Blog: Writings That Are Not Drug Induced But Have Nothing To Do With Anything Especially David Foster Wallace

New idea for character: carrot man. Second thoughts: perhaps limited in emotional aspects, but possibilities for merchandising good. Read today that David Foster Wallace died. Strange because I read it today, but it happened a week ago, but at least my world-awareness gap is getting smaller; earlier this month I read that Bernie Mac and Isaac Hayes had died on the same weekend, a month before I read about it, which made me feel bad, but not as bad as their loved ones, and perhaps for different reasons.

Hayes and Mac had just completed work on a movie about a man whose only joy in life is composing internet blogs about dearly departed celebrities, or dead celebrities as people with other joys in life call them. In the film the man (unemployed, alive) had an unhealthy appetite for loneliness but constantly failed at it, acting out by going out all the time and meeting lots of people. The man, not apparently based on the screenwriter or any of his family or friends or internet favourites, despite being memorable to all those who remembered him, had the strange fear that he was completely unmemorable; that even his very own mother would just walk past him on the street, even if he was bleeding from the eyes and she recognised him. The man also had a private paranoia that there was very little money in his bank account, even when there was none at all. To assuage this, the man retreated into the internet, like Hollywood Star in one of those 80’s sci-fi movies where special effects are hand-drawn. The rest of the picture dissolves into self-reference and the greater bulk of the audience are lost, with only those who can find a good book or supermarket brochure on their person not realising that the final twenty minutes don't make sense.

Apparently its Citizen Kane meets David Bowie; sad about Mac and Hayes though.

More thoughts on carrot man: definitely a promising idea. Refer to Coles docket from January; I remember I left another vegetable themed character there who would go nicely with carrots.

Have begun painting my nails with this cleverly titled don’t-chew-your-nails paint, which looks just like a bottle of nail-polish, which seems flammable enough to add fuel to the fires of my masculinity, ongoing ever since I began walking like my first female “crush.”

I’m always too shy to admit it, but when I hear about a celebrity who’s died I feel kind of like the first time a grown-up gave me free money. I sit there, helpless as to when the good news will next return. My days are long and quiet, and aside from packages arriving bearing the latest Bryce Courtney, which I need because I have a squeaky door that disturbs my writing, all that keeps me going is the hope that each dawn will be greeted of something significant.

For what is more significant than dying? I mean, not many things we have no control over, aside from being born. Everything else we can influence to happen to some degree: getting married, getting a job, voting to encourage the politicians; its all stuff that in a free and right-thinking society we have full control over. But I have to admit that aside from writing another book, dying is one of the only ways I can get any excitement out of David Foster Wallace; and I find that sad, which is why I say I’m sad he’s died. But J.D. Salinger is another story. That bastard has for years stubbornly refused to let me read any of his unpublished books or died, so I get nothing from him.

If I ever do something significant, I’d like it to be very reckless; like wearing a bath-robe and slippers to the shops; because I think I’ve been through my sensible period. The only times I’m scared about are the puritan period and the idealistic period. As soon as I start shouting at dinner parties because of baby seal farming or baby Jesus farming just shoot me dead with a witty insult and bury me in hypocrisy.

Final decision on carrot man, and any derivations of the vegetable theme: I retract all these ideas and deny I ever had them.

Blog: A Guide To Embracing Politicians

Politicians have it tough. They have to put up with the hard parts of fame, like being surprised in public by political comedians with cameras, without the good parts like producing any music we like to listen to, or movies we like to watch. But I think the two-party system is good; I think the stage-like atmosphere of the parliament floor enables one group to keep another honest, without any unwanted side-effects, like the inflation of ego that goes along with the fact that question time is televised (which doesn’t make anyone any more right, it only makes them seem more right).

Despite what everyone believes, politicians are good people. Also, they are usually required to be educated at least till year 12, and in some cases beyond. One or two have even been educated at foreign universities that no-one can pronounce. This alone gives them a chance at being good at running a country. Travelling overseas is hard. The people there are not like us. Their very body odour tells us that. Putting up with this is hard enough, but when combined with university, the challenge becomes insurmountable. If politicians can not only surmount it, but come home afterwards without running out of money, then the rest of us should be happy to put the keys of the nation in their hands and not expect things they are not capable of like independence and decision making and self-doubt.

The trick with politicians is not to focus on how much they irritate you, but to focus on what aspects of them do not irritate you. For instance, my favourite thing about politicians is that if they do something scandalous, I always find out about it; my neighbours could do almost anything and I would never find out about it. If you look at it that way, politicians are more open. What impressed me most the first time I met a politician in person was how they displayed their true personalities, without the unconvincing smiles more familiar from their television appearances. In person, they respect us enough to not even try to pretend to be something they are not; instead they merely behave as if you were not there on a school trip to parliament house, and they were actually somewhere else, with someone more significant, and nothing they said could possibly make a difference; primarily because you are a good ten years away from voting age, and the age of consent. Therefore politicians are an honest sort of people in that they do not generate niceties when they do not mean them, which they never do.

So I think recent calls to give politicians any real power are worth considering.

B.C

Blog - Saviour Rudd, Bluesfest 2007

Someone at Bluesfest HQ must have noticed that John Butler and Xavier Rudd both play slide guitar, and both look as though they’ve been plucked from a ‘special’ Byron Bay plantation, so they decided it would be a good idea to put them one after the other on the same stage at Bluesfest 2007. I can understand where they’re coming from: until I saw Xavier Rudd live, I thought they were similar artists too. As soon as Rudd started playing, however, it was pretty obvious that something was happening that John Butler, even if he noticed it, wouldn’t understand. Although this was just one guy on stage, and it wasn’t too unique musically (simple chord progressions), the audience were really responding to it. He may use the same four-on-the-floor foot stomp percussion as Ash Grunwald, but I think to borrow one of Xavier’s own phrases, the “energy” in the air is different from any other gig I’ve been to. It takes a certain character to thank an audience for their “positive energy,” a gesture that could sound hokey coming from somebody else, but is undeniably genuine when coupled with the elation on Xaviour’s face at the end of a song-slash-happening.

Rudd does seem to want to make people happy with his music: similar to Ben Lee’s hit “Catch My Disease” which created its own flower-power image for Lee, replete with toy piano and flowers stuck to microphone stands at live gigs. But the irony of Ben Lee was that “Catch My Disease” was written when Lee was feeling bitter and unloved. He separates himself from even the weirdest Aussie bands (Sleepy Jackson) who were getting radio play when he wasn’t, and likens pop music to a contagious disease, suggesting a degree of shoulder chippage which must have conversely reveled in the fact a song complaining ‘they don’t play me on the radio’ ended up saturating Australian radio waves. Xavier Rudd must be a refugee from the hippie generation, where music was still thought of as a collaborative venture. These days people don’t usually live in communes, and drum circles are comparatively rare, even on university lawns. Producers behind the R&B hits we hear too often today seem to have reduced music to its most cynical state in the modern era; eliminating everything except those frequencies which excite people on the level that sells downloads. It is important to point out that what Xavier Rudd did to the crowd at Bluesfest was not about money. His festival appearance would generate him the same amount of income whether people liked him or not. It was about something much more important: communication.

Although Rudd cuts a mysterious figure when he’s singing, hunched over his microphone, as soon as he leans back from the mic, particularly when he feels the crowd’s really responded to a song, he simply radiates genuine human emotions. Rudd is not just reproducing a rehearsal or recording that worked in a different setting, he’s behaving organically in his present environment. There is a subtle but crucial difference, because I think that’s why there’s this feeling of a communion between Rudd and his audiences, because they feel they genuinely are having an affect on the action onstage, which is, let’s face it, every rock fan’s dream.

Afterwards, John Butler had the unenviable task of playing to a crowd still stuck on Xavier Rudd. So much about performing is physical, very little about it is verbal. Whether John Butler knows it, the crowd are watching him closely while he performs, expecting a reaction, a connection of sorts. Unfortunately, Butler gives the impression of being bored, as though the audience were transient and interchangeable: Butler is not present as a performer, and after the vivacity of Rudd, gives the impression of going through the motions. Sadly, with the inevitable comparisons to Rudd rolling in, it is hard to not ponder on everything that Butler could be doing, when one thinks back to the cult following of ‘Better Man’. Today, some might feel that there is little genuine or relatable about Butler, despite his technical superiority over Rudd.

I think John Butler is popular for the same reason prog bands hit big in the 70’s, because they broke out of the pretension occasionally to produce catchy pop hits like Procol Harum’s Whiter Shade of Pale and The Moody Blues’ Nights In White Satin, and because instrumental virtuosity which was their hallmark is alluring to a certain kind of crowd, because its something they can never do. Its like buying meals at restaurants you wouldn’t be able to make yourself. There’s something to be said for that, and so its fitting that John Butler, who decks his music out with plenty of impressive-ish solos, gets a respectful and impressed sounding applause between songs. I was watching the crowd with my rock scientist hat on, and during John Butler they were deadly still between tracks. They were watching him like he was on TV, because not only did they feel like they could never do what he was doing, so it was a bit alienating, but they perhaps didn’t feel there was any need to let John know how they were feeling because they couldn’t have made a difference. They couldn’t have been heard over the sheer volume of the band, whereas Xavier was responding to squeals and dancing he was observing during songs.

During John Butler’s set, the audience’s reaction was much more akin to their reaction to Vanessa Amarossi, who inexplicably had been standing right where Butler was just a few hours before. And she was really singing. She was singing like it was a high-wire trapeze act, like she had to climb higher and higher up the registers until she just… exploded! Because that’s what you do. Not because it feels right. Because Mark Holden’s told you to, and he’s the guy of Australian Idol, and that’s how the business works. No. That might be the state of pop music today, but you do not come to a blues and roots festival, no matter how jaded, and do something you don’t feel. The audience clap because its something they can’t do, and sounds really tricky, not because they’re feeling what the performer is feeling. They couldn’t feel more different from the performer, because the performer won’t quit shoving their brilliance in the audience’s face. Same problem with Joss Stone. It’s a very impressive party trick, but its just a trick. Having all the right moves, doesn’t necessarily mean you’re playing for real. Joss Stone sings like someone who’s had to grow into a role higher powers in the industry have allotted her: ie, soul diva. She tosses her hair and writhes around just like James Brown, except she’s faking it, something James Brown would never do: just watch him on DVD Live at the Apollo, he virtually induces an orgasm onstage. For ninety minutes. This might sound extreme, but these kind of ecstatic moments are possible in music today, and I had one at Bluesfest 2007, with my first encounter with Xaviour Rudd live.

The reason is this: John Butler may be technically competent, but Xavier Rudd’s music, and his personality, as it comes across onstage, have something that Butler lacks; namely, honesty. If Butler was an actor, people would ask him, “Do all your lines mean the same thing?” to which he would reply, “Of course not.” The underlying question would then be, “Well, why sing them all the same way?” I am personally glad I am not in charge of mixing live rock gigs. Understanding an entire line of words on first hearing is a rarity, let alone an entire new song as a whole. Performers must fight to communicate, and make every effort to enhance their chances. John Butler seems to love a challenge: it was enough for R.E.M to write one hit in the four words a beat style (It’s the End of the World), quickly retreating following the fans’ backlash to more manageable fare, but John Butler seems intent on making every song sound like the end of the world. Perhaps Butler is naïve, otherwise he’s just brash, thinking it humanly possible to communicate anything at that speed. Whichever is true, the result is giving himself needless trouble getting a simple message across, unless he does not care whether people understand him. Why write lyrics at all, then, one might ask, why not just scat? It worked for Ella Fitzgerald, maybe that could be the new direction for John Butler?

I’ve been looking for a magic formula to what Xaviour Rudd did to cast a spell over the crowd at Bluesfest, which is something most industry types prefer to think of as the mysterious “X-factor,” but I think there’s no reason the phenomenon can’t be simple, why not, since that’s what I think his secret is: keeping the music simple. Rudd’s progressions are simple indeed. Three chords, sometimes four, ones we’ve heard before, often in the same order, but born out of necessity. If Meat Loaf wasn’t allowed a band, and had to produce every noise on “Paradise By The Dashboard Light,” he never would have agreed to the bombastic arrangement (as it happens Meat Loaf had nothing to do with Jim Steinmans’ arrangements)… If you have to play several instruments at once, of course you can’t afford to be complex. But I argue this is a great thing for pop music.
Rock history has so far has been like a wave: one one side of the wave, it gets complex and interesting, but at a certain point it gets too tricky and people stop listening, so a ritual cleansing takes place. This effect can be seen with the punk movement which cleaned the decks after the misguided moog wanna-be symphonies of “super” groups like Emerson, Lake and Palmer and other musical excesses of the late 70’s. The first punk music, years before Green Day, was simple: two chords is fine, three chords is just for jazz. But its other defining characteristic was its anger. Johnny Rotten couldn’t “sing,” but he didn’t care, and the fans loved him for it. Usually when you simplify your chord progressions and song structures, you find you’ll concentrate more on whether the vocal tells a story, and whether that story is worth telling.

Rock is a continuum, and there’s no precise equation for working out the right amount of honesty and complexity, but just judging from the fact that none of Butler’s lyrics come across live, and the arrangements swamp the lyrical sentiments of the song with unnecessary riffy bombast, and so audiences don’t respond to it in that special way they respond to Rudd. Butler, I argue, has gone too far in the wrong direction of the continuum. Popular song existed in Beethoven’s time, Schubert wrote his Lieder, and they were popular because they were simple: Pop music is popular because it’s easy. It is music at your fingertips, music in the first place you look for it. It doesn’t try or want to be difficult. Of course, as in all arts, artists can choose to be difficult, if that’s their thing, but generally they’ll only be difficult to their mum and, if they’re lucky, a small cult following. If Butler wants to stay in the game, I’d suggest an acoustic album, and replace his pro-muso partners with looser jamming buddies from simpler days, who might be more interested in complementing a song than showcasing their personal talents. Like the boys in the bars say: too self-indulgent.

It is human to crave communication, if we didn’t, MTV and commercial radio wouldn’t jab at our ears with nothing but drum and bass and lyrics containing nothing more thought-out than ‘booties’ and ‘bitches’. My hope is that Rudd’s frequent aural resemblance to dance music (with his drumming and simple vocal style), a current fad, might help him rise like a condor to be the saviour (pardon the pun) of the scene, using the ultimate superficial music, dance music, as his platform, and wipe the slate clean again of the drum’n’bass epidemic.

I’m normally quite cynical, and I pride myself on not getting swept up with crowds, so I hope it’s a testament to Rudd’s talents, not my naivety, that he managed to move me like he did. Music moves us in mysterious ways, most are non verbal, but I believe music that survives its year of being current must gain its strength by saying something people can’t help hearing. Keeping it simple may get you heard, but then the choice is what to do with your platform once you’re on it. For today’s R’n’B stars, it’d be as simple as spending the night before thinking what the song should be about, or turning up to the studio and expecting something brilliant to come on the spot. After ten years of this crap haven’t they realized it doesn’t? Look at some of the longest living songs, ‘What A Wonderful World’, ‘Stand By Me’: we don’t have to concentrate, they just communicate, because their entire body has an Aristotilean unity of purpose, which their every syllable contributes to. Do you think that kind of thing just comes blurting out?

This is probably the biggest reason why Xaviour Rudd’s songs are so simple, for they are not trying to be different, but are simply the natural expression of the man’s soul. I don’t know if Xavier Rudd has written any songs that will live beyond next year, but by caring about communicating, and communing messages of real love, not just using pop music to spread his image like a Ben Lee-esque disease, he’s done all he can, and let time tell the rest.

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Blog: "Still Life" in contention for gala final of Short + Sweet.

Last week four out of ten wildcards were chosen to be "in contention" for the gala final; this week three out of ten wildcards were nominated.

They were "Bathing with Tadpoles," the monologue and Still Life.

Thanks to all who attended, and if you didn't, don't worry, it sold out, if you hadn't booked, you wouldn't have been able to get in anyway.

On Feb 17 they will nominate one play from the "in contention" list to play in the Gala Final, and stand the chance of winning money and possible adaptation for television.

I'm not too worried about that; being my first play submitted in any competition, I'm just thrilled as punch to get this far. The production went amazing, and that's what really counts. A 3-camera crew filmed the performance, so as soon as I get my hands on the video, I'll post it online so anyone who missed out can see it.

Ben

Blog: "Still Life" shortlisted for Short and Sweet

Hello everyone who is reading this, and even anyone who isn't (just cause i'm nice).

I have news that makes me tickled inside my hands:

I am rehearsing Baron of You Know Where, my first two-act comedy with Sydney Uni Drama Society, and it will be on at the Cellar Theatre in March-April, so more updates closer to the date.

In other news, my third short play, Still Life, has been shortlisted for Short and Sweet, Sydney, and it will play for one-night-only, unless you show up and vote for it, at the Seymour centre, $25 a ticket for I don't know how many ten minute plays fit into two hours, I'm not a mathematician. It will be directed by my high-school theatrical chum Claire Smith, who has worked on such aspects of the Sydney scene as Wayne Tunks' many plays.

Still Life, and other short plays, as the evening has been dubbed,
will show at the Seymour Centre on Cleveland Street
on the 2nd February, a Sunday, at 3pm.

Hope to see you there,
Benjamin

Blog: good poets you may not have heard of.

Tattoo

The light is like a spider
It crawls over the water.
It cralws over the edges of the snow.
It crawls under your eyelids
And spreads its webs there –
Its two webs.

The webs of your eyes
Are fastened
To the flesh and bones of you
As to rafters or grass.

There are filaments of your eyes
On the surface of the water
And in the edges of the snow.

- Wallace Stevens

Voyages I

Above the fresh ruffles of the surf
Bright striped urchins flay each other with sand.
They have contrived a conquest for shell shucks,
And their fingers crumble fragments of baked weed
Gaily digging and scattering.

And in answer to their treble interjections
The sun beats lightning on the waves,
The waves fold thunder on the sand;
And could they hear me I would tell them:

O brilliant kids, frisk with your dog,
Fondle your shells and sticks, bleached
By time and the elements; but there is a line
You must not cross nor ever trust beyond it
Spry cordage of your bodies to caresses
Too lichen-faithful from too wide a breast.
The bottom of the sea is cruel.

- Hart Crane


I'm Nobody Who Are You?

I’m nobody. Who are you?
Are you nobody too?
Then there’s a pair of us.
Don’t tell-they’d banish us, you know.

How dreary to be somebody
How public – like a frog –
To tell your name the livelong June
To an admiring bog.

- Emily Dickinson


O Me! O Life!

O me! O life!... of the questions of these recurring;
Of the endless trains of the faithless--of cities fill'd with the foolish;
Of myself forever reproaching myself, (for who more foolish than I, and who more faithless?)
Of eyes that vainly crave the light--of the objects mean--of the struggle ever renew'd;
Of the poor results of all--of the plodding and sordid crowds I see around me;
Of the empty and useless years of the rest--with the rest me intertwined;
The question, O me! so sad, recurring--What good amid these, O me, O life?

Answer.

That you are here--that life exists, and identity;
That the powerful play goes on, and you will contribute a verse.

- Walt Whitman

Blog: For sale. Baby shoes. Never worn.

I just found out Hemingway once, on a bet, thought of a complete story in six words.

For sale. Baby shoes. Never worn.
- Hemingway

I can't believe I never heard this before.

That's all.

Also, the title of my blog mentions a supposed work-a-hole world; now, I don't know if anyone noticed, but I've been seriously considering becoming a part of this world, going so far as to begin a vocational degree, in teaching, as if such a thing is possible; I still don't know that it is.

I don't mean to separate myself from the world people are in when they're building a library or fitting together links in a causal chain that proves who killed JFK, but I don't feel like this little world my words live in wants to mesh with that world. No matter how many people I attempt to teach something they insist they don't need to know, this world will go on. A cheshire divided against itself CAN stand; and I can stand it.

Blog: Update

Too much has been going on since my last post; if you're wondering why I'm so seriously neglecting my online life, its cause I've been so busy with my real life.

I'm studying to be an english teacher, and I just passed my first prac. I recently submitted two new poems to a host of magazines, after rekindling a love for poetry thanks to Harold Bloom's "Genius" and facebook's poetry shout. Who needs blogspot when you have facebook, really...

At time of writing, I'm making my directorial debut of Being There (the second of my plays to be performed; which is not affiliated with the Peter Sellars movie); a domestic black comedy of around 20 minutes, which is part of a short play festival with Sydney Uni Drama Society and the 2007 Verge, arts festival. Getting actors to bring my ideas to life is an electrifying experience. Seriously, I got a shock at one point. It might have been static electricity, I'm still waiting to hear back on that.

I'm just preparing videos of a gig I recently did with Ali on violin at Madame Fling Flong for youtube; and John Columbus have our EP completed and mastered, and it sounds terrific; I'm so proud to have been involved.

Blog: "My Imaginary Friend, Jesus" Completed

I'm pretty serious about getting my full... Or medium length play (its maybe 40 minutes, haven't timed it, not huge) read. Boris from Rag and Bone productions has said he'll organise it. Its pretty good, so I'm looking forward to it. If it was bad, then I might be a little skeptical.

I've basically finished the first draft of it. I rarely finish first drafts of long works... Haven't finished a novel in over five years, and no-one hardly reads those two I wrote when i was 18-19 except my close friends, which might be you if you're reading this...

I'm not sure whether to post my Jesus on this web site... Its the kind of thing where its really better getting a proper dose of it.

Ben

Blog: Silent Film Festival, end of April.

I recently received this email, and wanted to spread the love to any secret silent movie fans among the people I've come across and directed to this blog...

Hello Ben

I see you’ve reviewed a Keaton silent film at IMDB (my review - BC) and thought you might like to know about Sydney’s inaugural Silent Film Festival to be held March 30 – April 1 at the Hayden Orpheum in Cremorne and the Art Gallery of NSW. Saturday afternoon will feature 2 Keaton films; The Goat and Steamboat Bill, Jr, but you can check out the entire program and further details at their website.

Best regards,
Barbara

I thanked Barbara personally, almost as personal as her invite to me, we're like so close to being best friends... Many more interesting things than this have happened to me lately, I promise. Just the other day I dropped my phone into a toilet... Had I had a computer, and an internet, in the vicinity, I may have thought to peruse this web site and save myself a modicum of trauma... Not too much, though... You want to preserve a little trauma in each day, so that you have stories like this to recount to people.

Blog: Updates

There are various updates all around this blog you may not have noticed, I've been working mainly on my novel, Food That Eats You. If you are intrigued by the chapter in February, you may not know, there's a link right down the bottom which you can click on to get the next ten... Have also just created a secret blog for Baron in the Hen House which you can access via the easter egg down the bottom of its page in February.

NOTE: CLICK THE LITTLE ARROW NEXT TO MONTH ON LEFT TO DROP DOWN ITS MENU.

B.C

Blog: What I'm Reading

Currently carrying around David Foster Wallace's ridiculously long 'Infinite Jest.' Tis a library copy, though... If anyone has a copy (and has read it) would love advice on whether you think its pleasant to read in paperback. Im reading hardback, and though its size of phone-book to carry round, print is large enough so you can forget you're reading a page and just get engulfed in the sentence... Er... Then there's the problem of which edition... Whether the ten year anniversary edition has any other perks other than Dave Eggers introduction... Is print different size, book easier to handle... Thinking of investing in a copy... Will pay $50 if its right book for me...

Recently aquired (library) copy of William Gaddis The Recognitions and begun listening to language on first few pages... Definitely must aquire personal copy for life-long perusal... Am currently just signing up to study a B.Teach to enable myself to be paid to teach English in New South Wales high schools... Because I basically don't give a fuck about academic articles, so I wouldn't go down that road... Also just yesterday had a gig at my old primary school in which nobody paid any attention to me - something I will never get used to. Actually, I don't mind it when people leave me alone off-stage, but once I'm on there... I vow never to play to anyone at a cocktail gathering, or where any consumables aside from beer are involved... Wasted so much good material on unreceptive ears... Apparently I have a lot to learn about how receptive the world is going to be to me... Or fuck that. Have recently developed a penchant for swearing in everyday speech... Haven't yet tried it out on loved ones... Its great fun but.

Um... Am working, when I do, primarily on my food/crazy piece currently called 'Flux' aka Food That Eats You! Veering away from sillier title... I enjoy stories with humour, but I hardly ever read things with joke titles... I take my humour seriously! Think that's probably it. Um... Also working at my old primary school, same school where I had gig - that's how I got it. We're having a health inspection soon... And today on the news there was a botulism scare... All these things are milling around my head... 'Infinite Jest' is full of names of drugs and diseases - loads of jargon. That kind of technical detail doesn't interest me as much as the concepts... As far as my own writing...

Am enjoying 'Infinite Jest', up to pp 60 ;)... Gaddis is calling me though... He's saying strange things...