an empty telephone: written Archives

October 26, 2005


	i'm no longer a freelancer for New Times Now I am a freelancer for Village Voice Omnimedia. Now another owner (er, merger partner) looms. Will things change for Voice readers? There've been two schools of thought among employees during these months of rumor and counter-rumor. One is that New Times might not like the Voice's inherent lefty bent, and might try to change it. The other is that business is business and no one's going to mess with a product... Posted by xtop at 12:18 PM \| Comments (0)

October 20, 2005


	a grand float in the embarrassment parade Digging through my hard drive this evening, in search of something I can't remember, I came across a whole treasure trove of old files I hadn't looked at in months, years or never. And, ever the sucker for bad writing, I dove right in, discovering way too many ellipses, hamfists and the ever present inflated sense of self, which was easily destroyed in the face of so much terribleness wrought with my... Posted by xtop at 10:59 PM \| Comments (0)

July 27, 2005


	stupid stupid stupid or wow, i really am a jackass When getting a call as to whether you'd like to interview John Irving or not, never ever say "Well, I don't know if that's possible." If you make the first mistake, do not check the schedule and say "Yeah, no, that week's already full." But then, don't beat yourself up because, honestly, what the fuck would you say to him? In your world, growing up in your household, interviewing John Irving would... Posted by xtop at 04:09 PM \| Comments (8)

May 19, 2005


	gone fishin' People who fish are, by and large, single-minded creatures, devoted to their pursuit with a tunnel vision interrupted only by sunstroke and the cooler of beer. With rare exceptions, no fisher we've dragged out of a solitary reverie has considered introspection, sport-as-meditation or bonding with friends proper reason to fish. At Swope Park's Lake of the Woods -- as the hot sun mercifully sets behind the trees and traffic -- sits... Posted by xtop at 11:44 PM \| Comments (1)

May 10, 2005


	false starts: poet laureate Got this one down pretty quick, thus the lack of starts: Somewhere out there, poets are fuming. While comic books and video games are optioned every day by Hollywood, no one is rushing out to buy the rights to T.S. Eliots The Wasteland or turn Ezra Pounds Cantos into a Brad Pitt vehicle. Every day, poetry is ignored while more and more poets are born. But, according to Jonathan Holden, Kansas first... Posted by xtop at 12:03 AM \| Comments (2)

May 03, 2005


	"hey, buddy" Kicking off the week of shame: In my stint at the Pitch, I've spent a lot of time interviewing people indistinguishable from myself besides some particular bent: a black cowboy, a lady who collects things solely with images of rabbits dressed in clothes, rehabilitated street racers and oh so many local band members. On the other hand, I've interviewed famous people, people I admire, people I would namecheck as being heroes of... Posted by xtop at 11:48 PM \| Comments (8)

February 22, 2005


	false starts: kcccccccccccccn Writing an aimless spotlight piece about the local "comics creators network," all of whom never responded to my email (and still haven't). It would be fine, but you know that comics nerds check their email on basis so regular it's almost religion. Anyhow, this stupid fucking piece took me a few hours to write, a fact which still fills me with shame. Here are my cast-off ledes: Comics, like porno, rise and... Posted by xtop at 10:11 PM \| Comments (11)

February 06, 2005


	the ira glass interview I read about this guy on the internet about this guy who was competing for the Asteroids world championship. -Are you serious? Theyre still going? Yeah, I guess so. They print volumes of video game world records. And this guy on his 27th straight hour, the game just went dead. They had some glitch in the game. -Oh my god. But how did anybody beat him? Well, they didnt have as many... Posted by xtop at 02:48 AM \| Comments (4)

February 05, 2005


	kitchen sink 9 Two pieces in this issue, which basically sum up either end of the spectrum of my personal enthusiasms and some stuff in-between. A short piece on discovering Randy Newman and a longer one about BTK and how a message board of curious on-lookers became a stake-out for the Witchita PD. Available in your finer magazine shops.... Posted by xtop at 11:15 PM \| Comments (1)

January 06, 2005


	and your little dog, too For Chris Shields, it wasn't ska music or the Who album-cum-Mod film Quadrophenia that delivered him into the arms of the scooter lifestyle. It was the crappy economy. A piece for the Pitch that I wasn't exactly excited about at the original 180 word count and mildly dreaded when it got bumped up to 550 a day later. But considering I did all the legwork and wrote it while in the depths... Posted by xtop at 11:27 PM \| Comments (0)

October 17, 2004


	through a glass brightly My interview with Ira Glass from oh so long ago culminates in Kitchen Sink #6, out now at your favorite magazine shoppe. Just got it in the mail and man, it's sure awesome.... Posted by xtop at 11:55 PM \| Comments (0)

September 04, 2004


	i only get the best assignments forwarded from my editor: "Our fourth comedian is from Portland, OR and suffers from cerebral palsy. His handicap gives him permission to go over the edge about handicap people and he does. There is a much broader story to this show so I'll only go into detail if you're interested."... Posted by xtop at 02:26 PM \| Comments (0)

July 29, 2004


	easy does it The way Walter Mosley tells it, his formula for writing a book is remarkably simple. "I sit down with a character in mind, and wherever that first sentence takes me, that's where I go," he tells the Pitch. That first sentence is what drove Mosley, who worked for 15 years as a computer programmer, to write in the first place. "One day I wrote a sentence," he explains, reciting the sentence from... Posted by xtop at 08:30 AM \| Comments (6)

July 27, 2004


	false starts: jerry garcia memorial stomp -Society can be divided among those who can explain the significance of August 9th and those who cant and those who can are probably too stoned anyhow. -Summer wouldnt be complete unless youve spent at least one muggy August night in a club, elbow to elbow with the stink of patchouli, body odor and kind bud. -August 9th will forever be known as the day the US dropped the bomb on Nagasaki,... Posted by xtop at 08:03 AM \| Comments (0)

June 09, 2004


	pitch(fork) - 06.09.04 "The guy I was up against was standing there drinking a beer, and he says, 'Here, hold this,' and he goes, throws the hammer really far, comes back and takes another swig and says, 'That's a pretty good hammer throw.' That kinda got me hooked." While the Von Bondies have floated along on the momentum of the Detroit scene, they've never stood up and made themselves heard. So "C'mon... Posted by xtop at 06:13 PM \| Comments (3)

June 08, 2004


	i was the world Or so it seems. I dunno what exactly my Pitchfork status is these days, but it doesn't necessarily bode well. Maybe it does. I haven't the foggiest, really, as I've become inured to the concept of being a writer means being treated like Amway, but without the swanky merchandise. So, maybe someday I'll tell the saga. Maybe they actually like me and there will be no telling, only more writing. Maybe you'll... Posted by xtop at 12:10 PM \| Comments (0)

May 18, 2004


	metrosexual man As far as moments of pure, unadulterated culture shock go, probably the strongest in recent memory is driving down the expressway to look over at one of those radio station billboards that proudly display the Journey or Foghat song currently playing. Instead, the words "Metrosexual Man" appeared-- I nearly drive off the road to tune in the last 30 seconds of the song, savoring what would likely be my only opportunity to... Posted by xtop at 11:33 AM \| Comments (3)

May 07, 2004


	i'm still the world House music might be the only genre it's safe to kick around anymore, now that saying "I listen to everything but country" marks you as an elitist snob worthy of others coming down on your head with a litany of alt-country, old country and even hee-haw country recommendations. It's a pretty safe bet that John Cage and Tiny Tim probably don't hang out much in the afterlife ... Posted by xtop at 01:07 PM \| Comments (2)

April 26, 2004


	i am the world The production shifts, with guitar and drums both going from scratchy and rough to smooth, from the other end of the dining room to a foam-walled studio, unevenly divided between a live bit of rough playing and intimate brinksmanship. Beneath the clean and straight are still lines that haunt ("Your father's body was judgment day"), and a rough bedroom imprint no production can erase. If there isn't a subgenre... Posted by xtop at 11:15 AM \| Comments (0)

April 02, 2004


	my phone call with ira so, if you were gonna interview Ira Glass, like, say, Tuesday at 1:45? What would you, my intrepid half dozen readers, ask him? No. Seriously. Cause I have no idea. This is like interviewing god. Y'know, if god were Jewish and talked to me on the radio for an hour once a week and was real. So i'll make you a deal, I'll open the floor to questions and, provided they're not... Posted by xtop at 04:37 PM \| Comments (6)

March 31, 2004


	dear you Listening to the newly expanded and finally-back-in-print edition of Jawbreaker's Dear You felt like discovering that once upon a time I was a giant asshole.... Posted by xtop at 07:04 AM \| Comments (3)

March 28, 2004


	my adoring fanbase Are you high? You ever even heard any Descendents stuff? You're clueless my friend. -ZACK... Posted by xtop at 09:57 AM \| Comments (2)

March 26, 2004


	'merican If you've read any reviews of The Descendents' new EP, 'Merican, you'll likely have encountered a long rundown of dozens of other Descendents songs that these five songs are bound to remind you of. You'll also notice that no one finds this to be a problem, and are more giddy because they can draw stylistic lines back to the band's 80s catalog of awkwardness, alienation and food fetishism. For an industry where... Posted by xtop at 08:57 AM \| Comments (1)

March 24, 2004


	westSIDE There's a strain of nostalgia that Civil War recreationists and classic rock devotees often fall victim to, in which they cling to sugar-coated perceptions of the past in a desperate attempt to stave off the horrible present. The things they froth over are decades and millennia old, lending credence and legitimacy to the subject of their devotion. And then there's Westside Connection, whose second album longs for the halcyon days of 1992,... Posted by xtop at 01:52 PM \| Comments (0)

November 19, 2003


	the volume enthusiasts I'm unnaturally proud of this article and the fact that, as fraction pointed out, I was bylined on a cover with a picture of a midget: . . . Schiller soon found herself up against other volume enthusiasts who'd spent months and thousands of dollars to achieve a speaker setup better than those in most local rock clubs. She took first place -- and did so five more times at contests sponsored... Posted by xtop at 11:05 PM

November 15, 2003


	false starts: santa parade Wherein I tackle the age-old question: What the hell do you say about a Santa Parade in a mall? Call us ignorant, but we never knew Santa lived in a mall. In the movie Im Gonna Get You Sucka, one ghetto superstar remarks to his younger counterpart, Every superhero needs theme music as a soul group follows him down the street, wah-wah pedaling his every strutting step. Now just re-imagine that scene... Posted by xtop at 01:44 PM

November 10, 2003


	false starts: the volume enthusiasts False starts on a long sidebar about the upcoming International Autosound Competition. A convention of people with tricked out rides bumping the funk in each and every one of their trunks to win the big tall trophy and the respect of other future owners of inner-ear implants. Some are born to make beautiful music, others are born to play it. Among we the untalented are those not content to just listen. They... Posted by xtop at 10:30 PM \| Comments (1)

October 26, 2003


	false starts: pink floyd New feature. Freelance assignment for the Pitch asks that I write about the upcoming Pink Floyd Laser Show: "125 words (of mockery if you wish, but far be it from me to assume)." With any of these pieces, I usually start them two dozen times before something actually works. Here, then, are the aborted fruits of my labor. Every town must have a place where phony hippies meet. LSD... Posted by xtop at 09:56 AM \| Comments (8)

April 16, 2003


	jello biafra article Hm. Well, yeah, here's the article that came out the other end. It's a sidebar in the weekly calendar spread, meant to enlighten the dull about what there is to do every day of the week. So, knowing my word count in these situations, I always opt for having a good and long interview and every thing else follows well behind. I'm not exactly going to rewire anyone's circuitry with 325 words... Posted by xtop at 11:42 PM

April 12, 2003


	jello biafra transcript Complete transcript of my interview with Jello Biafra. The teenager lurking at the edges of my psyche is still doing handsprings. The more evolved element currently in fuller control of my faculties has a few shattered illusion problems, tho. x: Inevitably, at protests, there's someone there holding up a 'Jello Biafra 2004' sign. We have one here in KC. I know you were nominated for the 2000 Green Party. What do you... Posted by xtop at 11:37 PM \| Comments (7)

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