Rubin Recommends

(Part of The Weekly Check In series)

Here is the Weekly Check In with Mark Harrison. It’s probably one of the longest ones ever.

Mark plays many instruments in the band Capybara (who I’ve talked about a lot lately and if you haven’t listened yet, you should right now.) He lives in Kansas City, MO and he’s a very talented guy. I recently got to meet him in person when Capybara played in San Francisco last week and it was great. How good is that photo of him?

(Here’s a video of the first song of their show in SF shot terribly on my digital camera)

Find out more about them at http://capybaramusic.com and here’s a new video they just put up yesterday.

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

Harrison: Excitement is weird.  Being on my first tour with our band Capybara for the past 8 weeks – booking, managing, and performing – provides confusing amounts of excitement.  As I stop momentarily to search for instances of this one feeling, I am conflicted.  Every day provides exciting new challenges, and when I speak about my life on the road to friends, family, and strangers, I hear excitement in my voice that contrasts my old routine, working a 40 or 60 or 70 hour a week job in NYC, and I know: My life is exciting.  But as I sit here at 4:17, surrounded by 8 timid cats in the living room of an acquaintance’s house in Pasadena, CA with Gattaca playing as a soundtrack to this e-mail, and this is the first time this week I have been able to sit down to collect my thoughts, I am definitely caught off guard by this question.

Opportunity brings excitement, and tour equals constant opportunity.  Tourpportunity.  Therefore, I am full of excitement, excitement is my life, and I smile.  A lot, everyday.

Between recording in the beautiful mountains of Taos, NM, releasing our debut album Try Brother, establishing relationships with friends like The Record Machine, Mushpot, and Team Clermont to help broaden our base of support, traveling with Range Life Entertainment’s amazing films, playing in old funeral homes, waffle carts, and potluck parties live-on-air in the middle of a forest, or staying up all night to get on the Price is Right, my mind still wanders to what is next for Capybara.  And I can’t wait to see what happens – more music, more friends, more opportunities to learn about music as a career, the list goes on.  And yeah, I am excited.

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(Part of The Weekly Check In series)

Ladies and Gentlemen I’d like to introduce you to Zac Little.

Zac sings and plays instruments in the band Saintseneca who I just had the honor (with the help of Kurt Lane) of releasing their new 4 song 7″ / digital EP which is out now on Paper Brigade. Zac lives in Columbus, OH and I hope to someday hang out with the talented awesome guy since we’ve known each other for a few months now. Here’s a little check in with him where he talks about the recent tour, new record, and more.

You can listen to more Saintseneca at Myspace, check out the new record at Paper Brigade and read their tour blog here.

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

Little: I can’t tell you how excited I am about the release of this 7″. It’s been quite the process from beginning to end, and when you take into account the time we’ve spent writing and recording the songs, it’s probably taken more up more of my time in the past year than anything else. That moment when we opened the box of records and then sat on the couch and listened to them was like magic.

I’ve also been working on some other things like designing and screen printing some posters for the 7″ release show. Saintseneca is playing this little festival called DIT (do it together) fest, Grace and I have been working on making t-shirts with a pocket in the shape of Ohio to sell.

I also just finished moving, which I’m very excited about. I now live in a house with 11 people, which is awesome. Before, I was living alone. You can’t play hide and seek alone in a small apartment. Well you could, but it would suck. We’ve already had a good round of lights out hide and seek here.

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(Part of The Weekly Check In series)

photo by: Chrissy Piper

I’ve been going to Needles and Pens store/gallery for the last 5 years or so stopping by when I’d visit SF to always pick up a copy of Cometbus. Since moving here I’ve gone in for their art shows and to dream about buying everything they carry.

I’m glad I finally met Andrew M Scott, the man behind the store Needles And Pens, as well as being a photographer, writer and curator. He’s done work for Maximum RocknRoll, Punk Planet, Hot & Cold, his own zine “Sob Story?” and many more. Keep up with him at http://www.amscott.org/blackhole.

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

Scott: I just finished writing an essay for the very last issue of Chris Duncan & Griffin McPartland’s Hot & Cold zine. Also, and I’m working on finishing up a 2010 poster/calendar of my half-frame photos.  …Here’s a blog about the last one I did over at Fecalface.

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(Part of The Weekly Check In series)

I first discovered Nicole’s work through a link from the awesome Kate Bingaman-Burt. Just last week I was lucky enough to have the covers for the record I am releasing printed at the amazing Pinball Publishing in Portland and noticed Nicole worked there. So I had to do a check in with her.

I posted about her design work last week and you can view more of her work at http://www.makingstuffanddoingthings.com. I want everything she makes.

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

Lavelle: This summer is so full of projects, I don’t even know where to start! I just wrapped up a collaborative zine with my friend Will Bryant, called Where We Don’t Live, as well as a solo zine about the beauty of summer in the American West. They’re both releases from a experimental creative and curatorial imprint I recently launched called This Place Projects, which is to support and explore location-based artmaking. I recently acquired a letterpress, so I’m excited to get that up and running. Lots of printmaking projects to come!

I was also recently hired at Pinball Publishing, and am so excited to be a part of their team. Creative offset printing, friendly people, cool projects; it really helps me as a designer to understand the ins and outs of the printing process. We’re working on Scout Books, custom pocket notebooks and our newest exciting Pinball project!

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(Part of The Weekly Check In series)

I just want to start out with saying that Brandon Brown and I share a birthday. It gives us something that no other friend and I can share AND we live in the same neighborhood in San Francisco.

I met Brandon Brown in Kansas City around 1995 or 96. He did a zine I loved called “Dee Dee’s Kids” and a few others. He’s an amazing writer and if you read this check in you’re about to get a good little guide to music jams, as well as food and drinks in San Francisco.

http://brandonbrown.blogspot.com (and the other links he mentions below)

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

Brown: It’s been a pretty busy and productive late summer and fall. One thing that’s winding down for me is the (New) Reading Series at 21 Grand (http://newyipes.blogsppot.com), a series I co-curated with Alli Warren at 21 Grand gallery in Oakland. I had a terrific time doing it, and we were able to invite some of my favorite writers from around the country to come and read for a pittance (or less). I’m taking a little break from curating, but am planning on releasing two new chapbooks this fall from my small imprint OMG! (http://omgpress.blogspot.com).

At home, I’ve been working on a translation of the Roman poet Catullus, writing a collection of pervy lyric works, and mostly preparing for a performance and hullaballoo in September at Small Press Traffic @ California College of Art. I’m also writing a collaborative novel with local poet Suzanne Stein.

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(Part of The Weekly Check In series)

I’ve never met Jessica Hopper in person (a lot of friend of a friend) but if you were into music in the scene I was, her name or her zine Hit It Or Quit It was often around.

Jessica Hopper is an author/journalist and just released her new book The Girls’ Guide to Rocking, which she’s now on tour doing readings from currently. She regularly writes for The Chicago Reader, Chicago Tribune and LA Weekly and also does music supervision for one of my favorite shows, This American Life. I’m so glad we’re in touch now.

You can find out more by reading her blog at http://tiny.abstractdynamics.org and keeping up with her on Twitter.

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

Hopper: I just finished sleeping for nine hours straight and I am totally excited by that. I have been on tour for the last week and haven’t slept more than four hours a night due to six a.m. flights. I didn’t have to work at it though. Other than my book and subsequent tour, I am excited about this long piece I just wrote for Chicago Reader about David Bazan and following him around the Christian music festival, Cornerstone, which he just played, despite now being agnostic. He and his record, the new one about to come out, are just brilliance. We are lucky we have music is so smart.

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(Part of The Weekly Check In series)

I’ve been in touch with photographer Pat Graham for many years. I think it all started with the feature I did on him back in the Paper Brigade days. I don’t remember how I found him but he was shooting tons of bands I was into at the time. Now Pat Graham is on tour with Modest Mouse photographing them daily, releasing photozines, and working on other photo projects. He’s an awesome guy and fun to keep up with.

Learn and see more at http://www.patgraham.org.
Check out the Modest Mouse photoblog here.

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

Graham: I Just finished working on the second of my Modest Mouse photozine series I teamed up with RAEN optics/Libre Design to create an old school punk photozine with modern standards. They are like mini books. The zines represent what I like best music and photography. I used to love the old tour books you could buy way back in the day. My first was Iron Maiden in 1982.  All the zines have captions/stories about the places and photos. I really dig Wim Wenders book Once, the zines I would hope have that feel. Me and Isaac first bonded over a photo project back in 1992, I’m really happy to be working with him again on photo stuff. He has a great eye himself and really knows how to edit my work.

I’m now working on number three. this one is tapping my archive of Polaroids going back to 1997. This was the first Modest Mouse tour and my first as well. Since then I have been documenting the band. This has been a incredible journey that started out with 4 guys in a van…now its 18 guys and two buses. I tend to take a polaroid everyday when I’m on tour doing this I now have hundreds. It has been really exciting to go back and pull the best of this collection.

I’m also deep into my second book which is going to be called Instrument. Being a music photographer I have always been into the instruments that people have. I always tried to make a point in my live photos to get as much instrument in the shot as possible. I started shooting abstracts of instruments back in 96 as a side project. Around 1999 I did a feature on Ian Mackaye for guitar world and spent a lot of time shooting his cream SG. The shot ended up in my first book Silent Pictures, and seemed to get a lot of attention. Johnny Marr was really into it and i ended up shooting his Jaguar on stage of the Grand Ole Opry. This kicked off me getting more focused on the project. Currently I have around 30 done: they include: Ian Curtis (Joy Division), Flaming Lips, REM,The Shins etc, etc I will be shootin a ton this summer while on the road with Modest Mouse. (see info in next question)

Rubin: Where have you traveled so far this month?

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(Part of The Weekly Check In series)

Heather and I grew up in the same suburb of Kansas City, but didn’t really become friends until we both moved to Lawrence. Since then we’ve gone to Las Vegas and Barcelona together and now live around the corner from each other in Brooklyn. She’s got great taste in pretty much everything and is basically a very classy lady. If you’re going to go on vacation I definitely recommend inviting Heather. She now works as studio director at Acne in New York.

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

Neuburger: I just started my own blog, brownpapercake , it’s totally random shit that I am inspired by, but it’s main focus is my musings about fashion. Gosh, I am turning into such a geek.

Lane: Where have you traveled so far this month?

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(Part of The Weekly Check In series)

The first Weekly Check In by Kurt Lane.

I met Sharan while in high school and we’ve kept in touch over the years. I called her up when I moved to New York last fall and she immediately gave me a job at a record store that was about to go out of business. It pays (in cash and just above minimum wage) to know people! In addition to her awesomely elaborate listening habits she’s a drummer and composer of note. She also knows more about delicious beers than I could ever hope to. Basically, the perfect person to hang out with.

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

Singh: I’m presently working for Waxpoetics on an archiving project of the label Fania (and its subsidiary labels) down in Miami, Florida. It’s been a fascinating excavation of the true gems of Latin music, mostly from the ’60s and ’70s. Uncovering relics like master tapes, test pressings, photos, film, and press kits from musicians I have long admired has been an unbelievable experience.

Lane: Where have you traveled so far this month?

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(Part of The Weekly Check In series)

I found out about Hilary Pecis’s work because of the CCA Grad program here in San Francisco. I really liked her work and have been following ever since. She just did the album cover for the new Deastro: Moondagger record that came out a few weeks ago, has a solo show up, with more on the way.

Learn more by visiting her website at http://hilarypecis.com.

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

Pecis: I currently have a solo show up at Triple Base Gallery in San Francisco on 24th st. I will have work in a group exhibitions On June 27th at Catherine Clark Gallery in SF and then on July 9th at Morgan Lehman Gallery in New York City. I just finished the MFA program at CCA, and am kinda just looking forward to holing up in my studio and making some super secret work without having to explain it to my teachers or my peers. Grad school was wonderful, but I think it is time for some artistic freedom, experimentation and personal research.

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