internet place in brooklyn is straight out of Wm. Gibson, complete with dirty floors flickering neon and host of odd characters… returned from U.K. yesterday rush hour… as things progress i realize how hard it is to differentiate one show from another, was thinking that if something fell on my head during the set i might then be able to make a distinction, as it is though, the actual music parts of the separate events are all blurred together… what i remember is the cute girls, sometimes boys in the crowd, the streets of whatever city we’re in, sometimes what the backstage area looks like etc etc, that stuff… cause people ask me what i thought of such and such a concert and on the whole the answer is that i dont really know, some are better than others as a result of various intangibles the last show in London at wembley was good for me… (by the way i still dont have an internet account up and running which is why im in this place with my yahoo account…id had this hotmail account for years but of course as {with all good sleazy corporate entities} i tried to log on recently and discovered that since i hadnt used it in 30 days they expected me to pay for what was formerly a free service… yahoo seems to still be free) it was of course great to be back in the U.K. and briefly in Ireland, Scotland…i’d gotten a lot of e-mails from you all questioning the wisdom of us going out with INXS everyone being too polite to just say it was a fucked idea but i got the drift…i dont really know anything about those guys except that the singer managed to do himself in weirdly and naturally you were all right about it being an odd bill at best… they seemed like nice enough guys… the tour involved long blocks of down time, often after arriving at the venue for a sound check we’d have six hours of mind numbing blank space to fill… for whatever selfdestructive lack of foresight i didnt bring anything to do except for a ‘game boy “advance” ‘ on which i battled snails and tomatoes before advancing on to forks and evil cupcakes, this all in a game called “bomber man max” or some such, initially i had no aptitude for this whatsoever but after discovering that my approach had been all wrong (that i didnt have to blow up all the snails after all) i became appropriately obsessed… also there was a copy of grand theft auto 3 on the bus which was good for various moments of violent expression (ive gotten a copy of the new one ‘vice city’ which is more an extension of GTA3 than a new game, its got ‘atomic’ and i think ‘call me’ init as well as Debbies voice as a taxi dispatcher…seems they made so much fucking money with GTA3 that they could afford a whole bunch of big names as voices including Ray Liotta as the lead voice etc etc…{speaking of celebrities i was really plucked to meet Juliette Lewis when we were in L.A. the last time, its funny how one can get a sense of how people are from seeing them act, she’s one of the few people ive met who i could honestly say i was a fan of without being merely polite, had seen a lot of her work etc etc, she was so sweet and good natured and down to earth i was really knocked out, i havent had an encounter like that in ages. sooo many of ones heroes turn out to be disappointing when one finally meets them} so yeah a lot of time spent on the bus crashing virtual cars and murdering innocent bystanders) the U.K. is going the route of the USA in as much as the western economy is creating more fancy ass little cafes and galleries everywhere one looks…the last time we were over about 5 tears ago some of the now thriving areas were still uninhabited… Manchester was a real surprise and pleasure, we got a quick glimpse of the pumping youth culture as we walked around one afternoon, i wish i could spend more time there sometime, it reminds me of here in Williamsburg Brooklyn a great deal… im gonna wrap for now ive got a lot more stuff in my head that id like to put down here and hopefully ill have an account up in a week or so (all i can get where i am now is a satellite hookup or a dial-up ugh.) do keep writing i havent checked my mail from the site here for a while and expect to have to spend a day reading… oh yeah the one last thing for now is that i think it was Louis B. who gave me the “switchblade kitty” cd, anyway i really loved it especially the version of ‘my heart will go on’ , a huge improvement over celine thing, and we wound up playing the whole thing before we went on at some of the UK gigs and the sound guy Dave told me that quite a few people had approached him asking what it was… so switchblade kitty there is hope keep up the good work…. as for everyone else thanks all of you who said hello over there and i should be back here pretty soon love CHRIS

the period since returning to nyc has been quite hectic mostly due to my relocating out of new york city proper… simply, i’m moving from a large dark dirty expensive space in the city to an even larger clean light cheaper space in the country…with trees recently i reread “Neuromancer” and was surprised to note how much stuff from Matrix was lifted from it: “His vision crawled with ghost hieroglyphs, translucent lines of symbols arranging themselves…He looked at the backs of his hands saw faint neon molecules crawling beneath the skin”…reminiscent of the green streams of readout in the movie, beyond that the book features a Rasta spacestation called “Zion cluster” and numerous other items that wind up referenced in Matrix… required reading… if anyone was confused by american foreign policy objectives i hope you’ve all got it figured out by now, really simple: take over the world… not to forget that theres a presidential election coming up again in ’04 and being in the middle of a war should assure bush another term, changing horses “in mid stream” and all that… im halfway through Chuck Palahniuk’s latest book “Lullaby” (guy who wrote ‘Fight Club’ , ‘Invisible Monsters’, others) he makes some very cutting observations about the new american decadence, i can also recommend that… i got a few e-mails to the effect of “gee putting out another greatest hits cd sure smacks of wanting to make money” yes! thats absolutely correct! (deeper though, lets not forget that blondie is no longer on emi and they’re gonna put these things out anyway and tempted though i might be to tell them to just keep my share i think i might somehow regret that decision)… i just heard the atomic kitty version of tide is high which is weird that that kind of britney spears programmed sound has evolved into an actual genre, i hope John Holt has made some bucks off of it… not much else is afoot now, packing stuff includes uncovering various forgotten items both great and horrific, old photos and memorabilia; a couple of old pictures of james dean that id forgotten about, posters, autographs, but the fucking miserable moths ate my Tibetan rug even though it had been wrapped in plastic to prevent their access (the moths only eat good stuff, have no appetite for polyester or other synthetics) i’ll be glad to leave them in the city… i dont know when i’ll get on again probably not too far forward, got to get the cable modem up and running in the trees oh, i remembered one thing; what if someone had a program or site where anyone could submit a 3 dimensional rendering of their environment, inside their house, around their neighborhood etc etc etc the goal being to have a computer map of the entire world that would be like a game envirronment, would eventually enable one to travel around the entire planet from their home computer, people could constantly be adding details like a rusty tin can on a sidewalk, a picture on a wall, then the whole world would be filled in in HTML or whatever and you could walk from san francisco to atlanta on the computer all the while going into buildings and rooms and around corners and down alleys etc etc… this led me to think about the time coming when people will be able to brain link with the computer and what if thousands, millions of people could all do it simultaneously making for a huge mechanical hive mind… maybe it would be better than television though somebody would no doubt try to put commercials out there stay out of trouble chris

got back to nyc in one piece more or less currently playing catchup with this and that… burning man was fun, really fantastic. the actual fire was the best of the three ive seen, really massive, the post office got to cancel mail for real this year, we met a lot of people… i got about a hundred messages when i went on line, read fifty in each of two sessions (AGAIN!: the hunter is not my favorite blondie album, i dont have a favorite blondie album and im still not sure if i ever said otherwise, i dont think that debbie knows about whatever is named ‘diamond bridge’ in new jersey, and im certain the song title is not a reference) this is short… 9-11 looms like a huge commercial for cultural contradiction, yesterday bon jovi played in times square for the start of football season… i think everything is catching up with me ahhhhhhh im glad everyone seems to have liked the shows what else? i dont know ill think of something for next time as usual thanks for all the nice things youve written chris

tour is winding down with a few more shows i think some of you occasionally misconstrue what i mean, either that or im just not clear which is also a distinct possibility…for example my point about commercials in the cinema was that though i’d first seen them in the UK, showing them is now common practice in the US, thanks to all the game freaks who sent me tips about grand theft auto, i’ve gotten all the nuances and tricks figured out so you needent send any more info… (one thing i didnt see on any of the game cheat sites was the very surrealistic thing one can do with the tanks which is to try and fill up the whole city with them, i found that i could keep producing more and more tanks which would just pile up on top of each other making a huge pile of crunching burning tank flesh, one time the game crashed as a result) i really dont have many thoughts on us playing with INXS, i hope its not too bad a bill, again i never was really familiar with their music and we werent involved with putting the bill together (at this juncture {point} id like to suggest that anyone with complaints about stuff like this address them to Laure Dunham <laured@10thst.com> and let her as a management rep know what you think… i’m always getting messages that i dont know how to respond to) one guy out there wanted to know (sigh!) if i thought Johnny Ramone would play a 6500 hundred dollar guitar… well of course not but ol’ JR is a very specific case in point who proudly told me that he never plays guitar unless he’s on stage or recording… also dude presumes i paid for the guitar im using… i have bought and own plenty of expensive equipment and junk however and if someone wants to accuse me of being greedy and or capatalistic i’d much prefer they come directly to the point rather than resort to implication… this stuff is painfully ironic and makes me want to bitch and whine about how much money we’ve generated for others that we never shared in, certainly a big conflict for yours truly as i’ve never been in this for money, at the same time feeling anger for being so financially screwed over the years… you can believe this or not, i think the majority of you know that im honest with you all, i think it would be really horrendously bad karma to bullshit about oneself en masse like this… debbie and i talk about sometime writing a more detailed account of the band history from our point of view (dont write asking when it’s coming out!! go back and read the precedeing sentence again before you do) my old buddy from brooklyn Mike “the psych” who lives out here in maniac mode just showed me a clipping from a local paper which once fucking again refers to the “next Blondie album ‘Drive'” again this is not, and never was the name of the next record… the media is like playing that game ‘telephone’ where one person whispers in the next ones ear etc etc and like five, six, whatever number of people later a completely warped version of what the first one said comes out of their mouth someone else asked what i think about bands doing covers of other peoples material… personally i always liked hearing an artist with a specific sound/style redefine a piece of music by another, sometimes it works, sometimes not, for me a great example is hendrix doing the beatles ‘sgt.peppers lonely hearts club…’ which i never liked and doing bob dylans ‘all along the watchtower’ which is for me is an absolute masterpiece of pop music… a piece of advice i’ve always given bands starting out is to do a lot of cover songs, i think it enables you to get into the head and hands of another musician as it were, also as far as doing a demo for the rest of the world people are able to connect with a familiar song, sometimes especially for record co. people its hard to hear a new band and a piece of familiar music is sometimes a good bridge san francisco is a great place i was here in the summers of ’67 and ’68 and i oftimes wonder why i dont live here… new york has just been wrecked by ghouliannies regime and i wonder if and how much it will ever be able to swing back… ten years ago i couldn’t tolerate los angeles, now that new york has become so plasticised even LA feels refreshing, as ive said before people cant have a future without a past and the elimination of so much history in new york is terrible to me, landmarking has nothing to do with reality, is only about money and i’ve seen just fantastic old buildings torn down and replaced with grotesque ‘modern’ structures that look more like futuristic prisons than anything else…san fran is still possesed of a lot of atmosphere, alleys and run down old structures are beautiful in their noble decay, maybe its like old age, cities shouldn’t be the victims of ‘ageism’ by now im a little bit worn out and im quite looking forward to heading into the desert for burning man, im going with barbs and some others a week early leaving from sacramento the day after the tour ends, im easily found out there at the post office and i’d be amused by anyone who said theyd seen the site here (im meeting more people at the shows who say they’ve seen it) i’ll probably get a chance for another post before the end after that i’ll get back on in sept-oct love chris

“We were dancing and loud. We snuck our way down to the secondfloor section. One girl joined us, she came by herself and she knew all the words. Then later we were joined by a dancing frog, and sexy cow girl.” “I sat down in the beginning (with the crowd) for a couple songs, but then couldn’t stand it, it was wrong… you can’t sit at a rock concert, so once I committed to screwing the people behind me” “…i came up with the acronym, ” Pioneers under negative komments” (PUNK).” “…a good antidote to all the 9/11 media crap we’ll have to tolerate. Everyone must feel for the victim’s families and communities but the thought of watching Bush and Blair bullshitting about their anti-terrorist achievements while doing the suitably sympathetic and dignified thing – yeeucch.” “Thank GOD the market crashed.” ” F anyone who says/implicates you’ve sold out – what are you supposed to do, live in other people’s attics/couches and steal bread from friends’ cabinets (i got a 47 year old one-of-those in my attic right now! Nice, sweet guy, but…)?” “AOL sucks. i keep losing my coonection ” “SHAYLA LIVES !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!” “Please tell me that you guys are at least getting paid for the Mazda commericals featuring “One way or another”?” “…I could use my binoculars to focus on your hands and try to steal some licks. Guess what…I have no idea what you are doing” “…for our 8 year anniversary he booked us a suite at the Silver Legacy in Reno for the night of the show. He made me promise I wouldn’t roam the corridors and elevators in search of the band, though. Damn. ” thought i’d include a few choice comments from the e-mails i get… unless some major event or other drives me to the computer i think this is the last of the tour messages for now… i think there are two shows left… i really had a good time at pretty much every gig, all in all this tour has been very enlightening, i’ve gotten even more involved with the website and i feel more hopeful about the future of the band in general, that we may actually be able to keep on doing live shows for longer than id anticipated going into this… i’ve met a lot of great people, last nite we played in Kelseyville CA at some kind of resort deal, this was an odd choice for a venue, bordering on a dinner theater, (at least they cleared the tables before the show) problem with these situations is that people show up because they just attend anything thats at the place, not because they want to see whoever is playing, i guess this is good for making converts but we’d like to think people are there to see us… (this doesnt mean we aren’t aware of all the fans who come to the shows in out of the way locations, i always can get a vibe from the people in the audience who are there for blondie even if they’re not yelling and carrying on, just more cosmic energy stuff)… anyway last night right at a table in the front was a young girl who was so moved by the whole thing that she was literally in tears for the entire set, i in turn was caught up in her enthusiasm and handed her my finger picks as we got off stage, by sheer coincidence i walked right into her and her father as i was heading for the bus… turns out ‘Lacy’ was there for her 18th birthday present, (her birthday was sept 11 no less) and was a huge fan… i brought her on the bus for a bit, she got to talk to DH and watch me play grand theft auto some more (punch line of the grand theft saga is that the fucking copy of the game im using which was borrowed from Jinsoo [the knife] our keyboard tech, has a glitch of some kind so that everytime i’d get all the three ‘caporegimes’ [see the godfather] to the meeting at the dons house, while fleeing from the triads in a ‘stretch’ limosine that was really miserable to handle, every time i’d succesfully complete the damn ‘mission’ the stupid game would crash, what this means in english is that one cant finish that particular copy of the game no matter what [yes i tried cleaning off the disk, no, it IS actually the disk itself thats screwed up, weird] i still am not sure if ill ever buy it, im scared of not doing anything else if i have it around)…Lacy was so sweet and knocked out at being around Debbie, we were all pleased we could do something for her that meant so much… i am really psyched that we are getting so many young fans here in the US, this too makes me feel hopeful that maybe at least some of the kids here will be able to get past the GAP style media brainwashing thats attempting to produce a generation of safe clones who will act out their ‘animal house’ spring break safe legal wildness and then settle into dull middle class life with no questions asked (people dont get that the ‘aquarian age’ technically is, according to the doctrines of western astrology, a very orderly period, ask your friends who are into it… have you seen ‘starship troopers’? where everyone is part of the global government system and all live a mode of communal fascism? i thought that portrayal of the future was really fantastic, and im often afraid that thats exactly where things are headed, only difference is that i dont think the enemy is gonna be outer space bugs its gonna be us, other humans, one would think that world leaders would appreciate the inherent schizophrenic nature of the time now, that the “enemy” cant be destroyed without also committing suicide… i just spent about 45 futile minutes trying to find a quote from writer Theodore Dreiser… to paraphrase its basically that man isnt high enough to be totally human and not low enough to be totally animal,(of course i give animals more credit but you get the idea) somewhere in a limbo sort of non committed transitional state… right this minute in the hotel room here the two talking heads on tv are debating the “target iraq” headline with the sound turned off…well thats fucking inevitable, good as done… one of the people quoted above asked a question about my playing style and guitar influences, the finger pick thing goes back to my liking Earl Scruggs and playing five string banjo early on, also the first electric band i ever saw was “The Blues Project” who most of you probably havent heard of except maybe for keyboardist Al Cooper who went on to play with the pretty awful Blood Sweat and Tears and who is redeemed for playing on Dylans “Highway 61 Revisited” and i think other of Dylans records from the period…the guitarist of the blues project, the late Danny Kalb was the first person i saw using fingerpicks on an electric guitar, the second was the guitarist of a very obscure band called “the Spike Drivers” who i saw open for the Velvets… a really major influence on my playing besides of course Hendrix is John Fahey who is a kind of unclassifiable blues/folk guitarist master who has a lot of solo recordings available that go back to the early sixties, finally the guy who wrote me mentions Jorma Kaukonen who i dont often think of but who was an influence in that i always loved the Airplanes psychedelic approach to guitar, how guitars functioned in their mixes etc in other news something about some fish that is climbing out of the water and eating everything in sight back east and even weirder to me is some dude arrested with a garage full of short range missles in ROSWELL NM of all places… i could probably think of more stuff but i’ve got to sort through all the junk i’ve accumulated on the road today and figure out what to send back to new york and what to take to burning man… so have a good rest of summer i’ll get back on in sept some time thanks again for y’all support and keep those cards and letters coming in folks… also again: SEND PICTURES love chris

it took me like three hours to get through the 60 or so e-mails i got from you all mainly cause i was checking out all the stuff about grand theft auto that people referred me to, im really a novice at the thing and i didnt quite get how dense it is, jeez, ive just been playing a borrowed version on the bus i dont think i can afford to suffer the addictive aspects of owning it… so thanx for the tips ive got enough info now to get completly enmeshed in the damn thing in LA before the Anaheim shows we saw a bunch of acquaintances and friends, i hadnt seen Cherie Currie for like twenty years and she is a major babe still, old comrades Lydia Lunch, Paul Zone, Michael Schmidt, Chris Young, this was at an ‘informal’ dinner Mr. Schmidt tossed for us and Siouxsie who i’ve only met on occasion but who looked quite terrific, Howie Pyro and Mr. Zone were acting as DJ’s.. much else is status quo, ive been meeting more of you out here, still thanx for the messages, do keep them coming… ive got to deal with things, this is short, ill get in another more detailed report in a day or so, (id intended this to be but i havent even gotten out of the hotel yet, presumably ill get a better sense once again of the horror of las vegas and have some thoughts on it) happy birthday whoever has one regards, love chris

Debbie asked me to specially thank everyone who got together to get her the birthday present of…? a trip to a spa in NYC? something like that IM not sure but she said she cant wait to go also everyone else who sent her greetings and stuff for her birthday thanx again all of you for the nice remarks, a lot of these hotels have high speed connections which make computer life much easier… if only the goddamn windows would open, one weirdass aspect of this particular tour is the constant air conditioning, im freezing a lot of the time with occasional blasts of horrendous heat… i find myself sort of brain dead during the down time, haven’t had the patience to read, i have been spending a lot of time in the world of grand theft auto 3, i can understand somewhat why various parents groups would mistakenly object to a game whose object is destruction and mayhem as one climbs the ladder of criminality while engaging in bloody high speed pursuits and shoot outs with the police… but as usual confusion reigns as video games, professional wrestling, M&M etc etc etc are given the rap as being the causes of things that they’re really the result of im continually amazed at the difference between individual and mass intelligence, what everyone will put up with as it comes drooling and puking out of tv’s and radios disguised as information and ‘news’…this week and last debates about whether or not the media is merely stirring up fears in its approach to the supposed ‘wave’ of child abductions, is there really a rash of kidnappings or is it just sensational journalism… i saw somebody make the point that although crime statistics have been steadily decreasing for the last ten years the reporting and focus on crime in the media has increased proportionately, the grinning chick reporter wonders dumbly why we cant focus on the ‘good’ things in the news, (presumably stories about flower gardens and cute kittens rather than death and violence) i cant tell if this is stupidity or just blatant hypocrisy… so STILL no one in all of this babble EVER EVER addresses the crux of the matter which is very simply peoples morbid fascinations and how they’re dealt with…dont you think its about time people just could say ” uh, yeah i like to watch car crashes, seeing death and destruction fascinates me, maybe it makes me feel more alive, gets my fear fed adrenaline going, im attracted to things that terrify me…” etc etc how long is this all going to be part of the ‘big lie’ that underlies american culture on so many levels… does anybody really fucking believe that they want to see the story about the guy who had his face removed so that they can gain deep insight into his courage or his wife’s self sacrifice? that the reason for watching “best police pursuit crashes” is for getting driving tips?… i think i’ve raved along these lines previously but of course its business as usual, nothings changed, the line between entertainment and ‘news’ continues to erode, by 2004 i think most network news broadcasts will have soundtracks of sentimental music accompanying stories… all of this eats away subtly at the quality of life, things get a little bit dumber and false and no one seems to give a shit (when we were in the UK a few years back we went to a movie and were surprised to see regular product ads, commercials, running before the film, before even the trailers for other upcoming movies; “gee…” i naively said, “no one in america would stand for this!” hah! i’ve heard that cd’s will eventually have audio advertisements on them) pretty soon we’re gonna see the big gear up for the 9-11 anniversary which promises to be absolutely nauseating in its lack of dignity and level of exploitation… anyway if anyone has any tips on secret stuff in GRAND THEFT AUTO let me know, i still haven’t been able to get off the first island… when does the tunnel open? when does the bridge get fixed?… what else? well i hope everyone understands about the autograph/photo deal, debbie and i frequently talk about how to deal with requests, she specially gets frustrated about having to turn down people who want there pic taken with her, all i can do is assure you that she wont decline for any kind of ego related reason, that generally its quite the opposite; that she feels unattractive, isn’t made up, is preoccupied, or just feeling private thanks again…also dont hesitate to ask stuff, the postings here have all the info about the next record so as far as that goes just go over the older stuff ive written, i’m sure you all are smart maybe there’s something that you’d like to know about that everyone else might think was interesting… send more pictures see you chris

ten-twelve hour bus from Orlando to myrtle beach here…i frequently wonder if i should just stay on the bus, a major pain is getting to sleep on it for a few hours and then not being able to get back asleep when we arrive and enter the hotel… but the pacing of everything is pretty relaxing all in all, grogginess isn’t cumulative, and if anything there’s an abundance of extra time… its always great to be out in the summer… one forgets… here ive got a room overlooking the beach and the warm winds blowing in are really great, very luxurious… last night was really great at Orlando house of blues… the different rooms we play in are like instruments, the sound in each one is unique to itself, now that we’ve gotten the stage volume finally under control after years of struggle im much more appreciative of the texture changes from one venue to the next… i think pumping out a louder level of sound makes the audio clash with and overpower the nuances and subtleties of the room and i much prefer having the acoustics of the place become part of the sound… i’ve really never been a volume freak, the volume issue is a constant debate in rock and roll and i really am pretty solidly on the side that attributes power to content and style rather than to loud presentation, Robert Johnson, Lightning Hopkins etc etc, no amps but still full of power… in a similar context the audience of course contributes heavily to how i feel on stage, it is a tribal event after all, interactive…Atlanta was strange with the dinner vibe and i got a few messages referring to it…the audience reaction to the songs has also changed the set around a bit, we’ve replaced one or two that didnt seem to hold attention, for ex not too many are familiar with “love comes in spurts” or “see no evil” but while the latter stands up on its own and keeps getting an enthusiastic response, it turned out that “spurts” wasn’t getting nearly as warm a welcome, probably would only appeal on a home movie level just pleasing someone who was closely related, familiar…we’ll try it again in the UK, (its curious to see the difference in reactions there… those who assume the UK and US to be similar due to the common language are victims of a misconception that probably goes back to WW2 when it was necessary to stress political bonds socially)i for one am really looking forward to getting back to England,i wish we were there for a longer period…i dont know anything about INXS except for their name, ive likely heard some of their music without knowing who it was, i mention this since getting a couple of messages regarding the wisdom of the bill, hope it works ok i wish we/i could have a “hands on” approach to everything but it never seems possible, i frequently have to defer to the opinions of others who are out of the artistically creative circle of the band, people who have a better grasp of the business end of things; its nice to want to do a double cd but it would make it more expensive and even later with its release, etc. over the next year or so i hope to start working on some of my own things outside of blondie, beyond that we all are always talking about doing this or that odder project together but a lot of that means we have to be stable enough and at present its still a struggle getting blondie really established, this sounds weird right?… along these lines i just saw SYLVAIN of the NEW YORK DOLLS who we’ve known since the beginning, we were reminiscing and were amused to have both noticed the same phenomena; that various trashy clothing knock off outlets in new york sell t-shirts that say “New York Dolls” and that we both saw them worn by little teenage girls who dont have a clue that the words refer to a band im gonna sign off for now, ill continue in a few days when i think of more to report… as usual thanx so much for the writing, i have finally started getting approached by people who say they see the site, i haven’t checked out the chat thing that i hear is on the site but maybe i can get on and write live at some point i really have been enjoying the shows as much as you all say you have, nice its working out all around… dont hesitate to send me pictures and or weirdness… i hope this posting wasn’t too serious… ill definitely be at “burning man” again this year, Barbs and i will be at the post office all 4 now love chris

from Ouspensky again: “…art which does not reveal mysteries, which does not lead to the sphere of the Unknown, does not yield new knowledge, is a parody of art, and still more often it is not even a parody, but simply a commerce or an industry.” and dude wrote that in like 1915 or so… wonder what he’d think of the current state of affairs ol’ P. D. Ouspensky is pretty dense stuff, it takes me quite a while to get through one of his books but i’d heartily recommend it to anyone who wants to try and stretch their brain a bit, i find that studying his writing has the effect of making me think less about the dumbass side effects of what goes on in the world and more about the basic human condition, about why the human race seems to only be able to ‘rise downward’ as it were… theres a great film playing on cable tv these days entitled i think “grass” or such, is the history of marijuana ‘reform’ and legislation in the US… beyond the questions of drug use what i got out of it is just the general way terror media tactics have always been used here to influence popular opinion, it never fails to amaze… apparently there was a period following the civil war where morphine, heroin, cocaine and various related heavy ass stuff was readily available to the american public in the form of “remedies” for this and that… interestingly, a great deal of this use was the province of the middle rather than lower classes since they were the strata of society who could afford doctors… just when the problems and dangers of addiction were about to come into focus suddenly along comes the ‘horrors of the killer weed’ etc etc completely diluting and adding a layer of insane bullshit to the whole subject… i’ve always thought that the post WW2 generation had none but the fuzziest information available to them about drug use, the results being that me and a lot of others who came up in the sixties were a lot less cautious than perhaps they should have… and of course this relates to the way so much is dealt with here, young people who have to cut through layers of lies and misinformation arent going to bother to question etc etc thanx again for the baby related encouragement and advice it really is much appreciated… the american deal seems to be almost done so we should have an actual release date for the next record pretty soon, (while working on the thing for so fucking long i of course wondered if it was any good but having been away from hearing it and being confronted with the finished thing i think its really fantastic, one of the best ones etc etc) great electrical storm here last night, first one this season… i got a great letter, i quote: “but, cHRIST, aren’t you a little old to be cranking out kids?? I’ll never understand you Hollywood types…” …i love it,… yeah, like i was just saying to ben and j-lo the other day “well the baby isnt born yet but at least its got a good agent…” all 4 now love chris

back in nyc for a day or so, tomorrow is the nyc show at jones beach… gratifying to hear everyone likes the direction of the tour, set, etc… i have really been enjoying these shows a lot, tempted to say ‘more than in the past’ but stuff like that is so realative and i cant really be sure its true as ive gone through so many different incarnations within the band… all that aside i HAVE been liking these shows a lot, somehow they feel less like work and more like play the american cities are just weird i cant figure why some are so seemingly hip and youth oriented while everyone on the steet dresses so conservatively… i couldnt believe the fucking statue of mary tyler moore in minneapolis… thus far i havent been able to talk to too many of you, we generally get in the bus and leave after the show… i regretted not taking my laptop and will have it for the next leg… id like to write more but “time” is limited right now… what else… oh the hip hop exhibit at the walker museum in minneapolis was totally great anyone around there should try and catch it… so far ive run into WYCLIFF, THE ROOTS, and DANZIG in various hotels… i was also playing “GRAND THEFT AUTO” on the bus and noticed debbies ‘scarface’ song “RUSH RUSH” in it, (also debbie is going to be a voice on the next one i think)… im really sorry that anyone has trouble getting into any of the shows due to age restrictions, that sucks as far as the band is concerned and i would just recommend some creative i.d. usage to try and get around it… i dont know what we could do about it now that we’re already booked into places with restrictions… ill try and report at greater length from the road when i have more down time in hotels etc thanx again as usual you all rock chris