I was in 6th grade in the 1980’s when a classmate gave me what he called “a punk mixtape.” Side A was labeled SKATE ROCK and on Side B was scrawled SUICIDAL. We had basic cable and I’d already become a devout MTV watcher which had heavily influenced my musical tastes, but this cassette rewired my brain in irreparable ways. (I consider that a good thing by the way, anytime you have the opportunity to have your worldview turned upside down I highly recommend it.) I listened to it until it broke...
Last month landing in Munich on a stopover from Paris the pilot made an announcement as we were taxing to the gate. He said if we looked out the window we’d see several emergency vehicles heading towards the plane, that there was nothing to worry about but one of the passengers was having a medical emergency and the medics needed to get on the plane and help the person off and this needed to happen before anyone else could get off the plane. He asked everyone to please be considerate and rema...
If you follow me on any number of various world wide web portals you know I turned 50 yesterday. The truth is 49 always felt like a desperate, forced age. Like "look, I'm not 50 yet!!!" so for most of the last year if someone asked how old I was I just said 50, so I sort of let the air out of that tire a while ago so to speak. But in case you had any question there's no questioning it now, I'm officially old. And don't anyone older than me reply back with some youngster comment, you are old t...
Hi Crowd! Things have been a bit scattered recently, by design or just unfortunate timing it seems like one can barely digest the chaos of the day before being presented with the next wave of complications. This manifests in many ways, doom scrolling and retreating into known comfort zones among them. I don't know that I have either a solution or a useful processing method, though certainly find myself hunting for one almost daily. My list of things I want to write to you about continues to g...
I visited Los Angeles for the first time in February of 2001. I’d passed on previous opportunities to visit because I assumed it would be a place I’d hate. The only things I knew about it was there were lots of earthquakes and fake people. I didn’t work in the movies, had no interest in plastic surgery or fancy cars and generally didn’t think there was anything I’d find interesting there, so why bother? I eventually decided to check it out not for any grand reason other than that it was reall...
Hi Crowd! [Insert obligatory "I haven't written to you since last year" joke followed by copious laughter] The most persistent new years eve memory I have pegs back to perhaps '94 in Gainesville, we'd all just gotten home from some new years eve show happening at the Hardback with which bands I've forgotten but certainly loved with all my heart at the time, and when I say home I mean the shitty 8 unit breezeway apartment complex I lived in at the time of which 6 of the 8 apartments were occup...
Hi Crowd!So before we get into it, some good news this week: The ICC finally issued arrest warrants for some war criminals. That took too long, but it's in motion now and that's great. Matt Gaetz withdrew his nomination for AG because of too much attention into alleged "sexual misconduct" and payments to underaged girls. Quietly laughing about the people who told me over the last week that this was all unfounded smear campaign lies. Gary Gensler announced that he will resign in January. Baby ...
Hi Crowd!A little more than a year ago I wrote about the end of social media. I think a lot of what I wrote there holds true and is more obvious from this perspective, especially if you consider the trajectory X/witter is on. Regardless of how you personally feel about Musk or any of his choices (like removing block functions and unbanning abusers) the fact that he's moved from apolitical to heavily pushing one side, and will have a role with the incoming government, it's fair to consider thi...
Hi Crowd!Before we jump into it just a reminder that there are preorders available for my UNFINISHED PROJECTS photos book, as well as PUNKS NOT DED, my unofficial companion to Phaidon's soon to be published CRYPTOPUNKS: FREE TO CLAIM. I'm using a new printer for these, and just ordered 10 test copies of UNFINISHED PROJECTS which, if they look good, will serve as a limited pre-release edition before I do the full initial print run and those will be prioritized to the first orders I get on the ...
Hi Crowd!Before we get into it, I have some new books available for preorder. I won't spend time shilling, info in the links. Also before we get into here's something unrelated: Millimetric is guitar maker out of Montreal who has a set of custom shapes that are just beautiful. I've never touched one in person but people I know who have speak highly of them, I just think they are gorgeous so I follow along. Turns out the guy (I don't know his name as I've never spoken to him, Florian maybe?) h...
Links, commentary, occasional rants by Sean Bonner sent out irregularly.
