Mark Zian

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January 30, 2015 by Mark Zian

Happiness is a sad song

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When I first started writing songs, about 10 years ago now. I always struggled with writing happy songs, I wanted nothing more than to write about happy things, about ‘good’ things, but every time I tried it came out forced and awful, so I guess I went with what came more naturally, songs about the things that bothered me, things that sort of forced me to write about them.

I watched a short documentary about an Australia musician the other day and in it he said that his music is about happiness, about the good things, I find it really hard to connect with that, I guess thats one of my biggest issues as a human is that I focus on the negative, the things I would rather change, than focusing on the good things around me, I just don’t really find happiness a compelling topic. I said to Nick once that he should be a character in all my songs, but he said he would rather not as all of the characters are viewed in a negative light. I don’t 100% agree with him, but he makes a valid point. I have had people ask me to write a song about them (in a cute sort of way) but I fear that these people don’t listen to the lyrics and therefore don’t understand that if I did write about them, they would probably prefer that nobody heard that song.

After writing Animal Urges I didn’t write a song for about 18 months, which was alright as I had a lot to record, but I was struggling with the purpose of writing music, making art. Why bother? I could probably write a book about my failed attempts to answer this question but the answer came when Kellie decided that she would leave the empty toilet paper rolls on the floor of the bathroom. Instead of getting angry, I decided to turn them into my own personal entertainment, firstly I created a pyramid of the rolls on top of the toilet seat. Secondly, I drew people on them, begging for a chance to live and not be thrown out.

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I finished with a poem, part of which was transposed on the toilet roll.

The secrets of the universe
are all on youtube
But the production value is poor
So nobody believes them
 
Jesus says
“Its harder for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven,
than it is for a Camel to pass through the eye of a needle”
 
Maybe they should be focusing their research dollars on Camel shrinking.
Just in case
 
Did a 5km park run today. Got beaten by the current state premier ‘Campbell Newman’
Conspiracy?
Campbell Newman or Camel No-man

Then Kellie left a few items of clothes on the floor so I arranged them like people lying on the floor.

I can turn annoyance into entertainment and I think that is probably what I do with my music.

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November 24, 2014 by Mark Zian

It’s not what you write, it’s how you read it

I feel like my poems are to poets, what gay marriage is to catholics. The discussion quickly turns to what a poem is. It doesn’t rhyme, where are the poetic devices?

The problem is, these conversations only serve to distract from the work itself.

Table tennis table
$89.99
To bring some joy to the living room
Assembly is required
Some screws are falling out already
As I open the box, nothing is quite straight
Some holes are drilled twice
And the legs don’t make right angles
3 hours later half complete realisation
This thing is fucked
I think we have reached the point
When this becomes pointless
When the assembly required costs more than the product is worth
it is past saving?
I’m driving back to the store
55kgs no trolley
Matthews helps walking backwards with thongs
Callum tells me that its not what you write is how you read it
These sentences run on and I am bored
Why am I wasting my life
What does purposefulness look like
It’s not what you say its how you say it
How can one be a full time artist
Expressing on a expressing
All day morning coffees
Why do we need to eat
Waste of life
Life is beautiful
I’m bored
There are so many interesting things
No time
Less motivation
I’m bored
No one cares
stop complaining
This is not stream of consciousness
this is training
But I don’t write poems any more
I don’t know what one is
Waste of life
It’s not what you write
It’s how you read it
It’s not what you write
It’s how you read it
I’ve never believed that

It seems that we take words for granted, a poem is a poem, fun is fun, love is love. But so many people have different definitions for theses words. Yes all these definitions will be similar, and therefore we think that we understand what each other are saying, we think we are communicating effectively, but I think we sometimes forget that the small details that may differ are of great significance. I might miss spelling things or forget a comma, but we are all using words with seemingly subjective meanings.

Take fun for example, you may be a reserved person by nature and due to this hear comments like. ‘why don’t you just let your hair down, have some fun’. For this reason, I have always taken fun to mean child like fun, a sense of freedom and complete presentness to a situation, in which you might stop analysing the situation and enjoy its basic moments. However this strikes a problem for people that might struggle to reach this sort of state, a quieting of the mind, naturally. And therefore some self judgement might follow. My point is who cares, who cares whether you think the guy next to you is subscribing to your ideal of fun. but more importantly who cares what a poem is. Whether you describe the above writing as a poem, a mini story or trash, such a distinction does not really aid in understanding it, or possibly getting something out of it. If indeed there is something to get from it.

Certain words mean much more to some than others. If I describe something as a poem, this could be blasphemous to a poet who has worked his life to hone his craft.

Fun is a word I have always struggled with and I found it interesting when I discovered the words origin:

ORIGIN late 17th cent. (denoting a trick or hoax): from obsolete fun [tocheat or hoax,] dialect variant of late Middle English fon [make a fool of, be a fool,] related to fon [a fool,] of unknown origin. Compare withfond .

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November 5, 2014 by Mark Zian

The Lawn

I feel that reading books and mowing the lawn are in great opposition. I have never been good at self talk, well not the kind of self talk that works to calm the mind and console myself in the actions that I am under taking. I am know to those around me as an interrogator, constantly asking questions of those around me. Why? Why? Why? But I also ask how.

Back to the lawn?

The question is why?

In this instance because we had a rental inspection coming up

So the question becomes, why should the rental agency care if our lawn is mowed?

I guess its much like wearing certain types of clothing on different occassions, we must keep up appearances, take pride, the state of your lawn speaks to people, it says something of the occupants of the house.

I’m sure our landlord doesn’t want bad tenants. But couldn’t we be excellent tenants, with a bad lawn?

I work to limit these sorts of questions in the mind of the my landlord.

Then question then becomes about aesthetics.

Aesthetics: “Origin: late 18th cent. (in the sense [relating to perception by the senses] ): from Greek aisthētikos, from aisthēta ‘perceptible things,’from aisthesthai ‘perceive'” 

More specifically why is lawn maintenance viewed as a favourable asethetic. Thats easy, and the key word I think is ‘maintenance‘. It looks as though somebody is taking care of the place. Where as a lawn that is left to grow wild, looks like the inhabitiants don’t care and are willing to let nature resume the house.

Why did we do this to ourselves? Why do humans continually create asethetic ideals that take so much time to maintain? It just doesn’t make logical sense that we would do it. It grows back continuously and we must constantly maintain it. Our lawn is full of bindi’s and weeds and I don’t think anybody in my house actually enjoys it. But what would people think if we didnt have a lawn. What would there perception be then? Haters of nature and the environment.

If we truly loved nature and its beauty, wouldn’t we allow it live naturally, save the constant manicuring.

I think maintenance in this case implies that nature needs humans to preserve and take care of it. It’s an interesting sentiment, however I’m not sure that poisoning  and cutting equal preservation of nature, rather they more elude to preservation of the perception that we are civilised tenants. We must not be unruly. Clean your room.

 

The real estate agent came over
to check if we had tidied our bedrooms
Rinsed dishes on the sink
Washing in the machine
Lawns and hedges cut

It was lunch time
and a manager at work and I were discussing my maturity
She made a comment that she sees her brother as very young
and that I am younger than him
so I asked her what she thought of my maturity
she said your very young
and I asked why.

She brought reference to my part time job
and that i dont have the same level of responsibility as her
as i do not own a house.

The way I see it is that we are both adults
paying for our own existence
not living under the shelter of our parents.
The rest
how much we work
the size of our mortgauges
is all lifestyle choice.
Still no real estate agent
checks if she has cleaned her room.

Mark

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July 20, 2014 by Mark Zian

This is evidence

Today was one of those exciting days
when you’re at your friends house
signing up to a bookkeeping course
so that you can create your own part time job
as you have recently been made redundant

that you go to the toilet and notice
that there are trivia questions printed on the toilet paper
and you realise that your dream is possible
one day you may have your poetry printed on toilet paper.

I worried that Quilton will jump on this quickly
making my eventual rolls look passe
so this is evidence

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January 31, 2012 by Mark Zian

Psychic foretells a future in landscape gardening

My work place is a bit strange, my boss is extremely understanding and I work most days with only women who treat me either as their child or little brother. Basically I get teased all day. But I like it.

A few weeks ago the ladies at work were talking about Psychics and thought it would be a good idea to get a Psychic to come in and give us all readings. I agreed.

For those that know me I am extremely curious and quite a large skeptic and did a little bit of research before the session, mainly into cold reading.

So we sit down and she explains to me how it all works.

The information comes from universal consciousness that is somehow all stored in a central location (maybe in the heavens). She has the ability to access or channel this information from three different spiritual guides. She says its a bit like downloading. Today’s guide is Merlin. How original. Only her name for him of course.

So she starts…… lets just call her Jill for the purposes of this post.

Jill: (Meditates and makes contact with the guide) 

Mark: (As per Jill’s instructions Mark becomes a white clear light as all of his Chakras light up, Mark becomes grounded by said light)

She proceeded to tell me the following:

  • You are in the wrong job
  • I can see a course of night study, something to do with plants or animals
  • Maybe landscape gardening, you dreamt of this when you were younger (unfortunately, not Jill)
  • Building? Animals? Zookeeper?
  • Maybe a Ranger?
  • Merlin is showing me a beach (maybe a Ranger on Fraser Island)
  • You need to be inside
  • When this man is inside something in him withers
  • Im seeing something like a Zoo, breading animals or whatever.
  • You need to look for a job in maybe a wildlife park, if it gets offered to you take it.
  • He is saying to me, although you like to be by yourself there is a girl that shares your interest.
  • Not sure if she is in your life now but she has kaki shorts on and blonde hair. You are walking along the beach together and she has boots on.
  • Don’t get in an old Red or Burgundy sedan (Best mate has one of these)
  • So much is hinging on the decisions that you make soon.
  • Look around for a better superannuation fund

In the end I think that she is good at what she does but I don’t believe she has Psychic abilities. She got some interesting hits, but after listening back, I think I helped her along way too much. Was an interesting experience and I was happy I tried it.

Later that night, my friend Amorina decided that she no longer wanted to sing on my next album. Which I have just finished writing by the way. So if anybody knows a good female singer let me know.

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January 7, 2012 by Mark Zian

Deed Done

I have now left the repository of hangers on, that is facebook. I understand that this doesn’t seem like a big step and really its not, but it feels like one. It must be hard for people to stop playing world of warcraft, especially after it cost them their marriage.

Today, I have Knee Chin practice and the radio show minus Liza.

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April 6, 2011 by MZ

Busy Business Cut

Its amazing how busy I have been recently given the fact that I am currently only working two days a week, but I have been doing a lot with the whole music thing. Here is a list. Everybody loves a list.

  • Band practices with Curlew & Knee Chin
  • Recording the “I am not a Nihilist” album. (Nearly at full completion)
  • Preparations for the album launch
  • Doing the radio show (Weeds & Wildflowers 4zzz 102.1 fm 6-8pm Sunday)
  • Playing squash
  • Reading books

As an undercurrent to my new found happiness, I have been quite worried about money. I accidently brought an expensive guitar on ebay, which turned out well by the way. Other than that I have a large amount of debt and very little income. That is part of the reason for the following.

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I think its like one of those movie Nazi haircuts, or a corporate hair cut, but I guess they are the same thing. It will probably improve my squash playing.

Now all I need is a decent playing part time job.

Peace

Posted in News, Thoughts · 4 Replies ·

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February 25, 2011 by MZ

Moving out

My friends/band mates are moving out of their house tomorrow so Poolie and I went around with a bottle of Mead.

Here is a photo of nick with a mirror.

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In our boredom we decided to have some fun with a lyric generator, I have not laughed so much in years. Here are the results. We are thinking of using it for a Knee Chin soundcheck sound. Its amazing what the internet can do. Name your band, write songs for your band and many more.

The Tale of My Jewish Librarian Friend

It began on a Sleepy Saturday Midday:
I was the most Crazy Didgeridoo salesman around,
He was the most Jewish Librarian.

He was my Friend,
My Jewish Friend,
My Librarian.

We used to Clean so well together,
Back then.
We wanted to Fuck together, around the world,
We wanted it all.

But one Midday, one Sleepy Midday,
We decided to Fuck too much.
Together we Fucked a Hand.
It was Clean, so Clean.

From that moment our relationship changed.
He grew so Drunk.

And then it happened:

Oh no! Oh no!

He Raped Poolie.
Alas, Poolie!
My Friend Raped Poolie.
It was Homely, so Homely.

The next day I thought my Knee had broken,
I thought my Chin had burst into flames,
(But I was actually overreacting a little.)

But still, he is in my thoughts.
I think about how it all changed that Midday,
That Sleepy Saturday Midday.

My Chin… ouch!
When I think of that Jewish Librarian,
That Jewish Librarian and me.

Generated by some lyric generator thing.

…………………………………….

That made me cry it was so funny.

If people actually read any of my babble, please comment, I need gratification, I need to feel loved etc. (Can’t you just hear my Violin music?)

Bye

Posted in Knee Chin, Poems/Lyrics, Random, Thoughts · 2 Replies ·

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February 23, 2011 by MZ

Talking to myself again?

It’s seems to me, that a lot of conversations are merely just a way for people to talk through other people. A way to resolve things for ourselves to obtain clarity. Waiting for their time to talk. I talk a lot, too much. Silence makes me a little uneasy and with my mind always racing, it’s easy to fill the space by vomiting words all over it.

Blogs are really just another way to talk to ourselves. If anybody is actually reading this, you may think that this is worded as if I am talking to you, and trying to put a message to the outside world. However you’re wrong, just like a diary you seem to be, well as I am writing at least, nonexistent.

I uploaded some demos on the nihilist myspace today and realised that I was wrong, people do seem to exist on the Internet. This reminds me of time I told my friend Paul that I put some songs online. He said “you are entering a world of pain.” I am still waiting for said world to arrive, so I think I don’t worry about sharing overtly personal shit, on the internet and otherwise, for the following reasons.

1. People could care less what I have to say and just as if we were in a conversation, they are merely waiting for their turn to speak.

2. People are nice to our face and will only really talk behind your back. And if we use the same logic many use to dismiss god, “I can’t see it so it doesn’t exist”. So it’s all sweet.

My favorite is when you ask a person what they think. They stop and think about how to make what they were thinking acceptable. A spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down. The interesting thing is that we will also dumb down the complements, can’t look like we care too much. Don’t want to be gushy.

This is retarded, I could talk to myself for hours.

Goodnight Mark
Goodnight Mark
Goodnight John Boy

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January 30, 2011 by MZ

Moving out

Musicians must apparently use the following things.

Myspace
Facebook
Twitter
Drugs
Alcohol
Women

So the best way to do all of this and still have time to actually make music is by linking them. For example, you consume alcohol, drug and then use the women. Note that this is not undertaken by me, but I hear on the grape vine that there are certain heart throbs in the music scene that swear by such an approach. But of course these are more than likely just rumours. Cough.

More seriously promotion seems to be the most important thing in music, mailing lists, Facebook fan pages and twitter updates. I can hear you saying, you’re a hippocrite mark, Mr I write a self indulgent blog, however this time I’m not being negative. Its just the basics of being a bottom of the barrel scum bag musician these days. We can’t all be Jandek. Everybody has heard the stories about people becoming famous by putting their music on myspace, but I think it’s more like this: a&r rep walks down the street, sees the only musician in town and signs him. In this story Myspace is the proverbial street. The problem is that now this town is bursting with millions of kids looking for some easy fame, now enter the Idol tv shows and it gets even worse. The bottom line is the bottom line and if you don’t have dollar signs all over you nobody will touch you, this goes for all levels of music, if you’re a local nobody you can get shows at pubs as long as people want to sink piss to your shit. With the big guys it’s still all about numbers, tickets, cd’s and merch. Let’s think about music as if it were like choosing the colours to paint your house. I’m going to assume that the majority of houses are painted neutral colours. Everybody likes them, beige or White Walls etc etc etc, calming blues, peaceful greens and all that bullshit. So this is what music has largely come to, a consumer targeted product designed to maximise profits.

Don’t get me wrong there is really good music out there, it just doesn’t get rammed down your throat, most of these people are struggling just to break even. So now coming full circle, I am back to my point. The Internet and promotion, how can we not be appreciative of it, it makes it easier for us to find real art and also share our own work. We might not find fame, and for a lot of us thats not what we are looking for, but we can share our work, and have some satisfaction as we slave away at our day jobs that somebody might just be listening to one of our songs.

So yeah, after much pressure from, my accountant friends Mark and Ricky and after much thought, I am going to try and use this twitter and Facebook thing to promote, oh and also to babble opinionated bullshit.

The problem now come to motivation as when I am faced with the choice of making music and promoting music, making music always wins.

I think I got a bit off topic there.

Farewell

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