Not Half Right

Top 10 Albums of 2011

2011-12-29T12:14:00.000-08:00

The albums that struck my fancy this year. Keeping descriptions minimal this year. Hope you all enjoyed your year.

10. The Civil Wars, Barton Hollow
Beautiful and spacious. Delicately placed notes. Gorgeous, if not overwhelming, voices.
Standout Tracks: "I've Got This Friend," "Falling"

9. Beastie Boys, Hot Sauce Committee Part 2
A perfect blend of raucous artistry and maturity. Variety is a non-issue.
Standout Tracks: "Make Some Noise," "Long Burn The Fire"

8. Manchester Orchestra, Simple Math
Crunchiest concept album in a while. Wins the award for Most Existential Angst in 2011.
Standout Tracks: "Simple Math," "Mighty"

7. Panda Bear, Tomboy
A trippy, noisy monstrosity tumbling over the edge of popular culture.
Standout Tracks: "Slow Motion," "Friendship Bracelet"

6. Death Cab For Cutie, Codes and Keys
A step back in the right direction for DCFC. Ben Gibbard is singing less like Neil Young.
Standout Tracks: "Underneath The Sycamore," "Stay Young, Go Dancing"

5. Coldplay, Mylo Xyloto
Coldplay finding a new way to sound like Coldplay. Thicker bottom end. Yummy.
Standout Tracks: "Hurts Like Heaven," "Us Against The World"

4. The Strokes, Angles
The Strokes go back to the basics ... and the '80s.
Standout Tracks: "Machu Picchu," "Games"

3. Gillian Welch, The Harrow and the Harvest
Welch and Rawlings deliver the best country/folk record of the year. As haunting as it is beautiful.
Standout Tracks: "Dark Turn Of Mind," "Down Along The Dixie Line"

2. Radiohead, The King Of Limbs
Genius work in micro-rhythm and texture. Highlights bright moments amidst the chaos.
Standout Tracks: "Bloom," "Give Up The Ghost"

1. David Bazan, Strange Negotiations
Bazan pays homage to his Pedro days and creates the most complete album of 2011.
Standout Tracks: "Virginia," "Eating Paper," "People"

V.

2011-12-25T20:43:00.000-08:00

"it is She that hath made us,
and not we, ourselves."

the hours' breathe like smoke from the fireplace,
drab and familiar,
dry and commanding.

I'm fondling spirits against their will,
long forgotten sins,
like we always did.

now that I can fin'lly use my tongue,
dress in Her forest,
die in my icebox,

I have lost what I wanted to say.
Locked and tossed away.
Little by little.

"fill my cup, Lady."

Cemetery Angels

2011-10-30T08:51:00.000-07:00

On these cold days
they stand over
our dead, who will
erupt into flower as soon
as memory and human shape
rot out of them, each bent
forward and with wings
partly opened as though
warming itself at a fire.

--Galway Kinnell

October

2011-10-16T10:23:00.000-07:00

It is time to lose your life,
Even if it isn't over.
It is time to say goodbye and try to die.
It is October.

The mellow cello
Allee of trees is almost lost in sweetness and mist
When you take off your watch at sunrise
To lose your life.

You catch the plane.
You land again.
You arrive in the place.
You speak the language.

You will live in a new house,
Even if it is old.
You will live with a new wife,
Even if she is too young.

Your slender new husband will love you.
He will walk the dog in the cold.
He will cook a meal on the stove.
He will bring you your medication in bed.

Dawn at the city flower market downtown.
The vendors have just opened.
The flowers are so fresh.
The restaurants are there to decorate their tables.

Your husband rollerblades past, whizzing,
Making a whirring sound, winged like an angel--
But stops and spins around and skates back
To buy some cut flowers in the early morning frost.

I am buying them for you.
I am buying them for your blond hair at dawn.
I am buying them for your beautiful breasts.
I am buying them for your beautiful heart.

--Frederick Seidel

Means Everything To Nothing

2011-10-06T16:58:00.000-07:00

There is nothing worse in this world--for people who love to work with words--than when clichés are full of truth.

And there is nothing better in the world--for a fool--than to realize that you just want her to be happy. And to stop hurting.

It's the only way you can truly fix the brokenness
if you're the one shattering her to pieces.

IV.

2011-10-05T16:04:00.000-07:00

sometimes I get lost in the hours
and feel like a balloon hitched to a tow truck
what a waste of power

when did it slip from escape
to necessity
was it there before the rain fell upon
wet cement hearts scattered on earthy walkways
'when did the bow break'

it happened before your time, he sings.

she doesn't taste like brown, tho.
she tastes like heav'n or gold
who can tell the difference
heavennever
felt better
(or more like home)

i need it more than heav'n tho.
it doesn't taste broken or love you back

but it warmly grabs you by the face and reminds you she ever existed

Are you trying to crush me out like the rest of them?

2011-10-02T20:45:00.000-07:00

but as God said,
crossing his legs,
I see where I have made plenty of poets
but not so very much
poetry.

-excerpt from Charles Bukowski's "to the whore who took my poems"

"What if I was wrong and you had never questioned it?"

2011-09-27T21:23:00.000-07:00

Believe me. All is brilliant.

III.

2011-09-22T20:51:00.000-07:00

The brown the brew the brown the brew

the little one tears himself in two

the pretty one lies to herself and then

they both go back to drinking again.

II.

2011-09-21T12:19:00.000-07:00

Ever did life seem so long
when I felt you in my skin
in between your only lips
and shimmering down my back.
The ev'rynights I kissed you
one-two-three-four-five-six-sev
lost with ev'ry fleeting drop.

I.

2011-09-19T20:50:00.000-07:00

ah.
i can climb out of the ethereal moment of whiskey

sometimes for a lifetime
and exercise
that spine of mine.
mmmmmmm the
earth spinning on god's finger

(as if she's some kind of allstar)

makes me sick enough to my stomach
to eat my own words.

tho
i must admit that
my favorite [sober] moments
are any moment
spent witnessing public bibleverse menstruation.

you always call me perverted
but translation is
interpretation.

"Little Sleep's-Head Sprouting Hair in the Moonlight"

2011-08-03T20:04:00.000-07:00

1

You scream, waking from a nightmare.

When I sleepwalk
into your room, and pick you up,
and hold you up in the moonlight, you cling to me
hard,
as if clinging could save us. I think
you think
I will never die, I think I exude
to you the permanence of smoke or stars,
even as
my broken arms heal themselves around you.

--Galway Kinnell

A current favorite of mine.

Truth

2011-07-09T21:22:00.000-07:00

"I know that it's dangerous to judge. But man, you gotta find the truth. And when you find that truth, don't budge until the truth you've found begins to change. And it does, I know. And when you love the truth enough you start to tell it all the time. When it gets you into trouble, you'll discover you don't mind. 'Cause if truth is finally gonna trump, then you've got to take stock, and you've got to take your lumps, or else they'll trickle down into someone else's cup. I know."

-David Bazan, "People"

Freedom

2011-05-31T16:06:00.001-07:00

"Once upon a time, I was always talking of freedom. At breakfast I used to spread it on my toast, I used to chew it all day long, and in company my breath was delightfully redolent of freedom. With that key word I would bludgeon whoever contradicted me; ...

I didn't know what I was doing. I didn't know that freedom is not a reward or a decoration that is celebrated with champagne. Nor yet a gift, a box of dainties designed to make you lick your chops. Oh, no! It's a chore, on the contrary, and a long-distance race, quite solitary and very exhausting. No champagne, no friends raising their glasses as they look at you affectionately. ...

At the end of all freedom is a court sentence; that's why freedom is too heavy to bear, especially when you're down with a fever, or are distressed, or love nobody."

--Albert Camus, The Fall

Affliction

2011-05-16T22:29:00.000-07:00

I picked up my face

off the floor
and spat out

the most painful (and bloody) thing of which I could think ...

You're a fucking waste of flesh
,you Goddamn piece of trash.

You might be stronger
and happier
than a little piece of shit playing
music he doesn't even like for a living,

but you'll always be a person who doesn't know himself.
who doesn't actually think outside of his perfect sense of what masculinity looks like.

Immediately, I realized

I was so fucking wrong.
Who's the piece of trash, again?

Who spends his life wishing he could still write beautiful music
and care for someone who loves him
and give to those who need it

but continually bastardizes the actualized version of himself
only to be spit out by
the same turbine
churning out Jason Aldean,
and Kenny Fucking Chesney?

As I picked my jaw off the floor,

I wished I was that Affliction-wearing Fuck who broke it.

2011-05-05T22:20:00.000-07:00

I fought myself again. I caught myself wishing for the worst.

It doesn't really matter how happy you get, you will always want to do it. You'll always want sabotage.

Sometimes I blame God. Other times I remember that God is probably just the self-awareness I possess sitting in the back of my mind. That guilty feeling that always overcomes me when I'm doing stuff my parents said was wrong is really just me noticing it.

But if God is just my self-awareness, to whom am I smiling when I'm driving in perfect summer weather or when I sing words full of truth and beauty as loudly as I can? Surely not to my self-awareness.

Maybe part of the essence of life is constantly relinquishing your own power to someone else ... even if it does turn out to be yourself in the end. Maybe I wanna give this sense of self-destruction to someone else so they can fix it for me.

That's pretty selfish. But God and I are often pretty selfish.

Let Us Rejoice

2011-05-01T23:43:00.000-07:00

But I tell you who hear me: Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you, bless those who curse you, pray for those who mistreat you .
(Luke 6:27-28)

Let us ponder revolutions,
and freedom,
and the death of collective innocence.

Let us reward ourselves for feeling taller,
and smarter,
and disguising our immortality
with the lives of 3000.

Let us remember that the good and just
never give someone the spear
only to turn it back on them one day.

Let us rejoice with similar hastiness
when the lion who eats her young
is euthanized.

Let us rue the day we were ever bloodthirsty.

The Beach

2011-03-24T19:53:00.000-07:00

The sun is a
furious so(u)l

beating
down
upon
the
miserable
beasts
below.

All of whom
hide their misery
from their mistresses

and share their symptoms
with their peers
like poetry.

Their fragile little frames
on display
for whomever would look their way.

The beach is (a) hell (of a place).

But, the moon is
a lightbulb

reflecting on the surface
of an
endless blue,

like a beacon in a bath tub.

We wave
our limbs like
children at a bus stop

saying goodbye to the
ones we love.

We really only know
what we know,

but isn’t it special
to

finally let life
echo

off the surface
of something bigger

than our misery?

The gulf
sheds its salty tears.

The beach is (a) beautiful (place).

Update and A Friend's Blog

2011-03-17T15:39:00.001-07:00

Sorry for not posting much lately, friends. I 'preciate any and all of you that have been paying attention and asking me if I have been writing anything new. The answer: of course. I'm attempting to get into a new funk of poetry/songwriting. I've been doing the same style for a while. So, while I'm developing that I will probably only post the stuff I like the most. Thanks for understanding.

However, a great writer friend of mine, named Sarah Noel, allowed me to write a poem for her blog during her maternity leave. It was a sincere pleasure to do so. It felt like a commission of sorts. Er something.

If you feel like checking out the poem there, feel free to do so. I'll post the link at the bottom. But, you should definitely keep following along at her blog. She has great anecdotes and thoughts about life, also. It's a pleasure reading the ongoing story that is the life of Sarah and "the gentleman." The guest bloggers have been fantastic. My reticence to comment on any of them should not indicate any sort of distaste. They've all been wonderful!

Make sure and check out her blog here. My post is here.

And keep checking in here at Not Half Right. It may be worth it ... eventually.

Fallen Hero

2011-02-22T21:12:00.000-08:00

A dinner is always the most appropriate place for ideals. If you want to assert your views in front of those you love then there is no better place to do it than at a holiday meal.

One time at such a meal, I watched a tragic figure as he quoted ancient poetry at the table like it was ancient fact. The words stumbled, stagnant and stubborn, from his moist lips. His head gleamed with the sweat that has permeated his existence since I've known him. He wore it like ashes upon his head. It seemed out of place at a holiday celebration.

I remember similar celebrations as a child. He was always willing to sit near the kids' table. It was a promotion from uncle to father-figure for him. I approved every year. But I was now standing in the adult section looking back. He looked childish and needy of a God that he wanted to exist. He had become so certain that his shortcomings, his problems, and e'en his own victimization were that God's will, and if that weren't the case, his whole world would break down. What deep blackness is created when we can't even control our degeneration? Who is this God of man-eating fish, first-born genocide, and pig hatred? Must my fallen hero be driven to black-out insanity o'er every single word spit from this God's lips?

The tragedy was that I saw someone who once read scripture like poetic symbols that subversively changed lives, read the same words as though he was afraid that he had ever not believed it to be true. He was so ashamed that he had ever let himself be human. I wonder if he ever read the part in his pocket Bible about Jesus being fully man and fully God.

It's a shame when that happens, tho.

What once had holy meaning had become as divine as a John Wayne Western. Poetry had been reduced to the level of history.

You Won't Wanna Miss This

2011-02-10T23:07:00.001-08:00

Finding your voice is hard when you’re screaming
and kicking your feet to make some righteous noise.
Afraid of the world, you started your scheming
and your double-dealing ways just like a jealous boy.

It’s clear now, to all, that any brain that you had
has been stripped and sold for parts.

Keep wooing your fans, your middle aged women,
the WASP’s, and their industry, and your liberty.
I’m telling you now, you won’t wanna miss this:
The “socialist” moving in. Does it make you sick?

It’s clear now, to all, that any heart that you had
had been frozen from the start.

A Capacity for Cleanliness

2011-01-25T15:55:00.000-08:00

I leaned over the sink awkwardly. I felt like I was some gangly giant unsure if I should put my empty hand to my side or in my pocket. Only the distance traveled by the drops from my mouth to the drain could remind me just how small I really was.

I felt the spinning bristles grind away at the enamel caverns at the back of my mouth. At this point it was more of a cruel joke than a polishing. But, it was a habit that had gone on long after the capacity for cleanliness had reached its limit.

At some point I had to rid my sensitive mouth of the poison--once white, now pink--that had been gathering grime efficiently and persistently. I spit the foam out like it was luke warm (never to be received by God). My mouth had made it neither hot nor cold.

Then I looked at myself in the mirror. That rabid fool staring back at me. What mess are you gonna get me into today? Whose toes are you going to step on? What faded memory of compassion and love will finally lose it's last inkling of light?

A bloody, creamy grin.

Evil spouted out from the Devil's lips:

"So, you're the wrecking ball."

2011-01-20T13:05:00.000-08:00

The war is over.

Long live King Vanilla.
Praise
his holy name.

The queen removes her mask.

She is the virgin daughter
of some asshole soldier.

Her blood on the dead's hands.

Calm
cool
collected
a bridge evaporates.

In an instant
one
world becomes invisible

from the other.

Schubert's Winterreise: Der Lindenbaum

2011-01-09T22:21:00.000-08:00

This is the fifth song from Schubert's famous song cycle Winterreise. This is a fantastic interpretation. Maybe the best I've ever heard. The English translation of Wilhelm Müller's text is below.

"The Linden Tree"

At wellside, past the ramparts,
there stands a linden tree.
While sleeping in its shadow,
sweet dreams it sent to me.
And in its bark I chiseled
my messages of love:
My pleasures and my sorrows
were welcomed from above.

Today I had to pass it,
well in the depth of night -
and still, in all the darkness,
my eyes closed to its sight.
Its branches bent and rustled,
as if they called to me:
Come here, come here, companion,
your haven I shall be!

The icy winds were blowing,
straight in my face they ground.
The hat tore off my forehead.
I did not turn around.
Away I walked for hours
whence stands the linden tree,
and still I hear it whisp'ring:
You'll find your peace with me!

Any thoughts?

"Half Moon, Small Cloud"

2011-01-08T17:47:00.001-08:00

Caught out in daylight, a rabbit’s
transparent pallor, the moon
is paired with a cloud of equal weight:
the heavenly congruence startles.

For what is the moon, that it haunts us,
this impudent companion immigrated
from the system’s less fortunate margins,
the realm of dust collected in orbs?

We grow up as children with it, a nursemaid
of a bonneted sort, round-faced and kind,
not burning too close like parents, or too far
to spare even a glance, like movie stars.

No star but in the zodiac of stars,
a stranger there, too big, it begs for love
(the man in it) and yet is diaphanous,
its thereness as mysterious as ours.

-John Updike

The Ghost of Mark Twain

2011-01-06T11:54:00.000-08:00

I thought this bit from Ta-Nehisi Coates' post about the defamation of Mark Twain's tour de force was extremely well put. I don't do a lot of fear mongering for the state of our society, but I tend to be constantly discouraged by the way our culture is moving. I don't really know anything else.

"This is actually much worse, because the invocation of nigger by Twain is not a moral failing. But because of our needs, Twain isn't good enough. Because we can't handle the story of who we were, and evidently who we are, Twain must be summoned up from the dead and, all against himself, submitted before the edits of amateurs.This is our system of fast-food education laid bare: Children are roaming the halls singing "Sexy Bitch," while their neo-Confederate parents are plotting to chop the penis off Michelangelo's David, and clamoring for Gatsby and Daisy to be reunited.

Let us all live in a world of warm snugglies. Let the air-conditioning anesthesia sprawl free. May the flowers of happiness multiply out. May Mark Twain's ghost haunt us all."

What do ya'll think?

Here's a link to the post at TNC's blog: http://tinyurl.com/33dg7lw

Top 10 Albums of 2010

2010-12-29T09:54:00.000-08:00

No descriptions or qualifications this year. No honorable mentions or close calls. Just an unashamed and unassuming Top 10.

10. Gorillaz, Plastic Beach
9. Kanye West, My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy
8. Sufjan Stevens, The Age of Adz
7. Fran Healy, Wreckorder
6. Band of Horses, Infinite Arms
5. Aqualung, Magnetic North
4. Jakob Dylan, Women and Country
3. Sufjan Stevens, All Delighted People EP
2. Brandon Flowers, Flamingo
1. The Divine Comedy, Bang Goes the Knighthood

Psalm

2010-12-05T11:18:00.000-08:00

Lord of dimensions and the dimensionless,
Wave and particle, all and none,

Who lets us measure the wounded atom,
Who lets us doubt all measurement,

When in this world we betray you
Let us be faithful in another.

-Mark Jarman

An Advent Prayer

2010-11-26T22:20:00.000-08:00

Come, Savior, come.(like the first time)

Come into my stable
where the blood lay like a cold, desert night in Bethlehem;

the trough in which Mother Mary placed a son,

more fitting a home,

than the flesh that holds
liquid life in my veins.

Come, Savior, come.(truly)

Enter into this house as we give thanks.

Teach me(.)

only(,)

what is eternal(?)

It's going to take a miracle miracle miracle miracle.

"we lift our voice to worship you,"
Oh my Soul, you are my soul.

Come,(to die)Savior, come.(so we can live)

Spill my blood on your roman christmas tree.
Fill your cup (Lord)

and forgive me

for I
know (nothing)
not
what (does that make me?)
I do.

I'll Never Find Another You

2010-11-23T09:49:00.000-08:00

Romantic, unrealistic, faulty, and quintessentially me.

Coming Soon

2010-11-14T22:52:00.000-08:00

Hey friends. I've been spending a lot of time working on some essays about Pop Music Theory. They are sort of written in classic scholarly fashion so I'm currently in the process of dumbing them down a bit and making them fun for the blog. So, stay tuned. Particularly if you're interested in Weezer's "Across the Sea" or how Steve Reich basically invented hip hop.

Also, starting the day after Thanksgiving I am going back to my old tradition. Last year I skipped this tradition for no apparent reason. But, I will be going back to my "Christmas Posts Only" philosophy starting on Black Friday.

So, if you're interested. Tell your friends. It's a fun time of lists, pop culture criticism, spiritual infidelity, and paganism.

2010-11-11T21:27:00.001-08:00

I'm such a conflicting mess of conflicting conflict.

Alleluia (revisited)

2010-11-06T17:41:00.000-07:00

There's a scene in Grosse Point Blank where Cusack's character, Martin Blank, is at his ten-year high school reunion. He happens to run into a friend (a character who is merely there to perpetuate this scene) who is married and has a child of around 1 or 2.

His reticence to hold the baby or talk to the toddler is voided and his friend dishes over the charming baby boy. The baby is content. Beautiful in his innocence and happy in his forbearance of the future, the baby smiles up at Martin as if to say, "I've got this life figured out."

Martin looks down at the baby with complete awe, almost as if he is the baby in this situation: new to this world having experienced nothing. The lost Martin has witnessed the almighty testament of this wonderful little child. His life, on a deeper level than e'er before, has meaning ... possibly.

There are some days when I feel like Martin. Lost in who I am. Unfulfilled in the life that I choose. A bit too reticent to hold onto something that is truly precious, and truly meaningful.

But, damnit. Those moments when I prickle at the breath of God or feel the touch of the mysterious, I can't help but get a Blank face.

Awe and wonder.

The sun shines down on me again. And I am suddenly courageous enough to face the reality of who I think I am.

And I feel that strange foreign feeling:

that smile
that laugh
my heart turning a warm gold and ridding itself of the dark blue.

And I can honestly say, without irony or bitterness,

Alleluia.

Fear as Faith Tested

2010-10-31T19:04:00.000-07:00

I think this is so poignant and real. It makes me wonder (and awe) about the nature/importance of the faith-as-question. What do you think?

The disciples out at sea again.
So many complications in the mission.
Five loaves and two small fishes
to feed the sick Tiberian five thousand,
who want to crown this miracle a king.
But Jesus will not suffer them their vanity
and leaves their lonely company to bread.
He finds another mountain: thus the twelve
abandoned, putting out to sea in the generalized
direction of Capernaum, lost without their master.
A storm blows up, the kind that makes of sailors
disciples of us all. Three, four miles,
twenty-five or thirty furlongs,
rowing in a wind that feels like crime.
They know they should have waited at the shore.
Fear, they know, is their faith tested.
Fear of the figure they now see walking toward them.

--Stanley Plumly, "John 6:17"

Happy Halloween!

2010-10-31T10:41:00.001-07:00

2010-10-27T22:56:00.000-07:00

I fear that the level of irony I choose to live in is caught by no one.

Or maybe everyone tries too hard for no reason.

2010-10-21T22:30:00.000-07:00

There's a fight a-brewin' up ahead
and a drunken soldier in my stead.

But, I hate to think of what I could be if
I had never met you or you had never left.
I could write this story like it never ends
or feed the hungry and love my friends.
Inspire a world and live eternally.
I’d finally show her what she means to me.
I could cut you off and try to start again,

but it’s all a dream that you have left me with.

Alleluia!

2010-10-20T19:52:00.000-07:00

Alleluia! Alleluia!

I stretched my arms out wide
and felt The Spirit lift me
to unreasonable praise.

I let myself dance.
I felt the accents on the weak beats.
I caught a glimpse of Mary Magdalene.

Alleluia! Alleluia!

I entered in ever so slightly.
And then ever so deeply.
I pushed against the grain as You pushed back.

I wondered if You'd ever let it end!
I felt You squeeze back.
I trembled at Your touch.

Alleluia! Alleluia!

You caught my sins.
I forgot Your name.
I filtered out the memories.

I remembered who I was.
I taunted Your stories.
I looked for another.

23

2010-10-19T17:54:00.000-07:00

I think it would be very typical of me to post something today on how apathetic I am towards my birthday. Or something based on the anxiety of growing older and feeling uncertain about the life I've chosen up to this point.

But, to be honest, I've had a nice, solitary day. I read some. I wrote some. I fought some aliens with technology.

I even saw myself feel something for another human being, but only in passing, and only very quickly. I'll never tell her.

But, I'd like to remember my 23rd birthday as the day I had planned something completely different, and was completely content when those plans didn't end up working out.

So, now I look back at a time when I didn't care so much about why I liked things, and I just enjoyed them inherently. And with that, I leave you with my nostalgic birthday song.

Rubber

2010-10-12T05:03:00.000-07:00

Rubber
Rubber
rubber
rub
ber

Rub my face until my hands are raw and
cheeks are
bleeding.

My eyes are paperweights
on the ceiling.

My limbs:
in boxes and wrappers
waiting to be-sold
for feeding.

Rub my heart until it's numb.

Time bomb.
Messy ending.

Cheap Plastic

2010-10-06T04:10:00.000-07:00

It was very clear to both of them that he had become desperate.

"I wish you could just explain how this makes any sense. Our lives just seemed to fall into each other, and we're similar in all the important ways." He was intellectualizing it out loud because he knew he'd already lost her emotionally.

"You will never find someone who gets along with your family as well," he continued. "You can't give me any reasons because you know this is wrong."

He was temporarily like a math genius calculating every possible answer she could have while simultaneously conjuring up the best possible retort to that answer.

"I just know, Okay?" She had used those fateful words. The ones that mean nothing and something at the same time.

Suddenly, he was no longer calculating. What did that even mean? How had this women who had never made a self-analytical statement in her entire existence somehow show up to this conversation with an intuition so great that she never need to explain this mess?

She was confusing emotion with knowledge.

With these words he suddenly realized that he wasn't only losing her circumstantially; he was also losing her idealistically. The pedestal he had placed her on was made of cheap plastic. It had suddenly collapsed. She was a fraud like everyone else he knew.

Then he began the justification.

At least I was always honest about how I felt, he thought. He was mean, and he said some damaging things but he really thought them and he really meant them. Somewhere along the line, something had told him that this was right, and that in relationships of this sort honesty was the most important thing. Where he had gone wrong, he now realized, was in thinking that she could handle these things:

that she was the type of person who was strong enough to work these things out with him instead of caving for the easy.
that she was somehow purer than everyone else.
that she wasn't some facade.
that she might be aware of what's going on and he was just dreaming that she didn't even look inside herself.

But, maybe love isn't about some ideal. He had been infatuated with a fictionalized form of her. Now, that the false structure had been razed maybe he could begin to see her like she deserved to be seen.

And tragically as ever, he fell in love with her the day she broke up with him.

Maybe the important part is that he was honest and that he loved someone. But, no one is ever comforted by things like these.

Jude

2010-09-30T23:37:00.000-07:00

Dedicated to Thomas Judah Camp on the day of his birth.

I know it's hard,
and get used to that feeling,
my dearest dear,
but try
and remember people as you see them now:

bright eyes,
toothy grins,
halo overhead.

Granted, these people you see right now,
are the light of your life,
and mine.

Blessed are the meek.

You never need fear
while you have us.

You might run into times when,
under the duress of winter's oppression
and coffee-scalded tongue,
a short word will fall upon your ears.

But,
remember,
not a single one of us

will ever
do you harm.

I hope when you look in my eyes
you see the future:

solace in the wounded
and brazen new beginnings.
fountains in the moonlight
and wind 'neath your playthings.

Jude,
we-do,
love you.

2010-09-29T12:39:00.000-07:00

Thou my best thought by day or by night,
Waking or sleeping, thy presence my light.
-Traditional Irish Hymn

You are me at my best.
When I am me you are me.

Make mine eyes blue like your sky
and restless like your forest.

Give me this day my daily suffering
and forgive me my debts as I'm borrowing more.

Rid me of this
Holy Holy Holy Almighty Ache.

Ever hear my songs.

Wooden Watch

2010-09-26T11:36:00.000-07:00

These many months of

kissing carcinogens
and

yielding
to
the
yeast

of pasts
and presents

have popped a hole
into the
blackpotkettleheart of mine.

The subtle
breath of breasts
and liquor
lingers in my soul
and
whispers
nothingsosweet
in my ears.

How
does the warmth
of woman

become a fossil of
a
former
other(lover)?

And
who
are you
to take it(warmth)with you?

The gift was given
to me (I) alone.

Leave me(thisworld)with your
wooden
watch.

Rhetorical Questions and Breakthroughs

2010-09-19T17:00:00.001-07:00

I wrote a song this weekend that has taken place of the album opener I've had planned for over a year now. There aren't too many days when I feel like I've written something that important. As a matter of fact, this song feels like the "Eden" of the record on which I'm working.

Here's the problem. The main tagline (there is no real chorus only a "tangled up in blue" type line at the end of every refrain) ends on a preposition. It drives the grammar dragon in me NUTS! But, Andrew, "the artist," loves the sentiment of the line, the phonetical phrasing, and the tone color of each word in a good succession. It's also necessary with the soft rhyme I create at the end of each refrain.

So, my question: which one do I fuel, the unworthily snarky grammar Nazi in me or the passionate self-loathing artist?

It kind of brings up a deeper (cliche) question: should I give the song more mind or more heart? It's always a balance, they say.

I am pretty certain of my answer. But, these are the kind of things that go into my songwriting on a regular basis. I need to give the lyrics a few days of editing before I post them, but they will follow soon.

Thanks for reading, kids.

2010-09-14T21:59:00.000-07:00

I find
that the hardest thing
to find

is

my mind
when it's on some
one else's mind.

I find
my mind

, sometimes.

Like a Thief in the Night

2010-09-08T20:49:00.000-07:00

When I look back, I guess I realize I was trying to give myself some sort of freedom. I don't know what that freedom was. Could it have been a freedom to evade monogamy one more time before I tie myself emotionally forever to a woman I had fallen in love with?

Maybe.

But, I've never been the kind of guy who wants a million women at once. There are hints of it in my life, but never is that a true desire. When it all comes down to it, I've been searching for "one" since I was 12 years old. Sure, I get the buzz of speaking intellectually with a woman, or feeling the pulling satisfaction of flirting with someone whose newer than the person you're with. Quite frankly, I'm gifted in that territory. I can have a conversation with a woman better than most, because I think they are the greatest things in Creation. They literally are creation, for me.

However, that's never been enough to tear me away from her. That person who would end all of this.

Maybe it was the freedom to find myself first. I've been on that never-really-know-anything kick for a while. Maybe I needed to define myself first.

Eh. Probably not. I've known myself for a long time. I know what I am. I knew the entire time that everything about her was important. That she was true, and I was a false prophet.

That something like her existed, proved there was a Savior.
Her innocence proved there was a God.
God came, exactly like John said, like a thief in the night, and took her away from me.

The God of the Bible exists after all.

But, I've never been the type of guy to get pissed off at God. Sure, I question God. Sure, I question God's existence in its entirety. Sure, I find times when I'm better than God, and times when I'm the most distant figure in the world to an all-powerful Creature/Human-Being/Lover. But, God does exist, and God is in my mind. God might be my mind, for all I know.

Maybe, I was just tired of her not knowing herself. I needed freedom from herself. I needed to know her outside the context of me before I could ever find a way to be with her forever.

That can't be it either. She was, after all, always honest.
She was herself.
Her beautiful, loving, dark, enflamed, broken, and sensual self.

Let me remind you, dear dear friends:
Freedom is absolutely overrated.

An Open Letter To My Good Friend

2010-09-06T23:45:00.001-07:00

You get it. But, you don't get it enough, because you're still too much like me.

One day, we'll spread our wings out and fill this town with pride. We'll soar o'er the beautiful buildings and decide, as always, for Ourselves that what we do is worth a shit, e'en if we're the only people to see it.

My friend, the only one who understands what this is. The one who inspired all of this is.

The is of this.

You are better than me, can't you see? This isn't a game to you. It's inspiration. You have what we all want: a passion for the living and the misgiven individuals who live in spite of their wanderings and filth.

You live for me, whether you know it or not.

I will never have that passion, and I feign passion for myself daily. I create awful situations I know will be the death of me, so I can live a life that is meaningful-less.

I have dreams of you, sometimes, facing your Fear with tears in your eyes.
With your chest in the air, and your jaw as square as ever.
Your mind at ease, finally.
She, being the only one, understanding you, if not finally existing in your mind again.

I want that so badly for you, my friend. E'en more than for myself. My dreams of you are really about me. Why would you do what I do? Don't do it any longer.

Fight our mutual temptations and become something. Not material, but spiritual.

Become the savior we all know you can be. Only you would know what I mean, and that I don't mean that so irreverently. Or, maybe it's irreverent until you prove me right.

Which you do, all the time.

2010-09-05T10:09:00.000-07:00

I perceive I have not really understood any thing, not a single
object, and that no man ever can,
Nature here in sight of the sea taking advantage of me to dart
upon me and sting me,

Because I have dared to open my mouth to sing at all.

-Walt Whitman

The Narrator

2010-09-01T19:28:00.000-07:00

I love songs. I really do. I take the title "songwriter" very seriously. I give myself that title whether you believe I'm worthy of it or not. And there's a funny thing about songs. Well, there are many funny things about songs.

But, there is specifically ONE funny thing about songs: the narrator.

All songs have narrators. Whether it's some omniscient being never identified and completely detached from the situation, or the person that the experience or story is describing, or even a reader of a Letter to Juliet, the narrator is crucial in the understanding of the song.

Now, that's not hilarious. That's pretty simple. But, the interesting (maybe funny wasn't the right word all along) thing is that I often find myself identifying with the narrator e'en more than I identify with the lyrics.

There is something so powerful about music with words that an atmosphere or emotion is created. There is some emotional/musical/nonliteral/spiritual thing created when the two are put together. This is a phenomenon that is loosely based in musical symbolism or impressionism. Sometimes, words aren't enough, so you get the music to fill in the gaps for you. I eluded to this in minor detail in this post about Nico's "These Days" and how it effects the listener as a part of a movie soundtrack.

Very often, I find myself REALLY singing along with the narrator. It happened to me today while I was listening to "Telephone Line" by ELO. The lyrics are sort of mundane and they express a sentiment that is pretty obvious and boring. But, what really makes the song is the tone of Jeff Lynn's voice and the sounds that the words make. Those things accompanied with a classic motown-y melody just tug at your heart.

I just sat there thinking "Man, this song sounds a lot like how my life has felt since february." The fact that the narrator was talking about himself helped sell these feelings to me as well. I realized then--I had realized it probably a million times subconsciously--that when you listen to a song where the narrator is speaking from his own experience, you're actually projecting those feelings upon yourself and adopting those emotions and thoughts as your own. THAT'S why songwriting can be so powerful.

Of course, this isn't an exact science. And it's not the only reason songs are powerful. But, damn. I love that a song from 1976 perfectly captured how I felt, not through its writer's mastering of language, but their mastering of sound.

And I'll be damned if I wasn't happy for a moment or two as a result.

The River

2010-08-29T20:37:00.000-07:00

I stuck my little paws into your heart and tried to clean all of you from me.
I slipped on your slick surface and soft stones.
I put my belongings on your bank and waded in your seemingly clear mind.

I looked into the water. I saw you there. The reflection was ugly. The pitiful little creature staring up at me.

You're a no-nothing means to an end.
You're a mime of a real life. You're a shoddy piece of arbitrary.
You are a callous.

I thought I had washed my hands of you.

Then, I felt the wind.
I saw the green moss and the water bugs.
A smile and laugh from down the river.
Wading in the mountain creek, I heard a secret.

It's
not
over
... yet.

Good friends
and
music in a valley.

Service and solitude.

"It restoreth my soul."

Pictures in the rain,
dizzy
dancing, and
unexplainable
earth.

I must have washed my hands in You.

2010-08-22T19:56:00.000-07:00

yours is the light by which my spirit's born:
yours is the darkness of my soul''s return
--you are my sun,my moon,and all my stars

-e.e. cummings

Knowledge of Good and Evil

2010-08-16T03:26:00.000-07:00

I immediately got up and started looking for my clothes in the dark, sticky bedroom. The alarm clock had made just enough light so I could see her full, beautiful silhouette: a shape only God could create. I blurted out the only thing I could muster up, in an attempt to make myself feel better.

"I guess we now realize that what really 'makes love' is equal parts how you feel and what you know," I analyzed, inappropriately and pompously as ever.

I had ruined her beautiful shape and made a mockery of all Creation. She knew it and felt it.

"Please, don't ever leave home without that knowledge," she replied. Her embarrassment and pain were obvious to both God and I.

By now, fully dressed at the foot of her bed, I felt so foolish and filthy. I wanted to just crawl back inside and fix what I had shattered. Instead, I said the only honest thing I ever have in my life.

"We never really know anything. Maybe we never really love, either."

She let out a bitter laugh, finally seeing who I was when I was sincere.

"Then pack lightly," she said, turning toward the opposite wall on her side.

I walked down the squeaky stairs to my car and drove somewhere else, because I had thrown away the only place I really wanted to call home.

Losing My Grip

2010-08-10T21:43:00.000-07:00

Some people have nightmares of being naked in public.

These people are terrified of themselves. They are driven to their knees by the notion of showing their most intimate secrets with others, and losing the power of being able to show it only to whom they want.

And for good reason.

People are awful people, and awful people will take your imperfections
and send them out

across every nation

like the Gospel of Some Infected Eyesore.

And why should we be driven by any Word that doesn't truly represent us?
Why should anyone submit their intimacies to terrible creatures?
How are we ever going to be safe with who we are when we are what we are?

My nightmares never involve nudity. I've thrown away my intimacy so many times that it doesn't mean anything anymore. Who the hell cares anymore? No turning back now.

My nightmare is having a firm grasp or steady footing ... then losing it. The feeling of clinging to grass as you lift yourself out of a ditch and all of a sudden the feeling of it turning to mud that slides right through your fingers. It's not the falling that terrifies me; it's the total loss of grip.

It's not so much a nightmare, anymore. It's what I feel every day.

That feeling of perpetually climbing out of a hole and losing my grip, sometimes with reality, and falling right back in the hole.
I want to believe I'll make my way out someday. I have tried to face it bravely

and cowardly.

But, it's been this long.

I wonder if these people's nightmares and my reality are all that different.

Words to Try and Live By

2010-08-08T20:46:00.000-07:00

Forgotten about this verse until a friend posted it on Twitter. I thought it was so fitting and beautiful and remembered why, even in my deepest moments of angst, regret and agnosticism, I can always rely on the power of these words.

I liked this translation best:

In all things we suffer tribulation, but are not distressed; we are straitened, but are not destitute.
2 Corinthians 4:8

A Brief Tangent on My Top 10 Favorite Television Episodes Ever (Comedy)

2010-08-07T21:19:00.001-07:00

We interrupt this unusually long string of posts filled with heavier-than average content, to bring you something a bit more light-hearted than you may be used to reading here. Hope you enjoy.
-Andrew

Television gets a bad reputation. Sure, it kills many of the important functional parts of the brain. So, it may be full of some of the worst bits of gawdy entertainment humanity has ever seen. And, it MIGHT be partly responsible for the decline of civil society and has probably contributed to obesity more than any factor bar fast food. I GET IT!

But, television has a lot of fun and edifying qualities as well: especially comedic television. Comedy has a fantastic way of not only lampooning parts of our culture that sort of deserve it, but taking the viewer off their guard so they can see parts of themselves or their culture that fall between the cracks, so to speak.

Due to this brief and understated description of one characteristic of television, I would like to present to you a Top 10 list of my favorite comedic television episodes of all time. I have limited myself to one episode per series, otherwise half of the spots would be filled by Arrested Development season 2, or The Simpsons season 8. Also, I don’t try to pretend to be a connoisseur of old television. All of these choices were made from the last 15-20 years. Most of these from the past 5-10, actually. So, I apologize if you’re looking for Laverne & Shirley, or The Cosby Show. They just ain’t gonna be on this list.

Feel free to comment and let me know where I was wrong ... or right.

*Also, any comments relating to How I Met Your Mother, Three and a Half Men, or It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia will be deleted upon reading. Thank you.

Top 10 Best Television Episodes (Comedy)

10. Psych, S1E2: “Spellingg Bee”
I remember posting a couple years ago about how I had a friend once call this show "Disney Channel for adults." I've always thought that was a load of bullshit. This show is quick, and you fall in love with the characters so easily. This is the second episode, but it was the 4th or 5th episode that I watched. It hooked me immediately. The chemistry between and Shawn and Gus is very apparent early on. The scene where Shawn and Gus are locked in the Spelling Master's booth and have to read the questions to the contestants will be the template for many a scene for Shawn and Gus.

9. Friends, S3E2: “The One Where No One is Ready”
This is definitely in my top two episodes of this juggernaut of a sitcom. It takes place entirely in Monica and Rachel's apartment (a technique borrowed from New York plays and Seinfeld) and keeps you entertained the entire time. This is also at the apex of Ross and Rachel's relationship and we get one of the most poignant moments of Ross' early devotion to Rachel in the "drink the fat" scene. Worth a watch.

8. Curb Your Enthusiasm, S7E10: “Seinfeld”
Larry David's second homerun series is ALMOST as good as his first: Seinfeld. In this season finale (and could turn out to be series finale) he plays off of his early success and finds a way to make the most creative tv show reunion ever. This whole season is about getting together a Seinfeld reunion. We get to literally watch almost half of a BRAND NEW episode of Seinfeld within this episode of Curb! This also contains some pretty decent dramatic acting for this show, as well as some classic Larry David freak out moments.

7. 30 Rock, S2E13: “Succession”
I've always been a 30 Rock apologist. I think it's hilarious. The thing I usually have to defend is Tracy Morgan, or Tracy Jordon, his character. No one, including me, knows whether to treat his character ironically or seriously. It may be part of the genius. But, something tells me they know what they are doing with him in this episode considering he puts together the perfect money making scheme: mixing porn with video games. This invention leads to a fantastic parody of Amadeus that also has the B-plot of the episode combined with it. Probably the smartest episode Tina Fey has ever written.

6. Scrubs, S5E7: “My Way Home” This was the 100th episode of Scrubs. It opens with Toto's "Africa" playing right away and pans to JD in a bathtub full of girly sensuous products. The episode of a retelling of the classic Wizard of Oz motifs. It is brilliant in it's re-characterizations: JD as Dorothy, Turk as the Cowardly Lion, Elliot as the Scarecrow, etc. It is wonderfully written and works on a very simple surface level as well.

5. The Office, S3E1: “The Gay Witch Hunt” In what could be the most intensely awkward moments the series has ever created, Michael Scott works his oblivious and childish ways to new levels in this episode. To me, it represents some of the final "believable" Michael Scott moments. After season 3, Michael and Dwight get ridiculous beyond the level of suspension of disbelief. Watch this episode and remember a simpler time.

4. Seinfeld, S9E8: “The Betrayal”
How does one pick a single episode of Seinfeld for a list like this? It's nearly impossible. I had so much trouble picking one that I decided I'd pick one that has some sort of gimmick. This episode is presented in reverse order. It starts with the final scene where all hell is breaking lose in an Indian wedding, and the rest of the episode you're attempting to find out why in true Memento-esque fashion. Has classic George and Kramer moments.

3. Community, S1E23: “Modern Warfare”
My favorite episode of the one of the most flawless seasons of television in history, especially for a debut season. It has satirical draws from so many classic elements like Die Hard, to Glee. It is perfectly placed and they never let in on the joke, even though you're laughing the entire time. Also relieves some sexual tension much needed since episode 1.

2. Arrested Development, S2E4: “Good Grief”
Where do I begin with AD? This episode has so many classic moments that it seems pointless to name one. The recall of 4 different characters doing the sad Charlie Brown walk to "Christmas Time is Here" is probably my favorite running gag in the history of television. Every single character in this amazing ensemble has a classic line in this episode. One of the best:

George-Michael: "I have Pop Pop in the attic."
Michael: "The mere fact that you call making love 'Pop Pop' tells me that you're not ready."

1. The Simpsons, S8E2: “You Only Move Twice”
This is my favorite tv show of all time. And if I have to pick one episode it might have to be this one. Homer and co. move to a new town because Homer finds a new job working in what seems to be an Utopia. What we later find out is that his boss, who is an extremely likeable guy, voiced by Albert Brooks, is actually a terrorist and Homer is helping to get the Nuclear reactor on board for his Doomsday Device. From multiple hammock gags, James Bond references, Bart in a Special Learning class, and a final joke about the Denver Broncos, this is easily one of the greatest moments in comedic television history.

2010-08-05T21:25:00.000-07:00

I am a drink away from telling you everything and telling you nothing.

When will it end and when will it begin?

#28

2010-08-01T22:06:00.000-07:00

sleep well.
sleep alone;
not lonesomely.

sing songs.
write songs.
pop art songs.

find yourself.
lose yourself.
let go of all you've never known.

wash away.
wash your pain.
hide it from himself, or herself, but no one else.

build-burn a thousand bridges.
create new enemies and learn to love them.
learn to love.

repeat.

Self-Reflections on a Vinyl Floor

2010-07-30T21:27:00.001-07:00

At the lowest point in my personal history, the brink of self-destruction in a very real sense, I was not saved by some moral guilt tremor in my bones, or some fond memory, or supernatural experience, or even the touch of my best friend.

I survived facing total damnation because I was a scoundrel.

I might have started this story a bit late in the events for your taste. Let's rewind.

We had some of the best weather, at least that I could ever remember March having, this past spring. And one of the great cosmic middle fingers to me is that my worst days always fall on days when nature is dressed in her sunday best. I wish my life were more like a novel, where I could expect awful days only because rain foreshadows them for me, or where being in lowlands compels me to let out the seedy parts of my personality and highlands drive me to moral feats unmatched by my peers. But, alas, my life is not a novel. My darkest moments live in Carnivals, Weddings, and 50th Anniversaries.

The particular moment I keep thinking about happens on such a beautiful day. However, the weather meant nothing to me. I had come to my parents' house seeking help with a problem. I had come unannounced, and I was living in an apartment across town at the time, so no one was home or expecting me. This was an awful twist of fate. I was facing maybe the most real problem I had ever faced: myself.

After 22 years, it was finally obvious to me that I was the problem. The armor that I had put on myself for years, forged in manipulation and strengthened by greed, had finally come off. I could no longer look in the mirror and convince myself that I was looking at a good person. It was all too real, for the first time, that I was the worst type of person: the one who knows exactly when and why he does something wrong and chooses to do it anyway. This is not a problem that one deals with, I thought. This is it.

So, I reacted. Life is reaction, really. The best react well, even with shaky hands; the worst react by escaping or denial. I chose escape.

I went upstairs to the bathroom closest to my room, locked the door, and took a seat on the floor with my father's gun. Just sat. No tears. Turned my phone off. Turned off the light. And tried to fit in with the silence and darkness. I tried imagining myself missing. I wanted to sound like darkness or look like silence. With my entire being, I concentrated on emptying my mind. No longer was I going to let my mind get in the way of my decisions, or decision.

Of course, thinking isn't really an option for me. It just happens and I can't turn it off. So, my mind went everywhere it shouldn't have. But, I never once thought about what God thought of this. Total damnation to me, at the time, was leaving my humanity behind: complete darkness and betrayal. A final defiance.

But, the thing that bothered me the most was that through all the vinyl-floor self-reflection I slowly found my deepest motivation for doing the damning act: it was still manipulation! I wanted this last thing I did on Earth to just tear everyone to bits. I wanted to prove to everyone how childish I REALLY was, and how wrong they were for ever believing in me or "loving" me.

This awareness drove me nearly insane. My own Faustian side was manipulating itself to destruction. I could not let this happen. I could no longer be driven by a selfish sense of getting what I wanted and proving to everyone that something exists in me that doesn't. My fake authentic living, my existential bullshit, had to become authentic authentic living. I had to stay alive at least long enough to defeat this monster in me, or as Graham Greene calls it, this "devil in my mind."

There was, and still is, lots of healing to be done. I have grown in ways I never thought I'd grow since that lonely moment I shared with a toilet bowl, and a Smith & Wesson Model 36.

But, this dark moment has also shined importance on some of the most beautiful moments and memories in my life. I now react, with shaky hands and a stitched heart.

But, I no longer escape.

Taking Up My Bed and Walking

2010-07-24T19:05:00.000-07:00

I dreamt that I walked past a landmark that really meant something to me. A landmark that will be stuck in this town long after I leave it. A symbol that represents something that should have lasted but didn't: the ultimate irony is in it's shape and how permanent the landmark is.

The wonder of it all is that I watched a part of myself die as I drove by it. I don't mean this in a depressing or self-loathing way. What I mean is I saw an image of myself looking at something that meant a lot to me and felt it die before my eyes. A painting in my mind that would have destroyed me days ago: one that, at one time, was the most beautiful image I could think of, and watched every ounce of beauty crumble to the ground at my feet. It was like dominos in the shape of perfection falling to the ground and disintegrating when they landed.

My heart was racing like crazy. It was as if I understood why it had to fall, why the landmark had to mean nothing and why I had ever fooled myself into believing it could mean something. The beat of that heart slowed until there was no more beating.

I woke up thinking it had to mean I was about to get better finally. Maybe my subconscious yearnings were finally over. I could take up my bed and walk out of there: saved from sin and no longer lame.

If it were only that simple.

2010-07-20T19:53:00.000-07:00

Every day there is a victim welling up inside of me, and a cruel master setting up my heart for failure after failure after failure.

And I've gotta wonder when I will see the stars again.

Let Me Be Who I Am

2010-07-16T14:44:00.000-07:00

Just keep moving. Advice I gave to someone and myself nearly four months ago. (Whether they read it or not is well beyond the purpose of me sharing that sort of advice).

Never stay static. Always change. Always breath new air and wipe off fresh dust from your feet everyday. Never be complacent in what you believe, and never EVER let yourself believe that you know yourself.

I had a clear future. There was a time when I was comfortable with being a musician.

I am no longer comfortable with being a musician. I want to be the everpresent, effervescent, eloquent voice of my generation. A piece of the puzzle so important that the cobwebs of my dusty, decrepit mind infest the sterile passion of the world's brightest, and newest thinkers.

My crippled steps: the catalyst of every marathon runner.

There was a time when I was comfortable with being a lover.

I am no longer comfortable with being a lover. I want to be a mountain for a woman to climb and conquer. I want to be broken and scaled. A peak so high that only the best and the brightest can reach the top.

Every one of my cliffs a clearer picture of how worth my stupid little shit of a personality is. How much of a treasure I can be if you let me be who I am. If you let me love you, now. If you let me FINALLY treat you like a human being.

There was a time when I was comfortable with God.

I am no longer comfortable with God. I never want to be comfortable with God. I want to be a challenge. An every day attempt to love people in a way that would please the type of God I hope exists. The type of God who loved humanity so much that that God made God human.

That that God made being human being God.

Let me be God and let me be human. Let me be a mountain. Let me have a voice.

Just let me, already.

Just Say the Word (or Whether or Not Guys Like This Exist, or Blunt Self-Reflections, or Temporarily Desecrating a Jesus analogy)

2010-07-13T21:16:00.000-07:00

A brush of the hand and a delicate sigh.
A safe-guarded charmer to soften your pride.
I’m channeling boys and the best of my kind,
‘cause I am a serpent; a log in your eye.

And I could break your heart, just say the word.

Don’t twist up my wording. That’s not what I meant.
I’m in love with the version of you in your bed.
Just separate me from the ones that you’ve met
who care about living or what you have said.

And I could break your heart, just say the word.

Don’t hold out hope for that moment
when I would give what you need.
The brand of truth that I give you
has much more power to please.
And if I make you too nervous,
with all my strength and my seed,
take some comfort in knowing
there are millions more like me.

2010-07-12T15:55:00.000-07:00

deep inside of
the shape

i choose to take

is a bathroom mirror
and closet

space.

Four Brothers at a Funeral

2010-07-09T09:38:00.000-07:00

One chilly, wet morning in May, I woke up in an SUV somewhere in southern Michigan. I had failed again. My whole goal was to try and stay awake for the trip up from Anderson so someone would keep Adam accountable and awake. But, it didn't matter. It was more of a courtesy than mistrust on my part.

Adam had gotten us to Michigan just fine. When he wants to be, Adam is nearly the most responsible of all of us. He comes through leaps and bounds above all of us, many times. Due to how late of a start we had gotten, my father (and Adam for that matter) were afraid we were going to be late. But, we made fantastic time.

We were right on time for my grandpa's funeral.

I had been irresponsible the night before. Alex and I had hung out with some friends and spent most of the night out. When Alex was ready to head home, knowing we'd have quite the trip--emotionally and geographically--the next day, I just pleaded for more time. I was attempting to make something happen that I had no business to be trying. I spent most of the night working and working, knowing that it'd make me feel better, yet hoping I'd never be successful. It was almost as if Alex, although never annoying me, was my conscience telling me to go home. Just go home and sleep!

But, alas, I was successful. That just added more guilt to an already emotionally draining day.

Adam and Amy, his girlfriend, Alex, and I walked into the small church in Jackson, Michigan at about 10 am to a church already crawling with miserly northerners, unfamiliar relatives, and some of the most important people in the world. My oldest brother Aaron was standing right in the middle of the chaos, looking--per usual--like the singer of a ska band. But, that's one of his most endearing qualities.

To be honest we all looked ridiculous to some degree. I was wearing a painfully blue shirt with a darker blue tie that really didn't match the charcoal pants I was wearing, but for the occasion, the outfit was more than out of place already. I looked dressed for Easter Sunday (my brothers would usually have been dressed in nearly matching outfits) and evidently didn't get the memo that we were going to a funeral.

We were all unshaven and about has indie chic as you can be in southern Michigan at your grandpa's funeral. It was a motive that's been following us since our respective middle school days.

We pretended to know our mom's side of the family, irreverently joked around our feelings, and made fun of each other for a couple minutes and then headed inside the sanctuary.

The service was so quick and surreal that I don't remember much. There were some highlights. My mom's brother, Craig, gave the most fantastic opening to any funeral I've ever been to. It referenced my grandpa in such a spiritual fashion that it was painful. His quick words had the power of Tolkien or Tolstoy. They hit all of us so hard that we could only choke ourselves to keep it together. (I'm very thankful my Uncle Craig sat between my brothers and me during the Elvis impersonator singing ... I don't think I would have survived that, otherwise).

We had survived the service. How hard could the rest be? Isn't the service usually the hard part? I had prayed that I would let myself feel. That I would let myself be moved by God or whatever was up there. What had I believed at that time? I don't even remember. I don't remember getting angry at the salvation jabs that have to be thrown into every Christian funeral. I don't remember thinking about what heaven and hell could mean. I don't remember thinking about God at all during the service.

When it was time to take our pallbearer positions, we took our places around the casket and started taking it to the hearse.

One of us whispered, in jest, "Shit just got real."

And like comedy often does, it took me off of my emotional guard and left me open to feel other emotions. As soon as I stopped laughing from the comment I realized the physical and emotional weight of what I was doing. I was literally carrying the Kittredge family tradition, 70+ years of a fantastically lived life, and my grandpa's shell. I looked up and noticed we were all struggling to come to grips with it. It had hit all four of us at the exact same time.

We got the casket to the car and we all just broke down. Right there in the pouring rain. Four grown boys, crying like babies in each other's arms. It was like a damn Thomas Hardy novel.

That's when I noticed God. God had given me a family with three built-in best friends. Three people that I could depend on the rest of my life. Three blond boys exactly like me, who would know exactly what I was feeling and would help me through such a hard time. The same ones who had the same assonant name problems as me. ("You're Aaron, right? Adam? Alex??" Wrong again.)

And you know what? I'm glad that I remembered God through them. I'm glad it wasn't some trite eulogy or lionization that caused me to remember what I could believe in. I didn't want a Bible verse, for once. I wanted the rain of life to fall on me and I wanted to feel every wet and cleansing drop. I wanted to feel God in the embrace of my brothers.

I'll never forget that moment. I'll never forget listening to hilariously irreverent songs on the way to the burial. I'll never forget Aaron's power when speaking at the burial site. I'll never forget what seeing Alex letting himself go looked like and how I wanted to be just like him. I'll never forget Adam knowing how to comfort me perfectly.

I'll never forget how it feels to be a brother at the moment when it counts.

Blood in Your Bed*

2010-07-06T21:02:00.000-07:00

there's a devil in my mind.
he's working again,
to remind me of a time when we're only friends,
when you would come along
and change all my plans.
a whiskey for your time and a fighting chance.

there's a spirit in your room,
god's blood in your bed.
a covenant was made where our bodies met.
if life is just a flash,
or heat in the night,
you burn with every breath when you come alive.

is hell just a place in our minds?
i'm praying everyday to seem right in your eyes.
i can't seem to make up my mind:
living for a lie, or doing what's right.

there's a flood that's rising fast,
and a soft foolish man
who chose to build his love on a bed of sand.

*This is a repost because it has been finished. I started it a while back ago and posted what I had at the time. It is now complete.

"i carry your heart with me" (for you)

2010-07-05T22:26:00.000-07:00

I wanted to share with you a piece of my heart. Sometimes, someone else's art can be so fulfilling and so meaningful that you can't help but truly believe they were channeling your own subconscious when they put it down. Of course, e.e. cummings was around much earlier than I was, but I still can't help thinking he had me in mind when putting his pen to paper.

This poem fell in my lap at my worst and tore me to absolute shreds. Then, it lifted me up to a place I may never reach again. I hope your world is torn apart and built up higher than before, as well.

"i carry your heart with me"

i carry your heart with me(i carry it in
my heart)i am never without it(anywhere
i go you go,my dear; and whatever is done
by only me is your doing,my darling)
i fear
no fate(for you are my fate,my sweet)i want
no world(for beautiful you are my world,my true)
and it's you are whatever a moon has always meant
and whatever a sun will always sing is you

here is the deepest secret nobody knows
(here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud
and the sky of the sky of a tree called life;which grows
higher than the soul can hope or mind can hide)
and this is the wonder that's keeping the stars apart

i carry your heart(i carry it in my heart)

-e.e. cummings

Happy Fourth!

2010-07-04T08:04:00.001-07:00

Happy Fourth, everyone.

Always remember that patriots were people who were not complacent with the government forced upon them. These were people who went out and tried to change things when they saw fault in the leadership that governed them.

Let us never believe that patriotism looks like what some pundits want us to think it looks like: that if you aren't completely sold on everything the government ever does than you are un-American. (It's amazing how some of these pundits would posture for 8 years with this load of maniacal fervor, and then suddenly, they look so "un-American" now).

I'd much rather be un-American than un-human. I think it's time for our nation to make a shift in our thinking. It's time for us to look across this globe and see fellow humans rather than foreigners.

It's time to maybe put the whole "neighbor" narrative that Jesus described to good use.

We will be a better nation if that would happen. We'd have even more to celebrate on a day like today.

Sometimes (A Prayer)

2010-06-29T20:49:00.000-07:00

Because I think you're watching, sometimes, I still look over my shoulder. I surprise myself when I remember that I still believe most of what you've ever said to me. I still believe a lot what you've taught me.

Sometimes, I catch myself believing that you exist.

Every once in a while, I believe with everything in me that I'm worth all of this. That I am part of a plan. That I'm not alone and that you are looking at me. That you are waiting for me like I wait for you to show me what to do.

I don't wait to do anything. I just do.

But, I'm trying to wait. I think I'm waiting. I might be moving. I might be drifting.

A lot of the time I don't believe you. Or at least, I don't believe what you said is what you said. How could you be so cruel? I don't believe you were. I don't believe you are. In my mind, you're at least ... indifferent.

I don't believe you were anything, sometimes. You're nothing. You're a third or fourth type of reality. A part of existence so far removed from what most people can begin to understand that it becomes meaningless for those of us who try to.

Sometimes, I don't give up. I follow these paths to you and I find a peace deeper than anything he or she could give me.

I find portals into my mind that are evergreen trees.
That are jazz chords.
That are wooly mammoths and dodo birds.
That are rainy first kisses.
That reach out and grab me by the face and tell me why I'm here.

Thank you for those times. If you're more than indifferent, which I do and don't believe, never prove it to me. Make me search for it and thirst for it forever.

Let me burrow in my know-nothingness and never be satisfied, and never give up.

I believe you right now.

A Brief Tangent on States of Awareness While Writing

2010-06-28T21:48:00.000-07:00

... or at least something I've noticed in myself lately in my writing.

In the near future, hopefully, I will be posting some new lyrics that I've been finishing up the past few days. I don't really ever feel like I have to give a disclaimer on the things that I write. I've always been a big fan of letting people try and understand where the perspective is coming from. Half the fun, sometimes, is trying to decide if what someone is writing is autobiographical in the purest sense, or whether it is a character study of some type of person they have known. I don't know why I feel compelled to say something before I unleash these lyrics.

I thought I was writing some stories in these songs, or trying to base them on characters I knew or based on elements of people I know. I don't always write this way. A great deal of what I write is very personal and at the very least has some personal elements to it. I am very candid with what I say and I think it plays a huge role in being a performing songwriter. But, sometimes, it is good to create a character for the song and just go with it. Some people call this the personage of the song.

Regardless, nothing that is extremely personal is exactly me, and nothing that is a character study is completely void of me, either.

But, never have I seen this line blurred so much before. I don't really wanna go into the content of the lyrics, too much, because, I will never divulge as to what I think the songs mean unless asked by someone.

Some people don't wanna know.
Other don't deserve to know.
Other's probably already know.

I don't want to change any of these things. But, I found myself writing these songs and then looking back at them and saying:

"Sheesh! This is really how I saw myself for a little while there. That's kind of scary."

or

"Wow! Sometimes you can even be honest with yourself. That's very fortunate."

I just thought this was an interesting phenomenon to capture as I was doing it. I've always known there are pieces of me in everything I write. But, never have I caught myself attempting to write about someone else and accidently pinpointing a version of me at some point in my life.

So, don't let these words ruin the surprise.

The softest hands provide the strongest hold

2010-06-24T13:45:00.000-07:00

The softest hands provide the strongest hold.

I look back at years I've died,
years I've lived,
years I've wandered through
blue forests
of my own mire
and my own mud,
but I recall the tiniest hands.

The little hands that squeeze
the pain
from every fruit.
The fingers with the power
to rout the champions
of my every folly.

The skin of my every breath,
now, the wind of every sorrow.

Hold your hands upon my eyes
and I will see through,
see beyond,
see because,
and see you.

Yours are the hands that could,
and will and won't,
lead me home.

Mine, are the ones,
were the ones,
and aren't the ones,
that wait for your soft,
and your tiny,
and your strength.

Patience

2010-06-22T23:13:00.001-07:00

It's weird. I feel kind of strange. I really wanna know this certain someone and really want them to know me. There are certainly some classic obstacles in the way: things with which I could never interfere.

I feel sort of positive that if one specific obstacle weren't in the way, I could possibly show what I'm made of. Prove to this world that I'm ready to put my whole heart out there again.

This person has the potential to be something important to me, but man ... I guess I just gotta be patient.

It's a shame. I used to think all of this was so easy. I don't know if it was four months ago that I changed my mind, or four years ago.

Here's to sitting on the sidelines and hoping you get to play doubles with someone else's partner, and having the courage to play your very best with that one chance.

It's Good to be Back

2010-06-20T15:15:00.000-07:00

I'm ready to be happy. I dunno how to explain it really.

Take it away, Neil.

Sometimes Aqualung Just Knows Best ...

2010-05-14T00:20:00.000-07:00

"If only love was enough, I would reach you."

-Aqualung, "Lost"

When We Get Older

2010-05-12T10:31:00.000-07:00

When we get older and we have found the time,
you will get your pony and I will get my bike.
We’ll ride to every playground left in our little town
and hide away until the sun goes down.

When we get older and you’ve ran away with me,
I’ll buy you a castle or cottage by the sea.
We’ll spend our nights exploring every inch of our frames,
enchanted in the world we found that day.

When we get older and we have grown apart
from all the changing faces and all the broken hearts,
You’ll prove, for all, what you’ve thought love has always been
and show this fool where he can start again.

When we get older and life does finally cease,
I’ll find you a portal or rusty time machine.
We’ll visit every blessed place we’d known in our lives
and ever endlessly slip into time.

Milestone

2010-05-06T05:50:00.001-07:00

It's days like today, the ones where I complete a huge milestone in my life, where I would give literally anything to share it with you. What I wouldn't give to have you congratulate me and then assure you that it was done with you in mind. That all of this education was only a subplot to the story of what I truly wanted for us, or for whomever I would find while I'm here.

I know I messed that story up. I know that you'll never trust that I mean all of this. But, it doesn't make it any less true to me.

My accomplishments seems worthless without sharing them with you.

2010-04-29T20:42:00.001-07:00

I still can't believe how hard this is for me ... it's astonishing.

Margot, Richie, and "These Days"

2010-04-25T09:57:00.000-07:00

The Royal Tenenbaums has always been one of my favorite movies. At the risk of being torn in half by friends of mine, I'd like to say that it probably isn't Wes Anderson's best movie. I don't even think it is my favorite Wes Anderson movie. But, for some reason, I've always had this strong emotional attachment to this movie that none of the others have given me.

This scene, where Margot meets Richie at the bus stop, is a reunion of sorts. I believe it captures the love Richie and Margot have for each other, in an understated romantic fashion, better than any scene in the movie.

There is something so beautiful about the way the slow motion and and camera work go with Nico's "These Days." What one has to learn when soundtracking, or scoring for that matter, is that very seldom does one get to push the actual ideals presented in a song, at least when using source music. Wes Anderson is very conscious of this fact and he is a master in working with timbres and feelings in music instead of trying to convey some abstract meaning as to why the song fits.

The reason "These Days" fits so well, is because of the gentle tone of the finger-picked guitar and the lush breath of the muted string ensemble accompanying Nico's interesting voice. We don't consciously hear "I've been out walkin'/ I don't do too much talkin' these days." We hear the sounds of vowels and consonants in beautiful succession. It's very similar to the symbolists and impressionists in the early 20th century. This is why Debussy's music is used as models for soundtracking all the time.

This little scene always gives my heart a mini jump start. It makes me wonder if these moments ever happen in life. But, I think that they can.

Even if we have to fabricate them after the fact.

Redemption in Art

2010-04-21T15:33:00.001-07:00

What came first, the music or the misery? People worry about kids playing with guns, or watching violent videos, that some sort of culture of violence will take them over. Nobody worries about kids listening to thousands, literally thousands of songs about heartbreak, rejection, pain, misery and loss. Did I listen to pop music because I was miserable? Or was I miserable because I listened to pop music?

- from Nick Hornby's High Fidelity

I've had many discussions with other artists/friends where we try to discover what it is about our internal makeup that makes us artists. It doesn't always go a certain way. But, many of my talented friends and I have discovered a certain attraction to melancholy and the honesty that often accompanies it.

To a degree I find that I live in a somewhat fantasy world about writers: we all have to be unhappy, we all have to write in a strict autobiographical format, and healthy relationships can't be afforded when working through masterpieces.

I know these things aren't true. These ideas are perpetuated by a social myth that's been around since Beethoven changed the face of culture forever. But, damnit, I can't help but think that the worse my life gets, the better I will write.

More recently, I've realized that I'd definitely take a happy life (and fulfilling relationship) over a life of good writing. But, I can't count on either really. I have to accept that I just don't have that much control over either aspect of my life. I write what my subconscious writes first, and then I make sense of it, later. That's not really comforting. And when it comes to relationships ... well ... as I pointed out in an earlier post: "they want you or they don't."

But, that doesn't mean we stop trying either. That doesn't mean we give up and throw in the towel. I've more recently realized how much writing songs has become a type of therapy for me. I still write for the same reasons I always have, but through this pain I'm gaining valuable experience in an art form that has transcended the imperfections of its writers for centuries.

Music has a way of going above our little quirks and speaking to people regardless of the part-writing errors, the obvious lyrical contradictions, and the cheesy guitar playing. Music is paradox in art form. It is constantly changing how we view ourselves and our surroundings.

I now know that as I write about situations, autobiographical or not, melancholically or not, relationship or no relationship, that people somewhere else will relate to my art in spite of my mistakes as a writer. I can be redeemed simply by doing.

And that's the most encouraging thing I can think of right now.

Schumann's "Im Wunderschönen Monat Mai"

2010-04-16T20:57:00.000-07:00

In the wonderful month of May,
When all the buds were bursting open,
My love burst forth from my heart.

In the wonderful month of May,
When all the birds were singing,
I confessed to her my yearning and my longing.

Do you sense the irony of this musical setting? Evidently, yearnings and longings aren't always returned. I had no clue.

The Beautiful and Damned

2010-04-14T10:12:00.000-07:00

Lately, I have been able to see how God takes care of the beautiful. When I say the beautiful, I mean those who exude beauty in every choice they make, every delicate step, and whose actions are, in every perfect way, human.

What I'm having trouble seeing is how God takes care of the self destructive. Why can't God save some people from themselves?

I believe that God can do this. I just can't see it happening right now.

A Test

2010-04-12T20:53:00.000-07:00

Tonight I begin something that I'm probably not ready for. I'm gonna try and read Graham Greene's The End of the Affair for the second time. This is scary because its one of the most beautiful books I've ever read and I have an emotional attachment to this book.

If you know what its about. You know that its rough content. It peers into humans, their devices, and their insecurities so honestly that its hard to deny any of these things in yourself as you're reading.

I need this, howe'er. I'm gonna go for it. God help me. I'm gonna try and avoid any self-pitying blogs along the way.

But, I can't make any promises.

"Say Yes" and Regret Analyzed

2010-04-11T10:15:00.000-07:00

Neo-Bohemianism and post-punk Grunge sentiments tore into the '90s like a tornado bearing down on a dingy farm town of hair metal and Reaganism. But, as the dust settled, a figure emerged who was tired of the lackadaisical jawing and the angst that represented this era. After overstaying his welcome in a band driven by both of these movements, this soft-spoken shadow, guilded in pop music history and a life of pain, created a vision with an honest edge not seen for decades.

If it wasn't obvious from the get-go, this figure can be identified as Elliott Smith, post-Heatmiser. The best example of this honest edge, that I can think of at least, is the masterpiece: Either/Or. But, more specifically, its flagship song, "Say Yes", will be the basis of this conversation.

I remember buying Either/Or, in early June the summer before my freshman year of high school, in a Sam Goody on the way to a soccer tournament in Ft. Wayne. And as I laid in my hotel room late that friday evening, I remember being enthralled by the piercing quality of his lyrics and the beauty that came from every quiver of the voice. Every fret squeak drew me in even further. Nothing could have prepared me for what the final track would do to me, however.

"Say Yes" opens with one of the most memorable lines that independent music has ever actualized:

"I'm in love with the world through the eyes of a girl who's still around the morning after."

The line is as cryptic as it is poignant. The listener never really finds out what event precedes the morning of this contemplative bereavement. It can be assumed it's some sort of break up from the rest of the lyrics. It almost seems like the narrator of the song is putting himself in the position of the girl that just broke his heart, and how her world has just become new and fresh again. This idea contrasts the narrators own feelings of feeling "like shit the morning after." As a matter of fact ... the whole song seems to be a list of contrasting ideas. It's almost as if this is the real title track of the record. It continues to give us "either/or" ideas. One or the other:

"a happy day ... and then you pay"
"and instead of falling down, I'm standing up"
"another fool or an exception to the rule"
"they want you or they don't"

In this way, Smith highlights the dualistic nature of the way you feel post-break up. It seems to either be all bad or all good depending on whether you are the victor, for lack of a better term, of the break up.

Elliott highlights the tender nature of the lyrics with the music as well. The song is a long string of A sections with a B and C interspersed. The A section is a gentle harmonic walk downward to a V7/V that doesn't resolve to the V, leading the listener to believe that things aren't all well. The unresolved chord always falls on the lyrics "the morning after". This theme reoccurs at the very end of the song when he repeats the opening line and ends the song on the V7/V that never resolves.

The most interesting section is the C section (birthing jokes are always funny) in which the narrator illustrates the restlessness and brokenness he has attained post break up. "Crooked spin, I can't come to rest. I'm damaged bad at best." The music has a chromatic turn around from a G, to a D#dim, to an Em, and it feels like a jarring spin. Just like the lyrics state.

I think the most painful thing that I can think of is the realization that the narrator comes up with: "They want you or they don't .." and then the hope that accompanies it: "... Say yes."

Is there anything more painful than that? Lately, I can't come up with anything. But Elliott Smith's mastery was in creating beauty out of this pain. It's why we all love him and why we all wish we could do what he did. I wish I could take this regret that I live with, and will live with for the rest of my life, and turn it into something beautiful and meaningful.

But for now, I'm left with this only:

They want you, or they don't.

Gatsby, Second Chances, and Why (American) Dreams Fail

2010-04-06T15:28:00.001-07:00

Over the weekend I was in Michigan for the final gigs I would be playing with a country band I have been with for the past 9 months. But, during the drive there, any form of downtime, and the drive home, I did my annual reading of Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby. It is among my top 5 favorite books ever. There's a good chance it's #1.

The thing about Gatsby that makes it a tour de force is its ability to continually describe generation after generation and the disillusionment that is attached to its youth. I can feel like the narrator Nick Carraway is speaking for me, with his honest ability to peer deep inside the superficial, while simultaneously aligning myself with Gatsby, with his deep and tragic longing for love and his complete and utter naivety. The reason it speaks to me lately is how much of myself I can see in this book.

I, like many a literary student before me, have always seen the clear analogy between Gatsby's failing love for Daisy and the pursuit of the American dream. But, never have I seen it as a symbol for the eventual failure of dreams that are unreasonable and built on faulty foundations ... until now.

I think about the first time Nick, unknowingly, sees Gatsby. Gatsby is standing on his lawn facing the bay that separates West Egg, where Nick and Gatsby live, and East Egg, where Daisy lives. His arms stretched towards a green light on the other side of the bay. We later find out this light is coming from Daisy's house. To Gatsby, this light is the symbol of everything he's worked for: Daisy telling her husband Tom that she never loved him and running away with Gatsby forever.

Gatsby is delusional, however. He could never compete with the security that Tom provides. This includes both his massive amounts of strength and his wealth, enriched over generations of bourgeois living. Daisy needs this security. Gatsby's new money, based on shady activities and bootlegging, could never compete with that.

Gatsby's dream of having Daisy forever is tainted by the fact that it's unreasonable, for one. It's also founded upon sketchy circumstances and wasn't attained honestly.

This is where Andrew Camp comes in. This past weekend I realized that my dreams will never be fulfilled when they are so unreasonable.

How could someone love me?
How could someone give me a second chance when I treated them so unfairly?
How could I expect to live a life full of love when the foundations it is based on are so wrong?

These are questions with answers I will live with the rest of my life. I could never provide the security and trust that a relationship needs to someone that I have proven to over and over and over that they can't trust me. It's completely unreasonable.

So, after realizing this, I am completely broken. I'm not certain I'll ever get another go with someone who will let me love them o'er and o'er and o'er. And why should I get that? Maybe some people get once chance, ruin it, and don't ever get it back.

... For now I think I will go use my pool. It's getting cooler, and the pool man wants to empty it out soon. I hope my fate is similar to Gatsby's.

2010-04-05T20:17:00.001-07:00

... and in moments like this, we can take solace knowing that rain still falls, hearts still beat, and children weep violently into a wind that never ceases with faith thats broken, but not dead.

Remember this feeling, child. Remember.

When days are over ...

2010-04-04T16:53:00.000-07:00

When days are over,
time will be measured in sighs.
An era will have ended
and we'll move on with our lives.

None of you will notice.
The signs have long been shown.
You'll tend to all your talents
and leave well enough alone.

The careless will be covered
by the sand of wasted love,
and ships will all be grounded
by waves of happy drugs.

Millions of sighs later,
Holy Wars will be fought
for the sacred land where romance
and self fulfillment rot.

So keep your head down under,
forget to hold your breath.
Hold tight onto your lover
and bravely pray for death.

2010-04-02T23:37:00.000-07:00

It's hard realizing that you've given up the most beautiful and pure thing you've ever had in your life.

But, we still move on, don't we?

We have to.

There Is A Place

2010-03-30T10:20:00.000-07:00

There is a place, not too far from here,
where hope is tied to every breath.
That's where I'm waiting. I'm waiting.

There is a life that I threw away,
a truth I never could accept.
But, I'll keep holding on. I'm holding on.

But, love could never be lonely,
and feelings could never evolve.
Don't waste your time on my heart.
It was deaf and dumb from the start.

There is a dream that I believed in,
and thought that I'd be satisfied.
But, I'll keep holding on. I'm holding on.

So, heal the ones who are broken
and sail the world that you love.
Don't get stuck singing the same damn song.
Your freedom's here if you want.

There is a gift that I have for you,
The only one that I can give.
Just keep moving on.

Keep moving on.

Sometimes Paul Just Knows Best ...

2010-03-28T20:06:00.001-07:00

"Losing love is like a window in your heart. Everybody sees you're blown apart. Everybody feels the wind blow."

-Paul Simon, "Graceland"

Stuff I'm Going To Do

2010-03-27T12:22:00.000-07:00

Memories are the best things this life has to offer. And as painful as they can be sometimes, I would never let anyone take them away from me.

Not for anything.

God help me.

Sometimes Elliott Just Knows Best ...

2010-03-25T16:13:00.001-07:00

"I could make you satisfied with everything you do. All your secret wishes could, right now, be coming true.

... and be, forever, with my poison arms around you."

-Elliott Smith, "Angeles"

A Brief Tangent on Aqualung and Follow Up Albums

2010-03-25T09:00:00.000-07:00

In recent years I've been completely disheartened by follow up albums. Don't get me wrong. There are plenty of artists who make fantastic record after fantastic record. But, the kind of follow up albums I've been disappointed by lately are the ones immediately following best records.

Think about it: Radiohead releases the immaculate Kid A followed by the mediocre, albeit groundbreaking Amnesiac, taken from the same sessions. Death Cab for Cutie release the most lyrically poignant and musically diverse record of their career with Plans and follow it with a record so diluted with post-Strokes idealistic indie nonsense with Narrow Stairs. John Mayer creates his perfect balance of pop and blues with Continuum only to follow it with the "half-hearted" love album with no dynamics and even less musical motion with Battle Studies.

These are kind of things that can drive a music lover mad!

Artists are becoming afraid to try and make an album that sounds like their other albums. I'm not arguing that people shouldn't try new styles and formulas. I think they should. I think they should constantly be attempting to transform their art. But, why are they so afraid to do what they do well?

Fortunately for Britpop lovers everywhere, Matt Hales of Aqualung has honed in on a niche that he doesn't want to get rid of.

Last time we met Aqualung in full album form was January of 2007 when he released the pop symphony in 11 movements: Memory Man. A record like this immediately made me nervous about a follow up. He released a collection of reworked old tunes (and a superb Paul Simon cover) with 2008's Words & Music. This only frightened me more, as it was a mess of boring or typical British pop songs.

But, recently, I got ahold of his upcoming release, Magnetic North. I was very happily surprised by what I heard upon listening.

Aqualung has once again made a record of mid-tempo pop songs spilling over with heartbreak and limey quirks. (If you're offended by the term limey, listen to "Time Moves Slow" where in classic Beatles' elegance the chorus switches over into a triplet motif out of nowhere.) Hales & Co. don't flinch as they create songs that sound like they could be on either of their first two releases.

The big difference between this record and his earlier albums is the lack of electronic edge. There are no fake drums or sampled beats. There are very few electric guitars at all, if any. There is no Memory Man delay pedal on every keyboard track. This record is set up sparsely the entire record: Piano, voice, guest voice, organ (sometimes), acoustic guitar (sometimes), drums (sometimes). This set up gives the record a hushed seriousness that emphasizes the heart breaking nature of the lyrics. Very smart composing.

I am very excited for the rest of world to listen to this record. It also gives me hope in follow up albums again. Maybe artists can be confident enough in what they do to try and tweak what they are already doing.

I have hope in this world, every once in a while.

Best cuts: "Reel Me In", "Lost", and "New Friend"

We're All Alone

2010-03-22T07:22:00.000-07:00

Time has, once again,
seemed to show me where I’ve fallen.
All my old regrets
want to follow where I lost them.

Fill my broken heart
with silence and your memories.
and forget about the way
you acted when you met me.

Tell me what’s a man to do with dignity
‘cause I can’t remember.
And who would want a world where love don’t mean anything
and we’re all alone?

Put me on display:
the model for the hopeless.
And give me one last chance
to give you what I promised.

Tell me what’s a man to do with dignity
‘cause I can’t remember.
And who would want a world where love don’t mean anything
and we’re all alone?

I know I can’t keep you from runnin’
I know I might not keep you at all.
I need you to know that I’m dying to give you
whatever you’re wantin’.

Tell me what’s a man to do with dignity
‘cause I can’t remember.
And who would want a world where love don’t mean anything
and we’re all alone?

Wally Beaver Perfect

2010-03-09T18:58:00.001-08:00

I do solemnly swear that I will use the internet for good, that I will uphold artistic integrity and not take a shit on everyone else due to my cynicism along the way, that I will become better and wait for whatever I have to wait for to be content, that I will never strive for happiness over what's intellectually/spiritually/emotionally sound, that I will write the best music I've ever written.

All this will make me Wally Beaver Perfect.

The Virtue of Honesty

2010-03-07T22:16:00.000-08:00

I've spent the past 2 years of my life a changed man. A man who told himself that in the face of anything, I would be honest. I would be brutally honest when I had to ... and if it hurt people, I could just explain the value I have in this virtue.

Well let me tell you. Honest people don't sleep better. They're definitely not very creative. They don't have lofty consciences. They don't make closer friends. They aren't the salt of the earth, either.

They aren't happy.

The happy ones are the selective liars. The manipulative people. The managers. Those who can manage and arrange their lies and comforts so well that they never have to fear being caught. The ones who can say "I love you" to their lover and then the next minute text it to their mistress. This is happiness.

I think I will continue with this code of honesty, even if its only to have one consistent thing in my life. But, if you know me, you probably know that I don't really give a shit about consistency. It'll drive you mad.

And who needs one more thing that's driving them insane?

Christ as a Root Word

2010-03-03T11:12:00.000-08:00

I think the whole counter-cultural, "subversive" understanding of Christianity is completely played out. I'm a bit tired of it. All the young pastors and their underlings constantly criticizing old traditions that are steeped in historical communities and ways of doing things that make little sense to them is getting a bit obnoxious. Or these hipster Christian life self help books written by people who study other people who have studied the Bible; it's interpretation of interpreter's ideas. It's two-fold.

I'm really tired of most old traditions of Christianity. The ones that pay no mind to living things in desperate need of love and those who spout off about salvation as if any of us have a finite clue as to what that means.

Let alone ... who the hell is going to hell? And what the hell IS hell, anyway?

Come to think of it, I'm tired of Christianity. I think it's time to find a new word for someone who is trying to live in a way that amplifies the humanity of themselves and their surrounding humans.

Sorry, Jesus. You were a fantastic example of what love could be. But, after a couple thousand years, we can't exactly figure out how you did it. We probably shouldn't use Christ as a root word anymore. I'm open to suggestions for what we could replace it with.

My personal favorite: artists.

Nothing

2010-02-27T21:11:00.000-08:00

"Well, I just wanna die," said Raleigh St. Clair to his wife Margot.

And never have I felt exactly that until now.

Here's to praying for things that your mind tells you don't exist. Here's to 22 years of knowing nothing and ruining every single important part of your life.

We ache. We endure. We fight for nothing and die for even less.

I Stuck My Hand Into a Fire (A Sonnet Revisited)

2010-02-21T21:44:00.000-08:00

Tonight I stuck my hand into a fire
and let it melt the calluses away.
She fueled the kindling, lit by my desire,
and helped extinguish any sort of pain.
The holy hills that rest above the flame
did tremble ev'ry God-forsaken breath.
And finding joy atop their snowy frame,
I reveled as the tremors shook my head.
But, every pleasure has its vicious bite.
I find it simple to forget the way
that feral fire can lure you in the night
and leave you dry and burning in the day.
The embers cooled and I was all but lost,
I traveled on, now hardened by the frost.

The 1st Person, or How to Rule the World and Give it Back.

2010-02-15T22:26:00.000-08:00

I decided tonight, on a long wintery walk home, that I could finally put into words what I've always wanted to be. One acquaintance of mine asked me if I truly cared for people. I said, "Absolutely. I just don't like people." After those words left my mouth, I realized how to phrase my identity as it looks in my brain.

I don't know if I was being completely honest with myself when I spoke that way to that innocent person that I haven't ruined yet. I think I was mostly trying to be clever and cynical. It's usually those sort of phrases that can get an awkward conversation over with. But, I am starting to realize that these types of statements have become actual pieces of who I am. I've noticed that when I say these sorts of things, it is often honesty. But, I try to pull it off in a way that people think I'm joking.

Ever since I started going insane, (which I will get around to posting about that eventually, I'm sure) I've been increasingly aware of the things that I do while I'm doing them. It used to be that I visualized myself outside of my body before. But, now ... I'm frighteningly aware of my 1st person perspective ... and it scares the shit out of me.

I am aware of how aware I am when I see myself seeing myself.

Well, I'm gonna put this 1st person awareness to good work finally. I've analyzed the sick sexual addict in me. And the charlatan in me. And the spartan in me. And the politician, who could just get fat and spit on the people, in me.

I've seen these things.

I don't want to be just somebody. I want a body that gives to other bodies.
I want to be a person who everyone gets second chances with.
I don't want to be cynical.

I want to rule the world. Then give it back.

Then drown in the exhumed memories cascading o'er my fragile frame.

A Damned Conversation

2010-02-11T11:18:00.000-08:00

Lately, I've been thinking a lot about how people respond when people ask them about their faith. For me, it's pretty easy to talk about because of the fact that in my average day, at a Christian Liberal Arts university, the people I come in contact are at similar places in their faith.

We're all questioning. We're all wondering. We're all wanting to help. We're all flaming piles of nothingness trying to do something meaningful.

But, in the form of confession, I have to say something. I'm tired of the designations we fight for. I'm tired of defending the names. I think about the responses that people give about faith and how they can immediately be shut down by the insignificant names we attach to them.

Maybe, I'm speaking more about connotation than names.

This is a real confession from me because, most of the time, I put a lot of stock into language and being correct about it. Of course, I'm human and mess up as well. But, that doesn't make me more forgiving about these sorts of things.

I think about the times I have stopped conversations dead with things like "that's not actually Atheism" or "that's not really consistent with what other Fundamentalists teach" or "I bet you'd have a hard time defending that position to other ChoGs."

I want to, basically, remind myself that the important parts of these conversations are not about the consistency that everyone attempts to have, and remind myself that the heart and bones of these conversations happen when two people are being honest with each other.

Brutally fucking honest.

Let's drop our collective intellectual ego and have a damned conversation.

It might feel bad, which could do you some good every now and then.