Capital Swamp: The DC Resource Thread

There's the once.twice festival coming up in Baltimore next month-

April 15th - 17th, 2004
Baltimore's 4th Annual
once.twice:festival of sound and video art feat.
AKUFEN . DIMBIMAN . AGF . CHRISTOPHER WILLITS .
DABRYE . SUE COSTABILE . MATTHEW DEAR .
GHISLAIN POIRIER. NAUTICAL ALMANAC.JIMMY EDGAR
MYLENA BERGERON . CAROLINE HAYEUR .
SCOTT PAGANO + more TBA

once.twice also runs the occasional Treatment night at Sonar, the last one in November featured Magda and Sammy Dee.

On a different note, any musicians (d.j.'s?) who wanna perform for free outdoors or maybe at Carter Barron or other locations during the June 18-21st 2nd annual Fete de la Musique DC should call 202-724-5614 or e-mail jose.dominguez@dc.gov . There will also be meetings at the DC Arts Commission, 410 8th St. NW , 5th Fl. on Mon. 3-15 7:30 p.m. to 9:30 and on Thurs. 3-18 from noon to 1.

I'm trying to encourage them to expand the musical horizons of this event...

Five is a great venue, nearly perfect, but the different promoters that do nights there only really book house, d+b, and reggae. There was the electroclash/breaks night there, too, but that's over and has turned into a retro night.

9:30 Club, as you mentioned, is a live music venue. They'll have the occasional DJ, but it always comes off as a bit out of place.

It costs a lot of money to run a club in DC due to the scarcity of suitable spaces. In a town with 8-foot ceilings in 95% of all buildings, there’s going to be a lot of competition for the remaining few with large open spaces. Permitting, safety codes, and accessibility standards are pretty tightly enforced, which means you have to sink a lot of money into a space before you can do anything with it. This goes for bars, dance clubs, live music clubs, and pretty much everything. And don't even get me started on ANC's and "voluntary agreements".

"After over 4 years in business, the owners of Now! Music and Fashion
have decided to close permanently, so we can move on and pursue
other opportunities. We've had a blast talking to you about music,
putting on instore performances, and participating in the local
community. But the best thing about running a record store has been
the opportunity to meet you. Many thanks to our loyal customers and
friends we've made along the way.

We will be having a going-out-of-business sale beginning this
weekend. All clothing and music (except consignments and bargain bin
stuff) will be on sale for 30% off the regular price."

So I don't think DC's gone utterly down the pan. Close, but not gone yet.

They're also stocking the Ellen Allien album and remixes, Coloma's Finery. I think I even saw that Damon Album demo double 10" there, too!

Melody on Conn. Ave. is very underrated - I always thought they were better than DCCD for keeping up with current releases and pointing customers in the right direction. Good international and classical sections, too.

I also have given them a list of stuff I'd like. They have an account with Forced Exposure, so I'll soon have the Lawrence album I've been gasping to hear for ages.

Re: Melody: While they're matchless on international, classical and jazz, their electronic section is showing conspicuous gaps since Joel, who used to buy for the electronic section left for Baltimore at the end of last year. CD Warehouse deserve to clean up!

The DC Commission on the Arts and Humanities invites musicians to participate in the 2nd Annual Fête de la Musique DC. The Fête is an internationally recognized music festival that marks the first days of summer. Festival dates are June 18-21, 2004 with performances throughout the afternoon and evening. The Arts Commission is sponsoring special workshops for area musicians interested in participating in the Fete and conducting live auditions for “acoustic” and “acapella” musicians and performers.

All types of musicians and bands interested in learning more can attend one of two special festival workshops. The workshops will provide valuable information on how musicians can participate and receive promotional assistance from the Arts Commission. The workshop dates are:

Dates and Times: Monday, March 15, 2004 at 7:30 PM – 9:30 PM

Thursday, March 18, 2004 at 12 Noon – 1 PM

P Place: DC Arts Commission, 410 8th Street NW, 5th floor

Please call (202) 724-5614 or send an email to jose.dominguez@dc.gov with any questions that you may have.

st ex has chimay, stella and delerium and a few more that i cant remember on draft. really nice people there. the barback, by mistake, bussed my last cigarette and matches when i went up to the bar to get another beer. when i mentioned this to the bartender, he gave me matches, a regular hooked me up with a cigarette, and a woman who was with the DJ said she was going out a cigarette run, and asked me what i wanted. i was actually confused by kindess.

My attempts to get the DC Arts Commisssion to add more indie-rock, Latin, African, go-go and hiphop to the upcoming June 20th Free Music Fete seem to have run into bureacratical walls and lack of money. Oh well, I tried.

didnt mix, just having some fun. am going to see Ken Mcintyre of AACM fame tonight I think.

6/11 is Richie Hawtin and Magda at Cubik

here's the day-by-day linup for the once.twice festival in Baltimore...

>>>>>>>>>

avant hip-hop + twisted rhythms
THURSDAY APRIL 15TH
2549 N Howard Street
www.theottobar.com
All ages / Doors open @ 9pm / ADMISSION $10

DABRYE [ DETROIT - Ghostly International ]
GHISLAIN POIRIER [ MONTREAL - 12k / Chocolate Industries ]
JIMMY EDGAR [ DETROIT - Warp / M3rck / Audio.NL ]
NAUTICAL ALMANAC [ BALTIMORE - Heresee ]
MARC LUSSIER [ BALTIMORE ]

>>>>>>>>>

PERLON LABEL FOCUS
FRIDAY APRIL 16th
THE SUPREME IMPERIAL
223 Pearl STREET
http://www.thehush.net/supreme.htm
All ages / Doors open @ 9pm / ADMISSION $10

AKUFEN [ MONTREAL - Perlon / Force-Inc / Musique Risquee ]
DIMBIMAN aka ZIP [ BERLIN - Perlon ]
MATTHEW DEAR aka JABBERJAW [ DETROIT - Perlon / Plus8 / Ghostly ]
SOMEONE ELSE [ PHILADELPHIA - Foundsound / Musik Krause ]
BEN PARRIS dj set [ Baltimore - Once.Twice / Foundsound ]
MISKATE dj set [ PHILADELPHIA - Foundsound ]

>>>>>>>

SATURDAY APRIL 17th JOHNS HOPKINS UNIVERSITY
MATTIN CENTER ROSS JONES BUILDING, SDS ROOM
3400 N CHARLES ST,BALTIMORE MD
All ages / Doors open @ 8pm / ADMISSION $10

AGF [ BERLIN - Orthlorng Musork / Kitty Yo ]
+ SUE.C [ SAN FRANCISCO - Orthlorng Musork ]
CHRISTOHPER WILLITS [ SAN FRANCISCO - 12k / Fallt ]
+SCOTT PAGANO [ SAN FRANCISCO - Reline ]
MYLENA BERGERON [ MONTREAL - Oral ]
+ CAROLINE HAYEUR [ MONTREAL ]
LOADBANG [ BALTIMORE ]

I've been really pleased with the ridiculous amount of good music available to us in the last month or so. Bummed about missing TV on the Radio, but Xiu Xiu were great, and the prospect of seeing Sunburned Hand of the Man + Four Tet (again, in Baltimore, Tuesday the 20th) = more excitement. Add CocoRosie on to that, and I'll be near broke.

resident DJ's Milo & Daedau

every Friday starting tonight

at Saveur
2218 Wisconsin Avenue, NW
Glover Park, DC
10ish-2ish
NO COVER CHARGE

What's happening this summer? I don't think the Fort Reno schedule has been announced yet. I'm excited about the D.C. Caribbean Carnival and the related shows happening in a few weeks. Also, the Smithsonian Folklife Fest is gonna be featuring Latin and Haitian music. Anything new folks to tell me about dancehall, electronica, hiphop and go-go wise?

I'm excited about a few DC-area shows coming up in the month of June. MF Doom w/Talib Kweli at the 9:30 Club, Sunday June 13. Madvillain has finally clicked for me, you have to listen to it as a series of vignettes ... looking forward to the show. I've seen Decembrists and Neko Case before, so I'll probably skip their shows the next two nights in order to check out Acid Mothers Temple at the Ottobar in Baltimore, Thursday the 17th. Two good acoustic shows at Iota in Virginia the next week: Iron & Wine, Tuesday the 22nd, and Devendra Banhart Thursday the 24th. I'm from Florida orig., and really looking forward to hearing Sam Beam(Iron & Wine)'s voice live.

the fall
early superchunk
unrest
the wedding present (fast strummy guitar)
pavement
the strokes

and theyre all TOTALLY nice awesome kids. and this hardcore band, kudzu wish is opening.

ALL FOR $5!!!

so, if you wanna party like its 1995, come to the black cat backstage tonight.

bubblecrunk, grime, ragga, favela funk, 2step, neukÖln, soca, ardkore jungle, lover's rock +

Also, anyone been out to the Crossroads or other joints that feature dancehall?

I've listened to that latest Q and Not U cd and imho their punk-funk w/ falsetto vocals pales compared to the circa '81 stuff, and even to the best DFA singles.

At my night at Saint-Ex, SALT (1st Wednesdays monthly), I generally play a fair amount of grime, dancehall, crunk, and german goodness. But that's only around half the playlist, and we vary quite a bit month to month. We've going to have another grime focus night coming up (our 4th!), this summer Dizzee and Wonder were there after their DC show.

Matthew Dear was very disappointing. Tracky techno with little personality, and the bass was a little overwhelming (and not in a good way). It had nothing on the Jake Fairley live set at Andalu a couple of months ago.

I'm pretty happy with the new Q & Not U, but I haven't heard The Medications yet.

And in case anyone doesn't know, Kingpin burned down. It's maybe the only place in the city I'd ever been where you knew anyone could have a great time anytime. There were a lot of good DJs that played there, too, though not as recently.

Thanks for the other stuff.

There are a couple other D.C. threads floating around right now.

washington dc record stores?

Please get in touch with me before Monday. I need to talk to you about a City Paper thing...-Steve

Welp. Sad, as a certain person might say.

I am not a KenCen insider but in a previous life I did some work for Roger Stevens. He'd owned the Empire State Building and produced Cat on a Hot Tin Roof. In addition to the Kennedy Center he was big in the Stevenson campaign, the DNC, the NEA, and National Book Awards. By the time I knew him his mind was not exactly there, but still.

A lot of the OG KC bigwigs, ancient megadonors, longtime ushers, etc. have died and I suspect that's for the best. I would not want them to see this.

whither Shear Madness

but seriously I was dismayed when just a few days ago Noseda said the NSO isn’t leaving the KC. Looks like the choice has been made for them! I was not going to renew my subscription next season to the NSO but now I may if they make the break permanent.

Jeff Bezos and his right wing Brit publisher and managing editor of the Washington Post laid off 1/3 of their staff today including pop music critic Chris Richards, virtually the whole sports department, writers based overseas, and more. They claim they need to do this to help the Post break even and become more financially successful, but it is not clear to me how ruining your product and reducing reasons for people to subscribe or keep their subscriptions will help the Post. Also, Bezos via Amazon is still spending millions on the Melania movie, and he spent countless millions on his wedding this past summer in Venice.

Bezos also laid off arts editor Jon Fischer (who was once my editor at Washington City Paper where he was also a great writer )

And the classical music critic Michael Andor Brodeur also got laid off.

jesus

https://www.nytimes.com/2026/02/05/arts/smithsonian-folklife-festival-great-american-state-fair.html?unlocked_article_code=1.KVA.ut2R.OKrAu38Ib7ym&smid=nytcore-ios-share

Damn. The planned one month special Smithsonian Folklife Fest this summer is off. Now just a Trump fest . Smithsonian will do a few things in buildings and around the US but nothing on national mall. Grrrr

the folfklife fest seems like it has been on life support for a while anyway.

lol “900 square foot beaux arts pavilions”

maybe I’m dumb and don’t understand the great man’s organizational genius but don’t events like this take years to plan, just logistically?

X-post - yes the Folklife Fest has been on life support for a number of years ( due to a lack of funding and to National Park Service restrictions on how much of the national mall could be used) but they were promised more money this year to go big for a month on the national mall, and now that has been taken away .

If you really want to ruin a city's cultural life and civic institutions you need to be thorough.

Ordinarily I wouldn't credit a toddler with much focus or follow-through but the track record speaks for itself.

Ruint: the Smithsonian, the Kennedy Center, the Post, the White House, the Institute of Peace, PBS, Congress, the Folklife Festival, the Supreme Court, and public service as a noble calling.

Next up: Memorial Bridge, the airports, Amtrak.

Please nobody tell him about Wolf Trap, the Zoo, or Ben's Chili Bowl.