Let’s see. Manson thought the Beatles were talking to him. Chapman thought he was Lennon’s mirror self. And some nutbag last night in Columbus apparently blamed Dimebag Darrell for breaking up Pantera.

Once again, insanity rears up and bites the music world on the ass. There’s no making sense of any of it — why would you want to kill your “other self”? Why would you try to start a race war because of someone’s lyrics? And what logic underlies shooting a guitarist over a band breakup? Didn’t it occur to the shooter that bullets are a minor impediment to a possible reunion tour?

It’s sad and stupid and pointless to try to figure out, but it’s scary, too, knowing that anyone can go at any time because some cross-wired brain sends a goofed impulse at the beginning of the day.

You look around you and see the behavior that you can’t explain or understand, no matter how empathetic you consider yourself, no matter how in touch with thinking outside the box, and it’s hard not to wonder why.

There’s a lot of wrong in the world that still ends up making sense — murder for revenge, starting wars over territory, whatever. It’s the other evil that makes me truly sad.

RIP, Dime.

Or maybe that was food is for chumps. I can’t recall anymore. Late nights of staying awake punching in code until the letters and numbers and operands and function calls all look more and more like Axl Rose and Judy Garland’s bastard stepchild — that’s what’ll be the death of me. Fuck drinking my liver into an early and forced retirement, or being bludgeoned to death by elderly women with sharp sticks… I’m taking the nerd’s way out.

But at least I’m not stealing another person’s words and thoughts uncredited.*

There’s something clearly refreshing and ever-so-slightly moronic about staying up for more than 24 hours in a row at the age of 33. Even if it is ostensibly in the name of capitalism — yay, Almighty Dollar Bill Y’all!

Geez. Fred Durst. There’s a set of eye sockets waiting — begging, even — for a good crunchy fuck.

I’m now at the point in my consciousness that not even Warren Ellis’ depraved web challenges can hurt me. Instead, I’m am listening to the Flower Kings and preparing to go and scoop kitty poo from a tiny box, because the voices in my head demand it.

Bah, humbug. More caviar, Jeeves, and bring me the head of a Thai ladyboy while you’re in the kitchen.

km

*The original text can be found here. And the text that was stolen from can be found here. There’s something very meta about plagiarizing a plagiarist. Or is it just sad?

Life is good.

Very nearly drained of the Effexor, finally suffering no more strange arrythmic vertigoes, and anxious to see what a return to normalcy is like.

Haver… well, there’s that. I want to write so much, and yet don’t. Partly because of the hour, partly because I’m afraid to jinx this. So…. I leave this to memory and imagination.

Saw the stars last night, and was positively overwhelmed at the beauty and immensity of it all. For a few minutes, the dream was real, I was awake, and those moments are forever burned into my mind like the dreams. And I’m glad I was able to share it with someone.

I feel a renewed sense of self, closer to what I claim and want to be. Feeling more open and honest in the past week. I’m amazed it took so long, when there’s really no excuse for it, but the capper on this feeling is a deeper and more honest sense of communication with Wade — after 25 years, I would figure it would have been as it should be, with open and intelligent discussion about issues… But apparently both of us are too content to let things slide and heal.. Hopefully, communication lines will remain open, and our friendship can grow.

Haver’s family is amazing and wonderful and so welcoming. Just a few hours with them and I felt totally accepted and at home.

Home… my definition comes back into sight, both in concept and reality.

And now, to bed. Probably to read, but it’s the thought that counts.

Or is that May? Fuck, who cares?

What a time to be alive and me in the world of LaLaLand. Unemployed as of Tuesday, and busier than I’ve been in months if not years. Getting ready for the Red Bull Writer’s Block documentary competition this weekend. Getting ready for Sidewalk. Working audio on HIDE AND CREEP. Went into the studio with Eric and Chance to do the Exhibit(s) msuic for H&C, and am more jazzed than I’ve been in a while to get in a work on the next AEX disc. Catching up at the moment on a few web sites and then back to audio work. May even find time to read or watch one of a billion DVDs before I fall asleep at sunrise.

And then there’s Haver, about which I’ll leave imaginations working. But I feel good, and I think this might be a feeling that hangs around for a while.

Finally saw PASSION OF THE CHRIST, and must say two things. One, easily the most intense movie I’ve ever seen (though the devil kids and Judas, I think, were unnecessary distractions). Two… I need to go to church. Not out of a sense of obligation or duty, but to start looking for answers to questions. I may never find those answers, but I can’t not explore the ideas.

Moving back on my own at the end of this month (technically, I’ll probably start around the 20th, but I’m taking some time to do it slowly, and cleaning the new place superdupergood). It’s a nice feeling — knowing that my own space is coming back. Kevin and Liesl are great roommates, where roommates are concerned, but I need my own space, my kingdom, my domain. And my own fridge.

And Adolf’s been petitioning for his own room, so there’s that, too.

Who needs a job? Let’s just cut out the middleman and get straight to the paycheck, shall we?

Too many thoughts to give accurate writing time to…

This weekend, the documentary, and if I have time (between that and an Exhibit(s) show) I’ll attempt to document that experience here. If nothing else, it’ll be a good learning experience in the world of documentary filmmaking, and I hope I can get Wade involved in the process somewhere. I sense that he’s eager to get involved and learn, and it’d be nice to be able to suck him into the temporal vortex that is filmmaking. Tomorrow night, the before party and basic prep; Saturday, starting early, filming and editing, alternately, through the day, until 9 PM; from there, set up and play until I fall down. Nap, more editing, film due at the Kudu by 4 PM (NO FUCKING LATE TURN INS THIS TIME!). 7-10 at the Kudu — Catchfire plays, documentary viewings, me projectioning, and hopefully winning some money. Then, the sleep of the dead.

And hopefully, I’ll have the energy to go to church on Sunday.

Thank god for Labor Day, a holiday I’ll force myself to take.

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Originally uploaded by abstract visionsound.

Sunday, 8/22: A return to Atrox in Leeds to shoot what will ostensibly be the last shots for Chance Shirley’s Hide and Creep. My part in the day includes helping out wherever I can in reshooting Jim Roberson’s scene (he’s the Pick-Up Truck Zombie who eats the government agent’s head), and to get shot.

Not really shot, Mom. Just hit in the stomach with a cotton ball soaked in blood.

It occurred to Chance that he hadn’t any shots of zombies getting hit anywhere other than in the head, so while it is said that only head shots stop the zombies, it’s not shown. Thus, the purpose of today’s pick-up.

Chance offers, as any good filmmaker should, to take the first shot from the goregun to prove that it won’t hurt, and I tell him not to bother getting blood all over himself — how bad will it hurt, after all?

And so we line up the scene I’m in, and the camera rolls, and I hit my mark, and I go past my mark, and then the gun finally goes off, and there’s no pain in my stomach, but suddenly I can’t see out of my left eye.

Fucking marksmen.

It didn’t hurt, fortunately, though I lost a contact to a permastain of fake blood. And it should make for a great outtake — every tells me that the look on my face when it happened was priceless.

A little follow up on the fan mail (see post below):

Journalists are trained to be reporters of fact, impartial cameras that pick up detail that relates to the story at hand. They are observers, occasionally distant and ‘uninvolved’ participants, but always (theoretically) aloof enough that they are able to act as recorders of fact.

Writers — a tag which journalists are a sub-group of — are able to put thoughts into words, succinctly and descriptively enough that people are able to understand them. This tag also includes script writers, fiction authors, biographers, PR hacks, advertising copywriters, lyricists….

I am under the writer’s umbrella, but I am not and have never claimed to be a journalist.

I don’t work for newspapers such as the New York Times or the Washington Post. I don’t write investigative pieces on Presidential scandals or financial corruption. I write what might best be described as fluff filler — interviews with musicians and filmmakers, reviews of CDs and books, feature pieces on cultural areas that interest me.

This is the joy of freelancing. I write what I want, not what other people tell me to. And what I want to write is positive, not negative. I don’t want to expose the darker side of Birmingham’s film or local music scenes; I don’t want to out Famous Musician X as an asshole or a diva. I want to let people know about good bands that they might not have heard, good books they might not have read, local efforts that deserve more attention (at the very least).

This town has one common complaint from people in the 18-34 demographic: culture, or lack thereof. “Birmingham has no local music scene.” “Good movies never play here.” “People are so interested in football that no one ever writes about theater, or foreign films, or … ”

What no one seems to realize is that there is as much of a scene here as there is support for. Maybe no one knows where to go to support the things they are missing; maybe they don’t realize that the Galleria 10 does show indie films, or that ther eare other bars in town besides the Nick and Zydeco, or that Sidewalk features a huge array of local talent. Maybe they all know all about these things, and I’m kidding myself into thinking that Birmingham is not hopeless mired in the past.

But I like to think that it’s not, and I’m just trying to do my part to change that.

I’m not a journalist. I have degrees in criminology and in computer science; my experiential background is one of music, film, design, and writing. These are things that interest me, and perhaps will interest other people; think of me as a billboard for entertainment in Birmingham.

Yes, I tend to know a lot of the people that I interview (locally, at least); it’s a small town, and after 25 years, you get plugged in to a certain level and know who you know. Those people doing things I want to support, I get to know. Those people that i know, I tend to want to support the things they are doing.

So yes, a lot (95%) of my published writing is self-serving. I still think it’s honest — believe me, there are plenty of things I haven’t supported publicly because doing so would require pointing out the flaws, and I don’t want to do that — and no different than what an outsider would report. On the flip side, my insider status (concerning HIDE AND CREEP or local music) affords me a unique insight to a lot of things, as well as a passionate interest that I hope comes through to the reader.

Perhaps I should write articles on things that I know nothing about, or about subjects that I don’t like. But expect the same lack of objectivity that apparently permeates my writing — it just might not be so pleasant.

Forwarded to me, this lovely piece of criticism regarding an article I wrote for Birmingham Weekly:

From: “[person I probably know]”
Date: Tue, 24 Aug 2004 06:08:21 GMT
Subject: How far…

can someone’s head get up another’s ass?

I am referring, of course, to Kennnn McCrackennnn and his shameless
promotion of his current bandmates’ endeavors (chance shirley et al). Does
no one in B’hdm [sic] know how much of a circle jerk his writings are?
Congratulations on supplying the Vaseline.

I have no response, other than to say that yes, there are plenty of people in Birmingham that know how much of a circle jerk my writings are. Especially those interviews with Norah Jones and Tenacious D, close personal friends of mine, and Amber Benson, who is, in fact, my future wife. But it’s okay, because at the end of the day, they all pay me large amounts of money and supply me with endless amounts of 95% pure heroin — not snow white, but white like a January day in Aspen on the slopes, to badly paraphrase Chuck Pahlaniuk.

Also another one of my buddies, by the way.

Nostradamus was a pussy.

Seriously. He was too busy studying to play tag and stickball. He wanted to be a doctor, and he wrote poetry. And that name — “Our giving,” from the Latin. What the hell is that supposed to mean? I mean, yeah, I would have changed my name, too, if my folks had tagged me Michel, but Jesus, how pretentious. Did he think he was a rock star or something? Even Jesus had a last name…

And Edgar Cayce — oh, don’t get me started. Farm boy. Kentucky, for Chrissakes! Fell asleep on a spelling book and woke up knowing the meaning of life, or somesuch. He went down like a brick, though, when the uppercuts and left hooks were flying. Even the old witch Mother Shipton got in a shot or two on him.

Me — I stick by the dreams. Okay, sure, I had taken about half a sheet of some seriously high-grade blotter just before the peyote kicked in, and the previous day’s David Lynch marathon on AMC probably didn’t help. But any dream you remember three years later must be true, right?

Right?

I still freak out when I hear Miles wail. That cat could blow a horn, but really, did he have to do it so well?

(from The Journal of John the Apostle, Volume 3, recently published by Insomniactive Press; the journals are claimed to be approximately 2000 years old, discovered in a remote underground cave in western Egypt, though the presence of Liquid Paper on some pages seems to refute this)