Some more publishing news: my werewolf story “Nothing But What You Bring With You” is out now in the Carpe Noctem anthology.
Carpe Noctem was edited by Megan Fennell and Leslie Van Zwol (who were fantastic to work with) and published by Tyche Books in Calgary. There was an official launch at the When Words Collide festival on Aug. 18.
The theme for the anthology was stories deeply connected with the night. As the announcement for the book says: “Night transforms the world. Owls and bats claim the sky from songbirds, nocturnal predators prowl beneath cover of darkness, and cloying shadows grow thick enough to swallow a scream. As the saying goes: people aren’t truly afraid of the dark—they fear what could be in the darkness with them.”
A promo card for the Carpe Noctem anthology, with an excerpt from my short story, “Nothing But What You Bring With You.”
My story, “Nothing But What You Bring With You,” is a werewolf tale of friendship, betrayal, and revenge. It takes place in Manitoba near the Ontario border, in the Canadian Shield, during a winter snowstorm. Those are especially fun at night…
The full list of contributors to Carpe Noctem is: Teresa Aguinaldo; Tyler Battaglia; Stewart C Baker; Beth Cato; Barry Charman; Tommy Cheis; Jonathan Chibuik; Derek Des Anges; Richard DiPirro; David J. Fortier; David Jón Fuller; Chadwick Ginther; Joseph Halden; Richard Lau; Jennifer Lesh Fleck; Avra Margariti; Thomas C. Mavroudis; Cat McDonald; Paul McQuade; Ville Meriläinen; Tais Teng; and Laura VanArendonk Baugh.
Tyche Books held a countdown to the release date on social media, making up beautiful promo images for each piece in the collection, which is where the image for my story above comes from.
For more information on Carpe Noctem and ordering, visit the Tyche Books website.
L.K. Bertram’s new book on Icelandic immigrants to Canada and the United States is a fascinating look at a culture that persists in spite of, and in some ways because of, assimilation.
In each chapter, Bertram looks at the evolving Icelandic identity through a different lens. Clothing, food, drink, folklore and language are each considered. She shows how early immigrants sought to succeed, and how their descendants built upon those successes in the face of changing pressures from the dominant culture.
Clothes make the immigrant
Her exploration of clothing is of particular interest. Traditional Icelandic outfits, such as the peysuföt still worn today by women on formal occasions both in Iceland as well as in North America, is sometimes seen as static and unchanging: a link to the past. She documents how this distinctive dress was created as part of Iceland’s struggle in the 19th century to define its culture against that of the Danes who ruled their country. Further, she shows how Icelandic immigrants abandoned aspects of that ensemble in North America, particularly the skotthúfa (a tasselled skull cap).
“Although many migrant women had eagerly embraced these
fashions at home in Iceland,” she writes, “it became clear when they arrived in
North America that this clothing, including the ‘peculiar’ skotthúfa, could
represent something different, a marker of excessive ethnic and racial
difference in the eyes of white, Anglophone North Americans.”
But her treatment of clothing is much deeper than what is marked as “traditional” by Icelanders and their descendants. She shows how adopting new styles was crucial for Icelandic immigrants. Those who settled on the Manitoba prairie, including on Lake Winnipeg, soon began wearing clothing more effective against the bitter cold. That included moccasins and garments made by Cree, Ojibwe and Métis artisans. Those who settled in large urban settlements such as Winnipeg abandoned clothing that marked them as foreign. They began wearing styles in conformity with the dominant Anglo society as a way to both gain employment and avoid discrimination.
Immigrants and colonialism
The book also examines the changing relationship between First Nations and Icelandic settlers. Bertram looks at the well-known (among Icelandic-Canadians) relationship between John Ramsay and the Icelanders at what is now Riverton. Ramsay, a prominent member of the Salteaux and Cree community living there, had petitioned the Canadian government for land rights, only to find the government had granted them to the Icelanders. Despite conflict between the two groups, Ramsay helped the Icelanders survive. Both his community and the Icelanders’ suffered a devastating outbreak of smallpox, likely picked up by the Icelandic immigrants as they passed through Quebec.
“Although individual Icelanders might have had positive personal relationships with their Cree, Ojibwe and Métis neighbours at certain times,” Bertram writes, “the Icelanders overall were very aware of and, in many respects, dependent on the appropriation of Indigenous land by the Canadian and American governments and the violent state repression of organized Indigenous resistance in the late nineteenth century.”
A decent cup of coffee
In another chapter, she looks at two important Icelandic beverages: coffee and alcohol. Early arrivals to Canada were frustrated at the lack of good quality coffee in a nation where tea was dominant. Thus, the customs that grew up around procuring and preparing coffee as good as they were accustomed to in Iceland became a part of the Icelandic identity in North America. (Especially interesting is the continuing practice of brewing coffee through a “sock,” which was the only way I knew how to do it until finally getting a coffee maker as an adult.)
Alcohol was more problematic, given its prevalence among male social culture in the decades following the Icelandic immigrants’ initial arrival. Its negative effects on how Icelanders were perceived led to many joining the burgeoning temperance movements in the early 20th century.
Bertram also shows how Icelanders and their descendants managed public perception of themselves and their culture. Xenophobia during the First and Second World Wars added to pressures to assimilate and not be seen as dangerous or too foreign. She shows how this led to a celebration, and mythologization, of a “Viking” identity.
Vínarterta, an ‘Icelandic’ icon
Appropriately, Bertram gives one defining aspect of Icelandic culture in North America its own chapter: vínarterta.
This layered prune torte that has become synonymous with
“Icelandic” culture in North America had an unlikely path to stardom. Bertram
traces the dessert’s origins in the 1700s as the “Vienna torte,” which then found
popularity in Denmark, and thence to Iceland. There, it was popular during the early
waves of emigration to North America. In Canada and the United States,
vínarterta lived on as an ethnic Icelandic food. But in Iceland, it fell out of
fashion and all but disappeared.
Interestingly, while the original versions called for experimentation in fillings and thickness of pastry layers, the recipe ossified in North America. That is, many Icelandic families’ versions became set as the “traditional” recipe. It was a matter of intense debate how many layers one should have, and whether anything but prune filling constituted a “real” vínarterta. (Bertram also includes an appendix with various versions of published recipes, including the early Viennese one.) It might be that I’ve eaten a lot of vínarterta in my life — and enjoy making it! — but this chapter alone is worth the price of the book.
Overall, Bertram’s The Viking Immigrants is a welcome addition to the growing body of historiography of the Icelandic diaspora. It goes beyond community histories and explores multiple themes in the context of emigration, colonialism, settlement, and assimilation, over multiple generations. It’s well worth picking up for anyone of Icelandic descent — as well as for the serious student of immigrant cultures in North America.
As recent Metal Monday posts show, I lately became a big fan of the Killer Dwarfs. I’ve loved their songs since first seeing the video for “Keep the Spirit Alive” waaaaayyy back in the winter of 1986-87. But it was seeing them live not just once, but twice, within a year in 2019 that got me hooked. I began searching out their back catalogue. Easier said than done! And sadly, there is no Killer Dwarfs box set. So… I made one.
Homemade Killer Dwarfs box set by David Jón Fuller / Photo by Mike Aporius
To start with, I’d been fortunate enough to pick up their 2013 album Start @ One, and their 2018 live album Live, No Guff! at one of their shows. I bought Russ Dwarf’s Wireless at another show. But finding the Dwarfs’ earlier albums is something of a challenge.
The signature crate from the Killer Dwarfs’ popular video for “Keep the Spirit Alive,” in which the hapless Russ Dwarf suffers many misadventures.
I had never bought Stand Tall when it came out, despite “Keep the Spirit Alive” being one of my favourite songs, nor Big Deal, despite the brilliance of the video for “We Stand Alone.” However, thanks to searching out music stores and resellers online, I was able to put together most of a collection on CD. Stand Tall and Reunion of Scribes — Live 2001, were by far the hardest to come by.
Sometime around the second Dwarfs show I went to, in late 2019, I started thinking: of all the bands that have released box sets, who better than the Killer Dwarfs, whose signature crate would make the perfect case for it? But as mentioned above, there is no Killer Dwarfs box set. If you’ve searched for one online and ended up here, you already know that.
So, being in no way a carpenter or marketing genius, I decided to make one. Here’s how I did it.
Filling your Killer Dwarfs box set — the albums
Obviously, it’s not a box set unless it is in some sense “complete.” So, absent any bootlegs, I figured I needed:
The easiest way I found to get the recent CDs (i.e., released since 2013) was at the Killer Dwarfs’ live shows. (I’ve tried ordering other CDs through their Bandcamp site, but just cannot get it to work.) They really ought to sell their complete back catalogue at each performance (hint, hint).
The hardest albums to track down on CD were Stand Tall and Reunion of Scribes — Live 2001. Good luck finding either for less than $200! I found the first on eBay, eventually (search early, search often). The seller was in Russia, and it was going for around 10 bucks… so for that price, either it’s not a collector’s item there or this is some kind of copy — which, upon receiving it, I think it likely is. But the sound quality was fine and I have the original album on vinyl, anyway! I just wanted to have a complete collection to go in the crate.
The second hard-to-find album is one I have now owned three times. I reviewed Reunion of Scribes for Uptown magazine when it came out in 2002, but it wasn’t my favourite album, so I gave it away. (It’s a decision I rue now). Recently I tried many used record and CD stores, locally and online, to no avail. To make a long story short, I bought a digital copy from Russ Dwarf’s Bandcamp page, and then, ironically, found the CD for a decent price from a seller on Discogs the very next day — so I bought that too.
Designing a Killer Dwarfs box set
First, I figured out how big to make it. I chose to make it a cube with enough room to hold at least 10 CDs, to allow room for the entire Killer Dwarfs back catalogue, as well as a future album or two.
Then I had to figure out materials. I thought of building it around a plastic CD rack, but couldn’t scrounge one that would work. I decided to go with lightweight wood.
The crate from the video for the Killer Dwarfs’ “We Stand Alone” is clearly built to a different scale than in the previous music video, but it had a clearer image of the front lettering.
For the inner box to hold the CDs, I went with ¼-inch fir “good one side” plywood. For the outer appearance of the crate, I took screen captures from the videos for “Keep the Spirit Alive” and “We Stand Alone” and stumbled onto a workable selection of materials in my basement: ¼-inch wood panelling, which on its unfinished side looks like “crate” material, and wooden stir-sticks for paint that could look like framing.
Fortunately the folks at Rona were willing to sell me a
bunch of long stir-sticks that were also ¼-inch thick, making the math of
figuring out how the materials would work together way easier (and, it looked
better than a thinner stir-stick like the ones I had).
I looked up online some ways to build small wooden crates,
but to be honest, since I’m no carpenter (see above) and since the look of the
crate in both videos, while slightly different, isn’t particularly finished, I
didn’t go for any complex, jewellery box detail in the assembly. Let me say
here that all the apparent blemishes and mistakes in the final look of my CD
crate were TOTALLY INTENTIONAL AND AESTHETICALLY NECESSARY.
Anyway.
Pieces for the inner crate of the Killer Dwarfs box set
Building a Killer Dwarfs box set
I cut pieces of ¼-inch plywood for the interior box. I cut them so the outer dimensions of that cube would be 6 ½ inches — so the top and bottom pieces were 6 ½ inches square, two sides were 6 ½ inches by 6 inches, and two sides were 6 by 6 inches.
The inner crate had to fit all the Killer Dwarfs albums on CD.
I always dry-fit pieces before I try to put them together
since I am Not A Carpenter ™ and don’t fully trust that my designs will work
before I put them together. Also, I was figuring this out mostly as I built.
Lots of measuring and re-measuring. By the way, building a cube that is
perfectly square on all sides when you don’t have a working table saw is SUPER
HARD.
I painted the interior walls black.
I decided to add something a little extra on the bottom — a
Killer Dwarfs logo. I found one online, printed it out large, and then scaled
it to fit, using a geometry set and a bit of junior high algebra. Then I did
the lettering on the wood in pencil as well as I could.
I scaled down and drew the Killer Dwarfs logo by hand.
After I had tweaked the imperfections in the logo, I painted
it black. After it dried, I erased more of the visible pencil lines and painted
a second coat.
I put two pairs of sides together with glue, and when that had set, I glued each two-side pair to the other and used elastic bands to keep pressure on the joints as they set.
I painted the interior sides black, and glued all the pieces together.
Then I glued the four-side construction to the bottom. The
front side showed no joins, since I wanted to use the fake “slats” I would be
adding to the sides to help hold the joined side of the inner cube together. To
be honest, given the number of pieces of wood I would be adding and gluing, I’m
not sure it would have made a difference. But since the wood was all too thin
for me to nail, I wanted to make sure it had as much strength as I could.
Making the “slats” of the crate meant cutting the stir sticks so I could have a square frame, which would go over the horizontal slats.
I used long paint stir sticks to make the slats and “frame” of the outer crate.
I painted the outside of the interior box black where it would show through the slats. That was for the illusion of it being dark inside, as well as allowing the glue to hold directly to wood on both sides, instead of paint.
I used elastic bands instead of a clamp to hold the slats tight while the glue set.
Once both sides were done, I started working on the bottom,
using the 1/4 –inch panelling. It was just right for the dimensions I needed.
In a perfect world I could have cut the tongue and the groove off the edge, I
suppose, but it looked pretty good to me.
I used tongue-and-groove siding, with the rough side out, to get the look of an unfinished crate.
The back and the front were also ¼-inch panelling, running horizontal. This duplicated the look of the crate, in my opinion, and let me cut the tongue and groove off the top and bottom for a more finished look on the top.
I put the back on first, partly because I needed to paint the front of the crate before gluing it in place.
Painting a Killer Dwarfs box set
For the front, I had to recreate the “DANGER / KiLLeR DWaRf / INSIDE / THIS SIDE UP” signage. I felt the lettering for the front of the crate would be much more difficult than just the logo, so I did it on paper first, using the images from both music videos.
I worked out the lettering for the crate at the scale I needed based on what is visible in the Killer Dwarfs’ videos.
It’s not an exact replica. (And the crates in each video don’t match, either!) But I was pretty happy with doing a rough draft, because it took several tries (and a lot of erasing) to get it right.
I debated using the paper version as a guide only, and re-drawing everything on the wood. Then I thought: maybe I can use it as an actual template.
So I made copies, cut the shapes and letters out, and used that to get the lettering right. I still used a ruler to get the lettering as straight as I could, even with the paper template.
The photocopy of my original lettering made a pretty good stencil after I cut the shapes out with an X-acto knife.
Then I painted the lettering on the front of the crate. I
did two coats.
The front of the crate took the longest to make, due to the lettering work and finding the right shade of red paint.
Once the front was painted, I glued it on. It might have allowed more stability to do the lettering afterward, but I felt it would be much more awkward to letter and paint on the assembled box.
I left the top until the end, in case I had to cut or sand
down the top of the interior CD box to fit within the outside construction.
(Did I mention how hard it is to make everything perfectly square when you
don’t have a table saw?) As well, the wood panelling tended to have curves or
warps in it. Even with the use of clamps when gluing it on, it was not
perfectly flat. (TOTALLY INTENTIONAL.)
And, for the top of the crate, I decided to add a little extra. Leaving it blank would be more accurate to the crate in the music videos, but I thought it needed a Killer Dwarfs logo on it. So I stencilled the name on it and painted it to match the one inside.
Finishing touches
The final touch was to add some Russ-Dwarf-esque hands to the side of the crate. It was harder than I expected. I searched through used toys at the second-hand store, online makers of marionette parts, and eventually stumbled onto a hitherto unknown (to me) fandom, namely ball-jointed dolls. FINALLY, after racking up many a weird search result for “doll hands,” I found a supplier with two that looked like they might work.
I needed them to fit flush with the side of the box, so I used a mitre box and saw to get a nice, flat cut.
I also wasn’t totally happy with the colour of the hands as they were, so I painted them before gluing them between the slats of the side of the crate.
Now, for the finishing touch — I enlisted the help of my friend Mike Aporius to take some “official” shots of the finished product. As you can see, he made it look fantastic.
Homemade Killer Dwarfs box set by David Jón Fuller / Photo by Mike Aporius
So, there you have it. Until there’s an official Killer Dwarfs box set, you’ll just have to make your own. But for me, at least, it was a fun project to work on for several months!
Questions? Comments? Have you ever concocted something for your personal fandom because it didn’t exist yet? I’d love to hear about it in the comments below!
For me, the Killer Dwarfs’ second live album, Live, No Guff! had two barriers to hurdle. First, I bought it at the concert where I first saw them live, when they and Kick Axe opened for Helix, and they were fantastic. How could a recording live up to that?
The Killer Dwarfs’ Live, No Guff!
Second, I wasn’t super keen on their previous live album, so I had my doubts about this one. (In hindsight, I think that was due to the recording quality on Reunion of Scribes, the true-to-life gaps between songs, and the fact it works better as a video recording).
So how does Live, No
Guff! measure up?
Fantastically.
Any live album should make the listener feel they are actually at the concert, even if this means editing reality. The band recorded Live, No Guff! at live performances in Toronto, Ottawa, Whitehorse and Vancouver, rather than the single Toronto concert that was Reunion of Scribes.
Singer Russ Graham keeps the between-song banter to a minimum, but there’s enough to let you know the Dwarfs are having fun. During a lull in “Doesn’t Matter,” Graham tells the audience that maybe he’ll be prime minister one day “once I learn how to do all that math and stuff.”
The lineup on this album is Graham on lead vocals, Gerry Finn on guitar, Johnny Fenton on bass, and Darrell Millar on drums. The audio mix of electric and acoustic guitar, bass, vocals and drums is excellent.
The feeling is of a seamless blow-by-blow tour of the Dwarfs’ greatest hits. (Sadly, they still don’t play “We Stand Alone” on this recording, either).
The band plays songs spanning its entire career, from “Heavy Mental Breakdown” off debut album Killer Dwarfs, to the title track for Stand Tall, to Big Deal’s “Union of Pride,” the electrifying “Comin’ Through” from Dirty Weapons, “Hard Luck Town” from Method to the Madness, and the title track for Start @ One. It’s a clever way for a band whose albums are divided between various record labels and independent releases, some of which are out of print, to issue its own “greatest hits” album.
Having seen Killer Dwarfs now as both opening band and headliner, I’d say Live, No Guff! gives the best of both worlds. It sounds like a band professionally keeping things tight, playing together seamlessly, and still having a great time with the audience. I’d put it at the top of my favourite Killer Dwarfs albums, as well as near the top of my favourite live albums.
It’s also the perfect intro for anyone who’s never heard
them before, and unlike some of their classic albums, it’s relatively easy to
get hold of. Well worth the price of admission.
While not technically a Killer Dwarfs album, Russ Dwarf’s Wireless is a worthy addition for any Dwarfs completist, featuring acoustic reworkings of many of their best-known songs.
Russ Dwarf’s Wireless
As with any album of acoustic versions, Wireless has its ups and down. (Points to Russ “Dwarf” Graham for calling it that instead of “unplugged,” which conjures up memories of endless 1990s albums.)
Musicians on the album include Glenn Belcher (guitars, sitars, banjo, wood), Rob Zakojc (bass, backing vocals). Also contributing guitar playing are Kevin Simpson, Dan Lear, Kevin Reid, Ron Thal and Glen Drover. Cosimo Crupi plays keyboards, and Fred Duvall is credited for “bottles of anger,” whatever those may be.
Perfect fits
Slower songs from the Dwarfs’ later albums like “Look
Around,” “Four Seasons” and “Driftin’ Back” each work so well acoustically they
might as well have been the original versions. There’s less layering to, say,
“Driftin’ Back,” but it still sounds great.
Out of left field
The wireless take on “I’m Alive,” from Big Deal answers the question “What would the Killer Dwarfs sound like as a twangy honky-tonk band?” And I’m less sure I buy Graham’s crooning reimagining of “Dirty Weapons.” Nothing wrong with his singing; it just got me thinking, “Maybe their heavier stuff can’t be ‘wireless’.” But then…
Songs that shouldn’t work, but totally do
The Dwarfs’ first big hit, “Keep the Spirit Alive” kicks off the album. It’s slower than the original, but no less effective. The optimistic spirit (ha) of the original shines through on this stripped-down version.
Graham follows that up with a song from the same album, “Stand Tall,” which keeps the tempo of the original, but recreates the beat which crisp strumming instead of the soaring power chords and heavy drums. Mike Hall’s outstanding guitar solo, played on acoustic guitar (I assume by Belcher) would give Adrian Legg a run for his money.
I was blown away by the live version of “Comin’ Through” in concert and on Live, No Guff! And the studio original on Dirty Weapons is as heavy as the Dwarfs get. But man… the wireless version loses none of the aggression, and sounds like it should be on the soundtrack for a revenge-heavy Western. (You can hear some of it in the video below.)
Overall…
This is a solid album of different takes on the Killer Dwarfs’ pop-metal standards, with a few curve balls thrown in. Outstanding singing by Russ Graham and guitar work by many make it worth adding to your collection.
On Start at One, the Killer Dwarfs wail like the early 1990s never went away. As far as the album is concerned, it’s true.
The Killer Dwarfs recorded Start at One in 1993, but released it in 2013.
The Dwarfs originally recorded Start at One (stylized as Start @ One) in 1993 with the same band lineup as Method to the Madness: Russ Graham on vocals, Darrell Millar on drums, Ronald Mayer on bass and Gerry Finn on guitar. Unfortunately, it wasn’t released then and was, apparently, only available as a bootleg called Just Another Day. Blogger Carl Hose has more of the story. So for most fans, Method to the Madness was the last Dwarfs album before the band went on an indefinite hiatus. (That is, before some members reformed the band for a performance they recorded for Reunion of Scribes — Live 2001).
However, in 2013, the Killer Dwarfs released the album independently as Start @ One. (When the band signed with the EMP label, EMP re-released it in 2018.) So how does a heavy rock album recorded during the height of Grunge hold up in the 21st century?
Pretty well, actually.
Start @ One showcases the melodic songwriting the Killer Dwarfs displayed on albums like Dirty Weapons and Method to the Madness. But sonically, it’s more stripped-down, hearkening back to the style of their debut album.
The album starts off with two catchy songs, “Lonely Road,”
and “Solid Ground,” before shifting into the slithering “Sky is Falling” that
starts off with sharp, spare guitar riffs that keep grinding all the way
through to the sarcastic-sounding chorus and calliope-infused end. (Yes, the
calliope sound works, even if it’s a little weird.)
In 1993, not as many radio stations were playing this style of heavy rock anymore. But by the time the Dwarfs released Start at One, heavy metal and hard rock had had a renaissance. Bands like Iron Maiden, Mötley Crüe, AC/DC and Guns N’ Roses were releasing new studio albums and touring as if the 1980s roared on. The fact the Dwarfs had an entire album’s worth of “new” material in that style made it a timely release in 2013.
The songs show a good diversity of what the Dwarfs are capable of. The title track, a hammering, melodic number that also sounds great live. The album shows its mellow side with the slower, Led-Zeppelin-esque “The Crowd.” I wasn’t as crazy about “Down in Hollywood,” which seems like a throwback to the L.A. music scene at the time it was written.
Overall, Start at One is a solid album, and a good addition to the Dwarfs’ catalogue. With its eventual release, fans no longer had to chase down illegal copies.
