08 19 08 09:41 |No comments yet Agreeable

Christina came back from teacher orientation at MICA in Baltimore feeling "nourished". Not by the hummous wraps they carted in for lunch, but by the people and community that she found there. It got us to thinking of how important it is to question the nutritional value of not only our food, but also of our day to day activities. Jobs, relationships, time off etc. can all be quesitoned. "Is this healthy? Is this nourishing? Is this energizing me to continue contributing to that thing that is providing this nourishment?". It's a great way to look at work, school, neighborhoods, and religious institutions. It's a very clean analysis for many things, but one that's probably not often done. The  food to living analogy is great. Perhaps go on a diet of unhealthy things? It's beginning to chime back to the Seven Habits, but I like it. Hmm...what's for lunch?

Chrissy was excited by how organized and clear the school's administration was throughout the day. MICA puts a lot of responsibility on their professors and rewards them with a community of teachers and students that are among the best anywhere. We're both very excited by this new opportunity and the chance to explore Baltimore.

08 05 08 9:12 |No comments yet Huh?

These are hideous. These are the new ?uestlove Nike Air Force One sneakers. Wow.

Chrissy and I have taken the last few days off to tool around, hit some beaches, and cook. Had a blast at Brigantine beach yesterday, and visited Lewes beach today. Really enjoyed laying out as it began to rain and watching it pass over us. Finishing a mix and 3 songs for a 21 Day film project entry this week. Hopefully we'll have as much luck as we did with the 48hr Film Project. I wrote 3 songs for the film. One entirely in Spanish. One is a rocking jingle style number, and the other is... well we'll just have to play the video when it's finished on Friday. It'll be funny. I also scored the opening to a new Comcast OnDemand show about Puppies. A few chords mixed with some barks and some great animation by John Conning @ CCFV. Fun fun.

Paris Hilton filmed a response to John McCain's ad. It's really nicely done and quite funny. Click here to watch it. It is perfectly safe for work.

I've got some entries in waiting about new music, Aza Raskin, supercolliders and tequila, but those will wait until Thursday. Back to vacation

07 07 08 8:32 |No comments yet College Latin et al.

So here it is, well part of it at least. My site is now more compatible with Internet Explorer. Turns out it was a super easy .css fix after all. Coincidentally Internet Explorer has been found to be the least safe of all the major browsers. Which means more spam, phishing, and the opportunity for identity theft. Click here to read all about it. Later this week I'll have new colors, a new header, and links to my videos on YouTube.

I had 2 great meetings last week wrt new projects. Anwar Hassan and I are about to embark on an electro pop project. David Dworanczyk and I are diving into fleshing out some of his original material, starting with a very personal and moving song titled "In Between". The first EP of my Everything Burns solo project is also almost there. 

Chris Landau turned me onto PicLens today. It's an amazing Firefox add-on that has to be seen to be believed. Insane. I highly recommend it.

I also came to grips with our Mandolin Slicer today. It's more complicated than it needs to be, but it seriously whooped some onions, carrots, and celery into shape tonight. And yes, I almost took off the tips of my fingers a few times.

06 26 08 09:15 |No comments yet The Liquid Channels

Hello all! Long time no blog. It's been a very exciting couple of weeks here. I had the chance to mix 3 live broadcast TV shows over Father's Day weekend. They were live Father's Day special episodes of the Sprout "Sharing Show". We took live calls and emails from the kids all afternoon. It was a lot of fun. It's kind of like how they portray the helm of a sumbarine, lots of call and response commands in the Control Room. "Cue the key, "Cueing the key". "Deko Audio down", Deko Audio down" and so on. I was very nervous the night before but after a few minutes the nerves wore off and I started to really enjoy the experience. On a technical note, is Mackie kidding with the faders on the 1604. I haven't used one since the mid-90s. Boy are those faders awful. So nice to have the D-Command in my room.

I'm also finishing up mxing season 2 of the Let's Go Show for Sprout. It's live action environments this season, as opposed to the green screened CGI backgrounds we used last year. It looks really good, and Bruce Liteki did a bang up job recording the audio. It's a pleasure to mix well recorded talent.

In other news, "Happy Birthday Harris Malden", a film I recently mixed for Philly production team Sweaty Robot, was premiered at the CineVegas film festival in Las Vegas last weekend. See www.sweatyrobot.com to watch some of their shorts and read the reviews. Sounds like they had a blast in Vegas and the film was very well received. I may have mentioned this below but a lot of it was shot on Franklin St in South Philly, just a few blocks away from our house. It was a lot of fun gathering ambiences and foley sounds from around the neighborhood and having them fit in so easily. 

So there are some serious changes in the works here at my website. I'll be updating the look and adding some features in the next couple of days. All this co-incides with the removal of the Made on Mac banner I used to have over there. Yup, that's right, we're getting into our PCs now. My Mac will always be my platform at Work, but for web stuff and day to day computing, we just can't afford to keep up with Apple's prices. I still think they are clearly superior devices, but we're getting an awful lot of bang out of our very used PCs (read:killer workstation class computers from a few years ago), and will the prices of things what they are today, we're glad to be saving the dimes. Also in the works is changing some things around to be easier to view in Internet Explorer. But, for those of you in Internet Explorer, please please please please go to Firefox.com or Opera.com and make the switch to those browsers. The web is so much faster and  smoother in a better browser. They copy all your user data from IE so nothing will be lost and you can always switch back, but please, for me, go give one of those a try. Thank me later.

05 15 08 4:00 |No comments yet Chrissy Day

Click this link to go to the Canadian Center for Architectue bookstore to pick up a copy of Architecture and Ideas vol. VII which features an article by Christina P. Day, my lovely wife. Her sculpture "Bystander" is featured on the cover. Very nice. Good writing abounds inside: Susan Molesky on Richard Kroeker architect; Blair Marsden on walking; Ginger Nolan on re-curating the city; Christina P. Day on looking at nothing with longing; Aaron Horst on strage measure; and Andrea Ling : "Girl in wooden frock". Grab your copy today!

In other news, I'm wrapping up work on a feature film mix I have been working on. It's a very funny story shot a few blocks away from us here on Franklin St. Nice to see a team of filmmakers embracing the neighborhood and going all the way for a feature length film. Details will follow upon its completion.

The Sharing Show is underway every afternoon on Sprout. Early response has been very positive. The puppets are really adorable. You can beat a 3 piece house band consisting of Ricky the rabbitt on Piano, Patti the pig doing the singing, and Curtis E. Owl on the Bass. Really nicely written and produced. Go team go.

Middlehill is threatening to get together in June and record a new record, Ben and Brad don't know it yet, but they'll be coming to Philly to cut some new songs and have a few laughs. Maybe we can get John Charnota to produce? I'll have to work on that. Also, planning a trip to DC in 2 weeks. A nice weekend away with the Landaus. Looking forward to seeing the hope diamond, and getting down at the Black Cat to some new wave dance action. We're staying in the GW/Froggy Bottom area, right near the watergate hotel.

05 01 08 9:56 |No comments yet And the winner is...

We are! After 48 hours of blood, sweat, and tears, we took home the best film award in The 48 Hour Film Project for Philadelphia! Our team, No Right Return
, was made up of Center City Film and Video Employees and their friends and family. 15 of us put in a heck of a lot of work over the course of the weekend to create "Kitchen Aide :  A tale of domestic harmony", a 7 min film about loss and recovery. Chrissy and I were honored to work with such an amazing bunch of creative friends.

So glad to be able to incorporate a few Middlehill songs (thanks Brad and Ben) and a song by The Classic Brown (thanks Staci and Dave) into the film. Check out Staci Brown's myspace over there. She's amazing.

Special thanks to Jordan and the CCFV family for hiring all of us in the first place and granting us access to CCFV's amazing resources. Also, a big thanks to  Mark and xlntads.com for sponsoring the project. And, thanks to the 44 other teams that submitted films to the Project. It's excellent to see so much talent in the city we love to call home.

Click here to download the .wmv file of the movie.

04 14 08 12:17 |No comments yet The Black Blood of the Earth

Very much enjoyed the opening of Ryan Widger's new work at Kelly Webster inthe Crane Arts Building on Thursday night. I like feeling like I'm seeing something I may not be supposed to see. Almost as if I'm getting away with something in front of these pictures. Really enjoyed the evening, which included a teriffic dinner at Tinto. Kick ass dining area in front of the open kitchen. Well priced drinks, carefully selected chef's tasting menu. We'll be back there, despite some frites that were salty enough to make my eyes water.

Working on 2 new super secret projects. But you didn't hear it from me. Been reading Getting Things Done by David Allen, re-aligning how I organize my to-do lists and calendar. Very cool way to use ann extend an existing organizational system. Turns our our neighbor across the street is a roller-derby gal. Love it. Missing Reel.

03 28 08 09:39 |No comments yet SQUUUUUUEEEEEZZZZEEEE

I'm about to embark on the sound design for a new Sprout daily show. It's three puppets. It's very funny. I'm back to work on my solo record after having to replace my tried and true Apple Cinema Display. First generation, you know, with the ADC connection on it. I put it out in the trash on Wed. Within minutes someone had walked off with it. I wish them all the luck in the world finding a PowerMac with and ADC video card in it or an ADC to DVI adapter. I replaced it with a beautiful HP display, w2207. I've been very impressed with HP stuff recently. The little tx1410 I'm writing this on has been a lot of fun to use and Christina's xw8200 workstation should be a treat when it arrives. It's been easy making the transition to PCs. Especially on the wallet.

Enjoyed a bachelor party last night for Thomas Reynolds. We went to the Philadelphia Gun Club off of the Italian Market. Had a lot of laughs. 12 of us went, clearly with no idea what we were doing. we had a great class with an un-named master of lethal force and shot 9mm and 40 cal. handguns for a few hours. Good times, good times. DONT BE THAT GUY!( the guy that holds the gun wrong and cuts up his han). We weren't that guy. Though Ryan spilled a bit of beer at Triumph in old city afterward. 

Philadephia is gearing up for our crucial primary battle. Everyone I talk to is pretty excited about Obama. Looking forward to the drama on April 22.

03 02 08 1:25 |No comments yet Batches and barrels and quilts

So the mega huge and exciting news of the week is that my lovely wife Christina is back from her two month stint at Sculpture Space!! Two months = 3 pieces of work, 7 poems, 9 models, lots of seitan with studio mate Heather Dewey-Hagborg, almost 60 chilly days in the bustling metropolis that is Utica, or beau-tica, or minu-tica, or nothing-to-do-tica. Great to have her home! I've got photos from her residency at my Flickr page. Over there --->

Meanwhile, my record is coming along nicely. I've got all the ideas together and three songs just about completed. They are taking me in a new direction, which is adding to the complexity of the production, which adds to the time it takes to execute the songs, but they are worth it.  Perhaps I'll tka emy own advice and release 2 EPs  instead of a Full length record. Maybe a part 1 and 2 type of thing. We'll see.  

We attended the 2008 Art Banquet at Scott Kip's artist studios. Great turnout, great food, and a very good Art Swap. I randomly received a 7" Single by Paper Napkin, produced by Jeff Mott. Which is an amazing coincidence as I knew Jeff pretty well at one point and was a fan of his. Very cool. I look forward to checking it out today.

Other news, I'm typing this entry on an HP tx1410 laptop running Vista Home Premium. Yup, I've had to make the switch from Mac to PC for my everyday computing. Still have a kick butt Mac Pro as my workstations at home and the studio, but the network at the new CCFV facility necessitated my getting a PC. It's actually really nice. I'll report more on this later as the glow from a new gadget fades and I start to see it for the pc it is. But so far no problems.

Almost done with the 2 songs I'm producing for Best Wishes, looking forward to getting together with Bradly and Ben for a new recording, dinner with the fam tonight to celebrate Chrissy's return.

02 13 08 12:29 |No comments yet The buzz is slow and low

It's here! It's here! Our new audio post digs at the Comcast Center are here! Center City Film and Video has 2 new audio post suites to compliment the 9 Avid Suites and 2 production studios in our new space on the 24th floor of the Comcast Center. Here's a YouTube of a little walkthrough.Over there too --->>> Recorded the first VO in the booth today. Sounded sweet despite the bangin' and clangin' from the construction above. The whole studio is a twitter with prepping content for Comcast's Management Conference. Big projects, lots of great things happening.

Started another new song last night. "Can't afford to lose" is the title. Some nice country action on it.

I enjoyed a terrific weekend with family. Here's a photo of my niece Lilly and I enjoying brunch on Saturday. She's the best, all smiles and giggles. She is even clapping, almost walking, too. I have a video of her almost gnawing a water bottle in half. Pac Man style. It's great to have family around while Chrissy is away at Sculpture Space. She's doing great by the way, despite the sub zero temperatures and the dryness associated with a wood burning stove.One piece down one more to go. Some very exciting things are happening with her work up there. More info upon her return (too many days and counting!!). Odd how being apart affects us. 

Very excited about how Senator Obama is making out in the primaries. Great to see some real momentum heading in a good direction. I found the Yes We Can music video very moving. There I said it. I also liked "We are Marshall". Darn, perhaps too much information for the web...

01 24 08 11:33 |No comments yet It's a spontaneous thing

Today I had the pleasure of working with Sean, a new host of the Sunny Side Up Show on PBS kid's Sprout. We put together a dance song using transportation sounds. Lots of fun. I'll try and post a video of it next week. While in the session we got to talking and it came up that i had made a few bluegrass recordings while in Michigan. I've been meaning to post our Middlehill "Pills to Purge Melancholy' record for some time now. I sat down today to do so and realised I don't have a copy. I've got the case but no CD. grrrr. In the meantime I've posted a video of Benjamin Teague and Elliott Earls playing "Dink's Blues" during one of those sessions. It's really pretty. Hope you like it. I'll post the entire record as soon I find it. Too many hard drives...

Spent more time writing Everything Burns tonight. I'm looking forward to letting you all hear it.

01 19 08 12:32 |No comments yet Sondheim's beat me up

Danielle Tobin and I saw Sweeny Todd last night at the Riverview. Some of you may know this, but I have a weakness for musicals (except those by A.L. Weber, but that's another post), and Sweeny Todd was a doozy. I loved it. It's a great re-imagining of the story and the new recordings of these amazing songs are sopt on. Kudos to the music producer and conductor. The costumes were killer as well. I'd dress like a blue collar bloke from that era everyday, if I could only find the duds. As I found with No Country for Old Men, some of the gruesomeness of it was a little over the top. There is 1980's Hong Kong (think Boxer's Omen) style blood squirting everywhere. I found it a little cheezy. Perhaps a political commentary? As the news networks are not showing us the mortality-checking images of some of the atrocities occurring around the world everyday, perhaps directors are serving them up. Well acted, well sung (in that easier to manage speak singing required by the songs), and beautifully imagined.

Looking forward to a full day at home working on "Everything Burns".

01 18 08 1:56 |No comments yet include free music

I attended the Junto at Punk Ave. The topic was the music business and the new distribution models that are challenging our notion of music as a business and presenting music creators with new challenges wrt getting music out there to the people. Mike Kiley of The Mural and the Mint and Kristen Thomson of the Future of Music Coalition were the moderators.

I'm of the mind that music should be free. That's what the marketplace is telling us. People are not placing the same value on .mp3 downloads that they did on vinyl or CDs. People want easy to access, free/inexpensive music. In light of this availability I think consumers are ingesting more music than ever before. Media file players are ubiquitous, it's almost too easy to create your own musical wall paper to accompany you throughout the day. Gone(more like going, probably) are the days of gathering around the turntable and really listening to a recording. So I think we music creators are being challenged like never before to create a sort of beacon than can keep an audience coming back. Look at the big mainstream entertainers of our time, Will Smith, Queen Latifa, Ice Cube, etc.. all have transitioned from being musicians to being entertainers. Adding skills to their quiver that keep them in the limelight and keep consumers coming back for more of their output.

Not to mention the huge hit to actual sound quality people are willing to deal with. No wonder hi - def audio has been on is death bed for years. 5.1 records? I think not. Can't enjoy them on the train, in the car, or at a cubicle. Forget it. Music is easier to make, easier to put out there, lower fidelity, and almost too abundant. It's never been better. More people making more music thats reaching more people than ever before possible. Yes please.

This does however make us change our expectations of monetizing out efforts in music. We need to redefine a successful record. How far can the money from a tour take you? We need to get better at licensing works to TV and film, make better use of touring support services like eventful.com, and we need to always have something new in the stream to keep listeners engaged and returning for more.

Last night, one of the Punk Ave. guys, Rick, mentioned something super important. Curators. How can a listener choose from this infinite pool of new music content. I love recommendation algorithms. I'm curious to see how important better music journalism will become. I'm suspicious of the lack of bad record reviews. It was good to see the booking agent from Johnny Brenda's there last night. She's curating new music, too.

Mike brought up subsidized music. It's coming. This record sponsored by Audi. The record is free but you can only get it from a slickly advertised site.

I could go on and on. My new record is coming along nicely. I've got our living room looking like a pawn shop. Accordion, banjo, uke, guitars, maracas, and piano bits everywhere. I'm taking advantage of Chrissy's 2 months away at Sculpture Space to get it all together. It's still titled "Everything Burns" and yes, it'll be available for nothing, right here.

12 27 07 12:38 |No comments yet RIP Benazir Bhutto, 54

silence silence silence

11 08 07 09:43 |No comments yet I've got invisible armor on

So Michael Nutter will be our new Mayor here in Philly. I'm pleased he won. He was the only candidate we saw out on the town, attending town hall meetings, getting on the stage at the Chinatown festival. It's nice to see a Mayor around town. That's one of the things we really appreciated about Ed Rendell. You could be out to dinner or at a bar and lo and behold there's the Mayor, hanging out with friends or colleagues. It gives a small city like Philly a real small town feel. Hope to see Mayor Nutter (the original Nutta?, I can't help but sometimes say his name in my Jungle MC/Bristol UK accent) around and about.

So things are excellent around here. Chrissy and I are re-building our vestibule. It all started as an innocent attempt to build shelves for our record collection. I was ready to go to home depot and pick up a miter saw (we got the Dewalt that Chrissy uses at work, kick butt machine). Christina was up stairs getting ready and I sort of absentmindedly started pawing (well, more like boot-toeing) at the wall to wall in the vestibule. Just sort of poking around, curious as to what lie beneath. Chrissy comes down and in a thrilling flurry of expletives, scarves, and freshly applied hair products we broke out the crowbars and went at it. 6 hours and a few Evan Williams later we had it down to studs and sub floor. There was an almost geologic amount of lineolium, wood paneling, luan, and wall paper. I'll post pictures later. The floors made this amazing wet sticky "SCHLOOOOOOOP" sound when we peeled up layer upon layer of nastiness. So we've ordered tile, cut the hardi-board, and pointed the bricks. We'll have a new vestibule by thanksgiving. 

Speaking of which, we're very excited to have 16 family members joining us for Turkey day. From the far reaches of NYC, Doylestown, Juniper St., and Old City. Dueling turkeys, grandma's cranberry sauce, hashweh, pies and some of Mike Baker's kitchen magic. It'll rock. 

My concolences to the families of the recent murder victims here in Philly and abroad. I applaud the city of Philadelphia for giving the Boy Scouts an awakening "WHAT, WHAT" about their free rent sudenly becoming not so free on the basis that their anti-gay policy violates the City's anti-discrimination policy. Our many congratulations to Chris Landau on his first few days at his new job. Happy Birthday to Tommy Reynolds. Cheers.