Capital Swamp: The DC Resource Thread

Wot's Up

Caribbean music club and more the Crossroads is closed for "maintenance." In the 60s and early 70s this was a honky tonk roadhouse. Supposedly the Stones came here one night in 71 or so to check out guitarist Roy Buchanan.

http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/artsdesk/general/2010/12/22/crossroads-nightclub-still-closed-for-maintenance/#more-37712

City Paper cover story on Dave Nada's mini-genre, moombahton:

http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/articles/40191/our-year-in-moombahton/full/

so awesome

Moombahton Mondays at Velvet Lounge were the highlight of the summer, no doubt

the couple of times i went back home recently and hit up burns' underground soul solution at the esl i kept finding myself over in the other room listening tomb drop moombhaton with a girl on drums

it's great to finally see bass music end up in print in dc

This City Paper year-end article about the difficulties in finding practice space in gentrified DC was also interesting:

http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/articles/40194/practice-imperfect

Washington Post Weekend section listed top DC rock, metal, and hiphop bands/artists for the year

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/12/22/AR2010122203627.html?sid=ST2010122204025

http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/artsdesk/music/2010/12/27/crossroads-nightclub-reopens/

Crossroads reopens

I'm glad Crossroads is back.

That story on practice spaces is about 20% good insights and 80% bullshit on gentrification. Guess what, if you practice with a band and full amps in a rowhouse you're an asshole no matter how long your neighbors have lived next door. As always, the lack of good affordable rehearsal space in DC has a lot more to do with the city's federal/residential history and the lack of industrial areas than it does with any short term population trends.

are there any affordable metro-accessible rehearsal space complexes anywhere in dc, though? i don't doubt that about dc's residential history, but when i lived in boston it seemed like every other band i knew paid for a space in the sound museum

nb: collin is a bro, but i think he comes off way more strident in this article than he actually is about this issue - although as one of the last people who lived in kansas house he's got some fair points to make about this

"Affordable" from my reading on this seems to be what is lacking.

If I recall my history right, I think many Dischord bands were practicing (and living) in the burbs--Arlington and Bethesda.

Meanwhile the DC hiphop debates over whether any DC rappers are great and whether they should get more media support has been happening--Noz vs Head-Roc in CP, and elsewhere plus kys website list

http://kysdc.com/locals/mmartin/the-kys-list-the-dmvs-hottest-rappers-2010/

Thurs. Jan. 6th

Hillbilly Jazz (Chick Hall and Jim Stephanson on guitar and vocals, John Previti on bass and Brooks Tegler on drums) at the Surf Club on Kenilworth Ave in Hyattsville, MD (not exactly metro-friendly I don't think)

I think Big Hoos might like this show. The Surf Club is now mostly just a bar for the area Hispanic community, but on ocassional Thursdays it goes back to its traditional honky-tonk roots (or uh average blues-rock and alt-country side). Chick Hall is a talented fun guy to hear play though.

Eddie Jones & the Young Bucks at 6 tonight at Westminster Church Sw. He's an older soul guy who rarely plays in public much anymore

Wow. Glad I finally made it to Westminster for a 6 to 9 pm Blue Monday gig.

http://www.tgrionline.com/2011/01/dave-nada-spins-at-good-life-tuesdays.html

Good Life Tuesdays

you guys are all checking out the Kokayi album, right

That's quite a write up for Good Life Tuesdays.

x-post. I should have checked out the Kokayi album already but haven't yet. I liked him ages ago when I saw him live as part of rap with musicians group Opus Okuben.

Here's more re top dc rappers and that WKYS list:

http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/artsdesk/music/2011/01/04/dmv-rap-attack-wkys-hottest-rappers-of-2010/

Head is spinning around trying to decide whether to try for Optimo on Thursday.

oh yeah y'all Optimo tomorrow night! About to head out now to see Treasure Fingers.

the feigned insularity of the DC indie hip hop community continues to astound me

The community,though, like with other genres is subdivided into even smaller groups (old-time DC rappers grumbling that their golden age era fancy technique flow doesn't get recognized; younger ones; younger signed to label ones; pop ones; street mixtape ones) although yep, they have certain attitudes in common

fuuuuuuck, Optimo were extraordinary at U Hall tonight. They'll be back.

So amazing! I needed that something awful as well.

Danced like a moron until the very end.

oh and the venue was killer. will be going back.

I feel out of the loop, who is Optimo and what kind of stuff does he play?

Yo no se.

Various rock music gigs at homes getting highlighted on Post click tracks and the in yr basement tumbler and elsewhere, but none featuring the local band I want to see : True Womanhood

ya'll should keep this thread up to date on dope shit going down on a Saturday night.

Various rock music gigs at homes getting highlighted on Post click tracks and the in yr basement tumbler

curmudgeon ty ty ty ty ty this is exactly what i've been looking for since i moved here

i honestly don't know how to interpret that sentence. (curmdudgeon's, not that of a HOOS)

haha i just googled 'inyrbasement' and found a long list of small club shows & house shows, i'm in heaven

I was referring to "house shows" (aka gigs in people's basements and such) highlighted in a Chris Richards posting on the Washington Post Click Tracks blog, and on a tumblr site.

http://inyrbasement.tumblr.com/

Also, I do a "whirled music and more" once a month calendar (e-mail me and I will add you) and you can find some stuff on the City Paper Arts Desk blog and elsewhere

Sat. Jan. 8

Non Stop Bhangra at 11 at Artisphere in Arlington ( a Bhangra and more party, featuring dance lessons with Dholrhythms Dance Company, followed by dance performances, live music sets, visuals, live painting, and DJs spinning an electic mix of bhangra, hip hop, reggae and electronica. metro accessible, fre parking when you get your your parking thing stamped

http://capitalbop.com/

http://blog.washingtonpost.com/clicktrack/2011/01/eleven_minutes_at_the_dc_jazz.html

thanks dude

No problem. More sources: Chris Burns e-mail list and the tgrionline.com site highlight some dance events, and there's kesta happenings website for reggaeton and Latin, and the W. Post Going Out Gurus website list sometimes has some cool stuff and WPFW's Saturday radio programmers from 10 am to 5 highlight chitlin circuit soul, and WPFW's Tony Carr has a caribbean events website...

sources:
www.dccaribbeanconnection.com/NewSite/Events.asp
www.wherewegotozydeco.com
www.foolsnightout.com

one last link for the day

http://www.myspace.com/truewomanhood

saw noon:30 & White Noise Supremacists at Comet Ping Pong. Showed up way more excited for the scuzz of WNS, but wound up being blown away by the whole shoegazenb thing noon:30 have going on, like Blonde Redhead on a steady diet of Philly soul & Nico solo albums.

am def gonna see em again at liv on the 31st, then gonna try to catch wavves after at 9:30.

Oh forgot that was at Comet last night. I wanted to see Paul Collins there Friday night but didn't.

hadn't used it in years but sad to see pheer.com show listings gone

forgot about that one.

Sunday Washington Post article by classical music critic Midgette about the building of regional, suburban performing arts centers (Hylton Arts Ctr in Manassas, Strathmore in Mont. Cty, Clarice Smith in PG, etc.) over the last ten years slightly interesting. She sorta points out how expensive it is to build these huge places and how difficult it is to fill 1,100 size rooms that rent for alot, but I think she could have come down harder on the programmers of these places and their lack of creativity in booking, no matter how hard it is (plus some of the places have smaller rooms; or they could just close off the upstairs). Get the taxpayers their money's worth.

I've been pleasantly surprised at how Strathmore is promoting itself and the kinds of bookings they're doing, like they've got Ra Ra Riot there in a few weeks which I expect is gonna draw a way bigger crowd than the Steve Reich showcase me and tza went to a couple months ago.

Their "eclectic" offerings (I think they use the word "eclectic")in the mansion are good, I just think they need to do more of them. Although a little birdie told me that their budget for those is smaller, so maybe that explains the limited number.

But I also would hate to see that more creative booking for these types of places be simply defined as what a Washington Post reviewer said in regards to a Baltimore indie-rock band playing the Kennedy Millennium stage- we need more of this(indie-rock on the M. Stage). That's true but these places need more of lots of different types of non-symphonic music.

http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/artsdesk/music/2011/01/10/yeah-about-the-wammies/

It's time again for the well-intentioned but flawed Wammie awards.

I think I enjoy parsing the head-scratching nominations more than I would an actual good awards showcase.

From the City Paper post:

But a browsing of this year's Wammies nominees raises enough red flags—like, where's all the good indie rock? It's great that Bob Mould is nominated again, but did he actually release music in the last year? Props for nominating Nadastrom, but why does the list otherwise ignore the EDM scene's banner year?—to suggest that this well-intentioned awards ceremony is pretty removed from much of the great music that comes out of D.C. each year.

^ I'd like to note that Nadastrom moved to LA late last year and Bob Mould moved to SF in 2009.

Just looking at the electronica (don't get me started) segment:

- in the "Electronica Vocalist" category, two of the nominees live in SF and Baltimore, and three of the other four are on the same very small label

- in the "Electronica Performing Artist" category, one of the nominees (Nadastrom) has never performed live, they only DJ. But they're not nominated in the following...

- In the "Electronica DJ" category, they have "Dubfire & Sharam" nominated. The two of them were huge as Deep Dish before they stopped working together - five years ago.

I mean, people are going to nominate dumb shit. It happens. But you'd think they could at least do a quick google check on things before announcing nominations that only serve to make them look like idiots. The thing is, these are niche awards and anyone who cares enough to pay attention also likely knows enough about the local scene to know the nominations are bullshit with just a cursory glance.

the EDM scene's banner year?

banner year? aside from recognition as moombahton ground zero, how so.

Good points I Died. Fauxmarc, I think the writer is referring to the opening of U St. Music Hall. Ali S. over at tbd.com has been writing similar such praise.

Meanwhile Blob's Park in Jessup, Maryland has not yet been sold and turned into real estate for Mcmansions:

This Friday, 14 January, The Oklahoma Twisters hit the stage at 8. Free survival dance lesson with Ben at the first break (9ish). Word is getting out on this great continuing roots music series every 2nd friday of the month. Get there early, order some schnitzel, get a shot of ice cold schnapps from Max's amazing ice-cream case, and ease on out on the dance floor!

Blob's "no neon sign/40 acres of parking/watch out for the deer" Park, 8024 Max Blobs Park Road, Jessup, MD

http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/artsdesk/music/2011/01/11/more-thoughts-on-the-wammies-nomination-process-and-omissions/#more-38920