my favorite song
-absolute music-

i have a lot of favorite songs.  ask me tomorrow & you will get another list.  i am this old punk who has been around, read a few books, watched a few movies & listened to a few bands.  i am neither expert nor an authority be it art, pop music, exploitation movies or poetry.  & yet, i have a little history in all these & a bit more.  several weeks ago i discovered what i think might be one of the greatest cover bands in the united states.  that statement is conditioned by my own limitations of time, exposure & human nature.  & yet, i do have an opinion that is predicated upon something similar to why the punk/poet john cooper clarke calls himself: dr john cooper clarke, even if he didn't finish secondary education.  it's because the poet/punk was not just awarded an honorary phd, that he calls himself 'doctor' because he has, 'read a few books & had a few thoughts.'  so i make my claim that the atlanta, ga based bar band, foxes & fossils, might very well be the greatest cover band this country has produced.  i say this because i've, in my 50 + decades on this planet have listened to a few bands & i have a few thoughts.

the bad news is that foxes & fossils is no longer a working band.  bummer. but  many of their performances have been preserved on youtube.  the setup is this, singer & arranger, tim purcell, has a fantastic ear for musicians & harmony.  he recruited two teenagers [one is his own daughter], as well as a cracker group of musician to make music that makes me glad to be alive.  i shit you not about that sentiment.

rather than write a fucking essay about why i think foxes & fossils might be the best bar band i've encountered i present you with a few of their songs.  the first is, at present, my favorite song.   but may i suggest a couple of things.  first, turn it up loud.  second, wear earphones.  really, really dig their vocal harmonies.  then dig their musical prowess.  this band is a proof [if we ever needed one] of the value of art in our late capitalist age.  here is a band of amateurs [meaning lovers in the root sense of the word, e.g. of music & voice] who make art because they love their art & because they can't help it.  art ain't a professional degree.  art is what we do to make a life.



and dig these harmonies



and 'landslide'



& this utterly gorgeous version of CSNs' 'helplessly hoping'



allow yourself to fall in love.

peace & love

absolute music

i heard this song by country music artist orville peck this afternoon when i was running around doing chores & i was fucking ravished.  i love peck's deep voice & the country-punk sound that reminded me of the under sung, beautiful, 1980s country-punk band rank and file.  been a long while since i heard a band &/or singer that hit me this hard.  i don't know much about orville peck but i did hear him interviewed on NPR a couple months ago.  i understand that he is a country singer who is queer & wears a leather-fringe mask.  but ain't that america, for you & me.  goddamn, dig this song & let it ravish you too.

recent viewing

streaming platforms like netflix are ripe with movies & tv shows from other countries esp. netflix a platform where anna & i have made all kinds of discoveries of productions from, for example, india, finland & cuba

& we have been on a mysteries & cop shows kick

this week anna & i have binged bordertown [2016-] a cop show set in a small town in finland that borders russia with lots of trade culture & crime between st petersburg, russia & lappeenranta, finland the characters are beautifully realized & the actors are not the pretty people that populate u.s. & british productions tho yes the actors are attractive but the characters they portray are gritty with faces & bodies to match this series is addicting & while the plots can wear a bit thin the characters direction photography score & editing more than make up for the occasional shallow writing

& i've discovered & watched last night the first episode of four seasons in havana [2016-] set in beautiful decaying havana, cuba we find a detective mario conde who smokes & drinks too much writes novels & falls in love too easily conde is a romantic who looks & acts as rumpled as his demeanor permits but it is the stunningly beautiful havana that complements the action holy shit is cuba gorgeous & as for conde's character i dig him i just wished that instead of novels [that he writes then destroys the manuscripts] the producers of the series made him a poet not because i belong to the poets' guild but because i think poetry matches the moods of the character i mean the dude lives & works in havana how could he not want to write poems

quote unquote

"post-national"
(je suis)
but also "lower-case american"

--anselm hollo [from the notebooks]

crazy from the heat

it's been way too hot this past week
100 + F
too prickly to do anything but
go to work
& back
even the walks to & from work
are ordeals
tests against the wherewithal
of human endurance
i get home
i'm exhausted
& the ambient heat
even with air conditioning
creates an air of dolor
that is too thick to beat
this ambience matches
the daily news
of incremental horrors
i can scarcely believe
even so
tonight the heat broke
anna nick & i
took a kayak trip
sponsored by REI
down the cosumnes river
to watch the colony of bats
fly into night
thousands of bats
& thousands of dragonflies
above the river water
that smelled of moss
& decaying wood
while my muscles
unused to paddling 
felt that good kind of
tired that comes from
an exercise
that is situated
beyond the ache of
shoulders & back
an other where
of heat
& of light

upon watching the 1st episode of tales of the city [1993]

it wasn't the babe-like innocence of laura linney's mary ann

nor was it chloe webb's mona's goofy druggy charm

it wasn't even the horrid assholeism of thomas gibson's beauchamp

nor was it the heady earthy hedonist light of 1970s san francisco

it was that last 5 minutes when donald moffat's edgar

knows he's got just 6 months left to live

stumbling thru the park to the bench where

olympia dukakis' mrs madrigal sits they meet by the device

of a deathbed quote by gertrude stein

& she offers him a sandwich because she

sees he needs a little human warmth

edgar falls immediately in love

finally thank god

that is the moment

i lost my shit

& cried   

lowering my standards

whenever i think i can't or am unable to write another line or word i think of the late poet william stafford who got up each morning before dawn sat at his desk took a sheet of paper & composed his daily poem

stafford was asked by critics readers & admirers often what if he can't write that morning's poem

i lower my standards he said

& i am not making a direct comparison to my own life as a poet to stafford's life in poetry but i think he was on to something

so i say fuck it i lower my standards too & dig in

on the subject of alien intelligence

i open another beer
then take a piss
i look up & out the bathroom window
at the distant stars
alight in the firmament
& wonder if there is
another being
in a distant star system
similar to me
a poet buzzed from
the local intoxicant
taking a piss
or what might be their equivalent
looking thru their own
bathroom window
wondering if their is
intelligent life
among these distant stars

& yet again

less than a week from my last post
the horror of another mass shooting in
el paso tx
happened
this time i lost my shit
all equilibrium
i broke down
after reading
[i can't confirm if it be true]
the murder of a
4 month old baby
& seeing videos
[these are true]
of people hiding
under tables
during the shooting
each concussion
in terrible rapid succession
yet i turned up the sound
for i can hear
the person making the recording
whisper to someone[s]
beside them
under the table
as the shots broke the air
i love you so much
oh my fucking god