Welcome to the 21st century

Hope all of you who were able to vote in this election did so. The day after the election I felt extra optimistic about the future of the country.

Joe Jackson Song of the Day!

Well it's September. The Seasons are on the verge of change from Summer to Fall. Oddly, this is the time of the year that always strikes me as the perfect time to break out some Joe Jackson records out. Jackson of course is one of the greatest songwriters of my time. For wise advice in love and heartbreak check out this cat's tunes!

And yes, sometimes I find myself listening to his songs when they coincidentally seem to draw a parallel to what I am going through at the time. Man's prophetic.



What the hell is wrong with you tonight?
I can't seem to say or do the right thing
Wanted to be sure you're feeling right
Wanted to be sure we want the same thing

She said, I can't believe it
You can't, possibly mean it
Don't we, all want the same thing
Don't we
Well, who said anything about love?

No, not love she said
Don't you know that it's different for girls?
No, not love she said

I know, a lot of things that you don't
You wanna hear some?
She said, just give me something
Anything
Well give me all you got but not love

-Different for girls 1979

Writer in the sky

Until You Read This
by RM

This is the hardest game you have me playing.
This time I need to know if I can rely on your word.
If you mean the things you say you mean.
If you actually feel it nice again
I feel your attempt to reach out
but see that you don't quite get your arm
over the threshold.
Leaving me to wonder what you are really after.
Sometimes I daydream a pain you want me to feel.
A pain you feel.
Other times I daydream a message in a cloudless sky;
The afterthought of a careful pilot
skywriting words as legible as possible.
In dense white smoke, the vapor reads;
you may never know how much you hurt me.
The wind flushes over and in a matter of minutes these words are
nothing more than gone.

Lee Miller: Muse and Master

Recently I stumbled upon the photography of Lee Miller whose pictures are beautiful, tragic, and iconic. Miller was first known as a model for Vogue then became student, lover, and muse to Man-Ray during the late 1920's and early 1930's. She appeared in many of Man-Ray's most famous photographs of that era. For a time she worked as Man-Ray's assistant so that he could concentrate on his painting. Miller even took on his fashion assignments. Interestingly, many of the pictures accredited to Man-Ray while Lee was his assistant were actually taken by her. During and after her time with Man-Ray she developed her craft as a photographer, opened her own studio in Paris and became active in the Surrealist movement. As World War II intensified, she dedicated herself to photojournalism and became war correspondent/photographer for Vogue and Life Magazine. Her family pleaded for her return to the states while London was bombed but Miller refused and continued to be a presence on the front lines. Her pictures covered war time, devastation, sorrow, pain, poverty, loss, and post-war life. Miller captured the war and produced a dazzling array of images all across war torn London and Europe.

Check out to see a virtual gallery of her photography;
http://www.leemiller.co.uk/virtualexhbframe.aspx

Little Children

Recently I caught the film Little Children, an adaptation of the book of the same name by Tom Perrotta. It is an above average adaptation that translates very well from book to film. The film was nominated for Best Actress by Kate Winslett and Best Supporting Actor by Jackie Earle Haley including Best Adapted Screenplay by Perrotta. It revolves around a community of imperfect characters in a suburban town full of neighborhood hypocrisy and deeply rooted personal issues. It's a drama with a tinge of dark humor centering over characters that are self destructive in their own ways, some more so than others. The story is very much about human behavior and urge. Little Children is filled with fine character performances that keep a well balanced pace throughout the film until the chilling climax.

The most interesting and unsettling performance is by former 70's child star Jackie Earle Haley. The actor's own story is interesting. He is previously best known for his role as a foul mouth, chain smoking, motor-bike riding kid from The Bad News Bears. He also starred in one of my favorite coming of age films, Breaking Away. Up until a few years ago he was delivering pizza. Haley struggled getting acting roles for years until finally moving on. After 13 years, he returned to acting, landing a role in All the Kings Men which led to his critically acclaimed and Oscar nominated role in Little Children. In Little Children, he plays a formerly incarcerated pedophile struggling to ignore the stigma of his unforgivable actions. There are points in the movie in which you feel an odd sympathy for Haley's character because of the hatred strangers give him which is also felt but soon enough you realize completely how serious his internal problems really are. Haley succeeds in making his film counterpart far creepier than in the book. I was pleased with how his character was integral to the plot and how he was used to connect all of the other character's stories together. Very well done.

I highly recommend both the film and the book by Tom Perrotta. I actually met Perotta once when he visited my high school to give a lecture. This was when his only book was a selection of short stories called Bad Haircut before his first well known novel Election, which incidentally was adapted into a widely popular film starring Matthew Broderick and Reese Witherspoon. Perrotta is one of my favorite contemporary writers and is a master at weaving multiple narratives in his books. The book is excellent. After you are done with it, watch the film!

Bukowski Revisited

Currently reading Love is a Dog From Hell by Charles Bukowski. I discovered Bukowski many years ago and every few years pick up a book or two of his. I still find that he is hit or miss but he certainly brings his ugliness and self destructive reality to the table which at times can be both unsettling and heart wrenching. There is much writing fodder here but plenty of provocative pieces sure to make one willing to go through the degenerated, misguided, and caved-in world of Bukowski--poet for the working class and the desperate.

Man-Ray

Years ago I became an appreciator of Man-Ray; modernist, photographer, and painter not to mention one of the most significant contributors to the Dadaist and surrealist movement. My favorite Man-Ray story centers around a piece of work he deemed, "the object intended to be destroyed." Dada was anti-art. It was anarchistic in intention. Dadaists sought to create art, the concept, with the form and materials being inconsequential. Dada was intended to be impermanent; the creation and idea of the artwork was the only purpose. The object was not to be venerated but to be destroyed once it was completed. Fitting that on one night self proclaimed art critics broke into the studio in which this particular object was kept and destroyed it.

Here is a piece found recently that I wrote in my late teenage years, shortly after I first discovered Man-Ray.

The “object to be destroyed” was destroyed ahead of schedule. From broken bits is an inanimate ghost reincarnated in trivial fashion. Long live the indestructible object in anger and in spirit. The minute they broke it, anti-dadaists made proof of a point. The aim was destruction, didn’t matter who did it, the so called creator or those threatened by it. The fiasco fulfilled the purpose nicely, a quirky affirmation that proclaimed vitality. The purpose was to despise the common value. The outcome was an indispensable quality; a new outrage, a jolt to shatter aesthetic tradition. The movement was hysteria; a delirious disease that attacked and infected.

Something old

Today I thumbed through old pieces of mine from up to 15 years ago and stumbled through a couple of gems from my youth.

Here is one I am particularly fond of...enjoy!

Long may you run
by Ray Manuud

Somewhere in the darkness within faint FM air wave, I hear someone whisper “long may you run.” A harmonica and a haunting bed time story about restless apparitions searching for loved ones, cast a spell where I lay my head with my lady. We drift into a drowsy stargaze guided by Apollo, turnpike noise, and UFO’s that chase firefly code. We sleep like king and queen, losing ourselves between quiet chatter and soft good morning. Dawn breaks to the smashing of eighty mile per hour winds and stainless steel grills, all song to the king and queen beneath the overpass.

Absorption is Playtime

I wrote a piece almost 10 years ago called Playtime is Absorption.

Here it is friends...

In the shadow of a trailer home by the soft glow of an outdoor light bulb, dirty fingertips and wrinkled hands moved along tight strings and disappearing smoke. A man lays on the floor, out cold on a bed of dirt, unconscious and breathing in the desert air. It is neither too late nor too early to pry him off bottle shard. He is left where his spirit commanded him. Outside, he is oblivious. Inside he sees a bird’s wing. It flaps across a fixture of mosquitoes. The night time continues smoothly as planned, smoothly as expected. Playtime is absorption.

Bad Ass Picture Time

First wave of female Los Angeles police officers testing their firearms. Circa 1966.

Ed Gein Inspired Pop Art

This has got to be the weirdest album cover I have ever seen from one of the biggest recording artists of all time. This album cover was very short lived and recalled soon after it's release.

All Things Superb

by Ray Manuud

Buried in the space between crumpled body and closed lid
All things superb explode in a fiery crash
They make spectacles out of a plan gone right
All things superb fake witnesses
and deceive people into believing it is all over
All things superb are resurrected from a semi-comatose state
by partners and associates
All things superb are smuggled
Packaged correctly if done right
paid upon arrival
and transplanted at buyer's convenience
The black market carries all things superb
Bid at own leisure
and accept at own risk

By Now

by Ray Manuud

By now this wheel has turned in on it's axel
Buy now, a 2010 model

By now this carton of milk has spoiled
Buy now, a gallon from your local supermarket

By now this needle has worn out
Buy now, an ipod instead

By now all sales are final
Buy now, while supplies last

By now this sounds like a subliminal message
Bye now.

Curvaceous 8 asks a question

By Ray Manuud

I see a flesh color of reddish orange. The sun beats down the other side of closed eyelids. It knocks me into drowsiness and a lucid state of television messages mixed with a mid summer’s daydream. My loved ones are reciting commercials followed by we now return to our program. Amidst the dream fog is a bad daytime talk show starring characters of my subconscious. The warmth of a sun ray smack pushes me over sleep territory. Finally, R.E.M. goes into overdrive as I see myself outdoors with a neighbor complaining about the humidity.

The conversation is interrupted by a change of dream sequence. Elevator music plays overhead to the tune of a Clash song followed by slogans of shopping happily and matching price reductions. I stand in the frozen meat section of the supermarket wondering what to get for tonight's dinner. A curvaceous 8 passes by. She stops to fondle vegetables. Curvaceous 8 turns to my side to ask a question I anticipate would have to do with ripeness and fresh produce. Instead she talks about irregularity of cycles and the side effects of brand X; dry mouth, insomnia, sexual side effects, diarrhea, nausea and sleepiness. And so it ends. Hooked line and sinker, snagged with eyelids popped open with disorientation.

I am pulled up from a hazy slumber. Fruits and vegetables disappear, replaced by the noise of an annoying buzzing fixture. The small animated figure on the screen hops from side to side. Consult your physician if side effects persist, the message concludes.