The past two weeks I’ve been fairly ill and haven’t found time to update my bloggy. I’m still highly uncertain about the future- i.e. my future and what I’m going to do as a living. I’ve positioned myself in a position where I’m still kinda working with radio but not. I do not want to divulge more than what is stated here for privacy reasons. Let’s just say I’ve encompassed several media opportunities that can lead to other places besides radio- WHICH IS WHAT A YOUNG PERSON LIKE ME NEEDS. If I decide to pursue media, it has to be in some interactive form cause duh, that’s the future.

Nevertheless, yes, there is always going to be that part of me that would drop life if I ever had the chance to work at the BBC in some capacity if I could live comfortably on my own on the given salary. As a US citizen, it will never happen. Maybe if I acquired a graduate degree in foreign political relations and spoke a second language, perhaps I could get a job at BBC World service in some form and capacity. It’s in the back of my mind, as are many things. I wish I knew what I wanted.

I’m always going to be a bit of a radio geek, a scary foreign KROQ fan, and slightly much to obsessed with UK Radio. I don’t see that changing.

Today at work, I found some old late 90’s style KROQ stickers on a filing cabinet (I have no idea how they got there) and the guy that worked at the desk nearby probably thought I was really weird that I took them off of the cabinet surreptiously.

Don’t even mention the words ACX to me.

DECEMBER 12th

(There’s nothing here I’d really want to see besides maybe AFI but I’m not into them as much as I was. Note, as a kid I’ve seen AFI perform when Davey used to dress like a So-cal punk band singer. That means there was NO makeup, NO bondage, and NO black clothes or hair.)
AFI
Rise Against
Alice In Chains
Thirty Seconds to Mars
Three Days Grace
Dead By Sunrise
Anberlin

DECEMBER 13
Muse
311
Slightly Stoopid
Phoenix
The Bravery
Metric
Vampire Weekend
Cage the Elephant
White Rabbits

I’ll start crying.  Well not really, but you know, it never goes away. My dad jokingly asked me earlier this week if I wanted to go to Jingle Ball. Ironically it falls as the same weekend as ACX but I’ll be home in New York with finals. The Live 105 week of NSSN and the actual NSSN is unbelieveably tempting. If I manage to catch up with my schoolwork and somehow snap, that would be something I’d be willing to go to. The bottom line is I am not ten, eleven, twelve, thirteen anymore. Rise Against, Anberlin, Unwritten Law, Pennywise, (e.g. all those so cal bands) don’t really rule as much as Vampire Weekend and Passion Pit does now. After spending most of my time in NYC, I’m used to smaller shows at clubs and seeing the bands play for an hour or two. Nevertheless, when you’ve never really experienced the ACX, like poor little me, the thought of what if always lingers.

Anyway Live 105 has something more my style with my current tastes and state of mind (Yes, I still hate on LA, DUH.)

LIVE 105 DAYS OF XMAS!

No. It’s not happening.. sigh. There’s always XFM winter wonderland? NO Jeany NO. You must stay home!!!

So as I sit here, I wonder if New York is a curse and a blessing. We’ll never have events like that in our cluster but that’s the way it is (we also never had a real alternative station either).

When I’m feeling a bit more energized, I shall resume blogging and writing again once I pickup my good ol’ laptop macbook pro from the apple store.

At least things with me are nominally better and that sorta radio sorta not radio thing I’m working on isn’t so bad. It looks better on a resume than what it actually is – at least for an undergrad.

Take one part Steve Wynn Dream Syndicate guitar, 2 parts Raspberry puree, one part voice of emotive  the love child of Serj Tankian and Tommy Shaw (find it in the  alt / prog rock section of your local Trader’s preferably the one in Glendale,) dust lightly with some finely ground Mothers of Invention, and finally add a pinch “Exploding Plastic Inevitable”.   Mix well.  Add two teaspoons John Fruisciante  into the mixture and boil down to a nice reduction.  Let cool, add two drops of alt / prog / Roger Waters and whip to a slight screamo (wait until you see peaks).   Mix some  Thurston Moore (be sure not to use any Kim Gordon though) pour into  a  9×12 ungreased pan and set aside.  Now, prepare your oven.  setting it to “burn / sizzle and pop” and trip out on the fog that forms inside.  Put the visceral confection in the oven at 425 for 30 minutes.  Soon the concoction will ignite and send sparks in all directions!  What you have here is a creation that will burn your hands but… you won’t be able to move away!!  Pour this eclectic, yummy paroxysm into your limited edition “Nick Cave” serving plate and enjoy!  Feel the sweet burn as each bite of this prodidgeous culinary course goes down.  Aint it kinda beautiful?

So I heard that Rancid opened for Chicago bred punks, Rise Against, this past summer. I grew up in Chicago (but now live in LA) and caught the tail end of the 80s hardcore scene when bands like Naked Raygun were packing them in at the Caberet Metro. Back then I couldn’t wait to mosh with the skinheads. Man, those were the days…I caught many a combat boot in the head while skanking in the pit.

So now that there’s a Chicago “Punk band” cracking the Billboard 100 I have one simple question: is Rise Against any good? Or does their straight edge vegan agenda kinda ruin it for you? Isn’t there something patently “unpunk” about being dubbed PETA’s “most animal-friendly band?” I think my cool meter just hit zero.

I heard their song “Savior” on the KROQ but thought it was The Offspring. What do you think of these guys?

AFG Must Rock!
Check out: www.TheSwaggerSticks.com

We’ve heard the clamoring all summer…”When are Silversun going to play an LA show?”

Since the release of Swoon, the band has criss-crossed the country playing numerous headlining shows and festivals, yet they still haven’t had a chance to play to their home crowd.

Ladies and gentlemen, the wait is over (almost). Silversun Pickups will headline LA Weekly’s first-ever LA 101 event on November 3 at the Gibson Amphitheatre, with two stages brought to you by the cherished local paper and KROQ.  The Dandy Warhols and Matt & Kim will join them on the main stage, with an additional acts to be announced in the coming weeks.

Tickets will go on sale Saturday, September 19 at 1pm, at LiveNation.com.

On New Year’s Eve, I found myself at Brixton Academy at an XFM show with Dan Le Sac vs Scroobius Pip and the King Blues. To my delight, I saw Alex Zane walking around. That night was a bit bizzare because I was in a dream state. I’m in my favourite city with the physical presence of one my favourite radio stations. To me, XFM was this unreachable radio stream from a far and foreign land that I could only access through my box of a laptop. And of course, there was Alex, Bob, Mark, Sunta, and Bob who always kept me awake when I had to stay up late revising for uni.

Yes Indeed. Alex Zane = REAL. At first, I was really nervous and wondered if I should’ve said anything to him. I was afraid he would think I was weird because I listened from America. I decided that I should just walk up to him and say hi because I thought, “Well, Jeany, you’re in London. Where on earth are you ever going to find Alex Zane again?”

Some minutes later, I finally introduced myself to Alex Zane and we had a good chat. I told him where I worked and that I listened from abroad. He thought that was really neat. After five minutes, he gave me his email address and offered me a week of work experience on the spot. Since I was still in “dream-mode” I gave him my email and put the piece of paper in my pocket. I just chuckled to myself thinking, “Yeah, I’m going to wake up back in my cold  New York apartment back in Midtown really soon.”

I watched the King Blues and Dan Le Sac. John Kennedy was on stage in between bands playing music. He was real too.

After the gig, my good mate from Stockwell came and collected me. At that point, I figured this was all real. I went back to my mate’s flat and told myself if that piece of paper was still in my bag the next morning, I’ll send an email to follow up. I woke up. It was there. It was real.

I emailed Producer Bob and Alex my CV (so they did not think I was some lying weirdo) and got to come up to 30 Leicester Square for work experience on the Alex Zane Breakfast show. Being in the studio with Alex, Bob, and Sunta was absolutely unreal. At that point, I was experiencing radio heroin. I couldn’t believe that Alex Zane was incredibly polite, down to earth, and really nice. Over the past year of listening to his Breakfast show, I always dreamed of what it would be like to be one of those work experience kids. I never thought I’d actually get to do it at the invitation of Alex himself. To this day, I ‘m really glad I got to spend time at one of my favourite radio stations and interact with the people that work there. XFM still is one of my favourite stations and it’s one of the few that I became attached to while in uni. So, yeah, it was all real.

Thanks to a Camfield and a Zane, some dreams could really come true. And they did. I am forever grateful too.

Fast Forward to Nine Months later….

Anyone that reads this blog knows I’m a massive KROQ and K&B fan. I’ve been one since I was six years old. In the past 3.5 years, KROQ FINALLY started broadcasting online. From that point, I was able to get K&B anytime I wanted between 8 AM – 12 PM (which is when I usually wake up). In the ancient times of my childhood, the only way I was able to hear them was when I was stuck in LA with my dad (for months on end) through an analogue radio.

This morning I found myself eating Fruity Pebbles watching the Kevin and Bean NYC webcast on my computer. The experience was incredibly trippy in many aspects.

The technological factor is not an aspect. It’s more that Kevin and Bean were broadcasting in the same building where I used to work 5 months ago. Kevin and Bean were broadcasting from the VERY SAME EXACT STUDIO where I first cracked the mic on New York radio. Many months ago, I used to help 92.3 NOW’s drivetime presenter, Tictak, in reading texts, emails, and twitters received from 92.3 NOW’s fans. Being on the radio was a fun experience when I had the time to do it. Ever since all the NYC FM stations moved to 345 Hudson, 40 W 57th became the home of the CBS Radio Corporate office. I really thought those radio studios would’ve been an office by now.

It’s really weird. Kevin and Bean are yet so close and far away. K & B were a part of my LA childhood that I absolutely enjoyed.

It’s strange that they are in my city and in the building where I used to work. I really do want to meet them, just briefly, and not take up too much of their time. However, I don’t think I will get that chance. It’s okay though.

Fate has a funny way of delivering opportunities. The opportunities from abroad that seemed impossible seemed to have worked out for me. Yet my favourite childhood radio presenters from my favourite childhood radio station are merely miles away and they still feel inaccessible. It’s a strange feeling, unsettling, but something that has to be dealt with. I’ve always wanted to go to one of those K &B band breakfasts, Weenie Roasts, or AC X’s. However, at this point, I know I never will go and right now, I’m perfectly okay with that. Some things in life are meant to be accessible and some are not.

In another twist of fate, I think San Francisco has managed to get me out of a slight LA slump. San Francisco always manages to save me from a LA-associated episode of LA related funks.

I’m absolutely certain anything associated with LA will never be for me. And that’s perfectly okay.

The interaction of people with blogs, twitter, and email is something that I still find phenomenal. It’s amazing when people find you, or when you find people, and where the interactions lead. It’s the bizzare twists of chance and random coincidence that truly boggle my mind.

In other news, I’m truly done with this blog. I’m still in the process of working on a new one that is completely unassociated with radio. This was just something I had to write.

The Pimpit Empire has been on the forefront of trend-setting amongst the 15-36 demographics for over 10 years. From the streets to the high-end department stores Pimpit has played a major role in the development of trends in the fashion industry, action sports market, and music industry. With A-Class celebrities, top rated reality shows, world renown extreme sports athletes, and powerful roots in the urban market, http://www.Pimpit.com has outfitted the biggest and the best names in every industry. This corporate leader has formed 2 other well distributed retail brands as well. Enve is the high-end boutique brand, and Code of Silence is the mass retail brand that moves major units. story The world renown website Pimpit.com has had 10 years of success in its niche market. Pimpit started out selling cool t-shirts of other hard to get, underground brands. With the website name of Pimpit.com, there was an overwhelming demand for Pimpit branded t-shirts and other great accessories. Derek Jaeger, the original founder had a vision of what was cool a decade ago, and put it to work. With his love of heavy metal, extreme sports, and urban lifestyle, he collaborated the best part of these niche groups and developed his Pimpit brand. With 10 powerful years in business as a trend-setting e-commerce website Jaeger could push is brand to the same early adopter demographics that embraced the other unique lines that have been featured on his website. Pimpit has had their hand in action sports since day one with their love for Mixed Martial Arts, also referred to as MMA. Pimpit sponsored the best of the best in the UFC as well has being a cage and mat sponsor for the massive CBS/Showtime Elite XC fights over the last 2 years. They have been able to build 2 other powerful brands with a major presence in the urban, music, and street scene. Code of Silence has had big sales online, strong retail placement in the mid-tier stores, chains such as No Fear, and even in adult boutique stores such as Hustler Hollywood. Their third brand is Enve, which caters to the 16-40 crowd that has some money to spend on their t-shirts and accessories. Some of these shirts retail for as much as $100.00. Many celebrities have sported the Pimpit Empire brands. Tommy Lee has been a Pimpit regular for the life of this company, Paris Hilton has shopped at the headquarters in Costa Mesa , Ca, and you can see Enve, Code of Silence, and Pimpit as regular mainstays on just about every MTV reality show. With the state of the economy and small retailers closing their doors daily, Pimpit.com will be among those retailers continuing to positively grow. Watch for the first action sports, lifestyle online community the Pimpit Nation that launched in December 2008 on Pimpit.com.

The host hazy and dusty race tracks are not the normal habitat of wolves. No, I picture wolves living in the misty mountain hops of vampire infested forests up in Northern America. But I wasn’t interested in spotting your average wolves. I was jonesing to see the kind of hard rock wolves who are native to Australia’s open plains. Wolfmother. They will do just fine in Pomona’s Fairplex.

I kidnapped my British friend, Som, and we headed south, outside the comfortable political and social strata of Los Angeles county. for KROQ’s Epicenter Music Festival. This being the inaugural year, they nabbed headliners Tool, Linkin Park and Alice In Chains but upon arriving, it seems that not even metal/grunge/rock juggernauts could overpower an economy on life support. Of course there are always those with disposable incomes, or meth labs in their basements…

As the backstage area slowly filled with Monster energy drink abusers of all types, the gifting suite filled up with ear plug hawkers and a laser tag course (with air rifles) was constructed in the massive media/artist building. I was quickly and succinctly shot in the face by a man in a Return Of The Jedi shirt, who was on a laser shooting spree while carrying on a cell phone conversation. C’est la Pomona vie.

The dusty field slowly became dotted with barrel-chested men in black Tool shirts, Street Sweeper Social club were adequately received, save for a few boos lobbed at them when they made political statements about sending troops overseas to fight in Iraq. You’re not in Los Angeles, anymore, Morello. Click your Hollywood heels three times. These men like their guns. And my guess is they don’t want you to kill their grandma with healthcare options.

As Som sought out his friends in the band, Hollywood Undead, I managed to spot an Australian red backed wolf, in fact the leader of his pack. Andrew Stockdale and I sat in the back of the artist tent, near where the caterers were inexplicably serving up tray after tray of hot brussel sprouts…By the way, really? Brussel sprouts? How is that a rock n roll food? Like Linkin Park is gonna come rolling through and say “Oooh I’m gonna eat the crap outta those brussell sprouts!” But I digress…

Andrew and I lounged amidst the stench of rockin’ brussel sprouts and talked about his return to sunny LA, where the band had recorded their latest release, Cosmic Egg. Andrew wholeheartedly admitted that the October 13th drop date was a nod to my birthday. He knows better to disappoint me. I mean, he does live in the land down under, but LA is like his second home so he does have to worry about making me unhappy. And how did he feel about being back in his second home?

“I do like LA. I’m interested in all the different sides to it.”

Yeah, we know. Our city can be just as bi-polar as it’s inhabitants.  That’s why we self medicate or meditate. And speaking of our namaste ways, what of the folklore that Cosmic Egg was named after some crazy yoga pose Andrew found himself in?

“Yeah, I think it was some resting pose, I’m not sure. It could have been the fetal pose. It must have been a tripped out instructor for sure.”

Tripped out sounds about right. But the Cosmic Egg is also a Hindu symbol often used to describe what we call the big bang theory. Did that factor into naming the album?

“I was interested in something I read about black holes being the end of time but now they think they’re the beginning. So it’s the end of the beginning. Or, it’s a new universe. If that makes sense. I didn’t even know all that was behind the name when I heard it. I just thought it sounded cool!”

With all the talk about the beginning and the end of the universe, and 2012 quickly approaching, anyone who is still following he Mayan calendar would be getting a little uneasy. So is this the end of days? Or is the cosmic egg cracking open something wonderful and new?

“When I first started writing songs, there were a lot of environmental issues in the press and we did shows for lower emissions. So, some of my songs are about the end of the world. You know: ‘The sun’s getting closer! We’ve got to change our ways!’ But I’m glad there are only one or two songs in there like that. One of the songs is called ‘The Violence Of The Sun’…there’s nothing hippie about it. It’s this burning mass of destruction. The environment is violent. Evolution is violent.”

As out discussion starts to get farther from mysticism: (star showers, wolves, and eggs) and further into science and the temperature of the earth’s core, Andrew gets uneasy and balks.

“I don’t want to be overly intellectual about it.” He pauses and adjusts his grey vest. “Not that I could be.” He adds, laughing.

Well, then it seems that he’s come to the right place. I don’t want to generalize but after watching Boots Riley and Tom Morello get booed, the field outside seems to be a giant mass of duh being stirred up with beer and energy cocktails. Since when did it become uncool to be smart? Was it dummy pimps, like Palin, who made the intellectual a dirty name?

“You don’t have to be dumb,” Andrew starts out carefully, “but I think it’s important to be instinctive and expressive and have passion. That goes a long way. And not being too strategic too. I saw this thing on Picasso. He wanted to get one of his mistresses pregnant so she’d be less intellectual and more in tune with life.”

Point taken.  Intellect and instinct both have their place. And I am hereby doubling up on condoms. Just in case.

As his band mates begin to shuffle by and get ready to head toward the stage, I ask Andrew if he’s seen It Might Get Loud. He hasn’t yet, but we talk about Jimmy Page and Wolfmother’s big date, opening for Led Zeppelin when they were inducted into the Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame. I point out that they are most likely the last band to ever do so and that the pressure would drive someone like me to drink.

“I sat in the backstage area and played that solo (Communication Breakdown) about fifty times before we walked out there. The bizarre thing is that James Brown was there to induct himself and he looked over at me and I gave him a little wave and he waved back. He died the next day. It’s amazing. It’s like he stayed alive just for that.”

Andrew kind of pauses, lost in the moment. A cameraman tripping over himself in front of us brings Andrew back to storytelling mode.

“Anyway we went and did Communication Breakdown. My monitor on the stage stopped working. The sound was blaring. I couldn’t hear a thing so I thought I just better go for it. It was the highest I have ever sung in my life!”

I start to laugh, picturing Andrew’s already soaring voice reaching the outer galaxies. I mention to him that whales and dolphins across the seas were with him in spirit that day. He made a legion of marine life into Zep fans that day. He smiles at the thought. I think I might have just inspired some album art work or posters for the next round.

Andrew gets ready to rock the Pomonians, but before he does, I ask him one last question. If the epicenter is the point of an underground explosion, what does he think is the next underground explosion about to hit our culture?

“Aw, I haven’t even had time to think about good stuff like that. Easy listening? Bossanova! Like Jose Feliciano? Really beautiful bossanova music.

I tell him he could start the trend today. He’s got a big audience awaiting him with rapt attention.

“Yeah, maybe I’ll bring out the nylon string today.”

If anyone could pull it off, it would be Stockdale, who has managed to bring back a classic rock sound without aping the genre. Luckily for those about to rock out at the Epicenter Festival, Andrew and the wolf crew kept it hard and loud. Mixing some new blue cheer tunes like California Queen and New Moon Rising, with old popular Zep twinged tunes like Woman, White Unicorn and Dimension, the audience roared with a whole lotta love.

credit: Firecloud

The Cosmic egg was cracked and the kids gobbled it up and were left wanting more.

May I suggest maybe releasing a b–sides rarities album? Something with a dolphin on the cover.

At the sweaty, smoky dust bowl they call the Fairplex in Pomona, I hid out in the Epicenter artist tent, getting spoiled with laser tag games, free lip gloss and massages. It’s not that I hate music or anything, it’s that other than a curiosity about Street Sweeper Social Club and a burning desire to see Wolfmother and Alice In Chains, I had a tepid interest in the other groups and a strong distaste for the oafs who kept hitting on me. Plus I was getting a sunburn, which kept worsening despite the hazy clouds.

One highlight of my day, OK my week, was hanging out with one of the coolest, funniest and most talented cats in underground hip hop, Aesop Rock.

I swear, if I could only sell one of the networks on a rap sketch show, it’s be a massive hit. I’d add Aesop to my Murs and Me show and that shit would be an instant classic. Guaranteed.

As we sat in the ice cold air conditioning, avoiding the sweaty masses outside, here’s a bit of how we passed the time.

ALI ON THE AIR: Soooo. First things first. Are they remaking Beverly Hills Cop? Or Police Academy?

AESOP ROCK: They are remaking Beverly Hills Cop but I wish they were remaking Police Academy again. Why stop a good thing? It’s pretty much the Harry Potter of the police movie world.

AOTA: I saw the first two Police Academy movies and I wasn’t sure what other scrapes they could get into. To be honest, I’m not sure my heart could handle it.

AESOP: Understood. Tackleberry with his guns all the time…

AOTA: Do you ever sample the noises that Michael Winslow makes?

AESOP: I saw that guy recently on TV and he’s still doing that shit. He’s still doing the robot noise. I found myself wishing I could do it. At first I was like ‘he’s still doing the same thing?’ And then I was like ‘That’s awesome man!’.

AOTA: You have a video on your page about building robots.

AESOP: It has a sad ending. There were three…my friend Cage was with us and…at the end there were supposed to be these theremin style synthesizers that had a robot face and the eyes were light sensitive. It required soldering. It was something we thought we could get stoned and do in a half hour. Six hours later with the soldering iron…we’re like shit. Now it’s a pile of robot guts sitting in the corner of the room that my wife keeps asking if she can throw out. ‘No! One day I’ll fix it!’

AOTA: You probably could’ve recorded an entire album in the time it took to NOT build those robots. But hey, it’s the journey, I guess. You’ve known Cage a while?

AESOP: I met Cage in New York. But I was a fan of his. I didn’t really get to know him until he signed to the label (Def Jux) in 2003or four. He’s been doing underground rap in New York for a long time. He had records out in the nineties. He would go on college shows and for a while I looked up to him. I still do but now I know him. A lot of these guys are a couple years older than me, and they were guys who, when I was trying to make a little noise, it was directly plotting what they had been doing. Cage is one of those guys. And now we’re friends.

AOTA: And you popped up in his video. And you collaborate with him. You started out studying painting. You don’t see collaboration in the art world like that. Except maybe Banksy, but he ain’t exactly asking permission.

Banksy

AESOP: The current generation of street artists who turn into gallery artists do collaborate, but it’s mostly in music. It’s a gift and a curse. You don’t want to see every song have a ‘featuring so and so’ cause it’s like…well what did YOU do? But, yeah, it’s cool I have a group of go-to people. I have a small network of people if and when I need them. At the same time, I try and keep the collaborations to only a couple per album, because that gets to be too much and looks like you can’t complete it yourself. But it’s so cool that dudes I used to tape off the radio, I can now call them and say, ‘Hey do this thing with me’. I definitely never take that for granted.

AOTA: I should say thank you…and also I hate you, for contributing to the whole nike/ipod song sync up thing. At first I thought it was so cool to have a sensor in your shoe to match up to your i pod and your music. But then, what a nightmare. Now I’m held accountable. My ipod knows how slow or lazy I am. Thanks a lot, Aesop.

AESOP: Oh, hell. I’m not getting on a treadmill. Luckily my wife runs so I was like ‘Oh this will be great. She can be my lab rat and test it out.’ I’d make ten minutes of music for them…they said ‘We need it in forty days’. Now, I’d been working on my own album for two years. It was about an hour plus of music. And they want this in forty days? So I’d say ‘Hey honey, here’s seven minutes of music. Go run to it!’ It worked! She’d have some notes about where the levels of intensity should go and I’d rework it and send her out again.

AOTA: Why do I see you like Burt Young, the coach in Rocky, driving along side her in the car, making her run in the street?

AESOP:  Yeah. The best is when I turned it into Nike before it was fully mixed. They had a room full of people running on treadmills to it. And the runners had notes for me! Part of me wanted to say “Fuck you! You don’t understand what I’m doing with my music.” But it was to serve a purpose. It’s for people who run. Gotta meet in the middle as what’s best for a runner and what’s best for a stubborn little musician guy.

AOTA: For some of the milestone points, they had people like Lance Armstrong or Tiger Woods with pre-recorded congratulations messages. They didn’t have you do that. I want to hear what you would have said at the ten mile mark.

AESOP: I would’ve said “Fuck you! You’re never gonna make it, you pussy!” HA! Cause every time I’ve joined a gym and they give you a free training session I’m like, ‘Cool, let me cash in on this.’ And last time, the trainer…I just hate having people telling me what to do. They’re there to push you, but they’re just yelling at you. My last trainer experience, ugh. He googled me. Half way through I knew I was never coming back. I had to write a letter saying ‘Hey it’s been cool and you worked me hard, but I feel like crap. So I’m not coming it tomorrow…but you’re awesome!’. And then I’d keep seeing him at the gym. So now I don’t go.

AOTA: Felt 3? You’re not allowed to talk about it? Is it like Fight Club?

AESOP: No, I can now! I’m producing it. I can’t say who the dedication is. It’s definitely a woman. And its definitely an actress.

AOTA: Paris Hilton.

AESOP: I said an actress. And one that kinda hasn’t been in the spotlight for a while.

AOTA: Paris Hilton.

AESOP: I can tell you it’s NOT Paris Hilton.

breaking news - it's Rosie Perez

AOTA: But I’m close? See? I’m getting answers out of you. So, Dewana’s Bridal. A film short. You’re doing the score?

AESOP: Yeah, I’m psyched! Ace Norton, a director who did the video for Coffee off my last record (None Shall Pass), he did a horror movie style video. We hit it off really well. Now when I go home, there will be a cut of the movie. It’s officially scoring something.

AOTA: Yeah and you don’t have to make people run.

AESOP: No! I get to sit there in the dark and eat Junior Mints.

AOTA: That’s the opposite of running. So you’re performing later at this here Epicenter festival. Which is the name for an underground explosion. What do you think is the next big underground explosion?

AESOP: Uuhhhh, I don’t think it’s here today. Musically?

AOTA: Whatever. Music. Junior Mints. Cake.

AESOP: I do love Ace of Cakes. Did you see that cake in the gifting suite we were in? The woman was like, ‘Look at this cake. It’s make by a rock n roll bakery.’ And it’s totally just a bullshit version of an Ace of Cakes cake. B rate Ace Of Cakes. I love those Ace guys and the people over there should be fucking ashamed to be in the same category as creative cake makers.

AOTA: You need to use REAL guitar strings when you make a guitar shaped cake. None of this licorice whip string bullshit. I want to be able to play a b flat!

AESOP: Agreed! I want engines and small motors! Hmmm. Where’s the underground explosion? When I took Black Moth Super Rainbow on tour with me last time I thought they were really good…I would sample them if they were obsure and from another decade. I thought they were doing some cool shit. And the other thing I like about them…I feel like I fumble through everything I’ve ever done. I look around here at this KROQ festival and I’m like, this is ridiculous. What the fuck am I doing here? And Tom is a ball of talent who is nervous who doesn’t know how to say hi to the world, which is how I feel sometimes. Most music people are hermits and them they pull you out of your shell and they’re like go do KROQ! So here I am. I’m not saying I’m the next underground explosion but it’ be nice if I could still make some kind of explosion.

***

I so wish it would’ve been one of him exploding out of that bullshit cake. Alas, that was not to be. The KROQ kids had to settle for a cakeless Aesop Rock set which is still enough to rock Marie Antoinette’s ass off any day.

By Ryan – HodgeBlodge Merrymaker

Here’s a fact you cannot rise above/ we’ll have problems (yeah) then we’ll have bigger ones…

If you’ve heard of the band Harvey Danger it’s probably for one of two reasons.  1) Mike told you about them.  Or 2) you remember their one hit single Flagpole Sitta.  As with all Wonders, this one track got them on plenty of soundtracks and radio station rock festivals but ultimately it couldn’t get people to listen to their entire body of work.

And all those that never looked deeper than Sitta missed out on a wonderful collection of songs.  Harvey Danger—which even to fans of the band is a stupid name for a band—wrote about losing a parent (Jack the Lion), wrote about what all songs are written about (wine, women, and song), and wrote about whatever Sad Sweetheart of the Rodeo is about.  But to me their best song is, and will always be, Problems and Bigger Ones which is, not surprisingly, about breaking up.

Cross through the border states to the wrong side/ look away Virginia

Of course the fact that Harvey Danger got any notoriety at all is somewhat of a fluke.  Formed as a college band in Seattle in 1992, the fact that nerd-rock was able to get any college-radio airplay in the time and place of Nirvana just seems ridiculous in hindsight. Then again their first real show fittingly took place about two weeks after Kurt Cobain’s death in April of ’94.

The man was very helpful but I knew he wouldn’t stay/ there used to be a baby but the baby went away

I guess given the sheer number of bands trying to make it, any time one actually does break through it’s always going to seem weird, but Harvey Danger’s big break came when an intern for London Records decided he—since he couldn’t convince his major label to support them—would personally fund an album for the band.

They got plenty of attention in their hometown, but KROQ of all places made them big.  (I know we’re “LA” and all that, and maybe it’s just because I never leave Long Beach, but KROQ always feels like a local radio station to me. I’m always blown away when I hear just what kind of trend-setter KROQ actually is.)  Anyway, when Flagpole Sitta hit the LA airwaves Harvey Danger lived the next 12 months like they were in a certain Tom Hanks movie.  But we know how the movie ends, and judging by the fact that you haven’t heard Harvey Danger on the radio since then, you can probably figure out that their story ended about the same way.

Spiteful confrontations/Trial Separations/It’s just another present, to get past

The band went back and made another album, King James Version.  There was some label trouble and ultimately there were poor sales and just a genuine lack of interest, so the band broke up.  Took two years off.  Got back together.  Made an EP, started touring again and made a full-length album.  Obviously nothing matched the success of that first album but for the last few years they have been chugging along.

Spend every day like the past is a bridge, crossing 20 years/ whispers away/ not so much/get your poison tongue out of my ear

You’ve stuck with me this long so I’ll cut to the punchline: I was 15 when I first heard Harvey Danger’s album Where Have All the Merrymakers Gone? And I’ve been listening to them non-stop since.  I have never seen them live—I was supposed to once but things feel through (a whole ‘nother story)—but anyway they have announced they are breaking up.  For good this time.  It very nearly fell below my radar; I am embarrassed to admit that I thought they already were broken up.  But I’m seeing them this Saturday night for their last show outside of Seattle—they then go back home and will play three final hometown shows.

Forswear what you undergo/ You wanted to go alone though

But before they are gone for good I just had to tell you about them.  To tell you that this is a smart, funny, talented band.  How many bands can quote Bob Dylan in one song and F. Scott Fitzgerald (show me a hero, and I’ll write you a tragedy) in another?  Maybe this is my aggrandizing of my twelve-year love affair with them, but I honestly believe they were the forbearers of Death Cab and Modest Mouse and a lot of other stuff that you love.  They tasted real success with what was probably their 7^th best track from Merrymakers, and now they are playing one last show.  My favorite song of theirs, Problems and Bigger Ones was on that first album so surely it wasn’t written with this moment in sight, but it really feels like it was written with this moment in mind.  All bands breakup one way or another, and clearly before it all had even begun for them, Harvey Danger had made their peace with it all ending.

I guess I’m going to have to too.

It doesn’t make me cry to hear Dylan say/ most likely you go your own way/I’ll go mine…I’ll go mine…

Here I invented a punk band from scratch, using the Minutemen, the Germs, and Violent Femmes as templates/inspiration, for a supernatural L.A.-centered music-industry novel I’ve been tackling off and on since leaving Rhino in 2007. This is a brief peek into the group’s backstory. (Real scene vets will scoff.) As for the overall book, imagine W.P. Kinsella at the corner of Hollywood and Cherokee.

Distant Suffering
(1980s)

Years Active
1980-1985

Hometown
Pico Rivera, CA

Genres
Rock
Folk
Protest
Anti-Folk
Avant-Garde
Jazz
Funk

Members
Jason “Broken” Sanchez
Dennis “Deep” Patton
Simon Arch

Discography
1980: Four Square Alarmed [EP] (Skydog Records)
1980: Will Pay Damages, Even If Physical [EP] (Skydog Records)
1980: Come Out Screaming [Live EP] (Skydog Records)
1981: The Greatness of Man Is Genocide (Skydog Records)
1982: Lies, Betrayals, Swindles & Laws (Skydog Records)
1983: Idiot Christ (Skydog Records)
1983: The Tide of Disruption [EP] (Skydog Records)
1984: One Nation Under the Thumb (Skydog Records)
1985: Society Eats It, Excretes It, Defeats It (Skydog Records)
1985: Simple Simon Met the Pie-Eyed [split 7-inch, limited] (Lost Sanchelez Records)
1985: Never Let Them Hear You Think (Skydog Records)

Excerpted from Distant Suffering’s All Music Guide biography (author: Thom Josewski):

According to legend, Distant Suffering literally collided into existence at El Rancho High School in Pico Rivera, California, in the spring of 1979. Eighteen-year-old Jason Sanchez, known derisively around campus as “‘Broken” Sanchez (short for “Heartbroken”; Sanchez eventually discarded the apostrophe) for his failed attempts to seduce female classmates with overwrought poetry, was leaving the school’s parking lot in his 1974 Chevy Nova when he metal-kissed classmate Dennis Patton’s 1978 Plymouth Duster, pinching its tail-light into a blind squint. Sanchez scribbled a quick apologetic note (“Will pay damages, even if physical,” which would later provide the title for DS’ breakthrough EP) with his address and telephone number and stuffed it under the Duster’s left wiper. Taking the note’s contents literally, an incensed Patton raced to Sanchez’s quiet suburban home looking for a fight. Instead of fisticuffs, the two discovered a mutual but definitely unspoken affection for the punk rock then emerging from New York and blossoming on their own coast, thanks to exposure on Rodney Bingenheimer’s Rodney on the ROQ, a popular program on Los Angeles’ KROQ-FM.

After their high school graduation in 1979, Sanchez and Patton became fixtures in Hollywood during the dying embers of punk’s infant glow. They were a familiar sight at the corner of Hollywood and Cherokee avenues, where they busked for bus fare home. “We weren’t very good,” Patton recalled years later, “but no one strummed an out-of-tune acoustic guitar like Sanch. He made it scream. We made five, ten bucks a week easy.” Their site selection had a strategic purpose: Across the street was Brendan Mullen’s club, The Masque, burrowed in a downstairs basement thrumming with bass. Just up Cherokee’s steady incline were the notorious Canterbury apartments, where L.A.’s punk glitterati squatted rent-free for years. Patton would fondly recount watching Darby Crash wobble up the sidewalks, legs rendered rubbery by the mountainous trek up Cherokee. “He spewed a beer river near my shoes one night,” Patton laughed. “He said, ‘Don’t take it personally. Your music’s fine.’ When Darby died I put those shoes in a closet like religious artifacts.”

Unlike most street musicians, Sanchez and Patton’s hit parade were improvised real-time sociopolitical streams or juvenile screeds against women who’d turned the corner only moments before, noses aimed high. “Our songs were spur-of-the-moment meaningless,” Patton once quipped, “but they were ours.” Only one of those improvisations survived to be recorded (launching the invective-laced fury of debut EP Four Square Alarmed, in fact), and the full band encored with it at every live performance until the end. “We’d come back out onstage and whip on our beat-up acoustics,” Patton said, “and the old-timers from the scene went apeshit.” The song, of course, was “Fuck You (Cop Car),” two breakneck minutes of expletives stumbling down a verbal mountain until somersaulting into the cathartic yelp “Cop car!” The instant perennial was born in the fall of 1980, with Sanchez, belly warm with spirit, yelling and strumming “Fuck you!” in a furious one-word roll until a black-and-white materialized at cruising speed down Hollywood Boulevard. “Cop car!” he shouted after it. The duo made it an inspired duet, both bellowing the denouement whenever 5.0 glided past. Passersby would often request “that ‘Cop Car’ song” and respond giddily when their favorite part came. “We knew it was a hit right away,” Patton later recalled, noting that the song accounted for 70 percent of their tips. “‘Cop Car’ got me bus fare, Big Macs, and Iron Man comics,” he said, “so, yeah, it’s been good to me.”

Six months of steady busking resulted in the duo’s first serious booking. The Masque had shuttered by then, but the Starwood was at full steam — and one night found itself in desperate need of an opening act for the visiting Lemminz, a short-lived Polydor act from Manchester. Someone suggested the scruffy, melody-assaulting teenagers who’d transformed the Hollywood/Cherokee T-section into a Dylanesque nightmare for foot traffic. “We were supposed to be a novelty,” Sanchez said in 1982. “They thought they’d get us onstage and we’d be cute for a few laughs. Me and Pat decided, ‘Fuck that — we’re gonna be a real band.’”

Excerpted from “Sanchez Breaks,” Fuckin’ Up #4, June-July 1982:

Q: So Simon comes in.

A: Yeah. What happened was, some guy from the Starwood just came up to us and said, “We hear you guys are really good, and everyone talks about you, and we’ve got this band coming in, but they need a local supporting act” — you know, that trip, which we loved. What the hey, right? We’re 19 years old. But we also knew why they asked us to do it. We weren’t totally stupid. We were supposed to be a novelty. They thought they’d get us onstage and we’d be cute for a few laughs, like, “Hey, it’s those guys! What are they doing onstage? That’s some funny shit.” Me and Pat decided, “Fuck that — we’re gonna be a real band.” We were serious, you know? We wanted to be legit.

Q: Did you think of Simon right away, like “We know just the guy”?

A: Kinda. We knew about Simon; he was the same class as us. But he was a jock. One of the untouchables, you know? Girls liked him. Moms liked him. Everyone liked him. He had a bad-ass Corvette. He had these thick fuckin’ surfer arms. He was good at anything with a ball. He wasn’t punk to us at all. But Pat knew he played the drums, so that was one advantage he had. Cuz we didn’t know anybody else who played anything!

Q: So how hard was it to approach the “popular” kid?

A: You know, I thought it would be hard. He’d laugh at us and kick our asses or something. But Simon was really cool about the whole thing. We’d graduated, so all that status stuff was meaningless. He was working at Pioneer Chicken back then, right up front where the chicks could see him. The owner got off on having a local celebrity athlete hawk his grub. Pat went in one night — we decided he’d be the one to do it, since he once said, “Hi” to Simon at a Jeff Deaver party that summer — and pushed his way past the tits and ass and said, “Hey, man, wanna be in our band?” Simon was like, “What kind of band?” Pat’s like, “We make a bunch of noise to piss people off.” And Simon says, “Sure.”

Excerpted from “Interview with Simon Arch,” Long-Gone Suicide #12, December 1986:

SA: I didn’t know those guys at all. They were off my radar in high school. My priorities were totally different: pussy, football, surfing, and beer. I’ve crossed football off the list since then [laughs]. I knew about Sanch because of his nickname. All the kids called him Broken Sanchez. Most people think it’s a punk name, but it goes back to before punk. They called him Broken because he couldn’t score with chicks. Maybe his dick was broken, maybe his heart was broken, or maybe the little chemical mechanism that made him attractive to women was broken. Or maybe he couldn’t communicate with them properly. I don’t remember. Today everyone’s like “What a cool name,” but for many years Sanch didn’t think it was so cool. He made it his own, though. Pat I think was just a run-of-the-mill stoner with rich parents. He had a nice car, which Sanch nicked. Which is how the band started, as you know.

MICK DIXON: What did you think when Dennis Patton asked you to join his band?

SA: I thought, Why the hell not? I didn’t have anything else to do that summer but drink, fuck, and surf. Variety is the spice of life. [laughs]

MD: What did you think of punk rock? Were you aware of it?

SA: Not really. I’d seen pictures of all the Mohawks and safety pins and whathaveyou, and honestly, I thought it was some fag trip. I liked Led Zeppelin. John Bonham. Keith Moon. Billy Cobham was my man too.

MD: It’s funny you mention Billy Cobham, because ordinarily you wouldn’t think a jock would be into fusion jazz!

SA: Well…I mean, the dumb jock is something of a stereotype, just as much as punkers being a bunch of violent douchebags is a stereotype. The guys had to get over that too. I had to keep telling them, “You know, just because I was All-State doesn’t mean I don’t care about nuclear war.” [laughs] But I’d actually been drumming since I was seven, so I could appreciate people who did it well or just flattened me as musicians. I knew my way around the kit, which gave me an advantage over the guys when the band first started rehearsing. They were used to just strumming whatever the fuck they wanted. I had to rein them in and show them how to stay on beat and write some hooks, some riffs. At first they were pissed, but, actually, I was just talking to Pat the other day and he said, “Simon, you were the discipline we needed,” which made me feel real good.

MD: The famous story goes that you were working at Pioneer Chicken –

SA: Yep. Right there on Whittier Boulevard in downtown Whittier, California. It’s gone now, I think. I haven’t been back to Whittier in years. But, yeah, I was working there and one day DP comes in and says, “You play drums, right?” I told him yeah, and he said, “You wanna be in our band?” I asked, “Well, what kind of music do you play?” He goes, “Noise.” Boy, was he right about that!

MD: What was your first impression of them?

SA: Total shit. Sanch thought he was Bruce Springsteen, but old Bruce, back when all he did was write a mess of words and hope the music came close, like “It’s Hard to be a Saint in the City” and shit like that. They both played guitars, but only Sanch had any promise whatsoever. I told DP, “Maybe you should play bass.” He said, “Fuck that Geddy Lee shit.” [laughs] I had to inform him that he would have to sell his soul and both balls to ever be as good as Geddy Lee, so we fought for a while about that, until I asked him to play the line from “Spirit of Radio,” which he couldn’t do. Your honor, I rest my case! [laughs] Sanch had rhythm, but because he now had an electric guitar instead of an acoustic guitar, he thought every song needed a solo. “You don’t have the chops!” I remember yelling that at him throughout our first rehearsal. “You don’t have the chops! Stop wanking off! You suck!” [laughs] Boot camp had begun!

I’m making it sound like it was terrible, but, really, it wasn’t a total loss. When they played me “Cop Car” for the first time, I couldn’t wait to pound on that motherfucker. It’s that song that made me want to join their band. It blew my mind. It was so simple we could play that song forever. Real genius. But we had our work cut out for us. Two weeks to get our shit together for Starwood. Sometimes I just told them, “Hey, they want your street act. Just go do your street act!” They said no, they wanted to be taken seriously. This was their Dylan Goes Electric.

From Stopgap (Vol. 12, No. 6):

Who The Fuck Are The Lemminz,
And Why Do They Think They’re Punk?

by Jeff Stoppard

If you happened to open the Starwood doors last Friday night, I hope you were wearing waders and holding your nose, because the swill that spilled out was the toxic chum of bullshit corporate punksters the Lemminz, about the faggiest name for a talentless haggle of sooeys since Blue Oyster Cult. Imagine the Byrds with Desi Arnaz Jr. trying to perpetrate a Dicks fraud. Their lead singer looks like he barely escaped Blue Cheer with his potbelly intact. I swear someone in the audience saw the bass player flailing away, pretending he didn’t play the instrument for 200 years in Emerson, Lake & Palmer, and asked, “Dad, is that you?” Behind embarrassing song titles like “Lost Little Punker Girl” and “What the Cool Kids Don’t Know,” Polydor thinks they’re the second coming of the Pistols. I think Polydor’s A&R reps should stop mixing airplane glue with highballs. Better yet, they should all throw themselves under trains. The only saving grace was opener Gilby & The Dilholes, the professional moniker for a couple JDs who stand like statues in Hollywood harassing tourists with songs about mayonnaise and pigs (cops). They’re young and they can’t play for shit, but we all lustily bellowed along with the showstopping “Cop Cars,” [sic] which sounds amazingly hardcore with recent addition Simon Arch, obviously a real musician, drilling holes in his kit (drums, you sicko). Now if only the Lemminz would do the same to theirs (you’re right this time). Not a total waste, but management needs a spanking for that headliner. Bleargh.

Excerpted from “One Night Only: Gilby and the Dillholes!”, Music-Verse Monthly [U.K.] (Vol. 12, No. 10), October 1997:

[Dennis Patton] I’ve had a thousand people come up to me and say they were at that first Starwood show. I know some of them are full of it, cos I don’t recall more than 40 people in the whole venue — and I personally knew about ten of them! Four of them are dead now! Jesus. But it’s become part of the legend. Truth is, it wasn’t that special. People remember it being better than it was because the Lemminz were so bad. You had to be there. I never bought that album of theirs, but someone at their label must’ve been out of his mind. I hope that person got fired, cos live those guys were pathetic. Just awful. I remember they had a song that went — and I’ll never forget this lyric as long as I live — ‘Welcome to the mauling/Our leather spikes are calling’ ['Pump Your Fists and Rise,' from The Lemminz Are Cummin'! (1979)—Ed.]. They were, ugh, like bad BTO mixed with Venom. Spinal Tap all the way. Sometimes just for fun Sanch and I would sing that on tour. The audience always got it.

[The band name] was Sanch’s idea. We knew it was gonna be a one-off. We just wanted to get a show under our belt, and it was the first thing out of his mouth. He was Gilby, we were the Dillholes. You could say it was juvenile, but we were 18-19 years old, for Chrissakes. It went with our aesthetic. We’d been the goofy kids from East L.A. in Hollywood, harmless. Now it was time to make our move. At first it was just me and Sanch, but then we recruited Simon, and Simon really worked us to death, shaped us until we were kind of a real band. He was Mickey to our Rocky. We didn’t have quite that dramatic a change, but in two weeks of rehearsals we’d gotten to be a pretty tight unit, so much that when we got to the Starwood people were taken aback. Oh, you know, they’re serious. Which is what we wanted. We weren’t looking to be a joke. We were looking to be an experience.

Untitled interview with Broken Sanchez, Flowers Dead #3, February 1981:

BS: I’d heard stories about the Germs and the Stooges, where the guys would cut themselves up or smear peanut butter all over themselves, but that wasn’t me. I was inspired by that, but that wasn’t me. I felt we had to be memorable beyond that stupid name. So I took it upon myself to become a master showman, ha ha. I’m a pretty big hombre, but I’m agile. I just started bouncing around, pretending like I was throwing my entire body into every riff. I had long, curly hair, which of course went everywhere, like Neil Young.  I’d flick sweat; my entire body would be this wet sheet. You could peel it off me like orange skin. I’d pull at my guitar neck like I was keeping a little kid from getting hit by a train, then shoving him back in front of it. The whole band got way into it too. Deep [Dennis Patton] was rockin’ his ass off and Archie was through the floor. I remember beginning the show by telling the crowd, “The next band blows nutsac worse than us, so cherish this memory.” That little moment before we dismantle your whole world.

Excerpted from “Interview with Simon Arch,” Long-Gone Suicide #12, December 1986:

MD: Then there’s the infamous Starwood show…

SA: That legend is totally overblown, in my opinion. The truth is, we were terrible that night, but we were terrible in an interesting way. Sanch copped to it from the start. He opened by saying, “Ladies and gentlemen, we suck, we know we suck, but everyone except our drummer can’t play a fuckin’ thing. The next band sucks worse, and they’re professional musicians. Who wouldja rather see?” [laughs] The Lemminz weren’t too happy about that, but it was true. That was Sanch, always startin’ shit. I spent most of the evening either playing catch-up with Deep and Sanch because when they got nervous, they got really fast, because they wanted to get off as quick as possible — or trying to pull them back into the actual beat. I felt like their fucking dad. [laughs] There were a couple times they got loose and the audience started pulling away, and I’m shouting over the feedback, “‘Cop Car’! ‘Cop Car’!” — our crowd-pleaser — trying to win everybody back. We played that a few times that night, once for about ten minutes. We’d stop whatever song we were mangling and dive right in. Over the years it’s gotten this, like, mythical status, but that night I almost crapped my OPs on pure fear. I didn’t feel very legendary barfing in that grimy-ass men’s toilet, wondering if I hadn’t made the stupidest career choice ever.

From “20 Years of Distant Suffering,” Magenta, Spring 2000:

DENNIS PATTON: “It’s weird. Now that I think about it, the Starwood show was the beginning of the end. It was obvious that we weren’t gonna be Hollywood mascot clowns no more, so that was one strike against us. When we got some decent press that wasn’t ‘Look at these weird dumbass kids playing street guitar,’ but, ‘Wow, what a great band,’ all our original fans started turning on us. ‘Oh, they’re selling out.’ ‘They have ambition.’ ‘They’re recording an album.’”

by SolitaryJohn

Yeah, the piece titled “Whale Sub” by “Backburner”, of Kongregate.com, won some Kongregate contest. I could give less of a rat’s ass about that. What I do care about, is how f*@#ing awesome this is.

http://jimsdrawingboard.blogspot.com/2009/07/whale-sub-or-little-sprezzatura.html

I’ve got it as desktop background on my 22′ Desktop screen, and GOD it looks impressive. Now I’ll go hide all of those annoying icons and folders.

God, I suck at painting.

This has suddenly made me come down with a case of “Kevin Syndrome”. Back earlier this year, Kevin and Bean called up some mountain-climbing kid. He was around 18, and had already climbed the highest peaks in all 7 continents. Kevin, after hearing all this, advised the kid to “slow down”. If he had done all this stuff in his youth, what would he do later? (Also, he was inadvertently making Kevin look bad.) “Backburner” makes me look bad.

Now I’ve got a strong urge to go paint. Like, NOW.

Picture time:

The whale is a sub. Ingenious, no? (Ingenuous too, in that it's such a childish depiction of fantasy. Suck on it, Joe. Suck on the Blue whale. The one that we nearly bought @ target for the "Adopt a Family" kid.)

PS: I’m pretty sure it was Kevin, not Bean, who got showed up.

Anyone that reads this blog knows that Kevin and Bean was and always will be one of my favourite morning shows! Recently, KROQ’s Bean was on summer holiday in Finland and sent me a postcard! How thoughtful was that?

One interesting fact about Bean is that he has a fascination with Christmas music! He has a blog dedicated to finding cool christmas songs called http://www.christmasmusiceveryday.com

If you click here, you can see a picture with KROQ’s Bean with a Santa Claus in Finland! Cool!

Here is the postcard KROQ’s Bean sent me form Finland to New York:

The back of Bean's Postcard! The stamp on it is quite interesting. Bean tells me Napapliri is the Finnish word for Arctic Circle and Sumoi is the Finnish word for Finland!

The Front of the postcard! Pretty innit?

I should send Bean a postcard next time I’m on holiday!

http://ping.fm/p/eDReF – Vans Warped Tour – Pomona CA – Emilio @KROQ TENT son of a DJ.

We’ve got a couple of exciting news bits to report!

Tune in Sun, June 28!

First off, War Tapes’ music is going to be featured on Los Angeles’ very own KROQ – a very influential modern rock station, so this is not to be missed!

To catch War Tapes, tune in this Sunday, June 28 at 9:00 PM at 106.7 or at http://www.kroq.com (the Locals Only show). Please show your support by sending KROQ a request for more War Tapes! – http://www.kroq-data.com/request/

Secondly, War Tapes will be featured on an exclusive WOXY.com program with Christopher “The Minister” as he discusses “A Tribute to Love and Rockets.” WOXY is one the largest internet stations in the world, so this is a great honor!

Tune in on Wed, July 1!

The WOXY show airs at these times:
Wed. July 1 @ 9pm
Thur. July 2 @ 6pm
Sat. July 4 @ 4pm
Sun, July 5 @ Noon

The show will feature a number of artists, including:

• War Tapes
• Puscifer (MJ Keenan)
• The Dandy Warhols
• A Place To Bury Strangers
• 8mm
• Black Francis
• The Flaming Lips
• The Stone Foxes
• Snowden
• The Morlocks
• Lossy Coils w/ Ian Moore
• Film School

I hope you are able to tune in! Oh, and if you like hearing War Tapes on the radio, please let WOXY know!

Thanks everyone!

Saint Motel and KROQ Locals Only present “Future Father’s Day” at the Viper Room this Friday June 12th. FREE mustaches are included with tickets which can be bought ahead of time HERE to avoid the inevitable line.

Kevin Bronson of http://www.buzzbands.la will also be on hand as the special guest DJ for the evening. Also playing are Fight From Above and Links. Should be another packed/crazy/sweaty show in association with Get Fresh MKTG

So, it’s been a while since I posted one of  these. To make up for it, I’m posting live performances from the KROQ Weenie Roast concert from last month. It’s a big festival event from the big “alternative” music station down in the LA area. I found some awesome footage that sounds great. Most of what follows are bands you probably should know, but if you don’t…well, that’s what I’m here for. I encourage you to check out all of these bands more closely.

Before I get to that, I would strong suggest that you check out Dave Lawrence Online (the link can be found to the right) where he does Live Tour Tracker every Friday night (9 pm Pacific Standard Time). Always has great stuff and it’s all under a month old.

The Airborne Toxic Event – Sometime Around Midnight: What a great tune. Is it me or do they remind you a little bit of The Pogues? Good new band on the rise.

Cage the Elephant – Ain’t No Rest For The Wicked: Needless to say, the lead singer is pretty crazy on stage. Young band from Kentucky. Very cool song.

Kings of Leon – Use Somebody: Slowly but surely becoming one of the biggest bands in the world. They’re definitely taking the industry by storm. Awesome performance.

Silversun Pickups – Lazy Eye: One of the breakout bands on “alternative” radio (I can’t stand that genre name, if you havent noticed) last year and this was the song that did it for them. Still going strong, this is a great show. Wait til the end. It’s worth it.

Yeah Yeah Yeahs – Zero: This song just has a cool sound to it. Lead singer is quite the performer…and what is up with that outfit? Anyway, yet another very good performance. The girl in front of the camera is clearly enjoying herself.

That’s all. I think the performances speak for themselves. Check out all of these bands if you aren’t familiar with them. I’ll probably do a Flashback next week then a BFD Edition after that.

Have a great weekend!

- Chris Lejarzar

I came home for the summer happy to be back where I knew there would be decent radio. Imagine my horror and disillusionment when I tuned into 92.3 FM and found not my cherised KROQ, but a top 40 station. The only thing I hate more than top 40 music is inescapable top 40 music. The music I listen to (mostly punk and rock) may not be the most popular kind, but it has a very well established fan base. Green Day’s latest album was number one on the charts, and I have yet to meet a person who doesn’t like the Beatles. Alternative music deserves to be played on the radio as much as if not more than the latest badly spelled ode to clubbing and drinking. Instead nearly every station plays exactly that. 92.3 KROQ was one of three or four stations in my area dedicated to rock in all its forms. I could turn it on and hear Nirvana or Black Sabbath or Sublime and even if I didn’t really like the song, at least it was close to something I did like. At least it provided a few minutes of enjoyable background noise before the DJ switched over to the next one. It was an option outside of the world of Ryan Seacrest.

So I did some digging. As it turns out, the original KROQ station in Los Angeles is alive and well at 106.7 FM. In New York it’s a bit more tricky. That version of KROQ has moved to HD radio, which explains why I couldn’t find it anywhere. If you don’t have an HD radio you can listen live on their website.  The pop up player shows you the name of the song, the band, and a picture of the album it came from.  It’s pretty cool.

Mostly I’m just happy that KROQ still exists.  There are thousands of rock fans out there who routinely get shortchanged because the rest of the nation is obsessed with things like American Idol.  After all businesses will always pursue the most lucrative possibilities first, and the songs on top 40 radio are just the sort of wildly popular junk that can make them millions.  Next to countless downloads and ringtones of an R&B song, a moderately sucessful rock album is nothing.  A lot of rock songs also make it into the top 40 playlists, but often briefly and only towards the bottom.  They aren’t likely to be requested constantly for weeks on end.  People’s tastes don’t work that way.

As I typed that, Green Day’s new single “Know Your Enemy” came on the KROQ player.  It was the perfect antidote to the hopeless feeling I had before.  Suddenly I was screaming into the abyss of popular culture and someone was screaming back.  This is why KROQ needs to stick around, even if it requires a computer to hear.  Someone has to be the defiant voice keeping rock alive.  There have to be options for people who won’t accept whatever a record label conspires to shove down their throat.  This country is all about individuality and forming your own opinions.  Our choice of radio stations should reflect that.

If you don’t believe me, believe the Clash.  Here they are with “London’s Burning”.

God, Hollywood must suck balls!  They can’t come up with one new idea.  The only plus is that they are bringing back some cult classics, and damn it, Short Circuit was awesome!  Thanks to the guys on the Kevin and Bean show (KROQ), I found out Short Circuit will be back in 2010.  Love it, especially that silly Indian guy. 
Favorite quotes:
Ben Jabituya: Ooh. Her pants are blazing for you, Newton Crosby.
Newton Crosby: Will you grow up?
Ben Jabituya: I am sporting a tremendous woody.

Star Parts played a KROQ Locals Only show at the Roxy on May 21, 2009. Also on the bill: Funeral Party, Venus Infers and The Tender Box.

Star Parts: Let it all burn!

I remember listening to Katt Corbett on WFNX when I lived in Boston back in the 90s. A few years later, like an old friend, I kept in touch with Kat by listening to her Locals Only show on KROQ after I moved to Los Angeles. Sometimes it’s good to keep up with old pals from afar…it’s sorta like checking in on a high school friend’s Facebook page but never sending a message.

But once in a while one of those old friends will send you a note or, in some cases, you’ll get included on some random email list by accident (as I suspect I recently may have been).

Either way, it was great to hear from Michelle Reeves the other day when she sent out an email about her band’s show at The Roxy. I had met Michelle about five years ago at a Halloween party when I was wearing a Pixies T-shirt but we lost touch after a few months.

At first I asked her if she was playing On The Rox, the upstairs bar at The Roxy, which is generally for smaller local bands. We had jammed a few years back when she was playing bass but I had no idea that she had switched to keyboards.

So, to be polite, I said “Even if you’re playing upstairs you’re still a rock star in my eyes.” But then she told me she was playing the mainstage and that the band she was playing in, Star Parts, was playing a KROQ Locals Only show. I quickly realized that SHE was the one being polite. I would definitely be going to this show.

Though Star Parts was first on the bill the room began filling up quickly. My friend Beth, one of the Roxy bartenders,  got me a seat in “VIP section” and I told her that I was really into ”Human Skin,” one of the songs on Star Parts MySpace page.

Then, without warning, the black curtain on the Roxy’s mainstage went up and guitarist Michael Compton’s heart-felt and soulful vocals filled the room. It became apparent rather quickly that Star Parts had enough jangly hooks to fill a tackle box. Bolstered by drummer Tom Ackerman and bass player Jacquie Parson’s harmonies, along with Michelle Reeve’s melodic keyboards, the attentive audience seemed to sway in agreement.

When their 30-minute set ended way too quickly I realized that Star Parts is the kind of band whose CDs can make their home in your car stereo for an entire summer and even find themselves welcome in the fall, wedged between fading memories of warm August nights and the growing nostalgia that accompanies the passing of another celebrated summer.

But now that this summer has barely begun, you won’t want to miss Star Parts when they play The Silver Lake Lounge on June 11th. And don’t forget to bring a friend!

Visit Star Parts at www.myspace.com/starparts

~AFG Must Rock
Check out: The Swagger Sticks

Skateboarding Legend Tony Alva At X Games 15th Anniversary Kickoff Celebration. Photo by JB Brookman © HW Design Inc.

Thursday at Nokia Plaza, ESPN Zone and extreme sports fans got together to celebrate 15 years of the X Games.  Skateboarding legend Tony Alva was on hand at the event which featured the world’s largest skate deck, pro skate street demos, birthday cake, music by KROQ and mariachis.  Tickets also went on sale for X Games 15, which take place from July 30 through August 2nd. 

The X Games will be held in Los Angeles and tickets are available now at the Staples Center and Nokia Theater box offices as well as Ticketmaster.com. 

200 athletes will be competing in events such as BMX Freestyle, Moto X, Skateboard and Rally Car Racing- as well as two new events:  Skateboard Big Air Rail Jam and Skateboard Park Legends. 

The list of invited athletes includes:  Ryan Sheckler, Travis Pastrana, James Stewart, Elissa Steamer, Kyle Loza, Rune Glifberg, Daniel Dhers and Bob Burnquist.

 See Winter X Games star Shaun White here.

E! News Daily 10 And X Games Host Sal Masekela At Nokia LA Live. Photo by JB Brookman © HW Design Inc.

The World's Largest Skate Deck Was On Hand At The X Games 15 Launch Celebration. Photo by JB Brookman © HW Design Inc.

X Games Celebration At Nokia LA Live. Photo by JB Brookman © HW Design Inc.

ESPN's X Games Celebrates 15 Years With A Quinceanera/Birthday Cake By El Manjar Peruano