PAXtatstic
Where to begin?
I suppose I’ll start with this TERRIBLE injury that I received while putting my bags into the trunk of a cab on my way to the airport. A lot of musicians would have stopped right here; I soldiered on (please note: I am not talking about the wedding ring, that injury was sustained years ago ZING!).
Arrived in Seattle Thursday night and immediately felt the “Seattle Smoothies,” which is a term I have just invented that describes the feeling of well-being that settles on me the moment I breathe the delicious air of that charming city. I don’t have a photo of this. Dined with the fine people of Harmonix, plus Wil Wheaton, plus Paul and Storm, plus MC Frontalot. Also enjoyed beers with various Guild and Legend of Neil folks. Yes, I am dropping names, it’s the only way I can demonstrate to you how I roll. When I returned to the hotel, this apple was on the floor (I am just reporting the facts):
Up early to set up the booth and sound check with Frontalot. See here the empty but enormous concert cave:
And also Wil Wheaton “practicing” with Frontalot:
Spent the day a-boothin’ and got to meet many fans, costumed and otherwise. Saw a lot of dressed up babies this year, which is always hilarious. Received two half-pony-half-monkey-monster gifts, was pleased:
Also sold quite a few of this new flash drive I have: it’s 2 Gigs, contains 320K MP3s of all my music plus source tracks for everything on JoCo Looks Back, also album artwork, AND PLUS ALSO comes with a DVD. This incredible deal will also be available at future shows, I’m just saying. The image on the flash drive is by Len and also appears on my guitar picks, due to my narcissism. And yes, I probably should have rotated this image before I exported it:
Did a panel with all the other PAX musicians, who all seemed smarter and funnier than me. Played “Diseases of Yore” with Frontalot at his Friday night show, talked Paul and Storm into singing harmonies with me (click the play button that’s currently in the top right corner of Frontalot’s site if you’d like to hear it and then go buy Front’s fantastic record). Went to sleep. No partying for poor, old, tired JoCo.
Similar things happened on Saturday, including a very fast lunch of sandwiches with actual rock stars John Roderick and Jason Finn (again, do you see how I roll?). Did a panel with Harmonix on the subject of the very exciting Rock Band Network, in which we pushed an authored version of The Future Soon into an Xbox and then played it right there in front of everyone with the help of some audience members. As you can see, I am not very good at playing Rock Band. It was also announced that another PAX Pack is coming to Rock Band next week, featuring me (“Re: Your Brains”), Frontalot and Paul and Storm. “The Future Soon” is going up on the Rock Band Network obviously, and I’m working on putting a lot more stuff in there right now. In case you missed that, “Re: Your Brains” will be in Rock Band next week. Brains!
And then of course, late at night, the big show. Wil Wheaton introduced Paul and Storm by talking about me for 10 minutes. Paul and Storm did their usual kick-ass job of warming up the crowd, then setting them on fire and burning them up until only ashes remain. I staggered on at 12:45 in the freaking morning to do my little show. I was joined by Paul and Storm and our pal Molly for a few songs, including a version of “My Monkey” where we replaced those words with “Wil Wheaton” to extremely comedic effect. Participated in group hug with all parties. Collapsed in a heap.
Sunday morning hopped a plane home, ate a lunch/dinner combo meal out of a tube, watched as the ratio of food to garbage in my Luxe Snack Box (TM) descended quickly to almost zero. This is ALSO how I roll.
Thanks to everyone who came to the concert, visited the booth, bought me a beer, helped me sell merch, joined me on stage, or stuffed my dinner into a tube. Special thanks to all the people who work very hard to make PAX such an incredible event, extra-especially the very generous and often be-kilted Enforcers.
You rule Seattle, I’ll see you soon.
Scarface is dead, long live Scarface
Well OK, not dead, that’s overstating it. As you know, I’ve had an assistant for a while, much to my surprise and amusement. Thus far I’ve referred to this assistant only as Scarface, both to protect this person’s identity, and because it is hilarious. But mostly because it is hilarious. In a move that I applaud with loud isolated claps (the stirring, earnest, emotional kind, not the sarcastic kind) Scarface has moved on from Coulton Industries and taken a real job with a real company. And so I can now reveal that Scarface’s name was actually Meaghan.
I was going to write a fantastic post about Meaghan and our time working together and my extreme delight at seeing her take on the challenge of a brand new thing, but I see that she has beaten me to it with a post of her own that has made me all misty. It’s true, Meaghan now works for Tumblr, but she is also on the Twitter and on the Tumblr as a very talented writer and observer of things funny and sad.
Much as I would have liked to, I never intended to keep her prisoner here at my secret mountainous island lair forever. If there’s one thing I’ve learned about living a life it’s that you need to keep moving, and if there’s another thing it’s that you really should quit your job every once in a while and take on something new, maybe even something that seems crazy and scares the hell out of you. So I wish her well, and I thank her for her time of servitude. She was a great assistant, but I’m sure that she will be an even better former assistant.
But for all of us here at Coulton Industries the work goes on. There is a new Scarface, as there always will be, because it is my way. I’m not going to tell you anything about this person either, at least not until they break my heart and leave me alone in this godforsaken place (kidding Meaghan! I kid!).
That’s all for now. I’m painfully aware that the Summer is ending, and I got lots of stuff cooking that I hope to share with all of you soon.
Rock Band Network
The fine folks over at Harmonix are launching something called the Rock Band Network, which will allow independent musicians to create and sell songs in the game. The answer is yes, I am very interested in putting more of my stuff in there, and I’m working on making it happen right now. It’s all brand new, so nobody knows how long it takes, how much it costs, how many will sell, etc. For my part, I’d like to get a sense of what you all are interested in getting in the game.
Will you take this poll? You can and should vote for more than one, and you can write in a song if it’s not already on this list that I have very scientifically derived just now.
Six Word Memoir
UPDATE: So many great ideas, it’s hard to pick just one six-word memoir. I think I should have six six-word memoirs, that should be a thing. There is one that has become my favorite because it makes me laugh out loud, and it also captures a little bit of that “I am unable or unwilling to be a grown-up and have a real job” feeling. “For sale: adult shoes, never worn.” It’s a reference to Hemingway’s six-word story, “For sale: baby shoes, never worn” (which may or may not be real but is famous anyway). It was submitted by Tim Canny, who, if he will email me a mailing address, will receive a free DVD from me. Thanks everyone for thinking on it, this was a lot of fun.
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The coffee shop I frequent here in Brooklyn is filled with lots of other people who are, like me, using it as an office. I can’t imagine the work that everyone else is doing is quite as important as my own work, which is mostly avoiding the OTHER work that I have to do, but they all seem pretty busy. There is one person in particular who is always there before I arrive and after I leave, and who does not seem to be merely reloading Twitter every couple of minutes. In fact he is working on his media empire: you may know it as SmithMag, and that might be because you have heard of the Six Word Memoir. This fellow and I – let’s call him “Larry Smith” – Larry Smith and I were talking about the Six Word Memoir and he suggested I contribute one for his book about same. Let me tell you, it’s hard. Just take a look at the ones that people have submitted, some of them are sort of brilliant. In its perfect form, it’s kind of like the punchline of a joke, where something very small and specific suddenly expands in your mind to sum up a life story. OK, now do that for your own life. Actually, stop, do it for mine instead.
I asked Twitter to help me out on this and got some great responses. From a quick scan, here are some of my favorites:
@meaghano: Sorry didn’t get to this sooner.
@awryone: Should have left that pimple alone.
@mehuman: Already peaked with song from portal.
@petersagal: Vanished after failing as IT professional.
@aaronfever: I need someone to work merchandise.
@colleenky: Should not be trusted with cats.
@paulandstorm: Paul and Storm just won’t leave. (Note how even MY six word memoir is somehow ABOUT THEM.)
@unmodisch: Internet pioneer, domesticated money-pooping cow.
also @paulandstorm: Dear Internet: thanks for…well, everything.
@marmotry: Liked cold baths with Angela Lansbury.
also @unmodisch: Phase one: music. Phase three: profit!
@scottknaster: Couldn’t write own six word memoir.
And they continue to trickle in. Boy do I love the hive mind! Since I don’t want the blog readers who are not on Twitter to miss out on the fun, I’ll take suggestions here in the comments as well. A couple of things I didn’t know until I started getting suggestions: I probably will avoid using my own lyrics for this, and ideally this will not be about me being dead. Though it’s only six words, it would be nice to somehow capture the collaborative nature of my rise to online semi-celebrity, by which I mean that while I owe the internet plenty already, it would be fun and appropriate if you also did this work for me. By Tuesday.
OK, back to tweeting about sandwiches and pretending to be on vacation.
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