Shows

Lots of American League shows coming up, check our MySpace.

I'm sure having shows every weekend (this week we have 3) is taking a toll, I'm getting tired and I'm sure Riley and Ryan are. At least when we sit down and record we'll be tight.

Punk Rawk Doesn't Use Primary Sources

I'm tired of political bands, especially in hardcore. So many bands write so many songs about so many different worldly plights that those bands have no physical connection to. The glean information from generally biased sources and regurgitate it in the form of really quite terribly written lyrics. I don't quite see how a band in Olympia can have the gall to assert that they really know anything that is going on in Palestine, in Iraq, without either going there or having any credible primary source to back up their claims. Academics don't write anything without concrete evidence and I don't see why musicians should differ. This becomes incredibly irritating in hardcore where it seems that every band out there writes songs to "educate" people about a certain issue. This would at least be tolerable if it were something new or out of left field, but I can guarantee you that 90% of hardcore songs are about either
1) the Palestinian-Israeli conflict
2) Iraq
3) George W. (maybe not anymore, but jesus there were too many of those songs while he was president)
4) Police
5) How the government does not represent said hardcore band

Politics have lost their shock potential. Nowadays a band puts a picture of a recently slain police officer and scrawls "Die Pig" or some rubbish like that and it just looks like they're jumping on the whole "I'm against authority" bandwagon. I can guarantee the first number that any bonehead calls after he has been assaulted or mugged will be 911.

I love looking at bands on Last.fm whose pictures consist solely (okay maybe 1 in 200 are of them playing instruments) of photoshoots. How manufactured can you get, I'm looking at you "The Killers".

This is my job.

So before I even start to complain, I'll just cut to the chase: my job consists of absolutely nothing. No effort and no stimulation, no pain and no gain. Three times a week I resign myself to sitting at a desk in a relatively empty art gallery full of relatively mediocre attempts at art.

It truly isn't a bad job, but the monotony is beginning to take its toll.

My new band with Ryan and Riley from Jetman played our first show up in Bellevue. As far as first shows go I am incredibly proud of how well we played. That being said I am awfully glad that it was an out of town gig and not in front of anyone we knew. Our next show will be on October 24th, which brings me to my next point of business.

SonicDeath1&2 will be held over October 24th and 25th. This is essentially a weekend full of a bunch of bands I've had the pleasure of befriending. The parameters are only that there can be only amplified instruments, no acoustic singer/songwriters and thus no staples of the current incarnation of the Olympia music scene. Everything is DIY and free.

SonicDeath1 (10/24) at Ol' Blue House is tentatively:

Hari Kiri 9:30-10
Sectors and Segments 8:45-9:15
Slo-Mo Diablo 8:00-8:30
APOC 7:15-7:45
Repeaters 6:30-7:00
Thought Bandit 5:45-6:15
Chung Antique 5:00-5:30
American League 4:15-4:45
The Humans 3:30-4
Halophile 3-3:30
Ikizukuri: 2:15-2:45

SonicDeath2 (10/25) is still in the works. It'll be at Charlie's way out near San Francisco St Bakery.

So thats pretty cool...

On December 5 Repeaters will be playing with Hungry Ghost. I'm pretty excited about that.

I haven't updated this in a while.

I haven't felt the need to write much lately, the past several days have been gleefully mundane.

Its rather nice being back in town, the climate has been more-or-less agreeable, the usual erratic bouts of rain and sun interspersed with eons of cloud cover.

I haven't been toying with songs as much as I should. What little I have done has been in Reason, but it isn't turning out to be of too much value right now.

This is the basement. I've set my amps up in a stack (off camera and to the right), Silvertone Cab on the bottom, Peavey Combo on top, Silvertone Head above that, Rocktron Exciter on top of that.

Michigan to Minneapolis/Minneapolis to Brandon Manitoba

From Frankenmüth we travelled up the middle of Michigan, across the Upper Peninsula and over across Wisconsin to Minneapolis. We stayed a day in town at Nelson's, went to the record stores Electric Fetus and Cheapos (where I happened across "The Art of Self Defense" by High on Fire), met up with Arthur, met up with Uncle Tom... etc etc etc. Today we traveled North across the border into Canada and hitting the Trans Canada Highway. We headed west a few hours, got attacked by crop dusters, remained maladjusted to the metric system... anyways, pictures:

Mackinac Bridge












The Bridge Again












Wisconsin was unbelievably boring












Crop duster Attack

Future album cover

Road Day 1/2.25

J. Spaceman


Frankenmüth, my mother's family's first home in the new world. The town is prostituting my German heritage...

Various other pictures of West Virginia, The Ohio River