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Ballad of the Blog

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Perhaps you’ve noticed that this blog is alive once more, after a long and mysterious absence. My newsletter came to a skidding halt about seven months ago, and the blog’s been eerily silent. The only place you could openly find me all this time was Twitter, which is simply embarrassing.

I wrote about this on Twitter last August with an optimistic tone that, in retrospect, was perhaps jumping the gun a little. Expanding on that thread, I’ll say that I was (and am) exhausted — just like many of you. As COVID-times dragged on and on and on and the vicious news cycle dragged on and on and on, the ennui gathered into mountains. There was nothing I wanted to write about. Nothing in my head, nothing inspiring, nothing exciting to document in the early morning hours. Even my journal, updated almost daily for years, went dark.

Luckily my professional life doesn’t rely on writing, so I had the luxury to stop and wait. Nevertheless, I knew that I was hardly alone in this stifled feeling. And, heeding the advice of those talented enough to write through this malaise, I knew the best strategy was to not stress out about my lack of motivation. The recommended move was actually to lean into it — do other things, find new hobbies, read lots of books, and occupy the brain with something other than the fact that the creative plumbing’s sprung a bad leak.

So, that’s what I did. I shifted focus to my spunky music label, 8D Industries. I learned to make tasty and fiery hot sauces (which became a gateway drug to vegan cooking). I got actively involved with marketing Caroline’s growing Kitten School channel. I spent a lot more time with family as I successfully and safely moved mom to a house next door during a pandemic. And I started getting involved in freelance podcast production.

Several months ago, I was hired to edit and co-produce Andrew Loog Oldham’s Sounds and Vision podcast, and the experience has been a delight. If you don’t know, Andrew is the original manager and producer for The Rolling Stones — as just one of his too-many-to-list-here historical music adventures — and he’s got stories for days. Check out the podcast if you’re even a little curious. It’s a lot of fun. I’d recommend the Elliot Easton (guitarist with The Cars) episode for a starter as it’s got lots of juicy behind-the-music-industry tales.

Meanwhile, the writing bug has finally returned over the last couple of months (along with the music bug, but that’s another story). As arbitrary as ‘the new year’ is as a signifier, it’s still a useful prompt to refresh. And that’s what I plan to do. On the immediate agenda: make some changes to the blog (currently in progress!), start blogging regularly again, and then, once firmly in the saddle, relaunch the newsletter. Voilà. Easier said than done, right? But I’m excited nonetheless, and that’s an accomplishment in and of itself.

I’ll finish this deep gaze into my navel with a few notes about the newsletter. 

First off, I’m retiring Ringo Dreams of Lawn Care. I consider Ringo its own series (in the television sense) and a moment-in-time capsule. I’ll call the relaunched newsletter something else (tbd). It’ll have a different format, but I’ll cover the same genre of topics. 

Also, the newsletter won’t be on Substack. I’m exploring a combination of Sendy and Newsletter Glue to host the newsletter on this site. This change potentially sets up a roadblock of discouragement as it’s complicated (oh jeez I’ve got to figure out what a VPS server is). But I want to learn newsletter self-hosting partly as a self-challenge and also to be able to teach others how it’s done. 

If you’re a Ringo subscriber your subscription will automatically transfer to the new entity once I’m ready to roll. You don’t have to do anything, unless you’d like to unsubscribe, which you can do at any time (including now if you’d like). If you’re not subscribed, go ahead and use the Substack sign-up form found in the sidebar of this site. I’ll add your address for the new incarnation of the newsletter upon launch.

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Another personal update: I released a song at midnight on January 1.

Grottoes is a long-imagined project, revealed as I finally step away from Q-Burns Abstract Message. Yes, the AUDIOTOTEMPOLE EP was always meant as a closing of the door. And Grottoes predates “Touchtones (1997),” the earliest reference on that EP. I tried and failed to start a band called Grotto in the early ’90s after the dissolution of my much-beloved (by us and some others) band Tick Tick Tock. There are too many other bands called Grotto nowadays, so Grottoes it is. It looks mightier written as text that way, so win-win.

The quiet first appearance of Grottoes was a remix for Brighton’s The Self-Help Group and the song “Temple OS” (a fine song in its own right, btw). That one was recorded in mid-2021, during my supposed creative lag, and is the last time I worked on something musical. I hoped this would spark other Grottoes tunes to serve as accompanying tracks for something called “Straw Belle.”

“Straw Belle” isn’t new. I started recording it maybe three or four years ago, and it’s a song that I revisited and tweaked periodically. I settled on a final version at some point in late 2019. I feel it’s one of the best things I’ve recorded. And I held it tight — only about four people have heard “Straw Belle” before today — under the assumption that I’d record a few more songs like it and release an EP. As you probably guessed, that never happened.

After encouragement during a catch-up phone chat with my friend Jeff (the bass player in even earlier attempts at bands), I realized that “Straw Belle” would never see the light of day if I attached it to the loose promise of ‘other songs like it.’ So I decided it should finally come out on its own, and, as this revelation came at the end of 2021, New Year’s Day seemed like a novel release date.

For your consideration, here’s “Straw Belle” by Grottoes. Artwork by Matthew Naquin. Secret assistance from The Imprisoned Wizard. Sounds like group homes, wavering spaces, pangs of crunch, tones from belief, e-bow symphonies. I hope you like it. Please tell the others if you do.

Addendum: The Orlando Weekly‘s Bao Le-Huu wrote about my musical shift to Grottoes and scared a few headline skimmers by declaring me dead.

Ballad of the Blog: Phase 3 or 4

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I’m thinking a lot about my responsibilities as a digital citizen and how I can better contribute to the ‘indie web.’ There are steps I want to take to lessen — and perhaps remove — my participation in ad-supported social media. Ideally, my internet output will happen through this blog, my newsletter, and — for direct engagement — email. A longer post is forthcoming about why I’ve come to this point, but tl;dr: I’ve had it with Facebook and its ilk.

One upside is that I’ll post here more often. 8sided.blog has been quieter than usual, mainly due to growing pains with the demands of the weekly deadline of the newsletter. I don’t think I’ve had a writing deadline since college, so that’s proved challenging. I also set myself up by mostly posting more extended essays on the blog. That set up an expectation for myself that anything that goes here should be meaty — a multi-paragraph screed on a newsworthy topic. That’s held me off when I don’t have anything lengthy to say. It’s time to drop those reservations.

I’m an avid reader of other personal blogs out there in the ‘indie web.’ One of my favorites is Warren Ellis’s, which he claims to use mostly to post status updates and catalog his music and movie purchases. He peppers short posts that are sometimes just a photo of the sky (’timestamp‘) with longer musings about his world and process. The blog is entertaining and serves as the backbone for Ellis’s weekly newsletter, Orbital Operations. Every time I read it, I think, “I’d like to do something like this.”

Of course, I’m not Warren Ellis (there can only be one! … oh wait), and I’m not going to embarrass myself through imitation. But his approach gives me a lot of ideas. I’ve always wanted a more personal flavor to this blog and some fun posts outside of essays on ‘music’s place in the 21st century.’ And, as I begin my exodus from social media, I’ll want to use this space to check in with the world. It’s my home base, after all — the hub of my digital world. So if you’re a regular reader or have this planted in your RSS reader, then, first off: thank you. And secondly: get ready for an increase in blogging action.

One goal is to regularly post my version of a daily ‘status update,’ compiling what’s on my mind alongside things I’m encountering with my eyes and ears. If you’re a fan of the meatier stuff, that will still happen on the regular. Stay tuned for phase 3 (or is it 4?) of this blog.

 

The Ballad of the Blog

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Writer Alan Jacobs has some strong words for those of us still using social media:

The decision to be on Twitter (or Facebook, etc.) is not simply a personal choice. It has run-on effects for you but also for others. When you use the big social media platforms you contribute to their power and influence, and you deplete the energy and value of the open web. You make things worse for everyone. I truly believe that. Which is why I’m so obnoxiously repetitive on this point.

Jacobs’ attitude is in line with my previous thoughts on intention and the depersonalization of ‘newsfeed culture.’ The reality of supporting a corporate behemoth that’s up to no good is also something I struggle with. I’ve picked up my Twitter usage over the past few months, not decreased it, telling myself it’s a useful tool for networking. And I’m still paying for Facebook ads on my label releases. I feel like a little part of me dies every time I send a dollar to Facebook.

It’s remarkable that — though admittedly part of a tiny minority — we’re all asking these questions at the same time. And this is a conversation we need to have, whether supporting artists outside of Spotify or finding promotional and networking avenues that don’t involve Facebook. I’m not the only one to plant a flag in these issues. But I’d like the blog to talk more about how we wrestle with the tension between the independent creative community and the corporate interests propped up as gatekeepers. Music’s place in the 21st century, indeed.

And the Heart Grows Fonder

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My eyes are a mess. You probably already know this. Funny thing: I’ve only been admitted to a hospital once — at the age of 12, I stabbed my leg with a knife while building a tree fort on Christmas Eve — and still have all my organs. That includes my tonsils, my appendix, and even my wisdom teeth. I often joke that I’ll probably get hit with everything all at once, as if my maladies have been biding their time. I couldn’t have predicted that it would all go to my eyes.

I’ve always had an outrageous astigmatism, but in my late 30s, the condition graduated to outright keratoconus. Then there’s this double vision, requiring expensive prism lenses on the glasses I wear in addition to the keratoconus correcting contacts. And now I’m dealing with fucking Fuchs’ Dystrophy. I’ve noticed a haze in my right eye that I first chalked up to foggy contacts. But, of course, I live in the armpit of humid central Florida, where fogged-out lenses are a way of life. But then the haze — now resembling a light gauze — became noticeable without my contacts. This state of affairs also made driving impossible at night, as oncoming cars’ headlights made the gauze in my eye burst into an unattractive light show. 

Thanks to a superb new optometrist, the Fuchs’ was identified. She referred me to a specialist who explained the condition would get much worse in no time at all. The two options were a cornea transplant — sorry, nope, for reasons I won’t go into — or a new procedure that involved scraping the Fuchs’ out of my eyeball. Yikes, but okay, sure.

I had this procedure about a month ago. It went smoothly. Supposedly the surgery is just like a cataract removal (if that’s a helpful frame of reference) — I was awake, somewhat sedated, and didn’t feel a thing. It looked like I was watching a stationary version of the light tunnel at the end of 2001: A Space Odyssey as the doctor performed the surgery. 

For the first couple of weeks, my eye felt like an eyelash got trapped on the surface. An awful feeling, especially as this was an eyelash that wouldn’t budge. And half those days, the feeling was accompanied by a faucet of tears. I went through multiple boxes of tissue. I couldn’t read, I couldn’t watch movies, and I could barely look at anything for long.

Now all that is thankfully over, though looking through my right eye is like peering through the bottom of a drinking glass. This fuzziness should fade to normal eyesight in several weeks. And I have to drip exotic eye drops ordered from Japan into my socket four times a day. The drops have something to do with stem cell growth. Unfortunately, they’re expensive and only available in Japan as the procedure performed on me is so new. So I had to order a pack of these eye drop bottles months in advance.

It’s a slow process, and it’s slowing me down. I’m constantly fighting off frustration as I fall behind on projects and work. These past months have felt like a deep pit, from hurricanes creating a wake of chaos to my bout with COVID that turned into weeks and weeks of godawful exhaustion, and then this eye biz. There’s so much I want to do (like post all the time on this blog!), but I feel captured in the sticky web of inconvenience. 

I’m finally prying myself loose. I’m still way behind on my work stuff (and please accept my heartfelt apologies if you’re someone I work with), but for the first time in ages, I’m experiencing motivation. More than anything, I want to write and ramp up my creative output. It’s as if the period of incapacitation has made the heart grow fonder. So I’ve devised plans and goals for this blog that are inspiring. I’ll detail them in an upcoming Ballad of the Blog post.

These months have also been a learning experience and a lesson in not beating oneself up. I’ve had lots of practice with self-blame during these challenges, and I’ve come out the other side more accepting and less debilitated. Anne Helen Petersen had a similar epiphany in today’s Culture Study newsletter, which I highly recommend you read. Ann imagines what her weekend would be like if she had completed all of her work tasks: 

The work would’ve been done. But I’ve already tried that whittled-down version of a life, and it’s not a life at all. It’s a burnout trap, a suffocation, a flattening of self. Sure, I’d have completed all the work, done all the tasks, finished all the laundry. But to what end? And to what future? The next weekend would come, and I’d feel some semblance of control, which I may or may not have been able to carry over into the week. But achieving control is not the same as achieving happiness.

As I advised someone on Mastodon going through a post-COVID struggle similar to mine: “Don’t mentally punish yourself for not being able to get everything done that you think you need to while feeling [exhausted]. I was doing that constantly, and I’m sure it made things worse.” If I gain extra wisdom and a new spark to create that I continue to cultivate, the turmoil of the last several months will have been worthwhile. As a wise person said, “When life hands you Godzilla, build Mechagodzilla.”

8sided About

To Here Knows When

Hello! I’m Michael Donaldson, and I’m the curious fellow behind 8sided.blog. This blog has been running in various forms (and URLs) since 2015, with a few inexplicable long breaks.

The standard social media bio is a series of nouns often preceded by descriptors. Mine is no different. Presently, I’m identifying myself across the web like so: blogging proselytizer, music industry exile, sonic swashbuckler, sunrise watcher. Beyond that summary, other personal obsessions include the history of cinema, hot sauces, the sound of tape delays, vegan cooking, travel or simply dreaming of it, the studio as an instrument, lake life, solarpunk and imagined futures, these damn cats, and collecting more books than I’ll ever read.

Terry Matthew of 5 Magazine did a profile on me a while back that I like, going deep into my history in music and my attitudes on the industry. It’s a good MDonaldson primer.

Another fun profile that’s more recent is this one in the Orlando Weekly written by long-time confidant Daniel Fuller. If you’d enjoy a time warp, Daniel also wrote about me way back in 1997.1The date on the article says ‘1998’ but it’s wrong.

I live in Orlando, Florida. Many years ago, I ended up in this city in a misguided attempt at film school and lacked the means or will to escape. But I wouldn’t have it any other way. Despite some questionable life choices and Florida’s ever-sinking status (in more ways than one), I’ve made an interesting, fulfilling, and generally happy life here.

As for this spot on the web, 8sided.blog is my pet project, my pride and joy, my journal of personal interests, and my digital thinking cap. It keeps me sane. If you want to add a dose of sanity to your life, I suggest starting a blog filled with your obsessions and ramblings. Here’s how.

A quick bit of housekeeping: 8sided.blog remains ad-free and I rarely use affiliate links (I’ll let you know when I do). This site and the newsletter run solely on grit, a love of writing, an insatiable curiosity, interactions with my readers, and money out of my pocket. If you’d like to help out with the latter — any amount is appreciated — you can buy me a vegan chalupa.

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• Blog Archive
• My Projects
• Contact Me
• Submitting Music for Review
• Social Media
• Colophon + Tools
• About That Avatar
• /now

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Projects

My adult life consists of metaphorically throwing things against walls to see what sticks. It’s kind of my profession. Because of this, I’ve found myself involved in a long series of projects. Here’s a list of those, present and past, in a descending timeline.

• Your Podcast Friend

I am a producer and editor of podcast audio. I am currently working on Sounds + Vision, the podcast of ex-Rolling Stones manager/producer Andrew Loog Oldham, and Spotlight On…, a nifty music industry conversation podcast. This line of work has been a ton of fun as I’m (finally) able to use my background in audio production in a commercial space. And managing a podcast is not that different than managing a label or artist. I’m always looking for more podcasts to take on, especially in the talking-about-culture niche. Here’s more detail on my podcast work and how to get in touch if you need help with your show.

• The Email Newsletter

Shortly before the pandemic, I started a newsletter. It was curiously titled Ringo Dreams of Lawn Care. Launching a newsletter was one of the best decisions I made, as pumping out a newsletter every one or two weeks was a necessary discipline as lockdown took hold. It helped me feel the weeks. I kept it going at a steady clip from February 2020 to April 2021 and built a respectably numbered and delightfully engaged subscriber community. There was even an article written about the newsletter. Then that second (or third?) pandemic wave set in, followed by the ennui or malaise or whatever you’d like to call it. You probably felt it, too. I couldn’t do much of anything, so I stopped the newsletter. I put out one last ‘episode’ of Ringo Dreams of Lawn Care on January 1, 2022, and announced I was canceling the show. But! I love email newsletters, and I love newsletter readers even more, so I’m now planning the next ‘series.’ I swear, its launch is right around the corner.

• 8D Industries

After Eighth Dimension Records and EIGHT-TRACKS I swore I wouldn’t start another label. However, the goblin-energy of Al Pacino had other ideas. Some fantastic music landed in my lap, all looking for a home, and I felt like I was the best one to make this happen. Thus 8D Industries was born in 2018, catering mainly to my taste for music that sits in the center of the post-punk/ambient/shoegaze/kosmiche Venn diagram. The release schedule may seem slow, but I’m waiting to put out music that I love, and I’ve been lucky so far. The current label roster consists of San Mateo, More Ghost Than Man, Ralph Kinsella, Gemini Revolution, Monta At Odds, and my Grottoes project. This is the most focused I’ve ever been on a label project, and I’m excited to see how it all grows and where it goes.

• 8DSync

I’m fortunate that a wise person told me about the importance of music publishing early in my music career. So, in the mid-90s, Eighth Dimension started a publishing company, and I learned to self-publish my own music. These moves paid off once Q-Burns Abstract Message music started getting licensed for things like Sex and the City, and Eighth Dimension label artists began getting placements in iconic shows like The Wire and Six Feet Under. This action inspired me to eventually shift my focus from the label to music publishing, rights management, and sync licensing. So, around 2010, I officially started 8DSync, and music publishing has been my main game since. Like 8D Industries, I’m only bringing on artists and writers whose music I love and believe in, though the genre range is much broader than the label’s. This field is where I genuinely feel like I can call myself an “expert.”

• Consultancy

In a freelance capacity, I consult recording artists and labels on how to navigate this ever-changing music industry landscape. It’s so damn confusing, and I’m happy to help. My specialties are music publishing, label management, artist marketing, music contracts, rights management, and good old-fashioned creative coaching. I steep my ideas in tradition — I don’t think technological ‘disruption’ should discount the base concepts and perennial practices that have always brought excitement to potential fans. I’ve advised a diverse crop of artists + label owners, including Arthur’s Landing, DiViNCi (Solillaquists of Sound), DJ Three (Hallucienda), Sodastream, Snax, Vexillary, Deepak Sharma, and Toni Tennille (really). Interested in having a chat? Our first session is ‘name your price.’

• Q-Burns Abstract Message (and now Grottoes)

Where to start? I decided I never wanted to be a band member again, so I started a solo production project in 1994 called “Q-Burn” (a pun on the old radio term ‘cue burn‘). After getting mixed up with the famed turntablist Q-Bert and a lofty idea that “there is no Q-Burns … this is an imaginary band!” I changed the name to Q-Burns Abstract Message. Unfortunately, people kept on confusing the name with Q-Bert (including, once, DJ Shadow). My first records were on a small but beloved San Francisco imprint called Mephisto Records and the Hardkiss offshoot label Sunburn. Then I was signed to Astralwerks for a few fun years and returned to Eighth Dimension. After a couple of decades of spurts and sputters (and way too many remixes), I released the AUDIOTOTEMPOLE EP in 2019. As far as I know, that’s the final release under the Q-BAM moniker. Now I’m all about Grottoes, a creamier, sparser, less beat-concerned, and somewhat ominous project that I hope I’ll actively explore in the coming months.

• 8DPromo

When the economy took a turn for the worse in 2008, I needed to figure out how to pay the bills. So I started 8DPromo, utilizing my experience promoting and publicizing music releases as a label manager. The company did excellent work and still does excellent work. In 2016 I handed the reins over to Jon Lemmon (owner/manager of Viva Recordings), and he continues to provide a valuable service to a wide range of labels and artists.

• Eighth Dimension Records and EIGHT-TRACKS

Eighth Dimension Records started as a collective of Orlando electronic music artists looking to support each other and combine forces to raise our profiles as a group. It worked! Running the label (alongside my partner Gerard Mitchell) was like going to music business university. Everything I’ve done since stems from the experience. Meanwhile, EIGHT-TRACKS was a side-label I started in the mid-00s with house music producer Atnarko. We had big dreams (and, in retrospect, a lousy logo — sorry, Stephen), but interest waned as the music biz got tough. Though the releases still haunt the streaming platforms, both labels are no longer in operation.

• Bad Mood Records

Here’s where I was cursed with the idea that I should only ever work for myself. Sometime between Lollapaloozas one and two, I opened Bad Mood Records, a record store in downtown Orlando. You can read about it here. It had some decent success, and I still run into people who remind me how much they loved the shop. But then the city of Orlando started a street construction project literally on the store’s doorstep that was supposed to last three months. Instead, it ended up lasting three years, and the store feebly eked it out for two of those. But, as they say, everything happens for a reason …

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Talk To Me

I’d enjoy hearing from you. Feel free to reach out here: michael@8sided.com

And if you’re visiting Orlando and would like to join me for breakfast or lunch (your treat), I’m game.

I also recently opened up ‘office hours.’ These set hours are mainly for those looking for a single consultancy or coaching session, but I’m open to anyone and any topic. These sessions are ‘name your price’ — I’ll follow up with a donation/tip request afterward, and you pay me whatever, based on the value you feel you got out of the session. Cool? You can schedule an office hours session with me here.

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Sending Music To Me For Review

Yes, I will accept your music for a potential review or short feature on the blog. My tastes are broad but there is a thread that ties together the things I like. Check out the ‘music recommendations’ tag to get an idea of what I’m into.

I try to give everything a chance that’s sent my way. However, there are certain triggers that will make me less inclined to listen. If your email is obviously copy-and-pasted, blasted out to a seemingly random set of bloggers, I’ll likely delete it on the spot. Same if I am BCC’ed (or, worse, CC’ed) in your email. And heaven forbid you attach MP3s or other large files to your message. Those are immediately zapped out of existence.

Likewise, there are things you can do to ensure I’ll give your music a try. For one thing, I like it when it’s evident that you’ve read the blog and understand the sounds and styles that I review. I also prefer to review music that is or will be available on Bandcamp. Though that’s not a deal-breaker, I tend to only post Bandcamp players to accompany my reviews. And it’s a good idea to send me a Bandcamp download code for your release. That way I can post an excerpt of the review in the ‘Supported by’ section of your Bandcamp release page.

Though you are welcome to send releases to me prior to the release date, I post my reviews once the music is available to the public (and a Bandcamp player is live and embeddable). I also don’t necessarily review new music (I’m often behind on my listening anyway) so it’s okay if your release isn’t the freshest.

There’s no way I can review everything I’m sent. And sometimes I’m so backed up I may not reply to your email for weeks. Please don’t take it personally.

Got it? You can send me music here.

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Social Media

Regular readers of the blog know I have an increasingly complicated relationship with social media (don’t we all). I’m trying my best not to add value to platforms owned by companies that I disagree with ethically. I wrote about this struggle here. And more recently here.

A few years ago, I deleted my Instagram accounts and stopped using Facebook, except for release-related posts on the 8D Industries page. I continued to use Twitter with a smidgen of enthusiasm, but that glimmer has died in light of recent events.

Going forward, I plan to only use the corporate social media sites solely through remote posting and only posting updates about the blog and my projects (like new label releases). The goal is not to have to visit those blasted sites at all but still exploit their reach to bring people to this site. I’ll post using Publer (the best tool for this IMO — and, yes, that’s an affiliate link), and said posts would be about new things on the blog, with links sending folks here, hopefully decreasing their time spent on social media just a tad. One does what one can.

That said, I’m using Tumblr as my ‘filing cabinet’ and don’t have qualms about it. Automattic, who now owns Tumblr, seems like a well-intentioned company. After all, they’re behind the WordPress backbone this blog is built on.

I’ve also plunged headfirst into Mastodon, and I have to admit I’m liking it quite a bit. The engagement and good vibes are refreshingly … old-school. Don’t believe anyone who tells you it’s complicated or weird. Find me here, and feel free to reach out if you need any pointers. Ernie Smith’s excellent ‘pop-up’ series about Mastodon is a great start if you’d like to learn more, too.

If you consider Letterboxd social media, you can also find me there.

Want to ease yourself out of social media and algorithm-guided content? You should use an RSS reader!

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Colophon + Tools

This section is for those of you who enjoy peeking into workspaces, lists of creators’ tools, and ‘what’s in my bag’ type stuff. (Guilty as charged.)

8sided.blog is proudly built on WordPress using a heavily tweaked Modern Studio Pro theme, part of the Genesis Framework. Unfortunately, that theme, and the framework, haven’t been updated in ages, so I’m hoping I don’t have to change it all anytime soon as WordPress gets fancier with all the block magic.

I write and organize in Obsidian. If I’m feeling a more focused writing experience, I’ll open the document from Obsidian into Typora. I’m also a longtime paid user of Grammarly, and I honestly feel this tool has improved my writing. I finally get what passive voice is all about. I process my blog images in Pixelmator Pro, which helps me maintain that zine-like photocopy look. I listen to wordless + beatless music when I write, and if I’m not spacing out to one of my Bandcamp purchases then I’m shuffling this huge ambient playlist on Apple Music that I put together.

For research and sourcing things to write about, I have a large but tightly curated mess of RSS feeds I subscribe to. Inoreader is my RSS reader of choice. I also find and save articles in Matter. Anything interesting goes into my Obsidian vault or my online filing cabinet on Tumblr.

I recently sprang for an M1 Mac Mini, replacing my trusty (but lately not as trusty) 2013 iMac. I’m looking at stuff on a gigantic Asus monitor. It’s almost too big — I never use the sides of the screen except for getting Zoom windows out of the way. I type noisily on a Keychron K8 mechanical keyboard. I’ve got a pair of nice-sounding Mackie CR4 speakers on my desk. I also have a couple of Alesis Monitor One studio monitors on shelves above the desk (powered by the matching Alesis RA-100 amp) for when I’m doing audio work or if I want the day’s music to be a bit more immersive. I’ve had these Alesis speakers for many years — they’re the same ones I used to mix Feng Shui. There’s a Logitech C930e webcam for Zoom calls and such on a flexible boom attached to one of the speaker shelves.

Other items on the desk are a Nu Board dry erase notebook, a Miroco Light Therapy Lamp for those dreary days or extra Zoom lighting, and a deck of Oblique Strategies cards. I have a Focusrite Scarlet Solo for sending audio to the Alesis speakers, connecting a microphone when podcasting, or plugging in a guitar when music-making. I also have a vintage Electro-Harmonix LPB 2ube next to the Scarlet for those guitar moments. Oh, and that desk is a Fully Jarvis Bamboo Standing Desk — just wonderful.

When I’m not standing, I’m sitting on a QOR360 Ariel active chair, a birthday gift from last March. I love it, but it took a while to get used to sitting on it. In the first couple of weeks, I had a few aches — it makes you use some muscles you don’t use in a standard chair. I recommend the chair, but if you get one, take the instruction manual’s advice and only sit in it for a few hours a day at first to warm up. Don’t be a dope like me and go all-in immediately, leading to a few sleepless, achy nights.

For privacy, I use Private Internet Access VPN. I’m using Safari as my browser with AdBlock, Super Agent, and Privacy Redirect extensions. When my Safari set-up makes a website act funky, Vivaldi is my backup browser. I’m also a decade-long fan of 1Password.

I’ll wrap this up with some other tools I can’t live without:

  • Logic Pro for music-making and podcast mixdowns. I’m a big fan of plug-ins from Togu Audio Line, Audio Thing, and Izotope.
  • Descript is essential for my podcast work. Just like I can’t remember how I found someone’s house before GPS, I have no idea how I edited podcasts before Descript.
  • AirTable and Fantastical are how I keep my businesses (and life, really) organized. If you schedule an office hours session with me, you’ll see how I use them together.
  • Whenever I debate letting go of SetApp, thinking it might be too expensive, I discover some new apps in the suite that validate its place in my arsenal. My favorites/most used are Receipts, Yoink, PDFpen. Mate Translate, CleanMyMac X, Meta (helps out so much with my music publishing work), Forklift, and the indispensable CleanShot X.
  • I have yet to find the perfect email app, but Airmail comes close. I’m phasing out Gmail and going 100% SMTP.
  • And here are a few MacOS apps that I recently started using that I think will stick: Fraidycat, Singlebox, and Raycast.

What’s With that Avatar?

It’s from a photo that some of the members of GusGus took of me in Los Angeles. We were play-acting an imaginary Wim Wenders movie and, in this scene, I was demanding my driver hit the road. This shot ended up getting used by Astralwerks as my press photo. It’s still my favorite Q-BAM photo and, despite my suspicion of nostalgia, it gives me all the feels.

Anchor Drop: Add Music To Your Spotify Shows

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I’m usually critical of Spotify, as I was yesterday, but I’m also happy to give credit when it’s due. Utilizing the company’s 2019 purchase of Anchor and its podcast-creation tools, Spotify now allows users to create podcast-like audio programs around the streaming music available on the platform. I say “podcast-like” because these aren’t what we know as podcasts — these aren’t stand-alone shows that play outside of the Spotify ecosystem, nor can one talk over the music or only include music snippets. The new feature, accessible through the Anchor app, allows users to insert their own audio content — assumed, in most cases, to be spoken commentary or conversations — within their shows (i.e., playlists). In other words, you can create a ‘podcast-like’ playlist that contains your song selections with the sound of you chatting about the songs in-between. These playlists are published to Spotify as a ‘show.’

I’ve spoken about the frustrating issues with licensing music for podcasts before. Those problems persist for podcasts, but Spotify’s work-around is a smart option for those who don’t mind their content getting locked to the platform. The pre-existing music licenses already in place with Spotify apply since users are merely adding music to ‘playlists.’ Technically and legally, it’s nothing new for the platform.

This tool opens up many possibilities for music-oriented programs such as Song Exploder-style dissections or celebrity ‘desert island disc’ spotlights. Anchor’s feature has launched with some interesting examples of it in action, such as this program on murder ballads and The Ringer-associated 60 Songs That Explain The ’90s. 

Of course, artists will have no control over where their songs appear, so thick skins are necessary for the inevitable ‘These Songs Suck’ shows. Spotify may also have to deal with commentary of its platform, as I’d like to see the tool used to highlight and explain ‘fake artists‘ and other efforts by labels and production studios that exploit the streamer for quick bucks. 

Here’s a Twitter thread where Anchor co-founder Michael Mignano announces and describes the new tool: 

🔗→ Introducing a brand new way to create in Anchor, with all the music you love
🔗→ Spotify Now Lets You Add Music Tracks to Podcast Shows

Shine a Light

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First off, as previously mentioned, today is ‘Bandcamp Friday’ — the platform is waiving its cut of revenue with 100% going to the artists. Here are some suggestions where you can throw your support today:

  • Pitchfork’s list of labels and artists directing Bandcamp revenue to Black Lives Matter organizations [LINK]
  • A list of black artists, producers, and black-owned labels on Bandcamp [LINK]
  • Resident Advisor’s list compiling both, with an emphasis on electronic music [LINK]
  • If you’re into ambient music, here’s a Reddit thread listing ambient artists of color that could use your support (h/t Terry Grant) [LINK]

Like most of you, I was feeling dispirited and down yesterday. The constant barrage of evidence that this country is falling apart weighs heavily. And the gray skies and rain weren’t helping. I had an interview scheduled in the early afternoon and didn’t know if I was up for it. I was looking for some good news, and anything would do.

Unexpectedly, Warren Ellis provided that bright spot with a shout out on his blog, perhaps in response to my shout-out to his blog on Tuesday. It’s a nice boost to get mentioned under the ‘Isles of Blogging’ tag. I’m proud to inhabit my little beach-side hut.

One thing I learned: Ellis has a lot of readers. There are a lot of new eyes peering at this speck on the web (hello), and I picked up a healthy amount of newsletter subscribers. Shining a light on a fellow toiling soul is one of the best parts of operating in an independent space, whether you’re a band or a novelist or a painter or a blogger. It’s a lovely feeling when you’re the recipient.

I mentioned Ellis’s newsletter — Orbital Operations — only a couple of days ago. It’s something I look forward to each Sunday. One of its regular highlights is the heartfelt words of encouragement closing each email, a needed end-of-week reminder that things eventually will be cool. I’ll shine a little light back by urging you to subscribe.

My interview was with Lawrence Peryer for the Spot Lyte On podcast. I talked about growing up in Central Louisiana, the challenges of finding underground music there, the historical threads of influence that connects musical artists, utopian streaming models, Kraftwerk (of course), and lots of other things. It was freewheeling and fun. Though I think we intended to include music industry shop-talk, there was very little of that. The podcast hits the pod-ways next week. I’ll give you a preview by linking to a record from 1981 that comes up at the end of the discussion: the mind-blowing “Outside Broadcast.”

Side-note: I enjoy gabbing on podcasts. If you’re interested in having me gab on yours then please get in touch.

I also mentioned a podcast interview with Derek Sivers. It’s an episode of Yo Podcast — an uplifting listen that will give your brain a break from the world-on-fire for an hour. Specifically, I mentioned and clumsily explained this part where Derek answers the question: Hendrix or Bowie?

Jimi Hendrix is like Charles Darwin. Darwin, he presents “The Origin of Species” to the world and it blows everybody’s mind. But now the theory of evolution is common knowledge, so to read the book, “The Origin of Species” now, is not so impressive. So Hendrix presents the “Star-Spangled Banner,” full of feedback and more sounds from a guitar than anyone had heard before, and it blows everybody’s mind. But now, every kid in the guitar store can do the same thing. So to hear the original, is not so impressive. I think it’s kind of the same with Stravinsky and the “Rite of Spring,” it’s actually kind of unfair that they’re revolutionary contribution is diminished with time.

But David Bowie is like Josephine Baker, exotic and desirable in their time, and exotic and desirable now. And same thing with Claude Debussy’s music. Like, David Bowie, Josephine Baker, and Claude Debussy, all of them stood outside of the culture. Their art didn’t infiltrate the culture and culture didn’t assimilate or adopt it. And so time doesn’t diminish their allure.

The podcast audio and the transcription are on Derek’s site.

Once again, dawn brings a bluish-gray over Lake Holden this morning = [LINK]

#Worktones: Loscil, M. Sage, Dytomite Starlite Band of Ghana

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Here’s a trio of excellent musical selections that have been permeating the home office this past week. It’s the latest installment in a series that I’m calling #Worktones.

Before knowing the photographic inspiration behind Equivalents, I mentally described the sound of the album as ’the hum of weightlessness.’ I wasn’t too far off. Those photos are a series of black and white pictures of clouds, captured and decontextualized by artist Alfred Stieglitz in the mid-to-late ‘20s. Some consider this work the first intentionally abstract photo-art statement. Here Loscil (the Vancouver-based musician Scott Morgan) deploys processed piano in sonic washes and layers that can recall an imaginative session of cloud-watching. Many only see uniform clouds in the sky — an everyday occurrence — while the lucky ones stop to pick out distinctive shapes, implications, and gentle reminders. Equivalents welcomes a similar exercise, rewarding the deep listener with soothing impressions of an atmospheric terrain.

Catch a Blessing is an adventurous album, in that it has the feeling of exploring unworn paths and venturing down overgrown trails. The album begins with the lively “Avondale Primer Gray,” hinting at randomness and an embrace of the ‘happy accident.’ But as things in nature experience emergence, the ensuing tracks, though sonically unconnected, appear to gather into themes that are just out of grasp. M. Sage, the artist behind this work, assists the experience with field recordings — such as the nostalgic fireworks of “Polish Triangle” — and guest musicians providing beautiful and exotic strings to “Window Unit + Three Flat.” But it’s the short but moving “Michigan Turquoise” that stands out, a lonely ballad complete with a looped guitar strum, seabird calls, and a mournful crooner transported by magic from a distant time.

It’s not all strange ambient music playing at the workspace. Some days (Monday mornings?) require an uplift, music that’s got some get-up-and-go. And I don’t know about you, but I can’t work alongside songs with words, especially when I’m writing. But there’s an exception for languages I don’t understand, especially when rhythmically sung in mesh with the instrumentation. This reissue of a rare 1982 album from Africa’s mysterious Dytomite Starlite Band of Ghana fits the bill. I say ‘mysterious’ as BBE, the reissuing label, doesn’t have much information on those involved. The songs are wonderful and instantly improve the mood and feature more than a few tight synthesizer riffs. I love listening to this stuff. I’m presently reading Rosewater, a terrific novel set in future Nigeria, so there’s some geographical synergy in my media consumption. FYI: BBE is quickly reissuing decades-old albums from the extensive back catalog of Nigerian label Tabansi Records and this is one of many in that series. The titles I’ve heard so far are consistently worth your time.

🔗→ Follow me on Bandcamp