Review: Battle of Mice's "A Day of Nights"

This will be my first official review of any kind, so bear with me.

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Battle of Mice is a sort of supergroup comprised of members from Red Sparrowes, Neurosis, Book of Knots, The Fugees, and Made of Babies. A Day of Nights is their first full length album and was released by Neurot Recordings. The album itself is dominated by such a haunting darkness with the combination of the slow riffs trudging on behind Julie Christmas's vocals which can sometimes remind you of a Brjork who has witnessed the execution of her family and forgot to take her Zoloft.

At times, her vocals portray a childish sound while conveying a Damienesque motive such as in the track "Bones in the Water" where she says, "Every time I think of pushing you down the stairs I lick my lips/ But don't be upset, it's the only way that I know how to show you I really care".

The instrumental portions of the music are reminiscent of Red Sparrowes work and will please fans of the band who love their brand of crushing-yet-simple riffs.

When combined, the vocals and instruments leave you with a dark, depressing aura (just listen to the 911 recording at the end of "At the Base of the Giants Throat" and try not to be disturbed just a little).

The members report having extreme problems with each other which definately come through in the recording but only positively for the music.

The album will appeal to fans of bands like Pelican, Jucifer, Explosions in the Sky, ect. Some may find Julie's vocals a tad grating and hard to bear in some of the tracks whe she goes completely nuts, but it adds wonderfuly to the tone of the entire recording.

My rating 7/10.


Track Listing for A Day of Nights:

1. Lamb and the Labrador

2. Bones in the Water

3. Sleep and Dream

4. Salt Bridge

5. Wrapped in Plain

6. At the Base of the Giant's Throat

7. Cave of Spleen

Released from Neurot Recordings
2006

Members:

Julie Christmas - Vocals
(Made Out of Babies)

Josh Graham - Guitars/Keyboards/Vocals
(Neurosis/Red Sparowes)

Joel Hamilton - Drums
(Book of Knots)

Tony Maimone - Bass
(Book of Knots, Pere Ubu)

Joe Tomino - Drums
(The Fugees, Dub Trio, Peeping Tom)

A Witch Hunt: Remember the West Memphis Three

Another article written for The Keystone about the West Memphis Three.

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On May 6^th, 1993 in West Memphis, Arkansas, three eight-year-old boys were found dead, naked and mutilated near a creek in an area known as Robin Hood Hills. The killing had seemed to police as a satanic ritual. In June of that year, Damien Echols, Jason Baldwin and Jessie Misskelley were arrested as the prime suspects in the murder of the three boys.

Authorities were under pressure by the residents of West Memphis to find the perpetrators of this malicious crime as quickly as possible. There is one very large problem with the arrest and conviction of Damien, Jason and Jessie. No physical evidence linking the three, now known by many as the West Memphis Three, to the murders was ever found.
According to accounts of the investigation, the West Memphis police had never had any experience with a murder like that of the three eight-year-olds. It was because of this that the crime scene was not properly preserved and much evidence was lost due to the inexperienced work of the authorities.

A seminal piece of evidence was found in the form of bite marks on two of the victims, which were not studied until four years after the crime. When they were compared to the bite patterns of Damien, Jessie and Jason, they did not match.

One unusual figure in this story, Mark Byers, adoptive father to one of the victims, has been speculated by many to be the true perpetrator of this triple homicide. During the filming of the first half of Paradise Lost, a documentary which covers the entire story up until sentencing, Byers gave the film makers a serrated hunting knife as a gift. It was noted by the film makers that blood was present on the knife. Subsequently, they handed it over to authorities who tested the blood and found it to match that of Byers’ adopted son. The serrations on the knife also matched the cut patterns on the mutilated child. Byers also had his teeth removed following the first trial where the bite marks had been mentioned. He has not been able to keep his story straight on how or why he lost his teeth since.

Another possible witness was practically let go on May 5^th. A few hours after the three victims had last been seen alive, Marty King, a manager at the Bojangles restaurant near Robin Hood Hills, phoned the police. He witnessed an African-American man in the woman’s bathroom for an hour that was covered in blood and seemed dazed. An officer was dispatched to the scene but did not leave the car. The suspect left the scene. After the bodies of the boys were found, an officer returned and took blood samples from the bathroom. These samples were lost and have never been found.

Why were Damien, Jessie and Jason arrested for the crimes? A juvenile detective who had been following Damien for ten years prior to the murders suggested to the chief of the WMPD that Damien was the only one capable in the area of this type of crime. Damien was also considered by many in the conservative town to be weird. He was constantly seen dressed in black and had a preference for heavy metal music, which the town associated with the occult and Satanism. The testimony forced from Jessie Misskelley did not help the boy’s plight, either.

When Jessie was brought in for questioning on the murders, he was questioned by authorities for an extended amount of time – different sources speculate anywhere between 6 and 12 hours total for the interrogation – in which only 46 minutes were actually recorded. Misskelley, who is also legally mentally challenged, was subjected to the questioning without legal representation or parental consent. He later recanted this testimony.

Damien was sentenced to death, Jason received life without parole and Jessie was handed a sentence of life plus 40 years. For more than thirteen years these boys have been sitting in jail because of shoddy police work and a modern day witch-hunt mentality. Since their conviction, much information has come up that uncovers even more counts of corruption.

In 2004, an article by Peter Blumberg of the Daily Journal in San Francisco reported that three jurors in the case admitted that they reached guilty verdicts by considering deeply incriminating evidence that was strictly off limits. Also in 2004, Victoria Hutcheson, a key witness in the trial, came forward and admitted that her entire testimony had been fabricated due to police pressure. According to Mara Leveritt, author of Devil’s Knot -- a book which covers the murder and trials -- Hutcheson's interviews with police gave them [WMPD] a theory to build a case around. With that theory, and a confession from the 17-year-old Misskelley, whose IQ was subnormal, police had what they needed to arrest Damien Echols and Jason Baldwin.

Thousands of people openly support the boy’s appeals and hope for their release. A website dedicated to their story – www.wm3.org – details the events before and after the murders. Those who know of the murders believe the boys to be innocent. Even the true father of Byers adopted son wrote a letter expressing his disapproval of the trial and sentencing of the boys, which can be found on the wm3.org website.

In this country, we expect to be protected by our law officials and we are guaranteed the right to a fair trial under the constitution. Damien, Jason and Jessie were denied this right. They were persecuted because of the way they dress, the music they listened to and the literature which they read. It is disgusting to think that the Salem witch trials could be reincarnated in today’s society, but the case of the West Memphis Three is nothing short of that. The residents wanted their witch to burn at the stake, and they found three in Damien, Jessie and Jason. I would strongly suggest you visit the wm3.org site and research this case for yourself; for it is one of the most sickening displays of corrupt and flawed American justice in our time.

Von Dutch: More Than Just a Name

This article was written for an issue of last years Keystone. I'm not sure it's as relevant as it was then seeing as how the fashion has not been as noticable -- to me anyways -- this year, but I liked the article.

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Von Dutch more than just a name
By Dale Wilsey

One of the most influential movements in custom car making history is being defaced by capitalists looking to make a buck. And it makes me sick.

Von Dutch isn't about clothing, hats and money hungry fools-it's about a man who revolutionized custom car and motorcycle work.

Ever since I was a kid the custom car culture has been part of my life-from early rat rods to the high-end customs turned out by master fabricator Chip Foose. Recently though, fashion designers have taken a name from this culture and turned it into a money-making ploy of which hardly anyone knows the history. I speak of motorcycle mechanic and master pinstriper Kenneth Howard, also known as Von Dutch.

Following his death in 1992, Howard's daughters Lisa and Lorna sold his name and imagery to Michael Cassel, a maker of surf clothing in California, who established a company under the name Von Dutch Originals in 1999. By 2003, the company was doing $33 million in sales. The Von Dutch name has been slapped on everything from hats to handbags to custom motorcycles and even energy drinks. This has been done with almost no acknowledgement to the actual man who bore the name Von Dutch.


Von Dutch is a historical man in the Kustom Kulture, an all-encompassing term used to describe the artwork. The vehicles, the hairstyles and the fashions of those who drove and built custom cars and motorcycles in the United States from the 1950s through today are being disgraced by Cassel and his enterprise. Howard is considerd one of the fathers of the Kustom Kulture along with many other figures like Ed "Big Daddy" Roth, who drew inspiration from Von Dutch.

Although revered for his art and contribution to the Kulture, Von Dutch had a dark and very angry side to his life as well. Von Dutch was a stubborn man, an alcoholic and a racist. He alienated his family and customers and lived in a California city bus, which doubled as a machine shop, for a good portion of his life.

Even though he was described as a pain by many who knew him, he was revered for his contributions, such as the flying eyeball, one of the most recognized logos in the Kustom Kulture. For pinstripers, Von Dutch is the one person most responsible for the existence of the craft.

Howard once said of money:

"I make a point of staying right at the edge of poverty. I don't have a pair of pants without a hole in them, and the only pair of boots I have are on my feet. I don't mess around with unnecessary stuff, so I don't need much money. I believe it's meant to be that way. There's a 'struggle' you have to go through, and if you make a lot of money it doesn't make the 'struggle' go away. It just makes it more complicated. If you keep poor, the struggle is simple," said Howard.

It's kind of funny. A man who had a bus seat for a bed and owned nothing more than he needed is pulling in millions with just his name.

Well, he's not. But his name is.









Kenneth Howard's bus in which he lived and worked.