Hi. I’m Ben. I indulge in a variety of interests that include:
Writing, recording, and performing pajama rock songs with my band, Indoor Condor;
Making old-fashioned photomontage collages; and
Composing semi-self-reflective expository essays on my pet obsessions—across music, fiction, poetry, art, etc.
More Explanation
I find myself at midlife (hopefully) with, among other assets and deficits,
A fulfilling family life,
An engaging and financially sustaining career,
A set of preoccupations (or pet obsessions), and
Creative impulses.
What to do with this embarrassment of riches?
The first two, I work with elsewhere. Online, through my creative output and writing, I grapple with the third and fourth. Experience has taught me that the constellation of things I care about (those pet obsessions) feels to other people like a bunch for stuff that is either “wholly unrelated,” or at least “irresponsibly eclectic.”
I disagree. My theory is that:
By attempting to articulate the connections that unite my seemingly disparate interests, I will—at the very least— (a) Have a nice time, (b) Perhaps learn something about myself, and (c) Even perhapser, produce something of value or interest to others.
So that’s what we’re doing here—mapping the as-yet unarticulated connections among my pet obsessions. These obsessions include but are not limited to: Blade Runner, Wittgenstein, Wallace Stevens, the Muppets, Deadwood, David Lynch’s oeuvre, the montage art of Winston Smith, lots of music, and a handful other figures such as Captain Beefheart and Tiny Tim. Why do this?
Because it means something!?!
It’s curious to me that I need an audience for this endeavor, if the primary and secondary goals (a & b above) are self-amusement and self-discovery, respectively. I think I’m looking for an interlocutor—in a purely nonliteral sense. The eclecticism of my interests means that no other real-live people (whom I’ve encountered) share them sufficiently to help me map the connections that make them a coherent whole—i.e., no one wants to talk about this stuff in the way I seem to need to: The music people don’t care about Wittgenstein; the Muppet people don’t care for Blade Runner; and so on.
So if the interlocutor I’m looking for doesn’t exist, I will imagine them. Like Joyce’s ideal reader traversing Finnegans Wake in a single sleepless reading, this audience is both essential and imaginary. (Of course, “interlocutor” isn’t quite right as it’s more of a monologue-receiver, and in my imaginings, an enthusiastically interested one.)
I’m confident the imagined audience doesn’t actually exist in some as-yet undiscovered coutnry, or that its actual existence doesn’t matter, as long as the performer-audience structure creates the forum for me to figure stuff out—because here’s my other theory: Understanding the coherence of my aesthetics is tantamount to understanding myself à la a sort-of pop-psychological self-actualization. And wouldn’t that be nice?
So what am I doing to articulate the connections? Here’s a list—a rearticulation of the first list above:
I’m writing, recording, and performing songs under the band name Indoor Condor
I’m generating images using old-fashion photo-montage collage techniques
I’m writing little essays that are part appreciations of my pet obsessions and part autobiographical reflections
You can keep up with parts or all of this via my website, Instagram (which also posts to Facebook and Threads), and my musical output which is housed on Bandcamp (where you can buy records and more) and partially available on all the music streaming platforms (Spotify, Apple, Amazon, YouTube, etc.). There’s even an eBay store with some shirts and other merch. You can also sign up for the Substack where this “about” entry resides.
This is a collage called, Anti-Ante
Select Publications, Releases, Exhibitions
“Cotton Candy Bat Logo.” Collage. Included in group show at Studio Fallout as well as the exhibition catalog, Batalog 2025.
from The Animal-headed Pin-up Model Series. Collages. Published in Packingtown Review, Vol 22, Fall 2024.
Candy Macabre by Indoor Condor. LP Record. Bird Band Recordings, 2024.
“The Great Muppet Paper, or How to Become a Muppet.” Essay. Published in Kermit Culture: Critical Perspectives on Jim Henson’s Muppets, McFarland Press. 2009.
“David Foster Wallace: A Remembrance.” Essay. Published in Packingtown Review, Vol 1, 2009.
“Purely Platonic Relations with Isabel: Henry James's The Portrait of a Lady and Plato's Allegory of the Cave.” Essay. Published in ANQ: A Quarterly Journal of Short Articles, Notes and Reviews, Vol 9, Issue 2, 2006.
“Kingdom Battle Tourism Ad.” Collage. Published as Cover Image of Stillpoint Literary Magazine, 2002.