Dan Deacon. Photos by Amy Darling.

For the 6^th anniversary of Sean Carnage Mondays, the crowd was the most packed I’d ever witnessed at Pehrspace, with lines circling the parking lot and some people waiting for hours to get in for a taste of special guests Dan Deacon and Future Islands. While it was great to see so many new faces, I have to admit relief at the sight of all of the regulars in the crowd, the people who week after week return to Pehrspace loyally on Monday nights for the eclectic and exciting programming that is Sean Carnage Mondays. The “TGIMers.” Even self-appointed announcer Karen Centerfold managed her way in somehow, but tonight Val Kilmer was the guest host, interacting with DJ Kyle Mabson’s mix of television themes and Tim Allen grunt samples. Jon Barba emerged on the stage bedecked in a silvery cobweb cape for a homecoming set, having established himself musically as “Nicole Kidman” among smaller crowds at Pehrspace and similar D.I.Y. venues over the years. Kevin Greenspon joined Barba on stage with guitar on Southpaw, and finale track Thirst for God, a dancey, biblically based track from Jon’s days of attempting to woo a Jehovah’s Witness. The first time I saw Lucky Dragons I half-expected a fawn to prance into the room and nibble from the stage, and I’ve felt that way at nearly every subsequent performance, tonight’s being no exception. It really is just that magical. With a slow build on a rhythmic journey composed on laptops, employing heavily reverberated vocals in a way that is vaguely tribal and raw.

Before Future Islands took the stage Mr. Kilmer led everyone in a chant of what I think may have been “pancake warp state,” at least that’s what the people next to me were chanting. Future Islands have been quickly gaining traction with powerful emotional performances highlighted by vocalist Sam Herring, alternating between a melodic soulful tone and Danzig-esque growls and howls. They treated the audience to some new tracks as part of a tight set driven by heavy bass lines complementing synthesized beats that occasionally veer into tropical territory. Dan Deacon took to the stage with a green flashing skull light display, and a computerized chipmunk falsetto, bursting into a high energy set like a demented children’s chorus. Deacon led the crowd through a variety of exercises, Jurassic Park vs. Big (the movie) dance contests, and a cathartic head touching interaction, all culminating in a “Wham City!” sing-a-long. Of course, no Sean Carnage Monday would be complete without the subsequent Kyle Mabson-led dance party to a variety of pop jams from the 90s onward, mixed with post-ironic nümetal riffs. Emerging from the space, steam rolling off of my shoulders, my fingers were pruned as though I’d been bathing for hours, and indeed I had been. Bathing in sweat, and filth , and pure joy.

For more on Sean Carnage Mondays please visit www.seancarnage.com

-Walt! Gorecki

[View with PicLens]

photo by Charles Mallison

This Thursday, August 4^th, the team behind Concertpage, Sean Carnage and Sam Lubicz, along with Liam Morrison and Nika Kolodziej will be presenting three weeks of art, video, and performances at Sancho Gallery on Sunset. Concertpage is a self-service online DIY event listing that is also distributed in print throughout Los Angeles on a monthly basis. The show, much like the print version, is a team effort bringing attention to some of L.A.’s rising talent exhibited alongside renowned artists like Gary Panter, Lou Beach and Wayne White.  I caught up with them at Sancho Gallery as they prepared to mount the show, and over an afternoon we discoursed over queer imagery, secret philosophies, and a friendship rooted in sperm. This interview by Walt! Gorecki

How did you come up with the L.A.’s Got Talent theme?
Liam Morrison: It’s sort of a joke that went too far. We were sitting in my car eating McDonalds, coming up with ideas for the show.
Sam Lubicz: We were trying not to over think it, to not come off as contrived, to have something that’s a bit loose and silly, you know? Originally we were considering having it be called L.A.’s Got Talent (Faces of Meth), and another name was going to be The Pagemaster, you know that movie?
Oh yeah the 90’s Macauley Culkin fantasy. What brought that about?
SL: Playing on the name Concertpage, but I think that has a whole different level of cheese from America’s Got Talent – which is kind of just right, it’s obviously cheese, but it’s not overwhelmingly cheese.
LM: Well it kind of is . . .
SL: Or I guess it is, it’s supposed to be a bit overwhelming. A lot of times you see galleries with these very serious shows, and we’re trying to break away from that and have something fairly loose, although we are serious about the project.
Are you going to have any judging panel, like on America’s Got Talent?
Sean Carnage: We could, but really it’s just ironic, despite what you may read in the press.
So how did you narrow down the themes for the performance series? The L.A. Lottery League one seems like an obvious choice, I wasn’t even aware that there was a movie in the works.
SC: Yeah it’s a crowd-sourced movie. We provided the overall audio track to offer some consistency there, and I assigned two camera-people per stage, but we also accepted anyone else’s footage. The movie’s about twenty-five minutes. It’s the highlights of every band, with no prejudice against any band.
So what sort of workshops do you have planned for Craft Night?
SC: We’re going to make this back patio into a craft area. Vlad the Retailer is very kindly burning some screens for us, and people are welcome to bring their own screens too. And people will be able to print their own Vlad T-shirt, or LA’s Got Talent screen, or Folktale Records.
So Mikhai is doing the friendship bracelet workshop as well?
SC: He really deserves the credit for coming up with a faster manufacturing process, a faster crocheting process, and then just relentlessly making them every week, it’s kind of his hobby. He makes other ones at home too, so I think he’ll be showing alternate methods of making them at Craft Night.
How did you hook up with William Burgess and the Burgess Ministry for the Druid Film Festival?
SC: That actually goes back to Il Corral [where Sean Carnage Mondays originated], as he was an Il Corral resident. He was always into the satanic and disturbing videos, and he very quickly learned that in Hollywood people are desperate, so he’s like “why don’t I do some good in this shady-ass world of Hollywood film festivals?” and he actually watches every film submitted to his Druid Film Festival, and over the years has connected with and built up an arsenal of the most twisted videos ever made, and he’s putting them on DVD and it’ll be released at that party, it’s the Best of the Druid Film Festival DVD release.
You have Essay performing at Totally Gay Night, but the performers aren’t really gay at all.
SC: That actually ignited an online debate about queerness. I’m really proud of these guys [Sam and Liam], they made the fliers for all the nights and the Totally Gay Night is the most remarkable one because they introduced some new imagery to the gay canon, which, frankly at this point in time, is a bit tired. It introduced some really slick, like CGI renderings of mountains, the Svedka come-hither-AI-looking robot from the commercials.
How did you come up with the mountaintops and such as queer imagery?
SL: We were just pulling things into Photoshop, and we didn’t want to put any blatant imagery in there, it’s too easy. We were trying to capture the essence of a “totally gay night” without being too up front about it.
Sam, how do you go about meeting some of these people who do the Concertpage covers? I know your father, Lou Beach, was one of the artists, but many others are involved in the Pehrspace Monday night scene.
SL: Well I like to mix the group of artists, a lot of up and coming artists, many of them are my friends, but then of course there’s people like Gary Panter, who’s an old friend of my dad’s.
LM: He’s put on the same level as someone like Kyle Mabson.
SL: He’s obviously highly revered, and an important L.A. artist, but I think all of these sort of underdogs are too.
Sam, do you involve yourself with any musical projects, given all the crossbreeding with art and music here?
SL: Yeah, well Liam and I have a group together called 333 Boyz; we have like 8 fake groups.
LM: We’ve been doing that since we were like 7 years old.
So you guys go back pretty far.
SL: We’ve known each other since, well, we say since sperm. [laughter] Our parents knew each other before we were born and we grew up in the same neighborhood, so we’re like brothers. But we’ve had a handful of bands –The Molesters, Satan’s Last Wish . . .
For the DIY Fashion Show are you expecting people to arrive in full costume, or will you have fashion stylists on-site?
SC: It’s going to be an actual runway show, the runway show is no joke, however it’s different from a regular fashion show. We aren’t trying to screen out people who aren’t serious or something, we welcome those people. In some ways that’s my homage to these guys and their whole younger person way of not differentiating between high and low art, but not in a postmodern sort of 80s way where like “lowbrow art can be high art,” now it’s just art. Sam and Liam’s statement really encapsulates everything about that.
SL: Okay – “L.A.’s Got Talent showcases work of individuals from all backgrounds. Hot shots, bottom feeders, the passionate, and the unenthused all meatloafed together. Los Angeles is depressing, and has undergone a continuous decline. But you can only fall so far! This is the dawn of a new age. Let this shed light upon your deepest fears of Art’s collapse.  Concertpage is for all, and I hope you are all for Concertpage. Raise your chalice for this enlightening tasty!”
Any surprises in store for the show?
SC: I think everyone’s going to be blown away by Kyle Mabson’s artwork.
A lot of people might be familiar with his Celebrity Juggalos, or flier art, which has a lo-fi repetitive Photoshopped imagery thing going on.
SL: It’s kind of got a similar feel, but he’s been talking to me at 3 in the morning, so it’s nice to see someone who hates art, now working at 3 in the morning making art. I don’t think a lot of the galleries in Echo Park have seen something of this caliber, it’s something new, and I think a lot of people are going to be blown out of the water by it.
SC: Kyle’s entered sort of a Barbara Kruger realm with some of this; it’s not sort of the Extreme Animals style that you’re maybe expecting. I don’t want to give away the surprise but, it’s much more sloganeering, kind of like twisted inspirational posters. Also, I think it’s important for us to be here on Sunset Blvd, these are people who have basically worked quite literally off the beaten path, from Il Corral to Pehrspace to The Smell, these are all alley places, and I think it’s actually really fitting that all this stuff is on a major street, accessible for the first time. It’s going to be new to a lot of people, but it’s actually not a new scene, it’s long continuing, and comes from many places. But the idea behind Concertpage, and hopefully some of the subtext or groundwork that these guys [Sam and Liam] have built their own ideas on top of, is that you need to reclaim these art and music events. People have complained about how the internet has maybe watered things down, or made things more impersonal, but we’re the people who have let thing become more impersonal and don’t try and network with people. So many people involved in the [music] scene are artists, so when I met Sam and Liam they represented to me that whole aspect, which is why I wanted to collaborate with these guys – to make more explicit the fact that this is all interwoven, and so many people do not realize that and it’s so frustrating.
Yeah there’s a lot of incest in the L.A. art and music scene.
SC: But just like incest, nobody wants to talk about it.

L.A.’s Got Talent runs from August 4^th – August 20^th at Sancho Gallery, 1549 W Sunset Blvd, Los Angeles, CA 90026. The opening on August 4th at 7pm is free, with complimentary refreshments, and gallery hours are Thursday – Sunday 12pm-9pm beginning on August 5th, with later hours for performances and screenings. For a full schedule of related events check www.concertpage.org.

Along with the debut of the new Big Whup videos will be the screening of a collection of music videos and short films curated by Big Whup Industries, an extension of Big Whup that last year produced the popular What is Happening… compilation CD surveying the best in the Angelino D.I.Y. pop scene and this year released the first Big Whup single. Accompanying the screenings will be live musical performances from Big Whup, Kid Static, Peter Pants, David Liebe Hart & Adam Papagan (formerly of “Tim and Eric Awesome Show, Great Job!”), and DJ Kyle Mabson.

The first Big Whup video, for “B.O.N.I.Z.H.E.A.R.T. ♥ ♥ ♥.” See it screened tonight: Big Whup Video Premiere, presented by Sean Carnage @ Pehrspace. Five Dollars, All Ages, BYOB.

Directed by Kate Gill.
Cinematography by Patrick Meade Jones
Edited by Eliot Dewberry
Production Managed by Nathalie Curtis
Choreographed by Stephanie Jamieson

– Drew Denny + Geoff Geis

Download: Sean Carnage’s Mixtape #3

For the first time in four years—after 200+ Monday shows in a row—I’ve taken some time off from booking and hosting California’s most obscure new bands, and I must say, it’s been great to catch up on the stacks of great new music sitting on my desk top. Here’s the best of the best for you, dear listener, combined into one end-of-the-summer mix…good things lie ahead:

Th’ Mole “Zombie Dance Mind Programme”
The DIY scene remains a refuge for the unabashedly eccentric, and ideas that are hashed out by underground artists now inevitably become accepted mainstream concepts in the not-too-distant future. That’s the whole reason we do this: “Tomorrow’s sounds, today!” And invariably, the more out-there the musical concept, the fewer the members the group will have. Case in point: Th’ Mole from Nevada City, California. Like other past Monday faves Militant Children’s Hour from Oakland or Agape from Salt Lake City Utah, Jonah Th’ Mole rolled up at one of my nights a stranger and left a hero thanks to his wild costumes, freaky stage antics, and his hip collages of dance and musique concrete elements that seemed years ahead of their time. Another thing that’s great about the underground is that you never know where these futuristic sounds will take root. Th’ Mole is playing Burning Man
next, so I’m curious to hear how that turns out.

Health “Die Slow”
I gave Health their very first show back at the dawn of the Sean Carnage Monday era, but I can’t get too highfalutin’ about it. These four L.A. lads were superstars from the moment they began jamming. Sooner or later someone was going to book this band (though I’m proud I got to be the one). Now I’m happy to report that what attracted me to Health in 2005 still compels me all these years later. Witness “Die Slow,” the first single off Health’s new album, Get Color. It’s noisy and avant-garde (but not to a degree that would be alienating), it’s highly textural, it’s strongly rhythmic (i.e., it rocks), and though the vocals are not the main element (they are very carefully interwoven amongst all the other aforementioned elements), the singing is actually in key. Health is also a band that has never gotten lazy; they were and are total perfectionists and never release new material until they’re ready. As a listener, I appreciate their devotion to the music.

Foot Village “Anti-Magic”
Speaking of perfection, I think I have included a Foot Village track on every Monday Megamix I’ve created for L.A. RECORD thus far. No, I am not taking kickbacks—I just love this band! That said, I’m not sure you can really capture the visceral excitement of four bashing and crashing drummers in the recording studio, which is why I included Foot Village remixes on my other podcasts. But here they are with the title track of their brand new album, proving me wrong. It’s like a pocket-sized version of the Boredoms or a more down-to-earth Crash Worship (to name two of my all-time, all-percussion favorites). Foot Village retains the voodoo that’s inherent in all-drum bands but leavens things with a big dose of fun.

Single Mothers “Untitled”
Single Mothers are transplants from Georgia, and they ended up being (along with Th’ Mole) one of the best new groups I booked this past July. Basically a solo outlet for Woodruff Foley (until he reconstitutes the band with local players), Single Mothers seem to be cut from the same cloth as Caroliner Rainbow, early Butthole Surfers and weird side of post-Syd Pink Floyd. I also hear audiophonic analogies to those jarring acoustic breakdowns that Kraut rockers like Faust used to throw into the middle of their albums. Hopefully this Single Mothers’ track functions similarly within this mix.

Hello My Name Is Red “Deadbeat”
Lest we get too deep into esoteric territory with this podcast, I thought I would bring things back down to earth with this very catchy track by Angelenos Hello My Name Is Red. This is as straight-up as it gets—guitar, bass, drums, and a great melody. Sometimes simplicity is quite revolutionary…

Skull Kiss “96 Tears”
…but simplicity doesn’t have to mean normal! Skull Kiss is the brain child of filmmaker William Burgess and his cohort Ignacio Genzon. This duo keeps the flames of rock insanity burning with spastic live shows in which they wear masks, become dangerously intoxicated, and destroy rock classics like “Last Caress,” “Let’s Twist Again,” and this one. With great underground rock, the psychotronic is never submerged too far below the surface. Raise a 40oz. (or two)…and celebrate the music of our lives!

Sean Carnage Mondays—a celebration of the best and newest cutting-edge music—returns to Pehrspace on Monday, September 7th, with I.E. and a slew of special guests. For more info go to seancarnage.com.

Cops and Unpaid Bills: Though his likeness still haunts everywhere you look, the King of Pop was finally laid away. Meanwhile, Los Angeles has spent the rest of the month looking for someone to slap with the bill for the king’s Nebuchadnezzarian sendoff. Though unattended by me, his funeral orgies fetched hundreds of thousands and that the LAPD was out in massive force didn’t need my eyeball confirmation since there was scarcely a cop to be seen anywhere else. All Jackson’s shove into Eternity meant to rockers and the party set downtown was that J.Q. Law was occupied in heroically overpolicing one event instead of the usual twenty. That the city attempted to hand fans and the (sore-bereaved) Jackson family a $1.4 million bill for its twitchy, long-running, and surreal policy of cop-overkill at every public gathering is bad enough. Add the fact that more police were around Staples Center for Jacko’s last appearance than for the entire 1984 Olympics and the public gets a broad hint of what underground parties and live music now face on a weekly basis. Thin blue line or no, there was little change in Angelenos’ customary sheeplike behavior after dark—even the very muggers did as told when directed to fuck off, I’m happy to report. Perhaps the city will know similar rebuffs while rattling its tin cup.

The Great Kim F.’s Lesbian Hunt and the Silver Lining on Mateo Street: Straight and Frankenstein tall stood Kim Fowley in the low-roofed Redwood Lounge last weekend. Presiding over another installment of “Hollywood Sexual Underground”, the legendary songwriter-producer-impresario was haranguing a roomful of sweating freaks and lovelies when I clambered in off the street on another boiling hot Friday night. “Are there any lesbians or drunks in the house tonight?” he intoned from somewhere near the ceiling, glowering about the narrow room like a rock ‘n’ roll Vincent Price. There were no confessed Sapphics, but that the place was packed with lushers was discernible by the naked nose, yet nary had a peep arose from the bar. Amateurs, I snorted. Just wait ‘til L.A. Decom. Impossible to rattle, Fowley breezed through the intro to Trophy Wives, who let out as deafening a caterwaul as I’ve ever heard loosed in the place. The lead singer’s mic died, but the drummer went off like a long string of M-80s and the narrow bar began to suitably rock. Grinning, I left, loping south through Little Tokyo and the Arts District as the floating parties and nuzzling lovers heralding the start of another off-the-hook weekend. I toked a buzz all the way down a dark slit of Mateo Street to Silver Factory Studios. This (literally underground) rock venue likewise surged, only this time with friendly indie rockers and the bent-neon psychedelia of 60 Watt Kid. This local trio went on at senatorial length, sculpting a too-big-for-the-room groove out of reverb and pleasantly unnerving electronic soundscapes. Their Women rez ends on the 27th, and I urge you to buy the ticket and take the inner-space ride.

Rock Around the Block: My run the following Saturday night was more of a downtown dogtrot, begun at the Smell with a fusillade of heavy noise from Christmas Island. This San Diego three-piece served up the blare with minimalist brio, as a double handful of spritzing kids capered crazily. Around the corner at the Five Star Bar, Anaheim’s Thee Makeout Party was doing the same to an older crowd, far gone in beer. TMP is power pop done the populist way, their raveups eschewing all Alex Chiltonian subtlety in favor of Cheap Trick-style detonation gratification. Out in the street, gaudy rockers mixed easily with the tranny ladies and street vendors, the whole gladsome magilla distancing themselves from the overflow crowd at the Edison just up the block. Smiling miniskirted ladies and glowering beaux greeted me at the Ed’s alleyway entrance, their attentions further warming an already sweltering night all the way back to the Smell. Bipolar Bear was just then going off inside, their horror-movie hodad rock blistering away as stylishly as ever. Anyone who can imagine mutant descendants of the Trashmen shooting the curves eleven toes over off a post-apocalyptic San Onofre already loves these guys whether they’ve heard them or not. I faded into the heat-glazed night with ears blistered by more better rockin’ than any half-block in Los Angeles.

The Glazed Daisies of Alex Chilton: The long bake of last week made grim my writerly slog through speculative fiction and reportorial fact. One of the consolations of a rock writer’s life is the vast haul of incoming schwag suited to every facet of one’s weirdo tastes. My latest audio bauble is Fantasy Records’ single-CD remaster of two longtime power-pop cult artifacts —#1 Record and Radio City by wildly influential Memphis maudits Big Star, an act blessed with far more talent than luck. Alex Chilton’s post-Box Tops comeback attempt zigged when the rest of rock zagged, despite first-rate collaborators like Chris Bell and Andy Hummel, but their sound lingers on in pretty much every four-piece Beatle-inflected rock band since. The sound is fully up to the standard set on Fantasy’s Isaac Hayes reissues earlier this year, with classics like “Don’t Lie to Me” and “September Gurls” packing an intensified wallop and lending a gorgeous Southern context to SoCal’s yearly spate of Dixie-like heat.

—Ron Garmon

Daiana Feuer

“What the fuck is Women?” I thought as I drove, very late and alone, away from civilization as I know it and south on the 110 towards the 10, where I hooked a right and started in the dangerous direction of West.  I’d gotten this assignment at the last moment, and the only thing I knew about the night was that 60 Watt Kid was awesome, and Pehrspace was no longer the venue.  Google Maps had shown me that Women’s address was something that looked like a frat house, which scared me. I had no idea there was a college anywhere near Crenshaw and Washington.

It was a house, a big ol’ thing, but when I got there, it weren’t no frat-type deal. Scraggly-looking twenty-somethings mobbed the front porch, my wristband for entry was a hand-woven lavender friendship bracelet, art and various trash messes covered the walls and counter space inside, and what seemed like confetti was spread all over the floor—but on further inspection, it was handmade.  Shreds of every kind of paper imaginable, including dollar bills, had been sliced up seemingly to bedazzle and bewilder aging hipsters like myself.

It wasn’t easy to comb the floor for further clues, because while 60 Watt Kid massaged their mic stands and drum kits into being, fuckable curly-haired young ‘uns in shorts and tee shirts grooved out, dancing to P.M. Dawn’s “Set Adrift on Memory Bliss.”  I fell in love immediately.  It was like the Pit in PCU!  Houses like this, like the Vermont House or Ellis Island near USC, are so important to true lovers of music.  This is why San Francisco in the sixties happened.  When a home becomes one big playroom, it means somebody is book-ending every day with magic.  “Yay to Sean Carnage for finding this place,” I thought, as he stood in the doorway, clapping his hands to the beat.

60 Watt Kid started their set beautifully and sweetly, samples of a woman “intrigued by the idea of virtual plastic surgery” lending themselves somehow to the build-up of a wondrous tune.  Then they got into a second tune, Dylan Wood looping some “Wipeout” style drums into beautiful, fragile song structures.  I realized that I was the only one sitting down.  The rousing crescendos that suddenly dissipated into atmospheric delicacy, and the punctuation by guitarist Derek Thomas of what sounded like a child’s xylophone all kept the audience on their toes and quiet as sweaty church mice, even when front-man Kevin Litrow ended a song with “God Bless Patrick Swayze!”

Cutting the set much too short, they wrapped up with their Willy Alexander-esque “American Standard,” an against-type rockabilly tune, wherein Litrow meandered through the audience shouting things at people.  They plunked the last few echoey notes, and sadly, the hip-hop CD started its thing once more.  As the audience made its way to the lawn, I caught one young man with a Misfits tattoo on his neck tell his girlfriend “These guys were siiiiick!”
It would be a tough act to follow.  But Th’Mole definitely started things right by coming out wearing a full-on super-hero costume made out of plastic goggles, wrestling boots, and some kind of Junior Birdman side-visor helmet deal.  His one-man hip-hop act over tinny beats reminded me of about a hundred similar acts that have shown up on Sean Carnage bills, but aside from the originality of his costume, he set himself apart by pulling off rhymes about nerdy bravado and heartbreak that made the Streets seem contrived and sterile.

And like Jonathan Richman, the real-ness of Th’Mole’s delivery was punctuated by constant explanations of his songs’ lyrical meaning.  Before one song, titled simply “I Hate You,” he told us flat-out that the song was directed against an ex-girlfriend, then proceeded to drop a narrative plea for justice: “I baked you a cake—I don’t even cook!”  Nothing warms my heart more than seeing other hearts laid out on superhero sleeves.  It’s to Sean Carnage’s credit that he has an eye for this stuff and can put together such disparate acts who flow so magically one to the next.

Or, at least I assume that he continued the flow.  For embarrassing cubicle-related reasons, I had to head home around the 1 a.m. mark, missing all the acts that followed.  I won’t make the same mistake next week, when Sean celebrates his four year anniversary, and 60 Watt Kid gets another chance to sweetly lift us to our feet.

—Dan Collins

We asked adopted Angeleno extraordinaire Sean Carnage to continue presenting his series of mixtapes collecting some of his favorite bands—local and otherwise. Here’s the second installment! (And click here if you missed the first!)

Los Angeles is currently at the beginning of a huge musical renaissance. There are so many local bands and performers—many of them Monday nighters—grabbing the national spotlight (like Abe Vigoda, Health, The Mae Shi, Captain Ahab and Nosaj Thing and the list goes on…).

But it’s the new, unheard of bands that continue to command my attention most. Why? The burst of creativity that accompanies a band’s initial birth is so pure and wonderful. For a diehard music fan, it’s like seeing all the possibilities of life expressed through sound. Here’s some more of the best new music. Do check them out!

The Press Fire! — “Hipster Crickets”
The Press Fire! seemed to come out of nowhere to upstage nearly everyone at one of the biggest Monday shows I ever hosted—the tribute to the songs of I.E. this past May. TPF!’s cover of Margot Padilla’s “You Think You’re Cool” was like one non-stop orgasm of confrontational brattiness. With “Hipster Crickets,” the Press Fire! has preserved that new attitude and applied it to one of their own self-penned creations. Perfection, non?

NASA Space Universe — Cover of unreleased White Flag song
In my last podcast I mentioned how sad I was NASA Space Universe broke up…but they hadn’t split! This OC unit is once again gigging around the area, packing shows at the Smell, and laying waste to everyone’s musical sensibilities with their raging hardcore. Like this—a cover of an unreleased White Flag song, recorded with Bill Bartell (aka Pat Fear).

Anavan — “Chicken & Cheese 2 (Originally by Foot Village)”
Notice how certain bands sound best when they work together with friends? Such is the case with Anavan and Foot Village. Here’s another Anavan re-working of a FV anthem. This time, the reference is not acid house, but Prince-like new wave funk. I can’t stop dancing (or singing in falsetto)! Go to http://footvillage.org/music/anti-magic-friends to learn about and hear mp3s from the Foot Village’s myriad collaborators.

Sex-S — “Sex Anonymous”
Sam Lubicz is another longtime Monday showgoer that (seemingly) pulled a talent for music right out of thin air. With support from Liam Morrison (drummer for the impeccably chaotic and rocking Amazements) Sam crafts some devilishly hook-y musical collages (like the one here released under his “Sex-S” moniker) and also toasts over freeform reggae tracks (as the outrageously racist/homophobic/misogynist “Jamaica Man”).

60 Watt Kid “2012”
Long Beach’s 60 Watt Kid make the perfect summer music. Witness “2012”—a sneak preview of an exciting new batch of recordings from the trio. The Kid’s burbling, repetitive, trance-inducing flow is perfect bed for singer Kevin’s wild and soulful vocals. It’s kind of like Elvis circa the year 3000, with Neu! as his back up band.

Double Dagger “We Are the Ones”
Double Dagger—a trio from Baltimore, Maryland—was one of the most physical bands I hosted all summer. They distill everything I love about ‘90s post-grunge underground music into a new style that feels totally fresh and progressive. And that’s what underground music is all about: taking the wreckage we’ve been left with by previous
generations and making something revolutionary—and beautiful—from the debris.

Sean Carnage Monday Nights (version 1.0) ends after four years and 200+ consecutive shows with a huge party—and complimentary Scoops Gelato cocktails! So be a part of history and make sure you attend Women (1852 Crenshaw, 9:30pm) on Monday, July 27th. Then I’m back with an all new run of Sean Carnage Mondays starting Monday, September 7th. My only credo: The best of the cutting-edge every Monday, and only five bucks…See you then?

Download: Sean Carnage’s Mondays mega-mix

(full tracklist with liner notes here!)

Sean Carnage has done so much for L.A. music that there had to be a movie made to help document it—40 Bands 80 Minutes!, now recognizable as early home to much of the most vital actives still performing in the city. He’ll be celebrating four years of DIY shows (across six venues!) all this month at Women during his traditional Monday night residencies, and he’ll have the official Sean Carnage birthdayversary spectacular on July 27. This interview by Drew Denny.

The first time I attended a Sean Carnage night was at Il Corral—Is that where it all began?
That’s cool that you were there! Il Corral was really special, and that’s where Monday Nights began—on August 1st, 2005. I covered the back story of the Il Corral and the atmosphere of the times in my movie 40 Bands 80 Minutes!, so I’d recommend checking that out. Il Corral was everything a Rust Belt kid like me hoped California would be—wild (but still innocent) punk rock fun. Stane (Il Corral co-founder) installed a rope swing in the music area, so that gives you an idea of the venue’s play zone atmosphere. I was really lucky to be able to host shows there. A high proportion of the performers who played there were bona fide geniuses, and for once in my life, I realized what was going down as it was happening and turned on the video camera. People doubted my selection of performers for 40 Bands 80 Minutes! when it came out over two years ago. (Including L.A. RECORD—LOL!) [LOL @ us—ed.] But damn near every person who appears on the screen in my movie has gone on to do important stuff. The Los Angeles artistic and musical community is something to be proud of.
How did you get started?
I love underground music as a style and as a craft, and I had been involved as a musician, promoter, writer and fan for about thirteen years in Cleveland, Ohio. I moved to L.A. to retire, but couldn’t shake the music. So I started booking again after taking about three years off.
Did you know when you began that it would last this long and be so loved?
Derek Hess did Mondays at the Euclid Tavern for 8 years. Speak In Tongues also lasted 8 years. I knew if I could bring regularly scheduled music into the D.I.Y. and all-ages realm, it would work.
What was Speak in Tongues? I’m researching Pentecostalism and speaking in tongues for my thesis right now, so I have to ask…
Speak In Tongues—and the guys who lived there—changed my life. It was all-ages D.I.Y. for eight years—an amazing run. I learned that you don’t need to do shows in bars. You can strip away another layer of mediation and do it yourself. Not an original concept, but it was new for me in the mid and late 1990s, and it informs everything I’ve aspired to since. (SIT hibernates at speakintongues.com)
It seems that at any location—Il Corral, Pehrspace, the Smell—you create a space that fosters a family of bands that might not have otherwise had any place to play, or at least not any other place where they’d feel quite so at home. Was this always a goal of yours?
I was seeing a ton of excellent shows around L.A. in the early 2000s and that was tremendously inspiring. So I just started asking bands if they wanted to play my night. All the attendees of those initial Mondays were way turned on by the energy of it all. When we moved to Pehrspace in 2007, it only got better.
Which bands did you start out with?
The first show was Haircut Mountain Transit, FM Bats, Buko, Ugly Shyla, Szandora… and Jell-O shots. Jon San Nicolas and my boyfriend at that time, Richmond Tan, helped me so much. We were noisy and gay right from the start! Now Mikhai Tran helps me tons with the shows—taking photos and weaving our distinctive bracelets, which are unique for every show.
How political is your programming process? By that I mean, how much—if at all—do you concern yourself with representing or attracting a certain group?
A lot of the people behind Mondays’ success are gay, and I’m proud of that. It’s emblematic of a new non-political phase of the gay rights movement. Young people can now be themselves and not worry what people think about their sexuality. That said, I bring up sexual orientation because with the passing of Prop 8, we still have so far to go. I suppose this is preaching to the choir—musicians are usually pretty progressive—but Mondays have been my modest way of saying ‘we’re here, we’re queer,’ and building something positive and constructive that every music fan can enjoy.
Is there is a unifying factor among the Sean Carnage bands—in terms of genre, style, or scene? If not, what is it that you consider when choosing bands to book?
I’m looking for the best music. I don’t pay particular attention to style. I listen more for general musicality. And the execution is important. I really cherish the Monday audiences so I am always trying to find new ways to thrill them. What’s nice is that most of the bands are already friends, but because they operate in different areas of the music scene, my shows bring them together—often for the first time. The other unifying factor is the between-sets music of Kyle H. Mabson. Kyle’s become my partner in the shows since I met him fall of 2005. I feel like Kyle’s really changed how underground music is experienced. He brings the dance party and that amps everything up.
Who are some of your favorites right now?
I love the new Amazements album. I like American Gil and the Major Dudes a lot. Certain performers like Billygoat, Birth!, D. Bene Tleilax, I.E., Whitman, Nicole Kidman, Moment Trigger… they’re all Monday superstars.
My best friend and band-mate, Geoff—Pizza! and Big Whup—and I just made a compilation that includes tracks from both American Gil and Nicole Kidman. We love them! What is it about those Inland Empire kids that makes them so amazing?
Haha—good question! It astounds and humbles me the people from the I.E. drive so far to attend shows like mine. I don’t 100% understand the local culture there, but I’ve always gotten a good feeling from both the music and the personalities of the Inland Empire folks. Maybe there’s something about living in the 909 that is similar to living along Lake Erie? I’ve always related to people with backgrounds that are similar to mine, but for lack of scientific evidence, I can’t really say much else except: I like what I hear.
Tell me the craziest-best-worst-funniest-most-miraculous-most-tragic Sean Carnage night story. Please?
This past Monday, people were freaking and beating each other with pool noodles on Women’s front lawn for 20 minutes after the music ended—that was pretty crazy!
I heard the police came a few weeks back and threatened to shut down Pehrspace—have there been any recent developments in that story?
I don’t have anything new to report, but Pehr is continuing to host a small number of weekend shows, so please support them every chance you get.
How are you getting by in the meantime?
I’m proud to be hosting at Women. They’ve given me the space to do some really ambitious programming, like the four-week 60 Watt Kid residency in July which features a ton of new bands.
Is there anything we—as Sean Carnage and Pehrspace fans—can do to help in this struggle?
No matter what venue you see live music at, be mindful of the neighbors when you are outside the space. It’s hard—I’m trying to inspire people to be free, but on the street you have to be low key.
What will you do if you can’t continue booking there?
I’ve been lucky to have done Mondays at Il Corral, Pehrspace, the Smell, Zamakibo, House of Vermont and Women, so if I have to find a new home I will. I figure that after 200+ shows in a row, I’ve earned some vacation. So I’m taking this August off to prepare the new Monday home and I’ll be back the first Monday in September.
Sounds like a good plan… And finally, I’d like to say CONGRATULATIONS! What are you doing to celebrate your anniversary?!
On Monday, July 27th I am hosting some truly amazing bands—60 Watt Kid, Shirley Rolls, the Seizure, Mikki and the Mauses and Single Mothers. Then I’m going to take August off and figure out where the heck Mondays are gonna live in the fall. Then I’ll be back on Monday, September 7th with… I.E.! I will be keeping everyone updated through facebook.com/seancarnage and seancarnage.com.

SEAN CARNAGE’S ANNIVERSARY MONTH BEGINS WITH 60 WATT KID, HIGH CASTLE, ITALIC INDIAN, SKULL KISS AND GARRETT PIERCE ON MON., JULY 6, AT WOMEN, 1852 CRENSHAW BLVD., LOS ANGELES. 9:30 PM / $5 / ALL AGES. SEANCARNAGE.COM. 60 WATT KID WILL BE IN RESIDENCY EVERY MONDAY IN JULY. FOR COMPLETE LINE-UP AND MORE INFORMATION VISIT SEANCARNAGE.COM.