TheCrashTest

Demon Hunter.

   Polar Bear Club at the Bug Jar in Rochester, NY is tonight, and I can barely hold in my excitement. It’s going to be an amazing night, no matter what I have to do. This city needs shows like this, to remind the people within that their city is a cool place to be,  otherwise the shit weather and the gloom just warps your perception of the place. 

   It’ll be front-row and center for me, and if my ears aren’t ringing by the end of the night, then I either did something wrong, or the show got canceled. With both of those scenarios highly unlikely, it looks like my ears’ll be ringing pretty bad by the end of this. 

   Seems like the words, “Can’t wait”, just don’t do this feeling justice. 

   Sometimes I like to dance alone, in my room, with nothing, but my hundreds of books, CDs and art pieces as my audience. 

   Scratch that, actually. I can’t dance, and unfortunately for many women I’ve met over the years, I don’t like to dance. It’s never really been my thing, but alas, my love for music has put me into quite the “catch 22”. 

   In a foggy fit of rage, I gunned out of bed this morning, realizing I only had an hour to spare before work, and hopped into my stiff, wooden torture device of a dining chair to catch up on my daily dose of inter-webbings. After finding some not-so-spectacular reads (it is after all a Sunday, so not much news or flashy material winds-up surfacing on the net usually), I stumbled across an amazing track on Vevo, by a group called Hyper Crush, whom I had thought were long lost to the depths of trend obscurity. I had known of them since hearing their earlier work during my short stint as an employee of Hot Topic, back in 2008, but as all things from that den of “scenester mainstreamitis” tend to do, I was under the impression that the fuse on their then infatuating grooves had fizzled, and died. Clearly, I was oh, so wrong.

   ”Werk Me” (cleverly misspelled for coolness’ sake) is a dance hall epic, with tempo changes and beats that’ll drop you on your head and beat sex into you from beginning to end. Laden with bass heavy rhythms and soaked in synth, the song is addictive, clearing out inhibitions and taking no prisoners. It’s almost a sure thing that you’ll listen to this once, and find yourself wanting to listen to it over and over again. Just try not to pay attention to some of the songs more corny lyrics.

  Check out Hyper Crush’s “Werk Me” here! 

Ryan Gosling.

   Henry Rollins is easily one of my all-time greatest inspirations in my literary quests. His work has had profound effects on both my writing and way of expression, in which he has taught me to bear my soul more openly and fluently. Fear, usually being my number one impediment in most cases, normally bogged me down, causing me to constantly question whether or not what I had to say would mean anything to anyone. I was just another punk kid, trading in the internal torture of feelings gone awry, left to the only device he had, to purge his heart of what ailed it: pen and paper. It’s nice sometimes to know you’re not the only one, and in finding so much of myself in Rollins’ work, it’s now easier to feel a little less lonely in my travels.

   After purchasing “The First Five”, a collection of Rollins’ earliest writing, I decided to strive for something a little bit more visual, but still deeply literary. Just released this past Fall, “Occupants” is a beautiful documentation of Rollins’ journey across the globe, displayed in pictures and words that attempt to capture the magnificence most of us overlook in each waking moment of our lives. As the book begins, the pictures start off grainy and underdeveloped, but as it progresses, the potency of the visuals become increasingly stronger, to a level of mind-blowing proportions. What’s truly amazing though, are the blatant effects these images had on Rollins and his literary craftsmanship, causing him to create some of the most powerful prose he has ever written.

   Having given “Occupants” a test run, at my local Barnes & Noble, I’ve finally decided this is a book I can’t have missing from my collection. Not only is it inspiring to read, but the comfort of knowing it’s there to wake me from the impending boredom of some days is a kind of comfort I don’t want to live without.

   Oh, bookshelf. Here I go again, filling you up as always with great reads and more Henry Rollins.  

   Where do I start with Kat Von D?…

   Having owned these books for a couple years collectively, it’s about time I opened them up and stimulated my right brain, drenching it in the ecstatic creative achievements of one of this generations undeniably great tattooists. Although her name has been perched, stale, on the lips of so many ink-covered bodies around the globe, it’s hard for me to dismiss such a soul, so deeply entrenched in what she believes in.

   Ask yourself, how many people out there are truly in love with and indebted to what drives them? Do you find most of them driven to begin with? Kat Von D is one of those people that knows how to “just live”. Through perseverance and persistence during struggles that might easily boil the blood of the average human to an untimely death, she has plotted her mark in history, making sense out of the insensible aspects in the tattoo world. Letting go of societies false conceptions of normalcy and letting her soul take the reigns, Kat has helped the world embrace tattoos and body modification more so, than many.  

   Let’s just say it.

   Without Kat Von D, us tattoo junkies and body modders wouldn’t have it so easy. So, without further ado, I present “High Voltage” and “The Tattoo Chronicles”. The latest consumers of my life.    

Black Sabbath (Dio-era).

   Dia Frampton has a way of making you fall in love with her, if not only because she makes the stage her own, it’s that, with every beautifully aching moment, you realize who she is on stage, is exactly who she is in life. A soft, well-spoken, and explosive talent that deserves just every bit of your attention. Looking back, it’s hard to say where I was for the hour she was on stage. I was far too deep in this songstresses hymns to even notice that my jaw was inching, gradually down to the floor. 

   On the balcony, looking down upon the room, I could feel the air as it grazed me, so damp & thick. With every step I took towards the edge, it were as if my body was cutting through cloth. Hanging my head over the balcony bars, I listened, briefly closing my eyes, for a few moments at a time, becoming something else with every word sung. 

   I imagined myself a-flight, above the bobbing heads of the crowd. Swooping and soaring, her songs were the perfect soundtrack to a daydream. Yet, before I could bring myself to mix with the air, my eyes startled open, and my heart, stammering to pump blood, began to ache. There, before me, was a bare-footed beauty, elegantly dressed, with a voice as serene as sunshine. Flawless beyond all measure, with arms outreached, she grasped the room in her hands, driving our souls on a poetic trip through her life, song after song, after beautiful song. It was only when she let go, that I felt empty, and out of love with the moment. Like a connection was severed. An amazing musical connection. Although I’m thankful I lived it, I could’ve lived in it, forever. 

   Dia, with an honest heart such as yours in the world, singing itself out to countless crowds as it does, I know ingenuity still has a place in music. Through your poetry, and originality, I know you will go on to inspire so many. You’ve inspired me. If there’s ever a time that you feel out of place, as does every artist at some point, just remember, so many people love to see you smiling. Singing. Performing, with your every heart string.

   You’re amazing, and I hope you know.

   Petering out, the lights in the room diminish to nothing, but a dull glow, as I look on from the back of the room. Time is of the essence, and the days off from the mire of a corporate work week will be coming to a close, sooner than I can imagine. I rush to collect my films, stacking them neatly in a pile, so that I can pick them off one by one. This evenings choice is almost perfect, if not slyly remarkable. Into the slot, “Eyes Wide Shut” slips smoothly in, as though it’s plot becomes one with even the disc it’s been etched on.

   Sexually charged, and emotionally bereaved, “Eyes Wide Shut” is a journey into the darkest realms of lust, hideous deception and the wandering eye. When Alice (Nicole Kidman) begins to fantasize about having an affair on her husband, her fantasies trigger her husband, Dr. Bill Harford (Tom Cruise) to opens his mind to enacting some of his most sexually repressed desires. Slipping into the dregs of some of the most wealthiest people’s depraved orgies, and swinging parties, he seeks to satiate his darkest hungers and brooding jealousy. As Bill realizes he is falling prey to his desires, he comes face to face with the idea, that the only way to save his marriage is to follow his wife into the depths of emotional bankruptcy, where he finds that the world around him is much more lecherous than he once perceived. 

   While I am not a fan of Tom Cruise, this has to be his most perfectly executed portrayal of a character on film. Since his first steps on a Hollywood set, I’ve despised his supposed skill as an actor, grieving the many lost roles that could have been given to someone with a much greater skill-set. “Eyes Wide Shut” is my sole exception for him. The forever gorgeous, Nicole Kidman, shines as the illustrious, not so physically dangerous, but definitely physical, femme fatale. Delivering as the collected, yet lustfully depraved nymphomaniac, Kidman makes you believe in her simulation of the carnal desires hiding deep within her characters psyche. The way she lets them slowly seep out with her every scene is almost addicting, leaving viewers on the edge, wondering, pleading for what will happen next.

   In the dark, under the heat of director’s bulbs, I will remain immersed in the awe-inspiring last film by Stanley Kubrick. What an amazing final contribution to the world of film by such an undeniably, artistic soul. My mind melts at the thought of what could be, had the habit of death being so sudden, not taken such a great talent.

   Tonight, although I am alone, will be a beautiful addition to my memories.