eskimo bliss

everything was in its right place last night for Radiohead. Man, what an amazing band. I’ve never been a huge fan but seeing them live sealed the deal. You can say what you want about Thom Yorke, but last night it struck me just how much his voice really is like a musical instrument, probably more so than any singer I’ve ever heard. Go see them if you get a chance on this tour!

Just a few things on my mind, and to briefly recap my weekend…

• My baby went to work this morning at 8AM, and is still there (15 hours later). SUCKS! He is so not going to be in a pleasant mood when he gets home.
• The most rewarding thing about having a record label is when you get the pleasant surprise messages in your inbox reminding you that there are a few people out there who give a shit. Today that came courtesy of Jamison from the Rainy Day Collective, who wrote fondly of the eskimo kiss t-shirt that he bought from pacer in 2001, saying it’s still his favorite shirt; and then from the band The Sour Notes from Austin, who sent me a blind demo submission email. Typically I might not even listen to it (I would mean to, but then forget) but today I happened to… REALLY excellent stuff that reminds me of Fountains of Wayne raised on a steady diet of The Beach Boys. Check them out.
• Yesterday I had a massage, then went to see Yeasayer. Rock. Photos here (of the show, not the massage).
• Later With Jools Holland is a really great show.
• This weekend I also finished my song about the Bad Driver and learned a Mountain Goats tune. Yay me.
• Oh. Richard Blais is not gay, folks. People keep finding my blog for searching on things like “richard blais gay” or “blais chef gay”. Now I guess even more people will since I put the terms together like that. But he’s not. Not that there would be anything wrong with it if he was, but he’s not. He is married, and he and his wife are expecting their first child next month.

I’m a little late with this update, and I already fear that I didn’t do very much in April to support my long list of things to accomplish in ‘08! But let’s take a look…

• Make serious progress on my book - wow. not a single thing to report here, still.
  
• Record (at least) an EP’s worth of songs - I recorded seven songs in April! So yeah, I guess I actually did a lot more than I thought. Yay me!
• Visit my parents once a month - this one is going ok
  
• Learn more about Buddhism/Visit the Buddhist temple in KM - Still trying to finish Sit Down and Shut Up; and still haven’t made it to the temple yet.
  
• Visit some things in Atlanta I’ve yet to see:
  High Museum - done!
  The Wren’s Nest - not yet
  
• Get organized:
  Get rid of clutter, one room at a time - wow, it’s amazing how quickly i can slip on this one. Was doing well for a while, but ever since M started the new job we’ve really just let things go. Ugh.
  Organize my eskimo kiss records (”records” meaning info, data, etc.) - I’m doing ok with this one, but still have more work to do.
  
• Get a new bed, change setup of bedroom - Done, at least the bed part
• Start doing yoga (this one I’ve already started, yay me) - I seriously don’t know what I’d do without my daily yoga routine.
  
• Podcast more often (once every 4-6 weeks is the goal) - Still haven’t gotten around to my SXSW recap…
  
• Get prints made of some of my Cabo photos - Done!
• Read all my new books and refrain from purchasing any more until doing so - I’m pretty proud of myself for this one. It’s hard for me to not buy new books sometimes but I still have several to get through.

Here’s hoping you’re accomplishing all you’ve set out to do this year Tomorrow I’m accomplishing a much-needed massage, I can’t wait!

I have a major bone to pick with what used to be one of my favorite websites. And since they’ve temporarily banned me from their forums, I guess I’ll do it here!

Several years ago (either around the same time that I was becoming addicted to the Kelly & Justin story that was American Idol, or before MTV’s The Real World had become a mockery of itself) I became a big fan of a website called Mighty Big TV. At the time it was a fairly small website that was dedicated to forums and recaps of reality tv shows. It was hilarious and I loved it.

Fast forward a few years later, and it’s gotten really popular, is acquired by Bravo and changes its name to Television Without Pity (I might not have the exact order right there, but you get the idea). I still check it out occasionally but just don’t have the time that I used to.

Anyway, as some of you know my hubby’s boss Richard Blais is on Top Chef; we’ve always been a fan of the show but obviously we’re even more interested in it this season. I had been keeping up with some of the forum talk about Blais on the TWoP site, and decided to weigh in on the topic of him googling himself, among other things.

Well I guess it’s standard protocol for the site administrators to allow you to say whatever you want about a “cheftestant,” but as soon as someone (me) takes up for them by saying it’s ridiculous to be saying things like “he’s funny looking” then you get a warning. That’s basically what I did, and if you know me you know I’m not really argumentative unless I’m forced into it. I was really nice (I think so anyway), basically explaining that I’m delurking to weigh in on some of the criticism that had been thrown Blais’s way, over silly things like him googling himself (so? my argument was if you know people are talking about you what’s wrong with being curious about what they are saying), and comments about his looks (which have absolutely NOTHING to do with his cooking). My take was this, this is reality TV, these people aren’t actors. To harp on things like how they look, wear their hair, and what color Crocs they wear is a little silly. Blais is just trying to do what he loves and get a little recognition for it. Can we fault him for that? Well I guess my saying this was considered an attack on another member of the forum, and that’s a no-no, so my post got censored (they removed the part where I said calling him funny looking was ridiculous). I didn’t like my post being edited though, but couldn’t find a way to delete it… so I just edited it further asking how to remove it. Eventually they did.

Today I return to the site to see more Blais bashing by the person who seems to be leading the anti-Blais camp, someone who calls herself (I think it’s an angry ex, so that’s why I’m saying “her”) Peachtreeinatl, so I got curious and clicked her handle to see what I could find out about her. Whatdya know, my account has been suspended! WTF?!? Crazy. So people can go all over the Internet bashing him (I suspect a lot of the negative comments I’m seeing on other sites are from this same person), but I can’t defend him in the slightest without getting banned. And what I said wasn’t even confrontational anyway. Whatev, I guess I’ll stick to just posting my opinions here, and reading the recaps on David Dust’s site. His is much funnier anyway (and there’s half-naked gay guys to boot).

I’m so so so soooooooo frustrated about this wreck bullshit. I’ve resorted to lots of cursing in blog posts which I don’t typically do. Today I went to the chiropractor because I think my back is jacked. Right after it happened I felt just fine, save the strawberry on my elbow and my head feeling like someone had pulled my hair really hard. But considering the impact and damage to my car, I felt pretty lucky.

Over the past few days however, my back has gotten progressively worse. Saturday night it started bothering me a little, then Sunday it seemed ok. Yesterday by the end of the day I was really uncomfortable, and today I was uncomfortable all day long. That’s the thing, it’s not really pain, it’s just discomfort. It’s like I’ve lost some of my mobility. So I thought I should get it checked out… I’ve never been to a chiropractor before and I was really hesitant and skeptical. I still am really. She took x-rays and I’m supposed to go back tomorrow, so I guess we’ll see.

What do you guys think of chiropractors? Quacks or legit? I just don’t want to get into a situation where I have to go back again and again and again… I’ve heard horror stories about them just making you feel worse. But I also don’t want to neglect something that might cause me even bigger problems later.

As for my car… surprisingly Geico didn’t total it out. There’s still a chance that may happen though as the body shop tells me that once they take it apart their estimate will probably be higher than Geico’s. If they fix it, that’s a little less hassle for me. But I worry that with that much damage, it will completely ruin the value of my car. Such a pain… and what bothers me the most is that the jackass who hit me is still just driving around or stealing cars or making drug deals or whatever the hell he was doing, unless karma already got him.

Life’s a real bitch sometimes!

Thanks so much for thinking it was appropriate to cross the double yellow line on a two-lane road, attempt to speed past me as I was turning left, slam into my car and send it into a spin in the opposite direction. I am thankful that I was just at the end of my street, and the neighbors who saw it happen and watched you just drive away were extremely nice and helpful, and got a good description of your shitty SUV. I’m also very thankful that I wasn’t hurt, other than a tiny bump on my head, boo boo on my elbow, and now my back is sore and stiff which will probably be a lot of fun to deal with tomorrow and down the road. But it could have been much worse considering you hit the driver’s side of my car, completely broke my axle and no telling what else, flattened my tire and sent my bumper flying completely off my car. Not to mention that the new plants I had just gotten at Lowe’s got jostled around my car spilling dirt everywhere, but I guess that doesn’t really matter now.

I hope that stealing that car, speeding away from whatever trouble you had just caused, driving without a license or whatever the fuck you were doing is worth it you useless piece of shit.

Sincerely,

Kim

My hubby is on the Bravo Top Chef site, how cute

This weekend I drove to NC to record some Good Graces tunes; I had been planning this for months was so excited about it all last week, as my day job had been giving me a fit and I was so looking forward to focusing on something else (that’s actually fun and productive!) for a couple of days.

Friday night I stayed at my parents’ house in Kings Mountain to split up the trip; got there in just enough time to eat a snack, attempt to take care of some work emergencies, then hit the sack. Managed to wake up early enough Saturday to make it to Mebane just around noon.

I had decided to split up the sessions, recording on Saturday with the esteemed Jerry Kee (who’s recorded most anybody who’s anybody in the NC indie scene… Superchunk, Kingsbury Manx, Polvo, and of course EKR’s Citified, and the list goes on and on), and then on Sunday over at Saxapahaw with my good friends Jay and Jane, from the band Velvet.

My goal for Saturday was to get three songs down, and we did just that. I started with the acoustic guitar and vocals, John showed up a couple of hours later to add his very tasty leads, then I added some percussion, hand claps and backing vocals, and we were done! I said my goodbyes to Jerry and Molly, then headed to Chapel Hill to meet Jay and Jane. It was great to see them and we walked over to Spotted Dog for some food and catching up. Ran into our old friend Bob there, which was a nice surprise too. After some really delicious vegetarian food we went over to our friend John’s house for his birthday cookout. John plays in North Elementary so we talked shop for a while, listened to music, talked about our current guilty pleasures (his is Jennifer Lopez, mine Jordin Sparks), and played with his dog Parker (who was totally awesome).

It was getting late so we headed on over to Jay and Jane’s place, which is a turn-of-the-century farmhouse in the middle of the woods! I knew as soon as I saw it that it was going to be a great weekend. I met their pets, Clara the dog and two cats Zoe and Puzzlina, and we listened to music for a bit before I crashed out on the couch.

Things got started Sunday around noon. I knew instantly this was going to be a very relaxed session; that’s what I enjoy about recording in someone’s home, it’s not stiff like some studios can be. We set up for guitar and vocals in one room, like we did at Jerry’s. I got to use Jane’s 1979 Guild acoustic for a couple of tunes which was sweet. Laying down the basic tracks happened pretty quickly, then we got to the fun stuff — drums, keyboards, odds and ends. I love adding little textures like that and find that it can really bring songs to life. And if you know me you know I’m a drummer, so I took advantage of the drumset they had for a few songs, even adding the whole set for one (I think that was the most fun I had all day!).

We played around with the tunes all day, Jay contributing some keyboard parts and Jane adding a bass line, then walked down to the lake behind their house. I was already jealous of their setup but they have a lake too??? That’s it, I’m moving in.

After we got back to the house we finished up one final keyboard part, then Jay did a rough mix for me. We ended up with four songs total, one more than I had intended. All in all it was a very productive and extremely fun weekend. All that’s left is a few tweaks, maybe some additional keyboard here and there, then final mixing! If all that goes well, I should have the finished debut Good Graces recording in about a month, yippee!!!

I was fortunate enough to receive an advance of the upcoming Tracy Shedd release, Cigarettes & Smoke Machines, which Teenbeat is making available this fall. I was a big fan of her previous output, but this is her best record yet. As usual, the standout is Tracy’s vocals, which are delivered in a very earnest, deliberate fashion, reminding me a little of Laura Veirs. But there are also a few surprises in store… thanks mostly to the very tasty and varied lead guitar work of Tracy’s husband James Tritten (of the late, great Audio Explorations).

The entire record is great, but I especially can’t stop listening to “Won Past Ten.” When I first heard it I thought the hooky guitar line sounded just a little too obtrusive, but now that’s the part that I find myself humming almost non-stop. It’s this song that made me think this record fits perfectly on the Teenbeat roster (and would have fit perfectly on Sarah Records, if it were still around), as it reminds me so much of great early 90s indiepop. And speaking of the Teenbeat roster, fans of the band Aden will likely fall in love with this record, as at times while listening to it I couldn’t help but think “this is what Aden would sound like if fronted by a female.” Anyway, it really is great stuff, just check out the track below and keep an eye on Teenbeat for more details of the release.

Tracy Shedd - Won Past Ten (mp3)

Yay Kansas! I won the NCAA tourney pool at work, and didn’t watch a single game after Duke lost. Take that, boys!!! Mwah, ha, ha, ha, ha!!!