When in doubt...

     So, maybe it's true that the last big swell wasn't nearly as good as the prior. Plenty of big waves, plenty of big wipeouts, and the when a wave was made, it was really good. The sad fact is that falling in love with a sandy-bottom beach-break is bittersweet, and while we enjoyed the sweetness of the surf at Sandal and Wounded Gull a few weeks ago, now the early morning view is tinged is tinged with bitterness. Where once were perfect, empty, hollow barreling lines there are now sand-sucking closeouts. More sand has washed down from HC and really ruined the place, and to drive the point home, Frank witnessed the actual Wounded Gull, after a period of time with nary a sighting, battling a bigger, stronger gull for a dead bird. The outcome? Wounded Gull lost! O! But the bitterness is made a little easier to stomach by the spectacular sunrises, which, it turns out, are not influenced in the least by shifting sandbars and seagull battles on the beach. Thank God.

    Been working a little on Frank's board, figured on art layout and stuff like that, but have been a little busy preparing for a new addition to the Erricozia household: Henry, pictured above. He is a White German Shepherd/Husky mix and will be ours on October 2nd. He was at a "high-kill" shelter (I know, never realized the term existed, and it is terrifying) in South Carolina, and is on his way up here. A Southern gentleman? I think those eyes say it all.

    And on the music front, the hardworking prog-psych-stoner-rock-free-form-jazz-explosion Brooklyn-based trio La Otracina has just released another album, Reality Has Got To Die, a double-LP mind-bender from everyone's favorite psych/strange/interesting music label Holy Mountain. The album definitely leans towards the harder side of psych-rock, part of which is due to drummer Adam Kriney's vocals, which fit the part to a "T", as they say. The band has been leaning towards more definite song structures as of late, but there are still the free-form psych-aural exploratory jams that everyone who is a fan of the band have come to love. Just take the title track for example. When I checked the album out, and saw that it was 19 + minutes long, I knew it would be good, if you're into that sort of thing, which I am. For your consideration, two tracks from the album.

Click here to hear.

01 - Hail Fire
06 - We Ride On (Maybe my favorite on the album, although I admit I have only given it one serious straight-through listening so far)

   Without a doubt, the best advice I have ever received from a fortune cookie.

Recent Developments

     So, it's been a little bit so I figure it's time for an update, and a rain-day washout morning is the best time for that sort of thing. We had a great swell this past weekend, with days upon days of ever-changing solid northeast windswell, ranging from chaotic to semi-clean, from shallow take-offs to steep drops. Wind never switched offshore, but that's OK. Surfed Wounded Gull, Sandal, and had inaugural WJ surf on Saturday, which was great to get back down there after a couple months hiatus and surf some nice long lines. Sunday's surf at Wounded Gull was punctuated parenthetically in the middle by the 32nd Annual Dog Day 5 Mile Road Race, in which I beat my past self by about 1 minute 15 seconds, for a total of 41:14 (which when you factor in the delay between when the siren sounded and when we actually crossed the starting line is more like 39:14 or so) which is better than I thought I'd do considering I haven't really been running. I have been surfing a lot more than last year, though, so I guess the lesson is: surfing is better training for running than running. Probably not, but a man can dream.

   If you remember, back on Valentine's Day I posted about skinning Frank's Rastafish with plans to make something out of it for him. Well, with 005 finished for Mark, it was about time to start this one. The dimensions are 5'4" x 19 5/8" x 2 5/16 ", with a single wing and this little fang-fish-squash thing of  a tail, which was entirely my design. No, it was Frank's, and that's the truth. That square hole is where the leash plug used to be. Still a bit to go shaping-wise, but it's coming along.

     Check out that cover, first printing 1968. Been reading this book I picked up at the thrift store last week. Science Fiction by Gaslight: A History and Anthology of Science Fiction in the Popular Magazine from 1891-1911, edited by Sam Moskowitz. This collection has been really interesting so far, with the first 30 or so pages giving a really detailed history of the popular magazine in the United States and England, along with the prevalence of science fiction material therein. Really great stuff in here, divided into sections such as Catastrophes, Marvelous Inventions, Monsters and Horrors, Future Wars, Man-Eating Plants, and more. The titles of the stories are really great as well: "Where the Air Quivered," "The Voice in the Night," "The Ray of Displacement," "Itself," and "The Mansion of Forgetfulness," just to name a few. There's a couple well known names here, H.G.Wells and Jules Verne, but most of the stories are written by authors I've never heard of. One thing to think of when reading the works of forward-thinking imaginations of the past: Would they have been disappointed in the future? Maybe, because Robert Barr, in his story "The Doom of London," imagines that by the year 1950 electricity would have run its course and been replaced by "vibratory ether." It must have been a strange, strange world back then. I guess it still is.

A rare shot of Wounded Gull.

KAK was a psych group formed in a San Francisco in 1968 by Gary Lee Yoder, who would later be a member of Blue Cheer. A really wonderful album from '69 that has since been re-released with some great extra tracks. A blend of really good psych-jams veering towards the harder side, such as "Electric Sailor" and "Bryte 'N' Clear Day," and some mellower stuff that really balances the album, such as "I've Got Time" and my personal favorite off of the album, "Flowing By." The whole album is a solid piece of '60s psych rock that is definitely worth a listen. 

Here to Hear

03 - Electric Sailor

05 - I've Got Time

06 - Flowing By

07 - Bryte 'N' Clear Day