I Wish This Police Story Would End

    Here we go again.  Not satisfied with losing twice in the election cycle of 2021, former cop Tony Moreno is going to take another stab at running for the mayor of Pittsburgh.

    At least this time he won’t be on Democratic ballots during the primary.  He flipped his final flop and will be running as a Republican so he won’t be able to take advantage of a split vote between Ed Gainey and Corey O’Connor.

    The scary part is that there are enough dumb, white bootlickers in Pittsburgh for him to pull off a win.  The playbook has been written for how to scratch that primal white supremacist itch that runs deep in this town.  It’ll be up to Moreno to see how far he goes with implementing it and getting the worst people this city has to offer to rally around him.  Gathering together old white people into rooms does seem to be his only qualification to hold public office.

    Back in 2021, I never saw too many of his yard signs while driving around different city neighborhoods.  That is, until Ed Gainey won the primary and Moreno ran as a Republican in the general election.  Those signs were all over the West End and uncomfortably close to my house in Beechview.  I still find it odd that I saw those signs out in the suburbs where people couldn’t even vote for him.  Sometimes the obvious answer is the best answer and I’m going to go ahead and say that Pittsburgh’s history of racism may have played some part in Moreno’s minor popularity.

    This country is still dealing with the backlash of having its first Black president and I would not be surprised if the same thing happens on a local level after Pittsburgh elected its first Black mayor.  The critical thinking skills of the city’s general populace leaves a lot to be desired and leaves open a giant window of opportunity if someone wanted to exploit that, which Moreno seems to.

    He’s a run of the mill racist cop right out of a bad episode of a TV show that would have had multiple spin-offs on CBS.  I would really love to know what the history of brutality looks like in his file.  He epitomises every single reason why the phrase “Fuck the police” exists.  Moreno speaks in code and dog whistles to cover his racism.  He decries socialism and “progressivism” as if they were interchangeable and as if he could define either one.

    We’ve already got heavy recruitment efforts by white power groups in the South Hills.  There’s graffiti and stickers popping up all over town and groups of dipshits waving flags and threatening passersby on bridges damn near every weekend.  These pinheads learned to vote and Moreno will tell them whatever they want to hear to curry their favor.

    From what I can tell, the major local media outlets haven’t bothered reporting on the uptick in hate group activities because I guess it might harsh the tourism appeal and the bullshit image of Pittsburgh’s most livable city status.  And with their false attempts at “fairness” they won’t bother treating Moreno like the piece of shit that he is.

    Moreno has already stated that he wants to overinflate the police budget to hire more cops to sit around and do nothing.  The city’s finances are already strained so this will be done to the detriment of the few public services that we have left.  What’s a city full of cops going to do?  Shoot the potholes after they beat them up?

    I’m sure he’ll go after our houseless population with fervor and start arresting people in order to make their bad situations even worse.  There won’t be any money leftover to provide services for the people that need it because all of the money will be spent on throwing away their last few possessions and making them disappear from sight for a nationally televised sporting event.

    Without a doubt he’d welcome ICE into our city with open arms and they’d be free to hassle anyone that doesn’t look like they’re from ‘round here.  ICE already has its foot in the door in my neighborhood and Moreno would only make it worse as mayor.

    Don’t get me wrong, I am not a Gainey apologist whatsoever.  He has been as disappointing as any other elected official this city has seen.  He went soft on the cops and failed to tighten up on their leash even after a city referendum to do away with bullshit traffic stops was completely ignored.  And he kept up on sweeps of homeless encampments instead of providing easy to access services that would actually help people in need.

    Every time Gainey had to release a statement about something going on in the city he failed to take a stand.  He would put out the most meaningless of statements in an attempt to placate both sides which would then fall flat and make everyone involved even angrier.

    There has to be a way to counteract this faux populism that is put forth by power hungry charlatans with the intent of taking advantage of stupid people.  Weak willed liberalism can’t stand up to it because it’s always afraid of offending people, especially the wealthy donor class.  The most vulnerable among us always end up bearing the brunt of this nonsense and I see no end in sight.

    Here’s to another year of voting in favor of fecklessness to stave off evil.  No wonder we’re so fucked.

Tired of The Man v. Tank Storylines

    Even though it’s been several weeks, I keep dwelling on the photo of Dr. Hussam Abu Safiya walking off to his unknown fate in the face of two tanks that I helped pay for.  Armed solely with his lab coat, the doctor’s only crime was caring for his patients and his people until the very last moments.

    The same bullshit playbook of lies was dispatched by the occupiers in an attempt to smear his reputation and label him as a terrorist.  Much like many other doctors, journalists and everyday people, he will be tortured and murdered, if he hasn’t been already.

    When this photo became public, the immediate parallels to Tiananmen Square were being made.  This bit of Rage Against The Machine lyrics coming to life was rather unsettling (see “Roll Right” off of Evil Empire.)

    I was ten years old when the events in China took place on June 5, 1989. We were told by the American propaganda machine that we should look upon this unknown protester as a hero standing up against evil with nothing but his shopping bags.  And rightfully so, even though we may have different reasons for doing so as the years have passed.  The same thing will not happen in this instance.

    The Western Media Machine completely ignored the story for fear of lionizing the “enemy” and making them seem innocent, which they are.  There are no tunnels under the hospital, as we have been repeatedly told.  That’s some Bugs Bunny level bullshit.  Stop being so gullible and believing the poorly made PowerPoint presentation that gets trotted out every time a hospital gets blown up.  The colonizers do that so they can make feeble attempts at justifying the destruction of medical infrastructure.  If people can’t get to a hospital to deal with a simple problem, that health issue can escalate and become fatal.  It helps make the ethnic cleansing a little easier.

    It feels like the end of this failed Euro-centric colonial/apartheid experiment could be imminent.  The problem with that is it also feels like the Palestinian people are caught in one last bloody spasm of the occupying forces and that they may not survive to see the end of it.

    I no longer have the patience for all of the what-about-ism and false equivocation that gets thrown around to somehow justify the slaughter of thousands.  A struggle for freedom is messy.  There is no right or wrong way for a people to remove the collective boot from their necks so debating and criticizing tactics does not serve any purpose.  As a country full of people whose idea of freedom is to be able to choose between smooth or chunky peanut butter while drowning in consumer debt, who the fuck are we to tell someone else how to get free?

    I no longer even acknowledge the people that are somehow unable to recognize that apartheid and occupation are even happening, let alone a full blown genocide.  Some people are so entrenched in their way of thinking that they find it laughable when parts of Palestine are described as the world’s largest open air prison/concentration camp.  Their lack of empathy and understanding is a tell.  Whether it’s white supremacy, Islamophobia or a mixture of the two behind it, I don’t know.  It does make every other opinion that they hold suspect to me and I begin wondering what else is below the surface if they’re so out front with supporting apartheid and genocide.

    The one sided ceasefire will not last very long.  The military force of the colonizers always ignores them and cries foul at even the slightest infraction when Palestinians defend themselves.  Like the bully that gets upset and can’t believe that the target of their aggression fought back.

    And since the ceasefire only pertained to Gaza, violence in the West Bank is escalating rapidly.  People are being arrested by the hundreds for simply existing on a piece of land that someone else wants.  Infrastructure is being destroyed by armored bulldozers for absolutely no reason other than depriving the indigenous people of electricity, potable water and functioning roads.

    The powers that be are counting on us getting tired and taking our collective eye off of their land grab.  Especially with the intense deluge of white male Christian supremacy that’s going to happen in the United States over the next four years.  Those pigfuckers couldn’t go a day without fucking up and showing their obvious hand.

    Protesting will get people slapped with domestic terror charges.  Speaking up will be considered a hate crime.  Everybody will be isolated out of fear and those that stand up will be made example of.  The entire situation is fucked and it’s only going to get worse.

Submachine At The Shred Shed On January 16, 2025

    Here's are pictures that I took at the Shred Shed on January 16, 2025.  The lineup was Submachine, The Pist, Ancient Torture, Deadsky and Grassy Knoll.

Submachine:

The Pist:

Ancient Torture:

Deadsky:

Grassy Knoll:

Read Banned Books

    Recently, there was a board meeting in a school district that is located in the suburbs north of Pittsburgh known as Pine Richland.  The topic of the meeting was the scope of a proposed book ban.  This was at least the third school district in Western Pennsylvania to attempt imposing book bans on their students over the past few years.

    The unsettling trend that is growing in school districts nationwide is a vocal minority of bigots, that probably don’t have any children attending these schools, have singled out libraries and lead the efforts to ban books from them.  If, by chance, they do have a child that attends one of these schools, it’s an attempt by the parents to stifle their children into fitting the narrow scope of their own world view.  If it wasn’t for the large amount of books that I’ve read over the years, I’d probably be just as dumb and tuned out as the majority of people in the Pittsburgh area.  It took a lot of work to deprogram myself and to be able to see through the bullshit.

    With all of the screaming and yelling they do about books, have these idiots never heard of the internet?  I’m sure that whatever is in the books they’re trying to have banned is relatively tame compared to what can be found in the awful depths of the internet.  And kids aren’t stupid.  They’ll get to what they want to get to regardless of any parental protection software that can be installed on their devices.

    There are so many ways to fuck up raising a child and withholding information is one of them.  Once a child steps out into the world and starts to have experiences outside of the parental bubble, they very quickly begin to learn how full of shit their parents actually are.

    Some parents are dumb enough to think that it’s their right to keep their kid hidden behind the same veil of willful ignorance that they cover themselves with.  Fine, go ahead and think that.  These parents may want their own children to be as stupid as they are but they cannot try to extend that stupidity to someone else’s child.

    I thought the purpose of educating our children was to make the next generation smarter and better than the one before.  That’s why our property taxes go toward funding our schools so we can have a community that’s a little less dumb over time.  Well, that used to be the case.  Now our tax dollars go toward building sports facilities instead of educational materials.  Our children can have a nice new stadium to give each other brain damage and ruin their knees but textbooks that were printed in the past twenty years are out of the question.  And don’t even mention teaching them art, music and the humanities.  We’re creating cogs that can fit into the Capitalist machine, not people that can think.

    This rapid increase of ignorance and lack of critical thinking skills is appalling to me.  I’m tired of dumb motherfuckers trying to impose their will on everyone in some bizarre attempt to make us all dumb motherfuckers.  I refuse to be brought down to their level to wallow in the muck of their stupidity that they somehow wear like a badge of honor.  I have never seen a group of people be so proud to be so dumb and think that they are so right.  Instead of raising ourselves up to be smarter, let’s lower the bar and force everyone to get dumber.

    Most of the time the books in question aren’t even on the shelves in the school libraries in the first place so the whole thing is nothing but an exercise in feigned outrage and a complete waste of everyone’s time.  Any time one of these dipshits trundle in front of a camera to be interviewed by the sad excuse for local media, they should be asked if they actually read any of the books they’re objecting to.  Chances are they haven’t and I’d be surprised if they could read at all.  And of course they won’t be asked that question out of the need for local media to keep up the veneer of being impartial and not wanting to seem biased by asking the obvious.

    At one of these school board meetings some dumb ass went so far as to bring in a pastor from out of state to speak.  It’s a public school district, this pastor, with his bullshit religion and opinions, can fuck right off.

    After years of being laughed out of the room during meetings, these morons somehow figured out how to run for open seats on school boards and are embedding themselves in the education system like the dimwitted parasites they are.  Having dullards in even the lowest positions of power is a danger to us all.  As has been made very clear since anti-intellectualism took over this country in the 1980s and is currently on full display.

    This is all rooted in homophobia, racism and all the other phobias and isms, full stop.  Books don’t turn kids gay.  Books help gay kids learn to become ok with who they are because they’re forced to put up with ignorant dumbfuck parents.

    History books that aren’t written from the perspective of whitewashed bias may eventually lead to a reckoning that this country has always refused to have over its violently white supremacist past and present.  Oh no, the truth of multiple genocides being used to build this country might tarnish our image of bullshit patriotism.  Fewer children might grow up to be cops or join the military, whatever will we do.  I’m all for kids learning that Capitalism is a blackhole that will eventually kill all of us as soon as they possibly can so they can start working on solutions that previous generations have either refused or failed to come up with.

    Trying to keep the morons at bay is getting more and more difficult.  Their numbers are growing and getting louder and more violent while they cry foul at even the slightest inconvenience to their stupidity.  And the opposition is getting weaker and weaker out of fear of upsetting the violent mob of idiots that don’t know how to process their emotions.

    Everything has to be dumbed down to the level of a pop up book with rounded corners or the heaving mass of stupid will have a conniption.  And these are the same people that complain until they’re blue in the face that everybody else is too sensitive these days when they get called out on their bigotry.

    This is one of the growing number of instances where I see no viable solution other than stepping out of the way and laughing at these intellectual lightweights punch themselves in the nuts while they can’t figure out why their nuts hurt.  I know I’m stuck in the middle of this trainwreck of a society and it’s only going to get exponentially worse by the end of this decade.

    I guess I’ll stay in my house full of books and records until I get dragged off to the de-education camp for my lobotomy.  Fuck it.

Here's a link to the Digital Public Library Of America:

https://dp.la/

They provide free digital access to books that have been banned.

Wading Into The Depths Of Another Unnecessary Non-Argument

    Word going around the internet has it that there was a hardcore show somewhere in Chicago that was limiting photographers.  I don’t know what bands were playing the show and I wasn’t curious enough to find out more information about a show I had no intentions of driving to Chicago for.

    Chances are that if this show were happening in the Pittsburgh area, the show would have probably consisted of bands that I wouldn’t want to see or at a venue that’s an hour out of town that I refuse to go to anymore.

    A person that runs a DIY label in northern California said they were in favor of such restrictions and was inundated with comments, both for and against their statement, to the point where they left the internet platform where they felt compelled to share their opinion.  At times, I could understand the point they were trying to make.  I could also say that their moral high horse only has three legs, much like my own.

    When I’m taking pictures at a show, I try my best to stay out of the way and be aware of my surroundings.  Having played road crew for my fair share of shows, I've learned a little bit of etiquette to not interfere with the show itself.

    With the exception of DRI, bands have always been appreciative when I take the time to come out to their shows and take pictures.  I have been in the room to take pictures of various bands playing their first show, their record release show or their final show.  I have, on several occasions, also had the privilege of taking pictures of some of my Punk Rock heroes. Being able to document all of these situations makes it worth the effort to do the thing.

    The amount of people that actually give a shit about music in Pittsburgh is a very small percentage of the population.  My goal has always been to go out and document the bands that play in this town in an effort to say that, yes, we were here and we did these things even though no one asked us to or cared that we did.

    The other side of that coin is that I have been in small, dark rooms when three or four other photographers have shown up and there were so many flashes going off it was like a photo shoot.  I’ve been to a show where a photographer wouldn’t get the fuck out of the way and stood right in front of the singer the entire set and would put his camera right in their face.   I’ve also seen someone bring a step stool into a show and had a large, muscle bound fellow stand guard and act like a bouncer while they stood on it to film a show.

    Everything has its extremes and its limits.  Either no one comes out to document that these things happened or they border on the ridiculous and the first four rows of people all have cameras.  But these days, the first four rows of people all have their phones out and record the whole night so it really doesn’t make much difference.

    There is a happy medium that can be found but I doubt that anyone would give a shit about upholding it and would end up doing whatever they wanted to anyway.  It’s that lack of common sense and self awareness that leads to places putting rules into place.  It only takes one dipshit to ruin something for everyone.  Like the dipshit filming duo that I’ve encountered that put their tripods all over an already small stage and then proceed to push people out of the way so their sweeping shots of the musicians from the front of the stage aren’t interrupted.  I’m pretty sure that no one watching the video of a hardcore show on their phone while pooping is handing out extra points for cinematography.

    Without a doubt, Chicago is a completely different environment with its own set of challenges than Pittsburgh, but this town is slowly becoming over-saturated with photographers and I don’t necessarily see that as a bad thing.  I enjoy watching pro shot videos of shows that I missed because I was off shooting another show that was happening at the same time.  I always try to make space and trade places with other photographers so we can all get our coverage.  And as the number of people that come out to take pictures of shows seems to be growing, the number of paying media outlets that care about underground music is rapidly shrinking.  We’re all out here doing this thing on our own.  It would probably be best if we all looked out for each other as best as we can instead of competing.

    I’ve been doing this for years now and I have never gotten any response whatsoever from any local publications that I’ve reached out to about freelance work.  The only times that they’ve responded was when I caught them “borrowing” my work and I’ve had to raise hell to be compensated for the use of my pictures.

    I don’t get paid to do this and I know I probably never will so I won’t be quitting my day job any time soon.  Websites and publications that offer to pay in exposure and experience are a fucking joke.  I’m sure my mortgage company would gladly accept the exposure that I received for a picture that I took instead of money, once I figure out the likes to USD conversion rate.

    I always make sure to pay my cover charge or buy my tickets to get into shows even when there’s a photo pass involved.  I fully understand that if everybody gets into the shows for free, the shows will stop happening.  Especially with the rising expenses that touring bands of all levels face.

    When I’m shooting a show, I always try to stick to the periphery as best I can and operate in the area of the speaker stacks.  I know I’m not the only one in the room so I try not ruin anyone else’s night out by getting in the way.  If a show is overly crowded, I’ll stay in one spot and make due with the angles that I’m given.  And with my proximity to the PA and the drums, I always try to lend a hand in putting things back together when they inevitably go wrong.

    Over the years, I have been kicked, elbowed, run into and splattered with booze.  Those are all occupational hazards that I’ve taken into consideration by not taking expensive equipment into a place where it might end up damaged.  I keep the gear budget low because I know at some point the worst will happen and instead of getting angry, I’ll just go out to the store and pick up another cheap camera in the morning.  I have seen photographers walk into the shittiest of clubs and basements with the most expensive gear and I can only think, “Wow, that looks really expensive.  Godspeed to you, good sir.”  It’s like they don’t know what happens at these shows and failed to plan accordingly.

    Between working shows and taking pictures at them, I’ve been at it so long I’ve become incapable of being a spectator.  It’s rare that I’ll go to a show without a camera and when I do it feels so awkward.  Standing around waiting for something to happen and then getting back in my car when it’s over.  I figure that if I’m going to be in the room, I may as well put myself to work and be useful somehow.

    Since I don’t drink and I don’t socialize, it feels very strange to me to be one of the crowd.  Especially when I always end up surrounded by the unavoidable gaggle of white dudes with beards that bother the ever living crap out of me with their know-it-all conversations at the top of their lungs.  I’m trying to watch a band play and listen to their music, could you please shut the fuck up or go back to your wife and kids?

    I don’t know if there’s a solution to any of these issues.  Or if these issues are even severe enough to be addressed at all.  I mean Punk was all about instituting rules and such, wasn’t it?

    I’ll try my best to keep shooting shows until the arthritis in my knees tells me differently and I’ll leave the pontificating to those that think they know better.

Some Records I Listened To In 2024

    Here are some records that came out in 2024 that I really liked.  They are in no particular order.  Music is art and not a competition.  I may seem biased with a few bands from the Pittsburgh area on the list but that’s not my fault this town finally has a crop of decent bands playing on a regular basis.

    Gouge Away–Deep Sage–If we lived in a different time that still considered music as something of artistic value, this record would have been a monster.  That’s why I feel Deep Sage could have been a product of the 90s.  It would have broken through MTV and mainstream radio.  And it was great to hear Gouge Away move away from being a great “hardcore” band and into simply being a great band.  I wrote way too many words about the record here.

    Uniform–American Standard–The word masterpiece does get thrown around a lot in very unwarranted ways but I can’t think of any other way to describe American Standard.  It’s one of those records that demands my attention every time I put it on and I end up sitting down and watching the record spin as it plays.  Uniform went out on a limb and reached for something artistically and stuck the landing.  There is so much risk involved in putting out a record where track one takes up the entirety of side A.  I am so glad this record exists to challenge the listener.  Especially since no one has an attention span anymore.

    De Rodillas–Implacable–I cannot say enough about how good De Rodillas is as a live band other than I need to see them play more than I have.  In the meaningless and decades old debate of what constitutes hardcore or punk, De Rodillas ends that debate single handedly with Implacable.  They are one of those bands that confound me when I see them live.  I have no idea how a recording would be able to contain the fury of their sound and properly display what they can do but they managed to do that perfectly on this 7”.

    Body Farm/Dry Socket–Body//Socket–Not since the Faith/Void split that Dischord put out all those years ago have I been enthralled by a split LP.  Most of the time a split LP or single ends up sounding like a novelty record to me for some reason but Body//Socket made complete and total sense to me when I saw it was happening.  Both bands attacked with clarity of purpose and complemented one side of the LP with the other so well that I’m not sure if having two separate 7 inches would have been equally as effective.

    Yellfire–Dear Gods–I know absolutely nothing about this band other than they are on the label The Ghost Is Clear and they’re from Seattle.  Any time The Ghost Is Clear puts out a record, I give it a listen and Dear Gods grabbed me by the ears.  Yellfire scratches that same itch for me that bands like Botch and Karp do.

    Speed Plans–D.U.I.--This is the best sonic representation of Speed Plans to date.  I could always hear something trying to break through in their other recordings but the production constraints sounded like they were being held back.  The mix on DUI sounds balanced and everything the band was trying to do is on full display.  The record is a short blast of mayhem which is what Speed Plans does best.  It feels like the band is about to have a moment of some sort and I can’t wait to see what happens.

    Bed Maker–Bed Maker–Bed Maker features Amanda MacKaye, of the MacKaye clan from Washington DC, on vocals and is way more talented than her brothers, in my opinion.  I had been waiting for this record to come out since Bed Maker put their first few songs up on Bandcamp years ago.  After each song ended I was always left thinking that there had to be more music from the band.  I had wanted to hear her sing again ever since I heard her voice on the Routineers record that she put out with Ryan Nelson back in 2004.  The self-titled Bed Maker album far exceeded the expectations that I had built up in my head when it hit my turntable.  I am so glad that I was part of a small group of people that got to see them play in a basement when they came through Pittsburgh.

    Shellac–To All Trains–The last recorded testament of Steve Albini did not disappoint.  As much as I had issues over the years with some of the production choices that he did or didn’t make while recording other bands, he was always very deliberate in his choices with his own music.  Steve Albini always tried to fight the good fight for small artists.  He saw how awful the landscape was going to get in regards to the business side of music and did what he could to push back against it.

    Help–Courage–I discovered Help while I was doing an insomnia riddled deep dive down the Three.One.G catalog on Bandcamp to see if there was anything that I missed since I last checked in with the label.  Help was one of the bands that I completely missed.  Courage had just been released and right from the first track I was smitten.  They have a sound that would have put them right at home on the Amphetamine Reptile roster in the early 90s and that is a sound that is right up my alley.  Lots of yelling over odd time signatures seems to be my love language.

    No Man–Glitter And Spit–Sometimes the time for nuance is over and the right tool for the job is a hammer to smash the ever living shit out of everything in the tri-state area because enough is enough.  That is the vibe I get when listening to Glitter And Spit.  It is a relentless slab of vinyl that has gone feral and will jump out of the shadows and cut you in a dark alley.  This is what hardcore could be if for one moment it would take a half step away from the dunderheaded, willful ignorance that seems to have taken over.  Everything that No Man does, from lyrics to the colors that get pressed to vinyl, seems aimed to educate.  If only the bros would open their ears and listen.