Book Launch (and more).

i have no internet at home.

well, i do, but it’s useless. i can connect occasionally on my tablet. that’s my excuse for this taking nearly a week.

i had the book launch last thursday. it went pretty much the way i expected it to - about ten or so people turned up, the music was beautiful, and i read things. i sold a few books, a few people signed the mailing list. that’s the factual report, i guess.

but it was absolutely fantastic. it was so much more than the facts themselves combined. it was the first time i’ve read to more than three people at once (and reading to three people i had previously done only once). it was exhilarating. it was joyous. shit, i was nervous. i was freaking out the day before, and only marginally better the day of. it didn’t help that for the first twenty minutes, remedy was empty. but people came, and they seemed to enjoy themselves. people asked me to sign books. that was quite literally one of the best feelings i’ve ever experienced, and yet it was rather terrifying. stuck, in the moment, trying to think of what to write in the copy of the book this person that you probably don’t know too well is buying. for someone who doesn’t really know what to say at the best of times, that is nerve-wracking. it’s a permanent thing. there’s no removing that message, that signature. so, frightening. but good.

i know i had more to say, but in the week that’s gone by, it’s all faded. so i’ll leave it at that and compose my thoughts for another time.

thank you to all that came. thank you a lot.

anyway. onto more things.

the day after, i went along to the wine cellar to see jed & hera play their auckland album release show, i guess. and holy crap, was it fantastic. their music has always been so stunning, and hearing it live was a treasure.

this will sound contradictory, but i was so caught in the moment i had to sit and write about it.

there are gigs that you enjoy, gigs that you appreciate. there are gigs that you love. but, occasionally, if you’re extremely lucky, you’ll go to a gig where you’ll want to be nowhere else. gigs that make you so extremely happy. you feel like you’ve never been so happy before, like you would rather be nowhere else at all.


and to be honest, i think that sums up the night pretty well. all i can say further is that, if you get the chance, you simply must go see them play. i know they play quite often in christchurch, and there was word of a tour sometime in the next few months. if you can’t make it, at the very least, go listen to their album, live at york st. you’ll love it. trust me.

http://herasings.bandcamp.com/album/jed-hera-live-at-york-st

Q:Will you read any of your poems from last year?

Anonymous

I might! I’m going through everything I’ve written in the past few years and compiling a list of everything I like. And if people want to hear poetry from last year, I’ll certainly read some.

BOOK LAUNCH!

it’s been nearly two years. it was either june or july, perhaps august, when i wrote against the current. It was published in september 2011.

i haven’t done a lot with it since. i ordered copies for myself and friends and family. i found out last year that auckland libraries had ordered two copies. i discovered that a pretty below-average pop band had gotten semi-popular with the name. But that was pretty much it.

it’s time to change that. the book is something i’m really proud of and it deserves a decent launch (this is also a really great excuse for a party at a sweet venue). AND if it weren’t for real groovy in auckland downsizing (read: getting rid of their book section) i can guarantee that it would have been there by now (i have the contracts and everything).

i’ve ordered a bunch of copies. unfortunately, on my budget, that amounts to 16. but i can sell them cheap and order even more, which i intend to do.

anyway. if you’re in auckland next month, on the 13th of july at 8pm, at remedy coffee on wellesley street, there will be a launch. i will be there, reading things, as will a few friends (i hope). dyaltov will be there, playing music. so will silke (the dj for freak the sheep - i am really really excited about this) and so will eden (who just got booted off xfactor, unfortunately. it will be interesting to see where that goes). there will be really good coffee. trust me. it is fantastic.

my books will be on sale there for $10, and there will be an order form for things. if you buy a copy of against the current on the night you will get a surprise extra (i cannot guarantee you will love it, though. it just ties into the book nicely.)

anyway. it will be a fantastic night. looking forward to seeing you all there.

- ash

(ps: the facebook event for those who want it, and against the current on amazon and feedbooks (which is free!))

dyaltov:

Flaws - Dyaltov (Farah Loux cover)

An off-the-cuff, improv cover of Farah Loux’ Flaws at the KMC on a Friday night before an art opening and the launch of NZ Music Month. Followed by an improv version with a technical difference that I promised myself I would remember but have since forgot. Thanks, free drinks at NZMM.

New Zealand Music Month Launch Party

i got to go. how strange.

silke (the dj at the bfm show I work at) was out of town, touring with the gunslinger’s ball, so I got her ticket. sam was with me in town (we had just been to an art opening, partially for the jacqueline fraser, partially for the free wine) and i figured it was worth a shot, what the hell, let’s see if i can get him in, too.

it was piss easy compared to getting myself let in. the lady at the door took a few seconds or more (definitely more) to realise that i wasn’t actually silke (plot twist!) but she got it in the end. the security on the door gave me the pass in (which were really nicely printed, holy hell), sam just followed behind me, and he didn’t question it. gave him one, too.

it was about then that we realised how pseudo-exclusive that was. it was good enough to have door passes. we checked out the setlist (on the back of our entry passes) and there were some pretty big names - little lapin, who i had met at freak the sheep a few months ago, the basement tapes, who i had heard of but never really seen, tahuna breaks, who everyone seemed to be really excited about, and the wilberforces, who i had missed at bstreet the night before (that’s a whole other blog post right there, actually). there were others, too, like the bads, who i knew but didn’t really know why.

anyway. the point is, this was goddamn exciting for us. we went and got our first free drink (of five. five!) and ran into sarin of bfm and the good ol’ sunday night sex show, who sam had worked with the night before at the wine cellar, and i had met briefly also the night before after alec recognised her voice. go figure. i was surprised to notice that we hadn’t actually missed little lapin, who were on later than listed, and they were damn good live. in the studio, it was just lucy and her keyboardist. live, they had drums and a guitar (and possibly a bass, too, i forget). absolutely fantastic.


after the set, sam and i went up to chat to her. she was worried about the sound (her vocals were pretty low on the monitor) and we told her it all sounded fine. sam got chatting about playing a show together (that might be happening sometime this month).

the basement tapes were fantastic, too. like a dj set of original stuff. like my open eyes sets, but more upbeat and like actual music rather than soundscapes and ambient noise. an open eyes/basement tapes show might also be on the cards.

we chatted with peter mclennan, too, who i knew as @dubdotdash on twitter. i’d been following him for a few years, and his opinions were always goddamn interesting. i saw him tweeting about someone at the launch, so i asked to meet. we did. we discussed things. he has a book coming out which i am really looking forward to. he’s a wise and intelligent guy. it was fantastic.

we also ran into geordie of sin sin, who was a pretty cool guy.

essentially, it was a goddamn awesome night. we had to leave early to catch a bus, but we met some fucking awesome people. night well done.

more photos to come.

-ash.

  • 11 Plays
  • Why Won't You Turn Me Away? [Demo]Dyaltov

thoughtsfromalonelyroom:

I was reading an article online today about recording things efficiently, not worrying about mistakes and just moving on etc….. So in that vein, here’s a new demo, written and recorded in an hour and a half flat - rough patches, out of time vocals (still getting used to singing in odd time signatures) and all.

This got radio play. This is a good song.

The reason people cared about Gmail was because of Google. The search engine. Which magically did what no one had been able to manage before, deliver the results you wanted. It was just that simple. You had to tell your friends about it. Just like you told your friends about that band. Now the bands speak to the media and bombard the public with multiple impressions, hoping to hit you once, not realizing you’re hit multiple times and end up hating what’s being sold. It’s all top down, as opposed to ground up.
Bob Lefsetz, of the Lefsetz Letter on bands and marketing.

i met hera today.

last night, whilst rather drunk, i started getting tweets about her playing a popup picnic show (her name for what amanda calls ninja gigs), and silke invited me to go along early to sit in on the bfm interview she was going to do. obviously, i went. i had heard of hera before - she had opened for amanda quite a lot. from what i could tell, she was a goddamn cool person.

it was even better than i could expect. she’s currently touring as a duo, with  jed parsons. they were absolutely fantastic. the music is absolutely stunning, and turned me into an instant fan. here, go listen to their first single as jed and hera, issues: http://herasings.bandcamp.com/album/issues-jed-hera

after the interview, we headed down to silo park (for those outside of auckland, it’s an ex-industrial turned public park on the waterfront) for their popup show. we sat under a concrete silo, in the wind, as the sun began to set. it got cold. there were perhaps ten or so people there, plus passersby that would stay for a song or two (there was a couple that stayed for the entire set, bless ‘em).

i’ve been thinking about setting up ninja shows around auckland a lot recently. they’d involve acoustic music (probably sam and eden and anyone else who would want to play) and perhaps some readings (i would read, i’d ask demi to read). essentially anyone who wanted to do something could. i was worried about turnout, though. i figured that as long as we had a core group of, say, five or so people, that, combined with the commotion, would help passersby realise that something was going on. they’d be drawn in, like they were at hera’s show.

but today, before everyone arrived, when it was essentially just silke and i alongside jed and hera, she said something that seems so obvious now - and it had before, too, i had just somehow forgotten it. she said “and even if this is all that turns up, we’ll play anyway. that’s the beauty of it.” and that’s exactly it. it doesn’t matter if no one is watching, if no one turns up. it happens anyway. that’s where the beauty lies.

hera herself seems like an exceedingly interesting person. she told us stories about playing in greenland in the middle of winter, playing for  arctic challenge teams at base camps, about freezing dogsled rides and warming up in huts filled with polar bear skulls and the like.

i’m glad to have met jed and hera. it’s something i’m really glad i didn’t pass up (which i came close to doing).

absolutely brilliant.

-Ash.

Ratsmagic.

we had them on freak the sheep on wednesday. they’ve been a band for a little over a year, and already they’ve won battle of the bands, played at vector arena and at music in parks and rhythm and vines. they recorded and released an ep, and are touring on it this month (sort of: they’re going to wellington, at the very least). sure, they got funding from winning battle of the bands to record it, and the publicity they got surely helped with getting those big-name shows, but it’s what they did with that boost of publicity that got them so good. they’re another example of a band who really utilise the tools we all have available - they post constantly on facebook. their twitter account is a bit neglected, but you can tell they used it heavily during battle.

on a similar note, i met a girl last night - well, met her properly. we’d met briefly before. eden’s a friend of sam’s. she’s at music school, too, in the pop school. but she’s only staying for a year, for the experience. at the end of the year she’s going all-in, recording an album and really putting herself out there. what’s interesting is that she’s also on x factor this season, mainly to utilise the publicity it’ll give her. a really smart move, if she uses it right. look at intone - one of them was a finalist, that got them a decent amount of fans - far more on facebook than in actual gig numbers, though. but they don’t play often, and when they do, they usually don’t get paid. not that it’s about the money, but paid gigs are obviously necessary. if you’re playing for free, you’re always playing for someone else, to get their name out there. you’re always the extra act, the opener. if you only pay for free, you’re probably actually having trouble finding shows. even if it’s playing for a lesser percentage of the show’s take, even if it’s a set rate of twenty bucks, even if it’s beer money, being paid for a show makes your act come across as that next step towards professional. not that you shouldn’t play for free sometimes - by all means, help your friends fill a set, help your friend who needs an extra musician. free gigs are fun, but they’re far better as an occasional thing in a profile of other shows.

in any case, i’m looking forward to seeing where eden goes with her stuff - both her music and how she handles it. she’s a fantastic singer.

in other news, dyaltov have a couple of shows this month. details for those shows will be up soon.

i have a story or two to write about soon, too.

see you around.
ash.

A couple of things, unrelated.

first off, if you didn’t catch it, go check out @amandapalmer’s twitter feed. this morning (NZ time) she moderated a fantastic discussion on indie music being used in advertising, after a talk at berkley. fantastic thoughts everywhere.

personally, i’m okay with it - for the most part. a lot of the time, it’s ideal. when i hear a song by someone i like used in an ad or show or something, i enjoy it - it’s publicity they deserve. but when it gets to the point where bands change their style or sound - not through natural progression, but because of advertising, with the intent to get more placement, then it becomes somewhat of a problem. but even then, it’s sort of a case by case basis. the topic raises a lot of issues and a lot of interesting cases: does the situation change when the artists no longer need advertising money to live or create their art? should bands and artists only agree to contracts with companies whose products they use and enjoy? should people be more concerned about some companies’ potentially amoral practices? certainly, i’d say. that seems obvious.

certain cases are interesting, too. avalanche city had that track used in one of tv2’s ads, and it played a lot - pushing them from an ‘actual’ indie band (another discussion in itself) to becoming a band everyone knew - or at the very least, everyone knew that track. they owe a lot to that ad placement. would they be more ‘authentic’ or ‘true to themselves’ if they had got where they are now without it? maybe, maybe not. nick drake wasn’t especially popular in his own time, but an ad or two in the early 2000s pushed him into - well, certainly not the mainstream, but it gave him a lot of success - but posthumous. interesting.

the general consensus in the end, really, is a reasonable one - as long as the artists are happy.

secondly, i got to interview shapeshifter last friday. they’re a reasonably big kiwi drum & bass band, and they have a new album coming out soon. i think their new single from it drops this friday or something, and, while i’m not really a fan - not because i don’t like the music, but rather because i never really had the chance to be - i’m looking forward to it. they were really nice guys, actually, and it was a pretty sweet experience to have.

thirdly, and i won’t talk much about this, because there are people much better equipped to, but regan (my graphic designer flatmate) just got bioshock infinite and it is a very pretty game, to say the least. i’m not much of a gamer myself, but i played a bit of the first, and i’ve certainly done my fair share of research into video games and whatnot (see: ‘the aesthetics of video games’) and this is something i’m going to be following very closely. the first, as a lot of people know, deals quite heavily with randian philosophy. it’s the kind of game that can actually generate what’s known as ludonarrative dissonance - dissonance between the gameplay and the narrative, or themes presented within. your character is essentially forced to help andrew ryan, where the randian values presented within quite obviously recommend not to. the result is a dissonance that is utilised pretty well (though criticised by some) to point out the flaws in ayn rand’s philosophy.

infinite is already dealing with race and religion - and it’s not afraid to be really upfront about it. signs i’ve seen in the past few minutes include slogans such as “mind your manners amongst your betters”. i’m really looking forward to seeing whether they attempt a similar thing again - creating ludonarrative dissonance without the rand influences will be tricky and different, but perhaps they won’t go for dissonance. perhaps they’ll aim for something else. from what regan has told me about the writers and developers, it’ll be interesting, nonetheless.

ewan-mcgruber: hollyherself: confusedtree: alloutorg: Tumblr, we need you! A rogue Arizona State representative, John Kavanagh, wants to pass a bill that would thow trans people in jail for using public restrooms. Anyone could be asked for I.D. to “prove” their gender, and if there’s a discrepancy they could face a fine or jailtime. When asked why the bill targeted trans people, Kavanagh explained that it’s because he thinks “they’re weird.” Outrageous. We can stop this bill by taking action at www.allout.org/arizona and spreading the word far and wide. Will you help? That quote sounds like something out of an onion article oh my god I can’t believe people are this awful You should help and spread the word too This is everything that makes my heart hurt and my stomach drop. I cant think of a state I hate more than arizona 
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ewan-mcgruber:

hollyherself:

confusedtree:

alloutorg:

Tumblr, we need you! A rogue Arizona State representative, John Kavanagh, wants to pass a bill that would thow trans people in jail for using public restrooms. Anyone could be asked for I.D. to “prove” their gender, and if there’s a discrepancy they could face a fine or jailtime.

When asked why the bill targeted trans people, Kavanagh explained that it’s because he thinks “they’re weird.” Outrageous.

We can stop this bill by taking action at www.allout.org/arizona and spreading the word far and wide. Will you help?

That quote sounds like something out of an onion article oh my god I can’t believe people are this awful

You should help and spread the word too

This is everything that makes my heart hurt and my stomach drop.

I cant think of a state I hate more than arizona 

(via calmrad)

Source: allout.org