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The Liberation Dance Party returns to DC9 this Friday night with a special live performance from NYC-based (Lower East Side, to be exact) The Phenomenal Handclap Band whose tracks we’ve been grooving to all week here at ol’ TVD HQ.
We chatted with Joan Tick from PHB earlier in the week, and she’s supplied us with perhaps the best and certainly the longest, First Date on record. (And we all know that if a first date goes long, that’s a damn good thing indeed.)
"I grew up in Las Vegas with a former musician for a father. Shortly after I was born, he quit touring, sold his bass guitar and amp, and took an entry-level job cooking at a casino in order to keep his family afloat. The only vestige to his former musical life remained in a slim stack of records neatly shelved inside his 1960s console stereo, and that hefty monster was further buried inside a closet. For years, this stack and the immaculate record player inside the console went untouched.
In the summer between sixth and seventh grade, however, my best friend and I saw the beginnings of our teenaged shenanigans. This included raiding our Parents’ belongings. Maybe it was in search of old clothes, trinkets, prizes, secrets, proof that they weren’t really what they said they were, and by default we weren’t either. This certainly included sifting through the old stereo and its records in my house.
We were amused, confused, and impressed by the covers of dozens of Beatles albums, The Doors, James Brown, Frank Zappa, The Carpenters, The Mamas and the Papas, Simon and Garfunkel, and Bread. These are the ones I remember clearly. The stumbling upon a parent’s small music canon, his vinyl files of an era gone by, is undoubtedly a common first glimpse into music for a kid, but it was in these songs, specifically that of Karen Carpenter and Mama Cass’s voice that I realized I could actually sing, that singing or dreaming up a melody of your own could invoke something more complex than joy or sadness.
Right away we memorized lyrics and began showing off the records to our friends as if we were the first two people on earth to discover The Beatles on original vinyl. On Friday and Saturday nights before we went to bed, we smoked cigarettes and drank Dr. Pepper in the dark to Side A of Simon and Garfunkel’s Sounds of Silence. From those lullabies of longing, we began to pursue lesser known music--the natural progression into the underground being punk and post-punk music--and by the end of junior high school we had acquired a preliminary collection ranging from The Jam, The Birthday Party, and Bad Brains to Bauhaus, The Cure, and The Cocteau Twins. The older and harder to find records were a lucky inheritance from a former punk rock uncle who was trying to clean up his act. His music was the first to go. Again, my friend and I were sifting through someone else’s abandoned vinyl treasures, but at least this time we knew what we had on our hands.
It was just after ninth grade at age 15, when my mother decided to move from Las Vegas to rural North Idaho. I recall throwing an absolute fit when they tried to sell his console stereo at a moving sale. It was, after all, really big, heavy as hell, and an absolute oak and mustard green eye sore to both of them. But my pleas triumphed. It took three people to load it into the moving van and three more to carry it into our new house and up the stairs into my room.
The stereo took up the entire width of the closet. At night, the bulbous knobs glowed yellow, red, and white while I thought about the bleakness of life along with its vast possibilities. In my early days of living in the rural Northwest, music was the easiest thing to focus on and I soon discovered Maximum Rocknroll and a few other zines that led me to a small record store in Spokane, WA called 4000 Holes. I would make the 45- minute drive from Idaho to Washington at least once a week with friends. The Northwest was still reeling from the start of grunge in Seattle and a lot of punk bands were coming through the smaller surrounding cities and playing in abandoned churches and all-ages shacks. The Dickies, Jawbreaker, The Dead Milkmen, among many other memorable and unmemorable hardcore bands played. If you couldn’t find a show listed somewhere, someone knew about something happening at an abandoned rec center in the woods and you¹d spend all night trying to find it.
I was probably 17 when the skinheads moved into the scene. I already lived half a mile from the Aryan Nation compound in Hayden Lake, Idaho and had avoided seeing any white supremacists in person (that I knew of). But there they were, muscle-bodied and a lot older than us punching girls in the face, knocking them unconscious, ending the shows.
I think that may have been the early start and early end to my love affair with hording vinyl for a while. Not for any other reason than it was time for something else. Over the better part of the decade, I became increasingly more intrigued by new music and fell in love with quieter bands like Yo La Tengo, and Low-- traces of which, along with those very first record findings, you can hear in my songwriting.
In New York City, I worked at a bar with a DJ named Greg Caz, who would keep me at the bar until 6am playing folk and punk favorites from my teenage years, but also a whole host of Brazilian and African music that I had never listened to. Caz can speak French, Portuguese, and Spanish--all learned from his beloved records--and he would translate lyrics from his favorite artists, many of which lived very short lives in relative obscurity across the world. The one who stole my heart was Tuca. The Brazilian songwriter’s gothic lyrics rested against an otherwise uplifting beat. She seemed painfully aware of her own mortality, the love she might not attain before perishing, and indeed she died in her twenties.
Greg was, of course, close friends with Sean and Daniel of The Phenomenal Handclap Band, which at that time had not yet taken its current shape, but was already being talked about. We all eventually met when they began looking for new members. I was intrigued by the wide-ranging songs, by how ambitious their concept was. Since his late teens, Daniel had been living in Manhattan DJing gigs, forming bands, and attending music school. Along the way he began DJing obscure soul records with Sean. Together they began producing some of their favorite music heroes like Joe Bataan and Unaio Black. Between the two of them, they had acquired a group of some of the cities best musicians (their friends) to work alongside them.
The first Phenomenal Handclap Band record was released this summer along with a limited edition 7-inch featuring "Testimony" and "15-20" through Pure Groove, a boutique record store in London. A full-length double vinyl is in the works."
If you’re like the mid-August me, the impending ending of the summer’s always a drag. It used to be the looming prospect of returning to school that’d have me in disarray, but now it’s mostly the speed at which summer sails by with little beyond a farmer’s tan to show for it.
So, in the constant effort to bring you an upside, we’re counting down the last 33-1/3 days of summer with weekly vinyl giveaways to gracefully usher in the Fall.
Our friends over at Interpunk have supplied us with two reissued versions of Bad Religion's 1994 release 'Stranger Than Fiction' for ONE winner to kick off the 33-1/3 Vinyl Giveaways.
We’ve got the very LAST copy of an Interpunk Exclusive version on clear vinyl (that’s right—sold out, only 500 pressed) and a collectible red vinyl reissue of the Southern California-based band's Atlantic Records debut album (and eighth of their career). Mastered from the original analog tapes! Original album produced by Andy Wallace and Bad Religion! Highlights include "Incomplete" (featuring guest riffs from the MC5's Wayne Kramer), "The Handshake," "Slumber" and the title track!
We’ve got them both just for the asking. Or, the commenting, I should say. Plead your case in the comments below (with some contact info!) and we’ll choose the best of the bunch next Monday (8/24) and launch our next 33-1/3 Giveaway. (If you’re following us on Twitter—and y’ should be—we’ll take your 140 characters as entries as well...)
DC band Dangerósa is celebrating the release of their first EP this Saturday night at The Red and The Black with a line-up assembled just for the occasion.
Florida indie pop band Mumpsy, who are on their own national tour, return to DC for another pairing with Dangerósa having opened for them the front end of their tour back in March. Also returning to DC is the great local alt country band, Typefighter—this show being their first since their own national tour which took the band as far as Salt Lake City and Los Angeles. Opening the evening’s bill will be the new project from Dave Mann of Mittenfields, Sweet Tea Pumpkin Pie, which also features vocalist Emily C of Mittenfields.
This TVD-approved lineup’s stellar from start to finish, so we’ll see ya at The Red and The Black Saturday night—right?
So, it seems that last week’s visit to the old house most likely won’t be the last. The house has got to go up for sale and ultimately the contents of two lives passed, boxed and moved. On the upside, I may be able to squeeze another week of posts out of the endeavor, so there’s that.
Quite a few of you have called, emailed, sent tweets, and Facebook’d me inquiring about my mom. Many thanks to all of you for the support and the awfully warm sentiments.
She’s doing fine it seems, and I’ve only received one call from the nursing home so far. I anticipated, “She’s pulled a knife on Mrs. Jones in the community room...” or “Boy did she ever tell Mr. Smith where to go...”
But, no. She’s been trying to give her jewelry and rings away to the other residents saying something like, “This would look FANTASTIC on you...” I’m told.
Proof that you don’t need to be a ‘new’ band to be a featured First Date as I’ve been a fan of the Trashcan Sinatras since 1990 with the release of their fine, fine debut LP ‘Cake.’
The Sinatras are back with a new release ‘In the Music’ and a tour which stops at The Rock and Roll Hotel tomorrow night (8/13) and straight from the tour bus we caught up with the band's guitarist John Douglas for a bit of a chat:
"We [Trashcan Sinatras] are a six piece vocals, guitars, keyboards, drums and songs band from Scotland. Our forte is songs... songs with character, evocative melodies and lyrics. We are about to release our fifth record called 'In The Music' featuring 10 of our latest creations. The record was recorded mostly live in the studio and is our finest yet. We have been playing as a unit for around twenty years and our chemistry is at it's peak. If you like your music with a little depth and a large dose of quality... put on your grooving shoes and come along to the show.
Addition: Our tour mgr just told me I missed the point which is the importance of mom & pop record shops. We [Trashcan Sinatras] play lots of in-store appearances and it's just so nice to meet actual clerks who know music and love it in all it's forms.
Sadly, it seems the shops are keen as 're-sellers' of either CDs or LPs vs selling "new" records. In order to survive now, a shop has to also sell clothes, posters, small pins and also movies or DVDs to stay afloat as opposed to being just a "record shop" and focusing on the latest old and new music.
And as to vinyl itself, I'm not bothered either way as to the debate of whether vinyl sounds "better" than CDs, but I love that you can hold a 12" jacket with bigger art. That's all I miss about vinyl being better. That and when I move it's harder to lug around my crates of LPs vs the ease of moving CDs."
Wanna know what the earliest tip-off was that something was amiss in my Mom’s home upon first inspection last week?
There was a vinyl record out of its sleeve among a stack of books and paperwork on the kitchen table that doubled as my mom’s desk in a way. There it was, just slid into the pile of stuff. A naked LP.
I went on yesterday about my mom’s musical inclinations, but my dad who wasn’t a musician was a bit of an audiophile in the era of reel to reel tapes and LPs. And man, did I ever get an education as to how to hold the LP by the edges and how to set it upon the spindle as to not scratch the label. And to how gracefully, set the needle down and then later how to properly return the record to its sleeve and refile. Alphabetically, of course.
So, yea. That LP wedged into a pile of books and magazines. Something was clearly amiss.
Throughout her life, my mom has been a wonderful pianist. Entirely self taught and without the ability to read music, she could listen to most pieces and in moments play it back for you almost verbatim. It’s a skill she seemingly had to pick up as her father, a violinist and concert organizer, forestalled my mother’s desire to study and participate in the classical ensembles he’d put together each weekend in the family’s home in Newark, New Jersey.
And my mother never got over it. I think she’d say her father’s grand ego and perhaps chauvinism on some level was the mitigating factor, so mom set out on her own and in the 1940’s and ‘50’s joined various USO groups and began writing music for live, staged performances to welcome soldiers home from the war and those who’d later shuffle on off to further conflicts.
I of course didn’t know my mom in this guise—her musical endeavors having been set aside to raise two kids later on. But oh, the house was full of music daily and her weekend piano performances quite literally could be heard through the neighborhood. And it seems, even up until recently at 84, she was serenading the aides who’d come in three times daily to tend to her and make her meals. I’d hear quite often, “Jon – your mother is SUCH a wonderful piano player...” I’d nod and agree as I’ve heard this all of my life. Self taught, never read music.
In her absence last week, I sat at her baby grand which has followed her throughout her entire life. It’s been well maintained and the innards have been rebuilt many times over and it still rings pitch-perfect.
There was a notebook on top of the piano that I started to flip through and the header on the very first page took me back a bit. In my mother’s oddly singular longhand, she had begun the page with “Memory Lapses.” What followed was an enumeration of things she’d forgotten—some were merely actor’s names or songwriters of popular standards or movie titles. This list grew longer and longer as it became clear she was adding to it over time.
Most surprising however was that, with exacting detail amidst cross-outs and erasures, she’d begun to transcribe all the songs she knew by memory into basic scales and keys with the accompanying lyrics. Page after page, each one marginally less focused than the last until nothing was left but empty white lined pages in her notebook.
Responsibilities we understand, the body fitfully performs.
So, I have a bit of a confession in regard to our 'break' last week—it really wasn't a vacation at all as was insinuated by the vacation graphic that was posted, all tall frosty one and teal ocean water.
In fact, Business Week Magazine framed an article (no joke) on why we were absent from TVD HQ last week:
"On a Tuesday night in late July, Jon Meyers, 42, got the call every child with an elderly parent dreads. His 84-year-old mother, Ruth, who suffers from dementia, had fallen in her kitchen and was heading to a New Jersey hospital by ambulance. But instead of agonizing over not being able to get there quickly—it's four hours from his home in Washington, D.C., to Point Pleasant, N.J.—Meyers took comfort in the fact that Stephen Mielach, a geriatric care manager, was following the ambulance, ready to take control.
Before 2007, Meyers had never heard of geriatric care managers (also called geriatric case managers). But then his mother developed problems that required hospitalization, and Meyers couldn't keep taking days off from his job as an art director ... On the recommendation of his mother's physician, Meyers, an only child, hired Mielach. He accompanies Meyers' mother on doctor visits, looks after her dog on occasion, and even helped with the paperwork for a reverse mortgage so that she could stay in her home."
Little did I realize then, like dominoes, what that one fall hath wrought. But, I've got a blog ... where I'll try to work it out.
TVD goes back to the old house this week. For the last time.
Well, sure. The Finn family is from New Zealand which technically IS down under ‘Down Under.’ So, for ME, it’s works as a bit of a capper to the week...
...in which we welcome back TVD's good friend Leerone:
I'm a Featured Artist this week (July 29-August 4) in the Microsoft Windows Sponsored Songs program, a campaign Microsoft is doing to advertise their newest Windows Media Player. What does it mean? 1,000 free mp3 or mp4 downloads by indie artists. My song "here on earth/The Opening" is one of ten songs omnipresent here: Myspace.com/Windows and available for free download.
The Sponsored Songs program was launched by ReverbNation.com, a social networking site created to help musicians turn emerging online technology into marketing tools, fanbase monitors and, ultimately, money makers. In more sugar coated terms, it’s a place where genuine music enthusiasts can easily browse, sample, and discover music from established and emerging artists, and where artists can distribute their music across the web regardless of where people want to go get it.
Sponsored Songs is an opt-in program for select artists that use ReverbNation.com as their online marketing platform. 1,000 out of the site's 400,000 indie artists were selected to join the pilot program (by pilot, they mean it is a trial run). Artists are paid for each qualified download, and are shown the exact advertisement for their approval prior to the campaign launch.
Who is the sponsor paying these starving artists for their music and giving it away for free? Microsoft Windows. The program is the latest in the trend— large companies using independent music to reach new audiences. The music can lead the brand into new markets, and simultaneously offers bands a new avenue of access to potential fans while earning the band a pittance.
ReverbNation is probably the most artist-friendly social networking site that I have come across and that says a lot as my music is pretty much on every significant music site there is (I’ve done the research!). “We treat Artists like we would want to be treated,” says Lou Plaia, vice president of artist relations at ReverbNation.com.
The three month campaign will provide reach metrics to the participating brand (in this case, Microsoft Windows) by tracking the songs with a digital watermark as they move through peer-to-peer networks.
According to Jed Carlson, chief operating officer of ReverbNation, “Sponsored Songs aligns the interests of artists, fans, and major brands, creating a win-win-win situation where free music is a shared goal that benefits all parties.” I (want to) believe this statement is true and I’m honored to be included in the program.
I’ve taken a particular shine to both bands from Down Under today. As a matter of fact, we named bluejuice’s ‘Vitriol’ our top track for last year and they indeed (along with our friend Will) put this whole week into motion. So, without any further delay...
"Hello from bluejuice. We're a band from Sydney - a band that will do almost anything to get to the top. We'll sell our souls by spending years of our existence in relative obscurity as a stodgy funk band. We'll make a desperate grab for fame by being independent and self-managed for 7 years. We'll tour the country over and over again, and sometimes sleep in the van just like the celebrities we admire so much. We are truly shameless in our quest for overnight success. Let's hope we never make it.
Anyway, we've been described as many things, "punk-hop" being the most recent; "shit" being equally as recent and slightly more relevant. We've just released our first single from our second album, which was produced by Dr Chris Shaw, a Godly man known for his penchant for lip balms and fine red wines. He also has a history of working with people we'd throw up on if we met them - Bob Dylan, Public Enemy, Weezer, JSBX, Paula Abdul. That dude has cyborg ears.
I spent many hours as a youth in various independent record stores in Sydney's CBD - Waterfront, Red Eye, and Good Groove. Waterfront Records was a brilliant place that fulfilled my all of my teenage desires (well...mostly) when the owner asked me to look after the store while he went outside. He was gone for all of ten seconds, but in that ten seconds I felt like a Nerd God. I also felt like making off with his entire collection of JSBX rarities. Sadly, Waterfront is no more, possibly due to their breezy adherence to store security."
"We are a rambling, Melbourne, alt-acoustic, pop four-piece called Skipping Girl Vinegar. I'm obsessed with melody, pop hook and the craft of songwriting. We spent way too long writing and recording the material for our debut album, which took close on four years. It was, however, a process of growing up as writers and trying to stretch ourselves to make something with as much substance as we had within us.
Our name comes from a 1930's, old world neon sign located in Richmond, Melbourne, Australia that features a girl skipping in neon. The girl is belovedly known as 'Audrey' the Skipping Girl Vinegar. She is an old, cracked, underground, pop icon of Melbourne that we felt an affinity with and that is deeply rooted in our childhood memories of driving past at night.
I love independent record stores; they have been a haven for me to discover new music. They are usually run by obsessed music lovers with an encyclopedic knowledge that can turn you onto something new as well as reference you back into influences from the past. Two of my favourite ones in Melbourne are Basement Discs and Polyester Records. We are big supporters of indie stores, who are a life blood for emerging and underground bands. We created an Audio Library bag for our debut album which was exclusively available at indie stores and online from the band in an attempt to support and thank these stores for their support.
I was buying CD's in an indie store yesterday - I need credit card intervention!"
There’s actually a photo of Michael Hutchence holding an INXS fan club newsletter with the cover I drew. Snicker if you will, but back in 83/84 they were it for me. There was a newness and a rawness to them in the “Shabooh Shoobah” era that really got me—which didn’t slither fully into that LP’s follow up “The Swing.” Nevertheless, INXS was on heavy rotation.
As I’ve remarked before, songs or LPs are like little pin-pricks of memories for me. In particular for whatever reason, I’m reminded of a mid-June afternoon as school was winding down. We were on half days then and I had come home just before lunch time.
My dad was off at work and mom was standing in front of the bathroom mirror in our coral green bathroom, WCBS newsradio on, cig churning in the ashtray, and we just had a chat. About which I don’t actually recall, just the visual lingers, and afterward I headed down to my little artist studio in the basement where the stereo and the LPs were and grooved on track one, side two of ‘The Swing’ - ‘Johnson’s Airplane.’
‘Four long lines one darker than the rest Each one has a purpose making borders on the land Farmer's pride you know he works real hard From a small aeroplane you can see the fields...’
Last night when I arrived home the phones were ringing like mad. The cell, the house, the cell, the house. The care manager I’ve hired for my mom was trailing the ambulance with her inside as they careened to the emergency room. Mom, at 84 now, had taken a tumble in the kitchen and was knocked unconscious and passed out and had remained on the tile floor until the aide returned that evening to prepare dinner.
Ultimately she became lucid but had a number of pains and precautions were warranted so strapped to the gurney she was and zipped across town to the hospital.
I inhabit pin-pricks of pin-pricks of memories as new ones manifest from the same source material.
‘Four long years one leaner than the rest The animals are thin and the pasture's dry Farmer's pride if the weather doesn't lie From a small aeroplane you can see the sea Lots of blue very deep blue...’
Day #2 of "TVD Down Under"...and boy is my jaw tired. (I kid, I kid...)
But hey - Scotland, Ireland, England...step right up for your theme weeks, emm kay? Publicists/promoters get in touch...
...anyway, now where were we?
"We are the five piece band called Special Patrol. We come from a little town in the deep south of Australia called Adelaide. The isolation down here makes for some mind numbing drives. The nearest city to us on a national tour is a nine hour drive and the next one after that, Sydney is sixteen hours away. With five members plus a sound guy in a car one can lose their mind quite easily.
We have been making music for years and the process is one that we enjoy like nothing else… apart from being tickled under the arms... man that tickles! We started making music in high school and have now made three albums and two EP's. We are just gearing up to release the third album recently named "The Stranger's Dozen".
Our favourite record store is a tiny store in the town of Adelaide called Big Star Records. This store stocks all the local bands plus a great selection of national and international artists, has creaky floorboards and home made record shelves. If you are ever down this way come and say hi."
"The Paper Scissors (TPS) play rock music that borrows from all of our favorite songs and styles from the past 50 years, and tries to consolidate these into pop music. We come from Sydney, Australia which is a big pretty city, but doesn't have the healthiest of music scenes, there is definitely room to move and play shows and get known, but a lot of the time people are too busy barbecuing or dining al fresco to go and see music. We don't really consider ourselves a part of the scene because we don't really exist as just musicians, we are all pretty chilled - dorky actually - exchanging cooking tips, talking about David Lynch films and drinking tea.
Sydney is a great place to live and write, but you need to escape as much as possible. Our music is usually based on groove and simplicity, but then layered on top of with lyrics and melodies that strive to be memorable and universal- personal stories from cathartic times that have enough ambiguity that people can still project themselves into the story. Sonically though, it usually takes this catharsis and turns it on its head and into something that has elements of fun and joy that hold hands with the darker noisier bits.
We made an EP in 2006, an album in 2007 and just released The Howl EP in July 09. Howl sees us evolving and growing up and is a good snapshot of where we are heading. Our next release is going to be our first vinyl, we are planning on doing a 7 inch single later in the year which is fucking exciting.
My favorite record store in Sydney is Red Eye Records in the city - Red Eye stocks a lot of good vinyl and they have 2 stores- one for new and 2nd hand, and the other one is just 2nd hand. They have in-stores and I love going there to trade, giving them old shit I don't listen to anymore and getting store credit in my hot little hands..." The Paper Scissors - Howl (Mp3)
The Liberation Dance Party returns to DC9 this Friday night with a special live performance from NYC-based (Lower East Side, to be exact) The Phenomenal Handclap Band whose tracks we’ve been grooving to all week here at ol’ TVD HQ. 
