...and we're back.

Last friday I went to update the 7" Recording Project, and the domain was gone. I couldn't connect to the FTP site, and the pages were all gone. In their place were spammy placeholders, so I contacted Register.com to see what was going on.

Turned out, my domain had expired. The one I've had for over ten years, and instead of notifying me so I could renew it, they let it expire and put it straight up for auction.

$119 later and some back and forth with Register.com and Snapnames, we're back up!

That was really annoying, I swear I won't let it happen again. I'll get back to the music soon.

(This is the first in a series of posts where I digitize my 7" collection and talk about those records. Some of them rule, some suck. We'll deal with it together. Okay?)

One Man Running Stress 7" Kirbdog Records #006 01. Here By The Shore 02. Albegra 03. Windfall 04. Johnny Come Lately 05. Trustfund Junkie 06. Termaline

I really don't remember where I got this record, but I know I paid $3.50 for it. One Man Running were a pretty rad Lookout! records era pop-punk band from Arcata, and they may or may not have members of Fifteen in them. I may have picked up this record in Orange County, either in Laguna or Huntington Beach the year afer I graduated from High School when I went down there for a couple weeks to hang out with my ex-girlfriend, watch people play volleyball, be punk, and sell chocolate dipped strawberries on the side from the store she worked at to fund trips up to Los Angeles.

Purchased: 1994? Maybe in Orange County, but not at Amoeba in Berkeley
Cost: $3.50
Notable because: These songs are so short, they were great to put in the last couple minutes on mixtapes.
Like it now?: You know, it's OK. This is a great snapshot of early 1990's California pop-punk, that tie that runs from Berkeley to Santa Rosa and then up to Arcata and Eureka. There were zillion bands who sounded just like this, and a zillion Very Small Records compilations you could har them on. You know, even Billie Joe met his wife in Arcata...

I bought this portable USB turntable on Woot, and it arrived today! Now all I want to do is go home in the rain and digitize my 7" collection. This is exciting.

I'm going to start posting MP3s of my collection here. Stay tuned!

Jump on over to pizza.saur.us for a series on current American music.

I'm trying to do an MP3 a week, and so far it's working!

What an awesome, amazing day. I still remember clearly in 2000 when MRA watched the election results come in at McNally's in Oakland. Now, eight years later, I'm married and got to watch Obama get inaugurated on a little TV with my coworkers.

Everything feels right today. This Is Nice.

Weekend Update!

Spent Friday night going to dinner at one of my favorite Vietnamese spots, Binh Minh Quan. I had frogs with lemongrass, it was tasty although labor insensive as each part of the frog you had to pick up and eat with your fingers to get the meat off. I love this restaurant for their full menu, Vietnamese beers, and great service. YUM.

After dinner we headed over to Merchant's, which is in the fruit packing district of Oakland. If memory serves, it's the oldest bar in Oakland, just a bit older than The First and Last Chance Saloon down at Jack London square. They've really added some nice, new touches to Merchant's including a big projection TV above a set of tables and chairs in what used to be a weird, dark corner with a pinball machine. Talked to some random guy (of course, this bar seems to attract these characters), drank a PBR, and watched a sports highlight countdown. Came back home and played some Baggo in the parking lot before watching some episodes of Three Sheets and some music videos. Finally went to bed around 2 AM? Maybe? I don't really remember, we were drinking many bottles of Czechvar.

Saturday I got woken up by my Dad who wanted to bring my my new mini wine fridge that he gave as a Christmas present. Went over to a friend's house and lifted weights for a bit (my arms and legs are sore sore sore sore sore still), came home, met my Dad, got in the car and drove out to Treasure Island to see some Rugby for awhile. Drank some Chablis and enjoyed the sunshine, headed all the way into SF, went to a couple bars, made homemade dominoes out of coasters, went to a gay bar for the rugby social, drove home, and then went and saw American Steel at the Uptown in Oakland.

Today we relaxed in the morning before heading to Mosswood for some Baggo, horseshoes, beer in the sun, and softball batting practice.

Yeah, I guess it was a long weekend...and it's not even over yet!

SFGate has a new article out on the damage from last night's riots. Pretty much sums up a lot of my feelings on the issue how how to express your frustrations and anger.

downtown oakland, california

My friend Tim snapped this photo last night of the assembled BART police and Oakland PD assembled to quell some smallish riots over the shooting death of an unarmed man at the Fruitvale BART station on New Years. This story is now national news and probably isn't new to you, but the protests and riots sure were close to home for me last night.

I stopped in at The Trappist last night with some coworkers for an after work beer. As I got on the freeway heading North from work I noticed lots of helicopters in the sky over downtown. I should have thought something was up, but just figured it was for a traffic accident or something. I parked downtown, right across from the OPD headquarters, had a drink, chatted a bit with my coworkers, and relaxed.

The next thing we know there are some people running by outside, so look out the windows to see cop cars, news vans, riot police, and a small group of protesters heading down the street. I got out of there fast, mostly for fear my car windows would get smashed. As I headed around the corner the riot police turned and were heading straight towards me. I jogged and hopped into my car and flipped a U-turn to get out before it was too late, and succeeded in driving around a small group blocking a news fan yelling "Fuck the police! Fuck the police!"

I drove home, called MRA to make sure she was OK, and turned on the news just in time to see the riot police walk in a long line right in front of the Trappist where I was 15 minutes earlier.

I felt weird the rest of the night. The shooting death is a complete and total tragedy, but I felt a sadness that my town, My City, a place I've lived since I was 19 years old was acting up violently. I don't really see how torching people's cars, breaking their windows, and breaking store windows is really gonna stick it to the man. It only fucks with those people who love this city, those businesses that are strong enough to keep going downtown. I also felt sad that I knew lots of people, both around the bay and around the country would have the reaction that "Oh, that's how Oakland is. I told you so."

But it's not, and that's why this whole incident has me bummed out. After celebrating in the streets a couple months ago, dancing with Obama supporters outside of Everett & Jones BBQ a few blocks from where these riots took place last night, I was hoping all was well.

I guess it's not. And that's had me feeling a little...empty.

Happy New Year!

I guess there has been a lot going on, really, there always is. I had a grand plan the week before New Year's Eve to post a Top Ten Songs of 2008, but it never materialized. So, instead, I was just going to make a Top Songs Of 2008 Playlist on last.fm, but so many of the songs I wanted to put up there didn't exist as a full track.

So, I didn't do anything except post the merits of recors from The Hold Steady, Dr. Dog, The War On Drugs, CSS, Annie, Justin Townes Earle, and British Sea Power on a messageboard or two. Maybe I'll repost that here, but recors by all of these bands and artists impressed me to some degree.

At work, I've been transferred/promoted again, and now I'm going to be *selling* wine instead of just moving it around a warehouse. I'm excited about this new prospect as it's a great opportunity for me to learn, expand my wine knowledge, and meet some good people in the business. I've gotten a lot of great congratulations from people, so I am thankful for that.

That said, we had another round of layoffs this week. Three months ago during our first round of layoffs when I was transferred temporarily to Customer Service, we were told that would be the only round. Now our company has shrunk by 50%, and I had to watch some coworkers I enjoyed working with get laid off before my eyes. It was a scary time, but now a few days later I am excited for the new opportunities (and I secretly like being in a more empty office as I can listen to music aloud instead of on headphones).

Also, if you want to buy any wine, contact me. Please.

Our New Years Eve was fun but went by very quickly. We headed on over to Periscope Cellars for a party, then took a cab back to the Rock Block to go to another party. Everyone there was at a level of inebriation much higher than mine, so we decided to just go home and call it a night. New Years Day though was the real leisurely time. We had a couple friends over and watched Melrose Place episodes, the movie Victory in which Sylvester Stallone and Pele play soccer in a prison camp, played a bunch of baggo, watched more Melrose and 90210, and then watched the hilarious Devil's Advocate again. So nice.

I guess I should leave work now. Off to home, and the cats, and listening to music, and maybe laundry. Good times Wednesday style.

This was a pretty good Thanksgiving. It was mellow, and we stayed close to home, but MRA and I got to sleep in, and I ate some pizza for breakfast, fixed a couple lattes, cleaned the house, hung out with her Dad, went to a friend's house for food and conversation and a few rounds of Whoonu, and finally home to watch a Stephen Fry documentary about America and some amazing BBC documentary about The Galapagos.

Ok, so now that I read that, it doesn't sound as mellow as it was.

Anyways. I'm up in the way up, listening to Mojave 3 on headphones (right as I typed that Bunny jumped up on my desk to surprise me), and checking back with what I was doing on the past few Thanksgivings.

2001: MRA and I drive up to Eugene, then Portland and around to Boise. In Boise, we had an amazing time, ate some great food, took a few walks, did up the thrift stores, and then got stuck on a mountain in the snow, twice, before making it back home with a trunk full of Olympia beer stubbies. Wow.

2002: MRA must have been out of town, becaus this was the Thanksgiving I spent at a coworkers house in El Sobrante. Sometimes I read posts like this and think it's odd that I've been a fan of country music since around this time. Also, it's cool to see that six years ago I was taking pictures of the cats fighting, and then tonight when I came home from watching BBC documentaries at MCT's they were both sleeping on the couch. This is not meant to imply that they now magically like each other, but that they are still well and with us, granted, in their 3rd house together.

2003: Santa Cruz Thanksgiving. I think this was the first one, and I think we went to three, but now the couple whose house we used to go to has split up, but at least the weather is still good.

2004: Santa Cruz again. I don't think this was the year I was super sick, but it may have been. Anyways, notable because I had just started working at the high-end hair salon that I later became manager of, only to quit this January to follow a career in the wine business. MRA went do a Thanksgiving dinner a the owners of the salon's house this year mere weeks after I started working there. I still think of them often, thankful for the opportunities they gave me even though it didn't work out in the end. Also, I think this was the first amazing Friendsgiving at the 41st street house.

2005: A dark year for (!)BYB, hence no link to an archive. We probably went to Santa Cruz. I would have just left Communique, and MRA would have recently returned for a trip to Europe with the rest of JACT.

2006: Another dark year for (!)BYB. I didn't update at all for three months between September and December. Again, we probably went to Santa Cruz. I think, maybe.

2007: The entire wheel fell off my car on the way to take MRA to the airport at like, 5:30 in the morning. Shit was crazy, but at least we didn't get hurt. I ended up driving down to LA with my friend Emily, had Thanksgiving at Julia's place in the big white house on the hill, and saw my brother's new house for the first time. It was actually a great Thanksgiving, even though I missed MRA who was in Portland with her brother and her dad.

So that brings me back to 2008. It was good, nice, but I couldn't help but feel in the evening that it seemed sort of like Any Other Day. But a good day, yes.

It's funny. I came upstairs to post something meaningful to Blackyellowboack, only to get sidetracked by last.fm (of which I've seen a little obsessed with being exact about recently), only to find last.fm down for mainetenance...so I actually got something done.

Really, what I should do, is just shun regular social networking and go back to old school, just blogging here, keep all my thoughts in one place.

"Cause most kids give me credit for being down with it, when it was back in the day, back when things were real different."

Time to hold my breath for a day.

Miss Rodeo America and I are getting married on Saturday. Very cool.

I just did a little inventory check in our warehouse and listened to my High School Years playlist on my iPod. It was a pretty solid selection of tunes that, for me, defined the last couple years of high school. Check it out:

1. Cocteau Twins: "Cherry-Coloured Funk"
2. Sugar: "Granny Cool"
3. Tiger Trap: "My Broken Heart" (Tiger Trap was pretty much the soundtrack to my senior year drives to Sacramento to, well, hang out with Tiger Trap. That, and drink beers.)
4. They Might Be Giants: "Letterbox"
5. Operation Ivy: "Officer"
6. The Charlatans: "Ignition"
7. Jawbreaker: "Caroline" (fucking awesome!)
8. Faith No More: "Be Aggressive"
9. Green Day: "Words I Might Have Ate"
10. Nirvana: "Heart-Shaped Box"
11. The Breeders: "Mad Lucas"

Classic.

MLB.tv is a magically thing. However, whoever the announcer is for the White Sox who says "He Gone!" whenever someone strikes out is highly annoying. I kind of hate him for it. Also, I'm rooting for the Twins in the AL. But really, I'm rooting for the Phillies. (Update: I guess it's this guy.

Oh, lordy.

I'm just sitting here, browsing Flickr for photos of Hanoi to remind me how much I miss it. Clockwatching. Listening to 80's music. Plotting the lineup for the Mosswood Greens game tomorrow. Waiting for the A's game at 5:05 to come on the radio.

Russian River Valley Vineyards

I always say summer isn't over until I have a birthday, and this year the weather turned to fall frosty mornings right after my special day. Good timing, weather. The days have been super nice though, and we spent Saturday with Mitch & Lara up in Sonoma County hanging out at Roshambo winery's open house at Frank Johnson Vineyards. It was an amazing house, complete with a horseshoe pit, hammocks, and chickens. The folks at Roshambo really treated us right with food and wine and decent music. We even got to bottle our own magnum of the 2006 Frank Johnson Syrah. Also, today, MRA and I got our marriage license. It was kind of cool. Less than a month away now...

Maybe I will still a little high from the Hold Steady show last night at Mezzanine in San Francisco. My experience, at least at first, wasn't as strong and immediate as I though it would be, but by the end of their set and before their first encore I was getting really into it. The band was fucking tight and I loved the choice of songs they played. The most surprising aspect, at least to me, was that the kids up front were fucking *into* it. I mean, hands in the air, singing along during the singalongs, jumping up and down, and both feeding Craig Finn and being fed by his energy. By the second encore, perhaps the first time I've ever seen a second encore happen well *after* the house music came on and a good amount of the crowd had left, I was right there up front, hands up, singing along, having a blast. Here I was, a 31 year old man jumping up and down at a rock show like I did when I would see Avail at Gilman Street at age 19. Maybe with all the things that have changed in my life, I'm still basically the same after all.

Here's the setlist in case you're a superfan and you're curious:

The Hold Steady @ The Mezzanine, San Francisco, CA July 29, 2008
Constructive Summer
Chips Ahoy
Chicago Seemed Tired Last Night
Sequestered In Memphis
Girls Like Status
Massive Nights
Southtown Girls
Lord, I'm Discouraged
Yeah Sapphire
Knuckles
Hot Fries
One For The Cutters
You Can Make Him Like You
Your Little Hoodrat Friend
Crucifiction Cruise
How A Resurrection Really Feels
Slapped Acress

Encore #1:
Positive Jam
Stuck Between Stations
Most People Are DJs

Encore #2:
Banging Camp
Killer Parties

Labels: live music, mezzanine, san francisco, setlists, the hold steady

It's been about a month and I've been really flakey on the MP3 of the week. I still want to keep doing it, but I did throw down with a 13 songs post on pizza.saur.us that includes a lot of stuff I've been into recently. Check it out, there are a lot of great pop songs in there and I'm still really into the new CSS record and am patiently awaiting for the new Annie to come out.

However, this is a project that is a decade in the making and something I've always wanted to do.

From 1994 until about 1998 I recorded every live show I went to. I didn't want to make money, but as a historian I wanted to document what I did and the music that happened all around me. I went to so many shows, mostly around the SF Bay Area and I feel like I got a lot of good stuff from venues around the bay area including a lot of good indie stuff from The Bottom Of The Hill's heyday. A lot of these recordings I traded for other tapes through the pages of Maximum Rock N' Roll magazine and the internet in its infancy, but some of the tapes I've recorded I know don't exist anywhere else.

I've decided to digitize a lot of these tapes and release them into the world. I assume I'll get better at breaking up the tracks and whatnot, but for now these are entire live shows available as an MP3. I was really good at dating all my tapes and I am entirely certain about their date and location. I used a small, good quality tape recorder initially and always wore a blue work jacket that I had altered to be able to wear a stereo condenser microphone in the center. I used good Maxell tapes and kept a great list to keep track of all my recordings (although over the years I've actually lost my list and hope to remake it someday).

I'm going to start with the first Modest Mouse show I ever went to. It was April, 1997 and they played at Mod Lang records in Berkeley (an institution that now finds a home in El Cerrito, a few miles north from Berkeley) the same night they opened for Built To Spill at Slim's in San Francisco (I have that show too). I was an avid, almost obsessive Modest Mouse fan ever since I heard This Is A Long Drive For Someone With Nothing To Think About and probably recorded upwards of 20 shows from San Francisco to Washington State before they hit the big time with "Float On." I still like the band, but I have new favorites and new groups to listen to and go see live.

I listened to these tapes a lot back in the day. I used to work as a medical courier and would spend my entire day in the car, before iPods, avoiding the radio and listening to music as I cruised Northern California. These tapes and the others I traded for provided most of what I heard in those days.

I am so happy to share these, and if you have any tips regarding recording these digitally please let me know. Until then, enjoy.

"You get creative when ordering your drinks, and yours stinks. Mine stinks."

Modest Mouse
Mod Lang Records
Berkeley, CA
April 27, 1997

1. Neverending Math Equation
2. Cowboy Dan
3. Whenever I Breathe Out You Breathe In (Positive Negative)
4. Tundra/Desert

Labels: bootlegs, live music, modest mouse, tape trading

Looking through all the crap I keep in the drawer that sits underneath by super old, old school monitor I found an old notebook with streetsandavenues songs and keyboard settings listed in it. Some songs I wish I could hear again and never made it to a proper recording (well, any recording really).

1. a fateful heaven
2. rohyphnol
3. the period in tamarack between
4. ellipsis (i love that this is the only word written on the page)
5. a modern version of rita hayworth
6. finalcy
7. you're twenty minutes late i don't love you anymore (I must have been bored writing this, I decorated all around the title with tiny astericks)
8. the people under the stars
9. song without a name (I honestly have no idea if this was a song without a name, or "song without a name.")
10. guided by voices song (I'm pretty sure this was a song that, you know, sounded like GBV. a working title for sure.)
11. ...when you're going to die.
12. (can machines be heroic?)
13. four hands to hold you under the water.

My favorite page is titled "Songs We Will Play In Vacaville On June 25, 1999." This includes, among other songs we recorded and other songs listed above, "brian lilly in the US air force." Yes, it is struck through.

Anyways, good times down memory lane. MP3 of the week is new, sorry it took three weeks. I'm old(er).

Some songs for the weekend. Duh.
01. Swervedriver - Rave On
02. Film School - He's A Deep Deep Lake
03. Ride - Seagull
04. The Stills - Rooios / Palm Wine Drinkard
05. My Bloody Valentine - Only Shallow
06. The Hold Steady - Slapped Actress

One of these things don't belong...but oh well.

Actually, I'm listening to sassylime's muxtape, that's more appropriate.

As promised, there is a new MP3 of the week. I'm going to see Swervedriver tonight in San Francisco and am pretty pumped for the show. I did a more thorough post over at pizza.saur.us but thought ya'll might enjoy the opening track from Mezcal Head. I peeked at the setlist from Monday's show in Seattle(?) and it looks good.

Click on the cover of Mezcal Head on the left to enjoy.

Last chance to get the MP3s from Friday. I also flaked on posting an MP3 of the week on Sunday, but that will all change this evening sometime. I had also forgotten that I used to use an image of the album cover for the MP3 of the week, so I'll bring that back too.

Went to an unexpected A's game last night and had a blast in the cold night as the A's beat the Blue Jays to extend their winning streak to 5 games. At one point some sullen teens snuck down to our section, but I couldn't figure out why since all they did was text message each other and pay absolutely no attention to the game. Go figure.

Down there on the left column I've added a feed from Twitter. I'm going to use it as a mobile blogging, but will do my very best to not use it as a way to drunk text everyone I know. Have to be careful!

Just got this piece of spam:

This will be my first real three-day weekend in a long, long time. You see, I used to work Tuesday - Saturday so these Monday holidays were nice because everyone else I knew was off work too, but it still wasn't the same because I always still had to work Saturdays.

F that now. No more Saturdays at work watching everyone enjoy the sunshine.

The new Hold Steady album Stay Positive leaked last night. I listened to it well after midnight while sitting on the couch downstairs because I couldn't find my good headphones in the dark and MRA was sound asleep. Eh. I don't really know what to think at this point. It's different. Some of the instrumentation is wacky and crappy (the harpsichord on "On For The Cutters" and especially the crappy synth line on "Navy Sheets." That one in particular sounds so stupid and is so high in the mix.) However, I definitely like the first track "Constructive Summer." It has that high energy that I had hoped for from this record. In fact, I wanted Stay Positive to *BE* my record for the Summer Of Awesomeness which will be Summer 2008. Now I'm not so sure.

I talked to Mitch last night about how right around now there seems to be a ton of decent (if not good) new music flooding the market. New Ratatat is out soon, there's a new Annie record on the way (this one has a nice megamix featuring songs from the album). I also noticed today that there's a new Joan Of Arc (???) record coming out? The hey?

Enough hoo-ha. Here's some songs for the weekend:

Anyways. We're off to SF for a nice dinner at Rohan Lounge. Pork lettuce wraps & pancakes await!

"In bar light, she looked alright. In daylight, she looked desperate."

New Hold Steady track for the MP3 of the week. The Hold Steady continue to kick out the jams, and I'm hoping their new album Stay Positive becomes my car ride, party in the park, getting drunk in the daylight kind of soundtrack. This song is a great start with the handclap/singalong outro, blasting horns, E Street piano, and howling organs. Good stuff.

MP3 of the week is back. Click on the link over there yonder on the left and enjoy a bassline grooving, silly and addicting song off the new Islands record. I really can't stop grinning when I hear the lines "Creeper in my home, crawled in through the window. I grabbed the kitchen knife, couldn't stick it in though" and I really love the background vocals that echo the word "didn't." One of the best songs of the first part of 2008. For sure.

Eating delicious tacos at work is awesome.

Played a good game of softball yesterday, but unfortunately a friend got smacked right in the face with a ball and bled a lot out of her nose. Had a great BBQ on Sunday afternoon in North Oakland and ate some sausages and drank some beers outdoors. Saturday we went on a nice long walk around San Francisco and soaked up the sun and avoided tourists. Had a BBQ ourselves Saturday night. Can't really ask for a better weekend.

Yelle - Ce Jeu (Moods Remix)

I just ate about a pound of Hawaiian BBQ for lunch. This Yelle song is what I usually throw down in the afternoon to wake up in stead of hitting the espresso machine. Too much slappy dancey fun.

This is the 855's post on Blackyellowblack. I still like to think of it as (!)BLCKYLLWBLCK better though since I like the typewriter look.

I had a good night last week of reading back through some of the archives here, especially those of 2001 when I kept a good log of Amscray's US tour and did a (surprisingly) good top-ten records countdown. I was so glad I wrote so much stuff down and posted it here, and it's soothing to know that it will be accessible forever.

I kept wondering why I stopped doing this log as much as I used to but I really know that it's because of all the time I spend on other sites (oaklog, flickr, pizza.saur.us, myspace, etc), well, really not how much time *I* spend on those sites but how those sites came to represent what I wanted to do with (!)BYB. What I wanted back then was a media outlet, a place to post pictures and MP3's and scans of the recent records I bought at Amoeba and a record of travels and day-to-day activities. What makes it so special to me now is just the written record of what I was doing then up until what I'm doing now.

What surprised me the most was how little extra content went with each post. Now I feel like I should add a photo or a MP3 or something from Youtube because that's a lot easier than actually sitting down and writing something. Blogs now are fancy and strive for readership because it's so much easier to make a Myspace page and then ramble on that instead of designing an actual website and putting an effort into creating something people want to read.

That's kind of what I miss. Going through the archives most of the websites & blogs are gone, even the bigger ones (at the time). There are a few holdouts leftover and it makes me happy to know they're still there.

So, yeah. I'm still here. I'm happy to be here as a holdout from when the web began to be something that everyone could use and before it was something that everyone *had* to use.