I'm back hanging with my buddie Chip in San Diego after an emotionally wrangling (in the most amazing way possible, of course) and inspiring trip through Mexican waves. There were parties, more beach fires, humanitarian home building, and volunteering alongside a crew of mainly high school students to help out indigenous farming communities and small-time Mestizo contractors. Have fun with the next crew Heidi :) -- My mind floats along all the paths I have traveled and then again towards what home will soon be...
I've spent the last day developing some sweet playlists on Pandora -- the music genome project (read: the sweetest fucking thing in existence... google it), eating Korean-style pig stomach, and -- oh ya, I lost my wallet this morning when we went surfing at Scripps -- but I totally found it and a folding army knife which wasn't mine too (which could be real U.S. Army issue, since there are ton of military bases in the area -- the Navy base I passed today was GIANT).
A generally rad dude: Chip -- the man whose answering machine lets you know you probably won't hear back from him.
We stop for gas the first day in San Diego on Turquoise Street, as Chip gives me a run down on all the different beach communities that are home to nightlife, waves, and really tasty burritos.
Go up to the war memorial past the road that says it's closed and you get this view in 360 degrees -- a metropolis of squirming lights rolls along gracefully.
Beer in the fridge -- check. Thruster for barrels -- check. Fan on for max chill -- check.
Surfing as politics: Surfing is not part of some marginalized "surf culture" -- these days out here riding waves is just what everybody does.
Manuel is the Mexican guy in charge of maintenance and stuff at the house here. He's super chill but freaks out when the authorities show up at the door.
I totally rode that longboard.
SoCal is the home of the concrete jungle mystique -- you could probably lay a foundation over an entire small country with all the roads that cross over each other down here.
I wrote this last month while sitting in a Tim Horton's munching on a chocolate danish and sipping a double double, in the middle of my break in a split shift at work, after I found out I was working alongside a ex-Sudanese youth warrior, who had already felt the rush of battle and the power of loss:
I feel the rush of wind throughout my veins, sending ripples to the tips of my fingers and toes. All my skin is shivering. But it's not the warm breeze swaying the maroon planters outside the glass so lazily that's doing it. And it's not the swaying afternoon trees by the curb. And it's not the lulling air conditioning inside, circulating the atmosphere constantly, artificially, which is doing this to me either.
Instead, I shake from the silent screams I know are still emanating from desert-covered village wells that now serves as burial grounds for so many of Sudan's non-Arab Darfurians -- where the water supply is now poisoned. I hear the wide sweeping gusts of sand along the Sahara. So far, so foreign, to these pretty cars cruising slowly through the intersections and past traffic lights. The closest we might come to hearing echoes of a similar scene is the now-laughable epic electronic dance number they still play at the club by Darude called "Sandstorm". And we might be able to comprehend a prairie whirlwind. But nothing could really capture the sorrow of the 400,000 that died in only four years in the Darfur region, or the half-century of civil war and rebel conflicts that we have had a hand in perpetuating. But listen well and you might just hear the aftershock. Eyes wide open. Tears well. Muscles spasm.
Because just knowing is such a struggle for some reason out here. It's so hard to find people who give a shit. So fucking hard to tap into what's really going on. And sometimes the only way is through the back channels. And it's strange how liberating it can feel to uncover the truth behind disaster and tragedy. Finally piercing the thick wall of bullshit our protectors and authorities set up for us is like reaching the surface again after an agonizing struggle with volatile waves on an ocean has kept you under and totally disoriented. Savour that first breath. Drink it in son. For it might be awhile until you get another.
"The discovery of oil in Africa can be a blessing or a curse, as is the case in southern Sudan. Against all odds and predictions, the Sudanese regime, backed by Chinese, Malaysian, and Canadian oil companies -- was able to forcibly clear out the populations of huge swathes of south-central Sudan in order to secure the way for the oil companies to begin exploiting the oil. Hundreds of thousands of people were killed or displaced by these vicious scorched earth campaigns -- in which everything is burned including crops, villages, and houses -- in the oil fields and the manipulation of relief flights was an effective complement to government air strikes and ground assaults."
The Sudanese government recruited Janjaweed from the poorest reaches of Sudan's north. Khartoum "released criminals from jail, recruited fighters from neighboring countries, and gave cash handouts of around $100 to anyone who would take up arms against Darfur's non-Arab tribes. The government provided the Janjaweed with new rifles and heavy weapons, and some of them even got uniforms."
"Beyond indifference and the ghosts of Somalia, responding to Darfur has an additional obstacle. Sudanese government officials, who were close to Osama bin Laden when he lived in that country from 1991 until 1996, are now cooperating with American counterterrorism authorities. The regime in Khartoum rightly concluded that if they provided nuggets of information about al-Qaeda suspects and detainees to the Americans, the value of this information would outweigh outrage over their state-supported genocide. In other words, when U.S. counterterrorism objectives meet up with anti-genocide objectives, Sudanese officials had a hunch that counterterrorism would win every time. These officials have been right in their calculations so far. As of this writing, near the end of 2006, the United States had done little to seriously confront the Sudanese regime over its policies." --From Not On Our Watch by Don Cheadle and John Prendergast
I have just so many questions I want and need but can't really ask of that kid who says he's an ex-Janjaweed from Sudan. I don't know how much to believe, but he can't be lying about everything. Why would he? And I mean, I work with him, but I'm not really sure how I would go about asking. But just seeing him. Hearing the stories about cutting off the enemy and pounding out slaughter. About the thrill of having an army of your fellow rebels outfitted with American firearms (note: the U.S. is not allowed to sell Sudan weapons). Feeling where the bullet went into his chest was a shock. It was like his ribcage bent inwards. Just watching the transition, his own recovery and switch into materialistic North American society -- the finesse and silence -- says quite a lot on its own though. Girls love the dude.
But when you were shot in the chest in a foreign war and had two of your brothers fucking die there -- I can't imagine how hard it would be to try to fit in to a world where the hugest damn issue the kids out here are in emotional turmoil over is: whether it's a big deal or not that they kissed another girl and liked it.
One day we'll be sultans again, oh glorious Fur who have suffered so much.
Now go watch Leonardo DiCaprio in Blood Diamond to get a sense of modern African conflict, the influence of Western consumers and the culture of child warriors.
Or read more about an Alberta company's oil work in Sudan.
One of the hottest tunes of the season, they play this song at least twice each night at the club: Kate Perry "I Kissed a Girl"
(Or just in case that one craps out on us again, here's another vid cut with Degrassi the Next Generation clips -- almost more relevant since there are actually chicks kissing in it instead of the official music video which just teases the consumer, seeking controversy but not too much controversy, eyes squarely on your pocketbook... yumm)
The crescent moon shows its face from behind dusty wisps of heavy clouds that are darker than the twilight, and you know it's time for those jazzy funky records to come out. Flip through stacks, dust 'em off, and fire up the old turntable in the garage. We are about to step into another era...
It's pretty cool to be able to pick up a relic of history -- a square case with roughed up edges and a yellowed inner slip-cover -- and know that at one point someone else -- maybe even a younger version of you -- held this very artifact in their hands when the world was younger, more naive, less connected, and quite a bit bigger. And someone liked it enough to keep it. Maybe there's a picture of an evening ocean that covers the back of it, the whole thing a rich harvest orange, with shades of water, earth and sky running from peachy yellow to fiery bright and right down to a heavy auburn. But you know this isn't a manipulation -- the computer software to do that didn't exist back then. You know equally well too, and just as unconsciously, that this isn't the real deal either. See, the way you've been presented with the beach scene is not how it really was. Just think of an old mid-20th century National Geographic if you're having a hard time visualizing the effect: the shot appears the way it does because of the camera equipment that was available at the time. What you're seeing is how they wanted to believe the world was 20 years ago. This was all that could be captured. And it maintains its radiance. So we're left with an enigmatic image to stamp Jean-Luc Ponty's "Enigmatic Ocean" all across our brains -- all across the times. Fretless basses, organs, synthesizers (the ARP -- so wandering, unrefined and lost by today's standards), grand pianos and electric guitars -- quintessential elements of a 1977 attempt at the modern concerto. The Enigmatic Ocean spans four parts. There are three portions to "the Struggle of the Turtle to the Sea".
And whether you like the old record, the style, the approach, the flow of the segments -- or not -- You can always delve into each and every bar and note like a book. Just let the sounds sweep you away into another land far gone. Or -- more precisely -- the same places, the exact same space -- but in a completely separate mindspace and soundscape. But the structures of the waveforms remain the same.
So whether you're looking at the abstract shapes that spread out over "Where Have I known You Before -- Return to Forever" featuring Chick Corea, while hearing parts you fucking hate or moments that glisten so hard you just want to reach out and touch them, sample them and soak yourself in them -- or whether you're looking at brown bodies playing on the sand and in the light blue water on the Weather Report's Black Market album jacket, greeted by a deep foghorn and textured saxophones from its vinyl -->> you're being given the gift of playing in a landscape that exists now as only a dream, a remembrance in someone else's mind. And now it belongs to you too. Quite a trip if you ever want to try it.
Or maybe you want to travel on with Herbie Hancock on his "Maiden Voyage". The sleeve has a lime green border at the top with white text denoting the album. The photo across most of the front is a blurred ocean blue. Sit back and listen to a man delve into his fascination with the great deep beyond -- the heaving and crashing big blue.
Keep in mind that this sophisticated man with a piano was not only imaginative as hell in years past -- but has the staying power to keep on headlining right through the new millennium to today. So he says:
"the sea has often stirred the imagination of creative minds involved in all spheres of art. There still exists an element of mystery which surrounds the sea and the living aquatic creatures which provide it with its vital essence....This music attempts to capture its vastness and majesty, the splendor of a seagoing vessel on its maiden voyage, the graceful beauty of the playful dolphins, the constant struggle for survival of even the tiniest sea creatures, and the awesome destructive power of the hurricane, nemesis of seamen."
So do yourself a favour, hit a garage sale and dig dep. Maybe you too can be soaked in the grand schemes of rhythmic time travel. Catching sonic waves along side homemade chip dip and drifting on and on and on. Look. Over there across the dirt back lane, over the covered automobile, across the wooden fence, the white haired lady is out on her porch again, and again. She sure has to throw out a lot of garbage for some reason today.
When you're away, as dislocated from home as I am -- with little news coming back to me really from Toronto via emails or telephone calls or Facebook posts (it would be too costly and time consuming when you're trying to deal with the people and circumstances in your hear and now, and I don't really have the time to return many emails either... I have a hard enough time posting blog entries) -- you spend a lot of time wondering what all your friends and loved ones are up to. And you try to balance the person you are while on the road and in new cities and climates with the person you where when surrounded by high-density urban boxes, with all their marvelous nighttime colours. I think most of all I dream about how my life will be when I return. Because there is absolutely no way of knowing. Somethings never change. And then, some things will never be the same. Some things just regenerate or explode or blossom or... commit suicide.
I just had this urge to hop on Facebook around midnight this morning and check out what some of my friends from Toronto have been up to. I stumbled upon a Facebook group called In Memory of Micheal J. Sinclair. My heart skipped a beat. I thought it might be a joke, and I saw his profile page showed no new activity. But when I read the text on the page that said Michael had committed suicide recently, I just somehow instantly KNEW that it wasn't a joke at all. And I've been in shock ever since. I cried as I stayed up the rest of the night and watched RENT for the first time in my life (this'll be the night to watch it I had thought to myself earlier). The movie/musical is about a bunch of young urban bohemian characters who ride the line so close to the edge, while struggling with artistic vision, emotional baggage, and creative independence. And so many of the images ring so true. The inner-city silence can be a deep and hard one. And I know a lot of kids that'll back me up on that -- especially in Toronto.
It's funny how well you can come to like someone even if you haven't known them for long. I was busy as hell and he was working all the time too last year. But I definitely remember jamming out with the dude a few times as he came and crashed at our downtown Chinatown pad in Toronto last year a whole bunch. He was just a fucking awesome guy to have around. He was never an asshole, was a great musician, was quiet but pretty hilarious and was always adding that little extra, you know -- like making our small little apartment feel like a home. He was the type of guy who you could count on if he said he'd be there. I mean he was super cynical and everything -- but I've come to expect that from anyone who's lived in Toronto for more than a couple years. And had kind of this inner goth that I never really saw come out too much. But I never expected this. As it turns out, he hung himself about a month ago.
I remember the last time I chilled out with him -- it was at Pierre's show at the Cameron House. This was the first time that the new roommate that was taking my place, James, came to a show with a bunch of us that had been at the place previously (Me, Casey, Pierre and his roommate, for example), so I remember the night pretty well. I remember Michael had stopped by our house to jam with Casey I think, but no one was there. I recall being just outside the side of that bar that has the giant ants and the murals all over it, telling him he should come check out the show. He said he would, and I believed him. I saw some people blazing outside. And he showed up a few minutes later. The band bought us beers because we helped promote the concert. I remember what seemed to be a funny middle-aged gay man take forever to ask us for beers, and then way overcharge us for the pitcher. Someone passed out right there, and I can't remember if it was Casey or Michael -- but that's just how soothing Benhur is, I guess.
And it's funny for me to think that the guy I knew that reminded me most of Matthew Good (Michael had a similar sense of humour even kind of looked like him) and the band that sounds like Matthew Good the most to me (Benhur has a ton of similarities to Matt Good's music, you can't deny it Pierre) were in the same room at the same time for that moment. This is one moment that will never take place again.
So I didn't fall asleep until after my alarm had already gone off. But I passed out of an hour and had to spend $20 bucks on a taxi to try to make it to work for 6:30 a.m. to make burgers. And I kept falling asleep in the mists of the early morning burger freezers. I've never seen the plant in such a fog as that. Wearing my white smock, I crouched down and disappeared, except for my orange hardhard. It was the hardest I've ever had to struggle there so far. If I stood still for more than 5 seconds I would start falling asleep or dreaming. And the lines were down a lot, which means the burger stampers or something were broken, and so standing around was the only thing to really do. I had to sneak off to the bathroom once and I hid in the materials room for a bit, and I kept switching the job I was doing on the line --anything to keep me sort of awake. Three times I almost told the supervisor I was going home. But somehow I made it to break -- and immediately downed as much coffee as I could afford from the vending machine. Things went pretty smoothly after that.
But strange thing is that today -- the day I found out that Michael J. Sinclair killed himself -- is also his birthday. Holy fuck. Happy birthday bro. You're radder than shit and always will be.
The worst part is, I didn't even have the chance to learn you loved waves this much.
If you know the right bouncer you just might be able to save yourself the massive $5 cover charge they'll force you to cough up if you don't have hook-ups. And the raddest girl at the rave over at Walker's doesn't use drugs anyways. Barely ever. Been going hard for about 10 years. But she parties just as hard, if not harder, than the girl -- hot as hell -- fucked on mushrooms. The two, just themselves, basically bring the party. It's mostly electro-house and techy stuff. But people here like a mixture -- rap, drum n' bass, and trance too -- and just end up calling it all "techno". You'll meet some real stand up dudes here.
It only took half an hour to tattoo up his face. That was just over a year ago. But it makes him look like a warrior. Some of those kids are so smelly and grimey. And they know what they're up to ain't "legit". But ripped Propaghandi shirts, jean jackets and the most MANIC patches can't all be a sham can they????? Naw... these cats are the most adorable things you'll ever meet. Serious. They'll grin beyond description or smile with their eyes, and tell you how lovely your face is. And coming from them -- arising out of slime green glasses or broadcasting from thick-ass natural dreds -- you know they have no reason to bullshit you. Which is a nice breath of fresh air for a change. So I'm kind of glad Lewis snuck some of them into his garage. It's not like it's being used for anything better anyways.
Colouring on the table... whoever thought of this is a genius.
It would seem that country music is the happy medium out here. But to catch all the undercurrents I think you'd have to dig around a bit.
You might wonder, for example, why a Toronto band as faraway and distant as Metric, has the ability to resonate through the airspace out here, though kids in farmland suburbs south of the border aren't given the chance to hear the same music.
Or you might also wonder as well, how come, with the simple twangy ballads and tender Christian radio hits, in Canada's own Heartland, why punk and hardcore tunes done up with super fast guitar licks and an easy enough style -- just make so much sense to so many kids out here.
And from Regina I'm picked up by a dark-haired girl with rings in her face and tattoos on her arms, the wife of a dude in a non-stop touring hardcore band. She fell in love with the urban kids who need so much help, but are still so rad, over there in Nairobi. Over the kilometers we chill to tracks from Cursive's Domestica album, Coheed and Cambria, and various melodic hardcore bands. Then we put in the latest album her husband's hardcore group has put out, and vibe out to the breakdowns.
As we cruise along (half the time on the wrong side of the road I swear) we'll pass some guy on a bike raising money for Darfur. And later I'll watch Andy Shauf play some great acoustic, check out some chill art photos, and salvaged Douglas Fir woodwork, and I'll hear about a girl going to help out in South Africa.
But for now, alongside a soundtrack of guttural growls, I watch the sun stream through the clouds, fanning out for miles.
Hollywood Undead - ...check out some Linkin Park-esque hip-hop emo. They seem to have an oppressed Sum 41 mixed with Slipknot vibe going on.
The Medic Droid - In emoland the electro-reprisal of Good Charlotte's emo forays pays off with middle-America's lost children. It's as if Jeffree Star and Jon B got together to manipulate computer kids with provacative hot-topic rhetoric and annoying synths. Pretty great stuff if you're in the mood.
Metro Station - "Kelsey" http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CRTyMUZ1m1A - One more emo favourite that I would normally pass on -- especially with the 80s flare I kill to avoid. But I checked their "Kelsey" music video online, and I have to say this is a pretty good interpretation of the spirit of the domesticated lands I've been traversing. The droopy haircuts, automobile transportation, traffic flow signs, the longing for the coast. "I'd swim the ocean for you. The ocean for you. Whoa-oh. Kelsey." Emo goes Escada -- for those in the know. The waves are kind of small, flat, and grey though.
Pomegranates -- silly Gondry-style indie-pop. I'd call this moreso local Deathcab-infused passion, rather than large-format emotional exploitation. I love the erratic starts and stops. Glad to see that element of the informal pop-rock playground sticking around.
Dark Room - http://www.myspace.com/darkroommusic This stuff is a little more spacey, and they could have even been at the symphony I was at, since that's pretty much their territory. I think those guys might like a little Mozart now and again, if my guess is correct.
Anathallo - yourhappymakesmegooldies.blogspot.com (playing the El Mocambo with Dosh on May 19th) http://www.myspace.com/anathallo The name sounds pretty cool, and I hung out with some kids that seemed pretty into this stuff, so I figured I'd give 'em a listen. From a first impression I'd expect the band to be sticking around for awhile anyways.
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