Confessions of a record addict.

Addiction is rough. It is consuming. It takes over everything. Some people like booze. Some people like hard drugs. I have always dipped into my piggy bank in order to buy music products. Tapes, Records, Cds, T-Shirts, Stickers, Buttons, Posters, Zines, anything that could expand my knowledge and collection of rock and roll.

This started around the age of 8. Every day my mother would pack me a juice box and a few little snacks to accompany the lunch money she provided me. Early on I realized that the snacks could hold me over until I got home each afternoon. I would save the $1.50 a day I was given for lunch and place it into a little white dice shaker that I kept on my dresser. Each week or so I would take that money and purchase a new cassette or cassingle. Records were being phased out of stores to make room for cds right around this time. Most of these tapes were current hair metal that was popular at the time.

I never really broke this pattern. I am not certain if I got an allowance, but my lunch money savings account purchased the majority of my music and comic books throughout my youth. I eventually began getting paid $10 to cut the grass (man i was a sucker! the hills in my yard were practically vertical). This changed it all. I was generating close to $60 a month. Do you know how much money that is to a 12 year old with nothing to do? A LOT.

Playground pizza appeared around this time and the rest is history. $5 admission provided entry, a slice of pizza, and a beverage. In addition, you were also graced with many touring bands from up and down the east cost. During 1992 through 1996, I could be spotted at this venue almost every Friday. I normally had $10 to $15 in hand, ready to buy every 7”, tape, and t shirt in sight.

Over the years not a whole lot changed. I was walking down the street today after buying a record thinking about how I limited myself to a very small lunch budget for the week in order to spend 4 times that on records. There have been times in which I haven’t eaten in order to buy an album. I prefer to think of it as dedication, not sad.

Reblogged from i know some things.

Digital vs film.

I have been thinking a lot lately about digital and film photography. I have felt somewhat overloaded lately with photos documenting events & happenings. It has gotten to the point where I have stopped taking photos of people and have focused on shots of objects and other visuals that feel right in my gut. Pinpointing the why is tough, but there is a feeling in my body that doesn’t like what it is seeing. Is all this digital technology taking away from wonderful moments?

At the core, I don’t think so. However, I think the bombardment and detail of happenings these days takes a bit away from seeing things through another individual’s eye.

What I love about film is how you get to revisit things awhile after they happen. I know the one hour photo changed all that, but even waiting a few days makes all the difference to me. The excitement of wondering what is going to turn out. Extreme TLC in order to obtain the perfect shot. Accidental mayhem creating beauty.

It all feels so foreign when shooting digitally. The initial conveniences and ease are becoming lost on me. 300 photos from a Friday bar night seems crazy to me all the sudden. It is almost as if the constant fun keeps getting thrown back, thus watering it down.

Am I just a total sucker for the nostalgia engine? I have bought a lost of record re-issues lately.

What do you think? If you had unlimited resources, film or digital?

Remember the Record Shop?

Incredible pictorial on slate.com.

View the entire photo set at the link below:

http://todayspictures.slate.com/20091023/

Reblogged from Airplane Jesus.

Poster Win.

This poster had prime positioning in my room from 1993-1998. This doesn’t do it justice, but the thing was pretty huge. During the Archers performance at the legendary playground pizza, I was the only kid who was tough (stupid) enough to rip it off the wall after the show. I treasured this black and white gem as no one I knew had it. Little did I know that there would one day be a familiar face in the upper photograph. A certain lady in my life might be the one in the poster screaming her heart out, most likely to the song “wrong”.

Life’s funny.

Pet Peeve.

I promise I am not this big of a sour apple in real life. I promise. I have a very mild temperate.

I cannot stand it when anyone other than my father calls me “SON”.

Examples:

“Watch and learn how to bong this beer, son.”

“That is because you don’t know how to have fun, son.”

“C’mon son. That song is tight!”

This might drive me wild because it is normally attached to criticism. It might be because normally this comes out of the mouth of someone years younger than me. Either way it drives me insane.

You can continue to use this vernacular. You might even do it now to get a rise out of me.

Bear in mind you sound like a total MORON.

I leave you with this cute kitten photo to assure you I am not a total jerk.

I hate weddings.

My incredible friend Amanda Starling penned the entry below a few years ago. It is right on target.

Okay, I don’t hate ALL weddings, but after a recent conversation about wedding season and all the weddings we had each attended and were going to attend, I realized that there’s nothing worse than a corny wedding. Every time I have to go to a wedding like this I feel pretty much suicidal the whole time. How people get away with things like making signature drinks out of hypnotic and hiring ugly djs who play “lady in red” is something I’ll never understand. There are a lot of things I hate about these kind of weddings, and a combination of this conversation and being laid up in bed sick have prompted me to share the highlights of my disdain:

Personalized party favors:

Are you fucking kidding me? If I were engaged and my fiance told me he wanted to use some “creative spelling” on a mint tin I swear to god I’d break up with him and we’d never talk again.

Not only is this probably disgusting honey but this marriage will only last up to 4 weeks.

Table decorations:

There was a point in the making of this beautiful centerpiece where the creator decided there wasn’t enough silver. If I were at a wedding where this was the centerpiece I’d set it on fire and hope it spread to the altar.

What are these plates made of? sticks? it looks like someone found a warehouse with a bunch of old gross hats and decided to flatten them to use as dishes so they could capitalize on the fact that everyone in the world has horrible taste. this “beachy theme” is seriously worse than the bee honey. i especially like the petrified seagull statues and the shell accents.

Bridesmaids:

Anyone who insists on not only matching the dresses of the bridesmaids but also arranging for a mass garder wearing harem should be shot.

This photo is actually called “silly girls”. these are the kind of people I’m scared of being stuck on an elevator with because we’d probably end up talking about how cute the movie “how to lose a guy in 10 days” was. Not that they would learn anything from that film that they didn’t know already.

I love cheesy mirror photos usually but this one goes from bad to it’s funny because it’s so bad back to it’s not funny at all. I can tell you exactly what these girls’ rooms look like. They’d have a canopy bed and some glittery frames with pictures of their friends and them at hard rock cafe and concert ticket stubs from jars of clay and switchfoot.

First of all, I don’t want to see ONE picture of this girl and her eyebrows, but five? whoever made this is completely retarded and a pro at using oval frames to induce day long puke sessions. Someone tell Jeff Lindsay that he owes me a subway sandwich and some sunchips.

Groomsmen:
I was going to put up a few pictures of groomsmen, but this one did it for me. The fact that they even had the kid do the jacket-over-the-shoulder pose is complete child abuse and I’m not kidding. You can totally predict the future overdose of tylenol pm he’s going to suffer through after finding this picture in a photo album ten years later.

This is what his parent’s car looks like:
Nice cross placement where the ribbon hole is supposed to be. I bet jesus would be really proud of your magnetic ribbon devotion.

And finally my favorite picture of all:
This guy totally knows where I’m coming from. He is so miserable in his vest that he had to drink a whole vase of vodka. How big can a tie get? I think that would be called a “bib”. I hope that the next time I go to a wedding this guy will be there with his bib on and I will pet his hair as we drink an “amy and tom’s soulmate martini” and talk about how much we hate our lives.

Wow. She hammered the nail on the head. I want to make one thing clear. I don’t hate your wedding specifically. I think I have been to so many BAD weddings that I have a pre-disposed mindset of crap. I have always had an uncomfortable feeling at them and I think that is due to way too many drunk relatives of the wedding party chatting me up about when I am getting married. Ugh.

Friends who are getting married this fall…I assure you I would not have checked the Chicken box on your invite unless I really wanted to attend. I don’t associate you all with the examples above because I don’t hang out with anyone who has no taste.