Chad Things

Last week I got back from Coachella, a 3-day music festival in Southern California.  It was my 4th time going, the other years being 2001, 2002, and 2006.  This year, like previous years, was awesome - good friends, good drinks, pimpin’ house and pool, and tons of cool bands and DJs to rock out to.  Here are noteworthy moments followed by details from the whole weekend

• Groove Armada doing superstylin for like 20 minutes, including a few mins of daft punk in the middle.  After “Around the World” they unloaded the superstylin’ drop that totally electrified the crowd.  This was my favorite moment this year - 3rd favorite coachella moment of all time, after daft punk in 2006 and my personal fav squarepusher in 2001.
• The Do Lab giving off a great burningman vibe, sick music, interesting art and decorations, water hose, and central location. My favorite spot. Video. Big UP to Jupiter, Random Rab, Beats Antique, Lucent Dossier, and many more.
• The Dome was another sound location in addition to the Do Lab and the 5 official ones - they provided sound as you entered and left, going till 5am for those in camp city.  LA Riots played sunday night.
• Naked Hippie getting tasered.  3 fat cops using a taser on a dude out of his mind. article.
• Contact solution containers are very useful.
• The Ting Tings singing “Whats my name” (my fav song of 2008)
• Yeah Yeah Yeahs rocking it - love that gold costume, Karen O. video.
• Girl Talk really knows how to rock a party, short-attentions span style. milkshake.
• MIA was good, but Blackstar (her Coachella DJ) went a little crazy with that air horn - could barely hear the songs. Lame.
• Public Enemy doing the entire album of “It Takes a Nation of Millions to Hold Us Back”
• The Black Keys got Soul, damnit.  a video.
• Leonard Cohen rocking it at age 74.
• Morrisey left the stage early cuz he smelled burning flesh.  Sigh. Pass the Bacon.
• The Cure did almost 3 hours - including 2 songs after they cut the sound and lights (only saw first hour, tho).
• I heard Paul McCartney, would have been really impressed if i still loved him.
• Wish I saw Etienne De Crecy. Awesome video.
• Wish I saw MSTRKRFT, saw them in 2008.
• Wish I saw Roni Size, The Kills, Atmosphere, M Ward, Crystal Castles, the Orb, etc.
• Out of 166,000 people attending coachella, I ran into my boy Zac (chicago) twice. I ran into tons of other people from California as well. Attendence was second only to 186k in 2007 (src).

It all began with my arrival Thursday night, along with checkoway and kerry, crashing at my friend Rob’s place in Ontario. Friday morning our new best friend Jason picked us up in his super 80’s Van - Our Carpoolchella.  The rumor was that one lucky crew with “Carpoolchella” written on their car/van would win lifetime vip tix to coachella.  No, wed were not that lucky crew.  Anyways, we drove 80 miles to Palm Springs, got supplies, checked into our house for the weekend, and met up with Isabel (not Babs), Jess, and Brian.  We got our drinks on and headed to coachella friday, coming home around 1 or 2 and staying up till 5 in the morning.  2 hours later I’m up for some reason and ready to go.

Saturday started with more drinking, a surprise arrival by Ding Dong, Cake-Oh, and Katheeee.  Yay.  After some pool shenanigans we left the house for the iMeem party - more pool, free-drinks, DJs (A-Trak was there but did not spin), and great people watching.  It ended up being pretty fun, till the Asahi ran dry.  We made it inside the coachellas around 5 or 6 and lasted till about midnight,  then home and more drinks and late nite grilling by Chef Checkoway. Sunday was more of the same, morning cocktails, donger made eggs, pool chillin, a few visitors, and music at coachella from 6 to midnight.  I was planning on leaving sunday night but I aborted that plan due to lack of sleep and desire not to get sick.

Monday we cleaned up and left the house by noon, made it to LA where most of us did more pool side chilling at the roosevelt in hollywood.  Around 6pm everybody left but me and checkoway - he was in LA for biz and my flight didn’t leave for chicago till 6am the next morning.  Lee Williams showed up, instigating round 7, and with the help of Katie Curry we were out drinking till the bars closed.  After some post-bar pizza I took checkoway back to the hotel where i crashed from 3:30am till 4:30am (thats 1 whole hour of sleep for you kids at home), got up and taxied to LAX.  Needless to say i slept the entire plane ride home.

Good times, Good times.

The last week I’ve noticed lots of green in Chicago - People are getting siked for St. Paddy’s Day.  This year St. Patrick’s day falls on a Tuesday, and the parades are the weekend before.  That’s right, There are 2 parades in Chicago - the “official” one downtown (which moved from the south side in 1960) and the one in the south side (recreated in 1979). Here are the deets

• March 14, Saturday’s Parade:
  • Where: Downtown, Grant Park, On Columbus from Balbo to Monroe (src).
  • When: 10:45am River turns green, Noon: Parade Begins
• March 15, Sunday’s Parade
  • Where: South Chicago, on Western from 104th to 115th (src).
  • When: Noon Parade begins.
• March 17, Tuesday, St. Patrick’s Day
  • Lots of Bars - Timeout Chicago’s Info

Some say the southside one is where the party is at.  That’s good, cuz it will give me time saturday to prepare my leprechaun costume.  I’m still gonna check out the green river and parade saturday, tho.

UPDATE: Southside parade might be canceled due to drinking (54 arrests) (src)

More Info

• http://www.nbcchicago.com/around_town/the_scene/South-Side-Irish-Parade-Cancelled.html
• http://www.southsideirishparade.org/index.php?id=1
• http://www.chicagostpatsparade.com/parade.html
• http://www.saintpatricksdayparade.com/chicago/index.htm
• http://chicago.about.com/od/museumsattractions/p/StPatrickParade.htm
• http://chicago.metromix.com/events/community_event/54th-annual-chicago-st-grant-park-museums/889687/content
• http://www.timeout.com/chicago/events/comedy/50395/490045/downtown-st-patricks-day-parade

Every month or so since last summer I listen to this song over and over. So good, So catchy, So fun.  And its even better mixed with “party in my tummy”.

The Ting Tings - That’s Not My Name (Yo Gabba Gabba Mix)

Four letter word just to get me along
It’s a difficulty and i’m biting on my tongue and I
I keep stalling, keeping me together
People around gotta find something to say now

Holding back, everyday the same
Don’t wanna be a loner
Listen to me, oh no
I never say anything at all
But with nothing to consider they forget my name
(ame, ame, ame)

They call me ‘hell’ (ye-ah)
They call me ‘Stacey’ (ye-ah)
They call me ‘her’ (ye-ah)
They call me ‘Jane’ (ye-ah)

That’s not my name (party party)
That’s not my name (party party)
That’s not my name (party party)
That’s not my name (ye-ah)

They call me ‘quiet girl’
But I’m a riot, yeah
Maybe ‘Joleisa’
Always the same

That’s not my name
That’s not my name
That’s not my name
That’s not my name

I miss the catch if they through me the ball
I’m the last kid standing up against the wall
Keep up, falling, these heels they keep me boring
Getting glammed up and sitting on the fence now

So alone all the time at night
Lock myself away
Listen to me, i’m not
Although i’m dressed up, out and all with
Everything considered they forget my name
(ame, ame, ame)

They call me ‘hell’ (in my tummy)
They call me ‘Stacey’ (party party)
They call me ‘her’ (in my tummy)
They call me ‘Jane’ (party party)

That’s not my name (party party)
That’s not my name (party party)
That’s not my name (in my tummy)
That’s not my name (ye-ah)

They call me ‘quiet girl’ (ye-ah)
But I’m a riot, yeah (ye-ah)
Maybe ‘Joleisa’ (ye-ah)
Always the same (ye-ah)

That’s not my name (party party)
That’s not my name (in my tummy)
That’s not my name (party party)
That’s not my name (ye-ah)

Are you calling me darling?
(why are you sad? we want to goto the party, the party in your tummy.)
Are you calling me bird?
(the party in my tummy? ye-ah! OK, Lets GO!!!)
Are you calling me darling? (party partay)
Are you calling me bird? (…)

(repeat chorus)

LA Riots Rock. I saw them last night at rickshaw stop in san francisco, and this DJ Duo kept us on our toes mashing it all up - punk, electro, rock, hip hop, booty bass - including a lot of annoying yet polished static (bring earplugs) to produce an incredibly energetic fun show (altho a fight between two drunk girls erupted around midnight). I also saw LA Riots when they opened for MSTRKRFT at Mighty on March 1, 2008, which obviously kicked ass. And the best part about last night - it was free, part of scion’s 20th CD sampler release party - the second one i’ve rocked here in SF. Read more on LA Riots, download MP3’s. Go Team.

Oh, and there was this one killer track last night that went something like “back it up” or “backup” .. I need a copy.  Ya feel me?

I haven’t had cable or satellite since 2003 - over 4 years. Just a DVD player and computer connected to my TV. And i think its great - easier and better suited to my lifestyle. Everybody knows how to rent a DVD from the local video store or get’em in the mail from Netflix, so today i’m just gonna discuss watching from your computer (I connect my macbook pro to my HDTV and watch it on that).

So what to watch? Well, some people really like Tivo to get shows - it saves stuff for you as it comes on TV, makes it easy to skip passed commercials, etc. I prefer to download an entire season of a TV show at once, like LOST, Heroes Season 1, or my favorite, The Wire. But sometimes you need more recent shows, like The Colbert Report.  You can also get classic movies like caddyshack or browse the latest comedies or latest action movies.

Note - the system is not perfect - if something is not popular, its hard to download. Thats why i always tell people to sort the results by number of seeders (people sharing), and only download ones that are easy to get (like 10 seeders minimum, 50+ seeders is best).

On the techie side, you’re just downloading a small torrent file from the links above, which just tells your torrent client where to get the rest of the data. Kinda like google search results tells your browser (firefox) where to get the thing you’re looking for. Once you have the torrent file, you wait anywhere from a day (new movies are popular) to over a week (Heroes season 1 is 4 GB) while your torrent client does all the downloading. What torrent client should you get? I like Azureus for Windows and Transmission for Mac OS X.

Mininova is the most popular site to get torrent files, but there are other torrent sites.

Disclaimer: Don’t download any movies you don’t already own - thats illegal.

Last of my big trips for the year - Burningman. My ninth time going, always glad i went. This year’s favs include the dust storm thursday, my boy pete hudson’s monkey-snake thing (read wired, mercury news, grist.org), the big rig, and the oil rig tower (hello? coolest fire EVER). Oh, and the glowing ping pong balls - best visuals ever. And how could i forget our very own monkey island art car. Good times, good times. Check out my flickr pics and the youtube videos.

I’m finally getting in gear for this year’s Burningman. This will be my 9th year going. Yeah, i’m old, and nine times may seem like alot, but each year is different at burningman and for me (where i am in my life). Why do i keep going? why don’t i get burned out? Well, i see burningman as life - you get out of it what you put into it. You don’t have to party or drink or build large things that take all your time. You just have to participate. You do have to abandon some comforts of home, but you get more creativity and freedom in a larger context. I like that alot.

This year i’m going small again, minimal planning, small camp of friends tied together by the Monkey Island Art Car - brainchild of Sir Checkoway (and chef ben as the workhorse). The island is a ford taurus station wagon with the back chopped off, wood platform for the island, rocks, green plants, a generator, dj setup, and tastee beats. Right up my alley, and i’m lucky to have close friends that let me join in at the last minute. Sadly, i’m not staying with the brasstax bunnies - they’re way over at 3 o’clock and we’ll be at 9 o’clock area.

I’ve only been back in SF for about 2 weeks, so i’m still getting my feet wet in this year’s theme - the Green Man - but its right up my alley. Mainly cuz i’m looking into doing a Green MBA - environmentally and socially aware business - but i admit i’m still just looking.  But if you know me at all, you know i love nature - especially hiking in mountains.  I read that the man will be on a green mountain peak this year.  Can’t wait to climb that mtn !!

I also put together a list of DJ lineups at Burningman 2007. This will be updated till i leave on Monday. Enjoy.

Move over Coachella, here comes something meatier.

Saturday, September 15th focuses on electronic and dance oriented acts with an eclectic bill including Thievery Corporation, DJ Shadow & Cut Chemist, Gotan Project, M.I.A., Ghostland Observatory and Zion I. Sunday September 16th features the best and brightest in indie rock with Modest Mouse, Spoon, Built To Spill, Clap Your Hands Say Yeah, and M. Ward. In addition to the above acts, there will be a second stage featuring up and coming and local bands.

I already got tickets for both days.  I’m excited to be back in SF!!!

This song kicks ass and the video chops up the ass and gives it to you on a platter.

Child 1 :
Why don’t you tell me a story?
Child 2 :
Please tell me a story too.
Man :
You know, I think I’ll tell you the story of my life.
Child 1 :
You tell me!

Ghetto-ghetto! Ghetto-ghetto! Ghetto-ghetto!
Check me out!
Ghetto-ghetto! Ghetto-ghetto! Ghetto-ghetto!
Check check me out!
Ghetto-ghetto! Ghetto-ghetto! Ghetto-ghetto!
Ghetto-ghetto! Ghetto-ghetto! Ghetto-ghetto!

I’m a bad ass motherfuckin’ DJ
This is why I walk and talk this way!
I’m a bad ass motherfuckin’ DJ
This is why I walk and talk this way!
I’m a bad ass motherfuckin’ DJ
This is why I walk and talk this way!
You suckers!

He’s the master of disaster and the master of beat

Come-Come-Come-Come-Come with it
Ghetto-ghetto-ghetto-ghetto-ghetto-to

He’s so quick
He’s so fast
He’s so quick, he’s so fast
He’s upper-class player / He’s on the crossfader (?)
DJ Shadow with the scratch
Moves through town like a skater
Come on, rock
Check out the cut you suckers

This is why, this is why I walk
This is why, this is why I walk
I’m a bad ass motherfuckin’ DJ
This is why, this is why I walk
This is why, this is why I walk
This is why, this is why I walk and talk this way
Check me out

Rave! Rave! Rave! Rave! Rave! Rave! Holy shit!
Rave! Rave! Rave! Rave! Rave! Rave! Holy shit!

Let the beat rock.

- DJ Shadow, Walkie Talkie

Well, i’m just another sucker who thought Apple designed products well. Apple products sure are pretty. But what could be the absolute worst thing that could happen when you use iTunes? Besides blowing up in your face killing your baby nephew. Yes, erasing your harddrive without warning. I backup my laptop, but not my iPod. So of course today i got my iPod wiped clean by iTunes 7. For you techies out there, its like the old “sudo rm -rf /”

What do you do when iTunes erases your iPod??? well, first stage is denial. What? no songs? eject ipod, hold it in my hand, look at artists .. blank. WHAT?? Ok, maybe i can recover .. search the web .. Oooh.. “iTunes 7 erased my iPod” happened to this guy, too. Hmm.. most of the 48 responses are people complaining how it happened to them too. OK, so maybe it did happen. Any recovery tools out there .. a few for windows, none for the mac. Let’s recheck the iPod, maybe my songs are there now. Nope. Videos gone, too. But my photos are still there. Wow.

Sigh. Luckily i have copies of my mp3s on a backup server, but i did lose all my playlists. I spent many many hours creating and tweaking these playlists - those run mixes, driving in the car mixes, chilling out on a bus mixes, and many more. I hate iTunes.

Ok, for the record, here’s what i did - I reproduced it to make sure i got warning message and steps correct. With my iPod plugged in, on iTunes 7 I clicked on chadpod (my name for my ipod). I clicked on the Music tab, and unchecked “Manually manage music and video”. I got the warning message in the image above - “Are you sure you do not want to manually manage music and videos on your iPod? All existing content on the iPod ‘ChadPOD’ will be replaced with content from your iTunes library.  Ok, i think “merger” when i read that, not “YOUR IPOD WILL BE ERASED”?  Clearly i was wrong.  Then I clicked Summary tab just to the right of the Music tab. I tried to sync one of my playlists automatically by checking the “Sync Music” box and selecting one of my playlists. I then had an interruption, and when i got back to my computer, I decided i didn’t have time to finish this right now, so I went to eject my iPod.  Then i got the following warning: “You have changed the settings for iPod ‘ChadPod’.  Would you like to apply these changes?”.  Umm.. Ok.  At that moment it erased my ipod - i could tell cuz it took a few seconds. Now my chadpod is blank. Wha?? Unplug from my macbook pro. Yep, wiped out. I admit that popup was a warning, but i definitely didn’t expect to lose my music and playlists. What i still don’t get is that it didn’t even sync. I have tons of music in my iTunes, none were copied.. No playlists copied. Whatever happened, it definitely was not a design flaw, it’s a bug in iTunes.

Lessons Learned:

• Use Manual Mode to update iPod (apple info on switching to manual mode).
• NEVER accidentally click on anything in settings - especially do not try and sync a playlist if you’re in Manual mode
• iTunes SUCKS.

Hmm… I think i feel better now that i vented.