I’m Zach Barocas. I’m a drummer (I play Ludwig Drums), sometime poet (though not lately), a publisher, an amateur photographer, a stationery shop owner, and a cultural activist in Brooklyn, New York City.
I’m best known for my drumming in Jawbox, BELLS≥, and The Up On In, and am currently recording and composing with/as New Freedom Sound, a gathering and reassembly of improvised performances. There’s always music somewhere in the mix.
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I have accounts on Threads, Instagram, Glass, Bluesky, and micro.blog (which more or less mirrors this blog and is also a fediverse handle) but don’t always post regulary. My interest in them wanes in direct proportion to how many of them are owned by the same company and how much they try to be like each other. I think that blogs and personal sites are often the most interesting way to learn what people are up to.
Many years ago the writer Lucy Sante, Luc Sante at the time, wrote that living in New York City was like living off the coast of America. She was referring to Manhattan, of course, which for many people was the entirety of the city back then in the late-1970s and early-1980s. I have taken this remark to heart, and noting a shift of cultural emphasis to Brooklyn these last 20 or 25 years, at least for many artist-types coming here from elsewhere who would see the relevance of referring to a Lucy Sante remark whose source is no longer known, I have adopted her view and think of us here in Manhattan and Brooklyn (and even Staten Island, though differently) as living off the coast, still a bit out of step, both ahead of and behind the trends on the mainland.
Questions? Comments? Drop me a line at mail@zachbarocas.com.