CarrionFlowers

"Carrion Flowers" is the name of a new mix I just made. It's about the beautiful and the grotesque. The dead and the pretty. It's about being cute and happy while also maybe deciding to kill something.

Enjoy the Spotify version here (though it is missing a couple of CRUCIAL songs).

Otherwise, listen/watch the mix below.

laughing and not being normal [a 2015 mix]

Above is MixtressRae's 2015 mix. It's called "Laughing and Not Being Normal" and it's as autobiographical as any mix filled with someone else's music can be, as much as all our mixes are.

Side A takes one on a journey through a woman's life cycle and her relationship with feminism. First you see her parroting back the sexism internalized from culture ("Lukatar"). Then she begins to notice the needles of pervasive misogyny ("Venus Fly" and "Pedestrian At Best") everywhere around her in our world. She feels empowered ("Bitch Better Have My Money" and "Worth It"). Next, she gets really really angry ("Bride's Speech" and "Kill V. Maim").

Side B (beginning with Lana Del Rey's reading of T.S. Eliot's thoughts on time-present/past/future on "Burnt Norton") displays the truths that follow her transcendence. Here, she moves through the world without fear of repercussions from men. After the extreme emotions have been expunged from her body in Side A, she feels a little hollow ("Iron Moon"). Without religion ("Sprinter") and her former destructive relationships ("Notget") she has to rebuild her soul on her own ("After the Fall"). She emerges victorious ("Butterfly") while never failing to question all her previously held beliefs ("Simple Death").

Hear this mix in its entirety on YouTube, Spotify, or on December 18th on Mixtress Radio which airs from 7-11pm CST (just press play on the little yellow cassette top right of this blog during broadcast time).

I will also make you a mixTAPE (as in 90min Maxell cassette, old school-style) by special request. email me your address and PayPal me a couple bucks for shipping, and I'll send it to you. It really is better on cassette.

Top Twenty Albums.

Assignment: exchange top twenty albums with coworker/friend Evan. And now more information than you ever wanted to know about me and my relationship to these twenty albums (in no particular order).

MixtressRae'sTOPTWENTYALBUMS:

sarah mclachlan // fumbling towards ecstasy -- This album slays me still, 20 years after its inception, around 17 since I first discovered its divine beauty. It's breathtaking, gorgeous, and my #1 makeout album of all time. Forget Barry White, THIS is all you need to get down. I'm pretty sure this album has never been played in its entirety in front of a man I like without something interesting happening, is all I'm sayin'. It's sexy. It takes you through all stages of well, fumbling towards ecstasy. Best named album ever. I don't know what to say...I couldn't love this album more, from start to finish. 

portishead // dummy -- A pioneer in the trip-hop genre, this album is indispensable to my life. Without the soundtrack within the sleeve, if you will, I would not be who I am today. I have a black and white music video of me and my Xine doing "sour times" on VHS if you ever want to see it. It's pretty cool, if I do say so myself. One of the requirements of my top twenty is that I have to be able to listen to the entire album almost without tiring of it, and this one stands the test, for sure. I could probably listen to this album on repeat for a week.

cibo matto // viva! la woman -- One of my most vivid memories of this album was listening to it, Garbage's s/t, and Frente!'s "shape" on shuffle on my three disc CD changer (later when I had a 5-discer, Fiona Apple's Tidal and Tori Amos' Boys for Pele won the other two spots). I can barely remember a time before this album was on my top ten, at least. These first few albums really have become a part of me at this point, knowing them for so long...each at least 15 years. Another album I've NEVER gotten tired of listening to...that's pretty freakin' serious, man!

pj harvey // to bring you my love -- This is one of those serendipitous albums. I saw it at Hastings, having never heard of PJ Harvey, and fell in love with the cover, took it home, and loved it, obviously. This is one of those singular experiences, hardly ever duplicated (happened with Ani DiFranco's Dilate, too) in my whole history of listening to music. These days, listening to something on Google or Spotify is just a momentary click, but back in the '90s living in a small Midwest town, you had to shell out the bucks to experience an album with an intriguing cover, and often, VERY often, they sucked. PJ Harvey does not suck, and I still think this is her best album, bluesy, emotional, and dark.

tori amos // boys for pele -- Pele is a Hawaiian volcano goddess, and she requires boys to be sacrificed to her, like Tom Hanks maybe, in order to calm her lava rage. Yes, my Pele (the cat) is named after her. This is my #1 breakup album ("I shaved every place where you been, boy"). Despite my more recent disillusionment with Amos, this album holds up and was the album that started my scary-intense obsession with her. It's so angry and demonic and dark and scary. Love the harpsichord.

garbage // garbage -- Garbage never really moved past how amazing their debut album truly was. It's legendary, in my mind, at least. It's just good rock. I also have many music videos of me emulating Shirley Manson. Manson (Shirley, not Marilyn, though I sooooo had a crush on him too) and Geena Davis from "The Long Kiss Goodnight" inspired my emergence into goth at 14, and I never looked back. This album is partially responsible for me becoming ME. 

grimes // visions -- This is the newest album on the list (though I briefly considered Lana Del Rey's Born to Die), only from last year, so I wasn't sure if it counted as one of my top twenty, but I think it does because according to my last.fm profile I've listened to Grimes 1,182 times since I discovered this enchanting songstress in February of last year. That's almost three songs a day every day since I discovered her. Yeah. I've said it before and I'll say it again, Grimes is what my brainwaves sound like. Her and her bf have really insightful posts on their tumblrs too.

cure // pornography -- This album was made the year I was born (1982). #1 bathtub album of all time. It was hard not to have at least three Cure albums on this list, but I decided I only get one per artist. I can get sucked into a Cure-hole easily. I could spend an entire evening listening to this, Faith, and Disintegration. Disintegration is the #1 driving-around-in-the-rain album of all time, in case you were wondering. I just can't get enough of the wall of sound of The Cure, the dark and twisted vocals of Robert Smith, and the atmosphere. I could get lost in The Cure for days...

depeche mode // violator -- Depeche Mode is another artist I can get lost inside. If you want to know what MixtressRae considers a love song, it's Depeche Mode. Their lyrics are honest love songs. I get the impression that the songwriters (Gahan and Gore are kind of indistinguishable to me) are kind of dicks, but if I'm directing a love song at someone, I'm a little bit of a dick too, so I empathize, I guess is what I'm saying. I'd like to be more like Sarah McLachlan, but I'm more like Dave Gahan. I feel like Depeche Mode is my "cosmic" connection to my dad too, because he was kind of a dick too. He he.

brian eno // here come the warm jets -- Glam. '70s rock. Androgyny. Hot men in eyeliner. Most of the time people think of Bowie, I think of Eno. The Eno in my head based on the sound of his resonant voice, because his face isn't that attractive, but that VOICE. Why did he stop singing? Why? This is the first record I go to when I listen to LPs. Every song is an island.

talking heads // fear of music -- Produced by Brian Eno. The Talking Heads' most atmospheric album. Kind of psychedelic, even, in that world music/punk/new wave way. Contains two of my favorite Talking Heads songs; Air and Animals.

fiona apple // tidal -- Listening to Fiona Apple has always been like reading my diary, if my diary were incredibly, ingeniously lyrical. Again, every song here is an island. So perfectly singular, yet fits within the whole seamlessly. Sullen Girl is my theme song. This is one case in which the critics are right. She really is everything they say she is. My initial music crush on Ms. Apple started in 1996 and it still feels as fresh as it did then. Somewhere in a landfill (or an undisclosed location chosen by weather) is a scrap of sketchbook paper wherein a 15-yr old girl drew Fiona as an angel. I'd never call ANYONE an angel but you, dear sweet Fiona. Incidentally, my best music video ever was my lipsync to Sleep to Dream. I nailed it!

roxy music // country life -- Another album that feels like a world you step into for an hour. I keep characterizing albums as "atmospheric" and this is what I mean. I like fantasy worlds, and albums create that for me if they're worth their salt as ALBUMS. Some songs do it by themselves and I aim to make my mixes sound like worlds unto themselves, but nothing does it like a well-constructed album. Country Life is my #1 ennui-in-the-bedroom-at-2am album ("I'll find myself if it takes all night").

queens of the stone age // lullabies to paralyze -- #1 summer album of all time. Reminds me of drinking bad beer and canoeing, of general sun-soaked drunken debauchery, of long sweaty drives with my hands catching the wind out the open window. Love it. Just good fun rock with a pretty ginger boy on vocals. Honey voice, that one. I'd drink a summer shandy with Homme any July.  

sneaker pimps // becoming x -- Another trip-hop essential that was on constant repeat back in the days of frente!, Fiona, and Cibo Matto. Never get tired of this album. Sad they didn't keep this lead singer longer than one album. She was just too wild to tame, baby.

kate bush // the dreaming -- Kate Bush is way more important than most people know. I can't tell you why (because you have to feel it), and most people I know can't handle her voice (she uses it as a weapon, and most people are just too scared to embrace the hammer), but she's creative and interesting and goddamnit, she's amazing. This album was made in 1982, my birth year. If you ever need to exorcise a demon, play Get Out Of My House and that sucker will leave screaming. Kate Bush is a witch and she's crazy empowering. "Can I have it all now?"

metric // live it out -- When rock and electronic meet. You have the headbanging, all the headbanging, but also the synthesizers. This is the #1 I'm-better-than-the-asshole-I'm-dating-and-he's-never-going-to-understand-me-and-neither-does-society album. And that's all I have to say about that.

cake // fashion nugget -- I have sooooo many stories about this album. The first time I heard it I was cuddling with one of my first boyfriends, so that's a pleasant memory. He also later used Friend is a Four Letter Word as a fuck-you break-up song to me over the phone, so that's a little less pleasant memory. Nugget was playing when my mom told me "fuck" was her favorite word. Frank Sinatra is the name of my iPad with lyrics engraved on the back, not because of the person Frank Sinatra, but the song, you see. All Cake albums are created (mostly) equal, but this is THE Cake album for me. The Distance still brings the house down when I sing it karaoke. I suppose this album is a story of each individual song, and I like it for nostalgia.

nirvana // unplugged in new york -- It was hard for me to pick a live album (because I hate applause), though this is the ONLY live album I listen to in its entirety often, and it's my favorite Nirvana album, so I had to choose it. Every song breaks my soul in half, and I'm into that. "I cannot see the end of me. My whole expanse, I cannot see." What a lot of people don't remember is that Kurt was a feminist and a really spiritual, intuitive, NICE person. I say this like I knew him, but look into those eyes, man. Those Pisces eyes...how can you not know him? I once wrote a pornographic poem about Kurt Cobain. Not because of his face, but his delicate Pisces soul. I love a delicate Pisces soul, for sho.

bjork // post -- Electronic pioneer, she is. Army of Me is the most perfect "buck up" song. I named a mixtape Army of Me once. So many great songs on this one. I don't even know what to say about this one. I like its isolation. It feels like a girl sitting in a beautiful landscape of circuit boards hacking her way through someone's mainframe just to dance on the 1s and 0s. There's a childlike destruction in the joy of Post. 

Too tired to proofread! so there it is.

I am an Aspergirl.

I've been holding off on this post because I've wanted to make it super intelligent and though-out and like an Aspergirl manifesta, but I'm just sick of waiting to form intelligent thought, perhaps it will come out naturally Grimes-Tumblr-style. It could happen.

So, a couple of weeks ago I took the Autism Quotient and scored a 35. A score of 32 and above most likely means you're on the Spectrum. The spectrum of Autism. As I scored in the lower area of Autism, that probably means Asperger's. I haven't sought a formal diagnosis (which I'm planning to talk to my therapist about that at my next appointment) yet, but this label is fitting me so comfortably, so perfectly, that I think a lack of formal diagnosis would piss me off. Because I SO am an Aspergirl.
Let's just get the definitions out of the way first...
Mayo Clinic defines Asperger's Syndrome as: a developmental disorder that affects a person's ability to socialize and communicate effectively with others. Children with Asperger's syndrome typically exhibit social awkwardness and an all-absorbing interest in specific topics.

Doctors group Asperger's syndrome with other conditions that are called autistic spectrum disorders or pervasive developmental disorders. These disorders all involve problems with social skills and communication. Asperger's syndrome is generally thought to be at the milder end of this spectrum.

While there's no cure for Asperger's syndrome, if your child has the condition treatment can help him or her learn how to interact more successfully in social situations.

Some of the symptoms (what I'd rather refer to as traits) that I exhibit include:

• lack of eye contact and awkward body postures/positions
• not understanding sarcasm: I never have. The first time my mom did it and explained the concept to me as a child I said, "I don't like that. Don't do that ever again."
• poor coordination
• mutism: being unable to speak in certain situations. For me, this is usually exhibited in one-on-one situations, especially if someone is asking me about myself.
• can engage in monotonous tasks for hours on end: my favorite job ever was being a library page (shelving/checking in books). I love engaging in activities that occupy a background-space of my mind/body so that I can think about other things. My Valium is monotonous physical movement. If I'm sorting/shelving books, I'm calm. If I'm walking, I'm calm. If I'm dancing, I'm calm. If I'm typing, I'm probably ok too. This also goes along with stims (self-stimulating behaviors, like rocking, feet-shaking, weird, repetitive movements). I also can calm myself by touching certain textures. I like brushed aluminum, computer keys, warm metal, paper, etc.
• repetitive routines/rituals: I fall apart without my routines. I almost can't sleep without watching Star Trek first. The soothing background noise on the Enterprise in The Next Generation calms me greatly.
• eccentric personality/style: Have you seen me? Yeah.
• strong sensory sensitivity: I find this to be the biggest part of being an Aspergirl. Every moment of every day I try to control my sensory input. I won't go to shows unless I know I like the music. I've taken to wearing earbuds when I go to movies, as they're often too loud for me. I'm constantly turning up and down the TV so that it's "perfect". I can't stand the sound of dishes clanking together. On days when I'm having a really hard time getting out of the house for work, I wear really comfortable layers and hide within the softness in order to create a buffer with the outside world. I frequently feel as if I don't want to be "seen". I like to have music going at all times, but I have to choose the music and the volume level myself. If I could always have headphones on in public, I'd function a LOT better in social situations. The only time I feel empowered/capable is while listening to music. Often I am overwhelmed by emotions portrayed in pop culture and I can't continue watching something that upsets me, especially if an image upsets me, I'll experience it over and over again in my mind for hours after seeing it. I can also be intensely distracted by an aspect of someone's appearance on a show or movie I'd otherwise enjoy and have to stop watching. For example, I can barely look at Courtney Cox on Friends because I know how much she'll fuck up her face later. Even though she was beautiful on Friends and I love her character as Monica, I can barely look at her with flashes of her new alien face flashing in my head.  
• attachment to animals and/or inanimate objects over people: I have NO problem bonding with animals and electronics, its people I have difficulty understanding.
• being in "their own world": I am CONSTANTLY fighting this at work. I have to remind myself to do my job constantly, because it's very easy to daydream in reference.
• can spend hours in a library researching: but the problem here is that I can only spend hours researching something I care about. If someone asks me to help them on their family history, forget about it. I don't fucking care and I have a hard time pretending I do.
• unusual preoccupations
• hard time saying "i love you" or showing affection: I have a very hard time with this. I assume that those I am close to know how much I care about them because I tolerate their presence. I am aware how this sounds, and I try to be more engaging, especially in my marriage, but it is a conscious effort.
• need to withdraw into solitude frequently: I would prefer to spend about 75% of my time alone (with animals and internet connectivity with other humans).
• attention narrowly focused on their own interests: I really only light up in a conversation when something interests me personally. I have a hard time remembering to ask what's going on with the person I'm speaking to. I tend to befriend people who entertain me, as well. If you bore me, I probably won't engage with you often.
• shuts down in social situations: if I feel like I'm not in control or can't predict something in a social situation, I probably won't even be there, let alone engage. I will probably leave a situation immediately if I can't find a calm, comfortable, clean place to sit. Although, if I was allowed to supply the music, I could probably handle any environment/social atmosphere.
• rigid social behavior due to inability to adapt to social spontaneity
• has a compulsive need to inform which can come off as blunt/rude: This is very true. I have unintentionally hurt people MANY times with my bluntness. Often the reason I am mute in social interactions is because I'm attempting to censor/translate/sift my initial reactions. If I spoke what first came into my mind, I'd sound like Cordelia or Anya on Buffy or Sheldon from Big Bang Theory.
• great difficulty with small-talk: I abhor bullshitting. I am incapable of it and I find you fake if you engage in it. I don't get it at all. One of the reasons I don't say "i love you" often is because I want to genuinely FEEL it at the moment I'm saying it. I feel the same about conversation. I don't want to say something unless it's genuine. My expectations, therefore, for what is "genuine" are extremely rigid.
• can appear younger than age in dress, actions, etc: I never understand what people mean when they say a 40-year-old woman can't wear certain things. I don't agree with that at all. I wear the same clothes I did in middle school (sometimes literally the same exact articles of clothing). If I like it and fit into it, I'll wear it until it falls apart.
• will not spend a lot of time grooming: My hair has to be no-maintenance. I only bathe every other day. I only wash my hair once or twice a week and only brush it once every two weeks or so. I don't spend much time looking in the mirror. As long as my zits don't need to be popped and my self/clothes are relatively clean, I'm good to go. 
• androgynous (hates gender roles): This is a big one. I hate gendered expectations/roles. One of the reasons I'm obsessed with drag is because I like when people play with gender.
• enjoys reading scifi/fantasy
• may find employment daunting: It is a struggle almost every day for me to go to work. I accomplish it and have held down a job for 9 years, but it's only part time and I don't think I'd ever be able to handle full time work. 
• highly intelligent, yet sometimes can be slow to comprehend due to sensory and cognitive processing issues. Will not do well with verbal instruction--needs to write down or draw diagram: there are several times at work where I will have to ask again and again the same questions about how to do something. I WILL NOT remember until I write it down.
• due to sensory issues, can be overwhelmed by sex: it takes a LOT of emotional energy for me to have sex. It feels like a total body overtaking and it is a huge gesture of love for me to engage in sex. I feel like I will "never be enough" in this category. This is the #1 issue in my romantic relationships. All sensory stimuli have to be in perfect alignment for me to be "in the mood". It's very difficult for anyone attempting to have a romantic relationship with me. I feel a lot of guilt about this issue as well. 
• words and actions often misunderstood by others: like all misfits, I feel misunderstood almost all the time

I already feel very exhausted by exposing all of this. I made a sort of Asperger's announcement on Facebook, but have gotten hardly any response. I guess people don't know what to say? Some close friends/family have said that I don't need a label and they don't think of me as different, but I don't really believe that. I think they're trying to be nice. I feel VERY at odds with people ALL the time. Surely I stand out, socially. I don't understand why they can't tell me the truth. But right now I feel like I DO need a label. I like having an explanation for why I am such a pariah. I really like connecting with people, but I don't want to do it in the way most people do. And I usually can't relate in the way others do. Sensory issues are always with me. Currently, I'm torn between how much of this Aspergian stuff I can work around, how much to use as excuses for things I've always thought I should "get over", like what's the line between acceptance and excuses? On the one hand, it's really great to feel more self-acceptance for all these things I've always thought were "problems" I had, but how do I know when to accept and when that acceptance becomes an excuse, if that makes sense.

Anyway, that's my freestyle rant on being an Aspergirl. I'm happy for the distinction, and I feel I am understanding myself, forgiving myself more than I've ever been able to do. This is a crux of change. This is a moment of precipice and what do I do now? I'm flailing madly between certain/uncertainty.

In celebration of All Hallow’s Eve (yes, yes, weeks ago, but as ShAaron Needles says, "Every day is Halloween, ghouls!"), I want to talk a bit about a new(ish--the term was coined in 2009) genre of music that embodies the essence of the dark and spooky fall months.  It’s called “Witch House”.  When you boil this genre down to its “simplest terms and most convenient definitions” it is both a brain, a prom queen...wait, that’s The Breakfast Club...

Put simply, Witch House is the newest iteration of goth music.  The ethereal miasma of Ambient Dream Pop meets the electro-industry of Dark Noise.  It is simultaneously futuristic and covered in cob webs.   

“The melodies are hooky and sweet, but each track has a throbbing undercurrent of menace that pulls you in like a riptide. It's hard to pinpoint exactly from where this pervading element of darkness springs...” -- Lindsay Zoladz from pitchfork.com

The above quote was in description of Witch House’s most eminent artist’s debut, Grimes’ Geidi Primes, but is also indicative of the entire genre, in my opinion.  This music can set the stage for a haunted night in PeaceChurch cemetery, or put you to bed at night if you’re already a spooky girl like me.  It is truly fascinating to allow yourself to be entombed in the dichotic soundscapes, the surreal beauty of the almost angelic vocals mixed disjointedly with the torrid doom that seems always on the precipice of descending upon you with alarming ferocity.  It tricks you into falling in love with the witches and ghosts living within the whorls of your grey matter.  I can’t get enough of this genre.  I’ve been spiraling down the rabbit hole since I first discovered Grimes early in the year and discovered more related artists through a fabulous station/playlist on songza.com called “Haunted House”.  Start here if you’re remotely intrigued with this genre.

Here are a few artists that fall within the witchy distinction that I recommend (all can be found on Spotify):

Grimes*

Purity Ring*

Glasser

Blouse 

Fever Ray

Crystal Castles

oOoOO

White Ring

Modern Witch

There isn’t enough of this music!  If you know of any additional artists (or if you already love this genre) within the murky cemeteries of Witch House, please let me know: mixtressrae@yahoo.com

*Available at the Joplin Public Library for checkout!

perception/deception

In high school my English teacher (you remember: the cute one that is now a principal?) taught a class about pluralism.  Pluralism (as I remember him teaching it then) is this idea that perception is reality and everyone perceives things differently, so can reality be defined/constant?  This is something we've all thought about at one time or another, so I am presenting nothing new, but recently I had to take a hard look at myself.

Remember in Anne Rice's "Queen of the Damned" where spirits were these giant balls of misty energy that spanned hundreds of miles with a concentrated meaty center? After the tornado, I was forced to gather up all of my misty-wide energy and stuff it into the shell of my body.  I then turned that body into a fortress and tried to ignore it.  In the time since that stupid Spring day I've over-indulged in alcohol, food, and darkness.  Any escape I could find, I clutched onto until my fingers bled.  As a result, what was already growing stagnant within me even before last Spring became so still, so unforgivingly rigid, that I couldn't even see that I was frozen.  My father died and I felt as if I was looking through an opaque glass at myself from another realm.  Apathy has been my muse, and I thank her for her service, but I have to break the fucking glass.

Recently, a confrontation/intervention was placed in front of me that I could not ignore.  I have always known who I am, so it was really hard to admit that I didn't know who I had become.  I had become this insular being without ardor.  I had forgotten that what we all are is fluid.  We change and evolve and taking a look at who you are is required of you every day.

The only people that remain sane in this world let go of the perception they believe others have of them.  They don't let themselves be defined by that perception.  Not even the perception that is their own.  I've always known this, but recently I've lost sight of where I sit within it.  I feel SUCH a kinship to those that are being their genuine selves without definition.  What I am now is not who I will be.  What I have been is not what I am.  I always really liked the lyrics to Incubus' "Make Yourself".  The idea of creating your self has always been important to me, but the thing I am grasping now is that you have to do this continuously throughout your existence.  It isn't forever that you are, it's forever that you choose to be.

With one swift primal scream I must let that giant all-encompassing spirit take her space again.  It cannot be contained within my body.  It must pervade everything around me so that I can feel and be felt by others.

We cannot see things as they truly are, or they are what we see and we can't see what anyone else sees. So why construct an image without purpose?  If what you're trying to fit within doesn't feel comfortable, get out!



The celebrities that I find interesting usually have zero control over their personae (Courtney Love, Grimes, and Fiona Apple) and don't care.  They are raw and real and it inspires me tremendously.  I also enjoy when they have TOO much control over their personae (Lady GaGa, Marilyn Manson) because they're taking their art to such an extreme that it becomes an agenda.  Grimes IS art and GaGa forces you to confront your own art and both of these images make you look at yourself.  The video above makes no sense and that was probably Grimes' unintentional point.  She just gathered together people she liked and visual images that intrigued her and she danced.  I cried watching this because her weirdness feels so genuine to me.

My next tattoo is:

stop.
making.
sense.

and this to me is my zen.  Reminding myself that what I think others think does not matter.  Who I am and that I am confrontationally genuine is what is important to me.  I want to be a Fiona, a Grimes, a Courtney Love.  A brash, bold, ballsy, blunt BITCH.  The witch within is emerging from the gristle she's been hiding amidst.