Slackr

"Also, global warming? Total effing letdown. Americans are no longer believing in it. Do you know..."

Sat, 30 Jan 2010 07:00:00 -0500

““Also, global warming? Total effing letdown. Americans are no longer believing in it. Do you know why? Not because the mountains of scientific proof aren’t there. Not because it’s not happening. But because it’s not yet happening to us like they said it would in the movies and those worst-case scenario books. Where are the zombies? The ice forests? Where’s the tidal wave crashing over the Himalayas? I want my goddamn apocalypse, and I want it now.”

- Mark Morford , Why are you so terribly disappointing?, January 29, 2010.

See Also, Everything is Amazing and nobody is Happy.

Dear Consumers: Happy Black Friday

Fri, 27 Nov 2009 13:38:00 -0500

Ten years ago Tyler Durden warned us:

“Advertising has us chasing cars and clothes, working jobs we hate so we can buy shit we don’t need.”

We still haven’t gotten the message.

Hopefully no no one dies this year to save 10% on a new TV.

newresolution: There is a difference between wanting and...

Fri, 27 Nov 2009 10:03:33 -0500

newresolution:

There is a difference between wanting and needing to become somebody more.

Just so we’re clear.

Wed, 04 Nov 2009 11:20:11 -0500

Just so we’re clear.

More than last year.

Sat, 31 Oct 2009 20:58:00 -0400

More than last year.

Kinetic Communist Text

Sat, 24 Oct 2009 12:39:43 -0400

Kinetic Communist Text

Yes Marge, what kind of people indeed.

Wed, 21 Oct 2009 14:48:01 -0400

Yes Marge, what kind of people indeed.:

A short clip from this year’s Simpson’s Treehouse of Horror

Teddy bear made from a placenta. Yeah. You read that correctly.

Wed, 14 Oct 2009 15:47:20 -0400

Teddy bear made from a placenta. Yeah. You read that correctly.

The last 5 books I’ve read: The Painted Veil Sleeping Naked is Green Choke A Friendly...

Sun, 13 Sep 2009 23:50:37 -0400

The last 5 books I’ve read:

Current reading:

Expect Resistance

Something has to change, and I don’t think it’s my reading list.

Jason: Well, InDesign is much faster [in Snow Leopard]

Wed, 09 Sep 2009 16:00:29 -0400

Jason: Well, InDesign is much faster [in Snow Leopard]
Mark: InDesign? You've got InDesign? Can I get InDesign?
Slack: You could if you needed it for something. Do you need InDesign?
Mark: What about Photoshop? Could I get that?
Slack: What do you need it for?
Mark: Pictures?
Slack: Doing what with pictures?
Mark: Making them pretty?
Slack: Just take better pictures.

"The US is the only major industrialised country that does not provide regular healthcare to all its..."

Fri, 21 Aug 2009 16:25:23 -0400

“The US is the only major industrialised country that does not provide regular healthcare to all its citizens. Instead, they are required to provide for themselves – and 50 million people can’t afford the insurance. As a result, 18,000 US citizens die every year needlessly, because they can’t access the care they require. That’s equivalent to six 9/11s, every year, year on year.”

- Johann Hari, in The Independent via Derek Powazek

Children as wind-up automatons. Uh… Creepy?

Mon, 17 Aug 2009 22:23:00 -0400

Children as wind-up automatons. Uh… Creepy?

Vacations

Fri, 14 Aug 2009 16:28:30 -0400

WIN

image provided by twictur.es | original tweet here

FAIL

image provided by twictur.es | original tweet here

"The argument “Jesus must have existed because so many things were written about him” makes me want..."

Tue, 28 Jul 2009 13:21:19 -0400

“The argument “Jesus must have existed because so many things were written about him” makes me want to go to New York to meet Spiderman.”

- Theo Tsecouras (via bullshit)

Right on Trent

Thu, 16 Jul 2009 22:34:00 -0400

Some solid advice even if you’re using the internet for something other than music.

tedr:

bijan:

Trent Reznor from the Nine Inch Nails has some great advice for young, unknown artists trying to make it.

via Trent:

Forget thinking you are going to make any real money from record sales. Make your record cheaply (but great) and GIVE IT AWAY. As an artist you want as many people as possible to hear your work. Word of mouth is the only true marketing that matters.

To clarify:

Parter with a TopSpin or similar or build your own website, but what you NEED to do is this - give your music away as high-quality DRM-free MP3s. Collect people’s email info in exchange (which means having the infrastructure to do so) and start building your database of potential customers. Then, offer a variety of premium packages for sale and make them limited editions / scarce goods. Base the price and amount available on what you think you can sell. Make the packages special - make them by hand, sign them, make them unique, make them something YOU would want to have as a fan. Make a premium download available that includes high-resolution versions (for sale at a reasonable price) and include the download as something immediately available with any physical purchase. Sell T-shirts. Sell buttons, posters… whatever.

Don’t have a TopSpin as a partner? Use Amazon for your transactions and fulfillment. [www.amazon.com]

Use TuneCore to get your music everywhere. [www.tunecore.com]

Have a realistic idea of what you can expect to make from these and budget your recording appropriately.

The point is this: music IS free whether you want to believe that or not. Every piece of music you can think of is available free right now a click away. This is a fact - it sucks as the musician BUT THAT’S THE WAY IT IS (for now). So… have the public get what they want FROM YOU instead of a torrent site and garner good will in the process (plus build your database).

The Beastie Boys’ site offers everything you could possibly want in the formats you would want it in - available right from them, right now. The prices they are charging are more than you should be charging - they are established and you are not. Think this through.

The database you are amassing should not be abused, but used to inform people that are interested in what you do when you have something going on - like a few shows, or a tour, or a new record, or a webcast, etc.

Have your MySpace page, but get a site outside MySpace - it’s dying and reads as cheap / generic. Remove all Flash from your website. Remove all stupid intros and load-times. MAKE IT SIMPLE TO NAVIGATE AND EASY TO FIND AND HEAR MUSIC (but don’t autoplay). Constantly update your site with content - pictures, blogs, whatever. Give people a reason to return to your site all the time. Put up a bulletin board and start a community. Engage your fans (with caution!) Make cheap videos. Film yourself talking. Play shows. Make interesting things. Get a Twitter account. Be interesting. Be real. Submit your music to blogs that may be interested. NEVER CHASE TRENDS. Utilize the multitude of tools available to you for very little cost of any - Flickr / YouTube / Vimeo / SoundCloud / Twitter etc.

If you don’t know anything about new media or how people communicate these days, none of this will work. The role of an independent musician these days requires a mastery of first hand use of these tools. If you don’t get it - find someone who does to do this for you. If you are waiting around for the phone to ring or that A & R guy to show up at your gig - good luck, you’re going to be waiting a while.

Suicide Girls Flip Strip App for iPhone

Tue, 26 May 2009 14:27:18 -0400

Suicide Girls Flip Strip App for iPhone:

So, Eucalyptus gets rejected (though later approved) for being objectionable, but an updated nudie-pen is OK? The hypocrisy is amazing.

"The enemy of humanism is not faith. The enemy of humanism is hate, is fear, is ignorance, is the..."

Mon, 13 Apr 2009 22:37:00 -0400

“The enemy of humanism is not faith. The enemy of humanism is hate, is fear, is ignorance, is the darker part of man—that is in every humanist, every person in the world. That is the thing we have to fight. Faith, is something we have to embrace. Faith in god means believing, absolutely, in something with no proof whatsoever. Faith in humanity means believing, absolutely, in something with a huge amount of proof to the contrary. We are the true believers.”

- Joss Whedon

You can't always get what you want

Tue, 07 Apr 2009 13:53:20 -0400

Ted: Charlie… what are you thinking
Charlie: I'm thinking about what I want and what I need.
Ted: What do you want?
Charlie: I want a peaceful soul.
Ted: And what do you need?
Charlie: I need a bigger gun.

"He’s actualized his psychotic vision, which is all we can hope for in life."

Wed, 01 Apr 2009 06:43:55 -0400

“He’s actualized his psychotic vision, which is all we can hope for in life.”

- Seth Rogen

I need one of those microphones.

Wed, 25 Mar 2009 14:03:00 -0400

I need one of those microphones.