Marke B. Archives — Page 26 of 55 — San Francisco Bay Guardian Archive 1966

Flesh tones

September 23, 2009

markeb@sfbg.com

Like a cold, wet pinky, porn has truly inserted itself into every facet of our lives — even our nightlife. Gay porn, especially, is big business in the Bay, and besides the endless stream of between-flicks go-go boys this provides many mainstream gay clubs and a host of porn-themed parties, most featuring DJ Pornstar, it also draws a lot of international hopefuls to our fair shores, maintaining some diversity on the homoclub scene. You wouldn’t believe the amount of Swiss buttboys I’ve met at the disco, child.

But what about the music of gay porn? Has it moved beyond the stereotypical boom-chaka-wahow-wahow to reflect our hip-hop-infused, electronic reality? I recently talked via hot pink iPhone with The minor9 (www.theminor9.com), a young production duo who’ve been working with Raging Stallion for the past few months, helping to infuse that megastudio’s soundtracks with a little contemporary flavor, from the neo-tango trappings of the forthcoming Hombre to the trip-hop trimmings of shoe-and-weed fetish flick High Tops, which features a sampled recipe for marmalade(!).

Minor9 members Marcus and Chris stepped into the giant shoes of legend JD Slater, a cofounder of Raging Stallion whose soundtrack work helped bring rock, ambient, and industrial sounds into the porn mainstream, and who recently retired to concentrate on his own music. "It’s amazing the amount of opportunity composing for porn provides," says Marcus. "Obviously we’re not out to make a big artistic statement — the director tells us his vision and we do our best to match it in the background. So no grand chord changes or cymbal crescendos at the climax. But in terms of creative outlets, you couldn’t ask for more."

"My greatest triumph was slipping some bassoon into a scene," adds Chris. The local duo share a past as independent musicians and combine live instrumentation with software hijinks to set the right backseat blow-job mood. Chris and Marcus asked me not to use their last names to avoid future employment kafuffles. So, is there still a porn stigma?

"Porn’s such a fact of life now, and my mom said, ‘That’s great!" when I told her about my new job," says Marcus. "But you never know." Chris chimes in, "Let’s put it this way. I used to be a graduate student in math. Talk about stopping a conversation dead. Now I tell people what I do and suddenly I’m the life of the party."

—————

BEARRACUDA MAGNUM

Sweaty gay leather bears packed in hairy shoulder-to-shoulder, grunting to live sets by dark duo Ejector and drag tragedy Christeene, plus electro-pop DJ Francisco Guerra. Fri/25, $10. DNA Lounge, 375 11th St., SF. www.bearracuda.com

BLOWOFF

Another hairy bear woof attack, this time on the rock remix tip, with indie hero DJs Bob Mould and Rich Morel at the first anniversary of this too-popular party. Sat/26, 10 p.m., $15. Slim’s, 333 11th St., SF. www.slims-sf.com

SISSY FIT

"Rock ‘n roll, cheap bear, and sloppy dick" brought to us by the queer punk Trans Am boys. DJs Dirty Knees and Pickle Surprise help usher in the mosh madness. Sat/26, 10 p.m., $6. Sub Mission, 2183 Mission, SF. www.myspace.com/transamtheclub

SS TRANNYSHACK

What’s better than nutso drag? Nutso drag on a boat. Try to stay seaworthy at this swingin’ who’s-who with Heklina, Dirty Sanchez, DJ Juanita More! and more. Sat/29, 8:30 p.m., $45 advance. Pier 41, SF. www.trannyshack.com

Wayfarer crests

September 15, 2009

marke@sfbg.com

In heaven, apparently, there’s really good asparagus. Damn fine string beans, too.

So writes the composer Gustav Mahler (1860-1911), somewhat kookily, in the incandescent ode to the afterlife called "We Enjoy the Delights of Heaven" that caps off his typically over-the-top Symphony No. 4. And if Measha Brueggergosman, the too-hip barefoot soprano delivering the news in German ("Gut’ Spargel, Fisolen!") hadn’t been so dazzling — or dazzlingly backed by the San Francisco Symphony — my bf and I would have succumbed to an unholy giggle-fit in our seats. Seriously, asparagus?

That was a couple years ago, however, before foodie culture had tightened its iron crème-brûlée-cart grip on the Bay. Now, thoughts of angelic asparagus and legumes aux cherubim seem only natural, and the main question would be, "Yes, but are the vegetables in heaven local?"

There are more substantial ways that Mahler’s massive output — currently being explored by SFS in an ongoing stream of self-released recordings and annual Mahler extravanganzas, the latest of which takes place Sept. 16-Oct. 3 — seems up-to-the-minute. Mahler, with his ecstatic song cycles and otherworldly symphonies, was the last, and arguably the most bombastic, of the Romantic composers, attempting to transform the shuffling grunts of our mortal coil into a celestial star-chart of the Soul. If there’s one thing a quick listen to indie rock and dance music of the past two decades, from My Bloody Valentine and early rave to Animal Collective and the Field, shows, it’s that we’re in the midst of a similar period of musical transcendence through sensory overload.

Yet despite his yearning for earthly oblation, Mahler always kept both ears to the ground. His symphonies (SFS presents No. 1 and No. 5 this year) are whirligigs of pastiche, scandalous at their debuts for including tavern tunes, folk dances, mechanical noises, self-quotations, stage directions, shock tactics, even a slightly tipsy rendition of "Frere Jacques." To my ears they sound like DJ mixes of DJ mixes, each separate movement an isolated act of alchemical distillation. If the sum of the exquisite parts doesn’t quite exceed the whole — Mahler always seems to be reaching for the same perfect conclusion, and is never less than full-on intense, even in his more hushed passages — the individual moments are ravishing. I dare you to sit through SFS’s exhilarating new CD of Symphony No. 8, the so-called "Symphony of a Thousand," and not leave your body a few times.

Another contemporary relevance: Mahler was a bundle of shifting identities and internal contradictions. He was a Jew who unhesitatingly became a Catholic to score a major conducting gig yet quit Europe for America due to rising anti-Semitism there, a Bohemia-born, Germany-raised, Austrian citizen, an advocate of complete creative freedom who obsessed over his status in the canon. He was a composer who conservative critics accused of abetting the rise of the labor movement with his yen for popular music and whom other critics abandoned for more avant-garde experimenters. According to Alex Ross in his juicy book The Rest is Noise: Listening to the Twentieth Century (Picador, 2007), Mahler agonized over the question, "Can a man win fame in his own time while also remaining a true artist?" Culturally, we’ve moved beyond that question a bit, and sure, Mahler’s Facebook updates would be atrocious (total oversharer), but in his struggles and ambiguities he’s of the now.

One way Mahler released some of the pressure of his churning personality was through song. Voices are everywhere in his work, popping up in the middle of symphonies, vertiginously interlacing and often opposing each other. Ventriloquism reigns supreme. In Das Lied von der Erde ("The Song of the Earth"), which SFS recorded in 2007, Mahler composed six rather trippy songs based on ancient Chinese poems, four by Li Bai, the "wandering poet" of the Tang dynasty. The vocal wandering and searching continues in Lieder eines fahrenden Gesellen ("Songs of the Wayfarer"), which SFS will present with baritone Thomas Hampson. Wayfarer traces a young man’s crazy voyage of romantic love, including "I Went this Morning over the Field," in which a finch shouts, "Zink! Zink! How the world delights me!" and the creepy, suicidal, "I Have a Gleaming Knife." SFS will also perform Rückert-Lieder with the radiant mezzo-soprano Susan Graham, in which Mahler forcefully adapts the OK poet Friedrich Rückert, kicking off the set with a bittersweet wink called "Do Not Look at My Songs!"

In working his way through Mahler’s oeuvre, SFS conductor Michael Tilson Thomas is doing something very psychologically interesting. The project is a bit anal — everything is polished to MTT’s usual, almost fussy, tee and recorded using the latest mind-boggling technology. And it’s a bit Oedipal — MTT’s mentor, Leonard Bernstein, who also presented Wayfarer with Hampson, became possessed by Mahler at one point, taking on Mahler’s symphonies as if his life depended on it. To Bernstein, Mahler foretold a century of death and despair and "showered a rain of beauty on this world." That century is over, and Bernstein’s recordings with the New York Philharmonic are gorgeous. So why the redo? Beyond the Freudian hoo-haw, I think MTT, with his ultra-refined yet luminescent interpretations, is moving past it. He’s presenting Mahler not as a turbulent visionary or stereotypical cloud-headed groundbreaker but simply as a glowing green fact, one for a new century, complicated and complex enough already, to chew on but not choke on.

SAN FRANCISCO SYMPHONY MAHLER FESTIVAL

Wed/16-October 3, various times and prices

Davies Symphony Hall

201 Van Ness, SF

(415) 552-8000

www.sfsymphony.org

Come a cropper

September 15, 2009

superego@sfbg.com

SUPEREGO I had absolutely no idea that there was a hysterical ’90s gay dance hits mashup scene!

This was just one of the many, many worlds that opened up for me as Hunky Beau and I girded our burgeoning loins and embarked one recent Saturday on a whirlwind Castro bar crawl. Despite the nutso economics of late, a large new crop of attractively unpretentious San Francisco nightspots has bloomed, from the odd-but-pleasant hunter-themed Bloodhound in SoMa (1145 Folsom, www.bloodhoundsf.com) and multi-chandeliered DJ paradise Triple Crown in Mid-Market (1760 Market, www.triplecrownsf.com) to Potrero Hill’s underground-minded Project One Gallery (251 Rhode Island, www.p1sf.com), the Mission’s jazz-inflected supperclub Coda (1710 Mission, www.codasf.com), and — hurray? — our first "dessert lounge" CandyBar in the Western Addition (1335 Fulton, www.candybarsf.com). Even a few mainstays have had fresh alt-cred life breathed into them, like absinthe-happy Buckshot Tavern (3848 Geary, SF. www.buckshot-sf.com), classy dive the Hearth (4701 Geary), and reinvigorated Madrone Lounge (500 Divisadero, www.madronelounge.com).

It’s a regular autumn harvest of buzz-heavy embarrassment opportunities — a barvest, if you will. But it’s the Castro that’s seen the most openings in the past few months, so that seemed the logical destination for a night of guzzling look-see.

For the sake of my flawless skin, I try to stay positive. Complaining about the Castro is like crapping on a pigeon: you feel a little vindication, but then you realize, "Wow, I just crapped on a pigeon." So you have to just take our increasingly generic, Kylie-nauseating gay Mecca on its own terms, acknowledging that among the upscale influx there’s at least some crazy drag and heartfelt effort at the Lookout (3600 16th St., www.lookoutsf.com), a very nice overdue remodel of the hip-pop Café (2369 Market, www.cafesf.com), with a lot fewer tiny backpacks in line to get in, even a cozy laidback alcoholic outpost called Last Call (3988 18th St., www.thelastcallbar.com), which slid right into the old Men’s Room space. And Q Bar (456 Castro, www.qbarsf.com) hosts some some damn cute weekly parties.

That hoo-hoo gay mashup scene I mentioned — think Armand Van Helden’s rejigger of "Professional Widow" by Tori Amos overlaid with Deee-Lite’s "Groove is in the Heart" and Stardust’s "Music Sounds Better with You" — was rocking a dance floor of five at the distractingly bright Toad Hall (4146 18th St., www.toadhallbar.com) but the nifty back patio was packed, mostly with amply proportioned women who’d probably wandered over from the Castro Theater’s Erotic Film Festival. I suppose apoplectic owner Les Natali is trying to somehow channel the spirit of the original clone-era Toad Hall bar through a blaze of big-screens and several hot pink waterfalls?

The cover at Trigger (2348 Market, www.clubtrigger.com) was $8.

By far the best new arrival to the cologne zone is Blackbird (2124 Market, www.blackbirdbar.com), a relaxed, narrow, and hiply appointed joint around the corner from the former Transfer, now known creatively as Bar on Church (198 Church, www.thebarsf.com). Blackbird has been in the news a lot lately due to the sad death of droll co-owner Doug Murphy from swine flu, eclipsing the happier news that the bar has quickly become one of the city’s more celebrated hotspots. Blackbird’s other co-owner, Shawn Vergara, knows that a few rough edges, a risk-taking cocktail menu — try the sparkling, tequila-based "grape drink" — and a freak-welcoming vibe stick in the mind more than wannabe polish.

As for the rest of the Castro: Is trying to do something different too much to ask? Did I just crap on a pigeon?

Hobbs knobbin’

September 8, 2009

superego@sfbg.com

SUPER EGO "My mission is progression," says BBC 1 Radio’s Experimental Show host DJ and left-field electronic music goddess Mary Anne Hobbs. "Everything should point to the future. If there’s any reason I’m here, it’s to build new causeways beyond classic sounds toward symbiotic textures. I cannot hang in suspended animation."

Hobbs is on the horn from Britain, and her droll Lancashire accent and signature breathy enthusiasm, combined with my wet-pantsed fanboy palpitations, is making it hard for me to keep up. I’m gushy, y’all. Because basically Mary Anne Hobbs is one of the coolest people on the planet, not only dedicating her considerable charisma to bringing challenging sounds to a wider audience and galvanizing a disparate community of bedroom knob-fiddlers — but also able to instantly conversation-hop from Kawasaki motorcycles (she’s made a multipart documentary about riding through Russia) to late Bay jazz oracle Alice Coltrane (the title of Hobbs’ excellent new Planet Mu platter of twisted audio thrills, Wild Angels, was inspired by a meditation on harpist Coltrane’s "cosmic arpeggios").

Although she’s been closely associated with dubstep and future bass, Hobbs eschews core genre sounds, yet she recognizes her role in helping dubstep become such a mainstream phenomenon in her native land. "I look after my small country of artists, and if extraordinary talents like Benga or Burial break through, I’m enormously pleased. But there’s still so much out there."

Mary Anne Hobbs, Wild Angels preview

Hobbs laughs when I mention her maternal reputation, but when I bring up the glaring invisibility of women on the scene, she says, "People just aren’t looking in the right places," and launches into a list of about 20 favorite females, including Vaccine, Blank Blue, and Ikonika before deftly nipping my typical American multiculti soapboxing in the bud. "I think many of these artists prefer not to be viewed through the prism of sexuality."

Wild Angels, Hobbs’ third compilation, moves away from dark dubstep toward the esoteric, sticky-starlight synth sound of Scotland’s LuckyMe collective (represented here by Hudson Mohawke, Mike Slott, and Rustie) with some West Coast rep coming from Nosaj Thing. More Cali cuts may make it onto future releases. "I’m so excited to be spinning in California again," Hobbs says. "The energy is incredible. I really feel that’s where it’s at right now." Agreed!

Get Freaky Afterburn featuring Mary Ann Hobbs Fri/11, 10 p.m.-3 a.m., $20/$25. 103 Harriet, SF. www.1015.com

BEAT DIMENSION

Synapse-melting live electronic showcase hosted by NYC’s Soundpieces, with the Austria’s Dorian Concept, Cinnaman, Flying Skulls, E Da Boss, and more…

Thu/10, 10 p.m., $5–$10. Paradise Lounge, 1501 Folsom, SF. www.paradisesf.com

HONEY DIJON

The scandalously fun transgender DJ brings her bubbly brand of runway house hoo-hoo to Temple’s main floor. Solid Bump Records electro-hosts the basement.

Fri/11, 10 p.m., $20. Temple, 540 Howard, SF. www.templesf.com

KINGDOM

Bass-heavy Brooklyn rave revivalist — with a light touch and some Bmore beats — has scored bigtime with his crazy "Mindreader" single on Fool’s Gold. Can he keep it up?

Sat/12, 10 p.m., $10. Elbo Room, 647 Valencia, www.elbo.com

TRIPLE THREAT

It’s a 10-year reunion for groundbreaking turntablist trio Vinroc, Shortkut, and Apollo — could it herald a return for actual vinyl skills? Sure hope so.

Sat/12, 10 p.m.-3 a.m., $15. Mighty, 119 Utah, SF. www.mighty119.com

Architecture and the City

September 8, 2009

PREVIEW I don’t know whether this is awesome or boring, but one of the most perverse pleasures to be had in the Bay for the last decade has been fantasy house-hunting — dressing like you can afford more than a rent-controlled railroad flat’s closet and hitting the Sunday open-house real estate orgy circuit, mostly to decry the recent penchant for tacky recessed lighting and cheap beige granite counter-tops. The ’80s are back! If you’re a premium architecture and design junkie, though, you’ll be swooning all September — launching your intellectual and tactical fantasies into the clouds with the Architecture and the City festival, presented by AIA San Francisco. The sixth annual celebration of unique builds, the nation’s largest, not only takes you on the San Francisco Living: Home Tours drool-a-thon (Sept. 12-13) focusing on smart sustainability, but also explores a bonanza of exciting, dialogue-stimuutf8g Bay design ideas through presentations, investigations, demonstrations, and more. Prepare to push up your teeny octagon-shaped eyeglasses and scream, "Build it! Build it NOW!"

ARCHITECTURE AND THE CITY Through September 30. Check Web site for locations, times, and prices. www.aiasf.org/archandcity

Werk

September 1, 2009

Things I’m loving so much lately, besides the way your new used shoes go with your new used hair: The awesome trip-disco movement, with the Lamb + Wolf and Soul Clap duos in the lead — dig Soul Clap’s "Great White Hope IV" mix at www.wolflambmusic.com — which fills out classic soul and R&B slabs with subtle, supple laptop hijinks. Young SF queen Chastity Belle wholeheartedly reviving old-school Liza, Sondheim, and Showgirls drag histrionics — frighteningly accurate! The new Spanish-German techno, revealed by the likes of Edu Imbernon, Coyu, and Niconé, which harnesses minimal techno and microhouse knob-tweaks to ethereal samba and salsa beats. And my favorite thing ever? BART runs all night on Labor Day weekend, so we can work it out on both sides of the Bay quickly, tipsily, and conveniently. Tube it, baby.

STUDIO SF

Two of our loveliest parties, Look Out Weekend and Go Bang!, combine their electro and disco spirits to update the future sounds of yesteryear for right now, with White Girl Lust, Ken Vulsion, and the always perky Sergio of KALX.

Thu/3 and every first Thursday, 9 p.m., $5. Triple Crown, 1760 Market, SF. www.triplecrownsf.com

AGNÈS

Swiss decks heartthrob expands his ravenous-eared range from dubby minimal tech to roots house for a set that’s guaranteed to be full of audio Alpine peaks. He’ll be joined by Jan Kreuger of Berlin’s delicious Panoramabar.

Sat/6, 10 p.m.–6 a.m., $15/$20. EndUp, 401 Sixth St., SF. www.theendup.com

BLESSED

A truly spiritual monthly Oakland affair, from the soulful house sounds of residents Rafriki, Discaya, and Kimani — plus special guest (and personal crush) DJ Ellen Ferrato — to the blessed out crowd of get-downers.

Sat/5, 9 p.m., free. Somar, 1727 Telegraph, Oakl. www.somarbar.com

GEMINI DISCO

It’s been three wild years for the beautiful-yet-intellectual disco kids of mad monthly Gemini, and this champagne celebration with DJs Nicky B. and Derek Love should be a real corker. Lovely Le Dinosaur hosts.

Sat/5, 10 p.m., $5. UndergroundSF, 424 Haight, SF. www.geminidisco.com

DUB MISSION

Woah — DJ Sep’s groundbreaking dub and raga weekly is now officially a classic, celebrating 13 years, and untold influence on the current SF sound, by hosting a rad "dub summit" that includes Twilight Circus Dub Soundsystem and Yossi Fine.

Sun/6, 9 p.m., $15. Elbo Room, 647 Valencia, SF. www.elbo.com

LABOR D’AMOUR

Funky house and techno party mainstays Sunset and Stompy get wild in their inimitably sunny style at Cocomo, filling the giant patio with, yes, "all styles and smiles" — plus the sounds of Sascha Funke, David Harness, and a dozen more.

Sun/6, 2 p.m.–2 a.m., $10/$20. Café Cocomo, 650 Indiana, SF. www.pacificsound.net

PARADISE LIVES!

Even more disco! Honey Soundsystem name-checks the mother of them all, Paradise Garage, with this special installment of its weekly party, calling down the spirits with legendary Trocadero Transfer master DJ Steve Fabus.

Sun/6, 10 p.m.-3a.m., $2. Paradise Lounge, 1501 Folsom, SF. www.paradisesf.com

SIXXTEEN

I’m totally wetting my petite BVDs about the glorious return, after a decade’s absence, of DJs Jenny and Omar’s raucous rock debauch. Peaches Christ hosts, FLAWK hands out drink tickets to flashiest thrashers and best-dressed punk ‘n’ roll runaways.

Sun/6, 10 p.m.–3 a.m., $10. Cat Club, 1190 Folsom, SF. www.sfcatclub.com

art.tech

September 1, 2009

PREVIEW As I write this, I’m eating one of those new giant Cheetos — you know, the latest delectable Alice Waters heart attack, sheer processed junk food Armageddon, elephantiasis of the puffed balls? Yum. My point here is that there’s no form of art that hasn’t been deeply and irrevocably touched by technology, and also that I’m a little stoned. Pitched somewhere between Maker Faire and head trip, the three-day art.tech festival at the Lab explores the intersection of artistic exploration, experimental fabrication, and digital prestidigitation and includes performance, workshops, presentations, and interactive flights of fancy. Among the highlights: a Virtual Knitting demo that entwines physical and virtual space; a "relational presentation" of Anti-Pandora, a hand-made backpack that generates usable energy from walking or running, and Seek ‘n Spell, an interactive iPhone game that’s a cross between Scrabble and a scavenger hunt. Dang, my fingers just painted my keyboard neon orange.

ART.TECH Fri/4-Sun/6, various times, $12–$20 daily, $36 for three-day pass. The Lab, 2948 16th St., 415-864-8855, www.thelab.org

The shakedown

August 26, 2009

markeb@sfbg.com

If you think you can handle more massive autumn debauchery than Oct. 3’s gargantuan Lovevolution (www.sflovevolution.org) parade and festival, which showcases every electronic continent-shaker on the local scene, or the Treasure Island Music Festival (www.treasureislandfestival.com) Oct. 17-18 with its onslaught of dance music NAMES, then you may want to jet to the below. Child, I’ve seen your plate — and it’s never full.

HIP-HOP DEBASER

Launch your fall-forward blackout in old-school shelltoes, as the primo Debaser party veers from its grunge-revival template with classic rap chestnuts, St. Ides drink specials, and a sneaker contest (prizes: an eighth, a forty, a pager.) Sat/29, 9 p.m., $5. The Knockout, 3223 Mission, SF. www.myspace.com/debaser90s

MATTHEW DEAR

Oh dear, oh Dear, the techno DJ heartthrob is back in town from touring the world, this time without his live band. Expect a ravenous pop polish and the usual Ghostly International joys. Sept. 4, 10 p.m., $12 advance. Mighty, 119 Utah, SF. www.mighty119.com

BATTLE AT GROUND ZERO

The very grand finale of the SF Grand Vogue Ball, which has been energetically building up a roster of fantastic contestants during preliminaries every Friday night in August, will be an explosion of face, attitude, and flailing limbs. Sept. 11, 8 p.m., free. Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, 700 Howard, SF. www.sfgrandvogueball.tk

DAM FUNK

Laidback techno-boogie and electro-funk from the shades-bedecked master of jambox rock. West Coaster Dam of L.A.’s luscious Funkmosphere parties will be showing off rare vinyl cuts from his personal collection as well as some of his own, much lauded tracks. Sept. 11, $10. Poleng Lounge, 1751 Fulton, SF. www.polenglounge.com

BEARRACUDA MAGNUM

Supersize your Folsom Street Fair weekend — and prepare for your hairy winter hibernation in style — with hundreds of sweaty, burly men when furry-techno paradise Bearracuda takes over DNA Lounge. Heave, ho! Sept. 25, $10–$15. DNA Lounge, 375 11th St., www.bearracuda.com

DROP THE LIME

Sexy electro ragers — plus singing! — from the super-flirty posterboy of all-night bangin’. He’ll be rolling up with twisted adrenaline junkie Tim Exile and hometown Lights Down Low hero Sleazemore. Sept. 25, $12.50 advance. Mighty, 119 Utah, SF. www.mighty119.com

SLAVIC SOUL PARTY!

In the hoot-and-whirl tradition of Gogol Bordello and Balkan Beat Box, this massive brass band brings Eastern European sounds to the dancing masses, on the order of our own beloved Kafana Balkan crew. New album Taketron (barbes) is a shining example of the new Romany hybridity. Sept. 25, 8:30 p.m. and 11:30 p.m., $15/$25. Elbo Room, 647 Valencia, SF. www.elbo.com

PART TIME PUNKS

L.A.’s rabble-rousing promoters, Part Time Punks, join the Honey Soundsystem and Donuts crews for a thoughtful onslaught from the past, with live performances from the Raincoats and Section 25, plus a DJ set from Gang of Four. Oct. 9, $25 advance. Mezzanine, 444 Jessie, SF. www.mezzaninesf.com

BOYS NOIZE

Pushing electro through the crystalline prism of your ass, the esteemed (you can be esteemed in electro?) DJ and beat-mongrel keeps squeezing dirty, dirty beats from the banger stone. He’ll be pumping lightning jags from his new disc Power! (BNR). Nov. 4, 9 p.m., $17.50 advance. Mighty, 119 Utah, SF. www.mighty119.com

Itches

August 26, 2009

markeb@sfbg.com

SUPEREGO "It’s not the heat, it’s the humidity." Actually, having just touched down from the East Coast, lemme tell ya it’s both. No matter how much I may wish I was getting down to Afro-acid in New York’s P.S. 1 courtyard, I know I’d be rabidly itching to claw off my custom polyester Isabel Toledo bunny suit if I had to deal with the Big Apple heatwave. I much prefer to get sweaty on purpose, after dark, in our own climate of nuttiness, thank you very much.

(A note: This column is dedicated to the memory of Daithí Donnelly, a mastermind behind Anu, Swig, Bourbon and Branch, and more who passed away earlier this month. We’ll sorely miss his tireless dedication to SF nightlife.)

DISCO VS. DUBSTEP

"Why the hell not?," I ask you. I’m anxious to hear the result of this new weekly 18+ club experiment at Poleng, as local and international DJs from both sides of the seemingly incongruous musical divide square off or blend their various strains. Firsts up: Kid Kameleon and Lexxus in the dubstep room, and Salva and B. Bravo in the disco room. Stand in the middle.

Wednesdays starting Wed/26, $5 for under 21/ over 21 free. Poleng, 1751 Fulton, SF. www.hacksawent.com

STAY GOLD

There’s so much going on right now on SF’s dark side that occasionally regular parties that I enjoy immensely slip through my liquor-lubricated crack. Thus, I’ve finally gotta give many snaps to the queerlightful monthly Stay Gold party, which features "hella gay dance jamz" from DJs Rapid Fire and Pink Lightning and a beauteous crowd of lezzies, fags, and in-betweens.

Wed/26 and last Wednesdays, 10:30 p.m., $3. Make-Out Room, 3225 22nd St., SF. www.makeoutroom.com

HOLY FUCK

Electronic music, without those annoying synthesizers. Perfect! The Toronto-based experimental rock quartet subs in live drums and bass — plus toy keyboards, effects pedals, and other delicious analog goodies — to reinterpret edgy dance sounds. It really works, and gives rise to some surprisingly heady combinations.

Thu/27, 8:30 p.m., $15. The Independent, 628 Divisadero, SF. www.independentsf.com

KEYS N KRATES

More live electro-emuutf8g shenanigans from Toronto, this time courtesy of the multi-member outfit dubbed "kings of the live remix." Discover in wonder their guitars-and-turntable versions of Justice and other dance floor juggernauts. It’s no joke karaoke, the boys mean business.

Sat/29, 10 p.m., $10. Club Six, 66 Sixth St., SF. www.clubsix1.com

BIG TOP

Once upon a time there was an amazing bar called the Transfer where really fun nightlife things happened. One of those fun things was Big Top, promoter Joshua J’s outrageous circus-themed drag hoo-haw. It was like Cirque du Soleil, but with less French and much more basket. Well, it’s back, now at Club Eight, with three rings of disco-tinged scandal.

Sat/29 and last Saturdays, 10 p.m., $5. Club Eight, 1151 Folsom, SF. www.eightsf.com

MISS HONEY

I went to the premiere of this monthly party earlier this summer, and it was too, too much. Packed with young art stars, energized scenesters, and vogueing — there was indeed a runway — it brought together many of the city’s oft-dispersed up-and-coming movers and shakers. With surprisingly little irony! Ms. Terry and Mani host, with DJs Chelsea Starr, Frankie Sharp, and more.

Sat/29, 10 p.m., $5. Triple Crown, 1772 market, SF. www.triplecrownsf.com

1999: RETURN OF THE RAVE

I’m so scared of this! Were you still raving in 1999? If you were, and you haven’t died of sugar-shock from all those candy necklaces, then you may want to wayback with ages 16+ to those Hot Topic-tinged days of yore.

Sat/29, 9 p.m.–4 a.m., $40. regency Ballroom, 1300 Van Ness, SF. www.skillsdj.com

Alphabet soup

August 19, 2009

markeb@sfbg.com

SUPEREGO ADDICT "That techno shit ain’t nothing but a bunch of clowns tripping their balls off to car alarms," the old saying goes. And it’s almost exactly right! If we’re still in the 1990s — which, by the way, also saw over-tattooed punk and swing revivalists nodding off to black tar and a swarm of bronze-bleached gays mething out to Bryan Adams circuit remixes when they could pry away from AOL chat. (You thought it took forever to download a naked JPEG in 1997? Try doing it on crystal.) Plus: candy-flipping Burners, K-holed zombie househeds, and reams of GHB newbies shitting their pants and dropping half-dead at the unfortunately ambulance-ridden EndUp.

Glancing back with a delicious shiver, the ’90s were a shadow-peopled heyday of designer nightlife drugs, an alphabet soup raining down in clubbers’ peripheries. But, really, from opiate-stoned flappers and Benzedrined mods to the Factory’s orange Obetrols and MDA at the Paradise Garage — when haven’t drugs driven the wee-hours subcultural?

Yes, the music plays into the drug of each scene’s choice, a Pan flute solo wafting over the Valley of the Dolls. You do need to drop E on a crowded dance floor to "get" most strains of techno, or smoke out bigtime for reggae to wobble you to Jah. And drugs drive the music: I’m currently rereading one of my fave tomes, Please Kill Me: The Uncensored Oral History of Punk (Penguin, 1997), and it blows my Swiss cheese brain the sheer piles of drugs everyone was on in the ’70s rock scene. I guess that’s why they got so bloated in the ’80s.

Which leads us, squinting in dawn’s foggy light, to the present. It’s odd that the same prescription drugs kids use to stay well-behaved in math class are the ones most clubbers pop while getting dressed, with a key-snort of terror-funding coke to keep the edge off. But if ’00s electro and fidget house were the sound of Adderall and Ritalin, dubstep derived from hydroponic stank, the disco revival uncorking fresh poppers (see www.homochic.com for your designer bottle), and minimal techno just OCD writ large (a self-consciously undrugged movement?) then the illicit substance center, though cut with baby laxative, at least still holds. And always the liquor flows and flows….

STEVE BUG

Brain-teasing techno label Pokerflat presents a rare showcase of its stable, including deep mentalist Bug and smooth criminal John Tejada.

Fri/21, 10 p.m., $20, Mezzanine, 444 Jessie, SF. www.mezzaninesf.com

DERRICK CARTER

Do-the-doo house is making a shining comeback, thanks in part to the Chicago master’s tireless touring. Shimmy and shake, boogie child.

Fri/21, 10 p.m.- 4 a.m., $10. Temple, 540 Howard, SF. www.templesf.com

KRADDY

"Cybernetic breaks with asymmetrical dub delays" from the former Glitch Mobber, with "global slut psy-hop" queen Ana Sia opening up.

Fri/21, 10 p.m., $10. Mighty, 119 Utah, SF. www.mighty119.com

RONSKI SPEED

Your progressive-trance Burner warmup begins with the Euphonic Sounds tunes of this dapper space octopus.

Sat 22, 10 p.m.- 4 a.m., $15 advance. 1015 Folsom, SF. www.1015.com

JEGA

Wherefore art thou, Ambient Romeo? All around us, of course, as pioneer Jega drops his excellent double-disc Variance (Planet Mu) after nine long years.

Sun/22, 10 p.m., $10. Li Po Lounge, 916 Grant, SF. www.nastysonix.com

Teh ghey

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August 12, 2009
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SUPER EGO It’s been a coon’s age (is that racist?) since I lifted the bloody glitter-crusted rock of alternaqueer nightlife and peeped with prickled horror at the writhing wigged creatures of darkness beneath. There’s a lot going on this month, so buckle up your birdseed boobs and ride, baby, ride. But first, I’ve got to give a special screechy shout-out to Faux King Awesome and his filthy-excellent trash-club blog, www.dragslag.org. Check it, chicas, that child never sleeps.

HOMO A GO GO FESTIVAL

As Zombie Cher would say, "A-woooaaaah!" And then, "Brains." Four nights of edgy queer music, fashion, film, art, activism, and, yes, parties with more than 50 performers spread out across the city. Italo disco darlings Glass Candy swoop in to join noise-makers like Erase Errata, Katastrophe, Younger Lovers, Hunx and his Punx, Honey Soundsystem, Chelsea Starr, Girl in a Coma, and a spectacular buttload of others. Plus: old-school zine exhibitions, activist workshops, and plenty of classic homopunk/queercore/riot grrrl spirit in the air — so strap on your 16-holes and let’s get mish-moshed.

Thur/13-Sun/16, various times and locations, www.homoagogo.com

THE ROD

"Wet jock strap contest" — are any four words in the English language more titilutf8g besides "five-second rule, bitches"? Almost five years ago, DJ Bus Station John launched his bathhouse disco-drenched tribute to teasingly moistened fabric, bringing many a screw-worthy type through Deco’s doors to compete for $100. (Full dis-clothes-ure: I host the contest when I can remember what’s happening, and Hunky Beau recruits contestants with his "special talent.") All good things must come to a tight little hairy ass end, however, and with this final installment The Rod promises to go out with a sopping bang.

Fri/14, 10 p.m., $5. Deco, 510 Larkin, SF. www.decosf.com

SF GRAND VOGUE BALL

Chop, mop, fierce, and shade, Miss Realness. People have forever been talking about holding a grand vogue ball in San Francisco. Finally the money’s where the mouth is and the chin is on the floor, dropping for you as local houses compete each Friday until the final battle royale Sept. 11. Categories include: Face, Drama, Butch Boyz in Pumps, Look in the Book, Butch Queen Femme, and Old Way/New Way. Walk, work, walk — are there any more?

Fridays through Sept. 11, 8 p.m., free. Yerba Buena Center, 700 Howard, SF. groups.google.com/group/sfgrandvogueball

14TH SAN FRANCISCO DRAG KING CONTEST

It’s big time, y’all, for the sexy kings to come tearing out of the closet in their testosterone Testarossas — and my stubble is itching with adrenaline. For 14 years, Fudgie Frottage and company have brought out the munchable machos to stomp the boards in a quest for the spiky Mr. San Francisco Drag King crown. The talent numbers are uproarious, the crowd bursts with rare hotties, and all involved have a sweaty ball. The whole thing benefits P.A.W.S., so you know you’ll be riding that mustache for a very good cause besides your own.

Sat/15, 8 p.m., $15–$35. DNA Lounge, 375 11th St., SF. www.sfdragkingcontest.com

HERR-A-CHICK

This raucous biweekly Wednesday rock ‘n’ roll lady night at the Eagle just got a reboot of sorts: felch whore Renttecca has climbed aboard Anna Conda’s wig and Juanita Fajita’s taco truck to join them in hosting live bands, drag disasters, and the occasional poetry interlude(!).

Wed/19 and every first and third Wednesday, 9 p.m., $5 (free in drag). Eagle Tavern, 398 12th St., www.sfeagle.com

BJÖRK NIGHT

Oh, how I wish this event were called Björk Wars, and tranny Megabots had to trudge their four-story iridium stilettos across the frozen tundra, transforming with groans into stupendous radioactive igloos housing prancing bands of radical faeries and elfin gals fashioning their own soy jerky shoes. Well, instead we get Trannyshack arising from the grave to pay tribute to the Voltaic princess with stunning low-cost effects and volcanic performances. OK, then.

Fri/28, 10 p.m., $12. DNA Lounge, 375 11th St., SF.www.trannyshack.com

On the Rael

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August 12, 2009
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superego@sfbg.com

failed teleportation with a microwave is painful

at least my small intestine reemerges during rainfall

watch where u put those feet —

I have a fetish for on-the-crotch antihistamine — Odynophagia

I first caught 23-year-old native transdimensional rapper Odynophagia (www.myspace.com/odynophagia) at a freestyle night at El Rincon. He materialized onstage with his hyperactively dazed hype man King Eljen, flamboyantly brandishing a koi in a little plastic baggie. The atmosphere was immediately tweaked off-center, the inverted rhymes delivered with supersonic giddiness, and the fate of the poor fish in doubt from the get-go. (It survived.)

Earlier, I’d been transfixed by the boob-blackening video for “The Container is Pervasive” from Odynophagia’s mind-twisting first album Social Masque, put out this year by his music-film-art distribution and production company Millipede Handjob (www.millipedehandjob.com). MF Doom on shrooms meets meta-fractured art star Ryan Trecartin? Sure, but Odyn, whose name means “painful swallowing” and whose rickets-rocked flow opens a quaking quark-hole in indie hip-hop’s current unholy oatmeal, has limned the freakin’ tesseract, man.

Social Masque was made “half in channel with unconscious, half coping with altered chemistry from bad acid,” he told me. “I call it ‘chemical jaw.’ I do the art of living Sudarshan Kriya every day, and consider myself a mystic surrealist (the 100-year-old French kind), letting anything come through from the nether regions.” Right now he’s getting ready to direct his first film, Struggled Reagans, a semi-pornographic deconstruction of Power Rangers, featuring aborted quintuplets and a traumatically dripping sink nozzle. “One of the characters is Evie from the sitcom Out of This World,” he says. “It’s about nine percent sex. I’m still casting.”

He’s also recording his second album, Collage Fossil, due out in December, which he promises will marry U.K. grime style to “slower, more accessible U.S. commercial rap structures, with a more overtly sexual plotline than Social Masque mixed with apocalyptic urgency. Scared about 2012, so making a collage fossil time capsule with an “only certain are invited in” substory. Also, more of an subcultural satire.”

SFBG Sitcoms, sci fi, crotch fungus, sex sweat — what, exactly, are you?

Odynophagia I’m Odynophagia, the rapping plasticization of the pathogenic presence, looming in the host body of Gregg Golding. He’s a pretty choice mulatto specimen with nice genitals. The nigga just has too many rest-stop asphyxiation rashes. Blame the pressure of hip-hop fame and the Japanese corporation, Tanaka Inc., hot on his trail. (Let’s just say he has eels from Spanish sitcoms lodged in a glass vial in his stomach)

Here I float, in the chemical jaw of scarred spirituality. I move my abacus as a disease routing agent. The powerful Mr. Tanaka drags blue-braid weave from his Segway i2. Upon observing me route cholera to a Wale mixtape listening party, he suggests syndication. Next thing you know, I’m in human form on this toxic plane of samsara, exuding pathogenic spores through my verbal flows in warehouse performances. A big booty white girl with a split-tongue body modification tells me she vibes to my constructivist cumshot rap. Can I fuck her mouth and asshole before Lou Gehrig disease sets in???

I tell her and her crew of needle exchange anarchists to buy my album Social Masque at Amoeba or Rasputin (or online if she handicaps and loses friends). But not Aquarius, cuz I was caught vaginally invading the owner’s housemate with a Jon Moritsugu DVD.

Can’t talk long, Im txtng u frm a dinner party. To my right is Mr. Tanaka, to my left, the head of Raëlianism. Raël compliments designs of Tanaka Inc.’s bright orange metallic clit rings and cybernetic love dolls. Five of the exposed circuit units, for the spring line, round out our guest list. (Including the K-5, which lactates heated donor sperm out its foam nipples, for lesbians with tit fetishes, ready to start a family.) Oh no it’s a trap …

The love dolls hold my pressure points and flip me on the table, a fork pierces my thigh. Bone marrow squirts on Georgia O’Keefe flower folds. Raël says the Odynophagia energy is the key to mankind’s salvation, and was in fact the router of a Moebius syndrome to their extraterrestrial creators. So catch me later, he’s about to reclaim the eel and cut open my stomach with plastic Crayola scissors.

Flashers

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August 5, 2009
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superego@sfbg.com

SUPER EGO "I’ve taken plenty of cheeseball photos just because I wanted to play with some boy’s nipples," longtime club snapper and braided-bearded pixel elf Eric "ShutterSlut" Stein (www.shutterslut.com) tells me over the phone. "Some people take nightlife photography way too seriously. It’s about having fun."

None can deny the avalanche of flashes that has overtaken nightlife, a neo-Warholian cataclysm of f-stopped frolic — Polaroids, RIP — diutf8g lenses and pulsating softboxes sprouting like neon mushrooms on the dark underbelly of the underground. It is annoying? It is over? Maybe, but it’s now a legitimate practice of nightlife performance, democratized by digital, adopted by post-ironists, crucial for Facebook updates.

San Francisco sports a celebrated legacy of sublebrity paparazzi, stretching from relative newcomers like Leo Herrera, Brandon Norris, Parker Day, Darwin Bell, Parker Tilghman, Ava Berlin, Silke Labson, Furtographer, and Jerome Pour Homme back to classic demimonde shutterbugs like Rink Foto, Barton Crawford, Robert Pruzan, and Uncle Donald. There was a brief break: upper-crust social event and rough-edged street fashion photography are ancient nightlife traditions, of course, but — except for the gloriously clubkid-oriented, camera-loving Clubstitute, Product, Uranus, and Baby Judy’s scenes — the underground movement that arose in the late 1980s and early 1990s eschewed runway-like snaps for a resurrected sense of temporal erasure. "Living for the moment" meant you were a lens-unfriendly, often illegal, sweaty mess, no matter how meticulously decorated.

Plus, who wanted to lug their three-pound 35mm to an all-night rave? "I think a big part of what honed my instincts was the fact that taking pictures used to be really expensive," says ShutterSlut. "I was paying $400 a month for developing. At that price, you learn quick to sense good shots." ShutterSlut, who came to San Francisco in 1991, first rose to prominence as a house photographer for Trannyshack and Sugar at the Stud in the mid-’90s. He’s straddled the analog-digital divide and is completely self-taught. "Some art student yelled at me once for using 100-speed film in the club, and I thought, ‘Screw you, I’m free,’" he says. "But it was still a learning process — I have hundreds of pictures of wonderful people who are no longer with us that are completely useless because I didn’t know what I was doing at first."

If he didn’t know what he was doing, why did he do it? "I think nightlife photography is a calling — not just to document fabulousness but to inhabit an identity," he says. "I loved the scene I was part of, but I felt like a hanger-on. I wasn’t a drag queen, not really, or a DJ or singer. But I wanted to contribute somehow, and it turned out I was pretty good. I developed my own aesthetic — hard flash, focus on detail, close-ups, very little retouching. Purity. Through photography, I became more comfortable with who I was.

"It also got me on the guest list," he laughs.

What does he think of all the club-photog newbies? "It’s easy to be catty about what’s happening now," ShutterSlut continues, "You know, like, ‘You think you’re a photographer, but you’re just taking pictures, honey.’ But there’s some genuine talent out there, so why not? As long as you’re not pissing people off."

A few years ago there was a well-founded panic that social networking sites would drain clubs of their patrons. Why go meatspace when you could cybermeet? This proved especially true, at least at first, of gay bars, in particular leather and fetish watering holes. Now that the online novelty is wearing off — and the damage done in terms of bar closures — I wonder if the current need to feed one’s update stream with fresh snaps is actually driving people back to clubs, both mainstream and underground. You were there — and here and here and here. And you look amazing, I think.

Hold the pickle

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July 22, 2009
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superego@sfbg.com

SUPER EGO Enough with the gourmet street food carts, already. What this joint really needs is some gourmet street cocktail carts. I can barely see it now: fixie-powered blenders, home-brewed Fernet shots, "shit coke" smuggled Cuban rum margaritas with powdered-sugar rims and laminated dollar-bill straws, bacon-wrapped hot dog martinis, 5-HTP power boosts … Anyone for an heirloom finger banana and Prather Ranch taurine daquiri? No?

BONER PARTY

DJ Richie Panic promises "cupcakes, piñatas, condoms, fashion tragedies, and those that understand the power of songs like ‘Surfin’ Bird’ recontextualized for these fucked-up times" at this tastelessly amazing Wednesday banger. Trust.

Wednesdays, 10 p.m., free. Beauty Bar, 2299 Mission, SF. www.beautybar.com

RIP: A REMIX MANIFESTO

Mashups — in or out? The scene’s still lively, and this SF360 Film + Club night brings together SFs top mashers Adrian and Mysterious D and London’s Eclectic Method, with a screening of mashup doc RiP: A Remix Manifesto.

Thu/23, 7 p.m., $12–$17. Mezzanine, 444 Jessie, SF. www.mezzaninesf.com

NICKODEMUS

The leader of the legendary, decade-old Turntables on the Hudson party just dropped the stellar, border-hopping Sun People (Eighteenth Street) disc, full of interesting, upbeat tribal tracks. "Positivity" is no longer a dirty word.

Fri/24, 10 p.m. –4 a.m., $10. Paradise Lounge, 1501 Folsom, SF. www.paradisesf.com

GLITCH MOB

The heartthrobs of glitch-hop, now whittled down to a trio, bring their effed-up laser sound to Mezzanine’s tables, with L.A. future bass pioneer Daddy Kev opening up. Gangsta rap meets Burning Man? You better believe it.

Sat/25, 8:30 p.m., $22.50 advance. Mezzanine, 444 Jessie, SF. www.mezzaninesf.com

BAY OF PIGS

The night before the raucous and naughty Up Your Alley fair, get your big gay fetish on with this giant man-meet for charity. Am I scared of the kiki party music by DJs Ted Eiel and Luis Cintron? Yes, sir! But scared equals horny here, hello.

Sat/25, 10 p.m. — 4 a.m., $40–$50.181 Eddy, SF. www.folsomstreetfair.org

UNITING SOULS

It’s the 12-year reunion of promoters Ramiro Gutierrez and Mikey Tello’s progressive house and chunky techno outfit — get that post-old-school rave feeling back with good ol’ Doc Martin headlining and a roster of other well-knowns.

Sat/25, 9 p.m.- 4 a.m., $15. Six, 66 Sixth St., SF. www.unitingsouls.com

SUPER HERO STREET FAIR

To the Batmobile (let’s go)! Wonder Woman Underoos are totally go at this huge, charitable outdoor affair. Heroic tunes by Opulent Temple, Afrolicious, Supersonic Salsa Collective, Pacific Sound, Smoove, and more mutant decks X-Men.

Sat/25, 1 p.m.–midnight, $10 with superhero costume, $20 without. Indiana and Cesar Chavez streets, SF. www.superherosf.com

FOR THE FUTURE

This massive gathering of pretty much every Bay techno and house crew benefits NextAid.org, which helps AIDS-affected African kids. Staple, Green Gorilla, Stompy, Dirty Bird, Om … 15 DJs, 14 hours, perhaps a few oxygen tents.

Sun/26, noon–2 a.m., $10–$15. Cafe Cocomo, 650 Indiana, SF. www.cafecocomo.com

MISS $1.98 PAGEANT

They don’t come any cheaper than drag queens Anna Conda and Monistat — or do they? We’ll find out when they host this koo-koo pageant where all the contestants must put themselves together (and fall apart) for less than the price of an, er, Estonian bride?

Tue/28, 10 p.m., $10. EndUp, 401 Sixth St., SF. www.endup.com

Squeeze me

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July 15, 2009
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superego@sfbg.com

SUPEREGO Obama’s been in office for a whole 200,000 blog centuries, but times are still so tight I have to make my own mascara out of Marlboro butts and melted-down pantyhose. Why won’t he magically fix everything immediately! Flasks are making a flashy comeback on the club scene, spontaneous street parties are all the rage, and 2 p.m. at Dolores Park is the latest rave time for the hip, half-naked underemployed. (The free San Francisco Symphony performance then and there on Sun/19 will be an awesome culture clash.) It’s a freakonomical conundrum that just as delicious-sounding specialty cocktails are taking off and a new crop of fascinating DJs are touring, no one really has the ducats to taste or hear them.

But the worst thing you can do is stay home. Fortunately, some of the best parties in the city are free — and many more, don’t forget, are gratis if you arrive early enough (bring a crossword or something) or pimp inventive drink specials to help you fight the squeeze. Look Out Weekend (Fridays, 4–9 p.m., free. Vessel, 85 Campton Place, SF. www.lowsf.com) is a bumpin’ electroish happy hour that boasts two-for-one well drinks and an überstylish crowd. The weekly hip-hop-laced glass of adventure that is Red Wine Social (Wednesdays, 8 p.m., free. Dalva, 3121 16th St., SF. www.myspace.com/dalva_cocktails) has been getting scruffsters loopy for the better part of a decade, while hip-hop upstart West Addy (Wednesday, UndergroundSF, 424 Haight, SF. www.myspace.com/westaddy) gooses the neon youth. The eclectic Drunken Monkey (Tuesdays, 9 p.m., free. Annie’s Social Club, 917 Folsom, SF. www.anniessocialclub.com) brings together goth and hip-hop — goth hop? Gnip gnop? — while the occasional, usually free Alcoholocaust parties (various dates, Argus Lounge, 3187 Mission, SF. www.arguslounge.com) get your rock rocks off.

The gays love it the free: Honey Sundays (Sundays, 9 p.m., free. Paradise Lounge, 1501 Folsom, SF. www.honeysoundsystem.com) brings the best underground queer sounds in town to a lovely cross-section of post-weekend freaks — and is celebrating its second anniversary Sun/19 — while Charlie Horse (Fridays, 9 p.m., free. The Cinch, 1723 Polk, SF. www.myspace.com/charliehorsecinch) is an actual delicious freakshow, with Anna Conda and her merry band of blackouts dishing out punk rock drag for a packed house. Tiara Sensation (Mondays, 9 p.m., free. The Stud, 399 Ninth St., SF. www.myspace.com/tiarasensation) is a mad mix of outré drag themes — Bea Arthur never died here — and DIY outfits, many of them constructed onscene. Freesational!

WATCHA-CLAN

Breakbeat revival in full effect? Maybe, but how about "world ‘n bass." French-Algerian phenom Watcha-Clan puts a refreshing, live global spin on the fractured obsession of yesteryear, in keeping with our borderless times. The Afrolicious boys crack it all open.

Wed/15, 8 p.m., $10. Rickshaw Stop, 155 Fell, SF. www.rickshawstop.com

JUST ANOTHR PARTY

My fave ‘Loin-hearted electro band, the Tenderlions, will be rocking it with super-naff Ferrari Party kids Jason D. and Primo and glam-slam DJs Sarah Delush, Mario Muse, Pony P. and other razor-sharp untouchables.

Fri/17, 10 p.m.– 3 a.m., $5. 103 Harriet, SF. www.1015.com

SMACK

Could I go at least a week without writing about Detroit? Sheesh, y’all go back home! But not before Smack, a D-lovely affair, that pairs scene queen Juanita More with the Motor City’s Sass and Family crews, with quite-right techno-reppin’ DJ Chuck Hampton, aka Gay Marvine, on the decks.

Fri/17, 10 p.m., $5. UndergroundSF, 424 Haight, SF.

PHEEKO DUBFUNK

More North African dancefloor diaspora, as the man from Oran-El-Bahia rips out some seriously silky smooth house and, well, dubfunk at Temple. Although he became well-known for his sets in South Beach, Miami, Pheeko’s no mere sparkly sunglass-wearing slickster, keeping the tunes deep and intelligently constructed.

Sat/18, 10 p.m., $5 before 11 p.m., $20 after. Temple, 540 Howard, SF. www.templesf.com

The Bush era

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July 15, 2009
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a&eletters@sfbg.com

SAT IN YOUR LAP: THE LATEST DAUGHTERS OF KATE BUSH FLESH OUT THIS WOMAN’S WORK

By Marke B.

Kate Bush was gifted with a fierce female originality at a time when the rock world was starved of it: her golden run of eccentric achievement in the late 1970s and early 1980s placed her next to Joni Mitchell in terms of adventurous — if not always intellectual — influence in the minds of aspiring young women singer-songwriters. (And there’s some extremely perverse pleasure to be taken in the little factoid that her stunning 1985 EMI comeback album Hounds of Love snatched the top U.K. album slot from Madonna’s Like A Virgin.)

But that gift was also a curse: Bush was so original in so many ways that it’s easy to forget the myriad musical pathways she forged. This “artist in a female body” — as she famously protested when her panicked record company started pimping her rack on sleeves to shift units — has mostly been boiled down to spiritual oracle, swooping-voiced Sybil, and, ever since concept albums by women were banished to exile in Guyville, keeper of the idiosyncratic prog-rock flame. In other words, Stevie Nicks with a Fairlight synthesizer and a degree in Celtic mythology. Or else just plain weird.

Fortunately, musical weirdness is so much with us today that other Bush qualities are starting to be glimpsed through the babushka, including her production abilities, precocity, sincerity, humor, and unabashed gender-fucking. For the past three decades, it’s never been rare for artists to be compared to Bush — mostly for childlike vocalizations or way with a silver space suit and Circe metaphor. But in our post-neo-neo-soul moment (sorry Wino), a new crop of female British singers has arisen that takes its cues, mostly acknowledged, from Bush’s kaleidoscopic talent.

FLORENCE AND THE MACHINE

Without Kate Bush, flouncy freak-folker Florence Welch and her ever-changing backup band could be heard as a product of the unholy union of Devendra Banhart and Tori Amos — except those two probably wouldn’t exist without Bush either. Florence grounds her lyrics in the sexually frantic Bush. “I must be the lion-hearted girl,” she sings in the vid for “Rabbit Heart (Raise It Up)” just before her wedding banquet table folds up into her coffin.

www.myspace.com/florenceandthemachinemusic

MARINA AND THE DIAMONDS

Marina and the Diamonds, a.k.a. the singular singer Marina Diamandis has been gaining huge traction with her excellent “I Am Not A Robot” track, calling up the more vulnerably affirmative, “Don’t Give Up” Bush. But it’s her screwy, cuckooing “Mowgli’s Road” that effectively conjures up woozy Kate at a post-rave bonfire.

www.myspace.com/marinaandthediamonds

BAT FOR LASHES

Half-Pakistani lovely Natasha Khan works the gleaming edge of Bush’s dark underworld glamour, and grounds her post-goth balladry and soft electro sparks in the sensual world. Her single “Daniel” de-Eltons the title character and places him among Bush’s slightly menacing, jig-footed cosmic effigies.

www.myspace.com/batforlashes

MICACHU AND THE SHAPES

Mika Levi calls herself Micachu and spits out shiv-sharp blasts of dissonant micro-punk — seemingly the opposite of Bush’s epic dramas. But Levi echoes Bush both in the sheer Englishness of her lyrics, the knockout oddity of her instrumentation and starry-eyed gender-bending. Micachu’s rambunctious, exhilarating new album Jewelry (Rough Trade) could easily have been shaken out of Bush’s backing track outtake archives.

www.myspace.com/micayomusic

MICACHU AND THE SHAPES

With tune-yards, Tempo No Tempo

July 22, 8 pm., $10

Rickshaw Stop

155 Fell, SF

(415) 861-2011

www.rickshawstop.com ————

MOTHER STANDS FOR COMFORT: KATE BUSH IN THE SOUNDS OF NOW

By Irwin Swirnoff

It’s always exciting when you sense universal consciousness in motion. Like so many around me lately, I can’t stop listening to Kate Bush. I play Hounds Of Love (EMI, 1985) from start to finish again and again, allowing a different song from the album to become my theme or guiding light for weeks at a time. I play The Dreaming (EMI, 1982) and let it spin in and out of my head. These songs are as dramatic as they are sincere. They conjure magic while maintaining an emotional core. Bush’s undeniable integrity travels through her songs like a force of nature, from soft-lit soap opera to primal realms.

Many great records by other artists in the last few years have been stamped with undeniable Kate Bush moments. A new generation of musicians is learning that avant and pop sensibilities can coexist in exciting ways and that it is possible to blend the organic and the mechanical to create songs that soar with a mission. Here are some of today’s cloudbusters.

GANG GANG DANCE

“House Jams” (from Saint Dymphna)

(from Saint Dymphna, Social Registry, 2008)

On its latest album, Gang Gang Dance not only embraces its love of the dance floor — it invites the spirit of Kate Bush to a psychedelic midnight rave.

M83

“Skin Of The Night”

(from Saturdays =Youth, Mute, 2008)

No strangers to teenage mellow drama and melodrama, M83 makes music with a cinematic quality, much in the same way that Kate Bush’s records sound like movies unto themselves.

PAAVOHARJU

“Kevatrumpu”

(from Laulu Laakson Kukista, Fonal, 2008)

This Finnish group roams through a landscape that varies from dusty fairytale to psychedelic future. This track is by far the most dancepop — and Bush-like — moment on a record that also channels Kurt Weill, Edith Piaf, and Robert Wyatt.

JOANNA NEWSOM

Ys

(Drag City, 2006)

Many eccentric female artists are compared to either Kate Bush or Björk by lazy critics, but few actually reach that kind of ecstatic individuality. Joanna Newsom is one. Her complete belief in her vision is apparent in these commanding, flawlessly executed songs.

TELEPATHE

“Drugged”

(from Dance Mother, IAMSOUND)

Much like their New York City neighbors Gang Gang Dance, Telepathe calls Bush to mind when it branches out from its experimental roots into a slow burning state that’s ready for the dancefloor.

CHROMATICS

“Running Up That Hill”

(from Night Drive, Italians Do it Better, 2007))

It takes major guts to cover this Bush composition, a contender for one of the most poignant songs of the last quarter century. The air of magic and mystery here is very Kate.

FEVER RAY

Fever Ray

(Mute)

The debut solo record from Karin Dreijer Andersson of the Knife is more internal and intense than the dance floor stylings of her well-known group. Andersson plays with different voices and personas while creating sounds that are creepy and comforting. The result feels like a perfect contemporary response to Bush’s explorations of 20 years ago.

Miss u?

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July 8, 2009
0

superego@sfbg.com

SUPER EGO Killer apps available soon for your iClub phone, besides the one where you can fake-snort Adderall, that epilepsy-inducing portable strobe, the virtual cigarette, and — Goddess help us all — the Paul Van Dyk BPM counter and 3-D glow stick:

Breath Blocker.

Douche Douche.

Cops Are Here (for bathroom line clearance).

Midi Jammer (to fuck with laptop DJs).

Instant Breakfast. Better Breakdown. Red Bull Unburp. Take Back What You Told Her. What’s Your Name Again? Third Ear Corrector (for trainwreck mixes). Stiletto GPS (to avoid injury). Bachelorette Banishment. Collar De-Pop. Hands In The Air (for lazies). Center Of Gravity (for twirlers). Personal Space. Interested Face. Sleep It Off. Leave The House. Get Me Home. Cocktail Scan. Dealer Dialer. Bag Locator. Eyes Uncrosser. Name-On-List. Instant Blackout. Armpit Undo. Wardrobe Wand. Singalong Stop. Conversation Erase. Invisible Walk of Shame.

Embedding Disabled By Request.

No More ’80s? Electro Silence? Trance-A-Way? Techno Buffer? Affliction Tee Annihilate? Child, you could make a million. Call me when your cell’s a mirror, and I can look myself up in it.

CLUB 1992

It was the best of times, it was the blurst of times — I think. I was too busy raving with Big Bird. In 1992, "Baby Got Back," "I’m Too Sexy," and "Jump Around" fought it out on hypothetical dance floors somewhere in Mainstreamland, probably, but the most important thing you need to know about that annus horribilis (Queen Elizabeth II’s phrase, not mine) was that something called Super Typhoon Gay threatened Guam. I do the research so you don’t have to. In any case, if irony’s taught us anything, it’s that taste is now a featherless bird that will peck out your brain. And — welcome friends! Awesome hair! — for the hot new gen flooding the clubs at the moment, these songs were its older sister’s jams. I can’t say mine were any more artistically momentous, because a) I’m basically a cultural relativist and b) she blinded me with science. In an undoubtedly canny move, the kids from electro-styley bonanzas Blow-Up and L.O.W. SF are getting all JTT on the TRL, coloring 111 Minna badd with a mess of DJs. Along with the neon pop dollops, "’90s hip-hop" is promised — which I’m guessing means more "getting jiggy" than experimental Quannum mechanics. Question: when will someone do an 1892 party? Now that would be epic.

Sat/11, 10 p.m., $10. 111 Minna, SF. www.club1992.com

PRINCE VS. MICHAEL JACKSON

Alas, I think we have a winner already for the 62nd installment of this seven-year-old monthly party at Madrone. But, despite it’s unabashed gimmickry and slightly worn template — and the fact that you’ve been dancing to MJ everywhere — this DJ battle pitting Purplesaurus Rex against Sparkle Fingers is a poppy blast, if now overshadowed by tragedy. In terms of dance music influence, Prince currently holds the ruling orb (just ask precocious ’80s pinchers La Roux). Michael hasn’t really been in the game since Frankie Knuckles’ masterpiece remix of the R. Kelly-penned "You Are Not Alone" in 1995, despite Rihanna and Justin’s bland efforts and Ne-Yo’s excellent ones. But all that has now been reset, with postmortem reevaluation and exposure forced on us. This party, with its hits, rarities, and remixes, is a good start for hearing things afresh.

Sat/18, 8 p.m., $5. Madrone Art Bar, 500 Divisadero, SF. www.madronelounge.com

Spanish Street Threads: Look of the Day

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June 25, 2009
0

SFBG photog Ariel Soto just returned from Spain with a glimpse at the street fashion there. See the previous Look of the Day here.

Today’s Look: Juliette, Rambla del Raval, Barcelona

Editor’s Notes

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June 23, 2009
0

marke@sfbg.com

So, OK, I just got engaged. Gay engaged. Engayged.

So weird.

First, this may be the worst time ever to plan on jumping the lavender chuppah knot or whatever. As far as legality goes, California’s up in the air until maybe the November 2010 elections and perhaps for a long time after that. Then there’s the whole federal kerfuffle to go through. And Iowa might be tempting right now — but gurl, I don’t have enough something blues for three ceremonies. Iowa, then Cali, and then federal — sheesh! Two is enough! At least when we were illegal, we only had to plan for one polka band. Miss you, "commitment ceremony."

Then there are the political equivocations. Plus or minus a few episodes of America’s Next Top Model, I’ve considered myself near the front lines of radical queer resistance ever since my friends started dying of AIDS when I was 17. I’m all for ethical non-monogamy, get queasy at the thought of official state-sanctioned relationships, and definitely believe that marriage, with all its financial benefits, discriminates against people who haven’t fallen in love. Or turns them into liars for money. Or makes them scream a lot during Sex and the City reruns.

Hunky Beau and I aren’t really after the cash and perks, anyway. Hospital visitation rights and insurance discounts would be cool (and are available locally already), and who knows if we’ll have kids who’ll require federal protection. But I’m pretty sure we’ll never need the legal right to “enlarge accommodation estimates for foreign dignitary missions” only available to married couples now. And as far as political statements go, there are a lot more things in my personal life that I’d like to see being used to help change the world for the better. Housing homeless queer kids and seniors and restoring the recent awful AIDS services cuts seems much more necessary right now as well. But this is the fight our community’s in — and whether it’s because I was raised that way by two incredibly supportive parents, or because I get a real rash when my government says I can’t do something other people can, or because within every loud-mouthed queen lives a hopelessly traditional romantic, I’ve got a dog in it. Not a chihuahua, mind you. More like golden retriever. Totally butch.

As some of our writers eloquently point out in this issue, same-sex marriage may be a boondoggle, sapping our community’s strength to confront real issues of poverty and inequality. It’s certainly not for everyone. But in a truly dark time in my life, when I thought the whole world was falling apart, I suddenly fell in deeply in love with someone almost annoyingly perfect for me in every way. To my continued astonishment, he seems to feel that way about me as well. We’ve been together a long time now and marriage seems, to us, the logical next step for whatever reason. It just feels right. Love is a crazy, crazy thing, full of diversity, surprise, and wonder. Isn’t that what Pride’s all about?

Nickodemus blazes across globe on ‘Sun People’

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June 17, 2009
0

By Michael Krimper

Fresh for the heat of the summer, Brooklyn based beatsmith Nickodemus — seasoned selector for the acclaimed Turntables on the Hudson party — drops a gem on us. In his inspired sophomore effort, Sun People (ESL Music), Nickodemus delivers a groove pummeling sound collage that expands on the cosmopolitan spirit fundamental to the Afrobeat tradition. He manages to inform Afrobeat’s free-formed jazz sensibility and funkified polyrhythmic arrangements with raw elements of celebratory music from around the world. Swaying jazz horns give way to uplifting blasts of air from Latin American and Balkan brass sections that loosen up the heavy hitting, grounding percussion. This strategy allows the drums to thrust in endless hypnotics without feeling too claustrophobic, a subtle formula for creating holistically sanguine dance grooves. And the fusion feels organic, perhaps due to the lively multinational character and experimental ethos at the very heart of Afrobeat, allowing the music’s dynamic nature to morph, mutate, and evolve in provocative directions.

Nicodemus, “Sun Children (feat. The Real Live Show)” by elpuma70

Collaborations bless nearly every track on the record, giving Sun People an organic, outernational party flavor. Quantic helps to arrange the infectious Latin number , “La Lluvia”, where Richard Shepherd croons joyful bars over congas and drums, wistful vibes, and swaying horn riffs. On “Brookarest”, the name tells it all; New York’s multicultural sound, armed with a drum machine and transformer effects, meets Romania’s hypnotic vocals and boastful, wedding brass band. All the influences converge in “N’Dini”, a monster jam bookending the album (“Sun People” on the jump), simultaneously taking on the cyclic role as closing and opening. The joint is impressively crafted out of, well, the nearly infinite histories bounded within the album; Afro-latin rhythms, dub percussion, blaring Gypsy horns, and electronic inspired bass. Such cross sectioned travels across the globe from Columbia to Guinea to Hungary and everywhere in-between might seem crass in the hands of a less skilled producer, but Nickodemus effortlessly pulls all the pieces together in a simple, innocent cry of joy. The coherent element might just have something to do with the sun, that giant ball of heat and energy, that ultimate source of life, shining above every single one of us on terre nostre. This ain’t world music anymore. Time to get down to sun music my people!

Dave Cummings: the oldest American in porn

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June 17, 2009
3

By Juliette Tang

69-year-old Dave Cummings, the oldest active porn star in America, has filmed over 500 movies and performed over 1,200 sex scenes in his 15-year career in the adult entertainment industry. He swears he doesn’t use Viagra, and when he’s not filming hardcore sex scenes in movies like Screw My Wife Please 32: And Make Her Sweat Like A Pig, Dave works as an educator and speaker, offering online classes on getting into the porn industry. Dave will be giving a seminar at the Cybernet Expo (1500 Van Ness) on June 27 called “Producing and Directing Adult Videos with Dave Cummings,” and spoke with the SFBG about sex, life, and his career in ‘old man porn’.

San Francisco Bay Guardian: First of all, congratulations on being 69! You are at arguably the most apropos numerical age for doing pornography and not many porn stars stay in the game long enough to get there.

DC: Thanks! I love my present life and age, and wouldn’t alter my past or present life at all!

SFBG: Nice name by the way! It can’t be your real name, right?

DC: No, it’s a stage name. Almost everyone in the porn industry uses a stage name.

SFBG: When did the idea of doing porn first occur to you?

DC: It happened as part of my swinging experience, specifically while Playboy Television was including me in a segment they were filming about swinging; that led me to a husband-wife team that filmed amateur porn, and my very first day as a crew member I was forced into doing a “stunt” money shot for the actor who was unable to do it that day. Subsequently, I performed in a few amateur movies, and then decided to try becoming a porn actor. I liked the fun of having sex with hot girls, AND getting paid for it. It was Heaven!

SFBG: What’s the market like for the kind of pornography you make?

DC: Aside from the present financial challenges foisted upon us by rampart piracy and copyright infringement, the market for my porn is unlimited. Although I’m a “niche”, people of both genders and of all ages seem to patronize my movies. The fantasy is that if an old, wrinkled, overweight, bald guy like Dave Cummings can have sex with such beautiful young actresses, then viewers can more easily envision that they themselves could indeed also have sex with the woman if they ever had an opportunity to meet her.

SFBG: Describe the sort of fan base you have.

DC: Mostly men looking for women to masturbate to while fantasizing that they are actually the one in the sex scene (not Dave Cummings!); couples looking for movies that show respect and caring for women; gays who appreciate older males (although I am heterosexual, I fully support their right to enjoy whatever sexual preference they want with other consenting adults); women who want to assert their right to get turned on sexually; and, women into the “daddy thing”.

SFBG: A lot of your titles have words like “Daddy” in them. “It’s a Daddy Thing,” “Sugar Daddy,” and “Dirty Dave’s Sugar Daddy”. You also have sex with much younger women in some of your movies, like “Barely Legal”. Your website talks about “teens getting drilled by Dave Cummings”. Yet the people you have sex with are, obviously, of legal age, and basically you’re just playing out a fantasy for viewers of an older man sleeping with younger women.

SF’s sexy queer film festival explodes

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June 17, 2009
0

By Juliette Tang

Frameline, the San Francisco LGBT Film Festival kicks off tomorrow and a quick glance through the festival schedule reveals that we are in for some sexy little treats. I have not seen any of the films, so I can only conjecture at their artistic or cinematic value. I did, however, sit through the trailers, and after doing so, I now know which films offer sex scenes.

Trailer for And Then Came Lola.

And Then Came Lola is the gay, San Francisco version of Run Lola Run. Because of the allusion to its German predecessor, in And Then Came Lola, Lesbian Lola is by plot’s invisible hand, forced to run – rather than cab – all over San Francisco in order to save her relationship with a girl named Casey. The film is described as a “fun-filled lesbian rom-com of 2009 complete with SF inside jokes and sexy bedroom scenes”.

Still from Boy

Boy is a Filipino movie about a young, rich lad who pays a gogo dancer at a party to go home with him, upon which they fall in love (and will forever have a great story to regale polite company at dinner parties when asked how they met). In the blurb on Frameline’s Web site, Michael Fox ambitiously alliterates: “lengthy, lovely, languid love scene”.

Trailer for Lollipop Generation.

According to its description, The Lollipop Generation offers these things: a bathroom blowjob, masturbation scenes, hooking, punks making porn, and lollipop licking. Shot on Super 8 film, the images might be too grainy to see all the dirty stuff, but at least you know its there.

Still from Dirt and Desire

Dirt and Desire is a set of dirty short films starring “sexy, hot, and porn-arific queers of all genders”. If something is described as “porn-arific,” you can bet there will be sex involved. Featuring shorts with titles like The Leather Daddy and the Unicorn, Kat-I’s Sex Toy Stories, and Tour de Pants, Dirt and Desire offers a feast of naked people doing, you know, all sorts of things.

Trailer for Greek Pete.

Greek Pete is a sexually explicit documentary about a year in the life of Pete, a rent boy in London who jumped in the game because he wanted to make fast money, and hooking was, in his own words, “the quickest and bestway to make loads of publicity”. Well, at least we feel less bad, in that case, for not feeling sorry for him.

Still from Thundercrack

Thundercrack is an underground porno/horror flick from 1975 that maintains the healthy cult following automaticlaly entitled to any movie of that description. The film stars 4 men, 3 women, and a gorilla, and “will arouse, challenge and question you through every torrid moment of solo, gay, bisexual and straight couplings, voyeurism and more”. Though not scary for a horror film, the scarily bad dialogue is truly something to fear. But hey, at least Thundercrack is funny, and there’s lots of sex.

Still from Shank

Sensitive, secretly gay thugs at so hot. In Shank, a sensitive, secretly gay thug named Cal drops trou in a “a sweet patio seduction scene” with a guy named Oliver.

Trailer for Champion

Champion, a film by Pink & White Productions (famous for the series) is, like Million Dollar Baby, a sexy film about a boxing lesbian — except this one features, in addition to the fighting, some rough lesbian sex. Angelique Smith at Frameline describes in more detail: “sweet, sweet pain of scratching, hair pulling, bondage, slapping, anal, choking and biting, with some unexpected FTM action thrown in!”

Appetite: Burmese delights flower in a SoMa alley

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June 17, 2009
0

By Virginia Miller

Yellow Pa Taut’s Burmese chicken curry with lemongrass

After a little jaunt to nearby Hall of Justice (wait, let’s hope that’s not the case), you might want to take notice of the unusual: Burmese food in an alley across the street. Though it’s been around awhile, it’s remained quietly under the radar. And it’s good, too. Yellow Pa Taut, named after a Burmese flower, is a small, welcoming SoMa restaurant lit with twinkling lights, serving curries, salads, noodles and a range of vegetarian dishes. Standard Burmese salads like the tea leaf or ginger ones ($9.95 each) are fresh and bright, curries are mild (some a little oily) and chicken tenderly falls apart. There’s also eggs with okra ($7.25), rice-based biryani dishes, samosa salad ($8.50 – with shredded cabbage and mint leaves) and Burmese curry pork belly ($9.95). Next time your friends want to try something new and cheap, win points by suggesting a Burmese spot they haven’t tried yet.

15 Boardman Place (between Bryant Street & Fargo Place)
San Francisco, CA 94103
415-701-8188
www.yellowpataut.com

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