Rubin Recommends

(Part of The Weekly Check In series)

JIm Bauer is the art director / team manager at Odyssey BMX. He travels a lot and is always building SOMETHING out of something. He will someday build me a super bike and I look forward to that…

Meeting Jim was probably one of the best happy accident friend meetings I have had in Los Angeles or ever. I shot a photo of Michael Ardelean for DIG BMX. The week after Mike was in my neighborhood and wanted to get food with his friend and me. Cue Jim B. (that ended up living 4 houses up from me.) That’s the good stuff ladies and gentleman. Best dude ever.

(side note: Check out this interview about Bauer’s Death Gap. Really awesome pictures of it too.)

RR: What are you currently working on or just finished that you’re excited about?

Bauer: We just sold out our latest feature length video, Odyssey Electronical, and I am really excited about that. In this day and age, selling DVD’s is nearly impossible, but we still put 100% into this one and it shows. We never thought we would sell through the copies we had, not to mention sell out so fast and need to re-order. The summer is approaching which means full tilt catalog mode. We have some really good ideas this year, so we may have an award winning piece again.

RR: Where have you traveled so far this month?

Bauer: I just returned from Sao Paolo/Bahia, Brazil. I went for the Brasil X Games, and a little vacation with the lady. Lots of beach, pool and sleeping. very relaxing.

RR: What’s your favorite music right now?

Bauer: Throw me the Statue, The Bronx, and Dethclok have been getting heavy rotation.

RR: Best food you’ve had in your neighborhood lately or while you were traveling?

Bauer: Well the worst food I have had while traveling was a pepperoni pizza I shared with Sharon. She got food poisoning from it all day after, hence eating nothing, recovering quickly. My body miraculously held off the poison for 20 hrs, letting me eat 2 or 3 meals filling the stomach for a potential bomb. Right before the 10hr, overnight flight I got sick. The first vomit explosion was on the plane and I FILLED up a air sickness bag. Have you ever seen anyone use one of those? Have you ever seen one filled? Have you ever had a shrimp come out of your nose? No? You are lucky.

Best food was the Strawberry/Banana Jamba Juice I had after I finally arrived home in LA. It tasted like heaven.

RR: Anything Else You Want To Mention?

Bauer: I’m really sad Rubin will be moving to SF. Hopefully he doesn’t start recommending hemp shirts, tevas, and bongs.

(Part of The Weekly Check In series)

I met Eric through his work at Creative Commons which led me getting to see Kool Keith open up for Spoon one night, which was pretty amazing. Also Eric can be found rapping, hosting internet talk shows, and writing for Wired Magazine.

RR: What are you currently working on or just finished that you’re excited about?

Steuer: My band, Meanest Man Contest, has new music out on Gold Robot, RCRD LBL, and Plug Research. My partners in Sneakmove and I are about to issue our third Minicomp 7inch, which was compiled by our pal Bomarr and features ten short tracks from acts like Tunng, Copy, and Broken Spindles. As part of my job at Creative Commons, I’m working with the guys from Dublab on a remixable art and music exhibition called “Into Infinity,” which is set to launch at the end of the summer.

RR: Where have you traveled so far this month?

Steuer: I don’t know if a drive 90 miles away to Temecula counts as travel, but I was there a couple of weeks ago. Unfortunately, I had to have an emergency appendectomy within a few hours of getting into town, so the majority of my trip was spent in the hospital.

Then I was in New York last week for the Tribeca Film Festival to be on a panel about copyright issues for filmmakers. I was really excited to see Larry King taking a morning walk on 5th Avenue. I guess because you don’t really get that kind of celeb sighting in LA.

RR: What’s your favorite music right now?

Steuer: Some of my favorite recent stuff is from James Pants, Sa-Ra, The Glitch Mob, MGMT, and Bill Callahan. I can’t stop watching the video for The Bird and the Bee’s amazing “Polite Dance Song.” Dublab’s web radio stream is always awesome. My friend Noah turned me on to two blogs – Loronix and Hippy-DJKit – that consistently post amazing music. I’ve also been buying ’70s and ’80s country music compilations from Amoeba’s clearance bin and have found out about a lot of good songs that way.

RR: Best food you’ve had in your neighborhood lately or while you were traveling?

Steuer: Mom’s Specialty Foods at the Hollywood and Silverlake farmers’ markets has great hummus, olives, and cucumber salad. And the guy who runs it is super nice.

RR: Anything Else You Want To Mention?

Steuer: Peace to my WESHfriends!