In reference to this, I just happened to crack open my copy of Fear and Loathing in America: The Brutal Odyssey of an Outlaw Journalist, and here’s what I found… In a letter to Tom Wolfe, 4/20/1971, this is in reference to the experience of writing Fear and Loathing:

The first draft to Part One, for instance, was written by hand on Mint Hotel stationary during and all-night drink/drug frenzy while I waited for dawn to come up so I could flee without paying. I typed the section you have in a motel in Pasadena, but hardly changed anything from the original crazed draft…

So in terms of Gonzo Journalism (pure), Part One is the only chunk that qualifies — although even the final version is slightly bastardized. What I was trying to et at in this was [the] mind-warp/photo technique of instant journalism: One draft, written on the spot at top speed and basically un-revised, edited, chopped, larded, etc. for publication. Ideally, I’d like to walk away from a scene and mail my notebook to the editor, who will then carry it, un-touched, to the printer.

But I think that will take a while to hash out.

The marriage of blogging with actual field-experience is where the hot action is. And, for balance, here’s an earlier (March 3rd) letter to Wolfe in response to his description of being on a lecture tour in Italy:

Dear Tom…

Thanks to Frank for the recommendation of Brick, which takes an improbable melange of genres -- the high-school drama and film noir -- and hits it out of the part. It's just very well-done cinema. Recommended!

Last night went out to a kick-ass rock show at the Logger Bar in Blue Lake. It was fantastic in many ways.

First of all, the music was good! The headlining group was Orange Sunshine, from the Netherlands:

The problem with music in the late 60's was the hippy shit, right? The goddamn peace and love stuff, the acoustic folkies, the going-to-San-Francisco-with-flowers-in-yr-hair.
But what if the 60's were as wildly murderous a time as these strange days? What if it was ALL Charlie Manson and napalm and muddy drugfreak people and Up Against the Wall, Motherfucker? Well, then, there'd only be, like, 5 bands left standing- the Stooges, the MC5, Hendrix, Blue Cheer, and Orange Sunshine.

They were well supported by Ghengis Khan from Oakland (no link, sorry) and notable locals The Ravens. It was all good loud, driving, rock and roll. Orange Sunshine and Ghengis Khan featured singing drummers (always a strong configuration when it works), and the Ravens frontwoman Melissa Medina is channeling some serious shit.

The Logger Bar is also a great place to have a show. It's big enough to actually have a show in, but small enough that it feels full even when 1/2 the crowd hasn't shown up yet. It's also covered with ancient logging paraphernalia, like giant esoteric chainsaws and pickaxes. They serve 24oz cans of Pabst and although the two sturdy women behind the bar could have used a barback, it worked out ok.

And finally, everyone was there. It had the feeling of public life that I've been craving, and there were also girls (hooray, girls!).

Yeah, so a good time was had by all. My neck is sore today. Kudos to Kelly B for doing such a great job of organizing it. Hopefully this will happen more often.

Interesting stuff from Johnny Sunshine.

I very much like the message of "doing stuff is better than waiting," and I suspect we're going to see a lot more of this internet-enabled "candidates getting up close and personal with individuals" over the next year. I'll be neat to watch this unfold. Kudos to Camp Edwards for an innovative campaign tactic that, whaddyaknow, actually does some good in the world too.

Adding: they seem to be the most intent of all the major campaigns on emulating the Dean model. DeanCorps (which this is clearly a copy of) was a pretty successful program in 2003-04. The major difference is that the Dean campaign didn't generate it from the top, but you have to start somewhere. It will be intriguing to see if the Edwards campaign is able to stimulate independent activism (probably can do), and then whether or not they'll be able to nurture, develop and scale it (much harder).

A marketing effort for Aqua Teen Hunger Force is mistaken for a Terrorist Plot.

I feel safer already. I also love that the kids who were charged w/crimes here made the most of their press time.

If they're actually prosecuted for this, it will be a dangerous precedent, because it furthers the line of authoritarian thinking which basically goes "any time we think we're being threatened, we're being threatened, and we can strike back with deadly force." That's obviously bullshit. It's manipulative paranoia.

Note to all the people in charge: this is what's coming. There are millions of us out here who have no respect for the delusional way you do business, who realize the Emperor has no clothes, and we're going to have fun with it.

FWIW, I'd love to see Frylock zap OBL.

Meanwhile, the slow build viz Iran continues. Deja vu indeed.

Proof!

Fanboyism is a menace. It must be resisted.

I'm particularly interested in quashing political fanboyism (such as members of the press seem to have for John McCain), especially during the primary season.

UPDATE: in light of Wes's slogan, perhaps I should adjust my tactics, and just choke 'em out.

A while back, I got the url democrobot.com, based on a conversation with Jon Berger and Eric Klotz about how there aught to be a digg.com for political news. At the time it was sort of trendy, and not especially needed (this was in early 2006 IIRC).

I think the time for such a site may be drawing near. The relationship between the established blogosphere, the newsmedia, and the major Democratic political campaigns is becoming increasingly symbiotic. Many major bloggers walk the line well, but quite a few don't. Trust is on the decline as people play favorites without acknowledging their biases, and/or take professional gigs with no disclaimer.

Add that to a campaign season which seems to have a very strong top tier, and you have a very different scene than 2003-04, when the internet fueled disruptive insurgent candidacies. At this point, online communications are a fully-integrated integrated part of the political establishment, and that includes much of the widely-read blogosphere. This isn't a bad thing, necessarily, but it's not like before.

However, at the same time, there are a large number of new/upstart citizen journalism projects which will produce a large volume of (relatively) independent campaign journalism. There's also a much greater chance that staffers will post anonymously about the inner workings of some campaign operations in more obscure fora. There will also be a glut of low-quality audio and video content to sift through. This is all new.

The sifting is what's needed. That's where democrobot might have a purpose. If you added in Zack's old "PPipes" idea of aggregating progressive/Democratic mailing-list messages, you'd have something that would be pretty interesting, and pretty useful too.

I clearly don't have a lot of bandwidth to take on additional projects, but it might not be all that much work to get up and running. We'll see.

So, I saw this somewhat amusing documentary called Dig!, about the Dandy Warhols (old Portland band, made it big w/European ringtones) and The Brian Jonestown Massacre (junkies from California). It's an interesting time capsule of 1990s Americana, which we watched back on Vagabender in Tuscon. We're making fun of it in this audio dispatch with the "You're out of the band!" and "I can play 400 instruments!" lines.

In it, main ego-man from BJM comes off like a borderline messianic kook, which is by other accounts more or less accurate.

The thing you don't really get from the documentary is how fucking good his music is. Clearly overblown sense of self? Yes. Also a sonic genius. Since I don't have to deal with the personality, I enjoy the product.

Just pulling something out of my last post which I found real interesting upon re-reading, the phrase public life.

If there's one real huge difference between living here in Humboldt County versus New York City, it's how small the public sphere seems to be. I'm sure this will be a contrast anywhere else I live, but there's a way in which the spatial restrictions and density of the city adds a decidedly public character to much of life.

Most of your time, on average, is spent outside your home. You socialize in public places and because of the genial nature of eyes on the street and because no one drives anywhere, you can get drunk in public with little fear for life or limb.

Here it's very different. Life is more private for more people -- you can spend six months at Westhaven and never really go out, still be happy -- and for that do head out, the band of experience that really passes for "public" is somewhat narrower.

This creates an interesting situation for me. While I'm hardly a gadfly or a social-climber, I do enjoy the kind of energy and interactions that come from having a public profile. I'm also very much a newbie, and finding the right scene in which to see and be seen is on my TODO list for sure.

Anyway, more gozo later. Just thought it was an interesting and revealing turn of phrase.