EMHU record is done // RXR @ HoC

There is a new EMHU record and the tracking for it is done. its called "No Man is an Island" and its 13 tracks about 45 minutes long, I believe. Should be mixing it down Friday, so stoked! also check it out, RXR played a sweet show at House of Commons in May. Thx to Sean Padilla for taking video, here is the bands playing the show: RXR: Each Other (Montreal): Milezo & The Noize:

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Antecedents and Opinions // Kill Rock Stars

Some of the piss and vinegar of this post has been taken out due to the fact that when I first got to the computer full of it (piss and vinegar...maybe something else, too, we'll let Chris decide...) I had to help my grandma print out a latke recepie because her printer wasn't working. Anyways I am in Hawaii! Fuck yeah! It's my second day here and my mind is still racing around in circles like "do this, do this" but I should be a much mellower person by the time I get back in the ATX. This trip could not have come at a better time for me, and its been a bit different than previous trips already. I saw a Hawaiian Monk Seal which is an endangered species. It was rad. It came up on the beach and the seal patrol came and put caution tape around it. I was like "wow, this is really amazing" and hung out watching the seal for a while. Eventually it went back out to sea, and I was like, "that was an amazing and finished experience," but then a few minutes later it came back on shore about 30 feet down the beach, and the seal patrol set up new caution tape around it and the same people who were watching it (minus me) set up shop behind the caution tape and continued to watch it. Also, some people up on the balcony of our hotel clapped the first time it went out to sea which seemed pretty fucking dumb to me, but hey, people are dumb.

Something awful happened that I didn't realize until this morning (day 2 of my trip). The night before I stayed up all night ripping CDs so I would have some choice tunes to listen to on the trip. I got a bunch of stuff I really wanted to listen to and a nice variety. No jazz this year. I can't listen to jazz on the beach. I've tried, and with a margin of sucess in the past, but the beach is not a place where really enjoy "challenging myself" with the music I am listening to. Not at this point, anyways.

So I ripped all this music, expecting that I would stay up all night and then sleep on the plane (didn't work) and then what did I do but leave this case with all the CDs on the plane! Fucked, right? Well, first off, like I said, I didn't even realize I had left all the CDs until this morning. Yesterday I was just saying what's up to people and playing my ukulele and a tiny bit of swimming. A couple asides before this story gets finished...I'm reading "A Confederacy of Dunces" which is like one of the best books I have ever read. It's truly amazing and I'm really enjoying it. Also, I did maybe the smartest thing I've done this year by bringing my 4 track to the beach with me. Unless you're my roommate I don't know how you would know how you would know this, but I've been having this problem with my writing solo songs lately. I gradually got stuck writing less and less musically interesting things until eventually I wrote this string of like 8 songs that were only 3 or maybe 4 chords and then I just stopped writing. I guess you would call that writers block, but fortunately it corrisponds with some new X-Rays songs, so I didn't feel totally lost.

But back to the topic, I left my (burned) CDs on the plane and I felt this horrible horrible feeling of loss. I was counting on listening to those CDs on the beach. I have my computer with me which has some stuff on it that I could rip onto CDs and listen to, but the good shit on there I have already listened to at work a billion times. The stuff I burned for the beach is stuff I haven't listened to much off my parents computer. They just got a bunch (80gigs?)of pretty good stuff on there from this one guy too, so its not like "all the shit my brother listens to" (which is not bad). The thing I am listening to right now is Elliot Smith. I had never heard any of his records besides Figure 8 before, and maybe some of XO, although I don't know why, becuase I really like what I'd heard of him. Anyways, I think I picked it out because there are great melodies and also chord changes, which is something I'm trying to get back to (I'm pretty sure its working, too). Ukulele is great for that too, because it limits you, and the part of your brain that wants to play root chords is subverted. Pretty sure I heard somewhere that Paul McCartney wrote all of his songs on ukulele.

But back to the topic. I felt horrible about these lost CD-Rs. Really awful. But about an hour after I figured out I had left them on the plane, my dad told me he had gotten a call and they had them at the airport! So I felt better, and I did have like 5 CDs, including Elliot Smith, in my backpack seperately, so I have some stuff to listen to today until we go to pick them up tomorrow.

Now, also up shit creek musically is my buddy who I see on the beach every year. He left his 160 gig Ipod on the plane. I don't think he's ever going to see it again, but he said something rather curious to me, which was "I don't care as long as I get it back for the plane ride home." Dude's got a 160 gig Ipod but only brought it to his 3 week Hawaiian vacation for the plane ride? I think it a) goes to show the value of having something that other people don't value and b) this guy was bent out of shape for sure, but I find it interesting that he didn't even want it back because it was worth money (I'm sure his family will just replace it, which I don't take issue with), and he didn't want it back so he had shit to listen to at the beach, he just wanted it back for the plane ride. It's just interesting how people interface with things I guess.

So that's my travelogue, now for some opinion. And I'll try and keep this short, being as though I'm burning daylight. I went and saw Ian McKaye speak a few weeks ago and it was very interesting his perspective, and his stories about his life were funny but he kept hammering home this "music is free" point that I take issue with. Ok, and we are going to ignore the blatent hypocracy that I listen to music that has been pirated, because this is more about "the state of the union" than "this is my ideological standpoint and everyone should follow it." His big piece of evidence that "music is free, hey everyone go download music!" was that he went and played in South America with his current band The Earlies and the kids in the big crowd there were all singing the words to his songs, despite the fact that he had no South American distribution, and I think the songs weren't available on ITunes or something (I'm assuming that for the purpose of the story making any sense at all.) So he was like "hey how do you guys know the words??" and they got sheepish and he said "hey you downloaded my songs didn't you!" and they were like "yeah," even more sheepishly, and Ian was like "Rock and Roll!!!" and played the show and everyone had a great time. Which is great if you are Ian MacKaye, right? And without knowing the details, I think the basic tenaments of what that guy does and is about is cool. But its hardly the whole story.

Let me tell you some things about music that aren't free, and I don't see a way they ever will be, short of government grants, which maybe everyone should collectively be pursuing. Recording a record is not free. Mixing and mastering is not free. Making physical copies of your record is not free. Vinyl right now costs about twice what it cost to make 5 years ago. If someone sells you a 7" with any artwork at all at $4, realize they are basically selling it to you at cost, which means if they put it out themselves, they have to sell out (min run 300) to recoup all their money. Legal venues (aka guaranteed no cop trouble) are not free to maintain. You want to book a place reasonably close to downtown where you wont get shut down over SXSW, one thing that has become clear the past few months is youd better either be a tricky motherfucker or have some real cash behind you. And even then there's only so many spots for the tricky motherfuckers.

All this is just to point out that, while you (or I) may be listening to music for free, and while the artist may or may not be personally comfortable with it, either because they think it is beneficial to their own career (Ian MacKaye? at least half of his explaination) or because they just accept it as how things are these days, it is in fact, how things are these days. And the other side of it is I've been working this data entry job the past few months that would be completely untenable if it weren't for all the external hard drives worth of free music I got from my friends. So I'm sympathetic....this is all just to make a point that is still forthcoming about what constitutes a sustainable model for artists at this point.

First another aside: I think if the major labels were really smart, and maybe its not too late for them to do this, (and this is certainly something I would hate to see happen), instead of going after publicity with these huge fines on certain individuals for downloading music, they would try and sue everyone who downloaded music for like $100, or something where it wasn't a figure so high that it was obviously unfair and being used as a scare tactic. Sort of like a reverse class action lawsuit. It would depend on being able to minimize litigation costs, which also may not (is hopefully not) possible.

But so ok, what is a record at this point? Its your "work of art," but professionally its more like your business card that the product you are selling. I read somewhere Bradford Cox trying to make the case that Deerhunter wasn't this huge band. "We are a cult band! Call me when we've sold 50,000 records." Or something like that. That's a paraphrase. But the idea of selling 50,000 records making you a big band is so completely outdated. I have a lot of respect for that band, which is its own post. I was blindsided recently by a friend who said he hated their guts and thought they were a fake band. But I disagree, even if I do agree that they are (or at this point it seems more accurate to say, were) total publicity hounds. For comparisons sake, I'm pretty sure that Blonde Redheads record after Melody of Certain Damaged Lemons (which was that?) sold about 50,000 copies, but that was like 2004 maybe? Totally different world now. But yeah, if you are an artist making money on your record (which can be very expensive to make) is a tricky motherfucking thing. And you might be able to get some stuff ($$) from Itunes, but it doesn't compare as a % to the money that you aren't making because someone is downloading it for free. I read somewhere Death Cab for Cutie talking about their first record, which I believe they put out themselves, saying to each other "dudes, you think we can sell 500 of these?" And they decided to give it a shot. Selling 500 records is astronomical at this point.

OK, I have to cut myself off, I guess there will probably (hopefully?) be a part 2 to this post, but like I said...burning daylight...

let me just say first...
I think there is good and bad that is coming out of this. Good: people who care about music are more educated about it than ever before. This means more people who know what they are doing are starting bands, I assume. Bad: There is no fucking money in music at all. Why is this bad? When did everything become about money all the sudden right? Making music costs money. Touring costs money. You want to booka tour by yourself, the first time you go out you may do everything right (I think RXR did a pretty good job) and you are going to lose money. Think about it...how are you supposed to get more than $60 a night in a town where no one knows who you are? And you got 4 mouths to feed and a gas tank? That's not counting rent, which went at great lengths to get covered (also we went out in August so it was a little easier to do this.) And gas may be $1.50 right now, but I mean that's gotta be temporary don't you think? People want to tell you that bands don't make their money on records, but its OK, because they make it on the road, but show me those bands. Those bands are Deerhunter. Or not even Deerhunter, but look at it this way....if you want to save up your money and go on tour as your vacation for 3 weeks sleeping on floors and eating shit all the time, that's one thing and its a great experience, but if you want to do the DIY thing to the point where it's sustainable I'm just asking you to show me the model where that actually works.

And I do have a solution, which is that the bands have to themselves become the booking agents in order to setup shows for themselves out of town that actually pay something, but I'm skeptical about this too, because it assumes that the bands can play enough shows locally with payouts for out of town bands without killing their own draw. We will see if it works, or if you really do at this point need someone big to latch on to (please god no.)

Also, there is maybe nothing as fun on this planet as touring so please no one be discouraged for any reason by this from doing it just for fun, because it is and it makes you a better person too in a lot of different ways you would never even imagine without doing it first.

Anyways aloha!

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Tour Kickoff!!!!!!!!!!!!!11111

Whoaaaa so we had a parttay last night. I think it went rather well, with the exception of the door to our bathroom getting kicked in and completely fucked. Hey, take it out of our deposit. It was a black light party and the basement was tricked out blacklight style, courtesy one mr david salines, who i found passed out on my floor at 4 in the morning after returning from some appartment complex crashing swimming (across Red River from the HEB...nice pool, id never been there before). There was an empty couch available. Signs of a good party, I guess.

Anyways, we are about to embark on our great adventure. 4 weeks! It seems like a really long time. Like, this whole idea is almost silly, but I guess we will see how silly it is after we get back. I just can't even imagine all the adventuring that is going to go down, but I guess if you have to give us credit for one thing, its that we usually live to tell the tale. Plus Party Chris (henceforth WYLD Chris, as opposed to Regular Chris, which is Chris Reed) gave us all necklaces and WYLDPRTY Tshirts. I was there, so i got first pick, and grabbed the necklace with the turtle to protect from bad vibes. I think they all have personalities. The turtle one is protection. Its my spirit animal now. I also got the shirt with the glow in the dark.

REVERSE X-RAYS TOUR KICKOFF @ RANCHO RELAXO, AUSTIN TEXAS
8.1.08
Who Played The Show:
Reverse X-Rays -- probably our best show ever
Plutonium Farmers -- these guys are killed it. Jonathan asked at one point "are we too loud?" The answer was no. You guys are loud as fuck, but no, you are not too loud. you are rocking out.
Operation Playmate -- Erich Ragsdale and Eric Archer ...was this IDM? It was badass.
Ethan Master of the Hawaiian Ukulele -- That dudes an asshole! No, I'm just kidding
Little Mystery Trail -- Christine Aprile solo jammer. badass.

NOTABLE HAPPENINGS: BROKEN DOOR, POST-SHOW SWIMMING, BLACK LIGHTS, OTHER STUFF

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Why Music Still Matters, part 1

Ok, that title is totally a joke. If it were a Rocky and Bullwinkle title, the second part would be:

or

What I Learned From Werner Herzog On Tour

So lets do it. I'm just going to ramble here, you are welcome to not read this, or to take it with a big ass grain of salt, cause I'm going to just go out on a limb here and let it all hang out (AKA bullshit, question mark?). Also, the tone of this was at least partially inspired by Dann's essay on 50 Cent. You have been warned.

Tour. Ha. Honestly the play-by-play wouldn't mean so much. I wrote a play-by-play, which totals about 20 pages single spaced 12 point times new roman font, and will be distributed to maybe 4-5 people, but mainly because they are interested in the trivialities of my life, as I they (AKA not because what happened is some big secret, although I still value my privacy in some measure.) But the summery would be much more useful.

The single most important thing that happened to me on tour is I became a reader again. All that time in the van surrounded by books with fucking nothing to do, and you start reading. The most affecting thing I learned came from a book, not experience, which hypothetically could have happened if I hadn't gone on tour at all. It was in my tourmates book "Herzog on Herzog" which was Werner Herzog talking about a bunch of shit. It was published in the last 10 years, so is mostly retrospective. The singly statement that affected me the most was one he made about the role of the artist (although there's a lot of great shit in there). Basically he said that a society needs relevant imagery to be able to talk about things. In what I understand of Herzog's view (or at least what I took from it) it's the artist's function to create and relate images, vocabulary, references, metaphors, or whatever you want to call it (after all, those are just words themselves) with which society can make analogies to life. This relevant imagery often comes from specialized knowledge, the most recent of which often, but not necessarily, shows itself most relevant (which should be expected).

There are ultimately many goals of creating such images, not the least of which in importance is the survival of the human race. But it goes beyond that, which in my estimation is good for the artist's point of view, since hypothetically the human race would have at least some chance of survival without updated imagery. In Herzog's view it is possible to create a life not just filled with happiness, but with meaning, AKA there is something beyond survival. Maybe this seems obvious to you, but I think its probably advantageous to have some sort of clarity in how a person, pulling against a biological drive towards hedonism in their daily life, is supposed to derive that conclusion.

It is certainly a humanistic goal to update a vocabulary with which people can relate to each other, and it's not a given as to whether in our lifetimes the parameters will be defined by the individual, the march of technology, or institutions with financial motives that will define the vocabulary which frames our lives. In my opinion, it's a constant struggle; the modern day equivalent in many ways to a sociological good/bad, us/them dichotomy that can be viewed as having defined human society for most of our species existence. But I am a humanist, and hold solace in believing that even as circumstances grow dire, the individual will always hold a trump card, that being that if society were to collapse, the individual would once again become the main agent for defining society.

So that was the most important thing conceptually that I came across this tour. There is actually one additional antecedent about Herzog I want to touch on. In his book he mentions his dream of starting a hypothetical film school. The requirements for entry is that a applicant would have to first walk x number of miles on foot. X number of miles was something like 5000 miles. Basically, in his view there is no substitution for that sort of way of relating to the world, and after tour I really can't agree more. If you want to see the world, that is the way to see it. That's where the people are, and the way to meet and relate to them. If a person wishes to be an artist (one who is able to create relevant imagery) that person has to live experiences in opposition to their prior biases. One root of their biases is their personal experiences to date, and the way to rob those experiences of their power is to have novel experiences, and a quick path to novel experiences is to remove oneself from an environment where one might have repeated experiences.

Still, Herzog's focus is of greater importance than that. First, the whole walking thing confines the rate of travel to what can be achieved with the human body. If we are going to address the question "what does it mean to be human?" why should our instrument of measurement be anything but the human body? Relatedly, it defines the survival of the individual as something outside of society, or at least technology. While in our current global society this can not be used as a rule (6.6 billion people could not all survive without farming and distribution techniques), it is important to note for our own decision making that we as individuals (especially in America) are not governed by this fact, and although the arrogance of technological and monetary supremacy is a main problem for our country, the freedom of movement that it provides as is a noble source for internal confidence (it is important to note that while provided, this freedom is rarely exercised. I found it an interesting and depressing comment in Florida made by a garage attendant who pegged our group as musicians and noted we were the only type of people who traveled anymore.)

I just traveled the United States in a car, but really, I'm letting a car (pervasive technology) get in the way of things. I'm making a concession, but that said, a musician necessarily creates something more bound to technology than a filmmaker in my opinion. The filmmaker can choose to create the deception of nature as might be viewed by the human eye, but with the exception of purely vocal music, the musician does not have that option. The human eye is a mechanical-lens-imitated organic technology (derived through evolution), but outside of the human voice, the sounds we describe as music (or the sounds we describe as "from an instrument") are instantly recognizable as synthetically produced, and furthermore the act of recording, or listening to recorded music is in my opinion more intrusive than that of film.

But this is only one way of relating. Although it may be said that this view lumps in the formalities of music theory, including timbre, harmony, rhythm, large-scale form, and even melody as a comment on technology, that is clearly only one angle of approach. The structural difference between relating to film and recorded music is not in the recording process, but rather in the human body, which is to say the eyes vs the ears. And of course the aforementioned formalities of music may all be reproduced by a single human voice (or group of human voices in the case of harmony, unless you want to count implied harmony, in which case, it can still be reproduced by a single human voice.) One of the main methods humans have for concise communication is through language, and therefore it should come as no surprise that much of the most lauded instrumental playing is said to imitate speech patterns (Jimi Hendrix's wah-wah solos being one prime example among many).

So that's the first and really big thing I learned on tour. That's already pretty long, so maybe I'll save more thoughts for a later post.

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Show Tonight

duuh. hole in the wall 10 PM. Be there, you squares. EMHU CD Release party

also, check check it...
http://partyends.com/peblog/2008/04/hawaiian_ukulelejohn.html

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Ethan, Master of The Hawaiian Ukulele invades The Woodlands

One of the better days of my life was yesterday, when I drove with my brother Daniel, and my best friend Julian down to The Woodlands, Texas and played a EMHU show for the kids there in the high school orchestra room. They were all great, and Pat, who is big in the guitar club down there, and also I'm told an excellent swimmer, took a video of this. The phone died in the middle of the song, but here's a taste of what "Noise Band" sounds like in an orchestra room at The Woodlands HS (was this really taken on a phone? it looks good! Maybe a camera, but still). And to those kids...THANKS

Also its sideways, so crank your neck, soldja boy / break yo neck, busta rhymes



sound band

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