Destroy, Seattle, Destroy

Last summer I started noticing an odd trend of sticker graffiti cropping up around town, the common thread being a tag with either the word “DESTROY” or the phrase “DESTROYED LIFE”. Initially I thought it to be some manner of political statement, but as the trend grew, the political nature waned. I started taking pictures of the works, as I stumbled on them, and decided it was high time to compile it all in a post. What strikes me as the oddest part about this trend is that, being as rampant as it is, I can’t find any murmurings about it online. One day, however, I was taking a picture of one of the bits of graffito and was approached by another fan who was excited to tell me about a few of which I wasn’t aware. Unfortunately, they were gone by the time I made it to those locations, but it was heartening to know that I’m not the only fan.

In order of my discovery:

My personal favorite is the Paul McCartney as Lee Harvey Oswald, getting shot by Jack Ruby. Fucking classic.

As always, caveat emptor, motherfuckers.

Four Day Warning

Four Day Warning!

Deadline for submissions for Of Places and Moments is this Saturday, August 14th. The tracklist continues to grow with today’s submission from the mighty madman, Mystahr. Definitely going to be an awesome collection of sound, once it is all compiled and organized.

I have a handful of albums I want to review this week, so don’t let me forget to take care of that. Work has gotten manic here of late, with my current project all but wrapped up and days that are spent vacillating between the frenetic rush of tackling clean-up projects and the soporific downtime between such projects. I should still find time to get in a few reviews, though. I also might work in a few mini-reviews of tracks that I’m finding on SoundCloud.

A couple of pictures to share:

My newest favorite “Destroy/Destroyed Life” sticker graffiti comes from the light post across the street from my apartment.

The kids had their first encounter with a Theremin this weekend.

Monday Night Debutante Ball

I’ve got submissions for the new compilation slowly trickling in, which makes me glad that I swallowed a little pride and extended the deadline. I haven’t had a chance to listen to everything yet, but this may well be one of the most diverse compilation projects to be hosted on these pages. It certainly boasts a cast of new faces. That, in and of itself, makes me happy.

I’ve been working on a couple of extracurricular projects that won’t see light here, so I don’t have much to report on relevant subjects. I do have these pictures I can share:

More awesome cryptic sticker graffiti from around town:

Sean throwing gang signs:

The most ridiculous thing I saw last week:

Alright. Time to put on some ambient and get in some reading before I crash for the night. Until next time, etc. etc.

Let it whip

Since today is the first non-kid Saturday that I can remember in a very, very long time where I didn’t wake up with the sort of hangover that makes you pause to reconsider your life choices, I decided to make it the most productive non-kid Saturday I’ve had in a very, very long time. The first thing I did was sleep: a lot. Now this might not sound very productive, but it FELT awesome. After a quick breakfast of grits and fried eggs, I tackled the dishes piling up in the sink, then came upstairs to tackle the mess of tangled wires residing in that feared no man’s land where the common space of my work table, computer and music rig meet. Between the six wall outlets and two power strips in that immediate area, it had accumulated a veritable rats’ nest of jumbled wires that boggled the mind and complicated any endeavor set to take place in that particular region. This mission accomplished, I then moved over to the computer to transfer pictures from my phone and begin working through my list of songs I want to locate and download. After which, I am currently posting about said victorious achievements.

I plan on working on some new material today – either for Controlled Dissonance or Nests of Disorder. When I originally realized that I had no plans for the day and thought to spend the day noising, my goal was to dig deep and put myself in a bad place so that I could create something really dark. Of course, as fate would have it, I’m inexplicably in a really good mood today. So, I’m just going to set up some gear and run through a few live performances, and cull out the good stuff.

I’ve run across some interesting street art recently. One that keeps popping up around the city is this picture of a bloated and deformed fetus with a caption that contains the word “destroy” in some capacity. I managed to get these two pictures over the last few weeks:

Some other random pictures I just transferred over from the camera include this shot from Post Alley in Downtown Seattle. I took this picture while capturing a field recording that didn’t turn out so well. The other field recordings from that same venture were sent to Steve for inclusion in the Sounds Found library.

And, finally, this is a view of the portion of the Downtown skyline that I can see from my new office at work. I recently moved into one of our other buildings, to help expedite the project I’m on, and one of the big bonuses is this view from my desk.

Alright. Stick around for an update to the Instruments pages. It’s a cheap electroacoustic device I rigged up in an hour earlier this week.

Until then, etc. etc.

“And I’m proud to be an American…”

It’s Ye Olde Independence Day here in the Merry United States, and it sounds like a fucking war is taking place in Seattle. I hear yelling, buzzing of planes, sirens and explosions outside. Granted, the planes and sirens are a common fixture, and the yelling is not so uncommon as to be noteworthy, it’s just the combination of all of them, with the explosions of fireworks, that really set the mood.

I decided it was the perfect opportunity to give the H2 a proper field test. I still haven’t played back the recording, but I’ve got my fingers crossed that this was a worthwhile investment. Once I have some recordings under my belt, I’ll write up a proper review of the product, because I have some strong opinions on the physical presentation…

I discovered this scrawled on the back of a sign near my apartment:

It reminded me of this random graffiti picture that Joseph sent me a few months back. I hope there’s some worldwide movement starting, because I really want to see more creepy and negative graffiti gracing the flat surfaces of my city.