Tonight in Seattle, Studio 66!

Friday, October 10th
Studio 66 at the Lo-Fi Gallery on Eastlake
429 Eastlake Ave East
9pm, $9, 21+

The Love Me Nots

Have you ever been to Emerald City Soul night at the Lo-Fi Gallery? It's pretty awesome. Unique space, cool crowd, great rockin' music that takes you back to an era that was nearly left forgotten until a few dedicated folks totally into it helped bring back a Northern soul revival. It just has a great vibe, which has made it hugely popular.

In a similar vein, but a different bent, is Studio 66. Rather than focus on Northern Soul however, Studio 66 more tries to capture a time in the '60s when the airwaves and fashion revolved around mod, garage rock, early psychedelic, soul, acid jazz and Brit pop. Think live bands with organs and mod haircuts, dancing girls in mini skirts with white vinyl boots, flashing lights, and a crowd ready to boogie. Tonight's the night for the action and there are two outta town live bands that are gonna burn up the stage:

Montreal band The High Dials play guitar driven psychedelic rock along the lines of an updated Cream/Beatles/Byrds hybrid. But if you were to ask me who to hit Studio 66 for, it would be The Love Me Nots from Phoenix. The Love Me Nots have a total garage rock with organs sound going on with a couple of cute girls in miniskirts in the band. If you click the band links above you'll find their MySpace profiles, give "Move in Tight" by The Love Me Nots a listen and tell me this band doesn't rock!

There will also be a pile of DJs, the Tangerine Tonic go go dancers, projectors, lights, two bars and lots of beautiful people!

New Book of Black Earth album out Oct. 14th!

Easily one of the most heavy and brutal metal bands in Seattle right now, The Book of Black Earth is all set to release their second album next week. Now on Prosthetic Records (home of a bunch of screamo and metal bands from All That Remains to Testament), the new album, entitled "Horoskopus" is due out October 4th. The label is doing a limited edition of 500 of the vinyl as a double gatefold album, my advice is if you want to snag one, pre-order it now here. I just pre-ordered the LP and tshirt, vinyl runs being so small these days, releases like this sell out instantly and become collectors items you'll have to pay twice as much for on Ebay within a few months.

Book of Black Earth was formed in 2003 by former members of Teen Cthulu, Skarp, Wormwood and somewhat surprisingly Rebekah from Kill Sadie and The Fitness. They've had a few member changes over the years before cementing into the current line up (press photo by the esteemed Miss Kelly O):



The band will be in Seattle on October 15th and Portland on the 16th, for you non-Northwest folks, here's their full tour dates:

Oct 09 2008, 31st St Pub, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
Oct 10 2008, Peabody’s, Cleveland, Ohio
Oct 11 2008, Reggie’s Rock Club, Chicago, Illinois
Oct 12 2008, Vaudeville Mews, Des Moines, Iowa
Oct 13 2008, Cervantes Masterpiece Ballroom, Denver, Colorado
Oct 14 2008, Urban Lounge, Salt Lake City, Utah
Oct 15 2008, Studio Seven, Seattle, Washington
Oct 16 2008, Rotture, Portland, Oregon
Oct 17 2008, The Metro, Oakland, California
Oct 18 2008, Knitting Factory, Hollywood, California
Oct 19 2008, The Jumping Turtle, San Marcos, California
Oct 20 2008, The Sets, Tempe, Arizona
Oct 21 2008, Gator’s, Farmington, New Mexico
Oct 23 2008, Reno’s Chop Shop, Dallas, Texas
Oct 24 2008, Walter’s On Washington, Houston, Texas
Oct 25 2008, Red 7, Austin, Texas
Oct 26 2008, Dragon’s Den, New Orleans, Louisiana
Oct 28 2008, Brass Mug, Tampa, Florida
Oct 29 2008, Masquerade, Atlanta, Georgia
Oct 30 2008, Volume 11 Tavern, Raleigh, North Carolina
Oct 31 2008, Jaxx, Springfield, Virginia
Nov 01 2008, The Sterling Hotel, Allentown, Pennsylvania

McLeod Residence announces it is closing

I just plugged the current show at Seattle's McLeod Residence and was hanging out there Friday night. It's such a cool space for shows because it pushes the envelope for what a gallery can be. For those that have been around Seattle for the past decade or two, you might remember Vox Populi up on Capitol Hill, which was really the first gallery in town where I saw the music scene and the art scene smashing into each other in a big way. Vox Populi, run by Grant Alden (of the Rocket and No Depression) and Carl Carlson (now owner of Tigertail) was the first gallery in town to really focus on so-called "low-brown art" - poster art, rock'n'roll aesthetics, zine artwork, comics, etc. After Vox Populi closed, a few years later Roq La Rue took up the cause and is going strong to this day. The McLeod Residence, while not focusing solely on the same genre of art, similarly was able to pair the music community with the art community, drawing in tons of non-traditional art fans and building a new community around their space. Unfortunately, as with most small businesses in America, financially they seem to have lost the struggle. It's one a sympathize with immensely because my co-horts and I when through a similar struggle with Tablet, creating something cool and awesome that's community building and exciting, but not always financially viable. And when a small business in the U.S. is struggling financially, government doesn't step in to bail you out like Wall Street and corporate America, you survive or fail on your own and you pay your own debts.

I can tell it's with a heavy heart that the fine folks behind the McLeod Residence announced today that they will be closing down their gallery at the end of the month. In the last three weeks of the gallery's existence, I challenge everyone in Seattle to stop by and check out the current show, buy a few drinks in the bar and tip the staff well, and give a few words of encouragement and support to the people that started and kept McLeod running. They could use a lot of thanks and support from Seattle right now. If you read through the whole blog entry I linked to, they do say they plan to regroup and start up the gallery in a new location at some point in the future. That, at least, is encouraging.

Brent Watanabe art opening at McLeod Residence Friday!

When some friends and I first ventured into self-publishing and launched 10 Things, we didn't know dick about putting out our own fanzine. We were just obsessive music fans that knew Seattle was missing a big zine to hype local music and decided to fill the void. Artwork? Design and layout? Proofreading? Photography? Bah... we jumped right in and reasoned we'd figure it out along the way. I did 22 issues of 10 Things over the next decade and then 103 issues of Tablet with a whole different group of cohorts. 125 issues later, when I look back at the first issues of 10 Things, I absolutely cringe. Early issues were laid out on computers at Microsoft, we'd sneak into the library on the weekends to scan photos in. Then we did a few at my friend Ty's office downtown... all before I bought my first 486 PC for over $2,000 at Radio Shack with a credit card and started to lay it out at home. The artwork in the first few issues was horrible, mostly clip art and stolen graphics from old magazines I'd butcher up. About 3 or 4 issues in I realized I needed to find both band photographers and underground artists, so I started putting the word out and luckily, there seemed to be piles of talented people willing to work for free because they wanted to get published or were into the ideas behind 10 Things.

I was attending classes at the University of Washington in the early '90s, so I decided to put up some flyers looking for "punk or rock poster artists and cartoonists for a cool new underground fanzine" in the School of Art. I got a couple of responses, and the one that worked out by far the best was this kid Brent Watanabe who was doing posters for shows at the Old Firehouse in Redmond. Brent had a twisted style that I loved, one that I've seen a lot of other people do since then, but was very original in the early '90s. He'd draw cartoons and illustrations of happy, cute animals, only they'd be totally fucked up. They'd have 4 sets of eyes, holes dripping blood, a bottle of liquor or a cigarette... you get the picture. And he was super gung ho and enthusiastic. He did covers, spot illos, comic strips and section titles all in his crazy unique style for 10 Things starting from the early issues until I stopped publishing. Stuff like:





I think in part Brent liked doing artwork for 10 Things because I was open to anything and gave him no restrictions, whereas for posters for the Redmond YMCA sponsored all-ages shows he really couldn't have animals with their heads lopped off pouring booze down their throats or bears walking around with their heads sizzling in a frying pan. You know, the kids. And honestly, the more twisted stuff he gave me, the more I dug it and the more positive reinforcement he got to keep pushing it that direction. He definitely started branching out doing film, mixed media and developing his skills as a more serious artist (like a cool video for the industrial band Kill Switch Klick), but every time I'd tell him I was working on a new issue, Brent would work up some great fucked up cartoons and illustrations for me. Early on when I was asking him about his creepy characters and why they'd have two sets of eyes or limbs, he said he actually had double-vision and wanted to reflect that in his art. A few years later he got lasik to fix his vision and got the Japanese symbol for vision tattooed on his arm. Totally cool.

In recent years Brent's had shows and video screenings at places like Soil, the Decibel Music Festival, Cornell University, the Henry Art Gallery and a bunch of festivals. He's got a great website up of his stuff at Creepco.com.

This Friday, October 2nd, Brent has an art opening at Seattle's coolest art gallery, The McLeod Residence. You should go! It's called "Mixed Media Matters" and features a number of mixed media artists from the high Tech and low tech. Here's part of Brent's piece:



From the press release:

"A mix of media, from high-tech computer programming to low-tech street art, makes its way to McLeod next month in four new exhibits. An animation installation by Brent Watanabe, paintings by Curtis Taylor, photography by April Brimer and an urban art installation by a variety of street artists open on Friday, October 3 with a reception from 5-9pm. The exhibits will be up until November 22.

Brent Watanabe will create an environment in the Conservatory that is a cross between a large, ever changing drawing, a runaway video game on the fritz, and an experimental animation, complete with surround sound. Stack:Heap:Loop consists of an animation portraying a mother duck pulled in an endless trek through a desolate man-made environment, her head trailing behind on a distorted/elongated neck, ducklings falling from her mouth. In the corner of the room a nest of ducklings face the wall, visible only by their reflection in a mirror.

The installation is controlled by multiple networked computers, with each element interdependent on the other: the mother duck communicates with the landscape, which communicates with the nest of birds across the room, which communicates with the soundscape. See a sample of the animation here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qo26fn5I4C0&fmt=6.

Brent is a local artist who programs computer applications to connect the gap between his interests in drawing, audio and video, mixing high tech tools with low-tech techniques. He works primarily in video and animation, and will have an artists residency at Jack Straw New Media Gallery in 2009.

The Parlor will house Curtis Taylor's Chinese Factory Paintings, 26 eight-inch-square photorealistic oil paintings, each of a different anonymous factory. The factories were documented in snap-shot form during a trip in 2003.

According to Taylor, "the Chinese factory is an engine of creation and change. Whether it produces consumer electronics, toys, pharmaceuticals, clothing, low-cost weapons---anything desired by a global marketplace---they each transform the life and political economy of the planet." His paintings are a distributable homage to the power of these buildings.

Curtis Taylor is a filmmaker living in Seattle Washington. From 1996 to 2006 he operated Vodvil, a film-and-performance storefront that made original narratives in opera and ballet. He has written, designed and directed shows which have premiered at Vodvil, Northwest Film Forum, Film Brigade of Chicago, Toronto Film Festival, SXSW, Center on Contemporary Art and On the Boards.

Portraits of Curiosity, a series of photographs by April Brimer, will hang in the McLeod Residence Foyer. The photographs tell a story in magical realism, with characters that are strong, adventurous, curious and sometimes mischievous. April creates portraits that are open-ended, inviting the viewer to speculate on the setting and motivation.

April Brimer has been taking photographs for over ten years. A former Seattle resident, she currently lives in Santa Barbara, CA, where she is pursuing fine art digital photography."

The important details:
-The McLeod Residence is located in Belltown at 2209 2nd Ave
-The opening is Friday, October 3rd, from 5-9pm
-It's free and they do have a bar!

What will be the new name of the WaMu Theater?

I've never been a fan of Seattle's WaMu Theater. It's booking is by corporate media giant AEG (who also now own the two Showbox locations and book the stadium at Bumbershoot) and it's just too big of a venue for me, I like more intimate shows. But I liked WaMu as a bank, I've had an account there for quite a while and enjoyed the lack of extra fees and the highest interest rate savings account I could find. But Washington Mutual is no more, the nation’s largest savings and loan was sold almost in its entirety to JPMorgan Chase for $1.9 billion yesterday evening.

I can't think that JPMorgan Chase will keep the Washington Mutual name, nor will they miss the advertising opportunity to rename the various WaMu theaters and stadiums in a way that serves their corporate interests better (a name that isn't as tarnished as the WaMu name now is). So what will the new name be? The Chase Theater? The JP Morgan Chase Theater? Both are pretty boring, so my suggestion is pick something less corporate and more cool instead, maybe with a more regional, Seattle feel. Any suggestions?

Northwest Rock Music Videos

I did a previous blog entry about Bombshelter Videos, a great Seattle underground punk and rock video show in the '90s hosted by Frank Harlan (AKA Bill Bored).

Harlan also co-hosted another video show aimed at just covering Northwest music right at the height of the whole grunge thing, when the Seattle music scene was exploding. It was a perfect time for "Northwest Rock Music Videos," which ran directly after Bombshelter on KTZZ (Channel 22) for it's last few months and then continued on it's own for a few years. The actual dates Northwest Rock ran were from May 1992 to September 1994, and Harlan's co-host was Barbara Dollarhide, who also worked at Seattle label C/Z Records for many years. The show took off, mainly because it was at the right place at the right time. They'd mix in videos of hit bands of the day like Soundgarden, The Posies, Sir-Mix-A-Lot, Coffin Break, The Walkabouts, Skin Yard, TAD and The Accused, with older and more obscure Northwest band videos. Harlan has a partial episode/playlist up here. One of the cool things the would do is have a different local band host it each time, doing the introduction and some of the commentary from locations shot around Seattle. Mudhoney hosted the very first episode from the observation deck of the Space Needle, it doesn't get more Seattle than that.

Chris Sievanen, a long time contributor both in writing and photography for 10 Things back in the day, did an article on the show back when is was debuting in 1992 for the UW Daily's "Glass Onion" section. She was kind enough to give me permission to reprint it. Click on the article parts for the full-sized readable files:

This rules, Ben Kingsly as Ian Mackaye singing "Minor Threat"