.

hello

DCS

Dear Danny,

Who am I? I ask you this seriously. Who the fuck am I? How the hell did you fall in love with me?

Ever since you left me, I’ve rebelled against you, I’ve been looking for something to replace you with, to get rid of that void. Someone to make me as happy as you did and I’ve failed and in return I’ve destroyed what we had.

God, you would hate me, if you knew me and who I was you would hate me. You would feel so upset at what I’ve done and said with other people so close after your leaving but, Danny I want YOU, I wanted to be close to you. To hug you, To shampoo your hair, do you remember that? We made that pact not that long ago but, it seems like it was forever ago now.

Have you forgotten? Was I not GOOD enough for you? Is that why you left me? I did something wrong and let you slip from me and now I’m continuing to do wrong by you because honestly I don’t understand what has happened. How could you come here so quickly and take my heart and then leave me so quickly in the same fashion?

Don’t you know what you mean to me? Meant? Mean? Meant? past tense, present, whatever. Are you out there? Really?

Are you out there reading this now, making me suffer because I did something wrong? Keeping this secret from me? Come back. Just for a moment let me know, just give me that moment. I deserve it.

Ugh, I’m such a hack. I’m copying from Stasia. She always writes to you, she’s such a good friend, she loves you, like you deserve. Why couldn’t I be more like her? Why can’t I honor you that way? How come I’m so fucked up Danny?

Remember what we used to say? Brothers in the fight, <4, all that crap? We were such kids weren’t we? haha. We acted tough but, we found a way to be kids to each other. Frootloop and all those things.

I want to go back to that, I want you to be around, I want you to just lie to me, lie over and over. Or don’t lie just exist again. Hate me if you have to. Tell me all the terrible things i am, call me out, say you’ve been all those people in my inbox just to see if i would go through with it. Post it up in a note, let the world see, do it

DO IT

just come back. That way I know I didn’t kill you. It couldn’t have been me. I would have done anything for you Danny. You were like my…

Where are you? I can’t make sense of this post anymore.

Somewhere in this day you came and hijacked it. I just wanted you to know that I miss you.

I’m a monster but, I was your monster for a little while right? Surely you remember that, that you had me. You, so protective and possessive, and I never minded. You remember that, you can’t forget because you won’t let me forget will you?

Ok no more.

I Love You, but you knew that already.

Just…forget it.

Don’t forget i love you. Just forget I’m pathetic. think of me with the same wonder you had before. I can be that man for you. just give me the reason, come back and I’ll be that man.

On: Fallible Expectations

As I sit here in the overflow room in at my campus I’m suddenly reminded that I have absolutely nothing to look forward to tonight. Another night alone watching television I don’t want to see.

maybe I’ll go the movies by myself but, that wouldn’t be fair to my dogs who like to have company and I don’t want to do to them what others have done to me.

Today I feel…alright. I don’t feel angry at the world as much as I usually do,  the same old betrayal and nonsense engulfs me but, what can I do? I can’t make people act the way I want them to act. The individual is a beautiful thing even when its ugly.

Though I’m starting to wonder what the point of being in love is. I mean I get it it’s nice sometimes and it works for a little while but, then it just dies like a slug sprayed with salt. It dissolves into a disgusting abomination I wish I hadn’t seen in the first place.

On the one hand I’ve got a man who has so many ambitions he can’t sit still. His mind and hormones and social life are all buzzing like bees and maybe I’m stupid but, I’ve found myself falling for him and he wouldn’t give me the time of day until recently. We had a great time, smiling and eating and being sexual and whatever but, then two days later he was on to the next one.

Why is it that I feel upset? There was no contract there, no one said neither of us could go out and pursue our fleshly, emotional and mental needs. Maybe I’m just idealistic and stupid, I shouldn’t have ever have put my self in that position because I knew, I KNEW this was going to happen. This is how it always happens, I think I’m some sort of treasure that should be beheld and cherished and really at the end of the day I’m nothing more than a chew toy. Amusing while in use but, other than that no lasting quality. As he said why should he care about anyones emotions over his own?

Self Preservation is man’s first instinct.

On the other hand I’ve got someone with such low ambition he can’t even stay awake. He slouches and whines and picks at his pathetic life and wallows in self pity that’s generated by his overzealous need for nothing. But I’m expected to treat this was some sort of excitement or at the very least some moderate transgression of interest. Some rule forbids me from being disgusted and repulsed by his line of thinking, my intellectual make up has run over some taboo that I didn’t know existed. And so when I talk to him I snap or I’m not as kind as I could be but, kindness is a tool that is allotted by some sort of respect and how can I respect something or someone who has utterly nothing to show for themselves at any point of any time? Furthermore why has he decided to hitch to me? I’m not wildly successful I’m moving at a moderate pace and barely that on my own, why hitch your suffering to that which you can easily take down? Isn’t it more a challenge to drain the soul of an Angel, aren’t the rewards greater then?

And on the foot I’ve got a guy who owes nothing to me in any fashion but, I want him to feel the way I feel about him. A constant ache to just have someone understand that I don’t ask for much but, I do ask for accountability. Someone who will finally think about me before they commit their actions? And why do I prescribe this falsehood on someone who doesn’t even live within 100 miles of me? Why have I let my silly little heart jump ahead of itself again and want someone who isn’t even emotionally there. He’s got problems of his own and I come with some much baggage you could pack you house in it.

I’ve lost control to some degree, I really have let myself be ruled by the inane actions of a few. So what If I’m a ‘nice guy’? That doesn’t strengthen someone’s allegiance or make them want to fight for you or make them someone who can even exist in my realm of insanity.

Why did I ever put these people on this pedal-stool, they’re just human beings. Imperfect, sometimes irrational, normal human beings. The pressures I’ve bestowed upon them are all the things I guess I want to be and can’t. Out of my broken pieces perhaps I could have welded together something greater but, I chose the wrong subjects and they had never asked for the positions.

And likely they’ll never give me the satisfaction that I want, not because its too much to ask of them but, really because they don’t WANT to. THAT’s the critical illusion to dispel.

But, like always; Tomorrow is a new Day.

Twitter.com/KeithBCovington

Facebook.com/Raganork8

On: Personality Flaws

I need one but, I'm afraid I might corrupt him

I never pretended to be an amazingly together person. I like to think that I act with a great deal of logic and kindness but, every so often I can slip into a rage of total foolishness and selfishness. I admit I have flaws in my personality, ones that wish I didn’t have but, nevertheless I do.

Sometimes I can sink into such a dark place that I don’t even know what i’m doing anymore. I scare myself at points, I ignore my responsibilities, I alienate the people I care about and what not.

I give into the beastly feelings of my animalistic ways, i’m no different than any other man, except sometimes I think I’m twice as mad. I can become some mad that i physically cannot find a place of comfort. It’s an inescapable nightmare that haunts me every so often.

It’s as if there’s another person sitting on my chest insisting that my getting up is a criminal offense. I’m incapable of falling in love the right way, I can love but, For some reason I can retain that feeling in others, either I smother them to death or I force a drought upon them.

i didn’t ask to be this way but, I have accepted that this is who I am. I transpose my flaws into my creative writing or use it to attack the problems of my ethical issues. Who better to charge the fight against an immoral than an equally immoral person? I know the animal better than most others will and I can be the one to slay it.

The fatal disease that poison that infects our society and permeates our legal system is the same thing that flows through my veins and threatens to consume me in total. But If I’m strong and can conquer, or at least learn to control it I may have a chance to be the one who plunges the spear in its heart.

I am not a warrior

I am not a monk.

I’m just a man who wants to either tame the monster or embrace it wholly.

 

Twitter.com/KeithBCovington

Facebook.com/Raganork8

On: Dealing With Other People.

The Truth is usually written in black and white

To anyone who knows me its no surprise when I say: “I don’t like other people” Hell, I don’t even like myself that much. That’s not to say I hate everyone, it just means that when confronted with new people its more often an experience that doesn’t lead to any lasting (good) impressions.

In my head I chalk this up to being because ‘other people’ are unreliable and uninteresting but, the other part of my mind likes to be a little more reasonable and accepts that maybe the problem lies within myself somewhat.

The first issue is that I missed the pop culture boat. When I was younger I just didn’t care about listening to popular music or anything. I spent the week in the city with my mother and went to school (which ultimately resulted in watching 90’s sitcoms and PBS) and the weekends in a more suburban area relaxing (which consisted of mostly talking and playing games). What was hot on the charts didn’t really come up unless it was some sort of sweeping phenomenon like Michael Jackson. So when I entered middle school and high school I was behind on the Jonses.

The Second was that I had no interest in catching up. By the time I was high school people were established in their artist and 99% of them consisted of what was on the radio at the time. It wasn’t until my second year of high school til’ I discovered the Pretenders and totally immersed myself with their music. In the four years of high school I caught myself up on some near 30 years of music, I didn’t have time to get into the ludicrous reaggeton and rap crazes. This of course made me the odd fellow in school, not to mention my homosexuality (which became the craze at some point but, even then I wasn’t very interested in other people), the odd fellows in the school still weren’t my friends.

Ultimately I didn’t care anymore, I had been alienated from people my age over what interested me, alienated from the Gay community cause I didn’t share anything in common with the general community and the same for the Black community. My life as a recluse really was solidified.

When I went to college I didn’t think it would be more interesting, and it wasn’t. I didn’t need to interact with anyone anymore and there as no one to interact with anyway. My specific taste in music and culture still was putting me at odds with people. Except this time people were more understanding about it. instead of flat out rejection I got a series of slow rejection, whether it was people pitying me or just generally losing interest in trying to figure out my habits over time I don’t know but, the general pattern was meeting someone who was interested in me in then in 6 weeks tapering off into barely speaking.

So at this point in life, I’ve given up on other people, if I meet someone interesting I’m jaded enough  to know that patterns exist for reasons. The Human race is a slave to its previous actions, they’ll never move away from the things they’ve done because its a scary thing and with the world they’ve created there’s good reason to fear a lot of things.

 

Twitter.com/KeithBCovingon

Facebook.com/Raganork8

Review: Jp, Chrissie and The Fairground Boys Live!

A Complex of Complexes and Perfect Perfections

Thank You For Ruling, New York City!

New York City

September 25th, 2010

Under the lavish bright lights of the Marquee that read ‘Irving Plaza’ small black letters meekly spell out the name of tonight’s act. ‘Jp, Chrissie and The Fairground Boys’ loads of New Yorkers walk by unawares of that exactly is going to happen tonight as they do every night.

‘Jp, Chrissie and the Fairground Boys?’  A women swimming, inebriated, in her own inebriation questions out-loud to herself. ‘Never heard of em”

And that’s the classic New York City anonymity coming in to play. It’s not unbelievable but, somewhat odd to think that Chrissie Hynde who has fronted one of the most enduring rock bands, The Pretenders, for over 30 years could be looked over so easily BUT, that starts the first major appeal of this band.

Fresh of the heels off a small tour playing just acoustic sets and the release of their first studio album ‘Fidelity!’ Jp Jones a Welsh born ‘Gypsy’, Chrissie Hynde and  lead Guitarist Patrick Murdoch are somewhat used to this grind with the songs at this point. Tonight, however, is going to be a new experience as NYC is going to be treated to the first performance with (most) of the band.

It should come to no surprise to anyone that this album is nothing less than amazing. Hynde who has put out consistently good work with the Pretenders and Jones who has been creating, writing and performing music for years have created a music child that can only be described as: ‘as close to perfection as humanely conceivable’.

If the mortal existence that human life exist in is an underling to a different world where the purest forms of every possible things exist, then ‘Fidelity’ is the skyline to the perfect city of music. It has everything one could ask for, great writing, great music, great voices and great production.

Jones/Hynde and the Fairground Boys pull no punches with this album, if its what they wanted to say they say it and do it in a way that you won’t forget. From Rockers to ballads to songs that simply fit into both and neither category, ‘Fidelity!’ is a revelation of the twilight that falls on a doomed relationship.

But enough of the obvious, with the technology today almost anyone could crank out a good sounding album, the real question is: Is it really them on the album, or when we hear them live are we going to hear something else? The test of any good band is how they sound live. Even if a studio album sounds horrific (which couldn’t be further from the truth about ‘Fidelity!’) the band could gel live and create a new life.

Anticipation over how ‘Fidelity!” would sound with an entire band was somewhat eased when the album was released. After hearing acoustic shows the album sounded perfect unplugged and an initial worry set in about how they would translate electrified but, it worked out better than one could have hoped for. Yet still, could they play live?

Marred by a dysfunctional Visa renewal system the Fairground boys were grounded overseas as Jones/Hynde and Murdoch carried the fight alone. Touring most in New York City during the acoustic sets there was something special about bringing the entire band to the City.

At show time NYC Finally got its first look at the entire band (minus 1) Patrick Murdoch on Lead Guitar, Vezio Bacci on Bass and Geoff Holroyde on Drums (Sam Swallow who plays Keys and attended the Housing Works show in NYC was absent for reasons unknown to me at the time of this post) took the stage with Jp Jones and Chrissie Hynde.

“Hello,” Hynde purred in her signature voice. “New York Fuckin’ City”

And then they proceeded to teach us a lesson.

Before I mentioned that people not knowing what was happening that night was part of the appeal of the band and by that I mean, the band is a secret almost. Its something that if you know about YOU KNOW what its all about (hopefully) this isn’t the Pretenders in any sort of fashion, this is a new endeavor that is amazingly genuine and crafty in itself and when other people are worried about their big box office tickets in row Z-21 at Madison Square Garden we’re standing five feet from one of the best acts out there today.

There isn’t any pretense with this band, they know already most of the audience has come to see Hynde and that the album may have been overlooked at this point, so they go into ‘sell mode’ they’re going to prove to us that this is an album YOU want and as a Bonus to those fans who have been digging the album since it was released on August 24th they opened with a song that’s not even on the album.

‘If You Were My Age’ says it all. Its ALL about that exact line. An album borne from the frustrations of the age difference between Jones and Hynde but, also of the mutual respect as artist, ‘Fidelity!’ broadcast the message of not being able to be together but, always being tied together. A Rocker that is already sorely missed from the album ‘If You Were My Age’ blast you into the world of the Fairground Boys and puts you on their roller-coaster/Carousel of mixed emotions and unabashed honesty.

The Band then started with the songs from the Album starting with their single: “If You Let Me”. No surprises here (unless you hadn’t heard the song before) Jones and Hynde musical conversation offers dueling ideas but, a want for the same thing (is your head hurting yet?) “If you don’t want to let me in, you better lock this door” Jones warns before Hynde coos in “Cause I’m not fine by myself are going to help me survive?”. It’s than kind of unique quality to their writing that really puts the listeners in awe of what they’re hearing. They could just as easily say: “I love you…you love me…this is hard. Let me in!”  and it’d be a fine song but, the way they play off one another shows, this isn’t just a collaborative act THESE two are somewhat one musical entity on stage.  They don’t take it too seriously either, the music isn’t meant to depress you into a state of endless rumination. Jones flubs up a lyric in the first line, catches himself and smiles through it giving Hynde a smiling nod as they understand each other. Its a fun scene.

‘Fairground Luck” follows, (a phrase that apparently sparked Jones’ and Hynde’s collaboration) a sensual ballad that crescendos into the chorus: “would you whisk me away, could you kiss these lips everyday? If I was down would you pick me up, throw me a little of that, ohh fairground luck”

The show really picks up from here on:

Jones and Hynde explain for the first time that they album is not meant to be taken literally at all points. “We didn’t really go to Australia” Hynde explains and the band begins ‘Australia’. A pop/ballad with enough heart to make a mass murderer reconsider his profession. It tells the story of when Hynde and Jones met, the two open up their verses respectively with: “Didn’t you come over and say Hi to me? I was propping up the bar on me own. Mostly guys like you say Goodbye to me and they never offer me a ride home”/ “I was too loaded to think you’d talk to me, but you’re obviously used to guys like that, when you said ‘no worries’ it came to me where you’re coming from and where you’re at.”

What struck me the most about this performance was just how amazing the band sounded, dare to say better than the studio version (which is impressive on its own) Geoff Holroyde pulls off a drum beat after the bridge that brings new dimensions to the song. Its suddenly no longer a song but, an experience. Jones and Hynde are letting you into their lives…honestly, openly and unapologetically.

The Jazzy Ballad: ‘Meanwhile’ follows, Vezio Bacci’s bass skills are a highlight. The opening notes between him Geoff and Patrick are so perfect that Jones and Hynde almost don’t have to be there and then of course they begin singing and it only gets better from there. Now I’m going to say this again listen to Bacci’s bass playing on the album and if you see them live listen for it…it’s there and its amazing.

Perfect Lover is next, quoted in EVERY article I’ve read about the band but, I won’t do it.

‘Courage’ follows that, Jones explains they hadn’t normally been doing this song (WHY?!) but, they were going to do it tonight. A psuedo-1970s R&B style song. Jones and Hynde show off how well they can sing. In the middle of the song professing: “They got it wrong when they said that we were done” they repeat over and over each time becoming more and more defiant as the music builds until it explodes and overflows like a tidal wave of emotions. Also for you guitar enthusiast Patrick Murdoch pulls off some of the best harmonics I’ve ever heard.

Jones’ solo song ‘Leave Me If You Must” comes next, he puts his guitar down and Hynde keeps hers, he takes his microphone and begins. Anyone use to Hynde’s writing can hear that even though Jones’ is singing it Hynde wrote it. Aside from the obvious lyrics that somewhat bad-mouth her (something Hynde does often about herself) “I couldn’t blame a man to leave a woman past her prime” there are these moments of unrivaled poetry: “I’m the spy who had his back turned hiding in a phone booth” and the Johnny Cash-esque quality of the song also lends to Hynde’s making but, it’s Jones’ deep semi-sexual growl (as he stands on stage with his shirt unbuttoned 3 buttons, his chest showing and a brush of hair peaks out) that pulls the song back as the music pushes it forward creating the sort of result one can only think to find in complex chemical reactions.

Misty Valleys a song Hynde explains is how she imagines Jones, her voice has never been in finer form. “Rockin’ the boat, we’re going nowhere, Drift and float We’re almost there’ Hynde coos in a falsetto that’s to die for.

Portabello Road – There’s no much I can say…This song rocks beyond belief. EVERY band members adds some kind of new besieging burst. Jones’ screams the condemnation of a place where only ‘stuck up muthafuckers’ would go to. in the Chorus they don’t warn but, demand: “don’t go down, don’t you go down Portabello!” Geoff, Vezio and Patrick then show you why THEY are the band and not some other folks. Holroyde doesn’t ever relent as he blast the drums, Bacci adds a pounding pulse with the slightest inclination of a fault and Murdoch, my word Murdoch crafts a solo that never seems to end but, always seems to get better and better and better.

It was then that I realized that something had happened, that this band wasn’t going to go anywhere anytime soon and also that the people closest to me were dead inside. So starstruck and stuck on Hynde that they forget to appreciate an amazing band. Portabello has fire behind it, the fire you see under a space shuttle or erupting from a volcano. Had the show been ended there I would have been fine. Pretenders or not THIS was among the best performance I’ve seen Hynde a part of and anyone who couldn’t appreciate the Fairground Boys last night, should have their hearts checked.

Your Fairground followed, slowing down the pace to be followed then by one of the most beautiful songs Hynde has ever sung. The title track ‘Fidelity’

A uniquely different song of the album Jones and Hynde explain they consider the album their child and since it was written in Cuba they gave it its name after Castro, as the song says: “Its life, we gotta little girl…Fidelity”

They ended the set with “You’re The One” another song not on the album. It continues the theme of the album. “You’re the one That I should’ve married, you’re the one that I should have carried” A nice rocking song to end the first set with.

They came back out for the encore and performed “Never Drink Again” my favorite song off the album, the Moby Grape song: “Murder in My Heart” and ended the show their Christmas song (Jones: “Its almost…well no it’s no where near christmas) “Christmas Soon”

All in all the show was amazing and anyone who has the chance would be a fool to not go see a band in top form perform top notch music together.

This isn’t it though, Jones and Hynde have good poker faces but, not that good. One could see easily that they’ve got more songs out there waiting to be put out.

Lets just hope we as fans are ready to experience the rawest form of perfection again.

Facebook.com/Raganork8

Twitter.com/KeithBcovington

On: The Problem With All My Children

As 2 Dimensional as Mario on the SNES

If you ever watched a dying animal you know what the height of pathetic life is. It’s not something you can really help (other than to kill it) and it’s not something you’d feel comfortable walking away from because it demands your attention.

And thus is the story of All My Children. The soap has been on for decades, winding its way through a cultural maelstrom. From race to aids to terrorism to gay marriage All My Children has always stayed on top of the issues and provided unique and sympathetic stories to the current situations at hand.

Being the most “plain” of the soap operas (no regular super cops, or super criminals or spies and whatever) All My Children has always been propelled by characters. Money grubbers, crooks, murderers, fathers, sons, daughters, drunks, junkies, mothers, philanthropist, moguls, psychotic, storytellers and even a couple of bears here and there. These characters are what have kept All My children unique and interesting.

We’ve watched Erica Kane go from young dreamer, to broken rape victim, to high end model, to addicted fiend, to indignant mother, wife, single, wife, single, wife, single and wife again and in each change we’ve learned something about a woman many of us have know for over thirty years.

But recently the soap has seemed to lose its way. It still has its characters (arguably maybe now they have the best roster of characters) From the sultry and possibly psychotic Annie Novak (Lavery, Chandler) to the plotting and cunning Dr. David Hayward, All My Children has a lot to work with and even could pull from older characters to spice it up a bit.

But when Charles Pratt Jr. took over as head writer audiences cried foul. The most frequent argument being that the female characters had all be degraded to shells of people, subservient and not as clever as their male counterpart.

The end of the Pratt Jr. reign followed the death of long time character Stuart Chandler and a sordid Baby’s Father drama involving nearly every character but, primarily: David Hayward, Jake Martin and Amanda Dillion. Admittedly it was some of the same stuff we had seen before but, it was still intriguing.

After Pratt was released from his duties writing the drama of Pine Valley, many fans thought that a fresh perspective would bring about a new and improved look and feel to Pine Valley (couple with a move to L.A. to shoot what could go wrong?)

Sadly it hasn’t turned out to be what most expected and hoped it to be. The characters of Pine Valley have been reduced to mere talking points, a brief look into a common thought from the character followed by some uncharacteristic actions and then onto the next set of characters before repeating the process for 45 of the 60 minutes.

Characters many of us have known for ten, twenty years are suddenly reacting to similar situations in totally different manners. A painful look at writers testing the waters to see what sounds nice on paper doesn’t always apply when acted on a continuous scale.

A great example of character trampling came with the character Aiden Devane. A private detective/spy like character who at the very core of him was benign. Only in Pine Valley because he cared about some of the women, Devane was written as a raving lunatic at the end of his run.

For weeks audience were subjected to him sitting in a padded room attempting to help (or extort?) a mental ill patient that he was (or wasn’t) in love with. Varying with the day Devane was either trying to uncover evidence against Annie Lavery or uncover a way for her to escape. For the first week it offered us some intrigue not being sure but, then after a little while it became very clear that the writers weren’t sure as to what they wanted to present with the character.

And in the end a character who hadn’t lifted a finger to do anything against the women of his life ever, except to protect them from themselves occasionally, kidnaps his ex-girlfriend and holds her hostage against her husband (whom he had a good relationship with too) before being sent to jail.

The end result served as a slap in the face to viewers who like to be treated more than just cardboard cut-outs sitting in front of a television screen. And as bad as that was, we weren’t expecting what was going to come next after Pratt’s leave.

The show as of late has been reduced to watching one story-line repeated endlessly. It’s not as if there’s multiple components to the story, literally the same thing happens over and over again. In one story Adam Chandler Jr. struggles with a lust (and possible love) for his father’s ex-wife (and cousin’s current fiancée) even though he’s married already. Normally this kind of thing is fair-grounds for a soap opera but, it’s been months of the same dialogue being used over and over again.

The guilt he feels in his heart, the burning he feels in his loins. Every episode serves for Him to say to his mistress: “We can’t be together but, I want to”, week after week we hear him say “We can’t be together but, I want to” without and real clarification of the issue. 3 months ago the show was in the same position as it is now.

The writers have forgotten what drives the story FORWARD. Instead they pick one talking point and talk about it at until the viewer is ripping their hair-out or mindlessly speaking the dialogue of the show along with the broadcast.

The characteristic of the characters have been twisted into mere stereotypes, the blending of unique and intricate qualities of characters have been replaced for blatant moments of characters stressing “I AM THE HERO” and “I AM THE VILLAIN!”. There’s little wiggle room to understand the motives for characters other than: He’s the bad guy, he’s supposed to be that way.

In the past characters of pure evil were introduced, with no motive other than to wreak havoc but, they weren’t trying to live in the society, they attempted to use it and control it. Like Dr. Kinder but, the real joy came in characters like Vanessa aka Proteus who was clearly doing wrong but, had an overbearing love for her sons that lead to the death of one of them.

On one hand you hate Vanessa on the other hand you can’t wait for her to be on screen again to see her rationale. Gone is that feeling once you hear a character admit something it stays that way. Black and white is how the lines are drawn in, no one in Pine Valley is complicated, they’re either: simply good or simply bad.

Some characters don’t even have conflicts. Amanda and Jake stand around having sex whenever they can and helping friends but, neither of the characters have anything to do individually. Sometimes they’re asked to participate in unethical actions but, they show absolutely NO conflict, they just go along with it because it’s against  ‘the bad guy’ and that’s what ‘the good guys’  do.

And so before you watch an episode you know what’s going to happen and for what reason and you can’t relate because surely YOU as an actual human being are more complicated than “I do the right thing all the time and hate everything wrong”.

All My Children is a medium in what many consider to be a ‘dying art’. The characters are treated like Adjectives: “loyal” “evil” “righteous” “confused” but, never as a mixture of one and another. So we as viewers get stuck watching the equivalent of literary stick figures but, we know there’s more. We’ve been with most of these character for ten or more years, we’ve seen them grow up, we’ve seen them do bad and good and we’ve seen them wrestle with which was more appealing to them.

That’s why we still watch because anyone who’s watched All My Children knows that the show was founded in greatness and can still achieve that goal if someone would take some time to think of stories that encompass more than one character and present more than one view-point as ‘right’.

But maybe this is the end, maybe the animal is really beyond saving and we loyal fans are just unable to look away because we love it so much still.

Or maybe someone will go to L.A. and whip some of these ‘writers’ into shape!

Facebook.com/raganork8

Twitter.com/KeithBCovington

On: Long Periods Without Writing

You would think that having two personalities in my mind would make me more prolific with writing that’s not the case however. For weeks at a time (sometimes months) I will have nothing of any interest to say about anything. Sure something will happen in that time but, no one really comments on this blog anyway so there’s no reason to share with the world if the world isn’t looking.

Don’t take that as a guilt trip, it’s simple logic.

However on occasion I will think of something I think is important enough to share with the people who do come across my blog, and then I blog. My last blog post are some of the easiest to put down. I love music so sharing my experience with new and/or live music is something that comes easily.

What doesn’t come easily is a way to make the banal routines of my life come alive for you all in this blog.   Writing isn’t a challenge per se but more of a required discipline that I  haven’t totally gotten down. It comes to me in waves, sometimes as small as a tide and sometimes as large as a tsunami.

This doesn’t only apply to my blog  but, also to writing a book or short story, I have to be in a very specific mood in order to get anything down. And even then I tend not to write a whole lot in one day, sometimes I’ll pull our a page or two and be content with that because when the feeling goes…it’s gone.

The frightening thing about writing a blog is that everyone who reads it seems to expect some sort of consistency, I have friends who blog once a month on the same day every month, or vow to blog twice a week or some schedule but, I’m not able to stick to that sort of thing. As soon as writing becomes a ‘job’ so to speak, where I have to worry about getting it down in a certain amount of time or fear the deadline, I lose a boatload of interest.

I know, that’s real life, right? Sure it is and I didn’t say I wasn’t able to do it but, I just said it’s no longer as fun for me. I like to take my time and even be lazy. I spend every waking minute thinking about writing, how I want something to look and how I want it to be presented on the page and whatnot and when I get to the execution I get there.

This blog is more of a twisted therapeutic sort of engine for me to work with, I get to write whenever I want to and share it out to the world. Sure the lack of comments and viewers sometime annoy me but, that’s not really the big issue. The issue is filtering through the packing peanuts in my mind to find the really fragile things and bringing them into some sort of like in reality.

With two people in my mind constantly trying to find a way to appease each other there’s often a lot of interesting stuff that gets cut on the editing room floor. I just can’t express EVERYTHING sometimes, mostly because I think a lot of what I say is common sense, but I’m not a common guy and this isn’t a common world and so maybe I ought to consider getting over my personal misgivings with my writing and just put it out there.

I often have this vendetta against artist, like painters and sculptures and cartoonist; maybe not a vendetta but a jealousy because for them the final product of the art is there and can be beheld with the eye. For me I have to then embark on a new journey to get people to read what has taken me a year to write and thats the hardest part of all.

You would think that people would be jumping for joy over the fantastic like: Dreams and the damaged infrastructure in the mind of a semi-psychotic but, people really aren’t. Maybe they think it’s silly or overly-dramatic but, no one cares that much and in some degrees neither do I. I’m still entertained by very simple things like Soap Operas. I watch All My Children everyday as if it were something that will feed my starving stomach. It’s one of the few things that both my personalities will agree to doing but, who wants to sit here and read about how much I dislike Ryan Lavery or think Marissa Tasker needs to buy a clue.

Maybe someone, I guess but, often I don’t feel like it’s a worthy subject to start ranting about in a blog.

I guess part of me still feels like I’ve stumbled into this writing thing, Like maybe I don’t deserve to even be doing it. I love it though, I just like taking my time as well, maybe if i had an actual job writing I would think differently about it but, as of now I don’t. And even when I worked for my school magazine I waited til submission day to do something and it was still pretty good.

What I need is for someone to take me seriously, seriously enough so that we can work together. I work fine alone but, I think ultimately I feel comfortable if I have someone to bounce ideas off of and craft together with. I’ve been alone all my life so maybe that’s why.

I should write a comic book and work with an artist (maybe that would ease some of the jealousy) and put it out one day. That sounds like it could be a barrel of monkeys!

Now let’s see if anyone’s interested…

Twitter.com/KeithBCovington

Facebook.com/raganork8

Review: Fidelity! (Live)

Love, Loss and Fidelity!

How does one begin something like this? A review of this magnitude ought to be taught as a college seminar. That’s not some overzealous view of my writing skills but, rather an understatement of what happens when two musical geniuses get lemons and make lemonade.

Fidelity!(Available August 24th)  is the newest project from Chrissie Hynde, this time she shares the stage with Welsh born singer/song writer JP Jones, along with a band, filled with talented Musicians, the Fairground Boys. The result is: Jp,Chrissie and the Fairground Boys.

Make no assumptions about this band and about this album. You may think you know Chrissie Hynde and some of you may think you know JP Jones but, this album will send you for a loop from it’s subject matter to its execution.

Monday night  I had the chance to see Jp, Chrissie and the Fairground Boy(s) at the Rockwood music Hall in NYC. To say the show was intimate would be a drastic understatement. Sitting less than 5 feet from Chrissie Hynde, JP Jones and their guitarist Patrick Murdoch, I found myself apart of the action going on onstage.

In a fine mood the three came out ready to play the ENTIRE album of Fidelity (previous shows had only showcased a maximum of 7 songs) JP Jones explained that this would be the first time they played some of these songs live at all and asked for our pardon in advance.

He wouldn’t need it.

Starting with their single “If You Let me” (Released August 10th) the band began to rock the acoustic set. Its in this song that the listener realizes that this isn’t just an album. This isn’t someone putting out music simply because they want to make money or because they like to. This is a story of why growing up is a hard thing to do sometimes.

The lyrics say: “I’m going to on this world/I’m going to make you love me/if you let me/if you let me/if you let me” sung in tandem it shows the like mind of the two songwriters. Every song is just as much felt by JP as it is Chrissie. There aren’t any petty disagreements or empathy for the other. On Fidelity! Jp and Chrissie are one and the same.

The two of them chatted with the audience adding a great deal of humor to the rather humorless chunk of music.

The set of live songs were all gorgeous and painfully honest. The whole of Fidelity! being a story in which two people are forced to understand that they cannot be together because of the age difference between them. The woman is painted as “Past her prime” (a line which sparked some surprised audience reaction and “she wrote it!” as a response from JP Jones) and the man described as a “perfect lover but, he’s only half my age”.

The entire album is of this sort of thing, the realization that it isn’t going to work between this two characters (are they Hynde and Jones?…probably) but, what sets this apart from a normal ‘I wish I could have you but, I can’t’ story is that the two decide to take their love in a different direction.

The word “Son” and “Lover” comes up so much, it’s PAINFULLY clear that they came
to a choice when they said “Hey we can’t be lovers, let me take you under my wing son”

In words like my feeble minded vernacular it sounds somewhat perverse but, when you hear this album, start to finish and hear Hynde’s cooing versus JP ranting, you’ll know.

While JP Jones seems still somewhat embarrassed to admit that this is of any truth to his life Hynde seemed casually open about the failed relationship. Whilst introducing a song named “Never Drink Again” (A quote Hynde has used before) Hynde explained the original name of the song was going to be: “Never drink again, until the pub opens up” a sentiment apparently shared by the other two and much of the audience.

It was then that Hynde does what she does. There aren’t any words to describe it, it’s either some sort of fearless truth and insight of herself or some kind of over-the-top form of bullshit but, Hynde says that she’s stopped drinking because when she does she becomes a “Cunt”.

At the sheer utterance of the ‘C’ word the entire audience gasped and moaned in disapproval but, Hynde got defensive of the choice of words. “No it’s true, he knows it. When I drink I go to the dark side”

It’s that kind of honesty (?) that fills the album, listeners will be treated to an unabashed version of their view on this tragic situation and the audience can decide if their even doing the write thing. Sure the two of  them can write a song but, what will this love affair yield at the very end? Is Fidelity! the ultimate love story or a musical tribute to the mistakes we make when we fall in love and can’t climb our way out?

Whatever it is, Rockwood Musical hall was able to get a glimpse of it. Filled with humor, fun and the passionately played out lyrics, it was hard not to get totally sucked into Fidelity!’s world. A wave of uneasy apprehension filled the room as the words: “I wish I could have met you in a former life, or seen you in a future time” Heartbreak plainly laid onto our laps with no real solution in sight.

Fidelity! is everything and nothing at the same time. Its what you WANT from an artist and yet it has no solution to its story, we’re told from the first lyric how this game is going to be played before our eyes and in the very end we still see they had not lied.

The concept of their love not being able to grow the way they want is complicated but, they treat it as a simple inconvenience. The human mind will baffle at it and enjoyed being toyed with.

Fidelity! is a complicated, perplexing view of simplicity and common sense.

As harsh as an acid and soothing as a base.

Tuesday August 10th New York City, SoHo.

After the events at the Rockwood musical hall the night before, I couldn’t pass up the chance to see the band again at the Apple store in SoHo. A free event that was set up for the store.

There’s not much to say here, they did 5 planned songs and revealed that management or Apple or some other power that be wouldn’t be allowing them to do anymore. But after some coaxing from the audience they unveiled an even NEWER song in a catalogue of new songs. Hynde explained the song is going to be released as a Christmas EP and the band had to take some time to remember how to play it but, when it was all over, the song was a beautiful christmas ballad.

Restricted by time and the store the SoHo appearance wasn’t the same glimpse into life ala Jones/Hynde but, a showcase of good songs.

I shouldn’t have to type this but, if you aren’t convinced that you should rush out and find the nearest performance by Jp/Chrissie and the Fairground Boys at this point of the review then simply don’t go. You’re not alive probably.

Fidelity! is NOT a Pretenders album and one shouldn’t convince themselves that the band will play Pretenders songs or have any Pretenders sentiments whatever. This is all new, and as real as it gets. Hynde hasn’t ever really let her audience down and Fidelity! is among the best music she’s ever put out.

Walk don’t run.

The Setlist for August 9th was:

If You Let Me

Fairground Luck

Meanwhile

Your Fairground

Leave Me If You Must

Misty Valleys

Australia

Never Drink Again

Skinny Love (not performed)

You’re The One (not on the album)

Perfect Lover

Fidelity

Portobello Road

Murder in My Heart

an encore included

If You Were My Age.

The Setlist for August 10th was:

If You Let Me

Fairground Luck

Never Drink Again

You’re The One

Your Fairground

An Encore included:

It Must Be Christmas

JP. Chrissie and the Fairground Boys will be back in NYC on September 25th 2010 at Irving Plaza. Tickets on sale now

On Dreams

Fantasy, Reality? Whose being picky anymore?

I swear I was thinking about this blog post before I saw Inception be-that-as-it-may, you may or may not see some influences from the movie. Whatever seems similar is pure coincidence.

Much like headaches aren’t a normal event in my mind because of the dual (dueling) personalities in my mind, sometimes dreaming is an interesting event in itself. Not all the time though, most of the time of the dreams are banal and of standards pseudo-creativeness but, everyone once in a while sometimes I’ll have a dream that will even somewhat amaze me.

The other day I had a dream about something that I can’t fully explain but, in the dream I was rejected and blame for something that wasn’t my fault, and in a very cinematic fashion I walked off and an orchestra started  playing in the background. Nothing amazing there but, the odd thing was that when the music started playing I, in the dream started thinking of more music. So as this invisible orchestra was playing my walking off music, I was thinking of more, different music.

An odd thing that hasn’t happened to me before in a dream. It was if, for once, the two people in my mind were working quasi-together. Even though music was conflicting it was most certainly as if there was two things happening at once.

When I was young dreams used to be the place where all my wants would come true, around the conception of  ‘Bryant’  they started becoming a place where I would see all the things I didn’t understand, like or believe. I’ve died in my dreams several times, each more unspectacular than the last. There’s nothing like death but, even more depressing is  an uneventful one, or one ironic in circumstance. Something like an ill-fated joke gone wrong, I wake up thinking that my life might be a really strange joke with a non-halarious punch like…like anything Dane Cook says.

I’ve also a series of dreams within dreams, which I think bothered me the most. I suppose Inception did bring this back to my recent memory but, a year or two back I was being troubled by this terrifying nightmares that would keep me up at night and make it hard for me to go to sleep at night. In the most vivid one, I was sleeping alone in my room (the severity of the dream is always determined by the proximity to my room, if it’s in the city, it’s scary, if it’s in the building it’s terrifying, if it’s in the apartment it’s horrifying but, if it’s in the room it’s downright demonic. I mean what sensible person dreams of their own room? Dreams are for escaping not, second hand experiencing.) and suddenly this person begins talking to me and then a moment later begins to scream at the top of its supernatural lungs and pushes me into the bed at its full force.

The sheer volume of the screaming and the force of its pushing me into the bed was so horrifying that it eventually woke me up. Of course when I woke up, the same thing happened again in the same way and now I felt as if I couldn’t trust my own mind, eventually waking up in my bed in the exact same way I would have in the dream.

Usually I forget these things and settle in the quiet anger of my original, skewed psychosis. I don’t believe I’m capable of daydreaming, I consciously ignore and blame it on such but, to think that I actually could be so lost in a thought that my surroundings become blurry in terms of focus. not with two personalities in my mind, one is always looking around, I’m afraid if I ever did daydream I would be stuck, because it would be giving priority over one personality and I don’t think it would ever be willing to let go.

But honestly whose to say what’s a dream and what’s not? Maybe typing this blog is all an elaborate illusion of my brain, giving something to do. Maybe my real life is that ethereal, unfocused world in which I’m constantly berated and die, sounds terrible but, sometimes it’s nice to somewhat all-powerful. Sometimes it’s nice having the ability to look at the world in a totally creative way, without the boundaries of physics.

But that’s probably too much to ask for.

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