(Still) Rockin' in the Free World

A new-first for me, but something I've always wanted to do: random record reviews.
I just wanted to cover stuff that I have and like, stuff that's bad (and overhyped), stuff I just bought, some records and bands that I just stumble across, and the occasional judging a book (or in this case a CD) by it's cover.
I've had this idea for a long time, but I don't write for a magazine, and let's face it, magazines only review records to keep up with PR campaigns. It's rare to see a review of some old record that one should check out (the only time you see that is when a record is re-issued, which is, again, a part of someone's publicity campaign!)
So, from time to time, I will be posting some reviews of stuff I simply dig.

So, here goes...

While I have been collecting records for a good portion of my life (20 years!) I have a pretty decent sized collection, and I think I know a fair amount about different bands and artists, there are a some very significant gaps in my musical knowledge. I don't think I've ever really listened to Janis Joplin, Neurosis, Megadeth, Tommy Keane, Styx, or Pavement. I don't listen much to Led Zeppelin, Velvet Underground, Dinosaur Jr. or the Stones either. Sue me.
One particular artist that I have always avoided is Neil Young. Why? I don't know why exactly, probably a vague hippy association, and then a vague grunge association, O.K., that's exactly why.
Recently, a few things have made me re-think some aspects of Mr. Neil Young, particularly, his great 1975 album, ZUMA.
1. After meeting a number of Canadians, and of all the famous-Canadians-that-we-are-proud-that-they-aren't-American, Neil Young seems to be at the top of the list, much higher than Pamela Anderson, William Shatner or Jim Carrey.
2. Thinking about that video, where he made fun of Michael Jackson's hair catching fire, how punk is that?
3. Seeing him recently on Stephen Colbert, and his segment was funny as hell.

So, after seeing Neil Young on Colbert, I downloaded a couple of tunes, and liked what I heard. Then as luck would have it, when I went to the library and they had about 4 Neil Young CD's and ZUMA was one of them. Sure the folk-rock-country sounds of Harvest are nice, but it's all about ZUMA, you rocker, you.

ZUMA is a record Neil Young recorded with Crazy Horse in 1975, when I was only 3 years old, (for those of you that don't know, a year after I got the big scar on my face). And while it's not Neil Young's most famous record, it certainly isn't obscure, but it is certainly different than what was happening at the time. It seems as if Neil Young and Crazy Horse wanted to record the nastiest, dirtiest, loudest, and swampiest (is that even a word?) blues record ever recorded.
I knew that Slint covered "Cortez the Killer" but I didn't expect that ZUMA was such an influence on so much music I like. It's like the first time I heard Mission of Burma or the Stooges, and realized, "OH, that's where that sound comes from!"
To name just a few bands I like that really seem to have been influenced by this record are: Slint, Drive Like Jehu(!), (especially) Silkworm, Sonic Youth and Guided By Voices. Acoustic Folk, Bright jangly guitar pop and weird dark discordant blues are the colors of this album, but the thing that stands out is Neil Young's jangly, loose (almost sloppy) guitar playing. Some songs are drenched in feedback, crunching overdriven guitars, and yet contain a weird sparseness and tension. Think of the quiet moments in a song by Slint and you're getting the idea. And Neil Young's frequent backing band, Crazy Horse's sparse and restrained playing really give the record this feeling. Zuma, has the feeling of being one long song with different parts and moods. This CD is like discovering the primordial DNA of a certain breed of indie/grunge/punk rock (I'm sure it was an influence on a number of bands I don't like) complete with the crappy cover drawing that looks like it was done by your eight year old cousin.

The Humid Press Of Days

Hi folks, those of you who still check this space, man, it's been a long time. Holy crap! The last entry was in February, and I was still in California!!! Yikes! Man, that means I haven't had much time to waste on this biographical-log.
Well, a lot has happened.
The first week after I returned to Vienna, we moved into a new apartment, which is actually down the street from the old one. It's nice, and we're pretty happy with the place.
Oh and we moved the MOTMOT shop, down the street from where it used to be, and that has been quite a handful of work. It's fun and actually quite rewarding to run your own shop. So far we haven't lost any $$$. So, hopefully, it keeps doing better. We are working on the website which will be up and running one of these days, with online ordering and all that fancy stuff. Any day now...
And we don't have an internet connection at home, so I can only update this at the shop!

Yeah, so what's new anyway? Lots of time spent working and fixing up the apartment, and not a lot of time for anything else.
My mind is drawing a blank when it comes to what I've been up to. Mostly reading and coming up with new artwork, which isn't really all that exciting to write about. Lots of nights spent drawing and listening to the radio; the life of a graphic designer/illustrator/shopkeeper/screenprinter/commercial artist, it's pretty boring. No crack cocaine hooker parties for me.

Which reminds me that I do have a few things being published this year: I should have a few photos and a few sentences published in the upcoming Jabberjaw book, whenever that gets published. O.K. it's not a lot of stuff, it's a few photos of bands (Lungfish and Trenchmouth) and a paragraph about my overall impression of what made the Jabberjaw so great.
Jabberjaw on Myspace
AND I have a few collages appearing in ROSEBUD magazine. Rosebud is an annual publication which features a different theme for every issue, the upcoming issue will be titled "Ideal." The collages are a series which I made using a color copier. This was a more process-oriented series than I had done before, I would run the collages through the copier multiple times, until I would come up with something interesting. Thematically, the artwork deals with: religious fundamentalism, intelligent design, the apocalypse, evolution, anthropomorphism and commercial art. Somehow these topics seemed to match up with the idea behind the "Ideal" issue. I can't wait until this comes out!
Issue 6 of Rosebud should be out by the end of the year.
Rosebud magazine

I'm also adding a few things to my sidebar, y'know links to friends and good stuff, like 2nd Cannons and Killed By Death Records!

Top Ten for Summer 2006
1. The Marked Men, who says punk's dead. These guys make some great punk music. Can't wait to see them when they play in Europe this fall! Yeah so what If I mentioned them earlier, they still rule!!!
2. Almost everything written by Grant Morrison! WE3 and Seaguy rule, and even his All Star Superman comic is great (yeah, that's right SUPERMAN! Not to mention his run on Animal Man, and the Filth, and Seven Soldiers!)
3. We Jam Econo. I saw this at the local rock-bar, but I ordered the DVD and I think I like it even more, there are some great deleted scenes, and music videos. The Bonus DVD has 3 whole Minutemen shows! A great band, and D. Boon certainly was taken from us way too early.
4. Kenny Burrell, he just rules, to any Kenny Burrel detractors I say, listen to Midnight Blue or Blue Bash with Jimmy Smith!
Technical virtuosity and great feeling, without being too overbearing.
5. Stephen Colbert rules! That speech at the White House Press Corps dinner, ouch! His show ain't bad either!
6. Parallel Worlds by Michio Kaku, A good introduction to the current state of theoretical physics. Stranger than Sci-fi!
7. Swami Sound System streaming online! John Reis' radio show is as great as you would expect!
8. Podcasting, just in general, I'm glad people are getting with it, and making a lot of great shows available. For me it's X-tra great, I can get caught up on my news (and other stuff.)
9. The Fact that the Channels CD comes out this month, I'm sure it's gonna be great. The Licensee is such a great song, and I'm kind of glad to see that it's on Dischord. Waiting for the Next End of the World!
10. The Jam, the Specials, always great summertime music! And lots of great stuff I downloaded from Killed By Death records, that guy is posting some great obscure punk and power-pop. The Toys and Slime ep's are highly recommended!

See ya next time, folks, all 3 of you!

Graphic Masterpieces

I'm in the last week of my Southern California vacation, and I'm here, doing this, while I should be out surfin' or going to Disneyland or something.
I have found two great examples of bad album cover art, which, nowadays I find way more interesting than GOOD album cover art. Although, some of these are so bad, they go past good and back to bad.
I wonder how some of these ever get printed; either they had NO budget for artwork, or they were fried-stoned-baked out of their minds!

Museum of Bad Album Covers

Pitchfork Media's: The Worst Record Covers of All Time

Enjoy this graphic treasure trove! Leave a comment and let me know which are your "favorites."

The Big Heist

Hi everyone! As most of my friends in the USA probably know I am back in the USA for a few weeks to get caught up with friends and enjoy the lovely California winter.
But the update is an incredible story that happened recently in Vienna.

On May 11, 2003, the Saliera was stolen from the Art History museum in Vienna. Cellini's Saliera is a very famous piece of sculpture, if anyone reading this took Renaissance art history in college, you should remember this particular sculpture. It has been described as the "Mona Lisa" of sculpture, and with the exception of Michelangelo's David, is possibly the most famous piece of sculpture in the world. This piece was one of the highlights at the Vienna Art Historical Museum. Estimated to be worth $60,000,000 (THAT'S RIGHT! Sixty Million Dollars!) it was one of the most valuable art objects ever stolen!
After it was stolen there were calls to fire the director of the museum, and it was an embarrassing and tragic loss.

Then, just two days ago, on January 21st, after nearly three years, the Saliera was finally recovered. The recovery process was a long and difficult investigation involving some high-tech surveillance and tracing phone records. When the police finally apprehended the suspect, he confessed and told the police where he had hidden the sculpture, and when it was finally returned, the sculpture hadn't been damaged.

Now, what's so strange about the whole story is that the man the police captured, works across the street from our shop/office. He even came into our shop, and Anna saw him just a few days ago before he was arrested. And, of course, in true-criminal fashion, the art-thief owns and operates a burglar alarm company (he's got a cute window display featuring Disney's Beagle Boys memorabilia, which now seems just a bit ominous). We called him many times to try to get an estimate for an alarm system for our shop, but he never really returned our calls. In retrospect, I'm glad he didn't.

Thoughts about Glenn Gould (50th anniversary edition)

I've been spending the holidays with my girlfriend and her friends and family in Northern Italy, in the city of Merano.
I went to a local book shop and picked up a few CD's, the selection is a bit limited, so I picked up a few things I probably would have skipped over in a huge record shop like Amoeba...

I have to say beforehand, that I don't know a lot about "classical" music.
I originally picked up a CD for my mom, A deluxe 50th anniversary edition of Glenn Gould playing the Goldberg Variations, recorded in 1955. Of course, it looked so nice I had to open it up and listen to it myself.
The music is intriguing, simply Gould on solo piano playing one of Bach's lesser known pieces (which, apparently, Gould made famous!) (Listening to the music, it makes me wonder if Glenn Gould's stripped down style, influenced later minimalists such as Philip Glass and Steve Reich.) There are some outtakes, and extra songs, some interesting unreleased pieces, which just add to the overall package.

But the packaging is what's so great about it.
The CD comes with a nice book, in a sturdy slipcase, and the CD itself comes in a sleeve that is a replica of the original album. The original album artwork is pretty nice, although it is classical music, the sleeve is more reminiscent of Blue Note style jazz LPs. And what's cool is the actual disc is a CD that resembles a 5" record. It has the vintage label, with grooves, and is an all black CD. Just holding it and looking at it, the cd itself is such a nice art object.
The book is a 165 page hardbound book, with EXTENSIVE notes (in English, German and French), an interview with the original producer, Columbia's original press material, relevant news articles from the era, and photos galore. Looking through the book it reminds me about the movie Twenty Two Films about Glenn Gould, I saw it a long time ago on PBS and thought it was interesting, but I barely remember it, I'm gonna have to watch it again one of these days. (It also makes me think how our neighbors up north, Canada, do such a better job at preserving their cultural legacy, but that's another subject!)
I like to see when a record label tries a little bit harder, and makes their product a little bit nicer, maybe they could get the hint and make the music come in nicer packaging, and turn the whole thing into a kind of special object, maybe people would want to buy the CD.
And the whole package cost $18, the cost of a regular CD nowadays.

I'm thinking about a few anniversary reissues that could use this treatment.
John Coltrane's Blue Train and/or A Love Supreme.
Steve Reich's Music for 18 musicians and or Drumming (although Steve Reich's gotten the Box Set treatment)
Elvis Presley's Sun sessions, Johnny Cash as well.
All the recordings by Buddy Holly (including the "Apartment" tapes, c'mon it's about time!)
The Beatles' Sargeant Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band (I'm not even a big Beatles fan but this would be interesting)
I think the Beach Boys Pet Sounds would have been better served with this treatment, than a whole box set dedicated to one record!