Twenty Years Ago!

Time flies!

Space Streakings was a noise rock band from Japan formed in 1993 by four video game programmers. Very little information is available about them, not even their real names.

Space Streakings:

• Captain Insect – bass guitar, vocals, programming
• Kame Bazooka – alto saxophone, vocals, horns, illustrations
• Karate Condor – turntables, vocals
• Screaming Stomach – guitar, vocals, trumpet, kazoo

As those pseudonyms may suggest, the group took a cavalier attitude to their craft, producing a series of unclassifiable songs which have confused critics in and outside of Japan’s borders – the band themselves dubbed it ‘Cyber-punk-techno-core’. They had unusual instrumentation. No drums, for one thing. But, they also featured a gasoline-powered guitar and flamethrower trombone.

In 1994, musician and music engineer Steve Albini flew to Japan in order to record the band’s second album 7-Toku.  Shortly after the album’s release Screaming Stomach, who had grown tired of the band’s cacophonous sound, left the band. This resulted in a collaboration with Mount Shasta of Chicago, forming the supergroup Shakuhachi Surprise:

• Jason Benson – drums, percussion
• Carl Brueggen – guitar
• Captain Insect – bass guitar, vocals, horns
• John Forbes – vocals, guitar, harmonica
• Kame Bazooka – alto saxophone, vocals
• Karate Condor – turntables, guitar, horns
• Jenny White – guitar, bass guitar, vocals

I actually like this collaboration even more than Space Streakings itself. The addition of a real drummer smoothed out the jagged edges of the stiff-sounding drum machines. Space Streakings Sighted Over Mount Shasta is the sole album recorded by Mount Shasta and Space Streakings together, released on October 1, 1996 through Skin Graft Records. It is a shame that they didn’t make any more.

After a brief tour of the United States, Space Streakings disbanded.

I look at making music as kinda like making movies.

There are different styles of making music, just as there are different styles of filmmaking.

Some bands are very dictatorial, with one or two people in charge.

I have always hated that and avoided it like the plague.

Frank Zappa was like that.

So was Captain Beefheart.

If a band were a film crew, both were the writer, director, and producer of their band.

The rest of their group would be the cast and crew.

They would compose the music alone, then hand it off to their band, who would play it exactly as it was written.

I always tried to be more democratic than that, involving everybody in the process, through the whole thing.

I am terribly uncomfortable in a leadership role.

But, that is not a very efficient method.

People get frustrated by it and leave.

After years of trial-and-error, I think the best approach to operating as a group is to be a “benign dictatorship” of sorts.

Someone has to have an idea of where they are going or the whole thing will drift apart.

They also have to leave a lot of wiggle-room for others to work with.

I try to look for ideas from the world of filmmaking, when it is applicable.

http://filmmakermagazine.com/95125-10-lessons-on-filmmaking-from-roger-corman/#.VgClvtJVhBf

I think my biggest problem is the lack of social skills.

I don’t read people or situations very well.

I don’t communicate what I am thinking very well, either, it seems.

So, if I want to do anything at all, it seems like the best approach for me is just working alone (for the most part) with some occasional collaboration with friends.

This really sucks.

Part of the reason I make music is to overcome anxiety, depression, and have some sort of social life.

I don’t really participate in much else, besides music.

But, it seems like having a real band is going to always be out of reach for me.

Actor / singer Meatloaf was interviewed once about his music career. He corrected the interviewer, though. He said that he was an actor, who happened to play the role of a musician.

I think that is the best way to sum up David Bowie. He is a shapeshifter. Each album is a new role to play. He changes his costume and persona. He becomes a new character each time.

I don’t think I could do that. Maybe its a stubborn streak of honesty. I am just always myself. Some friends I used to have would tell me how they “grew out” of certain kinds of music. I don’t really grow out of anything. I just keep expanding my vocabulary. I kinda look at my musical tastes like the Borg, assimilating everything in sight.

So, maybe I have more in common with Locutus of Borg than David Bowie. I dunno.

I think somebody else likes David Bowie, too.

Hip-hop producers The Dust Brothers are on my shortlist of people who I would like to work with someday (if I could actually afford them).

Contrary to popular belief, sampling and mixing is an artform.

Some people do it very well.

The Dust Brothers, The X-Ecutioners, or The Bomb Squad come to mind.

Some people are just talentless hacks.

MC Hammer and Vanilla Ice come to mind.

In the meantime, unless a million dollars falls into my lap, I will have to do this sort of thing by myself.

Sometimes, less is more.

So, keep it simple stupid.

Pop music
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia:

Pop music (a term that originally derives from an abbreviation of “popular”) is a genre of popular music that originated in its modern form in the Western world during the 1950s and 1960s, deriving from rock and roll. The terms “popular music” and “pop music” are often used interchangeably, although the former describes of music that is popular (and can include any style).
As a genre, pop music is extremely eclectic, often borrowing elements from other styles such as urban, dance, rock, Latin, and country; nonetheless, there are core elements that define pop music. Such elements include generally short to medium-length songs written in a basic format (often the verse-chorus structure) as well as the common employment of repeated choruses, melodic tunes, and hooks.

The funniest description that I ever heard about KISS is that they are like if The Beatles signed a record contract with McDonald’s.

Most musicians are, by necessity, also businessmen.

They have to be, in order to survive.

But, none take the capitalist cake like KISS.

I am pretty confident that they hold the world record on band merchandising.

Is there anything that they HAVEN’T put their faces or logo on?

I mean, I understand the mentality of a collector, having been one myself.

But, does anyone really need a “KISS Kasket” to be buried in?

The first record that I ever bought was the Paul Stanley 1978 solo LP.

I also got a KISS t-shirt.

It was the silver glittery iron-on logo on black.

I gotta admit, at one time, they were a good band.

They wrote good songs and put on a great show.

That was long before Peter Criss and Ace Frehley were ejected, before it became just two greedy old Jews and their hired hands.

Honestly, the group should have disbanded by the 1980’s.

We would still have better memories of them.

Okay, I understand that putting on a big spectacle every night like they do costs a lot of money.

Revenue has to come from somewhere.

In the band’s early years, they sold out venues, but couldn’t sell any records.

The label was going bankrupt trying to keep the band afloat.

So, merchandising had to take up the slack.

The same phenomenon happened with the film “Star Wars.”

George Lucas received very little money or support from 20th Century FOX.

But, he owned the merchandising rights.

In both cases, merchandising saved the projects.

Hell, during their entire career, The Ramones made most of their income from t-shirt sales, not records.

The Misfits make their money the same way, putting their artwork on skateboards, belt buckles, coffee mugs, almost anything.

You cannot swing a dead cat in a Hot Topic without hitting some Misfits merch!

I don’t begrudge artists trying to find ways to support themselves.

But, it can reach a point where you lose your integrity and become another corporate whore.

John Lydon took a lot of shit for doing a butter commercial.

I admit, it was annoying.

In his defense, though, Public Image Limited wanted to release a new album, but had no backing from a record label.

The financing needed to come from somewhere and this was an opportunity that presented itself.

The butter ad money was exhausted on this project alone.

Now, some bands avoid these moral dilemmas by keeping their overhead low, “jamming econo.”

I can dig that.

I usually TRY to do that.

It means figuring out how to do more with less.

Fugazi never sold merchandise of ANY kind, no t-shirts….nothing.

Their reasoning was that if they had to sell stuff at a table, then that is one more person needed to watch the table and make sales.

Cut out the merch table and cut expenses.

Overall, I guess it depends on what compromises that you can live with.

I am generally against making commercials, unless I can have creative input.

I made some for a friend’s record store once, which appeared on the MTV Music Awards no less.

There is no way that these commercials could be mistaken for something cooked up in committee at an advertising agency.

No way.

Art and commerce have always had a shaky relationship.

During the renaissance, artists were supported by wealthy benefactors, kings and merchants. Now, art is just another commodity on the market. Artists have to sell themselves to be supported. Every dollar has strings attached, though.

There is a scene from “Man On The Moon” where Andy Kaufman (Jim Carrey) is fired from a club gig because of his stubborn refusal to conform. I couldn’t find a video clip online, unfortunately. But the exchange with the club owner goes like this:

Andy Kaufman: So, Mr. Besserman, same spot tomorrow?

Mr. Besserman: I don’t know, Andy. I think I have to let you go.

Andy Kaufman: You’re firing me? You don’t even pay me.

Mr. Besserman: I don’t want to be insulting, but your act is like amateur hour. Sing-alongs for six-year-olds……puppets that aren’t funny, playing records…?

Andy Kaufman: But it’s original. No one’s ever done it. I’m not like everyone else.

Mr. Besserman: Everybody else gets this place cooking.

Andy Kaufman: I thought it was cooking. There was a man really upset.

Mr. Besserman: He stormed out, and other people left during your act. I can’t sell booze to people who–

Andy Kaufman: It’s about booze. Not comedy, not art?

Mr. Besserman: I can’t sell booze when you’re singing “Pop Goes the Weasel.” I’m running a business. It’s show business. Show. Business. Show. Business. Without the business, there’s no show. And there’s no show for you.

My experience dealing with the “legitimate” side of the music business has not been very pleasant. Half the time, clubs will try to rip you off. I got the sense that they were really mafia fronts for drug smuggling or human trafficking. I overheard talk about some clubs blacklisting bands for playing at DIY shows.

When I tried to book shows myself, I mostly got rejections everywhere because I was too different from what they wanted, except pay-to-play venues. Fuck that. So, I played coffeehouses and parties when I could. Hell, I even played in parking lots, anywhere with electricity.

I would rather avoid the “business” side of music, if at all possible. I am very suspicious about people wanting you to sign a contract or join something. I know that it is often necessary. But, I prefer to do things DIY when possible.

Some artists have done pretty well by this work ethic; Big Black, Fugazi, Crass, NoMeansNo, etc.

Is compromise sometimes necessary? Maybe. But, it usually better not to be put into a situation that forces you to.

I was not planning to add another post today.

But, a friend requested to keep ’em coming.

So, okay, one more.

Redd Kross is an American alternative rock band from Hawthorne, California, who had their roots in 1978 in a band called The Tourists, which was begun by brothers Jeff and Steve McDonald while they were still in middle school. With the addition of friends Greg Hetson and John Stielow on drums, the band’s first gig was opening for Black Flag.

With deep connections to influential groups like Black Flag, Circle Jerks, Bad Religion, Off! (and even the White Stripes), Redd Kross are a band that I can relate to for a couple of reasons:

• They began very young (11 and 15), performing in a hardcore punk scene full of adults.
• They’ve had a thousand different drummers and lead guitarists.
• They embrace campiness and 1970’s pop culture.
• They are not afraid of change, trying new musical styles.
• They wrote a song titled “Notes and Chords Mean Nothing To Me”.
• They are punks with long hair, like moi.
• They are still at it, decades later, with little or no recognition to show for it.

Overall, I dig their pop catchiness and the colorful retro presentation that they usually bring.

To me, rock & roll is like a musical Rosetta Stone. It has co-opted everything in its path, blurring the distinction between genres and cultures. There are fewer degrees of separation between musical artists than Hollywood actors and Kevin Bacon.

Because I like so much different music and want to play it ALL, I have always relied on other musicians to filter it, molding it into whatever style we were going to perform together. Also, other musicians may be more skilled at performing different styles than I am.

Frank Zappa set such a high standard for people to join his band that he, himself, admitted that he couldn’t pass the audition. I never had such a luxury. I just had to work with whoever would work with me and try to make the most of their talents.

Writing music by myself, I have more freedom to work without having that filter.

But, the limits of the technology available is still a factor.

Having only one performer (me) is a factor.

The skills that I possess (or the lack thereof) is a factor.

So, will it really sound the way I want it to?

I don’t know.

Maybe.

Maybe not.

All I can do at this point is continue to throw everything at the wall and see what sticks.

Polystylism
From Wikipedia:

Polystylism is the use of multiple styles or techniques in literature, art, film, or, especially, music, and is a postmodern characteristic.
Some prominent contemporary polystylist composers include Peter Maxwell Davies, Michael Colgrass, Lera Auerbach, Sofia Gubaidulina, George Rochberg, Alfred Schnittke, Django Bates, Alexander Zhurbin, Lev Zhurbin and John Zorn. However, Gubaidulina, among others, has rejected the term as not applicable to her work. Polystylist composers from earlier in the twentieth century include Charles Ives and Eric Satie. Among literary figures, James Joyce has been referred to as a polystylist.
Though perhaps not the original source of the term, the first important discussion of the subject is Alfred Schnittke’s essay “Polystylistic Tendencies in Modern Music (1971)”. The composers cited by Schnittke as those who make use of polystylism are Alban Berg, Luciano Berio, Pierre Boulez, Edison Denisov, Hans Werner Henze, Mauricio Kagel, Jan Klusák, György Ligeti, Carl Orff, Arvo Pärt, Krzysztof Penderecki, Henri Pousseur, Rodion Shchedrin, Dmitri Shostakovich, Sergei Slonimsky, Karlheinz Stockhausen, Igor Stravinsky, Boris Tishchenko, Anton Webern, and Bernd Alois Zimmermann.

I have always been a packrat and tinkerer.

So, naturally, I liked to build my own instruments and noisemakers when I had the materials for it.

Anything that vibrates and changes pitch is fair game.

I made many attempts, but never mastered building electronics.

Some of my simple guitar-based instruments worked pretty well, though.

I once played “The Electric Stick” with Carey Loren’s Monster Island and MSBR, from Japan.

MSBR were so impressed that they put a video of me on their website.

I ended up giving the The Electric Stick away to Davin Brainard, of Princess Dragon-Mom, during a housecleaning Marsha Postel and I had in our Detroit apartment.

I recently uncovered some old parts in storage that may be useful.

So, maybe I will make something again, soon.

Frank Zappa on TV!

Just out of curiosity, I wonder who will watch these videos and who will run for the hills.

I am already losing subscribers.

Gotta weed out the trash.