“Johnny was playing us all his four-track recordings. We were like, ‘you need a band.’ So we decided to be his band,” says Mama Cree, who along with fellow members of Terrible Twos provided early backing support for a young Ypsilanti-bred songwriter to get on his feet.

Johnny Ill first entered Detroit’s punk scene as drummer of The Potions, and since 2008 with The Johnny Ill Band (as a revolving assemblage of members) has released a pair of seven-inch singles on indie labels Kaboodle and Italy—with a third coming soon on X!—in addition to a solo downloadable single via Beehive. After undergoing several changes in both personnel and instrumentation, the band has settled into its lineup and sound, currently with Cree on drums, Matt Larson on bass, and Pete Steffy (Beekeepers) on organ. “We’re kind of stuck with the name now,” says singer and guitarist Johnny Ill.

“I guess it’s singer-songwriter stuff from a more skewed perspective,” says Johnny. Somewhere between the restrained crooning of Jonathan Richman, rigid rhythms of Wire, pop sensibilities of the Clash and washed in New York no-wave, the Johnny Ill Band is more proto than punk, yet could comfortably reside within the early SST Records catalog. “It’s kind of tightened and shifted. It was more guitar-driven before and weirder in some ways… at first I thought, let’s get an awesome guitar player to solo or something, but it seemed like it was almost getting in the way… so I thought, let’s try something new. Let’s try organ.”

The band has a full-length coming this summer on Urinal Cake, and they look forward to taking a continued new approach to songwriting. “It’s a lot more of just getting a feeling in a song, and a really different way of working with musical ideas,” says Steffy. “I’ve struggled to play a lot less.”

With firm adherence the Detroit community, the band’s collaborative sprit and drive toward simplicity define the essence of punk. “If you really want to be a band it’s super cheap. It’s easy. Everyone’s really close and supportive,” Johnny says.

“Bands that don’t sound anything alike can share bills here,” says Cree. “You get a lot of true weirdos. It’s not like it’s put on.”

Johnny Ill Band w/ The Vista Marias and The Rads • Saturday 03/25 • The Painted Lady • 2930 Jacob, Hamtramck • myspace.com/thejohnnyillband

03.23.11 / Real Detroit Weekly

The consolidation of multinational corporate media giants has had a drastic influence on national dialogue and thought. Discernibly biased cable news and syndicated talk radio affords little more than political agendas and talking points, whereas public broadcasting presents a variety of perspectives targeting a wealth of worldviews. “The kind of show that allows me to explore music… would never fly in the commercial world,” says WDET host Ann Delisi. “To hear a story done in a very in-depth way, with a lot of consideration… I don’t know that if WDET stopped doing that if somebody else is all of a sudden going to.”

“The country is in an information crisis,” says WDET general manager J. Mikel Ellcessor. “We have sort of record levels of people who don’t have a strong relationship to the basic facts of what is going on in our culture…. Just because something is called news doesn’t mean that it’s fact-based.” Most media outlets provide whatever will generate the highest ratings, often sensational exaggerations or weak speculations. “We’re presenting overwhelmingly fact-based programming,” he says. “That is a critical difference.

“The driving question underneath all of this is, ‘is this in the public interest?’” says Ellcessor, “not ‘is this going to improve shareholder return?’” Threats to defund the non-profit Corporation for Public Broadcasting (to which the average taxpayer contributes around $1.43 per year) have again entered the national discourse, yet the vast majority continues to praise its contributions to society. “They’ve said we like what this does, we think it’s a good use of our money, and it’s doing a good job… we’re kinda doing what people asked us to do.”

While syndicated, opinion-based programming is the most inexpensive to produce, Delisi feels it separates us from the essence of Detroit. “They’re not talking about the streets that I drive on… they’re not talking about things that affect me as a person that lives here… all those connections would be very strained if not completely eliminated if these shows went away,” Delisi says. “That became more of a mandate for me, to connect with this community in a meaningful way…. There’s amazing things that happen in Detroit and I want to help give them a voice.”

WDET 101.9 FM. Ann Delisi’s Essential Music: Saturdays and Sundays from 11am-2pm, with local music every hour. For complete show listings, information and streaming audio visit wdetfm.org.

Why public radio? With J. Mikel Ellcessor

03.16.11 / Real Detroit Weekly

“This place was a bunch of sticks floating down the stream,” says PJ Ryder, on the Lager House’s condition upon his purchase in October of 2007. Scrubbing away decades of nicotine (discovering an array of hidden colors and surfaces), removing several layers of flooring, replacing the roof, clearing out binsful of debris, rewiring the electrical, replacing the plumbing, resurfacing the bar and upgrades to the stage and sound system have revealed the potential of the historic Corktown showspace. “I think musicians appreciate the fact that the building is now grounded,” he recognizes.

Popular local and substantial touring acts are beginning to make more frequent appearances at PJ’s. “A lot of bands, especially traveling bands… are at least putting us on the map. We may not get everybody… but we’re at least in some of those discussions, whereas three years ago we weren’t.”

Last April PJ and his crew (mostly local musicians) silently liberated the hundred-year-old kitchen, and have since been serving a variety of high-quality burgers and vegetarian dishes, and have expanded their hours, opening at 11am on weekdays. Most Sundays are free acoustic showcase nights, with PJ himself cooking up New Orleans-style creole gumbo, barbequed shrimp, or whatever he’s in the mood to prepare.

PJ’s Lager House is an example of what big ideas can accomplish for a city. “You rebuild an old house one board at a time. You rebuild a city one little piece of whatever at a time and just keep on going,” he says. “The city needs to get out of people’s way and let them do what they’re doing, because what we’ve been doing for the past 40 years hasn’t worked.”

He believes the “limitless energy [and] crazy ideas” of younger generations moving in to be what will ultimately save Detroit, and he sees Detroit’s oldest neighborhood as an epicenter of the city’s salvation. “These guys have taken this crazy Robocop idea, and they’ve created this whole thing, and they’re gonna make it happen,” PJ enthuses. “One of the objections is: ‘you could build something else…’ and it’s like—yes! Put it together! Get the hype going… find a place to put it, find someone to build it and find some way to raise the money. Quit asking the city for stuff and do it yourself!”

1254 Michigan Avenue, Detroit • This weekend at PJ’s Lager House: Friday 03/11 Obits (Sub Pop; ex- Hot Snakes, Drive Like Jehu), Jaill (Sub Pop) and Swimsuit • Saturday 03/12 Scarlet Oaks’ final show • Sunday 03/13 The Zoobombs (Japan) • pjslagerhouse.com

03.09.11 / Real Detroit Weekly

“We realized we were both huge KISS fans,” says Kelly Jean Caldwell, on the dawn of her friendship with fellow folkstress Aran Ruth. After having discovered Ruth online and becoming absorbed in her music, Caldwell approached her at a bar, and soon they were making flyers for their first of many shows together. “Have you ever been to Sears later in life and gotten your picture taken? … They were like, ‘you guys are too big for those props.’”

“Sometimes it’s a really good idea to follow through on the drunken plans,” says Ruth.

Songbird Caldwell, with solo albums produced and released by Fred Thomas (Saturday Looks Good to Me, Ypsilanti Records), an EP and a 7” on Top Hat, now fronts a frenzied and haunting, punkish-country rabble including husband Brian Blair (Bad Faces Clan), Craig Brown (Terrible Twos, Mahonies), Todd McNulty (The Sugarcoats, Lee Marvin Computer Arm) and Kevin Sullivan. “You get to go crazy. I’m finally old enough that I’m confident enough to like, roll around on the ground, and scream, and say stuff.” The group will soon head to a secluded Michigan cabin to record a full-length with Derek Stanton of Awesome Color.

With a split 7” with Scott Michalski, a cassingle and digital download in the books, Ruth hopes to self-release a full-length sometime this year. She courageously performs alone—after previously pairing with a keyboardist, blending supernatural soundscapes into her delicate songs—and often finds it difficult to be discerned over the din of Detroit. “When I play on a rock bill, everyone’s there with the expectation of a rock show… because it’s framed that way,” she says. “You want to party. It’s tough.”

Ruth hopes to appropriately showcase the quieter side of Detroit by way of house shows and an upcoming in-store appearance at Royal Oak’s UHF Records. “I think when people go into it and it’s already framed as a mellow night, people will have that expectation,” says Ruth. “There’s no folk scene… that’s probably the closest thing to the style of what I play, but that doesn’t really fully explain it.”

“You sound like Pink Floyd,” Caldwell confers. “But you also are like, the folkiest, folk-downer, motherfolker I’ve ever known. There’s a tiny Fred Neil tucked inside you.”

Kelly Jean Caldwell, Aran Ruth, Gardens and the Sugarcoats • Friday 03/04 • The Belmont • 10215 Joseph Campeau, Hamtramck • myspace.com/kellyjeancaldwell • myspace.com/aranruthsmyspacepage

the interview: http://songsfromthemoon.com/2011/02/19/country-boy/

03.02.11 / Real Detroit Weekly

It came to Jared Groth and Andy Martin one hazy Pontiac night. Working at local venues provided the access to bands; interconnectedness and a passion for local music brought together some of the best in their fields to create the twenty-something-member filmmaking collective Single Barrel Detroit. Musicians perform in a variety of environments that suit the particular songs while a revolving door of directors, engineers, photographers and journalists document the experience. “It’s an interactive conversation that we’re having with the city,” says assistant producer Candace O’Leary.

“You see a lot of… attention paid to just the blight. We just want to tell an honest portrayal,” says Groth. Single Barrel gives a tour of Detroit guided by Child Bite on the grounds of Theatre Bizarre, The Juliets among the Hanging Gardens at Forest Arms, The Satin Peaches at Hamtramck Disneyland, Alan Scheurman outside his Fourth Street home, along with stops at the DIA, the Burton Theatre, John K. King Books and the Russell Industrial Center. “We’re introducing these places to people where it may be in their backyard, but we also keep a consciousness for people outside the Detroit area coming to the site and it being just as accessible to them.”

The bands are often required to come up with miniaturized, lo-tech versions of their songs. Accidental sounds from the surroundings are not only left in, but occasionally sought out. “There’s so much richness from what used to be the wealth of Detroit,” sound engineer Hugh Holesome says. “It’s taking the music that is current and… marrying it with where we’ve come from.”

“We’d like to keep it as spontaneous as possible, so that when the performance happens you get that sense of just being there,” says Martin. “A lot of the concept revolves around the idea that the music itself that’s produced can actually be inspired by the location.… Without capturing the environment that we’re in, then we’re not doing justice to the whole concept.”

“A lot of times I prefer that the band has never been there,” Groth admits. “That experience where the band is surprised and then they react to it… maybe even musically.”

pictured: Holesome, O’Leary, lead creative editor Zachary DuFresne, Martin, Groth, sound engineer Andrew Smetek and editor Patrick Duffy. Director of photography Mike Berlucchi and web designer Jeremy Franchi are either the “meat” or the “potatoes” of the crew—I didn’t catch which. Watch at singlebarreldetroit.com.

02.23.11 / Real Detroit Weekly

Formerly of the Electric Six and Rocket 455 (with stints in the Detroit Cobras, Ko and the Knockouts and the Go), Stephen Nawara has transformed years of exposure to the realities of the music industry into the Beehive Recording Company. Most releases come out of a Woodbridge studio called the Hive, with production, engineering, even much of the artwork done free of charge, simply to celebrate the ingenuity of Detroit music. “Whatever needs to be done,” he illustrates, “I do it.”

Beehive first launched in 2008 as a commercial enterprise, with downloadable singles selling for $2.50, but Nawara soon realized that “pay what you like” was the way to go when standing behind burgeoning artists. “As donation only, we’ve done a million times better than we did selling it,” he admits. “The generosity of mankind is way underplayed… doing this you get to see it on a weekly basis. It’s amazing.” Beehive is now able to release around a single a week.

From swirling and pervasive soundscapes to youthful, dusty 4-track power-pop, Nawara holds no restrictions on what he releases, letting the diversity of Detroit’s creative genius shine: catchy, lo-fi solo home recordings by Johnny Ill, a trio of Townes Van Zandt covers by a banjo-clad Audra Kubat, an Atari-esque rendition of “Gay Bar” by the Wildbunch, holiday-themed releases from The Henchmen, the captivating psych-folk of Aran Ruth. “I want to have polka bands from Hamtramck. I want to have mariachi bands from the southwest side. I want to get that far out.”

While anyone can visit the site and stream music without registering, Nawara urges people to become members—promising never to spam—to download the tracks and to increase the likelihood of ad revenue guaranteeing that the site will remain free. Beehive also plans to throw monthly showcases at lesser-known showspaces around town, such as Donovan’s Pub and Nancy Whiskey’s, along with yearly formal revues. “I want to utilize the entire city of Detroit… it’s a small town in a big city. I think it’s one of the most unique places in the world.

“It’s a very serendipitous thing,” says Nawara. “There’s a living-in-the-present-moment kind of feel to it… it’s all about the freedom of the artist and the benefit of the artist… hopefully it’ll just get bigger and bigger. I don’t see how it couldn’t.”

Check beehiverecording.com this week for a new single by Gardens, who will be celebrating its release this Sunday 02/20 at 8pm at Donovan’s Pub in Detroit with the Johnny Ill Band.

photos of Gardens recording at the Hive and an audio clip:
http://songsfromthemoon.com/2011/02/15/gardens-at-the-hive/

02.16.11 / Real Detroit Weekly

The charm of the independent quarterly literary zine le jolie rouge is in its minimalistic Xerox aesthetic. Hand-bound with red ribbon, the publication comes postage-paid (or personally delivered—anywhere within biking distance of downtown Detroit or Ferndale) with enthusiasm. “The easiest way for me to get my stuff out there is for me to put my stuff out there,” says co-publisher and often pen-named contributor Daniel Davies. “I guess maybe doing it in print is our different approach.”

Free from the constraints of trend and with no financial obligations to meet, the editors of le jolie rouge gravitate primarily toward the independent-minded and thought-provoking. Submissions come in a variety of ways from throughout the Midwest—typewritten essays, poems, drawings, short fiction, a handwritten note on diner ticket, a voicemail transcript, text messages and comic strips. “It’s more raw. People are writing this because this is how they feel, not because the cadence fits,” says co-publisher and contributor John Marchione. “What we want from someone is just something that they’ve written that they really feel like other people should read.”

“So long as the intention is honest,” says Davies. “Rather than… trying to force a story, or an idea.

“We’re not doing the norm, so make it completely wild. Invent a new form,” Davies encourages. “Use us as a platform to do something you’re nervous about doing.” Beginning with volume two (spring 2011), they plan to release full color, professionally bound editions of le jolie rouge, with online archives and the perpetual availability of DIY print versions ensuring that it will always be free to anyone who wants it—one of their core founding principles.

“For writers, you have to work for a long time, and you have to… struggle before someone’s like, ‘oh, wow, you’ve found your voice,’” Davies relates. “Fuck that. You’ve had a voice. Here’s the beginning of your voice.” Ultimately they hope the project outgrows itself. “There have been a couple of people who have told us they appreciate what we’re doing and have been like, ‘we have ideas about our own zine…’ then do it, man! We made it happen—you do it!”

“When people start doing it and we become old hat, so be it,” Marchione anticipates. “We’re not in it for anything but to get people’s work out.”

This week’s release of issue four concludes volume one of le jolie rouge. To request an issue, peruse the upcoming archive or make a donation visit lejolierouge.blogspot.com. Email submissions to lejolierouge.zine@gmail.com or call or text them to 313.718.1064.

complete interview, additional photos and an audio clip:
http://songsfromthemoon.com/2011/02/01/a-sunday-at-the-bronx/

02.09.11 / Real Detroit Weekly

“Ferndale’s an awesome town for riding bikes,” says Jon Hughes, owner of the Downtown Ferndale Bike Shop. “In the middle of summer there’s fifteen, twenty bikes locked up in front of the bar. You just don’t see that in other places… everyone’s real laid back and really nice. It’s just a great environment to be around.”

While DFBS is only now toughing through their first winter, bikes and bike shops have been in Hughes’ family for generations. His grandfather Mike Walden, who is enrolled in the cycling hall of fame for coaching multiple Olympic superstars, previously owned Continental Bike Shop in Hazel Park and opened several others in the metro Detroit area. Hughes was raised building fixed-gear racing bikes with his father (who owned shops of his own) and eventually built them throughout Asia, Europe and the Middle East. After becoming one of the nation’s top-ten riders, Hughes spent years as both head mechanic and manager of several shops. “I ended up working more than I was riding for a while,” he says, “and it just came time to open up my own place.”

DFBS sponsors some of the best teams in the country and often holds in-store trick sessions on a rickety quarter-pipe, complete with stationary roller race competitions (or “gold sprints”), conducts weekly rides from the store, and will soon be offering mechanics classes.“That’s what I like doing,” says Hughes. “All sorts of crazier stuff that other shops don’t really want to do.”

“It’s gonna be professional quality when it comes to the workmanship on the bike,” says Hughes. “When it comes to riding, we’re just trying to ride and have a good time… we’ll congregate and just decide, alright… we’re gonna ride up to this school, or we’re gonna ride up to this bar, and we’re gonna go have a couple of beers and we’re gonna ride back.

“That’s totally that’s what I’m about,” Hughes stresses. “Every time you get on your bike it should be a good experience. I wanna make it that way, whether you’re buying a bike from us or if you’re just coming in to go riding with us.”

You’re having a party this weekend?

Yeah we’re having a party on Friday night from seven til midnight. We sponsor a trick fixed-gear team and they’re gonna be in here. We’ve got these ramps, we’ve got a grind box coming in, we’re gonna be doing a little photo shoot. Should be pretty cool. So that’s kinda what we’re doing in the winter right now, getting amped up. Getting ready for spring.

We’re gonna do our $50 tune up for $25 this year. It’ll be February first through April first. Coming up in springtime we’ve got all the new 2011s are starting to come in, which, some of them are here and there. We’re doing fifty bucks off of any 2010 right now, twenty-five bucks off any new 2011 and that special will be through April 1st too. So we’re trying to blow out some new and some older bikes, this time of year as well.

The mechanic classes, is that happening?

We actually had to postpone it. We had a bunch of people that were gonna do it and then when it came down to the different times and dates, it didn’t’ quite work out. So were hoping to be able to do it in spring or summer when everyone has a little more free time. So I was actually really disappointed. I was really hoping to do it right now. But hopefully next year, I’d really like to do two sessions of it next winter and that’s gonna be a really cool class. I’ve got a whole thing written out. I was ready to go and then I was like, man everyone backed out in the last second! It was only like, three people and I was like, I don’t wanna… it’s too much of a commitment for three people to do it.

What does it entail?

That was basically gonna be, teach you how to do pretty much everything on your bike. We’d start out with the wheels, doing tires too, learning how to treat wheels, how to adjust your breaks, how to adjust your gears, and then we’d go through and we’d take apart your whole bike. It would come with a tool kit and a maintenance manual. And that’s valued at like $135 retail usually so it’s like you’re paying sixty bucks for the classes. So it’s a killer deal, but it just didn’t happen quite yet. So we’ll see. I got a ton of emails on it, just when it came down to it most people were like, “you know if you do it in April I’d love to do it!” So I’m hoping that, I’d really like to, it all depends on… we were so busy last April that if we’re that same amount of busy it wouldn’t be something til midsummer at the earliest. So we’ll see how that goes. It’s something that I’d definitely like to do sometime in the future. We do that, and then we also do… we do a lot of rides out of here. We ride out of here usually, well if you’re on our Facebook page you know… I try to post them early but a lot of times I’m like, “hey, were riding tonight out of the shop, if you want to show up and come on out and have a good time, have fun riding your bike…” that’s kinda what our whole thing is. We’re gonna make sure your bike’s running. It’s gonna be professional quality when it comes to the workmanship on the bike, but when it comes to riding, you know we’re just trying to ride and have a good time.

Where do you guys go? Just different places every time?

All over the place. We do a lot of rides into Detroit, we do a lot into Royal Oak and up that way. We’ll congregate and just decide, alright we’re gonna go check out… we’re gonna ride up to this school, or something, we’re gonna ride up to this bar and we’re gonna go have a couple of beers and we’re gonna ride back. And that’s usually what our rides consist of. And it’s just more about having run. we sponsor a trick team and we also sponsor… we have a new team that’s coming out that’s a road track racing team and these guys are gonna be, probably the fastest guys in Michigan. Definitely the top three in the fastest teams in Michigan. They’ll be the fastest on the actual track and hopefully they’ll be up in the top five of the nation this year. So we’ve got a really high-end elite team that we’re sponsoring. We also got a nice trick team that we’re sponsoring, doing all sorts of kind of crazier stuff that other shops don’t really want to do. And that’s what I like doing. I’ve been doing the bike thing forever.

How’d you get started?

My grandpa owned bike shops, he used to own Continental down the street. He opened up most of the bike shops in the metro Detroit area. He was a big time coach. He coached Olympic champions, multiple, multiple world champions, and he was in the cycling hall of fame as a coach. My parents owned bike shops.

What’s your grandpa’s name?

Mike Walden. There’s actually a picture of him up there and those are some of his riders. Those are the world championship jerseys that they won. And then they also… then my parents owned bike shops and me and my dad, we built fixed gear bikes. Those are actually, I have pictures of those somewhere around too. I built those over in China, Sri Lanka, Qatar, Italy, Germany, all over the place. So started out doing that and I’ve always worked in bike shops. I was top ten in the country for a while, racing on the road and the track. I was also a big mountain biker, and you know, you gotta work to pay the bills, so I needed… I was working more than I was riding for a while, and I was head mechanic at a couple shops, managed at a couple different shops, and it just came time to open up my own place. And it’s fun. We get to have fun, you know? And that’s totally that’s what I’m about. I’m about… every time you get on your bike it should be a good experience. So I wanna make it that way, whether you’re buying a bike from us or if you’re just coming in to go riding with us. So I can’t complain, yet.

When did the store open?

This is our first year. We opened on April first of last year. We’re coming up on a year and it’s been really good. Last summer I was… I couldn’t have been happier with how busy we were. I mean, Ferndale’s an awesome town for riding bikes. It’s a huge cycling community. No other towns you go around where out in front of the bar in the middle of summer there’s fifteen, twenty bikes locked up in front of the bar. You just don’t see that in other places. That’s one really cool thing about this place. Everyone’s real laid back and really nice and it’s just a great environment to be around. We’ve done really well. We’ve been really happy with it. Hopefully, I mean, I can’t imagine that next summer’s gonna be less crazy, and then just continue on with it. The winter’s always slow. You just gotta push through it. We’ve only got a month left, hopefully.

How do you plan to spend the next month?

We actually have a lot of stuff going on outside of the shop. With the shop itself, our hours, we cut down a little bit. We’re 11-6 Monday through Friday, 11-4 on Saturday. Normally our summer hours would be 11-7 or 11-8 in a couple days, and that’s Monday through Friday, and then 11-5 on Saturday and 11-4 on Sunday. So our hours are cut down a little bit but we’re doing, we actually have, these right here these are rollers. This whole system it’s actually not set up right now but this all runs. There’s timers that get put down here, these little electric light switches I guess you could call them, they catch the magnet as it goes around. And they run to sort of like a router which goes to the computer. And I hook the computer up to the big screen, and that actually, when these races are set up, they’re set up so you race against the guy next to you. And it shows everything up on the big screen. It looks like a giant clock and you have different second hands for each racer. You can have up to four racers. And one full rotation is the entire race. So you have the guys racing and you can see their progress as they’re going. And it’s a heads up race. The speed tells how fast they are, what the distance is and the winner overall, and then we set these up and they do… it’s like a whole series of indoor racing. Called roller racing, or gold sprints. And we’re actually, we’re doing these, we did it a couple weeks ago at the Loving Touch. We’ll be doing this Sunday in East Lansing for the Michigan mountain bike… they have an annual convention and then after that we’re actually… I don’t have the exact date pinned down yet but we’re talking to the New Way Bar cos they got a stage and everything, where we’re gonna hopefully do a big event there somewhere in the middle to the end of February. Then actually February 25th we have an event down at the Park Bar in Detroit.

photo from Facebook

So you bring these down to the bar and set em up and you have people sign up to race?

Yeah people sign up and they race and they do heads up racing. We actually have, like I said we have the ability to do four of them, so probably most of that time we’ll do two, but when we have some more experienced riders we’ll have the other ones out as well. And it’s really a lot of fun. It’s a short, really exciting, just beat your own ass type of workout. it’s only like a minute that you’re on the bike, you’re just going as hard as you can for the minute, and then you get off and you wait a little while. Basically it comes down to bracket racing. So you’ll put in, you’ll get your initial time, and then by that time we’ll set you up with someone that you’ll race against. If you beat that person then you go on to the next race and so on. And then there’ll end up being a champion. The one that we got going on that’s going to be going on at the New Way, probably actually the Park Bar too, we’ll have a bunch of different age categories. We’ll have junior categories, different levels of skill, different skill levels, and also hopefully we’ll have a nice sized prize list too. We’re trying to get to like a 3-500 dollar prize list together so that way people will have a little more incentive. We do that and then with the shop, we do all the ride sessions inside the shop here pretty much every other week. We’ll be doing that for the rest of winter, and then starting as the 2011s trickle in we’re starting to build em up, kinda get those going, learn all the new stuff and just get ready. We’ll be remodeling the whole back of the shop in the next couple weeks here and then our tune up special will start. So hopefully we’ll start getting crazy busy with tune ups. And that’s kind of our goal.

I’m thinking probably the first week of March I’m gonna have a huge used bike sale as well, cos I got a ton of used bikes that we’ve been working on. And I think I’m gonna probably like, chop down the prices on a bunch of used bikes and try to move some of those real quick so we can get a bunch of new stuff in. So probably like the first couple weeks of March we’ll do some crazy deals on ‘em where it’s just like, get em out the door. Half price. So that’ll be coming up too. I can’t think of much more. Just tell people to come out and ride with us.

163 W. Nine Mile, Ferndale; winter hours: M-F 11-6, Sat 11-4, with sales on bikes and half-off tune-ups until April 1st. Look for upcoming roller race competitions at the New Way Bar in Ferndale on 02.15 and the Park Bar in Detroit on 02.25. Befriend the shop on Facebook.

02.02.11 / Real Detroit Weekly

The Bell Beat’s debut The Carrot Chase (released as Sh! the Octopus), largely conceived by vocalist/guitarist Randy Bishop and hurriedly home-recorded into an iBook, could heartily be considered a modern folk record. Its followup Our Manderley presents the efforts of years of growing collaboration, and comfortably shifts from breathy and modest ballads, to jaunting and shuffling pop staples, to melancholic reveries. “Lyrically and musically, it’s much more fitting,” says keyboardist/vocalist Marina Trejo. “It just took time to find it.”

“I think we’re a lot more sure on what direction we’re going,” claims Bishop, “and I think the song quality is better. Not only because of the fact that everybody’s contributing equally but also we’re a lot more comfortable critiquing.”

“This album’s definitely a lot more mature than the previous,” bassist Chris Sesta attests. “It took so long to actually release the second album… because we were constantly picking at songs.”

“And we took our time, obviously,” says Joel Pearson (drums). “A lot of songs that we wrote, somebody would hate it and we’d end up redoing the whole thing.”

The key to their revamped sound was reimagination—not being afraid of experimenting with an entirely new approach. “It’s already taken us this many years. Who the hell cares?” Bishop remarks. “Let’s just do it again. Scrap it and start over.”

And time and calculation prove to succeed for the Beat (with Andy Stachowiak on guitar), who unveil their sophomore release with professional sensibilities. A beautifully shot video for “Call Me the Fool” starring an alluring young muse in a variety of vintage dress precludes the release of Our Manderley; ongoing DIY multimedia shows accompany the band’s performances, allowing the audience (or anyone else) to submit their own photos, videos and tweets from their phones in the crowd (or anywhere else) directly onto an onstage projector screen during one of their “Sh! Mob” events.

The first 25 LPs (including digital download) purchased at the show come with a silk-screened poster and a 12 oz. bottle of home-brewed, Bell Beat brand ‘Our Manderale.’ “There are so many bands out there. You have to do something… to somehow diversify,” says Bishop. “Something kind of fun.”

The Bell Beat Our Manderley LP release party w/ The Cold Wave and Big Mess • Saturday 01/29 • The Berkley Front •3087 12 Mile Rd., Berkley •$5 • 9pm • 21+ • thebellbeat.com

01.26.11 / Real Detroit Weekly

more Bell Beat: http://songsfromthemoon.com/2011/01/19/the-bell-beat/

Rachel Cunningham, Saquita Clark, and Demetrius Rouse each came to McGivney School under different circumstances. Saquita was court-referred and hopes to become a veterinarian. Demetrius was court-ordered, is currently student council president and wants to be an actor. His heart is set on NYU. Rachel chose McGivney when offered early release from her previous institution on good behavior. She hopes to become a writer but plans to attend law school. Because of Principal Looney and his competent, qualified, and engaging staff, students who end up at McGivney are granted opportunities that may be otherwise unattainable. They are all juniors who have attended Detroit public schools.

“It’s more help,” says Demetrius on McGivney. “There’s more individual assistance.”

On her experience at DPS, “I think that they’re just there for a check. I know its struggling time in our city, so maybe they just come in there and just get a check and they’re with us for the seven hours a day,” says Rachel. “They don’t challenge you.”

“The work can be so simple,” says Saquita, “and they’d be like, grade school. And you look at like, if me graduate from high school, what am I gonna do on a college level, and I isn’t learned nothing in high school?” She elaborates, “at DPS you can’t say one cuss word or it’s a suspension for two or three days. They really don’t care if you’re there or not. And they tell the government like, no child left behind, but some kids are dropping out and I feel like they don’t care.”

“If we suspended for cussing we wouldn’t have anyone at school,” says Mr. Looney. “We address it, but at the same time we understand why maybe these emotions are coming out.”

Mr. Looney and I step out for a McChicken. He points out a crackhouse that is habitually raided. Most of the surrounding homes are in stages of disrepair. “This is shit you see in like, Beirut. It shouldn’t be in Michigan.” We pass a collapsed garage, swerving to avoid a stumbling drunk as a pack of wild dogs barks at a fenced-in mutt. “That’s exactly what this is—decay. It doesn’t look like we’re a fucking powerful nation, driving around here.”

dialogue with Mr. Biolchino: http://songsfromthemoon.com/2010/12/28/mr-biolchino/
photos of McGivney: http://songsfromthemoon.com/2010/12/21/mcgivney-school/

01.19.11 / Real Detroit Weekly