Sad Studio

I'm going to play fanboy for one more day. I"m hoping that next week I can announce a little project I have in the works...a proper name for the project is all that's holding me back from unleashing it. We're (plural) trying to figure that out and then properly deliver the goods to you. Stay tuned.

Until then I have this to offer up. It's a nearly 12 minute guided tour through Jimmy Tamborello's (aka Dntel, James Figurine, Postal Service) home studio. Quite a few sounds that I highly enjoy were crafted here. I love behind the scenes stuff like this. Normally, I'd have to admit, watching a guy fool around with piles of electronic boxes (blipbloopbeep) wouldn't be that interesting. But Mr. Tamborello has the back catalog to justify these tweaks and knob twists. For fans of this sort of thing, click the thing below.

giving props where props are due

The weird and wonderful world of Jona Bechtolt aka YACHT continues to keep me eagerly interested and wanting more. I guess I can only say this about a handful of people out there. Not only does he find the time to pump out great music and remixes that don't sound like anyone elses (not even close) and mastermind really far out albums like The Blow's Paper Television, but his design skills and overall web presence are something to behold. I highly enjoying watching his creativity pop up randomly across the internet.

For anyone who is getting a tad tired of bands taking themselves too seriously, YACHT is probably for you. For anyone who enjoys the idea of blurring the lines between audience and performer, YACHT is probably for you. If you are into the idea of digitizing your life and aesthetically presenting it online, then you've found your guy.

Oh, and this pretty blue and white background that you see here on my website was most likely designed my Jona. I, um, borrowed it off of a site he designed last year. Hope this won't be a problem; Props where props are due.

And, digital cameras are only invading our personal privacy! Let's put a stop to this insanity! Let Jona help:

FlickrBlockers

And here's a peek into his musics:
Yacht - See A Penny (Pick it Up) - mp3
(diret mp3 link to YACHT's site)

Mirah - Make It Hot (YACHT's Over Remix) - mp3
(direct mp3 link to States Rights Records)
I don't know Jona and have never met him. He's from Portland. I'm just a fan and wanted to spread his good vibes a little further. His new album I Believe in You. Your Magic is Real is better than most things. It can be purchased here. An online search of Jona will produce tons of results in which you can dig far deeper.

screensaver

Tonight's blog acts as a two-fold solution to the problem of having the below, rather large, Playboy image as the first thing people see when they come to my website. 1. This is a side note to the Swedish Bikini Team myth (or is it?). 2. This is a space saver to move the Playboy image down out of initial view of people like my mother.

About a month ago a show debuted on Swedish television called Welcome to Sweden. The advertisements for the program immediately made me throw the WTF! card on the table and look on in astonishment. How could I of all people not tune into this show.






Yeah, that's Verne Troyer and Richard Kiel as the two Americans who come to Sweden to see this country for all it's worth.

Is the show good you ask? No, it's not. Troyer and Kiel are put into stereotypical Swedish situations like celebrating the first of May, watching a Swedish dance band, which is a whole weird genre of music that I'll go into further detail on at a later time, and eating fish of acquired taste. They make the obvious comments on how stuff is different and not like it is in the States. The best episode is where Richard Kiel crashes and burns while driving his wheeled-machine over an icy sidewalk. That's as good as it's been.

Check out this article in English if you want to read more about the show.

Ok, so I wouldn't have blogged about this show if it hadn't been for this little snippet that I just came across.

Yeah, that's Verne with the SWEDISH BIKINI TEAM, here, in Sweden. Man, I don't know what to believe any longer. And I'm not going to do any further research. I am going to just let this go and be done with it. Maybe a real Swedish Bikini Team does exist and maybe it doesn't. I don't care anymore.

From now on no more blogs about bikinis or the teams of girls that wear them.

MYTHBUSTING

Well it's a little after 9:00AM. I'd like to point out that my day doesn't usually start by uploading old Playboy magazine covers onto my webspace. I started my day as usual with a trip to the computer to read some news. First I do my best to get the latest happenings and practice my comprehension skills on a Swedish news site. Then I head over to thelocal.se (Sweden's news in English) to cross reference and make sure I got everything right.

This morning I couldn't help but click on a link of this Playboy cover that appeared on thelocal.se. I thought to myself, "here it is, this Swedish Bikini Team I've heard so much about, been asked a ton about by Americans but have never once heard anyone in Sweden mention." Well, curious minds would like to know. And knowing is half the battle:

The "Swedish" Bikini Team was:
Uma Thorensen — Avalon Anders
Karin Kristensen — Suzanna Keller
Hilgar Oblief — Heather Elizabeth Parkhurst
Eva Jacobsen — Jane Frances
Ulla Swensen — Peggy Trentini

Yeah, they're all American actresses in blonde wigs.

Firstly, it is interesting to note that not a single flailing Nordic limb was to be found among the Swedish Bikini Team's ranks. The girls, all of them American, were hired to help market Old Milwaukee beer. Platinum blonde Swedish strand maidens were considered a perfect complement to the brewer's slogan: 'It doesn't get any better than this'. - from thelocal.se's "Introducing...the Swedish Bikini Team"

In my research I read that the Bikini Team was said to have traveled back to Northern Sweden in 1991, that being the reason that they no longer were appearing in Old Milwaukee commercials. However, a few years ago a revitalized and um, perky, "Swedish" Bikini Team surfaced. They make their own direct-to-DVD movies and make appearances at pig roasts and the like. Their official site is here, but you don't really need to pay them a visit. I did the dirty work for you and you won't see anything you haven't seen before.

So there it is, the myth of the Swedish Bikini Team busted. My heros would be proud.

Hyperlink

Mike Downey on Virbº

I won't preach that everyone should dump Myspace, like some Virbº supporters are. But I can say that out of any of the "Myspace killers" out there that I've come across, this one is the best. It was made public recently, so it's obviously nowhere near as close to populated as Myspace. Virbº is for those of you that hate looking at your Myspace profile because it's so ugly. It's for those that require quality over quantity. Advertisements are pretty well hid at the bottom of each page, unlike Myspace. It feels better at least. I was hooked when I saw that importing your Flickr photostream was a built in option. That's just the sort of thing that impresses a dude like me. Go sniff around and see what you think. If you dig it, add me as a friend. I have no friends who are people.

Have a swell weekend. Tomorrow mike-downey.com is exactly 2 years old. Can you even dig that?

Individually wrapped

I got to thinking...since the Wolfie 4 Track Rarities mp3 album was released as a free download as individual files it would make sense to offer it up that way again. Head over to the podcasts page to download them all in one .zip file. Enjoy!

In Revue

I really have no way in knowing how many people are subscribed to my monthly podcast via iTunes. It's possible that they're slipping under the radar of the casual reader. So I'll start making note of them here when they are released. The latest podcast was a really special one that included a sort of lost Wolfie (my old band) album in its entirety. 4 Track Rarities was an mp3-only album released in 2003 that was available on the old Wolfie website which has been offline for a while now. We're really not sure if we'll ever get it up and running again. However, I recovered all of the files and the artwork and packaged it up nice and pretty for you over on the podcast page. In addition, if there's any Wolfie fans out there interested in playing along, there's a myspace fan-site up and running here. It's the only Wolfie place on the web these days. So please go and join up, we could use some more friends!

Also close to my heart is the Mathlete mix podcast that I put together back in March. Mathlete was Dan Marsden and myself. Pretty much all of the programmed beats, synths and synthetic instrumentation that you hear happening in my songs these days got their start in my time with Mathlete. The podcast is my own personal greatest hits from Dan and my 2 full length CDs. The great thing about the Wolfie and Mathlete podcasts is that they aren't limited to just my songwriting. There are some Joe (Wolfie) and Dan (Mathlete) songs there that are real gems in my honest opinion.

And of course, how this whole podcast thing got started, my collections of unreleased songs, The Unreleases, is on vol. 2, with a 3rd currently in the works and set to drop early in May.

Thanks to those of you who've been listening along. I'm trying not to think too far in advance on this project and take it a month at a time. The archive of old songs is still thriving of stuff that is worth releasing this way so expect a steady stream of it for the time being.

La La La Logo

Earlier this week I was doing some pre-game research for the Chelsea v. Valencia Champions League game that I was planning on watching. I took to Chelsea for some unknown reason back in the late '80s when I'd video tape an English Premier League highlight show that came on at 6AM; I'd watch it before going to school. Chelsea seemed like the most interesting team to me. As I've mentioned before, I'm back into watching and supporting European football. The Premier League features some of the best players in the world and a lot of the higher profile games are broadcast here in Sweden. Reaching back to my youth I picked Chelsea as my team of choice across the pond.

So I linked up to the Valencia website (a Spanish team playing in La Liga) and, based on their logo, thought that Chelsea was going up against a pretty badass team. I mean, a spooky bat hovering above the crest...well-played on the intimidation front by whoever designed the logo.


That match ended as a 1-1 tie. Luckily for me and Chelsea their hovering bat didn't get any playing time; he surely would've scored numerous times. But this one logo got me thinking about football teams' logos that have stuck in my head over the years. Not sure why, some just have. While most of the European logos are in a classic vein with the team's name in a royal-looking crest that looks like it should be forged out of iron and bolted to the side of a castle, there's others that took different, more design-oriented avenues. Here's a few that I've come across.


Nottingham Forest - English League One. Maybe it's just the fact that Nottingham Forest seems like a magical land. I dig the simplicity factor of this logo. It's classic.


U.C. Sampdoria from Genoa, Italy - Serie A. This logo pays tribute to the old smoking men that most likely fill up the stands on lazy Sunday afternoons to take in a match. True.


This is either the album cover of a lost Kraftwerk record or the logo for the Old Boys Basel football team from Basel, Switzerland.


Lokomotiv Cove FC, Syndy, Australia - Eastern Suburbs Football Association. Any logo with an anchor rules. Makes for a good tattoo as well. Long live the Eastern Suburbs Football Assocation! wtf?


Vale of Leithen F.C., Innerleithen, Scotland - East of Scotland league. I think the Cubs should add the "keep faith" banner to theirs.

Now, my real history with football (ok, soccer) is grounded in the American indoor soccer leagues from the mid 80's through the early 90's. I have extremely fond memories of being at the Rosemont Horizon (now All State Arena, I think) in Chicago watching the Chicago Sting and then the Chicago Power. I was so impressed by those guys playing what seemed to be the best brand of soccer imaginable. What I didn't realize was that those players were playing professional indoor soccer in America only because they couldn't catch on with any teams in Europe.


Kansas City Comets - Major Indoor Soccer League. Highly 80's vibe going on with this. Looks best in neon.


Wichita Wings - Major Indoor Soccer League (among others). Here's where Weezer got their big "W" from. Most likely designed by the same dude that came up with the Kansas City Comets logo.


Chicago Cats - American Soccer League. I didn't know about this team until I got into this overly-involved research and I bet you didn't know about it either. This team existed from 1975-1976 before folding like a ton of other American professional soccer teams. In my mind some twee pop designers were big American Soccer League fans.

That about does it. If you've read this far you deserve some sort of medal, or personalized logo.

Or, how about a song?

Pulsars - Logo - mp3

A Proton pack is not a toy

I like when my friends do things that are totally impressive and creative. Here's a good example of that. My pal AJ Naito (or Jun Naito as Hollywood might one day know him) has been taking acting classes and acting in student/low budget films for a little while now in NYC. A while ago he told me about a teaser trailer of the project he was currently working on. To my suprise, he had fulfilled one of my childhood dreams; he was a Ghostbuster.

Here's the official trailer for the film. I'm pretty excited about this! The movie is going to be available as a free download over at ghostbustersgeneration.com this spring so keep your mouses pointed in that direction. This is a fan film so it won't be getting the blockbuster hype or anything like that but from the looks of the trailer this is no half-assed production. Some real Ghostbuster love and well used dollars went into this.




Shoot AJ a message over on his myspace profile if you want to show some love.