Saturday in Ann Arbor - Relay for Life Concert

Album Review: Bones - Walker

Bones (King Christenstein the 10th)
- Walker













...head-swimmingly eclectic. If you really open up your mental palette and let all the gooey kaleidoscope-ing pastels and midnight-blues and sparkly synth syrup pour out and spread upon you from the softly baritone-led spooning of singer Ben's voice - then you might fall into the same labyrinth I have, while I sit here writing, trying to pen-it-in. I keep spinning around every third measure with the impulse to name drop yet another flavor, genre or artist-reference-point: electro-pop, folky-circus romps, theatrical space-opera.

It feels like some unassuming lysergic tale of starry night woods-wandering, its vocals gruff and whirling in some numbing haze at some points, but at other times downright twee and sashaying into the delectable na-na-na pop whimsy choruses. It welds the hot bubbling seam between the booming weirdo-barked blues plates of Bowie (see the spaced out Low-like odyssey), Beck (think the lost middle-ground of Mutations and Sea Change bossanova-inflected dirges) and Tom Waits (you could flail your arms in some Small Change-recalling sermon)...(Hell, we can throw some Danny Elfman in there, for any Tim Burton dorks - only take that and wring it with this strange swath of druggy-country twang.)

...but the baffling thing is, for how organic Waits may be in his shamanistic growls and strung-out-nocturnal piano balladry - Ben only provides that illusion, but he is able to create a similar feeling based solely on the intricate arrangement of his synths and drum machines. This is music for the night, rapt in that shooting-star-gazing robe, but far from straight dream-pop, or even dream-pop revival - it may swell with drowsy swoons and beats may sway and undulate under a delicate, blunting fuzz, but this is closer to singer-songwriter traditional-pop - warbled with an almost entirely digitzied orchestration of peaking, poking, careening cadres of blurting, gurgling synths, overlapped nicely with unassuming acoustic guitars and a steady bass line. Spacey waltzes, circus-y blues, music for the in between spaces, both physically and mentally.

The album is recorded under Bones - the moniker of singer/songwriter Ben Christensen - a Scrummage affiliate - who has recently changed the name to King Christenstein the 10th

Friends of Dennis Wilson - Album Release - 4 / 4 at Izzy's Art Gallery

"Friends of Dennis Wilson to me…means…no boundaries."
-Tony Moran, FODW














(photos: Trever Long)
(words: milo)

Tony asks me if I ever get tired of hearing the same ol’ stuff from musicians.

I slip and refer to him as a subject; I tell him I enjoy digging for the story and piecing it together. It’s almost, I tell him, like I’m prying you apart (I mimic metallic hands spreading his chest like open heart surgery as I say this). And I know this won’t creep him out - because scattered across the café table between our coffees are blood-splattered record covers, coagulated upon spray-painted images of Charles Manson. He transported said-cargo through the streets of Ferndale so that we could meet and talk about dark, super spacey music that conjures imagery of potentially murderous trips out to the desert.

Chiefly amongst our topics, is the release (finally) of the third proper full length recording of Tony’s band, The Friends of Dennis Wilson – with an unveiling concert scheduled for April 4th at Izzy’s Art Gallery in Detroit. FODW has been more of a collective than a band – or an institution, if you will. With a hook-filled rock sound soaked in 60’s psyche-reverb, it inevitably follows that the band’s more avant-garde philosophy and personnel functionality would conjure that secluded farmland commune vibe of come-and-go as-you-please. (FODW’s gone through 2 bass players in the last year and now sees two former members, Sam Santurro and Brandon Codeine form a band of their own, Qualia, with Patrick Elmore).

Not that FODW -in taste or sound- is entirely rooted in the 60’s, but the influence is unmistakable. The unique imprint of 60’s psychedelia seems imprinted on Tony’s soul: be it his home, (where each room is flooded with bright saturated colors, psychedelic memorabilia and glorification of both cars/crusing/motorcycle/surfing culture and beatnik art), or his shrugging admittance that, "I’ll probably be listening to Piper at the Gates of Dawn till the day I die…"

"All I’ve ever wanted to do was to play guitar in a band," said Tony. "Just being able to do that, put out 3 records, a 45, and now…success to me, is just all personal success."

Indeed. The FODW, spurred by Tony’s tireless work in the studio (lots of headphone-bound strung out, red-eyed nights) alongside "master-mixer" engineer/guitarist Robby Buxton (of The Rue Moor Counts), the band can finally say they have "3 records" completed…The thing is, it took nearly 20 months to complete the third...

It started to seem like the whole thing was cursed. Songwriting began in late 06-early 07, and soon after the band started recording at Carlot Sound, Buxton’s once-Pontiac-based studio. The first pillar to fall was the mixing board blew out…in fact, damn near all the rest of their equipment blew out as well. They took their amps, recording equipment and moved shop to guitarist Tim Doneisia’s joint, where they planned to finish recording and mix it. But then, the 16-track died and they needed to take all the busted shit in for maintenance, (which killed another couple months). Eventually, they restored the set up and finished recording – but when they went to mix it down to DAT,… "I swear to God, the DAT machine breaks," Tony scoffs. They found a new DAT from a source in Pontiac and Tony told Tim to drive out and get it, because damn it – they were going to stay there all night if they had to… Only, it was also a torrential thunderstorm that was causing the power to go on and off while the band waited for Tim to return from his DAT errand.

"These are a collection of songs over the past 3 years," says Tony, patting the stack of records, painted and decorated by artist Nai Sammon. "It’s been good, now I finally know where I wanna go with the music. I know what I’m capable of in a studio and where I want the band to go."

Tony is tall, broad shouldered, with long billowy hair – a striking figure and an even more animated performer, but still a sensitive dude with a heart of gold. I know it’s pained him to see this creation so impeded throughout 2008 – but now that it’s out he says he feels that it is the first true Friends of Dennis Wilson album – that the others were mere demos by comparison – and that’s why it’s self-titled.

I ask him if it was worth it – all the nerve-wracking run-around of this record "Fuck yeah it’s worth it," he squints through a grin. "I can’t find anything that can take my mind off music for two minutes. I’m always ready; when I wake up I’m thinking of a song title, chord progressions of a song, the name of an album…everything, that’s all I’m thinking about…"

Even if the road to get there is difficult? Even if the light at the end of the tunnel is faint?

"It puts more hair on your chest, man. I’m not just saying that to sound cool. Here’s the thing, what I’ve learned from all the obstacles is that I can maintain all my composure and still wanna do it. I really wanna do it."

We talk about the entering of late 20's for the singer/songwriter, all that assesing-your-life shit, and we return to his definitions of personal success – and what he wants to do, not just with the band, but with his time here on this frazzled spinning rock. "I want other people to like my music, but as far as underground…we’re totally underground."

Perhaps they’re still underground because they, whether explicitly or not, glorify a dark icon in their band name – often connected to the occult – the Manson family, a.k.a., the "friends" of the wayward Beach Boys drummer. Or maybe it’s because Tony seeks out avant-garde artists like Nai Sammon, who designed more than 20 original covers for the vinyl release of self-titled (some including wrung splotches of his own blood), or other allies like noisy experimental rock of Heroes & Villains.

Then, maybe it’s the style of music – this swirling shoegaze meets psychedelia, with a muffled Brit-pop whimsy and classic 50’s rock hooks radiating out in sunny surf tones. Or maybe it’s the out-there trajectory of their tastes, spaced out, dark, sometimes brooding grooves informed by a biker-gang disposition and a taste for the road; a taste for the transcendent – through music.

Or maybe it’s just psychedelic music, not specifically as a genre, but as a scene here in Detroit. Each year Tony does his part to keep the blood flowing through the sometimes perceivably inconspicuous psyche scene as curator for the Fiberglass Freakout. The yearly summer festival celebrates a conglomeration of fuzzy feedback pop and gritty experimental rock and punk, often featuring Heroes & Villains and Friends of Dennis Wilson – but, most recently hosting the up and coming Oblisk and soon, the bluesy psychedelia of Sik-Sik Nation.

Tony says there’s no questioning the strength of the scene – especially when you look at stalwart, aristocratic trailblazers like Windy & Carl, His Name Is Alive and Outrageous Cherry.

"For me," said Tony, "I want to do more to support that scene, and my music is growing in that way.

"All I can think about is the now," says Tony. He has slightly retreated from his once showy and confrontational front-man role to aligning with the band as a second guitarist – with Adam T on guitar, Tim Doneisa on organ, Charlie Monsoon on drums, Brian from the Bad Faces Clan joining on bass. Tony said all his focus is on the next recordings – the immediate future includes a 7"
"Dose Down" on he and Buxton’s label No Gold. FODW are also to record another full length and hopefully, at worst, get it out by the end of the year.

Meanwhile, the No Gold label celebrates an unofficial showcase on April 4th(along with the release of self-titled). All of these bands on the bill (Oblisk, Rue Moor Counts, Qualia, FODW) are affiliated with the label. In a couple months, No Gold will put out the Birddogs (currently known as the Rue Moor Counts)’s second full length on vinyl – followed by a Birddogs split with Toronto psyche-rockers Speaking In Tongues. Then, Detroit’s shoegaze heavy atmospheric pop quartet Oblisk will put out a 45 on the label, followed by another FODW 45…and eventually something from Qualia. The show takes place down in the basement of the art space (Izzy's Art Gallery) where 100 or so of the album’s record covers will be on display. Each unique cover features an original design by a number of different artists, including Carl (owner of Izzy’s), Jeff (from Heroes & Villains) Robbie (who helped mix the album and performs with Rue Moor Counts) and Nai Sammon, among others.

And going back to growing scenes, and growing as a band – that’s the one word Tony uses to sum up what this album means to him: growth. "In the beginning of the record, there’s stuff that wants to be free…there’s songs about riding choppers and wanting to be free and then there’s a lot of drug influence too. Then, there’s a lot of real abstract ideas of being secluded, a lot of ideas about wanting things that you can’t have…seclusion, stuck in your own world, wanting to break through and then in the end not really caring about breaking through. And I don’t mean ‘breaking through’ in like, being popular. I mean, personal feelings. There’s songs about love, not caring about life, hating yourself, hating people and loving, it’s a weird combination of hating people and loving people and loving yourself and hating yourself."

And…
"[Self-titled] leads into the next one which is just total darkness…"

Far away from those tripped out oscillating tones of 13th Floor Elevators-recalling psyche sludge and garage pop, eh?

"I wanna get as far away from that stuff as possible…" But really, "I just wanna play guitar in a band…" And that this line up, "it seems like this is gonna be the permanent line up for a long time…"

4 / 5 Izzy’s Art Gallery – with Qualia, Oblisk and Rue Moor Count

Deep Cutz Revue - 4 / 11 - Belmont

Motor City Rock Revue - Not another retrospective... - 4 / 5 Magic Stick:

with: Spitting Nickels, The Muggs, The Hentchmen, Deastro, The Silent Years, The Friendly Foes, The Displays, The Pop Project

We go on and on each year…hell, sometimes every six months… Books, blogs, newspapers, go on exalting the tremendous vitality of Detroit in rock n roll history, forged by all the grimy blue collar hunching, sweat-beaded back-breakers that have passed through our crumbling gates.

We go back to John Lee Hooker, migrating up here with many Delta/Memphis musicians in the ‘30s looking for work in then-booming factories – subsequently helping to energize blues music in the city. As the Muggs (below) singer/guitarist Danny Methric emphasizes, “…go back to where it all really happens, start with the blues! Kids always ask me, ‘how'd you get to where you're at as a guitar player…I go, ‘the BLUES.’”

From there, our reverent regaling points to the birth of rock in the 50’s - inspiring bands like The Fugitives and Hank Ballard & The Midnighters. Then, in the early 60’s, you have the opening of venues like The Hideout in Detroit or the Fifth Dimension in Ann Arbor. Venues like these, also featuring bands like The Rationals, the Frost, The Up and some other cat named Bob Seger, helped spur a new energy – some kind of spaced-out caveman torrent; spastic hard-chugging passion – something chipped from crumbling cement, steamed with sewage smoke and drunk on life, drunk on something, drunk on…a flailing release, a tightly locked in rhythm, a grimacing guitar, a therapeutic, declarative howl…get crazy now baby. Above all else, as the Stooges lead singer, Iggy Pop and the MC5 would later demonstrate through the late ‘60’s – we were about energy!

We took the tragedy, the passion, the grit of the blues and we made it sharper, noisier, more rousing – we turned it into punk rock (We took the carriage and we turned it into the automobile. We took gospel and we turned it into pop – we turned it into Motown. We took disco and house and we turned it into techno. We are Detroit.) We’re unavoidably, often unabashedly, and…most times, deservedly, proud of our history. I, myself, will always lift a glass to the revolutionary work of Creem magazine (staring out here in ’69) – but you’ve already heard enough song and dance about how much we owe the past…

“I think you need to respect where all this comes from,” said Eddie Baranek, drummer for Spitting Nickels (top photo) and also of The Sights and Expatriates). “Because, what you’re doing is really not that original, even though you probably think you’re original… I’m not that original, ya know? You’re basically repackaging and recycling something for a newer generation that hasn’t heard it yet…”

Baranek, with Spitting Nickels bassist John Bissa, were bantering on bar stools one late winter’s eve, with Bissa, as he often does, pitching another “crazy idea” for a show to his bandmate. The pair were “trying to decide how to celebrate [Baranek’s] birthday (April 5). In a couple minute’s time, we realized it was the same weekend as the Final Four. We also realized what a great opportunity there was to put a big show together for the day that there was no game (Sunday-also April 5). It just seemed like serendipity.”

Hence, a few phone calls and some emails later – the Motor City Rock Revue was born. It features a wide, varied arc of local music, from rock, to pop, to electro, to shoegaze: The Hentchmen (venerated garage-pop trio, formed in 92); The Muggs (fiery blues trio, performed at the final show for now-legendary Detroit garage-boom venue The Gold Dollar in 2001); Spitting Nickels (a humble gang of long-time appreciators of Detroit rock, fueled by uncommon camaraderie, pure passion and inspired to forge an homage to their fallen friend, late band mate, guitarist Tom Furtaw); The Displays (spanning garage/indie and a bit of lo-fi pop, these teens have been playing around town for 3 years and take a lot of inspiration from Detroit rock of the ‘60’s); The Friendly Foes (newer indie-pop trio comprised of players from numerous other Detroit bands, including Thunderbirds Are Now!); The Pop Project (ten years together, this tight, 70’s-power-pop inspired quartet of songwriters weathered the raucous garage boom when it was, as singer/guitarist Dave Lawson says “not very fashionable to be singing harmonies in Detroit,” band pic below,); The Silent Years (indicative of the new direction for Detroit music, more experimental, embracing classic pop sensibilities as transformed through layered instrumentation, reverb and a deconstructionist writing style); Deastro (energetic, electro-centered, slightly-danceable pop that feels more arty-New York or Euro-dream-pop by the day – but still unyieldingly dedicated to their hometown).

“The central idea for this show is simple,” said Bissa. “We have a fantastic local music scene and, on that weekend, we have a great opportunity to share it with the world. For one brief moment, we have the world at our doorstep…we should absolutely take advantage of it.”

The Revue comes to represent many things: a look back to the past, a celebration of Detroit, an offered sample of the current musical/cultural climate to the Final Four crowd and a look toward the future.

“It’s crazy to think that in some way the Muggs are a small part of the ‘Detroit lineage,’” said Muggs bassist/keyboardist Tony DeNardo. “[Methric] and I started out when we were 21 years old and just threw ourselves into the music scene. We were going out every week and weekend to see what Detroit was made of…Man, I used to dream about performing at the Magic Stick and other big Detroit venues in my early 20’s. We are the ‘elder statesmen’ on the scene nowadays and I’m proud that we are sticking to our collective vision as a band…”

Now, whenever music journos or record-store aficionados or bloggers start prattling on about Detroit Rock History and replaying the same rigmarole worshiping of the 60’s you read above, like the Stooges, MC5, fill-in-the-blank…etc etc – now…we can look back, 10 years on, from what’s commonly referred to as the Garage days, or the garage explosion, or the White Stripes days…


Methric recalls the duo happening upon the Gold Dollar for the first time, in the late 90’s, and catching a band called The Hentchmen performing. “And just, ahhh, I can’t believe this! What kind of music is this, I never heard anything like that! This is right before the whole garage movement took off…We were very fortunate that that scene took us in.” Methric points to Detroit musicians like John Lee Hooker (and Mitch Ryder and the MC5) as key influences for his passionate guitar work, often revered for its mind-melt-ability. “…having a respect for history, the music is just so fantastic. It’s just an addiction, I gotta hear it, I gotta see it.”

The days of the garage boom, to put it kindly, are history. Which means two things – we can properly qualify it, for the energy it infused into the scene and the city’s musicians and, secondly we can start, justifiably, moving on… to the Deastros, the Silent Years of the future…(ed. But then again – the focus here isn’t so much past vs. future – it is more towards, Hello World – We are Detroit – Come get a taste…bang your head, shake your ass, listen to what we got…)

Lawson’s band, the Pop Project (far from garage, though its members have connections to the sound and style), serves as a good bridge between the garage boom and the now more indie-pop, harmony-heavy inclination of newer bands. Lawson asked the Silent Years to play to “make sure there was a full spectrum of current Detroit rock involved. I feel like there’s a view of Detorit as this garage-rock world. Obviously there’s a lot more to it, anybody whose here knows that, so it’s good to have it all under the same roof, which does not happen enough. I feel like the (musical) landscape has broadened a lot more in the last 5 years.”

The Displays (above) singer/guitarist Andrew Hecker (whose band released their Jim Diamond-produced full length Ain’t Gonna Put Us Down) called me out on asking him, during our first interview in 07, if at that time he felt Detroit, as a motivated scene, was dying, a floating sentiment at the time… “…and now, just like a year or so after? I've never heard that mentioned and things really seem to be shaping up for the town. So many new bands popping up, I feel like the town's music scene's more alive than it's ever been since we started playing 3 years ago. And I really feel hopeful for the city…

News:
Look for more appearances from The Displays throughout the summer. Meanwhile, check out The Silent Years online to hear songs from their newest EP, tentatively Let Go, with more “globe”-trotting touring). The Muggs are looking to record their next full-length, a follow-up to last year’s On With The Show. Deastro is releasing a 7” with Five Three Dial Tone and unveiling his debut full-length Moondagger. The Friendly Foes will tour eastward on their recent release Born Radical (with tourmates, locals Prussia). The Pop Project look to record a split-EP with local comrades The Recital (while they prep material for another full length).

The Hentchmen have been spread out, with keyboardist John Szymanski has been touring in SSM, drummer Mike Latulippe has been playing with Speedy Greasy and guitarist Tim Purrier has been training for the Tour de France and writing wine reviews. They’re getting ready to release the second of four 7-inchers, (“the latest on Italy Records.”) The first came out on Bellyache Records in July 08.

Finally, Spitting Nickels (with keyboardist Ben Borowiak, singer Dennis Miriani and guitarist Chris Brosky), have several shows lined up, including a Chicago gig. They hope to record over the summer with a release in the fall or winter this year.

News from Spitting Nickels - regarding the Motor City Rock Revue - Magic Stick and PJs Lager House "join forces"

(from John - Spitting Nickels)

The Magic Stick and PJ's Lager House are joining forces to ensure that Sunday, April 5th is a day for all local music fans to remember. For the low price of $20, you can see an orgy of music as twelve of best Detroit's bands play non-stop over ten hours in two of Detroit's best local music venues.
For $20, you get a Golden Ticket valid for:- admission to PJ's Lager House- a beer at PJ's Lager House- admission to the Motor City Rock Revue at the Magic Stick- a beer at the Magic Stick- transportation to and from the Magic Stick
Here are the respective line ups:
4:00 PM - PJ's Lager HouseThese United StatesGreat Lakes Myth SocietyLightning Love! Big Mess
7:30 PM (doors open) - The Magic StickDeastroThe MuggsThe Pop ProjectThe HentchmenSilent YearsFriendly FoesSpitting NickelsThe Displays

PJ's Lager Housewww.pjslagerhouse.comwww.myspace.com/lagerhouse
The Magic Stickwww.majesticdetroit.com/stick.asp
The Motor City Rock Revuewww.motorcityrockrevue.com

Wonderland at The Russell Industrail Center - 4/3, 4/4, 4/10, 4/11

Wonderland, a Detroit-flavored re-telling of the classic children’s tale of Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, told through music and burlesque. Starring Roxy D’Lite as Alice, featuring the original artwork of John Dunivant – and an original score, performed by The Questions and The Electric Lions and other talented musicians forging a new band.

Performances are April 3^rd, 4^th, and 10^th, 11^th, inside the Motor City Movie House (on the 5^th floor) of the Russell Industrial Center. Doors at 8pm, Shows start at 9pm.

The Show:
wonderland…

The brain shivers and the eyes rotate sideways…you try to break it down with your adult logic and feel as though you were cloaked with some unfounded comfort as a child, that the kaleidoscope phrasings and biting verbiage were innocently capricious – the same way pastels and launch-able pieces draw children to toys or McDonalds. You try to take yourself back, -back down the rabbit hole: it seemed at the time, reading as children, that the winding, graceful clumsiness of this upside-down paradoxical world created by Lewis Carroll in the 1860’s was just a fancy, wondrous playground, a silly symphony to roll on in clownish manners with nonsensical things being said by extremely imaginative characters.

Merely a wonderland...

Yet, the story has come to be culturally conceived (and, quite convincingly at times) to be an elaborate metaphor for hallucinogenic drugs. (Transportation to alternate realities, ingesting drinks or foods that alter your state, teleporting cats, and rampant confusion…) Though nothing is definitive and contemporary readers, literati and more avant-garde cognoscenti can debate whether Carroll “…was taking drugs” when he wrote it, and we can try to dissect the meanings of Ravens and writing desks and Jesus allegories and eating mushrooms…and whether or not it all has any atom of meaning to it… Regardless…

The longwinded point is – it is ripe for interpretation.

And who better to reinterpret the (innocently psychedelic) tale of Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, then the already bubbling, macabre and storybook-ish minds of Theatre Bizarre – the same artist collective responsible for, indisputably, the greatest, (most imaginative and rewardingly surprising) Halloween party around…

“We’re all mad here!”

Theatre Bizarre is an outdoor space that serves as a collaborative vortex for numerous artists and creative minds in the Detroit area – particularly invested in artwork and performance art – with special attention to live music.

It was started 10 years ago by artist John Dunivant and carpenter Ken Poirer – combining visual and physical (or, architectural) art – a living space, on W. State Fair Ave. It is run by (and consistently attracts) lovers of freak-ified costume balls, sideshows, vaudeville, and ethereal (often fantastically creepy) imagery. Their art is embodied in the spirit of a masquerade – which carries over, heavily, into the idea of Wonderland.

The idea starts with Casey Miller, more than 8 years ago, when he started getting into show organizing. He’d worked in drama before, from high school onward, but had lately gotten into organizing concerts. After overseeing a Save The Vegetables concert for Theatre Bizarre, he became “adopted” by “the family” and became the Theatre’s stage manager. From his youth, he had always wanted to do what he, tellingly, refers to as “…an Alice in Wonderland party.” For this is, my friends, indeed…quite the party.

“I’m fascinated with the story,” said Miller, Wonderland’s director. “I’m a Lewis Carroll dork.” Two years ago, Miller attended a show in Windsor, an Alice-themed dance and burlesque show, that starred Roxi D’Lite. “I’m watching it, thinking, oh my god—we could do so much with this…this is the answer! Turn it into a variety show!

Essentially, that’s what [the story] is, [Alice] goes through Wonderland and all these characters that she meets, she sees these crazy performances that they do…”

Not long after, at a People’s Art Festival at the Russell Industrial Center, inspiration started churning once again – and Miller presented the idea to his mates at Theatre Bizarre. He also crossed paths with his old friend, Ed

Gartner, who runs the Motor City Move House (now located on the 5^th floor of the Russell). With support from both camps – Miller set to work gathering more hands to help – which included fellow Bizarre collaborator, Jason McCombs, to handle the technical side of production. Dunivant and the rest of the Bizarre crew would also join in – with Dunivant’s new original artwork (inspired by classical illustrations from old editions) being back projected onto a giant story book, with “turning pages” throughout the performances.

Combine a number of burlesque dancers, with world-renowned Roxi D’Lite as your lead, with music provided by local musicians, playing live to the dancers (including The Questions, The Electric Lions) and you’ve got yourself quite a trip…a mind-melting psychedelic, multimedia trip…

The basics: A play led by interpretive dance (mainly burlesque), angling towards a masquerade-ball vibe, while also leaving it open to audience members to embrace it as an “Alice in Wonderland theme party” (with dressing up encouraged). All of the classic scenes will be interpreted, the opening, the falling into the rabbit hole, the white rabbit (dancer), the (mind-melting) Mad Hatter, the caterpillar (a two-person costume), the Cheshire Cat, the Duchess, all the key elements – a theatrical adaptation.

“It’s all about recreating subconscious dimensions,” said Drew Bardo (singer/guitarist for The Questions). Bardo was approached by Miller and McCombs and offered the job of music director – a new hat for the poet and singer/songwriter, who’d gotten used to slam poetry stage performance and, over the last 4 years, singing on stages like the Magic Stick and Blind Pig with interpretive rock group, The Questions. Now…he had to essentially write a musical – up to a dozen original pieces, some with lyrics, some instrumental, that could not only fit to a burlesque style of interpretive dance, but also reference the action of the plot.

This being a new venture for Bardo (above), he holed up in his home on a few inspiring candle-lit evenings, and left himself alone with the text of Carroll and his notebook and guitar. After a few rewarding experiments, he approached Rabeah Ltief, singer/guitarist of The Electric Lions, and asked him to be his collaborator for scoring Wonderland.

As Ltief puts it, no matter how you cut it, the story of Alice is a trip…mostly viewed as a psychedelic one…but, that said – it lends itself to experimental-pop and smoky, surfy psychedelic garage rock – a flavor The Electric Lions have already been honing through their three years together. This style melds well with Bardo’s project, the Questions, a more amorphous sort of rock that harkens back to classic 50’s blues writers, draped in a gothic New Orleans-tinged freak-folk.

“[It’s] not showy, showtunes songs…” Ltief (below) says at the mentioning of ‘scoring a musical.’ “These are really cool songs, we would feel comfortable putting a lot of these songs in our normal sets.”

“We want to make sure that it represents our environment here,” said Bardo. “I don’t want to put together something that people expect…We’re not recreating Disney’s version or recreating somebody else’s…we’re bringing a Detroit perspective to the story.”

It reveals a secondary triumph for Wonderland (and Theatre Bizarre as a whole) – to expand the sometimes-tunnel-vision tendencies of Detroit’s cultural cool-crowds beyond just music…into the realm of performance art. Miller echoes this sentiment, because everything in the production, art, music, dance, is original – “…the whole thing is very Detroit, it looks Detroit, it sounds Detroit, it's all Detroit artists,…except for Roxy, who's from Windsor.”

Indeed, Roxy D’Lite will be performing numerous dances throughout the show, as Alice, along with Pend Suspension, Nichole of Sultry Surfers of the Apocalypse, Warrior Girl, Hardcore Detroit, Satori Circus, Flec, Shetan Noir And Miss Juliana…along with Drew Bardo on guitar, with singer Kate Nickerson and the Electric Lions, including Pookie, Spazzy, Hussain - guitarist Mike Latcha and saxophonist Benny Johnson

With all the artists involved, from the musicians to the dancers, to the tech crew, to the production crew – Bardo said, this project has forced them all to step it up. For the two bands involved, who were both at the time involved in writing/recording their next albums, their current work was paused so that they could begin work on the Wonderland soundtrack – which will eventually be released on vinyl. The collaborating musicians have formed a new band – tentatively...called Medicine Tree (myspace). The band also features: Kate Nickerson (singer,), Pookie, Spazzy, (on rhythm, drums and bass) Mike (on guitar), Hussain (on keys) and _ (on sax).

“What we really hope to accomplish here is to make a really interesting story come to life,” said Bardo, “in our own Midwestern, weirdo, beatnik way, ya know? Just to bring Alice in Wonderland to Detroit.”

Bellydancing, break-dancing, burlesque, live rock n roll…and an errant mystifying wonder.

“I don’t want to call it a play or a musical,” said Miller. “It’s a trip. A visual, musical, sensational trip…” He adds… “just that…people’s eyeballs are gonna be melting out of their faces…and they’re gonna be slipping around on their eyeball juice. It’s that brain-bending, ya know?”

We’d have it no other way…

~

"We’re all mad here!" - Cheshire Cat

"Take care of the sense, and the sounds will take care of themselves." - The Duchess

~
More info:
Myspace.com/wonderlanddetroit

http://www.theatrebizarre.com/

Credits:

Executive Producer/Director: Casey Miller

Producer/Technical/Video Director: Jason McCombs

Music Director: Drew Bardo and Rabeah Lteif

Costumes: Hayley Jane Nickerson

Art Director: Jon Dunivant

Alice: Roxi Dlite

Voice of Alice: Hayley Jane

The Duchease: Satori Circus

Chesire Cat: Flec

Queen of Hearts: Shetan Noir

Medicine Tree: Drew Bardo, Rabeah Lteif, Kate Nickerson, Pookie, Spazzy, Mike, Hussain, Benny Johnson

(Kate and Mike)

(Spazzy, Pookie, Hussain)

Interview: Wavves (4 / 1 - Magic Stick)

(Just a guy with) Somethin’ To Say: Wavves
(words: milo)

Standing in the middle of the liquor aisle in Meijer, struggling to hear, while on the phone with a proud stoner and smart-alecky slacker in San Diego…as we talk, I’m dodging troll-like consumers sniffing milk and he’s playing video games in his bedroom.

“Wait, what are you doing?” I ask again, not out of disbelief but because the connection is so riddled with static interference. “I’m playing Fifa 2009 for Xbox 360…” answers Nathan Williams, who records and performs as Wavves – a project that’s garnered relatively large amounts of buzz in the indie music world, from Fader to Spin to countless blogs. The 22-year-old San Deigo shredder (on both guitar and skateboard) started experimental recordings as Wavves 13 months ago, the results of which were released on a full length (last week on Fat Possum). The not-quite-self-titled Wavvves features 14 tracks of ultra-fuzzy flumes, sandpaperey textures, classic 50’s pop ¾ time rhythm set to Sonic Youth guitar blazes, with vocal delivery crossed between monotone indie fuck-all and sunny Beach Boys falsetto. Often regurgitated as surf-punk or goth-surf, or grime-pop or whatever kind of oozy, but poppy, dark, yet sunny, classic-pop-meets-experimental genre label you wanna come up with – as told in guttural grunted poetry from not so naïve lips over unavoidably surf-y grooves.

The album’s been wrung out by hipsters and even sipped by would-be hipsters and now the weeklies are chomping down. I realized I had over-thought my questions, or had at least aimed too grandiosely, when, mid-answer, Williams would turn to his opponent in Fifa 2009 to call him “a bitch…” I wanted to get this partying proponent to open up and actually unpack the deeper, abstract meaning of his work (often airing real life adventures/musings on being bored, being broke and smoking weed) – but…

“Yeah, me and Ryan (friend since junior high and current drummer on tour) have heated matches. I’m about to score right now…oh my god! You mother fucker!” …voice directs away from receiver, “…you just fowled me, deliberately. Red card!” …then back to receiver… “Yeah, 2009 is going really well; 2009 is the best year yet…”

So, near the Meijer bakery, I dropped my notes and forgot to ask the potentially stand-off-ish Emperor’s new clothes question: ‘What’s so great about what you do?’ But the secret lies in an unfound charm – particularly in his sound...

Williams and drummer Ryan Ulsh are one week into a 2-month U.S. tour, having recently returned from some shows in Europe. All too appropriately considering the supreme fuzz of his sound’s aesthetic, our phone conversation - between video game banter and smarmy shrugs, is intermittently cut into by storms of static.

Wavves - "No Hope Kids"

I ask about his lyrics and if he worries messages or meanings may get lost in the fuzz – with vocals often blurring right along with the guitar. “I never thought about that until right now and…now I’m a bit scared…nah, just kidding. No, not at all. I make the music the way it sounds ‘cuz I like the way it sounds…Really, in the end, it oughta be about stuff that I’m doing, about what I’m feeling…”

I offer that, with their almost militant lackadaisical-ness, they seem like antiheroes to the rigmarole of clichéd overly arty noise-pop experimental artists… “Yeah, I like that…” Williams agrees. He and Ryan both chime in but it cuts out in the static…and I’m left nodding awkwardly into the phone, next to a potato chip display under fluorescents.

“Yeah,” I say.

Wavves plays the Magic Stick with Carjack on April 1.

Spitting Nickels - For The Love of Music - playing Motor City Rock Revue - April 5th Magic Stick

with - Deastro, The Silent Years, The Hentchmen, The Muggs, The Displays, The Pop Project and The Friendly Foes

(words: milo)

The genesis of Spitting Nickels can be affably summed up as: “three old guys from the De La Salle class of 1982 and two young guys from the De La Salle class of 1999…” respectively referring to bassist John Bissa, singer Dennis Miriani and guitarist Tom Furtaw, gelling with guitarist Chris Brosky and drummer Eddie Baranek.

“In early 2008,” said Bissa of the hard-rolling bluesy rockers, “we got serious about playing out, starting with a well-received gig at the Cadieux Café. We made a demo with Dave Lawson (from The Pop Project) and eventually an EP with Jim Diamond. We even managed to score an opening slot on a bill with Blue Oyster Cult in the ‘Rockin’ on the Riferfront’ concert series.”

“…that was the day Tom died…”

~

Furtaw, Miriani and Bissa grew up together, attending De La Salle High, class of 82. Early on, Furtaw and Bissa shared “a huge common passion for music.” Digging on radio stations like W4 and WABX, the pair matured into appreciations for power-pop, new wave and went “ga-ga about anything coming out of England. Tom had been raised on AM Gold and I was a Beatles freak…”

Bissa paints the musical/cultural landscape of Detroit in the mid-80’s as transforming from “…the strict caste system that drove you to listen to certain music based on ethnicity and income…” to being completely overhauled into embracing a varied blend of “Clash back to back with the B-52’s and then Prince.” Furtaw offered to Bissa, “‘…if the B-52’s can be a band, why can’t we?’”
The duo continued their refinement as passionate music heads and upon entering college, expanded their appreciations to the Manchester scene and Motown’s seemingly bottomless catalogue. The band idea never came to fruition in the 80’s and Bissa eventually joined the Navy and Furtaw went into public service.

In 1998 the pair was once again living on the East Side, “busy as fathers, and in our careers. The love of music continued, but always passively…”

After he was given a new bass guitar for Christmas by his “exceedingly thoughtful girlfriend” and witnessing the premier of the garage-focused documentary “It Came From Detroit,” the inspiration to form that dream band was recharged. Bissa wound up at the Northern Lights Lounge where he met back up with longtime local player Eddie Baranek (also of the Sights and Expatriates). The two got to talking about music and became (better) friends (having been acquainted,) – adds Bissa, “Eddie will ‘music-geek’ with anybody.”

“By early 2007, we had concluded to get together to jam. I had a co-worker who was of a similar disposition. Straight out of the blue, Tom also purchased a guitar and asked if he could participate. This was completely unexpected -- Tom had never taken played any instrument before.”

“This was an extremely rough group,” Bissa continues, with blunt honesty, “Tom had no musical experience and my experience was way out of date. Eddie was patient with us and continued to play...on the condition he could use the group as an opportunity to learn the drums. Soon, we hatched the idea of playing out -- and Eddie presented another condition: he didn't want to sing lead. This lead Tom and I to approach our old friend Dennis (Miriami) about singing lead -- which he jumped on without reservation.”At first, to avoid becoming ‘basement heroes,’ (as Eddie put it), they played charity gigs and parties, performing all covers, through 2007. Eddie’s participation was a bit erratic, as he was spread across numerous other bands – meanwhile, the rest of the boys were still honing their chops and getting used to each other. They soon started writing original material and Eddie’s friend Chris Brosky joined on guitar.

It was during the show with Blue Oyster Cult that tragedy struck. Ten songs into their 12-song set, on a perfect summer night, Bissa turned around mid-song and saw his friend Furtaw lying on his back, eyes rolled up. Medics rushed the stage and had him out of there in 15 minutes – but Furtaw passed away later that night.

“Everybody -- everybody -- was just stunned. You can imagine the magnitude of the tragedy,” said Bissa. The band pledged to continue, with no hurry to have a new fifth Nickel. They continued to play gigs and write through 2008.

Most recently, Ben Borowiak (former band mate of Brosky and De La Salle grad) has joined on keyboard and percussion.

Summing up the band’s taste and writing methods, Bissa said, “along with his prohibition on sing leading, Eddie has never brought us an original song. Instead, all of the rest of us have brought song ideas (some more complete than others) to "the cave" and we eventually "find" the song by trying various ideas. Clearly, Eddie's very strong musicianship is the stone on which these diamonds are polished, but all of the rest of have contributed original songs and musical ideas. And so the influences come from everywhere: 50s rock and roll, the British Invasion, the last fifty years of Detroit music, 70s blues rock, Manchester, Power Pop and 90s "alternative."”

Coming up, on April 5 (Eddie’s Birthday and the only day where there isn’t a game being played during Detroit’s hosting of the Final Four College Basketball Tournament), Spitting Nickels plays on a monster bill with The Silent Years, Deastro, The Hentchmen, The Pop Project, The Friendly Foes, The Muggs and The Displays – the Motor City Rock Revue.

“The central idea for this show is simple: we have a fantastic local music scene and, on that weekend, we have a great opportunity to share it with the world. For each of these bands to reach the kind of audience we think we're going to have would require a huge investment in touring and other promotion. For one brief moment, we have the world at our doorstep...we should absolutely take advantage of it.

"There is sometimes a tendency for the negative voices out there to get the most play. We're not going to be one of those negative voices. We're going to work hard to make a positive contribution to local music.”

The band looks to record a full length over the summer.

More info: spittingnickels.us

Tom Furtaw

"Still Sour" over Sordid Systems: The Satin Peaches' triumphant return with Morning Maid - 3 / 27 - Blind Pig

(words: milo)
(photo: Allison Young)

The four gaunt shadows shimmied down from the 3rd floor bedroom on a string of knotted bed-sheets, arched frames balancing knapsacks as the house burned down. They jumped off onto the concrete slab where they’d been found, knobby knees revealed by tears to the fresh spring air. They dusted the soot off of their rescued cargo: The Morning Maid EP and walked back into the smoke curtained streets of Detroit.

Not that the burning house accurately depicts Island records, no – but it does feel like the Satin Peaches may have escaped (not just their label home, but something else) just in time. More specifically the metaphorical flames are gobbling up a system, or, er…uh, the system, (and not one label) – a crumbling order, an out of touch industry – who seem to be losing more and more bands to more modest, independent outlets to have their music heard. The Von Bondies just snubbed Sire for the humble MajorDomo and now the Satin Peaches have struck out on their own (with SleekSpeek) – and are finally, *sigh*, finally…able to release their EP, Morning Maid, to the world.

But any aim to portray the label dispute in any dramatic manner would be admittedly over-reaching (sorry, too late for this blog) – no, they were more like 4 scraggly Rapunzels. “I think what major labels do is,” said singer/guitarist George Morris, “when they don’t want to do anything with you, they just stop talking to you. And, they don’t care about you anymore, so they just sweep you under the rug. ‘Cuz it doesn’t hurt them at all to still own your record and not put it out…”

The torched system that these four lads (with Morris, bassist Aaron Nelson, guitarist Ryan Wiese and drummer Jeremy Smith) sidestepped, is the same pornographic cad who would instill starry eyed delusions into any young, forgivably naïve artists, petting their doe-eyed heads with one hand and locking them into golden shackles with the other. As did happen, almost perfunctorily, with the Satin Peaches in 2006, starting when the quartet of high school friends who’d just tipped over into college got accosted for demos, judged on the strength of their myspace songs, by an independent label owner from Europe. They were contacted by said label-owner later in the year after he’d wound up as an A&R rep for Island – he checks em out at a show in Detroit and…the whirldwind begins.

“Once one label gets a hold of you, every label starts talking to you,” recalls Morris, now only 22 but speaking in a tone that feels wrung with a bit of healthy, focused cynicism. His mid-high voice sulks on the subject of labels, “We finally settled on Island and it was great for the first couple months, we went on tours and they suck your dick and they take you out for a nice dinner…” but it soars with enthusiasm when we talk about Morning Maid actually coming out… “I’m really happy...because it means we can start doing other things and completely do it our way and I think since then we've been really motivated...”

Their shooting star story was captured nicely by a 2006 Real Detroit cover – with the band, a fresh faced pack of pop-rock upstarts, sitting on a tarmac with a jet waiting for take off, with the headline “…Back To School?” Instead of college, the band toured Europe and the UK and went out to New York to record with Owen Morris (engineer of Oasis-fame). They were sufficiently swept up…And, understandably so: the quartet’s melody-focused indie-punk with spacey-guitars and tone emphasis (just barely harkening to new-wave dream-pop) and visceral fuzzy hooks (tasting like a refreshing contempo-reach-back to 60’s rock), was in high demand through 05 and 06. The Peaches songs, if at that point still rough and written/sung from still developing talents, fit nicely along side the rising tide of new indie/literate college rock like sound/style reference points The Strokes and Broken Social Scene or the ubiquitous Radiohead.

“It was amazing,” Morris’ voice flares, recalling the chance to tour Europe at 19-years-old, still caught up in the spectacle of ‘being signed.’ “I keep looking back on it…as a band, I don’t think we were ready at all.” He recalls sessions with 2 six-week sessions with Owen Morris in upstate New York… “The first week or so we would record and then the next 5 weeks we would just…pretty much party, and self-loath the whole time…and it got to the point where it wasn't even fun anymore, it was just a mad house. But, you just had to keep going. It was a good lesson on how not to do a record; that was the first time we’d ever been in a real studio or anything like that…We went to L.A. and finished it with Dave Sardy. We actually got shit done and it felt good…”

These sessions combined to make Morning Maid, but, ludicrous as it sounds, the band couldn’t quite communicate with their label – which seemed indifferent towards releasing it – so both the band and the EP hung in limbo. Fittingly, the song they’d been planning to release as a single may sum it all up, “Still Sour,” (a fine ditty of danceable beats under chrunchy storming guitars, flickering into shoulder shaking surf-toned hooks under and Morris’ crackly (Bejar-meets-Bowie) coo. “Stiiiiil soooour” his voice burns…then quickly shrugs in a melodic downturn “…I don’t care.”

Morris said that the band learned a lot over the nearly-20-month haul of releasing Maid. Though some promises of a release were made, nothing materialized. “As a band we learned how to play and learned the business a little more and definitely became closer throughout it.”

The band wasn’t dropped, they essentially quit. They wanted their record back. They just wanted to get it out. Morris suspects the band may have quickly grown into something the label hadn’t expected. “We got signed on some really old demos and then we went in the studio and recorded [the Maid tracks]...I don't think they really understood ‘em…”

"I just want to get [Maid] out there for people to start talking about it. It’s strange, we kinda had slightly established ourselves a little bit before we got signed and then we got signed and we pretty much left [Detroit] for 2 years. We played a few shows in Detroit but we were mostly concentrating on the U.K. and things like that…And then that fell through so when we came back it was almost like a fresh start, and that was exciting.”

The band has been playing a slew of shows since last September. “It took us about a month or two to rethink what we were gonna do. We were so used to relying on other people for everything and then we got back and didn’t have it…so there was a month there where we were really like, ‘whoa, what the hell are we gonna do?’ And, then we realized that, now we can really do whatever the hell we want..”

Hence, they’re releasing Maid on fledgling Sleek Speek – a still experimental, yet ambitious project spearheaded by Jesse Shepherd-Bates (former Peach member and leader of JSB Squad) along with fellow young singer/songwriter Mick Bassett (who leads The Marthas). They’ve formed a triumvirate, Shepherd-Bates, Morris and Bassett, three collaborating talents overseeing an online-based label…with a heavy Detroit focus. A label that, as Morris admirably and mystically puts it, “will become whatever it needs to be…” in time.

For now, after seeing the world, the boys are back in town. A tour may come in the summer, but for now, Morris said he and the band will just “…see what comes…”

Myspace.com/thesatinpeaches
Upcoming shows: CD Release – The Blind Pig – 3 / 27 with Lightning Love and Mick Bassett & the Marthas
4 / 17 at PJ’s Lager House


...

Sik Sik Nation and the psyche scene of Detroit - playing The Belmont - 3/27

Listen on myspace
~

Sik Sik Nation
3 / 27 Belmont

w/ Qualia

Gossip Gospel &

First Communion After Party

Local trio hopes to surge the psyche scene:

They'd barely left Detroit when the muffler fell off the van.

Trio Sik Sik Nation had to be in Cleveland in 3 hours, for a show. The van was now an immobile custodial shell for their vital drum kit – but they couldn’t cancel the show, they couldn’t bring themselves to back out. A shrug and a quick nod, and they grabbed their pedal boards, some drum sticks, commandeered a friend’s car and drove down to the gig. Almost immediately after meeting their bill-mates, they had to beseech them to borrow amps and a drum kit. And,...shoot-from-the-hip as it was, it turned out to be one of their best shows yet.

It exemplifies what bassist Eric Oppitz says of the trio’s principled makeup, “We’re very proactive people.” Singer/guitarist Sean Morrow added, “We’re always trying to one-up ourselves, to advance.”

Sik Sik Nation self-released their debut full length 8 Styles to the Unholy, last spring. Last winter, after some touring through 08, they built their own studio in Oppitz’s basement, sound-proofing the walls, obtaining the equipment, building a computer, installing shelves and laying down pedal boards. Since then, they’ve prepared nearly an album’s worth of material and released a single online for free download.

Listen: "Lord Is My Gun"

Though they valued and enjoyed working with Ann Arbor’s Jim Roll (engineer for 8 Styles,), Morrow said they wanted to “buy all the gear and do it ourselves.” This way, “we’re not on a time clock and we can work on it as little or as much as we want.”

“We just have more creative control over everything,” said Oppitz, who met Morrow 4 years ago to form Sik Sik Nation, with drummer Rick Sawoscinski. The band was able to prepare, record and release (online) their single in the span of a weekend, on their own terms, at their own pace, with their own mixing.

“Eric and I have been in bands for like 12-15 years, so we’ve been in studios. Just being around studios, seeing what people do. You just get an ear for it and if you have an ear for it you know where things need to be placed.”

The three of us discuss the regrettable act of bypassing studios or engineers, but yet, also, the often unavoidability of it, in this day and age, with the hyperactivity of the internet-music-world. Not to mention, the effects of this veritable economic depression we live in…

“When you’re paying someone else and you’re on their time, it’s very nerve-wracking,” said Sean. “You gotta wash your hands, or take a dump…it’s gets like, alright this is costing me money!”

“You lose that momentum,” said Oppitz. “We can do this and we can do it on our own time. We’ve just released a single and we’re gonna continually release stuff…because we can make good recordings whenever we feel like it and continually release singles. Whatever we want to release, whenever we want...” Oppitz said that that has been the goal, repeating their work ethic buzz word of “continual…”

“We love what we’re doing,” said Morrow. “Getting paid or not getting paied, we love what we’re doing.”

The band charts a dark swirl of hard-rolling, smoky psychedelic rock – that has a gritty garage swagger, classic rock’s relentless pounding mixed with a nice dose of sultry shakeability – electrified by a strong, underlying blues influence. 8 Styles captured a stretch of their work reflecting these shoegazey fuzz-rock ballads and punchy, rhythm-heavy blues. The bands in their constant listening rotation include A Place To Bury Strangers, Black Angels and the Warlocks, as a reference point.

With their newest (as yet untitled) album, Oppitz said, “It’s definitely got that psychedelic experimental aspect…But, it’s definitely got a groove. We’re never gonna abandon melody in songwriting…”

Morrow adds, “It’s gonna have something that someone can shake their ass, tap their foot to or clap along to, we’re never gonna abandon that. But, at the same time, we’re getting away from the straight verse-chorus-verse thing…”

“We had a lot of the blues element [on 8 Styles],” said Oppitz, “that has turned into more of a groove backbone. As opposed to straight up 12-bar-blues type of thing, there’s more of a backbone, more of a groove that rides through the song, with layering the psychedelic and the soundscapes on top of it…”

While singer/guitarist Sean Morrow had time off from his day-job teaching during mid-winter break, they hit the road through the east coast and midwest. Now that they’re home, they thought they’d try to spur some life into the often-under-the-radar psyche scene percolating in Detroit, with a stalwart psychedelic-leaning bill at the Belmont, featuring Detroit’s Qualia and Minnesota-based First Communion After Party and Gospel Gossip.

“It’s hard…” said Oppitz of trying to build and connect into the scene, especially for psyche bands – a more mysterious scene comprised of bands who only poke their heads out once in a while, seemingly. We joke about a “proactive” band in a non-proactive genre; or, as Morrow fittingly quips, “We play drug music but we also get up for our work on Monday morning…”

“For us,” said Oppitz, “to get on really eclectic bills [is] fun, but those don’t always necessarily work. Because, [with scenes] you have a pocket here, a pocket there; they come to see THAT band and leave, and people come in to see US and then leave. It works on a level, but I feel like every single show we played on tour, yeah-we ended up playing first – but, people came early and stayed till the end. I feel like that doesn’t always happen here.”

So the trio, modest, earnest…and relentless, continues to forge on, with no real scenester-ins or hot-connections to the hip-spokes of this fickle stratum of Detroit music. They’ll put out more singles as the year goes on – and in the autumn they’ll release their self-recorded 2^nd full length, (not to mention a tour in May). But in the meantime, it’s March 27^th at the Belmont…

“We’re trying to create more of a scene around ourselves,” said Oppitz.
~

Tune in next week for more on Detroit's Psychedelic scene: an interview with Tony Thrush from Friends of Dennis Wilson.

Reading Day: Six Years of War

Deep Cutz -
State of the Union:
Iraq - six years later







[ed. - No need for my ramblings here... Instead, it's reading day on the blog.
I sincerely hope you find some time today or tomorrow to click some of these many links below - Some provide vital information, news, updates, insight... Some provide ways to get involved Some provide ways to promote peace

(Just right click as many as you can/want and open them in a new window) ]

* from Detroit Free Press, (from the AP) 3 / 19:
Total number of U.S. troops who have died as of Tuesday: at least 4,259.

• from Michigan, 156;

• Total wounded in action as of Feb. 28: at least 31,102.

• Total wounded, including for nonhostile reasons: at least 36,106.

COALITION TROOPS

• Total number deaths as of Tuesday: at least 307.

IRAQI CIVILIAN CASUALTIES

More than 91,121 killed since the 2003 invasion, according to the Iraq Body Count database.

TROOP STRENGTH

United States
• March 31, 2003: 90,000.
• Now: 138,000.
• Month with highest level of troops in Iraq: October 2007, at 166,000.

COALITION
• Total number of countries at war's beginning, including the United States: 31
• Now: 4 -- United States, Britain, Australia, Romania.

IRAQI SECURITY FORCES

• Total trained and equipped, July 2005: approximately 171,300.

• Total trained to date: 561,159.

COST OF THE WAR

• More than $605 billion, according to the National Priorities Project. According to the Congressional Research Service, Congress has approved more than $657 billion so far for the Iraq war.

• In August 2008, the Congressional Budget Office projected that additional war costs for the next 10 years could range from $440 billion to $865 billion.

• Total tab for Iraq war, accounting for continued military operations, growing debt and interest payments and continuing health care and counseling costs for veterans: At least $3 trillion, according to economists Linda Bilmes and Joseph Stiglitz.

REFUGEES
INTERNAL REFUGEES
As of November 2008, there were at least 2.8 million people still displaced inside Iraq.

Associated Press

~

Stay Informed:
Six Years of War in Iraq (from Huffington Post)

Obama Loses Phrase "Enemy Combatants," But Detention System Remains the Same (AlterNet)

No More 'Enemy Combatants' -- But Is Obama Merely Rebranding Bush's 'War on Terror'? (AlterNet)

~

Get Involved:
Amnesty International

Democracy Now!

Support Our Troops!

AlterNet

Anti-War.com

Campaign To Ban Torture

Central Committee for Conscientious Objectors

Educators For Social Responsibility

Grassroots Peace

Iraq Veterans Against The War

Librarians For Peace

Military Families Speak Out

Peace Action

Stop War On Iran

Veterans For Peace

link to Swathmore College Peace Collection: