been reading a lot of great comics recently.

flight 3 just arrived, i'm a little way through, it's beautiful stuff so far.

read the back catalogue of dresden codak, which i've really enjoyed, one of my favourite comics in terms of both art and subject matter. and it's really consistent, too - some of my favourites are free will and easy wandering, and nuclear wessles, and the dialogue in absinthe makes the heart grow fonder is perfect. for some reason it reminds me a lot of a lesson is learned but the damage is irreversable, which is also one of my favourite drawn/scripted comics. maybe that's the link! check out david's comments on this one for an amazingly detailed analysis and look into why comics are awesome, which is concurrently the same reason that you are not good if you think comics are not awesome, and are just for babies. with no teeth.

today i am enjoying: simple sentences! with exclamations!

perfect stars definitely gets better as it goes along, i'm reading it backwards for some reason. actually, as i get deeper into the older comics, it appears there was just a rough patch. they're getting better again. let's kiss each other so much! i can't wait for 2007, so i can get the calandar.

i wish copper updated more often, go and read all of those.

i think i liked this one because it's all on one page. just the immediacy.

i've also just started reading minus from the start, which was linked from dresden. minus is a really great name for a kid, and some of the comics are magic. actually, all of them are magic - what i mean to say is, they are magic and also to do with magic, in a little world. get what i mean? oh, oh, you'll see! you'll see, my friend! this one is good, as well as this one and the first one. and a lot of others, too.

whoa, i've just come across a minus that i read the other day, without realising it was a minus. it was linked from this new webcomic colective called koala wallop, which hasn't started yet, but i'm quite excited about it since i read all of the comics its members draw. one of them is the secret crocodile adventure club, and if you aren't a member, then you are an anus. seriously, it's hot stuff - i think i might even like the newsposts they email better than the comics. and the idea of a secret club! it used to be a lot more secret, but now i think they've open it up to everyone. i don't even think you need to be on the mailinglist anymore, which used to be one of the conditions of being a member. but i hear you still get some secret stuff as a member...i don't know what that stuff is, as i've always been a member. ALWAYS AND FOREVER.

here is another secret club! the secret friend society. i'm in the middle of salamander dream. hope larson contributed to flight comics. kazu (writer of copper) kind of orchestrates it all.

i've been trying to have some old ragtime kind of stuff playing in a room in the house a lot of the time - just so you can hear it as you walk past that room. it's felt really good, coming in from the garden and hearing 'georgia....geooorgia' with a brass band playing, it really takes you to another place, or back in time. i highly recommend it. here's a couple for you:

Mr Freddie - Let's go Riding

Vince Giordano and the Nighthawks - Georgia On My Mind

Let's Go Riding is a real feelgood song, you can play this one loud and dance along, it doesn't have to be other-room music. I've made a whole CD of this stuff, a lot of it is off the Ghost World soundtrack, because i wouldn't know where to start really. maybe it'll be my next avenue to explore.

Vince Giordano does a lot of the subdued big band stuff like this, they all start out fairly incognitoulously (i totally made that word up!), but then develop into real little gems, not the bing crosby stuff you're expecting. you can hear this perfectly in Georgia On My Mind, where it starts with that bland violin line, before adding the horn and the minor chord. that's the way, vince.

i think that's all. i went on for a bit, didn't i? sorry about that.


georgia, the whole day through.

inky stars (or, you were right about the stars, each one is a setting sun)

so, i just threw a tissue at the bin, but it flew nowhere near the bin, and actually just hit a soft monkey hanging from the bookshelf and landed in a rack of holiday brochures.

urgh. got the cold and the sore throat, need the drugs. i've got some bitch-ass lemsip. it tastes amazing for the first couple of sips. and then it tastes like the repetative chewing of soft, semi-liquid tinfoil. so, ups and downs with that one.

there are two things that i want to illustrate right now, and luckily enough, there are a couple of kelly vivanco paintings that are perfect for the job.

number one:








i have heard that some starfish can live forever!










number two:

i want to get an ink well and a good inking pen.



i don't know if it's the same with you as it is for me (wouldn't that be nice?), but i prefer the fact from 'number one' and the picture from 'number two'...however, neither would be as good without the other half. it's like a banana - a banana has to have two halves, otherwise you would just say "i don't think i'm going to eat that...it has gone brown where the naked flesh has been exposed to the air and, besides, where did the other half go? i don't want to be caught up in some kind of power struggle against the original owner of this banana, we may end up making a big hole in the middle of the street, or breaking the lamppost."

also it would only be 'bana' or 'na' without it's other half. and that just looks silly.

i got it in! i got it in that time - the tissue into the bin, cushioning off two walls, "flum, flum, rest".

the lemsip is at the tinfoil stage right now. nothing a good night's sleep can't handle - if only i could get one of those! the mirth of my sinuses. sinuses? sinus? sirius?

Michael Zapruder's Rain of Frogs - Butterfield's and Baker's

i don't know why there's apostrophes on the end of of butterfield and baker, but that's what they are on the file. maybe they're shops? or owners of houses? i'm not going to argue with mr. zapruder - he's got a fucking rain of frogs! i don't want to have to scoop a gaggle of lightly charred, convolsing amphibians out of my gutters. no sir.

there's something very intelligent about this song, although i have no idea what it is. in fact, i know next to nothing about either the song (i only catch a few lyrics at the time) or the artist. i did a quick google on rain of frogs..and to cut a short story almost to decimalic levels: aside from the whole bible plague stuff, i came across an article on the new scientist website entitled 'Return to Paradise - If the people flee, what will happen to the seemingly indestructible?'. this is a question i want asked more frequently, and with arms flailing; possibly with hands in claw-like shapes, reaching towards the sky as if to pull it down around like a blanket, or to kneel on it and steal its lunch money. maybe in a wickerman pose, but with a perfectly pressed creme suit, or a super mario costume.
alas, i can provide you with no answers, mr mario, for i would have to pay to read the entire article rather than just the seemingly unrelated opening paragraph.

anyway, it slightly reminds me of the eels, if they lost themselves in a firefly lagoon, and their instruments became trees and vines. and were helped out by turtles!

*sneeze*

ok, i'm going to have to go and look up the place the mean lady lives in the rescuers - it's nibbling at the back of my brain. just above where it connects with the spine. turtles are nibbling there!

enjoy the song, and ms. vivanco's art. check out her comic, too - there's a good shirt there.

hope, away!

mediator mixtape #2 - oceans never listen

i never knew tearing a photograph was so easy! i always thought you had to burn them, but now i'm thinking that's just polaroids.

mediator mixtape #2 - oceans never listen

tracklist:
1. manitoba - bijoux
2. weird weeds - sweet thing
3. akron/family - before and again
4. the books - all our base are belong to them
5. jana hunter - k
6. adem - everything you need
7. psapp - tricycle
8. broken social scene - ibi dreams of pavement (KCRW acoustic session)
9. cat power - satisfaction (planet claire session)
10. mice parade - the boat room
11. sunset rubdown - shut up i am dreaming of places where lovers have wings
12. secret stars - wait
13. múm - the ghosts you draw on my back

i made this one for my girlfriend, who has just gone back home. it's a really happy set of jewels, starting with the unbelievably twinkly and euphoric bijoux, and then getting a little more ethereal towards the end. it looks like it may have been lost in the post, which i'm kind of annoyed about - i drew an inventor on the envelope and everything. i'm hoping it's just delayed because i didn't put enough stamps on it. i had a dream last night where i went to the postoffice and bitched for about half an hour, i was the real awkward customer.

now, if only the postoffice worker who lost it would have a dream about me bitching at him, then everything would work itself out.


i feel arguments held purely in the collective subconcious are a lot more effective.

inicagin kte.

one of the great things about working in a library (in fact, there aren't many bad things) is the books. all the books. this is plainly obvious, but it often takes a while to actually thing about it and see the opportunity you've got there. it's like when you first realise that the sky is an inverted bottomless pit.

adrienne is studying photography as a degree away from uni - not open university, but i gather it's kind of a little like that; as her old college as a touchstone. she ordered in some books from another library that arrived today, and i was looking at them on the staff reserve shelf out the back, and it was like my obsession with light and 'light bleeds' in photographs (i don't know the technical term, sorry) was just made legitimate. i'm looking through this beautifully presented book, and there's photo after photo of overexposure and reel after reel of blocks of colour. the photo above is mine, and i've really struggled to find one of the photographer's pictures online to compare it with (for reasons that will become apparent in a moment), but the similarity to some of his stuff is amazing. it made me feel like i'm not just wasting my time, or that my stuff is too easy or lazy or something. i know you're not supposed to need validation and stuff...but, come on, it's encouraging. really encouraging.

when i finished my break, i told adrienne how much i loved the photo's, to which she replied, 'you know who did those, don't you?' in a non-agressive way; in a way that she knew i didn't, and wanted to tell me because she knew it was a really good fact. the same face when you tell someone that some starfish live forever. i'm not sure if that second fact is true, but i've heard it said from the staff at the sealife centre.

i had seen the name 'viggo mortensen' on the side of the book, but to be honest that name meant nothing to me. sure, i'm taking a degree in film, but i don't really base my knowledge on secondary characters in films that i didn't fall in love with. that's not meant to be elitist, it's just not something i know.

anyway, if you don't want to follow those links and know more actors than me, then you will know viggo played aragorn in lord of the rings, among other things like main performances in history of violence and hidalgo...in fact, he's been in a lot of stuff and i should have known him really.

anyway, i found it really comforting - i had completely overcome that feeling of embarassment when you discover you're admiring the art of an actor or similar. it's really elitist and childish, but i'm sure all of you know the feeling: the example that keeps coming to mind is when russel crowe released a single with his band. ok, it was shit, but what if it had been good? and good in a non-ironic way? would the community have acknowledged that, or ignored it? it's the white label syndrome - do i like this, or am i not supposed to like this?

anyway. this has gone on for long enough. viggo mortensen is probably my favourite photographer, and you would do well to seek out his books - especially 45301, which i will probably buy tomorrow. maybe you will get the same experience as i did, washing all trace of irony away from these photos. here is one of the only photos i could find online, and it's from 'Miyelo'. it's not one of my favourite's, but it could be one of yours. it's also longer in it's actual proportions.

i'll post some music with this a bit later, but right now i need some food to go with this wine.

mediator mixtape #1 - drive north

i'm trying out this new diet.

i don't have any breakfast, and then i have a bowl of cereal for lunch, and then i have like a couple pieces of toast around 7:00, with some salad. and then i go out, and when i come back, i have a little snack to take the taste of blood from my mouth.

mediator mixtape #1 - drive north

tracklist:
1. set fire to flames - wild dogs of the thunderbolt/'they cannot lock me up...i am eternally free...' (from the lips of lying dying wonder body #2)
2. amina - skakka
3. low - lordie (peel session)
4. espers - widow's weed
5. efterklang - bright
6. six organs of admittance - black needle rhymes (live on KVRX)
7. saul williams & blackalicious - release
8. jeff tweedy - crack a smile
9. peter and the wolf - red sun
10. the album leaf - spinning makes me dizzy
11. beirut - mount wroclai (idle days)
12. four tet - my angel rocks back and forth (live in copenhagen)


also: name change! this one's a keeper. a bee keeper?
we
shall
see.

today's task: shout 'weird weeds!' from a foggy mountain

this one doesn't seem to have taken off like the last one; i think i had less people to talk about stuff with back then, and so it worked out that i was telling no one in particular, and that was good enough.

now, obviously, it seems pretty shit, and i'm much happier that several friendships have come to a point where i'm happy to talk about everything and nothing, and both will be ok.

first time i've used that scanner in a while. have you ever started a comic journal? i did it a lot a while ago, got quite a rhythm going, before i just stopped, drawing something every few weeks if i remembered, and then not at all. i'm sick of dripping out like that. i've got a few ideas to start a new one, but not just with writing (like this one) or comics (like the other one), but with both, and some photos as well. maybe i'll go out right now and get an awesome book to put it all in.

of course, before creativity must come materialism.

i'm enjoying a lot of simple guitar music at the moment - the kind of songs that could be created at anytime and live forever with their beauty. i'm also listening to a lot of efterklang, too, and that free weird weeds EP. as free EPs go, it's right up there, and there's one song that is really making me smile everytime i hear it, called 'sweet thing'. it's just a simple fingerpicking affair with really strong vocals, the kind that you would be happy to sing along to on the top of a big sunny hill, or a foggy mountain. it was also the inspiration to make another mixtape, and there can be no higher praise than that. i'll post a mixtape i was particularly proud of later in the day or tomorrow or something, it starts with a beautiful creak of a ship at sea - or, at least, that's what i always thought it was. it's probably just some floorboards in a house...but think of it as a boat, and it sets the whole compilation up a lot better. i would say the whole tape has that atmosphere of a creaky boat, lost at sea.

efterklang - bright (from the springer EP - i recently got 'tripper', but i need some time with that.

weird weeds - sweet thing

(link to the whole free weird weeds EP)