exterior by Pablo Vision.

A Revolution Of Consciousness

DEAD RECKONING by todd moore.  epic rites press, 2010.
a review by tony moffeit.

timing is everything.  and the timing of DEAD RECKONING by epic rites press is everything.  because todd moore, the author, and wolf carstens, the publisher, have unveiled a book that captures that fraction of second in time when something new is happening.  to go to examples of that revolution of consciousness, one needs to go to american music. one needs to go to the robert johnson sessions.  one needs to go to leadbelly’s last sessions.  one needs to go to elvis presley’s sun sessions.  one needs to go to the early albums of the rolling stones.  one needs to go to the early albums of bob dylan.  one needs to go to the miles davis/john coltrane collaboration of the album kind of blue.  all of these musical sessions or albums ignited a change in consciousness.  what were the aspects, the parameters of this change in consciousness?  they were threefold.  first, a new and independent individuality, a new way of approaching the world as a separate individual.  second, along with the freedom of that new individuality, an innovation in the art form.  and third, through the new individuality and artistic innovation, a revitalization, an enormous injection of energy.       

DEAD RECKONING is about todd moore and todd moore is about a whole variety of things.  todd moore is about the short poem with a wallop that you find in DEAD RECKONING.  todd moore is about a famous long poem, DILLINGER, which will also be published by epic rites press.  todd moore is about essays and poems which evoke the philosophy of outlaw and outlaw poetry.  what is outlaw all about?  let’s go to some of the predecessors of outlaw: friedrich nietzsche, bodhidharma, federico garcia lorca, and walt whitman.  like nietzsche, who gave us thus spake zarathustra; like bodhidharma, the first zen patriarch;  like lorca, who identified the duende; like whitman, who used america as a metaphor;  todd moore gives us poetry as a new philosophy, a new metaphysics, a new way of approaching life.  and like nietzsche, like bodhidharma, like lorca, like whitman the very essence of his outlaw metaphysics is extreme energy.  the individual artist must become a bolt of lightning.  the individual artist must turn himself into a tornado, a hurricane, an earthquake.  there must be a transfiguration.  there must be a transmutation.  the individual artist must reach a point of pure energy.  the individual artist must burn, burn, burn, and then burn some more.  the individual artist must become a comet who never dies.  or, even after death, burns some more.  and in the process of this transfiguration, the individual artist must reach a new level of innovation in his art.  todd moore does this in many ways:  the electricity of his language, the slimmed down line which works to produce a psychological intensity that is irresistible, and a darkness that is as dark or darker, than the duende.  here’s a poem from DEAD RECKONING:

instructions

for playing
russian rou
lette first
put the
bullet in
an empty
chamber
spin the
cylinder
3 times
quickly
cock the
hammer
back lick
it off for
luck & the
black taste
of death
then point
the pistol
at yr head
take a
very deep
breath ex
hale slowly
& let yr
finger fall
in love w/
the trigger
the way
that maya
kovsky’s
did the
shock of
the click
cd kill
you      

in the age of the internet, todd moore is the poet rock star of the world wide web.  through two outlaw websites, metropolis from france, and st. vitus from america, todd moore is the star performer.  his outlaw poems and essays are the equivalent of the first exposure of a bob dylan, an elvis presley, or the rolling stones.  he’s the world’s greatest underground outlaw poet.  incredible staying power, unbelievable energy, and exceptional production are aspects of his genius.  why is todd moore the poet rock star of the internet and, now, of epic rites?  here is a good reason, again from DEAD RECKONING:

the way

i write
is strictly
fuck you
no cap
ital letters
no punc
tuation
the words
jammed
together
or all
smashed
up like bro
ken glass
crushed
pop cans
& used
condoms
the ameri
can sen
tence is
either a
stutter
or a
scream
& i’m
waiting
to watch
it explode

buy this book.  no, buy two copies.  one for yourself.  and one for a friend.  to introduce that friend to a new wave in writing. 

"Todd Moore has revolutionized poetry with a style that is all his own: the stripped down line that leaves an electrical impulse of lyrical violence; the outlaw persona of one who leaves blood on the page, a visceral experience of life, death, and rebirth; and his channeling of the essence of John Dillinger, including myths, symbols, and archetypes." - Tony Moffeit

"The poems from Todd Moore's DEAD RECKONING do not strike me so much as words written down, but rather as primal relics unearthed from an archaeological dig. They go much deeper than bone, they speak to my blood." - Wolfgang Carstens

"Todd Moore's poems kick you in the teeth and leave you curled up and bleeding on the wrong side of the road. Todd Moore is the Big Daddy of poems that deal with muscle and grit and bone. The reason no one else writes like Todd Moore is because no one else can. These poems give it to you straight, no chaser." – John Yamrus

"Todd  Moore’s writing works at the nerve endings like a beast not yet named. DEAD RECKONING exposes a corrupt and fetishistic America that habitually reinvents its own endgame.  Each poem is a scattergun butt to the head; a perfectly worded organism that pulsates with the rhythms of life but also reveals the darkened mayhem of the soul:  whorehouse shoot-outs, doomed gangsters, toxic women who pay more than lip service to those who haunt the killer outskirts of town. His short lines are the palpitations of the street. Todd is a poet’s poet, raw, highly stylized, richly American, violently lyrical.  He’s a master of the form." – John Macker

"Todd Moore is an American original. He breaks language between his fingers brutally yet deftly, so it falls apart just right, screams like an angel as he contorts it to fit the thought precisely as it should. He's not raping it, you can hear the words screaming "yes, yes." His poetry centers on the gangster outlaw figure, it drags out the fasciantion we feel before the aesthetic beauty of violence. People have accused him of being a pornographer of violence. It was they who were fumbling with their hard-ons when they should have been reading one of the best writers living." - David McLean

DEAD RECKONING is coming soon from epic rites press. It`ll be available through Small Press Distribution, as well as part of The Lucky Bastards Club subscription.

Epic Rites Press
240 - 222 Baseline Road
Suite #206
Sherwood Park, Alberta
T8H 1S8

epicritespress@gmail.com

"because all our fingers are middle ones"™