Performances…

I have a couple of performances coming up that are a bit out of the ordinary for me. First off, this Wednesday, Sept. 1, is the Show & Tell Regulators’ All Vinyl Extravaganza, where Timm and I will be reviving our ridiculous tandem DJ project, the infamous Car Stereo Destroys Michael Bolton Tape. Expect odd sounds, overlapping and conflicting audio, cheap records, and weird beats. Our accomplices that night? DJ Sea-Tac International Airport, DJ Penicillium Roqueforti, DJ Vincent Price, DJ n00b phACE, and DJ See You At The Party Richter. It will be a night like no other, guaranteed.

The following week, Citizen Mori and I will be performing improvised soundtracks to portions of Matthew Barney’s Cremaster Cycle. I’ll be playing live guitar with plectrum and e-bow, through a series of effects pedals and software plugins, with some occasional drum machine accompaniment.

Both events take place at the Living Room in Capitol Hill, an excellent little venue with great atmosphere, in a great location. Hope to see some of you at one or both of these events, as they are likely one-time-only occurrences.

Holy Zola

I was lucky enough to get in to this year’s Capitol Hill Block Party for free for a few hours, thanks to a friend’s unexpected +1 pass. The lineup wasn’t good enough to justify paying for a ticket, but I’ll happily show up to just about anything for free, cheapskate that I am. Sadly, Blonde Redhead ended up cancelling due to illness, but getting to see !!! do their thing was pretty fun.

I also got to see a cool little old-school goth band called Zola Jesus, holding court on the Vera stage to a small-ish but enraptured audience. The front woman paced and crooned, stalking the stage and singing intensely while her bandmate pumped out layers of dark, dreamy synths and drum machine beats. It was an unexpected experience, and the rest of the crowd seemed to agree. After all, they demanded an encore from the duo, who happily (if a goth band can be described this way) obliged.

I assumed this was a local group, considering they were playing on the small Vera stage, against the headlining set by Atmosphere over on the main Neumo’s stage, and I was looking forward to seeing them play around town again. But suddenly they started showing up in all sorts of places – the KEXP song of the day podcast, RCRD LBL’s newsletter, in my twitter feed being mentioned by folks from faraway places. Turns out this band is actually a big deal, or at least on the verge of becoming one. After all, they’re touring in support of Fever Ray, and can count Lady Gaga as a fan.

I guess I was wrong to write off Block Party this year, but I did end up finding something worthwhile and unexpected anyways.

Not a Bad Night

So tonight, I had some delicious homemade enchiladas, drank a couple of beers, watched some of the new season of Project Runway, and ate some amazing gelato. Pretty fun times, all around.

Oh, and in between doing all of that, the fledgling little record label that I co-founded put out our 7th official release, an album of remixes from my recent full length LP as Miniature Airlines. If you liked the album, you should check this out too.

The more we keep doing this sort of thing, the more excited I am about running this thing. The more attention, the more releases, the more legitimate and fulfilling it feels, even if it is still just a collection of MP3s sitting on a server somewhere. We have big plans. And I figured out the trick to this whole record label thing recently – just act like you are one, and take it seriously. Put in the work and the care, and it will grow into its own. That’s what we’re in the process of doing, and it feels good.