The Houston Press’ Jef Withonef recently spoke with me about my CDgami art work for the HP Art Attack blog. Below is an excerpt from the article which can be read in its entirety here. Some of the items mentioned in the article can be purchased at Cactus Music in Houston, TX. For other items or custom pieces, contact me directly at david.sadof@gmail.com.

Local Radio Legend Recycles Former Career Into Art

by Jef Withonef

David Sadof is one of the most influential names in Houston radio. His show, Lunar Rotation, introduced the city to pretty much every top alternative act when he helmed the mike at KTBZ. But there’s a side of Sadof we were completely unaware of–his abilities as a visual artist; particularly in a medium he calls “CDgami.”

Being a music director at a radio station, Sadof was sent enough CDs to stock every now-defunct music store in the city, and many of those discs were radio-only singles not for resale. Sadof now has thousands neatly filed away, but they’re not filed by artist, title or genre. They’re filed by color and design to make cutting them into workable pieces easier.

(Continue reading at Houston Press Art Attack blog)

In 1996, I made arrangements to interview Ani while she was touring for the album, Dilate. I also wanted to see her in concert, but the Houston show was at Fitzgerald’s on a Sunday night, the same night as my radio show. I opted instead to see her in Austin the previous night where she played in a ballroom on the UT campus. That night, she began her show with “Worthy” which opens with the following lyrics, “You think you’re not worthy/I’d have to say I agree.” I loved the humor of using that song in that situation and thought it was a great way to open the show.

After spending the night on a friend’s couch, I arrived back in Houston around 2 pm when I got a call from the radio station that Ani’s road manager was trying to reach me. When I returned the call, she told me that Ani was available for the interview, but since they were traveling in a tour bus they didn’t have any way to bring her to the radio station. Usually, an artist will have a local record rep who can drive them around, but small independent record labels rarely have that luxury. I got in my car and headed over to Fitzgerald’s to pick her up.

When I knocked on the door of the bus, I was greeted by her road manager who instructed me to wait in my car. There were a handful of fans hanging out around the front of the club and she wanted to get Ani to my car quickly without causing a fuss.

A few moments later, armed with an acoustic guitar and a bag of cd’s for the taping of a show called, What The Hell Is This?, Ani and Goatboy (Andrew Gilchrist) made the short dash to my car. Ani referred to Gilchrist, her sound engineer whom she later married (and even later, divorced), as “Goatboy” and “The Goat”. It was a nickname that immediately explained itself so there was never a need to ask why. We made our introductions and I began to drive back to the station with Ani in the front seat and Goatboy in the back. As our conversation progressed, it became apparent to me that Ani had no idea who I was or where I was taking her. I mean, she knew that she had her guitar and the bag of cd’s with her for a reason and that we were going to some sort of radio station, but as she put it, “Oh, I just figure we’re going to some little 10 watt folk music radio station”. I replied, “Well, actually, it’s the big evil 100,000 watt rock station, but I do a show on Sunday night’s where I play whatever I want to and I’ve been playing your music quite a bit on the show. We’ve also been playing “Shy” in the regular rotation.”

Our conversation was relaxed and fun and I told her about our show, What The Hell Is This? and that she was asked to bring her cd’s along, because she’ll have an hour to play whatever she wants on the radio. Apparently, the folks at Righteous Babe had given her very little information, which I found amusing since she is actually the owner of the Righteous Babe. However, it is a good thing that she allows others to focus on the business while she focuses on her music.

We arrived at the station and made our way up to the eleventh floor. Ani wore a bright orange tank top, black vinyl (or some other shiny and tight material) pants with a zipper going from front to back, and platform shoes that look like they were taken from Gene Simmons’ closet. First, we stopped by my office, a 6 x 9 room with no windows but a lot of cd’s. We spent a little more time talking about What The Hell Is This?, before Ani and I went into the production room to record the interview. The Goat stayed in my office and looked through the cd’s for other songs Ani might want to play on the show.

Ani gave a great interview and performed an acoustic version of “Dilate” as well as her spoken word piece, “Coming Up”. At one point during the interview, I had to bite my lip to keep from laughing when she lifted up her arm and I noticed she had more underarm hair than I do. I was aware of this possibility, but it’s something else to see it in person. Next, she recorded some station ID’s and I had her sign my Dilate cd. She wrote, “David, You’se the best! Thanks for the support”.

Now it was time to record her DJ breaks for What The Hell Is This? which we would later put together with the songs she had chosen. Steve Robison, Asst. Program Director of The Buzz at the time, was at the station that day and stopped by to join us along with The Goat who now in the production room. Ani quickly discovered that being a DJ is very different from being a folk singer. During the recording of her first break, she said, in a very animated voice, “I’m nerrrrvousssss,” and asked the three of us to leave the room. Of course, she was only joking and before we could turn to leave, she said, “no, no, come back”.

After we finished the recording, I drove Ani and The Goat back to their tour bus which they were able to re-enter without incident.

The performance of “Shy” from that night’s concert at Fitzgerald’s received such a strong reaction that it was included on her live album, Living In Clip.

The Songs Ani Played on What The Hell Is This?, in order:

1. Where Will I Be by Emmylou Harris

2. Viewed From The Spire by Stina Nordenstam

3. Amandrai by Ali Farka Toure with Ry Cooder

4. Pow by The Beastie Boys

5. Listening To Los Angeles by Soul Coughing

6. Can’t Stop The Rain by Los Lobos

7. Most Of The Time by Bob Dylan

8. Ellis Unit One by Steve Earle

9. Water (live version) by PJ Harvey

10. In The Colosseum by Tom Waits

11. Mraya by Abdel Ali Slimani

12. Trigger Happy Jack (acoustic version) by Poe

13. Mustt Mustt by Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan

14. The Long Road by Eddie Vedder with Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan

Note: It wasn’t planned, but during the recording of her breaks, Ani realized that several of the songs she chose were produced by Daniel Lanois.

You may think you already know what your favorite albums are and the order in which they rank, but… you’re probably wrong.

In 2005 I came up with this, admittedly geekish, approach to determining the rankings of my favorite albums. By employing the David Sadof Method (DSM) you will discover your true favorites and you might even surprise yourself. When I first did this myself, I believed my #1 album of all time was Mazzy Star’s So Tonight That I Might See, but as I learned, Mazzy Star was my #76 album and my #1 favorite was The Clash’s London Calling.

Here’s how the DSM works:

1. Divide 100 points by the number of songs on the album (including hidden tracks, if you want to include them). Example: If there are 10 songs, each is potentially worth 10 points.

2. Give each great song the full amount of points and each terrible song 0 points. Give all other songs the appropriate amount of points somewhere in between.

3. If you consider the album to be a “classic” (defined as a flawless album without a single track that isn’t great) give it (up to) another 10 points.

4. If you are impressed by the artwork and/or packaging, give it (up to) another 10 points.

5. If you can think of 5 or more artists that were inspired by the album and you like the majority of those artists, give it (up to) another 10 points.

6. If you can think of 5 or more artists that were inspired by the album and you don’t like the majority of those artists, take away (up to) 10 points.

7. Add or subtract discretionary points as you see fit.

8. This final step is the tie-breaker. Using the decimal point, rate the album on a scale of 1 to 99 in regard to how likely you are to listen to that album at any given time. When you sort your list, if any two albums have the same exact score, adjust the decimal points up or down so that no two albums have the exact same score.

Final comments: When using this method for determining your favorite albums, it is my opinion that “Greatest Hits” albums and other compilations of an artists work should be excluded. There may be some exceptions to this. For example, Adrian Belew’s first three albums are out of print, but a cross-section of those songs were compiled for a CD called Desire Of The Rhino King. In a case such as this, that CD may be a person’s only access to the material. Each person should decide this for themselves on a case by case basis.

Additionally, you may want to create a separate column when using this method in a database to indicate categories (ie: live album, soundtrack, reggae, rock, etc). This will allow you to also sort your list for separate categories, if you choose to do so. When dealing with multiple disc sets such as box sets (if you choose to include them) which may have 100 or more songs, it may be difficult to rate them using the 100 point system. In a case like that, you may want to start out with 1000 points, divide your final score by 10, and then apply steps 3-8.

My Top Albums using the DSM:

I haven’t added to my list for a least a couple years, but I have applied this method to over 700 albums. Many of the albums I know so well that I can rank the songs just by looking at their titles and don’t actually have to re-listen to them, so this doesn’t take as long as you might think. Here are my Top 20 in order, along with their DSM scores.

Rank   DSM Score           Artist                                  Album

1. 130.99       The Clash                      London Calling
2. 130.98       David Bowie                   Ziggy Stardust
3. 130.97       Lou Reed                       Rock And Roll Animal
4. 130.95       Echo & The Bunnymen  Crocodiles
5. 130.89       The Jam                         Sound Affects
6. 130.88       The Beatles                    Revolver
7. 130.75       The Rolling Stones         Some Girls
8. 130.74       Ramones                        Ramones
9. 130.73       Led Zeppelin                   Houses Of The Holy
10. 130.68       Pink Floyd                       Dark Side Of The Moon
11. 130.65       Sex Pistols                      Never Mind The Bollocks
12. 130.62       The Clash                       The Clash
13. 130.59       Led Zeppelin                   Zoso
14. 130.54       The Beatles                    Sgt. Pepper
15. 129.88       The Who                         Who’s Next
16. 129.87       R.E.M.                             Reckoning
17. 129.85       R.E.M.                             Automatic For The People
18. 129.78       Psychedelic Furs            Talk Talk Talk
19. 129.76       The Replacements          Don’t Tell A Soul
20. 129.75       R.E.M.                             Life’s Rich Pageant

Touring rock bands have always had a lot of downtime inbetween shows. A fact well documented by legendary tales of the classic rock era when Joe Walsh remodeled hotel rooms with a chain saw and Keith Moon constantly found new ways to get banned from Hotel chains. These days such antics are a rare occurrence. After all, given the current state of the music business, few artists can afford the repair bills that accompany that behavior. Still, bands do manage to find other activities to bide their time.

While on tour in 2002, Ash spent some of their downtime making a slasher movie titled Slashed, written by their friend Jed Shepherd. Eight years later, the unfinished film is making its debut as an alternate video for Ash’s latest single Binary.

continue reading at examiner.com

A beautiful video for this ethereal song by Charlotte Gainsbourg. You may get vertigo from watching this, but that’s the best part.

[vimeo]http://vimeo.com/12041573[/vimeo]

Each week on Lunar Rotation I had a segment called Undercover to highlight some of my favorite cover songs. This cover of Leonard Cohen’s “Everybody Knows” performed by Concrete Blonde originally appeared on the soundtrack to Pump Up The Volume.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ov0yFqqFfJ0[/youtube]

Lunar Rotation made its debut on KTBZ on Sunday, March 12, 1995 at 9 pm. Since it was the only specialty show on the station, I needed to get the word out among the DJs so they could talk about it on the air. For the first few months I published a weekly memo like the one below:

Wanting to use an appropriate song to kick off the new show, I chose “Turn It On” from The Flaming Lips’ 1993 album Transmissions From The Satellite Heart.

Watch The Flaming Lips first \”Turn It On\’ video at MTV

Watch The Flaming Lips second \”Turn It On\’ video at MetaCafe

Joy Division only recorded two studio albums during their time together as a band. Sadly, that time was cut short by singer Ian Curtis’ suicide on the eve of their first American tour in May 1980. While the tour did not include Houston, it would have brought the group to New York, Chicago, Minneapolis, San Francisco and a few other large cities.

Despite their sparse output, the albums Unknown Pleasures and Closer as well as the band’s posthumous releases, showcased their minimalistic approach to music and placed them at the forefront of the post-punk movement. Joy Division were not a punk band, but it was punk that motivated and inspired them. Their influence can be heard in the music of many modern bands, the most notable being Interpol.

Last night (May 18) at Manchester’s Fac 251, Joy Division bassist Peter Hook with his current band The Light and guest vocalists Rowetta (Happy Mondays) and Simon Topping (A Certain Ratio) paid tribute to Ian Curtis by performing Unknown Pleasures in its entirety as well as other songs from the Joy Division catalog for the 450 person capacity crowd.

(continue reading at examiner.com and watch fan video of “Love Will Tear Us Apart” from this show)

Here’s a fan video from the show with Simon Topping singing “Transmission”.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8u-shnpjNLk[/youtube]

The world learned of the loss of heavy metal legend Ronnie James Dio on Sunday when his wife and manager Wendy Dio broke the sad news on the Dio website:

“Today my heart is broken, Ronnie passed away at 7:45am 16th May. Many, many friends and family were able to say their private good-byes before he peacefully passed away. Ronnie knew how much he was loved by all. We so appreciate the love and support that you have all given us. Please give us a few days of privacy to deal with this terrible loss. Please know he loved you all and his music will live on forever”.

Dio had been undergoing cancer treatment at Houston’s M.D. Anderson hospital for the past six months.

(continue reading at examiner.com and watch fan video of Pearl Jam’s tribute)

This is one of my favorite moments from the Henry Rollins spoken word albums. The part about Ronnie James Dio begins at 1:15. (In memory of Ronnie James Dio).

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VUGYMLJFibA[/youtube]