The Week That Was – A Bad Week and a Zombie-pocalypse

I am ill. I’ve been ill since Tuesday, so I’ve spent the week on the sofa and in bed.

Right now, we’re in bed watching Shaun of the Dead, which is one of our favorites. A is a connoisseur of zombie movies. He has “seen all the ones worth seeing and some not worth seeing.” He is describing Night of the Living Dead and freaking me out. (He just noticed I was typing: “You can have vampires and still get by, but not zombies. You don’t often get to use the word inexorable, but …”)

I have been listening to demos this week. I was asked to provide “
an honest opinion” of a business associate’s artist. That’s always a dodgy proposition. How honest? I gave a bit of criticism about one of the tracks, but overall, it is a good project with a great song. As I was walking around tonight (well, from the sofa to the kitchen to the bed), I realized I had it going through my head after only a handful of listenings.

 

The Week That Was – Hope and Movement

This was actually a pretty good week. Stressful, of course, but we are making progress.

Work: I had a great meeting with half of the team one day, and then the rest the next day. We’re all excited about moving forward. I spoke to F today, and he is all of a sudden completely on board. (That may change again, but he was insulted when I told them I had moved on without them.)

Also, my oafp called with a couple of new projects. He’s producing an album or two, which sound good. Very catchy club music. He negotiated his own distribution, again. I am not certain how I feel about launching back in, but our last meetings in August were really productive.

Life: A is riding again regularly, so he’s feeling great. I am not down with regular exercise yet. It’s been about three months since I was working out all the time with my trainer, and I can definitely tell. I will be walking around the lake tomorrow and Sunday, and that will be my exercise for the week. I usually do 1.5-2.5 hours/day, but it’s not like when I was doing an hour/day of aerobics and/or my training sessions.

Music: I have been listening to the iPod to fall asleep each night. I plug in, set it up for a playlist, and plug in my “real” Sennheisers (as opposed to my Shure earbuds) and toss and turn while I hear one of my nighttime playlists. This week, it’s been all British Soul.

 

The Week That Was – Hopes Dashed and Renewed ad infinitum

I am juggling a lot of different things and writing here helps me keep a handle on what’s working and what isn’t. I have always written, usually in sketchbooks or moleskines. For me, it’s the best way to keep perspective as things get really out of control and to figure out when to create distance, or pull the plug, or recommit.

The past two weeks have had extreme emotional swings, day by day, and hour by hour. I am at a project stage when everything is ready and everything is in flux. It sounds impossible, but it’s my reality. We put everything together and now it’s all floating in orbit, perfectly staged.

I hope.

At the end of last week, I was convinced we’d have complete clarity by the end of this one. Yeah, not so much. We are moving ahead with everything as I am pulling together all the minor details.

Again, I have had another week filled with talking about music, rather than listening to music.

 

The Week That Was – New Joy, New Stress

My word for the week: argh.

My phrase for the week: “yeah, I know, right?”

I have felt absolutely amazing — all-powerful, even — and then absolutely crushed. Then better, then worse. Now, I am just slightly numb from the anxiety, stress, and pressure.

We were given a deadline and, if we meet it, everything’s great. If we miss it, we have to kill the project and we’ve all been working on it for a long time. It’s basically up to me to save it, if I can. Our guy got a little flaky and I either need to convince him to do what he committed to do, or I need to find someone else to do it. In 5 days. (This is actually day 2.) (Ack!) It’s a hard sell only because it’s so last minute. It makes everyone nervous.

Still, when we talk about the project, everyone is incredibly supportive . . .

It’s about 50-50 that we’ll prevail. Maybe higher. It’s late, and my meeting for today was pushed after I sent the narrative, so I am more nervous than I should be. (The two things are most likely not related.)

The good news is that I think my business partnership is far stronger than I would have imagined. We have enjoyed at least having each other to turn to amidst the joy and stress. I have become unguarded, which is slightly unsettling. I usually keep my own counsel and suffer far more alone while only I know all the turmoil.

(A has been dynamite through the whole thing. He’s so much more supportive than he thinks he is.)

We committed to moving forward, even if this project fails. Honestly, that had always been part of the plan. We’re shockingly still on plan, though it feels a bit like the walls are shaking and the ceiling is dropping plaster all around us. I suppose it feels that way because we don’t like plan B, though we know it’s for the best. We can’t quite convince anyone else that it’s for the best, but we know it’s what we have to do because it is the right thing. Neither of us could live with a DJ situation.

By this time next week, it will be a whole new world. For better or worse . . .

 

The Week That Was – Excitement and New Beginnings

This has been a reflective week for me. I have been preparing for a while for today. We didn’t achieve what I had hoped we would by today, but it was still satisfying.

I am actually very happy, and I have been happy all week. I met some interesting people, I spent time with people about whom I geniunely care, and I saw some great music.

I am sitting outside and I can hear our neighbors’ wind chimes. The night is cloudy and fairly warm (60s, it feels like).

I have spent a lot of time working toward some specific goals, but I have realized that despite the stress and anxiety associated with not quite getting there yet, I am really pleased with how far I have come and with who I am. It feels pretty darned good to be me, right now.

(That may change as the grey goose completely catches up with me and I sprawl on the floor for a few hours.)

A is happier than he’s been in a long time, too, and we’ve planned a celebratory dinner for a couple of weeks from now. The fact that he’s already planning a celebration is an enormous change. Again, celebrating small victories is really important, so I am glad he suggested a worthy reason to celebrate and a place.

New music this week:

Really, I haven’t listened to much. I have a bunch of new things in the queue, but I had to rebuild my library again (my last corrupt hd corrupted some files). I have all my old metadata, but lost my playcounts and ratings.

I bought a lot of new music over the past 7 or 8 days:

Apostle Of Hustle, National Anthem of Nowhere
The Brand New Heavies, Get Used to It
Of Montreal, Hissing Fauna, Are You The Destroyer?
RJD2, The Third Hand
Sharon Jones and the Dap-Kings, Naturally

and of course, Amy Winehouse, Back to Black.

Because of SX, I just haven’t been listening to much. I have a lot of people to contact over the next few days and a lot of things to push ahead.

Honestly, I don’t know exactly where everything is heading. I just know that I am surrounded by great people and we’re all working as hard as we can.

 

The Week That Was – All Prep, All the Time

SXSW started today. It’s an extremely busy time in Austin, and the next 8 days can get a little crazy.

I try to avoid as much official stuff as I can. Because of my postition, I am not really going out looking for new people to represent. I check out bands people recommend to me and that personal recommendation is the deciding factor between someone whose work I will enjoy and someone for whom I will expend my time and energy.

This week has featured ots of work, lots of phone calls, a new project. We’re in the home stretch on two projects and I am trying to figure when I will travel to close them.

I am still holding out hope that I will meet my deadline of next week for the big project, but we might just miss it. The project will still happen, but I would love to make the announcement when everyone is together.

I am not listening to much new this week.

I bought RJD2’s The Third Hand. It’s okay, not great. Not as ghastly as that terrible Pitchfork review. I will allow it to grow on me. I like a couple of the songs a lot, and we’ll see what happens as I hear more.

I also bought Apostle of Hustle, The National Anthem of Nowhere. I have loved every track I had heard, so I had to get it.

 

The Week That Was – A Valuable Lesson

I am tired of the “it was a stressful week” litany . . .so, this week, I am accentuating the positive.

My lesson of the week, month, year, relationship is that it’s always better to tell the whole truth than try to protect your SO, friend, client, etc. from uncertainty.

Uncertainty is the bane of my existence. People come to me for answers and certainty, and sometimes, it’s just not there.

Last night, T said “we’re not children, we can handle it.” And he was right.
(Thanks, guys, you really do rock.)

From here on, you all get the whole truth. Even if it drives you all as crazy as it drives me.

On the new music front, I am not that interested in the stuff floating around the blogs this week (Wilco? Really?) .

Except for Beirut and Feist.

 

The Week That Was

SXSW is getting close so there are lots of deals to close and announce before everything kicks off.

Everyone loves to wait until the last possible moment. I had someone in film call me at 4:15 this (Friday) afternoon to tell me he needed a contract by Monday. Bwahahahahaha. (Actually, the joke is on me, since I am working all weekend on other deals, which have to be closed in the next two weeks.)

I had to book and then cancel a show today (which breaks my hard, AL, more than you know).

I have been listening to more hip hop this week, mostly independent hip hop.

My songs of the week are:

Of Montreal, Heimdalsgate Like a Promethean Curse, which I originally heard on Music for Kids Who Can’t Read Good.

Annuals, Complete or Completing, which I originally heard on I Guess I’m Floating, and about which I have written here before.

 

The Week That Was

This week, I spent more time talking about music than listening to music.

I was without my new MBP for a couple of days, and then had to rebuild some of my iTunes library again (because I am an idiot who only backed up the failing hard drive as it failed), but I think I only lost a hundred songs and nothing that’s jumping out at me. I lost all of my playcounts, ratings, and date addeds, which is far more annoying than you’d think. ipodrip helped me retrieve most of that data from my ipod, but it’s still missing for about a thousand songs.

Things feel like they are on an upswing.

A and I had a really nice Valentine’s, despite having been sick all week.

My song of the week has been the acoustic demo I’ve been listening to for a couple of months. It’s a top 20 favorite song. I heard the live performance recently, and I am excited to hear the final recorded version in a month or so. JE gave me their new limited edition disc last Saturday, so I have it in lossless, which is higher quality than the mp3 S emailed me in December.

This weekend, my plans are to chill, wander aimlessly through the park listening to music, and watch a lot of hoops.

 

The Week That Was

This was an interesting week. Lots of work and a stomach virus kept me from posting much.

Tonight seemed excellent. I got repeated, adorable calls from my mother who was in Miami as I made up a playlist for my two dearest friends who are each going through break-ups (the master list is about 61 songs long, so I am arranging and editing before I can post it).

As I began this post, I got the panicked phone call and jumped in my car to rescue my friend. So, overall, an improvement in my life and strife in theirs.

I spent a lot of time this week listening to:

1. Break-up/sad/hopeful songs for the Playlist/Mixtape.
2. Andrew Bird. Wow, what songs. I love love love Heretic. It’s just extraordinary.
3. The Rifles. I love the live cover of Inbetween Days from Radio 1, in addition to
4. Aloe Blacc. I am awaiting my cd from Amazon, while I play the hell out of Gente Ordinaria.
5. Instrumental versions and covers of Am I the Same Girl.