3:AM Magazine

» Writing a Rothko: An Interview With HP Tinker

When I first started being published I felt like I was producing these stories in a literary vacuum. I stayed in a lot with the curtains drawn. This was back before the Internet of course when you had to communicate via public telephones, or else write words down on pieces of paper. Steven Hall hadn’t been invented. Paul Ewen was wearing short trousers in New Zealand. Tony O’Neill was in borstal. Heidi James was a brothel keeper’s daughter. Everybody was alone and fairly frightened. Dark days indeed. Well, the context is very different now.

Chris Killen interviews “bookshop poison” HP Tinker.

» We Can Be Anything We Want To Be: Genesis P-Orridge

At 57 Genesis wiggles in his jean mini skirt, tights opaque enough to see a dazzling selection of tattoos spiralling around his legs, each of us unsure as to who goes through a doorway first. His face is Barbie perfect, almost plasticized with applied American makeup, overstuffed lips pouting a cherry salmon colour, his eyelashes bat flirtatiously when deciding which book on army camouflage to buy; it is hard to remember that he is either man or woman.

Sophie Parkin interviews Throbbing Gristle and Psychic TV front man/woman Genesis P-Orridge.

» To Be a Writer: An Interview With Jeremy C. Shipp

My mind is often overwhelmed with ideas and images that could be the seeds of future novels and short stories. The ones that stick with me, the ones that just won’t shut up — these are the little devils I know I should prioritize and cultivate into a story or book.

Mikael Covey interviews Jeremy C. Shipp.

» Beauty

She comes out with her large mocha and sits down with her cell phone to her face. It is the LG VX8600, LG’s version of the RAZR, which she got a week ago. Verizon is sending everyone those phones these days in anticipation of the iPhone, which they are worried will steal their business. I’m getting a iPhone, naturally. I’ve been waiting and saving up since the last iPod was stolen. It’ll make a good counterbalance, but when I sit at this table it will be just as silent.

By Ned Vizzini.

» Playing House

I was so nervous when I told Colin about the baby; my throat was dry; my hands shook. Tom was never that responsive when I tried to talk to him about kids. Looking back, I think it was one of the things that moved him in his new direction. But Colin couldn’t've been happier. He found a box in the basement with some of my old records. He analyzed them with those large brown eyes, those long fingers inspecting the faded and cracked cardboard, inspecting the dust and scratches on the black vinyl inside the sleeves. He resembled an Egyptologist on the Discovery Channel, finding a small piece of a new pharaoh. One of these records was an extended mix of Madonna’s “Papa Don’t Preach.”

By Robert Hyers.

» Auditing

When was the last time you stopped and really listened to what was around you? If you listen hard enough, you’ll hear the hum of electromagnetic fields, the baleful soliloquy of florescent bulbs, the stoic chorus of wall and ceiling. Listen more and you might hear the resigned grunts of cobblestones and, still more faintly, the silty disintegration of bones.

By Tim Horvath.

» Breakfast

I’d woken up on the bottom of a bunk bed, wrapped in scratchy Spiderman sheets and a camouflage blanket. For the first time in my life, I’d thought about the benefits of thread count and wondered at what age the minutiae of comfort starts being so important.

By Aaron Burch.

» 3:AM Brasil: Perfect Love

Inside it there’s a beautiful image of Holy Mary in natural size, placed by the side of a black portable radio. Without any warning the music starts: “AVE MARIA”, sang the Italian interpreter. He unfastens his serge black trousers and holds firmly the hard and hot sex. The image of the saint looking so beautiful and merciful transfigurated her look, and he thought how much he loved her while stroking the sculpture’s merciful face, ‘Ah I love you so much,’ he’d say in loud voice, his climax getting closer until he comes with a scream of happiness to then kiss the image of his adored saint with the reverence and fascination typical of the deepest love that one can ever imagine.

By Patrick Brock.

» Thank You for Paris

He is still romancing me in Paris. He is thinking about getting down on one knee when we reach the Eiffel Tower. There is a bulge in the top pocket of his jacket. I am trying to get as far away from him as possible, but he is designing my future and he has no plans for me to leave.

By Emily McPhillips.

» Event Horizon

The crowd coalesced into an audience
as if self-aware, staring inward

at the anatomical singularity taking place.
For the next fifteen minutes
we could not look away.

By Dan Hoy.

» I Will Become a Mexican

i should go to the grocery
and use the blood pressure machine
and feel it constrict around my arm
i’d like a machine like that for home
big enough to stick my head in
i would do it every day first thing in the morning
and every night before i go to bed
and probably a lot throughout the day

By Blake Butler.

» The Pigeon

The weather-beaten sarcophagi
below: a curious vantage the
pigeon can use at leisure when
resting; when sprucing; when
looking – orange eyes clicking
shut to capture her in a glance.

By Lee Rourke.

» The Thermals Live

Everyone sang along, slammed their bodies about with reckless abandon, and repeatedly spilled forward onto the stage. From the first chords of opener “Here’s Your Future,” the floor shook under the impact of the feet that repeatedly crashed upon them. Bodies toppled forward, back, and to the sides, feeble attempts were made to steady themselves on walls, speaker cabinets, and other people.

Amanda Farah reviews The Thermals‘ recent London gig.

» Burning Bright

‘Comeback album’ is a phrase few bands like to hear. It’s positive, of course, but the entailment is anything but: it speaks of wilderness years, creative bankruptcy, even – whisper it – irrelevance. In short – something to come back from. As Cymru’s most outspoken politicos, Manic Street Preachers must be especially terrified by the last of those things.

Richard O’Brien applauds the Manics‘ rediscovery of their radical edge on their latest LP.

» To Here Knows When

Of the shoegazing era, which the author firmly places it but also seeks to mount a rival argument for its consideration as a classic album, it’s probably the only candidate that could make such a list… Loveless is significant for a number of reasons. By legend alone it almost bankrupted Creation Records through frontman Kevin Shields’ erratic perfectionism and among shoegazers it’s the one record that has, cliché notwithstanding, truly stood the test of time.

A. Stevens gives his verdict on the 33 1/3 edition of My Bloody Valentine’s Loveless.

» Popular Culture at its Most Mental

Written in the style of an insane tabloid genius running riot with the trade tools of alliterative hyperbolic headliners, Wells is cranking up a seriously influential political agenda into a surrealist, disruptively libidinous energy without the checks of moderation, civility or deference. After all, moderation, civility and deference have been the external parameters within which the Murdoch agenda’s Burkean extremist fantasies have been controlled. By removing these external constraints, Wells has been able to redirect the agenda.

From the archives. Great moments in literature: the Attack! Books story.

» Baring All

The Neo Naturists never seemed very underground to me, personally but then I was an art student and I thought mainstream galleries were being terribly conventional swept up in Thatcher’s Britain, and all that Conservatism. Only one man had the eye to see otherwise at that time, Mr James Birch with his first shows for Jennifer Binney, Grayson Perry and then Wilma. There was always a explosion of body painting performance in his little gallery in the New Kings Road and much drinking of red wine and scrumpy before rolling around on the floor in rousing choruses cheered on by legendary old man of surrealism, Conroy Maddox.

Sophie Parkin reviews the Neo Naturists at England and Co and Sudeley Castle.

» On Ranting

Getting his kicks from animal bites, the Rabies he spreads disables the ports and forces the populace back into the ‘real’. He is supported by a cast of subversive and deviant acolytes whose individual voices combine to create a highly effective and engrossing satire, which is just a little over-egged by the time travel story threading through the narrative. Time travel aside, Chuck Palahniuk has delivered a jaunty tale of a bleak over-crowded world, where if you time it right, just about anyone can become a God.

Heidi James enjoys Chuck Palahniuk’s muscular tale Rant.

» Sohoitis III: Cads, Rakes, David Piper and all that jazz revels at The Café Royal

By the time you got to 45 in 1945 you were practically dead or destitute, and dripping in widow wear, my dear! Vanessa then started to take off her clothes pulling her t-shirt and jacket over her head bearing her breasts to the world she cried a muffled – “Naked women all look the same from the 1940’s to now so I shall come in naked and look tres 1940’s,” the free spirit said. David look ruffled, upset and distraught he held his head and said, “I’m going soft, OK let them in, but no one else after this.”

Sophie Parkin’s latest dispatch from the frontline of Sohemia for 3:AM.

» Sohoitis II: Child’s Play - The Diamond Mind of Damien Hirst

“All that glisters is not gold” as Shakespeare said, sometimes it’s a diamond or a star, on Saturday night it was both. Damien Hirst was making his massive statement, the most intrinsically expensive piece of art ever made; platinum skull encrusted with diamonds in the manner of the ancient Aztecs. ‘Beyond Belief’ is the name of his show at both White Cubes, you must have heard, otherwise where have you been?

Sophie Parkin still believes diamonds are a girl’s best friend, as does Damien Hirst, in a report from the launch party for his ‘Beyond Belief’ show.

» Sohoitis I: Being with Dylan, on The Edge of Love

So how had I got to be in director John Maybury’s new film all my friends want to know. Synchronicity, as simple as that. Was I going to be the next Daniel Craig? Discovered by Maybury, who played artist Francis Bacon’s boyfriend in, Love is the Devil memorably appearing naked in the bath, and currently enormously popular on YouTube.

Sophie Parkin reports from the set of the forthcoming Dylan Thomas biopic in her new column for 3:AM.

» Star Wars, Episode 7: The Clash of Civilisations

The Clash of Civilizations. Capitalized like that it looks even better — the two big C’s on either end give it the feel of a new Playstation game or a Star Wars sequel’s title. The word ‘clash’ is certainly more poetic, more cinematic than any comparable synonyms like ‘fight’, ‘war’, or ‘conflict’. The Battle of Civilizations sounds like a WWF match — which might be more appropriate anyway.

Jeff Gibbs wants to see Sir Salman and Mahmoud Ahmadinejad get in the ring, for the good of liberal journalism.

» The George Berger Column: In Defence of Jeffrey Archer

It’s a bit like admitting you loved ELO back in the 70s. In certain circles (these ones, for instance, but not only) it treads beyond unhip into some kind of unacceptable. But to slag off Jeffrey Archer as an author is to enter into a game you can’t win. If he’s that bad, how come you’ve read him? And if you haven’t, how come you know he’s that bad? His real crime writing-wise is simply to not be trendy.

George Berger is back. And not a minute too soon!

» We Have Nothing to Fear

Our politicians are the defense industry. A person going from the state department, to being CEO of a defense contractor, and back into the vice presidency, defines the legal principle of a ‘conflict of interest’. The same man who wages war cannot be the same man who profits from one.

Theo Gangi rails at the weapons manufacturers who rule governments and the fear that lets them.