Crushing Krisis

Comic Books, Drag Race, & Life in New Zealand

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FaceBook flash mobs crash British bashes

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You might have to read this one to believe it.

The Daily Mail reports that police were called to shut down a local club when more than 500 youths decided to crash a private 18th birthday party that had been advertised on FaceBook.

The hilarity here is that the mob clearly didn’t log in to FaceBook en masse and click “Attending.” An agent of the mob took note of the event, and they colluded in some other way to converge upon it. They must have a special “mob of louts” social network, or perhaps a loutish bulletin board where such anarchy can be planned.

Even more hilarious is that this isn’t an isolated incident, but one in a string of flash mob usurpations of teenaged Brit bashes. Behold the final paragraph:

And in February, thousands of pounds of damage was caused to a house when hordes of louts barged their way in and staged a drug-fuelled orgy at 15-year-old Gemma Johnson’s bash in Worthing, West Sussex.

Except, doing a touch of background research reveals that Ms. Johnson was actually aiming for a drug-fueled orgy, which doesn’t seem to be the case in this new story.

Gemma had an interesting idea, but her execution was off. I think the ultimate in hilarity would be to stage a party that specifically benefits from being crashed, but I’m hard-pressed to think of any kind of event that benefits from the attention of over 500 drunk, drugged, possibly libidinous louts.

Thoughts?

out with the old, out with the new

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Being a consumate overachiever, I am usually all over “small changes that can yield big success” articles. Like, whoo boy, sign me up for micro adjustments that cause macro improvements!

Except, at this point I have made every micro-tweak I can make. I am fully tweaked.

Take, for example. a CNN article from yesterday that suggests five simple diet changes that result in 500+ saved calories a day.

Here’s what they suggested, in comparison to what I do.

Old: whole milk
New: 1 percent milk
Me: rice milk

Old: whole bagel
New: half a bagel
Me: low fat granola
(occasionally a bagel with non-hydrogenated, light spread)

Old: chocolate ice cream
New: chocolate yogurt or a Popsicle
Me: soy- or rice-based ice cream, fruit chillers, or nuts

Old: latte made with whole milk
New: latte made with skim milk
Me: chai made with soy milk

Old: be a couch potato
New: take a 20-minute walk
Me: walk 1-3 miles a day

I could continue to match them one for one – they’d say, “eat lean meat,” and I’d say, “eat fish.” They’d say, “no more extra cheese,” and I’d say, “no more cheese.”

Articles like this make me feel okay for being thin, because I have clearly eliminated every source of culinary indulgence from my life already, and have largely found replacements that I prefer to the original gluttonous versions.

(I wish that articles like this could also make me feel like I can stop worrying that I’m going to turn into a giant Italian balloon when I turn thirty like half of my family did, but I’m just going to have keep being anxious about that bridge until it’s crossed.)

My total tweakedness isn’t limited to diet, which means I react similarly to “small changes” articles about budgets or goal setting – I’m excited to read them until I realize they’re preaching to the me of 2003. I’ve made most of these adjustments already because they all dovetail with my concept of living marginally. I suppose it’s my personal version of being green – why waste money and time on frivolous things you don’t even care about, when you’d rather waste them on frivolous things you actually enjoy?

So, to CNN readers I say, “If you like your lattes with whole milk, go ahead and drink them.” Micro changes are nice, but it’s a major change of attitude that’s going to make the biggest difference in your life.

Stuff Takes Time

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I rung in 2009 the same way I spent December 25th – quietly at home with Elise. The reality is that every other day has become its own holiday spectacle, so the actual holidays are one of the few chances we have to lay low and relax.

Our wedding is a scant 16 days away. When we set the date for January I was concerned that it would compound all of the craziness of December. Now that we’ve crossed over to a new year I feel exactly the opposite. We’re changing in a time of change. The wedding extends the exfoliation of a prior year, as though our NYE kiss will last from midnight yesterday through when we touch down back in Philadelphia after honeymoon.

My mantra in 2008 was “stuff takes time.” If it sounds unspecific, good – that’s the point. The point that everything in life – my education, my music, my blog, our relationship, our music festival, my career, and our band – has taken a lot of time and effort to get to this point. The point is that no goal worth attaining is instantaneous. I didn’t have a senior position at work and four CDs with my band in 2004, yet here we are. We couldn’t have gotten married in 2004 or rented a farm for our music festival in 2006, but that’s where we’re headed.

It would be pointless to spend the rest of the post back-patting for all of my accomplishments in ’08 – I sortof already do that once a year, anyway.

Let’s not look back. Let’s just devote our time to the people and the things we love, and move inexorably closer to our goals, one year at a time.

getting up to speed / my musical existence

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Who could have known that after my night in the smokey room the voice I would lose would be this one, rather than my physical one?

The last week has been an awesome proof-of-concept that I truly am living a duality of professional and musician, which is something I’ve wanted for myself for many years.

It has also illustrated that I a wee bit over-extended, and that after blogging the next thing I have to sacrifice to keep things up and running is my own sanity – not necessarily a bad thing, but not always a practical choice.

So, here’s essentially a week full of posts, because I really don’t have enough time or willpower right now to go back and post them all to the days they ought to have been posted on.

Wednesday. The story starts ten days ago, when I took the day off from work to record a new Live @ Rehearsal disc with Gina.

We had plans to just hit the four songs we had never recorded, but we wound up with eleven, including one I didn’t plan to record, three oldies we took random (successful) shots at, and three of our most frequent covers. Of the eleven I only discarded two for being a little subpar, which meant I had nine songs to mix and master and six days to do it.

Thursday. I could have just locked myself in the house and mixed for a week, but I had so many other plans that I was hesitant to sacrifice. Plan #1 involved dashing out of the house still chewing the last bite of my dinner to leap into the car of Mike from Shackamaxon, who organizes an amazing Philly Songwriters In The Round concert once a month at The Auction House in Audubon, South Jersey.

I attended to have a chance to see Mike and support his event, but I came away a huge fan. Mike’s trio of ITR artists were the increasingly national John Francis, Joshua Britton of melancholy favorite Sweetheart Parade, and one unknown quantity – Mike Baker of The Spinning Leaves.

I couldn’t get a read on Mike Baker in the car on the way to the show, and when I asked host-Mike what kind of music to expect from him I effectively heard “you’ll see.” And, see I did. And hear. Mr. Baker is an absolutely gem – a treasure of the Philadelphia scene. His stuff swung from key-shifting freak folk to lilting murder ballads to an impromptu, note-for-note take on “Paranoid Android” (with the other gentlemen completing the verbatim arrangement acappella). He also added harmonica wailing and pitch-perfect harmony to the songs of his compatriots.

Auction House features Philly Songwriters In The Round once a month, and if this one was any indication it’s always an amazing evening to drop $7 on.

Friday. So, despite my dire post about smoke inhalation, this was actually an amazing concert. I’m shocked again and again by the depth of talent in the Philadelphia music scene – you can hit a show full of people you’ve never heard of and wind up seeing some of the best musicians in the city, and you can probably replicate that experience multiple times a week, because Philly has that many amazing musicans.

Friday’s show was sponsored and anchored by The Spinning Leaves, who were every bit as great as Mike’s Thursday performance presaged – paired with his female half the band sounds like Arcati Crisis through a filter of Devendra Barnhart. However, I was equally delighted by Joshua Park’s melodic blues, and absolutely entranced by the sparse arrangements and killer fretwork of Chris Kasper, who at one point was joined on harmony by Adrien Reju – one of the Philly acts I have been the most delinquent in catching.

(I sadly missed Tin Bird Choir due to my smoke-induced illness, but I definitely plan on seeing them in ’09 – boy/girl acts are hard to come by!)

Saturday. After a quiet day Elise and I ventured out to catch the 2nd Annual PhilACappella – one of three yearly acappella concerts organized and hosted by The Drexel Treblemakers.

I was around at the outset of the group in 2001 when they hurriedly threw three songs together for their debut at the concert of another group. I’m so, so, so very gratified that in 2008 the group is over a dozen singers strong and full of amazing frontwomen who give the original artists runs for their money on songs like “Grace Kelly,” “Disturbia,” “Torn,” and “Dream On” (yes, Aerosmith’s “Dream On.” One of the best acappella performances I’ve seen in my life.)

The girls also debuted my arrangement of Paramore’s “That’s What You Get,” which still needs a bit of retooling before it’s as awesome as the rest of their rep. I still have machinations of doing a Rilo Kiley song for them, but cannot decide between “Portions for Foxes” and “Breakin’ Up.”

As a concession to my wiped-outedness, I missed the CD release party of Katie Barbato’s band The Sleepwells. I adore Katie and I’m so thankful for how hospitable she has been to me and my music in 2008. I definitely have to make up for my missed appearance by seeing another few shows of hers in ’09.

Sunday. Gina’s father-in-law Larry recently passed away.

I wasn’t especially close with him – I had met him at the holiday revue we’ll be playing tonight for the sixth year, and when we moved Gina and Wes into their house in 2007, plus a few other occasions. But, I very much liked him, and I expected he and his wife Joan would become a part of my extended family in the same way Gina’s parents indisputably are.

In lieu of a funeral, per Larry’s express wishes he had a wake at his favorite bar, full of food and drink, friends and family, and his favorite local live music. Throughout the day people from every corner of his life stood up to share a few words – not just extended family, but bands he had booked, scuba-diving buddies, former employees, and people he met while campaigning for Obama earlier this year.

Late in the proceedings Gina and I took the stage for an impromptu performance, offering our cover of Neil Young’s “Pocahantas.” Afterward Gina and Wes covered Neil’s “Helpless,” which I heard for the first time right hear on CK in 2003.

In the midst of sorrow for our loss, during that performance I found joy. In his passing Larry gave us all this amazing day, introducing every important person in his life to each other. More personally, he emphasized to me that I have been doing the right things with my time, because the bonds of music and friendship can last the length of a life and beyond.

.

I have to burn another sixty copies of our new demo CD and figure out a way to look attractive while Gina and I are acting as the holiday revue house-band in less than six hours. Oh, and my groomsmen just called to tell me they are kidnapping me right now to get fitted for tuxes.

Bye.

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So, this is sortof the intermission of the story of last night, which I have yet to write, but…

I spin this whole narrative, little singer and his lack of confidence, wrote songs in his rooms but didn’t play them in bars. And, you know, the growth was stunted – I’m seeing concerts now of people who were at some point my peers, but now they’re an echelon higher and I am a fourth wall away definitely a spectator to their art.

But, see, the story that’s going on under there is smoke. Bars in Philly – musical bars in Philly, especially – were nothing but smoke. A haze. It was prohibitive, and when I first started venturing back out in 2006 when I had my giant hair and before the smoking ban I would just wince at every cigarette lit, because I knew my thick Italian hair was just sucking it up. And, sure enough, when I would come home I’d have no choice but to deflate the cloud of smoke with a scalding hot shower, lest the scent seep into my bed in my sleep.

(I grew up with a smoker – with a family of smokers, and I don’t know how I did it. How everything I owned smelled like smoke, and how the only air I breathed was smokey. Now I can barely hack a car ride of it, even with the windows down.)

So, this is the untold story: I am not a big star because of smokey rooms. Other reasons too, I’m sure. But, the smokey rooms were primary, as I was reminded tonight – taking in some of the best talent of Philly and I had to leave midset. Me, leaving a concert, that asshole slipping away between songs. It’s completely unheard of.

The thing is, I couldn’t breath. A table at the front of weird little Connie’s Ric Rac (not a bar, so no smoking ban) with two new friends enjoying the music and suddenly my eyes couldn’t focus and I was like why is it that I’m not breathing? I thought, you know, maybe someone nearby had just lit a bad brand for me, and I needed some fresh air. So, I poked my head out the door, but when I slunk back in it was worse; pressing against me.

I’m not much of a claustrophobe, but this was too much. I sat back down at the table, but it was through my clothes now, on my skin, seeping in. Breathing was thick and heavy, and now my stomach was churning as well. It was that sort of toe-curling discomfort, where you are squeegeeing up your toes in your socks, clenching tight and willing your way past it.

I ran home, clothes infected, happy to breath crisp freezing point air if only because of the difference in pressure.

And that is the story of how I didn’t get to hang around long enough to buy a handmade CD from Spinning Leaves, who I am in love with (and also probably the story of how I am going to miss the Sleepwell’s CD release tomorrow despite having it on my calendar for TWO MONTHS, because just the thought of going back into that place is raising hives on my forearms).

https://crushingkrisis.com/2008/12/3433/