Nightlight News

My interview with Pterodactyl on Tiny Mix Tapes turned out ok, methinks. Not as erudite as the No Docs interview, but then again, the setting was different, the people are different, I am different sometimes. Ahhh.

My volunteer writing gig continues, this time with a review of a show by Dark Meat at the 506. I tried to book the show at the Nightlight, but according to their agent, Dark Meat band members went with the 506. With this review, so it is that I discover the beauty/joy/pain of the editor, for reading back something you wrote after a heavy edit makes one feel slightly queasy, yet also strangely satisfied. Seeing your article restructured, slashed, reinvented, yet also strangely personal is something I guess I'll have to get used to, since my writing style probably lends itself to editing. See ya . . .

from Handbook for Boys: The Boy Scouts of America. 1910

Early in the fifth century, there rode through the forests in what is now London a large and powerful knight, with lance and plumes and helmet. Like his master, the great warhorse was clad in full shining armour.

From my schedule description - Tues 9/11 -Inspector 22 and the Bramble Ramblers / Bill Taylor / Baby Robots - 9:30 PM $5 An amalgam of weirdo indie-art rock bands, including our local Nightlight favorite Inspector 22, which is evolving into a full band revelation of Todd's song-writing output. The show was put together by Clarque Bloomquist, who is an indispensable asset to the local music community. Clarque plays drums and other stuff in the Bramble Ramblers, and he got Bill Taylor from the Manx to do a solo acoustic set to open. He also envisioned the whole evening to help showcase the touring band Baby Robots. Baby Robots are Austin residents/Florida transplants who seem to write songs that combine pop's gentleness with psychedelia's penchance for slight distortion and abrupt imagery. Classic.

At this moment, I am pretty much fully removing myself from the 'Nightlight News' format and switching to the 'Personal Update from Chizz' format. I guess the essential difference is that instead of attempting to write quasi-freelance news columns or posting fliers or trying to hype the schedule, I am just laying out a bit of personal shit for the world to find as they may, interested or not.

First things first, Charlie is stepping down as the booking dude/co-manager/artistic nonsense purveyor. Nightlight is still my peas and carrots, and the club, the patrons, the friends, the bands, the late nights, the dancing, everything about it is still as fresh and unrelenting as apple butter and fancy biscuits. However, in truly free spirited fashion, I feel my path is moving me away from Chapel Hill, and I just couldn't continue to do the job and club justice if I were many miles away following wispy notions of creative endeavor or natural environs. That path is as yet undefined, but it may involve something as wide-reaching or large-steppin as the West Coast, or Mars, whatever is feasible.

Nevertheless, please don't start any rumors. If you need a reason, well, I am moving along because I need to stretch my legs, I need to see more of the world. I grew up in the Triangle y'all. There is more to the world than Raleigh-Durham-Chapel Hill. I want to dip roots in different places, but the Nightlight is and always will be a major creative force in my life, and for that I am eternally grateful.

So we have been steadily and patiently thinking and deliberating about who will take the immensely important job off of my hands. For the time being, there is a small sense of limbo, for I have fully moved to West Asheville but still retain the duties. Even though moving and so forth have created some gaps in my ability to concentrate on the job, Nightlight will still persist and continue bringing you a diverse and eclectic calendar. August was a beautiful month for music - just the other night I had my mind blown by The Whole World Laughing - did you know that they really fucking rock these days? I was stunned, not because I ever doubted them, but rather because they exceeded my expectations my a multitude of one thousand million zillion. Between Scotty's amazing rhythm and looseness (Yogalates?) and Dave's killer shreds, plus the impressive length of their weirdo freak-out passages AND their ability to transcend instrumental rock's relatively banal hold on my attention - I digress.

Regardless folks, expect a continuation of my contribution to the Nightlight News, little updates here and there, but also expect a new voice soon. A new booking person, with a fresh sense of energy and new commitment, will only strengthen the powers of Chapel Hill's best club to deliver something for everyone. Perhaps other folks from the Nightlight (Alexia?) will step up and start contributing more to the creative side in order to help fill the gap. Alexis, my friends, has done an AMAZING job of building the capacity of Nightlight, and I am so proud of what she and I have accomplished in the past year. She deserves SO MUCH MORE CREDIT than I do for making the Nightlight successful and sustainable, and therefore, I issue an entreaty - do not suppose or wonder whether Nightlight will continue to rock or slip or ooze or booty or whatever you believe it to do with alacrity and consistency. Instead, trust that Nightlight will always be a wonderful place, a place with the power to test your notions of what is new and amazing.

Nightlight has taught me to embrace things that I would have otherwise written off because working and being at the club has taught me that limiting yourself to a certain genre or scene is as useless as having a dogmatic spiritual view of the world. In other words, Nightlight has taught me to see the value and beauty in so many different forms and expressions that I can't help but feel like a wiser, more balanced person for having risked a night or two booking something that seemed, on the surface, to be stupid, inane, boring, run of the mill, or disgusting.

Certain acts have been no brainers - Costes, Volcano the Bear, Jack Rose, others. It was so easy to say yes, we want you to play at our club. There have been other bands that aroused skepticism on my part, but I went for it anyway. Whether or not the skepticism was warranted when examining the night in hindsight is not a question I care to ask. Rather, I only wish to mention that some shows have been less well received or less successful because sometimes those are the best nights-even if the music was kinda lame or no one in the audience got it-precisely because I fully believe that maybe, on each of those nights, at least one person had to have gotten something. That something was likely a creative spark or little juice in the ankle, something that makes axillary odors emanate that surpass pheromones and persist for weeks or months. Sometimes I was that person, and I went home with a renewed vigor and desire to totally create some artsy goo. No other place in which I have ever spent that much of my nighttime has aroused that kind of consistent inspiration and belief-not even the mushroom dens of my college career or the campfires of the Maine backwoods have had as much of an enduring effect on my subconscious flow as Nightlight. And so, I hope and remain confident that Nightlight will always be a vanguard for the weird, challenging, and beautiful forms of art that roam the earth in search of somewhere, anywhere, to share a vision of a different world.

Thanks to you all for a full year of wonderful music. Thanks especially to Jeremy Smith, Anne Gomez, Dave Cantwell, Dave Jordan, Aaron Smithers, Scotty Irving, Ryan Martin, Lauren Ford, John Chavez, Jonathan from Kork, Jason Crumer, John and Charlie, Emma and Trekky, Chuck Johnson, Eberhardt, Todd Emmert, Clarque and Caroline, Crowmeat Bob, Isaac Trogdon, Brian Miller, WXYC and all DJs therein, especially David Harper, Cole Goins, Kevin Clark, and Isaac Sandlin, Ethan Clauset, TJ Ward, Darren Hunnicut - wait, this list is getting ridiculous - how can I expect to thank everyone who has helped me in the past year? The Nightlight community is so large and wide that you can see its butt from the front. Let's just say that I am eternally grateful to these folks and anyone else I left off the list that has helped in the past year.

But of course, the biggest thanks of all goes to my best friend, my special bunny Alexis Mastromichalis, who picked me for the job in the first place. Thanks baby for giving me a chance. I love you! Keep it up - you're doing a fantastic job and I am so grateful for everything you have done to help make Nightlight thrive and jump and bounce like circus fleas of love who drink not blood but smiles. Your beauty and grace and ebullient charisma are like linchpins holding up the books. I wish you the best and anytime, anywhere you need a hand give me a call and I will send mental crystal powers through a Durham Bulls cap to give you support.

That's all folks. For now at least. What was meant to be a brief update and caveat to bands (I'll be in touch) has turned into a self-indulgent panegyric to a club I love, to people I admire, and to a place that I will return to as long as it is.