chickfactor technology poll: consent and approval

don’t you think that the artist should have to consent or approve of his-her material being uploaded to youtube, spotify, soundcloud etc? why isn’t this the case?

bridget st john: YES. why isn’t this the case? I don’t think we were paying attention when – for example – youtube started up. or we didn’t even know until someone told us that our work was uploaded – and at that point what do you do? it’s hard to find phone numbers for websites. and then there is the ego which is flattered to see how many people have viewed a particular video – and in the end you rationalize it by saying it’s like having a visual business card and it might help live gigs, cd sales etc…

erin a girl called eddy: yes I do. and again, I truly believe that no one is getting paid through these outlets (certainly no one that I know) and stupifyingly, no one seems to care. all I hear is “it’s just the way the business is now” etc. independent artists are taking an incredibly passive attitude about this and I’m not quite sure why.

fran cannane: I don’t know how it works as regards money but I am constantly surprised anyone is interested so good luck to them…and it cannot do any harm that people have a chance to hear the music. I am more appalled by live concert footage. we had it good in the past! but I do not watch it for my own mental health.

hannah grass widow: I actually have no idea but recently someone told me they listened to us on spotify, so that was news to me that we were on there.

stephen the real tuesday weld: yes. youtube is owned by a company that sells advertising.

corin tucker: yes. most of us don’t have the money to pursue a legal case against youtube, but it is illegal. no, I don’t think anyone makes royalties from these.

andrew eggs/talk it: spotify is a matter between you and your record company, if you have one, or you and spotify. the other things…how can you possibly police that?

matt lorelei: the royalties from streaming services like spotify are percentages of pennies. for textilesounds I used IODA (mike slumberland does/did as well; IODA is now a part of the orchard) to have them handle the licensing and manage the collection of royalties. they handle spotify, rdio, last.fm, et. al. but amounts to very little. certainly not enough to cover the pressing of any of the records being streamed.

pete paphides: spotify is the biggest rip-off ever. 99% of artists – and I’m talking about the ones who actually sell reasonable amounts of records – couldn’t afford to buy a cheese sandwich on a week’s spotify royalties.

stephin the magnetic fields: that is beginning to happen, and will get more professionalized as the industry solidifies.

james dump/yo la tengo: we can’t all hire prince to straighten out that shit for us (although I wish we could). also, I heard dick cheney gets $100 from every youtube view and spotify play, and $150 from every internet comment.

gordon the fan modine: copyright holders do have to consent to all three of those services. the stuff that slips through on youtube and soundcloud can be stopped with a heads up to those companies. youtube and spotify pay royalties. soundcloud is a royalty-free service intended to give copyright holders an easy way to share their audio on their own behalf. some people use it differently and probably shouldn’t.

tim dagger: artists/musicians should get paid for their work.

allen clapp: you get like .007 cents per play or something like that…I get these royalty statements that say “X” song has been played XX,000 times, and you look over at the right column and there’s like 16 cents over there. I don’t really get it. I mean, every little bit helps, but when you think about these businesses building their futures on the availability of a product that costs them almost nothing, it makes you wonder who’s benefiting. I have no idea.

kim baxter: I just made 1 cent for selling a song on spotify. I took that penny straight to the candy store and bought 1/8th of a mini tootsie roll.

gail cf: it’s absolutely appalling that any old chump can upload video of a band without the band’s permission. appalling. terrible. the worst thing about the internet is that it needs to be policed and intellectual property protected. I know I sound like an old fogey but I don’t care. using other people’s content without their knowledge and consent is rude and should be illegal. as a photographer I abhor pinterest and tumblr for this reason, but youtube has hundreds of my photos up without my permission or credit too.

shaun brilldream: I have no idea, but of course they should give consent. I’m sure most would.

clarissa cf: when your work is in the world, it’s in the world. what people pay for is no longer access to the work, it’s (the suggestion of) your personal approval of their having access to the work.

jennifer o’connor: technically you do have to consent. you could spend a lot of time getting them all taken down, but I don’t really see the point. spotify pays minuscule royalties.

ian musical chairs: yes. nobody bothers fighting it unless they think it’s costing them more potential revenue than the lawyer would cost.

joe pines / foxgloves: I expect chickfactor’s views on this subject are correct. I would like to add that ‘digital culture’ is not the level playing field of universal access that is sometimes implied. people’s levels of technological capacity are variable and it is sadly possible to get left behind.

does anyone make royalties from these?

ian musical chairs: supposedly, but not enough to buy a sandwich or anything. the idea that any subscription-type service is the answer to save the failing music industry is hilariously absurd and for people who choose to ignore math.

daniel handler: someone gets paid for those ads, I hope.

stephen the real tuesday weld: hahaha.

bridget st john: yes – in my limited knowledge I know that for instance if you have a publishing company assigned to the harry fox agency and opt in to their agreement with youtube – then you will be paid a (small) amount for your work being on youtube.

order the new issue!

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this is chickfactor 17, which you can order here.

inside the new issue is some pretty great content!

  • an interview with hannah and lillian from the mighty grass widow
  • an interview with the awesome joe pernice (pernice brothers, chappaquiddick skyline, new mendicants, scud mountain boys)
  • bushwick pop powerhouse frankie rose grants us an interview
  • dawn sutter madell interviews the lovely, constantly touring sharon van etten
  • gaylord fields (wfmu) chats with the super-influential music fan joe boyd
  • lisa siegel (mad scene) chats with kenny anderson, one of the forces behind fife’s fence records & king creosote
  • black tambourine tells all (even if we’ve already interviewed a few of them in these pages before)
  • liam hayes and plush gives us a brief but illuminating interview — he has recorded two new LPs and is doing the soundtrack for a new roman coppola film
  • gail interviews the talented drummer / artist rachel blumberg (m ward, arch cape, decemberists, michael hurley, etc)
  • a jukebox jury with the amazing corin tucker band
  • gail and connie try to uncover the mysterious bill callahan
  • gail and peter momtchiloff have a lengthy chat about art with the creative powerhouse tae won yu
  • lisa levy talks to uk cultural critic / punk-rock feminist caitlin moran
  • daniel handler conducts an interview with his friend/collaborator maira kalman + travel tips
  • lots of silly polls and tons of reviews! a new chickfactor cocktail recipe by dan searing!

edited by gail o’hara, the issue’s art director is gregg einhorn and our amazing writers and contributors for CF17 are: daniel handler, sukhdev sandhu, gaylord fields, dawn sutter madell, lydia vanderloo, alistair fitchett, bryce edwards, connie lovatt, dan searing, erica braverman, isaac bess, janice headley, jennifer o’connor, kendall meade, kurt reighley, lisa levy, lisa siegel, liz clayton, michael white, peter momtchiloff, pete paphides, rebecca braverman, robert mctaggart, robin davies, tae won yu, tim hopkins and wayne davidson.

chickfactor poll question: making a living

do you believe musicians should be able to make a living from music? are you? do you have health insurance?

rachel blumberg: yes I do. there are lots of different paths to do this, though. I do have health insurance but I pay for it myself. it’s just a choice I’ve made, that it’s something I can’t notafford.

stephen the real tuesday weld: yes, the nhs.

pete paphides: not all musicians are going to make a living from music, but sure, it’s a common courtesy to show someone your appreciation for the things they make by paying them for it. until recently, I made my living from music. I still earn money from it, but I have, as they say, taken “a back seat.” there are children to chauffeur; meals to cook!

james dump/yo la tengo: yes / yes / yes.

erin a girl called eddy: yes. no. no.

stephin the magnetic fields: plenty of people should and do make a living from music, but sales of recorded music have been cut in half. I make a living, but my health insurance is always precarious.

dawn cf: YES.

daniel handler: we should live in an absolute artistic meritocracy. my insurance is from the screenwriters guild. these two sentences contradict each other.

corin tucker: yes. not really. yes our family has health insurance thankfully.

hannah grass widow: I do believe musicians should be making a living. music is so important to everyone — and no one would want to live in a world without it — but people aren’t really willing to pay artists what we deserve. our culture makes us feel like idiots for spending our time making music, as if we should get a real job. grass widow has never made a living being a band. we all have day jobs. I used to think it was so not punk to license your music, but these days I’m thinking that we wouldn’t have had that money in the first place, so if someone offered that maybe we could take that money and donate it to a cause we believe in or open an all-ages venue or something. we’re not above capitalism and we definitely need money to pay rent/eat.

ian musical chairs: In theory, it would be nice but mainstream tastes and buying habits would have to change to make the numbers work for most musicians (especially indie ones). no. yes (through my day job).

shaun brilldream: of course. but too much money = bad art.

kim baxter: yes, definitely! no, I’m not making a living from music. I do have health insurance but it’s a constant source of stress.

andrew eggs/talk it: I don’t make my living as a musician anymore. I do have health insurance.

bridget st john: that would be great – but unless we can have benefactors who want to help support us – no one owes us a living in music – as much effort as you put in determines what benefit you are able to reap, and these days it is more possible with internet and downloads and self-pressed cds and live performance it is possible. I did from 1969 to 1976 – and then found it impossible in new york and found other ways to supplement my musical income. Ironically if I chose to I believe I could work a lot more and make a living through music all these years on! from 1976 to 2011 I never had health insurance — but now at the grand age of 65 I have medicare – as imperfect as that is!

joe pines / foxgloves: making a living from music is not something I could contemplate. in my country, despite endless neoliberal inroads, we still have a universal health system which I believe is the noblest creation in our history. it is the material testament to our solidarity as a society. going to a hospital is naturally burdensome and worrying, but I can also find it inspiring.

gordon the fan modine: why certainly! I make a living from being creative. It has been nice that some years music has been the main thing I was focusing on. I do (have health insurance). I’ve been buying my own for more than a decade. It is one of the toughest things for people who don’t sign on to a mothership. individual (non group) plans are more expensive. it would seem that we should encourage entrepreneurs and micro-business owners such as musicians and artists.

jennifer o’connor: it’s very difficult to make a living playing music and whether musicians should or shouldn’t, I can’t really answer. I am making a living from music for the first time ever starting just this year. I do have health insurance but I pay too much for it and it’s not good and I’m thinking about dropping it because it’s so expensive and I feel it doesn’t even cover anything. It feels like throwing money away.

tim dagger: absolutely, I’m not a musician and I do have health insurance.

allen clapp: there have been a few years I actually made a living from music, but I always keep a foot in the day-job world (I’m a writer) because it’s too darn expensive to live in the san francisco bay area without at least some kind of a back-up plan. I do have health insurance, but I’m definitely pushing it on the dental plan. now I’m scared to go back to the dentist and discover what’s gone wrong. eek!

fran cannane: musicians can make a living from music in many ways such as teaching, playing in cover bands, selling music to be in ads, etc. to be highfalutin about it, this question is not relevant to the artist. I do not think anyone musician or not has a right to make money. it is I suppose a marketplace. if enough people get to hear your music and like it and then buy it or go to shows you may make money. if not you won’t. I note this excerpt from a philip larkin interview in paris review

interviewer: do you think economic security an advantage to the writer?

larkin: the whole of british postwar society is based on the assumption that economic security is an advantage to everyone. certainly I like to be economically secure. but aren’t you, really, asking about work? this whole question of how a writer actually gets his money—especially a poet—is one to which there are probably as many answers as there are writers, and the next man’s answer always seems better than your own. ¶ on the one hand, you can’t live today by being a “man of letters” as easily as a hundred or seventy-five years ago, when there were so many magazines and newspapers all having to be filled. writers’ incomes, as writers, have sunk almost below the subsistence line. on the other hand, you can live by “being a writer,” or “being a poet,” if you’re prepared to join the cultural entertainment industry, and take handouts from the arts council (not that there are as many of them as there used to be) and be a “poet in residence” and all that. I suppose I could have said—it’s a bit late now—I could have had an agent, and said, look, I will do anything for six months of the year as long as I can be free to write for the other six months. some people do this, and I suppose it works for them. but I was brought up to think you had to have a job, and write in your spare time, like trollope. then, when you started earning enough money by writing, you phase the job out. but in fact I was over fifty before I could have “lived by my writing”—and then only because I had edited a big anthology—and by that time you think, well, I might as well get my pension, since I’ve gone so far.

interviewer: any regrets?

larkin: sometimes I think, everything I’ve written has been done after a day’s work, in the evening: what would it have been like if I’d written it in the morning, after a night’s sleep? was I wrong? some time ago a writer said to me—and he was a full-time writer, and a good one—“I wish I had your life. dealing with people, having colleagues. being a writer is so lonely.” everyone envies everyone else. ¶ all I can say is, having a job hasn’t been a hard price to pay for economic security. some people, I know, would sooner have the economic insecurity because they have to “feel free” before they can write. but it’s worked for me. the only thing that does strike me as odd, looking back, is that what society has been willing to pay me for is being a librarian. you get medals and prizes and honorary-this-and-thats—and flattering interviews—but if you turned round and said, right, if I’m so good, give me an index-linked permanent income equal to what I can get for being an undistinguished university administrator—well, reason would remount its throne pretty quickly.

 

today’s 20th-anniversary poll question…

how has your record collection changed in the past 20 years?

stephen pastel: bigger, better. stricter adherence to cataloguing principles. new, old… I feel I can find it and connect it up. in a good place with this.

hannah grass widow: when I was really young, I would sometimes buy records because the album cover looked cool. maybe the band name sounded familiar but in general I took a lot of risks. I didn’t have a cool big sister or the internet. I had the radio and my local record store.

stephen the real tuesday weld: I have one now.

jeffrey honeybunch: gone back to used vinyl, which I originally pared down due to routine changes of address. have become much less preoccupied with objects in general, and am fine with just having the song on a file. totally done with CDs — too much of negative impact on the environment, and simply not that satisfying to hold in your hands.

daniel handler: it’s ballooned out of control. not being broke will do that. but the pop-to-classical ratio remains about the same, I think.

rachel blumberg: it’s gotten more eclectic. I’ve learned about so many more genres of music.

andrew eggs/talk it: I have more records now.

gaylord cf/wfmu: I have more jazz and classical LPs; not so coincidentally, that’s music I can enjoy live in venues with seats.

clarissa cf: the “things I love” section grows, and not as slowly as I’d have guessed it would at this point. the “things I can’t get anybody to take off my hands” section is completely out of control.

gordon the fan modine: I’ve never had more than a small rotating collection and now I listen to a lot of internet radio. you don’t really need much more than WFMU and RDIO these days.

fran cannane: in essence probably not much except for addition of MP3s.

james dump/yo la tengo: it’s a mess.

corin tucker: I try and only buy a few vinyl records a year that I think are classics, due to space. I still have my favorites I’ve collected on tour like x-ray spex, prince 7-inches and weird finds like that.

pete paphides: I don’t much bother with CDs anymore.

stephin the magnetic fields: I’ve given up on following both rock and disco, which I used to think of as the two poles of pop music. I have a lot more folk, and I have everything ever released on numero. their amazing eccentric soul series makes me hear the 70s in ways I couldn’t have at the time.

ian musical chairs: it’s expanded exponentially as I’ve gotten into record-dealing. I listen to a wider range of music now, though I still love a great pop song as much as ever.

dawn cf: I buy fewer 7″s.

joe pines / foxgloves: I now have 3 copies of 69 love songs: one that gail o’hara instructed me to buy in greenwich; one that I bought so the band could sign it; and one that leonard honeymoon diary gave me because he’d realized he didn’t actually like it.

jennifer o’connor: my record collection has always been in flux even when I was more of a collector, but yeah, now I have quite a range of everything from vinyl and cds to mp3s, etc. I have a hard time sometimes knowing which format to purchase a record in.

allen clapp: it became more digital over the past 10 years, but now it’s getting more analog again. I kind of forgot for a while how much fun it is to listen to music on vinyl, reel-to-reel, etc…so now I have records and jackets scattered all over my music room again..it feels wonderful. it’s still as eclectic as ever.

bridget st john: physically it is less cohesive and quite scattered = some of it is digital downloads lurking on my computer, some cds and still have some cassettes and some vinyl – I find there are fewer albums that I have bought that I want to listen and relisten to as a whole.

gene booth: chronologically ordered (almost there!); also, 1969 has grown by like two feet in the last two years. no vinyl yet in 2012.

the legendary jim ruiz: it’s just gotten a lot bigger. I love the “let’s empty the vaults” attitude taken by labels concerning ’50s and ’60s artists. want everything lulu released on decca between 1964 and 1966? no problem! I can’t imagine the lengths you could go or the money you could spend to get even most of those tracks in 1992.

tim dagger: more cds, less vinyl (though I still do buy vinyl) and I still don’t download things.

michael white: much like myself, it’s larger and has too much ballast.

shaun brilldream: just got bigger.

gail cf: it got larger, then smaller: I wish I could have my record collection (vinyl) back, all the stuff I got rid of when I moved.

 

chickfactor international travelogue: notting hill/bayswater, london!

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notting hill/bayswater, london (part two)

by jessica griffin, the leader of fantastic london pop group the would-be-goods, mum to an oxford student, foodie and psychology enthusiast, among many other things. she has lived in the neighborhood for 23 years! chickfactor can attest to the super-greatness of al waha as mentioned below…

best venues: the tabernacle, powis square.

best record stores: rough trade, 130 talbot road.

best thriftstore: fara, 10 elgin crescent.

cheap eats: books for cooks (great cookery book shop with test kitchen and café at the back), 4 blenheim crescent. taqueria, 139 westbourne grove. royal china (daytime only, for dim sum). tawana (authentic, friendly thai), 3 westbourne grove.

not so cheap eats: al waha (best lebanese in london), 75 westbourne grove. hereford road, 3 hereford road.

vegetarian-friendly eats: ottolenghi, 63 ledbury road; al waha (see above).

best drinking holes: cock and bottle (splendid traditional pub), 17 artesian road.

best coffee or tea houses: during the summer and early autumn, the temporary pavilion next to the serpentine gallery, kensington gardens. a different architect or artist designs the pavilion each year.

cool cinemas: gate picturehouse, 87 notting hill gate.

best used bookstores: notting hill books, 32 palace gardens terrace.

best local bands, artists, writers, designers: simon fisher turner (film music composer and erstwhile king of luxembourg).

parks and green spaces: kensington gardens, bayswater road (or kensington gore).

unmissable highlights: artisan du chocolat (best chocolates — and hot chocolate — in london, or maybe anywhere), 81 westbourne grove. leighton house museum, 12 holland park road, kensington.

photo of jessica by gail o’hara. 

 

dump reissues!

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basically chickfactor has been into dump ever since we heard it and we have no idea why the rest of the world has been lazily ignoring it since its early ’90s brilliant genius recordings. now FINALLY some label has gotten the good sense to reissue some dump! at last! for chrissakes, what is wrong with the indie labels in the u.s. — um, matador, hello? if enchanté had the dosh, we’d have started the feeding frenzy way back in the day. instead we just forced james to play at our chickfactor parties.

earlier this year we saw the release of a new dump 12″ single called “nyc tonight,” try not to let the fact that it is a g.g. allin cover put you off! now chickfactor has the exclusive international news scoop that morr music of germany has the excellent wherewithal to reissue these first two dump albums that you see pictured here: I can hear music & superpowerless! according to james mcnew (also of yo la tengo, a band you may have heard of), these two will be available on vinyl (for the first time), CD and digital, with new artwork and lots of extra bells and whistles and bonus tracks! dump even had to consult chickfactor to find out the dates of all their shows from the olden days because apparently chickfactor is the only one who remembers (or wrote down this kind of thing). so there you go! there is no release date yet but we will surely be the first to have the scoop so check back with us. and hopefully all the other dump recorded work will be available soon on vinyl too!

here’s some way old fun stuff james wrote for chickfactor: brazil food diary. lambchop interview. and a mini interview here.

 

today’s poll question! chickfactor parties

can you recall something memorable that you’ve witnessed at a chickfactor party?

stephin the magnetic fields: james mcnew (dump) playing “sunshine, lollipops and rainbows” right after september 11. everyone was sobbing.

daniel handler: I remember my slowly realizing that lois was lois, but I think I kept pretty cool about it.

bridget st john: being completely ignorant of the aislers set’s music and briefly exchanging words backstage with a seemingly reticent linton – and then watching their set and being much affected and surprised by her powerful presence and energy – I love this band!

gaylord cf/wfmu: at the most recent chickfactor party in new york, I saw more people of color than ever in the audience.

janice cf: adrian tomine showing up for the softies set!

michael white: the aluminum group, at the 10th-anniversary soiree in new york, not so much playing a gig as performing a tag-team sit-down comedy set that happened to be broken up with some of the best love songs of the past 20 years.

clarissa cf: I once accidentally walked in on [redacted] making out with [redacted]. it was cute.

rachel blumberg: seeing both small factory and aisler’s set reunite. never imagined either might happen. both were amazing. more than memorable. I can think of something very personally memorable to me, which was when a certain person and i got love potion dumped all over us or something during the first night of the shows at the bell house. ahem.

gordon the fan modine: stephin merritt debuting a dozen or so of the 69 love songs at under acme on a uke way before the record came out. you booked that right? (yes. —editor)

jennifer o’connor: lots of things. 3 favorites include: seeing dump doing his solo  looping pedals thing for the first time, aislers set at the 10th anniversary show at fez, gail singing “fuck and run” during the cover girls set.

fran cannane: chickfactor parties are always in the wrong hemisphere but my memory is appalling so I would not recall anyway…

corin tucker: have I been to one? that one at fez? I remember mary timony on stage in braids?

dawn cf: mary timony/joan wasser (later to be policewoman) duo performance.

james dump/yo la tengo: I saw the cannanes beat and rob an audience member at a 1995 CF show at acme.

kendall mascott: I loved seeing brilliantine at the blue cabaret.

gail cf: more euphoria than anyone should be allowed to have. I have a record of them that I will someday publish. along with some footage!

tim dagger: sigh…have never been to one.

chickfactor 17 is out this fall on paper!

chickfactor 17: sneak preview poll question!

how has music changed in the past 20 years?

allen clapp: seems like there’s more tolerance for melody now than there was 20 years ago. everything back then was so aggressive and serious! ugh. I think the world has loosened up a lot since the early 90s. thank goodness.

dawn cf: lots.

stephin the magnetic fields: the enormous changes in every genre between 1972 and 1992 are obvious. changes since ’92 are subtle (country, dance music, children’s music) to nonexistent (cabaret, rap, metal, musical theater, rock, gospel, jazz, soundtracks). In chickfactor’s core genre of cheaply made strummy rock, there hasn’t even been a new guitar effect.

gordon the fan modine: hmmm. has it?

stephen the real tuesday weld: there seems like there is an awful lot of it.

corin tucker: obviously the format has gone digital and people find new music in a different way now. there also seems to be many many more bands than there were in 1992. unfortunately there are still very few great bands.

james dump/yo la tengo: haven’t really been paying attention.

ed shelflife: more bands and less labels.

jeffrey honeybunch: everything is accessible which has its good points (josef k video’s on youtube) and bad (I can’t tell if the josef k–influenced band is new, or something old I missed out on).

michael white: it barely has; only its delivery systems have been revolutionized.

gaylord cf/wfmu: music has changed more between 1960 and 1970 than in the 42 years that follow.

shaun brilldream: we have a healthy post-oasis indie scene now. more record labels too.

andrew eggs/talk it: the 1992 music economy is unrecognizable today because it depended on narrow channels to distribute music, channels that are by and large irrelevant now.

bridget st john: It’s a more level playing field – with the will and a little wherewithal any one who chooses can make music and has a good chance to be heard.

clarissa cf: there is much less new music that is my idea of a good time, and much more that is 20-years-younger people’s idea of a good time. I’m fine with that.

fran cannane: a lot of use of the vocoder. more silly talent shows encouraging bad music. a lot more cover versions being hits perhaps?

gene booth: popular music is incredibly subtle and diverse now — thanks nirvana you really did change everything.

jennifer o’connor: the idea of what passes for a song in many cases these days is a joke.

pete paphides: it’s more freely available and, as with anything which is more freely available, its monetary value has gone down.

gail cf: the underground disappeared in the 1990s when the internet happened and maybe even before.

daniel handler: has it? I keep hearing music that I think is new and turns out to be old, or vice versa.

ian musical chairs: the mainstream has embraced an indie sound; indie bands have embraced commercials and other licensing opportunities (now the only reliable sources of income for bands). most commercial rock music is otherwise basically the same as in 1992 (grunge) and aside from the occasional interesting production job, top-40/dance music seems pretty the same too except for the overuse of auto-tune which will sound silly in a few years.

tim dagger: mp3/downloads.

joe pines / foxgloves: the sundays stopped. belle & sebastian started. I got better at writing songs, and was lucky enough to record some of them with a few tremendous people. it arguably became easier to filter out what you didn’t like. which may, come to think of it, mean that contemporary culture is even worse than I think.

 

name this cocktail!

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This is a new cocktail designed by glo-worm percussionist (and member of Whorl / Big Jesus Trash Can / Saturday People / Castaway Stones / etc) Dan Searing, master of party ceremonies for many cf-attended events over the past two decades — read his recipe and then see the name ideas below. He is the author of the Punch Bowl…

This one is bittersweet, international and sparkling, just like Chickfactor!

Drink name TK

1 oz gin*
0.5 oz maraschino liqueur
0.25 oz fresh lemon juice
3 oz Champagne**

*I think an American craft gin like Breuckelen from New York or Small’s from Oregon work particularly well.
**Or use any dry traditional method sparkling wine such as Cava from Spain.

Stir first three ingredients with ice. Strain into a champagne flute or coupe. Top with sparkling wine and garnish with a lemon twist.

To serve as a punch chill all ingredients  well. In a punch bowl combine one 750 ml bottle of gin, half a bottle of maraschino liqueur and 6 oz plus 2 tsp lemon juice and the same amount of cold water. Gently add 3 bottles of sparkling wine. Float lemon slices in the bowl and add a large chunk of ice. Serve in punch cups, timblers or coupes. To make ice chunk freeze water in a bundt or loaf pan overnight. Release by dipping or rinsing with warm water. Alternatively, fill a well rinsed paper quart container with water and freeze. Peel away container to use.

Please vote here

  1. Call it a chickfactor (suggested by Stephin Merritt)
  2. The Pam Berry? The Bubblecore? The Aviatrix? The Cat Eye Glasses? (all suggested by Daniel Handler)

(later) Yes, I love an Aviation so I thought it applied. You could call it the Earhart because if you have too much you disappear.

  1. The Gaylord Fields?  There’s no name more delicious than that. (suggested by James McNew)
  2. I agree with whoever suggested on Facebook that it should be called the Jukebox Jury. (suggested by Pam Berry)
  3. How about calling it the Enchanté? Or the Bien Sur? The Peut-etre or the Tal vez? Or the Delovely. It sounds a lot like an Aviation with Champagne added to it in place of some gin, and lacking the creme de violette, which makes it a lovely purple tint. http://cocktails.about.com/od/ginrecipes/r/aviation_cktl.htm In other words, it sounds delicious. (suggested by Sheri Hood, who ran 4AD’s NYC office in the early days and managed Stereolab)
  4. La Choupette. It’s high time someone named a cocktail after Karl Lagerfeld’s cat. (suggested by Edna CF, please don’t vote for this one, I hate Karl)
  5. The Jukebox Jury (suggested by Mark Butler)
  6. The Indie Cool Queen (suggested by David Moore)
  7. The GailBerry (suggested by Joe The Pines) Please don’t vote for this.
  8. Write in the drink name here _________________________

Go to our Effbk page and message us your vote. Winner receives a smile and a wink.