I'm a bit hitRECord-scattered this week, which isn't really a shocker. I'm feeling pretty scattered in general. I've just been gone for a week to a beach house with a crappy internet connection, I've had a busy summer, and to top it off, I'm going away again for a week on Saturday, this time with no internet. So when I thought about making a re-REC video, my first instinct was to crawl back into bed, put my pillow over my face, and hide.

Instead, I thought this week would be a good week for me to get organized, to clean out and sort the massive folder of bookmarks titled "hR - To Remix" as a way of both sorting out what I want to do next and nudging people to go in the directions I either have no skill or time to, and then finally to just give snaps to people who did a damn good job of making stuff these last few weeks while I've been hither and yon.

Is the phrase hither and yon? I'm too lazy to look it up.

RECords That Are, As Bruno Mars Would Say, Amazing Just the Way They Are:

fuck you chicago by megancarnes - I have a confession to make, you guys, and it's a pretty controversial opinion here on hitRECord, but here goes.

I hate cities.

I mean, I'm pretty agoraphobic, so that's part of it, but it's also just a deeply held personal distaste. I hate crowds, I hate noise, I hate how everything is always ten degrees hotter, I hate the lack of greenery, I hate no fresh air, I hate when everything is in right angles, and I fully believe that human beings are just not meant to be that closely packed together. I think there's some sort of violation of a natural law going on. (And don't even get me started on my New York City feelings. I'm 99% convinced that New York City isn't that great, that it's all one giant marketing scheme and that the whole world has been collectively drinking this Kool Aid saying NYC is the best place on earth, only since it's NYC the Kool Aid is made of pigeons and hobo piss. But it is also possible that my hatred is irrational and based at least partially on growing up in Boston.)

For that reason, I've steered clear and kept my mouth shut when it came to the re: Cities collab, because no one likes a party pooper. And, as my dad would say, this is why they make more than one flavor of ice cream. I'd pondered making some sort of video that was in defense of people who are, like me, constitutionally opposed to urban dwelling, and then this video came along and did it so much better for me. Probably because she likes the city she lives in. But I think a healthy part of love is recognizing the crappy parts of whatever it is you love and loving it anyway, and I have a strong appreciation of anyone who is able to affectionately mock something without being outright mean.

So I love this video/song. I love it because it's smart, and funny, and sassy without being rude, and even if you, like me, hate cities (or have never been to Chicago), that sort of fond exasperation for everything that makes the place you live both unique and infuriating is something we can all relate to.

Escape Artists (w/Metaphorest Harmonies) by spaceship - When I first heard this song it bugged me a lot. Not because it was bad, but because something about it was just ever-so-slightly off. Like, you know how when something's almost perfect, the fact that there's something intangible but totally wrong about it becomes way more irritating? That was this song for me. It drove me nuts. But the harmony work and re-mixing on this is genius. It's exactly what this song needed to go from feeling just a little empty to feeling warm and complete.

How I'll Love You by blbest - I think that sometime around adolescence there needs to be some sort of mandatory Relationships 101 class, and I think that in that class, they should teach that love is kind of like making a giant batch of multiple lasagnes. It's hard and messy and sometimes kind of gross and you have to work on it and work on it and then hope when you stick it in the oven it turns out okay, but you really have no fucking idea. Which, to me, is what I think this poem gets across perfectly. Love isn't sunshine and flowers and adult contemporary music playing softly in a well-lit background, sometimes it's ugly people doing ugly things for awesome reasons, and it still feels pretty fucking great.

The Little Spider Girl by BowtiesAreCool - This is just adorable. I mean. I don't really know what to say about it. It's so weird and surreal and awesome and I want an entire picture book of this character. Because it's adorable.

Everything Stopped by djnamelis - When it comes to photography, I'm very, very, very hard to impress. The thing is, good pictures are, thanks to fancy new technology, really easy to take. All you really need is enough money to buy a fancy camera and the right situation. It's nothing like what it used to be, where taking a picture was only a tiny fraction of what you did with a photograph, and it was much more about hours in a darkroom getting each tiny setting and chemical right with just the right amount of exposure on just the right paper. And I'm not saying it's a bad thing that that's changed, especially when you think about things like family snapshots, but it does mean there's almost an embarrassment of riches when it comes to photography. And it's very easy to get very jaded very quickly when it comes to commonly used photographic tropes.

But this photograph really made my breath catch. Everything about it is just so, like if you changed one itty-bitty detail it would somehow lose its power. It's stark and minimal and extremely powerful. And it wouldn't have worked if it was a plain black background, or if the head hadn't been bowed at just that angle, or if the person was any skinnier or fatter, or if they moved one tiny bit, or if there wasn't the dynamic of the moles across the back. It's what minimalism should be, which is restrained not for the sake of restraint, but because understatement speaks louder than blaring something from the rooftops.

In short, damn, son, that is one fine-looking photograph.

Suggestions for Remixing (For you! Yes, you!)

There are times when one must come to the conclusion that they cannot, in fact, do everything themselves, and in these instances they must delegate.

I have always been really shit at that. Not because I don't trust people or don't think people can't do stuff better than me, but because I just have so many ideas and I have a very hard time accepting that I cannot, in fact, put together all the ideas I have in my head. (See also, why this album exists in the first place.)

So here are some things that I am officially moving off my to-do list and giving to you. Go forth, my lieblings, and may your creative juices spill all over these fine ideas.

(That sounded far more sexual than I intended.)

Image to color: Gentle Giant by WhenIWasLittle (At the very least, this guy needs the coloring treatment, if not a children's story written for him.)

Idea to Expand On: The museum of lost ideas from KittyPimms' Imaginary Artifacts (I've requested it before, and I'm requesting it again. Someone better at concept writing than me should get on this idea. It is a damn cool idea.)

Video to Make: Electric Wonder by Pamagotchi (Great words by Phen, great reading by Pam, paired with great backing music by Johnnyclyde. Gorgeous. Slow pace and strong visual imagery makes it easy to edit even for a beginner.)

Activity to Try: A hitRECord playdate - see "Hecate" for an example. (While it is true that there ain't no borders between hitRECorders, there is something magical that happens by getting creative people in a room together. For example, this awesome short film. Is there a way to make, like, a google map where people can put their locations down so more in-person meetups and brainstorming can go on? Because imagine if we had even more of this kind of material to work with. It would be awesome.)

Julia's Personal To-Do List

Okay, it's still a pretty big list of stuff to do.

Audio (needs lyrics/vocals)
Synth-O-Rama by blakefisher
Stella Mary by fleurdelys
Make Space for Me in Your Coffin Blues by Robo_J* (This one I already have lyrics written for, but the instrumental needs a little jiggling, among other things. RJ, consider this your bat signal.)

Images (to use as drawing backgrounds)
Hallucinated Terror by scarletoak
Theta and Solaris by Jiradevan 

Videos
Footage to use: The Artworld (A Tragedy) by Omar Zingaro Bhatia
Video to cut together: Music video for Audrey by chrisflew (Possibly with vinyl initiative footage? See lyric: "I want to be the song stuck in your head")
Video to Film: My contribution to the Tragedy/Comedy collab

...And in the end I think this took more time than a video would have to make.  But at least I'm organized. Hooray, I guess.