Sorry, kids, no SirenFest reporting here. I like Spoon as much as the next person, but I really can't imagine hearing Spoon - especially the new songs - from 5,000 feet away, crammed in a sea of sardines on Coney Island. Call me crazy, but I'd rather hear Spoon - especially the new songs! - in, like, a supper club. Or at a burrito shack in Austin. Ditto the above for Q & Not U, substituting a DC basement for the burrito shack.

However, shout-out to local success story Morningwood, who are sitting pretty on Capitol Records, one national tour under their belts and who-knows-what ahead. Chanteuse Chantal's boobs are everywhere these days (apparently the marketing people noticed them). It'll be interesting to see what happens for them - and, if you check their bio, you'll see that they owe it all to Sean Lennon.

The awesomest place in the city to hear music and get drunk is, hands down, 169 Bar. It hasn't been overrun by hipsters. The sassy bartenders pour lethal drinks. There's a cute cat hanging out in the DJ booth. The booker used to work at SpinArt. The sound sucks and the DJ decks function in some kind of alternate reality where "cue" means "not actually cued," but I still love it there, and you should stop by if you're in New York. Just don't tell anyone with a white belt or a blog.

Three hours away and over and out.

After Melissa's post regarding the demise of VH1 Mega Hits and the subsequent comments in reference to "The Alternative" on VH1 Classic, I felt compelled to stop working on certain job-related activities involving finding insightful things to say about albums and veg out in front of the t.v. After cringing through a Peter Murphy solo number ("All Night Long"), but before cringing through a Daniel Ash solo number ("This Love"), I caught the video for "Big City (Everybody I Know Can Be Found Here)" from Spacemen 3, which plays like a rave loop over a backdrop consisting of the cover of Recurring (reminiscent of a pair of bike shorts I wore under my blue plaid uniform in 1989). Now I ask, dear reader, when was the last time you heard anyone namecheck Spacemen 3? I think the last time I heard the name in conversation was in college, somewhere around the time that Spiritualized released Ladies and Gentlemen, We Are Floating in Space.
Shortly thereafter, Lush appeared on the screen in "De-Luxe" video form looking exactly as I remember them from Request Video in 1991. I watched Miki and Emma and thought, whatever happened to ultra-wide headbands? I relied on thick, cotton-lycra blend headbands in an assortment of colors during high school. These were the perfect remedy for crappy hair days, which I have just about every day. I'm starting to think that the people need to bring back this look.
After Lush, "Christine" from The House of Love and a bunch of stuff I can't remember right now, the show closed with "Only Shallow" courtesy of My Bloody Valentine. Those guitars pierced right through my ears as I spoke to Carlos on the phone. I backed away from the television set and said, "Man, I really miss this stuff."

Ever since I left the dinosaur-like state of dial up and switched to a cable modem my online experience has been simply amazing. I had no idea videos could be so seamless, webpages now load at breakneck speed and I can actually send an email without waiting for that damn hourglass to disappear in a moment's time. I was also thrilled that my new digital cable came with a myriad of choices in video entertainment that I had never experienced with my ghetto basic set up. One of my most beloved channels was VH1 Mega Hits, for you Adelphia subscribers you'd know it better as channel 155. I readily admit that I'd sit for hours on end sometimes watching all the videos rotate that were so much more entertaining than anything that MTV had to offer and was always the first place I'd see new Garbage vids! My friend Sofi and I would often be talking online late at night and IM each other with cries of "OMG Mega Hits..NOW" and enjoy the latest technicolor explosion. At times they'd show commercialized stuff but when I was healing from surgery and off work for 3 weeks back in November that was really one of the only channels I kept as a constant selection. They didn't have any lame ass reality crap--just straight up videos from a mix of artists. I got a notice from Adelphia informing me that Mega Hits was going to be purchased by some bigwig MTV outfit later this summer and in the blink of an eye was transformed overnight into LOGO which is gay and lesbian programming. I've been a self-proclaimed fag hag from my earliest memory on this earth and when I learned that this new station was in the works it made me happier than a drag queen at a Madonna-thon convention! How cool is a station that actually shows such classics as Priscilla Queen of the Desert, Torch Song Trilogy and Heavenly Creatures as well as featurettes on the best gay discos worldwide and a campy committment ceremony offering that rivals TLC's "A Wedding Story?" However, given the fact that I do have SEVERAL hundred channels on my premium cable, isn't it possible to keep my Mega Hits channel AND provide me with a groovy gay gala as well? L.A. is an entertainment mecca so why are they pulling the plug on a video network??? I haven't been this bummed since KDL folded and became Indie 103.1 and before I get bashed by all the kids who love that station this is the exact same point I've been trying to make since I started typing: that I love Indie 103.1 but I also loved KDL and why couldn't those two stations have been neighbors on the radio dial instead of an all or nothing takeover??? Maybe my friend Sofi and I were the only two people who cared about or even watched Mega Hits but I for one am disappointed that it's gone. There's a snowball's chance in hell of me ever seeing any quality videos on MTV since 120 Minutes and Alternative Nation have disappeared faster than a new supply of Lamb of God t-shirts at Hot Topic. Well I guess I can just console myself that the sole purpose of me getting digital cable was to have a faster and more user friendly internet experience including anything and everything relating to music so I'll just kick back in front of my monitor and watch videos that way. R.I.P. VH1 Mega Hits....

Right before Le Tigre released This Island I poured over the piles of press regarding the album, not as a writer but simply as a longtime Kathleen Hanna fan. Every interview and each review I found said virtually the same thing: Le Tigre's "crossover" album, the one inspired by the sort of music that resulted in the wildly successful (at least on dancefloor's the world over) DFA-mix of "Deceptacon." This peaked my not-so-secret interest in house music.
When the album finally hit the street, I ran to the nearest record store, grabbed a copy and thought, What the f___, if this is a dance album, why didn't the label release it on double-vinyl?
Regardless, I made my purchase, went home and slipped the record onto a turntable. The quality of the pressing infuriated me. It was too quiet. I wanted to feel the kick in my rear and the snare over my head. Meanwhile, I was stuck fiddling with the gain knob.
After I finished grumbling about cheap-ass record labels not taking the care to properly press a piece of vinyl for club play, I realized that the album itself was pretty disappointing. As far as dancing is concerned, I shook my ass with greater ease to the self-titled debut than to this album, even before DFA got it's hands on "Deceptacon."
My disappointment went further than just the lack of an anticipated Daft Punk-style of rhythm. A few months prior to the album's release, I saw Le Tigre at Coachella and the new songs sounded much more energetic. But even in that setting, I wasn't feeling the new tunes. I was waiting for something to grab me from around the knee and shake me, as the aforementioned hit and "Hot Topic" did when I first heard them.
After consecutive listens to This Island, only one song stuck in my head for more than half a minute.
Fortunately, Le Tigre released that song, "After Dark," as the single. The wide grooves that mark the two-mix 12" single filled my speakers with loud, full and pristine dance sounds. I have to say that Diplo's remix is a bit of a bore. It just pitter-patters along all seductive hipster-like without ever reaching a peak. The remix from A Touch of Class, though, is a floor stomper if there ever was one. Perhaps these two lads also realized that this is the best song on the album and that it is best to leave the embellishments to a minimum. Essentially, the duo kicks up the beat, extends the number and fiddles with a few vocals right when the song should force everyone in the club to wave hands in the air. It is exactly what I wanted to hear.

As you can see, I'm one of the DJs. The set is a secret, as usual.

We spent a half-hour driving around Silverlake sidestreets trying to find a parking spot. We stood in line for no less than twenty minutes wondering if any of the grocery stores in this neighborhood sell shampoo. We returned to the car after the show only to find a big, fat parking ticket firmly planted on the windshield of the Carlosmobile. Was it worth it? Hell yeah.
It was worth it because The Bell Rays are one of the best live bands this haven for the overrated has to offer. Lisa Kekaula has a voice too big for little ol' Spaceland. She struts onstage in an ass-high, Kelly Bundy-tight black dress, silver shoes with cut-out wedge heels and massive gold earrings. Her hair stays firmly in place throughout the entirety of the lengthy set, even though she is working up such a sweat that her glitter eyeshadow slowly trickles down the side of her cheek, catching the light reflecting off her earrings. She isn't a singer. She is a rock star, belting numbers that feel like bits of life that the audience can only express through its screams and handclaps, commanding the crowd to move, chiding the guy next to me for standing with his arms folded. Every slice of heart-wrenching soul, be it Tina or Otis, that I heard as a child is in her voice.
The band plays on her voice, mixing fast-paced garage rock with drawn-out jams. Virtually every song ends with a dramatic roll of the drums as if to say, "You thought we were finished, but we sure fooled you." It's a rock'n'roll that, as cynics will tell you, has not existed since 1970-something.
The Bell Rays will make you burn like trapped in a rock inferno. Don't believe me? Check them out for yourself. They're playing at Spaceland every Monday for the next month. No cover.

On the door guy:
"Y'know the door guy sets the whole night," Kid C. (y'know, I have a hard time calling him by his DJ name, from now on, it's just Carlos) remarked.
The door guy at Circus on Saturday night was a big, athletic guy with a winning smile who high-fived and/or bear-hugged everyone who walked inside. Friendly is a personality-trait not often associated with the guards of entry at L.A. nightclubs. I suppose, though, that friendly is in order at clubs catering to folks raised on P.L.U.R.

On the trance room:
"Is it really packed in there?" Carlos asked.
"Yeah, like Mark Farina at Coachella packed," I answered.
The main room at Circus is the size of three hipster bars and lined with mirrors so that a crowd of about 1,200 looks to be closer to 4,000.
"Wow, this is Coachella packed."
After walking around the room, I started dancing.
"You need some glo-sticks."
"I don't think I have the coordination for glo-sticks. Look at that guy with the flags!"
I nudged Carlos in the direction of a guy doing the glo-stick dance with fluorescent flags with neon posts.
"What did you guys call the girls who twirled the flags with the band in high school?" Carlos asked.
"Tall flags."
"Yeah, we had those too. They were kind of nerdy, weren't they?"
"I was friends with most of them."
"Band was pretty nerdy too."
"I was friends with most of those kids as well."

On closing the bar at 1:30 a.m.:
"They closed the bar already," Carlos exclaimed.
"I having a feeling this really isn't an alcohol sort of crowd," I said while taking note of the plethora kids wearing little more than Ewok boots.

On the music:
"Do you even know what Nelson is playing?"
"No, but it sounds German."
Truth is, by the time our friend Nelson took over the decks, at 2:00 a.m., I had already danced for two hours and was preparing for another two hours of "non-stop ecstatic dancing." I had lost all perception of time and certainly was in no state to trainspot. After hearing Juliet's "Avalon," a remix of Starsailor's "4 to the Floor" (I think the Jacque Lu Cont mix) and a white label mix of "Pump up the Jam" I stopped paying attention to anything more than a consistent rhythm. I think that's the mark of a good night.