Some books and other news

Here are some books I read recently: 

The Prodigal by Alexander J. Allison

I think I enjoyed this more than I thought I would. It seems really 'tight', like a lot of hard work and care has gone into it.
Not sure about the different font sizes used, whether that adds anything or not.
Seems very British in style/tone.


Baby Babe by Ana C.

Think Ana (along with DJ Berndt) is one of the people that I have known the longest in the online writing community. Some of the pieces in this I remember reading on her blog a few years ago when my life was very different and made me feel kind of nostalgic for that time.
For some reason I was expecting this to just be laid out like a very standard poetry book, or at least something like Ellen Kennedy's 'Sometimes My Heart Pushes Against My Ribs', in terms of style. There're a lot of illustrations and stuff though, which kind of reminds me of a zine in some ways. The paper is a couple shades lighter than the Financial Times. Seems cool.


You Private Person by Richard Chiem

Remember reading 'What if, Wendy' on my iPhone at my Dad's old house when it came out then commenting on his blog that is reminded me of Marguerite Duras. Not entirely sure if that comparison is appropriate, but I think I get the same kind of feeling reading both of them. Some of these stories are almost like prose-poems in a way. Not really sure what classifies a prose-poem. Basically what I'm saying is that the writing is really good.

Bluebird and other tattoos by Luna Miguel

According to Goodreads, this book has been on my to-read list since 2011. The book is divided into three parts, or eras - 2005-2008, 2009-2010, 2010-2011. Enjoyed reading her 'progress' as a writer. I think I tweeted something from this. Can't find it now. Damn.
The guy from Scrambler books had to send out replacement copies of this and You Private Person, because apparently a load he shipped out went missing int he post. Seems shitty they went missing, but v nice he replaced them. If I ever get the originals he posted I'll give them away. On here or twitter or something.


Other news:

1) Selfies with books you read seem really cool, right?

2) So far in 2013 I've had 2 new stories published. The first, 'Fortuna' (english title is currently 'Backbone') in Italian magazine Zamenhof. It was translated by the talented Livia Franchini.

The second, Saturday Night Babestation Viewer, in the new excellent edition of Shabby Doll House. There's so much good stuff in this issue, if you haven't check it out already.

3) You may have noticed I took down the links to stories published online on the side. I've been reworking a lot of the stories, plus some new unpublished stuff into a collection. It's called 'Everything's A Joke To You'. Not really sure what I will do with it. It's 13K words long, which seems too long to turn into an ebook/something to be read online, but maybe too short for a physical book. Let me know what you think.

4) I am going to be reading at this soon with some of my favourite people.

This blog is nearly 4 years old now. Seems crazy. Sometimes I regret calling it 'library of dust', sometimes I don't. It's from an article from national geographic about a book about the unclaimed urns of dead patients from a mental asylum. The urns had developed these weird patterns over time. I used to be interested in stuff like that.

Just thought,
'Where am I going goddamnit'

I'm on a coach in London.

I don't know what I'm doing.

The man across from me has this fluffy red thing pinned to his suit jacket that looks like it should have googley-eyes attached to it. I wonder how well he gets on with his wife. I wonder how he makes his coffee on a weekend morning.

I'll never get that.

Around the time I read national geographic I would occasionally buy this magazine called monocle. Have you seen it? I don't know who their demographic is but it's probably not me. It's aimed at young men who travel business class. Who travel. As mentioned, I travel national express. Not sure what magazines there are for this demographic. But then I'm here sitting next to this dapper old man and maybe the only reason I'm thinking of that magazine is because to turn into someone like him you would have to read a magazine like that at my age.

At some point in the last four years, maybe 3 years ago, I used to visit my girlfriend-at-the-time in derby. I lived in this bedsit that didn't have any Internet and I would have to go into town to use the public library computers to buy and print off my train tickets. Megabus had this deal with the train company, but after a few uncomfortable and noisy trips I realised that a first class ticket bought far enough in advance was not really that much more expensive. I got a free paper and free coffee refills. I remember coming home in the first class carriage, being served coffee, staring out the window at nothing because it was dark, realizing that what I was losing was beyond my control.

why i didn't publish those tweets.

1.

i felt like the measurement of the cut was inaccurate i think. and i'm sure no one really cares. there was a lot of blood though. i enjoy shaving. i use a safety razor and badger brush. it seems therapeutic sometimes. and so satisfying when you've been growing it for a while. if i wasn't so anal about it i would shave every morning, stare in the mirror, dwell on what an awful person i am.

2.

this one was a quote from a lorrie moore reading that you can download as a podcast on itunes somewhere. i like the advice of writing something you wouldn't show your mother. feel like i am always terrified at the idea of my parents reading my writing. i wouldn't be able to deal with their disapproval. i considered the other day that maybe i should have gotten my mum a lorrie moore book for christmas. i think she'd like her. i like to drink a lot of coffee. had doubts at the time with regards to concordance with other recent tweets. 

3.

i remember leaving susie's old house before the sun was up. we got on a train, got on more trains, went to an airport. had breakfast. said goodbye. i got on a train, got on another train. just as i was getting home the sunset was coming through the window. i started writing this tweet and then i lost signal. then i just forgot about it. 

03/02/2011

Has not being in a relationship made me realise how unhappy I really am

If I cannot be happy on my own then why should I be in a relationship

14/02/2011

Saturday night with Jacob telling me how in love with his girlfriend he was

woke up at 12 on sunday

had a dream I was still living with J.

05/01/2011

I did not go swimming today as planned

I have done very little

I emailed my psychology tutor

somehow in my head I define this as work

my brain feels good when I am learning, working, reading, writing

and yet I choose not to engage in these activities

I have not been able to concentrate 

my whole life

to avoid dealing with the present 

I make things up all the time

Up until around 2pm there's the lingering thought that something might happen, that the day will not be like every other day, that something will be achieved

after this time, i do not care

between 2pm and when I fall asleep, I forget all the things I promised myself I would do

06/01/2011

I did not go swimming today as planned

My alarm woke me at 6:42 

I felt I was in a heavy sleep

I turned the radio on and went back to sleep

I woke intermittently and finally got out of bed at 10

I spent half an hour in the bathroom

07/01/2011

Interesting to know that Jeffrey Brown was 25 when he started his MFA

Before he wrote Clumsy… perhaps? 

Today is slowly running out and I haven't done anything

The things I have done today have not taken that long

Monk's house is closed until April

Will have to find somewhere else to go in the meantime

My computer says midnight

12/01/2011

I went to the library to print off an essay

Walking out of the library I saw N. waiting for her student

When her student arrived we were introduced

Her student said 'Hola'

I said 'I don't speak Spanish'

N. said, 'Okay I'll see you later'

I paused for a moment thinking 'when?'

Then I said bye and walked away quickly

As I left I thought 'I would pay twice the amount for printing so i could have an awkward 30 second conversation with you'

I spoke to J. today for the first time since we broke up

02/01/2011

I have started taking diversion on my way into town and my way home so that my journey includes walking along the seafront

I don't think this has been for the view of the coast, the beach or anything like that, but the houses on the opposite side of the road

I don't know why

I walked along the seafront, down the road leading towards the aquarium

I passed houses converted into hotels

On the steps of one I saw the back of a potentially beautiful young girl stood with her luggage, waiting, staring out at the sea

As I passed her I noticed the sun, partly obscured by a large grey cloud, a heavy mist of orange, a line along the still water

two fingers fell on my iphone until i reached the end of the road where at least three people stood taking pictures

further along the road, more people had stopped and were staring

people are always so surprised by things like sunsets and new years

I don't need my glasses as much as some people do

the prescription isn't strong enough that I would be blind without them

but when I don't wear anything everything is less focused

less detailed

I find myself being distracted less

04/01/2011

I started reading a book 

having had it recommended to me by a girl I found attractive, the name of the book and author stuck in my head probably more than if I had seen it recommended on htmlgiant

I have considered that this is why I do many things in life

to gain the attention of someone

but once I have their attention and I no longer need it 

I am left with something far more worthwhile

03/01/2011

distances on a map can be hard to mentally conceptualise

walking back from somewhere you have just been for the first time can often seem to take half the time it took to get there

walking from lewes to offham i saw a mcdonalds bag at the side of the road

i saw a full bottle of M&S sparkling orange juice

two pheasant feathers

"[Bergotte] excused his behaviour to himself because he knew he could never produce so well as in an atmosphere where he felt he was in love. Love, no, pleasure well rooted in the flesh helps literary work because it cancels out other pleasures, the pleasures of social life, for example, which are the same for everyone. And even if this love brings disillusion, at least that too keeps the surface of the soul in motion, where otherwise it might become stagnant."

going to the beach at midnight with someone you love may seem romantic but you cannot really enjoy it for what it is

part of you will be wanting to enjoy the other persons company and make conversation with them

you will be there but you won't be

the best company in these instances is probably a dog

Alt Lit Cityscapes Promo Post

Hi,

I'm not really sure who reads this now. Like, if we're friends on facebook then you probably already know this but Alt Lit Cityscapes is now out. It has 39 other writers and they are all great. I want to pick this book out of the internet and hold it tightly in my fists.

The premise of the book is 'people writing about the city that they live in'. I feel like I've written a bit about Brighton in the past. I wrote this short story that was in Wtf Pwm and it says something like, in this city it seems like no one is ever at work. Since writing that story I have heard other people say that too. I don't know, have you seen some of the assholes in Brighton?

Other things: I read recently at an event called Brit Lit Tea Time. Not really sure what time of day 'tea time' is supposed to be but we turned up around 8pm and had already been drinking. I enjoyed reading, it's been a while. I haven't seen Vicki Tingle read in a while as well and that was really good. Other notable peeps I can remember off the top of my head are Susie Anderson, Crispin Best, Livia Franchini, and Peter Bloxham who did one of the funniest readings I have seen in a while. Not Lucy K Shaw though. Did not like her one bit. Thanks Paige for putting it on, although I feel like maybe you won't read this. I don't know. Blogspot...

Keep on singing along to Why? songs and then getting like one word slightly wrong.

Here's a video of me playing bass for Keel Her a couple of weeks ago:

Charles Mingus or I Feel Like This is How I'll Always Feel (2011)

1. Fluid or something pressing onto the back of my eyeball. Is this cancer, a brain tumour?

            I will take asprin (two a day) and drink Britta filtered water until I need to pee every five minutes and will never go to the doctor.

I will look at Tea in Infinity Foods that has the word “DETOX” written on the box.

I will pick up the box and read the packaging. I will look either side of me to make sure no one is watching before bringing it to my nostrils and breathing in.

            I will look at the price and put it back on the shelf, promising myself I will just eat better and stop buying junk food and take aways and only listen to French Language Builder by Michel Thomas when I am walking in the wilderness, meditating on how to live a better life.

            I will start running again.

2. I’ve got to tell you I feel pretty incredible right now.

Incredible.

            My room is glowing with the soft sunlight filtering through my white curtains. Soon I will open them and look at all the beautiful people that walk past my window.

            Sometimes when I am walking down the street I want to give high-fives to everyone I pass and use the word “beautiful” three times in a sentence and for them to agree with me and smile. But some people gain no pleasure from high-fives or conversation and you have to respect peoples boundaries.

            I cannot imagine a future not feeling like this and every second before that I have ever experienced is being re-experienced through this new emotion, filtered through the curtains of feeling incredible right now.

3. A small ball of violent energy is inside my chest. There are so many things I want to achieve.

            I get a phonecall and we talk from half eleven to half past midnight.

            We have a weird relationship, she says, although maybe she didn’t use the term “relationship” but something else, softer.

            Perhaps I have turned a corner now though. I feel positive. I feel powerful. I can see myself devoting more time to doing things that I want to do.

            It’s strange how dinosaurs haven’t evolved since Jurassic Park, she said.

We both laughed at that.

4. I want everyone to know. I always want everyone to know. Always.

            I do not want to seem obscure or mysterious in my feelings, I want people to know how I feel. And I feel this is very human.

            People like to take pictures of themselves kissing a new partner on the lips, a close-up of both their cheeks, half their faces, barely recognisable, because they want people to recognise that they are not alone and they feel strong emotions for another human being, and this behaviour is very human.

            I want to post pictures of how I feel to all my friends. They will wake up one morning and go downstairs to make breakfast in their dressing gown and just as they reach the bottom of the stairs they will see a collection of letters and take away menus. They will look through them, not expecting to see anything special, but then they will find a postcard from me with a picture of how I feel on the front.

            And then they will know.

5. I feel like part of me is like this all of the time but maybe not right now because I am suddenly feeling the effects of the coffee I just drank and it’s 9pm on a Monday night and I haven’t felt like this from drinking coffee in a long time.

            My chest is suddenly restless.

            My skin is vibrating.

          I have been avoiding things lately. I know this because when I avoid things I join internet dating sites and masturbate more frequently and I am not like this.

            I am not like this.

            She asked, How was your outer body experience, because she was more experienced with drugs and it was just a joke anyway. I don’t know if this has effected her view of me, but she is at least partly to blame.

I can’t tell her this.

            I feel emotionally resilient like nothing can get the better of me; I don’t feel like hugging anyone, I just feel really awake at 5am and I write with restlessness thinking repeatedly of her ‘Some guy I’d like’-description.

I feel like highlighting all of the previous lines and then pressing the delete button and instead typing the word “jealousy” in bold capital letters and I really hope this is not how I’ll always feel.

6. I feel like I’ll always tell myself I am content in solitude. I spent the morning looking at google maps of Ukraine on street view. I wanted to know what Ukrainian suburbia looked like, if it was anything like the town I grew up in. But I kept on being drawn back to the city, where the window frames were ornate in a typical Eastern European way and I was reminded of Western film sets from the 60s.

            There was one picture of a model of a man with stilted legs hanging on to a balcony.

            There was one picture of a sign-post written in Ukrainian, a grey sky behind.

            There was one picture of an old woman carrying shopping bags in the middle of a crossroad.

            Who takes these pictures, I wondered. The indiscriminate capturing of a landscape. A photographer with no artistic aspirations or pretensions.

            I think I want that job.

            I want to work for google and travel every country writing down everything about every street, without similes or metaphor, without paragraphs or punctuation, until all my words turn into a pixelated blur.

            You will be able to go to the ‘more’ tab on google.com and it will be on the dropdown menu under ‘The World’ and you will be able to search for your childhood home or where you’re going on holiday next summer and I will be able to tell you how mundane it all is.

            I think I would like that.

             

7. I feel like this is how I’ll always feel whenever I look back at anything I have ever made after some time away from it.

            All the faults become clear and everything I thought was good turns into something pathetic.

I will worry about this.

I will walk and walk and worry and swear to myself that I will do something.

Or, I don’t know.

I probably won’t do anything.

Viewing

3:AM published a short story by me titled 'viewing'

Will try and post another excerpt tomorrow. Soz. Sometime soon...

Trailers

I. and U. appear at the top of the train station underpass as if they’re late for something. Or they are late, or something.

The train station platform is crowded, commuters look down the train tracks, impatient; the waiting room is full. In the town where I. and U. live, you only ever see people at train stations or bus stops.

I. and U. walk half-way down the platform, stopping to lean against a large poster for an exhibition at the Royal Academy of Arts. U. puts her hand over a breast and makes a face. She is wearing a hoodie and an oversized t-shirt that reaches half way down her thighs. The t-shirt has a picture of a kitten wearing sunglasses on it.

I. looks at the kitten, then at U.

I. touches his face. He feels the warmth of his cheeks against his cold fingers.

‘It’s busy,’ says U.

I. looks around as if he hasn’t noticed the other people there. ‘I want to teleport,’ he says. ‘I’m cold,’ he says. ‘Are you cold?’

‘Your cheeks are red,’ says U.

A pre-recorded voice coming from a speaker above their heads tells them to report any suspicious items or luggage. There is a vending machine next to where they are standing and I. reads out the prices in an increasingly exaggeratedly shocked voice. A pre-recorded voice announces that it is sorry for the delay with the train, which is due to a fatality. 

‘They say that to make you feel bad,’ says I.

U. reminds him again that he should not have crashed the car.

‘Like I did it on purpose.’

‘I’m kidding.’

One light, then two appear in the distance. The lights become larger and brighter as the train begins to bend on a corner and come closer. The tracks below make shaking, high-pitched noises. Carriages pull in and people leave their positions, walking alongside the train, quickening their stride the slower the train moves.

A man around I. and U.’s age with a  protruding Adams-apple and patchy facial hair, a tattered library book by Tove Jansson in his hand, jogs past. He chases the train as if it is never going to stop and he will have to leap from the platform and cling to the door. I. feels an urge to stop him, call out and tell him it is okay, that they would all get their turn, their very own seat, once the train had stopped moving. Or maybe, he thinks, it would be funny to see him jump onto the still moving train and make it successfully without completely destroying his human body in the process.

They get on the train and sit down in a table booth opposite a man who has fallen asleep with his face pressed against the window and a woman whose body and face are half obscured by a copy of the Metro. The doors bleep close, the carriage jolts forward. They pull away from the station.

In the dark, I. looks for Molineaux Place—for the window of their apartment that overlooks the train tracks—but he had turned all the lights off himself and all he can see now is a reflection of the interior of the carriage: himself, U. and the passengers across from them. And then a reflection of this again and again and again, versions of themselves shrinking in millimetre increments.

They arrive at a different station.

They walk, holding hands. Everywhere is closed now apart from a few off-licenses, but there is one shop where U. stops and points—not with one finger, but both hands pressed against the glass—at a stuffed pigeon on display. 

She wonders out loud how much it costs.

‘A dead animal?’ I. says. ‘Maybe I can get that for you for your birthday.’

‘I didn’t say I wanted it. I just bet it costs like, a ridiculous amount.’

They walk until they are in a residential area of the city, one row of houses after another, Nissan Figaro’s parked in dead leaves. 

The cinema is crowded when they get there. They both struggle to squeeze through the doors that are being blocked by the people already inside.

I. gets in line for the kiosk.

‘I’m going to sit down,’ says U.

I. gives U. her ticket.

‘Put your hoodie on the chair next to you,’ says I.

She has already turned to leave and looks over her shoulder as he says this, giving him a look that means what he has just said was so obvious that there was really no need to say it and the fact that he has said it is further proof of his own stupidity.

She disappears behind the entrance door.

I. looks at the long lines of corduroy that run down the back of the man in front of him and imagines making similar lines in mash potato with the back of his fork. He finds this thought calming in a claustrophobic setting.

I. buys beer and popcorn and has his ticket torn halfway down the middle.

He looks for the back of U.’s head amongst the rows of chairs.

He sits down next to her.

‘The trailers have just finished,’ she says.

- excerpt from 'Last Week', a novella. 

Lots of love

'I don't want to offend anyone, I'm sorry, but literally no men know how to work a washing machine.'

A girl said this in a lecture yesterday. 

Maybe her bf is a moron and she thinks all men are like her bf. 

I don't know. 

At some point soon I will have a short story up on a website.

Have kind of been waiting for them to post it. 

They haven't posted it yet.

Think I'm gonna start posting excerpts from this novella I wrote a while ago. 

Then I'll just post it as a pdf or something. 

It's really sunny today.

Makes me want to watch films by Eric Rohmer. 

Instead I'm going to go to the library. 

My hair is getting pretty long now. 

I need to get my eyes checked.

I need to buy some new glasses maybe.

I need to find somewhere to live. 

LOL, 

GR.

C.P. Cavafy

I was in the library and it was quiet.

Earlier I got a phone call and left the library to take the call outside despite other people talking and even others talking on their phones.

It was windy outside.

This morning I watched an episode of Tintin. Much of the episode storyline was used in the recent film. It's where Tintin first meets captain haddock. Snowy finds a tin a crab meat (crabe extra).

Here is how I rate all the snowy incarnations:
1/ BD (book) version of snowy where you are told what he is thinking.
2/ cartoon version of snowy where he barks a lot and is quite expressive.
3/ film snowy, who is just like there I guess, just being a deus ex machina.

I've spent hardly any time in the library this year.

I like to set my timer while I'm working so that I know I can definitely have a break once the timer has finished.

They have a book of letters by Samuel Beckett in the library. I was looking through the chronology of it earlier. Seems like it took him a long time to get Watt published. Like I don't even think I found out when it was published. Just seemed like he sent it to a lot of publishers and they said no. Seems like Simone de Beauvoir rejected something by him and then was like writing him letters asking for stuff to publish once his trilogy of books was picked up and georges bataille wrote a sweet essay on Molloy.

Makes her seem like a bitch.

Walking through town I saw a man and a woman walking at a fast pace next to each other. As I passed them the woman said to the man, "Listen you are not my type of man. At all. Not one little bit."

I guess I felt sorry for him.

I wondered what her type was.

Girls like guys with criminal records and scars (not acne scars) etc. etc. etc.

I guess I used to be scared of getting beaten up when I was a teenager. I got threatened. Then I went to Uni and came back and one night I went out with some old school friends and this group of guys started saying stuff to us. I started shouting at them but they did nothing.

Harry reminds me of that night sometimes. He's a lot bigger than me and it surprises me he was scared how they'd react.

Harry is in Germany now.

I don't know if this bio oil or this clean and clear deep cleansing lotion is working at all. Like, maybe it is.

I'd like to get a tan this summer.

Five pounds

MOVIE REVIEW!!! (not a review)

OSLO AUGUST 31

I watched this film for the second time last night. The first time, it was late and I was watching it on my girlfriend's laptop and I fell asleep. Last night I had finished watching season 1 of Game of Thrones and was putting off starting an essay on youth suicide.  

Oslo August 31 is based on the book 'Le Feu Follet' by Pierre Drieu La Rochelle. There's another film adaptation of the book, directed by Louis Malle - a 1960s French New Wave-era film, black and white with an Erik Satie soundtrack. Both films though are very different, kind of like how Eric Rohmer's six moral tales all follow the same plot line but are all different takes on that plot line.  

The plot line is: a day in the life of a man who is a recovering addict and about to be let out of rehab.

I guess both are quite bleak, existential films. 

An ad for 'flu-camp' just came on on spotify. 

That reminds me, there's this scene in Oslo August 31 where the main character, Anders, is going for a job interview at this magazine and he starts complaining about a recent article the magazine ran called 'Mad Men and The Man Without Qualities'. I think the first time I watched the film I woke my girlfriend up, who was turned on her side away from me, laughing about that like an asshole laughing just because he 'gets' something. 

Anders admits to being a spoilt brat that's just fucked up.

The man who plays Anders, Anders Danielsen Lie, was in another film by the same director/writer team, Reprise. If you haven't seen Reprise and you're reading this blog then maybe you should, you'll probably like it. It's about two friends in their earlier twenties who want to become published writers. One gets published and goes mental, the other feels like a failure for a bit then ends up getting published too but his book gets slammed, but then other things happen. I thought the idea of this film was going to be too similar to that of the first character in Reprise. It is similar in a way I guess. Similar in that you can tell it's the same director behind it etc., but I feel that they have done well in making the characters very different, even with the same actor playing them. 

That paragraph seems to make no sense. 

I liked recognizing places that I had been to in Oslo while watching the film. Feel like I spent a lot of time looking for places to see if I recognized them or not. 

Recently my nose has been really blocked. I don't know why. I think maybe it is the heater I have in my room. It's sunny now. It's probably not warm though. I am going to go outside and go to the park and read the things I need to read to write this essay. 

MAXIMUM VIOLENCE RECORDS EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW

me: shall we start the interview?

MVR: okay

me: okay, first question. or rather, not questions but, can you tell me a little bit about your record label, why you started it etc.?

MVR: cos i was bored and had some disposable income for like the first time in my life so it was something to do. so far ive only released the first keel her tape but im like in the process of releasing a tape for a rad band from oxford called beta blocker and the body clock. they're like the only good band in oxford p much. but im v lazy so it's taking a while. im the worst record label ever.





me: the name of your label, 'maximum violence', seems very... violent. where does it come from? are you a violent person? do you crave violence and destruction in your life? is destruction a way of creating something new for you?

MVR: nicolas cage's motto is 'maximum violence immediately' and he is the best person ever so thats where it comes from. i wouldnt say im a violent person, more like a bully.

me: really? can you give me an example of a time when you've bullied someone? also, can you rank your top 3 nicolas cage films?

MVR: me and my friend ghost worlded some creep called sad terry that was like 20? and he used to flirt with us even though we were like 15 so i arraanged to meet up with him but i stood him up and we watched from afar. i don't think thats that bad though. also i threw a chair at some lame girl's head

me: damn. that seems pretty violent

MVR: it was lulz. okay.

me: how well do you think you'd do if you were in the hunger games/battle royale?

MVR: terribly, i'd kill myself instantly. yeah i would not be down with it at all

me: what if you had an infinite supply of chairs to throw at girls?

MVR: sounds kewl. but like a lot of effort.




me: shall we get this interview back on track (NO PUN INTENDED)?

MVR: lololol

me: i was going to ask you a few more questions about your label. on your facebook page there is a picture of a cat as your label's profile pic. does the cat hold any symbolic meaning for you yourself or as a label? is it linked to your aesthetic identity?

MVR: lol gay. i just love cats, i got a kitten like just before christmas and its the raddest thing ever but it doesnt have a name so i just call her kitty. remember the band kitty?

me: of course

MVR: i liked them

me: if their records went out of print, would you try and rerelease them on your label?

MVR: nahhh i cant be fucked to release any bands outside the uk really. unless they were really really gr8

me: are you saying kitty aren't great?

MVR: i preferred veruca salt. volcano girls is the best song

me: did you ever listen to the band volcano i'm still excited?

MVR: no. thats a terrible name.

me: it has that guy from the league in

MVR: hes the weakest character. hes just like the 'straight guy' and u can tell he think hes super hot even though hes just an old dude in a pair of converses

me: lol. so, is maximum violence a solo operation or do you have other people helping you out? are you taking interns for low (no) pay?

MVR: nah im just doing it on my own, some girl wanted to do it too and do gay merch like frisbees and shit but i just ignored her til she went away. my boyfriend (you lol) is like my dogs body and comes with me to post the tapes but i dont pay him

me: damn. frisbees...

MVR: ikr

me: seems like new found glory or something

MVR: seems like a bad idea

me: so. can i ask you again about the nic cage films?

MVR: thats hard, but i guess:
3. bad lieutenant
2. vampire's kiss
1. face off

i wanna say knowing too but that is just a bad film

me: sweet list. apart from keel her and beta blocker and the body clock, you got any other bands you want to recommend? do you have any other plans for the label?

MVR: um i just wanna keep releasing bands that i like and that i think are good. also i wanna be more organised, like keep a spread sheet or something

me: a spread sheet of what?

MVR: i dunno really, just seems like a good idea

me: i have a friend who went for a job interview in some office and told the interviewers that she loved spread sheets

MVR: did she get the job?

me: she did

MVR: see its a good idea

me: and there was a guy that worked there called max madderson or something. he had changed his name by deed poll. and he was a prick. and she made a comment about him on some message board and he came across it while googling his own name

MVR: lolololol. i know someone that changed his name to jordan 'danger' birch

me: why?

MVR: he was a comedian. anyway bleached and old forest are my favourite bands atm. also the new hunx and his punx album is rad

me: okkkkkk. i think that wraps up the interview. unless you have anything else to add?

MVR: nah i need the loo


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