tangible memory, tactile sound

has fantasy or illusion ever come true exactly how you imagined it? even if you tried and tried not to expect anything at all or even expected the worst?.. i´d never had a taste of that magic until saturday. the stars alignment to fulfill for a couple of minutes the ethereal. wow, god manifest might sound like an overstatement, i´d agree but i think back on it all, and it still feels like a dream. maybe that has to do with the fact that i had more than a couple of beers. nonetheless, the sweet taste remains.

if anyone has been reading what i´ve been writing since this blog began, you´d understand a small fragment of the impact tv on the radio has had on different aspects of my life. it´s weird to write that but it´s true. music to me, is an art form that makes you go beyond your own limits and layers. art in genereal aspires to that, but music, at least for my ears becomes solidified when chemistry makes a cameo, chemistry you can play over and over. it´s like you can eat it, and cut it, hold it and taste it, and travel through space with it. there are no actual words that explaln the exact feeling. what makes one have this chemistry with certain bands still remains a mystery. like why am i into terry riley, mt. kimbie, george michael, earth, wind, and fire, or how nat king cole´s unforgettable, infalibly makes me cry...
i could speculate that music speaks to the soul at some unknown, subconscious and invisible realm. earth, wind and fire must channel my texan nostalgia towards the radio station my dad heard. terry riley, my pretentious contemporary adult.

i know exactly why unforgettable makes me cry, but that´s a whole different story i´ll tell when i´m feeling a bit more sentimental.

memory´s webs are infinite.

back to tv on the radio, the affection dates to wolf like me, rarely it was heard on the dancefloor (back when i was a wolf myself) but when it did come on, a full moon appeared. i got really into them, then came a best friend, guillermo whom i met on the internet, yes, the internet, all we did was talk about music, he recommended mogwai and sonic youth, and claimed to be a tvotr lover. the spark was mutual. to this day he always comes to heart with the band. i remember perfectly, the first time i saw tvotr was in prospect park about two years ago, guillermo was in mind for most of it.

with a little bit of history, we arrive at the almost present when i found out my best friend singer/writer of disco ruido! was opening a small show for tvotr in guadalajara. a part from it being a huge thing for d.r!, they happened to be playing with my favorite band.

no brainer.

i took one of my postcards of a red sky i´d photographed and wrote on it something i wanted to say to the band, i was sorta anxious that if the time came the words i wanted weren´t going to come out...
i saw tunde standing outside his tent and walked up to him, introduced myself, gave him the postcard and asked for a picture. he was super nice. something you could vibe from seeing him on stage or on rachel getting married or through something about his smile or whatever, but you never know if that´s really true or if it´s just you exalting. we chatted for a while. he told me about the movie he co-directed for their new album (posted below), we talked about illustration, a project i was working on, how he liked disco ruido´s! graphics, what i did for a living, why i was there, what was the downside of touring, how he liked making things, how my friend (elena) had confused him with another person and asked for a picture, how i was nervous, etc.
after a minute i was at ease, and i said, "this was better than what i´d pictured, you never know when you meet someone you admire if they´re gonna turn out to be assholes. i didn´t really wanna stop listening to your music if you did turn out to be one"... he laughed and agreed that it´s not cool to have that type of illusion shattered, "i´m glad you´re not an asshole either".

fiuf.

after disco ruido! came down from playing an excellent show; kyp, dave, jaleel, and the drummer headed over to our tent to congratulate the band. something i´d never seen. which amazed and made all our jaws drop. god how refreshing it is to find real people in the world. i mean of course that´s ideally what you´d think would happen, what else should one expect right?, but that´s not always the case. more so with a band that´s covered as much ground as they have.
anyways, after observing all this, even if i already felt most of it, i confirm they deserve absolutely everything good that´s coming to them, that they´ve created, and´ll continue to create. i have nothing but admiration towards whatever they´ve put their heart into. and here is a great example of how the universe again conspires to compose and soundtrack something beautiful.

of course, they went on stage and put on an awesome show. i am no longer objective in this aspect, as you obviously deduced. if you gotten through most of this post, maybe you feel nauseous for the excessive sunshine (here too, i am no longer able to help myself), i don´t doubt there´re one or two of 364 bad days, one thing is fact, they do transmit clarity in how far they wanna take themselves and everything around that happens to be true to it. that alone supports my theory. all the rest is just an extended version of my own perception.

they later appeared at the after party where julian was djing. we danced and drank some more. so the world didn´t end but it brought mexico and a faithful part of brooklyn to guadalajara. (here´s where i actually get that brooklyn´s a whole different planet than manhattan.)

in conclusion to this post of praise, it still amazes me how bands have all these effects on thousands and thousands of people without knowing it, or better said, with just seeing faces and bodies move in elevated ways to what they do, connecting in the unseen and apparently unconnected... it´s like if you split yourself into a million melodic little pieces and you are able to share it with anyone who happens to stumble upon what you do.

dear science,
please explain.




favorites include caffeinated consciousness, second song, killer crane. you and backwards dragon probably top it.