Where Am I? What Time Is It?

I was reading a friend's latest blog entry a few minutes ago and I've just realized my last entry here was some time in early 2009 or so. Things had been taking a decidedly political turn, and I'm not sure that's the direction I want to go. I'm not really concerned about my readers, because I'm fairly certain I don't have any, but this is something I feel is important to do for myself, and to that end I'm going to try to start being a more regular visitor to my own blog once again.

Let's see how that pans out, shall we?

Iranian People Shine In the Face of Dirty Politics

I've been caught up in the drama of the Iranian presidential election for the past couple of weeks. After seeing the enthusiasm of the candidates, the voters, the debates, it was hard not to feel excited for them, and with a reported turnout of something like 85%, Iranian voters have certainly shamed voters in democracies around the world, including the United States and most notably the European Union with it's abysmal 43.3% showing in 2009 parliamentary elections.

The words, deeds and faces of everyday Iranians spoke of their excitement to be participating in the process of government, their hopes for a bright future and their desire to have their voices heard. In the face of that excitement, hope and desire, the cloud of suspicion surrounding the election results announced Saturday morning, and the attempts by Iran's Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and the allegedly re-elected president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to assert his "landslide victory" make this story a tragedy for all the people of Iran. Although hard evidence is difficult to obtain, the seated government's claim that the incumbent won the majority of the vote in every demographic is simply beyond all rational belief. As an example, imagine that in the last U.S. presidential election the Democratic party took every single state. It's totally preposterous. Add to that the fact that supporters of the opposition candidate, Mir-Hossein Mousavi, have taken to the streets in the hundreds of thousands, and you begin to get a clear picture of the scale of this deception.

This is a sad time for all Iranians. Protesters can be seen in the streets of Tehran and around the world carrying signs that say "Where Is My Vote?." You don't have to be a Mousavi supporter to ask this question- if the election results were fraudulent, tampered with in any way, then no one's vote matters. Supporters of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad take note: this election, and the importance of your vote, has been stolen from you as surely as it has been stolen from the Mousavi supporters. Which would you rather have, a voice that matters in the future of Iran, or Ahmadi re-elected at any cost? Think about that carefully, and understand that victory at any cost will likely cost you democracy itself. If you truly love Iran, and your part in shaping it's future, you will take to the streets and join your fellow Iranians to demand that your voice be heard and your vote counted.

To all Iranians- I have been inspired by your passion, hope and love for your country, and I'm inspired yet again to see you so bravely standing up for what you think is right. I salute you, and my thoughts are with you.

Suppression of Information Is Not Transparency

sup·press
1: to put down by authority or force : subdue 2: to keep from public knowledge: as a: to keep secret b: to stop or prohibit the publication or revelation of

source: Mirriam-Webster Online (emphasis mine)

Dear President Obama,

I am writing to you today to express my disappointment at your stated intention to suppress the release of photos showing prisoner abuse by the military. Is this the greater transparency in government you promised?

Sincerely,

Brian Cournoyer

____________________________________________________

So what's the deal here? I won't go as far as the ACLU and say this makes a mockery of Obama's promises about greater transparency in government, but I'm really not happy about it. He cites military leaders who say that releasing these photos will put the lives of American soldiers at risk. Correct me if I'm wrong, but the lives of American soldiers are already at risk as long as we're at war aren't they? That just doesn't wash with me. And the other reason given, that this will damage the image of the U.S. in the eyes of the world, well, it's already in the toilet, isn't it? The rest of the world already knows these photos exist. Suppressing them just makes it look as though we're trying to cover up our dirty deeds again. Which is exactly what this amounts to.

You can hide your shit by kicking dirt on it, but it still stinks.

Seems as though this administration is back-pedaling on a lot of issues pertaining to this sort of thing- the release of evidence relevant to the treatment of detainees, the investigation of the torture, yes torture - "enhanced interrogation" my fucking ass - conducted by Dick Cheney and his band of merry inquisitors. Our fearless leader has come out and said himself that waterboarding is torture, and therefore in violation of both U.S. law and the Geneva Convention, but we're not going to prosecute anyone (or even try to discover the truth about what happened, who knew what and when?) because it's traditionally taboo to criticize previous administrations? Seriously? Wow.

But back to the photos. OK, maybe he spoke to his advisers and thought better of releasing them. Fine. Maybe, Mr. President, next time you should consult your advisers BEFORE you make these bold sweeping and lofty statements. Case in point- Guantanamo Bay. The senate is now going to withhold funding for it's closure because you still have no clear plan of what to do with the prisoners still held there. And rightfully so. I'm not keen to see $80 million of taxpayer money allotted to a project that has no plan to move forward on. So yes, it was great to see you issue an executive order to close the facility by next year, something the overwhelming majority of voters wanted from you, but what good is it if it never happens? And now we're going to start up the military trials dog-and-pony show again too? Yay! Another mockery of the American justice system and brain(?)child of the Bush administration finds new life.

I still think you're doing a good job on lots of things, Mr. President, and I still support you, but covering up the truth has never done anyone any good, and it doesn't seem likely to start now. If you suppress the truth you've lost the moral high ground, and it's the moral high ground that supported the platform on which you were elected. It's called the Freedom of Information Act for a reason.

Music and Nazis and White Supremacists, Oh My!

Ok. So it was recently pointed out to me that one of my all-time favorite social networks, Last.fm, was home to a number of neo-nazi groups, and were listing neo-nazi, white power, etc, oriented bands in their music catalog. What's a peace-loving, granola munching Skinny Puppy fan to do? My first reaction was that I didn't want to be associated with anything that gave a voice to this sort of hate-mongering, and I still feel very strongly about that. I decided I was going to vacate the premeses, with a quick note to my friends and a polite but disappointed email to the administrators of said network, and after a lot of flip-flopping and thinking it over, I started writing.

I expected to get a few replies, and was rather shocked at the amount of response I got. Everyone was very polite, and very kindly sorry to see me go, but the general opinion was pretty much unanimous- how can I say I support the right to free speech if I don't extend that to include nazis, even if they are completely retarded shitheads. Was I not contradicting myself? Well, it's a bit more complicated than that, but the short answer is: Yes, I was.

All of you are pretty much dead-on. Freedom of speech, freedom of expression, all the freedoms I purport to defend, are meaningless if I don't extend them to include everyone, even those who exploit that freedom in an effort to deprive others of it. I let my disgust get the better of me this time, and it nearly made a hypocrite of me, so thanks to all of you who pointed that out to me.

So my decision is this: I plan to keep my Last.fm account (which, to be perfectly honest I was REALLY loathe to delete). I also plan to write an email to Last.fm expressing my deep unhappiness at the presence of these hate-groups (for that is what they are), because expressing my opinion of things is MY right, too. My problem with these groups is that their belief system is oriented toward denying the basic human rights of others, based on misinformation, hatred and lies. Should anyone be able to say whatever they want, even if it's harmful to others, and without any basis in fact? I honestly don't know, and that's where I get into this gray area and start feeling like I'm contradicting myself. Right at the moment, I think I'm making the best choice, and feel like my earlier decision was hasty and not thought through enough.

So there you have it. Thanks to everyone who wrote back to me. Feel free to write again. What do you think now? Am I making the right decision? Or am I just a schizo? I'm thinking the latter, but at least I feel a little better. For now... :P

Amazon's Big Gay Fail

Ok, so this has been the hottest subject of the day and has been talked/Tweeted/blogged to death already, I know, but, dammit, I haven't been inspired to write about anything since January, and the stupidity factor in this story is just too high to be ignored, so here's where I open my mouth for awhile. If you're already sick of the story, you don't have to read me, but you're also not as concerned as you ought to be about your First Amendment rights.

So here's the way I see this: Back in February (and some now say even as far back as August 2008), several authors of gay-themed literature realized their books had been stripped of sales rank on Amazon. This effectively makes them harder to search, and in turn that hurts their overall sales. When the authors inquired about the change, they were told by Amazon execs that the books had been classified as 'adult' material as part of a company policy change' and adult material would not be ranked. Interestingly, this extended to ALL books with a gay, lesbian or bisexual theme, including such classics of porn as "Heather Has Two Mommies," by Leslea Newman, a children's book that deals with a little girl growing up raised by her biological mother and her lesbian partner, as well as the autobiography of Ellen Degeneres...pretty raunchy stuff, eh? Meanwhile, such family fare as "Ron Jeremy: The Hardest (Working) Man in Show Business" maintained it's ranked status. Apparently since Ron wasn't playing Flagpole Sitta with the boys on poker night he's ok. My point is that there is a clear pattern of witch-huntery here.

Amazon's answer to this has been to waffle, back-pedal and clutch at any available straw to lay the blame anywhere but at their own feet. First, a computer glitch was blamed. It must have been quite a sophisticated glitch to send out personalized emails to authors whose books had been effected, and signing the names of company execs. There are a million holes in this story, but the plainest one of all is that software is useful, software is flexible, software is adaptable...but software is not bigoted unless someone programs it to be.

Now to the rescue comes the self-styled "hacker," who claims he engineered the whole thing by creating a script that exploits the fact that a small number of consumer complaints can flag a book as inappropriate, and the book will be automatically stripped of it's rank. Even if this were true, (which I sincerely doubt) and not the opportunistic boast of a delusional wannabe, the fact that it's even possible for a small number (or even a single determined person) to have this sort of influence in deciding what's appropriate for us unwashed masses to see and read is a serious fuck-up on the part of Amazon. This basically means that if I and ten of my closest friends decide that Harold and the Purple Crayon is a thinly-veiled tale of sodomy with writing utensils, we can flag it on Amazon and presto! it will lose it's ranking also. How stupid is that?

So to put it simply, no, I don't buy it. Not a glitch. Not a hack. Not an "error" as they are now insisting. And not a penny more will I spend with them until I hear some truth. What annoys me the most is how hard it is for these people, company execs, politicians, celebrities, what have you, to just throw up their hands and say "Look, we made a very poor, very ill-considered decision, but we've heard you, the public, we accept responsibilty for our mistake and we apologize for any offense that was given. Every effort will be made to correct this problem immediately." Problems should be investigated, causes rooted out, errors should be corrected, and, if warranted, heads should roll. Instead they insult our intelligence by making excuses, generating spin and pointing fingers at anything and anyone but themselves. Am I the only one that would just like to be told the truth for a change?

Censorship is the most objectionable material of all.

What would you do if you lost everything?

This entry is a repost of a blog entry by musician Erica Dunham (Unter Null, Stray), who, on the day after Christmas 2008, lost pretty much everything she owned when the house she lived in with her family burned. Apologies to Erica for being so late in posting this, but if anyone can help in any way, even if you just send her a sympathetic note in the mail, please do.

I hate to do this because I feel like an asshole but as my entire family is currently totally screwed and living out of a hotel and trash-bags:


if you can donate anything:

please either mail me at UNTERNULL@GMAIL.COM

PAYPAL: ERICA@ERICADUNHAM.COM

MY PHONE IS: 253-632-8410















I never have been in a fire and I am terrified for this to ever happen again.



Currently, I am in a hotel room with my mother, father and sister. We found our cat earlier this evening hiding in the tool shed. Our dogs are safe. No lives have been lost.



Current situation: My entire room used as a music studio is gone. It is completely black. My flat-screen monitor is melted into my keyboard. My M-Audio keyboard is, as you see in the post below, some warped Dali-esque thing.
((could now make an art project out of it)

More details as to what I remembered happened:

I went to bed at around 3:30 AM. I took 2 Benedryl as I do every night because I have a problem sleeping. I probably dozed off at around 3:45. I remember putting out the candles that I had lit in my studio previous to going to sleep.



My bed is located right outside the door of my studio ; as I like to separate work/music from bedtime.


In my sleep I was having a waking dream of it being very warm and hearing things pop and crackle and things crash. I think I slowly came to, most likely because of the heat.
The second I opened my eyes I think I realized something was very very wrong.


I flew out of bed, looked to my right (where the door to my studio is) and saw my door ajar with thick black smoke pouring out from the door. It was EXTREMELY hot. I have never felt such heat in my life.

Still in a half-sleep state, half-dream state ( I did not realize I was awake) I tapped the door with my finger to push it open a bit and I was met with a gust of heat, smoke, and flames in my face.

This woke me up completely and I ran like hell away from the room towards the other end of the house (upstairs) screaming "OH SHIT OH SHIT OH SHIT OH SHIT" and I wasn't thinking clearly because this was all happening so fast.


I pounded on my sister's door which was directly across the hall from my studio and yelled 'WAKE UP GET OUT" and ran down the stairs still screaming "OH SHIT OH SHIT OH SHIT"
My father came racing out of my parents' room at the bottom of the stairs compeltely oblivious as to what was going on. He went racing up the stairs and I heard him shout "GET OUT!!!!!!!!" to my sister. My mom came racing out of my parents' room next and had no idea what was going on.
All I could say was 'FIRE FIRE BAD FIRE FIRE FIRE FIRE CALL 911! CALL 911! CALL 911!!"

She raced to the phone and dialed and got connected as I ran to the sink and filled a 4-cup measuring cup with water. The water wasn't pouring fast enough into the cup. I had no idea what I was doing at the time, I was at then going on instinct and adrenaline. I raced back up stairs, which was fucking stupid of me, (my sister and dad were now downstairs) and I tried to approach my room. The heat, the smoke, the air was so heavy and hot and dense.. I can't even describe it. It suffocated me and I became dizzy and wanted to sit down. I made it to the door of my studio, opened the door, and the rush of hot air in my face was overwhelming. I threw the cup of water into the room and ran away immediately because the heat and smoke was unbearable.


I got back downstairs coughing and hacking and couldn't breathe and fell on the ground. My mom was still on the phone with the fire department still trying to explain the situation, and she had been on the phone for at least 2 minutes then (perhaps because my sense of time at this point was in slow motion) and I was just screaming "IT'S BAD IT'S BAD GET HERE NOW IT'S BAD" and she kept answering fucking QUESTIONS.


Almost a minute later 2 police cars arrive.


Guess who the first officer to arrive on the scene was ? YES! The jackass whom I currently have a lawsuit against! He gave me this horrible, demeaning look and said "where is the fire?" and I said " upstairs"

My mom, dad, sister, and I got out of the house. We still didn't see any fire trucks. I looked up at the window to my studio and saw smoke and flames billowing out of the window - the glass had burst.


It was so fucking surreal. Seeing the house I grew up in, seeing the room I've lived in for the past 23+ years on and off being engulged in fire. It was also extremely terrifying to see the red flickering of flames reflecting off the snow on the roof.


I looked down the street and saw a fire truck approaching. The snow had been so bad here lately that they were having problems getting down the street. By this point, the smoke coming out of the room had gotten worse and blacker and thicker and I was near biting my tongue off in distraught and absolute non-control of the situation.


Eventually the fire truck arrived in front of our house.


Then another fire truck arrived.


The police (there were 8 cars there now of police - I do believe the entire POLICE DEPARTMENT - bored much?) were parked all around the block and street and blocking our street. It's now 5:20 AM.


I am outside in pajamas, no socks no shoes standing in snow. My parents and sister were smart enough to grab their important belongings (purse, shoes socks etc) and were outside with me.


One of the police officers yelled at us "STAY AWAY FROM THE FUCKING HOUSE" even though we were all EASILY 7 yards from our house. They were being very rude.


I couldn't feel my feet at this point, my father had me get in his car and turned on the heat.



So at that point we are all sitting (all 4 of us) in my parents' car in our driveway, watching fucking helplessly as the fucking firefighters weren't DOING SHIT but STARING UP AT MY STUDIO.


I counted this time on the clock how long it took the firefighters to actually hook up the hose and it was 10 minutes.


No one had gone into the house yet. Everyone was outside. There were at least 20 firefighters milling around outside our house. I don't know what they were doing but I was seriously pissed because nothing was happening.



Finally they hooked up the hose and started shooting water from the yard of our house into the window of my studio. All we could see then was more black smoke... and more... and more... and it was not getting better.


The cops came to our car and told us to get out of the driveway. We pulled out and parked in the street right by our house, where we had a full view of our house.


For a minute it seemed like the smoke coming out of my studio room had died. Then I saw about 10-15 firefighters go inside our house.


About 2 minutes later, I saw massive flames shooting out the window of my studio, easily 20 feet. I lost it at this point and just started bawling. I figured that our house was gone. I figured, my cat was still in there. I KNEW that everything in that room was just fucking gone (it is).


The flames kept coming out. It was really surreal, it was like from a horror film.. I don't know what my state of mind was then but I just remember repeating "it's a nightmare it's a nightmare" because I thought i would wake up, this wasn't happening.


About 10 minutes passed and the flames were gone. There was smoke EVERYWHERE. I could smell it in the car.
(Well, I smelled like burnt plastic)

One of the police officers came over to my car and asked who was closest to the fire. My dad answered for me because I was shaking badly at this point and could not speak and said that my bed was right outside the room. He took one look at me and asked why the paramedics hadn't seen me. I said I felt fine. Except of course my voice sounded like I'd swallowed acid. Also I didn't realize at this point that my eyebrows had been burnt off and the ends of my hair had been singed severely.



ETA is now 6 AM.


The fire is out.


One of the firefighters twisted his ankle on our stairs.


2 1/2 hours after everything started I got seen by the paramedics. They held up a mirror to me and it was fucking awful. My face was blotchy red and my hair was really badly burnt. No eyebrows.


One of the other firefighters came up to me and told me I was a "hero" for closing the door to the studio. I said i wasn't a hero I just thought it would keep the fire contained to the room.


Either way..... it kept the fire contained only to my studio.


The rest of the house is fine except for major water damage.


There is no power in our house.


Thus we are at a hotel for the next week.



So..

I was taken via ambulance to the hospital where I was checked out, done numerous tests on, blood drawn, oxy mask etc.


One lady came in and wanted to give me this treatment she said would open up my airways.


She got this face mask ready and it was BILLOWING SMOKE. (later I find out it was gas or something) ... I completely lost it and started heaving and ended up vomiting because I was so beyond myself. I didn't need that. She started to apologize profusely and I felt badly for her because she probably had no idea it would set me off like that.



They gave me Ativan at the hospital because I was not, uh, sedated. I passed out. I woke up at 12:00 Noon after having arrived probably at 6:30 AM.


My parents had come by to see me at one point but I don't remember much because I was in and out. Supposedly my trachea is burnt. I'm taking some mediation every hour to help with it.



I went to work at 6 PM.


My boss asked why I was there, I said because I am Not Dead.


I am not dead.


My life had changed forever because of this.


I don't know if I will ever sleep again. Today at work I have been having continual playbacks of the entire event, mostly of waking up and realizing as to what is going on.


Waking up and what I could have done different.


Waking up and


Not waking up and my whole family dying

Our house burning down



This has been a crude wake-up call to me and my priorities.


The sad thing is... last night, Xmas, my next Unter Null album was FINISHED.


Now my PC is melted.


Here is a short list of all the things I have lost in the fire:


Presonus Firebox

M-Audio BX8A monitors

M-Audio Keystation 49

M-Audio Ozone

Rode NT1A Condensor Mic

AKG Perception 420 Condensor Mic

COMPUTER (don't know where to start with this, PC, AMD 64, 3 harddrives, 15 years of audio work on there)

Sony TV

Sony DVD player

Appx.
$600 in books

Appx. $3600 in CDs (all melted together... nice)

4 microphone stands

Appx.
$200 in Monster cables

Passport

15 DVDs

Nintendo NES (original)

Sony digital camera (don't know the model and brand now)

iPod

2 pairs of Sennheiser HD280 headphones

Flat-screen monitor

Appx.
$2000 in clothes

6 pairs of shoes

Pop filter // mic

Unter Null / Stray merch valued at appx.
$1000

Fender acoustic guitar

Fender electric guitar

Sony camcorder (don't know model now)


Various furniture which now I don't care about.







I don't think I can lose anything more in my life.



Erica, I'm so sorry.

ohGr / American Memory Project, Blender Theater NYC 12.04.08

Made it to the show this time.

I'll begin by offering an apology for the EXTREMELY poor quality of the photos. Luckily for you, there are copious photos from the tour already circulating around the net, and for the most part if you've seen one you've seen them all.

So...cold, windy rainy night upstate? Nothing to do? You can be at the Blender in about two hours, and the good news is you only have to spend about 5 minutes out in the elements. From Grand Central take the 6 local downtown to 23rd street, exit the subway, walk half a block west on 23rd and get inside, you're there. Sweet. There will be some very nice people there to greet you. Also to pat you down. If you've brought a nice camera with you, they will admire it, then tell you you can't bring it inside unless you've got a press badge / photo pass. Otherwise, no professional lens cameras allowed. If, however, for example you've brought your 12 megapixel cybershot with 12x optical zoom, that's perfectly ok, since the lens doesn't come off. Go figure. Anyway, to be fair they were very nice to me, and did keep it behind the desk for me, much to my relief, because I wasn't exactly in a position to go home, put it away and come back at this point. On with the show.

I went inside to stake my claim to a piece of floor as near to front/center as I could get. An interesting thing about going to a lot of gigs alone is that I almost always end up standing next to at least one other person who is also rather obviously on their own. Tonight was no exception, and I was actually sandwiched between two of them this time. The first was a rather shaggy, boisterous dude in a Ministry t-shirt with a few facial piercings and an open can of Beck's in each hand, from which he was alternately drinking. We exchanged a few pleasantries, during which I noticed with amusement that the three rings through his lower lip caused him to lisp rather comically, and that each time he took a swig of beer they made little musical clinking sounds against the can. On my left was a pretty girl/woman who could possibly have been 16 or 36 or anywhere in between. We didn't talk, but did catch each other looking a few times and spent the rest of the gig studiously trying not to appear as if we were looking at anything other than the ceiling or the floor or the merch table on the far side of the venue.

At last the lights went down and American Memory Project took the stage. At least, I think they did. The screen they spent the entire show behind made it hard to be sure. I could see Justin Bennet pretty well from where I was, but Bill Morrison was sketchy at best. And I guess judging by the heavy-duty visuals on the screen, you weren't really meant to see them. Anyway, I was pretty impressed by the whole thing, really. The visuals were great and the music was excellent as well. My respect for William Morrison as a musician has gone up several notches since last night, and while I'd seen Justin play with Skinny Puppy on tour a few years ago, his drumming abilities were on display on a much grander scale here (and later with ohGr as well) than anything I'd seen before. The guy is GOOD. And must've been exhausted by the end of the night. So as a veteran of uncounted hundreds of gigs, 99% of which were supported by bands that made me wish I'd brought something to throw at them, AMP were a pleasant surprise. And god bless 'em, they didn't drag it out too long, either.

Now the obligatory "wait for the headliner to get it together and hit the stage" bit. Lights back on, check out the merch table and look at all the things I'd like to have but didn't bring any cash to buy. My shaggy friend, who was pretty well innebriated at this point, clapped me on the arm and told me very amiably "jusht to warn you man, when ohGr getsh on shtage I'll be dancin! I get movin around pretty good sho if I bump ya or anything I'll jusht apologishe in advansh. Jusht give me a good kick if you want, man." So I thanked him for the warning just as if I'd never been to a gig before in my entire life and if he hadn't let me know, why I would'nt have known what was happening to me! I talked with him for a few more minutes and clued him in on what to expect, as he hadn't seen any of the youtube videos or anything. On my left, the dance of "I'm not looking at you / you're not looking at me" continued gracefully, my dancing partner finding a piece of paper stuck to her boot at just the same moment I noticed for the first time there was a roof on this particular building, and became engrossed with the architectural details. Then hooray! the lights went out again!

Justin was the first on stage and the martial drum-beat opening to Shhh went on for a good 5 minutes before anyone else appeared. The kid's got stamina, for sure. The rest of the band emerged, followed by Ogre in the costume and mask that for some reason makes me think "Snot Man." I had seen it in several video clips and photos from the tour, so I was expecting it, but up close and live I noticed more details, not least of which was the security camera mounted on the torso-area, complete with flashing red light. Say what you will about the man, but for someone who's been in the business as long as he has, his creative spark hasn't dimmed in the slightest. He was under a sheet and had to be led onto the stage by the world's most cheerful-looking roady, but by the time the sheet came off and the band had launched full-bore into Shhh chaos ensued. What followed was a gradual shedding of layers of costume, mask and make-up, ultimately revealing the face of my hero of the last 25 years, looking like the world's craziest clown, a sort of Ronald McDonald in grey and black instead of white and red, a sleevless straight-jacket instead of the yellow clown suit. The soundtrack to this macabre strip-tease turned out to be the entire DIMD album from start to finish, which I wasn't expecting at all. Nearly all of the songs from the new album translated very well played live, despite a few moments where Ogre seemed to have forgotten a line or two. A few highlights from this portion of the show- Ogre grabbing cameras from the audience and gleefully taking pictures of himself; reading Bill Moseley's monologue from the intro to Feelin' Chicken from a piece of paper and flinging it into the crowd where it was likely torn to bits in the squabble for possession; Ogre throwing great handfulls of feathers into the crowd throughout Feelin' Chicken; The whole band coming out front for a bow and group hug after playing Witness and the end of the DIMD portion of the show.

It has to be said that whatever some people may think of the new album, Ogre's pride and satisfaction with it was obvious in every moment of the show. He certainly was in a good humor, smiling and laughing a lot, such a contrast to the way I've seen him so many times in the past. The band seemed very happy as well, and there was a lot of joking and banter between all of them. They played as a very tight unit and all seemed to play well off of each other.

After DIMD came what were, for me, the highlights of the whole show, starting with a version of Minus that could have peeled paint off the walls, followed by a seriously groovy set that even made me want to dance- Magik, Water and (my memory was getting hazy after a long day at this point) I think Pore. They came back for 2 encores, Lusid and Cracker, both of which were amazing. My only (very small not-even-really-a-complaint) complaint was the absence of Dog, which I really would've liked to hear. But like I said, no complaint at all. The show ended with a drum solo from Justin that just went off the wall, and finally slowed and slowed until it ground to a halt. Normally I sneer at drum solos but this was an exception.

This was the first time I've seen ohGr live, and the energy of the band combined with the pretty small venue took me back to the first time I saw Skinny Puppy back in the mid-eighties with Severed Heads, and sort of made me feel like a kid again, and reminded me of how glad I am that this man is still making music.

Scale of 1 to 10: venue - 8 / crowd - 9 / setlist - 9.75 / band - 11

That is all. (Wasn't it enough?)