A Less Restrictive Model

Time For More Space Junk

Mark Rushton’s Abundant Spare Time is a weekly email on Substack where I talk about my ongoing work as a recording artist and visual artist.

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This 151st weekly email is brought to you by the Mark Rushton Gallery, for printed and original artworks. License my music, sound fx, and illustrations at Pond 5 for your creative project. I’m on Bandcamp and all the usual streaming services.

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This week’s topics:

• A Less Restrictive Model

• Bandcamp Saturday

• Marty Stuart and his Fabulous Superlatives - “Space Junk”

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A Less Restrictive Model

I’ve been recovering from that bug for most of the week.

I did go to the day job, but I wasn’t 100%. I did edit music at night and threw it on the pile. I got a couple of releases scheduled in the future. I convinced somebody to sign up to ASCAP as a writer and publisher. I stay busy.

Did you go to the doctor? Why would I go to the doctor? They would only prescribe a benzo or some other garbage. I’m not interested in the patented medicines. I don’t want the latest thing the smiling people dancing around in slow motion on TV are pushing.

I was never really less than 65%. I did take extra zinc in the form of Zicam and an extra Zinc Carnosine. I drank a lot of water. Ate a little less. I got better as the days wore on. Most days at work, in the afternoon, I did a 10 to 15 minute steam in the company gym followed by a cool shower. That helped.

I asked the word robot about the health benefits of spending 10 to 15 minutes in a steam room. It was very positive, but one of the alleged benefits was instantly suspect: “steam opens pores, helping to remove toxins…”

Even I knew this was garbage advice, so I backed the robot into a corner and was abusive to it. After an apology, it said: “According to Britannica and medical experts, the primary detox organs are the liver and kidneys, not the skin. The skin is not considered an excretory organ in the same way as the liver, kidneys, or lungs.”

Then I followed up with, “What organs in the human body get rid of toxins?”. Much better answers here: The liver was first, kidneys second, lungs, colon, and way down the list was the skin, the lymphatic system, and and the adrenal grands.

So if you hear somebody go on about “sweating out toxins”, realize that you’re just listening to somebody who has been programmed.

Also, be good to your liver, kidneys, lungs, colon, and everything else.

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Bandcamp Saturday

I never promote “Bandcamp Friday” because everybody else is doing it.

The main selling point of “Bandcamp Friday” is that Bandcamp doesn’t take any fees for purchases on that day - all the money goes to the artists.

I’m not comfortable with that sort of thing. That’s like walking into a store and buying something at the shop keeper’s cost. I think the store owner deserves their cut.

On Substack, there are factions that whine about the evils of “streaming” and only push record stores and Bandcamp. And while I do agree that one particular streaming service, Botify, does not deserve patronage, all the others provide a service without many shenanigans.

I use Qobuz. I do use others. But I recommend Qobuz.

But I still use Bandcamp, too. I put my Bandcamp-purchased tracks on my new-old Sony Digital Walkman that I picked up on eBay recently for $38.

In 2022, I mopped up a lot of my ambient singles from 2016 to 2022 and put them into a Bandcamp exclusive collection called Already Evident.

It’s around 3 hours of ambient drifting music for $5.

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Marty Stuart and his Fabulous Superlatives - “Space Junk”

Yes, another one by Marty Stuart, the title track from his still “vinyl-only” album. Space Junk.

This time in “visualizer” mode.

Everything I’ve heard so far from this album is an instant classic.

And Marty Stuart was not on my radar at all prior to this album.

They’re playing the Surf Ballroom in Clear Lake, Iowa, towards the end of August. $31 and up. Only a 2 hour drive… Hmmm…