MorphSalon: Boogie's Mean Streets

Back again, suckers. Sorry for the delay, as the baby is almost here and shit is absolutely insane. The parents in the house know what I'm talking about, and those on the way to becoming parents better get ready. Hell comes soon.

Speaking of hell, I'm back in Salon for a short stint with a new piece on the photographer Boogie, whose monograph It's All Good is both harrowing and eye-popping. Literally, in the case of one shot. Parents might want to turn the kids away from this, unless they aren't afraid of truth:

Mean Streets: An Interview with Boogie
[By Scott Thill]
America's unending war on poverty and drugs has been about as successful as its unending war on terror, mainly because its enemies are abstractions. Meanwhile, the real worlds (not the ones you see on MTV) of drug and thug culture have been left to wither, like its victims and champions, beneath a glossy simulacrum.

Few are those souls who seek to document and transmit the routinized pain and addiction of these worlds -- worlds filled with everything but Cristal Champagne, Hummers and supermodels. Rather, they are the scenes of unending wars whose only victory is another fix; once each fix is achieved the whole process starts over again like a nightmarish rerun. So it should come as no surprise that those who journey into the hearts of darkness that pump lifeblood into these circular hells might know their way around a war zone..." READ MORE

Feel free to read and rant, as usual. Feedback loops are always appreciated. More to come later, as I gear up for the return of Jesus. Or whatever.