Friday, December 21, 2012 : 6PM–2AM : PJ's Lager House : 1254 Michigan Ave. Detroit, MI
$4
Terence McKenna was the new wave Timothy Leary, if you are unfamiliar, he is now YouTube famous. While taking copious amounts of psychedelic mushrooms in South America with his brother in the late 60's and writing The Invisible Landscape he decided to plot the Chinese I Ching against time. His “timewave zero” timeline ends on December 21, 2012. At the point of this discovery, Terence was unaware of the Mayan calendar system. Or the Egyptian calendar, or even ancient Indian calendars.
On December 21, 2012 we are having a festival at PJ's Lager House. Sure, we're calling it a festival. Ideally it would be summer and we would all be in Hart Plaza or the New Center area with the rest of our community celebrating music and Detroit together. I suppose these festivals will return, just as the seasons turn. For now, it is winter and we have everyone's favorite rock and roll bar. Next year, if enough of you join us, we may be able to spring for an outdoor tent and a heater for a winter solstice party or a winter blast party, or something grand and fun like that. This year we have 2 stages, 12 bands, a DJ, psychedelic light shows and lots more surprises and gimmicks that we haven't even thought of yet. If the world is going to end, we might as well do it right, huh? But I think we all know that the world is not going to end, and we seem to have all realized that the world IS going to end. Or begin, or something. It's a Christmas party, a belated Hanukah party, a Holiday party, a Kwanzaa party, an early New Year's party, a Winter Solstice party, a Festivus party and all. See you tomorrow !
Featuring:
Six and the Sevens: Blues-tipped rock 'n' roll with a pop sense. There's lots of feedback and heaps of white soul too, I mean, jangled, jaunty shake-em-ups, man, just get right up and dance on the table if you're feeling it. Yes, grab a tambourine if it's near...or just clap along, because the beat won't stall and the piano keeps rolling, guitars are gushing and bluesy vocals are bleating and blaring.
The Walking Beat: Maturing indie-sweet combo featuring Matt Van (Uncle Kracker) and Steve McCauley (Scarlet Oaks) and one Jesse Paris Smith (daughter of Fred and Patti Smith), is 55% beauty, 41% walking and 65% beat, with bits of sadness and clumps of rock and roll too.
Ungrateful Daughter: Yours and my rock and roll hero, Frank Woodman, with his actual ungrateful daughter and her boyfriend on drums, hilarious! They'll all be in full caveman apparel, the tunes will be crunchy, the ukulele will be heavenly and the mood will be, as always, a raucous festivus of never-ending good times.
Brandon Hamburger: You ever wonder what kind of songs you'd write if you were the doorman at the lager house? A lot of character walks in those doors, and a lot of character flows from these songs. See the singer-songwriter you've been waiting for with the light-up Beatles heads in the up-stairs window and that hat. You are definitely going to want to hear this before the world ends, you can count on that!
The Echoes of Revelation Full Proclaiming Demon Slayers Tabernacle: Also known, as The Botanical Fortresstra, are a mysterious group. Their name is spray painted on the ground at the front door, was that always there or did it just appear there, like a glitch from the Matrix? They'll be summoning up the Mayan gods or Zool or something, with ranting and raving and rocking and rolling and riling and god knows what other r words. Not to mention the other letters! Bass, drums, guitar, organ, a fleet of horns and LASERS. It will be an event, I've figured out that much.
The Reelers: How many times have you read in a press release that a band gives new meaning to the phrase “like a well-oiled machine”? Well, this band really does, I'm serious! Guitar, bass and drums; locked in. Solid. Grooves, jams, blues licks, runs, solos, and I mean shredding, ripping, heavy-heavy solos, brother. Hot damn! Your face won't just melt it will implode, maybe that's what the end of the world's all about? Your entire universe imploding and then exploding from outrageous loud spectacular beyond-the-twilight zone rock and roll? Probably.
Johnny Ill Band: gentbent.fm says “is largely akin to other synthy garage bands like Wet Illustrated (San Francisco). But their disregard for rhymes, their real life motifs, and their pop-mocking minimalism tie a unique stylistic bond between them and the decade in which they were probably most formatively formed: the 1990’s (particularly via Weezer). Ask All the Doctors is rife with lazy anti-anthems. Johnny Garcia’s dispassionate deadbeat attitude almost dares you to sing along with his lyrics which, in large part, are about commonplace pessimism. “Where Do You Live?” is probably my favorite track because it exploits my predilections for bitter inter-personal rhetoric, understated bass loops, and brief, hyped up synth solos. Another noteworthy strength, which applies to the album as a whole, is the percussion section’s dedication to simple beats. They’ve found the happy medium between sense and sensibility, which I think is fairly well capitulated by the aleatoric recording of a conversation between bandmates in the conclusive track, “NYE”. In talking about how ready they are to eat dinner, they laugh at someone who says he’s “famished”, as though his diction was just too much for the moment.
The Potions: Gritty, soulful, gritty, raunchy yelling with a scratchy throat with guitar licks out of a genie's bottle, swirling around the grimey thrash beat. The heaviest wah-wah solo you've ever heard in your life could break out any second, but it doesn't. And that anticipation for it gives the groove so much more. A teasing to the crowd to show some god-damned enthusiasm and boogie for once. Catch these sounds while you can.
Swimsuit: Gaze-y, wave-y, it's all gravy. Groovy lively melody with light, or higher in the atmosphere, rhythm that sweeps over your heads. Compelling you to leap into the air with the illusion that gravity no longer applies. Beach-sounding boy-girl punk twirls and twang and soul. The kind of music you'd imagine hearing if you just found out that teleportation was real. Not without a heavy grunge attitude and honesty, punchy even. Most definitely catchy. With Fred of Saturday Looks Good to Me, Shelley of those show flyers and Dina of Secret Twins. Support your Ann Arbor neighbors, Detroit!
The Priests: dcist.com says “Bands that are excited about what they're doing are always more fun to watch. As such, when a band is so unabashedly in-your-face and energetic, its live set becomes instantly memorable. During Priests' show at the Black Cat last March, Katie Greer (also of Chain and the Gang), sneered, screamed and sang her way through a set of loud songs. Daniele Withonel pounded furiously behind her, with complex rhythms and occasional chirpy screeches of her own. Meanwhile, Gideon Jaguar seared through guitar riffs that while powerful, still sounded melodic and deliberate, as if fighting against the speed and dissonance of most hardcore. Every Priests performance since has been the sort of affair that has made us believe that D.C. hardcore is alive and kicking.”
French Method: Brand spanking new band of Eddie Baranek (The Sights) and Nicole Allie and Ben Luckett (Beehive Recording Company) are brand new. What to expect? Dunno, I guess there's only one way to find out, ain't there? Bass, organ and drums. With 2 or 3 vocals? Sounds like good ingredients. Try something new, dig it baby.
Beekeepers: It's a sort of punk-jazz quintet. Organ/sax/pink floyd-inspired chanting punk rock band. Meditate on the survival of the honeybee population through this music, or something. The egg heads say we're not quite sure why the bees are dying. It's probably because of the pesticides though, right?
More fun and rock and roll and surprises and mystery to be announced and experienced! You'll not want to miss this one. You know if you draw a line from the Giza pyramids to the White House it creates an arrow pointing directly towards PJ's Lager House? The alignment will be off only by 0.00001 degrees on December 21, 2012. DJ Richie Wohlfeil (The Potions, Lo & Behold Records) will start spinning at 6pm, the wildness starts, and the first band goes on at 8pm. Do not miss them. It is essential! Also; shot specials and christmas presents. See You There!
