Matt Margo

                Matt Margo ought to drive you wild. With his finger in so many pies, it is pretty difficult to avoid bumping into him. I’ve seen him (virtually) in countless ustream chats. In his own words, he’s still exploring himself as a person, as a writer. Though he is exploring, he’s doing a great job. Since I see him everywhere I notice how much of other people’s work he readily consumes.

                “Cormac McCarthy’s Dead Typewriter” combines a few of his interests. Besides the joy of being named after a still living author’s supposedly deceased typewriter, he has multiple categories one can submit under. It is a literary blog but Matt appears to be a bit more open regarding what counts as poetry, what is art, sound, and photography. Sometimes the lines blur between each form. Matt realizes this and offers what are extremely welcoming terms. 

                A lot of the submissions celebrate the beauty of randomness. There are an unusually large amount of ‘algorithmic wordchains’ and ‘asemic writing’. For Algorithmic wordchains you can technically read them though they prefer to be near-nonsensical. Whoever can read asemic writing probably has some serious issues or is incurably insane. 

                Other submissions are a bit more graspable and slightly less experimental. Flarf, that delightful poetic form, is given a home, as are fiction dribbles and cut-ups. Really, I don’t see enough people doing cut-ups so it is good to see someone wants to give them a home. See Logan K. Young’s piece for an example of the form’s madness. Even though he didn’t state it, normal poetry of the make it yourself kind, occasionally appears on its hallowed pages. The fiction dribbles keep up the slightly cryptic tone Matt has set for the site. Keeping a piece only 50 words long reminds me of the ‘micro-story’ genre, a one I used to dabble in a long time ago. 

                Harsh noise gets some attention. As a big fan of noise, I’m glad to see I’m not the only one. Though seeing the harsh noise releases on his blog further convinces me that noise fans exist on the internet. Noise fans otherwise can never admit to it in person or even meet each other in person. Sometimes I think geography exists for the sole reason of keeping weird music fans apart. My personal experience hasn’t shown me any other alternative reason. Matt knows the genre well as he puts a ten minute limit on the noise pieces. Without any kind of structure, noise often outstays its welcome even with its few fans. 

                The site is full of love. Under the contributors section, he allows any contributor to write as much or as little about their work, lives and interests. I’m glad to see Matt taking a more personal approach to literature and music than “Here is a link to their blog. Have fun.” Reading about each one of the contributors makes me happy. Whatever the contributor did is suddenly humanized. Now I think of the contributors as people rather than faceless people on the internet. Having spoken with people about their perception of bloggers, Matt’s approach is something more people ought to be doing. Most people I speak with barely think of the individual behind the actual pieces of writing. Seeing how some of his contributors do multiple art forms (Matt and a Finn named Jukka-Pekka Kervinen) cheers up me enormously.

                Despite the dead typewriter, the future looks bright for Matt Margo.  To celebrate the blog’s three month anniversary (in blog years, three months equals a year) he’ll be doing a live reading of some of the material this evening at 7:30PM on ustream. I’m excited by this prospect. Harsh noise walls may or may not be played as he’s particularly fond of them even creating his own noise project accessible here. I’d suggest he look into a favorite genre of mine, yet to be created, called “Polka-Noise”. By this evening I hope he gets some pictures of butterflies or carrots (those remain the only submissions he has not received). I’m dreaming of a noise dance party.

Ear Eater 5

                  Shaun Gannon began the marathon Ustream chats. Lately there have been a plethora of these going on, allowing for mere passers-by to become fully engaged. “I am Shaun Gannon” is to Shaun Gannon as “I’m Rick James Bitch” is to David Chappelle. While it is funny, it isn’t all that he offers. Shaun writes other poems as well.  Some of those other poems were read by his geologist friend who got somewhat intoxicated.  Once this ‘pre-gaming’ party ended, we headed off to the next Ustream party. We bounced.  

                Ear Eater 5 came up next. People waited anxiously for it to begin. People began discussing teeth. Cassandra Troyan’s teeth looked great. All of a sudden they broke into song, specifically “I believe I can fly”. The song moved the multiples of people residing in cyberspace. Since this group resides and publishes poetry on the internet, it only makes sense that they would try to interact on Ustream.

                Someone explained to us the importance of unicorns. While we had the beginning, we learned how nice an apartment you can get in Chicago. I feel that it was really strange moment when Ken Baumann read a poem from another laptop. Those in the Ustream listened to him as he read from a remote location. For a brief moment, I realized one of the goals which bring together the boykitten movement. Perhaps more so than any other literary movement, it openly embraces the internet. Most other literary movements usually shun the internet or aren’t as savvy about using it. Boykittens know how to use it. 

                The readings were great. I felt strange watching it from such a far distance. Oddly, my experience with poetry readings in real life are not as good as they are online. Perhaps the poets are more active knowing that they are being judged by an anonymous audience. Anonymity on the internet means it can get a bit harsh regarding the criticism. Some of the criticism is rather crude, but some of it misses the point entirely of the work (see Kat Dixon’s article ‘DadaGate’ as it has been dubbed). 

                Brett Gallagher began with “Vessel”. I liked the reading. Seeing his body’s rotation as he read showed a certain affection and attention to his own work. This sounds silly but a lot of writers tend to treat readings as a formality rather than a performance in and of itself. In this case Brett treats it with proper attention. Considering the sheer amount of words, he didn’t get very tripped up, as if he had practiced this quite a bit. Passion emanated from his delivery, it felt wonderful. Note “Vessel” will be in full-fleshed form at some point in the near future. Look out for it. 

                Online poetry readings bring love. Even those who felt sad in the beginning grew happier as the chat progressed. People merely talking to each other brought joy. Slowly the host Cassandra Troyan and the virtual host Steve Roggenbuck began working in tandem. It can be strange giving attention to two parties happening simultaneously. The two groups began to merge together as bizarre forms of flattery fused the two groups together. ‘Driving Me Wild’ ended up being a major chant of the night. But the next reading ended up allowing for silence on both sides, serving as a palette cleanser to some degree due to its quiet nature.

                Devon King came with musical accompaniment. Usually poetry readings don’t include an entire backing band. They were surprisingly quiet. Percussion and drones accompanied the reading. I liked the drones a lot; they grew more and more massive. For me the drones appeared to be well done. At first I didn’t get why the drums were there, but slowly it began to form a full whole. Each tap and hit worked against his reading’s tempo. By having two separate rhythms, it allowed for an extremely weird poetry-music hybrid. 

                “Sex Hair” began Carrie Lorig’s reading. Apparently she was born in Poland, studied in Wisconsin, and has generally been all over. Her poem about horses was enjoyable, as I have a thing for animal-centric writing. ‘Our flow is hard’ introduced her poem which she explicitly stated “was not about periods”. LetPeoplePoems published this wonderful weirdness. Despite being so far, she had a surprisingly strong performer. “Swamp Gods” celebrated the rivalry between swamp things. NewWaveVomit got some attention to, as Ana C hung out in the chat room. Her poems were extremely funny as was her delivery. Then, in case we weren’t sure if she was a good sport, she wore a blanket under the drunken audience’s request. 

         

            Finally, the end drew nigh. The laptop itself ran out of energy as this happened, almost exhausted by the sheer amount of literature it had consumed and shared. We left as virtual guests as the party winded on down into a drunken, debauched haze (or so I imagine). 

                It was totally worth it.