I left a good book Tuesday for the studio a little more hopeful “the boys” could fix my (apparently, it’s not unheard of) crashed Mac than sure of a shoot in a warehouse we third-handedly acquired. But following a truly grueling and moderately costly three and a half hours of shuffle, what pained us to put together turned out to be wildly cool.
Written on a sorely wounded, but not dead partner, Aldous (my ibook), after surviving an eight hour surgical procedure, he sends with me in resurrected body…
THE SAGA OF THE WAREHOUSE DISTRICT:
The sun just eeking under the horizon, we stepped out and into a ripe old something turning. Maybe it had already turned and what left to rats or worse knows how long ago just loomed stagnant and waiting, hoping to evaporate from the vacuum of summer into our noses. Whatever it was, it certainly did. And having stung its way down twixt the broken-windowed carcasses of industries far more dead, through a distance more cobweb than the cobbled roads, from at least as far as, or maybe even from, the only lit sign in the district–what one can hardly call its life, the parasite of a younger, older building–the stench rose, and The Adult Book Store farted out a couple of patrons as contribution to the pungence. Passing it a quarter block led us up to the door of our destination, what later, from a mural of saw mills and flanneled up hatcheteers, appeared to be an ex- lumber yard office building. Here it was we found solace from the outer reek, only to become acquainted to a new sort. Long-time handyman/maintenance-boy, I do believe the black, glistening fibers half-heartedly scraped from the sub-floor were indeed the dreaded (dum dum dum) asbestos. Aaaah, what I do for you Hillsiders.
Health aside, the space was something to behold. For a trifling FIFTY bones a month, our second hander rents this-what few would call-gem. A three story behemoth all to himself in a neighborless void of square blocks, where he ought be making moonshine or methamphetamine, something better his way came. This space maybe the only in the city where a man may with no recoil of law, guiltlessly turn his amp to 11, arrogantly wag his quivering voice, and shirtlessly rock. And so he does. And so did we.
MinorMass, hailing from Baltimore, Maryland, took a day break from their schedule at Cornerstone Music Festival in Illinois to travel to our dirty little building. Having played only five prior gigs in Maryland the band somehow got an entry into the Festival and then conveniently parted it to us. Expectations were high as they arrived and together we splintered to explore the building’s haunts for toilets, electricity, and ghoulish figures.
A fan of shameless promotion, I asked what it was the band intended to be and share that with you here, now: “Our name’s a combination of two words, obviously, minority and mass. We decided on the name hoping to convey an idea of minorities coming together to tackle struggles we all face. We’re not holding the word ‘minority’ specifically to the minority of race; there can be minorities of many things, like ideas and beliefs, and on and on. The second half ‘mass’ conveys a large body of people, a collection of parts forming one. We want to bring the broken together and create a whole.”
We came to find that one of the inconveniences of doing work in an abandoned building, is the amount of power available. We were lucky to have SOME, but powering lights, amps, and a full traveling audio rack’s a pretty decent draw on a breaker box unused since the 1940s. Such is the technological age, I suppose, but what it meant to us was the subtraction of monitors for the band (forgive us please). Another unexpected bump was a hum, not just any hum mind you, no, a hum of hums coming from the twenty tubed monster of MinorMass. Don’t try this at home folks, but we slapped a two prong adapter on the end of our extension cord to lift the ground on the little guy and we, presto-chango, were in business. But just as that happened, someone stepped on a light cable. Timber! Down it went in a shatter of hot glass and darkness. As we waited for it to cool down enough to change, some of Minormass took a trip back to the studio and snagged a second amp.
Meanwhile, the rest of us exhausted our chatting it up, did TacoJohns and a gas station, discovered a third story room with three Bob Dylan Posters, and used a very un-private toilet in the middle of the completely gutted basement.
The time went zombie-late, the band probably made it back to their evening gig, and we eventually collapsed in our respective homes. The actual shoot went smoothly enough to just let you watch. Enjoy all. The downloads are free, the trouble was worth it, Aldous recovered, the band was a success at Cornerstone. If you’d like to bring them your way, contact them here. Thanks for stopping.
~Riley
May 8th, 2009 at 2:26 pm
I want to hear someone using computers.
guitar bands.. guitar bands. everywhere.