Pre-Cluster Show Poster Party

Brother Reade in San Francisco this weekend

Naked on the Vague

This Sunday, May 11 at 8pm Naked on the Vague will be playing the store. They are old friends from Sydney, and I have seen their music develop into the very singular and visionary concept it is today. This is how their Australian label Dual Plover describes them:

"Diving deep into a world of apocalyptic pop and psychedelic weirdness, their disparate vocals grip onto stabbing keys and menacing hook-laden basslines, pushed on by an unrelentling drum machine far past the end of its warranty period. Essentially a ‘punk’ assault ranging from some almost dance-able short and sharp ‘hits’ to gloomy extended freak-outs. Taking direction from where the short lived 'no-wave' movement ended, expanding on what the imploded scene may have garnished had it not succumbed to its own fatalistic shortcomings."



Band member Mathew Hopkins is also an amazing artist and keeps a well maintained blog of his projects that you can check out here:

Dark Hand and Lamplight-your second chance.

The audience of last Wednesday night's Dark Hand and Lamplight show had their collective minds blown. For those of you who stayed home, dont worry-you have one more chance to check this amazing performance, this time at the Hammer Museum in Westwood-Wednesday the 7th of May. The show is free and starts at 8pm.
Not to be missed.
The above photo comes courtesy of Eric Kroll (nsfw).

Nouns Out Today

Here's the opening part of the Pitchfork review that gave the record a 9.2

It's disingenuous to talk about Los Angeles' New Yorker-profiled, vegan-snacks-serving, book-lending, all-ages venue the Smell with the same high-art vocabulary you'd use to dissect other creative collectives, like Andy Warhol's Factory-- the Smell's constituency (L.A.'s optimistic experimental art pack) appears un-fixated on fame, self-aggrandizement, or furthering its nascent mythology. To an outsider, the Smell is idealistic and romantic, a stroller-friendly, cheap-haircut-hocking haven that's as functional as it is fruitful. Save Baltimore's Wham City, it's been a while since American music fans have had a similar hometown scene to get riled up about; regional culture has been fractured and marginalized by the internet, and being too focused on anything local-- except produce, maybe-- feels depressingly provincial in 2008. Consequently, it's weirdly thrilling that a community-sponsored, community-supported art space can attract (and sustain) such a horde of admirable bands.

No Age, along with Mika Miko, Abe Vigoda, Lavender Diamond, BARR, and a handful of others, are mainstays at the Smell; the cover of No Age's 2007 EP compilation, Weirdo Rippers, famously features the exterior of the club, and guitarist Randy Randall reportedly helped mine trenches in the venue's concrete floor so that a second bathroom could be installed to accommodate new crowds. Given the critical success of Weirdo Rippers, No Age's scope has now expanded well beyond Los Angeles, and Nouns, their first full-length, is appropriately ambitious.

The rest

Los Hamgeles

Dark Hand and Lamplight

I guess about two years ago now, we had a Kramers Ergot event at the Hammer Museum, where amongst films, readings, and slides, one of those totally memorable things happened in the form of a performance by toronto based artist Shary Boyle. Shary was someone whose work had always blown me away-the first time I saw her work was at a friend's house, going through a box of mini comics. It had no name on it, no contact info, and some of the most powerful single images I had ever seen. Presumably based on dreams, they depicted a haunting and familiar world that was sexual, mysterious, and intensely personal. One drawing in particular, of a cluster of tiny horses galloping from under a girls bed, stuck in my mind sharply for at least another two years, by which time I finally found out more about the artist, saw more of her incredibly varied work (porcelain sculpture, oil painting, paper cut outs, models, watercolors, miniature clay sculpture), and got the opportunity to publish a series of watercolors she did in Kramers Ergot 6. And I reckon her work in that issue is some of the best I ever got to publish in any issue.
Anyway, I had the museum fly Shary in because I knew, however vaguely, that she did live drawing/performance, but I wasn't (nor I think anyone in the audience) quite prepared for how powerful her piece was going to be. Her's was the last of the evening, and it was a killer. When it was all over and the lights where up, the audience was genuinely stunned by it, their mouths agape, eyes wide. The feeling in the air was we were all lucky to have caught it. She somehow expanded upon the dark beauty and timeless mystery found in her painting and created it out of nothing in an actual physical space.
Soon after, she went on tour as the opening act on Bonnie 'Prince' Billy's next west coast tour. This time with live accompaniment from Doug Paisley, and the duo now titled Dark Hand and Lamplight. Supposedly it was even better than the Hammer performance.We are happy to announce that Dark Hand and Lamplight are coming back to LA for two performances. First at the Cinefamily on Thursday, May 1st, then at the Hammer Museum Wednesday May 7th. Shary tells me both performances will be different, so I am sure after you come to the Cinefamily event, you'll be lining up at the museum for the second.
On top of that, Shary's new monograph, Otherworld Uprising, comes out the same week! So come check it all out.(You can check Dark Hand and Lamplight on Myspace too for more info)

Sissy Spacek Installation this Sunday.

Please join us this Sunday, April 20 from 7pm-9pm for a one night only unique sound installation put together by Sissy Spacek (John Wiese, Corydon Ronnau, & Jesse Jackson) fresh off a recent west coast tour! The band has just released a new album "French Record" as well as "California Ax", an extensive 4-CD boxset that includes three all new studio albums PLUS a recording of their 13-tet show that took place back in December at The Smell. Both will be on sale starting Sunday to accompany the installation. See you there, Family