Image of the Day

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Peep the line-up for Cairo's fourth annual Expo.
Quite fantastic, I would say. Info here.

I Love Eggs

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Grass Widow "Fried Egg" from Past Time (2010, Kill Rock Stars). Video by Hannah Lew. Grass Widow plays at Cairo's VIBRATIONS festival in Volunteer Park, Seattle, on August 20th.

Vibe, Vibrations

Illustration by Brian Standeford / type + layout by me
Mark your calendar, this is gonna be a fun one

Coming to Flex

.Front and back cover of the forthcoming Flexions LP Golden Fjord, designed for the newly-minted Cairo Records by yours truly.

The album is out August 2nd and in addition to band members Robin Stein, Devin Welch, and Tyler Swan, also features Margaret Jones and Morgan Henderson (Fleet Foxes, Past Lives, Blood Brothers, and, perhaps most importantly, Mt. Henderson).

Here's the first video, by Chris Ando and the homey Robert M. Wolfe, who is best known for design work with Wavves and Best Coast:


Flexions play at the Wildrose on July 9th and the release party is August 5th at Chop Suey. Mark them calendars. More info here.

Eclectic Magic

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A design by Stacy Rozich, one of six designs by local artists featured on T-shirts available at Cairo during Eclectic Magic, a low-key but delightful pop-up shopping experience for the holidays. Cairo is open 12-6pm everyday now through January 3rd and they're having an opening this Friday night featuring music from Alaska's, Wild Orchid Children, and Stephanie. I don't know the other two but I had the great pleasure of seeing Alaska's at the Anne Bonny for Expo 87 the other weekend and would jump at the chance to repeat the experience.

Alaska's at the Anne Bonny for Expo 87 the other weekend

More info at Cairo.

Tonight & Tomorrow Night:

[ more info ]

Utopian Dreams

.We're headed out of town so we're going to miss this one, but Cairo has an opening on Saturday that looks great: Peg and Awl features drawings by Seattle artist Toby Liebowitz, with an accompanying collaborative sculptural/sonic installation by Max Liebowitz and Sean Pecknold. From the gallery's description of the show:

Peg and Awl is a fictional society based in Douglas County, Oregon between the spring of 1933 and the winter of 1934. A community built from the dreams of the great depression; a place for artists, carpenters, writers and adventurers with visions of a utopian society. Through a series of graphite drawings that span the seasons of a year, we witness the rise and fall of a community of people who are forced to face the realities of human desire and the harsh unknown.

That is a crazy scope for a project – I'm excited to see it.


More info at Cairo.

Closing and Opening

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Two things on the radar tonight:

Sarah Kavage The Long Road West, 2008

1. Closing party at Vermillion for the Headwaters of Industry show featuring Sarah Kavage & Erin Morrison.

2. Opening party for Ghost of Plants, featuring new work from Heidi Anderson, at Cairo.

Also, some Rainier tall boys. And then after that: sleep, because we're getting up early to go on our first camping trip of the season to Rialto Beach. That's near Forks, for all you Twilight fans out there (don't lie! it was kinda good).

Weekend Activities

Tonight and tomorrow night, two more editions in Cairo's excellent series of shows (past performers include Tiny Vipers, PWRFL Power, Generifus, and Talbot Tagora, among others)…

We probably won't make it tonight because we have been planning to go to the TBTL party at Spitfire, but I am intrigued by what I've heard of Braidstorm and I like it that they're releasing a tape, so I'm gonna try to go Saturday.

See also: this Seattle Times article about Cairo from earlier this week, with some exciting news about the Anne Bonny's forthcoming move to the space next door.

The Shows Must Go On

Tonight at Cairo…round the corner and up the street.

Flexi-Disc

I had the pleasure of working with Flexions and photographer Kyle Johnson last week on a photo shoot for the forthcoming Flexions record – a favor for my man Byron Kalet. Flexions = Robin Stein and Devin Welch and they are doing some interesting shit…it will be cool to see what else they come up with. I picked up the Flexions 7" (pictured above) at Cairo on one of the first weekends I was back in Seattle, and I highly recommend searching out a copy for yourself.

In the mean time, listen here.

Up in the Hood

On Sunday we walked around Capitol Hill a little, and then had drinks at Redwood and watched the Seahawks wipe up the field with the sorry little '49ers. That was fun for a change.

Redwood is a relatively new bar that feels like it's been there since 1967. Apparently it's owned by (among others) Mat Brooke of Grand Archives and formerly of Band of Horses and Carissa's Wierd. (I realize that everyone in Seattle probably already knows this but I have to go at my own speed here.)

Carissa's Wierd Suedehead mp3

The bar has these old mining lanterns retro-fitted with new lightbulbs.

Taxidermy. Obligatory at this point, but I'm not really tired of it, I guess. It's kind of classic in bars – like you wouldn't get tired of paintings on walls.

The bathroom has all these old targets as wallpaper.

The bar is lined with shotgun shells. So yeah there's a vague undertone of violence…to animals, large and small…but somehow the place is very relaxing…for humans.

When the game ended, the bartender put on the new Mount Eerie album Lost Wisdom, featuring Julie Doiron and Fred Squire, which is so good, we stuck around just to listen. Get it on white vinyl with a gatefold and poster at PW Elverum 7 Sun, Ltd., or download it from emusic.

Redwood mixes a mean bloody maria – maybe the best I've had. It has long green beans in it, and they blend it really well. It makes a big difference.

I didn't order food but the menu looks solid too. I like Redwood – it will definitely be my third place, or at least one of them.

After that Emily and I walked over to Linda's Tavern, the old standby. It's across the street from my old office, and I used to go there sometimes.

After that was the Tiny Vipers show at Cairo on Summit Avenue, which was part of Expo 86.
It was weird to me that there weren't a ton of people there—I think if Tiny Vipers played Union Hall or somewhere in Brooklyn, it would probably sell out. Of course, selfishly, I would rather see a small show, and Tiny Vipers did not disappoint, even considering she only played four songs. I will look forward to seeing her play again.


Here she is playing "On This Side" for the Seattle Burn to Shine session.

Cairo seems like a cool place. It got written up in the T blog several months ago.

I got a zine and a Flexions record there, which I'll cover in greater detail later (rest assured).

And, finally, on the way home I walked by this little installation in a closed check cashing place on Broadway:

Reclaimed (Ace Cash Express), by Joanna Lepore, imagines that Seattle has been abandoned and "left to the mercy of nature." It's pretty cool.