Category: Announcements

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My Rosi Braidotti Piece on H+ Magazine

My piece about Rosi Braidotti’s latest book, (“Beyond the Body with Rosi Braidotti,” from June 1st, 2013), was picked up by h+ Magazine.

H+ Magazine

The site describes itself like so:

h+ covers technological, scientific, and cultural trends that are changing — and will change — human beings in fundamental ways. We follow developments in areas like NBIC (nano-bio-info-cog), longevity, performance enhancement and self-modification, Virtual Reality, “the Singularity,” and other areas that both promise and threaten to radically alter our lives and our view of the world and ourselves.

More than that, h+ aims to reflect this newest edge culture by featuring creative expressions of humanity on a razor’s edge where daily life and science fiction seem to be merging.

I’m sure you’ve already read it, but here it is anyway. Thanks to Peter Rothman for spreading the word(s).

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Frank the Rabbit on Reality Sandwich

The latest Reality Sandwich Top Ten list assignment was “Top Ten Fictional Demigods,” and I chose Frank the Rabbit from the movie Donnie Darko (2001). Not only is the film my favorite of all-time, but Frank is largely the driving force. He’s the animating flood from which the plot spills forth. He also takes the form of a rabbit (well, a dude in a rabbit costume), which is my favorite animal.

Frank in Donnie Darko.

Here’s an excerpt:

Though Donnie Darko writer/director Richard Kelly has never copped to it, Frank the rabbit fits the auspices of the pookah legend. In the film, Frank, a young man in a darkly realized bunny suit, guides Donnie, the film’s protagonist, through an alternate present (albeit around Halloween, hence the costume). Cryptically leading Donnie through this aberrant timeline, Frank is out to set things right. I don’t want to completely give away the plot, but it’s a basic Christ narrative, and Frank is the guide, the mentor, the messenger from the future.

Read the full post over on Reality Sandwich, along with the staff’s other picks (scroll down: mine’s at the bottom).

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“Previously on Veronica Mars…”

I started drafting this post before they’d reached their Kickstarter goal, but it only took four hours for The Veronica Mars Movie Project to get halfway there and less than ten for it to make. It’s good to know that I’m not alone in my love of Kristen Bell, Rob Thomas’s writing, and the product of their working together.

Now that it’s definitely happening, I’m all abuzz with possibilities. The only hints Thomas is revealing are,

Life has taken Veronica away from Neptune. In the years since spoiling Keith’s chances to be reelected sheriff, Veronica hasn’t taken a case. But something big is about to bring her back home and back to her calling. My goal is to include as many of your favorite characters as possible. It is, after all, time for Veronica’s 10-year high school reunion.

In the preview to the doomed fourth season, Veronica had joined the FBI. That direction has clearly been scrapped, what if there’s the second or third of a serial murder spree that happens in Neptune around the time of Neptune High’s reunion and Veronica, already in town for to catch up with her (and our) old friends, is tapped to investigate? What if Kyle MacLachlan, reprising his role as Special Agent Dale Cooper from Twin Peaks (one of Mars’ obvious influences), is involved (he could have played her boss at the FBI!)? It looks like Logan, Dick, and Keith are definitely on board, but here’s hoping Wallace, Weevil, Vinnie, Mac, Piz, and even Corny find the time and interest to join in on the fun.

Few other shows have made me want to write as much as Veronica Mars, so the movie becoming a reality has me taking frantic notes. Regardless, I am a proud backer of this project and it illustrates the power of fans in our current media-state. A long time ago, we used to be friends, and now, we can be again.

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The Haunting of Mitch Hedberg on Splitsider

Eight years after his death, Mitch Hedberg’s unique style of standup continues to haunt open-mic stages and playlists of millions, as well as our daily conversation. I commemorated his humor and haunting over on Splitsider.com today, thanks to Samantha Pitchel and Adam Frucci.

Splitsider

Here’s an excerpt:

I was at a bar in Seattle called Lynda’s with [Hedberg’s road manager, Greg] Chaille and several other comedians on the two-year anniversary of Mitch’s passing, and we all went around the table telling our favorite Mitch jokes.

“Last week I helped a friend stay put,” started one comedian. “It’s a lot easier than helping someone move. I just went over to his house and made sure that he did not start to load shit into a truck.”

“I had my hair highlighted because I thought some strands were more important than others,” offered someone else.

“An escalator can never be broken, it can only become stairs,” added another. “Escalator temporarily stairs! Sorry for the convenience!” everyone finished in unison.

“I think Pringles’ original intention was to make tennis balls,” I chimed in, “but on the day the rubber was supposed to show up a truckload of potatoes came. Pringles is a laid back company, so they just said ‘fuck it, cut ‘em up!’”

During the blackout in the desert, Chaille built a bonfire in the campground across the road from the Panamint Springs resort. We all soon reconvened there, clumsily finding our way through the dark desert where Mitch’s spirit still lingered. Shortly after his death, comedians from all over the country gathered in Los Angeles to honor Mitch’s memory. “If I didn’t get a chance to say hello,” friend and fellow comedian Doug Stanhope wrote on his website after the show, “it’s because it was hard to talk.”

Read the full story here.

Thanks to Bill Minutaglio and David Patterson who were early readers and commenters on this material, and many thanks to Lynn Shawcroft, Greg Chaille, Doug Stanhope, Brendon Walsh, Emery Emery, Brett Erickson, Kerry Mitchell, and especially Mitch Hedberg. Rest in peace. You are missed.

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Reclaim My Domain: Thank You All!

As many of you know, my domain slipped from my hands a few months ago. Well, several of my most ardent supporters contributed to my getting it back by donating and spreading the word, and their rewards are packed and ready to ship.

The Fruit of the Loot

Many, many thanks (and packages of loot) go out to the following: Jeff Newelt, Michele Foreman, Doug Armato, Brian Peterson, Chris Bentley, Val Renegar, Steve McCann, Alex Burns, Matt Bailie, Elizabeth Usery, Sean Cashbaugh, Katie Newcomb, Mark Wieman, Sidney Brinson, Eric Larson, Ryan Lane, Matt Youngmark, Kath O’Donnell, Matt Schulte, Adam Menz, Alaina Nims, Ed Lawrence, Austin Tolin, and Nate Sanders. Your names will be permanently appended to this site’s About page, and watch your mailboxes. Your rewards will finally be hitting them soon.

Thanks again for all of your continued support. I appreciate it more than I can say here.

Onward,

royc.

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Surreal Estate: Reclaim My Domain

Somehow the registration for my main domain name lapsed. I don’t know how it slipped by me, but it did. Since my website gets a decent amount of traffic, it showed up on various radars, and someone snagged it. The guy who now owns my name told me via email, “I am planning to put in on Sedo for $2000 USD. These type of domains usually sell fast, because they have high PageRank.” The only reason this particular domain name has a high PageRank is because I have spent the last 15 years developing content for it, promoting it, and keeping it visible. Also, it’s not just some cute web domain, it’s my name. Because of the money-making land-grab of domain poachers, I didn’t even have access to my own email address.

I bought my first domain name in 1997. The ‘zine I was doing at the time was called “Front Wheel Drive,” so I made the leap online and bought frontwheeldrive.com. As it says on the About page here,

A few false starts later, it evolved into an archive of interviews and reviews that explored the peaks of theory and technology and the depths of the cultural underground. Following our interests and curiosity wherever they led, my small but dedicated staff (Tom Georgoulias, Brandon Pierce, Mark Wieman, et al.) and I kept the site up-to-date with in-depth reviews of books, films, music, and art from all the edges of culture — and interviews with the minds that created them. Scott McCloud described the site as “nicely designed and packed with ideas (a rarity on both counts),” and Mark Dery called it “brutally cool.” Though frontwheeldrive.com ceased operations in late 2007, the best of its content is archived in my book Follow for Now, and all of the above continues on this very site.

“This very site” was roychristopher.com, my main web presence from 2007 to, well, a month or so ago.

I spent those weeks trying to decide if it’s worth it to pay the guy off and maintain the name I have spent so much time and effort to build. To dispute this with iCANN would cost more than the guy wants for the domain, and I also don’t have a case. I inadvertently let the name lapse, and he bought it. I thought maybe since it’s my name–my legal name–and a brand of sorts that I’d have a legal precedent, but according to my lawyer friends, I don’t. So, I opted to see if I could raise the money to get it back.

I decided that getting my name back would avoid a lot of confusion now and in the future, but would also require help (as a grad student, I don’t have two grand just to get back where I was a few weeks ago). Eventually, the precious PageRank of my domain would lose its value. No one wins in this situation. Not even the poacher and his domain-trolling scripts.

So, I started an Indiegogo campaign, and I convinced the poacher that I’m no one and the only no one interested in this piece of surreal estate (save maybe the award-winning production designer of the same name). I also got his price down to $1000. Thanks to my gracious friends, I’ve raised enough so far to regain control. I don’t yet own the domain, but I am able to post here again. I know this may seem like a frivolous or minor problem in the grand scheme, but I work very hard on what you see here. If you like anything I do here, please consider helping me out of this jam. I have rewards available, and I will keep working on the site as ever.

Thank you all for your continued support,

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Kickstarting Ume’s New Record

My dear friends Lauren, Eric and Rachel, collectively known as Ume, have been perched on the verge of the next level for a while now. With the interest of Grammy-winning producer Adam Kasper (Foo Fighters, Queens of the Stone Age, Seaweed, etc.), they have a chance to finally break through. And we can help them.

Ume, being the DIY-minded folks that they are, have started a Kickstarter campaign to raise the money to book studio time with Kasper. These are hard-working, hard-rocking, talented musicians, good people, and good friends. Help me help them get this thing done.

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How I Got Over The Roots

I put The Roots collective head out over on my man Tim Baker’s SYFFAL site in a column they call “Old Yeller’d.” The idea is to kill off some cultural sacred cow that’s just gone on way too long. I picked Illadelph’s finest.

Here’s an excerpt:

It’s been a decade since anyone should’ve been paying any attention to The Roots (Phrenology for those of you keeping score at home). They probably peaked before that, and it wasn’t on that heavy-handed, overrated Things Fall Apart joint. It’s hard to innovate with that many crocks on the counter. How many dudes are in this band? I can’t imagine how they ever got paid, laid, or fed. It’s only fitting that they became a house band, slowcooking into onscreen oblivion.

It gets worse, and it’s only partially in jest. Read the rest on SYFFAL.

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Aggro Rag: Ride First, Read Later

I’ve expounded elsewhere at length about how zine-making during my teen years informed my life’s path, and I’ve mentioned fellow traveler Mike Daily before, but I haven’t really given him due credit. Mike Daily is a founding member of The Plywood Hoods, one of the most influential BMX crews in the history of our little sport. He also made one of the first BMX zines ever: Aggro Rag. Echoing my own feelings about making zines, Daily told Jared Souney in an interview for ESPN BMX in 2010, “Working with the printed page in mind has always been my way of creating something, from the early ‘zine designs to my cut-and-pasted writing journals. I like to lay things out visually, so the collage approach helps hone poems, lyrics for songs and fiction/non-fiction I’m working on. It’s more of a calling than a career — that kind of gnawing feeling that compels you to make stuff.”

Well, Daily’s never stopped making stuff. From his novels and zines to his complete rebuild of his original CW California Freestyle bike, he’s stayed on the make. His latest missive is a new issue of Aggro Rag, the premiere BMX zine’s first appearance since 1989. Each of the 500 copies is signed by original Plywood Hoods Brett Downs, Mark Eaton, Kevin Jones, Jamie McKulik, Dale Mitzel and Daily himself. Contributors include Mark Lewman, Spike Jonze, Peter Relic, Drob Meyer, and Pecos B., among many others. There are interviews with flatland undergrounders like Mark McKee, Aaron Dull, Gary Pollak, Chris Day, Jim Johnson, Derek Schott, Gerry Smith, Dave Nourie, and several others, as well as Hip-hop undergrounders like Dark Time Sunshine and Sole. You can snag a copy right now, and I suggest you do so.

As for me, Daily asked me to interview my dude Aesop Rock, which I did gladly. It’s an honor to be a part of the zine I read so avidly in my youth. Here are two of my friends and heroes celebrating the release of Aggro Rag #13 at Portland’s Wonder Ballroom on July 19th, 2012:

If the return of the zine weren’t enough, this issue precedes the forthcoming 443-page book, Aggro Rag Freestyle Mag! Plywood Hoods Zines ’84-’89: The Complete Collection, coming out January 1, 2013.

It’s going to be so dope, but as Daily always said, “Ride First, Read Later.”

——————–

Ordering instructions can be found at the Aggro Rag site.

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Please Support Adult Rappers

Sorry for the late notice, but there are only five days to go in this campaign. Please support my dude Paul Iannacchino, Jr. in his endeavor to document the aging of Hip-hop:

From the Kickstarter page:

In 1999 I moved to the L.E.S. of NYC during the hottest summer on record to pursue rap fame as the next hottest thing to the weather. With little more than a mattress and my MPC 2000 I was lucky enough to go on to make some records (when they still made those) with names like Mr. Lif, Aesop Rock, Cage, C-Rayz Walz and others before ultimately signing to El-P’s Definitive Jux label as one third of the rap power-trio Hangar 18. I got my first shot at a legitimate tour courtesy of Def Jux and The Hangar hit the road in support of The Multi-Platinum Debut LP, the most platinumest album of 2004. We did lots of shows in lots of places from Compton to Connecticut (peace Connecticut) and sold some CDs (when they still made those) but shortly thereafter came to the realization that the “rap game” was not for me. It was on a tour bus actually – sitting next to Shock G…but that’s another story. This is not a film about yours truly.

That said, many of my friends new and old either were or are actively pursuing a career in hip-hop…and “the game” is a cruel, cruel bitch with little to give but heartache, bad credit and chronic wanderlust.

So not too long ago I embarked on a journey to talk to some of my friends. Many of whom, like me, grew up in what’s considered the Golden Age of hip-hop. And many of whom, like myself, remember a time before hip-hop and it’s current ubiquity across our pop culture landscape. And many of whom, like I, have watched as our peers have struggled to maintain relevance and earn a paycheck as the torch is passed to a new generation of rappers that cut their teeth on You Tube instead of YO! MTV Raps. The journey to date has given me the chance to talk to a wide range of rappers, past and present, from indy to mainstream. Some you’ll know, others you should act like you do. So far that list includes; Yesh aka Yeshua DapoED, Soul Khan, J57, Alaska, Blockhead, DJ Js1, DJ Elle, Despot, J Zone, Jams F. Kennedy, Bobbito, Masta Ace, Eternia, Torae, Luckyiam, Brooker T, Jensen Karp aka Hot Karl, Cryptic One, RA the Rugged Man, Homeboy Sandman, Jarobi, Slug, Blueprint, Louis Logic, Open Mike Eagle…and the list grows like a 90’s posse cut everyday.

If you know what day Ed Lover Dance day falls on, what EPMD stands for AND you can name all the groups that make up The Native Tongues Family? You might just be an Adult Rapper. I think you’ll enjoy our story.

So if you’ve ever wondered what the other 23 hours (off stage) of a working rapper’s life looks like in the 21st Century – look no further. It’s a story we’re anxious to tell. It can be both inspiring and heartbreaking so YouTube millionaires take heed. Only some 30 years after the birth of the music we’re wondering – where does it go next? As rappers get older, their music arguably stays the same age. Will we see rappers age gracefully and perform well into their winter years like so many Jazz greats? Will Kane still rock the Apollo at 70? Do rappers have expiration dates, and if so, do they know it? How does a rapper get a real job after years on the grind? We explore all this and more through a series of in depth interviews with a line-up that would makes Eddie Ill and DL jealous.

We will be eternally grateful if you support our film. With your support we will wrap up shooting in NY, LA, Boston, Chicago, Detroit and everywhere else a great interview awaits. While a little luck and a lot of emails have gotten us this far, a little money will bring this labor of love down the home Stretch (& Bobbito).

Thank you.

Paul Iannacchino, Jr.

Help us make this happen.