Cosmonox/garage sales/archives.design

Cosmonox played the second of its two weekly shows last night (thanks to grandma for babysitting). Jason and I leaned into some Village People-esque identities (I was the "third-string 70s power forward" and Jason the "digital cowboy" - thanks to JL for taking the photo:)

Jason modded my Cardmaster to bring the full speed/half speed switch to the front, and while I miss the visual aspect of digging into the battery compartment to access that switch, I have to admit that it is expressively useful to have it accessible at all times. Anyway, it was awesome, as is the new album Labelmaker.

I biked to a bunch of yard sales yesterday - found some quality stuff, got some exercise. At one of the sales I leaned my bike up against a towering Douglas fir and got a bunch of pitch all over my left handlebar. People at various yard sales had various solutions for the problem, but the best one was, "oh, rub a bunch of peanut butter or mayonnaise on your hands!" When I got home, I tried it out, and I have to admit that it was pretty pleasurable to rub a bunch of Jif on my hands. My kid was not a fan of the way my hands smelled afterwards.

Archives.design (ht: Recomendo) links to a bunch of Internet Archive-hosted scans of design importance. I was glad to see the maniacal kids' book Honeybees included (we picked up a copy at The Clackamas Bookshelf for ten cents and I always try to foist it on my kid at bedtime), plus of course the collection of scanned floppy disk sleeves is right up my alley...

Desperate Bicycles "Grief Is Very Private"

I made Hot Cargo Bike Summer 2023 a little more interesting by buying a really terrible Bluetooth speaker with a very good handlebar mount. In painfully obvious bicycle listening, I was listening to (The) Desperate Bicycles. Their whole discography is great and totally not legally accessible except through the collector-scum market. Since most of the online anthologies are chronological, I never end up playing their last single as often as the rest. But every time I do, it rearranges my mind. '

Who makes music like this? It's reasonable to call it "post-punk," I guess (a term which I was struggling to define for Cosmonox live-dub enthusiast Jason recently). But what sort of post-punk is built like this? Things are jammed together in totally non-linear and exciting ways, it's all built around some sort of asthmatic organ/Stylophone sound, there are chords I can't figure out on the guitar, and then on top of it the bassist is positively shredding, on an emphatically fretless bass no less. (Important to note that even on their early stuff the bass is fretless and all over the place.) The last song, "Conundrum", is both super catchy and completely bewildering.  

New Cosmonox album, plus live shows

Cosmonox has a new album and I think it's great. We are branching out from our initial four-track-and-language master sounds into something a little more expansive. Getting maximum value out of the Casio CZ-101 and the melodica, sometimes at the same time.

Shows in Portland, Oregon:
July 15: at Turn! Turn! Turn! with The Vardaman Ensemble and Otolithia
July 22: at Starday Tavern with Dr. Something and ///supersun///

Mention the key word "lethologica" to the awkward-looking dude with the squeaky card machine at either show and I will give you a dollar or a mostly-filled-out punchcard for Great American Video and Espresso in Milwaukie. (Side note: I love the fact that there is a fully-functional video store within a few minutes of my house, even though the only videos I watch these days are from the library, and that they serve pretty good Italian ice!)