I am buying art

Yes, as soon as I figure out how my brand new paypal account works, I will pay for this painting and become a proud owner of art work by Matthew Feyld a.k.a. Driftwould. I didn't find him, Said the Gramophone did. Because they know what they're talking about both when and it comes to music and art.

I don't know much about Matthew, I just know he's really really productive and that there's a constant flow of brilliant art on his Flickr-page. The recurring cast of characters include men with large heads and small faces, different kinds of bears, bird-men, and more, in different combinations. They wear nice sweaters and red boots with eyes, and almost all of them carry really sharp knives ( or not so sharp sticks). Many of them are running, in a silent hurry to fight evil or maybe just mess with people I'm not sure.

Not this bear though, not my bear. Agile as he is, he is in the middle of a jump, frozen in time with the knife trembling slightly in his tiny hand. But for some reason I prefer to think of him as floating, suspended in mid-air by the pure power of his mind. He knows exactly what he's doing. I showed him to my mom, and she thought he looked like a protective saint and I agree.

This post is not just going to be me bragging about buying fantastic art. It's also a Random Post ( which was a great idea Mazur), and I will treat you to some fantastic music.



This is a French kid who calls himself Bear Creek, doing a cover of Daniel Johnstons Deviltown/ his own song Vampire. His name is Leo and will no doubt break the hearts of millions and millions of girls, and I'm sure it's already started. I found out about him and his two other bands Coming Soon and the Matching Cubes through Kimya Dawson's livejournal page. Oh right, he's in her new band Antsy Pants too. Did I mention he's 13? Yeah. The coolest 13-year old in the history of the world and time itself.

Shwiller

A little while ago I read a book named "The Fortress Of Solitude," by Jonathan Lethem. The story chronicled the main character's life, basically from birth to his post college years, also tracking the de-gentrification of his neighborhood, the rise of hip-hop in new york, the later birth of punk, and the lives of his father, childhood friend's and one of their fathers as well.


In the book, the protagonist's father, Abraham Edbus, is a struggling artist who paints science fiction book covers to make enough cash to get by and is working on an experimental video art masterpiece. This character, I later learned, is based on a real-life person named Ed Emshwiller. Although the resemblances are not all that similar, seeing as the real-life counterpart did not quite resent his dayjob as much as Lethem's character. Emshwiller was one of the first artists to embrace computer animation and test it's capabilites, a true science fiction-minded artist. He was also married to celebrated New Wave SF writer Carol Emshwiller who is said to have been the model for all the cover females he painted.

Anyways, thats about all I know about that. I do enjoy his videos though, Sunstone is my favorite.

Thanatopsis:


Sunstone;


Crossings And Meetings

The New Wave

FK + JMC

Dearest Max, my last request: Everything I leave behind me (in my bookcase, linen-cupboard, and my desk both at home and in the office, or anywhere else where anything may have got to and meet your eyes), in the way of diaries, manuscripts, letters (my own and others'), sketches, and so on, to be burned unread; also all writings and sketches which you or others may possess; and ask those other for them in my name. Letters which they do not want to hand over to you, they should at least promise faithfully to burn themselves.

Yours,

Franz Kafka


Okay, I can't really make these things connected, but this is my post, Kafka's death letter, and The Jesus and Mary Chain covering My Girl.

The Jesus And Mary Chain - My Girl

Songs For The Open Road

The Breeders - Forced To Drive

Sleater-Kinney - Jumpers

Tomorrow me and some friends are going out west because Tom Waits and The Marx Brothers told us to. And also to pack 4 1/2 years worth of collegiate memories/crap into a Uhaul and U-haul it from Boulder, CO to Madison, WI. *Sigh* I’ll be spending the next week sharing drunken hugs and sloppy goodbyes with my Bitchin' Boulder Buddies, extending “I’ll never forget you man”’s and taking one last look at the Rockies through retinas blurred with tears and marijuana smoke. And blood. Lots of blood.

But, as important as the destination of course, is the road trip itself. Nothing’s better for the spirit and psyche than soaring like a bloated gas-powered eagle through America’s majestic amber waves of grain.

Here, in honor of Eisenhower’s empire of snaking pavement and America’s promise of westward consumption, are two great road trip songs (which I will not be listening to tomorrow), both for and about driving.

You drive for days and it just keeps being America.......

Random Post #1

Numbers - The Fuck You Garage

The God Damn Doo Wop Band - Don’t Forget Me

In the spirit of blog-tivity, I’m gonna upload some stuff that I’ve been looking for an excuse to post for months. Our blog is pretty random as it is, but I feel we’ve always had a certain order and topicality to our randomness which I liked (because it kept me sane). Well, that order and sanity dies here, within the confines of this post. It’s like anarchy, except way less sexy (like a riot at the chess club, or an orgy at a Star Trek convention).

The randomness begins with the above still which is, yes, Vincent Price holding a homemade stake, after a hard day of zombie-vampire slaughter. It’s from AIP (an independent studio specializing in B-movies, from back in the days of drive-ins and Hollywood vertical integration)’s 1964 post-apocalyptic horror flick, The Last Man on Earth (which The Omega Man was later based on). It has absolutely nothing to do with the songs that follow. (Thanks to Brain’s Drive In Theater for the still).

The first of which is by California’s post-pop outfit Numbers (named after a term from Yevgeny Zamyatin’s seminal Soviet Sci-FI novel, We, which Huxley claimed to have ripped off for Brave New World). A reference completely fitting for a band who, with their mechanical melodies and unmodulated yelling, find a way to bring human emotion/expression to a boiling point by confining it within an ultra-restrictive musical framework. The track is off their 3rd and most recent LP, ‘05’s We’re Animals. If you need anymore info about the band, this single sentence from their website’s bio should answer any and all possible questions: “Indra Dunis plays the drums of eternal liberty and sings upon the wind, Eric Landmark plays the keyboards of undying devotion to true personal freedom and Dave Broekema plays the guitar of 1000 mighty naked rayguns.” More downloads available at their website as well.

The second track is by Minneapolis’s The God Damn Doo Woop Band. I uploaded a song by them a few months ago in my Halloween post, and interestingly enough, our site gets more hits due to that song than because of any other band we’ve posted. Since the original link is dead (obviously, since we were the recipient of the very esteemed 2006 Grant Miller Drysdale Award for most broken links), and since the intra-net is all about democracy, I thought I’d give the public what they want. You can listen to two more tracks off their debut Broken Hearts, at their myspace page.

Since we are the cyber-queens of broken links, if you ever want anything relinked, just let us know in the comments and we’ll be more than happy to la-la-la-la-la-la-la-link it.

World Mix Tape vol. VI

OK, the time has definitely come for my contribution to the World Mix tape, it's way overdue, especially since I'm the only one of us who's actually from the World, in the World music sense.

Well actually, ok, my parents are from the World, and I'm born in the twililght zone which is Sweden. Music from here is still " Swedish Music" and not plain "music", even for us. Be that as is may, it is still not exotic enough for this post. Accordning to Wikipedia, it has to be non- western, or non western-influenced. Now,music like that is pretty hard to come by, and I'm too lazy to be a purist. Always.

I'm going to post 2 songs by 2 of Egypt's finest artists.

Ali Hassan Kuban- Mabrouk Wo Arisna

This guy is really cool, and this song is about congratulating the bride. It is not about my subway stop here in Stockholm called Rissne. After my initial disapointment I learned to love it anyways.

Amr Diab

I don't know the name of this song, on my iPod it's just amrdiab05, so the name will remain a mystery for ever and ever. This is one of the happiest songs ever recorded, but it still keeps it's edge with it's ripping Santana-ish solo somewhere in the middle. Just kidding. There's no edge, just pure egyptian chest-shaking happiness.

I want to finish off with also posting a song by Nancy (Nency) Ajram, Egypt's Coca Cola-promoting superstar diva.

Nancy Ajram- Oul Tani Eih

This is not a good song. BUT, it starts with this Bruce Haacke sort of robot-voice saying " Nancy------I love you, Nancy-------I love you, NancyIloveyou". And that, my friends, is priceless.

World Mix Tape Vol. V

Dada Swing - Oversize

Boredoms - Synthesizer Guide Book on Fire

Manu Chao - La Chinita

Transmissions From Wintermute’s week of volcanic blog-tivity continues with the 5th installment of the ohmygodimmike world mix tape (thanks to OMGIMike’s kind willingness to extend tape mixing duties to his co-bloggers). Put them all together on one CD (along with Laz’s hopefully upcoming contribution) and be the hit of the bakesale!

The first track is by Italian “yes” wave post-punkers Dada Swing, who describe their sound as "italiano-"yes"wave-electro-punk-pop-twitch-attack!" I love the idea that nowave and noise rock doesn’t have to be gloomy or negative, but can in fact be cheerful, even cute, without sacrificing any of its disturbing or confrontational sound or sonic experimentation. According to them, “They don't wanna learn to play music correctly even if, by playing, it gets harder and harder not to learn. They did it. Till today!”

Dada Swing recently finished recording their new album Grand Hotel, and are currently looking for a label to distribute it. Oversize is off an Art Rocker compilation, but you can listen to tracks off their first LP Cut, Cut, Cut... and their two most recent splits on their myspace page.

The next track is by one of my all time favorite bands, Japan’s Boredoms. They’ve changed their sound a lot over the 2+ decades since their formation (and have pioneered a sound that was from the beginning pretty impossible to nail down), but this song is one of the more, er, relaxed cuts from the 1995 album Chocolate Synthesizer. I’m not gonna say any more about them because there’s a fuckload of stuff on Boredoms out there in the vast stretches of the intra-net, written by people far more knowledgeable than me. For example, This Site, which is a good place to start mainly because it has links to a zillion other Boredoms’ sites.

The 3rd and final track is by politically minded songwriter Manu Chao, who currently resides in Paris (but as a general nomad, born to Spanish parents, has spent time all over the globe, bringing many diverse cultural and geographic sounds into his music and singing in French, Spanish, Arabic, Galician, Portuguese, English, and Wolof, sometimes within the same song). This is a lovely little track off of 2001’s Proxima Estacion: Esperanza, the follow up to his solo debut Clandestino.

World Mix Tape Vol. 4

Time for my continuation of our mix tape project consisting only of songs falling into the rigid category of those made in this one world. Part of the projects aim is to change people's hippified perception of world music (ie. not just african drum circles and sitar music). Hippys have become a large force in our society today, and as much of a negative influence they may have at times, I'm totally jealous of this guy.
I've tried to pick three songs that have a geographical seperation although they were all recorded in the same 10 year period. I hope these choice morsels are to your liking.

Howling Bells - This City's Burning

This Australian band's debut was one of the '06 crop. Among my favorites of the year, I guess they never really made my official top new artists. Not many Australin artists make the cut for me, especially those non-crazy rock ones (ie. The Vines and ACDC). I remember in my history of rock class at Southern Cross University down under, they felt the need to throw in an Aussie band with each genre we covered. Their contributions can basically be summed up as: "basically the same but with more crazy yelling." As a welcome breath of fresh air defying my unjust expectations, this band's sound is a synthesis of country sounds and pop with a shoe-gazer flourish. Anyways I love it, yet another great song about fire made in the last couple years.

Marušić is Trio - Taranjkanje

My favorite artist working right now in the Croatian tradition of Istra music. Dario Marušić is somewhat of a cultural leader in the region coordinating with many artists and organizing educational programs to keep awareness of the Istra tradition, as well making traditional intruments. A songwriter and a multi-instrumentalist Dario Marušić's sound in a way reminds me of a Leonard Cohen type figure.

Lo'Jo + Django - Jah Kas Cool Boy

This song hails from my latest CD purchase Festival In The Desert which is a highlights CD of said festival organized by Robert Plant of Led Zeppelin fame, which is basically what he's been up to in recent years. The song is in the Malian musical tradition but Lo'Jo, from France, is composed mostly of ethnically curious white euro-trash. They became friends with Malian singer-songwriter Django while helping to organize the first Festival In The Desert in 1998. This collaboration track brings together the voices of most musicians involved, and supposedly contains references to a few members of Tinariwen.

3 Good Songs released in the last 12 Months

These are all pictures from Iraq. Those are the more tasteful ones; don't click here unless you have the stomach for it. I wanted to put together this collage to give Americans an image of what our media isn't showing. Although the website I got these from sucks and probably shouldn't exist in the way it does, the power of the internet can't and musn't be stopped.

2006 left a residue of violence in the minds of many and my contribution to the best of 2006 mixtape will hopefully act accordingly.

Sex and/or rape can be used as a metaphor for power. It gives some people (Bush) an erection that must be brought to ejaculation and usually leaves the sexually abused (Iraq) a feeling of dryness, dissatisfaction and horror that five minutes of being brutally raped will imprint on someone directly or indirectly for the rest of his/her life. So in other words we can pull out now and Iraqi's and the rest of the middle east will still hate us for the rest of time; there's nothing anyone can do to fix this. Not dems, not republicans, not greens. It is FUBAR.

This Brazilian girls song conveys that metaphor well.

Brazilian Girls - Never Met a German

The next song has nothing to do with destructive libidos but a good song even though. This song makes me long to backpack Europe again, and drink wine in terraces outside with fellow backpackers, who although I've never met, instantly become like-minded companions so far from home. Beirut is our diplomat to the rest of the world. They are cultured, likable and worldly; maybe even otherworldly. Though I still think they are more indie rock than eastern European.

Beirut - Elephant Gun

The next song is from the Electric Gypsyland 2 album I posted a song from a while back. Buscemi is a Belgian DJ who normally mixes Brazilian dance and gives Kocani Orkestar a loungy exotic feel.

Buscemi vs Kocani Orkestar - Alone At My Wedding

Mazur's Best-of '06 list

As stated below, due to many internal and external complications, Transmissions From Wintermute went un-updated for over 2 weeks. That is totally uncool and we apologize for said uncoolness. Here, almost 2 weeks into the new year, is my belated 1/4 of Transmissions From Wintermute’s Official Best-of ‘06 Mix Tape. Offered to you as an anthropological artifact, from the dark times of 2006, is the post I wrote on Dec. 22nd:

I’m currently trapped in the middle of that blizzard that’s enveloped Colorado and much of America. You may have heard about it on TV. I’m suppose to graduate from the University of Colorado today, but it was uncertain weather (get it!) the film department’s ceremony was even gonna be held anymore, although it doesn’t really matter since half of my family is trapped in the midwest. It’s cool thought because it’s given me a chance to do some last minute college (and therefore justified) drinking, and find the peace to meditate on the important things in life, like the best songs of 2006.

I completely agree with our pirate captian DJ’s philosophy on How I Learned...’s concise three song best year lists; rather than bogging you down with boastful over saturation, we each give you 3 or 4 great songs, at least one of which is guaranteed to rock your sox off cowboy style.

Liars - Drum and the Uncomfortable Can

As I have said twice before on our site, Liars are one of the best new bands around and Drums Not Dead is hands down my favorite album from 2006. And then there’s this song, so dark and so sexy. You can listen to the whole album, and watch the videos for it HERE.

Sonic Youth - Incinerate

I was hesitant to put this on, because Rather Ripped, even though I definitely like it, really isn’t that great of an album. At least for me, the stripped down garage rock sound didn’t compare to the lovingly woven noise melodies of '02's Murray Street or even parts of Sonic Nurse, but I suppose that’s all a matter of taste. This song really does it for me though. Its nice to hear these old school noise rockers cut through all the pop cultural bullshit of ‘06 with a straight-up beautiful and heart lifting anthem.

Awesome Snakes - Shut Up

I know this is totally fucked up, but I actually don’t own any Awesome Snakes (because as of now, you can’t find their debut, Venom outside of the Midwest, and the website is sold out), so the above Title is a link to their myspace page where you can listen to Shut Up and 3 more Awesome songs (one with Minneapolis rapper P.O.S). This is the work of Annie Awesome and Danny Snakes, half of Minnesota's punk 4-some The Soviettes. One of the reasons I chose this is because of the prevalence of 2 person bands these days. Usually it just sounds like half a band to me, but for some reason the Snakes’ brand of booze-soaked bar room riffing makes only having bass and drums sound like an advantage.


And now, a look towards the Future:
Even though I still haven’t come close to wrapping my brain around the musical landscape of ‘06, here are a couple tracks off some of the upcoming ‘07 albums I’m most excited about.

Deerhoof - +81

The new album, called Friend Opportunity will hit stores on Jan. 23rd. You can read more about the album and their upcoming tour HERE, as well as listen to unreleased tracks off Deerhoof’s masterpiece Reveille.

Burial of an Era - In Light of Consuming Darkness

Madison death metal gods Burial of an Era have finally finished mixing their long-awaited first LP The Remains of Judgment. Once out, you’ll be able to buy it off their website. Thanks to a Midwestern leak, Transmissions From Wintermute gives you a sneak peak unavailable anywhere else on the intra-net. Hoo-ray! You can also listen to their 2004 EP HERE.

WE'RE BACK, JACK

Hello world. Due to blizzards, ezarchive malfunctions, life and geographic rearrangements, and Gen. Sloth, Transmissions From Wintermute has been in stasis for over a week now. We wholeheatedly appologize to our three devoted readers for the cataclysmic loss of our blog in your life.

To help re-esteablish our once glorious readership, here are a string of vulgar words as search engine bait: assbucket, sluthole, trough, young boys, upskirt shots, basket, Brittney Spears, syrupy flap jacks, Mark Foley sex tape, Dr.PhilCocainHookersRage, fuck-spaces, astronaut porno-ago-go, clown snuff, Grant Miller naked, sluts on a bus, bucket, slut-trough, Cannibal Holocaust, crumbum, glory-hole golfing, buckets, donky punch, Paul Reiser, assbasket.

To make up for our irresponsible absence, in the next week our blog will explode with a shitstorm of volcanic blog-tivitiy as never before beheld by human/robot-hybrid eyes, including the long awaited conclusions to our Best of '06 Mix Tape, Mazur’s best of film school list, and ohmygodimmike´s world mix tape.

In honor of us all being in the same room (and same town) together for the first time since the birth of How I Learned..., here, as never before in the history of the intra-net are pictures of us, and the food we ate today.









Here’s a song, by our collective favorite band, hailing our glorious return to your life.

Just Friends - Screamin' Cyn Cyn and the Pons

-DJ, Laz, Mazur, ohmygodimmike

P.S. Correctly link the picture to the plate of food, or correct blogger identity, and win a signed print by Laz, or a signed DVD of one of Mazur’s films.

Now we’re all gonna go out and get wasted together, before Laz’ flight back to Stockholm.