New York City educator Debbie Almontaser was, according to the New York Times, forced to step down from her position as founding principal of the Kahlil Gibran International Academy public school, before it even opened. It was her dream that the school could mold a curriculum that would serve a broad cross-section of NYC kids and produce graduates fluent in Arabic and with a clearer understanding of the Middle East and Islam, so as to be prepared and qualified to go forth, as “ambassadors of peace and hope,” and bridge the ever-widening chasm that separates East from West.
Almontaser, a Yemen-born, New York-bred Muslim, tendered her resignation in the wake of a deliberate smear job by a New York Post reporter who artfully misused her words, quoting her out of context and omitting qualifying clauses from her statements that mitigated what the Post presented as militant rhetoric.
Daniel Pipes, director of the self-described “think tank,” Middle East Forum, a conservative watch dog group with their eye trained on Muslims, sees Almontaser’s efforts at the Gibran school as part of a long-con strategy of Muslims to promote radical ideals through “soft” jihad. Pipes contends that Muslims are slowly and, more importantly, lawfully infiltrating, at a molecular level, all facets of American society. Pipes fears Muslims with radical leanings are operating under the radar and are ultimately intending to impose sharia law in the United States.
Whereas Pipes might view Barack Obama as a potential Manchurian Candidate type of un-witting operative, a less savvy group of fear mongers began work in January smearing “Barack Hussein Obama” by planting seeds of dread via a chain e-mail that claims that Obama is a closet “radical” Muslim extremist. The email reminds us that “the Muslims” endeavor to destroy America and that one of them in the White House would certainly accelerate their affecting that end.
What if Barack Obama is Muslim? He certainly chose a strange route along which to run for president. You would think a Muslim extremist mole would at least come up through the Republican Party to take us off of the scent for a while longer. But no, this crafty underhanded bastard has risen to the precipice of prominence as a radical reform Democrat. That’s “reverse psychology,” where you hide in plain sight and so forth. More diabolical still, as a college student, Obama changed his name from Barry back to his original christening, Barack. Damn, he’s good.
Who would suspect a guy of East African heritage with an African surname and a middle name identical to the family name of an infamous Islamic dictator of being Muslim? The length of exacting calculation to which this man and his cabal of coup d’etat hopefuls must have gone is horrifying to contemplate. But, the most daring and paradigm-inverting tactic that he has employed thus far has been to speak at length on the subject of race at a critical juncture of a tightly contested bid for his party’s nomination.
He had to do something to divert the scrutiny of the press from his glaring Muslim-ness and steer the focus toward a safer subject. So this cunning operator presented himself as someone who comes from a culture and community that struggles with its own conflicted sentiments toward the white race in general.
The 9/11 Truth-ers and Loose Change folks–the people promulgating the notion that the Bush administration, in cahoots with World Trade Center ownership, blew up the WTC themselves and blamed it on al Qaeda as an excuse to wage war on Iraq, or some such business–never saw this one coming. The only problem with the Loose Change theory is that Cheney and Co. quite obviously needed no complex and impossible-to-pull-off conspiracy in order to go to war. They just told some lies to buy some time, sent in the troops, were found out in their lies, and re-elected. Where is the necessity for an intricate conspiracy plot in all that? Here’s the conspiracy you fricking yahoos, it’s not this president who is doing al Qaeda’s bidding, it is the next president who is a secret Muslim.
If Obama gets to the White House, is he going to blow up his own crib, family, flat-screened TV, and his own ass, like some crass suicide bomber? If your goal is to assassinate the leader of the free world does it make you re-think your plans if you are the leader of the free world? Or, would he quietly wait it out through two terms of molding the new Great Society and, after he’s out of office, with his full compliment of Secret Service entourage in tow, pass the floor plans of the White House, along with lists of security pass codes and descriptions of secret handshakes to some thickly-bearded guy in a turban on a bridge in Ankara or Damascus?
What if they are right about him being Muslim but wrong about him being “extreme”? What if he’s just a regular old Muslim, like five or six of my neighbors? Most are single mothers who I rarely see or hear anything out of unless they are coming from or going to one of their multiple jobs. Directly across the street from me is an African-American Muslim bachelor who drives a fairly new pick-up truck. There is often a lot of foot traffic in and out of his house. But it’s mostly just the white work crews he regularly hires to lay tile and frame walls. He’s remodeling his house. Pretty scary.
Do the Tighten Up - Communication Breakdown
Rehearsals are about learning or writing new tunes, tightening up your existing repertoire, and working out the specifics of how your band plays together. Naturally, this takes time, but you can eliminate many hours of frustration if everyone speaks the same language, or at the very least, if one person can interpret for the rest of you. If you’ve ever witnessed or been a part of a rehearsal of trained professional players, you know how quickly things can happen–an entire show’s worth of material can be perfected in a matter of 3 hours. Yeah, the skill level may be higher than your average garage band, but it’s also a result of having a shared frame of reference. When the band leader says: “Take it 4 bars before the modulation, and this time catch the kick on the “e” of 3–and let’s try it with a 12/8 feel,” everyone knows what the hell he means, and jumps to it.
Okay, so it’s unlikely that your band will enroll at Berklee College Of Music, but it’s a good idea to sit down together and develop a standardized glossary of musical terms. First, make sure everyone relates to the form of a tune the same way; terms like intro, verse, chorus, bridge, solo, interlude, tag, and ending are all standard. Make sure everyone is clear about what each section of a tune is called, this way you can go right to it to fix things without having to play through the entire tune every time.
Remember the major scale–“Do, Re, Mi,” etc? Every note in the scale gets a number–1-8, with the in-between notes being called “sharp 4” or “flat 7” etc. Use these numbers to communicate chord progressions, chord structures, harmony parts, lead lines–any pitch-related information can be described this way. If your song is in E, the first step is to number the E major scale: E = 1, F# = 2, G# = 3, A = 4, B = 5, C# = 6, D# = 7. If the song goes from E to G then A, you’d describe the progression this way: “1 to flat 3 to 4” (G is flat 3 because it is one half-step below the natural 3 of the E major scale). You’ll be amazed at how quickly information can be exchanged using this system.
It’s important to understand the chords in a song–more than just the letters. If you call something an “A chord”, do you mean A major, A minor, A7, Amin7, A “power chord”? Be specific. If you don’t know what all those different chords are–learn them!
Learn about rhythms. Understand the difference between quarter notes, eighths, triplets, sixteenths; know what different feels are called: a shuffle, a half-time feel, double-time feel, straight eighths, swing eighths, etc.
Don’t have time to search out this week’s essential MP3s, streams and viral videos? That’s why we’re here.
Devendra Banhart “Don’t Look Back In Anger” (Oasis cover)
Yes, a bunch of new Oasis demos leaked all over the place this week. But just like the band’s last five albums or so, they’re horrible. Luckily, the same isn’t true of this beautifully wobbly cover of the Brit-pop group’s classic “Don’t Look Back In Anger” as reinterpreted by the blessedly cosmic Devendra Banhart.
Bart Davenport “Beg Steal Borrow”
Just in time for his new album, this East Bay singer-songwriter’s under-appreciated self-titled release is getting reissued. Luxuriate in this standout cut’s summer-breeze melody and the ex-Loved Ones frontman’s satin-smooth harmonies.
(via Antenna Farm Records)
The Last Shadow Puppets “The Age of Understatement (Acoustic)”
The Arctic Monkey’s frontman’s side project with Miles Kane is so good we kind of wouldn’t mind if Alex Turner never went back to his day job with the leading lights of British guitar rock. Here, the title track of the duo’s sweeping debut album gets the unplugged treatment.
MP3: “The Age of Understatement (Acoustic)”
MP3: taotu.mp3
Shy Child “Astronaut”
With the Killers on a break, why not invest a little time into their slightly more punky keytar-slinging cousins? One listen to this slice of trendy, ’80s inspired mayhem and you’ll understand why Stella McCartney recruited them to soundtrack her line at last year’s Fashion Rocks.
MP3: 06Astronaut.mp3
The Dandy Warhols “The World The People Together (Come On)”
Dumped by Capitol, these Portland rockers have lost none of their pop sheen of affection for unwieldy song titles as they re-enter indiedom. This propulsive preview track from their self-released sixth album, Earth to the Dandy Warhols, has a bit of a Chemical Brothers vibe, which so does not surprise us.
(via Stereogum)
War of the Roveses
For all of its incompetence, greed, lying, looting, and criminality, for all it’s hypocrisy, scandals, and military blunders, there are two things that modern Republicanism does well: accrue power and defeat liberals at the polls.
The Neo-con cabal, in spite of its anti-government rhetoric has succeeded in centralizing power in the executive branch to a degree heretofore undreamed of except perhaps in some paranoid and dystopian science fiction. Clearly, at some point the executive branch must voluntarily cede some of its power back to Congress and the judicial branch.
Additionally, over the last thirty years they have trained a large segment of the public to react emotionally to “cultural issues”, turning the 60’s on its head. Now it’s liberals who are old fashioned, hypocritical, and ideologically inflexible. This has been done using tactics perfected and instituted by that most foul of all Karls, Rove.
This is what worries me about the Clinton bid for the nomination. Beyond the daily insults to my intelligence, which are merely annoying, one’s tactics speak loudly as to what one’s motivations are. If the Clintons are willing to use Rovian tactics on Obama–whom nationwide polls indicate is the most popular Democrat in America, what does this say about how president H. Clinton will preside?
Like mustard gas and anthrax bombs, the mere existence of Rovian tactics doesn’t mean that they must be used. They contaminate the battlefield for everyone and must never be used except as a last resort on an enemy who has used them first. A Democrat should never use them on a Democrat. Ape shall NOT kill ape!
This brings us to the crux of the matter: these are not people whom I trust to pare back the executive branch’s power. Hillary promises health care and troop withdrawal. What if she decides to triangulate to the right as she has done so often in the past when faced with a tough political battle? Will she “go Rovian” on Democrats who stand in her way?
Because of the Supreme Court situation, I will vote for Ms. Clinton should she receive the nomination, but under extreme duress. Like the Third Degree, smallpox blankets, and McCarthyism, Rovian politics must be brought down. They have made the American voter a laughing-stock, an object of pity and scorn around the world. Rovism must be torn town like Saddam’s statue. This can only be done when it is no longer tolerated by decent people. It is the issue of this primary and indeed the whole election; it’s the one that History is watching.
As the 1980s dawned, American punk found its voice. Hardcore acts scowled and grimaced in hundreds of regional scenes between Black Flag’s angry West and Minor Threat’s steely-eyed East. Despite hardcore’s sonic standardization, powerful music abounded–but humor floundered. So when a gloriously goofy band like The Meatmen emerged from that solemn landscape they became more than court jesters; Tesco Vee’s fraternity of sophomoric pottymouths were genuine rock ‘n’ roll heroes. At the time, few bands strove to put smiles on faces–even the brilliantly ridiculous Misfits would kick you in the head upon suggestion they weren’t dead serious. The Meatmen proved that punk need not be joyless.
Vee (Robert Vermuellen) was a Lansing, Michigan rock fan and Michigan State English student who eventually combined his love for loud music with his writing skills and launched a series of zines, including Touch and Go, which became a flame that attracted Midwest-scene mojo. By 1980 he had formed The Meatmen, obnoxious innovators who adapted hardcore’s sonic simplicity but rejected its non-theatricality. Tesco regularly took the the stage in leather sex garb and wielding props. After Necros bassist Corey Rusk helped Vee turn the Touch and Go zine into a record label, the Meatmen launched their ridiculous recording career and Rusk began building Touch and Go Records (now in its 26th year) into arguably one of the best indie labels in existence.
Releasing several EPs of ultra-offensive joke punk, the Meatmen (in less than an hour of material) managed to attack gays, women, the handicapped, the elderly, Rastafarians, onanists, aborted fetuses, Jack Grisham, and countless others. We’re the Meatmen and You Suck, their 1983 LP (really an expanded EP reissue), managed to render half-assed hate speech comical in part because of Tesco Vee’s transparently tenuous tightrope walk between articulate wordsmith and his inner dumbass.
The band soon dissolved and Vee relocated to Washington, DC, where the Meatmen had mysteriously made a big impression on righteous straight edgers. Reforming the band with Brian Baker and Lyle Preslar of Minor Threat, the ‘85 Meatmen proved to be the mightiest. With disciplined musicians behind him Vee expanded his comic visions, crafting songs that explored hard rock from the rawest punk to flamboyant metal, creating powerful sonic backdrops for motormouthed comedic rants. On War of the Superbikes and Rock ‘n Roll Juggernaut he skewered the fans, but also revealed himself to be one, celebrating clichés, covering favorite bands, and living a rock ‘n’ roll fantasy. Certainly the Meatmen continued to spew bile (forever telling us what sucks, be it crippled children, you, French people, you again), but Vee also found the freedom to move beyond insult comedy.
After this incarnation, the band dissolved in 1989 and Tesco briefly attempted to translate his humor to MTV. He then got back on the horse, fronting Tesco Vee’s Hate Police, then reforming the Meatmen. Though new lineups were consistently rocking, rarely did they provide as nurturing a backdrop for humor as his ’80s bands. Though several bright spots shone through, his obnoxiousness now seemed downright obnoxious. By 1997 the Meatmen were kaput.
There are many cult bands in music history whose haters are simply mistaken. If you believe that the music of Sun Ra, or X-Ray Spex, or AC/DC is not good–subjectivity be damned–you are wrong. However, the Meatmen do not fall into that category. It is completely reasonable for anyone turned off by posturings of homophobia, racism, sexism, or baby seal abuse to go ahead and hate them. Even if you’re a fan but you think their early work tries too little, their middle phase is overambitious, and their later work is ugly, I wouln’t argue. If you can’t get past Tesco’s lyrics (Trouser Press compared them to things assholes shout out of moving cars), fine. However, if you like the Meatmen, you do not suck. Tesco’s comedic stage presence, love of music (revealed by his cover songs), creative euphemisms for female genitalia (“pickle parlor,” “glorious gravy boat”), and relentless jesting make a case that his songcrafting is an act of joy, not an outlet of hate. Those who get the joke can dig the Meatmen shamelessly.
Recently Tesco reactivated the band, reissued most of the non-Touch and Go material, compiled a DVD, and took a new Meatmen on the road. Over the dozen years since the band last gave it a go plenty of things have sucked. If ever we needed an experienced “that sucks” finger-pointer the time is now–and if, as in 1982, we must learn once again that it is we that do the sucking, so be it. Welcome back Tesco!
What the Hell Is Punk, Anyway?
The three unavoidables for musicians: death, taxes, and the van–the less than sumptuous facilities from which I am reporting to you now as the Damned hurtle at breakneck speed from Thessalonica to Athens on our latest Euro jaunt.
At least we had a reasonable hotel last night–but is it “punk rock” to be afforded the luxury of a bathrobe, room service and a vanity kit and all that? It takes a lot to get my chum Charlie Harper, singer of the UK Subs, to complain (”sleep on the DJ’s floor Charlie?”…”Yeah yeah yeah, but where’s the beer?”). The Subs will play any gig, anywhere, anytime–the bloke’s a legend.
Now I’m not saying that dossing on the floor’s beneath me–I just think at this late state in my dubious career I deserve a bit of comfort after a hard day’s flitting about in my quest to spread a little joy and happiness (plus a dollop of subversion) around the planet. Oh, and I’m not sure my dodgy old back would stand sleeping on the DJ’s floor these days, either.
A few years ago the Damned participated in the Warped Tour, a traveling punk circus with the bands journeying from town to town through the night in their various tour buses. We did notice then that some of the buses were a lot posher than others. And how about the bands that have private planes with an anarchy logo on the tail–as the owner of our last label had (although that didn’t stop us borrowing it on occasion…cough, ahem!).
I remember when we flew in for what was the first US show by a UK punk band. At CBGB’s it was, in 1976 and we were met by this limo to take us into Manhattan…which we promptly sent off in disgust taking the shuttle bus instead. Who did they think we were–rock stars? But it wasn’t long before we started selling reasonable amounts of records and the inverted snobbery went down the jolly old toilet pan!
So, what exactly is punk rock? Is it just about kick ass songs, spiky hair and tattoos, or is there more to it? The Damned’s motto was “THE FIRST RULE IS–THERE’S NO RULES”–but I’m not sure you can front a punk group wearing bright orange loon pants and get away with it.
Maybe punk’s job is to tell it like it is: naming names, challenging the lunatic policies of government and pointing out the failures of a society that works just fine and dandy if you’re stinking rich but is a nightmare for the poor–in a way that journalists used to do before the likes of Rupert Murdoch changed all that nonsense! And whatever you think of Green Day–”American Idiot” did hit the nail firmly on the head lyrically (even if the tune does reminded us of Kim Wilde’s “Kids In America” somewhat).
But is it not the DIY attitude that is the crowning glory of punk? Buy a guitar and do it yourself. You only need to learn a few chords and you’re away. And for me that philosophy should go for sport, TV, religion, art, whatever…don’t sit on the couch watching some arrogant overpaid asshole do it for you–use your own brain and see what you can create. That’s punk if you like.
But I’d better wrap up now as our van is finally approaching Athens after 6 hours of hell–sweltering heat with no AC to speak of–and regardless of my preceding waffle about punk all I can say is if they don’t have any decent beer at the venue tonight the gigs off!
Pip pip,
Captain S.
The worst joke I’ve heard this week…
A 6 year old and a 4 year old are talking. The 6 year old says, “I think it’s time we started swearing”. The 4 year old agrees.
They go down to breakfast and Mum asks what they want. The 6 year old says, “Oh shit Mum, I think I’ll have some Cocoa Pops”. WHALLOP… he flies out of the chair and across the room and runs out crying.
Mum looks sternly at the 4 year old and asks what he wants.
“I don’t know,” he cries–”but it won’t be fucking Cocoa Pops!”
So you decided not to back out, and you want to start a record collection of your own, or you have a small one and you want to make it bigger–like, you-have-to-hire-movers-next-time bigger. No way do you need this; it’s something you have to want.
To to that extent I can offer up the following advice:
- You have to love music to make this work. You will become obsessive about it in due time, should you choose to follow this course of action, so at least be obsessed with something that you love.
- If you are unlucky enough to be afflicted with OCD, this is a Grand Canyon-esque expanse for you to throw your anxieties into. A man, a plan, a canal; Panama. People built that canal. This is your canal.
- If for some lame reason you are jumping in to become a record dealer because you see recent singles going for three bills on eBay, you really are going to have to love the music you’re flipping enough to know what you’re trying to get into and get rid of. This is not some “get rich quick” scheme by any measure. No one person could impart you with that much information in a way you could understand it, either, so don’t try hopping on somebody else’s coattails to know what you need to know. Nobody’s that lonely, and record collectors are generally more suspicious than the average person.
Listening to music has always been a big concern in my own life. As a little boy I had a Fisher-Price turntable and a rack full of records I could ruin all on my own, scored from garage sales and the cut-out bin at the local Peaches. I moved onto cassette tapes and then CDs in a trajectory that led from Duran Duran and Thriller to the Beastie Boys and Ozzy solo. This in turn put me right in the frame for “YO! MTV Raps” in the butter years, then down that evergreen path that many an early ’90s pre-teen followed: Violent Femmes into Dead Milkmen, then the Chili Peppers and Nirvana, then Ministry, then Sonic Youth and Dinosaur Jr. and Mudhoney. Pretty soon I discovered college radio and filled in a lot of the gaps; a few years later I was at a college radio station, doing a radio show and listening to everything that came out that looked interesting, and going to see bands several night a week. Every time I turned around, there was something new to check out. That’d be enough for most people, but I got involved with running a label and promoting shows on my own on top of that. I guess somewhere inside I have this driving need to program the air around me with music, to show how I’m feeling at that particular moment, and to get the people around me to understand and celebrate (or commiserate, as it were).
It’s with that life experience that the last important thing you need to take in before starting a record collection is to share. Be pleasant, be enthusiastic, and share (I don’t mean give away your records–though if and when the time comes to do that, you’ll know. You do have to share, however–information, stories, advice, scores, goodwill. I’m not suggesting that you offer it when it’s not asked for; I’m merely saying that this is going to be a pretty lonely and unfulfilling time if you can’t reach out to other people and talk about it. Nobody wants to hang out with the guy from the cover of the Warrant album, greedily hoarding four bins of new arrivals. Don’t be that person. There’s enough of 98% of the records out there for everybody who wants one to own it. Share, and be cool with sharing. Unless you’re confronted with a manipulative sociopath, you will find that sharing represents one of the only ways to get by.
OK. So you like a particular kind of music? Go out and buy records. Repeat as often as necessary.
HA!
Next installment I will provide you with some more wisdom about etiquette, digging, and a handful of other chestnuts.
(Missed somthing? Read Part 1)
Amongst all the rhetoric on one side about “big government” and on the other about “protecting the commons” lies a whole lot of denial about what government is: a protection racket.
They guard the property of the rich from us, for a fee, and protect us from the avarice of the Rich, again for a fee. Their representatives are called “politicians”. They grow organically in each society. One helpful function of politicians is to make sure that wealth doesn’t become so concentrated at the top that rebellion becomes inevitable-voting as safety valve. It also acts as a safety valve for wealth owners if economic conditions change. They can form new coalitions amongst themselves and remove a politician, as opposed to overthrowing a king or dictator who is the state personified.
Modern multi-party democracies allow us to choose amongst two or more “branded” protection rackets. Instead of serfs, we are customers. Like Al Capone’s gang giving out Christmas hams, they need our goodwill. But they’re also happy to have us pay a lot for shoddy work, if we let them.
We create the wealth, but they own it. I do not mean this in the Marxist sense–I mean that in choosing a protection racket, it behooves us to examine the coalition that forms it, what their interests are and how they pursue those interests. We must shake them down for all the goodies we can get without mortally wounding the economic interests that fund them. It is a delicate dance, fraught with fraud on both sides.
We must be careful not to let wealth hide behind God or Patriotism and make them stick to the facts, if for no other reason than this: neither God nor Patriotism in and of themselves create any wealth.
Make no mistake, government wealth and power are ultimately accumulated and backed up by guns and bombs–they are protection rackets. We can however force them, through politicians, whose currency is votes, to behave more (for lack of a better word) “civilized”. How we spend that currency largely determines that behavior. To give up on politicians completely (loathsome as most of them are) is self defeating. It is politicians who stand between us and naked force. Ask Iraqis or Afghans–whose societies lack true professional politicians–what that’s like.
Don’t have time to search out this week’s essential MP3s, streams and viral videos? That’s why we’re here.
Coldplay “Violet Hill”
For those hoping that bringing Brian Eno into the studio and giving their forthcoming album a ridiculous title like Viva La Vida of Death and All His Friends would signal that Coldplay was about to pull a Radiohead and start making records that sounded like fax machines, this freebie single might be a bit of a disappointment. For everyone else, it’s exactly what you wanted–an epic, mid-tempo piano ballad with Chris Martin beautifully spouting off his usual nonsense over the top. Cheers.
MP3: “Violet Hill”
MP3: 01 Violet_Hil.MP3
Dizzee Rascal “Where’s Da G’s”
Apart from the part where he goes, “Liar, liar, pants on fire!,” what we don’t know what this veteran British rapper is going on about on this track from his belatedly released new album, Maths + English. All we know is that it’s probably the closest thing we’re ever going to get to a hip-hop Cylon.
MP3: “Where’s Da G’s”
(via Daily Rind)
Les Savy Fav “Sweat Descends”
After allegedly killing it at Coachella his year, bloated, bald, bearded and shirtless Les Savy Fav frontman Tim Harrington is ready to destroy your iPod with this raucous old school sounding punk joint from the group’s latest, After the Balls Drop. The Replacements would be proud.
MP3: “Sweat Descends”
(via Les Savy Fav)
Newton Faulkner “Dream Catch Me”
Thanks to that idiot on “American Idol,” sensitive singer-songwriters with dreadlocks are all the rage this season. Too bad there’s only one with an actual album out. Still, we’ve got to admit, Newton Faulkner’s first single from his debut album, Hand Built By Robots, is pretty damn good. Crowded House-esque, even.
MP3: “Dream Catch Me”
MP3: DreamCatchMe.mp3
South “Better Things”
Don’t count these Brit-pop also-rans out just yet. From its fifth album, You Are Here, the trio returns with a pretty, straightforward ballad for some very complicated times.
MP3: “Better Things”
(via Bluhammock Music)
A few years ago I wanted to get a tattoo on my wrist that would symbolize “trust your instinct.” Unfortunately I felt compelled to get this tattoo while I was in Idaho.
When I walked into the tattoo parlor in Boise I saw the dreadlocked owner of the store holding a baby so tiny and squishy it looked like it had just dropped out of the mini skirt of the girl standing next to him. (“So glad I didn’t wear underwear today–super easy birth.”) The owner dude looked down at the baby’s face and then handed it right back to its mother with a “gross, get that thing away from me” shudder and he told her that one of the baby’s eyes was way bigger then the other one. “And it’s freaking the shit of out me.”
He then responded to my very simple Hopi Indian design with, “Oh fuck, circles are really hard.” My instinct whispered very softly to me “THIS IS A PLACE OF EVIL…GET THE HELL OUT OF HERE,” and then it told me to wait until I was in prison to get this ink. At least there everyone is pretty much detoxed and they don’t have the morning shakes as bad as this guy had them.
It turns out he was right–circles are really hard. The circle he left on me looked all inbred and fucked up. Just like the Quasimodo baby that he tried to act like he wasn’t the father of.
And imagine my surprise when I got back to LA and discovered that the three little dots that were a part of the tattoo design were the Mexican gang symbol for Mi Vida Loca. Boy, was my face red–with the blood that was gushing from the head wound where a cholo threw a beer can at me in the 7-11 parking lot.
Even though I sort of hoped the gang symbol on my wrist would help me get a better partner at my salsa class, I knew I needed to get it removed, or at least changed into the Chinese symbol for “All Girl Babies Must Be Drowned in the River”.
The hipster LA tattoo parlor that I found magically transformed my jail tat’ into what most people refer to as “a piece of toast with a weird gang design in the middle.”
At first I’d said “No.” when the LA tattoo artist sketched out what looked to me like an old mahjong tile…but he manipulated me. When I said “I don’t really like it” he shook his head and said, “I think you’re making a mistake. It’s actually really cool.” I didn’t want him to think I couldn’t recognize cool when I saw it…so I laid back and let him do it.
When I went to pay for his work, I spotted “tattoo removal brochures” and started to ask for one–but didn’t want to be rude.
Right after it was done I sat in my car thinking of bracelets that I could wear or having my arm sawed off. As I sat sobbing, staring at the bizarre tattoo of what was starting to look like a piece of concrete toast that was now on my body for the rest of my life, I heard on the radio that one of my favorite writers and fellow Hoosier, Kurt Vonnegut, had died.
So every time someone aggressively grabs my wrists and demands to know, “What the hell is that?” I tell them it’s a piece of concrete toast that Kurt Vonnegut wrote about in some of his lesser known works. If they don’t believe me, I lie and say it was the last mahjong tile my grandmother played right before she died. If they don’t believe that, I point out the three dots that are still visible in the design–and threaten to kill them if they ask anymore questions.
