The next time you’re loitering in a book store or dumpster diving, look for my various pieces in both The Onion and Harp Magazine, two brand new additions to my resume. Maybe you should buy Harp, so I can continue writing for them, and The Onion is free.
I’m especially excited about the Harp feature (should be the issue hitting stands next week). It’s an extensive interview with Tom Scharpling and Jon Wurster of…Scharpling and Wurster fame, plus a sidebar history of seminal comedy duos.
For The Onion, I’ll be penning an essay about Marilyn Manson (among other things). Yep.
Well, I’m still here. I guess that’s the good news.
I’ve survived May Day, with its illiterate marchers:
These posters (above) were everywhere. Everywhere. You just have to wonder about people who’d represent themselves like that. Let alone march with a huge banner with a boner like that in it. (You may have to click the photo to get my point here). Thanks to Kean for snapping this.
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I’ve survived Christi Himmelfahrt, the silliest-named German holiday, on the 14th, which is also “Men’s Day,” with men roaming the city drinking beer until they can barely stagger. This is, as you may have parsed, Ascension Day. What that has to do with men in particular I have no idea. But it’s a good day to hole up inside. I had to go to Hauptbahnhof, though; I had no idea it was a holiday.
Modest suggestion, Germany: In America, you’ll find signs on many businesses saying, for example, “We will be closed all day on Tuesday, December 25, Christmas Day.” Now, Christmas is not only a date everyone in the U.S. recognizes, but it’s one that never changes. It’s always December 25. Things like Ascension Day and Whitsun (which is this weekend: stuff is closed on Monday, folks) change according to Easter, the date of which is different every year. I know courtesy isn’t big around here, but if Berlin is, as it pretends, a “world city,” perhaps it might actually act like one and tell those of us who practice other religions, or no religion at all, when the religious state holidays are.
Hauptbahnhof was jammed, of course, but not with as many drunks as I’d anticipated. The downstairs is still dark and gloomy, but the Diplodocus skeleton upstairs is a nice touch.
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I survived the reopening of Tresor, although, of course, I didn’t go. For me, Tresor will always be the basement of the bombed building it’s named for, and even that turned into a bridge-and-tunnel-kid club before it closed down. Several people sent me an IHT story about Dmitri’s plans for his new location. Not that he’s ever asked my advice, but first I’d do something about the name. By the time he finally finds the dough to make this happen — if he ever does — people will have long ago forgotten what a “modem” is.
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I’m surviving Spargel season.
I have to say, I don’t see the attraction of white asparagus, which is what Germans invariably mean by “Spargel.” It seems fairly tasteless, is often quite fibrous (not always: when my pals Ranya and Susanna had a restaurant they could make it well), and is served in such boring ways — with ham and boiled potatoes, with schnitzel and boiled potatoes, with Béarnaise sauce dumped over it most of the time, or just plain butter — that I tend to avoid restaurants during the season. (Well, being broke has something to do with it, too).
Fortunately, the Vietnamese guy I buy lots of vegetables from has a good supply of superb green asparagus at remarkable prices, and thanks to him I’ve discovered roasted asparagus, which gives it a totally different flavor, due to the caramelization of sugars I’d never guessed existed, although, in retrospect, they’re certainly there. There’s just so much flavor in green asparagus I’m eternally grateful it’s not in such high demand around here, making it easily found and affordable for the likes of me. But, if a recent trip to the outdoor market in Hackescher Markt means anything, the Germans may be catching on. I just had to snap that label!
Fitness: yes, actual vitamins’ll do that to you…
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And I expect I’ll survive Burger King’s unsettling campaign for its new sandwich: Long Chicken. No relation — I don’t think — to Long Pork.
I’m posting two lost tracks from the halcyon days of do-it-yourself bedroom recording in England, captured in large part by the MESSTHETICS compilations that roll off the presses a couple times a year. These two are uncomped, at least in CD form, and are favorites of mine that I’ve come to know in recent years. I thought it was high time that I shared them – because now I can! The first is a creepy haunter from a band called SUBVERSE. Finding any sort of information about it or them online is impossible, so I’ll tell you what I know. It comes from an LP compilation called “STARFORCE STUDIOS – COMPILATION 1â€Â. I’m going to guess at a date of 1979. That’s when much of these lost sounds were being laid down, and that’s a year that will probably go down as being, on whole, the most depressing in England’s recent history. “Chance Romanceâ€Â has the feel of being recording whilst looking out the window on a 40-degree, fog-shrouded day at dole queues stretched around the block amid a grim miners’ protest. Good times!
DEVIL’S DYKES (pictured here) are a wild-ass party by comparison. This jaunty holler of a number from a Brighton band was originally found on a 1978 comp called “VAULTAGE 78â€Â , and if you like what you hear here, you can grab the whole compilation by clicking over to here (and ’79 and ’80 too). Just promise you’ll come back to Detailed Twang when you’re done.
A podcast you rock-n-roll luvahs might enjoy is one I finished listening to this very morning – the always-great NEST OF VIPERS podcast has a thing on touring bands, sharing their stories of car accidents, cop encounters, hotel fires and Philly cheesesteaks. Chuck Prophet (Green On Red), Anthony Bedard (Icky Boyfriends, Resineators, Gaping Wounds) and Gil Ray (Game Theory, Loud Family) join host Danny “Danny Pâ€Â Plotnick for an hour’s worth of roadmouth. Great fun – download it here.
Rockstar –Over The Hill/Mummy –MCA 265 (UK 1976)
A rare 70s outing by ex Move man Ace Kefford. The autobiographical Over The Hill is a solid rocker on the periphery of JunkShop Glam, Kinda like Hector attempting to do a Quadrophenia…It features some loud cutting guitar and a fine production by Steve Rowland. Mummy is pretty haunting and dramatic, the song builds and builds and is a real grower. These two tracks are compiled along with other tracks on the Ace The Face CD. https://www.acekefford.com/
I am older and arguably wiser than I was a year ago at this time. And yet I feel the same. How does that work? Anyway, I’m 35 years into this life as of last Saturday.
There was this compilation of mostly current Australian punk & art/noise I bought in the mid-80s called “WHY MARCH WHEN YOU CAN RIOT?â€Â, and it was a mind-expander for several reasons. First, it featured three tracks from the Australian band X that are among the greatest punk rock songs ever recorded – “Hate Cityâ€Â, “Home Is Where The Floor Isâ€Â and “TV Cabaret Rollâ€Â. If you think “X-ASPIRATIONSâ€Â is a masterpiece, and I do – these tracks are even better. I’m going to post all three in an upcoming entry.
Alongside debut recordings from the HARD-ONS (whoopee) and lesser lights, there were also two tracks from Sydney’s fEEDTIME that blew me and many others clean away. fEEDTIME (the small f is deliberate) were a trio who played a propulsive, mechanical, wicked-fast, sometimes bluesy punk rock, sounding like a band of the 21st Century who just happened to be stuck in the 20th. I’d never heard anything like them before, and still haven’t since. A lot of us in the United States took notice pretty quickly, and they got a US distribution deal for their LPs, which were all over the place for a while there in the late 80s. Forced Exposure magazine were a particularly enthusiastic proponent. Me, I thought the LPs were good, but spotty and uneven. In 1987 a 45 came out with new versions of the two songs that were on “Why March When You Can Riotâ€Â – “Don’t Tell Me / Small Talkâ€Â. They were good, just not as powerful and angry & weird as the ones from the 1985 comp that I’m posting for you today. Listening to them now makes me want to dig out the fEEDTIME records for a reappraisal. Anyone have an opinion on how they’ve held up? In the meantime, here’s what I still think were the band’s finest moments.
I just returned from L.A., where I wore my body to shreds. My heart feels like a baby birds, beating inside of a thin layer of skin and muscle. Also, I need to start coming up with some better posts (see various criticisms in various comment sections).
To hold you over a day, if you are a non-regional reader, here’s the transcript of Sen. Ophelia Ford’s 911 call (this occured right after the incident detailed in my previous post)…
This is the transcript from a 911 call placed by an employee at the Sheraton Hotel Downtown Nashville. The entire call can be heard by clicking on the link at the top of this story.
Dispatcher: Metro Nashville Police and Fire.
Caller: Hey, this is Jeff at the Sheraton Hotel Downtown Nashville.
Dispatcher: Yes sir.
Caller: Um, I have, uh, I need someone to come and take a look at one of our guests. They took a fall out of one of our bar chairs upstairs in the concierge lounge on the 24th floor.
(Caller gives address and phone number of the hotel.)
Dispatcher: And you think they need an ambulance?
Caller: Well, I don’t necessarily know … she’s, she’s extremely intoxicated so I can’t tell.
Dispatcher: Are you with her now?
Caller: I am.
Dispatcher: How old is she approximately?
(Redacted from tape.)
Dispatcher: Is she conscious?
Caller: She is.
Dispatcher: Is she breathing?
Caller: Yes, she is.
Dispatcher: About how long ago did this happen?
Caller: Oh, about 20 minutes ago.
Dispatcher: What caused the fall?
Caller: Uh, intoxication.
Dispatcher: Is she completely alert?
Caller: She is.
Dispatcher: Is she breathing normally?
Caller: Yes, she is.
Dispatcher: What part of the body was injured?
Caller: Uh, she landed on her upper back, neck area.
Dispatcher: Is there any serious bleeding?
Caller: No, no, no bleeding that I can see.
(The caller gives directions to the concierge level and says he’ll meet paramedics. The dispatcher tells the caller not to move the person unless she’s in danger and not to let her have anything to eat or drink.)
Dispatcher: Just let her rest in the most comfortable position and wait for help to arrive.
Caller: OK.
(Dispatcher instructs caller to call back if person’s condition changes. He agrees.)
Back in March over at Mere Words, I wrote about how I was honorably mentioned in managing editor Ed McCormack’s essay “Andy’s Aura, Patti’s Power, My Sister’s Boxes, My Father’s Press Clippings, Paul Nelson’s Withering, and Other Aspects of Art and Fame, Obscurity and Loss, Death and Resurrection,” published in the February/March issue of his magazine Gallery & Studio. Lo and behold, tonight I discovered that the article is now available online at the G&S website. Check it out.
Copyright 2007 by Kevin Avery. All rights reserved.
