NOW, PLEASE

The red lines are the ones I'm looking at, of course.

HOUSE-US RETURNS THIS WEEKEND

ARTIFACT is happy to announce our re-re-invention of itself as a house reading series (again). We started off that way & we're excited to get back to our roots.

Cassandra Smith & her compatriots of The Dollhouse have invited us into their home and for that we are deeply appreciative (& blushing quite a bit)!

We are going to kick it off on:

Saturday, April 4th at 7PM
w/
Kaya OAKES
Dan FISHER
Amanda DAVIDSON
We're going back to our $3 cover-charge (as opposed to $5), as well as our BYOB air!

The address & directions are:
3263 Kempton Ave
Oakland, CA 94611

If you're lost & need help finding your way call:
Melissa at 415-517-5176 (however I'll just be asking someone else)
Brent at 415-314-0649

email us at artifactsf@gmail.com if you have any questions!


BIOS

Amanda Davidson will perform with the assistance of an audio tape, a part of her ongoing homage to lost technologies. With Judith Jordan, she makes a pants-pocket sized zine called Parted in the Middle. She hopes that by the time you are reading this bio, her website partedinthemiddle.com will be loaded up with new and breathtaking film clips, but even if it isn't, she hopes that you will visit the site and enjoy the cartoon. Davidson also co-edits Digital Artifact Magazine, the Web based, narrative little cousin of the Artifact Reading Series. Look online at digitalartifactmagazine.com for submission details on Issue 3: We Made This for You Out of Nothing.

Dan Fisher lives on the island. No one seems to know exactly where the island is. You can get to the island via 4 bridges and a tunnel. His poems have appeared in Bay Poetics, Viz, Lament, Work, Cricket Online Review, among other places. He also makes collages and drawings under the name Fish Fishtofferson. He's really excited about being back in a house.

Kaya Oakes is the author of Slanted and Enchanted: Indie Culture in America (Henry Holt, 2009), and Telegraph (Pavement Saw Press, 2007). Her poems and essays have previously appeared in Kitchen Sink Magazine, Parthenon West Review, Coconut, Volt, and many other publications. She teaches writing at UC Berkeley. Her website is http://www.oakestown.org.

A selection from "I Hope You Die" (the sequel to "Punks") is in the new Brooklyn Rail. Just fyi.

If you are so inclined, please consider attending this. I will present a sound piece based around a poem in my Taxt chapbook, "Punks", which may soar wonderously or be a spectacular failure, but either way, fun, right? There may be copies of the once-again-in-print chapbook Bruised Dick available for purchase, and I will make sure to truck along some copies of Laura Jaramillo's The Reactionary Poems, also available online here (now with PayPal).

* * *

Join us on January 18, 2009 at 6:30pm for a very special ensemble performance, gala in spirit and cozy at heart.

In the intimate manner of carnival coin toss or old-school tents-of-wonder, a dozen poets will present their work fairground style, with all performances happening at once around the space. Expect real-time twitter feeds, sultry slide shows & other sweet surprises! Listen in on headphones, have a poem whispered in your ear, observe in groups of two or three, or all at once or all alone. There might even be a REAL KISSING BOOTH.

Our star-studded TAXT cast of contributors and performers includes:

Stefani Barber
Jasper Bernes
Lindsey Boldt
David Brazil
David Buuck
Geneva Chao
Del Ray Cross
Chris Girard
Michael Nicoloff
Eleni Stecopoulos
John Sakkis
Jerrold Shiroma

This event is a TAXT FUNDRAISER. All proceeds will go towards the printing, stapling, & mailing of the 2009 series of TAXT chapbooks. TAXT appreciates your support!

About the press:

"TAXT works to make visible the work of contemporary Bay Area poets, writers, & artists previously under-represented in publication. The chapbooks are produced at home in Oakland, on an irregular but consistent basis & will continue to appear thus until I get tired of folding pages. This editor's role is to provide a physical space in which writers & artists may do whatever work they choose: the site is always 24pgs, in the 5.5 x 8.5 framework. This publisher's desire is to work with each contributor to produce a simple book that makes its consideration as both object and container.

TAXT chapbooks are ALWAYS FREE. Keep yours or pass it on. Share the wealth; there will never be more than 100 copies of each book. Sorry."

If you can’t come to the KISSING BOOTH, but would still like to support TAXT, or would just like more information about the press, please visit http://www.taxtpress.blogspot.com/ or email the press directly: taxt@mindspring.com

7 x 4

BRUCE ANDREWS, PLEASE SELL ME YOUR BOOK

Vaguely pathetic title, yes, but I was just thinking how a couple years ago Bruce Andrews read at New Yipes and carried with him several copies of I Don't Have Any Paper So Shut Up and yet it didn't register at that moment that, hey, that book is super out of print and going for $200.00 on Half.com, no kidding, so I'm appealing to you now, Bruce--if you happen upon this, if you have a Google Alert set up or something, and have any copies of said book floating around that you would like to charge less than $200.00 for, please please email me (to yr right).

THIS IS WHAT BLOGS ARE FOR.

IF YOU PLEASE

See and, if you like, order the new book over at the olywa press blog.

SPREAD THE WORD

I will officially announce the book itself soon, but for those of you in NYC or the general vicinity, I would greatly enjoy your presence at this reading. (I will be there.)

Saturday, October 25

at 8 pm

at Unnameable Books

456 Bergen St.

Brooklyn, NY

Please join us for a reading by Laura Jaramillo and CAConrad in celebration of Laura's chapbook The Reactionary Poems, just published by olywa press. Chapbooks will be available for purchase at a discount.

Bios:

Laura Jaramillo is a poet from the borough of limitless opportunity, Queens. She holds a BA from Bard College and a MA in Creative Writing from Temple University. Her poems have appeared in Pocket Myths: The Odyssey, P-QUEUE, Cross-Connect, Tribilingual, the Bard Papers, and For Godot.

CAConrad is the son of white trash asphyxiation whose childhood included selling cut flowers along the highway for his mother and helping her shoplift. He escaped to Philadelphia where he lives and writes with the PhillySound poets http://www.PhillySound.blogspot.com. He is the author of Deviant Propulsion (Soft Skull Press, 2006), (Soma)tic Midge (FAUX Press, 2008), The Book of Frank (Chax Press, 2008), advanced ELVIS course (Soft Skull Press, 2009), and a collaboration with poet Frank Sherlock titled THE CITY REAL & IMAGINED: Philadelphia Poems (Factory School Press, 2009). He invites you to visit him online at http://www.CAConrad.blogspot.com

How to get there:
2, 3 to Bergen St
2, 3, 4, 5, M, N, Q, W, R, B, D to Atlantic Ave-Pacific St
C to Lafayette Ave

PREVIEW

My Bloody Valentine noise massage, Kinko's with quarter-inch borders, new TVOTR: am I friend or foe?, olywa press debut, catching roses, Canadian pop bands in Santa Cruz, BK book party, converted movie theater, how many descriptors in this are from the same event, make your subjects flesh-and-blood subjects, make your actions non-nominal with actual verbs, Google Reader, the fact that I appear twice in Issue 1 under two different names that are both incorrect (Mike Nicoloff, Michael Nicholoff), are you surprised that I enjoy that, cut your covers, your gossip doesn't enter history but should.

SAVE BITCH

Please assist this worthy magazine.

UPDATE: Wow, cool.

Get me into a library now, please.

IDENTITY AND REPETITION

You can now hear an MP3 of the reading mentioned below, featuring myself and Alli Warren, on the Moe's website, here.

LOOK WHAT CARLA COSTA HATH WROUGHT

Favorite parts: synchronized walking in the snow at around 1:17 (I know, right? So amazing, so apropos of nothing), the pointing at the car at the beginning and the pointing in general, the three people dancing around the can fire in the video's third act. The rapping is pretty standard early '90s fare, but you will I'm sure not be surprised when I say that I like the production on this better than the majority of what I've heard this year. I'm not saying hip hop production should go back to this, but I still think more folks taking a cue from this post-Bomb Squad moment would be very helpful. Say it with me: more noise. Uh huh, uh huh.