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SUPER WAXING PARTYTIME
Tomás Ford's DISTRACTOMATIC _//April 2008

INDEX // SOMEBODY SHUT ME UP /_ THINGS THAT SUCK   / THINGS TO DO IN A SEPARATE WINDOW WHILE YOU SURF PORN SITES /] AGING RECORDS YOU SHOULD TOTALLY SCORE OFF BITTORRENT ../ WHY PERTH IS NOT AS LAME AS YOU KEEP TELLING ME IT IS / OUT OF CONTEXT REVIEW QUOTE OF THE MONTH // UPCOMING TOMAS FORD GIGS////////////////////////////////////////////////!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!///1!?!

SOMEBODY SHUT ME UP
Yo yo yo,

As difficult as this is for me to admit, I’ve been brutally shafted on eBay. See, I was waiting for a MIDI Controller (ie the box of knobs I control my beats with) to arrive from the eastern states for the last two months, but it never came. I left my PayPal claim too late and ended up having to do the fundraiser show with only a keyboard and trackpad for control, which was arse. Then last weekend, I got tired of waiting (it’s totally lame performing without a controller) and went out and bought myself a shiny new (read: “demo clearance”) Akai MPD-24, which has awesome little drum pads on it and everything, for the amount I assumed I would get from my PayPal claim. Which I did. Hours after I got home, I received an email from PayPal saying they’d decided the claim in my favour. Which was a bit of a relief.

And then I got an email from this idiot from the eastern states, saying he’d sent it via registered post on the Friday just gone, even though I’d clearly told him everything that was going on with the PayPal claim and he hadn’t said anything about reposting it to me.

So on Tuesday, the midi controller I had been looking out the front window like a four year old looking for his lost puppy for two months, finally arrived.

It’s a “Bitstream CME 3x”, which RRP at about $700 and I got it for $350. My wife suggested that he’d probably sold it to someone else while it was on au ction on eBay and when I won the au ction, he had to get it back, hence the delay. Which, in the absence of a less bitter story, is what I’m choosing to believe. So I’m feeling vengeful.

Normally I’d send this controller back to this dude, but since I have it at such a good price, I might as well flog it to someone I like. Do you want it? It’s $350. Do a google search on it. It’s a wicked controller, but the one I bought already really suits me. It doesn’t bother me if I don’t flog it, but if I can and I can piss this dude off a little and perhaps force him to confess that he totally sold it to someone else, all the better.

Anyway, no pressure. It’s in almost perfect nick and comes in an awesome little padded roadcase. If you want to look at it, send me an email before monday.

In other news, a big mega-thankyou to everyone who was either involved in or came to my fundraiser party a couple of weeks ago. We raised enough to make my touring do-able, so I’m mega, mega grateful. It was also really great to see so many live electronic acts on the one bill and an au dience who were into that. Much fun was had. Gracias, gracias.

Yeah yeah,

Tomás

THINGS THAT SUCK 

• That eBay Guy – no further explanation required. 

• Gladiators – We totally assembled at my house at 7:30 to watch Gladiators on Sunday. It totally wasn’t on. We ended up watching the 80’s movie version of 1984 and then some hentai. It didn’t make up for my sense of loss. 

• Moora – In two separate conversations this week, I’ve had to describe the weird creepiness of Moora, a small town in WA’s wheatbelt. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moora,_Western_Australia

• My Friends Being On The Australian Fringe Festival Run – Seriously, if you write one more blog about how fucking happy you are to be at Melbourne International Comedy Festival and Adelaide Fringe, I’m going to stab you in the face with a poison dagger. 

• Cut Copy – Australian music’s most recent and least interesting game of Spot The Influences is Cut Copy’s latest LP. But yeah, I guess the vocoder bit on the opening track is cool. And the sax solo in Hearts On Fire. I don’t see it having much shelf life beyond next weekend.

• V Festival – Who brings Duran Duran to Perth when everybody’s run out of money to see things after spending all their ticket money on Air?

• Not That I Went To Either – Ugh.

• Bookings – Apologies to anyone waiting to see me in Melbourne on the Anzac weekend, it all fell through due to some booking problems. My July tour is gonna be pretty cool though and is on its’ way to being locked in already, so don’t fret. I’ll be jumping on you and your friends in no time.

THINGS TO DO IN A SEPARATE WINDOW WHILE YOU SURF PORN SITES
Wish Your Future Looked Like Old Grandma Hardcore
I know it seems nerdy, but it would be absolutely rad to be of a Grandma-level age and to be obsessed with video games. Have you seen what dementure can do to people?
http://oghc.blogspot.com/

Download MiteyKO Tracks
I’m sure they won’t mind, at least one of them is an anarchist. They make mind-altering, subtly political slowcore music. It sounds lame when I say it like that, but I think you’ll like it
www.myspace.com/miteyko

Try To Be As Cool As PVI Collective
Bet you can’t.
http://www.pvicollective.com/

AGING RECORDS YOU SHOULD TOTALLY SCORE OFF OF BITTORRENT
Spawn – Motion Picture Soundtrack
Oh, you’re all like “I’m too underground for the Spawn soundtrack. It’s got Silverchair on it.” Well, I’m all like you need to re-listen to this. Sure, it’s got a few late-90’s f au x-gothisms to it, but it’s predominantly a collaborations album and things like Atari Teenage Riot vs Slayer (!!! – ATR career highlight, btw) and Soul Coughing vs Roni Size and Henry Rollins vs Goldie (!!!) and hell, even Marilyn Manson vs The Sneaker Pimps and Filter vs The Crystal Method resulted in two of the musical highlights of my late 90’s f au x-goth high school wicca-nerd period.

Scott Walker – The Drift
Do what I did; download it bec au se someone told you it was cool. Try to listen to it about five times over a couple of years. Lose faith in that persons’ taste in music to the point that you think it reflects harshly on their personality or lack thereof. Then two years later, listen to it in the background and pass out from its’ awesomeness. Then never listen to it again.

Paris Hilton – Paris
Sure, you’d never listen to this record if you had to pay for it. But if you nick it, it’s awesomely awful. I Want You suuuuucks... and it samples the title song from Grease! There’s a song called Fighting Over Me! She covers Do Ya Think I’m Sexy! Sans irony! So bad it’s awesome! It’s like a less musical Ashleeeeeeee Simpson!

WHY PERTH IS NOT AS LAME AS YOU KEEP TELLING ME IT IS

• UNIMA Puppetry Festival – There’s a puppetry festival on here at the moment. We have all the best puppeteers in the world here, right now. I’m sure this is a much cooler thing than I’m giving it credit for.
• WA Maritime Museum – When viewed from the front it looks kind of like the Sydney Opera House. When viewed from the river, it looks like the house from Beetlejuice after the evil wife has finished with it. You don’t need to go inside. Just marvel at the hideous design.
• Kanye West – I know they have Kanye West’s Graduation in other places, but it’s pretty much lit up my life this week. In “Flashing Lights” he unfavourably compares the paparazzi to the Nazis. In “Big Brother”, he draws a picture of the extremely complex mentor/apprentice relationship between him at Jay-Z, in which he felt neglected, grew beyond it and then began to appreciate it again, in such a specific way that you wouldn’t possibly connect it with anything from your own experience. He then shouts out “if you feel the way I feel, why don’t you wave your hands?” No, Kanye, I don’t love Hova like a big brother. But I do love the way you don’t seem to edit.
• Rain – Perth can’t handle rain and it’s totally cute. The freeway grinds to a halt, the drainage on the highways gets clogged, people start driving like maniacs … so much to look forward to over the coming months, hey?
• Good Cop Bad Cop – Finally someone is putting out records by a few mega-awesome Perth rock acts, plus some other, slightly less awesome Perth rock acts. It’s a nice thing to see.

OUT OF CONTEXT REVIEW QUOTE OF THE MONTH

"...you're the most sexually gratifying hands on performer in town. High five." - myspace friend request comment from Samantha-will-steal-ya-pants-from-ya

UPCOMING TOMAS FORD

SATURDAY 12 APRIL 
DEATH DISCO AT CAPTIOL (WA)
With GRAFTON PRIMARY + HARLEQUIN LEAGUE + DEATH DISCO DJ’S

So tonight I’m opening for Grafton Primary, who are one of my favourites. They do bass-heavy, grinding electro with sci-fi overtones and tripped out shit. They’re like a hallucinogenic Presets. Also playing are Harlequin League, who I last saw pre-local hype and quite liked. Now to see if I like them enough to think they live up to the aforementioned local hype. Personally, I’m on at 9:30 , I can feel an awesome show coming on and am totally psyched. It’s $20 and it’ll be a brilliant night. Come down.

THURSDAY MAY 8
“COTTONMOUTH” AT 459, ROSEMOUNT HOTEL (WA)

This is the spoken word gig I MC and help organise on the second Thursday of each month. It’s been huge, lots of people coming down to listen to words, music and random performances. I’m not sure who is on next month at this stage, but it’s always a great night and a party vibe. It’s the least boring spoken word event in the history of the world ever.
http://cottonmouth.org.au/

JULY 17-26
EAST COAST UBERTOUR 
Canberra , Sydney , Newcastle , Melbourne , Hobart and Geelong . I’m getting so excited I’m finding it hard to breathe. I’ve never been to Hobart before, so I’m really looking forward to the fourteen hours I’ll get to spend there, mostly hanging around doing a soundcheck. But dinner will be nice.

MEANWHILE
Check out http://www.tomasford.com (it sucks but there's still a lot of cool content on there and I'm about to change the entire thing so you may as well read it while you can) and http://www.myspace.com/tomasford (.)

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