Inertia

Check out the Inertia Records and Books Website.

http://inertiajax.com

Rushed at work post. Yup.

Ceramics / This Bike is a Pipe Bomb

We had a Freeschool at Inertia on ceramics this past Tuesday. My friend Marie Myers whom I work with taught it. She brought a lot of clay so everyone could keep what they made, gave us a few pointers on making things and if we want them fired how to / where to - and we were off. Notable creations... a pegacorn (a mixture of a pagasus and unicorn) , a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle ashtray. Complete with the weapons (Raphael - anyone? what are those weapons called?) and his guts on the bottom of the ashtray part. A little girl made Ren and Stimpy. Then got bored and made them a stage with microphones and said "They're singing Happy Happy Joy Joy."


Ok. Alot of this blog will probably talk about rad shit that went on the weekend before, etc. This week I was literally thinking "sweet, my next post is going to be about the art show - and most definetly about how killer This Bike is a Pipe Bomb is..." And then I got kinda bummed because maybe if I didn't post about the shows on this new bloggy thing then someone might miss it.


So first and foremost - The art show is of Clay Dorian's and Terri Littleton's new stuff. It's at inertia Records and Books / Heartworks in 5 points across from Subway on 820 Lomax. The show is from 7-10. And duh, it's free.

This Bike is a Pipe Bomb are playing at The Pit in Riverside (er Brooklyn technically) this Saturday, July 13th. The show starts at 9:30 and is $5. Other bands like Tomatoes and Peace Trout are playing, plus my friend Lily from Tampa.

I set up alot of shows at this place. Here is the myspace page. It's basically a
warehouse - and since the shows are outside, it's bands playing in a parking lot. If it rains we can do it inside. We have fires when it's cold, and we put up lights on the roof. We set up the PA. Also every show is $5 and you can bring your own drinks, food etc. I'm not trying to sound silly, but that's sort of the bare bones of it. Alot of the character of events at The Pit are brought out by the people who attend them. We've had costumes and grills and people bring there own firewood in winter. We had a ridiculous volcano thing once, people kept jumping in it. Alot of people show up on bikes. I dunno, basically it's a great independent place for bands and the like. This picture is from a show - I think it was Lightning Bolt...

Bands like This Bike! They are from Pensacola, Fl. They tour all around it seems. I remember hearing about they were on NPR and talking about the tour they did of Alaska. Basically they kind of have a country punk / folk punk sound. I remember seeing them in Daytona for the first time - they pulled up this old yellow ghostbuster looking car that said "Ramen Car" on the side of it.

This is a picture I took of them at that show in Daytona. Go to the Daytona Hardcore page to see more.

I heard they played Stripmine records before too, when is was in 5 points I think. I've seen them a handful of times since. The last time I saw them in Jacksonville was when they played at my house on Ernest St. It was chaotic. Many people in a small room trying to dance. A band I was in at the time was playing, Regression. Funny, because Becky was in Regression too, and she's in Tomatoes and Peace Trout (who are also playing with This Bike). Geebuz Becky! Oh and she has this boots made of straw that are killer.

Format...

The 7" vinyl record. I just released 2 more of them. And have another lined up. All great material I'm excited about. All of bands that tour a lot, and a good mix of bands. Merkit from Ft. Myers Fl. Demian from Brazil. I Object from upstate NY. FxPxO from Macedonia. Environmental Youth Crunch from St. Augustine Fl. Defiance Ohio from Bloomington. Some bands have done stuff on "bigger labels" already - No Idea, Alternative Tentacles... One release is split between two labels, one of them between four labels.

So why am I worried? And what about? I have a storefront where very few people buy 7" records. Pretty much almost none except the super "into it" fans all of who work at the store. Whever someome is going through the 7"s you pretty much know they are either from out of town, or just bored. I even remember talking to Jacob of EYC about stuff we've gotten recently and we both concluded we rarely buy 7"s. And you can't look on any scene-y message board without a few daily posts of people selling off all the 7"s they have.

Ok so I won't sell much. That's not really a problem or the intent. The purpose of the label is for documentation, fun, but also certainly partially for sharing documented bands etc. But if so few people get 7"s (or even vinyl??) what's the point? I'm kinda of worried that maybe this isn't being done right. I was very glad when Merkit came through town and had a tour cdr of the material they had recorded - since otherwise they'd only have tapes and 7"s. I've seen bands put in cdr with the 7". Or how Shellac put a CD version of 1000 Hurts in with the vinyl, and sold the vinyl w/ CD for cheaper than the cost of just the CD. The new Black Heart Procession has a coupon w/ the record to go download the music. But with smaller labels to survive you need a product to sell to keep it going and release more records, but you also don't have funds to put a CD, or even CDR, into every vinyl release. Alteratively you could just post mp3s for free and that's it - but you'd really be amazed how many people don't care about the music you make if it's free.

A lot of the music is short punk songs. Some of it is really noisy and intense I guess, certainly for some. In an interview with In/Humanity they stated about the discography CD that it 'isn't meant to be listen through all the way. Who the fuck would do that?' It's taken from all the early 7"s - out of that context and all together is just too much.

Maybe it's the context the bands want to create. If you have to go through the trouble of playing a 7" that will only last a few minutes, you really listen to it. You read the lyrics, read the song explanations. It's not a long playing LP that you can have in the background - or even a CD or Ipod on shuffle. The latter two formats make music so commodified, so easily taken for granted, that it's that much easier to ignore artistic statement. That much easier to distort context. To skip this track and go to the next. Is technology making music a victim of it's own success? Too much music, so little time...

And economic factors - a 7" doesn't cost a whole lot. Packaging is, well, smaller than a CD - but big enough can screen print it. Recording costs are lowered since it's not a full length.

A band recording and releasing anything in any format - it all seems so accessible to everyone, and that's great, but... will less and less stand out as a flood of music and releases are created? Truly a victim of it's own success?