couple of suggestions:

Infinite Jest, by David Foster Wallace, is a hilarious, insightful, LOOOONG novel (with many, many footnotes) about entertainment and addiction and the problems of post-modern living in North America. I'm finally past the halfway point myself, and still enjoying it and ripping it off as much as when I picked it up a year and a half ago.

100 Days, 100 Nights, by Sharon Jones & the Dap Kings, is a contemporary album of soul that is not an album of contemporary soul, meaning that it actually sounds like soul music and not some pyrotechnical diva belting out vocal gymnastic routines that display her lack of soul. This woman's been around since the 70s, but only recently started making a name for herself, and she's GOOD! Think Aretha Franklin or Tina Turner.

Breaking the Spell is Daniel Dennett's most recent book about materialism, consciousness, evolution, and meaning, both linguistic and life-related. This one addresses religion — how could it have evolved and what good does it still do us, if any — and makes a nice, clear-headed, slightly less reactionary though no more apologetic companion-piece to his friend Richard Dawkins's The God Delusion.

Finally, I hear the latest Bruce Springsteen album is quite good. I'm not usually a fan, don't know about you, but Alison just heard it and claims to be converted. I know you like some of those intense, gravelly-voiced singer-songwriters with something important to say.

Of course, should you be granted the opportunity of choosing a new book or CD, I realize that the choosing-to-fun ratio in such cases can easily be at least .50. These suggestions, therefore, should be taken only as such, and represent no greater legal or moral liability than, for instance, an enthusiastically bellowed "Happy birthday!"

Happy birthday.

- Andrew

Update on Cliff

He did break his collarbone. All the way through. Plus a couple of other fractures. There was a possibility of invasive surgery to make sure it stays in place, but he's opted instead for a sling and a prayer. There'll be no drumming for quite awhile. And it turns out it was a tripup from his shoes, and not any kind of macho never-say-die attitude, that sent him sailing racquetfirst into the next court over. I still feel bad, though.

- Andrew

Shows and Other Disasters

It's been awhile since I've blogged, and I don't want anyone to get the impression that this is all we've been doing during that time or anything, but I have to admit we've been watching quite a bit of these video collections called TV Carnage. They're these compilations of random scraps of really terrible television, but put together in a pretty hilarious order. Sounds stupid, I know, and of course it is, but Ali and I got fairly addicted for awhile there. Seems like any time you turn on the TV you're going to see total crap anyway, so why not watch the crap that someone has selected as representing the absolute crappiest? Here's a couple of the "better" things we discovered. I think they're both from the same show, which I regrettably never saw when it was on.

And speaking of questionable performances, I played a recorded show with Al Tuck yesterday, opening for Ron Sexsmith. Pretty cool. It was part of a series called "Pop In Sessions," which are short shows played in a local recording studio and filmed for later release on the internet. Buck 65 did one recently that I guess was mind-blowing, though I didn't see it or even hear about it happening at the time. Here's one by Brent Randall and His Pinecones that turned out really well, in my estimation.

Anyhow, so this show went OK, I guess, although I think we've played better. But Al's recently moved to Sackville, NB, so there wasn't much opportunity for rehearsal. There was also some awkward tuning between tunes and a song that had to be started over due to technical problems in the sound booth. Every time I looked out at the audience to get a sense of how it was going over, they seemed to have expressions of concern and even fear on their faces, sort of like when you drive by a potentially horrific accident on the highway and can't help but looking even though you're pretty sure you'll wish you hadn't. It was kind of making me giggle a little. I've since been assured that everyone was just engrossed in the intensity of Al's lyrics. I'm not entirely convinced, but I guess you'll be able to judge for yourselves when the show comes online.

Oh yeah, and Ron Sexsmith, he has GIGANTIC hands! Before the show, he was playing this song on the piano and it was really nice and I recognized it as one my mom used to play when I was a little kid, so I asked him when he took a break what it was, and he told me the name even though I forget it now and said that it was something he'd always liked as a kid because it sounded like vampire music and asked if he'd ever met me before because I looked familiar but I said I didn't think so, as if there was actually a little bit of doubt about it, don't ask me why, and then I introduced myself and held out my hand and the hand that it ended up meeting halfway between us was GIGANTIC! It was also very limp, with almost no grasp at all actually, possibly because Ron, who seems like an especially sensitive and caring individual, worries that people whose hands he shakes will be afraid, if only briefly, that their own hands might be inadvertently crushed upon envelopment in his GIGANTIC meatloaf of a manual appendage.

And speaking of crushed bones, Alison and I were playing some tennis this afternoon with Meg and Johanna and Cliff, when Cliff dove for a particularly tough shot I now wish I hadn't hit to him and fell onto the concrete, breaking his collarbone. We had to call an ambulance for him and pull his partner, Angie, out of her yoga class to come to the hospital. She's promised to call us to let us know how he's doing. It was very upsetting. Cliff may now be out of commission for up to six weeks! Poor guy. He'd just been starting to go to the gym regularly, too. And this is pure selfishness speaking, but as he's the drummer in the band at present known as Lowlands, that project's going to move along even slower than usual. Bummer.

I'll keep you posted.

- Andrew

Yuck

I feel like crap today. I'm at work right now, in the sense of physical location, but my brain is so curdled and my eyes are trying so hard to close themselves that I don't feel like stretching the prepositional attitude out into any further senses. Plus, I keep seeing this guy in the corner of my office.


Should I be worried?

- Andrew

Quickie

Pizza's here for dinner and we're about to start watching the season's second episode of The Office, but I want to get a quick post on here as part of my quit-ruminating-about-it-and-just-do-it-scrappy-style philosophy I'm trying out sporadically.

Ali and I just played some tennis in a surprise doubles match with our friends Jenny and Sarah, who happened to be there too. It was super duper fun and we're planning to do it again.

Work's been insanely hectic. I've already logged over 40 billable hours this week, and there's still a day to go. Last night in bed my head was surrounded by a buzzing and vibrating energy field that was radiating into and out of it. Some people pay good money for such experiences, but this one wasn't pleasant.

I sent some people emails asking them to sign a petition for the Chinese government to step in in support of the Burmese protestors. Hope no one was offended. Seems like a fairly important and uncontroversial cause to me. There's demonstrations going on all around the world at noon on Saturday.

OK, pizza's getting cold and Johanna's on her way over (recently back from Europe) to watch TO with us and Krista. Hope it's a good one!

- Andrew

In Which He Pouts a Little

Lately Ali and I are feeling kind of "off" Halifax. ("I've gone off London this week. It doesn't do anything for me," says the pouty and foppish fashion photographer in Blowup.) It makes me feel spoiled to admit it, as I really don't know where else could be any nicer. I guess the students all being back has something to do with it. And the recent upturn in random violence. I suppose mostly we're both just feeling in a bit of a rut. Fall's always a good time for a big change.

Speaking of The Fall and depression and fashionably aloof young Englishmen, last Friday we attended the Atlantic Film Festival screening of Control, the new biopic about Ian Curtis from Joy Division, who committed suicide at the height of the band's power. It's really well done: gorgeous black and white; fine acting, especially by Sam Riley as Curtis and Samantha Morton as his long-suffering wife; based on the book written by the latter (character, not actor). And lots of Joy Division songs are performed in the film, which has been making me feel like listening to nothing but ever since. That insistent bass, those robotic drums, that dark, Wire-like guitar... such a perfect environment for Curtis's brooding baritone to feel its way around in. This one's a particular favourite. I've already started working on a JD-inspired song called No Comment: "No one ever comments / On his wiseass blog / Makes him feel unwanted / Like a pedagogue."

In other film-watching news, we've lately rented the complete series of Sister Wendy's Story of Painting and are really enjoying it. I don't know whether you've ever seen it, but this super-loveable nun with awful glasses, horrible buck teeth, and an Elmer Fudd voice takes you through art history from her own personal perspective. She's so passionate and full of sympathy and joy it's infectious, and one soon finds oneself very emotionally involved. Well, these "ones" do, anyway. Marveling at a Brueghel depiction of peasants sitting in front of a fire, she notices that the lady "warming her underpants" turns her face slightly away from the men, who are "warming their, well, lack of underpants."

Oh, and the softball playoffs were last weekend, as I believe I'd mentioned. We lost every game. No one seemed to mind much, though, I must say. It managed to be a pretty fun day of ball.

And now Alison's considering playing next year. She's a bit of a natural pitcher, like her man. We went out for some batting practice with Meg before dinner tonight. Won't be able to do that for too much longer. I can't believe next weekend is Thanksgiving! Oh well, bring it on, I say. I've had enough of summer's light fun and tomfoolery. Time to get down to some serious contemplation in a cold dark room. Now that's what I call a good time.

- Andrew

My Favourite Comic When I Was Fifteen

Dump

I've been meaning to do a post about how busy I am, but I haven't had time.

Played a show at the Music Room with Erin Costelo last Saturday.

Recorded some more with Al Tuck.

Finished Alan Watts' The Book: On the Taboo Against Knowing Who You Are. I'd read it as a teenager, but forgotten how inciteful it is. Probably one of the more influential books in shaping my life. Probably could have just read it over and over instead of a lot of the various metaphysical stuff I've read since.

Lately I'm obsessed with Nancy comics.

Worked myself into a literally nightmarish state over a used car sale print ad that over two weeks became so cluttered with junky visuals and starbursty exclamations there's no communicative architecture whatsoever, let alone hierarchy of meaning. In my dream the ad is the surface of a pond under which I'm drowning as there are no spaces where I might come up for air.

Realized that some people probably couldn't see the animated GIF I'd put on the last post, and must have wondered what all the fuss was over an admittedly Escherian but quite lifeless cube in a cube drawing. Well you'll just have to trust me that your mind would be verily blown if you could see the way it perpetually turns itself inside out and outside in. Seriously, dude. If Escher were alive today, he'd be working in animation. Or Lego®.

Currently reading Italo Calvino's Invisible Cities, wherein Marco Polo describes the cities he's seen to Kubla Khan, whose domain they ostensibly comprise. Only it becomes apparent that the cities being described are fictitious and all based on Venice. Each description is only a page or two, some banal but poetic, and some quite fantastic. Calvino uses the format as an excuse to spout off about human nature. It's fascinating.

Softball playoffs are this weekend, starting at 8:00 in the morning on Saturday. Ah hope we wee-uhn!

- Andrew

Me & Doug go way back.(He just doesn't know it yet.)

I found this in some random guy's comment on Douglas Hofstadter's MySpace page, and it won't stop freaking my beak. I see it behind my eyelids when I lie down to go to sleep. I finished his book, I Am a Strange Loop, the other day and it was a really fascinating read, as I expected, if a little limited in its scope. He has an interesting and by some standards radical theory on how a physicalist view of the world can be reconciled with the experience of consciousness, but as he's from an academic background, I find he stresses cognition too much, at the expense of the really interesting pre-cognitive environment, which is where I would locate the "soul". I kept nodding along with him, waiting to see what he was going to say about that stuff, but the only real references he made to it were some cheap shots, based on misunderstandings, at the "Tao and Zen people".

I'd really like to see someone who's writing about this kind of stuff from a scientific/American philosophical viewpoint find a way to allow some room for spirituality or even a little mysticism, without tipping over into the totally kooked out camp. I guess there's a general and justified fear of organized religion among academics these days. Still, I'm trying to figure out a way to land Hofstadter as one of my MySpace friends, so I can try out my Motivated Book Exchange (see this blog post) idea on him. Got some borderline New Age literature I think would really open up some new territory for him. Plus it'd be super cool to see what he would think I need to read. I think he'd be a perfect celebrity endorsement to get in on the ground floor of what I still believe will be a huge phenomenon.

- Andrew

Stuff You Need to See

Things have been pretty hectic at work this week, meaning there hasn't been much going on during free time, besides watching movies and sleeping. Alison had a photo shoot to go to in LaHave this morning, assisting with shots of the sunrise. She had to get up at 3:30 in the morning to get there! Ugh.

One of the movies we saw was Year of the Dog, starring Molly Shannon from Saturday Night Live before it got totally terrible. It was a really good character-driven comedy, and quite an admirable stretch for her. We also rented the remastered special edition of Meatballs, Bill Murray's first movie and the one that would win him a place in Alison's heart and wallet. It was of course even cornier than we remembered, but also surprisingly funny every time Mr. Murray was on the screen, and even sort of heart-warming. My favourite line was a random bit of encouragement during the hot dog-eating contest scene: "Every day, I am eating more and more hot dogs."

There's been some tennis going on, too. Our friend Jeff is visiting from Toronto for a week, and he came out to play some mixed doubles last night with us and Meg. Good, sweaty times.

Finally, here's an outrageous site that my coworker tipped me off to today. WARNING: Although there's no visually gross or graphic content, this site represents a very sick concept and will make you very very angry. I'm still not sure whether it's a joke. My friend claims not, but check out the testimonials. I can't read them in a non-sarcastic way. In the FAQ section, they claim to be legally protected under religious freedom laws. If this is in any way serious, it's a pretty good argument against those laws.

- Andrew