Crushing Krisis

Comic Books, Drag Race, & Life in New Zealand

Creative

Breathe in, breathe out. Breathe in.

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When I am out and about as much as I have been lately – happy hours and concerts and open mics and all that – I become fussily self-involved and introverted in all of my off-hours.

I’ve never had to sustain my “on” state four or five nights a week before, and it’s definitely taking it’s toll on my personality, subsequently turning down my volume and contrast until I can adequately recharge.

This always catches people who don’t know me that well off guard – namely, my co-workers. In my corporate life there is a lazy susan of personality quizzes that spins back around every year or so, and each new set of peers are like, “really? introvert? are you sure?”

You can’t really afford to be an introvert while being an account manager, so I can understand their confusion. But, everyone else knows this about me: I need to balance personal and public, output and input. And, sometimes even when I’m the communications guru the off state can make an appearance. Word spreads pretty quickly that I am having an in-service day.

On the homefront my darling Elise is, curiously, trapped inside of the introversion – the girl in the bubble – forced to act as the shoulder-angel to complement the devil in me. To her credit, she knows the call and response pretty well now – communicate, commiserate, and castigate.

(i.e., first find out why I am fussily inwards facing, then agree whole-heartedly with why the rest of the world sucks, and then finally tell me to shut the hell up about it and lighten the fuck up.)

So, yes, we all know this about me by now, having read and re-read endless iterations of the cycle here over the years. Sometimes the ebb is measured in weeks; lately it’s more minute to minute. Round up friends to go on a bar crawl, turn off my phone the next day. Buy twenty new CDs, eschew them to write songs all weekend. Et cetera.

What we maybe didn’t know was that I have a similar web ebb (webbeb?), insomuch as when I’m all over MySpace promoting the band and Facebook keeping in touch with people and Gmail haggling with various wedding musicians, and The 61 hearing awesome new music and, oh, my job that involves keeping tabs on people in email all day … when I’m doing all of that I’m in my on state, and then I get home with the intent to blog and I am off and I’d rather just write eighteen emails to myself and work on my 20k word critical essay on Hedwig then chronicle what is what for the internet at large.

Which is, as per my wont, my excuse to say here comes a backlogged tonne of thoughts and links and mental flotsam that I need to flush out of my system so I can talk about actual timely topics like politics, and my wedding, and how my band fucking rocks.

(Which, by the by, it does, and did, just three hours ago. But, before we get to that, first the further digression…)

Arcati Crisis, Live @ Saxbys

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On Friday Gina and I ventured out to Abington for Arcati Crisis‘s second outing as headliners at a Saxbys Coffee.

We arrived with a car full of equipment (and Elise) at 7:00 p.m. on the nose to be greeted with a modern, comfortable shop in the capable hands of manager Matthew and barista extraordinaire Becca. Saxbys Abington is located in its own lot, adjoining a Peace A Pizza, which is fourth on my list of consistently favorite pizza, behind La Rosa, Franco & Luigi’s, and – improbably – Powelton.

(Somehow I did not come home with a pizza, possibly owing to knowing how stuffed I would become at the impending Sunday wedding.)

As we briefed Matthew and Becca on our own extensive barista experience they let us move all manner of comfy chairs and high-end stereo equipment to accommodate our PA system and microphones, to only slightly curious stares from the existing patrons. We were tickled to see that Matthew had made a special “music at Saxbys” advertising mat with our promo shot on it, and he further won his way into our hearts by plying us with free caffeinated beverages.

Without describing each minute detail of our set, I can summarize the night thusly:

(1) Arcati Crisis rehearse in an informal, chatty manner (even in the midst of playing songs), so it shouldn’t come as a surprise that we deliver some of our best performances in the same fashion.

(2) We are much better at playing cover songs than we give ourselves credit for, as long as we count them in correctly.

Over the course of our mammoth 90-minutes of play time we turned in some surprisingly great takes of our own songs, especially our oldies: a very controlled “Real End” and a randomly awesome “Under My Skin.” I also think we nailed our catchiest trio – “What’ll I Say,” “Hyperbole,” and “Fisher Price.”

As for covers, “In My Life” was made all the more lovely for the fact that we had only ever sung it together once before, and “With or Without You” is a testament to how far we’ve come vocally since we last performed it together – in 2001. And, we finally debuted “High and Dry,” after over a year of playing it at rehearsals.

Despite the beautiful weather the shop never entirely filled up, but we played to a fun range of people, including a foursome having a spirited informal meeting, a family passing through after karate practice, and a charming trio of teen girls who actually requested The Beatles, of all things.

(The latter were so nice that I may have promised to learn a Jonas Brothers song for them for our next appearance in June.)

It was altogether a wonderful gigging experience – gracious hosts in a charming shop, us seamlessly running our own sound, and a curious blend of customers who each needed individual charming in order to stick around for more of our set.

We’re looking forward to our return on Friday, June 27, bolstered by our dear friend and top-notch support act Lindsay Wilhelmi.

I, only half-jokingly, have threatened to subsequently engage in a national Saxbys tour in tribute to Hedwig’s run of Bilgewater Restaurants in the film of Angry Inch. We might just start with playing in some of their other local locales, such as a brand new Temple University shop.

Lineup and links for There’s a Stage on My Lawn!

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If you are free on Saturday between 2 p.m. and 11 p.m. I hope you’ll be at There’s a Stage on My Lawn! in Yardley, PA, presented by Lyndzapalooza. And, if you can’t come I encourage you to to pass the word along to another music lover in your life.

There’s a Stage on My Lawn features fourteen amazing, independent, local artists. They’ve all been busting their asses for the past year to rock better and harder than ever before … evolving from coffee shops to open mics to underbills to featured shows.

I’m honestly a fan of our entire bill – I’m still not sure how we got so lucky as to gather them all in one place, but I promise you that the opportunity to see them all together is fleeting. And, it’s certainly not going to happen again for just $12.

I am as proud as I can possibly be to be an organizer of and an artist in this amazing event. It’s going to be good, and it’s going to be fun, and I wish every local music fan could be a part of it. Check out the music of our artists below, and then head to TicketLeap for more info & pre-sale or reserved tickets.

Geoff Ednie – Former acapella staple plays a mix of crowd-pleasing covers and originals influenced by the Beatles, Alice in Chains, and Phish.

Bevin Caulfield – Smokey-voiced darling of rooms like Tin Angel and The Fire. Lots of classic soul influences make her stand out in a crowd. (Watch)

Arcati Crisis – My band! Harmony-filled boy/girl acoustic pop from a pair of life-long best friends. Sounds like Rilo Kiley crossed with the Indigo Girls. (Listen) (Watch)

Old Man Cactus – A great band we shared the bill with at Tin Angel. Inspired by a who’s who of 70s singer-songwriters, they come off like an acoustic, bluesy version of Maroon 5. (Watch solo)

Brian Flannagan – A surprisingly gentle, folky sound from this former producer and drummer.

Lindsay Wilhelmi – LP’s founder writes unshakably catchy original tunes, and plays covers from Jewel, the Recipe, and 4 Non Blondes.

Ben Guez – Golden-throated classical singer dissects songs from unlikely sources, like classic rock, or even the Pixies, and also slips in his own infectious originals.

John Glaubitz – Original, solo modern-rock from an accomplished guitar player. A one-man Warped tour. (Listen)

Enter the Rooms – This band is hot. Incredible local alternative rockers can grab your attention acoustic or electric. A riffier Coldplay? Not sure, but they never disappoint. (Music Video)

Jesse Schurr – Tiny, local yoga instructor typically fronts an acoustic funk four-piece, but will play stripped down versions of her rhythmic tunes for us. (Watch)

Irene Molloy – Lilting, country-tinged folk-pop that would be right at home on XPN, from the star of TV sitcoms Grosse Point and Andy Richter Controls the Universe.

Da 1 – Solo MC/songwriter describes his primary influences as Jimi Hendrix and Jay-Z, and lives up the to hype with his guitar shredding and vocal hooks. (Watch)

Just Like Me – Young band from Temple plays engaging, challenging rock music. Some hear a Radiohead/Tool influence, but others cite Pink Floyd. Either way, a great band. (Listen)

Dante Bucci – Hypnotic original compositions on the hang drum, a bell-like percussion instrument. You’ve never seen anything like it! (Watch/Listen)

How To Edit Your MySpace Music Profile

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Editor’s Note: This brief article has helped thousands of musicians begin to gain control over their MySpace pages. If it also helps you please consider friending me on MySpace! In your “ADD ME” note make sure to mention that you found me through my blog. Or, comment below, including your url, to share further tips or tricks you may have uncovered.



I just spent a boggling amount of time (inclusive of intensive brain-process time while asleep) trying to learn how to update the layout of my MySpace music profile.

I won’t bore you with all the gory details. The upshot is, MySpace operates on its own peculiar set of rules, and 99% of websites proffering updated MySpace layouts (AKA “MySpace Codes”) do not care one iota if you understand them. They just want you to pick your layout and be happy.

(Even if you’re a savvy web-user it might not be immediately obvious where you paste the layout, as there is no obvious “backstage” area of MySpace. Improbably, any code alterations get pasted into your About Me box – or, if you’re a Band, your Bio box.)

My problems were twofold:
(a) We all know I can’t be happy until I understand how something works.
(b) Normal profile codes and editors don’t necessarily work they way you want them to on a Band profile.

Now, allow me to provide other musicians with the benefit of my 16 hours of experience in this field. It’s not a tutorial, so much as a guidebook. For this to be of any use you should have a basic understanding of HTML and CSS, and a high capacity for trial and error testing.



First: Understand what you’re getting into. Read an awesome article by Mike Davidson that gives a detailed overview of how MySpace layouts work, and what you have to do to alter them. They’re effectively a series of nested tables altered by simplistic CSS code – not so bad, right?

Next: See Mike’s explanation at play. Visit Views Under Construction and then visit their sample profile and band profile. Now you understand the degree of manipulation you can put your profile through!

Then: Look before you leap. Dip your toe in the alteration waters by checking out some isolated edits you can make at Pimp Web Page, pasting them into your profile to see their effects. Note that you can do more than just change colors – you can resize, move, and hide most elements of a profile.

Finally: Head to the best editor I found, Real Editor. It’s meant for normal profiles, but you can still load up your band file. Here you can tweak just about any element of your page!

My suggestion? After you’re through playing around copy out the complete code for reference. If there’s any of it that doesn’t make sense, go back and work out one element at a time. Each time you finish an element, get the HTML. It will have some other junk in it, but it should be easy to pull out the one element of the code you actually altered. After a few iterations you’ll begin to understand what’s what. Try starting with your Contact Table, which is called contactTable in CSS.

When In Doubt: It’s not always obvious what certain page elements are named, or how they’re manipulated. If you’re stumped on how to get your intended result, trying viewing the source code of your profile, or another profile that you like. Zero in on the thing you’re trying to change.

If it’s an element like your top friends, search for text inside that table – you’ll discover the table class is friendSpace. If you’re viewing a cool profile that has altered that particular element, search again – this time for the name of that class. Now you should see the CSS that’s driving their manipulation.

If what you like is a minor element, like a certain border or text treatment, try searching for that color’s hex value (grab it beforehand by taking a screenshot and using an eyedropper tool in Photoshop, or similar).

And: Every time you arrive at a non-objectionable result copy out your code into a text file and save it before you keep working. If you’re having trouble with one tricky element, just work on that element in an otherwise blank About Me box, and add it to the rest of your saved code once you get it right.

Hope this helps!



No, Not I

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On the list of Arcati Crisis’s mutually favorite artists I don’t know that there’s a musician that debuted within our lifetimes ranked higher than Tracy Bonham.

Tracy’s was the second concert Gina and I saw together; the first was Presidents of the United States of America. Gina and I were possibly the first people into the TLA that night, because I remember standing almost directly in front of Tracy, pressed up against the barricade, Gina intently watching her fingers on every song.

At the end of that school year, Gina decided to audition for the school talent show, and the song she decided to play and sing was “Sharks Can’t Sleep.”

I had just starred in my first play, but at the time I didn’t play guitar. Or sing, for that matter. Yet, when Gina told me about the talent show, I had an unexpected reaction – I asked if I could sing with her.

Our friends were immediately skeptical about this – not only did I not sing, but I was at some point banned from singing entirely in the basement hallway where we all ate our lunch. Suffice to say, I was not experiencing widespread support for my sudden impetus to vocalize.

However, I did have one supporter: Gina. Gina brought in her guitar so I could practice, and gave me my own verse to sing.

As murky as some of the details of this story are, my memory of auditioning for the talent show committee is crystalline. We were seated in the corner of the band room, Gina and I and our friends Lucy and Joanna, who were singing harmony. When we got to my verse I shook like a leaf, but ever-so-carefully sang “Met a star today…”

Afterwards someone on the committee said, “I didn’t know he could sing.”

I don’t have any memory at all of being on stage at the talent show, although there are photos to prove that it occurred. What I do remember, and will always know, is that afterwards I – completely out of the blue – demanded that my mother buy my a guitar.

I’m sure I demanded a lot of things at the time, being a stubborn only-child teenager, but for some reason this particular demand was taken seriously. Within a week I had my clunky old Ashland guitar in my hands, and a guitar lesson once a week. I kept taking them until I learned the F sharp i needed for “Sharks Can’t Sleep” and never looked back.

Over ten years later it is both completely apropos and batshit crazy that I am playing guitar in a band with Gina, since I wouldn’t be playing or singing at all without that first nod of support.

This fall Tracy blogged about “Sharks Can’t Sleep.” (She also spent some time co-writing with Garrison Starr, which blows my mind, as Garrison is my #2 longest supported indie song-writer right after Tracy. Whatever song they wrote, it is surely the best song in the known universe.)

Last year Tracy stealthily released an acoustic disc, In The City + In The Woods. She also peppers her homepage with downloads of new demos, so I suggest you keep an eye out.

Happy birthday, Gina.