4.27.2006

Welcome to Ronsonville: The Blog

Hey there. How ya doing. Relaxed? Need a refill? That's great....

Thanks for coming by -- there's a lot to check out around here and hopefully the posts will start becoming a little more frequent. My suggestion is that if you're a fan of Daniel Powter and that "Bad Day" song, you start at the beginning...

The beard article that's reffed here in a couple of places can be found here.

But lemme know what you think and thanks for stoppin' by...

Anti-Artist of the Week, 4/27


Daniel Powter

So you had a bad day, hm? I have too, a lot of 'em, but I never wrote a crappy pop song about it. At first I was encouraged to learn that the number one selling song on iTunes was not some shlocky, humps-related nonsense. Then, after being forced to hear this overearnest, mediocre, instant adult contemporary classic 1,100 times, I realized there was something far more sinister at play. Like "Everybody Hurts" and "Don't Worry, Be Happy" before it, the song is so annoyingly generic and universal, that it loses any personal impact it could possibly have.

Are people seriously thinking "Whoa, he's singing about bad days. I'VE had a bad day. How did he get into my head!? Time to purchase!" Please, someone explain this to me. Also, will someone else please yank that dumb hat off his head? Double thanks.

Next week, I promise to be fawning over someone I actually like again. Promise!

4.20.2006

Meeting sketches 1

I have a tendancy to doodle/draw during meetings. Crude, but occasionally interesting, I have no public outlet for this skill, so I've decided to post the more bizarre/less embarrassing ones here. Here's a modest tribute to Tom Cruise (and the new TomKat baby) via some tangent I was on a few weeks ago:


It says so little, and yet, so much.

Random Artist of the Week, 4/20


Tom Vek
I just bought Tom Vek's first CD (We Have Sound) used this week. I had heard C-C (You Set The Fire In Me) a few times in random places, and finally the song got stuck in my head. I went straight to my local record store (Shake It) and picked it up like some sort of zombie. Nonetheless, the CD is great. A mix of LCD Soundsystem, Beck and the Talking Heads (if that's possible), but also very original. As most of his reviews point out, this guy's got great potential. I beg of you to check it out.

Key song(s): The one-two punch of "C-C " and "I Ain't Saying My Goodbyes." These songs make up for any shortcomings on "We Have Sound." "The Lower The Sun" is a highlight too...

Web site: www.tomvek.tv/

4.13.2006

Random Artist of the Week, 4/13

I've decided in order to keep up on this blog, I should start having regular features. This week I'm starting a "Random Artist of the Week." You'll quickly understand the reason for this name.

Quick shout out to my sister Angie who celebrates a big birthday today. Happy Birthday, Ang!

And now, this week's Random Artist...


Fatlip
I first got into Fatlip through watching the Spike Jonze documentary "What's Up, Fatlip?" which was basically Spike talking to Fatlip between takes for the video shoot for the song of the same name. A few years (try 5) passed and finally I heard that the long-awaited Fatlip album "The Loneliest Punk" came out on CD in 2005. It turns out the CD is worth the wait, a lot of it is a perfect breakdown of the mind of an artist who can't create art. Great stuff...

Key song: It still doesn't get better than "What's Up, Fatlip?" Though "Writer's Block" is good too...

Key lyric:
“"I'm sort of like a dweeb, but that don't sell / I've never been shot or been to jail / But I'm beginning to wish I had been / Just to put it down in a pad with a pen," Writer's Block

Web site:
www.myspace.com/fatlipmusic

4.06.2006

Forever drawing monkeys


Here's part of one of the projects I've been working on recently. A kinda weird and very inside joke t-shirt for my dad and his friends involving monkeys. It took a loooong time to put it all together (the final project features 8 monkeys doing various things), but once I finally got used to the idea, it came together pretty quickly. So, enjoy this sneak peak, and if you see a group of people in California wearing matching monkey shirts, that's probably something I did...exciting, eh?