some records for sale.

I'm heading out to Portland, OR in a few months for a week long vacation and looking to stack as much cash as possible for an epic trip. Starting to thin out my record collection. Some choice slabs are up for auction here: http://shop.ebay.com/prince_pamparius/m.html?_nkw=&_armrs=1&_from=&_ipg=&_trksid=p3686. More to come.

downloading and a larger discussion of culture.

I recently came across a music blog that has a FLAC version of my band Coffinworm's album posted for free download. For those who may not know, FLAC stands for "Free Lossless Audio Codec" which essentially means it's an exact copy of the original audio recording in full-quality. While all of us in the band agreed to not pursue people posting the album for mp3 download (it happens and sometimes it's more of a help than a hurt), seeing something that we worked hard on for several years from inception and that our label, Profound Lore, pumped a chunk of money into making a reality being offered up for free pisses me off.

Coffinworm have never necessarily been opposed to downloading. In fact, it proved a very effective way to spread our demo and reach a lot more people than we could have otherwise. That being said, there's a trend of irresponsibility on the part of the (formerly) music buying public that has bred a sense of entitlement when it comes to this practice. I'd wage a guess that almost any music fan who's internet savvy by this point has directed their browser to Google, typed the name of a band or album followed by 'Mediafire', and promptly copped some new music. We've all done it, but after that point it's what you do in order to support the band that counts. Liking someone's record doesn't do a damn thing if you didn't help support the label (who paid for it to be manifested) and/or the band (who spent countless hours/days/weeks/years to conceive that aural document that took 3 minutes to steal) in a tangible form. I'm talking snaps. Dollars. Euros. Yen. Now, is everyone able to pay for every album they like? No, of course not and that's part of the beauty of the shift to discovering new music through music blogs or trading mp3s with friends – you are able to be exposed to a lot more than you might have been previously. It does, however, leave a question unanswered: "How much is art really worth?" By that, I'm not talking directly in terms of capitalism, but on a personal level. Art evokes a response or a connection that all of us can participate in (regardless of how it personally affects us). Based on that connection or response, we decide what value to place on said art whether it's literature, music, etc. and there's two main facets to this that I see: Personal identification & our response of appreciation. Regarding the latter, in the traditional realms of western culture this generally means buying a physical format of the recording or book. Anymore that seems to have dried up into a smaller and smaller portion of folks. Home taping in the 80s & 90s is a footnote to what the internet has done to the music industry (both large and small labels) and thanks to the corporate infiltration of what used to be largely underground music (punk, metal, hardcore, and hip hop) musicians are trading decades of hard work and self-sustaining practices for a quick shot of cash and some free media hype. In the process, everyone involved in said scenes are affected as a new standard is being set and with corporate bucks behind videos, festivals, and even subsidized recordings all of which are being offered up for free. The problem of entitlement existed before this began, but this compounds it.

My point? In short, we need a new standard. Regression almost never produces favorable results (unless you're talking about Darkthrone), but continuing to 'plug in' to this alternate framework and metaphorically resting on our laurels will only lead to disastrous results. DIY still works. Embrace your community and create something within it. Share what you've created. Set a new standard and expose new people to those values. Support others and help them continue.

recycling xtian garbage.

Best note I've ever received with a mailorder LP. Thanks, Hector!

internet.

Liquid courage for booger eaters.

stowaway.

Yesterday I discovered something I'd never truly put a name on...a thing I've carried with me since my childhood, something I've always kept at bay. Yet, over the past few years it's become a harder beast to keep in check: Despair. I seem to have always carried a darkness and formerly it was something that I was able to tame. In more recent times, it's become unruly and I no longer have been able to prevent it from rising to the surface. It scares the shit out of me sometimes. I've gone much of my adult life without feeling things...it's kept the bulk of my emotions at bay, and replaced the array of them with one: Anger. I burn (literally and figuratively) every day. My body feels like it's wrapped in a wool blanket I become so hot. Critical thinking shuts off. I become solely a reactionary being and in the last two years it's pushed me to the point of initiating physical altercations with a few complete strangers. 0 to asshole in no time flat. It's a complex thing to assess, because while I've always had the void it's never driven me to such an angered state and living within that frame of mind for several years has brought nothing but dissatisfaction, no hope, and self-loathing. Putting a 'face' on this thing, however, seems to have begun to break loose some of what tied me to it. Crawling out of the hole...

disconnection.

It's become an endless stream of distractions. None of you seem to notice or care...and I'm just as guilty of it, which drives me to near insanity. It's as if reality has become this disease that society has suddenly declared war upon, and we're seeking to destroy it through any means possible. The anti-bodies? Smart phones, social networking, television, and the internet at large. Suddenly, there's a parallel existence to plug into where everyone finds a way to avoid seeing the elephant in the room, but you never really escape it. It's always there, pissing and shitting on your floor, leaving you to clean up the mess when you log off and check back in. So, what's the cost? Everything. These small increments, the tiny pieces of ground we all give day-by-day to things we know better than to indulge breeds weakness, and in turn we're destroying not only the existence of worthwhile culture on a broader level but our own minds. Learning is beautiful. Information is the most valuable thing we covet outside of our own emotions, but instead people pay money to immerse themselves in virtual reality to fight trolls and catalog their 'unique personality' by clicking the 'Like' button on Facebook.

dream.

I'm driving frantically, late for something (as per usual), in my car on a cold and wet morning through the darkness of pre-dawn. I make a sharp left-turn into a huge parking lot that looks like it belongs to a deserted department store and park. Someone has been following me for some time. As I grab my things from the back seat of the car the couple who has been following me walks past me and glares. I give them some time to get several steps ahead before making my way towards the building we're all about to enter, which looks like an ancient English castle or something. Inside it's modern looking, like the waiting room of a new hospital or a typical office lobby. I turn right down a long hallway towards the elevators and the couple are crouching around a corner, seemingly hidden. The doors to the elevators open and I step inside, attempting to select my floor and hit the 'doors close' button, when the man pushes himself into the elevator and gets right in my face. I struggle to push him out of the doors, but they close before I can succeed. I move to the opposite side of the elevator and he stares at me. At my floor he gets off and follows me. I walk into a room and suddenly the setting changes...a grassy, suburban backyard. Still dark. The man now has sheathed knives that he's attempting to throw at me, but I dodge them. He holds the sheaths and does a flipping motion to dislodge and hurl the blades towards me. At one point we're only a foot away and he tries his last one, which I catch by the handle.

The dream then changes...

I'm standing on an open patio in the backyard of a house built on the bank of a man-made lake. In the dream it's Bob Peele's house. I'm talking to Nate Olp, his back to the lake and me facing it. The water is toxic. Disgusting. The top of a long shape begins to emerge within a mucus-like bubble from the water, then in an instant it launches at top speed from the water like a missile and crashes into the roof of a neighboring bi-level house. The object looks like one of those tall, industrial oxygen tanks you see being hauled in groups on the backs of small trucks. The roof gives under the impact and the house begins to crumble as if it were made of sawdust or sand...the debris falling into itself, towards the center. Suddenly, it's occupants (a mother and daughter) are standing on the patio and seek refuge within Bob's house. They stand in the kitchen, making phone calls and acting strangely. Nate, Bob, and I go into the living room and drink beers. Mike Hill appears and suggests we listen to some records from his collection. The women appear from the kitchen and start thumbing through Mike's LPs, most of which didn't seem to have any band names or titles on them but donned lots of skulls and satanic imagery. There was a die-cut sleeve in the shape of a zombie, which particularly disgusted the mother and they left.

I awoke.