Video: Drive Like Jehu @ Balboa Park Organ Pavilion, 8.31.2014

Today was awesome. That is all I can really say. I did my best to shoot around other photogs but whatever. Here is my video perspective of Drive Like Jehu at the Balboa Park Organ Pavilion. I hear that the best way to experience the organ portion of the music was somewhere near the Japanese Tea Garden. I'm sure 74 people might have better footage. After all of this, I hope everyone understands there was nothing "free" about this show, and people went out of pocket to make it happen. In return, support Bar Pink, support The Organ Society, support Balboa Park, and write emails and letters to your councilpeople to let them know how amazing this was, how you support it, and how it should happen again in the future.



Update: Great articles and photos being shared...I like this one with Diffuser for the setlist, thought calling Dang "an employee at a local bar" is the understatement of the year, and perhaps the author doesn't know the story of Bar Pink and all the owners and that this whole thing was out of pocket for the band and bar. I also really love these photos by Max Nanis on Twitter. Kelly Davis of CityBeat was next to me for part of the show and then maneuvered around for some great shots. If anyone else wants to share, send me your links.

Photos By Chris Valle
Video on UStream
Video By Jason Bang

Swami Soundsystem: Now on Slacker

For all of you who poured a forty out when John Reis' Swami Soundsystem left the FM 94/9 airwaves, you can rejoice! You didn't really think Swami was silenced, right? Today, Slacker announced the launch of the Swami Soundsystem station. That means you can listen to John Reis' personal record collection anytime you want. I heard it took months to take his record collection and digitize it because his collection is so vast and full of rarities that you can't find anywhere else.

Here is the direct link to Slacker: http://www.Slacker.com/station/Swami-Sound-System (but you can find it under the Specialty stations) Anyway, I'll let the Slacker people do the talking (after the jump).

San Diego Radio Shake-up

On Friday I was crammed in the back of my friend's truck on my way to NAMM when I got a press release from 91X with the subject "91X Begins Hunt For New Program Director". Here's the press release.


San Diego’s Heritage Alternative Rock Station
91X Begins Hunt For New Program Director

91X announced this week the departure of Program Director and afternoon drive host Garrett Capone, who has accepted a position as VP of Promotion at Crush Management. Capone ends his almost 5 year run at 91X, leaving the station in the top position in ratings in multiple demographic categories among rock stations in San Diego. Capone’s final day will be February 29th.

91X has already begun the search for his replacement.

“Over the years Capone has made tremendous contributions to the success of 91X on numerous fronts,” says Gregg Wolfson, Vice President and General Manager of Local Media San Diego. “91X and LMSD are grateful to have had him at the helm of 91X during very competitive times.”

91X is owned and operated by Local Media San Diego, a privately held San Diego-based company. LMSD also operates Z90.3 (XHTZ-FM) and Magic 92.5 (XHRM-FM).

This will be an interesting twist at 91X. Now that Halloran is back on the air, will he step back into the position? Will someone jump ship from another local station to fill the slot? Will someone come in from another market to takeover the position? Should I email Wolfy and throw myself into the running? More importantly, will there be sweeping changes at the station or will the new PD just be a figurehead to keep things more or less status quo? As stations have moved further from specialty programming to focus-group decided playlists, will anyone even notice?

As for Capone, I wish him well in his future endeavors with Crush Management. Here's a blip about Crush, according to the company tagline on a recent press-release about a partnership with Crush and Grooveshark:

Jonathan Daniel and Bob McLynn are two former musicians who have been through the major-label wringer and lived not only to tell, but to apply what they've learned to creating one of the most successful and innovative music management companies in the business. They brought the public Grammy-nominated, multiplatinum global superstars Fall Out Boy, reignited Train's success with a Grammy-winning, multiplatinum best selling song of 2010, and have had worldwide hits with Travie McCoy as a solo artist as well as with his band, Gym Class Heroes, not to mention multiple hits from Cobra Starship and more.

In other local radio news, over the weekend John Reis took to Facebook to announce his final show on FM 94/9. After seven years of hosting the Saturday night specialty show, Swami SoundSystem, the reasons for the end are as yet unannounced. Of the 207 comments left on the thread, speculation and snark took over, from people joking that Mikey must've demanded a raise to Reis leaving to focus on a Rocket From The Crypt world tour. It is possible that it is just another of the specialty cuts that took away features like "The Local Member of The Day" and "Desert Island Discs". Let's hope these were just compromises to make the extra hour of commercial free radio from 9-10am possible and that the rest of the station's specialty shows (FTP, The Local Pyle, Big Sonic Chill) stay intact.  Additionally, the stirrings that Reis is focusing on Swami Records and a Hot Snakes tour make me believe that this was a mutual parting.

Random Notes: The Liars Club, The Night Marchers, Sue Palmer, The Kings of Rhythm and more...

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Tuesday Newsy Tidbits

I'm adding a link on my page to mVideoJukebox. A project by Dwight Jegler, there are 124 bands on the site including many older and now defunct local San Diego bands as well as bands that are still around. And speaking of....

Did you know Tim Pyles was in a band? You can see footage of the Banana Seeds? in action back in 2001 if you click the popups. Rumor has it that there have been talks for some time of a new project with Tim Pyles, Mike Halloran, Garrett Michaels and John Reis. That is a band I wanna see!

Alex of Swim Party is currently practicing with Kite Flying Society and preparing to hit the road with them this weekend for a mini tour. He says he'll play with them as long as they need him, however his priority is and will be Swim Party and he does not plan on being a permanent fixture in KFS. He may or not play with them as they do a weekly residency at the House of Blues Sidestage starting on Wednesday, February 7 and continuing each Wednesday for 4 weeks. Don't miss the show on February 28th with Princeton, a great band out of Santa Monica right in the same vein as KFS.