Happiest Boy Alive

This is one of those really bad songs that transcends its badness and is actually really great. Super bland, nondescript, semi-religious, almost AM rock, from a group called Safe.
 

My New Credit Card Just Came w/ My 99¢ Plastic Wallet!!!

Finally! All my woes with Amex and Visa are over with! Mastercard can suck it! Metrocard can go to hell! Ever since I moved to The Internet, they'll never be able to track me down. From here on out, I promise to think twice before making an impulse purchase. Don't worry though, "Shop Til You Drop" is still my motto, especially if I'm scouring eBay. And since this card isn't real, I'm pretty sure there's NO CREDIT LIMIT! One side, Black Card.

S.E. Rogie, palm wine guitarist from Sierra Leone. Came to the U.S. in the 70's and performed in elementary schools across California. Filmmakers! Use this song in your movie before Wes Anderson does.
 

You Don't Need LaCoste to be Super Cool

This alligator patch on the hi-quality Boutique label is only $1.50.  Plus you gotta love the low stakes guarantee.

Availaibe at P&S Fabrics on Broadway
in Downtown, NYC

My Vacation

CLICK FOR BIGNESS

CLICK FOR BIGNESS

I See Red

Little known super high energy sessions jam by The Split Enz.  It reminds me of Sheer Heart Attack by Queen.
 

Rollie Fingers

He had the name and the moustache.

80's Topps sticker after he got traded to the Brewers

Drawing of my Dad

I drew this in 1992

Standard Superguy Iron-On

Skull Iron-On

This would make a good skull tattoo, if you need a skull tattoo. It's a iron-on.

Props to my friends at Alphaville!  They have a booth at the Brooklyn Flea on the weekends. They used to have a really terrific shop across the street from Film Forum.

One Size Fits Most

The Illest Face Team on the Planet

My Dad's Mafia Family Tree

My dad always worked for residential building management in New York City. For most of my young life he had a really sweet gig managing the Plaza 400 building's Skytop Terrace Club on 56th Street and 1st Avenue. The Club consisted of a bar and party space, an outdoor pool, an exercise room, a sauna, and kitchen service. As far as my family life is concerned, this was my father's golden period. Managing Skytop in the 70's and early 80's still had a Wild West quality to it and my dad was able to make some of his money under the table. Bookmaking, favors and kickbacks, scams on kitchen deliveries. At the height of his fun, other members of the building's nefarious staff (doormen, janitors, concierge) got some white-out together and added themselves to a Daily News published "Mafia Family Tree". That's my dad, Frank Sisti, top row, second from the left. This is back in the day when the fact that the office had a Xerox machine was a tremendous deal and each Xerox Copy was given the respect of a Kodak snapshot.

CLICK ME TO SEE ME BIG

REPOST WEDNESDAY!

I interview Stuff.



Bill talks to me.



Sudsy yells at me.



My intern sort of answers some questions.



Mr. Parfenix flies from one part of the apartment to the other.

Stéfan!

Stéfan was Belgian and 9 years old in 1979.  This 45 was produced by none other than Plastic Bertrand, the man behind Ca Plane Por Moi.

Lilas

Quideo: Cameo Pet Shop

Send Help!

HBO Free In Your Room

I love the old future

Yogurt Raisins: Don't Do It

Yogurt Raisins are sort of the quintessential bad thing.

1. In some insane way I like them.
2. They taste horrible, like crayons.
3. But crayons taste better.
4. Because they claim to fuse yogurt and raisins into one tasty bite, they seem healthy.
5. They are not healthy. The fake yogurt coating is made from sugar and palm kernel oil.
6. No yogurt goes into making them.
7. Most places that sell them, sell old ones, because they don't sell well.

People In My Neighborhood: Broomy's Pal: Henry

Henry vacuum cleaners come in other colors that have other names. Charles is blue, Hetty is pink, George is green and James is yellow.

Find out more about them here.

Bandy's 1st Album "Kid America and the Action Figures" 2001

CLICK ME TO MAKE ME GROW BIG!

I now present the first Bandy album, fully downloadable.  Completed in 2001, Kid America and the Action Figures was the first fully realized piece of storytelling I'd ever completed in a medium besides paper words.  BANDY #1 is supposed to be a concept album, about a misfit crew of sonic warriors (Kid America and the Action Figures) fighting an evil DJ (The Muffinman) who wants to collect and horde all the records for himself, while filling the airwaves with his own hypnotic NOISE (a tone known as Subether).

The idea behind BANDY was that anyone who was taking part in the formation of "the story" was a part of the overall concept, and hence a part of the recording group - BANDY.  So Bandy was a big giant collection of personalities, ideas, and influences.  Me, my main partner Jeff, my ex-girlfriend Rosalie, my animation mentor Henry Jones, the bounty hunter George Psillides who couldn't play bass to save his life, my ex-friend Simon Curtis (record collector extraodinaire) who we based a lot of the Muffinman concept on, my father, kids from the schoolbus, Scottie Marshall, Jim Nachlin, Jeff's Mom, Tony Stanisci, Rost 357, Harmony Korine...  The list really goes on.  The world of cartoons and rap and video games.  Teen films and science fiction.  In my mind, all these people and things were in BANDY.  The album was supposed to be an amalgam of people, events, memories, and music - and together those things were BANDY.  Even if you didn't know it, you might have been in Bandy.  And so long as there's anybody to listen, even a little bit - those people and things are still in Bandy.

The other thing about making this Bandy record was that I always loved Prince Paul's production techniques and wanted to make a fully sample-crazy record that went really psychedelic with his style.  For those that don't know, Prince Paul produced the first three De La Soul records, the first Third Bass record, part of the first Gravediggaz records, some stuff for Stetsasonic (a group where he was also the DJ), as well as a plethora of solo albums.

TRACK #1: Introduction
On this track, we meet the characters in our story.  Kid America, his crew, and the bad guys.



GOOD GUYS
- Kid America - DJ, guitar.
- Fatboy (aka Stuffed Eddie) - beatboxer, drums.
- Silly Goose - vocals.
- 808 Jr. - our very own souped up drum machine
- Robotski: 6-inch robot engineer.
- Invisible MC: Rapper. His vocals are invisible to the ear. It was a joke.
- Billy Kazoo - a kid who becomes the leader of the Cartoon Rebellion

BAD GUYS
- Radio Muffinman: the villainous DJ - his goal is to collect ALL the records from the past at all costs. He's like a Farenheight 451 guy, but with records instead of books.  All he wants is for people to listen to is his great "TONE," a minimalist composition he calls "Sub-Ether".
- The Electric Company: the Muffinman's record "label" - really just a warehouse full of the Muffinman's record collection which he won't share with anyone.
- The Club: The Electric Company employs it's own version of stormtroopers - they are know as the Muffinman's fan club - CLUB, for short.  The Club guys wear "phun-suits" which look like cheap sports mascot outfits but actually are very hi-fi on the inside.

CLICK TO SEE BIG

This is the Muffinman's NOISE - a tone he calls Subether.


TRACK #2: Stupid Simon
Like a lot of bad guys, The Radio Muffinman didn't start out all bad.  Originally, he was Simon, an artist who aspired to ordinary dreams of NY success. But a darker side revealed itself. Simon was lazy.  He was addicted to Advil.  He loved to wear pom-pom hats.  These things were bad, but then he got really into EASY LISTENING music, a lot of AM radio, then ITALIAN DISCO, and finally ELEVATOR MUSIC.  At the height of his MUZAK addiction, Simon found the cheesiest record of all time and was transformed into the evil Radio Muffinman - a being of great musical power, fueled by pure greed.  This track is about Simon's simple ways and his werewolf-like transformation into the evil, digital, twisted freak DJ whose ears grew so big he has to wrap himself in them, sort of like a bat.  The main samples in this song are from a really great Ub Iwerks cartoon.



TRACK #3: Muffinman's Theme
Following from the last track, this song is all about the Muffinman, at the height of power, taking it all for himself and being bad bad bad.  It's a pretty excellent collection of samples and the main "Muffinman" chorus samples at least three different Do You Know The Muffinman? renditions.  The main bass hook is stolen from a 3.5 megabyte disk that the real Simon Curtis left behind in my studio after we stopped being friends.  So that's fitting.  Fatboy jocked the main beat from Gasface for the drum pattern, realizing that there are backwards drum sounds over forward drum sounds on the original Prince Paul jumpoff (Gasface).  

TRACK #4: Bouncing
This is the first try at a Bandy "single" - about the good guys comin' and bouncing through the Muffinman's tightly patrolled sectors, navigating through a sea of dulled-out kids that have been effected by the Muffinman's NOISE.  The main "bouncing" vocal sample is off some circus record, and it's actually recorded on waltz time - but we didn't care, we just jammed it in on the 4/4.  There's some Kid A guitar on there, the sound of real kickballs bouncing on gym parkay, and some decently busted vocals by Rosalie Knox.  Other highlights include: a sample of Gandalf from the original Ralph Bakshi cartoon saying "Go" like he's Chuck D,

The party is starting

Retarded teenagers

Dimwitted Children

Farting in the arcade

Jumping and bouncing

Synthetic Fun

Don't forget to take

Your Medication

The Microphone has

Extra chromosomes

Listening close will give you 

Down's Syndrome

TRACK #5: Fan Club Theme
This is the track for the Muffinman's squad of killer goons: The Club.  In the story, Fatboy goes undercover as a Club guy.  He is dubbed Stuffed Eddie by the Muffinman.  Even though he is able to break his mind free of the Muffinman's programming, he becomes one with his phun-suit.  This track is really quintessential to the Bandy Way.  It's super hi-concept in that it is IMPOSSIBLE to follow the story if you're not me.  But the whole Fatboy/Stuffed Eddie thing happens on this song - it just happens mostly sonically.  It's like a piece of classical music.  I wish it were easier to understand, but if it were, it wouldn't be as good, because I really do think it carries off the feeling of the idea.  Which is why we did this as a record.



TRACK #6: Electro City
Goose and Robotski have been on a long mission and encounter trouble just outside of the Muffinman's main sector: Electro City (formerly NYC).  Before Silly Goose is captured by the Club, she entrusts a kid, Billy Kazoo, to deliver a MIXTAPE back to Kid America and the rest of the Action Figures, containing security codes for a top-secret Muffinman "project".  Although the project is a mystery, we find out that the Muffinman needs all the electricity in the country to make it happen.  Although the 6-inch Robotski is Goose's partner, he breaks protocol and syncs brainwaves with the young Kazoo as they make their way to Kid America's underground headquarters, where they make contact with Stuffed Eddie, the 808 Jr., and Kid A.  Muffinman's Club arrives to spatula the crew but our heroes make it out by the skin of their teeth, using the "WE CAN JAM YOURS" sample from an old Batman cartoon.



TRACK #7: Reggie's Revenge
The Kid America crew encounter a mostly brain damaged Noise addict named Reggie who leads them to temporary sanctuary in an Arcade.



TRACK #8: Arcade Style
The crew thinks they're safe in the arcade, but really every game they play is putting them closer to Muffinman's control.  In the end, Robotski recognizes that the only way to save Goose and infiltrate the Muffinman's lair is to make it to the BONUS LEVEL.  When they do, one of the arcade games gives way to a staircase, which leads to the Muffinman's skyscraper.  Our heroes enter but are they just playing into the Muffinman's hands?



TRACK #9: Everybody Come and Play
The Kid A crew battles the Club.  It might sound like fun, but it's actually a hell of a battle.  You just have to listen between the bars.



TRACK #10: Trick or Treat
The Crew disguise themselves as Club members and look for the Muffinman's main record stash.



TRACK #11: C'mon Record Player
The crew find the Muffinman's stash - but no Muffinman.  He's not there.  The power levels start to drop.  The gang know they're in trouble.



TRACK #12: The Story So Far
Amidst the great collected clutter, the gang find the Muffinman's main Stereo System.  Much is revealed.  There is an alternate dimension IN the Stereo - a dimension of the Muffinman's own computerized design where molecules are transformed into cartoon molecules and anything is possible.  The only way to save Goose and the city is to insert the mixtape and go to Stereo.



TRACK #13: Skids
The inbetween place between being human and transforming into a Stereo cartoon.  No tempo, just a collage of sounds and samples.



TRACK #14: In-Stereo
The big jam.  Kid America and his team are transported to Stereo, they become cartoons, and they are reunited with Goose.  Then, they must face the Muffinman and fight - imagination verse imagination.



TRACK #15: Dancin'
The number 1 single off the record!  Kid America and the Action Figures defeat the evil Muffinman!  Most of the Club guys, having no other jobs lined up, join Kid America in his quest to make a TV show on public access TV!  Enjoy!



TRACK #16: Ice Cream
More celebration! Ice Cream for Everyone! The darker tones are there to illustrate that cleaning up the city post Muffinman is gonna be a struggle. Redistributing the records. Getting the kids back to imaginating.

Record Squeal

When the needle on your turntable arm gets really old - and it make contact with a record groove that is also old - an amazing synthesis of sound takes place that is known as a "squeal". I always thought Cypress Hill records were defined by these squeals, but then I found out one of the squeals was actually the sound of Prince screaming, so now I'm not so sure. Still, here's a squeal for you guys, and it's downloadable so please - make a beat with it and bring me back to the good ol' days with the squeal on the one.

People in My Neighborhood: Angela

Angela has always been known as outspoken. Today when I ran into her she wanted to talk about the future. She expressed that although she doesn't believe that we'll be able to "teleport to the beach" anytime soon, she does think that doors will be able to be unlocked by "breath analysis" in only a year or a year and a half. Breath analysis, is, like, well -- there will be some sort of gizmo that you breathe on near the doorbell and then the door will say, "Welcome home, Angela. Come right in."

Angela is so great. I love her jeans and her easy manner. She always tells me how "real" I am, which always makes me feel better because Sudsy is always calling me a phony.

Finally! I Can Get Me Some Color Copies!

Thomas the Tank Engine is now... a TRANSFORMER!!

Horseride!

I'm feeling that green paint under the peach

Limited Colors Marker Set

But the price was right!!

courtesy of Rubbish James Garbagetruck III

"You Better Jump Up" - A Donkey Kong Song

One of my great struggles as a "DJ" has always been trying to play totally cracked out songs that all the cool people think are totally wack BUT STILL getting them to dance.  I used to push this semi-new wave Donkey Kong track down peoples' throats but it never really worked.  From my perspective this is a 100% super excellent song and, as a DJ, a commendable "find", worthy of lots of love.  People should have it in their iTunes playlists and it should come up in a shuffle during dinner parties or sleepovers.  In fact, I think "You Better Jump Up" is a shining example of why it's great to be alive.

Now, in reality - it's the ultimate example of a commercial throwaway track - trying to make a buck on Donkey Kong however they could.  No one cared or monitored the process.  I couldn't even say the studio musicians who were assigned the task of writing and making the song cared - but they still had to sit down with some instruments and figure out the song.  And something about the inbetweeny-ness of that (and the way that it came out) actually scrapes the fine line of what makes a song emotionally powerful and relevant to another human being or just some piece of manufactured garbage.  Anyhow, no one ever agrees with me on things like this.

Doctor Snuggles Theme

Early sampling devices had the ability to "lower the bandwidth" when you sampled a sound, so that the file you were creating would take up less space on the teeny tiny disk you were storing it on. A lot of excellent early rap has this lower bandwidth as a quality that almost defines it. It made sampled drum sounds have a little fuzz on them, it added a bit of a computer vapor to a sampled bassline, it made voices sound doubled up or lost in a fog. It sounds like Nintendo one. It sounds dusty. Dopey. Sometimes bigger. Sometimes more bedroom-like. It's the sound version of a xerox paper "zine". It's basically always a good thing, especially because it transformed a known sound into something different.

Today, I present this super-low bandwidth recording of the Dr. Snuggles cartoon show theme as an example of how this low digital quality sound is a building block of "cracked out creativy" - an essential component to Frankie's Apartment.

Unknown Cambodian Rock Jammer

Jam for the part of the show when we sample junk food from the far corners of the universe.

Incredible Bike Poster

The Man Underneath The Sheet

Matthew Dipple: The Acting Genius who plays Sudsy The Ghost

This Is More Like It!

If you're like me, you're sick and tired of the inflated prices at your local 99¢ Store.
Go to Liberty Ave. and 98th St. where the prices are right!

99¢ Security Center

I think I found my New Glasses!!

I Can't Believe I Missed This

People In My Neighborhood: Broomy

Broomy has a really positive outlook on life and is a really good influence on these other brooms.

People in my Neighborhood: Me and Mariella the Crossing Guard

Jamaica Ave. and 113th St: The best crosswalk in the city!

Frankie's Favorites: Goldfish Pretzels

Pretzel Design: Grilly Marks and Salt Spots on Shiny Light Brown

STUDY: for underwater animation

Prized Possessions: Billy Ripkin Baseball Card

The 1989 Fleer Billy Ripkin.  Only Catfish Hunter's handlebar moustache pics beat this card.  Why?  I leave it up to you to inspect the card and find the specialness.  Just so you know, Billy Ripkin was pretty much a smelly second base guy with bad batting add-ups and lots of missy swings.  His ball-catching was medium and his falling down style for getting to those white pads was decent, but a lot of times he would space out and screw up in playing.  I heard his dug-out demeanor was really cool-guy and he often needed to have his mouth washed out with soap by the catcher every time the O's went on a losing streak.  Hint: I know that Oriole hat is really dope, but that's not it.

CLICK ON ME TO MAKE ME BIGGER

Plantasia Title Track

For all you little green thumbs out there, this moog lp was designed to be played for your plants, to inspire them to grow big and strong, make pretty flowers and yield big vegetables like those radioactive jammies on Gilligan's Island.

Rocky

Played by a high school band. Perfect for a montage sequence where the guys actually wing up screwing everything up. HIGHLY RECOMMENDED!

Missing Cat

Click to Big Make It.

The Real Theme Song To: The Wire

This song should have been the theme song to that great TV show, The Wire.

By Jem and The Holograms.



Big Shout Out to Zach Baron @xzachbaronx.

Hey Look Out!

An amazing song. From the western "The Terror of Tiny Town", featuring an all-dwarf cast.

Droids Theme

This might not be a club banger - but it's got a lot of heart.  The writer and the performer of this track somehow figured out how to feel emotionally invested in what it must be like to be a droid.  I'm telling you.  Listen.  It's heartbreaking.  And the guy singing is totally feeling it.

Kidd Video Theme

Kidd Video was a cartoon where a bunch of kids get sucked into a cartoon dimension called the Flipside where they have to fight the Master Blaster.

The only way to get the soundtrack to the show was to go to Israel, the only place where they marketed the LP as a real band with a New Wave sound. I always thought the theme cut had a lot of panache.

Frankie is in Bon Appetit! Well. On Bon App's Blog! All Hands On Deck! This counts as Press!

I don't want to disappoint all my female fans out there, but in case you didn't know it already, I'm married - to Melia Marden.  She didn't take my last name, Sisti, because she thinks it sucks.  She's a chef at a restaurant called The Smile here in New York.   I've been trying to put her on the shlog, but mostly she just runs away from the blinky red dot.

She wrote a story for Bon Appetit magazine about all the summers she spent on the Greek island, Hydra - a place devoid of cars and TV, a place with extremely fleeting internet connections.  The story is about the boat picnics that we go on and some of the recipes Melia likes to make (for to eat food).

This is a link to Melia's Story About Hydra.

There are a tons of pictures in there, and I am in one of them.  I am Frankie.  That's me - holding the deadly sea urchins over my eyes.  If you get pricked by a sea urchin you have to pee on it.  It being you.

If you get pricked by a sea urchin, you have to pee on it.  This counts as PRESS.
Photo by Mirabelle Marden

NEW VIDEO! Frankie and Stuff Reunite on Talk Show

After not talking to each other for more than a year, Stuff and I finally air it out on Neck At Night.  Well, we don't really air it out so much as beat around the bush and not really do much of an interview.

A lot of people wanna know what we fought about.  Here's a short list.

1. What to do with all of our money (our jug of money, that is.  Two years worth of pennies and nickels.)
2. Who would be who on Spongebob?
3. Fanny packs - genius or so obviously genius that we shouldn't talk about them?
4. Who had dibs on my collection of gold plastic jewelry from the quarter machines at Key Food (which was just insane because they were mine, they always were mine, and that's that.)
5. Who was better in Superbad?  The girl that was into Michael Cera?  Or the girl who got period blood on Jonah Hill?
6. The flavor 'blue raspberry'.  Is it good?  When did they invent it?  90's?  80's?  (The answer is the 50's!)
7. Stuff refused to admit that his polkadots are actually pimples.
8. Stuff claimed that he had an agent - who turned out to be my rat Rubbish.  They took me for a key part of my comic book collection - the entire run of Peter Porker, The Spectacular Spider-Ham.
9. Stuff used to eat all my socks.  Sometimes right off of my feet.
10. Our biggest fight was over who "discovered" Sofia Vergara.  Me, Stuff, and Mr. Parfenix used to watch Sofia Vergara back in the NINETIES on Telemundo.  She used to host some sort of show like Eric Nies did on MTV.

Stuff even claimed that he wanted cinematography credit on the movie, even though he wasn't sure what cinematography was.  "It sounds like an important thing," he said.  After a lot of hemming and hawing, Stuff finally agreed to come on Frankie's Apartment in exchange for 3 bagels and a meatball sub.  "The footlong from Subway!" he bellowed, as I hung up the phone.

The craziest thing is that he's been living in one of the rooms of the house - one of the "lost bedrooms" that Sudsy rerouted through limbo and may or may not lead to the 70's.

As a bonus, Stuff brought a DELETED SCENE from the movie.  He stole the scene out of one of my G-drives when we were editing, because, in the scene, Stuff gets Kevin Corrigan in a headlock.  Stuff wanted to show it to some of his skuzzbucket downtown friends.

2001 Theme (Also Sprach Zarathrustra) and . . . Hey Jude - The Majorette Summer Camp Versions

Summer is coming, so here some music that was made at a summer camp. Please someone download this version of Zarathrustra and make a minute long space epic with it.

Also Sprach Zarathrustra (1:07)



Hey Jude (1:26)

Frankie's Apartment Closing Theme

Found this in an old bin upstate. And now it's our closing theme. It's beautiful.

My Generation: The Midi Version

From a certain perspective this sounds disgusting. But it's sort of like when Lester Bangs first heard Psychotic Reaction by The Count Five. I wasn't there or anything, but I think the story goes that he hated it, but by the end of the week he was listening to it on constant replay.

On this, all I'm saying is to dig the programmer's rendition of Roger Daltry's vocal - transforming it to a thin little Casio lead with all the mis-timings and off tempo-ness of the original.

Punk Toy Uses Banana Eraser To Make Collect Call To His Gang

Mixed Race Lesbian Police Officers

Jacob Barnett

"Stuff" Makes Print In France: I Heart Magazine

I have no idea what it says, but my name in it!

Written by Lucille Béziers, who today tweeted to me to say that she would one day soon be marrying Harry from One Direction.  Harry's obviously the best, but I like that Zayn...

CLICK ON IT TO MAKE IT BIG!!!

Click here to go to the I Heart Website.

REPOST WEDNESDAY!

All About Us:



Rubbish:



Totem Pole:



Apple Bank:

"Fourteen Carrots" a 19-Second Easter Jam

Fan Art: Easter Bunny, Eggs, Sun

A found contribution from neverinpittsburgh

Greek Easter Egg Dye

"Musicland"

An instrumental I made in '03 featuring samples by The Archies, some Gumby, and a bunch of snippets from an old Wonderland record called Animal Alphabet.

It's Easter Week on Frankie's Apartment! Hurray!

Click on the little girl's crying face to see this masterpiece extra big.

This Easter Bunny outfit is way more like Batman's cowl - designed to strike terror into the hearts of little criminals - like this little shoplifter right here.

Best Easter Bunny Ever?

Bunny-Land: A Collection of Dept. Store Easter Bunny Photos

Hey - You The Easter Bunny?

Please click on the photo to see a nice, phat scan.

With varying degrees of courage, young patients at Cook County Hospital assess a most unusual visitor.