#█▒ ❝ beyond any recall to hone key ( musing ).

[dustedmagazine]

Marc Ribot’s Ceramic Dog — Hope (Northern Spy)

Hope by Marc Ribot's Ceramic Dog

Marc Ribot’s unorthodox right-handed playing style, developed under the tutelage of revered mentor, Haitian classical guitarist/composer Frantz Casseus and honed to a polished sheen during his storied stint as an R&B sideman, sounds quite natural at this point in his eclectically nomadic career. Given his technical fluency, Ribot is justly celebrated as a session player, but he is much more than that — intuitive enough to have profound influence as an esteemed collaborator, the unsung hero teasing out idiomatic layers in Tom Waits’ music and lending soulful texture to numerous Elvis Costello records, just to name two of his most enduring creative partnerships, and passionate and voluble enough to have pursued his own projects with singular focus.

For Ceramic Dog, Ribot enlisted Chess Smith, a percussionist who plays with ferocity and nuance, and Shahzad Ismaily, a versatile bassist capable of shifting between a mellifluous bebop style and assaultive punk minimalism, sometimes amidst the same track. For well over a decade, the trio has used the album format to stretch beyond the constraints of genre sonically and indulge both poetic and agit-prop impulses lyrically. At their best, the trio coalesces with verve, especially in the latter stretch of their new release.

Ribot emerged as a key contributor to the work of John Lurie’s Lounge Lizards and John Zorn during a time when NYC’s Downtown was establishing its own mythology, less high concept than today’s boutique-ridden landscape, but more spontaneously thrilling. He’s bohemian, and this aura, while perhaps a bit shopworn to some, is endearing and somehow revitalizing in the context of the current moment, imbuing these songs with an enduring quality after a year and a half of relative isolation and a pervasive feeling of loss.

He shows his thematic cards early, that is to say he’s outspoken and caustic, but sly, winking, tongue-in-cheek, as if he’s not taking himself too seriously. Polemical set opener “B Flat Ontology”’s verses can be overwrought and clunky, shoehorned in in their sheer verbosity — as Ribot laces doggedly into a world gone awry. Lines like “This one/vivisected a celebrity on YouTube” suggest a more acerbic Mark Knopfler. And yet the band must be applauded for unadulterated literary ambition, gleeful nihilism that also recalls the Dadaesque musings of indispensable Lower East Side bard John S. Hall, whose King Missile scored hilariously, epochally unlikely hits with “Jesus Was Way Cool” and “Detachable Penis” during a fruitful early 1990s stretch. The reggae-inflected “Nickelodeon”’s poesy comes across as more nonsensical, pleasantly banal, like elevated doggerel, but there’s an exuberant intensity to the performance, viscerally evoking the late, lamented Nuyorican Poets Cafe slams in their heyday. The melodies can be a bit rote, but they’re as beautifully rendered as you might expect from these artists, pleasurably out-of-time, not modish, trendy. 

“Wanna” cuts in with a more prickly, No Wave urgency. It’s an album of many hues, tonal shjfts, and Ribot and cohorts are nothing if not versatile. The track’s capaciously recorded with foreboding riffage that wouldn’t be out of place on an early 1990s Helmet record. Hope is as wildly eclectic as its name portends, and while the experimentation stagnates at times, it exhilarates more often — a tension that not only plays out holistically, but within the songs themselves. 

“I don’t accept any aspect/of capitalist society,” an unrepentant Ribot declaims to introduce “The Activist,” and just as his didactic screeds sometimes put us off, he reels us back in, beguilingly self-deprecating — the man knows whereof he speaks, being a venerable firebrand community organizer who earned his bona fides long ago. The piece closes with a burst of abrasive, serrated guitar, one of several late-album exemplars of potently distilled sonic virtuosity I would have liked to hear more frequently, as in the squalling sax, courtesy of Darius Jones, that introduces “They Met in the Middle,” and the shriek of catharsis that cleaves the song in half, erupting spontaneously, midway through, as well as the wryly-named “Bertha the Cool”’s lush jazz funk groove, reminiscent of the quietly influential Steve Coleman and Five Elements, refreshing after the verbal fusillades dominating the album up to that point.

Hope’s closing stretch is magisterial, resoundingly punctuated. “Maple Leaf Rage” might be named in homage to Joplin and ragtime, but a sense of the elegiac is the only discernible connection between the two compositions. The track arrives muted, tentative, with abundant negative space, becoming gradually more pointillistic as this keenly attuned trio establish themselves individually, but remaining reflective, hinting at stillness. The shouting and freneticism that characterized the first part of the record have dissipated, and the track breathes. Bandleader Ribot arrests the chaos, and Hope settles into place, at least momentarily, until the guitar kicks in, echoing the first passage with amplification and force, an avant-garde roundelay, and the song is deepened by this contrapuntal interplay. The record’s occasionally high-gloss production overwhelms its minimalist spirit here and there, and yet Ribot’s charm lies in his shapeshifting musical voice, as much a venerable journeyman professional as he is an irascible deconstructionist. So it is with the jagged guitar lines that tear this track open — impeccable and yet rawly emotive. It’s always a kick to hear Ribot solo. He conjures Funkadelic’s “Maggot Brain” here, in the way this one sputters to a standstill, at last capitulates to silence, an echoing cavern of the mind. 

Michael Wiener

[house-vexile]

🌑 Your muse just had a nightmare and needs cuddles to fall asleep again. (Jayley & Y'asmina)

Some nights, the burning returned. Her mind was a creative creature, twisting glowing and branded skin beyond its markings, turning it to fiery chains that seared through her flesh. Even in the midst of her dreams she could smell the scent of charred flesh and iron.

Other nights, it was a different kind of burning. Her limbs felt heavy, cold and bloated - no longer her own. A unique sort of suffering twisted in her gut, squeezing her chest and forcing the breath from her lungs. Her throat restricted, strangled by a twist of scales. And yet her fight was long over. She was merely present to witness her own defeat, deep beneath the surface dappled with light.

Tonight?

Tonight, swirled in a frigid and suffocating darkness, she chased candles. One after another, she would reach that flickering safety only to find the flame out of reach, snuffed out by her presence. Over and over she tried, desperate to keep just one candle alive as the number of lights dwindled. And yet every time, it was the same exchange. Her painted hands would reach, and the light would fade. Where did they go? Why couldn’t she just keep one? 

Just as that last lick of flame disappeared and her body was enveloped in the chilling ichor, her eyes shot open and her body jolted up to sit in the midst of her tangled bedding. The constant drum in her chest felt off kilter, deciding to play a melody instead of a beat. Teeth chattered until the witch forced her jaw closed, raking her hand back through her sweat-dampened, tousled hair.

It was a dream…go away…go back to sleep.

For a bell, she laid there, contesting her fear in favor of returning to slumber. And yet, the darkness of her quarters taunted her, warning her that the moment she drifted off, she would be back in the midst of that horror once more. 

Frustrated, Y’asmina reached under her bed, finding a dark shirt that was far too big for her frame. Over her head it went and the witch tried again, curled on her side with the bottom half of her face tucked beneath the collar of her safety garment.

No luck.

Rolling to her opposite side, her tired stare fell on her door. And in that same glance, her golden eyes honed in on the lock. Her mind drifted for only a moment before recalling something in her possession.

Maybe she would…

It took another bell of bouncing back and forth between what she should do, what she wanted to do and what was the adult thing to do before the witch told all of her foolish thoughts to fuck themselves. Throwing off her sheets and grabbing only her linkpearl bracelet and that singular key she needed, Y’asmina reached out to allow the aetherstream to take her where she needed to go.

First, it was merely a walk through the wilds, her bare feet chilled by the damp moss underfoot. 

From there, it was only a door, once defiant but now? Compliant with the turn of a key. She made sure to return it to its valiant state behind her.

Finally, it was just a few carefully taken steps to find where the Keeper was sleeping in the darkness. The witch even made sure to make her footfalls audible. Azeyma help her if she actually caught the woman by surprise.

Her ears could hear that continuous rumbling that shook the vicinity whenever Jayley breathed. In the darkness, Mina’s widen pupils could just make out where the outline of her body lay. Of course the Keeper would fall asleep on a couch on the one night Y’asmina took advantage of her secret weapon.

Well, she’d come too far to turn around now. She’d just have to make it work.

At the very least, the witch made her best effort to not poke or prod any bony bits against other bony bits as she crawled on the couch, considering trying to sleep on the slim outer edge of the couch that wasn’t occupied. Deciding that she was being dumb about this whole ordeal, she merely settled down atop the Keeper, taking solace in the heat and the soothing gravelly groan she heard beneath her. The witch breathed deeply, rubbing her face into the curve of Jay’s neck and shoulder as the trepidation in her chest finally settled. 

“Bad dream,” she whispered, “I’ll tell you later. Go back to sleep.”

                                           _______________________

~Cuddle Meme~

[kristen-lockhart-blog]

Book Review of “(Im)Proper Nouns” by Donna Sparrowhawk

https://www.facebook.com/permalink.php?story_fbid=2534067513341256&id=135308913217140&__tn__=K-R

Kristen Lockhart (Im)Proper Nouns By Donna Sparrowhawk Book Review

In the collection of poems, (Im)Proper Nouns, poet Donna Sparrowhawk utilizes an effortless flow and rhythm within and between her poems. Some of my favorite literary tools she uses throughout her poems are imagery and metaphors. Her collection is split into three sections, that are the nouns persons, places, and things. The poems within each section complement each other nicely as well as the three sections to form the whole collection. Sparrowhawk’s themes and imagery gives insight to a well-rounded and fulfilling life so far as well as holds hope for a fulfilling life to come. In the section titled Persons, Sparrowhawk has an array of poems, some dedicated to someone by use of their name, others with a more metaphorical title. The poem “Even Now I Listen,” is a pretty straight forward poem about the speaker’s dad. I really appreciate the glimpse into the speaker’s relationship with her father growing up. She hones in on the relationship between her and her father through her diction and metaphors.

“I know what tone you would use Soft, sliding your words under The door of my pain-induced silence.” I like the imagery that this stanza creates. I imagine a teenage daughter distraught and not wanting to talk to anyone, but her dad is the one who can truly reach her in these times. As if gently whispering through the crack of her door or sliding a letter with some heartbreak advice on it. In the last stanza, the speaker is reminiscing on times when her father could give her advice in person.

“Would you lift your eyes to mine and gently with your Fatherly tenderness, sweep the hair fallen in my eyes Remind me

To lessen fear…love more.”

She is admittedly fearful and doubtful of something throughout this poem. Perhaps, felt she was not ready to take on some things in her life without her father always being right there with her. All she has is these memories and can only imagine the advice that her father could give her now. Because of the vulnerability, I feel like this poem is a lovely and intimate glimpse into the speaker and maybe even the poet’s life. Moreover, in the poem “Not Quite a Sonnet for Susan on Her Sixtieth Birthday,” Sparrowhawk has a very compelling free form as well as great diction to portray the speaker’s feelings towards “Susan.” The poet reflects on her own use of form in which she originally intended a sonnet that actually became a free form poem.

“I tried to write you a sonnet for your birthday… abab cdcd efef gg but the fact of the matter is you are definitely free verse and otherwise and wise.”

She admittedly switches gears from a sonnet form to a free form. Moreover, I like the analogy of comparing her friend, Susan, to a free form poem herself. As well as the wordplay in “…you are definitely free, verse and otherwise, and wise.” Moreover, she utilizes lots of little comments inside of parentheses throughout the poem.

“extraordinarily fun deliciously irreverent outlandishly chi-ful (and I love it that you know what that means)”

The use of her parenthetical inserts creates more intimacy between her and the friend receiving this gift. She adds some fun, witty inside jokes and personality. And the way she describes Susan; the words she uses, “extraordinary, deliciously irreverent.” She is describing a deep admiration of everything that makes Susan the way she is. While keeping few elements of a sonnet throughout the piece, the author iterates that her Susan cannot be described in any one form. She reminisces on the first time they met recalls specific details with her imagery and describes the instant connection the friends had. I love the final line of the poem, comparing Susan to a child, having the same whimsy and wonder as a newly Sixty year old woman. And ending the poem on an ellipse as to say that her and Susan’s friendship and story is far from over. Much like in the poem about her father, the speaker creates an intimacy between not only her and the person the poem is dedicated to, but also her and the reader. She does so through the use of parentheses, her imagery in describing her memories, and her witty metaphors. The first poem in the “Places” section of the book is one of my favorites called, “Musings on a Train.” I find the setting of this poem so refreshing. She truly captures what it is to feel like you are in the story itself with this poem. “I glance out as sheep newly shorn And young, bolt as the train Whistles, and the old ewes lazily graze, Ignoring the fray.”

I am fortunate to have ridden on a train in England as well, especially as someone who lives in Florida with very few, if any, passenger trains. This poem describes to calm whimsy of riding on a train traveling past hills and grassy fields. A quite relatable stanza in this piece, is as follows:

“I doze in strange comfortable discomfort Drifting in and out, nestled against my Ferdinand’s Jacket, crumpled on the table under my head.”

Though, not all readers might have had the experience of riding a train, the images she creates can certainly come to life in the reader’s imagination. I particularly love the phrase, “comfortable discomfort,” to describe falling asleep on a train. Again, maybe not all readers would know this as exactly as described, but I feel like the sensation of trying to fall asleep on a bus or car even, can be a strangely calming scenario in a not quite so comfortable vessel. Especially if you are riding in said vehicle with a loved one. The scene described in this poem is that of a comfortable, daily event that is intimate between the speaker and a loved one. Sparrowhawk’s imagery allows the readers a glimpse into the speaker’s life because of her descriptions of this sweet life. Another one of my absolute favorite pieces is “Ballad of Equeurdreville.” Sparrowhawk’s effortless rhyme scheme creates a hilariously witty and whimsical story in this poem. I love how while reading this poem the reader gets a scene laid out in front of them of this funny banter between a traveling couple.

“My, what a pleasant urban walk! said he As she dodged the biker […] I’m sure my mate said repast was just beyond this hill A lovely place for dinner, in lovely Equeurdreville.

Why, yes, my love! cooed she to he Somewhat loudly over the roar of the passing lorry.”

From the very first line, the setting is being described as “urban” and disruptive with the biker needing to be dodged, as well as the “roar of the passing lorry.” Yet, the positive attitudes of this couple is already creating a humorous build up.

“I fear a restaurant I will never see, said he. Her reply reassuringly whispered, perhaps more a shrill— Do you think we’ll ever bloody find this Equeurdreville?”

“[…] I dare say one can look from here to eternity, said he. But no sign, no hope of food, nor drink—no, nada, nil In this, this, uh…lovely…Equeurdreville.”

The couple have a shift in attitude the longer it takes for them to find this restaurant. I particularly love the last line of that stanza; it makes it seem like a sassy narrator is reading this poem aloud to the reader. “Oh my, said she. Oh my, indeed, said he As they walked and pondered what was the key Don’t know, said she, but make out a Will Next time you suggest to me Equeurdreville!”

The final stanza after the couple had finished their long awaited meal in Equeurdreville, we get the final round of witty commentary. The poem ends on a silly joke as well, adding to the fun nature of the rest of the poem. This poem reminded me of the whimsical ways of rhyming of Dr. Seuss. This poem is different from the other poems in the collection due to its playful theme. Yet it still holds the particular style especially when it comes to Sparrowhawk’s romantic diction and intimacy between characters. The contrast in playfulness from this poem compared to more mature themes in other poems, as well as her consistent rhyming scheme shows how talented and versatile Sparrowhawk is with her writing. Finally, in the section “Things,” there is a poem entitled, “Twilight,” that has just more of that calming scenery that Sparrowhawk paints.

“It’s that time of day again… The light, in its fade Softens… Well, softens Everything.”

This opening stanza creates such a lovely setting with just a few simple phrases, which is magical. I also love the third stanza continues with this serene imagery and the fourth begins to introduce another theme into this poem.

“I wonder if the fox Will make his appearance tonight Now that you, Not I, Are absent.

“I’ve missed you today I should have been with you today, But, painfully I really couldn’t Because we You and I Know how to love.” The speaker is describing beautiful scenery yet is lonely or missing her loved one. Yet, I gather this is the type of missing someone when they are just out for the day, perhaps at work.

“I know you are on your Way back to me now.

Warm soup is waiting And music, and me,

The words can wait.”

The lines of her poetry feel comfortable and familiar. Sparrowhawk has been able to take sorrow in her poems such as this one and spin it around into hope. This entire collection of poems by Donna Sparrowhawk reflects on a life filled with beauty and love for these persons, places, and things. She uses wonderous imagery and metaphors to describe these loved ones and locations in such intimate detail. The warmth, wit and charm in her words are the ties that carry over and connect all her poems in this collection, (Im)Proper Nouns.