Hey hi!
I’ve spent much of this week on eight wheels, which is a nice habit to reconnect with. I’m seeking out little nooks of pavement to skate on, and recording the silly, awkward process of learning new moves. My roller skating playlists are feeling a little stale, so if you have any suggestions, do let me know!
A fuzzy screenshot from a video my friend Rae took of me trying to “shoot the duck”
What I strive to be.
Memory gremlins
It’s intriguing to think about how we each have so many memories, but for the sake of presence and everyday functionality we have to keep them compressed and shut away. There they sit, waiting for their time to shine. Some of them go untouched for years and gather dust.
The bold ones get impatient enough to leave their place and sneak around. They’re like tricksy little memory gremlins. They convince their neighbors to rearrange themselves all together, just so they can squeeze in somewhere out of place. When you go looking for one memory, you instead find the memory gremlin tagging along to get a little time in the spotlight.
Coming across a lost memory can be a delight, though, no matter how insignificant it is. They’re valuable because they’re hard to come by. Even though the little memory gremlins have a tendency to sneak out unexpectedly — especially at times when we’re all stuck and bored (see Disco Diaries #2) — the gremlins are mighty shy. I find it very hard to pull up disconnected memories from my life without a prompt or an inexplicable association. But it’s fun to try, and I suggest that very activity for the next time you’re waiting for your coffee to brew.
Share random memory experiment results here:
I’ll go first:
Skipping class with my friend Lauren, sitting on the hood of my Plymouth Acclaim eating cranberry almond crunch cereal straight from the box.
Finally winning a purple (or was it blue?) stuffed toy from a claw machine at the community pool where I had my first job selling Sour Punch Ropes and popsicles at the concession stand.
Making myself a lunch break panini at a coffee shop job in 2009. Garlic bread, ham, cheddar cheese, mayo, tomato, chipotle sauce. Smash. Side of chips. Greasy tasty.
Gigging at the internet
I got to thinking about memories as keepsake while I was working on a story about virtual music performances and education. I spoke to a number of people who are putting together things like festivals and music summer camps online, an asked them what value they thought virtual events could offer that live ones could not.
One thing several of them agreed on was the record these performances leave behind. Of course, you could film any live performance and save it, but it wouldn’t be complete. Virtual performances, on the other hand, only exist on film to begin with, so they remain exactly as they ever were in the bowels of the internet and external hard drives.
There is a growing archive of the public creative expressions we are compelled to make during one of the stranger times in history. It’s wonderful that these performances can be accessible, without the limit of time or space, to anyone who has the opportunity to log on to a computer with internet.
Since the beginning of this, I’ve been grateful for people who have played around with the virtual landscape and found ways to make it fun for themselves and their viewers. Probably the most inspiring advice I took away from writing the story was to let go of expectations and start from zero. Simply trying to recreate the type of performance you already know doesn’t work well. You have to come at the format with a fresh perspective, and have fun playing around with it.
So far I’ve been chained to my old standards of performing, but I’m taking that advice to heart and hoping to find it in me to play around with something really new.
For now, Strobobean will play a live, thirty minute set online tomorrow, August 8, along with other local Cincinnati artists, for an event called Thrive Stream. Jake and I are performing in a simple configuration with our DIY apartment setting. The limitations have inspired some cool versions of a few songs with just two guitars and vocals. That’s something that probably wouldn’t have come around in a live setting, and I should remember that.
A song for you
Earlier this week I was listening to an old mixed CD and was particularly taken with the buildup of this one Rilo Kiley song because of its live energy. It brought me back to a time in my life when I was seeking out lots of shows, driving anywhere from one to three hours to attend ticketed events of bands whose CDs had spent hours and hours living in my car’s CD player. I listened to this song and I could imagine the excitement of the lights dimming, the band coming out and grabbing their instruments, the crowd bopping in rhythm with their feet planted to a black, sticky floor.
This was a time when I was less familiar with what it’s like to be in a band, and therefore pleasantly unattuned to any of the ins and outs of organizing a show. I sometimes miss having no awareness of the industry. It’s simple to pick out a cool outfit, show up and bop along to the openers, and indulge in the sweet, energetic familiarity of a favorite song unfolding right before your eyes.
After seeing my favorite bands perform, I’d walk away from the venue trying to lock in the memory of their set, reliving the most emotional and cathartic moments in the show.
Fortune cookie
The best recipes are the ones with seconds.
May you remember something odd this weekend!
Katya