Pacific Boilerplate group art show, Eagle Rock, CA (Elmo Fogfood)

I was quite taken with Elmo Fogfood's drawing in a group show at AndPens in Eagle Rock, California co-curated by Marc Bell up until Jan. 28th. It looks like Fogfood just scratched my name out and replaced it with their own! I've been plagiarized before but this is beyond the pale! Someone should buy this piece so we can find out exactly who this Fogfood is!!!!

Lots of great artists in this show, too (a rare Owen Plummer sighting for example).
http://andpens.com/pacific-boilerplate/
https://andpenspress.bigcartel.com/

Rest In Peace Mark Gabriel

Rest In Peace Mark Gabriel, the loveliest loveliest fella, my dear friend and bandmate in July Fourth Toilet who was such a music lover that was open for all kinds of music and shenanigans, egging me (us) on! Mark opened up his home (along with his wonderful partner Alison and kids Zoe and Aaron -thank you so much for this, so much joy in your home) and studio to rehearse our many shows and record our albums and stuff over many years, making it happen. And they even let me live there for a spell at one point! I fortunately got to visit with Mark in Vancouver a couple of weeks ago and he was nervously waiting on test results. He'd beaten cancer twice and I just thought he would beat it again. Fucking cancer. I was looking forward to doing more stuff with him -it was so much fun creating and hanging out with Mark! I miss him. This is just so sad. My heart goes out to Alison and Zoe and Aaron. Here are links to music and vids, of which he was a huge, important part of, a big throbbing heart part of! Listen, watch, I'm proud of the stuff we did together, that he helped create.
Small Town Carnival:
http://www.mungbeing.com/issue_11.html?page=50&sub_id=626#626


When he worked on this song he told me that he cried and that meant so much:

https://julyfourthtoilet.bandcamp.com/track/lady-bug

https://www.youtube.com/@JulyFourthToilet

https://julyfourthtoilet.bandcamp.com/track/twinkle-belle

His son Aaron is on this and it’s a song that Alison told me he sang on his last night:
https://julyfourthtoilet.bandcamp.com/track/cute-little-baby

This song led to Ted joining Destroyer, he and Dan Bejar informed me recently. Ted was rehearsing in Mark’s garage and played on this as we were recording with Mark in his studio:
https://pointsgray.bandcamp.com/track/tonite-you-sleep-alone

Marmalade Duplex review

I run this review here because I just want people to know about this… read on…!



Marmalade Duplex - 01001000 01001111 01000111 01001001 01000010 01000001 01010010 01000111  (2023, Corduroy Palace Recordings)
https://marmaladeduplex.bandcamp.com/music


Most original album of the year? Of the decade? What??? Of the day? Well, almost all of the lyrics are binary 0’s and 1’s. You can follow along with the enclosed lyric sheet. The opening track “01010011 01001111 01010011” begins exactly like that before venturing off into other arrangements of 0’s and 1’s. These are transmissions. As binary as these lyrics are, the music is decidedly non-binary, it fits nowhere. This song contains long horns and delicate pulses. Where are they taking us? On a voyage of uncertain destination. The ship adrift just outside our comfort zone.

The second number “01001100 01001111 01010011 01010100” is an instrumental you could almost dance to if your bones were gelatinously askew. Bouncy analog synths get sideswiped by scraping tones dogpiling up side-saddle, somewhat erratic yet always pulsating. The guitars never riff but they do bend (with Marmalade Duplex’s previous album being titled “Snot Bath” these really are the literal bends). Are they guitars even? Or is it all an amazing array of analog synths?

The 0’s and 1’s grow more emotive nearing a clarity of their own (not ours). All these 0’s and 1’s never wear thin (some also thicken with vocal doubling). I have been discreetly told that this vast accumulation of these 0’s and 1’s have actual meanings with some lyrics and titles reductively translated into “S.O.S. help us”, “loft commnctn”, “out of rng”, “pzzl”, “escpd”, and “where do we end up?”

Nearing the end of side one, we get a response from the calls of 0’s and 1’s. Actual words asking, “Hoagie barge, are you there? Are the members of Marmalade Duplex safe?” overtop of an intentionally Suicide-“Ghost Rider” template that transitions into a sci-fi seafaring drama melding. This is a most perilous journey.

To further muddy the waters there are three people involved in these binaries. Musicians Tyson Brinacombe and Brad de Roo are based in Guelph, Ontario, a mid-sized Canadian city, while the vocalist -noted cartoonist Marc Bell- exists elsewhere. Marmalade Duplex’s previous two albums had actual lyrics such as, “Hot fresh barnacles I said/I don’t know if I want you to go into the light/That sallow green light.” There the more eccentric aspects of The Fall were a musical influence, but here it doesn’t fall, it sinks, down below the vast mysterious depths. Marc Bell’s art on those first two records was elaborate and colourful; full of squishy, fine detail. “01001000 01001111 01000111 01001001 01000010 01000001 01010010 01000111” is rendered in striking contrast, further locking in the concept in near mechanical black and white featuring only a rendering of the hoagie barge, a sandwich submarine that the band members (not depicted) are stuck in unmoored.

            Yet, after the emergency response, the music becomes heavenly synth plateaus, the 0’s and 1’s are delivered with coy bemusement, tickled to be here, galumph fish bass waddling along with kick drum and tittering percussion as we get further submerged. In the accompanying log book, written by their label Corduroy Palace Recordings, it is assumed that Marmalade Duplex may just be content to be lost. Have they made peace with their situation? Their label is seeking clarity. However, as a listener, when an album’s mysteries become unlocked the allure can disappear. For this album there is great joy in the confusion that, though carefully considered, may never be fully resolved. In frustration the label tore up the band’s contract then released this album in a limited pressing of 200 copies. They plan to release another Marmalade Duplex album in future.

-Robert Dayton
mrdayton@gmail.com

The Canadian Romantic in Seattle this Saturday opening for Mantraband and L80 for Art Martyrs Relief Society


Info:
https://do206.com/events/2023/4/29/mantraband-w-l80-and-the-canadian-romantic-powered-by-art-martyrs-relief-society-tickets

Sunset Tavern, yayyyy!

Part Donna Summer, part The Electric Company, Mantraband is a sing along, dance along, disco catharsis joy cult. The synthy dance club vibes are the music baby of Matt Manges on drums (Circus Contraption, Annie Ford Band, Orkestar Zirkonium), Doug Arney on bass (Correspondents), and Sari Breznau (Flotsam River Circus, Up Up Up Crane Truck Circus, Future Fridays) on synth and trumpet, with the help of the Mantraband Friends Fellowship Society, a choir of true believers, on vocals. Unabashedly positive, Mantraband is here to uplift, unite, dork out, and get down.

https://mantrabandmusic.bandcamp.com/album/mantraband

Crawling their way out of the seattle underground avante garde, L80 (pronounced like lady) is a two person dark wave performance art duo.
L80 (Chadka and Tony James) is a force to be reckoned with. Solely through efforts of their labor alone, they execute every single part of the creative process; from production to video.

The Canadian Romantic is a character created by Robert Dayton, a melodramatic figure of faded glamour who tries to bridge and explore the gap between Canada and romance with somewhat dubious results. So far he exists through live performance (having performed across Canada and the U.S.A.), a series of videos, an album with music by Marker Starling (unreleased), a lenticular winking photo, a doll and an art book.

SpunkFest in Seattle with Gibby Haynes & The Paul Green Rock Academy performing Butthole Surfers and more!

The Canadian Romantic is performing AND Mcing Seattle this Sat at The Crocodile for SpunkFest with wild cabaret acts, Gibby Haynes and @paulgreenrockacademy_official (these students do Butthole Surfers songs so incredibly) and Victim's Family!!! Tell your Seattle pals! So excited to perform!!!! If you know me you know how much the Butthole Surfers inspired me…and the whole night looks VERY interesting! It’s going to be a blast!

Tix and info here:

www.spunkfest.org

Updated Reel

I have an updated reel of my ACTING! Thanks to Craig Irving for his help…you can view it in the REELS section on my website.