Michael Falcore is our rock star friend. I mean whenever we bang out of the house dressed to the nines and our father says (with a hint of goth-father pride), ‘where are you girls going in your goth finery?’ We always reply, ‘To dine with our rock star friend.’ And in fact my two favourite images these days are us three sisters, our friend Rany and Mr. Falcore eating Indian food all in black, and the second is thinking of him sitting on the tour bus after a show, swirling 25 year old scotch in a high ball glass with a look of satisfaction.
As you know, Mr. Falcore is one of the guitarists for The Birthday Massacre our favourite band about town. They’ve been around since 2000 slowly growing and growing in to the magical mélange that they are now. Mr. F. is funny, interesting and has a film-atic past. Visit the bands website for all their doings, they are busy! We begged them to take us on their next tour, but alas, there’s no room for three crazy sisters.
The Pomegranate Questionnaire
1. Can you tell us a little about what you do? Well, for my day job I’m a guitar player/songwriter for a band called The Birthday Massacre, but my real dream is to work at one of the big banks inside a small cubicle
2. Why that? It seemed like a good idea at the time.
3. Does it pay the bills? Does it matter? Somehow, the band manages to pay my basic living expenses. Despite all this file sharing, and the music industry bottoming out, we found a way to survive. Maybe it’s because we’ve been independent for so many years. Knock on wood. Btw, the music industry is in ruins
4. What book did you last read? I read a Richard Laymon novel calledFunland. Laymon is one of those authors where I have to hide the book cover if I’m reading it in public. He’s such an odd writer. His characters are goofy and totally unrealistic, but there’s a strange charm to them. And, he puts them in really dark, perverted situations. And, he’s obsessed with the word “rump” What’s not to like?
5. What is your idea of perfect happiness? My grandparents have an engraved sign in their house that reads ‘Good friends, good wine, good times.” Maybe that’s all you need to be happy. Good friends and fermented grapes But, in all seriousness, I think the only true happiness is sitting with Bilbo Baggins on his porch blowing wonderful smoke rings.
6. What achievement are you most happy about so far? When I first started playing music in highschool I never imagined that I would get to travel the world and put on shows. That has to be the biggest thing I’ve done, performing on a stage on the other side of the world.
7. What is your most treasured possession? I don’t know, maybe my Gibson SG guitar. It’s been all over the world with me, and it looks cool. I have a lot of toys, and I treasure all of them
8. Have you swooned in the cinema? I think swooning is more of a girl thing. Like when Daniel Craig emerges from the water in Casino Royale. I know some girls who swooned at that.
9. Do you have a hero? I don’t have one big hero. I have a bunch of lesser heroes that are genre specific. For example, one of my guitar heroes is Robert Smith. But, for film I admire David Lynch. That way I don’t have all my eggs in one basket, and if one of them gets caught in some perverse scandal then my whole world doesn’t come crashing down
10. What is your motto or favourite expression or both? “It’s the case” when confirming the absolute truth of something. I love it. “That’s the case” works too
Two things I remember so clearly, one, a tiny finch that flitted on our window ledge although it was so cold, it must have been a tame finch escaped and now lost like I was in this city. I grew so sad thinking of it, but it was gone before I could do anything save store the memory of it within me. It was so perfect, the way a tiny mouse is perfect, nature at its best; so elegantly proportioned and beautiful, so smooth and gray, with a cap of black and tiny wise eyes which, in my imaginings, caught mine and said, ‘I am so alone.’ The other was the last night, the night before he disappeared he had brought me strawberries. Where were there strawberries at a time like this, in a city that seemed underground frozen and dead? He reached in to a bag and pulled them out with a bottle of champagne, ‘cliché, I know’ he said, but we sat on the bed and ate them, drinking the champagne, chilled by the night air so it tasted like green apples from glasses from the bathroom and it was heavenly all the same.
Have I told you his name? William, William Gallows. I am writing it here to see it in ink, and to put it out in to the world, the ether, in hopes that he is reading this. Although from what little I learned of him from him, he would have so hated to be talked about, he’d leave the room when his odd little cronies would start to tell me his history. It seemed a fairy tale the places he’d been, and what he’d done. ‘It’s nothing’ he’d tell me later, picking up empty glasses and rearranging the room (he was a big re-arranger) ‘I’ve lived a long time, its easy to do a lot when you’ve lived a long time, I would hate to think of having done nothing with all the time I’ve had.’
He slept with me the whole of that night, and on in to the early evening. I was so hungry, but he would not wake. I went out, feeling so oddly guilty as I always did, passing the concierge and the front desk. They’d watching me slink past like a cat that had come with the night, or worse someone with a secret. Yet I am of age, and we are in love I told myself, but I couldn’t shake feeling slightly dirty and somewhat temporary. I ate in the café next to the hotel. They had gotten to know me and joked about my dietary habits. I told them vegetarian, I got tired even thinking about telling them I was vegan. I could not tell if they found me quaint with my oddly accented French or a sad joke, with my shadow of a lover. I can’t worry about these things. On my way back I remember looking in the poor black trees, like skeletons with their feet stuck in to ornate grills, for that poor finch. I had a small bag with a croissant for him, though I knew he wouldn’t want it.
When I got back to the room he was gone. The bed was made. The room smelled of nothing, not even sleep. He was gone. He didn’t even leave a note.
He had packed his personal belongings, shaving kit, his watch, his one ring and left. He left behind a black suitcase, his battered black suitcase as if to say, ‘I will be back’ or to say, ‘I will never be back, and I will need this no longer.’
I deluded myself in to thinking that he had just stepped out, but on the second day, when the front desk called and asked if I was keeping the room as the bill was paid up to noon that day, and if I wanted it any longer I would have to come down and swipe my credit card, I admitted to myself that he was gone.
I wept then, violently, for I knew I would never see him again. He was so furtive and self contained. I knew so little about him, but what he showed me seemed perfection. He always said the right thing, had the right answer, knew when to and when not to talk. He fit so well. And now I was alone in a room that didn’t even have his scent, having had the last word and knowing I will never get an answer.
There is nothing more horrid then having the last word.
After that I remember little, I knew I couldn’t function as my knees were giving out, my intestines were vibrating, my brain was disconnecting. I remember calling home, and, thankfully, it was my father that answered and I remember that, with hearing his voice suddenly feeling warm and safe and horrible and ungrateful. Our father is a absentminded recovering goth who gets lost in city’s that have streets that curve, but in an emergency he is the person I will always rely on to have a plan. He took down where I was and in two hours told me there was a flight booked in my name and that the hotel bill had been settled. The concierge would put me in a taxi that would take me to the airport and then back to Toronto.
On the flight I just sat there. Food came and went. I was polite to the woman beside me who fussed with her small child. I don’t think I ate. I think I drank gin. There was a movie. I felt horrifically dry. Inside I felt altered, unwatered. I felt betrayed. I expected nothing, yet I did not expect this. I had let my guard down and fallen in love.
My parents and my sisters met me at the airport. Elizabeth, embarrassingly started sobbing so loudly I had to comfort her. Our father had lost it also, which made me cry, then Sarah did. Our mother, who only looked worried and ashen, shepparded us to the car.
It was raining.
There is something about the drive back from the Toronto Pearson Airport that always makes me regret having come home. I love Toronto, I love my parents and this house, but driving through the suburban wasteland, surely one of the most antiseptic and ugly stretches of banality, takes all the sublime magic, joy and pain that one has just experienced and seals it in a Ziploc and tosses it in to the freezer.
I am home now. I have not heard from him. My parents did not ask about the marks on my skin. My mother simply said, ‘when you are ready, you can tell us. As long as you are safe.’ His suitcase is here, it was my only luggage, and I have not opened it. I can see it in the attic corner as I write this. Outside a storm is coming and the leaves on the trees are swishing sounding very much like the sea.
We must confess we were a little overwhelmed by all the very magical people who answered our casting call. So much so that we couldn’t narrow it down to one and have picked a posse of Pomegranate girls, well, two, plus three from other countries and one intern. We will introduce you to each of them as we have photos to show.
So ladies and gentlemen, please welcome the first official Pomegranate muse, Amanda. She describes herself as an “animal loving, tattooed vegetarian, and makeup artist. I’m outspoken, loud and fun.” We think she is luminous, don’t you agree?
These are a few test photo’s that Sarah took of her on the weekend, (giving you a sneak peak at a few of our fall releases). More muses, more photos to come.
Signs and symbols trickle down like petals falling from a tulip tree.We were all made late for work today by the arrival of the morning post. In it was a lovely box, pre-ordered almost a year ago and forgotten, The Vampire Tarot by Robert M. Place. We fell upon it and were tempted to call in sick, so rich are the illustrations so dense is the book.
Isn’t this just magical? You really must have one. A full review, with tea and a reading to follow.
Come autumn we are going to launch the publishing wing of the House of Pomegranates. I know, I know, we’ve already published a number of intriguing and sublime books, but by October, we’re actually going to have the webpage up so you can order them. We will also have a meet the author page and downloadable MP3s of our authors, geniuses that they are, reading from their books.
But that’s not all! We are going to launch a webzine much in the manner of McSweeney’s (clever, smart, AND well designed) where we will publish on-line articles by you, gentle readers on topics you feel compelled to write about; recipes, shoes, books, calculus, you name it (though, please nothing about your boyfriend’s band)(or your boyfriend)(unless he is a tight rope walker). So here we are, megaphone in hand, calling for submissions. Articles can be on any topic, and any length, we love photos too. Send your magical writing here and lets put out a zine!
Did we ever tell you that our dream is to put on a production of
Dracula? It’s true, however we are so back and forth on it. At one point Alice in a fit of ballsy consumerism bought every known script of stage version Dracula’s available. We spent weeks reciting them aloud, making notes, scrunching our noses. Always though, two things would stump us, 1. the money obviously and 2. whether it be a lavish stage set with the audience sitting in a theatre or, and this is what we were more leaning towards, a lavish stage set where the audience sat in (think the garden’s of the Westenra estate in Francis Ford Coppola’s Dracula) and on stage a very sparse set for the play. Elizabeth, of course, would do the goth/loli costumes which would be, naturally, to die for. As money is always an issue, there it sits, in our dreams only.
Flash forward to last night, June 11, 2009, The Winter Garden Theatre the city’s romantic hidden jewel, an audience in a garden, hidden away to watch the life of Edgar Allan Poe, the all singing, all dancing play Nevermore, and there we were, dressed in our goth/loli best, we three sisters and our parents (who looked pretty good themselves for recovering elder-Goths) with front row seats.
We were unsure what to expect, it was the promotional photo in amongst all the others on the poster for Luminato, an arts festival here in Toronto that sold us. Toronto in the summer is awash in festivals, one tends to spend most of the season tripping over mimes and doging buskers, we love Luminato however as it is mostly indoors and mostly theatre and dance. Nevermore comes from close to home, well, close as in Edmonton.
(from their website) “The Catalyst Theatre is an Edmonton-based theatre company that creates bold new productions under the leadership of Artistic Director, Jonathan Christenson. Catalyst’s work can be described as “small-scale spectacle” - big plays with big ideas, stunning, surreal designs, evocative musical scores, and a heightened approach to language, movement and performance style.
The company has been recognized nationally and internationally for its unique theatrical vision. Past productions have toured England, Wales, Scotland, Australia, the U.S.A. and Canada and have been honoured with over forty awards.
In addition to creating new work, Catalyst runs a funky and flexible performance venue - a 140-seat converted warehouse in the heart of Edmonton’s theatre district.”
We must confess the production left us dizzy. Mixing fact and fiction, prose and show(tunes), it was sublime, and also one of the first productions I’ve been to where the instant standing ovation at the end was truly, truly earned. Alice whispered mid-way that it was production made for us, but that would imply that we have a clever and cool Byronesque aura, and we so do not. Elizabeth said, it was the play you would see as the evening’s entertainment in our imaginary mansion built on a cliff by the sea, if we had entertain one stormy night midway through a weekend soiree. I just thought it was so well done.
The costumes by Production Designer Bretta Gerecke were in the manner of goth/loli with the foundation garments, the lines of vintage jumble-sale Victorian and then HUGE hoop skirts and frills and additions that seem to be made with *Japanese Paper* Amazing. All black and white with red. The set was really just a sectioned scrim made of lace and using clever lighting and even cleverer props nightmare worlds and shapes appeared in the shadows. Made all the more delicious by the luscious, lugubrious and haunting choreography of Laura Krewski.
The music by writer/director/composer Jonathan Christenson was *sumptuously* good. Think Switchblade Symphony showtunes played by Tafelmusik Baroque Orchestra (kidnapped and made to play in a dark room). The actors all were perfection and as we sat SO CLOSE we could see that in the last scene they were all crying. We cried too.
I so wish you could have been there with us. There are a few days still left, go, go now, it’s changed us, it will change you! Art can change lives as the Victorian’s felt. We felt like running home after seeing this, we almost felt good about the world.
- Sarah
p.s. Their production of Frankenstein is coming next year, you can bet we will be there, it’s a date.
I will set the scene for you. Elizabeth and I are sprawled upon our respective spaces on the attic floor, she muttering as she works (she takes her own personal meetings) and I, stomach to the floor, feet in the air, chest on a pillow, typing to you. We are listening to the gloriously irritating and crackly 1953 recording of Façade by and with Dame Edith Sitwell, helped by Peter Pears with music by poopy Sir William Walton, performed by the Chamber Orchestra, all conducted by Frederick Prausnitz. (say that aloud three times!) We have this specific recording playing you see to drown out a) the blood curdling screams of the children in the street engaged in bloodcurdling honest children’s play and b) I have the song Loves Me Like A Rock by Paul Simon in my head, and believe me, you do not want that in your head for love or money. Across the dusty floor (we really must dust, damn the sun for casting that glorious ray and exposing our slovenliness) I can see Alice, curled up on our couch all in her nest of black like a lovely crow enwrapped in her wings, with huge headphones on listening to who knows what, scribbling furiously in her journal. She has a novel to write, you see. I can see over in her corner the strange black suitcase she brought back with her and, to our knowledge has not yet opened. It is the suitcase of that man, Mr. Gallows as she called him, who she disappeared with and then he to her, like her from us, disappeared leaving only that behind. It smells of earth and moss and lemon. (yes, I have smelled it)
Monster our cat is sound asleep in her otter position, on her back, paws bent forward in her own patch of sunlight.
And so then, the scene is set, add in the scent of freshly cut grass and lilac. May I add we’d just eaten a huge breakfast where I experimented with making the tofu scramble using silken tofu. No one was quite into the mushrooms, but our mother said, ‘no matter, I will make soup.’
Yesterday a film crew was here all morning. It was the strangest thing. Our family was filmed for a documentary on eccentrics. Us? I mean, we are thrilled to be thought of as strange and unusual, but we do not collect souvenir spoons, wear Hammer Pants without irony or paint half our faces opposite colours and hoot at sporting events. Eccentrics? Us? Anyway, we were thrilled to oblige and the filmmaker was charming and put us at ease and the crew were nice and broke nothing and were silent most of the time, filled as they were with the task of trying to find light in the enveloping darkness that is our house. The day was warm and delicious however and the Korean lilac in our front yard scented the scene. We mostly sat on the porch in the swing, in the shade of the awning and stayed out of the way.
Dreams of No Coffee and Doing Math In Your Sleep
Forgive me recounting a dream. I dreamed there was no coffee left in the world. Think of that! I went from coffee shop to coffee shop and was met with the same tense look of the staff and people standing with their coffee mugs empty looking desperate, confused, sad and lost. When at last I did find one hole in the wall place that still had coffee, (and believe me by then I was getting pretty scared) they demanded exact change which for the life of me I could not do.
Fortunately Monster the Cat jumped on my bladder and I was saved from this dreamland hell.
Why did I share that dream with you? Did you know that in your sleep you cannot read numbers or do math? It’s true, and funnily enough, in that coffee dream hell I kept saying to the shopkeeper, ‘I’m dreaming this, so there’s no way I’ll be able to do the math!’ Try it next time you’re asleep. Try dialing a number on the telephone or looking at a clock to tell the time. Has anyone else experienced this?
Marsupial Pouches And Rock Stars
We went out with our favourite rock star last week. He is urbane and kind and knows quiet places that serve cheap Indian food. As he is a rock star we rarely see him as he is forever on tour, something apparently a rock star must now do as no one pays for music anymore, so you must tour, tour, tour hoping all the while that your girlfriend doesn’t lose her job. He was regaling us with tour stories and of his time in Australia when he said something that, honestly readers, we have still not recovered from. Marsupial pouches are filled with a secreted waxy compound. I was shocked. Apparently everyone knows this, but I could not go on. A secreted waxy compound? So when little Roo in Winnie the Pooh jumps in to Kanga’s pouch it is in to this sticky, gut filled world of secretion? Who knew?! I thought they would be like hoodies and have maybe a little bit of lint in them. I have not been the same since learning that.
So what have we learned today?
- Discordant tone poems will eradicate Paul Simon from your head quite nicely.
- You cannot make proper change when you are asleep.
- Never go to dinner with a rock star and think you will be the same afterwards
Our very magical friend Magda Trzaski is having her work shown in L.A. this month at the super cool La Luz de Jesus gallery. If you’re in L.A. stop by and, well, buy!
On Halloween night I made some vegan vows, I vowed from then on two things, to never kill or knowingly harm any living thing and to only sleep with vegans (should the opportunity arise, so to speak). Well, nine months on, no sex, but I’ve sure gotten a lot of mosquito bites.
In other news we are so excited about the response we’ve been getting from our Scary/Monster/Beautiful casting call. We had no idea who was reading our little newsletter from beyond, fearing it may only be our parents, but we’ve since found that there are a lot of insanely cool, interesting, articulate and lovely readers out there. Thank you. The deadline isn’t until June 15, so if you’re curious, there’s still time.
