+!+

(continued from over here.)

TUES.10th APR. '01 - We’ve gotta hurry up & get our ass outa this place…The landlord has been coming round all the time & he’s out for blood ‘cause it’s pretty obvious that [name suppressed (absent flatmate)], who owes him back rent going back I don’t even know how far, doesn’t have any intention of coming back to Dunedin, & he’s never gonna see that money. Wise up, dude...jeez, anyone'd think you've never dealt with HARD DRUGS USERS before. Anyway as that’s become increasingly apparent he’s become intent on extracting it from whoever’s still left within his grasp. Maryann basically told him fuck off, I gave at the office, but anyway he said get out. So get out we gotta.

THURS. 12th APR. '01 - WITTY DINNER TABLE BANTER DEPT. - the night before last we're having dinner with my mother & my sister again & we're talking about whether the artist (that would be my sister, in this case) needs to be conversant with the language of critical theory & all that kind of stuff. The general consensus seems to be either NO or WHO CARES. Or maybe YES. I don't remember. Violet is saying she feels intimidated by these people discussing her work in words she doen't understand. She says "I don't really engage with critical theory"...this doesn't even get a laff (wasn't meant to) until I put the word engage in italics.
Don't worry, the people at the next table weren't listening to us, they were all really drunk.

FRI. 13th APR. ’01 - The other day we were walking round & Maryann was talking about how bad it is that the whole way we talk (we = not just me & her but the whole so-called culture that is) is like totally dominated by the argot of , I guess basically of teenagers from Southern California - that is, absolute subhuman grunt-level communication, with one ‘civilized’ attribute - contempt. For your interlocutor, for the ideas you are expressing, for the value of communication itself. That’s not exactly what she said…I’m extrapolating…but this was this thing we were talking about again today & I was hassling her about how someone who can write the English language fluently (that’s her, not me) still can’t speak it any way other than this, she said yeah but it would just be so annoying to have to pay that much attn. to form-as-opposed-to-content & I went yeah but form *is* content…we just sorta laffed abt that but, oh yeh that's right that's what we were saying about that fuckin cali-teen-argot in the 1st place - the whole tone of it is mean & sarcastic, you don’t even need to engage yr brain to be sarcastic, ‘cause yr entire vocab consists of readymades like Whatever & Yeah right & all those - the whole lingo consists of glib putdowns…Yeah well, we’re like so over that…just another symptom of global standardisation at the lowest common denom. level - okay, I'm gonna try and do somethin about it. OK that’s my New Year’s Resolution (Do I sound like one of those stupid old geezer columnists in the papers who always do columns bemoaning the way people speak these days,or what?...you know the kind of articles I mean, where they say nobody talks good any more & for their ultimate example of what's wrong with the world these days they always glom on to that thing teenage girls do where the intonation rises at the end of a sentence? & they're like, no-one ever noticed this before? & like, it's worth writing a whole stupid column about?) - that &, y’know, environmental stuff...I mean actually trying to do something about that stuff...How? I don't even know. I dunno if I’m up for any actual eco-terrorism activity but there’s stuff happening that probably deserves that kind of attn. (Milford Track gondola & those fuckin hiways that these clowns on the Coast want to put smack dab thru the middle of 2 nat’l pk areas.for a start) & Yeah sure I know people that’d take it that far(*)...Me, I’d have to consider the ethics of that stuff some more but you know the other fuckin team are winning already & if you care about that shit you probly gotta do more than sit at yr fucking computer smokin pot.
Anyway my friends Lisa & Christine just got into town & we’re gonna go out & see a band, that’s correct ACTUALLY GOING OUT.at night & stuff like how people use to in the old days. Later then. I’ll let you know how it goes.
* THAT GONDOLA THING THAT THEY WANNA BUILD DOWN SOUTH - (quote from a friend of mine [name suppressed]) : If they go ahead with that fucking thing, I’m gonna gelignite it. I don’t care, I’ll go to jail for it, I don’t fucking care. Fuck ’em…especially fuckin’ Ngai Tahu, I know they’re a business now but fuck’em.

SAT. 14th APR. - going out last night was a quite a good idea...The band we were checking out was LD50, it’s these 3 girls who used to be in the Murdering Monsters (never saw 'em but I’ve heard their tape, it’s good) & this other girl we know plays drums in it, they were good.
(OK there's yr. review right there.)

MON. 16th APR.. - We got a new house! It’s great too - it’s up on the top of a hill & facing into the sun all day, & on a good size section with trees & native shrubs & stuff....we all went up there today round noon & waited round for the guy for nearly an hour I guess & he didn’t show up...Maryann was real convinced that we weren’t gonna get it for whatever reason but I thought the indications were pretty good, i.e. that there hadn’t been people living there for wks so they were probably pretty desp. to get people in there - caught up with the guy & it turned out that was so, & we can move in right away. Maryann was telling Jane you shouldn’t’ve wore that t-shirt (Fiona’s print of 1999 upside down so’s it looks like 666I) ’cause what if the landlord’s a Christian (like for inst. the guy at the place we’re vacating ) & he thinks we’re some kind of satan creeps because of it & we don’t get the place; this fear dissipated immediately the moment we saw the guy - the most obvious junkie we’d seen, oooh, all week. He just went, I haven’t got a key but you can get in the back door, I broke in thru the bathroom window. (Why’d you need to do that for? the front window wasn’t even locked, we know ‘cause we’ve been thru there already. Oh well.) Anyway, cool, I’ve (1st time in 2 yrs) got a proper house to live in & good flatmates.....yeah & a junkie bogan landlord, but hopefully we won’t have too much to do with him.

FRI. 20th APR. ’01 - Yesterday after that shit happened with that gripper of a landlord from Tennyson St. (it’s in Maryann’s diary if you wanna hear about it) we were driving out into South Dunedin to go junk shopping & I saw a guy who looked just like John Baker - I went, Hey look it’s John Baker (but just kind of joking ’cause I didn’t really think it was him) - the guy then climbed up into the cab of a truck that was towing a trailer with an enormous Robbie Williams billboard on it & the realisation occurred to both of us about the same time, Oh right, some kind of music promotion thing, it probably is the real John Baker. So we wanted to go back & talk to him so’s we could hassle him about how he was driving a truck with a big-ass Robbie Williams billboard on the back, but by the time there was enough of a break in the traffic to make a U-turn he’d driven off.
So does anyone know if John Baker was driving through South Dunedin at about 10 a.m. on the 19th in a truck towing a 3-metre-tall Robbie Williams billboard? If he was down there searchin’ out ’60s 45s he was shit outta luck, I’ve done over all those places down there pretty thoroughly...(Good ’60s NZ & Aussie stuff I’ve found down there in the last few months incl. the Twilights "Comin’ On Down", the Aztecs "Everybody I Know Thinks that I’m Crazy", the Avengers "Water Pipe", also stuff by Lloyd’s World, Keith Richardson w/ the Avengers, Stoney Lonesome, Flying Circus, Executives...OK so maybe not all of these are that shit-hot but they’re still all pretty cool things to still be able to find for 50c. in a small heavily picked-over country. So isn’t it choice that they’re being found by me instead of some traitor who’ll sell them to the international fatsos.)
So here I am writing this in my new rm. with the choice view out over the valley betw. Mt Cargill & Flagstaff & Highway 1 off in the distance (‘cept I can’t see it any more, it’s dark) - boy it is so great to have (for 1st time ever) a computer set up in my own room with my stereo & a bunch of records...yeah man, if I had a bag of pot I could probably write a book this evening! Or something.
We’ll spare you tho’, I think we’ll just go out for a curry instead.
& after we saw John Baker down in South D. that a.m., we were going into this thrift store & a bunch of 10-year old boys on bikes went past & 1 of ‘em jeered "2nd hand shit shop!" & pointed a toy gun at us. It annoyed me ’cause I thought it sucked that kids had been programmed to think that buying 2nd hand shit is so bad & yeah probably their idea of a good shop to go to is one where you pay 10 bucks for some piece of crap that Stephen Tindall paid 10c. wholesale for & it was made in a Asian sweatshop by people about 2 yrs older than them. So I flipped them the fingers. A few minutes later though I saw the same kids on their bikes all blocking the pavement & a old lady in a motorised wheelchair was coming towards them & I thought, they’re just gonna stand there & get in her way on purpose, but they didn’t...Do you believe that, whatta buncha wimps.
P.S. - This from Jon Bywater - "...caught xanadu and the revengers at cafe 223 last night. rip roaring shit - revengers coming off more like a power trio but still like the germs like usual. then to the kings arms to see brent hayward's new band, with roddy, luke and wayne (violet's flatmate, on drums), called fats white. pretty choice on a bottle of wine and no dinner, but other people didn't like it. sorta terminally velvetsy stuff, with roddy doing a bit of rude heavy open e slinging (looking and sounding nicky suddenish). their gimmick is they all wore hats and suits. cool! played "the nose one", with roddy presumably taking his lead from the 3ds cover version. speaking of sudden, xanadu cover "full moon in my pocket", and it kicks ass. ok. gotta go before it gets too dark to ride my cycle."
So Auckland's where the rock action is, looks like. I sure wish I'd been there for the Fats White show (esp.). I think that must be the 1st music stuff Brent H. has done since the Kiwi Animal - 15 yrs ago or something I guess? - so it's something pretty special.

SUNDAY 22nd APR. Today Jane & Richard moved a bunch of their stuff in, & when they were packing up stuff at the old house they found under some furniture a big bud of pot. They did some spots & then they came over here & told me how they found the bud & I was like, Choice, but when they went to get it they couldn’t find it .They must’ve left it home by the oven. Yeah, that’s what they must’ve done. But they hadn’t, I knew that ‘cause when they went back to the place they were gone for a pretty long time & obviously they were looking for it & not finding it ........but anyway check it out, then after that she found another lost stash of pot anyway.
Yeah, anecdotes about losing & finding yr. pot stash, boy you can tell my life is just bubbling over with exciting events.
So they went off to have dinner, we went & watched TV in Maryann’s rm., & for some reason we were watching - don’t know why ‘cause we never watched the NZ one or the Oz one - the English "Popstars" show - there was this guy who said that he wanted to become a pop star because it would be, quote, "a springboard to Hollywood....maybe politics...become a world leader...President of America". Boy he was somethin else, his song of course was "Living La Vida Loca", that was the one all the most insane guys attempted (& all the real delusional ones were male...some of the girls were pretty bad but you could kind of usually see what it was they thought they had to offer; the boys tho’, most of them were a complete joke). It was really pretty mean that they showed all these people...I mean the whole thing was fucking mean, I mean even the people that were like "good" would’ve made me snigger if I’d’ve been one of the judges...those guys did pretty good not cracking up, they maintained their cool deadpan bored BBC thing. Yeah well I suppose you probably would be bored, I guess it’d stop being funny after the 1st 50 or so...working in TV I’d imagine you’d have to get pretty desensitised to that stuff.
So that sorta made me wish I’d bothered to watch the NZ one, but actually I bet it wouldn’t’ve been nearly as good ’cause in this country it isn’t such a big thing, y’know every kid wanting to be a pop star, & I don't think many ordinary people are so desperate they’d make dicks of themselves on national TV in pursuit of the dream. I guess. I don’t know.

MON. 30th APR. '01 - Has anyone tried using the link to Steve McCabe's page lately? If so you'll probably've noticed that it doesn't work. This oughta work. (Does now - checked, 14-08-01). I got in touch with the guy himself & asked him but he didn't seem to exactly know what the problem was - said he'd look into it tho'.
Here's a link to something real funny I was just reading - an interview with America's greatest present-day rock critic, Maaaaaaark Prindle!
& while I'm on some haven't-got-anything -to-say-myself-but-here's-some-links shit, Julian Cope writ this great piece on Sir Lord Baltimore, go & have a look.

+!+

SUNDAY 13th MAY '01
anyone out there an APRA member? you gonna bother to fill out their Top 10 NZ songs thing? I am, have done, 'cause I wanna salute some of the big musical figures in my world. So here's my list (send me yours, anyone, I'm interested to see 'em) (they're not in any hierarchical order, as per APRA's instruction) -

* "Arson" (Ian Blenkinsop/Craig Davidson) - as done by Scorched Earth Policy & Drowning Is Easy - S.E.P. were one of my favourite bands that I used to see in Chch in the '80s. They got this song from Mick Elborado's (or M.S. Agro's, as he was then known) previous band Drowning Is Easy...I never saw them tho'. (I've heard the recordings though - their version of this song, or actually a version by a later splinter group dubbed the Zeds, appears on their only record, a no-name/no-label e.p. [PR 2012] from 1984, also featuring "Loup Garou" as later done by the McGoohans).
* "Queer Song" a.k.a. "I'm A Queer" (Kevin Hawkins) - as done by the late Screamin' K. Hawkins. I hope someone gets around to releasing this on a record some day...It was a widely recognised underground hit by the time he died in, what was it, '86 or so? Who's got the tapes? Damon Crowe I think. Anyone know where he is?
* "A Drink for the Heart & a Heart for the Road" (Steve McCabe) - the Axemen. My favourite favourite band from Chch/'80s.
* "Lollipop Man" (unknown) - the And Band.
"TV Producer" (Lawrence Kennett) - Nux Vomica.
"The Nose One" (Shoes This High) - Shoes This High .
"Took From Gloom" (Hyphen-Smythe) - Hyphen-Smythe.The plan (well, my plan) is that Say Yes To Apes oughta re-form to do some shows when we all turn 40. I haven't axed this guy yet (haven't been in touch for years) but it could happen. (Smythe & Ears recorded a couple songs together last year - 1st time in maybe 12[?] years). Wanna buy yr tickets now?
"Christmas In the Country" (George D. Henderson) - the Puddle.
"How Long" (Robert Cardy) - Shaft.
"Social End Product" (don't know) - the Bluestars.

Yeah see "Social End Product" is my concession to the mainstream. I mean I figured I ought to vote for at least one song that might actually stand a chance of making the chart. If anyone anywhere actually cares what is on that...I have no idea who might. But, I just wanted some of those names to be mentioned somewhere, y'know.
so there they are again, just-4-U. I coulda changed a couple things - yeah 'cause y'know, a few of these were just the arbitrary 1st-song-I-could-think-of by an artist I thought I oughta be represented...like, it only occurs to me now that if I'd maybe put a different Shaft song on it might've been a "concession to the mainstream" too...but, enough about a stupid list of songs. What's been happening in "real life"? Well my sister had her art opening & that all went pretty good, & so you know what, now she's saying she's gonna move down here too. I think that'd be really great. She's saying she'll move down in time for the Terminals comeback show, which is pretty soon (gotta go check when).

MONDAY 21st MAY - so I just took Violet to the airport to return to Auckland, we never did get to do any Space Dust stuff & I guess no way will she move down here in time for the Terminals show either (it's next week, I think)...still she says she will move down here, maybe in summer...That's still quite a long time. I hope she does do it, anyway, because I really want to be in that that band again, it's still kind of my favourite...no new stuff has just magically spontaneously happened since I moved down here to make me feel all inspired about playing music again, I'm still locked in an inertia of (a) laziness about the actual practical logistics of rock band rehearsal type activities, (b) anxiety about entering the kind of social scenes where rock music gets done (we had to do another PLC show the other night at this marathon lots-o'-bands late nite gig at the Crown & the sight of the crowd as I entered the place straight away filled me with panic - I'd taken dope & my excuse for doing so was at least in part so's I wouldn't feel like this...Yeah well the drugs didn't work) & (c) just haven't had the feeling of sustained collective inspiration that you need to keep interested in group-based music, you need frequent jamming with the same group of people (I don't mean exclusively of course, other people coming in is usually good), but the PLC band just has this intermittant level of activity with different guys not bothering to turn up each time & all that shit, it never really hits a groove. I haven't really tried to do anything about finding a group I could feel like this about, of course, I just kind of assumed that something would kind of fall into place, & surprisingly, it hasn't.
So, I don't know, if you live in Dunedin & you have some idea for some kind of band & you need a guy who can play pseudo-1960s/70s musique-concrete rock drums a la Maureen Tucker/King Usznievich/Vertical Slit sort of thing, I'm thinking harmolodic rhythm'n'blues, the deep sound, but the purposely lightweight "who-gives-a-shit, it-could-mean-anything" modern version, unironically populist & authentically "unreal", y'know the sort of thing I'm driving at, call my phone number! Call it 471 7075!

WEDNES. 23rd MAY -

i also found the quote: "To achieve the impossible dream, try going to sleep."

SNOW today (this morning)(last night) here in Dunedin. So it's fucking cold. & I have a cold. Which I considered reason enough to get high. But I gotta go now, if i've got any profound-sounding resolutions i'll get back to ya after "Just Shoot Me".
(The Jewish kid from "Freaks & Geeks" was in it! yay!)

THURS. 31st MAY '01 Today I was hassling Maryann about - actually I don't think I was really hassling her about it but the mere fact of mentioning it again was annoying her - how she always says "brought" for "bought". (If you're not from this country maybe you've never heard people do that but heaps of New Zealanders say that, I don't know whether anyone anywhere else does.) Anyway straight after that I spoke of ideas that had been "installed" in me at an early age. Then I got home & I was watching "Popular" (yeah well you shoulda seen what was on the other channels), & one of the characters said something about something "thereby obliterating us of any blame". No maybe that wasn't it, maybe it wasn't "obliterating" but it was some word like that, it wasn't "exonerating" anyway which is what I guess it was meant to be (right?). Doesn't anyone proof-read this shit? Nah 'cuz it's just for teenagers anyway, fuck 'em.
Man is "Dr Katz" great or what. I was thinking maybe I oughta be seeing a psychiatrist, maybe I'd benefit from that but y'know, it's more my way of doing things to watch a parodic version of psychoanalysis on TV...same goes for religion ("Father Ted"), I think I'm benefiting more from this than I ever could from the real thing.

SAT. 1st June - hey here i yam in ARC CAFE, Dunedin's #1 hippie internet caff & late-nite rock-type-music venue, all excited boy-o-boy 'cause tonite's the nite of our old (yeah & i do mean OLD,'cause these old buggers are all even older than me THE TERMINALS comeback special! All right. Yeah all fookin righty right right i yam actually all excited 'bout a actual rock show, 1st time in a long time, also just to see some of my old back-in-the-day Chch buddies (buncha other ppl from there came down too & they brung me presents & stuff, Mick Elborado had bought a pile of rec's & he had the Blue Orchids' "Sleepytown" 12-inch & when i saw that I went, Oh man I 've been looking for their stuff for forever so he just gave it to me, that guy rules. & Rico just gave me a copy of Meltzer's "Just a whore..." - wow wow 'cause I so wanted my own copy of that & i would've probably never bought it, i'm such a cheapskate. & Lynton gave me a copy of his hot new [i ain't heard it o'course but sho' i betcha it's hotasspoop hotsy potsy, how cd it be otherwise 'cause that guy is GREAT) solo alb. "To Venus With Mars"...yeah Lynton & Rico & Nick Hodgson (i.e. the CM ENSEMBLE altho' they're not playing in that guise on this particular occasion, they're, uh , can't remember, somethin else) are down here to do some rock axtion too, ooh mama. hey have you seen me so excited EVER, isn't it great. & 'cause this place is a internet cafe 'swell as a rock-a-boogie musical venue, yo i can review it live on location if i wanna, that's (not-quite-as-but-) pretty exciting too. i mean i prob'ly won't but i could. anyway i think someone's gonna start playin soon so maybe i better go & alert my gurlfren 'cause her & Gilbert & them've gone to hang out in the bar over the rd. 'cause they hate hippies & this place is always rotten lousy with them stinkin' funky-smellin' dumm-gross-rude hippies. Hey I be talkin to you later, O-kay-dokie.

FRI. 08 JUNE sorry I have not been updating, it's not like I been busy, it's mainly 'cause of our crummy ass computers...the one i'm reduced to using is the Brother's old one that he gave me in lieu of a debt (it's what i have to show for being in that Snakeskin flick, i guess) - 5-10 minutes to open a page with any graphics at all, so all we use it for is I LOVE MUSIC ('cause that loads pretty fast 'cause it's text-only) - both me & Maryann are totally addicted to it & now that guy Pat Krauss is too, he got on to it 'cause of reading about it in Maryann's diary I think. I didn't even go & see those guys play the other night (Pat played on his own, Ricko & Lynton & Nick Hodgson's band played, Maryann said it was really good.), I'm so fuckin' ashamed. Of being old, that's why I didn't go, no it isn't it's 'cause I took dope the 2 days before & would've had to again to've done anything much that day or night. Smart work. I haven't been doing it that much tho'. Let's talk about something else.
Anyway The Terminals the other night were choice, I did a review for local free sheet FIX so I'll put it up here when I got the disc on me. I'm in the Law Library right now pretending to be a student. Anyone oughta be able to tell I'm fake tho', when ever in the 21st century do you see someone doing a degree, any kind, any age person, who types with just 2 fingers?
& also, real students are always just in Hotmail. unless they're from Eastern Europe, they're usually downloading porn.

Actually that is not true about my typing skills betraying me as a non-stude, i said that to Maryann & she went No 'cause actually that's 1 of the well-known traits of "mature students," they're the ones who can't type.
How old would you estimate me to be anyway? From the way I write, probably about 17, right? But nope if you don't know I'm 38.
& in the lift coming up here, see this lady of maybe only 5 or so years older than me - coulda been 50 or older, not sure - anyway she said to me ,Oh I had 1 of those road safety badges (round luminous kind that I suppose are from the '50s, actually I had 1 the same when I was a kid but I have the feeling that was already kind of a old object then - don't know.) when I was in primary school. & without thinking I went, Mmm? uh, oh yeah, I suppose it'd be about that old. Immediately I had said that I realised the important rule of etiquette or y'know just being nice to ppl or whatever I had just broke, & I blurted out , Oh you know when I was in primary school I mean, too late tho', jeez it was embarrassing. I mean she laughed about it but, y'know.
We scored pot from our landlord! - we had to get him round 'cause the drain was backed up & our toilet was emitting the Rolf Harris wobble board noise & a bunch of water containing scraps of toilet paper & (couldn't exactly see it but) human poop was running down our garden path. & Jane noticed, Hey that's obviously not all even *our own* poop! (Don't use coloured t.p.) The guy came round - actually he's not the real landlord, the actual owner of the hse lives outta town & this guy is her brother - the guy came round & we told him that & he was like, Oh good, that means it's a council problem, means I don't have to pay for it. Yeah good, we got other people's human feces all the hell over our back yard. (Not any more tho' & we bought some pot off him, big deal, lots of people buy drugs off their landlords).

SUNDAY 10 JUNE - This morning when we woke up (it was snowing)(still is & we walked all the way all the hell down Stuart St & London St & got our feet all fuckin wet 'cause we were both wearing sneakers, duh) Maryann said 1st thing when she woke up that she'd thought of a question she wanted to post on I LOVE MUSIC . She was saying, Yeah I usually wake up with lotsa ideas all organised & stuff that maybe the night before were just an unformed mess. I went yeah? not me. I can usually only organise my thoughts when I'm taking a long walk or maybe a drive in a car on my own.
Which of course I never actually do.
I'm embarrassed by the lack of actual content on this site, when I started doing it I assumed that having a forum for ideas would make me, y'know, have ideas. Which has not been the case.
Hey anyway, it's been snowing, we went outside & walked around in it & everything. It's cool, it makes strangers all act friendly towards each other just 'cause it's snowing. Which I normally'd have a problem with, I hate it when people talk to me. But when it's just on the level of, they throw a snowball at you, you yell YOU FUCKER! at them & flip them the fingers, that's easy, that's cool, I can walk on feeling like, OK, social interaction with other humans, transaction completed without anyone being able to tell that I'm any different from anyone else, cool.

THURS. 21st JUNE - This is weird to me. Brendon sends us this letter all about how fucked up his life is & how he wishes he "had it together" like we do. "You guys are both such great diarists" & stuff, reading about our lives makes him envious, blah blah. WHUH? It's not even a nice feeling like, oh well I'm glad I could shine some light into someone's life, it's (I don't know)
I'm having a crisis of purpose, I've gotta start doing something to make my life more than just the mere fact of surviving. I'm thinking I ought to start some formal study of something, enrol at university & do an English paper or a philosophy paper or something. But what'd I be doing, immersing myself in stuff I already decided was of no use to me (following day - I came back to discover that the end of this page is missing for some reason, thanks Geocities. Maryann told me "I thought you conceptualised that very well" - now I can't remember what I said. Too bad. I guess this page has gotten too long, I'll start a new one).

FURTHUR