Electrohouse Party

If you are ever in Los Angeles, you need to hit up a Droog event. The DJ/promotion team's parties aren't like anything you would imagine if your only exposure to Hollywood nightlife comes from The Hills and TMZ. In plainer English, their parties are fun, no pseudo-celebrity bullshit and no poorly mixed banal radio hits. Last night's party at The Room on Cahuenga Blvd. was an amazing alternative to the local Oscar night madness.

The night's secret guests were Tiefschwarz (photo above), who are amongst my favorite remixers (seek their mix of Depeche Mode's "John the Revelator"). The duo played early, from 11 p.m. until about 12:45 a.m. and it was beautiful, tons of slick electro house that made dancing more of an involuntary response than an action. We made it up to the front of the packed crowd (an amazing feat in itself given that Sunday is typically horrible for 21+ clubs and the bulk of the Hollywood clubs I've seen have been slow for the past few months) and kept up with the groove until it got too hot to continue.



Following Tiefschwarz was Matias Aguayo, who popped into Los Angeles after playing a slew of dates in Mexico. Aguayo is a member of Bumbumbox, a Buenos Aires-based collective that performs live alongside pre-recorded DJ sets playing through a boom box. We got to hang out with Aguayo, who is based both in Buenos Aires and Paris, for a bit before the set and chat about things like City of Quartz. He played live with compelling Euro-electro vocals and tons of pop hooks. We hope to see him playing in LA again.

Clubs We Love: XY:XX at Miss T's Barcade

Miss T's Barcade is a retrogeek watering hole in Koreatown filled with classic video games and toys that date back to the time that Atari and Nintendo ruled the living rooms. For someone like me, who stopped playing video games when Street Fighter II got huge, this is the perfect spot to veg out whilst standing upright. But the truth of the matter is that I was never very good at anything outside of my personal Big Three (Ms. Pacman, Tetris and Super Mario Brothers), so, if I do join in the gaming madness, I tend to hit every button until I blow up something.

Saturday night, though, we didn't get to play anything, due to the huge crowd at the club and, at least on my part, a lack of quarters (been using up those in an attempt to avoid more parking tickets). Without the games, the Barcade is still a good time. Special thanks to the bartenders for pouring serious soju Cape Cods.

We typically hit up the Barcade for XY:XX, which is the new party from Job Leatherette and Eric Dead of M/R/X. The club takes place on the third and fifth Saturdays of the month and it's a can't miss party. XY:XX is far more low key than M/R/X. There are no bands and people tend to come as they are, no Vivienne Westwood or Cabaret outfits here. The music is primarily synth-punk, mostly stemming from the 1980s. I only have the vaguest idea of what is played here as Job in particular never fails to stump this electronic freak.

Part of what makes the Barcade special is its location. Koreatown is now what Hollywood was when I started clubbing in the mid-1990s. It's a place to people watch. For example, when headed out onto the sidewalk for a smoke last night, there was a bit of street theater going on at the corner and then, out of the crowd bolted a bike rider covered in lights. He kindly let me take his picture.

Lady Sovereign Is Back

Lady Sovereign is playing Underground tonight. It's going to be off the hook.

Upcoming: Gitane Demone & Dame Darcy @ Bar Sinister

My friend Elizabeth of eFeM Productions is co-promoting tomorrow night's Bar Sinister event and it's going to be special. The evening will begin with Gitane Demone, who played with Christian Death in addition to her own numerous solo releases, screening her new DVD Life After Death, featuring footage of her past performances with Rozz Williams. Demone will be signing copies of the DVD as artist Dame Darcy signs copies of her new book Gasoline. There will also be a Dame Darcy art exhibit and both performers will play live with their respective projects.

Unfortunately, I have an all-work, no-play weekend ahead of me, so I cannot attend. If you're free, I suggest that you go. I think I will be listening to the live broadcast on KXLU.

The Cahuenga Strut

Ah, Cahuenga Blvd. Once upon a time, it was just a street whose name baffled out-of-towners ("How do you say that? Ka-hoo-en-ga?" "Uh, no, its Ka-wang-uh"). Now it's the heart of everything a true local hates about the city-- traffic, overpriced parking, people who cite Lindsay Lohan as a "hero" on their MySpace pages.

We usually avoid this part of town, it's not worth the expense and frustration. But last night, Martin Landsky, of Poker Flat, played his first gig in L.A. (for a party hosted by Droog) and, you know, now that the Germans are finally making their way out to our city, we have to support.

So we drove across Selma, down Wilcox, around Hollywood and up Cahuenga for what seemed like an hour, trying to cut through alleyways that were actually the secret parking spots of valets. And then, when we finally found a lot with space available, we paid $15 for the privilege.

Weekends on Cahuenga means sweeping down the boulevard as part of a humid swarm of bodies, most of whom you could live a life without ever wanting to meet.

"What is this, douchebags on parade?" I asked Carlos.

"Geez, say it a little louder, Liz," he answered.

"Oh, I don't care."

On Cahuenga, the girls all look the same-- barely dressed and in varying stages of drunk, clutching on to their friends as they stumble in between cars on too-high heels, trying to live the West Coast version of Sex and the City. The guys fall into two camps, those who fancy themselves rock stars or actors and those who will tell you that they are producers, probably because they lent money to a cousin shooting a student film at CSUN. The musician/actor guys are scruffy, with unwashed hair, faux-shabby clothing, essentially a high priced version of the dudes who hang out at Spaceland. The producer types are clean-cut to a point that borders on parody. Their hair is slicked back, their clothes are obviously expensive and most likely of European design, and the scent of their aftershave preceeds them by half a city block. These are people living the L.A. life without any clue of what that life actually is, driving out from the suburbs or moving here from somewhere else because Entourage makes it look so damn fun.

And somewhere in the middle of this mess was The Room, a destination marked by a line of people who looked completely unconcerned with being cool. We chatted up the two guys in front of us. They were DJs, of course, and one was British, again, of course, and they were here not because of some hype surrounding the venue or even the promotion, but because of Landsky. Inside, the club was packed and the sound-- primarily minimal techno-- was pristine, comparable to that of a mega-club in terms of clarity and volume (this, I should note, is a bit unsual for a small space in L.A., where distortion and too-low volume is common). It was a proper club with great music and people who were more interested in dancing than taking shots of bottle service vodka while discussing what they do for a living. In a neighborhood where L.A. Bullshit is a selling point, this was something real.

The Coldwave Hits Chinatown

There are clubs that I like and clubs that I love. M/R/X-Wolfpack, which goes down the first Saturday of every month at Roberto's, falls into the latter category for three simple reasons. First, the dudes in the M/R/X room play things that I manage to completely stump me (and I'm actually a pretty good trainspotter). Second, the dudes in the Wolfpack room play things that I know but haven't heard in years (like "Giddy Giddy Carousel" last night). Third, the selection of performing bands is always excellent.

I should also mention that the promoters create a nice ambiance inside goth sports bar Roberto's.

This was the Wolfpack room before people arrived.



This was the M/R/X room, also taken shortly after doors opened. (We went to Philippe's for French dip sandwiches, so we got to the club unusually early.)





Last night, the club hosted an event for Wierd Records, a New York label whose only band that rang familiar to me was Blacklist (I found them through Rich Girls Are Weeping and the name stuck in my head because it's a Legendary Pink Dots song). Apparently, Wierd is also an NYC club that looks far more interesting than all of the trite-sounding NYC clubs I read about in magazines.

Since this was a Wierd party, DJ Pieter Schoolwerth of the minimal electro and coldwave club/label played a lengthy and interesting DJ set. I'll be honest, I had no idea what he was playing, but the music prompted three most-likely-straight guys to strike homoerotic poses on the dance floor. Additionally, the two bands scheduled for the evening were from the Wierd family.

Xeno & Oaklander were the first to play. This is a Brooklyn based duo that sounds a bit like Depeche Mode in that phase between the loss of Vince Clarke and the full-time gain of Alan Wilder. I imagine that sentiment means nothing to people who are not Modies and, yet, I feel no need to explain further.






Martial Canterel played well after Xeno & Oaklander finished. In fact, Canterel went on so late that we were all effectively kicked out of the club as he hit the last note of his last song. Like his Wierd Record cohorts, there is a dearth of biographic information on Canterel. I will just say that he is one man with a keyboard setup that plays in a minimal fashion similar to Fad Gadget sans the nutty stage show.







At some point, Don Bolles spun in the Wolfpack room. This must have been while one of the bands played because we missed the set. I'm sure their were some darkly psychedelic and totally obscure jams involved.

We're in Seattle Part III: On Mexican Food and Grunge

On Thursday night, the nice door guy suggested that we try eating at Bimbo's Bitchin' Burritos, which is apparently a very hot Mexican food establishment on Capitol Hill. Since the restaurant is only a block away from Nuemos, we decided to grab dinner there on Friday night.

Now even though neither Carlos nor I are of Mexican decent, we are L.A. natives, which makes us fairly particular about our Mexican food. It just seems like people outside of L.A. (or, even a lot of high class L.A. types) can't handle the basic concept driving all Mexican dishes-- lard makes things taste better. But, we're in Seattle now, so we figured we ought to give the city's take on Mexican food a chance.

Bimbo's menu features a few varieties of burritos, tacos and nachos. Much to my dismay, there is nothing involving chili relleno here and very little involving big scoops of guac. With that in mind, I figured I would go with the least authentic of Mexican dishes-- the nachos. I ordered a vegetarian version, since it boasted lots of guacamole, and asked to hold the sour cream. I was pleasantly surprised to see that my plate of nachos came just as I like them-- all stuff and light on the chips. However, the chips were pretty small, which meant that I had to eat most of it with a fork. That just seems a bit awkward. Carlos had a chicken burrito, which he said was alright, but I got the impression he wasn't impressed with Seattle's take on the L.A. staple. Yeah, that's why I ordered nachos.

As far as the ambiance is concerned, Bimbo's looks a lot like Jabberjaw did back in 1996. The place is decorated with flea market finds, including a plethora of Lucha Libre memorabilia and Keane paintings. Musically, they seem to dig the Melvins and things that sound like the Melvins.

It's bizarre that the Melvins, a Washington band that relocated to Los Angeles, has become the reference point of this trip. It seems that grunge was never just a trend up here and, as such, it really never went away. The last time I saw this many people wearing flannel, I was a senior in high school.

After Bimbo's we walked around Capitol Hill. Like L.A., there are a lot of homeless people. Unlike L.A., the graffiti is minimal. All we saw was "El Barto" sprayed across the back of a brick building. Someone must have been feeling nostalgic for the glory days of the Simpsons.

We stopped inside a coffee house before heading to Neumos. That is another difference between L.A. and Seattle, this city actually still has coffee houses that aren't affiliated with Starbucks or Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf, which is perhaps a bit ironic considering that Starbucks is from Seattle. I can't remember the name of the coffee house, but it was virtually identical to anything we had in L.A. ten years ago. Inside, they played TV on the Radio, which might be the most modern thing one can find that comes from the School of the Melvins. One thing was obvious, though, Seattle is a rock city, so much so that it makes L.A. seem like Berlin in comparison.

Back at Neumos, the crowd was much smaller than the night before. I don't know if this was because Guns 'N' Bombs isn't as well known as Diplo, or because the crowd was split between three rooms.

If the dB events are indicative of the dance scene in Seattle, one point can be made. People do not dress up here. In L.A., we always thought of ourselves as being fairly casual, but here, everyone is one wearing jeans and not those of the Seven for All Mankind variety. During the course of my few nights clubbing here, I have not seen a single sparkle top, no shoes that look like Jimmy Choo and no Olsen Twin clones.