12.18.2008

Metal-Rules.com interviews Flaming Tusk

Canadian metal webthing Metal-Rules.com has published their interview with Flaming Tusk.

Read and weep here.

12.09.2008

Flaming Tusk in Underground Rising Podcast #12

Dark Sky Records has included two tracks from Flaming Tusk's Abigail EP in the twelfth edition of their Underground Rising podcast.

We're on there with four other unsigned bands, and the podcast is distributed for free via the iTunes Music Store so go ahead and click on the link above if you've got iTunes installed.

12.01.2008

Flaming Tusk's "Abigail" EP reviewed by Metal-Rules.com

Hanntu at Canadian metalhead web mecca Metal-Rules.com has reviewed Flaming Tusk's Abigail EP, rating it 3 out of 5 (which translates to "recommended for serious fans" on their scale).


Metal-Rules says:

This five piece band from Astoria, New York plays an eclectic mix of death, black and thrash metal that draws as much musical influence from The Doors and Black Sabbath as Immortal, via Emperor and Deicide and Testament... Singer Stolas Trephinator mixes up tortured gurgles and screams with death roars to great effect, and the fact that I’m reminded of Schmier, Zetro Souza, Abbath and Glen Benton can only be a good thing. And it’s well worth you to taking the time to read their twisted lyrics, seeing as how ABIGAIL was inspired by the true story of Abigail Taylor (I won’t spoil it for you here but you can look it up on Wikipedia)... With the jagged, doom-ish riffing and the black/death vocals, ABIGAIL is a great debut effort. With the inevitable improvement on later albums in the lyrics department as the band matures, Flaming Tusk will be one to keep an eye out for.


Read the full review by clicking here


There's more to come from Metal-Rules.com w/r/t Flaming Tusk, so stay tuned.
And, of course, download the Abigail EP.

Flaming Tusk photo op

FT buddy Andrew Lynch dropped by the house yesterday to take some Flaming Tusk band photos for our upcoming profile on metal-rules.com. I fiddled with a color treatment on one of my favorites, with the following result:

Flaming Tusk

10.30.2008

W.

Last night as we were on our way out of the theater following a screening of W., my ladyfriend and I were asked to record an interview with a Swedish radio journalist regarding our feelings on both the movie and the actual man. Since I've apparently represented the entirety of America on the Swedish airwaves, I suppose it's appropriate now to spout my feelings to the rest of the world.

When I first became aware of the existence of W., my reaction was that it's simply far too easy to take two-plus hours' worth of shots at our still-President. How, I thought, could a comedy about a self-parody really be all that interesting? It wasn't until much later that I learned the movie had been directed by Oliver Stone, and while I'm by no means a fan of all, or possibly even most, of Stone's films I was was intrigued enough to put W. on the "will see" list.

I think it's not giving too much away to say that the movie charts the course of George W. Bush's life from his induction into a frat at Yale until just before the 2004 presidential campaign (also, the boat sinks!). Structurally, it intercuts his distant past with more recent past in an attempt to evoke resonances between events in Bush II's first term and his troubled history.

To use a term of technical film criticism jargon, my reaction to the movie was more or less 'meh'. I do give credit to Stone and screenwriter Stanley Weiser for attempting to draw Bush as a semi-real character rather than a pure caricature. What they could not overcome was the fact that George W. Bush simply isn't a very interesting man.

So Bush is an alcoholic, privileged rich boy who's had everything handed to him his whole life and suffers from extreme Daddy Issues? Gee, that's fresh and compelling. And how do you draw an audience into the inner life of a guy who pretty clearly lacks one? The closest we get is visualization of Bush's "happy place": being all alone on the field at the empty Texas Rangers stadium.

Far too many scenes build to, essentially, punchlines consisting of well-known Bushisms with which we are all too familiar. There's an overall lack of drama stemming from the audience's foreknowledge of every single event that's going to happen. This, of course, is an issue with any biopic or historical fiction, but what one generally hopes for is interesting characters and an evocation of the tension those characters felt during the events in question. In W., the Grand Events are generally dispensed with via stock (and/or artfully altered) news footage after which we are treated to dramatizations of conversations had by the Big Players Involved. Maybe the revelation of Dick Cheney's grand worldview of American Empire is supposed to be shocking but, really, how can it be at this stage?

Speaking of said players, I must give credit for both best performance and most interesting characterization in W. to Jeffrey Wright for his portrayal of Gen. Colin Powell. Making Powell the sympathetic character in the Bush administration was most likely a gimme for Stone and Co., but it does work. Conversely, Thandie Newton's Condoleezza Rice is simply a silly cartoon. Elizabeth Banks's Laura Bush is boring as hell, but then again so is Laura Bush. Richard Dreyfuss is excellent as Dick Cheney and deserves praise for a relatively subtle performance given his source material.

Swedish Radio wanted my opinion on how W. was likely to affect the Bush legacy. I told them that Bush's legacy was written long before this film, and that even without it Bush will be remembered at best as a President who not only failed in everything he attempted to do (unless the plan was to create a state of perpetual war and chaos, which is entirely likely), but diminished the power and stature of the United States to such a degree that American hegemony over world affairs is likely over forever.

If that latter point is true perhaps I should be grateful to W.

10.24.2008

criticism!

No musical thing I've ever been involved with has been reviewed before. Before now, that is.
Venerable metal blog Chronicles Of Chaos has written up Flaming Tusk's Abigail EP in their Demos department. Read the review.

10.20.2008

regarding Sarah Palin

A longtime reader (hi, Dad!) wrote me to express his surprise that I hadn't written anything about Sarah Palin in this space. Perhaps I've been attempting to ignore her so as not to feed the troll.

I would write Sarah Palin off as a cartoon, a self-parody and a caricature if it weren't for two things: the success of her demagoguery and the insult to women she embodies.

The former is, of course, the reason she was brought onto the McCain ticket. In addition to transparently and cynically attempting to attract disgruntled Hillary Clinton supporters, McCain's campaign realized that Palin was perfectly cast to play well to white suburbanites and rustics suffering from Authoritarian Personality. She's somebody they can "relate to" who is "like them". While McCain had to attempt to appeal to the majority of Americans, Palin was tasked with currying the favor of reactionaries, racists, medieval-minded Christianists, jingoists and homophobes. Her affected "golly-goshdarnit" aspect puts an apple-cheeked mask on the grinning demon of insinuation, hissing at us to wonder "who Barack Obama really is". Let's not forget that the base she is pandering to isn't merely the bedrock of a political party, but the lowest and meanest parts of human nature.

Her candidacy is an insult to American women, particularly those who've devoted their lives to achieving some kind of political parity with men. However, it's not merely the fact that she was chosen specifically because she is a woman which causes offense, or the attempted manipulation of the female electorate evidenced by her selection. Rather, it is the particular stereotype of femininity she chooses to adopt as her public persona.

It's popular to characterize Sarah Palin as stupid. I find it difficult to believe that anyone can achieve political success, especially on the national stage, by being staggeringly unintelligent. Even George W. Bush, who is by no means an intellectual, clearly has a type of fratboyish social smarts. However, it is clear that Palin is more than happy to appear, accurately or otherwise, like a rampaging airhead. Proudly oblivious of key foreign policy ("what's the Bush Doctrine?"), unable to name credible news publications that she reads to inform herself, inability to speak in public without clumsily relying on GOP talking points... the list continues to grow. She epitomizes two of the most contemptible aspects of modern right-wing politics: the populist appeal of total ignorance ("hey, she's an idiot like me! I really relate to that!"), and the denial of responsibility via rejection of reality as evidenced by her reaction so far to Troopergate.

As an aside, this may be brilliant positioning for her role as Vice President, since under Cheney it has become clear that the new purpose for the VP office is to manage all the outrageously illegal activities that the White House cares to undertake. The Republicans, via Alberto Gonzales and many others, have clearly demonstrated their belief that public expressions of abject incompetence are a viable legal defense against charges of criminality. Perhaps by installing as Vice President a woman who goes out of her way to cultivate an aura of ditziness the nascent McCain administration is merely taking the next logical step to cover the ass of the Imperial Presidency.

In sum, the women of the United States have been offered as their political champion a picture perfect cliché of the subservient, ignorant, photogenic Conservative Woman. Her politics, of course, are also essentially anti-woman, what with her refusal to recognize that the decisions to carry her daughter's pregnancy to term and to essentially force her daughter into a loveless marriage with the mullethead who knocked Bristol up are choices. Palin's antique religious philosophy doesn't do her gender any favors, either. I shudder to think of the impact her election may have on a generation of American girls, and that's sad. Her elevation to office should be a cause for celebration, and it would be if her place was taken by any number of other, vastly more qualified women.

For me the possible election of a McCain/Palin ticket smacks far too heavily of a dystopian sci-fi novel in which the President dies in office to be replaced by a moronic religious zealot who decides that launching all our nukes at Canada is exactly what Jesus wants.

Remember, everbody: turnout, turnout, turnout. Go vote.

10.16.2008

good feedback

Vanshnookenraggen seems to like the Flaming Tusk EP.

WARNING: EXTREMELY BRUTAL

People of the world.

NYC extreme metal band Flaming Tusk has just released their first EP, Abigail, onto an unsuspecting world.

To download it for free, in pretty much every possible digital format, visit flamingtusk.com and click on Music, or visit our bandcamp.mu page, or use this handy embedded player:







Abigail (Guts Down The Drain) by Flaming Tusk





TOTALLY NOT RESPONSIBLE FOR MELTED FACES

10.09.2008

title imminent

The Flaming Tusk demo has been promoted to the Flaming Tusk EP. Title TBA.

Add flamingtusk.com to your RSS feed reader, or just, y'know, keep checking back.

Plus I'm sure I'll announce it here.

Hail.

9.25.2008

you keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.

People are flipping the hell out about the Canon EOS 5D MKII and the fact that, in addition to stills, it shoots 1080 HD digital video as well. A primary culprit in the hype about this functionality seems to be Vincent Laforet and this blog post of his.

Now, I do not disagree that the 5D MKII is most likely a very nice camera, and furthermore I think the 1080 video capture feature is pretty cool. What it most certainly is not, however, is a game-changer in the professional cinematography world.

Vincent claims, or at least repeats claims, in that blog post that the 5D MKII shoots "full resolution 1080p RAW footage". This is wildly inaccurate, as a brief glance at the official specs sheet makes plain. To quote:

Movie Type: MOV (Video: H.264...)

H.264 compression is not at all RAW. Not even close. It is, in fact, quite highly (if nicely) compressed*. So let's not dupe people into thinking that they're getting RAW HD video footage from this camera.

Vincent also quotes an unnamed "top commercial film editor who regularly edits RED camera footage" as saying that the 5D MKII's low-light performance is “far superior to the RED camera”. From the test footage that I've seen, this is impossible to say. It is clear that the 5D MKII applies a quite strong gamma curve to the image (and other color processing), rolling the shadows off into oblivion. Granted, this is a very common procedure in video post (crushing contrast), but the fact that the 5D MKII is doing so in-camera makes it impossible to tell how noisy the shadow areas actually are. Applying permanent gamma curves in-camera is also by no means a hallmark of RAW footage. If you actually look at RAW 2K, 3K or 4K footage (from, say, the RED One camera) you'll notice that it actually looks rather desaturated and has fairly flat contrast... until you apply your own color and gamma curves. This, friends, is the point of RAW video capture: to give you maximum possible pixels and minimum pre-processing of the image so you have a beautifully pixel-rich canvas on which to work your color grading magic in post-production.

As another nitpick to set against the claim that this camera will somehow be widely adopted for professional (or even pro-am) cinematography is the fact that you are limited to a 30fps framerate. No 24 or 25 fps capture? No varispeed for fast or slow motion? Good luck interesting most cinematographers.

Also, while Canon-compatible still lenses are very nice I seriously doubt you're going to find any cinematographer who's itching to stop using the huge variety of extant PL-mount cinematography lenses made by Cooke, Angenieux and others.

In summary, while the 5D MKII seems to be an excellent DSLR the 1080p video capture feature is likely to be used as nothing more than a nice added-value functionality for stills photographers and photojournalists. I find it highly improbable that it will find any significant adoption in the cinematography world. And please, let's not continue to make wild claims about RAW 1080 video capture.


*What sets "raw" apart from "not raw" image capture isn't so much lack of compression (even though that's what I seized upon in the post above), it's whether or not the image has been "demosaiced" (or, if you prefer, de-Bayered) into an RGB image. AFAIK there's no way to generate an H.264 file that isn't RGB or YUV, meaning that the image must have been de-Bayered at some point and is therefore no longer "raw".

9.22.2008

whew.

Good lord, a lot of mail piles up when you aren't paying attention to anything but work for three weeks. I guess that means there's still a world out there.

Overhead

As Good As Dead was a pretty great experience overall, and it feels good to be done with working on my first feature film as a crew member. My hope that taking on a freelance job as a RED tech would allow me to meet some good people and move closer to my ultimate career goals was pretty well validated, fortunately. If I'm very lucky I might get to have some small hand in the post process for the movie but even if I don't I did impress quite a few folks with my editing and made some excellent contacts.

We had the wrap party at swanky meatpacking district club Tenjune, which was nifty even if the open bar only lasted two hours, and I had the pleasure of indtroducing my special ladyfriend to Cary Elwes. Good stuff, good stuff.

Seize Them! appears to have landed a monthly residency at Tribeca nightspot Uncle Mike's, which we're all quite excited about. Our first show of the series is this Saturday, 9/27, at 10:15PM. Come on by if you're in the area.

Flaming Tusk has begun recording our "2008 Demo", as we're calling it. Looks like we're going to have five songs ready to go in a couple of weeks. The goal is to book a debut show for Halloween night. If all else fails we'll just throw our own party, of course.

Poor Xristophage

9.08.2008

imaginemerunningbywhileshoutingthis

Hoo boy, so much going on.

I am writing from the set of the in-progress indie thriller feature film As Good As Dead, on which I am performing the services of a RED camera technician. Basically this means that I try to keep the cameras running (they're using two), and I back up all the footage from the cameras and deliver it to the post facility the production is using. It's been pretty fun so far, if tiring, and it's cool to get to work with Cary Elwes, Andie MacDowell, Frank Whaley, Matt Dallas and Jess Weixler.

They're still in search of an editor, which is a bit painful for me. When the producer dropped by the room where I was working to announce to the production staff that an ad needed to be placed so they could find an "experienced editor" I turned around and said "well, there's me!". Sadly, my lack of feature credits precludes me from consideration (for now, anyway) despite having quickly thrown together an edit of part of a scene that was praised highly by several producers and inspired the director to say to me "that's really good! You're a good editor. Want to cut the movie?". The director, sadly, does not have a lot of clout on this particular picture. Still, I'm trying to be a good sport about it and I hold out some small hope because the production is having a tremendously difficult time finding an editor with the necessary experience who will work for the amount of money they're offering. We shall see.

Band stuff is going pretty well. Seize Them! has a show coming up on 9/27 at Uncle Mike's in Manhattan, and Flaming Tusk is in preparations to play our debut show on Halloween.

Congratulations and kudos to my friend, author Chris Krovatin (better known to his bandmates as Stolas Trephinator), on the release of his latest novel, Venomous. Pick it up if you're into dark YA fiction. I'll begin reading my personalized copy right after I finish White Noise.

8.01.2008

the truest freedom is having no rights at all, I guess

"The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized."

Hey, guess who officially doesn't have any 4th Amendment protection anymore? You, citizen, if you're crossing the border into the United States.

The Washington Post has revealed that it is Department of Homeland Security policy that their border agents may seize, "absent individualized suspicion", "any device capable of storing information in digital or analog form," including hard drives, flash drives, cell phones, iPods, pagers, beepers, and video and audio tapes. They also cover "all papers and other written documentation," including books, pamphlets and "written materials commonly referred to as 'pocket trash' or 'pocket litter.'"

Additionally, the DHS reserves the right to "share copies of [the data] with other agencies and private entities for language translation, data decryption or other reasons". Also, they can hold on to your belongings as long as they desire... most likely just enough time to grab all those nude photos you took of your girlfriend during your vacation to the French Riviera that you thought you'd so cleverly stashed in that hidden directory.

All joking aside, though, this is unbelievably outrageous. Having your laptop (or, remember, "any device capable of storing information in digital or analog form,") seized indefinitely to be scoured, copied, shared and sifted for any hint of wrongdoing (or wrongthinking, one must assume) "absent individualized suspicion" is not only the definition of unreasonable search and seizure, it is blatant tyranny.

Have a nice trip, citizen.

7.23.2008

developments

Many things are happening.

Firstly, I've made the transition from full-time employee to freelancer and I think I'm going to be much happier. I expect to get a fair amount of editing work through the company I previously worked for full-time, and I'm free to seek out other work elsewhere. What made all of this possible was an opportunity (thanks be to DJ Porkcube) to work with OffHollywood Digital as an on-set technician for the RED Digital Cinema cameras they rent out to major productions. I'm really looking forward to that... I love being on a film set full of professionals working at the top of their game, and no one can deny that I like playing with expensive, hi-tech toys. So, ideally, I'll be able to pick up a couple of days of work each week being a RED pimp and a couple of other days of editing work, which will leave me with ample time to work on things for my bands Seize Them! and Flaming Tusk (no website just yet, folks).

Secondly, huge congratulations to my friends in Boston-area band The Luxury for winning a slot as an opening act for Coldplay's August 4th show in Boston. The show is sold out, but if you happen to be going give The Luxury some love and t-shirt dollars. They gathered enough votes in the WFNX-sponsored contest to land them in the top three, which meant they'd get presented to Coldplay as a potential opener, and then Coldplay chose them. Good on ya, guys.

Thirdly, plans have been made to fly to Columbus, Ohio next month to continue shooting the Everything, Kansas documentary. We've had a few setbacks with some of our interview subjects going through some major life upheavals, but the project moves forward. Also, I'll be up in Boston this weekend to attend Christa Terry's party for the release of her book iDo: Planning Your Wedding With Nothing But 'Net and to shoot some followup footage with her and her husband Tedd.

Fourthwise, Seize Them! will be playing the world famous Knitting Factory New York on August 15th, quite late in the evening. We're very excited about this and anyone who can get to the city should definitely come on out. Details are available at the seizethem.com Gig Calendar.

7.04.2008

this is what the world is for, making electricity

Yeah, it's overwhelming, but what else can we do?
get jobs in offices and wake up for the morning commute?


If we must define the Anthem of the Summer as The Song I Can't Stop Listening To, then I'm declaring for MGMT's "Time To Pretend".

In perhaps the only way fitting for a summer brainworm, Time To Pretend seems to be the sole really worthwhile track on MGMT's album, Oracular Spectacular, but let's not be curmudgeons in the face of joy. "Electric Feel" is pretty damned good, too. "Time To Pretend" hits me right in the heartbone with what are, let's face it, gimme lyrics tuned specifically to my particular species of rootless suburban refugee. A wink and a nod to ya, boys... your alchemist knew what she was doing when you two went into the retort.

6.27.2008

DETHKLOK CONCERT-TYPE THEATRICAL HYBRID EVENT

DethGene and DethBrendon
Dethklok, playing the Nokia Theater in Manhattan on 6/25/08

It was my first time at the Nokia Theater (where, yes, they display phones on the walls and have a "charging station" for your "handheld"), and I realized that the last time I'd been in that space was back when it was the Astor movie theater... I'm pretty sure I saw the re-release of 2001 there a few years ago.

My crew of folks, like many others in attendance, chose to skip the opening act. Dethklok went on around 10PM. Seeing full-length animated music videos for each song was pretty cool ("Murmaider" being a standout), though I wish overall I had a better view of the real, physical band. The photo above was taken during the encore, "Hatredy", which was dedicated to George Carlin and for which they had no animation and turned up the stage lights.

It's hard to think of the Dethklok show as a totally legit concert, but it was certainly an event, and I had a really good time. I've had a bit of a heterosexual man crush on Brendon Small for quite some time, having been a big Home Movies fan, and it was very cool for me to see him up there rocking out.

The performances of the songs were more or less note-perfect to the recordings on Dethalbum, which is, I suppose, what one would expect and many would desire. I'm always left a touch cold by rote performances, but when you have to sync your rocking to pre-recorded video well enough so that your singing matches your cartoon counterpart's lips, I guess there's nothing to be done other than slave yourself to a click track. Then again, drummer Gene Hoglan is known as "the atomic clock" so maybe I'm off the mark here.

One minus point was the sponsorship by some videogame called "Bad Company". As a mark of how old I am, when I saw the banner for it out by the merch area I briefly assumed it was an advertisement for a new Bad Company album, so it was significantly less hilarious to me to discover its true nature. Really, at any other rock show I'd be pretty offended by being advertised to with a pre-show video clip, but considering Dethklok's source as an ad-supported television show I kinda let it slide.

Soon enough, Dethklok will be opening for Flaming Tusk.

6.10.2008

thank you, Rep. Kucinich

Well, my deadline for Impeachment by the Ides has well passed. However, I was very pleased to hear this morning that Rep. Dennis Kucinich introduced a "Notification of Intent to Offer Resolution" of articles of impeachment against president George W. Bush. I assume he felt that the timing was appropriate, what with the long-awaited publication of Phase II of the Senate Intelligence Committee Reports on Prewar Iraq Intelligence (short version: surprise! The Administration lied about everything everyone's been saying they were lying about all along. Whee!)

Now, I'm not terribly well versed in Congressional protocol but my assumption is that the Resolution has not technically been presented for consideration by anyone. However, the entire text was read into the Congressional Record. The entire text can be found here, in .pdf form, but rather than reproduce it in its entirety below I will, rather, include the Article headings which go a long way to telling the whole story of why it is vital that Bush be removed from office.

There's little likelihood of all thirty-five articles making it into any final impeachment, and several of the Articles, while certainly scathing damnations of Bush and his Administration, are probably not appropriate for impeachment (at least, on their own), but it is a fairly complete litany of the Administration's more proveable crimes. The order of presentation is somewhat questionable as well, but this is niggling. I've highlighted my personal favorites in bold:

Resolved, That President George W. Bush be impeached for high crimes and misdemeanors, and that the following articles of impeachment be exhibited to the United States Senate:

ARTICLE I.—CREATING A SECRET PROPAGANDA CAMPAIGN TO MANUFACTURE A FALSE CASE FOR WAR AGAINST IRAQ

ARTICLE II.—FALSELY, SYSTEMATICALLY, AND WITH CRIMINAL INTENT CONFLATING THE ATTACKS OF SEPTEMBER 11, 2001 WITH MISREPRESENTATION OF IRAQ AS AN IMMINENT SECURITY THREAT AS PART OF A FRAUDULENT JUSTIFICATION FOR A WAR OF AGGRESSION

ARTICLE III.—MISLEADING THE AMERICAN PEOPLE AND MEMBERS OF CONGRESS TO BELIEVE IRAQ POSSESSED WEAPONS OF MASS DESTRUCTION, SO AS TO MANUFACTURE A FALSE CASE FOR WAR

ARTICLE IV.—MISLEADING THE AMERICAN PEOPLE AND MEMBERS OF CONGRESS TO BELIEVE IRAQ POSED AN IMMINENT THREAT TO THE UNITED STATES

ARTICLE V.—ILLEGALLY MISSPENDING FUNDS TO SECRETLY BEGIN A WAR OF AGGRESSION

ARTICLE VI.—INVADING IRAQ IN VIOLATION OF THE REQUIREMENTS OF H.J. RES. 114

ARTICLE VII.—INVADING IRAQ ABSENT A DECLARATION OF WAR

ARTICLE VIII.—INVADING IRAQ, A SOVEREIGN NATION, IN VIOLATION OF THE UN CHARTER AND INTERNATIONAL CRIMINAL LAW

ARTICLE IX.—FAILING TO PROVIDE TROOPS WITH BODY ARMOR AND VEHICLE ARMOR

ARTICLE X.—FALSIFYING ACCOUNTS OF U.S. TROOP DEATHS AND INJURIES FOR POLITICAL PURPOSES

ARTICLE XI.—ESTABLISHMENT OF PERMANENT U.S. MILITARY BASES IN IRAQ

ARTICLE XII.—INITIATING A WAR AGAINST IRAQ FOR CONTROL OF THAT NATION’S NATURAL RESOURCES

ARTICLE XIII.—CREATING A SECRET TASK FORCE TO DEVELOP ENERGY AND MILITARY POLICIES WITH RESPECT TO IRAQ AND OTHER COUNTRIES

ARTICLE XIV.—MISPRISION OF A FELONY, MISUSE AND EXPOSURE OF CLASSIFIED INFORMATION AND OBSTRUCTION OF JUSTICE IN THE MATTER OF VALERIE PLAME WILSON, CLANDESTINE AGENT OF THE CENTRAL INTELLIGENCE AGENCY

ARTICLE XV.—PROVIDING IMMUNITY FROM PROSECUTION FOR CRIMINAL CONTRACTORS IN IRAQ

ARTICLE XVI.—RECKLESS MISSPENDING AND WASTE OF US TAX DOLLARS IN CONNECTION WITH IRAQ CONTRACTORS

ARTICLE XVII.—ILLEGAL DETENTION: DETAINING INDEFINITELY AND WITHOUT CHARGE PERSONS BOTH U.S. CITIZENS AND FOREIGN CAPTIVES

ARTICLE XVIII.—TORTURE: SECRETLY AUTHORIZING, AND ENCOURAGING THE USE OF TORTURE AGAINST CAPTIVES IN AFGHANISTAN, IRAQ, AND OTHER PLACES, AS A MATTER OF OFFICIAL POLICY

ARTICLE XIX.—RENDITION: KIDNAPPING PEOPLE AND TAKING THEM AGAINST THEIR WILL TO ‘‘BLACK SITES’’ LOCATED IN OTHER NATIONS, INCLUDING NATIONS KNOWN TO PRACTICE TORTURE

ARTICLE XX.—IMPRISONING CHILDREN

ARTICLE XXI.—MISLEADING CONGRESS AND THE AMERICAN PEOPLE ABOUT THREATS FROM IRAN, AND SUPPORTING TERRORIST ORGANIZATIONS WITHIN IRAN, WITH THE GOAL OF OVERTHROWING THE IRANIAN GOVERNMENT

ARTICLE XXII—CREATING SECRET LAWS

ARTICLE XXIII—VIOLATION OF THE POSSE COMITATUS ACT

ARTICLE XXIV.—SPYING ON AMERICAN CITIZENS, WITHOUT A COURT-ORDERED WARRANT, IN VIOLATION OF THE LAW AND THE FOURTH AMENDMENT

ARTICLE XXV.—DIRECTING TELECOMMUNICATIONS COMPANIES TO CREATE AN ILLEGAL AND UNCONSTITUTIONAL DATABASE OF THE PRIVATE TELEPHONE NUMBERS AND EMAILS
OF AMERICAN CITIZENS
(ed. note: I have a feeling 'numbers' will be edited to read 'calls' in the final draft)

ARTICLE XXVI.—ANNOUNCING THE INTENT TO VIOLATE LAWS WITH SIGNING STATEMENTS, AND VIOLATING THOSE LAWS

ARTICLE XXVII.—FAILING TO COMPLY WITH CONGRESSIONAL SUBPOENAS AND INSTRUCTING FORMER EMPLOYEES NOT TO COMPLY

ARTICLE XXVIII.—TAMPERING WITH FREE AND FAIR ELECTIONS, CORRUPTION OF THE ADMINISTRATION OF JUSTICE

ARTICLE XXIX.—CONSPIRACY TO VIOLATE THE VOTING RIGHTS ACT OF 1965

ARTICLE XXX.—MISLEADING CONGRESS AND THE AMERICAN PEOPLE IN AN ATTEMPT TO DESTROY MEDICARE

ARTICLE XXXI.—KATRINA: FAILURE TO PLAN FOR THE PREDICTED DISASTER OF HURRICANE KATRINA, FAILURE TO RESPOND TO A CIVIL EMERGENCY

ARTICLE XXXII.—MISLEADING CONGRESS AND THE AMERICAN PEOPLE, SYSTEMATICALLY UNDERMINING EFFORTS TO ADDRESS GLOBAL CLIMATE CHANGE

ARTICLE XXXIII.—REPEATEDLY IGNORED AND FAILED TO RESPOND TO HIGH LEVEL INTELLIGENCE WARNINGS OF PLANNED TERRORIST ATTACKS IN THE US, PRIOR TO 911

ARTICLE XXXIV.—OBSTRUCTION OF INVESTIGATION INTO THE ATTACKS OF SEPTEMBER 11, 2001

ARTICLE XXXV.—ENDANGERING THE HEALTH OF 9/11 FIRST RESPONDERS

I suppose putting the issues related to the Iraq War first satisfy the "if it bleeds, it leads" dictum of public relations, but personally I think the strongest arguments for impeachment lie further down, in discussion of secret laws, extralegal imprisonment, etc.

Remember: the importance of impeachment is not in the satisfaction of punishing a Very Bad Boy, it's the official, public repudiation of the anticonstitutional actions of the current Administration and the intent to make sure the Executive Branch of the United States Government cannot continue on this course.

6.06.2008

ST! video now on YouTube

Well goll-lee, I guess we're a real live band now that we've got video on Teh YourTurbs.

Enjoy these clips from our record release show at Don Hill's on 4.25.08. Remember, you can download the whole show for free from seizethem.com. And, of course, our EP is still available on collectible, digipaked CD and via the iTunes Music Store Seize Them! - Seize Them! - EP and Amazon.com's MP3 store.

Cleoporchcat:




Drinking Song:




Ramble Tamble:


6.04.2008

Barack Obama For President

My sincere congratulations to Barack Obama for securing the probable Democratic nomination for the presidency. This morning I made my first-ever monetary contribution to a presidential campaign by donating here, and I strongly suggest you do the same. Obama has been able to come this far primarily with funding generated by small donors, and that needs to continue.

We, as a nation, now have the opportunity to elect this man and, thereby, indicate to the rest of the world that we're willing to join them in the 21st century as responsible global citizens. My great hope is that what can loosely be called "my generation", those of us 18-35 or so, will continue to rally behind Obama. It's our future we're deciding here, and if we want to get any kind of a decent start undoing the horror created by our predecessors it begins with this election.

5.21.2008

make me famous, using democracy

Seize Them! has entered yet another contest, this time with the intent of landing a slot at this year's Lollapalooza festival. Unlike the Ourstage thing I mentioned previously, you can actually go vote for us directly by following this link.
Vote early, vote often (once per day per email address... personally I've got four or five addresses to use), in the grand Chicago tradition. The number one band right now has 1020 votes after three days of vote casting, while we've got somewhere around 40, so as you can see we have a way to go.
Any and all voting is greatly appreciated.

5.07.2008

5.05.2008

museums can be fun



Kids enjoying Olafur Eliasson's Ventilator at MoMa in New York City.

4.28.2008

Seize Them! EP now on sale in various formats

Dear Internets,
At long last the Seize Them! EP (hereinafter referred to as the ST!EP) is a reality, the proof of which is that you can spend money and have one of your very own.

Those of you who like physical CDs in beautiful, collectible digipak packaging (and with a free sticker!) will want to either head over to the relevant page on the seizethem.com site, or see the sidebar on this blog for a Google Checkout link. If you prefer PayPal, we can accommodate that at the High Water Media webstore.

You hipper and anti-materialistic types might prefer to download your ephemera from the iTunes Music Store (click here: Seize Them! - Seize Them! - EP, or, again, use the link in the sidebar), or the Amazon.com MP3 Store.

In all cases the EP costs a mere $5. As Ferris Bueller says, "If you have the means, I highly recommend picking one up. It is so choice".

BONUS: Seize Them!'s 4.25.08 EP release show at Don Hill's is available for FREE DOWNLOAD from seizethem.com. Listen, and weep that you were not there to witness the glory. Or, if you were, it makes a nice souvenir!


Notice to Hillary Clinton (all others please ignore): Get out of the race. Obama has an insurmountable delegate lead unless you resort to antidemocratic massaging of "superdelegates", and Republicans will never vote for you. End the charade. Seriously. Also, your campaign behavior (and Bill's) has been disgusting and reprehensible.

4.14.2008

vote for ST! on OurStage.com

Hey, Golden, by Seize Them! on OurStage

I've entered three of our songs into competition at OurStage.com (prizes vary, but the important one is next month's contest for a slot at this year's Bonnaroo festival). The banner above will take you to Hey, Golden, but we've got Shimmery and Cleoporchcat on the site as well.

Take a minute to help us out, if you would be so kind, and we will be eternally grateful.

4.11.2008

endings

ST!EP FRONT

The self-titled Seize Them! EP is finished. It goes to the pressing plant today. Discs will be in hand by April 24, just in time for our record release show on April 25, and internet e-tailers like the iTunes Music Store, Amazon, Napster, etc., will have it up for sale by early June.

A huge debt of gratitude to our mixing and mastering engineer-cum-producer Don Red for his talent and tireless effort. Thanks, also, to so many other people that the only appropriate place to mention them is in the liner notes. Look for your name.



Here's a theory I made up in five seconds after seeing a headline: Katie Couric is positioning herself to become Hillary Clinton's press secretary. You heard it here first, folks.

3.20.2008

seriously, folks, we need this guy

This man must be elected president. If you haven't watched Barack Obama's recent speech, start with the first quarter of it below, and go on to the rest of it. Go ahead, seriously:



There are many noteable things here, of course, not the least of which is what Jon Stewart referred to as "talking to Americans as if they were adults". Is it as shocking to the rest of you, after all these years of utter mindlessness in the government, that you can actually watch and be enthralled by half an hour of a political speech?

The promise of an Obama presidency goes beyond the man himself to the, honestly, much more important question of the people Obama will bring into positions of power in the government. People like Samantha Power, who I mentioned in an earlier post. She's obviously on the outs for the moment, but I have no doubt she'd find a place in the Obama administration. Obama will surround himself with the people who have the worldview the United States needs to survive the early 21st century.


In music news, Seize Them! has finished recording all the instrument tracks for the upcoming, yet-to-be-named, EP (dropping in April!) and they are awesome. All that's left is vocal recording and a final mix. Very exciting.

I've been fiddling with the idea of a cover of Led Zeppelin's "Immigrant Song" in a bluegrass-esque style, and last night I whipped up a proof-of-concept demo just to see if it works. It does. Listen to it here, if you're interested.

3.04.2008

leap year rocking

Just a quick note to say that my band, Seize Them!, has posted the recording of our 2.29.08 show at Connolly's Klub 45 in Times Square to our website, seizethem.com. .mp3 and FLAC formats, as usual. Share and enjoy!

We'll be back at Connolly's on Mar. 28th, then at a Jam Solid Productions Battle of the Bands in Garwood, NJ on 4/20, then we have our EP release show at Don Hill's in TriBeCa on 4/25. Lots of live Seize Them! coming up for you to enjoy.

The EP is coming along well. Bass and drums tracking is finished, and this coming weekend will see all the guitar parts recorded. After that it's the keys and the vocals, and then we're into the final mix! Huzzah!

2.28.2008

I don't want to have to say 'I told you so'

In my earlier post about the necessity of impeaching the current President and Vice President, I offered as part of my rationale the imperative of repudiating as much of the Bush Doctrine, its associated assaults on the Constitution, and the general MO of the American Empire as possible. The danger inherent in failing to publicly reject the illegal and reprehensible powers that the current Executive has assumed to itself is that future Presidents will have the road open to them to do far worse.

Personally, I am supporting Barack Obama in the current contest (sorry, Ralph... I voted for you twice, but you're all done), in no small part because I believe his election will send a strong message to the rest of the world that the United States, recent evidence aside, is not entirely a nation of insane, jingoistic assholes and that we might actually take the idea of behaving as a modern global civilization somewhat seriously. Obama seems most willing to engage with the world on a constructive level and, more importantly, I think he has a sincere desire for the United States to be a good-faith shepherd of its empire.

That said, my support of him is not wildly enthusiastic because despite the extra plush he'll add to the velvet glove he is still a corporatist hegemonist, albeit a kinder, gentler one.

Clinton... well, none of us have any illusions about Hillary Clinton, now do we? She is, after all, the number one recipient of campaign contributions from the defense industry, even beating out John McCain1.

Both Clinton and Obama spend a lot of their airtime talking about 'withdrawing' from Iraq, and I've been commenting for nearly as long that as good as that sounds to our absurdity-fatigued ears it's a disingenuous statement at best and a total lie at worst. Both candidates plan to finish the mammoth diplomatic compound known as The Green Zone (a civilian contractor friend of mine who did a six-month stint in Iraq reminded me several times that there are many "green zones"), both candidates intend to leave tens of thousands of soldiers in Iraq to train and advise the Iraqi military, "combat Al Qaeda" and "neutralize Iran", both candidates will leave most if not all of the military bases we've constructed there in operation, and that massive diplomatic presence is going to require an equally massive security force.

The latter part is where it gets a bit depressing. We're all aware that the vast majority of diplomatic security for Americans in Iraq is provided by private, armed military contractors like Blackwater and their ilk. My feelings about the danger that extralegal, unaccountable paramilitary forces pose to both human life and democratic governance are well known, so I don't feel the need to go into detail here.

Barack Obama has also taken a public stand that unaccountable private militaries are dangerous and undesirable, for which I laud him. Obama sponsored a bill last year which sought to create a structure for prosecuting State Department contractors who commit crimes in extraterritorial areas of operation, for one thing. However, his actions seem to be drifting away from his rhetoric on this issue and I think this is a point on which he must be taken to task.

A "senior foreign policy adviser" (who is left unnamed in the article, but is almost certainly Samantha Power) told Jeremy Scahill in a recent The Nation interview that Obama "will not 'rule out' using private security companies like Blackwater Worldwide in Iraq" and that, further, "Obama does not plan to sign on to legislation that seeks to ban the use of these forces in US war zones by January 2009"2.

Now, it's true that Obama plans to increase funding for actual US Government diplomatic security forces, but the above article goes on to say that actually creating a diplomatic security force of the necessary size and training would literally take years. There are, apparently, only thirty six diplomatic security agents currently in Iraq who are actual US Government employees, as compared to Blackwater's thousand and other firms' hundreds3. If Obama's bill creating a prosecutorial structure for private contractors is not passed, and if Obama continues to refuse to support the Stop Outsourcing Security Act, we'll be left in exactly the same position we are now: with an unaccountable, extralegal Praetorian Guard.

Obama's campaign claims that we really have no good choices here and that this is an inherited problem. That it is an inherited problem is certainly true; that we have no choices is not. The obvious choice, and the one we've been led to believe we're getting, is a total withdrawal from Iraq barring the usual (read: drastically smaller than currently planned) diplomatic corps we have in all nations with whom we have relations. The United States' unwillingness to give up strategic territory that it has seized is what makes it appear that there are no choices. Obama can, and should, do better.


1. The Huffington Post: "Defense Industry Embraces Democrats, Hillary By Far The Favorite"
2. The Nation: "Obama's Mercenary Position"
3. Ibid.

2.14.2008

terminator? i hardly KNOW her!

I've suddenly become ambivalent about Fox's new series Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles. This happened more or less at the last minute; when I started watching the fifth episode I had every intention of removing the season pass from my TiVo and turning my back on the show entirely.

Briefly, for those who are unfamiliar with the premise, I will summarize. TSCC relates the continuing adventures of perpetually menaced mother Sarah Connor and her son John, the future savior of mankind. As in the movies which began the franchise, Skynet, the AI master of the world, sends robotic assassins back through time to murder John Connor and thereby remove the primary threat to its future hegemony. The human resistance in the future is able to provide a co-opted Terminator to protect young John, but in a departure from the previous stories this Terminator is significantly technologically superior to Skynet's typical soldiers. With this Terminator's help, Sarah and John attempt to do what they can in the present day (the series branches off from established continuity between T2 and T3 and brings the characters into 2007 from 1999) to thwart Skynet.

The Terminator universe bears returning to because it has, in the words of an associate of mine, every sci-fi trope you could want. Rogue AI, a post-apocalyptic future, robots, a young hero-to-be, time travel, time-traveling robots, hallucinatory alternate realties, etc. etc. However, the only way generic signifiers are made satisfying is by wrapping them around a story which feels true enough to its premises to enfold you in the characters' lives. Battlestar Galactica, for example, succeeds wildly at this (or, at least, seems to... I've come to the series very late and, as of this writing, have seen only the miniseries plus the first seven episodes).

TSCC is struggling with this problem right now. My primary complaints with the show all seem to turn on this issue of presenting drama which feels like it has flowed believably from the initial propositions of the plot. Verisimilitude, if you will.

I have so far been unable to match the characterizations of both John and Sarah Connor that we see on the screen with their, shall we say, idiosyncratic family history. They play their past significant lip service, but it has so far failed to come across as anything more than the typical family drama teenage squabbles, albeit with the survival of humanity at stake rather than, say, going to the prom with a shady date. At first I assumed this was the angle of the series, that the Connors were going to try to be A Real Family Despite The Insanity (John, you have a robotic killing machine for a sister, now!), and I feared excessive schmaltz. It may still be heading in this direction, but I was happy to see, in the fifth episode, that we may be reprieved of this and get an Ensemble Adventure kind of show instead. Those can sometimes evolve into We're All A Family Now shows, but Buffy The Vampire Slayer teaches us that the journey can, at its best, create incredibly compelling serial drama.

Almost everything good about TSCC can be summed up by saying "Summer Glau". Granted, this role isn't a huge departure from her turn on the dear departed series Firefly, but there are good reasons Summer's the go-to actress for this particular niche. The lessons she learned from Joss Whedon are serving her well here. Her presence and, more specifically, her character, are the most absorbing aspects of the series.

"Cameron", as she is known, is the zenith of the Terminator technology we've seen so far. Her AI is vastly more capable of passing as human than previous models, and her mind can conceive slightly more nuanced strategies than pure brute force. If one accepts the Terminators as Skynet's tools for infiltrating human groups while remaining undetected, Cameron represents a highly refined product revision. I've also concocted several plausible reasons for choosing as John's protector a Terminator cloaked in an extremely attractive girlbody approximately John's age, but forgive me if I save those for my lucrative side career in slash fiction.

Summer is succeeding most completely, when the writing allows her to, in drawing the audience into the mystery of life as a hyperintelligent machine. Her uncanny ability to straddle the line between total cipher and mere alien provides hope that a Terminator can be a real, interesting, complex character.

I was curious about the shift I made during episode five from feeling the show was wasting nuggets of good ideas to a spark of hope for the future, so I ran to The Internet to see just who might be writing this thing. In what I assume is no coincidence at all, episode five is the first of those broadcast so far not to be written by James Cameron and Gale Anne Hurd. Who, then, is working on this thing?

The IMDb lists thirteen writers1 for The Sarah Connor Chronicles in addtion to Cameron and Hurd. Executive Producer Josh Friedman wrote Spielberg's The War of the Worlds and de Palma's The Black Dahlia, Executive Story Editors Ashley Miller and Zack Stentz are responsible for twenty episodes of Gene Roddenberry's Andromeda, Producer Aaron Miller coordinated post production on fourteen episodes of Firefly, Consulting Producer Natalie Chaidez comes out of NBC's Heroes, producer John Enbom put a bunch of time in on Veronica Mars and, most promisingly, co-Executive Producer Toni Graphia filled that same position on the aforementioned Battlestar Galactica for thirty-three episodes (though she's only credited on three episodes of TSCC so far). The talent pool is here for, potentially, better-than-decent serial sci-fi drama.

I'm going to keep Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles on an episode-by-episode probation for now, and I sincerely hope the writing team makes a serious effort to explore what makes the Terminator premise interesting. I also hope they have time... there was a three point ratings dropoff between episodes four and five which was most likely caused by episode four being fairly craptacular, and that #3 position in its timeslot will be challenged now that the writer's strike is over.


1An upcoming episode in the first season is titled "The Demon Hand" which forces me to think it's a reference to Harlan Ellsion's episode of The Outer Limits titled "Demon With A Glass Hand". Ellison was given an "acknowledgement to the works of" credit and some money by The Terminator's production company and distributor to defuse any desire on his part to sue them over similarities between the movie and his script (along with another of his Outer Limits episodes, "Soldier").

1.29.2008

is this for real?

The New York State chapter of the National Organization for Women has posted a rather hyperbolic and certainly outlandish press release on their website condemning Senator Ted Kennedy's endorsement of Barack Obama:

Women have just experienced the ultimate betrayal. Senator Kennedy’s endorsement of Hillary Clinton’s opponent in the Democratic presidential primary campaign has really hit women hard. Women have forgiven Kennedy, stuck up for him, stood by him, hushed the fact that he was late in his support of Title IX, the ERA, and the Family and Medical Leave Act to name a few. Women have buried their anger that his support for the compromises in No Child Left Behind and the Medicare bogus drug benefit brought us the passage of these flawed bills. We have thanked him for his ardent support of many civil rights bills, BUT women are always waiting in the wings.

And now the greatest betrayal! We are repaid with his abandonment! He’s picked the new guy over us. He’s joined the list of progressive white men who can’t or won’t handle the prospect of a woman president who is Hillary Clinton (they will of course say they support a woman president, just not “this” one). “They” are Howard Dean and Jim Dean (Yup! That’s Howard’s brother) who run DFA (that’s the group and list from the Dean campaign that we women helped start and grow). "They" are Alternet, Progressive Democrats of America, democrats.com, Kucinich lovers and all the other groups that take women's money, say they’ll do feminist and women’s rights issues one of these days, and conveniently forget to mention women and children when they talk about poverty or human needs or America’s future.

This latest move by Kennedy, is so telling about the status of and respect for women’s rights, women’s voices, women’s equality, women’s authority and our ability – indeed, our obligation- to promote and earn and deserve and elect, unabashedly, a President that is the first woman after centuries of men who “know what’s best for us.
http://www.nownys.com/pr_2008/pr_012808.html


I have a hard time believing this is legit.

First, if a political endorsement is "the ultimate betrayal" of women, I have some very serious problems with NOW-NY's grasp of history. Groundless hyperbole doesn't serve anyone, people. Also, with the litany of complaints leveled against Kennedy in that opening paragraph, one is moved to wonder how NOW-NY could even be surprised about this so-called "betrayal".

Secondly, I find it offensive that NOW-NY is somehow conflating support of Hillary Clinton's presidential bid with generalized support for women. Hillary Clinton represents all women? Is this simply because she is a woman? I doubt anyone can make a credible argument that support for a particular male candidate somehow expresses support for Men In General. But here we are, being told in no uncertain terms that not supporting Hillary is the "abandonment" of women.

Thirdly, NOW-NY clumsily calls out all the left groups who aren't supporting Hillary and declares it's because they're all simply sexist. I say "clumsily" because the sentence actually reads "He’s joined the list of progressive white men who can’t or won’t handle the prospect of a woman president who is Hillary Clinton". Who is Hillary Clinton. Perhaps NOW-NY is not aware that Hillary Clinton is not terribly popular among the activist left because of her politics. Hillary is a pro-corporate American hegemonist (like, granted, pretty much all the presidential candidates). It's insane to expect the left wing to be happy about Hillary Clinton simply because she's a woman. And, also, isn't singling out gender as the trump-card ur-characteristic the exact kind of sexism that NOW theoretically fights against?

Finally, the last paragraph doesn't even parse properly, and this is one of the reasons I'm suspicious that the press release is a fake. What I think is being said here is that Kennedy's endorsement is demonstrative of the second-class status of women in American politics. But what is all this inane crap about women having an "obligation" to "...elect, unabashedly, a President that is the first woman..."? An obligation? Really? Would NOW-NY feel "obliged" to elect Ann Coulter if she were running, simply because she's a woman? Somehow I doubt it.

What all of this makes me wonder is how NOW-NY feels about black politicians, male and female, who may endorse Barack Obama over Hillary Clinton. Are they also handing down the "ultimate betrayal" of women? Or do they magically get a free pass because of their skin color?

Come on, NOW-New York State. You can't really stand behind this, can you?