waltmink

BUTLER’S WEBSITE

Wow. I am astonished this site is still live. I have no idea what the Hell is going on with the “design” either.

Anyway - I am alive and on the Internet in a different place: http://butlerswebsite.com

 

 

Three down

Two down.

one down

09.14.11 - MUSIC

I am alive.

Here's a comprehensive list of all the live Walt Mink performances I've captured and recorded. I compiled this in order to review and select songs for the final project. It's a lot of music - more than 80 songs.

SHOW: MARCH 3, 2003: KNITTING FACTORY. (John performs a solo acoustic set)
AUDIO: Desk recording to DAT tape.
IMAGE: Single camera MiniDV. Super 8 b-roll and second camera.

Subway
Lost in the World
Sold
Lovely Arrhythmia
21st Century Man
Settled
Love in the Dakota
The Other Shoe

SHOW: JULY 16, 2004: PETE'S CANDY STORE. (John and Candice, acoustic set)
AUDIO: multi-channel digital recording to Pro Tools.
IMAGE: 2x Super 16mm film cameras, 2x MiniDV cameras for support coverage.

Sound check: Up To You

Subway
Starstruck
Act of Quiet Desperation
Smoothing the Ride
Pink Moon
Lovely Arrhythmia
Tree in Orange
Settled
21st Century Man
Lost in the World
He's A Whore (first verse only)

John solo: Love in the Dakota
John solo: Giselle

RADIO APPEARANCE: JUNE 16, 2005: 89.3 THE CURRENT. MINNESOTA PUBLIC RADIO. (John, solo. Acoustic.)
AUDIO: Engineered and recorded by MPR.
IMAGE: 1x Super 16mm film camera.

Settled
Act of Quiet Desperation

SHOW: JUNE 17, 2005: TRIPLE ROCK SOCIAL CLUB. (John, Candice & Zach. Full band. Two shows [with the exception of one our two acoustic songs, each of these was performed and filmed/recorded twice].)
AUDIO: multi-channel digital recording.
IMAGE: 4x super 16mm film cameras. (show #1 black & white, show #2 color.)

New Life
Love You Better
Chowdertown
Stood Up
Everything Worthwhile
Shine
Showers Down
Twinkle & Shine
Frail
Betty
Subway
Smoothing the Ride
John's Dream
Pink Moon
Brave Beyond the Call
Lost in the World
Miss Happiness

Acoustic Encore:
Settled
Act of Quiet Desperation
Love in the Dakota

Second Encore:
Overgrown
Goodnite
Tree in Orange

SHOW: JULY 28, 2011: THE BELL HOUSE. (John, Candice & Zach. Full Band.)
AUDIO: Desk recording to DAT tape.
IMAGE: 3x DSLR's.

First set:
Zero Day
Love You Better
Chowdertown
Showers Down
Twinkle & Shine
Croton Harmon Local
Stood Up
Everything Worthwhile
Fragile
Frail
John's Dream
Goodnite
Miss Happiness

Second set:
New Life
Brave Beyond the Call
Pink Moon
Subway
Overgrown
Tree in Orange

09.05.11

Yes, I am alive. And I am working on the film.

Here's the first of the videos, as promised in my previous post! I suggest: headphones. High Volume. No interruptions for 3 minutes 34 seconds.

WALT MINK - "Fragile" - Brooklyn, New York from zsumoz on Vimeo.

Also available on the YouTubes, if that's your preference: http://youtu.be/3eD7NX9RM8Q

Thanks go out to Rob and Meg (as always) and to exemplary editor Brianna Caceres. What a rock star.

More soon.

C

P.S. I spend most of my Internets time on Twitter. | @butler

 

08.30.11

I am alive. I am working on this.

We have a very decent mix from the front-of-house at The Bell House in Brooklyn where Walt Mink performed on July 28th. Nothing but a single DAT tape (yes, a DAT tape), but it sounds crunchy and raw and excellent.

I will publish a handful of videos from that performance over the coming weeks, in the neighborhood of half a dozen songs, total. They'll live on both Vimeo and YouTube. The first of these videos is being cut now. It's footage we captured using 3 Canon DSLR's, looks fine. This is all bonus footage and I'm happy to have it, and even happier to share it online. Coming soon.

Last - I'm working on a monologue to be performed once in either LA or Brooklyn, depending on how the logistics shake out. Based on my experience with this project (and with myself) over the past few years, it's with great reticence that I even mention it, but I think this is the creative solution I've sought all along. Very excited to do it.

We shall see.

I posted a few of my incidental film pictures from Boston (July 27) on Tumblr:

http://zbzb.tumblr.com/post/9294292812/walt-mink-soundcheck-tt-the-bears-cambridge

http://zbzb.tumblr.com/post/9252722115/john-at-tt-the-bears-cambridge-ma-july-27

http://zbzb.tumblr.com/post/9209310840/candices-bass-tt-the-bears-cambridge-ma-july

Videos coming soon. No, really.

 

08.08.11

I am alive. I am working on this.

"Walt Mink" by Ian Koss

This article was first published in February 1993 in Ink
Nineteen, a printed publication in Florida, and is reproduced here
with kind permission of www.ink19.com.

* * * 

Walt Mink is the nation’s foremost authority on sleep behavior. Walt
Mink is a rollicking high-tension power trio. Identity crisis? Not
really. The first is a professor of psychology. The second is three
musicians/students who took their name from the first. The first feels
“pretty arbitrary” about the whole thing, explains John Kimbrough,
guitarist/vocalist for the band. “We were taking his class at the time
when we needed a name. So we asked him if we could use his. He was
pretty skeptical; he wasn’t sure we weren’t making fun of his.” And
does the eminent Walt Mink lose any sleep over the recorded output of
Walt Mink? “He probably listens to classical music or something. He’s
in his late sixties.”

Walt Mink started out playing at college basement parties. According
to Joey Waronker (drums), “One of the intentions of the name was to
let people see cheesy fliers that said ‘Walt Mink in Someone’s
Basement’.” The band played subterraneous virtually every weekend for
two semesters before trying to land a gig in a club.

The three members were attending college as the band was forming: John
majored in History, Candice Belanoff (bass) in anthropology and Joey
(drums) in Music. But the origins of the band stretch back a little
further. Says Joey: “John and I knew each other in western
Massachusetts, and we played together. It was pretty free-form,
though. Once we got to Minnesota and started jamming, we began looking
for a bass player and ran into Candice.”

The result was a tight blend of garage and pop, melodies that would
seem to lie defenseless against the towering strength of their
accompaniment (part 70’s space-rock, part funk, part Seattle
sediment), were they not so…catchy. Their debut album, Miss Happiness
showcases this approach, explicitly so  in the title track. As John
Kimbrough’s voice dreams from verse to verse, the rhythm section,
seemingly locked together tighter than a Houdini escape trick, pounds
out tempo changes, rhythmic collisions and angelic harmonies.

If the Smashing Pumpkins were more red than blue, they’d sound like Walt Mink.

Miss Happiness’s cover shows a scene from a musical bordello.
Instruments lay scatter. Wall hangings, beads, balloons and trinkets
abound. The band stares sullenly and sultrily at you. The ashram has
been overrun and the vermin is music. The scene is not from one of the
aforementioned parties, or even a college groovy pad, but the
recording room of Smart Studios, which the lauded Butch Vig calls home
base. Joey explains: “John had made four track demos in our living
room, and when we did the record deal, Caroline [the band’s label]
said ‘you should bring all your living room stuff down to the studio.’
So we did, and they really got into it; ‘we gotta take a picture of
this’.”

The band feels a deep connection with the concept of the original
power trio: Jimi Hendrix, Blue Cheer, “the Outpatients from western
Massachusetts, the Poll Winners, They had it together back then,”
recalls Kimbrough. “Hüsker Dü is also way up there.” The band has a
multitude of named influences. Joey admits to listening “from Captain
Beefheart to Frank Sinatra to Ry Cooder. A lot of Seventies music,
Dinosaur Jr.…the Beach Boys’ Pet Sounds…I was getting into that back
then, and nobody else would get into it. The bootlegs of the Beach
Boys’ lost Smile album are the ultimate psychedelic rock music. We try
not to work our influences directly; we try to have fun with it.”

And now, time for the dreaded “how do you write your songs?” question.
The response? “John writes songs with no real ideas in mind. He’ll
have a lyrical idea about something shitty someone did to him one day
and write about it, or something.”

Music forges ahead like a wedge formation, with one or three bands at
the tip and a multitude of others following in their own fashion.
Several don’t bother to catch up. Others were lost before they even
started. But Walt Mink found an interesting path, and stopped a while
to admire the landscape. And put out Miss Happiness.

WANTED: FINAL CUT PRO EDITOR

WANTED: FINAL CUT PRO EDITOR

Seeking highly-skilled, highly-motivated, inventive, clever, sharp, “creative,” innovative & improvisational etc. FCP editor with a reasonable (preferably wonderful) disposition to cut a 4-camera rock concert, from emcee’s intro to final encore. Source material shot on Super 16. Media is on digibeta.

Pros and cons:

Budget and salary: zero dollars!
Creative freedom: utter.
Source material: luscious, luminous, one-of-a-kind.
Deadline: flexible.

This concert is the marquis event that serves as the bedrock of a doc feature, so this is a rare opportunity to play an integral part in the completion of a unique project.

If you’re interested, email me with a link to your reel or your Vimeo channel. Once we're in contact, we will discuss in greater detail.
[ butlr.c @ gmail . com ]

Also, if you know someone please send this along via email or Twitter, blog it, Tumblr it, post it, etc. Spread the word. I'm looking for the right person. LA-based a plus, but not necessary. (ahem, Mpls/St. Paul).

Thanks,
Chris