Rain Music Mix side 1

This mixtape is quite different from the mixtapes of the past, mainly because it literally IS a mixtape of the past! ... haha ... In my Montevallo days, I used to obsess over the vinyl jazz section of their library ... not that it was very extensive or anything ... in fact, I checked the same records out over and over and over to the point where I think for a couple of years I was the only person who ever checked them out ... haha! Anyway, this is when I discovered the indescribable beauty of the music of Duke Ellington ... 

Oddly enough, for a long time I would only listen to his music whenever it rained and stormed ... I can never explain why ... it just seemed (and seems) to fit somehow ... the composition I played by him the most when it rained is a thing called "Black, Brown & Beige" ... That piece ALWAYS makes me think of storm clouds gathering, lightning flashing ... there's even a part (at the start of "Come Sunday") where you can "hear" the raindrops start to plip and plop onto the ground ... haha ... ("Black, Brown & Beige", as a composition consists of songs 1 through 4) ... so at some point, I taped these library records and made myself a "rain music" tape, which was played religiously during every shower or storm that cropped up, literally for years and years ...

So, in that respect, here I have recreated "side 1" of that cassette tape, adding a slight "backdrop" of thunder and rain and wind ... on this side, all of the songs are by Duke Ellington, except for 2 slightly creepy poems by Carl Sandburg (his voice has always been sort of haunting to me) ... side 2 will be next week, and that contains a variety of library jazz records, along with this crazy speaking-in-tongues bit of random A.M. radio I captured!

I decided to recreate the mixtape, not only for preservation's sake, but also because this month it has rained SOOOOO much and I guess I just wanted to, in some way or other, incapsulate these days since I am indeed a huge fan of rain and thunderstorms...

HERE it is, for your rainy jazz-listening pleasure.

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On a softball note, tonite's game will be the first-ever "Hair Metal" game for my team, the Bad News Bearons! We're gonna 80's it up with some teased wigs, makeup and leather! It'll prolly scare the hell out of the other team! In that spirit, I made a very repetitive "BNB" theme (crowd chant) for us tonite, based on AC/DC's song "TNT" ... I'm bringing the camera so there'll prolly be a video to accompany later ... enjoy! 

It's right HERE.

Eggling / Birdling Mix

This mixtape was made specifically to be the soundtrack for Peter & I's upcoming art opening, (see above flyer) so I don't really know what else it'd be perfect for ... perhaps:

A. drawing or painting

B. cooking a meal

C. cleaning yer bedroom

D. watching a thunderstorm

E. eating a meal

Anyway, I made 2 different mixes of this particular one, WITH BIRDS and WITHOUT BIRDS ...  (I suggest the WITHOUT BIRDS version for those who want to fully appreciate the songs ... because the bird sounds will serve a purpose at the opening ... otherwise, they might drive the listener mental and get in the way!) At any rate, enjoy! Both Peter & I picked out the songs this time.

So this week has been a bit frustrating because I really enjoy rain and thunderstorms, but because of them our last softball game was cancelled due to poor field conditions, and then after that we had numerous practices in which barely anybody showed up to ... so hopefully the field will be okay tonight, cuz we have a DOUBLEHEADER! Two games in a row ... 

Other than that, I've been painting and painting, working on the collaborations ... They're turning out bizarrely and surprisingly good ...

On a musical note (ha!) ... David posted this insanely hilarious video of Scottie's face super-imposed over moving rollercoaster footage with Scottie saying ridiculous things about "the rollercoaster" ... it all looks very 80's and is way funny! I tried posting the actual video on here, but facebook said NO, so instead I made a song out of the audio from it ... maybe somehow David can put the video on Youtube ... until then though, enjoy THIS!

The Magic Inside Of You Mix

This mixtape will be perfect for:

A. running wild through springtime landscapes

B. a spontaneous thriftstore excursion

C. spring cleaning (and dancing)

D. practicing softball during a thunderstorm

E. baking peanut butter cookies

You can partake of it right HERE.

This past weekend was a great one ... First of all, Friday nite was the grand opening of the Bici Bicycle Co-op here in B'ham ... there was a bike ride all around town, then a bike race and then a crazy dance party ... i think i danced for one solid hour! Saturday was a little more laid back but I did get some great stuff from Wes at the Bottletree rummage sale and then had fun hanging out with folks while the oncoming storm flashed overhead during the Dead Confederate show that nite ... The next day was madness ... Dan had a vegan cookout brunch so i went over to his place with some pasta i'd made ... Alan & Brianna & Leslie & Josh were there sipping mimosas ... Well, softball practice was supposed to be at 2, but the weather was getting crazy windy and thundery so Rebecca sent us practice cancellation texts and not only did the thunderstorm suddenly arrive with its torrential downpours and huge blasts of lightning, but the mimosas started pouring endlessly and the day-long merriment and mindless debauchery began! What a way to cap off a weekend!

In other news, I made a video for the Bad News Bearons themesong:

And if you want something to make you laugh out loud, try THIS.

HERE are the newest thriftstore fantasies (8 & 9) created for you by Brianna and I.

Micachu's Filthy Friends Mix

This mixtape will be perfect for:

A. discovering 

B. exploring

C. laughing

D. hero-worshipping

E. escaping

you can download it right HERE.

My current favorite band is Micachu & The Shapes ... I was looking at her myspace page and happily discovered that she'd made a mixtape (called the Filthy Friends mixtape) ... so, being exhausted from a very successful weekend where I displayed and sold my paintings at the Magic City Art Connection festival, I decided to throw the ball into the East London court and expose folks to the sound scene that's going on over there ... This mixtape is unique in the fact that when you listen to it, you realize that many of the songs were written especially for it because the bands performing on it are all Micachu's friends (and sometimes Micachu herself)...

below is a video she did for an early version of the song "Ship" (here it's called "Attac") from the very-playable "Jewellery" album:

Totally Random Mix 1

This mixtape will be perfect for:

A. doing anything random

B. driving to work, school or home

C. not being able to make up your mind

D. softball practice

E. wondering if it's gonna rain or not

HERE it is for you to download.

This has been a crazy week ... the combination of getting all of my paintings done for the Magic City Art Connection festival (this weekend! April 24th, 25th and 26th at Birmingham's Linn Park) and having softball practices and games has made me incredibly sore, but hey! it's so worth it ...

The idea behind this particular mix came to me while I was delivering Black and White magazines (I do this twice a month) ... I had my ipod on shuffle and it dawned on me that I was really enjoying the order of the songs and the song choices that were popping up on the ipod ... so I started jotting them down and basing this mix on the total and complete randomness of it all ... it gave the whole process a nice element of surprise and I enjoyed making it in a very different way than I usually enjoy making mixes ...

Speaking of this mix, the 1st song on it is performed by my new favorite band, Micachu & The Shapes ... I cannot stop playing they're amazing "Jewellery" album ... below is a video of their (very brief) song "Lips" from that album:

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On a softball note, I composed a catchy themesong for our team (the Bad News Bearons) and at tonite's game, it'll be premiered ... hopefully it'll get the crowd going and some nice chanting will develop! This is a very simple version (there may be funny raps and shout-outs in it later!) but HERE it is, if yer interested.

Electric Whirlwind Mix

This mixtape will be perfect for:

A. on & off dancing in the privacy of your bedroom

B. getting a huge pile of random things done

C. driving around running errands

D. trying to meet deadlines and such

E. jogging on a windy day

You may now download it right HERE.

Speaking of whirlwinds, I feel like my Life has been in one lately thanks to the fact that Magic City Art Connection is right around the corner (April 24, 25 + 26 at Birmingham's Linn Park) and I've been getting 60 plus new paintings ready for it, on top of joining a really awesome co-ed softball team called (don't laugh!) the Bad-News Bearons (okay, you can) ... We've had 3 practices and one game (we lost 5-14 but hey it was our 1st game!) but so far it's been a ton of fun ... our 2nd game is tonight!

On the day of our 1st game, my friend Laura was in town visting from Washington, D.C. and we had a great time catching up, getting lost in Reed's Book Store & Museum of Memories, taking pictures (witness Laura's photographic evidence below!), dining at Makarios and searching for stripey softball socks at Romeo's sports outlet ... 

Speaking of Laura, she had the idea of me possibly bundling all of my mixes on here into affordable packages (which I may or may not have time to do!) to sell at MCAC, and with this in mind, I burned all of the mixes so far onto an mp3 disc and started listening to them in order as I painted and painted for the festival, and it's been quite an experience so far (especially since I hadn't listened back to any of them since I started making them!) ... in a way, it was a bit like reliving those days all over again, but very abstractly inside my head ... hard to explain ... ther's a sense of nostalgia and sentimentality involved, but not in the way normal memories happen ... more like listening to the soundtrack of a memory instead of watching the movie ... haha

While Laura was here, we listened to Wolf Parade's "At Mount Zoomer" album in her car and it turned out that she hadn't heard their 1st one, "Apologies To The Queen Mary", which is one of my all-time favorite albums ... so I agreed to make her a copy of it, but she ended up leaving before I had a chance to do so ... 

so to whet yer appetite, Laura, here's the music video to a song off the album ... hope you dig it:

 

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On another note, Elise's 9-year-old son Nolan sent me a list of spelling words he typed out on an old typewriter and for some reason I thought it'd be funny to make a song using the list as the lyrics:

HERE is the Spelling List Song!

Sleep + Dream Mix

This mixtape will be perfect for:

A. drifting off to sleep

B. attempting to drift off to sleep

C. spending some quality time with a lit candle

D. taking a long bath

E. doodling random things on napkins

You can download it right HERE.

My great friend Lucy, who  i met in high school, came from California and paid a visit to Peter and I  ... we had a ton of fun taking pictures (Peter took most of the ones below), listening to music, eating cookies, playing with dolls, tape recording ourselves, sipping wine and enjoying a backyard fire ... We hadn't seen her in almost ten years and ended up reminiscing a good deal ... one thing that brought big grins to our faces was remembering a documentary we had seen on public television back in the teenage years ... it was called "Best Boy" and featured someone called Philly ... Here's the gist of it:

"It came out of nowhere to win the best documentary Oscar in 1980, and by now "Best Boy" should be ackowledged as one of the finest documentaries in film history. Filmmaker Ira Wohl took as his subject his own cousin, 52-year old Philly, a retarded man who had lived his entire life with his parents. Seeing the physical decline of the parents, Wohl suggested they prepare Philly for living away from home for the first time in his life."

The part that grabbed us the most when we 1st saw "Best Boy" was when the camera man asks Philly what he's doing and, although he's simply standing there with nothing in his hands, he happily responds "I'm eatin' chicken!" (This happens at 6 minutes and 33 seconds on the video below) ... Lucy loved this line so much that she ended up naming her cat Chicken ... ENJOY!

and HERE is the 3rd installment of the Mystery Tapes series.