Hi! I'm not in Texas, because American Airlines fucked up my plane ticket and booked me for Tuesday rather than Wednesday. They then refused to either refund my money or put me on a different flight or even give me my return ticket, and during our lengthy phone conversation I was repeatedly told that I needed to have some personal responsibility. I could make up for this lack of responsibility by paying them $1000 for a new ticket. I had neither the ability nor the desire to do this, so here I am, back at work.

I briefly toyed with the idea of doing a prank SXSW blog in which all of my rock critic fantasies came true (I met Kelly Clarkson and we cut an EP together of PJ Harvey covers before doing an unannounced late-night gig, etc.) but I don't really have the restraint or dedication necessary to make a good prank work, so never mind.

Bottom line: do not fly on American Airlines. Ever ever ever.
posted by Mike B. at 10:28 AM 0 comments

Monday, March 14, 2005

I know I asked this back in December and I know I got some responses, but would anyone be able to offer server space for the Blueberry Boat Chronicles MP3s? Due to someone or other linking to the MP3s directly, I've recently gone over my limit and have begun to incur charges. This would probably only be a from time-to-time thing, whenever things spike, or at this point until the traffic (7 gigs Fri-Mon) dies down. I'd prefer not to use archive.org because the MP3s aren't, you know, legal, and I'd prefer not to use yousendit because it's temporary. If I'm wrong about either of those things, lemme know, or drop me a line if you've got any server-switch ideas.

posted by Mike B. at 6:37 PM 0 comments

Just listened to the live version of LCD Soundsystem's "Daft Punk Is Playing At My House" that Fluxblog posted a while back, and damn--the vocals on that are just orders of magnitude better than on the album version. Much more energetic and rowdy, he's actually screaming here rather than speak-singing, which is certainly what I'd prefer. Well, maybe by the next album he'll have either abandoned that whole keep-the-first-vocal-take philosophy or developed enouh confidence as a singer not to sound kind of hesitant all the time.

posted by Mike B. at 4:34 PM 0 comments

Dunno if I've mentioned this before, but I'll be at SXSW this week, hangin' out with the Flagpole crew. If you're going, drop me a line before Tuesday evening and I'll give you my cell number if you want to get together at some point. Or just let me know things that are going on that I might like. E-mail link is at the top of the page.

I may or may not have e-mail access while in Texas, but since I don't have a laptop, I'm reliant on the fates for that. (Can I just wander onto campus and use a public terminal?) Anyway, it's best to assume I've out of e-mail contact after 7 pm on Tuesday unless I start posting here after that point.

I'll try and blog it, but see above re: computer/net access. If I can, look for updates. If I can't, um, check back on Monday.

posted by Mike B. at 11:42 AM 0 comments

If you haven't seen it already, take a look at this Metafilter thread on MIA.

Some people there seem to think she's electroclash, which is pretty funny, but it does bring up the question of how Interscope's going to market her: R&B? Hip-hop? Prestige artist? ("She's unclassifiable! The critics love her! Weird kids like you should buy her!") Given the piss-poor track record of marketing things as electroclash, I can't see that as a viable route, but never underestimate the marketing plans of record labels (trust me on this one).

Also sorta interesting to hear from people who are listening to her without the context of grime or dancehall, seems like.

That said, it takes a turn into the terrorism debate reeeeal quickly.

posted by Mike B. at 11:07 AM 0 comments