1. Who are you and who the hell decided to give you a camera?
My name’s Amelia and I got my first camera when I was 10. It was a spice girls polaroid camera. I still have it, and use it.

2. Brilliant idea! Who did you steal it off?
My sister argues it’s hers. It isn’t. I maintain that.

2a: What’s your weapon of choice now, then?
I use, for this project, an old Pentax P30 i got from an opshop. And for this project I only use AGFA colour 400 expired film. Otherwise I shoot Canon DSLR.

3. When was the last time your camera was smashed by someone who’s caught you out trying to take them from behind?
Never, I’m far too sneaky for that. I come in smooth and gentle, and they like it once I’m done. It’s like I was never there.

4. How do you choose your victims?
I go with my gut feeling. But it helps if they’re interesting somehow from the back (hairdo/backpack/hoodie/eyes in the back of head). Or if I find them attractive and am too shy to say hello. Which is often.

5. What happens when someone sues?
I run to Japan and start all over again. Under a fake name.

6. How many people have you posed for without knowing about it?
Too many. Mostly when drunk. I can only count because I’ve seen the results on facebook.

7. Are you a ninja?
If you can count small, nimble and crafty as the defintion of a ninja, then yes, I’m a ninja.

8. You’ve made up silly little stories about each of these people haven’t you?
Sometimes. It helps in the knowledge that I’ll never, ever know them, that I create a little fiction for each. Maybe that helps me pick them, too.

9. Are people more exposed when they’re unaware that they’re subjects?
I think if you’re being followed and photographed without your knowledge, you’re very exposed. Especially if they’re moving.

10. I want to do this. Any tips for the budding strangertographer?
Get up early, or wait for sunset. That’s the best light, and people are tired in the morning and at night. They’re less likely to pay attention to you and there is bigger crowds. And emotion is more heightened because people are impatient and cranky and are trying to get somewhere. Go places you aren’t used to. Scare yourself a bit. Be brave, but most of all, be invisible.

Now every morning,
The bitter dust comes raining down.
Now every morning,
The bitter dust comes reigning down.
She shuffles into the kitchen
When she hears that awful sound

Crazy daze,
When the kingdom paved the way.
Crazy days,
When the crown paved the way.
I let her in my heart
When she needed a place to stay.

Going down the road now,
Where she threw it all away,
Going down the road now,
Where she threw it all away.
She taught me to write this song
And to sing it where all the children play.

Upon the water,
She sails her ship into the sun.
Upon the water,
She sails her ship into the sun.
The shining of my heart baby
Will pass before the morning comes.

Late at night,
I see the forest for the trees.
Late at night,
I see the forest for the trees.
But I can’t find the answer
‘Cause it’s floating in the breeze.

Up at dawn,
All the children lose their way.
Up at dawn,
All the children lose their way.
Their old road turns to rubble
In the crazy month of may.

I’ll meet you there,
Down the corner of fifth and main.
I’ll meet you there,
Down on the corner of fifth and main.
Where we’ll buy back her soul
of rock n roll and play it once again.

Another attempt arises. Three shots of differing exposure on a meagre camera and only free software used.

Acceptable results.

New Farm Hill at Dusk

Salute to the Downtrodden

Fraught with ginger headlights blowing
Down the wind that keeps you knowing
About the lost temptation longed for
From the highland town on the foreshore,
We see a dark presence engulf
What was once a mere meeting post
Of ornaments and statues speaking out
To all that hear them scream and shout.

Tiring from the overtime unpaid
The pretty ladies fade away
Dreading the fifth movement of the piece,
Though waiting as though ill at ease
Along the back decks of the seventh sage
Never longing or showing their grace
The forever lost again find a place.

Subterranean Homesick Elation

She.

Take me down, take me out, for all the world to see, eyes closed elation as they stare. The deep coloured clothing hangs from her fortified frame, highly evolved to shoot you down, through the heart, through the mind, on my mind she stands, heels dig in.

Come evolve with me underground. Bring it all back home and then throw it up once more.

A Sombre Light Shines On In The Night

When the terrors of the night come wandering by
I know for sure that we all someday must die,
For the walls are painted with a million shades of gray,
Telling a story of when the wind ran away
Into the ocean, into the sea.
We alone will believe what no one else will see.
Try as you might, you will never walk down
All those paths in your lifetime you might have found.
Actors and agents they claw at my door,
But letting one in means that they all must want more.
Today is the day that they again throw you back.
What news do you bring from the coronary shack?

What Now?

Someone lead me now, failing that, this ship may sink,
Though no one stands there behind the curtain.
No one is pulling at the puppet strings.
Should I invent an entity so great,
That I, even I, could consider following?
Oh how diabolical a deed.
It must be done,
And right away.
My creation will create myself,
This new self,
Leading to the infinite
There for all to see.
Now I become the puppeteer,
That no one can see.

So below is the twelfth chapter of Tales of Andrew Waters, a chapter that stood out to me for some reason, written in the month of November 2004. Below that is the full book.

Chapter 12 – The Dream

I don’t usually dream really that much at all. They say you’re always dreaming while you’re asleep and it’s just that you don’t always remember your dreams half the time when you wake up, but I’m not too sure about that really. If dreaming is always that same process, where your eyes begin to go darting crazy all about in rapid eye movements and all and they measure the same difference in your brain waves and everything, then why would some dreams be remembered and others forgotten? Maybe it’s just the way certain dreams interact with the reality of your mind that really makes a difference. I have no idea. When I do dream, the ones I remember after I wake up, they’re always really vivid and all like it’s not even really a dream or anything. There’s also always all these strange things happening in the dream that wouldn’t usually happen in real life, just little spots of incongruence, but it’s like I just accept that they’re happening and all and don’t even worry about it too much, just going on with whatever I’m doing and just put everything in place, even the things that don’t seem like they would fit. I think it’s strange that sometimes after you’ve just woken up, you can remember just about every part of your dream, but then as the day goes on, you keep on losing more and more of all the details and everything. I sometimes wonder where those details go when they disappear from your memory. Is it possible that they just don’t exist any more? I think it’s more probable that they’d most likely just migrated over to another part of the brain or something, because sometimes when I remember something, like things that have happened to me and just trivial daily events, I’m always getting this weird feeling like I don’t know if what I’m remembering really happened or if it’s maybe just part of some mundane dream that’s just gotten all mixed in with reality.

Anyway, the dream I had while sitting up against that dirty, old tree in the alleyway, was like no other dream I’d ever had; I’m not kidding. And I can still remember just about every small detail like I’d just woken up from it, still thinking it all over in my head and everything. Usually my dreams are not at all that exciting really, about just things I’d done during the day or various things I’d been thinking about and all, but this one seemed different, like all profound and significant and everything, like it could have had some kind of meaning in it or something. Everyone is always saying how dreams can have all these hidden meanings and messages and whatever and that they are a door to your unconscious mind and all, like that weird, old, crazy psychologist over in wherever who thought that just about every dream you ever have symbolised something dirty about your mother or whatever. What a nutcase. I don’t really believe in all that too much though.

Anyway, I remember it started off in this really wide open space with blue skies and rolling hills and all that rubbish and I was lying down on my back on top of one of these really green grassy hills, just watching the clouds pass on by and seeing what little fuzzy animals or whatever I could make out from the billowing shapes. It was also almost like I was somehow looking down on myself lying on the hill and also looking at the clouds from the hill at the same time. I leaned my head to the right and saw there in the distance, all these really tall buildings and everything, like this giant city metropolis lining the horizon and I thought how nice and peaceful and everything it was to be up on my green mountain like I was, just breathing the cool morning air and all. I looked up again at the clouds once more to see what I could see, but after lying there staring at the shapes for a few minutes, it was like my mind just refused to see any more fuzzy animals and all the clouds just kept looking painfully more and more like plain old stupid clouds.

I began to suspect that something wasn’t quite right and looking down, I suddenly realised that I wasn’t wearing any clothes. It was okay though. There wasn’t anyone else around anyway so I wasn’t embarrassed or anything, but I noticed that on my hands and on my feet and everywhere was growing like all this dark fur and it continued growing until I was pretty much covered from head to toe in this thick furry coat. Then it became apparent what was happening to me. I was evolving, only kind of reverse over millions of years in time and lying there, slowly becoming more and more like some kind of apeman or whatever, I thought I’d better try to get up. I rolled over and pushed myself up on my hands and feet and then tried standing, but found, no matter hard I tried, that I just couldn’t keep upright properly for very long and had to keep setting my furry hands down on the ground to stay balanced. I looked to the right again to where I’d seen the big city before, full of buildings and everything, but now instead there were all these trees everywhere, a huge forest that looked as though it was spreading all over the countryside like some kind of mouldy green growth on the bark of a tree. There was no mistaking it, it was indeed coming closer and before I knew it, there were all these trees, springing up everywhere around me, turning the lush green hill into this dense, dark rainforest and all, with the squawks of birds and everything coming from high up in the trees.

I noticed that I’d grown this really long curly tail, I was quite a bit smaller than I had been just a second ago and was now down on all fours looking around with large beady eyes, when I got this sudden urge climb up one of the trees and so I did. Before long, I was swinging around from tree to tree having a hell of a time in the canopy. I felt myself changing once more and this time, I turned into this little rodent creature that was apparently not very good at climbing because I fell right out of the treetops and landed in this real disgusting mud next to a large riverbed that smelled really bad, but somehow I didn’t really care too much. I had a good little shake, just like dogs are always doing to dry themselves after they’ve just had their weekly bath, that seemed to come just naturally to me, like it was instinct and all, but before I had a chance to start licking my fur and everything, I turned into some kind of scaly lizard for a second. Then I became this really slimy creature that looked like a squishy grey frog with a tail, hopping all around the mud and the edges of the river and then I was this really weird fish, using my little front fins to trudge through the muddy water of the riverbank and then at last, when I got to the water’s edge, I dived in.

I had never been a terribly good swimmer in real life, but it came just about as natural as anything where I was and I was having a hell of a great time zipping around the great lake, and then, all of a sudden, I got this great urge to just follow the current and swim out to sea. I felt all my fins and whatever becoming all streamlined and everything as I began to dive down into the depths of the ocean and then race back up again over and over until I got the fright of my life when my seeing, hearing and just about all the feeling in my body just simply vanished like that. I was like floating, just about dead in the water with my long jellyfish tentacles trailing behind me and no matter how hard I tried, all I could do was float there, virtually at the mercy of the ocean currents, flapping my body to say afloat and this strange craving, like I was just dying for something, anything to just brush past my trailing arms.

The end part of my dream was kind of weird, stranger than the rest I mean. Missing most of my senses, all I can remember are all these different sensations as I felt myself progressively became smaller and smaller, an amoeba type thing, then a little single cell bacteria type thing, then I could feel absolutely nothing, but I imagined I was some kind of amino acid or something floating in my primordial pond of goo, completely at the whim of nature and everything. Then strangely, right at the end of my dream, just before I woke up to the alley way under the moonlight, I felt this odd kind of feeling like I was nothing, but then not just nothing. It became like almost that I was nothing and everything at the same time and then it was more like the very concept of nothingness or whatever never even existed. I know it sounds really stupid and all, but there’s no way I can convey to you what it felt like because I can’t really explain it all that well in words. Anyway, so that’s when I woke up and saw that the moon had disappeared, dark sky had become a touch lighter and a few early birds had sensed that the sun was on its way and were beginning to call in the new morning.

Was commissioned the other week to capture some headshot photos for Dion, a friend of a friend of mine so that he could apply for a position on a cruise ship. Went over and we had a light-hearted little snap session of about 300 photos, just on my little Olympus digital SLR. Of those 300, a few of them actually turned out ok.

Here’s some I prepared earlier, after a little adjusting and editing (and perhaps a touch of airbrushing).

Anyway, I’m in the process of putting together a portfolio, so contact me if you want some shots on the cheap/free.

Played around for a little bit today with Ableton Live, sequencing etc. It took a little while to learn the ropes and start to get the electric feel, even though I was already somewhat familiar with the program. In the end managed to string together a quick demo. Oh, and yes if it sounds quite heavily MGMT influenced, that’s because it is. I just wanted to get a feel for the software to create this kind of music.

History Heads it’s called anyway, obviously very roughly constructed, so don’t judge this one too harshly. Yep, probably went to overboard on the vocal effects too.

Still on the lookout for some kind of collaborator to create this kind of stuff for recording and performance.

Download the mp3.

More to come.

Update: for some reason, only the end part of the song was uploaded before. The full song should be there now.

Here’s the Lyrics too in case you were wondering:

History Heads

Seem like the stars are faded dreams
Maybe rock n roll ain’t all it seems

Now we live and dream in the past
You thought everything was going to last

Wake me when the sun
Wake me when the sun comes out again
Again

Night has cast its shadow on this land
The turning of the world is close at hand

Wake me when the sun
Wake me when the sun comes out again
Again, again, again, again, again

Personally I was quite happy receiving no replies to other people on my home page, though it seems most people complaining want all replies.

Misconceptions seem to include thinking that you will no longer receive replies directed to you from people that you do not follow, much like the direct message system, though this does not seem like a response to reply spam, and all replies from all users will continue to be received loud and clear. Also fears that this move will kill things like Follow Friday are completely unfounded, as user mentions will remain unchanged by this move.

Rationale behind this move? Perhaps, like most others are assuming, Twitter is just stupid and are just restricting user choice on the matter because they can. Although, I’d like to speculate that this change is the start of a radical change in the way replies work, by truly separating conversations as replies from users’ normal twitter stream. If this indeed this is the case, then I welcome the change wholeheartedly and will tolerate this restriction in the meantime.

Thoughts?

Still waiting on the final photos, planned to serve as promo for when we play Live Spark at the Powerhouse in June, she posted up a few teasers.

Anticipation awaits.