Alaska Tapes. An Artist Collective.

Not quite a record label. Not based in Alaska. Alaska Tapes, based in Chicago, started as a fictitious record label for the band/artist We/Or/Me. It took its obscure and misleading name from some audiotapes that documented a series of talks given by the artist's father in Alaska in 1984. It is now less a fictitious record label, and more an actual artist collective of sorts. It hopes to put out some records, put on some shows, and bring some people together. It will strive to create a supportive environment for creative expression and meaningful conversations. It will favor the word community over the word scene. So far it involves the following people/artists: Husayn Allmart, Minister of Communications Andrew Malo, musical artist Angela Malo, visual artist We/Or/Me, musical artist Liza Mitchell, photographer Soon it will involve others. var _gaq = _gaq || []; _gaq.push(['_setAccount', 'UA-27697539-1']); _gaq.push(['_trackPageview']); (function() { var ga = document.createElement('script'); ga.type = 'text/javascript'; ga.async = true; ga.src = ('https:' == document.location.protocol ? 'https://ssl' : 'http://www') + '.google-analytics.com/ga.js'; var s = document.getElementsByTagName('script')[0]; s.parentNode.insertBefore(ga, s); })();

[heritagebicycles]

Schoolin’ Chicago cyclist (at Heritage Bicycles General Store)

[alaskatapes-blog]

The wonderful Heritage General Store, hosting the We/or/Me album launch show tomorrow night at 8pm.

[weorme]

Me and Vashti.

[alaskatapes-blog]

Album drop show tomorrow night at Heritage General Store in Chicago! 8pm.

[awesomepeoplereading]

John Steinbeck reads.

[weorme]

Our new record is coming. Help us fund it.

[alaskatapes-blog]

What they said.

[alaskatapes-blog]

Napowan performs on Saturday night. Great set.

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Getting ready for the show on Saturday night.

[alaskatapes-blog]

The program for the show tomorrow night. Curt's Cafe, 7pm.

[alaskatapes-blog]

We got a show coming up! The Alaska Tapes Fall show - newly formed Napowan and We/Or/Me will be playing music, Liza Mitchell will be showing her amazing photography, Angela Malo and Luthando Mazibuko will be showing recent paintings, and Alan Hatchett will show an excerpt from and discuss a recent movie he edited, The Beat Hotel. Plus it’s all hosted at Curt’s Cafe in Evanston with a full service cafe, a pizza place that’s part of a training program for at-risk youth, big fluffy couches and even a kids area. How does it get better than that? I’ll tell you - it doesn’t.

[alaskatapes-blog]

Tomorrow!

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Andrew Malo, one half of Napowan, practices for the upcoming how with his daughter.

[alaskatapes-blog]

The Beat Hotel, a documentary about the in/famous gathering place for Beat artists in France. Alan, one of the filmmakers, will be at the Alaska Tapes Fall show talking about the film and his experience. Be there!

Curt's Cafe in Evanston, 7pm, October 27.

[alaskatapes-blog]

I get tired just thinking about how much work and time went into this.

[seasonswillchange]

[byturns]

This is what eastern Massachusetts was like when I drove throughout last week.

[alaskatapes-blog]

Write freely and as rapidly as possible and throw the whole thing on paper. Never correct or rewrite until the whole thing is down. Rewrite in process is usually found to be an excuse for not going on. It also interferes with flow and rhythm which can only come from a kind of unconscious association with the material.

True writing tip from John Steinbeck.

[alaskatapes-blog]

[lizabean-blog-blog]

Will be crossing “my photography displayed at a local coffee house” off of my bucket list on October 27th!  Whoot!

[alaskatapes-blog]

Go, Liza!

[likeafieldmouse-deactivated2015]

[alaskatapes-blog]

One of my heroes, always troubling the waters.

[longreads]

Moderately successful indie rock groups like Grizzly Bear have found it difficult to earn a living that would place them solidly in the middle class:

For much of the late-twentieth century, you might have assumed that musicians with a top-twenty sales week and a Radio City show—say, the U2 tour in 1984, after The Unforgettable Fire—made at least as much as their dentists. Those days are long and irretrievably gone, but some of the mental habits linger. ‘People probably have an inflated idea of what we make,’ says Droste. ‘Bands appear so much bigger than they really are now, because no one’s buying records. But they’ll go to giant shows.’ Grizzly Bear tours for the bulk of its income, like most bands; licensing a song might provide each member with ‘a nice little “Yay, I don’t have to pay rent for two months.” ’ They don’t all have health insurance. Droste’s covered via his husband, Chad, an interior designer; they live in the same 450-square-foot Williamsburg apartment he occupied before Yellow House. When the band tours, it can afford a bus, an extra keyboard player, and sound and lighting engineers. (That U2 tour had a wardrobe manager.) After covering expenses like recording, publicity, and all the other machinery of a successful act (‘Agents, lawyers, tour managers, the merch girl, the venues take a merch cut; Ticketmaster takes their cut; the manager gets a percentage; publishers get a percentage’), Grizzly Bear’s members bring home … well, they’d rather not get into it. ‘I just think it’s inappropriate,’ says Droste. ‘Obviously we’re surviving. Some of us have health insurance, some of us don’t, we basically all live in the same places, no one’s renting private jets. Come to your own conclusions.’

“Grizzly Bear Members Are Indie-Rock Royalty, But What Does That Buy Them in 2012?” — Nitsuh Abebe, New York magazine

More by Abebe

[alaskatapes-blog]

We got a show coming up! The Alaska Tapes Fall show - newly formed Napowan and We/Or/Me will be playing music, Liza Mitchell will be showing her amazing photography, Angela Malo and Luthando Mazibuko will be showing recent paintings, and Alan Hatchett will show an excerpt from and discuss a recent movie he edited, The Beat Hotel. Plus it's all hosted at Curt's Cafe in Evanston with a full service cafe, a pizza place that's part of a training program for at-risk youth, big fluffy couches and even a kids area. How does it get better than that? I'll tell you - it doesn't.