A line had already formed around the block, frustrated fans being turned away from the sold out show when I arrived at Irving Plaza early to interview C2C, whose colossal French fame has crept to America. I’m supposed to be some hip music writer, and of course I did my research, but come on, a few weeks ago I had no idea who the fuck these dudes were. (Granted, electronic dance music isn’t exactly my favorite scene, I’d actually rather make love to my heated curling iron than attend Ultra. Yeah, I said it.)

I read a joke somewhere that went along the lines of this: A man collapses on an airplane, clutching his chest. The passenger seated next to him urgently shouts to the cabin, “Is there a doctor onboard?” Someone stands up and replies, “No, but I’m a DJ.” “Me too!” shouts a woman. “I too am an excellent DJ!” answers another passenger.

You get the idea. With today’s technology and easy internet access to music, pretty much anyone can be a DJ. The word carries a sprawl of meaning, from D-list celebrities pressing play at clubs to stadium-filling true greats. As Atom, one fourth of C2C told us in the Irving Plaza green room before they took the stage to kick off a rare American tour, “We started 15 years ago when it was all vinyl and turntables. I think there are good and bad things [about technology changes] today, like everybody has access to all this music but at the same time you have less. 15, 20 years ago, you had to physically bring everything with you, and you had to find the record, and if you wanted to scratch with it you needed to find two copies.”

“So now if you want to DJ you just have to search playlists by other DJs on the internet,” adds 20Syl, the other C2C member we spoke with. “Everybody can be a DJ, but only the talented ones will rise to the top.”

C2C aren’t just typical DJs but a French turntable group originally from Nantes, consisting of 20Syl, DJ Greem, Atom and DJ pFeL. The four met 15 years ago in college, and despite a decade and a half together they just released their first full-length albumTetra in the U.S. on February 11, 2013.

After sidestepping many security guards and repeatedly dropping the “I’m press” line I made my way to the top balcony where I met Michael Edwards, MIMP founder and photographer, and Spencer Scanlon, Publicity Manager for Casablanca Records/Republic Records. Michael was sternly told repeatedly by a young and quite serious manager that no photos were allowed backstage and we would have to do with concert shots, a let down as Me In My Place focuses on a more intimate look into artists, difficult to achieve visually without portraits. Come on dude, don’t act like I don’t know that C2C got stuck with the 1:30 afternoon slot at Coachella. If you want more than just you in the audience while the rest of the attendees sip beers and pass joints in their tents next year, unclench your tight French ass and let in some fucking cameras.

After plastering ourselves with an array of yellow stickers, one for VIP entrance, a photo pass, press pass, and one allowing us to see the band, Michael and I were allowed into the green room. There was an untouched platter of crudites, and enough French sperm to conquer the Dutch half of St. Martin. Honestly, there was so much chaos going on I wasn’t even quite sure who or where the members of C2C were. As Michael and I stood there awkwardly for a few minutes I was ready just to bat my eyelashes at the first one to glance my way and pray he’s a member of the band, or at least knows where the hell they are.

We were finally lead into a second room and sat down with Atom and 20Syl, as a young friend of the group downed glasses of liquor and bobbled about the room. There was a television in the room that displayed the opening act on stage, and the interview was interjected with chants of “C2C! C2C!” from the eager crowd.

What I was most curious about, was why the 15 year wait to release a full-length album. In the years prior to the release ofTetra, C2C spent considerable time working on their two side projects, Hocus Pocus and Beat Torrent. Hocus Pocus is a jazz/hip-hop group composed of 20Syl and DJ Greem, while Atom and DJ pFeL’s project Beat Torrent is Hocus Pocus’s DJ brother. “We had propositions for gigs for C2C and Hocus Pocus on the same day. So the guys had to do the Hocus Pocus gig, and we had to do the C2C gigs, so pFeL and I said ‘Let’s make another band, just the two of us. And that’s how Beat Torrent was formed,’ says Atom.

C2C, the four’s collective whole and home, sound like the love child of Hocus Pocus and Beat Torrent. As C2C, they’ve been prominent on the competition circuit, winning four consecutive Disco Club Mix World Team DJ Championships from 2003-2006. After 15 years of side projects, playing video games, and owning the competition circuit, the group decided it was time to settle down and finally release a C2C LP. You’d imagine after 15 years of creating music together selecting the final tracks for Tetra would be difficult, but they simply picked 100, than voted on their favorite 20. “What was really funny at the end is that the 20 tracks we chose were the same…. the top five was the same for all of us,” says 20Syl.

Tetra was recorded in 20Syl’s home in Nantes he built himself, which includes a studio, a few bedrooms, a single bathroom, and his two most prized possessions: Two cats, one named Chicken.

“Chicken?” I ask.

“Yes, but in French. ‘Poulet.’ When we find him he was just preying in our garden, he was a baby, we just took him in. The other one’s name is Brittany but he became Pee Wee Net.”

“Pee Wee Net?” (Keep in mind there’s a chance I heard this wrong through the accent and surrounding hubbub.)

“You know cats, you give them a name and then you change it,” agrees Michael. I get it, my cat’s name was Sandra when I adopted her and now I call her Mama Cat, full name Mama Cat Pants.

For those new to the word “turntablism,” it’s more than just DJs keeping it old school, it’s an art form using turntables as musical instruments. In a live C2C performance, the use of turntables also includes physical feats involving rearranging the sizable turntables to “battle,” a light show constructed by each member to correspond with their beats, and of course, a tribute to MCA.

“There is this first step where we are moving with our turntables, then after that we battle, then my favorite is maybe when we play ‘The Beat’ song, because we take the mics and we are rapping and there is some explosion in the crowd because everyone is excited that we are… we doing a little homage to the Beastie Boys,” 20Syl says with a grin.

Eventually we were escorted out of the green room, yellow badges taken away, and the show began. It lived up to all of C2C’s promises, captivating light shows, a rearrangement of turntables for a battle, yes, a Beastie Boys tribute. My personal favorite moment was my favorite track of the album,“Happy,” a voodoo inspired video with vocals by Derek Martin. “We wanted to find a voice you could recognize,” says Atom. “Yes, we have been searching for something timeless, so you can’t tell if it’s a sample or not,” added 20Syl. “But there are no samples.” While slightly confusing, C2C’s range of cultural references in their music is impressive, from the old timey Chicago foot work in the black and white video for “Happy” to the group donning flat-brimmed New York baseball caps for a tribute to MCA.

I don’t particularly enjoy large sweaty crowds pressed against me, which at times has presented anxiety in my music journalism career and perhaps why I’ve kept my orgie fantasies limited to an incognito Chrome window. Sometimes a perk of covering a show is you get to sit up on the balcony, a different experience than the C2C fans pressed against the barriers I confess, but you get to witness backstage facets of tour that an average ticket holder does not. In this particular instance I’m not speaking of cocaine passed around on mirrors (there was none, don’t fret, dear family) but the elderly parents of DJ Greem who Michael and I gave up our seats for. Michael’s time is better spent running around capturing images and mine standing, enjoying a PBR and taking notes while discussing the show with Spencer, anyway. I attempted to talk to the adorable supportive French parents about their son, whose birthday it happened to be, but over the noise and the language barrier we couldn’t understand a word the other was saying, other than:

“You must be so proud,” I told Greem’s mother, smiling through the strobe lights.

“Yes, yes, we are so happy!” she responded ecstatically, hand on her husband’s shoulder.

For a list of C2C’s tour dates, visit http://www.c2cmusic.fr/tournee/.

(Source: app.meinmyplace.com)

Claire Coffee, You Sexy Beast.

Claire Coffee, You Sexy Beast.

(Cozying up with @NBCGrimm’s Sauciest Resident #Hexenbiest)

chat @ClaireCoffee

words @FaleneNurse

pictures @ME

As you may, (or may not) have figured out, Claire Coffee is well loved at MIMP. Spend a little time with her and you will be quickly charmed (and thoroughly entertained) by her campy “Kitten With a Whip,” sense of humor. Tongue n’ cheek sass, behind a jaw-dropping form. No doubt it’s that combo that turned her guest spot on Grimm, into a series regular. She falls into an exclusive club here on the site, we like to call “TwoTimers.” Which is not some tacky play on words, meant to reference cheating or any other salacious implications (trolls be warned!). “TwoTimers” are those delightful lasses, that quite frankly one shoot simply doesn’t suffice. We need, we want, and then we implore for more (dazzling photos).That’s right, a second glorious MIMP shoot is required for these coveted few. Where once again we can bathe them in the subtle haze of the natural light, as they get all cozy, lounging around the house in their undies—as the good Lord intended! Can I get an Amen?

Ms Coffee fits into another category as well, (one that I’m also rather fond of), those talented women who can go from soft-featured, natural beauties, to the incredibly creepy and unnerving. All with the slightest curve, of a particularly wicked grin. You know the “I’m smiling but I’m gonna devour your intestine” crowd; ladies like Chloe Moretz, Naomie Harris, Eva Green, Summer Glau and Helena Bonham Carter. If you’ve been watching Grimm (Fridays, 9 p.m), you know exactly what I’m referring to, and it’s not because of that Hexenbiest CGI either. Which granted, in it’s own right, is AB-SO-LUTE-LY horrific! It really does resemble a flesh eating virus, ravishing through the entire right side of her face! This show ain’t no kiddies’ fairytale hour, that’s for sure.

So I had a little Coffee ‘Tawk’ this morning with the captivating Claire, as she returned to NY for a few days R&R after shooting in Portland. In our MIMP chat she reveals the possibility Adalind Schade might birth the show’s first Hexenbaby; as well as her fantasy football picks, David Giuntoli’s continued irritation with carbs, and what it truly means to have shirtless rage. Thanks to my newfound insider info, I’m heralding Spring’s return of Grimm as the Season of the Witch.

Q&A

These chats can become a tad silly, it that OK?

I think all interviews with actors in general, should always be silly.

I like to keep it light.

Well there are pictures of me in my underwear, so how serious can you get (laughing).

Grimm shoots in Portland, is it really like Portlandia out there?

Portlandia is starting to seem more like a documentary than a comedy. Except for the mice, I have yet to see a talking mouse or rat.

New York or LA?

Well I lived in LA for 10 years, but now I live with my boyfriend out here. I moved last May, then got promoted on the show, which was wonderful. We went on hiatus, and now I’m flying back and forth to Portland to shoot. Although I prefer NY to LA, shooting in Portland is pretty fantastic! They have all these Craftsman, storybook homes.

How could it not? I mean people have coined phrases and learned a whole new word set, because of this show (terms like “pheromaniacal” and “#shirtless rage” immediately come to mind).

Well all signs are leaning towards it, so I think it will. Of course I hope it will. It really does appeal to a broad spectrum of people, for different reasons. A lot of people watch it as a family, the teens and young adults are into the sci-fi and fantasy elements, and I think the older viewers really enjoy how dark it gets. And the darker humor, that can come with that.

It’s one of the few unique, scripted shows on TV right now.

It is different. We do also have a very loyal, strong fanbase, similar to the Buffy and X Files fans. Those are the best kind of fans to have, they are invested. We were worried when we went on hiatus, but the Friday we came back we didn’t lose any viewers—I think the numbers increased. We came back really early, so we could air all ten new episodes before the 2 part finale. And let me tell you I have read the script for the first part and it IS BONKERS! I wait for these scripts with baited breath, not just for the storyline, but because Adalind is so insane (laughing).

She’s wicked, but it’s good. I’m thrilled she didn’t die.

Now she might have a baby on the way, a little Hexenbaby. It also might be mentally unstable, I mean she’s crazier then any contestant on the Bachelor and those ladies are out of their skulls!

What is Renard, besides Royal?

He’s half (witch) Hexenbiest (she tells the story as if it’s a family secret, or the plot twist to a popular Soap Opera). You see in the world of Grimm, you are born a witch, but your powers can be taken away. So Adalind’s mom was a witch, but we don’t know anything about my father yet. So of course I created my own back story, I assumed he abandoned me—upon discovering I was in fact a full-blooded witch baby.

(I break into wild laughter at this point, as this conversation sounds like the overheard ramblings of two Bellevue patients).

My Hexendaddy couldn’t handle the prospect of dealing with a teen witch, in the prime of her adolescence.

Who’s Adalind’s Baby Daddy?

One of the brothers, the baby will be of Royal blood. Adalind is very cunning that way. We were laughing that it might be a bit of a Rosemary’s Baby too. I was imagining “now, what would a Hexenbaby crave?” Blood? Raw flesh?

Please explain Shirtless Rage?

Sasha Roiz (Renard) has his shirt off in a lot of episodes, usually when he gets angry. So every time he gets mad, his shirt just happens to come off (laughing). I don’t know if he coined the phrase, or if a fan tweeted it, but it definitely has become a thing. I wish I knew how it started.

He’s like 6ft5 and you are tiny.

He’s a full foot taller than me, I’m a petite 5ft4 and he is 6ft4. He’s a pretty strapping guy.

You are an avid American football fan?

Yeah I have a blog where I predict scores, amongst other things. My team is the 49ers, I grew up north of San Francisco. As an 80s kid, I would see Joe Montana on TV in his hey day. Then when I graduated high school, I started following college football. About the same time I got back into the 49ers again, they weren’t doing so well at all. I certainly can’t be accused of being a fair weather fan. When they got a new coach, things started to improve.

Is that the team that’s going to sign Manti Te’o? (I know, I know, I don’t know ANYTHING about American football).

Well he’s a college recruit, so he hasn’t been drafted yet. He’s considered a real good player, but after the whole Catfish debacle, a lot thought it was a strike against his character. Like, how much of an idiot must someone be, to fall for this. Different positions, require a different skill set I say. I mean if your purpose is to bash in your opponent, maybe it’s better if you don’t ask too many questions.

Do you think you could ever be Catfished?

No way, Jose! I’m a very skeptical person, with everyone. People create entire fake profiles, they look for your weak spot as a way in. That someone would go to such lengths, to be so devious online, the internet can create highways for certain people to wreak havoc. At a really rapid pace.

Gay men would be my kryptonite. If you could be any football player, living or dead, who would it be?

Patrick Willis, he’s a linebacker and he’s ferocious, that seems like fun. Getting all those frustrations out as part of your job. He also has an amazing story, so he seems like a genuinely good person. Ferocious on the field and a sweetheart in real life. I think that’s a recipe for happiness.

Do you feel a pressure to maintain your shape?

Well I work out A LOT(laughing). There’s pressure as there is with any job, and I look at exercise as part of my job description. I’m not going to train like an Olympian, but yes, it comes with the territory. Then the wardrobe of an evil seductress, tends to be tight. Or I’m involved in some shirtless rage with Sasha (cackles), so it’s best to keep in fighting form. Thankfully, I like to exercise, so it’s not too much of a chore. I’m also generously rewarded with ice cream. That’s the thing I’m not willing to compromise what I eat, I love going out for dinner, I live in NY and film in Portland! Some of the best food and restaurants ever.

Well at least the boys have to also, none of them look too shabby on Grimm.

We were having a cast Super Bowl party and David, had to have his shirt off the next day, so he was eating celery and veggie dips. For the guys, if you are going to be half naked, the carbs are the first things to go. Oh yeah, the boys have to maintain too. Equal opportunity exercising, for all of us.

As an actress, have you ever read a post with one of your shoots, and thought “what the what?”

I try not to read the comments, you never know what’s going to get posted. I think as an actress, when you shoot pictures (or film a scene) in lingerie, you forget how many people are going to eventually see. There’s this buffer of time delay, as it may come out months later.

Even the complimentary comments, there is that point when they get far too specific.

I had a couple of situations like that on Twitter, where it wasn’t negative, just too explicit and graphic. I decided to block a couple of people because of that.

Whether recipient or sender, there’s a fine line between”hot” and “gross.”

Yeah, I never understood why men thought it was a good idea to send/text snapshots of their junk. Thank the Lord I have never received one in my lifetime.

Wish I could say the same, ugh.

Oh God, No, NO! How are you suppose to reply to that?

Good grooming? (lol)

I don’t think that was the response he was looking for (laughing). Maybe a memo should be sent to all men in the universe, when you send a penis pic, it probably isn’t going to end well. Was there a guy convention where they came up with this idea, without asking any actual women?

A film role, you would relish?

My most beloved movie of all time is Amelie, I would love to be set loose in that world. Fantasy laden, heartbreaking, charming and gorgeous. To work with that director (Jean-Pierre Jeunet) who sees the world in that way. Also I would like to be Dr Who’s companion, fantasy is the best.

Guilty pleasures?

Ice cream, pints and pints of ice cream, loaded up ready to go—in my freezer right now.

Are you a vintage clothes connoisseur?

I love vintage clothes and Portland has the best thrift stores. NY and LA can be overpriced because of the popularity, but in Portland you can find real gems. Vintage shoes and season bags. Sometimes I have to restrain myself, but the prices are really reasonable. I have had shoe binges out there.

Are your neighbors horrid?

In NY? I don’t know any of them, so that makes them wonderful. Though I will say a couple of units were partying the other night, and someone had taken a bag of beer bottles and vomit soaked paper towels and left them in the hallway!! Take it to the garbage, disgusting human! I was enraged.

You should have gone all Hexenbiest o them, at their front door, full make-up!

Then I found pup poop. I can’t say it’s the same person, but I do wonder.

Musically what do you like right now?

My fantastically talented boyfriend is a musician, he plays the mandolin. So I’ve been listening to a lot of mandolin. Classical music too, he’s recording a Bach album.

When is Shohreh Aghdashloo coming?

My God I love that woman! We share a future storyline, which is coming up—soon. As an actress and a person, I can only say glowing things about her, she is one of the most amazing people I’ve ever met—in life. She’s so perfect for the show, ah and that voice.

She’s the Queen of ALL The Gypsies! God these gothic, melodramatic characters, are delicious, yum.

Well she’s an ally… with an asterisk. Adalind doesn’t really have any friends, pretty much the whole cast wants to kill her. The Gypsy Queen should be arriving in about a month, I can only tell you that much though.

If they made a fairytale film, which one would you want to be in?

They did already, Hansel and Gretel.

As Gretel or The Witch?

Before, I would have said Gretel. As a kid I always liked that name, I was also Gretel in the Sound of Music (ha ha). Now, I would be the witch. I feel it’s in my wheelhouse, I’m good at it. I also like the idea of a house made of candy.

Forget those kids, there’s a whole house of sugar, BABES!

Also Jack and the Beanstalk. In that scenario I would have to be Jack, of course.

Catch Claire getting all crazy on Grimm every Friday night at 8/9pm on NBC.

And to see the bonus out-takes from Claire’s Me In My Place shoot, be sure to pick up a subscription to the MIMP MOBILE WEB APP here.

Return To The Wild With Jamestown Revival

Jamestown Revival @jtrevival

Words by Pisha Warden (@macpisho)

Images by Michael Edwards

Two cherries were popped recently here at MIMP.

Jonathan Clay and Zach Chance, also known as the band Jamestown Revival, recently became the first men to be photographed for MIMP. And while they weren’t peeling off layers of attire during the shoot, they certainly held nothing back when we chatted in their studio a few days later, at which point they became my first three-way…interview. For the record, they were absolute gentlemen and an absolute blast. (Besides, ladies, Jonathan is married. But Zach isn’t, and has one helluva mustache. Just saying.)

As a new music fiend in Los Angeles, I’d already heard good things long before we met about this band-on-the-rise, whose folksy, bluesy, harmony-driven and southern-infused songs are as honest as they are poetic.

You don’t have to take my word for it, either. We here at MIMP have your back, and you can watch Jamestown Revival perform the song “Fur Coat Blues,” from their upcoming full-length album, Utah. And as an extra special EXCLUSIVE to our MIMP readers, you can download a live version of ‘California (Iron Cast Soul)’ (This track is ONLY available through MIMP! Awesomesauce!)

Originally from Austin, Texas, Jamestown Revival came to Los Angeles in 2011 after being finalists in an independent artist competition for the cover of Rolling Stone Magazine. While they ultimately didn’t win the cover, the momentum from that exposure carried them west in search of new challenges and adventures, some of which include: performing on The Carson Daly Show, having their music featured on TV (VH1’s Couples Therapy), and recording their first full-length album, Utah, due to be released later this year.

In their Culver City studio on a drizzly Tuesday morning, these easy-going Texans got the interview going long before I even realized what was happening. While finishing each other’s sentences like twins, they talked about the upcoming album, chronic wanderlust, and the adventure thus far.

Pisha: You know you were the first guys to shoot with Michael for Me In My Place?

Zach: We stole the man picture virginity?

P: Sure did! Are you familiar with our site?

Z: We’ve poked around.

Jonathan: I wouldn’t say very familiar, but we checked it out and got a feel for it, what it was.

Z: Lots of great scenery.

J: We hadn’t heard of it previously, but it was a delightful discovery.

Insert the sound of my nervous laughter here as I try to “officially” start the interview, while convincing myself that the hotness I feel spreading across my cheeks isn’t from blushing.

P: First off, how would you guys describe your sound or influences to people who don’t know you?

J: (to Zach) What did you say one time? “It sounds like losing your virginity in the back of your grandmother’s Oldsmobile—

Z: “—while watching Purple Rain.” It sounds like if Burt Reynolds mustache could play guitar and harmonize with itself. No, maybe that’s too generous.

J: It’s harmony-driven, it’s rooted in American songwriting, and we tell stories about stuff we know. Our influences are everybody from classic rock like Credence Clearwater and Led Zepplin to fuckin’ ZZ Top when we’re feeling weird, to John Prine and Guy Clarke—

Z: —Simon and Garfunkel.

J: it’s kind of classic rock with classic master songwriters. I’m not saying we are, but those guys are what we aspire to be.

Z: Maybe this is one of those things that you don’t appreciate until it’s gone, but Texas is rich with music history. The south is. So I look back at all the influences that maybe we picked up and didn’t even realize until we got to LA. We didn’t realize how much we were Texans, and hillbillies—

J: —we’re refined hillbillies, and you can quote me on that—

Z: —yeah, that was a big thing [musically], really understanding where we came from.

P: Where are you from?

J: We grew up in a small town called Magnolia, Texas.

Z: It’s on the outskirts of Houston.

J: The population sign still says eleven hundred people, but I think that’s a farce. But they move slow, everybody’s got a little bit slower pace down there. Zach moved from Lubbock, Texas when we were in ninth grade and we immediately became archenemies.

Z: (smiling) We did.

J: At that point our class had like three hundred people in it, that’s pretty small. A new kid moves in and it’s a big deal, so I was skeptical of this guy. But we became friends quickly.

Z: It was “if you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em.”

P: Did your friendship develop because of music?

Z: It was an afterthought. I think it was a little bit later on that we were both like, “Oh, you play music? Oh, you sing a little bit? Me too.” Then there was common ground.

J: And at that point, music started becoming an ever-present theme between us. We wrote that first song when we were fifteen, we couldn’t even drive yet.

P: What was the song about?

Z: Girls! What else would it be about? I only had one thought on my brain at all times! But from there we finished high school and went off to the same college together, Texas State. We roomed together and were always doing the same stuff, but Jon was really into music and I was focusing on studies.

P: What kind of studies?

Z: I have a degree in marketing. It seemed like the practical thing to do. I’m an educated man, there’s a diploma somewhere in a closet!

J: I dropped out of school my second year, but I still lived in the college town. I am a feind for education. I love learning, I read a crazy amount of educational material, but I don’t like structured, formal education. It’s sort of a contradiction.

Z: I would argue that you could get a better education just by traveling and reading than from most universities, but it’s what you’re “supposed” to do. Jon’s a big do-it-yourself guy, he teaches himself things. He has a new hobby every week, but in a good way. (to Jonathan) You’re always bettering yourself and it’s respectable.

P: What sort of books do you read?

J: On my shelf right now, there’s a book about electricity and electrical theory, there’s a book on how to teach yourself PhotoShop, then there’s a book about why society will collapse by 2017.

Z: Towards the end of college I started to get back into music and found the desire to be doing it.

J: There was a switch that flipped with Zach. After that, he made his own solo record and that’s when we toured together, sort of each as solo artists—

Z: But then we’d end up playing all of our sets together.

P: It really happened that naturally?

Z: Yeah. Then we moved out here two years ago exactly this month. We had officially formed Jamestown Revival and we were doing some demo stuff—

J: (excitedly) No, Huntsville! That was a key part!

Z: Alright, you talk about Huntsville and I’ll pick it up from there.

J: So there’s this land that’s been in my family since the late ‘60s /early ‘70s, it’s a thousand acres in Texas and we’ve been going out there since we were fifteen.

P: Sounds like having your own private campground.

J: Exactly. Go take the guns, the four-wheeler, no tv. There’s a busted old trailer house that was hauled out there and has been there since the land came into my family’s possession, way back when.

Z: You gotta be careful where you walk on the floors, your foot’ll go through.

J: It is a piece of shit! But we love it. We’ve rebuilt the back porch three times cuz it keeps rotting through. We have a grill and a big fire pit and huge oak tress and it’s heaven. It’s paradise.

We had gotten back from the tour we’d both just done and I think we were both feeling like “What the fuck are we doing? This isn’t inspiring me.” We were at these crossroads, spiritually almost—loving being together and loving doing music together, but not necessarily loving being solo artists. And we went out to Huntsville for a while, like, “let’s just go write for a few weeks, bring the instruments.” We’d never done that before; whenever we went, we just brought toys. So it was just us, by ourselves, for two weeks and we wrote a couple of songs in this totally free-form manner, in a way that I’d never written before.

Z: It was also a revelation, a change of thought process. Our writing became more autobiographical, writing because it was what we wanted to say, not necessarily what we thought people wanted to hear. And I think that was big, we came into our own. We realized who we were as musicians.

J: We were writing about what we knew on an intimate level, which was the return to the wild, Mother Nature, the wilderness. The return to the simplicity and what makes us feel like we’re at home again.

We left Huntsville with two songs that ended up going on our first EP and knowing that we started something. We didn’t have a name for the band yet; it was the following week when we got back that we came up with the name and knew we were onto something, this felt better than anything.

P: How did you come up with “Jamestown Revival” for a name?

Z: Being a history buff, Jamestown was an ode to new beginnings and the idea of leaving behind the old, coming to a new world and setting forth. And the simplicity of it. It was a rebirth, essentially, I think that’s where it came from. It popped out and it felt good, so we ran with it.

But from Huntsville, we came back and started recording demos. And then this opportunity came up with Rolling Stone (the cover competition) and we ran with it.

J: We didn’t end up getting the cover, but it was a really good platform to officially launch Jamestown. And it did something for me mentally, committing to Jamestown. It was real and there was no looking back.

Z: While that was happening, we had been talking about coming out here—we love Austin, and that’s our home—but it was time for an adventure, it was time for a change. We wanted to be uncomfortable, especially with this new project and the idea of getting that adventure, getting dirt under our nails. So we packed up and moved and haven’t really looked back since. That’s how we ended up in LA. It was inspirational.

J: From start to finish, the new record (Utah) tells the story of the last twenty-four months.

P: So if I was curious about is what you miss about Texas the most or what you’ve discovered here in California—

J: You can learn all of that from listening to the record. What do we miss? That’s track four, “Heavy Heart.” What do we like? Check out “California.” I can reference exactly which songs tell you those exact things, it’s that specific.

P: And Utah? What’s the story there?

Z: We had access to this cabin in Utah and really liked the remoteness of it. The cabin was a decent size with this big great room, and we started tossing around the idea of recording out there. So we rented all this gear, we brought in some good friends to engineer it who work out here, got our band members together, we hauled out all this gear…It probably took us sixteen hours, that truck was just so slow—

J: —I drove the big-ass truck, it maxed out at 55, it was terrible—

Z: But we went out to the mountains for two weeks and recorded the record. And it’s all to tape, it’s all live recording, so it’s got some character and we’re excited about it.

J: We went as old school as we could with this album.

Z: We realized when we got out there that we might’ve bitten off more than we could chew, and so we were scrambling and learned a lot.

J: The way we did it led us to realness. Our whole goal was to really capture moments, capture energy. Sometimes when we play these songs, I can feel it, we get this smile on our faces, it’s like, there it is, there’s the energy. That’s really hard to force or fabricate. That was what brought us out there to record, and that was why we didn’t use headphones or a metronome. We just had our drummer, our bass player, me, and Zach.

We played so we could hear each other and the song was almost living and breathing in that moment, and there were mics everywhere to capture it. We would get so frustrated because a song wasn’t coming, and we would strip it all down and say, fuck it, let’s try something totally different. And that moment was captured and that’s on the record. So the results of this frustration and this realness, I feel like we captured it and that was the goal.

And the thing about the album is it’s not sonically pristine. As an artist, that’s scary. It’s not recorded with isolation, it doesn’t sound like a perfect, pretty black hole that perfect recordings are. You can hear the room; you can hear white noise from the tape machine. It sounds like it has character, and that is the thing that I hope people get. I hope people understand what this record is, and what this record isn’t. It’s a risk, but it’s a risk I think we had to take.

P: What were some of your favorite experiences there?

Z: There was a moose that would come by with her baby.

J: We’re sitting there drinking coffee and this moose and her baby come walking by the back porch, and it’s suckling from her teat, no kidding!

P: That’s some nature for ya!

Z: We had a lot of late nights because we had a limited amount of time and the very last night, everybody was pretty exhausted. We finished just about the time the sun was coming up. We were drinking whiskey, and there’s deer walking by, and the world is sort of coming to life again and it was such a profound moment and it was an awesome sense of accomplishment.

J: And cool trivia fact—as we were sitting down there, fucking exhausted, the sun was bright, coming up full strength. Our sound engineer had set a microphone outside on the porch and you could hear the birds going nuts, just singing and the leaves blowing, and the wind moving, and that is actually the start of one of the songs on the album, it was that exact moment recorded. (He pauses.) So that was the last day.

Z: Whenever I hear that, it takes me right there.

We all get quiet for a moment. The way Utah lights them up leaves me feeling like I was right there, too. And also leaves me with an insatiable thirst for good whiskey.

P: So what’s on the horizon for Jamestown Revival?

J: I want to get this entire record out, tour as frequently as possible and keep it consistent. Write the next chapter.

Z: Yeah, I’m ready for the next chapter. Long term, as long as we can keep our lights on, meet the people we get to meet, and have the experiences we get to have while doing this, then I have no complaints. I’m just excited to grow, I still feel like it’s pretty new and we still have a lot to learn. It’ll always be autobiographical, so wherever the world takes us is what we’ll be writing about. That’s what I’m excited for, to see the progression.

On that note, I’m gonna pour myself a stiff drink and listen to my copy ‘California (Cast Iron Soul)’ on the porch. It just feels like the right thing to do.

For the latest updates from Jamestown Revival, more music, and tour information, visit http://www.JamestownRevival.com.

If you live in LA, check em out this Saturday April 6th at Room 5, starting at 7:30pm!

A exclusive MIMP interview with Andrew W.K. and Cherie Lily. - “I’ve always said that real men enjoy the smell of vagina. Thankfully Andrew W.K. passes the test and my girl boner is still intact.” - The Bowie Cat

Words by Sophie Saint Thomas (@TheBowieCat)

Images by Michael Edwards

I was 14 when Andrew’s I Get Wet came out. I wasn’t sure why the infamous album cover of his face drenched in blood pouring from his nose got me wet, or why the video for “Party Hard,” featuring this wolf of a man headbanging in filthy ripped clothes, was such a turn on. Perhaps it was his party-positive message, or the raw male stench I was drawn to. Since I Get Wet came out I’ve had my eye on him, so when I heard Andrew had found himself a wifey, I had to meet this woman. It turns out Cherie Lily, the Queen to the King of Party, is just as intriguing as he is. While @AndrewWK gets wet, @CherieLily gets dripping wet.

Me In My Place is pleased to premiere an “Exclusive Bedroom Web Cam” music video for Cherie Lily’s “Body” produced by Vjuan Allure. The video is from her recent “Dripping Wet” EP, and in collaboration with MIMP’s “Dance Off” section, and a recent afternoon spent with the couple where we discussed sex etiquette, Cherie and Andrew’s love story, and of course, partying.

MIMP founder Michael Edwards and I are sitting at Santos Party House, the downtown Manhattan club and music venue Andrew owns. The party power couple arrives slightly late, coming from a joint work out session. Cherie, the afternoon’s star, is dressed in colorful spandex complemented with dominatrix-esque thong one piece. Andrew is in his signature dirty white jeans and t-shirt, in all likelihood the same clothes he wore over a decade ago in the “Party Hard” video. I ask Cherie if she’s ever worn the leather dominatrix accessory on its own for Andrew in private.

“Not this one specifically, but other things like it, yes,” Cherie answers with a smile.

“Do you guys want something to drink, some water or orange juice?” Andrew asks. He proceeds to pour himself some vodka, topped off with what appears to be cranberry juice, although I can’t be sure. In his stained white t-shirt and eyes hidden by sunglasses, he hands us some samples of Playtex’s “Fresh + Sexy,” an intimate wipe he’s become the face of.

“It’s two packets connected, the idea is that there’s one for before and after an intimate experience. Especially if you’re traveling, if I haven’t been able to take a shower for a day, or a couple days, or weeks or months, this really does come in handy,” he says. “Playtex generally makes products for females but this is for men and women. For men you can even use it if you’re by yourself! Um and you don’t have a partner…there’s cleanup that’s involved there.”

Between their workout dates, concerts, and exceptionally active lifestyle, these two sweat a lot. With her eccentric personality and style (not to mention flexibility and that leather ensemble) I wouldn’t mind smelling Cherie’s party myself, so Andrew better appreciate Cherie’s or else I’ll step in and do it myself. It’s obvious that Andrew is not someone who showers everyday, so I get how intimate wipes could come in handy, but just to make sure he’s down with unwashed lady parts, I ask how he feels about body odor.

“Cherie and I have been very lucky in that we don’t really smell each other. Other people might think we smell terrible, but I think we’ve been together long enough we just don’t notice it. Cherie smells like home.”

He gazes at her lovingly. “You smell like cozy.”

I see how far I can push the envelope. “Where’s the weirdest place you guys have gotten it on recently?” I ask, while Michael snaps photos of them making out. “Things must get tricky while on tour.” I’m hoping for stories of backstage blowjobs or a quickie in the green room before they take the stage.

“We go to a hotel room, or a bus maybe,” says Andrew. “I always just thought [public sex] was inconsiderate to other people, you know in case a kid walked in on you in a public place. I guess I had a few things like that happen to me, or even seeing friends when you’re over at their house being really loud because it turns them on for you to be able to hear them. It’s just not good manners or something.”

Time to refocus on music. I ask Cherie if the title of her her “Dripping Wet” EP is a nod to Andrew’s I Get Wet.

Andrew looks at Cherie. “Huh, I never thought of that.”

“Oh yeah, people say that all the time,” Cherie responds. “It’s a nod that happened without us really thinking about it.”

“A subconscious nod,” Andrew agrees. They often finish each other’s sentences, and forget that we are in the room and break into their own private conversations. It’s sickeningly adorable, and the romantic buried inside my pervert mind is quite pleased that my teenage crush has found himself such a perfect partner.

Cherie grew up outside of Chicago to Iranian immigrant parents who came to America in the late 60’s, before the Shah fell. Eventually making her way to New York, Cherie worked in the fashion industry before switching her focus to fitness and music, two loves she merged to create “houserobics,” a combindation of dance music and erobics. Along with continuing to teach fitness classes at Crunch, Cherie released “The Dripping Wet” EP on February 12th, 2013. The EP is Cherie’s follow up to her debut EP “WERK,” released on Andrew W.K.’s Steev Mike label. The video for “WERK” features her signature houserobics and some impressive moves by Andrew W.K., who says he pulled a few tendons while filming the video.

Andrew and Cherie met in 2005 through their shared vocal coach, Melissa Cross, who specializes in the art of screaming.

“I was in different hard core and rock bands at the time and I heard about this coach, so I went to go see her. I was in the waiting area and then this guy came out and it was Andrew,” says Cherie. “I was like ‘Oh my god, who is this guy? Andrew W.K., he’s so cute.’ ”

Melissa Cross’s role expanded from vocal coach to life coach as she helped set the two up.

“She knew right away! She knew Andrew really well, and then when she met me she knew we would be a good match. And she was right. Melissa told me that I couldn’t just ask him out, it had to be more organic. So she would make my lesson after his lesson so we would run into each other,” says Cherie.

I ask Andrew what he thought of Cherie the first time he saw her.

“I thought she was a little angel face,” says Andrew. “Also, I had been asking the singing teacher about a girl that could join my band, because from the very beginning, going back to like 98’, 99’, I’d always wanted this feeling of a team of people on the stage. I had a few friends who said ‘Oh use this girl, she’s great at keyboard.’ But I had met these girls, I mean they were very nice, and lovely and fine, but they would never be able to throw down, let alone withstand the atmosphere of doing what we do, not just on stage but traveling and the whole nature of it. Then when I met Cherie I asked Melissa initially ‘do you think she could do it?’ and she said yes, but I still had no idea the level of athleticism and stamina, and most of all the attitude that Cherie had.”

At the time, Cherie was working in the male model division at Wilhelmina Models. She invited Andrew in for a meeting with the celebrity division to secretly get closer to him, but it was Andrew who finally asked her out. The two married on October 4^th, 2008, in a traditional ceremony held at Santos Party House, although they did head bang to “Party Hard” during the reception.

The more I get to know the pair, the more curious I am of Andrew’s definition of “party.” When one envisions of the word, especially coming out of a rock star’s mouth, a “fuck it” Jim Morrison mind set comes to mind. Yet his politeness, the traditional wedding, and deep consideration of others (particularly when it pertains to humping in public) leads me to wonder if the most the two men have in common are their unwashed pants. I ask Andrew how he defines the word “party.”

“Party is a very simple word that everyone understands in its essence, but it can also mean something unique to each person, which I think is the best aspect of that word. It’s something you can do on special occasions like the New Year, or your birthday, or Friday; when you are very thankful that a weekend is coming, or that it’s a new year, or you were even born at all,” says Andrew. “But if you’re thankful to be alive every day then you can party and have that celebratory mindset,” he continues. “Taking something that you are grateful for, fully acknowledging it, and then driving that energy towards that appreciation. That’s how I think of it. That’s how I justify doing it every day.”

I’m realizing that for Andrew and Cherie, “party” isn’t just sex, drugs, and rock ‘n’ roll, but rather a mind set, something deeper, even spiritual.

When the interview concludes we all leave Santos Party House at the same time, and I happen to be heading in the same direction as Andrew and Cherie. So I don’t look like a creepy stalker who has secretly been envisioning group sex throughout the interview, I keep my distance, but observe. Bundled up on the chilly evening, arms around one another, the pair doesn’t look like rock stars, but they do look in love.

“I’ve never met any other person, let alone a lady, that can throw down as hard as me and never complain about it. She has a much better attitude than me. I try to learn from her every day about being better at life, let alone head banging,” says Andrew.

To see Cherie in all her glory, catch her performing at Webster Hall’s Trash Party Friday, March 29^th. She hits the stage at 2AM. Take a hit of whatever Andrew and Cherie are inhaling and stay up for it.

(Source: app.meinmyplace.com)

Get ready for She’s Ryan bitches… because this chick wants it so bad she’s going to be the next fucking @Oprah.

Words by Sophie Saint Thomas (@TheBowieCat)

Images by Michael Edwards

Get ready for She’s Ryan bitches, because this chick wants it so bad she’s going to be the next fucking @Oprah. Except rather than Spanx and a cardigan she rocks a pink weave and leather tube tops.

It’s 9:45PM on a Monday night. I’m squished in the backseat of a Jeep next to Michael Edwards, founder and photographer for Me In My Place, and Slimmy Neutron, founder and recording artist for Hello HVLO, (pronounced Hello Halo) a music production company and independent record label. We’re darting around cars on our way from their studio on West 30^th Street to Cameo Gallery in Williamsburg. There’s a plastic cup of margarita flavored Four Loko in my hand. In the front seat sits @ShesRYAN with her own can of Four Loko, peach, her favorite. Slimmy prefers watermelon. Ryan is much smaller than the two men accompanying me in the backseat, but the honor of shotgun goes to her without debate.

Ryan is supposed to take the stage at 9:50PM so we’re already running late, but she’s quite concerned about her boobs popping out of her leather tube top during her performance. “I need boobie tape, my tits are going to pop out!” Ryan screeches from the front seat. Her voice frequently rises from conversational tone to loud, uninhibited laughter. We stop at two different American Apparels under her orders, both closed. No boobie tape for Ryan. She knows they carry it, she used to manage an American Apparel store in Soho. “I’ve worked in retail everywhere,” Ryan told me back at the studio. “Banana Republic, American Apparel, Betsey Johnson, G-Star, Macy’s. I’ve worked everywhere. I was a different person then. I was smoking a pack of Newport’s a day. I was skinny though!”

With her long pink hair and tattoos, dressed in booty shorts, a leather top and platform combat boots, it’s hard to imagine Ryan in a Banana Republic. She buys her Brazilian human hair extensions in bundles from a 6’7” hair dealer who delivers the hair to your door out of a backpack. It’s baby pink now, although she’s thinking of switching to hot pick, “nasty pink.” It’s certainly attention grabbing, she’s even been stopped at airport security to have her weave checked to make sure she’s not smuggling drugs in it.

The first time I saw Ryan was at Tammany Hall in the Lower East Side of Manhattan, at Hello HVLO’s Christmas party. I was there to see my friend Skip Rage perform, another rapper signed with HVLO, and was enjoying a beer waiting for the show to start. Rap performances start notoriously late. In retrospect, we would have had plenty of time to stop at a CVS and and buy some boobie tape, but it didn’t matter, to the crowd’s disappointment Ryan changed her top to one with straps and her breasts stayed put throughout the performance.

Back at the holiday party, before I even knew she was there to perform, I couldn’t take my eyes off her. It was a combination of attraction and intimidation, only partially credited to her appearance.

“I wear shorts and a tube top every single day. Who cares? I’m not a ho, I’m not a prostitute. Who says I got to be a ho because I don’t got a turtle neck on? I walk down the street confident and bold and I don’t get harassed. I don’t like to wear pants so I wear shorts, and if you try anything I will fucking roundhouse you. Own it. Own your style and individuality”

Own it she does. Ryan admits her insistence on living in shorts presents a problem for attending weddings and funerals, but you get the feeling that even at such an event no one would give her a hard time.

An artist of many forms, it’s unclear if even she is certain what her main focus is, What is clear is that she craves success and has the determination and attitude to achieve it. Along with her music, Ryan frequently goes to open acting calls, and supports herself by freelance modeling. She’s also appeared in “basically in every tattoo magazine. Inked, Urban Ink, Skin & Ink, Rebel Ink. All the ones except fetish porn. The ones where you don’t have to shave your eyebrows off and can keep your clothes on. Or wear a latex mask.”

A believer in the law of attraction and the power of positive thinking, Ryan keeps a vision board. A vision board is a board filled with images or quotes meant to help you visualize and achieve your dreams, popular with performers. When asked about what was on her vision board, Ryan responded “Oprah. But Oprah may not be around because I feel like when I’m 56 I’m going to have my own Oprah show, I’m going to be Oprah.” Her vision also includes appearing in an Alexander Wang billboard on 42^nd Street. “I swear to god I see my hair blowing and it’s not pink it’s like black and I look all morbid, you know how they look all skinny and shit.”

The black and white Alexander Wang billboards she’s referring to are so stylistically different than the colorful and exuberant girl I’m sitting across from that I briefly wonder if it’s simply fame rather than artistic expression she’s after. Not that there’s necessarily anything wrong with that, most successful female musicians comparable to Ryan are multiple threats dabbling in various forms of art, and if we’re honest with ourselves, most of us share the same hunger for success, even if we have to veer slightly off path to achieve it. Yet then as we near the end of the studio interview, and I step into the hall with Michael and Ryan as he takes photos of her, Ryan makes a comment seemingly unaware that I’m even paying attention that reassures me of her artistic realness:

“I’m doing it because I love it. I don’t want to be the trendy bitch. In 10, 20 years I still want to be doing it.”

Ryan was born in Flatbush, Brooklyn to two high school students.

“My mom and had me when she was in high school. She went to Brooklyn Tech with my dad, they had me their junior year of high school. And basically they were really young so I had to live with my Grandmother for probably six or seven years, in not a good part of Brooklyn at all.”

She then moved in with her mother, frequently relocating from small two bedroom apartments crowded with her three siblings and her stepfather. As a teenager she moved in with her father, a successful business man, where she had her own floor in his five-story Clinton Hill brownstone. “When I lived with my Dad it was like a different world. I’ve seen both sides of the spectrum that’s why I don’t judge people. Because I know what it feels like to have both.”

She mentions the differences in her parents and their views on her career. Her father, the businessman, is often concerned about her ability to support herself financially while her mother applauds her artistic journey.

“I think he’s from a different time because he doesn’t even get it. He was friends back in the day with Doug E. Fresh, so he’s like ‘Yeah, my boy he got dropped from his label.’ I’m like how would you tell me I am going to get dropped from my label, why would you say that to me? Doug E. Fresh, you can’t compare me to Doug E. Fresh! And my mom she completely believes in me. She’s the hippie. She’s like, ‘I love to sing, you love to sing, keep singing!’ ”

From the love and camaraderie felt among the HVLO crowd, there’s no sense of danger of Ryan being dropped from her label. She was hesitant to join the group at first, having negative experiences with other producers, but Slimmy hooked her.

“Slimmy Neutron contacted me on Facebook. I used to put out little covers of myself singing and Slimmy ran across one, and was like, you have a great voice you should probably come to the studio and just check it out sometime. But at that time I was very scared because a lot of people would try to get me into the studio and it wouldn’t be productive. It would be me, sitting there, probably smoking, someone playing me a bunch of beats I really didn’t want to sing over, it wasn’t organic at all. And so it took Slimmy a while to get me here. When I finally got here he didn’t just play me a bunch of beats, he actually let me sing and let me write and constructed a beat around my voice. And that’s how “Bipolar” came about.”

If it’s her music that shoots Ryan to fame “Bipolar” will be the trigger. The jaw-dropping track alternates between Ryan beautifully crooning about her love for a man to fiercely screaming into the mic about how much she hates the same lover. It’s reminiscent of Kelis’s “Caught Out There”, an inspiration Ryan admits to, yet somehow (don’t hurt me Kelis) “Bipolar” captures the duality of emotions even more powerfully.

“I hate to say that I feel like the crazy one at most times, because if you listen to the lyrics it’s like ‘I love you but now I hate your guts.’ And I just know that sometimes that’s how women are. And it’s fine, the song is letting girls everywhere know that its okay to feel crazy girl, because we all have felt crazy at one point. You ever been so in love that you can lay in bed with this person at night but then see him do one thing wrong and you want to rip his head off his shoulders? So that’s what the song is saying, I love you but I hate you.”

HVLO isn’t quite ready to unleash the song on the world. In fact, Ryan doesn’t even have an album or video out for the track yet.

“It’s so epic and it’s put together so well that we don’t’ just want to throw it out and do a quick video for it. We need like time and money. So what we’re going to do is put out different songs and lead up to it and build the buzz more. So this way when “Bipolar” does finally release it’s going to be huge. Kelis probably will hear it, you know what I’m saying?”

It’s almost 11PM before Ryan appears on stage at Cameo Gallery. Ryan’s got the looks, the talent, and the attitude, yet somewhere buried in her must lie the seed of doubt: Will I make it? As an observer, I’m wondering myself as I look around the sparse crowd, in one of countless small music venues in New York. Ryan is an artist who doesn’t have an album out, yet alone a video, in a city teeming with artists trying to make it, some with better connections, more money, more exposure.

And then Ryan hits the stage. After a few songs to get the crowd amped, “Bipolar” begins. She opens the track by announcing it’s her favorite song and singing the chorus acapella, and then the track kicks on and she’s tearing off her jacket and writhing on the floor and her entire energy encompasses the room. Slimmy told me that after every one of Ryan’s performance, someone ends up booking her for another show. As a converted fan, I’ll take a page from Ryan’s book and use the power of positive thinking to hope that one day the right person is there to see her, as a vision board can only get you so far.

Before she goes on I ask her if she is nervous. “Hell to the no. I’m just going to go in there and rock the fuck out, probably with a Four Loko in my hand. I’m so fucking exhilarated, no nerves. That’s how I know I was meant to do this.”

Until HVLO is ready to release “Bipolar” you can listen to She’s Ryan’s “Painted Picture” here.

(Source: app.meinmyplace.com)

An Exclusive MIMP interview with Jordan Beckett of Bootstraps

Bootstraps’ Beckett

@bootstrapsmusic

pictures by Jordan Beckett

words by @FaleneNurse

I threw caution to the wind recently, by interviewing someone I had actually met in person. I attended a (straight to DVD) screening and afterwards they like to give you lots of wine and snacks. Namely an assortment of fancy cheeses. You sort of get tipsy and chit chat with people that you don’t really know and will probably never see again.

While chugging Pinot and nibbling on a slice of prime English cheddar (with caramelized onions), I came across a young man who looked uncomfortable, slightly awkward and a tad out of place. Not because he didn’t fit in with the dazzling smiles and athletic physiques (er, that would be me, looking like a beige puddle). Or that like most there he hadn’t already won the genetic lottery. Alas, he had, but for whatever reason he didn’t carry the putrid stench of vanity. He leant more towards the confused type, one who had been forced to attend West Point by his overbearing father. Who secretly just wanted to live the rest of his days in a cabin in the woods, with only the wolves as his friends. Or maybe I just made up that backstory because I was a bit bored and slightly drunk, I don’t recall.

So after stalking him in the foyer, I cornered him by the Gruyère. As it turns out, one of his songs was in the movie. His name was (*and still is) Jordan Beckett, he’s frontman of Bootstraps, who were recently feature asAmazon‘sband to watch. He’s a professional writer of words and in his spare time, composes music for TV and film. He smokes far too many cigarettes, gets agitated by my nosiness, won a Naxos Award for Best Film Music and you probably listened to him singing in an episode of Elementary, Monday Mornings or Parenthood. He also likes to swim in pools, at night. Two months after finding Jordan by the cheeses, he returned my call. Here’s what he had to say.

(Source: app.meinmyplace.com)

My Winter Wonderland

My Winter Wonderland

@alxwinter @sxsw

Portraits ME

Words @FaleneNurse

Remember when people use to line up for an album? Or if your town’s local Cineplex wasn’t included in the theatre release (or as is the case in my shitey youth, you couldn’t afford it), made the anticipation for the video rental unbearably delicious? When I was 12 I was curating taped trailers, interviews and magazine pages (turned posters), for every movie du jour. Intricately cataloguing them to heighten my excitement, like Beavis in the grips of a coffee addled Cornholio rant.

One of these unnatural obsessions was comedy cult classic Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure. The dreamy and “intellectually challenged” duo, fell into my misshapen view (guided solely by American 80s movies) of the U.S. teen experience. Right up there with those pretty Weird Science nerds. I was convinced in ‘89 if these were what misfits looked like across the pond, I couldn’t wait to get there! Believe it or not, I also found the lives of Bill S. Preston Esquire and Ted Theodore Logan, somewhat glamorous back then. All that quotable So Cal vernacular, cartoon colored clothing and lovable misadventures. It was always sunny there, kids hung out in places called “malls” as opposed to grimy underpasses, instead of chain smoking they ate uncooked Japanese fish; and on weekends would go to a “water park.” To me California was the promised land! More than that though I simply adored the two leads, truthfully I don’t think I would have enjoyed it as much if it hadn’t been the very young Alex Winter and Keanu Reeves. Alex with his pre-Raphaelite curls and blood red, bee-stung lips, Keanu in all his ethnically ambiguous glory. Both with such enviable hair. I had never seen such exotic male creatures, wondering the cobble stoned pathways of Tamworth. Which for the record, means hog mouth.

(Source: app.meinmyplace.com)

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