Nicer

The Swimsuit 7" is out now, and available over at the Life Like, as are a bunch of new tapes that I'm pretty stoked about. The Settle tape has some of the more adventurous sounds I've found in a minute, and all the releases just keep feeling great/better...

I heard the new Kanye record today at work. It's good! The beats sound great on a big system and it seems like a more coherent venture than 808s & Heartbreak (*wamp wah*). Just generally a pretty good record, but I'm told Pitchfork gave it a perfect 10.0 score. Somehow in the back of my mind I knew that was gonna happen! It's so utterly obvious that it's almost annoying, but also kinda funny. You can totally predict what will be hailed/hyped, regardless of what it sounds like or even how it's marketed. The meaninglessness is not just transparent, I feel like it's this silent understanding. I gave up p4k almost a year ago as my 2010 New Year's resolution and I've been a lot happier and a lot less perturbed by choosing not to read this stuff that disappears so quickly anyway. This sounds a lot like sour grapes, and I assure you, it is.. but the grapes were so much more sour when I was up at 3:00 AM every night refreshing the page just to scream at the computer in my disgust for people being so stoked on Major Lazer or whatever. In the end, this pretty much says it all...

Yesterday You Would Have Thought It Was Hilarious

I've never been a big supporter of Vice Magazine, but the latest (maybe?) issue has interviews and features on way too many artists that I think are amazing. In an uncanny way. Hermann Nitsch, Cosey Fanni Tutti from Chris & Cosey/Throbbing Gristle, Raymond Pettibon, Ryan Trecartin (seriously blew my mind about 3 years ago in a way I've never caught up with completely when I saw the above video he made. It took me a few days and multiple watchings to figure out if I despised it or not, but ultimately I ended up thinking it was one of the smartest and most incredible things I'd seen in years, still ahead of it's time 6 years later) and most strangely, a piece on one of the early founding illustrators of Marvel Comics, Jack Kirby. I basically got interesting in drawing by trying to copy Jack Kirby's strange and globby style out of early 1960's issues of Fantastic Four. For me it's really rare to hear him mentioned at all, let alone see a whole feature on some of his unpublished counter-cultural comics of the late 60's. I'm ridiculously stoked. The last issue of Vice I saw had some story about a kid who made himself barf on different stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.

Feldschwirl

It's cold as hell in Michigan, and I woke up with frigid air all around me, a grey sky looming outside the window and sick, static branches leaning down leafless from the once-vibrant trees on my street. Today it is winter, and my natural defense against the endless internal pain and cold touch of the world is to make a mix and blog it up with all my might... I have to grow up, seriously. But not today!!! Here are some songs I put on a tape for my friend Sean when he left for Austin TX in late August. There's an end of summer feeling, maybe, or maybe it's end of fall, or maybe it's just a feeling of ending. Hope you enjoy it.


Late November 2010 Mix
1.Jacob Danziger "Jump"
The first track from an amazing record called August 1st, recorded, conceived and packaged on the first day of August, 2003. Solo violin and some other elements. Totally worth seeking out the whole record, and this is one of my favorite songs to put first on a mix.
2.Gary Higgins "Windy Child"
3.The Dovers "I Could Be Happy"
Insanely perfect Byrds-meet-a-slightly-less-crazy-Love style band from the mid 60's. They only made 4 singles, a total of 8 songs, most of which were transcendently beautiful.
4.Earthen Vessel "Get High"
Christian rock unknowns. Get high... on Jesus, that is!!!!!
5.The Misfits "Cough/Cool"
6.Jandek "Nancy Sings"
7.Beech Boys "Wouldn't It Be Nice" (Instrumental)
From the "Stack-O-Tracks" record, a late 60's attempt to cash in on the now floundering "Friends"-era BBoy's earlier hits via a karaoke-style instrumental LP with accompanying lyric and music book. Coming up on an almost decade-long BB obsession, this is presently my favorite record by the band. There's a ghost-like impression there, even more searching and fake-happy/actually isolated without singing than with. This song especially.
8.Alice Coltrane Turiyasangitananda "Nataraja"
Deroche hooked me up with this hyper-out-there Alice Coltrane jam, I think available only on tape for some time (???) Weird dark synth washes and a room full of Krishna/something similar chanting and the obligatory guru talking over it all mid-way thru.
9.Bob Marley & The Wailers "Could You Be Loved"
Jah!
10.Hans A. Traber "Feldschwirl"
From a German field recording of bird calls.
11.Bill Fay "Omega Day"
12.Judee Sill "Sunny Side Up Luck"

Running Time: 37min 46sec

Download the mix here and bundle up!

Recent Jams

Swimsuit at Glasslands November 12 2010
Uploaded by brooklynvegan. - Explore more music videos.
Thanks to Scott Davidson for the top two videos, and Brooklynvegan for "Winter Water" by Swimsuit a few weeks ago in NY.

How Very

Thanksgiving is done, and I'm hanging out at my sisters house as the night runs out watching Heathers. So amazing, still. I sometimes think about how my life would be if I didn't chance to see this movie, Pump Up The Volume, Trust and a few other key movies in formative days.

Come On Everyone, We're Gonna Go And See The Waterfall

I just found this thought/note I wrote to my friend Michelle two winters ago, deep in a daily alcoholic/overwork stupor and reveling in the classic New York displacement. I don't know if I can follow it now, but there are sections that make sense still. I think the point is to do what you want and not get too caught up in thinking about how simultaneously important and horrible everything always is.

if one place is declaratively home, it means that all other places are not. more the not being something than even the something itself. if one way is love, all other ways are not. if one idea is truth or trust or obvious, any other option falls by the side. like the emptiness of rolled eyes and the beleaguered-yet-still-holding-your-hand moments of winter. miscommunicate to remember there's an inverse, or maybe one thing is communicating and everything else you do is not, so this is one less thing you're doing that isn't communicating. when you make something there's the race for the final moment, the fulfillment of finalization. could it be part of the process to throw the process away? could it be another step to disregard every step beforehand? if something is finished one way, does it mean every other way is unfinished? never getting to the point where the restlessness of creating an idea outlives the idea itself and we see there's a pattern and maybe eating food and/or spending time with people who (both/or maybe that) make(s) you feel better than when you were starving/not with them.

Drenched Rat

So much is going on. I just got caught in the rain waiting for a bus for about 30 minutes. My paper grocery bag was destroyed and a dude on the bus emptied out his plastic bag from the cigarette outlet to let me put my canned indian food and organic hash browns in. Last week's Swimsuit tour was incredible and we played with so many bands I like a lot. At the last DJ night in Ypsi I did a set of mostly 120 minutes jams from 1991. It went over better than any DJ set I've done before. Mighty Clouds is playing our first show the day after tomorrow, which means Betty is here all the way from Stockholm. I'm reading three books right now, a lengthy history on the Grateful Dead, "The Rest Is Noise" and "Crossing The Water" by Sylvia Plath, a collection of what came to be known as "transitional" material.

SWIMSUIT TOUR STARTS TODAY (WEDNESDAY!!!) !!!

(photo by Troutman)

The Swimsuits are headed back east for a short tour, mostly in the fair state of New York. If you're around any of these spots, come out and say hello! As of Thursday we should have copies of our first 7"!!!!

Wednesday, November 10
Foxhole (house show) with Elephant Upstairs & Amoeba Amoeba
244 Temple St. Fredonia, NY 14063
8PM, $5.00, All Ages

Thursday, November 11
Vassar College, Poughkeepsie NY
playing at a spot called The Mug with Velvet Davenport
10PM, pretty sure it's free to students

Friday, November 12
Glasslands with Blank Dogs, Velvet Davenport & Dead Gaze
289 Kent Ave Brooklyn, New York 11211
9PM, $10, $21+

Saturday, November 13
POPFEST!! At The Elevens
140 Pleasant Street Northampton, MA 01060
this is going on all weekend and will rule! We play at 9PM.

Sunday, November 14
Wildfire with Reading Rainbow & Velvet Davenport
106 South Cayuga Street Ithaca, NY 14850
8PM, not sure how much

Child/2nd Set

Maybe you remember Child? There was one live show back in May and on Sunday night there was a last-minute jam opening up for some out-of-town gnarlers. Reel-to-reel tape being rabbleroused through a few delays. Set time was 4minutes 9seconds. What did it sound like?? Mp3 is below!!! Swimsuit tour dates go up tomorrow!

Child: Second Set, 11/7/10

Until '91

Having another moment where I'm so happy I grew up in the early 1990's. This is really just a fraction of why.