Previous 20 entries

12:19AM - Someone anonymously left this message on my blog. I think it was my sister. (Tani is my mother.

)

tanis show did great. The place was packed and she sold a third of her paintings which is really good. Christopher lloyd bought one and steve tisch (the guy the nyu school is named after) bought another.

Monday, November 20, 2006

7:10PM - Comic Conventions: Leave your dignity at the door.

Yesterday I went to the Big Apple Comic Con so I could interview actors from the cult film, the Warriors. And I did.

I bullshitted about philosophy with the guy that played Cyrus, talked about the Bronx with an actor from the Orphans gang, talked about the Lower East Side with the guy who played Cochise and talked about kids with the guy who played Vermin. The guy that played Snow didn't want to do an interview. They were all fun guys.

I met Berni Wrightson, a guy who's most famous for illustrating horror comics from the 70s. He drew Swamp Thing and a comic called Captain Sternn that was turned into an animated segments for the Heavy Metal movie. I showed him my sketchbook which he claimed to approve of.

He was an upbeat guy in his late fifties or sixties and seemed to be having a good time with his wife.

I also talked to some folks from a group that's into choreographed lightsaber duels. They all came up with their own jedi identies and pay some guy upstate to customize their lightsaber replicas.

They announced that they'd be doing a demonstration at 6pm on the 18th floor of the hotel. I told them I would be there to watch their swordplay.

I wandered around and saw Andy Macdonald who once did fan art for Liz Baillie's comic, My Brain Hurts.

He now draws a comic called NYC Mech for Image Comics. Image isn't what it once was and most of it's comics are now in black and white and drawn by people who grew up reading Image comics. The effect is akin to inbreeding a small herd of dogs and making sure that the most deformed reproduce with each other until you've got dog-like lumps that don't have bones in their bodies.

Andy can draw well, I'm not lumping him in with most of those Image guys.

I went and talked to some guy selling original art by alernative comics folk. He had pages, sketches and paintings from Johnny Ryan, Peter Bagge, Ashley Wood, Dave Cooper, Dan Clowes, Gilbert Hernandez, Seth, Richard Sala, and some other super tars.

He was selling a skateboard that Ashley Wood had done an oil painting of a sexy lady on for $3000. I bought an underpriced drawing of a robot looking out a window with a pile of fruit in the foreground for fifty dollars.

I wanted to interview Adam West who was there signing pictures of himself from the mid sixties when he was on the Batman tv show.

I went up to meet him and pitched the mag at his agent. It seemed like neither of them had much interest although I could have been wrong.

I ran into my old buddy Captain Zorkih.

He's not that much of my buddy but I do enjoy his company when I see him. Regular readers of this livejournal will remember an entry that I wrote an entry devoted to him. He gave me a copy of his VHS cassette movie which is a ren faire kind of video and it's about the Pennsic War or something.

I'm going to review it for Trashed.

Around 6pm I went to see the lightsaber show. Adult men and a few women were dressed as characters inspired by the Star Wars movies and books.

They were sponsored by Master Replicas, the company that manufactures those pricey lightsaber replica toys. I sat down in the second rowm which was mighty pleasurable after having walking the floor for a few hours. I was drawing in my sketchbook when this adorable and impolite little boy sitting in front of me turned around in his seat and demanded that I draw him.

His mother told him that that was impolite but I like drawing kids and don't do it too often so I said okay. After a couple minutes he told me that I had probably memorized his features and he turned away from me. His mom was in her late twenties and she videotaped me while I was drawing.

He was annoyed when he turned around again to see that I hadn't finished.

The presentation began with loud dance music, which seemed to psych up the kids something fierce. The group of attendees was made up of people of various ages including some grade school kids.

There was an attractive nineteen year old couple there. The girl was wearing Batman shirt, matching beltbuckle and had a huge Batman Patch on her leg. Her boyfriend was a little more reserved in his choice of attire.

Except for them it was moms and dads with their kids and some straggling adults. The main host of the event mentioned that even though the lightsabers they used weren't real that they can still hurt you badly. He then explained some different swordplay techniques and had some of his club;s members do some choreographed duels.

After the duels were done he allowed people from the audience to fight with the members of their clan. He also did some Q and A. I asked him how he felt about lightsaber control activists and if he felt the ten day waiting period was too long.

I couldn't tell if he thought that was funny or not. I also asked if he was aware of the growing Jedi Knight religion that's getting popular in England. He expounded on what that was for the audience but didn't mention whether he was for or against it.

I got the sense he was into it.

After they were done letting people play with the lightsabers and had finished showing off their choreographed battles they announced that they'd give away one of these fancy lightsabers by trial of trivia challenge. I correctly knew the name of the band that plays in the Mos Eisley Cantina as well as the alien species that they belong to(Figrin Dan and the Modal Nodes, the Bith) so I was put into round two against a few adults and two kids.

I got the answer first (holocron) so I won this fancy-dancy lightsaber toy that retails for a hundred and thirty dollars. That was pretty boss. I held it up and triumphantly announced,"I took the toys out of the hands of the kids!

" The impolite kid who had sat in front of me asked if he could have it. His mother told him that it was impolite to ask that. I was glad that I won just so that he couldn't have it.

Maybe that's the kind of feelings that lead to the dark side.

When I got home I showed my new toy to Dick who was mighty impressed even though he considers the Star Wars films to be unwatchable. Dick and I went off to Cakeshop to see Livefastdie perform.

I told Andy Bodes my triumphant convention tale awhich bored him. He was nice enough to give me drink tickets. Cakeshop has a full bar now.

That's awesome. The Cakeshop is now a fully operational battlestation. Hunchback performed first and they were great.

The lead singer was a sweaty shirtless guy who threw himself all over the venue. They closed their set with a punk version of Neil Young's Heart of Gold. The next band was the not so interesting band called Golden Error.

Then Humay Eye played and they were good. And then Livefastdie played and they were great. They played "Can I get Some More" and sent it out to Nicholas Gazz-in.

Dick and I drank a bunch and danced and junk. A smiley, silent skinny Asian girl who reminded me of Deanna Gribb kept on shoving Dick and me when we weren't looking. I told Dani Golomb that I would miss her and she told me that I should be more aware of when I was being a dick.

I wasn't certain if she was referring to things I had done that night or at some other time. I really didn't get it at all. I think I'm sweet as punch.

Dick and I sang a version of Light My Fire in which the lyrics are about time travel on our way home and we also picked up some batteries for my new saber. The thing is awesome. the light travels up the plastic tube when you turn it on and then back down when you turn it off.

It makes different sorts of noises and it's got a nice heft to it. All in all it's a bitchin' thing that I wouldn't have spent money on but I'm happy to have. It even came with a display stand.

I psyche myself up for the day by swinging it around.

Dick and I watched some episodes of Futurama and then I went to sleep. The end.

What would it be like if the Ying Yang Twins hosted a gospel ttv show and sowre a lot while talking about God?




The Star Wars blanket with the fface of me and Matt Caron came form the blanket makers a few days ago and it is amazin'. The image is super crisp and the photos are twice the size of life.

On Saturday Koren, Mickey Duzjy and I went to this stupid illustration symposium at the New School. I didn't see much that had to do with illustration. I saw an animation panel discussion and a toy design panel discussion.

Illustration is sucha damn dead career that even at an illustration symposium the stars of the industry are having to find alternative means to pay their fucking rent. I could have just as well majored in unicornology! It was a through bring down for Koren and I.

Dan Nadel, a stiff kind of a guy that edits and helps see into print some great books that archive old and forgotten comic strips was there asking boring questions to some toy guys including James Jarvis and the guys who created Friends With You. It was dull and lame and the volume was so low on the speakers that crinkling paper was audible over their discussion of how dead the illustration field is.

Ben Jones of Paper Rad fame, showed an animated film that I enjoyed more than any of his comics that I've seen so far.

-Paper Rad dvd trailer. It is badassssss
video for 13 Monsters by Lightning Bolt



I said hi to Ben Jones afterwards. He is good buddies with Dan Nadel who probably hates me.

Dan taught at SVA for one semester and I took his class. Dan Nadel is kind of like a more serious Kermit the Frog. I was eating a hamburger in his class and he kicked me out even though Jon Vermilyea and I were the only two guys in teh calss he even gave a shit about comics.

The other students just wanted to talk about cartoon shows on Adult Swim. Dan quit after one year because he hated the class so much. So damned much.

Anyone I introduced myself to Ben Jones and mentioned that I took Dan Nadel's class. He said,"Oh cool. Were you there when he kicked a guy out of class for eating a hamburger?

" I told him that was me and he brought over his girlfriend and said,"This is the guy who got kicked out of Dna's class for eating hamburger. Oh dude, I wish I had a hamburger right now so you could go eat it near Dan and get ketcdhup on his sweater or something." That was pretty funny and may have confirmed that Dan Nadel really doesn't like me.

I wonder of all the people who I've been a jerk to, on purpose and not, who hates me the most. I'd like to havea top 25 list of my enemies in order of how dangerous they are to me. I would slowly and methodlcally dispatch everyone on that list.

The Lo-fi designer made a new Trashed website but it's garbage so I did a colored omposition sketch for how I want each page to look along with notes. I shouldn't have to do that. I'm annoyed that I have to.

Everybody is incompetent or is going through the motions. EVERYONE BUT ME!!

No one has common sense. Everyday I have to re-affirm that up is indeed up and down is down. If I don't make sure of this I'll later find out that everybody agreed otherwise while I had my back turned and I come back to discover that they're wearing their shoes on their hands and can't figure out why they are having so much trouble with the keyboard.

When I was four I would have nightmares that my parents were cackling morons and I was terrified. I remember them vividly. The last one I remembered involved my mom becoming smart again and we tried to turn Glenn back to normal but I woke up before that happened.

I think I have magical abilities and that my inability to turn Glenn normal in my dream is the reason that Glenn is the way he is.

I had dinner iwth Fletcher and herroommate last night. I had a drink called a blue Hawaii.

I like those guys and that drink.

I am doing an itnerview with a girl who lost fifty pounds and now is on leiasmetalbikini.com.

I am doing an article called "I have a Bad Feeling About This. It is dedicated to weird Star Wars shit.

I am supposed to do an illustraiton of the band Clinic for Duane's boring indie rock magazine.

I think Clinic are okay. I like drawing them.

I want to scream out but I can't ding-dong-diddily do it.

I feel like the world is spinning around me and I am five feet behind my body, it's like I am in a videogame controlling someone else.

5:40AM - This past week I went out a lot and felt no connection with other people.

Tuesday:
I Got off work and saw World Inferno's Halloween show on a boat.

I thought it was kinda depressing because the boat smelled like vomiting teenagers. I spent a lot of the show outside staring at the water. I considered jumping overboard and swimming home.

Dick took pictures. We're going to write a show review about this.

Thursday:
I went to work and then ate dinner at Around the Clock with Thomas.

He told me about the super fun n' secret Black Lips show at Cakeshop. I went to that thing after Thomas and I ate dinner, stopping to buy some comics on the way. I got the new Meathaus which has some good shit and lackluster shit.

Farel, Angry Jim, Mu, Kenichi, James Jean and Tomer all turned in top notch comics. Chris McD turned in a pretty good one. Zach Baldus's had nice Baldus drawins and worthless text .

Nothing else left enough of an impact for me to remember it.

I went to Cakeshop and hung out and read comics. That guy who runs Bankshot Records was there.

Before I was aware of him hanging around with the Vice staff he talked about Vice a lot with me and would introduce me to people as a Vice do. Thomas showed up eventually and the Black Lips went on despite their mikes going out and not bringing their own amps. It was pretty annoying that they couldn't make the mikes work.

How does that happen? How can no one figure out how to make the microphones work? So they played an instrumental show which was okay but a little boring The audience made up for it by dancing like crazy anyway.

Friday:
The first issue of Trashed came back from the printers. They look good. There are some flaws which only Koren and I will notice but most others won't I hope.

There are a few amateurish choices that my boss made with the font on the cover and there were some slight errors the graphic designer made on the inside but for the most part it looks good and I'm proud to say it's something I would buy. It's pretty incredible that the magazine happened since when I interviewed to work at Lo Fi I was initially going to be working in the office doing booking and promoting concerts.

Dick and I wandered around depressed after seeing SSM play to an almost emptry room in R AND R.

God that sucked. I like that band but no one was there. Afterwards Dick and I moped over to Max Fish, Dark Room and Arlene's Grocery and drank but without having fun.

All the people at the bars suck. I don't hate 'em but I hate that I can go to the hippest bars in the hippest city and be bored to deff.

Saturday:
Today Koren came over and we ate brunch.

He complained a whole lot. That's all I can remember. Then I bought a pair of Nikes.

I think they look pretty good.

We walked to the WFMU Record Fair together and it was like a comic convention but with records. Rows of white boxes and rows of people flipping through the contents of the white boxes and exchanging money.

It's interesting to be in a room and be surrounded by people who are all familiar with obscure rock and roll. It's not too diferent from being at a comic convention and knowing that you're around other people who also know that Quadruplicate Girl's secret identity Suzanne Suzalazazuzar.

I gave copies of Trashed to the people from Norton records, Sundazed (they do a lot of the 180 gram reissue records) and to Rex at the WFMU table.

I figure these guys might advertise or at least give me records at some point. I also ran into Dani Golomb and gave her a copy. I also saw Greg Paquette outside.

I never noticed before but he kinda looks like the Electro guy, Tiga. He was with some guys and they'd all bought some hip hop records. He was pretty proud of his 2 Live Crew record find.

I also ran into Thomas's friend who I was at the Black Lips show with.

I made some finds of mine own. I mention the prices because that is important to all the super-consumers.

Nuggets volume 7 (sealed -$10
? And the Mysterians - 96 Tears - $14
the Hentchmen - Ultra Hentch - $9
Tiga - You Gonna Want Me 12" single - $1
Billy Idol - 4 song ep with Hot in the City, Dancing with Myself and White Wedding - $1
Turban Renewal: A Tribute To Sam the Sham and The Pharoahs - $13
Human League Don't You Want Me 12" single - $1
New Order - Blue Monday 12" single - $5
Joy Division - Peel Sessions - $10
Human League - Human 12" single - $1
the Who - Odds Sods (sealed)- $1 (I'm not sure why I was able to get a sealed copy for only a dollar.)
Human League - Fascination EP - $1

I got all those one dollar records from one guy who gave off the wrong vibe I guess.

I was thoroughly surprised when I found records I wanted for a dollar.

I wanted to see Livefastdie at the Passout Records store but I got there just late enough to miss all the bands. On the way I ran into Sarah Poyet, the pretty French girl who was my high school prom date.

She was wearing both the Nick Gazin face button and a Trashed button. I gave her a magazine. At Passout Records I gavea copy to Camero Werewolf from Livefastdie.

Dick showed up a little after I did and he seemed thoroughly depressed. We ate some lamb shish kebab sandwiches and things were grim. Now I am at home wearing my "crunk ain't dead" shirt.

Cakeshop Trashed show update:
THe current bands performing are the Stalkers, the Choke and Unsacred Hearts. Direct from Hollywood Cemetery, Memphis Morticians and a Meatloaf tribute band have jumped on and ofboard the bill for this show. Yeesh.

I'm doing my best to make this show a good one. I don't want to disappoint my boss, the bands, Andy or teh people who come. But it's a little hard.

I'd rather have done a free Trashed show at Passout Records and had something fun and free instead of involving money and being complicated.

4:48AM - legal disclaimer: this following entry is intended as humor, not harassment

My child bestfriend Michael B. has banned me from replying to his livejournal due to the humourously hilarious blurbs I write at him.

I discovered this when he recently posted an entry that just said "Pay me a compliment! And then post this to your own blog!" I was going to say that I liked that he was easily annoyed but it didn't work because I've been banned.

Which is the gayest shit ever.

I request that my readers followers find him and murder him. You know, for laughs.

That last thing I said was a joke, I didn't mean it. You could however leave him offensive internet posts on my behalf. His lj name is pondering_duck.

Please help me tease him. Please. I'll give you a free copy of Trashed or a dollar or whatever.

Do it. He's on my friends list and his livejournal entries are offensively corny. Post pictures of scatological porn and shit.

And then find his address and mail your poop to him. Like in Pink Flamingos.

P.

S. If the prison I get sent to has a computer in the library I'll post an address so you can forward me the latest issue of Nintendo Power.

4:23AM - My new favorite Misfits cover band.

It's the Misfats.