Friday, December 13, 2013

Auri Sacra Fames

Well, here we go again, Colorado. Another shooting on public property in the Denver area. I'll spare everyone the false platitudes, and I won't go on and on about how tragic it all is, because really it just seems disingenuous and trite at this point. The fact is, I'm not doing anything to ensure that another incident like this ever happens in this city I love so much, so I'll skip it.

Here it is, people! Plain and fucking simple. No more debates, nor more petty arguing. As blunt as I can be, this is how I see it. 

We live in a country of choices. In fact we pride ourselves on that. That hallowed freedom of decision. I've struggled with the gun debate for so long because I don't believe in attacking symptoms. I like shooting guns. I get enjoyment out of it. My stepfather owns a small arsenal and has never committed a violent assault. To my knowledge anyway. I truly believe that the problems we're seeing would exist if we all suddenly, collectively agreed on sweeping restrictions or abolition. But that belief, and that "truth", does not automatically absolve me from having to make an inevitable and difficult decision. 

This is a table of the wealth disparity in the United States from the early 1900's on.


And this is a table showing the homicide rates in the United States from the early 1900's on.


Do you see what's happening? Do you notice the continuity in peaks and pits? Is it all a coincidence? Or can we deduce that when the wealth gap widens, violence increases, and vice versa?

I also do not find it coincidental that Switzerland, a country with a pretty healthy gun culture, one that puts firearms into the hands of most young men because they act as the nation's standing militia, also boasts some of the lowest wealth disparities among industrialized nations. 

We cannot continue to choose an unrestricted and unregulated access to wealth and guns, AND also expect to somehow miraculously see a decline in domestic mass violence. It's not in our nature. For years Jane Goodall documented aggression and group violence among chimps when stockpiles of food were introduced to the throng. It's in our nature to fight real hard for the most when the most is presented as an option. 

Guns are not the sole cause of public shootings. Super wealth is not the sole cause of public shootings. The culprit is the two combined. 

We have a malady of ideals in this nation. Our desires are cancerous in that we want it all without sacrifice. I'm not indicting anyone, I crave the same things you do. I just see the writing on the wall now. If we want to see a decline in these sorts of abhorrent catastrophes, I believe we have to exercise that beloved, and at times difficult, power of choice. "Freedom isn't free", right?

We have to pick one. Do we want guns? Or do we want unchecked prosperity? Because looking at the numbers, and the landscape as it stands today, we're instinctively ill-equipped to handle the two as bedfellows. 

Don't get me wrong, the choice still stands before us to continue down the path we're currently on. It's there. It's our right. But if we do, we all need to just shut our mouths, quit bitching, and learn to stomach aerial images of our children being lead out of learning institutions like shell-shocked prisoners of war.



****SIDE NOTE BEFORE YOU SAY IT: Yes, violent crime rates are on the decrease. But what I think people need to realize is that they spiked reaaaal high when baby boomers were hitting the ages between 18-to 24, the age range that men are most likely to commit violent crimes within. That bubble has deflated leaving a depression. But let's not assume that less than atrocious is good. Our murder rates are still kicking most every other industrialized nation's ass. I'm not mad at guns. I'm not mad at wealth. I'm merely saying that I don't believe the two together will create an environment ripe for rationality. Below is a chart showing population of certain age demographics by year. For the most part age 20-44 years old stays steady until it dips in the 70's and then shoots up in the 90's as baby boomers reach early 20's, following the spiking gun violence statistics. Then the numbers shrink after the baby boomers get older, following the dip we're seeing in gun crime.*******




Thursday, December 5, 2013

"The Reckoning of Fan Brent" Pt. 1


I wasn't born much.  Those born not much will often dream of becoming more than everyone else.  Like, all they have is their dreams.  Reality rarely ever makes a visit to the homes of the less fortunate and forgotten.  Most will entertain ideas of who they will be when they become someone else.  But that didn't happen to me I guess.   You can trace the lines on my face and the only thing you'll hear is the echo of my worthless father in everything I do.  I guess he wasn't much either.
Tomorrow will be my 27th birthday and I can honestly say that I've never done a thing of value, aside from being born, according to my mother.  But that woman's bat-shit crazy.  She's convinced that the natives are stealing her garbage as revenge for putting up a privacy fence.   If she's wrong about something small like that, how wrong could she be about something as "important" as my creation?  I believe that most things happen for a reason and that some things, or some people, happen for no reason at all.  They're simply just a border for all great things to bounce and bound off when on their way to destinations unknown.  Like, without stationary objects, speed and distance could not be determined.  I guess I just figure myself to be a part of the latter.
My name is Fan Brent.  I'm not quite sure why my father was so insistent on naming me Fan.  Maybe it was a prophetic primer to a life spent on the side lines.  Or maybe it was the easiest sound for him to bluster out after two pints of Bristols Dry Gin.  Often, out-of-town visitors to the fill station I work at will assume that I must be interesting given that I have somewhat of a unique name.  Maybe I'm the son of hippies or reclusive author parents, I bet they wonder.  They'll never know.  I don't speak much, and when I do I sure as shit won't waste my few sentences discussing the motives of the stewed couch turd responsible for bringing me into this void.  As I said, I don't talk much anyway.  It's not that I don't like people, but was it Shakespeare who said, "brevity is the soul of wit"?  I guess I'd rather keep my damn mouth shut and be scorned as retarded.  I'm better at watching anyway.  
I was born here in Boulder Flats, a small town about four hours northwest of Cheyenne.  I don't know if I'd call this place a town anymore I'd call a zit a mountain.  Three hundred people give or take, mostly native American, with no reason to stay here other than being too poor to leave.   A hard working people shaped by a harder working past.  Alcoholism is more likely to visit your house than the postman.  As it did mine.  At night there are few lights, and fewer reasons to bask in them.   The wind snaking through the foothills, punctuated by the occasional barking dog, is the soundtrack to most my evenings. 
I hate it here.  There's a uselessness that permeates into even the most essential of tasks.  Sometimes breathing seems like labor.  Why continue on?  Laziness, I guess.  Suicide is too much work in a town like this.  Between the gossip, stigma, and tradition, it's just easier to wait and let hell come to you.      
So the night the comet fell from ether and smashed into my pickup truck was made all the more strange by the bland, black back drop on which it occurred.  It was hot that evening.  Summer had decided to make its presence known that week by overstaying its welcome well into the dark.   The sound of crickets was only matched by the frequent click and hum of my old general electric refrigerator working overtime to keep itself cool.   A warm, sodden breeze through the tiny open windows of my trailer allowed me the sensation of sleeping in the bell tube of a bugle while a silent breathy version of taps was blown.  The T.V. flickered between thirty second and thirty minute segments of nonsense and misanthropy.  My eyelids began to open and close as if summoned by magnets.  All muscle and motion at long last succumbing to slumber's fragile rhythm.   
I often fall sleep in my chair.  Or so I will come to discover at almost 3:15 every morning when I'm  awakened from the same dream, at the same point, at nearly the same time.  Details of the dream lend less alarm than the manner in which it plays out on a seemingly endless reel.  My subconscious pondering an apparently immune question.  Sleep is necessary for sanity but not for survival, and always in short supply, I guess I've adjusted to its paucity as Bedouin does water.   
The first sound to jolt me awake that night was the loudest goddamn sound I do believe I've ever heard.  Starting first with a roaring hiss, then followed by a group of percussive bursts, and ending with an explosion that illuminated the whole room to heavenly proportions; if you believe in that sort of thing.  Debris pelting the windows and aluminum siding created the illusion of an angry mob showering my home with handfuls of nuts and bolts.  I came to still seated effortlessly in my overturned recliner.  Smoke immediately filled the air in my tiny compartment.  The odor of burning rubber quickly became overwhelming.  To my surprise, I learned that instinct immediately takes over, posturing the body and mind to that of a rat.  Without conscious reasoning or design I found myself clawing an open window at the far end of my tiny home, the structure birthing me onto the dry, parched prairie grass that rings my property on three sides.  
For a brief moment I laid there in the night air envisioning myself as the apparatus in which every moving particle is inhaled, cleansed, and released.  My lungs feverishly scrubbing every vapor before being dispelled into the nights gloom.  I recall a strange peace enveloped me.  Tears began to swell and form in the corners of my eyes and for those few fragile instants, I understood.  I understood the preachings of swamis and monks.  I understood the distraction in effort.  I understood the vibrancy in silence.  I understood humanity.  That we are not just the center of the universe or just part of a greater living structure, but rather, a complex combination of both.  Emptors, seated in private theaters of our own interpretation, fashioned by the mind to keep us consuming and creating together.  
I was snapped back to alarm by a sound I now know to have been my grills propane tank combusting and arching itself across the dimly lit pasture adjacent to mine.  Metal fragments,  charcoal soot, and gas concocted a sort of anti-rainbow.  Rolling over on to my hands and knees I crawled towards the edge of my home.   Peering around the corner I saw both ends of my truck perched high in the air, head and tail lights both angled as if waiting to search the nights sky.  The center of the green pickup was pressed firmly into a three foot crater and my house had shifted, leaning off its support blocks exposing the dirt and sun deprived grass that lay beneath.  Several small fires dotted the perimeter while most of the gas appeared to have burned off.  The Dodge intermittently hissed plumes of smoke as if it were the regulator on a pressure cooker.  
I found myself immediately aware of my own heart beat again; relentless and ever-present, pounding my rib cage like a child eager to escape a locked closet.  My knees started to feel shaky and cumbersome.  My lower half couldn’t be trusted to account for my upper half any longer.  Slowly seating myself on the gravel driveway, my mind began the tedious task of arranging the pieces of events gathered before and behind me in an effort to provide a much needed reasoning.  Starting as all minds do with the harmless and ending on the absurd.  Was there a mechanical malfunction of some sort?  Was I the victim of a vicious prank?  Was this an attack?  Am I being punished?  If so, punished for what?  And by whom?  I have my faults but I’m no one.  Punishment should be reserved for those that leave an imprint.  The invisible should be spared their amercement; deprivation will be their gallows. 
“Fan!”
“Fan! Can you hear me? Are you okay?” 
Not a single siren or light had pierced my thoughts and yet somehow, there before me stood four police officers.  Volunteer firefighters could be seen feverishly extinguishing  and examining the rubble of my vehicle.  
“Are you okay, son?”, a voice called to me.
I recognized two of the faces immediately.  Officers Frank Truston and Tommy Delfacto.  Both local police, Frank was in his mid-50’s, a solid built man with pepper gray hair and a long scar from chin to ear.  He had a calming fatherly sense about him.  Tommy had graduated a couple years before me.  Stern and cold, he had brown hair perched atop a slightly heavy set face and body.  Most young people in town vilified him but I guess I never had much of a reason to.  The other two appeared to be State Police Officers given their uniforms and cocky affectation.  I was shocked to hear my name called out.  For years I’d been wallpaper to the people of this town.  A pattern on the days backdrop.  The visual equivalent of a lawn mower or the scent of barbecue eminating from an undisclosed location in your neighborhood.
I hadn't updated the dazed look on my face because Frank began snapping his fingers as if trying to awaken me from hypnosis.  I validated his presence, and mine for that matter, with a nod and short grunt.  A sense of relief seemed to cross his brow.  At this point, I decided to speak my first words in nearly 8 hours.
“FFFFUCK!”, I belted out.
I’m unsure as to why my brain allowed this to be the pioneer thought on the evenings proceedings, but my body definitely had a say in its selection.
“You can say that again.”, frank laughed.  “What the hell happened out here?”  
Leaning one hand in the dirt, I began to slouch and shuffle myself to my feet.  I felt Frank and Tommy’s hand grasp at both my biceps.
“I don’t know.  I was asleep in my chair when I heard this thing explode.”, I said gesturing towards the remnants of my Dodge Ram. 
"I have no idea what could fold a truck like that", Tommy yelled while circling the smoldering mass, "but whatever it was, you're lucky to be alive." 
Theres so much arrogance in the assertion of privelage in survival.  There are no words for what awaits after death.  Perhaps it is the dead that are truly blessed.  Maybe we, the restless  beings of planet earth, are doomed to chasing our shadows, unkempt and vague, standing on the edge of a precipice we fear, all the while aware only of the inevitable collapsing landscape behind and not the feast of ages that awaits unseen below.
"I guess so.",  I muttered.  
Releasing from their grip I began to examine the damage for myself.  My vehicle laid destroyed and unused on the grassland as though it were some futuristic carcass from a poacher unknown.  Bleeding like an insect, the smashed exoskeleton belched viscous liquid in a display of form rather than of function.  Wires pulled from their sockets and left to sprawl like Medusa's snakes, sparked nervously as if given the daunting task of reviving this acrid landscape.   A sense of sadness crossed the pit of my stomach.  The loss reflex opened by an uninformed section of my soul.  My brain apparently confused possession with companionship, as it does to so many people nowadays.  This did not matter, I reminded myself.  My father smattered his pickup with what little love his worthless heart could dribble out.  I would not do the same.  
The truth is, I had never been like him.  He was hoarder of found objects.  Believing the people of Fremont County were ungrateful and unknowing of the treasures that lay just below their noses, he used our front lawn as a forum to make his case.  A three legged bassinet, a moveable dock for an above ground swimming pool, pedal bikes of all different shapes and sizes, an armoire with the name Steven spray painted across the front of it, six identical lawn gnomes, and countless legs, arms, and tops to luxuries unfamiliar.  Washers and driers from several different decades lined the porch and yard creating an evolution scale of modern laundering.  Our house appeared as an animal on the dissection table, it's viscera displayed outside the body for the study and scrutiny of others.  The old man loved these things.  And because he had so many of them, there was very little love left for us. 
 Since childhood I've avoided the collection of possessions.   I had found early on that loving an object and expecting an equal emotion in return was akin to expecting flight from a balloon you just fastened a brick to.  With title comes duress.  Assets only provide what little enjoyment is derived from the fulfilment of it's purpose and possibly the status of it's presence; all the while absorbing each sentiment invested during it's inception, intention, selection, acquisition, operation, and maintenance. 
For example, when I was nine my father fixed up one of the old bicycles he had found in a rare attempt at affection.  I'm still unsure to this day what motivated the worthless bastard to do something generous when he had always been vicious and self-serving.  Perhaps a perfect combination of spring breeze and whiskey had allowed him to lower his guard.   Regardless of what it was, I knew enough to question it.  It was not much.  A rusted Schwinn ten speed with only six working gears and a seat that would swivel whenever I moved my hips.  Nevertheless, I enjoyed the freedom it afforded.  It was a vessel of escape and peace from the Van De Graaff Generator and steel gate that was my parents union.  I would ride the endless dirt roads from dawn till dusk, spending hours without recalling a single soul.  I'd lay in the sun beside the small streams that rose up from nowhere and sank back into the earth, perforating the endless pastures as if portioning the east half of the land to nothing and the west half to oblivion.  It was my escort to shallower breaths.  But when that bicycle was left from my sight, or returned home on flat tires, this was reason enough to be beaten.  My father, only able to apply sentiment to plastic and alloys, saw this as a dereliction of fervor and in my family fists were fueled not just by my wrongs but by all misdoings ever thrust upon every member in it.  Being forced to attend school with bruises chin to brow, elicited tone and volume of voices from others that only served to unsettle the ego.  The whisper may be the most destructive and discomforting sound the body is capable of producing.  Ownership I discovered had a price, and that price, like so many others, was not worth the reward.   Walking became my preferred mode of transport from that point on.  Reliable, cheap, and mine, my bones were of little care to anyone.

Tuesday, December 3, 2013

Lyrics to Forget About Virginia

I wrote this song for a friend. That's it.

FORGET ABOUT VIRGINIA

Lee didn't want to overstate it 
She didn't want things complicated 
She hung her hat on understated 
Just needed pain abated 
But now she's gone, I wish I stated 
How much I cared and wasted 
All the rootless times to maybe say that 
Your beauty rests in our eyes 

Forget about what's in ya 
It's hard to do I know 
Forget about what's in ya 
And let us deem your soul 

And in the end all I can say is 
She found her course and stayed it 
And right or wrong is for the dated 
Just let her rest, satiated 
See Lee was rare in a way that 
Could make you feel so prosaic 
If she knew I wrote this she'd hate it 
But her beauty rests in our eyes

Lyrics to S-P-E-L-L-S R-U-L-E-S (SPELLS Rules)

The name and lyrics speak for it all. I wrote this in the span of five minutes. I really think it shows. This is the anthem that every self-respecting band should have. SPELLS rules!!!


S-P-E-L-L-S  R-U-L-E-S (SPELLS Rules)

We're coming to town
And we're soaking all your rays in
We just need a couch
And the PA in your basement
So call your friends
And the drunks you know will shake it
We don't need a crowd
Just a reason to vacation

(Chorus)
Cause we've never made no money
That's fine yeah! That's fine yeah!
And our tank is always empty
Just fine yeah! Just fine yeah!
We only just let go
Let go!!!

SPELLS are coming to town
Better warn off all your neighbors
Cause we're bringing it loud
And we're shaking all your wood floors
Then we'll air it out
Hit the beach for all that ails us
We don't need a crowd
Just a reason to vacation

(Chorus)

(OUTRO)
S-P-E
L-L-S-R-U-L-E-S X2

SPELLS RULES YEAH!!! X 4

Lyrics to All Hail Getting Old

To me, this is the anti-punk anthem. Don't get me wrong, I love punk and rock n' roll, but there's a good portion of it I no longer relate to. Just passing 3 1/2 of years of sobriety, I no longer revere and worship the years of my life I spent carelessly meandering across. There's no more pining "glories of youth" anthems left in my bones. More comfortable in my own skin, and easily charmed by simplicity, I enjoy the spoils of impending middle-age. I love having to not prove myself every stupid day. I love not wondering if I'm good enough for my peers. I love attending a party and not fearing a fight at the drop of a hat. I love not having acne. I love not indulging a cheating and equally self-concious girlfriend. I love the comforts of my small family unit. I love working out, training, eating right, and not worrying if I'll be labeled a jock because I do. Call me crazy.

I guess I've always found it silly and hypocritical that the same dudes who spouted off tale after tale of adolescent hardship, seem to be the ones still writing songs jerking it off. Fuck that! ALL HAIL GETTING OLD!!!

ALL HAIL GETTING OLD

Too many times I feared
I waited too long
And too many times I feared
I heard the whistle's bellow
And too many times I feared
The aging won't slow
And too many times I feared
I'm not elastic

(Chorus)
So I run
Yeah I wasted all, I've wasted all those years
And I
Severed casts and ventures I once deared
So long
To youth with all of its painful disregard
All hail getting old

Too many times I feared
I'll leave here alone
Too many times I feared
I'll never know a home
Too many times I feared
The exits, the crowds
Too many times I feared
I'm not respected

(chorus)

(breakdown)
What are we waiting for? X2
What are you waiting for? X2



Lyrics to Taking It Over

Another track from our newest cassette release, this song is a sort of, kind of, off-center love letter to my wife. If anyone reads this, you may find yourself wondering how any one female/male could possibly be flattered by an ode like this. But I'm incapable of viewing love with a rose tint. I can't. Love is not radical most of the time. For the majority it's baggage; necessary, and important, and comforting, and cumbersome, and useful, and painful, and exciting---- baggage. My wife stole my heart when I met her, coming into view at a time when I had resolved to be alone. That sucks! Just when I had finally grown comfortable with the prospect of solitary adventure, she arrived. She took it and I had no choice in the matter. That's the shit of it all. Like it or not, it's real. And true. That's why I wrote this. I wrote it for the part of our relationship that can be downright fucking nuts. That's why it's not pretty. But then again, things that are truly beautiful rarely are.



TAKING IT OVER

A lonely lock falls off your face
And hope
A tendril plucked from urge's frame
No more
And will I ever
Take another
Unlabored breath before you
Or will lust be my constrictor

(Chorus)
I fell off track, then got it back
But now you're taking it over
From proper beats, to heart attack
Yes now you're taking it over
Cause now my mind
Is running blind
Yes now you're taking it over
I'm in love, so I'm in hell now.

Anyone who sells love pure
A crook
A barefoot walk down razor shores
No more
And will I ever
Take another
Unlabored step before you
Or will love fill all my blisters

(Chorus)

YOU'RE TAKING IT OVER!!!


Lyrics to 80% is Good Enough

Damn I loved writing lyrics to this song. Chuck, Don, and Rob crushed the instrumental. So simple and fun. This track will be with our newest release and very well may be the closest representation to a band ethos. Try hard.....but not TOO hard. You get what we mean?

The irony is that when writing this, and this is on a purely personal level, I really felt as if I was speaking to myself. Emitting a warning. Like some separate, rational, and calm side of my intellect was trying to tell me to slow down. I can't. I wish I could. It's not in my make up. I wasted so much time being a fucking loser that I have to move. Unfortunately, I've found that heeding my own advice is a lot like trying to massage my own back.

ENJOY!!!


80% is Good Enough

I live my life by a certain set
Of principles, they aren't hard to get
I only work till I'm certain you're pleased
And leave the rest for all the "get aheads"
Now I know you think that you need the best
And that you swallow all you can ingest
But when you're hungry and lonely winning
I'm at home full and fast asleep

(Pre-Chorus)
How do you live like this? X4

(Chorus)
Lying awake and I'm racing fast
Cause I worked so hard they own me
8 out of 10 and I gave enough
Why fill mine up when it's clear your cup
Is constantly overflowing
80% seems good enough


I tried to see the appeal of working till my hands bleed
But it only hurts my head thinking of doing
Any more than you've asked of me
Now how do you live hearing "tick tick tick"
On all your plans? Cause that would make me sick
Cause whether hell or high water wading
I'll find peace in satisfactory

(Pre Chorus)

(Chorus)

(Breakdown)
Will I survive my heart attack
Or have it out cause I'm lonely?
80% seems good enough
And if that's right
Than I'll drink it cold
Cause I broke my back
And I was never home
80% seems good enough
It seems good enough
SEEMS GOOD ENOUGH!!!!

(Chorus)