It Only Seems Like Forever

It only seems like forever. But January will see the release of the Gena Rowlands Band's "La Merde et Les Etoiles." This disc has been years in the making. Several labels have pursued it, then dropped it. Apparently no one knows what to make of it - except Autoclave and Lujo. Perhaps if you quiz me in just the right way I'll reveal the shocking list of labels who tried to wrap their heads around it but couldn't. These are labels whose names you definitely know and probably respect. Me, I don't think there's anything that crazy about these songs.

Yesterday I made a list of all the half-finished songs I've been working on. They break down into two basic kinds which I mentally label "mersh" and "kamikaze." The mersh songs are straightforward, a little rootsy, immediately graspable. They're good. Then the kamaikaze songs are unconventional, challenging, spacious, seditious, moving. They're good. There's enough for two albums. Not sure what to do about that.

But a recent tour with The Out_Circuit fired me up to play shows. That's where it's at, that magical hour, not this tedious record biz crap.

A Requiem For Pacifism

It's sort of quaint to be called a faggot from the window of a speeding pickup truck. It says, "Hello, welcome to North Adams, Mass., incest capital of the northeast," where I spent the last three weeks. It's quaint not just because that last happened to me in third grade. And not because I now - as then - like girls. But that sort of thing happens less and less in the big city and really, for me, captures a certain Rockwellian rusticity which has been pushed out of my urban neighborhood by mega-million selling homophobic utterances by DMX, Eminem and the like.

Sure, when that grit in the truck yelled, I wanted to beat his ass sideways. Of course. Even those who may not be able to raise the same technical objections to the term don't like to be called faggot in that tone of voice. Naturally, said grit was too chicken to stop. Modern faggots are not the 98 lb. weaklings of yore. Or, I dunno, maybe it was my hat. Either way, after I yelled and flicked him off like the enlightened guy I am, the fantasy that sprang to mind involved smashing his windshield, pulling him through it, and breaking his teeth out.

With a lisp.

Hi, my name is Bob and I write sensitive songs.

http://www.genarowlandsband.com
http://www.autoclaverecords.com
http://www.lujorecords.com