BLOOD OF THE SPRINGTIDE (PART II)

“It’s something. Hey, you know, I got a ball, so does Rafael I’m sure.”

“I do indeed,” concurred a shorter brown skinned boy with black hair and a confident disposition.

“I know, but the teams are uneven now and it’s super hot. Let’s do something else.”

“Like what?” asked the greasy haired boy, annoyed at not being able to play some more.

“Well Aaron,” Tim raised his eyebrows and leaned his head in his direction, teasingly. “Let’s go take a dip in that waterway at the end of Exigency Lane.”

Aaron took off his cap and wiped his greasy hair away from covering his pimply face, tucking it behind his ears. He let out a deep sigh, paused and then said, “Yeah, you know what, that sounds good. Let’s do it.”

By now the rest of the boys had gathered around Tim. They were dirty and sweaty and a bit worn out from the tense competition in the hot sun. Tim raised his head to address them. “Who’s up for some swimming? We’ll get together here again tomorrow around ten o’clock for some more baseball, but how ‘bout some swimming right now?”

“Sounds refreshing!” said David with exaggerated enthusiasm and a sheepish smile.

“Si! I am also interested,” spoke Rafael. “Esta muy caliente.”

“I can’t,” said a red haired boy, pale and freckly. “I don’t have a swimsuit with me.”

Tim laughed a bit. “You don’t need a swimsuit. Come on, you’re clothes are already covered in dirt, what does it matter if they get wet?”

“My dad would kill me if I went anywhere near that water,” said a boy whose skin was the color of cocoa and his short hair the color of coal. A bunch of other boys nodded in agreement and started walking off the field, some shouting back. “See you tomorrow!” and “Nah, you guys are crazy, we’re going home!” Tim, Aaron, Rafael and David were suddenly standing together, alone, in the middle of the field.

Tim lifted his cap, took the bottom of his Iron Maiden Powerslave t-shirt and lifted it up to wipe the sweat from his face. “You guys have your bikes?” he asked.

They nodded and began heading toward their respective rides. Tim, Aaron, and Rafael all rode BMX bikes, while David had a department store brand junior ten-speed. It was a cheap bike, especially next to Tim’s Mongoose, but he loved it just the same. He could ride much faster then the others, for longer distances, and still do a few jumps and tricks. Not tricks like he had seen in the film “Quicksilver”, but he could balance on his back wheel and ride for a bit and spin around a couple times. He wasn’t trying to compete with his BMX buddies, after all there are things that only a BMX can do.

But for this endeavor, a long distance ride, some of which uphill, he had the perfect bike. He still had a bunch of energy; the game hadn’t really exhausted him in any way. That slide for second was the only action he had gotten the whole contest, and that ended up being it for the day. So, as the others bunny-hoped and did curb endos and foot plants, laughed and made fun of each other, David slowly turned his crank and began pacing out a nice even rhythm. For a time he paced out with his buddies, gyrating in the background while they did their BMX tricks. Once his rhythm found a groove he began out pacing the other boys.

“Hey you guys!” I’ll meet you there!” He didn’t wait for a response, but flew off down the blue spruce and cottonwood lined suburban street, the fresh summer breeze blowing through his blonde curls. It felt good. This is what he liked about having a ten-speed, cheap or not. He clicked into the highest gear, stood up and powered his way down the flat stretch toward the outer lying hills where the waterway was located. The cement lined “stream” flowed out of an archway built into the side of a forest covered hill, which was only the foot of an extensive terrain of rising hills surrounding a snow covered mountain that ascended into the sky. The water was very clean and cool, composed of rain water and snow run-off from the distant mountain, and they had swum there on three different occasions already this late spring. The most secluded part of the “stream” was up at the white cement archway, at the base of the hill, allowing the boys to swim in their underpants without being seen.

BLOOD OF THE SPRINGTIDE (PART I)

“You’re out! I tagged you David!” The ten-year-old held the dirty baseball against his friend’s side, imploring him to accept the outcome.

“No I’m not, dude! I had my hand on the base when you tagged me. You were too late!” David shook the blonde curls about his head emphatically. “I slid and touched the bag before you tagged me. I swear!”

“I don’t know. I’m pretty sure I got you before you tagged!” The taller, more muscular, boy with unkempt dark hair threw his shoulders back and stuck out his chest, as if that would sway the argument in his favor.

“I’m telling you the truth, Rich!” shouted back David, not intimidated by his friend’s bullish stance. He was shorter and skinny, but he had been raised by a no nonsense father who had taught his boys to work hard and to stick up for themselves. “You were too late.” He said the last sentence slower, enunciating every word, since it seemed to him that his friend was having trouble understanding him.

The other boys began to walk over to second base, seeing that the argument may need some intervention and also a little annoyed that the game was being held up. They had been playing for a couple hours now on an unusually hot spring day, and they were sweaty, dirty, and tired. The game was in the seventh inning and the score was tied, it had been a seriously competitive game, each side desiring the win badly.

“What’s going on? Is Dave out or not?” asked Tim as he approached from the dugout. He was a couple years older then the other boys and often acted as mediator over disputes, as well as counselor and guide when the need arose.

Rich relaxed his shoulders and turned toward Tim. “I tagged him ‘fore he touched the bag!” he said certainly. “That’s all I know. I’m pretty sure that means he’s out.”

“You did not!” David was still shouting. “I swear Tim; I slid and had my hand on the bag before he tagged me.” David was covered in dirt; his jeans, Allenville Body Shop T-shirt, neck and face. Sweat was sliding down from his curly blonde hair, making snail trails through the brown crud on his face. He was wide eyed and earnest, whereas the dark features of Rich’s face were tense and scowling. Tim studied them a bit longer, after a thoughtful moment he reached his open glove out for the ball and Rich handed it to him.

“He’s safe.” He turned and headed back toward the dugout. He really didn’t know who was telling the truth, and they probably both were, but he wanted to get on with the game and he liked the look on David’s face better.

Rich was mortified. “What?! Bullshit! He’s on your team! Bad call! Bad call!!”

“You couldn’t see whether he touched the base or not from where you made the tag, Rich. I believe he’s being honest,” Tim shouted back over his shoulder.

“Bad call!” Rich raised his mitt above his head and threw it down in disgust. “That’s it! Game called!”

“No, come on Rich!” implored a lanky but sinewy boy with straight greasy brown hair that glissaded out from under a beat-up baseball cap, who was standing a few feet behind second. He pulled down his cap a bit and punched into his glove a couple times. “I want to play some more. He’s safe, so what? We’ll get the next out.”

Rich’s face was red, he was hot, sweaty and irritated. He picked up his glove and walked very quickly toward Tim until he had caught up with him. “Give me my ball!!”

“What?” Tim turned around. He had the ball clasped in his glove, with his free hand he took off his cap and wiped his brow with his forearm. “Really?”

“Yeah! Really!” Rich was in full pout mode. He crossed his arms and stared intently at Tim with a snotty justification. “Come on!” He reached out his glove and opened it.

Tim let out a sigh of disgust, extended his gloved arm and dropped the ball into Rich’s glove. He then threw his arms up into the air and called out to the other boys, “Game called due to crybaby selfishness!”

“Fuck you Tim!” shouted Rich as he hurriedly walked away from him, on his way off the field. The boys that heard Rich were shocked, none of them really cursed that much, and he never did.

David walked up to Tim. “He sure got mad.”

“What else is new?” replied Tim a bit peeved. Then he relaxed and said, “He did get more upset then usual, maybe it’s the heat.”

LOCAL SONANCE

I am beginning a new music column that ventures down the dirt covered side road of the musical main highway. It is primarily being written to share insight and info about our flowering local music scene. It will not be wholly based in the Portland sphere, but encompass all of the Northwest. To prove this my first article will showcase Seattle’s Night Beats. I have seen them live a couple times recently and feel they are an up and coming band to take notice of. They are a psychedelic three-piece consisting of guitarist (Lee Blackwell), bassist (Tarek Wegner) and drummer (James Traeger); the guitarist and drummer having relocated to Seattle in 2009, from Austin, Texas, where they met groove artist Tarek.

Their brand of psychedelia is based more in the late sixties pop rock style, then in any of the more recent innovative realms, much like MGMT have done recently with “Congratulations”, except where that is more Syd Barrett era Floyd, Night Beats has more surf rock elements involved in the musical styling. Each musician is really very talented but, as with most rock bands that yearn to stand apart from the multitudes of artists in the genre; it is in the guitarist hands to carry the bands ability to convey the critical elements of their composition to the audience. An up and coming guitar great, Lee Blackwell intertwines surf guitar with psychedelia flawlessly, injecting it with his own brand of cowboy zeal that carries a dessert rose-like atmosphere throughout the venue.

It was hard to find a video that represented their talent. Although you will find many YouTube vids posted, few do their sound justice. However, I was able to find one that I think did. It is a live recording, most new bands that start recording early find it difficult to capture their sound in the studio at first, there are only a few bands that are able to do this successfully from the onset. There is plenty of time for them to work out their studio bugs. Live is the best way to check out new musical endeavors and live is where these boys excel. They tour relentlessly, so check them out if you can.

Night Beats Live

GOOD LOOKER

I’m a good looker. When I see an attractive young woman in some sort of New York fashion top adorned with a thrift store bought scarf and tight, dark blue, jeans around the hips; I take a good look. I get a look at the face and the legs, the over-all disposition of her body and her attitude, and then I get a good long look at the shape of her ass as she walks by. Size isn’t the issue; shape is where the aesthetic should be judged. But I digress.

I am a good looker. I walk it, I talk it, and I carry the flavor. I judge it and am judged by it. Never by how I look or by what I wear, but by how I perceive and what I observe. Such great talents of mine should be extolled and shared; thereby I am judged by my ability to express my acute perceptions to an ally in such deeds. In order for this communiqué to be successful I would have had to ascertain my ally’s flavor correctly. For it is only then that they can appreciate my candid eye. For if I have diagnosed their flavor incorrectly, even once, then they may never trust my good look ever again.

Too many times an attractive young lady misses the flattering speculation of the good looker giving them the good look. Too many times their eyes are buried in their text machines, their minds existing in the world of; “Ah jeez mom, I don’t want to see Aunt Carla this Saturday night, my favorite band is playing.” or; “No Dan, the box of chocolate does not make up for the drunken head you allowed to happen from my best friend.” If only they could live in the now, and take in the random activity occurring around them. Then they would see the eyes of the good looker looking them over, appreciating all the trouble they go through to look good. Then they could smile, and maybe laugh, and have a better day.

DEVIL BIKE

The yellow hot, orange glow of the sun rules the day. Its heat ignites the molecules in the air and its fervent light illuminates clarity, yet blinds with its intensity. The pavement smokes with its heat, searing through the protective green leaves of the trees, causing them to sag and droop in defeat. Mechanized metal parts churn in seething rotation on rubber wheels that melt upon the pavement and fill the air with the smell of cord fabrics, bead wire, carbon black and process oils burning. There are sounds of aluminum and iron grinding. They roar and growl and roar again with the occasional high-pitched whine of self-pity as they compete for positioning upon the black-top.

Along the street sides, lean steel, aluminum alloy, titanium, and carbon fiber skeletons glide upon thin rubber tires. They are bullied by the bigger, more powerful mechanized steel murder boxes. They keep to the side, careful not to draw the ire of the larger machines, fearful that in one fell swoop they will be struck forcefully, sending their flesh and bone operators careening onto the side of the rode, severely damaging their fragile skeletons. There are those of their kind, however, that are not easily intimidated. Some battle back with speed, fiercely attempting to match the acceleration of their intimidators and boldly taking their position in the road lane, blocking the mechanized monsters forward momentum. They are forced to slow down, but never slow enough to perturb them beyond slight discomfort. There are those that battle with strategic aggression. They brazenly take position away from the monsters, unconcerned with pace, or whether they anger the flesh hungry machines or not. Battling back with insults and hand gestures, fully willing to take on the brain washed flesh operator mono y mono. U-bolt lock always at the ready.

And then there is the Devil Bike!

The bright blood red paint of its coat shines in the intense light of the day sun as it speeds along the blistering pavement. Each rotation of its tires is a thunderous roar at contact, the smoke from the burning rubber rises and rushes with the wind along with the smell of fire and melting. The tint of its silver horn-like bar ends gleam as the machine is churned on by its beast master (drooling and growling with pain and determination). Its presence is so great that the monsters are aware of its approach a block before they intersect, even though they might not know exactly what comes. They only sense its dark presence, powerful and unforgiving in might and aggression and are fearful to approach or converge with such incidental catastrophe. They are right to be apprehensive; the Devil Bike is an instrument of great exasperation, born of eternal oppression. It is vengeful and vindictive if crossed, never willing to bend or to break under the force of the physically dominant motorized murder boxes.

Despite all this, there are some flesh operators of the murder boxes that test its resolve, push its ability to tolerate. Some dare to race pass and scream insults at the beast for merely being in the road. With such provocation the Devil Bike responds, its beast master churning it faster until it is upon the infringer. The bike eases up along the side, and with terrific violence the beast master pummels the windows until the glass breaks, shards of which embed into the driver, whom cries out in horror. The bike is gone; its beast master has inflicted the necessary punishment and is off, on its way. Murder box monsters that dare to cut off the Devil Bike are in far greater danger. They are instantly pursued and once they are overtaken, the beast master is a seething mass of fury. He pulls up the front of the Devil Bike, and it rises above the street to land upon the back end of the murder box, crushing it in with its might. Another hop and it is upon the street once again, and then it is off, leaving behind crumpled steel and carbon fiber speckled with broken glass. Fates forbid that a monster driver makes the mistake of turning their vehicle into this vindictive entity, for with one fell hop it will again take to the air. With supreme agility and dreadful competency it comes down upon the monster’s hood, smashing it into the engine's block, causing pistons to grind and halt in smoke and fire. It is in the air again and then upon the ground and off, retribution paid in full.

Reality bends and folds to the presence of the Devil Bike, forever upon the path of righteous defiance, against the dominant laws and rights made for the motorized vehicle. Created by the injustice of the gas hog, the excessive ozone reducer, the speeder, the impatient commuter: the steel murder box.

TO DESTROY IS HUMAN

Throughout the annuls of time there have been those that seek to aggregate the human being into an enlightened, pristine, flawless creation, an almost perfect living specimen of life. I’ve noticed that these scholars and analysts seem to almost entirely dismiss the naturally destructive side of the human animal. And I want to stress that last descriptive word; animal. Now I’m not even including killing and war in what I have observed as the naturally destructive aspects of human kind. Just in simple living habits, needs and wants, do we operate destructively. Little things, like building shelters that kill areas of plant, wild life and resources under and around them in their creation. We kill bugs to grow food, or animals to eat meat. This becomes all the more destructive the longer it goes on and the more humans that exist in mass upon the Earth. Now I know there are those that will argue that organic veganism solves that, or eco-friendly sustainable housing solves the other. I would put forth, without going into detail, that those methods of coexistence are only a slowed down, more sustainable form of destruction that propagates the selfish desire to live with a lesser amount of guilt.

Reality is that very, very, little of our mass population actually practices those less damaging forms of living in part, and certainly even less practice it in whole. Since this seems to be the case as the world expands, and even though more and more work towards a less harmful way of living progresses as we journey into the Tomorrow World, more and more are born into just the plain need to survive and stay alive at any cost. How can we be this wonderful creation (or evolutionary achievement) of life when we are so completely toxic to the natural world that sustains us? Our waste, our actions and reactions are almost totally self-serving in the general since, even to the disregard of our own destruction. I will not begin to discuss the ramifications of our mental degradation; the deep ugliness that exists inside each and every human mind is a book on its own.

So where is this utopia that is coming? Where is it seen and in what form? When did it ever exist? Why is it even considered as possible? Or dreamed up as existing in form or conscious?

The Intellectual and Spiritual community does humanity a great disservice by propagating such perfection within a perfectly flawed reality. As Science advances, we hear constantly that humans can live longer, healthier lives, that we can be safer, that we can even avoid death. Why is death looked upon with such fear and disdain? Death is a necessary function of the beauty that is a finite life. If no one dies, then eventually no one can be born; and if humans live longer lives then certainly fewer can be born.

If we cure all diseases, if we make everything out of rubber so that we bounce around inside a cocoon that keeps us free of harm, does that solve our fear? Death is a doorway, an evolutionary necessity, a need to be obtained for all living things.

To teach children that death is terrible, that we are constantly exquisite and wonderful, is to severely misguide them. To pamper and spoil them, to act as if they should never have to work, never have to fight, is to blind your children to the realities of their environment that you want them to excel in. There is a side to living that is considered dark and painful, and we fear it. There is beauty in the honesty of accepting it as a part of the whole truth.

Teach your children to work; just as well as you teach them to have fun. Teach your children to fight; just as well as you teach them to love. Otherwise you blind them to the reality of a truly honest and beautiful living existence.

MUSIC IN MOTION III

Interested in some deep space jam music, orchestrated through the crunch of heavy metal thudding? The band Mastodon has mastered this sound along with lyrics that bestow cosmic significance and anomalies. This video from their most recent album; Crack The Skye is complete with rock band flailing in space/time motion, prehistoric tribal sacrifice and earthly monstrosity. The song is called Divinations and its video is highly entertaining, but mostly I am using it to introduce their music to you. Mastodon’s best songs are too long for video and are original composed pieces that are conducted by musicians that have mastered their craft. The intensity that they exude can be considered mind-blowing. They are heavy and dark but not depressing and gloomy, or even satanic. They merely suggest that there is a vast and complicated multi-verse built of age and wonder that tugs at the human soul and imagination. They easily express these notions with their great writing talent.

Divinations is very entertaining with its comic book expression and portrayal of rock guitar power. As with all the “Music In Motion” posts; smoke it if you got it (or can) and watch it in ‘full screen’ splendor. Click the link and enjoy:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uxelXPg961M&feature=av2e