Hello Friends, some interesting synchronicities today. First on the radio in the morning a piece about offsetters.ca, which we will be using for all our flights from now on. The idea is that you can offset the carbon emissions you are responsible for by flying or driving (almost 3/4s of a metric tonne of CO2 on a return flight to Vancouver from Toronto) by putting money into projects that theoretically offset those carbon emissions, like reforestation projects or energy reduction initiatives. Not a perfect system, but so long as we're going to fly and drive, these are bills that someone is going to have to pay in some form. This form of emissions trading was essentially derived from Amory Lovin's concept of the "negawatt"....

Second the recent New Yorker article on Amory Lovins and the Rocky Mountain Institute.
Lovins makes the argument that households, corporations and governments can make money by reducing their energy consumption, effectively giving energy conservation a market-driven logic that makes sense to people who create a lot of income and pollution. The idea behind negawatts is that anyone who can implement enough energy saving measures in effect becomes a producer of energy rather than a consumer - imagine the hydro meter on the back over your house moving backwards insted of forwards - the negawatt of energy represents the watt of electricity that does not have to be generated because of some energy-saving measure. The New Yorker articles gives the example of replacing a 75 watt lightbulb with a 14 watt bulb - a generation of 61 negawatts. Negawatts produce money and more negawatts - for example houses lit with fluorescent bulbs (that emit less heat) need less air condition, and etc etc etc. He calls the United States the "Saudi Arabia of nega-barrels".

Anyhow, here are some vague show annoucements:

February 28th
@ The Gladstone Hotel 1214 Queen West
A Benefit for The Ontario Coalition Against Poverty
THE VILETONES
THE GOVERNMENT
FUCKED UP
possibly THE MODS?

Here is the spiel:

BACK TO THE CABANA ROOM
Everything new is old again.
Art Auction and Celebration of 25 Years of Toronto Rebel Culture

In the early 1980s video artist Susan Britton and Government
bass player Robert Stewart opened an artists cabaret over the little
cigar-bar at the old Spadina Hotel located at King and Spadina.
Though not long-lived, the little room became enormously
influential, spawning video projects, art collaborations, critics
>and of course, bands. Punk music may have been on the wane,
but its influence was integral for artists opposing the corporatization of
both culture and political life.

MARCH 12-18 *TEXAS*
March 12 - Dallas TX w/ IRON AGE
March 13 - Denton TX x/ IRON AGE
March 14 - Austin TX w/ IRON AGE

Here are some things we are doing for SXSW that we will have more info on later:
March 15th Jade Tree Showcase
March 16th Vice Party w/ Annihilation Time, Boris, The Black Lips, a million more
March 17th Party w/ Sloan, David Cross, etc (not kidding)

an a bunch more shit we haven't confirmed yet.

Here is an NME article in which they accuse Pink Eyes of being fat:

Here is a youtube video of our European roadie Marek (of Poland) (bass player from Monster) dancing while listening to Le Knight Club on my ipod:



Here is an "interview" about the recent performance on MTV from the Vice website.

HIDDEN WORLD LIVE
Just for FYIs sake, in the spring or early summer we are going to play Hidden World with all the people who played on it, in it's entirety at a show or two shows in Toronto. Keep your eyes peeled.

FULL US TOUR
We are booking a FULL US TOUR for June and July this summer. Get in touch with David (vibrationandhum @ Hotmail.com) if you want to book a show. No low ballers.

AND REMEMBER
Death is the mother of life.