I’m not necessarily saying, like William Burroughs did, that the town where I live is a ” dead museum “, or, as another so-and-so once said, ” a dying whore “, but just about every day I see something in New Orleans that makes me think, ” Gee, somebody should take a picture of that before it falls down ” .
Click on the picture below to go to a set of photographs of buildings that are clustered around the intersection of South Rampart Street and Martin Luther King Blvd.
“ Getting ready to cause much strife “ – yes indeed. 4 UK spikypunk– obsessed kids ( I was right there with ‘em ) from Evanston, IL on a fat Radio Shack Concertape with a hand-lettered cover. If you’re of a certain age and from Chicago, you may remember the synchronized “ Nadsat jump “. Some interesting things about this cassette – it was recorded by Steve Albini, who went on to become a producer of great repute — and has the band playing through Albini’s then-band Big Black’s gear, which accounts for the very unusual sound here. The guitarist, Matt Diehl, went on to write for Rolling Stone as well as several books.
When I listen to these old tapes on modern equipment, I’m amazed at how noisy they are – I probably could have trimmed some of the tape hiss off, but I think it’s part of the charm …. makes the music sound like a hazy transmission from another planet, which, in a sense, it is.
01. ” Nosferatu “
01. ” Nosferatu ”
Nadsat Rebel : 02. ” Slipping Fast “
02. ” Slipping Fast ”
Nadsat Rebel : 03. ” Getting Ready “
03. ” Getting Ready ”
Nadsat Rebel : 04. ” I Am The Wall “
04. ” I Am The Wall ”
Nadsat Rebel : 05. ” Bounty “
05. ” Bounty ”
|January 22, 2009 | Stuffs
Hey wow – a stash of unused Black Diamond Strings stickers from 1971 — the creepy girl bird-monster definitely does not want the creepy boy bird-monster to touch her guitar. First person to email an address gets one free.
I’m continuing my struggle to organize and consolidate the mountain of crap I’ve got and today saw me starting to open boxes of stuff from my White Zombie years. This was a bittersweet experience for a couple of different reasons, one being that I have a great collection of unique photographs, zines, demo tapes, and souvenirs of every kind — and when the recently released WZ box set was being put together, nobody saw fit to ask me – or Sean, or Ivan, or John T. , or anybody else who was involved with the group – about what we might have.
I’ve already stated my dissatisfaction with the box’s poor design and lack of written content, liner notes and credits, but looking at all this good stuff made me feel shittier about the whole thing.
The other thing, and if you live in New Orleans everything goes back to this, is Hurricane Katrina .. part of the roof of my storage space blew off in the storm and my junk didn’t get rained on directly, but it did get wet. The WZ boxes were on top and got the wettest, and then baked – mostly everything is okay, but some photos got ruined — you can see some damage on the lower right hand corner of the pic below.
This picture was taken by Michael Lavine almost exactly 20 years ago. I know because I met Rob and Sean the day after MLK day, 1989, and almost right after that they called me to come and do this photo session with them – before I had played a note – in fact, this night was when I first met their drummer Ivan. I like to kid myself that I was so cool that they started to integrate me into the band before I even tried out, but the truth is more along the lines of them desperately trying to find anyone with a pulse and some hair to play guitar – and Michael wanting to try out some new lights and needing a subject. I’m sure it didn’t hurt that I’d followed the band closely in the year and a half since I’d moved to New York City and that I sort of ” got it ” … and I certainly did put everything I had into the band from that point on. Anyway, check this out — I’m just 22 years old and I’m trying to figure out how to look tough without a beard. Cute!!
Hanoi, Vietnam : people have been asking to see photos from my trip, so here. If you’re like me and looking at crashed B-52 bombers and eating bugs is your idea of a good time, you may enjoy these images. Click on the picture below to go to the photos.
