Stronger Than Dirt Pete Moss

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Stronger Than Dirt Pete Moss is one of the many aliases used by a Tom Long of Chicago, Illinois (not to be confused with other Tom Longs of Chicago or elsewhere). Tom was active in xerox zine culture from the late ’80s through the early ’00s under the Colicky Baby Records and Tapes imprint, and several examples of Tom’s mail art periodicals are filed deeply and safely away at the University of Iowa Libraries Special Collections Department in Iowa City and the Museum of Modern Art Library in New York City. Every so often he posts things at http://colicky.blogspot.com.

Hair of the Cactus: Sebastián Silva’s “Crystal Fairy,” or, You Can’t Spell “OCD” Without “COD”

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Stronger Than Dirt Pete Moss
5 Min Read

Much of the press Sebastián Silva’s move “Crystal Fairy & the Magical Cactus and 2012” has gotten this summer has focused on the film’s female lead, Gaby Hoffmann, and the fact that she did not require a merkin or other artificial follicular embellishment for her nude scenes.

2013, Hair, September, Stronger Than Dirt Pete Moss

Love Letters (Straight from Your Heart): The American Rifleman, High Firepower by Mail, and the Gun Control Act of 1968

Stronger Than Dirt Pete Moss
7 Min Read

How many more copycats are waiting in the wings for their moment of fame from a national media machine that rewards them with wall-to-wall attention and a sense of identity they crave? — Wayne LaPierre, Executive Vice President, National Rifle Association (12/21/2012) The aftermath of…

Chicago, February, Politics, Stronger Than Dirt Pete Moss

Colicky Baby Records and Tapes: Introduction Part Three: The Mousetrap-Shooter Incident

Stronger Than Dirt Pete Moss
2 Min Read

(The first two posts in this series are here and here.) “Officially, one may not use anything that looks like a stamp but is not. Since the use of this sheet requires one to tear up the regulations, I consider this an inverse book and…

Stronger Than Dirt Pete Moss

REPLAY. Furdermore … dis, dat, and da udder t’ing

Stronger Than Dirt Pete Moss
3 Min Read

Editor’s Note: This post first appeared September 19, 2010.

CHICAGO – One of the funniest things I’ve heard in many years was said to me by a co-worker, a lifelong Chicagoan.

“There’s no such thing as a Chicago accent,” he said.

I laugh every time I think of it.

Of course, like everyone else who grew up here, he pronounced “Chicago” as “Shuh-CAW-go,” and, as well-educated as he is, I bet that after a beer or two, he would have said “dere” and “t’ing.”

He said it with a straight face, and he meant it. (Not like the Facebook group, “There is no such thing as a Chicago accent!,” which appears to have been started by individuals who, in fact, believe the opposite.)

“Dis’s hayer sapose ta tawk. Dis’s narmal. Ever’wun eltz tawks funny.”

All right, now I’m exaggerating. And I’d agree that there is no such thing as the Chicago accent. There are, of course, several. It’s a very diverse city. Ukrainians and African-Americans and Vietnamese and Assyrians and Bosnians all have their own accents. As do Uptown Kentuckians and the few remaining Andersonville Swedes. The most prominently parodied Chicago accent is a dialect that is mainly found among the white working class – specifically, white working class individuals who were born and raised here. Due to demographic changes, that accent is quite noticeably on the decline.

Stronger Than Dirt Pete Moss

Ambiguous, cynical zine returns; still ambiguous, cynical; also sadder, wiser, bigger, better

Stronger Than Dirt Pete Moss
4 Min Read

THAT LONG NEWSPAPER SPOON was a xerox mag I sporadically produced between 1990 and 1999, under the imprint “Colicky Baby Records and Tapes.” The name is derived from a quote by William Burroughs: If civilized countries want to return to Druid Hanging Rites in the…

Stronger Than Dirt Pete Moss

Colicky Baby Records and Tapes: Introduction Part Two: Gonzo DIY: The Amateurs Turn Weird

Stronger Than Dirt Pete Moss
9 Min Read

(Note: The first part of the introduction to this series of posts is located here.  Maybe with the next installment, the actual series will begin. Or maybe the whole thing will be all “Introduction.”—STDPM) In 1989, Mike Gunderloy, about whom I’ll have more to say…

Stronger Than Dirt Pete Moss

Colicky Baby Records and Tapes: Introduction

Stronger Than Dirt Pete Moss
3 Min Read

I was an impressionable kid. For instance, I was very moved by the “let’s put on a show!” ethos of “The Little Rascals” (aka “Our Gang”) shorts – which were broadcast every afternoon on Chicago UHF TV. Thanks to Spanky, Alfalfa, and company, I was forever trying to put on a show in my own backyard, always unsuccessfully, due to the fact that there were not enough fellow rascals in my neighborhood to stage a full-blown vaudeville extravaganza, or even to serve as a suitable audience, notwithstanding the tireless efforts of my long-suffering (and sole) sidekick, Jeffie.

I can’t remember if it was “Our Gang” or some other bane of Newton Minow that provoked me to try to start up my own neighborhood “newspaper.” Like my attempts at theater, my paper never got off the ground, even though I had found a really kick-ass place in the woods for a secret hideout, er, editorial headquarters.

Failures are learning experiences, and should be appreciated, as such.

I stayed interested in the newspaper business. After a semester of gonzo sex-and-drugs-and-rock-and-roll-soaked fun as the news editor of my community college weekly (the day we learned we were being evicted from our little hash-smoke-redolent trailer on the edge of campus, and were to be moved into a glass-walled fishbowl in the midst of the lair of our nemesis, the faculty director of the student government – dude was Dean Wormer with a cheesy mustache and smarmy grin – the editorial board got together, got wasted, and trashed the bejesus out of our beloved offices and spray painted obscene cartoons all over the hammer-and-boot-pocked wood-esque-paneled walls – good times) I transferred to one of my home state’s top-four “directional” universities and immediately joined the staff of the student newspaper.

I think I lasted two days. Maybe three. Details are unusually fuzzy in my memory, but something about my first assignment pissed me off, and I said some things to a couple of editors that made me unwelcome in their very stuffy and Omega-Theta-Pi-House-like home. Which was actually a house. A house full of very dull people.

Stronger Than Dirt Pete Moss
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