Happy almost-new year!
Blah blah blah marketing bullshit blah blah blah.
Now the real news: tons of all-new tees are about to land in the ClothMoth shop. Sometime between now and the end of January we’ll be putting out more new shirts at one time than ever before. So set aside a bit of your Christmas money, or sell off a savings bond if you have to. Actually, don’t do that. Financial solvency is a good thing, even at the expense of your t-shirt collection :-)
Please stay tuned. Please stay wonderful.
- ClothMoth
Long time no smell. Just a quick update to let everyone know that EVERYTHING in the ClothMoth store is on sale right now. All shirts are $20 or less, so it’s a great time to snag a few holiday gifts on the cheap.
Our wildly popular “Owls Kill” design is just $20. As always, shipping is free on orders of $50 or more.
We have new colors in:
- Women’s Yay Serotonin (uber pink)
- Unisex Craft Girls Get Me Hot (Aqua Heather)
- Our classic “Gestation Works for Me” infant onesie (mellow yellow)
Just a quick note to let you know that I’ve launched a channel on YouTube, called “The Joshist,” that is basically just another extension of the same silly brain I use to design ClothMoth tees. This time, you’ll join me at all sorts of crazy places like farmer’s markets, teddy bear stores, IKEA, and more and hear what goes through my mind. It’s free. . . and videos will be posted whenever I have something to say and the time to produce it :-)
First video is live. Please share with your friends, comment / rate the video on YouTube, and subscribe.
Oh, and as always, there are some adult themes and language, so “ear muffs” for the little ones, eh?
Watch The Joshist on YouTube today.
Since I was a wee little chap, I’ve been perplexed by the steady presence of the pickle at movie theater concession stands. So much junk food deliciousness. . . candy bars, buttery popcorn, syrupy sodas, pretzely heart attacks. And bigger than your hand, pimply, crunchy pickles from a plastic jar?
I’m not down on pickling, in general. I like sour cucumbers as much as the next guy. There just seems to be a time and a place to have pickle juice running down your chin. At a lakeside cookout, for example. Or by the pool in the backyard.
Movie snacks are also inherently communal in nature. Your friends and family should be able to have a few bites of your popcorn or candy. Here’s a few of my Junior Mints, can I have a couple of your M&M’s? Have some popcorn. Pass your pickle over here, I’m hankering for a bite.
Share your thoughts on pickles in public. Kosher or not? (groan, crash cymbal)
I agree with Joshua Love on just one point made in his recent Pitchfork annihilation of Regina Spektor’s album “Far.” The dolphin noises are funny the first time around, and a touch annoying every time after that.
And that’s the lone olive branch on this tree, I’m afraid.
Love’s diatribe reads more like an attack on Spektor’s character than an objective record review. At times it’s easy to imagine his article is a half-baked attempt at revenge after being abruptly dumped by Spektor herself, perhaps for someone in a band instead of critic.
His most often leaned-upon crutch is the ridiculous notion that Regina’s age (a young 29 years) should require she abandon her personal style of musical expression, quirkiness and all. Love is a seasoned enough critic (frequently appearing on both Pitchfork and Stylus) to know better than to harp on her use of non-words like “Eet.” I need only mention “Ob-la-di, Ob-la-da”, or any of Sigur Ross’s hybrid Icelandic / English / complete nonsense vocalizations, to jog the memory of hundreds of other subsequent recordings that are both celebrated and chalk-full of babble. I can only assume Love has not yet experienced the entire foundation of rock music built throughout the 1950’s, which as frequently employed wops and whoops and sha-na-nas as it did the Queen’s English.
He wrongfully assumes that Spektor’s “vocal curlicues or verbal flights of fancy” are interjections to the song, rather than intended paths of the songs themselves. While he studied her bio long enough to cite the success of her previous three studio releases, all evolutions of her unique interpretation of pop music, he seems more like a lifelong Chevy driver in his first week of driving a Fiat than someone who has dedicated his life to the sport of motoring.
The biggest weakness in Love’s assessment of “Far” is his own need to dabble in psychology, gracing us with Jack Handy zingers like, “God knows being quirky doesn’t mean you have an interesting personality.” If ever there was a verbal flight of fancy, this reviewer’s persistent need to draw a line in the sand between his Pleasantville black-and-white and her Technicolor surely takes the prize.
It’s funny, too, that Love’s own life inexperience (or simple rejection of the notion of experiencing) leads him to the conclusion that crisis, in and of itself, can be boilerplate. As if all wars, serial killings, deaths by starvation and infectious disease, infidelities, and kidnappings should be mourned at one generic memorial, their perpetrators tried under common evidence, and our own grief a singular and instantly forgotten process. Love’s own oversight of this commentary on disposable spirituality and the general cruelties of life is a much purer reflection of naiveté than any track on “Far.” I must be one gun-to-the-head closer to the storyline than Love, it seems.
Love makes consulting the textbook to write him a prescription entirely unnecessary. Trade Dostoyevsky for J.K. Rowling here and there, or listen to music without a snifter of brandy and a copy of the Wall Street Journal within arms reach. If I didn’t imagine him in 400 sq. ft. in Brooklyn, or a one-bedroom with a roommate in San Francisco, I’d alternately place him in the conservatory of a wood-paneled Dallas McMansion, or a freshman philosophy course.
I, for one, do hope that, as Love imagines, Taylor Swift is somewhere out there listening to Regina Spektor’s latest release, instead of simply hearing it, as Joshua Love has done for his review. And I hope he never reviews Bjork, for the love of (or laugh at) God.
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ClothMoth shirts are shirty. Mothy. They make people chortle, chuckle, undulate. They do not cure goiter, though. You can make a festoon from them, I am sure.
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Just a quick followup to the last blog post, where we tried to soften the blow for one of our customers, who had his card shamelessly broken into while he was eating breakfast at a restaurant. We came across the story when we noticed traffic coming into ClothMoth.com from a forum, and upon investigation, saw the pictures he had taken of the damage, which included a reflection of him on the door clearly wearing our Kalashnipod design.
So we offered the dude a free t-shirt via our last blog entry. At which point an admin on the forum banned the account we had posted under, saying we were a spam troll or something along those lines. Now ClothMoth has been called a lot of things (“shirty”, most notably) but spam troll is a new one on us!
Offer still stands for the original poster who suffered the car break-in. We’ll do what we can to take care of our peeps.
Wearers of ClothMoth are a close-knit bunch. So we don’t take too kindly when some Ed Hardy or Big Johnson wearin’ facebutts start getting rude all up on our property.
Prime example: this outstanding citizen was innocently indulging in some cinnamon apple pancakes (and quite likely a side of hash browns) before shopping for some Horehound candy drops, a new rocking chair, and a biscotti-scented candle at his metropolitan-area Cracker Barrel when his Subaru was defiled in the parking lot.
We like to think his Kalashnipod shirt, seen in the reflection of his crime scene photo, foiled the plot.
Original poster, owner of said Subaru, eater of crackers from barrels, drop us a note. We’d like to send you one of our soon-to-be-released tees of complete awesomeness to soothe your ails, gratis of course.
Scott and I are on the road, heading to Brooklyn for Renegade. Had an amazingly smooth time packing compared to most shows, and made it out the door by 2pm or so. It rained all through Texas and part of Louisiana, but cleared up pretty quickly.
Along the way we decided to stop in Baton Rouge to visit our friends at Storyville, but alas, they closed at 7pm and we got there at 7:20pm. Here’s a picture of Joshua (rockin’ some Seibei sitting on the stoop, let down and hanging around:
All wasn’t lost with the Baton Rouge detour, though. Check out this deal, it’s the gift that keeps on giving:
Scott took a turn in Mississippi that I am pretty sure took us straight to where Gummo was filmed. At least it felt like we might be boxed up and kept. I’m pleased to report, in retrospect, we weren’t, and are safely in a La Quinta watching That 70’s Show reruns.
We’re rerouting our drive a bit to make it through the fabled land of Asheville, NC. If the granola is fibrous enough, we may have a movement there as well.
Stay tuned, more mayhem as we create it.
Last weekend we unleashed the ClothMoth fury (i.e. t-shirts) on unsuspecting visitors to the Unique LA show in Los Angeles. Here’s his recap, emailed to me and reprinted here in its entirety:
“I managed to survive my experience in the valley of the golden gods and had a good time in the process. It was somewhat ClothMothy.
We made a few new friends, and practiced half and full nelson’s with some old friends. I tried a 3/4 nelson on a new friend, though, and that’s a combination that just didn’t seem to jibe. I’ve never used jibe before in a sentence, especially as a verb. Does it even make sense?
We ate ostrich enchiladas (surprisingly NOT bowel friendly.)
I bought you a little porcelain bell with a painting of a chimpanzee riding on what looks like Valcor from Never Ending Story. I’m wearing it around my neck right now. Can I borrow it?
Sorry to hear about the Dr. Scholls situation, quite unusual and I would definitely get it looked at.”
-Scott
Next stop: Renegade Brooklyn, June 6 – 7, Brooklyn, NY. New designs will be in full force.
