Capital Swamp: The DC Resource Thread

Ian Mackaye's on Kojo's show on WAMU today Wednesday talking Fugazi archive(they just added 25 more shows)

Waldorf, MD soulman Jim Bennett has gotten nice coverage at Daddy B. Nice's r'n'b soul blog

I posted about this in the sandbox thread - there are successful record stores in every city I have spent time in post-high school - Amoeba in San Francisco (though there were always negative rumors about how well they were actually doing), Princeton Record Exchange, Academy Records (and many others) in NYC. The key to all of those was increasing foot traffic by selling music at every price point, from 99 cents to 99 dollars. I don't buy that DC is too unartistic or unworthy for a CD shop. But DC is indeed not a town that can sustain a CD shop that prices new albums at $16.99 and $17.99, with a "sale" at $15.99. Even at the clearance price, I got 11 CDs for $150.

Bridge Street Books in Georgetown is still open for people who miss B&N, though the amazing old/rare book shop down the street on 29th also recently closed, to little fanfare.

Bridge Street is pretty nice, I bought Xhuxk's book there

just noticed U Hall booked Aeroplane again for February.

What's the deal with the "9:30 Club/Black Cat presents" designation for the rock shows?

Cassian's opening for Aeroplane, which is exciting! In a similar vein, Classixx is coming back in Feb and I'm opening for them, which is also exciting!

this explains the 9:30/Black Cat/U Hall thing better than I could:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/going-out-gurus/post/u-street-music-hall-and-930-club-partnership-brings-more-bands-to-u-hall-more-djs-to-930-backbar/2011/11/22/gIQAtYzflN_blog.html

omg after about 10 months of being ill I might finally be on the mend. I will hit it for Classix and probs Aeroplane if at all possible.

Classixx are seriously some of the best DJs I've ever seen.

i don't know if it was part of the partnership or if there were undersales or what but i'm super-psyched that buraka som sistema is moved from the 930 club to u. so much more dancefloor-oriented (wherein the 930 club sort of just isn't)

RIP DC blues man Whop Frazier (who also played with various old DC soul outfits and maybe even Chuck Brown at some point)

http://inabluemood.blogspot.com/

http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/artsdesk/music/2012/01/06/william-whop-frazier-1943-2011/#comments

I just got home from the U Hall annual staff party and I just want to say that it's such a genuinely great group of people with extraordinary chemistry, and I have no doubt our success is attributable to them in so many ways.

Also we had a moonbounce and sumo suits at the party and it was amazing.

i think mark farina a few weeks back was my first time out there. i'd just like to thank the establishment for allowing me to listen to house music while standing there eating a blunted pho dog, life just seemed really right

Busy with family, gonna have to likely miss Buraka Som Sistema there tonight, and at Politics & Prose tonight at 7- Daphne Carr, ethnomusicologist and series editor of the annual Best Music Writing anthology in a discussion about music and music writing with this year’s guest editor, New Yorker music critic and author of The Rest is Noise, Alex Ross, along with contributors including Ann Powers, Chris Richards, Frankin Bruno, and Jason Cherkis.

the buraka show was NUTS. how do we make that happen again like tomorrow

I don't believe we can make it happen tomorrow but especially with the 9:30 club partnership there should be a lot more great live shows coming up.

I couldn't make it to the show tonight (at home working on flyers for more shows) but all the feedback I heard was super great.

Did Buraka spray water guns like they often do?

well there was the water bottle they sprayed

and erm the vodka bottle i may or may not have gotten vodka poured into my mouth from them like a clubbing it up undergrad

...and bonus points for the kuduro'd lionel ritchie "all night long" and the straight "rhythm is a dancer" from snap

orchard lounge was really good last night too, i hadn't heard of them just went on a whim. lol i'm kind of into 18+ over shows, the kids like to have fun rather than stand there on the floor drinking/grinding.

eeeeverybody was dancing last night it was fun but so unexpected for a rainy Wednesday night!

Sorry for posting it at the last minute, but Paint Fumes at Comet Ping Pong tonight looks like it will be fun

oh dag

How was it?

oh i was at the last deathrats show w/draize at la casa

it ruled

a middle aged couple walked by me on the sidewalk afterward and said "those deathrats....excitement, huh?"

So does DC band Bike Trip sound like a Latin hybrid of the Pixies and Deerhoof as the Red Palace website says, or like an indie-pop band into African soukous and highlife and art-school experimentalism as the City Paper says...

I guess I will have to research on my own and find out. They're at Black Cat tonight, but I can't make it.

...what's latin about this? the (very) remotely ncalypso sound? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oOYZyQrRRgk

Pixies and Deerhoof?? Just admit it and say they sound like Vampire Weekend, that will be more effective at getting people to come.

Eddie Jones & the Young Bucks at Westminster Church from 6 to 9 should be a nice evening of old-school soul.

That's tonight.

City Paper Arts editor has angered D.C. singer/songwriters

http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/artsdesk/music/2012/01/20/should-city-paper-cover-more-singer-songwriters/#more-65047

I haven't heard any DC folky singer/songwriters that wow me

going to Twin Sister at R&R Hotel tonight.

They don't choose the genre of music that radiates from their soul any more than a person chooses his or her sexual orientation.

lol wut

...and that's why they don't cover more singer/songwriters

I finally listened to a Justin Trawick album I was sent and it was a dull mix of folk and jam band sounds.

bands I am curious about:

Deathfix --members: (Brendan Canty (Fugazi), Rich Morel, Devin Ocampo(Medications) & Mark Cisneros)

Cane and the Sticks members include Peter Hayes

Also: Black Alley http://dcist.com/2011/10/dcist_interview_kacey_of_black_alle.php

deathfix was great when i saw them last month

They're gonna be at Comet for the DJ Toubin benefit gig

Me on the glass mostly empty Wammies nominations. But this year I tried to help:

http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/artsdesk/music/2012/01/26/here-they-go-again-the-26th-annual-wammy-award-nominees/

nice boots and vest, MAN

http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/articles/42148/why-do-dc-bands-suck-so-much-now/

Ha

even the longer version is still remarkably myopic

http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/blogs/artsdesk/music/2012/01/26/why-do-d-c-bands-suck-so-much-the-directors-cut/

people hate on these recent articles but i tend to agree with the general intent i got out of it, that most people harping on the state of bands tend to just be looking for those that fit the tired presh "indie rock" aesthetic. i'm fine with the state of dc bands. there's not really any particular city in the states i can think of where i'm soooo blown by the state of so many amaaazzzing bands that i'd need to compare it to dc just to detract from the distrct

Just listened to Ted Garber, the singer who was complaining about the City Paper's Arts Editor's dislike for singer/songwriters. Uh, no thanks.

Tonight I went to the second of two sold-out shows at the Lincoln Theatre for a singer-songwriter who played an unaccompanied set of acoustic guitar+vocal tracks. And Jeff Mangum gained that adoring audience without all the marketing and exposure opportunities that are available to artists nowadays.

I have and liked those Neutral Milk Hotel albums and would not have predicted this degree of attention. You mean you do not think it was actually a marketing technique of Mangum to hide out for years and years and then to put out a box set and tour? Just kidding. Interesting how the mystique about him grew over the years.

This isn't so much about the music side of things, but damn the 9:30 club staff is impressive. On Saturday they were running shows at the 9:30 club, U Hall, and the Lincoln Theater at the same time without breaking a sweat.

For the most part it also seems like the Fillmore has decided not to compete with them for the same type of acts (some exceptions to this--the Roots)

Not sure anyone else cares, but I am curious if the Hamilton is getting crowds for music-- are people paying $15 for local been around forever roots-rock bands, and will they pay Birchmere prices for out of town roots and blues acts? I have not been there. Fr*tz's Washington Post Going Out Gurus/Weekend thing on the price of a grilled cheese sandwich there was uh entertaining (I guess it should not surprise me that a Clydes-owned place is charging too much for just adequately prepared American style food).

no price is too much for adequately prepared American style food at 4am