Big Ears, Big Noise and Big Art

In an attempt to make life not all about work when the kids aren't around, Eleanor and self have been looking into adopting some donkeys. One would have been fine but apparently they come in pairs. First of all, you need a field, which we haven't got - but her folks have. A big field at that. Not only is it a great grassy expanse of field but after the fire of a few years back, since the rebuild, there's now also some handy stable type buildings. Actually, not so much 'stable type', it is a bloody stable. Built by a stable company who specialise in stables. You would have thought a suitable place to keep them would be the worst of your worries but there's a spanner in the works. Seems that her folks aren't so keen on having a couple of donkeys hanging around the house. I don't think I'd be able to say no personally but all is not lost. I'm pretty sure that with enough pestering, they'll cave in eventually. How can anybody resist looking out of the kitchen window and seeing these guys:

Donkeys

Lots of work behind the scenes going on here, but having interviewed Andrew Kaufman yesterday... no, it was the day before wasn't it... I am avoiding the task I like least in life. Transcribing the damn thing - and that's nothing to do with anybody that I've spoken to, I find it a total chore no matter how much I enjoyed doing the actual piece. Couple that with the odd grimace at how often I like to interrupt people to lead them down roads I want to go down and you have yourself a mexican stand-off. Still, got to be done, so I might as well make a start. Maybe I've got better since I realised I did this (interrupting) but I doubt it. Just keep telling yourself, it's the destination that matters and not how erratically you drove to get there.

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One of the only blogs I check in on every single day as I've said before is Gaiman. This is mostly because he's both entertaining and posts almost everyday. I kind of like that in a writer. He's writing regardless of what it is. Today somebody asked him about how he dealt with time frames and being under pressure to write when he maybe thought he didn't 'have time' - this is how the enquirer saw their own lot as somebody who wanted to write a story but was finding it hard. Today, he gave the best answer of his online career and it went like this:

"Nobody else is going to do it for me, and if I don’t write it it won’t get written. I’ve got 12 short stories to write over the next 3 days, I have to make it home 1200 miles despite a record blizzard hitting my destination, and I’m probably going to have to do quite a bit of writing sitting in airports waiting for delayed flights. I’ll probably do it because I don’t have any other choices. Like I say, no-one else is going to do it for me."

And that, is the word on the street.

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<MUSICAL INTERLUDE>

This, is simply beautiful:

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Those who visit often (or even those who don't but scroll around a lot) will know that I'm an art lover. This week, one of my favourites out there, Brian Ewing, posted some great new monster material at his store and some of it looks like this:

Brian Ewing - Universal Monsters Print

Brian Ewing - Universal Monsters Print

...and I think you should invest heavily. Also on my travels (am in the middle of a project which has lots to do with monsters at the moment), I came across the Deviant Moon tarot. I stopped buying tarot decks once I had Dave McKean's Vertigo deck but this one matches - and may even surpass it. Here's some of the insanely cool images from the deck:

Deviant Moon VI

Deviant Moon XVIII

Deviant Moon PW

You're right. Got my name written all over them huh.

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I wonder of I can twelve short stories in three days.

<ON THE DECKS TODAY>

The 10 'Weapons' tracks from My Chemical Romance.

Stand Still, Look Pretty: The Wreckers

Cuttin' Heads: John Mellencamp

Wisdom of the Gods (III)

"This is not your playground - it's my heart" From Here We Are Juggernaut/Coheed and Cambria

You can watch the video here:

I am just as excited about their new album The Afterman as I am about the new Doctor Who season.

44 and excited about an album again. That makes me happier than I have a right to be.

Claudio and I are in competition to see who can make their hair explode the best. So far Claudio has the edge but I'm gaining on him...

 

The World All At Once (2)

Took the day to see what was going on in the real world and found myself at a record fair. Despite a hunt for very specific things which I didn't find, I didn't come home empty handed. The plan was to pick up some wax that I did want and at least one thing that I had never heard before (or, at the outside, was very unfamiliar with). On the 'found' list was Ian Hunter's Schizophrenic album and Mott the Hoople's Mott. I also came across a T.Rex album called Billy Super Duper which I'd forgotten was even supposed to exist. Back in '84, this would have been a real coup for me, so that got bagged too. It's well off the beaten track and if you're interested in some 'under the counter' Bolan, there appears to be a copy here that's free to download - though I can't vouch for its validity. I however shall content myself with the original. I have to admit, I'm really loving this vinyl lark. Bringing up the rear in the 'explore something new' column, are The Who. I never really got into them when I should have - too busy with other stuff I guess and when I was at school, they were tagged with the 'mod' brush. A few quid for a copy of Meaty Beaty Big & Bouncy seems more than reasonable. I don't normally do compilations of any kind, but they didn't have any other Who albums so I let myself off the hook. Not listened to any of them yet - that's a job for being alone in the house which will come tomorrow morning. Later, I also picked up a couple of graphic novels that I've been meaning to play with for some time. Ben Templesmith's Choker V1 and Fell V1. Throw the double finale of The Bridge on TV tonight and it's been quite a relaxing day. Can't remember the last time I did no work at all. Christmas Day probably.

So overall, those were good things to buy because as far as I can see, nobody released anything new worth a damn this week. What is it with people? All this freaking technology and still bands are stuck in a pointless rut of one album a year - two years sometimes. Nobody needs to hear the 'we were busy touring' excuse because thirty years ago, bands were banging out two albums a year plus material you'd never heard before as b-sides for all their singles. So don't come crying to me when you reach the end of the line and find no legacy to fall back on - or is everybody tied into deals that are so locked down, there's nowhere to move. Take a look at YouTube this week and how everybody has been lapping up the Coheed & Cambria cover of Gotye's Somebody That I Used To Know. See previous post for the clip but that's what we want in between albums - unexpected surprises of substance.

So that's a whole week in the win column for the past and a resounding suckerpunch in the mouth for the present. Yeah, I know it's not fair to compare but too bad. That's the way it went down...

To wrap up, I leave you with this speech from Mr Gaiman which is - without doubt - the single most inspiring speech in the history of inspring speeches. Anybody involved in the arts, no matter how long you've been hammering away at it, needs to absorb it pretty much immediately. It will make a difference: