gymclassheroes

My broham, Allen, in Union Square Park / NYC…

…Here’s a paper I just finished writing for a Boston University course called ‘Music & The Holocaust’…The topic centers around music as a tool for the Nazi propaganda efforts of the early twentieth century. There’s a large chance it will put you to sleep, so if you’re restless you should consider checking it out…

With artistic expression comes the ability to convey deep emotion and send powerful messages (whether verbal or non-verbal) to massive audiences. Uncompromised music as a vehicle for self-expression can be a beautiful and moving thing. Throughout this course, we have seen numerous examples of music’s capacity to inspire hope, promote change, and create a sense of balance and harmony amidst tragedy and chaos. We have seen life saving acts of heroism manifested through music. However, should music become tailored to suit the purpose of propaganda, then it has the power to become truly dangerous. Throughout this paper, I will highlight some methods and scenarios in which the Nazi regime utilized music as a propaganda tool during and leading up to the Holocaust.

To deceive a world at large, the carefully disguised Nazi agenda opted first to deceive Germany’s own citizens. In 1933, Joseph Goebbels initiated the creation of the Reich Chamber of Culture (RKK). The RKK immediately began to disseminate the notion that Jewish influence in music and the arts was degenerate and dangerous, and should thus be purged from German culture. Coupled with the dominance of Germany’s totalitarian regime, the RKK implemented policies that directly benefited loyal to the regime Aryan musicians, while giving them the jobs of their non-Aryan peers. Compliant musicians and composers now began writing and performing Germany’s new catalogue of tunes. A body of Aryan-in-spirit music, which affirmed Nazi policy, became introduced to the general population, furthering the extent of brainwash and regime control.

“Musicians thereby contributed to the Nazi effort of cultivating an image favorable to German culture…This development played a crucial role in the legitimatization of Nazi power in the cultural sphere. Musicians spoke and wrote a new language consistent with Nazi principles, which was standardized by the regimented press.”

As the Nazi regime assumed totalitarian control over Germany’s musical and artistic culture, the RKK divided itself into subdivisions. Now able to monitor more closely the great variety of expressionist freedom, political attacks were waged on music deemed to be degenerate, or ‘entartete’ as it was known. Nazi policies especially focused their efforts towards the eradication of jazz music, as it was seen to be a reflection of both Jewish and African culture. Although, we know that several concentration camps actually had jazz bands, which were both approved and obligated to play for entertainment.

Musicians of Afro-German descent were at especially constant odds with the policies of Nazi regime. For them, survival was reliant upon their ability to sing, dance, and act, which in many cases was for the entertainment or propaganda demands of the Nazis. The “German Africa Show” was a staged documentary, which displayed the Nazi’s own propagandist version of black culture.

As a side note, I can’t help but notice the irony in that the Nazi regime seemed to have a taste, perhaps even a preference for, contemporary ‘entartete musik’. Although deemed ‘unacceptable’ for the massive German audience, the Nazi party seemed to relish in private performances behind fences of the ghettos and camps. I’d like to reference a quote from the text of Steve Reich’s ‘Different Trains’ to highlight this irony.

“There was one girl, who had a beautiful voice (Rachella)/ and they loved to listen to the singing, the Germans/ and when she stopped singing they said, ‘More, more’ and they applauded.” 

The contradictions are stark, as we consistently see a regime pushing for the eradication of ‘dangerous’ and ‘unacceptable’ music such as jazz, while at the same time using it for their own entertainment.

Although limited artistic freedom was granted to some, to gain such approval, music was considered by the RKK under a series of qualifications. In appointing jobs and positions, the RKK first gave preference to talented Aryan composers and musicians, stipulating that they also be loyal to the regime. However, in awarding these artists with such esteemed positions, it was expected that they would respond by writing and performing music that espoused Nazi ideals. Traditional, folk-rooted, and Aryan-in-spirit, these new compositions would be used by the RKK as the soundtrack to accompany Germany’s anti-Semitic facelift.

Also approved to work, were non-Jewish musicians and composers who displayed a “genius” level of aptitude for their trade. Additionally they were also required to be a member of the Reich Music Chamber. While this doesn’t affirm that these musicians subscribed to Nazi party beliefs, they were likely in no such position to outwardly pen or perform music resistant to the oppressive movement. Included in this category would be composers such as Wilhelm Furtwängler and Richard Strauss, who although not necessarily anti-Semite in their beliefs, still helped to fuel the Nazi propaganda machine through music.

Whether adopted as an icon for the movement, or influential to the parties’ foundation, the Nazi’s viewed a handful of composers in extremely high regards. Ludwig Van Beethoven, although dead for nearly a century prior to Hitler’s rise to power, was considered by the regime to be a composer whose works were synonymous with German heroic spirit. Another acclaimed German composer, Richard Wagner may be more remembered for his widely outspoken and influential views about what he considered to be the Jewish plague in music. Although Wagner had long since deceased by the birth of Nazism, he is seen as a symbol of the Nazi era because of anti-Semitic views that he broadcast in his infamous booklet, Judaism In Music. In it, he states Jewish music to be characterized by coldness and indifference, void of human expression and passion, and to be trivial and unimportant. Additionally, Wagner believed that the inclusion of Jew’s into music was dangerous to German identity.

Richard Wagner became a hero to the fathers of Nazi ideology, and for the first time represented the direct parallels between music and propaganda. In a way, what Wagner did was essentially write the blue print for the Nazi regime. Many of Wagner’s themes, ideas, and quotes on race and religion were reused tirelessly throughout the Nazi campaign. To this day, Wagner’s anti-Semitic stance is difficult to forget and for this reason, has spread a substantial dark cloud above his body of work.

In the internment camps at Theresienstadt (Terezin), music and culture flourished. Although strictly forbidden on the outside, Terezin was a uniquely structured camp in which Jews were encouraged to perform, compose, and arrange music in a multitude of different settings. Although a seemingly novel and innocent concept, the farce of culture at Terezin was likely one of the Nazi’s largest attempts to conceal their crimes of mass genocide.

During the years of Terezin’s operation, the camp held exceptionally talented musicians and artists, rotating them out with healthier prisoners to keep up the appearance of a safe and idyllic community. Composers went write to work, creating and arranging material, which Terezin’s resident musicians performed in a variety of ensembles.

There are significant ties between music and culture. Realizing this, the Nazi regime used the music and culture of Terezin to deceive the outside world, with long term aspirations. They desired to create a ruse that would reach far into the future. This is obvious in the staged Nazi film The Fuehrer Gives a City to the Jews. Proud and cheerful music accompanies picturesque scenes of a model community. Although, to an extent, the hoax briefly served its purpose, the legacy of top tier compositions left behind ensured that not all musical works would be in vein. Furthermore, the music of Terezin recorded the dignity and pride of these individuals in an important historical context.

To utilize music as a means of spreading deceptive messages throughout Europe and the rest of the world, the Nazi party went to great lengths. From the manipulation of Germany’s own people, to the sinister concept of a falsely represented Jewish ghetto, the idea of music as propaganda appears to have been thoroughly and meticulously premeditated by this regime. 

matt mcginley / april, 2009

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Nicholls, David. 2000. Adolf Hiter: A Biographical Companion. ABC-Clio Inc.

Meyer, Michael. The Politics of Music in the Third Reich. New York: Peter Lang. 1991, p. 5.

Reich, Steve. Different Trains. 3^rd Movement. Elektra Nonesuch Records. 1990.

Teachers Guide To The Holocaust http://fcit.usf.edu/Holocaust/ARTS/musReich.HTM
University of South Florida © 2005

Controversy Over Richard Wagner http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/anti-semitism/Wagner.html
The American-Israeli Cooperative Enterprise © 2009

…Opening Night Event @ The Clevelander Hotel in Miami. I got a room so new it ain’t even finished being built…

Are like Motorhead dipped in a swamp.

or maybe a lifetime.

Retro Tim William

bored and lonely out in Georgia. listening to Ray Charles

STOOOOOOOKED!!!! I FINALLY watched the first one in its entirety the other day and was blown away. I grew up on Transformers and the CGI in these movies is on some next next, there were parts in the first where i couldn’t figure out what the fuck was going on during some of the battle scenes but it looks like they stepped it up this time around……HURRY UP AND COME OUT ALREADY TRANSFORMERS:ROTF…PLEASE!!

the places you go and the people you meet help you discover who you really are.

I recently recieved this email from Jane Tucker, she is the owner of a little coffee shop where I live and head of the Phoenixville Business Association, apparently she found fault with a few of the things I had to say in one of my posts on www.phoenixvillenews.com about how things are not going well in our town. In Phoenixville everyone likes to pretend the town is great even though almost everything is doing rather poorly. enjoy! I sure did.
I had the occasion to read a posting by someone claiming to be a co-owner of creep records.  I can’t assume it was you.  (I have posted the blog below).  I wanted to address a few things that were brought up in this blog:

Response: This was indeed not Arik it was me, Tyler Pursel i’m a touring musician who is part owner of the company
First, I would like to point out that your business has never taken advantage of the marketing, promotional and networking abilities provided to you through PABA. We have sent out emails and posters for you to be involved with numerous events, including a networking event that would have given you exposure to about 70 other business persons in the area who might be interested in doing some co-marketing events with you or in visiting your shop. In fact, you haven’t event taken advantage of the ones presented by myself through Steel City Coffee House.  I offered to let you folks have name sponsorship of a night at Steel City, all you had to do is pick the night and bring the bands in.  We could name it as a Creep Records presents.  I brought this idea to you long before you started going over to Chaplin’s and having shows there.  It would make much more business sense for you to have used a music venue right down the block from you to market your store, you could have an after concert party at your place, which would bring people down from Steel City to your brick and morter site for sales.  Instead, you chose Chaplin’s which is much further from your store.  
RESPONSE: Chaplins has a large stage and high quality PA, if we were going to do a show at steel city we might as well do one in our own store, were not really booking lots of acoustic acts our bands are more commonly than not LOUD and run around like maniacs with their instruments at times, a far cry from the standard fare at your venue (that is not an insult i’m just saying).
You had expressed interest in selling Flower Power tickets, but then when I gave you some to sell, you didn’t sell any, in fact, you couldn’t even find them when I came to collect them.  As a record store, I would have thought that you would be intersted in promoting a great concert like that.  
RESPONSE: I can’t really comment on this because I wasn’t around, I apologize if we didn’t sell any tickets.
Secondly, the blogger writes “I don’t subscribe to the weird backwards commradery that all the other business owners seem to have”.  I’m not sure what that statement means, but if it is weird and backwards to try to support each other and to attempt to group market ourselves, then so be it.  It seems to help, especially during these tough financial times to take advantage of group marketing and events.
RESPONSE: I don’t think it is weird and backwards to support each other, I think it is weird to walk around high and mighty about the business situation in Phoenixville, acting like everything is fantastic and while I have not had a good amount of contact with you I can say a number of the business owners do exactly that, I don’t feel as though businesses genuinely want to help other businesses, its like people seem to think that if they refrain from talking poorly about the town that all this shit is just going to fix itself.
Thirdly, “Next time I will be sure to inspect the area i do business in a little more carefully.”  One of the main tenents of a good business plan is to thoroughly research the area before you invest in a business.  You should have had a business plan, including a market analysis.  Had you done this, you would have found out that there is next to no daytime business in Phoenixville and that extraordinary efforts would have to be taken to draw daytime business to Phoenixville.  A market analysis would also have discovered that even the evening business that we have tends to generate around food and alcoholic beverages (currently) and that your “target” audience, 14-24 ish (I am guessing as I do not know the depth of the products you sell) does not regularly visit Phoenixville to make such purchases.It’s not enough just to set up a business and hope that people come in.  You need to know your audience and target them.
RESPONSE: Well thanks for the sound business advice, so seeing as you researched the area and have obviously done a market analysis and come up with the conclusions you have…why in the hell did you ever open a coffee shop, I would think the no daytime traffic would be an instant turn off but thats me, I don’t feel as though there is a lack of youthful traffic if anything there is a lack of overall traffic, and furthermore the most crowded i’ve ever seen your place is on open mic night when it is in fact filled with people in our demographic aside from a few of your higher profile shows. This is exactly the type of behavior I define as backwards in my previous posting, people in relatively the same situation coming in and trying to tell other people how to run their shit when they are basically in the same boat, correct me if i’m wrong but isn’t your business for sale? if its doing well why would you want to get rid of it? despite the poor situation of Phoenixville business overall we have not yet resorted to trying to sell our business. The first step of healing in any program is admitting that there is a real serious problem and getting angry/upset/heated whatever you wanna call it and say something about it, put your feelings out in the air in, if everyone admits there as frustrated as i’am maybe the people that have somewhat of a capacity to make a difference (of which there are very few anyway) will actually listen, maybe the rent will go down, maybe changes will be made that lead towards more successful businesses for everyone
Fourth, - since you did set up and started business irregardless of the lack of daytime traffic and youthful traffic, 
RESPONSE: Just as you did, in fact you did so in a time when it was way way less than it is now.

you still have options.  When we first started Steel City Coffee House, our original plan was to start a coffeehouse/ music venue/ bookstore.  A month into starting the business we realized that we didn’t have enough sqare footage to do all three.  So, we canned the idea of the bookstore as it required the most square footage and had the least profit margin- even though it was something that I really wanted.  We then focused on coffee and local music.  Luckily for us, the music side of the business really blossomed and the food side did as well for a while (less now that there are numerous choices with the availability of alcohol).  During the years, we have had to make alot of changes to keep pace with the changes that are going on in Phoenixville.  Sometimes you have to be flexible.  When Barry Cassidy started shutting down the 200 block for First Fridays and placing a band right outside our door when we were having concerts inside, we had to evolve.  We had to stop having concerts on First Fridays to allow the town to grow and take advantage of the foot traffic on First Fridays for the coffee and food side of the business while losing a night of concert traffic.  
RESPONSE: I’ve got no problems with first fridays, our store as i’m sure every other store do incredibly well, if every friday were like first friday things would be good but I realize that is somewhat of an unreasonable request.  What changes have you really made that made a difference? i’d love to know. 
Perhaps if you changed your business scheme a little to include a more diversity in your music selections and create an atmosphere where people feel welcomed in (despite their musical preferences) then you would get some more adult business.
RESPONSE: While we don’t really get a lot of customers these days, our customer base is extremely varied, I’ll sell Slayer CD’s to 14 year old kids while i’m selling Old Neil Young records to their Dad and Joni Mitchell CD’s for mom, maybe there is a little elitism when people come in but 1. To a degree that comes with the territory and i’m sick of  random old people who have no intention of ever buying anything or supporting us in anyway coming in and asking 30 million questions about who painted our back wall or how long we’ve been here, as well as people who only come in to try and get us to spend money to advertise in their stupid newspaper or magazine which has a circulation of like 20 people, or whatever weird crackhead has nothing better to do or wants to wash the windows, honestly I would say we are a pretty welcoming store, we let all those people come in and give us shit all day even though they have no intention of buying anything. 



Again, I am not familiar with all that you sell, but if it is what you list online, I don’t think that the average American is familiar with those bands and probably would not purchase their music.  
RESPONSE: HA! and were supposed to be an arts and entertainment town, I would also say the “average american” has no idea who some of the weird bluegrass/folk/acoustic acts you have playing at SS are either but you still sell tickets don’t you? to a degree both of our businesses are somewhat niche in terms of music, the majority of your appeal musically is to the upper-middle class XPN listening yuppies while a place like ours tends to appeal more to their kids, while that is so we sell music for every type of listener, our record racks are meticulously divided by genre and artist, there is something for everyone, in your last paragraph you made the suggestion that maybe we weren’t inviting to people who’s musical preference differ from ours to which I say bullshit but if were getting into that, where is your overall average american appeal in terms of music in your venue? we’ve certainly had acts comparable to what you have at your place play at our store and I highly doubt you can say the same, 

If your products appealed to a wider audience, perhaps you would draw in more people.  The way that your business appears, from the exterior, is that it is geared towards young people only 
RESPONSE: I don’t see how it is your figuring this? Our record store is really nice compared to other places i’ve been, i’ve been to shops that were nothing but dirt floors and crates full of records, our store has beautiful hardwood floors a plaid mural painting and track lighting. Our older customers have often commented on how nice it is, in store music is always at a reasonable volume and usually pretty non-threatening as we are aware that that would be a turn off to some of our older customers. I don’t know what you would expect us to do? sure if we were a bright shiny FYE store we would probably get more adult traffic but if you were a Starbucks you’d be doing a little better to.
therefore adults who do have expendable cash and good jobs are deterred from entering as they feel it is for young people only.  
RESPONSE: Honestly I feel like our store and hipster home are probably the only stores now that attract those people at all but there aren’t enough of them to make the world go round. Hipster Home certainly more than us but still….we get these types of customers a lot of times they come in and buy things for their kids.

In Philadelphia you would find a much larger audience that is familiar with your products. 
RESPONSE: No shit.
 Out here in the burbs there are much fewer individuals who know and listen to the type of music you are offering, whether we are culturally deficient or not is not the point. 
RESPONSE: It is a great part of the point actually, i’m tired of hearing people champion this town as some sort of arts and entertainment type of place, Its one street with a bunch of bars and restaurants….this street would technically work anywhere. People have to eat and people love to drink its pretty recession proof…its a crappy cheeseburger that everyone’s trying to pass off as a filet
 Although Steel City is considered a “folk” venue, we actually have had a wide variety of genres perform at our venue, including punk and rap- to appeal to wider audiences.  Perhaps if you widened your appeal, you would widen your ability to sell to more people.
RESPONSE: HA HA HA what rap acts have you had at Steel City, i’m gonna guess maybe G.Love or some shit like that, and I would be hard pressed to believe that punk acts ever played there, and if they did you sure as hell aren’t booking them anymore or they wouldn’t be calling me. Since our store has opened we have done Metal and Punk shows and acoustic nights, our opening night was a DJ spinning vintage Reggae and a couple of Hip Hop performances. Again people in glass houses should not be throwing stones.
One of the reasons that Spedies failed is because he refused to give up on his original idea, and refused to take the advice of numerous professionals that tried to help him.  His orginal idea was to market organic, healthy and freshly cooked spedie sandwiches, salads,and bison burgers to the public.  He didn’t believe in selling sodas (high profit margin) and did believe in traditional french fries (high profit margin).  He also failed to do a business plan.  Had he done a business plan, his research would have show him that no other “spedie” centered restaurant had ever successfully survived more than a year outside the area of Binghamton, New York.  How do I know? I know because I provided a free business consultation to him after he came to me complaining about his business.  I did the research.  Being from Binghamton, New York myself, I was one of the only ones that understood what a spedie sandwich was and that he was making them wrong.  In Binghamton, they par-cook the meat and keep it in a temperature controlled bin until the customer orders, they then finish the process so that it only take about 3 minutes to make a sandwich.  The average time it took him to make a sandwich was 22 minutes (I know, because part of my consulation process is to time the customer and food service).  My advice to him was to continue providing some organic, healthy sandwiches, but for survival to institute fresh made hamburgers (he could have had the best burgers in town), with regular fries, cheese fries, and crab fries.  Instead he invested in an air baked system that cost him twice as much as a regular french fryer and he could only use a specific type of fry provided by one company in the area that charged and arm and a leg.  I also gave him three specific marketing events to do to promote his business.  One was the Great American Spiedie Cookout- to occur on July 4th during the festivities on the street.  All he had to do was rent a large grill from Taylor Rental and give each customer a spedie from the grill with a coupon to come back for a sandwich from his shop.  His response was that he didn’t want to be there on the weekend and that he thought coupons made his business look cheap.  Not only could he promote his sandwiches by this idea, but promote his sales of ready to cook spedies for home barbecues.
RESPONSE: I was a pretty regular patron of spiedies and I thought the food was excellent, but yes it had its share of problems, as you mentioned it did take forever at times to get food which I continue to see as the ultimate death of his business. But also the reason all of our businesses are suffering is due to lack of foot traffic in general to businesses that aren’t bars or full scale restaurants, to me the town seems like its nearing death in terms of retail and smaller more lunch type places like Spiedies was, I hope i’m wrong but as I said it doesn’t feel like it. The problem with Spiedies was not the quality of food but mostly the service, 22 minutes for a sandwich is unacceptable and I would often wait longer than that for a Bison burger. Your suggestion makes great sense and its a shame for Bryan that he didn’t take the oppurtunity to do things like that, still I don’t believe it would have saved his business, poor service and wait time killed his business as well as whats killing all of us aside from the bars and bigger restaurants….lack of traffic at times other than weekend evenings.
I’m not going to tell you that Steel City Coffee House is the best business in the area.  I’m not even going to tell you that we are making loads of money, because we are not.  I’m also not going to tell you that we don’t have our own problems that I continually have to address.  Waht I will tell you is that when we  invested, we knew it would be quite some time before we made a profit.  We profited only two years of the last seven years and this year was not one of them, due to the economy.
RESPONSE: So the question is then how long are you willing to wait? does it make sense to continue to keep a  pretty much failing business open based on those numbers? I don’t think so. For all intents and purposes Creep has done okay, we did this with our own money, no loans or credit lines or anything else like that. We have been in this barely a year and it is disheartening to hear that one of the longest standing most recognized businesses in Phoenixville has turned a profit only 2 of the 7 years its been open. I understand the idea of believing in something, specifically the idea of turning a once dilapidated town into something cool or “rising from the ashes” so to speak but lets be reasonable! The town has definetly improved greatly i’m sure since your store opened but what can you foresee happening that is really going to make people come in and spend lots of money? how do you think its really going to get much better than it is? our town has hit a ceiling I think and if its going to change I think we need to allow some corporate business, the rent overall needs to be lowered and more people need to come out and support all the businesses, not just the bars and restaurants. I until this happens I don’t think anything is going to change.
What I can tell you is that we have established a nice community business that is interested in working with other businesses to make Phoenixville more viable with daytime traffic and nighttime traffic enough to support all types of businesses.  We need diverse businesses like Creep Records to bring diverse populations to town to add to our draw.  But, we also need businesses that want to work together.  Part of my goals in becoming the President of PABA were to help organize the businesses, target consumers, and create a feeling that Phoenixville is a destination.  With that idea, perhaps we can get some service industries, and daytime focused businesses (other than restaurants) to invest in Phoenixville to boost both daytime and nighttime traffic.  If we don’t work together, who is going to encourage others to invest along with us?  
RESPONSE: Well i’m not encouraging anyone at the current time to open a business here or invest in anything having to do with Phoenixville. If anyone came to me about opening a business in Pville i’d tell them to wait 10 years and see where its at. I’m not opposed to working with people to make this town better but i’m a small part of even my own business, i’m a touring musician and that is how I make my living for a little over half the year. I find it hard to believe that I will find any common ground with most business owners here, this town denied a tattoo shop because of the “clientele”. People need to wake the fuck up, other than the people coming in on the weekends to go out to eat and drink, the clientele is the same as it ever was, they are here and they are not going anywhere why not try to make a couple dollars off of them though I can’t even say that I agree with the idea that tattoo’s bring in poor clientele, a lot of those people are my friends. We have currently partnered up with The Pickering Creek to do a punk rock night every tuesday with beer specials and we are happy to be working with them because we feel as though they are the only real business that understands what we want to do. I think Phoenixville is already as much of a “destination” as its ever gonna be or if it does on the off chance improve its going to  be a long time, I think such an amount of time that the business people who aren’t doing well now are not going to be able to wait it out. This town could definetly stand to have some diversity and I like to think that our store is a part of that but I feel like we are essentially just scapegoats for the greater good, maybe in 10 years things will be working and someone will open a record store that does well, although by then records may be obsolete so who knows. I think the idea of seeing service industries make there way into town is pretty far off as well, service business require people with needs, all anyone seems to need to do in Pville is eat and drink, I think thats about as service oriented as its going to get.

In conclusion, I am sorry that you (or whomever did that posting) don’t feel that Phoenixville is what you had hoped it would be and that we are culturally insufficient, crap hole small town, etc.  What I can tell you is that you haven’t made any effort to work with PABA on networking or promoting your business.  In fact, you have not even made an effort to communicate with one of the businesses that has offered you assistance in promotions, Steel City.  It isn’t a one way street, in order to take advantage of opportunities, you need to communicate with businesses around you and take advantage of your membership in PABA.  Simply complaining about the situation doesn’t make it any better.
RESPONSE: I’m sorry to, I still like this little craphole town and I think it is a very normal thing to have a somewhat conflicted relationship with where you live or do business, on the living here side of things i’m not as terribly bothered by the bullshit, I drink at The Pickering, I eat at every restaurant on the block and in the afternoons when i’m around i’ll often stop in to Steel City with my dog and grab a Hall Street sandwich and a Coke. I would love to make an effort to work with PABA honestly as I mentioned because of work i’m not around a whole lot of the time but I will be in Pville all summer long, Arik handles a lot of the day to day things for the store and I can only really go by what he tells me and maybe there has been some miscommunication but that doesn’t change much. I would be happy to renew our PABA membership, let me know what I can do, I will certainly attend the meetings and share my opinions and ideas and make more of an effort to get involved, but do I think that it is going to save my business probably not. Were behind on bills and rent and all of that i’m guessing its only a matter of time before they ask us to leave, my theory though is that they don’t want us to because it will look bad for the town and if they do indeed ask us to leave someone will put a spin on about how we “were doing bad business” of course, it won’t be because the rent is outrageous the fact that people only really inhabit the street about 8 hours out of the week. I thank you for writing and letting me know about oppurtunities that I didn’t neccessarily know were available to us and for taking time out of your day to read my previous entry. I really do hope that things overall will improve but i’m hesitant to full on believe that. Also I realize after re-reading my previous post that I was maybe a little hard on everything, it was just an angry day overall and I suppose I took some of that in my post but then again I feel as though you zeroed in on only a small amount of what I really had to say in my post so i’d say its pretty even. Best of luck to you and everyone else trying to make it work
Tyler G. PurselMusician/Record Store Co-Owner









Original Post:I’m a part owner in Creep Industries, the record store at 239 Bridge Street. despite my efforts to inject some sort of musical culture into the small town of Phoenixville, PA the kids are mostly horrible excuses for human beings, while the entire town fronts like it wants to be some sort of “Arts and Entertainment” mecca (Mr. Demutis words not mine) what it has really turned into is nothing more than another craph0le small town with one street filled with nothing but fratboy bars inhabited by mostly overly conservative morons. Being a business owner in this town is even more frustrating and backwards, I along with my business partners were pretty much straight up lied to about the kind of foot traffic our store would recieve, yet our landlord is consistently telling us how much money our store “should be making”. Right now the rent for our small store in Phoenixville is $1400 a month plus bills, we recently came to find out that we can rent a store front of equal size in an up and coming area of Philadelphia for half the price, i’d love to do nothing more than close up shop and move everything down there but unfortunately that would probably cost a lot of money so its not really an option at the moment, Our business is doing okay but am I proud and happy Phoenixville business owner? no I find myself constantly pi$$ed off and aggravated with this town, rent is to high for almost all the business spaces and foot traffic during anytime other than dumb first fridays and whatever odd ball festivals they decide to throw is extremely minimal, a good weekday is getting 3 customers in the store, i’m sure some people will try and turn this around on me and say that maybe were not doing good business but thats bulls***, I would be willing to say ANY business in Phoenixville that claims to be thriving right now (Other than the bars) is straight up lying. Cheese! was a great shop that I frequented and would almost always have to wait for service because they were actually in the earlier days busier, they closed to my knowledge because the overhead of the place was to high, Speedies had really good food but it was hardly what I would call speedy nor was it affordable for what it was, despite this fact I ate there a lot because the burgers were so good but never once was Brian the least bit personable and on top of that it would sometimes take 30 mins to get a burger? what the he** man. Tyler James I always thought of as the least evil of all the bars but even that place sucked, drinks were expensive and I recall one night when one of the bartenders skipped all my songs on the jukebox because she didn’t feel like hearing “that punk stuff” (she did not say stuff I cannot get this comment in with the word she actually said, how wonderfully conservative) despite the fact that I was in the bar all night drinking chimay and buying drinks for my friends, whatever, if you only want people to listen to nickelback and whatever other red state rock degenerate aholes listen to don’t have an internet jukebox, don’t give me the option to play something that your just going to skip anyway. I don’t think the town is closing but I can tell you as a business owner that things do not look good and its probably not going to get much better, I don’t subscribe to the weird backwards commradery that all the other business owners seem to have i’m trying to be honest about the situation for people who want to know the deal about whats going on. One of the owners of Wolfgang books bailed out because he just couldn’t see being able to make it work (great guys, great shop one of the only ones who were nice and supportive of our shop early on.) and thats dissapointing considering how long they have been there, most of the businesses are for sale but people don’t like you to know that and its not rumor, you can buy Hipster Home on Amazon or overstock for like 1.5 million (yeah right) as well as a few of the restaurants, while people may not be neccesarily closing they are definetly trying to get out before it gets much worse and thats a fact.I feared coming here and sharing my opinions because I felt like my harsh opinions would make people maybe not want to shop in my store but then again almost all of our consistent business is from out of town clients or a tight knit handful of kids that feel the same way we do about everything, so I don’t really care the townspeople have been very unsupportive for the most part in terms of coming in and shopping, but they are always up our a$$ about paying an obnoxious amount of money to advertise in the first friday flyer or whatever or to put up their flyers for some dumb festival. The only people who I think are doing it the right way right now are Sean and Jeff at The Pickering Creek, Rocky at the Kilt Shop, Fiber Salon and the people own the Bridgeside Deli (far better than any eats on bridge) there may be a few others but these are the ones I believe in, These guys have a great business model and yet are still open minded and smart as hell which is more than I can say for most of the business owners i’ve come in to contact with. And while were at it how bout letting a little corporate business work its way in, while I do appreciate phoenixvilles intent to keep it pretty independent down on bridge street there is just no foot traffic to support the retail businesses, no real retail related draw of any kind people would rather go to KOP, throw in a gap maybe a chipotle and a cold stone creamery and watch business boom, maybe not but at this point its worth a shot, If I could and money wasn’t an issue our store would already be set up and running happily in Northern Liberties. Next time I will be sure to inspect the area i do business in a little more carefully. I’ve met a lot of really great people here but this town suffers from inflated ego, home prices and an unwarranted sense of entitlement, This is NOT Philadelphia nor is it really a Philadelphia suburb. It is what it is and maybe when it starts realizing that things will begin to pick up, If i’m still living here i’ll welcome that change with open arms but more than likely, I won’t be here. “

sick

On our way To AK-Chicago….

Ak-47 in Chicago…..stop by and have a cold one….

Me and the big(lil) Brother Wayne…..

Me Wayne and Kid Rock in Detroit Rock City….

The Last Show of the I AM MUSIC TOUR 09’…we went out with a BANG!!!

I wanna wear it ALL the time………

Little Ass Seth with a Big Ass Head……

Gym Class/Nappy Boy FAMILY….Last date of THE I AM MUSIC TOUR 09’…..So Sad…

Can you see me???????

Street art session in Detroit…..

Last Night Cypher….Wayne going IN…..

We Played at the Final Four in Detroit. It was fucking amazing…such a good time, such a great crowd. Did I mention we played with Staind?!?!?!?!?! 

TRAVIETRON…..BAWSE!!!

Gym Crest Heroes……..

Twitter Anyone?

It’s the first date of the Gym Class Heroes college tour in Ohio, the show went pretty well and it felt good to play a real full set again in front of a bunch of wild ass kids. I worked on some art today which I will try to post up soon. Our downtime has been filled with mostly long bouts of watching adult swim cartoons, drinking and listening to Daniel Johnston. I haven’t been sleeping much.

Very recently someone close to me passed away in a car accident at far to young an age and it saddens me greatly not to be around home to be with her family (Who always have been like family to me) to offer my condolences and support, though i’m not sure what I could say that would make anyone feel any better, i just wish I could be there. I find nothing sadder then when bad things happen to good people. I don’t think I have fully grasped the reality of the situation and i’m hoping that maybe by writing about it I will be able to properly cope. There is so much I want to say and do but I do not wish to mention names or anything of that sort out of respect to the family and their privacy during this hard time. The world is a twisted place and I hate to know that people I greatly care for are suffering. I have often as of late questioned a lot of the decisions I have made in my life, I certainly have my fair share of social issuses and i’ve lost touch with a lot of people over time and I plan to remedy this situation in the coming months. I guess I’ll just leave it at saying treasure the people your close to whether it be friends or family or whoever and do your best to set aside whatever differences or grievances you may have with them. To the family: i’m greatly sorry for your loss and I hope that in time you can heal I also want to say thank you for supporting me in realizing my dream and helping me out a great deal at a time in my life when I needed help and overall for being great friends and excellent people, I don’t think I ever really said thank you so…thank you, I apologize for not making more of an effort to be around when i’m home and I certainly hope to see more of you, R.I.P  B you will be missed and in my thoughts and the thoughts of many for eternity.

————————————

I came upon a doctor who appeared in quite poor health. I said “there is nothing that I can do for you that you can’t do 
for yourself.” He said “Oh yes you can. Just hold my hand. I think that would 
help.” So I sat with him a while and then I asked him how he felt. He said, “I 
think I’m cured. In fact, I’m sure. Thank you stranger, for your 
therapeutic smile.” 

So that is how I learned the lesson that everyone is alone. And your eyes must 
do some raining if you are ever going to grow. But when crying don’t help and 
you can’t compose yourself. It is best to compose a poem, an honest verse of longing or a simple song of hope. That is why I’m singing… Baby don’t worry cause now I 
got your back. And every time you feel like crying, I’m gonna try and make you laugh. And if I can’t, if it just hurts too bad, then we will wait for it to pass and I will keep you company through those days so long and black. And we’ll just keep working on the problem we know we’ll never solve of Love’s uneven remainder, our lives are fractions of a whole. But if the world could remain within a frame like a painting on a wall. Then I think we would see the beauty then. We would stand staring in awe at our still lives posed like a bowl of oranges, like a story told by the fault lines and the soil.

PA people come on out!

I just finished reading Phil Spector’s biography by Mark Ribowsky, excellent book about one of the most sick, fucked up, cold, evil, manipulative, talented motherfuckers in the game. I think this should be required reading for anyone going to school for music business related subjects.

Cold black island well you

hardly know me but

i’m selling ships but no one

knows where they’re going and

you’ve got your failures and 

I’ve got my hopes and we

capsize together as we

wave towards the coast

as we drift away 

into the coldest waves

we’ve seen better days

I see broken windows and lonely hearts and theres

no telling what I lost the shell of a man with no

plans for after no looking ahead of this

beatdown and broken and takin a piss 

we’ll drift away 

into the coldest waves

we’ve seen better days

Killer Bees

If I were to stand around and shout it out

with knives in hand you’d have no doubts and or regrets

lets please engage in casual sex to pass the time

before I step to surely over the line

but theres a problem here or so it seems

cuz even when its silent out I hear your screams

waking the neighbors like a windy breeze or new disesase

but I guess thats just her way of saying please

but she don’t have all the answers

she’s just a thoughtless romancer

she’s got a bad case of cancer of the heart

And with the sharpest glance you made it clear

i’ll turn my back and walk away for 40 years

but time can turn to happiness from empty tears

and medicate a future filled with fears

but I won’t take the pill to get me right

I sit awake between the palest moon and brightest light

You know I wear my dancing shoes behind my eyes

she’s always searching for alibis

but she don’t have all the answers

she’s just a thoughtless romancer

she’s got a bad case of cancer of the heart

so won’t you sting me like a killer bee

the very notion of it all makes me want to believe in 

a great mystery or a neverending dream

that girl was born in a smoke stack

with hay bails for her hair and a frail body

her heart was made from a stale air

that I could waste inside a thoughtless bar

where cheap talk over beer

could outlive all my cares

and how the empty dreams

seemed to fill her weary head

because sleeping was nothing

but something to do when your dead

and all the songs you write and try so hard to sing

and while the pronouns they may change 

they all mean the same thing

mean the same thing

this year has been everlasting

i’m not grasping the point of your fucked up life

you smashed my world on the concrete

like a promise you could never keep

and although it seems as if theres a shred of decency 

well thats fucked up too

before it was all just me but now somehow its me and you

because lifes just a test of the shit we can be put through

and all the songs you write and try so hard to sing

and while the pronouns they may change 

they all mean the same thing

mean the same thing

my futures lost but I can live without it

and what it cost  I can’t grieve about it

This is a new tune I wrote after a particularly bad day, though I can’t say for sure whether thats reflected in the tune or not. enjoy! its just a demo the vocals are a little rough and there is a lot of background bus noise.

This ones called “Sad Days Are Numbered”

This ones called “Colony Of Critterbeings”

Today I did pretty much all of the following things and therefore my Easter kicked ass:

1. Attended Strip Club with a pizza buffet

2. Went To P.F. Changs with my touring family

/thread

Anyhow things have been kinda fun, I wrote three new songs yesterday and did some little demos with my field recorder, also I’ve gotten really into drawing and art lately, I’m hoping the birthday fairy might bring me a full set of On The Run Markers, I will post some of my drawings soon enough. Also If you want to help me out please post this link wherever you can http://www.sendspace.com/file/gdmq2r 

Thats a link to my new solo record, I understand people not buying records anymore but this is totally free and will be forever so snatch it up before the sendspace link dies, for anone interested I have 2 copies of the limited edition pressing left if you would like one of these come up to me at a show and ask, these are also free and almost gone, plus if I ever become a big deal shit will be ebay gold. I’m gonna post some more stuff later. But seriously….spread that link around, help a brother out.

My American Hero chucks

from my blog that is. I drifted off into the life of being on the road. (Living on a bus lol) If you allow yourself to indulge in its allure youll lose touch with the world. <3

Chicago Today! Chi is where alot of my favorite hip hop comes from..

My Vimby Cover- Travie already blogged this so im sure you guys have already seen it but I still had to put it up just in case ; )

A few days ago we flew in a tad late for a show in Detroit. The venue sent us several police escorts to rush us through traffic. I’m not gonna lie…The shit was kinda cool, but as usual the sky got jealous and gravity was trying to hold us down.

Tim WIlliam…….a look into the dude you guys will be making babies to real real soon….BATSQUAD!!!

ME.  Tour is nearing an end. I’ve collected lots of pics and videos throughout it. The past week has been pretty awkward. It started nightmare after nightmare, got better in Universal City, sunk back to all time lows and yesterday, yesterday made me feel like a real boy. Checks and balances. Ups and Downs…….DAY OFF IN OKC.

its 3:22am and I can’t sleep for shit, i’m losing my mind as per usual. I’ve decided today to cleanse myself from the internet a bit. i’m deleting both of my myspace profiles and facebook as well as most of my messageboard profiles…i’m gonna stick with twitter and this blog I figure thats more sufficient, everytime I log in to one of these sites i’m reminded of how pointless they are, i’m mildly frustrated with life currently and have decided its time to maybe try taking control of my life and finding ways to be a little happier about everything, being on tour all the time I think has made me somewhat lazy and more irresponsible than I was before so i’m going to attempt to start filling my days on the road with more enriching activities, I really want to try to get back into building guitar pedals and amps and focus on that more.

The shows on this tour have been incredible , this is the first arena tour we’ve done where I feel like our band just kicks major ass. I also want to put up a website specifically for my personal music projects and recordings, this will probably cost a couple bucks but I think its a good investment, i’ve been obsessed with the song “Some Things Last A Long Time” by Daniel Johnston, not only for its lyrics but arguably for the most depressing set of piano chords possibly ever recorded.

I haven’t posted here in quite some time but I figured today was as good a day as any, Lately i’ve really been considering the prospect of moving to a new state mainly because despite my efforts to inject some sort of musical culture into my small town of Phoenixville, PA the people are mostly uncultured fucking horrible excuses for human beings, while the entire town fronts like it wants to be some sort of “Arts and Entertainment” mecca what it has really turned into is nothing more than another shithole small town with one street filled with nothing but fratboy asshole bars inhabited by mostly overly conservative fucktards. Being a business owner in this town is even more frustrating and backwards, I along with my business partners were pretty much straight up lied to about the kind of foot traffic our store would recieve, yet our idiot landlord is consistently telling us how much money our store “should be making”. Right now the rent for our store in Phoenixville, a small underpopulated cultural wasteland is $1400 a month plus bills, we recently came to find out that we can rent a store front of equal size in an up and coming area of Philadelphia for half the price, i’d love to do nothing more than close up shop and move everything down there but unfortunately that would probably cost a lot of money so its not really an option.

It’s starting to maybe look like Austin, TX is gonna be the spot, I considered Portland, OR for a minute but quickly decided it was way to liberal for my blood, don’t get me wrong, i’m into organic food and strip clubs and all the other good shit the city has to offer but I don’t want to ride a bike and despite the fact that they are a shitty company I still like shopping at the Corporate devil known as Wal-Mart, also I think overly crazy liberals are just as bad as overly crazy conservatives. I’ve been putting a lot of thought into it and I find its really hard to define the type of place I want to live, I want there to certainly be a vibrant musical scene but without all the bullshit and holier than thou type attitudes that come from a lot of the over priviliged white kids playing indie rock. I want to be able to go to bars that aren’t over run by college type dickheads, though I’ve been a lot of places in the USA and I think this is almost impossible, Austin is the closest i’ve come to this. I never thought i’d be moving to Texas but the more and more I think about spending time in Pennsylvania the more I just want to get the fuck out. Fuck life, Listen to Sleep.

Tyler :)

I haven’t posted here in quite some time but I figured today was as good a day as any, Lately i’ve really been considering the prospect of moving to a new state mainly because despite my efforts to inject some sort of musical culture into my small town of Phoenixville, PA the people are mostly uncultured fucking horrible excuses for human beings, while the entire town fronts like it wants to be some sort of “Arts and Entertainment” mecca what it has really turned into is nothing more than another shithole small town with one street filled with nothing but fratboy asshole bars inhabited by mostly overly conservative fucktards. Being a business owner in this town is even more frustrating and backwards, I along with my business partners were pretty much straight up lied to about the kind of foot traffic our store would recieve, yet our idiot landlord is consistently telling us how much money our store “should be making”. Right now the rent for our store in Phoenixville, a small underpopulated cultural wasteland is $1400 a month plus bills, we recently came to find out that we can rent a store front of equal size in an up and coming area of Philadelphia for half the price, i’d love to do nothing more than close up shop and move everything down there but unfortunately that would probably cost a lot of money so its not really an option.

It’s starting to maybe look like Austin, TX is gonna be the spot, I considered Portland, OR for a minute but quickly decided it was way to liberal for my blood, don’t get me wrong, i’m into organic food and strip clubs and all the other good shit the city has to offer but I don’t want to ride a bike and despite the fact that they are a shitty company I still like shopping at the Corporate devil known as Wal-Mart, also I think overly crazy liberals are just as bad as overly crazy conservatives. I’ve been putting a lot of thought into it and I find its really hard to define the type of place I want to live, I want there to certainly be a vibrant musical scene but without all the bullshit and holier than thou type attitudes that come from a lot of the over priviliged white kids playing indie rock. I want to be able to go to bars that aren’t over run by college type dickheads, though I’ve been a lot of places in the USA and I think this is almost impossible, Austin is the closest i’ve come to this. I never thought i’d be moving to Texas but the more and more I think about spending time in Pennsylvania the more I just want to get the fuck out. Fuck life, Listen to Sleep.

Tyler :)

…nice with his!