Slave Labia: The Columbus Dispatch

I designed the artwork for the new Slave Labia EP The Columbus Dispatch - with the help of Bernardino Luini. The packaging was printed by Shout Out Loud Prints. You can order the The Columbus Dispatch by PayPaling Tatyana Kagamas $5.00 ($3.00 for cassette plus S/H) at kagamas@gmail.com. There are more images of the tape after the jump.

SKYLAB 04/16/12

Slave Labia, Bird and Flower, Erin Earthling, and the Hive Dwellers (K Records) will play at Skylab on April 16th, 2012. The show is open to people of all ages, and run on donations taken at the door.

Rushing Ceremony Cover

These are the front and back covers and labels for Delay's new album Rushing Ceremony. I designed them with the indispensable/incomparable aid of Jack Ramunni, a former runner-up in Ohio's Photoshop Context Contest who deserved first. 

Rushing Ceremony comes out in December on Shout Out Loud Records. The album will also be available on Bandcamp at what I'm told will be a "politically-progressive" rate. Purchase Rushing Ceremony at a record-release show in the very near-future; for more definite information, watch Delay's Tumblr. 

Weakness: Record, Columbus Show

Weakness is Kevin Bruce's new band. Kevin Bruce is Jane Bruce's brother. I once booked his old band, K BRUTAL, at the Monster House because he edited a skateboarding zine entitled DeadRamones and was Jane Bruce's brother.

Weakness is reminiscent of Hickey, yet cuts the figure of a band that doesn't know who or what Hickey is. That is the ideal route to 'sounding like Hickey.' I also hear hints of early Meneguar. 

Some of Weakness lives in Cincinnati, Ohio, and some of Weakness lives where the economy runs on ten-hour work weeks, sno cones and zine consignments; namely, Bloomington, Indiana.

Now, anyone who talks to me knows I don't listen to music anymore, besides, perhaps, the Das Racist song with the Katy Perry song inside of it. Or Boy Crisis. (I would listen to Deathly Fighter but Christian won't give me a record (and I would listen to Unholy Two, too, but I don't want to be investigated by the Southern Poverty Law Center (and, anyway, I think the Columbus Alive likes those bands and I don't listen to Christian music.))) But I heard the Weakness record and some charred remnant of appreciation for things that 'sound like Hickey' was rekindled, albeit briefly. Make no mistake, this is high praise.

Download the Weakness record here. 

Weakness plays at Bat Chapters, the boho base on Gay St. that isn't Skylab, in downtown Columbus, Ohio, on February 18th, 2011. Also playing: Shut Up, RCI and Slugging Percentage. I believe it is all ages and donation-based.

(Weakness will also accompany The Pains of Being Pure at Heart on a mini-tour in April, news of which I only include so I can mention that TPOBPAH once stayed at the Monster House and everyone told me funny stories about it. I thought that ending with a mention of the Monster House, which is how I began, would give my blog entry a firm, symmetrical structure.)

MRR Reviews The Lose The Tude 7-Inch

From Maximum Rock And Roll 331:

'Feeling cynical and wary about modern music? Think everything is just rehashing old sounds? Well, LOSE THE TUDE is on the scene to help remedy the situation. These dudes throw down swift and snotty hardcore, but at the same time there are such variances in style thrown in that you really couldn't pinpoint them in any category. The songs lie somewhere between humor and conviction and give just as many nods to FUGAZI as they do the CIRCLE JERKS. The lyrics are sometimes significant and occasionally bizarre, but always shouted with a peculiar cynical earnestness. There might be a bit too much of the shouted dual vocals for my taste but everything else going on here--the guitar work especially--makes up for that. I can't make up my mind if I really like this or will never listen to it again; I've already played the record like eight times this weekend, though--does that mean something? (BG) (Bob Goldie?)'

You can order the 7-inch from Sacred Plague Records. There are also two copies left at Magnolia Thunderpussy Records in Columbus, Ohio.

In other news, Art21, the great PBS series on contemporary art, posted an interview with Anne Elizabeth Moore on its blog. Moore recently received a Fulbright grant for her work encouraging Cambodian women to self-publish zines about their lives.

Moore's installation entitled Garment Work, which  interpolates her personal relationship history with the socio-economic history of garment manufacturing in Germany and Cambodia, is currently on-going at Meta House in Phnom Penh. It has yet to be shown in the U.S. Garment Work also opens this week in Chicago, Illinois, at DOVA Temporary as part of the Our Demons exhibition.

Also, Ok Ikumi, with special guest star vocals from Kari Jorgensen, covered Billy Bragg's 'A New England,' which you can download here. It has my favorite lyrics of Bragg's this side of 'Between Marx and Marzipan in the dictionary, there was Mary.' 

Yikes! Reunion Set At The Monster House

Download an MP3 of the set here.