Interview with Lars Hedelin

Up next in our interview-series, we talked to my good friend and very talented artist Lars about drummers vs. drum machines, seducing Adolf Hitler and art.


-How and when do you get ideas for your films? What would normally trigger the brilliant madness? ( Or are you always brilliantly mad?)

Oh boy. I usually get an idea for one thing when working on something else. But then I'm wrapped up in this one year project and can't get to work on it right then and later it has morphed into something else. My ideas are always ruined by time and my imagination. I also get ideas from reading books and watching films. And I also steal other people's ideas. And one more thing: I object to the term brilliant madness because it strengthens a dangerous and boring stereotype, That one which depicts the artist as an outcast, and conveys the image of someone whose creativity is a result of this unwillingness to cope with society, or mental illness or whatever. [ You're so right, my bad - ED]


-From what I hear, it's the quiet ones who always end up being psychopathic killers. Is that why Americans as a people are so peaceful while Swedes are so violent? Please elaborate.

So, like, maybe Americans and Swedes have different outputs for their rage. Maybe Swedish people get into fights after soccer games (From what I hear there aren't many baseball or football hooligans in the US but I can be misinformed) while Americans go into war with different countries in the middle east. Also I think Swedish people have found a way to blow off steam through watching American action movies, while you sensitive Americans are mostly into French new wave cinema.

-If you had to choose between the Netherlands and Florida being submerged in water because of global warming which one would you rather see go?

Well, I guess it depends if you're more into oranges or pot. Me I could never choose. Next question please.

-If I remember correctly you play drums. Who is the sweetest drum player ever in the history of the whole wide world? Will there ever be peace between drummers and drum machines??! Could some unholy union in a drummer-drum machine cyborg finally create the peace in this god forsaken war????!!

I have a good friend named Danny who is a really good drummer. Also the drummer in Deerhoof, and Jimi Hendrix's drummer. I think the only solution to the drummer-drum machine conflict is two separate states. Also America has to stop supplying the drummers with weapons and play a more active role in getting the two sides to the negotiation table.


-Which historical figure would you most want to make out with? Optional follow up: "What line would you use to seal the deal?

Adolf Hitler. I'd just ask him to feel the Arian bump at the back of my head. No national socialist has ever been able to turn me down after witnessing the grandeur of that great swelling.

-Which city do you like best, Umeå or Stockholm? Please elaborate, unless it's Stockholm.

Ah, Florida vs Holland, Drummers vs Drum machines, inåtnavel or utåtnavel, Umeå or Stockholm. Stockholm is the place where I've tried to build a life for myself for twenty years, but my girlfriend lives in Umeå. Maybe if she moved to Ulan Bator I would like it there better. But Umeå also has fabulous Marta so I have to go with Umeå.


-It's your birthday and you have a magical dinner party, to which you can invite 3 nonfictional people, living or dead. The catch; at the end of the night you have to stab one of them in the heart with a steak knife. Who are your choices. Please elaborate.

I would invite Elisabeth II, Princess Diana and Prince Charles. I would use all my skill and cunning to maneuver them in such a way that at the end of the evening The Queen and the princess would turn against Charles and they would in a joint venture stab him together. The Queen and her stepdaughter would then get undressed and make out on the table, all smeared in blood and food, while I sit in my chair quietly observing.



Lars Hedelin studies at the Academy of Fine Arts in Umeå. Make sure to check out his movies and the rest of his webpage. Here's a incredibly sexy France Galle-video that Lars picked out for us. Enjoy!

Hey ya'll (World mix tape volume whatever/Song's I found on the street)

I'm glad to be back, this is literally the first time I've seen a computer with an internet connection in 3 months. The lab that I was working at in antarctica was recently destroyed by a bunch of mad norwegians that for some reason were trying to shoot a dog from a helicopter and then crashed into our satelite dish disrupting most communication with the civilized world.

I have to say that was a rough 3 months. Being the lab bitch in Antarctica is the worst gig ever, other than when I had to paint crosswalks for that summer and got hit by a mopeder who was carrying a bladder of red wine. The terrifying shock of extreme isolation and frigid antarctic winds that pierced through my whale blubber came close though. The rest isn't all that interesting, it just involved mutant wolf breeds and saving polar bears form extinction... temporarily.

This however is not an excuse and I know nothing can repair the bridges I've burned from my 3 month or so absence from this blog. But I'm back now and the autumn weather is fine in comparison, and on my first day back I found a crate of cd's my next door neighbor was apparently throwing to the curb. As much as he is an idiot for throwing away these cd's he does have good taste in music.

Here are some tracks

Lo' Jo + Django - Jah Kas Cool Boy
After dropping my Ipod in the snow my second day in Antarctica I was in such music withdrawal that listening to this song made me cry so hard I couldn't breath. This band lives in a tribal community in western France known as the Loire region, they live among "poets, acrobats, artists and circus performers." They helped organize the Festival in the Desert in the Sahara with Tinariwen which is where this track was recorded.


Dj Dolores Y Orchestra Santa Massa - A Danca da Moda
This guy is from Brazil and mixes local music to make beats heard in dance clubs around the world.

Fat Freddy's Drop - Hope
From New Zealand, reggea style can be attributed to DJ Fitchie. Vocalist is Dallas Tamaira (aka Joe Dukie)

Sorry to kill the Rockies fire Mazur. I'm a believer now though. Go Rockies!!!

unReal

The Rockies are going to the World Series for the first time ever, and I am a dirty stinking traitor.

We (that is, the half of this blog that thinks baseball is totally sweet) try to abstain from posting about baseball on this blog (because it annoys the half of this bog that thinks baseball is totally stupid), but I must say something about the Colorado Rockies and myself. To begin, I am a Brewers fan, because I am a Wisconsinite. They are my favorite baseball team. However, the Rockies were the first team I got really into by myself. I learned their line-up, watched them regularly, went to games, and even wore a hat, all without any parental influence or social pressure. In fact I got made fun of for doing so. Now here's the part where I'm a dirty traitor. When I graduated from the University of Colorado at Boulder almost one year ago, I moved back to Madison, Wisconsin, and went back to being primarily a Brewers fan. Other than regularly checking the Rockies' place in the standings, I pretty much stopped paying attention. Because I am a geographic whore. Now here's the part where I am a dirty stinking traitor. When I moved to Taipei, Taiwan, two months ago, I completely wrote off the Rockies like most of the country, and lazily followed the Brewers as they died just two games shy of the post season. I then learned that since the Mets had self-destructed, and the Rockies had beat the Padres in a regular season playoff game, they and the Phillies were now in the playoffs. I guiltily jumped back on the bandwagon because I am a dirty stinking whore. This of course means that I am not a true fan anymore and obviously have no claim to any sort of celebratory satisfaction. I can only watch in shame from afar. I can however say this, which is why I wrote this post:

Fuck yeah. Go Rockies.

Well, it's fall now, and I don't have much to say. I've started making little drawings again, which is something I enjoy. For some reason all the birds I've been drawing quote Richard P. Feynman. ( Yeah, I read one of his books. And yeah, I feel pretty good about myself now. Let me have this. )

Here are some songs:

Angela ( theme from Taxi) - Bob James

I can't remember if I've posted this one before. This song is so nice. One time when I was flying home from Chicago they showed an episode of Taxi, when the sun was setting and I thought life was kind of perfect.

Opfer Dieses Liedes- Les Reines Prochaines

This is another song from the fantastic mixed CD I got for my birthday. This Wicked Game-cover is something else. I'm telling you. It's great. And whenever I listen to it I think some weird girl is singing in another room, it seriously gets me every time. Oh yeah, I'm dedicating this song to ohmygodimmike, because it truly is a wicked game he's playing with the hearts of our dear readers. They are people with feelings too ohmygodimmike, and they miss your posts.

Geek.kon Thoughts

This weekend I went to Geek.kon here in Madison. I came to a little better understanding of what it means to be a geek, what geek culture means in today's social climate and also, who my real friends are.
With me was my friend from local death metal giants Burial Of an Era, David, who was the only person secure enough in their own awesomeness (and rightly so) to go with me.
We didn't go to many of the events to be honest. We started out with a screening of the MST3K episode "Jack Frost." The story was something about Russian, Norwegian wizards and the sins of pride and purity of spirit. My favorite quote was "I gotta go throw a cudgel." Baba Yaga and her chicken-legged hut made an on screen appearance. So that was sweet.
Afterwards we looked at some artist displays (mostly anime), wandered through the tabletop gaming room, and the vendors. I tried to pre-order the Jonathan Lethem penned issue of Omega The Unknown out this week, but the comic people got stuck in Milwaukee because of car trouble.
Last we went to a 2 hour lecture on Japanese music, which David had to leave after about 15 minutes and which really only covered the mainest of the mainstream. I do understand why David left, although my threshold for annoying personality traits is much much higher than his (which is to say they weren't actually very annoying). They started off with a quick dismissal of most traditional music, especially Enka. I would say the equivalent to this one axing would be to throw out Frank Sinatra and Billie Holiday as "old people's music." All ranting aside, I did learn a lot. I'm glad I stayed through the whole thing and it really was a very unique learning experience. I would say the best band I heard, hands down, was The Pillows. I couldn't find any mp3s for you online, but there is this awesomely grungy music video of Hybrid Rainbow on youtube:



The second day I went alone for the panel by local semi to famous SF/F writers Joan D. Vinge, Sarah Monette, and Patrick Rothfuss (and also Vinge's husband and editor for Tor Books, Jim Frenkel.) This part was of course the highlight of the con. I'm not sure why but I just get all warm and fuzzy inside when I hear spec fic writer's talk. They really didn't talk about anything out of the ordinary. They talked about success, both from the editor's and the writer's points of view. Monette and Rothfus talked about their recent climbs to market visibility. They answered a few questions and then before I knew it we were being kicked out of the room. Being the only panel by actual writers I really wish they had been given at least a 2 hour block, but oh well. What can be done aside from angry suggestion box confetti?
Now, in talking about events I have left out the biggest detail, which was the costumes.
There was a little boy dressed up as a giant robot. Almost everyone else was an anime character. I really wish I had brought a camera for you, Constant Reader. Maybe next year you should get off you lazy ass and go yourself.