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All posts tagged Ephemera
Ed Schrader Show: Thursday Night Lineup
Like I said before, I’ll be performing on the Ed Schrader Show on September 13th, at the Metro Gallery in Baltimore.
The Lineup
The Ed Schrader show always features a variety of shenanigans and this show should be no exception.
Honnie Wells & The Hundred Quart will perform music that has been described as “making Tom Waits look like a sissy”, with a bluesy raspy sound.
The more obscure Teeth Mountain will also perform.
The manager of Baltimore infamous night spot, The Talking Head, will make an appearance, presumably to discuss the reopening of the aforementioned night spot.
Baltimore’s self-styled vigilante super-hero, Blue Leader is sure to bring some gut-busting laughs to the whole affair. Check out his “Do The Math Comics” for even more laughs.
I’ll be performing spoken word, as well.
Spoken Word on the Ed Schrader Show
On Thursday, September 13th at Baltimore’s Metro Gallery, I’ll be featured on the Ed Schrader Show. I’m really excited about the opportunity to perform some of my new spoken word material, in front of a live, televised audience. What should I perform?
I auditioned with the latest version of my perpetually-in-progress piece entitled “The Outside Talker“. With such short notice, I’m not sure I can come up with the entire garb I’d need to really pull it off. “The Outside Talker” is an imitation of a carnival barker, or sideshow announcer. I’d need a top hat, at the very least. I might decide to perform something else, instead.
I’ll need to practice, maybe memorize (yeah, right). Whatever happens, you’ll just have to see the show for yourself. If you’re not in the neighborhood, don’t worry, the whole show is usually syndicated online via YouTube, etc..
Since it’s a late show, there are sure to be plenty of gags and jokes, and perhaps some room for the kind of quick promotional suggestions that guests usually make on that type of show (I’ve got two, as it happens).
Again, I’m still not totally set on what to perform. Any requests?
Publishing to the Blog from Microsoft Word
Several years ago, I wished that there was a way to publish writing online, straight from my favorite word processor. I’m testing that feature of word 2007 now. I don’t say this often, but thanks Microsoft!
Punk Planet Stops the Presses
The independent press lost a publication recently, with the demise of Punk Planet Magazine. An online Eulogy for the magazine reads, “Over the last 80 issues and 13 years, we’ve covered every aspect of the financially independent, emotionally autonomous, free culture we refer to as the underground.” The magazine died when their distributor went under.
This is a fate likely to befall much of the zine world, and many other less-than-ubiquitous print publications. When asked whether Punk Planet would be reborn online, the answer was: “Slow down dude. Everything in due time.” I do hope to see Punk Planet reborn online, where printing and distribution budgets are a non-entity, but there’s probably a lot of other fish to fry, like debt for example.
You can help out if you buy back issues of Punk Planet.
China Says “Don’t Let The Fat Kids Fall in Love”
BBC News reports today that China “is changing the way it runs compulsory dance classes, introduced to tackle child obesity, because parents fear their children may fall in love.” God forbid the fat kids should find a dance partner!
Indirect Address
I stepped into the McDonalds this morning, to get some orange juice, and the girl behind the counter began talking at me — you know, when they’re talking, not really to you, but then again you’re the one in earshot. It is a method of indirect address I don’t often employ but frequently encounter. It can be a powerfully effective form of communication, in some cases. In this case, she talked at me about her overwhelming feelings of failure, and her jealousy for the customers, who usually go to some better job once they get their orange juice — here’s your receipt — and wouldn’t it be nice if she didn’t have to work on Friday… It trailed off, as though, without someone within earshot, without giving voice to it, this manner of address is, simply, thought.
New York’s Downtown Literary Scene
The new issue of Boldtype reviews a new book about the literary avant-garde in New York City. Now, I wish Baltimore has this much going on.
Up Is Up, But So Is Down comprises short stories, essays, poetry, handwritten scribbles, and visual snippets reproduced from zines, posters, pamphlets, fliers, and literary mags” fragments that tell the tale of a wickedly creative artistic community that inhabited downtown Manhattan during the post-Beat decades of the late 20th century.
via: BookDwarf
Apocalypse Playground Gets a Place in History
Check it out, my old zine made the local news again. I do miss making a zine..
Nosferatu
Nosferatu is a 1922 German silent film about a vampire. The film has entered the public domain, so, you can watch it here.
Writers Online Community
Update: Websites come and go, especially social networks. It’s no secret. It is a shame, though, that these two online communities for writers have gone extinct. It’s also a reminder to save your work someplace else. If your only copy of something you want is on a website that dies, then your stuff dies with it.
There is hope, though. A new writers’ community, currently in a closed beta, might become something really useful to writers. It’s called Lit4us.
If you know of any good spots for writers to hang out online, please post a comment about it!
I’m excited about a new, and useful website for me to become addicted to for a while. For writers starving for community, there’s a new social networking website out there. Urbis is a bit like Friendster, or MySpace, except that it focuses on writing. Share your work, critique others’ work, and make friends in the process.
Dive right in at Urbis.
From the introduction…
How do I Use Urbis?
- Create an account
- Submit an item to the Creative Review Engine.
- Build a network by inviting friends and fans and meeting new ones.
- Connect with Seekers who wish to expose your work.
The Creative Review Engine
- Receive as much as you give using the Urbis credit system. Earn credits by reviewing people and spend credits when receiving reviews. Learn more about credits.
- Choose whether you want supportive reviews from people you know (in-network) or unbiased reviews from strangers (out-of-network)
- Qualify what kind of people you allow to review your work by specifying age range, location, talent, experience, and more. (coming soon)
- Hold members accountable for reviews that don’t meet the high standards of the Urbis review guidelines.
- Understand the value of the reviews you receive by viewing Reviewer stats.
- Receive ratings (algoratings) that are weighted to provide a true reflection of the community’s opinion of your work.
For a complete introduction to the idea behind this website, read the writup, “Judging the Books Without Covers“at the ambiguously named website, “solution watch”.
Urbis differs from many of the other writers’ websites out there, which focus on blogging, or “litblogging”. My favorite of those is MetaxuCafe. Here, writers come together, mostly as readers. Critical response to books and ideas seems to be the name of the game, primarily, in the litblogs, and there are many litblogs out there for you to choose from.
Together, the litblogs and an online community should provide a wealth of useful resources for a writer.
Star Wars Holiday Special
The Two-Hour Star Wars Holiday Special in only Five Minutes!
Merry Holidays, here’s a stupid video for your stocking stuffin fun.
The Moleskine problem
John, at Joshuaink has a problem with his crisp, new Moleskine notebook. It is too nice to mark on! I’ve experreienced a similar problem with mine. I think the best way to get over it is to do something awful on the last page, and get it over with. That way, everything else will feel “worthy” of such a nice notebook.
Mythic Figures
Spurious has run an interesting collection of musings on mythic figures, including The Golem and The Homunculus and The Doppelgänger
I wonder what else might be added to that set: The Succubus or The Asp? The figures chosen all seem to have a realtionship to the self, or to embody some sort of problem.
Books in the Future
From the New York Times Books Section’s article, Digital Publishing Is Scrambling the Industry’s Rules:
“an experiment of how books might be in the future.” That is one of the hottest debates in the book world right now, as publishers, editors and writers grapple with the Web’s ability to connect readers and writers more quickly and intimately, new technologies that make it easier to search books electronically and the advent of digital devices that promise to do for books what the iPod has done for music: making them easily downloadable and completely portable.
The Carnival Show
In a previous post, I outlined some ideas for a spoken word routine where I’d like to emulate the lyric qualities of one of those sideshow, carnival “barkers”. I’m also interested in the role: being outside of some place, pitching the sensory experience to be had within, where description is everything.
I’d like to continue outlining those ideas, this time by considering subject matter, now that I’ve got a clear idea of voice.
I left off with the question: “what’s in the tent?”. In other words, I’m wondering, what the object is — what are these lyrical words about? For example, Mercutio’s rant in Romeo and Juliet, it’s about Queen Mab. I’m not much closer to an answer yet.
I’ve kinda taken up physicalism, particularly its emphasis on beauty. People I’ve pitched this idea to say, “fine, great, but isn’t it kinda, well, UNphysicalist?” People think of carnivals, and they think of freaks, and they think dark thoughts. People also tend to expect dark thoughts from me, and that’s pretty much my fault, but it’s also why I’m trying to move in this new direction.
I try to explain that the only thing I’m interested in is the lyrical quality of these characters, because I think it can be beautiful, but people scratch their heads.
It’s as if there cannot be anything beautiful inside that tent. People refuse to believe it. They’re more apt to step right up and thrill to the sight of a fish with a human body. Will they ever be able to gawk and awe at real beauty? Can I put it there for them? They don’t want to see it, or even think it possible. They’re incredulous.
That’s the thing about a fish with a human body. Tell a person to see a fish with a human body — even if I stitched the two together, just before the show — and that’s what they’ll see alright. Tell them you’ve got something beautiful, and they’re inclined to disagree, because they can disagree. Now there’s no mistakin’ it: that’s a mummified mermaid … but that other thing, well, it just isn’t to everyone’s taste.
Perhaps what I need then is the hall of mirrors, where the only thing to see is what you brought with you.
Hans Haacke, 1966
. . . make something, which experiences, reacts to its environment, changes, is . . . nonstable . . . . . . Make something indeterminate, which always looks different, the shape of which cannot be predicted precisely . . . . . . make something, which cannot "perform" without the assistance of its environment . . . . . . make something, which reacts to light and temperature changes, is subject to air currents and depends, in its functioning, on the forces of gravity . . . . . . make something, which the "spectator" handles, which he plays and thus animates it . . . . . . make something, which lives in time and make the spectator experience time . . . . . . articulate something natural . . .Hans Haacke
Firefox wins!
Yes, this has got to be one of the funniest commercials ever made.
12 Month Memoirs
SNR Editor’s Blog , Blogging about Writers and Writing, Links to an interesting article.
Another Writing Trend?
In an article for Canada’s Globe & Mail, Tralee Pearce argues that more authors are writing what amount to be 12-month memoirs, that being memoirs covering a annual span. There’s A Year in the World, The Year of Magical Thinking, A Year in Provence, The Year of Yes, and My Year in Iraq.
Cut-Up Poetry
After enough spare time spent sorting through old files and notebooks, I have produced a pile of unwanted writing: drafts, failed poems, etc. The pile is large enough that I would regret throwing it away. It is so much. It occurred to me that I could cut out anything remotely salvageable, and then make a collage out of the pieces. This should be fun, if not productive.
I have scanned the first result, but I will probably type the others.
the Lazurus’ Corporation‘s brief explanation of cut-up for the uninitiated
The Cut-Up technique is to writing what collage is to visual art. Its recent use was pioneered by William Burroughs and Brion Gysin, and later David Bowie used it during the 1970s. The basic method is simple – write a piece of work, cut the paper up with scissors, and rearrange the pieces to form new phrases and new meanings.
“The best writing seems to be done almost by accident, but writers until the cut-up method was made explicit … had no way to produce the accident of spontaneity. You cannot will spontaneity. But you can introduce the spontaneous factor with a pair of scissors.”
William Burroughs, RE/SEARCH #4/5, 1982Obviously, using this method can and will produce results which you’re not happy with, but the surprising thing is how many of the results are successful. Sometimes all that is needed is a quick read through of the results, adding punctuation and deleting the occasional word to produce the finished results. Purists might complain about editing the cut-up text, but this process is a tool which you can choose to use at any stage in the process of writing.