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An Exclusive FIRST LOOK at Still Frames From Day 2 of the KH 'PROMISE ME' Music Video Shoot

Posted on March 24, 2010 at 05:36 AM

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Drinking: Hater-aid, mango tea, Spanish wines, Oban 14yr single malt scotch

Eating: Dust bunnies and spiderwebs.

Listening to: The Knife Heartbeats Remix, Metallica Sad But True, Catherine Wheel Chrome

Reading: The Agony and the Ecstasy by Irving Stone

Watching TV: Kidnapped Season 1

Watching Features: Alice in Wonderland 3-D, Green Zone

Watching Documentaries: Life in the Undergrowth, Lewis and Clark; The Journey, Man vs. Wild; Belize, What are Dreams? Nova

Wearing: Ben Sherman wax denim, Nike Terminators, tux jacket with tails from Sofia Vintage. I tried the headband-over-the-hair-thing for a sec. Biblical fail. Fine line between Echo Park hipster and Galilee goat herder. 

Happy belated St. Patrick’s Day to all Raccoons!

I’m typing at you right now from Caribou Coffee in Chicago, where the playlist is a sumptuous blend of light, eco-friendly, groove-oriented, mellow jams. 

It’s hard to describe exactly why, but whenever I hear songs that are so intentionally “soothing”, it makes me want to go on a killing spree. I start to feel warm and very panicky. Like I’m locked inside a Volvo with the windows up. I close my eyes and try to block it out, but all I see is Jack Johnson’s cargo shorts and hairy ankles. Fuck. I just want to lie down on an anthill or a bed of rusty nails. -Anything to take my mind off this tampon commercial I’m trapped in. OK, I’m bailing. Hang on.  

(5 min later)

Smart call. I’m now on the couch in my favorite Persian restaurant. This is where my friend Mike and I coined the culturally insensitive phrase, “Hummus or Hamas; Either way it’s THE BOMB.” The owner here sometimes has Thriller breath, but the lunch buffet is insane.

Update: 

I'm looking back with great pride on the Promise Me video shoot this past weekend. Until Saturday, I’d remained in shoebomber recluse mode, by necessity…. The amount of prep involved in a 2-day semi-illegal shoot with a large crew in several different locations was taxing, but ultimately VERY rewarding. This was the most ambitious KH video to date, ironically, for the album’s least commercial song (though most personal).

Explosives, fire, stunts… Many of my film school fantasies finally came true, and my teenage pyromaniac phase seems to have been finally put to constructive use.  Hey West Nyack NY Fire Department, Who’s the “juvenile delinquent” now?

We got incredibly lucky with the Chicago cast and crew (all of whom worked tirelessly, professionally, and with good humor), and luckier still with the Chicago weather, which remained perfectly gloomy and mean for us. Not one arrest, and more surprisingly, not a single injury (aside from the beautiful organ, who laid down her life, Joan of Arc style, for the sake of art).

I'm on pins and needles waiting for you to see the final cut, but for now, please enjoy some individual frames from Day 2, compliments of Director Alan Ortiz and Director of Photography Andrew Benz: More to come...

 

 

 

 

 

Tomorrow Greg and I travel to Miami for the Winter Music Conference. If you're in Florida Thursday night, come find us at Coco DeVille ( CLICK HERE for details ) and on Saturday night for E! Television at Cafeina with Shiny Toy Guns ( CLICK HERE for details ).

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RACCOON SOCIETY UPDATE: Steve Vai Dork Attack and Mat's TOP 10 ECCENTRIC RECLUSES

Posted on March 10, 2010 at 07:53 AM

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Eating: raw ginger, avocados, doing my part to deplete the ocean of unsightly bottom feeders eg: multiple servings of Beau Soleil oysters and shrimp wraps; voluntary mercury poisoning and cilantro overdosing

Drinking: Green Tea daily plus occasional glasses of Sassacaia San Guido and Allegrini Amarone ; Infrequent nips of liquid Hydrocodone – Thank you, Tonsillectomy of 2008

Reading: The Onion, W Magazine – cool article on the restoration of Venetian palaces and eccentric Countesses

Listening to: Coheed and Cambria Mother Superior and Here We Are Juggernaut (on repeat), Love and Rockets Earth Sun Moon, Pixies Doolittle

Watching: Shutter Island.  Documentaries: Examined Life, Cocaine Cowboys

Netflix: Tudors Seasons II & III, Summer Heights High Season 1, and the first 7 minutes of Sniper 3. Sorry all you millions of Tom Beringer fanatics, I tried. I really did.

YouTube: John Hughes Oscar Tribute.  Ski Jump Crashes Ultimate Collection.

-and then I somehow stumbled upon the sonic equivalent of the worst ski jump crash in history: Steve Vai’s Now We Run. -And now you're going to suffer like i did:

Chances are, your face looks something like this right now:

Now We Run? What, as in Now We Run to the Wizard Store to buy a trenchcoat for tonight’s show?

“Wow,” you’re thinking, “somehow that old dork managed to write the worst song of all time, AND combine EVERY SINGLE illegal stage antic into one spectacular catastrophic dork-a-thon.” It’s a tour de dork.

I could almost forgive the inter-band smiling, dueling solos, gorgeous hair, fiddles, the oh-shit-I’m-accidentally-melting-my-own-face-with-the-intensity-of-my-skills expressions, token Asians, etc.. But I'll never understand why Guitar Center dorks still believe in the 1980’s Canadian version of THE FUTURE. Will everyone REALLY be wearing neon? Will we be riding hover boards too?  

If Steve Vai were my dad, I’d say, “Vai, I love you. You know that. But I’d rather watch 10 hours of the Surgery Channel with your wet post-show thong stuffed in my mouth than watch 10 more seconds of you and your geek squad playing that song. Fucking seriously. Oh, and Morpheus called again. He said the Sentinels are attacking, so you need to leave the Matrix immediately.”

Hello and welcome to another edition of the Raccoon Society… -Writing to you  from Chicago where a vampirish fog has just covered everything.

I don’t mean to hate on Vai.. I’m just pregnant and hormonal. For the past two weeks, I’ve retreated into a hyper –antisocial KH cocoon. There’s an insurmountable list of tasks each day as we prep for the upcoming videos, radio promo and tour, so I’ve had little time or reason to leave the house, and truthfully, even less desire.  There are always invitations, but what's the point? With a few exceptions, I always bee-line for a corner after arriving anywhere, have a drink, and inevitably the DJ plays a Fergie remix and I want to stick hot dicks into my eyes.

Speaking of eyes, my raccoon mask is all natural these days; pure old-fashioned Vitamin D deficiency, and I’ve been sleeping in my old lady fur coat.  The more I evade contact with the outside world, the more idiosyncrasies and peculiar quirks start to emerge. There are hints to my future insanity that have me a little worried. Like, were I to die today, these are the 3 handwritten notes to myself that the paramedics would have found in my pockets

#1  -Random thought: I really wish I liked the taste of wedding cake. If I did, I’d order one and just eat it. Has anyone else thought of this? I mean, if you truly love wedding cake, then what kind of idiot just waits around to get invited to a wedding? Are they super expensive or something?

#2  -If I hear Wilco in Starbucks one more time, I’m just gona take off my pants and pee on whoever’s in line in front of me. Arrest me i guess. Press?

#3  -Just learned that adult male Harpy Eagles and Golden Eagles have wingspans large and strong enough to carry away huge prey like goats, caribou, and even humans. Is it possible to train an eagle to fly away with u without killing u first? Consult experts! Can you train them to fly you where you want to go? Draft schematics for a protective suit. 

Aside from supportive tweets from fellow raccoons and the knowledge that these upcoming videos and tour will be monumental, a couple other random items have crossed my path that keep me in good cheer:

Hope that you like as well.

For example, 

this shirt design:

This invention (stole my idea):

 

This video (I watched 5 x):

 

This video (I watched 10 x) :

The Fuse team and I are still working on the architecture for the AskMat Q&A section. Thank you again for everyone's patience.

In the meantime, apropos to my recent behavior, I thought I’d BORE YOU TO DEATH with my list my Top 10 Favorite Eccentric Recluses!  xoxo

#10. Troy Hurtubise (born 1963) Inventor and Conservationist

 

Canadians are all a little fucked, but Troy (featured in the video above) is at a level beyond. He’s noted for his bizarre, yet functional, protective suits (inspired by a childhood bear attack and the movie Robocop) that he tests on himself in incredible and at times dangerous ways.

His newest inventions, allegedly funded on the DL by MIT, include various ray generators (known as Angel Light and God Light) that he claims can allow people to see through objects, detect stealth aircraft, see into flesh, and disable electronic devices. Hurtubise says that the design for the Angel Light came to him in a series of three dreams, and that he was able to build a working device from memory, without the aid of schematics.

#9. John Hughes (1950-2009) Writer Director

A personal hero, a huge creative influence on my generation, and a recent tragic loss, Hughes is the mind behind the seminal teen movies that shaped my life. Among them, National Lampoon's Vacation; Ferris Bueller's Day Off; Weird Science; The Breakfast Club; Some Kind of Wonderful; Sixteen Candles; and Pretty in Pink

To this day, his films offer some of the greatest examples of masterful dialog, the rare marriage of humor with drama, and the perfect use of a pop soundtrack to amplify the emotion of a story.

In a bold move, to avoid the spotlight and bedlam of LA, he moved his family to the North Shore of Chicago, where seclusion only served to heighten his mystery and status.

8. Lyman Wiswell Gilmore jr. (1874-1951) Aviation Pioneer. Hobo.

Gilmore was a very controversial figure.

According to his claims, on May 15 1902 (1.5 yrs head of the Wright Brothers) , in Grass Valley, California, he flew a steam-powered airplane of his own design. Proof of his claim was lost in a 1935 hangar fire.

People say he “stank to high heaven”, vowed to never cut his hair or beard and wore a trench coat even in the middle of summer. The coat contained not only all of his papers but two pistols.

(Any remaining proof was lost when the coat was forcibly taken from him and burned during a delousing. There’s a lesson here.)

7. Griselda Blanco (b 1943) Billionaire Drug Overlord

Griselda, known eventually as La Madrina (“the Godmother”), was raised in poverty in Columbia. Surrounded by violence, she eventually escaped to Miami in the 70’s, where she single-handedly dominated the cocaine trafficking industry, earning at her peak an estimated $10Million weekly in cash. She also was a closet lesbian who, in a bloodthirsty reign of terror, was responsible for over 200 murders, including those of 3 of her husbands (earning another nickname, The Black Widow). “Reclusive” in that she evaded the FBI for a decade, “eccentric” for her sociopathic behavior and collection of fine art, jewels and Haute couture.

6. J.D. Salinger (1919 -2010) Author

 

As well-known for his secrecy as for having written the most influential novel of his generation, Catcher in the Rye, Jerome David Salinger retired to New Hampshire just after its completion in 1951. There, over the next decades, he’d written a number of other novels and stories, but left instructions with his daughter for some to be published only after his death.

A ton of bands reference his work.. notably "Shadrach" by the Beastie Boys (1989) "We Didn't Start the Fire" by Billy Joel (1990)  "Who Wrote Holden Caulfield" by Green Day (1992) "I Wrote Holden Caulfield" by Screeching Weasel (1993) "Get It Right" by The Offspring (1993) "Le Pastie de la Bourgeoisie" by Belle & Sebastian (2005) "6 Minutes" by the Jonas Brothers (2006) "Catcher in the Rye" by Guns N' Roses (2008) on the Chinese Democracy album, and I strongly suspect Young Folks by Peter Bjorn And John 

5. Bobby Fischer (1943 – 2008) Chess Master Social Freak

Fischer emerged very early in his career (13yrs old) as a world-class chess genius, and later as a world-class eccentric. He's makes odd and unreasonable demands before agreeing to a match, and quit many mid-match due to petty disagreements with the event organizers and his opponents. On Sept. 11, 2001, when during a Filipino radio interview, he called the reports of terrorist attacks on the U.S. "wonderful news."

When his U.S. passport was revoked, Japanese authorities detained him for nine months. After Iceland granted him citizenship, he was released to that country, where he lived until his death.

4. Howard Hughes (1905-1976) Aviator, Engineer, Industrialist, Film Producer, Film Director, Philanthropist, and One of the Wealthiest People in the World

Hughes could have been the male equivalent of Nikki Hilton, but instead, he turned his parent’s wealth in the oil industry into a legendary carreer. Unfortunately he also fell to pieces privately in a major way.

He gained prominence from the late 1920s as a maverick film producer, making big-budget and often controversial films. –Shaking up the industry and sexing up the hottest starlets, male and female: Cary Grant, Randolph Scott, Errol Flynn, Carole Lombard (my major crush), Billie Dove, Ida Lupino, Bette Davis, Ava Gardner, Olivia de Havilland, Lilian Bond, Katharine Hepburn, Ginger Rogers and Gene Tierney.

He was also one of the most influential aviators in history: he set multiple world air-speed records, built the Hughes H-1 Racer and H-4 "Hercules" aircraft, and acquired and expanded Trans World Airlines.

He was a major force in developing Las Vegas, and has too many other accomplishments to mention here…  His ever-worsening OCD and paranoia led to some famously bizarre behavior including collecting bottles of his own urine, and dictating lengthy memos to his staff about how many tissues to use when turning doorknobs or touching phone receivers.

In short, HH is possibly the most interesting American to have ever lived.

3. Nicola Tesla (1856 –1943) Inventor

Tesla had it all: extreme OCD, a fear of pearl earrings, a love affair with a pigeon, a residence at the Waldorf Astoria; He’s an absolute hero of mine.

He was one of the most important contributors to the birth of commercial electricity, and is best known for his many revolutionary developments in the field of electromagnetism.

Through bad PR, and his own lack of business acumen, Tesla remains an unsung hero… History is written by the winners, and though his name is becoming more popular, he without a doubt, shaped the world as we know it. Many people still don’t realize is was HE who invented the radio, Alternating Current, remote control, radar, and whose tests led to major expansion in the fields of robotics, computer science, ballistics, and nuclear physics.

He even designed blueprints for a “Death Ray” for the military, which could shoot bolts of lightning to knock enemy planes out of the sky.

In the 1890’s he totally enjoyed rock start status, but ultimately was ostracized for his revolutionary ideas and personal eccentricities. Many regarded him as just a mad scientist, and after being swindled by assholes like J.P. Morgan, he died impoverished at the age of 86.

The silver lining is that 60 years later, David Bowie would play him in the amazing film, The Prestige. Boosh.

2. Nero Claudius Caesar Augustus Germanicus (AD 37 –AD 68) Roman Emperor

Nero was the fifth and last Roman emperor of the Julio-Claudian Dynasty. A cold-blooded persecutor of Christians, an extortionist, and a debauchee, he outraged even the wildly licentious Romans with his tyranny and extravagance. 

He’s known for a number of executions, including those of his mother (who he was banging) and stepbrother. His golden palace became a symbol of his excess and ego; a120 ft high statue of himself stood in the entrance hall; and the pillared arcade ran for a whole mile. An enormous pool, more like a sea, was surrounded by buildings made to resemble cities and by a ridiculous garden where every variety of domestic and wild animal (including bejeweled live pet crocodiles) hung out. 

Entire walls of the house were overlaid with gold and studded with precious stones. All the dining rooms had ceilings of fretted ivory where the panels could slide back to let a rain of flowers, or of perfume from hidden sprinklers, fall on his guests.

1. Edward Leedskalnin (1887-1951) Sculptor and Engineer

Leedskalnin is my Number One Favorite Eccentric Recluse, because he’s not only brilliant and insane, but also the most romantic.

When Agnes Scuffs, his 16 yr old fiancé, broke up with him the day before their wedding, a devastated Edward traveled from Latvia to Florida and spent the next 28 years creating the Coral Castle, as a monument to her.  He referred to her as his "Sweet Sixteen," and hoped until the day he died, that she would come and live with him again.

The Castle is an absolute marvel, complete an accurate sundial, a Polaris telescope, an obelisk, a barbecue, a water well, a fountain, celestial stars and planets, a giant heart-shaped table, a table in the shape of Florida, twenty-five rocking chairs, chairs resembling crescent moons, a bathtub, beds, a royal throne and an 8-ton revolving gate that was balanced so precisely that a young girl could open it with the touch of her finger. To this day it’s a mystery as to how a 100lb man only 5’ tall could have built the castle, working only at night in secrecy by a single lantern, carving and moving coral rock pieces weighing between 14-30 tons each. Modern engineers are as puzzled today as Einstein was when he visited the castle.

Some claim alien intervention. Edward himself quietly insisted that he re-discovered the secrets of the Egyptian pyramid builders. His underground theories on magnetism and antigravity are still revered to this day.

Sadly, Agnes never did come back to him.

The ennui of that story has been inspiring songwriters for decades. Billy Idol immortalized the heartbreak in his song Sweet Sixteen.

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