Journal Archive - April, 2008

when i'm in the uk i'm going to do an in-store appearance at phonica records,
which is on 51 poland street. it'll be friday may 9th, from 7-8pm.
i'm also going to play some records while i'm there. thanks, and see you there/then.
moby

i'm not sure how these things work, but if you go to;
http://www.thinkyourepopular.com
and join an existing guest list you can come for free free free to see mylo and trentemoller and me.
hopefully see you soon.
moby

i just posted some photos from the david lynch weekend in fairfield, iowa.
i think they should be up on moby.com
saturday night(last night, ahem)was really fun.
from the acoustic show to playing at the fairfield prom with david lynch to drinking beer
with the fairfieldians and ending up at a rave.
raves in fairfield, who knew?
i didn't know it was possible to stay out until 6 a.m in fairfield.
but i learned that, yes, it's possible to stay out until 6 a.m in fairfield.
fun was had.
moby

here are some headlines from the news.
oh, a bit of trivia, 'news' stands for north east west south.
it's an acronym.
yes, trivia.
ok, headlines:

- Officials Search for Shark That Killed Man
- Texas Will Attempt to Show That Polygamist Culture Itself Harms
- Winehouse Gets Wrist Slap for Man Slap
- The Adult Crime Game Kids Love
- Karzai Escapes an Assassination Attempt

now i understand things so much better.
i was blind. now i see.
well, thanks to the headlines.
ok, in fairfield iowa.
g'night.
moby

today i did an npr show called 'wait! wait! don't tell me'.
ok, by 'did' i mean that i was a guest. 'did' is perfunctory show biz lingo. sorry.
if you don't know 'wait! wait! don't tell me', it really is the funniest thing on the radio.
i was in the audience for half the show and i was laughing. and laughing.
again with the laughing.
drew carey was one of the panelists, and he was really funny.
well, everyone involved in the show was really funny, the hosts, the panelists, even
the people making coffee backstage.
i'm not sure when the show is airing, but i encourage you to listen.
funny.
if you laugh you live longer.
it's true.
and today(friday)i'm going to iowa to spend the weekend with david lynch.
i think we might go canoeing.
ok, by 'think' i mean 'hope'.
i hope we go canoeing.
why?
i like canoeing and i like david lynch('inland empire' being the best movie of the last decade. i know not everyone shares
my opinion on that, alas).
i don't know iowa too well, but i'm assuming i'll like iowa, too.
if you're near fairfield, iowa come on over and say hi.
laura and daron and i are going to play a few acoustic songs there on saturday night.
oh, did i mention that tuesday night in chicago was really fun?
holy ghost! and justin and jacques were great, and the audience was great, too.
i'm ending a lot of sentences with 'too'.
it's like the lazy persons way of ending sentences without going into too much detail.
if i had an editor they'd hit me in the head with a rolled up newspaper and say 'stop being such a lazy fucker, write something
other than etc or too.'
but i don't have an editor.
which has probably been painfully clear for the last, oh, 7 years?
maybe i should look for an editor on craig's list.
ok, off to iowa.
-moby

Ok, more politics...
Yesterday john mccain opted not to vote for legislation that would enable women to pursue equal pay for doing the same jobs as men.
Mccain said: "They(women) need education, particularly since more and more women are heads of their households."
I guess that's the problem with having a republican front-runner whose view of women's rights was developed in the 1930's...
I guess it also helps when you have a wife(as mccain does)who pays all the bills with gobs and gobs of inherited money.
Yup, nothing says 'in touch with the average american' like having a wife with a $190 million inheritance.
I wonder when the republicans are going to call for women in america to wear burqa's?
Moby

Ew. Ew. Ew.
Politics.
Hillary clinton is claiming a lead in the popular vote.
Er, uh, what?
She's claiming the lead because she got more votes in florida and michigan.
Ew she's gross.
See, neither candidate campaigned in florida or michigan, and obama's name wasn't even on the ballot in michigan.
So she's claiming a lead based on a vote that obama wasn't even a part of?
Does she think we don't know the truth?
That We're just dim-witted rubes who are going to take her at her word?
She has pretty much effectively squandered any support and good will she ever had with democrats, at least the ones I know.
Her desperation is divisive and repugnant. If she can't win honestly(which she can't), she's going to try to win either through dishonesty or undemocratic loopholes.
She should just go away.
Such a shame, cos she was actually a good senator.
Next she's going to start inventing states, "no! I should be president cos I won the caucus in, uh, west dakota!"
Or maybe she'll claim that she should get extra votes from pet owners or people with bicycles?
Moby

this won't make sense to some of the people who are reading this, but i just finished listening
to 'rhapsody in blue' from start to finish and i'm convinced it's the best thing
ever written and recorded in the history of things written and recorded.
i bought my first vinyl copy of 'rhapsody in blue' when i was 13, and i've never gone for a month
without listening to it.
our generation most likely won't leave much of a cultural stamp, and that's heartbreaking.
not to sound like a cranky old guy, but where is anything that we've done that's even remotely
comparable to 'rhapsody in blue'?
and before you dismiss me as a crank, go listen to 'rhapsody in blue' and then go listen
to anything recorded in the last, oh, 40 years and tell me that it's in any way comparable.
or go listen to anything recorded in this century that even dares to hold the hem of 'rhapsody
in blue.'
dismiss me with evidence, but don't dismiss me as just a crazy old crank drinking brooklyn
lager and listening to george gershwin.
really, go listen to it, start to finish. and then listen to top 40 pop radio for 15 minutes.
if i were objective and dispassionate and able to objectively assess our music compared
and contrasted to and with george gershwin's 'rhapsody in blue' i would make
the following simple pronouncement/statement: we suck, and i'm certainly not exempting myself.
my work compared to 'rhapsody in blue'? nothin'.
in 'rhapsody in blue' there's nuance and complexity and subtlety and bombast and about
1,000 different musical vernaculars all exuberantly fighting for primacy with one another.
and the end result is fucking flawless, from start to finish. even when it lags it's still confident
with where it's going to end up. 12 minutes in? sure, it starts to meander, but so full of
life and confidence, that the lagging is filled with pregnant anticipation.
and the orchestral bombast contrasted with the delicate piano passages? fu...u...ck.
flawless. it's like orgasms made out of chocolate and vicodin.
you might think i'm nuts, waxing absurdly rhapsodic about 'rhapsody in blue', but go listen to it, start
to finish. listen. it's so fucking good. as i said, the best piece of music ever written and recorded.
ok, that's all.
goodnight,
moby

ok, so on tonights simpsons they showed lisa and nelson as nancy and sid chopping lines
and cooking drugs in a spoon.
yes, they were lines of chocolate and cocoa in a spoon, but still, pretty racy.
or racey?
racy.
and comic book guy as the proprietor of cbgb's(comic book guys bar)was truly funny.
bart looked surprisingly good as johnny rotten, red hair and 'destroy' t-shirt and all.
but still, chopping lines and cooking drugs in a spoon(authentically rendered, makes me think that one of the animators is or should be in n.a...) at 8pm on a sunday night.
impressive.
oh, the 'secret show'(again, less of a secret as the details are public knowledge now)on tuesday
in chicago at smart bar should be fun, especially as justin and jacques and holy ghost! will be dj'ing.
do they still have a photo-booth machine at smart bar? i have vague memories of beginning a relationship
in the photo-booth machine at smart bar in 2002.
poor photo-booth machines, sacrificed under the wheels of progress...
ok, see you tuesday.
moby

i'm going to be dj'ing in london with mylo and trentemoeller in may. and it's free to get in.
the only catch is that you have to win the contest.
the url is below with all the details.
hopefully see you in london in may!
moby

http://www.thinkyourpopular.com

hi, another rock show with the little death in nyc.
laura describes it best:

From laura:

True believers.
If you were there last time, then we need say no more

If you weren't there last time, here's one last chance to experience
The Cracked Society Revue
a night of nasty blues, libidinous Euro-trash, bad behavior, liquor soaked floors, & several reasons to avoid looking in the mirror the next morning.
featuring:

The Little Death
Rene Risque
w/ The Sweet Divines
and other special surprise guests

at
The Box
189 Chrystie Street

Thursday, May 1
Doors open at 8.
Show at 9 (sharp).

Tickets are only available here:
http://www.ticketweb.com/t3/event/EventListings?orgId=22823

P.S. Due to hitting fire capacity at the last show, we must sell fewer tickets this time--which means this will sell out pretty quick.

hi, another rock show with the little death in nyc.
laura describes it best:

From laura:

True believers.
If you were there last time, then we need say no more

If you weren't there last time, here's one last chance to experience
The Cracked Society Revue
a night of nasty blues, libidinous Euro-trash, bad behavior, liquor soaked floors, & several reasons to avoid looking in the mirror the next morning.
featuring:

The Little Death
Rene Risque
w/ The Sweet Divines
and other special surprise guests

at
The Box
189 Chrystie Street

Thursday, May 1
Doors open at 8.
Show at 9 (sharp).

Tickets are only available here:
http://www.ticketweb.com/t3/event/EventListings?orgId=22823

P.S. Due to hitting fire capacity at the last show, we must sell fewer tickets this time--which means this will sell out pretty quick.

ok, apparently you can go to myspace secret shows, sign up as a friend, and post bulletins requesting that I DJ at a 'secret show'

i say 'apparently' cos i'm ignorant as to the ways of this sort of high-tech future.

Moby

CLICK HERE TO ADD MYSPACE SECRET SHOWS NOW

www.myspace.com/secretshows

you'll see, if you're so inclined, that i have some shows coming up this summer.
what you won't see are:
a-the shows that are scheduled but aren't currently listed(like the 3 shows in mexico in may with underworld)
and
b-the shows that haven't been scheduled yet and aren't currently listed(like me stating the obvious, as is my forte).
i thought that some of your own testimonials to your own white-trash upbringings were interesting.
who's that 'you know you're a redneck when...' comedian?
jeff foxworthy?
somebody foxworthy?
maybe we should share 'you know you grew up poor white trash when...' anecdotes.
like(from my experience)-

'you know you grew up poor white trash when you get your first dishwasher at 35 and you realize
that you've never used a home dishwasher before so you continue to wash dishes in the sink
rather than deal with the new.'

'you know you grew up poor white trash when undiluted juice tastes too thick and syrupy.'

'you know you grew up poor white trash when someone at school said "hey, that's my old jacket." about
your 'new' winter coat.'

'you know you grew up poor white trash when you remember kfc being too fancy and expensive.'

and so on.
share your own.
ok, maybe i'll see some of you at the dj gig tomorrow(tuesday)night.
apparently it's free to get in.
moby

You might have noticed that I haven't been saying much about the presidential primaries.
That's mainly because the campaigns have gone from being interesting and compelling to uh, distasteful and, well, adolescent? Post-adolescent? Pre?
Most of the back and forth between the candidates and their surrogates(oh the surrogates, oi)just sounds like playground tattle-tale-ing('ms hoover, barack said a bad word! You should give him detention, ms hoover.')
Take obamas comment recently that economically insecure people might turn to old standby's like guns and religion.
Not the smartest thing to say, but not exactly earth-shattering.
And then mccain and hillary jump on obama for being 'elitist'.
Um, huh.
Hillary and mccain live in million dollar houses and travel in private planes. They're each worth tens of millions of dollars. They got advanced degrees from fancy colleges. And they're calling obama 'elitist'?
To quote david brent from the office, 'hello? Kettle, pot, black?'
They're politicians and they're all elitist, that's a given, no?
Its not like any of the candidates live in a double-wide and spend their evenings watching dr phil and washing government cheese down with bud lights while the neighbors kids shoot cats with a .22.
I still hope that obama gets the nomination and becomes president.
And, for what its worth, even though I'm probably considered by lots of people to be an elitist now, I can say from experience that government cheese is fucking rough.
I figure I paid my non-elitist dues when I was 10 and my mom sent me to the supermarket to try and use foodstamps to get cigarettes for her. That and adjusting the wire hanger in the salvation army tv so we could watch 'a-team'.
Or doing homework in the car outside of the laundromat.
Ah, I could go on all night...
White trash rules.
And obama should stay away from bowling alleys.
It would make a good slogan:
'Obama: good president, terrible bowler'.
And the best bowling in manhattan is at the port authority bowling alley.
They sell beer by the yard. Its awesome.
Ok, time for bed.
Moby

thanks for coming to maxwell's last night, and thanks to chris for organizing everything.
hopefully everyone enjoyed the show.
i particularly liked la lacque and salt & samovar.
i love the return of the vintage organ, although as a collector
of vintage organs it does make them more expensive(simple supply and demand).
but at least they're being put to good use.
i'm writing in simple sentences because it's still quite early and my brain
hasn't developed the ability to craft complex sentences as of yet.
an aside: are all rabbits kind of dumb?
we were in a park in hoboken last night and there were a few rabbits hanging out
on the grass.
the rabbits were startled and ran towards, not away from, a big, black labrador.
luckily said labrador probably just wanted to play with the rabbits(like george from of mice and men), and didn't rend them limb from limb.
so, were these rabbits just dumb(running pretty much into the jaws of the dog), or was it some
nihilistic rabbit rite of passage, like the lupine equivalent of eating hot peppers or sky-diving?
or, as it was a park at night, were these stoner rabbits, hopped up on the left-handed marijuana cigarettes that are so popular with the young persons?
rabbit one: 'dude, look at that big black rabbit.'
rabbit two: 'no dude, that's like, a dog.'
rabbit one: 'no, it's like the UR-rabbit.'
rabbit two: 'oh, dude, you're totally right, let's go love it, man.'
stupid rabbits.
oh, i'm dj'ing tuesday night at the aptly named 'le paris' in milwaukee.
no, it's actually in paris. dj'ing at 'le paris' in paris(france, not wisconsin. although
if there was a paris, wisconsin i'd be happy to dj there, too).
so, maybe see you tuesday night in france.
and thanks again for coming to the show last night.
moby

ok, so on friday i saw a video link from musicsnobbery.com
in said link mr. music snobbery. com admitted that he was having a party at maxwells and his
headliner had cancelled.
he then asked a few people(me being one of them)to play at his party.
so, as i spend way too much time on the aforementioned internet and i have free time on april 10th and i love to play if there's an audience and/or beer involved, saw his
request and i emailed him and said, 'i'd be happy to play at your party'.
then he wrote back and, to paraphrase, said, 'great'.
so i'm playing at his party.
at maxwells.
in new jersey.
if you want to come you can get tickets at here:

http://www.ticketweb.com/t3/sale/SaleEventDetail?dispatch=loadSelectionD...

or so i've been led to believe.
or:

http://maxwellsnj.com/

the april 10th musicsnobbery.com 3rd year anniversary.
i'll be doing drunken cover songs of my own songs and drunken cover songs of other
people's songs.
i'm particularly excited to play a cover of 'new dawn fades'.
which i rarely(and/or 'often')play.
see you thursday, i hope.
it's the only live show i have scheduled in the u.s of/and a this year.
hopefully see you thursday night w/ salt&samovar and la laque.
moby

p.s-the bars in new jersey close early, so i'm not sure what we'll be doing after the show.
but we'll be up late, as both me and my bandmates are, for lack of a better term, "alcoholics". we're open to post 1:45 a.m suggestions. thanks.

I'm going to be playing a really small live show on april 10th at one of my favorite venues in new jersey.
Laura and daron and aaron and luci and cherie from the little death will be my backing band, but we'll be playing a bunch of my songs(new and old).
I'll announce ticket details and location on monday at noon.
See you thursday, hopefully.
moby

a random list:

a-yes, i love pantera.

b-'the crystal ship' by the doors is a great song. not their best, but pretty great.

c-every song on the doors first album('crystal ship' was on 2nd, no?)is
flawless.

d-getting ready to go dj at hiro, i'm actually mainly looking forward to listening
to mehdi and tommy. and beer. not listening to beer. although it does speak
to me at times, in quiet, dulcet, white-trash tones.

e-chemical brothers 'hey boy hey girl' is a great song, too. i think i'll play it tonight.

f-i like coffee a lot. not as much as beer. or different, rather. differently? different?

g-i saw a picture of michael stipe today and i thought it was me.

h-is for hillary, who is getting lots of bad advice.

i-i really like edward gorey. i think that tomorrow i'll go buy some more edward
gorey books.

j-i'm going to mexico in a few weeks to do 3 shows with underworld. oops, was
i not supposed to announce this? sorry. i hope they play 'rez'.

k-i'm looking at an action figure of homer. he's hitting spider pig on the butt with a donut.

l-i have an odd love for/of portable organs from the 60's. not internal body parts from the kennedy era, but metal
and plastic and wood keyboards that sound like the sir douglas quintet.

m-i also really love old drum machines. someday i'll take pictures of my old drum machine
collection and share them with the world. that's assuming that the world is interested. which, to be honest, it probably isn't.

n-i'd probably be less annoying and sell more records if i wasn't such a compulsive blogger. i seem to have tourrette's of the blog. but what are you going to do?

o-'tourrette's of the blog' sounds/is disgusting. 'blog', although ubiquitous and in common useage, is still a pretty disgusting word.

p-south park, 'bigger longer uncut' might be the best movie ever made, especially the skeet ulrich poster above the devil's bed.

q-pantera and south park, i'm pretty high-brow. that's what a philosophy degree gets you; a love of speed metal, cartoons, bud light, and drum machines. bertrand russel would be proud. or ashamed. or indifferent. probably ashamed.

r-i'm going to try to go to the end of the alphabet, i still have 5 minutes to go until i leave for hiro.

s-once my studio is up and running again i'll put more songs up on mobygratis.com. i'm sorry i haven't put up anything new in a while. mea culpa.

t-i kind of miss miami. and austin. and mexico. and, well, being warm in general. remind me of this in august when it's 1800 degrees in nyc and the pavement/tarmac is evaporating and dogs are spontaneously combusting on the sidewalk.

u-patagonia. i'd really like to go to patagonia. only problem is it's far away and they don't have good deli's. or so i've been told. maybe they do have good deli's. a good deli is the single greatest achievement of western civilization. pennicilin? dentistry? air travel? sure, all nice, but where are they at 4 a.m when you need a burrito?

v-rob riggle on the daily show is really funny. i'm not sure if that's how you spell his name. see, i'm a cultural pundit. i guess that's what bloggers do. they pundit. i know, that's not a verb. thanks.

w-it's pretty clear that if i had any self-respect i would've stopped writing a long time ago. i owe my success to a lack of shame, a lack of self-respect, and an inability to do anything practical. if i wasn't a musician i'd be probably be selling water damaged fireworks behind a waffle house in nebraska.

x-i really love x. the band. and the 80's colloquial street name for mdma. mainly the band. drugs rot the brain, even if they're fun. alas, they still rot the brain. which is sad. if they can put a man on the moon and map the human genome why can't they make recreational drugs that aren't bad for you?
it's a valid question.

y-for 'yes'. my first concert. at madison square garden. i was in the 2nd to last row and i saw
nothing, but it was really cool being out late on a school night. 'and you and i' is a really good song to listen to if you're on a date in washington d.c and your date has a nice car with a good car stereo.

z-time to go to hiro. i can't believe i still love dj'ing as much as i do. i'm lucky.
ok, have a good night.

mob

my friends laura and peter at moveon are having a contest called

'obama in 30 seconds'. it's based on the 'bush in 30 seconds' contest we had in 2003(although this time they're looking for honest/positive ads about obama as opposed to honest/negative ads about bush).
if you'd like to enter, the url is:

www.ObamaIn30Seconds.org

if you win you get lots of attention and $20,000 and some nice equipment and a puppy.
well, maybe not the puppy. and maybe it's $20,000 in equipment. or maybe $20,000 worth
of puppies. i'm sure it'll all be made clear on the site.
i'm one of the judges along with:

Ben Affleck
Steve Buscemi
Matt Damon
Michael Franti
John Legend
Lawrence Lessig
Julia Stiles
Eddie Vedder

and a bunch of other nice people. well, i assume they're nice. but i also assumed that you get a free puppy if you win, so i basically know nothing. i do know that it's for a good cause(obama in chief).
and i do know that obama should never, ever, ever bowl in public again. luckily there's no direct correlation between bowling skills and chief executive skills(i mean 37 points? oof). oh, and thanks for coming to the union sq megastore today. and see you thursday at hiro. and i hope that you enter the contest and win prizes and a puppy. what kind of puppy? one of those invisible, mime puppies, most likely. and i wonder why i don't get taken seriously.

moby