Sophie Ellis-Bextor

I recently got to thinking about Sophie Ellis-Bextor and her song and video, "Take Me Home." I was introduced to this whilst in Central Asia in November 2001, in a place which time seemed to have left behind and where the skys were crisp and blue, and yet where the world around had gone terribly wrong. I digress. The only available distractions in Tashkent were MTV International and CNN, and that's how I met Sophie.

The song is great, the video is great, and Sophie E-B is a knockout. Check it.

Saturday

Went outside my usual orbit yesterday to an excellent party up in Silver Spring, in one of those huge apartment complexes up by East-West where everybody in this city has lived or knows someone who has lived at one time or another. The theme was German, and somebody went all-out and brought a Berlin Wall, made of rice krispies, with Gummy Bears representing people on both sides (but the Gummy Bears on the east side were all red.) The wall even had food-colored graffiti on it. I'm glad I got there in time to see it before it was torn down, I mean, eaten.

Then I headed in completely the opposite direction, to the Rock & Roll Hotel for Strangeways, a Smiths/Morrissey night put on by DJs Medusa an Strange. It was excellent, with a good crowd, and (of course) great music. I'm very much looking forward to their all-Bowie night at the same venue in January.

On the topic of R&R Hotel, I'm not used to the H Street NE Corridor being a destination, and the geography of that area is confusing. I think it's more so because Florida Avenue, which meanders through the city like a snake, is one of the main arteries down there, and if you're trying to orient yourself by a winding street like that, you're automatically in trouble. So to get there, I kind of felt my way across town, rather than knowing exactly where I was going -- down 16th, left on Irving, which I took all the way over to Park Place NW, where I took a right down to Michigan Avenue, which I followed past McMillan Reservoir and Children's Hospital over to North Capitol St. It's always been striking to see the Capitol all lit at night from way uptown in an area which is still a ghost town late at night. North Cap led me right to Florida, which took me over past Gallaudet to 11th and down to H NE. Worked out pretty well.

This is just wrong!

... but it's so good...

Believe me, I'm not one to go around recommending mashups, but "What's My Name" by DJ Earworm is really clever. He mixes together artists which have no business being on the same track together:

Ace of Bass, Mamas and the Papas, Brandy & Monica, Aaliyah, Britney Spears, Beyonce, Donna Summer, Maroon 5, Eminem, Alicia Keys, Destiny's Child, Snoop Dogg, DMX, The Who, Madison Avenue, Eurythmics, Peter Gabriel, Irene Cara, Kanye West, Lynyrd Skynyrd, Jason Mraz, Phil Collins

... and somehow it works! Here's the link:

http://www.djearworm.com/

Just scroll down the page for a bit and look for that song.

Adams-Morgan

Man climbs into a clothing bin
Originally uploaded by alex.DC.

So I popped up to Adams-Morgan today to get a CD or two at DCCD. Walked the whole length of the 18th Street strip before I realized DCCD must be gone. Finally I noticed on the other side of the street a place called Crooked Beat. (It's been there for a while, I think, I guess I don't get out much.)

Turns out it's a great little store, selling not just CDs but vinyl and a ton of obscure hard-to-get stuff. It's clearly a labor of love, like Flying Saucer Discs used to be. I was so excited I bought a bunch of CDs, much to the chagrin of the guy in line behind me (the actual discs are not in the jewel cases, so they have to reinsert them, and it took a while). Among the discs I was looking for was the Jesus And Mary Chain's Psychocandy, to replace my vinyl of the same thing, but they didn't have that so instead I left with a collection of b-sides titled The Sound of Speed.

Since I was up that way, I decided to walk up to Tryst. That's always a better idea in theory than in practice, because as usual it was so crowded there was nowhere to sit.

Finally, if you're into thrift store clothing, there is more than one way to get it, as evidenced by the man shown here....

Kristoffer Ragnstam at Mojito, SF

Krisfoffer Ragnstam at Mojito, SF
Originally uploaded by alex.DC.

After a great Chinese dinner at Brandy Ho's on Columbus, we decided it would be a good idea to go out for a late-night drink in North Beach, which is where the SRO hotel we're staying in is located. Decided to wander a bit off the beaten path that is Columbus and Broadway, and walk up Grant Avenue instead. There were two inviting bars directly across the street from each other. A little gang of fratboys was out in the street too, deciding which bar to go in -- so we waited for them to pick one, and went in the other one.

This was fortunate, because the bar we chose was Mojito which turned out to be a good find. One of the chairs at the bar's tables was occupied by a cat that looked just like Alley. And the cat was looking at a rubber rat that belonged to a woman at the bar. You've got to like a bar that draws cats and people with rubber rats.

And then we also got to see the doods playing in the picture here. Never heard of them before (they're from Sweden), but they're really good -- good enough for me to spontaneously purchase their CD, which doesn't happen too often. If you're interested in knowing more, Google them -- they've got a Myspace. They'll be playing at the Knitting Factory in NYC in a couple of days, and, according to their agent, "in DC -- at the Fire House on Diagonal Avenue." Huh? Never heard of it, but it turns out it's in Gaithersburg, technically not DC. MIght be worth a trip up 270 to see them, though.

WSC at Rock N Roll Hotel

Hallway Flyer
Originally uploaded by alex.DC.

So this weekend I decided to finally make my way down to H Street NE to check out Rock n Roll Hotel, and with it, Washington Social Club. I hadn't been there yet because the only sensible way to get there is by car, and who lives in DC to travel to clubs by car?

But anyway, the club turned out to be cool. Two floors, with bands and a dance floor on the first level, and on the second level a more chill space with couches, and separate rooms that initially appear to be like rooms off a hotel corner (thus the name). As I was watching the bands, it came over me that the place reminded me of the old 930 Club. Not sure whether it was the black-painted minimalist interior downstairs, the colored lights over a smallish stage, or just the spirit of an energetic club in an ancient building in a decayed neighborhood (as 930 F Street, NW used to be).

That feeling came over me even before I went upstairs and saw the corridor lined with flyers to old DC punk shows from the 1980s -- Grey Matter, Marginal Man, and many, many more. It reminded me of a similar corridor that ran behind the stage at d.c. space (rest in peace). So the Hotel, although being very much of the present time, also feels solidly as part of a continuum back to DC's rock-n-roll/punk past.

Anyway, on to the bands. I caught Stock Market Crash (funny name) opening for WSC. With Halloween nearing, the frontman told the crowd "we're in disguise -- as snotty British rockers." And actually, they did remind me of Oasis.

Washington Social Club put on a great show. They were all in costume, and the wackiness that is Halloween in DC (costumes in the audience included a Krispy Kreme girl with a knife through her head, and a bloodied tennis star, and the band was in costume as well) seemed to further energise an already energetic show. That energy showed no signs of dissipating when Liberation Dance Party kicked in right after their set, but I was getting hungry so I pointed my car up Florida Avenue, past the protesters at Gallaudet and back to the more familiar environs of Northwest.

On the way home, a dumpster hit my car, as if to punish me for breaking my never-drive-when-going-out rule. But it was only a scratch, and I'd have to say that for an infusion of good environment, music, and Halloween spirit, it was worth it.