Cara Walton Photography
January
ISSUE TWELVE
Edited by Mike Arellano and Iain Oldman
WORST WE Hey, we made it to 2015! Go ahead everyone, pat yourselves on the back and go out and find an evangelical preacher who pounded their fists that this would be the year of our biblical doom, and punch them right in their stupid face. Its a new year, a time to celebrate our gains from the past year, forget our failures, and move on to a better and brighter future.
Cara Walton Photography
EEK EVER Almost sixty percent of Americans truly believe that this next year will be better than their last, and I think that is true for maybe about a dozen of them. Truth is, we’re all getting older, more fat and useless, and our brains and bodies are decaying. What evidence is there to support that anything will get ANY better? This is the Worst Week Ever.
All poetry, short stories and artwork are submitted by people that live here in the Harrisonburg area.
Elwood “Trip” Madison
Thursday, January 8 10 PM Crayola House Donations Vomiting Dinosaurs, Nuclear Hellfrost, Swamp Squat Kick off the month with this ridiculously loud celebration of Indiana’s grindcore scene. Nuclear Hellfrost and Swamp Squat both visit Harrisonburg on tour, from Fort Wayne, Indiana. Swamp Squat play their own brand of crusty hardcore influenced grindcore and Nuclear Hellfrost are sure to brutalize your ears with their impending noise and pace, and are coming in fresh with a new 5 inch split release. Local grind greats Vomiting Dinosaurs round off the bill with a fresh release of their own. Don’t miss out on the chance to ring in the new year with ringing ears. Word play!
Friday, January 9 4 PM Three Bros. Brewing Free
Three Bros. Brewing 2 Year Anniversary Release
Ancient Sumerian texts show that the first barleywine recorded in global history was gifted to the sorry peoples by the benevolent Enki. Now, to celebrate their second anniversary, Three Bros. Brewing has elected to do the same. Show up on Saturday to enjoy some barbecue and expertly crafted booze so potent that it will strip the spray paint that you huffed that afternoon out of your lungs. Free live music, barrel aged barleywine on draft and bottled to go, what more could anyone want?
Monday, January 12 9 PM Artful Dodger Free Open Mic Comedy Night For the second month now the area’s best (and worst!) stand up comics will share the stage to try and force laughs out of the terrified audience through the age old go to’s of stand up comedyawkward pity, dick jokes, and the rule of threes. It would be nice to hear everyone laugh, though, so be sure to pound a few of those cheap liquor drinks and I dunno, pregame with that Tom Segura special on Netflix. Now THAT is funny!
Thursday, January 15 10 PM Crayola House Donations Earthling, Occultist, Krang, Meth Valley
Perfectly festooned smack dab in the middle of the month, this night of metal mayhem is sure to get you all junked up on adrenaline, necessary to carry you through the Valley’s angry winters. Harrisonburg’s own Earthling always puts on a great show, and are followed up on the bill by one of Virginia’s greatest, most enthralling metal acts, Occultist, who blast into your hearts with Richmond-signature thrash metal, infused with black metal straight from Scandinavia. Visiting Harrisonburg are Chicago’s d-beat crust thrashers Krang, and cock rockers Meth Valley, from Boston. Be sure to come out for a celebration of all things brutal!
Friday, January 23-24 5 PM Court Square Theater 10$ The 24 Hour Project Returning for their second year in a row, the great crew at Court Square Theater runs their 24 hour marathon celebrating all forms of art and culture in Harrisonburg. For only $10 a ticket, you get a seat to absorb an entire day’s worth of music (of all genres), art, poetry reading, theater performances, stand up comedy, dance, and workshops. You don’t have to be in your seat the entire run through (though it is highly recommended), but make sure you check out the full list of performances so you don’t miss whatever calls to you.
Cara Walton Photography
CALL TO WRITERS
word. A Juried Show Uniting Writing and Visual Art Opening Reception: Friday, February 6th, 2015 at 5-8pm Spitzer Art Center, 486 W. Market St., Harrisonburg, VA 1 Write an original poem or short prose piece (any style/subject) 2 Use any medium to display/frame/decorate your words, and/or the space around them. 3 $4 per entry/4 entries max 4 Drop off submissions at Spitzer Art Center on Sat, January 10th or 17th from 10am-2pm. 5 Beginners are encouraged to submit! Top three contributors will be headlining artists at Spitzer Art Center during Saturday, Feb. 14th at 10am. Winning contributors will be featured in Worst Week Ever, and will receive a professionally printed copy of the zine that they are featured in. Contact Angela M. Carter at info@angelacarterpoetry.com or Danielle Campbell at dncampbell83@gmail.com
Cara Walton Photography
Cara Walton Photography
WORST WEEK EVER
Year in Review There is always an inherent self-involved perversion when sitting down to read another wrap up review of the year that just blew behind you, and its in contrast to everything that we’re injected with to comprehend our lives: move on, don’t live in the past, you can’t change what has already happened. But every year, every year, we demand an instant recap of the news items, fads, food waves, international crises, tech trends, and all of the other happenings that ticked over Times Square, diluted down to neon headlines. So really, who am I to deny you of your given right to an arbitrary list of things that happened?
When you start trying to remember a list of everything that happened in the past year, you tend to suffer from recency bias, so let’s get those out of the way first and get everything uncluttered, alright? The deaths of Michael Brown and Eric Garner at the hands of police officers, and the subsequent lack of litigation became the undisputed political storm of 2014, sucking up all sorts of figures from the St. Louis Rams to Bill de Blasio to Barack Obama. Oh, what’s that ebola? You have something to say about that? Well shit, I guess you sure do. The epidemic outbreak of ebola exposed more about the rest of the world than it maybe did Africa. After seventy years of decolonization, ebola showed that much of the western world still holds onto pedantic and racist views of the African continent, shutting down airports and travel, lumping together all of Africa’s countries into one giant island. The United States and (recently) the United Kingdom have had cases of ebola on their soil in 2014. You know who hasn’t? South Africa, or Ethiopia, or Sudan. Cara Walton Photography
Also on the international landscape was the Crimean dispute in Ukraine, which brought down a Malaysian Air liner in it’s black hole of civil unrest. Most recently, the US rescinded it’s moratorium on trade with Cuba, which is pretty cool if you’re like me and love rum.
On our shores, oh boy, where do we start? Somehow, the NFL’s public image got worse when Ray Rice beat his then-fiancee in an elevator in Las Vegas, which as you know, is a time honored tradition of football weddings. When Roger Goodell failed to promptly and effectively punish him, SHIT HIT THE FAN, and rightly so. The league instituted a league-wide domestic abuse policy, and the players responded by throwing their spouses into a pile of guns and threatening to kill them (Greg Hardy) and beating them at their own birthday parties (Ray McDonald). Adrian Peterson then believed it would be a great time to whip one of his two dozen children. Also in sports, former Clippers owner Donald Sterling was nice enough to date a girl who would record him saying the ridiculously racist shit that he’s been sued for in the past. He lost the team, his girlfriend, and according to his lawyers, his sanity. Though, it can be argued that his sanity has been gone for years.
The winter olympics happened, too. I know most of you forgot about that, but not me. I legit love the winter olympics, and the weather was perfect for two weeks. Everything was covered in snow, the roads were drowned in slosh and ice, and everything that wasn’t in downtown Harrisonburg shut down, which all added up to a perfect environment to drink gin and watch the tandem bobsled. In the summer we got treated to the world’s favorite international competition: the 2014 World Cup. To recap- our southern neighbors got screwed over by Oscarnominated Arjen Robben, the United States lost out to a nation famous for their waffles and overrated beer, and the Germans took out the host country with ruthless bloodguzzling before defeating Argentina in the finals, leaving the handful of fugitive Nazis in the country at conflict to contain their excitement. Hoping to get everyone to chill the fuck out, a few states implemented legal medicinal marijuana and some even struck down state bans on same-sex marriage, including Virginia! If I’ve learned anything from my married friends, Virginia better get on that legalized weed train quickly before those same-sex marriages turn into samesex divorces.
That was 2014 in 700 words, or a little bit more, actually. But you know as well as I do that you won’t remember this past year because of some headlines or even an album that you learned to love. Maybe you broke up with your boyfriend this year, or maybe you got hitched. Maybe you got in your first real fist fight. Its odd, because the year is really only the last two numbers you write on checks or leases, and it is the landmarks of your life which dictate age, maturity, and health. I know that we’re usually pretty dopey and pessimistic here at Worst Week Ever, but now is the only time of the year where you can look forward and say “you know, I think things are looking up” and actually mean it. With the first of the year comes the renewed optimism that will slowly but surely degrade over the next 365 days, so be happy, and stop to enjoy the smell of the flowers without wondering about how horrific the car accident around the corner is. Or something. I don’t know, happy new years, I guess.
Written by Iain Oldman
2014 TOP T
Album Reviews
4 TEN
Cara Walton Photography
Since you’ve now read everyone else’s “top of the year” lists, we thought it would be a good idea to jam our own down your throat. Here are Worst Week Ever’s top ten albums of the year, sorry we couldn’t get them to you earlier when you could’ve been the cool guy recommending them to friends. (These are our top ten national albums. For the best local albums of 2014, look forward to our February One Year Anniversary issue.)
Flying Lotus - You’re Dead!
After Until the Quiet Comes, many fans wondered where Flying Lotus was taking his direction. His 2012 release was full of soul and was softer, and slower paced, removed from the blitzing hip hop jams that we got used to from Cosmogramma and Los Angeles. Well, this year we got our answer. You’re Dead! perfectly blends Steven Ellison’s innate feel for jazz and hip hop, blending together the two in a way that has been, up to this point, unmarketable, or left to NPR outros. If you listen to the first four tracks of the album and wonder where the rap comes in, appearances by Kendrick Lamar and Snoop Dogg are quick to put your curiosity to rest. 2014 was a great year for hip hop, even without some of the big names dropping albums, and You’re Dead! may be the king of the mountain for a decent while.
Mac Demarco - Salad Days
Canada’s Mac Demarco delivered a solid, composed album of unique guitar tones and a whispering voice full of aloofness that beckoned back to the Pacific Northwest’s monopoly on moody songwriters. What Demarco brings to the table with his fourth full length is a tour of indie music’s go-to’s from the past few years: synthy bass lines, surfer guitar tones, and brooding, swingy lyrics that are neither emotionless, nor overbearing. The album is constructed with immense foresight, blending together in your brain without a moment’s rest and sticking with you, sending your fist pumping in the air whenever you hear a track come on WXJM.
Future Islands - Singles
Written by Iain Oldman
On Singles, Future Islands delivered what is perhaps THE song of 2014 in “Seasons�, a rich song that passes through you and sits in your veins like scotch, leaving you staring out of your windshield, contemplating your past. But this album is so much more than one song. Each track carries weight and relevance, varied and separate, but delivered with cohesion and composition. Future Islands delivers a little bit of something for the music fan on their breakthrough album: a little bit of synth, a lot of indie, some solid rock licks, and a wholly unique voice from the emphatic Samuel Herring. Singles will probably be the album that lives on from 2014, representative of the zeitgeist and whatever soul the music world chooses to carry from here forward. Look for every band in 2015 to rip off Future Islands.
Ty Segall - Manipulator
No one is a stranger to Ty Segall anymore. Except, I guess, Segall himself. Ty Segall abandons everything that he is known for in Manipulator- the fuzz, the power, or the thinned out, stringy voice. What he delivers then is an immensely powerful tour through Segall’s brain, a menu of influences and breadth that could have appealed to absolutely no one instead of garnering the national praise it has. Segall doesn’t sleep on his name on this album, perhaps the first one that he could have done it, but throws his listeners a curve ball to shatter expectations and what we comprehend him to be as an artist now.
Written by Iain Oldman
Run the Jewels - Run the Jewels 2 The best part of Run the Jewels 2 is El-P and Killer Mike to weave together their completely opposite fortes into a cohesive and unforgettable album full of every element of hip hop, not elevating one over the other. If you’re looking for easily digestible club-bangers, this album is not for you. Neither is this the album for you if you want to listen to soulful tracks drowned in vocabulary. In creating something that should satisfy NO ONE, the two hip hop gods have created an album that has garnered both critical and casual acclaim, and for good reason. Nothing is off limits for this album, even when bringing in eye rollers Travis Barker and Zach de la Rocha, who are tastefully injected into the album. RTJ2 may be the album that kids 20 years from now point to as “classic hip hop” while blazing els in their parents’ basements.
Vince Staples - Hell Can Wait
2014 was a year of rappers making their names for the first time, and it’s hard to say that anyone made a larger impression than Vince Staples. Hell Can Wait is portrait of a man on fire, tired of monotony and depressed by everything he’s witnessed. So rarely does a rapper deliver a description of circumstance so gritty and real, stripped of cheesy descriptions of the “hood” that suburbanites can retweet with arrogance. Vince Staples gets uncomfortably personal at times and introspective to a point that is rarely seen in any form of music, much less the bravado-driven rap game. Add amazing production to the album and what you get is a record from a young man ready to become a known name in the rap world for years to come.
Written by Iain Oldman
Angel Olsen - Burn Your Fire for No Witness
Damn, what a way to make your name heard. Already known for her work with Bonnie “Prince� Billy, Angel Olsen insured herself to be a household name in the next five years with her masterpiece first full-length release Burn Your Fire for No Witness. The album is soaked in an oil of beautiful, hateful romance and lines that make the posits under your eyes swell while your throat chokes. Olsen delivers it all with a dark, rich band more borrowed from the New York punk scene than anything else, pulsing and heavy, heavy, heavy. Rest assured, Olsen is sure to sail in the upcoming years using her innate individuality.
Parquet Courts - Sunbathing Animal
Following up 2012’s blistering Light Up Gold was a hard task for the quasi-punk quartet from Brooklyn, but Sunbathing Animal has the same pace and fun in spades that kept Parquet Courts in our hearts. There’s nothing this band does that is simply outrageous: there is no obtusely blistering pace, or insane musicianship, and the hooks aren’t radiolevel catchy. But Parquet Courts is undeniably different, not cut from the same cloth as their peers trying to play the same genre to the same crowd. Sunbathing Animal is quick and catchy, and I’ll be damned if it isn’t fun as hell. Want an album to take roadtripping with you? Sunbathing Animal. Need something to play while working on tricks in the parking deck? Sunbathing Animal. Want to spice up your Cinco de Mayo celebration? Well, you get it.
Written by Iain Oldman
La Dispute - Rooms of the House
Finally, La Dispute is getting the attention they deserve. In Rooms of the House, La Dispute delivers an intense emotional ride in under fifty minutes of suffering and empathy, breaking genres along the way. Scream, sing, or whisper, these guys make sure you get the message in their newest full length, showcasing their growth as a band, but also retaining all the elements that have made them a cult favorite in the punk scene for a while now. They are heavy and delicate, rotten and refined all at once.
Sturgill Simpson Metamodern Sounds in Country Music It doesn’t take much more than the name of this album to find out what Sturgill Simpson is all about, but trust me, give it a listen to find out for yourself anyways. Simpson finds a way to perfectly weave psychedelia and authentic country music in a way that is so authentic. This isn’t the type of alt-folk that talks about whisky and women in a completely tripe manner, rehashed over and over again. Instead, he talks about shit like the galaxy and ponders existential questions while juxtaposing his own personal life: his failures and dreams, his bouts with lonesomeness, and the people he doesn’t care about leaving behind. The whole sum of this album is a unique traipse through Nashville on ketamine, colorful and low all at the same time.
Now booking shows for local and out of town bands, contact Michael Steele at
worstweekeverbooking@gmail.com
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