|||

Anything for a Weird Life

Found Sound Reviews IV

If you would like your release to be reviewed by Tim Kabara, donate it to your local thrift store.

The Best of Silly Wizard

The Best of Silly Wizard compilation implies the existence of additional Silly Wizard records. This means that a band name I thought I had made up has been taken for quite a while and I had no idea. This group has been in operation since 1970, it turns out. They are from Scotland. They play folk music. To be honest, I was hoping for something sillier, more Wizard-er. But oh well… not a big risk at 99 cents. This cassette marks the end of a glorious run at a local thrift store of odd and interesting items acquired, some fellow traveler cleaning house. The more recent used media wave there has been every Christmas album ever recorded by anyone. But I am a patient old salt. One cannot control the sea of thrift. There is feast and there is famine. I will be patient and wait for the next wave. It will come.

VHS cassette tape (sold as blank) marked Gunkanjima”

One of the great recent tragedies of the local thrift scene has been a policy shift to not selling used” formerly blank VHS tapes. I guess they dumpster them? You can get them on Ebay where they are listed as sold as blank” but it is not as fun. I never pass on these, as each is its own accidently curated and spliced/edited piece of someone’s history, an accidental video mix tape. When I find one with a language other than English all over it? Especially exciting. This tape turned out to be tourist promo video for Gunkanjima Island, which was engaging and spooky. The real gold? USA wresting from a broadcast in another country with subtitles and promo ads in the native language between bouts.

Local thrift stores, I implore you. Bring sold as blank” back!

The Crow Original Motion Picture Soundtrack

My parents got divorced right after I graduated high school, in the spring of 1994.

As I plotted out the summer of my senior year, I realized a friend’s parents were away on vacation, week by week, for the entire summer until college.

As I went from weeklong house party to weeklong house party, this soundtrack was ever-present. I never had to buy a copy, someone had one. They would put it on, dim the lights, offer me a clove cigarette.

Stumbling upon it for a few dollars and giving it a spin in 2023 unlocked many memories.

At my high school, in the early 1990s, there weren’t enough underground folks to separate up more formally. So, we sat together in the cafeteria and hung out together on campus. The Punks, the Goths, the Grunge Rockers, the Industrial kids, those heading to Art School… the other students nicknamed us The Dark Crowd”.

This soundtrack is like that cafeteria table. The Cure sitting with Pantera sitting with My Life with the Thrill Kill Kult sitting with the Violent Femmes. A neat thing that used to happen, as is mostly the case here, was that bands would release new material or previously unreleased covers of their favorite music, their favorite bands (here, Suicide, Poison Idea, and Joy Division get that treatment) on these OSTs.

Tim Kabara

IG: @kim_tabara

Up next Poem: "New Year Same Shit." by Eleanor Ball Fiction: "Chicken Plucker 9000" by Alex Antiuk
Latest posts Poem: "Paraphernalia" by Maya Stahler "The Campland Guide to Pack Fitting: 8 Easy Steps" by Kent Kosack Like Ideas, or Birds in Hell: an interview with David Kuhnlein "Installations: The Delivery" by Terence Hannum Confessions of an Authorized Schriftsteller [Alternative Currents] Three Poems about a Brain Tumour by R.C. Thomas Fiction: "Peanut Butter Milkshake" by Matt Lee Dreams Are My Social Life by Rupert Wondolowski [Baltimore Book Release] Loners Club: A History in Three (or Four) Shows [Anything for a Weird Life] Three Poems by Atsuhi Ikeda Poem: "Cool Blue-Tiled Pools" by Damon Hubbs Poem: "To Be a God" by Brian Austin Time to Say Goodbye for the Summer [Anything For a Weird Life] Three poems by Stacy Black Fiction: "i've got the worry" by Tony Rauch How Not to Go to Shows [Anything for a Weird Life] Poem: "The Parking Lot" by Travis Hoyles "Poem, With Holes in It" by 月 Duhem Fiction: "Paul, Standing by at Standing Rock" by Matt Gillick "A scribble, a letter, a thank you" by David Hay Going Underground at the Undercroft [Anything for a Weird Life] Fiction: "Strangely Colorado" by John Yohe Poem: "The Bride Stripped Bare by Her Bachelors" by Juliette Sandoval Citizen Sleeper: Notes Toward a New Cyberpunk Fiction: "So..." by Jake Williams Fiction: "Chicken Plucker 9000" by Alex Antiuk Found Sound Reviews [Anything for a Weird Life] Poem: "New Year Same Shit." by Eleanor Ball Jamie Stewart in Conversation with Kelly Xio [Alive at the Same Time] Fiction: "An Occurrence at L'Auberge Casino Resort - Lake Charles" Mental Gymnastics by Perhaps Hand [Baltimore Sound Document]