I wrote this off the cuff in a deabte we were having on MusicBanter. Theres a link at the bottom if you want more context but I thought I'd just put it here and see if there were any other Tools out there who enjoy them as much as I do...

Tool has, for me, always been something of an anomaly. Because while every other shit band out there was writing the same old things with the same distorted power chords, TOOL was out on Mars. The topics might have been bumper sticker politics, but the lyrics were such a massive diversion from the same stupid "i'm going to be politically active by yelling angrily as a name-less 'you'." lets take Stinkfist for example:

Every band was warning us about oversaturation, about letting the television tell us what to do, how we're all just becoming whatever, and then Tool, who takes that concept and marries it with an even more meathead topic, anal sex, makes a masterpiece by never really mentioning either. I'm not going to call MJK a poet because I don't think thats what he does on albums (he may be privately, who knows) but he's got a poets eye for the world. This device that he uses in Stinkfist, take a character doing activity X and basically talking about Y (and X i guess) at the same time is exactly what Adrienne Rich and Sylvia Plath were doing while writing poetry.

Beyond this, while other bands were out there following a formula well treaded by everyone else, TOOL was trailblazing through uncharted territory, making music that was more identifiable by its erratic "mistakes" than its solos or riffs. Who doesn't always remember Sober's feedback at the beginning, or Eulogys highhat work around the end of the song (minute 5 maybe?). TOOL was strange as an entity back in 1996. The bridged the gap between Distrubed and Soundgarden, between Korn and Primus, Between Ozzfest and Lollapalooza and the art gallery opening down the street. TOOL's most major and underrated accomplishment to me was that the showed everyone what was really possible if you just did what you loved. Loved enough to really learn it, and put effort into it.

They followed no trend, and while they weren't an end point (I wouldn't say TOOL is the final stop on anyones musical progression) they certainly were a boarding pass to destinations previously seen as well beyond the reach of many young nu-metal heads. To leave them out of the best of the 90's is inexcusable and ignorant. its not a question of whether or not you like them, its a question of whether or not we need them, and if any act was the rope thrown to a man drowning in a well of fecal matter, TOOL is that rope.

Read more: http://www.musicbanter.com/rock-metal/43681-official-tool-thread-31.html#post871090#ixzz0orW0rAzG

I prefer my founding fathers to be elitist.

Is it me, or were politics more enjoyable before Joe Dipshit got involved? Now I have to listen to someone who gets his U.S. History from a cereal box and every would-be king cry about term limits. There are exactly two things you should know about Term Limits; they prevent you from voting for people, and no one who ever said they believed in term limits and would stopping running after 2 terms ever has...Lindsay Graham, Bob Bennett.

Somewhere along the line, people got the idea that everything is political. And the right co-opted the Lefties "The personal is political." It isn't. It never was. And when people try to make the personal political I have to listen to diatribes about the subversive adminstration, liberal media, and imperialism to rule an oil empire. If you've said any of this, for what its worth, I think you're an idiot. And I think you're an idiot empirically.

This country needs to start looking at policy like a math problem. Does it work? What doesn't work? What do we need to make this happen. There are, by and large, far too many emotions in politics and it turns everyone into a would be Jesus on the Mount. It should be said that I wouldn't outlaw sensititivties to plight. We have always operated on good moral principles. But if I seen another Presidential Candidate cry on stage, and I mean cry literally, about how they just love their country/religion/family/ et. all I promise to spread every filthy rumor about them and their families. Yes I think that makes me a horrible person. Yes, I think it would save lives. Watching a Kennedy documentry one time they said that before JFK, politicians were boring, sexless. They wore gray suits. I want that back. At least in part.

Having passions has even ruinined the way government works. With everyone a full-throated partisan, even deal making has become a dirty word. DEAL MAKING. How can everything get without making deals? When you condem deal making you essentially ask for a room full of grown men and woman screaming at one another until eletion time when maybe the otherside gets a majority. This is why I think you're an idiot. For the record, I like what Rush Limbaugh does, despite not agreeing with him ever. ever. The only thing I don't like about him is that he's so successful that he's spawned a bunhc of know-nothing morons who cry abotu family values.

You know what I think is a good family vlue? Basic cable 24 hour uncensored porn channel. It isn't liberal, its a parental litmus test. If you're such a god damn idiot that you can stop a 5 year old from watching television then you ought to have your children taken away from you. And not for a little bit, for good. I'm all for putting into place permits for breeding. Christ, yesterday we had a guy in Northhampton try to trade his child for beer.

And another thing. I know a lot of you went out and got liberal arts degrees, but somethings just are what they are. Like science. There isn't a liberal bias in science. You think that because you haven't met scientists. This is obviosuly a generalization but they aren't the most empathetic group. Unless by empathy you meant autistic. Rules matter. Physics matter. Just because Al Gore works for a party you don't like doesn't mean we can start challenging the laws of the universe. Admit that you got a C in chemistry abck in highschool, that you don't know shit about science, and that you just don't like certain people or policies.

And before you scream about jobs, let me remind you that its Economics that deals with that. Not Sociology...which is what your degree is.

Politics is a job. Like most jobs, it requires people to put in effort and thought. We don't let joe six pack up in a space shuttle, we shouldn't let him into the Senate either. it leads to terrible, terrible things. We had a Senator in our state, repping my district and he was the biggest scum bag you've ever met. So we voted him out against a guy with the political skills of a garden slug. And he cost us countless dollars in government funding because he spent his time saying and doing what he thought was popular. He passed out countless times on the chamber floor.

This is what we get when we elect your neighbor. Too often people think the Founders wanted every man to serve his time. This isn't Jury Duty, there is a great deal of long term responsibility. The founders assumed we'd pick from an upper crust until Andrew Jackson shattered that notion. And now Joe the Plumber, who embodies the worst of everything we have to offer, is an elected official. We congratulations Ohio. At least he doesn't need a permit he won't get for that job. If you ask me, we need to start tossing out every idiot with an agenda. You want to elect Farmers, fine, elect them. But only elect the ones who've never voted before because those are the only guys willing to listen to reason. The rest of these assholes are just waiting to be Majority Leader.

Going to Museums in Boston

its Sunday and with the power still being out, I somehow figured myself into going to a museum. I'm not sure what came over me, because if theres any city you shouldn't go to a museum in, its Boston, Massachusetts.

Some guy wrote in the paper once that he'd never go see a Woody Allen film in Cambridge because people can't laugh loud enough. It lets everyone know that they got the joke and that they thought it was a riot. Same goes for museums in Boston.

No one really laughs, but everyones so fascinated, and they all stand in positions that suggest that interest; arms folded with their hands on their chin, and an index finger running up the sides of their faces. They'd argue to hot hell that I was wrong, but all that feigned interst ruins it for everyone else.

The walk to the museum only drives this issue home. The city itself is one big posture. The walk along the Fenway is filled with females-only college and their high fences, telling me I'm excluded because my morale compass is questionable. I catch the patchwork conversations of the women on the front stoops as I pass by, sitting 10 steps up and conversing about god knows what, but they've all got a tone.

The problem with a city full of college kids is that they all think they've seen the light. They know the truth and the rest of us are ignorant. Theres a truth alright, and its sitting on the otherside of those cast-iron gothic fences. But what there isn't is a light. The reality of struggle exists out here, down off the steps and out on the bus route, and the freeways. I take a deep breath and tell myself they'll all come down from that cloud someday.

The Gardner museum is a collection of works from Isabella herself, mainly untouched since 1924. Years before the depression, and Roosevelt, when Boston was dominated by Brahmin Yankees. The ghosts of old aristrocacy still linger here, where all the mansions became galleries and historical societies. Their upper cicrcles of society never left, they just became more unattainable. These days everyones chasing them.

The reality here is that everyones lying about their station. The old money trust funds exist for very few, still too many people vacation in the south of france, and take in shows at Tremont - or at least claim to. I wouldn't bother me if I thought it was a few people, but this is what Bostons become. Theres no middle ground here. We're all still looking to rehash 1949, the upper crust against the waves of immigrants. Boston has become an affectation of reactionism. Everything is hammed up. Your diction is sharpened or dulled depending on which group you hate more.

A brief respite comes from a New York man who speaks loudly about something he likes, and laments its lack of lighting. You can almost hear the aghastment as people begin to rattle off how it would damage the work, or how gawdy it would be. You get the idea he hasn't said this about every piece in the museum and its refreshing to see, amongst the professors and the doctors, a middle class man on vacation, confident in his skin, apprecaiting something for its inherent value.

My fun is shattered when i come acorss a woman, speaking to a viola player who'd just performed in the concert hall, "it must be so intersting..." she says before I exit and she fades.

Right before the gift shop I come across a bust of John the Baptist. The wall says that prior to aquisition, the piece had been painted over more than once, and its vibrant colors are not reflective of its creation. In fact we can only be certain its john the baptist because he's wearing an animal pelt beneath his robes and his mouth is open to signify testification.

Such is Boston.

I grab a postcard of the garden and head for home, hoping the electricity is back together. The trolley darts out toward the leafy suburbs and I've had my fill of memories for the day.

I saw this; I thought I'd share

I saw this on Bronx Banter Blog. I hope you like it as much as I do.

From E.B. White’s Here is New York:

There are roughly three New Yorks. There is, first, the New York of the man or woman who was born there, who takes the city for granted and accepts its size, its turbulence as natural and inevitable. Second, there is the New York of the commuter–the city that is devoured by locusts each day and spat out each night. Third, there is New York of the person who was born somewhere else and came to New York in quest of something. Of these trembling cities the greatest is the last–the city of final destination, the city that is a goal. It is this third city that accounts for New York’s high strung disposition, its poetical deportment, its dedication to the arts, and its incomparable achievements. Commuters give the city its tidal restlessness, natives give it solidity and continuity, but the settlers give it passion. And whether it is a farmer arriving from a small town in Mississippi to escape the indignity of being observed by her neighbors, or a boy arriving from the Corn Belt with a manuscript in his suitcase and a pain in his heart, it makes no difference: each embraces New York with the intense excitement of first love, each absorbs New York with the fresh yes of an adventurer, each generates heat and light to dwarf the Consolidated Edison Company. . . .

The city, for the first time in its long history, is destructible. A single flight of planes no bigger than a wedge of geese can quickly end this island fantasy, burn the towers, crumble the bridges, turn the underground passages into lethal chambers, cremate the millions. The intimation of mortality is part of New York now; in the sounds of jets overhead, in the black headlines of the latest editions.

All dwellers in cities must live with the stubborn fact of annihilation; in New York the fact is somewhat more concentrated because of the concentration of the city itself, and because, of all targets, New York has a certain clear priority. In the mind of whatever perverted dreamer might loose the lightning, New York must hold a steady, irresistible charm.

Letters to my later years

I sometimes look back on the things I thought as a child, teen, or 20-something and I'm slightly embarassed. That being said I really wonder where a 35 year old version of myself will stand in relation to myself now. At 27 have I finally latched onto a respectable track?

Its not a grave concern, but I always try to take it a little slower. I watch most of my friends sacrafice time and socilization to go after master's degrees and doctorates. I don't know what they're thinking. Maybe its some sort of artists temperment, but I'm always watching life from the third person. And so now when I'm thinking of what life will look like now from 8 years on, everythings little specs in a sprawling city of bright lights. When I think back to my life as, say, a 23 year old, its from a distance, theres just people riding in train cars and busese. I can watch the successes and rejections from a lunar-distance and pretend it was all a story. I'm not the same person now as I was then, and maybe it helps to distance myself.

I seem to review everything floating high above the city, watching where I was and where the large picture was headed. What went on downtown that New Years Eve I spent making sure you didn't puke on the floor. When we watched bad netflix choices and ate leftovers that wouldn't upset your stomach. I never know who these women are, but I've got a bad feeling their all placeholders in a narritive I've written for myself. I'd guess I date the ones that come closest to fitting the mold, but like an old literary idol of mine, I'm still trying to close a West Egg gap that I can never find a bridge for.

Last night I couldn't sleep, and I thought of all the conversations I would have if I ever ran into the ex's of mine. Who would get the ire I'd promised when it was freshly ended, who I never really stopped thinking about and what i'd tell them. I'm less angry as an older man, and less paraoid; fewer things really bother me. I'm wondering if its all the narration I'm using when I watch the world these days. As a reactionary teen, everything was immediate. Post-grad I'm adjusting. At 35 will I be world apart?

Maybe I'll just become one with nature like the Sweetheart of Song Tra Bong, fading into the landscape and all that crap. I never did like Jewett anyhow.

Where my dreams lay dead.

If you're looking to write there are a few go to sources that always help and one of those is Ranier Maria Rilke's "Letters to a Young Poet." Its a fairly large piece of work, as instructionals go, but the one thing that struck me while reading it was this line (that I didn't memorize, I went back and dug it up):

And even if you found yourself in some prison, whose walls let in none of the world's sounds - wouldn't you still have your childhood, that jewel beyond all price, that treasure house of memories?

He obviously couldn't go into every detail about how you ought to utalize you're memories, but for me it always works best when I meet those thoughts with the new, raw current reality of the situation.

Take for example: Caldor.

A buddy of mine I met back in college, who I should mention has a penchant for odd things, recently made his Facebook photo the old Caldor Rainbow (which had 3 of the ugliest colors you could think of put together; looked like Thanksgiving year round). I went to Google and poked around in the results for "caldor" and what I found was a little jarring.

If I had to make something up off of the top of my head, I'd imagine there are memories you have with prolonged traditions: Christmas at your Mothers house, The Town 4th of July Parade, friends backyard cookouts. And then there are memories you have because somethings gone like, say, old department stores, friends/family who've passed away, ect.

The thing about the latter is that you don't really conciously record that things are going away. Generally (as the topic here is Caldor) you wouldn't be shopping at a business right before its closing down(this is why its closing down). So generally, it has to come flooding back years later because something tripped that memory. Today I found tons of information on the chains successes and failures but the most striking were these photos.







Caldor wasn't the only game in town where I grew up, but it was the closets game to my house, and our end of the city so it held some fairly solid memories for me. It was always where my dad would take my brother and I for Valentines Day to get my mother earings, or perfume, or something foolish. I remember once I ran into my Little League coach doing the same thing there. That was the norm, everyone did that as far as I knew. Whenever my mother and my grandmother would go shopping, it was the best place because at least they had a toy section we could go play in while they shopped around.

When I look at these photos now I see two things: The first being a place that vanished overnight and came up too late, like a childhood friend you remember after reaing the obituary. The second is what that must feel like to towns and cities who haven't been as lucky. Taunton is pretty resiliant and financially strong. Where our Caldor was other businesses have opened up and its thriving. But to anyone who saw the 56 jobs a stroe held vanish only to be replaced by the wind-swept barron parkinglots full of nothing is a little heartbreaking.

I look at those photos and know that there are children out there in dying communities that don't get to buy cheap-o gifts for their families, and couldn't if the store was still there. Money's tight these days, and jobs are scare. I don't think I needed the cadavar of some long-lost memory to tell me that, but I can't help thinking about it when the crime scene shows up in the local paper.

Army of Wasps

I always wished i lived a wasp lifestyle. Not because I want to own a yatch or drink at lunch (though it would be nice) but because family was a lot tighter. And its tightness led to power.

In a discussion over a David Brooks article, I sent the above lines to my father. it was odd in a way because our family, comparitivly, has been fairly fractured.But family, regardless of bloodline, has always been a tremendous source of power by virtue of their indispensiblity. Which is not to say they're valuable, just unshakeable.

I'm about to finish up Kennedy & Nixion which, if you're into this sort of thing, is phenominal in its informational overload. But for all the money the Kennedy's had, and for all of their political connections, what served them best, longest was that there were 3 or 4 guys who always looked out for the best interests of the family. In a world where few can rely on much, having an expansive family drive toward the same mission might make you more successful than much else.

I think I respect the frugality of the WASP, too, because of the long term vision it held. If you read the Brooks article, he notes that company owners hadned businesses down to their blood. It lead to long term thinking. So too did the tightness of the wallet. Ensuring the financial independance of your own children, but instilling them with the hardened, Yankee-hillside discipline and social resolve meant they could drive like an arrow at intended goals with an alarming success rate.

I use to end journal entries with some form of closing position that today I feel gave it an overdramatic gravity I'm too aware of to use anymore. For my own dignity, and maybe another offspring of an old brahman dream i'm still waiting to realize.