"The hibernation of all animals, the suspension of life practised by a certain low forms of life, the marvellous vitality of the bedbug which lies endlessley in wait behind the wallpaper, the trance of the yogi, the catalepsy of the pathologic individual, the mystics union with the cosmos, the immortality of the cellular life, all these things the artist learns in order to awake the world at the propriotous moment. The artist belongs to the X root race of man; he is the spiritual microbe, as it were, which carries over from one root race to the other. He is not crushed by misfortune, because he is not part of the physical, racial scheme of things. His apperance is always synchronous with catastrophe and dissolution; he is the cyclical being which lives in the epicycle. The experience which he acquires is never used for personal ends; it serves the larger purpose to which he is geared. Nothing is lost on him, however trifling. If he is interrupted for twenty five years in the reading of a book he can go on reading from the page where he left off as though nothing had happened in between. Everything that happens in between, which is "life" to most people, is merely an interruption in his forward round. The eternality of his work, when he expresses himself, is merely the reflection of the automatism of life in which is obliged to lie dormant, a sleeper on the back of sleep, waiting for the signal which will announce the moment of birth.
The dissastifaction which drives one on from one word to another, one creation to another, is simply a protest against the futility of postponement.
The more awake one becomes, an artistic microbe, the less desire one has to do anything.
Fully awake, everything is just and there is no need to come out of the trance.
Action, as expressed in a creating a work of Art, is a concession to automatic principle of death.

Drowning myself in the Gulf of Mexico i was able to partake of an active life which would permit the real self to hibernate until I was ripe to be born."

- Henry Miller The Tropic of Capricorn 1938.
His strange, endless books which are still banned in the USA have been of great influence to me lately.
His doesn't use chapters and the plot line is well...disconnected at best but they are bursting with the most wonderful language I have seen.
Written 10 years before Kerouac and such had even begun to find their stride in the sea of Beat, Miller seemed to pre-empt and ironically surpass the writing that would draw him as a huge influence.
The beat generation owe a lot to his work.

In other news, I'm ill with a rather tasty looking throat infection; so posts will probably stick to quotes as I haven't really written anything lately.
I can only get to the internet in the public library / my dads, thus the reason for the sporadic posts.

yesterday I attended UKHC, a brilliant gig in Leeds which collected very nearly all of UK Hardcores up & comers.
Hang The Bastard pulled out at the last minute which I was disappointed about, as I was looking forward to getting my stoner-slow-double-horns-up-headbang-mosh on to their Black Sabbath / Electric Wizard infuenced hardcore. It really made me very happy to know that someone could get the lineup so perfect and thus offer a brilliant opportunity to see some Bands that will take the limelight this year.UKHC is currently bristling with bands from CCHC (Cardiff City Hardcore) and has a nice Dead and Gone records feel to it, which makes me feel very optimistic considering that labels demise certainly left a sizable hole in the Uk scene.But, all the new bands are certainly doing well in plugging it.
A full write-up soon when I have more time.

adieu.

.
MMX