I’ve been riding for 48 hours. Two nights sleeping, 1 night to go. I arrive in Reno at 8:30 am.

[I’ll add videos when I have a connection good enough to upload them. ]

The scenery is beautiful. We passed the plains, fields of corn, wheat and beans for endless miles. Then we crossed the Mississippi, where they were constructing a bridge on the river. The next morning, red/browns and green/blues stretch into the horizon and high above into the Rocky Mountains. We are currently among them, in the distance there are plateaus and canyons. I was happy to see that the California Zephyr took us by the Colorado River for hours. We got mooned and flashed by a lot of rafters.

The burners trickled out to the Observation Car, eventually… There are at least 7 people on their way to Black Rock City, including a family of 3, with a 7-year-old son!

One of them is a guy named Gpaul, or just Paul for short. He made full adult-size slings, like the fabric slings you see mothers or fathers carrying babies in. Its Yellow and black checkered. Hes sitting in front of me sowing his black and yellow checkered hat together now. Like a taxi-driver. But he carrys you on his back. Pretty awesome.

We’re approaching the Ruby Canyon now, so I’ll post this entry and get my camera out! More updates to come!

I gotta move most of my music off that site and onto soundcloud, because they’ll delete it in a few weeks if i dont. They’re a pay service now, screw that!

I’m approaching my departure day. Soon I’ll be on a train, heading to San Francisco. Then the PlaYa for Burning Man, and after that a 2-month bike adventure from Vancouver to LA. I might go farther, I might stop in Santa Barbara a few days away from LA.

This is my last week in Boston. I am moving out of my house while simultaneously packing up everything i’m shipping to Black Rock and setting aside all the things I’m taking on the train with me. Its a mess in this room of mine.

This week, I worked my last day as a bike rickshaw driver. After what I thought was going to be my last ride, I was in front of Fenway Park. Fellow pedaler Gaelan was talking to some girls. I joined them. Turned out it was one of their 21st birthdays, and they were visiting from Ireland. She asked for my Boston Rickshaw shirt. It was my last day, I was done riding so I gave it to her. I think I made her night! Of course I’m immediately stopped by someone who wants a ride: A cute 20-something girl, and her parents. The girl is trashed, and they are probably the funniest passengers I’ve had who didn’t hit on or harass me somehow!

Also this week, I helped create a big cargo trailer. Its big enough for 3 or 4 passengers. The last night of work, Dan (the man with the plan and a big cargo trailer ) tells me at 9pm that roomie Justin and I have to have all our things for burning man on his trailer by 4:30 am, in Providence RI. Eric, another pedaler of rickshaws, helped us by taking the overnight trip to Providence with us and all our stuff in his van. We pick up some other people’s stuff before we depart. We are low on gas and with 10 miles to go, the car sputters to a stop. Its 4 am and the driver is supposedly leaving in half an hour. AAA comes and brings us straight to the trailer, we unload our stuff, and eric goes with the driver to get gas. 8 am rolls around and we are dazing in and out of consciousness. The driver is THERE hitching his truck to the trailer! We approach him and hes a nice guy, lets us load up. That was a challenging packing job! This trailer thing is rediculously dangerous to move around. Justin cut himself really bad and I almost got a black eye while moving it into the trailer. But its done now, and everything we hoped to bring is going to burning man.

Im finishing packing up my room, moving out. Tomorrow is my last day in Boston. I’m thinking I’ll come back next spring to ride for Boston Rickshaw again, but I’ll be on an adventure until further notice!

I’ll do my best to post videos and stories to here. <3

I made this in 2008. Kalimba! Michael!

My first self-released album is in the works. Its groovy, its hip, its funky, its some next-gen music.

The tracks are composed by Max Jackson and will feature Boston musicians and lyricists, some known some not. I’m very proud of what we have recorded so far & there is still much to be done. Progress is going quick—at this rate it will be released before May.

My stockpiles of old electronic music will go untouched for this album. These are all new songs. I cant wait to put that download link on here!

Stay tuned! follow me on TWITTER as moncrey, and thanks for visiting!

Its easy to love music, only to forget about it for a long time. Especially when it is outside your normal listening patterns. Here is my suggested list of Last.FM stations you can tune into to hear something different.

Next Generation Hip Hop Beats: Samiyam

This man makes funky beats. They sound like nintendo and sway back-&-forth like a drunken-master. Listen to this Last.fm station and you will find a lot of great similar music.

The Best of ACID-IDM: The Tuss

If you obsessively hunt the best electronic music composers, you probably have listened to The Tuss. The Tuss is most likely a pseudonym for a mixed solo & collaborative effort by Richard James, better known as Aphex Twin. Listening to this station is most likely going to play lots of great unique electronic music.

Roots & Blues, its Funky too: Taj Mahal

So much music made today is influenced by something made in the past few years. Taj Mahal shows his deep knowledge of musical heritages in every song he writes. He is well studied in ethnomusicology.

Aside from Taj Mahal’s history, listening to his music and music like it will certainly be refreshing and inspiring to any songwriter or music-lover.

Pioneering Minimalist: La Monte Young

La Monte Young is a pioneer of long-scale music. One song of his may last between 2 to 5 hours. On last.fm you’re only likely to get 5-20 minute excerpts of these pieces.

I was fortunate to meet Mr. Young after a performance he gave at his performance loft in Manhattan. It was a 2-hour-long minimalist raga. He was singing with Marian Zazeela, accompanied by a sitar drone and a fretless touch-guitar (very sensitive pickups, strumming wasnt necessary) and Tablas. The tablas didnt even begin their 1 hit per bar rhythm for the first 30 minutes. Talk about slow progressions!

If you have patience and want to hear something totally “out there”, give that station a listen.

Speaking of Tablas: Zakir Hussain

Hussain’s music is virtuosic. Boy can he drive those tablas. He may have a traditional Indian instrument, but his music is certainly not exclusively traditional. You’ll find a pretty psychedelic set of sounds within his music, and of similar artists. This station will give you insight into styles of some modern indian performers. Definitely good listening!

My music is hosted on soundcloud.com and on virb.com I am on twitter as Moncrey .

Check back soon, I plan to add more music. If you would like to contact me, I’m at max [at] mxjxn {.} com
[ I am terrible at getting my own sites up and running. New years resolution is to break that trend with this site. ]