British Columbia has declared a public health emergency over the recent rise in fentanyl-related deaths. Good on 'em. ​

The numbers themselves are harrowing. The Globe and Mail wrote,

It seems to me that "state of emergency" is an appropriate term to use, considering those statistics.

I think it's shameful that anybody needs to die due to poor public policy. I believe these deaths stem from a refusal to educate people due to matters of criminalization, which creates an abusive black market.

I don't know how to write about this as a coherent post with a beginning, middle, and end. So here's a  bulleted list:

• I believe the War on Drugs has been ineffective. It hasn't worked. Cartels in Mexico, the prevalence and availability of drugs anywhere—prohibition has failed. It always will. People will find the drugs they want, no matter how much you prohibit them. At leaste give them a chance to buy the drugs without them being "laced" with impurities.
• As a public school teacher, I think a lot about effective education. It is impossible to teach students how to respond to drug-related situations when it's criminalized because the black market is not regulated. If you want to teach students about how to deal with something, they need to know what they're dealing with. But with the prohibition program, we never know what we're dealing with. Hence people buying MDMA and finding themselves poisoned by fentanyl. They can't be educated about MDMA safety nearly as effectively as we can educate them about alcohol and nicotine safety because the criminal aspect creates an enormous grey zone. Let's get rid of the grey zone.
• As a citizen, I want accurate information. Why should I listen to people who say drugs are all bad, all the time, when there are so many people who have used those drugs and been just fine? The anecdotal evidence is vast, but citizens deserve better than that. We can only have accurate information if we can study these drugs in a controlled environment, and this is very difficult when the substance is criminalized.
• As a citizen, I want to be able to experience drugs safely. Just as I can trust that my Tylenol is what it says it is, if I need to use some sort of currently-illicit drug for something, I want to do it safely.
• As a father, I want my children to have a wide swathe of experiences growing up, but I want them to have safe options. I know they will likely experiment with a drug or two, but as long as they are prohibited, they won't really know what they're getting into. So regulate it.
• As an artist, I want people to experience my art in any way they wish. If they want to get themselves high beforehand, go for it. If they can get drunk at a show, they should be able to also consume other drugs at that show, if thise drugs are regulated in a similar manner.
• Criminalization of drugs creates criminals out of users. This is a waste of law enforcement energy. Let the bureaucrats deal with users and let the police deal with real criminal matters.
• As I noted in the Tweet above, our culture is stressful and busy. There is no "simple life" when everyone needs money, when practically every family needs two working parents. The need for escape from this system is strong, and hallucinogens, stimulants, and downers are an effective short-term solution to those who can't break from the system in a more everyday manner. The demand will always be there and always grow. There's no escape from the demand—we need regulation.

(As I look at this list, obviously safety and transparency are important to me. Hmm.)

The following podcast with Johann Hari discusses an upcoming UN summit on worldwide drug policy:

Hari made this succinct thesis, paraphrasing Ruth Dreifuss, who legalized heroin in Switzerland:

I agree. Bring it out in the open and regulate it for safety's sake. Let's stop this prudish silliness and learn how to deal with culture without criminalization.

Here are some of the photos I took with it.

And a couple from a previous camerahack back in 2012.

For the last month or so, I've been trying to slowly put together a recorded version of LSU's "Pound of Flesh" for some upcoming Michael Knott tribute album. I doubt I'll be able to get it to top notch quality in time, but it would be pretty cool if I did. Here's what it's looking like right now:

Here's a confession: I stole a cassette copy of LSU's Cash in Chaos World Tour from a cassette clearance bin years and years ago, like back in 1993 or so. (I've since bought a legitimate CD version of the album). I'm pleased so see that you can order Cash in Chaos World Tour on Bandcamp. And you should order it. It's one of the most enduring albums in my CD collection; I've been listening to it consistently for the last 20 years or so.

"Pound of Flesh" was the first song I really connected with on the album. The groovy bassline and echo-box vocals really jived with me and I enjoyed the way it was a long song that had enough melodic variety in it that it kept my interest while it also maintained a consistent tone. Its lyrics meshed perfectly with the music. I'd often listen to it over and over again; it truly inspired me to think about the way bass guitar can drive a song.

I doubt that I'll be able to do it justice. I've replaced all the digital chorus-y guitars with wah-wahs, and replaced all the flange-y guitars in the chorus with some straight Marshall distortion; the bass is a clean Jazz Bass doubled with the Rhodes; there's a touch of high-end synthesizer helping to release the recording from the classic "mud" that usually permeates my recordings. But it still sounds like me, doubtless.

I wouldn't be surprised if I don't get to record the vocals before the due date, but it's worth a shot. It's sounding OK right now.

The most frightening thing about it is the following part of the instructions that Joshua Lory posted on Facebook:

You see, I've never sent anything sorta' professional to a stranger. I don't know if my mixes sound real or if they sound absultely, completely amateur. I'm a little freaked out that, if I get it finished on time, I'll send the mix to the guy and he'll laugh at its utter ineptitude. I mean, Joshua Lory's mixes sound pretty good:

So we'll see. Here's to hoping I get it done.

Larry Norman died back in 2008. It seemed like a big deal to me at the time. I had followed his life and music since I was in Grade 7 and it really shocked me that he had finally, actually died. I mean, he'd sung about his impending death so much that it was kind-of weird that it actually happened. I planned to go to a little open-mic tribute show at The House of James in Abbotsford, but was thwarted by unique circumstances. I intended to play one of his lesser-known blues numbers, "When the Son Comes Back."

For all intents and purposes, I was a fan. I think I really enjoyed Larry Norman's music for the most part, or at least I enjoyed collecting it and following him. Some of his songs are excellent; a bunch of them are pretty good; lots of them are laughably bad. Late in his life, he released five or six albums a year on CD-R and I was able to generally keep up with the releases until I got married. Admittedly, most of these albums were disappointing, but I have to admit they were fun to collect.

After a while, I started collecting the albums more for the artwork and the liner notes than for the music itself. Music-wise, I expected disappointment: some raggle-taggle collection of outtakes that didn't deserve to be released in the first place, or perhaps a live concert with a bunch of the same songs released on ten other albums. He seemed to have a mission to release everything he put to tape, even the most unsuitable bootlegs, and often alluded in his newsletters that it was hard to tell what type of music his fans wanted. Apparently there are piles of tapes still sitting at his estate in Salem, still waiting to be digitized.

Recently, on Christian Nightmares, I read an interview with David Di Sabatino, the director of Fallen Angel: The Outlaw Larry Norman. I saw the film a few years ago and wasn't impressed. I felt it was cheap and sloppy, extremely long, and obsessively shill-ish. Moreso, it seemed as self-indulgent as Larry's own liner notes: it made a big, big deal out of comparatively minor events. The film prompted loads of Internet and real-life drama for diehard Larry Norman fans. I even wrote a negative review of the film on Amazon.

But I couldn't shake a bunch of the film's accusations, largely because I felt he indirectly confirmed them by his many defensive and aggressive allegations in his extensive liner notes, interviews, and newsletters. Even when I was in high school, I could read between the lines and infer that there was more going on than he let on.

So, in case you're interested in the interesting Larry Norman story, although I can't recommend the film, I do recommend the interviews at Christian Nightmares. Here's Part 1: Here's Part 2. I feel that this interview is much more balanced than what came out in the film. Where the film came off as vendetta-like, these interviews come off as literate. Di Sabatino keeps it personal, describes his experiences clearly, and delineates the differences between his facts and inferences.

Here's one part that I appreciated, simply because it confirmed to me that somebody else read through the liner notes in a similar way:

And I appreciate what he says about being a "fan."

It's hard to say whether I'm a "fan" anymore. I only have five or six of his songs on my phone and I usually skip them when they appear in the shuffle. As much as I try to enjoy listening to the So Long Ago the Garden album (which is an excellent album) or scattered songs, interviews like this one have just tainted his image too much to really enjoy the music. And that's kind-of sad because I know his music brought me joy so many times before.

But here's a little version of one of his songs that I recorded a few years ago. His songs weren't all that bad. I just can't enjoy them anymore.