Random Thoughts: September 16th, 2010

Inspiration station, before and after. Photos taken July 11/14, 2010.

• A Synopsis. Been busy. Work has been a mix of frustration and tiny victories. I'd elaborate, but that'd be really fucking boring (and the last thing I want to do is incriminate myself). Baby room-wise, things are coming together, in addition to making the rest of the house comfy. I've posted progress pics of my workspace's transformation here. I have to admit...I've really been pissed at myself ever since I discovered my drawing desk is actually backward. Seems I need to spend more time at it! Fuck. On a related note, Veronica Hebard has a dope workspace. Natural light, cool trinkets, stuff on the walls...I've got everything except that last one.
  
  
• Afflicted with Tumblritis. Currently, a lot of my writing takes place at my other blog, Mr. Lorde Should Be Drawing – that is if you can call it writing. Via the power of reblogging, I often find myself making sure folks know who certain artists and models are, because I'm all about attribution, and a lot of folks using Tumblr are not. Being older than your average Tumblr user, I feel like an iconoclast swimming against a wave of entitlement. As maddening as that sounds, I really do enjoy it. It's the immediacy of it all, I guess. In the three or so hours it takes me to write a simple Blogger-based post, I can say a whole more with a video or photo and a few explanatory lines in Tumblrland. I'm not ready to drop The Place Where Al Dwells yet, but some things might have to change. I think I'm one of those things.
  
  
• Speaking of blogs... Did I mention my wife started one? She's off to a great start. For the record, she feels the same way I do about some of the parenthood advice we received a while ago. My missive wasn't unilateral.
  
  
• An End to the Whingeing. In an earlier draft of this entry, I was going to continue bitching in the style of the aforementioned blog post, but I think it's time to dead that. Instead, I'd like to shout-out the folks who gave me solid, real, down-to-earth advice when Sarah and I announced that we were expecting. I'm eternally grateful.
  
  
• John Smith's "I'm Rollerblading!" I was just re-listening to Blunderbus, or "In Transit" and got to the controversial "I'm Rollerblading!" (apparently, skating diehards weren't too fond of this joint), and I wondered when ESPN decided to drop inline skating from the X Games. According to Wikipedia and other sources, 2005 was the year. I was wondering why I hadn't heard Arlo Eisenberg's name for a while.
  This Kids In The Hall sketch was inspiration for that track, by the way.
  
  
• All Things Garage-y. About a week ago, I finished reading Eric Davidson's We Never Learn, and it was truly a joy to flip through. Even though I had only reached the 33rd page, I decided to give the book a healthy nod via Tumblr reblog last month.
  
  
• Masticators! I started a food blog with my homies Evan and Mark last month. I don't think I'll ever run out of things to write. I think I'm gonna whip up a couple of post drafts as soon as I'm done with this. They've been stewin' in the noggin a little too long. In the meantime, holler at us via Twitter.

An Open Letter To The Guy Who Sat Beside Me At The 10:10 Showing Of Scott Pilgrim Vs. The World

Thanks for eventually shutting up.
Y'know...after I pointed out that I wasn't interested in what you had to say.
I drew the line after "why does everything have to be so epic?"
Your idiocy knows no bounds and your friends are just as stupid for hanging out with you.
Dick.

Your pal,
Allan Lorde

Wynrush, soso, and Bowen Poster

I'm really happy with how this turned out. My new neighbourhood provided the necessary inspiration.

mcenroe's "Whoa"

A taste of what's coming.

The Nestor Wynrush Ensemble poster

August 6th, y'all! Should be a fun night.
Poster design and photo by lil' ol' me. I'll get to posting the original photo on Flickr someday soon.

R.I.P. Ryan August

I just found out that Ryan August of I Want Your Skull passed away on July 11th. I'm stunned. I really wished I had met him in person. He encouraged me to contribute to the first issue of IWYS, and the result is above. Anytime I saw a new issue or a blog post with amazing skull-themed artwork, I felt bad that I didn't draw skulls regularly, and I still do. I'm just thankful that I was able to be involved in a project that got better with each issue. He pushed the quality every time, as did the people that provided the content.
Wherever you're at right now, Ryan, I know you're kicking ass in some fashion. R.I.P.

My Jazz Fest 2010 Photos

The Slew – July 1st, 2010

Some of the best shows I've ever seen were part of this year's TD Jazz Winnipeg Festival. I plan on telling my son or daughter about The Roots show someday. The photos can be found here.

Adventures In Album Cover Design

This thread is comedy gold. Don't take your album design too lightly. Noyz's post pretty much sums up where Infinite P went very wrong:

Original: http://layoutsparks.com/1/232393/moonlight-tropics-night-view.html
✓ Google "moonlight" and steal one of the first images that come up
✓ Fuck up the aspect ration by squishing instead of cropping
✓ Add a second moon/lens-flare because the other fake one wasn't big enough
✓ Add Smoke without basic photoshop skills
✓ Add Parental Advisory logo for spiritual reasons
The even sadder thing is, I bet this cover took you at least a month to make.

Classic.

Johnny Wander – you should read it.

I tend to get a feeling about certain webcomics when I'm introduced to them. If I get that feeling, I'll read it from the very beginning in one shot, no matter how many installments there are.
That's happened three times:

• In 2002, a friend introduced me to Sinfest. I ended up reading two years of strips in one night, and I've been a fan ever since.
• Almost two years ago, I discovered Girls With Slingshots and read four years of strips in one night! Needless to say, it was compelling.
• Tonight, via a GWS guest spot, I found out about Johnny Wander, by Ananth Panagariya and Yuko Ota. It's very slice-of-life and hilarious. Did I mention that Yuko can draw her ass off? I'm already in love with this comic.

BNL-fueled Nostalgia

I'll admit it...I own The Yellow Tape. A lot of folks I knew back then did, too.
I just came in from work and heard a CBC concert featuring The Barenaked Ladies performing their very popular cover of Bruce Cockburn's "Lovers In A Dangerous Time" with Bruce himself. I suddenly remembered how I loved to watch the above video every chance I got (Much had it in heavy rotation back in the day).

For those of you unaware or too young to know, the record store in the video was part of the defunct A&A Records chain. I can't remember where any of the Winnipeg locations were.

I was going to say more stuff, but my sinuses are killing my ass, so my thoughts have evaporated. I'll leave you with this: to me, Steven Page will always be that guy that was in Barenaked Ladies, and the Barenaked Ladies will always be that band that Steven Page was in.