December 03, 2018 (Monday) - Thayer Sarrano returns to downtown Los Angeles, a quaint one-horse outpost, located in a state about the size of Connecticut, the only real difference being that it's on the West Coast, we cloistered scribal monks of the cloth dimly understand, a state where most everything in life, including life itself, as is only fitting, finds a Prop 65 sticker affixed to its shin, except for the grass. We enjoyed reading about Ham & Eggs in an article from 2013, the year of the club's establishment, as found in an old paper copy of the L.A. Times, which we kept tucked away in a corner of our scriptorium library, as if we had been saving it all these years for this very moment. And we were. This is known as being "prescient," (because we've got skills). Of this club, the said newspaper describes, preposition dangling, a "tiny punk joint you can lose a weekend in." If you aren't an adept, and need to brush up on your punk history, we would counsel a viewing of The Decline of Western Civilization. (Stick with Volume One, and your life will be the better for it.) If you would then like to catch up on the proto-punk movement, and all the various historical events that eventually led to the appearance of Darby Crash, there is but one way to do that. You will need to read the prelude to the film, which is, of course, both volumes of the Oswald Spengler classic, The Decline of the West, in the original German, Der Untergang des Abendlandes, from which the film clearly cribs its title. (Poseurs.) A Sarrano solo-set rendering, offered in tandem with Night Palace, clearly indicates that Western Civilization is back on the ascendant. Indeed, this is the general intent of the Sarrano Winter Tour, and helps to explain why we keep shipping so many copies of her new single -- I Will Never Be Used to Your Beauty -- to Germany. Not that we give much of a fig for any supposed demarcation between Occident and Orient. It's all one big blue marble as far as we're concerned, and we lost ours, along with our fig, long ago. In Night Palace, we clearly recognize shades (as in "good spectres") of Avery Leigh's Wanda, whom we've documented previously, as any random perusal of our Archives would reveal. Only now, Avery's got a brand new bag, and a new single. It's called, "Nightshade." We Scribes dig it thoroughly.  

November 30, 2018 (Friday) - A venture to Nashville wouldn't be a venture at all without a visit to The 5 Spot, which Thayer Sarrano duly did on Tuesday, rounding out more amply her winter tour. It wasn't a "visit," however, in the social sense. She played a set there, being the musician that she is, before magically reappearing today in more southerly parts of these States United -- Fort Worth, Texas. Now, tonight, Thayer Sarrano plays the Magnolia Motor Lounge. Headlining tonight will be Grant Gilbert, a native of Lubbock. In 2017, Gilbert released an EP entitled Lost in Transition. More recent, as of this year, is his single "Part of You." Also performing this evening will be Van Darien, also of the Lone Star State. Van Darien has an EP from 2014, which goes by the name of Silent Sparrow.