Nick Gazin's Weekend Round-Up

Oh, what a weekend this past weekend was. The week ended and then the weekend began strong, but when the weekend ended what a weak end it was. WHAT! A! WEEK! END!!!!!! This past Thursday, I DJed the Subpop afterparty at Lit with my pals OJ from the Xray Eyeballs and Jules from Dum Dum Girls. Although I like Dum Dum Girls a bunch, it is hard for me to not want to refer to them as the Dum Slut Girls or the Cum Dumpster Girls or the Going Dum Girls, which is more of a hyphy reference than a playful insult.

Here's the flyer I drew for the event. I probably should have showed it to more people before it happened, because only a handful of people were there, but it was a high quality hang out with some of the best people in popular music. Subpop may or may not do something cool with this image at some point. I'm very proud of my melting Subpop logo. I talked to people from Subpop and I think I am the first person to do this.

This is a guy we call Gothathan, because he is kinda like a goth Jonathan Toubin. He bit me really hard on the shoulder, but I didn't mind. We talked a lot about the history of Savannah, Georgia, and how great a city it is. Did you know that right from it's outset, it was one of the most progressive and least racist cities in all of the United States? If you get the chance to go to Savannah, go to Savannah. It's a really cool place, very pretty, and it's supposedly the most haunted city in America.

This is Kyle, a guy who looks like a handsome Alfred E. Newman and works at Lit.

Here's Jules Dum Dum DJing.

I did this custom sketchcard of/for Jules. Sidekick Productions gave me a box of blank cards and I've been using custom drawn trading cards as a form of currency with my friends. Sometimes, I get drunk and just give them away, but I try not to.

Here's Jules with Ben, who is best known for being in MGMT. I played a lot of goth tunes, OJ played dance and rap, Jules played all sorts of stuff, some of which was Bikini Kill. After Ben showed up, we mostly played glam rock and talked about glam a lot. Ben is a cool guy who knows his glam.

Then he put on this amazing song by Zaine Griff, who he described as being a third rate Bowie who was kind of obviously aping the Thin White Duke but still accomplishing something pretty cool. It was produced by Tony Visconti, who is famous for being Bowie's producer on most of his stuff.

On Saturday, I went to Jonathan Toubin's new version of Soulclap at Brooklyn Bowl. Pictured above are the celebrity judges, including Andrew WK, Cassie Ramone, Mac Demarco, and Taraka from Prince Rama. Greg Cartwright co-DJed with Jonathan. JT's parties at Glasslands were amazing clubhouse hangs with some of the best and most oddball characters in Brooklyn. While walking to the bowling alley/show space, I wondered if it would be vacant, but I had to wait in a line and once I got inside of Brooklyn Bowl, it was as full as I'd ever seen it.

It was such a huge event that it was hard to see or photograph the dance contest portion of the evening, but I still ran into some of my favorite people, including the lovely Laura Leigh, who hosted the party in it's old location.

Jonathan's girlfriend Lenaya was handing out the numbers for dance contestants.

Taraka from Prince Rama was one of the celebrity judges, but she told me there was no Taraka, only Zuul when I took this photo.

This guy is Joe Jagos. He's at every event I go to and he has a monotone that's sort of like Thurston Moore or Jim Jarmusch or even the Buffalo Bill killer in Silence of the Lambs.

I drew this shirt. When I see someone wearing something I drew, I always tell them. I can't help it. I know it's fucking corny. It's like that scene in the Larry Sanders Show when he sees a rerun of himself on television and, while smiling, says in a happy, naïve voice,"I'm on TV!" I didn't get into doing art because I was healthy.

This is Michelle Cable from Panache. She's Jonathan's manager. She told me that they had 900 paid attendants, which blew my mind. I'm so glad that Jonathan's doing awesome and enriching this city with his vision of what a party is. At the same time, I feel a little like those Beatles fans you see in documentaries who describe what it felt like not getting to see them play every day at the Cavern Club. I guess he can't just be "my Jonathan" forever. Also, Michelle looks like a pretty cool person, right?

Later, I ran into Devin from DIIV, which is always pleasant. That guy is in one of the best new bands and always looks great.

I think he looks kind of like a person you'd see in a Flemish painting from the 1800s in these photos. That guy on the sidewalk is Jeff or Jake from Cloud Nothings or Wild Nothing or something. I should probably know more about current music than I do, since I'm writing about it. I also saw A-Trak at Asbury Lanes and King Tuff at Cheap Storage, but those are stories for another blog. Try to imagine me as a gramp closing a big leather bound book as you read that last sentence.

@nicholasgazin