justin_guber - @ 20six.co.uk

"What's more important!? Raves or religion?!?!"

That's pretty much what my mom said this morning. This Saturday, Man Method will be down to experience this goddamn heat wave we're having (you know it's wrong when you step out of your car and automatically sweat) and I was going to bring him to Zoukfest, a big ass rave up in Genting. I was already worried about trying to figure out transport and accomodation: Genting is a big ass hill (but not big enough to be a mountain) but my car would die halfway up and all the hotels were booked. I was trying to figure all this out for the past few days when my mom told me last night,

"I've put your name on the list for a religious talk on Sunday morning."

You've gotta be kidding me.

Don't get me wrong: it's not that I don't like my religion. I believe in God, hard as it may be for you to believe that I believe. What I don't like is the whole "I'm your parent, so I'll book your time whenever I damn well please and you can't do jack about it". I'm 25 years old, and my mom is still telling me what to do. Wunderbar. The whole parental thing was getting under my skin already with the whole passport debacle ("I hold your passport, I control your movements!"), now this. Wunder-bloody-bar indeed.

"What's more important!? Raves or religion?!?!"

I can't fight that crazy mom-logic.

But I have decided on one thing. Most people at these religious talks play the good little lamb. Not me. If they're gonna drag me to listen to a religious scholar the goatee'd preacher better be able to answer my questions. It's time to put the hat on. Sunday is Guber day.

1.3.05 04:01

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Oscar the Grouch

I still can't believe Martin Scorcese didn't win a fucking Oscar for Aviatior.

His actors and actresses always win, his editor always wins, even the costume and sound dude, the cinematographers, music guys, anyone who works on a Scorcese film will eventually win an Oscar. But not Martin. Poor Martin. He didn't win for Taxi Driver. He didn't win for Raging Bull. He didn't win for Goodfellas or Casino. Now he's lost again with one of his most commercially (and Oscar-ly) viable movies to Clint-fuckin'-Eastwood.

Sure, I haven't seen Million Dollar Baby, but the fucker already won one last time for Unforgiven. Give Scorcese a chance, you diseased retards! Aviator was a good fucking movie!!!

I rant. And rave. Like a little film geek would.

1.3.05 04:17

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Designer Fashion

Definition: What rich people come up with when they get bored of regular clothes. Used as a status symbol. May be uncomfortable and a bitch to wash. Rarely functional. Like cocaine, it's God's way of telling you you're making too much money.

Fucking fashion.

I'm working on a designer fashion brand right now, trying to come up with a rationale for the fashion show's concept. Except there is no concept in fashion. There is no logic. It's based purely on aesthetics, with rarely no functionality or rational thought behind it. It's like trying to explain the meaning behind one of those screensavers that come up with endless pipes in a variety of colours.

So I try and write the rationale based on what the event looks like, but I've just been told that the bigwigs don't like the rationale. Do they like the concept? Who knows. The designers on my team are working their butts off, and if it all gets shot down for the same reason as the rationale I think I'll take a huge shit on the bigwig's cat for a laugh.

what was the reason they didn't like the rationale? Because it's not the brand. A few days ago I brought up the issue as to what the brand is and whether the designs fit that. They said it doesn't matter, it's fashion, who gives a shit about brands?

I give a shit about brands. If fashion is really so free-flow and purely aesthetic what exactly am I supposed to sell it based on? Opinion? You can't sell on opinion. Fashion could be called a form of modern art, and the appreciation of art is often based on opinion. Somewhere out there someone truly feels that the Mona Lisa is the most overrated portrait of a girl pulling an expression of "the painter's just farted and I'm trying to pretend I didn't notice" in the history of the world. Someone won't like the designs we've got, and that someone could be the client. That's where the rationale comes in. To sell the logic behind it. Except there is no logic. Just "wouldn't this look nice?" and "mmmm...".

I have a friend who's studying fashion at the royal academy of art. She put wings on a t-shirt once. How do I sell that besides saying "it looks kinda cool"?

They want the rationale. They want a rationale for every piece we're designing for this goddamn fashion show. "The chair has four legs and you can sit on it, which is why we've put it next to the table, where you can eat food. The food is there because you won't come unless there's a free dinner, and the table is sturdy in case you get lucky and wish to fuck the model's cornhole whilst her face is shoved in the over-priced tiramisu".

Fucking fashion.

1.3.05 09:34

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Ramblings From The Muckymuck

My apologies to all fashionistas and fashion victims throughout the world for that last post. I'm sure there's meaning in what you do.

I spent last night (and day) mainly reading comic books: Alan Moore's Swamp Thing is incredible, and the first incarnation of John Constantine looks a lot like Sting. I finally understand how his other friends died. Glad that's settled.

Warren Ellis' Global Frequency also has much kick-ass-ness. The man's contemporary sci-fi concepts and ideas brought to life in action packed sequential panels leave me with tingly sensations in my frontal lobe. Wunderbar. If only it was more than just a series of tight missions. I feel like I'm reading the equivalent of the first season of X-Files: lot's of cases, but the cancer man ain't there yet. Or deep throat. Or Linda Lovelace.

I've also got Frank Miller's Sin City. Save that for tonight.

I also spent the night recording a jingle with Y2k for Abang Rom's Rottwailer's Convention we're playing (click here to find out more). It's a slow acoustic ditty, so I thought I'd try the vocal condenser we've got. It sounds good. The room doesn't. I must figure out this acoustics problem. Or corner off one area for vocals and instruments and what-not.

Dull post. Fuck off somewhere else.

2.3.05 02:49

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The Truth About Iris

I've said it before and I'll say it again: the eye's don't lie.

Regardless, it gets difficult to trust them. Sometimes you want to believe your instincts have failed you and maybe you should trust your logical ol' brain, the same brain that told you that masturbating in your bedroom buck naked when there's no lock on the door is a good idea and your mother walks in to find your 14 year old cock in your hand with a copy of the Sunday Sport you found in the bushes on your way back from school spread open with Jo Guest's tits on one page and an article on Evil Hitler Fish on the other.

Not that I'd know, of course...

But the eyes. That's what we're talking about. Eyes speak volumes, you just need to listen to what they have to say. I've said it before when I talked of the FILTH, whose eyes screamed bloody murder and pretentiousness.

Most of the others have eyes that talk of daily routine and whatever opinion those eyes may say about me was never worth my time.

But someone new has caught my eye, and I decided to read her eyes in return, and everytime she walks past I hear those eyes say the same thing over and over again:

"You are beneath me."

She isn't in rank, I can assure you that. But her eyes say it. Yell it, almost. "You're not on my level". And the brain refuses to believe it because I don't want it to be true.

There are those whose eyes say the same thing, but I couldn't give two shakes of a quick wank what they thought of me. For all I care they can go off and live their imaginary existence of Prada handbags and designer mp3 players surrounded by socialite friends living off dad's money to 'find themselves'. People who use their dad's money as an investment put to good use, that I can live with. People using their dad's money because they have no other means to survive, I can live with. People who use dad's money as income for open bottles at Bangsar and another three years tuition because they've decided to change their course from "Fashion Design & Media" to "Existentialist Art Under The Influence of Rhino Scrotum Sweat as a Means of Higher Understanding".

I could've just given Paris Hilton as an example and not have written such a lengthy paragraph, but then geekboys would be clicking here looking for booty shots. Fuck it. Let's entice them:

Download Now! Paris Hilton fucking two bellboys from her dad's hotel in the penthouse jacuzzi. Hacked from T-Mobile. Also downloadable: uncensored shots of Paris Hilton fondling the horses naughty parts (cut from Simple Life). Download now!

Heh.

But yeah. Her eyes. Damn her eyes. No sincerity in those eyes.

2.3.05 07:49

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I've been quoted.

Honest. At blogbites.com, a site that grabs cool quotes from blogs, a line from my little rampage against fashion was quoted:

"Somewhere out there someone truly feels that the Mona Lisa is the most overrated portrait of a girl pulling an expression of "the painter's just farted and I'm trying to pretend I didn't notice" in the history of the world."

I've been quoted. Hehe. Bangga, siaaaal... Cheers, cobbers!

2.3.05 08:09

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Further Progress Is No Progress.

This much is true.

Work has been bogging me down. Not all day, like last week, but suddenly popping up ten minutes before I get up and leave to start typing away at my damn script. I wrote the short film here at work between assignments. Maybe I should do the same with the feature. Things might move quicker. I've gotten used to my messy workplace filled with job requisitions, old newspapers, doodles of ideas and Oreo double stuff packets. No-one bugs me here unless I need bugging. And the FILTH is leaving, so his eyes won't hound me so when I'm doing stuff that looks non-work related (what am I supposed to do between assignments? Study?).

The nagging thought of possibly changing the entire first fifteen pages and starting again from scratch has also come to mind. Some say that once you have an ending, your sorted. Just get everything pointed towards the right direction. I have an ending I love. The meat in the middle is getting a bit difficult, mainly because the beginning just isn't... UMPHH! enough. Yeah. It doesn't have enough UMPHHH! in the opening. Must UMMPPHHH!-icize it more.

The extra storyline of the father and making the character half English are also things I'm considering chucking in the bin for another time. Either he'll be fully Malay but educated from the West, or he's from the West doing a study here in Malaysia. Might make it more appealing to people outside KL. It would mean introducing the history of all the myths and magic of Malaysia would be justified because he wouldn't have been brought up learning this.

The worry there is that I'll tread back on the same ground I'm trying not to tread on: creating a John Constantine copy. One of the reasons I didn't mention earlier as to why I wasn't going to play the lead, even though I'd love to play the lead, is that I know exactly how I'd play him. I'd make my own version of John Constantine. The story itself was inspired by the Hellblazer comic books (in some loose, meandering way), but now with Keanu's Constantine out, there's the fear people might say, "hey, he's copying that Constantine movie" as opposed to, "did you get your inspiration from the Hellblazer comics?" which I'd much prefer.

Didn't know this story was inspired by Hellblazer? Well it was. In a fashion:

I originally wrote the story about two or three years ago, to shoot with Jordan, Rauf & Jacob (all from the band Flatline) and a friend of theirs who delivered the line "sweet pussy" perfectly (but since has been removed from my current short film script). Originally, the story was set as a new kid in town trying to make friends, and the local gang of kids pull a prank on him making him believe there's a pontianak in Ukay Heights. We spent a whole day shooting one scene, and I didn't enjoy the process. Jordan was behind the camera, and although he was getting nice shots, the process was too slow for my liking. I like filming fast and hard (a complete opposite from my bedside manners, ladies, I can assure you).

Last year, I'd been trying to figure out a way to do something occult. Malaysia has a wealth of spooky stories to exploit and adapt, but those damn rules kept getting in the way. The reason I wanted to do a story of the occult was because I had been reading Hellblazer a lot throughout last year and wanted to do something similar in spirit.

I had a whole bunch of different stories. At one point there was the 'Pontianak Hunter' storyline, which was a kind of 'Buffy/Lost Boys/From Dusk Till Dawn/Evil Dead 2' kinda thing, but the sheer number of effects shots I had in mind daunted me. Then there was an exorcism-story I had in mind, that got scrapped.

Then I remembered the story I wrote years back, and adapted it into a situation that made more sense to me. If all goes well, I may be shooting the it on the 19th and 20th of this month, which is after the final submissions for KSFM Shorts, but they'll have another one coming up soon. This means I'll have more time to come up with a cool soundtrack, cut it better and get the screen quality up a notch. I could even reshoot if I want. This will be my practice for the feature length. 'Nicotine' wasn't enough of a test. It was a toe dipping in a huge, cold lake. With the short film, I'll get my feet a bit more used to the temperature before jumping in for the final plunge.

And I still don't have pontianaks. Improvise. Worst case scenario, I'll 'shemp' it.

2.3.05 08:42

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The Zoukfest haunts me still...

Man Method e-mailed. He called me a bastard and threatened to whoop up the night with my brother in tow. On the 'chances of going to Zoukefest' front, it's looking fucking impossible. My father's now involved and there's no getting round him. Not for this. Other things, yes, but when he puts his foot down, it stays down.

Unless we were on the moon. Then he'd be a bit floaty.

Fuckery.

3.3.05 03:34

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Somewhere Out There...

...something strange is happening.

Somewhere out there some girl is selling her 34B Lace Cleavage Club Clubbing Stripper Bra on eBay.

Somewhere out there, also on eBay, some demented taxidermist is selling stuffed frogs in a threesome position.

Worst of all, somewhere out there some lowly coffee grinder working at Starbucks for tuition money has to not only put up with the wrath of yuppies and cannibals hungry for a lo-cal semi-skimmed mocha orange frapacinno, but he (or possibly she) will also be forced to listen to this song (right click -> save target as).

This is the internet. This is the free world, where the laws aren't even finalized and priests can confidently tell you that anal sex is ok in the eyes of God. Regular pornography is de rigeur, and the right click can you lead you to a wealth of strange sexual imagery: hamster porn, accidental condom inhilation and bugs bunny humping chicks on a seesaw.

You may be a good lil Malay girl at home, but one click on the internet and your flashing your tits for all to see as your profile on Adult Friend Finder describes you as a cum-hungry slut hoping to get into an orgy with your old standard five class and possibly the headmasters cat.

Click left. click right. Everything you could ever possibly want, there's sure to be somebody out there whose got it. This is beyond the Global Frequency. The agenda here is purely selfish. It's the age of information, and whilst your son in college may use that brand new iBook you bought him to look up term papers or download textbooks, the other 90% of his time spent on it is guaranteed to be non-academic.

Your son is whacking off to doctored pics of the Olsen twins dry humping an iguana. And your paying his bills.

Enjoi the new world, bitches.

3.3.05 07:39

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I think that's how the quote goes from 'Wild Style', the first ever hip-hop movie. Sure, production qualities were a bit on the whack side, but this was a real slice of life from the early 80's rap scene, way before all the bling-bling-jigga-jigga-booty-shakin'-video-pimps-n-ho's. I've always searched for music that was real, honest and from the heart, and when I discovered hip-hop in the early 90's I immediately fell in love.

Sadly, my interests in hip-hop dwindled for quite awhile after I discovered Kurt and those other long haired flannel wearers in Seattle. Rapcore almost looked like a perfect melding of the two until Fred put out Chocolate Starfish (derivative), P.O.D. got huge (no flow whatsoever) and Linkin Park burst the bubble (I liked Linkin Park until MTV played it constantly for a year. From then on if anyone mentioned the words to 'Crawling' I'd choke them with a rubber chicken and leave them to the roaches).

I then discovered more and more guitar based music, delving deeper in time to AC/DC, Motorhead, Led Zep and Sabbath, but somehow or other I always seem to find my way back to the cuts and scratches and the MC patters. I've been logging on via a colleagues more higher-end eMac to download stuff on acquisition and check out what's out there that's original, but I don't know where to start. The occasional Kanye West, some Mos Def & Talib Kweli, a couple hits of DJ Danger Mouse and DJ QBert. Apart from them, I'm up turntable towers without a needle.

Thank God, then, for the Low End Theory.

Discovered via Soul Sides (which was discovered via Moistworks), I've been spending a good hour or two on the site reading the posts and downloading some of the dopest tracks on the planet. It's not just hip-hop, but some of the classic soul, jazz and funk tracks that were sampled to produce those hip-hop tracks we all know and love.

I also got this pic from there, which cements the Low End Theory's rep even more in my book.

hit it up. Foshizzie my brizzie and all that bollockizee.

...

Bollockizee. Sounds like an italian dish. Or a strange monkey.

3.3.05 10:37

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