Warren borrows a cat to help with his mouse infestation. Featuring music by Saturnalia.
Archive for January, 2009
Polyester Dreams Episode 3: Soul Song
Friday, January 30th, 2009Episode 2 Production Notes
Thursday, January 29th, 2009This episode was loosely based on an interview that took place outside the 80th Academy Awards.
Shot it at a friend’s apartment on the Upper West Side. The exterior was done in front of Carnegie Hall in between being justifiably harassed by security guards. The cast finished off the bottle of Jameson I bought for them.
When I dressed up as The Living Oscar Statue the bald cap broke and I tried to fix it in post using After Effects. The results were less than impressive so I added some kind of radial blur to those shots.
The last part was filmed off Kent Street in Williamsburg. It was incredibly difficult to find an area that overlooked the East River and was not being actively patrolled by guards or rangers.
Danger Tally:
3. Lit my hand on fire. The only consequences were burning all the hair off and some residual stinging.
4. The gold body paint somehow got in my pores and my torso stung for several days afterwards. In case anyone is wondering, yes, I’m half-Jewish.
Tubefilter Story on Polyester Dreams
Tuesday, January 27th, 2009
The Radio Star Lives On In ‘Polyester Dreams’
by John Manalang on January 26th, 2009
Selected Excerpts:
“The Buggles proclaimed that video has killed the radio star, but rock DJ Warren Orlando has already cheated death, thanks to Andrew Harrison, star and creator of the new web series Polyester Dreams. The indie comedy series tracks the trials and tribulations of Warren Orlando, a prog rock DJ at radio station WXLA, who follows the rock and roll creed of self-loathing and manic depression in his own way. His misfortunes in life, from his Academy Award winning ex-girlfriend humiliating him in the media to reading half-assed commercial bits, are interwoven with homemade music videos, playing ‘forgotten’ songs mainly from the 60s and 70s.”
“If Californication’s Hank Moody were ever a disc jockey in his life, Orlando would fit that profile smoothly like a vinyl spinning on an old record player. ‘Warren is extremely bitter that his radio career never really got anywhere,’ said Harrison. ‘He is the type that wanted to make a name for himself, and when he realizes he didn’t, he’s content to destroy everything. And just be a total dick in the process. And I guess this is funny to me. To watch a guy just suffer through the indignities of life and rail against it the best he can.’”
Episode 2: Wicked Woman
Monday, January 26th, 2009Warren Orlando gets some unwanted publicity when his ex-girlfriend, former fetish model Syn Sparks, wins an Academy Award. Featuring music by Coven.
The Story of Coven
Friday, January 23rd, 2009
Helmed by the mysterious blonde siren Jinx Dawson, Coven released their first album in 1969 entitled Witchcraft Destroys Minds and Reaps Souls, which sounded much like a satanic version of Jefferson Airplane.
The album contains a full length “satanic mass” and some gems such as “White Witch of Rose Hall” and “Dignitaries of Hell,” which accurately details many of the prominent demons of the infernal regions and their respective ranks and habits (as referenced in Colin de Plancy’s Dictionnaire Infernal).
Though not incredibly popular, Coven was encircled with controversy. When they performed in their hometown of Chicago, police had a mandate forbidding the band to speak in between songs, for fear that they would invoke their dark master, I suppose. All of this came to a head when the Manson murders cast aspersions onto the occult subculture and Coven was released from their recording contract.
Coven re-emerged in 1972 with a self-titled album consisting of a very different sound. Reflective of the general evolution of rock in the 70s, Coven had moved towards a more emotional, riff-heavy sound akin to a fusion of Carly Simon and Heart. In 1974, Coven reached the pinnacle of their achievements with Blood on the Snow, one of my all-time favorite albums.
It is important to remember that Coven is almost definitely the first band to throw up the horns onstage, starting in 1969. Though Gene Simmons and Ronnie James Dio both try to stake that claim, the photos do not lie:
Coven is still around today, and Jinx looks unnaturally young. Hmm… You can visit her personal MySpace page as well as buy Coven albums and merch via their CafePress store. I’ve interviewed Coven on the radio twice, and you can access the archives here:
Episode 1 Production Notes
Thursday, January 22nd, 2009There was a big problem with noise in this episode. First of all, there are big servers always running that stream the radio station, and they are LOUD.
Second, the goddamn subway train runs DIRECTLY under the radio studio. Every five minutes. This was a considerable obstacle.
When sound is really bad, I usually use a program called SoundSoap, which does a decent job finding the background noise and separating it. The vocals become a bit tinny, but it’s better than any of the audio filters in Final Cut Pro.
What else? Chris Nunez let me throw coffee cups at him, which was fun. Oh, and since so many of these shoots involve me getting hurt somehow, I would like to start a Danger Tally that keeps track of these mishaps (some of which are unintentional, some not).
1. Almost fell off my roof when I kicked the Direct TV dish. Apparently I don’t understand physics.
2. Cut my hand open when I was smashing the umbrella.
Polyester Dreams Press Release
Thursday, January 22nd, 2009“POLYESTER DREAMS”, SELF-PRODUCED WEB SITCOM ABOUT A MANIC-DEPRESSIVE RETRO RADIO DJ, LAUNCHES ITS FIRST SEASON
Brooklyn, New York January 2009- “Polyester Dreams”, a webisode series that promotes obscure psych, prog and glam rock songs from the 60s and 70s, launches this week. Available on www.polyesterdreams.com and iTunes, the first season will consist of 8 episodes, each under six minutes. The site also offers short “Progcasts” recommending early 70s music in the guise of a video advice column.
Each episode features the comical tribulations of Warren Orlando, a manic-depressive prog rock DJ at the fictional radio station WXLA. The show interweaves the events of Warren’s downward spiraling life with homemade music videos for the forgotten songs he plays on his show. The season features Warren being burdened by many strange occurrences, from his ex-girlfriend winning an Oscar and disparaging him in the press to the menacing threats of a Brazilian death metal band in search of fame and holy relics. One episode takes place entirely within an abandoned religious theme park.
Creator Andrew Harrison has hosted the psychedelic radio show “Plastic Tales from the Marshmallow Dimension” and the webisode series “Street Talk with Andrew Harrison” on TheStreet.com. Harrison explains, “I wanted to raise awareness of the music I played on my radio show, and I figured the best way to do that was a comedy show about an embittered problem drinker unhealthily obsessed with the past.” With $600 from his Economic Stimulus check, he gathered a collection of misfits together to produce the first season.
“Polyester Dreams” cast members include Dallas Coyle from the metal band God Forbid; Satu Rautaharju, a candidate for the Wonder Woman role who has appeared in such shows as “Flight of the Conchords” and “Life on Mars”; Angelica Insectavora, renowned performer with the Coney Island Sideshow and Ripley’s Believe It Or Not; and Rob Lathan, an improv comedian who has performed with the Upright Citizens Brigade, Improv Everywhere, and has appeared on such shows as “The Colbert Report” and “Late Night with Conan O’Brien.”
For more information:
Contact Andrew Harrison
warrenorlando@polyesterdreams.com
Episode 1: Weatherman
Monday, January 19th, 2009Warren clashes with WXLA’s general manager and ponders life as a weatherman. Featuring music by The Idle Race.
Progcast #1
Saturday, January 17th, 2009In which Warren recommends The Sensational Alex Harvey Band to a future art collective exile.
It begins…
Sunday, January 4th, 2009The point of this blog is mainly to have a feed for the video content that gets released. But I’m also going to talk about music, video production, Web 2.0, the chupacabra, all that good stuff.
Eventually this whole site will evolve into a series of animal shaped robots that fit together into one giant robot who will turn out to be a real downer. At that point I’ll probably rename the whole thing Radio 2.0: Ninja Storm or something just as inane, babbling incoherently about media convergence and mobisodes while grisly ghouls from every tomb are closing in to seal my doom.
I started doing this show without knowing where it was going. This is because I knew that if I spent too much time planning it, it would never get done. The production quality is nowhere near where I would like it to be. All of the equipment was borrowed and it was crewed by whichever friends of mine were free. The budget ($500) was spent mainly on the rental car to get to Episode 5’s location, and on keeping cast and crew fed and moderately drunk. We got better and quicker as we went along, and midway through the season an arc begins to take shape.
So here’s the trailer:
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