They're Joking, right?

It's 12:27 AM, which technically makes this Wednesday morning, but i made an executive decision to hold off a few hours until after i met with Bubbles to discuss the state of affairs in Portland Music.

The other day i searched for electronic music in Portland. I know it's out there. But, it sure as hell isn't in the public eye. What the media filters consider electronic music, and what's happening in the rest of the world electronically are... well, lets just be polite and say that Portland has no fucking idea what electronic music is. (And no, pdx isn't that progressively different. It's years behind.)

Electronic music is NOT:

Starfucker. I don't know what these people are listening to when they call a straight-ahead indie rock band electronic music. Is it because they use a keyboard? They don't even list themselves as electronic on their myspace page. They list themselves as straight up Pop. Yet, they keep getting reviewed as one of the greatest electronic acts around town. Guh?

I could go on and list all the bands i found searching through myspace and cdbaby, or from wweek, mercury and vanguard reviews, etc., that claim to be the best thing that's happened to electronic music since the invention of the computer. But, i won't because this blog would be 100 pages long, and none of those bands would be electronic music; an indie rock band with a drum machine and a looper is not electronic music. But, according to Portland, it is.

Another thing that i'm getting sick of, that's probably going to offend every american who listens to music... what the fuck is with Guitar, Bass, Drums, VX, and sometimes Keys. Still? Really? Is that the extent of our musical prowess?

Rock and Roll was 'invented' circa 1950. It's 2008. Rock and Roll is 58 years old. We've been listening to Guitar, Bass, Drums, VX and sometimes Keys for 58 years. Rock and Roll can join AARP. Rock and Roll can start making plans to retire and collect Social Security. I know people keep bitching that rock is dead. I think the problem is that it's not.

One thing that rock has going for it is that it's name is self promoting. A rock show can rock. A fast car can rock. Anything cool, “rocks.” If you go to an electronic show and it's really good, you still say it rocks. I think we need a specific slang for electronic music, having to do with electronic music, meaning 'awesome,' to be memed into general speech.

“Yo, how was the Prophetnoise show you went to?”
“Oh, that shit was fuckin' Binary! Bleepin' Binary!”

Ok, i don't know if calling things 'binary' or 'bleeping' will actually happen.

Either way, here's a bleepin binary song for you:

It's Coming

And one more thing before i go. There really are a lot of great local electronic musicians in this town. I don't want it to seem like i'm saying all the electronic musicians in Portland suck. Just the ones you hear and read about do.

<3 Noise!

Prophetnoise full length: Godless Music for a Free Mind CDBaby and iTunes.
Prophetnoise EP Orange & Silver on CDBaby and iTunes
Prophetnoise on iLike
Prophetnoise on Facebook
Prophetnoise on Myspace

Yay, going into the deep end!

Some upcoming projects i'm working on:

-Some Reason 4 tutorials on YouTube and Vimeo.

-A D.I.Y. music video.

-Design and build my own lighting scheme for stage.

-Producing some dance songs for Katie Jean Arnold.

-Rework some of Noir City's songs to incorporate computrixing for a more trip-hop sound.

-Help ready AudiCinema for the upcoming AC/VC event. At which, i'll be doing sound and performing a Prophetnoise set.

-Work on collaborations with Bubbles, Mike Jedlicka, X24, among others.

-Convince a bunch of cats to collaborate on a satire album poking fun at the Portland music scene.

Also, X24 got a Digital Organics show on Portland Radio Authority. He'll be joining Mike Jedlicka, who also has a show on PRA, Optic Echo Presents.

This week i'm posting the song i wanted to post last week.
I fucking love this song. I hope you enjoy it.

Missing Somebody Beautiful

Until next time,

<3 Noise!

Prophetnoise CD Godless Music for a Free Mind
Prophetnoise EP Orange & Silver on CDBaby and iTunes
Prophetnoise on iLike
Prophetnoise on Facebook
Prophetnoise on Myspace

New Song, and how Scenesters Ruin Scenes

Hey there folks. I'm moving up in the world. I just installed NeoOffice and I'm using that to type this week's blog. I highly recommend it. It's a Mac ported variation of Open Office (the option for you *nix and Windows users out there) and an open source (read: free, donations accepted) option to the MS Office suite. Linus Torvalds said it best, “Microsoft isn't evil, they just make really crappy operating systems.” I might add, their regular software doesn't thrill me neither. I know a lot of people with brand new Macs who wonder why it's running so slowly and their programs keep crashing. Stop using MS Word, or any of the other MS Office programs. Use NeoOffice for a while and see how much better your life is.

Recently, Bubbles directed me to this video about the Portland music scene on MTVNews.com. Aside from the initial problem of it being on MTV News, i couldn't tell you how many things incredible wrong with this video. But, i will tell you a few of them. (...and you thought you'd get away with it!)

Give it a look.

First, i love Portland. It's a great place to live. There are a lot of amazing things going on here. But, it's not the best city in the world. Portlanders seem to have this bizarre notion that Portland is the end-all of anything important, and there's no need to look outside this city for anything, because it's all here. It's not all here, it's not the end-all of anything, and that provides you with a very naïve view of the world, especially if your involved in the arts. It reminds me of those people who claim the US is the best country in the world, and have never left the (continental 48) states. There's a wonderful world outside of Portland, and it should be experienced.

A lot of the things that go over huge here in Portland wouldn't survive a day in other cities i've been. People there have heard & seen it already, and are either done with it, or know there's much better to be had elsewhere. If you've got your head in the Portland's sand, you have no idea of the caliber of art going on beyond this city. Rarely do i go to a show with a local Portland act and go, “Wow, really need to step up my game as a musician.” It's only when people come from other places do i feel the challenge to step up.

“Everyone's kinda doing a mixture of everything...” Yeah, so long at it's some variation of indie-rock/art-pop/punk. This kinda goes back to the previous paragraph in that, Portlanders' view of 'everything' is pretty narrow.

They talk about Portland being an open arena for musicians to try new things; that people go out and do things that are super weird and it goes over well. Again, this stems back to Portlanders' narrow viewpoint on the world. There's not too much new things going on here. Replace the word 'new' with 'something that sounds like 1977-1983' and the word 'weird' with 'unrefined, sophomoric stuff that most musicians were doing in high school.'

Last order of business, it's Tuesday and that means you get a new song to listen to.

Sunday's Twilight.

<3 Noise!

Prophetnoise CD Godless Music for a Free Mind
Prophetnoise EP Orange & Silver on CDBaby and iTunes
Prophetnoise on iLike
Prophetnoise on Facebook
Prophetnoise on Myspace