Blues Concert

On Sunday, October 28th I went to the b.l.u.e.s bar in Lincoln Park, Chicago. We saw this cool blues band, the Billy Flynn band. Flynn is this older white gentlemen with glasses, who plays a mean blues guitar. He played this semi-hollow body Epiphone or Gibson that had a vibrato arm, whammy bar on it. He had another guitar playing primarily rhythm guitar but took a few solos, a bassist, and a drummer laying down the beat. 

The second guitar player was really good, although his solos weren't nearly as unique or characteristic as Flynns'. The drummer played the same beats for most songs. The bassist had a great tone, playing an Ernieball music man bass. They played a lot of what I would call Chicago blues, meaning that electric city blues with influences from BB King, Albert King, Muddy Waters, and John Lee Hooker, that unique city blues sound. 

Flynn's voice sounds nearly identical to aging Eric Clapton's voice, but I think Flynn is much more nuanced and careful with his guitar licks than say Clapton, who probably plays a lot more than this guy, a Chicago native. A lot of the songs were blues standards but a lot of them were also originals or songs going back to the 50s or 60s that were done by the greats of the blues tradition. 

The b.l.u.e.s bar is this small hole in the wall. Its even smaller and crappier than the bar I perform at open jams here in California. The mens room didn't have a lock, so that was kind of unexpected. The place is quite great though. The cover charge for the show was only $7 and there's no drink minimums. I did buy a Stella Artois which tasted great. There was maybe about 10 people there, the smallest audience I've ever seen for a concert. Well, this was a Sunday night in a college area so that's not too surprising.

I went to a classical and jazz concert during my trip to Chicago. I had to do a blues concert just to see three different genres, plus Chicago is a blues city, it would've been wrong not do see some great live blues. Flynn's guitar playing was inspirational, it takes me back to the roots of my playing, rock and blues. Sometimes all you need is one note to make a difference. 

Chicago blues! 

Venom

Venom got a lot of bad reviews in the press. In fact, I asked a lot of friends and peers what they thought of the movie and most of them had mixed reviews. However, they still thought it was fun and 'good', albeit in a broad generalized way. I only read maybe two reviews before I saw it. I already knew most of the plot and details from friends but didn't know exactly how it would be displayed. I wasn't disappointed, I thought it was good. 

Tom Hardy's Venom is a kin to the common-man trope in many stories, be they science fiction (Phillip K Dick's characters), comic books (Peter Parker, nerd), or fictional Horatio Alger stories (stories of the great American canon). Tom Hardy is a reporter who's life goes to shit when he loses his job, his girl friend, and all ambition. Venom, a symbiotic form from space attaches to him during this time of crisis, not only that but he identifies with Hardy, saying, "where I'm from I'm a loser like you, but here 'we' can be something more." This is a further identification with the common-man trope, or in this case common-alien. 

Tom Hardy does a great Venom voice, deep and vicious with jokes sometimes and serious threatening behavior the next. Venom likes to eat tater tots and chocolate, which was kind of funny. Venom even eats people, biting their heads off, which of course freaks out Eddie Brock (Tom Hardy's character). I like the way Venom is portrayed here. Yes, he admits to being a 'loser', but he's also a bad ass character, a strong fighter, who develops a sort of labored love towards Eddie Brock, and even his girl friend, who when Venom takes control of her, kisses Brock as She-Venom, quite an intimate kiss. Oui la la. 

My biggest criticism of this flick is that the villains were boring and one dimensional. Donald Trump makes a better villain than any of the characters here. Venom has his evil tendencies, but in the end he becomes an anti-hero, willing to live, take care of, and be a willing part of Eddie Brock's life. First off, that bad guy who finds the symbiotic goo that is the Venom strains (there are millions of them, just like Venom), he's this Silicon Valley type Elon Musk guy named Carlton Drake. That guy is one of the worst villains I've seen in a Marvel movie. Elon Musk is actually much more of a d-bag villain, especially when he called a guy a pedo a while back. 

Anyways, this character was so generic it was laughable. They try to make it more interesting by giving him a symbiotic parasite too, named Riot. But Riot ends up being kind of generic too. Other than the fact that Riot and Venom have an epic fight to the death (with Riot and Elon Musk-alike getting blown up), there's not a thing interesting about these characters. The bad guys need to be better, have better motive, other than typical generalized ideology.  

Lastly, I would say that they captured Venom pretty well. The way he runs up walls check. The way he's like a glue that attaches to Tom Hardy's body check. His jump from Marvel Vs Capcom 2 check. His "we are Venom" characteristic voice-line check. They did Venom right. He comes across as bad ass. I thought the movie was bad ass, in the sense that the action was great, the voice lines were strong, especially the "have a nice life" line. The love interest is sort of down-played in this movie and my friends even said that the actors didn't have much chemistry. Its true, but I don't think the luke-warm relationship hurt the action-packed scenes or the exciting nature of the human-symbiotic relationship. 

As a kid I used to love reading Spiderman, Venom, Carnage, those three were some of my favorite superheroes, antiheroes, and villains, mostly because they're from the Spiderman universe and I always liked Spiderman. The Venom movie is a lot different from the comics but I would still say its does a decent job of not straying completely off base from the comics. In that sense, its a safe portrayal, ultimately a decent one of the classic antihero. 

Overall I think Venom is a pretty damn good movie. I thought a lot of it was humorous but it was also action-packed. This is a better movie than Ant-man and the Wasp, the last Marvel movie I saw. I recommend the movie to comic book fans, Spiderman fans, and Carnage fans for sure. Carnage even has a cameo after the credits so make sure to stay after the credits to see this ginger talk about "bringing carnage."  

Chris Madsen/Adam Larson Quintet

So tonight I ended up going to a great jazz concert for only 12 bucks! Beat that LA. Chicago is a great town for live music, there's always somebody playing somewhere. The Constellation is a great, intimate venue. Its basically a warehouse converted into a studio space, looking like a basement but with amazing acoustics and natural reverb. Last year I saw my former UW-Parkside jazz teacher perform with a quartet, a trumpet player by the name of Russ Johnson (look him up on YouTube). 

Tonight I saw a double tenor saxophone quintet perform, the Chris Madsen/Adam Larson Quintet. They play modern straight ahead jazz. These guys aim to please, they never hit a bad note nor an ugly note. They play pretty. At their best I would say that they're a modern evolution of the post-Coltrane, post-Brecker sound. That is, a deep, throaty, emotive, and expressive tone. 

Adam Larson is a young tenor player from Normal, Illinois. At the concert, the music was split 50/50 Larson and Madsen tunes. Of the two I would say that Larson's music was more exciting. His melodies are very angular, which is my way of saying that its modern, and has that Giant Steps 'sheets of sound' aesthetic. At the end of the concert they played one of Larson's tunes, and it was so memorable that I was able to recall the melody on the bus trip home. His playing was great, in fact I believe that he could become one of the front runners in his generation (same as mine) for really great tenor sax players. 

Chris Madsen's (from and based in Chicago) tunes were more spiritual and expressive. He writes better ballads (if I can say they were ballads, they probably weren't considered such by the composer) than Larson, which is understandable because I believe Madsen is older and more accomplished, being apart of acadamia. He teaches jazz music at University of Chicago Illinois and lives here, whereas Larson is a Manhattan School of Music New York jazz musician. Madsen's onstage persona was more expressive and solemn as well, just like his music. 

On piano was Rob Clearfield, on bass was an older gentlemen (oldest guy in the band, probably the unoffical leader) named Curt Bley (who said it was great that I came from California to hear that), and Greg Artry the drummer and only black guy in the band. 

Clearfield's piano playing was one of accompaniment. He had one solo that stood out as virtuosic but not as expressive as the tenor playing. The comping was quite good though. He was pretty much comping most of the time the whole concert, laying out occasionly for extended sax solos. 

Arty's drumming stood out for me. Not only was he a drum and cymbals virtuoso but he played with emotive style and grace. Sometimes he would go into double and even quadruple time on the kit, stunning artistry. I would say he plays the modern Brian Blade style of drumming. Brian Blade has been the drummer for Wayne Shorter's band for a long time now and he's been a big influence on modern jazz percussion, and for good reason, he's one of the younger leaders of the style. There were many moments when I had to tap my foot to the swinging beats, and I would move back and forth in my seat to the sound. It was infectious. Him being the only black guy in the band gave the band more jazz credentials, after all jazz is a black American art form. The guy had chops to burn and the tenor players, presumably the leaders here, let him play with wanton abandon. He owned the rythmn, alongside the bassist, Curt Bley. 

Bley was obviously the oldest member of the band, tall, balding, with plastic rimmed glasses. He played as any great bass player would play, he filled the space with low notes, and mostly stuck to the chordal structures of the tune. He only had one solo per say, which was just an introduction to a tune. It was very short and he spent most of the concert comping. His bass tone was so natural and loud, using only a very small amplifier, which probably broadened the natural acoustic tone of his instrument, a acoustic double-bass. 

It was an eventful day and night. I spent the entire day talking with my music mentor Frank Abbinanti, a new music composer based in Chicago. You can check out his album Labor Studies on YouTube, also check out a tune he wrote for me that I recorded back in March called Poachers, which you can find under my YouTube channel name Megafigueroa007. 

Anyways, it was a great concert, memorable for my Chicago trip. I plan on checking out more music from Madsen and Larson when I get back home. Apparently Larson has an album from 2017 that got four stars in Downbeat and favorable reviews in Jazziz, two magazines that I read often. Its good to see that jazz music is alive and well in the windy city.

Jazz in Chicago! 

Classical Music at DePaul

I've been in Chicago the last couple days and I've been checking out as much music as I can. Last night on the 25th I attended a free classical music concert at DePaul University, a Catholic institution in Lincoln Park. Amazingly it was free and all I had to do was rsvp online and pick up my "ticket" at their box office. Not bad! 

The actual performance was quite elegant. Here's the setlist:

Mozart 

String Quartet No. 19 in C Major, K. 465 (1785) 

Beethoven 

Piano Trio in C Minor, Op. 1, No. 3 (1795)

Piano Trio in D Major, Op. 70, No. 1 "Ghost" (1809)

String Quartet in C Minor, Op. 18, No. 4 (1801)

Debussy 

String Quartet in G Minor, Op. 10 (1893)

Jean Cras (1879-1932)

Trio for Violin, Viola, and Cello (1926)

Schubert 

String Quintet in C Major, Op. 163, D. 956 (1828) 

As you can see it was quite a standard string quartet 'showcase I' as they called it on their program. The Mozart piece opened things up nicely with that characteristic 'classical' sound. The Beethoven pieces were the main showpieces. The Debussy piece was unusual, mainly because I think its the only string quartet piece that he wrote. 

I've never heard of Jean Cras, and when I asked my music mentor, a new music composer named Frank Abbinanti (find his work on YouTube), he said he had never heard of the guy either. However, his composition was quite good. There was definitely a middle eastern sound here. It was refreshing because it was the only modern piece, written in 1926. 

The Beethoven piano pieces were grand. The most virtuosity and musicianship was displayed when the pianists got onstage and woo'd the crowd with their dazzling gymnastic pyrotechnics. I tend to think that most pianists are virtuosos, due to the fact that its a solo instrument. Most guitarists aren't virutosos because its mostly an instrument of accompaniment. Anyways, these piano trio tunes were the real highlight for me. 

The other high light for me was watching the cellists bow and play emotive low notes. Cello is quite an expressive instrument and I've been interested in playing it, but I've been unable to because the instrument is too damn expensive. Maybe one day when I get a better job. Cello would be a great instrument for me to get into, and become a new music musician, one of my goals as a musician; to move from rock and jazz into the new music, modern music scene. 

Lastly, they ended the program with Schubert, classic quartet stuff. I've actually heard a lot of Franz Schubert's quartet music, thanks to YouTube, my main source for music of all kinds. It was a good note to end it on. 

Chicago is known as a blues town but I spent my first night here going to a classical concert. Its good to know that Universities put on free shows for the public, not just for those affiliated with Uni. In the words of Ice Cube, "Yeah today was a good day." 

Tales From Earthsea

Tales From Earthsea by Ursula K Le Guin is one of those all-time great fantasy novels. Now I'm no expert on fantasy, but I know enough about the genre to say this is great fantasy, even if it might have been aimed at a younger audience. I've read some high fantasy in my youth; The Lord of The Rings series, The Hobbit, and some low-brow fantasy as well; every Harry Potter book. This is probably the extent of most general readers' knowledge of fantasy. Tolkien is a master of prose and high fantasy, and Le Guin just as well. 

The book is a series of novellas set in the world of Earthsea, all of them unique and different, offering us different glimpses of people and their ways in Earthsea. The first story, The Finder, details the wizard school on the island of Roke. Its said that J.K. Rowling's Harry Potter school is based on this. Important to note, the story focuses a lot on women and the role of women's magic within the school, which is integral to Le Guin's feminist tone. It sets the whole narrative up in an exciting way. Yes, there's sorcery, wizards, and wizards that turn into dragons but what makes Le Guin stand out from low-brow fantasy is that she makes a sociology out of it. 

The Bones of the Earth describes the relationship between Ogion, legendary wizard of Earthsea, and his first teacher, a very loving relationship. Darkrose and Diamond is also a sort of love story, about a guy who would rather be a musician than a mage, and the girl he loves. On the High Marsh is a tale of madness and redemption. 

The last novella is called Dragonfly, its about a girl that wants to enroll at the magic school at Roke island, at a time when women were banned. She ends up changing the world of Earthsea in the process. 

Le Guin is a gifted writer, and I've learned a lot about fantasy and writing from this book and one of her other novels, The Left Hand of Darkness, which is one of her best science fiction novels. I highly recommend The Left Hand of Darkness in addition to Tales From Earthsea. In the beginning I wasn't sure if I could get into fantasy, after all I haven't read fantasy since middle school. However, Le Guin makes it cool, smart, and literary. She's brought me back to the genre. 

John Milton's Paradise Lost

Paradise Lost is a biblical epic poem by John Milton, written in 1668, the most well known epic poem in English. It has about 10,000 lines of verse. Milton was a highly religious man, a Protestant until late in life, who became apart of the new government in England, after they chopped off King Henry's head. He worked in government in between writing; poems and discourses on things like divorce and monarchy, he argued that the Divine Right of Kings was wrong, even idolatrous. Paradise Lost tells the story of the fall of man, when Satan tempts Eve to eat from the Tree of Knowledge, and ultimately lose Eternity with God in the Garden in Eden.

The story has everything; love, war, peace, evil, politics, science fiction style peaks into the future, marriage talk, sex talk, metaphysics, and philosophy. There are a lot of themes that this book touches on. I'd like to go over a few that I found interesting.

Milton shows us that his God in Paradise Lost is an artistic god, omnific, knowing all, creating all, everything. God is professorial here, the ultimate Monarch. In the passages where we see how God created the Earth, we see the true artist in his godly abilities. Milton's God is also shown as the ultimate sovereign, who sends his Warrior Son Chieftain to single-handedly destroy Satan and his evil angel allies, sending them to Hell. This is unusual because Milton doesn't believe in the Divine Right of Kings, but despite this he chooses to write a biblical epic about the most divine right of thee King. Milton strives to show us "the ways of God to men". Here we must take note and separate Milton's work in Parliament from his work as a poet. The artist's pen differs greatly from the political essays. 

Another theme is the justification of Satan being a sympathetic character. Here, Satan is portrayed as a bad guy, yes, but there's strong argumentation for Satan being a more understandable character than Milton's God, empathy. Sure, Satan is evil, and wants to overthrow God with a third of the angels, but in seeing this we see that, yes he is proud, but we can also see his "radicalism and fraudulence, freedom and its counterfeit fused in a single personality not easily pigeonholed." (hudsonreview) Milton doesn't see Satan as a hero, because Milton understands whats its like to go against an absolute soverign and lose. We can sympathize with Satan's determination, never to yield, perhaps because its inherently human, which we see when Eve eats from the Forbidden fruit. 

Another strong theme is the relationship between Adam and Eve. There's a hierarchical aspect to their relationship because when Raphael comes to warn them of an approaching enemy in the future, Raphael mostly talks with Adam. They talk about marriage, the enemy, even sex. When Satan enters their lives, things change forever. It seems to me that the way Raphael warns Adam and speaks mostly to him, it was like an early temptation for Eve to rebel. 

Once we see Satan travel through the Earth's globe, and take the form of the serpent, we know its all over for the human race. However, what comes off as a surprise is the psychological justification for Eve choosing to rebel from God, and eat from the Tree of Knowledge, and that justification creates greater empathy for Eve than it did for Satan. Its interesting, what a way to write. Of course, Adam choose to Fall with Eve because he "loves his wife too much." He can't stand the thought of being away from her, and the thought of losing another rib doesn't sound too good.

The book is quite astonishing. There's a great scene where after the Fall, Adam talks with the archangel Michael and is shown the future of the human race. This part had a strong emotional effect on me, in some aspects I could see how that future represents the world of today in a way, I almost can't explain it in words, the sheer emotional intelligence brings to mind Wagner's music (my signature daily favorite is Tannhauser), or the sounds of the archaic delta bluesmen, with their yells, shouts, blue notes expressing emotion and pain. This section had a science fiction vibe to it, because they were looking at the heavens at this portal, and seeing everything that would happen on Earth. It was beautiful. 

Another highlight was the description of the civil war between God's angels, Satan, and his army of evil angels. Again, I really like the archangel Michael's stature, because he's the ultimate angel-warrior, with a flaming sword, second only to the Son of God Himself. We get this description of the most epic civil war in the universe. Ultimately though it is Christ Himself, The Son of God, who comes out and single-handedly defeats Satan and his army, sending them to Hell. 

Yet another interesting section was a talk between Satan and his evil angels in Hell. Here we get a real glimpse of the ultimate evil-doers in their lair. This section gave me a strong Dante's Inferno vibe, reminiscent because I just finished reading that a few weeks back. 

Paradise Lost is one of the all time great writings. Its something I plan on going back to and rereading, and I think the poetic beauty in every line will be just as exciting the next time I read it. In today's world, Milton is still relevant. These ideas haven't died as technology has taken over, rather these ideas are forever, and shouldn't be overlooked in the modern age of literature. This isn't just for Lit grad students, its for everyone. 

Halloween 2018

Halloween (2018 movie) is a direct sequel to the original Halloween film, a slasher flick starring my favorite Halloween and horror character, Michael Myers. I ended up watching the film at an early midnight showing for employees at AMC theater, where my friend works. The audience of AMC staff wasn't my cup of tea. The constant laughter, whispering, and talking throughout undermines the seriousness of the horror flick, which it is a great one. 

The movie starts 40 years after the first one left off. Michael is old, but we hardly ever get to see his complete face. However, he's just a plain looking, bearded, tall, generic white guy from what we can see. His victim from the first movie Laurie Strode, whom he didn't kill is old, and looks even older. She's estranged from her daughter, the horror of Michael ruining her life, her marriage, etc. 

Michael ends up getting sent to another facility. Somewhere on the road the inmates break free, and Michael is on the loose, setting the movie up for the grisly murders. The body count isn't very high in this movie, but the killings are much more grisly than the original film. Not only that but Michael goes on a killing spree on Halloween night! Evil ensues. 

Once he finds a knife, its trademark Halloween time. Once again, the murders are pretty simple, but we see that Michael is a lot more aggressive with his killings. He's the face of evil, as they say. Anyways, so he's on the run murdering everyone he can, mostly teenagers, cops, and his doctor, but eventually Laurie Strode finds Michael and they have an epic battle in her booby-trapped house, the house she built waiting for this moment, to kill Michael Myers. She's prayed for this, she says earlier in the film when she finds out he's on the loose. 

They trap Michael in the basement, and set the whole house on fire, a scene reminiscent from Halloween II. Of course, Michael is presumed to be alive, and in the last scene we see Strode's granddaughter clutching the knife Michael had used. Fin. 

The movie is actually pretty great, considering that nothing could've topped the original film and that making a sequel to the original is pretty damn difficult, never mind those other six (or however many!) other Halloween movies there are. I think this movie is a good horror flick, it has the gore, the evil mascot, the innocent victims, and even a smidge of evil mysticism (the inmates at the hospital when reporters go see Michael). 

I think the movie's most serious aspects were undermined by the audience, but I still enjoyed the movie even if they all thought they had to be coolest kids in the room. The acting, while not great, was still decent, and Michael Myers' character was perfect, I remember him being the same way in the original. In this aspect, they excelled especially. 

This is a great holiday movie to watch right now. Even if you don't like horror movies (like me), I think this is something even people who are afraid of horror movies can enjoy. There's some grisly murders, but some of it is downright laughable, like when Michael stomps on a guy's head, and the head explodes into pukey chunks. You would have to be unbelievably strong to do that! Anyways, check out the movie, its the best time, its fresh, and its almost Halloween.

Dune

Dune by Frank Herbert is one of those all time great novels that you read, and in many ways the book is more relevant (it was published in the 60s) now more than ever. Dune encapsulates many things; ecology, politics, religion, ideas of the messiah, science, government, space travel, intergalactic planetary systems, its got a lot going on. At over 500 pages (including an appendix, which is a must read to learn more about the world of Dune), this is a very thick novel that can take a long time. However, its such a great novel that reading the 500 pages was an enjoyable experience. 

I saw the theatrical released David Lynch movie before I read the book so I had a basic idea of the plot. Its complicated but I will attempt to explain it with as little words possible. 

House Atreides has governing power over a desert planet called Arrakis, home of a spice called melange, used to prolong life, and for the workings of intergalactic space travel; think petroleum and cocaine mixed in one. 

Shaddam IV, the Emperor of this galactic space opera organization,  secretly has a setup with the Baron Harkonnen, of House Harkonnen, and they setup a sting operation to attack House Atreides after they move to Arrakis. 

Duke Leto of House Atriedes realizes this is a trap but the offer is to good to refuse, after all Arrakis is home to spice. The Duke's concubine, Lady Jessica is a Bene Gesserit (witchy, part of a breeding program to create the 'chosen one', Kwisatz Haderach, a male Bene Gesserit). Paul Atreides becomes this messianic figure, who goes on to have powers to see through space and time, and act accordingly in the present. 

Lady Jessica and her son Paul end up going into hiding in the desert after the Duke gets betrayed, and murdered. The rest of the book is Paul and his mother planning in the desert, where they are presumed to be dead. 

However, they end up in the hands of the natives, called Fremen. There, they teach the Fremen the "weirding way" fighting technique. Paul proves himself in a duel to the Fremen, choosing his Fremen name of Muad'Dib. He becomes a messianic figure, and stops spice production via Fremen raids. Paul drinks the Water of Life and becomes the Kwisatz Haderach, a kind of messianic god-like being that can see through space and time. He senses that the Emperor is in space and about to come down to the planet. 

Paul leads a Fremen raid to attack the Emperor's troops and there's a big battle, the Fremen against the Harkonnens. Paul's only son Leo II dies. Paul threatens the Emperor, and says he will stop spice production forever unless he abdicates the throne. Baron Harkonnen's nephew Feyd-Rautha attempts to duel Paul in a knife battle but loses, thus the Emperor gives in, and even has to give his daughter to Paul's hand for a royal marriage! Paul realizes he's achieved his goal, but its too late to stop the Fremen jihad, because they have a powerful belief in him. 

What can be said about this book? Its a terrific novel, one of the best and longest science fiction novels I've ever read. Dune introduced a sense of ecology for me, something I was aware of but didn't think much about. The lack of technology in the story gives you a sense of primitiveness, something most science fiction lacks. You find this lack of technology in old historical fiction and in fantasy. 

The ideas of politics and religion are huge here. Here Herbert creates his own political philosophy and religious context. The appendix talks more about this, its a must read once you finish the story. 

In addition, there's tons of Middle Eastern references, mostly words. The native language of the Fremen is supposed to be mixed from Arabic and Persian. "Paul's messianic name (Muad'Dib) means in Arabic "the teacher or maker of politeness or literature", and the prophesied appearance of one known as the "Kwisatz Haderach", meaning "one who shortens the way" borrows the Hebrew term Kefitzat Haderech (קְפִיצַת הַדֶּרֶךְ), a Kabbalistic Jewish term meaning one who can "clench the way", i.e. the distance between two places - and teleport. The Fremen language is also embedded with Islamic terms such as, jihad, Mahdi, Shaitan, and the personal bodyguard of Paul Muad'Dib Fedaykin is a transliteration of the Arabic Feda'yin." (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dune_(novel))

Lastly, I must mention that the women in Dune are powerful and have their feminist tendencies. This isn't your 50s science fiction where women are plain and simple. Here, the female characters are just as important as the main character. They are powerful and impact the story in their own way, especially Lady Jessica. She is just as important as Paul. Paul's Fremen wife also has a big role too. 

Dune is an important book in the science fiction genre. It took me a long time to read, but I'm really glad I did. Its an unforgettable book and I can see much to be gained in reading it again. The movie doesn't do the book justice, it lacks the eloquence and beauty of Herbert's literary sensibility. I won't be reading the sequels, that's too much man.

Fear is the mind killer.