CLEO IN LOS ANGELES

THE TIME WE SHOWED ECHO PARK WHAT "COOL" MEANS

VENICE, USA

LOS ANGELES BEAUTY SUPPLY

HOUSESITTING, PORTABLE STUDIO

I'm housesitting for the next week. Just me and Bonnie (she's a weiner dog) and North Portland and the two bags of recording equipment I hauled in.

I had this same adventure over the summer and challenged myself to write and record something completely new in two days. It was a challenge of creating a sort of freedom for myself -- I get so tied up in the subtleties of lyrics and melody that I'm often writing a song over months at a time. I'll work out a verse and spend the next two weeks singing it as I walk, tweaking the melody here and there, scrapping one word in favor of another.

But the best workshops don't slow you down on editing as you write -- they don't let you delay, put that pen on the paper, and just go, just write something, anything, and don't stop.

So I let myself just write something, and here it is. If you listen close, you might hear Bonnie howling along.

Little Bits, Draft One:



This time around, I'm going to revisit the song for the first time. Where should it go? What should it become? You tell me.

I BOUGHT AN X-RAY LIGHT BOX

NEW CARDS

I've made new cards! You can too -- all it takes is cork, rubber, an ink pad and lots of love.

Of course, it also takes an exact-o blade, a ruler, a cutting mat and a can of workable fixatif. Don't cut yourself with the blade. I also suggest using the fixatif in a well ventilated area, so you don't end up breathing it (like I did) and going to bed dizzy and nauseaus and loopy (like I did). Oh, you'll also need a crazy laser machine to make your stamp.




















The process was pretty straight forward. I wanted a card that had a great visual pop while keeping a natural look and a soft textured feel in the hand. I ended up with the B design and a flood of text in black on a natural cork.

Since I don't own a crazy laser machine, I put in an order with a rubber stamp company in Iowa -- the same folks we used for the Blackwater Collective packaging and that Katie used for her cards. They arrived four days later smelling like rubber and burnt wood.

I bought the cork at the Fred Meyer on Hawthorne. They sell a big roll of it for ten bucks. Then it was home to a few nights of measuring, cutting, and stamping. I capped it all off by building a little custom card box out of cork and gaffers tape.

Some photos of the process are below, and I made a flickr set for the originals and a bunch more.