- 01/22/10 LETTER FROM A FRIEND WHO SURVIVED THE QUAKE IN HAITI
Brother Julian Thank you.
I have been meaning to call u too since I got back. There is so much going on. I also meant to send you this message. Here it is.
Peace Love and Blessings
Most of you who grew up with Constant and I were already worried about our family in Haiti once you heard about the earthquake. One thing you did not know was that we had left for Haiti on Monday Jan 11th. Yes we were there, and thank God that we survived the unimaginable, and witnessed more dead bodies than I thought humanly possible.
Most of our family have been accounted for. Still, there are many others we haven't heard from. The quake has devastated most of Port-au-Prince, the city. While we were there, I felt that the people had lost their sense of reality. Not having any trust, even in nature. A crowd of lost souls without any destination. At night we all had to sleep in the middle of the road. The whole neighborhood divided in groups of 15 to 20, using two vehicles on each corner as shields. We were Constantly praying that it did not rain at night. I went walking on the hillside, just to relieve some of my own personal fear and confusion, and the damage was mind boggling. The aftershocks, every 2 to 3 hours, constantly reminded us that there could be another quake at any moment . No one felt safe. With the lack of communication, and the rumors flying every 5 minutes about a tsunami, I saw crowds heading up the mountain late at night looking for safety. The constant paranoia really made everyone feel totally on edge, and you ended up asking yourself, Why me? Why Haiti?
When we had the chance to leave it became even harder to say good bye. Leaving behind your family and friends. People that you grew up with, knowing that they have nothing left and all of their hope is gone. I felt guilty and it was a personal blow, and I quickly remembered this: I survive for a reason.
The next morning we did leave Haiti. I was happy to come home to NY and extremely sad what I left behind.
Food, and shelter are the most essential. They need it right now. We have to go back within the next few weeks to relocate family, and provide them with pretty much everything. They need shelter, antibiotics, medicine, clothes, food. Basic human everyday necessities.
We cannot depend just on the international aid. Those of us who have the capability should do what we can. Haiti is extremely complex geographically. To reach each family member and and help them is a very difficult task.
God gave me life to continue my mission, so we are asking for your help to give my people some hope for a better tomorrow.
We are very grateful to be alive and thank you for all your support
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This is a letter I received 2 days ago from my old and dear friend Lionel Bernard. many of you NYers may know him personally, as he has been involved in the downtown club scene since the mid 80s. He was an original member of The Toasters, as well as a lead singer in the band Unity 2. I was in a Haitian band with him for a couple years, called VODU 155. We also threw parties together in the early-90s under the name VODU 155 at Sybarite, Nells, Bond St, and different locations around the city. This is a video of Lionel being interviewed by MSNBC as soon as he landed in Miami
VIDEO
Lionel and his brother were in Port Au Prince and survived the earthquake. They are gathering donations and supplies and going back in a few weeks, to try and put the lives of their immediate family back together in some way.
For years Lionel, like so many Haitian expatriates I have met, has been back and forth to Haiti on a regular basis, taking on the role as caretaker of not only his extended family, but practically his entire neighborhood. Such is often the burden of those that "make it" in some way.
I know that many of you have already given generously to the Red Cross or other organizations. If so, feel free to disregard this. If you have not made a donation yet, I thought a some of you might find the idea of contributing directly to the efforts of this man and his family appealing. I can personally vouch for the legitimacy of this small fund and its mission. It's a cliche, but in a situation like this, even a few dollars goes a long way. He has set up a paypal account specifically for this. Thanks for reading.
DONATE HERE - HELP MY FAMILY IN HAITI
- 01/14/10 SAD DAY FOR MUSIC - R.I.P. TEDDY PENDERGRASS
Words can hardly express how much suckier the world is today for me, upon hearing of the death of Teddy Pendergrass. Teddy's voice has been with us since 1972, when he first broke through as the vocalist on Harlod Melvin & The Bluenotes "If You Don't Know Me By Now". He may be best known to you for some of his countless other hits, such as
"Bad Luck" 1975
"Wake Up Everybody" 1975
"Don't Leave Me This Way" 1977
"Close the Door" 1978
"Only You" 1978
"Turn Off the Lights" 1979
"Come Go With Me" 1979
"Love T.K.O." 1980
Aside from Barry White, Teddy was one of the first vocalists that really allowed me to connect with the slow jams of the late 70s. "Love T.K.O." is an amazingly powerful song. Tragic and sad, yet still incredibly sexy. He captures heartbreak so well in the tone of his voice, while still making you feel like slow dancing, or slow fucking, or both. Being such a student of dance music most of my life, opening myself up to slow jams like that did wonders for allowing me to truly appreciate the downtempo side of Black American music. Simply put, if you have ever appreciated D'angelo or Mary J Blige or Maxwell or Whitney, you have appreciated Teddy.
I credit my better late than never awakening to the power of TP to my good friend Jules Gayton, a DJ and music lover of the highest order, who was not afraid to drop "Love TKO" or "Close The Door" in a club full of Hip Hop thugs, to remind everybody in the room just exactly where the soul of all these R&B slow jams lies. It certainly didn't hurt that, at the time, Ahmad had sampled "Close The Door" for "Back In The Day", so it was easy for thugs and lovers alike to make the connection to the source material.
In a similar tradition of spreading the love, my friend Timmy Richardson stayed up late last night and made a Teddy Pendergrass tribute mix. It's posted on his site, and it is a perfect way to embrace TP's memory on this sad, sad day. I urge you to give it a listen, and join us in mourning the passing of one of America's great voices.
TIMMY RICHARDSON'S TEDDY PENDERGRASS TRIBUTE MIX
Come Go With Me – Teddy Pendergrass
Close The Door – Teddy Pendergrass
Somebody Told Me – Teddy Pendergrass
I’ll Never See Heaven Again – Teddy Pendergrass
If You Don’t Know Me By Now – Harold Melvin & The Blue Notes
When Somebody Loves You Back – Teddy Pendergrass
Wake Up Everybody – Harold Melvin & The Blue Notes
The Whole Town’s Laughing At Me – Teddy Pendergrass
Feel The Fire – Teddy Pendergrass & Stephanie Mills
This Gift Of Life – Teddy Pendergrass
Joy – Teddy Pendergrass
And If I Had – Teddy Pendergrass
Nine Times Out Of Ten – Teddy Pendergrass
Hold Me – Teddy Pendergrass & Whitney Houston
Bad Luck – Harold Melvin & The Blue Notes
Turn Off The Lights – Teddy Pendergrass
You’re My Latest, My Greatest Inspiration – Teddy Pendergrass
I Don’t Love You Anymore – Teddy Pendergrass
Only You – Teddy Pendergrass
The Love I Lost – Harold Melvin & The Blue Notes
Don’t Leave Me This Way – Harold Melvin & The Blue Notes
Life Is A Song Worth Singing – Teddy Pendergrass
Get Up, Get Down, Get Funky, Get Loose – Teddy Pendergrass
I Miss You – Harold Melvin & The Blue Notes
It Should’ve Been You – Teddy Pendergrass
I Want My Baby Back – Teddy Pendergrass
Love T.K.O. – Teddy Pendergrass
It’s Time For Love – Teddy Pendergrass
- THIS GUY'S ILLUSTRATIONS RULE
For my birthday this year, David Evans gave me two very small comic books that fit in the palm of your hand. Both are by California-based illustrator Mark Todd. The first is called "BAD ASSES", and chronicles just about every bad-ass that ever landed on TV or film screens. It includes bad-ass men, women, and cars.
The degree to which my own definition of bad-ass aligns with Mark Todd's definition of bad-ass is truly uncanny. Not only did he big up both Snake Plisken from "Escape From New York" and The Kraken from "Clash of the Titans", but he even went so far in to my brain as to shout out James Bond's white Lotus from "For Your Eyes Only" and the big evil car from the incredibly under-celebrated movie 1977 B-movie "The Car" - a movie that I have carried a torch for in a solitary vigil for my entire life.
To make things even cooler, he made another smaller comic called "LAME ASSES", which once again seemed to be ripped directly from own psyche. I urge you to seek out these awesome comics.
Mark Todd's website
more bad-asses
more lame-asses
- MOST AWESOME RANDOM WEB PICTURE I'VE SEEN ALL DAY
- 01/10/10 IS THIS THE COOLEST THING EVER OR WHAT
click to enlarge
For my birthday last year, my man my mellow David Evans did me the huge honor of creating a pyramid list of just about every mixtape I have ever done. It's hand drawn, pencil on paper, and is currently hanging on my wall. I should have taken this photo before I had it framed under glass, but you get the idea.
David is a Milwaukee-born artist and screenwriter and all around stand-up guy. He is currently based in LA, where he works as an art director with world class film makers like Quentin Tarantino, Robert Rodriguez, & Michael Mann, among others. He's a crazy-talented mother fucker who I am proud to call my friend. He's also a sloppy drunk with pitiful delusions of Tekken grandeur.
David and I first met at Do Hwa, the restaurant where he bartended, way back in 2000 or so. This was the only bar where I've ever actually had my own tab. You know, like those dudes in old movies that say "Put it on my tab, Joe". That was me. Well, myself and Ben Cruz, to be precise. We shared the tab, which consisted of an endless supply of Patron tequila sold to us at cost. Ah, the ol' dot-com boom days. Seems like we hardly knew ye.
David is currently working on a new screenplay and a comic book and about ten other hair-brained-schemes I can't keep track of. I will keep you abreast of his rise to super stardom as it continues to develop.
According to the pyramid, David's partial to "Liberation" from 2003. You can hear it by clicking the link below
LIBERATION
tracklist
Some close up shots
- QUINCY JONES IS MY HOMEBOY
From time to time, I rotate the records that sit on display on my record shelves. Some are permanent, like my copy of "Love Supreme", but most rotate in and out. I recently dug out this copy of Quincy Jones' 1969 classic "Walking In Space" LP on CTI Records, signed by Quincy himself. It reads:
To Julian,
Keep rockin' bro
Peace
Quincy Jones
I managed to score this when I was DJing Quincy's birthday party back in about 1995. The event was held at a big theater on 44th street. Brandy and a bunch of other R&B cats from Quincy's record label performed for him. I played Quincy tunes all night long, digging deep in the crates for a lot of his older, pure Jazz stuff. When I was finally introduced to the maestro, he looked up at me and said "man, I haven't heard some of those tunes for 20 years!". He was mad cool and graciously signed my copy of "Walking In Space". I was appropriately awestruck.
For an idea of what the record sounds like, click the link below. One of my favorite QJ tracks.
KILLER JOE
It's a classic Quincy record everyone should own.
BUY IT HERE
- TWO MORE OLD MIXES RESURRECTED
Today I unearthed two more mixes from 2003.
The first is "Chill The Fuck Out", which is mostly mellow, mid-tempo, electronica type shit. There's a bunch of songs on there from the first Verve Records remix compilation, which I had just purchased a few days before making the mix. It also contains Nitin Sawhney's "Moonrise", which is far and away Joe Clausell's finest work as a remixer.
CHILL THE FUCK OUT - 2003
tracklist
The second is "Fear and Loathing", which I made for a road trip to Vegas that I took with my good friends Ben & Serge. Serge grew up in Uruguay and had little exposure to classic rock, so he asked me to make a mix for the car that would introduce him to to some basics. So the mix is just that - nothing your average American kid hasn't heard a thousand times. Peep it if you're feeling nostalgic.
FEAR AND LOATHING - 08/03
tracklist
- 01/03/10 NEW YEAR'S EVE INNA BROOKLYN STYLE
The New Year's Eve party at my crib went off without a hitch. We had a nice, intimate crowd, and I can safely say a good time was had by all. I DJ'd for about 7 hours straight and it was just one of those nights where everything flowed perfectly. I played everything and anything: disco / house / hip hop / dancehall / rock / jazz / techno / whatever. I kinda wish I had recorded it, but I'm also kinda glad I didn't. At midnight I played the cheezy synth intro to Europe's "The Final Countdown", followed by an air raid siren, followed by this song:"Life Is Something Special" by The NYC Peech Boys.
Some of the music played appears on my latest mix, "Instant Party 4 a Mixed Crowd", which can be found in the mixes section of this site.
I bought this crazy 3-headed disco ball contraption on Canal Street at 5:30pm the same day of the party, which made a HUGE difference in the overall vibe. Believe me my friends, the power of good lighting should not be overestimated. By the end of the night, our apartment was trashed beyond belief, and we had a sleeping yeti down for the count on the big blue couch. It took a few days to get things back in order, but I think I can walk around in bare feet again. Though I'm quite sure I'll be finding pieces of confetti in every nook and cranny for the next 5 years.Thanks so much to everyone who came - even the random, drunk weirdos that wandered in from other parties in my building.
Special thanks for all the pics below, which were taken by Melinda, Serge, Min Soo, Dave, & Patricia.
- LIST OF SONGS I BARELY REMEMBER PLAYING ON NEW YEAR'S EVE
I pieced this list together from the pile of vinyl and CDs that were strewn all around the turntables the morning after. They're in alphabetical order cuz I have no idea what the order they were played in actually was. I'm sure I'm leaving out a bunch of stuff, as this doesn't really seem to cover the 7 hour span of the evening. If you were there and you remember some other songs, please Email them to me. If you're looking for any of this music, just about everything listed shows up on a mix or two from over the years.
The song of the night seemed to definitely be the Pizza Hut/Taco Bell song, cuz I was getting texts and Emails about it all weekend long. Sometimes the simplest ideas are indeed the most brilliant.
A Tribe Called Quest - Check The Rhyme
Althea & Donna - Uptown Top Ranking
Aybee - Filt
The Beastie Boys VS David Bowie - Fame (138 remix)
Beyonce - Crazy In Love
Willie Bobo - Spanish Grease
Brainstorm - Lovin' Is Really My Game
The Brand New Heavies - Never Stop (Heavies ext mix)
Cuarteto D'aida - Las Mulatas Del Cha Cha Cha
Das Racist - Combination Pizza Hut & Taco Bell
Dolle Jolle - Balearic Incarnation (Terje remix)
The Doobie Brothers - Long Train Runnin
El Chicano - Viva Torado
Peven Everett - Got To Get Down
Dennis Ferrer - Son Of Raw
Doug E Fresh - The Show
Marvin Gaye - Let's Get It On (Steppers' remix)
Stan Getz - One Note Samba
Grand Puba - I Like It
Grandmaster Melle Mel - The Message
Gwen Guthrie - Peanut Butter
Herbie Hancock - Watermelon Man
Donny Hathaway - The Ghetto (live version)
Loleatta Holloway - Hit & Run
Rita Indiana - La Hora De Volver
Michael Jackson - Billie Jean (138 EDIT)
Michael Jackson - The Way You Make Me Feel
Michael Jackson - You Rock My World
Grace Jones - My Jamaican Guy
InI Kamoze - Hot Stepper
King Sunny Ade - Ja Funmi
La Super Banda - Cinco Pa' las Doce
Barrington Levy - True Experience
Loco Dice - Flight 7475
LTD EXchange - Corazon
Mala Fe - Los Tigueres
Maluca - El Tigeraso
The Mary Jane Girls - All Night Long
Harold Melvin & The Blue Notes - Don't Leave Me This Way
Van Morrison - Moondance
Mystikal - Shake Ya Ass
The NYC Peech Boys - Life Is Something Special
Johnny Osbourne - Budda Bye
The Pharcyde - Passin' Me By
The Phenomenal Handclap Band - 15 to 20
Pinchers - Bandilero
Perez Prado - Mambo #5
Prince - Forever In My Life
Prince - Sexy Mother Fucker
Tito Puente - Oye Como Va
Radiohead - Everything In Its Right Place (Afefe Iku remix)
Pete Rodríguez - I like it like that
The Rolling Stones - Sympathy For The Devil (neptunes remix)
Carl Hancock Rux - Lamentations
Robin S - Show Me Love
Silver Connection - Fly Robin Fly
Soft House Company - A little Piano
Soul II Soul - Back To Life (long version with the 3 minute acapella intro)
Sound Dimension - The Real Rock
Reggie Stepper - Whining Skill
Donna Summer - Love To Love You Baby
Sylvester - I Need Somebody To Love
Shelly Thunder - Kuff
Rainer Truby - To Know You
Trussel - Love Injection
Glenn Underground - Mental Black Resurrection
Claude Von Stroke - Big n Round
Stevie Wonder - As
Womack & Womack - Baby I'm Scared of You
The Wonder Band - Whole Lotta Love
Zhane - Hey Mr. DJ
- FINALLY ADDED ONE OF MY ALLTIME FAVORITE MIXES
Happened to notice the other day that I had somehow overlooked adding a mix called "Sunshower" to the site. It's one of my personal favorites, and was recently voted to similar status by my good friend David Evans. All two of us can't be wrong, can we?
It starts out very mellow and grows to a smooth funky uptempo groove towards the end. It was made during a long lazy summer where there was a definitive need for what we call "wind down" music, which were CDs we would put on just after getting home from a very late night out. The best case example of this would be my friends and I staying out all night dancing at Shelter, then stumbling out of the club and getting on the train at 7am, heading directly to Fire Island without sleeping. We'd drop our bags, put on "Sunshower", then find an empty beach chair on the deck and collapse. This was the best way imaginable to sleep off the previous night's bad decisions. It also was a surefire way to endear all of us to the songs on the mix.
If you never downloaded it, allow me to humbly suggest that right now is as good a time as any to do so. It's buried down the list in the "whatever" section of the mixes page, with the other mixes from 2003. You can also get it right here, right nizzow.
SUNSHOWER
electrosacher - evenings
amp fiddler - possibilities
gil scott-heron - guerilla
erykah badu - bump it
max sedgley - slowly
the blackbyrds - mysterious vibes
barry white - strange funky games 'n things
sade - by your side
junior murvin - cool out son
alicia keys - you don't know my name
dr. buzzard's savannah band - sunshower
henrik schwarz - feel da vibe
carl hancock rux - lamentations (you, son)
alex kid - trindade
geraldo azevedo - berekeke
prince - crazy you
- 12/31/09 BRAND NEW "GALLERY" SECTION ADDED FOR EPIC LULZ
For years people have been bugging me to put up some of the weird / stupid / hot / scary / lulzy images that I find on the web. I decided it was indeed time to do that. I take no credit for the content. I suppose I'll have to update this from time to time. The gallery can be seen by clicking the GALLERY button on the left vertical navigation of this page.
- PARTY AT MY HOUSE. MAYBE EVEN TONIGHT
I will be DJing under the influence, so please bear that in mind during transitions from song to song. Also on the decks will be DJ Sam Hyde & DJ Matty Matt, though both of them won't be arriving until 3am after their normal/square gigs finish. Should be epic or at least not suck.
I even made a new mix to give out to the party guests. It's filled with songs that I may or may not be playing tonight. You can download it from the MIXES section. Here's the playlist:
INSTANT PARTY 4 A MIXED CROWD
sebbo - elephanze ce danze
major lazer - pon de floor
claude von stroke - big n round
das racist - combination pizza hut & taco bell
the wonder band - whole lotta love
the bee gees - you should be dancin' (terje edit)
fatboy slim - weapon of choice
santo gold - say aha (tepr remix)
mishal moore - oh lord (138 EDIT)
italian secret service - not the same
the london jazz four - things we said
the rolling stones - sympathy for the devil (neptunes remix)
the gorillaz - it's dare (DFA remix)
yoko ono - walking on thin ice
sebastien leger - rhythm
meyland visti - yes ma'am (all night long)
gino soccio - dancer
ruben blades - plastico
cesar 830 - descarga
maluca - el tigeraso
rita indiana - la hora de volver
mala fe - los tigueres
michael jackson - billy jean (138 EDIT)
dolle jolle - balearic incarnation (terje remix)
michael collins - sunrise
chaz jankel - glad to know you (dub)
chaz jankel - glad to know you (vocal)
i-level - give me
slick - space bass
dennis ferrer - hey hey (dub)
dennis ferrer - hey hey (vocal)
jerome syndenham - sandcastles (138 splinter EDIT)
- 12/26/09 OK FINE, HIP HOP IS NOT COMPLETELY DEAD
In October of 2007, in this very blog, I declared Hip Hop to be, for all intents and purposes, completely dead. It was a wrap. Or as my boy Fabian would say: "dat shit is straight reynolds". Many would say that October of 2007 was about 10 years too late, and you could make a case for that too, but I had been holding out for a hero. Alas, my hero never came. Instead, for our sins, the lord gave us Soulja Boy, who swiftly convinced me that I should stop kidding myself and face the truth: Hip Hop sucks.
"it's out there, you just gotta dig". Yeah yeah, I'd heard that too. And I believed it for a long ass time. And I suppose I knew there must still be a gem or two to be found here and there, but the ever-increasing rarity of these so-called gems, coupled with the fact that these so-called gems could really no longer keep a so-called dance floor interested, seemed to indicate these so-called gems might not be so shiny after all.
You see, as a DJ playing in clubs for a good 15 years, I had a very simple litmus test for the current state of Hip Hop. All I had to do was stroll down Fulton Ave in Fort Greene on any given evening. If the newest / latest / hottest shit coming out of the cars on Fulton was dope, then I could rest assured that Hip Hop was doing just fine. After all, Brooklyn lies firmly within the fertile crescent of the fabled five boroughs, so if we don't know good Hip Hop, then who the fuck does?
What's the significance of the hot shit, you ask? Allow me to explain. As a working DJ, to put it plainly, it's very important that the hot shit be the dope shit. The hot shit any particular week is the new song that the people on your dance floor are waiting for that particular weekend. The dope shit means that's it's actually dope, i.e. GOOD and/or DOESN'T SUCK. And as a DJ, you want to be playing dope shit, i.e. good music. But you are also required by the drunk screaming masses and the club owner to play the hot shit. So you want the two to be one in the same. Makes your life easy, and makes being a DJ very very fun.
As a DJ, I think I was very good at delivering a whole night of dope music, new and old, while still managing to work in the hot shit du jour. To me, that's what the art of DJing is. The hot shit will invariably keep the asses on the dancefloor, which leaves you the other 98% of your set to do something interesting with, while still keeping those asses out there. Lazy DJs just play that week's top 10 five times in one night. Funk dat. My nightly goal was to never play a song more than once. Only occasionally was I feeling a song so hard as to break this rule and run it twice (GZA's "Liquid Swords" comes to mind...).
So flash back to 2007: the music I was hearing out of cars on Fulton St was now just fucking horrible. Combine that with the fact that those so-called gems that I had to dig for, those so-called gems that would supposedly maintain my faith in Hip Hop, those very same gems would literally clear the dancefloor, and a floor-clearing song is a DJs kryptonite.
So I threw in the towel. I turned over a new leaf, and decided to live by my own new mantra:
THERE'S TOO MUCH GREAT MUSIC IN THE UNIVERSE TO WASTE YOUR TIME PLAYING BAD MUSIC
What it lacks in poetic fluidity, it makes up for in fundamentally undeniable truth.
This was meant to be applied to both DJing in clubs and DJIng in my bedroom. If being a working Hip Hop DJ in NYC meant I had to play music that sucked, then I didn't want any part of it. I'd just stay home and make dope mixes and put them on my site, and if people dig it, then great, and if they don't, they get the gasface.
I suppose I could have looked for gigs with more esoteric crowds of discerning Hip Hop heads, but that was never really my thing. My thing was playing for the masses. For the regular folk. I always told myself if the day came that my own Hip Hop tastes were no longer in sync with the tastes of the Jeeps on Fulton Ave, then I would politely bow out and let some younger kid with shitty taste have my spot. Good luck with that sucka.
So that's what I did. And I was happy about it. And that's all well and good.
But here's the thing, see. Truth be told, I really missed Hip Hop. I missed it somethin' awful. This feeling had been gnawing at me for the last few years. My subconscious kept saying "Really, son? You're just gonna walk away like that? Forever? ForEVER ever? Really?"
Shut up brain! You're not the boss of me.
So about a month ago, I reached a breaking point. I decided my 40 months in the desert were over, and I could play like the prodigal son and come back to Hip Hop. After all, since I wasn't really playing in clubs any more, I could refine my Hip Hop criteria to be all about the dope shit, and I could happy leave the hot shit to the sucka DJs and their dimwit crowds.
After all, The hot shit has been terrible for some time now. It started with the Dirty South takeover of the late 90s and has just snowballed ever since. And I don't blame those Cash Money Clik kids, really. They did their thing and got theirs. While they did seem to obliterate the art of MCing in the process (R.I.P.), at least they knew how to make a dancefloor move. And if the East Coast had truly been making hot shit at the time, they wouldn't have lost their spot. So I don't blame the Dirty South, I blame us. We had the crown. We got lazy and didn't change shit up, and somebody else got hungry and came with some new shit and took it. A hard lesson learned, no doubt.
Will hot shit Hip Hop, i.e. top ten joints, ever return to being actually great? I kinda doubt it. That ship has sailed. Just be glad you got to dine at the buffet so many damn times while it was in port.
There was a hot second where some of us thought Kanye might bring it back. After all, he was a bonafide underground Hip Hop producer making hot tracks for years before he blew up. And he was kind of a decent MC. And his first few hits were promising. Then that fool lost his damn mind. So we can rest assured if there's a savior out there, it ain't him. I mean, shit - A few weeks ago I saw a video of two white college girls doing a stand up routine called "who said it: Kanye or Hitler". You know his ass is done when nerdy white girls can bust on him just using his own words.
LINK
And many NYers had similar hopes for Jigga but, simply put, no 40 year old billionaire is gonna save Hip Hop. Wrong generation. And the belly is way too full. New music comes from hungry mofos. Always has. Always will.
Anyway, what was the point of all of this? Oh right, the prodigal son. Well, like the prodigal son, when I finally did return home, I was richly rewarded. I spent the month of November digging for new Hip Hop - anything from the last three years really, and I think I did in fact find what I was looking for. There truly is some dope shit out there. Don't believe me? Please check out my new mix "HIP HOP THAT DOESN'T SUCK" on the mixes page of this site.
Do you have to dig? Yes, of course you do. But with the interwebz at your fingertips, digging for good music is SO EASY these days. Seriously.
The great news? Hip Hop isn't dead, it simply that the divide between what is HOT and what is DOPE is now too wide to breach. So pick a side and live with it. I know where I'll be.
- 100 DAILY INSTANT MESSENGER SIGNATURES IN NO PARTICULAR ORDER
these are mostly random phrases that come to mind when I boot up my AIM at 10am every day and change my signature. A daily sampling of current events, poetic parables, internet memes, and music/movie/TV show quotes that are burned in to my psyche for some reason. Upon review, I guess they sort of make up a list of things that we're on my mind in the last year or so - snapshots from my own cerebral zeitgeist.
People often ask me "um, WTF does your sig mean today?". I've given a brief description below each, and made many of them hotlinks so you can see the relevant media item yourself. If you already know all 100, we must have been separated at birth, and we should promptly reunite to wage war on mankind and begin our thousand year reign on earth.
01. I got served by Poseidon
an apt description of the labor day incident in which a wave dumped me on the sand in Fire Island, ripping my right arm out of it's socket. Took 4 hours and 4 doctors to get it back in place
02. how can she slap
a weird clip from 2008 that became a meme of sorts via the gif wizards
03. black hole from super collider kills us all today. Also, the McRib is back
a popular doomsday scenario that I thought was gonna solve all my problems
04. a love supreme
the title of my favorite jazz album of all time
05. I, for one, welcome our new ant overlords
probably kent brockman's finest hour as a cartoon TV newsman
06. shamwow mother fuckers
this crazy wigga right chea'
07. if a tree falls in the woods and it hits a mime...
can't recall which one of these bald geniuses said this, gary larson or steven wright
08. we're puttin' on the foil
Line from the greatest sports movie ever made
09. ezekiel saw the wheel
a line from the catchiest gospel song of my childhood
10. i was saying boo-urns
definitely Hans moleman's finest hour
11. you cannot petition the lord with prayer
line from a record I listened to a lot when I was 12
12. i'm a loner dottie, a rebel
You knew this one. I know you did
13. http://i39.tinypic.com/2iiu3kk.gif
I think you'll agree this speaks for itself
14. next up, the airing of grievances
you know... For the rest of us
15. ichi ni san chi
from the dopest electro track of all time
16. de world, Chico
great line from a great movie
17. you are number six
great line from one of the coolest TV shows ever
18. hut 1 hut 2 hut 3 HUT old dirty bastard live and uncut
he's the ODB as you can see
19. rodents of unusual size
who knew they were midgets all along?
20. Breaking: Biden sworn in on Necronomicon
a running joke among satanist nerds the day after he was sworn in
21. gaeta the traita
yes, I was a BSG nerd, big time
22. whizz bang what a hang
my favorite song from Axis:Bold As Love
23. R.I.P. Jeremy Bentham
Locke was dead. Or so we thought
24. uptown top ranking
one of the greatest reggae songs of all time
25. my life = conference call about a sheep's undercarriage
I did a bunch of projection animations for Tylenol PM, and we had lengthy conference calls about exactly how much anatomical detail the sheep's undercarriage should have
26. in this economy, I can't afford to be seen with you
having grown so weary of the phrase, my boy Alan and I had a plan to make all these "in this economy..." Tshirts. We were gonna be so rich
27. R.I.P. Lux
Lux Interior, lead singer of the Cramps and one of the greatest front men a band could hope to have in any era, died on Feb 4th. I was lucky enough to see them in about 1985 and they were totally fucking awesome
28. otm shank
everyone's favorite bollywood hunk
29. galactica actual up in this piece
best Sci-Fi TV show of all time. Yeah, I said it
30. tony clifton returneth
Joaquin Phoenix is definitely the Tony Clifton of 2009. Everything old is new again
Mr. Clifton, in case you forgot
31. magic beans > stupid cow
I have no idea why I used this as my signature but you can't really argue with the logic
32. R.I.P. Joe Cuba, king of boogaloo
Joe Cuba died on Febrary 15th 2009. He made a lot of great music and had a cool mustache
33. i love to singa
34. about the moona and he juna and the springa
my favorite cartoon of all time
35. turn your watch back, about 100,000 years
The B-52s at their best
36. water no get enemy
the first Fela song I ever fell in love with. Also on my Hell's Kitchen Xmas mix from 2001
37. food is for losers
38. through the looking glass
this is from when I went on my first juice cleanse - 5 days of veggie juice & 5 days of master cleanse. I felt like a new man
39. you're stuck in here with ME
The best line from the best character in The Watchmen, played by Jackie Earle Haley, who was also great in Breaking Away (1979)
40. i hear ichat BOOPS when there are none
this is simply true. I really do
41. a pox on, at the very least, YOUR house
I believe this re-phrasing of The Bard was particularly relevant at the height of the swine flu scare
42. plate, or shrimp, or plate of shrimp
Infinite wisdom from the Repo Man movie. You should know this
43. the bebe rebozo of motion graphics
44. the brenda vaccaro of motion graphics
45. the dabney coleman of motion graphics
46. the scatman crothers of motion graphics
47. the bella abzug of motion graphics
48. the bootney farnsworth of motion graphics
49. the eli wallach of motion graphics
50. the brian austin green of motion graphics
51. the keshia knight pulliam of motion graphics
52. the fairuza balk of motion graphics
53. the robert loggia of motion graphics
54. the charles nelson reilly of hip hop DJs
these are mostly just the first names that popped in to my head. In some cases, I have just always liked the sound of them. Others are people who are so hilariously lame that they are actually cool. My old boss and mentor John King would use the name Bebe Rebozo anytime he wanted to describe a complete idiot. Fairuza Balk represents all the goth girls I never got to sleep with when I was 16. Looking at all of these faces in one bunch, it's admittedly quite a strange bunch LOL
55. it's gettin it's gettin it's gettin kinda hectic
A much sampled line from this song. Once it gets in your head, fuggedhaboutit
56. science: 47 million - churchy la femmes: 0
reference to the missing link story, ned flanders, and the turtle from the Pogo comic strip circa 1950
57. Mariana Trench > you
the Mariana Trench is 36,000 feet deep. WTF have you done?
58. alphabet song & twinkle twinkle song = SAME SONG : O
Am I really the last person on earth to figure this out???
59. tyler perry = the black Jim Varney
while discussing Tyler Perry with a bunch of black folks, most of whom found him embarrassing, I had a revelation that Tyler Perry is simply the black Jim Varney AKA "Ernest". He produces, writes, and directs all of his movies. He has a HUGE following. Makes tons of money. And most people would be embarrassed to admit they had sat through one of his films. Needless to say, this comparison was not warmly received by the black folks I presented it to. Funny thing is, I thought I was rather clever for coming up with this. Come to find out that there is at least one other person out there that already thought if it and had already made this JPG below. Ain't that a bitch?
60. pork chop sandwiches
very hard to pick a favorite Fensler GI Joe PSA, but this one is up there
61. R.I.P. kwai chang caine
I used to watch this show then run around my house walking all sideways like Caine. You know, where he steps his back foot behind his front leg to move forward. I was a total king fu master
62. best mj song = http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AHBqKfbt4W4
I actually go back and forth between this and "Heartbreak Hotel", but today I'll stick with this
63. mas dinero mas problemas
brooklyn stand up
64. shakedown nineteen seven nine
I never get sick of this song, evene after all this time
65. a new life awaits you in the off-world colonies
one of those movies I can never get out of my head
66. your ideas intrigue me
67. and i'd like to subscribe to your newsletter
one of those Simpsons lines that seems to work in so many situations
68. the coporate cosmology of arthur jensen
the greatest movie speech of all time is not by Alec Baldwin in Glengarry Glennross, but rather by Ned Beatty in Network. And more importantly, his speech is 100% true
69. howler monkey staring contest champion 2009
check my photos from Nicaragua in the travel section of this site
70. scale strokes & effects or fucking die
I mean seriously. Ever get on someone else's computer and use Adobe Illustrator? What are these maroons thinking?
71. burritos are sleeping bags for ground beef
think about it
72. play him off keyboard cat
hands down the best meme of 2009. The Tshirt below will be included in time capsules of the aughty-aughts for years to come. mark my words
73. welchkins VS keebler elves. Who wins?
think about it
74. big girls need love too
dream it. Live it
75. got a car full of girls and it's goin' real swell
I always thought this line was so odd. what gangsta calls anything "swell"?
76. jim cunningham says love > fear
I don't WANNA be afraid anymore
77. purple stuff > sunny d
prove me wrong
78. bring her on and let her scream
a great Mark Twain quote about writing. Rather than tell people that a lady screamed, bring her on and let her scream
79. free your mind and your ass will follow
incredibly simple yet truly profound words from one of my idols, Mr. George Clinton
80. kanye failocaust 2009
I was way ahead of the curve on this hating Kanye thing
81. friiiiiiiiiiied neckbones and some homefries
mr bobo laying it down
82. lost in the clouds again
83. seven swans sevens swans seven swans
I went through a real Sufjan Stevens phase this year, 5 years late. You should too
84. my cellular phone reigns supreme
I always found this Mobb Deep line extra absurd for some reason. Great song. I think QTip produced it, which explains why it is mixed really badly. Love that kid, but he is a god awful mixer. So many of his records sound like he mixed them on a bad pair of headphones and never bothered to check them on a real system. Ahvell
85. radio. suckaz never play me.
I had a ball this year working on the VH1 Hip Hop Honors Def Jam Tribute show. Got to dig out all of my old 12"s. Chuck D is still the man
86. in the dark all cats are grey
funny, I always thought Robert Smith wrote this line. Turns out it was Benjamin Franklin talking about his sexual penchant for octogenarians. What a nut
87. brb, gleaming the cube
rivals solar babies and prayer of the roller boys as gayest movies of all time
88. happiness is just a faming moe away
I guess it must be obvious by now just how much of my brain is taken up by random moments from The Simpsons
89. hey janelle, what's wrong with wolfie?
Is there anything creepier than Arnold Schwarzenegger speaking in a woman's voice?
90. the truth is never told during the 9 to 5 hours
a telling quote from our man in Las Vegas, Mr Hunter S Thompson
91. bearodactyl > pterodactyl
this comic simply rules
92. brb, going rogue
don't kid yourselves. Americans are indeed dumb enough to elect this woman president
93. castles made of sand, fall in the sea, eventually
you should really own this record
94. i too like turtles
I never get tired of this ancient meme
95. in control in effect so what the heck
big daddy kane at his finest
96. aka THRILLHO
probably only funny if you play video games. Also, note the 1980s Maxell print ad reference in the composition of the first shot
97. this guys says the horse can do
outta nowhere, this song was stuck in my head for a week
98. maybe the lateness of the hour
you MUST see the 2009 documentary SOUL POWER - about the 1973 concert in Zaire that preceded Foreman & Ali's Rumble In The Jungle. Bill Wither's performance of "Hope She'll Be Happier" is the reason I saw it twice in the theater, and the reason I'll be buying the DVD. It is breathtakingly sad. Also, I recently put that song on a mix, "Blue Winter", which you can find in the mixes section of this site
99. Peep my emmy award winning commercial
no, seriously
100. this is the best bah-ree-toe I've ever eee-ten
just try to get this song out of your head. I dare you
- 12/15/09 HEY WHADDYA KNOW, I WON AN EMMY
Alec & I coordinate our victory leap ever year, and 2009 was no different
I recently won an Emmy for a promo spot I did for The History Channel to promote their "Nostradamus:2012" show. It aired about a year ago. The program was the 3rd highest rated show in the channel's history, which gives you an indication of just how paranoid and gullible people really are. After watching the promo, my father said it was "appropriately alarmist for The Palin Nation". The win came as a total surprise, as I didn't even know we were in the runninng. We beat out CNN, NBC, CNBC, CBS, and PBS.
IN YOUR FACE, FRONTLINE! (always wanted to say that).
WATCH IT HERE
- BROOKLYN BOY GOES TO A NASCAR RACE, FINALLY FEELS AMERICAN
I was in Miami 4 weeks ago for my first ever Nascar race. Leroy & Clarkson, my new home away from home, was kind enough to send me down there along with a crew of 3 other dudes to get the full Nascar experience; so as to better design, animate, edit, and creative direct a graphics package for the Speed Network. The event in question was the Homestead Ford 400, the very last race of the Nascar season, where the cup chase champion is crowned. Speed is a cable channel that covers racing in all forms. For the Nascar sprint chase, they primarily cover everything but the races. Leroy & Clarkson is in the midst of building a beautiful graphics package for the channel which I have been tasked with overseeing.
We arrived on Saturday night and got a room at Townhouse on Collins & 20th. I stayed at Townhouse back in 99 or so, before the entire hotel was even complete. Back then, 20th was the ass-end of Collins, surrounded by empty lots and older abandoned apartment buildings long since replaced by towering hotels of every shape and size. There was even a weird strip club across the street with a Roman coliseum motif on the exterior. It was my first lapdance on a bed. And my last, come to think of it. I'll say this much: lapdances on beds are not as over-rated as one might think.
That evening in Miami was relatively uneventful. Drinks in the warm 78 degree air of the rooftop bar of Townhouse. Dinner at Nobu. More drinks at the always epic Delano, and the obligatory stop at the Deuce on 14th. We finished up at some horrendously cheesy Latino club on Ocean Drive, where the semi-topless leopard-skin bikini-clad girls dancing on the bar (that lured us in from the street) were quickly replaced by some gigantic gay dudes dancing to reggaeton. Talk about a bait-n-switch. My comrades kept giving me the "dude, why the fuck did you take us to a gay Cuban nightclub?!" look.
We headed out to Homestead racetrack in the early morning. It's about an hour from South Beach. The amount of police presence on the street as you approach the track made it clear they were expecting a massive crowd.
As we got closer I started to get oddly excited. I have virtually no interest in racing, or any sport for that matter, but I have long been aware that there was this huge chunk of American culture that I was embarrassingly ignorant of. I mean, Nascar is immensely popular in the states. Second only to football. And I think they actually generate more revenue than any other sport. It's akin to knowing nothing about the superbowl for your entire life, then sort of stumbling upon it one day and being like "DAMN... who knew?".
Our first hurdle was getting our all access super mega duper backstage press passes. This took place way out behind the track. One thing that is immediately clear at any Nascar event is the amount of sponsorship in play. Logos logos logos, for as far as the eye can see. And each sponsor has a large crew of people needing restricted passes of some sort. So all of that needs to be sorted out far in advance of race time.
This took place in a small building and truck trailer way out behind the track. The chick in front of me in line was wearing the most awesome race day outfit. Checkered flag knee-high boots, black pleather Checkered mini-skirt about half an inch below her finish line, and a rather flattering checkered halter top that did its very best to uplift her large, sagging breasts. She had tattoo of two crossing checkered flags on her right rear muffin top. The makeup and nails were similarly on theme. I wanted so bad to take a photo, but I was not prepared to get in to a fight with her bearded biker boyfriend.
We finally got inside the gate at around 11am. The race was not to start until 3:30pm. We arrived so early so that we could get the full tour of the grounds before the action kicked off, and hopefully get some B-Roll footage between the four of us. Our only task, other than soaking in the Nascar culture, was to photograph and film whatever elements of the environment we could possibly use for the graphics package. I brought my pocket-sized point-n-shoot camera. Graham, the lead designer on the project, brought a Canon D5, the rolls royce of digital cameras. It shoots fucking HD video for god's sake. He even brought his own steady cam rig. He looked like a professional. I looked like an aging Hip Hop DJ from Brooklyn completely out of my element.
Once inside the gate we got a taste for the midway that exists outside of the track - an endless, dizzying circus of automotive industry-sponsored attractions to lure potential customers in with raffles and games of chance and huge displays of bad-ass gas-guzzling wonder. It was a sight to behold. Logos as far as the eye can see. The Ford pickup truck remote control car speedway. The Border Patrol recruiting station and sponsored stock car display. The Coke Zero country music jamboree. The Penzoil this. The Chevy that. And on and on and on. The sheer scale of it all was impossible to ignore. Loudspeakers were blaring a cacophony of car-centric carnival barker shtick in every direction.
We made our way over to the Speed Race Day broadcast center sponsored by Home Depot. Our generous benefactors were there in full force, in the middle of a live broadcast to a growing crowd of Nascar enthusiasts. Speed hosts a live pre-race show on their network that is immensely popular. We weaved in amongst the crowd, trying to soak it all in and not look like total doofuses.
I was impressed by the brand loyalty displayed by the race fans. Almost every single person was wearing a shirt that represented their favorite driver, and thus the companies that sponsored him. In addition, I saw countless people with tattoos of their hero's car number. I have seen a fair number of NY Yankees tattoos in my time, but this was some next level shit. Especially considering that drivers do indeed change sponsors and car numbers in their career. These people were die-hards. That is something that I cannot help but respect.
After an hour or so in the midway, we asked our boy Zach from Speed to take us in to the infield, to show us where the real racing preparation was going down. He promptly picked us up in a 6-seater golf cart and we made a B-line for the tunnel beneath the track. I felt like such a VIP. "Out of my way, sunburnt masses!"
The infield was a whole 'nother scene. The infield was packed with thousands of VIPs. Who the hell knows who they were. Friends and family of drivers? Nascar people? TV network people? Employees of car sponsors? Wealthy fans? I have no clue. All I know is that there was a mess of mutha fuckaz back there, and everybody was flossing their all access pass.
The infield was fascinating. The amount of unfettered access we had was truly hard to believe. If you have any kind of pass, there is virtually NO division between you and the drivers and their pit crews. You can stand right there as they pull the car out of the truck, and right there when they push it up to the inspection station. You can run your fingers over the hood. You can take photos of the car's interior. You can walk right up to where the pit crew is preparing for the race and just stand there, ice -grilling them if it tickles your fancy. You can walk out on to the freakin' race track and graffiti your name on the 3rd turn. There is almost no area that is off limits. It's fucking crazy. Like being able to walk out to the 50 yard line before the super bowl and sit down and text your ex-girlfriend. NUTS. In our post-9/11 world, I have never seen any public event with so little security and so little restriction.
The start of the race is truly epic. After all the drivers have been introduced,a woman comes out and sings the national anthem. And when she does, every single person in the entire place takes off their hat and bows their heads. People come out of the garages and buildings expressly for this purpose. Total silence. Total reverence. When she finishes, an oversized 6-wheel pickup truck comes around the last turn, dragging behind it the biggest American flag I have ever seen. It was like a giant cape, flowing in the wind. The crowd leaps to their feet and goes nuts. And just as the flag crosses the finish line, 4 fighter jets go ZOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOM right overhead, buzzing the stands. And just as that happens, fireworks explode in the center of the infield. Then the engines start. Like I said.... EPIC. It was seriously one of the most patriotic moments I have ever witnessed.
So finally, after being there for almost 5 hours, the race starts. The cars do a few laps with the pace car. Once he gets out of the way, everybody floors it and the low rumble becomes a deafening scream. Like fifty 747s taking off at once. It was thrilling.
Sadly, our mission that day was really about shooting B-Roll before the race started. So once the cars were out on the track we couldn't do much else. We stayed for about another half hour before heading back to the airport to make it home in time for Dexter.
some more random photos
this LOLfiretruck was doing wheelies on the track before the race
they let fans out on to the track before the race so they can personally sign the finish line
saw this in the parking lot on the way out. guess there's more than one way to claim victory for the south.
- COOL UNCLE IS COOL
I took my sister, my friend Carey, and nephew Aidan to see Metallica at Madison Square Garden last month, and it fucking ruled.
It was Aidan's first big concert. He's 14. Metallica was my first concert too, when I was 16, so it really felt kinda full circle for me.
You may find this hard to believe, but when I saw them on the Master of Puppets tour, opening for Ozzy, most metalheads HATED Metallica. The crowd literally sat in their seats and booed for the entire set. Myself and about 20 other people were standing up cheering like wild and banging our heads. That was 1986. 5 years later, of course, those same boo-urns mother fuckers were making Metallica the #1 band in the world. Bunch of bandwagon jumping pansies, all of you.
The MSG show was fucking epic. Amazing laser show, badass columns of flame that changed color on beat, and an awesome setlist that covered chunks of all of their great albums and completely ignored the lame ones (*scroll down for setlist). Only song I was praying for was "The Thing That Should Not Be" but sadly, it was indeed not to be
We also had amazing seats, about 3 rows up from the floor. the stage was in the center of the Garden, so the band was constantly running around to all corners and giving everybody a great show. It felt really therapeutic to stand on my feet and pump my first for 2 hours, and who knew I'd remember all the words to "Trapped Under Ice" 24 years later.
If you're a Metallica fan of any sort, I strongly urge you to see them before you die. You will not regret it.
I stole all of these photos from other websites, except for the first one, which shows you how close our seats were.
Almost Like Your Life (Death Magnetic)
The End of the Line (Death Magnetic)
Creeping Death (Ride The Lightning)
The Shortest Straw (And Justice For All)
Fade To Black (Ride The Lightning)
Broken Beat & Scarred (Death Magnetic)
My Apocalypse (Death Magnetic)
Sad But True (Black Album)
One (And Justice For All)
The Judas Kiss (Death Magnetic)
The Day That Never Comes (Death Magnetic)
Master of Puppets (Master of Puppets)
Dyers Eve (And Justice For All)
Nothing Else Matters (Black Album)
Enter Sandman (Black Album)
encore
One Last Caress (Misfits cover!!!)
Trapped Under Ice (Ride The Lightning)
Seek & Destroy (Kill Em All)
- 11/09/09 HALLOWEEN 2009
This past Halloween was the first time I dressed up in years. I had some downtime prior to the night in question, so I decided to make my very own longcat costume. "WTF is longcat?" you ask? Hopefully one of these 80,200 google entries will illuminate this for you
LINK - Longcat is long
I searched high and low for a white, stuffed animal cat that most resembled the fabled feline. Alas, there was none to be had. Every toy store in the city seemed to favor long-haired cats, and never white ones. After searching high and low, I eventually found a light brown leopard with brown spots suitable for longcat conversion.
So if you wanna be cool like me and make your own longcat, this is how it's done:
• STEP 1: cut stuffed cat in half / attach either end to white cardboard tube using gaffers tape + wood glue
• STEP 2: attach the now long cat to a 5-foot wooden broom handle, using two zip ties (4 carrying overhead)
• STEP 3: spray paint the whole thing white. Repeat this 5 times until the cat looks kinda grey and crappy
• STEP 4: Buy Jesus costume at that insanely crowded costume joint on Broadway and 12th street
• STEP 5: Spend hours and hours cutting out a stencil with an Xacto blade and spray with black spraypaint
• STEP 6: Leave all of this by your radiator for 8 hours so that it dries in time for you to go party
• STEP 7: Put costume on at 8pm, realize that you spray painted the wrong side of your costume (D'OH)
• STEP 8: Repeat step 7, but stencil the FRONT (DUH). Let the whole thing dry again. Be late for dinner
• STEP 9: Meet up with crusty crew, hit the town. First 2 photos by Patricia Yoon, the sexy black pussy
First stop was an insane 2 floor house party that Matty Matt was DJing on 10th St & 6th Ave in Manhattan. His crew always goes all out for Halloween, so the level of costume commitment and the energy in the party was off the meatrack. These pics were all taken by Matt, cuz I had no camera. You can check his photoblog here:
LINK - Matty Matt - photographer to the starry eyed
or listen to his sweet DJ mixes here:
LINK - Matty Matt's site
Matt & Heather, vamped the fuck out as usual
The Hallways were mad dark, but lined with gold reflective paper, and random flashbulbs would go off, temporarily blinding you and throwing off your whole sense of space and time (ok maybe that was just me)
Like all Matt & Heather endeavors, the sexy bitches were rolling deep
This was the view from the dancefloor, overlooking 6th Ave. Madness.
Please smurf me back to your smurf mushroom village and leave the smurfin' smurf boots on
Next stop was the Turntables On The Hudson party at a huge Chinese banquet hall under the Manhattan Bridge. It was mad crowded but the music was great, as always. My boy Gordon was busy on percussion while Nicodemus & Mariano did their thing on the 1s & 2s. This party is always a solid bet. Much respect.
After that I wandered around the Lower East Side in the rain with a bunch of drunkards and druggies until it was time to drag some freaks back to my apartment and watch The Great Pumpkin til 7am on DVR. Never did make it to Shelter. Oh well.
- ACTUAL CONVERSATION WITH MY PARENTS
My parents had just returned from 6 weeks in the old country. While abroad, my mother bought my father a Diesel scarf. The following conversation ensued soon after we arrived at their house.
MOM: "Have you ever heard of the company Diesel?"
She pulls out a brown scarf made by Diesel.
ME: "yeah sure"
MOM: "I thought it was just perfect... as you know, your father drives a Diesel car... but as it turns out, there's no relation between the two whatsoever"
ME: 
My father does indeed drive a diesel Volkswagen Jetta
DAD: "Wait a second... does this have anything to do with that fellow Vin Diesel?"
ME: "Yes Dad, Diesel makes scarves, gasoline, and actors"
MOM: LOL
DAD: "Does Vin Diesel have any new recordings?"
ME:
- CREEPY PHOTO OF ME FROM 1987
courtesy of Andrea Porytko via Facebook
- NO JOB FOR A MONTH? GET ME ON THE NEXT FLIGHT TO AMSTERDAM
These pics were taken in Amsterdam & Utrecht in October. Many thanks to the coolest cats below sea level (ChiChi, Vicky, Menno, and Pollux) for their hospitality and company.
TRANSLATION:
Africa cries!
TRANSLATION:
We, Vicky, Menno and Polly have a guest.
He, Julian (circular beard and half long hair)
sleeps in the attic
He is friendly, American, and pees not
in the sink nor in the broom cabinet.
No reason to worry, in short.
Wednesday he's gone again.
Until that time, you could run in to him
He'll probably say "hello". You can reply
the same, or smile friendly. Both are nice.
On behalf of Julian, thanks for the hospitality.
- 9/29/09 HOME MOVIES
- HIP HOP HONORS 2009
This past summer I was given the honor of designing the graphics for the 2009 VH1 Hip Hop Honors. I had done the first two years, and then had consulted a bit on the fourth. This year's show was a tribute to Def Jam, and I found myself quickly put forth in midtown conference rooms as the resident expert on Def Jam's history and legacy. Lucky for me, I had a pretty good handle on that. Partly due to my devotion to Hip Hop for so long, but also due to the fact that my sister Sheelagh was hanging around with the Beastie Boys in the early Def Jam days, so she got to witness the foundation being laid by Rick & Russell. In 1986 she handed me a rough mix of the debut album of a certain Mr. James Todd Smith, also known as LL Cool J. "Rock The Bells" was just about the coolest shit I had ever heard. Rick Rubin's ability to mix loud guitars with Hip Hop was a big part of me straying away from punk rock and becoming a full time Hip Hop head.
I worked with Jimmy Fingers and VH1's internal creative team to come up with the concept for the graphics as well as help figure out the print and on-air promotional end of things. I produced the graphics at Stardust with my friends Carey Janks, Fabian Tejada, and Anabella Zubillaga. The wireframe design is based on the iconic Def Jam tonearm logo, which appeared on all of their 12" singles.
I went to the taping of the show, which was a lot of fun. The BAM Opera House was packed with any and every Def Jam vet you'd expect to see. I got to meet Rick Rubin after the show, which was cool for me, as I've been a fan of his productions since day one. He even thanked me and gave me a little namasté for doing the graphics.
Public Enemy. KRS One.
Ghostface. Mary J & Method Man.
EPMD. Foxy Brown.
DMX. Scarface & Ludacris.
Some stills from the show open. You can view the quicktime by scrolling below the images. It was a real bitch to finish, as the Maya effect that makes those cool wireframe strokes also generates these little glitch pixels at random. There were thousands of these, and the only way to get rid of them was to paint them out, frame by frame, in After Effects. We were working at 60fps for an interlaced HD delivery, so that meant there were about 1500 frames to hand-paint. A labor of love, for realz. I'm very happy with the end result. Carey Janks & Fabian Tejada did an amazing job of making it all happen.
These were the original hand drawm storyboards
These are stills from the final show open
view quicktime
- THE UNBELIEVABLY EPIC THREE DAYS OF THE 2009 ALL TOMRROW'S PARTIES MUSIC FESTIVAL
If you aren't already aware, All Tomorrow's Parties is a 3-day indie rock/underground music festival that takes place at an old Catskills resort in upstate New York every September. It began in England about 10 years ago, and has since begun branching out around the globe. This was second year it was held in the states. Each year the festival organizers choose one band to curate the entire weekend. Last year it was My Bloody Valentine. This year the monumental task was given to the Flaming Lips.
Disclaimer: it may become abundantly clear upon reading this that I know almost nothing about the current indie rock scene, so please forgive my ignorance.
My boy Jesse has been raving about The Flaming Lips to me and anybody else who cares to listen for years and years. I do believe he has even gone so far as to call them one of the greatest Rock n Roll bands on the planet. A bold statement, for sure, but this dude knows his music. So when Jesse sent the word out to my extended crew about a boy's weekend upstate to hear his fvaorite band and all of the favorite bands of his favorite band, I couldn't really say no. Nor could anyone else, for that matter. I think all of my friends share a slight regret at not seeing more live music on the regular. This seemed like the perfect opportunity to remedy that, as well as have some quality bromance time with the old gang. Most of us knew almost nothing about the lineup at all. We just figured it was worth a leap of faith. I am also always eager to hear brand new music without any preconceived opinions, and this festival was chock full of just that. Jim Jarmusch, when interviewed at the very same ATP, said something to the effect of "whenever I get depressed, I just think of all the great music I have yet to hear". Words to live by.
The Raleigh is an old relic of a resort from the Borscht Belt heyday of the 40s, 50s, and 60s, when middle and upper class New York jews had to drive all the way up to The Catskills to be let in to a country club. The outside looks more like an abandoned hospital, and the interior looks eerily similar to the hotel in The Shining. Long runway-length hallways with hideous, worn-out casino carpeting. Weirdly-fancy 1950s living room furniture that seemed borrowed from that end scene in 2001: A Space Odyssey. It appeared that it had been all but abandoned for the last forty years, frequented these days only by groups of Hassidic Jews who, viewing the art of suffering as a divine mandate of sorts, don't seem to mind one bit that absolutely nothing has been fixed, painted, cleaned, or replaced in the last thirty years. Hassidim, it is my understanding, believe it is God's will that they still be wandering in the desert, paying for the chosen people's lack of piety, which motivated God to bring down the temple of Jerusalem in 586 BC. That's a long fucking time to still be waiting for room service. But it will be pretty sweet when it arrives.
The Raleigh had almost no staff to speak of. Just a few security guards at the front door, one of whom came in to check us in at the front desk. There was nobody to carry your bags. Nobody answering any phones. Nobody taking massage appointments. There was no smooth jazz playing in the lobby. There was no busy hotel bar with live jazz trio. There were no brochures listing hotel amenities. There were no other guests in sight.
The security guard pointed us in the direction of our rooms, way down in "The Kennedy Wing". What little signage might have lead us there was in Hebrew, and withering away, just like everything else. Along the way, down long dim hallways, there were glass cases against the walls containing dusty golfing trophies and vases of plastic flowers. It felt a little like exploring the hull of some old sunken cruise ship. Like those urban explorer sites you see on the web.
Jesse had reserved two rooms for the seven of us. Each room had two narrow double beds big enough for two small children, if they tucked their feet in and had an incestuous relationship. These beds had one fitted sheet each, two wafer-thin pillows, and a small rectangular comforter just big enough to cover the surface of the mattress. Apparently top sheets and comforters hanging over the side of the bed were another luxury Yahweh was not too fond of. The carpet was old and soiled. The TV was broken. Most of the lights didn't work. Nor did the heat. The towel rack in the bathroom was rusted and bent. The place was such a dump, they should have been paying us to stay there.
I waited until Ben dropped a bag on bed #2 and I immediately leapt on bed #1 loudly declaring "I got dibs on Andreas! I got dibs on Andreas! The German sleeps with ME!". He may be 6'1" and from The Black Forest, but at least he doesn't snore. Ben snores like a god damn freight train. I'm a bit of a Polar Express myself, mind you, but not nearly as bad as the Bronx Behemoth. Serge quickly realized he had unwittingly drawn the short straw in that deal - big time.
We dropped off our bags, had a quick drink or two, and headed back to the lobby to catch a 10-minute bus over to the other resort, Kutsher's, where the actual ATP festival was already underway. Our Venezuelan crew (Alfred Fabiana Marcus Laura Anabella) had booked tickets early enough to get a room at Kutsher's, so our first order of business was to meet up with them and get some tequila flowing while the night was still young.
If we had been on our game in April or May, we would have reserved rooms at Kutsher's, where the ATP is actually held. There are only 400 rooms, and they sell out quickly, so festival organizers offer up The Raleigh as option B for attendees; running a non-stop bus service to and fro, all weekend long.
Once the sleeping arrangements brokered, we did some shots of tequila and headed out to the lobby to catch the next bus to the festival. It was about 11pm and time was-a-wastin'.
Kutshers was quite a different scene. It's an old resort, from the exact same era as the Raleigh I would guess, but it seems to have maintained just enough steady flow of nostalgic vacationers over the years to feel slightly better up-kept, and not nearly as haunted. They even appeared to have bought all new furniture in about 1979 or so, putting them at least two decades ahead of The Raleigh in the interior decoration department.
The lobby was crawling with garden variety hipsters and a deluge of mostly music nerds transplanted directly from Williamsburg and many other Williamsburgy locales around the globe. Dark-rimmed glasses wearing misfits with a penchant for tight black jeans and Converse All Stars. These are not annoying fashion hipsters, though. These are white music nerds, who are really quite tolerable I assure you.
We only made it to one show that night, which was The Jesus Lizard. I thought the band was tight but David Yow just sucked. Plenty of kids were stage diving and carrying on, so the crowd seemed in to it. I was bummed that we had missed both Iron & Wine and David Cross earlier in the evening.
I was, however, very excited to see the main venue, "Stage One", where we would be spending so much time for the next few days. Stage One was a semi-circular arena, with several elevated tiers. There were no seats, so everybody stands, which is fine by me. Looking around the room, you could easily imagine these tiers filled with a maze of cocktail tables with little lamps, like that scene at the Copa Cabana in "Goodfellas". The room must hold about 2500 people comfortably. You could get a good gander of the stage from anywhere. The acoustics were solid, and the sound quality of the system was excellent.
The show ended at around 1:30am. We explored the hotel for a bit afterwards. There were a few different lounges that were somewhat lively, filled with nothing but nerds talking about music. DJs played old school Hip Hop and dancey rock n roll. A piece of blue-cake-frosting asbestos ceiling fell in to Serge's drink. Like I said, this place was totally falling apart. The complex is surrounding a small man-made lake, so lots of people were outside smoking and milling around. It was kind of bizarre to see this crowd of music nerds transported from a dive bar on Bedford Ave straight to the edge of a lake in the Catskills.
We had a few more drinks at Kutsher's and decided to go catch a bus back to The Raleigh. While we were outside, some really chatty English dude started talking to me, asking where he could buy drugs. His demeanor was tweaky as fuck, as if he had plenty of drugs already, but he swore up and down he was stone cold sober and looking to get hooked up. I told him he was probably out of luck, man. A minivan taxi pulled up and we all hopped in, dragging the English weirdo with us.
By now everybody had a nice Friday night drunk on to some degree or another, which I blame for some nameless pervert among us asking the taxi driver to "take us to your finest strip club" (paraphrasing). We were in the middle of fucking nowhere and it was 3am. Such a bad idea. Yet on we went.
We pulled in to the gravel parking lot of The Jade Lounge - a seedy backwoods disaster if I ever did see one. There were only about 5 cars in the parking lot. We rushed inside to get one last drink and a sad, desperate gander at the local corn-fed talent.
It looked more like a dimly-lit elks lodge than a strip club. Wood floors. A pool table. Kind of empty in the middle. An L-shaped stage wrapped around the far corner behind the bar. There was three guys at the bar stuffing dollars in to a fat woman's brassiere. A fourth guy was passed out cold, with his head flung over the back of his chair and his mouth hanging open. There were only two ladies dancing, one gigantic white woman chatting up the patrons while a slightly-less gigantic latina woman worked the pole. The white chick was about 250 and shaped like something out of Dr Seuss. All torso and shoulders with thin little legs. She had two weird pancake breasts that seem attached at remarkably different levels of elevation on her chest. It was a shit show, for sure.
The buggy English guy was horrified.
"FUCKIN ELL! Where the fuck have you blokes taken me? You're fucking mad if you think I'm gettin' a dance with one a 'em". He kept grabbing my arm and pleading "whateva' yew fucking do, don't yew fucking leave me 'ere!"
Since I had pulled him in to our cab, I was now his best friend. "Yeah yeah, no worries".
The whole vibe was depressing and sad. We only stayed about 20 minutes. Just long enough for the two Calexican brothers to buy Jesse a lapdance with the gigantic white girl. She lead him in to the back, through a storage room, to another hallway with a dingy couch in the corner. He was a good sport about it. The quote of the night was "Don't touch these honey, I got three kids to feed". Good times.
We fucked around back in the hotel room for a bit, drinking tequila and listening to the Calexicans' ipod. Serge and I went out exploring at about 5am and found 5 guys from Pennsylvania in a room smoking weed and drinking bourbon. The weird English guy from earlier was somehow now with them, though they didn't know him either. Serge and I were drunk and apparently acting strange enough for these kids to keep asking us if we were cops. When we revealed that we already knew the English guy from a local strip club bathroom earlier that night, they were doubly confused.
We soon headed back to the Kennedy wing and crashed, drifting off to sleep to the Led Zeppelin lullaby album that had graciously gifted to me earlier that day. It was fucking perfect.
We woke up around 10am and traded Ben snoring stories before mounting up and heading in to beautiful downtown Monticello for a an old-fashioned diner breakfast.
We rolled up to Kutsher's at about 1:30pm. After a quick rendezvous with the Venezweirdos, we rushed down to Stage One to catch the last half of Sufjan Stevens. To my amazement, the auditorium that had been filled with loud punk fans slam dancing to Jesus Lizard was now completely silent. I swear you cold hear a pin drop. We walked in and made our way silently through the crowd.
SUFJAN STEVENS
I had never heard Sufjan Stevens before. He played the banjo and the acoustic guitar and sung in this beautiful whisper voice that probably got him beat up a lot as a kid. He had a small band with him and they seemed to play just the perfect amount of minimal accompaniment to keep the sound quiet and keep the audience in a state of hushed awe.
LINK - This is actual footage from the show
LINK - This picture is crappy, but you can hear just how quiet it was
It was magical. It felt more like a church service than a concert. It only took a few songs for me to think "wow, this is some really beautiful music I'm witnessing". He was performing his 2004 album "Seven Swans" in its entirety. There is a running theme of religious hallucinations in the lyrics that I picked up on immediately. This just endeared me to him even more. After the show I went out to the lobby and bought the album on vinyl. I've been listening to it almost daily ever since. Supposedly his new album is all about the Brooklyn Queens Expressway.
BRIDEZILLA
As soon as Sufan finished we headed over to Stage Two, where Bridezilla was about two songs in to their set. We waltzed in and found a good vantage point with no trouble at all.
LINK - One of their videos
LINK - A clip from the show
One of the greatest thing about this whole festival is the size of the crowd. They keep the tickets limited, so there is never too many people in any show. Hence, there is never a line to wait in, never a rush to get there. There's always plenty of room. Such a simple idea, but a great one nonetheless.
Another wonderful aspect is the lack of corporate sponsorship. No teams of promotional flunkies handing out free samples or trying to sign you up for The Discover Card. No tables of cell phone accessories or nasty energy drinks. Such a shunning of corporatism is almost unheard of in this day in age. Actually, I'm quite certain it is completely unheard of for a festival of this magnitude. Bravo ATP. Bravo.
Bridezilla was aiight. Not really my thing. I think they're from Australia. The saxaphone player did this very odd thing where she played her horn in very short notes, that sounded more like samples of a sax that were cut up. Go figure.
GROUPER
We left the Bridezilla show a few songs early and headed back to Stage One for Grouper, who is basically just a chick on a stool playing this weird, dreamy, droning ambient noise on a guitar and sort of singing here and there. It was interesting but not really grabbing me. Maybe if I was on 6 vicodin or something, but my 3pm sober was not cutting it. She did have cool projections behind her.
LINK - An unofficial music video
ATLAS SOUND
After Grouper it was back to Stage Two for a guy who calls himself Atlas Sound. He was sitting in a chair, playing guitar, and working some kind of sampler or keyboard. He's a very funky looking dude. Tall and lanky and kind of caved-in, like he's been badly photoshopped. Somebody said he was born with a form of gigantism. He's also the singer for this band Deer Hunter, who were playing later that day.
LINK - A clip from the show (with kinda crappy sound)
By late afternoon I had a pretty good read on the crowd that was in attendance. It's really pretty remarkable. It's as if they take all of the douchebags that you hate from any concert experience and remove them, leaving just true music nerds like yourself. No fashionistas. No shirtless suburbanites pumping their fists. No chicks up on dudes' shoulders flashing their tits. No wall street assholes with box seats. NONE of that. Just people who are like "holy shit this is my favorite fucking band and I'm so fucking happy to be here". It's really, really cool.
At some point in the day, well in to our respective altered states, The Venezweirdos and my crew came across an entire hallway filled with plastic colored balls about the size of an orange. It was like the Chuck E Cheese ball pit for adults. You can imagine my excitement. Like somebody magical wizard had dumped them all over the hallway, just for us! A huge plastic colored ball war ensured, and lasted pretty much the rest of the weekend. We started seeing them all over the hotel. Anytime we would spot one, there'd be a mad trampling race to grab it and bean the nearest person squarely on the forehead. They were plastic and hollow so nobody lost an eye. Good times.
The next show we attended was Anti-Pop Consortium. I was never a fan, really, but they put on a decent show and one of their MCs does have relatively mad skillz. El P played on the same stage about an hour later. He was actually pretty damn good, but he just never did it for me as an MC.
DEAD MEADOW
Dead Meadow was awesome. They play this Black Sabbathy bluesy rock, and manage to get a really nice, heavy, slow groove going out of just a simple three piece. It's stripped down and honest and just kinda kicks ass though you're not exactly sure why. I've downloaded a bunch of their albums in the past few weeks but none of them seem to live up to how good they sounded live.
LINK - One of their old songs
THE MELVINS
The Melvins were surprisingly great. I never really got in to any post-80s punk rock, and the kind of people I know who have told me that they dig The Melvins have always been a bit suspect to me. Turns out I was totally wrong and they actually kick ass for dayz. Their singer/guitarist wears a ridiculous Satanic robe and looks like a cross between sideshow bob and shleprock from the Flintstones. They had two Bonham-esque drummers and the whole outfit was tight as a mother fucker.
LINK - The singer, King Buzzo
SHELLAC
After the Melvins we ran over to Stage One to catch Shellac - one of Steve Albini's side projects. I hadn't seen Albini since about 1985, when I went to see Big Black & Squirrel Bait. Squirrel Bait were my boys, so after that show we all went back to some chick's apartment and shot off fireworks until 3am. Shellac's set was off-key and abrasive and challenging, just like Big Black. Short bursts of noise followed by wise-ass spoken word shit over repetitive riffs that seemed to be trying to test the audience's tolerance for enduring them. Their drummer Todd Trainer is the most rock n roll dude you could ever fucking imagine. Like Keith Richards and Iggy Pop and the tall skinny creature from The Gorillaz had a baby. We were all in awe of him.
LINK - This is a clip from the show
ANIMAL COLLECTIVE
Animal Collective closed out the day late Saturday night. Two guys with samplers and keyboards and one guy with a guitar. They totally blew me away. It sounded like nothing I have ever heard in my life. Abstract electronica that throws out just about all rules of conventional music that I know of. Layers upon layers of sound. Endless loops and delays. Sounds weirdly chaotic, yet still has just enough form to keep you engaged, with occasional tremendous crescendos that reach a rave-like frenzy. Their latest album has been widely compared to "Pet Sounds" by more than a few critics. Imagine early Pink Floyd, and Phillip Glass, and The Beach Boys, filtered through rave culture, but with little if any recognizable structure. It was cool. I have no idea if their records could live up to what they did live, cuz every song just blended in to the next in this seamless layered way. It was hard to comprehend how even the members of the band could be keeping track what they were doing.
LINK - One of their videos
After the last show we all ran around the lake in the dark and found a deserted playground with swingsets and one of those big giant hanging discs that can fit ten people on it. It was rusty and made a horribly loud creaking sound as it revolved. The stars were intensely abundant and looked like they were painted on a high ceiling overhead, Out of nowhere, a little gnome-shaped hippie appeared and started spinning these glowing balls around. He barely said two words. It was so fucking bizarre and yet perfect at the same time. We gave him a joint for both his impressive spinning light show performance and his perfect timing. We got back to the hotel around 3am and made margaritas in the room for an hour or so before listening to "No Quarter" in lullaby form and falling asleep. I'm telling you, this Led Zeppelin Lullaby album is like taking 3 Ambien.
So that was Saturday, and it was fucking EPIC. I kept saying to Ben and Serge and anybody who would listen "This is our real life! We are actually having this much fun!" I was truly beside myself with joy.
Sunday was more of the same magic. A never ending plastic ball war between the two rival camps kept us on our toes at all times. The bands were diverse and interesting and occasionally fantastic.
We stopped by Walmart in the morning, to buy some ammo for a final assault on the Venezweirdos. The plastic ball ammunition was growing thin, and we needed a decisive strike. That was my first time inside a Walmart. Holy mother of GOD is that place gigantic. You could have parked seven 747s in there. They were oddly devoid of plastic colored balls, but we did find twelve cans of silly string and one of those super loud air-horns. Now all we needed was the perfect moment to strike.
BOREDOMS
The Boredoms played first on Sunday. Holy fucking shit. INSANE. Nine drummers beating the fuck out of drumkits while that crazy dreadlocked japanese guy screams like a banshee and bangs on a wall full of guitars with metal pipes. It was outta this world. Talk about a wake up. I've been told they sometime perform this same show with 77 drummers. Bananas.
LINK - This video doesn't do it justice in any way shape or form
BORIS
Boris played mid-afternoon on stage two. Before the show I ran in to Peter Aaron, the bass player from my old band Sluggo. He later went on to form the Chrome Cranks, who are old enough to be doing reunion shows these days. We hadn't seen each other in about 15 years. He told me he was a music writer living upstate and was still playing in several bands. It was great to see him.
Good lord, Boris was the some of the slowest heaviest music I have ever witnessed. Like somebody playing a heavy metal album in a black hole where time has been slowed down to 1/25th the original speed. People call it sludge rock or drone metal or god knows what. They were unbelievably loud. Like being hit in the chest with 40 sledgehammers for an hour. I had only heard them once before, on the soundtrack to the Jarmusch movie "The Limits of Control" (which I highly recommend - both soundtrack and film).
LINK - This is a clip from the show
NO AGE w/ BOB MOULD
The icing on the cake treat for me on Sunday was the No Age show of all Husker Du songs, with fucking Bob Mould on guitar and vocals. Husker Du was one of the greatest American hardcore bands of my era. I saw them several times as a kid. This show was the first time Bob Mould had played any of their material in decades. I felt like I was 15 again. "Makes No Sense At All" was the standout for me, but "New Day Rising" and a cover of Johnny Thunders' "Chinese Rock" also brought the house down.
LINK - A clip from the show
BLACK MOTH SUPER RAINBOW
Black Moth Super Rainbow's AIR-esque groovy electronica made for the perfect find a chair and take a rest set. And I really do love the name of this band. Twas perfectly relaxing.
LINK - One of their videos
THE FLAMING LIPS
The Flaming Lips closed out the weekend late Sunday night. You can only imagine the energy in the room. Everyone there had just had the coolest three days of their lives. Playing to three thousand peolpe who are so grateful to you for curating this epic weekend of awesome music meant they couldn't have had a more willing and excited crowd.
They had a big LED curtain behind the stage. The show began with solarized 60s-lookin video of some naked chick dancing around. She then laid down and spread her legs, revealing a pulsating strobe light vagina. The Vagina grew and grew until it filled the whole screen. Then, to the crowd's delight, a door opened in the middle of the vagina, and the band emerged, one by one, stepping out on to a ramp that lead down to the stage. All but the singer, who appeared from behind the ramp, encased in a plastic cocoon. This cocoon soon inflated to a big atlas-sphere size bubble. When the band started, the singer started rolling around in the big bubble on the heads of the crowd. Then 100 giant plastic balls feel from the ceiling and confetti cannons exploded and people lost their damn minds. Somebody told me this is how all Flaming Lips shows start. All I know is that it was hilarious and fucking AWESOME.
LINK - This video kind of captures it, albeit from a very narrow vantage point
Once the giant plastic balls fell from the ceiling all over the venue, it was abundantly clear that the small plastic balls that we had been warring with all weekend were a subtle, guerilla foreshadowing of the Flaming Lips manic live show. Kinda cool, no?
After the Lips did their last encore, we rushed outside to plan our silly string assault. We waited fifteen minutes, until we were confident the Venezuelans were safe and sound in their room, hopefully winding down and off guard. I had a key to their door, so I gathered my troops behind me, pushed it open, and let loose with the air horn why everybody else rushed in, two-fisted silly stringing the fuck out of the place like a John Woo movie.
Not only were they a bit surprised, they were also sitting ducks. When we ran in, the Venezweirdos were all lying on the ground on their backs, with their legs and feet in the air, like turtles, with one of them CROWD-SURFING on the hands and feet of the others. There was no music on. They were just singing some Flaming lips chorus at the top of their lungs. It was fucking hilarious. After the air strike, we all took turns crowd surfing. Good times.
All in all, three of the most epic days of my life. 
Thanks Jesse!
I owe you a beer (and $500 - call me)
If any of this sounds like fun to you, I strongly encourage that you attend in 2010.
- TERRIFYING TUESDAY AT THE BROOKLYN MASONIC TEMPLE
I first heard Sun O)))) when they appeared on the soundtrack to the Jarmusch film "The Limits of Control", where they collaborated with the Japanese drone metal band Boris. Having just seen and loved Boris the week prior at the ATP festival, I was eager to get the other side of the story. I received a warning from the show promoters earlier that day via Email.
You may notice all of SUNN O)))'s albums feature their mantra MAXIMUM VOLUME YIELDS MAXIMUM RESULTS. The Blackened Music Series will be adhering to SUNN O)))'s wishes for this performance. The Brooklyn Masonic Temple is not restricted by any noise limitations. This show will be loud. This will be a show you will feel with your entire body. Please fortify yourself accordingly.
As you might imagine, this only enticed me more. My boy Marcus, who was going to the show too, swore that this was an ominous warning about the much-fabled "brown note" (South Park).
The show began with a burst of smoke from a smoke machine, and some kind of recording of druid chanting. This brought cheers from the crowd, who were eager to have their faces melted off. Not so fast, thought Sun O)))). The druid chanting continued... and continued... and continued...while smoke filled up not only the stage, but the entire auditorium. This was no quick operation. We stood there for what must have been 20-30 minutes, while the fog slooooooowwwwly rolled in from the stage. Reaction from the crowd was part restlessness, part bewildered amusement. The fog eventually got so fucking thick you literally could not see 30 feet in front of you. The stage was completely obscured except for the red lights above.
Thirty minutes later, outta nowhere, a loud crunchy guitar chord BOOMED from somewhere out of the fog. Like the bass scream of that creature from that movie Cloverfield. The crowd roared. Finally! Let's get it started. Like I said, you couldn't even see the stage anymore, allowing the band to literally sneak out there under cover of fog sometime in the previous half hour. Hilarious.
So the droning began. Simply one guitar and one bass, turned up to 1000, down-tuned to some Hellish off-key pitch that only a demon could love. And it was LOUD. Loud and slow as molasses on a winter's day. No drums. Just an endless droning combination of bass and guitar playing the same note for as long as the feedback could sustain it, before a slight chord change drags it up or down a notch. Did I mention this was loud? It was fucking LOUD. Deafening. Like being inside the slowly churning bowels of some great behemoth.
Twenty minutes in to their set, you could still barely see them. If you concentrated really hard, occasionally you would see some hint of a guy in a wizard's robe, somewhere in the mist. But only for a moment, and then he'd be gone again. Hilarious. Eventually, a third robed wizard appeared. He began speaking in one of those evil death metal voices, reciting some long abstract poem about something evil like a dark chasm or some shit. His voice was amplified to such an absurd degree that it was just as loud and bass-filled as the guitars. Each word was a kick in the throat.
So now it's 45 minutes in, and you're thinking to yourself "yeah, I guess this is pretty interesting". And it was, however I wasn't sure if it could hold my attention for two hours. But apparently Sun O)))) was way ahead of me.
The evil poet wizard receded back in to the mist, and a newer, much much more evil wizard appeared. This wizard was something entirely different. He wore a huge robe made from shards of broken mirrors, and a gigantic crown made from the same - like a bizarro statue of liberty from the ninth plane of Hell. His voice was about 50 times as loud and 50 times as deep and bass-filled and he was altogether 1000 times more evil than the previous Def Jam poet. And if that wasn't enough, he soon unfolded his clenched fists to reveal that all of his fingertips were red lasers that shot out in straight lines wherever he pointed his hands. Given the pea-soup thickness of the fog, you can only imagine how incredibly dramatic and effective this little theatrical trick was. And when he turned his hands inward, towards his face and head, the red lasers bounced off of all the mirror shards and created this incredibly evil spectacle of red laser spikes bouncing off of him and out in to the room. It was fucking SICK.
The whole time, I could only wonder what the staff of the venue must have thought of all of this. Walking in on it unprepared, one could easily assume that the dark lord himself had finally appeared to reign Hell on the earth, and this was a black mass of his minions awaiting instructions.
The satanic figure on stage was one Atila Csihar, singer for the legendary Norwegian black metal band Mayhem. Mayhem is one of the foundation bands of the Norwegian black metal scene. Sadly, they are most famous for having their first singer commit suicide and their guitarist stab their drummer 23 times or some shit. The band made necklaces from the skull fragments of their first singer. His vocals with Sun O)))) were an impressive array of evil black metal chanting and satanic incantations mixed with guttural droning noises that sounded an evil version of tibetan throat singing. And, of course, it was all amplified to a terrifying decibel level, where one word from him would rattle your ribcage for days. All while the other two wizards continued these loooooong slooooooow roaring chords. Occasionally the first poet wizard would play a long note on the trombone. It was bananas. It was awesome.
Later on Atila disappeared in to the fog and soon returned wearing a soiled burlap sack, with only his head one one arm visible. His right arm was made out of what looked liked twisted twigs and rotting apples. His face looked like a mask of dripping wax. He wore a crown of more twisted twigs. It was both terrifying and hilarious.
All in all, this Sun O)))) show was fucking bad-ass. An endurance test to be sure, but well worth it if you can appreciate satanic theater of the absurd (and you own a set of earplugs).
- MY TOP 20 RESTAURANTS FROM THE SIMPSONS
Up up and Buffet
Gulp n' Blow
Face Stuffers
Dead Lobster
Taco Mat
Kentucky Fried Panda
Griddler on the Roof
The Hungry Nun
Le Snotterie
Bob's Big Poi
The Zesty Fork
General Chang's Taco Italiano
Taj Mah-All-You-Can-Eat
P. Piggly Hogswine's Super Smorg
Mount Bellyache
Texas Cheesecake Depository
Much Ado About Muffins
Luftwaffles
Captain Corndog Shnitzle Palace
Bodacious Fritatas
- A KICK-OFF LETTER TO MY BEACH HOUSE MATES
Throughout recent history, there have been some summers that simply rolled into the next without much notice or fanfare. Then there are the summers that come along once in a lifetime – the kind that mark a clean break from a boring, beach-free past, and set a new course for a totally awesome beach-filled future.
This, my friends, is one of those years.
We start 2009 in the midst of a crisis unlike any we have seen in our lifetime – a crisis that has only deepened over the last few days. Nearly 6 inches of snow has fallen this morning and we are likely to learn more is on the way. And March has just begun. I mean, WTF? How many more blizzards has that cursed, foamy-mouthed, rabid, little, buck-toothed, furry, feral groundhog cursed us with this season? You do know he BIT Bloomberg on the hand on Groundhog Day, right? (google it) That can't be a good sign. So many, many of us are both anxious and uncertain of how many more snow-filled days the near future will hold.
I don’t believe it’s too late to change course, but it will be if we don’t take dramatic action as soon as possible. If nothing is done, this winter could linger on for months if not years. Our red wine intake could reach single digits. We could lose a generation of potential and promise, as more barely-employed beachbums are forced to forgo dreams of sun and sand. And our trusty tribe could lose the competitive edge in grilling exceptional meat and making world class margaritas that has served as a foundation for our strength and standing in the entire Davis Park/Ocean Ridge community.
Now, despite the fact that this chilling winter crisis is God's fault (stupid God and his stupid four seasons), it is not beyond our ability to solve it. We can restore sun, sand, and good times. We should never forget that our beach house crew is, pound for pound, still way cooler than any of those other lame-ass Fire Island beach house crews. Our deck dance-offs are still the envy of the entire eastern seaboard. We are still host to the most brilliant readers of trash magazines, the most creatively stoned cooks, and the most dislocated right arms Davis Park has ever known.
That is why I have moved quickly to create a beach house Recovery and Reinvestment Plan that will immediately jumpstart outdoor grilling and create long-term kale salad solutions for tomorrow and beyond.
It’s a plan that represents not just new policy, but a whole new approach to meeting our most urgent challenges. Actually, that last part is a lie. its the exact same approach as last year and the year before that. You give me your money, I give it to a weird old lady in a giant sun hat riding one of those 4-wheeled scooters, then we all have a great summer.
Now, I know what you're thinking. You're thinking: given today's uncertain economic climate, is investing in your summer really a wise thing to do at this juncture? Your saying "But Julian, will I even have a job in May? I'm on ichat 24/7 and I phone in about two hours of real work per day as it is". To that I say "WHO THE FUCK KNOWS? and, more importantly, WHO THE FUCK CARES?". Would you rather be bummed out, unemployed, and stewing in your crappy apartment for the entire summer with an extra two thousand dollars in your pocket that you piss away overnight on 2-for-1 happy hour lap dances at Cityscape on Queens Boulevard and 3 bags of shitty coke that some girl you just met at one of those old-timey drink spots managed to share with all of her friends in the bathroom while your were buying a round of $16 sazeracs and sidecars for those ungrateful bitches? Or would you rather take that measly two thousand bucks and invest it in your summer, where, worst case scenario, you lounge on your beach house deck for four months straight, perfecting your savage tan, mastering the Patchogue patois, getting a very clear sense of who wore it best, and picking up yoga tips from Melinda, cooking tips from Kenny, and endless ear hygiene tips from Randi. I mean, seriously. You do the math.
That is why the time has come to build a new beach house - one in which hard work and responsibility are once again shunned in favor of afternoon cocktails and tasty cheese assortments. That’s why I’m asking you to work with me to get the beach house crew assembled in the next few weeks. That’s why I’m calling on all of you – Brooklyn Ballers and Queens castaways – Americans and Venezuelans – Austrians and half-assed Australians – to put this wicked winter behind you and forge a bold new future of casual drug use and surprisingly tasty salads.
More than any program or policy, it is this spirit that will enable us to confront this challenge with the same spirit that has led previous beach house incarnations to face down the Y2K bug, the TV writers strike, and K-Fed. And if we do – if we are able to summon that Sybaritic spirit again; if we are able to cook out for one another, and pass a joint to one another, and do our part for the weekly Saturday evening feast, then I have no doubt that years from now, we will look back on 2009 as one of those years that marked another new and hopeful beginning for the crusty inhabitants of 16 Donella Walk. Thank you, God Bless You, and may God Bless Davis Park.
- YES, THEY HAVE DRUGS IN HEAVEN
I can't remember where I came across this online, probably 4chan or something, but I think it's hilarious. Again, I DID NOT WRITE IT (though I kinda wish I did)
GOOD NEWS FROM A CRAZY GUY
I made an amazing discovery when he was talked to by an angel, he wanted me to post this here to let some people know that the afterlife is very real. He says that he sensed something bad was going to be happening in the world soon. They have things for you to do that will keep you busy for thousands of years.
-Small people (dwarves) are made a normal persons height, people who are blind are made able to see again, and people who are paralyzed will be able to walk/be active again.
-You can look how you want physically and every month they give you a pill that will rid you of any bad materials in your body (such as fats, and anything else thats bad for your health)so you feel like your in the best shape of your life.
-You can eat/drink your favorite foods and drinks with no side effects.
-You have your own mansion, and can live a life of a king/athlete/musician, you can have a steakhouse/restaurant built into your house as well, and drink your favorite beer as much as you want.
-You can live out male or female fantasies, such as war or being a model.
-If you die before your loved ones do, you can be put into a sleep/meditation state until they get there to see you again.
-You can be given magical powers and sent to planets to fight off evil armies, and instead of feeling horrible amounts of pain when you are hurt, you instead feel a stinging sensation wherever you were hit, and when you are hit you lose energy in your body till you lose consciousness and die/lose.
-They have euphorias that will make you laugh out loud at how good you feel.
-You can do drugs there with no consequence to taking them, or if you like some of the consequences you can still feel them.
-They can give you 10 very attractive girlfriends or boyfriends.
-You can have parties that are even better then any party you'll have here.
-You can learn to fly(they add another piece of brain to your current brain that will allow you to fly yourself through the air).
-If you like games, they can create some of the best games you could ever imagine, that will keep you busy for decades, and can create another world which you live in with people who have lived an entire lifetime who will play the games you play, and people who are just living a normal life around you so its very realistic.
-They can create movies for you to watch, you can go to a world that has people that have lived a life for how ever man years old they are, and read about the film actors to further the bond and love for the movie you watched, and have your own movie theater and invite all your friends to watch with you. They can even insert yourself into the movie and you will be the lead role, for a good laugh or for seriousness.
-If you like music you can have music made for you instantly.
-You can live a new life.
-This is just some of the things that you can do there, from what I was told is that its even better then I could ever describe.
There are some amazing things that are about to happen in this world within the next few months, and not good things either. Please pray, I wish you all good luck.
- 1/30/09 OH THAT'S RIGHT, I HAVE A BLOG
Couldn't get myself to write a god damn thing in 2008. Not sure why. Too much drama in my head I guess. Mid life crisis? Check. Turning 40? Check. Uncertain about the whole fucking world and my place in it? Check. Second guessing every major life decision since 6th grade? Check. Long story, for real. All that, and I got severely owned by Poseidon in August, ripping my right arm way way WAY out of the socket and putting a serious damper on the following three months. All the vicodin didn't exactly help my productivity either, that's for sure. I have a whole comic sketched out about the accident, but I can't seem to finish it. Must do it before the memory of the pain dissipates. Anyway, below is a few other things I felt like blogging about in 2008 but never quite got around to. Enjoy.
- OBAMA NIGHT RECAP
Election night in NYC was simply amazing.
We kicked off the night with an election party at Do Hwa, our friend's Korean restaurant on Carmine & Bedford in the west village. This was a bit of a reunion, as we were meeting a large group of good friends as well as hardcore Do Hwa regulars and a whole gang of former employees.
Backstory: Do Hwa was a major haunt for all of my friends during the dot com boom. I ate there twice a week, and drank there at least double that. They had the best Bi Bim Bop south of 32nd st, and Dave Evans was the coolest bartender on earth (not to mention one of the few people I can count as a bigger film nerd than myself). It was the only bar in my life where I have ever had "a tab". This tab being, basically, a tally of how many bottles of Patron Ben Cruz and I could drink per week. Good times. As a young aspiring alcoholic of 16 or 17, and an avid watcher of 1970s TV shows, you dream of the day you can say "put it on my tab". And before you roll your eyes at our choice of beverage, allow me to point out that this was in 2001 way way WAY before Patron was cool. Or at least that's what I like to believe.
Election night in Do Hwa was really extra special. The mood was just electric. I think most people in the room had finally become comfortable with the idea that their dreams just might come true and the American people just might not vote in John McCain and the dimwitted abomination known as Sarah Palin.
We sat at a long table \and drank special election night Obama-themed concoctions of ginger soju and saké, gobbling down Bi Bim Bop and Dak Teegim as the election results rolled in on a large projection screen at the front of the restaurant. As one crucial state after another fell on our side of the fence, the collective excitement began to swell.
When NBC called it at 11pm, a great roar erupted in the room. Screams and hoots and hollers and hugs and champagne toasts and tears. A lot of tears. I cried like a bitch. The day had final arrived. A day very few of us thought we would ever see. I think it took about an hour to really sink in. And I actually felt kinda sick to my stomach, which was odd, but it was really just a whole lot to get take in at once.
After Obama's acceptance speech and some long extended hugs, Anne, Roxanne, Sam, and I walked over to Sullivan st for the Libation party at Sullivan Room. The whole village was nothing but screams and honking horns. Complete strangers smiling at each other, even hugging each other. Not since the weeks after 9/11 have I seen such open camaraderie among New Yorkers. BUt this time without all the sorrow. This time it was just pure joy. It was magical.
The Libation party was great. Ian Friday & Sabine laid down solid sets, peppered with Obama speeches here and there. Sporadic "O-BA-MA!" and "YES-WE-DID!" chants broke out about every 20 minutes. It was truly a night to celebrate, and the crowd was there to dance. So dance we did. We danced our collective asses off until 2:30 am or so.
Being on an extended leave from employment (healing my shoulder), I had no reason whatsoever to stop celebrating. Roxanne, Sam and I headed over to Bed Stuy to catch the tail end of Lil Ray's party at Langston Lounge, dropping the gainfully employed Anne Frederick off at home on the way. But by the time we arrived at the club, the gates were shut. This was a bummer, but there weren't too many options at 3am in Bed Stuy on a Tuesday, so we agreed to head our separate ways.
So I was heading back home, through Fort Greene, down Dekalb, in a yellow taxi. All of a sudden we came upon a surprising sight: A GIGANTIC block party in the middle of the street between Adelphi & Carlton. It seemed that the South African restaurant Madiba was in the midst of a serious Obama celebration that had spilled out on the sidewalk and overtaken he entire block. 500 people dancing and drinking and screaming and embracing. It was 3am and the party was no where near from over.
Seeing the large unruly, fairly black crowd, the cab driver was very nervous. "Maybe we should go other way?!"
"Don't worry dude, it'll be fine!" I reassured him "Just drive through really slowly".
I could see some uniformed police mingling in with the revelers, so I figured they would clear out the crowd in an orderly fashion.
As we crawled in to the middle of the jubilant throng, people began to notice the cab. Rather than part ways, a weird fever seemed to overtake them. Simultaneously, like zombies, they swarmed around all sides of the car. Cute girls started hooting and hollering and banging on the windows. men jumped up on the bumper and banged on the hood and roof. The driver was BUGGIN'.
BUt I didn't care, I was too distracted by the mob of cute girls banging on my door and screaming through the open window "OBAMA!!!! WOOOOO!!!! GET OUT AND PARTY WITH US RIGHT NOW!!!!!"
"FUCK!" I thought to myself "I should get out of this damn cab!"
In the middle of all that, a hand reaches in to the cab and violently grabs me by my shirt. It was my boy Cheo, whom I had been texting all night, trying to hook up with.
"DUDE! WTF ARE YOU DOING?! GET OUT OF DAT CAB AND PARTY WITH US!"
That was the last straw.
"STOP THE CAB!" I yelled. "I'M GETTING OUT!!"
The cab driver looked at me like I was nuts.
"RIght HERE? You SURE you want to get out HERE?" he asked alarmingly.
I hopped out of the car. The Crowd screamed "YAAAAAYYYYYYY WWWWOOOOOOO!!!!!". I held up my arms in triumph for some reason.
Cheo was partying with Anabella & a few of their friends. I immediately ran in to about 3 other people I know, one of whom was an old college buddy Jamal, who I hadn't seen in 5 years.
The crowd was insane. A small drum circle was going in the street in front of the restaurant. People dancing all around it. More music was coming from inside. A DJ playing some old Lauryn Hill song. People dancing inside. We fought our way in and got a beer. Almost everybody was drinking. Cops stood by smiling while everybody celebrated. This was a real shock. You NEVER see cops tolerating open containers in New York. To top it off, Anabella told me they had just come from Williamsburg, where a similar celebration of hipsters was broken up by riot police. You know it's a new day when cops go to the white neighborhood to beat up on the white kids while black folks drink beer on the street in front of smiling bending-over0backward-to-be-nice Brooklyn cops. Hail Obama!
I've honestly never seen NYC so fucking happy in my entire life.
It was like New Year's Eve and Halloween and Carnival all rolled in to one.
What an amazing time to be alive.
And to actually be that proud to be an American too.
Wonderful.
- HALLOWEEN NYC
We went to hear Matty Matt spin at Sapphire. It was the best party that club has had since 1995. Matt did his thing and Heather.....holy shit. Heather brought the house down. If you don't believe me, just peep the photos. I forgot my camera so i stole these from Matt's flickr account. Not only is he a great DJ and some klind of computer genius, but he also takes beautiful photos, don't you think?
- I HAVE TOTALLY KICK ASS LUCID DREAMS
I've had two lucid dreams this week.
NUMBER ONE
I was taking a group of older ladies to a museum cafe of some sort. We sat at a long yellow table. Looked a bit like the cafeteria at The Met. The conversation was painfully uninteresting, but I was obligated to be the chaperone for some reason.
In the middle of lunch, the woman across from me looks dead at me and says "this dream is boring. I'm outta here" and to my astonishment, vanishes in to thin air(!).
"Damn" I thought to myself "She's right. This IS boring. I'm going back to sleep". And I promptly exited the dream and woke up in my bed.
What a relief! And how cool that I could just exit at will! This development was really intriguing.
I went back to sleep, and was immediately BACK in the same dream. Back at the table with the elderly ladies.
"Oh no" I thought "This dream again! I'm outta here". And I woke up a second time, this time for good.
The end.
NUMBER TWO (2 days later)
I was walking down Dekalb Ave with an old friend (ESPO). It was a sunny, snowy, and very slushy day - but not cold at all. ESPO and I were heading to the subway, to go to VH1 in Times Square, where he supposedly worked. We were to be pitching my great ideas for TV shows (!). I was somewhat stressed that I didn't remember any of the great ideas I was supposed to be pitching, but I had bigger issues.
I had forgotten to wear shoes. So I was walking in ankle-deep slush in my bare feet. This was most embarrassing. How was I going to do a successful pitch with bare feet?
"That's unfortunate, dude" ESPO said "but you're just gonna have to suck it up and make the best of it".
This was not comforting at all. I kept asking myself "why the FUCK would I forget to wear shoes on such an important day?"
As we reached the bottom of the hill and the entrance to the subway, I stopped at the top of the stairs.
"This is crazy man, I can't go to VH1 with no shoes" I insisted.
"Dude, we're gonna be late. Just C'mon" he said
"Ya know what, there is NO WAY I would have forgotten to wear shoes today. NO WAY. This has GOT to be a dream."
"A dream? that makes no sense. The train's coming. Let's go!"
"No way. This is a dream. You go on. I'm going to stand right here until I wake up, because this is a dream."
ESPO ran down the stairs and down the hallway, out of sight. I stood at the top of the stairs. I looked up at the sun and woke up in my bed.
The end.
If I can master this lucid dreaming stuff, it will be like having my own personal holodeck.
- RADIOHEAD IS KIND OF A GOOD BAND
I caught Radiohead at All Points West on August 8th last summer.
I can describe the show with these three smilies:
I really feel like they are the Pink Floyd of my generation. Dark. Complex. Epic. Wholly original. Daring. And they just don't sound like any other band in history. To me, They are really on a completely different plane than just about any other rock band still making music.
I was so excited by the show, I woke up the next day and made a mix of the entire setlist, just so I could obsess over it on my ipod for the next 2 months.
If you want to hear that, here it is. Click to stream - right click/control click to download.
RADIOHEAD - ALL POINTS WEST (studio versions, NOT a live recording)
I left my camera at home, so I stole these first three photos from Melinda Gray.
The rest of these photos I ganked off of the web, from a brilliant Brooklyn photographer named kyle dean reinford. Hopefully he doesn't mind.
CLICK HERE to check out his site
SETLIST
01. Reckoner
02. 15 Step
03. The National Anthem
04. Kid A
05. All I Need
06. Nude
07. Weird Fishes/Arpeggi
08. Where I End And You Begin
09. The Gloaming
10. Faust Arp
11. No Surprises
12. Jigsaw Falling Into Place
13. The Bends
14. Bangers and Mash
15. Everything In Its Right Place
16. Exit Music (For A Film)
17. Bodysnatchers
Encore 1
18. Pyramid Song
19. Videotape
20. Airbag
21. Fake Plastic Trees
22. There There
Encore 2
23. House of Cards
24. Planet Telex
25. Idioteque
26. my own bonus track cuz I really wanted to hear it, even though they didn't play it (fuckers)
- THE COOLEST BOOKS EVER EVER
PSYCHOPTS by RICHARD HELL & CHRISTOPER WOOL
This is a collaboration between my main man Richard Hell & the artist Christopher Wool. Longtime friends, they share a mutual fascination with words - in this case, not really for what their direct meaning may be, but rather for the myriad of associations and implications and suggestions and even mistaken interpretations one can create by combining words that have some kind of inherent synergetic similarity. For this book, they created 57 couplings of words, and printed them in various graphic arrangements. Sometimes on top of one another. Sometimes above and below. Sometimes right side up and upside down. Etc. The combination creates endless interpretations depending on the power of your own imagination, both visually and semantically. It's a beautifully unique piece of work for lovers of words and typography and mindfucks.
COMPLETE MINIMAL POEMS by ARAM SAROYAN
A collection of rare and out-of-print work of one of the 1960's most groundbreaking minimalist poets. This is a great companion to the Richard Hell/Christopher Wool book above. Saroyan's work betrays a similar love of words and the endless possibilities one can create by leaving almost everything up to the interpretation and embellishment of the reader. Each page contains one single poem. Many of them consisting of just a single word. Others just a few open-ended lines. Such as:
An oyster
can't
read this
And another personal favorite of mine
We made a raincoat
for a bee.
Fascinating restraint, and so much fun to read. Perhaps I should mention that I know almost nothing about poetry and usually cannot bear to read it.
MINGERING MIKE by DORI HADAR
In the late 60s and early 70s, Mike Stevens, a total weirdo and total super genius created an alter ego for himself, a fantastic imaginary doppleganger named Mingering Mike. This alter ego was a soul singing sensation with an impressive discography and storied song catalogue.
Despite having no formal training as an artist, Mike hand-painted over fifty LP covers, complete with tracklistings and liner notes and photo inserts and quotes from his admirers and on and on. He even made some 45s. All on stray pieces of cardboard. He even made vinyl LPs out of cardboard and drew every groove on the record by hand. These were never intended for public viewing, just his personal hobby - creating fake artifacts from his fantasy life.
In 2003, his "records" started mysteriously showing up in flea market record crates around the DC area. Record collector nerds Dori Hadar & Frank Beylotte started blogging about these weird pieces of art they had come across while digging. Soon enough, they started to realize they had quite possibly discovered and as-yet-unsung folk artist. They set out to not only collect all the various pieces of the puzzle, but also to find out if the artist himself was still alive. It's a fascinating story, and a must have for any crate digger on planet earth. Funkadelic fans familiar with the work of Pedro Bell will be especially thrilled. Trust me. Peep it:
99 FEARS by NEDKO SOLAKOV
A beautiful, dark, weird, terrifying, abstract collection of fearful manifestations in all shapes and sizes. I'm finding it very hard to do it any justice with mere words. You simply need to see it to appreciate it. Recalls to mind the feeling you had when you first opened an Edward Gorey book. You were thrilled that there was somebody alive that was twisting illustration in to this dark, moody place - a place that seemed so fucking familiar - like he was stealing ideas from your own nightmares. Yeah. It's like that, but way WAY cooler. My deepest thanks to the cool person who gave me this book
- WINTER SUCKS
Some of these photos were stolen from friends blogs and facebook pages and flickr accounts and what have you. Yeah? So?
- 2/26/08 BACK ON THE BLOG
Haven't updated this section of the blog in a minute. This is primarily because I have become so obsessed with writing travel blogs that I am pretty much mentally vacant by the time they are finally finished.
Went to Peru in November and it was totally freakin' mind-blowing. Wrote an absurdly long blog about it, with photos that are so awesome my Mom swears they should be in National Geographic (!). Now Anne wants to move there so she can wander off in to the rainforest to learn how to read coca leaves in quechua while I work on my hippy tolerance.
Went to venezuela over Christmas/New Years and got a whirlwind rockstar tour of the country from my two good friends Anabella and Cheo. Wrote and even longer blog with even cooler pictures. Ended up formatting it differently so the pics could load on separate pages. It is insanely long and detailed, but I've been getting wonderful responses from Venezuelans all over the globe. Some random guy even called me for travel tips. I'm the poor man's Samantha Brown!
You can read all about these fabulous trips by clicking on the travel button on the left menu on this page. The Venezuela blog is also linked directly on the top navigation above.
- I HAVE FUCKED UP DREAMS. EXHIBIT A:
So I'm living in a suburban house with Rosanne Barr, Uma Thurman, and Tommy Lee Jones in full "Two-Face" make-up, reprising his role from the Dick Tracy movie. WTF?! It's a lazy Saturday afternoon and we're all just sort of hanging around the house. Some random 2-story house in the suburbs.
Uma is feeling a bit "snacky", so she pulls some ice cream out of the freezer, but it is too cold and hard to eat, so she puts it in the microwave. She leaves it there for like 15 minutes. The microwave overheats, causing a small radioactive explosion of some sort. After a small fire is extinguished, she apologizes to Rosanne for breaking the microwave. Tommy Lee Jones (as Two-Face, mind you) says nothing.
Uma then asks Rosanne and I if we both think the ice cream is still safe to eat.
Rosanne is like "I have no idea, what do you think Julian?"
"I don't know. It's probably fine" I said "Just scrape off the top layer before you eat it"
Uma looked pleased at this news and began to prepare the ice cream for immediately consumption.
A few minutes later I began thinking "That is crazy. I don't know anything about radiation. My careless advice might kill Uma Thurman! I should consult my Dad immediately".
So I call my Dad and tell him the story. Without hesitation he says "DO NOT EAT THAT ICE CREAM! GET IT OUT OF THE HOUSE NOW! BURY IT OUT IN THE WOODS AND NEVER GO NEAR THERE AGAIN!"
"oh shit!" I thought.
I ran downstairs to tell Uma. She had just finished the entire pint. Damn.
I was like "Um.....nevermind".
The end.
- THREE NEW MIX CDs HOT OFF THE PRESSES
I went on a crazy mix CD bender last week and made three new CDs in one weekend.
First was "TAKE TWO AND PASS", the title of which will make a lot of sense when you listen to it. I had three songs stuck in my head that desperately needed a home (i.e. a mix CD). One was the Sofa Surfers "Can I Get A Witness". My friend Melinda sent it to me out of the blue a few weeks ago. She said it was her new favorite song. It is fast becoming mine too. Another is a Radiohead song, "Talk Show Host", from the Romeo and Juliet soundtrack. A few weeks ago, Anne and I ended up back at my boy Ben's swank DUMBO townhouse at 4am on a Friday night, sitting by the fire smoking some California dreams while Ben played one of the coolest, most eclectic DJ sets I've ever heard, all from his ipod. Each song was played from start to finish for maximum appreciation - David Mancuso style (BTW, if you don't know who David Mancuso is, you betta axe somebody). Consequently, that Radiohead track was now stuck in my head too. Then, just the other day, my friend Jens IMs me at work, asking for music suggestions for his new reel. He sends me this crazy track by Disprupt, "Blow You To Bits", which has all these bugged out samples from the movie "Tron". He was looking for something similarly glitchy, but faster than this slow dub shit. I suggested the Chilean weirdo genius "Original Hamster" (who, BTW, has the single greatest DJ name of all time). Jens checked out his Myspace. Truth be told, I have no idea if Jens ever did find a track for his reel. Whatev. I had another song for my new mix CD, so it was all good.
The mix has a real kitchen sink approach, with dubstep and reggae and R&B and new disco and jazz and electronica and Radiohead and whatever - all thrown in the pot. It was one of those Sunday mornings where I spent a few hours pulling records off the shelves at home, searching for some random gems to fill out the mix. I do this a few times a year, and I'm always reminded that there is a crazy amount of great music, that I already own, that I barely ever even listened to. Too much music. Not enough time. Definitely not enough time. Still, I think it came out pretty fucking cool. Good music to wind down too. Those who know, know.
The other two mixes are some house tracks from the last six months that have been collecting in my apartment, in dire need of digital distribution.
"SUNDAY MORNING" was made specifically for my Shelter family, who I have been promising CDs to for the past year or so. I have about twenty or so fellow dancers who I have been delivering CDs to on Sunday mornings for years. Last year, I took a six month hiatus from the club. When I finally showed up empty handed in January, I got mad disappointed looks. Hopefully this mix will remedy that.
"WEDNESDAY NIGHT" is for the other family of clubheads on my CD delivery route - my peoples at Soulgasm, the Wednesday party that I guest at from time to time. DJ Brian Coxx holds it down every week, and brings in DJs of all types to fill out each night. The Soulgasm crowd is full of BBoying circle dancers. These kids are open to almost anything with a beat, so I tried to stretch out a bit, including some deep house, some tech house, some hip hop, some jazz, and some R and B.
All of these mixes are posted in the music section of the site, under LATEST MIXES. Enjoy!
- MUSEUM GUARDS. DAMN THEM ALL TO HELL.
Museum guards are, without a doubt, the rudest people on the earth. Their job basically gives them a license to stare. WTF?
I don't know about you, but my Mom taught me that staring at people is rude, and she was right. Yet here are these guards, just staring people down all day. Again I ask, WTF?
As soon as you walk in the room, they just stare right at you. And if you stare back, they get this "why the fuck are you staring at me?" look, as if there is something rude about staring at someone. It's a very ill-conceived profession in this regard, because it requires a violation of basic social graces, and that shit just ain't cool.
So I propose we band together and give these beady-eyed, furrowed-brow bastards a taste of their own medicine. Next time you go to a museum, don't even look at the art. Just walk right in to the gallery and stand near the doorway, staring directly at the guard. We'll see how they like it. Bastards!
P.S. If you get thrown out, don't call me.
- I HAVE FUCKED UP DREAMS. EXHIBIT B:
So I'm staying in a mountain cabin with my good friend Jesse Vendley. Ryan Oneal is our host. Apparently this is his summer place of some sort. Looks like the Rocky Mountains.
Ryan is sleeping very late. Like, until 5 or something, and Jesse and I keep wondering who the hell is gonna make dinner, cuz it sure as hell isn't gonna be us. Ryan eventually crawls out of bed and makes some kind of dinner. I think it was a stew of sorts. One would think we would have smelled a stew 'stewing' all day, but alas, we were clueless. maybe he was sleeping so late cuz he had been up all night making the stew. Who can say?
We sit down to eat dinner. At some point I realize something rather horrific has transpired inside my pants. As in, I had unknowingly relieved myself in the most thorough of fashions (both #1 & #2, right in my pants. I was really freaked out. I got up and non-chalantly shuffled off the bathroom to review that damage.
I was incredibly embarrassed and quit alarmed that it had come to this. I was a grown man crapping my pants. Not a good sign.
I cleaned up best as I could, threw my soiled underwear out of the bathroom window in to the woods (what else could I do, really?), and made my way back towards the dinner table.
I passed Jesse in the hallway and was compelled to confess my fecal indiscretion.
"Don't worry man" Jesse said "I just did the exact same thing"
"You're kidding me?" I gasped
"Happens all the time. No big deal"
The end.
I sent Jesse a text message the next day. This was right before Christmas.
ME: had a dream we were staying at Ryan Oneal's house in the mountains. I crapped my pants, but then so did you , so I didn't feel so bad. Merry Crappy Christmas.
JESSE: who's that?
(I forgot he just got a new phone. no caller ID yet)
ME: as if you don't know
JESSE: Ur not coming up on my caller ID
ME: oh well
JESSE: just looked you up on my old phone list. U were starting to freak me out, what, with the scatological dreams of me and whatnot. Merry crappy Christmas to you too, homeboi
JESSE: pretty interesting dream. I'm guessing the mountain is the task before you, and judging by my role in the dream - and the nature of the symbol itself - the crap in your pants probably represents fatherhood (Jesse disappeared off the face of the earth 4 years ago when he had kids. True story. It was like Jimmy Hoffa). Not sure what Ryan Oneal is all about tho...
ME: How insightful. I have been freaking out about imminent fatherhood. The first Ryan Oneal thing that comes to mind is the movie PAPER MOON, where he is a single father to Tatum Oneal, who is coincidentally the ex-wife of John McEnroe, who is coincidentally now married to Patty Smythe, who is coincidentally the ex-wife of Richard Hell, who, coincidentally, I had dinner with last night. Hmmm.
Moral of the story: I am so scared of having kids I wanna poop my pants.
- I AM SO ALMOST FAMOUS
My friend Eva Orner won the best documentary Academy Award at The Oscars on Sunday for her documentary film, "Taxi To The Darkside". Truth be told, I haven't seen her in a minute. She was in the beach house with us two summers ago. My friends Serge and Melinda give me updates from time to time. When they told me her film was short-listed to win best doc, I was very excited. A few weeks later, at a random dinner full of strangers at a Bulgarian restaurant in Queens, I coincidentally sat next to and struck up a conversation with the woman who edited the film. When the film actually WON on Sunday, I was completely thrilled for both of them. Congratulations!! I strongly suggest you go see this movie.
The best part: now I am only one degree away from my dream date with Tom Hanks!
*MORE BLOG ENTIRES IN THE ARCHIVE SECTION*
central park 1970
a day in paris
on the road
three in a tree
family meeting / groovy guests
donuts are good
angry squirrel
