it’s been damn cold and with the pipes at the store still froze and no running water i’ve been not drinking enough (and no place to go to the bathroom) and it takes a long time for the store to heat up to tolerable, basically, it’s a bummer. next week i think i might take a vacation week from the store and bust out the new HBML t-shirts i promised a million years ago in addition to some “me” projects here in the house where it’s warm and not leaving. i moved my silksceening stuff home and made room for it, i’m waiting on some supplies to be delivered in five days, then it’s no excuses pretty much for the t-shirts and the bandanas and the branded scents and the snow globes and the metronomes. actually, the snow globes might have to wait because jess, your “wet money” jar cracked in the cold and smells like sour milk and animal diapers.
yesterday i got a call from a reporter for the san jose mercury news, regarding the steve jobs “drop DRM” thing (and other things), because i run a record label that early adopted a chill attitude to file sharing, and why’d i do it and how’m i doing. it was funny (they got my number from downhill battle) but i was too self-effacing to admit to the full truth- that while i am, compared to any other label, a rinky-dinky “double stinky” affair (a fact that was glossed over in the phone interview), i am also totally the [future/present] of awesome music distribution– deep community, fingers in a million pies, the product is totally weird, , small footprint / maximum headspace, and answerable to the angels only. i feel silly sometimes describing myself as a businessperson, but i am. i’m just a businessperson on some seriously next level shit, so next level that i probably seem to a regular businessperson like an animal that eats the wrong moss. now if you’ll excuse me, i have to go hang around a drafty junk hole in february for no pay and draw mustaches on all the roger williams records.
today i did some errands, and on the way home ran into nik perry and jess VW in the street, and went with them adventuring. well, shopping. first we went to the mid towne mall to look at bling chains and the like. when yelled at by some sort of manager for trying to go upstairs, i did what i like to do in those situations, transition from my “hoodlum” identity to my “businessman” identity. for what it’s worth, spaces there start at $250 a month- pretty decent. so who will challenge my “fucked store” monopoly?
from the MTM we went to building 19 where i got a lot of great stuff- the second and third volumes of remembrances of things past, a video featuring “scatman crothers as beethoven”, a bunch of colorful fishing lures, many empty coconut halves, and a dvd of 2 italian “sword and sandal” movies starring steve reeves. again, italy. maybe i’m off-base, but my understanding of why italian shit kills it is that, in certain influential situations, economics forced italian players to early-adopt cheap technologies and easy approaches to content that later became standard, but to rep them with the jubilant spirit of the times (whatever times those might be) rather than the “this is what we’ve been reduced to” vibe of later losers. thus the way-fun futuristic sound of was borne of being unable to import american disco records, not having the money to hire a swirling violin section, doing everything 100% on keyboards, and never knowing any other way. similarly steve reeves movies are 100% OK with letting a weird physique alone drive a franchise. or maybe this is just something i’ve been thinking about a lot lately. anyway, what next, italy?
last night everyone in my triple decker made a nice big meal together, it was comfy and gossipy and raucous and delicious and warm. afterwards me and SA and nik perry watched “zombie”, which ruled. italo-zombie. a zombie fighting a shark. totally gorgeous. zombie is also known as “zombi 2″, being a sequel of sorts to “zombi”, which is the dario argento re-edit (and re-score) of “dawn of the dead”, which has its own sequels that have nothing to do with the zombi movies, and which constitute one of two non-intersecting sequel branches (“..of the living dead” and “of the dead”) on the .
with this last release, i think i’ve finally got the mp3 releases to look and act the way i want them to. if the dynamics are off, or something’s not working the way you think it should, or you see a way it could be better, please tell me. up next- jam soníques.
tonight’s show at meilssa & ryan’s was pretty fun, with difficulties that were overcome. the show took awhile to get started, as the fellow who wanted to go on first (zach) was really nervous, and was at his house (a few houses away) last-minute practicing and nerve-steeling. but when he went and did it, it was really great, playing mandolin, his brother accompanying on guitar. my only critique is that he overcame his nerves so hard and was having so much fun that he ended up playing way too long, and by the time he was done, people who had been quiet for so long really exploded into carrying on and loud-talking. needless to say, when jamie started his banjo set everyone was firmly out of “polite listening” mode and well into party zone, which caused some problems. as for me, i like being super loud, so i had fun breaking through everyone and hella yellin’ fer days. and it helped that i brought my sound system- a mess of people who knew all the songs and were ready to sing along. it made me really happy, and at some points i just mouthed the words and let everyone take over. really really satisfying. i played “old lamboghinis” for ML (who always asks me to), and everyone sang the end (“it doesn’t pay to live your past in your head like a movie”), even people who never heard it before. it was really really nice. thanks melissa and ryan!
oh, as for the tape it dropped and i’m happy with it. if i had a million years to work on it it would sound different, but i guess that’s kind of the idea? part of the idea. check back sunday for the full drop with scans and what not.
good pal and popular scientist willy shakes just dropped “, a “36 min. super party time mix of
blends, remixes, blends of remixes, and remixes of remixes.”. i’m really happy that he hi-lited my favorite three 6 line, as quoted above. gran turismo, this is yr shit!
me and JJBB and mykee ATO are playing a no drums show tomorrow (saturday) at 7pm at ryan and melissa’s house. this is my “cassette release show”, for what is also the first fujichia “new trend” release- simultaneous cassette drop & mp3 download (ala ). yes, new songs from me for the first time in years. there’s no flyer for this show because “our landlord hangs out on highland st”. call the store today for directions.
matt coe told me the other day that he likes cathy more than dennis the menace. buggin…
i let this become a hassle, in that i’ve extended the deadline too many times (all the way to tomorrow), and i started to take it personally when people didn’t come through. anyway i realize this is counterproductive (to feel this way), so i’m working on a new tactic for next time- strict rules and cash prizes. i don’t know what the next big collaborative community project is going to be, but i want to do another, and do better publicity beforehand, and all that. any ideas on what this next project might be, drop me a line.
also, i was thinking about using the idea “cash prize” as an impetus for getting more homemade stuff at the store- is this a good idea? i was thinking there would be a monthly (or bi-monthly?) $50 prize (30 cash, 20 store credit) for the best new item. the rules would be that it has to be at least in part homemade (altered clothing, cds, zines, jewelry), and it can’t be just one thing, you have to bring in 5 items (in one month) to be eligible (5 copies of that one thing or 5 individual things). is this a good idea, a good idea that needs tinkering, or a bad idea that needs serious reworking? weird homemade shit is the main reason i got the store started, and i need to light fires under the maximum numbers of asses. i want more zines, more cds and tapes, more jewelry, more cool fucked-up clothes. the market is there (people really buy clothes with dumb shit sewn to it), so step up!
providencers- talk to jenine about getting your dioramas to worcester.
UPDATE i just want to say that all the dioramas i got are totally awesome and i consider the dioramarama to be a complete success.
