Crushing Krisis

Comic Books, Drag Race, & Life in New Zealand

krisis

Krisis has been creating Crushing Krisis since 2000, writing songs since 1996, and reading comics since 1991. He is a Customer Success and Digital Brand Strategy executive, serial organizer, parent, and feminist, among other things. Based in Philly through 2017, he now resides in Wellington, NZ.

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Via Ernie, Via 37signals: Celine Dion’s new disc will not play in computer CD drives. I’ve been harping about this a lot recently, and there has been a similar amount of speculation in independent internet press on which overblown major-label artist would first allow themselves to play guinea pig to this particular corporate experiment. Ironically, Dion is one of the least relevant: music piracy is obviously most common on college campuses, but Celine is much more of an Adult Contemporary artist. It remains to be seen if labels are brave enough to similarly cripple a disc by Ms. Spears or even Metallica, as the ramifications on record sales alone are potentially horrifying — not to mention the nearly assured backlash by college-aged record buyers (and their potential to find an easy way around the protection).


Not to prematurely give birth to my aforementioned massive media essay, but record labels just don’t get the damned point. Students burns and rip discs because they aren’t realistically affordably. Record companies continue to raise prices to help maintain their profit margins, while they slash artist rosters at the same time. Maybe if brand new pop discs didn’t have an unbelievable list price of nineteen dollars they wouldn’t be so readily copied for under fifty cents. But, rather than assess their own corruption of the artistic process and of the artists’ own rights, the recording industry would rather point the finger at technology and punish buyers who listen to music at their computers. It isn’t the right way to solve things.

If any of this sounds totally ridiculous to you, then you need to boycott Celine Dion’s new disc as well as More Music from The Fast and the Furious , Universal’s first foray into infringing on our rights as record buyers. I’m sure songs from both of the cds already abound on internet retrieval services thanx to savvy buyers with a line-in function on their computers, so feel free to go and download them without any guilt; record companies have shown us that all they care about is the almighty dollar, so all we can (and should) do is withhold it from them.

https://crushingkrisis.com/2002/04/75059416/

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Just read: Ani DiFranco breaks out her pen and comes off as not only a credible artist but an apt critic of corporate bred media. I’ve been feeling a media-criticism essay welling in my boots for a few weeks now, but until that pans out try Ani’s opinion on for size. Also, while you’re reading media-critique, check out John Hiler’s witty article on how blogs both augment and interfere with more traditional means of journalism. And, while i’m linking to things, the musician i met on the street last week was just profiled by Rolling Stone. For the third time. RS doesn’t seem to be featuring the new mention online right now, but you can catch the other two on his site. So, um… i’m a little bit excited — hopefully he emails me back sometime.

https://crushingkrisis.com/2002/04/375059345/

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My ears are ringing terribly.

I sat there for a minute, between swiveling from the Eight Arms to Hold You book and the Tragic Kingdom book, trying to think of what i could play. Even though i have two electric guitars, i haven’t played very much loud electric guitar in my lifetime — guitar so loud that it distorts the amplified signal so badly that what’s coming out has no relation to what i’m strumming other than vague tonal qualities. For that minute i was i was mentally paging through my own songs, picturing open chords as tight barres further up on the neck and simple strums as thrashes.

At the end of the minute i decided that, for the most part, it just doesn’t work.

This month’s Rolling Stone was unusually chatty in tone, and it failed entirely to impress me. Four years ago i would’ve told you that my dream was to write for RS, and now i’m not even sure i would tell you that i want to be featured inside of it. My opinions on the magazine notwithstanding, one feature caught my eye; the article on Incubus.

I am decidedly indifferent to Incubus on the whole, though i am of the opinion that “Drive” is pretty much the distillation of what all of my songs possibly could sound like if i had a major label deal. At the end of the article there’s one of those colored boxes with incidental information in them, and in it there are two interesting pieces of information about lead singer Brandon Boyd. One is that “[b]efore a show [he] will scat jazz, growl punk rock, improvise a slow jam, or riff on Madonna.” The other is the following quote on Ani DiFranco: “She’s an underrated lyricist. Female artists are the perfect example of a creator: They know how to make life and art with their bodies. Life comes from their bodies, so on a very basic level, they have more to write about.”

There was something about the quote that left me in stunned silence, and that silence was mirrored by the long minute spent in limbo between my books of sheet music. Boyd, more than anything, comes off in the article as a rock star version of myself. He says things i say. He riffs on Madonna. He likes Ani DiFranco. His band wrote a song that’s indicative of my entire sound. And, i don’t really like his band; i’ve turned down invitations to their concerts and have serially neglected to buy any of their cds.


On days like today i get the sense that i don’t listen to and arrange loud music not because i don’t want to, but just because it hasn’t really occurred to me. Any other day i would tell you that my influences preclude the option entirely, but they really don’t: for every Madonna i have a David Bowie, and for every Ani DiFranco i have a PJ Harvey. Brandon Boyd is a sensitive singer-songwriter fan who enjoys an occasional pop tune. So am i.

I have no idea what i’m getting at, other than that even if converting my songwriting to be primarily electric occurred to me right at this instant, i think it might already be too late.

https://crushingkrisis.com/2002/04/75059224/

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The sky is so blue that it’s entirely intimidating — there is not another different color, shade, or hue to be seen past the orange bricks that make up circular rim of the building. I had intended to lie in bed while everyone else went through their morning routine, but lying there staring out into the endless blue with nary a cloud to be seen was entirely too unnerving for me. I quickly retreated to the computer, which is safely ensconced on the other side of the room — totally out of view of the window. I’m not sure why i find it quite so imposing… something about the clarity of it, i suppose.

The clarity scares me.

https://crushingkrisis.com/2002/04/75058021/