Greg - ProfilesArchive

About Me

I'm a writer (primarily short stories), guitar player, songwriter (not singer/songwriter acoustic sensitive type, though there's nothing wrong with that) and vocalist from Windsor, Connecticut. I spent the 90's as a blues musician, gave it up, and then four years fronting an original rock band called The Kelvins that folded in 2004. Now I've got a new project called Jet Black Jane that's a bit more retro (putting the "roll" into the rock). It's a nice mix of all of the great shite I grew up with, conceptually speaking. Check the band's MySpace page at: MySpace.com/jetblackjanerock .
I'm also a graphic/web designer, a student (at CCSU - English/Education major, writing minor), a lover of most things British (excepting: Marmite, Morecambe and Wise, jellied eels, fog, Margaret Thatcher, gumboots, Noel Edmonds, The Sun newspaper, cabbage cooked for three hours, Posh and Becks - Thanks to Anne for pointing this out!), a (deleted due to future teacher status), a bit of a (deleted due to future teacher status), a writer, an avid music fan, a dad, a husband (to a FOX), a son, a punk, a Deist [who becomes a Transcendentalist at the vernal equinox, then transforms back at around the end of July, when the best definition would be a (deleted due to future teacher status)], a left-winger, "gthree" (on the velvet rope messageboard ), a student of philosophy, a friend to woodland creatures and a collector of great and obscure literature.
The thing is, I'm not sure which "persona" I identify with anymore. Am I an artist? A rock star? A writer? A teacher? A dad? Which is dominant? I think the answer is that I don't want any one of them to fit any more than any other. I think also that as I move forward through life towards death, I'd rather maintain a bit of suspense than have a dull (and certainly false) sense of certainty. Aw, fuck it, I am a lahver! Okay, I'm tired of everyone saying "Dude, you're lting about your age," so I've reverted it to reflect reality. Happy, punks? ;)

My Interests

- music - I'm a musician, so it stands to reason.

- Literature - I read more than some people eat. See "Books"

- poker - yep, I'm one of the legions of "Hold 'em" players out there these days. I love the strategy

- Art - I attended Paier College of art a century ago, and used to hand-render a lot (mostly in ink) The computer was a great natural extension of this. As a graphic designer, I'm into the bold, simple graphic statements in poster art and stenciling and the like (like Banksy).

- Football - It's the one sport I like to watch. I'm a NY Giants fan. This is an odd year to be a Giants fan... will they ever get it together? Stay tuned.

[Anything else you might want to know about me, I'd have to tell you in person]

I'd like to meet:

Alexander Pope. Oh, and anyone who creates. Artists, musicians, writers, poets and the like--you're all essential to the grand scheme of things, and I'd love to connect. Christ, that sounds trite.

Music:

Latest finds: Til Willis . Also, check Eric Lichter and Rachid Taha !

I dig everything rock, excepting cheesy metal, pop punk (though I like Green Day well enough) and hair bands (alright, alright EL - I like some of that shite...). Mostly, I like what you'd term "classic rock", though I can't stand that moniker - to me it suggests shite like Foghat, Deep Purple Freebird and Stairway - not my cup of tea (though there may be a great song in that mix, like 'Hush' by Deep Purple).

I like Early Zeppelin (powerful and bluesy - just ignore the lyrics), Late Zeppelin (okay, I just like Zeppelin), Beatles, Lennon, Early to mid-70's Stones (Let it Bleed, Sticky Fingers, etc.), Bowie (before he got cheesy in the eighties, and when he was cheesy in the 80's), Clash, early Who, Sex Pistols, Yard Birds, Big Star, Black Crowes (as "southern" as I've ever gotten...), Nirvana, Soul Coughing, The Police, Elvis Costello, Beck, Sneaker Pimps, Zappa (my first concert), Foo Fighters, QOTSA, Ozomatli (thanks Trav) and a bunch of other shite that I can't remember at the moment and don't care to wrack my brain over.

Most of my predelictions come from the fact that I'm a guitar player and like certain styles of music that represent (to me) cool guitar playing - big chords and riffing and cool-but-not-overblown solos (if any). Of course, some days I just like music that sounds like sonic foreplay, and fuck all that guitar shit.

My Band: Jet Black Jane
My band on MySpace: jetblackjanerock
My old band: The Kelvins

Movies:

Primer (an amazing indie flick), Pulp Fiction, Austin Powers, Anchorman, The Big Lebowski, Old School, The Usual Suspects, Young Frankenstein, Wonka (the original), Eternal Sunshine of a Spotless Mind, The Lord of the Rings Trilogy (though when I read the books, I could have sworn that Frodo and Sam were straight), Reservoire Dogs, Kill Bill I & II, In Laws (the original from the 70's - goddamned funny shit), Tommy Boy, The Godfather, Natural Born Killers, and a lot more that I'll remember later.

Television:

Lost, Heros, and pretty much anything HBO puts out, then subsequently cancels.

Books:

John Banville, Mark Z. Danielewski, Max Barry, Chuck Palahniuk, Johnathan Franzen, Nick Tosches, Salinger (forget Holden - read his short stories), Hemingway, Kerouac, Ginsberg, Vonnegut, Tom Robbins, Charles Bukowski, Pope, Swift, Dylan Thomas, William Blake, T.S.Eliot, Tolkien, Updike, Emerson, Whitman, Melville, Hawthorne, Dickinson, Locke, Descartes, Rousseau, Hobbes and the like.

Heroes:

In no particular order: Jack Kerouac, Jimmy Page, John Lennon, Walt Whitman, Ralph Waldo Emerson, John Locke, Rousseau, Jefferson, Banksy, Swift, Pope, Danielewski, Dylan, Zappa, Bukowski, Beck, My brother Erik and more...