Counterculture From The Underground's Blog

Hi guys,

I guess I owe you all (those of you who are still here) an explanation as to why I am no longer posting on Buzznet. It's really strange for me to say that, because I have been posting here for over 5 years, and Buzznet effectively started me on my photography/social media career, which has blossomed in many ways. Still, I feel it's time to leave it behind and go on to bigger and better things.

The thing I will miss most is the people. You are what has kept me here so long through all the changes and the MySpace-ization of Buzznet over the years. If you haven't yet, PLEASE PLEASE add me on Facebook, Twitter, Flickr etc. and visit my music blog The Spirit of Mixtape, otherwise I shall cry and pine for you forevermore.

If you are not into all that social media stuff, e-mail me at leonasha at gmail dot com.

Farewell my loves!

Leona/Gena/Shapeshifter

Hey guys, let me indulge in a little shameless self-promotion for a moment.

Here's a list of media mentions of Sunday's Poverty Olympics, an event I emceed as Chewy the Rat, the role I was born to play! There are pics of me in several of these articles.

You can actually HEAR Chewy SPEAK in this radio report from Australian broadcasting etc ...

There's copious VIDEO on this page!! Chewy is in the 2nd one. Forgive my co-host ... he's a windbag.

And here are some Flickr pages featuring yours truly!

Edit: Pixeltopia told me about this piece on NPR - thanks Jeff!

this was my 3000th photo on Buzznet!!!!!!

wow I'm an old timer.

My photo "I'm Not Here" was judged one of the best in BC by Tyee magazine!!! And tomorrow it's gonna be featured in a photo essay with the other 2 winners!! Yes, out of all the amazing photogs working in BC today, I am one of the TOP THREE!!!!!

OK I'm getting a bit carried away now.

Check out the Tyee tomorrow ... I'm gonna be published!

Put your music player on shuffle. Type the names of the first 25 artists that play (no cheating!) Answer the questions.

1. Elvis Perkins

2. Laberge

3. Nine Inch Nails

4. Velvet Underground

5. Jane's Addiction

6. David Bowie

7. Happy Mondays

8. Teardrop Explodes

9. Sneaker Pimps

10. Cameo

11. Brian Eno & David Byrne

12. Einsturzende Neubauten

13. Kate Bush

14. ESG

15. Peter Gabriel

16. Eagles of Death Metal

17. Portishead

18. Portishead

19. Stereolab

20. Sneaker Pimps

21. Julian Cope

22. Bjork

23. Nine Inch Nails

24. April March

25. Bob Dylan

What was the first song you ever heard by 6? Let's Dance

What is your favorite album by 2? Um ... I have no idea, I only have the one song by them. it came off a mixtape.

What is your favourite lyric that 1 has sung? "we stared for hours in our maker's face"

How many times have you seen 11 live? Never ... but my friend saw David Byrne live last year!

What is a good memory you have involving 20? getting totally filthy and stupid in a bar when their song entitled "Get Me Off" came on.

Is there a song by 3 that makes you sad? Yeah, "Hurt" is pretty heavy ...

What is your favorite lyric that 14 has sung? "I know it all about you"

What is your favorite song by 19? Metronomic Underground

Who got you into 22? My friend Darrin in highschool was a fan of the Sugarcubes ... way back when.

What was the first song you heard by 21? East Easy Rider

What is your favorite song by 4? "Heroin" I guess ...

What is a good memory you have involving 13? trying and failing to sing "Wuthering Heights" at karaoke.

Is there a song by 23 that makes you sad? again? see above.

What is your favorite album of 15? I don't really know ... I have a greatest hits CD and it's good!

What is your favorite song by 8? Bouncing Babies

How many times have you seen 5 live? only once.

What is a good memory you have involving 25? there's this annoying hippie I know who dropped $50 to see Dylan live last year, and he was so excited, thinking he was gonna have some kind of transcendental experience ... but I knew that Dylan does really shitty live shows these days and has no respect for his audience. And I'm not even a fan! Annoying hippie dude was really let down. Sucker!

What was the first song you heard by 18? Sour Times. Saw the video on TV. I remember the VJ introducing it by saying, "You guys are REALLY going to like this!"

What is your favorite song by 17? Only You ... or Glory Box

Jane's Addiction is a feisty band that defies easy labelling. I've seen them referred to as metal, surf rock, art rock and "alternative rock" to name just a few. It's easier to say that their sound is characterized by Perry Farrell's nasally transgressive vocals, Dave Navarro's screamingly awesome guitar work, and a funky rhythm section featuring Stephen Perkins on drums and Eric Avery on bass. Oh, and also by the distinct aroma of controversy that hangs over everything they do.

Jane's Addiction formed in 1985 around Perry Farrell, stayed together til 1991, broke up amid some epic soap-opera style drama, reunited from 2001-2004, broke up again, and are now touring worldwide with Nine Inch Nails in the NIN/JA tour. These are some high-strung artists here.

The band had its greatest commercial success between 1989 and 1991, when they released Nothing's Shocking and Ritual de lo Habitual, the two albums from which their most well-known singles come. Helping their songs climb the charts were various controversies: rumours (true) of major drug use; a propensity for naked and sexual stage antics; and of course the great album cover debacle that had the band releasing a second version of Ritual de lo Habitual on account of the first version had pubic hair. (The second version was simply a white background with the words "Congress shall make no law [...] abridging the freedom of speech..." printed on it.)

I, of course, had the pubic hair version. Oh Canada! We stand on guard for thee!

Yes, I was a big fan of Jane's Addiction back in the late 80s-early 90s when I was in highschool, when everything was dayglo and "modern primitive" was the new thing and guys wore hideous neon print pants. I saw them live in 1991 headlining the first Lollapalooza tour, the alternative rock festival envisioned by Perry Farrell that is still going strong today. I don't think he was wearing any underwear. Neither were the models on stage with him.

Here's a live video for "Mountain Song". You can see Flea from Red Hot Chili Peppers on bass here ... he toured with Jane's Addiction on occasion but left when the original bassist Eric Avery came back. Also, you can see some of that hideous 90s fashion I was talking about.

Jane's Addiction on the net: xiola.org, this fansite has been around forever! Presently they are posting setlists and photos from the current NIN/JA tour. janesaddiction.com, official site.

if you've got some big fucking statement, then why don't you sing me something? - Pigs in Zen

if you want a friend, feed any animal - Summertime Rolls

sex is violent - Ted, Just Admit It

1.     Song that mentions (at least) one city: Route 66. too easy! I was a big Depeche Mode fan in highschool.

2.     Song from your childhood or song that makes you think of your childhood because of the lyrics: The Bee Gees - What A Fool Believes. Largely because as a kid I had no idea what the lyrics were, so I just made some up. At the time I was living in farm country and taking horseback riding lessons, so I decided the song was about an aging horse with worn out teeth.

3.     X-Mas song - The Pogues - Fairytale of New York. also too easy! come to think of it, this one satisfies question #1 as well!

4.     Song that makes you think of a person that means a lot to you: Live - Lightning Crashes. This past year, my grandma had a health scare and spent some time in hospital, and here I was thousands of miles away feeling powerless and very upset. This song just popped into my head out of the blue because of the lyric "The angel closes her eyes ..." and then I remembered the video where the old lady dies ... and then I bawled my eyes out.

5.     Male/female duet: Iggy Pop and Peaches - Kick It. Kind of like a nasty lovers' quarrel, with guitars.

6.     Song you've formerly misunderstood the lyrics to: Safety Dance. For starters, I thought it was called "Safe To Dance" ... and then there's the poetic lyric, "Everybody look at your pants."

7.     Song with 'rock n roll' or 'rock' or 'roll' in the title: The Donnas - You're No Rock N' Roll Fun. A song about overly intellectual musicians who would rather sit around writing songs than party with other bands.

8.     Song that comforts you: Loreena McKennitt - Cymbeline/Fear No More. One of those funereal Celtic ballads about how the dead have passed beyond this world's pain. I like to sing it at memorial ceremonies.

9.     Song with a hidden meaning (like sex, drugs etc): Come On Eileen - Dexy's Midnight Runners. Okay, so maybe the song itself has no hidden meaning, but the band name ... I have it on good authority that dexedrine was the poor man's drug of choice in the British Isles in the 70s & 80s, and musicians used to smuggle it over to Ireland while on tour.

10.   Cover song (that you like more than the original): definitely not Route 66. How about ... Alien Ant Farm's Smooth Criminal. Definitely.

11.   Song you used to hate/not like but grew to love/like: hmm ... this is a tough one ... usually it's the other way around for me, where a song I liked on first listen turned out to be painful after a few more listens. I guess any of the "new" Radiohead ... Kid A, Amnesiac and In Rainbows, were all hard to get into, but I stuck at it because I knew I would love the music once I understood it. and I do!

And for extra credit ...

12. An instrumental song: Fatima Mansions - More Smack, Vicar? It sounds ... like it sounds.

Alas, the link for actual listenables will have to come later ... I had to go to a public computer to publish this journal because for some reason they don't always publish from home ... and now I have to go home and make you guys a playlist.

The Tyee is a progressive journalism outlet here in beautiful BC, and they currently have an anniversary contest on ... I wanna win!!! but that is for the future. RIGHT NOW, one of my photos is featured on the homepage! today only! check it out!

The Tyee

The photo on Flickr

I have said more than once that I am abjectly addicted to SF (science fiction, to the layperson). Here is even more proof.

Picking up where I left off last time I submitted to this group: I read a novel by Robert J. Sawyer called Rollback, in which there is a new and very expensive treatment that causes people to revert to a much younger age.  An elderly couple receives the treatment ... but for some reason it only works on the man! So here he is, chronologically amost 90 years old but physically 30, living with his 90-year-old wife and trying desperately to find a way for her to "roll back" her age as well. Sadly, it does't work and she dies.

I have read Robert Sawyer before and really liked his work - he has some wonderful ideas, for example "What would it be like if we discovered an alternate universe where Neanderthals never died out?" He pulled that one off admirably with a compulsively readable trilogy ... but sometimes I find him a little ... PC maybe? or maybe a little milquetoast. Perhaps it's because Sawyer is from Toronto and a real family man; it's just too close to home to be exciting to me. Reminds me of my dad. And sometimes he seems to belabour his point of how morally upright his heroes are, and how thoroughly pathetic his villains; not enough conflict. So in Rollback, while I liked the story, I often wanted to say "oh yeah, riiiight" to the characters, ironically because they are too true to life!

Okay, so next I read The Margarets, by Sheri S. Tepper. This novel features a young woman named (wait for it) Margaret, who grew up in a place where she was the only child, and so had a lot of imaginary friends. Somehow, over the years as she grows up, her imaginary friends split off from her one by one and become real people who all go to live on different planets. (It's all "explained" in the end.)

I really like Sheri Tepper ... but I find her books are like Stephen King's: I like the beginning and setup of her stories, but am often unmoved by the endings.  So in this case we had a really compelling setup where Earth's ecology has broken down so thoroughly (Tepper often writes about the effects of environmental degradation) that all Earth has to trade with other planets is excess population, ie. slaves. This explains how all the poor Margarets end up living all over the known galaxy, each one on a different planet. And in the end, due to some vast astrological alignment, all the Margarets must come together and perform a ritual to save the galaxy from evil. So, er ... yeah.

Next I read a book of short stories by Iain M. Banks (WHY do SF writers always have to have that middle initial???) called The State of the Art. A few of the stories are set in the fictional universe of the Culture, an advanced society where the spaceships have hilarious names and most of the people are as sheltered and spoiled as Paris Hilton ... but the people who are not born into the Culture are largely barbarous. There's also a tale called Odd Attachment that points out how very difficult it can be to understand an alien that drops from the sky into your world. Heaps of fun. Banks has a wicked sense of humour. He's one of my new fave SF writers. I've only read one of his novels so far (The Algebraist) but I will be hitting up the library for more ASAP.

Then I moved on to a sequel by C.J. Cherryh, Invader. I had read the first book (Foreigner)in this (very long) series last year. At the time I didn't know what I was getting into: there are now nine books in the series, arranged into 3 trilogies, and from the dust jackets it's hard to tell what order to read them in. So one day last month I came home from the library, thrilled because I thought I had found book 2 and book 3 of the first trilogy, but after finishing Invader, discovered I had the wrong book 3. Just when the lead characters were about to get it on!!! So now I am jonesing, and pestering the librarian, waiting for book 3 to become available. Maybe I should just buy it for fuck's sake.

Okay, so this series is about a planet where humans have become stranded due to a broken down spaceship. They share the planet with its indigenous race, the Atevi, who are intelligent but less technologically advanced. There has already been a war between the two groups, which the Atevi won, so now there is a treaty requiring humans to share their technology while remaining confined to a single island, all except for one lone human who is allowed to live in the capital city and serve the Atevi government as translator. The books are about his rather stressful work trying to stay afloat in a foreign environment, dealing with unstable politics he doesn't really understand, and having to explain all this to his own government on the island. Oh and the Atevi are kind of like the Klingons or Cardassians on Star Trek - big and nasty and intimidating. You never know when someone's going to get assassinated or strung up by the thumbs. I just love this series, it's a blast!

Ad then finally, while I was in Victoria (where the vintage shops are cheaper) I bought this huge coffee table book called Science Fiction: An Illustrated Encyclopedia, by John Clute, which covers the history of SF from Frankenstein (1818) to the mid-90s. Sure, it has pictures, but it has lots of words too - essays on dominant SF themes over the years, articles on it musta been more than 100 authors, reviews of 50 or so classic works, and timelines of pulp magazines, books, movies and comics. Among other things. And this book was hard to read! it's a really huge and unwieldy thing, the pages measuring 12" by 12" easily. And now that I have read it, I have a list of about a dozen novels that I must find and read ASAP. Maybe I'll make it to 25 books this year after all!