This week, Fifi Laroux (KSPC, Décadanse Soirée) and I are joining forces in the DJ booth. Find us at Bar Henry on Saturday, June 24, for Fire Night Dance. We’ve got our favorite disco jams and more on deck for you starting at 10 p.m. There’s no cover and it’s 21+.
Bar Henry is located at 1228 Sunset Blvd. in Echo Park. Can’t wait to see you on the dance floor.
Check out Los Angeles-based DJ Liz O. at one of her upcoming gigs.
Throughout June, One Colorado in Pasadena is hosting a series of free, Saturday evening concerts with Prism DJs in the opening slots. This Saturday, June 17, I’ll be warming up the crowd for Arcy Drive from 7 to 8 p.m. with a special indie dance mix. This is an all-ages event and should be a lot of fun. Hope to see you there.
One Colorado is located at 41 Hugus Alley, Pasadena 91103
I have just one gig this week, but it’s going to be a good one. Catch me on Friday, June 9 alongside Summer Rose and Crystal Heart at BLVD MRKT in Montebello for She Spins.
We’ll be playing vinyl from 7 – 10 p.m. while you dine and imbibe at the Montebello food hall. There’s no age limit, so bring the family and come hungry. The food (and drinks) are great here.
You’ll find BLVD MRKT at 520 Whittier Blvd. in Montebello.
This Friday, May 26, is The Cure Night at Underground. Both floors of Chinatown’s Grand Star Jazz Club will be open. Catch Larry G. on the ground floor and me, Liz O., upstairs. Andy the Cure Fan is hosting the night, which will feature poster and DVD giveaways, plus a t-shirt raffle. This is going to be a really fun night, particularly for all of you who love The Cure, so get advance tickets now for only $8. Party starts at 9:30 p.m. and is 21+.
You won’t see much more than a few lights inside “Party/After Party,” but you’ll hear, and feel, a lot.
On April 16, “Party/After Party,” the sound installation from esteemed DJ/producer Carl Craig, opened at MOCA’s Geffen Contemporary in Little Tokyo. I interviewed Craig for Southern California News Group prior to the opening, which you can read online. (If you don’t have a subscription, but do have a Los Angeles Public Library card, log in through the LAPL portal to read it.) However, I didn’t get to walk through “Party/After Party” until this past week. It was both an incredibly familiar and unusual experience.
Disco Heat is back at Songbird on Thursday, April 20. This week, our guest DJ is Maurice de la Falaise. It’s been IDK how long since Maurice and I have played together and I can’t wait to hear what he has in store for his international disco set. The party starts at 9 p.m. and there’s no cover, but I recommend that you RSVP on Eventbrite, Facebook or Instagram.
It’s probably pointless to write about Cracker Island, the latest album from Gorillaz, almost a month after it was released. It’s already been heavily reviewed. It’s a Billboard chart hit. If you’re into the long-running collaboration between Damon Albarn, Jamie Hewlett and a revolving cast of star musicians and producers, you probably already have Cracker Island.
Still, I’m going to write a couple paragraphs about Cracker Island here just in case you missed it. After all, it is very easy for the albums you want to hear to get lost in the algorithms.
Star Creature Universal Vibrations is a Chicago-based record label dedicated to “contemporary boogie” that’s been around since 2015. They first hit my radar a couple years after that, back when Salt Box Records had a brick-and-mortar in Chinatown and I picked up a new release from a Russian outfit called Venus Express II based almost solely on the cover art. As it turns out, the record was just as cool as the album sleeve, so now I consider Star Creature to be a mark of quality for funky, synth-heavy tunes.
Perhaps like a lot of other DJs, I’ve been playing Nuovo Testamento a lot in my sets since nightlife returned. The disco mix of “Vanity” was one of the most-played tracks in my sets last year, in fact, I think I only played “Machina” from Boy Harsher more often.
Taleen Kali has a new album out today called Flower of Life and you need to hear it.
Last August, I got to DJ for Taleen Kali’s tour kickoff show at Rubycon Records in Los Angeles. One of the joys of that night was getting to hear Taleen and the band play music from Flower of Life, an album that was, at that point, still months away from release. I remember them ripping through “Trash Talk” most vividly. There’s an immediacy to the song. I had never heard it before that night— it wasn’t released as a single until that November— but, by the song’s end, I felt like I knew it. To me, that’s the sign of a killer pop song.