Neon to Radiohead: "Can you update everyday like Neon Phosphor?"

Radiohead, one of the great bands of our time but representing the generation before us, have started a blog called Dead Air Space. Being the good citizen of the blogosphere that I am, I have added it to my blogroll. And I expect reciprocation. So far, Thom Yorke has managed to update the blog everyday since it was created two days ago. Let's see how long he can keep it up. His latest post is about going into the studio tomorrow, which is not unlike the stuff Neon Phosphor typically posts.

Speaking of which, we should probably do some recording ourselves. Mark will try to set up a recording situation for himself at Davis, so that he can record the distorted guitar parts to "The Spanish Song" and "The Clapping Song" because he misses playing distorted guitar. And maybe some lead vocals, while he's at it.

An exclusive interview with Steven Chow

NP: I AM NEON PHOSPHOR

SC: how may i help you today?

NP: WE KNOW YOU'RE PARTICULARLY CONCERNED ABOUT GETTING THE BEST AUDIO QUALITY OUT OF A WIDE RANGE OF SPEAKERS. LET'S TALK, FOR INSTANCE, ABOUT MIXING IN MONO.

SC: our music is immune to the kissing disease. listen to our album once, and you'll want to hang yourself. it's definitely not makeout music.

NP: LISTEN, SMARTASS, NOBODY GIVES NEON PHOSPHOR A HARD TIME. WHY ARE YOU CONSIDERING MIXING THE ALBUM IN MONO INSTEAD OF STEREO?

SC: ask yourself this, when have you ever had a perfectly functional set of speakers? we know that many of our listeners are driving around in old cars with speakers that don't necessarily work on both sides. one of the speakers in my car doesn't work. the left speaker on arta's car has issues with the bass end. even on my stereo at home, it's hard to get the speaker volumes balanced, because of wiring issues on the back. the most annoying thing is listening to stereo recordings where all the harmonies or cool instruments are on the stereo channel that you can't hear. finally, even when you have good speakers, they're probably not in a sonically perfect place in relation to you. when you mix in mono, you know exactly how the mix is going to sound, anywhere, on any sound system. phil spector and brian wilson always mixed in mono.

NP: ANY CHANCE YOU'LL BE COVERING MONO'S "LIFE IN MONO," THE ONE-HIT WONDER FROM THE 90'S?

SC: you never want to cover a hit song because it'll always turn out worse than the original

"Just curious. Who is Lucy?"

----Saint Lucy of Syracuse is the patron saint of the blind and those with eye-trouble, such as Thom Yorke, Stevie Wonder and our very own Steven.

Lucy means "light", with the same Latin root, lux, as "lucid," which means "clear, radiant, understandable." "In 'Lucy' is said, the way of light" Jacobus de Voragine stated at the beginning of his vita of the Blessed Virgin Lucy, in Legenda Aurea, the most widely-read version of the Lucy legend in the Middle Ages. St Lucy's history is shrouded in darkness: all that is really known for certain is that she was a martyr in Syracuse in Diocletian's persecutions of 303 A.D.. Her veneration spread to Rome, so that by the sixth century the whole Church recognized her courage in defense of the faith.

A day of inactivity

Although The Tonics didn't do anything today, last night we got a preview of the type of destruction that the new album will cause unto the world. Thunder and lightning erupted directly over South Pasadena. We know that because the thunder and lightning were almost simultaneous.

In other news, "The Clapping Song" vocals will be re-recorded instead of hacked together, according to Arta.

"Clapping Song" problem

Steven: "the clapping song vocal track will be a combination of several vocal takes from today and eight months ago. because we used different mics, it's really hard to get the EQ consistent. i think this is what the chorus will sound like:

mark solo from winter take: i just can't seem to get things done, maybe i'm just spun
mark from winter + 3 stevens: but who the hell knows with me?
mark from today + 2 stevens trying to cover up strangely EQ'd mark: i just seem to get things wrong, i come off too strong
4 stevens: it's all my mind, all the time

so it'll be like a call-response/motown beatles thing."

Recording session

Today, Mark recorded "Mean Song" and new lead vocals for "The Clapping Song." The Tonics pioneered a new recording technique involving Mark going under a piano cover with the condenser mic to minimize reverb.

An exclusive interview with Ian Asbjornsen

NP: I AM NEON PHOSPHOR.

IA: I am not a melted VCD.

NP: INDEED. WHEN ARE YOU COMING BACK TO THE STATES, IF EVER?

IA: I have just arrived to D'eena Town. Due to translation difficulties I had problems communicating with you while in China.

NP: WHAT'S THE MOST INTERESTING THING YOU'VE SEEN IN CHINA, THE LAND (OF COURSE) OF GIANT PANDAS?

IA: I saw things that no red-blooded American could ever fully comprehend. I have learned things about the subconcious that no one should ever have to know. I saw Tibetans mouth-feeding their infants.

NP: FASCINATING. WHAT DO YOU HAVE TO SAY TO MATT SIEMONSMA, THE DRUMMER WHO SUBBED FOR YOU AT THE BERKELEY SHOW A FEW MONTHS AGO?

IA: I would say: "It was so brave of you to attempt to steal my position while I was ON THE OTHER SIDE OF THE PLANET." But seriously thanks for keeping rock alive while I was out shopping for my soul.

Album update

Last night, Steven burned a CD with about 20 tracks and more than 60 minutes worth of everything The Tonics have recorded. In other news:

• "Crowds of Nervous People" might get an "Eleanor Rigby"-treatment, i.e. a string quartet.
• "The Spanish Song" and "Tonight" are back on the album.
• "Hamlet" will be re-recorded.
• "The Clapping Song" will not be re-recorded, but Ian's drum track will be heavily modified to sound heavier. Also, Steven will add some more harmonies.
  
• "Blank Page" is almost finished.
• "Apart" needs more vocal harmonies, and we still haven't decided what to put on the coda.
• Steven's piano needs to be tuned.

Speaking of vocal range

Here is a list of the highest notes reached by Mark and Steven (lead vocals only):

Mark
Portrait, A4
Alpha/Alpha, A4 (falsetto)
Distance, G#4
Apart, F#4
Nothing, F#4
The Clapping Song, F4
Save The Day, E4
Hamlet, E4
Terrible, E4
Sunday Night, E4
Sad, D#4
Blank Page, D4
Thank You, D4
Not Enough, D4

Steven
Cube, B4 (falsetto)
Lucy Tricked Me Into Something, A4
Marbles, A4
Crowds of Nervous People, A4 (falsetto)
Elegy For Anne Bancroft, A4 (falsetto)
Therefore Play Music, G#4
Last Sun, G#4
Refrain (original version), G4
Paratrooper, G4
Radio, G4
Lucy, F#4
UFO, F#4
Mad Men, F#4
Maritime Blues, F#4
No Logo, F#4

The Spanish Song

Steven recorded the synths, acoustic guitar and vocals for "The Spanish Song." To appease Arta, it now has an E to Am switch instead of E to F. Ian retroactively recorded the drums. Steven says: "I don't like my vocals in the first verse. I fear my voice has changed. On the bright side, I can now hit A#4 with my head voice, which finally lets me sing 'Long Tall Sally', 'I'm Down' and 'Got To Get You Into My Life.' Theoretically, I can also sing 'Smells Like Teen Spirit', but I haven't tried. My lowest note, by the way, is F#2, although the lowest note I have recorded is a G2, which I hit on 'Haste'. So, my range is two octaves and a couple extra notes."

Meanwhile, on the radio...

We are a member of the Independent Artists Company because of their excellent customer outreach department. An IAC station called Bubbling Under the Big 50 is playing "Elegy For Anne Bancroft."

We are being played on KDVS (Davis, CA) by two DJs. She likes "Thank You." They like "Lucy."

Poetry in advertising

Today, I got this kind e-mail from the folks at iSOUND.com:

Sign up with one of the largest music communities, iSOUND.COM
Sign up an artist account.
Sell your music and keep 100% of the net profits!
Instantly create your own professional band/artist web site.
Promote your music to 1,000,000 music fans each month!
Upload your MP3's.
and much, much more...

I don't know why some web sites don't spend more time writing their e-mail offers, although this e-mail scores high in the cut-to-the-point department. But can you actually see anyone behind this generic advertising language, except maybe a loudmouth ex-car salesman? Who, but the most desperate of unsigned bands, want to deal with you? There's no name on there, and Neon Phosphor doesn't respond to e-mails without a name and some mention of the Tonics.

Sculpted Static flashback of the day

Named during an AIM conversation, "Salvo Social" was never one of the band's favorite songs, but it enjoyed quite a busy existence from the beginning. It first appeared in the spring of 2003, when Arta recorded ProgZ and wrote lyrics for the first two verses (without knowing the melody). Steven came up with the melody and added an extra verse.

Arta and Steven came home from school and started recording "Salvo Social" for a new album. Mark did not play on the recording because he was at school. Ian was replaced by a drum machine, which seemed to suit the song just fine. Nevertheless, "Salvo Social" was the most sophisticated recording by Sculpted Static at the time. It featured a strong guitar hook, audio samples, and modulation to a different key.

Listen to "Salvo Social" somewhere on this page
Lyrics to "Salvo Social"

During the third verse, Steven accuses ABC News of "putting your head inside the noose of ignorance," but, of course, he is not talking about the great Peter Jennings, the longtime ABC newsanchor (and Canadian) who died a few days ago. The man who took his work seriously but never took himself too seriously, the man who hated Fox News, never interviewed George W. Bush, and was frequently accused of having a liberal bias.

Anyway, "Salvo Social" was considered strong enough to lead off the Distance EP and the No Future concert. Unfortunately, the live performance was a little too sloppy, due to the band's not having practiced with Mark until that day, and Ian having only heard the song a few days before.

The lack of response to "Salvo Social" from EP listeners meant that the rockin' song was pushed to the second half of the new album, now called Sunny Ash.

It has been rumored that Alan Lawrence will be using "Salvo Social" in one of his short films.

I love to say da da

According to its proponents, Dada was not art — it was anti-art. For everything that art stood for, Dada was to represent the opposite. Where art was concerned with aesthetics, Dada ignored aesthetics. If art was to have at least an implicit or latent message, Dada strove to have no meaning — interpretation of Dada is dependent entirely on the viewer. If art is to appeal to sensibilities, Dada is to offend. It is perhaps then ironic that Dada became an influential movement in modern art. Dada became a commentary on art and the world, thus became art itself.

Those who participated in Dada were attracted to a nihilistic point of view (nothing achieved by mankind was worthwhile, not even art), and created art in which chance and randomness formed the basis of creation.

Dada was a way to express the confusion felt by many people as their world turned upside down by World War I. There was not an attempt to find meaning in disorder, but rather to accept disorder as the nature of the world, using it as a means to express their distaste for the aesthetics of the previous order and carnage they believed it reaped. Through this rejection of traditional culture and aesthetics they hoped to destroy traditional culture and aesthetics.

"Do you sell ringtones?"

----No, we're not in the jewelry business. If you want to change the tone of your ring, you should look into getting it polished, stained or engraved.

An exclusive interview with Steven Chow

NP: I AM NEON PHOSPHOR.

SC: yeah?

NP: WELCOME BACK TO SOUTH PASADENA. WHAT DID YOU LEARN IN NEW YORK?

SC: how to ride the subway

NP: INTERESTING. ARE YOU INSPIRED TO WRITE SONGS?

SC: and how to take the greyhound to amherst

NP: WILL THIS ALBUM BE FINISHED SOON?

SC: where i acted out morrissey's suedehead video by tracking down my favorite historical figure in a small town and visiting her house and gravesite. for me it was emily dickinson. morrissey visited james dean. it felt strange to be in the same room where nearly 1800 of the most remarkable poems in the english language were written. then it was quite an emotional experience at the cemetary to see the patch of grass directly above emily's remains

NP: I'VE BEEN ASKED A LOT, WHO IS LUCY? PERHAPS YOU CAN ANSWER THAT FOR ME.

SC: i'm so exhausted from my trip home that i'm going to sleep. later, neon.

She don't lie, she don't lie, she don't lie

The Tonics enjoy receiving their news from a plethora of international news sources, such as The Guardian and the BBC. The latter, while providing some of the best mainstream news coverage of world events and some decent features, also provides moments of hilarity which make a Tonic smile as only some vodka and lime could:

Italian river full of cocaine

Worst moments in rock and roll

Today's feature: bad music-related puns in political commentary.

If you haven't been under a rock for the past 6 months, you know that Iran's been in the news lately. Uranium. Bombs. yawn. And some people are rather upset, etc. etc.

Neon Phosphor hates politics, so we'll steer clear, but one thing must end: the use of Flock of Seagulls' 1982 hit "I ran (so far away)" as inspiration for gag-inducingly "clever" blog and article headlines. A search for the phrase "Iran so far away" on google yielded 4,690 hits.

Shut the fuck up, folks. No one's laughing. And a great song is being trivialized. Neon Phosphor would like to direct your attention to the sharp guitar work in the pop classic - the verse riff and solo are noticeably tight and melodic for a band that is now seen as a standard bearer of the synthesizer era.

Also noticeable is the song's fascinating astronomical/metereological diction:
"Aurora borealis comes in view. Aurora comes in view."

An exclusive interview with G

G was the bassist at the two Berkeley shows.

NP: I AM NEON PHOSPHOR.

G: I AM G - simple, easy-going, visionary

NP: HOW DID YOU GET THE GIG TO BE THE TONICS' BAY AREA BASSIST?

G: I responded to Steven's posting on Craigslist as a last minute filler.

NP: WHAT'S IT LIKE TO PLAY IN THE TONICS?

G: Anytime, anywhere, anyplace sums it up. Good people!

NP: DESCRIBE YOUR MUSICAL CAREER, INCLUDING CURRENT PROJECTS.

G: I experienced a rebirth after not having played for 10 years. I feel grateful, blessed, inspired and passionate to be musical; it's a gift I enjoy sharing and collaborating with others. Current projects: www.sundaygroove.com (pop band), THREAD (metal band), S&G Inc. (acoustic/rock ballad w/ female vocalist. I play acoustic guitar)

NP: THANK YOU

G: and thank you.... take care.

An exclusive interview with Alan Lawrence

NP: I AM NEON PHOSPHOR.

AL: Yes, you are!

NP: HOW DID YOUR RELATIONSHIP WITH THE TONICS START, AND WHAT WAS THE FIRST TONICS/SCULPTED STATIC SONG YOU HEARD?

AL: It was some years ago, I only vaguely remember...but it must have been Mad Men, which I enjoyed very much. But the ones that leapt out at me at the time were Marbles and, most especially, Star Ferry. I must have listened to Star Ferry a hundred times a day back then, everywhere I drove. It was the combination of the wacky, lovelorn lyrics and the effervescent melody, it made the song feel as if it were coming from high in the air, and never exactly alighting on the ground.

NP. WHAT'S THE MOST INTERESTING THING THAT HAPPENED DURING A VIDEO SHOOT WITH THE TONICS?

AL: I think the most interesting moment came from the Distance music video, when I sent the Tonics (then Sculpted Static) running out on a bluff with the vague instructions to just "goof around." We chased after them with the camera, and quite alarmingly each band member in turn made for the cliff-edge of the bluff and leapt straight off. They were like lemmings, running on some kind of non-verbal communication or instinctual programming, except they were all very into it. I was terrified. Luckily, it wasn't that far down to the next cliff, and they all survived.

Also, I would say that the filming of the Apart video was altogether one of my most enjoyable filming experiences. The band members were so spontaneous that everything we filmed just worked. There's a real spontaneous inspiration to that video, and it's thanks to the rapport we all had that day. You can watch that one again and again, and it doesn't really get old.

NP: WHAT ARE YOUR CURRENT PROJECTS AND HOW ARE THE TONICS' MUSIC GOING TO BE USED?

AL: Current projects include a feature-length experimental narrative film called Graceful Accident. It's a fractured piece of manipulated, semi-archival film about the fractured, semi-archival nature of romantic relationships in a contemporary city. It's due to be finished in August, with a premiere in September, most likely. The Tonics/Sculpted Static will have a number of songs in the movie, and the band will be recording some further music to accompany the various scenes. The feel will be pretty grungy and rebellious, but with a kind of romantic side as well.

Then there is a short film about ghostly love from beyond the grave. Sexy, pastoral, and fun, it'll finally give people what they want: a story to follow. I'm not sure what The Tonics are doing for it right now. Arta and I talked about music for it, but the direction I'm looking for in the music is pretty out-there. I'm sure the Tonics can handle it, I'll just be interested to see what comes up, 'cus at the moment I can't imagine what they'll do. But that's the best kind of collaboration, anyway.

NP: THANK YOU.

AL: Well, thank you, too, mystery person!