Mike Errico official site: http://www.errico.com

Also at: Facebook || Twitter || MySpace || Imeem || Last.fm || Pandora || ILike || MOG

First shot at it. Enjoy.

"Everybody Knows," filmed live at the Zipper Theater, NYC, 12/16/08 Credits: James Manzi, the Zipper Theater Mike Errico official site: www.errico.com

Link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GWOJntxFs88

Link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hUw13iIrKN0

Hear/Buy "OK to Go" here.

Would make a lovely addition to any vocal booth:

2009 MIKE ERRICO HOLIDAY SHOW

Thursday, December 17, 2009
Joe's Pub
425 Lafayette St., NYC, NY
9:30 PM || $20
Tickets: 212-967-7555 or click here to order online.
Dinner Reservations: 212-539-8778

Directions: Click here.

A highlight of Errico's touring calendar, the annual Holiday Show returns to Joe's Pub, featuring favorites from across his discography as well as new and unreleased material. In keeping with a long-standing Holiday Show tradition, Mike will distribute gifts, known to the loyal as "Holiday Omens," to the audience. Recipients will be invited to interpret the Omens personal significance in the coming year. Hilarious, poignant or cautionary, the Omens have proven to be alarmingly accurate.

"The Holiday Show is my favorite--it allows me to connect with my fans, many whom have been with me for a long time," Mike says. "Not only do I get to reach back for some older material, but I've really enjoyed rolling out new stuff, and of course, there's nothing more gratifying than playing a song and hearing people singing along." The evening concludes another prolific year for the New York City native.

On the Web: Facebook || Twitter || MySpace || Imeem || Last.fm || Pandora || ILike || MOG

The sky calls to us/if we do not destroy ourselves/ we will one day venture to the stars

Link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zSgiXGELjbc

Happy Birthday, Oscar Wilde.

Look at this. I'm infuriated. That was a priceless Vermeer!

It's OK if you can't read Japanese. Music is a universal language.

Link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H_X7mMU6Gb0

I do some music blogging on the Internetz, as you may know. Saw this Sufjan article and it made me think.



In a recent interview, the indie darling songwriter voiced a sentiment which is now familiar among musicians who don't survive on radio singles and club appearances where they're paid to sip Ciroc with the label turned towards the paparazzi:

"I definitely feel like 'What is the point? What's the point of making music anymore?' I feel that the album no longer has a stronghold or has any real bearing anymore. The physical format itself is obsolete; the CD is obsolete and the LP is kinda nostalgic. So, I think the album is suffering and that's how I've always created-- I work with these conceptual albums in the long-form. And I'm wondering, what's the value of my work once these forms are obsolete and everyone's just downloading music?"

Maybe he's just having a bad day. Maybe the whole industry is. I know I am (thanks for nothing, last night's Thai food takeout place).

Read the rest at Pitchfork: http://pitchfork.com/news/36784-sufjan-questions-the-meaning-of-it-all/

In case you were concerned that your work is not living up to standards of originality, consider the cave drawings at Lascaux, where Picasso is claimed to have admitted, “They’ve invented everything.”

I take this as a freeing thought. Once the yoke of invention is lifted, the act of expression can advance.

From The New Yorker:

"What those first artists invented was a language of signs for which there will never be a Rosetta stone; perspective, a technique that was not rediscovered until the Athenian Golden Age; and a bestiary of such vitality and finesse that, by the flicker of torchlight, the animals seem to surge from the walls, and move across them like figures in a magiclantern show (in that sense, the artists invented animation). They also thought up the grease lamp—a lump of fat, with a plant wick, placed in a hollow stone—to light their workplace; scaffolds to reach high places; the principles of stencilling and Pointillism; powdered colors, brushes, and stumping cloths; and, more to the point of Picasso’s insight, the very concept of an image. A true artist reimagines that concept with every blank canvas—but not from a void."

Link: http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2008/06/23/080623fa_fact_thurman

Have I read it yet? No! But I will.

Link to "Victory Lap," the latest George Saunders short story, in the New Yorker: http://www.newyorker.com/fiction/features/2009/10/05/091005fi_fiction_saunders?printable=true

Someday robots will be perfected, and future generations will never know how creepy they once were. Their dead eyes and unconscious gestures will seem quaint and obvious, and not the terrifying existential threat they presently are.

Till then, there's Japan, birthplace of the new singing machine, called the HRP-4C, featuring "Yamaha's voice synthesis technology 'Vocaloid.'" From its look, and its sound, it's probably safe to assume that Kanye's already hit on it. 

Link: http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/news/2669909/Robo-pop.html

Dear Japan,

Origato gozaymas for creeping me out one more time.

-m

And for $25,000, it's all yours. Recession? What recession?

“I am large, I contain multitudes.” - Walt Whitman

Interesting article. Basically: "Many researchers now believe, to varying degrees, that each of us is a community of competing selves, with the happiness of one often causing the misery of another. This theory might explain certain puzzles of everyday life...

An evolving approach to the science of pleasure suggests that each of us contains multiple selves—all with different desires, and all fighting for control. If this is right, the pursuit of happiness becomes even trickier. Can one self bind” another self if the two want different things? Are you always better off when a Good Self wins? And should outsiders, such as employers and policy makers, get into the fray?"

Read it up: http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/200811/multiple-personalities

Michael Emerson, aka Benjamin Linus (the creepy guy) from Lost, got the 'iPod Test' in a recent interview, where they spin the dial randomly and call out the first ten artists that come up. Whattya know:

"Arcade Fire, CocoRosie, Cat Power, M.I.A., Be Good Tanyas, Mike Errico, Las Ondas Marteles, Ambient Groove, Radiohead, and Boubacar Traore were the first 10 artists to pop up."

http://lostblog.com/2009/10/03/new-qa-with-michael-emerson/

I wonder what happened.