YOU WERE IN THE CORNER DOING BACKFLIPS, I SAW SWEAT ON THE WHEELCHAIR GRIPS

here's the trailer for the upcoming silkworm documentary again.
and yes, they were that epic and amazing.

WE BE JAMMIN'

well, here we are, just jamming out hard in the studio with our main guy colin "steady pimpin" stewart (above, right), laying down some new tracks for all y'alls in anticipation of the early march release of our brand new album.
at this very moment, big ryan peters is throwing down some heavy riffage for a song he wrote that i sing on. sounds good ry!
moments ago, burquitlam native and overall virtuouso nick krgovich (of p:ano, gigi, and no kids fame) was here laying on some icy synth soundscapes on a track that darcy wrote. if you have never heard of nick or his music you should wake the fuck up now. the gigi album may be the single most slept on album of all time. why has nobody put this out?
labels are weird...
check out his myspace pages:

(this image came up when i searched "no kids". disturbing, no?)
http://www.myspace.com/nokidsband


http://www.myspace.com/gigitheband

p:ano was one of the best vancouver bands ever, they have 4 albums you need to own right now.


nick is an actual musical genius, he writes millions of songs and all of them are pretty fucking cool. and he's totally evil! (just kidding. sort of...)

anyway, here's some cool videos and junk i was just jamming on because i'm bored and there's a computer in my lap.











and so on...

HORROR

FRIDAY NIGHT IS SACRED, IT'S NOT TIME TO BE WASTED, THEY'VE GOT DOOM ON CALL, YOU KNOW, FRIDAY THEY CAN'T USE IT

i have been drunk in you.




and so on...

friday nights at the astoria can be dangerous.
let me just say it's great to have the old girl back, letting the booze flow cheaply into the night, barfing drunks back out onto the pavement. i can safely say i've been drunker at the astoria more often than any other place on this earth. i remember the old days when thursday nights were invariably kareoke at pat's pub followed by the ooze down the road to the astoria where rudy, angel to drunks, would hammer you down with gin and tonics without the tonic. i can no longer drink gin, just one of those things... the long walk home was usually a path of destruction and senseless wastoid vandalism. those were the days. as a matter of fact, the song drunk eyes on our first album is about stumbling home from the astoria and the girl who would come along with me. and now we're happily married (just kidding).
anyway, the bar is finally back up and running after being closed for what felt like an eternity. thank god.
i was there last friday to watch sports (the band, not the activity) which features ladyhawk's own dreamboat captains ryan peters and darcy hancock on guitars as well as the high admiral of dreaminess danny marshall on drums. they straight up rule. ryan, who wails on the drums in our band, also happens to be a completely shredding guitarist and songwriter! who knew? actually, i did. he used to be in one of the best bands ever back in high school called alpha bmx, who sounded kind of like the steve miller band... ON ACID! more like: on acne. johnny wakeham and featherwolf played next, featuring ladyhawk's resident dungeon master sean hawryluk on bass, they jammed out hard and came correct.
the icing on the jam-cake was small fame (originally called dad music, which is apt AND amazing), the new project of bend sinister's dan moxon. dan is a talented fucker. he can whistle like nobody's business, just like you hear random old men doing, with vibrato and little fancy flourishes and stuff. amazing.
they're pretty fucking cool, check it out:

that's my roomie jake on the left.
anyway, the night ended suitably sloppy for me with a party at small fame drummer dana's place and a beautiful girl doing body shots of corona and chewing gum out of my belly button. it's a full ounce.
god bless the astoria!

SADE

WHALEBONES

the first time we were supposed to play with seattle's own whalebones was here in vancouver at pat's pub maybe a year and a half ago. they were turned back at the border and weren't allowed to come back for a full year. bummer.
a year passes and they finally make it up to play a show opening for wolf parade and frog eyes at the commodore ballroom. apparently the backstage area was so jammed with people that the commodore got pissed and banned them all from playing there again. bummer (i guess).
whalebones stole the show anyway.
so, eventually we head out on another american tour with a planned first stop in seattle playing with -you guessed it- whalebones. then we go and flip our van three days before said tour and have to miss our first show. thwarted again.
we finally got to play two shows with them, one in seattle and one in anacortes.
it was like unrequitted love...requitted! know what i mean?
anyway, whalebones are the best.
do you like rocking out? do you like awesome guitar and vocals with pretty harmonies? really like, AWESOME guitar? good. me too. WHALEBONES.
i always wonder about seattle. ever watch frasier? that movie singles? ever go to starbucks?
ever heard of nirvana?
what's up with that place?

justin deary is the main brain behind whalebones and my main man in seattle, i asked him a few questions recently via email.

how long have you lived in seattle? were you there for the "grunge years"?

I moved to Seattle on July 4th 1992. I was fifteen years old. A few months before I moved here I heard Nirvana on the radio. It was like a personal revolution or awakening. I had only really been playing guitar for a few months and was super excited. I was bummed to be leaving all my friends by moving here, but I was stoked to come to this place that seemed to have something awesome happening--a rad live music scene. It was new and exciting to me. I made a good buddy at football practice- Rocky Votolato, like me a recent transplant, but he was from texas. We went to see Nirvana together about a week into 10th grade. We got general admission tickets and we totally moshed. it was AWESOME! Two weeks later we saw Pearl Jam and it was rad too. We were 15 years old and way into guitars and rock music so it was pretty cool to see two bands that we really liked. When you realize music is really your thing, it becomes part of your identity.

as an outsider playing and seeing shows in seattle, the crowds have always seemed, let's say "restrained". i've often wondered if this is due to fallout from the early nineties, do you think this is true? do i have a mistaken impression?

People in Seattle aren't free enough. Everyone thinks everyone else is looking at them or something. There's a weird cool factor here. But there is also a strange timidity regarding physical expression. Like, there's a fine line between being a dude having a good time, dancing, grooving, or being the dude who gets more attention than the band and knocks over your girlfriend's beer. Wouldn't you rather be safe! I haven't toured in every part of the country so it's hard for me to say with true authority. Some cities suck one night and are rad the next. I've only ever had the most ultimate time in Vancouver and Victoria for example, but I think I'm just lucky to know the people I know. What city just rules all the time? I wanna go there. Regarding the effect of the early 90s- I think that in the same way "grunge" nudged out big hair metal, indie/punk/hardcore nudged out grunge and those new kids had the attitude required the shed the old ways. Not necessarily a good thing, but there regardless. Of course Duffy, you know I'm generalizing. Also, sometimes when watching a band, I just try to observe how it all fits together, song structures, details, mechanics. Especially if it's my first time seeing a band. I might come off critical I guess.

what's the music scene like in seattle these days? what are your favorite local bands?

The scene here has always been pretty fragmented. But I guess that's everywhere. Seattle is a geographically challenging city. There are many cool areas but they are all pretty far spread out. Since the weather isn't exactly welcoming for many months in a row, people tend to stay close to home and as a result have perhaps a more closed off attitude toward other people, particularly strangers. That said, I think seattle is a pretty welcoming place to start out as a band. If you're half decent and you've got someone willing to put the time into it you can get shows going. Nick Dewitt just composed a rad piece of classical fantasy music. He used a Mellotron a lot. I can't believe he did it. It's amazing. Right now he is recruiting people to perform it. His musical brain is GIANT!

do you have a favorite place to eat? hangout?

Lately the little lady and I have taken to going out to dinner at nice restaurants. Expensive French restaurants are our specialty. C'est Bon!

you and i are roughly the same age and therefore both starting high school in the early nineties, what was really doing it for you music-wise back then? can you/do you still listen to any of it?

I was way into the Doors, Hendrix, Zeppelin, Creedence. The usual 60's highschool stuff. If you're a guitar player it's likely that there was a time when Hendrix ruled your world. I mean he still does. When I moved to seattle I got into grunge stuff. I can't do Alice in Chains. I liked them back then but now it's like a weird principle that I have. Some shit will never be okay. Badmotorfinger is a rippin record though. I don't listen to Pearl Jam but I'm pretty sure I respect them as a band and I think they've done a good job maintaining integrity. I still listen to all the 60's bands. The Doors we're a kick ass band. I wish there was more instrumental stuff of them.

what's doing it for you these days?

Doug Sahm is grooving me tough. I'm into working on vocal harmonies. I'm getting so I can play the piano pretty well. That's exciting. Also, I've been exercising and it makes me feel really great. I like running around the neighborhood. I like jumping rope. We went to Joshua Tree and it blew me away. That experience is keeping me stoked.

do you believe in ghosts?

I believe in ghosts. I have one story. We were recording in our basement a few months ago and were waiting for Amy to get home from work. At one point we had all been in the same room for a while listening to a song. When the song was done we heard someone walking around upstairs for a few minutes and we thought Amy had gotten home. I went upstairs and no one was there. About a half an our later Amy got home. We all sort of shrugged it off but we all heard it and there was no mistaking. Someone, something, had been up there. But I don't think that spirit hangs around here on a regular basis.

ooh, spooky. i love that shit.
check whalebones out at http://myspace.com/whalebones

TOTAL SOUL APOCALYPSE

HONEY SLIDES PART DEUX

dude. i just listened to skullfuck, reckoning and live dead back to back.

he can see me.

LADYHAWK WHAT THE FUCK

proposed album cover art.

so, is there a new ladyhawk album coming out ever?
well my friend, i believe there is...
here's the story:
way back in february we set out to record our new record. we wanted to do it with colin stewart, who we worked with for our first album and then our little e.p., but his studio (the hive, the best place to make a record in vancouver) was booked up for the brief window of time we had to do it in. we didn't want to record in our practice space (which we did for our first album), so we looked around the city for alternate spaces. nothing really promising turned up, so we had the idea to try and do it in our old hometown of kelowna, about 4 hours east of vancouver. some friends of ours were operating an art space/venue in an abandoned farm house there and offered it to us for the last 2 weeks of february. boo ya. we packed up the old van and headed out.
those 2 weeks were spent drinking ghetto sangria (see post) and basically getting fucked out of our minds all day and all night. oh, and recording.
we then hurried back to the city to mix the bastard and flipped our van in the snow. the old white whale was totalled, but thankfully we were not and neither was our gear. darcy, ryan and i rode the greyhound back to vancouver while sean stayed behind in kelowna to work out the insurance details and try to find a new van.
did i mention that this is 3 days before we are supposed to leave for a 6 week tour? stress-zone.com! anyway, we made it back in time to mix the album in a day and a half. somewhat miraculously, sean found a new van and we busted out for tour, missing only our first show in seattle which ain't bad.
in the meantime, we released the afformentioned little e.p. which probably nobody heard about and have just sort of chilled while we wait for the album to be put out hopefully sometime in the middle of next march. why so long? that's just when the beautiful folks at jagjaguwar were able to do it. and they do a good job, so we just have to be patient.
but, it IS coming out one of these days.
everybody's had to wait forever for mike jones' the american dream to come out, but it looks like that wait is finally over WHAT WHAT!

HONEY SLIDES

"Anyway, we're in this hotel room (harmonica), we're trying some honey-slides, you know....You know what a honey-slide is? (voice from audience: Yes!) Honey-slide, mmmmmmn!
You know, poor grade marijuana (he's playing soft guitar all through this... Motion Pictures intro), worse than you get on the street, and you take it and you get your old lady, you know, if you got one, to cook it up on the stove, you know, put that stuff in the grinder, get it real fine, in a frying pan, put it on the stove, turn the heat up a little, wait till the grass just starts to smoke, just a little bit, take it off the heat, don't want to burn it too much (laughter and a few guitar bars), then you take the honey, you know, get a half a glass of honey about this big - I hope you ladies are listening to the recipies tonight - (audience laughter and a few words missing) just heat that honey up until it's slippery, you know, and mix that grass with it, you know the fine grass that you've cooked up just until it started to smoke and you took it off, mix those together and you get a spoon you know (voices from the audience and laughter).
I think you should eat it after that. Just eat a little of it, you know, maybe a spoonful or two, you'll be surprised, it just makes you feel fine... (laughter) That cheap grass is great. You know, in these times, you have to think about prices and things like that (laughter). "

that was neil young onstage at a show in new york back in 1974. i stole it off the internet. apparently neil recorded on the beach and tonight's the night under the influence of those legendary and mysterious honey slides, which is pretty fucking amazing because after a little kitchen experimentation about half an hour ago i can barely move.

ROCK AND ROLL NEVER REMEMBERS

so i sat down earlier today with my shitty ass cold, put on the grateful dead europe 72 and tried to write a post about the status of our new record. instead, i wrote a long and super depressing rant about paula cole.
for some reason, i got the melody from her song "where have all the cowboys gone?" stuck in my head, maybe it was playing in a store or something, and i felt compelled to do some research on her career. according to the all music guide, in 1998 she won the grammy for best new artist even though her album was actually recorded in 1994 and she was therefore technically ineligable. weird. i'm not really a fan.
anyway, from there i went further into a "is it better to burn out than to fade away?" kind of thing- is the surving idea of you more important than survival itself?- and at the end of several paragraphs felt so depressed about life in general that i had to delete the whole thing and go outside.
when i got back i went to her website and read a "paula update" that i found oddly touching.
anyway, what the fuck?
i've had a weird day.

PSYCHIC JAM-OUT PART 2

GHETTO SANGRIA

that shit is so goood.

if you want to get drunk, are tired of all the usual boring old booze and don't mind the prospect of a mild to serious hangover, why not try ghetto sangria? it's delicious, (somewhat deceptively) refreshing, cheap and easy to make, AND it gets you completely shittered! we recorded the entirety of our upcoming album under the influence of this sweet devil nectar and let me tell you: it sucks! just kidding, right?
here's what you do:
mix
1 bottle of cheap red wine (cheapness is key, don't try to get fancy)
1 liter/quart of fruit juice of your choice, orange blends are usually best
1 can of 7 up-style soda or ginger ale.
if you want to get fancy, you can serve it over ice or garnish it with fruit or some shit, but you know you'll just drink it straight out of the bucket as the lord intended.

PSYCHIC JAM-OUT PART 1

EASTSIDE SHAKE

this shit is REALLY popular around here.

east vancouver is a fucked up place. the gutters in my neighborhood are littered with a charming combination of used needles, used condoms and chicken parts, but don't get me wrong, i LOVE my neighborhood. even though the streets are (sometimes literally) crawling with fucked up people, i never really feel unsafe here and i think a lot of people genuinely feel that the area belongs as much to the users and homeless as it does to anyone else.
vancouver is the warmest spot in canada year round which means that people who live on the street won't freeze to death in the winter, so naturally it is the only place to be this time of year if you don't have a home. add to that a relatively relaxed and progressive attitude towards drug use and prostitution and you get this sort of mad max beyond the thunderdome post-apocalyptic zombie town vibe on the downtown eastside. as you can imagine, it's easy to become desensitized to it from seeing truly fucked up shit all the time. i don't even blink anymore when i see somebody smoking crack in broad daylight on the sidewalk in front of an elementary school, or a woman writhing on the pavement and tearing her clothes off with a needle hanging out of her arm. i realize this sounds hellish.
i work right across the street from one of the busiest pick-up corners in the city and the busiest time of day is between 7 and 9 a.m. it's like a starbucks drive-thru. who are these fucking dudes? anyway, a lot of the women are obvious users and interestingly, most of them seem to operate without pimps. and i think they work cheap, these are not julia roberts in pretty woman type prostitutes. there is this one woman who i see almost every day who has a kind of extreme working style. as people drive up to the stop sign at the corner, she walks out into the street and tries to get into their cars whether they like it or not. today she got into one of my co-workers cars as he was returning from his lunch break and refused to get out. he tried explaining to her that he didn't want a date and that he needed to get back to work and finally persuaded her to get out of the car by giving her a pair of sunglasses. he came back inside laughing with a sort of c'est la vie attitude towards the encounter. this kind of thing happens all the time, what a place!

JUST WEE PUPS

here are some photos taken by our good friend braden barclay way back in august 2004 at a show in kelowna, b.c. we played with jon-rae fletcher. notice a moustache-less ryan peters and a pre "wizard look" sean hawryluk. weird. also, we all appear less bloated and haggard in general. my guitar is still shiny and not crusted in blood, sweat and semen...