free_geek

When I posted on this site over a year ago, and said that I would start posting about things other then music I followed that post up with three posts about music. Since I am nothing if not predictable, let’s make a post about music.

The first sign that you are starting to get somewhere in writing about music is when people start sending you advanced copies of their albums. Well, tonight I had my advance copy cherry popped by my man Z. Z hooked me up with an early copy of his next compilation, Old Nerdy Bastard. The idea behind ONB is to get a bunch of vocal tracks from various geek artists and have them remixed by a bunch of other geek artists. The comp is a pretty good cross section of some of the key players in Geek Rock, WRock, and Nerdcore (sadly, all the Video Game Inspired Music folks that Z approached had to decline or were unable to get their tracks finished).

I’m not sure how much I am allowed to say at this moment, plus I’d like to give the album a few more spins before writing a full review. I can say right this minute though, that this album is destined for must have territory, and is a shoe in for all kinds of end of year album lists. In fact I will be rating end of the year lists this year by where this album ends up placing on them.

Seriously, Z hit up some very talented cats and they responded by bringing their A games to the table. There are some tracks here that are just jaw dropping good. To be completely honest, I knew we were capable of some amazing crap, but this thing is just silly good.

This is it folks. Break out the calendars and make note. This will be the first sign in the pilgrimage that will unite the geek tribes. It starts here. Keep your eyes peeled over at Hipster, please! for the release. You will tell your children about the day this album dropped.

When I started Headphone Sacrament it was as an experiment. I’d played around with blogs before, but I could never get one off the ground. My past attempts had involved a scattershot approach where I posted what ever the hell I felt like posting. With HS, I decided to try narrowing the scope a bit and focusing purely on music, hence the name.

I’m not sure how much of the equation was the narrow focus of the blog, and how much of it was just lucking into meeting up with Z and Church fairly early on, but HS was able to get some legs under it and stick around.

Over the past several months though I’ve begun to feel a little constricted. Music will always be my primary geek passion, but thanks to meeting folks like Jason and through my conversations with Z, Church and Lizz, I began to see what I wanted to write about shift from music to geek culture. At first this wasn’t a huge issue, since my writings on geek culture tended to be coming from a musical point of view. I wrote about WRock and nerdcore and other similar things. I felt a little tinge about the name. A slight longing for something that reflected the geek kink in what I was writing, but it wasn’t major. And I really liked the name Headphone Sacrament.

Then came my Geek Culture Debate with Jason and two interesting links that Jason forwarded to me. (here and here) The short of it is that through Jason my Geek Culture Manifesto had wound its way into the livejournal vidding community and many of them had embraced it. I’ve been seeing a slow trickle of LJ links popping up in my logs since (though, I can’t read any of these posts, so I’m not sure what people are actually saying). This caused me to realize that while I’m thinking of geeky music when I write these things, other elements of geek culture are also appreciating them. In some cases, they appear to even be adopting them. And so, the name Headphone Sacrament started to feel a little more claustrophobic.

Which brings us to today. I haven’t given up the name Headphone Sacrament just yet, it may resurface at a later date, but for now I’m re-christening this site free_geek.

With the new name comes a few new changes to the site, beyond the obvious layout change.

1) I’ve created a page that houses links to all the relevant posts between Jason and I and out little debate. If Jason ever replies to my last post ( :) ), I’ll put up new links.

2) I’ve also added a “Cast of Characters” page. This is a group of short introductions of people whose name pops up here again and again. This way I can avoid constantly having to reintroduce people and constantly link to them again and again. I’ll also be adding to this as time goes on.

3) I also figured this would be a good time to overhaul the About page in the sidebar, which I’ve never been happy with.

4) Finally, it has been decided that Z is, in fact, a crack dealer. It was Z’s peer pressure that convinced me to finally set up a myspace page and now the bastard has gone and gotten me to set up a Twitter account. The link is over on the side bar. I figure it is only a matter of time before either he or Lizz gets me on facebook.

OK, I think that’s enough for tonight. I’ll let these changes sink in. Nighty night.

I had intended to spend this weekend, the first non-working weekend I’ve had since January, writing up a big music/culture post, but then Jason posted a couple of questions to clarify my thoughts on my response to his post and they were such cool questions that I couldn’t help by respond right away.

The questions are as follows,

1. If I read this correctly, the implication here is that geek culture can also represent a viable alternative as long as we don’t embarrass ourselves by trying to look too desperate for mainstream approval. Would this make geek culture part of the overarching group of “underground cultures”? If not, what sets it apart?

2. You write that if geek culture can orient itself such that it represents another viable alternative to mainstream culture, “we will be in a better situation to achieve the goals that Jason outlines in his post.” So, just to consider some hypothetical examples…

a) What might we consider the road to this? Should we reject media producers’ marketing efforts like the “graphic novel”? Or is this just a matter of being aware of how we think about these sorts of things?

b) What’s the practical upshot? In other words, how does whatever gets suggested in response to (a) above translate into being in “a better position”?

Let’s take them in order.

1) I’ve actually been chewing on this question for awhile. There are several loose threads here that I’m still trying to tie up. In short, though, I see geek culture as a “third way”.

Wow, I just did a quick search on that phrase and realized how widely it has been used. I guess I’ll have to be a little more verbose in my response.

Let’s back up a bit. American culture, at the very least, has largely been defined, in modern times, by a yin yang type relationship between various cultures which can be lumped into one of two larger cultures, the mainstream and the underground. The two cultures can be looked at as two points connected by a line. Things are defined by where on that line they exist. The closer something is to one point, the more likely it is to be associated with that culture. Similarly, as things move on the line, they move farther from one pole at the same time that they move closer to the other pole. In layman’s terms, the more associated something becomes with the mainstream, the less likely it is to be associated with the underground.

This example has become some what muddled over the last 10 years or so, but not quite as bad as some would believe. We are now seeing the underground associate with elements of popular mainstream culture, but it is usually done so in a way that is different then the way these things are associated with the mainstream proper. Hipsters, as much as they can still be associated with the underground, may associate themselves with something in an ironic manner or with a post-modern sense of self awareness (liking pop music, but viewing it in a way that is fully cognizant of its marketing angle, for instance).

As an example, over the past couple of years, my friend Courtney, a member of the indiepop underground, has begun to rekindle her teenage love for the New Kids On The Block. She’s related to me on a couple of occasions her frustration when people automatically assume that she is doing this in some kind of ironic way. That there is no way that her appreciation of the group is something that she is serious about.

I see this as a significant departure with the way that geeks tend to relate to mainstream culture. One would be unlikely to find underground equivalents to Jason’s story of handing out “comics you should read” fliers at his college. One of the main factors that defines underground culture is that it is not mainstream culture. Geek culture does not have this limitation and actually tends to synthesize elements from both the mainstream and the underground. Given this tendency to freely associate with elements of both cultures, I do not see how one can associate the geek culture with the underground exclusively. There are, and will continue to be, overlaps between the two cultures, but I don’t see these as requiring geek culture to identify with the underground. Especially since these overlaps do, and will continue to, exist with the mainstream.

I realize that there are significant issues with this theory, as I said, it is still something that I’m working on, but I feel that the issues will likely be dealt with through a refining of my definitions, and not lead to a rejection of the concept.

2) To be honest, the real answer to this questions is *shurg*. I threw that out there as a carrot to try and entice people to stop playing that game (the only way to win the game, is to not play). I do see validity in the statement though. So, I’ll try to respond to your hypothetical examples.

a) Personally, I’m of the opinion that any plans that involve the phrase “don’t do this” are best avoided on principle alone. I would like to see a focus on developing our own mechanisms to support our culture. The best example of this would be the systems that the underground have developed to support themselves. Independent labels, publishers, promoters, media, etc. A lot of this work has been done, and even more of it is currently going on, but there can always be room for healthy growth and refinement. My basic idea though is to focus on developing a system that will allow artists to create art as they see fit. Remove the argument that an artist can not support themselves if they do not cater to either the mainstream or underground cultures. Once that argument is removed (note that I said support themselves, I did not say make a shit load of money) then the choice is best left up to the individual artist.

I think once we are able to support our artists we will be likely to see more of our artists catering to us. You can see an example of this in the indie comic book scene. In the past comics were dominated by super hero books because it was only through super hero books that you could pay your rent. Aspiring comic book artists and writers either had to work with super hero titles, or had to find jobs doing something else. As the indie comic book market has expanded it has been better able to allow aspiring comic book artists and writers to pay their rent telling the types of stories that they want to tell. Because of this the breadth of the medium has expanded and the medium has grown in acceptance outside of just the geek world. If we can support other geek artists in a similar manner, then I believe we will see a similar growth in the breadth of the types of art that are created. Geeks are a diverse bunch and it only stands to reason that if given the chance, we will create diverse types of art (we already do).

b) The central issue here is the diversity with in the actual geek culture, as opposed to the perceived geek culture.

Geeks are largely perceived by both the underground and the mainstream to be social misfits who are unable to properly interact with either of the two dominant cultures. We both know that this is in fact a false statement. The issue here is not that we are all social misfits who are unable to interact with other cultures, but instead that those of us who are able to interact with other cultures either do not have any cultural signifiers to identify ourselves as geeks or are unwilling to allow ourselves to be identified as geeks, lest we be assumed to be social misfits who are unable to interact with other cultures.

By creating a self sustaining culture of our own we are better able to address these two issues. First, by providing the cultural signifiers that we need to identify ourselves (this is already happening). And second by demonstrating the diversity among geeks. In this second situation, focus moves to those artists (because cultures tend to be defined by the art that it creates) who exist on the fringes between geek culture and the other two cultures. These artists are capable to creating art (literature, music, painting, video games, whatever) which explains the geek mindset in a manner that can be understood by other cultures, while not becoming separated from the geek mindset that they are trying to capture. In other words, these artists become the ambassadors of geek culture.

Geek culture is not something that needs to be created. It is something that already exists. It does need to be nurtured though. Allowing it to be nurtured in an environment where it is allowed to grow organically into something that properly reflects us, will allow us an opportunity to better express ourselves and communicate who and what we are. Trying to force it though into a place that is currently acceptable by either of the dominant cultures, will stunt it and will leave us with something that neither properly represents who and what we are, nor something that allows us to explain who and what we are to the other cultures. To organically create a culture that properly expresses who and what we are, we must first accept who and what we are.

Hopefully, all of this better explains what I’m getting at. Jason, or anyone else for that matter, should feel free to ask for any other explanations that they need.

I think I may end up just biting the bullet and putting up a Lizz category. Seriously.

Wrock Fans by ~lizzilicious on deviantART

The above picture is one Lizz took at a Harry and the Potters concert. Props have to be given to Lizz for taking a great picture, but that’s not why I’m posting this.

Someone, for the love of god, back me up when I say that this picture really reminds me of the work of Glenn E. Friedman, especially his punk concert pictures. I mean it isn’t just me, right? Someone else out there has to see what’s happening here.

For those who are wondering who the hell Friedman is, he is a photographer. He’s primarily known for the fact that he always seemed to be in the right place at the right time in the late 70s and 80s. He was in LA in the mid to late 70s, when the local skaters there were redefining the sport. He was there for the early days of hardcore and punk rock, both on the west coast and the east coast (his pictures of the DC punk scene are some of the best known). He was also there in NY as hip hop came into its own. In each case, he was one of the first people to take serious photographs of scenes that would shape the future of the US underground.

That isn’t why I’m posting this picture though. The Friedman connection with this picture underlined something that I’ve felt for awhile now. If punk has any real life in it, it is definitely on its last legs. What life was left in it after the rise of Nirvana and Green Day, is currently be beaten to a pulp by the current hipster scene. While punk itself is gasping its last breaths, the ideals and inspirations of punk, especially hardcore, are popping up in some of the strangest of places.

In my mind, Wizard Rock is definitely one of those places. Its youth focus. Its use of alternate venues. Its empowerment of people who typically feel left out of their own culture. Its unwillingness to compromise its values for “respectability.” Its whole hearted embracing of the importance of expression over talent. I’m sorry, this is hands down more punk rock then anything Pitchfork has even written about.

The Whomping Willows are probably the most obvious example that people would point to of the punk in WRock. With all due respect to Matt for being unwilling to compromise his vision though, in this regard I tend to find him the least interesting. This shouldn’t be taken as a slight against Matt in the least. If you’ve spent any serious time in the punk underground though, a lot of the message that comes from him is kind of old news. Not that it isn’t important, especially since so many of the kids involved in WRock have never had any contact with the punk underground, but I’ve heard it.

What really interests me in this regard are the kids in the scene. The ones who aren’t making artistic statements. Who aren’t attempting to subvert any dominant paradigms or change the world. The ones who came across WRock and thought, “that looks like fun, I want to form a band.” That, right there is the most punk rock thing in the world. And that it comes from a place that has no ulterior motives beyond having fun, makes it that much more powerful.

When people talk about the good that the WRock scene has done, they tend to talk about promoting literacy or the HPA or something like that. All good things, but the most important thing is those 300+ bands out there that formed for no other reason then to have fun and enjoy themselves.

Revolutions are messy affairs. They’re loud and and overwhelming. And when they are done and the dust has settled, then the real change begins. The change that happens when no one is looking and that no one notices until it is to late. Punk made for a grand revolution, but it’s done. Now it is time for us to get to work.

For those who haven’t been playing along at home, the below is a response, to a response, to a response.

It all begins here, with a post from Jason. I then responded here. Jason then fired back with some very insightful things here. If you haven’t already, I suggest giving the whole thing a read through.

Before I get into my response, I’d like to point out that some will undoubtedly notice a shift in my argument. In the past several days, I’ve picked up a copy of Henry Jenkins’ book Convergence Culture and have begun reading through it. The book, in conjunction with Jason’s last post, has caused me to reevaluate how I am perceiving geek culture in this discussion. Specifically, it has caused me to stop looking at the surface things and instead focus more on the underlying reasons that I see geek culture as a separate and distinct entity from either mainstream or underground cultures. Hopefully, my shift in perception will lead to a more interesting discussion. One that has more substance that can transposed onto other areas of discussion.

To begin my response, I’d like to take a little detour. Trust me, it will make sense once I get to where I’m going.

There is a belief among some geeks that we are currently entering the mythic age that most of us have dreamed about at one point or another, where the geek mindset will infect the other cultures and mutate them into our culture. That period where we are vindicated for our eccentricities and find ourselves held up as an exemplar of what people should be like. In short, we are entering into an era, that when finished, will finally allow us to sit at the cool kids table and lead to us no longer being persecuted for being different.

As evidence that we have now entered this mythic age, its proponents hold up examples such as the popularization of the internet and the success of franchises like Star Wars, Halo, and Harry Potter.

In case you haven’t figured it out, I am not a believer. As my own evidence, I ask four simple questions:

1) Does using the internet make someone a computer geek?

2) Does enjoying Star Wars make someone a sci-fi geek?

3) Does enjoying the Potter series make someone a fantasy geek?

4) Does playing Halo make someone a gamer?

I respond to all four questions with a ‘no’. I do not deny that these cultural touchstones are shared across various cultures, but how we react to and interact with these touchstones is vastly, and fundamentally, different. It is these differences that make us geeks. And it is because of these differences that we continue to sit at the edges of the cultural lunch room, even while we exert a surprising amount of influence over the directions in which other cultures grow.

The crucial point in all of this is to understand that in our hands something like Harry Potter is geeky. We write fan fic and create vids and go off to start things like Wizard Rock. In their hand’s though, the geeky elements are devalued to such a level that they do not even need to be explained away. For them, they are books which tell an entertaining story. They may discuss these stories with friends and family and coworkers, but they are just stories.

For anything; be it a medium, a genre, or whatever, to make the move from being perceived as geeky, to being accepted and validated by other cultures, it must first allow the individual from those other cultures a mechanism by which they can do away with the geeky elements. For Potter, this was accomplished by the fact that the series was originally cast as a children’s book. For Star Wars, the story was told in the medium of film, where audience members were already used to seeing fantastical stories told.

We are already seeing elements of this reach into the comic book market. The stories, at least in the indie market, have already shifted from the stereotyped geeky stories of super heros, into more traditional styles of stories. The indie market has also been moving away from the old serialized format and has made wider and wider use of the graphic novel format. Distribution channels have also started to shift with more and more book stores carrying these indie graphic novels. Most importantly, the indie market has cultivated a healthy distain for its geeky older brother, super hero comics. Some latitude is occasionally given to older comics, but the indie market is usually quick to join in in bashing the current super hero books.

While one might still run into resistance with comics with in mainstream culture, the medium is well on its way to full acceptance with in the underground. And history tells us that once full acceptance has been accomplished in the underground, it will only be a matter of time before the mainstream follows suit. As long as it continues to distance itself from its geeky past.

The title of Jason’s post, which started this whole discussion, was the question, “Will [insert geeky medium] ever grow up?” My response now is to say yes, when it successfully learns how to properly devalue those elements of itself that cause people to see it as geeky.

In Jason’s second post he put out there three different reasons why someone would want to see medium X gain a certain sense of legitimacy. The final reason was one that I found interesting,

And the personal reason (just to throw out one more term) is that people don’t want to have to feel embarrassed about admitting to liking things they really care about.

Now I can fully identify with this sentiment. I think most geeks, especially adult geeks, have found themselves in this situation on at least one occasion.

I do think though that this feeling, and even more so addressing this feeling in this manner, is counter productive. I’ve argued above that geeky things can not achieve acceptance outside of geek culture unless they learn to distance themselves from that which makes them geeky. Even once indie comics have achieved a full state of acceptance, there will still be a stigma with buying super hero comics. The success of the Harry Potter series did not dissuade a book store clerk from automatically thinking that I was a teacher when I bought a different YA novel. Nor did it lessen the look of surprise on his face when I admitted that no, I was in fact buying the book for myself so that I could enjoy it.

Acceptance will only be granted to those things that are deemed acceptable. We can not assume to leverage the success of a small fraction of franchises that have made the difficult journey to being accepted in multiple cultures, to bring our entire culture into acceptance.

We instead are better served by focusing our attention on our culture in and of itself and helping to instill a sense of geek pride in ourselves. Paradoxically, it is this geek pride, that offers us the greatest chance at acceptance.

The relationship between geek culture and other cultures, where by acceptance is only granted when geekiness can be distanced, is not something that is unique to geek culture. A similar relationship exists between the mainstream and the underground. Elements of underground culture are only able to gain acceptance with in the mainstream when those things that make it intrinsically underground, are devalued. Similarly, for something to move from the mainstream into the underground, it must first see a decline in popularity, which allows this thing to be distanced from what made it intrinsically a mainstream thing.

The difference is that the underground has cultivated a certain degree of acceptance of this relationship. They do not seek validation from the mainstream. Because of this, they have achieved a relationship with the mainstream that allows them to be a viable alternative. Those members of mainstream culture who do not fit in or are simply bored with the mainstream, view the underground as another space for them to occupy. Either another possible place to gain acceptance, or simply a place to find adventure.

By begging for validation though, we rob ourselves of this relationship. We create a situation where we are subservient to other cultures. By, accepting our relationship with the other cultures and instead focusing on developing pride in who and what we are, we free ourselves from this subservient relationship. We also increase the possibility that we will eventually achieve the same relationship with the mainstream and the underground that the mainstream and underground currently share. And through this relationship, we will be in a better situation to achieve the goals that Jason outlines in his post.

The above should not be construed as me promoting some kind of cultural isolationism though. Nor should it be seen as an argument against the promotion tactics that Jason mentions in his post. I am all in favor of spreading the gospel far in wide. The message should be spread though with pride, instead of a desperate attempt at acceptance. There is no reason for us to beg for scraps.

Thursday turned out to be a big day for my man Z, of Hipster, please! fame.

First, the Wired blog Geek Dads posted the first episode of his new podcast HipTrax. This new podcast allows Z to spotlight geek groups that geek parent’s can listen to around their geeks in training. The first episode features Jonathan Coulton, MC Lars, and Harry and the Potters.

While most people would pull something like that off and, rightfully, call it a day. Z, with a little help from his wife M, not only followed it up, he knocked it out of the park by later that night announcing the birth of his daughter. Little I now joins her big brother X as the first kids of geek music.

On behalf of the geek world, a big welcome to I! And a request to not push daddy to far. The man’s a little fragile already and we kind of need him around for a little longer.

Jason over at Geek Studies threw up a post awhile ago with the title, Will [insert geeky medium] ever grow up?. As always, I suggest giving the entire piece a read through, but here is the opening to give you a feel.

Kotaku recently compiled a bunch of articles and quotes from critics in a debate about whether games would ever “grow up.” To summarize, some arguments include:

1. Comics and games are “infantilized” because artsy content is the exception, with most of these media targeted to teenage boys;
2. But games “have more to achieve” as a medium, and some creators are pushing for that;
3. Moreover, dominance of the low-brow “isn’t inherent” to these media, but actually is common across all entertainment media;
4. And in the meantime, part of the problem is that consumers “expect too little” of games (as evidenced by Bioshock, which is not nearly as sophisticated as its reception might have suggested).

My response to this is sort of a follow-up to recent posts addressing the perceived immaturity or unmasculinity of geeky pursuits like games and comics. In short, I agree with just about all of these to some extent, but I’d contend that these stereotypes can be escaped through creative and marketing efforts. Just look at the “graphic novel.”

While I understand where Jason is coming from, I’m reluctant to agree with him. Before getting into my thoughts, it is worth while to provide a little context.

I am all for artists attempting to push a given medium into new and interesting areas. To work with Jason’s reference to comics, while I am a fan of super hero comics, I am also a fan of many indie comic creators as well. I’d easily hold up something like Joe Sacco’s recent journalist style comics (Palestine, Safe Area Gorazde, War’s End, The Fixer) as some of the most important, forward thinking, work done in the medium in recent memory.

My issue with Jason’s statements is one of motivation. Attempts to expand the pallet of a given medium is something that I applaud, and celebrate when it succeeds. Attempts to “legitimize” a given medium I think are fool hearty and potentially detrimental to the medium itself. Any medium that places a focus on being legitimate, is destined to be irrelevant long before gaining any actual legitimacy.

As an example, I offer up Jazz. Jazz’s roots are populace. It was a form of music that reveled in the emotions and celebrations of the communities where it was being born. Over the years, the genre has moved further and further away from its populace roots and embraced a more high brow approach. Yes, the genre has created some amazing music while pursuing these lofty goals, but the fact of the matter is that the biggest artistic challenge facing the genre today is relevance. Most people don’t care about Jazz. In fact, many view it as little more then a haven for music snobs that has completely lost touch with its roots. The exceptions to this, tend to be nostalgia acts, who are trying to recreate an era when the music was relevant, or artists who are trying to merge it with other genres which are more populace in nature.

The thing to understand when discussing whether a given genre is legitimate is to realize that the discussion is always misrepresented. The idea that a medium’s validity is to be measured by its ability to create high art and the frequency with which it creates that art, is an idea that is held only by a small minority of people. The vast majority of people tie the validity of a medium with its ability to entertain and express emotions/ideas/etc that they can identify with. In short, for the vast majority of people, validity is tied to whether what is being done in the medium is relevant to their lives.

The whole discussion about whether a medium is legitimate is a trap, since the vast majority of the time the discussion is held between two distinct camps. One, which already sees the medium as legitimate and the other that will never see the medium as legitimate. The much more important discussion, in my opinion at least, is whether the medium is relevant? This is a subjective discussion of course, as is the “legitimate” discussion. A medium may be very relevant to one group and completely irrelevant to another group.

Since we are discussing geek culture, I feel it is safe to rephrase the question as ‘is the medium relevant to geeks?’ For things like video games and comic books, I think we can all safely assume that the answer is a resounding, ‘Yes’.

Now, you can recontextualize Jason’s statements as a response to the question of relevance, especially if you are considering the relevance of these mediums outside of the geek mind set. And I wouldn’t have any real issue with his statements in that regard. I do find myself wondering why I should care though?

OK, so there are very real implications to the question of the relevance of these mediums outside of the geek mindset. Especially as they pertain to the economics of keeping the companies working in these mediums afloat. The horrible state of the comic industry is probably the most obvious example. Let’s put that aside for a minute though, since the question is more an economic one then a cultural one.

The questions of relevance outside of geek culture is also a perfectly valid question for individuals who are operating in those cultures. And I have no qualms with these people using mediums which are predominately geeky in nature to express themselves. As I said in the Geek Culture Manifesto,

If it inspires you to create your own thing, then fine. The thing that you create though is not the thing we have created. Do not pretend otherwise.

Geek culture is ours. It is us expressing who we are and what we care about. Why should I care if someone who is not one of us groks what it is that we’re doing? Further more, why should I change how I express myself to conform to the will and whim of people who are not part of this culture?

To put this another way, they wouldn’t let us play with them when we were kids. And so we went off and created our own games and played amongst ourselves. Why should we give up our games, to go play theirs, now? I prefer our games. I find their games boring.

My mind tends to wonder when I’m driving back and forth to work. Sometimes I think about things I need to do. Sometimes I just have random thoughts about random things. And sometimes I end up thinking about things I’ve done. Tonight’s drive home involved the latter, though it left me wondering about the future.

Tonight’s memory went back to 1996, and the HORDE tour for that year. By 1996, the original HORDE bands had moved on to headlining bigger venues. In their wake though, a scene was beginning to form. Resulting in a plethora of groups slugging it out in the clubs all over the US. At the time, I was a pretty big fan of this scene and the bands around which the scene grew. So, in 1996 I hatched a plan.

Prior to the show I bought a half dozen 9X6 manilla envelopes. In these envelopes I put a flier for The Fantastic Voyage, a zine that was covering this kind of music and who had printed a couple of my reviews; a catalog for the Homegrown Music Network, a distribution company that was created to support these kinds of groups; and I probably also wrote a short letter describing what I was doing and why, and which likely included subscription information for the horde.net and homegrown lists, two email-based communities for fans of this kind of music. The center piece of this care package though was a tape of a live performance by one of the groups I was trying to support.

The idea was that here was a group of people who were quite likely to enjoy this kind of music, since they were at the HORDE festival, but who may not have actually heard of any of these groups. Who, may not even realize that there were groups like this playing small clubs. I wanted to help spread the word to these people and turn them onto what was happening. What better way then to physically put the music in their hands?

So, what does this have to do with the future?

In case you haven’t figured it out by now, promoting geek culture is something that I’m interested in. And so I wonder how many geeks are out there who would really dig something like this, but have never heard of it? As I see it, those are the people that I’m trying to reach. When this memory surfaced, I found myself wondering if something like that would work with the geek culture movement?

The idea would work something like this.

Put together a mix tape of your favorite geeky tracks. You can either focus on a single scene, or create something that goes across all the scenes. Include tracks that you love, but also make sure to make room for tracks that may not scratch your itch anymore, but have a tendency to be big hits with a wide variety of people. The idea here isn’t to show off your flawless taste in music, but to hook people on this movement.

Once you have a tape put together (I’m saying tape here because I’m old and I remember when mix tapes actually involved tapes, CDs would probably be a better medium) make several copies of it. Really as many as you can handle/afford and feel confident that you can give away.

After the tapes/cds are created, put a little packaging together for them. Feel free to show your artistic side, but make sure to get in some key information.

(1) A short description of what the music is. If you focused on a single scene, do a short (sentence or two) description of what that scene is. For instance, “the music on this CD is by Wizard Rock (WRock) bands. WRock is a music scene were people write/play songs about/inspired by the Harry Potter books.” If you’re cutting across scenes, then you may want to write something about geek music in general (may I suggest Z’s amazingly brilliant description of “nerd” music).

(2) A listing of the bands on the mix, the names of the songs, and a way that people can find out more info about the group (myspace links are probably the best option here).

(3) Information on where people can find more information about the scene. Links to popular web sites (WizRocklopedia, WizardRock.org, Hipster, please!, Game Music 4 All, etc.) are probably a good thing to use for this.

(4) If some of the groups on the tape are playing a show in the area soon, it may also be worth while to include that info with the packaging for a couple of the CDs.

Once you’ve got your package together, then comes the hard part, figuring out how to give it away.

Randomly handing them to people on the street may have a fun sort of surrealist quality to it, but may not be terribly effective. I would suggest finding some near by place or event where people like you may be gathering, and focus on that. Bonus points if it is a place that you already have a relationship with. Where the people working there at least recognize your face as a regular.

So, say you’re tape is made up of mostly VGM artists. May be there’s a local game store that might be willing to let you leave a couple of CDs on the counter for people to take? Or, if you’re doing a WRock comp, may be a book store or a library? Comic shops are another option. Make sure to ask permission before dropping things off though and be sure to stress that these are completely free and that you are not being paid to do this, but instead are just a fan. You’ll also want to be ready to explain what this music is about and exactly why you are doing this. If you’re leaving your CDs in a place where children will have access to them, you’ll also probably want to keep the music free of swear words.

One other thing. It isn’t uncommon for stores to have a designated place where free stuff (usually newspapers or fliers) gets placed. If you end up putting your CDs in a place like this, you’ll probably want to mark them in someway that let’s people know that they can take one and what it is. Some people, seeing a CD or a package lying unattended, will automatically think someone left it there and so won’t take it unless they are told that they can.

If you do end up dropping your CDs off at a store or library, go back a week or two later and see what the reaction has been like. Has the store heard from anyone who picked a CD up? Did they like it? Would said store perhaps be interested in either hosting a show or helping you promote one? :)

What ever the reaction, this is good information to have. Either to plan your next move or to pass on to a band in hopes of convincing them to come play your hometown.

Either way, it gets the word out and lets those of us who have yet to join us, know that we are here waiting to welcome them to the party.

Z just posted this over at Hipster, Please,

Nerdy music is many things to many people. Or, more specifically, it is what you need it to be.

Within the framework of the greater culture, nerdy music can take a myriad of forms, from hip-hop to punk rock to smooth jazz to chirpy electronica. Each of these styles may lyrically center on anything from video games to television and movies to personal, slice-of-life recollections to wholly romantic declarations to nothing in particular.

Its artists are doctors and dropouts, saints and criminals of all ages and colors and persuasions, and their instruments are computers, Gameboys, guitars, accordions, microphones, and turntables.

They are classically trained and ruthlessly amateurish. They are world-renowned and complete unknowns. They are performers and wallflowers. They are totally serious and just fuckin’ around.

Their songs are benign and malevolent. Accessible and oblique. Proudly dorky and subversively vague.

But most importantly, nerd music is functional.

Whether you want to let your geek flag fly or simply mock your dorkier predilections, it entertains your fancies. Like all art, it invites you to make of it what you will. It permits you to bend it to your desires.

It’s just like any other music, except for the fact that it’s ours. Whoever we decide to be.

I recommend reading the whole thing, but that right there is poetry in my book.

I keep this up and I’m going to have to rename this blog the Liz Appreciation Society or something just as silly. Because you see Liz has pulled a reverse Samson in that she has actually increased her awesomeness by sheering off her red locks. She increased her awesomeness by first hosting one of the evenings of the current Whomp The House Tour (featuring The Whomping Willows, Catchlove, Justin Finch-Fletchley, and, for this part of the tour, The Remus Lupins). Then adding to an already amazing bill by including The Mudbloods. And to make it all even more awesome, she’s posted video and audio of the Mudbloods set. (one day I will teach her how to separate tracks for her recordings, and then she will rule the world as a benevolent dictator.)

You can also catch some normal YouTube video of the night here and see Lizz (in her cute new haircut) talking about the evening here.

Anyways, this actually brought up two things that I’ve been wondering about regarding the over all geek music scene.

1) Why no one seems to have set up a Netlabel with Archive.org? You can find the netlabel page at archive here. I’m not sure what the requirements are to get listed at archive.org, so may be there’s a reason for that. I would have gone ahead and done it myself, but I don’t actually know any bands anymore, so that’s kind of stood in my way. If someone’s interested, but needs someone to handle day to day crap, feel free to drop me a line.

2) Why there isn’t more taping in the geek music scene, given the number of artists who freely give away their music?

For those who aren’t sure what I mean by taping, the practice started (as near as I can tell) in traditional music circles (and in this sense, I’m including Jazz and Blues as traditional forms of music). People would go to shows with a mic and a reel to reel machine (this was before tapes) and record the show live. If you listen to Jazz, Blues, or various forms of traditional music, you’ve likely heard a live album that was created from one of these recordings.

Probably the most famous taper friendly band was the Grateful Dead. Jerry Garcia’s background in traditional music and his fondness for these recordings, lead to the band turning a blind eye at first to people recording their shows and later to expressly allow it, even setting up a special “taper’s section,” behind the soundboard, where people could set up mic stands. While the dead are the most famous for allowing taping of their shows, tapes of different band’s from that era are not hard to find, if you know where to look.

The practice has, of course, grown considerably. Just check out the Live Music Archive at archive.org (and WRockers will want to specifically check out this site and this site).

So, given the number of geek groups that give away free music, why isn’t there more taping in the scene? Of course, cost is a real issue here. A good set of mics can set you back. And there’s the hassle of doing it (lugging gear, setting up, dealing with venues, watching your gear during the show, etc). That said, I’ve seen tapers at shows where they weren’t recording and they just didn’t know what to do with themselves. It is a geeky pursuit for sure. The people who do it are obsessed with it. The people that don’t, don’t understand it.

It is still kind of interesting that the Potters and the Malfoys are the only groups who are listed at the LMA. WRock seems like a perfect scene for live taping, given the off the cuff nature of the shows. I’m not as sure about the other scenes, but I imagine there are at least a couple of artists who could benefit from it.

And think about it for a minute.

For the tapers themselves, there is a pay off for doing it. For one, if that does scratch your geek itch, then it is something you can throw yourself into entirely. It gives you an in with artists (you can always let ‘can I tape?’ be your opening line) and it basically turns you into a god with fellow fans.

For artists, it is a great tool to use with grassroots level marketing. Especially if you’re an artist who has a strong live show.

It isn’t something for everyone, but it is still kind of surprising that more groups don’t do it.

May be I should start a netlabel doing live albums? There’s an idea that won’t look nearly as good in the morning.

Anyways, those are some random thoughts for the evening.