Also in this issue:

An Interview With Poingly

The Paula Abdul-loving solo artist, Poingly crams as many gigs as he can once he punches out of his day job - where he goes by the alias Jason Glastetter. Dedicated to his art & audience, Poingly manages to decipher mass transit schedules and even car pools to keep his music live.

AP: Have you always been a solo act?
Poingly: I've had people in the past who have played various instruments, but traveling with things like huge amps and drums becomes so cumbersome. So now it's just me and a laptop.

AP: What kind of music are you playing & who’s coming out to see you?
Poingly: It's electronic oriented, but with a lot of screaming. Sometimes there's a guitar or other instruments involved. Very Punk Rock. The Internet has been huge in growing my audience. I seem to have a fluxuating presence there. I think every few years a new group of 16 year olds stumble upon me and then forget about me.

AP: Since you’re not a full-time touring act, how many weeks a year do you hit the road?
Poingly: I think it ends up averaging about three or four. I wish I could get out there more, but it's tough!

At least half of the time I am out of town. I am trying to get out even further, even more. New York is pretty shitty for playing shows, so I like playing out more than in the city. I've been trying to do more "weekend tours," hitting places that are within a few hours and make a great weekend trip.

AP: Where do you go?
Poingly: I've been up and down the east coast a few times, and sometimes over to the west coast. A few scattered shows in the middle of the country here and there. For some reason, I have found myself in Texas on numerous occasions…even though I've never played SXSW.

AP: How do you get around?
Poingly: I've toured by plane, by car, and (within the City) by subway. I keep trying to figure out how to tour by mass transit (bus, train), but it's sort of difficult because you can't often get to where you need to go. I just played a show in Northampton, MA, and had to rent a car. It was sort of sad because right outside the venue there were tracks and an old train station, but it hadn't been used in years.

AP: Has the economy and gas prices crimped your style at all?
Poingly: The nice thing about being a one-man band is that I don't take up much space. I can pack everything I need in a suitcase and hit the road. Recently, I took to the road with another one-man band, Radio Shock, for a few dates. Though I know bands tour together all the time, they often each take their own vans and whatnot. Radio Shock and I shared a car. It cut our car rental and gas costs in half, and we could drive in the carpool lane!

Another idea I've been pondering lately is touring smaller towns. I haven't put this theory to the test yet, but imagine instead of a band playing Washinton DC, they play one night in a Virginia suburb and the next in a Maryland suburb; heck they could even ALSO play DC and get a very different crowd each night (or even better: schedule one in the daytime). Things are close enough to save considerably on gas for the band from gig to gig, fans don't have to travel as far, and so forth. It'd be win-win.

AP: Do you bookers seem to be more cautious lately?
Poingly: I don't know any band who had canceled their show at the last minute because of higher gas prices. You suck it up. But I do think bookers are more understanding. They're going to try to give you a little more if they know you traveled. I would like to think they are less likely to cancel a show on a band. The worst thing a booker can do is cancel a show. If you are an out of town band, you are going to be continuing down the road and spending that money no matter what. I've played a lot of shows that don't pay, but when there is no show, you are guaranteed no pay and no ability to sell merch. It sucks.

AP: What do you think are the greatest obstacles to your career?
Poingly: My day job. I've never made money touring. It's always an expense (though I feel I keep getting closer to breaking even, I suppose if things were still as cheap as they were five years ago, I'd be making money), so I have to keep my day job. It means less touring than I would do otherwise.

AP: Do you think that live music is thriving or just surviving?
Poingly: Can't it be both?

Links:
http://www.poingly.com
http://www.myspace.com/poingly

Tour: Planning for September 2008.

Recent release: I decided to pull a Radiohead/Nine Inch Nails and release an album online (http://www.poingly.com/sosueme) called So Sue Me. I'm not asking for any money for fans to download it, but there is nice request for a donation on the page. Because of the amount of sampling on the "record," I thought it was sort of unethical to officially charge.