May 14, 2008
Unless you were born with one of those silver spoons, you likely work a day job, sneaking time for your own business when not taking care of someone else's. You're not alone. Brandon Stosuy finds out how our favorite indie artists make ends meet...
Valet is Honey Owens. She was recently on tour as a member of Atlas Sound, but if you want to hear her own unique approach to homegrown ambiance, check out her beautiful sophomore album Naked Acid. I posted one of its standouts "Keehar" in the Outsiders a few months ago, and have the beautiful album closer, "Street," after our discussion. Our "discussion" because, yes, of course, she has a job. As she told me:
Basically my job is co-owning a vintage and handmade clothing/record store here in Portland called Rad Summer. We're about a 8 to 9 person collective. We all take turns working the store. The other time "working" is shopping at estate sales and Goodwill utlet stores to bring in fresh and delectable items ... basically the work part is driving and carrying heavy bags around town/digging through garbage, etc. Picking (what we call it in Portland) is kinda like an addiction or a mania.
I wanted to know more so I asked.
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latest by John Claude
April 30, 2008
Unless you were born with one of those silver spoons, you likely work a day job, sneaking time for your own business when not taking care of someone else's. You're not alone. Brandon Stosuy finds out how our favorite indie artists make ends meet...
Port O'Brien started three years ago as the duo (and couple) of Van Pierszalowski and Cambria Goodwin. The Bay Area band's currently a quintet, but the two remain at the group's core. It's a highly autobiographical project, connected to where they travel and how they opt to live while doing it. For instance, they have a song called "Fisherman's Son" and it's not just one of those indie-rock seafaring metaphors: Vocalist and guitarist Van Pierszalowski actually is the son of a commercial fisherman. He's a fisherman himself, too. As any number of tracks like "Stuck On A Boat" suggest, when Port O'Brien sing about heading to sea, there's lived experience affixed to the chorus.
Every summer Pierszalowski joins his father on Kodiak Island in Alaska to fish salmon. Goodwin, who sings and plays banjo, keyboard, and mandolin, goes north, too, as Head Baker at the Larsen Bay cannery. (This summer, bassist Caleb Nichols also worked at the cannery.) Like Bon Iver's love of the Wisconsin landscape and respect for the hunting tradition, these are the sorts of "jobs" you don't quit. After the discussions with Van (who details a few fishing accidents) and Cambria (who offers a recipe for cayenne cocoa cake), check out a couple Port O'Brien tracks. Listen closely for the echoes.
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latest by mr O
April 16, 2008
Unless you were born with one of those silver spoons, you likely work a day job, sneaking time for your own business when not taking care of someone else's. You're not alone. Every week, Brandon Stosuy finds out how our favorite indie artists make ends meet...
Baltimore spastics Ponytail are set to release the appropriately titled, J. Robbins-produced Ice Cream Spiritual in June (it follows their 2005 debut, Kamehameha). Appropriate, because everything about the quartet shouts "sugar rush." They make a sort of deconstructed art pop that balances off-kilter melodics with vocalist Molly Siegel's savant Ono-isms. Also, drummer Jeremy Hyman used to work scooping actual ice cream. But that's in the past. (As is Siegel's job as a pizza delivery person.) Currently, it's the guitarists who're holding down jobs -- Dustin Wong (ex-Ecstatic Sunshine, btw) is involved with the Blythe doll industry and Ken Seeno's a security guard.
Right now Ponytail's label is still working "Celebrate The Body Electric (It Came From An Angel)," so you'll find it after the discussion. I appreciate the emphasis on Whitman ecstasies, but it'll be cool when they're allowed to unleash another track ... Because, yeah, these folks are more than a one trick Ponytail. Sue me.
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latest by Futureosophy
April 9, 2008
Unless you were born with one of those silver spoons, you likely work a day job, sneaking time for your own business when not taking care of someone else's. You're not alone. Every week, Brandon Stosuy finds out how our favorite indie artists make ends meet...
Citay's sophomore album Little Kingdom is a great dose of sweeping psychedelia. Think Byrds harmonies, Floydian pastoralism, and more than enough reasons to namedrop Popol Vuh. Despite those epic arcs, the SF septet's songwriting and atmospherics are skillfully tight -- like my favorite Twisted Village bands deciding that excess is absurd. With that mix of chops and discipline, it's fitting two Citay members are employed by the School Of Rock in San Francisco. Guitarist and songwriter Ezra Feinberg works part-time, while drummer Warren Huegel teaches on a full-time basis. I asked them questions about Jack Black.
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latest by Brian Farrelly
April 2, 2008
Unless you were born with one of those silver spoons, you likely work a day job, sneaking time for your own business when not taking care of someone else's. You're not alone. Every week, Brandon Stosuy finds out how our favorite indie artists make ends meet...
On Visiter, San Francisco duo the Dodos wrestle flint-fingered jangles, busybody hardware-nicking drums, and '60s (at times, Animal Collective-lite) melodicism into catchy, insistent folk-pop. Or something. Singer/guitarist Meric Long and drummer Logan Kroeber also fit chicken roasting and letterpress work into the daily mix. The boys recently ditched the jobs to go on a lengthy Visiter tour (dates, many with Les Savy Fav, after the jump), but luckily they've developed the sort of workforce skills that won't fade when tour does. Also, after the discussion, take a listen to The Hood Internet's mash of "Park Song" with Crime Mob's "Stilettos" and, under separate cover, previously mentioned Visiters standout "Fools."
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latest by lisa
March 26, 2008
Unless you were born with one of those silver spoons, you likely work a day job, sneaking time for your own business when not taking care of someone else's. You're not alone. Every week, Brandon Stosuy finds out how our favorite indie artists make ends meet...
Kelley Polar's I Need You To Hold On While The Sky Is Falling -- the the Croatian-born Juilliard-schooled violist/vocalist/composer's follow up to 2005's Love Songs Of The Hanging Gardens -- is another great dose of his singular late-night Arthur Russell-meets-Italo Disco revving. This time out, there's something more intimate and bedroom Europop about the hoarfrost. Well, except when he stocks the dance floor with house tracks like "Rosenband." We posted the Glassy remix of the I Need You standout a ways back, and you can still hear the original, and more, at MySpace and his site (check out the robo dance opera of "A Feeling Of The All-Thing.")
In his day-to-day life, Kelley Polar, aka Mike Kelley, is an instructor at Apple Hill Center For Chamber Music in Nelson, New Hampshire as well as a viola player in the Apple Hill Chamber Players. Kelley explains the school's political mission statement, how to build "inspirational environments," and his place in the string quartet. He also kindly passed along the Apple Hill Chambers Players' lovely three-part "Dinny's Suite," for the classical minded amongst you. (By the way, his sister's Blevin Blectum. Cool family.)
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latest by lisa
March 19, 2008
Unless you were born with one of those silver spoons, you likely work a day job, sneaking time for your own business when not taking care of someone else's. You're not alone. Every week, Brandon Stosuy finds out how our favorite indie artists make ends meet...
Philadelphia duo Pattern Is Movement are about to release their unclassifiable third album All Together. Looking too deeply into childhood influences can get dicey, but maybe some of Andrew Thiboldeaux and Chris Ward's excellently unique sound came from their beginnings: They both grew up in "strict" Pentecostal households and met as teens while part of a Christian hip hop crew. They both dug Dr. Dre. I can't trace exactly how this led to their orchestral, shimmering, polyrhythmic pop -- part Pinback, part Grizzly Bear, part two-man tape-loop project, part musical, part... -- but it's likely in there somewhere. As are guest oboe, trumpet, violin, etc., fleshing out the already luxurious sounds. Really, I don't imagine you'll hear anything like it until PIM gets around to releasing a fourth record.
On top of throwing the kitchen sink into their music, the guys have jobs -- Andrew's a PE teacher by trade; Chris, a technical services assistant at the Drexel Law library who does sound in various Philly clubs at night. When you're done reading about underage jam band members, Pastor Steve, and volleyball played in a room with a low ceiling, check out All Together standouts, the super opener "Bird" and the previously posted "Right Away." We once described the latter as possessing a "contrapuntal Rodgers & Hammerstein vibe." (You might also remember We Versus The Shark's more jagged cover.)
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latest by derek
March 15, 2008
Unless you were born with one of those silver spoons, you likely work a day job, sneaking time for your own business when not taking care of someone else's. You're not alone. This week, Brandon Stosuy revisits some of our favorite day job Q&As with bands playing SXSW...
Since 2003, Blitzen Trapper self-released their first three albums, including Wild Mountain Nation, which caught on in '07, led to bigger exposure, resulting in a contract with Sub Pop. The sextet's currently on tour with labelmates Fleet Foxes -- dates include shows with Menomena, Beach House, Papercuts, Mahjongg, Dr. Dog, Rogue Wave, Man Man, etc. They play our party today. You can get the complete schedule here. Or, flash back to the day jobs they're currently missing...
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latest by lisa
