After what seems like the longest, coldest, wettest winter I can remember since moving to Austin over a decade ago, the sun is finally starting to break through. The familiar smell of a freshly-cut lawn wafts through the open windows, coaxing me out of the blanket pile faster than a carafe of French press coffee. Just south of my cave, SXSW rages into the weekend. I’ll make a couple contributions to this year’s festival with a performance tonight (Friday March 19th) with local composer Graham Reynolds and his DUKE! project, playing some of the rowdiest renditions Mr. Ellington may never hear. 10:30 at The Elephant Room. Then tomorrow night (Saturday March 20th) I’ll be bringing the heat with Dertybird, 11pm at Club One 2 One, with Noble Dog, making it a night of greasy Southern rock and whiskey-soaked good times.
In other news, I dove head-first into the world of microelectronics a few months back, and now that I’ve gotten familiar with a multimeter, reading schematics/datasheets, and have successfully built, repaired, and/or modified a mess of electronic orphans, either donated or thrifted, I can confidently present to you my three most-recent creations in the circuit-bending realm.
Much like the creation of music, or food, there are parallel universes existing within the circuitry of electronics. Reed Ghazala, the father of circuit-bending, is quickly becoming another of my heroes. A muse tickled my brain with the book “Handmade Electronic Music” back in November, and with the recent acquisition of Ghazala’s book “Circuit-Bending,” I’ve been focused mainly on taking kids’ toys (from thrift stores, not from actual children) and turning them into bizarre noisemakers by rewiring their innards. Sometimes they die on the operating table, but even then, I’ve only spent two bucks and I’ll likely pull all the jacks, knobs, and misc guts to be used for the next 6 volt cadaver. Check out NoysToise to see what can be done if you REALLY know what you’re doing. His pieces are jaw-dropping fountains of bubbly audio champagne. But before you watch his stuff, watch mine. If you watch his first, mine will seem, well, like what they are.. Crude, sorta-silly, slightly-creepy mutants. But they’re made with love, and mere mile posts in my quest for new knowledge. And trust me, I’m learning quickly. Just wait. For now, take a gander at my newly-created Ecclectronica playlist at YouTube. If you’re this flavor of nerd as well, you’ll be pickled tink to know that bending guru Eric Archer himself has opened Switched On in downtown east Austin. I’ve yet to make it to the newly-opened shop, but then again, I’m almost afraid. My place already looks like.. hell. Nah, it’s badass. Seriously.
And finally (big update, y’all, sorry) as some of you may already know, I was summoned by Bobby Flay’s casting agent a few weeks back, encouraging me to re-submit something for this season of Bobby Flay’s “Grill It!” So I’ll be putting the finishing touches on Jrm Says.. “Grill It!” over the next day or so. It’s a quickie, a gimmie, cheap, inventive, flirtatious, healthy, and most of all, memorable. “Honey Peanut Chipotle Pork Ribs w/Fried Mustard Green Potato Pancakes.” I’ll be sounding the alarm when it’s ready for launch. I need all of you, your parents, your children, your children’s children, your postal carrier, your acupuncturist, everyone, to watch this episode, rate it, comment, all of that. Especially those of you who’ve been begging me to audition for Hell’s Kitchen or go to a Food Network casting for years now. I’m going for it. I need you. Let’s see if I can get a toe in this door.. Why not?
So until then, have a great weekend. All you SXSWesterners, rock out, be safe, and make sure you pick up after yourselves. Be nice to my city, yo. We bite.
Cheers,
Jrm
(NOT Jonathan Rhys Meyers)
