Jordan Swartz-The Rad Times #14

These intros have become progressively old man yells at clouds, but this is my space so if you don’t like it, scram! I recently read 40 Watts from Nowhere, the documentary of which I shared a trailer for this time last year. I’ve always been bummed I wasn’t able to be a part of a college radio show or even a pirate station, and the book solidified this in a way I was never fully able to express, but the station becomes a part of the community. You find new music and DJs whose taste aligns with yours and you start to develop your own path and opinions. I’ve been thinking lately about how we now have more than ever while also having less. When I was a teen I would read the thank you lists of records I liked and make a pen and paper list to take with me to the used cd store, now I listen to thirty seconds of a song on my phone and decide if I like it or not. It feels the same way with radio; KBLT, the station from 40 Watts from Nowhere, was located in Silver Lake in Los Angeles, and the station could barely be picked up more than two miles from where they transmitted. This made it, it’s DJs, and it’s listeners all part of a hyper regional experience. At the end of the book, the author talks about how some of the pirate stations transitioned to internet radio, while it doesn’t offer the same community experience, I have a been a long time listener of a few different stations (East Village Radio, Electromagnetic Radio, Henry Rollins has had a show on KCRW for years, and one of my favorite podcasts Axe To Grind has recently started doing a weekly radio style show called Friday Night’s Alright) you do start to find your people and timeslots.

Thanks for hanging!
Be good to each other.

In its prime, tires were the only part of the Model T outsourced and not made by a Ford company or plant. Henry Ford decided to change this and built a city on the Amazon to produce rubber. He tried to recreate his view of small town America (racism and all!) in what would become known as Fordlandia. He spent millions to accomplish little, with a vast number of people dying from disease, malnutrition, and various poisonous bites. He imposed strict rules and him and his team knew little about the area or properly growing rubber trees, all of this culminating in a workers strike. He tried again up the river to similar results and eventually ceased operations after spending the rough equivalent to 400 million in today’s dollars.

Much like Hollywood itself, I love a show or movie about Hollywood, especially when it’s self-aware. The new Seth Rogen tv show The Studio premiered last week and while I enjoyed the first episode, what really caught my attention was the sets, design, and the wardrobe. The Continental Studios building is described as one of Frank Lloyd Wrights in his Mayan style, of which I didn’t recognize the building or even know he had a Mayan style. With their production designer they set out to build their own version for their own needs based on other homes of the style in California, with the final design being tomb-like to reflect the storyline of the show. I love when design matters and elevates a story, it can add a whole other layer, that other productions often miss.

Chris Ashworth’s new book Disorder: Swiss Grit Vol. II is a culmination of three decades of the designer’s work. Starting in the ‘90s with Blah Blah Blah and Ray Gun magazine, he has come to exemplify a self-defined style known as swiss-grit. Clocking in at roughly 500 pages, it’s a tome of analog design for a wide range of clients (New Order, Monster Children magazine, and Nike) and personal work. I love learning about artist’s processes and being able to see their work progress, especially from someone whose work I have followed for so long.

Built by soldiers in WWII, a foxhole radio, as it has come to be known, is a crude radio made from a razor blade, wire, safety pins, pencil graphite, and other easily acquired materials. I’m fascinated by these types of objects, cobbled together out of necessity; trying to get entertainment or even news of what is happening around you. It’s on my list to try to build one of these at some point.

Visiting countries of the Soviet Bloc between 1986 and 1990, David Hlynsky was struck by the lack of commercialism in Soviet window displays. He says he came to appreciate the simplistic displays. It wasn’t advertising a lack of product just a lack of consumerism. I love photography for this reason, of all art forms, to me it feels like the best time capsule of a time and a place. In a history repeats itself type of way, seeing displays of mom and pop storefronts now reminds me of these images, with the move to online retail, options in person have become fewer and fewer.

I recently did a couple of new designs for Happy Jack Cap Co., inspired by vintage industrial machine badges. HJCC is run by Connie, formerly one half of Print Mafia, a design team that was heavily influential on me as a young artist, so it was rad to get to work together on a project.

As well, I’ll have a few new paintings in my store later this week. There’s only a couple candles left, so grab those if you’ve been wanting one; Heaven Scent is sea salt, fresh grass, and lemon and the Devil’s Kiss is bergamot, amber, and tobacco.