The San Jose Metro published an article about us and The Rock Hop today. It features an interview with me talking about local music and all kinds of things. Check it out here.
Big thanks to Aaron Carnes for interviewing me! He was so fun to work with!
-Zen
Saturday night at The Rock Hop Holiday Hooplah in San Jose (577 S Market St, San Jose, CA / $10 / All Ages) we, along with Finish Ticket, Rin Tin Tiger and Picture Atlantic, will be releasing ‘Local Icicles’. Local Icicles is a collection of three holiday covers and one original and it just so happens that the original is ours!
Here’s the track listing:
1. Finish Ticket – All I Want For Christmas Is You
2. Please Do Not Fight – It Never Snows In San Francisco
3. Rin Tin Tiger – Let It Snow
4. Picture Atlantic – Place To Be / Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas
This is the fastest a Please Do Not Fight has ever gone from creation to recording. I wrote it as soon as I heard that Rin Tin Tiger might be doing an original (Which they didn’t) and we recorded it a mere two weeks later. We really hope you enjoy it! I’ve always dreamt of doing a collaborative release with other local artists I admire and I think this is a really great start.
We’ll be releasing it officially at The Rock Hop and then making it available on BandCamp come Sunday.
Happy Holidays,
Zen
At The Rock Hop Holiday Hooplah on December 10th we will be giving away a brand new black 8GB iPod Touch! The iPod will come loaded up with tons of music, artwork and videos from performers Finish Ticket, Please Do Not Fight, PK and Rin Tin Tiger as well as artist David Maddalena and, on top of that, also does everything a normal iPod Touch does.
Each of the bands will aso be donating merchandise and other gifts to be included in the Raffle.
TO ENTER: All you need to do is attend The Rock Hop on December 10th. Every person who comes wearing an ugly Holiday Sweater gets one free raffle ticket. Raffle tickets are also available for $2 and all the money goes toward supporting future Rock Hops and helping us create neat opportunities like this raffle! Raffle tickets will be drawn throughout the night with the iPod Touch being given away prior to Finish Ticket’s set. You must be present at the time your number is called to claim your prize!
That’s about it. Big thanks goes out to Dan Mahoney for creating this opportunity and donating a brand new iPod Touch to the cause. We’re stoked to be able to beef up the boing factor on our raffle to such a mega degree.
Can’t wait to see you all there!
-Zen
I am so excited. Please Do Not Fight opens up right at 7:00pm so be timely! -Zen
[Get Tickets] [Join the Facebook Event]
When Nik Bartunek from Picture Atlantic and I get together to talk it’s usually about one of two things: Dungeons and Dragons or how we can give back and help improve the local music scene. We’ve bounced a bunch of ideas around – for awhile we had a monthly local-band-meet-up planned where we would get together with local musicians we respected and schmooze. And by schmooze I mean bar-be-que and play games. We had one of these band-meet-ups, a small affair with the guys from WORD and Curious Quail and then both our bands got really busy and the thought kind of fizzled out.
One thing Nik and I have always wanted to do though is start our own series of events. We would book really great bands and we would charge as little as we could. We wouldn’t put Metal bands next to Acoustic acts and we wouldn’t make out of town bands play first. The other bands would all be musicians we knew and respected and the venue would be somewhere cool and hip that allowed for all ages shows and was down to be of service to the local community. We’d cut out the middle man, there’d be no booker or promoter other than us – that way we could charge less at the door and ensure that the out of town bands got the gas money they need no matter their draw. We’d cook up lots of fun giveaways and do our best to make sure everyone attending felt like they really got their money worth – like it was something special, a night to remember.
Well, that event is happening – we’ve given it a 50′s theme because we like dressing up nice and we’ve dubbed it The Rock Hop. It’s the first in what we hope will be a very long series and we’re pulling out all the stops to kick it off right. We’ll be opening the event, Picture Atlantic will be closing it and sandwhiched in the middle will be our very very good friends Ghost and the City and incredibly talented out-of-towners Fierce Creatures from Fresno. Our amazingly talented friend and photographer Aaron Blumenshine will be showing off some of his work and also providing a Photobooth (complete with goofy props) for people to snap their photo in. Psycho Donuts has graciously offered to donate a couple dozen donuts which we will be giving away to the first people through the door and SLG Publishing will be giving away free comics as well.
Speaking of SLG Publishing, we couldn’t be doing this without the support of them and their Art Boutiki. Nik and I have seen several shows at Art Boutiki and it’s a great venue – small, intimate and all ages. It’s tucked away behind a comic book shop and has just enough of that kitchy cool vibe to be hip.
Our hope is for future Rock Hops to also include plenty of fun sponsors, artists, friends and of course more amazing local and out of town acts. Maybe one day you’ll even see a Rock Hop San Francisco or a Rock Hop Los Angeles, who knows!
Anyways, we really hope you will join us in San Jose on this amazing night. We truly feel like we’re at the beginning of something great with a formula that we feel should be obvious. An event series that caters to what really matters: the music and the people who love it.
Magic missile,
-Zen