Cross section of Larry Carroll's painting for the cover of Slayer's Reign in Blood.
Several years back I attempted to write about the work of painter Larry Carroll, known best for his two-decade collaboration with Slayer, painting every album cover from Reign In Blood to Christ Illusion. At the time, I could find little information about Carroll, and his work was only briefly covered in a piece I wrote for Swindle back in 2005. Read More »
LAPD headquarters, overlooking #OccupyLA. (Photo: Eric Spiegelman)
We have so much knowledge, so many skills, maybe too much time and energy. Our knowledge is widely distributed and too easily evaporates into the cloud, but we have more of it than ever. We may have fewer skills than past societies (how many cobblers are left?), but there are more of us and a surprising diversity of interest between. For good or for ill, our time and energy, once consumed by a race to the top of working life, increasingly lie fallow. Surplus upon surplus. This is nothing new, neither an emergent condition nor a radical statement. It’s just the way of things. So what?
Why so much talk about “gamification” recently? Because we’re swimming in a surplus and have no idea what to do with it. Read More »
“The font of the movie’s title on promotional posters has been copied on most albums and associated promotional materials released by Glenn Danzig’s musical acts Samhain and Danzig.” -Wikipedia Read More »
Garage-rock revivalism holds a certain amount of sway over me, especially the type Hanni El Khatib has assembled on Will The Guns Come Out (Innovative Leisure). Most likely my interest has something to do with an adolescence steeped in power-chord worship. Or, maybe not. Whatever the case, there’s an undeniable amount of cheese to some of Khatib’s lyrics, and the arrangements aren’t strikingly original. But he triumphs in his execution, and gets high style points as a result. Hopefully time and experience will further temper the sound he’s searching for. Read More »
BuZ Blurr and the "Colossus of Roads." (Photo: Bill Daniel)
“I’m a retired railroad man who indulged in the folk art tradition of making chalk drawings on the railcars as an announcement of presence, and diversion from boredom. Although against the rules of the railroad, it was a common enough practice by the employees and hobos, by ignoring enforcement it was de facto tacit approval, for I dispatched drawings for 32 years of my 41 years of employment without interference. The initial purpose of this blog is to record the language used in my frequent boxcar icon dispatches.” -Buz Blurr Read More »
