Kick in the Eye’s GUIDE TO THE THIRD WAVE: PART THREE
Current mood: discontent
Category: Music

KICK in the EYE’s SONG-BY-SONG COMMENTARY: Sea of Bitterness

Worseful Life:
This song was inspired by our hatred of living in a modern metropolis. Life in Vancouver gave us a taste of the evils corporations bring: pollution; piss poor wages; compartmentalized, isolated living conditions; traffic nightmares; small business takeovers; MSG addictions; advertising assaults; no nature, no real art, no free space; jobs no one cares about doing; and a myriad of mental frustrations. Capitalism today has nothing to do with free enterprise, fair play, morality, community, or humanity. So, listen to this song as a boy meets girl scenario if you must, but understand the bitter emotions that inspired it run very deep.

Point of interest: a First Nations friend of ours coined the term "worseful" in describing Whistler, BC, home to the 2010 Winter Olympics in Canada.

Red Army Overdrive:
This song is written from the perspective of Russia during WWII. Russia is the girl "voice" in the song. We’ve alluded to many famous historical quotes: Hitler’s - about Germany having only to kick in Russia’s front door and the whole rotten structure would come "crumbling down", Stalin’s policy of "not one step back", etc. We’ve even printed a picture of a T-34 Soviet tank on the cover of the single. The heroism of the forty million Russian men and women, who gave their lives to defeat an enemy who considered them less than human, has always been downplayed in the West. This is a morality tale: don’t underestimate the power of the people.

Back Off:
This song did start out as a relationship song, fifteen years ago. The lyrics sound so simple, but it’s tricky to write "in the language of the common man". We wanted to make the words sound completely natural, conversational even. That’s how it started, but it didn’t end there. We learned about the things that Big Box companies do to communities, and to people around the world. We learned about Free Trade, the government kickbacks, the cycles of poverty. So, this one is for the Wal-Marts of the world: "Back off and don’t you come back!"

Bounty Killer Blues:
Has anyone ever stopped you on the street and offered you twenty grand to knock off his wife? Well, it happened to Donnie - he must have been looking particularly nasty that day. More inspiration for the song comes from Sergio Leone’s spaghetti westerns.

Zombie Attack:
We took what was originally a simple truckin’ song and turned it into a tribute to George A. Romero’s zombie films. More and more, the notion of Armageddon has transferred into the realm of reality today -- be it from nuclear attack, disease, climate change, or something unknown. This notion is even more prevalent now than it was at the Millennium. What is becoming obvious is that people are aware that a new civilization is at hand.

Anytime:
On one level, this song speaks of the lonely isolation of modern existence. It’s ironic, because living in the city, you are literally surrounded by thousands of other people. How could anyone be lonely? Yet, the song features a lonely guy and a girl who’s always at home - anytime. It speaks to the need for companionship, and music, in a world afflicted with a general malaise.

Forty Degrees Below:
When Donnie’s brother "settled down", we wrote this song as a memorial to his bachelorhood. We tried not to exaggerate parts here and there. It makes us laugh.
Gerald Charlie Stomp:
Gerald Charlie, a First Nation blues singer/songwriter, is one of the all-time great musicians living today, but he’s virtually unknown. We tried to capture the spirit of his live shows. Great musicians should be forever celebrated and recognized, but they’re not. So, that’s why this song is on Sea of Bitterness.      

Special Kinda Music:
"Special Kinda Music" sounds positive, but we are really very bitter about the sub-standard state of music today. This track is a bit of nostalgia for songs that we can actually dance to, and that are part of the songwriting tradition.
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Kick in the Eye: Warrior Poets from Generation X Fighting the Culture of Mediocrity with Righteous Rock and Roll!

Using song, sound, and special effects, Kick in the Eye’s new CD Sea of Bitterness is a multi-adventure experience that takes you from the battlefields of Russia, to the rooftops of Gotham City, to the post-apocalyptic Forbidden Zone.
 
This is music as art.  
This is art in the new paradigm.   

Sea of Bitterness is available for sale or trade at www.kickintheeyemusic.com
 
Join the Third Wave!  Be a Culture Jammer!  Fight for Your Future! Listen to Kick in the Eye!

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KICK in the EYE’s GUIDE TO THE THIRD WAVE: PART TWO
Current mood: discontent
Category: News and Politics

15 EXPERIENCES TO CHANGE YOUR PARADIGM!

Are you finding it harder and harder to deal with the frustrations and complexities of modern life? Millions of people all over the world have experienced a sudden awakening, a "kick in the eye". Here are the fifteen experiences that led to ours:

1.  The Corporation (DVD) The question: If the corporation has been declared a person under our laws, then what kind of citizen is that corporation? The answer: A psychopath. Further case studies reveal the collusion between government and corporation. The Corporation today is as powerful and omnipresent as Europe’s Catholic Church a few centuries ago, and the evidence is literally all around us, all the time. The implication of this is that there’s an omnipotent psychopath controlling everything around us, all the time.

2.   No Logo by Naomi Klein (book) No Logo chronicles the erosion of three pillars of society: employment, choice, and space. It also provides an in-depth analysis of modern corporations and society’s failure to obligate itself to change what is happening. Even the modern university is hardly a place for counter culture thought or action. Many students today think they have nothing to believe in and nothing to fight for. Naomi Klein redresses that imbalance with detailed accounts of corporate atrocities.

3.   Culture Jamming by Kalle Lasn (book) Culture Jamming is action taken to disrupt the flow of the modern capitalist democracy. Kalle Lasn suggests that we use the methodology of the corporations against them. Essentially culture jamming is sabotage. This is an important book to read because it will define who you are: a culture jammer.

4.   "The Third Wave" by Alvin Toffler (essay) The Third Wave is a revolution that is both highly technological and anti-industrial. The Third Wave civilization bridges the recent breach between consumer and producer, giving rise to "prosumer" economics, and it recognizes that the growing problems of our world cannot be solved within the framework of the old, industrial order. It advances with an understanding of how to co-exist with Nature, not dominate or destroy it.

5. Natural Cures (That They Don’t Want You to Know About) by Kevin Trudeau (book) This book contains natural remedies to many of our modern ailments, but it is more important for the connections it makes between the government, the FDA, and the drug and food companies. If you need any more proof that capitalist democracy is failing us, look no further. Let your common sense be your guide, and if you have the means and strength of conviction to follow what Kevin Trudeau says, you WILL become healthier.

6.   The Consumer Smart Cancer Guide by the Labour Environment Association (guide) This guide identifies the many household and workplace products that contain cancer-causing contaminants. There is a great list of cleaning products to avoid, a guide to reading the numbers on the bottoms of plastics, and a list of the vegetables that have the highest amounts of pesticides in them. How could such toxic products have ever hit the marketplace? What’s really our point here is that criminal, lackey governments should never have allowed these harmful products.

7.   An Inconvenient Truth with Al Gore (DVD) Don’t expect a rollicking, adventurous, fun-filled blockbuster movie experience, but do be prepared to sit at the edge of your seat. It’s scary because it’s NOT science fiction.

8.  Walmart: The High Cost of Low Prices (DVD) There’s something not quite right about buying our last-a-year DVD players for twenty-five bucks. Find out where the costs are hidden, and then avoid Wal-mart and big box stores like the plague. We have all asked ourselves, how could the Germans in Nazi Germany have turned a blind eye? Watch this movie and you’ll understand how we all have been avoiding the truth.

9.  Who Killed the Electric Car? (DVD) This movie identifies the culprits involved with the destruction and defamation of the electric vehicle. One of the best pieces is actually a deleted scene that explains how corporations and government many years ago systematically destroyed the electric buses and tram system.

10.  "The Great Transition" by Kenneth Ewart Boulding (essay) This is a very prophetic essay written in 1964. Boulding correctly identifies that we are in the midst of a Great Transition to a post-civilized society that is much different than our current society. Most people are so accustomed to giving the word civilization a favourable overtone that the notion of a post-civilization may seem frightening. But in his own words, civilized society is "a rather disagreeable state for most people living in it, and its disappearance need occasion few tears".

11.  The Future of Food (DVD) This movie details the corporate attempt to dominate Nature. There is no doubt about the power of technology, but there must be more debate about its applications. The future of food is a world of suicide seeds owned by a few corporations who in effect have the power to sustain or starve humanity. But will humanity have the ingenuity to save itself when something goes terribly wrong?

12.  The Ingenuity Gap by Thomas Homer-Dixon (book) The powerful message of this book is that the further technology takes us away from Nature, the more ingenuity is required to sustain ourselves. Dixon also identifies the biggest obstacles facing ingenuity are powerful groups who stall or prevent key institutional reform. When that happens, civilizations begin to decay. The simple fact is that ingenuity requirements skyrocket as environmental problems worsen because societies need more efficient technologies to reduce pollutants and conserve resources. But the answer isn’t necessarily in more sophisticated systems.

13.  1491 by Charles C. Mann (book) If the ingenuity gap that Thomas Homer Dixon identified is going to be quickly and efficiently closed, then we may have to adopt systems from the past that have shown themselves to be successful. In 1491, Charles Mann reveals such amazing things about past First Nations civilizations that readers are compelled to compare First Nations technological and social achievements with our own today.

14.  Nickel and Dimed by Barbara Ehrenreich (book) This book chronicles a year in the life of a bourgeois professional attempting to survive by working for minimum wage. It is interesting to see how the affluent baby boomers completely neglect the physical and emotional welfare of their fellow citizens.

15.  The Structure of Scientific Revolutions by Thomas Kuhn (book) If you need proof of the inevitability of change, and the power of paradigms, turn to this classic.
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Add yourself to our Friends List and let us know what experiences led to your paradigm shift!

Read commentary on songs from our new CD Sea of Bitterness in Kick in the Eye’s Guide to the Third Wave Part Three!
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Kick in the Eye: Warrior Poets from Generation X Fighting the Culture of Mediocrity with Righteous Rock and Roll!

Using song, sound, and special effects, Kick in the Eye’s new CD Sea of Bitterness is a multi-adventure experience that takes you from the battlefields of Russia, to the rooftops of Gotham City, to the post-apocalyptic Forbidden Zone.
 
This is music as art.  
This is art in the new paradigm.   

Sea of Bitterness is available for sale or trade at www.kickintheeyemusic.com
 
Join the Third Wave!  Be a Culture Jammer!  Fight for Your Future! Listen to Kick in the Eye!

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KICK in the EYE’s GUIDE TO THE THIRD WAVE: PART ONE
Current mood: discontent
Category: Life

Kick in the Eye’s Guide to the Third Wave is an online introduction to Culture Jamming, the Third Wave, and the music of Kick in the Eye. Part One is an Action Checklist / Scorecard to show you how you rate as a Culture Jammer.

THE THIRD WAVE ACTION CHECKLIST

The following steps may seem too simple to be revolutionary; yet, companies have spent billions on social engineering and propaganda to convince you to forget all about age-old practices. Since our steps run counter to corporate profit, they are very subversive. Historically, ideas like these have been suppressed because they ARE revolutionary.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Are you a Culture Jammer? Count up how many apply to you and calculate how you rate as a culture jammer using the scorecard at the bottom.

I.  Practice Consumer Disobedience
___  1: Become a producer; not just a consumer. (Learn a craft, trade or art, or produce an alternative to a consumer product.)
___  2: Trade with producers in your own community.
___  3: Trade with anyone you can.
___  4: Borrow or lend rather than buy.
___  5: Purchase as much as you can from local markets and producers.
___  6: Buy 2nd hand.
___  7. Consume less; Reduce, Reuse, & Recycle.

II.  Take Care of Your Health
___  8: Don’t buy from publicly-traded corporations.
___  9: Eat organic.
___  10: Eat local, seasonal produce (100-mile diet).
___  11: Eat lower on the food chain.
___  12: Grow your own, or forage for food.
___  13: Find out more about toxins in your food, household products, and cosmetics.

III.  Avoid Compartmentalization
___  14: Avoid entertainment in isolation.
___  15: Use technology to initiate face-to-face contact, rather than replace it.
___  16: Find, make, or take back meeting space.
___  17: Reduce the time you spend in your car.
___  18: Make mealtime a social event.

IV.  Form a Clan
___  19: Extend your "family" to include non-family members.
___  20: Do things as a group: socialize, work together (on what you’re producing), join forces to fight for change.
___  21: Find other groups and form larger clans.

V.  Press for Change
___  22: Gather with other "culture jammers" and promote a new sense of community and activism.
___  23: Support or form a political group in your area that curbs corporate influence and presses for new initiatives. Write to local politicians.
___  24: Campaign corporations to take into account not only profits, but also people and the environment.
___  25: Talk to everyone around you about new ideas. ____________________________________________________________________________________
SCORECARD
Calculate your score out of 25 and use the following scale to rate yourself.
0-5 Please use this checklist to help you on your way.
5-10 You are making a good start.
10-20 You are culture jammer!
20-25 You are starting the THIRD WAVE!
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Add yourself to our Friends List and leave your own political / media rants for other Culture Jammers to read.

Read about the fifteen experiences that changed our paradigm in part two of Kick in the Eye’s Guide to the Third Wave.
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Kick in the Eye: Warrior Poets from Generation X Fighting the Culture of Mediocrity with Righteous Rock and Roll!

Using song, sound, and special effects, Kick in the Eye’s new CD Sea of Bitterness is a multi-adventure experience that takes you from the battlefields of Russia, to the rooftops of Gotham City, to the post-apocalyptic Forbidden Zone.
 
This is music as art.   
This is art in the new paradigm.    

Sea of Bitterness is available for sale or trade at www.kickintheeyemusic.com
 
Join the Third Wave!  Be a Culture Jammer!  Fight for Your Future! Listen to Kick in the Eye!

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