Eklektro Breakbeat of the Week

Solar-Sonic Beach, beta-Broadcast, best-of

2009-05-20T11:03:00.000-07:00

From a live-streamed test broadcast on an unseasonably warm day this past January... DJing from the Solar-Sonic RV parked on the beach in Malibu, my friend Cor on camera, with bikini-clad Amanda and friends dancing... a taste of things to come, this summer. Stay tuned for http://solar-sonic.com

Sunday MLK-day Obama Eve, flash-gathering

2009-01-18T19:17:00.000-08:00

Hey, if you got the text message, then check it out:

Here's the link that will list the physical location (40 miles from downtown LA)...

http://eklektro.net/streaming.html

Yes, to mark this memorable day (last day of Bush in office):

its a malibu-beach semi-mobile video stream / flash-mob w/special guests...

and we look forward to seeing you! starting at noon PST

(we'll be on and off from noon to sunset)...

new mainpage for EKLEKTRO.NET

2008-12-19T23:41:00.001-08:00

well its about time.... we've finally got a new look happening on Eklektro.net,
with better links to the road-videos, and some announcements on the way... soon...
so in the meantime... http://eklektro.net

Eklektro on Revver video

2008-12-11T15:04:00.000-08:00

Hey, i'll be putting up new video posts on Revver.com (search for Eklektro)...
or look in my Blogger side-bar for the Revver widget. We like Revver 'cause it allows our quick-cut video style to look its best, in Quicktime, rather than YouTube flash (trash). AND, best of all, the word Revver has "RV" in it... twice!

10 Years of Eklektro

2008-11-16T21:47:00.000-08:00

"And you may find yourself behind the wheel of a large automobile"....

The Talking Heads prophesized, and i complied, with a giant leap into tech-nomadic living: breaking up the band, getting a warehouse, cramming on computer music, then stuffing the studio in the back of a motorhome and finally hitting the road!
10 Years of Eklektro is the slideshow that says it all, set to the original Eklektro track Time Release (circa 1999). Follow the bumpy path of one modern day nomad, and trace the evolution of "solar-sonic" living...

Special thanks to the long list of amazing souls encountered on the winding road: from the gigs, the blogs, the crazy road-trips... the pics, clips, computer tricks, graphics and brainstorms. We're just getting warmed up.... solar-sonic / cyber-delic... So here's to the next 10 years!

Join the Eklektro group on Facebook

Electronically Induced Ideas

2008-07-10T16:57:00.000-07:00

Off the Road: Reflections of a Tech-Nomad (and $4/gasoline)

It was love at first flight. After packing all my belongings and moving my music studio into a re-designed retro RV, it only took the first hundred miles of highway to have me hooked. As I crossed the Massachusetts state line in the snow, leaving behind all semblance of "home", all i could do was laugh to myself about what i had just done, having taken the plunge; i was welcoming an unknown number of months of mysteries that surely lay ahead. The year was 1999, and with the help of a revolutionary new laptop, I was an electronic musician whose bedroom studio had suddenly gone mobile! I was heading west. I was going to make music and maybe start a new band; and at first, that was about the extent of my agenda.

And soon, with the addition of solar panels and the advent of wireless internet, my new mobile lifestyle had become super-charged (year 2000), with exciting new prospects. Now that the RV's power supply and communications link were all self-contained, it seemed less like a motor-home, and more like a space ship (yet still super-low budget, thanks to no rent payments)! So wow i thought, considering how electronic artists could specifically benefit from such a liberating experience (oftentimes tied to their bedroom studios), why don't i try to inspire more arts-oriented people do this? And that's when the never-ending flood of brainstorms first began. It almost seemed my "duty" that I should utilize these new technologies to their fullest, in a quest to do something new, vital, different... solar-sonic... but exactly what? I decided that the ultimate goal would be to launch some sort of mobile broadcasting initiative for artists and musicians (2001)... a little ahead of its time??... regardless, I was getting ready to take the jump.
9-11 was all the prodding i needed. Now it was surely time to change gears, put aside personal musical aspirations, and start concentrating on mobile media!

I needed collaborators, band members, a crew of techie friends perhaps; and so i bought a 2nd identical RV to serve as a complimentary jam station, the staging ground, in conjunction with my own mobile domicile, the main RV "studio". TechTV caught wind of my project, and so i assembled a small crew to do a cross-country caravan, doing street jams and working towards starting a "broadcasting band" of tech-nomadic artists. Tech-nomadic artists? Talk about a couple far-reaching terms, even on their own, let alone juxtaposed! I knew that demonstration would be the best way to promote such concepts which had become second-nature to me, and was looking to expand through collaboration. So I started blogging web-video (2002)... long before there was such a thing as YouTube... and we kicked off Project Eklektro, and I launched Eklektro.net.

And so to find that particular combination of artist, adventurer and entrepreneur, I approached "recruitment" as a long-term project (resolved to keep this project free of any entanglements to corporate sponsorships). I built a mailing list, organized road trips and continued blogging inspirational video tracks of the process. I met some amazing artists (2003, 2004, 2005), with whom there were countless upstarts, adventures, and collaborations that seemed to be made in heaven; yet ultimately none which could actually follow through, none firing on all cylinders together long enough to actually be starting a band, damn! On top of the usual set of variables: time, place, money, artistic intent... there were the rigors of RV living to circumvent.

And so after 7 years of living mobile, gas topped $2.50, then $3 a gallon... and without any other artist willing or able to take on the quest, I started to wonder if my ideal Eklektro Karavan-tech visions would ever be fully realized. And just how long could i remain dedicated to the task, without the contributions of at least one other full-time kick-ass accomplice? This was to be a "band" after all, set up to travel and broadcast; but in addition to the obvious need for music/media talent, i realized that mobile self-sufficiency was a tall order to ask.

Still, I was fascinated with the challenge, the cyber-punk aspects, and the love/hate relationship i came to feel for my favorite city in the world: Los Angeles (2006). And so spring/summer/fall, beach/desert/mountains, I'd mostly orbit the metropolis; and when the weather turned grim, i'd treat myself to months-long winter trips (still spoiled by no rent payments). I'd video-blog the tech-nomadic bliss i'd encounter with each tropical exodus. I suppose I was seeking to inspire simple thrill-seekers to something more specific... and demonstrate each technological update which made life more magic.... laptops, solar, wireless, and electronic music... not only would "we" start a band; but we'd be ready to broadcast! I now had 8 years of hands-on research put into this project, 8 big solar panels on top of 2 RVs, mobile streaming capability and a sound system, waiting for the moment (2007). Of course machines required maintenance. Mechanical breakdowns were to be expected, and i'd always find ways to circumvent them. But physical well-being was another thing (maybe i was "in orbit" too long?), and when i rushed back from Central America in sudden need of a hospital, summer 2008 found me unpredictably Off The Road, and reflecting... (and waiting out the $4.50/gallon gas!!)

Tech-nomads (still) wanted! Stay tuned!
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=6992229961

Thailand Rave Island - Eklektro Retro

2008-04-02T00:28:00.000-07:00

intensive rave research, from 3 years ago

higher quality available at http://eklektro.net/ek_breakbeatweek.html

Time Machine - Eklektro / Repo Man Mash-Up

2007-11-17T07:33:00.000-08:00

Eklektro Retro: Footage from 1999 and misc pre-millenium festivities, set to the Eklektro track entitled "Time Machine" and mashed up with musings by the character Miller from the 1983 film, Repo Man (also set in LA). And the moral of this story: RVs = flying saucers = Time Machines. Time flies... when you live in a time machine!

santa ana syndrome

2007-10-25T00:50:00.001-07:00

astrologers have many things to say about the phase called "mercury in retrograde", during which they claim communications scramble and technologies falter. add to the mix the meteorological phenomena of hot dry santa ana winds in southern california and you've got a rare recipe for disaster; wildfires and fall-out from malibu to the mexican border. at very least the forecast seemed like an impending dose of indian summer, and at worse, apocalypse. we fled the city and stuck to the beach

Video Breakbeat, extreme!

2007-10-03T09:00:00.000-07:00

Found this of course on YouTube. Here somebody takes it to the limit. I gotta find out how they did this one (which software?)!

Mobile Video Breakbeat

2007-10-01T13:11:00.000-07:00

(click on this pic for sample of video breakbeat)

What is mobile video breakbeat? Using music software in unconventional ways, triggering VIDEO clips from a Korg PadKontrol MIDI drum-pad (demo forthcoming); i now PLAY visuals rather than pain-stakingly "edit" them; and so i've started to rhythmically re-assemble 7 years of nomadic RV dreams (fueled by solar power, shot on DV) into some semblance of meaning for the outside viewer (maybe?). "Playing" video without a safety net, its like trying to master a whole new form of multi-dimensional instrument... laptop "data" now mapped in little chunks (of semi-relevance) to drum-pads (the palette... one's experience)... fluctuating fully mastered grooves to all-out trainwreck and back... its lo-fidelity, yes. (but life's too short to get all hung up on hi-def) And so no better way to declare the Eklektro manifesto (over and over again): Mobile Video Breakbeat, as a form of specific artistic communication?: video samples, spoken words, phrases, atmospheres, sometimes with underlying background beats... all get re-constructed, recombined on-the-fly, semi-accidently at times (and i'm kinda likin that, semi-roulette... forecasting the direction of the karavan... musically... and as a game of chance?); and so over the coming weeks... weeks of uploaded "episodes"... weeks of trials and errors: discoveries, declarations and dares will be unveiled out of thin air; theme by theme, concept by concept (solar-sonic cyber-delic?), starting with the core belief, of which i've been convinced repeatedly is the key... and grown a chip on my shoulder to this effect: CHANGE the world, through (mass-)media, through flash-mob, through the world's best kept secret (audio-visual) (and in-person), soon surfacing: Cyber EZ Ryder

Retro Eklektro - Thailand part II

2007-09-26T20:14:00.001-07:00

This is the part II clip from back in '05, the trip where my camera died. Finally edited and uploaded...
For part one, scroll down to Feb 2006 and watch the Thai intro bit first... the train to the bus to the boat to the bus to the pick-up truck! All this with gigantic back-packs full of studio gear... techno-travel!

NewYearsDay

2007-01-03T08:21:00.000-08:00

a sunny simple start to a New Year, shot with my cellphone!
here's my friend Angelo hooping to some techno-trance
at the Green Sector party, in the mountains 25 miles north of LA
Happy '007!

America Freedom to Fascism - Authorized version

2006-12-17T08:30:00.000-08:00

This is the "Director's Final Cut" authorized version of Aaron Russo's documentary, America: Freedom To Fascism (AFTF). Aaron put this documentary up "for free" on YouTube knowing that the hour has come for Americans to either be awakened to restore the Republic or be swept aside by the dark global forces of fascism that seeks to enslave mankind. Please be sure to visit http://www.freedomtofascism.com where you will soon be able to view a much higher quality "pay per view" Internet version of AFTF, buy the DVD and sign up as an affiliate to sell/distribute DVDs to others.

Additionally, if you find yourself agreeing with most of the documentary's findings, please consider researching the principles of the Libertarian Party, at http://lp.org. The tax and spend stranglehold of the US two party system must be put to a stop once and for all. Vote these criminals out of office! Protect the Constitution... Protect your Freedom... Vote Libertarian!

(Thanks for reading....
-EKG

CityJazz: pre-Eklektro archive audio

2006-11-13T07:19:00.000-08:00

Something to groove to over your Monday morning coffee...
While setting up the Silver Lake Studio, I uncovered some DAT tapes dating back about 10 years to the infancy of Eklektro: born of one particular warehouse party we threw in the frosty boston winter of '97, with the "eclectic-electronic" concept further developed via our renegade (and often car battery powered!) street jams that followed that next spring. There was never any set "band", rather just a fluctuating half dozen of us room mates and friends with synths and drums, all experimenting and seeing what we could cook up. Definitely a time of transition, as within the next year the whole crew would scatter in several directions when the warehouse was suddenly sold out from under us. That's when i weighed my options, bought the RV, minimized (and solarized) my studio... and hit the road to the west coast!
This particular jam was a one-on-one real-time recording with my friend Ryan on synths and loops, and me on live drums. I picked this rather simple and unfinished track not so much for its musical content as much as HOW it was collaboratively jammed, "written" in real-time... following in the footsteps of jazz. Yes, the next 10 years would bring incredible leaps in computer music technology... and unprecedented techno-travelin' adventures for the RV and me. So as one of the last recordings i ever made in a non-mobile studio, well the rest is Eklektro history. Stay tuned for more retro releases over the coming weeks... and a return to the VIDEO side of this blog!

All Saint's Day: more electrifying archive audio

2006-11-01T09:30:00.000-08:00

Continuing upon this pre-Eklektro AV archive trip-through-history,
for Nov 1st... "All Saints Day"
here's a heavy-duty death-defying track...
befitting for the day after Halloween, when all spirits are redeemed...
ahh ha ha!! (OK, maybe that's a stretch)...
Electric Angel Fixion, 1995
yes, in my pre-techno days, we were Nine Inch Nails wanna-be's...
and that's EKG (me) on drums and lead screams!

Halloween: bring out your dead!

2006-10-31T20:28:00.000-08:00

OK, searching my AV archives for something scary, I had to dig deep for this one... going back 11 years to my pre-nomadic life in the Boston warehouse studio, and the techno-industrial band I was fronting, called Fixion. Here's the B-side of our demo, and the track called Empty, and yes, you heard it right, the first lyrics are "When I am dead..." ha ha!! (and it kinda goes downhill from there)! something uplifting for you and yours on this hallowed eve...
So to put this all in context of pre-Eklektro history: Fixion kicked hard for about a year... until Eric went to NYC to try his hand at producing, and i went to Europe and discovered raving!
(more pre-millenium pre-Eklektro archive bits coming soon...)

Fixion was:
Vocals, drums and production: G. Weber (me)
Programming, synths and production: E. Lee (where are you Eric?)
Guitars and attitude: J. Carnabuci (where are you Joe?)

And so on the eve of a new Breakbeat of the Week,
wishing you a Happy Halloween!

ek>G

Absolutely Unedited: Eklektro in theory

2006-07-20T03:05:00.000-07:00

blog post #50 is an audio podcast, off-the-cuff and absolutely unedited, intended for playback at your leisure, on your ipod and/or while sitting in traffic... This 'Breakbeat of the Week' audio episode rambles... brainstorming out-loud as befitting of real-time, may sound like a sermon at times, but its only some utopian words off the top of one's head, musings rolling off the tongue of a tech-nomad, Siddhartha-style, solar-sonique... a Midsummer Night's ethereal dream... going for screen-play... and so conspirators wanted for Cyber EZ Ryder... Ek-lek-tro in theory. Time to shoot the movie
- E>K>G

Star Spangled Blogger

2006-07-03T18:07:00.000-07:00

For those who appreciate their freedom...
Happy Independence Day!

Eklektro Retro - beatbox megaphone

2006-07-01T20:46:00.000-07:00

Here's something summer-flavored and semi-cyber from 4 years ago. Camera by Matt Bass, editing by EKG using Vidvox Prophet software

Solar-powered breakbeats at the side of the street

2006-06-03T14:41:00.000-07:00

Live electronic drums by EKG and a (funny) Jim Morrison quote halfway through... Here's what you can do off RV solar power on an early June afternoon... in Malibu. Special thanks to impromptu camera work by Brian "Negative 2".
Running (2) Kyocera 120-watt solar panels, a Trace 12 volt inverter, dual Roland Handsonic HPD-15 drumpads, Apple laptop, Ableton LIVE 5 software = solar-sonic free-form grooves... starts off serious and disintegrates by the minute! More like this coming soon... stay tuned...

Cyber EZ Ryder

2006-05-29T19:01:00.000-07:00

click here to view

Wow, from May Day to Memorial Day, time has surely flown since being back here in the states! But finally here's an episode to put Eklektro back in rotation, and with lots more on the way... this summer.... introducing: Cyber EZ Ryder... from Rio de Janeiro... and back to orbiting LA... semi-nomadic status, a new MacBook Pro in the studio and a backlog of beats about to break... (and seeking a local web designer willing to work for barter-pay)...
Over and out for now, and thanks for watching...
EKG

RE-United RE-Creational Vehicles

2006-05-07T20:14:00.000-07:00

Funny thing that the same weekend "RV" tops the box office... these 2 get back together
Been too busy to blog... but here's the pic to prove: For the first time in nearly 3 years, the (2) Eklektro RVs are side-by-side! Pictured, the silver '76 GMC "Rocket", and the tan '78 GMC "Camel"... complimentary machines. The Camel is now half-way rebuilt after 03's catastrophic crash! So Eklektro Karavan is gearing back up, slowly... Currently looking into converting at least one of the rigs over to propane power ($2.25 / gallon vs. $3.35 for gasoline!)
Ariel view, shot from the roof-top of the new stationary studio...
(see Solar-Sonic, in silver...)

MayDay: Daily Manifesto: first audio podcast

2006-05-01T13:03:00.000-07:00

Insights via nomadic perspective, 16 minutes on the topics of philosophy and politics (continued from intro); perhaps best sync'd to your iPod and listened to while sitting in traffic. Subject: Freedom, America and the underground: How we almost had a Utopian path, Where we went astray, and what we can do to get back on track; exploring historical patterns and transgressions, objective analysis and proposed solutions... in tandem with the liberating powers of technology, the merging of eastern and western philosophies, and the re-recognition of perhaps man's greatest gift... volition!

MayDay_LA: Daily Manifesto: podcast intro

2006-05-01T11:47:00.000-07:00

Breaking the 2 week silence with an audio blog entry, celebrating the 7 year nomadic anniversary of my unexpected orbit 'round the metropolis of Los Angeles... yes, exactly 7 years ago, this week! So with respect to experiences and observations as a Tech-Nomad, living and learning... experimenting, and writing new code... NOW i'm gonna fire-up the blog called "Daily Manifesto"... and this is the first episode's intro... (see part 2 later today)... (and coming soon, the new sub-blog)... enjoy
-EKG