Mission Mission

Mission-themed comedian Chris Garcia snapped this photo late last night and had this to say:

I knew bars in the Mission had specially themed “Soul Nights”. I didn’t realize pharmacies did, too.

Now you know, Chris.

What do you suppose they’re listening to in there anyway? Perhaps the old classic ”Here I Am (Come and Take My Blood Pressure)”? Or maybe ”Let’s Copay Together”?

Watch a video of Chris’ act here. It’s good. He makes fun of the Mission, but very lovingly.

Our buddy Jamie wanted to go to the Elephant 6 show tonight really bad. So bad he bought tickets way in advance and everything. And he realized, “Oh, wait, I have to DJ at Debaser that night!” D’oh!

So, be sure to head over to the Knockout at some point this evening to help make Jamie’s sacrifice worthwhile. RSVP and invite your friends here.

P.S. Luckily for Jamie, and anyone else in his position (wanting to see Elephant 6 tonight but having to DJ at one of the most celebrated dance nights in recent San Francisco history), Elephant 6 is playing tomorrow at the Roxie too.

[Photo by Chris Brennan, as you can see]

Oldies Night at the Knockout was a blast as usual. Here are a couple gems that really made the grade:

Primo spun this one I think a total of three times, because the crowd demanded it. It got better every time, and I think it’s about to get even better RIGHT NOW:

(And, don’t forget, Primo’s bringing his skills to Mission United tonight. And there’s free food.)

Starts at 6, ends around 9. Don’t miss it out. RSVP and invite your friends here.

Also, our buddy Shae reminds us that Thursday is free-hot-dog day at the Uptown starting in an hour or so. So, let’s all go pound hot dogs for a couple hours and then head upstairs to Kitsch.

But, it’s kind of not even that disturbing. Is it a good sign that I feel that way?

Watch for yourself:

(Thanks, Amanda!)

Previously:

The Hives’ Howlin’ Pelle Almqvist offers terror rhetoric as stage banter

David is in Mermaid Bones, a band named after the secret ingredient in Clearasil.

He wants to give you, reader, two VIP guest list spots for his show at the glamorous El Rio bar this Saturday. This means you get into this girl-themed show for free, get to hang out with the bands “backstage” (aka that weird alley between the main bar and the show room where you put your drums between sets), and can play shuffleboard against the winner of the last game if you pay for the next round.

Ok, so you could do most of those things anyway. But still, free show.

Here’s the scoop:

My band, Mermaid Bones, is playing a show at El Rio this Saturday with Girls with Guns and Go Going Gone Girls. It’s gonna be the cat’s meow. Anyhoo, here’s an idea: could we have a contest on yer blog – best autobiographical story about almost drowning wins 2 spots on the guest list for the show…. whatdyathink? Here’s a link to the Facebook event.

So just leave a comment with your story about almost drowning and a real email address, David will pick the winner this Friday, and he’ll hook you up. It’s that easy.

Is there any way Primo could not be your favorite local DJ? Primo spins at Oldies Night, Nightbeat, 2 Men Will Move You, Lost and Found, Soul Night, and probably elsewhere. You could dance your ass off to Primo’s work every night of the week! AND he makes the best flyers (see above) by far.

So even though you can see him any time you want, this Mission United appearance on Saturday might be a little special because it’s a one-off event, it’s at Public Works which is a pretty different venue than most of the places you’ll see Primo (the bathrooms are so clean!), proceeds go to cool local charities, the event combines music with food and art and fashion, there will be a handful of other local DJs there that you might not be so familiar with, and it all lasts til 3AM!! Epic party!

Plus, we’re giving away three pairs of tickets. Leave a comment below telling us why you love Primo the best. Whoever gushes the hardest wins. (We’ll judge the winners based on merit, and the contest ends at noon on Friday.) Go forth and gush!

RSVP and invite your friends via the official Mission United Facebook page.

Check out Primo’s Flickr stream for lots more art and photography.

The day after having our minds and eardrums blown by No Age (and company), we got to see them talk with designer Brian Roettinger of Hand Held Heart at Noise Pop’s Culture Club at Public Works. They went into detail on their album art design process, including a history of record covers through the ages and lots of stories about their time growing up in the LA punk scene, and then they showed us this great slide of David Letterman holding their album:

We think Noise Pop should host Culture Club more often! What better way to recover from a show than seeing your favorite artists up close talking about their work? Allan’s first Culture Club suggestion was a panel of all those new bands with “surfer” in their name, or who use surfing and hanging at the beach in their music and imagery. Are they really all surfers? Do they listen to Dick Dale and the Del-Tones? We want to know!

So, Noise Pop, can you guys make this happen? Invite every cool band that plays in town to hang out the next day and talk about their process or their extracurricular activities or whatever? Hey readers, what do you guys want to see and hear?

In other news, my bike’s brake was stolen while parked on Mission outside of Public Works! It wouldn’t have saved my brake (who steals a used brake?), but Public Works would really benefit from more bike parking. So, Public Works, can you get some bike racks?

Oh and if you want to watch No Age’s rad performance on Letterman, check it out.

[Photo by Honey Jets]

This band No Age played at that sweet Grass Widow show the other night, and they were pretty amazing too. Drum-playing frontman Dean here charmed the crowd all night with a lot of cute banter. Before one song he exclaimed, “I love playing this song!” How cute!

At one point, he mentioned that the night before they’d opened for the Foo Fighters at Wembley Stadium in London. (Wow, right? From Wembley to the Rickshaw Stop in the space of 24 hours?) He said the crowd there sort of looked at them blankly the whole time, “like we were the weirdest band in the world.” The crowd at the Rickshaw Stop booed and hissed and shouted that this was lame, but Dean offered a word of caution, and a life lesson to an all-ages roomful of impressionable punk rock youth and snooty punk rock elders. “No, no, it’s not lame, it’s just how it is,” he said, “They just don’t know. They don’t know what you know.”

I thought that was nice. People need to be more accepting of different tastes. I’m tired of people getting all bent out of shape when I say I like Lady Gaga. But it’s great that he imparts that wisdom while also acknowledging that punks do in fact know a little something extra about the world, because we do, and that’s important.

Grass Widow were one of the openers for No Age the other night at the Rickshaw Stop. They totally held their own playing in between two more aggro bands (Rank/Xerox and No Age), and won me over forever by covering Mannequin by Wire. Here they are playing the same cover at Bottom of the Hill a few months ago:

Seriously, check them out next time they’re playing San Francisco (they’re locals!), before everyone discovers them and they blow up or something. Hey Noise Pop, thanks for putting together such an awesome line up.