Main Street Opening

Flickrrrrrrr

Set Up

I meant to blog these before the opening, but things got hectic! I'll post shots of the opening tomorrow.

I met Eugene Kotlyarenko sometime in the last year on one of my shifts here at the shop. I don't know much about him except we both like the fall and that he has written and directed a movie called 0s & 1s. There's a giant billboard in downtown on the 110 freeway for it that you've maybe seen, either way I ran into him last night at a club and we danced to a bunch of really old songs. here's the trailer for the film, i should say it looks exactly how Eugene described it to me when we first met which is really crazy;

All around ruler and artist Hisham Bharoocha's first solo published (to the best of my knowledge) book came in to the shop this week courtesy of Soundscreen and i should say i think it was worth the wait. also worth the wait is Hisham's website which is finally up and running with examples of his photography, collage, and music skills on display for you to drift off into.

Awkward first date: Chris Ware & Pete Wentz

This is the first and last segment - go to this weird european MTV-vibed website for the rest. You won't be disappointed!







Marc Bell & Johnny Ryan signing tomorrow (Wednesday) hosted by Pete Wentz.

we just got a bunch of new (and some old) records and cds in from labels like sublime frequencies, smallville, and dial, plus the new eric copeland 12", the rune grammofon label book by kim hiortøy, and the GAS (wolfgang voigt) book/cd set. click the covers above for sounds, more to come...

Spike No Age MOMA NYC Cool Poster

No Age and Spike Jonze are both involved in an upcoming PopRally event at MoMA happening October 15th. For the night, "An Evening of Skate Videos," the museum "invited Patrick O'Dell (Epicly Later'd) to assemble an evening of influential skateboarding videos from the 1980s to today -- including Jonze's own legendary contributions to the genre -- and to bring together a panel of significant skateboarders and filmmakers, including Jonze himself, to discuss their work. An after party with a live performance by No Age follows the film program."

The event is in conjunction with the museum's mid-career retrospective of Jonze's work (titled "Spike Jonze: The First 80 Years") taking place from October 8th-18th. A schedule of the screenings at MoMA (which include his music videos, feature films like Being John Malkovich, etc., and his work as a producer) is below. The opening event on October 8th pairs Jonze with Maurice Sendak, the author of Where the Wild Things Are.

Wild Thing!

Here is my one page Where The Wild Things Are strip for the Vice Magazine Wild Things insert. Normally, I would say read it in print form, but I just saw the insert and my page is printed all pixelated and it makes a slight strip even slighter.

Family Presents Nightmare USA Double Feature

One of the best film books of recent memory is Stephen Thrower's Nightmare USA: The Untold Story of the Exploitation Independents. It focuses on an alternate timeline of of independent exploitation cinema with a bent toward the artistic, the weird, the idiosyncratic. A goldmine of under appreciated, little seen movies. So when we heard that as part of the Cinefamily's month long Halloween Horror festival, Stephen Thrower was guest programming an evening of films, we were very excited to help get the word out.
The evening starts with an incredibly rare 35mm screening of Victims (this is its U.S. premiere after 30 years!), a criminally-neglected gem of psychological horror bolstered by superb naturalistic performances -- a film which never even had an American theatrical release! Paulie (played by writer/director Daniel DiSomma, aka Tony Vorno) is falling to pieces. His every encounter with the opposite sex ends in violence, while stirring up memories of his prostitute mother and her brutal pimp.
Followed by Don't Go In The House, a gritty, disturbing and blackly comic portrait of a pyromaniac struggling to cope with his abusive mother's death. Don't Go In The House is best described as Psycho Redux -- with flamethrowers! Not for the fainthearted!
This Sunday, October 18th, 8PM.
Victims Dir. Daniel DiSomma, 1977, 35mm.
Don't Go in the House Dir. Joseph Ellison, 1980, 35mm.
Get Tix Here!

my good friend from new york j penry has an opening saturday night followed by an afterparty i may or may not be dj'ing while j draws a few portraits. pets welcome even, oh wow.

TELL THEM ANYTHING YOU WANT: A Portrait of Maurice Sendak

by Lance Bangs & Spike Jonze

Premieres on HBO Wednesday, October 14th at 7:00 PM EST

For those with cable - I've seen this and it's really great.

Directors Spike Jonze and Lance Bangs capture a playful, intimate and resoundingly poignant portrait of children's writer and illustrator Maurice Sendak in his Connecticut home. From the early sketches and toys he made with his brother Jack, to his most celebrated work WHERE THE WILD THINGS ARE, Sendak reveals the provocative and prolific imagination that has spawned over half a century of work.

Lenny Bruce would have turned 84 yesterday.

Main Street Extended dates!

The dates for the Main Street video art exhibition have been extended. It'll now run from October 24 - December 6. Here's some stills...

Andrew Jeffrey Wright


Jacob Ciocci


Kris Moyes


Peter Sutherland


Lori D.


Lucky Dragon


Andrew Sutherland


Miranda July


Melanie Bonajo

Coffin Joe Speaks!

Was going to edit my previous post to include this good VICE interview with Coffin Joe, but once I saw this jpeg I had to give it some respect.

Coffin Joe Now Playing!

This why you go to the movies.

The Strange World of Coffin Joe Festival starts tonight at the Cinefamily!

For list of films, times, and ephemeral info, look here.

There's echos of Universal Horror, Russ Meyer, Teen Romance comics, Mario Bava, and Lon Chaney in the air of these movies, but these heartfelt, almost home made gems, all written, produced, directed and starring Jose Mojica Marins, have a distinct bizarre energy and thematic point of view you will not see anywhere else. And what a way to see them, in 35mm prints flown in from Brazil, maybe the only prints of these films in existence.
Ay caramba indeed, my friends, aye caramba.

Instore Show! This Sunday!

The Urxed
Nudge
City Center

Sunday, October 11, 7pm!

The Urxed:
The Urxed is the solo music and performance art project of High Places member Rob Barber. The name 'The Urxed' has been used for various projects since Rob was a youth. The name originated as a Graffiti name, and was a reference to the song "You're X'ed" by the early 80's Washington DC hardcore punk band The Faith.



Nudge:
Nudge is a slightly loose collective orbiting Los Angeles based musician Brian Foote, birthed premillenially in Portland with the intent to push forward with emergent technologies and antiquated kit alike. His prime collaborators are Paul Dickow who works solo as Strategy, and Honey Owens who records under the Valet moniker. Foote also plays in Atlas Sound and helps run the Kranky label.

nudge "war song" from nudge on Vimeo.

City Center:
Before delving into the sparkling, murky sound collages of his current project, City Center, Fred Thomas spent about 10 years masterminding resourcefully lo-fi pop and soul tunes under the banner of Saturday Looks Good To Me. Thomas began City Center after moving from Michigan to a more cramped situation in New York City and, in what he calls a classic New York moving story, retreated into a world of headphones, loops, and lonely electronic experimentation. Thomas' friend Ryan Howard joined up to help him flesh out the songs, resulting in City Center's recent self-titled album. City Center's sound—putting the melodies and songs under a canopy of reverb-heavy loops and samples instead of the other way around—has prompted some to accuse Thomas of "jumping on the bandwagon of weird music," as he puts it.

City Center - "Thaw" @ The Bakery (9/23/09) from Chad Paulson on Vimeo.

Main Street

Flier by Brian Roettinger

They're Both Coming!

HE'S COMING!

Marc Bell, one of my favorite artists, is coming to town. More info coming soon.