Category Archives: Music

Here’s what I like to hear.

February 20, 2011 · 8:50 pm

Steal this Post*

*In the spirit of full disclosure, I borrowed the title from Abbie Hoffman’s 1971 book, Steal This Book.

All the thoughts and ideas on my blog are my own, and they’re explained in my own words. I’m pretty sure people would frown on the idea of me plagiarizing someone else’s words. At the very least, if I want to share someone’s ideas, I’ll put their words in quotation marks and attribute the quote to them. A link to their website or blog would be a nice tip of the hat.

So it’s with honest concern that I’m going to approach the idea of “borrowing” (and I use the word loosely) images. I don’t mean for this to be a soapbox rant; I like my blog to have a positive tone.

I made a decision when I started blogging, to use only images I’ve taken and own. The only exception I’ve made is when I’m reviewing a CD or product or writing about someone well-known. I’m not thrilled about the compromise; in cases like these, I include an image of the album art and a link to a site where you can buy the music or I’ll add a manufacturer’s image of a product and link to the company’s website. For people, I include a photo only if I can find a rights-free image of them on a site like Wikipedia.

I’m an artist and I dabble in photography. I find it challenging and fun to take the right image for each post. Doing so will make my blog unique, and its uniqueness is what I think my readers want. I can also put myself in other photographers’ shoes and think about how this “borrowing” affects them.

Sometimes, I see iconic or well-known images on blogs without listing photographers’ credits. I don’t think that is fair to the artists who worked hard to create those images. Many times, artists who would otherwise sell their work are having their images taken from under their noses. Worse, it’s probably illegal. I’m not a lawyer, but “copyright infringement” is a term that springs to mind.

Other times, I’ve seen a page from a magazine scanned and uploaded to a blog. It’s great that someone can say, “See this page? I like all the things on it.” It’s easy to fill a blog with pretty pictures taken by someone else. But it’s not original—it’s a visual list of what someone finds appealing. At a minimum, attributing the credit and linking to the magazine seems to be in order. The magazine should probably be asked if they mind sharing the images.

If you want to use professional-quality photos on your blog, there are a lot of websites that make images available—some for free. Just do a web search for “stock photography” and you’ll find a bunch of sites.

One other site that I recently discovered (but have yet to use) is Polyvore. It’s a site where you can select images of your favorite clothing and accessories and combine them onto a page so you can make your own collage. The results look like a magazine spread made by you!

There’s a good interview on Pretty Shiny Sparkly that covers a lot of information on fair use and copyright infringement and includes links to other helpful sites too. Grit and Glamour has a great post about copyright and image use.

How do you deal with images on your site? Has anyone ever used your work without crediting you?

Destroyer: Kaputt

I just heard a song on the new Destroyer CD as I was listening to KEXP today. I love it and I’ve ordered it already. You might know Destroyer if you know The New Pornographers. If you don’t know either, I highly recommend both. They have very different sounds, and they’re both awesome.

Daniel Bejar, Destroyer’s frontman, has collaborated and contributed to The New Pornographers. Both bands are from Vancouver, Canada and are a big part of the Canadian indie music scene.

Destroyer’s shoe-gazing, mellow sounds are mesmerizing, but are anything but simple. The lyrics are complex and intriguing, and I often struggle to understand the meaning behind the words. That’s a refreshing break from most song I hear on the radio.

When I hear Destroyer, I think of New Order. If you liked the soundtrack to Sofia Coppula’s 2006 movie Marie Antoinette – especially Ceremony by New Order – I think you’ll like Destroyer.

Destroyer’s been around off and on for over a decade—but it’s never too late to become a fan. If you’re in the Seattle area, check them out at The Crocodile on March 18, 2011—I’ll be there. The tour spans the continent, with shows in the US and Canada between mid-March to mid-April. Merge, the label their signed with, has all the tour dates on their website.

Jini Dellaccio Style Icon

Jini Dellaccio is the most famous photographer you’ve never heard of.

At 94 years of age, she’s still going strong. How can I sum up a long career in a few words?

Briefly, Jini began her career in the 1930s as a musician in an all-girl jazz band. She later worked in commercial art in Chicago. In the 1950s, she turned to photography. She moved to California and launched a career as a fashion photographer – in a time when very few women worked in that field.

When she moved to the Pacific Northwest in the early 1960s, the modeling shoots dried up; however, she soon found gigs shooting rock ‘n’ roll sessions with rising musicians. Her client list includes The Wailers, The Sonics, The Who, The Yardbirds, and Neil Young. Jini stopped working for over a decade to care for her ailing husband. Now a widow, she’s dusted off her camera again and has turned to nature photography.

She’s a hidden gem of her time and has a sense of style that transcends time and genres; from fashion to nature, each photo tells a story. Jini herself is a style icon. She has poise and grace that simply can’t be taught. When people think of influential 20th century artists, Jini should be at the top of their lists.

I bought Jini’s book, Rock&Roll: Jini Dellaccio and I highly recommend it. It’s a limited-edition, slender, soft-cover coffee table book with 30 iconic images. It’s a mere fraction of the work she’s created over the past 60 years, but it’s worth it. You can order it from Wessel & Lieberman Booksellers.

For more information about Jini and her amazing life and work, checkout her website.

You’ll find a great interview about her on the Hasselblad camera site too.

Here’s an interview transcript from KUOW 94.9FM.

And here’s the original Evening Magazine interview where I found out about Jini.

The people at Five Star Films are in the middle of making a documentary about Jini. I don’t know when it will be released, but you can follow their production blog and learn more.

Everyone needs to know about Jini Dellaccio!