The Guitar Man

I didn't know much (=anything) about Johnny Winter until I saw him on the cover of this Japanese guitar magazine (don't ask), but I just couldn't help noticing that the man looks a huge lot like a zef version of Jerry Cantrell O.o

Ever wondered what would happen if Jerry got a little bit Ninja-ed? Or should I say a little Kid-Rock-ed - which is probably the closest Americans can get to zef?

...Or it was, until Rob Zombie shot this music video:

[Don't miss the ever-flawless John 5 doing his thing over there, along with his good old mate drummer Ginger Fish. As you can see, one half of Rob Zombie's current band actually consists of former Marilyn Manson members, which is funny as Hell LOL]

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That's Jerry over there, in case you have any doubts LOL

The similarity between the two turns even scarier when you find out that Johnny looked EVEN more like Jerry when he was younger (he was already in his 40s when the cover shot was taken)...

What. The. Fuck.

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This similarity, however, might not be entirely casual...

Partially quoting his Wikipedia article (which, as we all know, is the universal source of all truth LOL), Johnny Winter is "an American blues musician" born in the über-Southern town of Beaumont, Texas in 1944. That's actually not too far away from the Southern Oklahoma area where Jerry's father was raised and presumably born. Of course, this could be as much of a bullshit claim as saying that all the Russians look alike because they come from the fucking Russia, but I think it's pretty reasonable to guess that Winter (who's actually old enough to be Jerry's father LOL) and Cantrell might have been swimming in the same genetic pool without showering afterwards. Of course, Jerry's Southern genes are dilluded with a fair amount of Northern input... which probably explains why he's not zef enough to be zef LOL

...that said with all due respect to Southern people in general, and to Johnny Winter and Jerry Cantrell Sr. in particular.

In fact, Johnny Winter sounds really cool, based on what I've heard. He has a nice broken voice, and he's pretty vicious for a blues player, which definitely puts him in the Cantrell league... because that's exactly what Jerry is: a genuine Southern musician wonderfully swept by the Seattle grunge wave.

Something good had to come out of that, didn't it? ;)

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I'll end this Southern-flavoured post with a picture of Johnny Winter jamming with (Seattle-born) Jimi Hendrix... because that's the type of stuff people did in the 1960s.

Doesn't look that different from Jerry and Will playing together, heh? ;)

Twenty-two years younger, rocking just as hard.

Unfortunately, there is nobody left to play with at the other end of the next twenty-two year gap.

Fuck my generation.

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But don't worry, ladies and gentlemen... 

The South will rise again.

I swear to God it will.

Japanese Security

Tokyo, Japan. March 10, 2014

Only in Japan.

Australian Summer pt. II - Japanese Winter

"My guitar after the Singapore gig. March 7, 2014"

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I told you he was a vicious bastard.

Definitely not the kind of guy you'll catch spraying his fretboard with Finger-ease.


And take a look at just HOW great this picture looks under my blog header. You're an artist, Will. You already know it.

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"Rottnest Island, Australia. March 2, 2014"

Soundwave Festival is over, and the caravan of bands who can't afford to sit in their comfortable So Cal homes throughout the American winter (like KISS or Metallica do) starts slowly moving up from the cosy warmth of Australian summer and into the realm of the freezing Japanese winter.

Black T-shirts get covered with black leather jackets; jeans remain in place. The occasional scarf pops up to protect delicate throats from the dangers of cold air. At least, there's one aspect in which the life of a rock musician is pretty easy.

And the good thing about the freezing Japanese winter is that, like all things Japanese, it happens to happen in Japan.

It's precisely at this point of the trip where Dir En Grey put on their vicious bastard sunglasses and show a silent (and friendly LOL) middle finger to all the other bands who have followed them north from the Antipodes as they say to themselves:

"Welcome to the Land of the Rising Sun, gaijin bitches."

[Dir En Grey in full-on vicious bastard mode LOL]

Dir En Grey are obviously bigger than Alice in their homeland. Tangible proof of that is the fact that, on the two nights previous to Alice's tour-end concert, Dir En Grey played TWO SHOWS at the legendary Budokan (we could be talking about a total 28.000 people, if they sold out), while AIC had to do their thing at a 2.500 capacity club.

Yes, you heard that right: Alice In Chains play fucking theatres and clubs because... who needs justice anyway? Keep that in mind the next time you see One Direction selling out fucking stadiums or Kanye West doing fucking arenas.

It's even funnier if you consider that the next act to play at the Budokan after Diru was... Il Divo.

Il Fucking Divo, ladies and gentlemen.

How's that supposed to make you feel?

[Budokan vs. AgeHa. Not the most flattering comparison.]

Of course, it's remarkable that such an extreme band as Dir En Grey (especiall since they started turning the metal up and the visual down more than half a decade ago) can mobilize such amounts of people in their home country (just to make a comparison: 14.000 is more than Tokio Hotel ever sold on a regular show - excluding festivals, obviously -, and they were supposed to be a boy band LMAO).

This is just another proof that we still have a lot left to learn from Japan... probably.

 
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"Freezing in Tokyo post-show. En route to end-of-tour family dinner with band & crew. 3/10/14."

And so, this tiny little Pacific Rim tour has ended much earlier than I thought it would... and what a strange journey it's been.

A strange beautiful journey to the other end of the world.

And, like all good things in life, it ends with a Japanese (don't think they'll go looking for an American BBQ restaurant in Japan, right? LOL) dinner somewhere in the beautiful Tokyo.

Not bad, if you ask me.

 
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Like the coldest winter will

Heaven beside you... Hell within

And you know you have it still 

Heaven inside you

Disassociative

I can tell you what they say in space

That our Earth is too grey

But when the spirit is so digital

The body acts this way

That world was killing me

That world was killing me

Disassociative

That world was killing me

That world was killing me

Disassociative

The nervous systems down

The nervous systems down

I know

The nervous systems down

The nervous systems down

I know

I can never get out of here

I don't want to just float in fear

A dead astronaut in space 

I can never get out of here

I don't want to just float in fear

A dead astronaut in space

Sometimes we walk like we were shot

Through our heads, my love

We write a song in space like we're

Already dead and gone

Your world was killing me

Your world was killing me

Disassociative

Your world was killing me

Your world was killing me

Disassociative

I can never get out of here

I don't want to just float in fear

A dead astronaut in space 

I can never get out of here

I don't want to just float in fear

A dead astronaut in space

The nervous systems down

The nervous systems down

The nervous systems down

The nervous systems down

I can never get out of here

I don't want to just float in fear

A dead astronaut in space

I can never get out of here

I don't want to just float in fear

A dead astronaut in space

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"No man can surpass his own time, for the spirit of his time is also his own spirit." 
[*]

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Der Anfang

Hello, readers old and new.

To those of you who already know me, this will probably come as a big surprise. I bet you did not expect me to get back to such an anachronistic format as the personal blog is, but here I am... once again. I'm here and I'm going to keep writing, because that's what I do... or at least a big part of it. And even if the big-data-oriented Internet 2.0 doesn't favour this form of expression, I'm going to keep on doing it. 'Cause that's what I fucking do. 

The intrusive big data collectors we've come to know as 'social networks' are not going to last forever. Art is. In every possible form.

I've kept myself away from writing - REALLY writing - for more than two years now, and the reason for that - aside from the changing internet demographics - is that I've been dealing with depression. That's right, my old friends. You might not have noticed that, if you've been reading my tweets, because that's what we all do in twitter: we smile and we pretend to be moderately satisfied, because that's the way Mother Google wants us to feel. But not anymore. 

I'm so tired of not being able to express myself as the person I REALLY am, I just can't take it anymore.

I'm tired of being tired.

I'm bored of being bored.

I'm sick of being sick.

So yes, I've been depressed for the last three years - more depressed than I ever thought I could be -, for so many reasons I can't even begin to explain them here... but don't worry - you'll find out, eventually. During these dark years, I've seen all the things I believe in shattered. I've seen all my hopes destroyed. I've seen the people I love and admire being slowly deprived from everything they were, stripped from every little bit of human dignity they had left, forced to go through the most humiliating experiences I could ever have imagined, confined to the most miserable forms of existence; robbed, enslaved and outraged; reduced to a sad ghostly projection of the people they used to be... and my own spirit slowly dying with theirs. I've seen the light of my world extinguished. I've lost my faith in freedom, my faith in humanity, my faith in life.

But here I am... still. And I'm not planning to give up anytime soon.

As you might have already noticed, I'm writing in English now. I don't think that matters too much, though. I've always liked twisting languages a lot, and that's definitely not going to change. 

I don't even know how many of you - my loyal old readers - are still left here to care about whatever things I have to say, but we'll find that out along the way. We created great things together. I hope we can do that again.

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To those of you who don't know me yet... I'm sorry - I sort of forgot you were there. It's hard to explain who I am or what this blog is about at this point. The only thing I can tell you is I'm NOT writing about fashion (I have another blog for that). I'm NOT writing about cosmetics. I'm NOT writing about cooking. And I'm definitely NOT writing about lifestyle.

This blog is just me, in my purest form of expression - nothing more, and nothing less -, so be prepared for some potentially explicit content, the occasional swearing - whenever the fuck I feel like it -, polemic themes, unedited raw emotions, lenghty autobiographical tales, scary journeys through the depths of my psyche, exhaustive analysis of the cultural reality, pieces from my everyday life, picutres of beautiful androgynous people, endless love for Germany and the Germans (not all of them LOL), countless Simpsons references, Japan, cats, an insane amount of music, mindblowing absurd and, if my spirit ever gets back to form, even uncontrolled fangirling. We'll leave that one out for now, though.

Welcome to The Deadly Fetishes.

Enjoy it... if you can.