Troy Paiva is a designer and artist who, in a quest for means to be creative outside of his heavily art-directed nine to five job, took up photography. He'd been traveling the Southwest for much of the 1970's, and since 1985 has been photographing some of the great abandoned wastelands of Americana using a technique called light-painting. The result is an visual feast for nerds like me called LOST AMERICA.
Light painting is, in essence, shooting a long exposure photo (camera on a tripod), typically at night or in a low light setting, with a light source being the only thing that moves, allowing you the ability to, in Paiva's case, highlight different areas of the scene with different colored light sources. (He uses flashlights or strobes covered with theatrical colored gel filters.)
He truly has a massive portfolio of work done this way, and most importantly to me, a slew of photos from old junkyards, collector car scrap yards, and various other galleries of automobile related polychromatic magic. Most of the the locations that Paiva shoots in are either in such disrepair he is putting himself in harm's way for the love of his work or he is forced to trespass on the property to get the shots he wants, giving him serious badass bonus points. But he does what he does for the benefit of people like you and me: preserving the last remaining remnants of an era long gone, of a time when our country felt new and full of hope and (outlandish?) dreams.
Unsurprisingly, many of the places featured in Lost America have completely disappeared, either and the hand of man or by the ever erasing scheme of nature, so it is a blessing to have this work to look back on. For more, check out the Lost America Flickr page and hear Troy Paiva give an interview on the technique involved in capturing these images.
Well, well, well...months and months ago I was working in earnest to clean out some of the years of junk accumulating in my closets, when I came across a number of rolls of undeveloped 35mm film. (Oh, remember the days?!) Lo and behold, at least one of the rolls contained a bevvy of photos from an old NSRA show I'd been to in PA. Joy!
Fast forward to now, when I'm sick as a dog at home, trying to keep my mind off my throbbing throat and numbing my brain with a little website maintenance, when I realize that HEY NOW...I never posted those old photos to my website.
...voila! I mustered up my last bit of energy for the evening to provide you with some "vintage" Garage goodies. Click the image above to head over to our RODS page and open up the NSRA '00 photo gallery.
Woah nelly! Another rockabilly music festival in Brooklyn?? What the hell is going on here! I just heard about one going on from the 16th - 18th of July at the Warsaw in Greenpoint called the Rebel Night Weekender, but didn't post about it because I just didn't have the time. That one is much more traditional rockabilly sounding (The Trashmen, Sit & Die Co., a lot fewer bands), but who knows! Could totally rock.
So about the Luau: a few weeks ago I was at my friend Mike Fisher's band's show at the Lit Lounge in the LES. Mike's band is called D.I.S., punky death metal at its finest! Mike is also a great artist; check out his work at www.maxiumumflouride.net. While there, I met a guy who works for Rebel Angel productions, and though I forget his name (I wrote it down somewhere but lost that piece of paper), he was super nice and told me about how Rebel Angle had recently put on the first Deadbolt show in ages a little while back and said I should check out their site.
Rebel Angel is putting on music events for the hot rod set in NYC constantly, and the Psychobilly Luau, already in it's 4th year, is coming up next weekend! Good thing I finally got around to looking at their website, eh?
Psychobilly Luau @ the Bell House, July 10th & 11th, Brooklyn NY.
In addition to a zillion great bands playing over the two days, there will be all kinds of other rod-related revelry to partake in: sideshows, vendors, fashion shows, burlesque dancers, hot rods, BBQ, contests and more!
Just check out the list of bands: (Saturday July 10th - ALL AGES!!) GUANA BATZ (Midnight) The Goddamn Gallows (10:45) Memphis Morticians (9:45) The Hypnophonics (8:45) Stellar Corpses (7:45) Psycho Charger (6:45) The Arkhams (5:45) The Othermen (5:00) Viva Le Vox (4:15) The Rebel Angels (3:30)
(Sunday July 11th - 21+ only) THE NEANDERTHALS The Swingin' Neckbreakers Jukebox Jodi & her 45s Labretta Suede and The Motel 6 The Thunderfucks King Sickabilly One Man Band Thee Atomic Cavemen Amy Rose and Her Trouble Makers The Twang Bangers (Germany)
Damn...that's a lot. Tickets can be found on the Rebel Angel website and are $25 for Saturday, $20 for Sunday and $40 for a weekend pass. See you there!
As the purveyor of a website/blog about classic car culture, you might imagine that I'm probably semi-conflicted when it comes to my personal feelings about technology. It's not that I don't find it fascinating, useful or important, because god knows there are incredible things that happen in our world today that are a direct result of motherboards, processors, alternative fuels and stem cell research. My general "disdain for technology" (which is going to be a problem if I ever want to get a job designing apps for iPhones, I guess) is largely because the more we rely on the technology around us every day to do things for us, the more our brains rot into useless piles of mush that are reliant upon technology to do anything.
Some would argue that having technological devices around to take some of the weight off our ever more overburdened minds actually provides us an extra modicum of much needed free mental real estate. Our iBookBerryAlarmPhonePods keep all our daily menial appurtenances (what should I eat for dinner? What's that woman's phone number?) in order, so that we can ponder recreational things, like whether Dysgenics is actually a real issue worth addressing in our society or a made-up scientific-sounding term that racist people use to sound smart.
Perhaps one of my personal favorite "side-effects" of technology is the advent of the Podcast. Less that five years ago I was still that girl on the subway platform, trying to change mix CDs in my Walkman, multiple plastic discs on the tips of my fingers like olives, glaring disdainfully (ok, let's not lie here) jealously at the white earbuds of the other passengers nearby.
I will still proudly boast that I never spent a cent on my iPod (Xmas gift), but I instantly became a convert. First, I was relieved not to be carrying around half my CD collection in my already gargantuan purse, and secondly, when I can listen to hours of talk radio (not where you thought I was goin, was it!? Ha!) without a car or a radio...life has become truly perfect.
And that brings me to the point of this whole unintelligible mess of poorly though out sentences (and I'd also like to point out that having spent the last five years writing mostly on a computer has ruined my ability to spell without Auto Spellcheck, damnit. I used to be a grammar and spelling QUEEN.)....THE POINT - is that it just dawned on me the other day that I can listen to one of my favorite radio shows of all time...
That's right, Click and Clack, every morning with me on my underground commute to work. (And yes, I really did just realize they have podcasts like, two days ago.) My hour long ride is now much less like suffering in the a packed cattle car, soaked in urine and cheap cologne and more like sitting on the back porch with two imaginary gear-happy uncles beguiling me with their anecdotal automobile apologues. Previous sentence brought to you by Thesaurus.com.
Visit the Car Talk websiteto download episodes to stream the latest episode when you are stuck desk jockeying in your cubicle for a few hours, or head to Audible.com to download individual back episodes (for $.95 a pop or $3.95/$$19.95 for a monthly/yearly subscription) What could be better than trying to figure out hour after hour after hour what that eek eek eep noise in a caller's 1983 Ford Taurus before the Brothers Automotov do? Possibly nothing.
And when you've made your way through all the car chatter you can handle, check out these other podcasts that I can't get enough of:
:: Mobtown Ska Sounds - DJ Bobby Bobson brings you THE very best of old school reggae, Jamaican ska, dub, two tone and more straight out of good ol' Charm City (Baltimore). An hour of music, about one minute of talk. Just the way I like 'em.
:: Radiolab- Hosts Robert Krulwich and Jad Abumrad attempt to explore answers (or at least get you to ponder deeply) questions about everything in life worth questioning. "Bring your curiosity, and we'll feed it with possibility." This is hands down one of the most hilarious and well-produced science/philosophy/political shows I've ever listened to. EVAR. (Misspelling indended {meme reference}.)
:: This American Life - If you haven't already heard of this, well...you're way behind the times, maaaaaan. They even have a show on HBO now that you can instant-download episodes of on Netflix. Through humor, compassion, ingenuity and human interest, host Ira Glass takes you to many places in our great country each hour, but mostly to places inside your heart. (Heavy shit right there. It's no joke...I usually cry at least once an episode, but I'm probably 40% more overly emotional than everybody I know.)
So if you are still one of the many out there sans iPod - good for you! If you're still standing on the subway platform flipping stacks of polycarbonate plastic defiantly into your Discman, waiting for someone to think you're "so retro", most podcasts are available on CD too.
Check it out kids! I finally got wise to the fact that it's way, way easier to keep this site updated if I just incorporate the vast world of blogging software into it someway. So here we are...the blogger-powered Greaser Garage news update page. How truly exciting.
I thought about just changing the whole site into a blog, but there's something much more satisfying to me about having an entire website. Maybe one day, in an ultra perfect dream world, I will one day become a master of CSS, XML and .NET programming and this will be the coolest looking, least-updated website that has ever existed.
Now...on to the cars.
I haven't added any updates here since November of 2008 when I went to Portland to see Mark, who now lives here in stinky, glorious Brooklyn with me. I have, however, been bookmarking tons of stuff I've come across in the meantime that I wanted to share with the car-loving world at large.
Sadly, because it took me so damn long to get this blog crap figured out today, I've gotta keep it short. If there's anything you look at in the next week, it should be the Old Car Manual Project. This is an extraordinarily comprehensive site filled with vintage car manuals, brochures, fold-outs and various other ad materials, many submitted by dedicated followers like yours truly. I previously had a growing collection of my own vintage ads, most of which were lost during my trip down the long, bumpy road to adulthood, and are probably buried deep in my parents' basement under one of many boxes of other aging relics of my youth.
A random selection of examples from the TOCMP: '63 Plymouth, '47 Lincoln and the '57 Ranchero
Every automobile manufacturer, both defunct and still in existence, is represented within, not to mention a lot of awesome Canadian, Australian and a few English pieces as well.
I think what is so interesting (and titillating!) about old advertising materials is the psychology, and the artwork behind getting someone to buy your car "back in the day". (How could any other artist/designer/classic car lover not find them equally as captivating??) It's like a free lesson in post WWII commercial psychology...which might not be what you like to think about on a Saturday night, but that's probably because you are infinitely more popular than I am.
Or whatever.
While you're at it, check out the blog there as well for even more vintage iron and steel. I can never get enough of other people talking about cars either. For every new person, there's a dozen new cars and a hundred new stories.
**NOTE: I actually got some cred for posting some of my old ads, both at Found in Mom's Basement and over at Core 77. Hooray for me and my librarian glasses. **
