Category Archives: Rant

What Have I Been Up To?

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As each month ticks by and I’ve barely scraped together half a sentence for dear ole’ Taking Tiger Mountain, you might wonder: what have I been doing in the meantime?

A lot and a little, as difficult as it is to express…one of the major projects that I’ve been working on for months has finally reached a small milestone. It’s not at all music related but the first issue of Devil’s Due Publishing‘s forthcoming mini series Jericho: Season Three – Civil War has finally been sent to press. The six issue mini-series picks up exactly where the canceled CBS television show ended and I think it will be a massive treat to both the fervent fan base of the show as well your average comic book reader. This is the first title that I’ve edited from start to finish and it’s certainly been a massive learning experience for me along the way. I’m very proud of the end result that is issue #1, but I do recognize that there’s still 5 more issues to go. If you enjoy comics or the show, please check it out when it hits the stands November 25th.

Above is cover #1A, drawn by the fantastically talented Scott West. Hire him…well, once he’s done with the Jericho covers for me.

In addition to crafting the Jericho mini, I spent a some time earlier this year prepping for and succumbing to the whirlwind that is San Diego ComicCon. I got wrangled into planning and managing the Devil’s Due booth and it was certainly an experience. The usual potent mixture of too little sleep, too much booze and people overload coupled with the whole “responsibility” thing makes for a surreal few days. Definitely some good times and positive things have come of my time down there.

Now, none of the above has anything to do with music, but but I’ll throw it out there that posts should be resuming again. If not for the few folks who may still check back, I need to resume writing for myself. My life has been pretty nutty and I think, while it’s not looking like it’ll calm down anytime soon, I’ve just settled into the fact that I have to adapt to the din that seems to always surround me and write anyway. There’s been a bit of a silent identity crisis, both for me and the site over the last few months…a debate about what the function of this site has been and what it should become. The content I hope to have here is less of a “Hey, here’s a new single from this band!” and more expanded commentary on what is appealing to me. A lot of times it’s easy to pop off a few words about a new video or leak, but better thoughts seem come with time. As I’m always thinking about music, I will continue to create content for the site that will be, with luck, worth the read.

New Feature For Taking Tiger Mountain: Twitter!

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RSS feeds are out. Now we have what everyone loves to hate: a Twitter Feed!

Yes, I’ll now be contributing to the wonderful website with a mysterious profit model in hopes of promoting this wonderful musicblog. Subscribe to the OFFICIAL Taking Tiger Mountain feed to get updates on when new blog posts go up, recycled links from other more frequently updated music sites, and quite possibly, my musings about the chicken burrito I had for dinner tonight. (I ordered it without sour cream, it was good, and I ate it alone…glad that’s out of the way.)

Click the link below to find the new limb of Taking Tiger Mountain:

Oh yeah, I’m bringing the BLINK tag back, too. Just so ya know.

Oh Hai, Internet. I See You Were Here While I Was Out – Post Comicon

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The day job called me a way for a significant length of time to deal with the thrill ride that is Comicon International. About a month and a half of prep outside of my normal book load, followed by 5 days of blissfully uncomfortable nirvana that is akin to being forcibly penetrated by a rainbow.

Yeah, that was from the final day of SDCC ’07. It kinda feels like that after you work from setup to breakdown.

Anyhoo, I was drinking a solitary whiskey on the rocks of the evening, sitting outside at the Hyatt (yeah, too lazy to adhere to the boycott…it’s ok I didn’t pay for the drink) checking Google Analytics out of nervous boredom. Thanks primarily to Demi of This Next and her massive Stumbleupon influence, I found myself with a sizable spike in traffic. Moments later, my friend Andrew came running up looking like he’d witnessed the birth of his child, when he’d actually bumped into a slightly inebriated Joss Whedon *and* had a chance to chat with him.

Comicon is full of fun moments like that; it’s a surreal, democratic blend of fan, creator and furry all waiting in the same slow-moving line for a shitty convention center hotdog. Now that the madness is finally over, and the job has subsided a bit, I’m back to bring the posts up to a more regular frequency. Thanks to all those that have been stopping by!

This year I had a new phone around to snap a bunch of wacky pics. Enjoy the blurry fun over at my Flickr

(Potential) Mashup Alert! – The Cool Kids & Sebadoh

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I’m a fan of mashups just everyone else. Audiobytes For Autobots is a charming new addition to the scene (anyone with a penchant for sampling the Talking Heads that much is o.k. with me). The new Girl Talk is enjoyable enough, a bit of a retread of the same concepts…but fun none the less. We could even trace it back to 2 Many DJ’s if you feel like digging through to the vintage.

But, in these modern times, we need more mashups. This year has seen the release of The Cool Kids debut EP Bakesale, another fantastic feat of Chicago hip-hop. This fun bit of minimalist hip-hop shares the same title as 1994′s proto-indie classic Sebadoh release. See what I’m getting at?

Someone needs to bring the two together. Now, my song chopping skills are intensely rusty otherwise I’d screw this up myself. Instead, I’m reaching out to you, Internet, to take on the task. There’s got to be someone out there with the time and the chops to mix some of Lou Barlow’s manic lyrics with the sparse beeps and claps from Chuck Inglish’s production.

Pretty please?

There’s even 2 mp3′s down here to get the ball rolling.

I look forward to what you have to offer, Anonymous Internets.


The Cool Kids – What Up Man?




Sebadoh – License To Confuse



I love the Beat Drop – Metal Lungies’s in-depth discussions of Kanye and J Dilla

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A random click today landed me at the hip-hop tinged blog Metal Lungies. Much to my delight they have a reoccurring feature entitled Beat Drop. The site gathers writers to do a round table discussion examining the production skills of a particular hip-hop producer.

The most recent focuses on the great polarizer Kanye West. This discussion has of course garnered more comments than any of the other Beat Drops. Love him or hate him, Mr. West has a fantastic sense and feel for giving life to samples, at a level which belies his campy ego-driven persona. If I’d ever have to pick a bone with the man, it’d be that he chose to be the only man in hip-hop to sample Can and use it for the crappiest track on Graduation. I’ll forgive him…his almost equally strange choice of sampling Steely Dan’s Kid Charlemagne was an charming flip-cum-ploy for the ears of nerdy, white scenester kids. (See also, A-Trak). Weather you like his persona or not, his skill is undeniable. Listen to ‘Spaceship’ off Late Registration and try to say otherwise.


Kanye West – Spaceship

(On a related note, check out this Portfolio article on Steely Dan’s arrival into the world of samples)

For an even better dissection of a great career, their Beat Drop for the late master J Dilla is a wonderful exploration into catalog cut short. I became a fan quite late, well after his passing. One night a friend showed me the beautiful, Mixtape Club directed video for ‘Nothing Like This’.


J Dilla – Nothing Like This


The track is a kind of musical Schrödinger’s cat; something that is simultaneously hip-hop and not. The song, in combination with the beautiful video, blew my mind open and I began to probe the back catalog. There’s something startling about many of his production choices; combining elements both slinky and gruff to make unique compositions.

All of the Beat Drops are insightful & engaging bits of writing, something rare in this age of the McDonalds-esq music blogging. Where else are you going to find a statement like this:

I believe that people don’t truly change your life until your life has gone on for some time without them — only then do you realize the difference that they made on you.

It’s hard to find writing with such introspection in most corners of the internet, it’s even nicer to see such words written about hip-hop. Both posts alerted me to tracks loved but had no clue either had a hand in producing. (Kanye produced Goodie Mob…really?) Give them a read and I guarantee you’ll learn something…

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