Author: Chad Matheny

VOTE NOW CRY LATER

Trouble voting? Try calling these nonpartisan hotlines for help:

English: 866-OUR-VOTE (866-687-9683)

Spanish: 888-YE-Y-VOTA (888-839-8682)

Arabic: 844-YALLA-US (844-925-5287)

Asian Languages: 888-API-VOTE (888-274-8683)

https://866ourvote.org

Don’t assume it’s too late!

UK SHOW INFO MEGA-POST: Edinburgh, Sheffield, and Norwich Sep. 28-30

Edinburgh – 28 Sept. (Wednesday)

Time:
7:30pm

Location:
Thompson Balcony
3 St Andrews Square
Edinburgh, EH2 2BD

Drop your email address here to receive detailed instructions on how to get in to the concert:
https://forms.gle/1tPnSGyNDxvTRbAc6

Sheffield – 29 Sept. (Thursday)
w/ Forum Friends and Town Cruise

Time:
8:15pm

Location:
Delicious Clam
12 Exchange St
Sheffield City Centre, Sheffield S2 5TS

Ticket link:
https://www.skiddle.com/whats-on/Sheffield/Delicious-Clam/Emperor-X-USDE–Forum-Friends–Town-Cruise/36162766/

Norwich – 30 September (Friday)
w/ We Bless This Mess

Time:
7:30pm

Location:
Lowell Records
8 Pottergate
Norwich NR2 1DS

Info links:
https://lowellnorwich.com/
https://www.instagram.com/lowellnorwich/

WHERE IS THE MOASIS? (Jacksonville, Fri. 23 Sep. 2022)

This Friday I’m singing in Jacksonville for the first time in…honestly not sure, six years maybe? Crazy. Anyway, I’m getting a bunch of requests for details. Here’s what I can share.

Venue: The Moasis
Time: 7pm (early show, early curfew)
Cost: $10 at the door
Lineup: FLORIDA SMASH HITS opens, EMPEROR X closes

“BUT CHAD, WHERE IS THIS ‘MOASIS’ OF WHICH YOU SPEAK?”

It’s a private location, which is why the folks who set it up and I are being so conspiratorial about it. If you fill out this Google Form I’ll make sure a robot sends you the address a few hours before the show. (It’s in central Jacksonville, so you can vaguely plan a bit at least.)
https://forms.gle/w57KgMDaKzLeHprp6

You can also DM any of the other folks posting about this show for the address (but not me, I’m terrible at DMs.)

Go Jaguars. This tongue licks teal.

Why yes, I am indeed performing in Atlanta this evening.

Railroad Earth
1467 Oxford Rd. NE
Druid Hills, GA 30307

Times:
Doors – 7pm
Band 1 (Bummer Hill) – 8pm
Band 2 (Sanity Please) – approx. 9pm
Band 3 (me) – approx. 10pm

MARTA:
Blue/Green line to Inman Park/Reynoldstown
–>

MARTA:

Blue/Green line to Inwood ->

bus to Lindbergh Center Station

–>
get off at N Decatur Rd. NE & S Oxford Rd. NE
–>
walk 500 feet south

Recommended Parking:
Emory University
Fishburne Parking Deck
1672 N Decatur Rd.
Atlanta, GA 30322

Sitrep: 05 September 2022 // Forestville Industrial Center, Forestville, CT (w/ No Compute)

Various things in Connecticut. (bottom two photos courtesy @3th3rw4v3)

Woke up:
4:00 a.m. in Park Slope, Brooklyn at a friend-family’s home, the kind of apartment that seems more like a living story than a building, the kind of apartment with books and records and instruments hidden in every corner, the kind of apartment that feels like a labyrinth of ideas and memories that no one who didn’t live there to co-write the living story will ever be able to access. Also, there was a noise in the backyard that phased in and out like two airplane motors, and I was not sure if it was two populations of crickets trying to sync up or two A/C fans.

Journey time:
3 hours: MTA to Amtrak to a local bus which I was delighted to see was actually a dedicated right-of-way rapid busway. Impressive, CT Transit.

Breakfast:
There was a very legit bagel place on the corner by the friend-family’s home. Everything bagel, toasted with tomato and peanut butter and onion. Don’t knock it ’til you try it, snob. Five stars.

Incidents of note on journey:

  • At Penn station, escalators go down to the track and people snake around in a long line before boarding this escalator. One of the Amtrak officers stood over the escalator, leaning over us, and berating us positively. “HEY, bring that ENERGY to start your day. If you don’t bring it, no one’s gonna bring it for you. STOP checking that phone, you can find out how many likes you got later. HEY, you pack that bag? Heavy, huh? Well, remember, YOU packed it.” No one was enjoying this but me, and I found that very puzzling. New York’s still got it.
  • I spent $25 on a Metrocard and it didn’t work, so they gave me an envelope to mail to someone to get my money back.
  • On arrival at the closest bus stop, I still had to walk about a mile down a pretty green formerly-industrial canal, pictured above. I also had to pass a very enthusiastic display of American flags and white-painted flower boxes intended to memorialize war dead.
  • The lone crosswalk in Forestville emits an alarming beep when it turns green. It sounds like something is very, very wrong. This is probably meant more for the cars than the pedestrians: “DO NOT KILL THE PEDESTRIAN.”

Lunch:
A 12-inch tuna sub from Subway in the middle of a grocery store parking lot. Calling it bleak would be an exaggeration for car people, but as a pedestrian it was fairly punishing. I worked on LUH papers again.

Soundperson’s name/shirt color:
Jordaan, also the promoter and a very stand-up kind of guy, also his birthday. Shirt was black. He also had a collection of radioactive clocks.

Dinner:
I ate pretzels the promoter put out to make people more thirsty and buy more beer.

Partial Setlist:
The Anthem of the Greater McMurdo Station Chamber of Commerce
Freeway in Heaven
Tanline Debris
The Crows of Emmerich
Spieltier
A Violent Translation of the Concordia Headscarp
…kind of blanked out in the middle…
Stars
Defiance

Incidents of note during performance:
There are many pianos and piano harps in various states of disrepair strewn about the factory. For the last few songs, I asked people to follow me down a hallway where I found one of the most playable pianos and finished the set in the semi-darkness there. The piano was out of tune, it was dark, and I had no contacts in, but I managed to Muppet-fist my way through most of the chords, and it felt really really good. But when I was done, I turned around and was cornered by a bunch of people I didn’t know at the end of a hallway in a decommissioned factory, and no matter how much my conscious brain told me the context, it felt really alarming.

Sleep:
00:30. Going into it I knew this was gonna be a fun one because I had no plans. Fortunately, Jake from CT neo-Swirlie-ites Pulsr was on hand. We listened to some music, he let me crash, and in the morning he gave me a lift to the New Haven train station through extremely heavy rains that slowly turned into minor flooding.

Days off (06 and 07 September):
These were mainly spent making progress on my LUH papers, so I won’t document them.

From a laundromat in Chicago (more about that tomorrow),

-030-
-CRM-