Screamo Daydream

The show last night was quite good. Off-Kilter opened up, with my least favorite set of the evening. Loud, fast, lots of shouting and screaming, no dynamic range, no way to tell the songs apart. Blah. Then Archeopteryx took the stage…er…floor, unannounced, since one of the other bands was running late. One of the other bands gave Devin a headset mic, so that he wouldn’t have to rely on a rickety mic stand, and he took full advantage of the fact that people could hear everything he said. they played an awesome set, punctuated by random commentary between songs.

Then the late band finally showed up, but I can’t remember their name. They were a five piece that did a lot of instrument swapping, between two guitars, bass, a drum set, a set of extra percussion, a synth, and some vocals. They did a lot of droning, Radiohead-esque guitar noise with dual percussion rhythms. Pretty good band, even if they weren’t exactly my cup of tea. Really fun to watch, but not something I’d listen to on my own.

The New Trust and Polar Bears did another “unconventional” set….they both set up on the floor next to each other, and then proceeded to trade of every couple of songs. Two songs from the New Trust, 2 songs from Polar Bears, etc. Polar Bears seem to have a really rabid fanbase, that shouts out lyrics at the appropriate times, and claps along during some of the less math-y moments. The last song of their set was amazingly epic…I hope to hear that one again soon. the New Trust rocked out for their half of the set also, and they sounded a lot better than the first time I’d seen them, at Michele’s. Probably just a combination of a better PA and a better room. The guitar work was a lot easier to make out this time.

At the end of the set, the two bands combined forces, and played one song together to close out the evening, with Josh and Sara singing, both drummers wailing away like madmen/women, and the rest of the members laying down the rock. Very cool.

During the evening, there was a girl with a table set up outside the front door, offering free tea to everyone. I should have taken her up on that…I see her at open mic at North Light all the time, and she’s done some really cool stuff, on her own or with a makeshift band. Ah well, maybe next time. Looks like I’ll be going to the Velvet Teen show on Friday with Joey, so maybe she’ll do it again.

More Later….

No Escaping the Scene

I actually went to a show last night, for the first time in quite a while. There’s either been a dearth of good shows and venues in the area lately, or I’ve just been completely out of the loop. Probably a little bit of both. But I saw a lot of people I hadn’t seen in a while.

The show was at Michele’s, in Santa Rosa. I’m gonna have to pay more attention to what’s going on there, if there are good shows like this more often. Ashtray was up first, a boy/girl fronted punk rock band, really energetic with a lot of trade-off vocals and stage presence. Not really my sort of thing, but they’re pretty good at what they do. Next up was old favorites The Rum Diary, who I hadn’t seen in quite a while, and who were still rocking as always. Then came The New Trust, Josh Staples’ newer project. They’re a harder-edged sort of indie rock, very melodic, with lots of short songs and some really cool rhythmic interplay. I’m glad I finally got around to checking them out. But during their set, they took a two-song break and loaned their instruments to The Polar Bears, who tore shit up and left Josh’s bass bloodied and seriously detuned.

I need to find more local shows again. And get working on a band project of some sort. I’ve been neglecting the rock and roll for too long, it seems. I’ll have to do something about that.

Anyways, I saw Fahrenheit 9/11 earlier in the day, with Joey, but I think I’ll write more about that later on. I’ve gotta head out to Reed and Nicole’s slide show in a little while here, and I haven’t even showered yet. Bleh….

Comics, Books, Oregon, Features, and More!

Lots of good comics out today, although I’m a little pissed that a copy of Love and Rockets Vol. 2 #10 didn’t show up in my subscription box. I thought I added that to my list? Hmm….Anyways….I did get Demo #7, 100 Bullets #50, Bone #55 (the big finale!), Y: the Last Man #23, Love Fights #10, and PVP #7. I’ll write a little bit about some of that, along with Blankets, which I recently finished.

I’m off to Oregon on Friday for Lindsay’s graduation. It’ll be nice to hang out in Eugene for a couple of days, and miss out on a couple of days of work. Especially nice since work has been super-busy lately. Always a perfect time to take a couple days off, although I feel a bit bad about leaving my co-workers to fend for themselves!

This week’s Bohemian has a really interesting article about Santa Rosa author Robert Heinberg’s new book, The Party’s Over, which is about an idea called “peak oil theory” that’s gaining some attention since it was formed in the 70s (if I’m not mistaken). Sounds like a really interesting book, and I was thinking about picking it up at Border’s tonight (went there with Michelle for a few this evening). I couldn’t find it, unfortunately, but that may be a good thing. I’d probably end up reading it ont he way to Oregon and getting even less reading of Love in the Time of Cholera done. I’m slacking on that book. I took about a week off reading it to read my huge stacks of comics from Mile High from last week. But I will probably end up picking up either that book or The End of Oil, a similar book I saw at Borders that was a bit too expensive for an impulse purchase.

I’m thinking about adding a new feture or two to this website: one would be a monthly mixtape, a downloadable playlist of 8-12 or so MP3s that would rotate every month. Sometimes it would be a themed mix, sometimes, just what I happen to be listening to at the time. The other feature would be a weekly wallpaper graphic. I’ve got a serious backlog of fun desktops I’ve made, and I’m always looking for a good graphic to use to make a new one, so maybe I should give myself a public outlet for that. That way all 3 of my readers could download them. Har Har….

More later….

AE

That Autechre record just gets better and better. I haven’t even given it the ol’ headphone spin yet. Maybe tonight…I tried to download it at the 24 hour lab, but everyone has the cassette promo rip, not the CD rip. Boo! Hiss! I did get all of LP5 downloaded. I think that’s my favorite Autechre, with Confield a close second, and Draft 7.30 gaining. All my friends seem to like Tri Repetae best, and while I like that album a whole hell of a lot, I like their newest stuff more. It just seems to push more boundaries and play with their formula more.

Hung out at Reed’s place with Emily, Reed, Joey, Autumn, and Aaron on Sunday. We played video games and music, and hung out at Aroma’s for a while. ME and Reed and Joey are gonna start getting together and working on music soon. I jammed with Joey on guitar for a while. He was working on this crazy mixed meter song, and I joined in for a few.

Me and Timm also practiced for our Car Stereo Destroys Michael Bolton Tape shows on Friday. Turns out our show is going to be much more musical and controlled than previously thought. We have the whole set mapped out now, with us fading between the laptops and doing a brief e-bowed-guitar-through-Audiomulch piece. We’ll probably record the set, and I’ll do a write up at EM411.com, hopefully with samples, if I find some hosting for that. Rawk…

More later…

Draft 7.30

The new Autechre record is scrumptious. I really like it after 1 listen so far. I’m going to need to download it or burn a CD from someone, since I bought the vinyl version (which is lovely). And I need to finish downloading Autechre’s LP5 too…another one that I only have on vinyl. Looks like another trip to the 24 hour lab is in order. I haven’t really had a chance to listen to my Dr. Octagon record, except for at Holly’s house on Sunday, and her turntable is hooked up through an AUX input rather than Phono. Hmmm, craptacular. But you gotta work with what you got, y’know?

Hung out with Erin and Timm and Michelle at Aroma’s last night for awhile, which was pretty fun. Me and Michelle burned some CD’s and we all chatted about just about everything. Michelle may now be included in me and Reed and Joey’s plan to hunt down some rehearsal space once Reed and Joey figure out their living situation. Fingers crossed, hmm?

More later…

The River

The local oldies station just switched formats. They used to be a ’50s-’60s station, focusing on soul and Motown and pop, with a lot of Beatles, Supremes, Simon & Garfunkel, the Kinks, Aretha, and lots of Soul and British Invasion type stuff. It was usually on at work, and there were a lot of good songs on that station on a regular basis, along with a lot of clunkers. Now they’ve shifted their focus to ’60s-’70s classic rock, with more of the later, harder classic rock sound (ie Queen, Led Zeppelin, ZZ Top) as well as the older pop-oriented stuff (Credence, Doors, Boston, etc). The problem is, they started yesterday with a very, very small playlist, promising to double it every day for the next week. But yesterday, I heard Stairway to Heaven three times in less than two hours. And Sweet Home Alabama and others. Scary stuff, man. Why not just wait a week to launch with a full playlist instead of playing the same 20 songs to death for the first week? That makes no sense to me.

More later…

No Brains For Oil

Moral Dilemma alert!

OK, not really. But I had an unsettling moment at work today. I work for a sign company, as a customer service rep. We get a lot of people in here asking about short-run and unique stickers, which we can do. Which means we get people in here lately looking to make Pro- and Anti- war statements on their bumpers/windows/etc. I don’t really have a problem with either one, despite the fact that I’m a strongly Anti- guy myself.

Now this guy comes in today, and asks about bumper stickers, and we talk prices and he decides to place an order. When I ask him what he wants the stickers to say, he replies, without a trace of irony “Kick their ass and take their gas!”

I only paused for about a second, and in that second I considered A) telling him we have a no-profanity rule (which we don’t) and sending him on his way; B) handing him off to another CSR; and C) telling him he’s a discredit to the human race and to get the fuck out of here, and take his blood money with him. I took the order without protest or comment and sent him off though.

I felt guilty at first, but then I thought about it. He has every right to say what he wants to say, and we have the right, as a private business, to turn away his business for whatever reason. We have made political signs in the past, and will continue to do so, and in all the time that I’ve been here, the only times we’ve turned someone away for reason of content have had to do with copyright/trademark issues. I eventually decided that it’s not really my place, as an employee, to limit people’s expression, no matter how asinine, uninformed, or offensive. Besides, he’s the one who’s going to look like a jackass driving down the street with that nonsense on his bumper.

And then I cheered myself up by finding a shitload of good records on my lunch break. I got the Beatles White Album, Jesus & Mary Chain, the Sex Pistols, and the new White Stripes. I also special ordered the new Cex and Autechre records. So that took my mind off things.

More later…

Slide Show

Hi folks, been a while. Just got back from Reed and Aaron’s Madagascar slide show, which was incredible! Had to convince Emily to come along, since she wasn’t feeling so well earlier, but we were both super glad we came. Zae’s birthday was earlier, too, and hanging out at the Funky Monkey (a generic Chucky Cheese that serves beer, surprisingly) was interesting. I ended up leaving early after Erin, Timm, and Fonda cut out to go to a gallery opening. I felt kind of sorry for Melanie, since most of her other friends had flaked, apparently, and I was the last non-family person her age there. Ah well.

Me and Timm officially have a show set up on May 2nd for Car Stereo Destroys Michael Bolton Tape, our electronic noise project. We’re planning on just playing pre-arranged tracks on our laptops while we do something completely unrelated on stage, like arrange flowers or make cookies. Should be fun.

Me and Reed and Joey have plans….once Reed and Joey get settled in their new place, we’re gonna hunt for a rehearsal studio in SR somewhere, and I’m finally gonna buy myself a drum kit, and we’re all gonna start a band. Rawk!!!! I’m excited about the drums already….it’ll be a few months though, probably…

More later…