JUNE 1, 2008
we had a great time playing out in the desert last night. it was for the Utah
chapter of the BURNING MAN FESTIVAL and is just a smaller version of the one
in Black Rock Desert, Nevada. lots of people wandering about in the desert
in elaborate costumes or totally nude - with strange vehicles gliding around.
theme camps, hippies, tweakers, tribal drum circle enthusiasts etc... the
worlds largest mirror ball suspended from a crane. what made it so fun was
that our friends VILE BLUE SHADES, and ETHER were also playing - both great
bands to play with and fantastic to see live. we all just wandered around,
drank lots of beer, looked at the incredible desert/mountain scenery and laughed
a lot. we played a fun set, then VILE, then the giant wooden elephant was
burned (instead of the traditional MAN) in a huge inferno, and then ETHER
finished off the night. perfect way to end the evening. out in the desert
you can see billions of stars filling a night sky. fuckin beautiful.
MAY 22, 2008
just back in from band practice and feeling so much better than when i left
for it. i've been a bit under the weather and totally out of steam for the
past coupla days - half zombie wanting to hibernate. as i left to meet up
with the band , the storm that's hung around for a few days fizzled out and
all the clouds pulled apart with really cool evening light hitting the mountains
and city. it wasn't quite as glorious and cinematic as it sounds - not like
The Simpsons opening credits - but it was beautiful. Jesse is doing a river
run down the Colorado or Green River so he wasn't at practice, but it went
amazingly well anyway. we worked on nearly 10 new songs and they were all
sounding great. i'm excited to play them live and get them recorded. drove
home listening to Roxy Music's "THE BOGUS MAN". what a great song
to drive to and it ended perfectly as i drove up into my driveway. we're gonna
play the big BURN festival out in the desert next weekend. a lot of fun bands
and people and costumes and wildness will be there doing their things. it'll
be good to get out of town and run about in the desert and play to lots of
people we don't normally play for. Also the Utah Pride Festival, The Utah
Arts Festival, and opening for Faun Fables in June. i love Faun Fables and
it's always fun playing shows with them. Dawn the Faun is one of my favorite
singers on the planet. in fact i think i'll listen to one of their albums
as i drift off to sleep.
MAY 16, 2008
i've been a bit reluctant to type in this for the past few months with that
same sort of feeling that generally inspires me to burn all my journals -
over the years probably more than 20 large volumes filled with my doodling
(drawing, random thoughts, rants, and over ripe poetics) have been reduced
to a puff of smoke and a pile of ashes in a bar-b-q pit or fireplace. it's
like when you're talking on and on to somebody while a more grounded and wiser
part of your brain with a deep voice of authority keeps telling you to JUST
SHUT UP NOW. you know, why the fuck should anybody care about the dippy things
flitting across your (my) mind? but friends and family in far off places have
reminded me that it's through this that they keep up with me and purr bats
(because i'm crap at responding to phone calls, letters, and emails) and that
all they have to do is read, apply my voice and blank stares, and it's just
like me standing next to them and talking all the gibberish i talk. ok then,
i'll try to keep up with it a bit more. so - because i'm obsessed with the
weather and air quality right now, i'll report that today was beautiful and
warm and clear. the whole valley, all surrounding mountains, the GREAT SALT
LAKE in the northwestern corner of the valley - clearly visible. and when
you can see it all you remember how beautiful it all is. i've just got the
basic tracks for one of the new purr bats songs we're recording for the upcoming
autumn album. it's got quite a dark and spooky feel to it. i love it. i'll
listen to it in headphones over and over and put the words to it. Derwood's
birthday was yesterday and tomorrow he's having a big bar-b-q to celebrate.
i'll be careful not to take any of the remaining journals along. there was
a big Utah Jazz playoff game tonight downtown. i'm hoping it's over and all
the crowds have gone away so i can stroll over and get tickets for sundays
MIA show. i bet she puts on a fucking great show.
MAY 6, 2008
ahhhh, beautiful weather at last and it seems that it might stay this time.
the city is exploding with flowers and thank fuck i don't suffer from alergies
like so many of my friends do. have been hanging out with the niece and nephew
and watching ALICE IN WONDERLAND. my friend Scruffy has come over. we were
planning on working on our column/comic/story thing we do - i write most of
it and he draws these fantastic illustrations - but we're gonna go walking
about town instead. can't let a night like this go to waste. the first run
of the new album has sold out so i'm fixing the typos and missing lyrics i've
discovered in the booklet, and ordering another run. am planning to have the
next album out for autumn. will be recording a chunk of the vocals in the
next few weeks. i'd better learn how to sing. i'll practice my yodeling as
i walk through town tonight.
APRIL 27, 2008
finially a full weekend of beautiful weather so i was able to attack the yard
and at least get it mowed. the billions of Box Elder bugs didn't like that
so attacked me. IT'S WAR. oh great, a car just sped around the corner and
rammed into the back of a car parked in front of my house - and then drove
off! good thing i didn't park out there tonight. my neighbors will be pissed
off tomorrow. i'm off to bed.
APRIL 24, 2008
what a weirdly shitty day. one of those days when everthing seems to go spectacularly
wrong. more blizzard weather, flooded basement, bureaucracy amplified, and
lots of violent people. one guy in particular was yelling and screaming because
a doctor refused to give him the prescription he wanted. he was GODDAMNING
and FUCKING this and that and flailing at a woman who may have been his wife
and anybody near by. the woman was in tears (apparently she'd been a bit late
in picking him up) and was also trying to contain two small children while
this fuck wit belittled her and cursed everything else. with how wound up
i'd been from the day already, it was all i could do to keep myself from kicking
the shit out of this guy. it actually scared me a bit how ready i was to lay
waste to him. i had to stand aside and keep quiet and try to let security
take care of it. i think everybody there was ready to pounce on this guy so
it was good that he was driven away in a mini van. god, i hope the woman and
the two kids are alright. driving home i popped in a Talking Heads CD and
their song "once in a lifetime" turned up loud was the perfect tonic.
calmed me right down and had me smiling and jerking around in my seat. our
warehouse show last night was a blast. we played with ROPE OR BULLETS and
NEW BLOODS who were touring from Portland, OR. we've cancelled practice tonight
but have to get together anyway for some band photos. good thing i don't have
hair because today would be a bad hair day of biblical proportions.
APRIL 16, 2008
monday we had 80 degrees F. and beautiful clear sunny springtime goodness.
tuesday we had wet, cold blizzard from hell. lots of snow. i figured the gods
were angered so i decided to perform a virgin sacrifice to appease them. it's
very difficult to find a virgin these days so i had to settle for a celibate
instead. apparently the gods didn't feel like settling for a celibate because
it's still snowing today. i'm debating whether to try two celibates at once,
but wonder if it's worth the bother and clean-up. the CURE'S "Carnage
Visors" made the perfect soundtrack for driving home this evening through
the gray weather with all the billions of snowflakes flying at the windshield.
it gave the effect of speeding through space past all the stars in some super
turbo wormhole tunnel.
APRIL 6, 2008 2AM
just in from a night out at The Trapp Door which is one of the main gay clubs
in SLC. it's the Mormon Church's spring General Conference in town this weekend
and traditionally conference weekends are the busiest nights in Salt Lake's
gay bars. the place was packed. we played some fun shows on both thursday
and friday nights, and the album release party last friday was a total blast.
hopped into the car tonight and when i started it up, our song "THE LADY
DUMPLING HORSEFEATHERS" was playing in the stereo. i instantly hit the
eject button thinking it was the new disc i'd left in the player from when
i was proofing it. there was no disc in the stereo. it was being played on
the radio. i was thrilled and had to listen to it all the way through - driving
along, feeling like a rock star and waving to the peasants. now i'm wide awake
and don't wanna hit the sac. too bad in this age of caller ID crank calling
is not what it used to be.
Hi Kyrbir, this is God. I fixed the internet so you can finish typing on this page. Use the usual method. Keytars rule!
MARCH 26, 2008
ah yeah. gonna take an evening and do fuck all - absolutely nothing productive.
no chores, no meeting people, no running errands. gonna lie about and read
- maybe watch a spaghetti western or a coupla episodes of the 60's tv show
THE BIG VALLEY from the box set i've checked out from the library. it's great.
the story lines are a bit bad and and full of wholesome "lessons",
but it stars a young Lee Majors and several other sexy blokey blokes all dressed
up in cowboy gear and launching into great fist fights at the drop of a hat.
it's far better than most current gay porn. and a young, wholesome looking
Linda Evans all form fitted and riding about on horseback doing a good damsell-in-distress.
it's been a lot of fun having practice with Amber and Susan of The Soiled
Dove Singers. a lot of goofy dancing about and hyper energy. doing the new
songs is a blast. we've also started recording the next album. we had a grand
and productive weekend in the studio a coupla weeks back. can't wait to get
back in there. this friday is the album release party for our new album "AND
THE COWS CAME HOME IN PIROUETTE" . we'll be playing with ROPE OR BULLETS,
CAVEDOLL, and THESE UNITED STATES. there is also a piece about us in this
weeks issue of City Weekly. i haven't seen it yet. i'll hafta try to remember
to hunt down a copy tomorrow.
MARCH 13, 2008
a beautiful stormy day here in SLC. one of those days with low, dark, dramatic
clouds that pull themselves apart across the mountains and fill the canyons.
lots of cool lighting effects when the sun breaks through the clouds. even
a bit of lightning and thunder. and all the bad air is gone so you can see
all the surrounding mountains and the lake. ahh, i feel bad poetics coming
on. heading downtown to practice soon. we're working on some of the new songs
for the album release party. last weeks attempt at PIN THE TAIL ON THE FLOOZY
was pretty dire. hoping i can find the right key to sing it in tonight. it's
good to have the Soiled Dove Singers there cause they can gently guide me
in the right direction. have got Cocteau Twins' GARLANDS album in the car
stereo and the volume nearly maxed out. it's perfect for a day like today.
march 2, 2008
DAVE GOT A PERM!!!!!!!!!
FEB. 16, 2008
had a new experience today. i decided to take my nephew to the monster truck
thing cause he's really excited by big loud vehicles and machines. he loved
it and i even found myself having a good old time. came home where my niece
was watching our recent City Weekly SLAMMYS show which is on the On Demand
cable TV. she turned to me and said "you sing like a pooping chicken,
uncle kyrbir". then she wandered back into her bedroom to watch HIGH
SCHOOL MUSICAL. god, how perfect. that'll keep me laughing.
FEB 11, 2008
well, haven't had access to the website for a good while which saved me from
writing over ripe poetics about what a sexy fucker the drummer for THE LIARS
is. saw them play a great show a coupla weeks back and the drummer is indeed
a sexy fucker. we've played some fun shows and have been writing a bunch of
new songs for a few different projects. we played the CIRCUS BROWN radio show
on KRCL this past saturday which was a blast except that i have a cold and
went Peter Brady voice-change squeaky a few times. next morning i'd lost my
voice altogether. dave p. built his keytar which makes all kinds of cool sounds,
and jesse picked up his own keytar so they can do keytar duels and duets on
stage. finially we have a release date for the new album which is now to be
titled "AND THE COWS CAME HOME IN PIROUETTE" rather than the original
intended title of "THE SCHLUPPING SOUND OF DISENGAGEMENT". it'll
be released on march 28 with a show/party at Urban Lounge. the show will also
be a benefit for The Utah Pride Center. we've scheduled the first recording
for the next album - mid march. and really all i care about is the coming
of spring. we've been pretty much snowed in since thanksgiving.
JAN 2,2008
ah hell! my 2 yr old nephew has been feeling i'll. last night he was calling
out in his sleep so i picked him up to see if he was ok. he seemed to be choking
a bit and as i opened my mouth to ask if he was alright, he erupted in projectile
vomit - splashing across my face, down my front, and INTO MY MOUTH! sweet
jesus! he'll be hearing about this forever. and so will all his future friends
and sweethearts. as vile as it was, it was one of the funniest things ever.
did the new years thing at Urban Lounge with the Wolfs and Ted Dancin djing.
it was the perfect way to bring in the new year - and for a while there, the
whole club was a splattering saucepot of sex. i went straight home and took
a bleach bath and am still repenting.
Dec 30, 2007
the show we played friday night at Burts Tiki Lounge was a blast! Burt's is
always fun to play, and the other bands were fun to play with. it was terry's
2nd show with us and he's got everything down. the stage is "cozy"
so not a lot of room for spazzing out in. i have a bad habbit of treading
on the guitar pedals when we play burts and this time unplugged terry's set
up. i'll hafta develop some special more contained Burt's Tiki stage moves.
maybe the hula where it's all in the hips and flowing arms. tonight Dave P.
hosts a sunday night lounge @ Urban Lounge. it's called Time To Talk Tween
Tunes and is a very mellow laid back evening with the music as background
to drinking and talking. tonight ETHER ORCHESTRA and COYOTE HOODS are playing
- both excellent and it sounds like just the thing to do tonight. i'll herd
a bunch of friends together and try to get them drunk so i can molest them
in sleazy ways.
Dec.9, 2007
i recently bought a house here in SLC and promptly got sucked into the blackhole
of painting, repairs and moving. it's taken up almost all my attention and
free time and it's been a bit weird to go out and remember that there's a
whole world or universe chugging along outside the house. slowly getting things
sorted though and it's actually starting to feel comfortable. tried to go
see Wayne Newton in Wendover, Nevada last night but got halfway there to find
out the show had been cancelled. maybe it was a good thing as there was a
lot of snow and wind and vehicles over turned and looking crushed road side.
the drive was actually pretty scary. stopped at a desolate and frozen rest
stop for a piss and headed back to SLC to a charity fund raiser show hosted
by SLUG mag. SLUG put's out a series of local music compilations called DEATH
BY SALT and are about to release volume 3. our slightly darker and more melancholic
side project SLEEPING BAG is included on this one which will be released vinyl.
we're also gonna play the record release show on the 22nd. it'll be the first
ever live SLEEPING BAG performance. it'll also be a reunion show for the band
ETHER. Ether we're such a great band - especially live. that'll be a fun show.
nov 10, 2007
ah, a beautiful autumn day in SLC. a storm blew in last night and cleared
out all the bad air. you can see all the Oquirrh mountains in the west and
Antelope island in the Great Salt Lake. blue sky with fluffy white clouds
gliding by. i'll hafta try and get up the canyons today. the new album is
almost finished. i just have a couple tiny mixing details to fix and then
finish up the booklet and artwork. we're playing a show on thursday @ Urban
Lounge with PINK LIGHTNIN. that should be a blast. Pink Lightnin are fuckin
great. it'll be terry's first show with us and playing with terry is always
fun.
oct 17, 2007
bonkers dreams deluxe! the best and most out-there one had me in a court room
watching the proceedings. a judge was trying to question some guy concerning
a case, but this guy had some sort of medical condition that required him
to keep his nose almost buried in a woman's crotch. if his nose was away from
a female crotch for more than a few minutes, the guy's mind would go hazy
and he wouldn't be able to make sense or function. there in front of him,
lying on her back on an elevated platform was some young woman. she'd lie
flat with her legs held straight out over his shoulders. he'd sit with his
head at the level where his nose could just slide right into her bits. apparently
this was not an uncommon condition, and the girl was a paid medical professional
for just this purpose. the girl was needing to leave, and the guy being questioned
was getting all worried about not being able to continue if he didn't have
a lady crotch to breathe. the judge looked around the courtroom and asked
if there was a woman present who would volunteer for the job. the only other
woman in the room was a seriously ugly specimen in the corner - i mean really
gargoyle type ugly - and i don't easily consider somebody ugly. but this woman
was really sassy and had a great sense of humor and lightning quick wit, so
i instantly liked her. the funny woman agreed and took up position. when asked
for her name, the woman stated, "Maroma" which turned out to be
her little joke - a sort of play on the title MA AROMA or MOTHER AROMA which
the woman gave herself on the spot because of her new little calling. Maroma
kept cracking jokes as she lay there sprawled and spread. she had the whole
room laughing. her body now resembled some sea creature or slug - kinda like
sea weed. suddenly the COMEDY CENTRAL TV channel were there and planning a
reality show of Maroma and her new job. there would be a talk show segment
where she'd interview celebrity guests while her sidekick would be somebody
who suffered from this weird condition and would spend the show breathing
her crotch like an oxygen mask. there was absolutely nothing sexual about
any of it, and in the dream it all seemed perfectly normal. it wasn't til
the next day when i thought back over the dream that i realised just how absurd
it all was. i just kept laughing all day. another great recent dream was me
in japan with my friend LuLu. we were riding on a high speed train through
this fantastically beautiful Dr. Seuss countryside. the train was going so
fast that it was hard to breathe. it was scary and enormously exciting. no
tunnels though. what would Freud have thought?
OCT 3, 2007
Derwood is in the hospital with a burst appendix. apparently it's been burst
for a bit and was so when we played our show on friday. what a fuckin trooper!
i went up to visit him today. he's got beer brewing books and morophine. what
a combination. i'll hafta put together a care package. too bad my Catherine
Tate dvd's wont play in the hospital's players.
SEPT 30, 2007
we played a fun show on friday evening. it was for the Fashion Stroll and
we set up on the sidewalk in front of SLOWTRAIN MUSIC and just played to all
the passers-by. we wore our bright orange polyester dresses which have fringe
and sequins. apparently one of the women from the choir where the dresses
originally came from happened by and was pleased to find the dresses were
still getting use. satan attacked and made it snow here yesterday. i'm not
ready for winter! through prayer and repentance, the snow has mostly melted
away today. just the mountains are dusted white. all the skiers and snow boarders
are happy. i should become one.
SEPT 16 (i think - it's a sunday - i think) 2007
just back in Madrid after having spent a week on the south coast bobbing about
in the sea. it was fucking great! i saw a clock once the whole time i was
down there and that was by accident. there just wasn't a need to keep time
- what a luxury! went to see some bulls running this morning and nearly got
scalped when i walked into a tree branch. this next week will be spent in
the city hitting the Prado and other museums and hanging out in the parks.
ah, i love Spain.
SEPT. 3, 2007
we played such a fun show this past friday with SLEEPYTIME GORILLA MUSEUM.
they put on such a great show and are such great people. it's always nice
when they pass through SLC. we played some of the old songs that we rarely
play now-a-days and had Dave Payne fill in on guitar again. it's too bad he's
too busy with his billion other bands and projects to be able to do more with
us. getting ready to head to spain for a few weeks which should be fantastic.
i love spain. and right now i'm watching that program THE UNIVERSE which is
infinitely more interesting than purr bats journal - so bye.
aug. 16, 2007
the last week or so seems to have been an exercise in being totally useless.
just zombieing around and eating popcicles. but been having some great wacked
out dreams. had some totally bonkers dream about the london underground the
other night. it included shapeshifting sisters, pickpocket gangs, sinister
decoy handbags, levitation and flight, out of control hair, and a low cut
gold lame' gown. most of it taking place in an old victorian part of liverpool
street station. last night found me in Payson Canyon at the cliff my brother,
my sister and me all fell off when we were younger. a pair of dottering old
dears who were all dolled up were wading through a treacherous part of the
stream. they were just holding onto each other and giggling. i was expecting
to see them get swept away. i went hiking further up the canyon and came upon
two bear cubs. i turned tail and made to flee but stupid people were in my
way. i tried explaining that when there are bear cubs around, there is usually
also big ferocious mamma bear and we should get the hell out of there fast.
whoever these people were, they take medals in stupidity. they just kept walking
towards the cubs and cooing all cutesy. then we saw mamma bear and she was
fighting with even bigger and more scary male bear. stupid people scuttled
towards the fighting pair cooing at them! all my yelling and warning went
nowhere. male bear turned his attention on stupid people. i just shouted "play
dead!" . stupid people went on cooing. miraculously the male bear passed
them by and grabbed up first one and then the other of the cubs and flung
them about violently. then it started coming towards me. i dove between some
cactus and played dead. the bear just sniffed at me and i woke up - thank
fuck. how did those stupid people get away with being so stupid?
AUG. 6, 2007
spent most of yesterday mixing the new album. got a huge chunk of the work
done. a flock of heavenly angels fluttered into the studio and held a dance
party. they kept getting in our way and dropping feathers over everything
so we had to banish them. they were gracious and left quietly but we later
noticed they'd walked off with our beer. the nerve!
JULY 23, 2007
spent the weekend down in Moab with good mates Bobby and Nich. we camped along
the Colorado River and did some hiking in Arches Natl. Park. FUCKING BEAUTIFUL!!!!
everybody should do it. though it was so damned hot - i remembered why we
generally do it in the spring or fall - even the winter in the snow is nice.
when we were about to turn into pieces of jerky, we flung ourselves into the
river and tried to comfort ourselves by saying the uranium tailings are downstream
from our camp. Moab was big with uranium mines and apparently some of the
tailings are stored along the river. it'll all end up in L.A. and Las Vegas,
bringing those cities eternal youth from their bath tub faucets - or bringing
them something anyway. we returned to both Utah and Salt Lake valleys filled
with smoke again from all the wild fires burning around the West. a huge series
of thunderstorms is what i'm wishing hard for.
JULY 19, 2007
it's been so hot here that i get fuck-all done. i sit at home and don't wanna
move. total whimp. it's a good thing i don't live in Phoenix or Albuquerque.
gonna go down to the southern deserts this weekend and do some camping around
Moab and Arches Natl. Park. it'll be even more hot than it is here and we'll
be running about in the sun like fuck wits but it'll be so much fun. have
cancelled band practice tonight so we can all go see YO LA TENGO and FIERY
FURNACES who are playing a free outdoor show in downtown SLC. it'll be great.
next saturday on the 28th, purr bats will be playing a free all ages show
in the Sugarhouse section of town for the Sugarush festival. should be fun
but also sad because soon afterward all the old cool bits of Sugarhouse will
be torn down to make room for bland big chain shopping center blight.
07/07/07
we played a fun show last night. it was for a wedding party at KILBY COURT.
Dave Payne filled in on guitar and we played a bunch of songs we haven't played
in a long time. i rigged up some totally white costumes that had us looking
like a weird white cult of garden gnomes. now it's almost too hot to move
so gonna take the niece and nephew to the pool and threaten them with BIG
TIME-OUT when they refuse to leave it quietly.
monday july 2, 2007
wheeee - i've been having some seriously vivid and wack-o dreams lately. this
series of particularly strong and strange dreams started a coupla weeks back
with one in which i was in London at a thames riverside cafe over looking
the thames barrier. everything was all pleasant and nice and then suddenly
- in less than a second- the barrier rose up. i found that weird having thought
that speed was impossible for the barrier. directly in front of me, in the
precise direction i was facing, i watched a 747 rising into the air just after
take off. from behind me a huge and violent storm rolled in. it seemed to
be chasing the plane which barely got away. but this huge blizzard just started
dumping loads of snow on london. it had been quite warm and seemingly mid
summer in the dream. it was spooky, but i felt just like some detached observer.
that was the first in a series of bonkers weather dreams where it would be
warm - even very hot and suddenly turn into huge snow storms - totally out
of season. what would freud say? have drempt of vampires, demons, Glenn Close
with the body - or more correctly half eaten carcass of a horse or zebra.
her head was attached to this huge animal skeleton with little scraps of meat
still clinging to the ribs like you see in wildlife docus after the hungry
lions have had their fill of a zebra. she was complaining, "i just made
a vampire movie and then this happens". drempt of having to save Jennifer
Aniston from a crocodile which was about to eat her. i had to wrestle the
thing because throwing my mobile phone at it had no effect at all - imagine
that. and i've never had any particular fondness for Jen A. she just happened
to be there and i didn't wanna see her get eaten. more recent dreams had flying
saucers gliding through the sky over SLC followed closely by the stealth bomber.
a B52 type plane doing what looked to be slow motion air ballet over my head
til i realized it was actually falling out of the sky. it was all in slow
motion and kinda graceful (and dorky at the same time). it smashed into a
field not 100 yards from me and broke apart. no explosion and no noise. the
pilot was just sitting there unhurt but wobbling his head like a bobble head
toy. then i was in a 1950's documentary about a baby factory. i was standing
near a series of conveyor belts which were carrying babies in little plastic
tubs. each tub had about 2 inches of water and soap bubbles. they'd glide
past these 1950's women who would each scrub a different part of the baby.
from a giant gymnasium i could hear a lot of crying babies and i started singing
the CRASS song "shaved women" that has the chant, "screaming
baybies! screaming baybies!" then i was in some british soap opera where
they were about to kill off some long running character - an old woman - but
there was a huge outcry from the viewing nation so the old dear was saved.
then i was in a near miss accident with several vehicles and a maniac 18-wheeler
carrying a huge concrete barrier. the thing ran a stop sign and almost ran
a bunch of us over. i noticed the road was covered in a layer of soap bubbles
(more soap suds - hmmm) and there was a Willie Nelson duet with some unknown
guy being played - there was some connection between the song and the soap
covered road ("on the road again" i suppose) , but i wasn't able
to figure it out. lots of colors and lots of nonsense. and no drugs or alcohol
to induce these dreams - not even cheese. i bet it's the heat though. all
the chemicals in the brain get cooked and send a person through the looking
glass.
SAT. JUNE 23, 2007
went down to utah valley to spend yesterday with my brother, nephews, and
a friend i hadn't seen for nearly 20 years. this friend is visiting from germany.
we decided to hike to the hot springs in Diamond Fork canyon. A TOTAL BLAST!!!!
god it's good to get into the mountains. came across several snakes - a couple
of them huge and man eating - or they seemed at the time when they decided
to shoot out from underneath my feet. god, i jumped straight up like an armadillo
and yelled out noises that didn't sound human. i nearly had 3 heart attacks
and certainly gave my fellow hikers some good laughing. also came across a
rattlesnake - thank fuck not under my feet but just off to the side of the
trail - which just sat there coiled and rattling at us. as we were leaving
- not a hundred yards from our vehicles - we came into a herd of singing cows.
some very un cow like noises. there were two HUGE, mean looking and horny
bulls waggling their engorged bull bits and climbing atop the back of whichever
cows were close. between mountings, they'd just stare and make seriously unnerving
noises at us. we thought they were gonna charge us. unfortunately these bulls
decided to do their business on the trail right in front of the gate. 8 of
us just stood on the trail looking worried and not knowing exactly what to
do. we didn't wanna antagonise the bulls with loud noise or sudden panic'd
fleeing. with the kids and grandma we just watched cow sex. after ten minutes
we got brave or just fed up and slowly walked towards the gate - shooing the
bulls out of the way. finially the things gave in and took their filthy party
off the trail and up into the sage brush. we dashed out through the gate,
pulled it shut behind us, threw rocks towards the bulls (not at them -none
were hit) and yelled bad words at them which probably did hurt their feelings.
they deserved it. then we laughed all the way home.
TUES JUNE 12, 2007
derwood and gretta got hitched yesterday. i just had time between work and
kid responsibilities to stop by and say "congrats and see you later".
i'll hafta plan a beer swilling evening to celebrate with them later. Der,
James and i got together the other evening and discussed ideas for purr bats
post eli. we've decided we wanna be the music people listen to while lying
in sun tan beds. serenade to the slow cook. we'll compose epic long pieces
for the jerky process session. the new album needs only to be mixed, mastered
and manufactured. to get the money to do this, i've decided to whore out the
band lads. the other lads are all straight, so they should bring in the largest
wads of cash. being the enthusiastic homo i am, i probably wont pull in nearly
as much - so remember folks, fathers day is upon us. gift certificates available.
fri. june 1, 2007
wierd-o fuckin dreams last night! i don't know if it was the blue moon or
all the alkyhall - probably the latter. we played @ THE BROKEN RECORD last
night with the Wolfs and a band from San Francisco called Ohsees. it was our
last show with eli. it wasn't our best, but it was fun just the same. Ohsees
seemed like a great band, but i got to see only a bit of them before being
kidnapped and taken over to The Trapp Door. kept drinking and reminding myself
to say as little as possible. everything was hazy from there and suddenly
i was in my bed, limbs sticking off over the sides. in the dreams, all my
siblings and i (there are 10 of us) were some sort of teen detective team
- like hardy boys or bobsy twins or the scooby-do gang. we were all between
the ages of about 13 and 18. we were also hyper aryan with golden feathered
hair - all of us. i was laughing and saying , "look, we're the brady
bunch". then the bad guys (and girls) showed up to "get us".
they all were wearing black slacks and turtlenecks and there was a washed
out grey look to them. all the girls with long hair had it pulled back into
a single ponytail. the creepy thing about them (or the funny thing) was that
they all went around on all fours. but their legs were kept straight and some
of them had really short arms. they looked like wierd insects crawling around.
the dream would have been sinister - it seemed like it was trying to be -
but i kept laughing at how the bad guys looked. and the theme song to the
dream was that horrible 80's love duet that was a theme song to some 80's
movie like Romancing The Stone. "i had the time of my life and i never
felt like this before. it's the truth and i owe it all to you ooh ooh ooh".
that song stayed looping through my head well into the waking morning. in
fact it's still there. pray for me.
THURS. MAY 24
from Albuquerque we drove to phoenix. barely made it to the club in time to
set up and play - though just as we'd expected, there was almost nobody there.
we played to each other and a few friends who used to live in SLC. even so,
the show was a lot of fun. totally relaxed and even a bit down-the-rabbit-hole
given our states of mind. monday's marathon drive home was an adventure -
twilight zone style. so so tired but i can't sleep while in a moving vehicle
so everything just blurred and left tracers. the drive from Flagstaff to Page,
AZ and Lake Powell is incredible. a lot of it passes through the Navajo reservation
where i lived for a while when i was 5. such a beautiful drive! i just fixated
on the crosses along the side of the road which i'd guess mark the places
where people met their end. the highway is practically lined with them. you
could totally imagine sinister theme music accompanying our drive. crossed
over into Utah and everything is a blur from there - a beautiful blur. eventually
made it home about 2am and have been playing catch up since.
sunday may 20 noon
yup, last night was a fuckin great evening. our set was tons-o-fun and the
sound was so good i had to try and sing in key - i think i did alright. THUNDERFIST
barely made it to town in time after some vehicle troubles and they put on
such a great show. i haven't seen them for so long and i'd forgotten how good
they are. SUBROSA, BLACKHOLE and THE WOLFS all had great sets. lots of drinking
and dancing and friends and family. a total blast. i came back to my sisters
place to sleep and i'm told this morning that the Wolfs got kicked out of
their hotel by hotel security last night. haven't been able to reach any of
them yet - possibly all passed out in downtown gutters.
SAT. MAY 19, 2007 9:30 am
just waking up in Albuquerque at my sister Pookah's place. here's how things
on this mini tour thing have gone so far: i had an emergency root canal on
tues morning and the dentist pumped my gums so full of numbing stuff that
part of my face stayed numb well into weds. the bits that didn't stay numb
hurt like hell. had a prescription for lortab and tried to hold off taking
it for as long as possible. met up with SUBROSA weds morning and packed the
van full of equiptment, merch, personal this and that's and enough (mainly
healthy) food to last us through armegedon. eli and jesee are both also part
of The Wolfs so they are traveling in the Wolfsmobile. james, derwood and
i along with our hilarious russian friend Vlad are squished in with the girls
and boy of Subrosa. very cozy. set off about noon on weds. nice drive to Ft.
Collins, CO, but the chugging along finially got to my teeth pain so i downed
some pain medication. that made me happy and lovy for a bit and then nauseated
for a longer bit. the scenery from Laramie, Wyoming on the cut off to Ft.
Collins is incredible. played at a small pizza and beer joint which was cool
but there were mic problems and i did a shitty job of it. great town though.
stayed in Boulder (another great town) and hung around there for most of thursday.
did some mild hiking up Boulder Canyon. BEAUTIFUL! traveled down to Denver
and met up with Wolfs at their hotel. took a grand marathon walk to and around
downtown with Subrosa drummer Bonnie. it's been a while since i've been to
Denver. i'd forgottten what a great town it is. the show that night was at
a small bar called Lion's Lair which is a really cool space and reminds me
of Burts Tiki Lounge back home. Purr Bats didn't play that night so i just
acted as photographer and lurked in the dark alley beside the bar. somehow,
in all the alcohol and fresh moves, the key to the van got lost. for hours
we scoured and backtracked, unpacked and repacked, swore and cursed and laughed
and kicked things. ended up having to sleep in the van and wait til 6 am for
AAA to open up and send a locksmith out. i slept maybe a total of 45 mins.
we discovered that we were parked on the turf of some interesting ladies with
jerky movemonts and a mysterious gentleman friend lurking about with handfuls
of cash. eventually our knight in shining white mini van arrived and whipped
up two keys for us. the guy was such a great dad type. he was kind, funny,
kept telling us to stay out of the street and even went well out of his way
to lead us to the freeway. we wanted to just follow him home and move in.
dashed back up to Boulder to collect the stuff we'd left there under the impression
we'd be sleeping there again. had to break into the place, luckily without
damage, grabbed the stuff and dashed back to Denver to pick up James and Derwood
who we'd commanded to go back with the Wolfs and spend the night.at their
hotel. van full and off again. it was probably a 7 or 8 hour drive to Albuquerque
and it was beautiful. at about 60 miles out of Santa Fe we drove into an incredible
lightning storm. swirly dramatic clouds, great grey darkness, forked lightning
shooting everywhere and lighting up the shapes of the mountains. of course
i whipped out my Monteverdi cd and made everybody listen to BEATUS VIR (see
previous entry) and then we put in the DEAD CAN DANCE album, WITHIN THE REALM
OF A DYING SUN. oh lord, we were totally geeking out - writhing about in over
ripe ecstasies and letting out ooohs and ahhhhs with each lightning strike.
by rights, the van should have been struck by lightning and exploded. made
it to Santa Fe, and james who was driving spotted a TRADER JOE'S market. he
just parked the van and insisted we go shopping. i found him a half hour later
with the other lads - all of them with shopping bags full of various alky
treats and a bit of flatbread. had a bit of a wander downtown eyeing up the
adobe and stucco, and then back in the van and off to Albuquerque. made it
to the hotel base camp, met up with Angela from SLUG Magazine and then was
promptly kidnapped by my sister Pookah and her girlfriend Kym. they rushed
me over to our sister Maren's place which was full of festive cheer. some
friends from SLC, some Albuquerque friends i haven't seen for too long, and
some new friends. was already in bonkers state from lack of sleep, long drive,
and over ripe ecstasies so i said "why not" to the magicly refilling
glass of red wine and something called green pepper stew. i could hear myself
talking, i knew it was shit, but i couldn't stop myself talking. i was trying
to enact comedy sketches from Catherine Tate and Victoria Wood - telling everybody
present "oh, yr gonna love em!" again and again and again. luckily
Kym and Pooks dragged me off to their place where i instantly sank into a
coma - and here i am. gonna meet up with our other Albuquerque sis (there
are 5 sisters in all) kari today and have a BBQ, make costumes and T-shirts
meet up with the other bands and run wild about the city. we'll play the SLUG
mag showcase tonight at a place called Ralli's and even if we are shit, it'll
be the funnest show in the universe! i think we play at 9pm. then i'm sure
the alcohol and whatevers will start flowing, and me, all the sisters and
all the friends will be dancing and falling over to THUNDERFIST, BLACKHOLE,
SUBROSA and topped off by THE WOLFS. i think we'll have a bit of a late start
towards Phoenix tomorrow.
MAY 13, 2007
the show on friday was loads-o-fun. lots of friends, lots of dancing, and
since i didn't drive, i even got to drink a little. we played first because
james had to dash across town to play a show with his other band THE FURS.
this meant derwood and i could relax and watch the other bands. SUBROSA played
a great set of their dark "stoner rock", and THE WOLFS were big
and loud and rockin. Eli and Jesse are both also in the Wolfs. i decided against
any after parties and went home, put on Montiverdi and chilled. it must be
old age, because i seem to always do that now after playing or seeing loud
rockin shows or being in noisy clubs. i go home and put on mellow music with
no connection to what i've just experienced. i first heard Monteverdi's BEATUS
VIR when i was 20 and hitchhiking around the British Isles with my friend
Tammy. we were hitching on the road that runs along side Loch Ness and an
older scottish gentleman stopped for us. he was one of those guys who is so
well spoken that it would be intimidating if he hadn't been so genuinely nice.
we were chuckling about things Dan Quayle (our then vice pres) had said in
his public speaking (i was silently thankful i wasn't in any public office
because i could only imagine the doozies i would come out with). suddenly
this amazing music started which shut tammy and me right up. we asked the
man what it was and he informed us - Monteverdi's BEATUS VIR. we just sat
listening and watching the scenery. we'd go through a bit of woods and wind
out to the loch side, then back through meadows and sheep - i'm sure we were
being moved to extreme heights of bad poetics. for the rest of the trip we
searched high and low for that bit of music, finially finding it just before
flying home. it's now become a staple for chilling out or for driving through
spectacular scenery. every bad poet should try it.
MAY 9, 2007
was woken up this morning by shouts of "AWESOME! AWESOME!" coming
from the neighbors driveway which is right below my bedroom window. apparently
the neighbor kid was getting excited about something out there. i thought
that was a pretty good way to start the day so i rolled my ass outa bed. pervy
dave viciously broke my kitchen sink faucet last night, making a huge stream
of hot water - full blast - spray down the sink drain. try as we might, we
couldn't shut the fucker off. had to eventually call out the landlord and
feel like stupid damsels in distress. gotta go buy more big tools to feel
more manly. today is beautiful. a day to flip flop around mostly naked and
read saucy novels. gonna go hang up flyers for fridays show. we're playing
for SLUG mags LOCALIZED show @ URBAN LOUNGE with THE WOLFS and SUBROSA. i
love both those bands so it'll be a blast. it'll also be one of the last shows
before eli moves on. everybody who can should come "wearing costumes
and doing demeaning things".
MAY 1, 2007
we played a fun show at SLOW TRAIN record store on friday night. so much fun!
and i kept myself from browsing which would have meant me spending lots of
money i shouldn't. now waiting for the hoped for thunderstorms to roll in
and shake the house. have all the windows open and Arvo Part in the cd player.
ah, spring!
SUNDAY APR. 22, 2007
woke this morning feeling mopey and a bit wah-fuckin-wah. paced the apt. trying
to prioritise the billion things i should do. picked up a book of photographs
by MARTIN PARR which i got at the library yesterday, and that was that. for
the next several hours i just sat turning every page and laughing - studying
every photo in detail. Martin Parr is one of my favorite photographers, and
that was just what i needed. it put me in such a good mood. just beautiful.
i've got a disc of the premixes for the album and have been listening to it
a lot to get ideas in how to do final mixes for it. listening to yrself so
much gets annoying and drives you bonkers - well, it does me anyway. i'm gonna
ignore it for a few days and try to get a bit of a fresh perspective on it.
there's definitely a bit of a darker psychology to the thing than we've got
on the other albums. even the la la sing-songs are a bit aggressive. we'll
see how it turns out.
APR. 18, 2007
went to see XIU XIU and SUNSET RUBDOWN at Urban Lounge last night. a fantastic
show but it was running late so i had to bail part way into Xiu Xiu. woke
this morning and while i was shuffling through the apt. , i kept smelling
this nasty smell. i was thinking, "is that me? oh sweet jesus don't let
let that be me". i checked the kitchen garbage bin and wondered about
the drains. when i walked back into my bedroom where the windows were open,
it was particularly strong. then i detected the smell of salt water mixed
in and breathed a great sigh of relief. it was the GREAT SALT LAKE. the lake
will occasionally send its aromas wafting over our way. it'll blanket the
city in fragrances that inspire love and romance. it smells much like a carcass
rotting in a salty swamp - which basically it is. we love the lake though
- dead and smelly as it is. the day is dark and ominous with low dark clouds
cutting off all the mountain tops and spraying tiny droplets of rain - not
quite a mist. i'm hoping we start getting the spring thunder storms soon.
the big ones that shake the houses and knock out power so you hafta sit in
candle light sipping scotch and clutching whoever is at hand.
apr. 15, 2007
on friday night we had a great time playing with THE FURS at THE BROKEN RECORD.
i love playing the Broken Record which used to be called TODD'S and used to
have a great gay night on wednesdays. it was more gritty and rockin than most
gay nights/clubs. i spent the whole of yesterday in the dark dungeon of a
studio where we've been recording. other than a few tiny bits, the recording
is finially finished! now just mixing, mastering, and manufacturing. we'll
hafta somehow come up with the money to release it, so it might be a while
yet. planned to go out and see some great bands and get a bit sauced up, but
i got sucked in by an old BBC DVD version of OLIVER TWIST and discovered it
was 2am by the time it finished. ROCK-N-FUCKIN-ROLL! hardcore.
APR. 9 2007
i'm now detoxing after an easter visit to mom's. ma has a house and some property
way out in boondocks on the San Rafael Swell. totally, beautifully nowhere
with all the seemingly barren buttes and plateaus and no phone reception.
she's also a dream grandma for kids and was baking 600 tons of cup cakes,
2 dumptruck loads of cookies, muffins and had every bit of easter candy that
made it within the borders of Utah. all you had to do was breathe in and you'd
inhale a cup and a half of sugar. the nieces and nephew loved it and i pretended
to be so put out while filling my gob with the stuff. mom is dangerous. we
played a totally fun show up in park city on friday night. not a lot of people
made the trip from SLC up the canyon, but those who did had a dance party.
we debuted a coupla new songs and i forgot words and verses only twice. success!
saturday was spent with the SOILED DOVE SINGERS recording their bits for the
album. they have a special way of making a person feel violated - and glad
of it. the studio was left damp - or moist.
APR. 1, 2007
it's the mormon spring general conference weekend and downtown is filled with
flocks and flocks in their sunday best. the conference happens twice a year
- once in spring and once in fall. conference weekends are also traditionally
the busiest weekends at the city's gay bars. all the closeted mormon men come
into town - going to all the church things during the day and then hitting
the forbidden delights of planet gay at night. i forced myself to go out last
night and THE TRAPP DOOR was indeed packed. i caught up with friends and watched
all the drunken flailing and posturing - always entertaining. decided it was
time to bail when some guy tried to woo me by licking the top of my head.
went to see LASER FANG and RED BENNIES on friday night. i hadn't seen laser
fang before and they were great. i'd previously only heard them practicing
down the hall from our practice space. red bennies were so good i got all
misty eyed like the sap i am. all new songs and i was reminded why they are
one of my all time favorite bands. dave bennie and his beautiful wife lena
(who is also one of the most fantastic people on the planet) just became parents
of twin girls. i'm waiting til all the well wishing dies down before i attack
them with casseroles and flowers and babysitting offers. right now i'm about
to take the niece and nephew to the park. they make me twirl them around like
a helicopter - and they don't let up til i collapse. good thing i didn't drink
last night.
MARCH 28. 2007
the perfect tonic for a shitty day is to take a deep hot bath in total darkness
and have ROBERTA FLACK'S album "FIRST TAKE" playing. if i get the
time, i may do it again tonight. we've got a bunch of shows coming up - finially.
april 6th up the mountains in Park City, the 13th at THE BROKEN RECORD, the
28th at SLOW TRAIN record store (earlier show and all ages!!!), may 11 @ URBAN
LOUNGE for SLUG mags localized and then a couple shows in colorado, eventually
playing in Albuquerque for the HYPERACTIVE festival. should be a blast and
i'll get to see 3 of my fantastic sisters in New Mexico. woo-fuckin-hoo! hopefully
we'll have a bunch more of the new songs ready to play live. the album is
coming along nicely though still more slowly than i'd like it to. i'm not
particularly patient with these sorts of things, but at least i haven't yet
taken a plastic fork to anybody.
MARCH 16, 2007
oh yeah, mom's b-day today. i gotta give her a call and pester her about old
age. it's time she bought a buick. it's been beautiful days here in SLC and
even the mucky air has been cleared. it makes a person wanna run into the
mountains or the desert and dance naked around bonfires. roll around in new
grass and mate like rabbits. and that's probably just what will happen when
we all hit the guiness and irish whisky this weekend. gonna go see RED BENNIES
and THE FURS tonight at THE BROKEN RECORD. that'll hit the spot. have a lathered
weekend and remember SAFETY FIRST!
MARCH 8, 2007
one of the SOILED DOVE SINGERS is also in the Utah Opera and she gave me a
coupla tickets to the dress rehersal of their LUCIA DI LAMMERMOOR last night.
i took pervy dave along. it was lots of great gloomy castle and fog atmosphere.
writhing and screeching and madness and bloody daggers and a million notes
to deliver each line and death. the subtitle screen above the stage was flashing
all sorts of fantastic gems, and for i good hour i was convinced that the
next purr bats album should be entitled "MY ARDENT SIGHS WILL COME TO
YOU ON THE BREEZE". it sounds like a breathmint or toothpaste ad. perfect!
for the last half, during all the madness, blood, crawling head first down
the stairs and inhuman singing, i kept having a particular CATHERINE TATE
comedy sketch looping through my head. i sat quaking with silent laughter
in my seat. Catherine Tate is dangerous. i don't know how she does it so perfectly.
possibly a pact with the devil. everybody should look her up and experience
her evil. the opera was great too.
MARCH 6, 2007
HAPPY BIRTHDAY PERVY DAVE! may yr day and evening be a sticky whirlwind of
bonnets and gingham floor length dresses - and the homespun morsels underneath.
tonight we're all gonna go see SLEEPYTIME GORILLA MUSEUM at the old URBAN
LOUNGE. should be full throttle fun and probably plenty of bonnets and little-house-on-the-prarie
magic going on. i'll be wearing my nellie olsen ringlets. ATTRACTIVE! getting
the final recordings for the album. just some vocals, primal fornication-inspiring
percussion, soiled doves back up singing, and backwards satanic messages left.
and then mix magic.
FEB 23, 2007
OK, the snow is too beautiful to ignore. woke to everything covered in a thick
and fluffy layer of it. you cant help but reach out and ball it up. when you
pack it together, it squeeks and crunches just like the marshmallows from
LUCKY CHARMS cereal do when you chomp them between yr teeth - and i love that
almost more than anything. if we get the warm weather that's predicted for
the weekend, we'll hafta build an ark.
FEB 22, 2007
a beautiful - downright glorious day here in SLC. i'll remain optimistic.
i'll also ignore the snow and cold we're supposed to get tomorrow. spring
is on the way! we've finially started booking shows again and so far have
friday march 30 at THE BROKEN RECORD, and saturday april 28 at SLOW TRAIN
Record store. total fun! we'll book some more to fill in the vast empty spaces
between. and now that i'm mostly moved and settling into my new place, we'll
again focus on the new album. it was sounding fun when we left off a coupla
weeks back. hopefully it will cause some joyful spazzing and twitching - that's
the ultimate goal anyway. i'm spending the day up on the mountainside, the
air is clear, and i can see the whole valley, all the mountains and canyons,
the lake, the city, the sky, and the sinister looking flock of spaceships
slowly and ominously gliding toward us.
FEB 13, 2007
well, so much for beautiful day and spring fever feelings yesterday. after
i left work, i decided to pick up a few things at the grocery store. while
i was there, some shitferbrains decided to take a shotgun into the mall across
the street and start randomly shooting people. the mall is a coupla blocks
from my place, so i later wandered over to see what i could find out. i have
friends who work in the mall and i'd just been in the night before for dinner
with pervy dave. we'd run into catfish who was having beers with other friends
- it's a place frequented by a lot of people we know. standing behind the
yellow police tape and looking through the glass doors, down the hallway at
a body lying in the center court was unnerving. felt sick with anxiety. i
still don't know who the victims are, but i've been able to account for a
lot of people who might have been there. found myself staring at the kitchen
linoleum for a good long time last night. tried to offset the unease by watching
some of the british comedian Victoria Woods. it's a persistent unease though.
FEB. 12, 2007
it's a beautiful day in SLC. we had a good storm yesterday which cleared out
the Salt Lake Valley of all the bad air. you can see the mountains vivid and
clear surrounding on all sides. spring fever has hit hard! everyone just wants
to fuck and wear flip flops and shorts and go camping. i'm moving out of the
back alley ex-polygamist compound and have got a place on my own near the
frat houses at the U of UTAH. i've been peeling all the gay porn from my bedroom
walls and ceiling. i cant part with it so i've been sticking it all into a
file for later to refer to. it's always annoying to realize how much useless
shit you collect, and i've been filling big plastic trash bags full of it.
the album is coming along nicely though slowly. we'll be needing to drag THE
SOILED DOVE SINGERS into the studio soon for all the backing vocals. they
can be a saucy bunch - especially if fed after midnight. and the acrobatics!!!!!!!!!
FRIDAYJAN. 26, 2007
i've come down with some shitty cold or inversion caused blah which i'm pretty
sure is making me glow a toxic shit green. so last night i dosed myself up
on nyquil and WHAT DREAMS!... in one i was in a southern utah type desert
landscape with all the buttes and plateaus and sandstone formations. the buttes
all started turning from red to green and were being covered or upholstered
with astro turf and green felt like on a pool table. a herd of cattle started
climbing up a nearby butte - very steep, almost straightup a cliff. suddenly
a cream and yellow blotched cow stood up on her hind legs, turned around and
started leaping interpretive dance style back down the butte. she was weaving
herself clumsily through the other cattle and flailing her front legs like
arms. i was laughing and pointing saying, "look. she's making fun of
humans". suddenly the cow was wearing a floral print moo moo type dress
and really making a show of it. my mom who was near-by was not impressed.
another dream had me floating down the Thames with all my sisters and most
of the rest of my family. i was giving them a tour of london and showing them
the ghostly phamtoms that you could see from the river. as we neared Greenwich,
there were these women phantoms with no mouths climbing up a tree with a rope
around their neck, jumping and hanging themselves. they looked real and all
these other tourists started freaking out at the apparent suicides. then the
second phantom woman jumped up and with newly formed mouth started saying
"it's just a joke. it's all pert of my act". i like these nyquil
dreams.
JAN 19, 2007
weird-o dreams last night! apocolyptic full force. in the first one, i was
in the back yard of my childhood home when a wind started up. i went running
to the front yard and looked back to see the entire western horizon blocked
out by great rolling clouds of grey and black. i thought it was a giant tornado
upon us but soon saw giant arms of molten lava reaching out from it. i started
running east as fast as my little legs could carry me. i passed up a group
of fire fighters who yelled out "give up, it's no use. we're all dead".
i kept running. then from the east these big yellow blobs of glowing matter
came flying through the sky at us. i was with a panicked group of people.
they were falling off quickly, hit by these yellow blobs that i took to be
caused by some meteorite. it was like a big cosmic shoot-em video game. i
seemed to have paired off with some girl and we went running towrds a big
shopping mall near-by. once inside, we came across a security gaurd and, for
some reason, this girl and i decided to flirt with him (as you do with horrible
death coming at you fast). the security gaurd turned camp and said he sucked
only doctors so we'd have to dress up in scrubs. that was enough to send me
running. i woke up there in a highly agitated state. fell back asleep to a
dream of a giant miles long water slide situated along a california freeway.
it was delux - like a rollercoaster. i was sliding along, splashing water
on people i passed and noticed i had on some elaborate flip flops. it turned
out that these flip flops belonged to a recently deceased hawaiian guy - royalty-
and were cursed. so there was suddenly a giant black demon dog chasing me
down, just like the hound of the baskervilles. i didn't want the damn flip
flops so i was trying to give them back to the dog saying, "here, you
can chew on em". then a group of murderous pre-teens showed up and started
pulling apart little living woodland creatures and such. woke there. wont
even go into the third dream of the night. i didn't have anything to drink
or eat before going off to sleep either. though i did read through T.S. Eliot's
THE WASTELAND just before dropping off. the SUNDANCE and the SLAMDANCE film
festivals started last night and it looks like there are some good films this
year. getting tickets to the shows can be the shits though. i'll hafta give
it a go and try though.
JAN 13,2007
just back from my first salsa lesson. i knew i'd be bad, but i didn't figure
i'd be THAT totally shit. i may need the special ed. version of the class.
i will be found in my livingroom doing (as a friend so kindly put it) a constipated
robot version of the basic steps over and over for hours. but watch out ricky
martin!
JAN 9, 2007
a bit of an odd thing happened to me at about 4 this morning. i was asleep
dreaming away when suddenly a girls voice said "hi" and called me
by a name that i used to be called when i was young but that almost nobody
has called me in many many years. in fact i can think of only one person who
sometimes uses this name for me and it wasn't her voice. the thing is, the
greeting was loud and not at all connected to the dream i was having. it was
friendly but also seemed to be coming through an effect or filter - or at
least had a bit of an electronic effect to it. it really was as if somebody
had been in my room very near me and loudly said hi. my dream instantly switched
off and i opened my eyes trying to figure out where it had come from. some
years ago i would have automatically put it down to some disembodied spirit
or something along those lines, but lately i don't know if i can believe in
ghosts as some sort of independent intelligence wafting about. i'm more inclined
now to think of these things as funny tricks of the brain or maybe stray energies
when other people experience it too. a very similar thing happened to me back
in the summer and i was very much awake at the time. i was walking through
our back room and about to start down the stairs to our basement when i had
the same greeting. it wasn't whispered but it was spoken softly and sounded
very close to my ear. there was an open window near-by so i leaned out of
it totally expecting to find a friend crouching below it and laughing. nobody
anywhere. i wandered across the alley to pervy dave's house and asked if he'd
just been over to my place. nope. i couldn't get back to sleep for a few hours
last night. not because i was freaked out or anything, but because my mind
was racing about thinking of all the weird-o things i've experienced over
the years and trying to figure out what in my mind would trigger them. i've
always seemed to experience these sorts of things and even remember things
from when i must have been about 2 or 3. they didn't seem odd at the time,
it was only years later when thinking back on them that they seemed not quite
right. maybe a lot of it is that mormon upbringing with all it's folklore
and spirit this and thats. i've realized that there are only a few places
i've lived where i haven't experienced a lot of this stuff. two were in london,
one on ABBEY ROAD and the other in a place where you'd think it would happen
nonstop - it was in SPITALFIELDS, EAST LONDON in a 100 yr old building in
a neighborhood that at the time was dark and filled with deserted buildings
right square in the middle of all the JACK THE RIPPER murder sights. barely
an unexplained wafting form or out of place sound. however the gay sauna near-by
at which i worked at the time was all sorts of spookily active and would display
weird-o tricks for audiences large and small. even tough east end and straight
cockney electricians would come from some solitary task in some dark corner
looking for refuge with the gay boys and refuse to go back to finish their
work. hmmm.
JAN 1, 2007
woo hoo! no drinking = no hangover. i could pull on brightly colored spandex
and do hours of aerobics to non-stop perma-beat music if i wanted. but that
would be breaking my main resolution, and i promised loved ones... yesterday
i had no pressing engagements so i decided to bundle up and hike up to ENSIGN
PEAK. ENSIGN PEAK is a tall hill on the mountain side up behind the state
capitol. it's a good 1100 feet above the city and is topped by an old stone
monument. apparently the early mormon settlers used to perform some of their
sacred rituals up there before they got a temple built in the city. the trail
up was total mud and snow and a hell of a lot steeper than i remember - or
maybe i've just become a wimp. eventually i made it to the top and it was
just me and the fucking cold clouds. usually the spot offers great views of
the whole valley, but yesterday everything was blotted out by a thick winter
haze. i could see the tops of the eastermn mountains sticking up through it.
i'd taken along some rough mixes of the recorded tracks for the new album,
and there i was dancing around alone on the mountain top with thick mud covering
my shoes and snot running down my face. a perfect way to see the year out.
later met up with friends and headed over to URBAN LOUNGE for TED DANCIN (a
great dj night - great music) . after the countdown, the WOLFS kicked off
and played a rockin set that got me off my stool and almost repeating my glorious
mountaintop moves.
DEC 29, 2006
watching several episodes of the british comedy series THE LEAGUE OF GENTLEMEN
just before going to bed can cause some seriously weird and not wholly pleasant
dreams. i was kinda actually glad to wake up this morning. i got the entire
collection of series 1,2,&3 at the library and have been having a bit
of a ROYSTON VASEY marathon. i've also recently got an all regions DVD player
that'll play DVD's from all the zones and have been having my matey BOB-SPELLED
BACKWARDS send me over discs from london. i just got THE BEST OF VICTORIA
WOODS: AS SEEN ON TV, the complete ACORN ANTIQUES, the complete TALKING HEADS
monologue series by ALAN BENNETT, and THE CATHERINE TATE SHOW series 1&2.
these'll keep me laughing for years. i've turned into the type of geek that
in high school never stops quoting MONTY PYTHON, and in junior high lives
in a DUNGEONS AND DRAGONS fantasy. everybody should do it.
DEC 22, 2006
last night at practice, Eli mentioned that his grandma is dying. he learned
a bunch of old time songs from the 1930's and 40's, took his guitar down to
see her and played the songs for her. i was thinking ,"ah, sweet. Eli
wins purr bat of the month". then, with a perplexed look on his face
he added, "she asked me to play "HERE COMES SANTA CLAUS". you'd
hafta know Eli to fully get the comedy of it, but it took a long time for
me to get to sleep last night because i kept thinking about it and laughing.
the idea of Eli singing "here comes santa claus, here comes santa claus,
right down santa claus lane" - oh lord! i was laughing hard. it was great.
i haven't laughed myself to sleep like that for a very long time.
wed. dec 20, 2006
well, let's see - this is what has gone on in camp purr bats: there was a
baby duck - or young duck waddling peacefully across the road near LIBERTY
PARK. unfortunately it waddled right into the path of Eli's truck and was
sent into oblivion in a puff of feathers. Eli was totally traumatised by this.
he said he wouldn't be able to write a song about it but that i was free to.
sounds like a dance hit sensation. Derwood went on tour with one of his other
bands and had to help disentangle one of his band mates from an over enthusiastic
61 yr old female groupie. Jesse went to pick up his girlfriend from work and
was caught up in a lockdown with a bunch of female teenaged sex offenders
who kept saying to him,"you're gay aren't you? i think you're gay. do
you wanna play cards?". james experienced something so naughty that i
can't even type it out. collectively: we played a totally fun show with THE
WOLFS, and had a seriously productive recording marathon with SCOTT S. at
THE LAIR OF THE BABE SLAYER. i'm gonna pick up some rough mixes tonight to
listen through over the holidaze. it's so cold in SLC right now that all i
wanna do is lie in bed and watch dvd's. i got a really cool BUSBY BERKLEY
collection from the library. it's all these heavily costumed (or scantily
clad) 1930's folks - mostly girls doing all sorts of cool looking dance extravaganzas.
boy, if i had a video budget, i'd be attempting purr bats dance extravaganzas
just like that. and always smiling too.
DEC 8, 2006
yesterday a friend of mine excitedly showed me his final letter from the LDS
(mormon) church stating that his name had been officially removed from their
records. hooray! we walked over to a near-by pub and downed loads of heavy
dark beer in celebration. for many folks it's become a sort of rite-of-passage
to have their name taken off the records of that institution. i tried to have
mine removed for years and met only with dragging of feet, beating around
the bush, and ultimate failure. if it had been the mormon church wanting to
excommunicate me, they'd have been quick and uncompromising about it. i've
seen them be very efficient and almost cruel in their ousting tactics. in
more recent years, a lawyer has put together a web site which describes the
legalities, a persons rights, and a how-to in getting one's name taken off
the LDS church records. god bless her. it even gives a form letter you can
print off and send if yr too lazy or just don't wanna bother with your own
pages of poetics and reasons. i took the form letter, signed it and sent it
in. in a few months, with little hassle and only a couple of "come back
to us" and "you still have a chance at salvation" letters from
the church, i finially received the letter confirming that i was mormon no
more! happy daze. it's so easy like a Las Vegas drive thru wedding. quick
and easy apostasy for the busy person of today. we're playing a show with
THE WOLFS. it's next friday the 15th @MONK'S HOUSE OF JAZZ. it should be a
blast beyond measure. the wolfs are so damn fun, and i'm sure everybody there
will be possesed by the christmas spirit(s). everybody who can make it should
come - and come dressed up like yr favorite nativity character or christmas
elf.
DEC 1, 2006
it's now snowy and cold in SLC so i'm spending a lot more time down in my
room with hot teas, hot chocolate, and the BUTT Book put out by BUTT Magazine.
it's just for the articles - not at all for wank fantasies starring the lad
on pages 389 - 397 who i totally respect as a person and never imagine in
acrobatic and probably impossible positions. we had a good practice last night
even though james forsook us for one of his other bands (he'll never be loved
by them like he's loved by us). made some good progress on the new songs HEAVENLY
BRIDEGROOMS and PIN THE TAIL ON THE FLOOZY. smash hit sensations! gonna get
holiday packages together to send to my very lovely sisters in Albuquerque.
some places still have left over halloween candy you can get for real cheap!
that's how much i love them.
NOV 26, 2006
shopping is not my thing. sweet jesus! it's horrible. had to go buy perfume
so i strong armed CATFISH to go along with me for support. wandered into the
mens fragrance bit and went about sniffing various bottles. suddenly we had
a very enthusiastic sales girl attached and showing us all the smells that
turned her on. after a few, FISHY said he couldn't smell anymore, and there
was this sales girl smilingly handing an open container of coffee beans to
me. i was perplexed but kept smiling back and reached for one saying, "thanks.
should we just eat one?" . FISHY snickering at me over my shoulder. the
girl kept the smile exact and replied, "no, you smell them to clear your
pallette." ah. a whole different world for me with strange customs. we
bailed as soon as the girl turned her back. dumped CATFISH at his place and
ambushed PERVY DAVE R as he was coming out of his place heading to the library.
invited myself along. after the library we decided to chill out for a bit
at a cafe. chatted away about ultra deep things like, "was that building
across the road blue before". a sorta bedraggled woman came in and sat
herself in a corner near by. from a crumpled little paper sack she poured
a small pile of change onto the table and started arranging it in rows. the
waitress greeted the woman who ordered a bowl of soup and a roll saying,"i
usually get butter with that. it should be $2.09." this was the most
exciting thing happening so i had to pay close attention. some minutes later
the waitress returned with the soup, roll, and butter. i glanced at the woman
and did a sort of short circuit double take. is she doing what i think she's
doing? sure enough, the woman had her left hand shoved down the front of her
trousers and was busily petting the kitty! she was sort of leaned over against
the windowsill in a strange slump for better access. then, as she was replying
to the waitress, like it was nothing, like she was adjusting her sweater or
something, she pulled out her hand, raised it to her nose and SNIFFED HER
FINGERS!!!!! maybe it helps clear the pallette. the waitress was soon at our
table with a face of shock and barely held composure asking us if we needed
anything else. i tried not to draw attention but i kept hunching over quaking
with silent laughter and DAVE wanting to know what was so funny. the remaining
bit of my cherry cheesecake just wasn't the same after that.
NOV. 17, 2006
had quite the evening last night. went to DAVE RUHLMAN'S art show opening
at THE UTAH PICKLE COMPANY. bumped into a lot of friends, raided the nibble
platters, listened to the soundscape performance that Dave and his brother
did. james met me there and we dashed off to pick up his drums from his other
practice space. then on to purr bats space where the rest of the lads were
waiting for us. had a nicely productive practice and worked on two new songs.
made plans with MISS QUITA to meet at my place. dropped james off for his
other practice and zipped home to find MISS Q. and a freshly opened bottle
of whisky. i've avoided alkyhall since returning from the UK, so thought what-the-hell.
things went hazy. derwood, jessee and yana arrived with more whisky and convinced
me that a coupla more shots would suit me. we talked about music and i could
hear myself just talking so much shit. i was very enthusiastic about it all
too. i just listened to myself and thought, WHAT A TWAT! - but in a happy
contented way. jessee was suddenly serving up pre bedtime grilled cheese sandwiches
and glasses of water. it seemed to work. hangover minimal. the most extraordinary
thing about the evening was james' revelation that he'd been mugged while
walking home from our last show. right next to the SALT LAKE CITY MORMON TEMPLE.
he was just walking along, maybe a bit tipsy, and some guy jumped out and
wrestled him to the ground. the guy kept repeating "PART WITH IT BRO,
PART WITH IT. IF YOU DON'T WANNA GET HURT, PART WITH YOUR WALLET" when
the guy got his wallet he exclaimed full of disappointment, "you've gotta
have more than $3!" how surreal - how funny. PART WITH IT, BRO has gotta
make it into a song. it's just too funny to waste. in fact, i'll use it as
my next great pick up line. i'll walk up to guys in bars and just say cooly,
"PART WITH IT, BRO." it'll be totally effective. who could refuse?
NOV. 11, 2006
there's a bit on purr bats in the november issue of INSTINCT MAGAZINE. everybody
should do just what i did and go out and buy several copies. once you get
them home, open them all to purr bats, spread them out across yr bed and then
roll around on top of them grunting and groaning - like a dog in dirt. it's
fun. purr bats are such dreamboats. i sleep with the lead singer almost every
night! we have so much in common.
NOV. 10, 2006
have been back in good old SLC for a few days now. mostly beautiful days and
great hanging out with friends. song most stuck in head: FROGGY WENT A COURTIN.
and only that one line too - froggy went a courtin and he did ride uh huh.
worked with eli last night on refining some of the song structures and then
went off to THE BROKEN RECORD where eli, terrence, and ruby were doing their
DJ night, PLASTIC RATS. it was a new wave theme last night so lots of old
favorites were heard. and i really hafta piss, so that's all i'm gonna type
now.
oct 30, 2006
HOORAH! the song BARBIE GIRL which had been stuck in my head for days has
been replaced by pretty much the whole of THE SLITS album, CUT. it's even
been in my dreams and i've woken up with it running through my head. since
i love the SLITS, this tells me that there is at least a 77% chance that there
is a god and that that god loves us. it could have stayed barbie girl for
weeks or been replaced by something like THE COPACABANA or THE HOKY POKY.
maybe like the belief in gaurdian angels we have our own personal celestial
DJs that transmit music loops (i get word and sentence and weirdo exclamation
loops going through too), and sometimes they like to torture us - then they
take pity. which reminds me of a funny thing. in about 1986/87 when my friends
and i were all a bunch of semi music-elitist goths, my friend jim found a
7" single of WHAM's CARELESS WHISPERS in the record collection of our
friend TONALEE. this was serious NO NO. as punishment, he tied her up and
put that record on repeat. then he left. for hours. you can just imagine,
after 10 times through, the horrible dread feeling she must have experienced
when the song ended and she could just hear the crackle and hiss of the vinyl,
then the mechanical sounds of the arm of the record player lifting up, rotating
back to the begining, setting the needle back down on the record, more crackle
and pop of the vinyl, and then those opening strains. oh god! i've probably
written that one before, but it bears repeating.
oct 28, 2006
just back to brighton after spending the week up in london. had a great time
- a whirlwind of museums, galleries, parks, pubs, bars, saunas, train stations,
more saunas, lots more pubs and espresso. walked 6 billion miles. have consumed
more guiness than i thought possible. spent the week at BOB-SPELLED-BACKWARD's
house in GREENWICH. got to hang tough with him a lot. watched a lot of a new
(to me) british comedy goddess called CATHERINE TATE. we were howling! in
fact, i've still been having random chuckle outbursts thinking about it. i'll
be on the train - or worse, in the sauna trying to be all cool and attractive
to sexy potential sex partners and will suddenly lose it all in fits of giggles.
and you know those brits - all generally reserved and polite in public. i've
been getting some wierd looks. poor lads probably thought i was laughing at
them as they passed wearing only their towels and semi hard-ons. i'll be trying
to hunt down CATHERINE TATE episodes when i get back to utah. today BOB and
i loaded up his mini cooper and headed down to CANTERBURY. holy fuck, i forget
how beautiful that cathedral is. a choir was practicing and i had my dictaphone
handy. so now on top of all my london train/museum/park/pub and general city
sounds i've been gathering, i'll have a hissy cheap sounding recording of
a beautiful cathedral choir mixed in with the occasional screaming baby, british
dads giving history lessons to their kids, and lots of babbling foreign languages
- some of which i couldn't make out where they were from. oh, and our footsteps
echoing. i love that stuff. i'll take it home and listen to it repeatedly
on long winter nights. so now BOB has dumped me off in brighton for a weekend
out on the town here. great town. he's off to Hamburg for a few days, and
then hopefully i'll get back up to london to see him again before i go home.
tonight - out for lots more guiness and probably waddle along the seafront
singing the horrible song "BARBIE GIRL" which keeps getting stuck
in my head. i'm sure if you play it backwards it has satanic messages.
oct 19, 2006
about a week and a half ago while i was still back home, i got a surprise
call from my long lost london pal BOB-SPELLED-BACKWARDS. i was so excited
i nearly pissed my pants. i hadn't heard from him for years. he lives in GREENWICH
in south east london - very near GREENWICH PARK which is one of my favorite
places on the planet. i've spent so much time wandering about that park. when
one of my teeth split in half, i buried the broken bit underneath one of the
giant several-hundred yr old oaks they have. anyway, i've now come up to london
, met up with bob, and am now rise and shining in his ultra comfy house. he's
even laid out clean clothes, a razor, and a set of keys while he's gone off
to work. i'm spoiled. we went out to a fantastic pub/restaurant here in Greenwich
last night. it must be a coupla hundred yrs old and has slanting floors. went
for a late night walk and then came back here to drink more beer and watch
DR. WHO. am about to go hang out in the park for a while, wander around Greenwich
and see all the old haunts, and then catch the train into town. yesterday
i was able to spend a few good hours in THE BRITISH MUSEUM. out of my three
priority items i was able to see two. since my first visit to the musuem i've
had the hots - absolute electric crackling lust for a big bronze head of CEASAR
AUGUSTUS. the thing is beautiful and i get all geeky about the details. nearby
is THE WARREN CUP which is a silver chalice type thing with nice images of
acrobatic sodomy displayed on it's sides. hooray for acrobatic sodomy in greek
costume. the one item i was unable to see is the GOLD NECKLACE SET WITH HUMMINGBIRD
HEADS. it's exactly what it sounds like - a gold necklace inlaid with several
real hummingbird heads - snipped off for posh adornment. it always creeped
me out and fascinated me so much that i named one of our songs about london
after it. have walked billions of miles wandering about the city. i have such
a thing for guys in suits - british guys especially - that i'm walking round
in a constant state of arousal. it's as if i was pervy dave r. at a LITTLE
HOUSE ON THE PRAIRIE convention.
Oct 15, 2006
well, have finially made it back to the UK. what a shitty flight - well the
2nd half anyway - after it had turned into FRIDAY THE 13TH! got feeling woozy
and had to twice run to the toilet and barf up everything i'd eaten, hefty
turbulence, bad tom cruise film, fog at airport so were stuck gliding around
the southern part of england forever while a satanic toddler directly behind
me screamed loudly and kicked my seat, unable to yawn and pop my ears and
the pressure in my head was so bad i was sure my eardrums were gonna burst.
finially landed only to be stuck on runway for another forever while satanic
kid behind continued. eventually we were let off the plane. i wobbled off
clutching the barf bag just in case and headed straight for the toilets. there
was nothing left to barf up. and then on to CUSTOMS!!! but now i've been in
Brighton for a coupla days and have fully recovered. it's a beautiful day
and me, the ex, and friends are all about to head down to the pub for a sunday
lunch. had a good pub crawl and UK debauchery last night. will probably head
up to london tomorrow. pure joy!
oct 9, 2006
we played such a fun show last night with SHAKLETON and PEELANDER-Z. PeeLander-Z
puts on a great interactive extravangaza, and BURT'S TIKI LOUNGE was the perfect
venue to experience it in. everybody should go see them if they get a chance.
was talking with miss quita the other night and we were discussing the vastly
different experiences between growing up mormon out of state and growing up
mormon in utah - utah valley in particular. she pointed out something that
i've heard mentioned several times before, that folks who come from utah valley
have their own special brand of fucked-up. that there is an extra intensity
and manic buzz to them. i think she's right. when i was growing up down there
the population was over 90% mormon, and like any unicultural society they
get a bit wierd. we got talking about the mormon folkore - some of which she'd
heard back in her mormon upbringing in Delaware and understood it as folklore.
We in utah were brought up with it all as fact. tales of armies/ legions of
evil spirits marching down out of the canyons and fighting great wars with
angels on the lawn of the Provo temple. these same evil spirits inhabbiting
the mountains and foothills surrounding the valleys and waiting for any opportunity
to pounce on god's chosen. Bigfoot as Cain still wandering the planet for
the damnation of souls. we had the idea constantly drummed into our heads
that we were the special strong chosen generation that could withstand what
SATAN was gonna throw at us in these last days. they'd tell us that in heaven
time (akin to dog years i suppose) we were two minutes to midnight - and midnight
was the end. the great apocalypse. the worthy upstanding mormons would be
saved while all others would be fried in the great cleansing of the earth.
well, being a budding young homo, i knew i was gonna watch friends and family
glide up to safety while i sizzled and popped. even when i didn't know what
homo was, i knew i was somehow unworthy. i remember living in states of panic.
no wonder i became a goth - and thank god for THE VIRGIN PRUNES who were the
perfect anti venom. holy shit, if i hadn't had a great supportive family and
group of friends... what a relief to finially move out of utah and look back
to see just what a load of horse shit it all is. there were record burnings
at the high school. i remember watching my brother set flame to his JUDAS
PRIEST "british steel" and RUSH "moving pictures" album
in our family room fire place. i poised myself safely part way up the stairs
in case i saw some demonic reaction happen and i could flee up the stairs
and out the front door. even so - with all that bonkers mania, once a person
has stopped feeling sorry for themselves and can laugh at themselves, it seems
it also spawns a strong and particularly utah sense of humor. my god, we even
had to campaign long and hard to be allowed to see starwars. my dad didn't
want to let us because it was rated PG. and poor lincoln who grew up in an
even more zealous household which he'd call THE REFORMATORY. once, when he
was a young lad, he and his brother were invited to a neighborhood birthday
party. the party were gonna go see the film CLASH OF THE TITANS. every kid
in the world wanted to see that movie. his dad had read a cautionary review
of the film in THE DAILY HERALD which mentioned partial nudity. so when they
all went to the movie theatre, everybody went into see CLASH while lincoln
and his brother were alone guided into another theatre to watch SAVANA SMILES
(!!!!!). god, he deserves a medal for that experience alone. what a horrible
disappointment and humiliation. i laugh whenever he tells that story- loud
and hard. but it's a bit of an uneasy, knowing laughter.
oct 3, 2006
have been bouncing around town this evening putting up flyers for our show
on sunday night with PeeLander-Z. it'll be at burt's tiki lounge which is
a perfect dive kinda bar and always has really fun shows. it should be a total
blast. the evening is beautiful with clear skies in all these great shades
of blue. earlier i was catching glimpses of the mountains with all sorts of
dramatic and fantastic light. it really could inspire endless bad poetry.
gonna go see Lilly Tomlin on saturday night. i'm so excited. she's made me
laugh til it hurts. hatching plots about new album strategies. the songs are
sounding like DANCE HIT SENSATIONS! and off to london in about a week - woo
hoo!
sept 27, 2006
well, somehow we went straight from heat wave summer into winter with snow
and all. obviously a sign of THE LAST DAYS! god is angry with us for allowing
homosectuels and lesbeans to have pride days. he's gonna blow up the super
volcano in yellowstone national park and wipe out salt lake city. the town
has now become corrupt and evil to the core with a liberal mayor and outdoor
rock concerts. but now the weather has gone back to early fall warm and beautiful.
my friend craig had never seen the wizard of oz so we decided to grab a bottle
of scotch and the deluxe DVD edition and pile into my bedroom with dave from
across the way - you know, the pervert who like's bonnets. maybe it was a
bit because of the scotch, but that film suddenly seemed to be the most beautiful
thing on the planet. i was feeling all soul filled and in love with the good
witch glinda - well, actually i just wanted her to be my aunt or something.
the lions swishing tail had me captivated - and the songs are fucking brilliant!
so that was such a success that we decided to continue in that way and last
night grabbed a bottle of red wine and series 3 of THE BLACK ADDER. absolute
and total joy! everybody should try it. back to that pervert dave, he's got
his art website up www.davidruhlman.com have a look-see. send him a message
telling him you know about his sick ways and how outraged you are about it.
have finially booked my trip to london. will be there from the 13th of oct
til the 5th of nov. i can't wait. i'll get to shag cockney lads and city gents.
have even arranged to meet up with one of my clients from when i was a rent
boy. EXCELLENT!
sept 16,2006
phew! these past few weeks have been bonkers. got broadsided by some family
issues which put me into a sort of surreal autopilot for a bit. tried to go
about things as usual but everything felt half assed. a planned trip to spain
has been postponed and instead spain came to us in the form of inma's mom,
brother and sister in law. none of them speak english and my spanish is shit
so we communicate by nods and smiles and lots of hand gestures. they're back
off to madrid tomorrow. we've been simplifying the site and taking out all
the flash animation so that more folks can get to it. it makes it about 1/4
as exciting but who wants cheezy fireworks shooting out of blinking eyes anyway.
have pulled out of the faun fables show on the 23rd but will go to see them
anyway. i love faun fables. have also done some rough recordings of some of
the newer songs - FEROCIOUS FIRE-BREATHING FROU FROUS, SPENT FIREWORKS (how
fitting with the site), WARNING CHIRP, and THE LADY DUMPLING HORSEFEATHERS.
getting back into working on the new album feels great. also planning three
weeks in london to see friends and places i'm missing. i can't wait.
aug.28,20000000006
you know, sometimes i really do want a ray gun. some people should just be
vaporised. sometimes you've just gotta ditch rational, ballanced thought and
revert back to junior high emotions and imagine laying waste to so much of
what surrounds you. much better than calgon baths. totally therapeudic. that
said, i did hafta kill some huge spiders that invaded inma's house the other
night. i hate killing spiders and i'm such a geek that i apologise to them
when i have to. but inma's screams and scramblings were too much to bear.
she was standing up on a table screaming bloody murder. each time one spider
died, another would come crawling out of some corner right towards where she
was. it was freaky, and they were huge. she tried smashing one and it wouldn't
die. it would jump right back up and start running about. more loud hysterics
from inma. so finially i went after them with a can of black flag. i pulled
back the couch and three of them scattered. it almost had me leaping up on
the table. sprayed those and turned to see another near by crawling up the
wall. got it. then inma commanded me to vacuum the twitching carcasses up.
that creeped me out the most. i could feel and hear the bangs as they slammed
into the sides of the hard plastic suction tubes. so that experience brought
back another great inma performance from years ago. it was just before we
moved to london and we were at the old SLC library. we were down some utah
history aisle or something and there was a youngish man standing near us and
browsing through a book. suddenly, in the silent and echo cavern of the library,
the man let loose with a loud high pitched fart. it was a short musical blast
as if he'd been trying very hard to keep it in and failed. i just chuckled
a bit and that would have been the end of it had i not also looked in inma's
direction. she was quaking. she was struggling very hard not to laugh, but
when i looked at her she erupted. she let out unrestrained howl after howl
and noisily sucked in air to let off more howls. when she laughs like this
it sounds exactly like she's crying - shrieking even. she had tears rolling
down her face and any attempts at shhhing her made her laugh harder. everyone
was looking at her and at me as if i'd beat her and made her cry. the poor
man made a quick exit. inma couldn't move from laughing so hard, and mortified
me ditched her and went gliding away up the escalator and scurrying off into
some dark corner. eventually she recovered though i doubt that man ever did.
aug. 24, 2006 144 am
i keep forgetting to mention that there is a piece on purr bats on gay.com.
it slips my mind every time i'm at a computer that gives me access to the
purr bats site. anyway, it's been up for a few weeks and i think you can still
see it. i suddenly had a bunch of lads telling me they'd seen my pic geeking
at them when they'd log on to do their ungodly chatting. which reminds me
that i need to update my very outdated profile on gay.com so that i can have
deep poetry discussions with closeted mormon men and uni students. my geeky
face never popped up for me though so i decided i'd google search purr bats
and ta da - there it was. so if anybody wants to see it, google search purr
bats. that was nice of them to do for us. i got a message from my friend NERAK
today. she's sent off a package to me containing a bunch of stuff i'd left
at her house when i moved to london in 1997. the thing i'm most excited about
getting is the big pink bunny suit i used to wear for puri-do shows. i don't
think it ever had a proper washing in the years i wore it, and it's been packed
away in her basement for nearly 10 years. i can imagine what's coming along
with it. that was a fucker to wear on stage and it would cause serious sweat
issues. all sorts of old mutated bits of my DNA are gonna be popping out to
greet me. i think there are also some cds and probably pages and pages of
bad poetry. this weekend has some great shows in store. saturday is the VILE
BLUE SHADES cd release soiree, and sunday will be LE FORCE and BLACKHOLE.
should be a grand ol time.
aug. 20, 2006
hmm, it's been a week of all sorts of goings on. saw a great show by PEACHES
at urban lounge. the place was packed which made it difficult to move but
peaches herself didn't seem to have a problem getting into every corner of
the place to perform from the tops of various bars and tables and probably
while standing on top of peoples heads. everybody rubbing up against each
other in their attempts to dance. it was almost as good as the old CRASH WORSHIP
shows in that way. had a successful practice and worked on new stuff. played
a show with RED BENNIES and PLEASURE THIEVES. i usually don't like drinking
a whole lot before performing, but it had been a good week of interacting
too much with fuck wits and annoying this and thats. drummer boy james was
also having a bit of a shit time and needed to beat something into submission.
so we drank a goodly amount and he beat the shit out of his drums and i suppose
i spazzed out enough to make me feel sore and paralytic next day - even still
now in fact. we attempted one of our new disco songs - FEROCIOUS FIRE-BREATHING
FROU FROUS, but i could remember maybe 3 words and it sucked shit. it was
fun anyway and some folks were actually dancing. needed to get into the mountains
so craig, dave r, and i all drove up to DIAMOND FORK and hiked up to the hot
pots yesterday. the trail head and parking lot has been washed away by some
flash flood so there weren't many people about at all. only the most adventurous
indiana jones style folks - which we were more than happy to consider ourselves.
didn't get eaten by bigfoot. played about in the lower pots and the waterfall
for a bit and then hiked up to the upper pots which have been built up like
some luxury outdoor hot tub. they were empty and we had them to ourselves.
fuckin fantastic! soaked long enough to get the sulphur egg fart smell embedded
into our very beings. then hiked back down and drove out of the canyons listening
to RADIO HEADS album KID A. got back into town with just enough time to wash
off egg fart aroma and dash over to club EGO'S to catch the GLINTING GEMS
and COYOTE HOODS. it's been a while since i've seen coyote hoods and they
are one of my favorite bands ever. i could go on forever about them. mellow
and dark and scott has this beautiful barritone voice. they even played a
mellow version of RUNT which is a song that always makes me cry in some great
joyful way. i've been pestering scott to let me put out an album for them
for years. i'd even postpone a purr bats album if i had to. it's fuckin beautiful
stuff. somebody has gotta put it out. walked home having not had a drop of
anything. parted ways halfway with catfish and robert who had apparently had
many many drops plus various other this and thats. left them laughing on a
corner. listened to crickets and sirens. watched the lights up on the mountainside.
and made it home just as miss Q was pulling up. yes, MISS QUITA IS BACK IN
TOWN! it's been so much fun having her back. we've been laughing non-stop
at all the various "smells of female" and whatever else pops into
the conversation. we found out that mr. dave r is a dark horse of biblical
proportions. in discussing the various strange things that turn us on, dave
informed us that he's aroused by glasses - as in spectacles, bonnets pioneer
or amish style, and long pioneer type skirts like little house on the prarie.
PERVERT!
sunday aug. 13, 2006
a night of drunken debauchery sounded like just the ticket last night, so
catfish, kyson and i started the evening off with gin something or others
(giblets or something that sounded like that) in their cool old polygamist
kitchen. coco rosie and some 50's lounge music playing to get us in the mood.
after a few rounds we called up a cab and got ourselves across town to the
trapp door which is one of the more popular gay bars in SLC. got handed more
gin things and went round rubbing ourselves up against various friends. catfish
who seems to love getting on his high horse and charging at things he doesn't
agree with decided that he was tired of the same exact music played every
week. he wrote a note on a napkin that went to the effect of " we've
been hearing this same shit for years. just because we're gay doesn't mean
we want to hear madonna on repeat. please play something else. " he calls
his rants "the good fight" and i can't always disagree with him.
he sometimes does have a very valid point. i wasn't so bothered by the music
though as that's never what i've gone to the trapp door for anyway. he delivered
his note in a very polite way to the dj and returned to our table. as we were
told later, the dj felt "very threatened" by the note. next thing
we know, catfish is being escorted out of the club by a bouncer. i couldn't
believe it. we were just laughing at the stupidity of it all. we said a few
bemused goodbyes and went to join catfish out front. he was laughing but very
much in the catfish fight mode. we decided to head next door to the trapp
which is traditionally the more low key sister to trapp door. it's generally
a more cowboy gear crowd, a bit older, music as background so you can chat
over it, and big screen tvs showing various sports events. bumped into more
friends and had a laugh. i kept refusing drinks having decided i'd reached
my limit and then kept stealing gulps off of other peoples drinks while they
weren't looking. was starting to get a bit touchy feely with whoever came
too close to me and then realised that i was far too drunk for any successful
debauchery. ho hum. piled into a friends vehicle and just remember watching
the city swim by and laughing at all the stupid things being said which somehow
seemed like the funniest things in the world. got dumped off at kyson and
catfishies place and decided to totter off home. somehow made it and belly
flopped onto the bed - straight into a coma. now trying to calculate the fun
to hangover ugh ratio. did do a lot of laughing, but i think i should try
to go camping next weekend instead.
aug. 3, 2006
we've had a few good storms the past coupla days. heard some roaring sound
yesterday morning and tottered upstairs to find great walls of water falling
past all the windows. all the streets were raging rivers and it looked as
if lake bonneville (the ancient lake that used to fill the great basin and
of which the great salt lake is the last dead remnant) was set to refill.
sadly it lasted for only a little while. but it sure killed off the heat wave
and blew away so much of the shitty air. everyone felt alive again and all
the peasants danced in the streets. have taken up the nocturnal walks with
headphones and my old cassette collection. it's a totally different world
at night and becomes surreal and magical when you've got COIL's BLACK LIGHT
DISTRICT as a soundtrack. have also been listening to some rendition of the
canterbury tales. those medieval pilgrims sure were a saucy lot. and now they
could hit starbucks at journey's end because one now occupies the ancient
stone wall - right at the gate of canterbury cathedral. pay homage to thomas
beckett with an americano in hand.
july 26, 2006
my older brother Twog left me a voice mail last week inviting me to hang tough
with him and his boys over the weekend. he was thinking they'd go camping
or at least do some hiking - maybe hit the hot pots. the hot pots are some
natural hot springs up one of the canyons. it's about an hours hike from where
you can park - up a beautiful canyon - and they are situated along a mountain
stream. the stream flows through them and cools them to a tolerable temp.
they also are full of sulphur so smell strongly like egg farts. i got too
busy and like a dumb ass forgot to call him back. no quality mountain time
for me over the pioneer day weekend. years ago we used to hike to the hotpots
several times a week - a whole big group including several siblings and friends.
we'd usually go in the middle of night - even in mid winter. one late night
we were hiking along and spooking ourselves out with the very bigfoot like
shadows and shapes that float about the canyon. i was about 10 or 15 feet
up the trail from Twog, merrily making my way along. Twog is this big burly
muscle guy who builds things, fixes things, taught nuculear physics, and generally
knows-it-all. not easily spooked - or so he likes to seem. anyway, there we
were hiking along when i heard twog scream and suddenly felt myself lifted
up and flying backwards a few feet and forcibly turned to face back down the
trail. twog was now up the trail some distance. after a few stunned moments
and little bits of panic, everyone stopped screaming. apparently twog had
been hearing the footsteps of somebody or something following along behind
us. just like one of those silly movie things. he'd stop and the footsteps
would stop. he'd start and so would the footsteps. he went faster, footsteps
went faster. he started running and so did the fast approaching footsteps.
time to panic! that's when he screamed and grabbed me, putting me between
him and the thing. HE ACTUALLY FED ME TO THE MONSTER SO THAT HE COULD GET
AWAY! the footsteps turned out to be the straps on his backpack slapping against
it. i've been laughng about it for the past few days. i've gotta remember
to tell his boys the story so that he'll never be able to live it down. tough
guy my ass!
july 23, 2006
we played a fun show on friday night with QUINTRON and MISS PUSSYCAT along
with HARRY MERRY from Holland. costumes and puppet shows and very energetic
organ music - a total blast. and even though we ended up playing last so were
all a bit sauzled by the time we went on, we played well. we even pulled off
a couple new songs to the set. the over heated days have been keeping me indoors
a lot so i've been doing a lot of reading and writing all sorts of smash hit
sensations which will probably all be impossible to understand - evidence
of a slow cooked brain. am finially finishing up PAPER MOON which lincoln
had given to me 3 yrs ago. great film and soundtrack too! also been browsing
through old history books and encyclopedias of the unknown. the combination
is potentially lethal. has been causing some weirdo dreams for sure. but i'm
actually loving the heat. always half naked and slow and damp and sticky,
eating lots of popsicles - and the crickets at night are one of the greatest
sounds in the universe.
july 18,2006
the air in the salt lake valley is so shitty right now that you could reach
out your hands and ball it up like a snowball. the outline of the western
mountains is barely visable in some spots and totally lost behind an evil
haze everywhere else. the eastern mountains on the base of which i live are
vague fuzzy shapes in shades of ugh. i suppose a small bit of the crud is
from wild fires , but most of it is probably from tailpipes. the heat has
been the type that makes you whither and look for rocks to slither under (what
a rhyme!). most of my afternoons are spent hiding out in my cooler dungeon
basement room in just my boxer briefs drinking water and iced tea and reading
through the billion partially read books i have lying about. i've actually
finished a few now. as i type, a thunder storm seems to be blowing in which
is just the ticket. it'll cool everything down and blow tho sludge towards
colorado - hoorah! and possibly the big electrical tower behind inma's house
will get struck by lightning which will deep fry my fingers to this keyboard.
saw THE LEGENDARY PINK DOTS this past week which was fucking fantastic. i
love them - and now i gotta go out and spend loads of money buying all their
albums because my whole LPD library has somehow vanished - the show reminded
me how crucial they are to my well being and hi-pro glow. we're playing a
show with QUINTRON and MISS PUSSYCAT on friday at the urban lounge and that
should be a total blast. anybody who can should come and shake their various
things about the dancefloor.
july 7, 2006
i went to see a great show the other night. first friends LUDWIG AND THE TOYS
played followed by other friends SUBROSA. then MADAME P who played mostly
voice manipulation and created some really great sounds and songs. then NORA
KEYS came on. she used to play with the L.A. band THE CENTIMETERS. she was
fucking fantastic! a coupla months back my friend jared had played some of
her CD for me while we were driving around in his car. it was spooky and humorous
and beautiful and definitely moved us (in all sorts of directions at once).
seeing her live was all that plus the visuals and her expert handling of technical
hiccups and the pleasure of seeing people squirm uneasily and then let themselves
get into it. there was a simple orange light on her but i swear that when
she'd raise her arms, she would turn a deep shade of TANG. it was like a wave
of tangerine would wash over her and it really looked as if her skin was deep
orange. juxtapose that to the music and general atmosphere, and i was feeling
pretty psychadelic. i hadn't even touched a drop or had anything else that
might alter me a bit. i wandered home chuckling and in a weird buzz. next
week THE LEGENDARY PINK DOTS will be here. i've been listening to their "any
day now" album a lot these past few weeks. that'll be a great show too.
and on the 21st we play with QUINTRON and MISS PUSSYCAT which shoul be a total
blast. we should have several new songs ready for that show. i wonder if TANG
is still sold in stores. i'm kida wanting some now.
june 29, 2006
argh! we've had some site technical issues and in our attempts to fix things,
we lost everything from the end of march to now. oh well. so ONWARDS! we played
last night at gallivan center in down town SLC last night. it's a big outdoor
plaza type thing and it was for the X96 4PLAY concert series. we had a good
time even though there was a bit of internal weirdness lurking about. at least
for me. we've decided not to play many shows for a while and instead focus
more on the new songs and recording. i'm liking that idea - we seem to have
stuck ourselves in a bit of a rut and the shows haven't been as full on joyful
as they were a few months back. i'm excited about the new songs and will be
glad to get them recorded. 10-4 over and out.
march 31, 2006
about a year ago lincoln had mentioned something about the existence of some
sort of purr bats fan club. i laughed it off as a joke. recently though, i
met with a coupla founders and the president of THE PURR BATS FANCY FUCK FANTASY
CLUB (!!!!!!!). i was informed that there are chapters in san francisco, and
rural Price, utah as well as the headquarters in SLC. also a las vegas branch
in the works. hmmm. the president is a formidible woman and i was a bit intimidated.
some of it sounded almost like a coven - very sex magic with a lot of tongue
in cheek humor. could be fun to join except that i don't think there are any
members of purr bats i'd be able to think of fucking. poor james the drummer
boy and scott the guitar boy from the last line up. they apparently have some
hungry enthusiasts sniffing their trails. they'll get a kick out of it when
i tell them. we had a grand time playing at the urban lounge last night. we
were lazy and ditched the costumes and several songs but actually played well.
planning the recording for the omit-o-matic ep and the next album. i'm excited
about the new songs. trying to fit in a long overdue trip to london to hang
tough with neglected loved ones. looks like it'll hafta wait til june. gonna
go to eli's octopus records shin dig at orion's music tonight and get my paws
on all the cool recordings he's releasing - old demos and out takes from red
bennies, vile blue shades, wolfs etc... and then tomorrow night, wolfs are
playing with helios creed. that'll be a fun show.
march 26, 2006
winter just doesn't wanna stop. oh well. went to a fantastic show last night
at kilby court. THE PINK MOUNTAIN TOPS. lincoln had been playing it for us
and singing their praises. he was right. i'd planned to leave that show and
head over to the depot to catch SPORK but the pink mountain tops didn't finish
until 11. by that time a storm had blown in and everybody else bailed for
their cozy houses. decided to hit the trapp door and meet other friends there.
since i wasn't driving, i indulged in the old alky hall. now i'm hung over
and ol pissy pots. at kinko's to make flyers for thurday nights show. ugh..
fuck this .
march 24, 2006
ah, busy as fuck - and yet seem to get nothing done. stayed in last night
and watched the old disney film DARBY O'GIL AND THE LITTLE PEOPLE. i love
that movie. i think it's what got me obsessed with ireland when i was a little
kid. the banshee and the coach of death were not quite as horrifying as i'd
remembered them. we've added a show on the 30th - next thursday at urban lounge
with EVOLVER and OUR TIME IN SPACE. we haven't been able to get together and
practice, so all my plans of sets filled with new songs have curdled. hopefully
by the mid april shows. the very nice folks at OUT magazine have included
a small piece about us in their very first music issue. that was so cool of
them to do. it is their april issue and has a cool looking pic of madonna
on the cover. everybody should buy a copy and keep it with their emergency
preparedness kits. spring is on the way - that's my mantra and i'm sticking
to it.
march 10, 2006
played at Urban Lounge last night with TOLCHOCK TRIO and THE CUNTED. both
were great, and we had a good ol time. i lied and said it was national interpretive
dance month. though noboby could have believed me, i did see some serious
and in depth interpretation going on down in front of the stage. actually
some really cool moves being thrown about. i got jealous and arranged to have
the better dancers snuffed out. now i can be king! tolchock are heading down
to austin next week for the sxsw thingy. our friend brad put on a show up
in ogden last night with a bunch of the kids he gave harmonicas and teaches
the blues (history and to play) to. i'd have gone to see it if i hadn't been
playing. lincoln went and said it turned out great. brad is one of the coolest,
most genuine and nicest guys you could meet - and he makes fantastic music.
one of my favorite luxuries is to have free time where i don't have to meet
anybody or go anywhere, stay home and coax lincoln to read to me. if friends
are over, we'll drag blankets and pillows into the living room and just lie
about chuckling away at whatever book we're getting through at the time. right
now it's one of the cosmic trigger books by robert anton wilson. years ago
when i'd had heart valve replacement surgery at the same time i'd also had
some nasty case of pnemonia and was stuck in a hospital bed, lincoln would
come round daily and read GEEK LOVE by katherine dunn. every so often i was
supposed to clutch a pillow and cough up any muck that might be settling in
my lungs. that hurt like hell and i decided that i didn't care if i croaked,
i wasn't gonna do it. well, lincoln would read and the book would set me off
laughing which would trigger uncontrollable spasms of coughing and i would
hack up the muck anyway. i remember one particularly violent episode set off
by the bit where the bag man has some last dying ejaculation - shooting off
like a cockroach. i laughed so hard and long. i was crying it was so painful.
absolutely the best medicine. in our teens we used to find some deserted corner
of the orem public library and read funny stories to each other. lincoln read
from EAST OF EDEN by john steinbeck. when we read the bit about mrs trask
and her new diety of vengence who demanded of her a sacrifice- her secret
sacrificial shroud and the way she offed herself we made a noise like that
library has probably never heard. in fact, i should read that again.
march 5, 2006
played a fun show on friday at kilby court which is a cool all ages venue
here in town. my 2 yr old niece skylar came and it was her first ever show.
she danced when she didn't stand staring perplexed at uncle kyrbir all dressed
up like a dork and flailing about. she was a bit spooked by the rest of the
band in their mexican wrestlers masks. we played with the wolfs and a coupla
bands from down in utah valley. total fun. went last night to one of the SLUG
mag release parties for their DEATH BY SALT 2 compilation cds. missed seeing
agape but caught some of tolchock trio and all of vile blue shades. i love
those bands. in fact i've been listening to the tolchock trio's most recent
album while running errands today. we get to play with them on thursday at
urban lounge - woo hoo! the SLUG comp is a collection of songs from local
bands and comes with band trading cards. miss quita, links and i all sat on
the porch this morning drinking coffee and laughing at how gross the SLEEPING
BAG picture is. dave and i are in a mummy bag and the pic has been doctored
up to look like some double headed larvae grub thing reclining on a sofa.
it's the looks on our faces that make it so creepy. we then all wandered over
to catfish's place for one of their delux sunday waffle breakfasts. ah sweet
jaysus! i'm now babysitting and the kids have somehow discovered some sort
of make up and covered themselves and a wall in it. bye!
feb. 26, 2006
the show on friday at burt's tiki lounge was a blast. not a lot of room to
spaz out in so i kept stepping on eli's effects pedals. i'm surprised he didn't
just launch me from the stage with a good thwack from his guitar. we played
with blackhole who are great so after our set i gotta dance about, well, bob
about to their set. saw a bunch of great folks who i only seem to get to see
at shows. got to hang tough with inma. total fun. sadly i had to miss the
spork cd release which was hapening at the same time over at urban lounge.
had a house music evening last night at W lounge where our friend nick was
djing. a bit more of a subdued evening for me but still a lot of fun. wandered
over to catfishes house today where he was preparing this huge delux mexican
breakfast. ate tons. we've been having beautiful spring type weather. it's
been a good weekend. now deciding whether i wanna hit latin night at the trapp
door this evening and find someone to do unspeakable things to or whether
to do the quiet dvd and popcorn thing at home. well, i did very much enjoy
that mexican breakfast.
feb 19, 2006
ok, i give in. winter has lost it's charm and i'm ready for summer and flip
flops and sleeping naked on top of the covers and crickets chirping and camping
trips to the mountains and the desert and bike riding in the canyons... i'm
just ready to not be cold. i guess i'm not quite the hardcore rugged yeti
type stock needed for shakleton type antarctic expeditions. fuck that, i'll
take the hot tub and fruity frothy drinks with little umbrellas. went with
the kids to the SLC international tattoo convention today. bumped into a friend
that we knew when we relocated to seattle back in 1991 and who we haven't
seen or heard from in nearly 15 years. he's a tattoo artist and builds tattoo
machines. we did the whole catch up and the "whatever happened to..."
thing. it was really cool to see him. now i'm babysitting and luxuriating
in a home that's actually heated. forgot to bring one of the books i'm reading
so i'll just watch some on demand TV. what a princess!
feb 17,2006
quick little howdy. am at work sneaking computer time because access to these
new fangled gadgets is becoming more rare for me these days. i need to cave
in and set myself up with one (and a web cam so i can spend most of my days
in dirty chat rooms). have had some beautiful days recently. had a big snow
dumping wednesday night. woke early to a winter wonderland. stepped outside
and discovered that somebody had covered our front porch with rose petals.
the snow is a powder, not good for packing or snowballs, but good for throwing
on people. when i tried to sweep off the steps, rose petals went everywhere.
we still haven't found out which friend did the deed, but it was nice of whoever
it was (unless it was really a voodoo curse). the sky was mostly clear and
pale blue except for a few big fluffy peach colored clouds and some sinister
dark grey clouds hanging out over the eastern mountains. cars going only two
miles per hour and still all ending up in snowbanks. it was a good morning.
now starting a three day weekend with plans of all sorts of debauchery. will
somewhere in there work on some of the new songs. also having a craft night
with jesse where we'll get heftily sauced up and make head pieces for an upcoming
show. i was thinking it would be fun for us all to be pinatas filled with
candy but it probably wouldn't be very practical for performing in. maybe
we could have some go go dancers as pinatas and let the audience beat them
to shreds. we'll see what we come up with.
fe 12, 2006
yesterday miss Q, linky and i were all prepared to set out on a grand exploratory
expedition up through the avenues, through memory grove, up capitol hill and
to the daughters of the utah pioneer museum. we had the portable cd and double
headphone splitter so that all three of us would be linked together like little
kids on a leash and listening to the same music. we were each to choose a
cd for the occasion. i had HIS NAME IS ALIVE's stars on ESP loaded up. links
had a CAN compilation in hand. when we went across the way to collect miss
Q, she withdrew herself from the outing. hmmmmph! somehow just lincoln and
i hooked up to HIS NAME IS ALIVE didn't have the same appeal. we ditched the
music idea and just talked shit about miss Q the whole way (not really quita,
we love you still). the avenues are all these really cool old houses in various
states of elegance and disrepair. they form a grid of streets up the northern
foothills of SLC. you gotta watch your step cause some of the sidewalks are
a billion years old and are now jagged and offering up their trilobytes. not
skate worthy at all. we hit the hansen family chocolate shop and loaded up
on almost one of everything. did our amazon jungle trekker routine down into
the canyon that forms memory grove. it actually is a sort of jungle if you
consider what often is lurking in the bushes and comes crawling out at you
at the first hint of eye contact. we didn't hafta fight off any ferrocious
beasts. made it safely up the other side and across the capitol which is in
perpetual restoration. finially made it to the museum and were shitting our
pants to actually find it open. two sweet older ladies greeted us in the lobby/giftshop.
we were supplied with maps and a locker in which to deposit our backpacks
and coats. inside are endless display cases full of pioneer and utah historical
this and thats. those folks could get up to some weird stuff. the hair art
is a favorite. they'd take all this human hair and weave it into elaborate
lace like patterns and then frame it. in fact, they used human hair for all
sorts of things. they definitely were a crafty bunch. they didn't have reality
TV shows and endless commercials to distract them. truth be told, i was kinda
envious of their crafty skills. i stared into display cases and made silent
resolutions which i'll forget at the first offer of an ab fab marathon. the
walls are covered with spooky photos of stiff and stern looking folks with
tight hair and washed out zombie type eyes. wandered through the basement
chuckling at the creepy woodcarved figures, some of them keeled over and dead
looking in the cases, past the collection of swords and rifles and pistols
and more hair and quilts and the two headed lamb and then nearly had a heart
attack when suddenly a loud booming voice shouted out that it was time to
close up. some older guy with a big white moustache and suspenders who'd been
lurking around in a far corner of the room. since links and i were the only
ones there and the room wasn't all that big, i wasn't sure why the guy didn't
just in normal tones let us know it was time to make our way out. but now
thinking about it i'd have a fun time giving people near heart attacks in
spooky silent rooms too. in fact, i'm gonna search for the opportunities to
do just that.
feb5, 2006
this past week our friends at the very cool and down right historic vintage
clothing (etc) store GRUNTS AND POSTURES let us slip in after hours and raid
their racks for a band photo shoot. so much cool clobber to choose from and
all sorts of wigs, hats and accessories. sadly we had a very limited bit of
time to get it all done in so we kept our dress up impulses under control
and just did the shirt and tie thing. i also brought along the dreaded orange
fringy and sequined dresses and coaxed the lads into them for a few quick
shots. they were good sports and we looked like a real classy las vegas review.
well, maybe a wanna-be las vegas review from a spokane suburb. but we sparkled
and that's all that matters in life. we'll post up some of the pics soon so
everybody can admire. we've finially got confirmation on at least 2 shows
(one at the all ages kilby court!) in march, and there are some more in the
works. for various reasons we haven't been able to play as many shows these
past months as we would like to have, but hopefully things have cleared up
on that front. maybe we can get paula abdul to work out some piping hot dance
routines for us - or maybe we'll just steal them from the film xanadu. KIRA!
jan 31, 2006
admittedly i'm a bit simple minded and am probably too easily amused, but
i've been having the greatest laughing spasms these past few days. it's one
of those things where a person would have to have been there to fully appreciate
it, but i'll type it anyway. it began some nights back when linky, catfish
and i were sitting around in the house and discussing some of the latest weirdo
episodes that seem to flare up in the house every few months. whether it's
ghosts or stray energy or just our brains short circuiting, weird things do
happen and keep us perplexed. so catfish who only recently started to experience
these things mentioned the shapes he's watched wafting about. i told of being
shocked awake by some loud vocal sounding noise coming from somewhere near
my head. lincoln, with a look of quietly creeped out, told us how a few nights
ago - late late in the early am he'd been sitting on his bed quietly strumming
his acoustic guitar. suddenly, from one of the adjoining rooms came an evil,
angry and metalic sounding voice. it was too quick for lincoln to catch what
was said but it was enough to give him the impression of pure malevolence.
he tried to figure out what it could be but could think of nothing. he said
it sounded like some sort of dalek creature - the robot baddies from Dr. Who.
we all chuckled uneasily and left it at that. then on sunday night catfish
was back over. he and i were sitting in the living room watching some 1960's
cowboy film when all of a sudden we heard an evil, angry metalic dalek type
voice say something about the basement and evacuate. catfish and i turned
to each other, catfish with fast growing panic on his face - all the color
draining out of him and his eyes widening. i got up and went towards the kitchen
to investigate. when i turned round i discovered that fishy had flown out
of his chair and through the front door and was now standing in the doorframe
cocked and ready to launch himself to safety. in the same second i caught
sight of the speaking carbon monoxide detector i'd installed a few months
back and had forgotten about. neither linky nor fishy had any idea of it's
existence. i collapsed in the most violent laughter i've experienced in so
long. i was laughing so hard i was crying. i couldn't catch my breath. i laughed
all night and woke up laughing the next morning. i'm still laughing. i went
to work and told coworkers. my hilarious coworker connie revealed she'd had
a very similar experience. she'd been moving into the home of a friend when
she'd heard the same dalek voice. she was alone as the friend was at work.
she called up the friend in a panic saying there were disembodied voices.
she barricaded herself in the bedroom until the friend arrived home. the friend
wanted a full description and played along with it, secretly knowing what
really spoke to connie. connie explained that she knew who it was but that
she wouldn't say because she thought it would upset the friend. more coaxing
from the friend, and connie finially gave in saying "i believe it was
your dead mother" (with a dalek voice!). then the friend walked over
to the carbon monoxide detector, inside the very room connie had barricaded
herself in and pressed the reset button. the evil voice spoke again. i laughed
all day at work and she will never live that down. so anyway, i went to a
great show friday which was the bands SPORK, BLACKHOLE, and RED BENNIES. an
excellent show! it was at monk's and the only drawback was that it was so
crowded and most of that crowd were smoking. it's a basement club so the smoke
just collected and stayed. even though i'm a big whimp about smoke, i'm not
so supportive of the proposed ban on smoking in bars and clubs. i don't like
the idea of everything being safe and clean and regulated. that's spooky.
jan 21, 2006
had to blow off steam so i decided to get sauced up last night and visit debauchery.
for the first time in many moons i consumed enough alkeehall to make everything
blurry and soft. i kept it so i could keep upright and even walk about without
too much weaving and swaying. in fact i was pretty sensible and not very hardcore
at all. a coupla jack and cokes at home and then a trip to club gossip where
i slurped down a long island iced tea which is very sweet and i imagine very
similar to toilet cleaner. did the trick for this whimpy light weight and
i was soon bumping into everything and petting people who probably did not
want to be pet. ran into a bunch of friends and carried on what i'm sure were
very deep conversations. allowed myself to be coaxed into going home with
some new found friends. watched the drunken apartment antics from a giant
bean bag chair. indulged in some drunken antics myself. stumbled through my
own front door at 7:30 am and dove into a coma. woke up this afternoon hung
over and annoyed at myself. i played safe though. i feel like watching swashbuckling
pirate movies tonight and avoiding alcohol and planet gay. it'd be nice to
hang tough in my living room with linky, miss q, catfish, and maybe a few
other good mates. have got to spend some time working out the lyrical details
of a coupla new songs we worked on at practice. the stuff we came up with
was pure wholesome goodness. sure fire smash hit sensations! the sundance
film festival is in town. maybe i'll try to weasel my way into some films.
a few of them sound good. also the slamdance film festival which runs simultaneously
and tends to be more gritty and daring. we played for one of their parties
last year and had a grand ol time. aye matey!
jan. 15, 2006
ahhhh, some leisure time - with computer access even! another snowy yet beautiful
day in slc. woke up at 11 am, put in throwing muses first album which is one
of THOSE albums that made a serious meteorite impact crater on my moonscape
- a great album. sang along with such heart felt fervor while making my bed
and folding up the bits of clothing scattered about my dungeon basement bedroom.
fed the dragon. milked the stink bugs. defrizzed my perm. did my aerobics.
jazzersize. the show we played back on tuesday was tons-o-fun. we played with
jeremy smith's new project MEDIK and also THE BUTTERY MUFFINS. both were great.
a lot more people turned up than i'd expected for a tuesday night. since it
was eli's b-day, we'd let him choose the costume theme for our bit. he chose
pajamas - i suspect more out of not wanting to have to wear the fringy orange
dresses. it was a good choice - low maintenence and so comfy. we'll hafta
do more of the sleepover party theme in the future so we can have pillow fights
and roll around in blankets and basically be lazy and cozy and have perma
come-to-bed eyes. eli has been updating our myspace profile and it's lookin
really cool. i wish i had more time to play with it and make friends all over
the world in far away exotic locations. maybe i'll ditch you and try some
of that now. 10-4 over and out.
jan. 8, 2006
no rest for the wicked though i haven't had the time to be wicked at all.
but today i finially got flyers made for tuesday's show and got some put up
around town. about to do laundry. finished several chores that had been screamingly
unfinished. today has been a day of accomplishment. gold star for me. spent
yesterday down at the southern end of utah valley in payson helping my brother
work on the house he's built pretty much singlehandedly (literally since last
week when he accidently nailed one of his hands to a wall - that's something
i'd do). felt all manly and deepened my voice for the occasion. have been
busting out in spontaneous laughter - sometimes at very inopportune moments
this past week triggered by lincolns story about one of his early paranoia
pot experiences: he was about 14 and grew up in a strict mormon household.
his dad was the piano player for the wards priesthood quorum. lincoln had
been roped into being song leader, waving his hand in rhythm up at the podium.
one sunday the ward teen rebel had taken linky behind the church where they'd
smoked some particularly potent weed. soon afterward link had to get himself
up in front of the all male congregation. as his paranoia kicked in, the song
started and he had to wave his hand back and forth in front of the upturned
faces, mouths open and flapping in song, of all the corpulent mormon men.
he had to fight the overwhelming urge to run away. the look on lincoln's face
as he described the experience was one of pure distress. the way he mimicked
the flapping mouths and upturned faces... i don't think i'll ever stop laughing
at that one. instant cure for the blues!
Ms. Thora Broadcockle of the Peekmore Division of Decent Citizens Against
Filth writes, "greetings mr. sweetpea. we here at the P.D.O.D.C.A.F.
have felt a great uplifting of the spirits in these times that try them so.
we would like to acknowledge that listening to your recent album "salt
lake city" has been part of the wind that lifts our underthings and keeps
them fresh! would that everyone could be privy to the moving strains of a
decent number like "perpetua's greening". one question, is she REALLY
greening? ripening even? we understand poetic license, but must express concern
lest this apparent verdure connote CROTCH ROT or something of the like. there
are means to combat such a condition and we can assist Ms. Perpetua if needs
be. It's our special duty to help! enthusiastically yours, Ms. Thora Broadcockle
P.D.O.D.C.A.F.
jan 5,2006
just coming out of sleep and in a bit of a groggy haze. no fantastic dreams
to report though i did have some kind of funny ones the other night about
some spirits trying to contact me and following me around with a ouija board.
i said no thanks and kept trying to ditch them. actually it was kinda creepy,
oh! now i remember the dreams from last night. i was discussing some new film
adaptation of a book that doesn't really exist and suddenly found myself in
the film - or rather in the films world. it was animated and was a sort of
bumbling slapstick space adventure in which this group of astronauts discover
some weirdo newly inhabbited planet. the planet was inhabbited by what may
have been snow whites actual seven dwarfs with all their friends. they'd also
brought along a bunch of strange space animals they'd collected in their travels.
the creatures were kinda muppety/fraggle rockish - bright, colorful and mostly
made of felt. the voice of the main captain astronaut guy was played by tom
hanks (imagine that). i suppose i was one of the lower astronauts because
all i did was observe and make a few comments about the absurdity of various
things. my fearless leader, captain hanks, was having a discussion with the
dwarf leader about the dwarfs colonisation of the planet and their ongoing
war with some space baddies over space hunting grounds. i was admiring the
industry of the dwarfs and quite amazed at how much they'd built in such short
a time. they'd put in a pretty impressive infastructure. for some reason i
was particularly impressed with the wroght iron fences they'd put up along
cliff side trails that wound around the lava like moonscape mountains. i woke
up while i was following a line of dwarfs up one of these trails. now i should
probably whip up some brecky for skyler and brayden, my way cool neice and
nephew. i'm babysitting and they're watching blue's clues. i blame them for
my muppet dreams. purr bats are playing a low key show on the 10th at urban
lounge. it's a tuesday so i wonder if anyone will show up. it'll be fun anyway.
it'll also be eli's birthday. we have practice tonight. i'm looking forward
to that. 10-4 over and out.
jan 1, 2006
happy new year! it's a mellow day and all the mucky air has been blown away
by the recent storms. i didn't feel like drinking much last night, so there
are no big hangover hazes lingering. i'm starting the year off with clarity
anyway. the wolfs had a big CD release party last night at urban lounge. BLACKHOLE
and VILE BLUE SHADES also played which made for an excellent show. saw a whole
huge mass of friends - some of whom i'd not seen for years. kissed a coupla
straight lads who i suppose were feeling particularly festive. that's always
nice. cheated miss Q who i'd promised dancing and fled the dance floor when
she wasn't looking. she was a good and fully sauced-up sport and still walked
home arm and arm with me. we stopped by some party along the way which turned
out not to be the party a friend of hers had told her about. the people seemed
to be a bit perplexed by our arrival and entry into their house. they were
playing kruder and dorfmeister which was nice and i saw the pixies "surfer
rosa" at the dj station. i was feeling the need for my pillows and blankets
so we continued on our way up the street. once home, i ditched the festivities
and dove into bed putting in the donnnie darko soundtrack to lull me off to
sleep. it's a beautiful soundtrack but made me a wee bit melancholic having
just seen brokeback mountain which has left me with a weird and lingering
sadness. these jake g. films in which he's somewhat damaged... sheeeit! had
vivid and colorful dreams about my older brother having a big stack of rare
throbbing gristle and psychic tv records. he had them as some sort of evidence
of the evil and degenerate state of "rock music". i tried to divert
him with some long winded history of that type of music while i discreetly
transfered the records into my backpack. then genesis p-orrige made an appearance
as bunny. he was riding a motorcycle and was all dolled up including some
serious looking stilettos. he had some scantily clad babe on the back of the
bike with him and was riding past as part of some gay pride parade. i woke
up with a chuckle in my heart.
dec 20 2005
back on sunday night i left the gym at about 11 and discovered it had started
snowing with those big beautiful flakes that make it seem like you're walking
about in a shaken snow globe. it was actually quite warm compared to recent
deep freeze days. there were low grey clouds that reflect all the city lights
back and keep everything visible and in soft focus and also muffles all sound
and makes things feel cozy. i decided that i couldn't waste an evening like
that so i dashed home and got my porta cd player (i'm not yet cool enough
for an ipod) and cocteau twins garlands cd - the import version that has all
the extra john peel sessions. as i was passing miss Q's i saw her lights on
so popped in to say howdy. she mentioned that she had one of those splitter
adaptors that make it possible for two people to listen to the same headphone
audio device. what a great idea. so she was on board for the adventure. off
we went with the snow the perfect packing type that crunches under your feet
like lucky charms marshmallows crunch and squeak between your teeth. almost
everything we passed got pelted with snowballs. up to south temple and then
east along it towards downtown. built a snowcreature and set it on a bus bench,
did the run and skid thing down past all the old mansions and the govenors
residence, avoided sliding out-of-controll vehicles, went sliding and out
of control ourselves, and finially made it to the cathedral of the madeline.
looked up at the gargoyles for a minute and then headed back. it was fucking
beautiful. one of those times when you feel truly happy. i couldn't stop smiling.
got back all wet (mainly from the belly flops and face plants into the hillside)
and had some peppermint tea. and today left the house to find the weather
had turned practically tropical and all the snow has turned to slush and deep
puddles. waiting now for the mountain sides to come sliding down into the
city. off to the airport now to pick up my sisters who are coming in from
albuquerque. and tomorrow lincoln should be back. PARTAY!
dec 18, 2005
i have been in that magical land under the sea where they don't have computers
so i couldn't keep you, dear diary, updated of my adventures. but oh boy...
on my way home from the last entry, i passed by the maverick convenience store
on the corner near my house. the whole corner was roped off with police tape
and there were several police cars a flashing. i thought the place had been
robbed and maybe one of my favorite clerks murdered. i didn't dare go ask
til the next day. i was happy to see my favorite clerk alive and well. in
hushed tones he filled me in on the happenings. apparently a 58 yr old woman
walked up to the gas pump, inserted her credit card, doused herself in gasoline,
walked over behind the dumpsters and set herself alight. she died. woh! what
a way to go. i can't stop thinking about it. the same maverick is also known
as the lori hacking maverick and the elizabeth smart maverick since both had
strong connections to it. with the alley of death that i live down, and the
people we've seen run over by trains a block away, the neighborhood is getting
a sort of bermuda triangle reputation. "YOU MOVED THE CEMETARY BUT YOU
DIDN'T MOVE THE BODIES!" . of course all the holiday coctails helped
to fuel our very scientific discussions. spent some serious quality time with
miss quita (i've been spelling her name wrong all along) and jarom who is
in town for the holidays last night. drinky winkies, snacks of all sorts,
good laughs at various utah valley goings on and music for sweet smooching.
of course we weren't. we were talking about schlupping noises and some gooey
makerel sushi that miss Q had experienced earlier in the evening. then catfish
arrived and we headed out to the trap door which is a slc gay club where people
tend to be more aggressive than at other clubs and you always find yourself
being groped and fondled - rarely to your pleasure. jarom and miss Q ditched
us and opted for party hopping instead. they gotta be punished for that. we
had a good time anyway. remembered that eli and jessee were having a christmas
party but figured it was too late to pop by at that time. hmm. what a lot
of horse shit i'm going on about. music going well. writing tons of #1 smash
hit sensations, riding in limo hummers with scantily clad writhers, and waving
to the peasants. sweetpea/ sweat pee.
dec 4, 05
when a storm blows away all the smog inversion muck and the mountains are
all white with snow and the sun shines down through lots of giant fluffy white
clouds that float against a baby blue background sky, salt lake city is the
most magically beautiful place on earth. you go up on the mountainside from
where you can see the whole valley, and if the sun and reflective snow aren't
blinding, you feel like you're looking at some fake painted movie back drop.
the lake all dark or shiny in patterns from the cloud shadows, all the surrounding
mountains so clear and seemingly close. too bad we all love our cars so much
and live most the time in the murky sludge that gets trapped in by the mountains.
we've had a coupla really beautiful days lately though. the wolfs , red bennies
and COSM all played at urban lounge this past friday night and it was fantastic
as usual. purr bats finially got the practice thing sorted out and had the
first full band practice in over a month this past thursday night. it went
surprisingly well. we went through all the known songs with only one tiny
snag, and worked on a coupla new ones. all the lads are such good musicians,
i shouldn't have been surprised. in fact i'm by far the weakest link, but
i'm pretty good at doing my homework. so now i feel alright about setting
up some more shows. we got chosen to be on an X96 sampler disc and i was told
friday that we also made the upcoming SLUG mag comp with our song "alaughing
til they bepissed themselves" woo hoo!! also the more mellow side project
SLEEPINGBAG got chosen with the song "you become an ex blackhole"
. i'm well happy about that. anyway, here's hoping for one of those beautiful
clear days tomorrow. 10-4
nov. 26, 05
for thanksgiving we packed a coupla vehicles full of neices and nephews and
made the drive through deepest darkest utah valley, through the mountains
and into central utah where ma resides. the mountains around utah valley are
incredible, but having grown up there, i know it to be the land of the damned.
in the very rural valley where mom's is, there are tons of turkey farms. over
the summer and fall you'll see thousands of turkeys filling their pens. when
you travel down for thanksgiving the pens are totally empty except for the
white turkey feathers that blow up against the fences. the sides of the roads
are lined and fluffy with the white feathers too. it adds a bit of the surreal
to the thankful festivities. now back up in slc and getting our first real
winter storm. the mountains are all now covered in snow and hopefully we'll
get a hefty dumping in the valley tonight with primo-packing snow so that
i can lie in wait for miss queeda to come out of her lair and pelt her with
snowballs. attempting to arrange a full band practice for tomorrow and then
next week hopefully have the regular practice slot all official and ready
to go. we've got dance routines to perfect and some tricky lipsynching to
fine tune.
nov 19, 05
some good quality timing last night. went to some friends art show openings,
then off to a fashion show for the black chandelier. bumped into tons of friends
who i don't get to see very often. raided all the food and free drink bits.
was informed of a SLUG mag party at todd's bar. talked to miss queeda who
was all pumped up and ready to partay. ignored the temptation to stay in and
get cozy with all the pillows and blankets and a book, and dragged my ass
off to todd's. much to my surprise and joy, the heaters and red bennies were
playing. i hadn't been able to see the heaters yet and caught only their last
song, but i loved it. red bennies was raw and rockin and reminded me why they
are one of my all time favorite bands. a good rockin show is an excellent
aphrodisiac, and i was all abuzz. unfortunately i think everybody in the place
was straight but me. woke this morning and had to put in the new bennies cd
- on repeat. three more crucial albums for the autumn album list: u2's "the
unforgettable fire" and "october" and dead can dance's first
self titled album. also roberta flack's "first take" has been warming
my cold clammy soul. what a fucking amazing voice she's got. i need to make
a new autumn compilation for sweater bundled nocturnal walks in the canyons.
life is good.
nov. 16, 05
met up with eli and james at the practice space last night. derwood was playing
a show with another band and jesee was tied up with work obligations. but
it's a start after a good few weeks of not being able to get together at all.
eli had some new magic pedal designed and built by our friend ned which somehow
makes the guitar a billion times louder than it was before without blowing
the amp to smithereens. my eardrums however... the two of them jammed out
on several ideas for new songs while i sat there stuffing napkins into my
ears and thinking "holy fuck that's loud". with my absolute lack
of rhythm, i watched james in awe wondering how the hell he can play so fast
and smootly and sustained. basically i did nothing but dictaphone record it
all so that we can go over the bits later and make smash hit sensations. still,
it was great to be able to get together and do something. eli and jesse have
been getting the new wolfs album done which'll come out on new years. it's
gonna be a fantastic cd and have one of my new favs, "dr. death"
on it. music for permagrinning.
nov. 13, 2005
all my plans for a weekend of household chores and soul filling inspirational
activities have been steamrollered over by a nasty most vile case of flu.
woke up yesterday morning with every joint, muscle, my head, and my very aura
aching. any movement brought on a dryheave. i picked it up from inmaculada
and jon who both had it last week. but what fantastic friends they are - when
they heard of my plight, they heroically dashed up to collect me and bring
me back to their well heated, fully food stocked, on demand cable TV equipted
home and install me in their very own bed. on came the plain toast, noodle
soup and gatorade. couldn't help but watch the show about killer flu. very
encouraging. just laid there pathetically moaning for the whole day. watched
all sorts of stupid hollywood lifestyle shows. the world is a weird place
and TV is the weirdest. so many advertisements! it leaves me wanting to be
surrounded by people with crooked teeth and odd body shapes. feeling much
better this morning though still a bit in slow motion. as i'm typing, jon
and inma are doing their sunday ritual of watching weirdo TV preachers purely
for comic value. i can hear great impassioned exclamations coming from the
TV in the other room followed by loud almost hysterical cackling. i had to
run out and get a gander. it was actually pretty funny. so, there is a plunderphonics
artist called vicky who goes under the name PEOPLE LIKE US. on her collection
album, "recyclopedia britania", there is a piece called, "in
the panto". in this piece there is a noise she creates from some woman
talking on a radio program. it goes something like "nmm nmm num nm nmm".
in the context of how she has it, it's the funniest thing on the planet. lincoln
and i have adopted it as our theme noise so that when either of us starts
to feel sorry for ourselves and get whiny, the other will burst into nmm nm
nmm... it's a miracle cure for the woe-is-me's. it's even better than "wah
fuckin wah". everybody should find that sound and have it close at hand
in your home remedies. signing off.
nov. 10, 2005
sheeeit! have somehow been thwarted in every attempt to pull together a band
practice and writing session. so instead of flinging the cat about, i've been
trying to ignore it and enjoy the fall weather. pulling out all the big whooly
sweaters and listening to my particular autumn albums - kate bush's "hounds
of love", echo and the bunnymen's "ocean rain", gus gus "polydistortion",
arvo part's "miserere", throbbing gristle's "20 jazz funk greats".
reached for coil's "horse rotorvator" to discover that linky had
had our mate davey nab it and take it down to him in springdale. no worries
- i can make do nicely with "the angelic conversation". some of
these things i gotta listen to alone cause it seems many friends are unable
to fully appreciate the beauty. i'll hafta lock the house and turn off all
the lights when i blast virgin prunes "heresie" and writhe around
the living room in acrobatic interperative dance. that's quality time best
spent by myself. i love autumn.
nov 1, 2005
woh, so much devil worshiping sure does take a lot out of a delicate blossom
like myself. especially in these latter days, these trying times. got totally
hardcore and spent the whole of halloween watching the travel channel. they
had that most haunted show from the UK and some live hunt for jack the ripper.
because my old flat was right in the center of the JTR murder sights, i was
all excited for them to show the old hood. sadly they just kept indoors in
the blind beggars pub and some unnamed warehouse. no big misty eyed nostalgia
for me. but i enjoyed - probably too much- just sitting on my ass and watching
tv for hours. that rarely happens with me. the wolfs, red bennies, starmy,
and captured by robots played on saturday night and it was fuckin great! what
an excellent line up. and the place was packed so i got a lot of quality people-watching
time in. my costume was a lame default sort of thing that i pulled together
1/2 hr before the show. had to just raid the purr bats costume reserve and
by that time there'd been several rounds of various coctails consumed by all
assembled at my place. we weren't capable of grand creativity at that point.
jessee made a fantastic colonel sanders, and all of red bennies dressed up
like terrence their keyboard wizard. a grand time had by all. i'm not feeling
done with halloween so i think i'll mix it up with my thanksgiving. all sorts
of possibilities there. 10-4 over and out.
oct 28, 2005
had a fantastic dream the other night in which i was in iceland. it was vivid
and bright and loud. i was on the tip of some spit of land that stuck out
into the sea. there were cliffs with huge white waves crashing against them
loudly. a long staircase type waterfall that went down to the sea in teirs.
some people were riding strange rubber rafts down it. they were wearing brightly
colored rubber wet suits - pink, blue, green, and yellow. velvety green hillsides
and moss covered rocks. i wasn't at all containing my excitement and joy at
having finially made it to iceland. i met up with some euro couple who were
also visiting, and we walked up the hill side to a cluster of old medieval
buildings. all stone and buttresses and intricate and colored tiles. i know
there isn't really anything like it in iceland, but hey... so the couple and
i wandered into what seemed to be an old abbey or something religious. it
had been converted into a hotel with a youth hostel feel. it had this big
open common room with bunch of fire places and wood burning stoves in a central
clump. around the clump of heaters were several fluffy armchairs and ottomans
for folks to lounge about on. there was an older guy sitting on one and eating.
next to him was a floral patterned, mainly gold colored chair and ottoman
set. as we passed by we could see the indentation of some unseen lounger in
the seemingly empty chair. the man hadn't noticed it. then the indentation
started to move around a lot - as if to get the attention of this guy. it
was mischevious and the couple and i were chuckling as we watched. the man
finially noticed with a start and got pretty agitated. he started slapping
at the empty chair. this just seemed to egg the ghost on and it seemed to
be spazzing out some grand dance in the chair. then the man slugged the chair
and we all burst out laughing. then i woke up. fell back asleep and had more
vivid and colorful dreams about slc and the trax trains and a whole lot of
family and friends. then all the mountain sides around the city were suddenly
engulfed in huge bright fires. we all watched in awe. it was actually really
beautiful. i woke up happy. and the dreams were all natural with no enhancers.
hmm, i wonder what freud would have concluded. now trying to figure out a
good costume for tomorrows big halloween extravaganza at urban lounge. the
wolfs, red bennies, starmy, and captured by robots are all playing. it'll
be a grand ol time. will try to get up into the mountains on sunday and roll
about in leaves and deer poop. good for the complexion and a healthy, low
cal snack. over and out.
0ct 23 2005
ah,
a totally beautiful autumn day in slc. woke up from a deep, mysterious slumber in which the dreams sure were weird. well, the deep slumber isn't really all that mysterious. it was miss queeda induced - she is a very dangerous gal and a fantastic neighbor. when i finially waddled out of the house and down the front stairs, i found miss Q and jarom smoking on her front porch and looking well rested and refreshed. jarom is one of the trio called rope or bullets who we played with on friday night for our seedy release soiree. i love rope or bullets - they make my arse bounce around. had to turn down their invitation to join them for french toast. got to the gym and pretended to be all manly. wandered about doing errands. home to play tidy up the basement but my mary poppins magic powers were on the fritz so i had to get manual and actually lift things and move them about. inhaled dust and quite possibly hanta virus. hung up all the still slightly sweat damp costumes from the show. got lazy and fled. now down in murray or something like that in the southern parts of slc, hanging out with the neice and nephew and taking advantage of this rare computer access. so - the cd release show went fantastically. i was surprised so many people turned up - and danced too! red bennies were also on the bill and i always love seeing them. sadly, i was stuck behind the merch counter during rope and the bennies so i was unable to spazz out with friends at the stage. catfish showed up in some super elaborate get up and when i saw him walk into the club i nearly fell over laughing. he's about 8 feet tall and was in some black silky edwarian hottentott sort of gown with bustle big butt and all. knee high pointy black boots with heels, a doozy of a wig, big back fan, gigantic fluffy feathers sprouting from his head and a sinister gothic looking P hanging down from his neck. the spooky make up was made all the spookier with his full beard. he made quite a spectacle in the mostly straight rock bar. he arrived with friends chris and suzi jo, both of them also all dolled up in elaborate ensembles. i'll post up some pics when i get my paws on them. avoided drinking too much before playing this time. show went well with only a few minor and easily covered fuck ups. was taken aback by several people singing along which is cool but which also means i'll not so easily get away with singing "blah blah you don't know what i'm saying anyway blah blah frosty the snowman blah..." into the mic when i forget the words. we were unable to play anything for an encore, but to have people scream for one was nice. it's all part of our rock and roll fantasy. the whole show such a funny contrast from our previous show at liquid joes where most people ran for the door when we started to play. we once played at todd's bar and grill and got more applause from the video golf arcade game next to the stage than from the audience. maybe we should invest in one of those golf games and tote it around to all our shows for when people hate us. we'll make miss qeeeda haul it about. so - now that SLC is finially done and out of the way, we can get to work on the omit-o-matic ep and the next album. the new direction will probably have a lot in common with motivational pyramid scheme devotional cd/manual sets. over and out. sweet pea
Aug. 15, 2005
Dear Diary,
I'll write more later.
oct. 7, 2005
played the 2nd show with new line up on the 28th at liquid joes.
we were just filling in for a band that broke up and the other two
bands were very different types of music to us, so most people fled
when we played. it was lots-o-fun though and i'd never done a show
while so seriously sauzled. miss queeda kept handing me vodka and
red bulls, there were shots of whisky, and a coupla friends had some
cans of some sort of beer out in their truck. it was like high school
rebelling in the parking lot. much fun! made it through the show
without hurling or falling over, but i think there may have been a lot of
peter brady voice cracking and fresh moves gone very stale. flew out to boston
next day in serious hangover haze with valum and more whisky thrown in to
keep me calm cause flying makes me a bit ughhh! listened to cocteau twins
on headphones. this effective combination made the big turbulence "sooo
beautiful", and i'd have been happy as a clam to fly into a mountain
side. late night arrival, early wake up, load uhaul, drive 20 miles to other
trucking place where all stuff got transfered to other truck to be driven
by shipping company. diplomatically held my tongue about some of the fake
potted plants and what-nots that loved ones find important enough to have
to cram into limited space and ship across the country. maybe some sentimental
value involved. hmmm. loaded the two small children into the minivan with
all manner of modern childhood enfolding us into a cocoon from which i hope
to emerge as a beautiful butterfly maria carey style. set off on cross country
drive. i do now appreciate the idea of seat back DVD players in cars to keep
the little one's occupied, but dear lord! i've now heard the dialog to finding
nemo a billion times. maybe a hundred times in the van and the non stop repeating
loop that'll never again leave my head. and also some wholly obnoxious thing
called dora and her pals. luckily i could block it out somewhat with t-rex
and siouxsie and the banshees. iowa city always seems to get me horny, and
not just because it's a college town. well, maybe moslty because it's a college
town. no opportunity to sample the local fare on this family themed quick
pass through. drove into beautiful weather in nebraska and wyoming, lots of
big ominous clouds, lightning, wind then rain and practically a full on blizzard.
was laughing so hard at in van antics that it's a miracle i was able to keep
us on the road. drove back into lovely utah, quick stop at park city, switched
cars and took the saab down the canyon at dangerous speeds with coldplay's
new one blasting. somehow the stereo was set on repeat and at those speeds
in that canyon, i was unable to set it right. so it was several listenings
to that fix you song. it was nice but i would have liked to move on. now home
and have effectively been avoiding laundry and with communicating with too
many people just yet. last night went to see acid mothers temple and another
great band called the occasion. saw lots-o-friends and completely avoided
the demon alkyhol. have finished the cover for SLC and will get it off to
the printers post haste. and just look at what horse shit happens when i have
spare time and access to a computer. 10-4 over and out. sweet pea.
sept. 28,2005
just back from dropping off new smash hit album, Salt Lake City, at manufacturers in creepy utah valley. ate one pound of ice cream to celebrate across from the recruiters office. dave and dave telling stupid jokes that seem funny in this state of eeeeeaaaaaah after a late night of super rock'n'rollin. played first show with new lineup last night. total fun. coyote hoods and barbez also played on space organ and guitar. playing again tonight at liquid joes way out in south of forever. must go nap and keep ice cream down and then eat more because no matter how much ice cream you eat, it's not real food (it turns to drink). dave has to go to work and since he's typing this, over and out.
sept.14,2005
howdy well since i don't have regular access to a computer and i seem to spend all my time braiding my long luxurious hair, journal entries have been a big none. but now i've had a fantastic weekend visiting linky the great muse down in ZION NATL PARK. beautiful! going to the desert is always supremely therapeudic. came back to slc and got to see a great show - alasdair roberts and the band wooden wand and the vanishing voice. very nice folks too. now over at dave's doing more mixing for the album "SALT LAKE CITY" which has been taking more time than i'd anticipated. still within my deadline though. it's sounding much better than it was a few weeks ago. practiced with the new line up last night and it was total fun. jessee the trooper who recently fell off his roof and broke his wrist and both eye sockets didn't let his big clumpy cast get in the way of his liberace dreams on keyboards. he has a thing for dressing up as a zombie every now and then, and now with both eyes bruised black he doesn't need make up to accomplish the look. james the new drummer is working out fantastically. it's great to be playing with derwood again after so many years. i remember his first ever live show when he was 14 and didn't know how to play anything. his band did a thrilling and creative though mostly unrecognisable rendition of the cure's "killing an arab". i think it was also my first show. i couldn't play anything then and still can't. i did apply some serious goth make up though. the pics look great! at the same time eli was in a utah valley band called the trees. they were much better at playing their instruments. and even though eli is such a crucial member of purr bats, i should probably give him a written warning cause the pink has now washed completely out of his hair. and truly none of this matters. i'm just practicing my typing. more later. 10-4 over and out. link