Month: November 2022

I’m looking for an online “workout buddy.” I’ve been having a hard time sticking with my bike routine, and while I know it is good for me, and I know it will help in almost all the places that I’m having a hard time, I just can’t seem to stay on the bike for very long. I got 30 minutes in today, which is better than usual. But I think if I had a partner in crime, we could help keep each other motivated, and on task. At least: we’d have to answer to each other when we miss a day.

I’ve hated most other forms of working out, save for biking and yoga. (And I’m really bad at the later one.) Biking feels like an exercise and doesn’t feel completely boring or something I dread. Maybe you wanna be my biking partner? We could motivate each other online somehow? 

Start a, “Biking Buddy Bunker” online somewhere, where we can chat and motivate each other? I hate most gym culture stuff and I’m not looking for real workout stuff. Just someone who’s also a little awkward and has

Maybe it’s a silly idea. Just trying to figure out how to stay on the bike and not dread it.

I’m anti-government, anti-military, and very much anti-American involvement in combat and war. But I’m pro veteran. Here’s my great grandfather and my grandfather, who were both vets, but both people who were never defined by military service, to me, anyway. (I had no idea my grandfather served for most of my childhood.)

There’s nothing good about the armed forces, or what they stand for. But Socrates was a vet, and many of the most vocal anti-war people come from the military.

Happy Veteran’s Day. Bummer we have it as a holiday.

One of my most recent “performance videos” I made this year heavily featured Kevin Conroy’s voice, in the character of Batman. I love his portrayal of the character, and in my head, Batman sounds like him. I watched this cartoon endlessly when it was on, and with my niece, who loves Batman, too.

This piece is one of the more well-received videos I’ve made, and it even has dance segments.

I’m not sure how he would have felt about this. But I hope he doesn’t mind too much, and can find it in him to groove one last time.

Trying to come to terms with not being able to see or play shows again. I feel like someone cut off both my arms. I know this sounds like so much hot air to most people, but it really deeply pains me. Most of my adult life has been spent caring about or going to see shows. To be in a position where it is off limits – and it’s not off limits to nearly everyone else – feels like the world has betrayed me in a very personal way. Trying to find a way forward is both incredibly hard and very likely one without a thing I care about tremendously.

I’m so angry with the world for leaving us behind, and how many people are completely comfortable to move forward without us, as if the world hasn’t changed in a deeply, deeply disturbing way.

After many delays (and a little reverb), the newest musical postcard is now ready for you to enjoy! Three new Mini-Mutations compositions, only available via the mail. A dangerous trip to the moon! A instructive documentary on using Effects Pedals! (w/ David Rees and Jackie Kashian.) And a biographical journey into how it used to rain so much more in the past. It’s the Late September EP, with over 30 minutes of new tunes that will help ease you into the end of the year.

If you are on the mailing list, one is on the way to you. If you would like one, you should message me and you’ll get one in the mail. Simply scan the code, and your postcard will sing to you these new and exciting tunes. My gift, to you.

As the pandemic shifts into a stranger and more complicated phase, it is likely that I won’t be performing in front of audience again, save for under very extreme and rare circumstances, and if the show can be outdoors. With that in mind, video performances and these postcards are probably the only way that I will be able to make music for the time being. And making these postcards is not only incredibly satisfying, but has become one of my trademarks. (Thanks Dylan, for showing me the way!) It’s always fun to see where the muse takes me each time I work on one of these, and hopefully you are enjoying them to some degree, too. ��Anyway, thanks for dealing with me as I try to process the world around me, how to move forward, and how to make more postcards instead of complaints.

#MusicalPostcards #MiniMutations #LateSeptemberEP #SynthJams #CutUps #Drone

From 1978 to 1981, In France, comic artist Norbert Fersen adapted the American TV cartoon “Jabberjaw” into a comic strip, under its French translated name “Mantalo,” and was featured in kids magazines all over France.

I’m so confused by how this even happened. When I think about France, the last thing I think of is their love of a talking shark playing drums in a future underwater civilization. And in a comic format the goofy music and voice impersonations are completely lost…

How did this happen?

As a kid, I watched an animated TV show where robotic versions of The Three Stooges fought crime. None of the original Stooges were still alive when this show was made; Frank Welker plays Curley. And: the show originally aired when I was two, meaning as a 12 year old I was seeing these cartoons 10 years after they were made… and 30 to 40 years after The Stooges heyday.

Who exactly thought this cartoon was a good idea? And who was this show made for?

I’m… confused for myself as a youth. What part of me really responded to a cyberpunk Three Stooges as a kid?

Weird.

Tonight, on Sheena’s Jungle Room on WFMU! and Mid-Valley Mutations! Certainly, the name “zer0-G Mice” is so well known that you hear their music almost everywhere you go, when you’re just trying to run a few errands out in public. But how did they become so mega-popular? Perhaps this radio presentation will give you the full story, so you will finally know, once and for all, how it all went down. Join Austin & univac (the writers and performers), with the help of their ground crew at UB RADIO SALON (Ninah & Das, assembling all the pieces), as we present the full story of the “zer0-G Mice.” As it originally happened! Join us in the chat, as we dispel rumors and myths, tell funny anecdotes, and generally: prepare you to float into space!

https://wfmu.org/playlists/shows/118349

#zerog-mice, #univac, #BigCityOrchestra #UBRadioSalon #Sci-FiComedy #ScriptedANDImprov, #SheenasJungleRoom, #MidValleyMutations #PartOneofTwo

I’ve been maintaining two music exchange groups since the beginning of 2020. Through these groups, I’ve released four compilation albums, featuring the best music that we recorded for those groups. One is for experimental artists. The other, as I call it, is for “less weird” music: rock & roll, punk, industrial, spoken word, singer songwriter. We even got a sketch comedy entry, and I keep hearing that someone will do a comedy album eventually. “Less weird” is code for “not experimental,” really.

We have some openings in our “less weird” group for 2023. A few people have moved on to other projects. With that in mind, I’m recruiting a few people who work as artists and might want to join.

The short version: you get 11 recordings in the mail from group members throughout the year, while working on your recordings, that you then send out during the remaining month. By the end of the year, our group has recorded 12 “releases” of some kind, a way to sort of measure the year and show off what you did.

Do you make music and / or recorded art of some kind, and would like to join our group? It’s one of the ways that we’re trying to help keep ourselves sane during the pandemic.

How cool is this: quite a while ago, I got an order for this record from Mexico. I was tracking the package… but USPS showed the package cross the border… and disappear. I was worried that it wouldn’t arrive, I was about to message with apologies… and then I discovered that it arrived, safely! (I mean, I paid enough in shipping… it better have.)

While most everything else in the world is completely terrible, at least there’s cool people out there.

Enjoy the record! The Formaldehydra side is EXCELLENT!.

Let’s be honest: we could all use more rain. Like, A LOT MORE. And with everything that went down for Halloween this year, I’m a little beat. So I’ve asked my friend and colleague Arvo Zylo to guest-host the show tonight, for a little “Radio Rain Dance,” as we try to make sense of this particular Day of The Dead. Audience participation is happening at the link below; a live, interactive chat, where you can hang out, join in the rain dance, and make your voice heard. Two hours of songs about rain. Join us… won’t you?

https://wfmu.org/playlists/shows/120423

I occurred to me today: if I were to eliminate from my life everything that has to do with music, would I have much of a life afterwards? Most of my free time is spent getting ready for radio shows, or reading about and looking for new records. I know a lot of people through radio and music. But outside of that?

I only mention this because I’m starting to feel like I don’t have much of a life beyond my own interests in music. If that is off the table… do I have much of a life? I like books and comics and movies fine… but it is not as satisfying as music is to me.

Is there much to me, if that’s really the extent of my passions? All I have to do is interact with one or two people who don’t care about music, and suddenly I have nothing to contribute.

Let’s get really real: is there anything to me outside of my love for my family and very narrow & specific cultural expressions that I enjoy?

Is there much to me at all?