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+.
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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.
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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.
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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.
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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.
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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.
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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.
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I just posted this month’s Beatique mix, which you can listen to either on Mixcloud or on this page. It’s composed of two eclectic sets, with the second set being a club-style mix, that includes indie dance, disco, soul, psychedelic and weird electronic tunes. Give it a listen and check out the full track list below.
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In 1972, the concept of a music television show designed to keep people glued to their television sets in the middle of the night was novel. In fact, it was so unusual that, according to various interviews with the Burt Sugarman, the veteran TV producer funded The Midnight Special himself to get the pilot on the air. That initial episode aired at 1 a.m. and featured performances from War, Linda Ronstadt, The Isley Brothers and more. The format was a hit and The Midnight Special ran until 1981. Today, there is plenty of footage to watch online and multiple DVD sets available, all of which serve as a 1970s time capsule. If you watch enough clips from The Midnight Special— and, trust me, I have— you’ll see the decade evolve from funky hippies to disco to new wave.
On The Midnight Special, viewers could check out artists from across genres. T. Rex, Kraftwerk, Minnie Riperton, The Doobie Brothers and Dolly Parton are just a few who appeared on the show. Here, though, I’m focusing on the disco clips you need to see. Check them out below.
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