Beach Sloth

Shabby Doll House Now this is an exciting...

Wed, 19 Jun 2013 20:47:49 -0400

Shabby Doll House

Now this is an exciting conclusion. Photography, school, and modern ages work their way deep into the consciousness. As an additional bonus there is the brilliance of buying age and spam, oftentimes they are the same thing.

Lyndsay Coloracci takes a photograph. Seeing through people means x-ray specs are working or they are ghosts. Plenty of people choose ghost-like scenarios. Old conversations are cherished for these ghosts. Online personalities pass away. Avatars die. New identities are born all the time. Dating sites attest to it. Saving people for lonely times seems intrusive. Party people are necessary. Without party people parties can experience serious vacuums.

Henry Greenfield experiences the pain of life. Roommates come and go. College roommates are among the least reliable individuals ever. Parties are one thing. After graduation things get progressively more serious. Jobs come up. Money becomes far more important. Nobody can stand under their own weight. Guarantees become vacant. Phone calls are ignored. Life after college is one of the worst experiences, young without anywhere to go.

Tracy Dimond purchases spam on Google. Normally spam is delivered straight to one’s email address. Searching for it doesn’t need to happen. Age costs too much. Youth is free. What’s weird is how little youth is valued. More than anything the one-night stands can only happen in youth. With age comes wisdom, wisdom to know how small cars are. Fruit hates aging. Unlike cheese or wine, fruit becomes shriveled, naked with age.

Vicki Tingle observes the doggy style life of dogs. They have no shame. Deep in the moonlight things become feral. Werewolves typically come out at night. Over the course of the day werewolves are merely hipsters trying to stroke beards. At night they transform into fearsome beasts. Life requires some kind of agreement, an acknowledgement of when things are perfect and simple.

James Hand feels so small. The world is gigantic. Children find the expansiveness impressive. Adults find it annoying. Everybody out there is having fun except the adults. Rather adults need to adhere to unreasonable demands of denial. Money requires the denial. Without it there is excess. Headphones go on. Music is turned up way high. Actions change to avoid eye contact or any kind of connection. Enjoying silence is what adults do best. Golden silence is what Depeche Mode sings about with their ‘Enjoy the Silence’ stance.

Serge Astapkov states the obvious. Honesty is never the best policy. From honesty comes hurt. White lies are named for their ability to blend into blank word documents. This is critical. Advice for the modern age is tragic. Due to the amount of hurt in the world there are many methods to limit pain. Mind-altering substances fail to work. Minds can be changed but the situations never can be controlled. Instagrams are memories put onto the internet for free to show off what one does in the company of others. Overachievers are worthless jackasses. Thanks to overachievers everybody feels worse about themselves. Overachievers are living breathing guilt trips. Breaking hearts is typical though this is part of life in the modern age, or any age really.

James Ganas takes a particularly dark turn. Tragedy strikes in offices across the country. Accidents are unavoidable. Hallmark makes cards for these sad stories. Obviously there is a reason for every office being staffed by multiple employees. Schools need the same things. Administrators in schools might as well be in any office. Seeing America’s greatest resource is excellent office work indeed.

Adam J. Kurtz creates to help others find their way. His words have a way of coming together. Tape works wonders in bringing these pieces of paper into a tangible coherent whole.

Shabby Doll House may take a summer break. Shabby Doll House will go to the beach. Nobody is stopping Shabby Doll House from following its dreams. Fortunately the next time Shabby Doll House returns to the internet scene fall will be all around. Leaves will die. Children will go to school. And the reading material will be online, curated by two fine fantastic fanatics of language.

Shabby Doll House This is the one year...

Wed, 19 Jun 2013 20:39:56 -0400

Shabby Doll House

This is the one year anniversary of Shabby Doll House. Shabby Doll House has come a long way. From humble origins the Shabby Doll House has undergone cosmetic facelifts, geographic shifts and the addition of new editors. Yes the house has begun to gain a bit of liveliness. One can determine exactly what season it is depending on the Shabby Doll House edition. Thankfully this is the bright, shining, and overwhelmingly positive summer addition!

Evan Leed is afraid. Passion does that. While it encourages some it can also terrify. Feeling such strong emotion can be overwhelming. Buses tend not to be the places for such happy thoughts. Climbing people is simply another mountaintop, a smaller one requiring more cunning and wit. Apologies for not being cool require an entire lifetime to get down properly. Coolness has considerable drawbacks, isolation, and regrets.

Matthew Bookin tries to hide the inner dick life. Rottenness can prevail. Terrible music permeates everywhere. Unfortunately this can lead to terrible circumstances. History is all around. Roughly 80% to 90% of history has no relevance whatsoever to modern life. Other professions love it. Relationships thrive off of this history. Besides the immediate it has little going for it.

John Mortara understands that unicorns drown all the time. They are rare fairly useless creatures. Horses tend to be the go-to kind of animal. Poor unicorns get short shrift. Worn coastlines contain plenty of odd objects. Every moment in the passage of time slowly erodes the coastline until everything drowns. Human bodies are terrifying. Implied violence is hugely important for this sort of life work. Disrespect is the start of things. Respect happens at the end, rarely in the beginning. Respect has to be earned through countless good moments added together. Happiness ought to be a fish. Abstractions of happiness are too hard to catch or quantity. One day it simply happens.

M.G. Martin invents sleep patterns. This is worrisome. Sleep is a tried and true method to help those overcome hardship. Dreams do have the tendency to inspire. Friendships can be based around dreams. Waking up to these dreams happens all the time. Crashes happen when somebody wakes up from what was a dream. Reality hurts badly. That’s why loneliness should not be a thing. People need each other. Embraces require distance first. Overcoming distance is what hugging is all about.

Samantha Conlon eats new foods. Food is alluring. The taste of food becomes wonderful if it is with the right person. Remembering who gave the first peach or kiwi is critical. Atmosphere surrounds these mystical sweet creatures. Bizarrely fruit exist purely to be eaten and consumed. Plants enjoy having others spread their seed as they are too lazy. From these foods new plants are born, relationships, and memories.

Scott Laudati admits bombs are scary things. Countries are always trying to get the bomb. International dodge ball requires the bomb. A few countries got access to the bomb in order to keep themselves going. Watching it from afar is ridiculous. One needs to get right into the action. TV doesn’t do the bomb justice.

Guillaume Morissette describes the pain of being an anxious man child. Leftovers of the internet make up most of the internet. Follow-up is close to impossible for the vast majority of internet comments. Explorers of the internet attest to this habit. An angry comment gets there, resides there, get a residency as others argue with it. Yet those who argue with it keep it alive; bring it back into feeds long after those who cared gave up.

Gabby Bess overcomes her fear of giraffes. A giraffe’s angle is hard to predict. Cities are ideal locations for giraffes. With all the tall buildings the giraffes are barely noticed. Rather they exist quietly. No noise comes from a giraffe. Unlike the kings of the jungle, they simply eat leaves. If a city employed giraffes they’d work on cleaning windows. Window cleaning is serious business. People ought to see outside if only for a moment.

Alex Manley waits for the plan B. Every life has a plan A. Plan B is the plan nobody wants. Rejected plan b longs for attention. When there are other plans, like c or d, it isn’t so bad. Choice is a main part of the world anyway. Society runs on choice. Things crumble without choice. Mass customization is what it is called. Honestly it is a little terrifying.

For this Shabby Doll House it was so nice it had to be reviewed twice. Part II is henceforth coming to all the young ones out on the internet searching for friends in all the wrong places.

Saåad / Insiden Split - Saåad / Insiden Split 7.4

Tue, 18 Jun 2013 23:50:00 -0400

This split conjures up images of ghosts. Within these two pieces there’s a sense of old areas long since abandoned. Spirits rule over these empty spaces. Aural elements run wild in these two tracks. Each artist employs aspects of civilization’s presence in the area. For sometimes it can be something from far away. Other times it can be as simple as a drip, or a clock. Certain moments try to erase this trace of humanity yet no amount of filters can ever remove it.

Insiden’s piece is certainly the stranger of the two. Presenting a comforting drone for the first seven minutes it turns down a particularly ugly path. The distorted wail is reminiscent of Zoviet France’s creepiest transmissions. Machines are being tortured in this section. Eventually the machines are morphed into an otherworldly choir backed by industrial effects. By the end of the track only static remains. Saåad’s piece is far more menacing. No respite exists for the overwhelming drone. Through its slow but steady buildup it takes over everything devouring natural sounds in its path. Volume plays a crucial role in how the sound morphs into something truly beautiful and terrifying at the same time. Less diverse than Insiden’s track it is defined by its limitations. Actually this extreme focus gives it strength. The minimalism supports its ambitions.

Both of these pieces celebrate the long-since passed presence of humanity. Now there exist only traces, shadows where there once were living creatures.

Masonic Cigar Sale by Keller Anderson and Battery Temple

Tue, 18 Jun 2013 21:56:42 -0400

Hardwood floors hide deep underneath the carpets. Carpets are the blankets of the floor. With them the floor is able to remain warm enough to accomplish quite a bit. To lift the carpet is to reveal a dark disturbing world where tiny creatures thrive. Little microscopic creatures hang out in carpets hoping for the absolute best. Unfortunately however vacuum cleaners suck the worthless creatures far away into dust-filled bags choking them to near-death. Only occasional trips to handle the human offspring help the creatures survive deep in the carpets. A lack of carpets suggests an empty house, lacking soul with clean-shaven floors.

Eyes are mechanical. Unlike carpets the eyes are perfectly clear. Bad eyes get the glasses. Good eyes require nothing additional besides aesthetically pleasing scenery. Dark yards yearn for perfect lighting. In the heat of the night, in the tweet of the night fireflies flutter about. From the behinds of insects the yard is illuminated with the power of light once more. Sure the sun might do a better joy. That’s a given. But there’s something to be said for tiny lanterns affixed to the bottoms of insects. With the power of the insect bottom comes the potential hope for copulation. Poor fireflies have the greatest gender imbalance ever. Fireflies would greatly benefit from online dating sites. Summer nights fail to bring flings to the horny insects. Doomed fireflies light up their own lives rather than have anybody else do it for them.

The world can be a harsh place for non-fireflies too. However these failings of life can make life wonderful. People tend to remember the bad things. At first glance they are miserable elements. With the passage of time they become better. Horrible things as a teenager become the building blocks of nostalgia. Memory works in funny ways. One moment dreadful, the next the golden hue of age creates a new story, better than the actual story. Untruths are far more enjoyable than reality anyway. Art exists because reality is boring. Reality lacks. Hence the imagination envisions a brighter realm drenched in hues of happiness where there is no happiness. Age is a funny thing that way.

Airwaves keep the dreams alive. Music distorts the senses. Radio morphs into wallpaper. Plants and animals react to the strange musical musings that remarkably sound alike. That’s uniformity. Culture enjoys being consistent. It is the one true virtue. Change happens too but at such a slow-neck pace that the onlookers never notice it until it is too late.

The Interview Process: Kringle H. Duste Who is...

Tue, 18 Jun 2013 21:10:09 -0400

The Interview Process: Kringle H. Duste

Who is Kringle H. Duste? He’s a bit of a scallion, rap to the scallion if you will. Really you ought to. Duste is a delightful guest. Recently Beach Sloth was fortunate enough to sit down with Duste in a super-secret location, where anonymous online entities tend to congregate. So it was a Starbucks. Yep nothing says ‘anonymous’ and ‘cultureless’ the way the ubiquitous Starbucks chain does. Below are a few of the journalistic, hard-hitting questions and answers by blogger extraordinaire, Beach Sloth. Unfortunately due to time limitations there was no question about Duste’s latest ‘The Kringle Korner Issue 1’. Note that Duste is quite interested in ‘stirring the pot’ in a literal sense via his hard-hitting, highly controversial answers.

1. What are your feelings about aardvarks?

i don’t get this question. an animal is an animal is an animal.

2. Who do you love the most in Alt Lit?

meta knight is my cousin so if i don’t say him he could get mad at me and steal my bike but i have to say that it is not jack serge!! jack serge is the lou bega of alt lit. what a one hit wonder. here one day and gone the next! what does he do that is so good??? he has a doggy icon! i will expose jack serge for the fraud he is! i will end his alt lit career! u wait and see mr beach sloth! everyone will see what a crock he is!!

3. Do you think Alt Lit should have a dating site exclusively for ‘hooking up’?

i dont get this question either and if u mean the sex that kids have today then no. get out of my face!!

4. Is there an Alt Lit piece that changed your life?

i am ready to dine a violet death!! by haiku julian. i am writing a sequel called ‘i am ready to vine a pilot’s depth’ hehe

5. Thought Catalog: what are your thoughts about it?

the website is full of bologna! thought catalog commit the biggest sin in alt lit! clicking! too much clicking and clacking and people excluding people cause friendship! who needs a friendship! i’m kringle dust!

6. Should Alt Lit have more Gossip to feed the Alt Lit Gossip Tumblr?

i think the alt lit renaissance is upon us! sure taipei was a flop but how much of a flop can a novel be! there will be gossip to come! youll see! i’ll show ya!! hehe. wait til my book on jack serge comes out.

7. Where do you see yourself in five years?

probably dead.

8. If you could be any animal what animal would you be?

the creeping hyena!!

9. What do you think is the greatest strength about Alt Lit?

u dont want to be where the ball is, u want to be where the ball is going! society will be online soon. like that bruce willis movie! when that happen then wikipedia will become lit and when wikipedia become lit alt lit will be the trendy word on the street. it is a metamorphosis in motion! 3 of these 3612 people will be rich some day!

Blare Coughlin Interview @ The Wan$ion...

Tue, 18 Jun 2013 20:06:06 -0400

Blare Coughlin Interview @ The Wan$ion 6-16-13

Blare Coughlin is a huge influence right here on the merry Beach Sloth blogspot. Anybody who dislikes young Blare Coughlin ought to simply close out this tab from their browser right now. Obviously the inhabitants of the good ship ‘Wan$ion’ get it. They get it pretty good. So good they get to have Blare Coughlin in the flesh, IRL. Usually Blare Coughlin inhabits those dandy virtual worlds talking to avatars, morons pretending to be sloths, etc. Yep it is a maddening online world. Right in this interview the (sober) interviewers at the Wan$ion discusses important-ass things with Blare Coughlin, including literal asses. For literature without asses is not literature at all, it is just pretending. Fine literature requires fine asses. That’s the rule.

Unpredictable elements make the interview infinitely more interesting. Destruction befalls Arnold Schwarzenegger. A random person joins the conversation talking about OK Cupid. Blare Coughlin discusses Guillaume Morissette’s fast-talking Quebec style. Meeting Guillaume Morissette in person is delightful. Ashley Obscura matches up with her online persona quite well according to the young whipper-snapper Blare Coughlin. From here Blare Coughlin goes into a long discussion of her adopted country. Canada takes good care of young Blare Coughlin. Canada ought to. Canada tends to export artists to the United States. But to hold onto Blare Coughlin is of the utmost importance for Canada.

Kersey Chase receives attention. Nathan Staplegun mentions how Kersey Chase earned $300 on Amazon thanks to Nathan’s advice. However if Nathan is willing to share this money-making experience to a poor blogging sloth he can contact a blogging sloth at: pleasepaybeachsloth@gmail.com. The money would be enormously helpful. Whatever Kersey Chase has gotten from his writing he has completely earned. All of his work is magnificent, beautiful. Beach Sloth strongly encourages everyone to check out Kersey Chase’s work.

Reclusiveness is a huge part of the Alt Lit lifestyle. Everybody in Alt Lit loves being a hermit. Thanks to the internet being a social hermit is now totally a thing. WAN survives in a strange underground bunker. Blare Coughlin hides deep in the heart of Montreal. At school Blare Coughlin hung out by herself reading. Nathan Staplegun did the same thing. Here is where the ‘shit gets real’. Interaction is not necessary if people are stupid. Thanks to the internet Blare Coughlin now has plenty of friends. So does Nathan Staplegun due to his bizarre art commune.

Support is given out the young ones. Blare Coughlin mentions supporting new art. That’s a wonderful experience. Art is rebirth. When people are mere children, infants even there’s less self-awareness about creation. Aging worsens it. Suddenly the creative impulse becomes self-conscious. It is a bit sad honestly. People need to embrace their creative inner spirit as it helps with more than just art. Creativity helps in daily life with every task.

Future worries Blare Coughlin. E-books are becoming a sadder thing. This hurts the heart of the sloth. With each e-book things get considerably better. Value is important. Physical books are wonderful things too. However the virtual may someday outdo the physical artifact. Good thing the interview ends on a positive note focusing on the joy of Beach Sloth, the internet’s busiest sloth. Check out Beach Sloth wherever fine blogs are sold.

Karelle – Richter 7.1

Tue, 18 Jun 2013 00:01:34 -0400

Karelle is mad. ‘Richter’ is a baffling journey down aural bipolarity. Nothing here is stable. Everything breaks itself apart for fun. Calm moments on here find themselves infused with a palpable uneasy tension. At any possible moment the pieces could collapses. For fun sometimes Karelle lets that happen. Textures here are one of the high points. Letting the sounds roam free means there are no restrictions at all. Occasional blasts of noise are welcomed into the fore.

‘Cave’ starts off on a rather quiet note. The sound is quite beautiful. Hence it is a bit of a shock how Karelle deliberately muddies the waters with a guitar played through numerous filters from miles away. Simultaneously aggressive yet far away it manages to explore whatever it feels like with total abandon. Eventually the beginning elements return back in to try and impose some semblance of order. Honestly this is the most straightforward song on the entire album. After this comes Gregorian chant. Yes it feels extremely classical in origin with perhaps a nod to metal. For the finale though is the longest and strangest track ‘Confidence Benjamin’. Apparently confidence for Benjamin is a distorted disorientated affair. No melody no rhythm it is pure free form. Random shouts only confirm how isolated this track truly is.

By mixing together very separate elements (pieces of 80s long gone, Gregorian chant, and deeply weird aural experiments) Karelle creates an environment of complete unease. With little chance of escape and even less concern for melody, Karelle works on a visceral level.

delirium syrup by reilly shellito Front flips...

Mon, 17 Jun 2013 22:06:03 -0400

delirium syrup by reilly shellito

Front flips belong in the front yard. Back flips belong in the backyard. Those are the rules. Stargazing from roofs may be a good idea. Normally though the light pollution ruins the beautiful weakness of celestial light. Most celestial lights are dead by the time they reach the Earth. Starlight functions as an epitaph for a big ball of gas too far away to have friends. Late at night people look up to the stars. Why remains a total mystery. The stars cannot help with anything. Stars cannot stop their own impending mortality. Objects taken for granted on Earth would excite the stars: roller skates, flips, these are things the stars will never know. All the stars get to see are lonely insomniacs anyway.

New Jersey is home for many of these morbid insomniacs. A boy in New Jersey believes he is steaming fecal matter. That’s poor self-esteem. Hanging out in graveyards most likely reinforces this imagery. Surrounded by death the boy knows little about life. Perhaps it is time that the boy leaves the graveyard. Headstones are eloquent. They basically have to be. Poorly phrased headstones are the leading cause of ghosts. If the boy smokes cigarettes in the graveyard he ought to be extra careful. Ghosts love merging with cigarette smoke and messing with minds.

What ghosts never worry about is sleep. They are up partying all the time. Every time someone wakes up it hurts. Clocks reinforce this perception of ‘needing to be somewhere’. Honestly there are plenty of times where nobody needs to be anywhere. Staying in a bedroom all day is an option. Few take it due to the bizarre need to be productive. Rather than sleep in on a weekday they take showers. They clothe themselves. After looking vaguely alive they go outside to do something that somebody else could probably do equally well.

Observation though is the main reason for waking up. Without interacting with others in reality there’s precious little to dream about. Part of the joy of dreams is to reinterpret a world in a way that feels more fitting. Dreams can help to make the world appear to be an easier, more welcoming place. Beautiful people in the world help to create better dreams. Smiles too warm the very heart so it is of the appropriate temperature. Love is a microwave for the heart.

The most important part of the heart is oxygen-rich blood. That stuff is amazing. Trees make it possible. Whoever is afraid of trees may not truly appreciate all the wonderful things trees do. Carbon dioxide gets consumed by the trees which is perfect because no person loves that stuff anyway. Right on the top of the trees are treefingers better known as branches that caress the sky above, tickling it with every breeze. The Earth and the sky get along better than anyone could ever possibly know.

3. am 154 Peterson Rd by Theo Thimo ...

Mon, 17 Jun 2013 20:59:24 -0400

3. am 154 Peterson Rd by Theo Thimo

Loneliness can cause people to disappear. The process takes some time. At first there is hope that the loneliness can be overcome. Geography makes it easier or harder. Separate houses do a good job splitting people apart. With each address is a group that remains totally bored of each other. Boys hiding in desolate homes are rather ridiculous. Rain and cigarette butts define lonely boys. Surrounded by smoke they live inside new atmospheres with their heads literally in the clouds. They have no reason to go out. No friends are out there waiting for them. Such a vicious cycle keeps the boys trapped in the homes forever.

Boarded up homes are lonelier. Structure without purpose they sit vacant. Homeless individuals are generally close to those vacant homes as a sense of irony. Children are advised not to speak to the homeless. Why this is the case is confusing. Parents falsely believe that perhaps the sadness of poverty might rub off on their children. So a sense of superiority comes into play. That plays out with purchased goods, coke, on the fattest of faces. Soda is a luxury. Nobody needs carbonated sugar water as a desperately needed good. Rather it is a nice thing to have every now and then.

Gutters keep on reappearing. Bela Lugosi grew up in the gutters of the world. That’s why he sucks. People are afraid of Bela Lugosi because he just sucks that hard. It was not always that way. When Bela was young he discovered just how hard things were in his goal in life. Street lights kept him warm. Eventually with an unsupportive family he ran away into the night, where the darkness could welcome him. Light offered him nothing. He needed the dark.

Empty homes hide in the bushes. That’s because they are empty. Children are so sad when they see these messed up empty homes. Somebody could be playing inside of them. Unfortunately nobody is. Middle School begins the process when the care and compassion become a literal danger. For a period in time it becomes cool not to care. Apathy becomes cool in High School. Negative worldviews like that are dangers. They make people feel stuck in life. Renewed interest in life acts like drain-o unsticking the clogged lives.

Those who fail to unclog lives become sad cynics, clowns. See-saws bring up images of happier childhoods. Little squeaks come out of the rusted near busted devices. Playgrounds serve scarier purposes later on in life. Grams equal losses of time, mental capacity, and ability in those late night playgrounds. Children are never out during those times. Sad words are exchanged at those late night playgrounds. Disappearing into the night the words become sadder. They can barely stay together. Broken fixtures replace the sadness that no longer needs to be said. Unspoken it is completely understood.

Thank You for Your Sperm by Marcus Speh Marcus...

Mon, 17 Jun 2013 20:30:31 -0400

Thank You for Your Sperm by Marcus Speh

Marcus Speh explores the tender side of absurdity with ‘Thank You for Your Sperm’. Though this is flash fiction it lingers in the mind for much longer. Entire histories are suggested in these small pieces. Not a word is wasted either. From the title to the last line Marcus Speh uses language economically. Words playfully jump across the page opening entirely new histories within histories. Geography is a key part of these stories as geography too can suggest a mood with a simple word or two. Berlin specifically gets rather affectionate treatment. How all of this comes together is quite impressive.

Characters within these stories are fully fleshed out. ‘Pleasant Pieces’ neatly organize a picture of a singular, titular character. Though they reference many familiar names (Max Ernest, Hansel and Gretel) they tend to focus on the writer’s own personal experiences, thoughts or ideas. How the mind wanders over these topics is brilliant. Little elements of childhood, growing up, ailments, memories, former friends and lovers, all find themselves in here. After a while the stories resemble a reality as filtered through a series of mirrors, constantly reflecting on both life and life’s inevitable interaction with a culture so dominant it becomes part of one’s upbringing.

‘One Thousand Shipwrecked Penguins’ adds additional layers of absurdity onto the overall structure. Here the pieces become more playful. Marcus Speh’s soul shines through the pieces about summer camp, swingers and snipers. Things become near-autobiographical in ‘The Serious Writer’ segment. For this particular series Marcus Speh gets quite personal. Later on this section is referenced as a particularly naked portrayal of himself as a writer. Since he is a German writer who writes in English it is interesting to see his perspective on those classically American experiences, both of writers and of America’s loudest embodiment, the great state of Texas. Tiny pieces of his life filter through in dying hamsters and blogs.

Blogs come up a number of times in the book through Marcus Speh’s own experience with his blog and another blog mentioned in the prologue. Technology comes into view with the IPAD which plays out as a comedy of misunderstandings. Writing changes before the serious writer, Marcus Speh’s stand-in. After surprising revelations in ‘The Serious Writer’ section he moves onto lovely, dreamlike imagery of ‘On Christmas Day’. Moving around the world he captures slivers of humanity’s experience.

At the end of ‘Unpleasant Pieces’ everything comes together. The absurdity is worked into a weird place. Everything moves. Nothing is stationary. Pieces of the Greek gods show themselves in the ephemeral ‘Thank You for Your Sperm’. By the very end of the book an interview helps to clarify elements of the book, neatly summarizing everything. Marcus Speh writes in a way that is refreshing unique, absurd, sad, and quite touching. ‘Thank You for Your Sperm’ is absurdity done gently from a point of view that’s revealing and surprisingly personal.

Mytrip - Scattered I 7.3 Mytrip’s ‘Scattered’...

Sun, 16 Jun 2013 20:12:51 -0400

Mytrip - Scattered I 7.3

Mytrip’s ‘Scattered’ references the pioneers of electronic sound. Going through the album is an exploration. The sound has an extremely tactile feel to it. Elements reference academic artists like Vladimir Ussachevsky’s ‘Wireless Fantasy’. All over ‘Scattered I’ there is the same sense of a living breathing organic creature at the heart of all this nebulous sound. What’s particularly likable is how natural it sounds. Lacking any sort of typical ‘digital’ sheen the feeling is quite raw throughout the entire album.

For the opener ‘September Nothing’ the environment gets particularly dense. The beginning few moments reveal a nasty scratching sound as the sound hones in on its ultimate destination. Less about rhythm the sound is a cartographer of a giant unknowable space. Eventually the sound takes it over to rule over the microscopic lush landscape. ‘I am Abandoned’ takes a darker approach flirting with potentially ear-splitting noise. Yet despite the flirtation it pulls back from the abyss again and again, teasing the listener. On ‘I am Cancer’ things take a more subtle approach creating a perfectly formed drone. The finale ‘Abstinence Insects’ is creepier than it sounds. Manipulating the sounds of insects gives the track a horrible, nightmarish cold-sweat experience. ‘Abstinence Insects’ is terrifying in its aural awfulness. It is a great track. It is by far the highlight of the album.

‘Scattered I’ uses aspects of a giant pulsing create to get its point across. This results in a living breathing creature made entirely out of sound.

Strawberry Hill by Carolyn DeCarlo

Sun, 16 Jun 2013 20:10:38 -0400

Vashti Bunyan introduces the bathroom window. On this bathroom window are intelligent poetry segments. Much like those delicious and nutritious apple segments, the poetry segments expand the mind. Here the poetry segments express a degree of sadness. Taped up on the window they hope for togetherness. Sadly the bed squeaks whenever the move. Bed squeaks are a bed form of guilt. Movement on a bed is punishable by little noises. That’s how beds roll. Unfortunately this selfish behavior is emphasized by naming a room after the bed. Living rooms are not called ‘couch rooms’, kitchens are not called ‘table rooms’, only the bedroom encourages furniture arrogance.

If someone already knows of the bed squeaks they might be a ghost. Right from right field is the real clincher, the fact that the poems will be written about a special someone on cloudy days. Suddenly the poem makes sense. The poem is about a ghost. The ghost knows about the squeaking bed, though that could be an educated guess by a non-ghost. However how the poems will be written on cloudy days confirms it. Deep in clouds ghosts simply hang out getting on with their ghostly selves. Clouds are ghosts of water containing moisture of now decreased droplets.

Outside the scenery is explored en masse. This is New Zealand décor. Apparently they explore a typical hobbit home. Color scheme attests to hobbits living there for it is too adorable for mere humans. Right on the left side is a Carolyn DeCarlo standing atop a ladder indicating a sense of joy. She stands above the roof even, which has various floras growing on it perfect for camouflage. Beyond the tiny quaint cottage, hobbit hole, whatever is a big full ‘human-looking’ city. If this is New Zealand it shows a serious advancement from hobbit holes to full-blown buildings in a precious short period of time.

Dirty dishes are shown off. Everybody loves clean dishes. This is not the way. Inside they linger while a Carolyn DeCarlo looks inside wondering who might live inside. Focusing on the dirty dishes seems rather pointless. With that close-up of the filth the inhabitants live in there could be at least one dish or glass cleaned. Instead the time is foolishly wasted. After the dirty dishes fail to excite the camera any further there is the return back to the lush outside. Deep in the flora stands a Carolyn DeCarlo who smiles at this point for she now knows the secret of the magical kingdom of New Zealand.

livemylief: Eventually you will be dead but today you are...

Sun, 16 Jun 2013 20:08:49 -0400

livemylief:

Eventually you will be dead but today you are not

Steve Roggenbuck has a raging rage-on. He looks up at the sky. There it waits for Steve Roggenbuck, taunting him with a gigantic presence. Although the sky lacks the twitter following of Steve Roggenbuck it does help give living creatures the air they need to live. So in that way the sky dominates everyone without the help of social media. Competing with the sky Steve Roggenbuck greets passers-by on a highway. Like a sane individual Steve Roggenbuck screams at cars hoping to enlighten at least one of the passengers. Unfortunately due to NPR they are infinitely busy trying to get somewhere. NPR provides the passengers with insightful commentary about the state of world affairs. Besides world affairs NPR has a totally ‘rocking’ interview with the members of Vampire Weekend.

Hobby horses are great things to have. No wonder Steve Roggenbuck has a hobby horse. Dogs get a lot of shout-outs. With a hobby horse Steve Roggenbuck is able to herd the dogs. Giant swarms of dogs are a pretty common thing deep in the forest of the mind. The award-winning documentary ‘Air Bud’ happened due to the herds of dogs. ‘Air Bud’ is a documentary based off of one extraordinary dog who overcame all obstacles to achieve true greatness. Few humans get to Air Bud’s level of accomplishment hence why the movie did so well. For if a dog can do it so can a human being.

Beings are located all over the planet. They are animals, humans, plants, etc. Each one of those creatures has dreams however small. For microscopic organisms they have no pretensions of trying to become baseball players. Microscopic organisms try for small goals like fucking bagel bites in a doomed effort to reproduce. They want to become pseudopod comedians for they understand the foibles of being microscopic organisms in a complex creature’s world.

Death is part of life. In fact it is the main part. No creature willing accepts death. They fight against it. Judging from action movies though death happens frequently. One moment the bad guys’ henchmen are protecting their boss’s base. Next Vin Diesel is there to blast them away to the afterlife. Though it is a basic action film it still engages in deep thought about death. Deep thoughts about action movies include wondering what happened to that henchman’s family, or the henchman’s friends, or how will the henchman’s children get to college. Will the henchman’s children need to take out more loans for college than they originally expected?

The world can be shitty. Steve Roggenbuck acknowledges it. Death gets a shout-out. Here he goes out of control. Everyone apparently is sucking at life. What’s the real challenge is to conquer the vile wretchedness of life and to soar above like non-annoying airborne creatures.

Cremator - Alpha Ralpha Boulevard 7.8

Sun, 16 Jun 2013 10:45:40 -0400

Cremator manages to create a number of particularly elegant moments on ‘Alpha Ralpha Boulevard’. Like many other interstellar travelers Cremator manages to use restraint to create a maximum benefit. Two sides present two separate worlds. On the first side there is an aurally pleasing polychromatic world. For color is an important part of the first part. By the time the second side comes around there’s an increased focus on the tiny details. Upon closer inspection the latter half manages to create more of a drone-like atmosphere.

‘Alpha Ralpha Boulevard’ immediately references specific aspects of progressive rock. This transforms into something considerably more active. Streams of sound begin to unfurl around the three minute mark. Playing around with the tempo appears to be another source of enjoyment. Where the song really takes off in the best moment of the album is at the fifteen minute mark. Everything releases to reveal a perfectly tragic crescendo. The release is one of the most satisfying moments on the entire album for everything before had hinted at it but not quite delivered.

On ‘Catmaster’ the finale things are much quieter. A few moments verge on pure silence. Here Cremator takes a more contemplative around. Rather than indulge in anything approximating rock structures (like the previous track) it remains grounded purely in electronic origins. Parts of it feel reminiscent of more recent work coming from the Spectrum Spools label. Quiet in the case of ‘Alpha Ralpha Boulevard’ means to pay attention.

Black Hat – Covalence 7.2

Sun, 16 Jun 2013 10:45:35 -0400

Black Hat’s ‘Covalence’ breaks itself apart. Managing to cover abrasive rhythms, sudden drops, and moments of ambient beauty, there’s quite an array of things going on within its short duration. What is particularly interesting is how each one of these different approaches references the previous style. Sonically in spite of its differences with volume and texture there’s a degree of uniformity in terms of execution. Though often the listener can be shocked by the extremity that Black Hat explores, there’s overall a certain sense of wonder of how these songs build off of one another. Rhythmically too there appears to be similarity among these six tracks.

‘Ashe’ begins with a propulsive rhythm. For the first minute or so that’s all there is. Eventually a bass arrives adding an additional layer of madness. Strangely the bass gives the track a certain dub-like flavor. The only traces of melody stem from the bass’s contortions. ‘Jaune’ offers the reversal of this aggression into something perfectly airy. Lacking little in the way of conventional beats it employs a harp sound revealing a soothing melody. Immediately following this is the album’s highlight, ‘The Lattice And Cormorant’. Giddy in execution it moves extremely quickly with a pulse-like rhythm keeping the pace. Beats are especially important for the piece as it musters together the best of the aggressive and ambient tendencies.

Things shift towards the aggressive beginning by the end. ‘Arabesque’ hovers about menacingly. For the finale ‘Singing Point’ things feel reminiscent of Container with its consistent aggression and increasing intensity. Black Hat manages to include divergent strains of sound making them stronger together.

PLVS VLTRA - Yo-yo Blue 7.9

Thu, 13 Jun 2013 20:31:53 -0400

PLVS VLTRA knows how to have fun. Following the same vein as the Focus Group, PLVS VLTRA injects a great deal of humor into the aptly titled ‘Yo-yo Blue’. The album careens from serious exploration of found sounds to slapstick early Warner Brothers work. Within the confines of the exploration it manages to remain extremely active. At times the strangeness becomes so fascinating that the apparent arc of the whole sound is almost ignored. Yet PLVS VLTRA appears equally interested in both the spontaneous and the emotional.

For the first half cinematic snippets weave their way in quite effortlessly. Great amounts of editing make this sound effortless and random. Moments settle down into weird warped grooves. When they finish it is back to the rapid-fire delivery of the samples, which work as punch lines. Upon the adaptation of faster tempos there’s a quirky dance focus to the music. Elements of Matmos can be heard quite clearly in the kitschy approach. Around the ten minute mark it begins to sound reminiscent of Enon’s efforts. In fact Enon’s vocalist Toko Yasuda comes in quite late in the proceedings to allow the track to mellow. This is her project.

On the latter half of the album things slow down considerably. Here though is where PLVS VLTRA gets considerably more emotional. Though it seems to have slowed down there are still plenty of tasteful samples and interludes thrown in for good measure. At the very end there is some hint of something trying to speed up but gets opposed at every possible chance. Overall this is a mysterious fun rather engrossing album.

The Inevitable June by Bob Schofield Bob...

Thu, 13 Jun 2013 20:27:05 -0400

The Inevitable June by Bob Schofield

Bob Schofield experiences the June of a lifetime. Illustrations in this book are tenderly drawn by the young Tumblr ghost of Bob Schofield. Though Bob Schofield died many years ago in 1987 due to a sky-bound octopus his ghost works tirelessly to create these elegant images. Pacing within these images is nothing short of amazing. Somehow Bob Schofield manages to create vibrant lively pictures that appear timeless. Even the story behind this June, this apocalyptic June, is quite amazing in its sheer breadth and ambition.

The ocean carries Bob Schofield ever onward. Separate bathtubs are necessary. Due to God’s love of long showers other angels had to wait too long. Bob Schofield discusses how God tends to bathe in the Pacific due to its warmth. Satan gets the Arctic Ocean because Satan sucks. God’s minions get to experience the joys of the Earth’s best oceans, including the warm Indian Ocean, the enjoyable Atlantic, and for those underachieving angels the Southern Ocean. Foam hits Bob Schofield’s face and then he knows exactly what is going to happen to him. He prepares his boat.

Continents are made to give Bob Schofield a place to live. For fun he eats June bugs. They are delicious. With this rich source of protein from eating insects Bob Schofield has enough energy to fuck an anchor. Sea-faring voyages typically require a christening of a boat. Here though he takes it further. Anchors generally are unattractive yet Bob Schofield sees beyond the anchor’s pedestrian appears to her inner beauty.

Forest fires rage on land. Bob Schofield explains how every book is a forest fire. Trees died for that. Every tree as it falls to the ground hopes it can become a book or piece of IKEA furniture. What worries trees the most is becoming a Maxim magazine. Out of all possible scenarios that one is the worst, almost as bad as becoming toilet paper. Unfortunate trees die so people can wipe their ass with tree ghosts.

Glass airplanes fly overhead. Worry is natural. The glass airplanes are fragile. Sky octopus hangs out around Brazil waiting for the doomed passengers. ‘Mega-Shark versus Giant Octopus’ expresses this sentiment well. Many thought that was a terrible movie. Yet Bob Schofield shares the explicit knowledge that octopuses live in the sky ready to destroy whatever passes. While he floats on like so much long-lost Modest Mouse hits, he swallows the sea. Half of it churns deep in his stomach.

Suddenly Bob Schofield discovers he is moth boy. This new-found strength cannot help him defeat the sky octopus over Brazil. Rather he misses the flight without worry. Glass airplanes fall to the ground. Part of him wants to help but most of him longs for fabrics to munch. Deep inside a closet he is at home. He eats someone’s sweater, someone’s blazer, someone’s dress shirt. For this moth boy hybrid the fabric nourishes him. Octopuses make love in the sea but now he has the power to rise above.

Newly elected mayor Bob Schofield hates Koi fish. Guys who own koi fish ponds are not his types of people. Frost bites him. He has a bruise from the frost encounter. To hide he buries himself in cheeks. With this protection he is completely safe from harm. The Arctic Ocean hurts him due to its satanic inhabitants. Hypothetical things bring him hypothetical power. Because of his hypothetical purchasing habits he must be hypothetically rich in something. Perhaps his hypothetical life is better than his real life as it is with nearly everyone.

A baby joins him in swaddling clothes. He travels up mountains for the small defenseless infant. Right in an avalanche he raises the child as if it was his own. The world is always pregnant with bricks. Clay is beneath everyone’s feet. Use of it has declined yet it remains the most durable building material. Finally he evolves to become a bird, a true upgrade from the moth boy; he is now a bird man. He can be an attorney at law but first he must face great trials.

KELSEA BASYE – IT IS STORMY OUTSIDE BUT THE BIRDS DON’T SEEM TO...

Thu, 13 Jun 2013 20:25:02 -0400

KELSEA BASYE – IT IS STORMY OUTSIDE BUT THE BIRDS DON’T SEEM TO BE AFRAID

Kelsea Basye admires the birds. They have no fear of storms. Birds have greater problems though. With hollow bones they can soar in the sky. Due to their small minds the birds fail to comprehend how many other animals would love to fly. Insects suffer the same fate. Neither animal can perceive itself from another’s point of view. Even humanity with its computers, intelligence accrued over centuries, and ability to live longer and longer, skill fails to understand how other animals think. Someday humanity too will learn how to overcome this disability and see things from new, non-human points of view. Good humans lack this insight despite their inherent humanity.

Cities house the humanity. Animals come into the human mix for both emotional and practical support. Emotional support involves pets, the usual dog, cats, and snakes, happy tender creatures. Practical creatures keep the places clean. Insects pollinate the flowers. Roaches eat the leftovers. Dung beetles eat shit and don’t die. They are little pooper scoopers making the world clean with their filthy stomachs. Who doesn’t like shit-eating insects anyway? Besides the insects have no emotional attachment usually.

When apartments smell of another person’s deodorant that is true love. Love covers up the smelly parts. Bad things can be hidden through the power of love. Thanks to it thousands of deodorants, colognes, perfumes, and other fragrant scents are sold. Each person tries to replicate that smell. Yet it is impossible. Mixture of one’s smells with the smells of industrial-grade scents, that’s true individuality. Overcoming the smells of one for the smells of oneself is an incredible power. Though people are quickly becoming homogenized it will still take time. Until that moment things belong to people rather than people belonging to things.

Mass production of items results in everybody having a little experience to share with each other. Industrialization then can be seen as a form of bringing people together through shared experiences as it isolates. Hence two people can see each other with the same Pixies T-shirt and the same headphones. Each one can smile. Yet neither one needs to say a word. Headphones isolate in that instance. Flowers were an early form of this industrial love, mass producing themselves for the benefit of themselves. Now humanity does it by churning out products to show its love for itself.

Ends are simply new beginnings. Seeing the finale is always worth it. Decay is one of the ways that this mass production can find itself influenced by nature rather than by design. Thus nature remains the necessary editor of everything.

Frausun - Wasteland Devastation Love Songs 7.4 ...

Tue, 11 Jun 2013 13:38:00 -0400

Frausun - Wasteland Devastation Love Songs 7.4

Frausun is a sonic chameleon. Ever shifting it is hard to get a definite grasp. One moment calm, the next exploding into an almost dance-like shuffle, it is shocking. Instability is the defining feature throughout ‘Wasteland Devastation Love Songs’. Right when the listener is drawn into lull that’s when Frausun strikes breaking up into distortion, shards of the previous melody blasting through. Keeping up with these sudden shifts is downright impossible. However multiple listens of the album start to reveal its many charms. The vocals on the album provide one of the few anchors of the sound itself with the female vocals generally offering the best contrast. Otherwise it is completely free to do nearly whatever it wants.

‘Temple Of The Delphi’ is a good example of what occurs on much of the album: buildups abandoned for the instant shock. On this track particularly the calm of the vocals counterbalanced with the activeness of the electronics makes it particularly intriguing. For ‘Black Clouds’ there’s a particularly perverse humor involved. Akin to Foetus’s approach it merges multiple versions of easy listening into something that’s quite disorienting. ‘Don’t Waste My Time’ continues in this similar vein. However ‘I Am The Lovely’ takes a completely different approach beginning with a full-on assault before breaking down. ‘Transmission’ is perhaps the most fun they have on the album with a perky stomp and interjections of random noises in the background. Actually this may be one of the highlights of the album.

Wasteland Devastation Love Songs is a deeply strange outright confusing album that nonetheless manages to be surprisingly engaging.

please open wide by Blare Coughlin ‘Please...

Tue, 11 Jun 2013 13:33:24 -0400

please open wide by Blare Coughlin

‘Please Open Wide’ is the first chapbook for dentists. Too long dentists have been ignored by Alt Lit. With Blare Coughlin’s help dentists will finally get the respect they deserve. Dentists are the most Alt Lit professional: suffering from higher rates of depression than any other profession they are ideal candidates to join the Alt Lit movement. Of course the chapbook begins the way a typical dentist’s day does: with a shoot-out. Unfortunately many dental patients hate their treatments. Quite tragic really, the dentist fights against a tide of indifference and false promises. At least in the short story the dentist gets shot in the heart, a better fate than what dentists usually get.

Guardian angels protect in theory. Like communism however, in practice guardian angels are rather worthless. They spend vast amounts of time wasting time on the bus. Sadly guardian angels earn minimum wage hence their lack of enthusiasm about their jobs. By making clothes during their bus trips guardian angels get additional spending cash for the luxury of the dollar menu whenever bad food is sold. Normally though guardian angels get more of their food from dumpsters. Some dumpsters are better than others. Freegans know this well. In a way all freegans are guardian angels giving waste new purpose. If only people got the same deferential treatment as commodities. That day is far away however.

Apologies are life. Life is full of sorry. That means that there is enough humility to admit when one has done wrong. It is okay. Sometimes this sort of thing happens where nobody knows what is about to happen. It simply happens. Balding requires no apology. Genetics take care of hair, or help it to disappear. Other instances are stranger still. IKEA furniture is a mystery. Bilar, that delicious Swedish candy, that stuff is wonderful. Exes are executive former friends or lovers. Keeping a good relationship with them is important for it is good to get a perfectly honest opinion on things.

Conventional beauty is honesty. Turning people away for dates sounds rather cruel and unusual. Everybody ought to get themselves a sweet silly date. Nobody tells the truth to the conventionally beautiful. Rather they hear lies. What the conventional beauty does is force the truth through a series of tests to determine the importance of the words, deeds, or actions. When someone is built tough, Ford-tough, then they are able to go through gullies and ditches. Regular conventional built people lack that same sort of pickup power. It is better to be built ‘like a rock’ then ‘like a dove’.

Transforming into a cloud is difficult. Transforming in the cloud though, that’s something people do on a regular basis. The cloud is a way to change people. The cloud is the new college, the ultimate re-brand.