Sunday, October 13.
9:42AM.
No one knows what they're doing, but some people do it anyway. Not my quote, but it's pretty much how I run things here. All I know is I type louder than I talk, and this is where I do my yelling at clouds.
24 hours in New York City.
Met a long time friend from Warner Chappell Music. We ate Chinese at a restaurant decked out like a 1920's Shanghai joint in the French Concession. Huge plates of bok choy and dim sum, waiters in flatcaps and suspenders. Conversated on Orange Theory fitness memberships, body horror, and the historical construct of the three-song cassette demo.
Six hours of Midtown sleep. Five hours at a job thing. A couple hours left to creep the Garment District and Hudson Yards. An hour in a ride share back through the hardscrabble neighborhoods of Weehawken to Newark. Three hours of airport theater, eavesdropping on Bluetooth conversations meant to be heard and admired. Rolling past Midwest transplants who fancy themselves bona fide New Yorkers after a year of living in gentrified neighborhoods of Central Harlem.
Noise-canceling AirPods are a godsend.
Home, then back to the studio to fix a Fixation Arc vocal. The instrumental track had an accidental editing splice that I tried in vain to fit words to. I thought it was just super-technical and I wasn't smart enough to tap it out. Reminds me of the time Sting's ass accidentally played a jazz chord on the piano and they kept it in the final version of "Roxanne."
Celebrated this revelation by going to the Cottage Home block party. Truly one of the world's great autumnal celebrations in one of the city's most haunted neighborhoods. (I missed it last year because I was sweating through blankets with COVID.)
Left to see "Amplifier Worship" performed in its entirety by Japanese band Boris. LA's Starcrawler opened the show. The singer was confrontational and slightly off-putting, but that seemed to be part of their shtick. Crowd was quiet and awkward. (Probably the reason.) But I felt a familiar energy - that please-clap thing of trying to break through a wall to people who have never heard you before.
I realized, my god that was me.
"You all know how to clap, right?"
"Look, I'm clapping," says the chronic people pleaser in me.
Still can't shake it.
10:47AM.
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What I’m reading: Anti-Story: The Anthology of Experimental Fiction (Philip Stevick)
What I'm listening to: Phase 3: Drones and Dominions (Earth)
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