GOTHIC FUNK EPISTLE #1
9 December, 2006

Dear Gothic Funk,

OK,

With that, I can tell a lot more about the space. First of all, get rid of all windows and natural light. There are good reasons for most dance clubs doing so. Second, you are right: there is something wrong about the floor. I think the green marble is real, but it looks too much like Old Country Buffet around the bar. I also think illuminated floor tiles are rarely used appropriately. Why doesn't anyone use real dance floor, like Marley? Mirrors are good, green accent lights are awesome, and so is the rest of the ceiling, and the walls. But where is the neon brick road leading to the emerald lounge?

I have an internal conflict regarding American beer. I have often said that I would support the United States adoption of the Reinheitsgebot [Bavarian purity law] of 1516, meaning beer can be made only from barley, hops, and water [yeast is implied]. It's the reason that German lagers are all very similar, and also of decent quality. At the same time, I appreciate the creations American craft brewers have been able to produce and experiment with because of the flexibility allowed, and even encouraged here. It seems like a pure example of "the American way" to have both a true American ale, and whatever you want to call Budweiser, within the beer umbrella. After all, we have both muenster and Velveeta, jazz and country, as well as baseball and American football.

I've been thinking about sustainability as a practical system, and the most likely direction for our culture, based on prevailing winds. No more than I have in the past, I guess. Looking around at the new development, the term "luxury" is so overused, it has been wrung dry of any sense of extravagance, and is now the mere status quo. The only development described as "affordable" seems to be "senior living." if those octogenarians had always been so conserving-minded, we wouldn't be so enamored with this cancerous luxury living.

But that's just the thing. To practice sustainability and conservation, do we have to hate luxury? If we strive for a stronger middle-class, must we mistreat the upper-class? Is the point really to deepen the rift between the tiers? in a world of those-who-have and those-who-have-not, is the middle class just a group of those-who-arent-exactly-without, who have one part compassion for the have-nots, and two parts contempt for the have-it-alls? When we are no longer defined by what we have, and instead by what we give, the strong middle will be made up of those who give the most, and likewise, benefit the most. Then luxuries - real luxuries, like education and entertainment - will be accessible, or maybe even protected.

Mom called the other day, and casually, as if it was something of little importance, apologized for how she treated me while I was growing up. Over the past several years she's been exploring spirituality, which somehow has led to some heretofore inaccessible insight on her part (I'm inclined to think that this insight was gained despite her spiritual explorations, but to each their own), particularly on how her children were raised. She admitted that she'd been crazy all those years, just as crazy as our dad was, and that, if she had it to do all over again, she would treat her children much differently.

I brushed the apology off in much the same manner as it was issued, as if it were a mere nothing. What's done is done... but that she realized that she had done wrong by us was a shock. To be quite frank, I didn't think that the woman had an intelligent self-awareness; I believed that this was a talent inherited from my father only. At the same time, I recognized that I was truly my mother's child, as we silently agreed to let this important moment pass without any special notice, treating it as if it were idle gossip.

Tucked away in the middle of an unremarkable conversation lies what is probably the most important communication to have ever happened between parent and child. It was slipped in, trying to be inconspicuous, and we averted our eyes while walking around it. It was the first moment of real connection between us since I'd reached adolescence (and, with it, the realization that I was smarter than she), the first time in years that I was forced to recognize her as a real person instead of the demonic force of my childhood.

Does this mean that I am no longer allowed, even in the still remaining petulant parts of my heart, to blame her for my prejudices against marriage, children, and parenthood? Does this mean that, finally, irrevocably, I must grow up and accept that I too, despite trying to act rightly, may end up deeply regretting my actions thirty years from now?

Emerald green being my favorite color and a fairly spiritual color to me, I feel they didn't use it enough. What's with the orange and blue underlit floor tiles? What's with the orange-red carpet? It's like they started with an idea and then couldn't commit to it. Or as if they just wanted to hint at Oz rather than give an actual Oz experience. The black chairs are particularly crummy and take away from the effect. The marble is only emerald green when the green lights are shining on it. If anyone knows anything about Oz, it's that it's green. I dislike when people don't go all the way with an idea. But I'm learning these years that I am a very extreme person.

A lot of people actually like half-ass carryings-out of concepts. Or they accept it anyway. I somehow imagine that since the nightclub experience usually seems to center on the music and drinks a bit more than the look of a place, they figured they'd save money and creative energy and just throw some loud music and Oz-themed drinks out and everyone would be happy. But me, I'd prefer a whole themed world;anything else is frustrating.

Although, I suppose I must be excused here; I suppose it IS called 'the Oz Nightclub' and not 'the Emerald City Nightclub' which is what I was thinking more of.

But... then it gets even more watered down. What exactly are they trying to represent? Again it seems like their priorities are just simply not the recreation of anything Oz. They just threw in some associations we have with it (green, for instance).

After all that, the dog died. His joy in seeing his errant master's face was so terrible it rent his heart in two, felling the creature mid-stride at the man's feet. Imagine that: a moment so transcendent that one's very existence ceases to be possible. It is not to overstate the fact. This is not camp or high romanticism - the dog, for instance, could not have loved his master in a courtly sense, for the dog had not known the word. The power in this moment is not an emotional indulgence.

Indeed, it is no simple emotion we seek. It is, rather, the intersection of quantity and quality, a maximized equation, a perfect moment, a moment so transcendent that, yes, one's very existence ceases to be possible. Yet even this is not quite the thing for which we yearn. Imagine that, and then imagine this: imagine that the dog lived. Here at last is the Grand Paradox: to transcend while yet remaining whole, to live in that moment and yet to walk away from it in the end, remembering, changed. To be able to look back on creation and comprehend its vastness. To be, not to do, but to be the impossible. Is this a flamboyant notion? Perhaps, but consider: we are all vampires. Nightly we shed our daylight lives and seek sustenance through the Gothic Funk. Is that sustenance truly less audacious than the Grand Paradox? No, I would like to believe they are one and the same. I would like to believe that we are that dog, and that when we fall at the Trickster's feet we yet live.

Your mama is so Gothic Funk that when you gave her the clap, she gave back the stomp.

Gothic Funk ...
... is the twilight at the start of the 20th century.
... is the fruit in their Garden of Eden.
... is the ice in their puddle.
... is the plunge in their roots.
... is the churn in their clouds.
... is a question with an answer for which we can search.
... is the Cosmic Microwave Radiation Background as seen 14.7 billion years ago.
... is elliptical and occlusive.
... is an incandescent shuriken.
... is a snow drift built by a snow plow.
... is a political present.
... is the taste of aluminum on a dance floor.
... is a planned party.
... is light inside but dark outside.
... is the tail of a Flan Princess.
... is a strobe light used as a flashlight.
... is progress.
... is tooth recay.
... is hyperbolic and occlusive.
... is cosmological inconstancy.
... is an answer to a question that we may not find.
... is that which will answer the queries posed by postmodernists.
... is the She's the Rainbow to their Paint it Black.
... is the While my Guitar Gently Weeps to their Happiness is a Warm Gun.
... is the Light My Fire to their The End.
... is the glisten to their glare.
... is the prayer to their project.
... is malleability to their brittleness.
... is House to their Techno.
... is that which will supercede the modest goals of new sentimentalists.
... is the Dear Prudence to their Back in the U.S.S.R.
... is the Gimme Shelter to their Satisfaction.
... is the The End to their Light My Fire.
... is the glaze to their gloss.
... is the path to their ramble.
... is ductility to their brittleness.
... is Techno to their House.
... is the fleet in the footed.
... is the genuine in the draft.
... is the stealth in the bomber.
... is the shark in the infested.
... is the space in the heater.
... is the rocket in the scientist.
... is the brain in the surgeon.
... is the starry in the eyed.
... is the rasp in the putin.
... is the mod in the ern.
... is the technic in the al.
... is the cam in the brian.
... is the sub in the lime.
... is the turn in the table.
... is the agit in the prop.
... is the cumulo in the nimbus.
... is the ass in the assin.
... is the come in the uppance.
... is the crock in the dile.
... is the e in the loquence.
... is the senti in the mental.
... is the bro in the ken.
... is the sis in the tine.
... is the ra in the men.
... is the ma in the thematics.
... is the i in the guana.
... is the occ in the lusion.
... is the crisp in the ing lover.
... is the music you hear when you're falling asleep.
... is the most beautiful person you've ever seen.
... is a fishhook used in all the wrong ways.
... is the kiss at the end of the rainbow.
... is the chainsaw on Ash's hand.
... is the black hole in the Disney movie, "The Black Hole."
... is the sparkle in Ral Juli's final performance.
... is a reference to a tribe that sacked Rome.
... is a reference to smoke.
... is a reference to medieval architecture.
... is a reference to foul body-odor.
... is a reference to kids obsessed with death and Victorianisms.
... is a reference to bass-heavy rhythm-driven soul music.
... is sove without lex.
... is the twilight at the end of the 21st century.

Bjrk ...
James Brown ...
Andy Kaufman ...
Baz Luhrman films, and especially Romeo + Juliet ...
Invisible Cities, by Italo Calvino ...
Inspector Gadget ...
Mutiny on the Bounty, any version, ...
Plainwater, by Ann Carson ...
The O.C. ...
The Mysteries of Udolpho, by Ann Radcliffe ...
Cosmo Dogood's Urban Almanac ...
The Game of Life ...
Science ...
Electronic music ...
This Mortal Coil ...
Cast Away (you know with Tom Hanks) ...
The Juno Reactor, most likely, ...
Vertigo, most likely, ...
Thomas Pynchon's writings ...
Role-playing ...
Casablanca, most likely, ...
Madonna ...
The Muppets ...
Faith ...
The Time Quartet, by Madeleine L'Engle ...
P.T. Anderson movies, especially Magnolia and Punch Drunk Love, ...
Afrika Bambaataa ...
Chaos, by James Gleick ...
The Murder of Roger Ayckroyd, by Agatha Christie, most likely, ...
Orbital ...
Nightwalking ...
Anachronisms, often, ...
Pleasantville, despite misgivings, ...
The Empty Space, by Peter Brook ...
Romance, often, ...
The Adventures of Pete and Pete ...
Eminem ...
Cosmology ...
Tristram Shandy, by Laurence Sterne ...
The Shawshank Redemption, most likely, ...
Underworld ...
To the Lighthouse, by Virginia Woolf ...
Disney's "The Castaways," but only when viewed ironically, as if there's any other way to view it ...
Ryder, by Djuna Barnes ...
Christmas Trees ...
Fraggle Rock ...
Outkast ...
West Side Story, if one is careful, ...
Urban Exploration ...
Frankenstein, by Mary Shelley ...
Sufjan Stevens ...
Night of the Iguana, by Tennessee Williams ...
Fortunetelling, if one is careful, ...
Anton Checkhov, stories and plays, and especially the Seagull ...
The Maraczec Orchestra, most likely, ...
The Pirates of the Caribbean movies, almost certainly, ...
Religious texts, the Bible, the Qur'an, the Vedas, etc., read carefully and imaginatively ...
Shel Silverstein's The Giving Tree ...
Aphex Twin, most likely, ...
My So-Called Life ...
The Zombie Survival Guide, by Max Brooks, most likely, ...
Antonin Artaud, collected works ...
Radiohead, most likely, ...
New Wave, I think, I think, maybe, ...
Paradox ...
Their Eyes Were Watching God, by Zora Neale Hurston ...
the poetry of Rosemarie Waldrop, though she would likely deny it, ...
Harold Pinter plays, but especially Betrayal, ...
Capra's It's a Wonderful Life ...
Number theory ...
Alfred Hitchcock movies ...
The Keep, by Jennifer Egan ...
Parliament ...
Topology ...
Funkadelic ...
Travel, always, ...
Caryl Churchill plays ...
Jane Austen, collected works, but especially Northanger Abbey, ...
Dr. Seuss' Grinch Night (not to be confused with The Grinch Who Stole Christmas) ...
Puzzles ...

... is/are/approach Gothic Funk.

It's great to live in a city full of new development. That is to say, everything I do is with the goal in mind to one day no longer live in a disposable, depreciable environment, where we, too can get to know structures more than 1,000 years old. But in the meantime, to be aware of the fertility in the earth around me, and to see the faith others have in that energy as it springs up, it keeps my perspective nimble, my role refreshing, and my imagination burgeoning. It's true that sometimes, the only thing preserving historic places is the apathy or lack of vision to replace them with anything new. Determining whether that preservation outweighs the risk to community vibrancy which such stagnancy typically presents will always be among my least enjoyable tasks.

I found a much better view here if you can use the quicktime plugin:
http://www.pocruises.com.au/html/vrx_pacific_sun.cfm?tourPage=4

What do you think?

What do you like and what changes would you make?

Personally, I think it's all about the glowing dance floor and the green rock-crystal lights for me. I still think they work. The carpet is kind of hideous and I'm not a big fan of the faux marble paneling. Replace it with black, but throw in some mirrors. Maybe alternate the green lights with blacklight. Make the whole thing a bit darker, with points of color brighter and more vibrant.

Sincerely,

Gothic Funk

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