GET YOUR FIX PROJECT.

MANIFEST! Limited Edition...Only 30 made!
A great look back at the Las Vegas Fixed Gear Community. Props to House of Commons, Neek, Aaron Garcia, and everyone involved.

See you next year!

TOP 50 RECORDS of 2008

Below is my list! It took some time to make. Brandon Cox had one hell of a year...two of his records are in my top 10! Lotus Plaza (guitarist from Deerhunter Luckett Pundt) has announced a release date for 2009! Animal Collective, Andrew Bird, American Football (re-release) and a ...ton others are scheduled for winter releases! Records with ** I have purchased and listened to. Because I do not have a strong hip hop background...gettin into it...very few are on here. Yes, I know, I didn't put Deathcab on. Again, aside from Radiohead and Burial, these are only records from 2008.

1 Deerhunter - Microcastle/Weird Era Cont.**
2 Fleet Foxes - Fleet Foxes**
3 Bon Iver - For Emma, Forever Ago**
4 Black Mountain - In The Future**
5 Crystal Castles - Crystal Castles**
6 Atlas Sound - Let the Blind Lead Those Who Can See But Cannot Feel**
7 Autechre - Quaristice**
8 Cut Copy - In Ghost Colours**
9 MGMT - Oracular Spectacular**
10 Foals - Antidotes**
11 Radiohead - In Rainbows**
12 M83 - Saturday=Youth**
13 Holy Fuck - LP**
14 Destroyer - Trouble In Dreams**
15 Sun Kil Moon - April**
16 Volcano! - Paperwork***
17 Burial - Untrue**
18 Girl Talk - Feed The Animals**
19 TV on the Radio - Dear Science
20 Ratatat - LP3**
21 Fuck Buttons - Street Horrsing**
22 E rykah Badu - New Amerykah, Part 1 (4th World War)
23 Ra Ra Riot - The Rhumb Line
24 No Age - Nouns**
25 Okkervil River - The Stand Ins
26 Earth - The Bees Made Honey In the Lion's Skull**
27 Bob Dylan - Tell Tale Signs:The Bootleg Series Vol. 8
28 Hot Chip - Made In The Dark**
29 Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds - Dig, Lazarus, Dig!!!
30 Of Montreal - Skeletal Lamping
31 Beck - Modern Guilt
32 Santogold - Santogold
33 The Roots - Rising Down
34 The Magnetic Fields - Distortion
35 Conor Oberst - Conor Oberst
36 Kings of Leon - Only By The Night
37 The Hold Steady - Stay Positive
38 Black Kids - Partie Traumatic**
39 One Day As A Lion - One Day As A Lion**
40 David Byrne and Brien Eno - Everything That Will Happen Today
41 My Morning Jacket - Evil Urges**
42 N.E.R.D - Seeing Sounds
43 Gnarles Barkley - The Odd Couple
44 Nada Surf - Lucky
45 Sea Wolf - Leaves In The River**
46 Thievery Corporation - Radio Retaliations
47 These New Puritans - The Beat Pyramid
48 Animal Collective - Water Curses 7"
49 Sun Kil Moon - Tiny Cities**
50 Belle and Sebastian - The BBC Sessions

dear snow that snows,

You're the snowiest...yesterday was the most snow Vegas has seen in 30 years!

HOLY FUCK

I am twenty one

This post should really be titled: not-so-weekly update post. Since I titled my last birthday post i am 20, it just seems appropriate. It's been more of a celebration week. I'm just now catching my breathe. I shared the same birthday birthday week with David Gamble, Jamesy, Matt D, and even Catherine Faris from AA Corporate. Crazy!!

8:36 am, November 24, I always get an anticipated and ecstatic phone call from my mother, wishing me a happy birthday. My parents took me out to the Peppermill for dinner, drinks, and gambling session. It was a great way to ease into my new freedoms.

The rest of the week was madness. The Fuckin' Party played their last show...for a while...downtown, and went out for drinks shortly after. Jamesy and I shared a small wine and cheese/birthday party the next day.

One of my best friends, Bryan Novelo, moved to San Fransisco last Sunday. He always inspired me to ride hard, push it to the limit, say 'fuck it' sometimes, and treat everyday like it's a new adventure. I can not recall when we first met, but he has always been there; good and bad. Novelo will always represent the positive side in my life. I'm extremely sad to see him go, but he's gotta do what he's gotta do. I wish him luck and hope he comes back with that dashing smile of his very very soon...

Matt's Cinelli Vigorelli

Save Your Generation

Blake Schwarzenbach, singer/songwriter behind awe-inspiring Jawbreaker and personal favorite Jets to Brazil, has a new project in the works. It's called the Thorns Of Life. Aaron Cometbus (Crimpshrine, Pinhead Gunpowder) joined the TOL camp behind the drums and Daniela Sea from The L Word is on bass! Sounds like quite the lineup.

They are currently recording a 7" in Brooklyn and plan on playing more house show on the East Coast. I'm keeping my ears open and fingers crossed that they venture over to the West. Hearing Blake sing live would be a check mark on my life-to-do-list!

Hats Off To The (Roy) Haper

the newest gem to my collection; it plays continuously.
Roy Harper- Stormcock

LA08

I almost forgot to mention LA. It had some unexpected twists of luck. Southern California in general has always been confusing and cluttered to me, but this was easily the funnest trip to LA yet. Spontaneous adventures have always been a key and essential part of my life.

We filled my trunk with track wheels and bags, but had to make room for our two shopping carts full of IKEA goodness.
Matt and I parked the car in Downtown LA, took out the bikes, tore up the streets, took some pics, ate some food, and ran into some friends.

We found an AA in Echo Park and ran into Nick, a very awesome merchandiser who was at our store a few months back. It was great to see him and he let us crash at the company apartment on Sunset Blvd.
We met some awesome riders at the Encino Velodrome and participated in the LAFixed Velodrome Day. The track was outside and the weather was close to perfect. It was definitely different from my past visits to velodromes; there was an instructor who conducted drills and provided useful, and at times sarcastic, tips for racing. Some fast kids...

change is good.

I woke up and texted my mother, who voted McCain, 'Change'. She replied, "Change is good."

happy halloween

TR476

I had hinted to AA to make a long sleeve V-Neck a few years back. Finally...and in Tri-Blend no less. Ohh fall, and all your layering-clothing goodness!!

MMJ Care Package.

My Morning Jacket canceled their Las Vegas date for their Evil Urges Tour last month. I was extremely upset about this. What made matter worse was Viva-Radio, an amazing internet radio program based out of NY- played in every American Apparel store, was doing a huge promotion for their upcoming tour and CD Release. After hearing about the news of their show cancellation, I emailed Neil from Viva and told him I was going to send back all the promotional items we were to display in our store.

I told him how excited I was to finally see My Morning Jacket and how disappointed I was to hear of their show cancellation. He replied shorty after, "Go ahead and send it to NY3 and we will work something out. Thanks!"

Last Friday, Brett and I were checking the store's mailbox and found a record box shaped packaged addressed: Attention: Ryan O'Keefe. I was completely overjoyed to find the box containing four, brand new My Morning Jacket LP's!!! There was no note and any e-mail prior to the package being delivered. Needless to say, I have been jamming on some sweet MMJ tunes for the past few days.

Not sure who was behind this, but THANK YOU...it made my month!

MS 150 Ride

Bike MS: Perini Building Company Las Vegas Gambler's Classic Ride 2008
November 8 & 9, 2008
165 Miles of Open Road Ahead

The MS Bike Ride provides an experience that tests your strength, your character, and challenges you to have more fun than you imagined. Two days, 165 miles!

I'm on the HOUSE OF COMMONS TEAM, with Brett, Kris, and Nick. That's our team so far, but we are always looking for more experienced riders to join! We are taking donations to help fight Multiple Sclerosis. If you donate even $5 it would help a great deal, and I promise to ride extra hard for you!

DONATE HERE

calm

Interbike Week is over. breathe.

All the training weeks prior paid off. The Vegas Drag Race was a massive success and there are so many people to thank. Top 10? well...maybe. I claimed if I got Top 5 I would be ecstatic. Your truly managed a respectable fourth place, and exceeded my own expectations! Matt managed to win second place, although he should have taken it all-if he only knew where to actual finish line was! Matt walked away with a Cinelli Vigorelli frame, a camera, and a bunch of schhwagg!

The Macaframa Premiere was insanity. Cyclist from SF, LA, Tokyo, etc. came out to watch the World Premiere of the newest fixed gear movie, that had well over two years of hype behind it. It was great to make new friends and see old ones. The movie was amazing, with great cinematography, insane riding, surreal HD Camera Angles, and a perfect soundtrack.

If I could have beeen two places at once, I still wouldn't have been able to go to all the places I wanted to go, and see all the people I wanted to see, and race all the races I wanted to race. It was completely overwhelming at times, and every year gets better!

Vegas was all over the place.

Check out
Neek's Blog
MASH

MASH IN VEGAS

invisible bike

The blog-o-sphere is an interesting thing. Information travels so fast that: any news, is old news. It's been a great few weeks. The weather is turning to fall and my bike got some new shoes!

Matt is a mastermind behind that lense.
Invisible bike FTW!

check out moar photos

I'm back

The damage is done and everything is pretty much back to normal. I'm on the right track. Fall is upon us and I'm back in the Boys of Summer House. It's a new month. This has been a crazy year...

totally tubular...

BIKE SWAP-MEET / ART SHOW

summer's perfection

this whole summer has been a working weekend. work and then straight into hibernation. can not wait for the season to change. big things coming.
in case you missed it...

HOC got inspired by Willy Wonka and I came out on top!














in music...

Missingtoof.com did a nice write-up on the new Sebestien Tellier album. American Apparel and Vive-Radio really got behind this LP release, and AA produced a limited edition Sebastein Tellier Sexuali-Tee and Sexuali-Tank. The album is great French-Dance-Disco-Electronic-Pop...perfect for riding. And the LP is pearl white!!
Get remixes and read reviews HERE

Michael Maronna

BEFORE

AFTER


that's right. See Micheal Maronna in the new NADA SURF music video doing his thing!

the lives of others

FILM REVIEW:

Nominated for a Best Foreign Language Film Oscar in 2006, the German film The Life of Others has quickly become one of my favorites. Placed in East Berlin, year 1984, a simple surveillance operation turns into a tale of triumph and defeat. A prominent, and rebellious, writer is stuck in the socialist Germany with a deep desire to tell the world what he sees. He is not the only one watching. Just above his flat, a member of the council is assigned to spy and blackmail the writer.

Georg Dreyman (Sebastian Koch), a popular German writer, tries to get his controversial work published in the West. He is completely unaware that all his plans and actions are being monitored by a special cases officer Capt. Gerd Wiesler (Ulrich Mühe).


Once the officer hears the work of the author his motive begins to change. The art truly speaks to him and he begins to see the flaws in his government. The officer feels a change in his life as he watches the change of others, the lives of others. He in fact, helps the writer by not exposing the secrets. The ending catches you by surprise and being a film with quick subtitles, the movie keeps you on your toes.

Watch the trailer HERE...

wide eyed

the whip. thanks Neek

moarr hats

Mad props to Matthew. Be the first to get your short run, Limited Edition las vegas cap.Made 100% in the USA by Pace Sportswear.
These caps feature a Lightweight Cotton Twill construction,
4 Panel Dome with Traditional Flip Up Visor, KoolFit® Elastic
Sweatband and are Sized: One Size Fits All.
Pre-Order - $17 (includes shipping)
get yours here

era 4

got one of these coming in the mail. stoked.
might take a while, since Dustin is on his way to his new home in Philly.

San Francisco and crash

okay...well...i finally bought an external hard-drive for my laptop, freed up some space, and uploaded the pictures from my San Francisco adventure. A lot has happened since I returned from Sf. see post below. but I think it's appropriate to post something about the trip. It was the best time i had ever had in the city. The weather, the food, the buildings, the people, and the friends were all top notch. I honestly can't wait to go back: next time with our bikes.

Brett and I tore up the town. rage hard and sleep harder.



...as if there wasn't enough to talk about, I go and run my bike and face into a car windshield. the windshield lost. It was bound to happen and luckily I walked away with only a few scars, ER trip, and a ticket for not having brakes on my bike. This was the only picture taken from the event, but it says it all. Keep your head up!

Eric from El Salvador

I love when friends can tell when something is bothering you, or something is out of sorts, or your shadow has become half full, or you are trying to hide something from everyone: but no matter how hard you try to hide it...they know. No mask is ever good enough.

Friends that allow you to make mistakes are essential. Sure, they can force their own life experience down your throat, but the ones that provide enough support and wisdom to help you carry on is something great. I think it takes great patience and heart. I love friends like these. I have a few. I love them unconditionally.

i first met Eric last summer outside of American Apparel. Bicycles were our common ground, of course. And when he came into town to ride and hang out, he fit in perfectly. Everyone knows him as if he were a permanent fixture to the Vegas cycling community. Check out Eric's blog HERE!

More later...it's 4am.

who needs tire clearance??

Bryan Novelo did some damage to his Bridgestone this weekend. Dana Point, CA has some funky hills. Luckily, no one has hurt and his whip is back in fine riding condition!

ja-pancakes

ohh it's been a good one. The weather pulled a 180 over the past week and I don't want it to ever end. I'm finally getting back into the swing of normal life. baby steps. slow process of progress is in acceptance of what you can not control.

it's going to be a good summer.
..and as if I really needed an excuse to go to Japan, I found a valid one.
I should not think about it too much and just buy a plane ticket; so I have to go. You got time, not until October but get your game face on.

...and I should start saving up money now!

who's in?

sekidobashi bicycle flea market...

boys of summer

Last night, it hit me. It's over; the weather is against me now. Time to hibernate during the day and play at night. The summer is ours when the sun goes down. I've got a lot of plans to keep my mind occupied this time of the year. Traveling has always helped clear my mind. LA. SF. NY.

tangents

I cant stop listening to Sun Kil Moon and Red House Painters.
I've been in better conditions.
My iPod gets more use than my heart.
I moved out of my house and have been living out of my bag
San Francisco in June!


I went to the Huntridge Theatre with my Dad a few weeks back.
No one knows what will come of it yet, but my Dad and Luke are on the case...

Myspace Blog...HERE

LA Velodrome

Last week, I got certified to ride and race on the ADT Velodrome. It was a great time with a lot of wonderful friends.

in case you missed it

ahh...I finally have internet again! It feels like so much has been going on, and so little has been updated. I like to set little mile markers in my life, a little tidbit and tangent to remind me of a place, time, event, person, etc...it was a bittersweet separation. So here's what's going on....in case you missed it.

in music...Demonoid.com is back up! I nearly jumped out of my seat when I got an e-mail from the gate-keeper. As if I haven't been spending every second listening to and finding new music.
...and No, I don't have any invitations.

Audrey got me this for our anniversary. Officially the happiest boy ever.


on the come up...
-LA Velodrome this weekend
-Radiohead in 106 days
-new house
-fall semester at the university
-summer.

we made the cover of CityLife

it's great when something you are truly passionate about gets the recognition it deserves. Andrew did a great job highlighting all the glorious things about the cycling community in Vegas. I didn't know we drank so much and smoked so many hand-rolled cigarettes. And we made the cover...how 'bout that.

Read the entire article HERE

love love love

I wasn't looking for it. It came out of left field. It was simple and the puzzle pieces fit. I see a bigger picture. I didn't expect to fall as hard as I did. I didn't expect to be as head-over-heels as I am. I'm glad i did. I found it. I found her. I found love.

can you keep up with me?

This is pretty great.
Have a blog/forum? Re-POST.

Take the test HERE!