Why I think the nascent Renaissance is already here.

example: Seattle's KEXP in SF and ode to the death of my beloved KPOO.

Here’s the cover Jeffrey Hicken dashed out before we re-broke up again. He also came up with the subtitle i’ve got to use: “Love conquers all… maybe even death…”

i’ll re-do the cover because we’re not together anymore but i like the open quiet space. i’m already planning the cover and interior.

my revenge on simone bailey will be turning her into a character inspired by DJ McShmormac from KPOO who upon learning of James’ death played for me on the air, “The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford.” i will ruthlessly make her the 666 murdering character she is.

last week or so, i ran into my first love, Sandra May, here on 24th street in the mission. she hugged me and said that i was going to be discovered by someone who’d recognize my talents and put me to work, it hurt and i said, “no, Lady May, this world doesn’t need me anymore. there’s no place for me and my talents to make a living.”

but she also said something that made me feel a little peace about how i’d trashed her in the press when i had the back page of “The San Francisco Bay Times” all to myself as a cartoonist. she said when i wrote cartoons about her cheating on me, it was the best day of her LIFE when she went into The Wild Side West on Bernal Hill and everyone at the bar was reading a copy and gave her hell before she knew WHY.

she dug being famous for a moment and while i don’t understand, i do feel a lot better that she flipped into a GOOD THING somehow. Lady May never really cared what people thought but she liked being appreciated i guess.

since then i’ve been super careful about how i portray real people in real life. i have a lot of barriers and boxes to check off before i do such a thing. simone bailey can use the legal system to crush me but i will make her a legend to warn others of this shtick. she will be an example of this bougie black girl thing gone seriously awry.

bougie black girls are worse than white girls they supposedly are supplanting because they have no hearts; just WANT and NEED.

my lawyer warned me against using her name on paper and i don’t want to smear her feces on my eternal work but the internet can handle it and i’ll connect the dot there.

writers like me get the last word. i will be patient so it doesn’t come off as bitchy but as good as the song about the coward Robert Ford because simone bailey killed James as surely as if she gave him the cancer, which James said it was probably her fault, too because he caught the coof after being in the DMV all day after she hit and run his motorcycle. said he felt like he’d been cursed. her eyes are deep with hate so it’s possible.

but this isn’t about hate. that part’s about teaching lessons and avenging by beloved James. all in due time.

the Renaissance was here before Trump got shot because KEXP from seattle now is in san francisco and they never play recorded shows like KPFA and KPOO, both stations are overtaken by dilletante DJs who just camp out and take up space for its own sake and don’t care about the listeners. like Disney. like San Francisco. like businesses now.

they’re taking customers, fans, and listeners for granted.

KEXP never plays pre-recorded shows and know radio’s specialty and power is LIVE DJs.

KPOO was my baby love. when i’d quit promoting myself all the time, i wanted to give love to OTHER ARTISTS and be their audience and clamour for MORE! MORE! MORE! because this art thing is all about give-and-take and audience members who give LOVE get LOVE because you wanna give them MORE! MORE! MORE!

KPOO is sadly dying because like all mainstream media and the former “progressive” stations, they don’t have room for new talent except begrudgingly. Kay Beezy Fasheezy (KPOO friday 6-10pm) has mad respect for his audience and it’s obvious it’s a two way love affair.

but my old beloveds like Lawrence Chew, DJ X1, and even DJ McShmormac seem kinda burnt out and tired by life a bit.

thing is, the artists and thinkers have been sidelined from making culture. there is an eco-system. the DJs are artists, too, or USED to be. to that i dig DJ Riz on KEXP. i listen to even the musics i don’t care about simply because they’re DIFFERENT and there’s a ton of respect for the audience as KEXP is putting the listener first. sometimes to the detriment of the DJ as they give in to requests maybe sometimes too much and every DJ is apparently supposed to say “appreciate you” every show. it’s kinda weird.

but it’s a shock to me that out of SEATTLE of all places, there’s a new alive respectful new artist energy. i hear new stuff that often sounds like the old stuff, but i love that they play …anything and everything. and fresh live.

that’s the power of radio as it’s been forgotten with the clear channel overthrow and the old DJs camping out like on KPOO, it’s all pre-recorded old shows piped in and people who’re just fantasizing about being DJs taking over. like Larry’s already re-playing shows of a busy globalist cat from africa who went to boarding school and was inspired by piped in airplane boarding music for his wide-ranging generic shows.

no one leaves no one new comes in so it’s dying. i think they’re not making their numbers financially and seem to get big bursts from their pay-to-play bougie businessmen on their for fantasy and fun.

sad but the renaissance is KEXP knowing the audience needs respect and connection or what’s the point??? it’s like Disney insulting its audience or all of hollywood taking the audience and our money for granted.

that’s why i see an open spot for new things. new art. and to that i hope CJ Hopkins becomes the first writer to get out of his nihilistic cynicism and writes new theatre/shows/movies for us to be in and produce. new stories are up next.

people are famished.

i even saw this as i fought for James in the hospital. just our love story alone inspired people to go all out for James. they told me so.

that’s the kind of copying i’m talking about.

so now i’m not writing love letters to KPOO anymore. they took ‘em for granted and thought i’d love endlessly forever as it was a pain in the ass. they didn’t WANNA know how they affected us unless it was all good all happy slappy crap.

as an artist who cares about the audience FIRST, you’ve gotta know what works and what doesn’t work if you’re going for something besides your ego.

it’s no longer working to say as Jerome Fox did today to say all BLACK PEOPLE SHOULD THINK MONOLITHICALLY. we are individuals. this team go team crap is what got us into this mess.

Why does Jeffrey get touchy and enraged about my questioning the validity of all this casual abortion and disposability of life around us where women are encouraged to shout their two dozen abortions? it does affect us ALL. the carelessness of life.

and i tried the feministy thing of sleeping around and whenever i’d do it, i never wrote about how it had me shaking sexually in a corner for two years or more between lovers because the casualness ruined me broke my heart.

it’s why women rage after fucking you men. because we’re playing at what we “think” or “thought” you men were about, but we got it twisted because we CARE we love to surrender …but the deal come daylight is harsh cold meaner than gay men after coming through glory holes and we cannot take it. we rage even though we got the deal wrong because it’s not NATURAL for us to surrender and then pretend it didn’t matter come morning but feminists never taught us how to BE after that.

being cavalier never works and it’s a lie.

it’s why MeToo took off.

we don’t know how to gracefully handle men’s sexual power and what we CRAVE. so we feel “unsafe” and crush you unless you can read our minds and only the “right and proper” man approaches us.

this isn’t going to end any time soon because you’ve got generations of women under 50 taught to be bitches and cunts.

i cannot help you all there because courage isn’t sold to women or even colored folks. just complaining.

a lot is being made of liberals getting it wrong that you can re-make culture by laws and enforcement but it’s not biologically NATURAL. so it cannot stick.

but the incentive is all feel good emotions and that’s why unhappy unfulfilled miserable people without vision creativity or ideas or energy will pull down this culture.

if i can figure out how to not get crushed and ruined while i’m still here in mordor, i intend to pass on what works to jujitsu my way out of this paradigm. maybe it’s just moving? nothing’s ever that simple (see CJ Hopkins’ trials and tribulations regarding wherever you go there you are).

so KEXP is a sign that others are getting it’s about THE PEOPLE in the MOMENT. the here-and-now. the internet made everything available whenever you want it. sure you can listen to shows later (and i love how they’ll play over 3 songs of an artist in a row because spinitron won’t let radio stations do that and it ruins the magic of radio and love letters DJs wanna give to PRINCE, say for example. Prince and Parliament and others deserve deeeep dives like old FM radio used to do before the internet made everything half-assed regarding our attentions).

so that’s why i see a renaissance coming. people can feel love and don’t want to be TOLD what to hear listen to or believe.

Lawrence Chew’s brother used to make short appearances on Larry’s show on saturday and even in 20 minute bursts you could tell he had MAD LOVE and respect for his audience as a preacher because he was attuned to his parishoners FIRST. it wasn’t an ego trip for him to be heard. i could feel the difference. but like all brothers, his brother takes him for granted and puts the millionaire globalist on to fulfill his dreams.

and that’s why my beloved KPOO is dying: no vision of any grander kind even though the station manager, Mr Jerome Parsons, is interesting and complicated. the artist puts himself or herself INTO IT ALL. it’s not an indulgence; it’s a GIFT. it’s necessary and the audience feels it.

that’s why Disney’s dying. you cannot tell the audience what to like. you will coast for a second but art is necessary and people want to see and here themselves as well as YOU. you have to be naked and afraid or they will not believe.

like when you look into eyes whether it’s simone bailey’s or a pimp on the street who has more heart than her. the bougie ones… look in their eyes. they see only themselves and fear. that’s why simone bailey is trying to kill me. i found the old email. this is existential. she is a shitty artist who takes from other artists and has her own control freak “vision.”

i am about being bigly myself so that YOU WILL FEEL CONFIDENT TO BE YOURSELF. otherwise i’m all boring by myself. what can inspire out of YOU??? then things get interesting like a true and proper love affair.

This is why artists are the unofficial legistlators of culture: because AI is vomit. no new ideas. artists do the backstroke in madness and new ideas come out of the dead ones.

that’s where we’re at NOW.

James taught me this by letting me unfurl myself with the freedom to not behave. i have to now see if i can do this in real life and not be cheap or short. go for the long game. new stories. new love stories. new talent. new people new artists and DJs.

why? because after the philosophers comes the MUSIC. times have a certain beat. the music answers as well as inspires how we move or feel. that’s why music of a certain time has a certain FEEL.

i heard DJ Riz’s show as he was filling in for someone one Tuesday night and felt “A DJ Saved My Life Tonight” and told him so. the beats were DIFFERENT the way he put them together.

out of SEATTLE of all places? go figure. i don’t care WHERE life comes from i just know it when i feel it. because this is also what DJ Marilynn was about when she’d quietly go off-road when filling in on Wednesday’s before Tia Carroll took over.

KEXP never takes us for granted and knows the power of LIVE DJs again.

that’s how i know i’m right. and they’ve had listeners admit they buy radios to go analogue because they don’t wanna stream it online!

see? there’s a nascent backlash against all this digital soulless crap. there’s magic to LIVE and all of us listening at the same time. there’s a hummmm….

we know when we’re loved and respected because IT FEELS GOOD. you can sense respect over look at me ego tripping.

it’s time for the artists to step back up and tell the fantasy artists to step aside. it’s not about color anymore. it’s about individuality again. that’s FREEDOM. not being told you’re a putz for who you’ve voting for. that’s a dead giveaway to dead art and thinking.

bougie anything is outta style. it’s getting rag tag again. where it belongs.

x

erika