Geek love

No, not the utterly creepy and strangely beautiful novel. Over the past few days, as fans have shown their racist asses to the world and other fans have lambasted OTHER other fans for not being "real" enough, I have been very disappointed in the nerd world. Being a geek is supposed to be about passion and excitement and loving things, not about racism, poor reading comprehension, and flat derision. So I decided to give the Internet geek message boards a rest for a bit and consider all the wonderful nerds in my life who aren't racist or sexist or cruel or exclusionary.

There's my best friend, with whom I share everything from Animorphs to Star Wars to Buffy the Vampire Slayer.

There's my friend dead-girl, who can always be relied upon for a run through Jurassic Park, a marathon of Doctor Who, or a long chat about fantasy novels (complete with property-appropriate food).

There's the group of people I've been lucky to hang out with here in Cleveland--my first friends here, really--an amazing collection of people who love comics, among other things. Guess what? Most of them are men, and a more nice and welcoming slew of dudes you will never meet. I've yet to be condescended to and I think it'll stay that way.

There's my bud Sara, a fellow nerdbrarian, a new comics fan, and a serious Whovian and lover of all things British literature.

There's some of my favorite Tumblrites: the-houxbois-academy, antioxidantsuperhero, and fyeahlilbitoeverything. Emma Houxbois brings the Marvel, antiox brings the Young Justice and Tammy Pierce love, and fyeah...well, as the name implies, that Tumblr's got some of nearly every geek property under the sun. 

There's my Shauna, for the times we've spent watching Firefly and Futurama and talking about Girls With Slingshots.

There's my youngest cousin, with whom I enjoy talking about books and movies, and who is just starting to read comics (her gateway drug was Batman: Arkham City), and my third-youngest cousin, often my date to the comic store when we lived in the same city. 

There's everyone at the Tao of Scoot and everything they love: anime and manga, Transformers, creepy old kids' films like Dark Crystal, Dune, Star Trek.

There's my gentleman, my companion to cons and comic shops and bookstores and action films, for always.

In short: there are very kind, very cool geeks out there, men and women alike.  For every dickbag there's five more friendly people like the ones I'm lovin' on here. If you haven't found your karass yet, you will. And to my various karasses, thank you for embodying the best of our communities.

Women who love women

Occasionally I pop over to Feminist Mormon Housewives to see what the forward-thinking members of the LDS community are up to. Recently there was a post about female friends which struck me. I don't think our society is very interested in female relationships, not when there's a possible male/female romantic relationship to be had. Lots of popular cultural memes revolve around the concept of "frenemies," women as backstabbing and untrustworthy friends, women as gossips, and so forth. A lot of young women end up with the feeling that it's easier to be friends with men, because there's "less drama." There is also the impetus of fitting into the boys' crowd and being "one of the guys"; I venture for some women, being the odd lady out and having male attention is somewhat of a powerful feeling. 

I can relate to this as a woman who was deeply unpopular in high school and was not used to having appreciative male attention, but I strive to not feel and act this way. A lot of my interests are traditionally dude-heavy: I like science fiction, action films, comic books, and heavy metal. I have a lot of male friends. I like hanging out with guys and I get along easily with guys. BUT: I also love women. I love being around women, talking with women, and having relationships with women. I do not subscribe to either the idea that men and women can never be friends without sexual tension fucking things up (literally) or the idea that women's relationships will always be drama-filled and emotionally dangerous. I also don't really find that boy friendships are for one thing (going to cons, headbanging, attending sports events) and girl friendships are for another (getting pedicures, venting about love lives, watching Moulin Rouge!). There doesn't need to be any kind of false demarcation in the lives of our relationships. People like what they like and hang out with who they hang out with. There are horrible people in every gender group and of every sex and sexual orientation. There are women who will demand to check your credentials when you tell them you like such-and-such kind of music; there are men who will gossip about you behind your back. 

Once upon a time I parroted the idea that "I just think it's easier to hang out with guys"--I know of what I speak. This attitude is rooted in sexist tropes about men AND women. This attitude reinforces the idea that most women are "girly" and useless, unintellectual, petty, out to steal your man--that smart women prefer the company of the compelling male personality. This attitude needs to be combated. Women's relationships are valuable and valid and deep, beautiful, strong, and ALL women are real women. Women are interested in sewing and interested in reconstructing medieval trebuchets; women like to read romance novels and books about entomology; women listen to Rascal Flatts and Slayer. Throw out the snap judgments--they are a way of not having to do the hard work of relationships. Incidentally, this discussion on fMh dovetails into yet another debate in the geekosphere about "fake geek girls." Do they exist? If so, why do they exist? What is their purpose? What are they trying to prove? These questions aren't the point; the point is the furthering of the "boys' club" mentality and the woman-on-woman crime present in these discussions, since a good amount of the shit being flung is coming from women. Women accusing women of not being real, because REAL women have curves and REAL women want to be mothers and REAL women don't start fights and REAL women this, that, the other. I reiterate: all women are real women. Women who are just discovering comic books because they loved Thor are real women, and real geeks. Women who are learning how to play videogames are real women, and real geeks. Women venturing into the hefty pages of George R.R. Martin because someone DVR'd Game of Thrones for them are real women, and real geeks. I hate seeing geeks lambast one another for perceived lack of cred and I especially hate seeing women nerds doing this to other women. I hate seeing the same old tired-ass falsehoods, that "fake" geek girls are trying to get attention or start drama.


As mentioned previously in this post, a lot of the things that I am into have a largely male fan community. I have faced and will continue to face questions about my credibility as a metal music fan, as a comic book fan, as a sci-fi fan. Because the bar is so low, I expect this from men. I don't expect it from women and I hate it when it happens, because it feels like a betrayal. Surely they know what it's like to be sneered at or disbelieved! Yet it still occurs, because internalized misogyny is insidious and difficult to root out. So I say, Be strong in your relationships. Be welcoming and try not to be judgmental, in geeky matters or on Ravelry or in any community you are part of. We already face so much bullshit from all sides, so let's not add to it.

The Hunger Games (spoilers)

So, The Hunger Games! I was looking forward to seeing it, because I am a big fan of the books, and I saw it, and I liked it, and now I will need Catching Fire to be released as soon as possible.

Things I liked:

• how the film was able to expand the POV of the story. In the books, we have Katniss' point of view at all times, which makes for tense reading but doesn't give as much scope as maybe some readers would like. So it was very cool to see sweeping crowd shots, the faces of the people back home in District 12, and especially how the Gamemakers went about controlling things. That was maybe my favorite part, actually--seeing a slew of people creating forest fires to drive Katniss toward the Career Tributes and setting the mutts on the battlefield.
• Seneca Crane's enlarged role. Similarly, I think choosing to give Seneca a reasonably large part was a good move. Watching Wes Bentley and his magical circus beard stride around the control room and smarm on television were good ways of showing just how soulless the Capitol and Games are.
• The acting. I had some issues with the casting process of this film, as many people did, but there's no denying that Lawrence did an ace job with Katniss. Lenny Kravitz was also very good as Cinna (restrained but clearly caring about Katniss), Stanley Tucci was wonderful as zany talk show host Caesar Flickerman, Amandla Stenberg was perfect as Rue, and I can't wait to see Donald Sutherland really bust it out as President Snow in the next two films.
• Capitol fashion, yo! The Capitol crowd scenes were really great in terms of nutty hair, clothes, and makeup. For the next film I kinda want to dress up as some Capitol fashionista (though I did wear some Cinna eyeliner for this one). I would have liked to see more of Venia, Octavia, and Flavius in their brilliant glory though.

Things I didn't like:

• the mutts. Without the utter creep factor of what the muttations really are, they came off as simply giant wolfy things. However, I venture that explaining about the mutts would have taken too much time (especially with the film already clocking in at nearly 3 hours). When I told my manfriend what mutts are in the book, his face was exquisite.
• the end battle. Similarly to the first point here, I found the final scene at the Cornucopia not quite what it might have been. Though I suppose having Cato be eaten alive for hours would have both taken too long and been a bit much for a PG13 film.
• the mockingjay pin. Cutting out Madge didn't bother me TOO much, but would it have been that hard to have Katniss' mother give her the pin? As it played out in the film, it just didn't seem significant enough.
• the marketing of Team Peeta/Team Gale. OH MY GOD YOU ARE MISSING THE POINT.
• the casting of Katniss. This isn't an issue with the film itself--since Lawrence was very good in the role--so much as a prior-to-the-film problem, but it bears repeating. Katniss' ethnicity is never stated in the books and based on her physical appearance (black hair, olive skin, grey eyes), it is entirely possible that she is of color. I think it would have been pretty great to see an actress of color in that role.

So yes! A good time was had by all. Very much looking forward to the second two movies (please please PLEASE cast Finnick soon. Hell, I'll save you the trouble: Armie Hammer).

Wonder Woman #7 (spoilers)

So, Wonder Woman. I talk about her every now and then. The seventh issue in her new title came out this week and lots of people are discussing it, so I might as well add my voice to the chatter. Warning: this is going to be looooong.

WW #7 is an incredibly well-written comic. Brian Azzarello is one of the most talented writers working for DC (or any comics company), and I was very glad to see Cliff Chiang back for the art too. There is quite a lot about it that I loved--the updating of Eros and Hephaestus, the continuing interaction between Diana, Hermes, and Lennox (though I already miss Zola!). It is also a problematic issue, one that I read twice and have been picking over in my brain for some time. I'm a mythology nut, and when I was a kid I was all Greek myth, all the time. Those are the myths I know best. I still love them, but as I've gotten older, read analyses of them and retellings, and considered them in their own time, I have naturally begun to view them with a more critical eye, because they are largely male-centered. Goddesses and women do not come off well in Greek myth. Unsurprising. And I have been disappointed to see Wonder Woman fall back on the trope of Hera as Queen Vengeful Nag, with no updating or changes at all, especially in light of how very interestingly Hermes, Eris, and other deities have been written.

Amazons are a feature of a few Greek myths, and an idealized form of them is found in the Wonder Woman mythos as a community of immortal women living on a paradisaical island. Other writers have reworked the Amazons as well (Xena comes to mind); when I was reading WW#7, the portions wherein Hephaestus explains the "real story" of the Amazons reminded me of The Firebrand, a retelling of the story of Troy by Marion Zimmer Bradley. In this book the Amazons are a tribe of women who meet once or twice a year with a male tribe, the Kentaurs, to get busy and further the people. If the babies produced from these meetings are female, they stay with the Amazons. If they are male, they go with the Kentaurs. For all the problems with The Firebrand, this still seems like the best possible way of formulating such a sex-segregated tribal structure. In WW#7, something similar happens, but in this case, the Amazons seduce male sailors and then kill them; if male babies are born, the Amazon women throw them into the ocean, as Hera threw Hephaestus into the ocean. Having strong feelings about this sort of thing, Hephaestus rescues the boys and raises them to work in his forge.

Now. Seeing the Amazons portrayed as heartless succubi and infanticidal, uncaring mothers bothers me...a lot. I felt for Hephaestus, as I always have (and LOVED the way he was drawn!), and I liked that the men of his forge were happy to be there and felt that their lives had purpose. I loved that Diana embraced her legions of newfound brothers and cousins as family and tried to help them. I didn't even particularly mind that the Amazons occasionally had sex with men and sometimes produced male children (although I still have fiery feels about Diana's own birth story). I do mind that the Amazons are recast in a nightmare role, the role which history has always accused and suspected us of: as soul-sucking succubi, as man-eaters only interested in sperm donors, as lethal temptresses who literally get away with murder. There are also undertones of rape in the way that the Amazons deal with the male sailors. Perhaps if I were reading this story in a vacuum, I would not be as bothered, but I'm not. I'm reading this story after weeks--hell, years--of hearing that I am a slut and a prostitute, that my body is not mine to make decisions about, that men far removed from me will continue to make decisions for me. I'm reading this story after hearing about more of the pernicious racism and cruelty which continues to murder innocents in our country. I am a female reader in a world which wars on women and sexual and ethnic "others" constantly and with intent. I am a woman in a country where a serious candidate for president is actively attempting to bring about a theocracy.

I like reading about the possibilities of a peaceful society. I like reading about relationships between women which are good and helpful and positive and healing. I like reading about powerful women, and quite frankly, I occasionally like to read about women who have absolutely no male influence in their lives. So to see the Amazons brought down to the same old bloodthirstiness, to see them saddled with the sins of using male bodies and discarding them (something which has been done to women throughout history and continues to be done), was disheartening. What is DC afraid of? Why is the idea of a women's society so threatening? Are we really still in a time where the concept of women thriving without male approval and input is terrifying? Most of the news bulletins and congressional blathering these days say a resounding YES. The white men are scared and it reflects in our art and culture. Maybe that's why on Earth-2, in a few of DC's new upcoming titles, the Amazons are all dead. Maybe that's why in the recent Flashpoint event, the Amazons were castrating, murdering harpies.

I continue to think that there is editorial fiat at work here. I do think that DC's top people have a real problem with unfettered greatness around their female characters. I think that DC would never even consider changing Batman or Superman's histories so radically and in a canon, flagship title. I think that DC has never cared much for Wonder Woman, period (especially given the wildly varying levels of time and devotion in terms of creative teams and promotion they've given her). I think DC thought Diana needed to be made "cooler." Well, news for you, bigwigs: she was already cool. She was already inspirational and amazing, smart, strong, powerful, and complex. She will continue to be so no matter what you throw at her, and make no mistake: I will not stop reading this book. I will support this book because she's mine and no one can take her from me. I continue to hold out hope and trust for this creative team and I hope--exercising naivete like only nerds can--that I'll be rewarded for that. I think Wonder Woman will rise above her new origins; I think she will understand that it is how we were raised and the choices that we make, not our biology or our family history, that shapes us. But that doesn't mean that I have to like these changes that have been made to her family and her people.

(Now, Moon Knight #10, the other comic I alluded to in an earlier post this week...that's just classic fridging, nothing complex or noteworthy about it.)

On fire

Yes, I am going to The Hunger Games this weekend.

Yes, I will be wearing gold eyeliner.

Yes, I will have cried all said eyeliner off by the time I leave the theatre.

Non, je ne regrette rien.

I have some catching up to do on a couple of notable comics titles. Expect a post about one or more of them this weekend.

Holy shit SEASONS!

Say what you will about public transportation, but if I drove a car I'd probably be missing the glory that is new buds on trees and misty sunrises and deer flirting their white flags in the woods outside work.

Friday sexytimes

In her latest post, Sulli at We Were Going To Be Queens talks about sex and the (LDS) church, including a quotation for discussion from Alison Bechdel to kick things off: "Sexual shame is in itself a kind of death."

I think this is an elegant summation of one of US society's most trenchant issues. Being raised in the Mormon church, I found that this broader perennial problem was percolated to a fine brew of feverish guilt Kool-Aid. It's probably the same in other churches, but as ever I can only speak to my own experience. As Sulli points out, in LDS doctrine sexual sin is second only to murder in God's Litany of Bad Things; in this case, "sexual sin" covers everything from cheating on a spouse to non-standard relationships--such as polyamory, ironically enough--to homosexuality to sexual abuse to masturbation to French kissing your boyfriend and possibly even oral sex within the bounds of marriage, depending on who you talk to.

This doesn't mean that church members in good standing never ever do these things (I recall overhearing gossip among the married women in my ward back home which singed my precious teenage ears). It certainly doesn't mean that sexual abuse never occurs or that Mormon babies are never born out of wedlock. What it did mean for me was that a disconnect grew between how I thought about sex on an everyday basis and what I expected would occur once I got married. Mormon youth are bombarded with messages about how their sexuality should manifest and express itself and what should be done about sexual urges. Effectively a good Mormon has no erogenous zones until a wedding ring appears on the left hand. Body shame is instilled early and reinforced often, and LDS members are expected to bounce from "sin second only to murder" to participating in and enjoying conjugal activities once married. I can't provide any real insight on Mormon marriages and sex lives, since I skedaddled before that happened--not that it was likely to. But I did get to go through the process of learning about my body and sexuality outside the confines of LDS doctrine. Thankfully, I had libraries and Internets full of health information to guide me, because no mistake, one of the most real consequences of the LDS attitude toward sex is teenage mothers. As I recall from my ward growing up, there were three teenage girls who became pregnant while I was nearing teenagehood myself. THIS CAN BE AVOIDED. It is frankly criminal negligence to lie to children about sex and the facts of life in the twenty-first century modern world. I was lucky in that I managed to rip out most of the shame I associated with sex all by myself, though sometimes remnants of it still surface. I was not ashamed enough to not find out everything I could about the way my body worked; I read tons of books, surfed Scarleteen, and talked to my more experienced friends. But what about the young men and women who are overwhelmed by that shame, who are afraid to ask questions or have no one to ask?

Doctrines of shame do no service to anyone save those in power. The death which stems from sexual shame is the death of part of a person's self. Shame is inherently about hating yourself; guilt is about the things that you do--it's easy to see where the two intertwine. A church that teaches its children, youth, and adults to hate themselves does not come from a place of divinity. Another death is that of a person's sex drive, for how are we to repress a thing for many years (many, many years depending on when a church member gets married) and then suddenly expect it to flourish? I recall a woman in my ward who was single and had never been married; I remember my mother saying that she was "angry"; and now I think to myself, Of course she was angry! She was in her forties and probably had never gotten any! Had I kept on in that church, I likely also would have become angry and depressed, since by the age of twenty no right-thinking LDS man had shown any interest. I mean, sweet Zombie Jesus, I was practically an old maid! Another death resulting from sexual shame is in the realm of self-love, and I don't even mean the Divinyls kind, although let us be clear: jerking it occasionally is important for most people. Self-love here refers to love and reverence for ourselves as humans. My experience as an LDS youth was a cycle of perceived sin and repentance, and apparently this is how it should be; keep in mind that I never actually had the opportunity to do anything tragically bad--I never dated anyone, let alone got close enough to do some sinnin'. I never masturbated. I didn't read or look at porn (except on accident, like when I discovered the novelization of The Wicker Man. O was that ever a night for repenting!). But that shame was there, always. I knew even thinking about kissing the cute guy in physics class was wrong. We are not whole humans if we can't acknowledge all parts of ourselves. Shame leads to fear, fear leads to hate...we know where this goes. So much hate manifests in the LDS church from the shame associated with sex: hate of homosexual people, hate of interracial marriages, hate of those who choose to marry outside the church.

Body and sexual shame forces bodies to be battlegrounds, and though I might joke about it, it's serious business. Sexual shame demonizes bodies, both male and female bodies. It lays blame for rape at the feet of victims. It places the onus of responsibility on women while creating men as animalistic and out of control ("You should dress more modestly to help men's thoughts remain pure"). Once upon a time I refused to be ashamed any longer and though it is a continual process of reworking and relearning, I will never look back. I am not ashamed of my breasts or my legs or my ass or my hair. I am not ashamed of my desires. I am not ashamed of my opinions and beliefs and morals. I am not ashamed of how my face and body look when I'm getting busy. I am not ashamed to embrace myself, to tell my gentleman that he's sexy and I want him, right now. I am not ashamed to bring a basket of condoms to the CVS checkout counter, and frankly I hope someday to be utterly shameless.

Once upon a time in Tampa

O Tampa! It's not my hometown, but it's where I spent six of my most interesting formative years, and despite myself I'm very fond of the place--indeed I miss it much, much more than I anticipated since moving to Cleveland.

This longing for a sometimes boring, often frustrating, wickedly humid patchwork city was further intensified a few weeks ago when I watched the 2004 Punisher for the first time since the film came out. In case you weren't aware, the film was partially set and completely shot in the Tampa Bay area. This is one of the only times that my fair city has been committed to film in a reasonably major way (the others being Lutz featuring in Edward Scissorhands, the Lowry Park Zoo used in Goodfellas, and one of the area racetracks in Ocean's Eleven), and watching it was a bizarre, weirdly moving experience for me as a former Tampon. Is this how New Yorkers and Vancouverites feel when they see the thousands of films and TV shows which feature their home cities? Is this how longtime Clevelanders will feel when they view Avengers in the spring and recognize portions of our downtown? Because it is strange, very strange, to see long shots of Tampa's business and club districts, to see Fort DeSoto masquerading as Puerto Rico, to see John Travolta holding court next to a tall downtown building which goes by the local vulgarity "The Beer Can." I even got a little maudlin when a scene happened to take place in a location which looks a lot different now (the old ampitheatre behind the art museum, if you're following along).

(aforementioned Beer Can and the "Saints and Sinners" club)

That paltry night skyline! The neighborhood where my sister and I owned a house! The beautiful mosaics of the Columbia! The bridge to Davis Island! The spires of UT! 2001 Nude Odyssey! That's me: that's my city: a glorious sprawl of strip joints and mansions and tawdry apartment complexes and rotting cigar factories which could be historic if someone would just give a damn. So, Thomas Jane and company: thanks for this, at least.

Happy birthday, Cully Hamner!

Yes, it's true, today marks the birth of one of my favorite comics creators: Cully Hamner. You might know him and aren't aware of it--the movie RED (yes, that magical vehicle of Helen Mirren shooting things) was adapted from his book with Warren Ellis of the same title, and its sequel is currently in production. Hamner has also drawn my favorite nonpowered DC heroine, Renee Montoya, in her guise as The Question for an amazing run of Detective Comics (with writer Greg Rucka, featured in the picture below...and of course I am also lucky enough to have an original Hamner Question sketch!), drew the first three issues of the excellent limited series The Shade, and designed the Jaime Reyes incarnation of the Blue Beetle.

Have a wonderful birthday, Cully! Thank you for all the amazing art.

Body Appreciation Monday: #problematicvaginas

I'm actually not feeling real appreciative of my body today, since I have a cold/weird new allergies/something that is causing my head to be cotton-woolly and my nose to run like a tap, but whatevs, because the best recent hashtag on Twitter, #problematicvaginas (courtesy of Elon James White), encapsulates something I do love about my body, all the time: it pisses people off.

Just by existing! Man. Talk about making the personal political.

And I was thinking...if all these old white dudes are really interested in my problematic vagina * (because, rest assured, it is QUITE problematic. Why, just a few days ago I allowed a man I'm not married to into the vicinity of my lady parts for reasons unrelated to procreative sex!), if they want to nose up in its business, are they entirely sure what that entails? Somehow I think not. I get the impression that none of them actually know anything about female anatomy. So in a way, it's a good thing that my problematic vagina will be here to teach them! Oh, they'll get to learn all sorts of interesting things about cervical mucus, why Excedrin is actually the best painkiller on the market, what to say to the TSA people when they insinuate that you're storing drugs in your junk after seeing a strange little item on the backscatter image, how often you need to shave your bits (and how often is too often? Old white dudes, ingrown hairs are no joking matter!), the exact quantity and quality of dead uterine lining which exits via my problematic vagina with reasonable regularity...

Are you ready to LEARN, old white dudes? 'Cause if you want to legislate my problematic vagina and the various things attached to it, you best know what the hell you're talking about.

*vagina vagina vagina vagina vagina vagina vagina vagina

Bloody policy-makers

A brief note on my lunch break: I was surprised and pleased to read these posts on Feminist Mormon Housewives regarding the issue, har har, of menstruation and temple visits. As I have posted about in the past, my experience as a teenager and young adult in the Orlando, FL area was that menstruating women were not allowed to perform baptisms for the dead. I was unsurprised and displeased to see that the Orlando temple remains among the LDS temples which restrict women in this manner.

At any rate, I encourage anyone interested to take a look at the Google Doc linked in the fMh posts and see how the temple in your area fares.

Body Appreciation Sunday: Hips don't lie

And these hips will tell you: we love Girl Scout cookies.

White whine ahoy

I don't know what they put in the water at work, but tea which tastes perfectly excellent at home tastes...off...here.

And that is my champagne complaint for the week.

How are YOUR lives, dear readers?

The Conception Superpost, Part 5: Final Thoughts

Four elements--earth, water, air, and fire--make up the natural world. Many myth systems suggest further a fifth element which binds the four together and transcends them: spirit, aether, or akasha: that which enlivens, the repository of all knowledge and wisdom. Similarly, the four albums of Conception's career taken together create something even greater than the sum of their very great parts. Four distinct albums, featuring four incredible musicians--that would have been enough, but a certain atmosphere and feeling are engendered by listening to each record consecutively, creating a shimmering strand of sound, an unbroken chain of growth from the first silky flicker of "Prevision" to the gorgeous breakdown of "Would It Be the Same."

The spirit of Conception is dynamic progress, ever-growth, a continual striving for the place where horizon meets sky. Never content to take the well-worn path, with each album the group refined their sound and blazed new trails, and if a new album sounded little like its predecessor, certain themes emerged and remained--a discarding of traditional ways, embracing self-reliance and even self-deification, a constant reach for something greater. The Last Sunset and its array of influences from flamenco to 80s speed metal; Parallel Minds and its complex metallurgy; In Your Multitude and its primal stomp; Flow and its poppy smoothness: each is integral to understanding Conception as a whole.

I will note, belatedly, that three of Conception's four albums have bonus tracks which were included on the Japanese releases. I elected not to discuss these tracks, for this reason: none of the CDs I own have the bonus tracks (despite two being Japanese discs) and my mind doesn't comprehend them as part and parcel of their respective albums; they aren't indelibly stamped into my brain the way the rest of the songs are. "Black on Black," "Gravity," and "Hand on Heart" are all fine songs, as good as anything else the band released, but they're...bonuses. Certainly I recommend listening to them if you can find them!

And--that's it from me...for now. I'm sure by now everyone knows I can always find something new to say about Conception.

The Conception Superpost, Part 4: Flow

Conception's fourth and final album, Flow, is irretrievably centered around concepts and themes of water. The fourth and most inexorable of the elements, water is associated with creativity, intuition, motion, femininity, and ultimate, basic life. Flow's tracks are, as the title suggests, always changing, yet they retain a cohesion of form, as water is water no matter what form--ice, steam, snow--it takes. The album is a creative one which melds a lighter, melodic sound with increasingly progressive music and lyrics more humanly emotional than anything the band had previously released. Notably the lyrics often indulge in the most basic emotions: grudges and anger, loneliness, lust. The headlong waterfall of Flow is propelled by the pulse of the band, the fluid bass of Ingar Amlien.

"Gethsemane" features a monologue in Christ's voice--standard thematic fare for the band, but in this instance the voice is a far more human one than ever before: Christ betrayed, tinged with mockery here and fearful desperation there. The rolling synth and smooth bass of the track conjure up the vagaries of storm gods, wind and water at odds, an encroaching front of inevitability. There's another deity at work in the blind orgasm of "Angel (Walk With Me)," the now-familiar voice of Lucifer, but as with the previous song, this is an eerily human demon, the embodiment of human frailty and pitfalls. Khan breaks out some growlier vocals for this song and the result is a devil you kind of do want to be seduced by, a tempter with a twisted, melting tongue. At first glance, "A Virtual Lovestory" seems like it would be better suited for Parallel Minds, perhaps, with its emphasis on technology, but the story beneath the veneer of cyberspeak is pure Venusian myth-telling--fitting, as Venus/Aphrodite is associated with the ocean as well as being a love goddess. The lyrics also recall the myth of Selene and Endymion, of loving someone from afar, someone you can never be with in the light of day (or the real world); this is also fitting, Selene being a moon deity and associated with the moon's pull on oceans and humanity. The album's title track is a microcosm of the record and was a smoother, gentler metal song ever sung? "Flow" too has underpinnings of moon myth, sacred femininity, watery birth and ancestral memory; this is the conch's hymn from "Soliloquy," the song which was sung when we climbed onto the shore from the ocean's womb.

Album cover

And then, there is "Cry," Conception's first makeout song--a full-on romantic interlude for a happy couple holding hands beneath a benevolent moon. After this out-of-character track, Khan boomerangs back to regular form with "Reach Out," a thrumming, wild exposition of Satanic self-worship which espouses the position that submerged beneath our conscious minds is a veritable iceberg of wisdom, enough truth, knowledge, and ability to become our own gods. "Tell Me When I'm Gone" is a strange song which stands out even in this relatively strange album; the colloquialism "hate-fuck" comes to mind. The woman the narrator sings to, with her reptile smile leaving lipstick on men's collars, can be read as a classic Siren, a temptress who drags men to their deaths in the cold breast of the ocean. The album takes another turn for the soft and romantic with Makeout Song #2, "Hold On"--a starkly simple track consisting of muted guitar and keyboard. Then comes the outstanding stomp of "Cardinal Sin," a soaring track of wonder, stubbornness, and resilience, and the cliffhanger finale "Would It Be the Same."

The liquid fingers of Tore Ostby and Ingar Amlien are on full display on Flow, with "Cardinal Sin" containing (for my money) the most fluid, technically impressive, and purely gorgeous guitar solo in the band's career. As for Amlien's bass--he is always stellar, but on this last album all stops are pulled out and in many cases the listener is left wondering if he has twice the normal amount of fingers. The bass lines in all tracks are audible; the sound mix on Flow is smooth and cohesive, with all elements given time and attention. Flow is easily the most experimental of Conception's albums after The Last Sunset, utilizing the changefulness of water yet not sacrificing the overall atmosphere and theme.

Must-listen songs: "Gethsemane," "Cardinal Sin" (live version).

The Conception Superpost, Part 3: In Your Multitude

Earth is...earth: grounded, primal, solid--earthy. In elemental terms it is associated with the human body and basic, material needs; some of its attributes are strength, heaviness, and fertility. In many myth systems earth is linked with the feminine, especially as it is associated with sensuality, shelter, and abundance. In Your Multitude is a sprawl of an album, as vast and dense as the globe and grounded in an overall heavier rhythm and theme than its predecessors, its robust heartbeat felt most powerfully through that essential primeval instrument, the drum.

"Under A Mourning Star" is an explosive first track sung in the voice of the Son of the Morning, here cast in terms which also call to mind an older, chthonic god: Hades, the "black horizon" and the king of shades. The drumbeat is almost industrial, a metallic klaxon which propels the song and demands attention. "Missionary Man" recalls a theme from a previous album, that of the false prophet; here the preacher takes the image of an all-sheltering savior and corrupts it, the promised land becoming a hell of sacrificed souls. Earth's association with death is first approached in "Retrospect," as the narrator sees himself taken to the cold country where nothing can live and mourns the loss of the "healing hand" which only those alive can wield. Furthermore, he sees the ultimate frustration of existence--that "the world will go on" without him, a desolate keening of powerlessness before something greater and more eternal. "Guilt" is a doomy, dense, and thoroughly depressing track of downtrodden soil and souls compressed...possibly the term "mundane" in its purest sense is fitting for this song, as the narrator warns that vivid dreams seldom last. The eponymous "Sanctuary" is a cave deep within the earth's womb, where light never reaches--so easy to hide, to fall back on familiar things. The song speaks of never attaining the treasure at "rainbow's end" and becoming color-blind, enshrouded in old skin and nurtured fears. And then comes the shattering complexity of "A Million Gods: a guitar solo isn't enough for this song; only a multi-instrument duel will do, and in a way that middle portion is reflective not only of the lyrical content but of the album's ambitions as well. The millions gods are not divine, indeed they, like most of mythology's deities, are downright earthly--petty, cruel, ambitious, domineering, and insecure. The song really puts the point home with its chorus, which proclaims that "you're the only god who's visible tonight" (emphasis mine).

Album cover

"Some Wounds" picks up the pace with a musically and lyrically surreal track about the battle scars we carry, weighing those ancient wounds against the material glory we earn for ourselves. "Carnal Comprehension" takes stalker anthems to a whole new level; in this case, the Devil (or maybe God) is your stalker, the black dog on your shoulder, and the entirety of the earth and sky is his playground as he compels the listener to give in to base fear, hatred, and lust. A juxtaposition appears in the next track, "Solar Serpent," between the heavenly body of the sun and the earthly body of the serpent; this carries into a metaphor of a person caught between high ideals and crude surroundings. The song could be interpreted as a metaphor for Quetzalcoatl, an Aztec deity whose name means "feathered serpent," and that deity's dual nature writ large onto humanity. The album's title track is its swan song, an elegiac glimpse into what would come next in Conception's career. The narrator of "In Your Multitude" mourns opportunities and loves lost--the world drags him down to mundanity, dreams unfulfilled, without the presence of the one he loves.

Arve Heimdal, Conception's drummer par excellence, seriously shines on this album. The intricate drum soloing in "A Million Gods," the furious, artfully off-kilter beat of "Under A Mourning Star," and the rolling earthquake of "Solar Serpent" cement his status as one of prog metal's premier drummers. Each track on the album contributes to the vast sonic experience of In Your Multitude as both remote and urgent, a densely transcendent masterpiece.

Must-listen tracks: "A Million Gods," "Carnal Comphrension."

The Conception Superpost, Part 2: Parallel Minds

The voice being intricately linked to breath, it makes sense that Parallel Minds is both Conception's album of air and the album which (arguably) best showcases Roy Khan's considerable vocal talents. Air is the element of the mind and denotes intellectual pursuits; air attributes include mercuriality or flightiness, intelligence and wisdom, communication, and multifaceted interests, and the element is fundamental to life. Air may be the pure ether of the highest atmosphere or the darker mists clouding the earth. In these senses, Parallel Minds opens up as a study in studies, a myriad deep dreams and lofty goals, and an introverted, thoughtful album.

"Water Confines" is a delightfully selfish and self-centered song; the narrator focuses on personal goals and high dreams, yet struggles with living up to his own sense of himself--he finds that perhaps he can't do it all himself, that maybe principles are not enough to live on. "Roll the Fire" (everyone's first Conception song, right?) is an intense, interior track, a review of years lived and a measuring of life's worth against encroaching shadow. The labyrinth of the mind is explored in "And I Close My Eyes"--a frantic pant of a song, musically dense and threaded with stream-of-conscious, free association lyrics. In comparison, the following track is almost bizarrely simple; "Silent Crying" is a dream of shadows and whispering secrets, and the fight to be free of one's own mind. The album's title track is a veritable electrical storm of guitar and vocals, lyrically covering everything from knowledge which is beyond belief and wisdom which lies in the bones to binary law and science's paramountcy to paranoiac ranting which throws the words of the majority back in their faces. Arguably "Parallel Minds" is the first appearance of Satan in Conception's lyrics (certainly not the last), and this is fitting, since one of his epithets is the Prince of Air. "Silver Shine," like "Silent Crying," is concerned with weighty memories and the effects of lies and truth on relationships, because what are words but shapes in the air?

Album cover

Then comes the one-two punch of "The Promiser" and "My Decision." It is difficult to separate these tracks; each spits in the face of the WASP establishment and each complements and completes the other. "The Promiser" speaks of corrupt men believing their own lies, while the narrator is too smart for the false tricks of religion--"My Decision" rams the point home with a blatant endorsement of atheism and elevation of self-reliance and brainpower. One song warns of placing too much trust in words (the words of the promiser, words from a TV screen, the voices of the masses) , while the other admonishes the listener to find his or her own voice. "Wolf's Lair" is a come-down, a reprieve before the big finish, a plateau of teasing, silver-tongued words of exactly the kind "The Promiser" warns about...only this time the words come from the Tempter himself. Parallel Minds concludes with the nine-minute saga of "Soliloquy," a three-part journey from gasping arousal through unfiltered divine knowledge to suffocation and paralysis derived from too much knowledge. Musica universalis is referenced in "Soliloquy - Sweet Lavender" in terms of "the conch's hymn," a connection of principles including those metaphysical and mathematical and a perfect reflection of an album consumed with deep thoughts and higher learning. It is notable that the conch's hymn is heard at the moment of sexual climax; intellectualism aside, the narrator comprehends the significance of carnal, material reality. This theme would be explored further on In Your Multitude and perfected on Flow.

Khan's vocals are often the most-talked-about aspect of Conception's music. Twenty-three years old when Parallel Minds was recorded, his recent training for the opera is clear on this album and the ones to come. As an instrument, Khan's voice is rarely equaled in the world of progressive and power metal music; and as an album, Parallel Minds is unparalleled, har har, in providing opportunities for that instrument to be used. Khan's presence is also felt in the lyrics, as he began cowriting most of Conception's music with Ostby, revealing himself to be an interesting, thoughtful lyricist. The interweaving of voice with stellar guitar, bass, and drum creates Parallel Minds as the first truly tight and cohesive album in Conception's catalog, with many hints of what was to come: oblique, smoky lyrics and astounding musical technique.

Must-listen tracks: "And I Close My Eyes", "Soliloquy".

The Conception Superpost, Part 1: Introduction and The Last Sunset

The progressive heavy metal band Conception was active from 1989 until 1998 when its members went their separate ways--singer Roy Khan to Kamelot, guitarist Tore Ostby to ARK, and bassist Ingar Amlien and drummer Arve Heimdal to Crest of Darkness, among other projects. Throughout the '90s Conception was revered by those in the know for their experimental, passionate music and refined technique, which began with 1991's The Last Sunset and culminated in 1997's Flow. These four albums can be interpreted in many ways; in the brief series which follows, I will try to interpret them as discrete yet interlocking elements analogous to the four elements out of which all nature is formed: The Last Sunset as the element fire, Parallel Minds as the element air, In Your Multitude as the element earth, and Flow as the element water. The final post will consider the four albums as a cohesive whole in the form of the fifth element, spirit.

Clearly I have too much time on my hands since leaving school. Anyhoo, away we go.

Fire as a classical element signifies assertiveness and energy--the stuff of stars, the burning of the sun and the deep hot places of the earth, the heart as the fountain of passion in the human body, battle as the historic human pastime. Fire may be creative or destructive, and many systems associate it with the fundamental masculine. Fire is the basic alchemical agent, changing anything it touches. As an album, The Last Sunset embodies fire in its passionate, raw, as-yet relatively formless and deeply experimental state as a group's first record, the coming-together and becomingness of four distinct personalities. Its ten-track listing espouses the religion of flames both lyrically and musically, and in many ways, this is significantly Ostby's record, the album on which his guitar, that essential masculine instrument, is most wild, unfettered, and changeful. Note also that almost all the music on the album was composed by Ostby and his brother Dag.

Reissued album cover

"Building a Force" and "War of Hate" kick off the album with guns blazing, both concerning themselves with the fight, as war gods are often linked to fire (Ogoun, Mixcoatl, Nergal, and others)--yet neither song glorifies battle. Rather both speak of war as the ruination of civilizations and the concept of "fighting for peace" as flawed; in these cases the fire burns out of control, destroying everything in its path. "Bowed Down with Sorrow" is about the pure ecstasy of grief, the cold fire which consumes all other cares and desires; a doomish track, it has the inevitability of a house on fire. The seeming-whimsical and amusing lyrics of "Fairy's Dance" belie this track's deeper meaning; the fire of sexual passion and lust leads to a complete alchemical change brought about by the fairy ("you are turned into a cow/'cause you did what she said"), making the track a warning about what happens when a person is obsessed and blinded by desire. Musically, "Fairy's Dance" is urgent, with a constant racing heartbeat of bass compelling narrator and listener forward, a headlong rush into the fairy's arms. "Another World" brings about more change, this time in the form of personal gnosis: the candle flame of intuition and spiritual strength. The album's title track is an epiphany, a spiritual shift cast in the metaphors of that omnipotent star Sol and painted in sunset shades, a warmer, gentler track reminiscent of a beacon fire on a hilltop. "Live to Survive" discusses the fire personality's drive to live and, more significantly, to live for the moment, in the most personal ways possible--against the endless battle of mundanity and oppression, a battle which ends with the holy war and cleansing fire of "Among the Gods." Against a backing of Spanish-inspired guitar and hand-clapping, The Last Sunset's final track climaxes in a glorious blaze.

Even the album's two instrumental tracks, "Prevision" and "Elegy," are fire music, with "Elegy" being a wonderful transitional piece of experimental guitar. Much of Ostby's guitar work on the album pulls from jazz, flamenco, and other non-traditionally-metal sources, creating a singularly passionate and progressive sound. Khan's voice at this juncture is exceptionally flexible and still somewhat raw; the fire of youth is evident in every operatic run. Taken both track-by-track and as a whole, The Last Sunset is a gorgeous first spark signifying the leaping bonfire in Conception's future.

Must-listen tracks: "Among the Gods," "Another World."

Yes, I hate freedom

Things I will be doing on Super Bowl Sunday:

+finishing The Devil in the White City

+working on various writing projects, including CONCEPTION SUPERPOST!

+making 3rd-rate longbox dividers from cardboard

+grocery shopping

+returning books to the library

+avoiding Facebook, Twitter, and Tumblr

Things I will not be doing on Super Bowl Sunday:

+watching the Super Bowl

Dear readers, no matter what you're doing, enjoy your day tomorrow!

2011 Brodies are here!

Yes, dear readers, it's awards season...and with the Golden Globes and Oscars and all the rest come the Brodies! As always, a dizzying array of funny, smart, sad, touching, sardonic, horrifying, beautiful posts are up for a variety of awards, including some of my very favorite bloggers (White and Delightsome, Life as a Reader, and We Were Going to be Queens among them), and yes, one of my own posts. Flattered and delighted! Go vote, if you can manage to choose between all the awesome.