HAY!!!
Been awhile since my last musings but A LOT has changed since I graduated what I used to call mount super fabulous. A certain film school in the middle of Hollyweird Californikation centrally located in the one of the center of the universes.
So what have I been up to since graduation?
October 9th, 2014:
One day before I graduate very cum loudingly with a Bachelors Degree in Entertainment Business I write this review on YELP:
10/9/2014
Been awhile since my last musings but A LOT has changed since I graduated what I used to call mount super fabulous. A certain film school in the middle of Hollyweird Californikation centrally located in the one of the center of the universes.
So what have I been up to since graduation?
October 9th, 2014:
One day before I graduate very cum loudingly with a Bachelors Degree in Entertainment Business I write this review on YELP:
10/9/2014
- This review is meant to be as honest and fair and balanced as possible. I'll be graduating tomorrow with a Bachelors Degree in Entertainment Business after being here for three years. I've also received an Associates from their Recording Program. Both with high honors.
So. lets start with the Recording Program:
I started this program in August of 2011. An 18 month extended program that mostly focuses on the music side and not so much on the film side which is what I'm most interested in is Post Audio. You have maybe four months out of the 18 that focuses on the film side.
The program also deals A LOT with the science of sound so if you're not a science geek this program will get really dull, really fast. Also, don't expect to get onto the big consoles for at least a year but instead expect to learn a little bit about Logic Pro and A LOT about Pro Tools.
Overall, I quite enjoyed this program and especially some of the instructors who have pretty incredible backgrounds in the industry.
As far as having a career post graduation it really is about who you know and the willingness to work for free at an internship if your lucky enough to get one that allows you ability to grow and learn within that studio.
This is the most popular program at LAFS and my class started with approximately 250 students and out of that about 50 of us graduated and now a year and a half later I maybe know 10 of those that actually are working in the industry.
Also, as an alumni you are allowed to audit this program as long as your student loan status is in good standing.
Onto the Entertainment Business Bachelor's Program:
I was pretty lucky in that this program started about half way through my recording program and for me this felt like the obvious choice for me as far as continuing to build my momentum within LAFS.
The key selling points for me with LAFS was the location and not having a network in the industry that I would be able to build that here and in the last three years I would definitely say that those two selling points have not been a disappointment.
As for the Business Program I found it to actually be A LOT easier than I thought it would. Another 18 month program, although recently they have introduced a 36 month version which includes taking all the general education courses that I took in the Associates program.
A LOT of presentations. Almost every month is a group presentation. So, in this regard you gain A LOT of experience doing Power Points and working in groups while learning the basics about the Entertainment World as a business.
Such as marketing, distribution, leadership, accounting, e-commerce, statistics, management, etc.
Hardest class is definitely Accounting and it's a bit insane to be learning in 4 weeks what a typical college student is supposed to learn in 3 months but the classes themselves are really designed to make you succeed if you put the work into it.
I found all my instructors to be very knowledgeable, helpful, and tended to have some very impressive backgrounds.
The only real complaint(s) I have is the way the school is run. It really feels, from my perspective as a student, that the priority is all about recruitment. And the further along you are in your program the less of a priority you are to LAFS.
Now having been here for three years I've also seen many changes as far as Security and with rules that I never knew were rules until I broke most of them within the last year, such as no sleeping (power naps are a sign of laziness mentality), the approval process about bringing in guests, the amount of signatures it took to book a room. The constant rule changes that seem to happen on a weekly basis, and the hours of availability that you have with equipment access.
There are other way specific issues that I dealt with that go in the WTF??? Twilight Zone category but the feeling I got is that the school loves you if you fit within their 9 to 5 schedule. Go to class, do your work, go home, repeat. If you're the type of student that security has to kick out of the building then not so much.
I also saw many a student organizations start up only to fail due to red tape within the school system. I only recommend trying to start one up if you are doing the Business Program because you will be dealing with A LOT of political type of road blocks and navigating the LAFS system is an incredible experience from a Business perspective but also incredibly frustrating as I spent the last year trying to get something off the ground that 'they' couldn't have given two shits about and in the end I wonder if it was even worth it?
I for one certainly feel older and wiser for have doing so, but if you are a high over achiever who has a real passion for films and gaming and music and animation it can be really easy to feel like the system in place at LAFS is really more about recruiting and that the students are third class citizens within that system.
BUT IT WAS NOT AN EASY JOURNEY. . .Another YELP review:THE LOS ANGELES MISSION:This review is from the perspective of having spent ten nights at the mission, as a guest, and what to expect when your options are down to nill as to where to go for the night.
Now first off, this is Skid Row. If you've never been to skid row you are in for a MAJOR SHOCK. If you're not used to someone who is, for example, an amputee, in a wheelchair, lighting up a crack pipe while you wait in line for dinner at the Midnight Mission while they're drinking a beer and getting their racism on with you as their target then stay far far away from Skid Row cause you need to be able to process something like that without it effecting you mentally.
As for as the L.A. Mission goes here is the daily routine.
In order to get in you will need to be at the less than pearly green gates by 5:30 p.m. with some form of I.D. Sit in the line by the gates on the left hand side (not the line on the right, this is the line you will get in after your first night).The guy will take your name and eventually issue you a bed ticket. This ticket will be good for five nights. You can re-new this bed ticket two times for up to 15 days.
Next you will have to check your bag at baggage. DO NOT DO what I did and let your ticket expire after the fifth day and not renew your baggage because when I went to get my bag on the 10th day I was there cause I was moving on it was no longer there cause I made the mistake of assuming it would automatically renew. But I'm an idiot like that and the loss was very costly. Also, those baggage people, for the most part, are incredibly rude and the process of checking in and checking out can be difficult to figure out since there's no signs that say what window does what?
Once your bag is checked, you are allowed one small hygiene bag (they supply the very easily tearable (terrible) plastic bags which you will find yourself double bagging and triple bagging) to bring inside, also a book.
After you enter the building you will have to do a bug check. Go to the bug check man and he will check your scalp and sign off on the bed ticket.
Next up is chapel service. DO NOT sit in the last two rows or the section to the immediate right. Remove your hat. Don't wear headphones. But as far as the evening version of the chapel version it is some major torture Jim Jones type of B.S. First thing is a run down of the rules of being a guest spoken by a middle age gentleman whom you will barely be able to understand but by the 5th night you will know the schtick.
Around 7 p.m. the sermon will start and this varies from night to night but it consists of the usual fire and brimstone sermon that caters to the addict, you need Christ in your life crowd because only then will you be complete. You will feel like the biggest failure on planet earth and those that drink the kool aid will give their life to Jesus at the end. This happens every night except for (ironically) Sunday?
Next up at 7:45 is dinner. If you want to be one of the first to eat bring a cane and go eat with the disable people. Or sit in the front row as rows are called from front to back. Sitting in the back will give you less time for the shower afterwards and they are major sticklers for being done at specific times.
As for dinner, this is a hit or miss affair. You will eat A LOT of sticky rice, but they're chicken and fish are actually fairly exemplary, I also enjoyed the juice bottle pomegranate blueberry whatever it was stuff, but the portions are usually fairly small and I found myself eating dinner and breakfast at the Midnight Mission to make up for it.
After dinner is the mandatory shower. The one time in my life that I was grateful that I'm incredibly near sighted without glasses. But if you haven't had a shower in awhile this is most welcomed. You're issued pajamas and afterwards I've never felt fresher.
By the time you get to your bunk it will be almost 9 p.m. I also did the 4:45 Midnight Mission dinner so the whole process of getting to your bunk is about a four hour affair.
At 10 p.m. they cut most but not all of the lights and of course I got top bunk right night to freight train of a snorer and a main light. And yet I slept like a rock cause . . .
WAKE UP IS AT 4 A.M. !!!
Yes, EVERYDAY, no exceptions. After a week, you are freakin' exhausted.
You will then have 30 minutes to change back into your clothes and be down to the chapel. I suggest shaving and do basic hygiene downstairs as to avoid the however many minutes countdown from the staff to 4:30, as much as possible.
At 5 a.m. it is the morning Sermon and this one done by John Kelly I actually really liked and John has quite the story and even though I never talked to the man I he's one of the few staff that I really liked. But the overall sense from the staff that I got was that it was very rare when they were actually nice as you would expect a fellow person of the human race to act when dealing with another human being.
I'm out of room but thats the gist of it._______________________________________________________________________________________________OCTOBER 22, 2014:I'M A VETERAN!!!I totally forgot about that and have a total of three two year housing per diems in my life time. Oh my!!! So...I used my first one from February 2011 - 2013 and I got my associates degree. #GOME.My Bachelors degree was a series of couch surfers, power naps, and 18 hour days from March 2013 - October 21, 2014.And then I started my second per diem right at skid row ground zero because it was the only place that I had a room to myself. It was a good decision. But then again homelessness was a step up for me than living in the cheese wiz utopia.THE MARSHALL HOUSEAnd yes this was my room lolNOVEMBER - FEBRUARY 2015:The great job hunt has begun in earnest. First place I go is a place called Avenues to Work which is your basic temporary staffing agency located in skid row.Now being on my second per diem I'm also subject to certain rules like getting a job, GR, cal fresh. Basically, a new start but with 4 years of Los Angeles mileage behind me and I start getting back to having a much more stable routine instead of the insanity of the last 18 months trying to get to the next day.At the end of November ATWork has job openings for AEG and I'm one of two people who apply.Now AEG for those of you who do not know is the fucking MECCA of west coast entertainment everything.THEE GREATEST SURVIVAL JOB IN LOS ANGELES!!!But first a pre interview which I kill and then onto SAGE. . .SAGE is another employment agency which is above ATWork which will eventually go away into the ether???Sage turns out to be a bit more difficult pre interview because I overdressed. And they wanted snazzy with a jingle. Smile smile smile. Bryan Wilson would have been proud.I pass but get docked for over dressing.I then I wait two months to get to the actual interview and go dressed exactly the same way. . .DECEMBER 2015. . .I appear as an extra in Eric England's GET THE GIRL. . .
To be released sometime in the future which is where you and I will spend the rest of our lives in the future. . .
And then I worked as a PA for free at mount super fabulous one Shatterday because I figured it would help me with networking and well let's just type I'm never working PA for free again unless you are HIGHLY SPECIAL & STUFF.
FEBRUARY 2015:
I finally have my interview with AEG and I'm hired within 5 minutes. #GOME
Easiest interview I ever did in my life. Questions asked:
Tell me about yourself?
A. Woman please I got this. . .
ART HOLMES MEET KEVIN SMITH (REDUX I)
YOU ARE HIRED!!!
NEW YEARS 2015/2016
4/13/16
A small sample of working there. And of course I also get to work at NOKIA errr MICROSOFT THEATER SO. . .AUGUST 2015I apply for Guest Services Representative thinking career path with AEG. GSR being the next step up to Supervisor. A position I plan on attaining within two years.And then my kryptonite. A group fucking interview. Me and two other yahoos who had been there since the great depression of whenever. . .So of course it's all based on seniority and I don't get the job.Now the only reason I applied was because it was a major pay raise and what I figured were more hours.And then at a low point a miracle happens. . .AEG implements an online schedule exchange and it's fucking glorious.You can post your shifts, pick up shifts, check schedule, use sick time. Its fucking amazing. And I was getting scheduled for maybe 10 events a month. Especially once basketball season is over it's pretty dead for the next two months if no one makes the playoffs and the last two years I have yet to experience sportsageddon. . .FEBRUARY 2016I'm getting really good at being an usher/ticket taker person. A real pro even. The major leagues of guest services and I'm working right in the middle of it. Life is amazing and yet I'm creatively stifled???So what to do this year?O.K.1ST off get in shape and get that gym membership you were going to get last April when you turned the big four oh my thang.And now back to my regularly scheduled Rally Point Radio program and how mount super fabulous goes from mount super fabulous to ego central high. . .Back in October of 2014 I originally was going to put out for more podcasts after Episode 16. A podcast I was barely to put out because my Executive Producer whom I shall affectionately call Satans Mistress Part ii canceled it and took a big ol shit on everyone who gave their time to come in and well for future students going to ego central high their incompetence will be your fault no matter what but hay it's great experience in producing so theres that.So I figure resurrecting my podcast would fulfill my creative needs and it did so. I was actually amazed I got permission to come back, work on them, but then again, I'm an alumni and have some nice perks and being a vet is like a great cherry on a big massive ego cake which is really nice to have plus 24 hour fitness across the street, cinerama dome across the street, sunset strip down a little further, and did I mention I work for fucking AEG?I just saw almost every one hit wonder of the 80s over the course of two days last weekend after working four Adeles but anyways. . .The first interview scheduled for October first week was Jessica Cameron. Whom was booked mainly due to her marketing abilities and well here we finally get to the crux of this blog posting that got me out of blog retirements. . .So there is a whole nother backstory but we shall save that for next weeks blog post where I get blacklisted from a production company.Back to Mz. Cameron. . .I interviewed here back almost two years ago now but have finally started to get that interview out now which I started the post edit on back in February before my life went on crazy train central and ended up getting validated for my gut feeling on project reciprocation..You know the ones on Facebook that they only like the stuff that has them in them. Yeah those people will not be there for you when you need them to reciprocate all of the shares you have given them over the last oh five years or so.And this one is a classic case and why she was booked because of her unreal marketing skills to market herself and so here is part one of a four part series that I feel to be podcast awards worthy. . .CLIPS FROM:JOAN RIVERS DOCUMENTARY:A PIECE OF WORK:
MONSTER MAN
DEAD MATTER
EVIL DEAD 2:WISHMASTER:TWO DOORS DOWN:
THE BLACK DAHLIA HAUNTING:
SIILENT NIGHT:
A CLOCKWORK ORANGE:
SUSHI GIRL:
SHOUT OUTS (HAY!!!)CLEVE HALL:
ROBERT KURTZMAN:ANDREW DIVOFF:
PRECINCT 13 STUDIOS:
MARILYN MONROE:
ELIZABETH SHORT:
Steven C Miller:
MALCOLM MCDOWELL:
TO BE CONTINUED. . .
