Bad Things Happen in the Night.

Last night I learned that Brooklyn Vegan sleeps late. I learned this because I emailed him at like 2 am and he wrote like right back. However, I doubt that he was busy writing a D-quality paper like I was. I'm sure you're pleased to learn a bit about the late night habits of your favorite bloggers. Anyway, for some reason I'm surprised he gave me proper credit for sending him the M. Ward show info. So I really appreciate it.

Some parts of today were really bad, including handing in said shitty paper and getting charged $1.29 for a 20 oz. bottle of Coke at St. Mark's Market. WTF. I USED TO PAY $1.18. Shit, you don't hang around the neighborhood for like a month and everything changes. What's next? I'm gonna go into Other Music and find out that Token Yellow Guy has gotten fired? The horror! But seriously, what the hell am I gonna go to St. Mark's Market now? Tch!

Also, one of my classmates came in wearing one of those rainbow-colored Unknown Pleasures shirts she probably bought from Urban Outfitters and I almost threw up in my mouth. Okay, yeah, that may have been THE low point of my day. Ian Curtis must be spazzing in his grave.

The cool parts:

- Got free pizza @ the Queer Office at school and we talked about whether there should be non-gender specific bathrooms. They showed us a documentary about the whole bathroom problem and one of the trangender individuals looks like a sort of effeminate version of Eddie Argos, bushy eyebrows and all!

- The girl in sitting next to me in Creative Writing was doodling in her notebook and on her notebook she had written "I'm not in love with the modern world". Can I get a LOL y'all? I <3 this girl!! Mostly because she actually speaks to me and shit!

- We had this journalist come into our class, Amy Linden, and she was too hilarious to be true. I couldn't stop laughing, especially when the teach put in this DVD and it scrolled the FBI/Interpol warning in multiple languages, so Amy goes, "Boy, this is like in every language except Wolof" and I cracked up and then I realized no one understood what she meant and I cracked up even harder. The end. Oh wait, not the end, cos she was actually there to talk to us about West Coast punk so we listened to X and I was so so happy.

Oh hey, here's a clip of Seu Jorge doing "Já sei namorar"!! Aww. He's serenading the babies. How adorable.

Rant.

Check out this fucking douchebag.

Why is he a douchebag? Because
(1) He doesn't write anything that hasn't been mentioned already. I mean, hey, The Hipster Handbook mentioned most of what's discussed in this Op/Ed like 4 years ago, and said it in a wittier manner.
(2) He doesn't get the difference between Indie as a genre of music and Indie as an easily-packaged marketing term used to sell shit to people.
(3) Because he writes as an outsider, who doesn't even bother to learn what Indie kids are like before writing about them as an authority on this subject, which, in turn,
(4) Proves that even though he lived in the same apartment as Claudia and Steve for almost a year, he hardly bothered to even acknowledge their presence and to learn about their lives.

He can go choke on a cock.

(Props to Boogie-Down Nicole who alerted me to this Op/Ed.)

Weekend.

A little recap.

Thursday I went to the Queer Office at school and we had pizza and this real cute dude from The Advocate came and the conversation was really interesting, a lot of it was about money and advertising and the internets and the direction the magazine was thinking of taking in the future and uh... Lance Bass. So it was pretty much like Gawker, but just a bit gayer.

Friday was brutal. I was a retard and went on an errand that involved a lot of walking while it was pouring a shitload. Grrreat.

Also, I feel like my allergies have flared up all of a sudden? I dunno what to do.

Yesterday was awesome! My parents are dorks and I was like "I'm a go party" and they were all like, "Dress nice" and "Are you sure you don't need to bring anything to the party" and I was all like, "Whateva". Also, I didn't tell them I was going to two parties instead of one because they would have asked even more questions like, "Who's house is it?", "Why does this person live in Brooklyn?", "How do you know this person?", "Are people going to be drinking?" and my favorite (NOT), "Are there gonna be boys there?"

They also tried to tell me what parties are like, to watch that nobody touches me the wrong way or steals my shit. Yeah, okay. I love how they don't know I've been to parties before. At least they care enough to ask me about it and pick me up, which is what my dad did after Scott's party. LOL.

Anyway, so I called up Maria and was like, "Come to Scott's party" but she wasn't sure how to get there so I was like, "Uh you can come with me to Paul's noise party if you want" and she accepted and then we had to figure out how she would take the train but finally we figured out she could take the R and then switch to the F and funnily enough we ended up on the same F so we found each other at the platform and it was quite the joyous moment.

So here's the deal: I know nothing about noise music. But Paul started his own little CD-R label, Obsolete Units, and to kick off the label, he threw a party-slash-band showcase, so I decided to go and show some support. About 6 months ago, in the spring, we had to review demos for this little Battle of the Bands events at school, and Andy and Jordan #2 submitted a demo under Totally Dad. The first Obsolete Units release was the Totally Dad demo, and now there's also a second release for Oubliette.

Anyway, I think Maria and I showed up right as the first band was starting. It was all very abstract, and I didn't quite "get it". Though I have to say, some parts I really liked. Like the process of making all these sounds seemed pretty interesting. But I sort of regretted not wearing earplugs when the high-pitched shit started. Also, I thought it was totally hilarious because from where I was standing, I could see a lot of the neighbors who'd be peeking our way. One individual in particular looked out his backyard, turned away, and when the noise didn't stop, he came back to close his door. AHA. I'm really shocked the police didn't come, especially during this first band's set. I didn't catch their name.

The second band was Archaeopteryx (sp?), who were just a bassist and drummer but I really liked them! They were totally aggro and shit! They seemed a bit needy emotionally (they kept asking the crowd watching from above to please come down into the "audience"), but overall they seemed like cool dudes and they totally delivered a big sound.

Totally Dad went last and I was pleasantly surprised. I was hoping they wouldn't suck--and they sounded great! Jordan #2 and Andy were on guitars, and they had a drummer dude named Eddie. The drummer dude was awesome! Except for the fact that multiple drums fell, he kept beating on them anyways. I feel like Totally Dad still have a lot of room for growth; I'm excited to see what they put out in the future. At times it felt a bit sloppy in the edges in a very Jandek-y way, but when it gelled, the music was awesome and sounded a bit Deerhoof-esque. Also, Jordan #2's vocals were weird, in a high quivering sorta way in the great tradition of Jamie Stewart and so on.

Apparently, someone from Magik Markers showed up to the showcase, and Paul was toootally geeking out. Aw, what a nice dude. He looked like a proud father as he watched Totally Dad do they thang.

Honestly, the best part was hanging out with Maria and seeing all my sophomore buddies and especially witnessing Totally Dad live. I'm not big on noise but this was totally worth it and I can't wait for another party, cos the place is pretty sweet. And I loved seeing Paul and hearing all this gossip gossip. Some of it was so shocking that, uh, I made sure to regurgitate the information to Rachel, and believe you me, her jaw dropped when I finally told her.

But yeah, I left the party feeling good and very happy that I went to this even though I have no idea what's good or bad in terms of this genre of music. After a few hugs and parting words, Maria and I left for Scott's. When we showed up we were greeted with Scott telling us we were guests number 4 and 5, and Gabs was all like, "Yeah, I'm not expecting a big turnout". Well fuck, the party was rockin'! Gabs looked really pretty, her outfit was cool. Rachel, Boogie-Down Nicole and Notorious Angela didn't show up until around midnight, unfortunately, but dancing to normal music with Gabs and Militant Vegan Emo Boy Adam and Scott was awesome!!!

For the most part Maria and I talked, though we also talked to (1) Scott about the underrated genius of dark chocolate M&M's and (2) this pale dude came up to me and Maria and was like, "Do you know Diana?" and I was like, "Sorta" and he's like "I'm her brother" and I was like, "Oh I think she's really pretty but don't tell her that cos I'm not really supposed to know who she is and she might be creeped out that some girl she doesn't know thinks she's pretty" or something like that. Anywyay, said brother of Diana's ended up being TOTALLY AWESOME. I mean, he danced his ass off!!

Oh, also, these two siblings showed up, they were so cute and seemed very sweet. The sister was all like, "I want to dance, but I don't know how" and I was like, "It's aight if you don't know, nobody here can dance well anyways" which was especially true because Kareem hadn't shown up yet, haha.

The one other notable thing that hilariously relates to Diana-the-pretty-girl-I've-never-spoken-to is that The Twat showed up. Now, I feel sorta bad about calling him The Twat because Boogie-Down Nicole reported to me that he's actually quite genuine and nice. But to justify my actions, I have referred to him as The Twat cos whenever I would bump into him around school, he'd be sporting these obnoxious aviator shades and he had his hair parted at an angle and whenever he walks he sorta swaggers in a wankery manner. ANYWAY. So he shows up and I was really surprised, cos I didn't get who'd show up at this party to bring him along. Except then I remembered that I'd seen Diana and The Twat walking together a few weeks ago, so I assumed that they're going out (this was confirmed to me laters).

To make things better, as I was getting ready to leave, I kinda encountered him in the hall looking all confused and we exchanged the following words:

The Twat: Do you know where the bathroom is?
Elizabeth: Um... I think near the entrance maybe.

It was a conversation for the ages, I tells y'all.

So I left soon after but I had a lot a lot of fun and people were very nice and it was a relief that it wasn't a 100% NYU kids deal. I hear I missed out on a lot, like a remix of the Futureheads' "Hounds of Love", and Scott whippin' out some rejected bottles of vodka from his company. LAWLZ.

Coffee + Music.

Starbucks Salon, lotsa cool kids performing starting today until Sunday the 17! FREE!

76 Greene Street (between Spring + Broome)

Tonite:
Eugene Mirman (8pm)
My one true love, Buck 65 (9pm)

Tomorra:
Lansing-Dreiden (7pm)

iLose, pt. 2

I just bought my first iPod eva. It cost mad money. Opening this fucking box has been a struggle.

Edit: I can't get it to work. I'm aware that it shouldn't be this difficult, and that's frustrating and I've been crying about it a lot.

Try Again.

Okay, I cannot believe I've been wasting my time listening to "Dance, Dance". I can't believe I just downloaded Ultra Blue by Utada Hikaru and didn't listen to it until now. I cannot believe I listened to Loose that much. And while we're on the same topic (Timbaland), I cannot believe I listened to Exodus that much, either! But I still like Exodus, I'm mostly ashamed about Loose. What a fucking waste of my time. Ultra Blue is such a good pop album! Maybe the best I've heard since Taller in More Ways. Oh wait, maybe since the Robyn album, I'm not sure. Heh. But don't let me do all the talking, here's a video for "Keep Tryin'":



Also, it helps that Utada Hikaru has a nice voice. I have to say though, the second half of the album dips a bit in quality (at least from this first listening session), and I get really annoyed when J-Pop or K-Pop songs mix English into the lyrics within the same phrase. Dunno if I explained that clearly. Anyway, just track the music down, it's really good.

I finished reading City of Glass, which I didn't realize was an adaptation of a novel. I read it in graphic novel form. It was such a mindfuck! It was so fucking meta! I thought the artwork was fantastic! I might have to read the actual novel, but the artwork was so beautiful, just very clever and intricate. I thought it fit the story very well. The story itself was wonderful because it talks about language and there's a lot of intertextuality so it really kept me on my toes.

I also finished Mother, Come Home, and I seriously... maybe it's a bit too naive of me, but I... I expected a lot of cryin' and huggin' and good, ol'-fashioned male bondin'. I didn't except the BIG TURN in the story to be such a... I don't know, I didn't expect it to be like that. I think what I liked most was the way the story is told, sometimes very stylized, sometimes very childlike. It made the story a bit more complex than most stories. Shit, what confuses me is that this is only one book in a series? Or something, I'm not sure. But yeah, I think I'd recommend it. Maybe even more so than La Perdida, because it's a bit creepy, sort of like little kids in scary movies.

Speaking of "scary" movies, is that new M. Night Shyamalam movie out yet? I want to read the spoiler. See, I tend to read the spoilers for movies I never intend to watch, many of which are so-called "scary" movies. So yeah! If anyone knows how it goes, do tell. Haha.

EDIT: (1) Gawker got a facelift; I think it looks nice and clean. (2) For those who care, I spotted one of those ghastly bookbag ads that the Misshapers modeled for. I was on Bowery. Seriously, so tacky. I'm all for making money, but couldn't they do it in a more fashionable way? I guess I shouldn't expect so much from hipster scum. Sigh!

Elizabeth U. Battles The Scenester Girls.

So I got to the venue and I just went up to the security dude, "I'm from TMT, I'm here to do an interview," and he just mumbled and pointed to a side door and I was like, "Um... okay?" So I just went to the side door and it was sorta open and... I waltzed inside like I owned the place. And as soon as I saw someone I was like, "Help?" And he was pretty helpful, just told me to go to the main stage, and when I did, I think it was the French Kicks setting up. I just stood there and was like, "Hi". HAHA. Okay, so then I go back out and I'm about to call the publicist when someone shows up and is like, "Hey, we don't know nothing about no stinkin' interview, we just need to make sure, nobody tells us nothing, etc, etc, SO COULD YOU PLEASE WAIT OUTSIDE WHILE WE VERIFY" LOLZ! I was kicked out of the venue quite calmly and politely, and I was left on the street to fend for myself against this handful of little scenester girls. ZOMGZ. I was so scared. They were really close to the front waiting for doors to open, and I stayed back a few feet away. As I waited I called the publicist going like, "I got kicked out, help me PLZ". One of them girls waddles over to me, she heard me earlier before I snuck into the venue that I was doing an interview, and she's like, "What publication do you work for?" I think she was being polite and stuff in case I was someone important. (After all, I may look geeky but Jon Pareles is even geekier. You never know.) I said, "Tiny Mix Tapes", and I said it loud, cos I'm proud. And she was wearing these shades, but they weren't that dark, and I could tell she had no idea what I was talking about. And she's like have you talked to their publicist and I'm like, "Not on the phone, we've been exchanging emails." She asked me who the publicist was, and I said Karen. And she was like, "Oh, right!" giving me this look like she totally knew who I was talking about. By that I mean she really DID know that Karen was Karen Plus One. She didn't make a big fuss, but it was still a fuss, so you could tell. Anyway, I ceased to amuse said girl, so she went back to giggling and stupid shit with her posse, and I kept my distance. Then the dude who kicked me out looks out the main entrance and points at me.

"You! What's your name!"
I knew this was no time to tell him that my name IS "U." LOL.
I responded, "Elizabeth."

He motions me over to him, to come in, and I strutted up to the door, past those annoying girls. I'm assuming Karen sorted me out? Maybe not. But then as I was walking in, one of these girls was like, "Hey, this other girl has an interview, too!" I didn't believe them. I don't think he did, either. He's like, "What for?" And the girls are like, "The Big Takeover" And I was like, LOLLERCAUST, if y'all gonna lie you could have picked a cooler zine!! And now that I think about it, Jack Rabid really disliked the first Futureheads album! So I'm like OMGWTF?

The thing is, in the end they weren't really lying, because a few minutes after I started stuttering in front of Jaff, this girl came into the room with Barry to do an interview. HAHA! Anyway, I was very awkward and nervous during the thing, he was quite nice and charming and I understood him just fine, and he'd never heard of the Unicorns and he wasn't feeling very confident about England in the World Cup. But yeah, I'll transcribe when I get home, and submit it, you'll see what he said. It was such a short interview. Time restraints. It's just as well, I was so nervous. It's hard to get all buddy-buddy within 15 minutes, but I got some really interesting answers out of him.

After the interview I shimmied on out of the venue and waited for Rachel to show up. We had pizza and waited for Boogie-Down Nicole to show up. Then I gave her her ticket, which I actually never used for the Crumpler Bags thing, which was for the best I think, and then I went up to the guestlist dude and I'm like, "I'm on the list?" And he goes, "Which list?" And in my head I'm like, FUCK, I KNEW I SHOULD HAVE ASKED! I'm such a n00b at this shit it's pathetic. Can I get a LOL? Anyway, he asked, "Who put you on the list?" I'm like, "Karen", and he's like, "Who does she work for?" For some reason I TOTALLY blanked out! It doesn't matter if I'd said the PR company cos the same dude who kicked me out/let me in earlier was like, "It's the Vagrant list", and he let me in and I said "I'm sorry for the trouble yo" and he was like, "It's aight". No, I'm not quoting anything verbatim.

I'm also supposed to review the show (which is why I sort of won't do it here, other than to say it was awesome and fun), so I had to write down the whole setlist. The problem is that I wasn't sure about the new song titles. I didn't know the words, either. The brilliant thing is, they blew up the liner notes as the backdrop for their show, and the liner notes basically show the lyrics to the songs in a newspaper layout. As a journalism student, when I saw it I almost died. Anyway, so I actually took advantage of the blown-up backdrop with the lyrics. It really helped and I got all the song names, with 95% certainty. I actually felt bad because I couldn't remember the title for one of the OLD songs! Haha, I fail at life.

There were no sightings of Elijah Wood.

After the show we bumped into Cameron, how surprising, huh? We recapped on the show, and you know, he's all like, "Well, they were better when they played [insert your choice of 20-person capacity venue]." Haha, I'm exaggerating. But we agreed it was a good time. Well, if you missed the Futureheads last night, they're gonna play Motherfucker (source: Brooklynvegan) for the 4th of July party. Except the party's actually on July 3rd, take note! So go check them out and see if Ross and Justine D break edge!!

And now off to the library to pay my fines. Oh lord. Later: ACME Cajun food, and Shakespeare in the Park. I have one extra ticket, anyone wanna come with? ALSO! Hi to Miss Modernage! Thanks for the hot linkage action!! :D

My Allergies Are Making My Head Hurt.

At work I was talking to this girl Anna and I was like "I write for TMT!" and she seemed genuinely excited. She was like, "TMT is my home page!" It was nice because I hardly write to many people except for the other interns. Speaking of the other kids, the two guys I work with regularly both have a "softer" taste in music than me. Like when I like pop music, I want it totally bombastic and loud and flashy, but when they like pop, it means it's nice and well-structured and... I dunno how to explain it. Let's just say I play Kylie Minogue and they play stuff like Jens Lekman. It's not necessarily bad, but I feel like a poop for hogging the music (I usually get to the office first.) Also, and I say this half-jokingly, I fear a coup d'etat against my Reign of FLASHY MINDLESS POP Terror.

The problem is that when I play mainstream stuff, it's just very obvious and already overplayed, and it's no wonder people are like, "Whatevs, biznatch." At the same time, when I play more underground stuff, I go off into some very "obscure" shit, at least for those who live in this American Indie Rock culture. Like if I listen to Café Tacuba, I know there's a lot of people who are like "WTF is this." And to me, a band like Aterciopelados, they just sound like, RAWWWKMUTHAFUCKAS!!! but for others, it sounds like, er, World Music. And it doesn't occur to me there might be music taste issues until the song starts, so part of the problem is definitely me. On top of that, I don't see why we should listen to Pavement and the Clash and Sufjan Stevens and Bloc Party and other such indie rock staples at work when we, as individuals, can go home and listen to that stuff ALL DAY. It's all in my head, but I feel so bad that I keep playing all this music that I'm sure they dislike, but it's not like the other kids are putting on some wild shit of their own for me to discover. Like the only thing I've realized in the past month or so is that The Soft Bulletin really IS a bitching album that I really wanna get. Shit, this is not really making sense. I don't even know what I'm ranting about. I just want to stop feeling bad about playing Asha Bhosle.

Ugh, and I also hate that they play entire albums. C'mon. If there's four kids working, and they all have different tastes, that's not cool! Knowing that my taste in music is a bit weird for the other kids, I don't play more than 5 songs from an album in order.

I feel very relieved just saying all of this. I'm sure I must have contradicted myself like a million times within this post, and I know I need to stop being so fucking neurotic about the music I play in front of other people.

One good thing though! Having guys who like softer music has made me go in the opposite direction, so like on Monday or Tuesday I'ma go and buy that Blood Brothers album I've wanted 4EVA and I think At The Drive-In and get all aggro on y'all. Haha, yeah right. But yeah, I only listened to ATDI for the first time today, I think, and I really liked it.

Oh, and the reason I haven't mentioned Fatrick this entire post:

Yesterday Rachel and I hung out and she mentioned the Hebrew Hammer and I remembered how fucking sexy and awesome he is and I was like, LE SIGH! And I forgot about poor little Fatrick. It was good while it lasted, though!

Yesterday we also went into Trash and Vaudeville uh, twice, to buy two pairs of the same skinny pants, one pair for Rachel and one for Claudia and none for me because I'm afraid my ass would look massive and ugly in that shit even if they say that black is slimming. Tonight my dearest hipster scum friends are going to go-go at Misshapes again and yes, I'm quite jealous that they'll get to dance to "Push It".

Today I stayed home until like 4 before I went out to get my dad a present. Cooped up inside, I thought my head hurt because I stayed up too late last night having a WILD WILD TIME watching er, Conan, and for oversleeping. But then I went out and my head felt, and still feels, quite awful and like it's stuck up someone's ass. But not my ass. Believe me, I have my head stuck up my ass all the time and I know the difference. Holy shit, I sound totally mentally unstable.

Well I went into K-Town. To be honest the reason I waited until today to buy my dad a present was because I was too nervous to go and ask in Korean for the book I wanted. Like my insides were just writhing with nerves, even in though in my head, I knew there was nothing to it. And I went to the bookstore. I tried looking around by myself for the book my dad asked me for, my reasoning being that since I know my Korean letters I'd have no problem finding it. Nope, no clue, so I finally gave up and I went up to the store person and was like, "Do you have this book." No, they didn't have it. Grrreat. Of course, to make things better, my brother was busy so he asked me to buy a cake for my dad, since it was in the same vicinity and all. So I went there and that was absolutely nerve-racking too. I managed to ask for the cake and just when I thought my excruciating experience attempting to speak in Korean was over when I gave the girl two 20-dollar bills for the $28 cake and she gave me only $2 back. I had to correct her. I walked out and went back to the train station and all I wanted to do was cry because I felt like I totally fail at life (and because of the damn allergies). I mean, I already get very nervous talking to people and doing it in a language I don't quite grasp just got me very edgy.

Ummm I swear the next post will be all POPCULTUREXCORE. I'm so glad hardly anyone reads this!

Bits + Pieces.

The Clint + Charles Show are playing at Fat Baby tonight:
112 Rivington Street between Ludlow and Essex

7:30 - The Fools
8:30 - The Clint + Charles Show
9:30 - G-Whiz

$8 cover.

-----

Haha, also, Steve and I were walking on St. Marks yesterday and these two decadent hipster types, bad haircuts and skinny girl pants and all, walked in front of us, and I was making fun of them, and Steve and I were talking about Misshapes without mentioning the party name, but all of a sudden the two guys in front of us started talking about Misshapes, too! The two guys did see us, but I don't think they knew we were talking about Misshapes, especially since we weren't referring to it by name! Later on our way to the Mercury Lounge, we saw them bumming around in some diner...