Chicago

Please don't feel obligated to look at my 'vacation' photos. First of all, you're not in them-- and photographs that do not feature the viewer have been socially-proven to be mass lamer than ones that do. Secondly they're not that good. And lastly, it wasn't even really a vacation.

I recently logged more than 4700 miles on a round-trip drive to Chicago to drop my son at college. At times, the road was so long and boring it seemed that by the time I reached the end of it, he'd be graduated. In reality it was only 12 days...

My hope was to return from this adventure having at least learned something about myself-- perhaps even having undertaken some kind of reasonably profound midlife transformation. I don't know what I was thinking! All I got was hoarse and dizzy, with a semi-dislocated hip I like to call 'accelerator hip' (the cruise control isn't working in the van...)

I don't know what I learned. Covering as much ground as I did, I'm not even sure what I saw. I strove to stay as fully inside each moment as possible-- to SEE things rather than merely look at them. But in the end, most of my discretionary time was spent working, as the internet connection was generally much more reliable than I'd hoped it would be. In that respect it was kind of like being at home, only I had to clean bugs off my windsheild more often...

A couple of general impressions:

* People are people. I've been known to make comedy jokes about those who don't live where I live or don't look like I look or don't dig what I dig. But there are genuinely kind people out there who don't give a damn about what I like or do. They're just doing their jobs and taking care of their own shits

* I've seen as many Trump signs in Ferndale as I did in South Dakota, Wisconsin and Idaho combined. In general, I did not notice much evidence that Donald Trump even exists, let alone is running for president. I assume he still does and is, but the uppermost western quadrant of the US doesn't seem inclined to erect billboards on their land--and they have a ton of it

* We live in a crowded and expensive place on Earth. Other than coming into Chicago on a weekday at rush hour, I never had to slow my vehicle down once-- anywhere. The traffic in Seattle is worse than Chicago and the traffic in Bellingham is heavier than any other surface street I drove and that includes not only Rapid City, Butte and Sioux Falls, but also Madison, Milwaukee and Minneapolis. There's a lot of people and cars on the west coast, and the people who drive them are willing to pay a TON for what they eat & drink, and for the souvenirs they buy

Still, I wouldn't trade. It was nice being in Bellingham today. And even though I'd only been gone 12 days, I felt as though I could see it through objective eyes.

But boy are my arms tired...

12 dusty days on the trail roundtrip Bellingham-to-Chicago. Please don't look at these photos-- I'm only posting them so they'll be in one place for me to enjoy later...

An open letter to Haggen’s Food & Pharmacy

An open letter to Haggen’s Food & Pharmacy:

We’ve been through a lot together, Haggen’s— but I’m leaving you. This time for good. Don’t try to follow me.

You still pretend to be a local store, but you’re really just Albertsons with a green logo now. I know the grocery business is cut-throat, but the noncompete nonsense keeping that Birchwood location dark is criminal. For-profit food deserts are not OK, especially now.

I’m changing my pharmacy to the no-name place run by friendly immigrants down the street. I’ll get my produce from the Co-op (real community), my meat from Carne (humane) and my Pop Tarts from WinCo (solid employment practices). You’re odd out.

Not that Albertson’s Inc. is going to fold because I’m not shopping with you anymore. But you might check my numbers. I’ve been buying wild in your stores for 20 years even though I knew it was wrong. Casual overpricing is one thing; exploitive neighborhood freeze-out is another.

Tell Joe Albertson that if he lifts his hex off Birchwood I’ll come back. Meanwhile, I gotta go break up with WECU now.

Farewell.

Jeff Braimes, Bellingham

Raid on the Sumacs

TODAY is one of my favorite days of the holiday season. It's a day that can't be scheduled with a calendar, or even by the weather. You never know when you get out of bed if it's going to be the day or not, and sometimes until as late as dusk it might seem like just another early December day. But when the birds start to get their drink on, you know it's that day.

It's as if every berry in the neighborhood has suddenly ripened in the exact same instant. Like one minute it's just a regular winter day and then the next minute it's the manic day the birds get drunk. The berries on the Sumacs out our dining room window are favorites for sure. But the birds are also ravaging the shade trees on the parking strip and beating the bushes across the street-- just bouncing from branch to branch kicking up a king hell racket, half-mad on high-proof fermented juice. If the birds were armed, they would shoot their guns in the air. They don't give a damn...

Late this morning we watched with delight as the Robins and Sparrows raided the last of the Sumacs. The Flicker danced atop the crown of the Habsnag, clearly out of his fool bird mind. The little green humming bird zipped here and there doing her usual speed freaky pattern and even the Red-Breasted Sap Sucker showed up to peck fiendishly into the upper reaches of the Douglas Fir as if to say 'there's got to be some more of that shit in here, man! Gimme that!'

The party raged into the afternoon, but eventually the still dried up and the birds crawled away to sleep it off. Tomorrow is New Year's Day for them-- a day to rise late and ice their tiny aching skulls. Tomorrow will be a day of reflection and of listening sheepishly to the stories of the crazy capers they hatched the day before, when they were blind drunk and free. Tomorrow we won't see much of the birds, as they slowly return to their regular bird routines-- just killing time till next year when the leaves have rid the trees and the berries are once again ripe for their fleeting pleasures.

Castro

Revolution is a fetching ideal for those who can afford it. But as uncomfortable as DJ Trump makes me, I am still probably a little too cozy to-- you know-- 'take up arms' or whatever you guys call it. Not as so in Cuba in the late 1950s.

Whether 50 years of Castronomics elevated the high of the average Cuban is, incredibly, still unclear on the Monday after his death was cheered in Miami and solemnly mourned in Havana. As confounding a figure as has ever pounded a podium, Castro made a career out of thumbing his great nose at the omnipresent hovering United States, brushing off assassination attempts like dandruff. He in turn treated his lesser adversaries to much more effective brands of merciless retribution. It was Fidel's way or the highway-- a highway often stocked with hammerhead sharks or lined with firing squads.

My mother's future husband Arthur Bender was a 20-year-old sophomore at Rutgers during the holiday break of 1959, and with a few more days to kill before returning to the books, he and 3 buddies piled into a car and drove down the eastern seaboard to some stockcar race in Sebring, Florida. Back then you could just do shit like that on a whim. One thing similarly led to another and before the boys knew it they'd taken a dare flight from Key West to Havana where they stood amongst the cheering throngs as Castro's freedom fighters rolled west into Havana atop the very tanks that had vanquished the forces of the previous badass dictator, Fulgencio Batista.

But even revolutionaries like a good photo gag, and a few of them paused to yuck it up with the young Americans on their way to the Havana Hilton. Stick em up, Yankee...

Americans can say what they want about Fidel Castro, but it is worth noting that we just elected Donald Trump to be our president. It's unlikely he will be 'in power' for 50 weeks let alone 50 years, but with comparable morals and only a pale fraction of the conviction, intelligence and personality of Fidel Castro, he could really leave a lasting mark.

Bob Simmons

The civilization lost an MVP this week. Bob Simmons has been my hero since the day I met him, and I know he's cast a similar spell on many of us. The man did everything well, but perhaps nothing was as lasting as when he'd clap you on the shoulder, look you deep in the eye and say "Gee, it's good to see ya." You always knew he meant it, because Bob weren't no bullshitter.

He was of my parents' generation, but he never seemed old to me. He had the curiosity of a child and the enthusiasm of a teenager; the knowledge of a grownup and the wisdom of an elder. I learned of his death on Father's Day-- ironic, as I felt a stronger connection to him than to any man in my blood family, my own son excepted.

It was an honor to serve as his & Dee's Realtor. Not because being someone's Realtor is so great, but because I got to spend so much time with them! For eight years we looked at houses in Bellingham. Sometimes not for six months at a time while Dee was trouncing cancer. Other times we'd see three houses a week. For eight years! The distinct & exclusive pleasure of driving the streets of Bellingham with Bob & Dee was mine. "We'd better see it, Jeffer," Bob would say. And we would...

The first one hundred + houses weren't right. But somewhere in the first third of that second hundred homes peeked the bashful but very earnest home on Toledo Hill where Bob left his things before going to the hospital and ultimately to hospice to die on the 62nd anniversary of the marriage to his very beloved Dee. His grandson was married bedside with Bob's only son officiating. You just can't draw it up any better than that...

As if Bob, Dee & I weren't spending enough time together in 2013, they graciously sat for a series of interviews to inform a two-part blog entry spotlighting them as my favorite clients of all times and nominating them for greatest love story of all times. DISCLAIMER: this first entry has more real estate detail in it. If you hate real estate, kindly skip to the second entry which is more about Bob & Dee. I re-post this only to demonstrate my affection for this grand couple and for Bob Simmons in the wake of his passing.

I'm sure he'll get some good sun in that great pea patch in the sky...

Mick

Hello family and very close friends. Some grim news from BraimesWorld. We wanted you to know without having to tell the whole internet that we've lost our stoney cat Mick Mars.

He'd been missing a few days and Patti I walked with some fliers only for a block in two directions Monday night. A neighbor from across the alley phoned yesterday to say he'd discovered the remains of a black cat in his yard on Friday morning.

There've been coyote sightings in the neighborhood and there are always racoons. We gave Mick as proper a burial as possible in the backyard. I think if you'd given Mick the choice between his freedom and his safety, he'd have taken the freedom.

Mick was preceded in death by his mother Scout and is survived by his sister Razzle of the family home in the 2600 block of Ellis Street, Sunnyland. He was one of the famed Sunnyland Cats-- a yawner and an ear-scratcher and if he'd worn socks (he didn't) he'd have worn them high because he didn't much give a damn about anything. He will be missed...

Razzle

Just a limited audience note to say that Patti and I had to let go of Razzle today. She lived a charmed life and realized a death to match-- with a sudden diagnosis, brief struggle and dignified passing in the arms of her deepest admirers.

All pets are special, but Razzle had a certain verve that made her a favorite of friends and strangers alike. Pedestrian commuters would veer many blocks out of their routes in order to drop by and pay their Razzle tax on summer days when she would lay lazily in-wait at the end of the concrete walk. Indeed, it seemed at times there was a waiting list to pet Razzle. She had a wide network of acquaintances that Patti and I knew nothing of-- a secret life!

She loved family, fire, and laps-- and would sit in one until the metaphoric cows came home. She never met a real cow (as far as we know!) but didn't seem to mind the deer. She did not have patience for mammals her own size, namely dogs and other cats-- with the exception of her late brother Mick. In her youth she would hunt and kill all manner of neighborhood rodents, birds and snakes. She ate them, too, sucking out the eyes and brains of her victims and bringing the tiny trophy skulls home for us to fuss over. She also enjoyed the occasional scrap of mild cheddar cheese.

Razzle was always an indoor/outdoor cat, and though she did not have free range these past 5 years (once the raccoons figured out how to use the cat door), she lounged and toileted outside until the very end. We were comforted that she wanted to be outside as much as she did these past 5 days, despite the foul weather. It seemed she was trying everything she could think of to sooth the aching in her kidneys. But in the end there was nothing she or we could do. That's just how it goes with pets sometimes. Eventually...

She was one rad cat. She is missed already

Infinite Jest

We interrupt your regularly-scheduled coverage of the collapse of civilization to bring you this unsolicited book report.

INFINITE JEST, DAVID FOSTER WALLACE-- 1996. BACK BAY BOOKS 1079 PAGES

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It’s not like I just go rushing to the dentist with every new tooth decay. But 29 had pretty much been reduced to rubble, so I scheduled the crown in an attempt to avoid a canal. I knew it would be a long appointment with built-in breaks, so I brought noise-cancelling headphones and a book the size and approximate density of a cinderblock. It doesn’t as much sit in your lap as on it…

“I see you’re reading Infinite Jest,” remarked my DDS, a skilled craftsman but not someone I consider a particularly agile small-talker. “Are you enjoying it?”

I said I didn’t think enjoying was the right word-- but that like it was powerful literature, sure.

“I haven’t read it,” he admitted, sitting to my right, already holding the syringe. “It’s kind of about dysfunction, isn’t it?”

The novocain shot is always the worst part. I looked from him to the needle, then back at him. The dental assistant was behind me, to my left. No one spoke or moved for what seemed like a very long moment, even considering how compressed time can feel in the dentist office. Eventually I rested my head back in the cradle of the chair and said ‘yes.’

“Alright Jeff,” he chirped buoyantly, the same as if I’d responded to a comment on the weather. “I’m gonna ask you to open up real wide for me...”

*************************************************************

The Boston Globe called Infinite Jest rabidly intelligent. The Atlantic Monthly proclaimed it a work of genius. Harper’s Bazaar said it was a sprawling piece of intellectual wizardry & social satire-- that it was at once serious, diagnostic, frightening, and lyrical and describing author David Foster Wallace’s imagination as limitless.

But those are dustcover reviews, probably commissioned. I’m writing a book report for free, because I’m out of episodes of Netflix or something. And book reports are supposed to like say what a book’s about.

I wish I knew...

My dentist hasn’t read it but even he knows it stars D. Function. And while there’s a lot more to it than that, he’s not incorrect-- neither is he the only one who hasn’t read it. Infinite Jest is among the most widely unfinished books of the last century. How many copies slouch on low shelves, sneering at lesser works-- a forgotten bookmark sticking out a third of the way through?

Most of my favorite books are short: Breakfast of Champions, Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, The Crying of Lot 49. You can read them in a weekend or in three baths if you really want. I liked Jonathon Livingston Seagull. Infinite Jest is a thousand rigid pages, the last hundred of which is an appendix of 388 errata drawn from the body of the novel. Some are as brief as #349 which simply reads [sic]. Others are lengthy (#110 is 19 pages) often with multiple footnotes of their own, meaning you need two bookmarks and a string tied to your ankle to find your way out of the somehow even more densely-leaded forest of errata (9pt!). Many of these asides feature complex underplots and formulas, graphs, unredacted field interviews and supertechnical social schematic equations related to concepts that increasingly diverge from the original footnoted idea 748 pages prior that you forgot about altogether and are subsequently surprised to be reminded of once you do finally return to the original like jumping off place.

I’m a slow and very linear reader. I read every word without skipping discriminately ahead UNLIKE SOME PEOPLE I KNOW and I don’t employ ghostreaders. I did read every page of Infinite Jest, many of them more than once. My pace-- call it steady-- is not complicated by the squinting associated with decoding metaphor and symbolism. When a white horse vaults a split-rail fence at the climax of a passionate love scene, I just go ‘huh.’

All good and well-- but what is it about?

Even DF Wallace didn’t always appear to understand exactly what Infinite Jest was about. While he did say in 2003 that it’s fairly clear ‘what happens’, he also conceded a certain lack of resolve, (dis)claiming “the answers all exist… (but) out of the right frame of the picture.”

“The story can’t fully be made sense of,” he admitted. Then he committed suicide in 2008.

So I think in terms of conventional like book report gradings, this one should be a sliding scale even though I don’t expect full credit since I’m turning it in 20+ years late…

*************************************************************

Insomnia is not without its benefits. I’m not usually relaxed enough to enjoy fiction when anyone else in my household is awake-- so most of my reading is done in the very dark of night or the gathering dawn. Merely sayin’-- and also copping that I would never have read this fucking book without this past six months’ reliable sleeplessness. Still: even during the day I could feel it staring at me, and more than once had to get up and put it in another room or otherwise out of my sightline. It’s no pamphlet; if it’s in the room, you can see it.

Infinite Jest starts in the future and ends in the past. At times hyper-precise as if written with a slide rule and ton of cocaine, while other times rambling and tangential as if transcribed from a voicemail left from a moving vehicle, it often feels like the Sympathy for the Devil movie-- a ponderous panning of seemingly unrelated vignettes depicting abstract violence and torture, a macabre theater of uncooked spaghetti right up the ol’ urethra.

The characters are almost universally unlikable. I guess I kind of rooted for Gately, and Mario is at least happy even if it’s only because he doesn’t know any better. Pretty much everyone else is deeply flawed and/or irreparably damaged: criminally insane, grotesquely disfigured, racist, narcissistic and addicted. The antagonist and title entity is a movie made by one of the co-protagonists’ late father which is so mesmerizing that anyone who views is dies within days because of their immediate loss of interest in anything else other than watching the movie-- including food or water. Infinite Jest quite literally entertains people to death.

The governments of what was formerly known as the United States, Canada and Mexico are spying off on each other, trying to locate the master copy of the film in order to eliminate the maps of the other countries’ populations. No one really succeeds (at least within the boundaries of the rightmost frame).

Generations of adolescences are spoiled by performance anxiety at a prestigious tennis prep school in New England. The Enfield Tennis Academy is covered in snow in its last appearance in the book.

Chemical dependence is a leading character and often manifests itself as the ghost of Recovery, specifically Boston AA. But despite the longterm sobriety of many of the ‘crocodiles,’ there are no blue skies or renewed leases or any actual redemptions seemingly for anyone. Rather, it is the ragged-right, secondhand smoke LABOR of Recovery—the plodding, rote obedience to a dogma that no one seems to truly understand or really even Trust, entirely. It’s a cruel swirly, but the best chance any of them have to stay alive-- so they keep coming back…

All that stuff happens, but I don’t think it’s really what the book is about.

***************************************************************

I don’t know if Infinite Jest is as hard a read as Gravity’s Rainbow or the Holy Bible—I’ve never read either. But after 800 pages of menacing concave ceilings, obsessive turd-tallying and repeated uses of words that not only do we no longer use in literature today but in truth were already not using in 1996—a reader kind of feels invested and that he might as well like finish. This is a great time for main characters to abruptly and without explanation begin speaking in first person after being portrayed till now in the third. This is the perfect time to provide detailed physical characteristics of main characters who to this point have not been described and to whom-- naturally and by necessity-- a reader has already assigned their own physical images. This is the ONLY sensible time to descend into a 36-page fever dream, fully eight of which are one single uninterrupted paragraph. Multiple colons in many sentences, levitating above the paper towel dispenser-- top hats for all my friends!

Because it does take six months to read. At least it did for me. To be fair, I did put it down between Thanksgiving and New Year’s as a Christmas present to myself. But it’s not like I felt any more or less hip after my winter break. It was still just as greasy a fistful of stories of Disease, abuse, disconnection, generational abandonment and unhealthy relationships between adults and minors—all running more-or-less parallel, sharing the same unfiltered tank asking what’s water. The apple (or pear, plum or peach) does not rot far from the tree...

Oh, it’s SUPER funny—don’t misunderstand me on that. DFW is a master of catch-and-release humor that elicits lolling about even the least-conventionally hilarious topics. As flung as this book seems at times, one does get the feeling eventually that there is not a single word out of place. What might be casually read or excerpted from the greater work could come off as random, but I don’t think there are any accidents in Infinite Jest. It is much more than the sum of its riddles, but I for one am going to have to read it again to understand exactly how much more.

Just probably not right now. Maybe a little Raymond Carver while I rest.

Riddle In Ruby

Unsolicited quarantine book report #11. A RIDDLE IN RUBY BOOK 1 by KENT DAVIS, 2015. GREENWILLOW BOOKS, 425 PAGES.

I'm not what you'd call a 'regular' in the Young Adult genre. After vanquishing the postmodern turnbuckle of Infinite Jest, I read Kurt Vonnegut's personal favorite of his own works, The Sirens of Titan in a weekend. It wasn't MY favorite of his numerous masterpieces, though it did feature the familiar themes of prophesied arrivals of half-wit chosen ones (Happy Easter!), space & time travel, and farmed sex in space.

Richard Bach's timeless Jonathon Livingston Seagull is only 10,000 words and is easily read in an evening. Should be, incidentally. If you haven't read JLS since college, give it a quick flip. Solid pandemic messaging right there.

Montana-based Davis has forged a heroine for the Now in his Riddle trilogy. Ruby Teach is part pirate, part alchemist, and all dreamer-- a reluctant, lock-picking, shape-shifting teenaged messiah (Happy Easter!) bent on the Right Things, no matter the costs. Set in 18th Century Colonial America, the novel finds the protagonist hastily cast with a small crew of similarly green bravehearts, on the run from Tinkers and Her Majesty's Royal Navy alike. Clowns to the left of her, jokers to the right. Seemingly everyone the scrappy young fugitives encounter has been expecting them. Ruby knows or has or is something that everyone is keen to commandeer. It would be simpler for her if she herself knew exactly what it was. But she's just learning, too...

From Peter Antonsson's swashbuckling cover art through to the last twist, A Riddle in Ruby is thrilling adventure story packed carefully with plenty of modern day relevance. Gender identity, social equity and a seemingly endless series of moral gutchecks lurk in every darkened iron doorway and up every winding stone staircase. A great read for young seekers or old geezers alike. Can't wait to get started on Book II. YAAF!

C

It's been a long time since I've shamelessly promoted my kids' art, but I see Patti has posted a link to Vincent's new record, so I think it's fair that I also be allowed to subject you, my unsuspecting social media acquaintance, to similar tortures.

Because it's not torture. Unless you don't like good rocking tonight, or maybe if you don't like subtly-cured melody tucked discreetly into short songs with one chorus. The first Boston record this aint. So if you like to be hit to death over the head with repetition or if you prefer polished production with glossy auto-harmonizered vocals, then maybe this not for you is.

Because 'C' was (almost) entirely made on 4-track cassette by someone without the formal training to know better-- quite intentionally on purpose. You can certainly make a record on your phone these days that sounds more conventionally professional than this, but the idea here was to build something that did not sound as if it had been crafted with the same tools available to everyone else for free. A lot of effort went in to making this album sound as shitty as it does.

Because it doesn't sound shitty. Hiss and hum and fart and the tones of discarded tracks that have been erased many sessions ago peeking out from under the final mix are the stuff that give recorded music some real DNA and that are often missing from modern music precisely because they're so easy to mute. There's a greasy, re-gifted thread that runs through this album, banding it together like a forcefield around the weird kids' lunch table in the corner of the cafeteria. They have all the secrets. They always have had.

And there are some secrets on this record. But you gotta listen to learn 'em. You might even have to listen twice. There isn't a note or chord out of place here. Some of it may sound a little rando at first casual pass, but I assure you that this is a very intentional work. The lyrics are insightful and bottomlessly clever. The melodies are sublime. And the atmosphere of the production gets more comfortable with each listen until you eventually can't imagine hearing it any other way.

But that's coming from a big fan who's listened to this a lot already. Several of these songs have been kicking around for years by now and these are merely the most-recent arrangements. Bandcamp isn't necessarily the most-familiar platform and that's no accident either. But it works perfectly fine, and I think you can pay for it if you want. However, I think Vincent would be more stoked if you listened to it without paying as opposed to the other way around. Go ahead, take a chance. On headphones if possible. And while you're there, 'B' aint bad neither...

(mastered by a real recording engineer, Evan Schiller)

(Try: Tell Yourself It's Good, Kick Down the Golden Door, Her Earlier Stuff)

Bellingham Herald

Call me old-fashioned (or worse) but I have trouble starting my day without a newspaper. It's not so much for the actual NEWS-- most of that has already been published electronically-- rather I guess I just like the PAPER part of it. Coffee just doesn't taste the same absent the smell of ink and pulp.

But not for $3.14 per day.

Unless I'm reading this statement wrong, that's what McClatchy thinks I'll pay for the privilege of proofreading the Herald. I've said it before, that publishing a daily newspaper looks harder every day in our realtime information culture. Dailies are folding at a startling rate and it's impossible to build an argument disputing the trend. The morning paper has lost its relevance and will soon be something only your parents remember with melancholy-- like ashtrays or rotary phones.

But it's still a drag.

I have to eyeball my computer enough for my job; I don't want to do any more recreational screening than I have to (he said on Facebook). But every minute I have to spend reading Gallagher or the local obituaries on-line is one more minute spent sitting on my ass at my desk or slumping into my phone. And neither of those things go well with breakfast.

But I can't continue to justify a thousand bucks a year for what the Herald has become. Sometimes I think maybe I'm the last subscriber-- that they're just hiking my rate up to get me to not renew so they can stop printing one copy a day and driving it to my house, flinging it onto my parking strip on the way to their real job.

It used to arrive on the porch.

The Cascadia News is great, but only weekly in 3 dimensions. The Seattle Times is a real newspaper, but I can get that news elsewhere. It's the local stuff I'll miss. Still, I just don't think I can afford it anymore. So long, Herry. You've been grand…

Metalfest

I don't need FaceBook to remember me today's date. I always wake up on August 29th knowing exactly what day it is.

And today happens to be the 40th anniversary of August 29, 1982-- a day that changed my life forever.

The event was a heavy metal jamboree at a roller rink in Bellevue called Lake Hills Arena. I'd just graduated from high school and had been to plenty of arena hard rock shows. But the concept of local music was an entirely unfamiliar one to me. I'd read about Culprit in The Rocket and saw they were playing with 8 other bands starting at noon on Saturday. So I put on my leather jacket-- even though it was August-- and pointed my '71 Impala in the direction of Bellevue.

I didn't know anyone. My metalgeek buddy Andy was supposed to come with me, but in the end buckled to the pressure of having dinner with his parents, it being his 18th birthday (remind me to phone Andy later). So I went alone. I didn't 'meet' anyone that day, but this was the first time I saw a lot of dudes who would become close friends later. They all seemed to know each other, and I was a little intimidated by their killer studded belts and spiked wrist bands-- not because I was afraid of studs & spikes, rather because I didn't have any of my own. These guys had a considerable headstart on me. Hartman, James, Layton.

By the time Bad Brad Sinsel and TKO came on after midnight, my mind (not to mention my ears) were in rubble. I'd had no idea it could be like this. At the arena shows I'd been to, there'd been a huge stage with barricades. Way up on top of the stage were the British rock stars and then down on the concrete floor in a pool of sweat & bile were we fans. But at the roller rink, there was no such divide between the performers and the audience. I distinctly remember arriving at the the dizzying realization that these kids were all from the same tribe-- that the dudes in the crowd were only the dudes in the next band. They were all just taking turns being the rock star. I had not previously understood this to be a possibility.

The first guy I observed grinning and winking at his friends in the crowd was Glen Logan from Overlord. In that tattered Levi's jacket and the Capezios, whirling around hockin' loogies and bangin' on that trashed V, I thought he was the coolest. So many cats impressed me deeply that day. Van Leiw. Matt McCourt. The Friels. Scott Earl and the Germ.

It didn't take me too long to get my turn on the stage. But I'm not sure that ever would've happened had it not been for Metalfest II. I always liked having the mic in my hand, but never got tired of being in the crowd either.

Long Live Crotchroads! Forty years...

Metal Machine Music

Insomnia is a rude bedfellow. I've been sleeping (or rather NOT sleeping) with it for most of my life, some periods worse than others. Thanks to the latest in a succession of Little Yellow Pills, these past few years have shown me some of the best sleep of my adult life. But once in a while my old adversary squeezes in between Patti and me, and I just have to get up and go to the guestroom and read it out.

What has worked a little bit lately, though, is Lou Reed's 1975 outrage, Metal Machine Music. Coming at the twilight of one his most-inspired creative periods which included Berlin and Transformer, MMM is an intentionally unlistenable brocade of feedback and tape effects, mixed at various speeds and pitches. True noise. There is no melody, rhythm, vocal or structure of any kind. And as if offering it at a time when the critic's spotlight was upon him was not wry enough for Blue Lou, Metal Machine Music is audaciously a 2-record set. Side A1 entirely indistinguishable from side A4.

I've tried white noise and mountain stream loops against insomnia and they've only served to wake me further thru sheer frustration. Metal Machine Music, though-- this might be 'just the thing...'

(if you try this at home, don't use Spotify. Because if MMM does its job and you're sleeping, you might just be jolted awake by "Uranium" by Kraftwerk, which Spotify assumes you want to listen to next. And the beginning of this song sounds much like the Emergency Broadcast System alert tone that we've all only ever heard as 'a test'. And that's not good for sleeping.)

Burn Out Loud

I stopped being conventionally 'proud' of Vincent's musical accomplishments once he became an adult. But I'm still a fan, and am really jazzed about his new album 'Burn Out Loud.' A year in the making, it's a technicolor departure from the lower-fi 4-track cassette recordings of the past three years. I had the rare treat of previewing it last week in Brooklyn and I can tell you it is a rich and prismatic tapestry with lots of surprises tucked into its pleats. Like a rubber duck piñata filled with nips, nails and chocolate caviar, all you have to do is hit it hard and gifts start flowing...

Professionally recorded in Boston, pre-mixed in New York and glazed in West Seattle, 'BoL' is a filling art rock meal of a record. It is being pre-released today, with the World Premier coming at 6pm PDT. You probably don't have Bandcamp already, but that's the only reason you don't. It's free and easy to download and there really is some stuff on there that you won't find on other screaming services. 'BoL' will be on Spotify next week, but if you want to be first on your block, meet me on Bandcamp tonight and we'll rock together.

Robert Blake

Don’t worry, I remember what I was saying last June about my record player.

In case you don’t, it got exploded in an electrical accident and didn’t work for five years. We finally got around to replacing it, but then that one didn’t work either-- so we had to take it to a specialist in Seattle who eventually fixed it up like new.

I was anxious to listen to some of the records that had piled up during those quiet years, but the repair shop was in Ravenna. Luckily Robert was in the neighborhood and offered to pick it up on his way home.

When I went to his house in the York District to collect it later that day, Robert slid a nice 180-gram copy of his latest album RECITATIVE on top.

“For your listening party,” he said with a wink.

I’d already worn out a copy of the CD, but was jazzed to have a vinyl copy—even if it did say LARRY on the back…

DAY #4: Recitative, Robt Sarazin Blake. Gift from the artist, 2023. Favorite side: Act I side A

If there’s a harder-working man in Bellingham show business than Robert Blake, I guess don’t know that dude. A Pacific Northwest native who’s called Bellingham home for more than 25 years, Blake is seemingly everywhere where there’s a PA, particularly in the summer. For more than 20 years, he has hosted and booked the wildly popular season-long Thursday night Happy Hour series in the garden at Boundary Bay Brewery. He’s toured extensively in North America and Northern Europe, playing small stages and house shows for fiercely loyal audiences of friends. He hosts and books the pandemic-born but surprisingly durable traveling livestream From the Kitchen Table. And of course, he is the founder and ringmaster of Whatcom’s favorite summer festival, the 21-year-old Subdued Stringband Jamboree.

And honestly, he doesn’t always even need a PA. He’ll play your wedding or your funeral, your porch or your pantry. All he needs is an acoustic guitar and some friends.

Robert will bring the songs. How he has time to write all these songs—let alone record and release them, usually on his own Same Room Records—is beyond me. This is his 11th album.

His father was a real live folk musician when he was growing up, so folk music is in Robert’s blood and bones. But his music aint really folk music, any more than all music is essentially folk music. You could call it Americana. You could call it roots. You could call it ‘singer-songwriter’ if you wanted to piss me off.

In the end it’s not all that important what you call it—neither he nor I will even have any way of knowing. Of greater urgency is what’s it sound like?

Like most rootsy Americana singer-songwriter folk troubadours, Robert Blake is a great poet and his songs need words to develop. Lots and lots of words. His streamy singing style is often as conversational as it is melodic, and some songs take on an accompanied monolog format. This works particularly well when the performer is introducing the band or reminding punters to tip their bartenders. The references to Dylan are handy (even though he’s not really-- or at least not only-- a folk singer) but there’s also a lot of Lou (Reed), Prine (John) and Todd (Snider) in his delivery and intent. He’s a storyteller.

And the stories on RECITATIVE are diverse and intriguing. Robert allows the occasional good-time up-tempo no-foul ramble like “Single Women” but also doesn’t shy away from a piercing purpose piece like “Own House, Own Guns” or “19 Shot.” His characters are inked around the edges with suggestion rather than description. You recognize that dude in “The Other Side of Fck it” without being spoonfed his vitals, and the utter hopelessness of his grim situation rings true as punch.

There's lots of humor here, like on the politically-perfect "Keeping Track." Lots of wonderfully wordy wordplay, too-- see: "Couples" and "Work." Other songs are just plain nice to listen to, and I can’t usually walk away from a spin through this record without the melancholy “Sketches” stuck in my head. Often for a week.

The images pile up and so do the reflections. Blake tucks references into verses where you might not expect to find them: same-sex marriage; gun violence; the collateral risks of war; imbeciles being President of the United States. It’s all here if you listen.

Professional musicians these days need to be flexible, and Robert Blake is indeed limber and well-hatted, never seeming to play the same song the same way twice. I’ve seen him do these songs a lot live, and it’s always a different experience. Sometimes it’s him playing solo, or maybe Jan’s to his left. David & Aaron are usually there in a combo of more than three, but not always. Sometimes it’s the whole High, Wide & Handsome Band. But not always.

The backing band on RECITATIVE is a group of friends from the Hudson Valley met on the road and courted into the studio on their turf, way back in 2015. Compared to other sparser Robert Blake recordings it’s practically an orchestra-- featuring keys, pedal steel, rich supporting vocals and the staggeringly lyrical horn interplay of Thomas Deakin.

It’s worth noting that this whole band returned the favor three years later, traveling the opposite direction to back Robert at the 2018 Jamboree, a show that eventually surfaced as the live album ONE SUMMER NIGHT. True to their words, the songs take on new life and dimension in a live setting, culminating with a humbling 13-minute version of the last song on RECIATATIVE, “Really Hard.” It was powerful live, and the recording does a faithful job of capturing some rare Saturday night magic.

The packaging of RECITATIVE is top-shelf. From the Michael Costelloe painting on the front to Larry’s name on the back, this is a heavy and handsome package—beautifully designed and produced. Lots of photos in the gatefold + melodious liner notes by the artist. The 2-record set is actually 360 grams and fully 85 minutes of music—an ambitious project fully realized. A triumph.

It occurred to me that I’ve always wondered what RECITATIVE meant, and that I’d never looked it up. I just now did, and it’s fitting. I won’t spoil it for you. Look it up for yourself (it’s on the internet) and pull it up on Bandcamp if you don’t own a copy of your own. Enjoy!

Devotchka

I don’t collect records the way I used to. With a few freakish exceptions (YKWYA) nobody does.

To be fair, I was never an obsessive—even in the 1980s. I anticipated and purchased the new records by my favorite bands on their release dates—but I was no completist. Some of my friends had problems, though. Bret had to have every available version and format. When WASP released a 12” picture disc single of “I Wanna Be Somebody,” he’d buy one (sometimes two) even though he already had the white vinyl, the gold vinyl, the clear vinyl, the splatter vinyl, the die cut 7” and the Japanese import.

That first WASP may have been my favorite record of the entire era. But one domestic copy of the LP was sufficient for me. I still have it.

But sometimes we buy records we don’t need. That’s why there’s Record Store Day.

Week #6: DeVotchKa, A Mad and Faithful Telling. Purchased at Avalon Records in Bellingham on Record Store Day, 2019. Favorite side: I honestly can’t tell them apart…

Like many people, I initially became aware of DeVotchKa via the alternate art form of film. It is still impossible for me to separate the plot & performance of LITTLE MISS SUNSHINE from the music of DeVotchKa. They are one and the same, and I fell hard for both of them in 2006.

By the time I got hip, though, it would be impossible to see the band in a venue appropriate to their makeup. Between Nick Urata’s emotive crooning and the band’s array of subtle acoustic instrumentation, DeVotchKa demands to be seen in an intimate, comfortable venue. Preferably one with a round stage, velvet curtains, strong cocktails and maybe even a cigarette girl.

Imagine our disappointment seeing them for the first time in 2008 at the hellish SoDo Showbox, a concrete cooler that seemed too base even for Motorhead when I saw them there (on my birthday) several years later.

No. The days of being able to see DeVotchKa at the Triple Door or the Neptune, or busking on a sidewalk are done gone. They have been for decades.

So what’s a casual fan to do other than stir one up, slip into the smoking jacket and listen to DeVotchKa’s records at home? A MAD AND FAITHFUL TELLING is a perfectly good choice, because it sounds exactly like every other Devotchka record.

Not that I own or have even heard ‘every other DeVotchKa record’ but when I cracked the cellophane on this one after staring at it for five years, I was struck by how much it reminded me not only of the LITTLE MISS SUNSHINE soundtrack, but in fact everything I’d ever heard by the band, both live and on record.

For kicks, I whipped out my streamer and punched up the band’s latest album, 2018’s THIS NIGHT FALLS FOREVER. And I’ll be damned if it might as well have been the same clutch of songs.

All of which begs another hysterical, historical question: when a band puts out 12 records in 20 years and they all sound exactly the same—is the artist to be praised for consistency or derided for lack of growth?

It doesn’t really make much nevermind to me. I happen to like DeVotchKa’s tangos and timbre, their embrace of non-traditional instrumentation and the fact that they often sing in a language I don’t understand. But you don’t really need to own every record they’ve made. In fact, you really only need one. It doesn’t much matter which…

Coming in March: Oscar Snubs

(Cynic’s note: As if to spite me, DeVotchKa will be playing in town between the velvet curtains of the unspeakably luxurious and inviting Mt. Baker Theater on Thursday. The last time Patti and I saw them, we actually had to walk out because the sound was so bad at the first Tune-Up festival two years ago. But presumably all the microphones will actually be working indoors at the acoustically-perfect MBT. We probably should go…)

The Snubs

With the 96th Academy Awards ceremony coming up Sunday night, my attention turns as always to the stack of records accumulated during the five years my record player was broken.

The refrigerator got traumatically bashed apart at that same time-- also the stove, hotwater heater and CD player. Those were all replaced lickety split-- but the turntable gathered dust, must and disgust until recently.

By way of perspective, the academy awards for best actress and best actor that year (they’re called Oscars) went to two actors (we can just call them both actors) who portrayed actual historical figures. We call them biopics (it’s OK to call them bi AH pix. I do).

Green Book winning the Oscar for Best Picture that year was an outrage, particularly ironically since it was Black Panther that got most conspicuously beat. In early March, that’s something we call THE SNUBS.

Equally ironical, then, that there was a record waiting for me by a band of that very name.

Week #7: The Snubs. Gift from Hartman, 2021. Favorite side: B

If the Dead Kennedys had a recessive Dead Moon gene and wore disguises like Deadmau5, that band would be The Snubs.

Fast and funny, The Snubs don’t get cheated when it comes to content. When you’re getting 15 songs on a 20-minute record, you are not getting cheated. Or snubbed for that matter. It’s impressive what you can accomplish when you play fast and don’t solo.

OK, there is a guitar solo on “Washed Up Diying [sic] Fish” but it doesn’t exactly bog the song down. “Dump Run” crams 200 words into a 45-second song. Some of those words are “… found a bloody knife in an old leather pouch.”

Singer/guitarist Tommy De Nyd’s lyrics are quite hilarious and are in fact printed in unredacted form on the insert. Pearls like “Fake Mustache,” “Growing a Tail (True Tale of a SWM)” and of course “My ‘Punk Rock’ Parents Raised a Republican Kid” explore themes of isolation, neighborhood contempt and generally low aspirations-- just like their heroes. Or at least as much as any theme can be explored in 1:15. “We Suck at Partying Now” has a Monday Night Football reference, which I particularly appreciated.

It looks like The Snubs are from Seattle. They made this record in 2016 at Egg with Conrad and there appear to be several subsequent releases at least on BandCamp. I’ve never heard of them playing at Daryl’s, though, so maybe they gave up.

If they felt like they weren’t getting the respect they deserved, they’d be in good March company. Just ask Greta, Scarlett or Sofia. Shit’s tough all over. Happy National Women’s Day!

(Coming this spring: Growing up Jeff)

Total NAR.

It’s OK. We’ve all seen the headlines. We know that thanks to a fistful of class action lawsuits against the National Association of Realtors (NAR) it’s going to be cheaper to buy and sell real estate in the Brave New World. As a 20+ year member of the NAR, however, I’m a little disappointed that the largest trade organization in the US wasn’t able to put down these suits without wrecking my flow. But I’m not a defendant and you’re probably not a plaintiff—so no big whoop...

At its essence, Friday’s $418M settlement is about transparency in compensation. But there’s a lot of space between price fixing and simply employing a system that has worked to the mutual benefit of both buyers and sellers for almost 30 years. And one of the unintended consequences of this legal pantsing will be a back-to-the-future stripping of protections for buyers moving forward.

Prior to 1996, real estate brokers—almost always men—represented only sellers and composed 3-page contracts with golf pencils on the hoods of luxury sedans. They’d write buyers' names in the blanks and give them the phone number of the title company. But they weren’t helping them schedule or navigate a home inspection. They weren’t working closely with lenders to make sure the best financing terms were applied. They weren’t steeping in the comps to make sure buyers understood the true value (not merely price) of a home. They weren’t representing them. This era is fondly recalled by the old guard as ‘buyer beware.’

With the rise in popularity of buyer agency in the early part of this century, buyers realized all the afore-mentioned benefits and more-- thanks to brokers who were representing their interests exclusively. And I just don’t see how we haven’t litigated ourselves back to the stone age with this settlement.

There is much still to be clarified between now and July. But what’s super clear right now is that it will no longer be legal for a seller to advertise a buyer’s agent’s commission. Seller may indeed still be willing to pay one-- but how that information is conveyed to a buyer via their representation is still a tall mystery. If the Missouri jury who decided this case thought there was selective exposure to listings because some offered 3% and others offered 2.5%, imagine how surprised we’ll all be by the difference in 2% and zero.

The NAR and individual brokerages have little choice than to apply as positive a spin as possible to this dizzying development. Think of all the opportunities for innovation! The adages are really flowing now. “Change is the only constant.” “If you can’t beat em, join em.” And of course, “Wish in one hand and shit in the other and see which one fills up first.”

Rather than learn all the new handshakes, a lot of older agents will simply run out the clock on their licenses and retire. Likewise, a lot of newer agents-- who historically work almost exclusively with buyers-- will surely do a career re-select. I like to think of myself as middle-aged despite what my abacus says. My plan is to not only hang around but in fact dig in. I for one welcome our new Overlords!

But it’s going to be different. The retail travel industry was pretty much choked out in the early days of the internet. So far, despite some peripheral degradation, the real estate industry has withstood similar sacking. But the same faceless internet-only remote contract generation firms will certainly emerge to provide clerical assistance to buyers in this new landscape, the same way the flat-fee MLS brokerages have for FSbOs on the selling side. Probably aided in some sinister way by a eye. It’s just another step in the pajamafication of our once-proud culture.

I’m happy to get together to talk more about this if anyone is still reading or even remotely interested. If you’re thinking about making a real estate move, or if your parents or grown children are, or your friends. Even your enemies. I don’t much care.

Call me!

KISS ‘77

We interrupt the regularly-scheduled coverage of the collapse of civilization to bring you this Extreme TBT: Forty years ago tonight: KISS at the Seattle Center Coliseum...

Not surprisingly, this concert was the first for a lot of dudes I’ve known. Like for so many white middle-aged men of middle-class upbringing, KISS was my introduction to rock music and my dominant social and artistic reference until I got to college and discovered how much more there was.

I’d barely missed them on the ‘77 tour. But the subsequent years’ biding, while agonizing, had given me a chance to immerse in the band-- to really go to school. By November 1979, I not only knew every song and lyric, but all the members’ birthdays & birthnames, favorite foods, musical influences and accent colors. I could draw pictures of KISS all day and often did. I could forge their autographs and I practiced drawing what they’d look like without their makeup.

There was no way for me to have known that the band was already well beyond its creative peak by the time I arrived at the party. I didn’t have a crystal ball, get off my fucking back already. It is amusing to consider now, however, that this Dynasty tour was billed at the time as The Return of KISS. It was still the ‘70s! No way could I have been expected to know the band would spend most of the next four decades returning. I did recognize-- in my own soft, pink heart late at night in the solitude of my own bed-- that this new record wasn’t as good as Love Gun. But I wore it out just the same…

In a creative outburst considered productive even by the busy standards of the day, KISS had produced seven studio records, two live double records, a sprawling greatest hits collection and the ambitious set of four coordinated solo albums between 1974 and the turn of the decade. Add to this the made-for-TV movie, the Marvel comic book and all the lunchboxes and action figures, model kits, wastebaskets, sleeping bags, transistor radios and pinball machines—and this was one hard-working, high-grossing act. Rock bands these days (whatever that term even means in the modern entertainment economy) aren’t usually allowed to make even two records in six years. This was a different era. The vinyl only weighed 90 grams and it cost $6. The concert tickets were only 8.

We were just kids, we didn’t know how it was supposed to work. Dennis Gregory (not a flying toy) and I camped out overnight at Mervyn’s in Burien to buy tickets to a festival seating show that would never even sell out. Then we waited, listening to Dressed to Kill as summer slouched away unnoticed.

At last the day of the show arrived. Instead of driving us to school in the station wagon, Dennis’ mom (with my own parents’ reluctant blessing) dropped us off at Seattle Center, near the Jetsonesque arena originally constructed for the 1962 World’s Fair (what is now Key Arena was less than 20 years old at the time).

The crowd we encountered once reaching the Coliseum was a bit unsettling. Dennis & I were reasonably sheltered suburban orchestra geeks in the very early stages of exploring any semblance of independence. We weren’t tripping balls and weren’t even drinking vodka and orrrange juice. What I remember about this particularly sunny late-autumn morning is that most of the other kids milling around were.

We got in line. There were only about 50 people in front of us, but by the time the doors opened a couple of hours after dark, we were several hundred deep-- back closer to the fountain. Some of our line-mates didn’t start moving once the traffic finally did, sprawled out in puddles of barf in the mulch beneath the great Elms. Those guys will have their own versions of the day’s events, surely posting on social media tonight as well, in observance of this important anniversary.

Again—we didn’t know what we were supposed to do. No one had briefed us. Once inside the arena, we ran directly to the stage which as it turns out WAS the exact correct thing to do. We were two rows from the fence. But being so green, we quickly second-guessed our position. Maybe we should get a killer seat instead. We just didn’t know! Eventually we began ebbing backward against the fierce tide rushing in from the front doors, the vomitty Southern Comfort breath of the each new wave washing over us until eventually we were standing in the middle of the main floor, out of the thick and closer to the sound board. We went to the souvenir table.

The Rockets were a band from Detroit. They spent the 1970s serving at the pleasure of a variety of headliners, kind of the equivalent of a career minor league baseball player. I vividly recall during their opener, with the sound up loud, and the stage lights pulsing down that this is what it’s really like. This is how live music looks and sounds. How perfectly shitty it was! The sound was muddy and sightlines were poor and the band looked tired and the whole huge building smelled like burning soap on a rope. I looked at Dennis trying to figure out if he was feeling the same disappointment. I tried asking, but he couldn’t hear me. The Rockets closed with Fleetwood Mac’s “Oh Well” and left the stage to deafening indifference, most of the 12,000 kids having come to see something else entirely.

My eyes burned. The houselights between bands were harsh, the air sticky with smoke. We didn’t know what to do in between acts. We’d forfeited our squares of concrete in the pit and all the decent seats were taken by now too. We didn’t smoke or drink and we didn’t know how to pick up chicks. We went back to the souvenirs.

I’d spent the past two years of my life imagining this moment, the moment when I finally would get to not only see and hear the only rock group I liked, but to actually commune with KISS—to wordlessly discourse semi-personally with Ace, Gene, Peter and Paul. I’d spent so much time manifesting what this experience would be like—finally witnessing their movements in three dimensions and actually seeing them see me. I wanted to be more than a spectator-- I wanted to be an acknowledged participant. I had gained admission to the Temple and it was finally time to at least worship, if not partake in an unholy sacrifice at the altar of disposable, self-conscious increasingly commercially processed rock and roll.

The show, of course, was just okay. Gene flew and Paul called us See-a-tal. But Ace looked bored and Peter very tired. Since I knew all the songs, my mind could color in the voids left by a bassy PA booming in a concrete sports arena. Since I knew the faces and the costumes, my mind could sharpen what detail was blurred from a distance of 300’. Since I’d come this far and invested so much, my mind could clean up in post what the actual moment lacked. In all, though, it was a fairly disappointing realization. It’s never as good as you imagine, if you imagine it too much. Romanticism is romantic-- unless you at some point are forced to face down True Reality, in which case a good stiff drink really does come in handy…

But not that night. Not on Wednesday November 21, 1979. That night we settled for a weird setlist and an overpriced program, a handful of confetti and a poignant memory. Patrick McDonald trashed the show in the next day’s Seattle Times and I don’t even remember who came to Thanksgiving dinner. I got better at enjoying rock concerts as I grew older, and in fact got to be something of an expert eventually. I’ve attended hundreds of shows by now, maybe a thousand. I’ve even seen KISS another half-dozen times, although they would never be as authentic as they were that night, with all-original members and five weeks remaining in the 1970s. I was there, of that much I can be certain. The time—where does it go?

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Metal Gateway

Super stoked for my good friend Brian Sibley and his new podcast Metal Gateway. Each week Brian interviews a different used-up rivethead about how they first got into heavy metal. Lots of interesting historical discussions ensue.

Episode III lands today featuring a particularly chafed piece of spent metal trash.

Pass it on!

Listen to METAL GATEWAY here.