I know what it takes to read someone's stuff and I have to say I'm blown away by the support and people who let me share my thoughts and creations with them. I get over 7000 page views on my site monthly and it's growing and I hope I have either brightened or maybe darkened someone's day haha That said, I wanted to put up an offer of 10 free downloads of The Book of Past poetry book in digital format on till the 20th of April 2017 or until they are all redeemed. I'll probably do it once in awhile because honestly personally I'd never buy a poetry book lol!! Terrible to say coming from someone who published one but whatever, it's my blog so I'll say whatever the f**! I want. I'd actually never really read a line of poetry unless it was shoved under my nose until I started writing it again several years ago during a very bizarre time. Talk about yanking yourself away from all you are it seems to your core to start newly with a totally different outlook, out of pure necessity though not always pleasant; not really sure if you will ever grow into it or even recognize yourself afterwards but ya... Before I give you the code to get it free I thought I'd tell you what poetry NOW means to me. Very different from the idea I had of it... What is poetry? As always someone around me inspired me to write something and they will never have a clue they have been my muse. My brother, not really a mushy sentimental person by any stretch got a hold of my poetry book paperback (seen below) and unbeknownst to me started to read it. He's a motorcycle riding, alternative rock musician and not the type of dude I'd see under a tree on some campus reading damn poetry haha - yeah...no! But then after a couple weeks he sent me a burst of texts saying he liked it and it was cool and had a rhythm he really liked. It was the first time a non-poetry writing person had actually duplicated what it was because they sorta fell into reading it. Yes I thought! EXACTLY right! I'll tell you why I don't feel like those labels I'd put on "poetry" in the past are accurate and why I'm proud of my stuff. Who doesn't like music right? Well what are all those lyrics that get us through that break up or spell out our betrayal so we don't need to embarrass ourselves with our drama or... you name it. I am actually about the heaviest rock/metal/alternative fan you could find (only the smallest percent of peeps even know my ultra fave which I don't promote) but now I'm all up in the face of the hip hop community and the reason is firstly my utter respect for some of these guys for their sheer writing ability and magic with words and concepts and their utter "take it or leave it but I'm gonna say it" and then coming in secondly, the sounds and rhythm they put to them. When your blood rushes it has a beat, a rhythm. When you sit down to write poetry there is something you want to say and it flows like harmony all over the page or whatever you are putting it on. Poetry doesn't have to rhyme at all and that's called Free Verse which is all I usually write but I generally end up with the sounds blending...interesting it takes me about a few minutes tops to write a poem and it's like a gush of emotion spelled out or an outrage I wanted to make beautiful or some insane idea I felt I could bring some beauty to, to perhaps provoke thought of something otherwise too ugly to face etc. It is a dance with words and some of the most hardcore stuff I've ever read was the punch of a poet. I was a drummer in my school bands and writing an intense or exhilarating poem has the same kick somehow. On deviantART where I have a literature group I've seen some intense stuff from our hundreds of members and most of them are kids and man, their words can fly. I've seen real tragedy and love on there and if you want to learn how our youth are feeling, go read them. You'll understand and love them more, I guarantee it. If you never thought of poetry maybe I've expanded your view. Either way it's something that may have to be experienced to be relatable who knows. So below I've put up a code that can be redeemed at the Smashwords link for 10 people. You have to be a Smashwords member which basically is signing up for no charge and creating a password. The Book of Past is also on iBooks and I'll probably do a coupon thing for that too down the road for any Apple iPhone peeps. If you do get a download I'm always happy to get a review of the book at the place allotted for that. It's super interesting to hear what people have to say about it for sure- hell, people in general are damn interesting so why wouldn't I want to know? Click here and use code PJ27Y at Smashwords at Checkout
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It's one of those shows you are SOOOO happy you made it to. The few clips I put up give a pretty good picture of some highlights but honestly we were flipping out in the crowd and it had all the elements needed. Being at a special celebration for the 20th Anniversary of the album Tip felt exactly like that, a CELEBRATION. This band is so good, so many great songs and the vibe and energy really left the crowd floating. They sound amazing acoustic but then they become rock demons once they are plugged in. Oh and they are local, I'm such a fan of the art that comes out of Toronto and surrounding areas- we are a supernova so move over.
Iam Dreamfire Victoria is a hair dresser and stylist that I met as a client. She's versatile and has done an excellent job on anything I've asked for. As I've visited her often we got chatting and hit it off and I got to know her a bit and she's super determined, successful and always working to excel at becoming the best she can be at whatever she undertakes. A breath of fresh air really. She also told me about her sister Michelle who is an incredible photographer and has worked with some pretty big names. When you see her art you'll see exactly why. A cool tidbit is Michelle has a friend who she gets helicopter rides from and they go above Toronto and capture our city and landscape from such a unique and epic perspective. I've seen some shots as well where Victoria will do a hairstyle and Michelle photographs them and there's even a collection celebrating the empowerment of strong independent woman. I've added some pictures to show some of the styles and colors Victoria has done for me personally and have included links to both her and Michelle's instagram accounts. I know I just added more beauty to your life by introducing you to these fine artists- you're welcome ;) Victoria on InstagramMichelle on Instagram
A friend of mine, Richard, is a musician and also a producer at Dick Black Music and an artist at Universal Music Canada. I first met him several years ago when he was the vocalist for a band my brother played bass for called Ebony Run. Recently he shared a video on Facebook and it was a song called Tomorrow Never Comes he created that he also sings on. Clockup picked up Datascape for the Maggot Baits soundtrack and now his tune is a feature in a new game and it's had quite some good exposure. Super cool tune so I thought I'd share it. I'm also including a link to my Soundcloud where you can find some of his songs which I've uploaded personally (with the bands permission) and you can connect to him on his profile through some of his songs I've reposted on there.
More info on song Tomorrow Never ComesMore on SoundcloudI have an ear for the bass because I grew up listening to it almost 24/7 around the house. My bro Sam of Centrifuge is pretty much self taught and he was playing in his own band and also whipping off Level 42 covers in high school and blowing people away with improvised bass solos that would be hard for the eye to easily follow. I remember going to an annual bass/guitar convention with him down near the Lakeshore when we were younger and he started playing quietly on an amp and after about 5 mins we had a crowd around us flipping out. The song "Halifax" is a collaboration of Humanoid 13 and Sam Hall. You'll find it if you scroll down to the bottom of the Humanoid 13 web page. You'll not only find the finished tune but an alternate version featuring just the drum track with Sam's bass. Find Humanoid 13 and the song "Halifax" hereOne day left of the promo on Smashwords to download The Book of Past for free- the site downloads to multiple platforms. Just click the link and type in the title and it's complimentary at checkout. Enjoy a sunny walk in the shadows...a frolic darkly. Get it free hereI can't say much at all about this shoot with Grimes but let's just say we met under very interesting circumstances (as you can imagine this video was quite the production). Grimes is awesome and she was totally involved on set and a part of the process and even after a loooong day (into the wee hours) she stayed super cool and super sweet. I said in an earlier post when she came by before on set for "Kill V. Maim" that she reminds me of a goth angel and I'm thinking this video just makes the point further. (It looked as cool during as when finished believe me- we had her Suicide Squad song Medieval Warfare playing on set)Hindsight may be 20/20 but when one is facing the future and there are some potential alarm bells ringing I'd say don't parrot off blind info irresponsibly BUT also don't be so quick to halt any communication of said "alarm bells" pawning them off as "hype" etc.- some cultural tragedies have ACTUALLY occurred in the recent past and they start through various social patterns and maybe if our criticized/often misused social media outlets (and resultant open discussion of issues on grand scales through the speed of our current web) had existed during earlier periods of severe darkness (such as the Holocaust), maybe some things would have never been able to go down to such a large wild extent like has gone down in even recent history because a majority was informed enough to know what was going on and said "No, not on my watch". The fact is that human tragedies have gone down and been let to occur by the majority of ONLOOKERS who never halted the little minority fueling the badly planted seeds of evil. Say what you will but in cultures it DOES matter what the majority upholds and whether sane ideas are upheld. The media can do a lot of harm but it can expose things too that otherwise would never been seen by the majority. Do you think "make love not war" or protest over war would have occurred in the 60s/70s without television and photos exposing the actuality of it for people to see and face it's horror? Hindsight is sure 20/20 but how do we avoid going down a future bad pattern if we may have access to information that was verified on a social level? I don't believe it's by not discussing it- silence is where the minority works fast and hard while the silent are absent or waiting. This post isn't an opening to have a debate as I'm not particularly interested in various takes on our current society (unless I've specifically asked someone directly) but just an urge to only state my particular view if anyone is interested; that good, bad or ugly we better discuss this folks, at least enough so we can personally be satisfied with our OWN conclusion reached so we can get into effective action of some sort moving forward on whatever we personally see fit that will maybe make things more tolerable or better.
Who comes from the middle of nowhere USA and becomes one of the most looked upon in the art industry not only for his various epic projects but for his originality? Yes Trent Reznor. Honestly, what completely unrelenting and inspiring integrity as an artist. Doesn't he make you fearless? Man there are times I'm like "Hell no, I can't write that cuz people may know me and what the hell would they think??" lol and then I think of him, probably totally sickened by the spotlight at times but just keeping it real for his fans and towards his own vision. Yep there it goes; it's written and yep the man, the phenomenon that is NIN and Trent Reznor, just made me more brave. I'm sure I'm not alone in that admiration.
I recently got his new album and I wrote to customer service for two reasons: 1) I wanted to know when the physical album "Not the Actual Events" was getting shipped out and 2) I wanted to know if there was a place to send him fan mail that wouldn't end up in frick'in oblivion. I wanted to send him a paperback copy of The Book of Past... without him leading the way, I think I'd just hide the writing and the anything- but if he can do it so can we is sort of his influence... and his silhouette is the image Phantanomaly used to create the fiery figure on the cover of the The Book of Past (of course I picked it and was like "Can you make Trent Reznor in flames?"). So customer service was amazing and no he doesn't have a fan mail account just in case all your awesome mail is landing at some address that some wannabe threw up on the net to receive stuff (sorry to burst thy bubble) Anyways, do you want to know the website the customer service e-mail came from? It was (person's name)@narlywood.com LMFAO! Ok nuf said! Only Trent frick'in Reznor could even have amazingly cool customer service lines! Now that all my adoration has been expressed I wanted to post a sweet gem I found on the net! When I posted it on twitter, NIN's bass player for a few years (Justin) was all enthused about it as this was apparently behind the scenes footage linked all together from a videographer (Rob Sheridan) that came on tour and filmed FROM THE STAGE! Not only that but there are some amazing treats in terms of who plays with the band. OK I won't spoil it- just watch it! And yes, you're welcome ;) Iam Dreamfire
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