The Narwhal that Almost Wasn’t – Episode 17
Episode 17 of the Penny Jam features Narwhal vs. Narwhal performing “Don’t Take” at Cherry Sprout Produce Market. You would never know watching this that we’d filmed the exact same band in the same location on a Sunday 7 days before. In a twist of random weirdness, our sound engineer, James, had his laptop stolen from his truck the following Monday night.
So with some heartache and a little explaining we set out to refilm Narwhal vs. Narwhal. Luckily we were able to get back into the Cherry Sprout Produce Market through saxophone player Amanda Mason Wiles, who is also in a cool band called Pink Widower (whose CD has been in heavy rotation in the Mustang.)
Here are some pics from Joe Mansfield on the first shoot (Sunday 1 of 2.) See the whole set on flickr.
I first saw Narwhal with Joe about a year ago at the Someday Lounge performing with Alan Singley and the Pants Machine. I thought they were pretty cool but I didn’t reconnect with them until recently for the Penny Jam, though the timing was good, with the release of their album “Wipe the Sweat from Your Words.” It’s worth checking out.
Craig Newmark Likes Instant Rimshot
I was very pleasantly surprised to find an email in my mailbox from none other than Craig Newmark, founder of the ubiquitous Craigslist.org. Turns out he’s a fan of http://instantrimshot.com and wanted to embed it on his blog. Of course I said yes!
Double Your Dolliver, Double Your Fun
Welcome to episode 16 of the Penny Jam. We filmed this episode during first Thursday, on Sept 4, a date and time requested by EWF Modern owner Rene Russo (not the movie star). It turned out pretty well as we got some intro footage of the foot traffic on a busy street in the Pearl, including a glimpse of the Ascetic Junkies banjo player, Graham, picking away on the street corner.
Our musician for the week, Ryan Dolliver, usually rolls with a posse called the Double Dragons (the DBL DRGNZ to be exact) but some key bandmates were elsewhere, likely playing shows with other bands as part of Music Fest NW. But Ryan brought in two backup singers to help him fill out “He Called Me Baby” by Patsy Cline, though we’ve erroneously titled it “All Night Long” in the video credits. Maybe we’ll change that in the future. Regardless, Mr. Dolliver brings the soul with his performance, check it out.
Starfucker at Rudy’s Barbershop
It’s that time of the week where I post the new Penny Jam video. This episode was filmed on July 27th but was sitting in our vault just getting better and better. I now present you with Starfucker at Rudy’s Barbershop. The timing worked out fine because Starfucker just left on tour and released their self-titled debut album just yesterday. I bought it at their release show last week at the Doug Fir and it’s great, you definitely won’t regret buying this one. It’s kindof an instant classic.
To set the scene a little: Sean and I left Florence at 10am that morning, stopping off in Monmouth to pick up his step-dad Tony’s Camaro. We raced up to Portland, rolling into Rudy’s just minutes before our 2pm meetup time. The band started setting up and after the sound guys troubleshot some buzzing issues we got started, shooting 5 takes of their song “Party Face.” Check out the pics from Joe Mansfield – check out the whole set on flickr.
Derrek Wayne at Immortal Piano
This here is a real pretty episode of the Penny Jam. We filmed this one back on July 6th, and aside from filming Starfucker (the next episode) we had a really slow production schedule this summer. I really love the light and color in this episode, it fits the music quite nicely.
Martha, the owner of The Immortal Piano Company on 40th and Belmont was very nice about letting us use her store and even tuned up a piano (the one Derrek is playing) specifically for the shoot. You should also check out Derrek’s music on Myspace if you like what he’s putting down.
500 Frames
I made this in 2005 for a drawing class a the University of Oregon, just found it on my computer the other day so I thought I’d throw it up here.
For the assignment, the instructor gave us the freedom to choose what our final project would be. I wasn’t feeling like spending a bunch of time on one large piece partly because I wanted to work on the project at home. Basically I sat in my studio apartment for 48 hours, watching movies and flipping through magazines for ideas of junk to sketch, drawing everything in Flash with a Wacom tablet I’d borrowed from work. The music is made by my friends Chris and Jesse of a band called Ape.