Growing up, my best friends and I would make mixtapes for each other by ripping songs from the radio or other cassettes we owned. The other day when I was visiting my family in the house I grew up in I began to dig through some old boxes. I was pleasantly surprised to find a pile of these old mixtapes. Let me tell you they were fantastic to listen to all over again. The nostalgia was overwhelming. I even found my old Wu-Tang collection. Man, I was way cooler then.
If you’re from the Boston area then I’m sure you know all about Jamin 94.5. For those of you that aren’t it’s a mainstream hip-hop/ R&B station that’s still around and serving the Boston Metropolitan and Greater Boston area. The 90’s were a great time for that genre of music and trust me, my friends and I were all over it. Some of the tapes even contained recordings of our favorite radio personalties. The amount of awesomeness that we were trading back and forth circa 1997 was out of control.
All of this got me thinking about the evolution of ripping and sharing music. I suppose the easy answer would be recording and trading mixtapes, burning and sharing CDs and then mp3 file sharing, but we all know it’s so much more complicated than that.
I was lucky to grow up in an environment where music was a part of everyday life. Not only was I exposed to the classics, Billy Holiday, Louis Armstrong and Etta James but also James Brown , Parliament Funk, Eric Clapton, Stevie Ray Vaughn, Frank Zappa, Bjork, Fiona Apple, Beck and Portishead. The list goes on and on. I think you can now see where my eclectic taste came from. I would flip through the endless rows of CDs at Tower Records and Newbury Comics looking for that next band or artist that would hold my attention for the month. I could be seen standing at the listening booths with in the stores seeing if they had something to offer me that I had never heard. Needless to say, when Napster came along my head nearly exploded. I couldn’t believe that this many people wanted to share and had found a way to share that much music with each other. The effects were irreversible and probably why I’m here writing this today.
When Napster was finally shut down there was Kazza and when that was gone there was Limewire. There are now an array of subscription services vying for our attention; Mog, Rdio, Rhapsody and Spotify. The explosion of social networks and music blogging has seemed to speed up the newest evolution in music sharing, the discovery platform. Every few months a new one seems to pop up. Off the top of my head I can name seven; Last.fm, Shuffler, We Are Hunted, exfm, SoundCloud, The Hype Machine and Bandcamp.
Have you ever really sat down and thought about how you discover music? Everyone’s path is different but our goals are all the same. Bijan Sabet, who is a General Partner at Spark Capital, sits on the Board at Tumblr and has invested in Twitter and exfm described almost perfectly how I think myself and many others discover and share music these days. Maybe this is not your exact process, but I’m sure it’s close depending on what social service and music discovery platform you frequent. “After the first listen, I hit the Tumblr ‘like’ button on my dashboard. On the second listen, I reblogged it. On the third listen, I hit the note button and sent it to my ex.fm profile.”
This has to raise the question, what’s next? What else can we possibly create, what other communication channels are available? Right now I can’t even imagine what the future holds, but I can say with one hundred percent confidence that something new will be developed. As humans, curiosity is in our nature. To seek out the new and share it with each other is genetically intrinsic to us as a species. As technology develops so will these services and I can’t wait to see what the future holds.
It’s Neil, ya know, long-lost AdventurerNeil, checkin’ in with ya to say ‘howdy!’, and share some muzak (mmm…sweet, sweet muzak). As you may know, I enjoy my music like the cookie monster enjoys his dough…
You guys are nazis, man!
So yeah, sorry for being all sorts of wicked-absent and never posting… sad story: right as the last mixtapes week was kickin’ off, my computer went kaput. Since then I’ve been busy, sure, but mostly just complacent and lazy. Boo complacent and lazy! >:| My computer is still broken, but I finally decided to hijack a roommate’s computer or two, and blamo, a few searched-up gmail passwords later and I’m in bloggerin’ heaven! Lesson? Where there’s a will there’s a way, yo! Man, I really really missed this place… I’m really quite happy with the kinds of moments that are possible on TSURURADIO!
A whiles back, Tsuru posted and invited all you fine folks to come on over to the society and engage in a little Crane’s Day Mixtape Exchange action… wellsir, 20+ of us birds swarmed and signed up and exchanged all sorts of fun goodies!
(A major shoutout goes to Story, the mistress of society awesomeness, for organizing it all and having patience with my lack of checking-in, patience with my extremely-late mixtape, and for sending me an awesome package!)
Welp, I’ve been itching to share my mixtape with the world at large (I never was good at keeping my mixtapes “for your eyes only”… gotta share that s#%t!). It’s basically a massive homage to the awesomness that is TSURURADIO…. which is to say, I owe credit to the blog and society for 85%ish of songs that appear on this mix. Regular readers might be sadfaced at how familiar the tracks look. But so what! I love them, and they sound damn good together, and include much of my favorite music from 2010… so what more can ya ask for?!
I like this mix. A lot. Tons of electronic, lots of pop, some rock, a hint of twee, a smidgen of post-rock, and many many healthy dashes of pure, unadultered longing…
…that just bleeds through in every song. It follows my basic mixtape formula… start like a lion, end like a bedtime story… RAWR!Zzzzz… (don’t tell anyone my secret formula). I hope you enjoy the living bajeezus out of it! :D
Over and out for now!
-Neil
PS. What a freaking ridiculously amazingly abundant year for music, eh???! Thanks to goodness we have papa Tsuru to help us enjoy the new stuff and share it… I’ve been looking forward to end-of-year madness ever since it happened last year!! Hours and hours and hours of new great epic stuff…! Or as Tsuru might say…
Okay… it is Labour Day, it is our day off, so we are going to keep this short. I will say, last night we had us a little BBBBBQQQQBBQ (the extra B’s are for boooooze and the extra Q’s are for Quality!) with some of our crafty peeps, local BFFs, and two bustown music bloggers – our friend Katie from Heavy Percussion & Jack In The Pocket & new Columbus transplant Jen from Tympanic Transplant, and it was all chill good times, full of drinks & grub & (as always) nipples!
Oh yeah… work it baby!
Not only was it a perfect time to hang out, meet up, and photograph nipples, it gave me the perfect opportunity to test out today’s epic — and I mean EPIC — mixtape! You may remember a week or so ago when we shared Recently Vol 1 from 2006, well, the other morning Baby & I found & shaked our money-makers to a good portion of the finale to the woo-ing trilogy, Recently Vol 3, so much so, that I had, HAD, to share some of it with you.
Unfortunately, while some of the mixtape was booty-rumpadumpin’ good times, some was a bit too chill for booze & bbqin’, AND it was just too short. So yesterday, I took volume 3, divided by 4, multiplied it times 2, then squared the shit out of it!
The results? Let’s just say, the BBQ went long & I’m hurtin’ pretty good today!!! So, here it is for you, for all your labours, enjoy as…
And we here at TSURURADIO, the whole paper crane collective, just want to say a big fat and delicious thank you… thank you very much! I hope you are enjoying what you are reading and spreading the good times yourselves to you and your’s. We really appreciate you comin’ around, takin’ yer shoes off, and sittin’ a spell. Until next time!
Okay… before we begin, check this out, originally tumbled by drowse, of the dad from Everybody Hates Chris doing a collection of the most random Old Spice body wash commercials. They are back-to-back-to-etc-etc without a pause, giving them an even greater sense of randomness and WTFness!
Awesomeness?
Yes…. yes it is.
Alright, the reason for the season, today’s mixtape. This one’s been brewing in my head ever since I first heard “You Were Born” by Cloud Cult. Every time I listen, all I can think about is my oldest daughter Saydi. Something about the tone, the lyrics, the theme of the album itself that when that song comes on, it’s only her I think about.
After falling in love with the album, I had the incurable urge to build a mixtape, with nothing but her in mind. Songs that make me think of her, songs that inspire me that I want to share with her, songs she loves but maybe with a new twist on them, songs to hopefully inspire her & her music, songs for Saydi, songs for my sunshine.
It’s been a long & tough journey, sweetie, a journey that in many ways is only just now beginning. I’m so proud of who you are, what you’ve done, the woman you have become, and all the places you are going. You are an amazing person & I love you so much! This is for you!
Alright! This is it! Got bad news which is kinda good news and then really good news! First the bad good news, we are going on VACATION TOMORROW!!! WOOOOOOOOOO! Yep! Tomorrow, we head out to Vancouver for a couple days, then take a lovely train ride to Banff & Lake Louise for another couple days, then finally down to Calgary to visit good friends and hit the Sled Island Film & Music Festival!!! Hot diggity, right?
In Calgary, we’ll be visiting Aaron aka therealAARONDUNN, Sandy from Slowcoustic, and the recipient of today’s smackdown, Chris from Culture Bully! It’s gonna be sweet biscuits on a stick, time away from work, off the bike, and with my baby, even if the trip is a total clustercuss, it will be heaven.
Hopefully, the wounds from today’s mixtape battle will be all healed and scabbed up nicely, because beers will be had and we need nothing but good times on our week away! Speaking of our mixtape battle — i.e. the REALLY good news (as far as you are concerned) — how about we get on with it!
Culture Bully v. TSURURADIO: A friendly comparison & contrast of the music of our youths! Alternate title: 90s v. 80s WOOOOT!!!
But this time, we’ll do it just a little bit different… I’m not going to jibber-on about 80s pop culture and the stupid things I wore & did (fat boy shoelaces & parachute pants, check, done), there’s plenty websites and TV shows devoted to all that, and judging from the hipster scene, some of it is coming back!
OH NOES!!!!!!!!
No, this is about the music, MY music from those critical adolescent development years. But, before we start talking, let’s get the music rolling, here we go as….
What? I’m sure there’s social commentary and what not in this vid, but at THAT age? Boobies!!!!!!!!
2. They Might Be Giants – Ana Ng
Heard this at a party my friend threw when his “Ps” were out of town… What’s this? Lincoln by They Might Be Giants. I had it the next day (probably stole it).
3. Violent Femmes – Add It Up
What teenager doesn’t love VF? It’s a rite of passage. For me, it was a way of life. Add in this songs near-proggish way of going all over the place and I found a new home for my ears.
4. The Buggles – Video Killed The Radio Star
Yes, yes, irony and whatnot that this was MTV’s first video they played or something, blah blah blah, whatever, who cares. For me it was simply this: Pre-Asia’s Geoffrey Downes + Post-Yes Trevor Horn = Awesome. I sing ALL the parts to this song, all of them.
5. Leonard Cohen – I’m Your Man
60s Cohen was some deep shit, 80s Cohen is some deep sex.
6. Camper Van Beethoven – When I Win The Lottery
Sensing a quirk theme to my 80s listenerin’??? No? Really? Yes, “Take The Skinheads Bowling” is their “hit”, but fuck that, Key Lime Pie was TSURURIFIC!!
7. Dead Milkmen – Punk Rock Girl
JUST YOU! AAAND MEEEEE! PUNK ROCK GIRRRRRRRRL!!! Oh, how many vocal chords did I destroy singing this song in my car? My career as a lounge singer…. ruined.
8. Pixies – Monkey Gone To Heaven
It’s Pixies, man. No Pixies = So much wonderful music never existing. Period.
9. Talking Heads – Burning Down The House
I had the 45. I played this in my room as a kid over and over and over and over….
and over and over and over…
10. Peter Gabriel – I Have The Touch
Yes, I sang Shock The Monkey (SHOOOCK THE MOOONKAY) but I have the touch, creepy stalker, dirty awesomeness…..
Quite possibly my favourite single of the 80s. I had this CASsingle and destroyed it by over-playing it. I have, not only mastered the classic dance from the video..
But I also was able to incorporate the non-foot-moving dance into my actual dance moves in “da clubs” years later! Oddly, the song sounds as applicable today as it did way back when, eh?
2. Murray Head – One Night In Bangkok
I have no idea why, but for a time in my childhood, I was obsessed over this song. Listening now, it’s rather seedy. I think I love it even more!
3. Prince – Let’s Go Crazy
I remember corduroy jeans, brown. I remember air guitar, so so so much air guitar. This was “my jam” and I did, Prince, I went fucking crazy listening to this song, in my bedroom, as loud as my crappy little radio would go… Listening again today, the guitar solo / finale destoys almost every guitar solo ever.
4. Duran Duran – The Reflex
I remember when this song premiered on the local radio station. I was in my mom’s old Toyota Corolla, it was night time and she was taking me & my sister home from the mall I think — a special night out for us! It was dark and I heard the muses fade in singing “Da na na na, da na na na”…. Goosebumps then, and even now.
5. Madness – Our House / 6. Dexy’s Midnight Runners – Come On Eileen
Both of these songs were recently featured in some mixtapes of mine. They go together, for me. They are MTV songs, songs I looked for and loved when they came on at my dad’s house (he had cable). For me, these two songs represent everything MTV was trying to be that it so long ago forgot about.. Let’s watch:
7. J. Geils Band – Centerfold
Negligees………………………
Really, what else do I have to say??
8. Michael Jackson – Man In The Mirror
One of two Michael Jackson songs I still love, and thanks to my sister for reminding me recently just how much I love this cheeseball tune. Michael Jackson and the 80s, very hard to separate the two, but for me, it was my mom playing the hell out of Thriller on those long Saturday morning commutes to her work. But we’d sing, all together, “PYT”, “Billie Jean”, all of them! For the most part, outside of nostalgia, I found most Jackson music painful to listen to, but not “Man In The Mirror”. But I know why…. Black Gospel + Any Song Ever = Happy Tsuru.
There you go, the 80s according to Tsuru… Like what you hear? Go buy it here or here or wherever!! As soon as I see Chris’s 90s mixtape, we’ll add the link here, but let’s be honest, 80s music fucking ruled!!! Amirite???
It was a beautiful Wednesday evening in mid-April when I, sun slowly but surely settling in for the night off to the west somewhere, found myself lost in my old black beat-em-up pick-em-up 1980 Toyota Pick-Up in the “neck of woods” that I should know by the back of my hand. I’m over-confidence’s bitch tonight, I thought as the clock on my phone was getting uncomfortably close to 8pm, the time I was fucking supposed to be there! I thought right now as I think back to then. It was time to be honest. I was going to be late.
I called Justin. The chronically punctual me forced a grin on his face while waiting for Justin to answer.
“Hey man,” I said as nonchalantly as I could muster, “This is Aaron, yeah, I can’t find the college!?” More specifically to you, reader, Capital University, where the band works, goes to school, and/or practices depending on who you talk to.
Lightly & patiently Justin gave me directions, which I then messed up again, but eventually got sorted out and way too much time later, I was standing on the back of my truck in the parking lot looking to be seen & found. Finally, I officially met Justin, my main contact to the Super Desserts.
Even though I was a little late, I was the first one there. Well, except Justin. I was thankful. One, I really didn’t want to be the douchey guy who runs a self-important blog who shows up late to an interview he requested, that’s like… a double-douche. Two, it gave me a chance to cool back off, relax, and get my head “back in the game”. It’s a rare-rare day that I have the time, means, or opportunity, not to mention the inclination, to do an interview. I had planned this one perfectly, my ride schedule, my work schedule, everthing. So, having a few minutes to get my head in check was a good thing.
To my delight, we both wore plaid short sleeve shirts and rather non-descript pants (me, grey jeans, him brown cords). In social circles, this would be a “good sign” of some commonality and I felt even more at ease. If he had shown up shirtless, only in leather pants and vest, and me in my cut-off jean shorts & slim fitting t-shirt, who KNOWS what kind of conversation would be had! Surely, the Super Desserts would be merely a tangent and the whole point of the interview would have been lost! Or worse… Vice versey. Fortuntely, my leather pants were at the cleaners, and I don’t think Justin even owns leather pants, so without a fashion wall to metaphorically climb over, Justin & I were free to get to know each other.
We chatted while we waited and little by little the band showed up. Well, most the band… Well, most of the band on some days, maybe not on all days, possibly not today, maybe. You see, it’s unknown actually how many members are in the band. This much I do know, Ianna brought cake & cookies.
After the resident banjo & sitar player, Tyler, and Justin finished “laying down some tracks” on the new album while I had hung outside with the balance of the group as various people from various other bands and/or orchestral-type groups – what were the folks “in band” back in highschool actually “in”? — passed in and out of the building, it was finally time to eat desserts while, appropriately enough, talk about & to the Super Desserts.
What follows is real, though edited down a bit (transcribing 30+ minutes of conversating equals many many pages of text), or at the very least my interpretation of reality, from the recordings of that night, which is & was real to me. As real as any memory with audio recordings can be. What is real? For all I know, you are not real, so who are you to judge what is real to me when you, yourself, are suspect!
But regardless, let’s push play and see what transpired on April 14th, somewhere around 9:30 or so PM when I sat in a chair faced by a horseshoe of talented musicians, namely, from left to right, Tyler Evans (banjo/sitar), Frances Litterski (vocals/bells/piano), Emily Ng (viola), Ianna Shively (vocals/shaker), Matt Ogborn (viola), and of course Justin Riley (vocals/tambourine) and asked them a bunch of interviewy type questions as…
TSURURADIO Presents… An Interview With The Super Desserts With Accompanying Mixtape!!!
*god, I hate my voice on the recorder*
Me: Hello and thank you for sitting down with me! Let’s get right to it, eh? What got you guys into music and how did you ultimately start Super Desserts? *inaudible, followed by laughter as everyone tries to figure out the guava cake*
Matt: It’s so sticky.
Justin: We don’t have a fork or anything
Tyler: You can keep asking questions, we are just going to keep ignoring you. Me: That’s totally fine
Ianna: First of all, who wants cake and I’ll pass it along while we answer the questions.
Tyler: You answered a question, you get a slice of cake
Ianna: Nobody wants cake? Me (maybe): Every answer should be answered with a mouthful of cake.
Tyler (Mouthful of cake): “Well, now that you asked…” *a bunch of jibber-jabbering*
Ianna: If you don’t like it, you don’t have to eat it.
Justin (seeing this could turn into a 30 minute conversation about cake took the reigns): Before we even played together, I had a bunch of conceptual ideas about what I wanted the band to be like. But um, it was basically there were going to be a lot of members, half the members were going to be girls, and there wasn’t going to be a drummer, there wasn’t going to be a bass player, it was weird concept stuff like that… and me & Bob, Bob & I, we got together about starting this pop band.
He had a couple different ideas & our ideas kinda got merged into Super Desserts. So it was the two of us, then we contacted Eve who isn’t here yet, Bob isn’t here yet, and next was… we were looking for a sitar player Me to Tyler: You play sitar?
Tyler: *nods* Me (smoothly & as creepily as possible): Niiiiice.
Justin: Sitar was next… *more dessert talk*
Me: So why Super Desserts, why the name?
Justin: Another of the original concepts would that it would be part band / part art do it yourself,.
Matt: I thought you were going to say part party monster
Tyler: That’s a pretty good album title, “Part Band Part Party Monster”. *laughs* Me: Super Desserts Beach Party
*laughs*
Justin: So, we were going to make handmake really original CD packaging. We had a couple ideas already for that as well and uh, we were going to make our own t-shirts, make this & make that, and Bob’s girlfriend at the time was an art student at CCAD and had just put on her first project which was called “Bring On The Supper Desserts” and it was based around jello. Me: AHA! What was the art, the jello art? Could you eat it?
Justin: Jello sculpture… There was a lot of stuff about how terrible it is, made of hoofs & bones
Matt: She was a vegetarian.
Justin: So it was a cross between this 60′s ideal dessert, like this futuristic dessert of the 60′s and murder. So like horse bones..
Matt: ..suspended in these beautiful jello desserts were grisly bones & stuff. Me: And from that you became this nice “twee” collective? How awesome-o!
Tyler: Gloom & doom is secretly our thing.
Fances: Obviously her weapon of choice was knives… Sometimes it cuts cakes, sometimes it cuts hooves. Me: To cut up the horse hooves? Grinds ‘em up.
Me: Uh… let’s see… See. I’m horrible with genre’s. What is twee? Why twee? I call you “twog”.
Justin: Oh… *laughter* okay? Me: Micro acoustic prog, yeah.
Justin: Micro acoustic prog… *ponders* alright. Twee originally was later 80s, early 90s, connected with C86?
Matt: Yeah… super sugary.
Tyler: Like K Records.
Matt: Cutesy.
Justin: BUT, nowadays it’s more associated with the Juno soundtrack. *laughter* Me: Thoughts on Michael Cera and what he’s done to the movie industry?
Tyler: He needs to do a nude scene, that’s the only place left for him to go. Me: Can he do anything beside “Michael Cera”?
Justin: Can Johnny Depp do anything besides the exact same movie over and over again? Me: Well I think in Alice in Wonderland he played, uh, Frodo Baggins, didn’t he? He was doing a nice Frodo. They could’ve saved some money though and just got Frodo.. What’s his real name? Ethan something?
Justin: Elijah Wood. *laughter*
Me: Okay… Influences??
Justin: Michael Cera… the Juno soundtrack….
Actually, jazz standards? One of my favourites for the past few years has been Cliff Edwards who went by the stage name Ukulele Ike. He would play ukulele, actually, here’s how most people know him, he was the voice of Jimeny Cricket. So he sang, “When You Wish Upon A Star”, “Give A Little Whistle”… and his stuff is just incredible, these old, vaudeville tunes he’s playing ukulele with these woodwind instruments in the background and really amazing string arrangements in the background. And so, ukulele, banjo, bass clarinet, that’s what we are! Me: And sitar!
Me: So no drums, right? No bushel buckets???
Tyler: When we first started out, we’d bring a snare drum and invite audience members to play on the snare.
Justin: That was one of the concepts too! Me: How’d that work out?
Tyler: It was a disaster…. A lot of bad rhythm.
Me: So who’s the writer?
Justin: We have seven writers. Me: How does that work out?
Tyler: It works really well, actually, there’s always momentum. A lot of bands, whoever writes the songs, will write a bunch of songs and will work on those songs for a year and turn that into a record, but here there’s always new material coming in.
Justin: We’re constantly recording because of that, oh, one of the other original concepts of the band was… record songs and release them as fast as possible. Just keep churning out songs. Me: Two albums a year?
Justin: The goal, actually, was three albums a year! Which we might actually be able to do this year? We released one in January, Banjo Forever, and then this knew one we have like 2 or 3 parts left to record. Me: And then maybe a Christmas album?
Justin: This one will be early June. And we already have a list of songs that need to be recorded.
Me: That’s great! I love your songs, what I love was that you had these sweet little songs going on and when, of course, you listen to the lyrics, there was a little bit of sadness, like “I Only Love You Because You Can Play Guitar”.
Me: It’s like a Tootsie Pop. All sweet on the outside, but you got that nasty little shit burger on the inside. Yeah… so, you know, why you gotta mess with our heads like that?
Justin: Well, I don’t think you heard the album before Banjo Forever, that one was called Barefoot In The Disenchanted Forest and it was all about, there were a lot of themes in that album about having these big goals & sweet naïve dreams, and then there’s kinda a bitter reality.
Tyler: It was pretty emo. *laughter*
Matt: Nothing beats upbeat music with depressing lyrics. Me: Ever listen to Noah & the Whale?
Justin: I… don’t like them. *awkward moment as I try to back pedal around that and move on*
Me: I love, one of my favourite songs, that I really fell in love with when I saw you at Junctionview, is “Ibiza”. Just the porch-style rhythm, the frantic banjo, how’d that one come about?
Justin: That’s a song Eve wrote and she had recorded a demo using keyboard, drum machine stuff, and it was about a boyfriend she had that lived in Chicago, the whole long-distance thing. Me: Those (long-distance relationships) are awesome.
Tyler: That’s one that started off with a house beat and kind of a dance song.
Me: I saw the video you guys put up on it on Last.fm/youtube. You had the stop-motion technique with the little kids bike and I’m a bit of a cyclist so it really appealled to me… though, you didn’t put the helmet on until the end. You were promoting to kids to not wear a helmet?!
Justin: That’s why we featured the helmet!
Tyler: I was riding and came to my senses!
Justin: You missed the whole point!
Tyler: No no.. this is wrong.
Matt: It was my daughter’s bike & helmet. The seat kept going up.
Justin: The model on the bike on the side is “Electric Stardom”. Me: Niiiice.
Justin: Which would make a good album title. *laughter*
Me: I love the song, “Banjo Forever”.
Justin: You’re an Eve fan! Me: I’m an Eve fan…. Can you tell me a little about that song? It’s almost ethereal.
Justin: Is that the one about a bunny? She had a earlier version with garage band stuff on it, but then we tried a lot of different arrangements & versions… we pay a lot of attention to arrangements. *a bunch of discussion, can’t make out much*
Justin: At first it was trying to recreate that ah-ah-ah-ooh-ooh-ah-ah. That weird string part she had from garage band, but that got thrown out, and then there was the Velvet Underground arrangement, but that didn’t work. Me: You should have an alternate b-side, “The Velvet Underground Mix”.
Justin: That’s the first album! Me: Where, I, where, I haven’t even seen it online? Where is this album?
Tyler: He won’t let anyone here it. I want to re-release it, I think it’s fun but Justin doesn’t want to have anything to do with it.
Justin: So Banjo Forever is actually the 3rd album. The first one is the electric one called Bring On The Super Desserts.
Matt: Still no drummer, but more of a rock band.
Justin: So then on the 2nd album, Barefoot In The Disenchanted Forest, what people think is our first album, is the album to have our new sound. Me: This will be great, when you guys are like 20 years from now, they’ll be trying to find copies of the first two.
Justin: Yeah, exactly! And there’s this homemade packaging, a 20 page 7 x 7 booklet, and we did all the artwork ourselves. Me: You should sell at Wholly Craft, they have a couple records that have that homemade thing.
Justin: *laughs* we did! We sold them at Wholly Craft! And we played there tons and tons of times!
Me: Okay, okay, when is the 18 minute “twog” masterpiece, twee-prog masterpiece, coming based on an obscure Grimm Brothers fairy tale???
Tyler: Justin has this weird notion that no piece of music should be longer than 3 minutes! Me: HAVE YOU HEARD OF THE BAND YES?? You can just put, like, 8 songs together and make it one song?
Justin: We considered it.
Tyler: The Midwest suite. Me: Could be like a “whole relationship”.
Justin: We considered it but that was one of the original concepts, just keep it short and sweet.
Ianna: And we like to play 50 songs each show.
Tyler: We got 25 songs in our set list, it’s a good.. 15 minutes.
Me: So what’s next for you guys, some touring? What’s the plan? Where you going? Canada?
Justin: We went on a tour after Banjo Forever was released, we did Bloomington & Cincinnati, and we did Chicago & Madison. And we’re definitely going back to Bloomington & Cincinnati again. We just played Athens, OH & we’ll definitely go back this summer. Me: What about things like SXSW?
Justin: Umm… We talked about it, but I don’t know
Tyler: It’s such a huge band, it’s kind of a logistical disaster to try to go outside of Columbus.
Justin: I do think if we decide to do it next year, we can take 2 vehicles down and not really book a place because we are completely acoustic. We can play in an alleyway and sell more CDs than people in an actual bar! Me: We should start our own festival! Mid By Midwest!
Justin: Bob’s tried it. *Here I kind of jabber on about festivals and mumble about loving Canada… pretty silly, let’s skip that and move on…*
Me: So, as a band this size, how do you handle all the drugs, the in-fighting, and the love triangles? *laughter*
Ianna: We do them all!
Tyler: We handle in-fighting & love triangles with drugs!
Justin: And we hand drugs & in-fighting with love triangles!
Me: That’s the key to these kind of bands… So, outside of the Super Desserts, what do you guys do?
Justin: We are all in other bands. Me: What’s the world domination plans??
Justin: Don’t dominate the world. *laughter*
Tyler: We make art for ourselves maaaan….
Justin: Just keep recording music!
Tyler: Our goal is to break-up and have someone really get into our music 30 years down the road
Justin: Seriously, that’s it.
Ianna: And do a reunion show!
Justin: We dream about breaking-up! *laughter*
FIN
Well thanks guys! It was a such a treat (no pun intended, well maybe) to meet & talk with you! And to our dear readers, you need to follow some of this delicious linkage and get yourself more acquainted with this wonderfully delightful band:
Want to know what you get at a Super Desserts show? Here’s a couple videos from their recent performance over in Athens, OH to get yer taste buds all wet & shit!
Okay! Now, as is tradition for TSURURADIO, a traditionally non-traditional site, so when we do traditions, you know they are special, we have built for you a mixtape inspired by the wonderful members of the Super Desserts!
Can I get a woot?
WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOT!
Nice.
Now, because their songs are pretty short and they are the reason for the season, they got two, the bookends, on this bad boy. In between lies some new, some old, some fun, some maybe slightly serious, but they were all built while thinking of Justin and the crew. Before we push play, I just want to say to the Super Desserts, thank you again so much for your time and the opportunity to meet & hang out with you. But now it’s time to get on with the music as…..
PS. This post was huge, eh? If there are any typos, quotes to the wrong person, or bad links… I apologize in advance & I hope you just go with it and enjoy! Cheers!
Rainy morning today on my ride… Wanna see? Here’s me finally reaching work and de-layering in a sheltered area.
I love it though. Rain, mud… fun stuff. But damn to my thighs look MAAAASSIVE from that angle! Gotta love a man in tights though, right? The hawtness on two wheels!!!
Anyways, busy boy today! Bunch of running around at work, then I (yes, ME) got invited to a good-bye lunch for a co-worker! I know, weird, eh? That never happens. Good people, good times, but, given it’s bar food I’m about 10 minutes from food coma city so I better get all this out quiiiiizzzzzzzzzzzzziiiiick.
Woo.
Think I just dozed for a sec!
C’mon T! SNAP OUT OF IiiiiizzzzzzzziiiiT! Oopah! Okay… 3 things before we get on today’s sweet ass album.
1. Baby & I are will be on a little mini-mini-vacation this weekend so no post from me on Friday. Awww… I know, I’m sorry, but I’ll be on a plane then see my mom & sis and doubt I’ll have time to jibber on about the latest album to coat my ear drums! BUT that leads me to number 2 (and number 3)…
2. I’ve got a little going-away treat for ya! Tomorrow we’ll presenting what I believe to be a pretty EPIC 2 hour+ mixtape! Just doing the final tweaking today, made a mistake when I pulled a 15 minute doozy for a 5 minute dinger, need to fix that tonight. It’s even got, not one, but TWO songs from the 80s? Holy shit! But that’s not all! Because of…
3. We got a new contributor to TSURURADIO! Yep, if the good lard’s a-willin’ and the creeks don’t rise, Dorice will be joining Grafista & Peanut and bring us the occasional column or song or album or thought or whatever from wonderful Toronto, Canada whenever the desire suits her! So, not sure when her first post will “hit the stands” but when it does, make sure to give her some sweet tender welcomes, okay?
Exciting stuff, eh? Yeah, I think so too!
And — yep, I’m going there — “speaking of exciting stuff”, how about that By Hook And By Crook by Shabby Rogue???
I like this (obviously). It’s been off & on in my ears for the past couple weeks. What’s most interesting about it to me is the variety of “genres” you get with this, it almost plays like a mixtape! Whether it be straight-forward rock of “Reason”, to the folk-rock, almost 90s Dylan/Wilbury-esque on “Every Light”, to the is-that-Irish-bar-rock? “Northern Lights”, to the acoustic indie-pop of “My Future With You”, it’s all over the place and normally that would spell disaster with a capital D and maybe even a capital T, definitely the R.
But it works. Not sure why… There’s a chemistry that seems to tie it all together that I can quite get the words out before my food coma truly sets in for good. But who cares what you call it, just listen, enjoy, and buy it!
01. Northern Lights 02. My Future With You
03. The Mountain
04. Old Man
05. My Life As A Secret Agent
06. Hidden In The Yard
07. Jack In A Box
08. Tales From The City
09. Every Light
10. Reason
11. By Hook And By Crook
12. Chamber Of Lights
tsururadio. The musical obsessions, meanderings, and field observations of Aaron (aka Tsuru) most often presented in mixtape format, the way the good lard intended!
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Growing up, my best friends and I would make mixtapes for each other by ripping songs from the radio or other cassettes we owned. The other day when I was visiting my family in the house I grew up in I began to dig through some old boxes. I was pleasantly surprised to find a pile of these old mixtapes. Let me tell you they were fantastic to listen to all over again. The nostalgia was overwhelming. I even found my old Wu-Tang collection. Man, I was way cooler then.
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