"The Best-Laid Plans of Mice and Men Often go Awry"

Much like the unfortunate little mouse in Robert Burns poem, "To a Mouse", I often find a plow being driven through my home. While obviously being metaphorical, it's often that the most thought out and time consuming of my schemes and plots...well....fall apart in front of me. While fortune and circumstance often casts a wayward frown upon my endeavors, it's just as often that I find a new way to carry on. That being said, this little thing known as Snuff Film Collective has seen it's share of unfortunate circumstances and some how has managed to persevere throughout, while not always assuming the same form that was initially intended. 

When this shit started, it was humble in beginnings. As a fan of hip hop and it's many personalities, A$AP Yams and his fundamental role in the creation of the A$AP MOB stood out and inspired me to attempt to do the same, but with a "do it yourself" mentality. I wanted to unite people with similar interests and diverse talents under one moniker that would allow us a bigger platform to work from than we could build on our own, while sharing resources and allowing a collaboration of ideas among ourselves. I never jived with contracts or other binding agreements, nor do I like one person using the work of others to further themselves. Hence the "collective" aspect of the name. The whole "snuff film" part comes from me and my friends having a very dark sense of humor, and our collective obsession with pushing what is considered "art" to it's furthest extreme. The idea that snuff films are an artistic medium is extremely interesting to us, and while we don't fuck with hack'n and slash'n, we like to carry the same themes presented in these films, anger, violence, brutality, and a perversion of mankind, into our music, but I digress. 

The first form this collective was to take was the creation of a zine composed by multiple contributors featuring interviews, art,  poems, essays, and other assorted visual works with the intention to pool our creativity into one cohesive form to better elevate ourselves and our works. A lack of contributors, funds, and time all contributed to the zine becoming little more than a stack of art supplies in my closet and a few unfinished interviews in my email. I shelved the idea for quite some time, and inspired by friends in the STL DIY community, I focused my energy on booking shows for my friends. Kirin Pax and the rest of the gang at Constant Cocoon Booking where a shining example to me of how a DIY ran group of promoters could succeed in a vast ocean of pay to play promoters and suspect "booking companies". I set out with the goal of trying to help my friends in bands get shows in STL when I could and it quickly turned into an addiction, while a pretty expensive one. I've met some of the best people through this endeavor and had some of the most memorable experiences in my life. It's an extreme drain both mentally and financially, but I love it. 

Rife with mental illness and a constant sense of insecurity driving me to constantly seek some sort of validation, I decided that booking shows wasn't enough, and even throwing together a haphazard string of bands known only as "All My Rowdy Friends" wasn't enough to satisfy the itch in my bones. I fried up a Tumblr account, because I assumed I wasn't hip enough for a Blogspot yet, and started posting the interviews that had sat in my emails for quite some time. Quickly I learned that Tumblr's character limit was a cruel mistress and that this wouldn't last. I'm lazy and technologically illiterate so I pushed off the creation of a blog or website for as long as possible, but when an Interview with DODECAD reached upwards of 8 pages, I decided that I had no choice but to upgrade. 

This past year or so has been quite a ride, and it's far from over. Just recently things have seemed to turn towards the direction I set out with in mind when I created this collective. New opportunities have arrived and people, or at least the people I respect and seek their respect, have started to notice our collective effort. I can be a pessimist, and like the mouse living in a field knows, sometimes circumstances can put a damper on your plans, but also like the mighty mouse, I seek to move forward despite whatever circumstances get put in my way. With the help and constant support of my closest friends (my bandmates), the love and support of my partner and my family (Haley <3, mom and dad<3), and the continued friendship and partnership with some of the best people in the world (Jason, Fam Med, Jared, All of Como<3, DODECAD, and the rest of you beautiful fucks), I know that the dream of creating a platform for all of us to benefit from will one day be achieved.

TL;DR: I'm not going to be using Tumblr anymore because their character limit is bullshit. Also, fuck you you lazy asshole<3