FEBRUARY MIX by Sam Pink

On February 14, Electric Literature will release Sam Pink’s new novel, Rontel, which Tao Lin calls, “the funniest book I’ve ever read.” Pre-order the eBook now and Sam Pink will sext you on Valentine’s Day.

Valentine’s Day Heartattack Music

happy valentine’s day everybody! can’t believe it’s that time of year again! you know, if you’re like me, then you’re useless. but seriously, if you’re like me, then you like music. nothing warms my heart and makes me think of love and other valentine’s day related things like music does. Mm hm, fuck yeah, music! love that stuff. good ol music. here are some hot-ass picks for you on this blessed day, a day where we either remember that we are too good for the person we’re with, or not good-enough. enjoy!

note: i am too stupid to figure out spotify so look up the songs marked with an asterisk. just imagined myself getting really defensive and yelling “my picks are my picks goddamnit.”

1. “south of heaven” slayer, as covered by modest mouse/califone*

3. ‘$’ by Young Family. (please go here to enjoy this musical selection)

I’m putting this selection on here because I make all the music for this band and I want to promote my own band and I’m using this opportunity to promote myself.

4. “Death machine” by the coachwhips

This song seems like the soundtrack in my head after walking into a dark room and just standing there. While re-reading that first sentence, I put my hand over my own ass and caressed it like I would with a woman’s ass. I felt really sexy doing it. My ass is good. i have nice legs too. Seems like I need to exploit that. Can I begin to make money by having people take pictures of my legs. What the fuck am I typing this is so shitty. What if someone reads this and then decides to never read my books.

5. “halibut acid” by aphex twin*

I don’t have anything to type about this song.

6. “to bring you my love” by pj Harvey.

This is probably the “heaviest” song I can think of. The lyrics make me have a vibrating feeling along my scalp. I like the yodeling she does at the end. Makes me think she could whip my ass. I would like to be whipped with a broken tv antennae to this song. I want a woman to whip me in the mouth with a tv antenna and then make me kiss her with my stinging/bloody mouth. I want to be getting whipped in the mouth with a tv antenna and then for the woman to have her leg up over my shoulder while it’s happening and then for her to stop whipping me and use the broken tv antenna to point up her dress.

7. “when your number isn’t up” by mark lanegan band

Much like my last selection, I would like to get whipped in the mouth with a broken tv antenna to this song. Only, for this song, the woman would have to be wearing sweatpants and point with the broken tv antenna through a hole in the crotch.

8. “hyperviolet” by pig destroyer

When the drum fill starts the song, I almost always curl my fingers and thumbs at my side and feel like my chest is growing painfully. Honestly feel like I could beat anyone up if this song was playing loud enough. Someties I like to read comment-thread arguments in pig destroyer youtube videos about what is “grindcore/thrashcore/whatever.” Haha for some reason I just forgot I was writing this and thought, “nasty nuggets” in reference to nothing. Also, I know this lyric isn’t in this song, but to tie this in to valentine’s day, there’s a pig destroyer lyric that goes, ‘your skin/is yellow/like wildflowers/in july.” And to me that’s good.

9. “96 tears” by ? and the mysterians

It’s a song where the lyrics would seem dumb to me if I just read them, but the way they’re sung makes me like them. The middle part of the song where the guy’s just like, talking, seems dumb though. Always imagine myself in the studio, pressing a button and talking to the band through the soundproof glass and I say, “guys, cut this shit out, this part sucks.”

10. “rich people” by the hospitals

The guitar riff is just a slowed down version of that song college marching bands play, where it’s like “let’s go team!” when that riff comes in, I honestly want to jump off a high thing and land facedown on the street but not die. I also really like the lyric, “there’s something I should tell you/but I don’t know if I should tell you.” I like that for some reason. For some reason that’s just the kind of nasty nugget to run my genitals through a deli slicer. (been trying to do that lately, like where how people describe things they like by referencing how it “destroyed” them or something, but I’m trying to use overly ridiculous things, feel me?)

11. “death before dishonor” by twista

This song is from the album “adrenaline rush.” I don’t like a lot of rap but I feel like “adrenaline rush” is so good. I like the “skits” between tracks too. There’s one about a guy buying a hotdog then getting shot. It’s pretty funny! Some of the lines on this album are like, really really well written too. I honestly feel like “adrenaline rush” is a failure because it’s too good. twis’ like, did it all on the first try. “death before dishonor” makes me feel something strong. He says, “always ever all days, death befo’ dishonor/coming back as long as I can still see/fuck tryna steal me/shit, you gon’ have to kill me.”

12. “fuck the usa” by the exploited

It’s really catchy. Seems like someone had put us in our place in the u/s/a. I also like the exploited because my only real friend in high school, rabbnuwaz ali shah, always wore an exploited shirt that said, “punk’s not dead” on the back and he was the kind of person who would just smash you in the face at a party or something. Rabb burned my arm with a lighter when I wasn’t looking and scarred me for life.

13 & 14. “we all love judy” (pts. 1 &2) by the melvins

Pretty heavy song. I immediately start a deep, slow, rich headbang when I hear this song. Feel like I really respect the melvins. They’ve been around since the eighties and they still make music and it’s always different. Dale crover is their drummer and he’s maybe my favorite drummer. I imagined this song on and me just sitting in a rocking chair naked putting lipstick all over my face while I smile with my eyes closed. For some reason I forgot I was writing this again and imagined myself saying, “what’s ya game, partner” to no one, in my head.

15. “crumbs” by ministry

This is from the album “filth pig” which most “hardcore” ministry fans don’t like, but it’s my favorite ministry album. The whole album is so good. “crumbs” is sweet because of the lyrics and also there’s a Charlie manson sample in it. Charlie manson says, “I never had a life, I don’t even know what life is. Have you? Have you? Had what you call a life…every day of my life.” Feels devastating to hear that sample every time. I also honestly feel an affinity for the idea of crumbs. One of the lyrics in the song is “juuuuuust crumbs.” Representative of how I feel about a lot. Just crumbs.

16. “pigs” by the black dice

I think the black dice were the last band I saw in concert, like years ago. They were the main band but almost all of the people in the venue left right before they went on, and it was me and like, maybe ten people. Fucking sweet. Black dice make weird improve alien dance music. Pigs is from their newest album. Pigs seems like the most accessible song the black dice have written, in that, there is a clear drum beat, and riffs and stuff.

17. “myth” by beach house

I just read over some of the things I’ve typed and decided I wouldn’t like myself if this was the first thing I read of me. But it’s like, who gives a shit because I’m going to die.

18. “street gutter boy” by FANG*

This is from the album “American nightmare” which is probably my favorite “punk” album. This song is about a kid who was born too late to enjoy the time period of his favorite bands. It’s another song where once the first drum fill hits and the singing comes in, I feel insane. They also do some sweet backing vocals, like “whoa oh” or “ah ah” like some punks bands do. The artwork in the cd is like a painting of people dying and getting their throats cut open and guts and crabs and weird shit.

19. “disciple” by slayer

Probably get some shit from “real” slayer fans because this song is newer. But I like it a lot. Most of slayer’s lyrics are really aggressive and violent but this one is the best to me. It’s basically about hating everyone equally and feeling no allegiance to anyone, not even god. The chorus is, “god hates us all” over and over. I always had this idea that I would understand/believe in god if I just thought of god as something that created us for us to be miserable. Like a terrible joke, unloving. Fuck. I like slayer a lot. I want to wear a slayer shirt and yell “god hates us all” while I’m inside a small cardboard box ductaped shut sliding down an icy mountain into a giant town on fire. i want to think about slayer while a woman cuts me with a razor and then pisses on me. At the end, there is a massive breakdown where the singer keeps screaming, “I reject this fucking race, I despise this fucking place.”

20. “oh why” by balam acab

A lot of people don’t know this but saddam Hussein is in this band. He didn’t die, the US government just wanted to erase his identity so he could make music.

21. “prayer to god” by shellac*

This song is written in the form of a prayer to god, where the singer first says, “to the one true god above, here is my prayer…” and then goes on to ask god to kill his ex girlfriend and her new boyfriend. I like it because it seems really powerful. It feels good for me to hear something so terrible because it feels honest. I like when people can write angry things and make it seems honest rather than just clichéd. Part of what I like about the song is how “wrong” it is but is still being genuine. Like, he asks god to kill his ex girlfriend quietly and painlessly with a single blow, and then he says, about the other guy, “him, just fucking kill him, I don’t care if it hurts/yes I do/I want it to/fucking, kill him but first/make him cry like a woman…let him hold out, hope that, someone or other might come and kill him, fucking kill him (repeat).” I also like that he’s praying for this. That makes it seem more good to me. I like how violent and unapologetic it is. I like when people are just straightforward about hating something/wanting to hurt it.

22. “(blackout)” by boris

When the first note hits, I imagine myself standing in 30 below zero weather, in the middle of a huge field while it’s snowing and I just stand there. This song reminds me that I’m a petty, hateful piece of shit.

23. “you gonna get it” by the coachwhips

I remember having an “argument” with this really clichéd hipster guy about how the drummer from coachwhips was not good. I kept saying, “he’s not good but it sounds good with the music.” And the other guy was like, arguing with me and I kept saying, “I’m not saying he’s bad but he’s, like he can’t keep the tempo.” A couple years later I was listening to an interview with the singer and he said he picked that drummer because the drummer didn’t know what he was doing/he wasn’t that good. So fuck that guy I was arguing with. Fuck his dumb ass. I hate talking to people about music actually. Seems like the worst thing to talk about. It’s a thing that is wordless (kind of) and then people talk about it. And people get mad if you don’t like what they like. Or you can be categorized based on the music you like. Feel like some people’s entire personalities are just “liking bands.”

24. “burn your house down” by wolf eyes

I first heard wolf eyes at a sonic youth concert that my ex girlfriend took me to. I don’t like sonic youth but I went and wolf eyes was the opener and I became an instant fan. Three guys came out and started making really, like, horror-movie type sounds and it kept building and I kept thinking “when’s the drummer going to come out” but get this: they don’t have a drummer. People were like, leaving the concert because of the noise and shit but I thought it was the fucking best concert I’ve seen. Another time I saw them at the empty bottle in Chicago and the people there were really like, they were booing wolf eyes so the band started just making terrible noise without doing any songs. I feel like that’s good. They piss off the audience because the audience was being shitheads.

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— Sam Pink is 29. He lives in Chicago. His books are available through Lazy Fascist Press and Electric Literature.