April 24, 2012
Wolfe Belkin | Interview
For more information of Wolfe Belkin, please see the the post Get to Know | Wolfe Belkin, below.
S: When did you start creating?
W: In my dorm room in my boarding school in Los Angeles.
S: Not younger?
W: That's when I started writing my own songs.
S: How old were you at the time?
W: 15...16
S: Some say art is all mimicry. At a young age, what were those first tracks you covered?
W: we can actually check that out...(laughs)...so some of these songs.... Some Elliott Smith, some Iggy Pop, some Simon and Garfunkel, some Belle and Sebastien, some Girls, some Bright Eyes, Devendra Banhart,
S: Was there any one specific influence that really...
W: ... Bob Dylan, white stripes....
S: ... held significance?
W: Actually, yeah. At the very beginning I'd probably say, uh, like the white stripes and the elephent record.
S: Yeah, you can hear it.
W: It made me want to write songs.. and I love singing those songs, like The Hardest Button to Button. I also loved the record before that too, White blood Cells. It had Dead Leaves on the Dirty Ground on there and a few other awesome songs. But yeah, that's how I gota into those bluesy, sparse, pop-rock tunes... I would say.
S: Was being away at boarding school; being away from home... did that have any influence on your artistic realization, so to speak? Was it the environment, or just that time in your life?
W: It was probably a bit of both because I hadn't branched out and made friends with a lot of people. I just kindof made one really good friend who was really into music. But he was kind of an amateur. He had a guitar in his room that he occasionally picked up. And, I dunno, I was just sitting in my room and I had not a lot to do. And I remember I wrote that tune, Decadence on Saturday, and I have no idea why...
S: Was that the first one?
W: yeah, the first recognizable song. I dunno, yeah, I guess it was just because I had nothing else going on. I didn't really take it very seriously..
S: Until people started responding?
W: Well not even actually (laughs).
S: Obviously, Juan was one of them, but were there any other specific people that your coming into creativity?
W: In reality? (laughs)
S: Personally, yeah, from actually working with someone..
W: Well, my writing, not so much, but we got into playing with this guy, Al, who was like Charlie's gardner, and we did a lot of practices with him, and yeah, you know, music was always a really good time with them, but it didn't really influence my writing very much. I don't think so no. Maybe, actually Charlie is the only other person because he just writes so many songs, with really good hooks. I like good melodies and good lyrical hooks. And every once in a while he'd just come up with a golden line.
S: How'd you go about writing a song back then? Let's begin with the process specifically.
W: I'd usually pick up my guitar and start strumming chords until I found a 3 or 4 chord progression I liked and I would start humming on top of that, usually something in a minor key. Usually, like I said, I was doing a lot of blues songs, and a lot of them were in the minor pentatonic scale, and I'd just hum over top of it, noodling on the guitar until I found a melody that I liked, and I'd just stick in words as they came into my head, and eventually some sort of lyrical foundation would emerge from the mood that was happening with the rhythm and the chord progression and I'd just work around that mood; that atmosphere.
S: And is that how you go about things now?
W: I'm trying to be a little more... to have a little more of an idea, even if it changes, I wanna have more of a plan going into it and knowing exactly what kind of sound I wanna go for; what kind of artist it'd remind you of; what kind of record label you would want to be on; describe the type of people that would like to listen to your music? What other kinds of music do they listen to? And like, other considerations, like is your music made for chilling on an every day basis, or are you going to make dance tunes? I think these are all important considerations to make. Audience. Audience is really important... in any form writing.
S: I've heard you say that melody comes pretty naturally to you. Can you describe this process? Or does it simply materialize?
W: Well, Its kind of a mystery. I'd actually like to do some research in to it myself. Like, why the hell do some notes, in sequence, together, only those notes, excluding other notes, why do they sound good to us, and different combinations, like they're perfectly good notes, but for some reason they don't sound good to us, those paterns. There are certain patterns in melody, and in rhythm, that just sound fuckin' good.
S: 4/4...3/4....they're hardwired into us.
W: Yeah, I don't really know why they sound good, but they do, and I think that if any thing, being a music creator, is having an ear for what you like, and when you hear it - you can identify it, immedietley. Like when I'm going through my new music, well it'll sound like I'm not giving it a chance, but I'll get 16 bars into a tune, and I can kind of tell if I'm going to be interested or not, and eventually, I think that you just develop your ear, you hear what's missing, what could be there, and it's not always bang on, but it does feel as if it comes naturally to some extent. I mean, its probably to do with the fact that I just listen to a lot of music. I think that it also probably had something to with... I started playing violin when I was really young and I have this theory, I have no backing behind it, no substantial proof, but I figure that if you get a kid making music at a really young age that it can really imprint a sense of rhythm, and melody, and just over-all musicality.
There are some kids though, who are technically so much more skilled than I will ever be, at the piano, for instance, but a lot of people wouldn't necessarily describe them as being creative.
S: What are your lyrics about? Fiction? Non-fiction?
W; Both. Mostly, there's just kindof a combination of an atmosphere and an emotional feeling, and its just images that evoke that feeling, and sometimes some elements may have some inspiration from my personal experiences, but very loosely, like no song is about any one thing in particular.
S: You've recently been focusing on making electronic music. Why the switch?
I don't intend to stop making acoustic music, I may not be making songs in that style... but I might do songs with just my guitar and my voice I guess, but I found that it became really limiting. I was working in the same scales... I did like the songs... but I didn't have any flexibility with the sounds I could use. Basically, I just wanted to know how to produce. In the future, the producer has so much more flexibility to articulate their sounds. Like I said, you could be a pianist on stage in front of a bunch of rich people, but if you don't know how to produce, then that's the only sound you'll ever be able to make. I'm interested in so many different sounds. I wanted more than just my voice and my guitar through garage band, and not have to pay some studio producer to do it for me. That's bullshit. That's no way to go about creating something. I want to be able to just sit in my studio and just chill, just experiment. The thing is though, its like learning a new instrument, like if you compare it to learning how to play the guitar. I'm really not that far into producing. But.... I don't even know if that answered the question..
S: You're on track: Why the switch to electronic music?
W: Oh I don't even think I've been answering that question. Well, I want to use my voice in my productions... pretty soon, but I still havn't figured out what sound I want use... what I want to go for.
S: That's certainly a defining statement...
W: I feel that's one way.... It is one of my strong suits. I've never claimed to be a guitar player, but that's the one instrument that I'm actually comfortable using, my voice, but it's going to require some thought, some work. I've come realize: anyone who's making music these days, hey must have some knowledge of production, or at least have a friend who's a producer. How do these indie bands make records? They don't shell out and go in to a professional studio. How do they find these experimental sounds? You can only do this in an environment where you can actually experiment at leisure, and that's what affordable software and the internet has enabled any kid who's half interested in making beats....anyone who wants to make music can now conceivably do so. Especially with electronic music, which is not surprising. You can make huge dance tunes on Fruity Loops, which is free! Skream, to the best of my knowledge, still uses Fruity Loops to make his beats. It's a completely amature production work station, but he likes it because its so simple that he knows it like the back of his hand. Rusko uses Acid Pro, which is even simpler and with less capabilities. These are simpler equivalents to programmes like Ableton Live or Logic. But one thing that I've been hearing from a lot of producers and musicians is that all this technology, all these choices actually slow you down a tremendous amount, because you have too many avenues to fiddle around, too many instruments and you never actually connect with one of them. I think its important to not get lost in all the choices you have. I mean, all the synthesizers and sampled sounds... You need to make decisions and finish your songs; finish your work. That's something I'm still working on.
Get to Know | Wolfe Belkin
I sit with my notes in an ornately detailed wooden chair. Oddly enough, the expertly carved ivy that I rest my left palm on top of fails to capture any of my prolonged contemplation as it stands in the shadow of the many other exquisite items of furniture, technology, and general intrigue that occupy the vertically endowed living room that I find myself contently admiring. It may also be that this chair is hidden by the literal darkness of a room illuminated modestly by a far from modest dimmer-switch-equipped chandelier. I hold the complacent gaze of a child-sized Virgin Mary statuette lurking in a shadow across the room. I can't help myself from furrowing my brow in disbelief - this is no student home. It is instead the den of Wolfe Belkin, musical wunderkind, industry mogul to-be, and some sort of genius, though he wouldn't say so himself. He's inexplicably cool, in that timeless sort of way, and although this aura and dwelling at first appear to be the product of either his effortless sensibility or a trusty little trust fund, I come to realize that hiding behind my host's superfluously adorned hand-crafted Italian sunglasses is a piercing gaze that reflects the true source of his lair's aforementioned swagger in it's entirety; his brain. Beneath his deceptive air of nonchalance hums a relentlessly contemplative mind, because ultimately, Wolfe Belkin is one strange motherfucker,
"Were there any other specific people that influenced your coming into creativity?" I ask at one point.
"In reality?" He replies.
The subwoofer under his desk patters at my shins to the rhythm of Roy Ayer's classic, "Everybody Loves The Sunshine." In one graceful motion, my host reclines back in his chair whilst dragging on his ceramic pipe. A moment after removing the piece from his lips, a milky pillar slinks gracefully into his left nostril. He exhales as Mr. Ayer's background vocalists praise, "my life - my life - my life - my life - In the sunshine."
Wolfe is currently tying up the loose ends of his Undergraduate Degree at McGill University, having now successfully bared the academic weight of a double major in the particularly demanding fields of History and Philosophy for a full four years. His indifferent reaction to my question concerning his considerable workload makes it unclear as to whether or not he regrets his fresh-faced decision to pursue the University's coveted Honors program; a program widely considered by the general student body to be a guaranteed pain-in-the-ass. Nonetheless, his hands are all but clean of the experience now. Soon, if all goes accordingly, one cursively inclined, fountain pen wielding official will provide the final confirmation of this feat. In a tone that seems to alternate between shades of pride, modesty, and humor, he confesses that this was not the only degree that he completed in this time frame. Sporting the decal of Boston, Massachusetts' world-renowned Berklee School of Music, his first-ever acquired degree, a diploma in Electronic Music Production and Sound Design, hangs from a wall in his Vancouver home, waiting for company.
Parallel to his academic career is a budding, but equally impressive career in music. He has a four track acoustic EP titled Decadence on Saturday, that has received an esteemed reaction from the local Vancouver indie scene. Late 2011, his debut eletronic release, Sleep Country, put out on his own start up label, Blenheim & Celtic, garnered international attention.
So how exactly does a pipe-smoking scholarly musican and creatively inclined creative being find the time, or even the motivation to pursue so many lofty endeavours? Shannon, local and revered Vancouver artist along with Wolfey's mother, helps to shed some light on his peculiar nature:
Long ago, when Wolfey was just a wee tike, still fumbling with activities like organized sport, his tee-ball team was having their season end barbecue. Now, he was already considered to be something of an odd duck on the team, but his actions that evening truly affirmed this notion. On top of his baseball uniform, Wolfey donned a full-length trench coat and matching floppy hat, making him look like a miniature noir-fiction detective. The team was apparently used to his excentricities by this point, so after his initial entrance, young Wolfe did his best to blend in. As the afternoon went on, the barbecue's attendees mulled about the back yard, enjoying their burgers and anecdotes. Shannon did a quick scan for her son, but couldn't spot his Sherlock-ian get up anywhere. But just as she were about to utter her concern, a little voice demanded the attention of the party. From the host's roof stood a Wolfe-sized Batman, with his hands proudly stuck to his hips. "Hey everyone, look at me!" he shouted, before whisking away into the closest window, his cape billowing in the Spring afternoon wind.
Wolfe is a unique specimen indeed. He could very well have reclined into the comfort of his families money, but despite coming from this cradle of wealth, he proves time and time again that he is one of more driven individuals that I have ever met. He certainly disrupts the growing societal inclination raised by the recent Occupy movements that the wealthy merely indulged misers. No, Wolfe certainly none of the sort. He is a uniquely creative-being and rare-intellect, and if you aspire to be anything of the sort, then I implore you to listen to his music and indulge in the thoughts I picked from his brain, because his motivation surely reflects what one would hope to be their own.
He's currently in the process of re-releasing his acoustic material, so please enjoy this, his latest product, the Sleep Country EP, via the link below.
February 16, 2012
Fury and Pudding
January 26, 2012
How To Kill Your Smoking Habit
The Underground Sees The Light Of Day
The Underground Sees The Light Of Day
A brief history of electronic music's place in popular culture
- Los Angeles' Electric Daisy Carnival saw a total of 200,000 patrons over the July weekend
How did a style of music, once exclusive to the seedy underbellies of international metropolises and pale audiophiles futzing with their university's hardware, evolve into a Bill Board-topping, Grammy-nominated, Bieber-endorsed genre?
After decades of sub-culture prominence, electronic music has emerged as a force within the mainstream. Thanks to globalization, the beeps and clicks of yesterday are now the tunes stuck in the heads of fifth grader's, young adults, and baby boomers alike. So what exactly is everybody listening to? They are listening to music generated electromechanically or produced using electronic technology. Trust me, they are.
It began in the early 20th century, with technologies from American, then Russian, then Italian, then German inventors and engineers. Then, after further advancements from Americans, Germans, French, and Japanese, we arrived in the 60's, the so-called, "fertile years," of electronic music.
Though the RCA Mark II Sound Synthesizer installed in the Columbia- Princeton Electronic Music Center in 1957 is considered the first ever programmable synth, it was Robert Moog that released the first ever commercially available modern synthesizer that really fired-up musicians.
The Monkees were the first popular act to make a purchase. Months later, the Rolling Stone's released, "2000 Light Years From Home," followed by the 1967 hit from The Doors, "Strange Days."
-Robert Moog gives Paul McCartney the grand tour
The Beatles also hopped on the Moog train, but it was the largely unsuccessful progressive outfits, like Beaver and Krause or Tonto's Expanding Head Band, that pushed the boundaries of these new electronic possibilities.
Let's fast-forward past the 70's, past Genesis, Brian Eno, The Human League, and Devo, and into the 80's when the first ever drum machines were released and popularized. The Roland TR-808, for instance, saw widespread success after its use on Marvin Gaye's, "Sexual Healing," in 1982.
Now equipped with drums and synthesizers, the electronic music genre took its plunge into the subculture by late 1980. Disco, defined by the cocaine-dusted corners of infamous venues like Club 54, was one of the first styles to use the "4 on the floor," beat so popular today. This developed in Chicago, and later in the UK, into what is now known as House music, defined by its minimal progressions, lengthy build-ups, and raucously illegal warehouse parties. Producers huddled around turn tables and sub woofers as the decade went on. Genre's like Garage, Jungle, Breakbeat, Drum & Bass, and, most significantly, Dubstep, also emerged from this considerably shady taste in music.
- Just your average rave
This underground rave scene continued through the 90's and early 2000's with only brief hiccups into the mainstream, from artists like Daft Punk, The Prodigy, and Moby.
Now, in 2011, over 50 years after the release of the first electronic instrument, we hear the styles once exclusive to the subversive employed incessantly over every major radio station across the continent.
As I write this, the top two spots on the American Billboard are filled with the electronic dance music of LMFAO and Calvin Harris. Uk dubstep relic, Benga, reached the number one spot earlier this year with his collaboration with Katy B. American dubstep producer, Skrillex, has just been nominated for a Grammy! Pop artists are now flocking to this new breed of producer to claim their slice of the cake. Rihanna teamed up with Jamie xx. Britney Spears hired Rusko. And it doesn't stop there.
Festivals known to feature this once sparsely loved genre are now expanding and even breaching capacity. Canada's largest electronic music festival, Shambhala, sold out for the very first time last year. The almost mythical Burning Man Festival is rumoured to be in its final year due to the obscene number of people that made the pilgrimage last year. Montreal's own Igloofest once saw a humble 4,000 attendees. Now, only 6 years later, over 60,000 ravers will flock to the Old Port Quarry to frolic in the sub-zero temperatures and even cooler Dub, Dance-hall, Electro, Minimal, House, and Future- Garage sounds.
- Igloofest 2011
Why?!
The metaphorical answer would be the Ipod. That nifty piece of tech-and-plastic serves as a fine symbol for the dawn of media file sharing. Kids young and old could for the very first time handpick their music library. It became a form of self-expression. It was your music.
This, combined with the ability to download music cheaply and easily, lead to a demand for more music. Luckily, with production software more affordable than ever, every eager musician with a few dollars, or a knack for pirating programs, could hide in their basement and supply this demand with their modern synthesizers and drum machines.
And they did.
Sure, acoustic outfits still reign supreme in the music industry, but since artists have had the ability to create, record, and distribute electronic music so effortlessly, the prominence of the genre as a whole has spiked significantly.
So does that mean electronic music isn't cool anymore? Is it too mainstream? Of course not! Its progress! Its evolution! Its thrilling! The future of music, electronic or not, has never been brighter. Sure, genre's will ebb and flow, but all this proves is the remarkable elasticity of one of man's greatest passions. Though, I must admit, if I hear, "Everyday I'm shufflin'," one more time, I'm going to shove that shot inevitably dangling before their wet lips straight down their throat, glass included.
-Chart toppers, LMFAO
Bless-
Samuel Scott Rutledge
January 19, 2012
Strawberry Lemonade Lipsmacker
Perhaps there's a kid out there somewhere cryin' to daddy for a new bed time story tonight. Perhaps Mee-Ma needs a new rag to wipe the spaghetti sauce from the delicate corners of her mouth. Perhaps some sloth-y teen is tearing their hair out right now because they have a story not yet begun, but due by morning, and perhaps they're prayin' on a star (or the internet) for some greedy inspiration. Perhaps somebody actually wants a dose of amateur prose-fiction. This one's for all y'all, eager, literate, or not.
Strawberry Lemonade Lip Smacker
Samuel Scott Rutledge
The scowl on Mrs. Kevowski's un-made-up face droops to reveal another set of middle age creases when she spots Jackson's ritually tossed wet towel on his bedroom floor. She heaves a sigh from her chest like a shot put and mutters sour nothings under her breath as she picks up the towel, and his underwear, and the open and now stale bag of Doritos she was saving for Caitlyn's baseball team's barbeque this after noon - off of the floor and into the wicker basket she's been lugging around the house.
"'Take it easy mom,'" she whines as she mocks the promise of her teenager, "'I'll pick it up tomorrow, I swear.'"
Bubbling over yesterday's broken pledge, she hurries out of Jackson's bedroom, but stops to crinkle her forehead at a freshly chipped chunk out of his doorway. She rubs it with the fingers on her free hand and recalls telling him not to practice juggling with the hockey stick in his bedroom because she had just painted the doorframe, but it seems that Jackson forgot.
Mrs. Kevowski takes a deep breath when she exists Jackson's room. She had refrained from breathing his musky bedroom air out of habit, and the hefty lungful of oxygen laced with the freshly plugged in lavender Glade Plug-in down the hall gives her enough pep to continue into Caitlyn's room.
"Well let's hope she looks good. Lord knows a twelve year old needs to have the perfect bloody outfit."
Mrs. Kevowski moans and commences plucking legging upon legging upon sock upon blouse upon sock off of the floor and into her wicker basket. When the room is marginally free of garment, she stands up straight and cringes as she holds her free hand to her lower back. She thrusts her shoulders back with a wince, and after a notably audible performance from her spine, she tucks a stray strand of not-so-recently dyed hair out of her eyes and behind her left ear. With her now unobstructed vision, Mrs. Kevowski's eyes scour her daughter's bedside table. Beside a tube of strawberry-lemonade lip smacker sits a photo she took of little Caity perched on her father's shoulders. She's stolen his shades and has them precariously balanced on her three-year-old nose. Mrs. Kevowski removes a dangling training bra from the corner of the frame and picks the photo up to admire it more closely. John is smiling like he once had before he was so worried about his crow's feet. Mrs. Kevowski sighs and just as the corner of her lip curls up for the first smile of this Tuesday morning, the phone bleats like the fax machine is harassing it.
"Yeah, yeah, I'm comin'!" She drops the picture on the bed and stomps out of Caitlyn's room and down the stairs into the kitchen.
"Yello?" She answers in a surprisingly jolly tone.
"Oh hi there Jill... Well, thankyou... Oh... mhm... Oh Jill, ofcourse...Yes.... ofcourse. I understand. Oh no, its no problem at all, really, I'm happy to do so... Well yes... mhm... well... oh, dear....oh, the poor thing... no, I understand... yes... well take care," Ms. Kevowski eases her head closer to the phone's port.
"Yes, I will be seeing you Thursday night ... don't forget to actually read the book... yes... yes... take care Jill... I hope Tommy feels better soon...yes... buh-bye now... buh bye." The phone clicks into place and Ms. Kevowski exhales.
"Shit."
She pulls her lips into her mouth and bites down gently as she holds her hand to her forehead. She inhales and exhales.
"Stella! C'mon, C'mere Stella! Les go!"
Mrs. Kevowski jingles the dog's leash, simultaneously downing her coffee. She grabs her keys, her purse, leashes the dog, leaves the house, locks the door, and proceeds to her once white, Volkswagen hatchback.
"Shit."
She puts the dog in the back of the car, slams it shut, hurries back to the house, unlocks the door, stomps to kitchen and shuffles through the graveyard of notices, bills, and homework, all the while shaking her head in anguished disbelief. Finally unearthing her phone, she grabs it and plods back out of the house, almost forgetting to lock the door. After a final sprint from the house, she unlocks the car door and plunks with finality into its worn leather seat.
Mrs. Kevowski covers her face with her palms and runs her middle fingers down each eyebrow with distinct pressure. Stella pants in anticipation.
"I know, I know." Without looking, she scratches Stella's neck with her right hand and starts the car with her left hand in a way that would be awkward if not for her seasoned experience. Stella smiles and pants her warm, hairy breath in Mrs. Kevowski's direction.
"God, you stink."
The Starbucks CD that's been residing in the stereo for the past few months cuts into a smooth saxophone that accompanies their jostled reverse out of the driveway. Stella looses what little balance she had and falls sideways. As the dog makes its hasty recovery, Mrs. Kevowski's blackberry trembles raucously in the cup holder. Without looking, she grabs it and voices a pained grunt inspired by the sticky quality her phone has earned on its brief stay in yesterday's coffee puddle. She holds the phone next to the steering wheel so not to be entirely distracted by reading the caller I.D. Hunching closer to the wheel and squinting for optimum concentration, Mrs. Kevowski accepts the call and puts the phone to her ear, but flinches when the cold, sugary cappuccino coating on her phone kisses her cheek. She settles on holding it a cautious inch away from her head.
"Ya?... No, I'm taking the dog to the groomer's now. Late. Shelly's going to be pissed. You now how anal she is about her schedule.... No... Caity's barbeque is today... No it hasn't changed, it's been on the calendar for a month!... You have to what?... Again!? ... Well that's just perfect, because Jill just called saying she can't drive the girls because one of her kids is throwing up!... What the hell am I supposed to do? Jackson's got a game all the way out in bloody Burnaby tonight too!... ya... ya... This is too much John.... Well tell those idiots that you have a family!... ya...no, its fine.... Ya, its fine... Bye."
Mrs. Kevowski hangs up the phone and drops it into the cup holder. Only Stella hears its delicate splash into the coffee puddle. Mrs. Kevowski presses her left middle and ring finger to her forehead and her thumb to her cheekbone. Her right hand navigates the wheel. She inhales through her nose. Stella pants in anticipation.
The key squeaks in the lock until the knob turns. The door is kicked open hard enough that it hits the wall 180 degrees away. Mrs. Kevowski makes a disappointed "T" sound by breathing in and pulling her tongue away from her front teeth. She hustles the groceries into the kitchen with shallow, weighted steps, and drops them beside the fridge, immediately tracing her path back to the wall by the front door to examine the fresh chip in the paint. She rubs it with the fingertips of her left hand.
"Shit."
Satisfied with her inspection, Mrs. Kevowski marches up the stairs and into the bathroom to turn on the shower. The heat hisses and the flow slaps the bottom of the bathtub. After peeing for the first time of the day, she washes her hands; scrubs off all the filth. While drying her hands with a towel she stares at her reflection in the mirror. Leaning closer, she takes a dry finger and pulls the skin beside her left eye up to reveal a younger Mrs. Kevowski. Just as she's doing so, the door squeaks open and slams shut, making her breath skip in surprise. Dizzy footsteps travel into the living room.
"John?!" She calls, eyebrow raised. "What are you doing home? I thought you had to stay late?"
She pauses, but there is no response.
"Jackson!?"
She pauses again.
"Hello?"
Mrs. Kevowski walks carefully out of the bathroom and halfway down the stairs, all the while craning her neck to get a better view of the living room. She hears a grotesque coughing and wheezing.
"Excuse me!" She demands, still timidly perched on the seventh step.
The hacking continues. It is wet and bubbly, and loud, like a toddler's toy lawn mower with the popping balls, except it is accompanied by a desperate inhale, causing the cougher to choke on their own muck and continue the violent cycle.
"Hello?" Mrs. Kevowski apprehensively asks.
She takes another step down, then another. She can now see the shadow of the violently ill. She holds her right hand to her mouth in shock and her left to her chest to steady her thumping heart.
The coughing continues, with more perilous vigour. She can hear the spittle flying from the man's throat and hitting the floor. The cough is deep and hearty, so she assumes the cougher is a man. Just as she contemplates that thought a deafening smash of porcelain echoes through the house, followed by a drunk stumble back and forth, and final thud to the ground. Flat on his back, the man's face and shoulders lay in view now. He's filthy, absolutely caked in dirt and his own phlegm. He's stopped coughing. Perhaps he's also stopped breathing. Mrs. Kevowski eases her self cautiously over the stair railing for a better view, holding her hand tightly over her trembling mouth. She inhales and exhales through her nose quickly, again and again, waiting for the sick man to move. Finally, his body gyrates, causing Mrs. Kevowski's breath to stutter. With a guttural choke, yellow bile mushrooms and spills out both sides of the man's mouth and settles like a duck pond between his chapped lips. Mrs. Kevowski's legs give away, seating her inadvertently. She crab walks backwards up the stairs till he is out of view. She holds her knees to her chest, breathes shallowly, and wrinkles the skin on her forehead in distressed contemplation.
"John...John."
She rises unsteadily, using the wall as temporary support until she acquires the voice of her husband. Her shaking limbs shuffle into her bedroom, quickly and uncertainly like a child attempting to shuffle a deck of cards. She grabs the phone beside the bed, sits down and dials.
"J-john." She stutters over his single syllable.
"No... No I'm not alright." She spills her distress over the phone like a game of fifty-two pick up.
"You'll call them?.. ok...b-bye... John?" But he's already hung up. She inhales, drops the phone on the receiver, misses, then hastily places it correctly with two hands. After a silent moment, Mrs. Kevowski drags her chin an inch to her right and stares at the doorway of her bedroom. She sniffs back her running nose, swallows, and stands.
She steps toward her bedroom door gradually; her lips sucked in and held tightly between her teeth. She picks up speed down the hall as she passes Jackson's room, then Caitlyn's. In fact, by the time she reaches the top of the stairs her pace has lost its nervous stutter. She marches with a certainty that she maintains down the stairs, through the front hall, and into the living room, until she finds herself hovering unsteadily over the body like a fruit fly over a rotting peach.
Mrs. Kevowski looks down on the grizzly display. His stench of returned recycling and stagnant vomit wafts vertically to meet her flaring nostrils. In contrast to his leathery skin so foreign to soap, the slivers of blue between his barely opened eyelids seem the only clean thing about him. The azure in the strewn pieces of shattered porcelain at his feet echo the cold hue and thin shape of his irises. Late September's low-in-the-sky sunshine pours through the living room's tall, spring-line windows casting disproportionate shadows across the figure on her floor. Mrs. Kevowski's chest expands and deflates with each deliberate breath.
His chest is still.
"I don't know what you're doing here," she breaks the silence as she lowers to kneel beside him, his odor now exhibiting its full effect. She can now distinguish between the various scabs and blemishes decorating his worn face.
"...on my floor..." She grabs his closest knee with her right hand and brings it to his chest, "...in my home," taking his left arm and crossing it over his chest away from her.
"Who do you think are?" She questions with blunt aggression as she thrusts his body on to its side. The contents of his mouth drain on to her eggshell wall-to-wall.
With a rumble from somewhere deep inside his body, he retches out a stale breath. Wide eyed like a hooked trout, he gasps for another breath, and another, until his coughing fit erupts in an encore, full force. But, before he can find his rhythm, Mrs. Kevowski interrupts.
"Get out of my house."
Her soft but menacing tone attracts his attention toward the furrowed brow of her statuesque expression. He refrains from a subsequent hack in disbelief; his mouth shriveled to the size of a reprimanded toddler's.
"What are you waiting for?" She asks unblinking. Wisps of hair dangle in her vision. They fail to distract her.
He coughs, but represses it with closed lips. His intimidated eyes are glued to her daunting stare.
Without breaking eye contact, he rises, shuddering, and continues out of the living room, toward the front door, blindly flapping his hands behind him in search of a handle. He stifles another wide-eyed cough, finds the knob, and falls out the door with the gusto of an eager paratrooper.
Mrs. Kevowski stares at the door with a curled lip and puffs a single air out of her nose with a tone substituting the phrase: "unbelievable."
She gets to her feet and strides to the kitchen. Without looking, she grabs a bucket from under the sink. In it are plastic gloves and various other cleaning supplies. After filling the bucket with suds, she swings it into the living room and brings it to the stained carpet with a thump. Donning the gloves, she cleans.
The decade old menthol crackles between her lips. She dips her toes in the bath-bombed water to get that "kerplunk" sound that used to make her daughter laugh so uncontrollably. Diana Krall's voice accompanies her splashing in the candlelit bathroom.
She hears the cops holler their presence at the front door. With an exasperated sigh and an eye roll she had adopted from Jackson, she responds:
"Sorry, in the bath!"
She turns the music up by remote to drown out their urgent pounding, picks up a novel, and enjoys the last of her cigarette.
Mini Art School
November 6, 2011
Eh... What's Up, Doc?
We've all heard about the mysteries and conspiracies of the Illuminati and it's invisible strangle hold on the international economy. One facet that is popularly believed to fall under the reign of these mysterious suits is medicine; not the fuzzy helping hand kind of medicine, but the legal drug dealership kind. And the result of this scheme is a vast population on far too many drugs.
What happened to the days of chicken noodle soup and a movie marathon in bed? Now I find myself taking cold medication strong enough to evoke my own, hallucinated films.
Just the other day my room mate came home with a official and flimsy piece of paper from the Doctor's office that perscribed him a healthy and prolonged dose of both Dexedrine and Xanax. That is, a pill to get ya' goin', and a pill to get ya' down. That, my friends, is a little something i like to call bullsh*t.
Whether this medically approved abuse is a result of conspiracy or simple doctor-patient communication breakdown, something tells me its not healthy.
Don't forget to eat your carrots,
Sam
October 6, 2011
Call Me Whatever You Like
We've all had our share of endearing titles, some beloved and others despised. Let me display my personal list of names.
sammy
sam I am
sayum
somo
somo man
shorty
sticks
twigs
bones
sambo
bo
samwise gamchi
silly goose
samis
boy
samwich
Friends, family, acquaintances, and enemies shout, whisper, purr, condemn, congratulate, and patronize me with these various, personal headings.
With out knowing me, by reading these one could assume that I am a very skinny, possibly African-american, Dr. Seuss cartoon on a mission to help my dear friend, Frodo, return a powerful ring. On top of all that, I am a delicious and portable lunch time treat.
Unfortunately, I am only one of these things. But I will strive to be as fascinating as the character I for mentioned, by way of publishing my thoughts, fears, and queries on this here blog.
See you soon,
Sam
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