Ancient History

In an ongoing bout of nostalgia, I have just released some old music onto the wild frontier of tubes we call the internet.

The Castaway EP (30mb zip file)by Superficial Hero is 6 tracks of hissy, sloppy, 4 track indie rock from my old band, circa 1999-2000. The ultrafine bass playing you will hear if you download this is by Mr. Monkey Robot Army himself, Reed Raymond. I’ve had this on cassette for ages, and a track or two has floated around in digital form before, back before MP3.com was sued out of existence, but for the most part, this is making it’s digital debut tonight.

While prepping this for upload, I checked on the domain name www.superficialhero.com, out of curiosity. I had once used that domain for the band, but that was in my naive days. I registered it through a third party “free website with ads” service, and they managed to sneak ownership of the name away from me. Lesson learned. I thought I’d never have a chance to re-register it, but lo and behold, it was available! I snapped it up in a hot second, of course.

I hope you enjoy this little gem of Sonoma County indie rock history. Since I own the domain now, there will probably be more content showing up eventually. Your eyes? Keep them peeled.

All Muxed Up

Since the Internet at large is going all ga-ga over this Muxtape business today, I figured I’d try it out. It’s pretty awesome. A little quirky and slim on features for the moment, but definitely useful, and if it improves as promised, I can see it becoming an internet fixture. Assuming it doesn’t become too big for it’s own good first.

Anyways, I threw together a muxtape featuring music I’ve made, in bands or on my own, over the last 8 years or so. I don’t have any music available from my first band from high school, Leviathan, or I would have a track from each of our releases (So What? and Alarmingly Stylish) up. I don’t have any tracks from my old (possibly resurrected) electronic duo Car Stereo Destroys Michael Bolton Tape either. But other than that, there’s something from pretty much all my musical projects represented here. The post-Leviathan indie rock band Superficial Hero, the solo 4-track project The Sigmund Fraud, my electronic project Miniature Airlines, and even a (thankfully) unreleased rehearsal track from the short-lived three piece The One Two Three Foes. It’s roughly chronological, and it’s a wide range of stuff, from tape-hissy demos, to full band recordings and all-digital creations.

Maybe someday I’ll get ambitious and track down some Leviathan material, rip some cassette recordings, and make it truly representative of my musical “career”. Until then, enjoy what’s there.

Best News I’ve Heard This Week

I really hope this story is true. I saw the stage production of C.D. Payne’s Youth In Revolt back in Santa Rosa, after reading the book (multiple times). It was a tiny little show that only touched on the first chunk of the rather large and engrossing story, and the no-budget production with age-inappropriate actors didn’t exactly leave me thrilled. But  Michael Cera would be perfect for the part of Nick Twisp, so as long as there’s a decent director involved, this should be good. Hopefully Hollywood doesn’t fuck this one up.

Evolve Into Nothing

Earlier this afternoon, I heard a sound of crumpling paper from the hallway. At first, I thought it was The Dog getting into something he shouldn’t (like the bathroom garbage), but it turned out to be the mailman forcing a manila envelope through our mail slot. Inside the envelope was a set of 4 7″ vinyl records containing the first new music I’ve purchased in ‘07, Dark Is The Path Which Lies Before Us by The New Trust.

It’s an interesting packaging choice. A limited edition of 1000 sets, with 4 records in individual sleeves, backed inside a cardstock folder. It reminds me of some of the Radiohead vinyl releases that split the album up onto several sides of 10″ vinyl. It makes for an interesting listening experience, forcing you up out of your seat every 1 or 2 songs, to change the record and keep the music flowing. But it certainly is beautiful, with stark black and white photography and a bit of silver type, very tasteful and understated.

The whole thing is such a Santa Rosa scene flashback, in a way. The album art contains group photos of the band members posing with a assortment of friends (and possibly family members?), many of whom are members of other Santa Rosa bands, or former members of Santa Rosa bands, or otherwise associated with that particular scene. It’s a little musical snapshot of a group of people who have been making music in their own little bubble for the past decade or more, and probably will be by the time the next decade rolls around. That can be a bad thing, but here there’s a sense of refinement, like every tiny house show, DIY tour, and self-produced demo recorded in some guy’s garage has had an impact on this particular final product.

It also has one of the best song titles ever: “You’ve Got To Be Fucking Shitting Me.”

A Busy Month

This month has barely started, and already it feels full. I’ve got so many events to go to and projects to work on, it’s hard not to feel excited an overwhelmed.

First up is my impending trip down to San Francisco tomorrow night, to attend the 2006 Alternative Press Expo, meet up with California friends, and just generally live it up.

Then, as soon as we get back, we’ll be heading to Neumo’s to see Subtle, Fog and Jel on the 11th. Then there’s a free Calexico in-store at Easy Street Records in Queen Anne.

That weekend I’ll be heading up to my hometown of Abbotsford, and then on to visit family in that area of BC, some of whom I probably haven’t seen in over a decade. Sadly, I’ll have to miss the baby shower that Serene organized for Tracy that weekend though.

After about a week of relaxation, we’ll be hitting up a records number of shows, seeing Mates of State, Pinback, and the Books. We would’ve gone to see David Sedaris too, but that sold out immediately.

While all this is going on, I’ll be scrambling to get my latest EP mixed down and mastered (panicNow is working in mostly analog for the mastering process now, so I’m excited about that!), and get artwork done. I’m hoping for a release on Belladonna Records by the end of the month…we’ll see. I also need to have a new track ready for a compilation on that label by May 15th. And I still haven’t settled on a new artist name…

Oh, and I’m also working on a ground-up redesign of this site.

So, if I seem a little out of breath, that’s why.

More later…

Northbound

At this time tomorrow, I will be eating sushi and geeking out with some of my best friends. At this time on Wednesday I will be close to or in my sister’s house in Portland Oregon, with a truck outside containing everything I, Serene, and Emily own. At this time Thursday, I will be in my new apartment in Seattle, trying to decide how to deal with the massive amount of stuff I’m moving into a third floor studio.

Life is good.

It’s Official…

I’m moving to Seattle at the end of November.

Most of you reading this already knew that (and being that there’s only about 3 of you, that’s not shocking), but I put in my notice at work finally. If all goes according to plan, I’ll be moving into a new place int he Pacific Northwest on the 1st of December.

Which means I only have to pack, find a place, update my resume, find a job, get a moving truck, change banks, do a couple of web jobs to get some extra moving money in my pockets, etc. etc. etc.

Piece of cake.

Well, it helps that one of my best friends is up there already, and I’m making the move with two of my other favorite people ever. So i think it’s gonna go pretty smoothly. But it’s weird to be in this weird transitional phase right now, where I can’t really do a lot do make it easier (too early to look for employment or housing for December), but it still seems to be looming so close…

Friday at the Phoenix

I went to see the Rum Diary at the Phoenix Theatre on Friday night. The Polar Bears were opening, but I’d heard a rumor that they had to cancel due to a finger injury. Turns out they did, in fact, play the first slot, and if I’d known that I would’ve shown up for them. Oh well…next time.

The Phoenix has this weird little substage now, a little platform in front of the main stage, about half as tall. It’s sort of a compromise between the big main stage and the tiny floor shows they’ve been doing lately. It’s kind of an interesting setup, and the Rum Diary split themselves between the two stages, with the two drum kits on the main stage and the guitar/bass frontline on the smaller platform. Jon was taking advantage of the echoing “stomp” sound he was getting out of the platform during one song…it made this nice, reverberating “boom” like an extra huge bass drum.

I missed out on the other two bands who played between the Rum Diary and Polar Bears, namely Settlefish (from Italy) and the Desert City Soundtrack (Santa Rosa natives transplanted to Portland). I’ve seen plenty of Desert City in my day, but it would’ve been nice to see what Settlefish was all about.

Scored a copy of Translation Music Vol.3, the latest installment of the compilation that my old band, Superficial Hero was featured on. There’s some excellent stuff, notably the Bjork cover by the Roots of Orchis, but I miss the hand-made packaging on this one. Somehow, a jewel case just isn’t the same.

More later….

Undependence Day

Happy belated birthday America. I spent the fourth hanging out in Middletown, which is not somewhere I would normally be excited to go to, but it was fun nonetheless. Especially with Serene and Joey and Emily and Erin and Morgan and assorted friends and relatives and pets thereof. And of course, copious amounts of Corona and Hefeweizen, a ping-pong table, and a pool.

Back up a day. July 3rd kicked July 4th’s ass all over the place. Didn’t do a whole lot during the day, other than hang out with Joey and Quinna at Aroma’s, and play some geetar with Joey, but when Serene got off work, we went down to Berkeley for a visit to Comic Relief (my first time at their new location). I picked up books to fill a couple gaps I’ve been waiting to fill, and also got the Collected Sequential and Goodbye, Chunky Rice.

Then we made our way into the city, to meet up with Nicci, Sherri, Matt, and Rachel at Cobb’s Comedy Club in North Beach, to see Hal Sparks do a stand-up set. The opening act, by local comic Kevin Katoaka was damn funny, followed up by a mediocre set by Chris Bono. Then Hal came out and pretty much rocked the house for at least an hour. It was a nice long set, with surprisingly fresh bits on a lot of topics that get a lot of stand-up play.

The sets at Cobb’s ended pretty early, and we made our way to….dare I admit it? Yes, a gothic themed strip show. It was pretty disorganized and ghetto, with a rickety looking pole on the stage and some pretty shoddy DJ work, but whatever. Tellingly, the most interesting person there was the guy who looked like a pudgy Andy Warhol in vinyl pants, who had a good 20 years on everyone there, agewise. It was a very young, very mixed crowd though, male, female, gay, straight, you name it, which I’m guessing is rather uncommon….(We even invited Hal Sparks, since he was wearing a Suicide Girls belt buckle that evening, but alas, he didn’t show).

Mmm….what else? Not a lot, really. I’ve got tons of comics on order that should start trickling in to my mailbox. More about those as they arrive. The Airliner/Mixedtape split EP is coming along nicely, but probably won’t be out for a while still. Nothing’s finalized, mixwise, but we’re getting pretty far along with our respective tracks and remixes. I’m also thinking about freshening things up around here. This design is over a year old, and while i still rather like it, I’d much prefer something new. And a new design might bring some structural changes I’ve been considering….but more about that as I come to it.

More later.

Day Eight/Nine

OK, so I kind of got sick and didn’t feel like finishing the Seattle chronicling. The last two days are a little fuzzy to me now. I think we went out to breakfast somewhere. I know we strolled down to the Aboretum again at some point. I know we went out for pho at Than Bros. again (mmmmmmmmmmm) and took a lot of crazy pictures with Emily’s camera. We ended up a little playground near Broadway and played some basketball (as much as our pathetic endurance levels would allow) and played on the monkey bars and such. Learned some new card games with Serene later that night, my favorite being Ninety Eight. And before we knew it, it was the next morning, and time to leave.

Tried to meet up with my sister for breakfast in Portland, but the timing just didn’t work out. Next time.

The drive was kind of grueling. Hot, uneventful, and long. It always seems longer coming back from somewhere. On the way up, we had days and days of just hanging out to look forward to, but this time, we were driving back to roommate drama, jobs, rent, obligations, etc etc etc. We were also pretty tired out from the past few days of Seattle partying, which made it even more difficult. I ended up taking the wheel through most of California, after switching off with Serene through Washington and Oregon. There’s this level of determination that you get when you’re in the last stretch of the drive where you don’t want to switch drivers because it would be like letting the road win, and you can’t let that happen.

Anyways. Back in California on Tuesday night. Back at work fighting off a wicked head cold for the past few days. And I left my iPod charger in Seattle. Fuck me.

And that pretty much wraps that one up. Tune in next time for more of the usual.

Oh, and P.S.: Joey has some pictures up at his site now. Enjoy.

More later.