Published Writing: The Florida Review & E.T.C.

This month I had some of my writing published in print, including my first national publication! My review of Lilli Carré's graphic novella, The Lagoon appears in the Winter 2009 issue of The Florid Review (volume 34.2). Florida Review is a nationally distributed literary journal published twice yearly through the University of Central Florida. They've featured some terrific comics in past issues and my review is the first review they've published for a comic of any sort. The Summer 2010 volume of The Florida Review will feature a page of sequential art by me for an illustrated interview with The Surrogates author, Robert Venditti.
A poem I wrote, entitled "Greenbriar Street, 1985" is featured in the 6th and final issue of E.T.C. (Everybody That Creates), "Déjà vu". The issue's cover is also a juxtaposition of two photos of mine. I've done a good share of work with E.T.C. in the past: a photo of mine was used for their third issue, "Blur"'s cover, and another was used as the basis for the cover of their 5th issue, "Next". Issue 2 featured a flash fiction story by me. Though E.T.C. is over, my work with writer/publisher Chris Wiewiora isn't. We're working on a comic project together.

You can still find issues of E.T.C. in independent stores such as A Comic Shop, Park Ave CDs, Quimby's Bookstore, Domy Books, The Regulator Bookshop, and a handful of others across the U.S.

NERDY SHOW Season 3 (now an LLC)!

When Triforce Mike, Hex, and I went out on our own to start recording Nerdy Show (which we jokingly called "season 2" after our six month stint on WPRK) we didn't expect even remotely how popular it would be. The original Nerdy Show trio plus our recurring "season 1" guest, Atomic Robo and 8-Bit Theater writer/creator Brian Clevinger, have made an uncanny team . Over the past 5 months and 14 episodes we've had some outstanding interviews such as chiptunes mega-star Pixelh8, the breakthrough electro pop rock band I Fight Dragons, and Ninja Pizza's Roseangelo. What's more, our monthly special, Dungeons & Doritos, where we play a live game of Dungeons & Dragons, is a smash success. (We've even received fan art of our characters.)
We decided to have a season finale, ending with our Top 20 Nerdy THINGS of 2009 list (which got us recognized by the official Red Dwarf homepage). After three weeks of regrouping and strategy, we've returned, not just as Nerdy Show season 3, but as Nerdy Show LLC. That's right, Nerdy Show is now a Limited Liability Company, of which I am the registered agent. We're getting structured and preparing for a massive onslaught of awesomeness for the year to come. Our first episode, "Season 3 With a Vengeance" is up, episode 4 of Dungeons & Doritos is on its way, and next Tuesday's episode will feature the winners of the contest we launched last year, Tetris Rap Attack including a live interview with Astronautalis! There's even more contests and interviews planned, we're the official podcast of Nerdapalooza, and we're covering Star Wars Celebration V from the inside, so keep your eyes on nerdyshow.com and our twitter for all the coolness coming your way.



NERDY SHOW - Season 2







NERDY SHOW - Season 3






Nerdy Show presents: Dungeons & Doritos

CoS: Interview with OK Go's Tim Nordwind and a review of their new album

In late December I got the chance to interview OK Go bassist Tim Nordwind over the phone. Their album Of the Blue Colour of the Sky, came out this month on the 12th. Our phone conversation lasted over an hour and was packed with a lot of terrific insight about the album and what went into putting it together. I edited and streamlined our conversation to over twenty minutes of audio clips making it the first of my CoS interviews to be presented in an audio format. I had only heard two tracks from Of the Blue Colour of the Sky when I interviewed Tim, but was able to listen to the whole thing soon after. It's an amazing album. I've listened to it countless times since reviewing it and haven't stopped. After all the list-making that went on last month I can't help but think I've already found one of my top picks for the year to come.

Interview: Tim Nordwind (of OK Go)

Album Review: OK Go - Of the Blue Colour of the Sky

CoS Top of 2009/ Media Potluck's Christmas Podcasts

Hey there, a little late posting this. What can I say, December was a busy month. I filmed a music video with Charlie Honderick for his song "Keeping Track" (more on that soon) and that consumed most of the month.

Much as CoS celebrated the end of the decade, we celebrated the end of 2009 with a list of the Top 100 Albums and Top 50 Songs. I enjoyed doing the write-ups, but what I enjoyed even more was making the graphic for the Year End Report (as seen above).



CoS Top 100 Albums of 2009



Albums I did write-ups for:

23) Bat For Lashes - Two Suns
47) Empire of the Sun - Walking on a Dream
78) The Protomen - Act II: Father of Death
80) Pixelh8 - Obsolete?
87) Gil Mantera's Party Dream - Dreamscape



CoS Top 50 Songs of 2009



And I did the write up for song #29, Moby's "Mistake".
As with the Top of the 2000s lists, you can see my personal Top of 2009 lists HERE, at my blog for things not entirely news and update-like.

Last year, I compiled an album-length holiday music compilation for Media Potluck, called Media Potluck Holiday Feast. The collection was an eclectic alternative to the usual blechy holiday music, with a write-up for every track. This year, Media Potluck debuted Volume 2 of the Holiday Feast as well as the first episode of our semi-regular podcast, Media PODluck, with the yuletide-themed Media Potluck: A Christmas Evening Together.



Media Potluck Holiday Feast Volume 1 (2008)





Media Potluck Holiday Feast Volume 2 (2009)




Media PODluck: A Christmas Evening Together

CoS Top 50 Songs of the 2000s

For Consequence of Sound’s 50 best songs of the 2000s list, the staffers were asked to compile a list of ten. As before, I did what I could to make a list I was comfortable with, but this one was considerably harder to settle on. As with the 100 best albums of the 2000s list, I composed a few of the write-ups:

5) Gnarls Barkley - "Crazy"
7) Postal Service - "Such Great Heights"
28) Björk - "New World"
31) Moby -"Extreme Ways"



CoS Top of the Decade: The Songs




You can see and listen to my personal top 10 songs of the decade list HERE, at my blog for things not entirely news and update-like.

- Cap

CoS Top 100 Albums of the 2000s

As a staff member of Consequence of Sound I helped in making their Top of the 2000s lists. The first list is the 100 best albums. To create this list, each staffer submitted their top 20. Some tough decisions were made and a lot of time was spent on it. The list is now up and features a write up on each album, including several by me:

12. Sigur Ros - Ágætis Byrjun
14. Vampire Weekend - Vampire Weekend
38. Daft Punk- Discovery
50. The Decemberists - The Crane Wife
51. Tom Waits – Blood Money
71. Astronautalis – Pomegranate
99. Outkast - Speakerboxx/ The Love Below

Check out the full list, and my write-ups HERE:



CoS Top of the Decade: The Albums



What I ended up with was something I could live with rather than something I feel is fully accurate. Naturally, many of my choices didn’t make the final cut for the CoS 100. So I've posted my personal top 20 HERE on a new blog for stuff not pertaining to news and updates.

Cap's Fun-Time Blog

Does it make sense to have two blogs? I don't know, haven't decided yet. Maybe I'll consolidate, but for now it is what it is.

Also, last month I published this Halloween-themed article:



Break Yo’ TV (Tricks or Treats Edition): “Anything Can Happen on Halloween”



-Cap

UPDATE: Busy, busy, busy (Articles & Radio)

There haven't been updates for a while because there's been too much going on. I've spent the last two months traveling, first to Edinburgh for a study abroad trip at the Edinburgh College of Art, then to Geneva - down to Venice, Florence, and finally, Rome. Then I had some R & R in Fort Lauderdale, followed by a short time at home before going on a road trip to Nashville to go to the CD release show for The Protomen's second album. From Nashville, I flew to Chicago, drove to Detroit to see KISS, then back to Chicago to interview Moby (which didn't end up happening, but the concert was great). Needless to say, it's been crazy. I've got a lot of summertime artwork and photos to upload - I'll tackle that soon. In the meantime, here's what I've been up to:

Consequence of Sound Articles

So, the in-person Moby interview fell through, a phone-in might happen in the near future. What did work out was seeing Moby live, which was awesome and I took the pictures to prove it. After the show Moby did a DJ set at a club elsewhere in town. CoS editor in chief Mike Roffman wrote the main write-up and I covered the DJ set.

Moby dazzles Chicago, saves Wednesday night (9/30)

The CoS staff did articles for every one of the Beatles Remasters. I contributed to the oddball of the remasters - the singles compilation, Past Masters. I expected it to be an easy article, but things got really in-depth. It's quite awesome.

Review: The Beatles - Past Masters [Remastered]

"Break Yo' TV" is a recent CoS feature on weird, music related online videos. I contributed one of the inaugural articles, the topic? Why the degenerative Internet video collages , YouTube Poop, of course!

Break Yo’ TV: YouTube Poop

The last two "Watch" articles I've done were both for comedic videos. I reviewed "Weird Al"'s video for "Craigslist" from the then forthcoming, now out, online EP Internet Leaks.


Watch: “Weird Al” uses the Internet to summon the ghost of the Lizard King, readies EP


More recently, I reviewed Eric Wareheim's unconventional video for Depeche Mode's "Hole to Feed."

Watch: Depeche Mode’s “Hole to Feed”

Media Potluck/ Audio Archaeology

I updated my article on Kate Bush and Cocteau Twins' Fruitopia Ads for its C onsequence of Sound debut, and premiered the first new Media Potluck article in quite some time: "Mother Goose Rock 'n' Rhyme (1990)". The article digs deep into one of the most unusual children's films of all time. Many secrets are uncovered.


Kate Bush & Cocteau Twins' Fruitopia Ads (1994-5)

Mother Goose Rock 'n' Rhyme (1990)

And now...

NERDY SHOW!

After a hiatus during August, Nerdy Show is back in action. We've had a roster change, and myself, Hex, and Triforce Mike are now joined by none-other than Atomic Robo and 8bit Theater creator Brian Clevenger. We'll be streaming again soon, but for the time being we're podcasting weekly. So far we're six episodes (plus one "pilot" episode) into what we're calling "Season 2" - you can check it all out on nerdyshow.com with new episodes up every Wednesday.

- Cap