this is your sign to watch the magic of the heart series by good boy audios because the recent episode -- OH MY GOD

I WILL NEVER SHUT UP ABOUT IT I'M NOT SORRY THAT RECENT VIDEO WAS SO FUCKING GOOD

Do you see Tom Riddle as a pretty boy or a handsome man?

Perhaps I'm missing some sort of modern slang as to what each means, but I'll reply literally. Anonymous (or others) feel free to correct/enlighten me if I stray off topic.

I don't see why he can't be both, especially considering that we get to experience young Tom as well as older Volmemort in the books.

He was a pretty, good looking boy when he was younger, and remained a handsome man for a while, until his magical experiment and the Horcrux making caught up with his appearance. I still HC that Bellatrix finds him more attractive in his gaunt, skeletal appearance than before, but that's probably just me.

In the fourth book, while he's still a semi-human creature, before the ritual that gives him back his body, Frank, the gardener of his family estate, demands he turns and "faces him like a man!"

"But I am not a man," Voldemort replies, "I am so much more than a man [but why not, I will face you]"

What Voldemort might have meant with that is up for debate. Perhaps all he means is that he is a man (as in biological male who identifies with the male gender), but he is also so powerful and, to use the expression Voldemort himself loved as a child, so SPECIAL, he's also in a class of human on his own.

Also, later on we find out that he has fathered a daughter, so apparently he does have normal urges that men have. He's not above lust, sex and even maybe being fond of another human (Bellatrix and Delphi).

In addition, when Dumbledore and Harry make it to the cave that Voldemort chose as the hiding place for the Locket Horcrux, we find out that Voldemort values magical power above all, and that HArry's magic, that of a young, average (maybe even a little beyond average), won't even register in his book compared to Dumbledore's. To me this seems to suggest that Voldemort is quite happy to be "old", "mature" and, to his eyes, "wise". And it's not hard to see why he thinks this. He used to be a little boy at the bottom of the social ladder. He might have been "pretty", something that, in older times, was associated with "good families" but he was still an orphan people just ignored or even pitied. Now he's surrounded mostly by younger witches and wizards, and he's their leader.

To sum up until now, I think Voldemort is happy to be a man of a certain age and standing, rather than a boy.

However, he wants to be more than that. He wants to be special, extraordinary. And not just with his deeds, but also with his appearance. He doesnt even want people to speak the name he chose for himself, a name that he likes and is proud of, as it sums up his grandiosity and goal in life (to flee death). Altering his appearance and making it bizarre and unique is also part of this need. By looking like a snake, he's finally special in every way: the way he acts, looks, talks, they're all unique to Lord Voldemort. He's not just a man, any man, he's The Dark Lord.

But I digress. The key for me is a (common, I think) headcanon, where Voldemort suffers from some flavour of body dysmorphia as a young boy. I'm not an expert on the condition, so by no means do I claim to know what I'm saying, just sharing how I feel about him. I think he DOESN'T LIKE BEING ATTRACTIVE, especially after he finds out he looks identical to his father. To some degree he finds his "pretty appearance" useful, since, sad truth be told, we're all inclined to treat a good looking person better and pay more attention to them, and in his early days of near starvation and abuse this was useful. But he hates it, deep down, as he hates everything about himself from those days.

Not only that, but he actually doesn't find himself attractive. He thinks he's too pale, his hair annoys him because it's too curly and needs some work in order to look presentable, his cheekbones are too high, he's too thin and boney, and the list goes on and on with things only he finds weird and unattractive. All part of his deep-seated self loathing that is in the root of all his actions, covered up with illusions f grandeur.

And so he sheds every bit of his old appearance that's possible to change, from his eye colour to the shape of his nose. In fact, now I think of it, in Goblet of Fire he says he'll be "Settling for his old body for a while", suggesting he's planning on further transformations in the future, when he has more time with Harry dead.

TLDR: to us, semi-biased readers, he's both. In his own eyes, he's neither.

Also this gave me an idea for a minific, so I may post a drabble at some point, inspired by this.

Thank you, Anon, for an interesting question that made me think and allowed me to put some ideas in order. And that it sparked a fic! ;)

Stab Wound

Tim doesn’t understand where all these freaking ninjas are coming from. It’s like they’re crawling out of every open space, every broken board, every hole in the old warehouse floor. They don’t seem to be stopping either. He’s got both Robin and Red Hood fighting with him, in an odd turn of events, and they’re still only barely keeping the upper hand.

Dodging the quick arms, the knives and the punches coming for him, he tries to move closer to the center of the room. He shoots a quick look over at Hood and Robin because they should be doing the same. It’s their game plan after all. They seem to be doing.. okay, he guesses. Further into the room than before, at least, and he can't ask for more.

Why did it have to be ninjas? They’re so sly and moving so fast, it’s tiring keeping up with them. Their little stabby knives more annoying than useful, he figures. They have yet to hurt any of them more than a few superficial scrapes, or so he assumes; he can’t spot any major bleeding wounds on any of his current teammates. Damian, a little ninja assassin himself, probably thinks this is fun. It for sure looks like it, the way the youngest of them is flipping around, wielding his katana.

While he's busy checking on Damian, one of the ninjas gets in a kick to his stomach which, ow, is not nice at all. Now he has to both focus on blocking and trying to get some air back into his poor abused lungs. That’s for sure going to bruise, it may have done some damage to his ribs too. Alfred will for sure give him a frown, maybe even a sarcastic unimpressed comment. He has to bite back a hiss as he straightens up to continue on.

A yelp to his right grabs his attention because ninjas don’t yelp - but baby demon brats do. He shoots a quick look over at Damian. It seems like in an unexpected turn of events, a ninja has managed to sneak up on the brat and got him with a sword. The wound doesn't seem too serious, Tim sees and releases a sigh of relief, even if it's bleeding. Damian himself looks even angrier than before.

Still, the younger is now fighting off multiple ninjas by himself. It looks like he's starting to get stressed too, Tim notes and frowns. Damian has got his tongue poking out, only the tip of it showing, smushed between his lips. He's concentrating, hard enough to let a small tell like that slip out.

Tim sighs, and hits a ninja with his bo staff, knocking them down. The ninja stays down, which he isn't mad about at all, as he starts making his way towards the younger.

He’s almost there, preparing to help Damian tackle the flow of ninjas when there’s a sharp pinch in his side. He reacts on instinct, lashing out with his staff and letting the tip of it connect with full force in the offending ninja’s stomach. The ninja doubles over and falls to the side, gasping for air. Serves him right, Tim figures, as he knocks him unconscious with another hit. Without looking he lets one hand move down to where it’s still throbbing a little from where the ninja got him. There's a growing hurt spreading through his stomach, and yep - that’s a stab wound.

Stabby ninjas are the worst kind of ninjas.

It doesn’t seem too serious, it’s not an unbelievable pain, and it’s not hurting too much.

No need to call it a night yet.

He continues his track towards the demon brat because even if the Robin would never admit to it, it sure looks like he could use a hand.

Tim knows Damian could take on all the ninjas and win. Hell, he's probably winning as it is, but Tim would rather see it happening with minimal damage, then well, the opposite. And that.. ain’t what's happening right now. He can see that the younger has a growing redness on his cheek where a ninja must have gotten a hit in. There’s a small knife wound on his arm, adding to the one from before, too.

A hurt, benched Robin is the worst kind of Robin, and to be frank, Tim would like not to deal with that. That, and the massive illogical guilt he'd be consumed by if anything real serious were to happen. Another great perk he's gotten from being a bat. Or he could have had it from before.

Whatever.

Damian doesn’t bite out anything as Tim comes up on his side. Tim hopes it means the younger has realized that he could use a little help. It’s nice, that Damian is actually showing some signs of aging, of becoming more mature. Or that his training is going through his thick skull at least.

The younger boy, he's .. not as insufferable any more, and it’s making working with both the Bat himself and Robin a whole lot easier.

Together they manage to force the ninjas further back, into the middle of the room. There’s a hole in the floor that some of the ninjas actually came crawling up out of when the fight first started. Jason joins their side too, at some point, watching their backs. So continuing as a little unexpected but united trio, they push the ninjas backward and down. Some of them even scramble back into the hell hole they came from.

They’re winning now, actually a more clear win than in a long time. Which means Tim's tired body gets a new shot of energy and motivation, enough to keep him pushing on. His side is still itching, more and more actually, but it’s not enough to stop him from fighting.

He's had worse.

After what seems like forever, the sound of Damian’s katana going back into its sheath fills the room. The top of Tim’s bo staff has at one point gotten sliced clean off when he’d dodged an attack from a jumping ninja (and really? It wasn’t enough coming at him from the ground?)

Jason is zip-tying the ninjas who hadn’t fled, both their hands and feet, in a methodical order. Tim steps towards the hole in the ground, where the last of the ninjas, when realizing their defeat, had disappeared into. It’s always annoying when they end up with loose ends, but there was no stopping them. They’re already long gone, he assumes, having sacrificed their weakest to get away themselves. Tim suspects they must have had some kind of hierarchy. It was clear who fled and who had to stay behind and fight to keep him and the two others busy.

As he takes another step, he feels a wave of dizziness hit him, which is usually not good. He puts his staff into the ground, steadying himself, leaning onto it.

“You alright there Tim?” Jason is by his side now, only a meter away, and when did he move over? Tim didn't hear his steps as he came towards him.

His knees feel weak and shaky. Pain shoots up his body when Jason hits his shoulder in what's supposed to be a friendly pat. Crap. He knows what this is, what happens now.

He’s coming down. The fight is over, and his body is taking in all the damage it has sustained. The adrenaline leaving behind a drained shell.

His fingers go to his stomach, his gloves get soaked in seconds.

“Tim?” Jason says again, as Tim’s vision tunnels, the darkness creeping into the edges.

“Tim!” Jason yells again, moving closer, but looking more like an unfocused blob made of red and grey.

Huh, that's weird.

Tim’s knees hit the hard floor of the warehouse as his vision tunnels. Though he doesn't feel any pain at the unexpected meeting between his boney knee and the cement flooring. Huh. That's weird.

He barely feels himself slipping, falling, and doesn’t even know if he hits the ground or not.

-

When he comes too again, he’s laying down, reclined, on something cushy and comfortable. He’s belted fast, but the straps don’t hurt. They’re not too tight like they would be if someone had kidnapped him, not cutting off his blood flow or gnawing at his skin.

There’s a familiar rumbling sound that his brain is still too muddled from blood-loss to understand what is. Whatever he’s laying on, or in? slows down a little. He hadn’t even realized he was moving at all, before.

His head is throbbing, but so is his side which - right, there was a stab wound. He wills his fingers, which takes a worrying amount of effort, to move towards his side. Is he still bleeding out? It doesn't feel like it. He would for sure not be alive right now if that was the case.

“You awake over there?” A gruff voice, lower than Dick’s but still lighter than Bruce’s, asks out of nowhere. Jason, his brain finally supplies. That’s Jason. Who he had been fighting with, plus the demon brat. Who’s either not there or being unusually quiet.

He can’t quite get himself to make his voice work, but he does manage to pry his own eyes open. It's relieving that he isn’t met by a blinding light. At least he isn't in some bed in the med-bay at the cave, or worse - the hospital. In fact, it’s dark, and there’s a window, he can see the outside rushing past.

Oh. That explains it. The rumbling, the movement. They’re in the batmobile. It makes sense he’s strapped in then. It's the seatbelts, costume made for the batmobile and its makeshift emergency med-bed passenger seat. He looks down his torso and sees that parts of his uniform have disappeared and been replaced by a white gauze. His fingers had never quite managed to reach the wound.

“Damian?” he croaks because there is no way the kid is in the car. He knows for a fact this exact car only has two seats, and not much more space to sit in. He was once crammed in the passenger seat with Dick, while Bruce drove them home. It's not an experience he wants to relive, not with Dick, and not with Damian. There is no way two over-average muscle built guys should fit in the seat, and they don't.

“The brat?” Jason asks with a huff, though Tim can spy a hint of a smile ghosting over the older's lips through the windshield. “He went to help B clean up once we figured you weren’t going to die,” the older continues. Tim notices there's a little bit more anger in his voice now.

He stays silent and leans his head on the rest while closing his eyes.

“Why didn’t you say you were hurt?” Jason asks, apparently unable to deal with the quiet only interrupted by the steady hum of the motor. “I know that the bat likes to be dramatic and shit, but passing out like that? Not nice against your fellow teammates, dude.”

Tim knows Jason is trying to sound casual, like he doesn’t care, but instead it's so absolutely obvious that he does. That his older brother was in fact worried. Tim can actually feel how it warms his heart, brings some heat to his cheeks, even if he wants to chalk it up to the blood loss. It's not exactly a regular thing that happens, Jason Todd showing that he cares. Then again, Bruce isn't there with his deafening silence and judging eyes. Perhaps that makes it easier.

“I didn’t think it was that bad,” Tim answers when he realizes that he's let the silence drag on a little too long while he was lost in thought. He can’t be bothered to open his eyes again, so he’ll just assume Jason is glaring at him. It for sure feels like it, his skin is prickling.

“You were stabbed. In the gut. You didn’t think that was bad?” Jason barks out, sentenced chopped and hard. Tim can feel the car swinging in a turn. He hopes they’re going to be home soon. Then Alfred can patch him up and he can climb into his big comfy bed and sleep for like, ten hours at least.

He should probably answer Jason too, at some point.

“I don’t know, I didn’t feel it until the fight was over,” Tim argues back, and can’t keep the slight irritation out of his voice. He’s tired god damn it, and lost too much blood to have this fight right now. So what if he smooths the details out a little? The wound had been an irritating pulse in the back of his head after he got it, yes, but nothing.. nothing that seemed dangerous.

Plus, Bruce will do the same exact dance with him when they discuss the case later. The less worrying he makes it sound to Jason, the less serious it will sound to Bruce. Keeping the story consistent and all that.

Jason takes a deep breath and breathes it out with a sigh, “I'm still mad at you, but, I guess that’s sound reasoning, adrenaline, and all. We've all been there.”

Was that Jason agreeing with him? Letting the matter go? What?

Tim cracks an eye open, looks at Jason’s face through the mirror. The older is biting his lip, staring at the road ahead, though his mind looks to be elsewhere. He wonders if he should be worried about Jason’s driving. Then again, he’s seen the Robin turned crimelord turn vigilante driving much more reckless, while distracted, before.

“You okay?” Tim hears himself asking, his voice sounding too soft. Then again, he can and will blame that on the blood loss too.

“Yeah, a few lacerations, one of the ninjas got in a good kick to my ribs too. Figured it was better I drove you to the manor. Let Robin join Batman,” Jason says before quickly adding, “not that I wanted to do that, even if I were in perfect health. Join Batman, I mean.”

Tim laughs a little at Jason's ramble. It sounds more like a croak, but it makes Jason look at him through the mirror with hardened eyes. It only makes him want to laugh more.

They drive in silence for a little while longer, and Tim lets his eyes slip closed again. In the darkness, he tries to feel the turns the car takes and guess where they’re at, but it's impossible. Usually, he could drive these streets blindfolded, or, he assumes he could. He hasn’t tried, if being so sleep deprived you’re seeing triple doesn’t count.

“Thanks,” he mutters, feeling sleep creep upon him. They’re going to be home soon, but a little nap won’t hurt. He’s pretty sure he hasn’t got any head injuries. Jason hasn’t mentioned anything and he knows the older has been watching him. That’s what they do.

“No need to thank me. When you faint right in front of me like a bigger drama queen then B, I can’t exactly leave you there to bleed out,” Jason answers. There's laughter in his voice, even though his words tells so much about his growth.

“You could've,” Tim says, letting the following silence hang in the air for a few seconds before continuing. “You could’ve left me. Or let Damian deal with it alone, or called Batman, but you didn’t. So thanks,” he finishes and stares up in the dark roof of the car. There's a small light there he hasn't noticed before, though it's turned off now.

He takes a deep breath, feeling the itching of his wound, it hurts - but not too bad. Maybe there's a numbing agent on the gauze, they use that sometimes if they have it on hand. His side is throbbing, but the sticking pain he remembers from before is almost gone.

Jason is being worryingly silent after the little proclamation Tim just finished.

“It’s the blood loss talking,” Tim reassures as he realizes there's a real chance he's hit some dark emotional spot in his older brother. He opens his eyes in time to see Jason’s shoulders sinking. The fingers cradling the wheel like a lifeline eases up, letting blood flow into them again.

“Yeah," Jason says, after a while, after too long. He's not looking in the mirror at all, keeping his eyes steady on the road, avoiding Tim’s eyes. Another defused emotional bomb added to Tim's belt.

"Do you really think-," Jason's voice stops midway through the sentence. He's still staring right head, eyes hard and guarded.

"Do I think what, Jason?" Tim is too exhausted for word games right now, and for any kind of emotions really. Maybe he hadn't defused the bomb, just deactivated the timer so now it could explode at any time by a single wrong move.

“I’m going to take a nap,” Tim states then, instead of commenting on anything more, and it doesn't seem like Jason is going to answer. He's too tired, so with a sigh, he tries to relax his tense muscles while shutting his eyes. As he breathes in deep it pulls at his wound again, and it makes it sting all the way through his chest. He forces his face to be natural, hoping Jason doesn't notice.

Anyway, it's kind of nice too, the pain, a screwed up part of his brain says. It means he's alive, that he's not dying yet. That's nice.

“We’re going to be home in like, five minutes,” Jason answers like Tim is being ridiculous thinking about taking a nap. Tim doesn’t dare comment on how Jason called the manor home, nop, not at all, not touching that with a ten-foot pole. Especially not after all the other emotions he's stirred up since waking up. He has some tact, even with a blood loss brain.

“It’ll be a short nap,” he argues back, voice already more groggy. A more comfortable than before darkness creeps into his mind, slowly taking over.

He’s asleep before he hears if Jason answers or not.

-

This was originally written for the “stab wound” prompt in whumptober, but all my plans failed, so the only thing i got around to writing was filing this prompt for my friend @marianne-in-wonderland

Sohrab Habibion from SAVAK (and Obits, Edsel, etc.) fills in the gaps.

I first noticed the name Sohrab Habibion in the Sub Pop band Obits nearly a decade ago. He’d then gotten in touch with me a few years back when he sent me the last Savak record, Beg Your Pardon (the band’s 3rd). I did some backtracking and realized he was in the old DC post hardcore band Edsel, whose music I enjoyed. We got to talking and I realized this guy’s had a pretty interesting career and I needed to find out more. He was more than agreeable to an interview on the DAGGER site. Oh and dig this....he recently he began posting some videos that he took of shows in the DC area in the mid-80’s, which is discussed below. Let’s all thank our lucky stars that someone was there with a video camera at shows back then.

Back to SAVAK, they have recently released their fourth full-length, Rotting Teeth in the Horses Mouth (on the Ernest Jenning Record Co label, like the last few) and it’s a terrific record. The kind of post-punk that’s not afraid to pOp! and vice versa. So needless to say Sohrab had plenty to talk about. Let’s take a trip both down memory lane and back to the future as well.

Sohrab.... always pushin’ the hair products.

 Did you grow up in the DC area? If not how did you end up there?

I moved to the suburbs of DC in 1979. My mom and I drove through Hurricane David from my grandfather’s house in Leonia, New Jersey to Annandale, Virginia with all of our possessions in the back of a Chevy Chevette. We had just left Iran because of the Revolution and, after a short stay in Bergen County to gather ourselves and do some research, my parents decided that we would resettle in the DC area.

Do you remember what the first record you ever bought was? First concert?

First record: It was a cassette of Love for Sale by Boney M. Actually maybe that was a gift from a friend. Either way I think of it as my first-owned album. I quickly had the lyrics to “Ma Baker” memorized and never gave a second thought to just how weird the cassette cover art was. If you’re not familiar, perhaps imagine an S&M dungeon version of Ohio Players? As a 7-year-old I think it just didn’t register. More interesting is that the producer, Frank Farian, was also the guy behind Milli Vanilli. If you’re up for it, I recommend doing some Googling about Mr. Farian, who was born Franz Reuther just after the start of World War II in a German valley settlement once known as the “Town of Leather.” It’s good stuff, I promise.

First concert: A friend’s older sister drove us to the old 9:30 Club to see one of the club’s 3 Bands for 3 Bucks nights. I remember feeling pretty excited about being in a part of town I didn’t know and seeing all kinds of people I didn’t ordinarily see. This was probably 1983 or 1984 so it was heavy on the New Wave look. In the basement of 9:30, once you’d squeezed down the narrow flight of stairs, there were bathrooms as well as a small counter that sold records and tapes. I bought The Halloween Cassette—a WGNS comp with Gray Matter, United Mutation, Velvet Monkeys, Malefice, Bloody Mannequin Orchestra and others—and the Minor Threat record that compiles the first two 7”s. On our drive home the DJ on WHFS played the song “Minor Threat,” which we literally had in our hands, and the whole thing felt tremendously serendipitous.

During his tryout with the Washington Bullets (Elvin Hayes beat him out). 

At what age did you pick up the guitar?

One night my mom came home from a school fundraising auction with an acoustic guitar that she’d won in the raffle. I actually think it might be the only time anyone in my family has ever won a raffle. I was 13 or 14 and discovering that I was not as good of a baseball player as I’d hoped or wanted to be and the guitar felt more connected to my interests, so I started to teach myself chords and rudimentary scales. It wasn’t long before I was able to get an electric guitar and make a complete mess of sound in neighborhood basements with friends.

How old were you when the punk rock bug bit you?

Thirteen, I think. I’m pretty sure it was 7th grade. I didn’t know a lot about rock music. Having spent a chunk of my early life in Iran, I missed the boat on a lot of big, American rock’n’roll moments. I was 9 when I was first exposed to KISS by neighbors who were also in the Boy Scouts and so I kind of lumped all that costuming together and the whole thing seemed silly. Special badges and membership cards and various allegiances you were supposed to declare. I felt disengaged from a lot of things in the suburban culture around me, so punk made sense upon its arrival. It took some time to sort things out, like what made the Dead Kennedys good and The Exploited bad, but once that initial door opened, I never turned back. If anything it just opened additional doors to other subcultures and underground movements and marginalized artists and thinkers. Punk helped me recognize that my sympathies will always be with the disenfranchised, the unheralded, the amateur, the wandering tinkerer.

How and when did Edsel get together?

I met Nick Pelliocciotto and Geoff Sanoff (who wouldn’t be in Edsel for a few years) at a Government Issue show at the Hung Jury Pub. Nick and I briefly played in a band with Jim Spellman (Velocity Girl, High Back Chairs, Foxhall Stacks), but that fizzled out. So Nick and I were looking for a bass player when we saw Steve Ward play a cover of “White Rabbit” at a high school talent show. Nick and I agreed that Steve looked cool (he really did) and, when we ran into him in the parking lot, he passed our test by answering that his favorite DC band was Happy Go Licky. We started practicing in the basement of the house Nick, Jim Spellman and I lived in off Reno Road in the Cleveland Park neighborhood of DC. We didn’t know what we were doing. Nick played me a bunch of records I had never heard before and we would talk about various details in the music. He made me aware of the way certain things interacted, like the bass guitar and the kick drum. I’d never considered that. I was also unfamiliar with singing in a band, so was starting from scratch. A lot of it began as rhythmic sing-song-speak-howling that could be heard somewhat above the volume of the band. I’ll never forget recording our first demo at Inner Ear with Michael Hampton. When it came time for me to do the vocals we were all surprised by what they sounded like and Michael nicely said, “Why don’t we call it a day and you go home and work on some melodies that we can record tomorrow.” Ha! When Nick and I got back to the house we listened to a bunch of albums to get ideas for vocal melodies. The one that resonated with me was Midnight Oil’s 10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1 and it helped me understand how you could take a simple line and move it around with chord changes. I didn’t figure out what phrasing was for some time to come, but that was the start. Thank you Michael, Nick and Peter Garrett.

How/when did you end up in NYC?

Well, it’s a circuitous story, but . . . Edsel toured a lot between 1993 and 1995. So much so that I moved back into my parents’ basement to avoid paying rent for a place I wasn’t going to be spending any time in. My folks are lovely and it was a fine arrangement, but I missed having an apartment of my own. On tour in Chicago I was presented with the opportunity of a cheap living situation in a city that I liked, so I moved there. I had this fantasy that the band could keep it together while being in 3 different cities—Geoff had moved to NYC and the two Steve’s were in DC. Not a chance. I had a good year in Chicago, working at the Empty Bottle and playing with different local musicians, but Edsel basically succumbed to inertia and I decided to move back to DC to make a solo record. My parents had a cabin in the Shenandoah Valley and I went there for a period of time with my 4-track and the hopes of discovering whatever my version of Leonard Cohen and Brian Eno might be. That didn’t happen, but I learned a lot about recording myself and making mistakes and stumbling on things I liked that I hadn’t intended. Around this point I got a call from Michael Hampton, who’d moved to New York City a few years earlier. He said his neighbor in the West Village had moved out and he wondered if I might want to take the apartment. I was feeling pretty untethered and the idea of giving Manhattan a shot was exciting, so in November 1997 I packed up my books and CDs and headed up here. I’ve since crossed the bridge over to Brooklyn, but have no plans of leaving. I love this city and all of its flaws.

How about Obits? I know Alexis was in Edsel….had you known Rick already?

Alexis played in Edsel for a few reunion shows we did in 2013, but he wasn’t in the original lineup of the group. I first met Alexis in 1985 when Lünch Meat, his band, played with Kids For Cash, my band, at my local community center. He and I also share a birthday and a similar sense of humor, so when he joined Obits after the departure of Scott Gursky, our original drummer, it was an effortless transition. I’d also played with Alexis in Girls Against Boys on a 2002 European tour that Eli couldn’t do. I was Fake Eli and got to play bass on some of my favorite GvsB tunes, which was a blast. Alexis has a humorous diary from that tour: http://www.gvsb.com/euro_diary/index.html

Here’s an excerpt just so you know it’s worth the clicks:

“scott has determined that we should get rid of all the equipment and excess drummers and bass players and just travel with a painted sheet (we in the biz call this a scrim). that way he could have a band painted on it and just cut out the head of the singer and stick his own head through. this would reduce overhead and be a whole lot less of a hassle than having squabbling bass players and drummers with no IQ whatsoever.”

Rick and I met at an art show of his in the summer of ‘99. In fact, in looking to clarify the year I came across this email I sent to a friend:

“Last night my friend Hiroshi took me to an opening of his friend Rick Froberg’s work in some unknown Lower East Side apartment/gallery. I was shocked at how incredible his stuff was. His etchings like Goya’s, his prints like a German expressionist and his paintings like a weird amalgam of Raymond Pettibon and Norman Rockwell. But everything was very original despite its familiarity. He gave me one of his prints and I actually ended up buying one of his paintings. I’m really excited about it.”

Funny thing is that on that European GvsB tour I was wearing a Hot Snakes shirt. Little could I have guessed that I’d be in a band with Alexis and Rick 10 years later. Or maybe I could’ve? Our behavior and patterns are probably more predictable than I’d like to admit.

Anyway, long and short of it is after meeting Rick we started hanging out and as Hot Snakes was winding down in the early aughts he proposed we get together and strum our guitars. We had a good time and kept at it until things started to take shape. Fast forward a bit and our friend Speck browbeat Rick into playing with her band, Orphan, at Cake Shop. That was early 2008 and the internet did us a favor by sharing a bootleg recording of our gig, which led us to signing with Sub Pop. Seems just as weird now as it did then, but so it goes! The band was a hoot to be in and we had a grand time, particularly touring. The trips we made to Europe, Australia, Japan and Brazil were fantastic. I never thought I’d be able to do that playing scrappy rock’n’roll music. All the people that we met, the local specialties that we ate and drank . . . and drank . . . and then ate some more. Unforgettable. Until I forget them. Then I’ll refer to the documentation.

Obits.....always ready to rumble (notice the switchblade comb in Froberg’s pocket). 

Tell me about the end of Obits and the beginning of Savak? Who came up with the name?

The end of Obits was a little unexpected. At least the timing of it. All bands end, so it wasn’t surprising in that regard, but we had a French tour planned and had been offered some East Coast dates with Mudhoney, so it was a bummer not to be able to do those. But it had been a cold and miserable winter and Rick had some family stuff to marshal, so it felt best to call it, which is what we did on April 1st, 2015. The April Fool’s part wasn’t intentional, but I liked that it happened that way, what with being in a band often feeling like a cosmic joke anyway. But we’re all still good friends and very much in touch with each other. Funny thing is we’d actually written a fourth record with two drummers, as Matt Schulz had started playing with us as well (we did one show with both Alexis and Matt, which was fun), so on my hard drive somewhere are the demos and jams for that, including covers of “The In-Crowd” (https://youtu.be/KYbwk26mYJA) and Beasts of Bourbon’s “I Don't Care About Nothing Anymore.” (https://youtu.be/IpWi4OxhJXY)

Towards the end of Obits I’d started getting together with other friends to make noise. I was playing with Greg Simpson and Matt Schulz, doing instrumental versions of Hooterville Trolley and Shadows tunes, and separately with Michael Jaworski and Benjamin Van Dyke, just bashing out riffs. I asked all involved if they would want to combine the two and everyone was into it. The nice thing was Michael and I got to write with two different drummers, which opened up new ideas, and for a band that was just getting the swing of our internal vocabulary, it helped jumpstart the mojo.

I can’t remember at what point we were talking about band names, but when Viet Cong couldn’t take the heat for their name and decided to change it I made a joke about calling our group SAVAK. Then the more I thought about it the more I liked it and the group was on board, so we ran with it. The Iranian side of my family was a bit perplexed and bemused, but they all understood that this was a rock’n’roll outfit and not some creepy tribute to the former secret police in Iran. I’ve come to appreciate how that type of band name is a good litmus test. With a moniker like SAVAK you can see who actually knows anything about global political history, but more importantly you immediately know that anyone who takes issue with it isn’t likely to be interested in or even be familiar with punk rock or underground culture. So that person’s opinion on the subject doesn’t hold weight for me and I’ll attempt to redirect to a different subject that could be entertaining to chat about, like food or wine or bicycle maintenance or John le Carré books or, I dunno, HTML/CSS?

Savak has been recording pretty consistently…how did the new record come together so quickly? Who came up with the title?

Michael Jaworski, the other guitarist, singer and co-songwriter, came up with the title of Rotting Teeth in the Horse’s Mouth. Apparently it appeared to him in a dream and, well, I just liked the way it sounded. Both in that it reminded me of the DK’s classic Fresh Fruit for Rotting Vegetables and as a play on the idiom “hearing it straight from the horse’s mouth,” since the current mouth we hear more often than is good for anyone’s mental health has enough proverbial rotting teeth to fill the mouth of a giant armadillo.

We worked on the album over a period of months. Sometimes we would get together with Matt Schulz, our drummer, and hammer stuff out. Other times either Michael or I would start something at home and build it from there. The main thing was to keep it feeling like a band had cut it together live, regardless of how accurate that may be on any given song. We started with 16 tunes, ditched 2 of them that weren’t as developed, and recorded the remaining 14. Then we picked the 10 that sounded the most cohesive for the album and the others will come out as singles later in the year. We spent many intensely focused hours editing, overdubbing and trying to really hone in on what each tune needed. I like discreet events in music and subtle details that may not make themselves evident for a few listens. A keyboard that only appears in the second verse or a backing vocal that’s buried deep in the right channel of the outro or a flanged cymbal crash at the top of the chorus. Stuff that doesn’t have to happen in the live version but makes the recording a little richer without being overbearing.

SAVAK, just before diving in. 

In Savak, re; the songwriting process, is it both you and Michael together or do you write independently?

There’s always a collaborative element. We each add or edit the other’s songs to some degree. That’s one of the things I really like about our partnership. We actively try to keep our egos out of the way. And while we may not share the exact same taste about every little thing, we trust each other’s sensibility. I think that willingness to let go of our own ideas makes them more interesting and strengthens the working relationship.

Tell us about working with Arto Lindsay?

Rick Froberg was employed as an illustrator at a web-based, digital media shop in SoHo called Funny Garbage and he helped get me a gig making music for cartoons and video games they were producing for companies like Cartoon Network. I had access to a recording studio on a floor above our office which was run by an incredibly talented musician/producer named Andres Levin. One day ‘Dre asked if I could work on a session with a friend of his for a gallery installation. It seemed interesting, so I agreed. The guy showed up with two pillow cases that he wanted to put on his arms and flap wildly in front of a mic. His idea was to pitch the pillow case recording down a few octaves and add a lot of reverb so it would sound like a giant bird was flying. I don’t remember if he was pleased with the results, but we had a blast trying, and it turned out that fella was Arto Lindsay. He got in touch with me soon after about recording his next album. I was direct about the fact that while I was brisk with the ProTools and could run sessions efficiently, I was not a real engineer who knew about microphone placement and how to apply compression, etc. He said that was fine and arranged to rent a recording rig for his apartment and we got straight to work with Melvin Gibbs, who is Arto’s writing partner, co-producer, and bass player. We made Invoke in 2002 and two years later we made Salt, once again doing the whole thing in his Chelsea living room. Arto’s a wonderful guy, as is Melvin, and we had a terrific time together. I also learned a lot. He has such a deep knowledge of avante garde music and art and a whole world of Brazilian culture that he can tap into. And Melvin is an incredible musician, so getting to see how he approached assembling Arto’s ideas was fascinating. He was also forgiving with the fact that a punker like me was trying to edit Brazilian rhythms when I was having an impossible time even identifying the first beat of the groove. There was a lot of, “Please just tell me where the ONE is.” Arto knows a wide array of people and the process of making a record with him was very much about getting it done, but not at the expense of the vibe, so if someone dropped by you’d just have to roll with it. Sometimes that person would bring their instrument and overdub on a song or two, so I had to figure out how to be flexible about the recording process to make sure it was gonna be smooth for all involved, regardless of if it was a violin player or a guy doing a percussion track using a cardboard box. I ended up calling Geoff Sanoff for advice quite a bit—to the point where Arto would joke, “Is it time to call Geoff?” Ha! But he knew the deal going in, so all was fine. The experience of making those records was great and I got to meet some interesting folks. Also my appreciation of Brazilian music completely exploded. An unexpected and super cool project with Arto, Debbie Harry and Mikhail Baryshnikov also came from that. Another side note: when we were recording Invoke there was a song which Arto wanted to get Animal Collective involved in. This was 2001 and they were still more of a record store employee kind of band, but Arto had a couple of their CDs (Spirit They’re Gone Spirit They’ve Vanished and Danse Manatee, I think) and was really into them. We arranged to go into Stratosphere Sound, the studio that was owned by Adam Schlesinger, Andy Chase, and James Iha, where Geoff Sanoff worked, and do the session there. They had an interesting way of working—they would manipulate all of the instruments, including live drums, and have everything run through their PA and then have Geoff mic the PA speakers. So the final thing was this gauzy, mushy, blur that was like a sonic paste. They totally knew what they were doing and I was particularly impressed with Noah/Panda Bear as a musician.

Speaking of legends, how did you begin collaborating with Michael Hampton?

First we should be clear that we’re not discussing “Magic” Mike Hampton AKA Michael “Kidd Funkadelic” Hampton. According to Discogs, the Michael Hampton I know is “Michael Hampton (3)” of Brief Weeds fame. He’s a few years older than me so I missed his days in SOA and The Faith, but I was a fan and saw him in Embrace and One Last Wish. I attended American University in DC and ran into him on campus, told him I also played guitar and suggested that we “jam sometime.” Knowing him now this detail cracks me up because I’m positive I freaked him out and that he was horrified by the idea of “jamming” with an arbitrary, long-haired frosh. Some time after Edsel started we asked Michael to help produce our demo, as we were clueless about the studio. And when he was in Manifesto our bands played together and we got to be better friends. After he moved to New York, it was he and his wife, Monica, who encouraged me to move here. They also introduced me to my wife. And for the last 15 or so years we’ve worked together on soundtracks for indie films, documentaries and commercials. I can’t recall how that collaboration first started, but I love working with Michael. He’s got a quick wit, so there’s lots of yucks involved, but he also has a remarkable knack for music composition and knows how to layer ideas for perfect cinematic effect. As a guitar player he remains one of my favorites. Michael’s distilled Bob Andrews from Gen X and Captain Sensible and George Harrison and all these choice rock’n’roll and punk players into something distinctly his own.

Somewhere in Madrid, Spain (Spain Radio Nacional) 

Tell us your top 10 desert island discs?

That’s tough. I’d like to ensure a bunch of different moods are covered, so let’s see . . . how about:

Hamza El Din - Music Of Nubia

Tsegué-Maryam Guèbrou - Éthiopiques 21: Piano Solo

Mark Hollis - s/t

Skip James - Today!

Charles Mingus - The Black Saint And The Sinner Lady

Mission Of Burma - Vs.

The Rolling Stones - Sticky Fingers

Television - Marquee Moon

The Velvet Underground - s/t

Wire - 154

Who are some of your favorite current bands?

Bed Wettin' Bad Boys, Cable Ties, Contractions, FACS, Gotobeds, Grey Hairs, Hammered Hulls, Hot Snakes, Light Beams, METZ, Mint Mile, Modern Nature, Patois Counselors, Pays P., Rattle, Skull Practitioners, Slum of Legs, Sunwatchers, Tanning Bats, TK Echo, The Unit Ama.

I know I’m forgetting stuff. There’s a ton of excellent music being made right now.

What’s next for Savak? Once the lockdown is over will you guys tour?

It’s hard to be certain about anything these days, but I do know we’re eager to play once the Javel water has cleared. My hope is that we reschedule our UK tour as well as the shows we had on deck with Archers of Loaf. We were also trying to coordinate a Japanese tour, which we’d love to do, so I’ll add that to the list.

In the meantime we have a couple of non-album singles coming out later in the year.

I love making music, so whatever form it needs to take to make it work given our circumstances I’m fine with. Wanna jam on our phones? Hit me up!

SAVAK’s new one- Rotting Teeth in The Horses Mouth

BONUS QUESTION:  Tell us about all of those shows you recorded in the 80’s and have been putting up on the Dischord page? Great stuff!

Thanks! My mom bought me a Sony Betacam in 1985. I honestly had no inclination towards videotaping anything prior to this, but I think she may have thought it was a positive thing for a teenager to get involved in instead of playing Atari or hanging out at the Orange Julius at the mall or whatever. So I had this camera and I started taping what I was doing, which was basically going to shows. I didn’t think much about it and I never watched the tapes afterwards, so just slowly built up a collection of recordings that sat in a box at my parents’ house for years. It wasn’t until James Schneider started working on what eventually became the Punk the Capital movie that the tapes were unearthed. Then Scott Crawford wanted to use them for Salad Days and had the genius idea of getting Dave Grohl’s production company to digitize them, as they wanted footage for that Sonic Highways show. So at Scott’s suggestion I sheepishly asked if it was something they could do and they immediately said yes. I was pretty stunned by their generosity. The tapes themselves are now part of the Punk Archive in the DC Public Library, which is both cool and hilarious. The idea of random stuff I videotaped when I was 15 being part of an institutional archive is pretty absurd. Now that I’ve got this extra pandemic time to spend in front of my computer, I’ve been editing down each set, adjusting the light balance so the footage is less murky and also remastering the audio so they sound better. The timing of the Dischord Records Fan Page on Facebook is fortuitous, as it provides a reasonably eager audience for what might have otherwise just been a few additional gigs of server space being cooled in a Google data center in Moncks Corner, South Carolina.

“Who you callin’ a low life?” 

www.savakband.com

www.savak.bandcamp.com

Death??

"Oh, crap! I'm late.  Oh, well...I probably have one of the only jobs where people prefer that I'm late.  Actually, to be completely honest, most wish that i would never show up at all. Not everybody.  But most."  I open the door.  "Hello.  Let me check my chart...Ah, here it is.  Mr. Campbell.  Hey!  You wouldn't, by chance, be related to the Bruce Campbell, would you? Ya, know...famed 'B' actor.  Guy with the chin?  'This is my Boom Stick'."   Campbell stared at him blankly.  Frank pitched his voice, "Give me some sugar, Baby."  Nothing.     "Um, no.  Why?"  Incredulously, he exclaimed, "I love that guy!  His movies are awesome!  So funny!  Hahaha...so funny!  Check him out, totally worth it.  Seriously."  "Who are you?", Mr. Campbell asks.  "I'm sorry.  How rude of me!  My name is Frank, but most people know me by my other name- Grim Reaper.  Ya know, the hooded one, the angel of death. But I like Frank better.  It's a less "shit-your-pants" kinda name.  "So I'm dead?"  "Well, yes and no.  You're currently in a coma, but it's your time."  Stunned, Mr. Campbell stutters, "If I'm in a coma, then how am I talking to you?"  "Cuz I'm dead, dude.  You're thinking of the laws of the living. I go beyound that. Take a look around, man!  All your family is here but no one can see us.  And for the love of god...  You're standing up!  You've been, like, paralized, a vegetable, for 5 years!   That should be a big give away right there."  Frank felt kinda sorry for him, but he deals with this crap all the time and had a job to do, so he continued.  "So, as you may know by my rep, I'm here to escort you to your final judgment. But since it's Friday and because I kinda feel like slacking off a bit, if you want, you can tag along with me today.  Hangout."   He looks around at Campbell's family- women sobbing, men shuffling from one foot to another, obviously uncomfortable and no doubt wishing they were anywhere but here. "This job can be boring.  It would be kinda nice to have some company. So, what do you say, man?  You game?" Death's enthusiasm was apparent.  "That is, unless your'e that excited to see where you'll be spending eternity."  Hahaha!  "I mean, I dont know how you lived your life so I'm not really sure if you'll be heading north or south, but it's your call."  Campbell stared at him vacantly.   "Please hangout with me!" Frank blurted out.  "I'll put a good word in for you."  Campbell snapped to.  "You can do that?" he asked.   "Well, shit yeah, I can!" Then, half-under his breath, Frank murmurred, "If they listen to me, that is.  But hey!  It can't hurt, right?  Ok then, Mr. Campbell.  Wait, that's so formal.  If you don't mind, what's your first name?"  "Rob."  "Rob.  No shit?  You took me as a Mark."   "So, Mr. Death."  "Hey!  That's my father.  Like I said, call me Frank."  "Ok, then, Frank.  Why "Frank" and why do you look like a normal man instead of a skull in a hood?  I thought you'd be, like, different."  "Death or any of my other names are just...scary.  The 'Reaper-look' is just so, ya know, eighteen hundreds. I mean, shit, your dead and this tall hooded skull holding a huge scythe just appears, standing over you...That's some scary-ass shit!  You humans are already dealing with the whole 'being dead' thing, and then that thing walks through the door!  Fuck me side ways!  That's some cruel shit.  Don't get me wrong, though.  There are still some of us who like that look but not all of us are into that shit."  "What do you mean by 'all of us'?", Rob asks.   "Well, you see, Rob, there are, like, 150,000 deaths a day so that would be impossibale for one dude to reap them all.  Plus, I like my weekends off.  Shit, who the hell wants to work that much? So, anyway, there are a lot of us. And since everything has to be so P.C. these days, there's a Reaper for every religion.  Like I said, most of us try to make this as easy as possible for you, but not all of us. Like Gary, for instance.  That dude is a dick! Scares the shit out of every single soul he reaps. So fucked up!  But he's been doing this for a super long time."  Frank chuckles to himself, as if a funny image just popped into his head.  He sobers, shakes the thought away and looks back at his charge.  "So Rob, what do you say?  Wanna hang for a little while or shall I take you straight to your judgment? Da-da-da DUM!"  Rob thought a second, then replies, "Sure, I guess.  Just as long as it doesn't effect my judgment."  "Nah, man.  No worries.  It really all depends on how you lived your life. Once your dead, it's all good. Ok?  Sweet.  Then, follow me.  We have an agenda to follow.  So, first, we have to go to a union meeting.  I know, I know.  Boring shit, right?  You wouldn't believe some of the stuff they make us do.  Like, before we got the Union, we had to work all animal deaths.  You wouldn't believe how many more deaths that adds to our schedule!  Man, those days were crazy!   Dog really is man's best friend. Those stubburn S.O.B.'s  would never want to come with us.  They'd just want to hang around waiting for their masters.  It was so bad we had to start carrying dog treats with us! And leashes!  Shit was unreal.  But ever since we got the Union, they sanctioned a whole other Grim department  to take care of pet deaths.  Helps out alot.  "Oh, and also to answer your previous question, we Reapers can look anyway we want."  To emphasize his point, Frank suddenly appeared as a large-breasted, scantily clad blonde woman, then quickly shifted back to his old self.  "Remember me talking about Gary?  Yeah, don't let him scare you. He can't hurt you in any way so if he starts anything, just ignore him.  "Alright, we're here.  Let's find a seat.  Don't worry, man, these meetings don't usually last long...unless one of those dick holes starts asking stupid questions. I'm sure you know what I'm talking about."  They both take a seat near the back.  "Wwwwhat the hell is that?", Rob asks, shuddering.   "Oh, now see, that's what i was talking about- that's Gary. Man, he is such a dick!  Why he want's to scare the souls he takes is such a dick move. HEY GARY!!!"  Frank waves, trying to get Gary's attention.   "Yeah, Frank." Gary waves the finger at him.  "Eat a bag of dicks."  "Screw you, Frank."  Gary shakes his head in total annoyance.  "Haha! I love fucking with him. You see, Rob?  You're lucky you got me. You could've had him or one of these other boring pricks.  Ugh, they're so lame.  It's like 'Hi...I'm Death, here to take you to your judgment...follow me, please'.  BOOOORRINNG!  So lame!  Told ya, you're a lucky guy...well, except for the whole 'dying' thing."  Frank shifts awkwardly in his seat.     "Right, then...it's starting.  Pay attention.  You might find some answers to a few questions you had in life."   The Grim on the mic clears his throat.  "Uh-Hem!  Excuse me, sorry about that.  Alright.  I'd like to thank you all for showing up and sharing you support for Team 013. I guess I'll get right down business- I know you guys have alot to do. Okay, first on the dockit. If everyone could do their best at getting the spirits to come with you, that would be great.  I know they have free will, but try to remember that they don't know they have free will.  Basically, don't give up so easily if they give you problems.  It's too much paperwork, anyway.  And now we're being threatened with quotas!  I know none of us want that.  So, please, folks, let's all work together on this."  The Team Leader shuffles a few papers, then runs his long, boney finger down the page.   "What's he talking about, Frank?", Rob asks in befuddlement.   "Well, you see, even though your dead, you still have free will.  Technicall,  you don't have to go with us. We have always made it seem like you have no choice, but that's really just to make it easier on us."  Frank muffles a laugh.  "And to make the boss men happy. But, some souls put up a fight, and that's where your 'ghost' comes in."  Rob's face glazes over.  Frank continued, "Alright...so, for some people, it's really hard for them to leave their loved ones.  Or maybe they have some sort of unfinished business so they refuse to come with us.  Instead, they end of wandering the world as a detached entity, or rather, a ghost.  Eventually, most end up calling on us after they feel that their loved ones are fine, or that unfinished business they were so concerned about finally gets taken care of.  For instance,  there are the ones that have been killed at the hands of their fellow man.  Once their murderer is caught or killed, they usually seem to be able to rest in peace and take their judgment.  Unfortunately, though, there are some that don't.  They stay on Earth, eventually becoming evil.  They start getting jeolous of the living and become violent.  They'll try to possess people."  Frank shakes his head, a little in disgust but mostly with sadness.   "You see, there are demons and angels, but known of them are allowed on Earth. Only us-the Grims- and the Almighty Big Cheese himself.  That's it.  So really, that demon-possession stuff is really just a pissed off spirt that's refused to be judged and is trying to find a way back to the living.  It's fucked up, right?!  Man, your kind will do anything to stay on Earth.  Oh, shit!"  Frank exclaimes.  "We've missed, like, half of the meeting!  We better start paying attention."   The speaker raises his voice a little. "And for the love of that man right over there..."  Frank glances over in the direction of the speaker's gesture.  "Is that God?  Holy shit!  It is!!  He never comes to these things  Check this- I'll see if we can talk to him after the meeting...ya know, throw a good word in for ya."  The Grim throws Campbell a wink.  Speaker- "Ok, ok...calm down, folks."  God clicks his cheeks and points his finger to th crowled.  The crowd starts hooting again.  God bows his head slightly, a sly smile on his lips and says, "What can I say?  I'm the shit."  The speaker sighs, waits for the cheers to subside.  "Ok, then, back to business, Boys.  As I was saying, I know all of you are overloaded as it is, but please, do your best to get the spirits before they die or at the least, right at the time of death."   "Why is that so important?" Rob asks.   "If we are too late the spirit doesn't really know they're dead, which brings us back to the ghost thing.  Have you heard of the different kinds of hauntings?"  "Yeah, I have.  I was kinda into that sort of stuff."  "Oh, cool.  Then you know what a residual haunting is, right?"  "Yeah."  Rob was actually starting to perk up, finally.  "It's where the ghost does the same thing at the same time, over and over.  Like, every day."  "Yep, you got it, buddy.  So these poor bastards...if we don't get to 'em in time, they get stuck and end up repeating the last moment that they remember.  Like, what they were thinking right before they died or whatever and get stuck there.  And they don't become mean because they don't know they're dead. They're the hardest ones to get to cross over.  So hard, even, that once they get stuck in that loop, we have a special Grim that gets appointed the case.   "And that concludes our meeting for Union 013.  Thank you, Gentlemen, for coming."   Frank nudges Rob, "Let's go talk to the Big Guy."  Rob follows the Grim over to where God was sitting behind the podium.  "Hey, you old son-of-a-gun!  Or should i say 'Gaylord Olda Dern'?  Hahaha!"  "You can stop right there, Frank." God says, holding up his hand in mock-protest.   "Haha!  I love messing with this guy!  Ok, Rob, like, we call him God 'cuz those are his  initials and he hates his real name.  That's why people also call him 'Lord'.  It's just the abbreviation of Gaylord."  Rob is still just staring at God, mouth slightly gaped.   "So, where's that bastard son of your's ?" Frank says, giving God a slight jab in the arm.  "Let me guess...back on Earth just hanging around."  Hahaha!  God roles his eyes and gives a slight huff.  "Man, don't get me started with that kid!  I have no clue where he is most of the time!  You know how he likes doing that disappearing act of his. Get's all kinds of attention when he's a kid and then poof!  Becomes antisocial for thirty years, resurfaces and is all like- "Look at me! Look what I can do!"- That boy, I swear!"  God's clearly exasperated.  Frank turns to Rob.  "So, I'm sure you know about Mary and the virgin birth, right?  Well, that wasn't really what God, here, intended it to be."  Frank lowers his head and starts chuckling.  He continues, "Oh man, this shit is funny! Ok, ok...so God goes down to Earth and starts spitting game to Mary, right?  He's all like, 'I'm the Almighty being, the creator of the stars and the universe...' Hehehe." Frank puts his hand to his mouth and whispers, "If you couldn't tell by the Bible, He kinda has an ego and shit." Rob just looks at him.  Frank nods over at God, "So anyway, He and Mary start talking all dirty.  She's all naked, rolling in the hay, talking some nasty perv shit  back to God, and he's all like, 'damn, girl' because she's a virgin.  So, He's gettin' all hot and bothered.  Starts priming his piece from across the room just from the way she's been talking to Him.  Then, all of the sudden there's a big BANG!  And it goes off prematurely.  A hole in one from across the room, like some Arnold Palmer shit!  Frank's doubled-over in laughter at this point.  Through snorts, he says, "God gets so damn embarrased that he's like, 'Oh, hey, yeah, sorry about that.  So.....I gotta go.  Peter just sent me a message...Morning Star is starting some shit, so I gotta split.'  Um, so I'll, like, set a bush on fire or something to get ahold of you.'  And poof!  He disappeared!  Whatdaya know...nine months later and here's Jesus!  Oh, man!  That was so great!  I love telling that story.  God just shakes his head at Frank, who asks, "So, what's that son of your's going by these days? If I can remember correctly, it's been Krisha, Mithra, Jeshua...that boy could never make up his mind.  Haha."  Frank shakes God's hand, says, "Alright, Gaylord.  We gotta get back to work...Unlike some of us."  He grins and gives a little ahem.  "I'll talk at you later, my Dude.  Oh and do me a solid, would ya?  Take it easy on Rob, here, when I bring him up.  He's a pretty cool dude."  He gives Rob a nudge.  God smiles at Rob.  "Yeah, I'd say...if he's had to hang around you all day, listening to all your shit, Frank!" Hahaha.  "Good one, God...go eat a bag of dicks.  Ok Rob, let's hit the bricks, Bud.  "So dude, I'm going to go in here and do my thing.  You wait out here.  Hopefully, it won't take long."  Thirty minutes later,  Grim walks out.  "Sorry man.  Took a little longer than I thought.  But anyway, Rob, this is Doris.  She's going to tag along with us, too.  I only have a few more stops to go.  "Oh, shit.  This next dude is a bad fucker. Um, if you here screaming and shit, pay it know mind."  Grim opens the door and walks in. All of a sudden, Rob and Doris hear screaming and begging, then, a really loud roar-like growl.  More screaming.  Finally, silence. Grim opens the door again.  "He was a bad dude.  He had to pay. I took him straight to judgement, but not before I had my fun. Fucking child molestor-piece of shit.  "Ok, I'm going to pick up a few more souls. Man, Peter hates when I bring a group to him."  He chuckled.  "When this is all you do every day for hundreds of years, you gotta have fun with your co workers, right?  I know it's kinda dick, what I'm about to do, but hey! It's funny to me!", he busts out laughing.   Regaining composer, "Ok.  Let me do a head count here.  Fifteen.  Ok, cool.  Didn't lose anyone."  Pointing a finger upwards, he says, "It's time to head up to them Pearly Gates for all of you to receive your judgements, and, of course, for you guys to meet the biggest Peter of them all!"  Frank snickers and lets out a snort.  "If you could just head through that door over there and take a seat, please. Thanks."  "Hey." Grim says as Rob slowly walks past him towards the door.  "I had a blast with you today.  I really hope you get some good news.  Come on...I'll walk in with you."  "God damn it, Frank!", exclaims Peter.  "What have I told you about collecting so many?  One at a time, you dick.  It's Friday and almost time for me to get off.  I have a date for  the movies with Shiva.  Oh, man...all those arms!  Can you imagine?"  "Chill, man.  You know I have to fuck with ya, Petey-boy."  "I hate you, Frank."  "Oh, but I love you!"  Grim puts a hand on Rob's shoulder.  "Well, Rob, take it easy, my dude."  He turns to Peter and says, "Take it easy on my boy here, Peter."  "Shit, if he's had to deal with you all day, then that should be a gold pass straight through!"  Peter chuckles.   "Whatever, Dick nose."  Then the Grim shakes his head and says, "Damn!  That's twice today I've been told that."  He lets out a laugh and turns to Rob.  "Hopefully for your sake they mean it.  "Ok, my dude."  He shakes Rob's hand.  "I better see some wings on you and not horns."  All of a sudden there's a loud voice behind the door. Frank turns his head.  "Oh, shit!"  He walks out the door.  As it shuts behind him, Rob hears Frank exclaim, "What's up, Dick nose?!"