rock and roll musings by Tim Byrnes

Boxing Outside the Think: A Dream Sequence

   (Authors note: The standard accusation thrown at me by our resident Christofascist is that I'm an entertainer and not a serious person. I refer the word 'artist', as I don't get paid for this shit, but that's another story. He once rebuked me w/ a snide "No business like show business, eh Tim?" To which I reply: THERE'S NO BUSINESS BUT SHOW BUSINESS! An idea, a belief, a feeling, a creed, a code of morality, whatever, once you start the attempt to share it w/other people, you start selling it! There is no purity inside or outside of self, because we are all products of our history. We are all products of our education. We are all products of our upbringing. We are all products of our individual, personal inclinations which are, of course, formed and informed by all of the above. Bottom line: We are all products.)    

     "It's a hot night here at the Heavenly Polo Grounds. I'm yr ring announcer Lester Bangs, and we're here for the Fight of the Afterlife. The fighters are just now entering the ring."

      (Mic slowly falls from clouds)

     LBangs: " In this corner, ladies and gentlemen, the challenger. Standing 6 feet 3 and 3/4 inches, weighing in at 148 lbs. soaking wet w/change in his pockets. The Nihilist From the East: Mahwah Tim Byrnes"

       (Loud booing from crowd, scatterred cheering from the section that smells suspiciously like sulphur)

     LBangs: "And in this corner, the reigning champion of all He surveys, standing higher than the clouds in all His eternal majesty, weighing in on everything that ever matterred and, praise him, always backing the right horse. He's mean, he's clean, the Galillean Grappler, The Nazarene Knockout King, Ladies and Gentlemen, yr Saviour and mine Jeeeeeeeeeeesus. H. Chriiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiist!!!!!!!!"

       (Tumultous, nay, rapturous applause, halos getting flung in the air, glorious trumpet music comin' outta nowhere, and I swear I saw a couple of bitches flying, man!)

      LBangs: "Our Lord and Saviour is in his corner praying w/cornerman Jim Muglia. Let's see if I can get them on mic. (Loud electrical zapping sound. Bangs appears back onscreen, face now blackened) Well, that didn't work, maybe we can listen in  on Byrnes and his cornerman, the Rev. Jeremiah Wright."

     JWright: "Now I wants you to git in dere and justa kick dat honky's ass! Kick him in da Holy Balls!!! Ain't representing shit for us. Now kick his thorny headed, water walkin', tragedy ingnorin', broke his promise to the promised people's, loaves and fishes multiplyin'  ASS!"    

     Byrnes:   Uh, ......OK

     (ding!)             

     LBangs: "Round one! Byrnes comes out, looking even whiter than usual, he's got his arms outstreched, and he's walking up to Jesus w/and I can't believe this, folks, w/his chin up! Jesus floats like a butterfly, one of the many wonders of His creation, up to Byrnes, and it's a right! A hard right! Another right, another right, another and another and another right. Byrnes is reeling and bleeding from his potty mouth. Another hard right from He who came to save the world!  Byrnes is waving his arms spasmodically, looking like Joe Cocker in a fish bowl. Byrnes staggers up  to Jesus, spits out his false teeth and, oh my goodness, he's kicked Jesus in the Holy Balls. I can't really see too well now, what w/all the flames and lightning suddenly filling this arena, ladies and gentlemen, but it appears that Jesus is pissed! "

(15 minutes later)

     LBangs: (Sounding bored) "And another right. And another. And another. Byrnes is little more than a long, skinny pulp of blood w/big ears, now, folks. Jesus stands back and raises his arms. The crowd roars!!! The arena is filled w/the triumphant light of good over evil once again. Pepperland is saved. The mouth of Byrnes has been silenced. Praise Jesus! Praise Jesus! Praise Jesus! Huzzah! Huzzah!!!!   Oh, what's this?  Byrnes is moving, he's trying to raise himself off the canvas! Great googly moogly, folks, I can't believe it!  He's on his knees now, facing Jesus! He's taking his gloves off! Could this be the long awaited surrender and supplication of the heathen Byrnes, for which so many of the faithful have prayed so long??!!! Oh, no, he's raising his hands to the Lord, I think he's making a one fingered gest............. "

     (Suddenly the screen shot slips upscreen like unraveled film and from offstage left comes that Oscar winning rabbit, Bugs Bunny, carrying a large pair of scissors and wearing a wily grin)

     BBunny: "Sorry, folks, but due to circumstances beyond our control, and understanding, we are unable to show you the rest of this cartoon. But let me tell ya what happened................................"

De-Ba-De-Ba-De g-g-g-god d-d-damn am-am-america!

                                                                              

                              

Posted by: timbyrnes at 19:09 | link | comments (6)

Told Ya We Were Doomed. Told Ya, Told Ya. Didn't I Tell Ya?

     I was watching the lovely Sara Vowell on Jon Stewart the other night and she was riffing on how, absent the type of reassurance that comes from real leadership during a crisis such as the imminent failure of the American, if not global, financial system, she consoled herself by going online and re-reading FDR's Fireside Chats. Yes, it was funny, but it'd have been funnier if it weren't so damn sad. And possibly true. We as a people find ourselves staring down the barrel of No Future for real, and all we wanna do is look back.

     To FDR. To Jesus. To the fictional 'good old days' we've all invented. To the America that never existed, the one where all men are created equal. To a time when we could ignore the world 'cause it wasn't in our face 24/7 in this magical new era of multimass communication. To a time when might made right and nobody asked any questions.

     And whither our leadership? W.'s turned into a blurry photograph of a President. McCain's running around like Al Haig whenever Reagan took a nap ("I'm in charge!!! I'm in charge!!"). Sarah Palin's providing material for Tina Fey. Obama is, of course, too cool for school. He's really not doing anuthing much more than projecting calm, but seems to me that, while comfort might ultimately be a useless commodity when yr house is on fire, it is after all, comforting.

     And this is the best we can do? Maybe we are doomed.

     Just an additional note of paranoia before I go: Be aware that W. has written into law something called Executive Order 51, which apparently allows him to suspend, in the event of a national crisis, any or all government activity, up to and including the election. Also, at the same time a battalion of Army soldiers (who's anacronym is prounounced SEA-SMURFS), a battalion that up until recently was in Iraq, containing civilian populations, is now currently training in Colorado Springs. Google it. Juan Espinoza wrote 1 of only 2 articles I've read about this in The Pueblo Chieftain, of all places.

     I'm just saying.

tb

Posted by: timbyrnes at 19:54 | link | comments (20)

An Open Letter the the 3 or 4 People Stll Reading This Crap

     First off, in the interest of disclosure, I'd like it on the record that I haver never killed a baby. Thought about it once on a long bus trip, but never went through w/it. I see that during my absence (just working a lot, nothing major) our disinvited, yet somehow still resident, Christofascist wingnut has been busy.

     This is a man who somehow sees my potential 'salvation' (read: my falling for the same fantasy he has, oh, and in exactly the same manner) not as a reacharound by the arm of compassion, but as a VICTORY!!! Something about me w/my tail between my legs.

    There's that Christian love I've read so much about. My take is that man invented god, right? Now of course I could be wrong but not Jim! Oh no, he knows the mind of god, this god of love and mercy that gives this little peckerwood the license to call people 'baby killers'. Once again, if that's yr god, Jim, then fuck her.

     You are not going to 'shut down' punkrock and neither am I going to ban you from here like you've been banned from those Christian websites for your hate filled nonsense (I cop to posting hate filled nonsense, too, but as I've never claimed to represent a loving god, I'm not the hypocrite here. You are.) And I'll tell ya why I'm not going to ban you. For one thing, I believe in free speech, no matter how idiotic, Also, Jim, you are the most unintentionally funny person this side of Sarah Palin. But most importantly, to me, I love giving you a forum so the 3 or 4 people that are still reading this crap can see the venal stupidity that results when someone takes Christianity to the extremes that you have. Thanks for doing my work for me.

     We get it, yr anti-choice. Then don't get an abortion, MAN. Focus on yr own damn family (oh, and btw, the reason I don't ask about yr kids is I don't give a fuck about yr kids. Do you give a fuck about my cats? No. So, shut up.) and post yr drivel elsewhere. One post of disagreement is usually enough, especially when yr posting where yr not wanted, but 50 plus posts basically represents a diseased ego talking to itself.

     Oh, and yr paranoid, too. Matching timestamps in order to determine the identity of a poster. Pathetic.

     One last question; how lonely do you have to be to hijack someone else's blog? Go ahead and bask in the reflected glow of my mediocrity if you must, but trust me, we're not laughing w/you. We're laughing at you.

tb

Posted by: timbyrnes at 18:14 | link | comments (19)

Kill Whitey: Just How Stupid Do the Republicans Think We Are and Are They Right?

(Authors Note: Sorry it's been a while. In the space of the last 3 weeks the person I was cutting trees down for, the same man I was to rent the Almost West Virginia house from, suddenly passed away. His son swooped in and is selling the house and it now looks like I'm not gonna get paid for the tree cutting. Also 2 new people moved in on either side of me, both of whom own pit bulls. Walking Buster and Sarah has taken on the flavor of redneck rollerball and if that wasn't enough, thanks to CSPAN, I watched nearly all of both National Conventions, so my mood might be a little, shall we say colored, and evident in the following piece. But not by much.)

    In an act of cynicism to which I can only aspire, John McCain - or more likely the Republican Party - selected Sarah Palin as his V.P. in a transparent attempt to mollify his Christofascist base and perhaps wrest a place in History from Hillary Clinton. Palin, a red hot trailer trash hockey mom just slightly to the right of, say, Hitler, has gone, in days, from deserved obscurity to the spotlight of the National Stage (if only for minutes at a time) w/a resume and familial issues that have the Republicans flip-flopping like the dying fish they are.

   Take the 'bridge to nowhere' debacle. Palin proudly boasts that she lilled this particularly odious earmark but fails to mention that she kept the 27 million dollars to buils the access road to said bridge. Reformer, my ass.

     Then there's 'troopergate', where it's alleged that Palin (ab)used her power in an attempt to get her sister's ex husband fired from the Alaska State Troopers. Reformer my ass.

     And of course, there's the pregnant daughter. Now, I agree that this is nothing new and that things happen in even 'the best of homes', but I find it suspect and not a little creepy that suddenly the Republican Party just looooooves illegitimate children and have chosen this issue to proudly bow out of people's personal lives and not, say, Bill Clinton's infamous blowjob. Reformers, my ass. Besides can you imagine the outcry if Barak Obama had, say,  a 17 yr old daughter who got knocked up by a thuglike boyfriend who showed up at the DNC looking like he just won the Stupid Lottery?

      Serious side note: OK the kids are off limits, but check out the Palin boyfriend's myspace page (and I quote:) 'I'm just a fuckin' redneck. Fuck w/me and I'll kick ass.' and, of course the deathless 'I don't want kids.' Trust me, this whiteboy's a punkass slut who's getting shotgunned into marriage by a political machine.

   Watching Palin, McCain, Romney and their ilk spew their brandy new 'change' message all the while lying through perfect teeth about working surges and airplanes on ebay appalled me. 'How stupid do they think we are?" I thought. 'Is anyone actually buying this crap?' I thought.  Then I watched the cheering masses in St. Paul and have listened to the locals talk about her (Palin) like the second coming of Joan of Fucking Arc and I slowly start to realize why we've been saddled w/the most corrupt administration West of Putin for the last 8 years:

     People are stupid.

     Not just ill-informed. Stupid. And lazy,.But mostly stupid. Around these parts and other parts, I'm sure,  Palin's getting praised for dangerously idiotic comments like 'The Iraq War is a call from God" and that the (so far nonexistent) plan to end the war is 'God's plan'. Come on, folks, we've had 8 years of these 'God talks to me' religious wingnuts and look where it's got us. Hated by much of the world for our simplistic and overbearing certainty that god blesses our 'right' to tell other cultures they're not good enough.

   So fuck this gun totin', bible thumpin' wolf murdering bitch from the North country who, 13 days into the zeitgeist has the gall to demean community service while exalting her own intentions to hide from the press.

   And while yr at it fuck John McCain for kissing W's ass just to win a contest and betraying what integrity he had all the while reminding us that he's a war hero. But you know what? McCain crashed not 1, not 2, not even 3, but five fucking airplane in his career. I'm starting to think he's bad luck.

Wright in '08

gopd damn america

tb

Posted by: timbyrnes at 19:05 | link | comments (66)
parts

Almost West Virginia: The Revolving Doors of Perception Roll Once More

   I'll dispense w/the usual appy-polly-loggy about being away for so long, I was working, 'nuff said and does anyone really care anyhow? Well, yes of course we do to one degree or another. Hey, you know what one of the greatest things I ever heard during my alcohol rehab experiences was? For those lucky enough never to have lived such a life as to require the rehab experience, let me open a little window: most mornings and afternoons are spent trying not to fall asleep in a little combination schooldesk/chair dealie while the same guy you listened to yesterday drones on and on giving essentially the same lecture each day. Repetition apparently works and is needed when trying to drill the obvious into that numbest of skulls, that of the drunken drug addict.

     Well, this one guy, let's call him George 'cause that's his name (Hi, George!) had basicallt 2 riffs: A) "Healthy people aren't any better than sick people, they just have more power" and, my favorite B) "Do we really care about you here in rehab? Yes, just not much."

     He had me w/the 2nd one. It had the ring of truthful sarcasm and, like any good trigger, made me think. 'Well, yeah," I thought," Folks do care in the sense that most would, were you on fire, put you out, but would leave the cleanup to the professionals. The 'nobody loves me' excuse gets lost when you really see that, well, nobody loves you, but we'll show you good things you could do so maybe you can love yerself, but really, Skippy, it's (as usual) up to you. NEXT!!!"

    I bring this up because, let's see, oh yeah, my apartment. As noted above, the little ghetto I've been living in had become something of a madhouse. CPS still hasn't shown up, the kids are still running around all night, smells like they're boiling fucking ammonia in the apartment next door and syddenly the guy next door can't afford to feed the GOLDEN RETRIEVER he keeps chained up on a 3 FOOT chain and I'm finding myself supporting half the resident's animals while being continually annoyed by the other half, who just act like animals.

     So, I'm torn between being judgemental (my specialty!) and trying to just bring a little good to the situation (3 burritos in the morning for the Retriever, a pack of cigarettes to his owner, maybe don't call the police one night etc.) when suddenly a third option opened up. Dig: when my house burned down 6 months ago, the old landlord rented me a new, smaller apartment for the same exact rent, guaranteeing me 1st shot at my old place once it was remdeled. That was, again, six months ago. In the meantime, he hired a drunk to fix my place who's 1st official act was to diamantle the shower in my new place. He was goi9ng to repair it, even had the new walls and fixtures laid out on my sidewalk. Then he gets the bright idea to 'wait until I finish yr old place' then he gets arressted. Twice. Then he leaves the state. Then the new landlord tells me it'll be another month. That was 4 months ago. The last straw came 3 days ago when the new landlord asks me if I'll help in move the aforementioned walls and fixtures from my sidewalk (they've been there 4 months now, remember) to a shed, thus assuring my shower will not get fixed and again promising me that he'll do it after I 'move back into yr place.'

    Later that night the universe hooked me up w/the possibility of a rental house 3 blocks south of where I am now except this time I'll have a fenced yard for Buster and Sara, a full basement for Flashback rehearsals, a garage for a cathouse (and I mean actual cats, don't get all offended) on a dead end street surrounded by old people. Almost West Virginia. (It's a John Denver reference and I don't believe in heaven. Do the math.)

     It's not a done deal and I don't want to jinx it, but it looks real good. In the meantime I'm figuring out a way to leave the ghetto gracefully (who'm I kidding, I want to crank Flashback up at 4 in the morning the day I leave, but I don't think I 'm really that immature. Or would be able to keep Dan or Kenny up until 4 in the morning!). I'll have to come back night after night, rounding up the straycats who love me and as such are those I cannot abandon. I really want to call the new landlord something dirty, but he is after all, a businessman and cares about me, just not much.

     Wish me luck. It feels like a graduation. Between the upcoming move, the tree cutting job (and I've worked 6 days and haven't fallen out of a tree yet, so whoever lost the pool, pay up) and my actual job, Ima gonna be pretty busy and among the missing, but all in a good cause. Gotta go email the Envelopes and let 'em know I'm not dead. Keep whatever faith you like, buy "Fight With Tools" by Flobots 'cause it rocks and stay tuned for more adventures 'cause life just keeps rocking and rolling.

     I wonder how much trouble one can get into for Grand Theft Retriever?

tb

Posted by: timbyrnes at 20:38 | link | comments (8)
am for the exact same rent only

Sorry It Took a While: We Were Just Tuning.

     I am, alas, one of those old men afflicted w/a trick back. I have no idea how it happened (although I tell all and sundry it's an old football injury: 'Yeah. Fell off a bar stool watchin' a jet game'.  What can I say? I'm a card. Deal w/it.) but every so often I turn my skinny frame like the wrong way and the pain comes down like a freeway and I wind up walking like Groucho Marx for weeks at a time and, basically, that's what happened 3 weeks ago and that's why I ain't been here.

     I am not dead. And ain't nobody won nutthin'!

     Has been a busy 3 weeks work wise and home wise and even music wise. Have finally settled into a consecutive 4 day work week and will be starting to help a friend cut down some trees at his sister-in-law's on my days off. Apparently I can make enough money in a week or so to pay for that sexy digital 8 track I've had my eye on. The living situation just keeps getting weirder and weirder; drunk all the time mom leaves her 2 kids (ages 5 and 7 and you know I'm guessing) w/the alleged crackheads next door who party all night and blast bad disco on the stereo.

     And before anyone gets too outraged, don't worry I've already called CPS.

      Because that's what a responsible person does and, let me tell ya, these people were a lot more fun when they were just annoying alcoholic sociopaths. Before these kids got involved the situation was manageable, even fun in that it gave me something relatively valid to bitch about, as opposed to another antiFloyd screed, and I loved the irony of being the one who called the cops for once. But the other night, 'bout a week ago. It's 2 in the morning. I don't get home from work till 11:30 pm, have to walk the dogs, feed the cats, unwind, watch Charlie Rose so I'm not going to sleep until 2am, right? I no sooner get under the covers when the headlights from their incoming van (bars just closed, remember? This is a Tuesday night, btw) flood my bedroom, followed by the noise of 5 drunks in their early 2o's falling out of the van and into the apartment next door, which shares a wall with, you guessed it, my bedroom.

BOOOM BOOOM BOOOOOM goes the most insipid bassdrum track I've ever heard. Through the wall and through my skull for I'm not kidding like the 4th night running (and why is it people who insist on making me listen to their music never play anything I like?) so I get up, dress accordingly and march out like a skinny policeman and knock on their door. I actually have to knock 4 times before the occupants hear me. Anyway, post 4th knock, the door flies open and here's this guy (my next door female neighbor always has a guy) I've never seen, striking a drunken bare knuckles fighting stance. He somehow knows my name and proceeds to use it 15 times in one sentence, asking if it's the music that's too loud or them. I lookes past this and him to see 3 other glassy eyed males and my neighbor, she who shall remain nameless, looking at me like I'm the enemy 'cause I guess in this case I am. There on the couch sat these two children taking it all in and processing it who knows how but does anyone here think it could remotely be good?

     So I told the drunk guy to'... just do it' after the 13th apology and promise to be quiet. I've learned from my own fieldwork that you can't reason w/a drunk. So idiot me wrestled w/it for a few days, each night I heard those kids yelling in the parking lot. Now they weren't getting beat y'all, they were yelling out of sheer abandon. Or abandonment?

     I don't know why I decided it was my call to make. Probably because everybody else in the complex was commenting on it was a shame the way those kids etc and the ever popular 'something's gotta be done' which for once I not only agreed with but acted upon. Well, not to blame America first, but I made that first call a week and a half ago and nobody's been out to check on those kids yet In the meantime our local police have been turning around in our driveway a lot more lately (Thanks, Jim!) and 2 other neighbors have taken up the task of calling the cops when the party goes out of bounds and stand there outraged when the cops show up, so at least now I'm getting a little sleep. Talk to y'all soon, I gotta make a couple of phone calls.

Viva la France!

tim

Posted by: timbyrnes at 19:32 | link | comments (2)

Ghosts in the Answering Machine: Something Creaky This Way Comes

    1st off I was wrong, as usual. The Tension Envelopes reunion will not take place in January, but in April. All other previous info still applies.

     So, who are these Envelopes, and why are they so tense? I was talking to guitarist Rick Neblung the other day and he commented that bassist Carl Simmons has' a memory like a steel trap' and I agree. His historical reminiscences re: Tension Envelopes on burninglight and elsewhere are likely yards more accurate than anything I might vaguely remember beyond feeling.

      But, oh, what a feeling.

     Anyway, it was 197something and I was like 6 months away from my second divorce, alcoholism was a comin' to git me, I was working as a receiveing clerk for a Great Metropolitan Communications company and playing 'Sweet Jane' in one lousy barband after another.

     Enter Rick Neblung. Introduced to me by a female guitarist friend Allison Ruta(who helped me realize I had no business being married and for which has never been properly thanked or apologized to). It was this introduction that set the stage for Tension Envelopes.

     The start, of course, was false. Rick and I and Allison and Tom Fraunberger (remeber Tom?) made our cbgb debut under the Envelope name and were rickety, drunk and split down the middle between my and Allison's songs. We also turned into kinda a punkdrunk Fleetwood Mac as Tom hooked up w/my not-yet-ex-wife and Itried, pathetically and unsuccessfully to hook up w/Allison.

     Allison, if yr reading this I am sooooooooooooo sorry. Truly.

     Anyway that version imploded. Rick and I hooked up w/drummer Don Gunning for essentially 6 months of power trio basement jams. A great 'woodshed' period but Don wanted different thinbgs than Rick and I and we all realized it and that band split up as amicably as pie making room for the ACTUAL Tension Envelopes.

     Enter Carl Simmons and Mike Hegger. Carl plays bass so Rick moves to guitar. Here's what I remember.......

     The 4 of us 1st set up as strangers in Neblung's loft. I'd just written a 3 chord slice of psychodrama called 'Danny Miller', a death ballad for a fictional idiot who snorted a boatload of heroin 'cause he thought it was coke and, as a result, died. It starts...

'i think you better sit down, Ii got some news, Marie

About the man you loved and I wish you didn't have to

Hear this from me.....'

     The riff, in Rick and Carl's hands was suddenly huge and commanding, like a giant stepping down a mountain in the silverain of Mike's cymbals and the thunder of his toms. Electric blood flooded the room. I crouched my best Johnny Rotten and continued to the chorus, which swung it's song of doom

 '.... someone sold pure smack to Danny Miller

Thought it was cocaine..... but he was wrong.....'

     Each powerchord accent became the tinsel explosion of the punch to the eye. I grew a backbone and believed the words I was singing as never before......

' Stoned celebrities urging kids DON'T DO DRUGS!!!!!

Someone's dealing death out by the playground swingset

Someone's turning our children into ghosts.....'

     Everything got louder and taller and smarter and hipper and finely tuned just right. Guitar chords crashed like jetfighters, the drums generated a freakin' magnetic field and I started swinging that mic stand, guitar forgotten. I'm a singer now, dammit, trying to dress up empathy as sympathy.....

'Somewhere somebody's visiting theoir own private heaven

Huddled in the cold w/a needle in their arm

And maybe for 20 minutes thay ain't got no problems

Finall, sleeping like a kitten in some kitchen

Comfortable ........... and warm.'

    At this lull w/no prearrangement other than knowing it had to be this way,m the 4 of us crashed on the downbeat, ponding that riff like we were nailing it to a cross. It was that perfect and important. I improvised the lyrics we ended the song w/ever after....

'If you can love me black I just might love you back

Love me back, mommy.'

    Crashburn, slow cymbal dissolve. Neblung picks up the riff in a ticktock rhythm. Carl's bass slides across sympathy notes like grace on skates, Mikes rolling down an endless flight of stairs while my guitar speaks in tongues of flame and feedback. It ends w/a crash that echoes in the vast space like waves on a beach.

     Mike looks up w/that 100000 watt smile and, as Rick reported elsewhere, asked 'Well, am I an Envelope?!' Truth is, in that moment we were all of us, finally Tension Envelopes.

     We've lost Mike Hegger and it truly breaks what heart I have that he and I never got the chance to know each other sober, to talk as men and perhaps settle differences; to forgive and be forgiven. I was a mess and yes, made messes, may of which I still regret (sorry again, Allison, you deserved better) but I wouldn't trade a day becausee there was such glory in the noise.

     It's that noise that kicks the ass of the James Taylor/Confessional crap that soaks the spirit in self-pity, sending it sounth towards self-destruction. It's that noise, those songs (and new somgs) played by those people that right now signals if not redemption, then a pretty funky form of vindication.

     A second chance. To not just do what we do best but, I daresay, to be who we are best.

     The beast is awakening. Don't say I didn't warn you.

Posted by: timbyrnes at 20:57 | link | comments (5)

Sherman, Set the Wayback to I Don't Remember

Random thoughts: Ok, either it's reality or it's television. It can't be both. Now there's a grand, sweeping statement (yeah, it tells the world ya ain't got a clue). How's the weather up there? I don't get to ask that question very often 'cause I'm like 6 foot 2 damn tall and people alays ask me that stupid question and Groucho Marx once said that the best way to answer that question was to spit on the guy and tell him it's raining, but has yr weather been as hot as ours? 102damn hot for the last 3 weeks. Or, oh my god, is yr place llike underwater in the flooding? I'm so sorry to be bitching about heat while people's lives float and drown and change irrevocably . From experience all I can say is, it sucks but that's all.

Try to find the good. Apparently that's what makes us human.

Wonder what makes a human torch?

  Feel like I'm living in a bad movie of the week about rural southerners and Hollywood's interpretation  of same as a kind of cartoon gothic opera. Suddenly my already seedy ghetto's been invaded by, and I'm sorry to say this, but ,,,,,,,,, stereotypes.

I myself have sunk to the stereotype of the grumpy old man who yells at the kids to 'turn that shit down' and while it breaks my heart on one level as I suffer not from an irony deficiency but in my defense it usually is shit and it's always too damn loud. And big ol' German Sheperds tied up all barking madness and teethteethteeth. Hank Sr blaring from the car radio at 1 am. Drunken howlings at the moon. A loud .love of life from louts who havn't learned that life is largely levels of loss.

When you choose to look at it that way. I guess.

And guess what? The (legendary) New Jersey barband Tension Envelopes will be reuniting sometime in late December/early January in the rocknroll hotbed of Fowler, Colorado. Ex Paul McKinney Band drummer Paul Costello will be filling in on drums (but not said drummer's shoes) for the late Mike Hegger. Still in the ridiculously early planning stages of this but suffice to say the more it hits me what we're actually going to do, the more twisted and excited this page is gonna be. Expect some type from both Eric Flesch and Speedy Firbank on this one.

Growing old in public.

tim

Posted by: timbyrnes at 21:36 | link | comments (14)

Bo Diddley Was a Gunslinger: On Mortality and Bomp Bomp Bomp Ba Bomp Ba Bomp Bomp

     Bo Diddley is dead. Long live Bo Diddley! Long live the spirit and the memory of the young heart articulating it's sorrowjoylovehatesexandmadness by spouting gibberish atop some driving beat. Long live the superherodom attained by strapping on a Stratocaster and plugging into the Marshall stack of collective conciousness. Long live the hopeful hopeless in their mission to get someone, anyone to LOOK AT ME and somehow register as more than a blip on local radar. Long live the attempt, through sound and words, to transform the randomness of the semi-wasted life into a culture. Long live the garage. Long live the cheap guitar. Long live the street dance. Long live the corner bar. Long live the idiots yelling out for 'Free Bird' when you've been slamming out Clash covers all night. Long live the woozy, frowzy drunk chick who can make you feel like Hendrix w/just one unfocused look and perhaps a lick of the lips. Long live the mixtape, the anarchist's answer to lousy radio. Long live the open mic night. Long live punk rock.

     Long live the blues.

tb

Posted by: timbyrnes at 22:46 | link | comments (2)

Themes for an Imaginary Western

    Viva Obama and his little old Mama and that's all I'm gonna say about it.

     For now.

     What I'd like to play around with is what kinda theme songs will the candidates choose. Obama's been pumping 'Beautiful Day' by U2 through his victorious speakers, while I believe Hillary was still using Fleetwood Mac's 'Don't Stop" and Old Man McCain was playing 'Glycerine' or 'Sixteen Stones'.

    Something by Bush. Get it?

     OK, it's patently obvious that I have nothing to write about and am simply sitting in the library typing at y'all and that ain't fair. It's a beautiful day - and speaking of which, I heard that Bono (not Sonny) has asked the Obama campaign to cease and desist using the tune of that same name, although no reasons were given. Or needed.

    Oh yeah, I have an empty head and busy fingers this morning. So how y'all been?

     I recently left one job to go back to another, the convenience store I almost had to manage. But now I'm the late shift (2 to 11) utility guy. I'm getting lots of hours and almost staying out of the politics, but you know what happens when you put 3 people in a room. They might not pick a leader, but they'll surely pick somebody to hate. That's from an old Star Trek and the best description of the birth of Politics I've ever heard. So far.

     Buster and Sarh say hello. Camille and the 100 cats all say meow. I say Watson whatever happened to J.F Murphy and Salt?

Be back when I have something to say. MMMMMMMMWWWWWWAHHHHH I Love you all!

tim

Posted by: timbyrnes at 20:24 | link | comments