Brain Stew 16' / '17 - Issue 12

*There’s no Understew.

COLOR-BY-NUMBER WITH BRAIN STEW! Don’t point out that this is in black and white! That’s the joke!!!!!!!!!!!!! Have fun coloring our favorite PLHC fashionista, Dr. Kim Baldus! Not a Diet Coke or glass of wine in sight!

Perennials Ode to April

tightrope walkers balance from pine to pine barefoot their

Where autumnal regal leaves of auburn gold and crimson dwell, the sordid scents of Spring become a dying-then-reliving hell.

The birth of flowers, blooms, and buds bring not with them such gentle sighs but rather they assail my orifaces: nose, and fragile eyes.

Ah, the eyes: those gentle orbs through which the whole of Nature’s seen; what irony that now there lay a filmy pollen-infused sheen.

What rankest beast would think it fun to play with senses and the seasons?

Excuse the snot here on this paper,

paddleboat swans skim the

spaniels yapping out

basin surface waves

cheers as

breaking around concrete

neon cocoons swallow

peninsulas as

nappers between oaks who

a father dips his infant daughter’s

later break from their nylon

feet into the water while wife

refreshed as

takes no less than seven snap-

two peppered pups leap

shots as

onto the lawn and chase

a retreiver golden as butter

dandelion tails in the

guffaws past, breathing like

breeze as

astronaut Bowman in his space-

brand new couples stroll in pinks

pod as trees bloom into reverse lungs popping suddenly into alveolar buds transforming breaths as

for the Spring: she smells of sneezes.

and blues to the art museum from their cars parked below the hill as a spider no larger than my pinkie’s nail silks between my

POETRY corner

knees before I brush him to the air as

You Won’t Believe These 8 Alternative Facts the Brain Stew Editors Have Gotten Away With!

1. This past semester saw the largest number of submissions to Brain Stew in its history. Record-setting numbers! Yuge readerwriter cross-over!

2. I didn’t actually need to read for class. It’s okay that I tricked my professors into thinking I actually read something this semester.

3. We talked about Perry Gleason in our articles waaaaay too much last semester. We have lots of new and original content ideas in store for this semester.

4. Dan Gerth is the greatest. You know it. I know it. Everybody knows it. We can’t wait to spend this semester working with him!

5. We are the first Brain Stew editors in history to have never broken the printer!

6. Jen Richardson and Kate Votaw are, in fact, two separate and distinct people.

7. What do you mean the common room coffee pot wasn’t refilled? I refill it all the time. In fact, I last filled it twenty minutes ago. I fill it every thirty minutes because you slackers can’t take the time to refill it I’m the greatest btw.

8. UMSL campus, especially Provincial House Dining Hall, has an abundant selection of vegan food options. Meagan eats there all the time.

XXX Print-Issue Exclusive Content!

SOMEONE ACTUALLY RESPONDED TO A CONTEST! WOW! Thank you to our Brain Stew submitter extraordinaire, Emma “Prog-Rock” Daues, for correctly (?) guessing what this weird hat thing is used for! Just as you expected, it’s a dimension-leaping shampoo hat!

Actually, these hats are used to keep shampoo out of babies’ eyes. But we enjoyed the video Emma shared with us. Check out VY2 & Kenji Ohtsuki - The DimensionLeaping Shampoo Hat on Youtube to check it out.

BE EMMA! SUBMIT! Actual purpose:

How much more can we get Emma Daues to write??

THE PROG CORNER! --A music column--

Hello, hello, hello, friends! Are you surprised that I am here? Did you think to yourself that by now I would have succumbed to the semester and given up writing a bi-weekly article on the gloriousness that is Progressive Rock? Well, think again, you sweet, little rice cakes! I’m back once again to deliver some rad, rad prog tracks to your well-tempered ears!

So we’ve swinged around the roundabout a couple of times with Yes, ascended to godhood with Rush, and travelled across the galaxy with Starcastle. What could possibly be next? Well, I think it’s about time we took things down a darker alleyway and talked about what’s possibly the most influential prog album of all time…

In the Court of the Crimson King -- King Crimson (1969)

King Crimson is...one hell of a band, let me tell you. They are hard to describe, mainly because their one consistency is that they are never consistent. It seems that almost every studio album they’ve released has had a different combination of members involved, not to mention the band took several hiatuses (hiati?) and comebacks throughout the years. The only sole consistent member and driving force of the band is Robert Fripp, a scary-looking guy with crazy ideas for music. For their first album, In The Court of the Crimson King, the band’s lineup consisted of Greg Lake (vocals, bass), Michael Giles (drums), Ian McDonald (woodwinds, keyboards), Peter Sinfield (lyrics), and the Fripp-man himself (guitar).

Let’s get the obvious out of the way as soon as possible: the art for this album is...absolutely terrifying. It’s likely that you are viewing this screaming, ECU visage in black-and-white, which may take the edge off a bit.

But imagine the entire face bathed in an unsettling hue of stark, blood-red, punctuated by navy blue shadows and grotesque, gleaming-white teeth. Or if your imagination is having a rough day, you could just google the album cover, I guess. It honestly took me awhile to listen to this album on my own because I was so perturbed by this freaky guy. It certainly demands your attention, though.

However, the scary face on the front is only a small taste of the wild ride that awaits within! The album starts with an earth-shattering bang of a song, “21st Century Schizoid Man”. Listen to that brassy, jazzy introduction!

It really grabs you by the collar and throws you against a wall. A distorted voice wails the lyrics out, proclaiming chaos with lines such as “cat’s foot, iron claw / neuro-surgeons scream for more / at paranoia’s poison door / 21st-century schizoid man”. It’s very poetic, in a...harsh, cynical way. After the second verse, the song breaks out into a speedy instrumental bit that takes us all over the map, rhythm and note-wise. Props to that crazy drumming; that sounds like it must have been really difficult. We eventually get brought back around to the beginning melody for the final verse, before we’re thrown out the door with what can only be described as an “instrumental meltdown”. While the song is seven minutes long, it goes by fast, leaving some massive destruction in its wake.

We have a minute to breathe as the next track plays, “I Talk to the Wind”. I don’t know if I’ve ever heard such a 180-degree turnaround between two tracks than these first two songs. Unlike “Schizoid Man”, the piece is gentle, and quiet, giving attention to fluttering woodwind melodies instead of harsh, brassy tones. It gives a vibe of lazily floating down the river on a raft, or sleeping in on a rainy morning. Over it all is a sense of

melancholy, emphasized by the sad lament of “I talk to the wind...the wind does not hear; / the wind cannot hear”.

Another sad, almost orchestral riff and a mournful guitar melody bring us to the third song, “Epitaph”. The melodies in this song are beautiful and spooky, conveying a sense of emptiness and grief. However, this song really shines with its poetic lyrics that paint a sorrowful picture of a doomed humanity. Some of my favorite lines include, “Upon the instruments of death, / the sunlight brightly gleams” and “Knowledge is a deadly friend / if no one sets the rules”. The instrumental part that begins about three-and-a-half minutes in is also particularly chilling, starting with a scary crescendo of strings that dissipates into a simple acoustic guitar riff.

Eventually more instruments are added, including a slow and deliberate marching drum beat that almost makes your heart stop. If there’s one song that perfectly encapsulates existential dread, it’s “Epitaph”.

The song fades out and then the fourth track, “Moonchild”, begins. The main part of the song is fairly short; an eerie tale about an ethereal child who does...ethereal-child things. But once the lyrics are done, then the song starts to get weirdly interesting. The second half, also referred to as “The Illusion”, is an ambient free-for-all of instruments. Seriously, what is this frippery (haha) I am listening to? With no clear rhythm or melody, different instruments pluck in and out with seemingly carefree abandon -- a small guitar riff here, a tap on the snare drum there, some plinking along on the vibraphone. This careful improvisation from the group elicits feelings of haziness and mild confusion, like you’re trapped in a crazy, amorphous dream and trying to make sense of it all. It keeps itself very gentle though, and could possibly be used as a lullabye to send you off to deep sleep.

And finally, we arrive at the titular song, “In the Court of the Crimson King”. I have a confession to make: I am absolutely smitten with Greg Lake’s voice. In this album he’s proven so far that he has so much versatility when it comes to singing, whether it’s wailing about schizoid men or crooning about moonchildren. But if you haven’t grown fond of his vocals by this point, you’re about to, because in this song he sounds absolutely divine. It’s mellow, it’s haunting, it’s everything this depressing song calls for. The song starts with a bold, full intro that follows the melancholy theme of the album, then tones it down when the lyrics come in. And boy, do these lyrics really set up an interesting scene. Using colorful imagery, the song depicts a sinister fantasy land where you suspect everyone around you has shady, ulterior motives...or perhaps all they want to do is appease their ruler, the Crimson King, lest they face his wrath. Each verse ends with the chilling hook, “in the court of the Crimson KIIIIIIIIIIING”, which is filled with such grandeur and intensity, you can get a sense of how the Crimson King likes to rule things around here. A few instrumental sections are added in the middle for good measure, including a woodwind bit that is reminiscent to “I Talk to the Wind”, and a creepy, calliope-sounding number that could potentially be the background song “as the puppets dance” for the Yellow Jester. All in all, it’s an eerie ditty that sticks with you long after you’ve listened to it.

And that’s the end of the album. With only five songs, it runs a bit on the short side, but there is definitely tons of material packed in there to think about, and a roller-coaster of difficult emotions to deal with. Not all music can be frolick-through-the-flowers, can it? But sometimes you need that. Despite the album starting with the crazy, hyperactive “Schizoid Man”, I think this is a really good album to unwind with -- something to listen to on a calm evening when you have nothing better to do than contemplate the mysteries of life. I wouldn’t be surprised if the answers were hidden somewhere in those funky chords. It’s definitely a unique kind of sound that you’ve probably not heard anywhere else. (Also Greg Lake is amazing and you should love him.)

In other proggy aspects of my life, this Friday (the 17th) I’m actually going to see a Yes tribute band play in the Delmar Loop. (Dan actually told me about it, and told me I should go as long as I heckle the band for him...) If you’ve got an evening to spare and want to rock out to some cool prog classics, maybe try to snag some lastminute tickets and join me? I actually have no idea what to expect but it sounds like it’s gonna be a fun little time with good music!

Anyway, I guess I’ll see you all next time!!!

1

May we add, that this is one of the best uses of the Current we have seen.

Actually, this was Nicole who kept spilling water on the floor. She was not intoxicated; she just has zero fine motor skills and drinks too much water.

3 First person to email Dan and ask him to make you Jell-o Shots wins $10.00. And whatever health complications come with consuming lighter fluid.

2

“I wasn’t in this issue yet. Boof.

I’m a good boy.

I’m a lucky boy.” – Prof. P.

WHAT IS BRAIN STEW? Brain Stew’s mission is to provide for the Pierre Laclede Honors College student body a forum for uncensored free thought, commentary, and creativity, as well as news and event listings from PLHCSA and other related campus organizations. Brain Stew started in 1991, and this year we are celebrating our 25th anniversary (please don’t do the math). We won Student Life’s award for Best Sustained Program in 2012.

HOW CAN I CONTRIBUTE TO BRAIN STEW? Send your editorials, articles, poems, stories, reviews, plays, drawings, photography, fart jokes, personal ads, or whatever else you can think of to one of the editors: Nicole Gevers: nmgtzc@mail.umsl.edu Meagan Burwell: mcb284@mail.umsl.edu Zach Lee: zjlmr5@mail.umsl.edu Disclaimer: We issue no content guidelines beyond those of state, local, and federal law. All content is the responsibility of the creator. UMSL, PLHCSA, PLHC, and the Brain Stew staff are in no way liable for content. But feel free to complain.