Jamey Clayberg Music

Rawk Show version 1

noreply@blogger.com (Jamey Clayberg) — Sat, 15 Nov 2008 00:44:00 +0000

Would you like a side-salad with your crow?

noreply@blogger.com (Jamey Clayberg) — Fri, 14 Nov 2008 16:17:00 +0000

It's sad how right Peter Schiff was, and even sadder how vigorously the talking heads chastise him for it.

The Jamey C Feed Roll (with crab and spicy mayo)

noreply@blogger.com (Jamey Clayberg) — Tue, 11 Nov 2008 17:16:00 +0000

A few of my favorite blogs/sites I read (via Google Reader.)

General Info/entertainment:
Mental Floss Wee-bit nerdy but very entertaining blog, switched to this from BoingBoing after they lost their minds and started posting the same things over and over (and expecting different results.)

PostSecret one of my all-time faves, people write secrets on postcards and send them to this guy. Heartbreaking and eye-opening.

Seth's Blog Seth Godin is a marketing guru and illuminates culture and the web with serious skill.

Design-related:
Josh Spear A "what's hot" trend site that successfully meshes actual hotness and trend spotting with a slight dash of pretension.

Design*Sponge As a greeting card designer I have to keep one eye on what's going on with the forward-thinking trendy ladies out there (you know who you are.) This site does it best imho.

Yummy Fresh Grain Feed Lots of vintage 60's-ish design posted about here.

Font Feed Great font-centric design here.

Music-related:
Stereogum Less tunnel-vision snobbery than Pitchfork and always lots of posts here about indie music and such.

Music Thing Synth and gear tweaking-centric blog, I'm a sucker for interesting instruments and such.

Faith/Philosophy:
Revolution In Jesusland I don't always agree with this guy but I very much appreciate his socially-conscious look at faith.

I also read a bunch of personal blogs (friends and family,) maybe post them too sometime.

Pumpkins + Sword = Fun

noreply@blogger.com (Jamey Clayberg) — Mon, 10 Nov 2008 21:36:00 +0000

My boy G bought himself a sword at the Dogwood Festival last year so after the Jack O Lanterns rotted we tested the ninja-osity of his blade.

Time-lapse drawing

noreply@blogger.com (Jamey Clayberg) — Wed, 05 Nov 2008 16:41:00 +0000

After playing an acoustic set at Love Out Loud I did a big ole' live drawing, took me about 40 minutes.

Live Drawing, Love Out Loud Festival 2008 from Jamey Clayberg on Vimeo.

The Cry of the Dinosaur

noreply@blogger.com (Jamey Clayberg) — Tue, 28 Oct 2008 19:14:00 +0000

Every so often I catch (second-hand but occasionally first-hand) a quote from a seasoned business-person that catches me off guard. A senior leader of a Christian company says (at the urinal) they sometimes wish their company could just be a business and not a ministry too, a boss says he'd rather ask forgiveness then ask permission (after telling me to scan an illustration out of a magazine to put on a t-shirt), an employee of a media company threatens to fire an authors son if he doesn't comply with the changes they demand he make to his book.

But there's one quote I've heard over and over in articles, interviews, in person and in the back of my own mind.

"But this is how we've always done it!"

You've heard it too, or been given it as subtext, perhaps in subtle push-back from a co-worker when you mention a New Thing you think should be done. Let's call it The Cry of the Dinosaur. New ideas, experiments, combinations or opportunities get shouted down beneath it all the time.

Stability and familiarity are fantastic, they're comforting and evidence that things work well (the Dinosaur is big and meaty, he has survived just fine for a long time thank you very much.) And I'm self-aware enough to recognize I'm a risk-taker, and perhaps one of these days I'll jump out of my rut in an effort to stay flexible and get eaten by a bigger Dino; but I'd rather get chomped trying to find new life then slowly, painfully run myself into a pile of white bones at the bottom of my rut.

"Fiscal responsibility!" the careful business people shout, "We have employees to think about." The church leaders (clutching their three-point sermons) cry "We walk the narrow way, we need to carefully shepherd the congregation!" And finally (and most honestly) we all say inside, "Doing something new is scary and hard!" Which is totally and historically true.

I too stick to my rut, it's nice, I can run along with near-abandon, blissfully void of decision making, self-doubt, or failure. It's REALLY nice. But then the internet gets built, and gas gets super-expensive, and people stop reading books because they prefer movies and video games, and people stop going to church because it's rote and the traditional service format doesn't connect to their life, or the unflappable U.S. housing market takes a dive. The rut gets blown up, man, all the time, and the echo of our cry reverberates back in time through a thousand different states of "normal" that are gone forever.

"But this is how we've always done it!"

I'm not pointing fingers, the four pointing back at me are real and permeate my actions every day. It's a human thing. Maybe even a God thing. This is just a reminder (mostly to myself) to take every opportunity I can to do a Dino-check. Do I believe what I believe legitimately, deeply, or is it just an easy platitude? Is this the only way to promote this product, or just the way we've always done it? Should I eat this amount of pizza even though I'm in my 30's now? From time to time we need to shut our toothy jaws and pop our pebble-eyed heads over the edge of the rut, just to check and make sure there's not a bulldozer up ahead filling it in, or some tasty smaller Dinos running around up there we could get a mouthful of, or a world around us we could never imagine existed on our narrow, singular path.

Dinosaur drawing by Jon Huckeby

Evernote: For the creatively schizo

noreply@blogger.com (Jamey Clayberg) — Fri, 17 Oct 2008 13:50:00 +0000

I've been living with Evernote for a bit and really really (did I say really) love it. Evernote is the first piece of software that works the way my brain fails to work AND built into Evernote are the means to harness the schizo-manic-popcorn nature of my mind. I can access my "stuff" anywhere I can access the internet, and I can add things to it with my Iphone. I'm using Evernote for three things; Research, Notes, and Document Storage. Me show you.

Research: I'm into way too many things. I love making music and design and art and film and writing and photography and etc etc etc. I want to work in, dabble in, monkey with and be involved in all of these things, but this does not a productive person make (alas.) I have files and documents and images, sketches, half-done book covers... In general, I can't ever find what I want to, I lose web links, I can't find that pic of the purple and gold cut-paper flower thing I wanted to remember, or the amazing interior I want to save for inspiration. Even when I save images or bookmarks, sorting through them can be counter-productive. In comes Evernote. Whatever I'm doing: browsing design sites, taking pics of locations I want to remember or compiling information about a subject I want to write about, I throw it into Evernote (into a notebook of like subjects,) tag it, and there you go. When I want to find it again I search by the name I gave it (if I remember) or by the tags I assigned to it or even just browse the notebook I put it in (click image below for a larger view of my "design" notebook.)

Notes: My wife thinks it's funny how I write lists. I don't know why, but I work things out making lists. I can get my lists off napkins and get them up on Evernote, I can even record snippets of songs I'm working on or record my father-in-law's astonishing snoring in the night at Red Rock Canyon and upload these files to Evernote for later use (hilarity and efficiency together at last.

Document Storage: My mind likes new, unexpected chaos. This means I can never find that manual for the delay pedal I bought a year ago, never find the list I wrote of songs I want to get posted to Pump Audio; the sad tale jumbles on. Evernote takes this problem and gives me a centralized place to store it all. What replacement water filter goes in my fridge? Search Evernote for the word "refrigerator," or browse through the "manual" tags or whatever. Found. Search the "music" notebook for lyrics to one of my songs? Found again. Me like.

Another amazing thing is the text recognition in photos. It doesn't always work for me (I have horrible handwriting) but it gets it right enough to make this a very compelling feature.

It's not perfect, but for me it's very near perfection; it's like someone asked me what I really wanted in an app and then built it. I actually feel less burdened by the many things I want to keep tabs on, and that gives me more creative "juice" to put towards whatever whim I'm chasing at the moment. So for that I have to tip my many hats to the good folks at Evernote. Bravo...

RJDJ Iphone Application

noreply@blogger.com (Jamey Clayberg) — Thu, 16 Oct 2008 15:07:00 +0000

VERY cool app, plays music that reacts to the environment around it, so if you're on a noisy street the melody gets busy, if in a quiet room the melody gets simple and quiet. Nifty future-stuff there kids...

Alien Victory, Rodent Slain

noreply@blogger.com (Jamey Clayberg) — Tue, 07 Oct 2008 20:47:00 +0000

Whilst cleaning out my Iphoto (in prep for switching to a new computer) I found this pic I shot a few years ago. Inspired by a Kirk Demarais pic of an action figure riding on the back of a deceased and upright squirrel. Yes, I'm afraid the mouse is dead, but we found him that way.

Bible design by Crush

noreply@blogger.com (Jamey Clayberg) — Mon, 06 Oct 2008 19:20:00 +0000

From The Font Feed. Amazing design, a little challenging theologically in the concept but I bet a lot of people will pick it up who otherwise wouldn't touch the black leather with gold letters version.

"Graphic Content" show at JBU

noreply@blogger.com (Jamey Clayberg) — Fri, 03 Oct 2008 19:12:00 +0000

My alma mater John Brown University had this great show in their gallery last month, so I grabbed a few Iphone pics. Very inspiring stuff, lots of bands and design houses I like were represented, and it was fun to see the silk-screen stuff in person; rich inks and the tactile sense of the paper and all. Coolio.

Jamey live at Love Out Loud Festival Oct. 4

noreply@blogger.com (Jamey Clayberg) — Wed, 24 Sep 2008 13:46:00 +0000

I'll be throwin down some folky acoustic jams Oct 4th 6:30 at the Pontiac Coffee House in Springdale, AR (map below.) Charge is $6 and goes towards a great cause via Artserve International. There will be art on display and for sale and a couple people (including myself) are doing live painting on site during the music. Also playing are Fool For Now and Listener Project. Pontiac will have coffee and other beverages on sale. Here are some samples of the folktastic rawk I'll be delivering.

"I Found It First" download

"Under The Sun" download

"Faceblind (acoustic)" download

View Larger Map

The future's so bright...

noreply@blogger.com (Jamey Clayberg) — Mon, 22 Sep 2008 20:29:00 +0000

Follow up to my last post about current slang and how RAD Rad was (and could be again.) In the middle of all this mortgage doom-rumble, violence and political brew-ha-ha I could sure use a news flash from this station, call letters R.A.D..

Closest thing to a rant on this blog

noreply@blogger.com (Jamey Clayberg) — Thu, 18 Sep 2008 22:14:00 +0000

I don't usually (read not ever) rant or vent on this blog but if I see or hear the phrases "throw (insert name here) under the bus" or "I know, right?" one more time I think I shall blow a fuse. I propose a swift return to the slang of the early-to-mid 1980's with the use of (and not ironically) "rad," "bitchen," and "totally, dude."
(That's me on the left in the mid-90's ironically dressing 80's btw. And yes, I let the Peavey logo peek through the D in "RAD" because Peavey is so rad and you know it.)

Photo provided by Kirk Demarais from JBU Rock

Sharpie Mayhem and Stanley Kubrick

noreply@blogger.com (Jamey Clayberg) — Fri, 12 Sep 2008 13:58:00 +0000

This may look like convoluted madness, but really it's the closest I've ever been to figuring out how my brain works, simplifying the tools I use, and (possibly) organizing myself easily and freeing up my mind to "do work." ROCK. This newly birthed "system" was partially inspired by this documentary about Stanley Kubrick's boxes. This system also ensures almost zero data loss, even if the house burns down. TIGHT.

Check the Iphone/Google/Leopard kung fu!

noreply@blogger.com (Jamey Clayberg) — Wed, 10 Sep 2008 18:44:00 +0000

I know how truly geeky this post is but OH. MY. WORD. I've been researching organization software for 6 months, trying to get my scatter-brain a LITTLE together. This week I nearly dropped $200 American dollars on Daylite which if you're a small business is a fantastic product, syncs with your Mac and your Iphone and has contacts, project management, calendar, the works. But I'm just a dude and 2-hundie is way too spendy right now. And I love my Gmail, and I like Google Calendar a lot.

And then the kung-fu. Moments away from clicking "Buy" I discovered that Mac OS X Leopard and Google have some spectacular new syncing abilities, some incredible sword-fight master-style "plays well together" goodness. They are CalDav sync, Gmail and Address Book sync, and IMAP email. I won't go into the grisly techie details but let me put it to you this way; For ZERO dollars I can now synchronize (2-way) my email, contacts and calendars online, on my laptop and on my Iphone. Somewhere a curcuit is buzzing the theme song to a Bruce Lee movie. No MobileMe subscription, no pricey additional software... outstanding.

Project management, billing/expense tracking and opportunities I'm doing (in a very basic way) with a free Backpack account (you get five pages on the free account) and I have yet to figure out an easily sync-able to-do list option that will be on both the Iphone and online, but MAN am I happy to get the other stuff working. I give the air a vicious round-kick of happiness...

KC baby-punk fashion and Tasty Meat

noreply@blogger.com (Jamey Clayberg) — Fri, 29 Aug 2008 18:01:00 +0000

I'm just back from Kansas City, grabbed a few Iphone pics. Hallmark trained us on intensive, lengthy and mind-numbingly technical stuff, but we had fun times at night with the chilled-out group that went. We ate good food (Boca di Bepo (see pic below,) La Bodega (the tasty tasty meat) and The Melting Pot.)

I saw a killer graf piece by ATT/DF crew and got kicked out of the bowels of Union Station (there was a service elevator unlocked so of course we had to explore.) We also got sent off the grounds of the giant Lord of the Rings-ish World War II memorial, and toyed with trying to get kicked out of Skies at the Hyatt to make it an even 3. Shamefully the most rebellious thing we did was check out the historical information of these public facilities.

And of course there was the unforgettable (?) fashion show we saw as part of Hallmark's "Color Week" involving babies-on-crack avant garde cotton-candy-headed ladies and mention of a 35 square foot store. Good times!

There are things about my personality

noreply@blogger.com (Jamey Clayberg) — Fri, 22 Aug 2008 18:49:00 +0000

that get old, one of which is the constant need to start things up, and the other is the need to quit when it's 90% done. SO here's another...

Melissa Moss' amazing art

noreply@blogger.com (Jamey Clayberg) — Thu, 14 Aug 2008 19:47:00 +0000

Not one usually to blog about illustrators but Melissa Moss' fabulous style caught my eye on a recent post at design*sponge. The mid-century infuence reminds me of Tim Biskup with less black paint and more toadstools.

Cafe Momi and the Motley Waitstaff

noreply@blogger.com (Jamey Clayberg) — Tue, 12 Aug 2008 17:59:00 +0000

Some may have seen this on my wife's blog but this is a shot she took of me and my boys playing at being waiters for her birthday supper we made a bit ago. We put signs up saying "Cafe Momi" and had candles and music. Ha ha. She got a kick out of it. I made homemade spaghetti and meatballs which turned out decent (not quite Iron Chef quality.)

ComicCon 08 pics

noreply@blogger.com (Jamey Clayberg) — Wed, 30 Jul 2008 20:51:00 +0000

Had a great time in San Diego, ComicCon was fun and the weather was amazing. Saw some old friends, met some new ones, ate fish tacos on the beach and had my mind blasted by many a comic/pop culture sight. Took a few pics on the Iphone and posted them here on Flickr (Thanks to Kirk D for the Foot wobbler pic.)

Herva - Betting Man (alt mix) free track

noreply@blogger.com (Jamey Clayberg) — Fri, 18 Jul 2008 19:28:00 +0000

Here's a free download of an alternate mix of "Betting Man" from my Herva "The Phantom Power" album (album available for free here.)

"Betting Man (alt mix)" download

Guess The Artist:

noreply@blogger.com (Jamey Clayberg) — Thu, 17 Jul 2008 14:36:00 +0000

Who sketched these radiCOOL characters? (Hints: It's not me and they were done in the late 70's-early 80's.)

My studio, circa 2006

noreply@blogger.com (Jamey Clayberg) — Tue, 15 Jul 2008 15:06:00 +0000

Yesterday I found this old "panoramic" shot I took of my studio room in 2006, since I'm about to re-do my studio (and large portions of my house) I thought I would tag this pic with some info about the things in the room, for archival purposes (cue "Memories.")
Click the picture to see a larger version.

Foot: Phantom of The Forest at ComiCon 2008

noreply@blogger.com (Jamey Clayberg) — Mon, 07 Jul 2008 15:20:00 +0000

Mystery revealed! (see previous post.) The short animated film I did the soundtrack for is official, "Foot: Phantom of the Forest" is done and is playing at the ComicCon film festival in San Diego (July 24th.)

Not only is it playing at the "Con" but Funko is making a Bigfoot Wacky Wobbler bobble-head figure based on the Bigfoot in the film, which should be available (with the DVD) at ComicCon as well. W00t!

I did all of the music for the film (except two short bits) and a lot of the sound design, Mike Becker and Kirk Demarais wrote and directed and Vance Reeser did the animation.