Hello world,
Long time no blog. expect a ------lot more.
Lemme tell you part of a story.
On April 2nd, 2008, I packed up my gear to play a set in Portland, OR. I went alone and took a Greyhound bus and my life was changed forever.
I stayed with Jon Boober whom I had known through my friend and roommate
Lana Blair the first night I got into town. We got drinks with his friend Ron, of Portland's bizarrely delightful
Party Killer and it was good.
On April 3rd, my life was changed forever. I met Portland, and I fell out of love with Bellingham. Soon, I knew that my life needed a drastic change.
I wandered around before the show and played on the street a little bit.
The show, which Jon had booked, took place on the PSU campus at some cozy yet expansive hippy cafeteria. Or something. I played second, after a band of cheery-faced and kind high school kids rocked the stage.
Don't Hurt Miles, they were called. I am still in touch with them and they were really cool and talented kids.
Luckily, their parents stuck around too. In between songs, I talked about my parents masturbating just to get a reaction. On top of this, I was dressed like a weirdo, with half a beard/ mustache combo (dyed with mascara) and a hell of a lot of hot pink eye shadow.
The show went well, I did my little loop thing, and people seemed to like it. I had a blast. I was away from home and basically alone and the world and everything in it seemed new and wondrous.
I made friends with the girl running the door as well. Her name was Nora, and I later found out that she makes excellent music under the moniker
Glass Teeth, which is also, in my opinion, a pretty badass name for a solo project.
Next was
Beta Crack. I met Mike and alex who would come to be close friends and an integral part of the development of the American Field Recording Project. Their music was weird and hectic and I liked it. Their stage presence immediately appealed to me, as they started their set with a beat and proceeded to harass the audience members for change and cigarettes. Awesome. Who does that? Pretty innovative, I thinks.
Party Killer followed BC, and I was floored. The most bizarre instrumentation -- circuit bent toys, vests of sound, singing drums of distortion ........ it's basically impossible to describe. I really really really like these guys as people and as artists, and strongly recommend witnessing them live.
It was at this point in the evening that an
an intriguing and captivating young ladyapproached me and asked if I wanted to be "kidnapped".
I asked what this entailed and the barrage of activity had me instantly sold.
In short, we went to an art show, then to an amazing performance at The Bossanova Ballroom with the wonder that is
March Fourth Marching Band, then to a bar with DJ's (where I proceeded to puke up most of the wine that I drank at the Ballroom), and then to a most wonderful warehouse party. Upon entering, you received a small children's sized bike and were able to ride around the different sections of the warehouse. Awesome.
I stayed at Lulu's apartment and the next day she dropped me off at the saturday market.
I played music on the street and made like seventeen bucks in forty five minutes. So, I decided to pack up and go to the Ash Street Saloon to spend my earnings. Happy hour, cheap beer and burgers and I met two gentlemen and talked about music. Cool guys, lost touch with them though. Maybe I will see them when I go back.
I get a text message from Lulu saying that she found me a house party to play at. Couple hours later, she drops me off at the house, and lo and behold, it's Alex's house from Beta Crack. The Party Killer guys showed up and we proceeded to create walls of fevered noise fires and spattering sizzle pops. I rocked my microKorg, per usual.
Sufficiently drunk by this point, I walked into the kitchen and overheard two ladies talking about going to another house party with music at it. I asked them if I could go. They said yes. I caught a ride.
This party was interesting, it was swarmed with high school kids, a lot of them covered in fake blood. I asked the host if I could play a set. It was sort of confusing but I ended up playing music with some chick who could really fucking rock the drums, and later I switched over to drums.
It was then that I met
Tasche De La Rocha We played music together before we ever spoke. She played my synth and I followed along on the drums. It was heaven. We talked a lot afterwards, even though I was stoned and awkward and couldn't make eye contact. Twenty numbers were exchanged and we knew we would be staying in touch.
I stayed with Lulu after that but I couldn't fall asleep so I made my way to the greyhound station and got a bus back home to Bellingham so I could make it to school.
Oh yeah, school. I had been attending college on and off since 2003. I was never really that into it and my personal projects always reigned priority over my scholarly obligations that I was just not into.
Fairhaven College is a pretty cool place though. I met lots of nice people there.
I began making plans to drop out. Again.
The rest of April was insane. Just fucking insane. I can't remember the exact course of events but a number of pretty huge things happened.
The dates get blurry and there was so much activity that is is hard to keep it straight, but I will still try.
The following weekend, I played a show at my
ex-girlfriends house and wrote a song about it later (called house party, or myspace tease) and it was awkward and she had a new boyfriend and he seemed cool but his
music sucked. Of course, he thinks mine sucks too. We are both right, I think.
I went to portland the next weekend for Lulu's birthday party. It was okay, but she was really sick from food poisoning so I took off sort of early. I met up with Tasche and I went to her house and it was stoned and awkward -- I thought I should leave but we ended up walking like six miles downtown. It was amazing and sort of romantic in the indy-movie sort of sense and we were going to Voodoo doughnuts but it was closed anyways so we walked/bussed back. I slept in the music room. We were friends.
I caught a ride back with Jason and Justin of
The Stranger Gallery and we got really into Tiger Woods flavored Gatorade. Sweet shit, check it out. I rode in the trunk.
The following weekend I got a series of annoying text blasts from Alex Hansen of Beta Crack that were sort of cryptic and vague but it turned out that they were coming up to visit. Rad. We had a lot of fun.
That weekend, we went to a show at my friends house in Bellingham. There were all these gypsy kids with their dogs their and they played a show. They were called
The Music Box I thought the music was awesome so I asked them for a CD. When they told me they didn't have one, I offered to record them one.
Well, well, well. They stayed at my house for the next four days and it was insane. Lot's of drinking, truth or dare (videos to come), recording and they gave me a *tattoo. I really got attached to them. I had a mini-crush on the
the accordian player, who I later found out to be an incredible musician.
One day we decided to get drunk really early and they played a set in the Fairhaven campus. I thought it was pretty cool, but I already knew that my scholastic journey was basically fucked.
An alternative plan was required.
They were heading south, so like the impulsive fool I am -- I caught a ride to seattle.
WE stayed in an abandoned house and I slept on a table. It was pretty cool. We read trivial pursuit cards in the morning and drank cheap beer and parted ways.
Again, I took a greyhound to portland. I didn't really plan ahead and didn't even have a backpack. Alex picked me up at the station and we went to his house to get really high and fall asleep.
This guy, Dane was staying there. He was cool, and his photography was brilliant. I will try to track down a link for his stuff. He felt to me like some sort of gas station guru catalyst. Does that make any sense?
This is where I came up with the American Field Recording Project idea.
I went to a house show with Nora (who tattooed part of my arm, I guess its still in progress) and ran into Tasche, and saw two really good bands --
Southern Belle, and
Purple Rhinestone Eagle.
Then, I hung out for a while and eventually caught a cab back to the Beta Crack house and I think Lulu picked me up there and we went to some crazy ass rave where I met Bria, whom I stayed with and did modelling for the SPLC album cover ( which I still haven't put out because I am broke and unsure of my music anyways...)
Anyways, my friend Riley Market was passing through town and he gave me a ride home.
Oh wait, backtrack a second. Before I went to Portland this time around I had met Kyle Schoolmaster, whose roommate had recently been murdered by the Bellingham police force in a drunken misunderstanding of sorts.
I invited him to move in, and he did.
More background info : I have been running an underground music label called
Murder Mountain for a little over three and a half years. It's taught me a lot. I realized that "labels" are not half as cool as "collectives". We were a team for a couple months, but a variety of events and personalities not worth being specific about caused the Mountain to erupt.
Oh also, I started writing for
a music magazine in March (which i will cover in chapter two) and this was a great influence on the "big decision"
But I guess it had to.
It was a good learning process for everyone.
Mike and Alex moved up from Portland to prepare for the AFR trip (scheduled to leave at the end of August) and Kyle moved in to setup his analog studio.
In school, I met Jack Lipke IV and we immediately connected and he got into the trip.
We started planning.
With ferocity.