The Budos Band is Bad... in a Good Way!

Tingles of jive turkeys swept across my skin. Antelopes roamed the fields peacefully, but inside; the air was cut thick with cannabis, sweat flung dripping from brow and flailing limbs, the sound of a new type of freedom was echoing through my dancing bones. The Budos Band is a race of beings unknown to us, misfits of hell, banned from the eternal realms to scorch the earth with its sinful desire of Latin soul funk. Some call it afro-soul, I call it… party time! Jared Tankel, baritone sax player and front man of this demonic posse walked on stage looking like Diego Delgado, eye’s blazed red from spooning bumps of cocaine with a scorpions deadly tail spike. His horn bellowed the whaaa of such loose sound waves I could almost see them as jelly fish moving through the smoke in the rafters, swimming to the nonexistent surface for air. The crowd became entranced, possessed, and danced crazed, except for one girl.

The magic was spinning like taking acid and watching the wheel of fourtune in the 60’s on a plasma TV, when I looked to my right and saw a human, a girl, motionless, expressionless, and still. My first reaction was to perform CPR and resuscitate this lifeless poor girl, but further examination proved her to still actually be conscious! Eyes open, breathing, what the hell is wrong with this girl? What the hell was she doing in this cavern of misfit toys carousing in universal vibrations with the rest of the awakened? The brassy horn called furiously as the band stopped 4 bars after Mr. Tankel raised a gritty fist.

The brief silence gave chance of change and I challenged this girl. “Saving your good moves for the end?” I asked with an air of confidence. She glanced down nervously smiling, than her eyes shot back at me.  Politely, in a 1950’s type way, she said no through a deep shade of red lip stick. Now fiddling her fingers nervously, the music burst into the room again. I performed a few easy movements, perhaps this girl would notice and emulate. Perhaps she would begin traveling in the caravan of Budos believers, drinking twisted cocktails and potions, clothing in feathers, and dancing for the ancient spirits giving thanks for the world they have granted us with. No! She was frozen! Her soul was fresh and afraid of where this music could lead. If these evil vibration blowing bandits had a plan for all this energy being released?! She was scared and confused.

 The bellow of Mr. Tankel’s horn began with a crisp closed high hat guiding the introductory rhythm of the next song. Still and calm on the right side of my peripheral vision, I find the energy reacting just dandy in my blue suede shoes. The magic and freedom that becomes dancing, beyond an expression, and into involuntary movement had been overtaking me for some time now. I have found nothing to make me happier than the pure ecstasy that this experience is. This lonely, tired, and beautiful girl I realized may never join the millions of souls who have and do experience this, and it made me sad. Will it be her choice or destiny to dance?

Either way it will be her decision I thought as all reason flew out the window! Daniel Foder, pure yin and yang of all that is good and evil floats around the stage. He holds his bass guitar like he was a mad Vietnam solider violently firing his automatic rifle into oblivion obliterating all that surrounds. It definitely made all of us observing feel a little more bad ass. After drummer Brian Profilio led us through a vulgarly enthusiastic and motivating chant notifying the rest of the band in the best Brooklyn accent us Capitol Hill kids could emulate to “get the Fuck out here” (and play an encore), they did.

The band finished, the lights turned on, the doors opened, the smoke seeped out, and the motionless beautiful girl in the red lip stick was gone. The Budos Band had retired to a den of cocaine, sexy Latina women, and dim lighting. Stepping out into the streets the world came back to us. But now, the world seemed evil, still, and quite like this mysterious girl. The loud and boisterous music, the smoke and sweat, the uncontrollable control of dance possession makes me feel good! No, no, excuse me. It makes me feel… bad.

Yellow

My heart was pounding. My foot pressed firmly against the pedal slowly gained speed up Denny Ave. Regrade my ass, I can barely get this four banger up the damn street! It didn’t help that this was the first real date I’ve been on in months. Hopefully she wouldn’t get to see my piece of shit truck, so I purposely looked for parking blocks away from our destination, out of sight. The day was typical, it was June, somewhat gloomy, chilly… definitely a day to grab a quality hoodie or light jacket. I wore the Seattle Blacks, you know, black jeans, shoes, and coat, and I believe I had a black cap on as well, the typical style of most kids on the hill for a late spring chilly day. My grey truck squeaked to a stop somewhere deep in the zone parking area; I had two hours until this date would become more expensive with a parking ticket. I lit up a fourth Marlboro 27 and gave myself the halftime locker room pep talk. Ok, let’s do this shit! The black concrete moved under my feet like a treadmill and the overcast gloom gave me no particular enthusiasm. My heart raced, and mind recreated pictures and moments of the few minutes we spent together the night before, she was beautiful. The pep talk was taking hold and I was prepared to woo and whoa her every delight. I turned the corner, slowly stepping with the cockiness of Tony Manero, taking the sexiest drag of my cigarette I could image, and then placing it beneath my middle finger and flicking it to the curb. I watched the embers explode and extinguish on the cold concrete as my eyes rose from the street. Slowly, each degree revealed a deeper beauty, and I became captivated by the most incredible woman, wearing a bright yellow jacket! Warmth, hope, and happiness punched me in the stomach and took my breath away! The grey gloom disappeared and the sun was shining a bright yellow love. The buildings around us changed into a forest, exposed with no canopy, the newly existant sunshine illuminated the area like lights on a stage. I had to shield my eyes. I was in a fantasy world. This yellow jacket, most likely made of cotton, had the style of a light and miniature pea coat, buttoned from her waist to her breasts, and fastened with a 2 inch thick belt around her ribs. Our rendezvous was at a bar, a small old house looking building which had a large wooden deck at its entrance. We looked up and suddenly the wooden structure rose from the soil as a grandeur ship, soaked deep with adventure. The bow was constructed of a single beam, carved like a totem pole, revealing the past, or future. It rose powerfully like a plant germinating, breaking its seed for its first breath of life, but on a Roman scale. As we both looked down to the street, we saw to disbelief that we were floating in a mahogany row boat of master craftsmanship. An energy twisted through my blood veins, I couldn’t speak, my words usually so bold and witty collapsed into the sea we now floated upon. Weird fishes of the brightest colors swam playfully around us, rainbows stretched across all parts of the land like the LA freeway system. Music, compassionate and invigorating chirped from the tropical birds flying above. My Seattle blacks faded into neon hues and exposed my twitterpated heart. The heat was intense, but the last thing I wanted to do was find shade. Rhythm and love began twirling in a hurricane of emotions, impossible to express in any way, except for one. “Do you like to dance?” she questioned. The light of day had already faded, we had been together for over my two hour parking limit, and I felt that I had only been standing here for moments. The moon was a smiling light of cheese and the stars scurried around the sky as millions of fire flies, smiling upon our acquaintance. I looked around and felt a warmth, like this yellow jacket was made to keep me comfortable and at ease. “I love to dance.” I replied, and yellow has been my favorite color since.

Blue

I spent a brief time skipping rocks on the Mississippi about two years ago. I’m still not sure if I am a completely horrible rock skipper, or if the overbearing muddy brown waters weigh my flat stone down to sink it to the bottom after only one or two measly jumps. The history of the good ole Mississippi is intriguing and sets an ambiance that only Tom and Huck could truly explain. I couldn’t help but to think that, water is blue. Not brown, and the transparently blue tides of the Caribbean, or a glacier lake, the fade of blues in a large wave, and the tints of green between the rapids of a river all set a calming yet powerful tone and are the mothers and fathers of what the Mississippi is. The two largest things this earth has are the water and the sky, and we are on this ever changing vessel called land. I’ve recently found that I perhaps have felt the most alive while swimming naked in the ocean. I typically would prefer a lake or pool of freshwater, soothing. But when you enter into the salty ocean, as it slowly moves all around you, like lying in the bath, letting it rise millimeter by millimeter around your body, feeling every water molecule cling and surround your skin, you can’t help but to feel alive. The blue becomes a fountain of youth, when you’re naked. Even just a small European or Brazilian bathing suit constricts the true freedoms that are being handed to you by this creation. Then when you dive under the surface, you are free. The water moves over you like the hands of the most skilled masseuse, holds you like an incredible lover, and lets you free like pollen billowing off a field of a thousand wild flowers. You never want the feeling to end, but you need to breathe! Bursting out of the surface to that first breath gives you an idea of the preciousness of life. Regardless to how or why we achieved our consciousness, it is inevitably a gift, and this luscious blue water had been like a yearly Christmas present from a distant relative reminding you that you are loved. As air fills your lungs, your eyes begin to open. And there above you is the blue sky, soaring for an unexplainable distance until it begins again. The sky is our ceiling, protecting us, and creates the possibility for life, its calm and deep, ever changing with the hours of the day, rotations of the sun and moon. It harvests our fresh water and releases it to once again create. They hold blue to a true standard. A mind stunned by the complete power of nature enters euphoria, leaving other senses immobile. In this case you may then be pounded back into the sea by the same power of nature. As you take your second breath, staring into the cloudless blue sky, the force of a stampede of stallions crashes over the top of this temporary body, hurtling you deep under the surface. The water scoops and sweeps you in its own circle of life revolving and shaking with a power that no man, however strong, could withstand. You’re lungs are out of air, under water, naked, just the same as the blissful swim moments ago. Now fearful of death, scared and not in control, airless, the wave releases you. Control of your body and strength over the tide rebuilds confidence and your mind stops to panic and controls your body responsibly again. Through the wavy glare of the water beneath the surface, the blue sky above seems to be fiendishly holding this air, like a drug dealer waiting for an estranged customer to relapse. You fill your lungs again, and quickly swim to the shallows; into the protection land gives us. Looking out into the blue, smiling, there is nothing to do but thank the water. It is like God, giving the bliss and pleasure of living, but more powerful, full of more energy than a million atomic bombs. As you just now, I remember standing in the wash on the shore about up to my shins, and felt the push and pull of the water, constant.  That push and pull will not stop, never sleep, and never end until the end of Earth. The blue sky and the blue sea will work together, forever showing us how precious life is, the chances we have to be free, and the limitations our mortality sets. The answers are clear, well, the answers are actually blue, and blue has been my favorite color ever since.

RED

I strolled down Mercer Ave to go to work, and my toes got chilly! These damn Chucks, I love them and hate them. The rubber is worn to the sole, the canvas ripped and torn. They’re only a few months old and I spent 60 fucking bucks for the most minimalist shoe wear on the market! I do like the color, they’re red. Red perplexes my mind. It is bright and positive, dark and twisty, bold and daring, full of life and death. Red makes a statement, and is always seen. Most cars stopped for speeding are red, stop signs are red, Christmas is red, heat is red, pain is red, love is red, blood is red. I remember watching myself bleed as a kid. I was rollerblading through the neighborhood and saw some older kids grinding the curb. I thought to myself, sliding looks fun! I like to slide. I made my approach, of course at a distant curb from the tweenagers to protect my neighborhood reputation, or lack thereof one. I pushed off with my right blade gaining a slight speed at a gentle angle towards the curb of the side walk, knees bent, focused directly on the stretched corner of this strange cube. I leapt enough to clear the edge and locked on between the 2^nd and 3^rd wheels of my blades anticipating freedom to hit my soul like riding through the curl of a wave. The gritty concrete gripped me, holding me like a fearful mother, freezing my skates, throwing my momentum from my hips over my shoulders and into the street where I began. I threw out my arms as airbags for my body and felt my hands scratching the rocky crust, grating the skin on my lower palms. I frantically looked up to see if anyone had observed the failure of my treacherous feat. The older kids rolled on further down the road, oblivious to my presence. Quickly, I leapt back up on my blades and scurried away to a vacant grassy knoll at the park nearby. I dabbed the blood into the grass, my grandmother would be furious if I stained my jeans. As the adrenalin subsided the sting began to slightly grow. I peered at the back of my hands slowly turning them outward revealing the consequence of my decisions. I watched the cool blue veins in my wrist, I could see each blood cell like a group of rafters on the Wenatchee, flowing into my palms, and out the perforated holes on the juicy part of the hand under my thumb. I could almost see the transition in slow motion, life turning to pain. Blue turning to red. I whimpered for a short instance, consumed in self pity as the red slowly filled the small pieces of my skin that had been torn away. Then, I saw it, almost for the first time, this amazing color. It invigorated me, empowered me, entranced me. It had texture and depth that inspired me to live. It was beautiful. Red has always been my favorite color since.

Phanto-YEA!

New Phantogram track has been hitting the waves. It keeps the feel and vibe that I love about Phantograms original album. Perhaps not as memorizing as 'Mouthful of Diamonds' but urges you to wanna take a large bong toke and to dance by yourself in your living room.

 New Black Keys on the way out too! I don't know how I feel about this track. I am being a little bit judgemental I believe, but if this is their new shit, their best shit is behind them as your shit usually is.
I always enjoy random guys dancing in videos, but after Christopher Walken guested in Fatboy Slims Weapon of Choice video, nothing has been able to compare. Still a solid shit, I mean track.

Watercolor Painting "These Arms" A Lo-Fi Record Adventure

Excuse me, could you please remove your shoes before entering, Socks Too!! Bare feet. Now, pretend that your feet are one; they collide together and join harmoniously. Yes, good and now your entire body is just that. Naked as your two bare feet, excuse me, one bare foot that is representing your body as a whole... Do you work out?  More so, are you comfortably confused, naked as a large foot man or woman!? Great!! Now take your big toe, which I suppose would translate to being your head, and dip into your favorite color. Now dip all your toes!  Like your ears and eyes, nose and teeth, dip all them little piggy’s in the paint. Okay, okay… so now, now we have facetiously developed an alternate reality to create with! Or, we have created an appropriate atmosphere for listening to the new album “These Arms” by Watercolor Paintings!

A lo-fi record adventure, at times is somewhat mysterious, in such a tech savvy industry, it sounds like it could have been a demo in 1978.  In the world today of laptop DJs and an endless list of at home studio record labels uploading tracks onto the internet like pissing into the ocean, what is lo-fi and someone who sucks at recording gets confused. The difference is not in the equipment, but inside your soul!  I’ve never met Ms. Redman, but I know her soul is all the technology needed to portray her feelings, she knows what she wants.  At times the ambiance on the tracks seem to be of a friend filled living room, outside in the front yard cars passing, some tracks sound like a gymnasium or cafeteria, some sound  back or side stage preshow. What it doesn’t sound like is a soundless vocal booth. Her words are powerful, witty, and at times just cutely confused in the ukulele twang or harmony vocal. Though I realized that I listened to the album in two distinct ways; one being that I intently listened to the lyrical content, or two, would find the specific words to be lost and the sound simply combusting and reconnecting into a gritty duet of string and voice upon sound waves that have never been genetically modified. But, sometimes you just want some beef and processed cheese on it.

The world doesn’t like fresh.  A super size me civilization has tolled the common man’s brain and what he believes to be good. Even myself at first listen found the sounds to be unlistenable in an inadvertent setting.  When I played the album for the first time, it was over doing other writing and work, playing in the background, and was lost in my thoughts to deem this artist as another confused girl with a guitar and group of fun loving hipster friends in California, who’s intentions are to be ultra unique, creating overused themes of timeless youthful ponders and thoughts. Was my stereotype correct? With all these Neko Case wannabees playing there intimate sets filled with lifeless, movementless crowds, falling into the feminism of Lillifest and woman’s rights in the 21^st century, a Folklife fanatic, hairy armpits and all! I looked up from my screen and saw myself in the reflection atop my browser opened to Google +. My face surrounded the screen like a connect-the-dots puzzle. I was becoming a social network, filled with judgment! NEVER!! I rushed to the closet and threw off my clothes, I don’t need THEM!! You see, I found that I was being just that, a hypocritical music whore stereotyping artists in genres I don’t particularly like or listen to often!! As timing usually plays a key part in life, it did now.  An acapella antidote called ‘Bigger than Yours’ began to play. The simple ideas of comfort and love created an instant feeling in my heart! I slid the socks of my feet with the opposite foots toe, and imagined them as my face watercolor painting. The harmonies created smooth glides across gritty brick walls, and I said okay, this lo-fi folk thing is cool with me!

I continued to listen with intent, naked at my desk, freed of societal chains directing my opinions to my heart, and not my facebook status. This slowly started to transition as the music charmed me to begin to draw. Lines became a man, which became a man with a stick and a pinecone. He soon began to use the pinecone to record the singing of a woman growing out of a tree nearby. The trees leaves slowly burned into the sunset atop the page and my wrist began to weaken as the last track “Spider Web” began to play. I decided it would be a good time to medicate. I found even now, that through the record, I still in my nudity was nit picking little things in my brain due to the low-fi recording; loss of tone and dynamics, clips and pops. Then, during ‘Spider Web’, it sounded perfect. The sweet harmonies broke my heart and made me cry yet smile again by the next line. Ms. Redman’s voice was charming my pants off! Well, they were already off, but you know what I mean. I found that I love her song, her voice. It’s so sweet and lovely, tender, silly and fun! Yes, and as I said before Ms. Redman knows what she wants. Not a mass of people giving her track 15 seconds of a listen and judging the hell out of it. She wants the people who will intently listen to HER. Her voice was designed by rainbows for people to listen to it, for people to paint to it, to make love to it, to be inspired by something so small.

Now remove your foot from foot, and extract your body to become whole again. But let them walk the streets of our world knowing that you can be naked and transform inside or outside anything whenever you want. Embrace what is not real, what is real, and choose to embrace art that was made to be art and not a product of consumption. Choose to listen to the new record “These Arms” by Watercolor Paintings! Oh, and yes, you can put your shoes back on. Thank you.

Buy 'These Arms" !!!!!!!!

Listen to more Watercolor Paintings!!

Pumping Out Soul Like God

Arriving late with my lady we peered past the smoking section, through the show flyer filled window of the Crocodile Café, to catch a glimpse of what we hopefully haven’t missed. Allen Stone is back again; tonight he’s sold out the house preshow, and is playing a double set from acoustic lover, to soul party! The players that surround him all seemed to be new, pieced together to travel in Allen’s Econoline the last few weeks opening up for Nikka Costa on a West Coast tour! “This band is playing tight, like champions,” Allen explained to me, “they bring the noise”! Now they’re back in the good ole NW, just off playing Bellingham, and ready to blow the lid off the needle! The crowd was still filling in during Allen’s opening acoustic set, designed to please the soft hearted soul and folk fans that scatter the emerald city, and have taken a liking to Allen’s indie pop soul folk sounds. I like to call it Erotic Folk, but that’s just me! He slipped away off stage as I entered through the door, only hearing the amazing reviews from countless friends who beat me through. “I had the chills… the entire time!” One girl confessed to me after over hearing my questions about the soft set! “That’s what I came to see!” she finished.

Ladies and Gentlemen.... Allen Stone!

We all know that Allen has a worldly recognizable voice. It’s fucking pure beauty of baby roses blooming out of the sun rise! His voice layered with just a six string, and you’re bound to experience something beyond. But, people that know me well, and don’t know me at all, know that I like to party! And I, personally, was waiting to get a dose of some funk and soul to my FACE! Donning a throwback Sonics v-neck, Allen cut up the oriental rug on stage like he was getting lessons from Sharron Jones and James Brown! The band filled the room with an explosive attack! Allen whaled! Julian stole my beer and drank it, we took airplane shots from a girl’s purse, and we danced! On stage, Allen knew he was the Flux Capacitor of party, flailing new variations of the ‘Silly Boy’ (official dance of the Chapustry) that other’s never believed possible.  The entire crowd began to shake it harder and harder!

Everyone was dancing, there was no room to break out any special moves and I needed, desperately, to Break Out!! I reached toward the stage hand in hand with all the fans, we channeled our energy to him, to Allonious Funk himself!! Our energy slowly began filling his soul making him grow into the size of an Avatar like creature. Allen’s face started transforming into a grimy, dirty, greasy, and nasty soul sex spectacular! His notes and words began to extract from beyond into a mystical aurora borealis above! Everything was connected. This connection, this miracle was happening! Sound waves swirled and unraveled themselves through the rafters creating lines you could grab onto! People began to climb up them, into the rafters, entranced by glory, to dance on the ceiling.  

Movement was made without friction, dancing was effortless, emotion was beyond control, the universal meditation has begun with music as its fuel. Allen burned it like a 67’ Camero! He was pumping out soul like God. He was untouchable. And the night never stopped. I slipped out of the realm to write this before it ultimately traveled to a distant dimension where such funky soul actually makes sense. Somewhere beyond our universe, Allen and that crowd are still there, still singing, still dancing, on all the walls and ceilings, swinging on the sound waves like jungle vines, sipping the sweet nectars of another’s mind, in a timeless glide across a rippleless pond… Hopefully, he can make it back to this dimension for his show in Cour de Lane, ID tonight, or that sold out crowd will be pisssssssssed!

Read "Allen Stone Makes Dreams Come True" reviewing Allen's April 9th, 2011 show at Nuemos.

Allen Stone Makes Dreams Come True  

http://stylesbentley.blogspot.com/2011/04/allen-stone-makes-dreams-come-true.html