"I'm spinning round the room in awe" ryan adams

Saturday, July 19, 2003

I am working at the record store with Jen and we're listening to "A Rush of Blood to the Head".

We both think Chris Martin needs a hug.

Spoonful of Pop

The new New Pornographers cd makes me extremely happy.

Again, like the Tim Easton album from last night, I feel that this CD is nearly flawless. I think I have listened to the recording at least seven times in the past four days. I really enjoy the Stratford 4 album that I listened to as well today.

The newlyweds came over tonight and we all ate chinese food. It was crazy good times.

And speaking of crazy, I am off to bed because I have this insane notion that I will actually wake up early and go running before work.

Ok, and so yeah, the new Turin Brakes video just came on Subterranean. I like Ethersong a lot better than the Optimist LP. Subterranean is one of my favorite things. Other entities that I have exclaimed were my favorite things in the past twelve hours: the new Fruit Juicy Grapermelon gum, internet at work, my black ballet slippers that I wore today, and vegetable spring rolls. Those are the best things ever.

Thursday, July 17, 2003

I'm listening to Tim Easton, and you're not.
I think his latest album, Break Your Mother's Heart, is nearly perfect.

So *they* say that kids don't buy music anymore. In the past two days I have had three people buy CDs in change. Sucks for me to count it, but a little heartwarming as well to realize that these kids are scraping up loose change to purchase art.

There is faith.

Wednesday, July 16, 2003

I'm at work. I rock.
The storefront of the record store is a giant window that looks onto Main Street. When we moved locations, we felt as though this window would welcome more stalkers into the store since its like a micro version of live reality show. This time, the TVs are off and its the Rainbow life that the passerby find them selves admiring, seperated by a smudged pane of glass. So in my journeys from cd racks to cash register to vinyl bins to internet, I almost always find myself on the other side. Constantly staring out the window at life passing by. We find ourselves staring out, more so then people staring in. That we are the actual voyeurs.
Nothing really exciting happens outside of the window. For pete's sake the Gap is across the street. Thrillesville in homogenizationland. A Dunkin Donuts is being built across the street as well. Welcome, Commercialization. Though I do have to admit I am a bit excited for the instant accessibilty of cheap coffee minutes away. But isn't three DDs' in Newark a tad extreme?
We also overlook the crosswalk, which always provides entertainment: does or does not the vehicle stop for the pedestrians? It's the main crosswalk in Newark, and though pedestrians do have the right of way, I think it is reinforced by a neon yellow sign. More often then not, the cars don't stop. Which all in all is ok because Main Street doesn't get that busy that one has to wait for longer than a minute to dart across the street. Reminds me of the game Frogger.

Tuesday, July 15, 2003

Greetings from the editing room.
Waiting for footage to load and thought I would stop in. My current project is the Jonasay concert DVD from their headlining show at the 9:30 Club. Coming out very very nicely. Still syncing all of the video and audio together and working on graphics. Currently loading all the fan footage then tackle that tonight. Since we bring the portable studio to the venue and I switch the shots there, there isn't too much editing to do shot wise, just mostly matching all of the B-roll up. The next few days will be going through the film frame by frame to work on lighting and stabilization and whatnot. Let's do some math. 90 minute concert. 60 seconds in a minute. 3600 seconds in the show. 30 frames per second. 108,000 frames I will be watching. We're calling this "The Masterpiece".

Beware the Ides of July...

Monday, July 14, 2003

Baltimore, MD - July 11
We packed the car and headed for Baltimore to see Jonasay play at Flecthers. What a very random day...
Aurora came over early so we could catch up on the past few weeks where we haven't talked as much. We're partners in crime, which unfortunately has been quieted down a bit since she has been down south more. It's a tradition that we hit up the Wawa right before 95 to fill up on cash and coffee, and of course, this day was full of traditions...a shortened roadtrip in a sense. Most would call Baltimore a destination, but since we have travelled from Maine to North Carolina together, Baltimore is more like a skip. So we're getting our coffee and we inadvertantly started singing to the Backstreet Boys song that was playing in the store. We started laughing and the guy putting in his sugar next to me told us he was releived that we were singing and he wasn't embarrassed anymore. He turns to this girl we can't see and says "who covers this, Matt or Howie". And of course, because I am me, I look at him and say, "are you talking about Nathanson and Day?" and he responds with the same shocked lok that I must have given him, being oh so familiar with what he was saying. The girl emerges wearing a Matt Nathanson shirt. These are the moments that I truly enjoy what I do. Matt Nathanson is currently on tour in the area and we talked about that and Howie's album that he is currently recording. They ask where we're going, and we say a concert. We ask the same question to them, and they reply..."going to a concert". Ari Hest was playing at NXNW outside of Philly and asked us if we wanted to go. Actually, Aurora and I probably would have if we weren't going to Fletcher's (OUR VENUE, well besides Recher...Fletcher's doesn't hate us yet). The girl actually came up from Florida to see a bunch of music this week. Wow, just like us. They ended up being involved with the Nathanson camp. So it was very odd and random that two people exactly like Aurora and I all met by singing a Backstreet Boy song while fixing our coffee at Wawa..... What a wonderful world.
On the trek to Fletcher's we pass a SWIFT Truck (where Aurora and I shout - "SWIFT!!!" Again, read previous blogs, especially the one after the 9:30 club). Get to Fletcher's, take some shots outside the venue, then go upstairs. We scope out who is there then head to get some Jager and beer. We watched the opening band, The Brilliant Mistakes, who I thought were decent, indie raw rock kinda like Ben Folds meeting The Natural History. We stroll around the venue some more and end up at the Jonasay email list book thingy where I think the girls wrote somehting, but I'm not sure....we were tlaking about band email lists and I said I don't get the Jonasay email, and then I think they wrote something.....I hope it wasn't embarrassing...hahaha. Run into Mark and Justin and catch up. Aurora spots a certain sticker on the merch table, where we both exclaim "SWIFT HOLLY!!" - yeah, we're weird. Then off upstairs to the green room, which was actually silver. Have fun up there, why does no one have a camera?! Downstairs, see the show. Played a good solid, energetic set to not that many people in the room. What gives. So we sang and dance and had an all around good time.
Food after at the Blue Moon where Michael and Aurora serenaded us with parts of Lady Madonna. Random. We all share secrets at the table and call it a night around 4 am. But not before Aurora and I pull up to the Jonaven blasting "Wish" out the windows to make Karen get back in the car. Justin just yells at us, "Hey!! I WROTE that song". Ah.
Get to bed around 5 and wake up 3 hours later to go to work. And work for 11 hours. Pass out, then work open to close on Sunday as well. And I wonder why I don't feel well.
I will leave you with Nate's words of wisdom: "You know, you probably wouldn't be sick all the time if you maintained some semblance of a normal schedule"

Sunday, July 13, 2003

There are a few things that I would like to have for my new apartment that I am moving into in less than a month. One is a silver mirror disco ball for my living room. The other is a toaster. New speakers would be great too. So I can eat toast while grooving out.

Las Vegas - June 30 - July 5
Wow, that was surreal. Karen and I flew out to Nevada for a week because our roomate, Natalie, had her wedding in Vegas. There are so many complications and stories intertwined in this trip....
The fun stuff first. :-) I absolutely loathe flying, nothing that heavy should be soaring through the air. Oh, I understand the physics, it's the logistics that just don't make it for me. But the flight was fine and we arrived in sunny, warm, Nevada safely. We decided to stay at the Boardwalk Casino because it is the home of the $3 tables, has a pool, in the middle of the strip, and um, yeah...was teh cheapest place to stay on the strip. We do have priorities. Less money spent on the hotel meant more money to gamble and spend going out. Yes, the Boardwalk was definitely the cheapest place on the strip. No fancy decor are flashing lights here. We did have two clean beds and an immaculate bathroom though, all we needed. We only had time to do one thing the night we arrived, so we decided to visit The Stratosphere, which is a 100+ story building with an exposed roller coaster on the top. Woohoo! There are a few things to know about Vegas: people are super friendly, the streets and sidewalks are amazingly clean, porn is everywhere, and everything LOOKS like walking distance. The kay word is "looks". With every building so flashy and tall, everything LOOKS close. We were sadly and sorely mistaken. On our trek there the two of us have never been cat called as many times as we had been. Do you really think that since you're calling us from your ride as you cruise slowly down the street we're going to talk to you? No. We spent our days by the pool, our afternoons gambling, and our nights at bars and clubs. The next night we went to Coyote Ugly. Didn't take much and shortly after we arrived Karen and I were up on the bars dancing and singing. Is it good to go to a wedding hungover? The wedding was the next day. Yeah....another paragraph is needed for that, and I will get to that after the fun stuff. The night of the wedding, Karen and I went to the Ghostbar, which is at the Palms, which LOOKED like walking distance. So here Karen and I are in the streets of Vegas, dressed up, trying to walk across highways to the Palms. We wouldn't have had to walk and risk our lives if Natalie didn't forget about us :-/. But we got in, for free no less because we are so smooth and had a great time with the outstanding view. the Ghostbar is on top of the casino on the 55th floor. Its decorated in all black and purple and blue and green neon lights. For more, see here: http://www.vegas.com/nightclubs/ghostbar/ Amazing. And great drinks. :-) The next night we went to see the Blue Man Group and eat and hang out at the Hard Rock. BMG was an incredible show infusing world jazzy rock music with theatrical comedic performances. Plus we got to meet them after, so that was cool. Karen and I finally got to hang out with the newlyweds so we went to Hard Rock to eat, drink, and be merry. I literally ran into Pat from Train and was too dumbfounded to say how amazing I think they are. Fourth of July was our last night there and decided we just needed to be out all day and take it all in. We spent the day on the strip going into and gambling at every casino and watched fireworks from our hotel afterwards. We got ready and took a cab to the Palms so we could check out Rain, another club. After waiting behind the velvet ropes for two hours we said screw it and hit the bar. The one thing about Vegas is that everyone is extremely nice and everyone immediately has a topic on conversation to delve into "where are you from, and why are you here". So we met some guys from Indiana, I think we crashed their party, then left and saw Woody Allen hop out of his limo. I think I saw more limos than taxi cabs while there... off to Hard Rock! A lot of great people were there. Poison was there. We met some people and they were talking our pictures as if we were all good friends. Then waiting near the bathroom some more people met up with us, one ended up being a DJ as well, so that was cool. We went to gamble and these two guys came over to us and I swear they were psychic. But they were awesome and I wanted to tlak with them more, so after a break, we went to the bar and met up with them again, along with another group of people. We all had met that night but it felt like we all were hanging out and knew each other for much longer. Russ and Rob, the psychic ones, seemed toknow everyone and spent the rest of the evening introducing us to everyone. And they were shady on what they did...odd how everyone has a disguise there... ;-) Introduced us to Trevor (or is it Brian...!? ;-) ) and Dan from the band, Ian Jones. Hung out with them until we saw daylight and realized it was 5:30 am. Damn. Hit up a cab, went to the hotel to take a nap, then off to catch the plane. So yeah, the plane ride. Again, I will reiterate how much I do NOT like flying. The take off was really shaky for 45 minutes. Shortly after I calmed myself down, the pilot, Captain Robinson, informs us that we will be going through a storm and wil hit major turbelence. After the first shakiy minutes, the plane was nearly convulsing and I have a panic attack. I start shaking and hyperventaling and crying. I was rocking back and forth trying to catch my breathe. I think it was the longest half hour of my life. the poor flight attendents came to my aid which only made matters worse since I was so embarrassed. So again, I calm down and I look out the window and see lightning. Another panic attack. Around North Carolina I was ok till the landing. I nearly kissed the ground when I got off the plane...
The wedding...
It would have been great if the bridesmaids weren't snubbed by the family. Congratulations to Kevin and Natalie, they're a great couple. :-) The wedding was beautiful, everything else was not.