2018: February 12th 4:40 AM

Based on two glowing reviews from friends, and the fact that A) I was in the mood for some new horror and, B) I had been reading about David Bruckner's latest film's steady hike to daylight (for those who have seen the film you will have guessed that pun was very much intended) on Bloodydisgusting for what feels like forever, we watched The Ritual last night. It landed on Netflix two days ago and is pretty fantastic. No reinvention of the wheel, except maybe in the effects department; not the actual FX per se, more what the film uses them to create. That's all I'll say, as I'm the type who finds movies - especially horror movies - are always better when you know as little as possible going into them.



Playlist from Sunday, 2/11/18:

PJ Harvey - To Bring You My Love
Johnny Jewel - Windswept
DyE - Fantasy

Not too much, but yesterday was a bit of a silent contemplation day, as we looked at a potential new home and decided it was too much to go ahead with purchasing. The rub is, of course, that what we almost paid for this small place in the SouthBay of LaLaLand would buy us a veritable mansion in the Midwest. But we'd also be buried in snow right now, so give and take, you know?

Card of the day:

Accidentally pulled two and turned them over, so I need to dig in a bit later this morning and figure out the juxtaposition:

"A well-rounded approach to material things - Success dictates understanding the actual value of material possessions, not taking for granted and not over reacting to gain and loss." This seems more like a card for a friend than me, so maybe the two show some insight into our business relationship? Priestess denoting change or fluctuation. Hmm.

2018: February 11th 1:41 PM

Late wake-up after a long night. Began the day with some PJ Harvey, courtesy of Season 2, Episode 1 of Peaky Blinders. Which is excellent (Thanks Tim & Lisa).



I have a feeling this album, which I haven't listened to in a while, more often than not being drawn back time and again to Stories from the City, Stories from the Sea and Uh-Huh Her, not for any reason other than To Bring You My Love is such an incredibly immersive experience for me, it does not mesh well with daily tasks, routines or whatnot. No, To Bring You My Love is the kind of album that I have to sit down to by myself with a buzz and give over to. So there's pot in my future apparently then.

Playlist from the 10th

The Foundations - Build Me Up Buttercup
ZZ Top - Tres Hombres
Touche Amore - Eponymous
Helmet - Aftertaste
The Veils - Nux Vomica
The Rolling Stones - Sticky Fingers
FNM - Angel Dust
Barry Adamson - Oedipus Schmoedipus

Card of the day:

This one again, eh?

2018: February 10th 10:04 AM

This one's been on my mind a lot lately.

Friday's playlist:

God is LSD - Spirit of Suicide
The Foundations - Now That I've Found You*
Helmet - Size Matters
The Jon Spencer Blues Explosion - Now I Got Worry
Le Butcherettes - A Raw Youth
Viet Cong - Eponymous
Dillinger Escape Plan - Disassociation
Judas Priest - Screaming For Vengeance (two songs; other than the single, which I love, this record seems unlistenable today)

Card of the day:

Breakthrough. Let's hope it's not Uncle Sam's breaking through my bank account when I get my taxes done in an hour.

Should be noted that while I shuffled two cards jumped out of the deck and hit the floor: The Princes of Cups and XVI The Star.

* Should be noted this was not the album I wanted. I'm a huge fan of both singles Now that I've Found You and the aforementioned Build Me Up Buttercup, both of which I've known my entire life as "oldies" but which have always, to me, stood out as something more than just a dusty that fades into the Oldies playlists the old Magic 104 FM used to spin perpetually in Chicago. No, there's something more to these songs. This record however, which I located with a quick search on Apple Music, is a re-recording from what I can only guess was the 80s based on the way the music has been re-arranged with 80s-sounding keyboard patches. No terrible, but not the originals. Another quick search and I located those.

2018: February 9th 4:53 AM

In my head upon waking. Waking, such absolute misery to crawl from my bed this cold, (relatively) California morning...

Not nearly enough sleep. My after-work nap yesterday set my sleep back and I didn't knock out until almost midnight. Just about 4.5 hours later I've hit all the snoozes I can and crawl from bed, feed the cats and put on an extra strong pot of coffee, put fingertips to these keys to make these words. How oh how am I going to manage to work 8 or 9 hours, drive 45-60 to Hollywood, come home around 10 and NOT be brain dead?

The new comic from Ales Kot, Danijel Zezelj, and Jordie Bellaire is Days of Hate; I picked issue #1 up on a whim and it's fantastic. And really, sadly relevant. Also, they have a super accurate visual depiction of DTLA on page 3 - looks like Bellaire was standing where I was two weeks ago coming out of the Converge concert at the Regent.

New edition of Drinking, Fighting, F*&king, and Crying went up yesterday, you can read it HERE.

Yesterday's playlist:

Deftones - Koi No Yokan
Mono and The Ocean - Transcendental EP
Mastodon - Emperor of Sand
The Politics of Punk (Disc 6)
Joy Division - Closer
The Afghan Whigs - In Spades
Sade - iTunes Essentials
Lustmord - The Dark Places of the Earth


Card of the day:

From my Grimoire:

"Add one to nine and perfect elemental alignment occurs (perfect in nature - the other end of the balanced path from The Crown). One big word: Culmination."

So what does that mean as a daily draw? You kidding? With my brain like this I can't even begin to wrap my head around it.

2018: February 8th 5:45 AM

Woke up with this one in my head today, probably because I listened to the album it's on - Teenage Wrist's Dazed EP about a half a half dozen times last night. At least.



Such a big, fuzzy neon dream of an album. Thanks to Jacob again for introducing me to this great band that has an album coming out in March. You can pre-order it HERE.

Playlist from yesterday:

The Fixx - Reach the Beach
ZZ Top - Tres Hombres
Nektar - A Tab in the Ocean
Odonis Odonis - Post Plague
The Jesus Lizard - Down
Teenage Wrist - Dazed E.P.

Card of the day:

Emotional deluge, use intellect and Will to prevent being drowned. Interesting... a few words on these daily draws. Events yesterday, Wednesday the 7th lined-up directly with two repetitive pulls that culminated the Wednesday before, on January 31st. What's the grid system at work here, or is there one? Well, we'll see. That's why I've shifted this blog into this 'journaling' paradigm - looking for patterns in the grid of chaos that, even though we do all we can to refute the fact, defines our existences. Hopefully I will find some and learn a way to 'hack' the graphs and grids I make from those patterns.

Yesterday I indeed stopped to buy my comics. TWD did not disappoint, but I haven't read Papergirls yet. Why? Well, I had an abortive attempt at my daily words, and after that I didn't have much time for reading, and this was unexpected but I ended up buying my first current Batman comic since Grant Morrison's run ended in 2013 and I was super excited to dive in. Why? What could make me jump into a Batman comic? Three words:

Sean. Gordon. Murphy. Look at this cover:

It's ultra rare to impossible for art to convince me to read a book, in Murphy's case it's a combination of his art and the fact that he can spin one hell of a yarn. Punk Rock Jesus is still one of my all-time favorites. One issue into White Knight and I don't quite have the lay of the land yet, but A) it's stand alone continuity and B) it's NOT the tired iterations of Batman and Joker we're used to being regurgitated every few years, although it starts there and moves out in what I believe is virgin territory for the characters from there. Either way, I'm in for all eight issues (five are out so far).

2018: February 7th 4:55 AM

Wednesdays are typically Comics-and-Beer days, where I extend my arduous sojourn home on the 405 by stopping at The Comic Bug and then Total Wine. I don't always stop for comics - it depends on what came out and if I can spare the time. That said, I always stop when these hit the stands:

Look at that Paper Girls cover - GORGEOUS!

Forfeited my daily words yesterday in favor of spending hours after work making space on my computer, which with a max storage of 500 gigs only had a little over 5 left. Starts to act wonky under 20, and I can't have that. So I had to delete a lot of music. This wasn't the hardest thing in the world - Apple Music means it's all right at my fingertips anyway. HOWEVER, it's interesting to note how not too long ago I had to purge CDs and now its digital - reminds me of how email has become every bit as cumbersome and annoying as snail mail, more so actually, because most outlets have given up on snail service. But these comparisons/juxtapositions show how we've transitioned our lives so well into the digital realm only to have it essentially take on all the characteristics of the tactile one. Well, maybe not all, but many. Also, I'm a bit of a librarian when it comes to music, so the purge was able to free a lot of space without really lacing into anything I actively listen to or even what I keep on deck at all times. That Anthony Stewart Head album? Well, it's awesome that he made it but I'm never going to listen to it again, and if I want to, I'm sure its a keystroke or two away. That said:



Playlist from the 6th:

Killing Joke - Eponymous debut
Anthrax - Worship Music
Sam Cooke - One Night Stand! Live at the Harlem Square Club
Faith No More - Angel Dust
Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds - The Good Son
Jucifer - I Name You Destroyer
Brian Eno - Here Come the Warm Jets
David Bowie - Heroes
Sade - Greatest Hits
Lustmord - Dark Places of the Earth

Card of the day:

Ah, so I'm going on a journey, am I? Maybe today's sojourn for imbibes and reading material will take longer than I expected. Or maybe one of my projects is about to ramp up.

Either way.

Queens of the Stone Age cover Brian Eno

I didn't know this existed until just now. In the midst of a binge on Eno's Here Come the Warm Jets I set out to find a youtube video for Needles in the Camel's Eye and found this in the search results:



And the original:



No matter who is singing it, this song makes me love life.