CRog

you can buy a whistle at Fred Segal Santa Monica this Thursday Oct 22nd from 7-10. All proceeds go directly to the rehabilitation of the people of Congo and efforts to bring peace.

I’m Djing the event. Learn more about the effort. Great blog with classic photography. www.fallingwhistles.com/

For one year, every Monday through Friday I went to Waterloo records in Austin when I was a Sr in High school. I was in this pretty serious, photography class at a school near by and I always had an hour to kill before driving back to my high school, which didn’t have the same print facilities as this other one near the store.

There was this guy who worked there and he was always recommending things I liked, like Pell Mell. He was also into the blues as in Sun House, Jazz as in Mingus and hip hop. I think he was the first person that told me about the Wu-Tang Clan. He also told me that when I go to Chicago I will find the GREATEST RECORD store in the world, The Jazz and Blues Record Mart.

So I went on a little pilgrimage. He was right. It was dusty and heavy in a weird spot under a bridge in the center of town and across the street from an ancient dinner in a Motel parking lot where the chef smoked cigarettes while he made breakfast, seriously.

The front was a door, a window, a hallway sized space crammed with the Blues. With the Blues it’s not so much what you play, its how you play it and everybody who played it well and was recorded was represented here somewhere in the stacks.

The hallway led to a hanger or barn like space, with a soft sun streaming in from high windows that picked up on all the dust floating in the air.

I remember it so well and in such detail because it was so amazing to me, what I could unearth here and learn just by listening.

This store has since been moved to a not so amazing space, but their collection is still a beautiful archive.

I don’t know if he was trying to spark a debate or what, but ironically someone I trust to post things on the CRog brought up the whole digital vs vinyl debate and used a picture of the Jazz and Blues Record Mart to illustrate the absurdity of being a purist… i guess.

They posted,

“In a more contemporary photo there would be something like ‘no digital files’.  There is a trend in the dj world to say ‘oooooo, Serato…never!’

DJ Harvey puts in a good perspective : it is not about what you play on, it is what you play.  Of course a vinyl will sound nice and warm and a cd will sound nice and cold and a digital file will sound nice and digital.  But in the end, when you are on the dance floor grooving, do you really care?”

Just today a friend who’s a pro-dancer reminded me of the importance of viewing these things: group, musical, gatherings such as raves, dead shows, whirling dervish gatherings not only from the perspective of the ones at the helm, the MC’s, the DJs, the Band, the Guru what have you, but equally influential in the power of the music being related, is how it is translated by the group.

So really in the end yes when you are a dancer and,  “on the dance floor grooving” like really in that state. When you’re high, on whatever: life, drugs, moonlight, no when you are high on the music, essentially and you transcend to use a Buddhist concept, and hell’s no you’re not checking if the DJ snuck in a CD during their vinyl set IF and only IF it sounds good, and sounding good depends on so much, the room, the cables, the needles, the size of the file, the speakers type, power, arrangement, the weather and on and on and on.

The point is, this is a debate that can go on and has because it can not be proven. If you were to created a controlled listening environment (A. not possible) and played a song from vinyl at the best possible quality, and the digital version a the best possible quality, and the same song on reel to reel at the best quality (B. who can determine that what would make something at maximum quality?), some people would be able to pick out which format its being delivered via and some people would only hear the same song being payed three times in a row. It’s the difference between someone who drinks a glass of wine and says oh, its 80% cab 10% merlot and 10% cab franc and the person who will say, “It’s red.” Ultimately its how the song registers with the majority of the people on the dance floor.

I for one am willing to take the test, and believe that I would fall on the more sensitive side of things. This is a poor example of my sound sensitivity, but I, like most DJs I know, can stand at the door of your average bar and tell you after one song if the person is playing serato or not. So? You just lost the translation on me, cause if I can tell, it doesn’t sound good to me, and I won’t dance if it doesn’t sound good.

So to the people who say it doesn’t matter? why bank only on those who can’t hear the difference?

Thanks to Kevin from Black Disco for leaving me with his crowd for the night, and to Chris Cruise my lovely and talented DJ partner and to all the bears who still get excited when they hear “First Time Around.” The Party’s every other Sunday Night at Ack bar on Sunset with Djs Chris Bowen and Kevin Nitedog. More Pics

tumblr_kplbs7BJ2I1qzn93yo1_500.jpg (JPEG Image, 500×333 pixels).

I can’t recommend these mixes enough, they are a pure pleasure for the mind.

A Silent Flute.

I just met a friend I made two years ago. Its weird. You create a blog as a personal outlet to explore what ever it is you currently need to exercise and then you realize that your exploration has no beginning or end. You are compelled to keep going, you believe that quitting is for quitters and you worry about what they will think if you really say what you feel and mean.

I met Jez Procter via the internet. He read something on my blog about the surf hotel that inspired him. He has since provided me with an arm to rest upon, not one in physical form, but one in the iconic since as in the American Woman of WWII who told us all, “You can do it”

You can work while your man’s at war.

You can dance while your heart lifts out of your body.

You can be just you.

We are following a model that’s been put into place for reasons most of us don’t an·a·lyze and by people who’s concerns are not ours.

I have the luxury of recently becoming a mother. I have been reborn. There will never be a day, and every day is the day.

I would say to those of us who are friends not because of what we can say but because of what we can hear, to not forget yourself in the intricacies of thought and its by-product, pride.

Its in all of us. That’s why you love it.

The moment you compare your self to another is the moment you’ve lost because you can never be that other, so just be you.

or… “If you want to be me, be me. And if you want to be you be you. If you want to be high, be high. And if you want to be low, be low.”

I’ve been doing this thing, just for fun with Cassia. Each day we dress in one color of the rainbow.

Monday = Red
Tuesday = Orange
Wednesday = Yellow
Thursday = Green
Friday = Turquoise
Saturday = Dark Blue
Sunday = Purple or white

and each day we look into different associations that can be made with these colors.

For example, I’ve been associating the colors to the 7 chakras.

Chakra Khan dressed for Monday, Root Chakra day. Chakra Khan Chakra Khan Let me love you let me rock you, Chakra.

Monday is red day, root chakra day, the part you squeeze when kegeling, ladies and gents. Its associated with the note “C” and the herb ashwagandha supports this energy.

Generally I feel like this day is a great day to have sex and to pay bills. Get those basics you have to do out of the way and celebrate with a little of ol’ the 1- 2.

In doing this, each day becomes a little investigation with a focus. Such a cool way for a kid to learn about their body and colors, etc.

Check this article out. It has more info on Chakras and color therapy or Chromotherapy