Residency is a four-part weekly journal entry brought to you by one of our favorite artists every month.

This week, Little Ruckus tells us exactly what he means by “Sweatpower.”

LEXICON RUNDOWN! (gonna tell you what the fuck I’m talking about when I talk about what the fuck.)

Hello folks, it’s Dom here again!

Confession time: music is power, music is glory, I am a slave 2 music to the max, music is feelings, sexual, emotional, community, orgy, justice, truth, freedom.

And yet, I would give it all up if something better than music came along, some sort of better way of feeling that Sweatpower cascade over my spirit, some sort of better way to let the Weird Life become us.

When I play shows, all I really want is to completely become the magic of the moment, to feel the enlightenment of a room full of people becoming transformed into one sweating, loving, completely unafraid being. Where that room isn’t a basement, or a bar, or a former-hospital-turned-commune in Germany, it becomes our church, our mosque, our synagogue; it becomes our freedom, our own wedding and our own death. Those moments when we forget we’re a group of people who’ve lived, fucked, betrayed, fallen in love, had our hearts broken, lied, cried, laughed and hurt, and we become only the truth of each other’s existences in that moment. And that moment is Sweatpower.

If there was some special way to make the Sweatpower happen, I would do that, it just so happens a room full of people sweating on each other and living and feeling completely free is a great way to feel Sweatpower. No doubt we’ve all been to transcendence from being part of something that didn’t involve pounding beats and yelling in a dark basement (e.g. a religious experience [however I would argue that Sweatpower IS a religious experience] or making love [also, I would argue that sometimes making love does involve pounding beats and yelling in a dark basement] or even just an extremely moving singer songwriter) and we’ve felt the Sweatpower even without the conditions I most commonly feel the Sweatpower in.

Another concept is Weird Life: somewhat intimately related to the freedom and truth of Sweatpower. Weird Life is honestly exactly what it sounds like, Life is fucking Weird, there are things about being alive that are truly bizarre beautiful explosions of existence, the way people treat each other, the way people create, the way people destroy. When we sit back and realize that somehow everything about life is so really very strange, and that in fact is supremely beautiful, we’re free to believe in ourselves and one another, we’re free to feel Sweatpower and to try and live like we want.

THE SANDWICH EATIN’ CREW (S!E!C!)

The Sandwich Eatin’ Crew aka the S!E!C! for short, is a few things. In one way, it’s all the Weird Life Sweatpower collaborators spreading the gospel of Sweatpower/Weird Life wherever we may roam, singing, dancing making beats, slaying guitars, jumping into danger at every turn. Also, it’s basically anyone who wants to be in the S!E!C! if you say you’re it. All you gots to do is to put your hands up like you’re holding a sandwich!

Like so.

And know that Sandwich isn’t just being held by you, but by everyone who’s felt the Sweatpower who lived the Weird Life, who fucked life like they believe. That Sandwich is made of our sweat and glory and truth of every moment of our motherfucking lives, and when we all feast upon it together, in that moment, our dreams become our genitals and we make our lives whole again, in romance, in erotic realness and Sweatpower for all.

Epilogue:

A part of me wants to write a sweet book about all this so I can go on motivational speaking tours for when my body gives out from doing the splits and dancing as hard as humanly possible while singing at the top of my lungs.

THANKS.

LOVE,

Dom

Week 1 | Week 2 | Week 3 | Week 4