So, this started off as a joke when my band went on tour a year ago. We had just recorded our album, put it on cassette and CD, silkscreened a some shirts, totes, and sweat pants, and created a variety of pins. It's a lot of stuff. And I had just recently hooked up my sample roaster. We thought it would be funny to sell coffee with download codes in a jar. If you hated tapes and CDs and you already have too many sweat pants, pins, etc, you could still at least enjoy a cup with the band. Hopefully the codes would come out of the jar before you tossed the coffee in the grinder.
The reason to create the BTC CCQ is complicated. I think there are three major reasons at the end of the end of the day that all deserve delving into and unraveling: 1) I am wildly interested in the idea of creating an experience and environment, 2) Besides coffee, I believe in the importance of music, art, and critical creative thought and sharing it, 3) That this might resonate with other people, maybe inspire someone to do something creative in their community (coffee, city, whatever).
The first point has been something I've been chasing, (slowly, perhaps, seemingly motionlessly at times especially while binge watching The Daily Show) for a while in one way or another. A moment of no return occurred when my friend Courtney took me the Castro Theater to see Jodorowski's The Holy Mountain. Jodorowski's use of color, patterns, time, and music just leveled me. I wanted to do that with coffee somehow. But how? Blue Bottle's uniform policy doesn't explicitly mention a ban of loin cloths during service...
Barista Competitions always seemed like an interesting means of exploring ideas, if you have them. And so I tried this a few times, admittedly self-sabtaging my routines. And it's hard to create a carefree, timeless, environment in 15 minutes while frantically serving up several rounds of drinks. I commend all that can.
But other than that, most shops don't really afford one the opportunity to do something like this, especially if you're just a barista. (It's not really economical and maybe weird?) It's a shame, because a healthy chunk of the employees are artists or folks who have dabbled in the humanities.
So, while talking with my coworker and partner in-crime, Luigi, we thought, well, what's to stop us from releasing a tape of music, like that last tour I did? Or a zine? Or why not both? You could experience this at home with others or solo.
Beyond the experience one might have with this, why couldn't we cram it with the really awesome works of our friends that we thought were worth checking out?
All of a sudden, this was a real thing.
It's real! It's here. And it's really exciting.
A lot of hands have helped shape this release and I want to take a moment to thank them.
Dear Luigi Savino, Julian Birchman, David Jaberi, Evan Hashi, Courtney Fellion, Colleen Johnson, Harmon Butcher, Taryn Jones, Andrew Keller, Stephen Steinbrink, Matt Fisher, Kelly Gemmill, Spencer Carrow, Spencer Sult, David Brant, Steve Poponi, Rebecca Redman, Paul Benson, Jacob Jaffe, Jason Henn, Memory Boys, Scott Churchman, Holly Bobisuthi....THANK YOU!
Stay tuned. Next issue is due out in a few months.
And if you haven't gotten a copy yet, I encourage you to go to our store and pick one up. I think they're really good!