The Loyal Divide.

Minneapolis has a wonderful local music scene. I took it for granted while I was there and was an infrequent goer to of shows. Mark Mallman and Tapes ’N Tapes and the Soviettes and P.O.S. and Atmosphere and the Hold Steady and Ol’ Yeller and the Brass Kings and Har Mar and the Hopefuls and Mason Jennings and he Jayhawks all lived and played in the area, while I was there. I saw not even all of these once, and none more than twice.

Belying that, I like live shows; I like to support local music.
When I got back to Ohio I rediscovered how rare it was to see a good show in a good bar. The only national tours that made stops were (1) giant names demanding at least 40 a ticket, (2) washed up straggling tours that never knew when to quit, and (3) bands that get play on top 40 and “rock” stations (ie Nickelback). Independent labels and bands seemed to all know that no one here cared and it would only be a waste of time and money to stop by. Cleveland and Cincinnati were as close as I was going to get.

Not long after I got here I was in a bar with some friends when a girl came up and started talking to me. It was later explained to me that she was “flirting’ with me, but as I was unfamiliar with the concept, no numbers were exchanged. We talked about music. I pressed her to name me some bands who were worth seeing locally. She could only name one. The Loyal Divide.

They’ve played about 10-12 shows in Columbus since that night. I’ve been to seven or eight of them. I even met my girl for the first time at a Loyal show. They are good.

I’d like you to meet them. But.
They are a live band. They have but one EP and I’ve found it rarely sounds good to people who haven’t the opportunity see them perform the songs. They’ve played but twice outside city limits since I’ve known them.
This is more of a notice that in a year or three, when they’ve left this cowtown for better pastures, and they play a show near you, that you are required by me to attend.

It’s five guys. Bands formed in college. Realized the potential enough to throw away other lives to move to Columbus to pursue this band. The sound is hard to describe. They play the requisite bass and guitar and drums and trumpet and fluglehorn(?) and cowbells and keyboards. Even their own website falls quite short:

The Loyal Divide graft tight-locked grooves upon broad strokes of psychedelic pop; a style which, if derivative, will over time develop into something both accessible and fascinatingly original.

And their myspace page claims they are from the category Indie / Psychedelic / Pop. My best stab was to muse that they are ‘what I would imagine Arcade Fire would have been before they figured out exactly what was so awesome about themselves.’ My friend who saw them for the first time last night, described them as Modest Mouse and Radiohead and something else all together.

Come A'Calling.

Log on Gmail. See what looks like spam. Titled link suggestion - blog banned by Google Hi. My name is Eugene Gershin. Perhaps…

It’s awkward enough that I am certain that it won’t lead to an ad for a Swedish Penis Pump or a silicone implants shill. Click.
It is an ad.

For a blog written by a pseudonymous expat of Israel. He wrote a book. He pens a blog. From a cursory glance it appears that he is their version of an extreme Neocon. Only difference is that we elected them here to fuck shit up and there he’s forced to move to Russia for safety purposes. To be fair, he might be slightly more bat-shit insane than our Wolfowitzs and Perles.

From the email:

Shoher is equally critical of Jewish and Muslim myths, and advocates political rationalism instead of moralizing.

My translation for you:

Less talking, more killing.

Somehow his PR flack found my blog. Stranger is that from that he found my email address. It’s not easily found on here, is it? He suggests that I write a post about him, maybe include a link? Check and Check. While I understand that the emails looking to garner support have done wonders for the right-wing and evangelical movements, this shotgun approach needs some reworking.

Things Done Gone On.

For the last week I’ve been dismantling and shipping bits of my car. Taking a wrench and a torch to it has been fun. Agreeing on prices, and shipping the bits has been a horror. Don’t ever part out a car in mid-December. Especially when there is only one shipper within easy driving distance.
My dad and I also undertook to straighten and reattach the Quonset hut. It took three tractors, three log chains, a massive come-along, two spud bars, two sledge hammers, 18 unique steel braces, 20 concrete anchors, multiple power tools, and two men 4 days to put her mostly back into place. Though, of all that, the worst of the job was cleaning the inside walls of 7 plus years of accumulated stuff. That took a day and a half in and of itself. *muttering* dirty rusty oily gunky dead.

Christmas is coming. This will be a good Christmas. Last year, my dad was in prison. My brother was unable to join us. My mom was recovering from surgery. I had been in charge of the farm for a month and not liking it. My Aunt and Uncle were more interested in the fact they had just moved into their mostly finished house. It was hot and foggy that day. This one will be better. None of those things are true this year. It’ll be the first time in years that my entire family is together for the mas.

This barn has nothing to do with this post.

Part Out.

My last car was a Nissan Sentra SE-R. If you know or care little for cars this means nil. If you *heart* cars you'll probably understand that it's a worthy and somewhat wanted sleeper beast. It has a fairly high performance engine hiding inside an entirely boring and unassuming shell. When modded properly, it becomes a killer.
Every sports car has a following. Al Gore invented the Intarwebs. These two seemingly unrelated inevitabilities birthed the automotive forum. Floyd has Celica-GTS.com. The Sentra has the SR20 forum.

I blew up my Nissan this, what is it now, this spring? And it’s been sitting around ever since. I put a classified ad in the local paper asking for $400, way more than a dead car is worth. I got one reply from some schmuck offering me $100. So yesterday I rolled out plan B. Selling it bit by bit on the SR20 forum.
I don’t know how much I’ll recoup. Not much if you factor in my grease monkey and packaging labor. But it’ll be a fun and learning experience to dismantle it. Especially since it’ll never have to be put back together and I should still be able to get most of the scrap steel worth out of it.

Of Our Fathers.

Cow Bio - Charles

By popular demand, here is.

Charles was the first calf I named when I arrived a year ago. There were two calves who were baldies (white headed black beefs) with an eyepatch like my man Spuds. To distinguish between the two one became Charles, the other the aforementioned Chuck.
In Minneapolis I played a game of pick-up ultimate weekly. One player was named Charles, another Charlie. That was too hard to distinguish for me so I made it one step easier.
Charles is the skinny dorky kid in the class. The one that acts out to get attention cause he doesn't seem to fit in. He's gangly and ugly, but has recently begun to grow into his bony head. Yeah, he's me in a cows body, so what?

Most of the friendly calves become friendly at the later stages of their short lives. The littler ones haven't gotten away from their wild animal backgrounds. Not so of Charles. He was little when I arrived. He was friendly then. He's still friendly. Too friendly. He's probably the most dangerous calf in the herd. He has no idea that he weighs 700 plus pounds and has a head made of bone four inches thick. If I'm found at the end of auger in bloody bits, Charles did it. But he was just trying to play.