Jimmy Jammer & the Jams - "Big Box Store"

Hey I wrote and recorded a song a couple of days ago called "Big Box Store." It is now available on Amazon for $0.89 cents. It will soon be available pretty much world-wide at other fine digital sites and download outlets including iTunes and Napster, etc.

Check it out if you are so inclined!

Maynard G. Krebs Universe

If you listen to those wacky scientists, we started with a big bang, and this big production number has been rolling out ever since.

The longer it rolls, the more entropy gets employed, the more entropy in the works, the more things break down and get wacky.

Starts out all bright and shiny then gets all kind of "beat-nik."

I dig it.

Unthinkable

Of course the unthinkable happens every day. Who woulda thunk it?

Days of Reckoning

And then there are those days of reckoning. You don't always see them coming. And sometimes you do.

See them coming or not. It don't matter. Finally you have to reckon with them.

The Waiting

As Tom Petty once said, "the waiting is the hardest part."

Waiting for the "other shoe" to drop in a universe of shoes.

The Dog Star Rages

The Dog Star rages. And we are left with the Burden of the Mystery...

Clip their Wings

Don't want to do it. But the Lovely Carla tells me it's time to clip the little birdies wings. They've been just little "too flighty" lately. Me too.

Any little thing can set them off. They start flying around like the world is burning. And maybe the world is burning.

Still, maybe it's for their own good. Put a little damper on their flight worthy-ness. Slow them down a little, bring them down back to earth.

Maybe they'd thank us, if they could.

Wounds

Some say that adults are just damaged children. Often it seems so.

As my resident house poet (Dylan) puts it: some are "wounded in love," some are "wounded in hatred."

I'd also add: some are wounded in laughter, some are wounded in remembering, some are wounded in forgetting.

It's a big old world. Lots of wounds all around.

Good To Be Wrong!

I like it when Physicists use the language of the poets and the mystics.

For instance, there is this one talking about "the arrow of time," and describing how the arrow tends to go in one direction.

I like it when Physicists wonder why "we remember yesterday and not tomorrow..."

I like it when a Physicist conjectures that the reason the Universe seems to be getting crazier is because of entropy.

I guess, I like this stuff because science doesn't really debunk the mystery of the universe, it actually increases the freaking mystery of everything.

Which for me increases the opportunities, the sea of possibilities. Maybe everything I know is wrong. That would probably be a good thing!

Reminds me that there's more than meets the eye. I like that!

The American Con Game!

I love this line from Kevin Drum's post, because I think it applies to Amerika as we know it now:

"A large part of the activity of the financial sector seems to be a machine to transfer income and wealth from outsiders to insiders..."

It's all just an elaborate CON GAME. Ånd the same con is carried on by the Food Industry, the Drug industry, the Religion Game, etc

We are a society that has gotten expert at hustling itself silly. We are actually entertained by the hustle. We are the happy dupes looking to be duped, over and over.

That Explains It! Approximately!

Ok, now I've circled back to Plato and his realm of ideas. What a long strange trip it's been.

So yes, I'm thinking there is this Realm of Ideas. It really exists. We can only access it through our brain-waves. Our brains are receivers.

So there's the world of Ideas, Ideals. And then there's the world we live in. Everything in our world, our realm, is an APPROXIMATION.

Everything we do in our realm is only an attempt at realizing the IDEAL. And the process goes on and on, as long as the universe exists.

Nature knows. It continues to churn out forms that don't quite measure up to the ideal. That's what makes the world go round.

It could be frustrating. Always trying to reach the ideal and always falling short. Aye, there's the rub!

Every Thing Counts

It has slowly dawned upon on me. I mean, after a long string, a long, slow, meandering string of days...

Everything counts. Every thought. Every word. Every action.

And we are the result of the count.

Our bones, our blood, our flesh, our brain matter reflect the count.

I guess this is sort of my version of existentialism. Every. Thing. Counts.

Elites Beating On Elites!

Goldman Sachs Busted! It's good to see one group of Elites, going after another group of Elites.

After all these years of rich and poor people ganging up and beating on poor people (Why would poor people beat up on other poor people? No one wants to be poor, no one wants to identify with the poor!) we finally get some rich people beating up on other rich people.

And not a moment too soon.

Maybe this all goes nowhere, I mean, Goldman Sachs will have a team of the best lawyers in the biz fighting tooth and nail, or alternatively negotiating some slight tap on the wrist.

But it is good to see someone throw down the gauntlet. See, I'm an optimist, hopefully not a sap. And clearly these guys are crooks! They are not the best and brightest. They are craven greed-heads feeding at the trough.

And we are such a rich-obsessed, celebrity-crazed society, we actually end up applauding, and lauding these wealthy criminals.

As Woody Guthrie once sang, "Yes, as through this world I've wandered, I've seen lots of funny men; Some will rob you with a six-gun, And some with a fountain pen."

And that fountain pen skullduggery draws real blood and devastates real lives...

Convergence of Some Really Cool Souls

We had a kickass, packed to the gills, standing room only show last night at our humble little performance space.

There was lots of love in the room. You can't just manufacture all that good feeling on demand.

It was all just a little happening. A mirage, a convergence of some really cool souls all there to listen, chill out and have a good time.

Plus, we finally had the mirror ball up and spinning around. I mean, come on, how you gonna beat a mirror ball?!?

Hey All You Appalling Offshoots - Dig It!

“For all our supposed sophistication, a human is still an animal, a primate,” Mr. Lorentz said, as sunset flashed pink over Bergdorf Goodman. And primates, he added, “are probably among the most appalling offshoots that exist of mammalian evolution.” The more time one spends around other species, he added, “the more you realize how foolish humans are.”

Tears for Stalin!

You see the Tea Party rallies and you think George Romero's "Dawn of the Dead."

We've seen these brain dead zombies before!

Turns out lots of Tea Partiers are nostalgic for the George Bush years.

Reminds me that people cried when Stalin died!

Here's Rick Pearlstein on these swine: "they are the same angry, ill-informed, overwhelmingly white, crypto-corporate paranoiacs that accompany every ascendancy of liberalism within U.S. government."

A Rat in the Vat

Words. Names. I don't know, sometimes all you have to do is pay attention.

For instance, Dodi Fayed.

Dood in Dutch means DEAD. So with a little creative transcription: the beloved, ill-fated Princess Di was dating a guy named DEAD Di.

Someone should have pointed that one out - maybe she'd be alive today.

And now we have a Pope named RAT ZINGER. All I can say is, of course.

Everything Goes Wrong At Least Once

You know, in theater we say, "You don't really know your show, until everything goes wrong at least once."

And the thought occurred to me, even as I hoped it wasn't true: "You don't really know your life, until everything goes wrong at least once."

Hopefully things "going wrong" is something you learn from and survive to tell the tale.

Of course, there's wrong, and then there's dreadfully wrong. That's a whole nother can of worms...

Mr. Mo Mojo

If you say "yes" you end up in places you didn't necessarily know you'd end up in. Sometimes this is good, sometimes not so good.

Yesterday it was good. I ended up in Mr. Mo's living room, listening to Mr. Mo and his friend from Madison, WI running through pop songs together. Mr Mo played guitar, piano and ukulele. Mr. Mo and his friend sang and harmonized like the Everly Brothers or John and Paul at their best.

It was a truly virtuoso performance. They ran through a mind-boggling catalog of songs: Beatles, Harry Nilsson, Beach Boys, Kinks, Simon and Garfunkel, Roy Orbison, the Archies, Abba, etc.

I think my favorite was Mr. Mo singing "Bridge Over Troubled Waters" to his own ukulele accompaniment, although "Strawberry Fields" and "Penny Lane" were pretty amazing too.

Who knew Mr. Mo had it in him?

Freedom in Increments

I guess I was thinking about Dylan's line, "If dogs run free, why not me, Across the swamp of time?"

Although it's a nice rhyme, the reality is that most dogs don't really run free. Except maybe in brief increments. Freedom is kind of parceled out.

That goes for us too. Freedom is kind of illusory. It's parceled out for us too. It's another chimerical state we pretend to stake our lives on.

Coyote is a lonely road. We can't just choose to be Coyote.

Wild, Free, Haunted

Dogs are sellouts to the humans. It makes sense in a big, cruel, dog eat dog world. We provide the meal ticket, the warm hearth. They provide companionship and loyalty.

Humans can identify with the dogs because they are sellouts too. To the corporation, the company, the state. Any higher power that assures a meal and a warm hearth.

When you come across a "wild dog" for instance a coyote, it's very disturbing. This is a "dog" that "sells out" to no one, to nothing.

I recently spied two of them running across the street, through the park, along the lakefront. Two scrawny, mangy creatures. Lightening fast. Moving, always moving forward. On the run, on the hunt, they seemed determined, wild, free, haunted, alone even if they traveled together.

Free to starve, free to survive with no provider, no big daddy, no friend willing to lend a hand or a morsel of food.

Zone Out!

I can step into the zone of my own zone, and I can completely zone out in that zone.

I recommend it.

When there's no future How can there be sin We're the flowers in the dustbin We're the poison in your human machine We're the future, your future

I guess Malcolm Mclaren was some kind of hero to me. Pretty much based on his managing the self-negating, quickly-vanishing-before-your-eyes "career" of the Sex Pistols, and two books I have read, Greil Marcus' enthralling Lipstick Traces and Simon Reynolds' Rip it Up and Start Again.

I still own (never play) a vinyl copy of the Sex Pistols' "Never Mind the Bollocks." Mclaren was detournement in action. He was like a spiky-headed version of Elvis' Colonel Parker to Johnny Rotten and Sid Vicious.

Mclaren was a provocateur in the best sense of the word: "one who provokes." He was an intellectual "shit-stirrer." And sometimes the shit needs to be stirred.

It's possible the Punk movement as we know it, would not have existed, and certainly wouldn't have had the same spiky, edgy flavor without McLaren's influence.

One man can make a difference, even if his credo is smashing and mashing up differences.

UPDATE: And of course he was a showman, a promoter extraordinaire! Little Johnny Rotten was the apple of his eye and the whole Pistols thing was a wicked r&r spitball into the cultural stew!

Something Nasty

I think those global warming deniers, are kind of like penguins walking around on a diminishing shard of ice, telling themselves everything is gonna be fine, just fine.

I'm thinking James Lovelock the author of "The Vanishing Face of Gaia" is onto something. But maybe it's information we are just incapable of processing.

Still, I think it's plausible, as he says, "You can't put something like a trillion tons of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere without something nasty happening."

Lovelock thinks we're in for a major population reduction. It's kind of like we're the germs, and global warming is the fever. Gaia is sick, the fever will break, and all hell breaks loose.

And I'm sure every germ thinks it is the center of the universe! Guess what germ!

I am Sun Green!

The highlight of my day yesterday...

I encountered the Dancing Man on the avenue yesterday.

The Dancing Man is our neighborhood trans-medium, our own "Shaman on the Block." He is a very unique character, a large spirit. Sometimes friendly, sometimes a little scary. Clearly in his own world, usually tapped into another realm, riding on his very own wavelength.

Sometimes he sings, sometimes he drums, sometimes he runs in place, or runs backwards.

The Lovely Carla and I are always keen to listen to the Dancing Man. Sometimes he conveys information. He has inspired lines or little seeds for songs. "Everything is Everything," came from the Dancing Man!

Yesterday he and I passed each other on the sidewalk. He looked me in the eye and broke into a big grin and said, "Sun Green." I took it that he was dubbing me "Sun Green." Now what's funny, one of my favorite Neil Young albums, "Greendale," which I love and listen to often, has a character named Sun Green.

Somehow all this has deep meaning for me. I mean I don't know what it means, but it means something. There's some secret narrative that I once in awhile glimpse.

I mean, I guess it was a slow news day.

Amusing Universe!

A professional "amuser," now that's an idea!

And with that in mind, I've got a sweet idea for a brand new band!

Jimmy Jammer and the Jams!

Private Resurrection

Easter. All alone. I sat on the floor of our bathroom (the best reverb in the apartment) with my acoustic guitar and a digital recorder.

I recorded 12 songs. All Jimmy Jam-master stuff. I'm thinking of calling this collection "Porcelain and Chrome."

I wonder if it will ever see the light of day? Or will I just bury it?

It almost felt like a Resurrection.

Cold

And it was a malady of the spirit. How to regenerate a spirit? It was another of those questions that stopped him cold.

Cure

"They were trying to cure him of something they created." - Anonymous entry in an old notebook.

Last Minute Plans?

Hey just wanted to mention...

If you live in or around Chicago, and you have nothing going on, come join WhiteWolfSonicPrincess at the Elbo Room Upstairs Lounge tonight, Good Friday.

We are the featured musical artist in a very cozy room. First set starts around 9:00 p.m. The band is tight and the sound is hot. Check it out!

Cloud Land

Some days it's like trudging in mud.

Some days it's like walking on clouds.

Yesterday it was all cloud land.

A flea-ridden, blind dog

Hunter S. Thompson had the Brown Buffalo. I have the White Rhino, or maybe we can imagine a more svelte embodiment, let's go with the White Puma?

So the White Puma and I are on a crusade. Battling the forces of darkness.

And we are seeking Justice. Some say Justice is a blind-folded woman balancing an un-wieldy scale contraption.

I don't think so. No, Justice is a flea-ridden, blind dog. A beat and rumpled spirit with a hell of a good nose.

Can smell a rat, or a Lying Weasel from a mile away!