At times...

Just re-discovered the Buck 65 website. Wow. It's an improvement. I saw a poster at the Barfly in Birmingham on Saturday. He's playing there on Friday 12th. Must go. Seen him 3 times now. Once here and once here and also at the Custard Factory. Although he doesn't vary the attack too much, he's been different and challenging every time. What always comes accross is what a great guy he is. He's always pushing the boundaries without losing the connection. He's also really unlucky (look at the link above regarding the Bar Academy gig). Go to his website and have a look at the Love Letters. He presented the Juno awards (think it's like a Canadian Brit Awards) and his in-ear monitors broke. Here are some excerpts:

You'll recall in an earlier letter that I refered to '05 as the worst year of my life. It's true. It's too grim to go into, but trust me that a lot of bad stuff happened. And bear in mind that this is coming from a guy who's lost most of his family, who's been in countless automobile accidents, who's body and name have been attacked publically and randomly, who's been cheated and screwed over more than a two dollar ho'...

Get this: Anyone who knows me even a little bit knows that I'm not an extremely materialistic person. But if there's one thing I'm strongly attached to, it's my beloved record collection. I've dedicated my life to this collection. I collected pretty much every hip hop record ever pressed up to 1996. I collected rarities from every genre. 45's. 12"s. 10"s. 78's. The oldest of the old. The newest of the new. My record collection has long been renowned for being nearly impossible to believe. So, a while back I had to move house. Everytime this happens, dealing with my record collection becomes a major dilemma. They take up so much physical space and are so incredibly heavy. I asked a friend in the city I had left if 'they' would mind temporarily storing them for me until I found the time and means to move them again. 'They' seemed happy to oblige.

A few months later I recieved an urgent call from a long-time friend and fellow dj/crate digger... "Dude, are you SELLING your record collection?!!?" "No. Of course not", I replied leisurely. "Why do you ask?" "Because I saw your records in a used vinyl shop here in town today!" "!@#$#@!$%^^&*()(*&^%#$%^&&*!!!!!!!!" That's right. They'd been sold. "They" turned out to be a crack head (somehow I didn't know that) and hawked my stuff so they could score.

If you've ever seen me play live, you may have seen me using a Vestax 07 mixer with a sticker of Bettie Page on the face plate. That went missing too. So if you ever see it in someone else's caress, you know the deal. How's that for luck?

I know there are people who've had terrible things happen to them in their lives, and I don't want to belittle that with my claims of being the world's unluckiest person. The grounds on which I lay my claim is in that crappy shit happens to me over and over and over again. It's more a quantity than quality thing, I guess. But my quality has been pretty high at times too...

In Short Supply

To hear your voice
Is to feel like I've been touched by a presence unknown
A feeling not yet felt
A tickling of my every nerve
You whisper and yet
Your soft voice reverberates in my rib cage
(So close to my heart)
My senses alive and eager for more
Of your voice
A voice like a vast fountain
Like the Fontana di Trevi, glistening in the sun
At once playful and yet resilient and focussed and everlasting
Precise and yet easily distracted by the wind or a change of thought

Your back arches
With more grace than any princess you seek to be or become
An 'S' shape like the reptile you shiver at (though you do so seemingly with such glee
and a frantic voice)
Covered and caressed by your golden brown skin
A skin so soft it feels like it could evaporate if I look upon it
And so I touch it gently and with care and with tenderness
(And love)

From my forearm, from my leg, from my chest:
Tears fall
They won't protect you
Why do they fall?
The thought that you are in need
I want one supernatural touch
From me
To protect you evermore
Rest your head
And all the magic it contains
And let me share my warmth with you
So you need never shiver again
Let me absorb your bad cells, your illness, your doubts, your temper, your tears, your sadness
Ensuring you neither need nor yearn for a thing

Now I need some breath
I call for breath
And receive none
It's too short upon thought of you
So clear a space for my new weight
I carry around now
I am two people now

poetry

Firewood

Discolouration of the sky
The breeze brought by the second day of spring
Change on the horizon oh my...
What do the clouds hold on this lie?
Yet still the birds do sing

Rule with a flourish to a crowd of mine
What will you do when you become king?
A suit of armour and a chance to sign
One more drink and I'll be fine
To think of the future and what it will bring

Telecast your view to rapturous lines
Your hopes and dreams on which to cling
Maybe I'll commence on time
And feel the love which exceeds mine
And then burn it all for kindling

poetry

Myself From Myself

Extracts from Norman Mailer's American Dream:

Did you ever feel the malignity which rises from a swamp? It is real, I could swear it, and some whisper of ominous calm, that heavy air one breathes in the hour before a hurricane, now came to rest between us.

But compassion, the trapped bird of compassion, struggled up from my chest and flew to my throat. "Deborah, I love you," I said. I did not know at that instant if I meant it truly, or was some monster of deception, hiding myself from myself. And having said it, knew the mistake. For all feeling departed from her hand, even that tingling so evil to my flesh, and a left a cool empty touch. I could have been holding a tiny casket in my palm.

The darkness came over like air on a a wound when the dressing is removed. My senses were much too alive...I had one of those anxieties which make it an act of balance to breathe: too little air compresses the sensation of being throttled, but too much - one deep breath - and there is the fear of a fall.

books,literature,Norman Mailer