Sunday in San Francisco

02010-07-04 | Photos



I had an idea for a new OL logo and quickly sketched it in a notebook. When I tried to re-create one of them on my computer I realized that drawing with a computer suffers from the same problem we have fitting musical events within the constrains of a Midi grid. Creating the design on a computer involves deconstructing the logo into geometric figures and lines that are available in the software… mind-numbing, in other words. I think I’d rather send my sketch to the designer we have been using and let him translate it into machine-speak. Remembered an interesting conversation with a friend, who is an architect, a year ago, regarding translating complex hand-drawn curves into a CAD program – which he claimed was nearly impossible and seemed to involve making many compromises.

A few photos of the stage:



The first show went well yesterday. The second one started out well, but suddenly, during Sixteen Hours, the stage became a rather warm place. And then uncomfortable and hot enough to make the guitar’s g-string suddenly turn sharp during Heart Still/Beating. Michael noticed the sudden heat-wave on stage as well. Was it when the DJ set in the other room started to kick in and maybe the AC was overwhelmed by too many bodies? We don’t know.

Loading out of Yoshi’s was hell, I am told, and lasted until 01:30 in the morning. Tight parking lot. Some helpful and some not so helpful Yoshi’s people. I was blissfully unaware as I was told to go back to the hotel a little after midnight. In my room I turned on the TV for the first time and discovered the Argentinia : Germany game on ESPN. Watched most of it and remembered my father, who was a big fan.

A few links:

A beautiful story and music by Canton:

Chanson pour Monsieur Du Serf (1993) | Canton Becker
“Il y’a un truque que m’a frappé: Tu a quatre-vingnt ans, il y’a des vins que tu ne boiras jamais.”

(This is the thing that struck me: You’re eighty years old, there are some wines that you’ll never drink.)

A bicycle joke:

Bike Joke « Urban Velo
What do you call an Indian bike messenger?

An explanation of a worm hole

Consumer Report blog entry regarding the iPhone 4 – no, I don’t have any problems with it either.

Beautiful video on YouTube, about Japanese motorcycle designer/builder Shinya Kimura


Saturday in San Francisco

02010-07-03 | Photos

The band rocked Friday night! Jon’s bass was fixed and he sounded great, really inventive and creative. We had some very fine moments and I believe Jaron captured it all. This is the strong suit of the trio, improvisation and creative exploration of the material.

Here are some photos from Thursday evening, when Jon and Matt discovered that the replacement potentiometer Lakland had sent for Jon’s bass, was different and the nut for the broken pot didn’t fit the new pot.

Tools of the trade:

The new t-shirt for men.


Michael suggested using a piece of a laminate to create a temporary nut that would hold the volume knob in place. It worked and actually looked pretty cool. Jon couldn’t use the knob that evening – he likes to use it instead of the foot pedal for swells – but it all held together.

I must wonder about Yoshi’s. I love playing there, but they had a DJ night in the other room, the sounds of which apparently spilled into the theater at times. I am told we got the DJ to turn down, but still, we had two sold out shows – why did they also do a DJ night, unless they really need the money? Here is hoping that Yoshi’s will be around for a long time!

Friday in Santa Fe

02010-04-10 | Uncategorized

I uploaded the March slideshow. You can find it here. Please click on the fullscreen symbol for maximum enjoyment. I have been looking into html slideshows, so that the photos can be viewed on mobile devices that don’t support Flash, but they either don’t advance automatically or they don’t dissolve nicely…
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I added a page for the new album. The official release date is June 15th.
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New York, New York. I love the city, but playing there with the band became a drag last year, when a new law was issued: a bus pulling a trailer is no longer allowed in Manhattan. As a result we have to leave the bus and trailer in New Jersey and drive into the city with the gear in a rental van and the musicians in a couple of taxis. Not fun.
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Behold, wild custom scooters from Japan.
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William Gibson
The writing worth keeping happens within a matrix of mysterious but crucially related activities. I might order myself to write for X number of hours per day (though in fact I never do) but the writing worth keeping can’t be ordered to happen at all, let alone for X number of hours per day. It has to be teased out. Fed.

The music worth keeping can’t be ordered to happen at all, let alone for X number of hours per day. It has to be teased out…
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Track number 4, “On the Road to Shiraz”, starts with the sound of dawn on a dusty street. It’s a gritty sound, gritty like the sand on both sides of the road. At the end of the road beckons Shiraz, the Persian garden city, home of the Sufi poet Hafez. The gritty sound returns at the end of the piece, when we realize that we are no closer to Shiraz, because we whiled away the time dancing and talking.