10 a.m., San Francisco
375 Alabama Ave., between 16th and 17th Streets.
3rd floor

Listening to: Sarah McLachlan - "Rarities, B-Sides, and Other Stuff" (1996, Nettwerk)

"Dear God" - an amazingly written, cathartic song written by XTC in 1984. it's quite a good version by McLachlan, who i always kind of liked for some reason.
She was never quite so cheesy as most of her contemporaries.
It's quite an angry song, as the writer questions the existence of God, the Devil amidst all the horrors of the world. I think it's also bold that McLachlan opens her album with it. The Bible-Thumpers would assuredly be screaming about it.
Or did. Since this B-sides album was released in 1996. How did it pass me by?

Maybe this is what i need to do.
Contribute random thoughts and just transfer 'em over.
God, i'm so way too self-obsessed and watchful of myself.
so much so that i think i've scared myself into not writing as much.
Ha, pretty funny.
I think i come up with these expectations for myself that are pretty much unattainable, therefore i'm never really successful. Therein breeds more depression, guilt, what have you.
fuck.
Of course, as always, i should be working.

yes, yes.
it's coming. it wants to come out. it needs to come out.
it NEEDS to come out.
all the depravity.
all of it.

funny thing that always seems to happen to me that i've never told anyone about: the majority of the time, while listening to a CD particularly loud, in which i WANT everyone around me while sitting at a red light to KNOW what i'm listening to, when i come to a red light, that's when there's a quiet moment in the song, the CD, or it's inbetween two different songs.
I seem to have a real knack for that, no matter where i'm going, what i'm listening to, etc. Of course, it could just be a stupid coincidence that i'm thinking is something more in my head.
Could be.
you never really no.

i don't seem to have the motivation to write about music so much. It's like part of me is resisting it.
Things are changing.
I need to purchase turntables.
i need to make the music thing work more.
It DOES speak to me in comfort (from the song i'm listening to "Fear" by ms. mcLachlan, the LunaSoul remix for all you trainspotting factoids out there).

helgabunny in a vacuum cleaner.

I've got to remember to ask if i can leave early on friday.
And tell them about my impending jury duty possibility.
I've got to get my tax shit together and get on that.
I've GOT to do SO much SHIT.
Maybe i need Tina to give me deadlines.

This morning i think of that woman at Country Fresh with the red dot on her nose (it was on there for fucking years, seemingly) who asked me blank-faced why i was still "living in sin" with Tina. She didn't mean it to be necessarily offensive, an innocent question from her perspective, but still effectively and unequivacolly wrong.
That's my problem, i'm too sympathetic. I care too much about people. I often act like i don't so much. But my actions speak otherwise. I mean, i'm not the type to engage in conversation with each and every homeless person i encounter -- it's impossible. And pardon me for being a bit selfish, but i've got my own dreams and self-obsesesion to think about.
But if i didn't care what people thought and/or trying to see the good in people, i wouldn't have many friends. and i do have a lot of friends. Too many really, for one person to handle. Tim Pratt the image is different than Tim Pratt the reality. But isn't it always that way?
We're all fucked up and don't know as much as we front.
One of the best quotes i read recently was somebody who was writing about Jay Leno or at least, Leno was in the story, and the narrator commented to him that he was amazed and impressed at Leno's ability to bluff his way through interviews, as if he actually really knew what each and every one of them was talking about and/or could relate.
Leno responded with "Welcome to Life." essentially saying "Life is all about bluffing and, at the very least, being an active enough listener so the other person truly believes you're understanding and Hearing them."
It also means you have to bullshit and talk yourself up a bit, to give the impression you KNOW what's up.
Even if you only sort of know. Which is much more likely the case.

We're talking in abstracts here but that's what i'm all about.
Obsessing about the human condition in relation to myself since, that's the only basis i can use.

That said, i think i can read people pretty well and have the unique ability to befriend an incredibly diverse mixture of people. In fact, that's what i like about myself. much like music, my other obsession (people has to be my first obsession), is that i can be quite the chameleon. I'm learning more and more the beauty of shutting up and taking it all in.

Now if i can get past this last hump, this fucked up weirdo apprehension.
Some might call it a fear of success. It's more like the fear of commiting myself to a nonstop barrage of overwhelming work that will envelope my very soul.
But then again, what have i been leading up to for the last 33 years? I keep saying the book and everything else is coming soon.But i need to make things start happening.
I am at the point where i need to take things to the next level. I have the momentum, i have the ability. The only one holding me back is me.

me.
fucker.
10:25 a.m.
same chair.
playing "song for a winter's night"

there's something about sarah's voice that warms you up. and i Love the production.
very clean, very warm. subtle warmth.

i LOVE the fact that justin's wife noticed i played songs from an emotional standpoint. I don't know if anyone has ever paid me a better compliment.
because that's EXACTLY what my DJing is about.

EMOTIONAL RESCUE
emotional miscue

And now i must write...ha, freudian slip (not really freudian, sounds good though)
and now i must WORK.

I challenge anyone to find a rapper that DOESN'T thank God, the Almighty, the Creator, Allah or any other supposed IDOL in their album.

so many people have worked for spinner. it's kind of funny. dj anna (who someone else i know lives near her) worked here too.
as did j-boogie.
chris orr.
dj sep, currently.

sarah reminds me of working at kinko's for some reason (along with moby and the walt disney 3-cd set i stole).
it reminds me of hooking up with that hyper conservative chick and then nearly puking all over her.

Rabbit in the Moon reminds me of the time i went to Indianapolis with Susan and she stood there, bored out of her skull, while i was mesmerized.

richard devine is producing the new nine inch nails album.

ok, i kind of like this evanescence track "Going Under." I kind of like their gothy element, sorta industrial lite.

interestingly, Dwele isn't that different from Vikter Duplaix's last album.

Mayday "I know your Troubles been long" (Bar/None Records, 2003), feat. cursive, lullaby for the working class, bright eyes. earnest breathy rock. uh oh, earnest poetry beforehand. sure, there's a pioius element to this. but it actually seems to work. for me anyway.
old time rock with violins, harmonicas and the like. an old time johnny cash sort of country. like it's not country in the framework of modern styles, but of 30-40 years ago style country. hushed vocals. "old blood" is what i'm talking about. steel guitar is nice.

baal
we need a golden calf.

Kit Clayton - Raging Mandible.

looking at this Soca Gold 2003 cd and all the reggae dancehall type shit on here makes me think of Gillian Gaynair. my god, she was so hot.