#friendly otter

[friendlyotter-diy]

Things We Make With Our Friends PT III: Southern Relocation

My time in Chicago has been waning the past year. This could be because of my graduation from college tomorrow, or it could have come from the series of mentally and financially draining emergency moves undertaken last year. Opportunistically I am going to settle this register by claiming that this move is needed for my art to progress into the next state of being. Not to say that I have felt a plateau effect over my work in Chicago, but I will say that the burning in my chest telling me to leave has only grown in its incessant ember. The next chapter of will be in Tampa, Florida.

Tampa for a few reasons: Family and Creativity.

As some of you may know I was raised in a military family and have moved around quite a bit in my years of existence. I have not lived around most of my family for most of my life, and now I have the opportunity to live around them and experience what it is like to have family immediately in my day-to-day. This is something a lot of people never get to experience and something I have to take advantage of. I need to learn what family means to me, at least the blood related kind.

We will never stop the Otter operations until we are physically or mentally impaired to the point in which I can no longer duplicate cassette tapes in my apartment. The movement will only continue to grow in the musky heat of Flo Rida’s turf. We will be starting a few projects down there.

First, Cult of Pythagoras will complete our migration by the end of summer, and therefore the Tampa scene will be exposed to our free noise chaos. Secondly, I will be doing vocals on a to be determined screamo band with some Recreant members: total emo-violence aspirations. Thirdly, I will be playing with pedals and drum machines in a noise-grind band that apparently has a bunch of shit in the works in lieu of my arrival.

There has been so much accomplished in my years in Chicago, and now it is time to take all these thoughts from the urban area and attempt to spread it in the Keith Urban area. Sun Ra proclaimed that space is the place, and I know that we will be able to create that space where it is needed. Tampa, you need me. I need Tampa. Come 5/15 we can finally be together.

Now to find wage labor job…

 XOXO

Oli 

[friendlyotter-diy]

A Day In Our Ever Transitory Shoes

Today was the day that I woke up and the sun was creeping through the glass brick windows of my basement space. I drank some coffee on the porch. 

  After stirring up my preverbial pot for a good few minutes I began to tick anxiously about the day to come. In this moment I knew that life would slip through my fingers less I channel myself into something that helps me see with a greater perceptive clarity. I headed to the backyard and set up a cardboard surface to paint on.  

I painted 8 envelopes which later housed cassette tapes.

After this my roommate and I came across some people in the alley scuffling. They approached us with a very amphetimine influenced stamper. We went inside and contemplated the police state: I made this. 

Around 1 PM I found myself in school reading about the 1980's AIDS Crisis. I went outside to contemplate my reading. The world seemed to spin around me. The energy from myself and all that is around me became apparently interlocking as I realized we are all in this city together. Soon after this I scurried home in a hurry. 

  I made haste on making time back to my house. Continuing to research for homework I manage to duplicate a few tapes.  

  Before I knew it midnight had come and past. Another day came and past. I'm not sure if I made this time or if this time made me. I do know that someone left this mound of garbage behind my house. 

  I thought I had post this quite some time ago, however it was only saved as a draft. Who I more foolish than I? They who through all this shit out without taking a 10/10 photo.  

- Olin / Friendly Otter  

[friendlyotter-diy]

Things We Create with Our Friends Part II: Group Funeral

“Tires stop, rims keep spinning”

-paul wall

 The last two weeks have been some of the busiest of my life so far. I am coming to the end of my final semester of college. I recorded music for three or four Cult of Pythagoras albums. I made the Comfort Creature, Hivemind, and Cult of Pythagoras/Se Mustard Terrorists/Joli/Deterritorialization tapes. Made some cds for Fat Kid, some CD cover for Tape Monster, and we got through the first disc of Final Fantasy VIII.

For school we wrote a research paper on Judith Butler’s Gender Trouble,  created this website, and got to intimately connect with Excel for my finance class. Also I put flyers in all around my campus for another class. Because of all of this I found myself wanting to put on one more show in Chicago before we head down South for #heatdeath2k16. Enter Group Funeral:

 On the twenty-third of April Joshua Virtue, Mister, and I organized a bunch of our friends to come together and perform in our living room, cop graveyard. Our friends Fling, from Missouri came into town. Mister and I performed a Cult of Pythagoras ritual. Tea Dog came through with his noises. Dharma distorted time measurement operations within the skulls of all attendees. Alexander Adams and I fought linear understanding by fighting each other with our instruments. Joshua Virtue mesmerized the audience with lyrical force atop an ambient recording on a boombox hidden inside the audience.

 Here are pictures

 All of the audio was recorded by Mister. A box set will appear in the future when it needs to.

 The most important part of the night was the convergence of people, place, and time. The depth of conversation, collaborations, and furthering of friendships will only be built upon in the subsequent time we call our lives. Right now Joshua and I are wrapping up the final weeks of college. I am packing up to move soon, stay tuned for more moves.

 =-)

[friendlyotter-diy]

Things we make with our friends Comfort Creature

Spring is upon us. It still snows and is cold. My allergies are on point, and I can no longer justify living in this dank little basement apartment. In order for me to keep my head from sinking into my chest I keep myself occupied indoors. As I turn into myself I simultaneously extend my hand forward into the digital cloud. It is not just the correspondence that keeps me mentally afloat, but the things we are able to do together. The act of creation is the sacred fiber of our being that allows us to connect our separate realities together in a way that brings forth new, intersecting realities for the parties involved. When was the last time you shared physical and spiritual essences with another being? I would highly suggest it, for it is the only way that I can perceive an equitable tomorrow. If we make more art than we have gained more experience in doing so and are hypothetically more able to make the art we wish to make; life acumen. 

Olin, what are you talking about? 

Metaphysically I try to chase my own tail in search of a clearing in a forest that will shed some light onto the infinite plains on which we inhabit. I suppose that creating things is how I am able to pin myself down for that moment in time. 

Comfort Creature comes into play about now.  

Their singer, Dan Ryan, is a longtime friend of mine. Him and I have both stood underneath each of our umbrellas, depending on who needs what when. When he started recording these songs they hit me with a ton of cotton candy bricks. The distorted swirling sounds contained enough harmony to bring the static fuzz to a functional place of conveying this existentialist "I don't know other than I am" vibration to the deepest part of your bones. I wanted to make a package that conveyed this stay-inside and think about the world mood Comfort Creature has captured my interest with. 

Here is what I have designed/created.

The plastic bags were purchased at a local bodega, Dollar Days. Their surplus of vintage goods is coupled with their need to sell a large back catalog of unsold domestic objects. I then used floppy disc labels, supplied en masse, to serve as a printable surface for the stamp kit used on each of the plastic bags. The paint used on the tapes was found in an alley. The insert features the complete lyrics written around a 35mm photo I took years ago of a friend long erased by the sands of time. I then ran the tapes through our dubbing machine and snapped these photos. The band will receive half of the tapes, and can be purchased in person from them or here:

I hope these songs find their way into your head like they have mine. I hear rumors of the band going on tour this summer - only time will tell.

-Olin/Friendly Otter 

[friendlyotter-diy]

Quickly

We are sitting in our website development course listening to my professor talk about putting together a boiler plate. I told him I have no experience in welding or appliance electronics but I'm not sure he got it. After we get home from class today we are packing up trades to

Structures//Agony

Dingleberry 

Bastard Sloth

sick. that means more distro soon, on top of what we have been uploading to the spot. Check out the latest arrivals by clicking distro below. 

Have a good 1

-Olin

[friendlyotter-diy]

Mountain Asleep - Smile Medicine

Kentucky Post hardcore/Emo 

[friendlyotter-diy]

Rainer Maria - Hell and High Water

so midwest 

Rainer Maria broke many hearts back in the day, and now you can relive that in your own life with a two song 7" via Polyvinyl circa 2000

[friendlyotter-diy]

Self Defense Family / Goodtime Boys Split 7"

ooohhhh ahhhhh 

euro import