Domo arigato,
Distroboto

>>Celebrating seven years of dispensing
indie art for pocket change through
converted cigarette machines

MISTY MISTERS: Think About Life

by JOHNSON CUMMINS

For seven years now, Montreal’s Distroboto machines—the brainchild of Fish Piss publisher Louis Rastelli—have been dispensing trinkets for the eyes and ears, care of largely local and entirely independent artists, for a mere twoonie and the push of a button.

With eight of these former cigarette machines already situated in various local watering holes, the Distrobotos have made over 20,000 sales to date and showcased over 600 different items, everything from handmade art, mini-comics, chapbooks and photo magnets to short films and local music—some of these three-inch CDRs, releases by such illustrious local acts as Sunset Rubdown, Unicorns and CPC Gangbangs, are now considered collector’s items. Unlike other immediate distribution outlets open to creative types on the Internet, the Distroboto system allows artists to design their own packaging, thus bypassing the uniform look and lack of freedom characteristic of MySpace and other streaming media sites, and offer cheap, cool, tangible products to any taker.

The Mirror spoke with three performers who will be showing their support by performing at the Distroboto anniversary show/fundraiser this week—Think About Life’s singer Martin Cesar, rapper Giselle Numba One (the alter-ego of Hot Springs frontwoman Giselle Webber) and Exhaust bassist Gordon Krieger. The show will also serve as a launch for Krieger’s solo project Erase Music. A 20-minute taste of Erase Music will be available in Distroboto machines, as will selections from Giselle Numba One’s record.

Mirror: The thing that must appeal directly to a local artist is that Distroboto represents immediate distribution to an already existing audience that is willing to take a chance on something they may have not heard already.

Gordon Krieger: Definitely. It’s only two bucks. I love those machines. It’s a nice way of giving people art, and its nice knowing that I can get 20 minutes of music together and get it out right away to 50 or 100 people. Those machines are of course a lot more inspiring than the alternative for a lot of musicians, which is mailing CDRs out to a label and hoping for the best.

Martin Cesar: I really like Distroboto because it appeals to my personal values regarding music. I think it’s so hard for a piece of music to be commodified and present itself to the public. To me, music and songs should just be seen as little paintings for people to look at. With Distroboto, I think the craft of how it’s getting music to people is an artform unto itself. I think any artist or musician would want to associate themselves with that craft. I think the world would definitely be a better place if those machines were just everywhere.

Giselle Numba One: Playing a benefit for Distroboto is like doing a benefit for culture, to me. To be honest, I also think that it’s just really cool that they found a use for all of these old cigarette machines. Louis [Rastelli] just took up all this antiquated machinery that would’ve ended up in some junkpile and turned it into this great thing. There’s usually no profit involved, but at least underground artists are able to get their stuff out there. It’s almost like a mini record label, in a crazy way.

With Gambletron, Random Recipe and
DJ Lynne T. at la Sala Rossa on Friday,
Jan. 25, 9 p.m., $10