Category: Music
Be Kind Rewind: The Cassette Tape Strikes Back
This article was originally published by LoudLoopPress.com on March 25, 2011.
By Audrey Leon
In the age of the incredibly shrinking, high-capacity mp3 player and numerous online music stores, independent artists are flocking to an unthinkable medium to get their music to the masses: the cassette tape.
Chicago is at the forefront of a subculture that is hitting the mainstream after an explosion of local cassette labels in town.
These labels serve as curators by catering to audiences and artists alike with eye-catching visuals and high production values that can only be rivaled by the original preferred format, vinyl, but at a fraction of the cost.
When it came to releasing its first EP “Sarcastic Summer,” the Chicago post-punk trio Rodeo turned to cassettes as an alternative option to digital downloads.
“While it is easy to throw some mp3′s on our [Bandcamp.com page], it doesn’t feel real unless we have something tangible to give,” said Rodeo’s vocalist Jordan Sirven. “Releasing a cassette allows us to create a unique product for our fans that hopefully will be played more than once.”
Rabble Rabble frontman Ralph Darski agreed stating that the cassette’s second-coming is tied to its tangibility as well its ease of use.
“It’s easy to lose that fulfilling connection to the music you love,” Darski said. “So people start reaching for something tangible and collectible to fill that void of connection, especially for local or indie music.
“A lot of people I’ve sold tapes to have said, ‘awesome I have a tape deck in my car. Now I can jam to you guys when I drive,’” Darski said.
Hollows lead singer Maria Jenkins echoed similar sentiments concerning why people racing back to cassettes.
“Tapes had never officially disappeared in my book,” Jenkins said. “They’re more fun to collect than CD-Rs.
“We grew up with cassette albums and cassingles, and even got a few love mix tapes from admirers in our day,” she said. “So it also seemed classic and somewhat nostalgic to release our first recordings this way.”
Rabble Rabble and Hollows are two of several bands to release its music via the cassette-only label Plustapes.
Dustin Drase, the label’s co-founder, said that originally he wanted to start an all-vinyl label with friends but they initially lacked the funds to do it properly.
“Cassette tapes were the easiest option since neither of us liked CDs,” Drase said. “CDs are bullshit,” he said of why the label concentrated on tapes only.
Sharing a similar distaste for the medium is Columbia College graduate Brett Naucke, founder of the Pilsen-based Catholic Tapes.
“I always disliked CDs,” he said. “I grew up with tapes and I always respected the aesthetic.
“I’ve always owned vinyl, but you can do more with the [tape’s] packaging.”
Naucke said that while he isn’t fond of cassettes as a fad, he isn’t entirely bothered by it.
“Four or five years ago there weren’t half as many tape labels – good or bad,” he said. “And now there’s tons of stuff coming out on cassette and I’m down with that.”
Memories of growing up with cassettes and the mixtapes friends would make for Drase emboldened him and Plustapes to turn audiences onto the bands they saw and enjoyed all over Chicago.
“We’re finding bands in their raw state,” Drase said. “For them, a tape is a low-risk way to give people a view of what you’re doing right now.”
Drase said he has seen orders drop over time, but he insists Plustapes is still steadily selling through runs as the label offers companion digital downloads with certain artist’s tapes.
“I’m not saying tapes are over,” Drase said. “But maybe they’re going back underground where they came from.”
Ambient pop artist Lindsay Powell, who also performs under the name Fielded, has had several releases with Naucke’s Catholic Tapes, including a recent full-length vinyl album “Terrageist.” Powell, 23, said she believes the cassette has staying power.
“As long as people want to make and buy them, they will be around,” Powell said. “It’s a beautiful thing.”
Behind the Scenes with Fugscreens
This article was originally published on LoudLoopPress.com on March 18, 2011.
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| Zissou Tasseff-Elenkoff and his newborn son Inka stand in the back office of Fugscreen studios on 1735 N. Ashland Ave., in Chicago. (Photo by Audrey Leon) |
By Audrey Leon
The building that houses Fugscreens Studios may be nondescript amongst the many sterile office buildings and schools that surround it on North Ashland Avenue, but the work that goes on inside is anything but.
The silk screener’s name isn’t as recognizable as Jay Ryan and Spudnik Press, but its gig poster handiwork can be seen around town at clubs like Schubas, The Empty Bottle or The Hideout on any given night.
“It snowballed a lot in the last year and a half,” said Fugscreen founder Zissou Tasseff-Elenkoff, a 2006 graduate of the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, of the studio’s visibility.
Tasseff-Elenkoff attributes this new found attention to his studio partly to moving into the commercial space on 1735 N. Ashland Ave. nearly two years ago. “It opened us up to professional contacts and enabled us to have interns and resident artists,” he said.
Plenty of up-and-coming bands such as Radar Eyes and Ornery Little Darlings, as well as underground ladies’ wrestling league the Mudqueens are repeat customers for Fugscreens’ designs and print work for their own promotional needs.
When Tasseff-Elenkoff talks about his studio’s success – such as landing big clients like Corona or the Jack White-helmed super group Dead Weather – he mentions luck. However, Mudqueens’ founder Meg Bell attributes it to talent.
“Zissou’s screen prints are amazing, unique and Chicago-centered,” Bell said. “I haven’t found anything else like it.”
Bell and the band Radar Eyes were turned on to Fugscreens by Dumpster Babies drummer Paul Puschautz.
“Paul would design our fliers and he found a guy (Zissou) who would print them for a reasonable price,” said Radar Eyes guitarist Anthony Cozzi. “We did a bunch of them and they turned out great.
“I always really liked what he was doing,” Cozzi said.
Retro rocking duo Ornery Little Darlings didn’t come to Zissou, he came to them, frontman Jason Ewers said.
“We were playing a Lincoln Hall show (last May) and he asked to do the poster for it,” Ewers said. “We had a cool response and we’ve continued and continued.”
With Fugscreens having printed or designed many of Ornery Little Darlings’ posters, Ewers hesitated to pick a favorite.
“My favorite poster is always the new one and always the next one,” he said.
Tasseff-Elenkoff started Fugscreens out of his apartment over three years ago as a way to further his own art. Tasseff-Elenkoff said he began teaching by chance after a potential roommate inquired about lessons after seeing his home set up.
He soon began taking on students such as long-time patron Louie Russo. Russo, his sister and mother all came to Tasseff-Elenkoff to learn silk-screening to further their own artistic creativity.
“It was a nice outlet for me,” Russo said. “I realized what screen printing was and what I could do with it.”
And now it is even easier for those interested in screen printing to take classes at Fugscreens. The studio began working with Groupon to offer large group (10-14 people) classes starting Thursday, March 24 and continuing for the next five months.
“It’s going to be intense,” Tasseff-Elenkoff said. “People tried to advise me against it, but it’s good for the shop.”
The 28-year-old father of a newborn said ideally he would rather focus on his own fine art prints and gig posters, but believes teaching has its own rewards.
“I like teaching, especially when you get someone who’s interested and really loves doing it,” Tasseff-Elenkoff said.
For those looking to get into screen printing on their own Tasseff-Elenkoff said it is tough, but doable.
“Chicago has one of the strongest print communities in the country,” he said, “It has a long history so there’s a lot of equipment hanging around that you could get inexpensively.
“Have confidence in what you do and go for it,” Tasseff-Elenkoff said.
48 (Not So) Angry Minutes with Scott Lucas
Originally posted at LoudLoopPress.com on October 19, 2010
I’ve never had the pleasure of visiting the Flat Iron while it’s busy, but Scott Lucas — frontman for Local H and Scott Lucas & The Married Men — assures me the place is packed after 2 a.m.
We’re sitting in the heart of Wicker Park not far from the hustle and bustle of six corners. The area is not only Lucas’ home base in the city, but where he works; Lucas played a headlining show a few feet down the street at North Milwaukee and Honore during Wicker Park Fest and across the street at the Double Door this past New Year’s Eve, both with Local H. Lucas also played an in-store with his solo project the Married Men at Reckless Records back in February.
However, we find ourselves sitting at a tiny table in the darkened bowels of the Flat Iron because Lucas has, not one, but two EPs releasing on Tuesday, October 19. The first being Local H’s Awesome Mix Tape #1 with his hard rock band of over 15 years Local H and the second being Absolute Beginners with his romantic folk-rock solo project Scott Lucas and the Married Men.
“I’m psyched because I can see everything coming into focus for both bands,” Lucas said. “It’s sort of stunty but it means more to me to put them out on the same day rather than one EP.”
The EPs do share one common thread, the songs could all be viewed as covers. While Local H’s samples the wares of other musicians, The Married Men (with the exception of “Absolute Beginners,” originally by David Bowie) sample Lucas’ catalog: two re-worked versions of Married Men songs from their debut George Lassos the Moon and a cover of Local H’s “Hey Rita.”
“These (Local H’s Awesome Mix Tape #1) are just songs that we’ve been playing live for the last decade,” Lucas said. “There wasn’t a whole lot of thought behind it.”
Lucas said that Local H’s Awesome Mix Tape #1 (the title a reference to the film Boogie Nights) was an idea that had been batted around for years. Releasing covers isn’t a strange move for Local H. On its 2003 No Fun EP Local H recorded versions of The Ramones “I Just Want Something to Do” and The Godfathers’ “Birth, School, Work, Death.”
“We didn’t think about the songs (structure) too much,” he said. “That’s the spirit of the EP.”
The one exception to this would be the EPs bonus track, an acoustic version of the Misfits‘ “Last Caress.” Lucas took a different approach to the song because Metallica’s cover was so well-known.
“U2 said, ‘Charles Manson stole ‘Helter Skelter’ from the Beatles – and we’re stealing it back.’ We had the same attitude,” Lucas said. “If you do a cover of a cover, it’s like putting instant coffee in the microwave. You might go back in time and nobody wants that to happen.”
Local H’s Awesome Mix Tape #1 includes a number of songs from TV on the Radio’s “Wolf Like Me” to the Jesus Lizard’s “Puss.” However, Lucas said that there’s one track Local H won’t play live: “Spider Bite” by the UK band Winnebago Deal.
“I think it’s too hard,” Lucas said. “The riff, I don’t have the technique to play it. That’s why we played it on a keyboard.”
Lucas said that he believes just because you can’t pull a song off live doesn’t mean it should stop you from getting creative in the studio. “You don’t want to think like that,” Lucas said. “I don’t like when people think, ‘Oh, I’m not going to make this song so hard because then it won’t be so hard to play live.’”
Lucas cited “24 Hour Break Up Session” from Local H’s 2008 album 12 Angry Months as an example. “It’s really hard to sing,” Lucas said. “It’s tough, but you don’t think about how you’re going to do it (live).”
While Local H’s EP had no thought behind it, The Married Men’s Absolute Beginners EP grew out of a need to measure the band’s growth as performers.
“It was important because we had rushed into the studio (for George Lassos the Moon,” Lucas said. “The band barely knew the songs and if they fucked up, that was the take.
“I wanted to see if we sounded different and capture the energy coming straight off the road,” he said.
Everything appears to be aligning for both of Lucas’ projects. He is currently working on new Local H and new Married Men material simultaneously.
The two bands are mirror opposites, even Lucas testifies to that fact. Where Local H may take the angrier and harder rock route, the Married Men aren’t afraid to slow things down and add a couple of strings and accordion into the mix.
For Lucas, the creative process for both bands comes down to one thing: lyrics.
“When I’m writing a song and the riff comes out, if I can picture it with Local H it goes that way,” Lucas said. “The most obvious is if it’s soft it goes with Married Men, but that’s a boring way to work.”
Opting to shake things up for both bands, Lucas said he is working on a country song with Local H and a song that he describes as “an eight minute epic with a Black Sabbath middle section” with the Married Men.
“The new Local H is sort of snap-shotty, like a document or a state of the union,” Lucas said. “This is where we are and what’s going on around us. We’re trying to talk to people, but not in a cheese ball way.”
To say Scott Lucas is a busy man is an understatement. Before our meeting he told me that he was running late (about 10 minutes) because he came straight from the studio where he was working on new Local H material. It is easy to imagine that he enjoys the lifestyle. With just a mere mention of his electro-rock group Prairie Cartel, Lucas’ face lit up with the possibilities of getting that band back together.
“A couple of people were asking about Prairie Cartel, it kind of made me want to record a new single,” Lucas said. “I kind of got inspired, as if I needed something else to do.”
Lollapalooza Artist Discovery Series: Metric
Originally published by Lollapalooza.com on August 4, 2010.
Melodic dance-rockers Metric work hard and play hard.
Since self-releasing their acclaimed 2009 album Fantasies, the members of Metric (singer Emily Haines, guitarist James Shaw, bassist Josh Winstead, and drummer Joules Scott-Key) have been locked on a speeding train of touring and press junkets. Yet, somehow the band takes comfort in festival gigs and the hope of someday getting back into the studio.
With the digital age encouraging artists to shed record label dead weight and go their own way, Metric decided that the timing just made sense when it came to self-releasing Fantasies.
“It was just painfully apparent,” said James Shaw in a telephone interview. “It just seemed like we’d learned too much about the record industry and we knew what the risks were going to be and what the pay offs were going to be (of self-releasing).”
The road to Metric’s success was paved with building a more intimate relationship with its fans. That meant producing extras such as music and behind-the-scene videos as well as connecting with fans via social networks.
While music videos are not his preferred method of self-expression, Shaw said that an artist’s role is to create art.
“Your artistic output is the thing that keeps people interested and involved,” Shaw said. “It keeps a dialogue and it keeps your life interesting and the fans’ life interesting.”
Shaw said that Metric’s videos allow fans to get to know them by using an element of humor.
“It’s as entertaining to watch a band make a video as it is to watch the video itself,” Shaw said. “I like a little sense of humor and self-deprecation. Self-deprecation is probably the strongest influence that Canada could offer the rest of the world.”
While Shaw admits that touring can be an alienating experience, it is the festivals that give bands a chance to relax and hang out.
“The only real connection you have is via the stage,” Shaw said. “Festivals are fun because you get to hang out with like-minded people and everyone just has a good time.”
Shaw recounted an experience at this year’s Ottawa Blues Festival where Metric came back to its dressing room to find Wayne Coyne holding two shirts from Metric fans he had met on the festival grounds. Shaw was impressed with both Coyne’s lack of ego and his prowess as a live performer.
“What [Coyne] does as a reverend of love is completely out of control,” Shaw said. “There isn’t one out of 30,000 people that isn’t smiling beyond ear to ear.”
Lollapalooza 2010 will mark Metric’s fourth trip to Chicago since the release of “Fantasies” in 2009. While Metric returns frequently, Shaw said that Chicago remains a daunting city to play.
“There’s a lot of real music fans in that town (Chicago) and they’re really listening with all their ears and all their hearts,” Shaw said. “You can feel that as a musician and it’s a very different experience.”
This year’s Lollapalooza will be Shaw’s first since playing the festival in 2006 as a member of Broken Social Scene.
“That (Lollapalooza) was one of the – probably the pinnacle Broken Social Scene performance in the last seven or eight years,” Shaw said. “We were right before the (Red Hot) Chili Peppers and the crowd was not wanting to turn around and it was just one of those magical, magical shows.”
Shaw is excited to return to Lollapalooza not only to play onstage with Metric but to see The Strokes.
“The Strokes, to me, are absolutely seminal, a very important band in my own life as a musician,” Shaw said. “I think they are awesome; I’m really happy they’re playing.”
After Lollapalooza Metric will join British alternative rockers Muse on tour in October and November. Shaw speculated that more tour dates may be on the horizon but his wish is to dive back into the recording studio as soon as possible.
“Records are made very meticulously by us and they take time,” Shaw said. “So I want to get back in and start working.”
Make sure to catch Metric at Lollapalooza before they speed off into the sunset with Muse. Metric will perform on the Playstation stage on Saturday, August 7.
Written by Audrey Leon
// Audrey Leon // 