I probably *should* be looking for work. But instead, I'm working. Working on a project I've been calling my TOHOE in my SOHO - triumph of hope over experience in my small office/home office. It's a movie about a 'Jazz Mass' put on by Jazz Amnesty Sound System. My friends Andy Williams and Lew Braden, two DJs, who hosted 'the jazz illuminati' of Montreal to come and jam in St John the Evangelist's church while they 'conducted' from their turn tables.
You can watch the teaser here…
The genesis of the project was Lew asking me to help them film a demo of the event. I asked Bruno Goulard to help me with it and he encouraged me to shoot a little higher. So he brought together a professional crew and we shot a multi-camera live event, with multi track audio. So, you know, we got something.
Now we 'just' need to turn it into a movie. Editing, more interviews, etc. It's going to require some resources.
And it won't happen overnight.
So I AM looking for work - if you know of anything in the writing/directing/editing vein please get in touch (hepworks@gmail.com).
If you know anything about financing also GET IN TOUCH!
I've been making @beavercanuckpuppet videos for awhile - attacking the #cpc and @pmharper over being asshats. Yeah, they're a little partisan - and VERY esoteric.
So having put another bunch of hours into another video
that is only understandable to #cdnpoli geeks…and even then at a stretch assuming the 'humour' works at all - I have to ask myself am I willfully making videos so obscure that they cannot possibly reach a wide audience?
and I think the truth of it is is that I'm somewhat obsessive over Canadian politics on twitter, so I've got real blinkers on what even the average Canadian knows about…and I've got a hate on for Stephen Harper and feel the need to do something to mock him.
As a 'business' strategy it's not really working - but it is keeping me motivated enough to keep producing. Which is probably as important as whether anyone watches.
Having spent years kind of producing my own 'stuff' very sporadically, we're kind of at a sweet point technologically where it's easier than ever to produce material, and personally I'm both sufficiently desperate to put out 'something' and proficient enough with the software to churn stuff out relatively quickly.
Now - I know some of the corners I'm cutting - the worst being the writing. In my rush to 'do something' I either don't script or only lightly script my videos, and then put much more time into producing and editing them - the result being that the jokes aren't exactly screamers, and they still take a long time to get out there. In the past I've gotten discouraged by the lack of audience feedback and stopped.
But I'm also of the opinion that I need to embarrass my way forward - I'm experimenting, and the costs of each video, in time, likely needs to be incurred no matter what my approach.
I don't just want to write and rewrite jokes - I want to put stuff out in front of an audience, no matter how small.
I'm trying different approaches - My Thomas Mulcair runs a stop sign
was basically improv'ed straight into my (new) microphone - and was a lot more spontaneous and 'fun' than other stuff I've written and then 'performed'…
the sweet spot I'm really looking for is a balance between fast and cheap and worthwhile - I'd written a five page script for what became Elizabeth May Pants John Baird and Stephen Harper dodges questions - which I may append to the end of this…and wanted the video to be much faster with more elements - a whole section mocking Pauline Marois for her Quebec soccer federation turban ban position 'I am Sikh of this…' 'Quoi?' 'Le hasch est muet…' 'Hash?' - anyhow - hilarious TO ME…
Now pretty much any book on startups, and this likely applies to anyone building a brand or band or whatever, is that you need to spend twice the time marketing, and figuring out how to get paid, for your product or ideas as you do working on your ideas…
so I go as far as tweeting links, and have started posting to reddit (thanks @aimeedavison)…a pinterest, etc…
But this falls into the dilemma so many people have that people don't 'want' to promote themselves - they want to be 'creative' etc…which, at 42, reeks of bullshit. NO ONE DESERVES TO GET RICH SCREWING AROUND WITH FELT PUPPETS! - or playing indie emo drivel, or whatever your 'thing' is…if people are going to give you money - which is essentially give you some of their life force, because money is generally earned with time, which is all we have and not much of it, then you better be worth it.
For the moment my level of creative anxiety is manageable - I'm supposed to be starting a job so 'have some time' and am enjoying the process. Each time I hit a beat - like getting Elizabeth May's biplane to shoot with the propeller spinning, or putting Stephen Harper in a crown…it's pretty amusing…and if 'This Hour has 22 Minutes' or 'Rick Mercer' or whoever happens to fall upon this stuff - well, I'd love to take your money for it.
Have I reached out to them? Not yet. I want to get better first…could you, dear reader, help by sharing and favoritting and subscribing? Yes - that is exactly WHAT I WANT FROM YOU.
It's google juice - how things get momentum. But I have to earn it. And keep asking.
why did the Harper conservative cross the road?
Because Stephen Harper needed a body to throw under a bus.
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Knock knock
Who's there
Stephen?
Stephen who?
you know, the asshole…
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How many Harper conservatives does it take to screw in a lightbulb?
Are you kidding? Harper conservatives reproduce by spreading lies on a rich bed of bullshit.
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what do you get when you cross a Harper conservative like dean del mastro and an ethics committee?
an empty seat…for months
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pop quiz -
Canadian tax dollars should fund
a) a strong stable conservative majority direct mailing attack ads to Canadians
b) a rub and tug for Stephen Harper to take the edge off his self loathing
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Pop Quiz:
The Canadian economy needs:
a) support for Canadian scientists to help inform evidence based public policy and innovation
b) partisan austerity measures, ineffective pro punishment law and order tom foolery, economic action plan boon doggles, and unaccounted for billions?
c) a rub and tug for Stephen Harper to tone down his self-loathing?
Thatcher is dead - condolences to her family. But lest the hagiographers turn her into something she was not, let's remember she was pretty mean and laid the groundwork for the crypto-fascist state we find today.
PRESS RELEASE: From the Happy Forest Protection League spokesperson Beaver Canuck:
"There comes a time when everyone has to stand up for what they believe in. With environmental degradation, climate change, unsustainable industrial development and overpopulation bearing down on a finite planet, this Beaver has had enough. That, and tar sands development destroyed my home, Happy Forest, and separated me from my girl, Beavette - heck, I don't even know if she's alive or dead.
I am Beaver Canuck, and I'm on a mission. To educate, to politicize, to motivate all Canadians to stand up for a better future. A future where prosperity isn't built on short term opportunism and destructive resource exploitation. A future where we leave the world a better place than how we found it. A future where I get my revenge on Stephen Harper for destroying Happy Forest!! And find Beavette! Sorry, sometimes my emotions run away from me.
Your responsibility is to help me make this happen."
While times are tough for the rest of us, this frickin' felt hand puppet may well be on his way...
For the love of kittens...
So the lady, erm, woman, suggests that there are a few tried and true ways to build your you tube channel, like asking people to subscribe...
You have to have a thick skin, or well pelt, but don't get any "I'm going to make me a bedazzler" ideas...you have to be tough, to deal with all the haters...all the 15 year olds ( and, well, people of all ages)! That love spreading the unhappy ...
So follow the Beaver, as he may, or may not land a job...
Why you must never write E_ra L_ev_nt's name online but why you should definitely subscribe to the Beaver and favorite and like everything he's associated with.
In our celebrity obsessed culture fame or at least notoriety is often enough to make an income. The age of search engine optimization, where you deploy online content in a way that the automatic search 'bots of google and its competitors deem your material relevant to one or several search queries, is upon us and allows a small subset of the community of people posting material online to earn money by drawing attention to their content.
Either through advertising, merchandising, selling access to 'premium content' or whatever, this attention seeking behaviour has become a business model, not unlike 'becoming a rock star' or 'the next Andy Warhol' has led many an aspirant to eschew more traditional routes to renumeration.
The real people making money of course are the distributors - the you tubes and googles (same company) who facilitate the dream of being the next online sensation by offering a venue to host people's content for free (well it's not free because it took you time to make it and post it), and even provide kindly advice on how to make your stuff better (see You Tube Partners) all the while selling advertising around your content and keeping the bulk, if not all of the revenue.
It's a bit like during the gold rush where some people struck it rich, but where the hardware stores, banks and railroads made the real killing because in order to pursue the gold, you needed the supplies and infrastructure. Anyone who has ever taken an acting class, paid for a headshot or paid to play a rock show knows how this works -- the dreamers pay, the schemers earn. Perhaps that is as it should be. The dreamers I know aren't interested in scheming, much as they wouldn't mind a bit more money, and the schemers, looking for an angle, do actually provide platforms for the few dreamers who break through to achieve their goals, as well as fostering a lot of innovation for the toiling masses who get to pursue their dreams of glory, even if they're only likes and subscribers are immediate friends, families, and that drunk guy who's phone you scammed at the bar and subscribed to your entire online oeuvre.
Where I am going with this? Well, I'm a dreamer - so subscribe to the Beaver, follow him on twitter Follow @BeaverCanuck
and never, and I mean never, mention E_ra L_v_nt online anywhere because if you give HIM attention, it's like watering a dandelion. Just don't do it.
Now while I'd like us all to rise above hyperpartisan politics and re-engage each other in constructive democratic debate, I'm flawed, like the rest of us, and just don't like Stephen Harper. In fact, having a pathological need to be liked I even dreamt that I spoke to Stephen Harper. It went I bit like this:
Geezer: "Ok, I'm sorry, I don't even know you, I just don't like or understand where you're taking the country"
At which point in my dream Stephen Harper made an Evil face and lunged at me. I woke up, and reached for my puppet...
The Jazz Amnesty Sound System - DJ Luv (Lew Braden) and Andy Williams play Bar Waverley 5550 St Laurent, Sunday nights from 9 pm. Drawing from their scary deep jazz collections it's a very chill way to see out the weekend.
