cutoffaPOPear

2003-06-11T10:13:00.000-07:00

Rroland to play the Flambé' Lounge , Sat. June 28th. Located at the artspace Crucible a metallurgy factory. After reading the flyer on the site, I have decided to makeup as Hermes, my favorite "God" and the one I most identify with. Not sure about the clothes but decided to paint my face two-tone, and of course my right arm the same (monophonic synth, played with one hand et al)

2003-05-07T09:13:00.000-07:00

it's been quite a while since i posted last, a war has started and supposedly ended, photoblogs have replaced pedestrian ones like this....and the FCC is writing laws to consolidate all US media and stifle the little guys like me. well, i had the opportunity to testify before an FCC chairman during a public comment period at a hearing regarding this matter, my statement follows:
Hello, my name is Rroland. I am a composer and am signed to and represent the independent record label American Patchwork. American Patchwork is a curatorial project, which features new music by alternative artists. We have artists on our label from across the US. Our artist’s genres range from classical experimental, to folk, to electronic pop. All of our artists produce music that is uplifting, thoughtful and sweet. Our mission is to bring joy and diversity to the public. We believe the FCC should not allow any further consolidation of media. As performing artists we rely on all forms of media to promote our sound. We also rely on independently owned venues to showcase our music. Any consolidation of television, radio and print media would place a large amount of power in the hands of a small group which will look at the bottom line of profits as the determining factor in coverage in various media. We believe this will severely limit our American public’s exposure to new and inspirational music. Therefore we ask the FCC and chairman Powell to not listen to the needs of a few corporations and pass this proposed consolidation, but to instead promote an environment wherein the American people can continue to find joy in the new music of it’s own composers and artists. Thank you.

Besides myself and one of the panelists Brother J (a hip-hop artist) there were no other speakers in either the group of panelists nor in the public that were musical artists, so I’m glad I took the time to do this. Also after finding out that commissioner Adelstein is a musician I gave him a Rroland sampler after the hearing. He responded to me that he wanted to make sure "you guys get heard".. He also said in his closing statement that he was very impressed by the public turnout in San Francisco, and that he would bring our comments and concerns to the FCC meetings regarding this decision, and make it clear to the chairmen that no one in the bay area supports consolidation. so there it is, in addition to marching, meeting networking and playing out, i have also been busy...trying to represent

2002-12-27T10:31:00.000-08:00

all though they all mean well...i'll never take prozac, zoloft, or any of the others. i need access to my emotional center...hello??

2002-10-09T10:57:00.000-07:00

in the disaster of my morning I awoke to death. he wore a big hat. he laughed at my cognition. he deemed me mad. i cannot love i cannot hate, without a full investigation. my curiosity billows as a cloud from my lungs...sputter block, decipher, invent, meditate, what began what will end?

2002-06-18T13:54:00.000-07:00

So the other day I was interviewed, for 2 and 1/2 hours! It was the first time I was interviewed as Rroland. It was interesting and I was ready for a chess game. I had an outline ready, so I could kind of steer the direction of the interview, if needed. But Kimberley was a professional, she had some prepared questions and knew what she wanted to ask. I had fears before the interview happened that family, work and therapeutic issues might come up and cloud the focus of the interview. I had some strategies prepared like, if she mentions work, steer it towards Patchwork, if she mentions family steer it towards Patchwork, etc. Well none of the fancy footwork was needed. It all came out, after all I am basically a simple, honest man. I may have sly imaginings about manipulation, but I know inside to let the universe take control. Especially if the universe is a woman. So it was very much an honest detailed interview, covering my past in this life, my past in past lives, my influences, etc. It was a great interview and I thank Kimberley for her time, and I hope to link to it from here when it comes out.

2002-06-13T13:44:00.000-07:00

In my previous post I spoke of the "American values" of suffering and martyrhood. I sited Christianity and slavery as sources. Well I'm sure some readers (if any??) were offended, particulary with the slavery reference. I am trying to start a debate. My point is that in America we latch onto a historical event and carry it around as if it is a determining factor in our behavoir in the now. This is a seed of supervictimhood. If a more Superflat view was taken it would be a given that the past holds embarassing events of cruelty, etc. but in the now, they don't exsist. We are all flattened, we are all consumers, subjects of a government, taxed, lovers, capable of hearing and learning. There is a way of feeling special in the littlest moment and tasks. It is a deep feeling, not like the orgastic rush of victimhood.

2002-06-07T14:11:00.000-07:00

Supervictims take on Superflat! There is a writer named Nicholas Currie. He is a philosopher as well. He is also a bullfighter of the mind. He writes essays that challenge you like a red flag, and inside each is a barb, which will be final as to your pre-conceptions. Over the course of 2 or 3 months Nick wrote two essays Superflat, and Supervictims. The parallels between these two essays show the stunning differences between two cultures, Japanese and American. In the essay Superflat , Christianity and Rock are the external forces impinging on Japanese culture. But the invaders are transformed by the inherent philosophies of Buddhism and simplicity into a magna, a cartoon character, a small snap of transcendence. In the essay Supervictims, the American values of suffering and martyrhood (source Christianity, slavery), are exposed as really a means to an end of profit. Be it style or not, big rap stars or fidgeting emotionally abused consumers, our media will serve us up a good dose of differentiation. Of course I tried to stir up something on the Momus newsgroup, and have no reponders. So if you want to play go to the Momus Newsgroup,
And help me grow this discussion.

2002-05-30T14:30:00.000-07:00

humiliation of a salaryman: I am sick of not being who I am, sounds odd? I am a composer, I am a musician, I am an artist. Not an administrative assistant, parking valet, tax slave. I am feeling so rebellious! I have been so patient. I have tried so long. I am really really really glad to have an LP out on Am Patch. I wish the world were different, I wish it paid to be me, really me.

2002-05-28T15:28:00.000-07:00

DAY EIGHT: clean and drinking green, tea, liquid barley extract, aloe juice. I'm getting healthy and ready for the tour. I spent the whole weekend working up a Bowie cover I hope to play while on the road, no lyrics, just the SH09 as the Thin White dude's voice.
It's going to be fun!

2002-05-23T15:34:00.000-07:00

DAY FOUR: still no cigarettes! And not that hostile either. The show went well at the poster room. I was sound wallpaper. I kept my levels real low so the crowd could eat, drink and socialize. I think they'll have me back, and someday, maybe, I can play the main stage and open for a great talent like "Crystal Method", let's keep a good thought.

2002-05-21T12:20:00.000-07:00

DAY TWO:no cigarettes. Tonight Rroland (me) is playing at the Fillmore Auditorium in San Francisco. I am in the poster room, a lounge/diner in the upper floors. I am feeling HOSTILE! I am taking a homeopathic remedy to overcome withdrawal, but tonight I am going to unleash my intense rage upon my audience. Poor suckers...also I am preparing for my usual post-performnace depression. Which always leaves me kind of staring into the distance at odd times in the middle of a conversation. All those wonderful fanatisies, all these beautiful women. All those years alone. I mean I want to stay positive, and draw the right person, but the reality of life is not a new age concoction of desires and actions, it's about money, ageism, position, looks. ARRGH, maybe I'm too fringe, who needs relationships?

2002-05-20T13:42:00.000-07:00

death, what is it? how do we discover it? can we walk through it untouched? I have re-visited many of my past deaths, and it was strange, but out of it came an LP. Now I am walking out of a physical death. Last summer when I went to NYC, I realized that death was New York. And that California, is all about life, with the sun, the climate and the tofu. But in New York, you can drink and smoke in restaurants and bars. Therefore I deemed this an excellent opportunity to experiment with the fringe and start smoking again! So I did, I bought imported cigarettes made with cloves, Turkish tobacco, English tobacco, Canadian tobacco, I tried em all. I settled with "Rothmans" because they are the official tobacconists to the Queen. Well it's been almost 10 months and...cough..I QUIT! One of my main reasons to quit was inspiration from Momus: he hates smoke, would rather not talk with anyone who does smoke, and since I am going on part of a tour with him, I thought it would be a good time to quit. Plus now my clothes and car won’t smell. BUT WAIT! Momus appears to have accepted and even be relishing death. In his new death essay he has gone all out, professing his fascination with the early stages of death in pop culture. Could this be stretched into tobacco usage by Momus, if so what brand would he smoke? I’d say he’d probably roll his own.

2002-01-25T23:51:00.000-08:00

what a whirlwind past two months it's been! i have pulled up roots and moved 200 miles south back to my home San Francisco, got a new job, and am now producing a couple of Cds. On for the almighty Lord Nasty another for Eric who runs the Demon Lounge. I recorded several shows for him there (including Rroland and the aka James (reading Ted Hughes over synth distortion)), as well as Rollerball and Bill Horist. The project is for a label that wants to compile live underground US music for release in Europe. I am also reading more physics, specific experiments that helped open up the field of quantum physics, and it is facinating, but a real brain-stretch. Art exhibitions and late night galleries abound, I'm so happy to be back.

2001-11-14T00:25:00.000-08:00

Well here I am midnight, I’m damned dosed: coffee, mochas, chocolate truffles, and cola. I don’t know what got into me the last few days, the whole bioterrorism threat makes it really easy to brazenly fall into bad habits of consumption,( or at least bad for me)…but on a musical note I am about to get a new Roland synth the sh09 monotone analog. It has a real cool design over the keys that says synthesizer 09…number nine, number nine. I’m excited because now I’ll have a note bender (one of the first probably)., and I’ll have a new challenge as well. I started recording new material about a month ago. I noticed I was coming up with similar sounds that I found on "reflections", I do want to still use the sh3a, perhaps as part of the virtual-drum-un-sequencer but the new stuff is going to require some more swishy whooshy stuff which I hope to find in the sh09

2001-11-07T19:58:00.000-08:00

i walked into Amoeba records, "do you have Rroland, spelled with two rs?"..."reflections on a past life, that is in rock under r, probably misc. (another hurdle, to get my own CD divider thingy). there it is one copy, at first i was surprised that there was only one, then a friend who worked at a large store informed me that they would usually order about five, the date was 10/25/01, three days after the release, so thanks for the purchases! as the charts go the darla top 50 had me bouncing between 19 and 23, until i basemented at my current 31. you know this really shouldn't matter to me, and it doesn't. i can’t live by the charts or the critics, i know cause i am quite a good one. in fact i was just thinking that the new Rroland music is very much a child's dare, to hang your self on a simple melody and put it out there in the mix with sparse accompaniment . my own pop critic would have cloaked the melodic origin in vocals, delays, instrumentation of the pop format, i was doing a bad thing i admit it, i took an inspiration and conceptualized it. when i made the first EP of “reflections”, I gave it to Nick. i really liked it, and hoped he would, but i had doubts for the above reasons, that it wasn’t going to work to anyone else ears but mine, luckily someone heard me.

2001-10-17T23:04:00.000-07:00

4 days, 4 days and you can walk into a store and buy product that I made. Wow. This is like better than having your name as quality control on a tee shirt insert. Or a brown bag "inspected by". This way tops selling my handmade decoupage jewelry in gift shops (yes I was an entrepreneur for about three years), or even growing grapes that someone will pay to drink the juice of. WHY? Real creation! This LP is created from a place inside of me that I had to work hard to find. It took me about a half of a year to process my past life regression therapy. Then In January 2001 I began the solemn task of interpretation, on songs like the "First Suicide" it was very painful actually, remembering the story as I hunched over the sh3a. I know most of you are smiling right now, and believe me I am very skeptical of new age religion, etc. It was just that in my life I reached a point that I wanted to face up to things, and it has changed me deeply. I am very grateful to anyone who purchases my LP and hope that somehow it can help you to a good healing place too.

2001-10-05T04:44:00.000-07:00

NEW AGE CLERICS PRECIPITATE WWIII! cells of new age believers are actively seeking the demise of our civilization. In reaction to the tragedy of 9/11 these hyper-denial "people" are refusing to read, watch TV or even be spoken too regarding the situation and it's repercussions. Sitting cross-legged, unaffected by substance these "saviors" of "spirituality" are drawing what could amount to massive worldwide chaos. What? How? Let me break it down for you. See I really believe in reality, I study physics. I think in the world of sub-atomic physics lie the answers to many deep questions about "why" our situation is such as it is. According to one of the newest disciplines in physics "string theory" there are sub-atomic fields connecting all matter in the universe, the strings. These strings contain extreme gravitational energy. G-force that is much stronger then that of Sir Isaac and the ruler of daily life. My theories are that this interconnection is basically a conduit between people and things where intent is transmitted. Willful intentions as well as lack of intention (denial). When we willfully decide to have a good day, or be angry or sad, that intention is sent out into the universe via these sub-atomic gravitational fields where reality will morph to accommodate your intent. You are then provided with the kind of reality you want . If you want to be angry, well someone will cut you off in traffic, or a door will slam on your fingers. If you want to be sad you will be provided with a memory of an old flame who left, or someone you care about will suffer something. This is what the new agers call “making your day”, but they don’t know why it happens, I think this is the reason, granted I am alone in this maverick opinion, but there is a dark side to these “made days”. You see as we try and focus on the positive we obliterate all other emotions. These denied emotions are basically being told to leave you, so they do. They jump in the sub-atomic strings and with tremendous speed and gravitation they go directly to a sympathetic vibration of the shunned and shunted emotion. In the case of anger and revenge it goes to those who are actively seeking same thereby releasing it’s emotional charges. If the denied emotion is grief it goes to the mother who loses babies to war and starvation. If you deny yourself happiness it goes to those who are wealthy and idle. THIS IS HOW OUR WORLD EXPERIENCE IS CREATED (in my theory at least). Sooo as these new age “spiritual” people seek to escape and deny what has happened they create more of it. These recent events are the explosion of denied rage sent to those who are sympathetic to that energy, the terrorists. So I think that anyone who is sweetly church-going, or burning sage cleansing their auras , should also take time to examine their guttural emotional reaction to life, and process it responsibly. Otherwise we are creating more darkness in our futures. Mad you say? perhaps but in addition to being mad I also have an LP you can buy from darla, so why not kindly mosey on over to this site darla.com and whip out some plastic and get a taste of a mad scientist at the controls of a reductionist monotone analog synth, scroll down to Rroland the weird, Rroland the deluded, don't worry if you don’t buy one I won’t get mad, or even, just breathe, sing shout and scream.

2001-09-01T16:09:00.000-07:00

In a faraway place, miles beyond the big mechanics of society is a special land called Triumvia. Where everyday people are rewarded for good deeds and healthy ways. Where creativity and ingenuity are valued in the old doubloons. In it's fruited plains are enough for all, and a shared knowledge of building is passed through the land so that everyone should feel comfortable. The laws of the land are none, except respect for one another and a open heart to change. Dataclouds hover as message boards educate with shared knowledge and opinion, and commercialism is forever banished because there is enough for all. The transcendental nature of relationships as we know it does not exist. For there is a mutually recognized need for acceptance and love for one another. As conflicts arise between persons, message boards offer advice and point direction to the home of a helper, to be an omsbudman and accept you without judgment. The parties are grand, with flowing libations and plenty of bawdry in everyway with a chance for everyone to get in on an act. Children are cared for responsibly by close friends who have the time to babysit so the parent (s) can enrich their lives to impart a more universal knowledge to their young ones. There is no religion except love for self and respect for life.
A dream world, too many years in the future for me to see perhaps, but sometimes I like to think it’s real and the in your face world of today is really an illusion.

2001-08-12T12:34:00.000-07:00

After visiting MOMA in NYC and seeing the “Mies in Berlin” collection of architectural masterpieces, I realize how close I was to genius of modern design and architecture in little old East Grand Rapids Michigan. My father worked directly for Charles Eames and we lived in a Mies inspired modern home designed by Bill Nelson. With it’s sparse interior, high ceilings and a curious wraparound window opening of about two feet, all around the top of the walls...I am struck at how fortunate I was as a child. Thinking back over the acoustic definition (or lack of) afforded by the architect, I wonder, how much my music today might be affected by that sound space I grew up in? Did the design qualities affect my sense of taste? Does childhood environment affect production values? I remember reading about how Hendrix was a paratrooper in the US Army before he became famous....all that wind rushing by...this might explain a few things! In a world of political upheaval like the sixties were, a child like myself was surrounded by design breakthroughs, true enough, but also graphic imagery of violence broadcast on the TV nightly. TV crews in Vietnam, race riots, war protests turned deadly, burning monks, and assassinations. Numbing events, then with the onset of drug culture a grand opportunity to escape. Escape from the trauma, but also the elegance and beauty of modern design. As I journeyed into the world of drug experimentation, I strayed. I muffled my childhood influences of art and design. I erased a value system. Instead of embracing the culture of design my father tried to show me, I rebelled in ignorance. I could of been an Eames understudy, instead I joined a cult of poverty in the name of hipness. My proud rejection of my parent’s ways left me naked to the corporate advertising sloganeering of American materialism. Ironically, in trying to escape the pop materialism of design I fell right into the clutches of corporate America.

2001-07-17T18:56:00.000-07:00

Rroland, a superflat project on a label called American Patchwork, run by a Scotsman, with album cover art produced by an art student and a designer in Japan. If memes could talk...with a bald eagle for a courier and the polite interchange of Emil (was email, but I think we should give email a name, what do you think...Emil? “Emil, send this message right way, with dispatch!”), a record is born. That is superflat. No emo interchange of personal wariness, etc. We are wired, we have our robo-clockspeed messenger “Emil”, to connect us to pubisher, producers, even other musicians. Mercury is in the house.

2001-07-15T10:23:00.000-07:00

EXTRA! EXTRA! POP IS DEAD (T. Ewing brain of Freaky Trigger). Yes, it is. That’s the way I’ve felt for the past year as I read with confusion on NYPLM the constant chatter about Brittany, as though she was somehow special. I never got it. I still don’t get it, but when did pop die? I would like to postulate the day of death was the day of osmosis of musical irony into musical cool. For me, pop, good pop is always ironic, where as rock, good or bad is portrayed as cool. What I think has happened over the past fifty years of modern music is a shift, from shores. In the fifties America was the home of cool, the start of rock. Elvis, Jerry Lee Lewis, Little Richard, all very talented, all very laden with attitude, all very cool, all very out in the American media. At the same time the seeds of what would become UK irony were there in the US. That would be Buddy Holly and the Everley Brothers. These acts were not really that cool, more kind of nerdy or boy(s) next door. The simple outward presentation of these artists, a safe package, singing happy but pained songs, irony. These pioneers of irony seemed reachable to young musicians in the UK, who although attracted to cool, because of the endemic, fortunate English “reserved” attitude, adopted the ironic over cool. The result was the British invasion, and the beginning of a clear geographical delineation of cool and irony. Style wise a safe British version of cool meant greasy hair, and leathers, until a German artist and her friend discovered that a simple swim in a pool can convert cool into instant irony, (In fact so ironic that the resultant hairstyle ironically redefined cool). So American youth began consuming British pop, began listening to lyric, began a cultural divide in their family. A generation of ears was born, a generation of thinkers. The very breavity of pop and all it’s irony was a liberation from the older siblings/parent’s slicked back simple pleasures of cool. The drive -in meant less, the soda pop crowd seemed flat, these were the glory days of pop. Then 1967 happened, starting in my beloved hometown (San Francisco) and spread everywhere, the deconstrucion of pop sensibility...drugs. Drugs softened, numbed, redefined cool as being high. The criteria for a great song began to deterioate. No longer was it about thought or poetic opinion, it was becoming more about effect. What can jar your attention enough that you would actually remember the show you went to on acid and smoked three joints at? It’s got to be loud, it’s got to be flashy, it’s got to show off, it’s got to be cool. American music-appreciation had reached a reversal point, we learned the irony, made it our own, reveled in the folk singers, but it wasn’t enough, we wanted more. The chase for trancendence spread overseas. In the UK bands that once gave America the seed of irony were losing that capability, examples: The Who, probably one of the finest pop bands ever, until Tommy, the Beatles releasing probably the greatest pop song of all time “Tell me Why?”, however losing it all on Revolver. I would say that the only British invaders able to retain irony would be the Kinks (why, well *I* can’t picture Ray Davies with a joint hanging out of his mouth). So now the whole world had gone cool...thankfully we still had Dylan to ironize (although by the seventies he had already degenerated into romantic material and relgious overtones) and the student protests of the sixties to remind us that everything wasn’t cool, but the damage to pop structure was done. FF tens years complete UK bastardization...the band Yes, FF ten more years, George Michael, FF ten more years the nothing nineties (read Oasis), until here we are, completely mislabeled as pop Ms. Spears is nothing more than a weak attempt at cool, at best.

2001-06-02T21:02:00.000-07:00

it's a real pea-souper right now for me. I mean I am rehearsing experimental music up in a rural town where the biggest sound on the street is country, top 100 hip-hop and skate punk in that order. I feel like I am in purgatory. Everything I am working on is so small, and the people for the most part so foreign and somehow removed from me, it seems very Kafkaesque. I sit in this beautiful flat alone in the trees playing tiny music. I am very excited about the upcoming release and of course want to publicly thank Nick Currie and American Patchwork for helping me. It was a week ago Thursday that I played my first live show as Rroland. It went well, I had a small audience for my tiny set of thirty minutes. I had an old card table set up, with the gear on it, so it was a tiny little village of pedals wires mixer and drum machine. My friend Eric who owns the record store where I played said that he liked the live show better, because he could see how I was doing it, it made it more believable. Another friend said it reminded her of marching midgets.
It was a fun time in a cozy party atmosphere. Still, I rehearse and add new techniques to the live show, I am also working on some visuals too. So there’s what's up with me of late, out there in the world, Robin closed Elidor to work on his “other” project, Tom is still going strong, Tim is still catching the dawn of sound from down east, and Momus is in Japan. He has a very challenging thought up“Cute FoRmalism” . Check it out. I am using the I Love Music board to post my thoughts ( and unfortunate misspellings...oh well). Thanks for reading my page come back or visit me on mp3.com.

2001-04-28T16:40:00.000-07:00

MOMUS POWERED? Anyone who knows James knows this to be so. My first audio admission was my parody back in '99 of MC Momus where my penis became a "Momus inflated penile messer". MOMUS POWERED? James fully admits to taking Nick Currie on as my college professor, perhaps unwittingly, Nick aka Momus got me reading again...alot, more than I ever dreamed I would, deBeauvoir, Marx, Kant, Pavese, Homer, Ovid, Passolini. The result an EP based on Ovid's' stories mated with Momus antedotes, as well as a three-post reenactment of Homer's "The Aeneid", with the Stars Forever cast tucked up in the wooden horse. MOMUS POWERED? Every time Nick comes to town James gives him a different CD of original compositions and this most recent visit allowed me to hand Nick a copy of "Reflections on a Past Life", my newest work, and guess what? MOMUS POWER! An email in February announces the intentions of MOMUS to curate and compile an LP of James’ new music for the new MOMUS label American Patchwork.....have you ever seen a man dance a jig while wearing a hooded sweatshirt and nothing else on? well that’s how you would of found James the moment he read the email while changing out of his work-clothes! But the name *James Lucas*...well if I cut right to it is...well, boring. I have therefore taken the name of a logo, a logo that means a great deal to me, a corporation that has created one of the most deep instruments *I’ve* ever played, the Roland corporation. See Roland way back in the 1970’s made an analog synth, the SH3A monotone synth, it is my axe. I spent weeks getting familiar with all the controls. I even made a diagram-template, in detail, so I could document *how* I got all those sounds. I felt it was important to spend alot of time with the instrument, before I started to compose music for it. The Roland logo, has a really big R written in a really modern way, followed by the word Roland...Therefore my new name is Rroland, not James. I answer to James now to people in 98% of my life, but to you wire memes I will now only answer to Rroland. The announcement of the release date is here at the Momus news page. Yes I’m still excited, yes it’s true and yes I still dance a jig, but this time wearing correct underwear!

2001-04-01T10:58:00.000-07:00

There is a great resurgence of energy across the land, the energy is people's attention, re-focused. With all the problems in the world becoming almost over- archingly a form of macabre entertainment. Forget daytime TV, I mean reality, it's very scary at times, and it begs the question, when will the audience see they have been duped by mainstream media and begin to look deeper for answers, deeper than the television? Hopefully musically too! That is look for something deeper than what they see in Rolling Stone. Napster was/is for now an opening for unknowns like me, and soon I hope to announce a release. I feel an urgency and a change , because I have taken a new direction, away from pop. Now I am gearing up for tours, gathering equipment, analyzing the various parts of my compositions to be looped and which to play live on the roland monotone analog synth. The process of producing a live show is actually a more pop articulation than when I originally composed and recorded the pieces, I intend to do a live show in front of about 20 people (I hope) and make a live demo for a certain friend.

2001-03-22T03:17:00.000-08:00

The days of analog are coming back! As reported in the US media: California where I hail from is in an energy crisis, and according to a new report may spread to NYC and southern New York this summer, where my friend Momus lives and works. What happens when an artist is recording digitally and there is a blackout? All data is lost, gone for good. What happens to the same artist if he or she records analog? Once you get power back you press rewind! At last the come-uppance of the cassette! I have waited years for this day, maybe I should do a version of the "Rocky" theme on my synth?

2001-03-20T18:32:00.000-08:00

Spring has sprung, and i have spent the last month composing new music, to launch me into the 21st century, I even managed to keep at work the whole month! I admit the nice coffee machine I bought with a stainless steel element was helpful. Very soon i hope to announce, here, a new release. So please stay tuned for the lowdown, in the mean while stay fresh, stay in a tree, look at the overview of the labrynth, have a banana, it's Spring!

2001-02-20T22:47:00.000-08:00

there are links that reach through phone wires links that echo to the past one of the reflections across the big pond is Robin and his site Elidor, a reflection of a fellow ruralist, with a metropolitan insight. Rather superthin is the wire that connects us, rather superflat when we see that’s all that connects us, but there’s more to be mined there , at Elidor you will find the dissemblance; of culture, a culture perhaps not familiar to all outside the UK, but a world within the world where increasingly what it says is what matters. Similarly I have spent the last three years working at my “hobby( day-job)” and recording at night up in the attic, crudely at first on a four track then expanding to eight, but none the less within my world within. It is this inner world where I work and have written and recorded over those three years where increasingly what it says is what matters. I think as a composer and writer and it seems for Robin as well, we both are increasingly dealing with topics that matter. Robin has a review of my new CD ”Reflections of a Past Life”..descriptively, and lyrically, a special review seeing as it is an instrumental CD. I hope to get some or all of it published soon, In the mean time you can go to the review and from there to links to an mp3 site where you can dl ”The River”. I know that Robin is involved in some very important work in the world which serves his inner world, I too have done some major personal journeys which have inspired this piece and my new one as well. The shared reflection is the search for personal truth, perhaps, to be sneered at by some, but eventually, face. I know as an artist getting into my world within the world has helped me immensely.

2001-02-13T19:19:00.000-08:00

the critical pressures the artist places on him or herself, what does this do to the creative force? rather irrelevant in the best cases, for the issue is not about criticism or even your own self-concepts as an artist, it's about input and outputs. what are you're inputs, what do you read, eat, whom do you sleep with what do watch and listen to? these are the inputs right? Largely yes, you have to be healthy, but perhaps it is more distraction, as the artist develops his or her own world the commonplace inputs become more of a distraction, even the basics like food and sleep seem a sandbar in the way. recently I answered a call for output, I immediately took two days off, and intently focused on the work at hand. I didn't eat more than two meals a day and by the second and third day of my work I was operating on 4 to 5 hours of sleep and not feeling stretched at all. I was in touch with my inputs, the inside ones. when my work was done I seasoned it a bit with some echo, then set out at the task of soberly listening to each track, at the time I was not third-personing myself, I was only trying to eq the fattest tone, the mix was completed the disc burned and in the mail. then a listen, another , will my patron like the work? I see that it is not relevant from the muse’s standpoint, what the quality of the work is or was, because a composition is it’s own, therefore it stands alone, as it were, like a sculpture. Can it be changed? Yes, of course, but it is my responsibility as the creator of the piece to review and make changes after the creation.(in the case If this particular work I made several mixing adjustments, and three new tracks composed), when it is done, I feel like , well it’s done, my patron will of course advise me as to his preferences of any adjustments to be made, and I of course will respectfully abide, however, each new carving, changes the sculpture, especially when you record analog, using analog instruments. I am reading just now a book on among other things particle physics, and I realize that most modern pop criticism is akin to Newtonian physics ie: beneath the prolific detail of music in all it’s forms there lie systemic and rational laws that govern music in all it’s genres....my particle physics view of music is that there is not any “stuff”” (or as Pete Townsend once put it “we haven't got any quality, we just do something real big and a bunch of geezers go, ahh.). No measurable quality by the old rule of thumb, in the particle physics of music what is =what happens, an unending dance of creation, annihilation and transformation run rampant within the conservation laws and probabilities of the instrument at hand. I have bandied about criticism of different genres, and recording techniques, but this latest work and it’s circumstances, have made me look at my work in a new way, one of real critical necessity, but carefully not over dissecting the pieces, letting them stand like so many rocks in the foreground of a sonic landscape which i will continue to ramble.

2001-02-01T03:44:00.000-08:00

Tom at Freaky Trigger must of burned a fatty. (duck flying beer bottle), from his recent Loafer’s discourse “ I think the dialogue around music reduces it somehow, turns it into something that can be explained, rather than just and occasionally illuminated.” What’s next? Ouija board driven reviews. I think I may have exsasterbated his pubness with my recent brutal dissection of dance music (or my attempt to do so) . Maybe it’s best to “leave it alone”, stick to my weird little corner, whatever. Sorry, sappiness is not an option.
Like Don Quixote I ride the hills jousting with my own shadow and any windmills that dare to show me their genre, I am really The Fool, with the tiger of fear chomping at my leg, blithely in denial of the fact that really...I am an employee. Friends have told me I jump to conclusions, and it’s true I do hyperpower my deductions, once I think I have tiny chance at a logical explanation of anything from a coolant leak on a tractor to the reason a track has no soul. I suppose I could review my record collection (yawn), or talk about my favorite movies, it’s been done, well done. I have to admit a great admiriation for Tom’s third person work, like Dr. Pop, truly a sign of a great mind and very entertaining. Do I want to entertain? My guts say no actually, I want to upset, I want to revolt, I want to make you think what was great was really great because it was the song that happened to be playing when you found that coupon for 20%off, or your girl finally called you back...sentimentality. Sentimentality may be, perhaps one of the biggest things in a Pop listeners selection criteria, sad really, I know because I live there, I latch on the song that generates a feeling or a memory. I guess then that what the role of a great pop song is to remind of us of better times and places. Welcome to retirement, would you like your jello now?

2001-01-31T12:08:00.000-08:00

this is the last day of the month that changed the world. No I'm not talking about Momus, I'm talking about politics. So it leads me to think about politics in music. Here in America the word in the indie-press is: it's going to be the 60's all over again. They're talking some kind of political backlash, but what about the American pop scene. Will it go through another set of major changes? A reflection of the time when we morphed from the pop of the 50's to the pop/rock of the 60's? What does this mean for the lyrical content of pop songs to come. Will more R&B, Hiphop, Rap lyricists use the platforms of politics rather than conspicuous consumption? Will the rest in the rock/alternative/indie scene excess about the environment, instead of emo-based, feel sorry for me shite? Will we discover another Bob Dylan? It’s very exciting time, it’s a very corporate time...time for Napster to start charging, time for global trade and easy access to labor markets, time to bring the faithful into the fold of our political landscape. How many prozacs does it take to cover the truth? Surely there must be some inspiration growing out there...somewhere in the 16 to 24yo demographic is where our next Dylan will emerge, keep you ears peeled!

2001-01-29T20:11:00.000-08:00

Stand your ground man! **OK I cant html Tim's link for some reason**... After rereading Tim’s first post, maybe I am one of those people who cant enjoy the thrill of music that is repetitious for it’s own sake. And after DJ assaults dl ...maybe I am. I just am not *feelin* it. The craft behind the sound doesn't stand up. True the gentlemen has a blithely cocky attitude, his subject matter is certainly well worn. I think that I should side-step these dance threads, I’m still mulling over the case of the Avalanches (probably one of my worst net stumbles, after dling a different Avalanches and thanking Tim for a new fav band). Is this the blog for hypercriticism? I hope not, I’m open to new sounds. As a musician I honestly do not care to look out there to find something new to adopt, as a listener my ears are always curious and finally as an observer I like to watch the impact reaction of music on people (probably the best reason to go to a show, really).

In order to join the fray I really need to commit to going to a dance club and just sit and watch and listen and take notes. For the most part I can assume the hard disk production techniques are going to be used by the artists played, (this is the 21st century and I’m just gonna have to get over it). Perhaps by gauging some sort of audience reaction to this minimalist *catharsis* Tim speaks of in his reply, I will be able to engage more effectively, and see the magic there. As a composer and also a ruralist I do get myopic I suppose, and now that I am on a break from writing maybe I should go back to some dance clubs...(as soon as I can scrape the dollars for the transmission). Admittedly I use a drum machine and I write sequenced patterns, looping the bar or the half bar is not really what I am talking about , it’s the over all production values of the artist. Is he/she thinking linearly, or holistically? Meaning do they sit down to their equipment with no set idea or outline and just find one cool pattern and then just link it to the next one they find then control c control v control c control v their way to songwriter status? Or, do they sit down with say a lyric sheet, or a story or a painting, or a vision , (something more than ass & titties) and find the pattern that expresses this and will ultimately and organically find the next pattern and then the next and so on? This is as for as I can go in trying to explain what I mean about what I think makes a track great/soulful, or background noise.

2001-01-28T07:48:00.000-08:00

Tim started it and Tom picked up the thread, let's see if I can add more layers to the question of quality in dance music. ok, i don't follow the genre, and as i expressed to Tim, I think all repetitive dance music originates from Kraftwerk, but what makes a dance track good, or as Tom ventured "soul"full. well as i wrote to Tim I think it has to do with courage and pain. as i have expressed i have little respect for digital sampled music, and the cut and paste editing so many use today. It's too easy, there is no pain. Recording used to be a recording of a *performance* not a 30 second pattern, followed by a different 30 second pattern, then re-pasted after the second 30 second pattern, etc. This is where any "soul" in the track leaves, second, third, fourth takes are hard, granted but the result is a real performance that the artist poured himself into, no pain no gain, sonically. The other element that makes a good track dance or otherwise is artistic courage, the courage to take extreme chances, from production techniques, to instrumentation and performance. A dance track generated by a prepackaged set of “dance patterns” will never sound soulful. But if the presets are run through say a distortion pedal, and some off drum beats are added, the incongruity I think generates a dark side to the track which makes for a more real listening experience, maybe I haven't answered anything, but i think it all goes back to production techniques and the talent and courage of the artist.

2001-01-25T18:53:00.000-08:00

one more thing: I want to point you all to my website where you can dl songs including the first track from the new CD, the track is "The River"...Cardboard Kingdom, it follows no set format except that it fits into the pop time frame (under 3mins)

2001-01-25T18:52:00.000-08:00

here's what happened. Arose for the job at 5am. couldn't sleep, was too excited about the Momus show, *I step outside of my self, "Uh, acting like a drooling fanboy"* argh getup, go, get through it come home change, and in the trusty Toyota fly down the freeway at 72mph for two hours until I reach SF, I go straight to the club, get my ticket, there seated at a table is Nick with the orange iBook, it's funny I glance down at the keyboard in it's plastic translucence and behold an oily smudginess, a little dirt! i'm likin this, the ones in the store always look repulsively clean. He remembers me, and I thank him for his kind words on the Momus site, the essay "Jan 1, 2000", I hand him two discs, one my new release "Reflections on a past life" "Oh, is this on your castlerobertson label?" Yes (I think: "sigh, such as it is, sign me, sign me”). The other disc was Lord Nasty and the Seekers of Perversion, my other band which only works twice a year, it was a record of our New Years Eve party, if you follow this link to my friend Eric’s record store you can watch the quicktime movie of the show, just click on the lord’s hands then the praise the lord banner...Lord nasty . So anyway, (let me take out my link rag to wipe the sweat...). the show was good, better than I expected. As Robin well knows I have a serious problem with this digital pop, and lifting Americana folk and using it so coyly I don't know if I’m being narrow, but it seems like this digital sampling based music, to a large extent has contaminated the craft of songwrting and recording. as regards the latter, there was a brief discussion about equipment after the show and what kind of harddisk recorder one used, when N asks: “what do you use James?” reply:”I use a cassette, eight track, I use analog synths recorded analog them i burn, I like the fat tones”...he looks at me rather blandly and makes a comment about Tape recorder man one of his new losses, where he put fake scratch noises (like an old record)*hate that* I mean I like the guy, but he relies on too much aural cliche. aural cliche, I like that, and that’s another reason to cutoffaPOPear, kill all cliches in pop, save pop, turn it on it’s head! So the show was done, I said goodbye, got in the car, trying to leave San Francisco, the car is in trouble...it won’t get out of first gear, I top out at 35mph, I can’t drive the 130 miles back like this! Stop at a gas station, it’s pouring rain, I have no hat, or umbrella and my little fanboy dress ups on. I ask the guy if he thinks I should make the two hour drive in first, laughs “no it’s ll ruin first gear”, laughs to myself (evil dopple James laugh), I hiss through my teeth...”got any coffee”.. Gas station coffee...well, it’s really really bad, hmmm. backout into the rain, no box, just a phone on a stand, The rain, The fanboy, The humilation, call the “insurance” company for the tow service, hold wait hold wait (no I dont have a cell phone), wait, OK 15mins. Driver comes, blue collar guy “seen alot of stuff here”. Tows me to a transmission shop near a needle park. My options are getting worse and it’s still raining, it’s now 3am, “OK can you take me down to the bus depot?” this is it, the end of the line, literally where the busses turn around and the end of the line for the homeless and the broken hustlers. There’s no ticket windows open at all, people sleep in heaps, the prized seat in front of the auto-video arcade game is taken of course by a healthy young black man who can probably throw a mean roundhouse. This isn’t for me, I ask a security guard back down the stairs when the bus leaves going north “5:21am” so I find an allnight puke palace/resturant and eat pancakes, pound coffee and circle personals, almost two hours killed and I stroll back down to the pit. Wait in a bus shelter for 45mins, finally the bus comes, it’s warm, empty, dry...now I have a little bit of the feeling of what it must be like to be homeless, cold and wet...it sucks.

2001-01-25T04:59:00.000-08:00

I am really too tired to write at all, but I must say that I have some major post to make here as soon as I reamp the caffeine levels after I go to my hobby today, but thanks go to Tim at Skykicking for the html for imbedded links, as well salutes to both you and Tom for your appreciated links. So now I have to get maybe twenty more minutes before it’s back to my hobby

2001-01-21T20:33:00.000-08:00

cutoff a POP ear, what did I mean? well I mean that I, like Van Gough will probably die freezing, alone, I know it sounds very fatalistic but when you are an artist the legends of Van Gough, Poe, Nick Drake and others who have to die to become well known, and the annoying habit of always needing money, tend to keep a framework of the definite end always near to the kernel. so I am going to someday, not by any pre-arrangement mind you but none the less there it is, waiting like some kind of bittersweet reward for the all day sucker of life. well i assure you readers that I am not one to hurry the process, I am perfectly happy being an underground music bitch, and not a pomo style chasing slut.