Paul Isakson: Heartthrob in Residence

Dear LA,

Sat, 07 Nov 2009 11:35:14 -0500

Fuck you for making me feel self-conscious about saying “pop” instead of “tasty bubble water” or whatever you call it.

This last week we’ve been shooting in Kovac’s Bar...

Mon, 02 Nov 2009 21:01:42 -0500

This last week we’ve been shooting in Kovac’s Bar off of W. Jefferson in Detroit.

It’s in one of the more bombed-out looking parts of the city (which is saying quite a bit), right across from the truck ferry to Windsor. Cement trucks were passing by all day every day.

Adjacent from Kovac’s is an enormous, terrifying industrial complex which, when we were downwind, alternatively emitted the smells of dog feces and dog urine. A giant orange and blue flame endlessly burst from the place. At night it looked especially sinister. Like Mordor or some shit.

The most interesting location, however, was the abandoned building by crew parking. I hadn’t noticed it until today.

Two fellow PAs and I decided to explore it after wrap.

It was 7pm so it was dark already. We walked through the building. They call this urban exploring or urban spelunking, but instead of SLR cameras we brandished LED flashlights and utility knives (you know, PA stuff).

It was exciting. Not sure where I was going with that, but you had to read it anyway.

Yesterday I invented a game called “Person Lying Down or Pile of Garbage?” where you try to figure out whether a dark shape on the ground (in alleys or the middle of the street) were hapless homeless people or, in fact, old Faygo cans and Coney Dog wrappers (oh Detroit). The results are sometimes surprising and always depressing.

What I’m really trying to say is LA is for pussies.

My flight back will be in about 20 days.

Hey there hot stuff,

Sun, 01 Nov 2009 20:10:30 -0500

want to come back to my place and help me resolve my intimacy problems?

MY LIST OF SUSPECTS:

Sat, 31 Oct 2009 18:56:38 -0400

marklevitz:

I want to know where these assholes were last night, and what they were doing:

SPENCER STRAUSS - He could have went in my room and stolen my camera!

JILLIAN BORDEN & DAN RIESSER - Jillian admitted to being at my house last night, and she could have stolen my camera, too!

JENN RUIZ, ASHLEY BORLIK & SHANE HOUGHTON

DAVE LYONS & TONY ZARET

PAUL ISAKSON & RANDY COLBURN

I was in LA, pranking people under the guise of Del and using Tim’s camera. OH NO I SAID TOO MUCH!

Anyone interested in starting an on-again/off-again relationship with me?

Sat, 31 Oct 2009 15:04:45 -0400

Anyone interested in starting an on-again/off-again relationship with me?

Going to MI has really taken its toll on my tumblarity.

Sat, 31 Oct 2009 04:33:17 -0400

Going to MI has really taken its toll on my tumblarity.

Jim Emerson: "Where the Mopey Things Are"

Fri, 30 Oct 2009 19:43:41 -0400

Jim Emerson: "Where the Mopey Things Are":

Jim Emerson on Where the Wild Things Are. I agree with what he said.

Happy Devil’s Night from suburban Detroit!

Fri, 30 Oct 2009 17:37:07 -0400

Happy Devil’s Night from suburban Detroit!

eyeonspringfield: Hey, I don’t remember saying that!

Tue, 27 Oct 2009 23:48:05 -0400

eyeonspringfield:

Hey, I don’t remember saying that!

If I Had A Bucket List...

Sun, 25 Oct 2009 21:53:57 -0400

kenohno:

…I’m pretty sure I knocked a couple things off of it today.

1. Waking up and starting a day at 2:30am.

2. Walking in the middle of a major expressway without fear for my life.

Thanks, Show Biz!

Mine is:

1. Working on a movie with Ken O.
OH WAIT I DID THAT TODAY!

boringloser: A few quick announcements: Announcement #1:...

Fri, 23 Oct 2009 20:12:59 -0400

boringloser:

A few quick announcements:

Announcement #1: Community has been picked up for 9 more episodes.

Announcement #2: Butt Soup!

Reaction #1: Awesome!

Reaction #2: Get me a job on this shit already!

Soupy Sales Died.

Fri, 23 Oct 2009 03:30:24 -0400

Soupy Sales Died.:

(via braidsbraided)

The movie I’m working on shot at the WXYZ station (Detroit channel 7) on Sunday. I was talking to one of the station grips about the place and he told me all about Soupy Sales. Weird that he died this week.

Michigan Update

Wed, 21 Oct 2009 05:15:48 -0400

It’s raining.
It’s warm.
It’s 5:00am and I just got home from work.
I-94 is surprisingly busy at 4:30am.
It’s a terrible time to come down with a cold.

erniwalker: ohmygoshyouguys it’s a new episode of the show i...

Tue, 20 Oct 2009 02:31:57 -0400

erniwalker:

ohmygoshyouguys it’s a new episode of the show ~~i like to pretend~~ you’ve all been waiting for…FOREVER SUMMER!!!

i don’t wanna play favorites, but this episode is my favorite. it features some xtreme new commercials, original music, and special guest star DEMORGE BROWN!

so i proudly present to you Episode 3: “Secret Agent Man.” GET RADD ON IT.

For those who don’t already know, Forever Summer is the best thing in the world.

Day 2. Sixteen hour day. Big, beautiful Polish church in Detroit. Moving on to night shoots starting...

Tue, 20 Oct 2009 02:31:08 -0400

Day 2. Sixteen hour day. Big, beautiful Polish church in Detroit. Moving on to night shoots starting tomorrow.

So far this movie actually looks pretty good.

First day of work. 17 hours. I’m exhausted. I’m getting my “sea legs.” In...

Sun, 18 Oct 2009 23:37:47 -0400

First day of work. 17 hours. I’m exhausted. I’m getting my “sea legs.”

In other news, There is apple cider in Michigan and apple cider, as we all know, is goddamn ambrosia. Nectar of the gods, people.

Made it back to MI! Thanks to everybody who hung out last night. It was fun and silly. It’s a...

Sat, 17 Oct 2009 21:00:45 -0400

Made it back to MI! Thanks to everybody who hung out last night. It was fun and silly.

It’s a lot less warm here than in LA. It’s mid-40’s. In Phoenix, where my flight was connected, it was over 100 degrees.

My call time is 5am tomorrow, so I’m going to sleep.

Goodnight!

postpunk: They Might Be Giants - We Want A Rock [Here’s a post...

Fri, 16 Oct 2009 17:49:23 -0400

postpunk:

They Might Be Giants - We Want A Rock

[Here’s a post I contributed to tuneage—SYNERGY! The song really just came to me after a stretch of forced insomnia, and in that mental state, the lines about rocks and strings just articulated something ineffable and profound to me, and I became consumed by the song and listened to it a million times. That’s all I really wanted or needed to say in the post, but you can’t do those kinds of pitches these days.]

Earlier this year, They Might Be Giant’s commercial breakthrough Flood was certified platinum, just shy of the album’s 20 year anniversary this coming January. To mark the occasion, the band has recently began doing performances of the album, and I accordingly decided it was time to revisit the album. The big hits—“Birdhouse In Your Soul”, “Istanbul (Not Constantinople)”, “Particle Man”—remain charming and satisfying, as do “Whistling In The Dark”, “Twisting” (dB’s namedrop!), and “Someone Keeps Moving My Chair”. The album provides a great snapshot of the offbeat pop that would eventually evolve into something called “alternative” music.

That is all good, but it’s “We Want A Rock” that really floors me. The wonderful melody and accordion performance transform the inscrutable lyrics—“everybody wants prosthetic foreheads on their real heads”—into something with a resonating sentiment. It only took a couple plays for me to identify with the song’s people who “want a rock to wind a piece of string around”. Although the lyrics seem silly and nonsensical, the meaning of the song, according to John Linnell, is quite simple:

This sounds really abstract, but in order to begin wrapping a piece of string around itself, you need something to start with. Like a rock. I guess you can make a ball of string starting from nothing if you just make a tiny loop at the end of the string. But it seems theoretically impossible. It’s a metaphor for getting started.

Okay, I don’t think I would have thought of that metaphor after 20 years, but that’s not going to stop me from joining a rock-and-string sing-along.

Chumpionship

Thu, 15 Oct 2009 18:52:40 -0400

Chumpionship

Magnetic Fields - No One Will Ever Love You I think this song is...

Thu, 15 Oct 2009 17:02:33 -0400

Magnetic Fields - No One Will Ever Love You

I think this song is pretty much perfect.