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HeelAndToe
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Name: Boss Matsushita
Country: United States
State: State North of SD
Birthday: 4/1/1982
Gender: Male
Interests: I like being a bum.....When I'm not being a bum I like to go to Starbucks with phil and B.S. about stuff....like..... music mostly. I also like banging on drums and practicing to be a rally car driver. um.......I like more fun stuff too.
Expertise: Let me get back to you on this...
Occupation: Artist
Industry: Entertainment
Message: message me
Member Since:
9/16/2004
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| For those of you that don't know.... Desperate times call for desperate measures. I am facing a desperate time right now that calls for a desperate measure. The only solution to these desperate times would be a 7 night cruise to the caribbean so I am going to do just that. I am leaving the rigs tonight to head back to Minneapolis. From there I will pack my bags and head down to sunny Miami, Florida where I will board the Explorer of the Seas and leave this world behind.
Thats right .....7 nights in the Caribbean with 3 of my good friends with no cares in the world. The only thing we have to worry about is what time we should eat, or where we should sit near the pool. Perhaps will hit up the on board casino or maybe go climb the 100 foot rock climbing wall overlooking the ocean. Maybe later we'll play some Mini golf on the top deck or do some shopping in the mall inside the ship. In the evening we'll go down to the on board auditorium and catch a live show. Whatever we do we will do it without a care in the world.
Along the way we will be stopping at San Juan, Puerto Rico, St Maarten and St Thomas in the virgin islands and stop by the Bahamas on the way back. We will do some exploring on the islands, maybe eat some good food and do whatever it is that happens to come up in our adventures. I am going to enjoy walking along white sand beaches and crystal clear blue water as the sun goes down over the Caribbean horizon. Good bye frozen tundra and hello tropical paradise!
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| Caution! This is a bit long....not for the weak hearted and weak minded! Thank you. (I'm making up for all of the long periods of times I didn't blog.)
Well....I am back on the rig again for my 3rd well since I started this job back in October. I gotta say that making this kinda money and paying off my debt really fast is great, but after having 2 weeks off and going back to my "real" life, I wish that I was already done. Its one thing, if this was what I was planning on doing for quite some time but for those of you that don't know, this job is not my goal but a merely a stepping stone of many on a path to my real goal.
Some of you know that I play drums....well maybe most of you that read this do and like my friend Ben Clark I too am in the pursuit of music. I play in The Fragile Campaign, our stuff is on myspace if you want to check it out www.myspace.com/thefragilecampaign. I'm not going to go into detail about the band because you can just see for yourself on the site but we are currently working very hard and making a lot of progress.
Most of you might be confused as to what I am doing now because I used to live in North Dakota, I used to go to school to be a pilot and I used to play in a band called Stonecast. Well since then, I put school on hold to pursue music full-time so that is why you don't see me flying around in planes. Just before the summer of 2005 our bass player Matt in Stonecast decided to leave the band to pursue other musical interests. Phil and I being without a bass player, had to decide to find a new bass player and continue on or just call the band quits. Seeing as how we were a 3 piece band and finding a bass player of the same caliber in ND would be difficult to accomplish we decided after much thought to call the band quits.
Around the same time, my friend Jared's band Stoughton was breaking up due to similar reasons of conflicting goals among band members. To make a long story short...Jared decided to start up a band called This Marathon so I moved down to Minneapolis to play drums in that band. This Marathon only played about 3 shows and then Jared decided he wanted to go to a worship school in Colorado. Although he wasn't leaving for another 6 months we decided to end the band since we weren't in it just for the fun of it. So it left me in the Twin Cities band-less with nothing going on. After about a month Jared decided to start up a "fun" band just to keep playing shows and to keep practiced up on our instruments while we were waiting for new things to come along. So we started The Fragile Campaign. Its original intent was not serious but after starting it up the rest of the band members decided that we were going to take it serious even after Jared left for school and here we are today.
Being in a band, for all those responsible college graduate working class people, isn't as easy as you may think especially when you are taking it as serious as a career. I know what you may be thinking.....Koko quit school because he is a slacker and wants to just have fun playing in a band, and not work a "real" job. Well I do understand the cliche and I do understand how it could be taken this way because there are alot of people out there that do just that. But let me take a min to change your perspective on how it really is for the serious musician. Being in a band is like working 2 full time jobs. You have your full time band job and then you have a 2nd full time job that pays the bills.
The full time band job involves many different aspects such as the actual playing of shows which takes up much of every weekend and some week nights. You have to load equipment, travel to the show, play the show, sell merchandise, deal with getting paid and all the financial stuff, load out, and travel back. Playing a show is usually a good 8 hour ordeal all together. And then during the week we usually practice for about 3 to 4 hours 2 times a week. Not to mention writing new material which happens outside of practice at first ,and then in practice, sometimes extra practices. When we are not practicing we are doing administrative "office" type work where we are booking shows, emailing and making phonecalls, promoting the shows we have, making fliers and posting online bulletins. Also adding friends to our myspace, commenting and responding to fans emails and comments. Ordering merch and keeping track of the financial aspect of the band etc etc. Pretty much a full time job, and to be honest it wouldn't be that bad if we had 40 hours a week to do all of this but unfortunately the band doesn't pay the bills. So thats where the 2nd job comes in..... The 2nd job is the one that pays for a roof over your head, food to eat, gas to get places, insurance, school loans, cell phone and all of the other necessary things that have to be paid for and let me tell you living on your own isn't cheap, every little thing adds up.
Where the hard part comes in......on top of juggling all these activities... being able to find a good enough job that pays decent enough to to pay your bills but allows for a fairly flexible schedule for playing shows and practice is tough and is very much a big challenge. Usually the type of jobs that are flexible, don't pay good and visa versa so its kind of a catch 22. Finding a good job that balances the two is key.
Our band also faces another challenge of saving up to buy a van and trailer to be able to get to shows without having to take 4 vehicles full of equipment and people. It is very costly and ineffective plus it adds to the headache of getting everyone at the same place at the same time. We have started to each pay in $200 every month of our own money to accomplish this goal. $200 a month is a hefty payment for someone who has the " flexible " job and is making just enough to make ends meet. It would be much easier if I had a Sugar Momma to put a roof over my head and pay for all the little things in life that I need so I can focus my money towards the band but I don't. We all can't have it that easy Ben......J/K
I have a unique situation where I've already accumilated a lot of debt from school and such so its pretty much impossible to live and make payments to my debt. That is why I am up here in ND working on the rigs away from home a month at a time so I can pay off all my debt and save up a bunch for the times coming up where I wont have a job because I am touring around the country in a van and trailer. I hope to be all paid off and have about $10,000 saved up by the time June rolls around and then I will be returning to Minneapolis to do the band full time. This summer we are planning on booking a tour across the country so maybe you guys could catch one of our shows!
So that is my life as of now....sorry it was very long and perhaps too boring to read it all, but I didn't have anything better to do with my time while I'm sitting here working the night shift. Questions, comments, concerns??
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| I better get a lot of comments on this post since its my first post in like almost a year.....
So....I ended up out here in ND again. This time its not for school.....this time its to pay off what I accumulated in debt while I was in ND the last time. Yes you've guessed it........the big four letter word that no one likes to hear....WORK! And what kind of work is in ND do you ask? Well its not farming as most of you may think that I am doing (farmer koko.....yes what a great thought).....I'm working in the Great American Oil field! Yes yes.......... I know what you may be thinking......."what is he thinking drilling for oil.....he is just fueling the fire of global warming and draining our natural resources" In fact I am doing just that. But really....is global warming really an issue or are we going to end up killing our selves off before it even becomes and issue...who knows only God knows. Besides we are already going to cleaner more environmentally safe forms of fuel anyway...eventually we will run out of fossil fuel and we'll have to go that route. Its not like we don't already have the technology to do so. And don't tell me that you tree huggers out there ride your bikes everywhere you go because you know you don't. You are just as much a contributer as me! But until the world decides to make the change over....I for one am not going to be the only idiot riding a bike around. I'm going to continue drive my gasoline driven cars and recieve my paycheck from Baker Hughes because thats what pays my bills! If anyone wants to pay me what I make out here by all means I'll quit drilling oil but who wants to pay me about $320 a day after taxes.
On days like these I welcome global warming.........its negative 5 degrees below zero outside today in ND with a wind chill of negative 32. 5 below 0 not 5 below freezing which would only be 27 degrees for all you people living in areas where you should put a jacket on because its 40. If you think you're hardcore.....think again. The weather out here will hardcore kick you in the face motha trucka! and you'll be laying in a pile of your own frozen feces. Put that in your girl jean pockets and sit on that!
On the bright side I enjoy sitting around on the internet all day at work provided via satellite out here on the rig. Although slow at times and being out here on rig for a month at a time gets a little old....it beats making 5 dollars an hour at mcdonalds or installing stereos in crabby peoples cars all day long. So be sure to talk to me on instant messanger, send me emails and comment me!
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| I got off of work like 3 and a half hours early today..... what a relief.
I was soo tired today and not at all in the mood to be at work so this was a very good thing. So now I am at home laying in my bed with my new sony vaio laptop. I'm waiting for a load of laundry to get done and I am listening to Paramore.... I'm considering a nap as soon I get done checking all of my regular stuff on the internet.
Tonight I have practice with the new hardcore band (although we are not really hardcore its more like "fun-core") This band started out as just a "fun" band that was going to just pretty much play shows until Jared left for school since we were all out of a band. Our plan was to get huge fan base play as many shows as possible and then on our last song of our last show...anounce that it was our last song ever and then never be seen again. We would go home and delete our myspace site and deny all association with the band all together. It could still be the plan but seeing as how good the chemistry is in the band who knows. In the 3 weeks that we've been a band we've gotten a whole lot more serious and dedicated. It is a strange but good thing. We'll see what happens.
We need a name so that we can start making merch and a myspace so if you have any suggestions let me know! Our first show is March 10th at the Segue cafe in Maple Groove so all of you should go. | | |
| We started a new hardcore band!! We are going to play shows soon. We already have 4 songs, 2 of which are just about complete "full band" Watch out for us when we come to your town. XpillowtalkX
Currently Eating: Hormel Chilli
Currently Listening: To Jared snore | | |
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