Can you hear me now?

2009-10-09 (Babies for Sale)

I had a dream recently. In it I was yelling. I was tired of not being heard. So the solution I came up with was to firm up and speak louder. Eventually I'd become hysterical. It must have been weighing down on me for some time. The energy had built up and once it had been given the chance to break free it let loose and I couldn't control it.

Then there was a moment of silence. I'd gotten dream knowledge that who I was yelling at was no longer who I was yelling at. Though the person still looked the same their character changed. I believe I was now yelling at myself. Maybe it was me who I was intending to yell at all along. It was me who was stubborn. It was me who'd get an idea in his head and run the length of the world. It was me who wouldn't listen. I want to think of myself as being able to hear people. And I once did.

But now I'm not sure of myself.

This set had a different order before the show. Right before it started, however, delight and I decided we'd do something different and play what we'd pulled at random.

Some transitions can be jarring.

Hopefully you'll still be able to hear the music.

2009-10-09 (Babies for Sale)



Tracklisting:

1	The Hold Steady	Positive Jam	Almost Killed Me
1	Sondre Lerche	Good Luck	Heartbeat Radio		*new arrival
8	Corb Lund	The Truth Comes Out	Hair In My Eyes Like A Highland Steer
1	Capybara	The Wimp	Thy Brother		*new arrival
-----------------------------air break-----------------------------
4	Gogol Bordello	Alcohol	Live From Axis Mundi		*new arrival
4	Super Junky Monkey	Parasitic People	Parasitic People
3	Juni Jarvi	i've never known what never means and i'll never understand what forever is	Whatever Thou Art
7	The Mae Shi	Hieronymus Bosch Is A Dead Man
-----------------------------air break-----------------------------
7	Kathy McCarthy	Rocket Ship	Sorry Entertainer
4	Jordan O'Jordan	No Princely Frog	Carbon Cycles		*new arrival
3	Okie Dokie	Capitol Glad Passion	Okie Dokie		*new arrival
5	FSK	I Want Out Of The Circus	International
1	X-Ray Spex	Cigarettes	Concious Consumer
-----------------------------air break-----------------------------
4	Detroit7	Mahoutsukai Sally	Great Romantic
6	Girlyman	Maori	Remember Who I Am
7	Jorane	Roll The Stars	the You and the Now
7	Melt-Banana	Key Is A Fact That A Cat Brings	cell-scape
-----------------------------air break-----------------------------
1	Vic Chestnutt	Coward	At The Cut		*new arrival
6	Sparta Locals	Peace (Remix)	SUN SUN SUN
18	Robbie Fulks	I Like Being Left Alone	Revenge
6	My Little Pony	The Sunshine Goodtime Song	Think Too Much		*new arrival
3	GO!GO!7188	Manatsu no Dancehall	569
-----------------------------air break-----------------------------
1	The Slits	Love and Romance	The Peel Sessions
3	Elliott Brood	Write It All Down For you	Mountain Meadows		*new arrival
2	Bad Veins	Gold and Warm	Bad Veins		*new arrival
10	Melchoir, Dan und Das Menace	Folksinger	Obscurred By Fuzz		*new arrival
4	The Wynona Riders	Corrupted To Hell	Artificial Intelligence
-----------------------------air break-----------------------------
1	The 50 Kaitenz	1..2..3..4!	1..2..3..4!

"But real weakness is as rare as real strength"

2009-10-02 (Babies for Sale)

This was a hard show to face. The first twenty minutes are me dropping one ball after another. One turntable was set to 45 so I played a few records at the wrong speed. During that time I also turned a turntable off as it was playing on air. The sound board doesn't turn the turntables off (it'll turn it on, though!). So when you're going from one song to the next you have to make sure you either bring the volume knob connected to that specific turntable all the way down before the next song on the record plays (as we have 3 in the studio) or hit the off button for that volume knob altogether and then fade in the next record with its corresponding volume knob. So it's pretty common to see turntables spinning but not playing anything on air. You just get up and turn it off yourself and cue up the next record. Obviously that wasn't the case for this record.

It all started when delight and I got to the station and the DJs before us told us an EAS test was scheduled during out time slot. We'd been given an overview of how to run one at the live training session a few weeks prior. Of course we just nod our heads and say yeah and expect it to never happen. Then it does and we're scrambling trying to remember how to run it correctly. So now we're going back and forth looking through manuals posted on the walls in different rooms. We're making sure that none of the buttons we're pushing is turning the whole station off and that we're logging it properly. It was recommended that we do it during a long song to try and hide that annoying buzzer sound it gives off so I rearranged the set and put the Jazz tracks up first. It always breaks my heart a little when I have to rearrange the set list for the night as I usually spend a great deal of time thinking about the oder of the songs.

So all this is going on as I'm also trying to make sure records are still spinning and I'm entering what's just been played onto the website playlist. There's also something hectic about the first 15 minutes of every show. Even now I still feel a little rushed to get to from task to task at the beginning. So this night's was a Halloween night's worth of sugar rush. It wasn't until Mingus was on that I could sit and listen to what was being played and it was off. It was just a tad high and the rhythm wasn't right. I looked over at the turntable and I saw the light flashing for 45. My face dropped. I'd been playing records at the wrong speed.

That ate at me. I couldn't stop thinking about how awkward the music must have sounded. I was no longer listening to anything that was being played. I wasn't paying attention to cuing records. So we play some more songs and I'm still out of it and in that daze I turn one off as it's playing on air. Throw a few more bricks on my chest these aren't heavy enough.

Back when I first started DJing at KDVS I used to listen to every show the next day and see how the mixing was and how we could improve on back rapping songs and talking on air in general. This one for whatever reason I don't remember listening to at all. So listening to it for the first time was a bit of a shock. I listened to that first 20 minutes over and over. I beat myself up for it. Why did I make those mistakes?

Soon it led to me seeing that this was a common occurrence in my life. I'm too rigid. I like to plan every little step but my plans have no room for error. That means when something does go wrong I'm thrown for a loop and I panic and it all goes bad. I'm horrible at improvising.

Finally, I gave in. After giving it a day of real thought the common theme is pressure. I put too much of it on myself. Especially on things that are no longer in my control. I'd already made the mistakes. Then I kept thinking about them and ended up making more. And I spiraled.

The reality is that it's not that big of a deal. I just play music. There's no need to get bent. Especially when it comes to music. Music is fluid and harmonious. I should be music. Ironically, if I just played music the show goes off without a hitch.

Just see the other hour and a half.


2009-10-02 (Babies for Sale)



Tracklisting:

3	Grant Green	Django	Idle Moments
10	Lee Morgan	The Stroker	The Procrastinator
6	Azymuth	Broken Key	Tight Rope Walker
-----------------------------air break-----------------------------
3	Charles Mingus	Group Dancers	The Black Saint And The Sinner Lady
1	Art Blakey & The Jazz Messangers	Backstage Sally	Buhaina's Delight
3	The Ornette Coleman Quartet	T & T	Ornette
1	Pharoah Sanders	High Life	Wisdom Through Music
-----------------------------air break-----------------------------
1	Blank Blue	Sonic What?!	White		*new arrival
3	Kofy Brown	My Own Time	Soul Rock		*new arrival
5	Jill Scott	He Loves Me	He Loves Me (Lyzel In E Flat)		*new arrival
2	Nino Moschella	Sleep	Boomshadow		*new arrival
-----------------------------air break-----------------------------
6	Sharon Jones	100 Days 100 Nights	100 Days 100 Nights
2	Maya Azucena	Right Away	Maya Who?!
13	Breakstra	Joyful Noise	Dusk Till Dawn		*new arrival
3	Wee	Put It In Real Good	You Can Fly My Aeroplane		*new arrival
-----------------------------air break-----------------------------
9	Clutchy Hopkins	Gourds of the Desert	Music Is My Medicine		*new arrival
9	Stacey Epps	Who Knows	The Awakening
3	PPP	Pigeon Hole	White		*new arrival
3	K-os	Call Me	Exit
-----------------------------air break-----------------------------
1	Gift of Gab	The Ride of Your Life	4th Dimensional Rocketships Going Up
3	Time Machine	Let's Not Be Real	Slow Your Roll
9	Lushlife	In Soft Focus	Casette City		*new arrival
4	Ohmega Watts	You Are Now Tuned In ft Adam L	The Find
-----------------------------air break-----------------------------
7	J-Live	The Listening	The Hear After

Africa vol. 1

http://8tracks.com/delaroche/africa-vol-1

Not much to say about this one except that I suggest you break out your lighters for it. It's going to be a ride.

http://8tracks.com/delaroche/africa-vol-1

Tracklisting:

Upper Internationals - Dankasa
Apagya Show Band - Ma Nserew Me
Boy Ge Mendes - Cumbia Ietu
Vieux Farka Toure - Slow Jam (live at The Thornbury Theatre)
Angelique Kidjo - Out of Africa
Nana Matias - Pays Sol
Etran Finitawa - Ndiiren
Cesaria Evora - Pe Di Boi
Ambabutho - Sikelela

No one can serve two masters

http://8tracks.com/delaroche/no-man-can-serve-two-masters

Delight and I once had a conversation about whether or not it was possible to love more than one person at a time. To be in love. I was on the side that you can. She wasn't. I can't remember what out points were. Mine especially. I probably didn't have a firm stance. It was just something that although I couldn't put concretely into words it wasn't something I could go along with.

I hadn't thought about it since. Until tonight. I had just finished putting together the previous post and I needed to release that excess stress. Scouring my collection, then sitting hunched over an extended period of time is hard. The writing especially. The words just don't come that effortlessly. I have to sit at the muse's feet and wait, and wait, and wait.

So when that all comes to pass I like to stand, stretch, and listen to silence. I went out the back and sat on our new old wicker chair under a dim light and stared out at the street as no cars passed by. I was at a certain silence. I was at that point where I could feel not being either happy or sad. Just empty. And light. And it hit me. I knew why I believed that we can be in love with more than one person at a time.

Love is boundless. It's not simply one thing. Any person we claim to give love to isn't the same love we claim to give another person. We understand this in the way we love friends, family, and a significant other. Especially the love we have for family compared to a partner. Of course, I did say at the beginning of this that it was about the being in love type of love. But that's the point. There are varying degrees of love, like color. But it's easier to distinguish yellow from red than it is brick from burgundy.

When thinking about past lovers it'd be pretty hard to say that you loved anyone of them exactly the same. I would even say that if you said you loved each of them the same that it would be insulting to their person. As if you didn't look at each of them individually. As if you loved them as the culmination of the same experiences, thoughts, feelings and ideas.

Being in love with that person is not being in love with this person.

The biggest problem is monogamy. This isn't an argument against monogamy. In fact, if you say you're in a monogamous relationship then that's what you should be doing. Some people reading this might think this could be used as an excuse to cheat. Especially considering that we live in a very monogamous society. Any idea of loving another in such a way conjures up fears of losing that partner or being cheated on. But that's a different matter altogether. That isn't love. That is possession. But you can't own another person's memories and their feelings. You can only share some of their moments. And monogamy is the moment by moment choice of sharing moments with that one person.

This is about love and how infinite it is. And how infinite people are.

And this is about how we want to love each other. That never stops. But just as there are different ways of feeling love, there are different ways of showing that love. Know what love to show.

Show that love.

http://8tracks.com/delaroche/no-man-can-serve-two-masters

Tracklisting:

Agent Ribbons - Buries with You
Sandwitches - Marry Me
Best Coast - Boyfriend
Jordan O'Jordan - Little Finger
Bare Wires - I Love You Tonight
Unwed Teenage Mothers - Do You Wanna Be My Girl
The Manhattans - That New Girl
Ty Karim - You Really Made It Good To Me
Jill Scott - He Loves Me
Nat King Cole - Brazilian Love Song ft. Bebel Gilberto
Eric Lau - Don't Let Them ft. Tosin
J*Davey - Everybody Touch It

Japan vol. 1

http://8tracks.com/delaroche/japan-vol-1

The start of a series of series highlighting music not just from Japan but anywhere music is played. I started with Japan because it was the first I'd delved into, it's what I'm most comfortable with, and I've got loads of it lying around my room. But it was KDVS's library that showed me just how widespread good music really is (geographically in this case). Not that I wasn't aware of the concept by the time I'd arrived at KDVS. In fact, I'd like to think I'd become fairly open thanks to my MD fam. But a friend once told me, "Anyone that listens to music passively hasn't heard music." And in my case reading about a red flower and knowing it is red is different from going out and looking at that same red flower and knowing it is red.

I'd understood the concept but I never actively sought something like Nigerian Afro-Beat from the 70's. I didn't actually know the world I'd be thrown into until that fateful day of my simply taking a chance. Honestly, I just judged the book by its cover. In fact that's my biggest secret. People have told me that they liked the music I'd played but really I'm shallow and judgemental and looked at the cool covers to decide whether it was worth giving a listen. Apparently it works; for others and myself.

The biggest surprise was that the music I was hearing wasn't all that different from what was played here in the US. Folks were funking it up all over the globe. They were rapping. They were making electronic music. They were distorting their guitars. They were doing it all. The changes were small. They added traditional elements and it was a wrap. And a world of difference it was by adding a rythmic chant. Or instead of creating a break beat with a drum bass and snare the sound of slapping water is used. Simply singing in a different language was all it took as I'm forced to think of the vocal only as an instruement and when I'm not thinking about the meaning behind the words, I can really think about the meaning behind the words. My imagination isn't bound by the rule that when a singer says tree I think of a rooted plant extending from the earth. Instead I hear the utterences and wonder is that pain for happiness they are expressing?

It was my story to create. The artists just asked me to step a little to the left and see the view from there.

So take a seat with me over here and let us see what we see as the series moves along.

http://8tracks.com/delaroche/japan-vol-1

Tracklisting:

Sparta Locals - Boku no Poppa
School Food Punishment - Snap
Emi Meyer - Teien
Midori - Chiharu no Koi
Tsushimamire - Ii Tempo Desu
GO!GO!7188 - Mayakashi no Sekai
METALCHICKS - Girls School
Akiko Hamada - Tsuki no Shizuku
Yuu Nakashima - Tenjyaki

I'm scared of having children

2009-09-25 (Babies for Sale)

Initially, the big letters above this picture had a point. I forgot what I wanted to say then. But the words came to me while at the swimming pool. I was watching two older women with two little girls. Which is probably why I didn't just dive right into the pool and do a couple laps to get used to the water. I have a tendency to people watch, hard. I almost forget I exist and I become absorbed in creating their life stories. I listen to the way they pronounce their words, look at the way the older of the two young ladies makes up pool games made to attract attention from who seems to be her little sister because ever since she came along attention has been hard pressed and she's still a child and she still wants attention.

It doesn't help that the one watching the two young'ns in the pool gives more of her attention to the younger of the two. The other of the old schools spends most of her time either tanning with an air of elegance or swimming a few freestyle laps. If any of the kids got close to the swimmer the babysitter immediately told them not to interrupt the swimmer's alone time. The kids seemed to know the drill well and immediately go back to their games of look-at-me.

I wonder what kind of character that builds. What kind of pair will the two grow up to be? How did the babysitter and the swimmer become who they were? Why did one become so motherly while the other more focused on herself?

I have this fear that I'll become the swimmer one day and my children will need more than I can give. Or rather, more than I'm willing to give. I can feel it in how at home I am when I'm in the studio rummaging through the library's music. I forget about everything above ground and it is just myself and the sounds and I'm free. What if I'm still at that point when I have them and feel the need to drop everything and hit the studio every now and then? How will I manage when I can no longer get my doses of momentary ignorance? Or will I give in?

I also have this fear that children are blank slates. That their eyes are at their most open when they first come into this world. And they see everything. And they hear everything. And they become it. And they'll see me and become me and I won't be ready. I won't be at that point that I'm comfortable looking at myself. And when they become me they won't be comfortable looking at themselves and they'll start to close their eyes. How do I keep their eyes open?

How do I keep my eyes open?

Listening to this first show I can hear the innocence in our voices. We're nervous and don't know how to fill up air time as we back rap songs. But we were at our most open and ironically, most natural. The music selection/mixing itself reflects this especially. The set shifts through a wide number of genres while remaining cohesive. I've been doing this for a year now and after a while that became the main goal for each show; to put together a show that can hits many genres while every song feels like it's right where it should be. Yet this is one of the very few that I feel accomplishes that. Even in comparing the time spent putting together this first show to other times spent putting a set together I notice that the same magical presence isn't there.

I feel like I've gotten mechanical in many of the sets. In that effort to try and create an uncohesive cohesive set I try and repeat the same movements of that first time in the stacks. I hit the same areas. In the particular sets I'm really proud of there's a common connection in that it's my first time in a different part of the library (e.g. Country/Folk, International). I also feel like this set was put together much more naturally than how it happens now. It took a couple of days as each song was carefully chosen by letting albums simply play and let the song that was meant to be played that day capture us. We probably ended listening to anywhere between 30 and 40 albums. We took some home because at one point we were at the station for almost 8 hours. It's no longer like that. In some cases I even rush sets putting them together in as little as 2 hours.

But that is today's lesson I suppose. Throw myself into uncomfortable and unfamiliar territory more often and let myself find my way out. And slow down. Don't try and control it. At most simply be aware as everything happens. Then sets like this will happen more often. And as I continue to learn to nurture myself and my openness to music, I'll learn to nurture my young and their openness to life.

2009-09-25 (Babies for Sale)



Tracklisting:

3	Dog Party	School Again	Dog Party EP
3	All Girl Summer Fun Band	Charm Bracelet
5	Beep Kitty	Sugar	Beep Kitty		*new arrival
1	Bunny Brains	It'll All Be Alright	What Makes You Think You Can Save Yourself (From Yourself)		*new arrival
3	Koenjihyakkei	Grabham Jorgazz	Angherr Shisspa
-----------------------------air break-----------------------------
3	Candye Kane	I Put A Hex On You	Superhero		*new arrival
8	Foreign Exchange	Sincere	Connected
15	Sol.illaquists of Sound	Bulletproof	No More Heroes		*new arrival
4	Cee-lo	The Art of Noise	Closet Freak: The Best of Cee-Lo Green The Soul Machine
5	Blue Scholars	Ordinary Guys	Bayani
-----------------------------air break-----------------------------
6	The Bad Plus	Thriftstore Jewelry	Prog
7	Akiko Tsuruga	Killing Me Softly With His Song	Oriental Express		*new arrival
3	The Waitiki 7	Manila	Adventures in Paradise		*new arrival
5	Feather	High Butterfly	Zanzibar
-----------------------------air break-----------------------------
9	Fantastic Plastic Machine	Filter (In Viaggio Attraverso L'Australia)	The Fantastic Plastic Machine
4	Bibio	Fire Ant	Ambivalence Avenue
12	Ancient Astronauts	Surfing The Silvatide	We Are The Answer		*new arrival
	Port Blue	At Anchor	The Airport
1	Apollonia Heck	God Only Knows
4	Meredith Monk	Ester's Song	Turtle Dreams
2	Omodaka	Kyoteizinc (Video Mix)	Favorite Games
-----------------------------air break-----------------------------
7	Ming & Ping	Vanilla	Ming & Ping		*new arrival
7	Cibo Matto	Clouds	Stereo Type A
12	Pizzicato Five	Good!	The Sound of Music
6	Ore Ska Band	Almond	WAO!!
-----------------------------air break-----------------------------
3	Asobi Seksu	Umi no de Jisatsu	Asobi Seksu

Hello

I forgot when I decided I wanted to start this project. This isn’t even the first site I created. It’s the second one. I lagged so much on the first one I forgot all the necessaries to log in. Another unfinished project lost in the sea of information that is the internet. I always wondered about the different places on the internet that are no longer seen. They’re probably not all that great; sites with horrible design put together by some random who thought that Dummies book could actually teach them how to be creative. There are probably hundreds, thousands, maybe even hundreds of thousands of them out there; old pieces of code that produce clashing colors that unless some form of deletion-due-to-inactivity was implemented weren’t given the dignity of building dust.

Just hindsight.

That’s one of the few things any of us really have. So it’s important that we don’t forget. And that we have the strength to look at past shortcomings with an open self else all we’ll ever know how to do is run. Even now I cringe when I look at the first paragraph of this first blog post of mine. That’s how bad my procrastination is and how long this draft has been sitting on my laptop. I’ve moved forward enough to see myself trying to do what instead I should have been simply doing. But this is where that strength needs to come in.

I’m scared at looking back and thinking, “What a fool.” And I run. And though I never fail in the way I’m afraid of failing I fail to give myself the opportunity to change myself into the way I imagine I can be.

I don’t want to run anymore.

So I won’t. That paragraph will be left intact. I will remember that moment. I will remember the moment that I realized I was beyond that moment. And I will continue to do so with every piece of now I can capture through this project until something changes. Maybe I won’t need to remember. But until then…

Enjoy the music.