The holiday months have arrived and we’re nearing the end of another year. When I was young, I loved the festivities and pageantry of it all. Christmas lights, garland, huge family gatherings and sprawling feasts; all of those memories I still hold dear, though their vibrancy has faded with the passing of decades, and many, many empty places at a table which no longer exists in a house that isn’t mine anymore. Now more than ever, I’ve entered the season of depression: where holiday cheer and longing has eroded into creeping gloom that amplifies feelings of loss and isolation; when the suicide rate leaps up and screams “Look at me! Look here!” almost as if it’s calling me by name, imploring me to plunge headlong into the indigo abyss of demise.
But there’s more to be done and much to prove. I’m not dead yet. I keep my faith in my heart, and my family and their well-being next to that. The joyous times haven’t gone entirely and I continue to focus on the good things I still have to look forward to rather than lamenting the past. It’s a vicious cycle. What else can I say?
I picked up some zines of excellent quality from the Crucial Blast Bandcamp page; one called “Abysm”, which is more or less a catalog of the label’s releases (A – E) with vivid descriptions of each; the other is issue zero/void of the forthcoming Crucial Blast zine which contains all manner of oddities. There is some special and exciting material here, and I’m feeling inspired to produce something like this myself. Crucial Blast has always been a source of inspiration for me, and the aesthetic this label has cultivated is superbly dark and weird. When I want truly off-the-beaten-path, off-kilter art, this is where I wind up. The heart of the underground continues to pulsate.
That’s a wrap for the time being. I’ve got a lot of work to do…
Towers of Rust 