SALT LAKE COMIC CON - POSTGAME

Well that escalated quickly.

Let me give you a rundown of the past couple of weeks, real quick.

I work every day except Saturday and do a double on Wednesday. I’m not complaining about it, because those two extra shifts each week are my choice and I could pretty easily make a few cuts in my budget and do without them, but I just don’t want to. All the extra money I make goes into a savings account in case I someday decide that I hate my job and want to quit, leave the country for a while and go on an awesome adventure to Norway, visiting Viking museums and then venturing down through Europe. Sounds like something I’ve been thinking about, doesn’t it? It also gives me a little capital to make stuff and things for events like Craft Lake City and Salt Lake Comic Con.

Anyway, the month of August was pretty hectic as it was trying to get ready for Craft Lake City and as soon as that was over I had a couple of breathing weeks to do things like clean my apartment, wash my car and catch up on sleep. But it wasn’t too much of a vacation, because I worked pretty much every day.

The last week of August, I worked Wednesday day and night, worked Thursday, went to a wedding Thursday night, worked Friday, went straight to Tamerlane practice, then went directly to my brother and his wife’s “Announce the Sex” party for their new baby (it’s a boy). The next day, I woke up, had a tattoo appointment, a baby shower/diaper party for a different baby, then the Tamerlane/Mick Morris benefit show. I waited tables all day Sunday and all day Monday (Labor Day), worked Tuesday then went home to get all my Old News Records stuff organized. Wednesday morning I went to work until 5, drove immediately from work to the Salt Palace to meet Casey and unload all the tables and racks for Salt Lake Comic Con. We left, I drove to my parent’s house and spent the whole night pulling out and organizing the comics I was going to sell that weekend. I left my parent’s a little after midnight and headed home.

The next morning, I picked up Casey from his house at 6:45 AM. We drove to The Park Café, had breakfast and then picked up a U-Haul at 8. We made our way out to Spidey’s house in Draper, stopping at Office Max along the way. We loaded Spidey’s comics, drove back to U-Haul to exchange the truck because the “check engine” light came on, and moved everything from one truck to the other. Casey and Spidey headed to Casey’s house and the toy store to grab all his stuff and I went to my parent’s house and started bringing everything outside. About 11:30, Casey and Spidey showed up at my parent’s house and we loaded all my stuff into the truck. The two of them headed down to the Salt Palace and I headed out to Midvale to pick up my more “Long Live Sloan” shirts and the new tank tops I designed for the show. We got everything set up and the doors opened at 3 PM for people holding VIP passes.

From there it was pure chaos. Well, controlled chaos was more like it. No one really knew what to expect from a first year event like Salt Lake Comic Con, but the bar was set pretty high with all the tickets they’d sold already. Casey, Spidey and I were ready and excited. We’d had plans of vending at San Diego Comic Con and Emerald City in Seattle, but never actually made it so we wanted to bring our best effort to this – whatever it was going to end up being.

People started swarming our booth, checking things out and looking through all of the stuff we decided to sell because we felt bad storing it at our parent’s houses. We had a pretty great system going and we were all ready for the night. Casey thought he was going to leave in the middle of things to go to the gym, but once he saw how busy and crazy things were getting in the hall, he changed his mind.

The rest of Thursday was packed, and Friday and Saturday were both the same, too. It was an awesome weekend and our Old News Records/Grudge City Comics (yeah, that’s what we’re calling it from here on out) shop did really well. We were pretty tightly confined to a 10x10 space and every once in a while things got pretty cozy in there, but it was all worth it.

We sold a lot of comics last weekend and I mean A LOT. Casey and Spidey brought more books Friday and Saturday and I had to bring a second round on Saturday. There were surprisingly few booths actually selling comics at the show, which I thought was kind of weird, but I guess it makes sense.

The other, actual brick and mortar shops in Salt Lake all had a presence, but Dr. Volt’s mostly focused on gaming stuff, Black Cat brought mostly quarter and dollar books and I have no idea what Night Flight had. Blast from the Past Comics, which was next to us, brought a lot of older comics that were worth some serious money. There was another shop from California that came by our booth every morning to pillage through our stuff and, I’m sure, turn around, mark it up and sell it at their booth. After I figured out what they were doing the first day, I stopped letting them go through the new stuff I brought. I hid it under the table while they looked through the boxes and told them that I hadn’t brought anything else. It was for no real reason other than spite. They just hovered around like vultures waiting to look through things while we were trying to get our booth set up and organized. I just started ignoring them instead of telling them to get lost like I really wanted.

But since we were selling most everything for about a dollar a book, people kept coming back over and over again. I even heard one guy say, “Oh this is the booth they were talking about.” I had no idea who was talking about us or what they were saying, but I was thrilled that people were talking and that word was getting out.

Between doing Craft Lake City two days and vending at Salt Lake Comic Con for three, it’s made sitting behind a computer writing IVR (Interactive Voice Response) copy and wireless Internet tips really, really hard.

All in all, it was a lot of fun and I’m very much looking forward to next year. There are already some wheels in motion for how we can do things better and how we can expand our little operation. Thanks to everyone that stopped by to say hi, actually bought some stuff or just wanted to look through our comics. You guys made it all worth it.

Now that it’s all over and I don’t have any other vending shows coming up, I’ll be updating the ONR store and probably doing a little spotlight on some of the stuff I had this summer – most notably Mike Farfel’s novel Tulip. I’ll have a little write-up on Filler Issue 2, the HP tank top and the new mini-comic that Candace and I finally got printed on Friday night of the convention.

If you missed out, you really missed out. It was an awesome time from start to finish and I can’t wait until next year. You should probably start planning your cosplay costumes now. And if you can top the Princess Leia, I'll be impressed.

Also, if you actually know the Princess Leia, send her my way. I'll be her stuck-up, half-wittet, scruffy-looking nerf herder any day.

RIP MICK MORRIS

We're a few months early, but it's that time of year again.

Our friend Mick Morris died a few months back because he had a heart condition. He thought he'd be okay and beat it, but one night after he left the hospital, he went to sleep and never woke up. It's a sad story because he was in his early 30's, had a fiance and a young son.

Mick was one of the first dudes I met when I started getting into hardcore, local shows, straight edge and veganism way back in the late 90's. He worked at The Heavy Metal Shop and lived at the house where the Bucket of Death was born. I hadn't talked to Mick for a few years because he had moved to California, played for Eighteen Visions and toured all the time. We just fell out of touch. He moved back to SLC a little bit ago, but I never crossed paths with him and heard about his death through the Internet.

This weekend, his old band Clear is getting back together for a reunion/benefit show for his son. They asked Tamerlane to play and we said yes. Daryl is busy with being a doctor and new dad and Jake wasn't interested, so we've got a couple of hired guns filling in. It's most likely our only show of the year, so come on out, support Mick's kid and watch a bunch of old guys relive their glory days.

It'll be a good time for a good cause.

LETTERBOXD

 

Sadly, the Half-Assed Reviews have been pretty much non-existent as of late. I still see movies and have more time to write about them, but I just don't. My little notebook of movies I've seen in the theater is almost full. I started it in 2003 and it seems fitting that it'll be full by the end of the year. 10 years of movies in one little notebook. I'll probably hold on to it for a lot longer than I actually need to because I tend to keep things like that for no reason.

But the good news is that you can keep up with some extra half-assed reviews by following my Letterboxd account. I spent most of the night last night cataloging everything I've seen in the theater so far in 2013 and writing quick reviews for all of them.

It's a pretty cool little site. There's no app, but it's optimized for mobile use and works pretty well. It's mostly a place where I talk about how badass The Rock is and give most of the movies three out of five stars.

So far, my highest rated movie of 2013 is MUD and my lowest is JACK THE GIANT SLAYER.

You could always use another social media site to share pointless info with, right? So let's be friends.

www.letterboxd.com/trevorhale

SALT LAKE COMIC CON

There will be a better, more informative post up soon, but just to give you a heads up, I'll have an Old News Records booth at Salt Lake Comic Con on September 5, 6 and 7.

I'll have more copies of Tulip, Filler (1 and 2), hopefully some more Long Live Sloan shirts and maybe a new design special for the con, too.

If things fall into place, maybe a mini-comic or two as well. Fingers crossed.

More info soon, but right now I'm busy formulating a game plan to get Tia Carrere to fall in love with me. It's taking up the majority of my time.

CRAFT LAKE CITY - POSTGAME

Salt Lake, I love you.

Craft Lake City was this past weekend and it was awesome. Long hours and a lot of work went into it, but it was totally worth it. I set up shop around 1 pm on Friday and when the doors finally opened a few hours later, Gallivan Center was packed for the rest of the night. Saturday was no different, just a lot longer and a lot hotter.

Old News Records is kind of a boutique thing and has never been very serious for me, but it's always been fun to do. I put out a couple of CD's right before CD's became a thing that nobody actually wanted. It's been pretty quiet since then.

Last year, when I published a zine called Filler, my friend Mike gave me an excerpt from a novel he'd been working on called Tulip. We talked a little bit about it, but not much. A few months later when we were doing the Top 5, he mentioned it was hard for a first-time writer to gain any sort of traction. I told him I'd be applying for Craft Lake City, and if I got in I'd just turn ONR into a publishing company and put it out for him.

Cut to May when they announced the vendors for the 2013 festival, I was sitting on my couch and got the news via Twitter that Old News Records was in. I sent a text to Mike and told him to get it ready because we were doing it. He was nervous and excited all at once. I threw together some ideas for other projects, like another zine and a few mini-comics, but Mike's book was the main thing I wanted to get finished. Everything else could be done or not and I wouldn't really care, but Tulip needed to be ready.

It was. And it looks fantastic.

Huge thanks to Mike Farfel for writing a great book and letting me be a part of it. Tulip is truly a fun read and I'm honored to be a part of something like this. And at some point this week I'll have it available in the Old News Records shop.

And now, everyone else that helped make Craft Lake City as amazing as it was:

First and foremost, Angela Brown and Karamea Puriri for working long hours and putting together a great event. To the dedicated SLUG staff who was there early every morning to late into the night - Alexander Ortega, Esther Merono, Nate Ryan and the rest.

The the amazing people at Molding Box - Ian, Matt & Lauren - for helping me get everything printed in time.

Everyone that had any part of making Filler what it was - Makenna, Chris, Candace, Danielle, Danny, John, The Big Dogg and the duck that I named Alan just now. Austin for bringing me a sandwich from Bud's, my parents for bringing me cookies, chips and some Arnold Palmer's and then letting me steal their patio umbrella all day Saturday. Also, thanks to all the dudes that turned my table into a hardcore hangout for a few hours both days and made it look like something really cool was going on so more people wandered over.

Thanks to the rest of the people in my quiet, shady area, too - Robin Banks (Design Flaw!), Audrey Patten (Midwest Meets West) and her trusty sidekick Casey, Carrie Wakefield and her Metalhead Jewelry Design. We partied all weekend and it was awesome.

I also want to say thanks to everyone that came by my table and picked something up or even just stopped to check things out (even if you were only admiring my early-70's NBA team tablecloth that I stole from Scott Whittaker). You're all fantastic and I wouldn't have had as much fun without you.

It was a hell of a weekend that made it incredibly hard to come back and sit in an office all day on Monday. I just want to be able to do things like CLC and make enough money to live off of. Is that too much to ask?

Luckily for me, Salt Lake Comic Con is only a month away.

Thanks again, everyone. I really mean it.

RYAN OTTLEY: DRAW LIFE

I like Ryan Ottley. He's an awesome dude and a really great artist. I might have a slightly biased opinion, because INVINCIBLE is a great comic and one that I love reading. When Esther (SLUG Mag managing editor) gave me a list of options to interview about SL Comic Con and he was on it, I didn't even let her finish the list.

He and I met up at the Draw Night thing he does with his artist friends, sat outside and chatted for a bit. It was a good time and we talked about a lot of stuff - including a good chunk that I couldn't even get close to fitting in to the space I had. Luckily for you, that's what the Interview Outtakes feature is for. I'll throw that up later this month, but until then, feast your eyes on Ryan Ottley's Draw Life.

SLUG Mag -- When Rob Liefeld, Jim Lee and Todd McFarlane (among others) founded Image Comics, they revolutionized the comic book industry. The artists were treated like—and acted like—rock stars everywhere they went. It was that attitude that put the creator-owned mindset of Image on equal footing with Marvel and DC.

Twenty years later, Image Comics is still a force led by some of the most famous creators working today. Its continued success is thanks, in large part, to books like Invincible—illustrated by local artist Ryan Ottley. Ottley may not have the bombastic, rock star personality of some of his Image peers, but he is every bit as talented. His line work is some of the cleanest and most detailed in the industry, and the level of gore he reaches at times is a stark contrast to the personality of the mild-mannered Utah resident.

Read the rest.

THE DAY AL GORE SAVED MY LIFE

I was visiting my family in Arizona.*

It was early in the morning and my mom and Aunt Karen were sitting in the kitchen. A newspaper was spread out on the counter. I glanced at it as I walked by. Something in it caught my eye, so I stopped for a closer look. At the bottom of the opened page there was an ad that read something like, “One lucky citizen will receive a phone call from Al Gore today!”

The ad confused me, because that was literally the only thing it said. There was a picture of Al Gore smiling at the camera with a flashy border around the whole thing, but there was no additional information. As I was thinking about it, the phone rang behind me. It was a cordless phone hung up on the wall next to the refrigerator. I was on the side of the counter nearest to it, and my mom and aunt were on the other. Karen motioned for me to go ahead and get it, which was weird since it was her home and I could have just as easily lifted the phone off the hanger and handed it to her. She said no, and told me to answer it. I did.

“Hello?”
“Hi. Who’s this?”
“Trevor. Who’s this?”
“Al Gore. I guess you’re the lucky winner!”
“Um, hold on. It’s my aunt’s house. You should probably talk to her.”
“No, no, no. You answered the phone and that means you’ve won. You get to spend the next 45 minutes on the phone with me.” **

My mom and Aunt Karen looked confused as to why I hadn’t passed the phone to them. I pointed to the ad in the paper.

“He said I can’t hand the phone to anyone. I answered so I have to be the one to talk.”

Both of their eyes lit up and they exchanged huge smiles. They both started running around the house telling everyone else what was happening.

“Bob! Kim! Trevor’s on the phone with Al Gore! Al Gore! Come up here!”

Everyone started flooding into the kitchen to watch me. Things started to get awkward because as I was talking to Al Gore about nothing in particular, the crowd got bigger and bigger. My brother showed up, his wife and son not far behind, all my cousins and their kids. I didn’t even know all of these people were in the house, but there they were. I eventually wandered into the backyard, down the steps from the sliding glass door, across the deck and to the back lawn. I paced back and forth as my entire family watched through the window.

I don’t think any of them actually like Al Gore as a politician and they’re not fans of his environmental efforts – he’s just the closest thing to a celebrity as they could get. They weren’t jealous that I was the one talking to him and not them, they were just happy to be within a single degree of separation of someone that’s been on TV before.

The first real meaty conversation we got into was about stamps.*** He was telling me about his stamp collection, but it was one he'd just barely started, so the only ones he'd collected so far were the "Forever" stamps that you can buy at the supermarket. He bought his at the post office from the self-service kiosk. He was really excited about it. I told him about my Grandpa's collection that he'd been working on for most of my life and probably before that, too. Al Gore was impressed. I looked up to the window to see if my Grandpa was there, but he wasn't. I relayed this info to Al, but he quickly shot me down. "Well, even if he was there I wouldn't be able to talk to him. You're the one that answered the phone."

Not for a single minute did my new friend Al and I talk politics or the environment. As soon as I got to one end of the yard, it ceased to be a yard anymore and turned into a desolate alleyway. Al Gore was suddenly giving me tips on how to navigate my way through various scenarios that play out in horror movies. As he began to describe whatever situation popped in to his head, that’s what my surroundings became. When he started talking about how to avoid a herd of zombies in an alley,**** all of a sudden I was in an alley looking for places to avoid the undead lumbering towards me. When he started giving me tips on evading a serial killer chasing my through the streets in the middle of the night, that’s what was around the next corner.

There was, however, always one exception. Wherever I ended up, whatever the scene became, there was always a window about 10 feet above me where my whole family was watching. They were never worried about me, because Al Gore was always able to tell me exactly what to do, exactly when to do it. I was never in any danger whatsoever.

Eventually my 45 minutes were up and he said he had to go. I understood, we said our goodbye’s and hung up the phone. That’s when the window to my aunt’s kitchen disappeared and I was all alone in a weird alleyway/neighborhood street hybrid. One half was the alley and the other half was a quiet suburban street lined with trees. I had no phone anymore and no way to get back to wherever I was supposed to be.

That's when I woke up.

This was a dream I had the other night. Lately I've been having weird dreams and in the middle of the night when I wake up, I take notes about them. The next morning, I try to remember everything I can about the dream, so I decided to start fleshing them out.

Here are the footnotes.

* Aside from my Grandpa for 5 months out of the year, I have no family in Arizona whatsoever. My Aunt Karen lives in the suburbs of Sandy. Everything about the house was the same, it was just in Arizona and the only reason I know that is because the newspaper was the Arizona Republic.

** This is the only actual dialogue that I remember.

*** I'm pretty sure this portion of the dream/conversation came about because earlier that day I'd been watching Jeopardy Kid's Week (which I killed at, by the way) and there was a category about stamps that I did surprisingly well at.

**** I woke up once in the middle of this dream because I jumped when a zombie came out of literally nowhere. I must have twitched in bed, which scared my cats because they jumped off the bed which is what woke me up. Luckily, I fell right back asleep and right back into the middle of the dream.

CRAFT LAKE CITY REDUX

Craft Lake City is less than two weeks away, and I'm in the process of getting everything ready for my table. It's two days this year, which will be fun.

Like usual, things that I had high hopes for early in the going didn't pan out as I'd hoped, but them's the breaks. I'll have another issue of my zine, Filler, and the Long Live Sloan t-shirts, but no comics.

My original plan was to write 4 mini-comics and have a few different friends draw them, then put them all together in a cool package. Didn't quite work out that way. I got two of the four written and none of the two were drawn. I can't be mad about it though (and I'm not) because drawing is way harder and more time-consuming than writing. All the artists have other stuff going on and they've got better things to do than draw fight scenes for free so I can sell something. Maybe I'll have them for next year, but I won't get my hopes up.

What I do have though, is the first Old News Records novel. My friend Mike wrote this really cool book called Tulip and he's letting me publish it. So, I'm taking ONR from one dying medium (cd's) to another. It's at the printer right now and I'm really excited about it.

Make sure you stop by the ONR/trevohale.com table sometime on August 9 or 10 and say hi. I'll be hanging out looking for some company.

Things might be kind of quiet around here until then. I need to get all my ducks in a row for the weekend, but there may be a stray post or two between now and then. You never know.

Also, if you feel like being a volunteer for the festival, I'm sure they'd love to have you. They need all the help they can get. Go here and sign up. Tell them I sent you.

NIRVANA REUNITED!

Sub Pop Records still gets legitimate mail.

A mail carrier shows up at their office every day with letters and things that they have to go through. Earlier this week, they got what might have been one of the best letters of all time.

A young woman from Virginia Tech wrote a letter to Sub Pop asking if Nirvana would be interested in recording a video for their homecoming celebration. As she states in her letter, "It presents great publicity for them, and as Virginia Tech loves Nirvana, we'd love to have her in our video."

This is where it gets confusing. Aside from Kurt Cobain having been dead for almost 20(!) years, she thinks Nirvana is a "her." It's also July. But maybe they start planning homecoming really early when you're the mascot. I don't know. Most of my college experience was spent doing anything and everything besides campus-oriented events.

But either way, Sub Pop played along. The young lady left her phone number, so Sub Pop had "Nirvana" make a video and sent it to her via text. She was thrilled.

So hopefully no one at Virginia Tech spoils the joke before the video hits the stadium of wherever it ends up, because there's now a video of Mark Arm from Mudhoney and three Sup Pop employees - one of whom is wearing the hat from the 4 Non Blondes "What's Going On?" video - posing as Nirvana. Hopefully it makes it all the way through and they're featured alongside the Ying Yang Twins, Big N Rich and three NFL players.

If this is real, it's probably a form letter that was sent out to hundreds of people and bands trying to reel in anyone that would take the bait. It's also possible that one of the older people on the board (or whatever it is that puts these things together) got kind of sick of listening to this young lady and just started throwing out the most ridiculous names they could think of to see which she'd fall for. Either way, it's pretty funny.

Good work for playing along, Sub Pop!

TWILIGHT CONCERT SERIES

Salt Lake City does some amazing things.

Every year they put on the Twilight Concert Series at Pioneer Park. It's every Thursday night from mid July until late September and it's $5. You hear that? It's $5. Total.

It used to be free, but they began charging money last year - probably to keep out the homeless people, Juggalos and people that didn't want to actually watch the show.

They always have some great bands and this year is no exception. Belle & Sebastian - a band from Glasgow, Scotland that I love - kicked things off last night, so of course I went. Blitzen Trapper opened, and I'm not a huge fan of theirs, so I mostly wandered around the park to take part in favorite pastime - people watching.

Luckily for you, I documented the whole thing via Twitter.

Tonight I start my Twilight Concert tradition of winking and smiling at every cute girl in hopes of becoming a Craigslist Missed Connection.
— Trevor Hale (@trevorhale) July 18, 2013

I may have to rethink this "wink and smile" strategy. It looks like 25,000 of these girls are still in high school. #TwilightConcertSeries
— Trevor Hale (@trevorhale) July 19, 2013

Welcome to the 2013 #TwilightConcertSeries - it's like browsing Instagram hashtags in real life!
— Trevor Hale (@trevorhale) July 19, 2013

Welcome to the 2013 #TwilightConcertSeries - Another year of blurring the lines between hipster fashion and legitimate homeless people.
— Trevor Hale (@trevorhale) July 19, 2013

Welcome to the 2013 #TwilightConcertSeries - Where high school kids come to smoke weed and yell their location into their cell phones!
— Trevor Hale (@trevorhale) July 19, 2013

Welcome to the 2013 #TwilightConcertSeries - Where every single girl stole her mom's jeans from 1987 and cut them into shorts.
— Trevor Hale (@trevorhale) July 19, 2013

Welcome to the 2013 #TwilightConcertSeries - Where every dude takes fashion tips from Justin Bieber and makes it douchier. #Swaggy
— Trevor Hale (@trevorhale) July 19, 2013

Welcome to the 2013 #TwilightConcertSeries - Where the guy in front of me AND his wife still own Teva's.
— Trevor Hale (@trevorhale) July 19, 2013

Welcome to the 2013 #TwilightConcertSeries - Seriously, are we allowed to use those White House petitions for ending twirly mustaches?
— Trevor Hale (@trevorhale) July 19, 2013

Welcome to the 2013 #TwilightConcertSeries - Where most of these girls seem to think they're auditioning for the remake of ALMOST FAMOUS.
— Trevor Hale (@trevorhale) July 19, 2013

Welcome to the 2013 #TwilightConcertSeries - All snark aside, Belle & Sebastian was awesome. Great show, SLC.
— Trevor Hale (@trevorhale) July 19, 2013

WORDS

Writing is hard.

I write a lot. Like, a lot a lot. Between writing things on this site, little articles for City Weekly, long articles for SLUG Magazine, quick posts and long rants on Tumblr, jokes on Twitter, freelance copy writing and SEO copy writing and blog posts (at my actual, day to day job), I spend at least 4 or 5 hours a day writing stuff.

It's fairly easy, and some days things flow easier than others but that's because it's all mostly non-fiction. I have a pretty good handle on journalistic and essay-style writing. I also feel like I have a few things to say every now and then, so I spit them out on the Internet and hope for the best. I don't worry too much about it and people generally seem to enjoy what goes out there.

You know what's not so easy? Fiction.

Fiction writing is way harder to do (and do well) than any form of word vomiting that I do.

That's actually why I'm writing this post right now. I was stuck on something else - a short story I'm toying with for a zine - and I'm hoping that switching gears for minute will get things back on track. I could lie and tell you that I expended all my energy writing 1800 words about pool maintenance this morning, but that would be a lie. That was easy.

But I think I've figured out what it is that makes writing fiction so hard. I've probably always known this but just never wanted to admit it, but more than hard, writing fiction is scary.

The things I ramble about on here are my opinions and worldview, if you don't like it, I don't really care. We probably wouldn't get along anyway.

But when you write fiction, it's a lot like writing a song. You're putting your creativity into something for the entertainment of others. That's scary because there's a chance that everyone might think what you're doing is just terrible.

I have no problem letting people read articles, blog posts and whatever other non-fiction work I do. It gets thrown into the world with very little second thought.

Creative stuff, though? Most of that never sees the light of day. I've started a bunch of movie scripts that very few people have read. I've written comics that no more than 3 people have ever seen. There have been short stories that were only read by complete strangers that I was fairly certain I'd never see again. There are poems sitting in a folder that met the same fate as the short stories, save for one or two people that I still see.

I'm working to change that. Not sure if it'll get done, but I'm trying.

It's hard to do, but whenever I think about it for too long, I just remember the advice of the great Jimmy Dugan:

"It's supposed to be hard. If it wasn't hard everyone would do it. It's the hard that makes it great."

WELCOME TO OAKLAND - FOX NEWS STYLE!

Remember the plane that crashed in San Francisco a little while back?

Well, during the subsequent mad scramble to report on the incident and in the continuing quest to beat out other networks for "scoops," Oakland Fox affiliate KTVU-TV thought they had something no one else did - the names of the pilots responsible for the crash.

Unfortunately, it was just someone playing a joke and the TV anchors were dumb enough to run with it. They claim that an NTSB (National Transportation Safety Board) investigator in Washington confirmed the names, but let's get real. No. Way.

KTVU listed the names as:

Captain Sum Ting Wong (something wrong)
Wi Tu Lo (we too low)
Ho Lee Fuk (Holy Fuck)
Bang Ding Ow (Bang! Ding! Ow!)

The kicker? The news anchor READ THESE NAMES ALOUD and didn't think there was anything fishy about them.

Hat tip to Matthew Keys (@matthewkeyslive, MatthewKeys.com)  for pointing it out and documenting it for the rest of us.

Here's the video of it. For now anyway. Until it gets taken down because they probably feel like complete morons as they rightfully should.



And here's video of her kind of apologizing after a bunch of people probably called the station to say: "Are you serious? What's wrong with you morons? You couldn't see those were obviously fake names? How dumb can you be?"



*UPDATE* - Asiana Airlines is now suing the station because of this. They're suing because it was the made up names—not crashing into a wall while trying to land—that has left the reputation of the airline "badly damaged."

INTERVIEW OUTTAKES - INSIGHT

Good news, guys! I'm starting a new irregular feature on this site - very similar to the My Friends Over You feature that barely ever gets used anymore. Exciting, right?

I've done a few really fun interviews within the past few months and recorded all of them. Mostly they've been for SLUG Magazine stories, and while I really liked how they turned out, there still wasn't enough room to fit everything in. No matter how many words I have to play with, it's never enough to get through everything we talk about during our conversation. I have to find a way to tighten everything up and sometimes the structure or focus of what the article ends up being about eliminates a huge chunk of the interview.

No matter how long we talk for, and no matter how long the piece is, the interviews still all get transcribed. I spend anywhere from half an hour to two or three typing out everything that was said and it seems like a shame to let some of that go to waste. That's where this new feature comes in.

Every once in a while, I'm going to take a portion of an interview and put it up here. I didn't do all that work for nothing, god damn it.

We'll start with the Insight piece. The actual article had almost nothing from Chubba, the drummer, but that's not because he didn't say anything. He talked a lot, but it was mostly during a portion where we discussed hardcore, straight edge, music and the state of all three back in the early 90's. There wasn't room for any of that stuff when the article started taking shape, though. It would have had to go in a much different direction and would have been hard to get back to the original focus.

But we still talked about some good stuff, so now, for your reading pleasure, INTERVIEW OUTTAKES episode 1, starring INSIGHT!

You can read the proper article at SlugMag.com, but here's the stuff from the cutting room floor.

Me: You guys were kind of the first straight edge band in Salt Lake. What was that like and what do you remember about it?

Jeremy Chatalain: I knew you were going to ask this question. I found straight edge accidentally. Andy, that was just here, he was an obsessive record collector like me. We would go to Raunch every week and buy first pressings of everything we could get. I met him at a skate shop and he asked me if I’d heard of all these bands like Justice League, Minor Threat, 7 Seconds. I went over to his house to borrow records and he drew big X’s on my hands. I was like ‘what is that?’ He just said ‘straight edge’. I said, ‘I don’t know what that is’ and he explained it to me and that was just who I was anyway. I was a skateboarder, I was Mormon growing up, and it fit my lifestyle 100%. I could get behind that. For me, straight edge was all about the music that came with it. The energy was totally addictive. One by one, as we put the band together, James and Doug, James you were into hardcore.

James Holder: Yeah, I was in to hardcore. It was more the skate rock stuff. I grew up in Heber, so Gentry (Densley) and I grew up together and he knew these guys. We were always listening to metal or a lot of skate rock stuff. Then I got in to straight edge.

Jeremy Chatalain: Mark and I had some conversations because we had been in bands before Insight, and that was kind of the thing that brought us together on the same plain. Then we were like, ‘this is what we want to do: thrashy hardcore, that’s fast and kind of metal.’ Then Mark felt like he had some things to say, and there was this platform, so not only was it about straight edge, but at the time all of us were vegetarian, there was anti-racism, everything that we thought were positive stances to take. Nobody around here was doing it and it wasn’t what it turned into eventually. The only people that were straight edge were people that we knew. When bands would come through town that were straight edge, we’d hang out with them and go skating or take them to raging waters. That was the extent of it. There wasn’t any tough mentality about it at all.

Me: There weren’t any other straight edge bands in Salt Lake at the time, right?

Jeremy Chatalain: Better Way, Gentry’s straight edge band, started pretty soon after.

Chubba: As much as straight edge it was the unity, the positive kind of thing. Everyone was friends. We played shows just about every weekend at Speedway or The Word. It was just a close community of friends.

Jeremy Chatalain: Insight shows in the late 80s were like kids from all of our high schools, sxe kids, hardcore kids, punk rockers, hippies and just a lot of energy. It started off where we’d play shows and you’d know everyone in the crowd. You’d play The Word and there’d be 35 people and you’d know all of them. Then suddenly new people that we didn’t know were showing up in Uniform Choice shirts, and more hardcore people popping out of the woodwork. Eventually we could pretty much fill up the Speedway.

Photo by Steve Midgley

Me: What have you noticed about the evolution of hardcore?

Jeremy Chatalain: Jamie and I played in other bands, but I did almost a complete 180 afterwards because I discovered Led Zeppelin. I feel like I was the same exact person, but my musical tastes just ballooned. The rest of these guys got into jazz, but I never really caught that bug. We all tried to do something different. I wasn’t involved in the scene too much after Iceburn. I had a serious thirst for music and that’s what I wanted to do—so much so that the bigger picture wasn’t really on my mind.

Chubba: Iceburn was kind of all over. We had quite the evolution and it still had a little bit of hardcore roots to it, a little bit metal, but the songs were more complicated. Once Jeremy and Doug moved on and James moved on, we kind of evolved through all these different genres but there was always a jazz influence and a classical influence. Gentry has a million ideas in his head always. There was a time when we were part of the scene, but there’d be maybe 10 people at the show.

Jeremy Chatalain: I feel like whenever I’d come home and go to an Iceburn show, it was like they’d kind of created their own scene. They were definitely a unique band.

Chubba: The hardcore scene for me kind of ended when everyone moved on and Iceburn slimmed down and went a different direction we kind of got out of the hardcore scene. We played a lot of different shows with different bands.

James Holder: With Insight we weren’t deliberately trying for it, we just played music and ended up as part of the scene. It was just part of the chemistry of it.

Jeremy Chatalain: More than any of the beliefs, I was into the music and I think these guys felt the same way. I think that’s why sometimes Insight was so intense. I also think that the flow and how things ended up – I think hardcore is a young man’s game. It takes youthful energy to have a scene and have these intense shows and I know they happen now. I work with kids that go to hardcore shows and go to house shows and do sing alongs. It happens, I know it, but it just seems the natural order of things for people to drop off and new people come up. When you’re young you can be so hyper focused on one thing and you have all this time for it and all this energy for it. At the time in 1988, I was all about hardcore. When you’re 17, 18 19 you follow this band and your belief system fits right in with theirs and suddenly they go a different direction, you’re like ‘you betrayed me.’ I’ve had these intense conversations with people over the years and they say things like, ‘I loved the first Jets To Brazil album, Orange Rhyming Dictionary, but what the fuck happened with your second record?’ And I would always have to remind them, ‘Do you realize how offensive that is?’ We’d just worked on that record for two years and if a band doesn’t evolve, they’re going to be bored shitless. If a band makes the same record over and over again they’re going to become bored and if someone is just a fan, but doesn’t play music, it’s really difficult to explain that to them.

HANDSOME

A few months ago, I sat down with the dudes from Insight to talk to them about a reunion show they were playing. We talked mostly about hardcore, reunions and stuff like that and a lot of the best stuff made its way in to the article I wrote about them.

As the interview was winding down and we had covered all the questions I'd planned, we continued talking. Mostly it was just bullshitting about one thing or another and basically me listening in as they reminisced about old tours. I didn't think we'd be talking about anything worthwhile, so I turned off the recorder.

That was a stupid thing to do.

I've never had any formal journalism training, so I continue to sort of make it up and learn as I go, so I'm still not sure what the proper protocol is when you're done asking 'official' questions but still talking. I figured I'd be out of there in a matter of minutes. Well, we talked for about 15 more minutes because I asked Jeremy about one of his other long-dead projects, Handsome.

Jeremy told me he was working on obtaining the rights to the one record they put out so he could find someone to reissue it on vinyl, but was having a hard time getting through to anyone at Sony.

Looks like he made it work, because last week 6131 records announced that they're releasing it this September.

Even though I have no use for vinyl, this is still pretty cool and I'll probably pick one up. I love this band.

JERSEY GUY

Remember when I told you that I worked in an office? It's been a little over three months now, and it's been... good. I guess. It's weird. There are as many aspects of this job that I love as I hate. Mostly I hate sitting in a chair all day.

I spent a lot of years waiting tables at a restaurant with a patio, so from March until November, I'm used to being outside nearly all day every day. It was a weird transition to make and one that I'm still struggling with. Fortunately, there's a huge pond out back with ducks. I get along well with ducks. I feel very Tony Soprano about the whole thing. There's something about them that relaxes me. If I ever own a home with a pool (however unlikely), I think I'll be okay if a family of ducks moves in. If they fly away and I collapse from a panic attack and have to go to therapy, we'll rethink things. But for now, I'm cool with ducks.

Every afternoon, I go outside and hang out by the pond with the ducks for a few minutes. It's relaxing for some reason. Not sure why, but it is. It takes the edge off being cooped up in an office all day.

Another thing about working in a big office like this? There are A LOT of people that work here. We're talking hundreds. I know maybe 15 of them and I talk to maybe 6 of those 15. There are a lot of energy drinks, fauxhawks, flip-flops, bedazzled jeans and Affliction shirts littered throughout these two buildings.

After the first week, I kind of stumbled into a bit of an office anthropological study.

My first desk (i.e. cubicle) faced the doorway and we were tucked away in a corner of the sales floor with a few other companies. The first day, I noticed a guy in a Lakers jersey. I only noticed it because I hate the fucking Lakers. The next day he was wearing a Reggie Bush USC jersey. The day after that, a different Lakers jersey. The next Monday he wore a Derek Jeter Yankees jersey, the day after he wore a Johnny Damon Red Sox jersey.

This is where my head almost exploded - simply because I couldn't get a read on what kind of fan he was. Obviously, it was a total frontrunner situation, but surely there had to be a pattern, I thought.

After my third week and a slew of different jerseys, I decided I had to keep track. I started a spreadsheet and began organizing what jersey he wore and how often he wore it. Each morning, I'd see him walk through the door and make a note of the jersey he had on.

It continued this way until last Friday. Last Friday, they moved me to a different part of the building and now I no longer see him every day. It's kind of a shame. I went over to his side of the building the past two days to get water from the break room, but really to see what he had on. He's been running repeats the past two days, which is a little disappointing.

Currently the count stands at 38 different jerseys. It's getting harder and harder to keep track of now, but I'll do it. I've just gotta keep coming up with reasons to go over there.

Don't worry though. I won't give up.