#but I’d like to have more punk books in my collection

[safety-pin-punk]

do u have any book recs for punk history?

As far as books I’ve read, no I dont, BUT I do have a link to all 80 issues of Punk Planet, a zine based out of chicago that focused more on punk culture rather than music!! (Honestly I recommend browsing it)

I did do a bit of quick researching to find a list of books that may be what you’re looking for though:

Punk Rock an Oral History by John Robb & Oliver Craske (it spans a few decades and I actually kinda want to get this one now lol

Straight Edge: A Clear-Headed Hardcore Punk History by Tony Rettman

The Rise and Fall of SST Records by Jim Ruland (a label founded by Black Flag member Greg Ginn)

SELLOUT: The Major Label Feeding Frenzy That Swept Punk, Emo, and Hardcore 1994-2007 by Dan Ozzi (more recent history)

NYHC: New York Hardcore 1980-1990 by Tony Rettman (a little more local to north east America)

[meat-wentz]

FOB LORE POST Pt. 1

okay so tumblr ate the original ask i was responding to and now refuses to save/post all the edits i’ve made, so this post has to come out in two parts. i’d rate it surface level-knee deep lore (maybe some waist deep, maybe some neck deep idk we'll see)! i'll be focusing on pre-hiatus just cause post-hiatus is generally easier to find (but there will also be post-hiatus because i can't help myself). also curated to my tastes these are things that *i* always think about, so big disclaimer this is not everything. this part basically covers the fob extended universe (terms/people to know, blog links, and important texts here and there), links to unrealeased tracks/rares/covers, and a rundown on the origin story.

so here's some basic things to know:

FBR- Fueled by Ramen. baby's first record label. also host to a bunch of other notable acts from the scene.

FOBR- easy to mix up. literally just falloutboyrock.com, their website. hosted journal entries, updates, the webstore, and more.

Decaydance- record label owned by Patrick and Pete under FBR, founded in 2005 when Pete wanted to sign P!ATD and realized he didn't have label to do so. AWESOME ORAL HISTORY FEATURING PETE, TRAVIE, GABE, AND SPENCER. intro to Decaydance (included in article). relaunched as DCD2 in 2014.

FOE- friendsorenemies.com, let's do a quote about this one: "If you’re one of those types that have uttered the words, “I’m their biggest fan” in reference to post-punk popsters Fall Out Boy, then you’re in luck because there is a site where like-minded people can hang out. Honda Civic Tours has joined forces with Friendsorenemies.com, to create a user-generated worldwide fan community for the Chicago-based band. The site includes dozens of up-close and oh-so-personal videos of the band, along with exclusive, unscripted content that gives an extensive behind-the-scenes look at the Fall Out Boy’s latest tour… because pop stars shouldn’t have any privacy or down time." they have a youtube with SO MANY videos here (check out their playlists, they have a bunch of fob specific ones.

OCK- Overcast Kids, fob's official fan club, usually got exclusive content, merch, pre-orders, and more. you'll see some blog posts where pete makes references to overcast kids referring to the fans.

Fuck City- essentially Andy Hurley frat house/collective/brand. he has Fuck City tatted on his knuckles. there's primers out there i'd search for "Matt Mixon primer" and you'll probably find some livejournal links.

Clandestine Industries- Pete's clothing brand. there's a whole dvd about his collab with nordstrom and in it he states he wanted to aim for "unisex," if i ever found a rip of this i'll link it here. meanwhile here's a video about their landmark store. video that was on the site. 2010 fashion show.

Pete’s blog entries (best viewed in browser). there's also this masterpost (hint, if some links don't work in this, especially for fobomatic, try amending the url to "fobomatic-blog," and it should pop up). and this tumblr: @disloyalorderofpete

Joe’s blog entries

Patrick’s blog entries

important text: “We Liked You Better Fat: Confessions of a Pariah” written by Patrick post-Soul Punk, and kicked off talks of coming off hiatus between Pete and Patrick.

important text: “Fall Out Boy Forever” by Hanif Abdurraqib

important text: “The Boy With the Thorn in His Side” by Pete (his first book), you can read here, just scroll to the bottom to start: @clandestineindustriespresen-blog

important text: to you (unfinished, off the top of my head) arguably one of the most important Pete blog entries (to the fans and to ME at least)

you'll see some names around, so here's a few touring friends and crew you'll want to make note of: Charlie (security), Dirty (personal court jester and whipping boy, he seems to like it, i want to do a study on him, he has Pete's initials branded in his ass- Pete did it himself with a hanger), HeyChris (i'll probably give him is own section), Nick Scimeca (i've never really clear on him, i think he acted as web designer/bestie, but i know for sure he lived in the dirty ass tttyg apartment), Hemingway (Pete's dog), Matt Mixon (Andy's bestie/fuck city roommate). primary ones to know are bolded.

HeyChris: okay Chris is important because he was in Arma Angelus and was fob's first supporter, caught the name HeyChris through grenade jumper (which they wrote for him!). he tours with them for awhile, i *think* doing crew duties, running the merch stand, being one helluva hypeman. QUITE A DYNAMIC with pete. part of the World's Most Hated Crew which were crew members primarily shared between mcr and fob, who had bad reputations for 1) their proximity to the bands 2) being scene kings/queens 3) gossip and drama. 2006, he and Pete have a massive falling out over their blogs. since then they've made up, still talk every once in awhile. he runs the catcade in chicago and emerges out of the woodwork to stir shit up every now and then. here's his livejournal. and another one. he also has a tumblr. so go hunting if you want. most of his updates are through instagram, he loves to troll.

list of movie references in songs

because it's referenced so much i have to include the drunk history, but be warned it's Brendon, and a whole lot of him.

here’s some of my personal fave unreleased/covers/features:

hand of god (some very uhm breathy whiny patrick vocals in this that i can’t believe are legal)

austin we have a problem (also horny vocals and for what)

star 67

we don’t take hits we write them (listen the amount of blood i would spill to get a clear recording of this song)

save your generation (jawbreaker cover)

basket case (green day cover live)

under pressure (queen and david bowie cover, patrick does both vocal parts and and it’s so cunt)

what’s this? (nightmare revisited: nightmare before christmas cover album and US SPOTIFY REFUSES TO COUGH UP THE ONE FOB TRACK, however i still recommend korn’s version of kidnap the sandy claws and rise against’s version of making christmas)

lullabye (hidden track on folie a deux written pete’s son)

catch me if you can

mr. brightside (killers cover which they did live a few times, which is extremely funny because pete and brandon flowers were feuding after brandon said fob and emo were ‘dangerous’ and ‘poisoning the minds of the youth’ and that he wanted to ‘beat all those emo bands to death’)

i write sins not tragedies

tiffany blews bridge ft. patrick vocals

patrick covering i can make you a man from rocky horror

patrick feature on one day i’ll stay home by misery signals

patrick features on cupid’s chokehold and clothes off! by gym class heroes (these may be obvious to some but i’m including just in case and also because they slap)

patrick feature on one of THOSE nights by the cab, brendon jumpscare warning, but patrick’s vocals literally made me fucking insane here, also the amount that pete is featured in this video is so funny to me

fob feature on the hand crushed by a mallet remix by 100 gecs (the way i fucking lost my mind when this dropped)

these are on spotify but often get looked over/missed/are hard to find:

roxanne (police cover): spotify, youtube

start today (gorilla biscuits cover): spotify, youtube

snitches and talkers get stitches and walkers: spotify, youtube

the music or the misery: spotify, youtube

my heart is the worst kind of weapon: spotify, youtube

my heart will always be the b-side to my tongue

pax am days

lake effect kid

yule shoot your eye out: spotify, youtube

i wanna dance with somebody (whitney houston cover): spotify, youtube

the world's not waiting (for five tired boys in a broken down van)- literally my personal favorite off of EOWYG it makes me insane: spotify, youtube

some fun extras:

there’s also this fun little behind the scenes video for cobra starship where patrick is singing city at war

this uncomfortable video of patrick and pete singing womanizer with ellen degenres

this video of fob at the inaugural dinner for obama where they have light up instruments and patrick starts off i don’t care with a little snippet of womanizer (very cunt) which also has a part 2 where pete climbs a tree and they meet the president ajbdjdksndnd.

fall out boy on teen titans go: part 1, part 2, song

deep blue love (patrick wrote this for a movie! and it makes me need to lay down) "behind the scenes" here

patrick song in star vs. the forces of evil

patrick theme for spidey and his amazing friends

patrick musical episode of dead end paranormal park (most of the patrick demos are uploaded as well)

patrick features on robot chicken, also here's the uncensored version of blue rabbits fucking

you can also look up their rare/unreleased songs and get a whole lot more than provided here, and also patrick has done so many covers it’s wild there’s a playlist on youtube that’s 130 videos long and includes bangers such as this is how we do it, let’s dance, in the air tonight, kiss my sass, fob covers of we are the champions, don’t stop believin’ and more.

NOW. as far as origin stories go. let’s start with pete who was a notable figure in the chicago hardcore scene, having been in bands on bands on bands, and very notably RACETRAITOR. pete, joe, patrick (i still haven’t found the source for patrick but it’s on wikipedia so i’ll include him) and andy have all at varying points played in racetraitor, and andy still plays with racetraitor when they get together. joe and pete become friends, joe driving him around because his license is suspended, and right around that time pete starts ARMA ANGELUS and when heychris can’t make it on tour, pete convinces joe’s parents to let him fill in on bass and they all go out on the road. when they come back, arma’s kinda its last leg and this is when pete and joe start talks for a pop-punk project. joe will play guitar, pete will play bass, now they just need a drummer and a singer.

so very important lore here, joe’s hanging out in borders when he’s interrupted by none other than one patrick stump who starts a lecture on music to which joe starts lecturing back, THIS IS HOW THEY MEET. i’ll let joe tell it (click for full view):

this continues into another important bit of lore, which is that joe dragged pete to patrick’s house so he could audition and patrick answered the door wearing a sweater, shorts, and socks. this is important, it comes up time and time again, patrick answered the door in an sweater, shorts and socks. it’s important. to both me and pete. he proceeds to show them all his talents, but when he sings, that’s when it clicks and everyone in the room says you’ve got a massive set of pipes there, you’re our singer. now, patrick didn’t care about singing, in other bands he had primarily focused on drums. but he wanted to be in a band that would let him write music and he also had admired pete from afar on the scene and so he agreed to sing.

they finally pull andy when they start recording seriously and their drummer can’t make it so they ask andy to fill in. andy at this point is a notable drummer in the scene, like he plays in so many bands and is referred to as “the metal drummer.” pete and andy have known each other for a long while and they've had their eye on him since the beginning, it's just that he's in various other bands and going to school so he hasn't had the time. but they ask him to fill in and everything just falls into place. i’ll let patrick tell it:

and they've been the same lineup for two decades now (outside of fill-ins every now and again for emergencies etc). as legend goes, they had switched out names quite a few times, fall out boy being one of them, referencing the character from the simpsons. one night they came out, said "we are [insert long drawn out complicated name here]" and a fan yelled "fuck that! you're fall out boy!" and they have been ever since.

[urlocalnonbinarybastardwrites]

Hi! I’d like a fandom ship/matchup type thing if you still do those:) someone from tcm, preferably from the first or second movie since those are the ones I’ve watched

Appearance: 5ft 2inches, chubby genderfluid guy. Short blond hair, blue/gray eyes and freckles and crooked teeth. I’m punk and wear a lot of band tees and stuff like that, I mostly dress masc but can dabble in feminine clothing for fun.

Personality: Id say im a pretty funny guy! I really can’t have a conversation without cracking a joke every other sentence (it is a blessing and a curse). I love being social but definitely need time to recharge after social events. I care a lot about other people and tend to go out of my way to help and comfort people.

Hobbies: I love drawing! I do both digital and traditional art, and I can also paint and sew and crochet. Mostly I draw people, that is my strong suit.

I also love cooking! It’s so much fun but I don’t like following recipes because I disagree with them.

I love horror media. Art, books, movies, you name it. I have an ongoing collection of horror movie dvds.

I listen to a lot of music. I like a lot of different genres, but I especially like punk and metal music. My favorite bands are Ghost, Against Me!, Dog Park Dissidents and Hozier

That’s about it I think. Please don’t feel stressed about doing this, take as much time as you need and also have a nice day:)

♥️♥️♥️ we love people who realize authors have lives beyond completing requests 

Your Texas Chainsaw Massacre ship: Chop-Top Sawyer!!!!

Explanation: starting off of the appearance, I think he would be extremely attracted to you. He loves that you’re shorter than him and I think that he would love your kind of punkish style since he likes anything music related and the fact that you have an alternative music related style just makes you practically his soulmate to him and I feel like he’d think you’re a pretty cool person from the get-go. he loves that you can switch between masculine and feminine and our gender fluid enough to just kind of look good in both and that’s something that he really likes about you and I think he would even start experimenting with more gender fluidness himself I picture him is more kind of a masculine/androgynous but I feel like he would also sometimes go a little feminine just for fun. He really loves your joking, personality and I think it’s part of the reason that he was so attracted to you besides how you look from the get-go as I just think that he was super struck by your humor and probably laughs like insanely loud and laughs for the longest out of everyone. I feel like he’s the type of guy that would continue laughing at a joke like five minutes after it was made. I also feel like he really appreciate your caring stuff because he’s not really used to a lot of people genuinely caring about him. He even feels like his own family doesn’t care about him most the time save for nubbins. Having you is just kind of like a refreshing thing for him and he’s pretty grateful to have you in his life as for socialist I don’t think he cares that much about whether he’s talking to someone or not to be honest I don’t think he’s an introvert or an extrovert. I just think he’s kind of in his own world, but he doesn’t mind that you’re an extrovert and would absolutely, let you recharge after large events, but you have to recharge with him. That’s the only catch. I hope you’re not expecting to get any more alone time because once you’re with this man, he is clingy as shit and you are not going to have any more social recharge unless you literally run away. (In which he will follow 💀) he loves your artistic personality, and I feel like he would annoy you a little bit bit because he’s the type of guy to stand by you while you’re trying to draw create something and be constantly asking you if it’s done yet or just random questions and I feel like you at some point I have to be like OK but I’m doing my art. You have to stand over there and not talk to me. And for the cooking thing, let me just say there’s a reason why Drayton is the cook of the household and no one else he would make the most monstrous and disastrous things in the kitchen and probably end up blowing something up. He’s like a toddler in the kitchen. You have to watch him because he would think it’s a funny idea to just throw water at an outlet or something like that. Just chaos. Absolutely, but I think if you made a meal for him, he’d be super grateful and would definitely eat it in like two seconds because we know this man is a fast eater. He also loves horror stuff for like obvious reasons and would totally watch horror movies with you or read books or whatever kind of horror media you like consuming.

I feel like he would like it too, and you guys can talk about it afterwards, and he would probably point out how certain things are unrealistic because he is like that he would be like “victims don’t actually react that way when you chase them” and things like that. As for music, I think this is again one of the very very very main reasons he would be attracted to you because he is a huge music guy. I don’t think he really likes Poppy stuff as much and I think he would find your alternative taste to be just amazing because he has kind of an alternative and wacky taste of music as well well, it’s not as much I’m sure would love if you introduced him and you guys could share tastes and I feel like you would be a little cute date to go on. I’m just listening to music talking and also I feel like he would ask for fashion advice like 24 seven from you and want to try some of your punk clothing out.

[omegaremix]

Mr. Cheapo’s (Commack) shopping list, 2018.

If there was one store that started it all for me, it was Mr. Cheapo’s. It was the first in a long line of mom-and-pop record stores that sold used titles. Brentwood’s Pine Hollow Video was the first store I went for all my hip-hop and rap CDs and cassettes, but realizing that my interest in music was growing, Mr. Cheapo’s showed me what potential was about. The first year of earning a paycheck was the same year I discovered this store. It was where I bought my first stack of used CDs notably from Pearl Jam, Marilyn Manson, and Filter, whose “Dose” promotional single would be the first-ever I’d buy. It’s been around for decades and hasn’t been renovated as long. It’s also the only record store on Long Island to have two locations: Commack and Mineola.

Cheapo’s is just like Talking Heads: same as it ever was. Nothing has changed except for its’ overall stock. New releases behind the counter, near-endless bins of new and used vinyl and CDs with a cassette wall nearing the back. What used to be shelves upon shelves of VHS tapes now have the most extensive used DVD and Blu-ray library of any store. Vintage and classic vinyl 12″ and 45′s were pinned up on the back walls. Boxsets, posters, other 45′s, music-related books, DVDs, and more rows of obvious titles on vinyl and CD made up the rest of the store’s real estate. And plenty of shelves of used pop CDs for $3 each. No. Thank. You.

I didn’t scan the entire store as I was uninterested in all those used pop CDs, so I go right to the jazz / fusion section as I always do. About seven to eight columns wide with another three for soul, funk, and R&B, they didn’t let me down. One, two, three Bob James albums; the stuff of samplists. Blackbyrds, George Benson, and Deodato were mine and so was Jon Lucien whose “A Sunny Day” stood as one of my most-played tracks of all time. Tough that wasn’t found on his Columbia’s Best Of… The Hubert Laws that I passed up a while ago? It’s back in the bin and I wouldn’t make the same mistake twice. What I also picked up was The Rolling StonesUndercover. Once in my possession, I decided to give it away to friend and collector Tommy when he found a dump of 500 records one of his customers threw out on the sidewalk. 

A category I haven’t thumbed through in a minute was the hip-hop section, we’re not talking vinyl. For the first time in a while I scored some good titles on disc.Pete Rock & C.L. Smooth and Naughty By Nature were titles that’d be in my collection starting out in the Brentwood days. Jedi Mind Tricks because Vinnie Paz is real underground hip-hop. Got to have M.I.A. in my collection, too. Then I come across P.O.S. whose truly-innovative packaging with interchangeable transparent and solid panels with CMYK theme caught my eye. It harkened back to the pre-internet days of discovering certain artists you never knew existed by purchasing blind. An inquiry for anything Suicide led me to search through the punk bins where I found The Unseen. Watching The Blank Generation made me seeRichard Hell & The VoidoidsBlank Generation disc with bonus tracks in the bins but at first passed it up. Then I find the vinyl re-issue of the same album with live and alternatve versions for double the asking price. In that case, I ended up going for the disc version.

I rounded out my two-hour visit with other odds and ends. Other titles I bought for $2.00 and less were The Jerky Boys, Katt Williams, and Last Stop Standing, a record-shopping documentary. How fitting! Finally, I got a Paula Abdul cassette, one I used to have in my collection until my bro- misplaced it on me. Like I have to answer to any of you.

Blackbyrds, The Action

Deodato 2

Jon Lucien The Best Of…

Bob James 2

Hubert Laws Romeo & Juliet

Deodato Love Island

Rolling Stones Undercover (stickered)

Bob James 3

Deodato Whirlwinds

George Benson White Rabbit

Bob James 4

Pete Rock & C.L. Smooth Mecca & The Soul Brother

Jedi Mind Tricks Legacy Of Blood

Naughty By Nature self-titled

M.I.A. Arular

P.O.S. Never Better special edition disc

Unseen, The Explode

Richard Hell & The Voidoids Blank Generation

M.I.A. Kala

All Dogs 7”

Last Shop Standing DVD

Katt Williams The Pimp Chronicles Vol. 1 DVD

Jerky Boys, The Stop Staring At Me cassette

Paula AbdulForever Your Girl cassette

[rustbeltjessie]

About Me / Ways You Can Support Me

I’ve gotten several new followers recently, so I thought I’d tell you a bit about me and what you can expect to find here:

I’m a 40-something bi/MGA nonbinary trans person. I’m disabled and neurodivergent. I live where the Great Lakes region meets the Rust Belt meets the Upper Midwest, with my partner and our two kiddos. I am a writer, zine-maker, spoken word performer, visual artist, and small press owner/editor. I occasionally dabble in making short films or playing music. I collect souvenir pennies and stick and poke tattoos. I'm in love with the undying spirit of punk rock (even though punk is far from the only genre of music I listen to). I'm perpetually melancholy, nostalgic, and restless.

I post my own writing and art, and photographs from my day-to-day life. (If you’d like to see more of that type of stuff, check out the tags: #my writing, #my art, #my photos #jessie lynn mcmains, and #rust belt jessie.)

I also post about stuff I’m into (music, literature, film, art, etc.), post things about writing and art, and post political stuff (mainly US-focused).

Speaking of political stuff, I’m basically an anarcho-socialist, but I believe in voting as a form of harm reduction. I’m pro-choice, pro-trans, pro-Black Lives Matter. (I say all this because if you are an anti-trans activist, a white supremacist or fascist, queerphobic, anti-abortion, etc., we won’t get along and you could save us both the trouble by blocking me right now.) And speaking of harm reduction — I am for the decriminalization of both drug use and sex work.

I try to tag for common triggers but I’m not very consistent, so if there is something specific you need me to tag for, please let me know and I’ll try my best.

I also have a couple side blogs: @witchofbonesandkeys - a witchy blog which I update very infrequently, and then a personal one which I won’t link to (but which you can probably find on your own because I sometimes reblog posts I made there to this blog) where I post a lot.

If you dig what I do, you can tip me right here on Tumblr, or via PayPal (coeur.de.fantome@gmail.com), or Venmo (@JessieLynnMcMains).

I also have a Ko-fi, where you can buy my zines and books, commission me for a mini-collage, or hire me to edit your writing.

Anything else you want to know? Ask! (Anon is on, but if you’re creepy or mean I won’t respond.)

[sunnysynthsunshine]

Rik birthday writing piece

Once in every lifetime, comes a love like this…..

18 years ago was when I first heard your voice, it was so exaggerative, so animated

I’d then catch you in other places, but it was a voice then, I didn’t have a face to put it with

Several years had passed, and somehow I started watching your old comedy shows and acts

Little did I know, that it lit the spark, which then illuminated the rest of my life 

At the time I was a spotty whingy awkward fella who went on about socialism without knowing the lark associated with it, I was unsure of how to talk to others, my mindset made it difficult

yet when you entered my life, you rewired my mind like a television set, the type gobbled up by that rowdy trihawk punk with the stars on his head

Watching some of your projective characters made me re-examine how I felt about myself, it was like I was looking in a mirror 

When I saw Rick, I saw how miscommunicative I was being, 

When I saw Richie, I saw how pretentious and overreactive I could be, 

When I saw Alan, I thought about the people running the world, being from a neighbourhood where we didn’t know about the underbelly of austerity, it made me realize how emotionally manipulative and selfish the tories can be.

However, I also saw the characters charm, their joy and passion, 

Rick’s love for 80s pop music and poetry made me more curious about those interests

Richie’s occasional mayallwife role made me embrace the campy queer I am 

I started to recover, I became more expressive about who I was and the interests I had, 

I wasn’t afraid anymore (like Lizzie when she faces her past), I improved my social skills and recognized the sources I was getting info from, the links to the punk movement got me down to anarchism route

One of my interests was….you and your comedy work, well it started as an interest, but then I started dressing like you and using one of your character names as a nickname, it made me feel more confident about myself and my gender.

I’d write introspective poems, I learned to write some comedy myself and eventually did my first drag gig, I met a lot more friends because of you, friends who I’ll treasure forever, and I’ll never forget who got me there, while the changes were my own choice, you were one of the signals I had to adjust my headspace

It felt like….someone understood me,  while we are separated from land, decades and spiritual energy when I read about you, I can sense the pure chaos and soothing aura you’d collectively share, wherever you went 

On stage, on screen, in books or magazines, 

random advertisements or video game announcements

You radicalized me into the snarky comedic anarchic lad I am today 

In the words of Karen Carpenter, today is the day, the angels got together and sprinkled moondust in your hair, you could appear devilish with a gurning smirk flicking a rude hand gesture or heavenly as your long hair flows in the wind, while you smile at the photographer, looking like a raphaelite painting 

You and the comic strip guys sure kicked up a fuss, 

you told people what was up

To stand up to the establishment and feel free

A theatrical comedy revolution is what you started

Beckett cocktails and poncy cigarette drags

A pretty boy rattish man who could yelp more sound effects than a  television sound box

But beyond the stabby badge pins, dated haircuts and frying pan slams

There was a heart, you are very compassionate and caring 

Even when the ticker stopped clicking, the energy I can sense is still loving

Happy Birthday you old bastard, now 65

Stage lights are off but your soul is alive

When we laugh at your jokes or gasp at your performances

Giving an offering when I play Little Richard on the playlist

even in your silver fox times, 

your joy feels so young at heart, 

as your silly ramblings and stunts stay in our minds 

The wild commentary and ruckus never got stale 

Here’s a toast, to “The” doctor rik mayall 

[bubblesandgutz]

Every Record I Own - Day 764: Liz Phair Girly Sound to Guyville

I was 15-years-old when Exile in Guyville came out. At that age, I was in a phase where I was fixated on loud, angry punk music and didn’t have much of an appreciation for contemporary singer-songwriters. Furthermore, my knowledge of indie rock was limited to the late ‘80s SST roster. So while I was aware of Liz Phair and her debut album, it didn’t seem pertinent to my interests. And somehow, I managed to go nearly 27 years without ever hearing a note of it. 

And then in the spring of 2020, a younger friend of mine posted something about it online and I found myself thinking “shit, if the younger generation is latching onto it, then I gotta get caught up.” So I pulled up Exile in Guyville on my phone while I was puttering around in my backyard and sure enough... I fell for its charms almost instantly. I think I’d always assumed it was more of a conventional pop record... a solo artist backed by hired gun studio musicians. The cover looked like a cross between a fashion ad and Madonna’s “Justify My Love” video. I knew it was a very “sexual” record, which only reinforced my assumption that it was targeted towards a mainstream audience.

But what I heard in 2020 was a scrappy young musician singing these unadulterated, unflinching, and resilient songs about being a woman in a male-dominated scene. Yes, it was an unapologetically sexual album. And yes, Phair had an eye for visual art, understood the allure of fashion photography, and shaped the aesthetics of her debut album to tap into that enticement. But this wasn’t Madonna. As one critic noted, Liz Phair had the appeal of a friend’s cool older sister---the one that smoked cigarettes, dated older guys, went to shows with a fake ID, played guitar, and let you rifle through her record collection.

The lore surrounding the album is too much to tackle here, but certainly a part of its appeal---the modeling of the track listing off of Exile on Main Street, the signing to Matador off the strength of her bedroom four-track Girly-Sounds tapes, the connections to the thriving early ‘90s Chicago scene, etc. The thing is, it’s a fantastic record even without that context. Songs like “Help Me Mary” and “Never Said” are just bangin’ ‘90s alt-rock pop anthems, even as they tackle the more localized issue of shit-talking and misogyny in the Chicago music community. Phair was obviously an untrained singer and musician, her vocal style being very matter-of-fact and the mechanics of her guitar playing being fairly simple. But when you hear a song like “Soap Star Joe” or “Explain It to Me,” those qualities elevate the power of the music. Like so many great folk songs, the simplicity of song structure and the relatability of the singer give the music its emotional weight. 

Ultimately, there has been no shortage of great writing on Exile in Guyville, and whatever I type out here will in no way match... say... what Gina Arnold accomplished with her entry in the 33 1/3 book series. But even if it’s a fun album to run through the lens of critical analysis or to examine as a reflection of a specific time and place, to me it will always be a great album that I immediately fell in love with in my backyard on an unseasonably warm spring day during an otherwise bleak time. 

It became my soundtrack to the happier moments of the lockdown era of COVID. I listened to it while I basked in the sun in my backyard. I listened to it while I grilled on my barbecue. I listened to it over and over again on two long road trips out to my grandparent’s cabin in western Colorado. It’s an album that feels like a beam of positivity projected out of the darkness, and it consequently felt like a perfect salve during those uncertain days of Spring 2020. It was an intimate, diaristic window into another person’s life at a time when we were cut off from other humans. It’s brash, fun, catchy, brutally honest, and timeless, and as the Northwest has gotten its first few sun breaks suggesting the upcoming arrival of Spring, it’s an album I’ve found creeping back into rotation in anticipation of warmer days.

[ryan-waddell11]

5: Do you sleep with a stuffed animal?

8: What’s your favorite band/artist?

15: What’s your favorite season?

20: What/who do you miss?

27: What’s your favorite book? Or just one you’ve read a few times?

And I hope you feel better soon, dear!

5: Yes I sleep with several!! Seriously my stuff animal collection is so big, but I actually cuddle three of them! One is a Puffalump, which is like completely satin and it’s a cow that I got when I was a baby. I usually put it behind my back so that it doesn’t roll off on the floor. And then I also lay with two teddy bears one is a Snuggle teddy bear (from the fabric softener) I also have had that since I was a baby. The last one I lay with is a bigger teddy bear and I got it for Valentine’s Day from my mom and dad when I was eight and it’s super floppy and I love it. I love all my stuffed animals, but my bed doesn’t give me much room so I don’t get a cuddle them, but they all lay right behind me!!

8: UGH THIS IS SO HARD. I live in like a pop punk bubble, so I listen to a lot of Paramore, Tonight Alive, State Champs and I kind of hang out in that area but then on the other side, I love boy bands, and then I go into like the heavy metal rock merger. Honestly I don’t think I could pick a favorite because I will have fun at any concert if any artist EXCEPT country music. There’s only a handful of country artists I would pay to see, but it is not my thing.

The list would be way too long, so I just explained my music taste because I felt like it was easier!!

15: I love fall. It’s just so beautiful and magical!!

20: I miss a lot of things. On the not so serious side there was this toy bat (I named him Chewy) that I wanted toy when I was younger that my dad would never buy for me because he said I’d forget about it. Now I don’t see it anymore and I miss it so much.

On the more serious side, I miss my two childhood dogs that have sadly passed one to old age and one was sadly killed by my neighbor when I was 13. I also miss my great aunt, who passed away last year and my childhood friend who passed away when I was 19. Very weird losses in my life. I do miss them so much, but I know for 2/4 they’re not suffering anymore so it’s easier to make my peace with it.

27: I love reading so my hyper fixations on books change once I read them, but I will always have a soft spot in my heart for the Hunger Games series!! I have fond memories of reading those books while I was growing up!!

thank you for these!! I’m sorry if I suck at answering/if it got too dark!! 🫶🏻

[tiny-elf-of-doom]

🦇50 Facts About Me🦇

I'm trying to get back into Tumblr and I hope this will provide my followers with some intel into who I am! Much love to everyone who comes across this post and those 180 people who follow my blog! Please call me Hyde!

I consider myself a goth with a rather eclectic style. My fashion is mostly soft goth and trad, but I adore dark goblincore, darkest academia, and whimsigoth.

I always have occult-centered dreams that involve demons and devils. I never feel scared of these entities and often have positive vibes from seeing them, almost as if they're there to protect me. If someone can diagnose this phenomena, I'd appreciate it.

My favorite color (besides black) is blue. Specifically, electric blues and that one Crayola crayon "cerulean."

I have two cats: my muted calico Willa and my grey tabby Blair.

I have a bachelor's degree in English and Creative Writing and am currently working on a Master of Education degree.

My favorite book series is The Infernal Devices by Cassandra Clare and my favorite stand-alone is Good Omens by Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett. The show for Good Omens is also exquisite!

My music taste is vast, but I generally love post-punk, goth rock/metal, black metal, darkwave, and lots of power metal. Ghost will forever be my favorite band of all time, though. Any ghost fans, I'd love to have you here!

I collect oddities and curiosities; both natural and manmade. Some of my favorite pieces are my two-headed chick, dental mold, cow skulls, and my creepy toddler shoes from the early 20th century.

I generally don't enjoy television and would rather listen to music or a podcast than sit on a couch or in bed watching a film or show. It's a very special type of entertainment that keeps me glued to a TV screen for more than ten minutes.

Some of you may or may not like this, but I'm a Satanist and a member of The Satanic Temple. My beliefs are completely atheistic and rooted in caring for your own needs and fighting for your rights. Religious pluralism is good if you use it respectfully, as a reminder to anyone who wants to try and convert me.

I am bisexual, split completely down the spectral center on liking both men and women.

I have severe astraphobia to the point where I get nervous when the clouds are a little too dark on a downcast day. This fear of storms has stuck with me since childhood and I haven't really gotten over it.

I am a perfume fiend. I love both popular and niche fragrances that reflect my dark fashion and lifestyle. Recently got into Zoologist and my ass is in love! Incense, natural florals, vanilla, and dark fruits tend to occupy my perfume collection.

My hobbies consist of writing, jewelry making, reading, spooky exploration, and creating vivid scenarios in my head. ;)

My biggest turn-on is someone having a great sense of humor.

My biggest turn-off is arrogance.

I believe in ghosts and cryptids, but on a more scientific level than a religious one. I believe there’s a natural explanation for these events, though we haven’t really found it yet. This makes lore and personal encounters even more interesting!

One day, I’d like to be buried in a gothic mausoleum in a creepy cemetery.

I would like to have children one day and, if I do, my top names are: Drach, Ansen, Sable, Zeph, or Lorelei.

My favorite horror movie franchise is Hellraiser and The Conjuring. 1980s BDSM demons and Patrick Wilson are the only reasons I will provide as to why.

My parents refer to me as their little vampire because I’m practically nocturnal, I hate the sun/heat, I get my steak blue/rare, and of course, I dress rather spooky.

As of now, my favorite animals are cats, vampire bats, goats, snakes, barn owls, Tasmanian devils, and toads.

The first tattoo I ever got was an owl perched on a skull in rainbow colors from a gum ball machine. $80 later, Dollie is my one and only tattoo (for now).

I used to be a wolf girl in middle school, but I took it a step further and claimed myself a werewolf. I wore a tail, made wolf sounds, and created a pack among my peers. For a year, I was Wolfie, the emo alpha…

My first real concert was with an ex-gf and we went with her family to see Miranda Lambert. I won’t lie, it was really cool and I absolutely hate beer now.

Before I chose English and education for my degrees, I was debating over attending mortuary school, medical school for trauma, and even taking paramedic courses.

Halloween is my favorite holiday (obviously). During the Covid pandemic, my friends and I passed out toys to kids with gloves and masks instead of candy as a little spooky support for such weird times.

I’m a big wench, but I’ve always done sports and performance arts to stay fit and social. I’ve done dance, marching band, boxing, and swimming.

My zodiac is a Leo and I feel as if we’re given bad reps for being self-righteous drama queens. I am dramatic in a theater kid way but I can assure you, I h8 myself :).

Cooking is my love language. If I cook you a meal or a bake you a batch of something sweet, I adore you. Genuinely. My favorite thing to make is Alfredo pasta and slutty brownies for big events.

I used to have a car that sounded like a dying cow when I turned the wheel, so I named her Bessie. Now that that car is gone, the name has been passed on to my current car who is a total goth, herself.

When it comes to gold vs. silver jewelry, I am a diehard silver girlie who loves cool toned jewels. The more tarnished the silver, honestly the better.

During my junior year of college, I took a Gothic Literature class and became the professor’s pet. I adored that class and the books we got to read, especially Frankenstein by Mary Shelley. I got to write a fanfiction for it as a creative assignment. If anyone is interested, I’ll happily share it!

My biggest talent is also one of my most questionable ones: bullshitting. I’ve gotten away with being the most prepared student in class for bullshitting so well. Did I get side tracked and forget to read? Don’t worry, I just skimmed the first page and got philosophical with it, baby!

My favorite dessert of all time without question is baklava. There’s a Greek bakery I used to visit that always sold homemade baklava… I miss it.

I’m a sucker for redheads. ;)

Some of my two, all time favorite goth influencers are thewolfinlace and It’s Black Friday. Both have great energy, style, and a passion for the macabre.

I love deep singing voices - I’m talking rich baritone and bass vocals that shake my car. Peter Steele, Colm R. McGuiness, and Bobby Bass would be my three examples.

I have severe generalized anxiety disorder and CPTSD. I understand the struggle that comes with controlling emotions and living a life at ease, and I’m happy to be a support system for those who need it.

My favorite makeup brand has always been Nyx Professional Cosmetics. Their Lip Lingerie XXL in “Naughty Noir” is amazing. I also love their liquid liner and it’s the only one I ever use because it does not move.

I blame (and applaud) my father for getting me into horror movies so young. I was eight when we watched IT, Bride of Chucky, and Tremors. From there, I fell in love with horror media and goth bimbos… Tiffany~

And, regardless how spooky my media intake is, I still love watching Markiplier and listening to Distractible. I don’t think I’ve ever laughed so hard at a podcast before.

As much as I love vampires, my favorite supernatural creature has to be a werewolf. Big feral beasts that growl in your ear Lorna Shore style is all I’ve ever wanted.

I used to be obsessed with ancient Egypt as a child, especially the gods and goddesses. Their methods for burial are absolutely incredible and every time there’s an Egyptian exhibit at the museum, I always visit.

I love cemeteries and often visit them to read and take pictures. I usually blur out the names for family privacy unless the grave is extremely old and the name isn’t visible anymore. Cemeteries are always so peaceful and “void of life.”

I have a caffeine addiction and I usually feed this demon with Monster. I prefer the ultra flavors, mainly the ultra zero.

I am the ultimate gift giver from the actual gift itself to the fancy ass wrapping.

The 1980s are my favorite decade.

I have the ability to sing and carry a tune, yet I find myself singing some impressive opera somehow. Not sure how I manage it, but I’m damn good at it.

My least favorite candy is Skittles. I’ve tried to like them from childhood to now and I just can’t stand them.

[safety-pin-punk]

hey im a baby punk, and i just started making a patch jacket (is that what its called?), its only a couple roller derby patches and a book quote beaded on right now, but what would be some good (preferably subtle, cos parents :\ ) things to add?

-ghostflower

0) HI THIS HAS BEEN SITTING IN MY DRAFTS AND I DONT KNOW WHY IM SO SORRY

1) I absolutely love the name ghostflower

2) patch jacket and battle jacket are interchangeable for the most part. Battle jackets have a bit of history behind them stemming from WW2 (I have a Punk 101 post saved in my drafts about this actually), but in 95% of cases I’d argue patch jacket and battle jacket is interchangeable

3) THINGS TO ADD!!!

I’ve made a post about this before too but hey everyones always looking for more ideas, right?

Sew on random but meaningful/useful objects (bottle opener, festival wristbands, guitar pick, etc)

Sew a pocket for something (like a lighter or tickets you collect)

Its common to see patches that are just a cool pattern of fabric (leopard, zebra, funky 70s looking things)

I’ve seen people wire speakers into their jackets to connect to their phones when they walk around (far beyond my skills but cool nonetheless)

Paint pins out of bottle caps (they can be anything! Maybe even something roller derby related!)

The Union Jack (also known as the British flag) has had a prominent place in punk culture/aesthetic

Black cats are a symbol associated with anarchy movements

The 4 symbols of Led Zeppelin

161 is a code for Anti Fascist Action

Put non-subtle things in ‘secret spots’ on your jacket, such as the interior or under the collar (assuming you know people wont be able to check it out if you dont want them to)

As always, add more in the notes if you have ideas!!!

[lemons-beignets]

New ongoing writing project :')

Hey hey! I've decided to finally post + promote some writing I've been doing. Although this blog has until now been strictly a Team Rocket fan blog, these stories aren't fanfiction, and are only very, very loosely based on TR. Like... seriously loosely. See below the cut for more.

Check it out--and all the associated context, including timelines, in-depth character descriptions, setting details, and more--on the Notion wiki below! Coming to AO3 soon as well.

More info below the cut.

FAQs

What's going on here?

This is my ongoing collection, “Lemon’s Beignets.” It's a worldbuilding and fiction storytelling project. The stories (which I like to call "beignets" because I'm weird*) take place throughout one OC’s life and are written non-sequentially but categorized into arcs.

Beignets follows a complicated character’s complicated life and explores how found/chosen families help them heal from an abusive childhood and generational trauma. Other themes include queer identity, punk rock, addictions and recoveries, hurt and comfort, and relationships with food.

Each story/beignet begins with a few sentences of context at the top, as well as a Spotify song link and some content warnings.

*What’s a beignet? Why is your story collection called Beignets?

A beignet is a fried French pastry that’s also popular in the Southern United States, specifically in New Orleans, Louisiana. They’re significant to our protagonist, Jamie, for reasons you’ll discover. Also, I love them.

I call my stories “beignets” as a play on the word “vignettes,” which is, technically, what these are. If I gathered them all up and published them in a book, I’d title it Beignets. So each story is a beignet, and the collection is called Beignets.

Some of your characters look suspiciously like the OG members of Team Rocket from Pokémon.

That’s not a question, but yeah, I took inspiration from Team Rocket and its main members in the Pokémon franchise (being, of course, Jessie + James and Butch + Cassidy). I always felt like there was so much more we could learn about the organization and so much depth its members never got.

These aren’t pure fanfiction, though—the story and characters are not at all canon-compliant and don’t have much in common with the world that inspired them, aside from some names and aesthetics. If you’d like, you could consider Beignets an alternate universe, but it would have to be… extremely alternate. There are, for better or for worse, no Pokémon in Beignets.

Can I see content warnings?

I’m a little hesitant about content warnings; there is research suggesting that they aren’t always helpful and can cause harm. However, I appreciate them sometimes and I will add specific CWs on all beignets, so you can find them if you need them. There is also a list of overall project CWs on the Notion wiki.

[crimsun-n-clover]

life’s been either monotonous or painful. i keep trying to focus on other shit but everyone i know fucking flakes or drains me.

i haven’t played dungeons and dragons in a fucking MONTH. every week i get my stuff all ready and plot everything out and try and expect what each player will do, and every week someone isn’t there. it’s usually not their fault and it’s not like i blame them but it’s my favorite thing and everyone else just doesn’t care that much. i want more players and better players, but every other player at the school is in a party and also probably actually homophobic or something. every party has at least one person who gave me shit as a kid or even recently and i’m not letting them ruin something i enjoy or get close to my party.

i just sleep through everything. i woke up at 3 today because mom called me to remind me i have dnd after school. or not but whatever. i’m just casually fucking miserable. i may have good times but i sure do have a lot of bad times.

did i post about how i kinda told my parents that my friend breakup with sugar was more than that? it was hard but it really explained a lot to them. i covered the basics but i don’t like talking to straight people about the nuances of gay relationships. you can’t just get into them a lot of the time and they never get that.

everyone around me is suffering and i can’t stop it. im just as upset as they are.

every week is just counting days.

monday- band practice with punk band

tuesday- dnd if anyone can ever fucking show up

wednesday- band practice with metal band

thursday- therapy

i wanna get away from this. i don’t even know what this is. i just need to leave and stay gone for a while.

i’m thinking about saving up to buy a trailer to get out as soon as fucking possible. i don’t think i’d fare well in an apartment and god knows the housing market wants us all dead. just somewhere i can sleep and put my instruments and comic books. somewhere i can invite the kiddos when they need to get away from their homes. somewhere i can make my own from the ground up with all my little collections of things and stupid posters. hell i’d even paint a dnd battle grid onto the kitchen table so i can run campaigns with less set up.

i sound like a goddamn hobbit but wouldn’t it be nice to have a little hole in the ground to come home to surrounded by gardens? with the occasional bout of relaxed partying and getting stoned in the middle. trade little gifts and dance around constantly. i wanna live in the fuckin shire. jesus christ. writing this shit out i’m worse than i thought.

i know i’d have to keep a lot of my stuff in storage. i may be a cave dwelling creature but my cave is fucking STUFFED. a lot of books, guitars, hobby related shit, stupid trinkets, hoards of blankets, all that.

there is some stuff i’m snatching from my parents. they have a nice coffee machine that they don’t use, too many fucking mugs, and vinyls dad won’t notice are missing for a little bit. plus i’ve been snatching pairs of pliers out of the garage as a form of psychological revenge, so i’ll probably have a whole box of them by then.

i’m worried that my cat won’t like it. i’ll try and put in a lot of things he can scratch at and give him sole high up places to look down upon me from but he’s one prissy bastard. well not really but he’s a lot like me. he’s picky and acts like someone who’s autistic. he likes to be up high and to have things that make noises. he picks fights he can’t win and sleeps through anything my that bores him. so the place i’m constructing in my head is an incredible fit for me, but i’m not sure if that’ll be good for him too.

i just did way too much research and what i want is in the 30-40k range, 200-400 monthly.

it’s not great but not too fuckin bad if it means getting out

[allthingsdarkanddirty]

 MAFIA LITE ROMANCE ALERT It's hot. It's mafia-esque. And it's live now.

Get Her Keeper by Quinn Marlowe today! Universal: 

BLURB:

I knew Penny Lane had something up her sleeve the moment she accepted the job she’d never wanted before. I knew it was a mistake to let her into my organization. My family. And I did it anyhow. Because she was a friend of the family. Because Sloane Brennan and Brooks Peterson stood up for her. And because I’d wanted the girl since we were kids.

I should have listened to my brother and kept her out of it. But now it’s too late. Because whoever is coming after my family is coming after her, too. They think she knows more than she does. They think she’s more important than she is to my family. And they’re willing to kill her to prove it.

But only if they can get through me and my men.

Do I know what she was doing? No. Do I think I can trust her? Honestly, I’m not sure. Do I have any intention of letting anyone else get their hands on her?

Absolutely not.

Because somewhere between hiring her to protect her and dancing through the night at a museum benefit, I fell for the girl I was never supposed to fall for. And now that I’ve got her, I’m not going to give her back.

Even if keeping her costs me my life.

Her Keeper is a swoonworthy romantic adventure that features enemies to lovers, a girl who’s in over her head and the guy who’s going to do whatever it takes to save her, spying, intrigue, hijinks, kidnapping, guns, and plenty of sexual tension, and is the second in the Penny and Michael duology of New York Rogues.

#releaseblitz #releaseblast #releaseday #bookbirthday #booklaunch #newbooks #nowlive #herkeeper #mafiaromance #romanticsuspense #newadultromance #romancenovels #romancebooks #contemporaryromance #steamyreads #kissingbooks #bookbuzz #booksbooksbooks #bookish #booknews #books #reading #readers #booklovers 

About Quinn:

Quinn Marlowe is the bestselling author of the Rossi and Southern Heroes series and a certified California girl. After studying English and film at UCLA, she decided to pursue storytelling full time. She loves red wine, cheesecake, perfect hash browns, really good punk rock, fast cars, autumn, and cooking, but she is most likely to be found spending time with her horses, snuggling her dogs, or taking orders from her small army of cats. She is a professional eye roller with a penchant for swearing like a sailor, and some of her favorite people (her nephews) are convinced she is a spy. She makes her home in San Diego with her loving husband and her prized collections of books and lipstick, neither of which ever fail to lift her spirits when she's feeling down. 

Follow Quinn Online! Amazon: https://amzn.to/3qoxxq9 BookBub: https://bit.ly/3x9iX9Y Facebook: https://bit.ly/3BpUy2g Goodreads: https://bit.ly/3Qvq2s2 Instagram: http://instagram.com/Quinn.Marlowe TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@quinnmarloweauthor Twitter: https://twitter.com/quinnmarlowe Web: https://quinnmarlowe.com 

[creativinn]

The Devil In The Details: SKiN GRAFT Records at 150 – a multi-artist interview on “Sounds To Make You Shudder!”

SKiN GRAFT Records just turned 150 catalog numbers old and have marked the occasion with “Sounds To Make You Shudder!”, a collection of fifteen songs (by seventeen artists) that the label describes as a “Halloween Long Player that plays fast and loose any time of the year”.

The album brings together longtime associates such as The Flying Luttenbachers, Jim O’Rourke and Strangulated Beatoffs, current acts like Terms, Lovely Little Girls and Tijuana Hercules, new signees Cuntroaches and Pili Coit – and some totally unexpected collaborations.

“Sounds To Make You Shudder!” sees The Jesus Lizard’s David Yow morph into a horror host frontman for the dark, chaotic math rock of , while Thee Oh Sees’ John Dwyer performs sci-fi, micro-surgery on Psychic Graveyard.

On the eve of the album’s release, we caught up with many of the participants for a virtual round table on how “Sounds To Make You Shudder!” came to be.

What can you tell us about your contribution to this project? How did you get involved? Are there any details or insight that you can share?

MARK FISCHER (Owner, Founder of SKiN GRAFT Records): SKiN GRAFT evolved out of a hardcore punk comic-zine that I did back in the 80’s, and in the comic book world, anniversary issues were always very important and something to celebrate: issue 100, issue 250 and on and on… I knew that we were coming up on SKiN GRAFT Record number 150 – and I’d had something in mind – but it was becoming more and more clear that it was not going to be possible to have that particular project ready in time.

Meanwhile, a bunch of the bands I work with – Terms, Psychic Graveyard, Child Abuse and USA Nails – had all been invited to play at the No Coast noise rock festival happening in Texas at the end of October. On top of that, Cuntroaches had nearly finished this wild Halloween-themed video for a song they had been working on, but with the maddeningly-long turnaround times we’re seeing at the vinyl pressing plants currently, there was no way to get even a 7” single out in time for the holiday. It’s pretty cruel, bands finally have an opportunity to go out and play live again, but now there’s no guarantee their album will be out by the time they get in the van.

So late in the summer, with all of this swirling around in my head, I hit upon the idea of a Halloween album and started contacting some bands to see if it would be possible to put something together – – – – and it was!

To make it out by Halloween 2022, vinyl was obviously out of the question, so we went with CD / Tape / Digital so it could be turned around fast. Most of the songs were recorded within the last few months. I got lucky. There were a lot of really happy circumstances. Dazzling Killmen were the very first band SKiN GRAFT worked with and while the band is long gone now, all of the members have continued to make music. It just so happened that Nick, the singer and guitarist, had started a new band called Upright Forms and Dazzling Killmen’s drummer Blake had also just started performing with his new band Shatter On Impact. Both bands are making their debut here.

As all of the songs started to come in and I worked on the sequence, it broke down into three “acts” (in this case, five songs apiece) – a lot like “Camp SKiN GRAFT”, the compilation I’d put together as the label’s 50th release twenty years earlier. I hadn’t anticipated it, but I suppose this turned out to be a kind of spiritual successor to that.

SKiN GRAFT Records Presents… Sounds To Make You Shudder! by Various Artists (David Yow & Yowie, USA Nails, Psychic Graveyard & John Dwyer, etc)

I’m so humbled, proud and blown away by the work everyone put into this thing. This album came together in record time; it was a thrill hearing these songs come in, and I’m even more excited to see them go out.

YOWIE “The Spider’s Greeting” collaboration with David Yow

SKiN GRAFT Records Presents… Sounds To Make You Shudder! by David Yow and Yowie

Shawn O’Connor aka The Defenestrator: Mark from SKiN GRAFT came to me with this idea and asked if Yowie was interested. For the younglings, some exposition may be required: The notion was that “Sounds That Make You Shudder!” would basically be an homage to those 1970s records made for kids’ Halloween parties, and Mark wanted to include some kind of Dracula-type narrator at the beginning, the kind of thing that is usually accompanied by lots of creaking doors and rattling chains and screaming. David Yow was on board to do an opening track wherein he would play a role not unlike the Cryptkeeeper (or that wonderful narrator from “Tales from the Darkside”) and Yowie was asked to do the incidental music.

My initial response was, “I don’t think we are the right band.” And that was very difficult to say, because I grew up on Scratch Acid and The Jesus Lizard and Pigface, so the idea of doing a track with David felt astoundingly good. And Halloween is the only holiday I actually enjoy, and consensually participate in, and so it seemed fun. But there was one problem – I don’t think Yowie is really much of an incidental music band. We tend to pull the listener’s full attention. And when I heard David’s track alone, I couldn’t help but think that the perfect sounds to accompany it would be something like creaking doors and distant creepy moans, rather than intricately arranged polyrhythmic rock music.

YOWIE

I should also point out that Yowie has consistently had a particular process in composition, wherein we allow parts to sort of independently develop and evolve over time… so the notion that we would be restricted to the parameters of interacting with a recorded vocal track, of all things, seemed pretty un-Yowie. Nonetheless it felt intriguing and very different, and so I talked a bit with people who were in or around Yowie, and it was decided that we would give it a go and see if we could do something that worked without becoming un-Yowie-like. I will leave it to the listeners to decide; I think we did a poor job of being “incidental” but instead made a composition that generally fits with a spooky theme, and is somewhat meticulously composed to David’s vocal lines. Does it work? Does it make sense? Is it a Yowie track? Is it something else entirely? You be the judge.

CUNTROACHES “Borborygmus”

SKiN GRAFT Records Presents… Sounds To Make You Shudder! by Cuntroaches

Martina / Claire / David hivemind: We wrote Borborygmus – a seven-minute long noise / metal / punk / post-punk mash-up – to score a music video idea we’d been toying with for some time. It’s named after the ominous sounds produced by gas and fluids in the intestines. The music video is about a hungry witch-slash-wizard abomination with an empty fridge who fails to summon food with her toilet brush wand. The only edible option for the witch is to eat her own dog (spoiler alert: it doesn’t go so well).

Cuntroaches

The aesthetic is inspired by the 80’s television series Tales From The Crypt and other B-movie horror classics, so the original plan was to release Borborygmus with two additional tracks on a special edition 7” with the Borborygmus music video on Halloween in 2021.

It was SKiN GRAFT who suggested expanding the 7” material into a full-length Cuntroaches album and we’re happy with this decision! The album is in the final stages of mixing, so the music video will launch independently on Halloween of this year to kick off SKiN GRAFT’s Sounds That Make You Shudder! compilation. We provided a shortened track of Borborygmus for the it, so conceptually this aligns with our initial idea of a combined speciality release.

TERMS “Mouthful of Moss”

SKiN GRAFT Records Presents… Sounds To Make You Shudder! by Terms

Christopher Trull: Mark from SKiN GRAFT asked us to contribute to a Halloween themed release, and Danny & I both immediately thought of this particular unfinished (at the time) track. Work on ‘Mouthful of Moss’ began about a year and a half ago while we were putting together tracks for our next album, and it ended up not getting completed at that time. It didn’t quite fit the vibe of the rest of the record we were making, but it definitely has an ominous, creepy quality that seemed perfect for a Halloween album!

TIJUANA HERCULES “Dark Slide”

SKiN GRAFT Records Presents… Sounds To Make You Shudder! by Tijuana Hercules

John Vernon Forbes: Joe Patt (Tijuana Hercules’ drummer) and I started fooling around with the riff. I hadn’t thought about what to do with it until Mark came up with the idea of a Halloween album. I thought the riff had a William Castle horror movie feel to it and I could envision Joan Crawford swinging an axe while the tune played. As the recording progressed, Doug Abram joined in with a baritone sax. For the percussion, Mike Young played a bowling pin and maracas. Since the song was intended to be played around Halloween, we asked our friend, Brian Buckman to join in. Brian is someone with a deep knowledge of the supernatural and occult practices. He gave us a recording of interstellar outer space that he ran through his synthesizers. It added a George Van Tassel feel.

Tijuana Hercules, by Jeff Noise

THE FLYING LUTTENBACHERS

SKiN GRAFT Records Presents… Sounds To Make You Shudder! by The Flying Luttenbachers

Weasel Walter: I composed this piece for the New York lineup of the band some years ago, and we never got around to playing it, so I did it all myself (something I resort to from time to time). It’s an interesting milemarker for my transition out of New York and back to Chicago after 20 years absence. The current Flying Luttenbachers full lineup is currently playing sporadic shows and writing a new album.

LOVELY LITTLE GIRLS “Procreation (Of The Wicked)”

SKiN GRAFT Records Presents… Sounds To Make You Shudder! by Lovely Little Girls

Gregory Jacobsen: Celtic Frost, specifically the Morbid Tales album, has always been a favorite. Of all the metal I listened to when I young, that album was just so weird. I had no reference point for what it was. There was no pose and the sound was dreary, malevolent, and aggressive in a way that all that other thrash shit I listened to didn’t even touch. And that guitar tone! I always wanted to do a cover of Procreation – there’s a certain idiosyncratic swing to it, and the structure is simple and wide open to do a lot of fun stuff with it, like a blank canvas. The challenge was convincing the rest of the band who are more prog-orientated. Too much repetition!

Lovely Little Girls in Austin – photo by Paul Millerlo

USA NAILS “Horror Show”

SKiN GRAFT Records Presents… Sounds To Make You Shudder! by USA Nails

Gareth Thomas: After SKiN GRAFT released our split with Psychic Graveyard, Mark mentioned he wanted to put together a halloween comp and asked if would we be interested in contributing a track, so obviously we bit his hand off. We are all long time fans of SKiN GRAFT so are dead excited to be working with them again. As for writing a halloween related tune, I had no idea how to approach that so was glad that Steven took the vocals on for this number…

Steven Hodson: Being asked to be on a horror themed compilation initially made me quite anxious as I had no idea what to write about. I mean, I haven’t really watched any horror films for years. We’re more of a Paul Rudd household these days, though I guess some would class his work pretty horrific (wink wink, nudge nudge, snare, kick and crash) Am I right? I thought I’d talk about real life horror stuff instead.

SHATTER ON IMPACT “Amar’s Volta”

SKiN GRAFT Records Presents… Sounds To Make You Shudder! by Shatter On Impact

Blake Fleming: Mark Fischer from SKiN GRAFT kindly asked if my new band, Shatter On Impact, would like to contribute a song to a Halloween themed album. We weren’t quite in recording mode yet. We were doing lots of rehearsing and writing and starting to play shows, and so we had to get something down quick. The result is a completely live in the studio version of a song we jokingly called “Amar’s Volta”. I co-founded the Mars Volta and SOI’s guitarist is named Amar. To clarify, it has no relation to The Mars Volta, it’s just practice space humor. We thought it was funny, so we kept it.

BOBBY CONN “Don’t Be Afraid”

Please give us a quick word or two about yourself or your band. Feel free to share information about other current releases you have and your plans for the coming months.

Please share your picks for the best records of 2022 so far or any under the radar releases that you feel warrants extra attention.

This content was originally published here.

[surveykilop]

Beth ditto

“Let’s get totally real about it and say that it’s not just taste that keeps Gossip ignored by the U.S. She has some very specific ideas about why that is. ”ĭitto and her band are far more popular in the U.K. It’s a complicated bag of tools I acquired, and I’ve put them all to work onstage. The cliché of the Funny Fat Friend: I absolutely was that character - I am that character. “My size has helped make me an amazing performer too. Though her weight gives her no small amount of youthful angst, Ditto credits her physicality with birthing her brash performing style. You could order vegetarian food all over town! It was so crazy to me - a place with so many vegetarians, the restaurants made special dishes for them? Being in Olympia was like going off to college. “The culture shock continued Olympia had bagels! We didn’t have bagels in Arkansas. I was new to the whole punk scene,” she excitedly recalls. It was a normal experience - Uncle Lee Roy had been coming at me that way ever since I could remember, beginning when I was about four years old.”ĭesperate to get out of Arkansas and enamored with the burgeoning Riot Grrrl movement, Ditto and some friends decide to move to Olympia, Washington and change their lives forever, even in simple ways. Every time we were alone, his hands were everywhere. Recreational vices and mistaken identity paled in comparison to some of the darker aspects of Ditto’s childhood. She chose Homer, and Homer chose me, so he lent me his name even though I didn’t have his blood.” Some dude who didn’t stick around too long who Mom was happy to get rid of. Mom had had a fling with some other guy who was my dad. “My mother told me Homer Ditto was not my father. I fed my habit by slipping Winstons from Aunt Jannie’s pack during our talk-and-television marathons.”ĭitto was under a mistaken impression growing up about whom her actual father was. As she explains, “an old babysitter had taught me to inhale at the tender age of six. These are the most revealing parts:įrom an early age, Ditto’s family provided some, let’s say, lax supervision. At only 153 pages, the book is a brief read, but it’s got its fill of drama. Beth Ditto’s Coal to Diamonds (Spiegel & Grau), out October 9, finds the provocative Gossip frontwoman sharing the details of her journey from poverty and a broken home in small town Arkansas to dance-punk stardom. She told the Guardian, “Instead of a fuss being made about a few cause célèbre exceptions on the catwalk, what I’d really like instead is for most models to be a size 10 rather than a size 8.Finally, the fall’s parade of music memoirs features a title from someone who is not an old white rocker. But is that a bad thing?īritish Vogue editor Alexandra Shulman, for one, is tiring of “shock” casting. WWD called the partially 3-D collection “disjointed.” thought the clothes were “all over the map.” And Cathy Horyn liked some of the S&M and biker-chic looks, all worn with Joan Jett wigs, but thinks the “deviance feels a bit old hat.” Everyone seems to agree that Beth Ditto was the best part of the show and perhaps overshadowed it. This collection’s pleats can be worn by any size and adapt to different body shapes.”īut critics were left feeling confused by the clothes in the the show, invitations to which came with 3-D glasses guests had to remember to bring. Gaultier told reporters after the show, “What counts is personality, there is not just the one form of stereotyped beauty. Renn was one of the few other plus-size models on the runway. Jean Paul Gaultier, who has become known for casting Renn in his runway shows and current fall 2010 campaign, cast Beth Ditto to open and close his show Saturday. Paris Fashion Week is doing much more for the plus-size model movement than New York Fashion Week, where the only notable plus-size model casting was Crystal Renn at Z-Spoke.

[gender0bender]

Monster Trans

by Boots Potential, taken from Inside Out: Radical Gender Transformation FTM and Beyond, published 2004 (you can read the full book online here)

As a kid, I had a fascination with monsters. I'd check books out of the library full of movie stills from Dracula, The Werewolf, Frankenstein, King Kong, and The Swamp Monster. The monsters and mutants always scared me shitless and inspired nightmares of all flavors. But I kept going back for more of the same. As any adrenaline junkie kid will tell you, the sheer heart-pumping, palm-sweating terror is the best part. The intrigue with monsters gradually waned as I entered late grade school, preferring to acculturate myself to the Pretty in Pinks and Breakfast Clubs of the time. However, like any healthy obsession, it gradually worked its way back into action. I began to appreciate the Friday the 13th and Nightmare on Elm Street slasher flicks (taking a short break for a terribly sincere and plaintive boycott since my feminist consciousness dictated I avoid such maliciously misogynistic garbage). And along with my burgeoning affection for punk rock, zines, and other pleasantries, I developed an infatuation with B-movie classics. By way of the Misfits, I learned titles to various Ed Wood, Jr. greats: Astro-Zombies, Plan 9 From Outer Space, and Night of the Ghouls. In my junior high-age, nerdy juvenile delinquency (and only half in jest), I identified with these mutant, misunderstood outcasts. I will never make claim to a coherent gender narrative.

I could tell you a story about my childhood that would surely predict a queer adulthood: crushes on teenage girl camp counselors, tomboy androgyny and jock identity, Transformers and Tonka trucks, and stealing boys' Underoos from friends' dresser drawers. Similarly, and just as truthfully, I could order my childhood into a perfect predictor of heterosexual and gender-normative fulfillment: cute boyfriends who I thought were hot, a darling collection of stuffed animals and Pretty Ponies, and a subscription to Seventeen magazine. To this end, I will never say that my early fascination with monsters was all about my being a queer genderfreak transboygirl fagdyke. I will say, though, that there has always been something compelling to me about a living (or undead) thing that can freak the shit out of someone just by merit of their very existence in the world. Especially when, in doing so, it forces us to question the boundaries of the things we once thought were neat, welldefined, and impermeable (human, animal, inanimate object, living, dead, etc).

My preoccupation with monsters has mutated into something that provides me with an index with which to enact my gender and transness. Cultivating my monster identity preceded my identifying as trans. Part of the reason for this is the rule-breaking nature of monstrosity. For awhile, I was swindled into thinking, as many of us are, that there is a “correct" way to be trans: we have to take hormones, get surgeries, get a GID diagnosis, change pronouns, pass, feel like a boy in a girl's body, and get a preppy haircut. My inclination is to break rules or flee from them, and if this long list of rigorous requirements was what it took to be trans, I didn't want that.

It was clear to me that I was involved in some sort of gender subversion project. For a long time, my queerness has been in large part about widening possibilities of gender expression. I didn't (and still don't) buy the story that there is something fundamentally dichotomous about gender, and that there are inherent or genetic characteristics that lead to expressions of femininity or masculinity (whatever those terms mean). Unfortunately, being in queer communities didn't necessarily mean that people agreed with me on that point. In fact, many homos that I know are quite wedded to conventional understandings of gender and its rules of conduct. When I became frustrated with all of these “play-by-the-rules” queers, I sought out freakier communities. Some did drag and some put on rock operas about animal-human creatures that subvert the futuristic corporate stranglehold on the world. With these people, I found a number of things I was looking for: political engagement, creativity, an unquenchable urge to fuck shit up, and most importantly, a passion for boundary transgression and rulebreaking. In and through my work and play with these communities (conversations, drag acts, writings, and so on), my fascination with monsters moved from spectatorship to embodiment. I became the monsters I used to watch.

The monster identity, however, is an imperfect model. I do not necessarily want to associate myself with viciousness, irrational violence, and pathological insanity (although mainstream culture has already associated these with queers and trannies, so perhaps it's not so far a stretch). Nevertheless, there is something very promising about a monster culture that might revel in itself, that might deliberately position itself as monstrous in the sense that it deviates, threatens, and challenges. As in the case of gender freaks (i.e., trans, genderqueer, FTM, MTF, multigendered, and so on), it is only the common experience of transgression that defines monsters and arranges them together as a group. Frankenstein, Vampira, and the Creature from the Black Lagoon have nothing in common but their “abnormalities”, yet they are bound by their monstrosity. This is how I make sense of my gender. It is defined largely by what it isn't (normative). However, it is also defined by what this disruption of “normal” opens up.

Monsters are often referred to as “it.” Though “it” is not my pronoun of choice, I am heartened by the thought that a living thing (at least within the collective imagination of a filmic audience) can escape immediate relegation to one category of the sexual dichotomy or the other. Like many genderqueers and freaky trannies, I perceive a profound lack of options when it comes to pronouns. “She” fits no better than “he.” For a time, I continued to use “she” in part to disrupt the notion of what a trans person is allowed to be and partly in resistance to adopting the other end of an “either/or” choice. At this point, more to articulate my gender incoherence than to find a pronoun that "fits" or "feels right”, I usually use male pronouns or the pronoun “monster.” Many medical, GLBTQ, and trans communities would often have us think there is no other way than to choose consistent male or female pronouns, or there is something wrong with us, with our transness, or both. Monsters, on the other hand, open up a wealth of possibilities: what do you call someone or something that eludes you to the point that you can't determine its species or origin, let alone gender?

Monsters demand this of people in their very existence. Their rule-breaking bodies and actions necessitate a navigation of language that is unfamiliar and uncomfortable to a normative audience. This is what I would like both my gender and my pronoun to do: create the necessity to navigate language and the concept of gender in a way that is unfamiliar and demands thought and critical engagement. Similarly, monsters open up new and unfamiliar categories with regard to their bodies. They often fall outside of the set of prescriptions that define female or male-bodied people. It is often useless to attempt to determine their “kind” (whether animal, plant, person, or thing) because they are rarely a member of an easily defined “kind.” They may be a hybrid (werewolf, swamp monster), an undead human (vampire, zombie), a semi-human/machine (Frankenstein, Astro-Zombie), and so on. All of these are frightening partly because they defy their kind. They are never entirely what they are supposed to be, and we are able to read this transgression on their bodies. I plan to seek surgical alteration of my gendered chest. I am not intending to “pass," my goal is rather to be able to be read as trans, to create a lack of gender-cohesiveness on my body. In other words, I aim to defy the “kind” that I am supposed to be, true to my monstrous affiliations.

We queers often make the mistake of replicating the conventions we initially intend to defy. How often have we heard proponents of gay marriage or gays in the military talk about liberation? How often have our sexual practices and identities been policed by other queers (e.g., dykes and fags can't sleep together; femmes can't be FTMs; butches can't fuck butches; trannies should always try to pass; MTFs have to hate penetrating during sex; etc.)? It seems that we queers in particular have a lot to learn about the monstrous habit of staking out new ground and in doing away with, rather than duplicating, the rules.

The drawbacks of associating with monstrosity are rather clear. Monsters are associated with evil, bloodthirsty violence, and aggression. Monsters populate nightmares and haunted houses. They are beings, real or imaginary, to avoid at all costs (except when we watch them in movies or read about them in comics and books). Less obviously, but equally importantly, the concept of monsters has racial implications. Monsters are oftentimes associated in negative and damaging ways with “darkness” and “blackness”. They are “foreign” in many different senses, lending to a sense of xenophobia. There is a none-toosubtle connection made between the “monster” and the “savage”, a well-worn racist term historically used by colonizers and anthropologists to indict populations of people with cultural habits different from their own, and to justify attempts to colonize, enslave, or persecute them. These are the connotations of monstrosity that I wish to avoid, disrupt, and question.

Film and fiction cultures have a history of subtle and overt racism that often plays out in “monster” stories, and this is unacceptable. At the root of these problems is a deathly fear of difference. It is in and through this terror of those that appear foreign to us that we superimpose upon them a sense of danger. We make the monster by seeing it as scary. I think it is entirely possible to divorce the concept of “monster” from an inherent evil. Queers inspire fear in people because they fail to fit a prescribed social and societal norm of heterosexuality. So, too, in the case of monsters: they inspire fear not due to an inherent evil, but rather as a direct result of failing to conform to an expected set of standards as to what a living thing should be and look like. Furthermore, just as there are many varieties and embodiments of queerness, so too are there of monstrosity. However, it should be said that this strategic employment of monstrosity is at least partially enabled or at least made more accessible to me as a white person. It might look very different for a trans person of color to claim monstrosity as a gender identity. It should also be said that the multiple ways in which our bodies are classed, raced, gendered, abled, altered, made, and understood are in a constant and changing relationship with the ways in which these bodies are understood, policed, and interacted with daily. This means that the ways in which we claim any gender identity are culturally and socio-politically loaded along those matrices. This should not point to preclusion from forging or claiming various identities, but should encourage us to do so with a high degree of articulation and specificity.

My favorite monsters are the B-movie variety. This is the source from where my gender enactments are inspired. They manage to be at once deliberate in their freakishness, fictional, contrived, shocking, fascinating, never "correctly” human, always tenacious, and often campy. I take from this my pleasurable enactment and embodiment of transness. I revel in being freaky and campy, attempt to use the nervousness I inspire in people to challenge, and never settle into categories I don't feel accommodate me. And every once in awhile, just to punctuate my point, I wear an old-fashioned Martian mask for fun and for effect.

It is interesting that I came to identify as trans in and through my gender-as-monster ideas. There is more than just monster culture that preceded and inspired my identification as trans, and there is more to my transness than monstrosity. However, it is interesting how much easier it was to say, “I'm trans," when I had a tangible example and concept of how I could explain my transness outside of the medical model (of Gender Identity Disorder). For me, thinking about rule-breakers like B-movie monsters laid out a neat framework of what I want and expect out of transness. It makes anti-gender-cohesion as fun a game as it is a serious project. And of course, monstrosity and transness are both of those things.

The most hopeful and beautiful thing about monstrosity-as-gender is the fact that once you become a monster, nothing looks “normal.” Everyone is a monster waiting to happen, they are just choosing, at the moment, to cohere to an arbitrary and fictional set of rules and regulations as to what they are supposed to be. You start inhabiting an entire world of monsters. And nothing looks better.

 For a number of years, I have been aware that rule transgression and other forms of productive and challenging delinquency are important projects to me in terms of gender and other personal and political questions. However, in the last few years of thinking about monstrosity and trans in relation to myself, the concrete ways in which I hope to enact those transgressions has become much less of a mystery. It is an answer that makes sense in reply to the question, “How can I approach gender in a way that is equal parts radical, fun, politically challenging, personally comfortable, and a serious and sustainable project?"

It suddenly feels like my project goals are dovetailing with the concrete ways I want to achieve those goals. I am thrilled to have a vehicle which allows me to be simultaneously politically engaged, campy as hell, tough-as-nails, sissy faggy, butch newwave dykey, dead serious, boy-girl-whatever, pansy, and terrifying all in one fell swoop. Male/female dichotomies do not allow for this mobility and simultaneity, but monstrosity does. I find it extremely pleasurable that it is B-movie monsters that made it possible for me to pinpoint the way I want to do gender and the way I can make sense of my queerness and transness. For once, the story ends happily, and the monsters are the heroes.