Ferndale DIY Profile: Mike Ross, Musician, Record Label Manager, Friend to Rabbits

Ferndale Patch has started a DIY Project, talking with various people from the community, asking them what DIY means to them.

To learn more about our DIY Project and to participate, go .

1. Tell us a little about yourself.

I’m a painter/weirdo musician/writer/occasional DJ/ordained minister and friend to rabbits, who’s trying to coagulate all of these things into one satisfying and creative life.

2. What does DIY mean to you?

Max Roach has an album called Deeds Not Words. For me, that sums up the DIY ethos. You can talk about your ideas all day long - but at the end of the day, what have you done?

3. Tell us about a DIY project (or projects) you've worked on and why it was DIY.

I try to live it, less as a finite project but as an infinite series of ongoing processes (and processes within processes). I run a cassette label called Algae Tapes & Records (all tapes so far, eventually some records), a small label in which - with a little help from my friends - I make pretty much all the aesthetic decisions and do pretty much all the legwork.

It’s but one arm of an octopus of similar tiny labels, all of which are populated with awesome people doing amazing things -- the Axis Mundi Collective.

That’s the music end of it. I also make furniture, birdfeeders, canvases and record racks out of wood and other materials I’ve mostly trash picked or reclaimed in some way or another. There’s a world out there of things to make if you look at existing materials in the right way.

4. Why does the DIY attitude fit Ferndale?

Ferndale’s fabulous and funky and for some reason it has attracted creative types - it seems every house in Ferndale has a basement that contains a music studio, an art space or both. I guess liberal, tolerant policies and politics has a lot to do with it.  I’m constantly inspired by folks I run into and articles I read about artists, musicians and just plain do-ers in Ferndale and Detroit.

5. Who is your favorite DIY artist/musician/human?

Wow, can I have a few? All of the musicians and artists who make up the Axis Mundi and crews - their art, music and work ethic is endlessly inspiring. Also, always impressive for what they do are people like Jamie Easter, Timmy Vulgar, Scott Dunkerley, and Carey Gustafson. 

But mostly Christina, my girlfriend (who will be Ross's wife as of Sept. 10) who is immensely supportive of my ongoing crazy endeavors and house full of crazy crap, and who also constantly amazes me with her own creative mind and DIY-ness.

If you'd like to participate in Ferndale Patch's DIY Project, email editor Terry Parris Jr. here.