..ish.
I've done most of the tricky backend bits now. I don't have a design yet, so that will be the next stage!
Have a look, and subscribe to the new feed at mf.grimaceworks.com
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So.. I'm starting to feel the limits of my not-a-gig structure. With no preparation, all my composition efforts start to be constrained in a mildly unsatisfying, undeveloping, uncontrasting, tunnelled way. I knew this would be the case. I think I can still get away with doing what I'm doing, but there is a strong case for preparing a few bits and pieces of tracks, just to make sure that it's not too tricky to get started. I'm always conscious that whatever I do to begin with will be construed as my 'style', and then people will leave thinking they know what I'm about, and then it'll all change.
That said, last night certainly yielded a few very satisfactory compositions. A friend has started hassling me about the stagnation of my mp3 feed. It is true, I have not updated for a while....
So I think I will start a consolidation phase. Get these sketches turned into tracks. I may have to enlist some help for this process as I am extremely bad at working when I'm in my flat on my own.
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I really should start doing these flyers sooner...
More Information
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So here's a new myspace for you: myspace.com/klangked. There's a recording of the set I mentioned on Friday. In two parts. Enjoy, if that's your sort of thing :)
If there was an expression for 'burning the candle at both ends' then that would describe my life perfectly. Why am I not asleep! Why am I in bed, trying to get the card reader on this laptop working so I can upload cropped detail shots of my musical instruments for use on moo cards!! Especially given that I've been going to bed really late recently and need to conserve energy for my NOT A GIG tomorrow!
Installation(3) will feature live clarinet loop remashing.
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I finally got around to picking out a selection of photos to put up on Flickr from my trip to Thailand.
Here they are flickr.com/photos/michaelforrest.
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Just went to the last Kino Fist of the season. Couldn't really be bothered with it - Chris Marker - politics. I'm so fundamentally uninterested in politics. Gave up halfway through and came home.
So now I'm sat in my flat, having to turn the light on even though it's clearly still perfectly light outside, because I'm in this basement. I can't bring myself to shut the curtains but I don't want to turn on the light too bright because then everybody walking past the window will be able to look in.
I know there are things I could be doing. Like Ann's website, or my website, or working on those two tracks that I want to get ready for Halina to sing on. I just don't feel like it. I can't be bothered - I just want to natter with some people in the pub. Even though I decided not to drink today. Even though if I was in the pub my mind would probably be somewhere else.
Again, I feel like I'm being childish - like by this age I shouldn't just be wandering around the house saying "I'm bored, I'm bored, there's nothing to do" - "what about tidying up? what about that washing up? what about cleaning those blinds in the bedroom? what about mopping the kitchen floor?" - "noooo, I don't wanna!".
I don't mind doing boring stuff between other things. Or while I'm waiting for other things... I did all sorts of mundane tasks on Thursday while I was waiting for friends to come over. Perhaps it's a 'deadline' thing - perhaps it's because if there isn't an obvious ending to a period of time, then - you know - what's the point - there's plenty of time to do this and that, no need to hurry - just mess about until it's bedtime and go to sleep with the heaviness of inactivity - the guilt of laziness.
Times like this I have a long list of things I could do - it's identical to the long list of things I don't want to do.
"Yeah, I could do that, but then what?"
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Friday night was great fun I have to say. I really got a chance to do some proper multi-instrumentalism live on stage - haven't had a chance to do that for a long time. Kaya kept up the clarinet while I tangled myself in a bundle of wires playing toy keys through guitar pedals, glockenspiel and trumpet and cello through Kaoss Pad. Lots of feedback was required to keep the energy up, and I had to get the sound man to throw me a new cable for the keyboard after the guitar amp cut out and I got it working again. It was my sort of thing really - balancing things on other things, using all my arms and legs to keep stuff working, reacting to sound engineering mishaps.
After receiving an initial batch of congratulatory sentiments I found myself sat alone. I felt awfully depressed about this. I felt frozen out of all the groups and didn't feel like I was there with any of my usual friends (i.e. I only knew the people I had played with, but they seemed to be talking to alternative, much closer friends). Angrily scribbling in my pad, I think I got to the root of my problem.
I think I subconsciously expect that if I prove that I am good at stuff, then more people will want to talk to me. Thus relieving me of that painful ice-breaking stage of any interaction. That is, if I show off then groupies will come to me. But no! This does not happen! My depression, it seems, stems from the fact that I *still* have to make an effort.
I cannot tell if my reluctance to socially 'prostrate myself' stems from a sort of childish "it's not fair, it's not fair - why do I have to do all the work?" mentality, or laziness, or something more valid. I'm not being lazy though - I work REALLY HARD on music, I work REALLY HARD when I'm playing live. I'm using my WHOLE BRAIN. So it's another reason I feel this upset indignation when people don't noticeably 'reward' me after a set. If human interaction is all I'm after, then it's an awful lot of misplaced effort! :)
So I discussed this briefly with Kaya, and she told me that I am probably perceived as rather authoritative and unapproachable - reminding my of the artist-audience divide whereby a person might be somewhat starstruck(!!!) in my presence. And so I came to perceive the utter irony of my situation. The more I work on getting good at things, the HARDER I am to approach! Holy fuck, what a joke.
So I know I have to do the approaching still, if I want to speak to people after I play a set. With my newfound proto-clarity on the situation I made a couple of advances to people that I would otherwise have indignantly avoided ('they should want to talk to *me*!'), and discovered that my performer status does in fact make it easier to start a conversation. With a cute girl.
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What happened here? I'm staring at screens like this all day now. I'm literally trying to work out how to recompile a compiler to compile my compiler. On two different platforms.
Plus I seem to be doing a lot of writing code to analyse code... GEEK!
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I burnt the shit out of the roof of my mouth on a pub dinner boiled potato bastard. It's called 'pizza palate', apparently. Still raw after 24 hours. Possibly because I indulged an urge to eat lots of Marmite on toast today. It's a novel variation on hot chilli pain- I got endorphins. It's more injurous than eating a curry unfortunately, so I should really let it heal now.
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Here's a bit from a jam I had with oMMM, Kayaka and Suzywan on Tuesday. Woosy, huh?
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So check this out: 
I made my little wheely trolley have some foam in it.
The block of foam cost £20 from Pentonville Rubber (does anybody know how to make gmaps link to a single business, instead of the search results?). The guy in the shop cut off two inch thick layers so I could cut all the way through the middle block and have padding on the outside. I cut the foam with my big kitchen knife :)
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With oMMM on clarinet
Kayaka on camera and glockenspiel
Michael Forrest on drums
And special guest Suzywan on keyboard
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I just started watching 'Samurai 7' here: http://www.veoh.com/videos/v257616KAy8YG
You can't really argue with samurai fighting giant robots. It's great fun.
Thanks to all who made it to my various sets last week. Sorry about the last one on Friday - I think we were a little ambitious in our plan to play at 7am - it didn't happen in the end.
I just had the tastiest cake ever: Honeybuns lemon and ginger slice from Fresh and Wild.
I'm not as tired as I thought I'd be after all the excesses of the weekend. Stayed up all night on Friday for this squat party, had a couple of hours attempted sleep on Saturday morning in my front room lying on a bean bag and a chair. Went out to another warehouse party on Saturday night - saw some more trapeze action. Got back from that at 5am, then came out today to the fourth Kino Fist show (it was very gay this week - as unusual as it is to see a man poking a prison wall with his tumescent member, I preferred the film about chess).
I should get to bed now really, but I haven't taken the bins out yet which means putting on my shoes again.
Oh - my musical instrument family has some new members. A lovely soprano glockenspiel, a little wooden double-mini-guiro-thing that calls itself an 'agogo bell', a triple actual agogo bells, a triangle and, at last, a clarinet! I love my new clarinet. I forgot how full bodied they sound. It's amazing. Expect to start hearing it on everything. I makes the trumpet sound amazing too - I always contended that those two instruments go together perfectly. 
There's an increasingly realistic prospect that I could start doing my 'full' installation projects before the year is out. By 'full' I mean: me, a grand piano, a drum kit, a trumpet, a clarinet, a load of toy keyboards and percussion instruments and a giant mixing desk - all going through a foot-pedal-controlled Ableton Live. I don't want to go into any more detail yet, but the prospect of doing that before Installation(10) is the most exciting thought I've had for a long time.
Here's something I was moaning about on Friday night after I played my set: I never seem to feel 'elated' after I've played a set. In fact, most of my sets are followed by a mild depression and emptiness. I'm always exhausted - it's really hard work playing the way I do. I wish I understood the base of this post-gig mild unhappiness. It's not to do with the quality of my set - I've been pretty happy with the last couple. It's not to do with not getting any good feedback - I usually get plenty. What could it be? I've got an awful feeling that it's just because I want 'hot groupie action'.
Perhaps I should do some gigs that are more conducive to getting hot-groupies. Maybe I should learn a dance. Like a Michael Jackson dance. Or perhaps I should go more 80s. That seems to be quite popular at the moment. Horrendous 80s style clothing. Or I could wear make up and/or an eccentric wig. Or perhaps I could constantly big myself up as though I were some kind of rapper: 'In case you've forgotten what I just said about 15 seconds ago, my name is Michael Forrest, this is Michael Forrest coming through, coming at you, like a tornado, like a beat machine, yeah, I'm really good me, yeah, you heard me, I'm totally awesome. You really should come and listen to the music I'm coming at you with. I'm coming at you I'm Michael Forrest. Coming with the music for you. You know, cos, like, I'm really good and shit, yeah man, check it out, it's Michael Forrest. In the house. On the beat. Move your feet." etc... etc.. etc.. Until you really know exactly what my name is. And shit.
Better not eh.
Nah - it's all about the music I'm afraid.
I once got a groupie you know - she was totally hot. Well - I say 'got', but I really mean 'a really hot girl once told me I was really good after a gig, I stammered a bit, and then I maintained an unconsumated crush on her for the following two years.' It's true. I was doing 150 feet-on-the-bed press-ups (the kind where you push up, clap, and land each time) a day for a while - trying to get myself into a shape that would be 'worthy of her'. I think I might have spoken to her three or four times. Ever. Don't ask me for any more detail, it's too embarassing. What a silly boy I was.
The next chapter of 'The unfortunately named and inappropriately anthropomorphised squirrels, aka Nephew The Squirrel' is written down in my Moleskine. I will type it up soon. I've worked out what Nex (as she will henceforth be known) is 'like'.
I have noticed my sighs have become a lot more efficient recently. A very short, gated burst of white noise. Do I sigh primarily out of habit now? Is sighing bad?
Did I mention I got a Mac for work? I am typing on its backlit keyboard right now. Why? Because I am retreating from all things Microsoft as fast as I can. More on that another time, perhaps.
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I'm playing in THREE different places this week...
Latest news will come through on this page: http://www.google.com/calendar
Wed 7 Mar
20:00
Opulence at 153 Regent St, W16 4QB
“As part of March's theme of This Modern Love, focusing on our contemporary obsessions.”
http://www.tescodisco.co.uk
Fri 9 Mar
18:30
Upbeat improv in Clerkenwell with Foz and Beatmasta Bill
Later on Friday night
Debuting with oMMM and Kayaka as 'Klang' in Seven Sisters (details to follow)
oMMM: http://www.myspace.com/bedcore
Kayaka: http://www.myspace.com/kayakath
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