It would be an understatement to say that I felt pretty let down by the retarded ostrich-style posi vibes that seemed to be overwhelming underground music culture. Music, one of the most potent forms of magick available to us now, was being wasted all around me every day. Rather than being used as a weapon against the obvious evil that had possessed the head of the superorganism, I saw a lot of young, energetic musicians fully embracing the idea that music is but a fun distraction from all that depressing shit we can’t do anything about— at its most romantic, a more tolerable meal ticket than anything in the food service industry. It seemed to me like even in the rambunctious renaissance of Baltimore’s rising weird music scene, there were few bands with goals loftier than going on subsidized road trips and getting photographed by strangers. The fear of conflict and/or failure felt, to me, quite palpable, and romantic notions of using the power of music to slay great evil was kept in check. I still see a direct line between artists with realistic goals and the pussification of our population. Feeling spiritually starved by the abundance of weakness dumped into the pantheon, I had to carve my own idols to praise: badass, perfectionist motherfuckers determined to raise the levels on their own terms. (For a minute I was really jealous of the ballsy “no more tours” policy Dan adopted after Katy Lied and thought DANNIBAL might be a good prelude to instituting a similar policy…) Donald crooning about driving drunk in “Deacon Blues” or invoking Odysseus’ journey to describe an unhealthy relationship to travel— to me, that’s 180 degrees from today’s scarf-wearing softboy mumbling dada-ist nature poems into 6 guitar pedals. “