Crushing Krisis

Comic Books, Drag Race, & Life in New Zealand

Personal

The Dots, They’ve Been Connected

by

I’ve known Leigh Marble, or at least known of Leigh Marble, as long as i’ve played guitar.

Literally. The night i came home with that crappy Ashland i headed directly to Leigh’s AniTab’s, which still exists at the same url to this day, almost nine years later. The first song i played on my first guitar was “Dilate.”

Two years later and i was a pro at figuring out my own arrangements of Ani DiFranco songs, and a contributor (and argumentative corrector) of Leigh’s tabs. At the time he was splitting a 7″ record with Erin McKeown.

Five years ago this week I saw and heard Erin McKeown for the first time in 2001, on a split bill with Peter Mulvey, and it was from that perspective that i first connected the dots between my favorite inspiration (Peter) and my first (Ani), through Leigh.

Leigh’s self-recorded his first full-length CD, Peep in 2003. He gives an elucidating account of the recording process, as well as samples of his songs. Each one i’ve heard is a fresh idea laid over an innovative arrangement, none betraying his Ani affiliation than “Bucket Seat” does mine. I’m buying a copy; you ought to buy one too. (Also, Erin has a free four-song session up at the spectacularly neat Daytrotter, and an album of standards on the way.)

I think the connection is that we’re all doing it ourselves. And, nine years later, i just submitted the 101st tab to AniTabs.

Alert! Alert! iPod Full!

by

Well, it’s been coming for over a year now as i’ve been selectively paring down my less desirable tracks by unchecking them but – after a brief All of MP3 shopping spree this afternoon* – my 40gig iPod is one album away from being full.

One album!

Of course there are easily another fifty albums in iTunes that i might never willingly listen to again, so those could be safely unchecked. The issue is that i literally have to take one album off for every one i add. And, given my typical monthly purchase volume (two-five digital albums in a slow month) the attrition is going to get ugly by this time next year.**

So:


Do i try to sell my b&w click wheel 40gig iPod and multiple accessories for $200ish, plunging the capital into the purchase of a 60gig? The extra space would last me through more than 215 more albums.


Or, do i wait until Apple releases another generation of iPods (presumably later this year), suck up the purchase price and just hand off my b&w to a deserving friend?

Or, do i just suck it up and not carry my entire music collection around with me every day?

* I was in the mood for some atmospheric music, and thus bought Sia – Colour The Small One; Medeski, Martin & Wood – Best of Blue Note Years; Mandalay – Instinct; Frou Frou – Details; Emiliana Torrini – Love In The Time of Science (excellent!); and a goth-band tribute to Tori Amos.

** No comment on the implications this has on my hard drive space; i really can’t even contemplate that right now. Now that i have a new acoustic guitar an external hard drive is probably #3 on my big ticket item purchase list.

Welcome to My Obsolescence

by

Meg at CK’s parent-by-proxy blog Meish links to an article about the creators of the recently mentioned Threadless, and how they’re upkeeping their technical skills with new drink-mixing site Extra Tasty.

Extra Tasty is pretty cool – it does everything i had been trying to implement for Tipsy Flicks. Perhaps i can just use their site for the drink mixing, thus taking a huge backend-burden off of myself. Of course, how would that be upkeeping my technical skills?

Erratic

by

Nine years of guitar playing and i still can’t manage to get through one frigging bar of 2/4 while trying to write a song.

This may indicate that i am writing new songs. I know that the hoopla celebration about this sort of thing has waned since i don’t accompany such announcements with audio any more. I’m trying to rectify that situation.

Seriously.

It’s just that as the years go by my standards get higher, and when i can’t strum a bar of frigging 2/4 correctly once in a half hour of recording i tend to give up where i would have previously just posted my weird aborted measure of 3.5/4 (i know, i know, that’s 2/4 then 3/8, shut up) and winced.

Nevermind how getting better at singing is like cutting infinity in half, and for every improvement i make my goal of being “good” seems to be persistently unreachable.

I think this will be a rare post that doesn’t involve creative editing or a contrived story about my life.

I sent my iPod back to Apple, certain that it was really broken and that i would receive a refurbed iPod and promptly sell it in its still-sealed mailer and then buy a fancy new iPod. Imagine my surprise when Apple sent me an email this morning to inform me that nothing was wrong with my unit. Sure. I didn’t troubleshoot for five hours until all the iPod did was the scary hard-disk death rattle over and over again and then bring it to an Apple store who TOLD ME to send it in for repair. Not at all. I am going to throw a major seven at some poor unsuspecting tech guy if they try to charge me for servicing a non-faulty unit, or some other such idiocy.

Also, i still don’t have the tracking number for my new guitar, which is a little frustrating since upon its arrival i only have a 24-hour window to decide whether or not i’d like to keep it. Plus, i am a hugely spoiled brat and want my now guitar asap. (and a squir-rel)

Finally, not since SongFight & SomeSongs have i become so immediately obsessed with a website as i am with Threadless. It’s like Songfight but with stuff to buy. Users submit t-shirt concepts, members vote for the concepts on a scale of 0-5 with a special “i’d buy it” button for emphasis, and roughly every week the webmasters choose what is presumably the highest score shirt with the most “buy it” clicks and make it into an honest to goodness t-shit.

Prepare to become addicted to both rating designs (some of which are so amazing that you want to bribe someone to produce them) and window shopping (with a few exceptions the designs they choose are awesome).

Alright, obviously i’m not recording any gems at this hour (which you won’t fully understand until you hear the notes i hit in chest voice on the new ones). To sleep.