...had an awesome, but still shitty doctors appointment this week. i've lost 45 lbs since my last visit in February (YESSSSS!!), but waiting for tests to come back for the real reason i was there ( MEGA :( like you wouldn't believe )...been having issues with sleep-walking these past 2 weeks as well...i keep randomly waking up in other rooms of the house & have missed a couple days at work as a result...that & the fact i'm going to be finally knuckling down & getting all the legal BS of my divorce & selling the house & packing up & moving me & my kittycats in the next few weeks...not to mention all the debt i'm facing & all that bullshit...

i've had my family & friends step up to the plate like you wouldn't believe & all your support is more than i could ever ask for, let alone appreciate and/or thank you for. but i just had to get out in the middle of nowhere for a bit this evening & get some solstace...packed up the lame-ass mini-van with me, a just-downloaded Yes show (Tooleman 35th anniversary remaster of Baton Rouge 27 June 1979- AMAZING RECORDING & PERFORMANCE!!!), and a camera & the chance to snap a few pics of one of the places close to me that brings me some inner peace. one of the reasons i live where i live is this... i can drive 20 minutes west down the freeway and dive into the abandoned, burned-out, rust-belt wasteland that is Cleveland & see all my friends & frolic in the barren & apocalyptic nightmarish reality that it is. i can also drive about 10 minutes south of my house & see this here that i'm now going to share with you. for best results, listen to an early Yes record while viewing... if you dont have one (imagine that??!!??), i'll quote some lyrics before i get started...

"on the hill we viewed the silence of the valley
called to witness cycles only of the past
and we reach all this with the movements
in between the said remark

close to the edge, down by the river
down at the edge round by the corner
seasons will pass you by
now that it's all over and done
called to the seed right to the sun
now that you find
now that you're whole...

seasons will pass you by...
...i get up, i get down...
...i get up, i get down...
...i get up, i get down..."

(ending excerpt from "seasons of man" of "Close To The Edge" by Yes, 1972 )

nothing's perfect...mans ruin in my inner peace...

and, as the sun sets on the horizon...

getting on with life...so much over rated!!! i keep listening to the Tetsu-Arei "Force" ep over & over...

"Starting Over!!! Starting Over....STRATING OVER!!!!!!!!!!" ...thats what i'm going to do. i have no choice, you see!!!

for no other reason than that its playing, i'll quote some inspiration from another Yes song...

"high vibration go on...
to the sun, oh let my heart dreaming
past a mortal as me
whare can i be?

wish the sun to stand still
reaching out to touch our own being
past all mortal as we...here we can be...
we can be here...be here now...here we can be...

star...song...age...less...
awaken...gentle...mass...touching...

like the time i ran away...
and turned around and saw you close to me..."

 (excerpts from "awaken" by YES, 1977 )

there's a mighty large handfull of you i can thank for your love & support. we might not exactly be blood, but we are DEFINATELY family. you know who you are; YES YOU DO!!! thats why you're in my top-24;unfortunately a few of you wouldnt fit...you're still in my heart!!!

with loving memory of Atlantis...we will all grow wings...2012...

  ~wedge

ok, i finally tracked down an official DVD of the Japanese cult movie called BURST CITY. this was originally released sometime in early 1982 & has been unavailable until a Japanese DVD popped up in the last 2~3 years, and for some reason unknown to humanity, some american film company just officially licensed it on DVD this past June 2006. my jaw fucking dropped when i found out about this release, and i was fortunate enough to snag a copy from a somewhat local (Akron-area) shop this weekend, but it already had "deletion/cut-out" evidence to the package, so i guess eBay or Amazon is your only realistic hope anymore...whatever...heres my 2-cents on this baby!!

actually, i should start that i never knew what the fuck this thing was until about 2001. ive been a MANIAC collector of "all-things-Japanese-PUNK" since about 1986~7, and would see references to a comp LP called "Burst City" lumped in with all the 100's of other minor releases on every want list since then, and when i found out that the main band featured on this LP is THE ROOSTERS, i steered clear cos this band IS THE MOST FUCKING LAME-ASS-PSEUDO-"POLICE"-WANNA-BE-PIECE-OF-PIMPLY-DRIZZLED-SHIT ive ever heard in my life!!! yeah, WORSE than The Mods. IM NOT KIDDING!! sometime in the summer of 2001, i FINALLY tracked down the official VHS Video History of THE STALIN called "Your Order!!"(if youre even a casual fan of STALIN-YOU NEED THIS, there are no words to describe how mindblowing & essential this video is!! but i digress...), and theres a clip from 1982 that introduces Guitarist TAM (if you dont know who he is and why he is probably the MOST IMPORTANT Figure in the HISTORY of Japanese PUNK & HARD CORE, just forget about it-YOU SUCK!!) & shows them playing tracks from the TRASH LP on the back of a flat-bed truck while a mob of people throw rocks & beat people with axe-handles & baseball bats & such...up in the corner of the screen it says "Burst City" & a whole bunch of Japanese script...i was on a quest ever since!!!

so i get this DVD & examine the sleeve...packaged like some modern-slasher crap, but it claims that the DVD within contains a (ok, im paraphrasing now...stay with me...) "Classic modern-film-noir neo-apocalyptic indie film that displays some cutting-edge(for its time) camera work & brutal realism while also being a document of the 1st wave Japanese punk scene- IN VIVID DETAIL!!"   ok, google search the movie & delve into the producers proflies, etc & figure out that this movie actually happened to be an actual "birth" (for lack of a better term) of an entire film genre/scene for Asian filmmakers & all the dudes associated have since gone onto HUGE careers that are still going on today...whatever- I WANT THE STALIN!!!

the movie starts out with a very amateur-ish intro of a sped-up filming of someone driving a car thru a desertrd highway...yawn...the opening scene is REALLY bizarre!! im not sure, but im CONVINCED that the producers of "Liquid Sky" stole their ENTIRE production values from this scene...100's of extras in a FULL-ON "Off-Broadway" Musical piece singing & dancing about being "The Dregs Of A Generation" & "We Are The Nightmare You Created & Yet You Never Wanted"...sounds stupid, BUT IT WORKS!!!...then theres a bunch of shit i cant figure out...sure, its pretty much an excuse for THE ROOSTERS & INU & BATTLE ROCKERS to play songs live & have their outtakes used as "score" music, but im just lost...a pair of iron-clad bikers drive up to a street sign & cry as the sign goes up in flames...some Yakuza dudes show up & are offered a VERY disaffected whore...some of the dudes from the featured bands are filmed working in an auto-repair shop & beat the crap out of their bosses...cut to afformentioned Disaffected Whore showering in a warehouse with 1 of the yakuza guys & a bunch of hobo's show up & interrupt them, but tell them "to continue" or whatever(for some reason, there were NO subtitles in this scene...)...cut to these same hobo's digging dirt on some wall/ditch, but one of the iron-clad bikers shows up & does his best "Bionic man" impersonation & then starts SCREAMING which DOES NOT END until the movie ends...Disaffected Whore is then raped to death by some Yakuza dude in a studded chastity belt in a room full of punk-rock graffitti & said yakuza dude gets shived by the whores long-lost-lover...the bands play on & off & theres RIOTING LIKE IVE NEVER SEEN!!! somehow, this movie is SUPPOSED to be "rebellious youth" on a "protest" about the buliding of a controversial nuclear power plant...ill take their word for it, cos this is NEVER touched upon, as far as i can tell...

ok, heres why im writing this... GOD BLESS THE FUCKING STALIN!!!
theyre casted as the "antagonist" band in this movie. every time one of these bands does a "protest" gig, THE STALIN shows up & BEATS THE LIVING SHIT OUT OF THEM, GRABS THEIR EQUIPMENT & PLAYS WHATEVER THEY CAN MANAGE DURING THE ENSUING RIOTS!!! seriously, the fight/riot scenes are BRUTAL in this film & it TOTALLY adds to the inherent violence in STALINS music...whats even better-ITS EXCLUSIVE STALIN TRACKS!!! sure, its stuff from "Stalinism" 7" & "Trash" LP, but its TOTALLY DIFFERENT RECORDINGS THAT KICK THE LIVING FUCK OUT OF THESE VINYL VERSIONS!!!the BEST is their 1st appearance (almost 75 minutes into the movie) where they DESTROY EVERYTHING, BEAT THE FUCK OUT OF EVERYONE & take over & play "Saru", but only to manage to get the drummer playing while feedback rages over the guitars(while about 30 people are piled up & MURDERING on stage) & Michiro is SCREAMING uninteligible stuff thru a megaphone (sounds like a classic 9 Shocks Terror gig...only 20+ years earlier & half a world away...) while the cops pull up & GET THEIR FUCKING ASSES KICKED...

at the end/climax of the movie, STALIN returns & MICHIRO throws 2(count em-TWO!!) Pig-heads off the stage after packing them with lit explosives...one of em takes a cops head off & a full-on stream of blood splatters all over the screen...pretty much as rediculously graphic as anything in "Bad Taste", but Michiro continues to dig into a bucket of (obviously) real pig entrails & is swatting everybody in the face with them...WOW!!!...they manage to pull off pieces of 3~4 songs in this part, but i SWEAR TO FREAKIN' GOD that 1 of them is NOT available anywhere else...its about 15-20 minutes of STALIN DESTRUCTION that made the $9.99+tax worth it...

so, i dig thru the "special features" & the liner-notes from the original LP Soundtrack are included...EVERY band EXCEPT STALIN appears on it!!!
FUCK!!!

what a waste. the BEST STALIN ever, & it probably doesnt exist anywhere else...motherfuckers just CD re-issued the soundtrack on the pretty cool & somewhat reliable PONY CANYON label, but...NO STALIN!!! what the fuck!!??!!

just for that, this DVD is ESSENTIAL for Japanese punk collectors & a nice curiosity for neo-apocalyptic trash-film freaks...RENT/BUy ACCORDINGLY!!

 alright, i decided to NOT completely show my complete immaturity & deleted my abhorently INANE blog posts.

maybee someday when i finally have something to say outside of the realm of stupidity, will i post another...

good day to you, sir or madam (as the case may be).