Party Garbage! Tomorrow Night! 09/13/08

Tomorrow night! Kendall and I will be once again hosting our monthly dance party at the C&D, Party Garbage. Come celebrate moving forward in the year and the return to hoodie/jacket/sweater weather! As always, there will be plenty of pure pop pleasure, confetti, balloons, lights and fog. I’m literally about to head out the door right now to do my prep shopping. So please come hang out, we love our friends, old and new alike! Musical treat after the jump…

You, You’re Awesome…

Twice a week there are bands in my basement. Both of these bands involve the two mysterious people above. For the sake of people not thinking I’m totally full of myself (I mean, I am a little bit), I would like to say for the record I am neither of these people. The other band will be revealed in due time, but for now let’s just focus on one of them. You, You’re Awesome is a live-electronics, all drums ruckus machine that will be invading our fair city any day now. As the only person who has actually heard them play live, I promise you that they are going to be your new favorite band. Let’ learn more, let’s listen, let’s jump!

Show Calender – 10/9 to 10/16

Musically, we’ve got a wonderful bunch of things coming up in the next couple of months. Noticeably absent from this list, as well as any potential lists I would have made in the past few months, is the Southgate House. What’s going on over there in Kentucky? Their calender has pretty dern weak lately in terms of national acts, with the exception of a We are Scientists gig. Hopefully the combo of upcoming Stars and Bell X1 shows, as well Midpoint will re-energize the venue. I mean, I’ll be seeing TV on the Radio, and maybe the Against Me!/Ted Leo show, at Bogarts, but I’m not particularly excited about those shows being there instead of the Southgate House. Tiny rant over. Let’s look at what’s coming up!!!

September 11 @ Gypsy Hut – Chicago electro/housey act Culture Prophet make a stop at the Gypsy Hut for the newly minted Clusterfuck night.

September 12 @ Northside Tavern – Cincinnati’s own The Hiders and The Chocolate Horse, the later opening for WHY? during Midpoint and the former playing the Southgate House for the same reason, will be playing the Tavern.

September 12 @ Gypsy Hut – Great Ennio Morricone inspired band Spindrift will be cowboying the Gypsy Hut with The High and Low. I saw Spindrift open for someone a few years ago (for Supergrass maybe, not sure) and thought they were fantastic.

September 13 @ The C&D – Sorry, gotta shill for myself a little bit. Kendall and I will be DJ’ing at the C&D on Saturday under our collective pseudonym Party Garbage. As always, I promise a lot of mess, confetti and me turning into my once-a-month-free-PBR mess of a person! Gonna be fun! Promises!

September 16 @ Gypsy Hut – North Carolinians Beloved Binge play the Gypsy Hut. The duo sounds like a lot of the post-hardcore albums Dischord put out once they got tired of being punk rawkers and decided to settle down.

That sould hold you for a little bit! On the horizon we have, of course, Midpoint, TV on the Radio (“Dear Science,” is fantastic), Against Me! w/ Ted Leo, Matt & Kim, Sunset Rubdown and plenty of other great things! Remember, thouse you may just want to stay in, you going to at least one of these shows does a little bit to benefit the city and our reputation. Even if you’ve never heard of any of these bands, just go out and see them. Cincinnati is an odd city, and good in a way, in the sense that most of the shows are free. We really take this for granted. You aren’t losing a thing by going and checking out a band you’ve never heard of. Oh and if a show is 5-10 bucks, don’t scoff, just remember you haven’t probably paid for live music in months. You can do it every once and a while! Go see a show, it helps the city bit by bit!

Love,

John

Let’s Look Inside…Iris Book Cafe

I’ll say it now, I’m sort of in love with this place already. My housemate and I rolled on down to the Iris Book Cafe last week, unknowingly arriving on their first official full day of operation. I had seen a little movement in there over the past few months and had been wondering what exactly the place was going to be like. Well, no worries, the space and atmosphere is absolutely wonderful. Also, in a city where there needs to be equal parts competition and cooperation, Iris has decided to cherry-pick the best of Cincinnati’s cafes, bringing them together in a lovely, both warm and modern space. You, the patron can have your choice of Emporium coffee, Essencha Tea, and, for your sweet tooth, Aglamesis Bros. ice cream.

Here Comes Midpoint!

At the end of this month we will be treated to the Midpoint Music Festival. They’ve just put the schedule up on their site, so I thought I’d share it with you (after the jump of course, we like keeping things clean on the front page). Of course, this schedule will look mightily daunting at first glance, so I’m here to tell you that in the coming weeks I’ll be dutifully and slowly working through the list to handpick some top choices to fill your nights, and to let you know about what some of the changes this year are, all thanks to Citybeats newly minted ownership of the festival. So go ahead, buy the 3-day wristband! There is so much to do each day that even if you only go two, it would still be worth the 15 bucks per day. It’s just a good idea. Go to Midpoint’s website to buy them! And just to remind you, The Mocks, previously talked about on here, are great and are playing at the Aronoff at 9pm on Saturday. Full schedule after the jump!

I’m all for taking a stand, but seriously, finally…

Does that house in the right of that picture look familiar? Well it should if you’ve ever been around the Rookwood shopping behemoth. That’s Joe Horney’s house and he was the finally holdout in one of the largest “Eminent Domain” battles ever seen. Well, apparently he held out just long enough to get a nice big 1.25 million dollar paycheck. I’m all about keeping pushy legislators in check, but I’m glad this was finally resolved. It had become a bit of a depressing chain-linked eyesore. As a result of this whole showdown, Ohio now has stricter rules about the usage of eminent domain and Mr. Horney will be able to enjoy quite the retirement! While I’m not sure Rookwood really needs to continue sprawling into the area (why not try some other location guys?), I’ll honestly be glad to see the land put to some sort of use.

“Lone eminent domain property sold” (Enquirer)

Love,

John

Cool Stuff! Visualingual’s Cincinnati design…

Whenever I’ve got a commenter, I like to click around and see whats up with them. I like know who is checking out what I do and seeing what it is they are up to. When I clicked on recent commenter Visualingual’s link I found out that it’s a blog run in conjunction with a Cincinnati design studio who have some great looking items to offer. I’m a sucker for items that are esoteric but have the ability to be loved purely for their design alone. Take a look at the great, mostly-local, design and architecture blog run by co-founder Maya Drozdz, as well as their online store. The blog does a wonderful job of picking up on those little design and architecture minutiae that make Cincinnati an awesome place to be fully, both mentally and physically, present in. Anywho, as soon as I’ve got a little more moneys in my pocket I plan on protecting my coffee table from evil condensation with their Vine Street Coaster set!

Perhaps you prefer the mighty Ohio to keeps your tables safe….

And did I hear rumblings of an OTR themed tea towel set? Yes! If you prefer buying things in person you can also buy their wares at the CAC’s shop, both MiCA locations (O’Bryonville and Downtown), and NVISION in Northside.

Visualingual blog

Visualingual store

Love,

John

Oh neat! The proposed CAM expansion….

I found this over at Visualingual today, and I have to say I’m rather excited about this proposed new structure. While Visualingual and their commenters make some valid points, I’d thought I’d put my two cents in. The expansion is designed by Neutlings Riedijk Architects, a Dutch firm. I’m kind of a sucker for Dutch design. The Seattle Central Library, designed by Rem Koolhaas, was easily one of the highlights of my time spent there. Every time a visitor came to town we would take people there and it really never got boring. If you ever have a chance to go there and check it out, it’s totally worth it. I mean they have and entirely red floor! Look after the jump…

Let’s look inside…The Emery Theater!

I was so disappointed that I wasn’t able to join in on the “Save the Emery” project that happened in late July. Run by Give Back Cincinnati, the project aims to gussy up the somewhat rundown and forgotten Emery Theater contained within the Emery building located at the corner of Central Pkwy. and Walnut. Many people aren’t even aware that when they are going to get coffee from the Emporium there is a beautiful old 1300+ seat theater right in the same building.

There were really two reasons I wanted to get in on this. First of all, I would love to see this theater return to operation. It’s place like these that give a city its character. Older buildings and classic structures like this become a rarity as you move further across the country. In Seattle, for example, buildings were rarely rehabbed due to compliance with earthquake codes. Rather, because I assume it was cheaper, old buildings were torn down to make way for less attractive, hastily built newer structures. Cincinnati has a surplus of these type of old theaters, warehouses, row-houses, store-fronts, etc. Volunteer projects like this, held on a regular basis, are exactly what the city needs. Give Back Cincinnati says they had at least 100 people there lending a hand, proving that many people are as interested in lending a hand in this type of thing.

My second reason for wanting to help was a bit more selfish. I just wanted to get into the place. For years I’ve walked by the entrance, wondering what was beyond those ticket windows. Unfortunately I had something to do that day and couldn’t make it down there. Thankfully, one industrious volunteer spent a portion of his time taking beautiful pictures of the inside. Here’s a hand-full of them, with more at his website Urban Up, after the jump…

Round 2 begins Saturday!

Your monthly two-weekend-spanning dance marathon begins this Saturday, September 6, with the second installment of Dance_MF. Last month’s was quite the success, and this time it should be that much better. I was in a rather rare form at their first night which is always a good sign. People tell me I’m a fun drunk and I don’t think they would lie to me…would they? This month Cincinnati’s A/V-Dance-meltdown night takes on “Back To School.” Good luck guys, get your homework done!

Dance_MF

September 6 @ Northside Tavern

4163 Hamilton Ave.

And, as always, our own Party Garbage will be having their third installment at the C&D the following weekend. More details on that later, this week is Dance_MF’s week.

Love,

John