Clockwork presents:

(n)eXt

Three hours of (mostly) new music
6-9 pm SL time
Topgol (205, 144, 65)

I used to spin on Mondays for an hour. Now it’s Thursdays for three. Lots of new indie rock, most of it good. Plenty of old faves and tarnished gems. Come on out and start the weekend early. Cross posted at Everything Hits at Once.

Burgess here. Just wanted to drop in and talk about a few things. First, those of you who I haven’t seen inworld recently, I miss you. Okay, not all of you. If you’re thinking, “Nah, he doesn’t miss me,” and you’re inclined to think well of yourself, you’re probably right. Everyone else, I miss. The depressives should just kid themselves and try hard to believe I miss them too. God, this is coming out all wrong.

Second, I started another blog where I can not post as much as I don’t post here: Everything Hits at Once. There is currently a post or two up there, including a truncated version of this one. If you’re at all interested, peruse it while it’s hot, because it will likely go dormant shortly. I’m reminded of the Dread Pirate Roberts: “Good night, Westley, sleep well. I shall probably kill you in the morning.”

And C, Clockwork is doing well, but there are only three of us dj’ing at the moment and we could use some assistance and promotions. So this is an open call for djs and a manager.

In terms of djs, I’m picky. Could be that’s why there’s only three of us at the moment. I want either college radio geeks or club freaks. It’s all right with me if you went to college in the 80s, I just want someone who was at some point obsessed with indie or punk rock, or serious about dance music. I want people who can both please a crowd and turn people on to rare gems and fresh tracks. I’m not interested in FM Pop, what passes for R&B these days, or the same house hits and industrial trance that three-quarters of all SL clubs spew forth 24/7. You work for tips. The club doesn’t take a cut. Drop a notecard on me, Alexander Burgess, with a short 12-song set or IM me inworld to talk about it. Impress me. Non-North Americans welcome.

If you think you’d like to help manage the club, you should to be able to:

- Be there a few nights a week, particularly when I’m not there, just to check that things are running smoothly, help bring people in, chat with the crowd
- Help find new talent and devise ways to promote the scene at the club without running the same pajama-and-peanut butter contests we see elsewhere. Okay, maybe a pajama-and-peanut butter contest or two, but nothing less ridiculous.
- Share my vision of a club that combines good conversation and serious music appreciation
- Get along with—or at least put up with—me and my occasionally crabby flakiness

I know that’s asking a lot, but it would be a paying job for the right person.

Please let your friends and enemies know and sic them on me. Thanks.

It’s been a long time coming, long train running, or some shit like that, but Clockwork is moving to a bigger space to accommodate the massive crowds. No, really.

When Romana crashed her blimp into one of the main speakers last week (see below), it destroyed the sound system that even Butterfingers Paine could not kill when he unbalanced the compressors. So we’ve moved across the street (above the not-yet-opened Mygology retail space), installed a massive invisible sonic barrage-and-subspace bass rig designed for maximum euphoria, and we’ll christen the “new” space with a hat trick of Clockwork dj madness, Wednesday, Aug. 27. Doors open 5:30 pm SL time.

-=Clockwork=-
Wednesday, August 27, 2008

5:30-6:45 pm – dj keTchUp
6:45-8:00 pm – dj Xax
8:00-9:15 pm – dj Esteban
9:15-? We’ll see how you’re all feeling…

And for those of you who heard rumors that the old Clockwork space was going to be blown up, we’re sorry to disappoint, but those plans are on hold after we were offered a lucrative deal to permit a high-end retailer to use the space in the hope of giving their merchandise more street cred. Hope we see you tomorrow, but if not then, real soon.

Frst post in a long time: I’ve been playing for a bit but I’m gonna try to get back into the swing of postings anyways.

This set is mostly a result of the Toronto propane explosion that occured on Sunday morning near where I live – one of the few positive things to come of that…hence the darkness, the noise and the bits of fear and anger. In any case, I found it relieving myself to express some of how I felt hearing all the explosions and crap in the middle of the night – not knowing what it was, fearing bombs or worse.

Anyways – the stuff is a a fair bit mixed so the tracklist isn’t totally linear! As always, feedback and stuff is appreciated!

The Mandelbrot Set – Aftermath: Aug 10 08 | Click to Play or Right-Click / Save As To Download

Tusia Berdize – Hero
Ellen Allien – ITS
Leila – Mettle
Byetone – Plastic Star (Dr Walker Remix)
Plastikman – Disconnect
Autechre – Sim Gishel
Radio Slave – Grindhouse Tool
Mathew Jonson – Symphony For The Apocalypse
Modeselektor – In Loving Memory
Squarepusher – Vacuum Garden
The Black Dog – Floods V3
Stimming – The Anger
!!! – Pardon My Freedom
Holy Fuck – Tonebank Computer
LCD Soundsystem – Give it Up

We were having a little talk, me and Alex, about how funny it is that of all the things that are possible in Second Life, one thing we really enjoy is having a club.  We could be winged creatures, out ransacking mythic lands. We could be gangters with bigass guns setting up hits and extorting $L from our neighbors (actually, maybe we should do that…). We could be part machine – in fact, in SL we actually *are* part machine. But what do we spend our time doing the most? Recreating a part of our history that we never got to live in the first place.

Alex and I have spent a lot of time playing in clubs in our indie-rock band. I have spent more hours in stench-riddled dives from Boston to Charleston, rocking out, drinking cheap beer and squatting to pee over nasty public toilets than I probably have in shopping malls. We often fantasized about owning our own club but never wanted to deal with all the alcoholics.  And it wasn’t conducive to being in a band either. So we never did, and came to terms with the fact that we never would.

Then came Second Life, which offered the chance to have a version of that experience without the drawbacks.  Here we managed to create some of the club atmosphere, share good music, meet digital people and make friends, without having to deal with the drawbacks of a real club. The other day Alex and I discussed this and said, “huh – that’s damned cool.” And it is.

I’ve been thinking a lot about “real” in Second Life and what that means. Last post talked about identity a bit, as that’s the blog topic ablaze in the SL Blogosphere.  Now I’m thinking about what it is we do. It is funny how sometimes we choose to emulate the physical world – we shop, we hang out, we hook up, we dance.  And even though those experiences in some ways pale by comparison to the real world experience, they are not without value.  Like when you can own a club and NEVER have to clean up some drunk’s vomit or blood, maybe it’s even better than the real thing.

So what’s your god damed dream, and how are you realizing it in SL?

Real quick. The other day I was digging in my inventory to look for proper attire for Codebastard’s latex party last weekend. I confess, it’d been awhile since I’d broken out the latex and I wasn’t at all sure of what look to go for. So I cobbled together my clear latex underthings for that shiny just greased pig look, and wore black pants from an old BareRose outfit I had from long ago, complete with holes in the leg and thigh, revealing spots of my shiny ass, topped with a black shiny patent leather halter top. To complete the look, I wore my bruiser skin from Civvies, which comes complete with black eye and massive scrapes and burns on the torso, fully visible. Sorry I didn’t take a photo – it was a really priceless look. With that, I wanted to shop a little bit before the party and said to Alex, “Let’s go and see how long it takes for some noob asshole to hit on me.”

Guess how long it took?

Not very. The minute I landed at the first stop, this dude in the picture above starts chatting me up. I am really losing my touch too, because I didn’t take any photos,  and I didn’t deliver any Myg style smack down. I was just kind of – bored. It was like too predictable or something. Alex tp’d in and tried using various orbiters on the guy, but none worked. It was really a little depressing.  As the guy started talking about how he doesn’t have enough L to buy a penis, I just tp’d away. Sad story, huh? Sorry – I said I had to get back into the swing of things here.

In any case, please do come on out to Clockwork tonight to hear AlexB (aka dj kEtchUp) spin all your new favorites you’ve never heard before, and some old ones too. 6pm SLT!

Just a shot from DJ keTchUp’s set at Clockwork last night. Here we’ve got the beguiling Romana Wei, mid groove. I took a bunch of shots, but to be honest my SL photography skills sucketh from lack of practice. I wanted to try to capture the crowd of folks who came out, and since my camera didn’t do the job I’ll do some shout outs: Sophrosyne, Galatea, Sable, Romana, JellyBean, Hawksrock, Akasha, Xaxoqual, Esteban, GoSpeed, Chestnut (who features much better photos of the night than I took), Zha, and damn, a few new faces whose names I am forgetting. Which is why I personally could never be mayor of Topgol.

Alex and I have been talking about what to do and where to go with our Second Lives. We’ve been pretty consumed in our real flesh begotten lives for awhile now, but we’ve missed our friends in SL a lot. We’d like to get the club up and running again, but for me it’s become real important that I don’t feel obligated to be there every night it’s open. My last few months in SL before I took a break all I did was host at the club. I enjoy it, but not when it’s all I do in SL. It burns you out like anything else done repetitively enough for no pay.

It’s interesting to contemplate these things from the standpoint of a long hiatus. When we first got into SL, it was all consuming for us. We were so riveted by the possibilities and the creative potential and the social aspects. We saw and still do see such enormous potential for Second Life. But now that we’re a little older and a bit busier, it’s a challenge to figure out where to fit it into the whole of our lives. It’s not easy to be a part timer in SL in some ways. I remember how easy it was to spend hours and hours and hours and hours and…well that can’t happen anymore.

What can happen in far less hours logged on a week? I guess that’s what we’ll be finding out. Stay tuned…

It’s summer time and what says summer more than condiments? That’s right, I, dj keTchUp, return tonight to lay down the retro wax and hot trax at Clockwork, 6 p.m. SL time. Okay, I know I’m wearing a jacket in that pic and it’s hot as fuck-all outside these days, but I liked it and forgot it was in my invy, and goddamn if it ain’t SecondLife, I can wear whatever I damn well please. Este’s trying to convince me that weather is some kind of jedi mind trick anyway. So I set the AC to 65 degrees in the club, cranked the sound system to 140db spinning some bleak 80s tracks, and started pouring scotch while imagining the sweet cool breezes of November.

Those of you still hooked on summer can show up in whatever you like and if you get cold, we’ll warm you up or you can party naked on the rooftop.Those of us inside can wax poetic about powder and argue skis vs boards. Ah, who am I kidding, I’ll prolly be on the roof as well, unless I can get someone to clean up that mess downstairs.

Remember, 6 p.m., Clockwork, Topgol. Hours of sonic indulgence from retro rock to indie punk electroshock. There’ll be blogrock, spitpop, and fraggle rock. Even tiptop, slopshop, and cockjock. You might even hear the latest underground daNceYC mix, Detroit trips, and psychotronicslaveraves from the desert ships. Who knows? I might even break out the grill and get the Jerseycue going for all my friends. See you there.

We’d just returned from our vacation and my head was splitting, but he bugged me and bugged me and bugged me and so I did it. I logged on. He was Alex, and he’d gotten the urge real bad. So in he went, and then a little while later, in I went too.

I was fumbling at the keyboard. Couldn’t type as fast as I once could. Couldn’t exactly remember my dance moves, nor how to find my favorite outfits in inventory. For once I didn’t bother to change clothes. I could barely maintain the assorted IMs and local chat that commanded more of my attention than I give to paying clients on my best days.

But then I like a challenge.

I can see a lot has changed since I was last on. I don’t think I’ve spent any kind of actual time in since the early or mid-spring. And I know I’m not the only one who’s been in digital crisis. All kinds of things have been up in the air. The Mean Girls  are finally packing it in. (And by the way, it seems I’ve been fired from the Mean Girls, though I only noticed it today when I went there and saw my name and link gone. But it’s just as well since, as I just mentioned, I only noticed I was ousted today, meaning I haven’t even been visiting the blog or anybody elses save this one once in awhile…) You can view the web in SL now, they tell me. Sable has a boyfriend! Romana has created a sex den with SL’s largest sex bed (link to follow). And you can make your lips move when you talk, if you know how. I mean, that’s some serious change.

But I think I’m ready.

Alex returns as DJ keTchUp this Thursday, you know where, at Clockwork. I think he said 6pm SL time, and yeah, I’ll be back with more and a reminder before then.

I’d throw you the SLURLs, but I forget how. Give me a few days, k?

Funk Me; It’s Friday | 27 June 2008: play or right-click here to download.
Set list:

Don Wright & The Housebreakers: Corn Bread
The Braids: Young Americans
Sylvia Striplin: Give Me Your Love
Peter Brown feat. Betty Wright background vocals: Dance With Me
Al Hudson & the Soul Partners: How Do You Do
Hidden Strength: Hustle On Up (Do the Bump)
Los Amigos Invisibles: Mi Linda
Dyke & The Blazers: Funky Walk Part I (East)
Dyke & The Blazers: Funky Walk Part II (West)
Illya Kuryaki & The Valderramas: Jaguar House
Famous Chromes: Groove On
Chicago Gangsters: Gangster Love
Control Machete: Humanos Mexicanos
James Brown: The Payback
Mexican Institute of Sound: La la La
Betty Wright: Girls Can’t Do What The Guys Do
Sister Josephine James: I’m Glad