Ok, now we're rolling. Here's the whole Osama show in bite-size chunks (box.net only allows 10MB at a time). Try the baba ganoush!
It is To Laugh in Toronto
Thursday, June 7, 2007
still working on it
Couldn't seem to touch it much the week I got home, but tried to catch up this past week -- mastering Osama, doing a 30-minute edit for air tomorrow night (streaming live at 10 on wmpg), designing a sleeve for both versions -- the full length, including Dan's demo of the Sonic Fabric at the end, is about 48:00 and has 33 tracks.
At the top is a piece of the cover art I created in Photoshop CS3 -- the highly literal "Osama on the Half-Shell."
I made some copies -- gave one to Lucy, one to Danno. Neither have said a word. But then I gave copies to Dan Bernard too, as of today he still hasn't listened to it! There are plenty of other people I've got to make copies for.
Anyway, even if he hasn't listened to it yet, Dan did record a promo tag for me -- because I couldn't fit the whole "Osama in Canada" prologue with the interviews, I used them for the promo which wmpg is running up through Friday. Here's the spot.
And now I have to tackle "Transistorized Feedback," the Friday show. This one is unfortunately the great lost mix -- Darren was recording the show into his 8-channel software, but before he could close the file, his computer crashed and he lost it. So I've got my Flash recorder board mix, which just isn't a very good mix. Two-channel but hardly stereo. And as I've already moaned, all of the sfx and music tracks TOO LOUD.
Still, I've got to be able to resurrect some of the performance -- it was pretty wild. But "Dramatic Hospital" is pretty much unusable. I'm intending to make a 30-minute show out of it, even if I cut it in half there were a couple of numbers from the Osama show I couldn't fit, so I can include them here -- I'm sure I'll make it work.
At the top is a piece of the cover art I created in Photoshop CS3 -- the highly literal "Osama on the Half-Shell."
I made some copies -- gave one to Lucy, one to Danno. Neither have said a word. But then I gave copies to Dan Bernard too, as of today he still hasn't listened to it! There are plenty of other people I've got to make copies for.
Anyway, even if he hasn't listened to it yet, Dan did record a promo tag for me -- because I couldn't fit the whole "Osama in Canada" prologue with the interviews, I used them for the promo which wmpg is running up through Friday. Here's the spot.
And now I have to tackle "Transistorized Feedback," the Friday show. This one is unfortunately the great lost mix -- Darren was recording the show into his 8-channel software, but before he could close the file, his computer crashed and he lost it. So I've got my Flash recorder board mix, which just isn't a very good mix. Two-channel but hardly stereo. And as I've already moaned, all of the sfx and music tracks TOO LOUD.
Still, I've got to be able to resurrect some of the performance -- it was pretty wild. But "Dramatic Hospital" is pretty much unusable. I'm intending to make a 30-minute show out of it, even if I cut it in half there were a couple of numbers from the Osama show I couldn't fit, so I can include them here -- I'm sure I'll make it work.
Tuesday, May 29, 2007
Bits and pieces
To fill in all of the details from the week, I’ve posted a series of random thoughts (starting with my long travel entry from yesterday) and tried to capture some of the memorable moments. They’re not in chronological order, sort of reverse chronological but not exactly either, so reading this entire story from top to bottom is a jumbled chronicle of impressions and thoughts that I hope give you some sense, non-linear though it is, of what the experience was like.
Orange Alert my ass
Apparently the terrorists are really stirring things up at the airports, it was Orange Alert when we left for Toronto on May 19 and it’s still Orange Alert as I write this in Philadelphia, waiting for my flight to Portland
Got cut off right there – they suddenly changed the gate so we all had to pick up and move across the hall, then didn’t get back to this – was going to on the flight, but was too tired, just snoozed the whole time. The flight was supposed to take off at 8:45, ended up delayed until around 9:30.
But back to the point. Orange Alert. I was going to say something about our Homeland Security personnel not being very alert, since my carry-on bag held a mini-screwdriver set (and other questionable things) – I got a kick out of the security agent scrutinizing his screen trying to figure out what all of the wires, microphones and small electronic devices were about. He finally let it through though, never even opened it up. Agent Orange, I’m on fire.
But when I got into Portland a half hour late, turned out my suitcase never made it with me. It may have just been the usual baggage screwup, but they may have actually flagged it – had my NanoPiano midi module, the cheap computer speakers I bought at Big Lots for $5.99, and the micro FM transmitter I built in Tetsuo Kogawa’s workshop on Sunday. Lisa warned me that it may be suspicious, maybe it’s used to detonate a bomb!
An aside about the workshop – Kogawa is famous as an activist for micro radio, and has given these workshops all over the place (including in person as previous Deep Wireless workshops) – if you’re handy with electronic components and a soldering iron, here are the instructions from his website. For this event, he talked to us over the internet, and the technology was less that impressive. For some reason he needed to present it over a Real Audio stream, which had a 60-120 second delay, meaning there couldn’t be any communication back and forth – at the Saturday session, people were calling the experience surreal, he quickly got far ahead of the participants and didn’t hear us say “stop!” even 2 minutes later, because he turned off the audio from our feed so he wouldn’t be distracted.
In fairness, it was 4 in the morning in Tokyo so it’s understandable if he was a little out of it. On Sunday, they set up a Skype connection which had no delay, but he still didn’t like it and insisted on using the Real Audio stream which was connected simultaneously…and in the process turned off the audio from the Skype connection so he still couldn’t hear us! However, we had Stephen Kelly helping us, a cool inventor and radio art guy from Halifax who was experienced in building the micro transmitters, and most of the people got one working.
So I carefully packed the transmitter in my suitcase. Did they see it on their X-Ray and stop my bag for investigation? Did they bring my bottle of Fructis shampoo to the lab for analysis? Did they discover my unauthorized copies of CDs and DVDs in the front pocket? I’m sure I’ll get the bag back today, I don’t really think my bag was under suspicion, it’s just fun to think about it.
Got cut off right there – they suddenly changed the gate so we all had to pick up and move across the hall, then didn’t get back to this – was going to on the flight, but was too tired, just snoozed the whole time. The flight was supposed to take off at 8:45, ended up delayed until around 9:30.
But back to the point. Orange Alert. I was going to say something about our Homeland Security personnel not being very alert, since my carry-on bag held a mini-screwdriver set (and other questionable things) – I got a kick out of the security agent scrutinizing his screen trying to figure out what all of the wires, microphones and small electronic devices were about. He finally let it through though, never even opened it up. Agent Orange, I’m on fire.
But when I got into Portland a half hour late, turned out my suitcase never made it with me. It may have just been the usual baggage screwup, but they may have actually flagged it – had my NanoPiano midi module, the cheap computer speakers I bought at Big Lots for $5.99, and the micro FM transmitter I built in Tetsuo Kogawa’s workshop on Sunday. Lisa warned me that it may be suspicious, maybe it’s used to detonate a bomb!
An aside about the workshop – Kogawa is famous as an activist for micro radio, and has given these workshops all over the place (including in person as previous Deep Wireless workshops) – if you’re handy with electronic components and a soldering iron, here are the instructions from his website. For this event, he talked to us over the internet, and the technology was less that impressive. For some reason he needed to present it over a Real Audio stream, which had a 60-120 second delay, meaning there couldn’t be any communication back and forth – at the Saturday session, people were calling the experience surreal, he quickly got far ahead of the participants and didn’t hear us say “stop!” even 2 minutes later, because he turned off the audio from our feed so he wouldn’t be distracted.
In fairness, it was 4 in the morning in Tokyo so it’s understandable if he was a little out of it. On Sunday, they set up a Skype connection which had no delay, but he still didn’t like it and insisted on using the Real Audio stream which was connected simultaneously…and in the process turned off the audio from the Skype connection so he still couldn’t hear us! However, we had Stephen Kelly helping us, a cool inventor and radio art guy from Halifax who was experienced in building the micro transmitters, and most of the people got one working.
So I carefully packed the transmitter in my suitcase. Did they see it on their X-Ray and stop my bag for investigation? Did they bring my bottle of Fructis shampoo to the lab for analysis? Did they discover my unauthorized copies of CDs and DVDs in the front pocket? I’m sure I’ll get the bag back today, I don’t really think my bag was under suspicion, it’s just fun to think about it.
The Hideaway
When Dan was particularly getting to me, first I accused him of being a “slack thief,” he takes all the slack for himself and away from the people he’s working with. That night, when he was bullshitting about recruiting Toronto musicians to join the show (necessary because of the over-ambitious Osama script with a lot of songs in it that our cast either didn’t know, couldn’t sing, couldn’t play or all of the above), I said “I went to college for a year in Missouri, show me.” If you don’t challenge him like that he just talks and talks and doesn’t get anything done – expects other people to do it for him of course. Slack thief.
So after rehearsal on Tuesday night, we stopped at a cool bar on West Queen called The Hideaway, a hip deco atmosphere, seemed like it’s been there since the 20s. An acoustic duo was playing, their rockin’ Guess Who medley of “No Sugar Tonight/New Mother Nature” was particularly fetching. Taking up my challenge, during their break Dan somehow got them to agree (in a matter of minutes) to be in the show! He showed me all right, and I was happy to acknowlege it. However, the story changed the next night when we rehearsed the script again, it timed out at 56 minutes (was supposed to be 40), Dan got all depressed and realized he had to tell them forget it, cut most of the songs, and rewrite a good portion of script. That was a good thing for all involved, the Friday show was a frenetic mess but the rewritten Saturday show was tight!
So after rehearsal on Tuesday night, we stopped at a cool bar on West Queen called The Hideaway, a hip deco atmosphere, seemed like it’s been there since the 20s. An acoustic duo was playing, their rockin’ Guess Who medley of “No Sugar Tonight/New Mother Nature” was particularly fetching. Taking up my challenge, during their break Dan somehow got them to agree (in a matter of minutes) to be in the show! He showed me all right, and I was happy to acknowlege it. However, the story changed the next night when we rehearsed the script again, it timed out at 56 minutes (was supposed to be 40), Dan got all depressed and realized he had to tell them forget it, cut most of the songs, and rewrite a good portion of script. That was a good thing for all involved, the Friday show was a frenetic mess but the rewritten Saturday show was tight!
The NAISA team
They were terrific and made us feel very welcome. I talked about Hilary and Chris, the audio aficionados who we first met when they picked us up at the bus station and took us out for drinks on the first Saturday night; we continued to see and hang out with them throughout the festival and conference events Thursday-Sunday. Then there was Carey, the tall enthusiastic technician originally from B.C. who provided support for Darren and all of the shows, discussions, presentations and workshops. He does some sound production too, and seemed to really dig our stuff.
Darren and Nadene themselves are great people with amazing energy to put on this event year after year, not to mention several other projects at other times of the year. Again, if you haven’t checked out the Deep Wireless site you should, it’s part of the NAISA site at www.naisa.ca, there’s information there about many of these folks and some of the other participants I didn’t mention.
Darren and Nadene themselves are great people with amazing energy to put on this event year after year, not to mention several other projects at other times of the year. Again, if you haven’t checked out the Deep Wireless site you should, it’s part of the NAISA site at www.naisa.ca, there’s information there about many of these folks and some of the other participants I didn’t mention.
the conference participants
The people who attended the Radio Without Boundaries conference, in fact the many Deep Wireless events NAISA held all month long, are VERY committed to the idea of radio art, soundscaping, all kinds of names for it. What do YOU call it? Despite the fact that it’s pretty far removed from the mainstream, it’s got fans and practitioners from all over the world. There were producers and artists at the conference from Australia, Austria, England, Germany and elsewhere. However, very few attendees from Toronto, or Canada at all for that matter. Which surprised me, I had imagined that the city was actually interested in the whole thing, but even CKLN, though they support the festival and the conference enormously, isn’t the hotbed of radio art it once was.
Anyway, I have to admit I found the panel discussions pretentious and boring, just people talking about themselves and how they create. They make up all kinds of art terms for what they’re doing, but to me it’s just not as precious as all that. I did enjoy meeting and talking with some of them though, Jim Whelton (look up "Harmon e Phrasyar on the Resonance FM site) was particularly fun. He seemed receptive to where we were at, but I’m sure some of the others thought my approach wasn’t up to their high standards of bullshit. Nevertheless, we got nothing but positive feedback for the Osama show, and since Darren and Nadene invited us, they obviously appreciate how our thing fits in to the total audio-art universe. So I don’t care what the seriosos thought of me.
Anyway, I have to admit I found the panel discussions pretentious and boring, just people talking about themselves and how they create. They make up all kinds of art terms for what they’re doing, but to me it’s just not as precious as all that. I did enjoy meeting and talking with some of them though, Jim Whelton (look up "Harmon e Phrasyar on the Resonance FM site) was particularly fun. He seemed receptive to where we were at, but I’m sure some of the others thought my approach wasn’t up to their high standards of bullshit. Nevertheless, we got nothing but positive feedback for the Osama show, and since Darren and Nadene invited us, they obviously appreciate how our thing fits in to the total audio-art universe. So I don’t care what the seriosos thought of me.
West Queen Street
This seemed to be the hippest street in town, we had breatkfast there the first day and were back Monday-Wednesday because we had to turn right off of Spadina to get to North Street Video for the rehearsals. All kinds of punks and hipsters hanging out day and night – I think my favorites were the headbangers bopping down the sidewalk with a high-distorto boom box on one of the guy’s shoulders (how 70s is that?) blaring, what else? “Bang Your Head!”
The Greenpeace Girls
Another great interview, they were outside the U.T. bookstore signing students up and complaining that they were being called terrorists, we used a few of their soundbites out of context (sorry girls), but they were so funny, high-energy, committed, cute. Dan signed up for a $5/month subscription to the Greenpeace newsletter, said I had to split it with him every month. Yeah right.
Chinatown
We had to walk through (or travel by streetcar) south on Spadina to get to North Street Video where we rehearsed Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday evenings. Overall, it was dirty and crowded, lots of junk/souvenir shops. I guess it had some good restaurants, but we didn’t sample any, other than some Chicken Something Dan brought me back on Wednesday afternoon while I was hacking away on the cues for that night’s rehearsal. If I had seen a Dim Sum restaurant I know I would’ve gone, but if there was one, it was hidden on one of the side streets I guess.
My most memorable characters in Chinatown were not even Chinese: one was the quadriplegic busker who played a pre-programmed electronic keyboard with his stumps; the other was Uncle Abraham, the Israeli pawnshop owner we interviewed on Thursday while he repaired a bicycle out in front of the shop. His best quote was “I don’t care about all this baloney.”
My most memorable characters in Chinatown were not even Chinese: one was the quadriplegic busker who played a pre-programmed electronic keyboard with his stumps; the other was Uncle Abraham, the Israeli pawnshop owner we interviewed on Thursday while he repaired a bicycle out in front of the shop. His best quote was “I don’t care about all this baloney.”
The CN Tower
If you’re lost in Toronto, just get your bearings by looking for the tower, which is located due south. I told Dan it was a giant antenna to draw in the universal magnetic fields (ala Foucault’s Pendulum, the Eiffel Tower, Empire State Building, etc.), when he wouldn’t buy that I suggested it looked like a Moslem spinneret – he jumped on that one, said it could be the corporate headquarters for Mosqueburger and worked it into the Osama script. It seems his new wife Fatima, who he met online, wants it as a gift. She also wants to be interviewed by Anderson Cooper.
Sunday, May 27, 2007
mission accomplished
Saturday night show went off great -- smaller audience though, only about 25 people. Too bad -- the people that WERE there seemed to love it. Oh well, at least I have the recordings to air on WMPG, etc.
Went out for drinks afterward. Starting to get a feel for downtown Toronto...now that I'm almost out of here. Would have been nice to experience the city, but I was here for a purpose, and getting paid for it, and it wasn't to be a tourist. Will have to come back, now that I know the streetcar system, etc.
Would like to write more, but I want to go to the rest of the "Radio Without Boundaries" conference today. I have to finish off my micro-transmitter so I can participate in the "Let's Go Wireless" performance that finishes off the whole thing. In case you haven't looked at the Deep Wireless site, here's the conference schedule.
Went out for drinks afterward. Starting to get a feel for downtown Toronto...now that I'm almost out of here. Would have been nice to experience the city, but I was here for a purpose, and getting paid for it, and it wasn't to be a tourist. Will have to come back, now that I know the streetcar system, etc.
Would like to write more, but I want to go to the rest of the "Radio Without Boundaries" conference today. I have to finish off my micro-transmitter so I can participate in the "Let's Go Wireless" performance that finishes off the whole thing. In case you haven't looked at the Deep Wireless site, here's the conference schedule.
Saturday, May 26, 2007
1 down, 1 to go
We made it through the first show, "Transistorized Feedback" -- a few missed cues, some over-effected voices, but for the most part a big success! The feedback, so to speak, was all very positive, though I didn't hear that many laughs from the audience. I think they were just stunned. As Chris told me, and this is something I've heard before about our stuff, you don't have time to process any punchlines because we're already on to the next joke. That's ok, that's the way aha aha we like it.
Lisa arrived from Portland in time to see the show. Afterwards we went out with Chris, Hilary, and a radio friend of theirs (I never caught his name) to a place Chris knew with a fantastic beer list and good food too. I had Thai mussels, yum.
Got back to the room and listened to my recording of the show on the Microtrack -- wasn't happy with the mix on headphones, much of the sound design is too loud and drowning out the voices. Damn! I was mixing to the room of course, where it was coming through 8 speakers in a circle around the room. But tonight I'll check on the headphones too -- we need a good stereo mix for the listeners at free103point9, not to mention when I air these back home on WMPG.
Now getting ready to do it again. The conference has already started, but there's no way I was getting there at 8:30 this morning. Noonish is more like it. Dan's at his B&B with Lisa now, I've got the room to myself. I'm hungry. More later.
Lisa arrived from Portland in time to see the show. Afterwards we went out with Chris, Hilary, and a radio friend of theirs (I never caught his name) to a place Chris knew with a fantastic beer list and good food too. I had Thai mussels, yum.
Got back to the room and listened to my recording of the show on the Microtrack -- wasn't happy with the mix on headphones, much of the sound design is too loud and drowning out the voices. Damn! I was mixing to the room of course, where it was coming through 8 speakers in a circle around the room. But tonight I'll check on the headphones too -- we need a good stereo mix for the listeners at free103point9, not to mention when I air these back home on WMPG.
Now getting ready to do it again. The conference has already started, but there's no way I was getting there at 8:30 this morning. Noonish is more like it. Dan's at his B&B with Lisa now, I've got the room to myself. I'm hungry. More later.
Friday, May 25, 2007
tech rehearsal
They always say "if the tech rehearsal's a mess, the actual show will be good." That's reassuring. Was VERY sloppy. But I think we've worked the kinks out. I hope. I feel like I'm firing off a million cues on the CDs, hard to keep up. Now they're starting a reception for the "Radio Without Boundaries" conference. I suppose I better attend...
Stockhausen
Man, I wish I had more time to keep this up to date. Feels like it's been non-stop work on this, between all of the sound design (over 120 cues over two discs for each show), rehearsals, etc. Very little time to be a tourist in Toronto I'm sorry to say. I've barely had time to eat, although Dan has managed to squeeze in about 6 meals a day somehow.
Last night was the first night we didn't rehearse, so I went to one of the official Deep Wireless events, a "performance" of "Kontakte," an electronic music piece by Karlheinz Stockhausen -- I put performance in quotes because it was just a listening experience, but on Darren's amazing 8-channel surround system. There were three other radio art pieces as well, all similarly abstract but pretty mind-blowing in Octophonic Sound. We actually have a piece in one of the shows called Octophonic Sound, we didn't realize that Darren was really using it! And it will be used for our shows as well, he's got a hand-held controller that he moves around in space to direct the 8 channels and "spatialize" the sound. How far out is that?
Dan had to stay back in the room and do some major surgery on the script since it was running about 25% over time. He was pretty bummed about that, but as he always says to me, you've just got to roll with it baby!
There are many more things to tell you, but we're leaving in 10 minutes, tech rehearsal. I'll fill in the rest tonight. Don't forget, the shows are streaming live tonight and tomorrow night at http://free103point9.org/.
Last night was the first night we didn't rehearse, so I went to one of the official Deep Wireless events, a "performance" of "Kontakte," an electronic music piece by Karlheinz Stockhausen -- I put performance in quotes because it was just a listening experience, but on Darren's amazing 8-channel surround system. There were three other radio art pieces as well, all similarly abstract but pretty mind-blowing in Octophonic Sound. We actually have a piece in one of the shows called Octophonic Sound, we didn't realize that Darren was really using it! And it will be used for our shows as well, he's got a hand-held controller that he moves around in space to direct the 8 channels and "spatialize" the sound. How far out is that?
Dan had to stay back in the room and do some major surgery on the script since it was running about 25% over time. He was pretty bummed about that, but as he always says to me, you've just got to roll with it baby!
There are many more things to tell you, but we're leaving in 10 minutes, tech rehearsal. I'll fill in the rest tonight. Don't forget, the shows are streaming live tonight and tomorrow night at http://free103point9.org/.
Monday, May 21, 2007
1st rehearsal
Well, more of a read-through really. We met Stacey DePass, our female actor/singer -- she's great, funny, really versatile, able to switch from one character voice to another in a split second.
Also Stephen Latigan, who's the head guy for Grip Radio. Not really an actor though -- I think we're going to proceed without him. The third collaborator, Mark Ellis, couldn't be there yesterday, we'll be meeting him this evening. His reputation is that like Stacey, he's really talented.
We also met Kerry, who will be Stage Technician for us. Very cool guy, lots of talents, he's into electro-acoustics, spatial sound, Darren's whole thing with 8-channel surround sound. And Darren of course -- also a great guy, very helpful.
Oh yeah, and a bunch of other people at CKLN, where in addition to the read-through (of "OBL on the Half-Shell," the Saturday night script) we recorded voice parts for Jim Whelton's radio play. He's the one also known as Harmon e. Phraisyar. Or maybe that's just the name of his show.
Got back around 8 and spent the next 6 hours crafting all of the CD cues for the Friday script, "Transistorized Feedback." We rehearse that one tonight at 7, I'm still not finished but pretty close. But I still have to do the same thing for the OBL script -- maybe by Wednesday I can get free of this editing phase of the project! Or as they say here in Toronno, "pro-ject" (with a long "o."
Time for breakfast.
Also Stephen Latigan, who's the head guy for Grip Radio. Not really an actor though -- I think we're going to proceed without him. The third collaborator, Mark Ellis, couldn't be there yesterday, we'll be meeting him this evening. His reputation is that like Stacey, he's really talented.
We also met Kerry, who will be Stage Technician for us. Very cool guy, lots of talents, he's into electro-acoustics, spatial sound, Darren's whole thing with 8-channel surround sound. And Darren of course -- also a great guy, very helpful.
Oh yeah, and a bunch of other people at CKLN, where in addition to the read-through (of "OBL on the Half-Shell," the Saturday night script) we recorded voice parts for Jim Whelton's radio play. He's the one also known as Harmon e. Phraisyar. Or maybe that's just the name of his show.
Got back around 8 and spent the next 6 hours crafting all of the CD cues for the Friday script, "Transistorized Feedback." We rehearse that one tonight at 7, I'm still not finished but pretty close. But I still have to do the same thing for the OBL script -- maybe by Wednesday I can get free of this editing phase of the project! Or as they say here in Toronno, "pro-ject" (with a long "o."
Time for breakfast.
Sunday, May 20, 2007
STREAMING
Want to listen live to our performances Friday and Saturday night? They'll be streaming on http://free103point9.org/ -- 9 pm both nights!
we're here
Yep, in Toronto now. Yesterday was a 12-hour travel day, from Portland to LaGuardia, then to Buffalo, then by bus to Toronto.
In the 3-hour layover at LaGuardia, we walked around the food court with my flash recorder and microphone interviewing a variety of people on their opinions of Canada and Canadians -- some pretty funny stuff. We're going to edit clips from those (and the ones I did in Portland last week) with some we record here, with Canadians' opinions about America. A subversive edit, mind you. That's for our Saturday show, "Osama on the Half Shell." We wondered why nobody in Security stopped us, or even asked what we were doing. I'm sure they would've been interested to hear the discussions of the possibility that bin Laden is hiding out somewhere in Canada...
Buffalo was extremely crappy, we had to take the number 24 bus from the airport to the Greyhound terminal across town, so got to see some of the slummier areas around town. Also passed the Wonder Bread bakery! The 3-hour bus ride to Toronto included a stop at Customs, which was a pretty annoying interrogation, may I see your passport please? We made a stop at Niagra Falls too -- I saw a couple of honeymoon hotels, but never got a glimpse of the falls. So I read my book and snoozed a little.
When we arrived in Toronto, we were met by Chris and Hilary, who drove us to our "residence" -- a big dormitory on the University of Toronto campus. It's fine, and I've got internet access with an ethernet cable (not much in the way of free wireless like good old Portland). After we dropped off our stuff, we went out with them to a nearby pub, had a few beers and some fun.
Now we're heading over to CKLN, the center of the universe in terms of Radio Art. We'll be meeting some of our collaborators, Darren Copeland and I think Nadene too. Dan wants to start some script readthroughs today to cast some of the parts, but one of the guys, Mark, won't even be there so I don't know how far we'll get. I think it's more of a meet and great, meet the meat.
Then after that, we're supposed to participate in somebody's experimental radio theater project -- his name is Harmon e. Phraysiar. I'll tell you more later, and start attaching pictures and audio files as soon as I figure out how to do it!
In the 3-hour layover at LaGuardia, we walked around the food court with my flash recorder and microphone interviewing a variety of people on their opinions of Canada and Canadians -- some pretty funny stuff. We're going to edit clips from those (and the ones I did in Portland last week) with some we record here, with Canadians' opinions about America. A subversive edit, mind you. That's for our Saturday show, "Osama on the Half Shell." We wondered why nobody in Security stopped us, or even asked what we were doing. I'm sure they would've been interested to hear the discussions of the possibility that bin Laden is hiding out somewhere in Canada...
Buffalo was extremely crappy, we had to take the number 24 bus from the airport to the Greyhound terminal across town, so got to see some of the slummier areas around town. Also passed the Wonder Bread bakery! The 3-hour bus ride to Toronto included a stop at Customs, which was a pretty annoying interrogation, may I see your passport please? We made a stop at Niagra Falls too -- I saw a couple of honeymoon hotels, but never got a glimpse of the falls. So I read my book and snoozed a little.
When we arrived in Toronto, we were met by Chris and Hilary, who drove us to our "residence" -- a big dormitory on the University of Toronto campus. It's fine, and I've got internet access with an ethernet cable (not much in the way of free wireless like good old Portland). After we dropped off our stuff, we went out with them to a nearby pub, had a few beers and some fun.
Now we're heading over to CKLN, the center of the universe in terms of Radio Art. We'll be meeting some of our collaborators, Darren Copeland and I think Nadene too. Dan wants to start some script readthroughs today to cast some of the parts, but one of the guys, Mark, won't even be there so I don't know how far we'll get. I think it's more of a meet and great, meet the meat.
Then after that, we're supposed to participate in somebody's experimental radio theater project -- his name is Harmon e. Phraysiar. I'll tell you more later, and start attaching pictures and audio files as soon as I figure out how to do it!
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