So I think it is time to do something. Time to post things. So I write and for the first time ever I think it’s time to put it out there. I heard about Mark Weir and the Martian. How it was a blog first. I have no illusions that the same will happen to me. But I have an idea and I need to put it out there.
So it’s coming. Not sure when, but it’s a comin’.
So here’s the thing: I suck at keeping a schedule. I mean terrible.
I haven’t touched this blog for three years. I’ve tried. Three times I’ve tried to write a post. Mostly its out of disinterest. My disinterest. Not peoples Mostly I don’t think that people notice. I am one voice in the wilderness that is the internet. Now I could just let it be. Never touch it again, but I don’t like leaving things unfinished.
My other problem was technical problems. My laptop at the time was slowly dying. Every repair did little to stop it. So here I was wanting to write and not really having a outlet to do so. I’m not going to throw shade on why it kept braking down. It just did and we’ll leave it like that.
So what am I saying? I don’t know. I want to write, but due to mental problems it’s hard to focus. I want to say I’m going to write a post a week, but damn I don’t want to lie. So here go. I write when I feel like it. I’ll keep writing what is on my mind.
Stay tuned.
So my last post was half of a list of the most obscure and surprising characters in Batman:The Brave and The Bold. I was going to do it as one list but then I saw the size of the list. There’s a point when writing when you realize that your project is getting huge and you should stop. Not only did I realize that, but I ran to that point. I did wind sprints to that point.
I’m not saying I’m lazy. But if I have to go to the easier route, I so would. But I wanted to do a better job than I did with the first half. The first half was okay, but I think it could have been better. Firstly I didn’t give the first appearance. Which I should have. I also didn’t really say the significance of the obscure character, but hopefully I will. So here we go.
10- Animal-Vegetable-Mineral Man
He made his first Appearance in Doom Patrol (first series) #89. He is one of the craziest designs. Half of his body is human. The other half is a T-Rex. Like you do. His arms are vegetable on his right side and crystal on his left. His legs are also the same kind of pattern. Though on T-Rex side his leg is shaped like t-rex leg. The Doom Patrol is the DC answer to the X-men, but came out a couple of months before of X-men. The Patrol have the weirdest villains well they did for the silver age. I mean one of their greatest villains is a brain in a jar and a talking gorilla. Even in the silver age that’s weird. The Animal-Vegetable-Mineral Man made his appearance in the episode “The Last Patrol”.
9-Ambush Bug
I’ll try to talk about Ambush Bug without sounding exceedingly high. This will be a daunting task. He first appeared in DC Comics Presents # 52 (December 1982). He is one of the few non silver age characters that are on this list. I’ve got some bronze age in here, but not many from the eighties. Okay when he was made he was a super-villain for awhile. He fought Superman, well annoyed superman. Then he became a superhero. He fought odd villains such as the malevolent sentient sock Argh!Yle. Yes folks a sentient sock. See what I mean about sounding high? He is also one of the few comic book characters that knows he is in a comic book. Which predates Deadpool and She-Hulks second series by some years. He has a following, but isn’t that known of a character. His appearance in the episode “Mitefall” is a surprise, but a welcome one.
8-The Creature Commandos
Simple concept for this. Picture the Universal Monsters as a military squad. That’s it. Nothing fancy. They first appeared in Weird War Tales #93(November 1980) I thought they appeared as hard bronze age characters and they are kinda in the bronze age. DC’s bronze age really didn’t end until Crisis on Infinite Earths in 1985. Anyway the Commandos are made up of Lt. Mathew Shrieve(normal human), Warren Griffith (a Werewolf), Sgt. Vincent Velcro (Vampire, isn’t alliteration fun?), Pvt. Elliot ‘Lucky’ Taylor (Frankenstein’s monster, though not the actual monster) and Dr.Myrra Rhodes (I was going to say Gorgon, but I’d rather say medusa because people will know what that is). The Commandos fought in WWII Europe which is good because actual super heroes couldn’t go into Europe to fight, because of the spear of destiny. This leads to more questions, like why should I care? Well reasons. Reasons I won’t go into here. But I will if I get around to it. Later. Anyway after Europe they fought alongside the G.I Robot (not explaining that one) on Dinosaur Island(not explaining this one either, just know that it is awesome.). They made their debut on Brave and the Bold in the episode “Four Star Spectacular”.
7-Detective Chimp
Okay think of the weirdest pairing you can think of. Now abandon that because I’m going to talk about Detective Chimp. He used to be a trained animal, but a run in with Rex the Wonder dog(yes that’s a thing) took him to the fountain of youth. That gave him enhanced mental faculties and the ability to talk to all living creatures in their own language. His first appearance was in The Adventures of Rex the Wonder Dog #4 (July-August 1952). I think other than the Cavalier he is the oldest character on the list. Hell he’s part of the Atom age. Part of the time between the Golden and Silver ages.
6-The Fisherman
Okay not much is none of the Fisherman. I don’t have my Who’s Who handy, so I can’t give you any more background than he fought Aquaman. His first appearance is Aquaman #21 (May-June 1965). With such little amount of information about him why did I put him so high on the list? Because there is so few information about him. This is a list of the obscure and surprising. The Fisherman is both. I’m not sure he’s as surprising as say Ambush Bug or the people later on the list but plenty surprising.
5-Doctor Double X
Now we get into the obscure. This is silver age silliness at it’s finest. Okay he has a energy double of him. That’s Doctor Double X. The actual man has an X on his costume. The Energy duplicate has XX on his. His first appearance was Detective Comics #261. He’s kind of lame by today’s standards, but there is a charm to him. Maybe it’s just me. I thought his picture in Who’s Who was really cool.
4-Black Orchid
Last post I made a point to say I would only use characters that had vocal parts and not just standing in a crowd. I kinda break this rule with my number four pick. She has no lines, but that fits into her character. See she is so mysterious. She has no set secret identity or a definitive origin. She was, until the eighties, a cypher. She would impersonate a background character and at the precise time she would drop the disguise and save the day. This is exactly what she did in the opener for “The Mask of Matches Malone”. Her first appearance was in Adventure Comics #428 (July 1973) and as I said she was mysterious. Than Neil Gaiman came along and answered the mysteries. Now I love Neil Gaiman. Don’t get me wrong, but one of the things that made Black Orchid cool was that she was a cypher. It’s like Wolverine once you get rid of the mystery, there is nothing left. But I will say this. Gaiman and Dave McKean did a three part prestige format miniseries. To drum up publicity for it, Karen Berger told McKean that he was going to do a graphic novel with Grant Morrison and Gaiman was going to do a monthly series. McKean did Arkham Asylum and Gaiman did The Sandman. Sandman is my favorite series of all time. So I guess I can’t be too hard on the miniseries.
3-The Ten-Eyed Man
Hey kids remember the Bug-Eyed Bandit? Remember I said that Marv Wolfman said that he Killed him because he wouldn’t be part of a company where they existed? Meet the other person Wolfman killed to protect DC’s integrity. The Ten-eyed Man was a soldier who lost his sight. Because he didn’t want to live like that he had his optic nerves implanted in his fingers. This gave him 360 degree sight. So what would you do if you can see by a miracle. He decided to commit crimes and become a Batman foe. Like you do. His first Appearance is in Batman 226 (1970). Okay Grant Morrison did kinda bring back the concept, but made them cool. That version isn’t the one portrayed. This the hokey bronze age version. Like It or not.
2-Crazy Quilt
……..I……..ugh…….Next!
1-The Haunted Tank
Sorry I’m lightning rounding these last two, but really crazy quilt is a dumb character. The Haunted Tank on the other hand is Awesome. It’s a tank that’s haunted by the ghost of J.E.B Stuart. But more importantly IT’S A TANK THAT IS HAUNTED! You can’t make that shit up!.
So that’s my list. If you like it leave a comment. Until next time friends.
Okay for the last few months I’ve been watching Batman:The Brave and the Bold. I really like the show. It does well to capture the feel of the silver age, but at the same time being modern. I’m a sucker for Silver Age stories. I don’t know why. I didn’t get into comics until the eighties. Why because I was negative twenty-one years old when they started to come out. For anyone reading thing saying ‘wait the silver age started in 1961 with the Fantastic Four number one.” Well yes that’s true, but DC’s silver age starts with the first appearance of the Barry Allen Flash. Anyway back to the analysis. The silver age seems more optimistic than what I was used to. Let’s see late seventies-early eighties was late bronze age. Things were going to a dark place. The grim and gritty was starting to take over. The world had changed in the time it took to get from Silver to Bronze. A president had been assassinated, the civil rights movement was in full and there was a an increasingly unpopular war. The optimism of the Silver Age was slowly being whittled away from the loss of cultural identity of America. The American dream was turning into the American Nightmare.
Anyway, the Silver Age can be seen as a hokey time to the more modern reader, but to me it’s four color goodness. Sure it’s simpler compared to bronze age, but hell it was some what a simpler time. Because of the comics code authority you couldn’t really get into adult themes. There was a lot of unrequited love between heroes and cast members. Hell I don’t think characters got boyfriends or girlfriends until the late silver or early bronze age. You would have a character like Lois Lane, who in that time her only defining characteristic was she wanted to marry Superman. Her comic showed her attempts to do so. She never got close. I think that the actual title for her title should have been Superman is a Dick. Because Superman was a dick in her comic. He was always tricking her.
So back to Batman:The Brave and the Bold. I started to watch it on Netflix, because why not. I liked it and kept watching. Pretty quickly I noticed that they were throwing an amazing number of obscure characters. I mean really obscure characters. Characters that I only know because I’ve read every issue of Who’s Who in the DC Universe. It’s one of two series I completed. Took me eight years off and on picking through back issue bins to complete it. I also had all of the updates for ’87 and ’88.But anyway. There is enough obscure characters for me to do a top ten list and guess what? I’m doing a top ten list. Okay not the greatest of ideas, but I want to do it. So this is the most surprising appearances. I’m relegating the list to talking spots and not just cameos. Though I do break this rule. I also try to keep to characters that I never thought I would see. Some of the characters I would normally think as obscure, i.e The Doom Patrol, The Deadman, vigilante, B’wana Beast, Vixen,etc. have been in other cartoons. So they are excluded. I had a full list of ten, but then I kept thinking. That is never a good idea. So kept adding to the list. Now it’s a top twenty now. Hey I’m lucky it ended there. I could still be complying data. So here is goes. Remember these are my own picks They are no better or worse than someone else’s picks. These are also in no particular order.
20- The Outsiders
This was a team of superheroes that really didn’t fit anywhere other with each other. The members are Katana, Metamorpho, and Black Lightning. In the shows first season you see them become heroes. Also you see them fight the Psycho-Pirate,who should be on the list. I’m tempted to make it a top twenty-one list, but dammit I already put too much effort making this list already. In season two the introduce the comic costume for Katana and Black Lightning. Also they added two new members, Halo and Geo-force. Which is the classic line-up from the eighties series.
19-OMAC
This was a creation with pedigree. This came from Jack ‘The King’ Kirby in the seventies. It’s kinda strange, but not a bad visual. OMAC is an acronym for One Man Army Corps. He goes from the mild mannered Buddy Blank to the mohawked OMAC. Not like the comic. In the comic he is stuck as OMAC. I think if you didn’t know it was Kirby , you would have no idea about this character. He’s not a popular character. Also it’s not really said if he is a part of the DCU. His stories take place in the future. I don’t think it was until post-crisis when DC released the two volume history of the DC Universe, that the tried to rectify the Kirby future (OMAC and Kamandi) with the DC future. I mean if the Kamandi future took place, that would mean somehow humans got back and became the masters of the planet. They then became technological advanced enough that they went out into space (which also means that none of the spacefaring races saw that earth was conquerable and didn’t do anything. Which is kinda bullshit, because even when the earth was defended by the Legion of Superheroes the Dominators tried and succeeded in conquering earth. That was with a whole fuckton of heroes. Why didn’t they do that when the only protection earth had was a blonde boy in Daisy Duke cut-offs?), became a part of the united planets and then got the science police up and running. Also the anthropomorphic animals mysteriously just disappeared. Which is why even when they made it in the DC post-Crisis they never really made it as bad as Kirby had it.
18-The Cavalier
The Cavalier. Oh god the Cavalier! If there is one character that just summed up the silver age it would be him. He dresses like a musketeer and has that code of honor. He’s a an out of time. So good.
17-The Madniks
The Madniks are villains from Blue Beetle. They are a Steve Ditko creation. Which isn’t bad. They crazy colored men that do theft and crazy frenetic style fighting. I always thought that the Madniks were Ditko’s (who was very conservative) way of saying screw you to beatniks. As a side note these guys are one of two obscure villains that was not created for a DC title. Blue Beetle was a Charlton Comic before being purchased by DC. Also they were called the Madmen, so maybe it wasn’t about the beatniks
16-G’Nort
Quick when I say Green Lantern who do you think of? Hal Jordan? Absolutely. John Stewart? That’s a good bet. Guy Gardner? Maybe. What you might not think about is G’Nort. G’Nort is odd. See first it was said that he was a Green Lantern whose Uncle bought him is ring. Then it was found out that no a different alien race gave him a fake ring. Then he earned an actual ring. He has following, but unless you are a big fan of Green Lantern you might not of heard about him which is unfortunate. His back up stories in Green Lantern Quarterly were funny and just all around good
15-The Freedom Fighters
Okay this one is kind of odd. They’re a team that originally wasn’t a team. They were characters from a rival company to DC called Quality Comics. When DC bought Quality they decided to shunt them off to a parallel earth where the Nazis won WWII. Earth X was what it was called. The team was made up of Uncle Sam, the living embodiment of patriotism. Dollman, who is kind of like the silver age Atom, but stuck at Doll size. Black Condor, who can fly because he was raised by condors. Why? Reasons. The Human Bomb, who is really what you see is what you get. And the Phantom Lady, who is one of the coolest characters. In the eighties Roy Thomas put all of them in All-Star Squadron. They said before they were in Earth X they were from Earth 2. Let me explain this. All the Silver age characters are inhabitants of Earth 1. The golden age characters are in earth 2. Which makes no sense. You would think that the older earth would be earth 1. I mean how pompous do you have to be to name your world earth 1. You go to another world and think ‘you know this feels like a two.’
14-The Weeper
This the second Non-DC villain.He is kind of a cypher to me. I know that he was a Fawcett character, but even that is pretty much all I know. He wasn’t a big name villain. His last appearance was in Justice League of America in the “Crisis on Earth-S” storyline.
13-The Gentleman Ghost
Way back I remember reading a Hawkman comic and seeing the Gentleman Ghost. For those who don’t know, the Gentleman Ghost is well a ghost. Spoilers, I know. He appears as a suit of regency era clothes A cape, a top hat and a monocle. That’s it no head or skin. Just an empty void. Visually it’s a striking image. I always like him, even though I didn’t see him much. But really what’s not to love he’s a dead man with fashion sense.
12- The Bug-Eyed Bandit
Remembered when I said that the Cavalier was the perfect embodiment of the silver age, or words to that affect? Well I kind of lied. It’s toss up between him and the Bug-Eyed Bandit. Really, can you possibly picture this character in any era. Hell he was killed in the Crisis because Marv Wolfman, the writer of Crisis, would not be a part of a company that would print him.
11-‘Mazing Man
Okay I’ve never read an issue of ‘Mazing Man. Hell I barely remember this character. I only know him from Who’s Who and an issue of Secret Origins. I actually wanted to put him in the top ten, but I think that ones on there are more surprising and more obscure. Now, not in a million years did I think I’d see him in a cartoon, but I still think the others are more obscure. Though because this is in now particular order I don’t think it matters. So my whole reasoning is rendered invalid.
So that’s the first half. I should get the second up quickly. Until then.
For the last month I’ve been obsessed with the Call of Cthulhu Role-Playing Game. I get this way. I get into funks where I have to collect things. It’s almost a compulsion, but it’s not because I’m not like that. Truth be told I have all sorts of craziness in my head, but compulsions are not it. But back to what I was talking about. This my second Cthulhu rpg I’ve bought. I bought my first in 2000. That was 5.6 edition. This was the first rpg I ever saw that had a decimal in it. I know that isn’t a big thing, but this blew my mind. I played first edition D&D prior and then second edition. Third was just coming out and 3.5 was three years in the future. This blew me away that there was a game that already blew through four editions and hit the fifth. And it had a fraction! A fraction! Was there there a 5.1 or 5.3? After research there was a 5.5. That makes sense. 5.6 not so much.
But anyway sixth ed. I have sourcebooks and adventures for it. I’ve been reading it and I do like the system. Which is good because after all the money I’ve put in to it, it would suck to hate it. I’m looking at you Wraith:The Oblivion. But really the system hasn’t changed that much since the previous editions. Hell some of the flavor text hasn’t changed. I was looking in the back for prices of things and I saw it still had a prices for answering machines and pagers. It was written in 2004 for god’s sake. Those thing were out of date by then! But anyway getting back to the lack of changes, that point struck me across the head when I bought the Investigators Companion because I thought it would be useful. Which it is, but see I bought it before in 2001. I knew something was up because I recognized the cover art. I thought it was dodgey , but maybe they recycled artwork. No big thing. But no, when I got it I looked through it and saw that it was the same damn book. I paid $17.25 on a book I already owned! After I smacked myself I realized this was a good thing. If I play the game, and adding up all the money I’ve spent on it and all the money I will spend on it, I better damn well play it. When I play it I can have two books in play for character creation of 1920’s characters. Why 1920’s because that’s where it’s at. That’s where Cthulhu should be played and you can’t tell me otherwise. I’ll fight you for it.
So you might be wondering where this love of Cthulhu comes from. Well to be honest I didn’t get into the Mythos by reading Lovecraft. Back in the early nineties I was a huge Stephen King fan. I spent all my money on buying his stories and this was the time where he has still knocking them out of the park. I was maybe thirteen or fourteen when I started to read him. My parents got me two of his books for Christmas. After more research I now know I was thirteen. I know this because my copy had a picture of Tim Curry as Pennywise on it. The mini-series had come out in 1990. So that puts me at thirteen. Also now you know I’m old so there’s that. Any way for the Christmas of 1993 my folks gave me a copy of Nightmares and Dreamscapes. My god, that book! I read it and re read it for at least two years. It had some of my favorite stories in it. Dolan’s Cadillac will always be one of my favorite stories. Not just Stephen king stories, but stories in general.
So I read the whole book and I was really taken with a story Crouch End. That was my first taste of the Mythos. Though not really. A couple of years before I read Jerusalem’s Lot from his collection of stories ,The Night Shift. Though I don’t consider that the first because I didn’t know it was. See in the back of all Stephen Kings short story collections is a little bit where he’s talking about the making of the story. As a writer I dug that. I like being able to look inside the curtain and getting a glimpse of what the man was thinking. Even if it boiled down to ‘Hey I thought it would be cool if I did this’. Still that’s a look in an author’s head. What struck me about Crouch End was well everything.
I was used to Stephen King endings. These are the bitter sweet endings. The day is saved, but things will never be as great as they were. So I thought I was prepared for the story. Nope. The main character is driven insane and after they go through therapy they still are compelled to write in a closet in small letters ‘Beware the Black Goat with a thousand young’. The police officers that heard her story are missing or dead by the end of the story. Also people keep vanishing. Okay odd. This was a Stephen King ending on steroids. Then I read the behind the scenes stuff at the end and that was where I would see two words that would change everything. Those words were Lovecraft and Mythos.
Those two words made me wonder. What was it all about. What was this Cthulhu? What was the Black Goat? What did it all mean? So I did my best to read Lovecraft. It was a bitch to find it in the local library. It seemed to disappear and be replaced by a different book of Lovecraft. That’s almost a plot of a Mythos story. The tome of eldritch knowledge keeps getting stolen, but another is put in it’s place. Or that’s just the mind set I was in. Finally I bought my first book of Lovecraft. It was a paperback best of book, but I really enjoyed it. I’ve lost that one, but I bought more and more. I also bought the Encyclopedia Cthuliana. Which is a good depository of Mythos knowledge. I bought the third edition because I thought it would be a better use of my money than another sourcebook. Which is a good thing.
So why do I love Lovecraft? I don’t know why. The obvious racism makes it hard, but you make allowances. Because of the time when it was written, you have to remember it was a harder time. Which isn’t much of an excuse, but you make allowances as I said. With your favorite artist you always make allowances. I like Frank Sinatra, but I hate the man. He was an asshole, but a great singer. Lovecraft is like that. He wasn’t the greatest at dialog. Hell none of his stories had dialog. They were narratives. Not too dissimilar to what I am doing. That’s a thought. A blog set in the Mythos. It would be something to think about.
What sticks with me is that with some stories there was some knowledge you shouldn’t know. There are things that men should not know. Lovecraft took that and basically went ‘well fuck that noise!’ You wanna learn it you can, but there is a trade off. You learn it you will never be the same. You will be uneasy for the rest of your life. Which won’t be long. Also as Neil Gaiman pointed out his characters always keep writing. The bad thing was at the door, but the keep writing to the end. That’s almost commendable.
As much as I love his horror stories I prefer his Dreamlands stories. That’s where I think he was writing his best stuff. There was no idea that too outlandish in the dreamlands. Hell there is a story where someone was killed by cats. To get a roving band of cats to do anything together, well that must be fantasy. So there’s that. Now I’ve read non-Lovecraft mythos stories. There are some good ones. Um Brian Lumley’s Titus Crow stories are good and they really tap into the feel of the Lovecraft stories. Robert E. Howard’s stories are good as well. I do have Chamber’s Hastur stories, but I haven’t read it yet.
My personal preference is Lovecraft. In a way that was a big part of my high school years. It was also odd being the only person who liked them in my school. When I got out of high school I found out that I wasn’t the only person who liked them. I also was surprised in the pronunciation of some of them. I did get some of them right. Well I think I got it write, but who knows. I wouldn’t be surprised that Cthulhu is actually pronounced Kevin. Because Lovecraft was insane when it came to naming things. Seriously trying to say is a bit of verbal gymnastics that you can’t believe. My worst nightmare is a spelling bee with all his words. My god trying to use them in a sentence.
I wonder what Lovecraft would think of his fame nowadays. Because he is huge. There are board games, T-shirts, and card games. It seems like every year someone puts out another anthology of mythos stories. To varying success. I read a Sherlock Holmes/ Cthulhu anthology that was pretty good. It had Neil Gaiman doing a story so that’s not bad. But Cthulhu is everywhere. In a spin-off of the game Smash Up they have a version called the Obligatory Cthulhu Expansion. So it’s become such a geek icon that there are slippers and plush doll. Of which I own two. One that was home made and the other was mass produced. It’s a Christmas Cthulhu bought by my mother. She is that awesome, but that is a tale for another time.
Summing up I have a love of the Mythos and need to read more. I think that in a way Lovecraft’s creations have surpassed his own vision. I wonder what it will be like when it hits the hundredth year anniversary. Which isn’t that far away. Which makes me feel old, but what can you do. Now if you excuse me I have books to read.
I would make a shit hipster. Now granted I have hipster traits. I have a tendency to like bands that no one else heard of. I have an outdated style of facial hair. Some might say an ironic facial hair, but I won’t. I don’t like things ironically. I don’t know how to. I love things emphatically. I also have a tendency to be the last person to get into things. It’s hard to say that you liked it before something went mainstream when you only know them as mainstream.
But I’m always thinking that I’m the only person in my neighborhood who knows about the bands. I’m not saying I’m the only person in a ten mile radius that knows who Joy Division is. I’m just saying it’s a good bet to say I am. Which is okay with me. I’ve always went my own way. I was the non threatening weird kid in high school. I’m used to being the odd man out. Depends on who you ask, but some would say very odd. Which is unfair. I mean what is their means of comparison? Sure I maybe odd for Ohio, but get me in a bigger city I’m frightfully normal. Yeah that’s a rude awakening if ever there was one.
So what does that have to do with anything? Well it does go to my back ground. Also it gives me the opportunity to rant and that gets my word count up. I’m all about that. So my point to all of this, if there is a point is this, is when I get into something I do not go halfway. If I get into a band I usually get the whole discography. I have been known to just get a greatest hits album, but then I get the entire catalog. I did this with the Talking Heads. I had the greatest hits album for three years. Then I was tempted to buy Speaking in Tongues. It was five bucks on Amazon. For that price you have to buy it. After that the part of me that is a comic book collector kicked in. Anybody that collects comics knows that part. It’s the part that yells at you to COLLECT ALL THE THINGS! Seriously there should be a study on collection mentality and addictive personality. Anyway word count. Yay.
So I get into collecting funks for bands. Sometimes I actively seek out the complete discography. Sometimes I don’t. One of the actives was the Beatles and David Bowie. The Bowie one took the longest time to complete, because I was taking the high road and not using torrents. So I was buying albums of itunes, finding them in bargain bins at thrift shops, and getting them from the local library. But still there was that one illusive album I could never find. For the official record it was Tonight, which was not as good as his earlier works or the stuff he did in the 90’s. But I had to have it. I needed to complete the set. I should mention that I was only including all of this to give context. Also word count.
My next big thing for me started very small. That’s the way it started in my life. My next big thing was Lou Reed. Growing up I never heard much of him. The classic rock radio station that made up my childhood, only would play Walk on the Wild Side. This made me think that he was just a one hit wonder. I never would have thought that song was really the most commercial song he made. Sad as that seems. I didn’t know the amount of influence that he had in the music industry. I didn’t know about the Velvet Underground and how they pretty much created punk music. Well they and the Stooges are the grandfathers of punk. Iggy Pop was so out there that they had to create a sub-genre just to be able to put him somewhere. But back to Lou. Slowly I found out about him, but I never got any of his albums. Though at the time this was the late eighties/ early nineties. I didn’t have the greatest of musical tastes back then. I had the first two New Kids on the Block albums, because my parents thought I liked them. I was too scared to tell them different. I also was at the whim of the musical tastes of department stores. We didn’t have an actual music store until the mid nineties. Even then they didn’t have the greatest of selection.
I don’t know how I first heard the Velvet Underground. They just became one of those bands that were always there after awhile. In the late nineties the alternative radio station would play the older stuff. The Stooges, the Velvets, and David Bowie were mainstays. Just a tangent, I had to tell someone that David Bowie was alternative before there was an alternative. God he should be a genre unto himself. Back to my ranting. I would always heard Rock n’ Roll and Sweet Jane. Which is nice, but I wanted more. Then I heard Heroin. I will always remember the first time I heard it. I was driving to Lima. The night before it had fogged up. The morning had still some fog and I listened to this song that had this strange beat. It went from slow to fast. Slow to fast . I fell in love with that song. So how did I react to it later? I didn’t buy an album and just kept doing what I was doing.
Fast forward five years, I finally had enough interest in Lou Reed to get the Velvet’s albums. That was it for awhile. I had all four albums and a boxed set of them. I thought that was good enough. Sometimes you get a band and think that’s it. I shouldn’t get the solo work. Why should I? I have the bands discography. So I had that mindset. I was like that for the Beatles. But somehow I got it in to my mind to give Lou a chance. I started with his second album, Transformer. I don’t know why. I could have gone with his first solo album. I think maybe it was because the fact that Transformer was produced by David Bowie. Anyway, I got it and I listened to it a lot. I kept listening. I knew the words to most of the lyrics. So two years later I decided to get another album. I picked up Berlin. If Transformer was good, Berlin was the best. I even hunted down the concert movie of it. I was really transfixed by it. I would keep listening to it. Every later purchased album was held up to Berlin. Was it as good? Was it Berlin good?
So I kept getting them, but I could only find certain ones at the local library. I’m the kind of person who want to get the albums in order. Which is tricky sometimes. I couldn’t find Metal Machine Music for two years. Mostly because it’s not a good album. Hell most people think that is was made to get out of a album contract. But I did get all of them. What made me do it was Lou’s death. I’ve had friends and family die on me. Every passing was a weight on me. Lou’s death was like that on me. I never met the man, but his music effected me. I don’t know what I’d be without it. I can’t explain why it effected, nor can I say why his death effected me.
I think every artist has a one way connection with the person who devour the art. I had a relationship with Lou. He got me through the bad days. He made me think. He made me sad. I never had one little consequence to his life, but he was big in mine. I don’t know if I will always be into Lou Reed. I hope so, but I don’t know the future. I can only look at what he did and all his albums and think what’s next.
I’ve always wanted my own blog. Ever since I first read Wil Wheaton’s blog. I never got into before now because I didn’t think that I would be good as him. So why am I doing it now. Well it’s because of my sister. She has a blog and I thought well maybe I could do it to. Not that I’m saying that she doesn’t have writing talent. Far from it. She just gave me the kick in the ass that I needed. So here I am. Hopefully people like this blog. Not this post of course this too much an introduction to me and what this blog is going to be. Let me start by sharing my shortcomings. A good way I start I think.
I’ve never been good at writing straight from the hip. That’s a half truth. What I really not good at is writing from a personal stance. Which makes doing a blog very hard. Now I can distance myself from the topics that I talk about, but that would be half assing things. God knows I half ass a lot of things in my life, but quality shouldn’t be one of those things. So I think some ground rules are in order.
Rule 1: I will only talk about things that interest me. Most people would think that would limit my focus. Those people don’t know me. I’m always on the lookout for new things. Everything interests me. So I will bring that enthusiasm to my blog. Just a quick second, my blog. A blog that is mine. Now I realize that these days that it’s not big deal to have one, but this is something that my family and friends have been telling me to get for the last ten years. Better now than later, right? No I’m still lazy for not doing it sooner.
Rule 2: I will not ,let me repeat that, WILL NOT talk about my personal life. Why because my personal life is boring. I’m 37 years old. I’m going through college. I read and sometimes play Role-playing games. I don’t play computer games because I don’t have time. So yeah those are the highlights of my life. I think I’m the only person blogging that won’t talk about themselves because their life is boring.
Rule 3: NO POLITICS. I’m not saying I don’t have political views. I do. I just don’t want to talk about them. Some people can talk about them with passion and honesty. I can for the most part, but I don’t know everything that goes on. I’m somewhat uniformed. So I won’t talk about them.
Rule 4: I might talk about spiritual matters. Why? It interests me, but don’t think that I will be argumentative about it. I’m not here to change or challenge someones beliefs. That’s not my schtick. Why would I? My beliefs are my own. They don’t need other people to believe to exist.
So what can you expect from this blog? Well mostly I want to talk about pop culture. I have some TV shows I want to talk about. I also want to talk about books I’ve read, games I’ve played, comics, bands, music in general, bands in particular, and all the things that are interesting. As the name implies these are all random thoughts. I don’t have a plan.I don’t go around thinking I should talk about something particular this week. Anything is fair game. If I want to talk about the new discoveries of science that week than I will. That said it will be a boring post, because I don’t know what they are and don’t know where to go to find them. My heart says to go to the Google. If I do I will start by screaming TO THE GOOGLE! Because I roll like that. Which is something I never say and really can’t pull it off. Fine.
When can you expect posts to drop? Well I don’t know. I know that I want to keep a schedule, but I don’t want to cement it. I’m just going to tell you that posts will come at least weekly. How many posts? Well ideally I’d say two a week. Three if I’m being ambitious. Don’t quote me on that. Also don’t yell if I don’t live up to my estimate. I do have school and that takes time. A lot of my time. But I will try to do my best.
So welcome to my mind. Enjoy the ride.
Thoughts at Random 