David Fishkind
David Fishkind was born in Worcester, MA in 1990. In 2008 he spent ten days in Nova Scotia. He lives and works in New York.
An Analysis of Action Bronson’s “Brunch”
If you’re at all familiar with independent music and hip hop, chances are you’ve been hearing a lot about Action Bronson this summer. Hailing from Flushing, Queens, the Albanian-American chef’s debut record Dr. Lecter was received with universal acclaim with its slick, sometimes self loathing, sometimes violent, other times just straight clever rhymes, not to mention his numerous comparisons to Ghostface Killah. Along with the album came a number of music videos, the most memorable of which I’ve chosen to break down with you today.
The video opens with the line “know you broke my heart [something] when you said goodbye to me” coupled with the image of fat being trimmed away from a cut of raw meat. The meat (“carne” in Spanish) represents the carnality of love. As it is trimmed away, then spiced, such is the speaker’s heart and soul cut open, salt rubbed into the wounds. Here, an unconscious woman is revealed in the foreground of Action’s cooking. The literal death of a once meaningful relationship.
All the Albums that Have Been Released in 2011 Thus Far that I Have Downloaded Illegally (with Commentary)
936 – Peaking Lights → I like this, but I’m not gonna get all excited about it.
A I A : Alien Observer – Grouper → This seems like alien music maybe? Just kidding, but am I? I think I liked this.
A I A : Dream Loss – Grouper → This is the same as the other one, right?
All Eternals Deck – The Mountain Goats → Forgettable. Forgiveable.
Angels Exodus – Lil B → Can’t go wrong, but also… can’t remember listening to this ever. Still seems good.
Apocalypse – Bill Callahan → One of my favorite albums of the year. Very funny, very smart. Excellent songwriting by a consistently excellent songwriter. Listened to this walking from East Village to West Village several mornings. Really good music videos.
Something I Wrote in 2009
I wrote this in 2009. I didn’t fine-tune it. I didn’t submit it. I didn’t blog it. It just sat there. I thought of it fondly. I reread it this morning for the first time in approximately two years, and a lot of it seems to holds true. Here is the unedited version (with yes, Hemingway, the 30s, 40s, 90s, and copious exceptions to this “study” missing):
notes on literary style concerning male protagonists: early-mid 20th century vs. turn of 21st century
– seems like an interesting thing to investigate, have noticed some interesting differences
– in significant works of early-mid 20th century male protagonists seem to uphold certain amounts of confidence, toughness, dominance, even in the face of hardship, emotional experience, or tragedy
– beginning in late 20th century, moving to 21st, male protagonists seem to experience greater awkwardness, greater sense of helplessness and hopelessness, less ambition, less necessity to uphold spirit and status
David Fishkind—
Clear your calendars because the video goes live at 11 PM EST and will only be available for 24 hours.
**UPDATE** The EXTREMELY NSFW video is no longer available for viewing on Vimeo.
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i’m a bullhole cliche / assshit: An Interview with Victoria Trott
When I started reading online literature, sometime in mid-2008, I discovered a short list of bloggers/writers (Tao Lin, Ellen Kennedy, Zachary German) with similar attitudes and approaches to literature. Later, when Muumuu House was established, I found, among them, a new name: Victoria Trott. I read her poems, her blog, and it was all very strange, funny, and poignant. On Halloween 2009, I met her at a late night get together in (where else) Williamsburg. She seemed quiet, estranged, grinning aimlessly. By then she’d sort of disappeared from the online scene, leaving behind only a few publications (not to mention an unreleased forthcoming issue of German’s now-discontinued litmag), an altered moniker, and a lot of questions. In late 2009, she created a hilarious, ingenious Twitter account, and in summer 2010, a wonderful new blog. Finally there was some clarity, openness, continuity, but still, I was curious. Last fall, I compiled a list of questions I had for (and regarding) Victoria in a Gmail draft. Then I emailed her some of those questions, commencing a slow correspondence, spanning three months. Here are the results:
David Fishkind: Hi Victoria, How are you?
Victoria Trott: Hey David, someone bought me breakfast today and I took half of a Ritalin, I feel pretty good. How are you?
How did you get involved with online literature? Or maybe, what is your time line of involvement?
Here’s a timeline of my involvement with online literature, which has the stuff about blog switching, I think
2007 – high school sophomore, read Hikikomori on Bear Parade. showed Tao Lin’s blog to my friend, she said “amoeba ass?” and laughed with a puzzled face.
Have You Seen This Bear?
This young fella (about 1 year old, according to some expert) has been creating quite a stir in the local Boston area. This picture, courtesy of The Sun Chronicle of Attleboro, cycled across the local news channels last night, poking its cute little nose into the homes of thousands. One woman reported that she saw this guy rolling around in her backyard yesterday morning. Ah, imagine! A quiet New England summer, the sun just rising over the trees, lying down in the cool, wet grass and rubbing your naked back and ass all over it. Can’t say I don’t envy Mr. (or Ms.) Bear over there. Another visual witness filmed the great creature lumbering about its day, explaining that normally he is a simple wedding photographer, but this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity roused him to take up the camera in new and unprecedented ways. Truly an inspiration to us all. And this seemingly innocent candid bears (pun intended!) a great deal of weight. It shows the fear and isolation of the creature in the eyes of modern suburban culture. What he thought to be an open grassy knoll happened to be the cornerstone of middle class life. A life more foreign to the bear than its onlookers are to the wild. There is such beauty and grace in its stature. It grasps to the branch like a child to his mother’s leg, eyes wide, mouth puckered tight. The greenery just slightly blocking our view of its face. And is there not a better moment to talk about precision and power in metaphor? Man and nature have been torn so far apart, blah blah, no connection, alienation, etc. We all know that. But hey, this is aesthetics in action. This is not just a photo of a bear. This is a photo of a human pondering his surrounding world. So controlled, so conformed, so well known and understood and industrialized, and yet… Here we are, bear and man, so close together in the circle of mammalian life, but further separated than any two creatures that have ever shared a backyard. I went camping a few weeks ago with my girlfriend and there were signs everywhere warning us of bears, and we put all our food and beer in the car when away from the site, but man, can’t we all just get along? Ehh, I guess not. Anyway, that’s old news because Whitey Bulger is dead!
The Screen on My Phone Broke
Above is the last picture it took before taking on water at work today, from which it would never recover. Luckily I uploaded the captured smorgasbord before it was too late. I replaced the phone at my local Verizon retailer. Now I’ve got a classic Samsung flip-style phone. Feeling pretty retro. Like, déjà vu. This shit happened two years ago. Seriously trippy.
Anyway, yesterday I received a package from out of the country containing three copies of a chapbook titled “Porn” and by “Richard Longfellow.” After some Facebook+Gmail research and hard-thinking, I determined the package to be from Jackson Nieuwland. I haven’t read it yet, but my mother did. She said it was like karaoke. Seems interesting. The chapbooks are pink and have a lot of things. I read a few words from the middle of a poem in the middle of the pamphlet yesterday, but was it like karaoke?
My dog is getting groomed right now. Right outside the house. In a van. The van pulls right up, washes the dog, cuts the dog’s hair, delivers the dog anew. It’s a deal.
I just want to take this moment to shout out to M Kitchell, I been loving David Lynch too. Rewatched Twin Peaks this month too.
And to all you out there thinking about voting for Mitt Romney, I’m just here to say, that’s cool I guess. I mean, I’m not gonna do that, but I’m not here to judge. Just out of curiosity though, are any HTMLGIANT readers Mormon? Does religion influence your vote (I mean anyone, not just Mormons)? Does anyone here even vote?
But really, don’t those hotdogs look good?
Brazil is on @Max right now
Do you guys like that movie?
Do you guys have a premium movie channel package?
Do you guys watch Max After Dark, i.e., Skinemax?
I mean, how was your day?
I Listened to Blood Meridian at Work
I have a job. The job is a summer job. I don’t have a full time job because I’m a college student. The job is working on a farm. I am a farmhand. My boss tells me to shovel dirt in a specific direction and I do it. Sometimes I hoe around Swiss Chard. Other things too. Most of the tasks are pretty monotonous and can several hours to complete. Different workers have their own way of dealing with this. The Skidmore grad chain smokes. The middle-aged Vietnamese man takes piss breaks. I listen to things on my iPod. I’d never listened to an audiobook at work, nor had I read a Cormac McCarthy novel, so I decided I’d kill two birds with one stone and give Blood Meridian a try. It took about three days of work to get through the story. When I started it, I was shoveling mulch from bigger piles into smaller piles. When I finished it, I was sitting down in a field my boss calls “The Plain.”
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June 2nd, 2011 / 6:54 pm
June 2nd, 2011 / 6:54 pm
Dogs vs. Birds
I like dogs. I’m what you might call a “dog person.” My dog, who my parents purchased somewhere in central Indiana in November 1999, is not only a great friend, but an important influence on my writing and art. Today, she sits approximately fifteen feet behind me staring out the window at the cold, gray earth. Did I mention she likes HTMLGIANT.
When I was growing up, a strong percentage of my favorite books were centered around dogs. There was Go, Dog. Go!—the second book I ever read. Then there were Marjorie Flack’s Angus books about a mischievous Scottish Terrier, not unlike the more popular The Poky Little Puppy, which as of 2001, was the single all-time best-selling hardcover children’s book in the country, selling nearly 15 million copies since its publication in 1942, according to Publishers Weekly. As I grew older still, I read Shiloh and, my favorite childhood novel, Where the Red Fern Grows. There was even a book narrated by a Pointer, read aloud in some public school setting, which has left an undying impression on me, years later. Needless to say, the dog books were a big part of my childhood.
Somewhere along the line, though, a shift occurred.