Month: October 2013

Modern Horror versus Weirdness

I don’t quite get contemporary horror. Some of it is really good (The Orphanage, The Ring) and some of it okay for one trick (Paranormal Activity) and some of it just plain gross (Saw). But growing up in the late 70s/early 80s exposed me to many all-time great horror movies: The Exorcist, The Thing, Carrie, Hellraiser, Nightmare on Elm Street, Halloween. Lots of Stephen King in there too.

A key appeal of Lovecraft’s world is his imagination – the man was a once-in-a-lifetime individual and his work will live on for quite a while. But his take on existentialism was both nihilistic and weird. The story about the fish people breeding with humans in the failed fishing town in remote New England? Kinda different than what F Scott Fitzgerald was writing during the same period.

It’s the same elements that fuel Stephen King. Buoyed by an unstoppable work ethic (and, in the 80s, lots of cocaine and Miller tallboys), King’s work showed that the world still had room for stories about normal people having horrible experiences. King acknowledges his own Lovecraft influences, as does Clive Barker, Neil Gaimen, John Carpenter and Guillermo del Toro, because Lovecraft sets the bar so damn high – not for scary but for Weird.

His landscape is full of distant Dreamlands full of monstrous shadows, dark libraries haunted by broods of alien cats, crumbling towns on the edge of civilization. Lovecraft pushed the boundaries of imagination so far we are still trying to find the edges. But it’s not about shocks. It’s about going to different worlds, meeting strange creatures and understanding that our cosmos is limitless. It’s about stretching our imaginations into unseen territories, dreamscapes, visions.

I love playing Cthulhu Mythos RPGs because they are weird and different. I love writing Cthulhu Mythos RPGs because I get to be as weird as possible. With He Who Laughs Last, which is set in modern Los Angeles, I continually stretched myself to make things weirder, to catch the players off guard and give their imaginations something to sink their teeth into. The greatest pleasure for me comes when, after a PC awakes to find a large hyena statue has moved in the night to now stand next to his bed, the player says, “oh, man, that’s really freaky…” Caught, unexpected, by a stretch of the imagination.

So my modern horror games aren’t about shocks or surprises. Instead, they’re weird, unusual, gross and hopefully totally unexpected. So call it horror, call it weirdness, call it whatever. I don’t need sudden shocks to make my point.

I can just be weird…

Murnie, “Crackle”

For piano rock fans, there are simply never enough bands to go around. Sure, there is Ben Folds Five (welcomed back after 10+ year sabbatical) or early Billy Joel or Tori Amos, but if you like rock bands where the piano takes the lead, it’s hard to feel sated. Fortunately, the Scottish band Murnie fills that gap, and they’ve got a new EP Crackle to prove it.

One of the best things about the death of the music industry is how it has blown apart the need to release a “proper” album. Bands now can release music on their own, in whatever form, so Murnie can put the four song EP Crackle out there to show progress and keep fans’ appetites whetted, which is exactly what it does. Over the course of the four songs, the piano-bass/gtr-drums+vox trio covers a lot of ground – from the opening rocker “Brass Boy,” to the wistful “Don’t Forget,” all the way until the longer, thoughtful “Little Girl Who Stole the World.” The shorter “Spidermonkey” again shows that the trio knows how to rock. All in all, Crackle is a great four song EP, and I was glad to add Murnie to my music library.

Another benefit of the downfall of the music industry is that bands can now record pretty much everything they need to put out a record on their own. Sometimes this is good, sometimes not. The Crackle EP was clearly recorded and produced on a string budget, which is great for the flexibility and independence it can afford a band, although sometimes a recording can lack the professional sheen that spending a little cash can acquire. Crackle needs just a bump in that direction (a good mastering goes a long way) and would raise the bar for the band significantly.

There is no question Murnie has all the skill it needs. They write great songs that give us piano rock fans exactly what we demand: solid rhythm section led by a rocking piano and melodic vocals. I imagine they’re a great live band, and they clearly get how to write, record, and release music on their own. Here’s to hoping their next EP is a bit more polished (perhaps an IndieGoGo project can raise some funds), which I would gladly pick up.

Listen to Crackle for yourself, and sate all your Murnie needs here.

Custom Built Empire, “Mission Statement”

After ten years together, Custom Built Empire (CBE) has finally released a record (literally), and while the album title Mission Statement is certainly appropriate for an 8-song EP, a more appropriate title might be “Finally Grows Up.” For while ten years is a long time to make your music available to the masses, CBE has finally put together a great sounding record that encompasses everything they love: delivering crunchy rock for however long they damn well please.

CBE falls squarely in the genre of “thinking man’s rock,” reveling in odd time signatures and extended song lengths familiar to fans of Tool and Mastadon. The dual guitar attack build solid walls on which to stack interesting melodies with lyrics about unusual people and their bad habits (my favorite song, “Robi,“ is about a crippling Robitussen addiction – bet you haven’t heard a song about that before). But the key appeal of CBE is the bass and drums; for fans of rocking rhythm section, CBE is not to be missed.

Songs like Flutter, Relentless, and Waking Sleep highlight incredible bass/drums interplay that is thoughtful, powerful and locked-in like the best of them. If your favorite part Tool, Queens of the Stone Age, Mastadon or any other complicated hard rock band is the rhythm section; if you are, like me, always in search of a bass/drums combo that “gets it” by providing unique and challenging grooves; if you’re looking for a rocking San Francisco band to support (when they play their annual gig) – then CBE is a great addition to your music collection.

In the final analysis, the record sounds great all around, and is meant to be turned up. The Hit Wall Studio recording has a great professional sound that does not disappoint. That matched with a band that finally delivers the goods it has been promising for ten years means that Mission Statement is definitely worth the investment. Pick it up, turn it up, rock out.

You can hear the record here, and purchase it here. Do it!

Christopher Miller Interview

More than ten years ago, I interviewed author Christopher Miller about his first book. Soon I’ll be interviewing him on his second, and maybe even third book. Check back soon…

October 2002

Pie Driver interviews Author Christopher Miller

I met Christopher Miller in the summer of 2001 up in Portland, Oregon. He had just sold his first novel, Simon Silber, Works For Solo Piano, and was contemplating a move to the Big Apple. In the brief time we chatted, I inundated him with questions about publishing, but never felt I got the time to really get the answers I wanted. After all, his novel hadn’t even been published yet. But the book was published in May 2002 and I ran down to my local bookstore first thing and picked it up. You should too. It’s a great story about an eccentric composer and his slacker biographer. A great read for sure. Pie Driver tracked down Miller recently and blackmailed him into submitting to an interview:

I’ve read the bio in the back of the book and talked a little about your history, but can you talk a little about the class you took at Washington University with William Gass?

It wasn’t a class but an independent study – Gass wisely refused to teach writing workshops, and I’m sorry to say that I never took his philosophy class. The independent study was a little disappointing because he was, or seemed, so utterly indifferent to my writing, and I’d admired his for so many years. It’s too bad, because there’s no one smarter than Gass, no one who has thought as much about style and structure, no one better qualified to mentor a younger writer with similar tastes. And I guess I went to Wash U. with some naïve idea that he’d take a special
interest in me, as if grooming his replacement.

Why did you take the grad school route?

Good question. I had vowed not to because I didn’t like the grad students I met as an undergrad, and because my father was a professor of literature and I felt duty-bound to strike out in a different direction. For a decade I did the starving-artist thing, working low-paying jobs in the so-called caring professions; when I applied to graduate school – already in my thirties – I was working at a group home for profoundly retarded adults, and I’d had enough. There’s a limit to how often you can hose feces off a profoundly retarded adult before you convince yourself that whatever bad effects graduate studies may have on other people, you’ll manage to avoid the pitfalls. I’m not sure I did avoid the pitfalls, but at least the shit I encountered in graduate school was only metaphorical.

How long did it take to write your novel?

About five years from start to finish, though I was working on other things too in those years, including a short novel that I started before Silber and am still working on, though I’m not sure it’s getting any better. It isn’t even getting any longer.

Describe meeting your agent and working with him to get him interested in your novel.

I met my agent through one of his clients, Deborah Eisenberg, who taught a writing workshop at Washington. I showed him the first 50 pages of Silber – all I had at the time – and he said he’d be interested in seeing the rest when it was finished, though that wasn’t for another couple of years. In the meantime I’d almost changed his mind by twice sending him the manuscript of
another novel, the hopeless one I just mentioned.

What was the hardest part once they bought the novel?

Probably the wait – almost two years between selling the book and seeing it in print.

How extensive were the changes they suggested, and were there any changes that you fought?

The most extensive change was to the ending, the last 10 or 20 pages, because my original ending was a mess. I knew it was a mess when I submitted the novel, but I was hoping I could get away with it. I’m glad my editor made me change it. As with the other changes he suggested, he didn’t try to fix it for me, just forced me to face the fact that as it stood it didn’t work, and then left it to me to find a solution. I didn’t really fight any of his suggestions, though I didn’t always find ways to follow them even when I wanted to. For instance, he kept urging me to include more of Norm’s aphorisms, and I wanted to–I think they would’ve been fun to read–but I couldn’t think of any more.

Why the move to NY?

I’d been reading a lot of Ben Katchor, whose comic strips make New York City seem like the most poetic place in the world.

How has it been?

I didn’t like it much while I was there, but now that I’ve left–I moved to Vermont last month to teach at Bennington–I’m suddenly incredibly nostalgic for NY. It takes me so long to warm to a new place–and I move so often–that it’s been years since I liked a place while I was actually living there. Who knows where I’ll be when I start to like Vermont?

Working on the second (or third) novel?

I’m working on two short novels, one about a small town where everybody is obsessed with food, and another I like to describe as a novelization of a non-existent David Lynch film.

What sort of work ethic is being employed?

I force myself to sit down and at least pretend to write twice a day, every day. I always drink coffee when I write, and I only drink coffee when I write. Coffee and writing are so inseparable for me that if I have an inspiration when I’m not drinking coffee, I don’t even write it down. “Naw,” I tell myself, “that one doesn’t count – I’m not drinking coffee.” I also chew Nicorette when (and only when) I write. I’m the only person I know who’s managed to addict himself to nicotine gum without first being addicted to cigarettes. It’s like getting addicted to methadone without ever
trying heroin.

Did any other authors/novels give you inspiration for Simon Silber?

I had been wanting for more than a decade to write an homage to Pale Fire (Vladimir Nabokov), and that book definitely served as a model for mine, just as it’s served as a model for half a dozen other books I can think of (Edwin Mullhouse, The Debt to Pleasure, etc). You could teach a whole course consisting of books that wouldn’t have been written if not for Pale Fire.

Top five books?

Maybe not my all-time favorites, but five books I’m feeling especially gung-ho about at the moment:

Hilaire Belloc-Cautionary Verses
Kazuo Ishiguro-A Pale View of Hills
Lydia Davis-Almost No Memory
Flannery O’Brien-The Third Policeman
Gilbert Sorrentino-Gold Fools

Favorite books of 2002?

Ben Marcus-Notable American Women
Lydia Davis-Samuel Johnson is Indignant
Martin Amis-The War Against Cliché

Any advice to aspiring authors?

Read everything (there isn’t much) ever written by Lydia Davis. If you don’t like her, you may be aspiring up the wrong tree.

My First Kickstarter

Early in 2014 (in February if all goes well), I will launch my first Kickstarter to help me publish my Cthulhu Dark scenario He Who Laughs Last. Over the past few months, I have been doing a ton of research on running a successful Kickstarter campaign, and while success is by no means guaranteed, I think I do have a handle on what is needed to help make it as successful as possible.

First has been the research itself. Hoo boy, have I done a bunch of research. It’s tough to find time for writing when I’ve been doing so much research. But so much has already been written on what makes a successful KS campaign, I think it’s better to share some of the resources than reiterate everything they’ve said. So here are the steps I’m taking to build a successful KS campaign. You can check in with me after my campaign is done and see whether it worked:

  • Start with Kickstarter: Look at KS campaigns, lots of them – no, ALL of them. Really, especially in the specific genre. In my case, both Cthulhu and RPG are searches I run on a regular basis, always checking out what other people are doing. Watch the videos, read the funding levels, and begin to see Kickstarter in your sleep. By now, I’ve seen so many KS campaigns, I can kinda tell if someone’s campaign is going to choke or not.
  • Read blogs: Again, my purpose here on the web isn’t to be an expert on Kickstarter, as so many others have done it better. So I’ve been reading and reading and reading, again, so much I don’t seem to be writing as much. Blogs like Stonemaier Games, James Mathe, and Richard Bliss are all must-reads and have given me great ideas and perspective on this journey.
  • Funding the Dream: Speaking of Richard Bliss, if you don’t do anything else to prepare for your KS campaign, you MUST listen to his podcast. All of it. I’ve been catching up on episodes all summer and is by-far the most important resource for Kickstarter I have seen (heard). Start now.
  • Support KS campaigns: How many campaigns have you supported? Right now I’m at 17, but I support another every 2-3 months and will continue to do so. Supporting KS campaigns is important for two reasons: 1, it gives you perspective on how/not to run a campaign and 2, it shows you’re part of the community. Seriously, you need to back some campaigns before you go ask people for money. I’ve decided not to fund what otherwise looks like a good game just because the person has never backed any campaigns.

So those are all resources on running a successful campaign, but then there’s a whole other thing: social media. You need a social media strategy. Actually, *I* need a social media strategy. Or at least did need one. I like Facebook fine, but so much of my effort is taken up in life (work, family, health), with some drumming and gaming with friends thrown in, that there’s no way I could decide on a social media strategy on my own. Know what I did? I found someone to help me.

Gregory Geiger is a friend, yes, but he’s also a nerd and a photographer and web designer and social media knowitall. You need to find someone like Gregory to help you figure this shit out. He has helped me figure out how to manage both a personal and public FB profile (which I’m still working on), as well as how to build a sympathetic relationship between my blog, my public FB persona, and my Twitter feed. Fortunately, I just have to pay Gregory in lunches, which is a super cheap way to get great info from someone who is focused on these sorts of things. If social media ain’t your thing, then go find yourself a Gregory.

Finally, as most importantly, you need to produce. This is the most important lesson that seems lost on most of us when we look at cool internet people like Wil Weaton, Scott Sigler and Chris Hardwick and wonder how we can get there. You know the one thing these guys do really, really well? They produce shit ALL THE TIME. Have you seen their Twitter feeds? Their FB posts? Their podcasts? They are constantly online sharing funny and informative stuff, like just about every day. You have to give the people something. All the time.

Long gone are the days of just sitting at your desk for months and years, typing away at your masterpiece until your editor comes and takes it away and you can start your next book. Today, you need to be out there producing at least five days a week. You need blog posts, Twitter posts, FB posts, updates to your web site or G+ or LinkedIn profile or whatever it takes. You need to be giving the people something all the time. ALL THE TIME.

A good friend of mine is writing his YA masterpiece and he has worked very hard at it, but he doesn’t even know that his real hard has yet to begin. Yes, Stasey has a blog and that’s a good thing. But the climb up to get your social media strategy enabled is long and takes being on your phone ALL THE TIME. How do I know this? Because I’ve used Twitter more in the past month than in the rest of my life.

Speaking of which, the rest of my life is calling, so I must go. But I want to hear your story about your social media strategy, or what steps you’ve taken to get your Kickstarter campaign prepared. Well?

Interview with Chris Livingston

Way back in 2001 I interviewed Chris Livingston, who was just finishing his long-running temp web site Not My Desk. This is the interview in its entirety, and look for a new update some time soon…
Pie Driver Interviews Not My Desk

PD: So I’m going to interview you for my site. we’ll do one question at a time, and it will be this cool email string that we can go back and edit and make even cooler. Cool?

NMD: BRING IT.

PD: What made you start a web site about temping?

NMD: Allow me to set the stage for you. The year: 1942. The city: Nazi-occupied Amsterdam. The writer: 13 year-old Anne Frank, hiding in her attic, writing faithfully in her diary. Powerful. Poignant. Unforgettable.

Funny? Mmmm… no. Not a lot of humor, almost no mention of fiendish fax machines, vengeful copiers, or unpredictable office chairs. Little talk of nose-hair issues or ties getting caught in paper-shredders or male co-workers’ nipples showing through their dress shirts. No essays, not a single one, about fart noises.

Obviously, there was a niche, just waiting to be filled. That’s where I came in.

Okay, seriously, I had been writing essays about my temp jobs and sending them (unsolicited) to my family and friends. One day it occurred to me: why should only they suffer, when I can hurt others with my immature and predictable stories? There’s a world of strangers out there, and I can reach them, and annoy them, through the internet.

PD: What sort of disease did you contract that made you want to eschew the full-time job-thing for the uncertainties of the temping world?

NMD: Well, for a while there, it wasn’t so uncertain. There were jobs galore out there. I could pick and choose. I could specify what I was looking for, be picky about location and pay. I could wear nothing but big cotton briefs to my jobs and no one would complain for fear of me quitting. Many of my interviews ended with me forcing the interviewer to do a little dance for me and shower me with fresh-baked cookies. It was a temp’s market. The tables have turned these days. Now they’re wearing the big cotton briefs, so to speak.

PD: Now that the boom is over, and George W. is firmly planted in the White House, is finding work become easier or harder?

NMD: It’s definitely harder. Back when Clinton was running things, he’d call me every few days to make sure I was finding work. Nice guy. But does Bush do that? No. Of course not. He calls maybe once every two weeks. What a jerk.

PD: Are you, as rumored, the Uber-temp? Or more of the Anti-Temp? Or just a plain, old Generic Temp?

NMD: I’d have to go with Anti-Temp. Definitely not Uber-Temp. An Uber-Temp would be a Jack-of-all-Trades, completely proficient at everything, like Lara Flynn Boyle is in the film “The Temp”, before she freaks out and starts killing everyone in predictable ways. I’m not a Jack-of-all-Trades. I’m more of a Jerry-of-a-Couple-Things. I can do a few things okay, but I have to fake the rest.

Also, it’s rare that I really take advantage of the resources the Generic Temp has at his or her disposal. I hardly ever call in sick, or skip work, masturbate in the lobby, or walk away from jobs. I’m also not really looking for anything permanent, like a lot of temps are.

So, I guess I’m the Anti-Temp. I care a little too much about what my employers think of me to be a complete pill. And I don’t steal as much as I should.

PD: What came first: the employed temp or the unemployed temp?

NMD: This is a silly question. Too silly to bother answering.

Although…

No, it’s silly.

But…

Hm. I mean, to be an employed temp, you need to sign up at a temp agency and get an assignment. Between the time a temp signs up and gets assigned, I suppose they are officially a temp, yet not employed. So, it would seem that an unemployed temp would have to come first. But then, let’s say the “temp” decides he doesn’t want to temp, or is so droolingly incompetent or surly or ugly that he never does get assigned… was he ever a temp? AGGGGGGHHHHHH NOW I WON’T SLEEP!
DAMN YOU, DAVE OF PIEDRIVER!!!!

PD: What’s the competition like in the “Web sites about temping” world?

NMD: Well, the wonderful thing about the World Wide Superweb Interhighway is that there are so many “lanes” or “avenues” that each “traveler” or “surfer” can “go” where they “want” with little or no “hassle”. This means the competition is nil. People can read my website right along with their other hundred or so favorite semi-daily temping humor journals.

Still, I pretend I’m in fierce competition with other sites, just to add a little excitement to my life. I also pretend there are agents of a shadowy branch of the government after me, when in reality, they’re just after my neighbor.

PD: Do you see any way of amassing large amounts of wealth by running your web site? People have got rich on less, you know.

NMD: The way I see it, I have a few options for getting rich. 1) Let people read the first paragraph of an article, then charge them for the rest, like Salon.com does. 2) Put up tons of pop-up ads, as well as placing full-page ads between the front page and the articles, like Salon.com does. 3) Change my site name to salom.com, and get bleed-off traffic from people trying to visit salon.com. And charge them for it.

The fourth (and best) option would be to charge money to people who want to interview me, like you are. Say, about $75,000 per interview. Deal?

PD: If Notmydesk becomes a Hollywood blockbuster, who do you see playing yourself? Who would be your as-yet-nonexistent girlfriend? Who would play me?

NMD: Look, if we’re talking NMD the Motion Picture, there’s really only one answer. Who could play me? Who could capture the innocence, the playful mirth, the wide-eyed wonder? Who could bring the pain, and power, and promise to the screen? Who could emulate the joie de vivre, while at the same time mirror the despondency and desolation? Really, only one man. Michael Winslow, the sound-effects guy from the Police Academy movies.

As for my girlfriend, she could be played by a digital amalgam of Christina Ricci (body, limbs & head) and an anklosaurus (powerful, heavily-armored club-like tail used for smashing enemies). And you could be played by Haley Joel Osment.

PD: What if they wanted Paul Verhoeven to direct and Joe Eszterhas to write it?

NMD: Hey, Verhoeven did RoboCop, and I’m down with that. As far as I know, Joe Eszterhaus is incapable of ‘writing’ anything.

PD: What if Episode Two sucks just as bad as Episode One?

NMD: Thing is, hombre, it don’t matter none. If Episode II sucks, we’ll go to III with the everlasting hope that it will somehow save the prequel trilogy. If II is good, we’ll hope III will continue the trend. Either way, we (Star Wars fans) are gonna be in the queue on
opening day. Sure, we would like nothing more than to wash our hands of the whole affair. But who are we kidding? And besides, wasn’t bitching about Jar-Jar (and the rest of the Episode I suckiness) a lot of fun? You might say we are the Gundark, and Lucas has got us by the ears, and no amount of wrestling will get us free, and holy shit what a giant fucking dweeb I am for having said that.

PD: And so Not My Desk heads into oblivion with only a temporary name badge to keep him employed. Ah, NMD, you are my hero…

What is Weird 8?

Fake it until you make it. That’s been my motto for 2013.

Weird8 is my new home on the web.

Yes, I have a twitter account (@SokolowskiDave), and will be opening up a new Facebook page, but I need to have a place on the web that is application-neutral. A home away from home.

I’ve had blogs before, in various states, and I know what it takes to make them work. For better or worse, I really have no have choice other than to make this blog work.

This blog has three main components:

  1. Serve as a home for all writing things by Dave Sokolowski (that’s me). Starting next year, I will kick off a series of Kickstarters to produce gaming and non-gaming materials that I have written. This is the main place where I will talk about them.
  2. This will be a place for me to go “meta.” I will talk about why I’m writing things and, more importantly, how the whole social media thing applies to building a readership. If you want to learn first-hand how a writer goes from zero to hero (nice cliche’), then this is the place.
  3. I will just write about whatever I want, which will mostly include music reviews and interviews with other writers. The most important component of writing is to keep writing, so when I’ve got nothing specific to write about, I will write music reviews and interview other writers. Both will be fun and interesting.

So here we are at ground zero. If you’re reading this, then things are going much better than I would have anticipated. Everything flows from here.

Lastly, a huge set of thanks to Wade, who helped me get this thing up and running. Glad to have him as a friend, and more on his awesomeness later.

Onward.