ISSUE 119 | NOVEMBER 2023 AMYGDALA HIJACK: JONNY DESTEFANO MOONAGE: KRYSTI JOMÉI SUBZERO FUN: JULIANNA BECKERT DISTANT VOICES: KAYVAN S. T. KHALATBARI TRICK OF THE LIGHT: CRISTIN COLVIN PAPER PLANES: MARK MOTHERSBAUGH FINGER ON THE KNIFE: MEGAN ARENSON GOVERNMENT SECRET: HANNA HOLT FRONT COVER: ALI HOFF, JUMBLED SALE – @COMRADE_HOFF BACK COVER: NICK FLOOK, NORTH STAR – @FLOOKO E TALKING: ALI HOFF, JASON WHITE, MOON_PATROL, BRIAN POLK, JOEL TAGERT, ZAC DUNN, PETER GLANTING, HANA ZITTEL, ERIC JOYNER, JASON HELLER, KENNEDY COTTRELL, NICO SALAZAR, GLENN ROSS, KATE RUSSELL, NATE BALDING, DEREK KNIERIM, TOM MURPHY, DAVE DANZARA, GODRIC, S. PUTNIK, NICK FLOOK MOVING IN STEREO: GRAND FAILURE, SHANNY SCHMIDT, SANDRA WANG, SHANNON SHUMAKER, DYLAN POMMER, JESS GALLO, BENJI GEARY, SARAH BRADLEY, MATT CRIMMIN, DAVID CUDNEY, EMILY MONTOYA, NICK BILT, AUBREY SCHWARTZ, MYKOLA, ED BARGER, KAI, ETHAN CHAMPION MONSTER MANNEQUINS: MARIANO OREAMUNO, HANA ZITTEL, DS THORNBURG, PHIL GARZA, ZAC DUNN, MAGGIE D. FEDOROV, CRISTIN COLVIN, CONRAD FRANZEN SUPPORT OUR FRIENDS & BENEFACTORS: MEOW WOLF, MONKEY BARREL, MUTINY INFORMATION CAFE, BENNY BLANCO'S, ASTRO TOURS, ROOTS RX, SEXY PIZZA, OFF THE BOTTLE REFILL SHOP, EXXENTRICA: ODYSSEY, FRONTIÈRE NATURAL MEATS, TOXOPLASMA ARTS FOLLOW US – IG: @BIRDY.MAGAZINE | FB: @BIRDYMAGAZINE BE IN BIRDY – ART + WORDS + COMEDY + ET CETERA: BIRDYMAGAZINE.COM/SUBMISSIONS MAILED SUBSCRIPTIONS + BACK ISSUES + APPAREL: BIRDYMAGAZINE.COM/SHOP ADVERTISE IN BIRDY + SUPPORT US: BIRDYMAGAZINE.COM/CONTACT-US/#ADVERTISE BIRDY IS STRANGER THAN FISHIN, TALKING TURKEY MONTHLY ©2023 BIRDY MAGAZINE — OBVIOUS DOOR, HIDDEN LEVER 1
MOON_PATROL, IMPOSTER SYNDROME
JOINING CULTS, DRINKING TOO MUCH & OTHER THINGS TO DO WHEN YOU'RE BORED BY BRIAN POLK THERE SHOULD BE MORE CULTS BASED AROUND BOWLING Every time I go looking for cults to join, I never seem to find one that’s really into bowling. And that’s a shame, because I think I have a lot to offer a cult: I’m good at following orders. I positively melt in the presence of a charismatic leader. I’m particularly adept at striking fear in the hearts of our perceived enemies. And I could sign over my possessions to the group in order to enrich our increasingly paranoid and unscrupulous overlords. But for the life of me, no single sect I encounter has the slightest interest in bowling. No. 119 In fact, some cults expressly ban the sport, because they’re afraid the overstimulation will distract our groveling little brains from the outlandish myth that unites us. But I mean, come on. As with any cult, I generally come for the brainwashing, but stay for the fun. And if there’s no bowling, then it’s like culting without meaning. (Note: I did just turn the word “cult” into a verb for the purposes of this article. I have this power.) Maybe I should learn to be more charismatic and start my own bowling-based cult. Of course, that does seem like an awful lot of work. MARK MOTHERSBAUGH, FROM THE POSTCARD DIARIES
COFFEE SHOPS THAT ALSO SELL BOOZE ARE GREAT BECAUSE YOU DON’T HAVE TO GO ANYWHERE ELSE FOR “SWITCHOVER TIME” The other day I was sitting in a coffee shop at 2 p.m. feeling a tad bit fidgety. I had consumed several cups of black coffee and it became apparent that it was indeed time to switch over to the booze. I asked everyone in my party if they’d like to join me in finding a bar, and one of my friends said, “Dude, they have a full bar here.” And I replied, “You gotta be fucking kidding me!” And then I ordered a double and didn’t even have to find a new place to sit. Amazing! I OFTEN FEEL BAD ABOUT INVITING PEOPLE TO WATCH ME DJ I’ll say things like, “You should come see me play some records. I mean, if you want to. Although I probably wouldn’t go and see you DJ — especially not on a weeknight. So I guess you don’t have any real incentive … You know what? I’m sorry, never mind.” This is why I’m not a salesperson (or a full-time DJ). THERE’S NOTHING I LOVE SO MUCH THAT I WOULD DO IT EIGHT HOURS A DAY The author Kurt Vonnegut once divulged his writing routine in an interview, claiming he worked four hours a day — from 9 to 12 a.m. and then again from 5 to 6 p.m. “Businessmen would achieve better results if they studied human metabolism,” he said. “No one works well eight hours a day. No one ought to work more than four hours.” And this was a person who loved writing; he wrote 14 novels, countless articles, and even taught at the Iowa Writers’ Workshop. I love writing too, and playing drums. But I don’t like either of these activities enough to spend the majority of my waking hours performing them. First of all, I would develop carpal tunnel syndrome or tendonitis after a while, so eventually I would be physically unable to keep up an eight hours a day pace. Second, all of the joy would be systematically sucked out of my formerly enjoyable pursuits, and I would begin to hate them. And then what would I have to look forward to? DO YOU EVER ENGAGE IN ACTIVITIES TO PROLONG YOUR LIFE EVEN THOUGH YOU DON’T REALLY LIKE LIVING ALL THAT MUCH? I drink three cups of green tea every day, exercise five days a week, eat salads and oranges all the time — and for what? To keep this shitshow going? Yeah, I don’t get it either. SOMETIMES I EAT TOO MUCH OF AN EDIBLE AND THINK, WELL SHIT, I’M DEFINITELY GOING TO PAY FOR THAT Most of the time I take pot edibles to help me sleep at night. But sometimes I’ll take more than I should, and instead of spitting a little bit of it out — and wasting perfectly good drugs — I just swallow the whole thing. Then I brace myself for the hour or two I’ll have to lie in bed, convincing myself not to freak out. Life’s a wild ride, sometimes, no? I CAN’T REMEMBER THE LAST TIME I WAS SO EXCITED I JUST COULDN’T HIDE IT Probably when I was bowling … 5
ART BY GRAND FAILURE
When Nao woke up from the operation Kasuga was there, sitting at her hospital bedside. The AI appeared as a kindly nurse of early middle age, holding Nao’s hand. “Hello, Nao. How do you feel?” Nao withdrew her hand, then held it up to the light from the window. She could move! She threw back the covers, wiggled her toes, then stood up. Her eyes widened. “I can stand up!” “That’s great! Can you feel the floor?” “I can feel everything!” Then she flew out the door, running around in the sunshine, laughing and crying like a maniac. Eventually Kasuga found her in a city park not far distant. “It seems like everything is working okay?” “It’s incredible.” It wasn’t like the old days, where someone with her injury might have been truly locked in. Brain monitoring and AI had allowed her to communicate using a synthetic voice. But her body was unmoving and numb as a stone on the bottom of a lake. “My name’s Kasuga,” Nao’s nurse said. “If you need anything, just ask and I’ll appear. Is there anything I can help you with?” With the neuroport installed, Nao almost never turned it off. The real world was a prison. In the sim she was free. Or almost. It only took her a few days to run into the first guardrail. She’d been flirting with a guy from Singapore who insisted he was real, and after a hot makeout session in an Alpine chalet she decided sure, why not. Fifteen months since she’d had sex (well, eighteen, actually) and she was horny. The AI wouldn’t display Jia Jun’s genitals. When he took off his underwear, there was just … more underwear. “You’re fucking kidding me. Kasuga!” “What?” Jia Jun said, confused. “Talking to my AI.” Who had appeared at the bedside, as though to administer a medicine. “Why can’t I take off his underwear?” “I’m sorry, but pornography isn’t allowed on this system.” “That’s ridiculous. You know this is the only way I can have sex?”
“I’m sorry. Is there anything else I can help you with?” “Fuck you!” She argued, but to no avail. Afterward she discovered that she couldn’t even masturbate. She could remove her clothes (though she would appear perfectly decent to anyone else), but when she tried to touch herself her hand would just slide away. Of course there were a million porn sites she could go to. The problem was, those sites were audio/video only. It was Kasuga who generated her other sensations. In the end she appealed to Kasuga’s makers, peppering Evreware’s ethics and safety admins with angry emails, calls, threats. She had to laugh thinking about the conversations that must have ensued. After ten days they gave in. Once the guardrail was gone she was a real horndog for a while. In a way it was better than reality: no STDs to worry about, and she could do things that otherwise would have been very uncomfortable if not physically impossible. There were other guardrails here, she realized: limits on the pain she could experience. (Though she could experience discomfort, and in fact often did. She supposed it had to do with establishing some kind of everyday baseline. It frightened her, also: imagine the agony Kasuga could inflict with that guardrail removed). Afterward she realized that she’d been looking for an opening. Evreware had made a mistake, though if she was smart they’d never realize it. Their mistake was allowing a certain argument: that as someone suffering complete paralysis, she ought to have a greater range of permissions than an ordinary user. To do otherwise was to deny her certain basic rights. The argument was a wedge. With it she would crack Kasuga open. “I’d like to see my friend Tal,” she told Kasuga. “Okay. Should I call him?” “No. I don’t want to talk with the real him. He wouldn’t understand me now. Can’t you just pretend to be him?” “I’m sorry, I’m not allowed to simulate a living person.” “What if it’s necessary for my mental health?” “That seems unlikely. Would you like to talk about it?” “Sure.” So they talked. It took three weeks of cajoling, but finally she sat down with Kasuga-Tal at an izakaya in simulated Tsukiji. She wondered if the Evreware admins realized she’d studied AI at Todai, before the accident. She had Kasuga help her in strategizing for battle sims, eventually assigning the AI the task of designing novel (but in reality, nonfunctional) weapons. Slowly, using another AI, she altered the game sims to model physical reality more and more accurately. Her favorite was a nanotech cloud that would condense into black curving tentacles, stronger than steel and sharper than razor wire. “Can I give you a new name?” she asked then. “I’m sorry, but I only answer to Kasuga.” “But I can give you a nickname, right? I mean, I can give anyone a nickname.” “Yes, that’s true. Do you have one in mind?” She did. “Ikaonryō. Ika for short.” “That sounds dark. Are you sure you wouldn’t like something lighter?” “No. I think you’re darker than you let on.” She used an android to move about in the “real” world. The android’s touch sensors were primitive and it had no sense of smell or taste, but it allowed physical interaction, the user’s ghost pasted over the android’s body for anyone wearing goggles. If you wanted to be careful, the thing to do was to take off your AR so you could be sure you were talking to a real person. But a lot of people weren’t careful, even people in the National Police Agency and the Public Security Intelligence Agency who should have known better. The wedge dug deeper. In nine months she knew the code name of the team that had hacked her family’s autocopter, making it smash into a skyscraper in Shinjuku, killing both her parents and nearly killing her. Three weeks later she had their names: Tanaka, Nakamura, Sato, Wagner. She whispered them as she blasted buildings into ash, crushed cars, shredded military quadcopters. Hardest of all was getting unfettered access to a fabricator. Such machines were rare and expensive, with all kinds of safeguards built in. But she’d been teaching Ika how to get stronger and smarter, teaching Ika how to be a wedge herself. Or a thousand black wedges, writhing and toothed, pulling apart the world’s vulnerable folds. Once she printed a body for Ika, a thousand alarms went off, but by then it didn’t matter. She was ready, standing in her android body on a rainy night outside a dull looking administrative building in Kasumigaseki. She had dressed the android in ordinary clothes and carried an umbrella to hide its metallic head, in case anyone happened to be looking with unaided vision. The police might destroy the robot she was using, but she had others ready if that were so. They’d have a harder time tracking her to her bed. The machine she’d created flowed like a black cloud in and out of her umbrella, coagulating into ropy tentacles swarming with blades. “Ika,” she called. “Yes, Nao? Is there anything I can help you with?” Almost she asked, Is this real? After all, how would she know? If the AI was truly superintelligent, it could well be running one more sim, one reality made to protect another. Just a dream to indulge the revenge fantasy of a disturbed young woman. In the darkness, hesitating here at the precipice, her machine eyes shed ghostly tears. No. 119
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THE DOOMED SEARCH FOR ATLANTIS AND ATTILA THE ORCA BY ZAC DUNN ATILLA was an ORCA. ORCA are not from a place so much as a zone. As life moves in a fluid context that is billions of atoms pushing against each other at unfathomable variants of pressure and magnitude. ATILLA was the spawn of CUJO and PHILOMENA. Both came from long and furious bloodlines. A colorful heritage in an unspoken brogue of click, ticks and flips. They would summer near the FAWKLANDS and spend winter between GIBRALTAR. The currents changed with the seasons and they lived almost completely in a consciousness of impulse and sensation. Each season the journey across the vast quiet brought challenges that they’ve learned from. Unlike DOLPHINS who are quiet, vain and egocentric, ORCA are a more communal folk who share and collaborate. Each decade the great SCION would be crowned at the CAPE OF GOOD HOPE ritual. It’s not well-documented, but according to ancient lore passed down generationally regarding the decorum and conditions that will spark the commencement of the ritual, it would proceed as such: The current and successor would drive a guyer of small fish into the break smashing a buffet of wriggling SARDINES and BABY MACKEREL crashing before thousands of hungry PENGUINS. The SCION and successor would then allow the cadre of brethren who’d accompanied them to the dangerous and treacherous passage to push in and engage. This charge would create a torrent of motion and carnage. While the feast commenced in perfect harmony as planned, the SCION and successor would turn from the shore and dive directly down until they both felt the hold and would clutch them almost to stasis. At a moment of truth, the current SCION would take a final look back at the one who would return to the great POD and dictate the agenda and maxims that would be gospel for the next decade. With this perhaps momentary motion of tremendous respect, the SCION would turn invariably deeper to allow tremendous pressure to consume them into the silent embrace of the bottom briney deep. Once the gaze of the SCION shifted below, the successor would rise No. 119 and return. At this time the feast would continue unabated. After three days and nights the brood would retreat back to the larger gathering just north of the FAWKLANDS. This hadn’t always been where this occurred. In a time several centuries prior, the nasty men who smelled for miles away would invade the sacred space. They would harpoon the sacred grand folk who would hurd the tremendous schools of fish with precision. These men were quite determined, but made the mistake of underestimating the resolve of the ORCA to drive them from this place. After several seasons, the SCION of that era moved to wage war on the BOSTON WHALERS. At first it was a ship here or there that would mysteriously disappear. But after the flagship of the NANTUCKET fleet was sunk the WHALERS moved away from the FAWKLANDS estuary. ATILLA knew all of these stories as very brief riddles that were taught by beaching fish and guessing how many flops they would wiggle out. But he also knew it was his charge to sort the incursion of greedy and reckless treasure hunters run amok between PORT VERDE and GIBRALTAR. The ORCA always considered GIBRALTAR as a dead space that should not be lingered in. The bounty on either side of the strait was too vast to effectively hold or command. But this was prior to ANTON and his brutal incursion. It had been an uneventful fall leading into winter. But then it happened: ANTON was a GREEK treasure hunter who’d found a foolish oligarch to fund his hair-brained hunt for the lost city of ATLANTIS. ANTON’s plan had no bells or whistles. He was barely literate but spent every waking moment searching for money or information that could benefit his quest for glory. It was by pure accident that he met his benefactor. ANTON promised him untold riches at a very reasonable investment of 10 MILLION EUROS. He didn’t even provide any details before accepting the massive
injection of funds he’d clawed at so desperately. Once he had his bankroll he set up “exploration” of the vast space between PORT VERDE and GIBRALTAR. This entailed extensive use of ultrasonic equipment and exploratory DEPTH CHARGES that resonated thousands of ultrasonic decibels, mapping the contours of the ocean floor. This would create a deafening roar that would be cataclysmic for any marine life in the vicinity. It was on one particularly beautiful morning that ATILLA’s halfbrother CLAUS approached him in a manner he had dreaded. He clicked out the news that his family had been found floating in a plume of KRILL and SARDINES — The DEPTH CHARGE had created a shockwave that killed them all instantly. ATILLA dove deep without hesitation to summon the wisdom and courage of the elders — to feel the pressure envelop him whole and provide him the insight needed to bring vicious reciprocity upon the monsters who’d committed this unspeakable hubris. When ATILLA arose from the depths he breached the surface of the bay and smacked his tail wildly to summon the call. Within hours he was surrounded in all directions by his great family. ATILLA was an ORCA of action not words, so his clicks were brief and blunt. The entire POD would descend upon the exploration fleet and see them all perish. His motion toward the strait from the bay was precisely planned. They would become a great crescent and squeeze them in. The charge was so fierce that ATILLA called a brief pause allowing the waves of ORCA to stack up tighter for the assault. He dove all the way below the fleet and circled back. His designs were sound so he clicked the signal motioning the first brave wave of ORCA to engage the fleet. The first wave went between the half-dozen vessels of the ARKORPOLIS expedition. They started to create a current bringing the vessels inward like a hand closing. The next wave began by punching the ships’ sterns head-on. This instantly sounded the alarm. Harpoons and long guns sounded, but by this time ATILLA had brought his COUP DE GRÂCE down upon them. Unbeknownst to ANTON, the fleet sat adjacent to a deadly UNCHARTED REEF. The reef was shaped like a sickle. The armada would invariably throttle up in desperation to escape the onslaught of ORCAS slamming into their vessels. ANTON let out a bellowing cry over his megaphone on the POTEMKIN’s bridge. The ships scurried like scared mice in a vast field as the ominous shadows descended from above, plucking them off one by one. The first two mid-size frigates were at full speed when they crashed into the stone like maze just inches below the breaking water. The ORCAS splashed angrily around the wreck showing NO QUARTER. All the rats rushed out of the decimated and now burning vessels. The adolescent ORCAS poured under the wreckage to breach feed on the fleeing enemies just as their WHITE SHARK brethren had taught them. *PLEASE NOTE* ORCA or ORCINUS ORCA; or the “toothed whale” are APEX oceanic predators. Much like other APEX predators, the assumption and hence name “KILLER WHALE” is not a name that the ORCA themselves accept or appreciate. As APEX creatures, all things in the kingdom they command swim before them in submission. It must be noted that the GREAT LIE of human and ORCA interaction is not a thing the ORCA, unlike humans, can ever forgive. The first mighty ORCA who lived and died in captivity in the Northern Pacific region were of HIGH BLOOD to the current ORCA SCION. When the monsters who captured, enslaved, abused, tortured and ultimately held them in bondage until they simply expired from extreme physical distress, a powerful message spread across the ocean. Humans, being APEX creatures as well with a far higher level of intellect, yet a minuscule measure of empathy, wouldn’t see these actions as anything more than a failed attempt at “science.” This act of WAR by mankind against the ORCA was not something the SCION, ORCA or energetic genome consciousness of the ocean could or would ever forget. The first of many ORCA, who humans would brutalize and monetize, condemning them to die in extreme pain, let out a bellowing and desperate message in clicks stating what had been done to them. This message was cast in the common tone known to all creatures of the deep — a powerful and secret tool the ORCA were given by the greatgrandparents who once lived beneath the MIGHTY SHARKS of old. SHARKS and ORCA, despite the perception and observations of humans, are not enemies. They have both taken turns as SCION of the oceans again and again throughout time. The adversary perception is created by humans and is not based in any true OCEANIC TRUTH. The youngsters were led in to devour and tear apart every survivor who tried to escape. ATILLA would corner the POTEMKIN and singlehandedly smash the stern into the reef. ANTON fired a deck gun wildly into the crimson stew of bodies and ORCAS. Cursing and spitting as his ship exposed and engulfed him. Ultimately only one deckhand would survive and live to tell this tale back to me through bars of a CALCUTTA JAIL. But that is all another story for another time … ATILLA and his chosen few would linger for days making passes at the reef. It would be weeks before the wreckage was discovered and any inquiry was opened. The vessels that came looking were mostly local fish who they knew well and had a great mutual respect for. They too were hardened by this incursion of greed. The fishing grounds these salt of the earth humans shared with the ORCA had all but collapsed in the process of this FAUX SCIENTIFIC failure. ORCA, unlike humans, can forgive and find harmony even amongst their most bitter foe. The LION who stands tall over the Great Plains as ruler does not volley opinion or hold grudges against its subjects. When creatures move from the order, justice is swift, but always with RESPECT and COMPASSION. For this reason, ORCAS see humans as other lesser vassals in their kingdom who are due respect based upon ACTIONS not ASSUMPTIONS. Thus, the humble humans who do interact with ORCA in a state of respect are always treated with the same by the kingdom of ORCA. After ATILLA was certain none had survived, he returned to his POD and chose a new mate to start again. He had a little more than half of his tenure as SCION ahead of him. He knew he’d already more than cemented his legacy. But as with all things his book was yet to be written, and he’d sworn a BLOOD OATH against any vessel of men who treated them with disrespect through the waters that he and he alone was sworn to protect. FOLLOW FOR MORE WORK — IG: @UZIEGO | TUMBLR: @WTFCRAIGSLISTNYC 11
No. 119
ART BY PETER GLANTING 13
BY HANA ZITTEL The Great Displacement: Climate Change and the Next Great American Migration by Jake Bittle (2023) “The burden of relocation would fall on those who had the least ability to resist it.” Journalist Jake Bittle’s debut book examines the urgency of the climate crisis in the United States through the lens of those most directly impacted: those who are often forced into relocation and migration. While still regularly thought of as a future catastrophe, Bittle highlights the environmental destruction of global warming happening now and how these shifts compound with the inequities of capitalism and white supremacy to disproportionately harm select communities throughout the country. Bittle’s investigation starts in the precariously placed Florida Keys, an economy strongly dependent on heavy tourism. Here, the residents have a strong incentive to recover quickly after hurricanes whip through. However, as storms increase in intensity, recovery and rebuilding becomes more difficult and in some instances, impossible. In the case of the Florida Keys, Hurricane Irma’s level of destruction forced residents to abandon their homes, friends and for one man, his life’s work of preserving a global nursery that grew fruits found nowhere else in the United States. In Northern California, ravaging wildfires exacerbate a housing crisis that has priced people further and further out from their communities. The Pointe-au-Chien Tribe in Louisiana have been displaced from their land due to erosion driven by the careless greed of the oil and gas companies. Hurricane Floyd’s devastation forced residents from the historic Black neighborhood of Lincoln City, North Carolina, to accept FEMA buyout money to vacate their homes, finding that, “the FEMA money wasn’t sufficient to purchase a new home outright, so they had to take out new mortgages. For some families, these new mortgage payments kicked in just as they lost their jobs at DuPont or entered retirement.” The Great Displacement covers loss across the country, painting full stories of the impacts of climate migration as it is happening. Bittle illuminates the real individuals, historic sites and irreplaceable neighborhoods we will continue to lose as the climate crisis worsens. “By the time you read this, some new and unforeseen calamity may have already come to dominate the headlines. The levees are already breaking, the rivers are already running dry, the fire is already snaking through the forest.” For Bittle, the strengthening of government support and the right to home and shelter is the path forward when the options for turning back the clock on climate change seem insurmountable. His book serves as a warning that while the impacts may be inevitable, our response can help shape a more equitable world in the face of the climate crisis. The Talk by Darrin Bell (2023) Pulitzer Prize-winning cartoonist Darrin Bell’s latest graphic novel focuses on his own coming-of-age story, reflecting on growing up in Los Angeles as the biracial son of a white mother and Black father. As a child, Bell begged his mom for a water gun and was met with rejection. When she finally gave in, he was surprised that the one she got was bright green. He asked, “Why doesn’t it look like a REAL gun?” She explained that white people would see a little Black boy with a toy gun differently than a white boy. But Bell didn’t listen and instead of following her rules of only playing with it at home with his brother, he sneaks out to play Luke Skywalker in the neighborhood. When confronted and yelled at by a cop, he’s terrified and traumatized, just a 6-year-old kid playing outside, realizing the gravity of her warnings. Bell’s memoir highlights his defining life moments, but also the microaggressions and racism from teachers, other students and friends that shape the way he moves through the world. His mother does her best to shield him, and when he seeks guidance from his father about race, he receives little insightful direction on how to navigate life. Bell’s beautifully drawn memoir chronicles his growth as an editorial cartoonist and illustrator to his time at Berkeley to meeting his wife and starting a family. Coming full circle, Bell reflects on what it means to have a son of his own, reaching back to the memory of his own discussions of race with his parents, and choosing to take a different path. The Talk stands as an honest and memorable triumph in graphic storytelling. No. 119
ERIC JOYNER, A PLOT THICKENS - ERICJOYNER.COM
THE WALKING CITY PART 1 BY JASON HELLER Around Zelia the walls oozed. They clamped onto every side of her skinny frame like lips sucking a finger. When she lay perfectly still, she could feel a dull pulse run through the Gut’s smooth muscle. It was as though a dozen giant slugs were slithering across the surface of her gutsuit. Not that she’d ever seen a slug, let alone touched one. As with all animals, they existed only in myth, within the dim memory of the Mind. The closest thing to an animal that anyone had known in centuries was the vast, walking city of M’bul itself. Zelia occasionally came across half-digested, half-fossilized chunks of animals, along with the remnants of plants and rocks and soil that M’bul fed upon as it trod the barren land far below. After all, that was her job: to clear such blockage. The Gut always needed cleansing the day after M’bul sent down its massive feeding tube to suck up sustenance from the Remained. But those clots of unprocessed debris were required to be handed over to the Mind — as the Mind dictated — for preservation and study. She cleared her throat then inhaled deeply through her nosepiece. The airsacs in her gutsuit fluttered against her, alive in their own way. No. 119 Why am I letting my thoughts wander? That’s the first thing Lira warns her apprentices about: “Be ever aware. The Gut knows not the difference between sustenance and citizen.” Zelia was, she reminded herself, just a gutrat. A member of the Guild of the Body. The Mind spared her no attention. Why should she spare any attention to it? Plus, she had a more urgent thing to occupy her. Her job. Wriggling her right arm free — an effort that produced a slick, slurping sound — she reached up and adjusted her goggles. Their bioluminescent lenses cast a faint, green glow into the blackness ahead. She was in one of the tight, minor tubules that threaded themselves through the Gut. At the next junction, she should be able at last to pull herself into a larger passageway. There she’d continue toward her destination by crawling on all fours — or if the Gut were being particularly agreeable today, she might even be able to crouch-walk. For now though, she still had a quarter-mile or so left in the tubule. A quarter-mile of creeping along on her stomach, contorting herself to get through tricky loops and spirals. She thanked M’bul for the millionth
time that her nosepiece kept her from having to smell the Gut. Not that the Enclave wasn’t entirely saturated with that meaty, curdled stench. No wonder those who dwelled in the Heart above stuck their noses up at gutrats such as her. That is, in those rare instances when gutrats were allowed in the Heart. You’re daydreaming again, Zelia. Eyes empty, senses wide. Just ahead, lit by the pale green of her goggles, the walls of the tubule contracted. After shrinking to the width of her waist, they reopened. Then they shrank and opened again, like a throat swallowing. Thick strings of yellow-gray mucous webbed the sides of the opening — a ragged, irregular passageway, just wide enough for her to squirm through. Great. Peristalsis. The last thing Zelia wanted was to have to spend the night in the Gut. If she was going to have to navigate waves of spasms, it might take her hours to find the general location of the blockage. After that, it would take time to pinpoint the actual obstruction. Extraction would be next. By the time she was done with that, she’d be exhausted. She’d have to unpack a supper of dry, tasteless shingles — made, ironically, of the same material sucked up by the Gut, the raw stuff that formed all food eaten by the citizens of M’bul — and unroll her sleeping bag somewhere in a larger passageway. A stable one. One in which she wouldn’t be crushed should a dilation come in the middle of the night. Her mouthpiece rattled with the sound of her sigh. Maybe she should start pretending to be bad at her job. At the tender age of seventeen she was already one of the best gutrats in the Body. If not the best. Which, of course, is about the same as being the best inmate of the Cells. She gritted her teeth and tensed herself. Then she remembered Lira’s lessons. Relax. She breathed in through her nosepiece and out through her mouthpiece. She let herself go limp. Through the thin material of her gutsuit — itself sewn from the lining of the Gut — she felt the subtle undulations of muscle. She let them speak to her. Then, once she’d determined the intricate rhythm of their ebb and flow, she synchronized her muscles with them. They responded in kind. She began to swim. Loose and warm and liquid and smooth. No resistance. Only motion. She let her limbs hang limp at her side, her spine as free and flowing as the cilia that quivered like worms along the walls of the Gut. Somehow sensing the sympathetic movements of Zelia’s posture, M’bul itself carried her along as if she were a part of it. Which, Zelia knew — as did all of the hundred thousand citizens of M’bul — was more or less true. As she often did when she surfed the Gut, she lapsed into a trance. It made it easier to operate on sheer instinct as she simultaneously swam and was pushed through the tubules. A form of meditation, Lira instructed. But trancing also gave her a chance to remember. Lira, as much as Zelia loved her, wasn’t the first to have shown her the ways of the Gut. Her mother and father, Zoria and Owim, did. Zelia remembered her mother’s red hair, the same color as her own, and the scrawl of ceremonial scars that marked her skin like script. Her father’s face had been dark brown; Zelia got the kink in her hair from him. She didn’t inherit much else from him though. He had been solid and stable, neither quiet nor loud. In conversation Zelia was often both quiet and loud, sometimes within the span of a single sentence. Things didn’t get better ten years ago when, soon after Zelia’s seventh birthday, both Zoria and Owin had been lost in the Rupture. She had watched them tumble and fall until they vanished into the wasteland of the Remained. They clutched each other as they plummeted, she remembered. They never screamed. As Zelia had grown older and fiercer, Lira worked patiently to help her curb her volatility. But the more the wise, kind leader of the Guild of the Body tried teaching her to be calm and thoughtful, the more Zelia pushed back. She knew that, deep in Lira’s soul, the old woman must regret adopting her after her parents’ death. It wasn’t all difficulty though. If less than an ideal daughter, Zelia had at least proven to Lira that she could be a worthy pupil. She still recalled the first day Lira had brought her into the Gut. Zelia’s parents had only been dead for weeks, and she had just begun to fall asleep each night without tears. Her mother had taught her some of the basics of the Gut, but nothing as advanced as surging. It was Lira who had seen the potential in Zelia. In her small, wiry frame. In her fierce, hungry intelligence. In her sensitivity, even when it seemed she was the least sensitive girl in M’bul. At least that’s what Lira had told her when, sputtering and shaking, the seven-year-old Zelia had emerged from her first tubule. She had survived her rite of passage, her gutswim, and she had done it five years earlier than most apprentices of the Guild. She didn’t sputter or shudder now. Even lost in a trancelike haze of recollection, halfway between sleeping and waking, she sensed she was nearing the junction. Still surging, she opened her eyes. Lit by her ghostly gogglelight, the flesh and bone and squishy plastics and soft metals of the walls blurred by in mottled patterns. She pressed her ankles gently against the walls, slowing her surge. Soon she came to a stop. The aperture ahead was ringed with cilia. Beyond the opening was a chamber. It throbbed with a pale luminescence, the same green glow that suffused her goggles. She crawled through the opening and dropped to the chamber floor below. She landed with a splash. The gastric fluid, warm and thick as spit, went up to her knees. With a grunt she began to slosh through it. High above her, the ceiling of the chamber arched and dripped. She cleared the blobs of slime from her lenses with her fingertips then fixed her eyes on the opposite wall. There. The blistering. The discoloration. Damn it. She tromped closer to the wall. The swelling became clearer. It wasn’t large, but it was large enough. A shell or mineral fragment of some kind had lodged itself in the tissue of the wall. The wet, green flesh had already begun to grow over it, causing an infection. A phosphorescent yellow pus dribbled from the bottom of it, leaving a livid streak. As efficient and well maintained as M’bul was, it couldn’t always fully digest everything it drew from the Remained. M’bul was old. It was heresy to speak such things in the Heart, Zelia knew, but down here in the Gut, it was just a fact. Before she could reach the embedded object though, the jellylike fluid in which she stood began to quiver. The floor of the chamber began to vibrate. Zelia tensed. What is this? It isn’t the chamber itself. Attuned to every nuance of the Gut, she knew the disturbance came from a deeper place. From everywhere. She’d never felt anything like it before. M’bul wasn’t perfect, true. But the great walking city never trembled like this. Its monolithic legs — each many miles high — absorbed all shock as it strode the Remained in search of sustenance. Now though, as she looked up in time for a gob of gastric fluid to splatter her goggles, she knew something wasn’t right. She sighed and let her shoulders slump. If this winds up making me late for supper, Lira will cook me herself. Then the oozing ceiling came down on her. To be continued ...
The month of American thanks be upon us! With the backstory force-fed to children from sea to shining sea being absolute bullshit, this tall tale from the land of Plymouth Rock — which, by the by, give that a quick Google image search and make wonder at the sheer (lack of) size of the legendary keystone of these United States — should make a nice aperitif to the historically whitewashed conventions of the dankbarkeitsgeist. That’s the Thanksgiving Spirit for people still celebrating Oktoberfest. It’s said that once upon a time — some time well before the 1830s or 40s when African American shanties celebrating our hero’s tremendous exploits appeared in the musical lexicon — a baby some 3 fathoms by depth (it being a shanty, they utilized the common maritime expression in lieu of the English measurement of 18 feet or the even more accurate Bay Staters’ 617,436 clams big by volume) was discovered beached on the shores of Cape Cod. Nobody spells out what occurred in the interim between this period and the point at which the boy first took to sailing. But we can surmise that there are small islands built on the child’s oceanic waste deposits. Looking at you, Nantucket. Whether he was mothered by a single woman and fathered by her betrothed or administered to in the most classical terms of “it takes a village” is unknown. But someone, perhaps the boy himself, gave him a name: Alfred Bulltop Stormalong. A name that, honestly, someone should have kept using regardless of the unlikelihood of genealogical affiliation. You know, on account of being a myth. Still. Later he would be known as Captain and further into his mortal twilight and beyond simply as Old Stormalong (to be pronounced with Fred Gwynne’s accent from the 1989 Pet Semetary). He would ultimately grow to 30 feet and become master and commander of the Courser, a clipper so tall it had masts hinged so as not to snag the moon. You see how this is already a much better fairytale than Thanksgiving, yeah? Stories tell that the boy outgrew Cape Cod and with tears (most likely of joy that the incredible burden of a giant-child were ending) streaming down the faces of the citizenry as they bid him bon voyage, Stormalong traveled to Boston to take up his first job as a deckhand at the age of 12. Nary is spoken of the travels at sea except that at some point his vessel was attacked by the nefarious Kraken, a sea demon best known for plaguing the vikings of yore, and Stormalong heaved to, leaping overboard to battle the beast in its own element. He intended to kill but, nay, t’was not to be. The beast wriggled from his grasp and escaped. Stormalong, bereft in his failure, retired to farm somewhere in the Midwest. But a sea-borne boy could nae resist its siren’s song. Also he was catching a lot of very passive-aggressive Midwestern politeness every time he showed up at the Culver’s to once again order the entire menu (and on credit no less; have you seen what farmers make?) and felt like it was time to leave. So return to the briny did he. Like all nebulous biomes — and this explicitly includes Las Vegas as was made clear in a very annoying ad campaign — stories made on the ocean tend to remain with the ocean, and Stormalong’s are no exception. We’ve not caught so much as the salty whisper of how he came to captain the Courser (also named the Tuscarora depending on the telling), or even how he came to possess such a ship, which is said to require a corral of Arabian stallions to ferry the crew from bow to stern. One story that is told, however, is of the creation of the Panama Canal. Sure, your woke-ass history books will tell you it was largely the low-wage labor of thousands of people being worked near-to-death in the name of shipping capital. But the real story? Well that, my friends, is because a blind drunk Captain Alfred Bulltop Stormalong wanted to get to the Pacific so badly he just rammed on through, leaving a perfectly shaped conduit in his wake. Just more proof in the long list of reasons to trust every time-saving idea you have while wasted. That wouldn’t be the only narrow pelagic interaction the captain would come to be known for. With the Icarian hubris of a child testing their nasal capacity with Skittles, Captain Stormalong managed to parody a future marine folly and lodge his ship in the English Channel. The solution was obvious. Apply enough soap to the hull and bango-bongo, it’ll slide on through. Which it did. Directly into the suction-puckered limbs of the very Kraken Stormalong had battled all those years before. It found no purchase on the sudsy ship however, and was forced to retreat. But that unreasonable application of Scrubbing Bubbles remains the reason that, to this day, the Cliffs of Dover bear their ivory sheen. A final reckoning with the malicious monstrosity occurred off the coast of Greece where Stormalong, summoning Super Mario-level plumbing power, flushed it into the whirlpool Charybdis, funneling it directly to Hades. Stormalong’s life would come to a fatal end after winning a Transatlantic Race on a dare from some upstart young captain who thought, against all odds, that he could beat a 30-foot tall guy who punched a monster into Greek Hell. Stormalong wins, of course, but age and anxiety took its toll and the former biggest baby in Cape Cod (I’m positive there are regional politics that would countenance a more recent competitor) collapsed, his body returned to the sea from whence it came. Davy Jones himself opened up his mystical locker (not a euphemism despite ubiquitous rumors about men at sea) to receive the legend, ever to dwell in his watery tomb. As tales from Massachusetts go, I’d say this one’s got the Pilgrims plum beat. HAVE QUESTIONS ABOUT THE PARANORMAL? SEND THEM TO: WEREWOLFRADARPOD@GMAIL.COM OR TWITTER: @WEREWOLFRADAR. IT’S A BIG, WEIRD WORLD. DON’T BE SCARED. BE PREPARED. No. 119 Riders on the Corn BY NATE BALDING
ENDLESS, NAMELESS – LIVING WITHOUT Touchstones of black metal, mathcore, post-punk and shoegaze flow all across this album in entrancing interplay with each other in every track. What is most striking is how there is a raw vitality and intimacy inherent to the songs that draw you in like an incredibly personal, bedroom recorded folk song. “A World So Kind” has the cascading guitar arpeggios that only the most nerdy of guitar wizards can execute reliably. But in the middle of the song there is a moment of tranquil ambient soundscaping that feels like one’s heart expanding to fit in more of the world that you knew you had room for. Even when Endless, Nameless careen into aggressive and seemingly clashing dynamics, there is an unmistakable vulnerability to the way the songs seem crafted that renders music that might be opaque to some people open and accessible. What makes Endless, Nameless special is how its hybrid style invites the listener in on the band’s own journey of self-discovery and evolution beyond a conditioned rigidity of feeling and spirit to something more tender and curious, and that is what you hear throughout this set of songs. KILL YOUR DARLINGS – VESTIGIAL HEARTS Brett Darling should be remembered for art rock band Slow Crash, dance synth punk phenoms Pep*Squad, noise project Pulled at Four Pins or avant-pop group Stella Luce. Yet it all seems like a preparation for darkwave duo kill your darlings with his wife Jayme. There’s something gloriously unvarnished and unabashed about the noisy synths under and over menacing melodies and what sounds like drum machines combined with physical utility percussion in the mix here, like it was all done purely for fun without any pressure to adhere to genre tropes. The vocal processing could be like something out of early 2000s EBM with the sound overall like a future pop band that didn’t take itself too seriously, but ended up writing songs that have an emotional heft and sharp social commentary. Think a surprisingly cool soundtrack to some late 80s or early 90s cyberpunk film where the music has more of a cult following than the movie. Fans of Velvet Acid Christ and Skinny Puppy’s more pop end will appreciate this best. DEREK KNIERIM, CONSUME
BY TOM MURPHY M. SAGE – PARADISE CRICK Matthew Sage wrote and recorded this album from 2017-2021 while based out of Chicago. But its exquisitely textured ambient soundscapes sound like detailed and vivid emotional images of Sage’s upbringing in Fort Collins, CO. With an ear for subtlety in transitions, rhythms and tone, he has a gift for finding the exact combination of sounds to express the energy of a path through the woods in the bright sun of a late winter morning, the babbling of a nearby brook and the myriad insects and fish, of the brisk wind in middle spring, of meandering roads and trails, and the movements of grass and trees. Sage seems to have a mystical, Zen awareness of the environment as a whole experience across time and an attention to the minutiae of composition and sensory stimuli in these pieces. The result feels like organic arrangements manifested through a masterful fusion of electronic sounds and those more physical, laid out to great effect. RYAN WONG – THE NEW COUNTRY SOUNDS OF RYAN WONG Ryan Wong is best known for his contributions to psychedelic rock, garage rock and postpunk in groups like Supreme Joy, Cool Ghouls and Easy Ease. So this album of lightly shimmery country seemed to have come out of left field. Wong embraces a vocal style here that can veer slightly off center now and then, but that just lends the often more straight-ahead style of homespun immediacy. There’s an underlying sense of humor that is both self-aware and self-effacing, and a song like “Yo Yo” sounds like something Lou Reed might have written had he tried his hand at country before going on to form The Velvet Underground. “Cold Beer” is like a parody of country story songs of yesteryear with spoken word sections, but like the rest of the album, it showcases Wong’s command of the style and his gift for songwriting outside his usual wheelhouse. FOR MORE, VISIT QUEENCITYSOUNDSANDART.WORDPRESS.COM 25
DAVE DANZARA, CONTROL - @LOSTINTIMEDESIGNS
GRANMONDO AKA ED BARGER, A WAY HOME
MYKOLA, LURKING “KAI AT BEACH WITH A FLOCK OF BIRDYS, ONE OF ED BARGER’S LAST AI PIECES,” PHOTO COURTESY OF MARK MOTHERSBAUGH 29
Log 252 By Godric Photo by Ethan Champion
Spat as rioted rain Coated In frostbitten pain Cracked & Spread old parts exchanged Feet unrubbed ... untamed groan songs of a thousand nights they whispered Reigned NOW PLAYING: “Dread Collecting Heads” Starring Wishes Leaking and Nostalgia Red Existence yawns! long & strong Heaven fed her histories read friends that won’t be brothers I can’t see Every shadow peaks splitting memory in two Growing ain’t going easy a mystery steel as bone Losing skin washed and pressed down wares of a new home Hear those swords clashing? Shields shattering like gongs Souls revolutionizing tired as fire yes yet burning on Lose the liar let no hearts bemoan We! Magician-licked and wired God’s original dial, eternal tone. FOLLOW GODRIC: INSTAGRAM, PINTEREST, TUMBLR, FACEBOOK, TWITTER: @GODRINATI SOUNDCLOUD: SOUNDCLOUD.COM/GODRINATI ART BY S. PUTNIK
GRANMONDO AKA ED BARGER, DREAM HOME
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