THE DEATH OF TOMMY AND LINEAR EXISTENCE

It’s been a little over three weeks since the passing of Tommy Ramone. Profile pictures in tribute have been replaced, and the eulogizing has ceased. Thankfully, the online eulogizing for the man who played drums on the first three Ramones albums was kept to a minimum. It’s not like he was Maya Angelou, even though the Ramones were about as ugly as Maya Angelou.

It’s more than a little comical when people who did not personally know a particular famous musician, actor, writer, artist, or whatever, get misty eyed and put up shit online that amounts to a eulogy for a dead stranger.

It’s not as if death erases their works. That’s the thing about the arts—They are immortalized. You can still go back and listen to that album or read that book. So what’s the problem? Another example of group thought and follow the leader I suppose.

I put up a little R.I.P. for Tommy Ramone on my Facebook and left it at that. I have to admit when he died I felt something. It wasn’t sadness or loss, but it was something. Initially, I wasn’t quite sure what it was.

I’m not a huge Ramones fan. Out of their entire, massive discography, I’ve owned only four albums: the obligatory Ramones Mania collection, the first self titled one, the lackluster Subterranean Jungle, and the much overlooked Road to Ruin.

To be honest ,I think the Ramones are overrated, as overrated as Nirvana and the Beatles.

Joey’s vocals often sounded like mumbling, and the bulk of the lyrics were dumb and disposable. The saving grace of the Ramones, for me, was always Johnny’s guitar; that high-voltage buzzsaw attack that was all down-strokes is the definitive punk guitar sound, yet I can think of at least fifty other punk bands I would rather listen to instead of the Ramones.

My favorite segment and era of the punk rock was always the Southern California bands of the early ’80s, T.S.O.L., the Adolescents, Circle One, Youth Brigade, Bad Religion, and of course Black Flag.

Yes, I recognize that the aforementioned bands probably wouldn’t have came to be without the foundation the Ramones built,, but I still would rather listen to the old school L.A. bands. The argument that the Ramones should occupy some elevated pantheon because they were the founding fathers of a genre is similar to the argument that blues trumps rock because the foundations of rock’n roll are found in the blues. Yeah, I get that, but preferences are preferences.                                                                                                            

So, what was it that I felt when Tommy Ramone died? It wasn’t surprise. He was proceeded in death by three other band members: Joey in 2001, Dee Dee in 2002, and Johnny in 2004. Linear existence is no surprise. We are all going to die. And that was it! The death of Tommy Ramone reinforced the harsh reality of linear existence.

I mean for fuck’s sake, it’s 2014, and all the original members of the Ramones are dead, so is Michael Jackson, and R.E.M. broke up a few years ago.

And that is a trip for me to think about, a reminder that today is today and yesterday was yesterday.

Of course I realize time can only move forward, and we all have a future date with a pinebox and a headstone. To acknowledge this fact is one thing, easy to do. Actually dealing with it and, fully, accepting is not so easy.

When growing up, we have living, breathing icons and long-standing institutions we live in the shadow of or even admire. They were always there, so when they are gone, the absence can feel surreal and unreal. If it happens over and over again, the world can start to look and feel less and less familiar. ( but keeping up is essential)

Linear existence is a motherfucker, and it took the death of a drummer from a band I’ve always been luke warm on to hammer home that point. Thanks, asshole.

Klosterman Is Still Analyzing (YOU MUST READ THIS BOOK)

 

 

 

An aspiring author should have a list of favorite writers, those whose works can inspire a young scribe. Chuck Klosterman is one name that ranks high on my list.

I remember when I stumbled upon a curiously titled book of his called “Sex, Drugs and Cocoa Puffs.” The book is not as scandalous as the title might suggest—it’s a book about pop-culture, a semi-academic, non-stuffy critical analysis of pop-culture.

Klosterman goes deep on subjects that many academics regard as superficial. If someone lives in Las Vegas, he or she doesn’t analyze the meaning of neon lights. They are just sort of there. That’s what modern pop-culture is the equivalent of. It’s become so deeply embedded in our society; it’s now an omnipresent backdrop. It’s always there.
With his magnifying glass like analysis, Klosterman discovered significance in the insignificant.

His books are chalked full of oh wow moments.

Klosterman gets at ideas that are under our noses but often go unnoticed. He went through those ideas at a rapid pace in “Sex Drugs and Cocoa Puffs. Klosterman wrote about how MTV’s “the Real World was not a reflection of youth culture, but a pseudo–mirror that changed it, and he also declared “Saved By the Bell” to be the ultimate example of suspension of disbelief on a TV show.

Ten years after “Sex, Drugs, and Cocoa Puffs,” Klosterman is still at it—with his most recent book, “I Wear the

Black Hat,” Klosterman dissects villainy. What is a villain? Why does someone get labeled as a villain?

In “I Wear the Black Hat,” Klosterman presents a formula for determining a villain, someone who knows the most but cares the least. He states that a combination of those traits does not automatically make someone nefarious, but if someone exhibits them, he or she will be thought of as a “villain.” Klosterman’s first example of this misjudgment is applied to Machiavelli, and I thought “wow.”

Each chapter is an essay about a public figure’s perceived villainy, and a wide array of names slither their way into the book– Newt Gingrich, Bill Clinton, Aleister Crowley,  Ice Cube, Joe Paterno and, of course, Adolf Hitler.

The diversity of names in the book is due to Klosterman’s compare and contrast method of examination. One of the most striking examples of such is the chapter “Easier Than Typing.” It’s about Bernhard Goetz, a now seemingly forgotten name from New York City’s past.

Klosterman opens the chapter by asking readers what if Batman was real, yet they knew nothing of his motivations, and with only surface knowledge of his actions would they think of him as a hero? Klostermen then elegantly transitions into the story of Bernhard Goetz.

While riding the subway in December of 1984, Goetz was approached by four young men—They asked for money. Goetz shot them, all lived, and one was left paralyzed.

The young men were carrying sharpened screwdrivers and had criminal records. Goetz had been assaulted and robbed two years earlier. Goetz was white, and the young men were black.

Klosterman writes that shortly after the shooting, Goetz was cheered and championed by many New Yorkers, at a time in which the city’s crime rate was 70 percent higher than the national average.

But public opinion began to shift as Goetz granted media interviews. He displayed no remorse over the shooting and called it “easier than typing.” Goetz became a villain not because of what he did, but because of what he said about the incident after the fact.

Klosterman sums it up by saying “Vigilantism’s profound contradiction is that every socially aware person agrees that it cannot be allowed to exist, even though huge swaths of society would approve if it sometimes did. As long as Goetz remained a nameless, faceless concept, those incongruous realities were in equilibrium. As soon as Goetz became real. He was not merely a problem of democracy; he was a thin man in a leather jacket without remorse.” Upon reading that, I thought “oh wow.”

Therein lays the brilliance of Chuck Klosterman and “I Wear the Black Hat.”

 

Reel Wolf Presents “the Underworld” (THIS IS NUCLEAR HOT FIRE!!!!)

Hip-hop/ rap is not dead–it just resides in the underground, independently.

I’m repelled by the mainstream, swag-fag, autotune, pop-shit like Dracula to garlic or a crucifix.

Kendrick Lamar, Rick Ross, and Drake are garbage to me. You couldn’t pay me to download that bullshit.

But this, this video/song is an example of what I like to hear in hip-hop. It’s one of the sickest posse cuts I have ever heard, a platoon of underground heavy-hitters going in bar after bar and verse after verse.

A common conversation among hip-hip heads is who should collaborate with who, who would you like to hear together on a track, and when two, or more, MCs are on a song together and their flows create some type of synergy, see Ill Bill and Vinnie Paz, (Heavy Metal Kings) it often sounds like some type of magic. And the type of vibe on this track is magic of the darkest variety possible.

The imagery and lyrics would make many mainstream fans recoil, suicide by drinking every day cleaning chemicals, smoking a joint with pages from the Bible, Vinnie Paz playing Russian roulette, and Ill Bill even works an Aleister Crowley quote into his verse! I eat this stuff up like candy. Not everyday can be a sunny day, and I think music, art, literature, and movies can and should reflect a spectrum of emotions.

So many styles, cliques, labels, and groups are represented in this one song, La Coaka Nostra, D-12, Strange Music , Army of the Pharaohs, and so and so forth, and all of it meshes together perfectly, from Vinnie Paz’s gruff bulldozer-like flow to Tech N9ne’s verbal gymnastics.

Iconoclast (Boyd Rice documentary)

Get In The Van By Henry Rollins

 

The Return Of La Coka Nostra

If you think Eminem, Mac Lethal, and Mac Miller are the only white rappers with skill, you are sadly mistaken. May I point you in the direction of La Coka Nostra, LCN, this dope thing of ours. If you are an underground hip-hop head, you already know who they are, more than just another rap clique: LCN is a super group, a clothing line, and a world-wide movement, a movement to bring that rah-rah grit back to hip-hop. The music of La Coka Nostra is about as far removed from the glitzy auto-tune bullshit that now dominates the charts as you could get.

 I had the privilege of seeing them at the Beaumont in Kansas City,MO  in 2009. It was a hip-hop show, but there was crowd surfing and moshing galore. They go so hard on stage, it provokes that type of response. My show-going days of my late teens were spent in the punk scene, and LCN had a stage presence that equally rivaled the best hardcore and punk bands I saw in my youth.

Originally the core of the group became Big Left, Slaine, Ill Bill, Danny Boy O’Connor, Everlast, and DJ Lethal.(House Of Pain) Big Left left the  immediate lineup, but is still part of the extended family and drops the occasional verse with LCN. It turns out LCN have a new album that is due out the end of this month. Everlast isn’t on this one, but he hasn’t severed ties. LCN released a statement saying that Everlast is not on this album or touring at this time because his daughter has cystic fibrosis, and that’s a more pressing matter, but there is a chance he could again perform and record with LCN sometime in the future. The new La Coka Nostra album, Masters of the Dark Arts is due in stores July 31^st Usually, I’m only psyched up about a few albums a year, and this year, just like in 2009, it’s La Coka Nostra.

New Mac Lethal Video: Mac Goes Hard Over Goyte’s “Somebody That I Used To Know”

I was overjoyed when I watched this on my Facebook feed this morning. It’s none other than Mac Lethal spitting fire over a Goyte instrumental. Mac actually lets his fans vote via Facebook on what beat should be used for these videos. A truly talented MC can flow over ANY beat. Google Crooked i-Fireflies for another prime example, a West Coast rapper who was once signed to Death Row records rapping over an Owl City instrumental!

Mac Lethal is more than just the dude who did the pancakes video, but in the era of the viral video, these videos allow his name to reach people who otherwise wouldn’t have known about him. Me, I’ve being listening to Mac Lethal for awhile now. I bought the 11:11 album a few months after it came out. The speed of his delivery on this is jaw- dropping; it’s right up there with Tech N9ne and Twista. The bulk of this freestyle is about the difference between “your” and “you’re” This is something every English major, or just anyone who possesses even the most rudimentary grammar skills, can get behind. Check it out. Mac Lethal is the shit.

Occupy The Fire by Jesse Jones

This is a video of not-so-famous musician Jesse Jones.  A couple days ago, out of the blue, Jesse contacted me, wanting me to review this video. I said I would. I don’t know why I’m reviewing this. I could give a shit about Jesse Jones’s musical aspirations. Jesse has been doing this music thing for a long time. I’ve known Jesse for awhile now. I first met him at a New Year’s Eve party, and the only reason I decided to talk to him was because he had on a Black Flag shirt.

He has been chasing the dream of rock stardom for many years now, and it still hasn’t come true; maybe his luck might change, seeing as he has recently made the move to L.A. Jesse was once in the band Dynamo; a band founded by Sonny and Joe Remlinger (now of Super Black Market) Jesse also did a stint in the 8-UPs along side Matti-Mat Alvarado. Somewhere along the way, Jesse went unplugged and is now doing acoustic folk rock.

Let me state once again, I have no idea why I am reviewing this video or why I even watched it in the first place. I’m not into folk music, and to be quite honest, ninety percent of the music being made today, across all genre lines, does nothing for me. With that said here we go:

What we have here is an homage to Billy Joel’s “We Didn’t Start the Fire,” but updated for the 21st century.”We Didn’t Start the Fire” was a condensed history lesson of a post World War 2 society, and “Occupy the Fire” comes off like an urgent breaking news update. I like the idea; the song is decent, but it felt like it was incomplete,missing a few more verses. The events Billy Joel sang about were in a chronological order, and Jesse shots references at the listener in a semi-organized blender-like fashion, but that works as far a capturing a sense of chaos, like the song it self becomes the soundtrack for a nation entering into the fourth stage of Polybius’s cycles of government. I think if Jesse sticks with it, he could still become a really big star one day; never mind that his singing voice sounds like Jeff Spicoli meets Conor Oberst.