Sacramento’s Ideateam puts their spin on influences new and old

Anyone ever asked to step up to a classroom-style white board to write down some answer they didn’t know probably had an abridged Hail Mary prayer running through their head, hoping that a light bulb would go off and save them from the painfully drawn-out scene soon to follow. Even without the pressure of a time limit and a group of judging eyes upon him, 26-year-old guitar player Justin Butler still found himself at the mercy of an empty white board late one night after returning to the studio from an explosive two live sets he had just finished playing with his newly formed Sacramento funk band, Ideateam.

Luckily for him, though, the light bulb he needed went off at just the right time.

“I remember wiping it all the way clean, and it was just a blank board,” he says of the band’s rehearsal set list at the time. “And for whatever reason that concept came to me at that point. And it was fitting.”

Butler is referring to three symbols he thought of in that moment of reflection, which, coupled with the then-million-dollar question facing Ideateam, ultimately became the name of their debut album: And What Now (&!?).

Nearly two years later and after some key new additions to the group (mainly in the horn and percussion sections), the nine-man ensemble has finally picked a release date for their long-awaited project, to be held on Oct. 31, 2014, at Harlow’s, an album premiere party and live performance alongside local acts ZuhG and James Cavern and the Council.

While this would be their official inaugural show for the album, the upcoming Harlow’s gig is far from Ideateam’s first rodeo.

Even before completing And What Now (&!?), Butler and fellow guitar player/bandmate Tim Snoke say they’ve been playing live fairly consistently for the past year. Whereas they used to think two gigs a month was busy enough, now they say they’re having to turn down offers because of how booked they are already.

“It’s one of those things where you don’t want to sound full of yourself or anything, but people continually say things that blow me away more and more,” Butler says. “When you have a good friend of yours who also happens to be a musician, and they tell you you’re their favorite band in town, that does something to me. That’s a really humbling thing to be told.”

The reason behind their bubbling reputation could lie in the unique sound Ideateam brings to the table, says Tim Snoke.

“There’s like a groove-based music [here], but there’s kind of a flavor that we retain that I don’t see a lot of other groups doing around town,” he says. Snoke also believes groove and dance-based music is making a “turnaround in this area” and that people are starting to embrace funk as a comeback genre again.

Drawing inspiration from artists new and old from Mandrill and the Meters to more contemporary bands like Orgone and Lettuce, Ideateam’s music resonates like a nice mashup of classic funk and soul with sprinkles of Latin jazz and even nuances of reggae thrown into the mix.

“I’ve heard it described before as a pretty powerful sound,” Butler says. “I mean, it’s heavy.”

While both guitarists agree that much of their success thus far is of their own doing, they also say their friends in the Sacramento music scene—which is pretty tight-knit, according to Butler—have been a huge help by letting them open for different bands in the area and build a name for themselves.

“I would just like to say for the record, we have really awesome friends who have been super generous that we’ve just known in the music community here,” Snoke says.

“We definitely had some people champion for us,” Butler adds.

As polished as Ideateam sounds on their studio record—where each instrument was tracked individually and layered as opposed to recording one group take at a time—Butler and Snoke say seeing the band live is truly an experience to behold in its own right.

“It’s different,” they both say simultaneously.

“[Us] live, there’s a different energy happening for sure that’s a little more… I wouldn’t say more, but there’s a different sauce on there,” Snoke says.

“There’s some more hot sauce,” Butler adds with a smirk, finishing his bandmate’s thought.

On stage, Ideateam’s lineup consists of a three-man rhythm section, two on percussion and three on horns with one extra member, Garrett Wildgust, contributing vocals every now and then.

Butler and Snoke are on the guitars, Kyle Pulskamp plays bass, Joe Carusi handles the drums, Mark Miller and Chris Ryan manage the saxophones while Josh Cambridge toots the trombone, and Mike Ruiz—the madman of auxiliary percussion—taps on and shakes up an array of instruments to fill in the pockets of any given song.

The band has performed as far north as Chico and as far south as San Francisco at the Boom Boom Room blues club on Fillmore Street.

A typical Ideateam set will feature a couple songs from their album (which are practically ancient to the team nowadays), a few new songs they’re prepping for their upcoming project and then some even newer material that they’re just starting to refine now. They’ll also play some B-side covers for all the crate diggers who are wise to the hidden gems of those funk and soul classics.

“I kind of like that there’s going to be those few people out there that when we do play those more deep cuts that they’re like, ‘Oh yeah!’ ‘Cause I’m that guy at a concert,” Snoke says.

Although Ideateam has only played regionally as of late, Snoke and Butler say they’d love to take the band on a West Coast tour starting up in Washington and going down to Southern California. Realistically, however, Butler says an effort like that will take some thorough planning for a band of this size.

“Truth be told, our real restrictions are our day jobs,” he says. “Otherwise we probably would have gotten out of town already and just done it.”

Their jobs range from Farm to Fork restaurant chef to delicatessen worker to professional musicians. Butler and Snoke work together at an E-commerce company mediating online transactions for vendors in the hardware and lighting fixture industry. It figures that at least a couple of Ideateam members would be dealing a lot with light bulbs on a day-to-day basis.

Still, even with their daily life limitations, Butler and Snoke are trying to stay optimistic about their musical futures.

Being grounded in the now and looking further down the road is a balance Ideateam constantly has to wrestle with. Making that leap into full-time musicianship is something they’re open to but also cautious about at the same time.

Snoke says he would love to see that happen one day but that mainly he’s focused on the dynamic of the band right now and evolving their music.

Butler says he agrees with Snoke in that regard. Yet, he also says a decision on Ideateam’s future will have to be made eventually.

“I foresee us approaching a fork in the road at some point next year where we’re going to kind of have to look around us and be like, ‘OK, we’re investing an incredible amount of energy times eight, times nine. What are we doing?” he asks.

Alas, the crucial question still stands for Ideateam: And what now?

As a young and up-and-coming band with so much momentum behind them, it’ll be interesting to see where they take it from here. So long as they stick to their funky jams and keep the feel-good music coming, I have a feeling they’ll always have a place here in Sacramento. Or wherever they end up going, for that matter.

It’s not just a CD release party, it’s Halloween at Harlow’s Oct. 31, 2014! To quote ZuhG’s facebook invite, “It’s time for Sacramento to get a freaky dose of spookygroove, so pop those eyeballs out and get your skull prepared to be electrified.” Doors for this 21-and-over show are at 8 p.m., with a $12 cover. Celebrate Ideateam’s CD release along with ZuhG and James Cavern and the Council, and stick around for the costume contest. For more info, visit Facebook.com/ideateamband.

Ozomatli unites cultures far and wide, and people young and old

Multi-tasking. It’s an ungodly buzz word that has more or less come to define our modern existence. Job titles now seem to be a never-ending string of hyphens or slashes; Web browsers allow for infinite tabs; that little waterfall thing in the upper-right corner of your Facebook page lets you know when one of your friends likes a photo of someone you’ve never even met. You’re busy. We know. So is Ulises Bella of Los Angeles-based band Ozomatli. When Submerge caught up with him, he and the band were hard at work on a variety of things.

“We’re not very good at multi-tasking,” Bella says with a big laugh. “We’re trying our hardest, though, to multi-task up in here.”

Bella reveals that the band has just started making demos and setting into motion a new Ozomatli LP, which would be the band’s first studio album since 2010’s relentlessly groovy Fire Away, an aptly named album that boasts an arsenal of sounds both exotic and domestic in flavor. However, at the moment, Bella (who contributes his talents on saxophone, keyboards and other instruments) and company are working on a project with a younger audience in mind. In between their rigorous touring schedule, which sees them on the road most weekends, at the very least, Ozomatli has been working on their first children’s record under the moniker Ozokidz. This isn’t a radically new idea for Ozo. Bella says that the band has “always been down for playing for kids and interacting with kids,” but as members of the band had their own children, making an album for kids seemed to make sense.

“Our fans are getting older, so a lot of them have kids, and what really put it over the edge was when we were the super music friends for a couple live shows of Yo Gabba Gabba,” he says. “That really made us say, ‘We have to make an album,’ because a lot of our music already kids relate to a little bit.”

Reminiscing about the music he grew up on, the stuff that he gravitated toward when he was a child, Bella speaks of a rich personal musical tradition. As could be inferred from Ozomatli’s music–a blend of, well, just about anything: Afro-Cuban and tropical rhythms, reggae, hip-hop, pop, good ol’ rock ‘n’ roll all deftly woven together with positivity and a purpose–Bella’s musical upbringing was quite diverse. Through his father, he learned to gain appreciation for the great composers, such as Bach and Vivaldi.

“A lot of baroque music really stuck with me,” he says.

Beyond that, the music of his parents’ heritage and popular music also played significant roles.

“My dad was from Spain and my mother was from Mexico, so my mom was super into Trio Los Panchos, a lot of Beatles, obviously, a lot of Beach Boys,” Bella says. “There’s this party music from Spain called rumba flamenca. The only thing I can compare it to is the same beat as The Gypsy Kings, but less commercial-y, but it’s very much party music. So all that kind of stuff was in me. Also, my friends at the time, the kids I was growing up with, were very much into breakdancing and break dance music, so a lot of that electro hip-hop sound, kind of Kraftwerk vibe type stuff, really resonated with me, and to this day I’m into that stuff.”

This sort of diversity, as well as the varying backgrounds of Ozomatli’s six other regular members, plays a huge part in the band’s songwriting process, which Bella describes as pure experimentation as to what styles will blend the best.

“When we were in each other’s presence, the band was almost like a musical conservatory,” he says. “Everybody came from these different traditions, and there were a lot of things each of us didn’t know about. So, whereas one guy probably listened to reggae all his life, he probably didn’t know shit about cumbia. But then another guy probably knew a lot about cumbia and tropical music, but didn’t know much about reggae. In between that, there was kind of one of those things where a guy was playing a cumbia, but to him it sounds like a mutated reggae song, so he’s playing a reggae bass line over it, and in a weird way it shouldn’t fit, but it fits.”

And Ozomatli never stops gaining new influences. As they live, grow and experience so too does the band’s music.

“A lot of it also has to do with what people are into at the moment,” Bella explains. “Obviously when we first started on the first album, we were super influenced by Afro-Cuban music, and the hip-hop influence was huge because of Chali 2na and Cut Chemist, the world music vibe of putting in tablas and all that stuff. And through our travels, especially through the country and through the world, you start picking up different things, slowly those influences start going into the music too.”

Bella says the Ozokidz album is about 95 percent done, but still doesn’t have a firm release date, but it will be released on Hornblow Recordings/Megaforce/RED, which has also released They Might Be Giants’ children’s albums. In the following interview, Bella talks about some of Ozomatli’s interesting experiences working as U.S. State Department Cultural Ambassadors.

Speaking of your travels, you guys visited Nepal a while back. I’ve always wanted to visit there, and I’m not sure why. I think it was because of Raiders of the Lost Ark. What was that like, and were you exposed to any of the local music there?
Totally, and the crazy thing about Nepal is that it was one of our first trips as cultural ambassadors, right? We show up in Nepal, and it was completely coincidence, the day we get there is the day this huge religious festival called Shivaratri, which is all about Shiva and millions of motherfuckers from all over India and all over Nepal come to this temple to do offerings. The lines that go into these temples are miles long. Now the other thing that distinguishes this festival is that all kinds of cannabis use is legal for that day, so you see all these kids rolling up these monster spliffs, and you’re like, “Whoa, what’s going on here?”

And then, trip out on this. This is like some National Geographic shit. We were like, “Whoa, what a party!” It’s really psychedelic because there are all these speakers blaring these chants. It’s fucking bananas. Then we end up in this courtyard that the government set up for the sadhus, who are Hindu holy men. Now these cats basically renounce all material items and shit–loin cloths and dread locks, bro. They reserved this square strictly for them just to get high. You walk in there, and you’re tripping out, and they’re asking you to come in there and smoke. They’re like, “No, please, sit down.” They have these huge bowls of weed… It was quite a scene.

And when we were there, there was a cease fire between the Maoists and the government. I guess every other day in Nepal there are general strikes. We were really tripped out, like this is really an electric environment.

When we played the show, you know how there’s the railing between the crowd and the stage?

Yeah, where the photographers sometimes stand.
Exactly. Dude. The gate was about 100 feet away from the fucking stage. We were like, “Why is it so far away? How are we supposed to connect with this audience?” Then the dudes who are breaking it down are like, “Look, if for any reason the crowd doesn’t like you, or you have technical difficulties and you can’t get your shit together, they’re just going to start throwing rocks at you.”

I’d just gotten food poisoning, so at this point, I’m sick as a dog. I’m like, well, fuck it. Even if they throw shit at us, we’ve got to bring this barrier closer to us. This is just ridiculous. I think we got it 50 or 60 feet away from the stage, played the show, and it’s estimated over 10,000 people were at this show, and it was one of the largest congregations of people outside of strikes and politics and all that kind of shit that was going on. It went off really really well. It was old people, young people, all kinds of people.

The thing is, going into Nepal, I knew that maybe 10, 15 people tops knew who we were [laughs]… But it’s an amazing litmus test to see if your music stands on its own and can just communicate, because we just played, and people dug the music and reacted to it immediately. So it wasn’t the hype of Ozo, or our legacy or our reputation didn’t precede us.

How did you get involved with the cultural ambassadorship, because that’s a government appointment, isn’t it?
Basically what happened was this woman hit us up about it to renew it, and it was at first a big point of debate with us, because obviously there was a government connection, and we were still in the middle of the Bush administration, and it was like, how do we want the world to perceive us and how do we want the world to react to us? Will they think that we’re peddling bullshit, you know? So a big thing with us was that we were really sensitive about how we were portrayed, and we were really sensitive about local interests. A good example with that was Nepal, there was one person there who was like, “They’re always striking here. They’re shutting down their country. Maybe you can talk to the kids about how it’s not such a good idea.” Actually, I was kind of jealous of them, because they can hold the reins of power and immediately take control of society. I don’t even think that there’s been a general strike here in Los Angeles. There have been times when demonstrations have shut down the city, but I was of the mind that I envy these kids, that they’re able to organize like that and shut things down.

Well, you guys formed at a labor demonstration too, didn’t you?
Right. That was the other thing. We were like, “Are you sure you want this band to do this kind of work?” For me it was about creating our own story and creating our own connections. As much as we have stereotypes about these countries, they have stereotypes about Americans too, and why not break down these stereotypes and show we’re more the same than we are different–especially when it comes down to common people, working class people. The same shit some guy has to deal with in Egypt is probably the same shit some dude in the Midwest has to deal with.

It’s true. There are little differences, but the big things are the same. Everyone has to pay rent and make sure there’s food on the table for the kids and stuff like that.
Exactly. There are tons of things that divide us, whether it’s our governments, our religions, our outlooks on society, but when it comes down to it, everybody needs a place to stay, clean water, clean food, education. And that’s the thing in the United States that we take for granted.

Are you still in the position now?
It’s kind of died down. We did a lot of work for a while. We visited a lot of countries that a lot of bands have never been to, and I think we were just like, “We did this work, but now we’ve got to focus on some other shit real quick.”

Ozomatli will play Ace of Spades in Sacramento on April 6. Doors open at 7 p.m. and tickets are $20. They can be purchased through http://www.aceofspadessac.com/. For more info on all things Ozo, go to http://ozomatli.com/

J*Ras of SouLifted strikes out on his own with City of Trees

At first glance, J*Ras is a tall, friendly and relaxed looking guy with long brown dreadlocks. But after meeting him, you quickly learn he is a hardworking musician who takes on the roles of DJ, singer, rapper, multi-instrumentalist, producer, songwriter, husband and father. The hip-hop and reggae lover from SouLifted who has been in the music industry for more than a decade is ready to unleash his first solo album, City of Trees.

Unlike some mainstream hip-hop and reggae artist, J*Ras wants his music to serve as a call of awareness and individualism to people of all ages in the community.

“You can hear in a lot of the songs the message to be your own individual and keep going against the grain, doing your own thing,” said J*Ras, sitting on a chair in the green music lesson room at the ZuhG Life Store. “But that can also help to give them inspiration to get through things in life.”

When the Sacramento State alum travels and performs, he likes to bring the whole family with him, including his wife, Lady Grace from SouLifted and his two children. Even though his children might be considered youngsters they are already starting to follow in their dad’s footsteps. His 10-year-old son, Chase, is a songwriter and rapper and, according to his father, “tears it up” while performing on stage. His daughter Jossalin is only 2 years old but has to be given her own mini microphone at the live shows or else she will attempt to grab a mic from mom and dad.

“She was singing Bob Marley at a show the other day,” J*Ras said with a smile. “It’s just natural to her.”

On top of traveling with his family, J*Ras is active in the Auburn Hip-hop Congress, a local organization that provides youth with the opportunity and tools to help make a change in their society. At the nonprofit organization, J*Ras acts as the Artist Development Coordinator and works with and teaches young kids creative writing and the history of hip-hop.

“[We’re] working with the kids, giving them what we didn’t have when I was growing up in Auburn and that community, which is an outlet to express your creativity,” J*Ras explained.

Meeting up with him downtown at the ZuhG Life Store seemed like the perfect place to get to know J*Ras, since we were surrounded by music and art by local artists.

Your new album is City of Trees. I’m guessing that it’s about Sacramento?
Yeah, it’s a reference to Sacramento. That’s one of the tracks on the album… It just has to do with Sacramento kind of being overlooked and it’s really a good place to be. I don’t live in Sac right now. I moved to Grass Valley up in the hills. But I was born in Sac, went to Sacramento State, and I got to show love for Sacramento.

You are a very talented guy: a vocalist, a DJ, rapper, producer, basically everything. Did you have all of those roles with your new album?
Yeah, in the new album, I produced the whole album and I play the majority of instruments. There are guests from SouLifted: Brian Fleshman helped to produce some of the tunes, Steven Leonard played some of the guitar and bass. So, we did add some those elements from SouLifted. But I played pretty much everything on all of the tunes, even turntables. [I] do a lot of the vocals, besides some of the backing vocals. And there are some other guests on the album, including Prezident Brown, who is one of my favorite reggae artists, Soulmedic and Jahworks the Revolutionary. We do have a few guests on there but mainly this is just something that I’ve been working on for the last couple of years.

Do you have a certain theme that you are going for in the album, a certain meaning behind the lyrics?
We’ve always carried a positive message in the music. And with SouLifted, we’ve always had the music to lift you up. It’s conscious music with a message. It’s not just about the things that you normally hear in hip-hop music or even reggae. It’s things that you’re going through and how we struggle and how we overcome those things. One of the songs is called “Champ for Life,” and it’s really just a reflection of life and what’s got me here now. It kind of tells a story of where I’m at now. I guess the theme still would be conscious music that does have a message, a positive message for the people.

Do you have a target audience?
What I’ve always liked is that at our shows we always get people dancing. Whether they’re little kids that are 2 years old or the 80-year-old grandmas. And that’s what it’s all about, is getting the people involved. I work with the Auburn Hip-hop Congress as well, and it’s all about trying to help with the youth and giving the youth positive music that they can listen to. Not just the hip-hop that they’re hearing on the radio or the things that are out there easily accessible for them. It’s about giving them something with a message. Mainly our majority of listeners and my majority of listeners are college aged, a little bit of older. But the music is for everyone for sure.

What were some of the challenges working on your solo album–going from a big band to just you?
One of the main challenges is doing it myself and being so critical of my own music. Instead of being able to have that input from everybody to make it that collected thing. But that’s also given me the freedom to make it exactly how I want it. So some of those challenges also become strengths of the album. Mixing and mastering, just some of those fine tuning things, were probably the hardest challenges. It was so hard for me to be happy for where the album was, making it perfect.

What made you want to work on your own album?
I’ve played in multiple bands from Heart Life and Soul to SouLifted. I’ve always written my own music, and I have so many songs that haven’t been recorded because I focus so much energy on the band… I love that collective energy of the people when we unite. It’s just stronger and I love it, so really just kind of realizing where I am now and seeing what I need to put some energy into this solo album so I could really get it out there. I’ve been doing a lot more solo shows myself touring more and just trying to get the music out there. I knew that this was the next logical step in the progression. And having the ability to work with some of these reggae artists and other artists that I aspire to work with on my solo stuff [has] kind helped me push it and get the album out.

Do you see more solo work for your future?
Absolutely, we have a lot of projects going on, which is great and we are doing a lot of collaborations. Right now, I’m working on an album with Soulmedic and a lot of music with him. He is a great reggae artist out of the Nevada City area and Hawaii–he is kind of half and half. I’m also doing a tour with some of the artists from Thizz Nation, which is kind of funny, because it’s totally anti what our music is about. But they’re trying to bring that consciousness and educate some of the people and their audience. We got to try and reach every target audience we can. So, I’ll definitely be pretty busy doing some solo work, but I also hope to include some more SouLifted shows. And doing a lot of collaborations with artists, a lot of hip-hop artists in Sacramento and working with the Auburn Hip-Hop Congress right now a lot too.

I’ve read that you have been performing since 1999… over 10 years!
Yeah, that’s when I actually threw my first show. I was 15 years old and I got approached because we had been doing parties, where we just pull out in the woods and set up our turntables and generator. And so the word got out. We had a little hip-hop crew when I was still in high school and one of the local bars actually asked us to throw a show and that was in May in 1999. That was the first show that I threw myself, made the flier and all that, cutting stuff out, old school. It’s come a long way since then and we put a lot into it. I’m real happy with where I’m at now and where it’s moving along.

What is the best part of performing live?
The energy from the people. Just the feeling that I get from performing, it’s not like anything else. I know I’m meant to be doing that when I’m up there… And I love getting the people involved and the energy and getting that love back from all of the love that you put into the music.

J*Ras will celebrate the release of his solo album City of Trees at Sol Collective on April 29, 2011. Lady Grace, Task1ne and many others will also be on-hand. Expect special guests and some big surprises. The show is all-ages and gets underway at 8 p.m.

Local four-piece difficult to define

Happy 4/20. If only you were in Arcata, you could be ZuhGin’ out.

After CD release parties in Sacramento and Roseville last week, the four-piece from the City of Trees cruised the ZuhGmobile to Humboldt for a weekend lineup of shows capped off by a 4/20 celebration Monday at the Humboldt State University Quad.

ZuhG will perform at noon at Sierra College in Rocklin on Thursday. The evening before, on Earth Day, they have an all-ages gig at Pyramid Alehouse in Sacramento.

On the April Second Saturday Art Walk, in Sacramento on April 11, ZuhG lured the audience away from the art and the couches in the back of the Blue Lamp to the dance floor with their set that featured songs from their new album ZuhG Life. A heap of jackets piled onto one couch beneath the artwork of Brian Nichols, ZuhG’s frontman.

“Listen to OutKast,” Nichols said while they played a “So Fresh So Clean” interlude.

Shoeless, Nichols led the band on guitar and vocals. Justin Vance opened their set with his bassline for “Accessories,” an homage to the mundanity in life.

Brian “Bot” Swart was the highlight of the night and, in a way, he is in ZuhG Life, playing tenor saxophone, giving the band the sound they want—”to be unlike others,” how they define ZuhG.

Self-taught drummer Matt Klee said in an interview at Nichols’s house that in order to get better he had to get uncomfortable. So, with Nichols, he took a jazz ensemble class at Sierra College a year ago. That’s where they met Bot.

In that class, Nichols said he met a mentor of sorts who taught him jazz guitar.

“I wanted to play jazz guitar, and he played way sicker than me,” he said. “Now, it’s all about practicing daily. We’re trying to get better every day as a band.”

A semester’s worth of jam sessions and Bot was a part of ZuhG. Though it wasn’t their intention, he replaced the band’s cello player, Jarrod Matthews, who left the band after Bot’s sax was added. (ZuhG Life’s bonus track features an improv session with Matthews and Bot.)

The youngest in the band at 19, Bot gives ZuhG its jazz element that makes the funk-rock-reggae-jam—whatever you’d like to call it—band a little hard to categorize. Last year ZuhG was nominated for a Sammie in the SN&R in the R&B category. This year, they earned the nomination in the Jam Band category. Recently, High Times Magazine online added them as an unsigned band of the week.

Both Bot and Nichols are studying music, though Nichols is at Sacramento City College now.

Local radio station KWOD 106.5 plays their song “Shangri La,” because it’s “reggae enough,” Nichols said at his house. “I wanted them to choose ‘Lately,’ but they said it was ‘too jazzy.'”

Bot and the guys laughed it off. “Too jazzy is a compliment,” Bot said.

Surely their music wasn’t too jazzy, or maybe it was, to make enough cash to produce ZuhG Life at Sacramento’s Pus Cavern Studios. The recording is great.

“We’d like to thank Northstar and Sugar Bowl for funding this album,” Nichols joked, because they were able to book a couple shows a month at the Tahoe resorts during winter.

Tahoe in the winter. They’ll see the coast for spring. From San Jose to Ocean Beach they have shows lined up along the coast for two weeks until they return to Davis to play the G. St. Pub, May 16 at Beatnik Studios Boobie Bash and May 23 at Marylin’s on K.