New York City playboy and FRICTION contributor/photographer, Pat, recently came back from a trip to Africa. While he was there the crazy fool decided it would be a good idea to climb to the top of Mount Kilimanjaro. Luckily, he made it and is back at home in Queens in one piece. In his own words, Pat describes his feelings at Uhuru Peak, the highest point in Africa.

Despite my smile, I was terribly unhappy at the peak. My body shutdown due to the lack of oxygen. I wouldn’t have cared if the Playboy Mansion were up there with free tits and taco salad. I wanted to get the fuck out of there.

Ha! In all seriousness, it’s pretty impressive, climbing to and elevation 19,340-ft is no joke – but y’all DO know that Ray’s now probably scheduling a trip to Nepal to climb Mount Everest or something even more extreme.

This track’s for you Pat. Congrats! Nice suit by the way.

[MP3]: Erasure  ”Stop!”
7″ Single, Mute; 1989

UPDATE: Check out Pat’s pics from the trip. Here

I’m enjoying my last day in California in sunny Playa Del Rey (pictured). Heard that it’s cold as fuck on the East Coast and I’m not looking forward to coming back. The weather out here has been absolutely gorgeous. See you soon Philly.

[MP3]: Dr. Dog  ”California”
Takers and Leavers EP, Park The Van; 2006

THANK YOU so much Ray for reminding me about today, I totally erm…spaced. Anyway, it seems a bit crazy, but I am indeed finally going to see My Bloody Valentine on July 3rd in Glasgow at The Barrowland Ballroom. The London tickets are selling like hotcakes, but it’s the weekend of POPPED! anyway so I couldn’t go. I’ve never been to Scotland, but this seems like a good enough reason to go!

So…Mom, Dad (I KNOW you read this thing, not really sure why), how about a flight to Glasgow (just follow this link) for Christmas please?

I’m stoked to say the very least.

[MP3]: My Bloody Valentine  ”Sugar”
1989, Free Flexi given out with The Catalogue magazine #67

[MP3]: Joy Division  ”Isolation”

More Holga pics on Flickr

Yeah, I know, I know, three days late on this and in the blog world, three days might as well be three weeks. I actually just got back this morning around 3am and didn’t really have a chance to think about and reflect on what made this year’s Pitchfork Music Festival so much fun for me.

It hit me this morning halfway into work on what made the last four days such a great time. Of course I went to Chicago to see live music, but I unconsciously approached this festival completely different than I have any other in the past. I had no schedule whatsoever, nada; all I knew is that I wanted to see The Field. It was all about the unexpected, I kind of just let the day take me wherever it wanted and surprisingly it turned out better than I could have imagined.

In the past, when I would go to one of these events, I’d have a specific plan that I was focused on, almost like a horse with blinders where I’d fail to take in a whole other side of the event, which I learned in Chicago was the people who actually came to see the music. This may come across as a bit cheesy to all of you, but for me it was a real eye-opener. Instead of rushing from the front of each stage with my camera in hand, I stepped back and took in the entire festival.

I’ll start from the end and work my way backward. In the wee hours of Monday morning, I found myself on the Blue Line heading back to downtown Chicago talking to some guy from Pitchfork about what he does there. Prior to this, I found myself aimlessly wandering and cab-less in a mostly abandoned area of the Near West Side neighborhood of Chicago after seeing DAN DEACON, DEERHUNTER, and some dude in his tighty whiteys perform at a warehouse loft on a scale much much smaller than they had played just a day earlier. The room where the bands played was also about 300 times more humid than it was here on the East Coast just a week ago and Dan Deacon ate up every bit of it, sweating (I mean pouring) it out with the crowd with his trademark show. Deerhunter’s live show was the real surprise of the weekend – putting on a solid (and loud) set to the Chicago crowd of about 100 or so. It’s really great when a band’s live show can completely sway your opinion about them.

Before hitting up a pre-party for the Deerhunter/Dan Deacon warehouse afterparty, I found myself front and center at the Pitchfork Festival for THE FIELD’s (aka Axel Willner) set. Musically, Willner’s set was the highlight of the festival for me, who delivered with layers minimal techno beats topped off with a bit of shoegaze atmospherics, letting loops dangle, extracting them to infinity, and further reinforcing why From Here We Go Sublime is the album of the year. Before The Field, I caught a bit of STEPHEN MALKMUS’ mellow solo set and some of JAMIE LIDELL’s antics.

The earlier part of Sunday was spent roaming around Union Park, browsing through records, getting caught in a water gun fight, playing bottle cap frisbee, drinking too many Goose Island’s and then waiting in dusty endless bathroom lines, watching people play basketball knockout, and finally learning about roller derby from the Windy City Rollers. I got a killer temporary tattoo from them.

We ended Saturday night in a weird and uncomfortable place, but fortunately the music was good. This followed seeing FREER, TIGERCITY, and DJ Mother Hubbard rock it at The Cobra Lounge. The first day of the festival, I watched Dan Deacon get shut down by the fire marshal after being dragged to see CLIPSE which actually was pretty decent. This was preceded by FUJIYA AND MIYAGI and BATTLES, both of who I was gladly seeing for the first time. IRON AND WINE was quite a bore, but you can’t really blame the band, the sound at their stage was suspect all weekend.

Friday night, I headed up to Wrigleyville, which is sort of like Bleeker Street in Greenwich Village on the weekends. Drunkeness all over the place. DJ Bald Eagle, one-half of the Life During Wartime crew, layed down an absolutely killer set at Metro after the crowd was nearly bored to death with a screening of the Daft Punk’s new movie, Electroma. Remember Gus Van Sant’s Gerry? Electroma also sees a duo hike (and drive) around, A LOT. Still, I’d like to get another shot at seeing the film.

That’s pretty much it, at least everything I can remember. Thanks to the people of Chicago and Pitchfork for putting together such a great festival and welcoming us out-of-towners to your great city.

[MP3]: Black Moth Super Rainbow  ”Sun Lips”

Crackers united for a trip to Lake Wallenpaupack in northeast Pennsylvania last weekend. Cracker antics ensued as we invaded the quiet and lush forests of the Poconos for a second time. It was a gorgeous weekend as we fled our respective cities and soaked up some summer sun.

One thing that we learned on the getaway is that we’re much too old for Pictionary, unless you don’t know what a weathervane is and errr…and not to pee off a boat full of drunken Crackers (or you might just “fall” in). Poor bastard almost lost his trunks (with a bum shoulder too).

Pat’s documentation of the weekend’s tomfoolery is over on his Flickr site.

Just got back from a week-long trip to Portland Oregon, including a jaunt to Mt. Hood and the historic Timberline Lodge.  I love this City, not only because they have a great music scene, but because of the creative energy happening here.  So much art and culture for such a small town.  Also, Portland is progressive.  They are lightyears beyond other cities in green design and the only city in the world to have a skatepark master plan.  They have signs downtown for skateboarding-approved lanes for Christ’s sake!  And if you don’t bike here, you’re a freak.  Just about every street has a bike lane and the cars seem to be outnumbered.   More pictures after the jump.

crackerCAM was on location in new zealand and french polynesia in early december. this cracker spent almost three weeks touring middle earth where i hiked along snow capped peaks, feasted on pb&j lunches, and nearly drowned in a river. won’t lie, it was a great time. the icing was a four day stopover in tahiti where i was fed grapes by a polynesian swimsuit model. ok, now replace “grapes” with “saltines” and “polynesian swimsuit model” with “unshaven bboy”. a truly once in a lifetime experience.

check out the rest of my pics here.

Growing up in suburbia, I always found it odd that my friend Chris’ house was exactly the same floor plan as David’s (which was great when you needed to find the bathroom) –

This low-income housing project in Ixtapaluca, Mexico City has certainly taken that to the next extreme.

Imagine having a few beers at the local Cantina and then trying to figure out if you are in the pink with dark rose section or the near pink with medium rose section…and then you have to ask yourself “crap, am I door #2,387 or #2,388?”

This brings back childhood memories of the one thing that all Architects have in common before they can even pick up a pencil: Legos. Or maybe this whole thing is just a SimCity screenshot.

There is actually over 10,000 homes in this project – amazing.

Sure, hotel food tastes like paper, the towels smell like dry dog food, and darn cleaning lady always knocks on your door at 6 in the morning (which is OK, because the phone starts ringing at 4 in the morning) – but who ever said business travel always had to suck?!

With a few days out on Hawai’i, I was able to escape Saturday morning to jump out of a perfectly good airplane over one of the most incredible sights I could ever imagine.

Everyone has always heard that you should never videotape yourself having sex – but now I add to this and tell you never to record yourself jumping out of an airplane for the first time at 14,000 feet – if you ever wanted to know what your face looks like, I will save you the embarassment:

After this, I really wish those childhood dreams of me being able to fly were true – just wait till you see the whole thing: my gumming flying out, my flailing legs, the ‘holy sh!t’ looks in my face, fist bumping, my butt skid landing, and for some reason I had my horns up for most of the freefall…