Newsy Stuff: Hollywood Bowl, The Void Soft Opening

I don't really know why I'm up at the moment seeing as Tuesday is going to be a pretty busy day, but sometimes I just have really productive days and why stop if you're on a roll and not really tired? So I thought I'd share a couple things while I'm listening to music and sorting through the inbox.

Hollywood Bowl Releases 2013 Lineup I just happened to glance at Facebook for a second when I saw that the Hollywood Bowl has announced their 2013 lineup. It has been a few years since I've been to the legendary venue, but it is a pretty special place to see a show. I gotta say besides Rodrigo y Gabriela, nothing seems worth the trek at the moment, but they always seem to add some major spectacular shows with contemporary artists backed by the Philharmonic. Or maybe I'm living in 2006. Whatever the case, the schedule is out.

The Void Celebrates a Soft Opening: Tonight (Tuesday), Eleven becomes The Void and naturally you're invited to hang out and celebrate. The lineup: THE VOID SOFT OPENING - PRIMITIVE NOYES, PURPLE//IMAGE (SUN ARAW), MYSTERY CAVE, ASHA, BILL WESLEY, 100 LBS OF SMOKE - DJS DEADAIR AND MARIO ORDUNO. The show is free so check it out. Kelsey says they expect the new sign sometime today and since I'll be nearby, I'll try to shoot a photo or two when it happens. For those of you who don't know, The Void (Formerly Eleven, Radio Room, Zombie Lounge, et al) is located at 35th and El Cajon Boulevard.

And a couple links I came across...I skipped NAMM this year because I just couldn't rationalize going to Anaheim in the rain when I had other fun local stuff lined up, but it always takes place around the same time as MIDEM which always seems to be a learning experience, even if you're just chasing the hashtag #MIDEM on Twitter. This was an interesting speech about the current business of music by Martin Mills, founder of Beggars Banquet, as he won an Icon Award.

Finally, I meant to post this link about Annoying Concert Behaviors last week because I found it amusing but then it wasn't really that funny so I didn't. But here it is anyway. Obviously as a blogger, I'm pretty much guilty of anything regarding social media, smart phones, or photos, but I also thought the author dated himself with number 8. Way to stay current on the name drops.

Newsy Bits & Bulletins: NPFoA, The Void, Sleep Train Amphitheatre, Che Cafe and more.

There was a time when I'd sit at my desk in my office and just pounce on new news related to San Diego or music or festivals. Perhaps I just figure everyone has the same information at their fingertips or perhaps I've lost my edge or maybe I've just been finger-wagged too many times for posting things prematurely that I just don't feel that urgency to be first or break stories. Maybe I'd rather just link you to other sources so I don't get the backlash of incorrect information. Or maybe I have been having too much fun freelancing and not being confined to a desk or laptop all day that I just figure I'll get to all of it some other time. Whatever it is, there have been some things mulling around my brain that I've been meaning to share, so I'll get to it in one long post. If you don't take the time to read, you can blame yourself for not knowing later. North Park Festival of Arts open for band submissions, Cricket becomes Sleep Train Amphitheatre, Eleven becomes The Void, Che Cafe Cracks down on bigotry, Givit sends you to SXSW, CityBeat Demo Review...read about all of it after the jump.

San Diego Newsy Bits: New Owners for Eleven

Back in early August, I was at the Soda Bar and overheard a friend say that Eleven had been sold. I tweeted something like "Just overheard Eleven got sold?" My friend requested that I delete the tweet though just hours later said it really didn't matter, he was friends with Alex Kacha and she said it was cool to openly talk about. Unfortunately a friend at Eleven disagreed and I got my ass chewed out for being a rumor mongering jerk. In fact, for about 12 minutes as he yelled at me, I was technically 86ed from the bar for life. Fortunately the whole thing settled down, traces of my Tweet were long gone, andfor the past 3 months have kept my mouth shut, despite many of my industry colleagues telling me that the bar had been up for sale for over a year and it was suggested that Scot Blair is just more interested in focusing on his beer bars and not running a music venue.

On October 20 the "public notice for ownership change" went up and yes, it has taken me this long to write about, though there's nothing really to talk about. The buyers, KADU, Inc, is a hybrid of the last names  Alex Kacha & Neil Dutta. I don't know Neil or Alex, but you've definitely seen Alex out at the cooler shows in town with her camera in hand. Peter Holslin covered the sale in last week's CityBeat and points out that Alex plans to keep things "pretty much...the same". Kelsey Breunig has been booking there the past few month in addition to booking by Zeke, and rumor is that Mario Orduno will also be booking nights under the new owners.

Being that Eleven is the closest cool bar to my house, I hope things truly stay "pretty much the same" and my part of El Cajon Boulevard doesn't get neglected from future Drinkabouts or Craft Beer events.

This Weekend: San Diego Music Thing!!

The weekend is nearly upon us and so it's time to talk about the San Diego Music Thing. I've actually been a little bit surprised at how so many of my own friends don't know about or understand what exactly goes on, so here's the basic rundown.

Friday, September 14 and Saturday, September 15, sees the return of the San Diego Music Thing. Think of it less as a "festival" and more of a conference. In the daytime, there are workshops and keynote speakers at the Lafayette Hotel. Topics like Music Industry 101, Marketing, Publishing, and Touring will all be covered. Keynote speakers include Martin Atkins of Public Image Ltd, Wayne Kramer of MC5, and Chuck D of Public Enemy.

By night, the city's music venues open up with showcases featuring local and touring bands. You can see the full schedule here, but I'll also put them after the jump so you can get them on your mobile device easily throughout the weekend.

It seems the biggest point of confusion is the ticketing, so just to clear things up, you can buy tickets here. You can buy a wristband for the full weekend for $55 or for just one day for $35. These wristbands get you into all of the workshops, panels, and keynotes as well as ANY of the nighttime showcases (based on venue capacity, of course). There are also PRESALE tickets for certain showcases available on the same ticketing page. This is recommended if you're not interested or available for the daytime events and you know you just want to go to one venue for the night. For the showcases that don't have presales, they too, will be charging cover at the doors for people without wristbands. The cover charges are usually $10 per venue. If you have a wristband, you do not need to purchase additional venue tickets, but venues will be subject to capacity so plan your nights accordingly. It's gonna be tough hopping around, but I think I'll be hitting up Bar Pink, Casbah, and Sunset Temple on Friday night, with Bar Pink, Claire de Lune, and the Casbah on my Saturday agenda. Of course, that could all change depending on transportation, so we'll see, but you can be sure I'll be Foursquaring/Tweeting all weekend.

Full schedule after the jump.

Awesome Fest Five: Keep It Awesome, Keep It Fast

Awesome Fest/Fast is back for it's fifth year (third year in San Diego). For what started as a relatively small event, the Fest has turned into a force to be reckoned with, now occupying four of San Diego's main venues for three days/nights with wristband-only access to see the best of underground punk, garage, and shit too cool to have a genre. These are bands you'll find on the pages of Razorcake; Pitchfork- not so much. Organizers limited ticket sales to 400, and they're close to sold out, with NO passes available onsite. Once you miss preregistration, you're out.

Awesome Fest attracts bands and fans from around the country. This year's bands include Shark Pants, Muhammad Ali, Be My Doppelganger, Toys That Kill, Madison Bloodbath, Soviettes, David Dondero, Rumspringer and more. The DIY ethos keeps the event growing year after year. "At AwesomeFest, there are no corporate sponsors or no direct dealings with any managers. All bands playing have been personally asked by one of the organizers." Like last year, night shows happen on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday at Soda Bar and Eleven, while afternoon shows are on Saturday and Sunday at The Office and U-31. Additionally, they've added a pre-fest shows on Thursday at Soda Bar and Eleven, a lawn party on Saturday, and a foos ball tournament at Luigi's on Sunday.

Organizers encourage attendees to have fun while respecting the hotel and venues that host them, while the bars are staffed up and ready for some heavy drinking. A bartender told me, "last year we ordered a pallet of PBR. That's 100 cases, 12 tall cans per case. We ran out by Saturday afternoon. It is easily our biggest weekend of the year."

All the information you need can be found here.
Passes
Bands
Schedule

Update: I just got off the phone with Davey and there are less than 10 passes left. Buy them now, or try the message board. Pre-Awesome shows are $7 each or $10 for both, but there will be no paid admissions allowed at any of the venues during Fest. You must have an event wristband to get into any of the shows.

FRIDAY!! sddialedin.com presents Fierce Creatures, Michael McGraw, Golden Days @ Eleven

I was really hoping to send out an email blast, but I'm gonna have to have hope and faith that you're reading this right now and are saving your Friday night for me because I'm so happy to kick off my First Friday showcase this week at Eleven with three fantastic bands: Fierce Creatures (Fresno), Michael McGraw (San Diego), Golden Days (Orange County)

The show is only $6 and I know there's a lot of stuff always going on in San Diego, but I'd like to open your eyeballs and earholes to new bands that might not be on your radar just yet. If you haven't yet been to Eleven (formerly Radio Room/Zombie Lounge), I don't know what you're waiting for! They have great beers, bar peanuts, and an amazing food truck that serves food from the old Liar's Club menu. It's a short walk over to Soda Bar and parking is generally plentiful along El Cajon Boulevard.

Eleven is located at 3519 El Cajon Boulevard.
Fierce Creatures (Fresno)
Michael McGraw (San Diego)
Golden Days (Orange County)
$6. Doors at 9pm.

Friday: Jesse LaMonaca and the Dime Novels, The Shivers, and The Janks @ Bar Eleven

Last night I had the pleasure of seeing The Shivers at the Casbah. They were a late add to The Tree Ring show, but they were awesome despite being sick and performing as a duo. They have a full band that will be joining them tonight at Habitat House (showtime around 8:30) and tomorrow when they play at Eleven. The Janks open that show and Jesse LaMonaca and the Dime Novels headline, so it's gonna be a good night on The Boulevard. The show is only $6.





And since I don't think I ever posted them, these are the two songs Jesse played live when I did the Coup d'etat on FM 94/9 a couple weeks ago.

Deadbolt: Two Nights at Eleven- Want Free Tickets?

"The Scariest Band In The World" is playing to back to back nights, and my good friends over at Eleven have given me tickets to get you in free. I've got one pair for each night, and since my email is FLOODED right now with SXSW stuff, just leave a comment with your full name and which show you would like to attend (or if you're available for both), and I'll pick a winner for each night using random.org.

Check out the event on Facebook and if you want to secure your spot, you buy tickets online.

First Night: DEADBOLT
DEAD ENGINES
BARRIO TIGER
9PM
$10
What else can San Diego want but two nights of "The Scariest Band In The World" playing two nights in a row! Deadbolt takes it to Eleven. It's a night of Hell raising, Beer Drinking and the greatest show on earth part 1. We arent talking about Ringling Bros Circus either... Supporting this great band is Dead Engines and Los Angeles' Barrio Tiger.

Second Night: DEADBOLT
BEHIND THE WAGON
BOURBON SAINTS
9PM
$10
Part 2 of "The Scariest Band In The World." Deadbolt returns to Eleven for another night of Raising the Devil from his slumber. Drinks will be flowing like the Colorado River and the Party wont stop till we call out Last Call! Two Chords in Two Nights!

Black Hondo, Steve Harris and Hi-Stax, Old Tiger at Eleven, 1/29/11

Old Tiger kicked off a wonderful night of soulful rock n roll at Eleven a couple weeks ago.



Steve Harris and the Hi-Stax got people dancing.





Black Hondo were fun too.





See my blog post on the show for more. It's awesome to be able to do this and share photos with you music lovers.

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All Images Copyright © Michael Klayman 2011, All Rights Reserved.
It's nice to ask for permission before downloading or linking to them.

In the Red at Eleven, 12/17/10

In the Red is playing tonight at Soda Bar, along with Terremoto and Bastard. It should be a fun show. Here's some photos from their show at Eleven a couple weeks ago.







Check out my blog for more.

NYE 2011: Ticket Giveaway for Casbah & Eleven

I was up until 7am attempting to compile the most comprehensive NYE guide that I could. My listings are all here, but being a live music oriented site, I wanted to highlight two huge shows going down.


The first is taking place at the Casbah featuring Transfer, Rafter, The Shape of Future Frames, and Low Volts in the Atari Lounge. Tickets are $20 in advance and $25 at the door (if it doesn't sell out beforehand) and can be purchased HERE.

The other biggie is taking place at Eleven. The show features The Zeros, New Mexico, The Dabbers, Gun Runner and the Wild Weekend DJs. This show is $13 in advance or $15 at the door and can be purchased HERE.

There are plenty of other live music events that night, including a free show at Tin Can with DJ Ryan Hand, Lights On, Dudes, D/Wolves, The New Kinetics, so don't write off your usual music hotspots for your New Years Eve festivities.

The Casbah and Eleven have both generously given me a pair of guest list spots each to giveaway. Send me an email at sddialedin at gmail with the venue of your choice in the subject. Include your first and last name and a phone number. I will pick a winner for each show tomorrow evening and notify you via email. Must be 21 to enter. Tickets will be at will call and are non-transferable.

Update: Congrats to Mark A and Kevin K for winning the tickets.

New Bar News: Eleven, The Shakedown, Til Two

Ownership changes in the bar industy are nothing new, but they seem to come in waves. It feels like it wasn't long ago that I was writing about Scolari's changing to The Office, or the Zombie Lounge becoming the Radio Room or Soda Bar taking over Chaser's. It seems that this will be a constant...some bars find a formula for success and endure tough economic times, other brave entrepreneurs have to get out while they still can recover their investments, and still other owners just decide their bar owning days are behind them and retire out of the biz.

This summer, there are three bars that are finding new life. I've already talked about Eleven, the bar that was formerly the Radio Room (and The Zombie Lounge not long before that). Scott Blair, the owner of Hamilton's and Small Bar has taken over the spot with partner Dennis Borlek to turn the spot into another great beer destination for San Diego. Louis Mello, former Liar's Club owner, is manning the ship and has already proven that the spot will be a destination. We had a very successful showcase there during the North Park Music Thing, and on Thursday night, the bar was at capacity for their "official" opening party with The Donkeys and The Silent Comedy. The bar will generally host music on Fridays and Saturdays, limiting their lineups to two bands a night. With these guys, the focus is on good beer and a kick ass jukebox. Nothing more. Nothing less. (oh, and peanuts, though I'll never feel right throwing shit on the ground). Visit Eleven at 3519 El Cajon Blvd.

Another bar will be finding new life as The Shakedown(With a great SD logo to match). What was once known as The Rhythm Lounge, the bar located in the Midway district near the Sports Arena has long struggled with being lost among titty bars and XXX superstores. (Remnant signs still inside the bar warn about people who bring in their own booze or have sex in the bathroom). The bar is currently being remodeled and renovated. Ted, the new owner, has been living in LA for the past 7 years learning the ins and outs of bars, entertainment, and marketing and thinks that with his partners, he can offer a spot for true rock n roll and punk rock in San Diego. Think old cars, choppers, punk rock and tattoos and you have some idea what they're shooting for. Dave from The Queers is one of those partners and on a recent afternoon, all hands were on deck painting and starting the process of renovating the stage for better live performances. I can't say I ever went to The Rhythm Lounge, but after talking with the guys and realizing that I knew Ted before he moved, when we both frequented places like the Ken Club, The Tower Bar, Scolari's, etc., I'm sure that The Shake Down will have no problem finding their niche crowd, with rock n roll DJs most nights and shows only when there's a bill worthy of hosting. Find the bar at 3048 Midway Drive. They expect to be open on September 1st, with at least one show already scheduled for September 10 with Social Spit, Neverland Ranch Hands, The Last Years and more. (The bar wasn't quite photo ready, but I expect to be back before the opening) (Update: there is also a show on 9/4, the opening weekend, feat. The Experiments, Strangely Strange and Punk Rock DJs)


And finally, what started as a not-for-blogging scoop earlier this week was confirmed last night while I was at the Beauty Bar. The bar has been sold to "Ron Ro Enterprises", which is a partnership with Mick (Tower Bar) and Thaddeus Robles (bartender extraordinaire at Livewire, Casbah, etc.).

Mick confirmed that the bar will take the name of the bar that once stood in the same location, Til Two. "We made a Facebook page today, so I guess it's public knowledge now!," Mick said in his mischievous accent. "Ron Ro" will take over the bar officially on October 1st. I asked if the bar will have a new look, and Mick was a bit coy. He likes it as it is, he says, but he'll probably add some booths in the front bar area, and of course change some of the Beauty Bar signature silhouette signage. He likes the outdoor stage and thinks that changes will be gradual instead of a shut-down/full bar makeover. Judging by classic photos of Til Two, it appears that the aesthetic will feel old school and laid back, and knowing Mick for a few years now, I know that the bar is in good hands. He's never had a shortage of bands that want to play at the Tower Bar (even when an entertainment license was in question) and his kind demeanor has always been appreciated. He makes you feel like you're a prized customer whether you see him daily or just twice a year. It will be sad to say goodbye to the Beauty Bar in San Diego, but I look forward to the next chapter forward, which appears to be a nod to the bar's past. Check out Til Two when it opens on or around October 1 at 4746 El Cajon Blvd.

Photos of NPMT, Day 1, 8/13/10

I spent the first night of the North Park Music Thing bouncing between Soda Bar and the new club, Eleven, where our very own Rosey held her SD:DialedIn showcase. Here's some highlights:

Boyscout:


A Scribe Amidst the Lions:


Swim Party:


Itai Faierman:


and zombies!


To see more bands from the night, click over to my blog at www.seemichaelsphotos.com. My Day 2 photos will be up soon, with even more bands and seminars from the afternoon sessions.

Michael Klayman

sd:dialed in North Park Music Thing Showcase

Perhaps you picked up this week's CityBeat and saw the program for the North Park Music Thing? Perhaps you noticed that I produced a stage at Eleven with my SoundDiego friends as sponsors? I've been talking about it for a while now and if you've followed my Facebook and Tweets, you know that things are never easy when it comes to booking.

My finalized lineup is as follows:

8pm- The Moviegoers

9 pm- Itai Faierman (of The Mashtis)

10 pm- Your Cannons

11 pm- Swim Party

12 pm- The Kabbs

1 am- Boyscout

I just wanted to take the opportunity to explain why my lineup changed. Holy Rolling Empire's guitarist Ian had to cancel as he's under doctors orders not to do much of anything after an injury. He's been off his feet for over a month and while he'll be okay, in order for him to heal properly, he has not been able to play at all. It was disappointing to all of us, but The Kabbs stepped up and will be filling the slot they left vacant.

This week I also found out that d/wolves would not be allowed to play because Eleven's new Entertainment license doesn't allow for underage performers, or if it does, it needs to be clarified by the issuing agency and the new owners just aren't willing to take a chance the day after opening. I love these kids and you can catch them tonight at Soda Bar, or on Saturday night at the SESAC showcase, also at the Soda Bar. Itai Faierman of The Mashtis will be filling the slot they left vacant.

The bands and I got together and decided to make Eleven your one destination for the night, so we encourage everyone to wear a costume for our Sci-Fi Prom. Anything that would work at Comic-con will work here. We'll have a photo booth and we expect it to be a great night.

Additionally, my bands all submitted some music for a compilation, which you can download for free via SoundCloud. I hope to see everyone this Friday night!