From the Pages of Dostoevsky's The Idiot

Bantam edition, 2nd printing, circa 1983.

My 2012 Music Writings

There are several reasons why 2012 was a big year for me, not least of which are 1) I moved out of my parents' house -- those are my records all crated up on the living room floor the night before my departure -- and 2) at the urging of my friends Chris, Cliff and a few others, I started writing about music for a few websites, namely the t.r.o.y. blog and Tiny Mix Tapes (so far for their Delorean Blog mostly). It's been much more fun than I'd expected, definitely improved my critical listening skills, and for better or worse, made me feel less guilty about slacking off when it comes to my other writing habits.

In case you haven't been following my work and would like to, here's a list of some music posts I did this year, from a little video biography piece that got me going back in April to a 3,000-word year-in-summary article that went up a week ago. The pieces I enjoyed writing (and reading) most are emboldened, so if you only want to check out a few, I suggest reading those (unless of course you're not really into hip-hop, in which case check out the Blue Oyster Cult, Bonniwell Music Machine and/or Lee 'Scratch' Perry posts).

Bobby Digital in Video for the t.r.o.y. blog
The Digital Revolution: A Critical Analysis of RZA as Bobby Digital In Stereo for the t.r.o.y. blog
on Blue Oyster Cult's Secret Treaties for DELOREAN
on Scaramanga's Seven Eyes Seven Horns for DELOREAN
on Lee 'Scratch' Perry's The Return of Pipecock Jackxon for DELOREAN
Schoolly D Instrumentals 101 for the t.r.o.y. blog
on Schoolly D's Welcome To America for DELOREAN
on The Bonniwell Music Macine for DELOREAN
on LoDeck and Omega One's Postcards From The Third Rock for DELOREAN
Synthesis, Synchronicity and Singularity: How Three of Hip-Hop's Most Ingenious Independents Helped Make 2012 a Year to Remember, a feature for Tiny Mix Tapes

Now then, if you're feeling my aspiring contributions to the canon of 2012 music writing, I'd sincerely appreciate you heading over to the Best Music Writing Ballot and including some of my work among your nominations. It looks like you can vote for up to 15 pieces. Short of doing all that -- actually, I'm not even sure if that whole contest is still up and running; it looks like it might be defunct, but voting anyway can't hurt -- I also wouldn't mind if you were to pass these joints on to your friends, bandmates, lovers, colleagues, or whomever you think might dig 'em. In fact, I hear that this is how writers lacking agents and publishing houses get their work out there.

Cambridge Nights Season 2

I'm very happy to learn that the Cambridge Nights web series has returned for a second season. In fact, I just found out tonight and this is the first new installment I'm watching (for obvious reasons). I'm not sure how I feel about the interviews getting divided into smaller segments in which the questions are framed for the viewer via on-screen text rather than shown organically as asked by the host/interviewer, but I guess it makes the series a bit more accessible.

Ripped Genes Promo

Pet-store patron purchases unborn human fetus from avian shopkeep.

Swimming instrumentalists mix horns, strings and hormones.

Draughtsman seeks amphibious splice for erotic tryst.

Editor’s namesake awakens to smells of blood, rot, more blood.

Wolfboy’s hired hand lights path, but does he know the way?

Labor pains with explosive implications.

Half-terraformed planet’s native inhabitants cross the border.

Insurgents spring ally from DNA-hacking overlords.

Copycat comes to terms with surroundings and selves.

Spaghetti-slurping journalist learns true meaning of pharmacovigilance.

Guerilla clinic guinea pig invests big in immunity.

Anthropomorphism: a matter of profit vs. principle.

Enamored animal activist meets familiar face.

Previews of Ripped Genes stories, for the Morpheus Tales #18 online supplement.

Ripped Genes Out Now

Kindle Edition 

Other E-Book Formats 

Collector's Print Edition

Coming Soon from Morpheus Tales

Ripped Genes, the Biopunk Special I edited for Morpheus Tales should be out sometime in September. It will be available in e-book and print-on-demand formats. To preview the issue, visit http://issuu.com/morpheustales/docs/rippedgenes or check it out below:

Open publication - Free publishing - More biopunk

I Heard It On Shark Week

Correct me if I'm wrong, but wasn't there a time when Shark Week was both entertaining and educational? These days, it seems like it's all about high definition closeup shots and slow motion videos of Great White feeding frenzies. As a matter of fact, you could probably count the number of non-Great White sharks they showed the whole week on one hand. I guess it's in keeping with the whole "History Made Every Day" scheme, wherein thought-provoking and informative programming is phased out in favor of ancient alien conspiracies and fat people selling shit.

Having said that, I cannot deny the fact that Shark Week offers some of the most entertaining TV of the year. Of course, the visuals are the main attraction, but this year I found myself chuckling at several of the interviews and voice-overs, so much so in fact that I was prompted to pull out my notebook (remember those?) and record a few of my favorite quotes:

"Colossus came in once, looked at RoboSeal and instantly took a liking to it -- took it out, chewed it to pieces, and unfortunately, that was the end of RoboSeal and our experiment."

"What happened to that - what happened to that whale?"
"It's like a crime scene. You have to solve it."

 "If we had that movie Jaws filmed from our boat, it would've been a 10-minute movie... It would've been dead really quick."

 "Angry over his loss, Al sets off to kill every shark he sees."

 "Her tremendous girth was obvious, but was she pregnant or had she just gorged on a whale?"