Last month a guy named Matt Bull launched a contest. To enter, you had to email Matt your compelling pitch for a website with a truly unusual URL. And then the winner would receive the odd domain name -- SlothPunchClub.com.

I couldn't resist!!! I dropped everything and put together my pitch for Sloth Punch Club right away. Here's what I sent to Matt:

A THREE-TOED PITCH

Like its namesake, my SlothPunchClub.com blog would take a three-toed approach to content -- comics, music, and podcasts. I'd put the SPC blog on a slow-but-steady three week cycle (just to keep things extra slothy).

Week 1: Webcomics

The Sloth Punch Club webcomic would tell the story of Larry and Bernice, siblings out to avenge the death of their brother, Roy, who was killed on the rodeo clown kickboxing circuit by a malicious leaf-eater named Fast Susan. I've attached the first page.

Week 2: Music

Under the name Nik Furious I'd release a new song every three weeks. The music would pair thematically with the previous week's webcomic. I've attached the first song, Super Sloth Slap.

Super Sloth Slap by Nik Furious [ 2:45 ] Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

Week 3: Podcasts

Each podcast would begin with a recap of the art from Weeks 1 and 2. I'd also have a segment on every episode called Sloth Death Match, pitting two pieces of art against each other. 

For example, it could be Dumb and Dumber vs. The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay. Then, on the next podcast, the winner would go up against the White Album by the Beatles. And so on. I'd use listener suggestions to create the media match ups.

Sooooooooo... did I win?

NOOOOO!! That's why I'm here telling you about my pitch and not announcing the launch of my Sloth Punch Club blog.

But I really enjoyed putting this pitch together. I've spent a lot of time pitching ideas this year (see The Demon From My Butt) and it was nice to know that Matt was receptive to my idea even if I wasn't ultimately the winner.

Best of luck to Timmy Ham, the official winner and soon-to-be owner of SlothPunchClub.com. I hope his custom shoes featuring original art of sloths punching stuff are a big hit!

Years ago I had a music podcast called the Beatcast and I couldn't have stopped posting episodes at a worse time.

Remix Da Bass by Nik Furious [ 3:20 ] Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

See, I was in the middle of something called Building Da Beat. The idea was to construct an instrumental song from the ground up and share each step of the process with the listeners. 

First I posted the drums. Then I added bass. Then I added some guitar. Then I changed the guitar. Then I stopped posting new Beatcasts. 

I didn't quit making the Beatcast because of Building Da Beat. If anything, it was a last gasp effort to rekindle my excitement for the Beatcast. Obviously, it didn't work.

Here's a close up of the Cort bass that I played on this track.

But something odd happened after I lost interest in Building Da Beat... I fell in love with a remixed version of Da Bass!!! Still unhappy with Da Guitar, I'd produced a stripped-down version that only featured electric guitar at the end of the track. This was the version I planned to use for Building Da Synth.

But the synth performance never happened in a timely manner. And so the unused version of the track sat around, waiting for some melody. But even without strong melodic components, I found myself listening to Da Bass all of the time.

Eventually Remix Da Bass became the foundation of Da Bounce, a synth-packed song included on my forthcoming album, 7 Star Sky Flash Kick. But to me, Remix Da Bass still stands on its own as a raw rhythmic jam with a lot of punch and progression.

Phoenix Bay is a prototype. Recorded in the mid 00s and mixed in 2008, it's a 100% original Nik Furious track. But due to its unfinished nature, I feel it makes a better mixtape beat than a final album cut.

Phoenix Bay by Nik Furious [ 2:56 ] Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

When I first created this song, I thought it was complete. But upon spending some time with it, I decided that it needed more components. And that's how it evolved into Remix the Phoenix, a song from my album Brilliant Shower.

The name Phoenix Bay is inspired by Jean Grey's rebirth. A character from Marvel's X-Men comics, Jean connects with a cosmic entity known as the Phoenix Force in X-Men #100-101. When it happens, the team's Blackbird jet crashes into Jamaica Bay, an inlet of water touching the edge of New York City.

Following a turn as Dark Phoenix, Jean Grey died in X-Men #137 and that was that. Or was it??? A few years later, she was revived in a storyline involving the Avengers and the Fantastic Four. It's been collected in the Phoenix Rising graphic novel.

Turns out that Jean was never dead -- the Phoenix Force took her place while it left her cocooned in Jamaica Bay until some other superheroes came around and pulled her up from the depths.

Ironically, I've never read this storyline. I just know about the events from years of reading other superhero comic books. The basic plot has been recapped over and over so many times that it was pretty damn easy for me to piece things together without reading the original material.

So why'd I tell you all that? Because there isn't much to say about Phoenix Bay. I already detailed its creation in my spotlight on Remix the Phoenix. While I like this track, I think it's more of a blueprint than a fully developed instrumental song.