I haven't bought too much music lately. This is partly because I've had KazaaLite humming away happily for most of the summer. But it's mainly because I haven't yet recovered from my massive hauls from my vacations this summer. First, there was five days in Montreal for the MUTEK festival, and I came home with an armload of vinyl and ten new CD's of yummy electronic goodness. And only two weeks later, I was off for California, and I hadn't come close to fully absorbing my Montreal purchases. So I wasn't at all prepared for my prodigious West Coast haul. No scratch that, I wasn't ready for Amoeba.

Trying to prepare a person for their first visit to Amoeba is like trying to prepare them for their first Mogwai show. You try and tell them how loud it's going to be, that it'll be the loudest gig they've ever heard, play them the albums and live mp3's, and they say "yeah, yeah, all right" because in their minds they're thinking "why's he getting so worked up about telling me how loud it's going to be, it's not like I've never been to a gig and heard a band play loudly before", but once they go, they're all like "Christ, I had no idea it'd be THAT loud and there was nothing you could have done to convey the sheer volume of the experience". Similarly, I thought I was prepared for Amoeba, because my friends had told me how big it is and how the music is really cheap and that you can spend hours there but I was thinking "yeah, yeah, why are they getting so worked up about telling me how great the store is, it's not like I haven't been to a billion music shops before, and some of them were very big too, you know".

I walked into the Hollywood Amoeba and for the first time in my life, I was in a music store and I didn't know what to do. The floor was so bloody huge, with the kind of floor space usually reserved for furniture departments, and there were racks upon endless racks of music and upon even a perfunctory flip through any random bin would reveal ultra-cheap jewels, so the continuous, pressing quandary was "WHERE IN THE HELL DO I LOOK NEXT?". After two hours, I forced myself to leave since I'd only planned to spend an hour there before heading to Venice Beach. And I hadn't even glanced at the vinyl sections because I didn't want to risk the records getting dirtied by the sand or melting in the car. Plus, I knew I'd be visiting the San Francisco Amoeba in a few days. I walked in and told my friends "I'll see you in a few hours". The timing worked out quite well. They shopped for a bit, left, got drunk, returned, and I had just gotten into line. I would love to take six months off from my normal life, move to San Francisco and work at Amoeba. That would be killer. I know as much about music as any of them. I even have long hair and can pass for a hippie if I need to.

On August 8, at around 4 PM, I listened to Whistler's "Faith in the Morning" CD. I'd bought it at the SF Amoeba for a dollar. I'd been back from my California sojourn for more than five weeks and I'd finally heard the last of the 37 CD's I'd bought while I was there. More than half of those were from Amoeba, many of the rest were from Streetlight, a chain which can best be described as "Amoeba Lite", i.e. selection and size a notch below Amoeba, yet still ten different shades of awesome for those keeping score at home. Of particular interest to me was the VAST selection of used electronic music. Average CD price $5-$6. That's just insane. I found Speedy J's techno headrush of a new record "Loudboxer", for five bucks. I loved his industrial funk direction, but I'm glad to hear him doing pure techno again. How about a John Acquaviva Frankfurt mix CD for six bucks, and a Dietrich Schoenmann mix CD for five bucks. I found Surgeon's "Force and Form", a CD I'd been searching high and low for for two years (I couldn't bring myself to fork over $35 to special order it) for $12, brand spanking new.

The ultimate slap in the face/epiphany moment is finding something for dirt cheap that I can't even find out here. Where can you get Loop CD's these days? I found "World in My Eyes" for four bucks. That's criminal. I picked up Chapterhouse's "Whirlpool" for fifteen, my most expensive single purchase of the trip, but still, WHO THE HELL STOCKS CHAPTERHOUSE THESE DAYS??. Just SEEING the CD was worth my $15 USD, the fact that the music on it is actually really good is a bit of a bonus. I got not one, but TWO Amp albums, neither of which I even knew existed. One of them is a live recording, the other is a two CD guitar+dark ambient recording. That's 150 minutes of rare Amp. Total cost: $22. I found a noise compo for two bucks, the classic first Sons of Freedom record (which sounds WAY ahead of its time for 1988, well, three or four years anyway, and "The Criminal" is still one of the finest pieces of music to spring forth from Canadian minds) for a dollar, a lousy DOLLAR folks.

Oh yeah, I bought some vinyl. Ritchie Hawtin, "Orange". Classic, ball-busting shit. Three bucks, mofos. I found Petar Dundov records for a dollar. Warp's second compilation, the "Tequila Slammers" collection, two discs, five dollars. Huh? Where do they FIND this stuff? 808 State vs Jon Hassell. Excuse me? Those guys made a record together? Actually, it's the former remixing the latter, and it's mine for three bucks. Don't worry, I'm not going to rant on and on about every single item, but hopefully I've managed to pass on my enthusiasm and convey how occupied I've been with my masses of recent purchases. If you're on the West Coast, for G-d's sake go check these places out. Don't be afraid to buy cartloads of music because you've got to remember, it's not how much you spend, it's how much you save. If I'd bought all my stuff in Toronto (if I'd even been able to find it all), it would have been easily equivalent to the amount I spent in CA, plus the price of my plane ticket. So hey, never mind "if you're on the West Coast ...", just GO to the West Coast. Your trip will pay for itself!!

Phish suck. You probably already knew that. However, I've been gaining a greater appreciation for the music of the Grateful Dead, at least some of it. Even though they would often belabour a simple theme into a fifteen minute wank-fast, the Dead's music was deeply rooted in folk and R&B. These roots shine through in their sweet harmonies, their choices of traditional material for cover versions, and the succinct folk-pop of stuff like "American Beauty". Phish may be rooted in the same musical bloodstreams (their musicianship is too polished for them to be complete charlatans), but they don't show it. Phish sound as if they've only listened to two musical acts -- the Dead (extended jams, overlapping genres) and Frank Zappa (we want to be always clever and witty, even at the expense of being goofy for goofiness' sake and/or saying absolutely nothing of substance).

I want to form a band. My band, coincidentally, has little in common with any of the aforementioned bands. First, I need a drummer. Second, I need a keyboard/electronics player. I don't want to have a bass player, so I need to add a bit more low end to the sound, preferably the thick drone of a Hammond organ. Also, this person can handle the samples, loops, echo boxes, etc. to add further layering to the mix. Finally, I need five or six guitarists. But there is a caveat: none of the guitarists can be any good. I define "not any good" as "unable to pick with reasonable competency or play a guitar solo of any kind". I can play about six chords and I'm not so swift with chord changes. That's the kind of acumen we need. People who want to show their licks are not welcome in this band. The music would vary between Loop/Spacemen 3 "let's pound one or two chords until we froth at the mouth" drone-rock, and atmospheric, drearingly eerie ambiance.

Once upon a time, I decided that if I was in a band, it would be Stereolab. But Stereolab no longer provide the minimal krautrock feel that I need. Then I decided that it would be Spiritualized. But since "Pure Phase", they've distanced themselves from the wibbly feel of that record in favour of tight pocket symphonies. Therefore, there is far too much formal talent in that band, so I wouldn't have anything meaningful to add. So I'll have to do my own thing.

I've missed shows due to sellouts, Jewish Holidays, cancellations, etc. On the 1st of August, I broke new ground by missing two shows in one day. At 8 PM, Badly Drawn Boy played a free set at Soundscapes. I biked by at around 6:30 and the place already appeared to be packed. It was little surprise then, when I eventually arrived there, that the store was jammed, with was a lineup of people stretching around the block. As it happened, I likely could have seen some of the show had I gotten into the line at that moment, since the heat inside the store was so sweltering that people had to be shuttled through due to the uncomfortable conditions. Word has it that the set was really good, and kudos to BDB for sticking to his vision and wearing a woolly hat throughout his set despite the ridiculous heat.

I then made my way to the Phoenix, making the 40 minute walk with leisurely aplomb because HEY!, I was about to see the Nesh tour by Warp Records, a label showcase by one of my favourite all-time record labels. I got to the Phoenix, but the venue was black, with a note taped to the door stating that the gig was canceled due to a bus breakdown. My first thought was "it's a lie", fondly recalling the days of ten years hence, when border difficulties had been the probleme du jour for the rave scene, but I later discovered that the freak bus breakdown story was indeed real.