For all of y’all who just can’t stand to spend July 4th the usual way, hangin out in your confederate flag bikini and shootin’ your rifle at 2,000 empty Budweiser cans and bbq grilled Donut hot dogs, relief is on the way! Tee Pee records will be throwing a “New Weird America” festival in Los Angeles at the Nomad Gallery…featuring performances by Weird Owl, Night Horse, Ancestors, Farflung, Spindrift, Radio Moscow, etc….

For the flyer, we recreated the classic draft resistence poster, so much fun! Can’t wait to see y’all there!

Come one, come all, you denim demons and rodeo queens!

TEXT BY: SASHA LEE

PHOTOGRAPHY BY: JENNIFER ZILIOTTO

Thanks to all who participated and joined in the fun at the LA ROCK/Swap Meet at Space 15 Twenty last Sunday! All Seeing Eyes kicked off the set with a Small Faces, big bravado induced swagger good time, old schoo, long haired, teenage rock n’ roll. Mack Winston played it cool (shades mostly in tact) in the Sunday heat calling to mind Saturday night Slade, the Cars’ pop hooks, and lots of leather! Last but not least was Din Caliber, whose heavy Hendrix inspired licks that could even turn Heavy Cream into butter. DJ Starrsign added some righteous in between riffage in between sets as well!

Vendors included lovely organic cleaning products by Clean Peace, biker metal head hesher axe-wielding beer cozies and the like from Emilio’s Pocket, sweet somethings by CutXPaste, independent publications from Narrow Books, LA Weekly sign ups & t-shirts, rock n’ roll wooden paintings by Shang A. Lang, Apparel & Magazines by Beautiful/Decay, muscle & might by REAL Rock ‘n’ Roll movers, and interdimensional photography and 3-D design by Ryan Colditz!

View more pictures & vendors after the jump!

Mack Winston

Shang A. Lang's groovy wooden paintings!

Mountains of California

PBR & Phil Lynott Forever

Rock n' roll movers!

Victoria Fasano of Clean Peace

Din Caliber!

Ryan Colditz (design guru behind the 3-D poster!)

Halcyon's own Jen Z enjoying the sun!

Dude, I don’t know, but I think this might be one of the best videos on all of YouTube. Wait, didn’t I just say that like, last post or something? Seriously though, I mean it this time…

A selection of comments about “Headbanging while making fire” as posted on YouTube:

“you guys are badasses. this is the plateau of manliness.”
- foodcomatose

“this looks [like] my kind of party”
- ponysoldier888

“As a somewhat distinguished, or at the very least experienced, film critic, I can say with no doubt in my mind that esy87’s “Headbanging while making fire” is this generation’s Citizen Kane. I lament that the character limit of a YouTube comment box could never hope to sustain an analysis worthy of this work of art, however, such an endeavor is unnecessary - “Headbanging while making fire” is of such a pure, simple quality that it can be both understood and enjoyed within its 1:42 run time.”
- Blocken

“Somehow they seem like animals who have an irresisteble urge to do this.”
- Mazinager

“it’s about the pragmatic views on socio-economic modalities that were initiated in the southern colonies, pre-revolutionary war … oh, and the oil crisis”
- guttermanek

“where is this? looks like a great place to camp”
- xedgedubx

93 93/93

Dude, I don’t know, but I think this might be one of the best videos on all of YouTube. If you’ve never experienced the brilliance that is the motorik beat, watch out, mind blowing ahead! Anyways, you might have to fast-forward past the weird German introduction, and then ignore the pointless parts after the song ends, but its totally worth it. Also, sorry the quality sucks, but how else would you expect something as awesome as this to be?

Amazing things to look for:

1. The drum kit is 2 toms (with pillows on top for that extra compressed sound), and 2 cymbals.
2. The synth dudes are lying down (and in a position not dissimilar to that of the lying Buddha.)
3. White overalls. (See also: Drummer’s visor.)
4. Interpretive dancer.
5. Wait… make that interpretive dancers.

My good friend and amazing designer Ryan Colditz recently returned from Coachella with some three-dimensional photography of the happenings! It’s like bringing a little piece of the mind-melting insanity straight to your face. And, completely fitting for musical photography- think of it as stereoscopic surround sound! 3-D glasses required!

More images & a quirky essay by Ryan himself on the (mostly self-invented!) art of 3-d photography. The dude jig-rigged two cameras  with some McGuyver style maneuvers from Home Depot! Great stuff.

The Wow Effect

By Ryan Colditz

I feel like the guy on the couch in Half Baked. I think I could equate everything in life to a great 3D image. 

“Hey man….you ever thought what it would be like to climb that tree right there and take a picture…..in 3D? Sooo cool man.”

Why shouldn’t I dream about 3D, I’m hooked on it and don’t need rehab. Doesn’t really matter what it is, if it has good 3D, I’m into it. 

The process of 3D photography has been around for over one hundred years and has been waiting patiently for technology to catch up with the concepts and take our visual world to the next level.  Growing up I would sit in my parent’s basement and look at stereo cards through an old stereo viewer I was blown away that I could look through a viewer and be transported to a different place and time all together. I would imagine myself walking into the card and experiencing that exact moment of time. Why shouldn’t I, I don’t even have to create the 3D world it is already there for me. I never stopped looking at that that same set of 3D cards because as far as I could tell they were more real than any other image I could look at.

Ten years later I was given a 3D camera found in a dumpster. I didn’t connect the stereocards with this odd, four-lenses camera that looked like it came from the 80’s version of outer space, but I knew it was something to hold on to. After realizing the piece of gold that was just handed to me, I made the connection and started dreaming up what was the best 3D image to me. To this point I had alway seen landscapes and lots of closeups of flowers. Not the most exciting material. I started taking pictures of things I loved the most, art and music. I was sick of looking at 2D shots  when I knew there was a better experience waiting to be realized. 

There is something about a 3D photo that sucks me in, no matter if it’s a screaming lead singer or a steamy pile of shit. It looks so real that I wait for it to move. It’s too real not to. Not that I want to see shit move, but you get the concept. I think it is the immense amount of nerdiness involved that shuns a lot away from 3D. Yea, I know, I can year you thinking it right now, those fucking red and blue glasses give me a headache. Me too and I wear them for hours on end. My eye doctor told me I was gong to be fine, so relax and let your eyes translate the 3D information before you get too cool to check it out. It might take a minute to get the full effect. Can you afford to invest in a minute? 

This 3D world is one not too many practice, but the ones that do are rabidly obsessed. Because it’s that cool. When it comes to making 3D photos I chose to make my own camera rig from pieces fround at Home Depot. Basically what I did was recreate two eyes (one camera for each eye) and each time I press the trigger switch, a blink occurs and that moment is captured in stereo. The slight difference in perspective of the two cameras is what creates the shift and causes the “WOW effect.”

What I love about this duo are their equal nods to Julee Cruise’s high pitched angelic warbling in Twin Peaks and Merle Haggard’s love songs. This strange combo is a little bit haunting, a little bit twang.

Listen To: “Madman, Hysterical Woman”

Despite what the title suggests, this is a slow-honey drip haunter of a country love ballad. Plus they name drop Kris Kristofferson!

TEXT BY: JENNIFER ZILIOTTO
PHOTOGRAPHY BY: JENNIFER ZILIOTTO

I was invited by my good friend and client Jackie (aka Full Metal Jackie, of Indie 103 fame) to do her make-up and photography for the first annual Revolver Magazine Golden Gods Awards Show, the first exclusively heavy metal awards show in the US this past Tuesday. Read Jen’s full review & photographs after the jump! 

Before we arrived at the show, Jackie gave me a list of all the winners and bands that were performing so I had an idea of who she was interviewing on the “black” carpet. But as the night progressed, the roster of metal “gods” that attended the show had supassed all of my expectations. First up was none other than one of the most beloved musicians in the heavy metal genre, Lemmy from Motorhead. I had met Lemmy before back in the day when I was working the front door at one of the most legendary strip clubs in Los Angeles, Crazy Girls. Of course that was when all the chicks had tattoos, wore leather, and only danced to Metallica and Pantera….ahhh, those were the days.

Jackie was doing a great job on the red carpet, interviewing members of As I Lay Dying, Bleeding Through, Suicide Silence, Killswitch Engage (all bands that I have never heard of before but whatevs) and also veterans like Alice in Chains, Slayer, Matt Sorum, and Dave Mustaine.

The “black” carpet eventually came to a halt when a sudden downpour of rain washed out all the rockers in sight, probably in fear of losing the volume of their perfectly coiffed metal locks. Soon we were escorted to the backstage area where Jackie was to interview all of the winners after they had received their awards. Upon retrieving some drinks for us in the VIP area, I was halted by a security guard and could not go backstage because I did not have the proper backstage pass…fucker. 

Anyways, after a few minutes of frustration, I turned around to see my old friend Kat Von D yelling at a security guard to help get some gnarly drunk dude away from her. I hadn’t seen Kat in awhile so I was super stoked to see her and her lovely sister Caroline. Within seeing Kat and also one of the members of Steel Panther, they grabbed me and along to the backstage we went. Felt like a scene right out of “Almost Famous”. 

There was never a dull moment for the rest of the night. So many bands and random celebrities to interview that I thought it could not get any more exciting. Well, it pretty much did. As I was reaching into my purse to apply some lipgloss, I felt a huge wave of silence rush through the room. I looked up to see that none other than the Golden God of metal himself, Ozzy Osbourne, had entered the building. I have never experienced being around someone with such a powerful aura like that, usually I am pretty immune to being starstruck from living in Hollywood for years, but getting a glimpse of the man himself was just too overwhelming for words. 

Jackie was skeptical that she would get a chance to interview him, but after he won his award his publicist (who is a friend of Jackies) gave her the word that Ozzy would grant her an exclusive interview…and I was there to capture it all. Within minutes, all of the other press people and hangers-on were kicked out of the room except for Jackie, her video-camera guy, and me.

Ozzy was just so much more adorable in real life, very humble and gracious. He is really one of those people you would just die to be able to talk to about music and life itself. After the interview Jackie told me that Ozzy was the only musician on her list of people to meet in her life that she has never gotten a chance to interview.

She also had the honor of introducing the closing band for the show, Megadeth. We stayed to hear a few tunes and then called it a night, already hungover from the brutal debauchery that is heavy metal. You can see the event on MTV2, airing sometime next week.

Little Richard throwin out some high pitched ooohs and discussing the genius of Jimi Hendrix, which apparently makes his “big toe shoot straight out of his boot.” God bless Little Richard and his thinly veiled sexual aphorisms. Watch out for the jab Little Richard gives to Hendrix that “he don’t mind lookin freaky, just like I don’t, cause I’ve been doing it for longer.”

A lone, faceless, magician strums his harp in the dead of daylight.