Tuesday, September 1, 2015
However, if crowdfunding seems a little to impersonal for you, never fear. The band's tour is nearing a close and they'll be back in Tucson soon playing their sometimes haunting, sometimes endearing, always entrancing brand of dark folk. So, welcome the band back, buy a copy of their new album Bethphage and show them a little of that Tucson love and support.
Human Behavior will be playing Wooden Tooth Records (415 N. Fourth Ave.) on Saturday, Sept. 5 alongside Human Behavior contributor and solo artist Karima Walker and the Old Pueblo's top up-and-coming indie band, Asian Fred. The show starts at 6 p.m. and it is an all ages event. There is a $5 suggested donation at the door.
Until then, check out what happens when Karima Walker teams up with local label Diet Pop Records on a recent installment of the Trundle Sessions:
Tags: human behavior , wooden tooth records , karima walker , asian fred , tucson , live , music , concert , Video
Saturday, August 29, 2015
HoCo Fest 2015 is resurrecting some of Tucson's favorite bands of yesteryear and even presenting a visual history of the music scene by way of the Tucson Rock and Roll History Museum pop-up exhibit, all culminating in a celebration of 30 years of Hotel Congress (stay tuned for more on all of this in our cover story next week). However, HoCo is also going to be a place for change, especially for psych cumbia outfit Chicha Dust.
The band announced in a press release that they will be officially changing their name to XIXA. Pronounced "SEEK-suh," the name change will also reflect a change in the band's sound. According to the release, Chicha Dust had focused on the "guitar-driven cumbia popular in the Amazon and on the streets of Lima."
XIXA will have "a bit less chicha" and "a bit more desert dust" with all original material, straying from the covers of chicha classics that popularized the act initially. With this new sound, XIXA will release their first EP—aptly-titled Shift and Shadow—in November via Barbès Records, the home of Roots of Chicha. After that, the band will release the full-length Bloodline in February 2016. Both releases will be available on vinyl.
Chicha Dust will officially become XIXA on Friday, September 4, when the group performs at HoCo Fest alongside Roger Clyne, Tom Walbank and many more. Tickets for the event are $10 and can be found online in advance, along with more information, via the Hotel Congress website.
Tags: chicha dust , xixa , name change , tucson , local , music , hoco fest , hotel congress , cumbia , chicha , barbes records , bloodline , shift and shadow
Thursday, August 27, 2015
On Saturday, Aug. 29, Wooden Tooth will be selling many of their records on hand for just $1 in order to make room for new buys and to help you beef up your own music cache. The store will also be offering a 15 percent discount on Crosley turntables.
Plus with all those new additions to your vinyl collection and a shiny new record player, you'll have pretty much no reason to even need to go outside for a while, which works out because it's too hot and too crowded right now anyway. You can take advantage of Wooden Tooth's sale from 10 a.m. until 8 p.m. on Saturday.
Tags: wooden tooth records , vinyl , music , record , turntable , sale , tucson , crosley
Wednesday, August 26, 2015
On Aug. 24, the band's van was broken into while they were swimming in a nearby river. The band estimates about $5,000 in equipment and personal effects were taken from the vehicle, including a Chuck Lee banjo and a vintage Mossman acoustic guitar. Andres Parada of Human Behavior says those instruments were collectable, but also very valuable in a sentimental way. The van was also damaged and Walker's journals, phone, wallet, money and credit cards were taken.
Parada said that a pastor and his son waited with him until the police arrived and simply told Walker and him that they had chosen them.
"Everything he said was pretty mystical and open," he said. "I understood the meaning to be that when we choose, we invest our identity. So when it's taken, it feels like we lost that part of ourselves, the part that chose."
While that semi-supernatural sentiment would make for a great future song for the band's existing aesthetic, it won't help them on the final week of their tour, which takes them from Portland to Salt Lake to San Diego and more. The band has already had to cancel two dates on their Western tour and that's where you come in.
Human Behavior has a few suggestions for those looking to lend a hand to their cause:
1. Tell your friends to come to our remaining west coast shows. We make beaucoup dolares from that.If you haven't already bought Human Behavior's latest release, Bethphage, you really should because "it’s folksy and bluesy and murky, dripping with religious influence and bouncing from a full spiritual chorus to barren and abstract shouting"—it's good.
2. Buy an album. Give it to your idiot brother. Then buy another.
3. Scour the Pacific Northwest (specifically Humboldt and Mendocino county) for some well equipped mouth-breathers playing bluegrass on stolen gear. Or, just check Craigslist in that area.
(The big hitters: A cherry, 12", open back, Chuck Lee banjo with a pickup in the body. In a light brown hard leather case -velvety green interior- SERIAL NUMBER 688. And a 1975 Mossman Great Plains with pickup in an off white hard plastic case.)
4. Tell your idiot brother to bring his friends to our west coast show.
5. Donate [to the Indiegogo campaign], what you can.
If you already have a copy, why not just pitch in some cash to their Indiegogo campaign. It won't bring those special items back, but it will at least help them continue making music—and that's good for everyone.
Tags: human behavior , karima walker , guitar , banjo , gear , stolen , tour , indiegogo , bethphage , donate , Video
Tuesday, August 25, 2015
Born to Run turns 40 years old today. Slate looks back at Springsteen's struggle to get the album recorded in the early days of his career:
Bruce kept struggling to get on tape the sound he had in his head, and at times it seemed like he was ready to give up. Long nights at the studio ended in misery, the atmosphere tense and rancorous. To stay awake, engineer Jimmy Iovine would take a piece of gum, throw it away, and chew on the aluminum wrapping. In the end, Springsteen was miserable: “After it was finished? I hated it! I couldn't stand to listen to it. I thought it was the worst piece of garbage I'd ever heard.”The Wall Street Journal assembles vintage performances of all the songs on the album here, Michael Calia notes:
He almost didn't release it. But Jon Landau, who had stepped in as a producer, helped persuade him to let go. According to writer Dave Marsh, Landau called Springsteen and said, “Look, you're not supposed to like it. You think Chuck Berry sits around listening to ‘Maybellene’? And when he does hear it, don't you think he wishes a few things could be [changed]? Now c'mon, it's time to put the record out.” The album appeared in 1975, and it launched Springsteen toward megastardom, getting him on the covers of Time and Newsweek simultaneously. Reviewing the album in Rolling Stone, Greil Marcus proclaimed, “It is a magnificent album that pays off on every bet ever placed on him—a '57 Chevy running on melted down Crystals records that shuts down every claim that has been made. And it should crack his future wide open.”
Tags: Bruce Springsteen , Born to Run , 40th anniversary , Video
Wednesday, August 19, 2015
As we pointed out in a past issue of TW, the lathe cut records coming from local label People in a Position to Know are pretty special. The lathe cutting process allows small bands to make limited run plexiglass records for a fraction of what vinyl production costs. This means both PIAPTK and local artists have the space to get a little creative with the process.
One of PIAPTK's more recent innovative releases comes in the form of a tape/record hybrid release called Magic Mirror with music from psych rockers Wight Lhite (on Side 1) and Dimitri Manos' new ambient experimental project called American Monoxide (on Side 2).
The unique packaging was made to conceptually emulate Sathers Candy packaging. Each deluxe set of this release comes with a "cassette/lathe sandwich" with the two musical media meant to be played simultaneously. Confused? Well, you're in luck because they've made a video explaining how it works:
Tags: american monoxide , wight lhite , people in a position to know , records , lathe cut , cassette , local , tucson , music , release , experimental , Video
Tuesday, August 18, 2015
The Old Pueblo lost one of its most talented stalwart local musicians this week. Stefan George, a genre melding blues guitarist, passed just two months shy of his 63rd birthday. According to longtime friend, TW contributor and fellow musician, Jim Lipson, George's impact on music will probably take years to really fully comprehend.
"When people get around to cataloging and archiving his music, they're going to be blown away," Lipson says. "I know it's cliche, but he really is one of those immense talents that never got the attention they deserved."
In the late '80s and early '90s, George and Lipson played together in the band Brain Damage Orchestra for six years, and the two men have collaborated as musicians and friends ever since. More recently, Lipson, along with Tucson Kitchen Musician's Association, made sure George was a Tucson Folk Fest headliner. Lipson comments that George's musical prowess extended beyond blues into folk, rock, bluegrass, reggae, ska, swing and zydeco. George was also a member of many local bands in his time in Tucson.
"He's not just a blues player, but a truly prolific musician," Lipson says. "He was a major talent—not just for Tucson."
George was also a staple at several local venues, including, until very recently, La Cocina. La Cocina bartender and fellow musician Steven Romo described George's personal impact via Facebook:
I just heard that Stefan George passed away. I'll never forget our conversation over whiskey about music, women, and life. You were always a stand out gentleman. You will be heavily missed.George's reach, in terms of genre, generation and more, already has people talking about how best to honor him. Lipson says he wouldn't be surprised if HoCo Fest, TKMA and the Tucson Blues Hall of Fame (of which George was a member) all opted to honor him in different ways.
"It would be great to see musicians take the time to really learn his songs and pay tribute that way," he says. "I think everybody wants to do something, and I don’t think doing just one night could really cover it."
Lipson says George was found in his home by a neighbor.
"I'm not sure at this point what happened," Lipson says. "He had been in failing health for the last several months."
George is survived by his son, Josh Kelly, who is traveling from Vermont to plan services. Although "a celebration of George's life," as Lipson puts it, has yet to be scheduled, we will update you on information regarding services for George as it becomes available.
Until then, let's take a moment to listen to this legendary Tucson musician:
Tags: stefan george , tucson , blues , musician , died , passed , jim lipson , Video
Monday, August 17, 2015
Tucson filmmaker Alex Italics creates a vintage sci-fi look for the new music video from Lips, the latest project from once-and-soon-to-be-again Tucsonan Fen Ikner.
With Ikner on drums and vocals and New Zealand-born Stephanie Brown on vocals and keyboards, Lips plays a catchy brand of synth pop. “Traces of Teddy” is a musical and visual showcase, "depicting an alien space queen who sets her sights and affections on a hapless gas station attendant, Teddy, and demands that her Lips head minions go and retrieve him," Ikner says.
“Traces of Teddy” is the first single from Lips’ upcoming album, which will be released in early 2016. In 2012, the band won the Silver Scroll award, New Zealand’s most prestigious songwriting award, for their song “Everything To Me.”
Filmed in Tucson, the video is directed by Italics, shot by Brody Anderson and features some familiar Tucson faces.
Lips is currently on tour in New Zealand, but Ikner and Brown will relocate to Tucson in November, with some local shows on the horizon, Ikner says.
Ikner may be best known in Tucson as a member of Seashell Radio, the much-loved, four-songwriter band that released albums in 2010 and 2012, but the multi-instrumentalist and producer/engineer has played and/or recorded with a host of bands, including Saint Maybe, The Modeens, Young Mothers and Calexico.
Download the song here.
Tags: Lips , Fen Ikner , Stephanie Brown , Alex Italics , music video , tucson , local , seashell radio , brody anderson , Video
Tuesday, August 11, 2015
Directed by Dave Mertz, the video for "Nothing's Funny I'm Broke" is all frolic, all the time for Garboski and friends.
But that frolicking—like this summer—must come to an end because Garboski is heading into a bit of a hibernation. Guitarist Ian Philabaum, who joined what was originally a trio of Beau Bowen (guitar, vocals), Garth Bryson (bass) and Josh Skibar (drums), has departed Tucson for a job as an immigration-rights advocate in south Texas.
It may be a while, but these boys of summer will return, Bryson says. So in the meantime, stream the band's 2014 "Nothing's Funny I'm Broke" EP and dream of sweltering days.
Tags: Garboski , Dave Mertz , music video , tucson , local , music , Video
Friday, August 7, 2015
There's quite a bit going on off Hoff Avenue these days. You might have thought of the small side street just east of Fourth Avenue as an alley, but with the recent openings of both Ermanos and Public Brewhouse, the tucked back street is starting to take shape as something more.
To celebrate, the new beer-centric spots will be joining forces to put on Two Nights of Entertainment at the Tophoy on August 14 and 15. Combining bikes, bands, beer, food and more, the two day event will pay homage both to what the space was and what it has become.
According to Ermanos owner Mark Erman, the Tophoy building, which now houses Ermanos, Saywell Designs, the Bookstop and more, was built in 1926 and was home to many different businesses including Frozen Pure Ice Cream and Schneider's Grocery. After Stephen Paul of Arroyo Designs and Hamilton Distillers moved his distilling operation to a larger space, Ermanos and Public moved into the newly vacant spaces. Although both buildings were built out for their new businesses, original wood and brick were preserved and repurposed to keep the history of the space in tact.
With all of that in mind, Two Nights of Entertainment at the Tophoy will offer a pop up bike tune up shop, yard games (giant jenga, cornhole, etc.) courtesy of Bookmans, the Seis and You Sly Dog food trucks, and bike raffles from of New Belgium Brewery (cruiser) and Ordinary Bike Shop (fixie). A pop-up cocktail bar put on by Burger Brothers' Parker Arriaga will be serving up specialty cocktails including:
- Hemingway: Arizona distilling company desert dry gin, cucumber, mint, lime, soda, simple syrup
- Eegeerita: 3 amigos blanco tequila, lemon eegees, rimmed with Mexican candy
- Not for Nothing: High West double rye, mint, peach, bitters, lemon, ginger
- Earl's Long Island Iced TeaEarl Grey black tea infused vodka (Sun Liquor UNXLD), peach/lemon simple syrup, soda, lemonade.
Best of all, while there's no cover fee, a quarter of every dollar spent will go to benefit the Living Streets Alliance in their efforts to make Tucson a more bike friendly place to live. Access to the event will be via Hoff Avenue between Eighth and Ninth streets.
Tags: two nights , tophoy , tucson , events , music , food trucks , local , craft beer , cocktails , living streets alliance , bicycle , ordinary bike shop , pee wee's big adventure , movie , free , logan & lucille , billy sedlmayr , hey bucko , dj , raffle
