Subpoena The Past were a post-punk project that existed from 1997 to around 2001, in which time they were sporadically active from various urban centres in California such as San Francisco, San Diego and Los Angeles. They released two EPs: 1998′s “This Year’s Eclipse” and 2000′s “Conjure Itch”, both of which contain different line-ups and have notably different sounds in instrumentation. All incarnations of this project featured Sonny Kay, who was the main mover and shaker of Gold Standard Labs (GSL), a label that captured the zeitgeist of the post-hardcore scene of the late nineties and early naughties. It was one of those go-to labels and one of the first to feature bands interpreting classic darker post-punk sounds with bands such as Beautiful Skin, The Faint, Get Hustle, Chromatics, etc. – all a number of years before that sort of thing was more common place. (more…)
At this day and age, looking from a hilltop backwards a decade or so, it’s safe to say that most of the people from my age and background started in music from absorbing fragments of their parent’s record collection. From there we all sort of moved into those awkward, twitchy teen years when a good number of us — including myself — discovered whatever local strain of punk rock there was and moved forward from there. In some cases this would inspire us to pick up guitars, or sticks for a drum kit. No synths though — they were somehow a sinful thing to mention in the early 90s — but in hindsight I just a bit young and naive to correlate what equipment it was behind the music of mysterious “English” groups like Depeche Mode or Human League.
It is true, my dad had a very extensive collection of LPs and chock full of a lot of the common classics from the 70s and 80s. For some reason I didn’t gravitate toward direct absorption of that music like what it seems others had done. My dad also had a collection of Omni magazines as well and the cover art for some of records were stranger than the music itself. “Slow Down World” by Donovan comes to mind: sort of a psychedelic man in space – lights burning and a name written in that glowing “calculator” font above his head. And films — yes, films and their soundtracks. This was a large contributing factor as well.
The first piece of music equipment I really had a play around on was some mid to late 80s Yamaha Portasound keyboard. I have no idea what model it was it. It had about 99 voices in it all trying in some fashion to emulate some “real” instrument: woodwinds, brass, guitars, Asian instruments — of course which none of them sounded exactly like the real thing. There were a few “synth” styled patches, mostly designed for the purpose of coughing out some sort of ghetto Rick James electro-funk (ie: Funky Clav, Fat Fifths, etc.). The Portasound also contained an Accompaniment section in which you could pick from a number of beats distilling various genres into some hammy backing track where you can execute chord changes to the whole backing track by pressing different root notes on the lower half of the keyboard.
I’m not sure what happened to that thing; it sort of lingered around for a few years afterwards but after that things took a slightly different route when the household acquired a Tandy computer in the late 80s. It was from Radio Shack and contained a really clunky operating system called Deskmate which was comparable to what Apple and Microsoft were doing at the time. I seem to have a memory of the mouse movements being highly inaccurate, therefore making it a somewhat frustrating physical experience to get the pointer to move around correctly on-screen.
In this clumsy operating system there was a program called “Music & Sound”. When booting up the program a pixel-mapped cartoon chacacture of Beethoven waited with while the hard disk clacked and whirled during it’s loading. Once up and running, it was a very basic program with a musical staff and four voices to choose from: strings, bells, piano, and I think clarinet (?). The sound quality would lead you to believe that these sounds were recorded on an extremely low bit rate and they probably were. Information about this Music & Sound program is a bit patchy and the old references to it on the vast expansive internet are in websites that look like they’ve been frozen in time since 1997 or something. There is one clip I’ve managed to find, which is a rather awkward sounding Xmas medley no less:
Being restricted to writing bizarre, attention-deficit classical music influenced compositions, Music & Sound quickly ran out of steam as my interests developed and a strange, predatory pace into the teen years. I had been thrashing out noise on a newly acquired guitar and although my attentions were starting to turn to harder music, I thought I could give that Tandy the equivalent of a punk hair dye job. A few years into the Tandy’s service a newer, more robust (for the time) soundcard was swapped out for the old, default one. It was an Ad Lib Soundblaster but don’t let the name fool you. “Blasting sound” was hardly a feature as it’s poorly constructed FM synthesis model was the equivalent of sound coming out of speaker cones made of generic range toilet paper. I did have a lot of fun though; writing these sort of industrial/punk/thrash compositions on them. I’d record them by plugging Walkman headphones into the rear of the computer and taping the earbuds over the internal microphone of a cheap Sanyo ghetto-blaster. That made the audio quality ten times worse with a sonic range matching the width of a coffee stir stick.
Once again, documentation is limited but here’s what remnants I’ve found online of that thing:
Eventually I moved out of the family home and the Tandy took up retirement shortly thereafter. By that time those fancy coloured iMacs started sneaking through pop culture’s back door and I think we know the general story of where things went from there. I have recordings on tape somewhere and should I somehow fall victim to house arrest and have a lot of time on my hands, there would be consideration to digging them up and taking a re-visit to those primitive recordings.
Amongst the tattered old envelopes and piles of yellowing paper in the archives of all of the stuff I’ve every wrote, I’ve been coming across alot of unfinished short stories and novellas. I’m not really sure what to do with them; perhaps get them in some new issue of Vexxed at some point. This is called “Love; Live At The Strip Mall” that I wrote sometime in 1997 and only got two pages in — all written in badly-set typewriter (with fading ribbon) on the back of, oddly enough, some court juror’s questionnaire.
The Cast: Don Ameche the Narrator, Joe Schmoe the anti-establishment yet commercialised teenager, Henry Who the land developer, Grechin Green the enviro-activist, Ted Tasteless of XXX Lawn Bowling, Suzy Homemaker as well…, and Bud Bitter as Head of Tourism.
PART I : “…the whole plan is a powerful ingredient to replace millions of years of woods with buildings — building that protect our physical well-being and enhance a sensual lifestyle of affluence. The career of neon lights could be lovely. Tearing town a four billion some-odd year ingenious masterpiece for our picky needs of convenience and (quote/unquote) fast service…”
It is the twentieth century. It is the year of nineteen hundred ninety-seven. Another brick in the mosaic of a dark dollar. The emotionless structures of monetary transaction sprout up like stupid, witless weeks through the pristine land (or not as pristine as it was). And to accentuate this weed-y mayhem; a sexless contractor’s masterpiece: the strip mall in the language of the English impostors. A tinkling hood ornament of this sleek, well-oiled machine of capitalist tomfoolery. Not even the apparent “purity” of (now a commercialised endeavour) all the children’s Rage Against The Machine albums could topple this Turkish Delight machine. For everything is a product.
“…and now that the populous have been introduced to this haberdashery,” cried the narrator, Don Ameche, “we will now look at one such incident of the creation of one of these vessels of misfortune: the strip mall. One such insight of one incident will allow us to – in the future – alarm and make us aware of such incidents. The birth of the strip mall occurs when the mall-loards cut a great cesarian gash in the fabric of the community, creating elusive advertising to make their minds to wish they could suckle the lovely products of the strip. “Pass a drink, we’re thirsty!” the citizens would shout to the mall-lords, who know the citizens are in their eternal grasp.
“Wine or champagne?” the mall-lords would query, “or maybe a dry vermouth?”
And so it came to pass that in the spring of the aforementioned year that the Universal Council of Mall-lords and Government Officials sent a commander to Everytown U.S.A. to add another addictive strip mall (or a bad habit as the locals called them) to the countless, infinite roster. Henry Who was the lieutenant contractor in the agreement.
Before H. Who left to attend seminars in the distant city, he and other U.C.M.G.O. members did extensive research on social and economic patterns in the city within the comfort of the Council’s super-fortress located underground. After research, H. Who was bestowed, by the Council, a new identity and documents to confirm H. Who was local in that particular city and for “all of his life” so that his given knowledge of local goings on could sway the locals of that city to be on his side. After all, he should know what was going on after years of living there (supposedly, but you and I know otherwise.
PART II : The reporters of FATE News grabbed their notepads, pens and sedatives before running off to their respective automobiles. The Editor was barking at the top of his lungs. Such a drill sergeant!
“Get this story! Get to the deadlines! Get me my coffee! Somebody give me a hand job!”
The office was an ant colony of drone workers. For you see, at the the crack of noon there was going to be a non-public public forum at the cellar of the town hall regarding a referendum on the illustrious H. Who’s proposal for the strip mall. The town was a-buzz. So many different opinions on this skeletal product market to be produced. The TV punk kids lining the streets of the city’s X district would be in an uproar over the phone to their friend’s (business wrecks) over the phone:
“I can’t believe they’re tearing down our spot for some stupid mall! I won’t allow it! I will never allow it!” cried – to + “I wonder if they have any Rage Against The Machine trading cards and tea cosies there?”
TO BE CONTINUED?
Written after hearing way to much Coldplay on passing radio, a band I don’t really enjoy – especially when subjected to it against my will. No intent of actual violence was meant by this “poem”, I just thought it was funny.
I shot Coldplay from the bush on the hill
A laser guided rifle and a whole lot of will
Took five different shots and then the task was done
Frantic crowds flee behind Vodafone and O2 tents in the festival sun
I shot Coldplay from the open doors of the lift
Sort of like Valerie Solanas when Andy got sniffed
There was instant satisfaction but not sure about the mess
I’m sure Parlophone could smooth out that stress
I shot Coldplay disguised as a midget
Though the first shot missed through the arm of Chris’ faux military jacket
A second shot was fired – a success! – but it wasn’t from me
The odds must be high for those wishing to carry out the deed
I shot Coldplay but first heard the man out
Mr. Martin insisted they meant no malice to offend anyone
We laughed and shook hands and let down our guard
But I shot him anyway as I hold grudges hard
That song where the kids sing “Wa-ohhh wa-ohhhh”
I just had to get out and “go-ohhh go-ohhh”
A short time later Martin and co were taken out by a bus
I’d like to think the driver had kicked up a fuss
I shot Coldplay from the depths of a dream
If I hear “Yellow” one more time I think I might scream
Don’t look at me strange from the things that I say
Sit down, relax, it was all in my mind anyway
Just saying really…
For a few weeks I was wondering when I’d break in this blog for the “first post” for this ominous looking and sounding year that is 2012. I had a few things in mind but sort of got lost for well over a month, side-lined by the realities of modern living including things like moving house, engaging in new places of employment and returning to my former home city over the holidays to further confuse myself to which city — the former or the current — is actually “home”. Oh, and I bought a cool oriental fan for $12.00 CAD.
It seems that my problems with a local rail provider would be worthy of this first post. As I’ve moved, my transport links have changed and I’ve had to make numerous journeys on an overground rail line that services parts of London I go regularly such as Hackney and The City. It has been no source of joy in my life, but you can read the full complaint letter I sent myself to the provider below:
Dear Personnel of National Express East Anglia,
My name is Jack Duckworth, a resident of Walthamstow, and I am writing you today regarding the bizarre, flippant spasms of activity that you publicly refer to as the Liverpool Street to Chingford line of your National Express East Anglia service. I guess you can say this is a complaint letter; one that I’ve been avoiding writing as I’m quite a busy man and feel it should only really come to a point of great distress that I should write such a letter. Well look, here I am… writing this letter.
I have recently relocated my place of residence to Walthamstow and have looked to rely on your London Liverpool Street to Chingford service as a fast and easy service to points in Hackney and The City. This service is scheduled to run every 15 minutes at the same times on the hour, every day Monday through Friday from any given station.
However, much to my confusion and astonishment, this service has not delivered on what I casually estimate as 35-40% of the time. I have arrived at stations in Walthamstow, Clapton and Hackney Downs to find trains delayed by at least 5-10 minutes or more, or even cancelled for reasons totally unbeknownst to myself, and upon my inquiry, to members of staff themselves. Notable extreme examples include a 25 minute delay (!) at Hackney Downs at approximately 9am on January 10th and a number of occasions at Walthamstow Central in the evening where the trains to Liverpool Street have been cancelled for cryptic reasons of “signal failure” with no further explanation or no prior warning.
Another example was a southbound train from Hackney Downs on December 14th at around the hour of 11pm. The display had stated the incoming time of the southbound train and then had stated all trains were cancelled. This cancellation was announced on the loudspeaker with no reason provided except to call an information number. I dialled this number and the pre-recorded message told me to call back during business hours, of which I forget now as at that moment my energies were mainly focused on quelling a brewing rage in the dumb, looming shadows of transportation incompentence.
The instances I’ve mentioned above were the most extreme in a somewhat more lengthy list of examples of poor train service.
Let’s assess the London Liverpool Street to Chingford line. It’s train that runs on quite a short length of track consisting of approximately 10 stops from end to end. I’ve taken the train from end to end and it’s about 25 minutes or so from what I remember. Aside from minor gradients in the track there are no challenging obstacles or features in this length or track; no obstacles which might actually vary train service: obstacles such as an insurgency of armed rebels obstructing track, sections of track running through sluggish quicksand or sections of track that may resemble sections of a rollercoaster (ie: a “loop the loop”) that one would find at a fun fair or carnival, which would obviously add an unpredictable element to the service and thus rightfully delay the service.
The usual reasons for delay are vague and non-eventful at that such as “signal failure” or “adverse weather conditions” (read: “light rain”) or in some cases, “an on-going situation at XXXX station.
I can already predict a likely reply to this letter, and one “justifying” the poor service. It would be one stating that the trains or sections of track are old and need upgrading or some other pre-written bureaucratic stock answers that underpaid customer service agents will spend mind-numbing hours copying and pasting into countless reply emails. Considering the UK pays some of the highest fares in Europe — and to which one occasion a European colleague of mine had with tact referred to as “highway robbery” — it’s an extremely tall drink of nasty liquid that one has to ingest to side with that reasoning. Where is all of this money going?
What is even more frightening, or tragically hilarious — depending on what way you look at it — is that we are six to seven months away from the 2012 Olympics; an event that requires London to allow itself to become fat and uncomfortably bloated with the addition of at least five million people (estimated figures). And with this train service, as well as notable other examples throughout the London transportation network, coasting into this massive event on the same quality of service to me is the equivalent of a stereotypical dope-smoking teenager coasting along in cannabis-induced bliss, right until that moment he needs to pick up the phone and order one massively large, Olympic-size pizza and failing to even do that when going into mad panic seconds after picking up the phone.
I can already imagine the blind rage of commuters during those patience-testing two weeks as massively enlarged body of population attempts to smoothly use this service as it’s current level of quality. The biggest spectacles I can assure you wont be at the stadium or track, but at tube and rail stations themselves as angry commuters create new sports of their own such as synchronised turnstile hurdling, Oyster Card discus, the 100m platform dash, inner carriage boxing and much more. Perhaps all of these events would revolve around the “Olympic Flame” of burning effigies of Boris Johnson, who the public identify as the face and mouth of TFL. A man with all the charm and charisma of a soft, perspiring potato.
Anyway, I’m sure as you can tell by my tirade expressed the numerous paragraphs aboves there are serious faults to your service which you’ll need to pick up the slack on in terms of efficiency to validate the amount one spends in fares. In the meantime it’s a bit of a farce to say the least.
As I’m sure most of your staff are familiar with the popular animated sitcom “The Simpsons”, I’d like to conclude this letter with words that would like be quoted by that curmudgeonly, unshaven and borderline shapeless character we all know as “Comic Book Guy”:
“Worst. Train Service. Ever.”
Yours Sincerely,
Jack Duckworth
