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Zabird

Children of the revolution

About Me

When I'm not goofing off (or listening to Jonesy's Jukebox or Rollins), I can usually be found either a) "cutting the color out of a story," b) saving writers from themselves or c) editing blog stuff.Bounced around the U.S. as a little kid (my dad was a journalist), but I mostly grew up near New Orleans and Oklahoma City. Somehow managed to get a college degree in 1982 despite the concerts, street-theater radical politics and lack of actual class attendance. After knocking around Europe (squatter riots!), spent a couple years trying to escape rust-belt Illinois (first "real" job) and 14.5 as a Phoenician (home of Alice Cooper, Barry Goldwater and Acquanetta) before landing in Lotus Land in 2000. What keeps me here? The jacarandas in bloom?... width="425" height="350"

My Interests

Films, music, art, fiber arts, books, photography, collecting kitsch, amazing facts. ..

I'd like to meet:


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Music:

Pistols, Clash, Buzzcocks, X, Screamers, Damned, DKs, PiL, Magazine, Echo & the Bunnymen, Psychedelic Furs, U2, Depeche Mode, the Specials, Madness, Wire, the Jesus and Mary Chain, the N.Y. Dolls, BJM, the Good, the Bad & the Queen, Arcade Fire, the Chieftains, Beausoleil, Steve Riley & the Mamou Playboys, the Balfa Brothers, Bob Wills and the Texas Playboys, Patsy Cline, Etta James, the Doors, '60s Motown, Iggy, the Dead, T. Rex, Kinks, early Stones, grunge Ashley MacIsaac, reggae, ska, dub, blues, world, early jazz, pow wow music.X, corrupting the youth of America. Look at Billy Zoom!Stripes, dots, Devoto-era BuzzcocksHair 'n' flairs. Future Clash, future PiL. The Brothers Reid.BunnymenA Fur piece Ah-haaaaaaaaaa!!!!! The Mamou Playboys Cleoma Breaux and Joe Falcon -- they cut the first Cajun single, "Allons a Lafayette," in 1928. My grandma used to go see them when she was a Flaming Youth in the 1920s.Who are we fooling? Let's just call it Paul's band.Anton.

Movies:

A See's assortment: The Goat, Cops, Sherlock Jr. and the rest of Buster Keaton's silents, Pow Wow Highway, Filth and the Fury, Sense and Sensibility, Wild at Heart, A Room With a View, Oscar and Lucinda, Pulp Fiction, Witness, The Commitments, Buena Vista Social Club, Fargo, Mad Hot Ballroom, Life of Brian, M.P. and the Holy Grail, Napoleon Dynamite, The Mummy (Boris Karloff version), Casablanca, Benny & Joon, All Dolled Up.Buster goes west.

Television:

yes! One of them fancy, new HD LCD models. the cheap old Penney's TV finally died after 20 years. The X-Files, House, Bones, Dirty Sexy Money, Weeds, Northern Exposure, Ab Fab, Nova, American Experience, Masterpiece and other PBS stuff, Monty Python, What Not to Wear, Craig Ferguson, Twin Peaks, The Office (U.K. version), Leave It to Beaver.

Books:

Here's a few keepers: Lonesome Dove, The Ten Grandmothers, Hollywood Babylon, The Time Traveler's Wife, Pride and Prejudice, Oscar and Lucinda, The Liar's Club, Rotten, Like Water for Chocolate, Possession, Will of the World, Special Topics in Calamity Physics, David Sedaris, Raymond Chandler, Sherman Alexie, Bust magazine.

Heroes:

Putting somebody on a pedestal is a bad idea.

My Blog

Buzzcocks invade L.A.

Happy nowadays? I know I am. Buzzcocks ruled this weekend. Thirty-plus years on, the boys from Manchester still have it. They’re the only one of the "Big Three" English punk bands I was lucky ...
Posted by Zabird on Tue, 21 Aug 2007 11:58:00 PST

Mardi Gras

It’s Mardi Gras, cher, and you know what that means ... beads, doubloons, king cakes and a whole lot of parades. Or if you’re an expat like me, enjoying it from afar and wishing you were t...
Posted by Zabird on Mon, 04 Feb 2008 09:15:00 PST

Anarchy in the U.K.

Never mind the Roxy, here's Brixton. It took almost 30 years, but I finally saw the Sex Pistols. In London. Crazy? Probably. But live for the moment. Nevah was on board too ... two Blogstars on the l...
Posted by Zabird on Sat, 24 Nov 2007 10:37:00 PST

Reason No. 3 to never leave your camera at home

I happened to look up as I was pulling into my carport space this evening and was amazed to see a flock of green parrots all squawking away on the power lines overhead. I think they're the neighborhoo...
Posted by Zabird on Tue, 21 Aug 2007 12:03:00 PST

Always carry your camera, Reason No. 2

Where's the Second Line? Driving through L.A.'s Chinatown this morning, I couldn't believe my eyes. There, crammed on the bus bench waiting by the old Italian Catholic church was an honest-...
Posted by Zabird on Mon, 21 May 2007 11:04:00 PST

Farm Aid

Dylan's comments at Live Aid begat Farm Aid in 1985. And since I lived just a few hours away from Champaign-Urbana, Ill., I drove my clunker Fiat down and met up with a friend who'd gotten fired from ...
Posted by Zabird on Mon, 19 Feb 2007 11:24:00 PST

Bands I have seen

Ding ding ding ding ding! News flash on the Zabird wire. Sex Pistols. Brixton. 12th and 14th November 2007. Incredible. -30- Some of these were for fun, some for work, and others remain anonymous: ...
Posted by Zabird on Tue, 30 Jan 2007 10:41:00 PST

Curlers in your hair? Shame on you!

I was driving up Fair Oaks this afternoon, bent on making it to the theater in time to see "The Good German" (shouldn't have bothered. Yawn!) when what did I see in the right lane? A Volvo station wag...
Posted by Zabird on Sat, 06 Jan 2007 01:02:00 PST

Viva Las Vegas!

Fooled ya. Bet you thought this was gonna be about Sin City. Hardly!  Heard "Viva Las Vegas" on Indie this morning. Definitely one of my favorite Dead Kennedys songs. For sheer fun alone. Right ...
Posted by Zabird on Mon, 04 Dec 2006 03:19:00 PST

Always carry your camera: Reason No. 1

Seen on Huntington near the DMV:  Tiny chihuahua riding shotgun in minivan driver's cupped left hand;  dog (and hand) half out the window.  
Posted by Zabird on Sat, 22 Jul 2006 01:56:00 PST