I’m just flabbergasted by last night’s DOMA results. How could we have lost? What plan in Heaven could allow such an injustice? What more do you people want? We give you daily updates. Weekly podcasts. Trenchant interviews. In-studio performances. A public forum. A call-in line. A well-paid staff respected by their peers. Quality control. Over a century’s experience in music criticism and journalism. We are so obviously the single most current, thorough, entertaining and multifaceted local music resource ever.

Ever.

And I firmly believe that.

I also believe this is of note: a short piece on circuit bending, with a complimentary focus on Dallas’ Tree Wave, who also lost last night.

Losers.

Tearing it down (every once in a while),

dconstruction

Congratulations to: Salim Nourallah (best song, best producer, best album), Sorta (best act), The Deathray Davies (best indie rock), Chris Holt (musician of the year, best instrumentalist), Kristy Kruger (best female vocalist), John Dufilho (best male vocalist), Texas Gigs (best web whatever), Boys Named Sue (best roots/country), The Valentines (best new act), The pAper chAse (best experimental), Steve Austin (best rap/hip-hop), Fair to Midland (best metal) - and probably others I can’t recall or don’t care to.

So, I have the show all ready to be posted, but I can’t. Some problem with my media file hosting service. I spent 150% of my lunch break trying to fix the problem, but to no avail.

Sorry.

I hope to have the newest podcast with Sam Machkovech up tomorrow.

Auspicious start to a resurrection, no?

Tearing it apart - and my hair out,

Lindsay

You’re not going to believe it:

We’re back.

It is with great pleasure that we announce the return of dconstruction.org, arriving back on the scene with a new podcast, a new schedule and a new staff member - but the same old swagger, snark and self-importance.

First: the podcasts. The first Monday of every month (like this coming Monday) will debut a new podcast like those you’ve come to know and love. Robert and Lindsay will sit down with some of DFW’s most influential and interesting artists, critics and promoters to listen to and discuss local music.

But then, every third Monday, we’ll release a new, music-only podcast like the one we did January 1st. We received a great deal of positive feedback from that episode, so have decided to make it a permanent feature of the site. The music for these podcasts will be selected alternately by Lindsay, Robert and…

…WeShotJR. We recently received an email from the mysterious authors of WeShotJR.blogspot.com alerting us of their presence on the scene. Immediately, we liked what we read. Crisp prose, thoughtful criticism and a no-nonsense approach to a scene that direly needs a good shaking. We liked WeShotJR so much that we invited them to join the dconstruction.org fold – and they agreed. WeShotJR.com was registered shortly thereafter and we’ll be helping them transition from their Blogspot home to a much bigger, better and more attractive permanent home.

But more importantly, WeShotJR will be contributing bi-weekly columns to the dconstruction.org site. Through these we hope to bring a stronger focus on the greater whole of North Texas music – including Denton and Fort Worth – all while maintaining the requisite level of scrutiny and sarcasm you’ve come to expect from dconstruction.org.

We should clarify that we do not know who are behind WeShotJR. We met them on the Internet, and we’re not embarrassed to admit that. We’ve talked about meeting “IRL,” but have so far just been, you know, trading pics, emails and IMing each other.

What this all means for you, our loyal listeners, is that new dconstruction.org content will be posted every week, including weekly show picks from Robert, Lindsay and WeShotJR. We have in the works more podcast guests, ideas for shorter, more digestible podcasts, dconstruction.org/WeShotJR.com-sponsored concerts and much more.

Not too terribly shabby for a website I know you thought was dead.

Or wished was.

Tearing it down,

dconstruction.org

So, we kicked up a little dust with this last podcast. Our commentary on Cindy Chaffin and TexasGigs.com seems to have raised the ire of quite a few people. To them we say, “Thanks for listening!”

But to the rest of you who might be curious about the hullabaloo, here’s what was said about Cindy:
 

L: Cindy Chaffin has been doing TexasGigs.com and live broadcasts from shows for years now.
R: Well, for a couple – well, TexasGigs for years and live broadcasts for about a year and half.
L: And most recently, she’s been doing podcasts herself with, uh…
R: Because, you know, we haven’t had her on.
L: Right, yeah, well, we think that.
R: Cindy, Cindy: I still love you even though you’re wrong about a lot of shit.
L: She provides an invaluable resource. Uh, and she is the foil, or we are the foil to Cindy, because we are discriminating.
R: Although, you know, Lindsay: I saw her earlier this week and she said, “Hey! I’m not a cheerleader! I’m not a cheerleader! I don’t talk about bands I don’t like. I just don’t bring them up.” And I said, “Well, Cindy. You know, the problem then is, your taste is not particularly great.”
L: OK. We’re going to stop down right now because there was a band, uh, there was an artist that she recently found and recommended. And I was like, “oh, this looks interesting” – until I listened to it. And this is why - Cindy provides a great service; I love her website - I think her taste is off.
R: And, and, well let’s, he asked the question; let’s answer the question. TexasGigs.com tries to be more than just Dallas, but she’s based here. They do - and for our listeners - they provide a very good listing of bands that are worthwhile to go see. And, a listing – they try to do a listing of all bands. But, they point out which bands are worth going to see. They also have Texas Radio One, which plays live music that they will - they will send Cindy or someone else out with a computer and you can listen to the show as it’s being performed. They now do a podcast. And all of that is great. I’m really glad she’s doing it. She has put her heart and soul into it. That’s great. We are just a different animal. We are trying to be critical. She is trying to promote; we are trying to promote, but we are trying to promote only the good and get away from the bad.

And here’s the official response.

But, boy: did people get angry.

And all of that is fine. Amusing, even. It’s not everyday we get called jealous, cynical, drunken, flaming, hipper-than-thou cocksuckers living in our mother’s garage who work in custodial maintenance, drunkenly bloviating incoherent nothings which bolster our unfilled musical egos. And no one seems to like my glasses.

Vitriol aside, we stand behind our words. In brief summary, they were:

1. TexasGigs.com is an invaluable resource
2. We admire Cindy for her work and passion
3. Cindy is not a critic, though we attempt to be
4. We think she likes some crap music

I would think that anyone consuming the work of both TexasGigs.com and dconstruction.org would agree to the first three points. The fourth is a matter of taste. Just like my glasses.

dconstruction

Post script: have you seen the new Texas Gigs? It’s swell.

I know it’s been a long time since we’ve spoken. I feel bad about that. It’s, uh, awkward, you know? Bumping into you like this, after so much silence between us? I really wish it didn’t have to be this way. We should work to make it different. Better.

Next week, why don’t you come around again? I’ll have this place cleaned up and then we can sit down and have a nice long conversation about The Valentines. We’ll have coffee - and bring some of those little ginger cookies I like so much. It’ll be nice. After that, we can do this on a regular basis. I promise. I really, really want to see you more often. You’re important to me. Really important.

But, until next week, read this review of Dallas’ own Tah-Dahs. On a similar note, congratulations to The Tah-Dahs for their recent Entertainment Weekly appearance - and then another by The Happy Bullets. And if we’re going to mention the Happy Bullets, we should also mention this.

See? It’s already getting better. I knew it would. We’re too good of friends to let anything get between us for long.

Until next week?

dconstruction

This city is just swimming in talent - and it’s all there for the taking, posted in online classifieds. This post didn’t actually come from Craig’s List, but Backpage.com, the Dallas Observer’s (and other New Times publications’) online classifieds. Regardless of where it came from, it demonstrates every quality of a good classified ad: it’s personal, direct, informative, brief and descriptive.

lead man
posted: November 3, 2005, 11:33 AM
hi my name is laura iknow a guy that would blow you away his voice is bigger and better than geoff tate of queensyche and he can lovesong andmake you feel it with every fiber of your body. he swept me off my feet 10 years in a locl karoke bar when he sang the search is over by survior he also writes his own stuff hes been in 2 bands and hes doen som tecahing as wellof voice there has been acable shot him performing and hes also sang at some of thelocalhotspots which are nolonger here, one time he was playing queensryche and singing i said is that you or geoff dont get me wrong hes doessound alot like geoff tate but he has his own way too , well if you wanna hear more callme at 214 703-9249 oremail me at lowrimorelaura@yahoo.com , he knows how to rock your world if you wanna be a singer he can teach you how so keep rocking

“Oh, wait. Uh-oh; there might be a few errors in there. Dang. But, I’ve already hit ‘post’. Well, I know what I can do:”

remake lead man available
posted: November 3, 2005, 01:39 PM
hi my name islaura i have avocalist that would blow you out of the water his name timothy gavin douglass hes 35 and can take asong especially alove song and make it his own, well ive seen him capture an audience like there was no tommrrow he can also teach voice , he use to rock the 80s and 90s hes still can rock your world now, hes also awriter he makes geoff tate o fqueens ryche sound bad. but we all know that geoff tate is agreatsinger, he sang slient lucidity and you could hear apin drop. well he can make dream theater sound bad alo hes got very powerful vocals.

“Ahh: much better.”

You’ve got a hell of a publicist there, Gavin. Too bad she’s neither silent nor lucid.

Craig’s List is fascinating: a market place, a meeting place, a meat market. Apart from single-handedly decimating the traditional media’s classified revenues, Craig’s List also provides some mighty humor.

To start off a new blog-only segment, “dconstructing craig,” we bring you a fine specimen of local Dallas music classifieds, an ad so compelling and rich that, well, uh: wow. If this is the future of rock, then give me Adult Contemporary Christian.

we are an original rock band that has over 50 songs ,i play guitar and sing and also create, we also have a drummer and we practice all the time,we need serious musicians that are easy to get along with and dont have there head up there ass, we will be recording a cd soon so we need you to complete the sound ,ages between 18 and 33 reply ,im 29 and our drummer is 24 we sound like nirvana,beatles,doors,and a few different heavy metal bands , it depends on the song, anyways we hope to here from you soon because we are ready, are you?

A few things to note:

1. It’s a single sentence. Must be a Joyce fan.
2. “we sound like nirvana, beatles, doors” doesn’t contradict “we are an original rock band,” does it?
3. Every band needs a frontman who can “and also create.” Ability to spell and punctuate optional.
4. I like the super-arbitrary 33-year-old cut-off. Jesus would have just made it.
5. The guy who wrote this is 29 years old. IJS.

Looks like the lovely folks over at Apple have finally updated the iTunes Podcast Directory. We’re back in, though we show up twice. The iTunes buttons at the top and right of the page will now work properly. Please click them.

Thank you, Apple.

We’ve always known Dallas has a fertile music scene, and it seems some other people think so, too. To that end, it’s time for dconstruction.org to acknowledge and welcome some new Dallas-based podcasts to the cast-o-sphere. Obviously, there’s no real comparison between these newcomers and the First, Best and Only True Dallas Music Podcast. Nevertheless, they are worth mentioning. Maybe.

• Texas Gigs: Though by no means a newcomer to the scene - or Internet audio - the interview format with Kate Mackley is certainly new. So far it’s been awkward, fawning, technically inept and an all-around amateur effort - but I ended up listening to the whole thing, anyway. Maybe you will, too.
• Quick’s PodQast: Isn’t that cute and clever? The “Q”? Oh, those savvy corporate brand managers. But despite the Belo-born marketing and affiliation with the stodgy Dallas Morning News, Quick has already become a champion of sorts for local music with their JuQbox (oh, look: more branding). Now, Hunter Hauk comes out with a weekly (?) three-song podcast to highlight more local artists, theoretically with more critical precision than the round-robin lottery of JuQbox. That precision is made suspect with the inclusion of Max Cady in the first episode, and Hunter’s stilted, teleprompter delivery adds little confidence. Still, we here at dconstruction.org know Hunter’s a man of taste and letters, so we await a maturation of his show.
• Dallas Does Indie: Popping, crackling and hissing in a pair of headphones near you, Dallas Does Indie is a low-rent Tracks Up the Tree, playing music that has no tie to Dallas but that the podcast originates from DFW. Some kudos to Jaisen Swords, who runs the site, for including Chet Baker in the inaugural episode.
• Indie Interviews: Another show out of Dallas, but having little to do with Dallas, this podcast sounds very much like an undergrad media project or some starry-eyed demo sent to NPR, but it’s well researched and the access “your host Garrison Reid” gets to bands like Clap Your Hands Say Yeah!, The Decemberists and The Wrens is impressive. Too bad the dynamic and dialogue between “your host Garrison Reid” and his guests are so lackluster. But, we’ll keep listening and waiting for improvement.
• The DFW Localshow: Veering perilously close to trademark infringement upon Chris Ryan’s Local Show, this short podcast seems dedicated to scripted commentary and absolute crap music. Whoever is behind this site, please report to Coke Machine Glow for re-education.

All of these podcasts except Dallas Does Indie and Indie Interviews are without an RSS feed. This matters to very few of you, but I’ll mention it anyway: podcasts should have an RSS feed. It’s kinda the point.

dconstruction.org is in its upcoming podcast episodes trying to feature more demos from more bands, unheard, unsigned and unappreciated. You will probably remain unheard, unsigned and unappreciated, but we’ll do what we can.

We are looking for interested bands or artists to submit their music for review, along with all the appropriate bio and press info. And a statement about why we should care. Contact phone numbers would be great, too: we’re looking into doing telephone interviews with the bands as we review them with our guests. A great opportunity to hear, say Ken Bethea, tell you your music “is, uh, well, interesting - is that a cat you’re playing?” Or maybe Sam Machkovech tell you, “definitely something I’d listen to if I’d just swallowed poison and needed to immediately vomit.” Or even Trey Johnson say, “[nothing].”

You can submit electronically, but please make sure the MP3s you might link to are downloadable. We cannot play what we cannot download.

And of course, we are always open to verbal abuse. Tell us what is shameful or disgusting about our podcast, and how to improve it. Our egos are far too inflated after this month’s D Magazine article.