Night blooming mix tapes

I remember the night-blooming cereus. It was rangy and clearly ambivalent about being domesticated, seemingly trying to crawl out of its pot (if it could), yet graciously blooming in the summer's humid evening air. In other words ... exactly the kind of plant you throw a party for, which we did.

It was a party at which music played through the window (“streamed” through the window, you might say). Music not very different from the music I gave to the marketing company I recently hired.

Earlier this year I laid out a ton of money for a marketing company to build my (very small) company's website. In addition to the money, the marketing company wanted other things from me. Like, information on what my company did that's useful, and a bunch of other stuff along those lines. There were dozens of pages that I had to write, explaining (a) how it was that I — miraculously — retained clients, and (b) why it was that I wanted to engage the marketing company's vaulted website production services.

After completing all of that, I decided to give the marketers two mix-tapes. So they could get into the proper spirit for building my site.

First tape: Country & Blues

Alejandro Escovedo – California Blues

Canned Heat – Goin' Up The Country

Chet Atkins & Doc Watson – On My Way to Canaan's Land

Del McCoury – Learnin' The Blues

Dwight Yoakam – Little Ways

Steve Earle & Emmylou Harris – Goodbye

Etta James – Whatever Gets You Through The Night

Fabulous Thunderbirds – Tuff Enuff

Gary Allen – Nothing On But The Radio

Guy Clark – Dublin Blues

Hot Tuna – Hesitation Blues

Iguanas – I Moved Too Slow

Jimmie Dale Gilmore – Defying Gravity

Joe Ely – Slow You Down

Joe Stampley – Do You Ever Fool Around

Johnny Duncan – It Couldn't Have Been Any Better

Johnny Lee – Lookin' For Love

Jon Spencer Blues Explosion – Special Rider Blues

Mike Ness – Dope Fiend Blues

Red Willow Band – Finally Hit Bottom

Steve Earle & Supersuckers – Creepy Jackalope Eye

Second tape: Rock & Jazz

Art Pepper – Blues In

Bad Plus Trio – Smells Like Teen Spirit

Brand New Heavies – Have A Good Time

Hot Chocolate – You Sexy Thing (OK, so there's no way you can stretch your definition of acid jazz to call this track anything but R&B, but it mixed well with Jane's Addiction)

Jane's Addiction – Sympathy

Jazzanova – Bohemian Sunset (electronic Brazilian samba; my favorite track on the disc)

Jon Spencer Blues Explosion – Killer Wolf

Marc Ribot Y Los Cubanos Postizos – No Me Llores Mas

Mink Deville – Gunslinger

Morphine – Buena

Nada Surf – Inside Of Love

New Wet Kojak – Love Career

New York Dolls – Looking For A Kiss

Patti Smith Group – Ghost Dance

Pharoah Sanders – Tomoki

Sonic Youth – Hot Wire My Heart

So, I gave the marketing woman the discs, and her reaction was veeeery distinctly, "Ohhhhh..." (can you hear her voice's declining inflection of dis-interest?) Still, she ended up building me a terrific site, one that includes, Pam, an authentic photograph of the Intracoastal Waterway, taken somewhere between New Jersey and Florida.

Comments

[Pam]

Love it. New Wet Kojak? I saw Guy Clark for the first time last winter, here in Charleston.

We did throw a party for those blooms, didn't we? It was hanging outside from an eave, over that brick patio with all of the grass coming up through the cracks. Funny that I still have that plant. I should send you cuttings.

[Pam]

Really? It's the Intracoastal?

[Ellis Hollow]

Wow. I thought marketing firms were supposed to work with you to shape your message. Not hand you a form and spit out a boilerplate website. Next time, call Hank. Bet he could help.

Hot Tuna and David Bromberg circa 1975 @SUNY Binghamton.

[Pam]

EH: Just so you know, this is a post from a friend of mine (who will start having contributing some music posts from time-to-time). Knowing this friend, he wanted to control his message I'm guessing - and it's probably the difference between hiring someone to build a website and hiring someone to really develop a marketing plan for a company. Oh, and I don't think that I really knew what Hank did, besides sail and work in his garden - learn something new everyday.

[3Dsound]

I'd love to see Guy Clark. He's one of those Texas singers who make you want to live there. And as far as the marketing company and the website go, of course I'm not sharing my company's site, because the Internets are a funny place, and you can't be too careful. Surfice it to say that I was real happy with the marketers did, regardless of how they might have felt about the mix tapes.