THIS is a CLOSE-UP?

  For nearly seven years on the button, Courtney and I lived on Perch Lake, just outside of Gaylord. Right next to Perch Lake was The Natural Golf Course, eighteen holes that twisted and turned through the best nature that the 45th Parallel could offer. The picture above is the view of the first green, and if you left the wooden bridge to the right and briefly ambled through the woods and over a rusted metal fence, you'd get right to our old driveway. Every now and again, an errant golf ball would appear at the edge of our property, like a single egg laid by an itinerant duck. Of the three major elitist sports -- golf, tennis, skiing -- I golfed because the barrier to entry was pretty low and the interest in golf on my Dad's side of the family was high, from playing the sport to watching it on television on the weekends. As spare clubs were abundant and my growth spurt had yet to overwhelm statistical norms, my grandmother would take prepubescent me to the Roscommon driving ran...

Upon reflection, I’ve had a fortunate life in the area of work. As a freshly minted teenager, I would visit Evergreen Park Grocery and dream of someday working there like my father did, and at the age of 14, I got $2/hour to live out that dream, such as it was. From there, I yearned to try other occupations, from record stores to teaching, and I’d be chuffed to tell Young Erick that both of those things happened in due course. ( Oh, and Young Erick, one of them got you to meet David Bowie, and one of them got you to own houses and cars, so I’ll let you ponder on which one was better. ) I even got to DJ a bit here and there, and while it never hit the heights of a professional radio gig, it was certainly better than the summer I played preset cassettes on my boom box for a nerd camp dance while my unrequited crush stayed in her room. What I never crossed off my professional life list was acting, either regular or voice, but while I still yearn for that big breakthrough -- seriously, ask...

If you capture a life in a eulogy or memorial service or blog post, what kind of superficial shitty life did they lead? It’s impossible for one with any sort of life that was rich and full, like lightly touching one dangling thread and saying you knew every feel of the fabric and every shape of the garment.  In the beginning, there was Phyllis Ann Lacey, the eldest of four who lost her dad at an early age. She loved and lost, made and mended, danced and laughed, studied and sassed, listened to music and played music and sang music, and had the best childhood one could have in spite of circumstances and surroundings that were less than idyllic or ideal.  Then, just under seven months before I came on the scene, there was Phyllis Ann Haight, a teen mom from St. Helen in a time and place where either was a challenge. A wife and mother, a friend and a traveler, continuing her education in school and in life, an inquisitive spirit searching for the next challenge and the next adven...

Here are two graphical representations of data related to guns in the U.S.: In the above, you'll see that the biggest American issue with gun-related deaths are  suicides , with the biggest at-risk demo being non-Hispanic white rural males aged 65+ with a history of military service and ownership of more than one gun (and at least one handgun). Do you know anyone who fits that demo? I certainly do. In this demo, you can make an argument for mental illness being a factor if one considers a mood disorder (esp. if you want to get historical and look at involutional depression , although that label it a bit of a dusty relic), but it's just one of many factors at play in suicide. " But we're not talking about suicide, you insensitive fuck ," you might be thinking right now. " We're talking about little boys and girls shredded into bags of lifeless meat by a murder with over 1K rounds of ammo at his disposal ," you vehemently hiss in my general direction, ...

From my History of the Rock & Roll Era class comes this brief glimpse into the art of the mash-up . While some form of embryonic mash-up existed since the early days of recorded music -- either as tape-driven sound collages or musique concrète -- the advent of sampling in hip-hop opened up the creative floodgates, as the end of the 20th Century offered three landmark recordings that significantly advanced the art form as sampling moved from analog to digital. First came the landmark "Pump Up The Volume" by M|A|R|R|S (a U.K. #1 single from 1987): Following the single release of "Pump Up The Volume" -- as well as the sample-heavy album work of hip-hop producers Prince Paul (De La Soul) and The Bomb Squad (Public Enemy) -- Endtroducing... (1996) by DJ Shadow and Since I Left You (2000) by The Avalanches were LP's built entirely from samples, often taking years to produce. Here's "Frontier Psychiatrist" by The Avalanches, which takes the sa...

There used to be a time when I would prep for a "Best Of ______" list by searching and researching, documenting and revising, and remembering and forgetting. I spent a lot of time listening to music and watching movies and series, to be sure, but this year I just couldn't muster the time or concentration to remind myself that 2021 had some serious high points in cultural artifacts. It did, of course, but still. What follows is less a rank order than a document of feeling and preoccupation. Some preoccupations and feelings were stronger than others, of course, and if the past is any indication, I'll find some cool 2021 shit in 2022. But for now, a moment in time: ALBUMS Shame – Drunk Tank Pink / The Weather Station – Ignorance / Mogwai – As The Love Continues / Black Country, New Road – For the First Time / Jane Weaver – Flock / Robert Plant & Allison Krauss – Raise The Roof / Lindsey Buckingham – Lindsey Buckingham / Hard Feelings – Hard Feelings / Duran Dur...