p.s. Hey. Thanks to the multi-talented artist and distinguished local The Dreadful Flying Glove, your thoughtfully raucous weekend is now in place, and all that's required to complete the happy coupling of here and you is an aplomb of which you have long since proved yourselves highly capable. My gratitude extends both to our guest host and to all of you out there who will take full advantage of his wonderfully tall offering and then leave your comments accordingly. Otherwise, here's one more reminder about tonight's and tomorrow's blog-tangential events starring d.l.s Kier and Stephen Boyer in NYC and SF respectively. More info at the top of yesterday's p.s. What else ... oh, there'll be one more blog disruption coming up, this time having nothing to do with my aching back but rather with the apparently vast lack of internet access I'll have while I'm in London for the 'Jerk' shows. Consequently, the blog will be taking a three day vacation next week. After the post on Tuesday the 30th, this place will stand still on July 1st, 2nd, and 3rd before returning to full operations again on Saturday, July 4th. I tried my best to get around this problem, but, given the old fashioned lodging set up provided by my London hosts, I'm probably not going to be able to even check my email for those three days much less hit the blog's Publish button. But, after that short break, the blog should be back to running smoothly and continually again. So there's an advance notice. This weekend I'm mostly going to try to continue my physical recovery and write some novel pages if I can and wander about Paris as thoroughly as possible. And you? ** Heliotrope, Aw, thanks, Mark. Gosh, I hope today's TDFG Special doesn't torture your computer. I know you'll love it if it'll have you. ** Kiddiepunk, Yeah, we don't mess around, boy. Of course the piece isn't nearly as polished up as the photos probably suggest, but, yeah, we managed to do a pretty solid 45 minute public performance of what we did make after only four days of working in that space, so no complaints. So very, very cool that you did that show with Marcus, and I so hope you guys get to make that record before you split. Yeah, we'll both be making international arrivals in Paris on the same day. Early afternoon for me. When will you hit the big iron gates of the Recollets? ** David Ehrenstein, Oh, I have no doubt the MJ story is going to be unraveling and raveling in a decent portion of our eyes and ears whether we welcome it or not for as long as we both shall live. It should be something of a laborious page turner at least. ** Tonyoneill, Hey, pal. I have that Jordy Chandler book albeit very lost somewhere in the jumble that passes for furnishings in my LA pad. Yeah, the late and great Amok store on Vermont sold it for a while, and that's where I scored it too. It sure would be a great time to unload that thing on eBay, damn. ** Tomkendall, Good to see you, man, but condolences about the rent and money crap. Even in theory, and even when the money problems aren't even mine, the mere idea gives me a nervous breakdown. (That sound you hear would be me cracking my knuckles if I cracked my knuckles.) Yeah, that's the new performer, the one I lobbied for relentlessly, and he's as fantastic in the piece as I had hoped, and a lovely, fascinating guy as well. Hm, that weird comment you got on your story was weirdly complex and, although full of shit, no doubt, kind of a nice little read. ** Bernard Welt, One of my Facebook friends' status updates yesterday, which were renewed every ten or so seconds for most of the day, were a high speed string of RIPs for celebrities both living and long dead. It was a lustrous use of the form, I thought. ** Statictick, Part of it was because Gisele and I are workaholic types, and part of it was because we had a deadline and needed to be out of there in four days. Fire lit under ass stuff. Dude, I hope the docs got things sorted out. That foot thing has been lingering way too long. And I hope your screams woke the dead if they were dead. ** Stan_cz, Oh sure, as Bernard more colorfully put it, students in the US change schools all the time. No big deal. I'm not sure if it's harder to do that when you're in the US on a student visa. You should check with the visa experts about that. ** Pisycaca, Mm, I guess if my back doesn't heal right on its own, I'll see another osteopath, but I'm hoping it'll slowly fix itself now with my -- and certain medications' -- help. I think if I were younger, the MJ thing would hit me more emotionally. But I was in my 20s when his big records came out, and I was into a very different kind of music, so my reaction to all those hits at the time was more on the order of thinking how well crafted and smartly produced they were, and the whole MJ/King of Pop stuff was more a ubiquitous and interesting pop culture phenomenon to me than something that went to my heart. But people's caring is totally understandable. When John Lennon was killed, the fallout was pretty similar to what's going on now, and I really felt that death in the way people are feeling this one. ** Daniel Portland, Hi, Daniel! It was really getting to meet you too, and it's nice to 'see' you here. Oh, Renoir is really in top form these days, so kudos. Let me pass along your query. Everyone, in the words of Daniel: ' ... also wanted to publicly mention here that the l magazine is seeking submissions for a new new york-based poets section and submissions can be sent to poetry@thelmagazine.com'. What's the zine festival? Any info that I could pass along to the folks here? Thanks a lot, Daniel, and take care. ** JoeM, I wish the holograms looked as convincing in real life as they did in the photos. But we're getting it figured out, I think. Elie's performing at the Avignon Festival next month if you need a fix, but I don't know if he'll be naked. He usually is. Very true about the richness of MJ's weirdness compared to the usual drug problem beset celebs. Still, we can be assured a huge volume of previously unrevealed MJ weirdness will be unfolding for years, with or without him. ** Bill, Ha ha, yeah, I managed to hold my camera strangely still considering I was quite the hobbling, groaning cameraman. Yikes but cool too about the scrutiny of your gig. Does stress not take your game up a notch? On the Recollets, it's fairly simple. You just need to describe a project you're working on or intend to begin that would require you to be in Paris for some reason. It's just that and the usual CV, links, materials or whatever that proves you're an artist. And if you did apply, I think I could help a lot on my end with a recommendation. It's not that competitive here, and they love having interesting artists come -- they've started a new program of trying to seek artists out because the place tends to be full of scholars, and they'd prefer more artists. It's mostly a matter of you being able to pay the rent or have an organization that will pay it. It's not cheap, but for Paris and for its location in Paris, comparatively, the rent is a very good deal. ** Alan, Yeah, Burroughs' understanding of my work really surprised me too and of course pleased me no end. It took years for critics and so on to stop calling me 'the new Burroughs', a comparison I always thought was super lazy since, admiring Burroughs' early-mid work as I certainly do, I don't feel there's much of a real connection between his work and mine, and I never really thought of Burroughs as someone who paid much attention to the work of writers who weren't in his immediate circle of either peers or blatant devotees. So, yeah. Hey, how's the novel going? Has that breakthrough you mentioned been panning out? ** Math t, Very awesome about the time off and festivities and, slurp, LSD, and give Kier and even Richard a hug for me tonight. I'll try to be there via pretend telekinesis. ** Wolf, Oh, your drooling is most welcome, trust me. The forest's location vibe will probably change from show to show because, apart from a few main trees that we'll be transporting around, the forest will be made from the stuff of the indigenous trees of whatever place the piece is being performed. That sketch set wasn't so indicative since we just threw what we could together, including a couple of stupid looking Xmas trees, basically because we had few options. 99 paintings/drawings, wow! If you weren't dried out after that, I'd almost start worrying about you, ha ha. The back is better enough that I should be mostly normal by the time of the 'Jerk' shows apart from maybe being a little stiff and achey. ** Flit, Such a poignant tale of you and your luggage cart and the balloon animal-responsive wide, moist eyes. I'm a little misty just reading that. ** Pascal, Family stuff, the dysfunctional, dealing and healing ... I hear you with a knowing, sympathetic nod in tow. So are you to be in Dublin for a while? I've never been there. I wish. I've only been to Cork once briefly as far as Ireland goes. One of these days I'm sure I'll figure out a way to like Joni Mitchell. The way, or rather the style in which, she emotes is hard for me. There's something very oppositional about her thing for me. A matter of two temperaments clashing, I guess. There's a joke about her in 'Jerk', but it's kind of neutral rather than critical. Anyway, blah blah, have fun. I'll get to meet you next week, won't I? ** Nick Hudson, The fake trees on that sketch set were default props. The plan is for the finished forest stage to be entirely made of the real, except for maybe a fake log that may be used to brutally bash in one of the performer's heads at one point. Yeah, that's the Avignon piece. Excellent about the stopping of the drinking. I mean, I'm speaking as someone whose drinking habits involve half a beer or half a glass of wine every six months or so. Clear-headedness is the trippiest, coolest thing going. That's my current life policy. So that's great news. Plus, the lack hasn't seemed to have harmed your dreams. ** Mark, Hey. Most of the trees on the sketch set were real. All of the trees in the real set will be real. I love your idea for that gallery installation. You should do it somehow. It sounds very complexly pretty and more. Now you've made me need to go back and look at that penis flag. You're evil, ha ha. ** Michael_Karo, Yeah, I saw the pix and stuff of your poor cat. I can't believe he and his portraits haven't lured Atheist back in here yet. Very nice toilet photo (scroll down). The photo definitely transcends the source while maintaining its edge. I did have an initial if not thorough enough look at your very beautiful book, but not the long look that remains in its cards. Hm, now I have another something to do this weekend, cool. Thank you, sir. ** The Dreadful Flying Glove, First, thank you for taking over. I'm so very obliged. What a fantastic shambles that Liberation Music Orchestra sounds to have been. Pocket trumpet, wow. That alone. I have been lucky enough to see Charlie Haden play a few times back in LA. Wonderful, the playing and the him-ing too. I miss my futon. ** Uli, Hey, Uli! Wow, it's so very good to see you! I mean, how have you been, what have you been doing, etc., etc.? That Gelbart video on your blog is insane. Yeah, if you have a little time on your hands, do tell me how and what you're doing please? Take care. ** Blendin, Oh, New American Paintings ... you know, I think I've only ever leafed through an issue or two of that magazine, so I don't know what to think of it. I liked what I saw of it, I think. I hope you get in. I guess just keep in mind the bureaucratical in-group crap involved in every art magazine decision in the world just in case. You have a great weekend too. ** Ken Baumann, Thanks a lot about the photos. Yeah, I think we have the makings of something strong, and luckily we have a year ahead to get it right. From my experience, I'm thoroughly blown away by the community of really, really talented writers that you've got going on there. I can't tell you how exciting it is to be discovering all of your work, which so far has just been non-stop so impressive and inspiring, and, with the online component of your writer gang, it's just fantastic to be able to experience both the work and the community itself happening and growing. I really haven't felt this jazzed about new American fiction in a very, very long time. It feels like a total renaissance to me, and I feel really grateful to be in range of the wave and be receiving all the gifts. I'm just a happy audience member feeling a real comradeship, but it even makes me feel kind of sentimental too. Fucking amazing! Mm, on the mood swing thing, I get these bouts of melancholy mostly that I don't really understand and whose source I can't really pinpoint. One came on in Belfort suddenly, and I'm in it now. I guess it's like a feeling of being really alone and outside even in relationship to my close friends. I don't know if that's like what you're talking about. It's a strange thing, and then it just passes, poof, again for no reason. Great to know you're on the cusp of getting into the work on 'Unguentine'. That's exciting, and I hope the conversation with the producer is mostly or ultimately positive and propulsive. And congrats on writing a new story you like. Is a collection of stories by you a future possibility, you think? ** Winter Rates, Thanks, man. Well, the process on the theater piece has gone something like this: Maybe eight months ago, Gisele started telling me her ideas, which were pretty basic at that point. She wanted the piece to be about a failed or rather failing gymnast, and she wanted Margret to play that role, and she wanted there to be hologram characters whose texts or songs would be very poetic and even kind of archaic, and other stuff. We kept meeting and exchanging ideas and developing the idea of the piece from then on, and it went through a big evolution -- for instance, the auditions for the replacement performer for 'Kindertotenlieder' introduced us to Jonathan Schatz, and from the first minute I saw his work, I wanted him to be in our new piece very badly, and so we created a whole new character and narrative for him, and that changed our original plans radically -- until we finally kind of agreed on a rough structure and narrative about two months ago. Then I sat down and wrote a number of possible texts for the piece, and Gisele liked them, which got us to the point where I could write out the script and structure of the piece, which I did a few weeks ago. We took that to Belfort and used it as a starting point, and, so far, we've stuck to the script I wrote, although with the holography stuff proving to be much more tricky than we'd thought, the whole center of the piece will need to be revised. I had five monologues written for that part, and we're down to three at the moment, and we might cut back further. And, like, we decided we needed a stronger ending while we were in Belfort, so I wrote a new part on the spot which has created three new characters, although they might end up just being the voices of invisible characters. Stuff like that. I would imagine that the piece will be evolving a lot and continually over the year ahead, at least in small ways, and Stephen O'Malley has only just started writing the score, and his score could cause us to change the piece to suit his work. It's pretty organic. But that's a long answer to your question. Anyway, that's the idea. The Sir Richard Bishop show should be pretty great. Pass along a report when the time comes. ** Trinie, Speaking of screaming, ha ha. The sharp pain thing really sucked. A few times I fell over and collapsed on the ground in extreme agony. Whoa. You were just in Joshua Tree w/Stanya. Joel was just in Joshua Tree too. I guess you guys didn't cross paths? So you might end up living in Taos for a while? That's an interesting development. Definitely would be good for the work dedication as long as you guys were happy otherwise. I'll go check your road trip photos. Man, I could so use a nice road trip right about now. In the US, I mean. In the West/Southwest in particular. Sigh. You're the best, T. Love you, and lots of love to Matt. ** JW Veldhoen, If Saxon was in a cult, it was a pretty soft-edged hippie love-love-love cult, and he wasn't when he was making his great Seeds stuff. Kip Winger is still alive as of this second in time if you want to call that living. ** Amccartney, Hey, Alistair. No, no acupuncture, yet anyway. Just the somewhat miraculous seeming osteopath stuff so far. We'll see, though. It ain't over yet. My pleasure and honor on the POL thing. Just hope it helps somehow. So now you get some writing time of your own for a while, I hope? ** Creative Massacre, Happy birthday! Awesome. How are you spending or did you spend it if you're reading late in the day? Did you have a birthday cake? What kind, if so? (I love birthday cakes almost as much as I love wedding cakes). Yeah, I really hope you have a great, great day, my friend. Lots of love to you. ** Steevee, That's interesting about Twitter. Very curious. The behavior seems so sheep-like. ** Misanthrope, I got sidetracked yesterday for too many hours reading the message boards attached to the MJ death news stories. It interested me at the time that there was no middle ground. There were the people declaring him a pure saint and genius, and there were the people popping cyber champagne bottles because the children of the world are now safe from his perverted longings. Nothing in between. It isn't that interesting, but looking in vain for people whose opinions fell into a gray area kept me busy for some reason. 'Off the Wall' is a really good album. ** Rigby, Needles, yeah, maybe, I hope not, but, yeah, it might be the right time to get into that. The Parisian MJ bereaved people who numbered in the high four figures gathered in front of Notre Dame yesterday in MJ costumes doing the moonwalk and singing the hits and stuff. That was kind of honestly touching, I have to admit. I like how sadness regarding a single thing unifies people for a little while. That's the part that gets to me. That's what makes me mist up. I don't know why. ** Inthemostpeculiarway, I like trains. Traveling by train is really nice, at least in Europe and as long as the train stops once in a while so I can leap outside and smoke a cigarette. Okay, I'll go look for 'The Graveyard Book' today maybe even. I need to walk, the doc says, and the store where it's sold is a good forty minute walk from my place as well as being quite likely the greatest bookstore in the entire world: Un regard moderne. Yeah, I know those loneliness feelings. That's what I was kind of talking about to Ken up above. My day so far has consisted of doing this p.s., drinking coffee, a few cigarettes, about fifteen minutes of work on my novel, six emails, checking Facebook, eating a piece of cheese wrapped in a tortilla ... that's it. Yeah, I get mentioned in Araki's 'Totally Fucked up.' That was nice of Gregg. Actually, every once in a while someone tells me they found my work only because of that bit of dialogue in 'TFU'. I almost did a cameo as a psychiatrist in 'The Living End', but I forget why I didn't. ** SYpHA_69, Gosh, why not write a romance novel? I think that would be really interesting. I guess the key will be whether it holds your interest long enough to write a whole novel. I say go for it. Fuck literary concerns. The literature will be there because it's yours. ** NB, Oh, that's so nice, N. Wonderful. Sounds very promising what with the existing mutual interest and shyness about the interest and all that stuff. I like the sound of this. This sounds really good, man. Digging the goofy smile. Take a picture. I mean at least of your goofy smile if not of him. I think someone around here is going to have a good weekend. ** Panda?, Hey. Dude, the album is so fucking good. I mean, the earlier work you've done was terrific, but this album is really a significant advance, I think. In the songs, the constructions, the textures, the lyrics ... Really, really good. I had the album looping yesterday, and my favorites so far are 'Maples' -- the first single, right? You should do a video for that one. If I were your exec, that'd be the single -- 'Light Diving', which is just gorgeous, and I love the ending with the repeated lyric, really strong -- 'Can't Write', very sad and smart and the sonics are beautiful -- 'Dream Collective', love the use of electronics, really interesting, drifty and deep and complicated -- and 'Fields of Alice', which is such a good closing track 'cos it's kind of small but very epic, catchy and strange, again with really good words, and such an interesting development. Yeah, I really love the album a whole lot. Really amazing, man. I'm dazzled and really proud of you as a friend too. Even though it would be hard, I guess, what do you think about playing live? Is that something you'd want to do? I kept wondering if that wouldn't be really interesting and work really well if you could suss out how to perform that material on a stage. Great, just great. Oh, and I glanced at the post you sent, and it's just terrific, don't worry. I'm pleased as punch. Yeah, the album ... you're doing such strong work, Matt. It's just a thrill be a witness to it. ** Put The Lotion In The Basket, Hey, Nick. Yeah, the feet thing has helped, thanks a lot. I continue to be on the upswing without stopping so far. So you'll be heading off to Spain just as I head into London. Drat. But there'll be other mutually agreeable places and times. I'm really glad you're going to get a break, and I'll be so incredibly looking forward to seeing how the time away effects your work. Have a blast of a weekend, okay? ** Armando, Seeing films is a good way to spend a summer. I should do that. I don't have 'The Greatest'. I've only heard random tracks and none of them stick in my memory as being better than the others. I should just go ahead and download it, and I will. What are your favorites? It would be interesting to know now before I dive in. ** David, Thanks about the forest. I'll happily take the 'Throne of Blood' resemblance, of course. I have a deep fondness and respect for Laura Nyro, especially the 'New York Tendaberry' album. I saw her play a number of times back in the early 70s, and it makes me sad that she's so overlooked and mostly forgotten at the moment. I always had trouble with Joni Mitchell's emotional makeup and delivery, but never with Laura Nyro, who still makes me feel shaky and kind of awestruck. ** Right, once again, have very fine weekends, give it all up for the screaming festivities of The Dreadful Flying Glove, and I'll see you guys on Monday.