Two Nights at xxxxxxx Studios or Party Hard in Private Spaces

You pass this space or a space much like it everyday if you drive up and around Highland Park, Glassell Park, or Eagle Rock.  They’re not public public, but if you’re a friend or a friend of a friend--as I am--then you can get an into some great events.  Entrepreneurs take a chance on a space like this converting them into commercial enterprises that are galleries or studios by day, but by night they host private parties and events.  Most won’t last more than a few years before either converting into a full fledged business or rotting on the vine due to poor planning and organization.  In the meantime people like me get to enjoy the heck out of them while they do last.

I end up here at random when a friend says our mutual friend’s space is putting up live music.  If you’ve read my bit about live local music recently then you know I’m reluctant to come out for random music.  I wouldn’t come out at all save for the fact that many of my friends--all two of them--will be there as well as other acquaintances.  Sometimes you just have to grit your teeth and roll the dice.  Besides that night I’m the one driving and if I needs an escape hatch I has it.

We roll up to the space with an an hour to kill so I say we walk up to a local bar just down the street.  It’s just down a ways really.  Of course five minutes into said walk, I realize I really don’t have a clear idea what I mean when I say “just down a ways.”  Apparently what I really meant was let’s walk halfway down to Figueroa grab a round and a taco then walk back to the party.  My two friends bear with me--god love them--and we do just that.  It’s not the best way to kill an hour, but it’s a lot better than standing around chain smoking cigarettes.

Back at the space, the event’s slowly building up.  The music’s set, but there are only a handful of people just arriving.  We meet the producer for the night’s headliner Dan and shortly after the headliner himself Cormac.  We get to riffing about things rather too vulgar and obscene for the page, but it’s amusing nonetheless.  They’re busy setting up their event.  Apparently it’s something like a record release for an album name Black Tie Affair.  Having not heard a note of it, I really couldn’t speak to them of it.  I didn’t even know that Cormac is a Hip-Hop act.

Into the space we go and after stopping for refreshments, we settle into the foyer.  The main room itself is too much filled with music to hear conversations and by far a comfy red sofa beats standing around the lights and loud noises.  No one else we know have arrived yet, so it’s still just the three of us.  Eventually two random women take a chance and sit nearby.  I’m perfectly happy to leave people alone, but I always want to take a shot and see what happens.  You never know what interesting stories and conversations might be shared with strangers.  My first attempt to start a dialogue ends in flames.  After a brief discussion about music--I swear it was like pulling teeth getting band names from her-- we agree that the Arctic Monkeys are pretty good, and then we disengage.

I follow my friends outside and then return inside to explore a part of the space I’ve never been in before.  Just above the main room where the performance happens, there is a small room.  We climb a spiral staircase with narrow treads.  Without the security of a safety rail I carefully climb up and down several times through the course of the evening.  There we find a couch, easy chair, and loft with comfy pillows.  I’ll call it the Lair.  From the Lair I can see out into the main room where more and more people are arriving.  Up in the Lair my friends can relax.  Me, I can feel the vibrations rattling through the floor and the chair I’m sitting in.  It unnerves me such that soon enough I leave the Lair and brave the narrow treads down to the main room.

Returning to the comfort and safety of the red couch in the foyer, I am happy enough to relax and observe the party evolve.  I enjoy my refreshment sharing the couch with the woman I spoke with earlier about the Arctic Monkeys.  Her and her friend--playing some sort of game on her phone--are likely doing exactly what I’m doing and I’d rather not distract them.  Maybe she’s bored because she lacks someone’s attention, but she starts a conversation with me this time.

I relish a second chance to interact and connect with people especially when my first attempt falls so flat.  I want to believe people are interesting and exciting.  She asks me the basics.  I give them to her.  She asks me to do the “pitch” I had to learn for my very brief telemarketing gig last week.  I comply.  I ask her the basics and she reveals she is a student at UC Pico or Santa Monica College.  It’s not intended to be insulting; it’s just one of those funny sayings you hear about like when you call USC the University of Spoiled Children.  She says she’s a dual major Psychology and English.  Both topics I’m familiar with.  I hope to connect on Psychology alone so I talk about some of the things I’ve read over the last year like The Invisible Gorilla and Predictably Irrational.  She hasn’t touched either book so I try to explain some basic ideas.  And somehow I fall into lecture mode and she’s really not having it.  Despite how interested she says she is, I know from her posture and tone she’s really not about it.  So I move onto English and we talk about books neither of us have read and one we both have.  She mentions Kundera and I’m like, “Yeah...I just don’t get it.  Couldn’t get into it.  Sorry.”  At least we both read Love in the Time of Cholera.  I name other works by Marquez that she hasn’t read.  I especially recommend the first volume of his memoirs.  Why won’t he finish the second volume already?  I’ve been waiting ages for it.  At this point I think I’ve put a good faith effort into it and disengage again.  I don’t think she enjoys this.  Later in the evening I find her again hoping to connect her to my friends who are up in the Lair; maybe one of them will have more patience than I.  But she Fake Boyfriends me and I walk away.  C’est la vie.

I wander about some.  Cormac is still some time away from taking the stage.  Everyone I know is up in the Lair and I’m just wandering seeing if I can find an interesting conversation.  I settle in front of a pass through window that looks into a kitchen and past that is the refreshment stand and the main room.  I’m closer to the action now, and I’m hunting for an opportunity to break into a conversation.  Ideally I’ll find one person, much like me, hanging back alone vulnerable.  I’ve had plenty of interesting conversations start off like that.  Just a few weeks ago I shared most of an evening with a local resident who just discovered his woman was pregnant with twins.  That was super fun times.

This might take some time and my patience is wearing.  I can’t quite find the right spot, but someone interesting comes up to me.  She’s not talking or starting the conversation, but she’s got a camera and she seems particularly interested in one gentleman.  His face fills her camera’s viewer, so I throw away a line like, “Should I warn him your stalking him?”  And she explains that she’s just documenting the night.  How attractive is that?  Professionalism and simple passion is so cool.  I would have loved to sit her down and chat about that for awhile, but who am I to distract someone who is focused and on the job.  After that I cut my losses and retreat to the Lair where me and my buddies wait for Cormac to take the stage.

When Cormac takes the stage I’m happy to say that they’re not too shabby.  They have a definite Tribe Called Quest vibe that I kind of enjoy.  Their beats are simple and very accessible.  Their rhymes flow well and are easy to follow along with.  It’s simple Hip Hop that many fans can easily connect with.  While in the Lair they were good background music to chill to while relaxing with my friends.  

I wasn’t able to stay for the whole show.  It was midnight or so when I Ieft because I had a job to go to the next morning.  From what I heard I sort of wished they were more ambitious.  Their hooks weren’t as catchy as they could have been likely because they wanted to avoid risk.  I say take a leap and see if a beat or hook flies in front of an audience.  I also wonder how connected they are to the Underground Hip Hop community in Los Angeles.  I myself, save for a Project Blowed 10yr Anniversary show, have never been able to connect to that local music scene the way I’ve connected to the Silverlake indie rock community.

And that’s that for this night at an amazing space you’ll never get to go to and on to Shotspeare.

The first time I rolled into this place I was with one of my friends and Shotspeare had just finished up.  I could see from the debris that littered the floor that some good time had been had just recently.  There were cups and empty shot glasses just lying about.  Everyone was in good spirits and happily conversing with each other despite the slightest hint of slurry speech.  It seemed like something worth checking out.

It rolled around this past Valentine’s Day and though I’m not about that particular holiday I wanted to see what was there to be seen.  Both my two friends were unavailable for this event so I roll up to the space solo.  I greet the two guys who run the space.  They’re both so smart and cool.  Some time after that a couple of other acquaintances arrive, but they look like they’re on dates and I happy enough to leave them to that.

I pass the time chewing gum and looking about the crowd of fifty people or so.  It’s a mixed one that pleases me.  I hate going somewhere and just seeing the usual scenesters and hipsters.  It’s always so cool to see the older folk come out to play.  I direct you to www.shotspeare.com for an accurate description of the format of this event.

This is not for any of you Shakespeare snobs.  I imagine the market for this event are fans of Rocky Horror Picture Show; if you’ve been to that before you know exactly what you’re getting yourself into.  Shotspeare is one part improvisation and one part Romeo & Juliet shaken with two parts of Jack Daniels.  Audience participation is expected and even demanded.  A fearless soul was required to join the cast for the play’s duration.  I do not envy him that task, but he did prove himself worthy of the honor.  That sort of “on the spot” stress would break a lesser person like me.

Two noteworthy highlights of the evening include a shadow play performed during the “love scene” from Romeo & Juliet with Reznor’s song Closer playing in the background.  I myself did not care for the vulgarity of it all--I imagine Shakespeare himself would disagree with me--but I do appreciate the care and detail of setting up that complete sequence.  The other highlight of the evening was Juliet taking direction from another cast member.  It was pure outrageous improvisation.   Juliet suffering the loss of Romeo is directed to motorboat an audience member in the first row; wet willie someone else in the third row; and scissor a woman in the last row.  I do not envy them their experience, but it was rather amusing and entertaining to watch.

After an hour or so the performance ends and I head out for some fresh air only stopping to be greeted and to greet the lovely woman who was documenting the evening on video.  Outside I meet a remarkably familiar man.  He’s quite well spoken and easy to converse with.  A relatively new resident of the area we discussed various local eateries.  Eventually I learned he was an actor.  I asked him what I might have seen of him.  “True Blood.”  I know of it, but I don’t follow that show.  “Gilmore Girls.”  Suddenly struck by how I knew him, I was much more impressed by his casual accessibility.  Todd Lowe, of “Zach and Lane’s three weddings in one day”, is a really cool guy.  He plays guitar and mandolin in a band called LA Hootenanny that’s just about to finish a series of gigs at Villains Tavern in downtown.  I’ve seen I See Hawks In  L.A. and that was worth checking out a couple of times; I’ll likely check out his band in a couple of weeks if they’re still playing at Villains.

Anyway the night quickly wears on me and I head out again into it soon after.