Me + Sumatra T. Photo Assistant figur’n it out…

I was doing a lighting test today in my living room, trying to figure out “the look” for an upcoming assignment. They want a classic Avedon type feel. Sumatra was helping me figure it out. So was Miracle Fortress and Do Make Say Think. It’s been a while since I practiced this kind of light, reminds me of 3rd Term Art Center: clean and simple, ya dig? Time is slowly, quickly, turning into our favorite season…watch your belly, brother, but eat everything that’s good.  Sheesh, please pardon my whack Kerouac!

Hidden Springs Cafe.

It’s with sadness that I read today that the Hidden Springs Cafe burned down in the Station Fire. I took these pictures of Elva Lewis and The Hidden Springs Cafe for Los Angeles Magazine back in 2001.  The shoot was scheduled for September 11th. I remember calling Elva, dazed and semi-incoherent but being very young and thinking I had a job to do, I asked if we could re-schedule for later in the afternoon. Very sweetly she said: “Hon, why don’t you stay home with your wife and we’ll figure it out later.”  I send the best wishes to the Lewis’s and everyone affected by these devastating fires.

I “heart” The Bats.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The mail came superduper early today, weird, very weird, and I just received The Bats’ new album.  Ah me, I’d like to buy the world the title track!  Gorgeous + melancholy + pure poppy + just what you want to hear as summer ends and you get ready for new things.  I’ve had it on repeat all day.  Hearing Robert Scott’s voice was friendly and sweet. Reminds me, I’ve been listening to them and The Clean most of my life. Wow, I understand why aging hippies/ yuppies/ yippies/ deadheads/ parrotheads/ etc. cling and shell out serious dough.  It just feels good to hear them.  I had the same feeling when I played Barry Adamson’s last record: Hello, friend!  Anyways, it’s awesome.  Grandpa says, go get it!  And get ready for Mr. Pop  next month. Ahhh me….

Thanks a million, Love Ryan.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

In case you haven’t heard, The Lucksmiths called it quits last month.  May 12th, to be exact.  Ah man, I haven’t been this sad over a last act since Stuart Adamson commited suicide back in 2001.  Or Epic Soundtracks in ‘97.  Well, at least the lads are all still living.  It’s been a slow gloomy june in LA, especially after a jam packed May, so I’ve had a good chance to properly mourn.  In fact, I think it’s the gloomiest, grayest june in all of the 16 years we’ve been here. Perfect. Dark days till about 6:30 in the pm, then the sun rises and you feel better.  What a Southern Cali softy!

Well, here’s a couple things I believe: I believe that The World According to Garp contains all the wisdom you need to encounter almost every situation in life.  I believe that art can save you and make you less lonely and that The Lucksmiths give that vital “As I lay with my head in your lap, Camarado” spirit you need to buoy through the toughest and worst times and make better the good times. MST3K helps too. Shit, I’m gonna miss them. When I was traveling all the time and away from home (Laura), “Guess How Much I Love You” was the kind of song that said exactly what I wanted to say (and those lines “ya know I’m thinking of you, in the book store, in the laundry mat” and the phrase “the loneliness of the long distance phone call” were bitter-sweetly precise…).  And every time we road tripped up north and spanned one of the glorious WPA bridges on Highway 1 near Big Sur, we’d “hold our breath” across each one and make a wish.  Ya know, almost every situation you’ll encounter in love, you’ll find in The Lucksmiths.

On Monday, I finally made some headway in clearing out our garage and turning it into our “club house”: I played ALL their music and made my way through lots of personal history, trashing trash and finding a safe place for keepsakes.  It was an all day affair and I got quite misty eyed and pie eyed in the process.  We have a name for this: we call it the “Old Charley Effect”.  It means, when you spend a day sifting through your personal artifacts trying to make a livable space amongst all the history, you can’t help but imbibe lots of vino or cerveza or both.  Partly because you’re remembering soooo much and partly because of the daunting physical task of gettin’ er done.  The expression “Old Charley” comes from my dad’s old ‘68 VW van.  He was sweet on it and called it Charley, and as kids we came to call anything old and friendly and nostalgic an “Old Charley”.

Anyways, I just wanted to say “thanks” for the music. O Brother that sounds cheap, but man o man it’s true. The Lucksmiths have been good companions for along time and I love ‘em. Adios. And if you’re ever in Glendale CA., stop in and have a drink.  It’s never too late.

 

The world is a beautiful place tonight.

Alright, THINK ABOUT LIFE are officially one of my favorite bands.  You can’t really say that with any authority (Not So!)  if they only got 1 album, but now they got 2!!!  I hated it on first listen, and fell in love on the second try.  When you buy it, you’ll see what I mean cuz it sounds a lot different than you expect.  I was just working in Alexandria VA ( cue the song!, thanks Caithlin…) and I listened to it nonstop solo party drop (HA!), sheesh, what joy!  And if possible, I’ve listened to the song “Nueva Nueva” about 600 times in the 9 days I was there.  WOW, it’s a love letter to Nueva York especially meaningful since Laura and I were just in NY City in January and she fell in love with it so it makes me even impossibly sweeter on her and the city and the song.  The album is a crazy gem of feel good dance party stroll: you can not not dance when listening.  You’ll grin alot too.  It’s the kind of art that’s free and seemingly effortless.

And as for awesome ear goodness for the ages: Nadja’s Numbness.  Holy sh*t, that’s some heavier than the house apocalyptic ambient doooooooom! Those 2 (Aiden + Leah) are surely the powers-that-be in an alternate universe of majestic sonic bloom.

Thanks Kyle!

Aaaaaawwwesome….The 13 year old high school girl in me squealed aloud when 1: I saw the handwritten note on the envelope (it took a couple weeks to get here, hence the meaning of the missive), 2: when I saw that Kyle hooked me up with #1 of 300!!! and 3: when I actually started listening to it.  It’s beee-yooot-iful!  Sheeesh, I could sing along to every song by the end of the first day!  

More happy news, Caithlin De Marrais put out her own gorgeous solo album!  Plus, her + Kyle started their own label, End Up Records.  So as sad as I was when Rainer Maria split, now it’s like getting two RM records all at once!  Albeit less rocking…But where’s William?  I think he might have something to do with this, but I’m not sure.  Very mysterious…regardless, it’s a killer site with some frighteningly pretty sounds…

An Almost Total History Of One Picture.

Got these beat old pins at All Star Lanes in Eagle Rock, CA.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Too clean…

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Sumatra gives critical cute support to “the artist”…

 

 

 

 

 

 

The worlds loneliest bowling alley…

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Sumatra gives critical art direction to “the artist”…

Results: a Laszlo Moholy-Nagy (at least in my head), 1950’s inspired color experiment in fun! HA, Enjoy! Couldn’t have been finished without:

Sumatra, cuddly/cranky old timer and warmest of work companions!!!

Nadja’s “Radiance Of Shadows”

the complete works of Davey Von Bohlen

Klangstabil’s “Math And Emotion”, with a super special nod to the tracks “love has too much audience”, “hanham vs. steinitz” and “good night kingdom”.  I must have kept each of those 3 songs on repeat, in turn, for most of this shoot. Gracias!!!

Our Buddy, Pecos.

He lived and loved us for 14 years.  We were very lucky.  He was the heart of our house and the house is so quite without him now.  We miss you, buddy.

I delayed cleaning and scrubbing away all his little paw prints on the floor till today. He had a number of things go bad inside him with age; the dry cleaners wondered when I was going to pick up the pillow slips, cushions, and blankets I had dropped off over a month ago.

We miss him coming to the door to greet us, laying all his 18 pounds of love against us when we watched a movie or listened to music on the floor in the living room.  When I’d stretch in the morning he used to snuggly slip under every new position I’d make, forcing me to push him out of the way. He loved licking the inside of my coffee cup and sniffing newly washed hair.  He could barely wait for us to go to bed to push deep into the covers between me and Laura and nod off.  Ah jeeze dude, we love you.

Stay Cool, I’ll See You Next Summer Pt. I

I found this picture on the Sunset Strip. Besides being very cool and mysterious (what’s up with that black shoe on the left, why was this lying on the sidewalk, who still shoots film?) this pic got me all nostalgic for summer coming to an end. Which gets me all nostalgic for the year gone by. Here’s some of my favorite things so far…

1. Carla Bozulich at Amoeba 3/25/08.

I stumbled upon one of the best shows I’ve ever seen when I arrived for a job one night on Vancouver Island BC exactly two years ago and found this poster hanging from a telephone pole. Carla Bozulich (who’s got the spookiest and most unrelenting eye contact of any artist I’ve seen) opened and immediately haunted the place with her gorgeous caterwhauling and voodoo walk through the audience. When The Tra La La Band came on-stopped on a dime-then sang together as a CHOIR, I seriously levitated right up to the rafters. This poster is one my favorite relics of rock…this March I brought it to Amoeba and got to meet her after her show. I told her the story of my luck that night, she dug it, and that’s the meaning of her inscription. I still swoon every time I look at that heart she drew! And if you haven’t heard “Smooth Jazz” or “Truth Is Dark Like Outer Space” off of Hello, Voyager-then your summer ain’t over yet! I cribbed my mantra for this year from “Paper Kitten Claw”: Every time you see the word never, you must cross it out.

2. Warning Sticker on Ryoji Ikeda’s new album TEST PATTERN

I didn’t quite believe it so I did a careful test. About 2 1/2 minutes into the last track the word “OVER” started flashing in red on my receiver. The word “OVER”. In red! I’m not kidding: how ROCK is that!

3. Tara Jane O’Neil singing “The Poisoned Mine” live at Echo Curio 8/4/08

The 2nd most memorable cry I’ve ever had at a show. Number 1: Rainer Maria singing “Burn” at Cafe Du Nord about 9 months before Catastrophe Keeps Us Together came out. It was the first time I ever heard it. Buckets, I tell you!

4. The cowbell that gets the ROCK started on“Statement”

I restart the first ten seconds of that song at least a dozen times everytime I play it. Three words: Monsters_Of_Rock.

The Album Leaf @The Echo 2/20/08 with Kill Me Tomorrow & What Laura Says Thinks And Feels.

What Laura Says Thinks And Feels are one of those bands that are awesome to see live even if you don’t like what they’re playing. Which I didn’t, but their live energy was catching and kept me cheering.

Kill Me Tomorrow is a bad ass trio from San Diego. They reminded me of all those bastard spawns of The Birthday Party, the mighty mid 80’s-early 90’s Mute triumvirate of Nick Cave and The Bad Seeds, Crime & The City Solution, and These Immortal Souls. Meaning that their songs are black epics roaring with the apocalyptic gallop of plague drums, creaking guitar, and mean, mean bass. I’ve been humming their soaring slave shanties to myself since I left the show that night. At least those I can remember: their website is about 2 years outdated and the tracks on it represent an earlier incarnation of the band that don’t sound anything like what I heard. Bummer…

I love The Album Leaf. I’d like to be their sound, that pure and beautiful energy that Arthur C. Clarke says we might evolve into one day. I’d even like to be that video projection that plays over them and the stage, all percolating electronic blips and melancholy blurs of oceans and sunlight. The Microphones make me feel OK about dying and The Album Leaf makes me hope there’s more when I do.