Jams Run Free

Hey! We saw Sonic Youth at the Arena in Vienna. Man, they were just as awesome as always, I'm beginning to think it was the best I have ever seen them!!! I'm always a little bit leery of big rock shows, big crowds tend to bother me, and I always like it when a band can remain accessible to their fans. But it's an imperfect word, what can you do?
They played a set heavily based on their excellent new record "Rather Ripped" and a lot of stuff from "Daydream Nation." They played my favorite song of theirs "Hey Joni!" Which I have never heard them play live. It seemed like most of the singing was done by Kim Gordon and Lee Ranaldo, which is kind of a cool treat.
They ended with "The Trilogy" from Daydream Nation, which was completely fuckin' awesome.
Man, their live guitar sound was just so loud and otherworldly, so, uhhh, Sonic! The sound just fills up the space. You can really forget how different the live sound is compared to the recorded version.

I do find it interesting that they hardly played anything from their 90's era, they skipped over: Dirty, Washing Machine, EX Jet Set, and A Thousand Leaves. And they didn't play anything off of their last two records, Murray Street and Sonic Nurse (Both of which are also great!)
I'm just kind of wondering about this band, are they like the Grateful Dead of Indie rock? Are they the Beatles of indie rock? Or are they really some kind of avant-noise-rock band that managed to stick it out and stay creative? Probably a bit of all of the above. I have to give it up to the band, they have managed to stick around for over 25 years, with almost no line up changes and no backsliding. If only Thurston Moore would have signed Royce's bottle of Paul Newman brand salsa... but that was a long time ago, and now, i think I can forgive you Thurston!

I'm still here...

We're just having a little "working vacation" in the South Tyrolean alps.
I'll post more later, but here's a weird little thing we found in the Italian grocery store.
For the baby that enjoys the finer things...

I've had a pleasant enough time watching some Swiss TV. Austrian and German TV are abysmally bad, but Swiss TV is pretty good. And they broadcast some shows in English and German. (If a movie is originally in English, they will send one signal in German, and one in English!) The other night they broadcast (uninterrupted and unedited), Anchorman, Secretary, then the Pretenders in Concert. A few days later they showed a great documentary on Elvis Presley.

Libraries are for Nerds

An actual post about life in Vienna! Sort of, kind of.
I've mentioned to a few people that I pick up quite a few CDs from the Vienna public library.
The library itself is interesting, it is a huge brick and mortar monstrosity placed right above the subway line. It has a never-ending number of stairs that lead to a restaurant, and a nice view of the city. If you look at it just right it looks like an upside-down Jawa Sandcrawler (sandcrawlers are always good!)
It's nestled in a comfy spot not far from inbetween work and home.
I normally don't spend much time in libraries, even if they look like they were built by Jawas.
The books are mostly in German, (duh!) so not much for me there.
But real deal is the amazing Compact Disc collection. They must have some cool people buying their music; I've never seen a library with this good of a music selection, not even my college library. Even after CSUF rebuilt their library, their shelves just seemed to have "library" music. (e.g., zydeco compilations, e-z jazz, Harry Smith's anthology of folk music, ZZ top, more jazz, and Gato Barbieri.)
The library will let you actually take 12 Cds home, for a whole month (with very modest late fees!) (CSUF, didn't let you take anything home, and the Cerritos Library let you take it home for a week, but with hefty late fines! I still owe the Cerritos Library a fortune!)
Last week I made it over to the Library and here's my big score.

1. Fela - Beasts of No Nation
2. Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds - Abbatoir Blues + The Lyre of Orpheus
3. Godspeed You Black Emperor - Yanqui U.X.O.
4. Linton Kwesi Johnson - Poet and the Roots
5. The Donnas - Spend the Night
6. Kraftwerk - Autobahn
7. Desmond Dekker - You Can Get it if You Really Want
8. Brian Eno - Ambient 1 - Music for Airports
9. Brian Eno - Ambient 4 - On Land
10. 20 Years of Dischord Box set!
11. The Temptations 2 CD set

Not to mention all the other stuff I've found: Shellac, Fugazi, Ian Dury, RFTC, Ethiopiques, Philip Glass, Melvins, Can, Faust, Steve Reich, XTC, and countless number of Lee Perry CDs. And they seem to keep current, I've picked up (or seen) stuff, by the Futureheads, Go! Team, Grizzly Bear, Arcade Fire, etc...
They also have CDs by your favorite Austrian, German, and Turkish pop stars.
They have a pretty good Jazz section, and an intimidating classical section.
I wonder who is buying the cool stuff.

Cheetahs Never Win!

Hey folks, It's been nearly a month. I just wanted to drop by and mention we're having a great summer, we're having a great time with lots of friends visiting, and we're having an all around bitchen summer! (And lots of work to keep us busy! The Motmot shop is bustin' loose, and we've got some new shirt designs ready for action!)
But I really wanted to mention, that I have come up with a definite title for my upcoming comic. Drum roll please......

CHEETAHS NEVER WIN!

Here's the cover art, I'm expecting a mid-late summer release date.
Around 36 photocopied pages of wacky-mad-cap comedy and foul mouthed animals in crisis and despair! Fun for the whole family, expose your kids to life's harsh realities at an early age, it's gonna happen eventually, why not in the form of a comic!
Available some time in mid August.
It's really happening!

I'm Giving it Away

Here's a sneak preview of one of my one-page-gag-strips.
This comic appeared in Murmel Comics # 25.
A slightly different version will be appearing in my upcoming comic collection titled "Run Like Hell!"
But here you can see the original!