leftovers

There have been a lot of random things happening and unfortunately I haven't been good about blogging this year so let's play catch-up! These photos are not at all in the right order but I'm too lazy to rearrange them so I'll just discuss the events out-of-0rder. These first two pictures are from an afternoon at MEAT Clown Studios in North Hollywood. This is me as the "Meat Magician." This is Dylan as the British "Meat Clown." MEAT Clown is sort of the mascot for The Stranger Page , a website and "outsider art" studio ran by my friend Shawn, who directed my music video for "Alien Nation." He and his team have been making these YouTube videos that parody local television commercials, for "discount meat products" featuring their spokesperson, Meat Clown. Several different people have participated now, portraying different Meat Clowns. They film them in front of a green screen and are, for the most par...

The title of the post is a Scritti Politti song but in reality, July is already here (and almost half-way over - how did that happen?!?!) The month kicked off with a bang because on June 30th the Traitors and I had a show at Que Sera in Long Beach, performing at our friends Crush's record preview party. They played all new songs and it was a fun night! After we played, my friend Brad aka Swivek performed and I helped out on stage with the backing tracks. Brandon, Me, Myles and Elene on stage at Que Sera. Photo by Luther Orrick at Double Agent Photo . That night after the show, Brandon went to LAX to pick up our sister Adrienne who arrived around midnight! I didn't get to see her until the next day for lunch, when I met her, Angie, Dylan and "the other Adrienne" (Pearson) at Kabuki for happy hour! Me and Adrienne at Kabuki for Happy Hour - in the Sunset/Vine District! After work, we all went over to Brandon and Angie's where we met mom, who Brandon had just pic...

June is always a fun, busy month for me, not least of which because my birthday is on June 22. It's also the first month of summer, gay pride month, and usually my favorite weather in LA (not too hot yet, but plenty of beautiful, sunny days). This year has been no exception. Kicking off with the video shoot for "Winnipeg Beach" the first weekend in June, we were expecting it to be cloudy and cool which I thought would be appropriate for the video since the initial concept was that I was bringing home part of Winnipeg back to LA in my luggage. However, we were all pleasantly surprised when we got to the beach and it was a gorgeous, warm day! The next weekend was LA Gay Pride and it was a fun one. It was a little mellower than in past years which was probably good for me. We didn't have any out-of-town guests, no gigs or parties, but I did celebrate in the festivities each day. Friday we went to the Purple Party, which was a new free night at the festival grounds ...

It's a nice, lazy Memorial Day and I just finished writing and recording a brand new song, which will serve as a b-side on the forthcoming "Winnipeg Beach" single. A very long time ago, I used to have an imaginary group called DSV which stood for Drees Strecker VanDoren, which included me and two fictional band members, one was a guy (Drees) and the other was a girl (VanDoren). I would draw our album and single covers, probably during class or whenever else I was bored, and make up song titles and lyrics. I only have vague recollections of this, but I remember that one of our "hit" songs was called "Do You Remember" and I only had a basic idea of how the chorus went. Well, this being memorial day, I decided to actually make a song out of that nearly forgotten idea. In the span of about 3 hours, I sat down and came up with the music, recorded it, wrote the lyrics, and recorded the lyrics. It's pretty much done although I will do some mixing and ...

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Wow, it's been a long time since I've done a How I Fell In Love With and this is the first time I've done a city (or even a location). Since I'm gearing up for a fun-filled Vegas mini-weekend, I thought it was a great time to blog this. My obsession with Las Vegas began even before I had ever set foot on the Strip. Back when I was in college, I still hadn't been to many places outside of Kansas, but my parents had taken a few trips to Vegas and I loved hearing their stories about all the lights, casinos, slot machines, entertainers, and the general excitement they seemed to feel towards the city. They would bring back big plastic cups from various casinos, from back when every casino actually had coin slot machines. It's gross to think now that we actually used those cups to drink out of, but back then we thought they were so exotic! When I first discovered the internet, one of my first "online boyfriends" was a kid who lived in Vegas. We had met...

Last night, I performed with the Traitors at the Amp Organization 's "Qore: A night of Queercore/Homocore Music" which took place at Que Sera in Long Beach. For this show, Elene was not able to make it since she has school on most weeknights, so it was just Brandon, Angela and myself. That meant I played the keyboard parts on most songs which made it more difficult for me, and I wasn't able to move around as much, but it's a trade off as it also shows my keyboard playing abilities. I was so happy with the turnout of all my friends who came out to see me, I was very surprised that on a Tuesday night in Long Beach we actually had a decent showing. Back when I was with Shitting Glitter, I always dreaded Long Beach shows because I think we had a few good ones and then I remember one horrible one where tons of people came to see the opening act, a solo acoustic "girl with a guitar," and then proceeded to quickly file out as soon as we started setting up, a...

The first printed review of my album is in the current issue of Frontiers In LA, which is our local magazine targeted towards the gay population here in Southern California. I'm completely thrilled with the review which is overwhelmingly positive, which just a dash of constructive criticism which gives it some credibility. Although personally, I think my lyrics for "A Modern Life" and "Alien Nation" are brilliant distillations on modern culture.

<a href="http://devintait.bandcamp.com/album/its-never-the-way-you-imagine-it">It's Never The Way You Imagine It by Devin Tait</a> My album is out and I can't even begin to describe what feelings of relief/joy/excitement/fear that I am filled with! Overall I'm just happy. I can't believe after so many years I finally did this - and with over a month to spare before the end of the world! (May 21, according to the picketers down the street from my office.)

&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;a href="http://devintait.bandcamp.com/album/alien-nation-single"&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt;Alien Nation (Single) by Devin Tait&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;lt;/a&amp;amp;amp;amp;amp;gt; Tomorrow is the "official" release date (which gives me time to actually print up the inserts and burn the CD's tonight) but my debut single, "Alien Nation" is now available on the website Bandcamp ( devintait.bandcamp.com ). In my mad rush of planning to get everything done for this single and album release, I had gotten it timed down to the last minute of course. Once I had finished the album and mastered it, I sent it off to the factory and while that was happening, I finished up the b-sides for the single (mainly just recording new vocals as the instrumental tracks were pretty much finished) and creating the artwork. Thanks to Shawn Sagen, of www.thestrangerpage.com , who directed the video for "Alien Nation" which we filmed w...

This is my first blog entry of 2011 and it's something very exciting... I'm here to announce the release date for my debut solo album, "It's Never The Way You Imagine It." Brandon and I worked on the mastering last night and I'm 99% happy with it - there are just three small tweaks I want to make before I send it off to the plant. I've set the release date for April 19th to allow time for manufacturing and some pre-planning before the release. I'm going to release the single "Alien Nation" a week before the album... possibly in CD1 and CD2 formats with different bonus tracks and artwork on each one. This album has been a long time in the making. Going back to what can be attributed as the "beginning," I bought my Apple iMac computer in March of 2005 and that's when I began learning how to produce music on my own. Before this point, I had just sort of written songs in my head, or scribbled/typed out lyrics and ideas. I had e...

Tons of great new music this year! Here's my top 10. 10. Hunters of the Night - Devin Tait It might be self-indulgent to start my list off with one of my own songs, but at least I'm being humble by giving it the lowest position, right? This was a song that I quickly recorded to release onto YouTube for Valentine's Day, 2011, as an accompaniment to a slideshow of photos taken by my friend, Luther Orrick, to promote his photography company. The original song is by Mr. Mister, a group from the '80's who I still love. I remember when I was young, those guys were on the radio all the time but I really loved their songs "Broken Wings," "Kyrie" and "Is It Love." My friend Brad aka Swivek had introduced me to this blog called Bottom Feeders: The Ass End o f the 80's that examined all the Billboard charting singles from the 1980's which never cracked the top 40. It's a fascinating read. Anyhoo, "Hunters of the Night...

We slept in and had lunch with Luther and Andrew and I started making cookies since Connor was coming over. I realized that I pretty much hate New Years Eve and every year end up having at best, just a decent night, or at worst, full on trauma! So, to curb any misbegotten notion of trying to go out on what we call "amateur night," I told Dylan to let Jennie know that we'd be willing to babysit Connor for the night. As luck would have it, Jennie hadn't made any plans for a sitter yet, but New Year's Eve is also her birthday and she was very thrilled with our offer! Jennie and Sean came over to drop Connor off in the afternoon while Luther and Andrew were still packing their stuff up so for awhile we had a full house. Soon, though, all the adults left and it was just us with Connor. We had seen Connor several times lately so he wasn't shy at all and immediately started playing with his toys and telling us stories. Once the toys had been played out, we decide...

It was the last work day of the year and it was actually pretty stressful! I was the only one in the office for most of the day, and we had our computer technician coming in to try and fix some of the issues we've been having lately relating to our phone and DSL lines, and he wanted me to get some information from AT&T before he got there, which ended up requiring me to spend over an hour on the phone with various representatives who were mostly all less than helpful. In addition, I was stressing out over the fact that my holiday bonus still had not been deposited into my account and neither had my regular payroll, which normally goes in on the 30th or so I thought. So, my bank account was overdrawn and I didn't know what to do about it. Luckily, Dylan was out and about with my car since he went back up to Valencia to pick up the new TV, and I found that there was a Union Bank up near where he was, so he agreed to go deposit some money into my account so that I wouldn...

I started using Facebook Ads to promote the page for Devin Tait & the Traitors, and today it seems to have paid off in the form of one new "fan" that none of us know (you can check by clicking on the person to see if you have any mutual friends). I know it's a small thing - but it's really cool to me. Sometimes I get frustrated that I don't have very many fans on my page, but considering I don't have any albums released yet, and I am really just starting out, I guess it's normal. Sometimes it just doesn't gel with my delusions of grandeur I guess! After work I went to the airport to pick Marc up, he was coming back from spending the holidays with his family up in Grass Valley. I got there before his plane landed so I just decided to park in the lot which I always think is nice for people to do when they pick me up from the airport. It seems so rushed when someone just pulls up and expects you to throw yourself and your luggage into the car. W...

It was back to work, but it's a short week and most people are still out for the holidays, so it really wasn't like being completely back to work. Very relaxing and a chance to get caught up on some stuff. After work, I walked over to Ryan's house. Dylan was already there and so was Von, and David. Von is in town for the holidays and wanted to get together with Ryan so we had all planned to meet and hang out. Ryan suggested we go to Te'Kila which sounded fine to all of us - I especially wanted to go since it's in the Entertainment District and I haven't been there yet. I like to try and go to all the bars and restaurants, actually all the businesses, in our BID so I know what they are like. We walked down since it's just a few blocks from Ryan and David's apartment. It was really fun and they were having happy hour which meant the drinks and the appetizers were all on sale for really decent prices - $2 tacos and $5 margaritas! It was ...

I had the day off, but Dylan had to work so he got up and it seemed so cold at the time, but then shortly after he left it was very bright and it started to get hot and I couldn’t sleep so I got up and did some housework. After I did some laundry, dishes, and cleaning up the apartment, I took a bath and then proceeded to watch about 4 hours of Arrested Development. Over the holidays, I’ve completely re-watched Season 3 and now I’m half-way through Season 2 - Geez, I love that show!!!

When I was a kid, I used to look forward so much to going shopping in Hays the day after Christmas. It was my chance to buy the presents I really wanted, with whatever money I had either been given as a gift or saved after all the presents I would by for other people. But shopping on the 26th has, of course, turned into a nightmare and so now you won’t find me anywhere near a store. Dylan and I woke up at noon in Brandon and Angie’s apartment, and Dylan told me that Brandon had texted to see if we were picking them up at the airport. I know Brandon had sent me their itinerary but somehow I had completely screwed it up in my head and I thought they were coming back tomorrow night. I had promised Amy that we would go visit them down in Fullerton and I had been looking forward to it, but I wasn’t sure how to make it all work. I finally just decided that if we got around quickly we could do everything, so I told Dylan we needed to hurry up. We ended up getting to Amy ...

Unlike in the days of youth, I slept in pretty late, knowing that the gift of sleep was the one I wanted the most. Once I got up, I found that Robbie was already awake in the living room and she had made a little plate of cookies for Santa (actually, brownies that Shannon had given me) and that she had seemingly attacked one of my fruitcakes. Anyway, I made coffee and then I went and got Dylan up out of bed. The first presents we opened were from Robbie and they were these ultra-soft robes that felt very luxurious. We put them on right away but I ended up getting hot soon after so I had to take it off and just wear a t-shirt and pajama pants. Then we opened all the gifts that mom and dad had sent and I gave Dylan his gifts. Unfortunately, he had planned to do his shopping on the 23rd which was the day he ended up feeling like he had an ear infection and at my urging to go to the doctor, ended up in the ER after failing to find any other doctor’s office that was open...