Posted on: June 2nd, 2023 by Gretchen Phillips No Comments
As unbelievable as that sounds, it is in fact reality!! Our first shows since April, 1985 were in Austin, TX mid-October 2024 at End of an Ear Records, Cheer Up Charlies, Museum of Human Achievement and KUTX. So now is the time to buy a reissue of the 1984 vinyl release, some with hand decorated covers like in the olden days! Be prepared to buy a live cassette and put that in your time machine! We love the lucky folks who got to see us, older but wiser and still in love with our songs, oh so very much.
Posted on: January 1st, 2018 by Gretchen Phillips No Comments
An amazing thing has happened: I have a new band. Well, newish. I guess we’re really more than a year old, but you internet folks might not know of our existence. Let me tell you a little bit about it, shall I?
I have been working really hard to get my pretty vast archives into good order, and to get them placed into institutions where they can be perused much more easily than they can be when they’re all cloistered up in my house. I mean, you don’t have access to them, and there might be stuff in there that you’d like to see. Stuff like old posters, old press and even lots of video footage of live performances thru the years.
I had amazing help from a wonderful Houstonian going to Smith who came to Austin for two weeks and worked her butt off to beautifully catalogue my stuff. We have a common interest in Russian music and a common chip on our shoulder about some folks not understanding that there have always been queer artists, activists and vibrant queer life in Texas. Really. All my love goes out to the great Sarah Orsak!
But then I needed to get some Austin folks to help me still after Sarah left. So, Lauren Walker from the Harry Ransom Center was recommended to me. We’re also a perfect fit and we were able to finish my stuff up for Cornell. Right on!
And also, Lauren mentioned to me one day that she plays music, too. Cool, I said. Let’s jam sometime. Well, I wasn’t prepared for just what kind of music Lauren lays down. I don’t really know how to describe it…she pulses and texturizes her sweet little cheapo Yamaha thru lots of effects and it’s so damn listenable. For the sake of mobility, I just brought my Baby Taylor and a $5 plywood SilverTone amp I bought at a garage sale over to her place. Plus, of course, I also brought a bunch of pedals. Lauren and I started jamming and droning and making lots of slow builds. It was/is mesmerizing to get to be inside it. We’d get on a roll and then easily 20 or 30 minutes would have gone by. I freaking love it.
At the end of our first jam I made a joke that what we’re doing is cool, but it needs one more element…something incongruent…something to maybe hang your hat on…how about classic country songs? Why not drone awhile and then I’ll sing a country song and Lauren may or may not play along in the same key? So then we tried that and we love it. We’ve had a few shows, mostly at Cheer Up Charlie’s. Our goal is to do durational performance art. So, we like to play without any break for the amount of time allotted. Once we played for two hours straight. And Thor Harris sat right there on the floor of the club upright without any backing for his back and watched the whole two hours! I love that guy.
Doing this band is helping me stretch out time and structure on the other music I’m doing, too. Why do things the way I always have? I want to change stuff up. I want to constantly be growing.
I thought that playing in a band with a woman half my age would mean that she would be all web-savvy and post stuff about how great we are all the time. WRONG! Lauren is not into social media. Good for her. So that leaves it up to me, the old lady, and we know how reticent I can be to share over the internet. But Lauren did set us up a page on SoundCloud that has a few of our iPhone recordings from some rehearsals. We also recorded more formally over at Rob Halverson’s studio. That was great. We did 4 songs and the total recording is, like, 69 minutes. But once I listen to the whole thing I just want more! So, I want to record another 60+ minutes worth and then we’ll release it. So, in the meantime…please enjoy the SoundCloud. And come see us if you live in Austin. We’re not everyone’s cup of tea, but there are some folks who really enjoy what we’re serving up.
Posted on: January 1st, 2018 by Gretchen Phillips No Comments
iPhones take great pictures. They just do, there’s no disputing that. A kick ass camera comes free with your phone. You can then store lots of pictures on it and scroll thru them and show them to your friends. There’s no need to buy film. No need to then pay for processing that film and then pay some more to print pictures from that film. It’s convenient and the quality is good. So why use mechanical cameras? Why bother with the expense? Why bother with the heartache of realizing that you just shot that whole awesome dance party with your lens cap on and that was your last roll of film? Or that there’s something wrong with your flash, maybe it’s the battery? Or that the shutter just froze on that new-to-you but actually 50-year-old Zeiss Ikon from eBay? Why bother?
Well somehow to me, the pictures that I do get mean more to me than the countless photos on my phone.
I love the whole process. I’m obsessed. I love interacting with these old cameras and I love the different qualities of the different film. I get my cameras and my film for cheap. I use the internet and my travels to Europe for purchasing . I use expired film that friends give me or that I buy in antique stores. I have a wonderful SLR I bought at a Goodwill in Canada for $2. Nothing is wrong with it. It’s a pleasure to use. It gives great results. I came across an immaculate 120mm folder at an antique store for $20 that gives really sharp shots. I bought the famous workhorse Nikon of Vietnam photojournalism fame for $35.
These gorgeous machines are no longer valued. People don’t believe that film is still being manufactured. So many of dad’s cameras or cameras from that one photo class in high school are sitting and mouldering in basements. And I’m so obsessive that I want to try them all. I want to see which ones speak to me, fit nicely in my hand and say, “you and I could do great things together.” I want to get into a relationship with these gorgeous old machines with their satisfying shutter clicks and their learning curves and their fiddly or reliable ways. I’ve been in a monogamous relationship for over 20 years. I’m very happy with it, but yes, I do need to keep on falling in love anew. So every thrift store and antique mall beckons with the promise that within lies an extremely affordable and wonderful camera in good shape that is looking for love. And I’m just the girl to love it.
About a year after I quit drinking I gave myself permission to get obsessive about film photography. I tell myself that in the end, I’m not spending more annually on photography than I would have on drinks. I tell myself that it’s healthier to channel my obsessive nature into reading online forums regarding the relative merits of the Olympus Trip vs the Canonet QL17 Giii than it is for me to be reading online forums about the wet cement mouthfeel of a trendy new gin. And I do actually believe that it’s healthier. Plus, I am going to have a really handsome and tangible archive of my queer scene, travels, domestic life, and of course, my cats by the time I leave this planet.
Being alone in the darkroom with the images of people I love is an active way of loving them. I select a negative that I want to print and then I spend a lot of time trying to get the photo right. It requires me to guess on time and exposure in order to make a test strip and then spend two minutes with that strip in the developer, 30 more seconds in the stop bath and then at least another 90 seconds in fix before I can look clearly at the image with a regular light on. So for every single piece of photo paper there’s the exposure time under the enlarger + 4 minutes. That is a time consuming. It adds up. But during that time, I’m communing with my friends. I’m looking at their sweet faces. I’m remembering where we were when I took this photo. It feels like a privilege to lovingly render these portraits of my former lovers, and maybe even my own chubby brown -haired pimple face. It helps me remember in a very palpable way that former time. I fear that I would not have access to these shots in 33 years if they were all on my iPhone.
I can make nice prints from negatives of sleeping young girlfriends from 1982. And because it’s a negative, it’s still here. The file didn’t get corrupted. The software didn’t change and I’ve lost access to the image. The negative’s material existence ensures its ongoing existence. It doesn’t live in something as unstable-sounding as a “cloud”. It lives on a shelf in my room where it’s pretty darn stable.
But the negatives do take up space on my shelf. There’s that part about the material. It takes up precious space. But some of us have sacrificed in order to have tons of storage space our whole lives. We haven’t moved. Or we’ve gotten good at just boxing stuff up. I don’t resent the space that my negatives and my prints and my as-yet unprinted photo paper take up. I don’t resent the shelf of cameras, either.
Film photography is an investment. It’s an investment in the tools, the film, the learning curve, the time and the storage. It’s delayed gratification. You can’t just check that last shot to make sure you have your settings ok. It’s an investment in faith. You have to rely on the machine, your knowledge, a forgiving film and on pure luck. And for that investment you can receive many happy returns. It’s possible to attain surprising results that can be quite pleasing once you let go of the expectation that you can control the results. I personally love the risk of the random and the collaboration with a gorgeous old machine, expired film, and my limited knowledge. The whole process of processing is pleasurable to me. I find it creative and exciting and engaging. And if I really need to get that shot, I can always pull out my iPhone (which has an excellent light meter app on it) and just capture it. In an iPhone way. Which isn’t the same as a film way. It’s not worse, just different. The investment of film photography is like a long courtship with lots of foreplay. It takes quite awhile to get to the tangible results, the literal “money shot.” But I don’t mind. In fact, I like doing it that way, I always have. It’s the same part of me that loves to mill wood from a local tree. I love the whole lengthy process of the unveiling of the grain. It’s super sexy to me, like when you finally get to see the one you’ve been pursuing naked. I no longer need to have everything instantly. To me, some things are worth the wait, the unveiling, and the process.
Posted on: October 5th, 2017 by Gretchen Phillips No Comments
Hi Friends,
Long time, no write.
What a world, huh? Where am I gleaning inspiration to go on? Well, I’m getting solace from two sources: the Bhagavad Gita translated by Eknath Easwaran and the Eames movie entitled Power of Ten. You might take a look. I’m finding them helpful.
It’s been a really wonderful thing to get to teach B&W photography at the Dougherty Arts Center in Austin. This is a city-run arts facility with performance space, gallery, classrooms and a variety of classes. There’s a well-appointed darkroom where I first learned how to process and print. I learned there and I want to give back to the community. So, I’m in the midst of my third 4-week session teaching the very basics. So far so good. I hope to get Austinites excited about the process of processing and about the magic of turning silver halide crystals into images. It’s alchemy!!! It’s magic!!!! If you’ve ever thought that you want to pursue film photography further, yes you do!!!!
I also have an exciting new band with my friend, Lauren Walker. We’re called Pico Farad. She plays keyboard going thru a bunch of effects. I play my acoustic Baby Taylor going thru a bunch of effects. Her amp is a Magnatone. My amp is a Silvertone. Her’s weighs a ton and mine is as light as a feather. We get on an improvisational wavelength together where we drone out with texture, dynamics, fun and play and then at some point later in the game I bust out into a classic country song by Waylon, Willie and the Boys. It makes total sense when you come see us. And please, come see us. This is a durational performance piece. We’ve done a few shows already. Mostly without any breaks. From 30 minutes up to 2 hours. Feels so good to get exhausted but lifted in this manner. I usually cry at some point. If you’ve ever thought that you want to play music with people, yes you do!!!!
In addition to my work with Pico Farad, I’m going out on a thin and scary limb again and performing a solo set for the first time in 6 yearson Oct. 15. I may have taken a long enough break that I can return to this terrifying and naked form of performance. We shall see.
I hope that you’re doing well. It can be hard these days. I’m a Cancer, I feel a lot. In my worst states I become too permeable and take in the world’s pain and find myself immobilized and unable to do my work. Or even figure out what my work should be. But surely it boils down to kindness. Surely that is the real revolution. Surely being considerate to all is the difficult task I personally am faced with. That’s why the Bhagavad Gita and the Eames movie are so helpful to me. They teach me to pull the lens out. Photography teaches me that, too. Pull out that lens. I am a part of things. I’m in this river of life with all of you. That can truly be a blessing. No one can say that we’re not living in interesting times.
Posted on: June 1st, 2016 by Gretchen Phillips No Comments
I’m getting really serious about these pet portraits, people! What better way to honor animals than to lovingly and yes, perhaps even imperfectly render their image onto a piece of locally-milled wood from TX trees that have sadly been killed by the drought, sheet wind, too much rain or even just old age? Chinaberry, cedar elm, walnut, pecan, bois d’arc, sycamore…I make furniture and I have these scraps that must not be wasted! I’ll also dig thru the piles of wood from the many, many old houses being demolished in our fair city to make room for new innovative buildings that feature retail on the ground floor and many stories worth of condos up above. It is my moral duty to recycle perfectly good wood.
I might use pine shiplap that I’ve salvaged from houses. That stuff is really beautiful and where this project initially began.
Likeness is not guaranteed. Rather, I capture the soul of your pet.
I’m a trained musician. I’m not a trained painter. I mean, sure I had some art classes when I was a kid but it’s been a long time. But I’ve had pet portrait clients beg me not to take any art classes and to not get any “better” because they like what I’m serving up. Search the words “pet portrait” and you’ll find lots of people who can render an uncanny likeness of your pet. I’m not doing that. I’m honoring wood, honoring our interspecies love of animals and charging very little for original art.
So let’s get down to business. Email me via my contact info. I’ll talk you thru the steps. It isn’t necessary for me to meet the pet in order to capture their soul onto a piece of wood using acrylic paint with a fixative on top to preserve it as a treasure you will treasure as a family heirloom for generations to come. What would you pay for such an offer? What would other people charge for such an offer? Well, I’m charging $85 an animal plus Shipping&Handling (if I have to mail it.) Please allow 4 to 6 weeks for delivery. That said, it shouldn’t take that long.
