Coloring Books For A Cause!

It never occurred to me to pick up an Adult Coloring Book before, but a global pandemic quarantine will have you doing a lot of things you've never done before. When my Mom was in a nursing home, her neighbor lady colored in a coloring book all day, every day, and I thought it was really sad. But then all of this happened, pretty much everything is sad, and I heard that Har Mar Superstar (Sean Tillman) and his fiancée, Laura Hauser, had created Coloring Books For A Cause, and suddenly I'm a crazed colorer.

Brainstorming ways that they could help local Minneapolis musicians out of gigs, Tillman and Hauser (a teacher and illustrator) thought about how First Avenue was celebrating its 50th Anniversary, all local musicians have played or hope to play on that storied stage, we're all home going nuts ... how about The Big Coloring Book of First Avenue and the bands who love it, to support them while they're out of work?! A plan was hatched, page were drawn, and the first Coloring Book For A Cause was off to the printers! All in like two weeks. The Twin Cities Music Community Trust is stoked!

So many great Minneapolis bands are in there ... I had a blast coloring Babes In Toyland, especially Lori Barbero's dreads.

Prince is in there, of course, as First Avenue is widely known as the house that Prince built for Purple Rain ... but the truth is he didn't play there all that often, and a zillion other bands have really made it what it is, but the association is there for life. And we're all forever proud of it.

The Replacements ... Hüsker Du .,.. Soul Asylum ... the classic First Ave bands are very well represented.

Newer (to the rest of the world) acts like Lizzo and Nur-D are there too ...

... as well as pages of the club itself for you to go freestyle and fill in however you like. It's weird, but it IS kind of addicting. Like, I get my mom's old roommate now. There's something soothing about it, and there is a satisfaction when you complete a page, as well as a kind of numbing to what's going on around you. I'm a coloring book convert!

And that's a good thing, because they're already on their THIRD Coloring Book For A Cause! There is now The Big Coloring Book of Grumpy's and Palmer's - to benefit the service industry workers currently out of their jobs at those classic Minneapolis bars. There is also now the brand new Dance Party Coloring Book - to benefit Violence Free Minnesota, because there is sadly a lot of domestic violence going on during this pandemic. Color for a cause!

It's catching on too. City Pages put a coloring page on their inside cover, with a totally appropriate phrase for the times:

... And the Star Tribune is releasing weekly coloring pages now, to be in with the cool kids. It's heartwarming to see how quickly these books are being churned out and snatched up, as they really are helping people while they're at it. This virus has done a lot of harm, but we're seeing an awful lot of good come out of it too. People are thinking of creative ways to help each other left and right, and I'm hoping that that will be the lasting legacy of this absolutely insane time in all of our lives around the world. I gotta go finish coloring in Atmosphere to look like Smurfs (Slug asked for it), but order yours and post your pictures, and help out some excellent organizations while you're at it. Thanks!

Order your super cool coloring books HERE.

*PS - I think this is a great idea for clubs and bands and bars all around the world to do! All the local people would get into it. Give it a shot!

Deap Vally At Lone Wolfs

Earlier this year I went out to Pappy & Harriet's to witness the reunion of my Minneapolis ladies, Babes In Toyland. It was, of course, awesome. The worst L.A. traffic ever found us arriving just as Babes was blazing through their first song, totally missing the openers, Deap Vally. All night we kept hearing how good they were, so I was disappointed to have missed them.

That all got fixed last night when I got the invite from RTO+P and Wolf At The Door to come and see Deap Vally play in the parking lot at the Lone Wolfs Objets d'Surf shop on Lincoln.

It's a gorgeous shop, and the Wolf At The Door recording studio lives downstairs in the former pool area of the PADI dive shop. The whole place just feels cool, and very Venice creative. I love it.

The gals of Deap Vally took the stage, and pretty much as soon as they blasted out the first notes, traffic got even worse on Lincoln, as cars slowed down to see what in the world was going on next to the Thai restaurant. And what was going on was pure rock.

Lindsey Troy belted out her vocals with sheer force, perfectly matched by Julie Edwards' banging drum beats, and both of them had on the freshest unitards, star spangled, fringed and shiny. Jealous.

Venice locals were out in force, enjoying a Little Friday (Thursday) and getting sauced (courtesy of Reyka Vodka) in a parking lot in a bit of practice for this Sunday's Abbot Kinney Festival.

In between songs, Edwards commented, "This is my next to last show before a baby comes out of my body!" - and I liked them even more. Rocking moms!

Some guys circle danced around in front of the stage and it all amped up from there ... and then we remembered we still had to go to work today. Oof.

The bottom line is Deap Vally is awesome, Lone Wolfs is super cool (more on them soon), and Venice remains the place to be surprised by a rock show when you're just out walking your dog, as happened with some friends of mine that randomly showed up. Excellent.

Thank you to everyone involved for another exceptional evening in Venice, California.

As we head off into the sure to be memorable weekend ... remember this truth from the Lone Wolf bathroom ...

You really do.

Babes In Toyland - Reunited In The California Desert

I feel like I just emerged from an awesome time machine. It took me back to the 90's, right in the middle of a frenzied punk show that was all I cared about in that given moment. We left Venice in some of the worst traffic I've ever encountered (like it almost made us cry) to head to the desert for the long-awaited and hoped for Babes In Toyland reunion at Pappy & Harriet's in Pioneertown. Like, I mean we left at 3 pm, and we were late for the 9 pm show. Yeah. L.A. traffic has been grizzly lately, something has to be done to help the people. It's wrecking our buzz.

The buzz that we didn't yet have when we walked down the dirt road toward Pappy's ... already hearing the punk rock of my Minneapolis youth pounding out of the building, as we ran to get there and avoid being hit by all of the zillions of stars in the sky. Wow.

The sold out venue was packed with fans, many of whom I overheard say they'd just flown in from Minneapolis, or Europe, or Australia (or just up the road) just to see this seminal and inspirational to many band. We completely missed the opening band, Deap Vally, but I heard people say they ruled, and the lead singer's Mom told me they did too. Awesome.

Kat Bjelland, Lori Barbero, and Maureen Herman were already tearing it up when we got there, and the fans were ecstatic, in an arms raised froth, yelling for their favorite jams. As it was so packed (and we were late), I didn't really get to take awesome notes, or hardly any photos where you can see anything on the stage (Pappy's could maybe raise the stage a couple feet to avoid this dilemma). No matter, it was awesome, Babes In Toyland are as awesome as ever (maybe even better, playing soberly and TIGHT), and that's all you really need to know. As well as what they played, so here's the set list I snagged.

And here's a crappy snippet from the thick of it, of the absolute rock being thrown down by these fiery dames. It was so heavy, even superfan Peaches was seen throwing arms up and head back in true respect. Even with a bunch of tech difficulties, this band was BACK. YESSS!

It was all over too soon (especially after that drive), but that freed everyone up to catch up and congratulate, and celebrate the fact that the Babes are back!

I met up with my bass playing friend, Maureen Herman, and just gushed all over her at how great it was. As we walked together to the back area, a fan (one of the ones who had flown in from Minneapolis) told her that she had loved them since she was 11, and she was now 33, and this was, like, the happiest day of her life. You could tell she meant it. How great is that? Your band breaks up, life's drama ensues over a bunch of years, you overcome that drama, get the band back together, and the response is so huge the rafters were still shaking, and then you're told that you gave someone the happiest day of her life. I'd say it went pretty well.

At one point in the show, Bjelland said, "This is our first show in a really long time, so we're kind of nervous." That didn't show at all. Then she said she hoped we wouldn't mind if she didn't play with her E string. Nope, and that didn't show at all either. Fans were too blissed out to really notice anything other than that their Babes In Toyland were playing live in 2015 right in front of their faces. It was actually pretty emotional for fans and the band alike, prompting Barbero to say, "I'm seriously going to start crying in one second... No, that's bbq smoke in my eye." To which Bjelland said, "Bullshit." And she was right. The shit was REAL.

Bjelland is sort of fascinating because she speaks in this tiny, sweet, little voice, then unleashes this absolute blood-curdling ROAR when she snarls out "CEASE TO EXIST!!" (during "Swamp Pussy") ... a good analogy for women all-around, I guess.

Fans hung around after the show and the band hung out for them, signing merch, taking photos, hearing stories about how far fans came and how much it meant to them. It was just great.

And then we stared at the stars until the sun came up over the pastel desert, got back into more hours of traffic, and clambered out of the time machine (car) to wonder if it was all just a really good flashback, or did it really just happen?

Turns out it happened. And will continue to happen, with shows all over the place, starting with The Roxy in Hollywood tomorrow night (for which tickets sold out in two minutes a few months back and why I shlepped to the desert to see them first), which you know is just going to kill it. Really do try and see these impressive ladies - pretty much every woman in rock and roll today owes them a massive debt - you will be rocked back to the future.