What's Up! Magazine

As always, we like to talk about a little What’s Up! news before we move onto the big and bad local music scene. This month… we don’t have much to talk about, it’s pretty cool! The big news item is that the shirts are on the way we’ve got ‘em being made by Seatthole and INNATE, with a version of What’s Up! is for Lovers as well as the Play Anything shirt with John Cusack. We also have What’s Up! is for Lovers stickers if you want to grab one they’re sexy.

In “sort of” What’s Up! news, Becca and I are starting up another publication in May! Grow Northwest (which will be our third pub after What’s Up! and the Foothills Gazette) will be a bi-monthly magazine all about local food and farms, as well as DIY projects, cooking, gardening, locavore adventures, crafts, sustainable living, interviews, a photo section and much more. Initially, the general focus will be on Whatcom, Skagit and San Juan counties, but eventually cover Snohomish, Island and King Counties and lower B.C. (we’re working with the loose idea of a 100-mile range being our coverage area). If it’s grown or made in the Northwest, we’ll be covering it!

Our Grow Northwest launch party will be at Boundary Bay on Saturday, May 29, after the Farmer’s Market and before the Kinski show (also Ski to Sea Weekend). Also, please stop by and check out our Grow Northwest table at the Earth Day Fair at Boundary Bay on Thursday, April 22. In the meantime, you can check out our press release in the Bellingham Business Journal and Bellingham Herald. Those of you wanting to follow us on Facebook, check out our Grow Northwest Magazine fan page. We’re also looking for magazine contributors, so if this is up your alley, please e-mail us at info@grownorthwest.com.

I’d like to welcome and thank a few new advertisers this month Snug Harbor, who recently sold out the Wild Buffalo, have come on board along with the Conway Muse, Cabin Tavern, El Capitan, Vaughn Kreestoe and After Midnight Photography. I’d like to personally thank you all for your support of the paper and it’s our pleasure to tell folks about how awesome you are. The magazine doesn’t run on well wishes, it takes money to keep it going and these folks are all supporting the magazine while also receiving the benefits of advertising. If you’d like to get the benefits and support the mag, please give us a ring at 599-3320 or shoot me an e-mail at brent@whatsup-magazine.com.

And lastly, before, we get into the music end of things, want to congratulate some friends on receiving local awards. I love a lot of folks (ya know me, all love… heh), but wanted to make a quick mention of my love for James Hardesty and the Green Frog Acoustic Tavern. James is especially amazing and so is his bar. Hardesty, along with Jinx owners Michelle Schutte and Django Bohren (also of Merch Bot – aka Merch HOT and Seatthole) are respective recipients of the Mayor’s Arts Awards this year for music and art. In addition, Bob Ridgley (and Terri Krantz) won in the film category! Congrats to ya’ll!

BOOKED & HOOKED

DJ Holland (big sexy Josh Holland) is making his triumphant return to the DJ scene every Tuesday in April at the Plan B. All 90′s, every Tuesday.

Vaughn Kreestoe are celebrating their two year anniversary with a show on April *** at the Wild Buffalo. The boys have also finished two songs on their demo and are close to releasing a live DVD. Busy, busy boys!

There’s a new-ish venue in Conway called the Conway Muse that is amazingly cool. Housed in a barn, the venue is all ages, but beer and wine are available and it seats 150 with perfect sight lines. It’s a very organic feeling place and with that, the bands are like those that you’d find at the Acoustic Tavern very cool. They’ll also be hosting all age shows geared towards a younger crowd in the near future. Check it out!

Kristi Nelson and Biagio Biondolillo have secured a steady gig at Archer’s Alehouse, where they’ll be playing every 2nd, 4th and occasional 5th Wednesdays. Kristi, Biagio, Shawnee Kilgore and a few others have been taking over the local singer/songwriter scene with regular shows at Bloom, Archer’s and Honeymoon. I dig it, ‘cuz they’re pretty damn good songwriters!

Adam Bates, Rob Stauffer, Russell Jander and Bobby Morgan have teamed up for a new band, tentatively called Rob Stauffer and his Fine Friends. They’ll be playing on April 21 at the Green Frog Acoustic Tavern. That, my friends, is a supa-group.

The Urban Music Festival is on again this year, June 4-5 at the Wild Buffalo. There will be two stages, with free all-ages music in the alley in coordination with Downtown Sounds both days, then two stages rolling for 21+ from 9 p.m. on. The details are still being worked out, but I’m sure Acorn Project will be the featured act of the night.

Couple cool shows happening this month that should be checked out… well, there’s a whole ton of great shows, but these are a few we wanted to make sure you knew about… Little Dragon, VV Brown and Cara Alboucq are playing at the Wild Buffalo on April 11. We all known Cara is awesome (read about her on page 6), but VV Brown and Little Dragon are coming a long way to play in town. VV Brown is a soul singer like no other and Little Dragon are just straight fantastic and interesting electronic soul. This is going to be one of the best shows this town has ever, ever seen.

Another show to check out is the Atomic Burlesque, which is happening at the Mount Baker Theater on April 10. Burlesque with a kitschy space 50′s theme it doesn’t get any better than that!

Finally, the Wailin Jennys, who are an amazing trio of singer/songwriters will be playing a show down at the Lincoln Theater in Mount Vernon, also on April 10. The band is ridiculously good and so is the venue.

ON THE ROAD

Yogoman Burning Band is heading out on tour AGAIN seems like a recurring theme. I should probably stop writing about it and just talk about the band when they aren’t on the road. The tour kicks off with a funky show at Bloom on April 3 which features not only sets by the band, Half Bees and the Endorphins, but speaking engagement by Joshua Ploeg who was the former frontman of Behead the Prophet No Lord Shall Live (Yogoman/Jordan Rain was the drummer). Ploeg is a vegan chef and he’ll be discussing his first cookbook, “Microcosm’s: Post-Punk Extravaganza West Coast Tour.” Yogoman Family Fun Band plays from 3-5 p.m., then Ploeg speaks from 5:30-8 p.m. and Yogoman Burning Band, The Endorphins and Half Bees close out the night (18+). The cost is $3 per child, $10 general, and $20 per family.

Four Players and Go Slowpoke are heading out on tour in June. It’s still early in the works, but should be cool for the bands to get out and go on a little working vacation.

Femme Uke just returned from a nice little jaunt down the West Coast with the Hot Mess Shit Show, read about it in Tales from the Road. Ya know how much I love this band, so I’m excited to see they hit the road.

For next month’s Tales, one of the two bands will be the Heligoats (which we’ll also have a CD review of). Great, great local band that just got back from a tour that had them playing 34 shows in 38 days while driving over 10,000 miles. THAT, my friends, is a tour!

RECORDS & RELEASES

Sons of the Widow James spent some quality time at Binary this month, finally putting the goods to tape (or computer). No word yet on the release, but I figure any time these guys aren’t on the streets, Jay Irwin isn’t terrorizing the fine, fine community of Bellingham. Aaaah, Jay Irwin, damn I love that dude one of my very, very favorite musicians and people in Bellingham. I love to joke about Jay, but he’s truly a great person and someone I’m glad I’ve known all these years.

Acorn Project is releasing a live CD on May 1 from their set at the Flowmotion Meltdown last year. After that, they’ll head out on tour, hitting the West Coast as well as Colorado and Montana (and I’m guessing spots in between as the tour schedule gets filled out).

Hailing from Camano Island, Cat From Hue has been making some waves from Island County (actually, one of the members lives in town, and the band plans on moving up soon). The local paper has been great to ‘em, deservedly so as they just put out a great EP and the band is picking up cool shows all over the Northwest. Hopefully, they’ll be playing more in Bellingham in the upcoming months.

Ex-local and current Seattlite, Chris Orlowski is having a release party for his latest CD on April 10 at Plan B. The first single “Your Move,” is actually about Bellingham and features Chris’s sister who still lives in town. Cool!

Polecat have been playing regularly on Monday at Boundary Bay playing their Appalachian stomp to bigger and bigger crowds. Featuring Aaron Guest (Vantage), Jeremy Elliot (Vaughn Kreestoe), Cayley Schmid (Giant’s Causeway), Carl Olson (Umami), and Richard Reeves. The quartet will be releasing an EP “soon” and heading out on a short tour this June.

Tyler Clarke, formerly of the Heodonists, is releasing his debut solo album in June, titled Tyler Clarke and the Tea Seas Big Band. Kat Bula, Joel Ricci, Keith Judelman, Mars, Wes Davis, Evan Bridges, Thomas Deakin, David Ney, John Meloy, Dave Payne, and Jake Evans have all pitched in on the recording, which was done at Sleng Teng Studios by Pat Gaye and mastered at Bayside by Paul Turpin. Tyler (who went to the same high school as myself, Jordan Rain and Sam Top) was cool enough to send me a few tracks and it’s very, very good. Good, “rollin’ country,” stuff to put on when you hit the road… or something to go see in a bar. Love the country scene making a comeback in Bellingham.

Kosh, one of Bellingham’s newer hip hop acts, is working on his debut release, which would be out in either May or June. In the mean time, you can check out his video, which was filmed in the mighty streets of Bellingham. Check it out, on YouTube, just type in Kosh and Bellingham.

Cumulus is FINALLY releasing their (her) debut CD. Me being a huge fan of Alex’s, this makes me happy. When you pick it up, you will be too.

The Keaton Collective have been working on their latest release, which features a move away from the rock-oriented songs and more towards the acoustic side of things. Cara Alboucq spent some time with the boys during the recording process, which just raises the level of awesome.

No-Fi Soul Rebellion had a piece of their song “Brother Lupine,” played on “The Real World” last month. Though it wasn’t nearly loud enough, the song was played while one guy was hitting on another’s mom. About as cool as it gets, really.

Idiot Pilot has a new song out, which you can find on their website. “The Tail of a Jet Black Swan” is what you’d expect from the boys really, really effin’ good. Check it out! They just got back from a little tour down to Austin and back, which you can read about in this month’s Tales From the Road.

REGRETTABLY

Last month we made a few errors and we’d like to apologize to Bandito’s Burritos owner Kristi Christianson for not including her name under the photo and Juice it for not including their ad. Plus Brian Fannin is not the frontman of Monkeywrench, Bryan Steiner is. Brian is the bass player.

In sad business news, Bijoux is closing on May 31. I love these folks and wish they were sticking around but it’s time to move on. Please go visit the shop, buy some goods and say goodbye to Shelly. Thanks for all the support with the mag and good luck with your next adventure!

With le Beat coming to a close, I wanted to mention a passing that I just found out about this month. Erik from Rumors passed way last winter after battling serious health problems for several months. Erik was a supporter of the magazine early on and just an all around amazing Bellingham nightlife kingpin. I didn’t get to see Erik as often as I used to when I was always out, but every time I got to talk to him, it was a treat. He was a good, good man and will be missed. Our thoughts and sympathies go out to the family at Rumors, and Erik’s friends and family.

I hate ending on a sad note, so I’ll just tell you the exciting news on the Cole family homefront… we’re buying our son, Harrison, a drum kit this month! He got to play a real drum kit (not a baby one!) at a friend’s BBQ last month and went nuts for it. Incidentally, Harrison’s new favorite band is Sugar Sugar Sugar he just loves the song “Something Like U.” We’re hoping Lupe will teach him how to rock the way she does!

Go have some fun, kiddos! Lots of good stuff this month. Viva la Bellingham!

–Brent Cole

editor@whatsup-magazine.com