Grimey: Death Grips

Tuesday June 7, 2011
Townhouse Lounge, Sacramento, California

On Tuesday, June 7, DJ Whores booked dubstep DJs from distant lands like New York City and France. But when the downstairs cleared for an upstairs Death Grips set, for once Sacramento showed some goddamned pride.

Death Grips bears the rumblings of a strange new era for hip-hop–if the genre is even appropriate. Between Death Grips and the teenage riot of Los Angeles’ Odd Future Wolf Gang Kill Them All (OFWGKTA) crew, hip-hop seems to be embracing a DIY and punk mentality that hasn’t been prevalent in the genre since Fab Five Freddie was kicking it with Debbie Harry in the Lower East Side. Devoid of heavy-handed derivatives, Death Grips respectfully appeals to Sacramento and the indie world-at-large’s iTunes playlist without losing an ounce of visceral gnarl. The Ex-Military mixtape is the group’s call to arms through heavy bass warbles, juke break beats and vintage psych-samples from Link Wray and The Castaways. Critics jumped the gun when they hailed New York-based MC Waka Flocka Flame as the first metal god of rap. No one could have predicted Death Grips’ Stefan Burnett, a Kimbo Slice-looking dude from Oak Park, was lurking in the trenches with a deeper-seated metal intent with lyrics, “Dismiss this life/Worship death/Cold blood night of serpent’s breath/Exhaled like spells from the endlessness/In the bottomless wells of emptiness,” over the thunder of Zach Hill’s drums.

The Sunday prior to the Grimey set, Death Grips played a secret show at Press Club, a set that made its way to YouTube in record time. The Grimey announcement was as last-minute as it gets, with most of the curious anticipating a Davis house show as the unveiling of the mysterious Zach Hill project. The cloak was off entirely, as was frontman Stefan Burnett’s shirt as he stalked the stage, like any moment he might snap and start cracking skulls. No one was injured during the set, nor did a full-on mosh pit ever break out. The surprise was the rush to be on top of Death Grips without taking the stage–an instant embrace virtually unheard of for a local act. Burnett’s coined grunt of “Yuh” was mimicked on cue and other times in brief quiet moments, affirming his bark as the group’s battle cry. Sacramento is excited for its locally raised rap beast–enough to shed the cool, shed the cynicism, shed the apathy and get buck for 40 minutes in ToHo. It caught me off guard so much that I’m reluctant to mention it for fear it might backfire and curse the unabashed enthusiasm.

Whether we sustain our buzz in the home front or not, Death Grips is in takeover mode with or without us. This week (June 15), the group performs L.A.’s Low End Theory, a weekly melding of art and music held every Wednesday at The Airliner, a stage that made the careers of DJ Gaslamp Killer and producer/musician Flying Lotus. In the end, if Death Grips maintains an indifference to hype present within the music, it will always have a home in Sacramento. The nihilistic candor on tracks like “I Want It I Need It (Death Heated)” and “Spread Eagle Across the Block” boasts a lifestyle prevalent in Midtown yet to be captured sonically. I, for one, hope this is the beginning of many voice-shot nights shouting “Yuh” to come.

The Detroit Cobras Scour the Archives and Revitalize Long-Lost Hits

The Detroit Cobras are good at what they do. So good, they kept the critical media scratching their collective temple as to why the band struck a familiar chord, but the origins were not quite traceable. Four albums and a gang of singles deep, the Cobras’ garage and R&B nostalgia earned them the company of their most-beloved songwriters and a friendship with a particularly notable Grammy Award-winning, Detroit-raised producer.

While the Cobras wait for Mr. Was to grace them with his time and expertise, we took to discussing the meat and potatoes of the Cobras’ next step in being the best darned (cover) band around. With the cat out of the bag and old songwriters coming forward at their shows, it’s an exciting new time for the band, in which perhaps an original or two might sneak into the tracklisting.

It’s been a while since the last Detroit Cobras record. What’s the motivation going into the new record?
Maribel Ramirez: Being able to record a little better. We make decent records, but we’d like to take it a little further than we already have–make it more powerful. We’ve done a decent job by ourselves. In talking to Don [Was], it’s something we both want to do.

Will there be a shift in the bands that influence the music?
MR: It’s digging deeper. It’s almost attitude-wise, you know what I mean. We’re a little more grown up and we still want to make a dance record, but dance by our definition.
Rachel Nagy: Was said to us, “Look, I won’t do this if I don’t know what to do. If I don’t understand this and don’t know what I can bring to you guys, I won’t try to fake through it or turn you into something you’re not.” And that’s what we needed to hear.

Does the band feel pressure of possible misrepresentation, considering the songwriting process is built upon previous works? Do you ever get approached by disgruntled fans or the original songwriters?
MR: You’d think we would have, but to tell you the truth, most people don’t know the records. People aren’t really going to come up to you and tell you negative things anyway. When we cover a song people go looking for it. Most don’t say, “Hey, I know that.” When we were in Europe, it was cool to see the effects of having done this. People come out and say, “Let me show you what I’ve got.”

In Los Angeles a person came to the side of the stage and said, “There’s a person here who says you covered one of their songs.” I remember thinking, “I thought most of them were dead?’ Who the fuck is standing at the door.” It was Jackie DeShannon [one of the first female singer/songwriters in rock ‘n’ roll]. We went to a little studio and wrote a couple of songs with her. One of the songs we wrote during that session I want to use on the next record. I at least want to give it a shot.

Have you ever had someone try to pull the wool over you and pretend to be related to one of the deceased musicians to get paid in some form?
RN: The closest thing that ever happened to that was Mickey Lee Lane’s brother. I don’t think we met him, but I think he sent us a letter. It was cool, but then died. The next thing you know we’re getting these long e-mails from his brother. He started on the whole, “Yeah, I actually wrote that and here’s some other stuff I wrote that I’d love if you guys would do.” It was very obvious that he hadn’t written anything.

The other music he was sending us was terrible. It was really bizarre shit like I don’t think we’ll be doing a dance remix of the blues anytime soon. Other than that, we’ve never really had anyone try and play us.

Considering many of these songs are obscure hits that are either out of print or impossible to find, has there ever been an interest to do more for the originals beyond the band’s interpretations of them? For example, a label that focuses on reissues or a compilation?
RN: We absolutely have the utmost respect, it’s one of the reasons we do what we do. But this is our personal jukebox. We get together, share each other’s weird records, drink some beer and play the songs we love and find fun. Other than that it was not supposed to be anything deeper.

I wouldn’t really call us collectors. I’ve lost so many records. It comes down to the difference between boys and girls. The girls run around, dance and have a good time, while the boys are the librarians discussing who begat who.

We’ll leave all the reissuing to those boys that are great at cataloging and remembering and not losing their records and not moving from a house and forgetting two boxes in the attic.

Detroit Cobras will perform The Blue Lamp on Thursday, June 9, 2011 at 9 p.m. Also appearing will be Girl in a Coma. Tickets are $12 in advance and can be purchased at Eventbrite.com.

Beloved Sacramento rock band Shortie will play on Aug. 20, 2011 at Ace of Spades, their first show since breaking up five years ago. Guitarist Anthony Paganelli (who currently plays in Will Haven and also has a new project called Horseneck) recently told Submerge, “The idea of the Shortie reunion came up because we all were chatting about music and projects we were currently and recently in. Ryan [aka Pogus, vocals] mentioned that we should all get together at some point and hang out and watch our old tour footage. He put up a couple songs from a show we played at CBGB on Youtube. Then, of course, the idea of us playing again came up.” The guys hit up Eric Rushing to see if he’d be interested in hosting the show at his new venue, Ace of Spades, and he didn’t hesitate to say yes. “Eric was our manager,” Paganelli said. “So it’s full circle.” Shortie saw a fair amount of success back in their heyday: record deals, sponsorships, legit tours and songs in movies (2005’s Hostel), television shows (Viva La Bam, CSI, North Shore) and in video games. What I’ll always remember Shortie for, and what I’m looking forward to seeing most on Aug. 20, was their balls-to-the-wall live energy. They put on a damn good show back when they were young bucks. Let’s hope they can still bring it. “We are just so happy to play this show and have our friends there so we can have a super good time and party all night long,” Paganelli said of the reunion. “So many people we haven’t seen since the last Shortie show will hopefully make it out.” A slew of killer bands will be opening, including F1rst Class Citizen, Eightfourseven, Self Centered, Above the City, The Seeking and Mark Wears Clogs. Hit up Aceofspadessac.com for more information.

Dance Gavin Dance moves past another bout of offstage controversy and releases epic new album

Considering everything Dance Gavin Dance has been through (or has put itself through, depending upon how you look at it), Downtown Battle Mountain II is a fitting title for the band’s latest album. Released March 8, 2011 it sees the band pick up where it left off after its arguably most successful effort, 2007’s Downtown Battle Mountain. Five of the band’s original members–guitarist Will Swan and drummer Matt Mingus welcomed back bassist Eric Lodge and powerhouse vocal duo Jon Mess and Jonny Craig in 2010–reunited to enter the studio late last year. Despite their years apart, DGD’s put forth similarly remarkable results as they had in the past, in more ways than one.

“Writing started in the fall of last year around September,” says vocalist Jon Mess from San Antonio, Texas, a day prior to the band’s scheduled performances at the 2011 South by Southwest Music Festival. “Prior to that, Will had already started writing new songs. All of November and December was the recording. Tracked drums, bass and guitar through all of November and some of December, and most of December was vocals. I was there for almost a month recording, so was Jonny.”

It may sound like things came together rather quickly. Mess didn’t rejoin the band until summer 2010. His arrival was quickly followed by a tour and soon after the recording process for Downtown Battle Mountain II began. However, for Mess, it seemed much more laid-back as compared to when the band hit the studio for Downtown Battle Mountain, which was recorded in just two weeks.

“On this one [the sequel], we had two months,” Mess explains. “Last time we were in this shitty hotel, and it was freezing cold. I think I was a little sick then, too. This time we were in this house, and we had all this time. It was a lot more relaxed and there wasn’t as much time pressure–at least for me. Jonny came off a tour with Emarosa, so he came in a little later, but it was way more relaxed than prior experiences.”

Life in DGD post-recording has been anything but laid-back. Controversy sprang up once again surrounding Craig’s substance abuse. This time around, he allegedly defrauded his fans by offering to sell his Mac Book to his Twitter followers. When checks were sent, and no laptops were received, the band was once again forced to play damage control. Craig was sent into a seven-day detox program, which he just recently emerged from. Mess spoke with Submerge about DGD’s seemingly perpetual state of turmoil and Downtown Battle Mountain II, which, despite the all the backstage hullabaloo, is perhaps the brightest post-hardcore gem the band has produced to date.

I caught your recent Fuel TV performance. How did that go for you?
I was sick when we did it, so I wasn’t too happy with it. It was in Los Angeles. It was right before our first show. That was interesting. We had a studio audience there cheering and stuff. It was fun, I guess. I tried to have fun even though I was sick.

Was that a different experience for you guys?
Yeah. I’d never done that before. That was awkward. We had to do the songs multiple times and they came in with different angles. Afterwards they were shooting a comedy special with a bunch of people from VH1’s Best Week Ever–those different panelist shows where they have different comedians talking about stuff. A bunch of those people were there doing some little skits, and they asked DGD to be the backing band and play a little jazz riff. I don’t know where people can see that. It might be on Fuel. We’ll probably announce that when we find out.

You just came up with something off the cuff?
Yeah, they wanted us to play some kind of jazz, walking bass line–little flow thing that the comedians could do their little skit over. The guys came up with something pretty quick, and it ended up sounding pretty cool.

On the new album, did you and Jonny collaborate on lyrics or did you mostly write separately?
We talked about some themes, but it was mostly separate. A very small percentage of the lyrics go together. It was more of a scattered thing. That’s been our style since the beginning.

What sort of themes did you discuss? What were you personally trying to express on this record?
I like to write about all sorts of different things–snippets, fragments of ideas or dreams I have, various little stories. I kind of break them apart and put them together in different songs. One line might relate to another song later, so it’s not a cohesive body of material per song, more fragments of things that range from talking about food to being mad about something. Broad topics–nothing real specific. I don’t want to pigeonhole into having any limitations on what I want to write about it.

You and Jonny have radically different vocal styles, is that also the case lyrically, and is it difficult to get them to mesh from song to song? Is that something you work on closely together?
I think as long as the delivery is good, and you’re hitting the right notes and it’s flowing well, then the lyrical content doesn’t have to mesh in that sort of sense. First we go for the musicality–something that’s melodic or rhythmic or exciting in terms of phrasing and rhyming rather than we need to have these lyrics go together or we need a concept. That comes second.

There definitely seems to be a lot of hip-hop influence in your delivery this time around. You have this growling sort of rap cadence going on in a lot of the songs. Is that something you’ve been working on a lot on this record?
Yeah that’s definitely intended. I like all my parts to rhyme, and when I write them, I think of them as sort of a rap, like if you could rap that part, it would still fit. I’m not into so much the long, drawn-out, heavy screams over the entire thing. I’m more interested in trying to make it not necessarily as complicated as possible, but as unique and interesting that I can think of. It does come across it sounding like a rap because it pretty much is. It’s just a screamed voice rapping.

The record has gotten some good responses so far. Are you happy with the reviews or do you not bother reading those?
Yeah, I read the reviews. The one thing with some reviews is that people who write reviews are English majors, or they’re into writing and they’re not musicians themselves, so they sometimes clutter up the review with colorful verbiage or whatnot instead of actually giving content or criticizing or talking about different parts of the album. For the most part, it’s been good reviews, and I’ve liked what the people have said. Every review has something that I’ll read and I won’t understand how they perceive that about the album, but to each his own. I did watch this Youtube video of someone who hated the album, and his reasoning behind it, it was so funny because it was the antithesis of what Dance Gavin Dance is. The reasons he disliked everything was because, well, you really just don’t like what our band is about, not the album itself.

Jonny just got out of detox. How is everything going with that?
It’s going really well, actually, and I’m saying this as someone who’s not necessarily positive about the situation. He’s being really honest and real about it for once. It’s actually a little surprising to me. We’ll see how it keeps going. So far so good.

South by Southwest is basically a big party. Is that something you’re worried about as far as Jonny is concerned?
He’s doing Narcotics Anonymous. He’ll drink. He’s not getting wasted or anything, but if people are expecting him to not drink, I don’t think that’s what he’s doing currently. I’m assuming after this tour he could go into an actual 30-day program, which would be nice, instead of just a seven-day detox, because that’s not going to do it, obviously. Yeah, Austin’s going to be a huge party, but we’ve got our manager, label guy, all the people who are looking out for him are going to be there. I’m not saying we’re going to babysit him like a little kid, but at the same time we kind of are.

I read the interview you did with Alternative Press, and you later apologized to your old singer Kurt Travis and Jonny on Twitter for some of the comments you made. Given what you said that you’re not always the most positive about the situation, was it difficult for you to rejoin the band and get back into that frame of mind?
First off, that interview was a phone interview, and he relayed what I said in a sort of manner that wasn’t necessarily what I was saying. He asked me why Kurt got kicked out, and there was no real reason. I listed a bunch of reasons and he [the interviewer] picked the one about cigarettes… I said that Will and Matt said that, and then Will and Matt were like, “That’s not necessarily what we said. You spoke for us.” And I was like, “Sorry, I wasn’t trying to speak for you.” Me and Kurt are good friends, so I felt like saying, “Hey man, it came across incorrectly.” It made it look like I was divulging a story that wasn’t my business.

In regards to coming back, I was skeptical. Since I left the band, I reconnected with Jonny. We were skeptical of how the album would go down. We were just thinking, hopefully we’ll get the album recorded and see what happens from there. It wasn’t really a high-risk situation for me, because I could just do the record and if something went wrong, I could just go back to what I was doing before. There wasn’t really a lot to lose.

You mentioned the interviewer misconstrued what you said. Do you think that happens a lot regarding this band?
I think to an extent, yeah, and I think there are things that I said that I might not exactly feel, but I just said them at the time. I think that happens to everyone. It’s half and half. Some things get misconstrued, but that happens. Sometimes we feel optimistic about the situation, sometimes we feel pessimistic. If we were interviewed one day, there might be different responses. I’m not saying we’re bipolar or anything, just normal changes of emotions that people have.

Dance Gavin Dance’s Downtown Battle Mountain II is available now through Rise Records. The band is also currently on a U.S. tour with I Wrestled a Bear Once, In Fear and Faith and others. The tour will bring DGD and company to Ace of Spades in Sacramento on April 8, 2011.

Papa Roach’s Jacoby Shaddix is addicted to bringing the rock

Love ‘em or hate ‘em, there is no denying that Papa Roach has earned their rank as one of the most successful bands to come from the Sacramento region. They’ve sold upwards of 10 million records worldwide, have toured the globe for over a decade playing venues packed with adoring fans and have truly lived the rock ‘n’ roll lifestyle. But for every high point, there’s been a low. Be it battles with their record label or battles within the band itself, Papa Roach has shed its fair share of blood, sweat and tears, most notably when they parted ways with long-time drummer Dave Buckner in 2008. It wasn’t a smooth split. Buckner, who in the early ‘90s co-founded the band with vocalist Jacoby Shaddix, filed suit against the band saying that they owed him money. They ultimately settled out of court. Papa Roach has since continued on with new drummer Tony Palermo of the San Diego rock group Unwritten Law.

Through all the ups and downs, there have been a number of things keeping P-Roach pushing ahead, Shaddix explained during a recent interview with Submerge. “I would say our relationship with our fan base, the kids that are coming out to the shows being affected by the music,” he said. “We’ve just got that drive inside of us as a band. We’ve got this heart that just fucking pops. It’s all we got and it’s all we need. We all are living this dream, which sometimes can seem like a nightmare, but I’d sound like a bitch if I were to complain. We just love it.”

As for the incalculable hardships that always seem to creep their way into the picture, Shaddix said that after a career like theirs, he and his crew are ready to take on anything. “It’s always a challenge. You’re always up against a challenge,” he said. “But the members of this band are always up for it. I think it makes it easier for us as time goes by too because we’ve just seen so many genres come and go and so many trends come and go.” He chuckles. “We almost came and went.”

In the following interview, we chat with Shaddix about his band’s deep Sacramento roots, how making music is like a drug, their plans for a new full-length record and more. Be sure to catch Papa Roach live in Sacramento for their first time in years when they headline Ace of Spades two nights in a row on Feb. 25 and 26, 2011.

What are some of the first thoughts that come to mind when you think back to Papa Roach’s humble beginnings when you were gigging in and around Sacramento all of the time? Do you ever trip out on how far you’ve come?
For me it’s a daily kind of realization, more so when I’m home around the people that I was with. Not only am I with my band on the road, but then it’s like we’ve got sound guys and light guys, a whole crew, you know? I never had that back in the day. Then I come home, and I’m back around my wife. She’s been with me since I had Papa Roach in the very beginning. We’re old school. We go through our old photos, and we see pictures of me and my wife and my band from way back in the day. My band was in my wedding way back. It’s a trip, you know, especially when I come back home.

I used to go watch you guys in the late ‘90s at this little club near where I grew up, the Gaslighter Theater in Gilroy, Calif. Do you remember that place? That was right on the brink of when you guys were getting the major label deal and whatnot I think.
Fuck yeah, dude! That was a really cool time for P-Roach.

I tripped out when talking to Eric Rushing, longtime Sacramento music enthusiast and promoter, the other day about that era of P-Roach because he was like, “Yeah those were my shows even down there. I was at most of those shows!”
Yeah for these upcoming shows that we’re doing in Sacramento, just to interject on that point, it’s kind of a full circle for us 10 years later. Eric and Brett [Bair] have been very successful. Brett used to manage Papa Roach; we split the sheets, we’re still OK, and we’re friends and such. But it’s cool to see that people who started in Sacramento are all still around here killing it. That’s even kind of why we wanted to put the type of bill together that we put together.

Yeah that’s cool. It’s all Sacramento cred-bands.
Yeah, bring it on home!

So the first night it’s Track Fighter, Will Haven and you guys. The second night it’s Lonely Kings, MC Rut and you guys. So many good Sacramento-based bands! I’m especially digging MC Rut lately. They’ve got a crazy work ethic. Are you familiar?
Fuck yeah, dude. That record is one of my favorites. I mean you’ve got to work hard in this business no matter what. If you want to make it, you’ve got to go in and slug it out in the trenches and build a fan base by playing rock shows. That’s the proving ground for rock music is touring. If you come with a hot song for a minute, that’s all good, but can you go out and tour and pack houses and rock audiences throughout America? Not just like San Francisco and New York, I’m talking, like America, you know what I mean?

Bringing it back to Sacramento for a second, don’t you guys own a studio space downtown? What’s that space all about?
Yeah right now it’s just pretty much essentially a demo studio for Papa Roach, and we’ll have some bands go in there. Like Dance Gavin Dance is going in a few days. They’ll be in there making some noise. Michael Rosen, he used to run out of J Street Recorders, Brian Wheat’s studio, he’s been bringing down some of his gear. He’s got really good gear, and he’s pretty much running it like a proper studio at times with bands. So that’s cool as well. We just don’t want it to collect dust while we’re out on the road.

Must be nice to just to get new riffs and song ideas recorded fast?
Yeah, exactly. I just got a new jam from Tobin [Esperance, bass] today actually. He programmed it on his computer, did the beats himself. There’s no guitar on it yet. It’s just keyboard sounds right now, but it’s like Papa Roach meets…I don’t know, it’s real good though.

So it’s sounding like there’s going to be another full-length ready for release sometime when? Next year?
Pretty much what we’re doing is this, Doomsday Radio, 2012, Papa Roach.

Oh really? I didn’t see that anywhere in any of my research! Is that a working title?
Yup. Working title, Doomsday Radio. There you go, print it.

Throughout the years Papa Roach has morphed quite a bit musically; it always seems like you’re progressing your sound. Can you talk a little about the many phases of your band?
I think for us it’s always been, “Go where the music takes us.” That’s the goal with Papa Roach: If it moves us, we think it will move our fans, and sometimes that’s true and sometimes it’s not. I think more times than not it has moved our fans. That progression that you speak of, we’re still in it. The track that Tobin just sent me, I was like, “Oh shit here we going again, we’re flippin’ it up.” But I’m into it, man. Music is this drug, and you want to try all different types of them. It’s like sex, you know, it’s like you do it the same way over and over and it just gets boring, so you’ve got to flip it up, put a wig on her, hit it doggy style. Switch it up.

What sort of vibe does the new song that Tobin sent you have? I read somewhere that Jerry [Horton, guitar] said the new record will have more electronic elements or something like that?
Oh yeah, for sure. It’s like somewhere between Prodigy meets Nine Inch Nails meets Papa Roach. It’s still got our sound to it, though, like when you hear the groove and the vibe, it’s still us, it’s just sometimes we want to use that texture in the music. I think we started to dabble in it with songs like “Burn” and “Kick in the Teeth” [off of 2010’s Time for Annihilation…On the Record and On the Road]. I think that it’s fun and our fans are receptive to it, and we like it because it opens up a whole new floodgate for us. I think it can make our music more beat-driven at times, which will be fun.

What’s one big goal of yours for the next record?
I don’t want to make a record that sounds like I’m a 35-year-old man, because I am a 35-year-old man, or I’m going to be, but I’m an exciting motherfucker when it comes to making music. I don’t want to make music that sounds compromised. That’s the goal for the next record is to kind of–and we’ve discussed this together–is to make a record that’s a little bit more experimental at times and a little bit more progressive. The last couple records have been song, song, song, etc. If you look back at one of our first releases, Old Friends from Young Years, there was a whole concept behind the way the record was laid out. I think we want to do something like that again.

Like as far as flow and transition tracks and whatnot?
Exactly, just to kind of dig deeper and make it more of an experience this time around. Not really a concept record, but something that is more than just song, song, song, song.

Even to the way that we’re going to do music videos in the future and the way that the band is imaged as well. For us, it’s a goal to kind of evolve all elements of what we do just a bit.

You might be getting older, but I sense that you are just as hungry as ever to succeed.

Yeah, look at the Chili Peppers. You don’t think of it that way. You think it’s just timeless. That’s what we’re going for. We’ve got a long, long road ahead of us. This is just another step in the path for us.

Papa Roach has heavy staying power in the music business, doesn’t it? It’s been so many years, but you guys remain relevant.
We definitely don’t take that shit for granted. But the fight is not over, dude. You look at a band like Green Day, they made that record, you know what I’m saying? For us, we still feel like we have that record in us. We still feel like we haven’t made the record of our career. Maybe it’s just that junkie inside me.

Papa Roach will play live in Sacramento for the first time in years at Ace of Spades (1417 R Street) on Feb. 25 and 26, 2011. Tickets are available at Dimple Records, The Beat, Armadillo (in Davis) and online at aceofspadessac.com. Grab their latest album, Time for Annihilation…On the Record and On the Road, a collection of nine live renditions of P-Roach hits and five newly recorded tracks, at record stores everywhere or through any major online retailer.

If you’ve walked or driven by street-wear boutique/art gallery Upper Playground at 2524 J Street recently, you’ve probably noticed the blacked out windows and lack of any sort of activity. No rad T-shirts in the windows, no art. And the hanging walrus sign is gone. What the fuck, right? Here’s the skinny on what’s happening: 22-year-old art collecting, street-wear and fashion obsessing Aaron Hearing (who worked at U.P. for years) is opening up his own men’s-focused shop in the space called First Edition. “It’s been the dream since day one to own a shop,” Hearing recently told Submerge. “It’s finally materializing into what I always wanted it to be.” Hearing’s resume also includes stints at Barneys New York in San Francisco, Heritage Footwear and Apparel in Roseville and Zumiez and he holds a degree from FIDM (Fashion Institute of Design & Merchandising).

Hearing assured us that he and San Francisco-based Upper Playground founder Matt Revelli, who also is the editor of Juxtapoz art magazine, are still cool. No beef, no bad blood. “He’s a great guy,” Hearing said, “He’s smart as hell.” Hearing pointed out that because Revelli isn’t in Sacramento it was tough for him to manage the shop and that because U.P. had pigeonholed itself by carrying too few brands, it was simply time to close up shop. “He wanted to test out the Sac market,” Hearing said. “It was great, but the only problem is we were selling T-shirts. How many people in Midtown will buy three T-shirts a week and then come back and buy more?” Hearing plans on carrying what U.P. did and then some: jeans by Crate Denim, “it’s all vintage denim in modern fits. All the denim is older than 1973,” men’s skin care products by Baxter of California, and even random smaller items like condoms. “We picked up a few other things like Sir Richard’s Condom Company. Totally random, but it was something I had to pick up.” For every condom sold, Sir Richard’s donates one to a developing country. “Same thing as Toms Shoes, which we are going to carry also,” Hearing said. “A lot of the brands in here we are going to be carrying have a story, a purpose.”

First Edition will open on Feb. 12, 2011 Second Saturday. After that they’ll have normal hours of 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. And just because it’s a men’s-focused shop, ladies should not be intimidated to shop for their BFs or hubbies, as Hearing’s super friendly 19-year-old sister will more than likely be behind the counter working. Even if she’s not, you’ll be greeted by either Hearing himself or one of his close friends. “This is going to be a place where, it’s weird using the word ‘safe,’ but it will be,” Hearing said. “People can come in with no pressure to buy anything and just kick it until you have to go to dinner.”

The E:motion Dance Ensemble is bringing their live full-length rendition of the movie that created a phenomenon, The Rocky Horror Show, to the Guild Theatre on Dec. 30, 2010—Jan. 1, 2011. Live music, hot dancing, cool multimedia elements and legit lighting will make this a night to remember. There are four shows, one on Dec. 30 at 7 p.m., two on New Year’s Eve (one at 7 p.m. and one at 11 p.m.) and one on Jan. 1 at 11 p.m. For more information and to buy tickets in advance, visit www.emotiondanceensemble.com.

New Year’s Eve is the most hyped-up-yet-somehow-always-disappointing night of the year, but it doesn’t have to be. If you head to Townhouse this year for some serious ass shaking thanks to the fine folks behind Fuck Fridays and Lipstick, there’s no chance it will be. Their NYE bash will take full advantage of the two stories inside Townhouse, with upstairs being the “Booty Bass Exxxplosion” room with Shaun Slaughter, Adam J and Taylor and special guest Richie Panic; downstairs will be the “Lipstick Year in Review” room with Roger Carpio. Sponsors include Filter Magazine, Hot Italian, Phono Select, Vitamin Water and Bows and Arrows (where pre-sale tickets are available for just $5). And with companies that legit come rad giveaways and freebies. The Facebook invite page for this party even says that “guests are encouraged to bring air horns, noise makers and other loud NYE celebratory stuff,” and that there will be a “booty ball drop at midnight.” Sign us up! Kicks off at 9 p.m., $8 at the door.