So every year, I try to get poetry published because I’m a raging narcissist with severe entitlement issues. Here’s a poem I’m working on trying to submit. What do y’all think?

For Jason and luck (bad)

Bring on Friday the 13^th.

Bring on the primeval system of measurement.

The Aztec calendars used 13 months,

Each one leading into a birth and a subsequent resurrection,

There are 12 major constellations in the sky,

And one star to circle.

Jason traveled the world with his 12 Argonaughts,

Arthur stood around the table with his 12 knights.

Divining the future, the 13^th card of the tarot is “Death,”

A ghastly figure that represents exasperation, extinction and

Resurrection in equal measure.

One mark off the clock is the 13^th, it’s the last step into

Oblivion.

A new moon is born, waxes and wanes over the year,

In 13 forms.

At age 13, women become reproductive.

Men can ejaculate.

On the single dollar bill in my pocket,

An eagle holds 13 arrows,

An olive branch with 13 leaves.

13 stars circle its head.

The pyramid has 13 steps

And an eye.

13 stripes, 13 stars on a shield,

13 letters in ‘E. Plubrius Unim.’

The green phoenix on the paper is reborn

And so am I.

Saturday, the 1^st.

So, we’re starting a new series about music, television and movies with “Quiet Revolutions.” Here we’re going to be discussing tiny moments in culture that changed the way we see everything.

Our first example is in one of John Carpenter’s best, if not best known, movies, “Assault on Precinct 13.” Released in 1976, the action/siege film was something of a precursor to “Die Hard,” but it’s most famous scene has nothing to do with the battle at the police station.

As the gangs converge on the police station, they repeatedly stalk an ice cream man. We also see several shots of a middle aged man driving his young daughter to his ex-wife’s house. He pulls up to use a pay-phone and his daughter asks for money for ice cream. That’s when the horror happens.

Carpenter upped the anty like no one had ever done before. the death of the girl is senseless and random, but until now, we as an audience had no sense of what the gangsters were capable of. It’s a moment that dramatically raises the stakes and it works in spite of itself.

No one has ever made this bold of a raising of the stakes before and Carpenter has since said that he would not have done the scene the same again. That being said, it’s a scene that defined how bad the bad guys can be and it set them at the highest level. We have never gone this far since then, even with the remake of the original “Assault on Precinct 13.” It’s a testament to the film’s strength as well as the golden age of auteurism in Hollywood.

As usual, Facebook blew up with news of the frozen perspiration that fell from the sky this morning and it was obviously the biggest fucking thing that had ever happened in the history of forever. I mean, SNOW! Are you freaking out yet?

Shit, I hope not. That being said, there are few things that get me jazzed like winter albums. There are certain records and just certain songs that seem to work best when it gets below about 30 degrees. It’s unexplainable, but there’s a warmth to some artists and a chill to others that makes this kind of thing just perfect.

The Arcade Fire perfectly captured the chill of isolation and death in their first record, the fittingly titled “Funeral.” As much about the fates of teenagers filled with overblown emotions and near suicidal loves, it’s also a record about doubt, danger and rage, a perfect document on growing up at an age when even the simplest action seems like it could have life threatening implications.

So, true story. A record expo once came to my home town of Springfield and I went with a couple of buddies. There wasn’t much there that interested me. I was a vintage music fan, but I already had a lot of things on CD and it was tons of artists I had never heard of. I wasn’t that experimental of a guy at the time and I didn’t want to tread to far from the ’70s punk that I found comfort in.

I decided I had to buy something before I left and I spotted a CD called “Chelsea Girl” by Nico. I had the first Velvet Underground record at the time, and I remembered liking most of her stuff on that album, particularly “I’ll be Your Mirror.” So, I bought it, thinking that it would be more of that experimental drug rock.

Needless to say, it wasn’t and at the time, I hated it. “Chelsea Girl” is an extremely European record, filled with experimental folk and damn near beat poetry readings of Bob Dylan songs. It’s rough listening, but it grew on me over the years. Now, it’s an album I listen to about once a year, with it’s whispering vocals and warm bubbling folk becoming the equivalent of a warm French blanket.

Eels might be the reigning kings of sad bastard rock and their document to love and loss, “Electro Shock Blues,” is as heartbreaking as it is beautiful. Written and recorded in the wake of E’s father’s death and his sister’s slow descent into cancer, it’s a record with a tangible sense of hurt. However, it also has some of the best snowy pop songs of the band’s career.

Really, the snow queen still stands alone. Bjork is still one of the most intriguing artists out there, willing to stage huge shows and unrelentingly creative records that pull their listeners into her created world. Her performance of “Thunderbolt” this summer was one of the most magical bits of pop culture arcana of the year and it’s perfect for any time of the year.

I used to be a pretty big techno fan. It’s a crunchy genre, filled with nuance and with lots of room for individual artists to carve out a unique spot for themselves.

That’s also sort of the problem. More so than rock, punk, indie or country, techno and electronica have never had enough set rules as to how pieces of the genre should work. Sometimes this allows for brilliant little bits of creativity and other times, it replaces nuance with ear slicing blips.

I mostly enjoyed Crystal Castles’ first self titled LP. It wasn’t anything horribly original, but it was danceable and beat heavy without feeling too commercial. I hadn’t picked up their second record until late and it wasn’t until very recently that I actually gave the damn thing a spin. There was apparently a reason for it.

“Crystal Castles” is an abrasive record like no one’s buisiness, filled with reverb, backwash and found sound that creates a less than comfortable experience. They can still do hooks well, but what I came out with was the memory of my ears being violently assaulted in the first track from the record.

The softer, easier to love songs just sort of fall by the wayside, especially when the first track does little more than dare you to keep listening. Which is a real shame, particularly considering some of the stuff that comes later. Despite that, they still go back to their old distortion heavy tricks way too often.

There’s a way to make distortion comfortable and easy to listen to, but it requires a knowledge of making the other beats simpler and more able to accompany the rougher stuff. Justice pulled this off masterfully on their first record, “Cross.”

I don’t know, maybe I’m just getting sick of the genre. That being said, maybe I’m just sick of incompetence. That’s probably it.

Let’s not beat around the bush. No one under the age of 40 really loves The Rolling Stones. They’re dinosaurs, aging titans who still manage to be one of the most profitable groups working today, edging out more nuanced and contemporary groups.

That being said, there’s a reason you’re dad still has their records (this may only apply if you’re father is my dad). The Stones were a group that were able to impressively change with the times, morphing from a post-blues outfit to Beatles-esque rockers, trippy expermentors, punks, glam gods and eventually an arena selling outfit. They’re one of the most successful copy cats of all time and it works because they were able to innately understand what made different genres popular and more importantly, what made them work.

In no place is this more evident than on their landmark recored, “Some Girls.” Coming out on the heels of the New York glam punk movement, Jagger channeled all the sexual fervor, drugs and challenging of conventions. It was a smart move, embracing what the band could do well but using the most convenient bits of David Bowie and Gary Glitter’s swagger and style to make one of the defining documents of the ’80s.

“Some Girls” just came out in a deluxe remastered edition with some additional tracks that Rolling Stones fans almost definitely already have, but it’s a solid addition to fan’s libraries. For haters of the band, it’s nothing that’s going to change your mind, but it’s an interesting look at what a band can do well when they know how to suit an audience. It’s Asylum actually making a good movie for a change.