Last night I had the greatest hot buttered rum ever at my friends' house. The hot rum and spices were perfect for that snowy night. It added to the festive mood of the night which was spent watching Brandon Roy give the best performance of his career so far. His confidence was unshakable even during the most intense moments.
We also played some XBox 360 and a board game called Power Grid was pretty fun.
So anyway, that buttered rum was so good I bought all the ingredients for it tonight after I saw the agave nectar for sale at Pastaworks.
Last night I worked the door at the Matador. There was a fight within 15 minutes after I started. Some musclejock knocked some kid out and friends on both sides were getting involved. Me and another guy got the puncher outside and he started to walk away (which we wanted) and then he turned around and grabbed me. So I flipped him around and tried to lock him up and pull him off balance. Well he reached up and tried to claw my eye. Luckily I had him well enough that he couldn't actually do it, but he scratched me right next to my eye.
And for the first time in all the years I've done any kind of security, I really wanted to hurt someone. I let go of him so I could punch him and then the other guy grabbed him, which was the split second I needed to change my decision. Not to mention it's bad for business for the security to be beating people up in front of a venue.
I was so pissed... it's not like I could grow another eye. I've always had the idea that it was my job to make sure everyone is safe and has a good time and I can't remember wanting to hurt a customer before, even the assholes.
Tonight I'm comforting myself by staying home with a t-bone, broccolini & yukon gold potatoes.
I just got done listening to this crazy crunk/ragga/glitch mashup mix... one of the best mixes I've heard all year. Maybe I'm overreacting but it blew me away. Check it out.
I saw DJ Krush on Monday night at Holocene. It was amazing... he spent about an hour and a half bangin' out beats and remixing on a sampler. He'd sample a scratch or layer a tone over a beat w/ his decks once in a while. He remixed beats that went as far back as his first album. All the while Josh was in the background painting/screening a hug art piece.
The crowd was very diverse and danced the whole time. There was a point toward the end where people seemed to mellow out, but someone started chanting and got the whole crowd into it; nice job. When Krush finished the crowd went insane and screamed/stomped/pounded until he came back out. He put down about 30-40 minutes of a downtempo set and sent everyone to bed happy.
Quad Magazine has been bringing Hawaii's urban culture to the world for 10 years now, and we are super super stoked to announce the July 14th lineup. We hope you can all make it to what it sure to be a one-of-a-kind gathering!
Hoku Award winning Hawaiian-reggae-soul siren Paula Fuga opens the evening with an acoustic set featuring Mike Love on guitar and back-up vocals w/ Lindy Patterson on percussion.
The rest of the evening’s eclectic schedule of entertainment includes: dynamic live hiphop band The Spacifics; Creed Chameleon and other artists from Hawaii’s newest label Siq Records; a special appearance by emcee Tassho Pierce (aka Emirc) and a dance performance by the late-night divas of Giinko Marischino, who will be channeling the infamous and influential Kids Klub parties at Fusion.
Hosted by Jamal, aka Kilowattz the Mongoose (a key player in the scene since the early 90s), the night also features a retrospective slide show and visual projections by VJ Clintone. Rounding out the musical lineup are Jahson the 45 Revolver, BassX, >Seeko and the NoMasterBacks hiphop crew, who just released a new album and will be making an appearance at the official afterhours party at Lotus Soundbar in Waikiki.
Saturday July 14th at thirtyninehotel. Free pupus while they last! Doors open at 8 p.m. Paula Fuga goes on at 9 p.m. 21+ $10 before 11.
My friend Greg has a new web project called Public Press, he and a friend coded it up from scratch. (He's been coding real time back end financial transaction software for years.) It's pretty interesting functionally and by no means complete, it's got some rough spots (they're constantly ironing them out), and the learning curve may be a bit high for people not used to logical thought processes. Seriously, when I did internet tech support I was enlightened... there are tons of these people out there.
But please, go check it out... here's some info from the about page:
What is Public Press?
Public Press is a digital newspaper where anybody can instantly publish, organize, and archive news and information about their neighborhood or community. Citizen reporters can upload hyperlocal content anytime from any device that can send email or access the web. Readers can subscribe to newspaper feeds and browse neighborhood news 24x7.
Who is behind Public Press?
Public Press is run entirely by two friends with a shared vision for improving real community through the use of technology. We have full-time, very demanding day jobs, so we work on "P2" when we can...during the dead of night. We hope to ultimately dedicate 100% of our time to improving Public Press as a tool for citizen journalism and community-building. We have zero capital funding and earn no compensation from the service other than the reward of knowing that we are doing our best to build tighter-knit, more informed communities. Please contact us at team@publicpress.org.
My first two obsessions were music and computers... the third was skateboarding. 50-50.com has been dedicated to skateboard and the Hawaii skateboarding community in particular since 1996. I found this excellent resource in '97 and immediately linked to the site in an early incarnation of Quadmag.
My days of hot dusty ditches, lumpy military quarter pipes, the decaying remains of Castle Park's Water Country and being chased off the Blaisdell property by angry Samoan security guards are long gone... So, unfortunately for me, I hadn't been keeping up with 50-50 lately. Fortunately for me, I decided to take a look at it tonight and was alerted to the ongoing battle to build a quality skate park on Oahu.
There were plans drawn up that everyone agreed to and a contract signed with legendary builders Dreamland Skateparks. The city has apparently gone ahead with construction changing the plans and without Dreamland involved. The Honolulu Advertiser article has the story from the city and PER construction's take on things. Please take a look at the 50-50.com discussion thread on the subject for the skateboarding community's assessment of the situation.
(I stole this little writeup from myself off quadmag.com.)
Couldn't get any sleep last night, even though I was nodding off before I decided to crash. I think part of it was my subconscious knew I left a record downstairs in the laundry room. I had taken it down to see if it fit on this bookshelf that some moved-out neighbor left. I guess I got distracted by throwing my clothes into the dryer and forgot it on the way back. Not to mention the sleeve blends in with the countertop like Predator's active camouflage. 5:30am it finally hits me and I ran downstairs and grabbed it.
Anyway... earlier that evening I had drinks with Steve and Piper at the Doug Fir. They're friends from Hawaii who spent most of their time on Maui. Steve Deejayed back in Hawaii with Scottie Soul and Daniel J mostly... he was Steve-O. A good deep house dj in all regards. My first time attempting to dj was due to him, he asked me if I wanted to try out his records one night at Acqua and that night I caught the bug. It was reasonably easy to pick up since I already had instrument playing experience. The basics of deejaying are mostly beat matching and getting your measures timed right. It gets harder from there.
So they moved to Portland just about 1 year ago and Steve got a job at the Mac Store and Piper was a schoolteacher, but Hawaii's are just too deep in their hearts. Steve wants to start a clothing line and design company while Piper got a job teaching at a new school.
I wish them well, but I was disappointed to see two of my favorite Hawaii folks leave.
Oh yeah, a friend of theirs was also there... her name was Paula and she's a sculptor who also makes and sells these hats she's designed. Check out her website here: PaulaDeer.com.
I saw one of my favorite bands, Bad Brains twice last weekend and it was the best hardcore show I've seen in a very long time. Even the best show period since I moved here to Portland. (Though the first time I saw The Faint was pretty damn good.) As a bonus, I saw them both nights for free after I've been obsessed with Black Dots for a good 6 months now. I didn't even know they were in town.
My birthday was last Saturday... My friend Ellyn took me to the Boys 2 Men concert, Tommy came along too, that boy loves to dance. I was never really into the guys, but did acknowledge their skill. It was pretty cool seeing guys that can sing that good in person. The deep bass voiced dude wasn't there, his back is messed up... that explains the cane he always had. There really wasn't too big of a crowd and it seemed like it was mostly young college students. I caught a rose and handed it to Ellyn during "I'll Make Love to You" hehe she loves those guys. I think she sang along to every song.
Ellyn is the most awesome and devoted female friend I have ever known... she is so good to me, I wonder what I did to deserve having her in my life. She's the one who put together the whole "Lance shirt" thing last year (people were wearing them again this year, they're collector's items). Two weekends ago we were up in Edmonds Washington at her twin sister's wedding. That was fun times... I took over the dj booth for a little bit and worked the dancefloor. Tommy happens to be ordained by the Universal Life Church and married the couple in a very nice ceremony.
Anyway... after the show we headed toward Green Papaya but ran into some other friends celebrating a birthday so we stopped in at Saucebox and had a drink with them. Then it was on to Green Papaya, a Vietnamese Bistro off 11th & Morrison. They have a killer $2 late night happy hour and reasonably priced drinks. The food is excellent and the staff were very nice... the crowd seemed like it was all their friends, a group of young 20 somethings. Afterwards it was on to the Matador and Tony's for more fun... after that it was of to a bit of a house party at Kristen's3.
The next day, I had breakfast at Detour Cafe with Ellyn & Kristen... then we saw Running with Scissors (good movie), never read the book but the movie made me want to. It was a nice relaxing day.
The next couple days were spent doing technical support for Comcast Highspeed Internet and doing some overhauling work on the Matador at night. Thursday night some girl from Camel cigarettes came in and gave out free tickets to The Faint and Ratatat at Roseland on Dec 3rd... The Matador looks a hell of a lot better now with a fresh coat of paint, new lights, new dj setup and a new menu among other things. The grand re-opening on Friday was a madhouse... They were turning people away all night for being over capacity. I drank a bunch of Jameson's and showed up for work next door at Tony's a little toasty. We were pretty busy catching the Matador's overflow.
Saturday, tonight, I worked the door at Tony's again and it was reasonably busy, I still found time to play pool against a regular and fix my friend Tommy's laptop. We had a few groups of twentysomethings who found the Matador too loud. I made decent tips and then went over to Ararat for the afterhours party, some guy named Scud Bloom was playing some pretty good house and breaks. While the music was good, there wasn't that much of a crowd so I took off and went home to finish this entry.
Hello from beyond the mist. It's been while eh? Well I don't have much to say at the moment but check out this interview with one of my favorite bands.
The Bad Brains are those of an extremely influential American all-black hardcore punk and reggae band, originally formed in Washington, D.C. in 1977. They are widely considered the pioneers of hardcore punk.
Originally formed as a jazz fusion ensemble, the Bad Brains developed a very fast and intense punk rock sound, which was both musically complex and more extreme than most of their punk rock contemporaries. The Bad Brains are one of the first American hardcore punk bands, commonly cited by many fans as the first hardcore band, though this is not surprisingly under persisting debate. They were also an adept reggae band, in a sort of Jekyll-and-Hyde arrangement, while later recordings featured elements of funk and heavy metal. The Bad Brains were also notable as religious Rastafarians.
The Bad Brains broke up and reformed several times over the years, sometimes with different singers and/or drummers. The group's classic lineup features singer H.R., guitarist Dr. Know, bass guitarist Darryl Jennifer, and drummer Earl Hudson.
I'm standing behind the bar at Tony's Tavern right now, three customers in the whole spot. We're hiring BTW, if you're a female who wants to pick up some bartending shifts you should apply. WARNING: It's pretty slow here, and you'll probably end up with daytime happy hour shifts featuring lots of old people and Burnside wierdos. Though, you'll probably end up taking this Sunday shift since Tony wants women behind the bar instead of guys. He already gave my shifts away twice.
I'm deejaying at Towne Lounge on Tuesday (the 27th) for Meet Dept. (They really need to update the site.) I'll be doing the electro/80s/prog house thing. As apposed to the more eclectic crate digging sets I do at the Matador on Wednesday nights.
I have net access at home again... my laptop still needs a new power cord, which is still on backorder and I don't want to spend $40 for a whole new power supply when the proprietary cord itself is just $12. I've been winning at the after hours poker game lately, enough to buy a 30g iPod video. I deejayed a wedding @ the Matador Wednesday afternoon (and still deejay there every Wednesday night). I tend bar @ Tony's Tavern on Monday nights. I had to literally kick someone out of Tony's on St. Patty's day. My best female friend from here in Portland is currently working on a tour boat floating around Hawaii and is looking to jump ship and get a job in the islands... she's an ex insurance underwriter and bartender, can anyone help her out?
Figured I should write something since I havent for a while...
I'm working the door at the Towne Lounge at the moment. "Amber Voltaire" is on right now and they sound like some sorta prog rock/Orange 9mm/Hum (without the thrash metal-y hooks) mix. Which I guess means they're emo or something... They play well with each other, I've seen a lotta sloppy local bands here. A lot of downright shitty bands for that matter as well. The girl who does the booking here was the in-house booker for Berbati's but they decided to drop in the in-house booker. So now instead of getting her 3rd string rookies the quality of bands here have picked up.
P.S. I spent the last 2 days working on computers and setting up a surround sound A/V system for the owner of Marrakesh. He hooked me up with dinner there last night and let me tell ya... Moroccan food = good.
This Wednesday (Dec. 28th) at the Matadoronrevolution will be deejaying with me. I asked him to come over and play an 80s set. I played a private party with him about 2 years ago and he spun the best 80s dance set I've heard since the 80s. I also wanna get some 80s rock and funk in there too. I promised Sarah I'd also play at least 30 minutes of psychobilly for her. I shouldn't have much problems pulling that off since I got a 4 hour slot.
Wow... I kept saying it, but I still didn't expect it. "If it's going to be this cold it might as well snow." It's sure as hell snowing right now. Too bad my down jacket got a cigarete burn it from some stumbling drunk while I was deejaying at the Matador on Wednesday.
Last night at work as the bar was closing... I walked into back and 3 guys were sitting there doing coke off the table, right out in the open. In nearly 10 years of working and a lot longer hanging out in bars/nightclubs, I never saw anyone try to pull that off before. At least go into the bathroom you fucking idiots. The worst thing was, they were my roommate's co-workers.
My friend asked me to deejay the Personal Telco Project (the guys setting up free city-wide wifi) Holiday Party 2005 tomorrow night. I played at last year's party and rocked the shit out of the place. It's kind of funny getting mousy nerds up and dancing to music some of them never heard before. Unfortunately, being a geeky event there will probably be only 5 females there... 2 married 2 over 40 and 1 that works at the venue. So, if you know any (preferably cute) nerd girls send them over.
If you're at all interested in the Personal Telco Project and want to get involved, I suppose this is a decent time to casually find out about it.
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