THE RETRIEVER WEEKLY FEATURES April II, 2000 PAGE 17 Meet the Hip New Boss, Same as the Hip Old Boss Soundbreak Takes a Lateral Pass From MTV

ALISON ANDREWS "digital jocks" to you; "disc jockey" is so Retriever Weekly Staff Writer 20th century). All six of them, from the fashion-conscious Tobi to the British trans­ Quick quiz: Name a company based plant Christian Hand, seem to come around bringing music to the masses. It straight out of Irreverent Jock 101. (Collect employs a revolving cast of 20-and-30- all six! Each Digital Jock has an Endearing something ebullient Caucasians with pur­ Quirk™ of its own!) ple hair and nose rings. It features advertis­ To be fair, Soundbreak's DJs do feature ing aimed directly at the ·advertising-wary some fairly eclectic playlists, although the 18-35 demographic. It attempts to stay one emphasis is definitely on modem rock. You step ahead of the ever-shortening attention know, the kind of music that a significant span of the American viewer. Finally, it portion of station programmers still define insists that it's bringing you the best new as "alternative" without a hint of irony. I music frrst. did smile a bit when Christian switched If you answered MTV, you'd be right, from OJ Rap to mid-'80s classic "Don't of course, but such a description would also Go" by Yaz; it wasn't exactly a complete apply to the new Web radio site www. 180, but still, that's not a switch you'd be soundbreak.com. It's actually not such a likely to hear anywhere else. And a hour or coincidence that Soundbreak bears such a so spent on the site will probably tum you strong resemblance to Empty Vee. The vice on to a new band that tickles your fancy. Of president of the company is Mark course, to get to that one song, you'll have Goodman- yes, that Mark Goodman, one to sit through seven others that you'd hear of the original V J s on MTV back in the day. ori most average-sized, traditional alt-rock Soundbreak presents itself as an excit­ station. ing music revolution, but that's not really As for sound quality, your mileage will accurate. It definitely is music, and if definitely vary. I didn't have an opportuni­ Soundbreak you've never encountered online music ty to try out the site on a dial-up line, but Digital Jockeys: Christian, Marnie, Web, Tobi and Drue express their excitement before, it might be somewhat exciting. It you probably wouldn't want to anyway. at working for new Web radio site Soundbreak. absolutely is not revolutionary, though. The Over a T1 line on a 300MHZ computer, I primary hook to Soundbreak is supposed to found that multitasking just murdered the nature, a background type of thing that you booth just doesn't have the appeal of say, be that the site plays established acts along­ data stream. Even opening a word process­ do while driving, or cleaning, or knocking Puff Daddy's gold chains or Jennifer side unsigned bands. While this may be ing program causes the sound to drop out boots or whatever. At the same time, Web Lopez's rear end. true overall, a week of listening to the sta­ randomly and repeatedly in an extremely surfing is an extremely low-attention span Perhaps Soundbreak is a bit ahead of tion revealed that it plays approximately 60 annoying manner. Soundbreak offers dif­ activity; the instant something boring hap­ its time; it seems that the people who'd percent well-known bands ·like Oasis and ferent data streams depending on how pens, you can just click away and do some­ really be able to fully enjoy the site the Offspring, 30 percent unsigned or inde­ muscular your computer is, but this usual­ thing entirely different. would be those with high-end computers pendent-label bands trying to sound like ly breaks down to sacrificing sound quali­ Something just seems a little odd about and fast connections hooked up to stereo well-known bands like Oasis and the ty for a solid stream. At the lowest sound the way that Soundbreak tries to fight both systems. Unfortunately for Soundbreak, Offspring and only 10 percent genuinely quality, it's a bit like listening to a low­ these trends at the same time. Like MTV, that probably doesn't describe their target original bands that don't sound much like power AM station through a sock, which is they try to make the music listening a fore­ audience very well. Their target audience anything else. very little fun. ground activity, but unlike MTV, they don't is likely sitting on the couch with a bag of Soundbreak's most obvious debt to Probably the main problem with have the visuals to make it work. A relent­ chips, watching the new episode of MTV comes in their selection ofDJs (that's Soundbreak is that radio listening is, by lessly frame-skipping Webcam on the OJ Undressed. Flaming Lip Suffers From Car Trouble, Spider Bites from LIPS, page 16 reverb and the clarity of the vocals and we were to sit down and say, "Let's write like, "Okay we're playing, you come see piano that that might get lost in the mix something that would get played on the us and then see you later." Sort of like a the show? when you're just in a big room, but you'd radio" - we don't know how to do that. We movie, you know, people don't hang MI: What we've arrived at, we like to still be able to feel what was going on. really just do what we like. Hopefully, the around and go talk to the projectionist say, you wouldn't have been able to just , We started off thinking that this is going times will intersect with what we're doing afterwards. wake up one morning and go, "Ok, fellas. to revolutionize the way people go see con­ and then everyone will be happy. We've We were talking about how this rock 'n' Here's what we're gonna do." I think some certs. The first time we did it, we took out seen it happen with all sorts of bands - one roll, playing in a band sort of thing is a job of the ideas that we're doing, a lot of rock 500 headsets thinking that eventually we minute they are a radio band and then all of that you can't call in sick for unless you're shows do. You know, video projection, and would be carrying thousands of them the sudden you can't give the records away. dying. You don't go to a movie and the pro­ plenty of people play with samplers or pack­ around. We came to find out that a lot of In the same way, I think that we're hov­ jectionist is like, "Ah, I don't feel like run­ ing tapes or things like that. We thought at people really didn't care; it got in the way ering around. We're in the right area, and I ning the thing tonight." There was a band the start that maybe we could bring out of talking to their friends or messed up think that at some point there will be an that came through Oklahoma City and I some other musicians. But why make it their hair. Which is fine because people go intersection- we did have a radio hit a lit­ was all excited. My wife and I actually got more unwieldy than it needs to be? So we to concerts for all sorts of reasons and tle while ago. Even then, back in '94, we out of the house to go and see a show and were able to just have us up there on stage sometimes it doesn't even have anything to could have fallen into the trap of thinking when we got there, they had canceled. but play a lot of the parts that we wanted to do with the music at all. that everyone is listening to cool music Someone had a tummy ache and they did­ - and every night the drums sound good. I think the people who want to wear the now and that the world is going to change. n't feel like playing. We've all had the flu, As far as the headphones go I think it headphones, they want to hear it pristine. And, well, it really doesn't. coughing up phlegm and throwing up after started germinating with going to live And the other people just want to experi­ We were talking to some friends of ours the show cause we're so sick, but we still shows and usually they just don't sound ence the sound in the air; I think that's two who had moved out from Oklahoma City. went on. very good. And then instead of just com­ different camps. Probably after a while They' rc older, so their perception of punk TRW: Even evil spider bites couldn't plaining about it, we sort of stumbled upon, we'll probably just accommodate-the peo­ rock is bands like the Circle Jerks and keep you away. why don't we broadcast it within the club ple who want to hear the absolute clarity of Black Flag. They would talk to each other MI: I know. Exactly. and the audience can wear headsets. tt- to almost watch a record as it's being back in the '80s and say, "Wow, wouldn't it The Flaming Lips play this Friday, Basically, what happens is that the played by real people. be great if one day we could live in a punk March 14 with Belle and Sebastian side whole show goes to the radio station and TRW: People kind of want to stick you rock world?" And now they're saying, project Looper at Fletcher's in Baltimore. the kind of headphones that we had settled in the indie-rock genre, mostly because the "Here we are in the year 2000, we are liv­ Tickets are $20 and are available only on are those ones that sort of poke into your Flaming Lips aren't really a radio band. ing in a punk rock world and it sucks." through Ticketmaster. This will be a head­ ear, so they're not the ones that cover How do you feel about that? TRW: What kind of relationship do you phones show, but only 150 sets will be pro­ everything up so that you can't hear what's MI: I wouldn't mind being played on have with your fans? vided, so either go early or bring your own. going on outside. That's kind of cool the radio. It's not that we go out of our way MI: We've met a lot of nice people, but Audience members are encouraged to because you can get a direct injection of not to be played on the radio. But I think if then there are some nights where it's just bring puppets.