L.ove S.ex D.reams - A short piece on psychedelic thoughts

Meaning.

What does it mean what does it all mean what does all this mean

What is the meaning of life?

What’s the point? Whats the purpose why are we here to do things and then leave?

Acid fills us with questions that are too big and we scurry around asking why why why. We’ve figured it out by now, have we not? Why this endless loop of wake up and think things and then go back to sleep. We’re like robots that haven’t been updated yet. Someone is still tinkering with us. We try to understand what we’re doing but we don’t know and they haven’t figured it out yet either. It all comes up slowly and without tunnel vision. There is no end goal.

But there has to be. People know, but it can’t be revealed.

History is a beautiful thing. Wow. Guns and planes and coloured television and automobiles and ayahuasca and tea and writing words formed from hieroglyphs. Hiroshima, cold war, vietman, keep the americans happy!

They know. They already know.

Psychedelics were first bought up in American culture through LIFE magazine where an issue mentioned a businessman with a terminal illness consulting (what they called mushroom tribes??) a shaman to receive a magic mushroom treatment.

A substance like that has to mean something. It can’t simply just be the brain releasing chemicals; the brain gets something out of it. If humans weren’t supposed to have a purpose then why are our brains so complicated? How can neurons and atoms possibly create something so complex on their own considering how long humans have been on this earth (which isn’t very long).

My mind just switched off for a sec. It’s like the acid wasn’t there and I was back to normal. Like a switch. Ego came back and I remembered where I am.

Did someone else do that?

I wonder about mirrors a lot.

Why do humans want everything to mean something so bad. We crave purpose. We want everything to mean so much more than just being and doing and enjoying.

I’m getting distracted again. I can’t think on a clear path like I was. I’m being pushed back to the normal. I think a lot about science. How amazing are the chances of my birth. Me being the winning sperm and egg out of thousands. Where do all those organisms go when they die? Isn’t there some rule in science where you can’t create nor destroy matter?

The conversation of reincarnation makes sense then. I often feel like I’ve been here before.

I was talking about the US government, that’s where I was. LSD became banned and the whole counterculture was crushed because it threatened American life and scared the older generations, but psychedelics have been around for ages and have been used in various religions (especially South America).

If god was real, why would he put such a powerful plant on this planet? Maybe the plants that psychedelics come from are seen as like the forbidden fruit from Adam and Eve. And when we eat them maybe people believe that is hell. What does it all mean? Maybe that’s our hell – not knowing but constantly asking, never getting any closer.

There is definitely something else out there. We know we’re responsible for a lot of the actions on earth right now but we also know that we’re weak and frail and stupid. Climate change is our punishment for being bad dogs. We try so hard to impress our owner but we just don’t know how to fetch or roll over. We try though, we do. We think we’re doing it right until it comes back to us.

People watch us through mirrors. I take mine off the wall at night because I don’t feel at ease to let down my guard when its looming over me, my view exposed. Culture has commonly thought that mirrors are portals, often to people on the other side.

What if heaven and hell is so much deeper than that? What if this is just one level?

This is a side, and the portal is the other side. People don’t die, they leave.

It’s thought that what’s through the mirror is evil, but isn’t our dimension evil enough.

It has to mean something, we wouldn’t come up with this shit for nothing. Why the fuck else would we make physics and drugs and buildings and science? What, are we just uselessly churning around stuff, spending our lives building these things to make us feel righteous? Is it just stuff? Does it mean nothing? What if it’s all wrong and we’re just building up our society on more and more usless shit and its all wrong and the mound of flesh and feces just keeps stacking and oozing over the sides and we try to bottle it up and it just keeps coming because we don’t change.

If god hated this planet so much why wouldn’t he just crush it? Maybe he wants us to feel in control when we finally bring this planet down. Maybe that’s worse than him curhsing us and us not being able to do anything about it. It’s knowing that if we’re in control, we die slowly knowing that we did this. We did all of this.

I feel calm again. It’s easier to not be a part of it now. To separate myself. Things don’t actually mean much. They’re just to look at, to make us feel useful for keeping them.

I keep leaving this on an open ending.

A Week Without Instagram

A Sunday night. I'm face-down on the bed, a bit of alcohol in me, feeling downright miserable. It wasn't a particular event or a person. I hadn't had an angry phone call from my boss, or failed a uni assessment, or even spilt a $7 coffee on myself. I was just... a blob. I just felt like I wasn't achieving anything. It was uni break and I had friends laughing over misty apricot skies in Singapore and the Himalayas and Dubai. The popular girl from my high school had just started a lash tech business and received a PR deal for a popular festival brand. A vague list of other model girls in my area were now getting real full-time jobs and going away with their partners.
I had spent the last 4 days at home watching Netflix. My self-esteem was just soaring, thanks guys.

But who's to blame here? It's not anyones fault for living a good life, is it? After all, I know that when I have a new achievement or cool outfit or travel somewhere new, I'll definitely be having my community of friends and followers knowing about it. Why is it so different when someone else is doing good for themselves? With our society becoming increasingly accustomed to social media, its becoming harder for us to realise we're looking through someone else's rose-coloured glasses. I decided I wanted to live life without filters for a bit, and deleted Instagram.


When deciding to take time apart from my good friend Instagram, I didn't leave a "I'm on a mental health break, call me if you need me", I went cold-turkey. Within the first hour of deleting the app, I found myself aimlessly scrolling back and forth through the home screen of my phone trying to find ... oh, that's right... Instagram. It wasn't even a purposeful need to utilise the app. It was unconscious. I've often found that I like to use Instagram when I'm thinking, perhaps to avoid just sitting there, like scrolling a photo platform really makes thinking more concise and worthwhile.

The official first day of the cleanse, Monday, already showed some sort of improvement. I had left the house; I'd bought some christmas gifts and grabbed lunch with my cousin. Two birds one stone. Once I got home I started sewing again. Sewing! Something I had been putting off for months. I wrote an article. I was regaining some sense of self. Originally deleting Instagram was just a spur of the moment action so I wasn't feeling worse about myself, but it was doing more than that, so I kept going. I decided I'd give myself a full week without the app. All the way to Sunday night at 9pm, I would be semi-offline. I still had my other two favourites Facebook and Snapchat, but I knew Instagram was my biggest weakness.

By Wednesday I personally found the magic of no Instagram wearing off. Like the Internet junkie I was, withdrawals were now taking place. I felt that I was starting to spend more time on Facebook and Snapchat and even Depop to make up for the void in my mind and home screen. I was feeling a little bit bored with being disconnected, even though it was doing so much for me. This appeared like a step in the wrong direction; was I really that dependant on an app? This helped me realise the positive perspective of Instagram in a sense that it was a useful resource for inspiration. I often got style cues, cute little quotes and holiday ideas from the platform. The shift off of the platform just left me a little bit drained of stimulus, but all things must be taken in moderation. Perhaps the key to this was balancing. Like Pavlov, perhaps I needed to work at this from the angle of training myself to have some self-control and use the app in mild doses, not overdosing.

The weekend came along and I had moved past the cravings to normalise my life without Instagram. No, I had not turned into some productive monster eating up ideas and chugging out work and I wasn't "cured" of anything, but I did feel different in a way. I felt purposeful, and truthful to myself and what I wanted to do. I didn't have to kid myself, and it didn't matter what other people were doing differently. By Sunday night I didn't even feel the need to have it back. In fact, I even waited until midday Monday to re-download the app, and well, life didn't feel any different. My energy was still there.


Screen Time Summary

My screen time before the experiment is slightly embarrassing now that I look back on it. To be completely fair, I have been on holidays which has given me too much time to endulge. I was averaging 6hrs of screentime a day. I ended the experiment averaging 4.5 hours. It's been almost a month since my experiment now, and I've still managed to keep my time down from its original average. 


Outsider Opinion
Like I said, I removed the app from my phone without telling anyone - and I decided that this circumstance would extend to even my closest friends who I talk to almost everyday. Although I wasn't always evidently online on the platform, most of them I tagged in memes pretty frequently and vice versa. I told my 3 closest friends, and this was the response.
Friend 1: Found it weird I hadn't replied to their memes, but just thought I was busy.
Friend 2: Did not notice at all.
Friend 3: I found out this friend finished a mental health break from Instagram halfway through my experiment. She agreed with me that deleting the app definitely made a difference to mood and self esteem. Didn't notice I was offline.


It's kind of funny, isn't it? We're inhibiting our own growth and productivity to awe at other people's perceived productivity over the internet. Although at the same time it can be a queue for inspiration and our creative movements. From the subject of comparing the lives on Instagram, I've come to the conclusion that the less we know about a person, the more likely we are to take the fabricated story of their life on Instagram and other social media platforms more literally. All of us have our glorious fairy-tale experiences, but we also all have those shitty days where we don't leave the bed and live off of 2-minute noodles. Everything is in moderation, even social media.

It Might Be Time

You ain't as cool as you used to be.
You ain't as young as you used to be.


Why did I ever give up on my creative outlets? Sure, I'm not the sixteen year old I was the last time I published on this blog; I'm a full-time uni student, I've juggled and dropped numerous jobs throughout the year, gone through my first real heartbreaking breakup and second boyfriend, went vegan, developed an addiction to green tea, retired from gym for a couple of months, nearly dated several more boys, went to music festivals, came close to alcohol addiction, and now here I am at the brink of the new decade. And I feel like I've accomplished nothing.

A few things made me refocus to writing, my original career pathway before taking a slight turn to Psychology after a shoddy highschool English teacher. I attended a Graduation Ceremony of my cousin's last week. My oldest best friend barely looked a day over 16, and now had a Bachelor of Fine Arts under her belt. Shit. It really puts into perspective how short but precious the university years of your early life are, and I'd already completed a year with nothing more than 1 good friend named Caleb, a favourite spot in the QUT library (2nd & 3rd floor, window seats next to the toilets),  and an unfulfilled need to see the university counsellor. One day that would be me on the stage with a degree in hand and onto full-time work. I hadn't acknowledged that with so much flexibility in my schedule with university and casual working, I could take on any new skill I wanted and turn it into something that's mine. Why waste it all stalking other people's Instagrams?

Creativity is key. I needed it back into my life. As a 16 year old I wrote articles for a music blog, created my own stories, journalled, wrote songs, played drums, ran a successful fan account, and actually had a personality worth something to me. I even made this blog to start my own music journalling and create the next Pitchfork or NME. I was going to write. I was going to publish novels. I was going to make albums. I miss being that ambitious.

So here I am again, ready to try and reunite with some of my old passions, and take on some new ones such as becoming a pro bass player, sewing my own cool clothes, and film photography. Hopefully I can get better at writing again, since it's been a while since I even wrote a diary entry. At least now if I keep regularly writing about stuff, I can have something purposeful and autonomous to just me, and maybe other people can read these hot takes of whatever the heck I end up doing with my words.

Catch ya for the next one,
Em

NEWBIES : BOAT SHOW

Ass kicking is something all girls should be participating in nowadays, but now there’s a band that provides you with some ass kicking music to go along:

BOAT SHOW is the denomination of a 5 piece garage punk band from Perth. You may recognize some of their members from other great sound creations, with lead singer Ali Flintoff having background in Dream Rimmy and Gunns, guitarist Jenny Aslett from Gunns, as well as guitarist Stella Donelly, who has launched her own solo work. For a recently budded band, they’ve definitely got chops.

As of February this year, their debut album Groundbreaking Masterpiece –props to whoever fabricated the name – was released, going on to receive acclaim from The West Australian, and Triple J with an average ranking of 4-5 stars.

The album features a perfect total of 10 songs that contain grungy, belligerent vibes, yet also tackle both the ability to relate to everyday emotion, and to address bigger issues such as gender roles and sexism that is still present in modern day society.  *sighs*

The band have released a new single as of Friday, entitled “The Big Smoke” in which Ali, in shrill fashion, sings about Victoria’s capital Melbourne and whatever must be so much better about the city than Perth that makes all her friends want to move there (heads up, Perth has better music by far). Another hit, the song is already copping a good 4+ stars, and with the rate of work in a year alone, perhaps another album may be on the way.

As far as live shows go, the band has their schedules filled in quite regularly. Earlier this year they toured as an opening act for Freo band San Cisco, as well as following with a number of ‘world tour’ shows across Perth and Fremantle.The band have also found the time for retaining frendships with other musos such as POND, GUM, Cam Avery and The Murlocs to name a few.

This August and September expect to see them branching out to reach cities Perth, Brisbane, Sydney and Melbourne to promote their new single “The Big Smoke” as well as the Groundbreaking Masterpiece album.

*Pictures sourced respectively from Conniption Hammerlessnail and Cam Campbell

Article written by Emma Newbury for SOUNDCHECK on August 18th 2017 (Was not published :/ )

THE RETURN OF THE GORILLAZ: 4 NEW SINGLES AND 1 HIGHLY ANTICIPATED NEW ALBUM

After laying low from the public eye for a good 5 years, British duo and virtual band Gorillaz have finally placed their sunglasses back on, match in mouth, ready to re-light the flame.

It was clear that this was serious business when on March 23^rd, the band chose to name-drop and then release whopping four new songs from their new album Humanz, which is set to drop at the end of April. The songs were released first to radio and now to Spotify, which include Andromeda (ft Broccoli Rapper D.R.A.M), Saturnz Barz (ft Popcaan), Ascension (ft Vince Staples), and We Got The Power (ft Savages singer Jenny Beth).

Saturn Barz came with a short-animated film to spread the release, featuring the brainchild of Jamie Hewlett and our favourite band members 2-D, Murdoc, Noodle, and Russel, along with some other truly chilling new characters that follow them around in a haunted house.

Including the phenomenal collaborators mentioned above in the release tracks, the album is said to also feature the vocals of other stars such as De La Soul, Mavis Staples, Grace Jones, Kilo Kish, Danny Brown, Carly Simon, and Pusha T, as well as of course the voice of the Gorillaz and the singer of Blur, Damon Albarn.

Humanz, the 14 track album, will be released to the public on the 28^th of April, so save the date, dare to listen to the 4 new tracks on Spotify, and prepare to feel good again.

*The following article was written for the blog SOUNDCHECK in April 2017

What Does "The Future" Even Mean?

"What do you want to do with your life?" Yep, it's the top of the list for questions you receive at family events. The one that you almost always reply with "I don't know" or come up with some bullshit answer that is not necessarily on the cards. It comes up constantly for adolescents through teachers, parents, career advisers, television, etc, but have you actually resonated with the question yet, or are you avoiding it for as long as possible?

I've always hated those presenting people that come in and make you think about yourself in relations to your future. As a young person, I can only guarantee two things for you: I don't know who I am, and I certainly don't know where I'm going. But now the more I think about it, I realise I should probably start thinking about it.

The future is defined as the time that follows after what is happening right now, and now, and now. I don't imply to get too deep into the laws of time and physics and all that nonsense, but basically it is physically impossible to avoid the future, just like it is impossible to avoid death, assignments, and that one clingy person you know, so rule number one: STOP ACTING LIKE YOU HAVE PLENTY OF TIME. Yes, I am also a procrastinator, but like you I am also trying to fix that. I haven't written an article in a good 3 months yet here I am.

Think of your life as a timeline. You're the red dot just less than a quarter in, with probably not having conquered a lot of time on Earth yet. Imagine markings for everything you've accomplished to your left. With the stuff you accomplish on your left, you've opened up potential markings for the right side of the timeline such as jobs, friends, love interests, experience (or even closed a few, such as bad relationships). Think of the things you would like to achieve, and start doing small things now to lead up to that. I'm not saying you have to be a prodigy, just take baby steps until you feel like you are independent in that field.

Stop thinking of it as "What do you want to be in the future?" and start thinking of it as "What do you want to do now?"

Australia's Goodlife Festival Review

There's Splendour, Falls, the fallen Soundwave and Future, but unknown to most people Australia also has another younger, more outgoing gem: The annual Goodlife Under 18s Festival. Goodlife Fest is a kick into the new year for high school students between the age of 13-17, with a week long tour across every state of Australia. It almost makes it fair considering how many Australian tours miss states.
As a young gun myself, I had the pleasure (and luck of getting tickets) to attend the Brisbane show last Friday night, and, lets just say, it's the closest I'll get to feeling high for another few years.

By midday you'll catch students running out of class to their lockers, grabbing their friends hands, and they're gone, with the epidemic sweeping through schools and stealing more students than even a scorcher or a flood. The teachers grumble and any pupil left behind wishes they could sneak in the boot of a mates car. That was the effect I saw.
It was clear when reaching the venue, being the Royal Brisbane Showgrounds or Ekka showgrounds, as the place was swarmed with short shorts, Stussy shirts, and tie dye as far back as two blocks, but the real eye grabber was the queue line to get in, but it was abrupt and totally worth the 45 minute wait as ears were hit with a wave of bass and eyes stunned by LEDs.
The beginning of the night was far more relaxed with most people getting settled, or easing into the mood, as well as the feeling of being pressed against individuals on all sides.
The effort gone in to moulding the venue was very impressive, as everything was easy to locate, even more so with the countless maps and even a Goodlife app. Lockers were onsite that could be purchased online along with tickets, which served as a real hand for me and my mates, even though they took a few minutes to work out. The night went on with no sign of the raving stopping, with acts pilling up from the 4 stages being the Main stage, Lucky Arena, Foam Pit, and House Party. Tyde gave us some modern bangers, and Dj Horizon specialised in hip hop throwbacks, Deorro did a spin on a Gorillaz favourite, Joel Fletchers set up was almost seizure triggering it was that full out, and lets not forget A$AP's madness telling a crowd member to "Stop throwing shit" and going overtime by a song, which no one was mad about.
It was a night of crazy shenanigans, everyone shoulder to shoulder, and if you looked at the person beside you for a brief second, they'd smile back through the jumping. Strangers kissed and randoms threw some mad dance moves (The Superman, anyone?). I even witnessed some couples slow dancing through DVBBS. How does one slow dance to edm music????
For a first year at Goodlife, I was far from stumped, and anyone under the age of 17 who attended that one night will agree with me.