...Johnny One Note Here

As I mentioned here a few days ago, I recently finished Barry Adamson's autobiography, Up Above the City, Down Below the Stars. It's a fantastic read; a sometimes heartbreaking deep-dive into the origins of the Manchester Post-Punk movement. Thrilling not only because Adamson is such an engaging narrator, delivering the story of his life in a quasi-Noir tone that totally fits Manchester in this era (think of the Joy Division biopic Control), but also because he names and describes so much music - a lot of which I have never heard before. The track above is a perfect example; I knew nothing of the Tubby Hayes Quintet until Adamson describes hearing the Live at Spot's album (renamed Down in the Village if you seek it out on streaming) for the first time on his father's new record player. He describes the way the opening horn attack blew his mind, and sure enough, I had the same experience. That is some smoking horn to open a set with! 

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Watch:

Before I left L.A., I actually had a chance to see a test screening of Cocaine Bear. I ended up not being able to make it, and now, after seeing the trailer, I wish I would have canceled whatever else I did and gone to this instead:

This. Looks. INSANE. I mean, in every great way a film can be insane, this looks as though it will check those boxes. 

 

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Playlist:

Alan Haven - Image (single)

Kermit Ruffins - The Barbeque Swingers Live

Tubby Hayes Quintet - Down in the Village (Live at Ronny Scott's Club, London 1962)

Metallica - Lux Æturna

Metallica - Hardwired... To Self-Destruct

Metallica - ... And Justice For All

Blondie - Eponymous

Ruelle - Emerge

Drug Church - Tawny EP

Feuerbahn - The Fire Dance EP

Zola Jesus - Arkhon

Harry Nilsson - Without You (single)

T. Rex - The Slider

Roxy Music - Eponymous

Alice Cooper - Killer

Barry Adamson - Back to the Cat

Magazine - Real Life

Bret Easton Ellis Podcast S6E27

Low Cut Connie - Get Out the Lotion

Greg Puciato - Mirrorcell

The Knitters - Poor Little Creature on the Road

Magazine - Secondhand Daylight

Serge Gainsbourg - Historie de Melody Nelson

Joy Division - Unknown Pleasures

The Birthday Party - Hee-Haw

The Birthday Party - Pleasure Heads Must Burn (DVD)

Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds - The Boatman's Call

Barry Adamson - Moss Side Story

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Card:

From Jonathan Grimm's Bound Tarot, which you can buy HERE.

Obscured influences come from a place of benevolence and should be accepted in order to further emotional security. Pretty broad scope, so I can't really pinpoint what this is addressing yet. But I'll keep my eyes open for obscured influences, of which there are no doubt many afoot in all of our lives. 

Call Me, Bobby Fingers

 

I've never been the biggest Blondie fan, but I've also largely remained to everything but the singles. They've long been one of those bands I keep meaning to dig into the back catalogue, and just never remember. Well, between the OST for Paul Schrader's 1980 masterpiece American Gigolo, which I just watched for the first time a few months back and became enraptured with, and now the Showtime series of the same name, I've been inundated with "Call Me" off and on for weeks, and I have to say, it is a fantastic song. I always liked this one, but now I'm seeing something deeper. So, motivated by that, I've begun digging. So far though, nothing matches this one.

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Watch:

Yes! Bobby Fingers has a new diorama video up!

 

Oh man, this guy is my hero. I haven''t watched this yet, but the subject matter for this, his second diarama video, is so in-line with his first, and both seem culled from the 80s pop culture detritus that I favor for fun-making. 

 

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Read:

I finally began Barry Adamson's Autobiography, Up Above the City, Down Below the Stars this past weekend. Adamson earned a perpetual place in my heart with his albums Moss Side Tory, Soul Murder, and of course, As Above So Below. This was all after his work on the Lost Highway OST in 1997 put him and his album Oedipus Schmodipus brought him to the awareness of, well, of anyone paying attention to the kinds of music that Trent Reznor included on that Soundtrack.

As Above is still my all-time favorite by him, but I've followed Mr. Adamson's career ever since. I grabbed a copy of his first short film The Therapist back in 2011, and had the total joy of seeing him perform live, solo, at L.A.'s The Hotel Cafe in... I'm not even sure when. 

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Beer:

Now that I'm officially into my first real winter in sixteen years -  I know the season doesn't officially start until December 21st, however, it's cold - my appetite for darker, thicker beers has returned full force. My palate would usually shift for a week here or there while in L.A., as nights did get down to the 40s on a regular basis, however, Tennessee is decidedly closer to what I grew up with. Already seeing the 30s and we're loving it. 

Anyway, while I still always have cans of Sierra Nevada Pale Ale on hand, I've really been peppering in more Porters and Stouts on an almost daily basis. This is somewhat propelled by my neighbor Vincent, who I've befriended and who loves dark beer. He's brought me quite a few Crowlers from his (and now our) favorite Clarksville brewery Tennessee Valley Brewing, and to return the favor, while in Chicago recently, I picked up a sixer of something for him.

Three Floyds is one of those entities that 100% deserves all the hype and mania they fostered during the 00s. Every beer I've had by them has been insanely consistent in quality, and their aesthetic - kind of a Doom Metal/SciFi/ComicBook thing fits the beer perfectly. There's always an air of blue-collar debauchery that undercuts what, in my mind, are very high-brow concepts, and I love that. 

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Playlist:

Metallica - Lux Æturna (pre-release single)

Blondie - Autoamerican

Various - American Gigolo OST (1980)

Zola Jesus - Arkhon

Mastodon - Hushed and Grim

Type O Negative - Bloody Kisses (Digipak)

H6LLB6ND6R - Side A

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Card:

From Jonathan Grimm's Bound Tarot, which you can buy HERE.

A slightly more ambitious pull today. The card that started this fell separate from the deck during shuffle, so I started there. An accomplishment of Will can make a Dream come true. A breakthrough with my Art will come via collaboration. Again, spot on! I've really become shocked that Grimm's Bound Tarot has essentially replaced the Thoth as my go-to deck. That seemed impossible; I'm not one to own a lot of decks. Sure, there are scores of amazing ones, but I have never owned a deck just because of how it looks - I've always struggled with reading and thus, felt it an imperative to limit the number I have to the ones that I use and bond with. That's been exactly Thoth and, later, Missi's Raven Deck of Major Arcana, which by definition, serves a different purpose altogether. Broader. But Grimm's deck has really become something I reach for multiple times a day, and I feel my readings and intuitions stoking again (I lost a lot after my Tarot debacle in 2015, which is described somewhere in these pages).