self-titled - no. 2 - (Page 16) EP R EMEMBER CA S S E T T E S ? Although he’s just now celebrating the release of his long-overdue solo debut, Adrian Michna started leaving his genre-jumping stamp on New York and Miami more than a decade ago with a series of side projects, his Egg Foo Young alias and the dearly missed Secret Frequency Crew. Producing music under his surname, Michna handcrafted Magic Monday (Ghostly) from live instrumentation and freshly baked samples. The following commentary follows just five of the countless tapes that sparked Michna’s everevolving career. Click on the cassette covers to listen for yourself. PHOTOS BY TRAVIS HUGGETT Salad Days Formed in 1993, this was my first band. [Our guitarist] was way into Nation of Ulysses and loved that they had a trumpet, so that’s one of the reasons I was brought in. The songs jumped from fast hardcore punk to slow dream-rock, like Porno for Pyros. The album was recorded on a 4-track with two Radio Shack PZM room mics. Once we had a master copy, we hand-duped a buttload of copies using dual cassette decks and then color-copied, cut and folded all the art. In our notes we thanked “everyone who got into us.” Then we broke up. New Era! Started a new band in 1995: the Fabulous Six Youth Movement. We wore costumes at shows and brought dancers onstage. We recorded an EP, The White Tape, at a metal mullet-head studio in Matawan, New Jersey. The recording sounded like hiss and cotton balls, but it looked cool pressed to a solid white-shell cassette. All copies of The White Tape vanished, but in 1996 we added another member, built more costumes, borrowed projectors and smoke machines, added a mannequin to the lineup and decided to throw the party to end all parties—and record it all. 16
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