During a break in a North Eastern USA tour, Ali and friends Marc St. Louis and Tillie Perks found themselves staying at a secluded mansion in rural Vermont. Ali used the down-time to shoot this music video for the Flames! track, “So Phallocentric”. The budget ran a little under $20 and the entire video was shot using the built in Apple iSight camera and a 1-megapixel digital still camera. Skillfully edited and over-saturated, this no-budget masterpiece successfully evokes the introspective sunny suspension so characteristic of the dog days of summer.

Not sure why I’m putting this up. Been sifting through the old files, and well, came upon this.

Edmund Lam, Heidi Donnelly, Rick Coluccio and myself, Ali Rahman comprised, arguably, A Vertical Mosaic’s best incarnation. During this late-mid-point in our career we were halfway between an electronic and acoustic band, halfway between pop and noise. There was strength in straddling dichotomies. This 10-minute opus oozes with drippy synths and cracks under jazzy drumming. I can’t remember what this song was called. Ed pretty much wrote the basic verses, asked me to come up with spacey poetic lyrics. I was listening to a lot of Built to Spill at the time so I remember my lyrics being a lot like “Randy Described Eternity“. Anyhow, still have a soft spot for this tune. It’s weird and long and bold in a way that was only really allowed in that post-rock era that had it’s crescendo sometime around 2002. Live footage shot by Sarah Taylor, grass footage shot by Ali Rahman. Editing by Ali Rahman.

Edmund and Heidi are presently in Hexes and Ohs.
Rick and Ali are current members of Flames!
Rick also plays with Amanda Mabro and has a solo project entitled Cozmos Quazar.

Excuse the self-indulgence and nostalgia folks. This is a blog after all.

Mysterious Questionmarks - Episode 1 [12.95MB - M4A]

This is the first in a series of episodes featuring the adventures of the Mysterious Question Marks. This podcast was recorded and produced in it’s entirety at Digital Bird Studios production facility.