New Year's

This will be me for New Year's this year.


















At least, that's how I hope I'll look, as opposed to a giant tumbling snowball with skis and poles poking out in all directions. Cathy and I are headed to Driggs, ID, way over just this side of the Grand Tetons, to spend a long New Year's weekend. Grand Targhee resort is just a few miles from where we'll be staying, so we plan to spend at least one day there. The above pic was taken there yesterday.

Both of us are pretty inexperienced skiers. Cathy's been doing it for some years, though never more than once or twice a year--not quite enough to get really good. I just learned how to ski last February, and have only been out twice this year, once up at Bogus, and once at Brundage. Both times felt great; both made me feel like I was learning and doing better than the time before. And while these trips were both in decent snow, I'm really looking forward to great snow.

So, we'll be out of town and largely out of touch until next Tuesday. Hope y'all have a happy new year's, and a great 2006.

Taking Time

I'll be honest: It's all to easy to rush and cut corners when putting together a show for Radio Boise. I'm busy, it's late, it runs tomorrow, I'm tired, blah blah. I've done it--though I know those of you who have listened to Range Life will find that shocking. I'm very sorry. I'll try my best to do better.

And, for that last part at least, I mean it. I put time into these shows. I read about music a lot, I search out new music, I log hours and hours both mobile and stationary listening to new music, and I love it all. Nowadays, I especially love the process of assembling a version of Range Life, the show. I love firing up the iBook and the Creatures and setting out in my office/bike shop for hours on end, listening to track after track and assembling playlists and listening to them and changing them and trying to create a good flow, with good transitions, with a healthy balance of new stuff and old stuff and brand new stuff and not so old stuff and whatever else grabs my attention.

So, why would I cut corners? Why would I spend less time on it than I could or should? Because I'm stupid, that's why. And so are you. We all are. We lose sight all too easily not only of the big things that give life meaning, but the little things that give each moment of life purpose and contain the potential to turn into big things or to alter or affect big things. We avoid things that make us happy for things that don't. I'm no hedonist, but I do think this happens far too often. And when you can make a small change that you're damned sure will affect big change, you do it. Or you should.

I'll be spending more time on this. It'll be better. And by this I mean both the radio show and this blog. If this is starting to sound like your run of the mill resolution, so close to New Year's as we are and all, I suppose maybe it is. I didn't set out to do it, but I think it's a natural thing to put things in order at this point of the year, to think of what was and what could have been, and to take the next step and start planning for the next year. This is just one way I'll make it better.

On Thursday, we're heading for Targhee. Friends of ours have a family cabin that we've been granted permission to use, and we're spending New Year's there. Not sure who-all yet, but it's coming soon. We're very excited. It's nice to be excited about New Year's. Staying at the cabin, taking the dogs for romps in the snow, skiing Grand Targhee, celebrating New Year's with a mess of other friends who will be out there, all of it. Can't wait. I've never skied powder before. This seems like the perfect time and place.

Top 10 of 2005

Since everyone else on the planet is doing it, why not me? In the time-honored tradition of end-of-year wrapups, here it is, my very own Top Ten Albums of 2005.

I preface this list by saying that, for me, this year has been remarkable for the depth of new music. So many great records have come out, so many exciting new bands have popped up, that it was extremely difficult to choose just ten. (So, of course, there will be a long also-ran list here.)

Perhaps this has been simply an effect of my re-awakening.

As I've written about here before, the first part of this year saw me wake up and walk out of my deep, dark, musical hole. I was and am still amazed at what I've found. I was so totally engaged in music for so long, so focused on finding it and writing about it and thinking about it and acquiring it and sharing it, that when I got married and left Austin, I just stopped paying attention. It was nice for a while. And during that time I sort of forgot what it was like to care so much about it.

Now I remember. And what a fantastic year it's been.

So, without further ado, here they are.

CHess' Top Ten Albums of 2005

1. Broken Social Scene ~ s/t
2. WHY? ~ Elephant Eyelash
3. Four Tet ~ Happiness
4. Clap Your Hands Say Yeah ~ s/t
5. 13 & God ~ s/t
6. Wolf Parade ~ Apologies to the Queen Mary
7. Animal Collective ~ Feels
8. The National ~ Alligator
9. The Decemberists ~ Picaresque
10. Brazilian Girls ~ s/t

Honorable mentions in no particular order which, in a lesser year, would have made this list easily: Okkervil River (Black Sheep Boy), The Books (Lost and Safe), Stephen Malkmus (Face the Truth), Spoon (Gimme Fiction), Art Brut (Bang Bang Rock and Roll), Wilderness (s/t), Sleater Kinney (The Woods), Boards of Canada (The Campfire Headphase), Bloc Party (Silent Alarm), Franz Ferdinand (You Could Have It So Much Better), New Pornographers (Twin Cinema), Beck (Guero), MIA (Arular), Caribou (Milk of Human Kindness), Iron and Wine & Calexico (He Lays in Reins), Death Cab for Cutie (Plans), American Analog Set (Set Free), LCD Soundsystem (s/t), Jeff Parker (Relatives)

So, there you have it. I'd love to see your lists, to hear criticism, or to share music with any of y'all who are interested.

WHY?

WHY?

Elephant Eyelash

(Anticon Records)

OK, so I've been sitting with this one for a while, soaking it up, marinating in it, and while I'm not so sure that it's "the Crooked Rain, Crooked Rain of our modern indie times" (Filter Mini, 10/05), it's a pretty damn good slab of music. Labels are lazy, but this band just invites you to try. Folk-rap? Avant-hop? Indie artrock hip-hop experimental freak folk... all of it comes into play during a listen to this record from front to back.

Yoni Wolf, who was Why? as a solo project for a few years and now heads up WHY? as a band, comes up with verse after verse of totally accessible everyman-as-freak lyrics, rolling them out in a near-deadpan singspeak that, after the necessary acclimatization, is just really cool. It's like my internal dork has found voice and form at long last.

The sound of light rain and burning leaves is the same... I'm fucking cold like a DQ blizzard, you act like a slut but you're really a freezer... Inhaling crushed bones through a dried up white out pen and writing the backwards racer in hot June rain in a matching blue and gold plastic bag poncho raincoat... In London where the sirens yelp like a helpless dog with his paw stepped on...

He goes from smart and sharp rap lyrics to weirdo free-association all a microsecond behind the beat, shifting the layers off time just a bit, making the music more dense and busy and turning the beat into a jarring shuffle that's tough to nail but wonderful to listen to.

The appeal of this record is, so far, for me, tough to put into words. If you don't think this is your kind of thing, just listen. Suspend judgement for the first few trips through, then listen to it again.

Chris Loves Macha: Macha Knows Chris Not

Alright, so I'm a little slow on this one, but in all honesty I didn't know this band was still making music.

Back in the day, when Macha and Bedhead sort of teamed up for the little indie lovefest Macha Loved Bedhead: Bedhead Loved Macha, I thought for sure that this would end up being my next favorite band. They brought the chill, but they threw down some cool crazy drums and Asiany percussion, putting a crashy ambient vibe onto the narcotic haze of Bedhead's style. F'ing brilliant.

Then they went away. Or at least that's the way it seemed.

And now (or, more accurately, last year) they're back with Forget Tomorrow, a gorgeous record full of exactly the stuff that made me love them: at turns ambient and lush, at others raw and spare, at all times totally unique and affecting. They have a gift for melodies that don't smack of melody--of tunes that are both immediately catchy and yet subversive enough to not fully reveal themselves until you've spent some time with them.

Thanks to Harlan for laying this on me. I heart Macha.

Freaky Friday

Hot times in Les Big Bois. Tonight, the queens of the country dirge, Freakwater, hit the Neurolux for some much needed good, dark, country music. This is good. Nothing can better reawaken a passion for a certain type or genre of music than catching a great show. It's been a while since I've felt like I give a rat's ass about country or country-related music, possibly a backlash to my ODing on it in Austin as well as a normal response to the lack of good music of this type up here in Whitaho. It'll be good to want to seek it out again.

Then again, I've seen Freakwater play a couple times, and although I love their records, and I wouldn't say either of the shows was 'bad,' I would say they did not blow me away. For whatever reason, I came away both times thinking that I expected it to be better. But, I go tonight with a clear head (well...) and an open mind (ahem), and in not expecting the world, I may come away with a renewed love for this music. At the very least, I'll get to hear the gorgeously rusty pipes of Catherine Irwin and the beautifully clear and high crooning of Janet Bean. (And I'll get to stare at the lovely Ms. Bean for at least an hour or so, which ain't so bad on its own.)

But anyway.

Their new album, Thinking of You (listen here), was made with the help of the fine fellows of Califone, and I'm anxious to hear how they'll pull that off live.

Art Brut

So, y'all ready for the next Brit band that's about to storm the US with a newer, sillier, snottier take on rock and roll? Like it or not, they're coming, and you are soon to hear the name Art Brut bandied about by hipsters and music geeks as the next Franz Ferdinand.

That statement may be a bit misleading, especially if it conjures thoughts of new and improved disco rock or dance punk or whatever the hell you want to call that pop-rock with the infectious backbeat and judicial use of high hat that the boys from Glasgow made so famous. You know what I'm talking about. Art Brut aren't doing that. They're doing something far sillier, far more basic--far more rock and roll, really.

They're ridiculous. Their songs are about themselves being in a rock band, themselves partying, themselves being themselves. It's absurdly self-referential, but that's the thing about it. As the singer says in "Formed a Band," "We're just talking... to the kids!"

Check out that track plus a couple others at their website.

http://www.artbrut.org.uk/release.html

I downloaded this CD from emusic because I was in a weird mood. (Apparently it's not available in stores in the US yet--ah, another great thing about emusic. And by the way, if you check out emusic and want to join, contact me first, that way you get a sweet trial offer and I get 50 free tracks for getting you to sign up. Everybody wins. Especially me.) I'm still not quite sure what to make of it, except for the obvious: It's silly; It's full of great hooks and catchy basic riffs; it's silly; and it's a hell of a lot of fun.

Check it out. It'll also be in the rotation over at RangeLife this week and, likely, many weeks to come. (RangeLife airs Wednesdays and Thursdays from 1 to 3pm, mountain time.)

Animal Collective

Animal Collective
Feels


I've resisted this band for a while now, based on a couple tracks I'd gleaned from various compilation CDs. It's weird. Its sounds are strange and delayed in ways that are hard to describe. The songs are assembled like they're a joint math-music project by genius kids on acid. Seemed to me that the tunes were either scary fairy tales that screeched in the night or teletubbyesque slackjawed daydreams.

But, I just downloaded the new album, and I may be changing my mind.

I'm on first listen as I write this, but man--and now I mean it in a good, intriguing, innovative sense--this shit is WEIRD.

Admittedly, I'm listening to this on crap computer speakers and haven't yet given it full attention or full stereo treatment, but so far, I'm being sucked in to this strange childish zap-brained netherworld. More to come, for sure.

Meantime, check out the first track, Did You See the Words, at the FatCat Records site, here. There are more to listen to, too. Flesh Canoe? WTF? And it's too bad Purple Bottle isn't one of the free listens. This is quite a track.

Statement

TV On the Radio, about whom I've written here before, have posted a free track and a very potent political statement.

Check it:
http://www.tgrec.com/bands/album.php?id=367

It's a track called Dry Drunk Emperor. Here's the chorus:

all eyes upon
dry drunk emperor
gold cross jock skull and bones
mocking smile,
he's been
standing naked for a while!
get him gone, get him gone, get him gone!!
and bring all the thieves to trial.

Guess who it's about...

Oh, and while you're there at the Touch and Go Records site, get ya a little learning on Dirty Three. I just got their new album, Cinder, and it's a good one. More to come on that later.

Back to the Life

We're back from the Big New Orleans Adventure, and it's now time to get back to normal life. Strange and hard to do so after all this, but it'll be good to get stable in the brain again.

So: Music.

I've gotten the big dump from friend Allison through her connection in Oregon, a certain someone involved in radio who's hooked me up to many a new band or latest CD. And all this from someone I've never met. God, I love this whole sharing business.

Cream of the crop so far: Lali Puna's offering of remixes and rare tracks, called I Thought I Was Over That. Fantastic stuff, much chill electronic beatifying and reworking of strong tracks by folks like Two Lone Swordsmen and Dntel. You can listen to a good bit of it at the Morr Music website. Lali Puna's take on (This is the Dream of) Evan and Chan is really something to get lost in. Taking the ethereal melody out and laying it on some skittering beat and nice effects, the track surprisingly does not suffer from the absence of trance-like fuzz or Ben Gibbard's vocals.

Other standouts include Koushik, some more chill deep thought electronic music that lives in the hazy fog between rock and dance music.

The most surprising thing to have captured my attention is the new album by Blackalicious, The Craft, which I'm really enjoying diving into. I've been through it a couple times now and it seems there's not a down or weak moment to be found. Great great beats and some outstanding vocal work. I know as much about hip hop as Brownie knows about disaster relief, but I'm enjoying checking this release through ears untainted by knowledge. Ignorance is bliss here.

Alright, back to normal. This ain't so bad.

Travel Blog

This week sees Cathy and I embarking on a different kind of trip. With the support of the Idaho and US Humane Societies, we are headed to New Orleans to help clear some dogs out of a temporary shelter that's about to close down. We'll be loading the dogs into a U-Haul and driving them from N.O. back to Boise where they'll either be adopted or placed in shelters until they're ok to be adopted.

None of you will be surprised to learn that Cathy's the one who's gotten us into this. However, I think you'd also agree that this is at least a worthwhile endeavor, and could be at most an adventure that will change our lives.

So, with camera and laptop in tow, we head out tomorrow morning on a flight for Houston. I hope to blog it at the travel blog, so check in over there if you're curious.

Okkervil River

There's something about seeing bands from Austin play up here in Idaho that makes me very happy and also profoundly homesick. The Gourds? Sure, that's obvious. There are strong connections to my life in Texas and, really, to my development as a human being that go along with seeing that band play. But Okkervil River? I've seen them a handful of times, I've got a couple of their records, and while I do like them quite a bit, I wouldn't consider myself attached to them or their music in any meaningful way.

Still, seeing them this past Saturday night at the Neurolux had a strange effect on me. They put on an outstanding show, full of their hallmark energy and abandon and yelling, and the respectable-sized crowd responded with enthusiasm, staying with the band even through the quieter moments of their loud-quiet-loud roller coaster ride. They were into it. So were we.

The strange thing is how familiar it all sounded. I mean, I'm familiar with their work, but I mean this in a larger sense. Back when I wrote for the Austin Chronicle I interviewed Will Sheff for a SXSW edition of the paper. When I asked him about whether moving to Austin has made a difference to the music he makes, he replied that he'd be making the same music no matter where he lived. I was surprised at this then, and I think I attributed it more to him not wanting to credit the scene more than he or his band's inherent creativity. In hindsight, I think I was at least partly correct. There is something Austin about that band, something buried deep that surfaces as part of the murky characteristics of Mood or Tone or Aesthetic or something indefinable like that. It's in the way the keyboards and the lap steel fit together, or in the way the rest of the bandmembers sing all the songs whether they have mics or not, or in the narrative quality of the lyrics or the sense of unrehearsed style they all had. Note: This is a good thing. It is a measure not only of style but of quality.

And stranger than this recognition of roots or pedigree was the effect it had. When the show was over, I was sad. Not in the sense of not wanting a good thing to end, but in the sense of leaving a place that I love. Oddly enough I don't really even get this feeling from seeing the Gourds play. Maybe I'm too close to their music. Seeing Okkervil River was less a big event than just a good show, more a feeling of being transported to Austin to see any one of hundreds of bands that would give me this same feeling. When it ended, I was only beginning to recognize it. Then it was too late.

I don't know what this all means. Just another layer on my already complex and freaky relationship with Austin, TX, I suppose.

Dramatics aside, the show really was very good. If you get a chance to see these guys, take it. Whenever you have songs this good, a band this solid, and a level of passionate engagement this high, it's not something to be passed on lightly.

I'm Too Much

Trouble

Only about 6 weeks back in the country after a wonderful trip abroad and already I'm reading through the travel blog every day.

I find it's getting harder and harder to stay content. I love where I live, I like my job more than I've liked most jobs, and all parts of life seem to have fallen into their proper places. But, still, the restlessness prevails, the wanderlust seeps into the front of my mind, and I find myself checking air fares and weather in far off places and just constantly wishing I were somewhere else.

Travel is good like that. It gets in your nose and your bones and creates a permanent place in the mind, a room off a main hall that you pass by often, where you can poke your head in and see how things are going and look back at trips gone by. But this, this is something else. It's distracting and troubling, a feeling that sends small tremors through the beams and mortar of everyday life.

On our last trip, I approached the day to day with the idea of just pretending I lived in a place. In Paris, or in Amsterdam, in this case. It was wonderful, a whole different style and pace of traveling, and I enjoyed it so much that I think I took it too much to heart. Now I actually do want to live there. Somewhere. And it seems so plausible. That's the trouble.

Wedding Bell Rung

The weekend is over. My little brother is married.

It was a hell of a time, starting with family arriving all last week, a bachelor party on Thursday, and the wedding weekend up in Stanley. Lots to report, from seeing family and friends to riding the totally burnt out Fisher Creek trail, but it'll have to wait. I'm now buried at work and have yet to get my head back together from the damage of all the festivities.

Brother married.

Fisher Creek scorched.
















Family gone now.

More later.

Fall

I rode to work this morning in the dark, accompanied by the familiar wet and cold of autumn. It's tougher to get out of bed in the morning, too. That happens when it's dark and chilly and I know I have to get on my bike and ride to work.

Fall must be here.

Though the official opening of the season is now a couple weeks behind us, and though it's already been dark during my morning commute ever since we got back from vacation, this morning is the first that's really felt like fall. I broke out the raincoat and the fleece gloves and even wore a hat under my helmet for the ride in. And just as I was dealing with the too-familiar dread of getting out in it first thing in the morning, I came around to the very familiar realization that it's not really as bad as it seems.

This change in seasons will bring about the obligatory re-ordering of life and all the re-commitment that goes with it, but this time it'll be a bit different. I'm committing to a training and fitness regimen for the fall and winter that will include a membership at the Y. I've never joined a gym before, so this will be some sort of experiment, but I've decided to engage in another training program for next year, and my winter training will rely less on actual road miles and more on a structured system including riding, spin classes, weights, maybe swimming, and most definitely a regular program of cross country and skate skiing.

In other big news, I drilled some holes into my house and shop yesterday, which allowed me to lead an actual cable from the router inside to my computer in my office, which means that at long last, for the first time since moving in, I've got reliable high-speed internet access in my office. This should change everything. And, to add to the excitement, when we make the move to re-do our bedroom and upstairs bathroom, we're going to include a small piece of money for renovations to the shop building. This way I can get a wall and some climate control without having to rig it all myself with second grade materials. Very exciting.

The lean-in to every new season causes this sort of shuffling and stocktaking in me, and I'm really excited about it this time around.

Them Gourds

I got to work at 11am today. Yes, it was a good night.

We started out at our place with a vat of sangria and about 30 of our closest friends. Great fun. We laid waste to 3 gallons of wine, a bottle of brandy, a crapload of fruit, a bunch of beer, and a table full of snack items. Very fun. Nice that so many people turned out early and stayed out late on a schoolnight.

I left the party and headed downtown early to try and catch Kevin Russell and whatever other Gourds I could round up so I could drag them to the BCRP studio and record some promo stuff for my show. I hovered about the Neurolux entrance, then went to the studio to set up, then went back to the venue, and stuck near to the entrance for a while. They never showed--well, they did, but they snuck in the side door and I didn't see them until they took the stage. Oh well. Kevin's promised to record a couple drops for me and send them via e-mail.

The Hackensaw Boys opened, and they did a fine job of whipping the crowd up. Good solid 6 piece acoustic music that sped around the stage and stomped all over, though without the "look at us and how hickish we are" facade of so many bands like that. They were good.

The Gourds opened up with "My Name is Jorge," which was a hell of a way to start, especially as it was followed by "Dying of the Pines" and then "Hellhounds." Great way to kick things off. They were having some sound problems, but they seemed to get them ironed out quick--due no doubt in no small measure to Rche being in the house--and got on with the rocking.

They put together a good set, digging into the old stuff, taking solid turns through the newer stuff, and even playing a couple tunes I'd never heard before. The biggest surprise of the evening was just how much Kevin's playing the electric guitar nowadays, as well as Claude's time at the keyboards. Suddenly dude can pound the ivories like mad. Really impressive. For a good bit of the night they seemed like a straight-up rock band, with Jimmy on electric bass, Claude on keys and Kev on the Fender, with Max switching between mandolin and guitar and Keith playing drums like he was back in Prescott Curlywolf. It was a big change, and one that could have gone over poorly. But they pulled it off and even had me hoping for more of it.

The first encore had Kev and then Jimmy come out solo, and to be honest I'm having trouble remembering what they played. I do remember that one of Kev's songs was new, original, and just beautiful. The final encore was a fairly rushed and obligatory turn through "Gin and Juice," which was a bit disappointing after the others and in light of everything else they could have played. It was done rock band style, which was a cool twist, but it still felt like "OK lets play this song and get the hell out of here."

Seemed like they had a great time, and we stayed and talked to Kevin and then Jimmy and then Claude until about 2:30 in the morning. Then we walked home. Getting to bed at 3am on a school night is great fun, and makes me very thankful that I have a flexible schedule and reasonable bosses.

Now the question: Do I go to Seattle this weekend to see The National, Clap Your Hands Say Yeah, and M83? Long drive. Tough call.

Gourds Tonight!

Something about seeing these guys play always feels like going home.

Tonight, for the second time since we've been in Boise, The Gourds are coming to the Neurolux, and we couldn't be happier. Last year they came on Cathy's birthday, which was about perfect as could be. This year, it's our friend Allison's birthday, and we'll be celebrating beforehand with a vat of sangria the size of my car.

Openers tonight are the Hackensaw Boys, about whom I've been reading quite a bit lately. They were even favorably reviewed in Pitchfork, which was quite a surprise to me, as they seem to do their bluegrass offshoot without a trace of irony or hipness. I've checked out some of their tunes on emusic, and while I was expecting something closer to the frenetic acoustic insanity of someone like Split Lip Rayfield or that other Austin band that plays the Continental all the time (drawing a blank here), they're more thoughtful and carefully assembled and song-oriented than that. At least, that's the case on first listen. Tonight's set could be a completely different thing.

I've also been giving Blood of the Ram, the Gourds' newest record, plenty of air time lately, and the tracks there have definitely grown some on me. Some of it is as great as they ever were, and while other parts don't really hit me so hard, it's easy to identify the quality of the songs and the growth and movement of the band within them.

So, Gourds tonight. Very exciting.

The Race for Race

While I agree that the rush to blame the disaster in New Orleans on racism was a bit premature, or a bit kneejerk, or at least not well thought out and carried out in the heat of the catastrophe, I have to say I am far more disturbed by the backlash and by the stronger racism and hatred it's conjured up in us. I'm pretty sickened by the internet trash being sent around about it, as if racist whiteys are finally able to publicly rejoice in what happened and can now let all their demons out of the closet where they've been half hidden to play in the flooded streets and spit in the eye of any who disagree.

Both these attitudes are way off base and nothing but destructive. Blacks in New Orleans were inordinately affected by the hurricane--that seems undoubtable. Beyond that, it's really hard to know anything for sure.

The tube-glued couch potatoes among us seem to think they've got it all figured out, that black people--all black people--simply ran amok with guns blazing and peckers hanging out destroying anything of their city that wasn't already destroyed, and then started crying that white folk weren't helping them enough. That's about as simpleminded as saying that the country ignored New Orleans because the only people left there were black.

There is truth in both those statements, but neither of them is the truth. There's a big difference there. And, mostly, I just wish we could disconnect ourselves from the canned and distorted reality of the idiot box and show a little common sense and sympathy. Something very bad has happened, and beyond the local politicians and Brown and Chertoff and Bush, we're not so sure who played what role in all of this.

I guess all I'm saying is let's think, not just react. Let's not assume that everything going on down there has been captured on TV. It hasn't. Or that all these malicious and racist e-mail bullshit making the rounds have any kind of wisdom in them. They don't.

Let's think for ourselves.

Jazz Joint

There's a new joint in town.

I've started a new program for Boise Community Radio called Jazz Joint. Bet you can't guess what it's like...

Actually, maybe you can't. It's two hours, once a week, focusing in a large sense on jazz music. I say in a large sense because it's not your normal public radio jazz show.

Jazz Joint will have rotating host duties, so far involving myself and four other people. And far as I can tell, we've all got pretty different ideas about what this show will be. And that's great. That's the point. There's already plenty of homogenous jazz shows out there, playing the greats playing standards, and that's a good thing, but that's not our thing.

I turned in my first show right before leaving town for vacation, so I haven't managed to hear any of the other hosts' work yet, but I knew their musical ideas beforehand, so I'm confident. But, in these descriptions, I'm also guessing. I'll update this as I find out how wrong I am. Art Hodge is way into breakbeats and all types of jazz, Tim Whitecotten leans more toward the hard rock and avant-garde modes, Isabel Holt is well versed in the classic and historical side of jazz, and Dave Foster leans more toward the ambient, electronic, experimental versions. A really good combination of perspectives if I do say so myself.

My own take on it is pretty scattershot, to be perfectly honest. It's not even all jazz. Jazz music, mostly bebop and hard bop from anywhere in the late 50s to today, makes up the core of the show, but it only spreads outward from there. I work in some electronic music that is, if not actually improvised, has more of an anarchic feel to it, and I'm also trafficking some experimental rock and some plain old avant-garde instrumental stuff. Thelonious Monk next to John Fahey next to David Murray next to Four Tet next to Isotope 217... You get the point.

Or, if you don't, check out the show. It's on Wednesdays from 11 to 1, mountain time, on RadioBoise.

Return

My two weeks of travel have come to an end, and now it's back to the grind. Sure, it's been a relatively easy re-entry, what with Kristi and Steve's fantastic wedding up at Warm Lake this past weekend, a trip that included a great mountain bike ride on the Eagle's Nest trail and road, but still. It ain't vacation, and it ain't in Amsterdam, so I'm gonna go ahead and be depressed about it anyway, thank you very much.

Two weeks is not enough. I mean, it is enough in that I feel like I did go somewhere for a decent length of time and was able to get work and everything else completely out of my system and adapt to a different pace of life, especially my sleep schedule. But last Wednesday morning, as I wandered the streets of Amsterdam for the last time, I felt all too deeply that I wanted another week or two. I wanted to see and feel more of that city before leaving it for god knows how long.

But, no such luck, and no more vacation time to play around with, so here I sit, back in my office, blogging over lunch, feeling all sorry for myself because I have to work for a living like most of the rest of the world. Poor me.

Highlights of the trip are tough to pin down in one sense, as just the acts of wandering the streets and neighborhoods of Paris and Amsterdam and Groningen were wonderful nearly every minute. Dinner at Robert et Louise in Paris was definitely one of the more memorable moments, as were the few hours spent watching football in a pub with an extensive English-speaking expat community the next day.

While the wedding weekend in Groningen, in the Netherlands, was without a doubt the highlight of the whole trip, other Dutch moments stand out with more individual clarity than the rest. Seeing Four Tet at the Paradiso was perhaps the most amazing and unique experience I had throughout this trip, the one that most made me feel I was experiencing something that just is not available to me here at home. And, of course, Wilco playing their tour-ender at that same venue was a pretty fantastic time as well.

In some ways, as it always is, it's nice to be home. Good to see Gus and Henry, good to see friends and to be able to cook my own food and to be in my house and to have my own bikes and all that stuff. But, there's still melancholy and longing for the places we just were, and there's still the time-tested means of best dealing with these things: planning the next trip.

New Zealand next fall for the Mountain Bike World Championships?

Myanmar next year for some SE Asia trekking and exploration?

A few weeks with my car and my mountain bike exploring British Columbia?

It's decisions like these that make time between travel more bearable.

And, it looks like the music offerings are still coming through town. Tonight, a band called the Moggs are doing an instore at the RX and a show later on at the Bouquet. I hadn't heard of them before, but the tracks available on their website are promising. I think I'll check them out.

Departure

Suddenly, here it is. Tomorrow's the big day. The wife and I are off at 8am for a couple weeks' vacation in Europe. As ever, the planning has been going on so long that it's hard to believe the trip is actually here.

Our first week will be spent in Paris, taking in the sights and eating untold amounts of amazing food. The bulk of our research for this trip has been spent on where to eat in Paris, so you can bet that most blog entries will center around food.

After Paris, we head to Amsterdam to connect with Gerry and Christina, whose wedding provides the reason for this trip. They'll be tying the knot in Christina's home town of Groningen, on September 10th, but we'll spend a couple days in Amsterdam with them before heading northward.

In Amsterdam, we'll spend Christina's birthday in a pub watching a World Cup qualifying match between Ireland and France, which promises to be a hell of a time. That's Wednesday 9/7, and Thursday I hope to drag someone down to The Paradiso to see Four Tet play a show. Never seen the dude spin live before, but I've had a few of his records on a short leash to my ear for a couple months now, and I can't get enough. We'll see.

One thing's for certain, though: I will be catching Wilco at The Paradiso on Monday 9/12. Gerry and Christina leave for their Tanzanian honeymoon the Sunday after their wedding, but we'll be spending a couple extra days at their place on Bloemgracht before we go home on Wednesday 9/14. How cool, to pretend we live there for a couple days and to just get to hang out like that for a while before coming home.

Sounds like there are some big plans for the wedding days, but I've yet to be privy to those. So, if you're interested, read along over at the other blog, CHess Travel Blog, and see what we're up to.

Morr, American Analog Set, and the Joys of Free Access to New Music

There's no shortage of free music floating around. That we all know. But still, it's always such a great surprise, a happy bonanza, to come across a site where you can get access to loads of music without having to pay for it. Matador's web site is one such place, as is the free downloads section of Pitchfork. And there are tons more.

But as I said, it still gives me a smug version of the warm and fuzzies when I find one that allows me to hear a bunch of stuff I can't otherwise hear. This happened to me today, at the Morr Music site. Morr, for those who may not know, is a German record label responsible for putting out a considerable amount of great electronic and avant garde and experimental music from the likes of Tarwater, Styrofoam, Lali Puna, Masha Qrella, The Notwist, and a mess more.

Now, American Analog Set has joined the Morr roster. I don't know the sequence of events that led me to the Morr site, but somehow I ended up there and was reading that AmAnSet has a new record coming out in September. Sweet! This band has come a long way, from a really enjoyable rock-at-a-snail's-pace outfit of kids in Austin to a well respected and critically lauded rock band. They still assemble the slow narco-jams like few others around, but they've upped the pace and the tone fairly often, and their live show has benefitted greatly from the change.

Right now, you can listen to the whole of the new record, Set Free, on the Morr site. It's a player window, and you can't download any of it, but so what? You can hear the whole thing, one track at a time, front to back, for nothing, while sitting next to your computer. Pretty cool.

While I'm on about it, there are some great tracks up for your downloading pleasure at the Pitchfork page right now. Jump on over and get ya some Bob Mould, Kallakak Family, and Paul Weller to chew on.

Dry Creek

Sunday, not knowing the mercury would rise over 100F by the end of the day, Will and I headed out to ride up Hard Guy to the Ridge Road and then to descend Dry Creek.

4+ hours in the saddle. 27 water crossings.

27.

A great ride. I'm ready for fall.

March of the Racoons

They came at dusk to the roof of our neighbor's shop, out at the rear of his yard, on the alley. They came masked and ready for action.

First there was a single older racoon.

Then there were four.



They were brazen, stealthy, and hungry. They made a feast of the plums in our neighbor's tree.



There were 6, actually. Old and very young, both. They moved freely from the tree branches to the roof to the steps.

Apparently, they live under his porch and have some sort of agreement with the cats. Plenty of food for all, so no one bothers anyone else.

Well, they all bother Henry. But that's to be expected.

March of the Penguins

If you haven't seen this movie yet, go see it. I caught it last night at The Flicks, by myself even, and I have to say that I loved it. I'm a total sucker for nature docs anyway, but even so, the work that went into getting the footage in this film alone is staggering, to say nothing of the beautiful piece of art they turned it into.

There were flaws, of course: I wasn't wild about Morgan Freeman's narration, nor the script that was given him to read, and I thought the end of the film very rushed compared to the cadence of the rest of it. But really, that's it. The saga laid out long form presented a whole nother side to these freaky birds, painting them as worthy of the highest respect for their strength of body and commitment and their fortitude for making this incredible journey over and over again, all for the sake of a single chick that may or may not even survive.

Check it out. I think it's pretty great when the big summer film is something like this, rather than the newest SchwarzeCruise Crapfest.

Tangents

I'm trying, in my radio show, to explore the tangents of what I like to call indie rock. (Defining indie rock will have to wait for another post: for now, let's just think of it as my own little aesthetic world.) It's in the transitions and contexts that these tangents live. Putting Slint/Paul Newman/Schneider TM in a row; letting a Wilco breakdown lead into a John Fahey exploration; letting Four Tet, Matmos, The Velvet Underground and Isotope 217 bounce around off each other for a while. That's what gets me excited; that's what lets it all fit together in my head.

I do wonder, though, what context people are in while listening to the show. I assume everyone else is sitting at their desk working and listening to it low on crap speakers. Or maybe not. I want your attention, but I'm not going singalong. I want you to hear something that catches your ear and makes you check the player window to see what it is so you can write it down. I want you to have to close your door and turn it way up at least a couple times during the set.

Bridgebuilding

This past weekend I and a few friends hooked up with a trail maintenance effort along Bear River, up in the Boise NF. A volunteer effort headed up by SWIMBA and run through the Trail Crew segment of the Forest Service, the goal of the day was to build a bridge across the Bear River about 2 miles in from the trailhead.

The day went well. We headed out about 10am, hiking to the work site with water and lunch on our backs. It soon became apparent that we'd build two bridges, not one, the first being through a runoff and mud pit just shy of the bridge site.

There were 10 of us total, including 3 pros and 7 volunteers. While logs were sawed and stripped, some of us gathered rocks and began work on the secondary bridge. We cut the banks out and lined them with large rocks, then set 3 cut logs across them. We filled the gaps in with small rocks, then decided it'd be brilliant to pack the center with mud and turf. It worked beautifully. It looks like 2 logs with a strip of grassy earth down the middle. If that thing lasts for some years, it'll be an engineering masterpiece. (If not, well...)

The main bridge was a larger task, two very big logs spanning two other fat logs running parallel to the river. These were anchored at both ends after they were dragged into place by resident mules John and Tony. Holes were drilled, bolts pulled through to secure the two logs, and then handrails went on. We cut it low enough to accommodate a handlebar, of course. Again we filled it in with rocks and stuff, closing the gaps between logs, smoothing things out. By the time we were done the thing came together, solid as a rock, sturdier than I could have imagined. A job well done.

Saturday night, John, Tony, Tim and I stayed at the Whispering Pines yurt up there. It was great, except for the fact that we never got inside the yurt. We didn't have the combo to the door lock, due to a misunderstanding on my part, so we spent the night out on the deck. It was gorgeous, a cool night under a starry sky. Next time, though, I'll get the combination for the lock first.

Sunday we did a mountain bike ride, a short trip out Beaver Creek and Crooked River with an extra loop on the Valley Trail thrown in. It was good, if not long enough, as those trails are fun and have great views but are still fairly primitive.

So, a great weekend, and I hope to have photos of the fruits of our backbusting efforts to post soon.

Look what I got!

A birthday present from my lovely wife.


Isn't she purdy?

Dialed In

Looks like we've sort of mostly got this internet radio thing running solid. The hiccups in the stream are fewer and farther between, the transitions between shows are a bit smoother, and the schedule is slowly filling up. Range Life is still running like 6 times a week (that's two shows, three times each), but repetition is still unavoidable for us. Hopefully, that will change soon.

So far I'm pretty pleased with how the show is going. I don't really want to get too comfy with the playlist-only format we're using now, because the whole deal with radio, or at least with my enthusiasm for it, is to be there, in the studio, slapping the records down (or sliding the CDs in), spinning them, and making it all fit together on the fly. While it would seem easier to assemble a show at home in front of my computer, with the ability to change and add things or rework a setlist to meet time constraints, really, I think it's a handicap. The thing that's missing is real time. When you're playing one song after another, no matter how many tracks out you've lined up, it's still the song that triggers the next song, and so on. Connections are made in those 3.5 minutes you're sitting there listening to the track you just put on, and that's how a show gains personality.

Still, though, it's going well. I'm finding it easier to transition between pretty different types of music and to bring in the freaky alongside the stalwart. I'm trying to take the "Indie rock and all its tangents" description to heart, using standard indie rock bands and tracks as the foundation, but being sure to depart from that foundation often, when appropriate or intriguing. I'm working in the old stuff and trying to keep up with the new stuff. Operating largely on mp3 and m4a files makes it a bit easier, as trading music is filling the gaps until we get some content rolling in.

So, take a listen. Gimme some feedback. Make some requests. It's nice to know I'm not broadcasting into the void.

On the Air

...Or, rather, on the internet, I should say. As of July 1, more or less, the Boise Community Radio Project is webcasting. Check it out.

We've had our fair share of burps and glitches, and it's popped offline a few times in the last few weeks, but for the most part the bugs are being worked out and the webcast is running smoothly. The schedule is a bit odd and still very much in flux, but a pattern is emerging and new shows are coming in with increasing frequency and timeliness. So it's coming together, if a bit slowly.

My biggest surprise so far is in the relatively small number of people who are turning stuff in. I don't know, I guess it's just me, but I really thought we'd be overrun with folks who were dying to be DJs. I've always wanted to be a DJ, and at this point, when it's essentially making mix CDs to be played on the air, I have a hard time imagining why our schedule is not jampacked.

My show, Range Life (snappy title, eh?), is currently enjoying heavy rotation. I turn in 2 shows per week, and I fill 6 slots per week. Monday and Tuesday at 5pm, Wednesday and Thursday at 9am, and again on Saturday at 1pm and 10pm.

Soon we'll attach a blog with setlists.

Listen in and enjoy. And let me know what you think.

Clap Your Hands Say Yeah

Something about the debut record by this band just gets my blood rushing and my mouth smiling. Heard it yet? Any thoughts?

The guy Alec Ounsworth's got a freaky-annoying voice, and the music is nothing groundbreaking or earthshaking, it's just a re-envisioning of indie rock that is greater, far greater than the sum of its parts. The songs are buoyant and refreshing, balls dangling free and easy and joy to the world and screw you if you don't get it. Influences and comparisons jump immediately to mind (Talking Heads, Broken Social Scene, and VU spring forward whenever I listen, for what that's worth), but none of them hold up under scrutiny.

Apparently they're being pursued by the label lobby, and before too long I'd expect them to re-release the record, which they put out and distribute themselves right now (also available through Insound).

Back To It

Though I started this weekend fairly despondent over the fact that, again, I wasn't gonna get out of town. No Sun Valley, no epic mountain bike rides through aspen groves on super-skinny trail, no solo campout, no escaping the 100+ degree heat. Just another lame-ass weekend here in Boise.

Not so. Friend Judi threw a birthday party for Cathy on Friday night that was mellow and very fun. And on Saturday I ended up tagging along on a trip down the Main Payette. This time, though, friend Hillary and I would be two-manning an 11' raft. It was fantastic. We ran it side-by-side, one foot in and one out for most of the trip, retracting appendages as we hit whitewater. And hit it we did--like a cork, bobbing and bouncing through and over, aiming for the biggest bits and squirting through again and again. Great fun. And now I want a raft. Hillary, who spent some years guiding rivers in Texas, New Mexico, and here in Idaho, is shopping for a raft and looking for an appropriate person to share the expense with. Seems like a perfect situation. I get into a raft for half what it costs, and I get to go with someone who can teach me a whole lot about running rivers. It's expensive--prolly a cool $1500 for my share--but in the end I think it'll be worth it.

It was good to get back on the water, considering I hadn't been in since the 7/4 weekend, where I dumped in the top hole of the Raspberry and swam the next quarter mile or so, bouncing rock to rock, sustaining one serious leg wound and a mess of small bumps and bruises. Not fun. I was wondering how it'd affect my psyche, as far as getting back in the water, but far as I could tell from this trip down the relatively tame Main, I'm none the worse for it. A little nervous, sure, but I always am before a trip like this, so no big deal.

Sunday it was up to Stack Rock, this time with a group of 6 pretty strong riders. We'd planned to head down the Bogus Drop, but plans changed due to group constraints, and we ended up putting in a killer 3 hours between East Side and all the new stuff off the firepit trail. The sequence of trails I put together and guided everyone through was, I must say, superb, and the ride was a long series of medium climbs and screaming descents, spreading the work out through the day. Of course, in the end you always have to climb out, so that puts the bulk of the misery in the last 45 minutes or so, but it was well worth the lung loss. Great ride.

And at the end of it all, I was actually glad that I'd stayed here in town.

No time for nothing

I've been in one of those modes lately where there is no downtime. No rest between commitments and activities, rushing from one thing to another without time to stop and breathe and just hang. It's all good, my time is being taken up by worthy things--work, radio production, radio meetings, trailbuilding, SWIMBA meetings, watching Le Tour (especially that)--but after a while you start to realize just how much you've let go, how many things have fallen by the wayside for days and days.

I usually follow up a period like this with a forced reorganization of my life. I'm about there now. I'd planned to go to Sun Valley and mountain bike for a couple days this weekend, but I think I'll put that off and stay home and tie up the bucket of loose ends I've got going. I'm dying to get out of town, but that'd just put me in this same position come Monday. Plus, the wifey is going to Iowa next week, so I should spend some time with her.

So that does it. No camping, but plenty of hammock time.

Morning Ascent

This morning I got up at the crack of 6 for a ride up Bogus Basin Road. This would be my first full ascent of the year, and following as it did an evening's paddle on the Main Payette, during which I swam twice and drank the water level at least a bit lower, I wasn't sure how the body would react. I mean, climbing Bogus is a tough enough endeavor for me (I'd never be confused with a strong climber), but doing it with sore abs and arms and groinage, I figured I was just asking for a seizure. But what doesn't kill you leaves you wriggling in pain, right?

So, up we went. Me and co-worker Paul. He's 50 and could leave me in the dust when the road tilts upward, were he so inclined. This morning, he wasn't, so we did a nice steady job of work going up that hill, averaging about 9.5 over the hill's 16.7 miles.

The morning was glorious, chilly and clear, arm warmers and wind vest leaving a bit to be desired at first, but then coming off after the first couple pulls and the only descent built in to the climb. As we came up out of that valley, the sun poked up above the hill tops, and for the rest of the way up we'd be playing hide and seek with el sol, warming, cooling, warming, often at the perfect moments.

The first half of the ride, up to the Forest Service sign, was, as always, a bizzatch. Tough going al lot of the time, but the reasonable pace and the early hour kept me moving and uncramped, for which I was thankful. There were a few other riders out doing it too, but I think we were the first of the day to go the whole way up. About 2 miles from the ski lodge the climb tops out and you get a couple screaming slightly downward miles to work the kinks out of the legs. I needed it, and I quickly got over the slowly developing sense of bonk that was running just a bit behind me. By the time we turned around to go down, I felt damn fine.

And go down we did. Where Paul leaves me on the climbs, I return the favor on the descents. I bolted off and ran the corners hot, trying to hit each apex a la Il Falco and nail the tight ones with minimal braking. I think it was my fastest and smoothest ever, and it felt great. Smooth.

About halfway down I started to shake a little, as the downhill was colder than the climb was, but just easing off and stretching for a moment at a time did the trick. Up in 1:35, down in :35. What fun.

Starting up at 6:30 got us back to work at 9am. After a quick shower, I was Mr. Straightjob again, but knowing what I'd already done that morning, the rest of the day was a breeze.

Gotta make this a normal thing.

Apolitic

I realize that 'politics' is one of the subheads up at the top of this page, and that I've failed to really address politics thus far on this blog. The reasons for this are many, but the one that rings truest is that I just don't wanna. It's 2005, and 2004 was a bad year for those of us who pay attention to politics here in the US of A. Unless of course you are one of the misled and zombified malignants who sludged forward to support the Dubya, then it was a banner fucking year. But then, who gives a shit about you, anyway?

I digress.

My point is that, after all the turmoil and effort and pain and complete confusion of last year and the way things turned out, the last thing I wanted to do in this space was add to the heaps and gobs of half-informed political commentary clogging up the ether. There's lots out there, and most of it is awful, awful stuff; half-truths or untruths disguised as news or reportage, rantings of lunatics that then show up in daily conversation, again masquerading as truth, being quoted and bandied about as if the parrots actually knew what they were talking about.

This is something I didn't want to engage in. And I still don't. I don't pretend that I'm more fully informed or more correct than most (though if you voted for Bush, you lose, automatically, period, because you are a twit with no conscience and your hand is quite literally one of those ushering in this dark age in America--sorry). I have an opinion on most things, but I feel that until I understand an issue thoroughly, it's better to keep mouth shut and ears and mind open. So, for this reason, politics go missing from this blog.

There are lots of great places to go to get your political fill.
I like to consider these the trinity of political blogs. Left, middle, and right, respectively:
Talking Points Memo

Bull Moose Blog

Andrew Sullivan

I consider myself pretty solidly left of center, so TPM is my source of choice, but Marshall Whitman over at the Bull Moose has a brilliant political mind, and his ongoing tribute to the spirit of TR resonates with me. Andrew Sullivan, conservative though he is, is consistent and fair-minded and is not afraid to call out his fellow righties when they're being assholes. Indeed, in these times, reading his blog is not much different than reading the other two. All of them understand and acknowledge the magnitude of the train wreck that is Bushco.

News:
New York Times

Washington Post

Out there, but good:
Punk Voter

AlterNet

Entertaining Lefty Agitprop:
The Gadflyer

Counterpunch


OK, that's enough for now. I guess I'm just trying to make the point that a little knowledge is a dangerous thing. There's a lot of garbage floating around out there, and Joe and Jane America have become as effective at spinning bullshit into acceptable political rhetoric as most campaign managers are, and that's not a good thing. I'm no absolutist, on pretty much anything, but I do believe there is right and there is wrong, and representing untruth as truth and calling it spin is just plain wrong.

But that's politics, right?

Broadcasting

If anyone is indeed reading this, I should let you know that the BCRP test phase is running on Live365 as I write this. There are a few sets programmed, and the rest of the time is running random through a bunch of tunes. So there's music on, and some of it's pretty good.

It's free to register at Live365, and then you get access to loads of internet radio stations. Some of them are fantastic. When you get to the search page, punch in BCRP, and you'll get a link to it. Don't expect a whole lot for now, but once we get up and running for real, come July 1, it'll be hot.

Check it out.

SASQUATCH

By about 5pm yesterday, the whole trip was worth it. At risk of sounding like a histrionic fanboy, everything I've heard about the Arcade Fire live is true, and then some. Their set yesterday, Saturday afternoon at the Sasquatch Music Festival in the Gorge Ampitheater, was without a doubt one of the highlight musical experiences I've ever had. In the middle of a blistering day in the desert of central Washington, these 7 Canadians in formal wear, buttoned to the neck more often than not, dressed for a funeral, went into the red from the very first notes of the opener "Wake Up." By the first chorus of Whooooooaaaa--Ohhhhh's, I knew this show was gonna hit me like a board to the head. Thwack. And it did.

It was a very very long day, but by and large the quality of shows made up for the heat and the price gouging. Early sets by Bloc Party and Ray Lamontagne were both fantastic, though the former was plagued by technical difficulties. Lamontagne may will be my own biggest discovery of the weekend, as every tune he played seemed like something I will often want to listen to at home. He's got a great voice and he uses it to full effect without getting too bogged down in it.

After the Arcade Fire blew the whole show apart, I wondered how Wilco would ever follow it. But they did, and very well. They came out and did their own thing, which is a very different thing from the Arcade Fire, and it was outstanding from front to back. Muzzle of Bees and Spiders (Kidsmoke) opened the set, which leaned heavily on the new record.

Kanye West put on a good show, though live rap to me is always a bit odd and underwhelming. But it gave me a chance to go sit down and rest up for the evening.

Modest Mouse, possibly getting the most excitement out of the crowd, kinda sucked, as they've been known to. They started late, wandered onstage after a half hour, and went through the motions on a few lame tracks--Float On, Dramamine, and a few of his Tom-Waits-impersonation banjo tunes. Crap. I made my way back up to my seat in the grass just in time for him to turn it up a bit and get serious, and the last half hour of the set was far better. Still, though, little Isaac is a bit of a petulant primadonna, and I find it harder and harder to forgive his live lameness. For fuck's sake, there are like 7 people in the band, including a totally superfluous second drummer, and they sound hollower than when they were a trio. Disappointing.

The headliners, The Pixies, however, did not fail to please. All business, they came out and thrashed our asses for a solid hour and a half, not talking, not doing anything but playing their asses off. Great set.

So Sasquatch was a great time, and I'd even consider going back again, even though I thought I was done with such giganto-festivals. A show like The Arcade Fire can change your mind about a lot of things.

Testing

We ran a beta of the BCRP webcast this weekend. I can't say for sure whether it went well or not, but I know that for a while we were on the air. Or on the web. Whatever. I've been having some machinery issues at home, so I was only able to upload a single set of tracks with no voiceovers or PSAs attached to it. Got some good tunes up there, but that's about as far as it went.

And now, in the wake of that, we're possibly changing direction from Live365 hosting our library to our broadcasting, essentially, live from a studio. Where that studio will be is as yet unknown, but Jeff is seriously looking into monitors and a mixing board and mikes and all that hardware, like for a real live studio.

Also, the acronym PD has been floating around a bit lately, pushed gently in my direction. Program Director. Thing is, I don't know what the job is all about. I'm interested, to be sure, but not sure if I'm capable. But then being capable is just a matter of learning the job and what it entails and putting the time in. Interesting, though. We'll see.

Dangerous Thoughts

What started out as a simple set of blog entries on a long weekend visit to Austin has turned into something more complicated. Basically, I had a great time down there and have been plunged into a whirlpool of doubt and second guessing about where I am now and why I ever left there in the first place.

At present, we have no plans to return to Austin permanently. But I find it interesting and a little worrying that both Cathy and I are talking about it fairly often. I think she had the same experience when she went to Austin in March for SXSW.

We love Boise in many ways. We've made a few good friends here, we have a nice house in a good spot, we both have decent jobs that pay the bills, and we have access to more of the wide-open Western outdoors than we could ever have imagined. That's what got us here in the first place. But lately, it seems, we're missing the things we gave up when we moved more than we're enjoying the things we gained. I find that in Austin I have stronger connections to people, Eric and Harlan specifically but others more generally, than I've been able to forge here. Perhaps that's my resistance, but more I think it's having common interests. Art and music are on the backburner in this town. People don't pay much attention to it except as a diversion. That's unacceptable to me.

Anyway, we're still sorting all this out. I doubt we're going anywhere, but I can't stop thinking what if. What if.

AUSTIN

Back from Austin. Brain and legs hurt. Stomach in knots.

What a fantastic time.

As expected, my visit back to wonderful Austin, TX was about as much fun as my 35-year-old body can handle these days. We ate, we drank, we rode, and we took in as much music as we could. It was exactly the trip I wanted--and more importantly, it was exactly the trip I needed. I feel refreshed, recharged. My scowl is gone. My brain feels lighter.

I'd been having a tough time of it here in Boise lately. I feel disconnected--or, more accurately, unconnected. But being in Austin for a long weekend got me thinking like myself again. Unfortunately, it got me thinking in ways that may not help me stay here in Boise for the long term, but better to realize and deal with that than to just keep making myself be happy somewhere I don't want to be. But, that's the stuff for another entry.

Now: The trip started off perfectly, rolling from the airport in Eric's car (beer and hitter handed off dutifully as ever, as soon as I took the passenger seat) to Polvo's, one of my favorite Tex Mex joints, where the parking lot and patio were jammed with beer-drinking locals and a Mariachi band was pumping the tunes out in celebration of Cinco de Mayo. Perfect. Before I knew it I had a Negro Modelo in my hand and was catching up with Harlan, Eric, and Kodi, and was meeting Eric's new girlfriend Wendy.

The first food to hit my tastebuds in Austin was a tortilla chip dunked in Polvo's legendary black salsa. Appropriate, and amazingly delicious. Dinner that night, not eaten til long about 10pm, was a plate of al pastor that I'd been dreaming about eating for weeks now. And it only got better from there. The weekend included visits to Juan in a Million (Don Juan taco and machacado taco for breakfast), Hai Ky (eye of round and meatball pho), and Cooper's Barbecue (so much meat it'd be disgusting to list it here). Ate like a champ.

And drank like one too. Loads of Shiner Bock filled my belly daily, watching the likes of Rilo Kiley, The Ponys, The Gourds, and a handful of other bands. It was good to be surrounded by people who give a shit about music. It was great, actually.

Rode my legs into dust as well. Had a couple great mountain bike rides, one in Travis Country on the Greenbelt, one at Broken Oak Ranch in Valley Mills, and a long road roade around the rolling hills of Austin. Spent a good day out at Wendy's family's ranch in Burnet, driving and hiking around with a cooler full of Tecates.

It felt good to be there. To sit and read at Flipnotics, to have lunch with Harold and catch up on his life, to hang with the Yeti for probably the last time, and just to sit on Eric's front porch and be.

It's tough to adjust to being back, but I know I'm happier now, more pleasant to be around. It's been difficult since returning from our trip abroad in December to readjust and make myself engage here. I don't know what it is. I feel sort of hanging, lost out on my own in the midst of a place where I don't quite connect with people. That's not gone, but at least I feel good for now. Boise's a great place--I just wonder if it's the right place for me.

For now, it will have to be. But it's good to know that the future's not all locked up. It never is--sometimes it just takes some reminding to realize it.

Geeked

Tiger is coming!

I never thought I'd see the day that the release of a new operating system would have me all excited and anticipatory and everything. But that day's come. The new Mac OS is on the way and I'm actually really looking forward to it. It'll change a lot, and I'm planning to complement it with a new external hard drive and a boost in RAM. This'll be just like a brand new machine. And even though it's a lowly G3 iBook, it still purrs like a kitten and does everything I ask it to. Though I need more space for music. Hence the new hard drive.

Anyway.

Dork.

Moving to Radio

I've been working quite a bit, ever since I got back from traveling in December, as a volunteer for the Boise Community Radio Project. I heard about it last year but didn't do anything about it until I got an e-mail forwarded to me by David Varner about a volunteer meeting. I showed up, and months later, I seem to have found myself another Diverse Arts.

Speaking of whom: They had a fire. DiverseArts is a non-profit arts organization in Austin where I worked for about 7 or 8 years. I worked mainly on their magazine, as writer and editor and Managing Editor and in any other capacity I could or would. I helped with Jazz Fest a little, with smaller shows a bit, and generally did whatever I could for Harold, the founder. Harold's got vision, and like many people with vision who try to turn that vision into a functioning reality, he's had a hard time of it. Things go well, things go not so well, and the tide of money available to arts organizations involved in the finer but less lucrative forms becomes ever harder to stick your feet into. But he persevered, put on good shows, did his thing his way and earned the respect of any who knew or worked with him. He's passionate, and I learned a lot from the years I spent working for him.

The office building where they kept their office and gallery space, up on Guadalupe around 17th St., burned in late January, and they sustained quite a bit of damage--they and many of the other artists and art groups who kept space there. I don't know any details beyond that, but I hope to get together with Harold when I get to Austin next weekend.

So, BCRP. Today Jeff Abrams, the guy running the show, offered me the position of Music Director. Pretty exciting, though I don't really know what that means. But I got to admit, I like the sound of it. This could be the thing I've been looking to get involved in, to sink my teeth into and live for music again, in a way that I never have but have always wanted to. I always wanted to be a DJ (who doesn't?), and for some reason I never pursued it beyond DJing in a rock club on off weekend nights in college. That was fun, but the radio is where I wanted to be.

Things have changed a lot for the medium, but I think it's more an exciting time and season to thrive than it is any sort of death knell for radio. Radio and the internet work together beautifully, and with a solid plan we could be viable and alive and an important component in improving the cultural life of this city.

I haven't officially accepted the offer yet, pending a conversation about what all I'd be doing in that spot, but I have a feeling I've already decided. Time to get into it. Time to make it happen and start an entire new phase of life.

5 Mile Creek

Today I took the mutts on a hike up 5 Mile Creek, as I do many weekends. It's a great hike in a little used section of the foothills here, and more days than not I don't see anyone else the whole time I'm out there. Today, with storm clouds rolling over the hilltops and the look of rain in the air, would be no different.

I set out with some fairly firm time limits, but I didn't have to pay attention to them, really. I ended up taking the trail farther than I ever had before, and I ended up all the way up on Boise Ridge Road, right at the junction with trail 4, Hull's Ridge Trail. A spot I'd never been to. It was fantastic having walked all the way there.

I made it to the top in just over an hour and a half, and after a short food rest break, was down in a little over an hour. Granted, I was moving at a good clip, but it's good to know a hike like that is possible without a huge time commitment.

Up at the top of the ridge, sheltered in the pine trees and looking over the other side into the Boise Mountains and on toward the Sawtooths, it's a whole different world than the lower foothills. And it's trips up to that area, like today, that I need to remind me of the fairly endless possibilities for hiking right out my back door.

M83 Sucks?

Times like this I wish someone actually read this blog.

I'm slogging my way through the new M83 album, Before the Dawn Heals Us, for the 3rd of 4th time, and I just don't get it. I was really excited to buy this thing, having read a bunch about them and heard a few tracks on internet radio. Hell, even Pitchfork liked it. (Shows what they know.) But this isn't what I signed up for--at least not that I remember.

This, simply put, is a French rock band. Read: sucky. It's all grandiose drum and guitar flourishes, pseudo-operatic keyboard tones and vocal constructs, just too gigantic-posturing musical movements full of nothing but glittery noise and fields full of fairies.

Funny thing is, when I heard some songs off it, they ALWAYS caught my attention and made me want to rush out and buy this. And now that I have it I'm nothing but disappointed.

Anyone? A little help?

I'll keep trying with this one, but hope is diminishing.

Earth Day Is Not Just for Hippies

Dirt-worn fields full of patchouli-stinkin kids kicking bean bags in the air.

Ratty dreads on white people, bad songs that last way too long.

Self-righteous lip service from SUV-driving new-bohemian-wannabes (bobos?).

Earth Day is a good thing. Unfortunately, this is what most people think of when they think of Earth Day. Instead of thinking of it as some sort of lifestyle-confirming all-day jam-band festival, think of Earth Day as a chance to examine your life and your daily actions and routines and consider in a fresh light how your moving through this life impacts your planet. And before you get all new-agey on me: Your planet is your house, your yard, your neighborhood, the streets you travel to get to work and back, the trails you run or ride or walk, the landfill where all your trash goes--all the physical spaces your living impacts.

Of course, everyone impacts everything. We're all connected to everyone and everything else. And that's the truth. But as this concept is so big that it is meaningless to many people, the best approach is to look closely at your own life and change what you can. Recycle that cardboard instead of smashing it in the trash bin. Ride your bike to the store instead of driving. Take walks in your neighborhood instead of driving to the greenbelt. Shop locally instead of driving to big box land. Water your lawn deeply once a week instead of 3 or 4 times a week. Mow that lawn early or late instead of in the heat of the day. Buy food and other products with less packaging. Buy organic. And on and on.

It's the little changes, piled on top of each other, that can make a true difference, because these are the things that can become a permanent part of your life.

You don't have to be a hippie to be responsible for your world. Just be smart.

TV on the Radio

Every so often, I come across music that seizes my attention and gets inside me for reasons I don't quite understand. The frequency with which this occurs depends almost entirely on how engaged I am with seeking out new music--as opposed to cruising through back catalogs and revisiting the old stuff. Or just being a lazy ass and not paying attention. Right now, I'm in full-on seeker mode, and I've returned to TV on the Radio to find out what it is about these guys that grabs me so hard.

I've sort of come at this band from the backdoor, so to speak. My attention was first caught with New Health Rock, off their latest EP. I'd hear it on KEXP, turned fairly low on not so horrible computer speakers at work, and would shut my door and turn it up as loud as I could get away with. The beat haunted me, seeking out my fingertips and toes and tapping itself out at any still moment, and the vocals were freaky streaming hip-hop prose like I'd never heard it.

I sought out other tunes, but for whatever reason I didn't dig deeper than just a quick listen.

Finally, last night, I bought Desperate Youth, Bloodthirsty Babes, their first full-length record, off iTunes. For the first few minutes I thought "What have I done?" It was a lot like the feeling I had after buying the new M83 album (more on that another time). But, the more I listen, especially this morning in headphones while doing some mechanical work, I realize that this stuff is fantastic.

There's something weirdly mesmerizing about the vocals of Tunde Adebimpe, not to mention that effect jumping to another level entirely when both he and Kyp Malone harmonize, low and droll mixed with a falsetto that makes Beck look even more foolish doing it than he did on his own. This is real singing, not tongue-in-cheek-mockery for the sake of a slow jam, and every tune is so tight, so uniquely itself, that I just sit and listen, mouth agape, a slow grin forming.

Poppy rocks, and Wear You Out is an amazing tune, a meditation in the moment of an impending sexing-up of some anonymous lady. Staring at the Sun is really the only song I'd heard before on this record--it doesn't really lend itself to singledom--and it stacks up nicely to the rest. I'm still digesting this record, but I wanted to get some words out to try and capture the wonder and bafflement and joy I'm experiencing in trying to figure it out. (That's a big benefit blogs have over published criticism--you can flesh it out in print.)

Further, after work today, after a meeting tonight, I came home and bought the Young Liars EP, which caused such a shitstorm of attention when it came out. Now, at this moment, I sit here listening to this for the first time, and I am impressed. It's like the other one but, maybe, better. So far at least. The title track is pulsing through my headphones right now, part of a continuum of somehow soulfully mechanical music, any organic parts repeated and buried as to be a part of the larger tonal shift that is the melody. And the vocals--that's the thing, the music is so droning, so consistent and simple and gorgeous and monotonous, because the focus is the vocals.

This record's vocals are all Adebimpe, layers of his voice piled on top of each other, to amazing effect. Especially now--his treatment of the Pixies' Mr. Grieves is just knocking me out. Snapping fingers behind 3-part harmonies with a couple lead lines over that. Just brilliant. Amazing.

Mostly, there's nothing in my mind to compare this to. I'm ill-prepared for what this is doing to my brain. Which is a good thing. In this my year of rediscovering music, it's very appropriate to be thrown for a loop like this.

Also, if you're interested, check out the band's blog. There's some crazy shit going on in these brains.

Spring Weekends

I'm dwelling on spring. Changes in temperature, lengthening days, dry trails, and everything blooming have me all swept up in the change of seasons. Every year since moving back northward from TX I spend a lot of time thinking and talking and writing about how much I missed a true change of seasons over the decade I spent in Austin, and here I am doing it again.

I love spring!

Took a long, crazy, stupid mountain bike ride with Will on Saturday, up and over Lucky Peak from the Council Springs access. It was a huge ride, clearing about a 3000+ foot gain over the course of about 6.5 miles. That's more drastic than the climb to Columbine Mine on the Leadville course. It hurt, badly, and I had to stop once because the dirt road tilted up a bit too roughly for me. Even rockin the new 24T granny I just ran out of push to get the pedal over the top.

It took a couple hours of steady trudging (counting a 4-mile slog on the greenbelt against a STIFF headwind just to get to the trailhead), but after some big pain and some mild cursing, we topped out. I tagged the antenna on top of the peak (TAG motherfucker!) before we headed back down the other side.

From there we descended trails 9 and E, connecting to the West Highland Summit trail, which I hadn't been on since riding it my first summer here with Bob and Leslie. Great, hard ride that knackered both of us. Good to be killing myself on the IF again.

The rest of the weekend was split between lounging and yard work. In those ratios I actually enjoy the labor (with a good fuel-base of my own Texas Two Step to keep me going all day, of course). The yard's looking good, the bikes are running smooth, the house is in order (except for that goddam bathroom fan).

So. Nothing to report, but sometimes just acknowledging that things are fine just fine is enough. Yes?

Stars Descending, Stars Staying Strong

Last night at the Big Easy here in Boise, ID, a double bill right out of my Texas past offered too much to miss. The Reverend Horton Heat headlined, with the opening slot filled by none other than the Supersuckers. 10 years ago, these bands were right near the top of my list of rock shows that make a weekend great. I've seen each of them at least a dozen times in my life, likely more than that, and they constitute a big part of a memorable and important step in my own development as a music freak.

(Note: Portland act I Can Lick Any Son of a Bitch in the House opened the evening, but as I could give a flying fuck about them, I missed them. I've seen them a few times here in Boise, and while the first experience was enjoyable enough, the novelty wore off quickly, and the music came into focus as the boring and uninspired batch of basic cowshitpunk that it is.)

So, with all that history aboard, I made my way to this show--ticket price a mere $7.50, due to advance purchase by a friend--wondering if I'd be horribly let down or re-connected to a big part of my past. In a way, neither of these things happened, but it was revelatory in other ways.

The Supersuckers started slow, haltingly almost. It was loud, and they were into it--sort of--but there was something missing. They all looked a little fatter and slower than in years past, but aren't we all? That wasn't it. Different drummer, but he proved more than capable as the night wore on. And that's the thing--the night wore on, the beers went down, and the band rose to the occasion. Eddie Spaghetti rallied the crowd with all the charm and charisma I've ever seen out of him. I was reminded how, the first time I saw them, at Emo's around 94 or so, I thought he had to be THE coolest motherfucker ever to strap on a bass guitar. Last night, he was that guy again. The Supersuckers keep tongue in cheek without turning to parody and without losing the edge in their music. A few new tunes seemed not quite up to snuff, but it's difficult to say whether that's because they took time to warm up or because the songs just aren't very good. Likely it's a little of both. But whatever--by the time they stormed through Creepy Jackalope Eye at the end of the set, and then especially during encore Born With a Tail, I was convinced. These guys SHOULD still be doing this thing. They are still, in many ways, the greatest rock band in the world.

The RevHo, however, was a different story. He's a showman to be sure. He's gone through some less-than-impressive attempts at change in his music and his live show, but what it comes down to is showmanship in the shtickiest sense. It's all routine by now, and it's been wearing thin for a while. Every song sounded as familiar as if it were stuck in my carousel shuffle for years, and this applied even to songs I knew were new. Martini Time grated as ever, and when he got to the lengthy introduction of band members, which now includes The Jimbo Song complete with audience participation, I knew it was time to go. The Rev is stuck in a velvet rut--he packs houses with his shtick, but the crowds are not the same as they used to be. The people there were not so demanding as I. The new was not important. The people wanted the same show they saw last time. And they got it.

Renew, Re-visit, Re-dedicate

Every so often, I find that I need to renew dedication to the things that are important to me. There is a time of recognition that I have drifted from a principle that I hold dear, or an activity that I know I need, or from a person that I don't want to lose. It's an unsettling moment, one that I usually try to deny or ignore or delay until a more convenient time, but once it's there it doesn't go away.

I stop eating as well as I should. I don't write as much as I should (perhaps the most common one). I don't treat my wife as well as I wish to, or don't spend enough time with her, or work hard enough to make our marriage great. Not logging enough miles on the bike, weighing in a bit too heavily on the bathroom scale, smoking and drinking too much, watching the idiot box instead of reading. The lists go on. It comes down to sliding from active, productive, fit and happy to comfortable, lazy, blissfully ignorant and sedentary. Of course, everything is relative, but when it gets to the point that I am aware and uncomfortable in my awareness, I know it's time to change.

I have a very good idea of who and what I want to be, and it's when I slip off the road to this state and begin to move away from achieving it that this need for renewal comes about.

For a long time this seemed a bad thing, this need to consciously re-commit to the things that I feel are important, that keep me happy and healthy and generally make life good. Why should I have to? Why aren't they as built-in to my life and days as breathing and sleeping and drinking water?

But now I see that the renewal is almost as important as that which is being renewed, if not more-so. Principle without action is hollow. It's politics. And as humans we are fallible. We slouch toward paths of least resistance as a matter of course, and when these paths are not the proper ones--when they are constructed for convenience and not betterment, ease rather than meaning--they are not only inappropriate but they are threatening to our very souls.

To renew is to acknowledge the things that make us who we are. It's a periodic reassessment to make sure that we, changing beings that we are, stick to the path that we want to be on. I imagine even Ghandi had to reevaluate himself and his life once in a while. And in the renewal I often find a renewed enthusiasm and love for whatever it is I'm focusing on. That rediscovery makes it all worthwhile.

So.

I will pay more and better attention to my wife, whom I love very much.

I will eat better, healthier, more frequent, smaller meals.

I will ramp up my ride/run schedule so that I have 1 and not 3-4 days off in a week. And on that day off, I will walk the dogs.

I will become angry less. To do this I will respond thoughtfully, not at the jerk of a knee; I will consider what is important to others as much as to myself; I will try to truly see things as others see them; I will constantly acknowledge that nothing is absolute and everything is relative; I will stick closer to the idea of learning everything, not knowing everything, and that a wise person is never afraid to not know something--it is from the not knowing that we learn and gain wisdom.

I will pay far greater and closer attention to books and music and far less to television.

I will cut the smoking and drinking down to a more reasonable level. This is not too far off, but I could definitely improve in the smoking arena.

And this is only the beginning.

Rewintering

Just as we settle in with the idea that winter came to a premature and unceremonious conclusion this year, the snow's back on the peaks and the weather is turned cold again. Snow and mud commingle and shorts and sunblock are re-relegated to backseat status. Out again with the thick socks and winter coats and skis and gloves.

Re-opening and re-snowpacking of the local hills has people in a tizzy about last chances resurrected, and the effect on the brain of seesawing between two distinct seasons, the transition between which is normally heralded and affective enough, has brought downright confusion to my own brain and body, if not to the population at large.

The normal turning of thoughts in the spring is still happening, it's just that we get to experience it during winter conditions. And, I suspect, it will make the true arrival of spring something much more likely to be celebrated. The doom and gloom is on pause--no more incessant talk about what a rough summer it'll be and how we're doomed for months of fire and drought. Now, we hope. A good boating season. Good crops. Snow that sticks to the high country until at least early in the summer.

We pay close attention to these things, especially those of us who have abandoned the trend toward insulation from our world. We don't dash from AC home to AC car to AC work and back in reverse during the summer, and we relish the finer points of seasonal change. It marks the march of life. It divides our lives and memories into understandable and bookmarkable segments. It connects us to the world and to each other.

So, winter is back, though how briefly we don't know, and we love it.