The blood is on the table

Celebrate every milestone

So much has happened since the last edition of Message from the Underworld that I don’t really know where to start. So I’ll begin with a thank you to the new subscribers, particularly the new paid subscribers, who help keep this thing going. I also appreciate those of you who’ve been reading this weekly newsletters since the beginning of the project. Whether you chime in each week with a comment, like, or share or simply read and move on, I’m grateful for your attention and support.

The Witch’s Door

Last week I returned from an optometry appointment and lunch with a longtime MFTU reader (Hi Thane!) at Los Cuatro Milpas to find some books waiting for me at home. Ever since I started writing the newsletter for the LA Times Book Club I’ve been receiving an avalanche of books in the mail—some requested, some not.

But this was no ordinary book. It was a finished copy of The Witch’s Door, the book I cowrote with Ryan Matthew Cohn and Regina M. Rossi, and it is an absolute show stopper. The publisher is Chronicle Books who have a reputation for making beautiful books. The Witch’s Door is part of Chronicle’s new imprint Prism and they pulled out all the stops. I mean look at this thing.

The cover is printed right on the board and the title is embossed. It’s loaded with black and white images on high quality paper with a stunning full-color photo insert. It’s not a coffee table book, but it kind of looks like one, and is a veritable feast for the eyes. I don’t think any collection of two dimensional images can do justice to Ryan and Regina’s stunning collection of oddities, artifacts, and antiques, but the images, design, and layout are absolutely perfect for this book.

I’ll share more about the book as we get closer to the launch on October 1, but right now it’s #1 in Art, Antiques & Collectibles on Amazon and available for preorder. (Of course, you can also preorder through Bookshop.org and when you preorder through this link I get a small cut. It’s the best way to support me directly through the purchase of this book.)

The arrival of The Witch’s Door lent a celebratory air to our excursion to The Tower Bar for a night of punk rock. But first, a question: should one celebrate the arrival of a book weeks before it comes out?

Also-fucking-lutely. Being the oldest child raised in a military household coupled with twelve years of Catholic education followed by six years in the Navy, I was raised to believe there is a hierarchy for everything. A goes before B and C follows B and to interfere with the divine order of things is to invite chaos into your life.

Well, fuck that.

I used to be in the wait-to-be-happy camp. I’ll be happy when I finish my book. I’ll be happy when I get that promotion. I’ll be happy when I lose ten pounds. Then I’ll receive the happiness I deserve.

That kind of thinking is profoundly unhealthy. It’s good to have goals to work toward and to celebrate when we accomplish them, but our happiness as human depends not on checking off achievements on an imaginary list but embracing opportunities for joy when they present themselves. Plus, if I’m hanging all my happiness on big goals, I’m going to miss out on a lot of opportunities for joy along the way.

Thus, I’m a big believer in celebrating every milestone, no matter how big or small, because I might not ever get to do this thing I worked so hard to do again.

So on Thursday night I celebrated the imminent arrival of The Witch’s Door by going to a show at The Tower Bar.

Miss España

Miss España, Haren & Glow Fiend

I love The Tower Bar. It’s intimate, rowdy, and has a fascinating history. The crowd on Thursday wasn’t spares but it wasn’t packed either. It was comfortably cozy and part of that was due to the energy of the performers onstage. Both Miss Espana and Haren are from Spain and all its members are women and the audience reflected that dynamic.

But there was a young dude in the audience who wasn’t a punk and very clearly drunk. You know the type. The kind of person who equates punk with violence and if there isn’t a pit he’s going to start one because that’s what punk is all about because they don’t know any better.

This guy was pinballing around and crashing into people and we’d push him along but because he was very drunk he was constantly crashing into people who didn’t want to be crashed into because there was no one else in the pit but him. Even though he was having trouble staying on his feet it wasn’t a problem until he crashed into one of the tiny banquet tables where bands set up their merch and knocked over a bunch of glasses that broke and shattered on the floor.

No one was hurt. The band kept playing. A bartender swept up the mess—or tried to. The guy kept “dancing” and every few minutes would end up falling on the floor. At the end of Miss España’s set, which was great, I looked down and there was a huge piece of glass at my feet. It was base of a whisky tumbler with a long, mean-looking shard that would have seriously ruined someone’s summer if they’d fallen on it.

As I picked it up and put in the trash I felt a shiver pass through me. Maybe it was the spirit that protects drunks from serious injury. More than likely, it was a remembrance of the many, many times I’d been drunk at a punk rock show and avoided being kicked, bottled, stabbed or worse while causing casual mayhem on others while avoiding the consequences of own my actions.

It was a not a great feeling. I’m grateful to be in the place I am now, but I feel badly about the nights I ruined someone else’s good time with my drunken shenanigans.

In Alcoholics Anonymous, one of the promises holds: “We will not regret the past nor wish to shut the door on it.” This is good advice. You can’t be present or build a future by living in the past, but you can’t completely block it off either—as much as you might want to. It’s a tricky bit of business. I never really thought of about the curious wording of “nor wish to shut the door on it.” I always assumed it meant deal with it, but don’t dwell on it, which is easier said than done.

On a negative note, the band Haren was ripped off a few days later when a pair of thieves in LA stole a backpack that had all of the money the band had earned on their tour. Kristine Nervose of S.O.H. and The Tissues organized a GoFundMe that reached its modest goal in 24 hours. If you’d like to contribute, here’s the link.

I made a modest donation because that door keeps swinging open, and I have a lot to atone for.

I Don’t Mind Stealing Bread

Over at Hell World, Luck O’Neil presents another installment of Top 5 Songs. This time the subject is Chris Cornell and I was honored to contribute. One of the songs I discuss is “Hunger Strike.” My friend and collaborator Paul Rachman directed the video so I asked him about it and you don’t want to miss his response.

Sex, Death & Cinema

My summer job is over. Last week I completed my final LA Times Book Club newsletter. I talked to Navid Sinaki about his fantastic queer noir set in Tehran: Medusa of the Roses. I also got book recommendations from Melissa Border, Matthew Specktor, Nolan Knight & Steph Cha.

Sinaki will be in conversation with Jen Winston at Skylight Books tonight. If you’re in LA, go check him out!

Thanks for reading. I hope you have an epic week.

Thanks for reading! If you liked this newsletter you might also like my latest novel Make It Stop, or the paperback edition of Corporate Rock Sucks: The Rise & Fall of SST Records, or my book with Bad Religion, or my book with Keith Morris. I have more books and zines for sale here. And if you’ve read all of those, consider preordering my latest collaboration The Witch’s Door and the anthology Eight Very Bad Nights.

Message from the Underworld comes out every Wednesday and is always available for free, but paid subscribers also get my deepest gratitude and Orca Alert! on most Sundays. It’s a weekly round-up of links about art, culture, crime, and killer whales.