maybe i’ve done it and maybe i haven’t but it’s entirely possible that i have managed to distill the essence of the years 2003-2012 (inclusive) into a single picture taken on a nokia 6300.

in years to come, i think the image of a hipster taking photos of people with an expensive camera with masking tape over the flash at a houseparty will be an enduring one (by enduring i mean “difficult to shake” rather than “sticking to the psyche via charm and merit”).

but yeah this is it. a tall skinny guy dressed head to toe in black, with a digital slr, at a houseparty in a house that’s white from floor to ceiling, taking a photo of a french dj who is smoking indoors and dj’ing (the track was “warp” by new musik, hot jam) to an empty dancefloor.

admittedly:

-he should be in vans, not nike am90s
-there should be a USE LESS tote bag in shot
-uncharacteristically there are no girls in american apparel leggings on the dancefloor
-those guys at the front door don’t appear to be talking about the monster children gallery

…but rarely can you have it all.

new musik “warp“

the amp at the feet of riton is a vox VBM1 “brian may special”. it’s designed to mimic a little battery powered amp that john deacon designed for brian may, which he used to get that signature tone (prior to running it through a wall of AC30s). it seems like a cheesy/gimmicky product but this little 10watt amp sounds fantasic, i am a previous owner.

i am not a massive Queen fan but i got some pretty incredible t-rexy glam tones out of this, equal parts shimmer and grit. also, it looks great: white with gold trim and red & green diamond pattern on the mesh.

sadly though, the amp died on me. before i left perth i was in a band with some friends (jimmy swift/donalde dijon from electric limosine, daniel burt and matt funnell) called Decades although i wanted to call it Futuristic. jimmy played drums, i played synth (strings on the right hand, droning bass on the left hand), matt played guitar and burty played bass. there is only one recording of anything we did and it’s the mp3 i’ve included here. it was recorded on a knock-off dictaphone (so you can’t really hear the synth bass at all) in the corner of the room under a pillow. around the minute mark you can hear the guitar cut out. somehow, we pushed it too far and something got burnt on the solid state circuitboard bit. it was a real downer. whilst listening to the mp3 you will also note that i am the last one to notice that something has gone wrong.

Decades/Futuristic “Reverb Anthem” (half a demo)

You can pre-order the debut Die Verboten release here.

The year is 1985 and the Decepticons run a club called DANCITRON. Starscream is the DJ and Soundwave is the venue manager. They lay a mind-control ultra-frequency under the tracks to hypnotise the crowd. I made some animated gifs: