About the most insane musical moment on Saturday Night Live ever. This may top the Beastie Boys and Elvis Costello doing “Radio, Radio” or Natalie Portman’s rap. Punk.
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About the most insane musical moment on Saturday Night Live ever. This may top the Beastie Boys and Elvis Costello doing “Radio, Radio” or Natalie Portman’s rap. Punk.
This installment is a twofer. During the second day of recording nickname: Rebel’s New Rock Church of Fire record (still working on it folks), I tried an experiment to loosen everyone up. Inspired by a session that Brown Cuts Neighbors had done for WRPI radio in Troy where, either the mics were cranked way up or the headphones in the studio were, so that every little movement or sound was incredibly loud, we tried the same sort of thing in a planned situation. I had a day of down-time in the studio (The old DeptEx/Magic Recording Eye studio of Jason Martin’s at 51 3rd St. in Troy) and scrounged the local Salvation Army and a couple hardware stores, and built a rotary saw cymbal stand (inspired by a similar rig of Steven Cerio’s and not uncommon in jazz circles) and a pair of bass springs (stretched out springs attached to a 2×4, amplified with either a guitar pickup or contact mic; inspired not just a little by Einsturzende Neubauten). So… Scott Smallwood, Aaron Smith and myself (and possibly Peter Barvoets?), recorded by Jason Martin, who had been instructed to crank everything as loud as it would go, consequences be damned, strolled into the studio (part of the composition as planned) and delicately touched and maneuvered the various implements of destruction. Various pianos, organs, electric razors, rebar, railroad spikes, walkie talkies and other detritus were also employed. Remember, it was not very loud in the room (and it was a very large room). A brief excerpt follows. OK. After seven days of February and just three posts, it is obvious that the gear blog will not be an everyday this month feature; but, I will try to keep it as a regular–once or twice a week-thing as long as the need is there. Brown Cuts Neighbors co-founder Colleen Martin – Lady Starlight talks to ClubPlanet about her NYC nightlife history, working with Lady Gaga and her unacceptable fashion choices. In 2006 DJ Shadow dropped his most recent solo album, The Outsider, and set in motion the process of creating one of the most fully-realized and successful artist sites on the web. The latest incarnation of DJShadow.com was built by Derick Daily and his team at the prestigious marketing firm Euro RSCG and DJ Shadow’s team, managed by Michael Fiebach, all under the careful control of Joshua Davis (DJ Shadow). The three-year project completed it’s final development phase and was relaunched in August 2009. As someone who is developing a label site (that would be WowCool.com, folks), that features a full online shop and artist pages, I look at DJShadow.com as an example of what can be done. Apart from the site’s innovations as a presence for a musician online, it represents not just DJ Shadow, but also works with, and by, his collaborators from Solesides/Quannum, Cut Chemist and Cali-Tex, DJ Shadow’s personal label for funk and soul re-issues, which includes the School House Funk compilations, and the recent ‘great lost Chicago funk’ album Pieces of Peace. It’s no secret that DJ Shadow is a major record hound, and his site represents that. This is clearly the work of someone who truly loves records and wants to share that with others who appreciate that. DJShadow.com has a clean and elegant layout. No confusion about what stuff is and where to find it. It just works. And it is deep. The archives and discography are presented in a straightforward, unpretentious style. The signature single from The Outsider ‘This Time (I’m Gonna Try It My Way)’ can be read as a statement of the need for an artist to control how his image is presented and his work is distributed; whether you are a DIY bedroom producer or in a ‘best of both worlds’ situation like DJ Shadow, who is both a major label artist and a successful indy label owner. At least that’s how I took it when it came out. Along with the Bloc Party’s ‘The Prayer’, ‘This Time’ served as a major inspiration for me when I started to plan the relaunch of Wow Cool. OK, enough about me. Holding down the day-to-day at DJShadow.com is Michael Fiebach. He handles the site management; marketing, project, and distribution management and sales for independent DJ Shadow releases; merchandise management for the entire DJ Shadow product line for tour and online sales and E-Commerce management for the online store. I met Michael at the last two SF MusicTech summits. He is direct, honest and knowledgeable about the music business. We spoke in depth about the site and the DJ Shadow Handmade label for this article on December 22, 2009 and followed up by email during January, 2010. This is the first of two in-depth follow up articles with people I met at the SF MusicTech Summit. I’m guessing the average person would have a hard time getting exactly why it’s an unique deal, the arrangement with Universal, to license back the albums for digital sale and how that works. Yeah, I think that you put it exactly right. The common music fan has no idea…doesn’t get it… ‘oh, you’re selling downloads… well, there have been downloads for 10 years on the Internet…’ who cares? You know? The unique thing about it, really, is that we’re the only artist site that I’ve seen, that is legitimately licensing music back from the label and selling it directly to the fan through downloads. We are licensing the music as an E-Store, just as iTunes and other major E-tailers do. I haven’t seen any independently operated artist sites that combine the downloads with physical merchandise for the entire store. We do t-shirt and download bundles and buy a CD and get the download for free; and, there are sites that do that, but not independent artist stores, and combining the merchandise with the digital downloads was something that was really hard, actually, to get done and it’s not something you see that often. We do all the fulfillment out of here ourselves. We ship all it from out of here, worldwide. Do you know the percentage that you’re moving of digital vs. physical sales? As far as digital compared to physical, digital is a nice piece of the pie, and it is growing…For most people, CDs are kind of tough these days…as I’m sure you know, in general, but we still do… People still want DJ Shadow limited exclusive merchandise and CDs and we just came up with some creative ways to make it available… and there, we still have plenty of interest in CDs. Overall, vinyl is still moving very well from a direct to fan perspective, and the interest in Digital is large and continually growing. When we bundle digital and physical together… that is when the real interest is sparked. From a mass distribution perspective, CDs are still the bread and butter. During at least the last two February’s, Ranjit Bhatnagar has built and blogged an instrument a day for the whole month. Ranjit works with interactive and sound installations, with scanner photography, and with internet-based collaborative art; and, he has been maintaining his personal web site moonmilk.com in one form or another since 1993. The moonmilk homemade instrument series was one inspiration to finally start documenting some of the more out-there gear in the nickname: Rebel arsenal. The idea to do a gear blog had been kicking around for awhile but was not getting done. The other inspiration was the RPM Challenge, which invites musicians to write and record a whole album of music, 10 songs or 35 minutes, during the month of February. I created ‘R is for Riot‘ for the challenge in 2008 at the urging of Joshua Baker of Offset Needle Radius. moonmilk’s homemade musical instruments
Wild Planet’s Beat Blenders Girls of Slender Means by WOWCOOL Picked up this pair a few years ago and did damn little with them. Finally broke them out for the “Girls of Slender Means” sessions with Mike and Nick of nickname: Rebel (excerpt above). It’s a tricky double-backed beast and deserves a further look, and probably some serious circuit mangling. And just what sort of info passes through those RJ45 plugs? See video and links to circuit bending info below. The Beat Benders Series: Bling Bling on TechDweeb | New Toy – The Beat Blenders on Unearthed Circuits Beat Blenders Product Sheet (PDF) Electronica Beat Blender
There is a nice little writeup of the NEWAVE! Minicomics book by the esteemed Mark Frauenfelder on today’s edition of BoingBoing. Go read that thang. NEWAVE! is now in stock and ready to ship from Amazon. UPDATE: Some photos from the release party at the Fantagraphics Bookstore/Gallery. An unholy host of New York City-type cartoon art guys (and a couple others and at least one gal), many of whom have been or are currently published or distributed by Wow Cool (and nearly all the rest are old friends from SVA, minicomics or the Zero Zero anthology) get to step out in style in Hotwire Comics 3, available today, Wednesday, January 27, in a comic book shop near you. That’s right, brand new work from Steven Cerio, David Sandlin, Mats?!, Danny Hellman, Michael Kupperman and a whole bunch more. The Comics Reporter says: “A boon for fans of a certain kind of energetic, restless, profane comic book making — for the rest of us it’s an exquisitely curated, controlled visit to that particular comics world.” If you are in New York City, there is a release event for the book at Desert Island Comics this Friday, January 29. Editor Glenn Head and contributors Danny Hellman, Sam Henderson, Michael Kupperman, Jayr Pulga, David Sandlin, R. Sikoryak, Chadwick Whitehead and Karl Wills will be there in person. If you miss it, I imagine you can catch most of them at Kellogg’s Diner sometime after 4 am. Get on down to the glorious DTSJ (that’s Down Town San Jose, folks) for the South First Friday art walk this coming February 5th; and, do not fail to stop in at Anno Domini for their Art of Zines show. Wow Cool will be at a table there hawking our wares, too. All the details and the awesome poster (including Frank Beam with the ductwork head on the cover of “That Dog Drives A Go-Cart”) can be found right here. The show runs through March 13th. Anno Domini, 366 So. First Street, San Jose, CA 95113 408.271.5155 I was sent a link to iO9’s write-up of Alex Cox’s recent Non-Sequel to his classic Repo Man film today by my nickname: Rebel cohort Michael Keegan. It was too early in the day to absorb. This was the first I had heard of any such sort of venture. I sort of peeked at it a couple of times. I sent it to someone else. Her response was “WHAT THE HELL WAS THAT?!” Which seems to be the general reaction. I’m gonna say that’s a good thing. I want to see this movie. Here’s the trailer: Alex Cox has a blog. He talks a bit about the development and making of Repo Chick, as well as his repo turf war with Universal.
Two other stories of interest you may have missed: It’s Official! Fantagraphics Bookstore & Gallery in Seattle, Washington will be hosting a release party for this massive brick of a book on January 30, 2010. The event marks the debut of their new Spectacular Saturday series. The show will feature original art and graphics by underground mini comix pioneers Jaimie Alder, Jim Blanchard, Wayne Gibson, David Lasky, Wayno, Steve Willis, Dennis Worden, and XNO. NEWAVE editor Michael Dowers will produce and distribute a mini comic on site. This festive reunion also includes live music, a comix jam, and the debut of the NEWAVE! anthology. I will have a piece of art on exhibit at the show but will not be able to attend. More details and the awesome poster by Gahan Wilson. This is the video I was looking for a few days ago. A lesson for me in not relying on YouTube. Gumby puts the kibosh on the blockheads latest evil scheme, a pesticide protection racket, that has the worms up in arms and gasmasks, even. Available on the DVD of Gumby: the Movie Yes, Captain Beefheart himself is 69 today. It’s no secret that he’s popular in the house of Wow Cool. Just released from Proper Records is the long-awaited biography by long-time Magic Band member and arranger John (Drumbo) French, Beefheart: Through the Eyes of Magic John French’s MySpaceship I couldn’t find any clips on YouTube that really fit with what I would have liked to have shown in memory of the great Art Clokey, creator of Gumby and Davey and Goliath, so I picked this video of Lightning Bolt’s 13 Monsters by Paper Rad. There’s a great bit in one of the old Gumby episodes that Brown Cuts Neighbors stole for one of our TV shows with Gumby’s band having a run in with some rustlers that has the classic line “Sorry we’re so dirty, ladies and gentlemen, but we were hijacked”. Sorry you don’t get that. You can just imagine. Rest in Peace Art. You are much missed. More previews and info on Fantagraphics site. Pre-order yours today! Newave!: The Underground Mini Comix of the 1980s This is the one book about sound you must read this year. I’ve been waiting for something like this for years and for this book since July. Steve Goodman, better known to the world as Kode9 of Hyperdub Records, delves into how sound has been used by government and industry to manipulate and control people. Description from Amazon
Order from Amazon: Sonic Warfare: Sound, Affect, and the Ecology of Fear (Technologies of Lived Abstraction) |
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