Tag Archives: Marvin

Usual Rubbish

What’s going on.

Is that what busy looks like? Shut the front door! I had no idea it looked like that. Sakes alive.

Press record nowWell, once again, you are encountering me in the midst of some level of astonishment. Seems like I spend half of my life sore amazed and the other half just plain sore. (I am definitely in the sore second half.) Anyway, never mind my poor self control – these are indeed heady days here at the abandoned Cheney Hammer Mill in now waterlogged upstate New York.  There’s so much shit hitting this fan, it’s hard to see your face through the fertilizer. Or something.

Here’s what we’ve got on the burner: lunch. Marvin (my personal robot assistant) is heating up a can of soup. He doesn’t seem to understand that you need to TAKE THE SOUP OUT OF THE CAN BEFORE YOU PUT IT IN THE FIRE. (I’m hopeful that, if I raise my voice, he will begin to understand.) So if we hear a ‘splosion just before noon local time, we will likely know why. Soup in a can, friends. Keep it cool. That’s all I’ve got to say.

Beyond the lunch issue, there are other things happening round these parts. Cowboy Scat: Songs in the Key of Rick has been sent to the distribution house and will soon be available in all the usual online outlets – iTunes, Amazon, Spotify, blah blah blah. We are also on the verge of pressing a limited run of discs – those should be ready by the end of July, maybe sooner. If you want one, tell Marvin next time you see him at your corner gin mill. (Lush!) Or just leave a comment on this post and let us know. Or visit our contact page.   

We’ve also got another episode of THIS IS BIG GREEN in production, with a fresh installment of Ned Trek. It’s Ned Trek #11, and you’ll hear it very soon. Weird? Yes. Childish and stupid? Perhaps. But you get what you expect, right? Big Green is nothing if not honest.

So, album … podcast … we’ve got it going on here at the hammer mill. Watch for the eerie glow of success. Or … something else.

Usual Rubbish

Release minus … what?

Still watching that space? Well, give it up. That was a joke, damn it. Don’t take me literally … that way lies madness.

Cowboy Scat: Songs in the Key of RickWell, here we are, inching closer to the release date of Cowboy Scat: Songs in the Key of Rick, Big Green’s third and perhaps silliest album ever. Fully 21 tracks of pure, unadulterated goofiness, each one performed by what is nominally a completely different combo. We’ve got the master all set. We’ve designed the packaging for our limited run of CD-Rs and the graphics for our digital distributors. Now all we have to do is, well, complete the arcane process of acquiring ISRC codes for all of the tracks, manufacturing the discs, doing a run of wax cylinders for those listeners still enamored of that format, and so on.

What is the release date? Good question. Ask our corporate label, Hegemonic Records and Worm Farm, Inc., a.k.a. Hegephonic. They make all the big foot decisions. (By that I mean, they actually have a sasquatch  serving as their Chief Operations Officer. Explains a lot.) Like many artists (and it’s in deference to the mansized tuber that I include us within that rubric), we get impatient with red tape. So when you see the disc – if you see the disc – you will see our own imprint on the package; a logo for Hammermade Records, and well, it doesn’t exist, but it sounds right, so what the fuck.

The mother of all imprintsSome have told us that we should have called the label Hammermaid, like Milkmaid condensed milk. We don’t listen to some people, particularly if they are Marvin (my personal robot assistant), who has a particular liking for condensed milk products because they remind him of motor oil. In any case, we don’t take a lot of pains over trifles like imprints and logos, because in all honesty, that’s not what we’re about. We are the original discorporate rock band. We say no to corporate hegemony. We’re off the grid, man. (Aside from all that stuff involving money, paying for things, etc.)

So again, be forewarned. Release of Cowboy Scat is imminent. After which, we will likely go into hiding (or perhaps the witness protection program) assuming Cousin Rick Perry catches wind of this. (Don’t tell ‘im!)

Usual Rubbish

Unique opportunity.

No, this isn’t spam. This is real life. Real as it gets, man. Gravity, oxygen, water, the whole nine yards.

This is what we need. I was just thinking back to the bad old days in the 1970s when television was king and the internets were just a twinkle in DARPA’s eyes. On about five million occasions – maybe slightly more than that – I can remember watching an ad for 120 Classical Masterpieces introduced by the well-known character actor John Williams (not the classical guitarist … nor the composer of the Lost In Space theme song). Now that we are on the verge of releasing our third and perhaps silliest album ever, Cowboy Scat: Songs in the Key of Rick, I only wish we had a marketing powerhouse behind us like John Williams. Or even Guy Williams. (Except that he‘s dead too!)

Looks like, once again, Big Green will do the legwork on our own. We have some volunteer help, as you know. Marvin (my personal robot assistant) will tell all of his robot friends to download the album. (They don’t even need a freaking smart phone!) The man-sized tuber will be in charge of rural distribution; we’ve provided him with the requisite maps of Nebraska and Idaho. The rest of the country will be handled by the two Lincolns, who – as candidates for the presidency – have tread that ground before with great success. We have great hopes for anti-Lincoln, who has made some friends in Nashville. (Actually, that’s Nashville, Franklin, Idaho. Look it up.)

Yes, distribution is always a headache when most of your fans live on other planets. There’s a cost-benefit issue in trying to ship discs via UPS to Neptune; it’s hard to make that $9.95 per unit generate a profit against the transportation costs, even with our interplanetary handling surcharge of $45,682.53 per disc. Add in the exchange rate headaches, particularly in the Quatloo zone planets, and it’s hard to make your nut that way. Still, we try. Mitch Macaphee has some ideas involving matter transportation technology. All very hush hush at this point. We’ll let you know.

Hey, we live on crumbs. It’s the art that matters, right? That’s why we’re assembling an all-star panel of reviewers for our June podcast – experts who will examine Cowboy Scat from multiple insane perspectives. So stay tuned. This may be the best batch yet.