This is exactly what he wants.

Hang on...in order to do a shameless publicity stunt, don't people actually have to give a shit?

Up'd Da Punxxx

So I woke up today and got an email from Punknews. I got offered a position as an interviewer for more of the "hardcore/metal spectrum." Did I say yes? Hell yeah.

Exciting stuff! I'm emailing back and forth with them right now setting up my first interview. I will withdraw the details, because that way, you suckers will have to just keep checking back my blog.


See how I did that right there?

We hate

your hate.

Phoenix.

My friend Scott told me that Lambgoat put out a new interview with Jacob Bannon. This is great news. Here is a little taste, for more...check it out here http://www.lambgoat.com/features/interviews/converge2.aspx

LG: You know, there are some fans out there who might attest to the perfection of certain Converge albums -- Jane Doe, for instance, seems to be a fan favorite.

JB: Led Zeppelin wrote perfect albums; we don't write perfect albums [laughs]. You know, I listened to Jane a couple months ago, and I think it has some parts that I really appreciate, and some moments where I think we could've done better. It's a really emotional record for me. It's a really dark record for me. And all of our records have a certain amount of meaning to me -- Jane is one of them, You Fail Me is one of them, No Heroes is one of them. They all have a part of me in them, so I can't measure them against each other. We knew immediately when we put out You Fail Me that everyone was going to dislike [it] because, first of all, the visual aesthetic wasn't the same as Jane Doe, and we knew that any follow-up to a record that a lot of people are emotionally attached to is going to be looked at in a negative light. It's the history of music, it's the way it works.

Technocrax.

I was in Montreal for the past few days with nothing to do but shop, go out, and people watch. On my second day, my friend and I were shopping on Sainte Catherine Street and noticed that there were line ups in front of Fido, and Rogers stores. Likely because I do not care at all about iPhones, it completely slipped my mind that it was the first day they were available in stores in Canada. Once this dawned on me, I could not help but laugh.

From what I have read, the iPhone plans are less than satisfactory. The internet costs so much to use, and in order to have any speed or memory, you need to shell out more money than you probably expected. Now, I'm sure that all these people had their own reasons for wanting one, but is standing in an hour long line really worth it? Do we really need the newest piece of technology the first day it comes out? It's more of a status symbol than a useful phone at this point, and just like the Sidekick, I am pretty sure 50% of these little guys are going to be faulty.

Here is a quick picture I took outside the Rogers Store. Suckers.

That's how it goes, kid.

Question:

What's more important, talent or ambition?

To me, the answer is clearly ambition and this is something that has been plaguing me for awhile. Sure, talent is the proof in your pudding, but without that raw sense of determination nobody will see your work, and nobody will care. It gets me pretty angry when I see people putting themselves "out there" probably because I am full of myself enough to know that I may do a better job than them, but they are the ones succeeding. I always thought of myself as a go-getter, but the truth is, I'm really uncompetitive to a point where I just back off. I really dislike this about myself. I've decided that I'm going to start looking at writing as a hobby (I hate that word though) rather than a potential career path. Teaching has always been my "fall back" but the closer I get to graduating, the more I realize that I don't want to spend years struggling to land a coveted editorial position only to be on a contract basis half the time. Instead, I'm going to get excited about putting together the best high school reading list and maybe making a real impact on sombody's life (even if that's only for a year). I definitely respect those people who go into journalism without holding back, but I've always been such a realist. It's a blessing and a curse because although I know I'm going to do great things, maybe life is about failure just as much as it is about succeeding. The concept of failure has become blurry to me anyway. Is failure not giving up on something even if it isn't working out for you? Or is failure giving up on your dream? It will be interesting to see how much freelancing I will do now that I am retiring my portfolio. I really hope I wasn't doing all of it for selfish reasons, but time will tell.

I'm climbing out of the shark pool and I'm going to sit back and watch the feeding frenzy. I guess I'm going to be seeing my name less in print, unless it's on a report card.