My Wishes for 2014: By Guillermo Gómez-Peña

My Wishes for 2014
By Guillermo Gómez-Peña

I wish that all my artist friends find a dignified job closely resembling their dreams and obsessions.

I wish that all my activist friends find the spiritual strength to continue fighting the many necessary fights on all fronts.

I wish that radical grace and uncompromising aesthetics remain the driving forces of my troupe.

I wish that all my friends and their friends find tender lovers to survive the loneliness of the American night.

I wish for the homeless of the world to find food, shelter and friendship. These are basic human rights.

I wish that all the greedy landlords trying to evict the working class suddenly wake up with amnesia and an empathetic heart.

I wish for all migrants to cross the borders they wish to cross successfully & safely.

I wish that Obama has an epiphany while he is taking a shit and remembers who he is.

I wish for the new pope to become truly radicalized and get lost every night in the streets of Vatican City catering to the poor and destitute.

I wish for the prison industry to collapse; for black and Latino youth to find a place of dignity in America.

I wish for the global project to continue derailing ad nauseam.

I wish for America to stop fearing otherness and diversity; and for white Americans to become less self-involved, arrogant & entitled.

I wish for the masterminds and perpetrators of war and violence to experience a daily living and unbearable hell; payback can’t wait for their next reincarnation.

I wish that all indigenous peoples continue to find ways to survive and thrive against all corporate and government odds and monsters.

I wish my mother remained a little longer on this earth. So many of us still need her poetic tenderness and quantum guidance.

I wish that my inner demons make truce with themselves. They drive me crazy, especially at night, especially in the U.S.

I wish to make peace with my intergalactic orphan-hood and with each of my multiple identities.

I passionately commit to make all these wishes come true, even if only in the realm of imagination, poetry, grassroots activism and art.

(I wish to thank Emma Tramposch and Anastasia Herold for helping me to organize my poetic thoughts)



LA POCHA NOSTRA LIVE ART LABORATORY
2857 24TH STREET
SAN FRANCISCO, CA 94110
pocha@pochanostra.com

Parallax Beach @ Pehr Space: Parallax Scroll Final Performance

Witnesses,

This was the last time Parallax Beach performed Parallax Scroll.  The night was filled with great acts.  I personally was hypnotized by the sounds and visuals of Beru.  I hope to see more of this very very talented lady.  I always gush for Intimatchine so...TV Crime Lords were fun.  Three cute boys making noise, much fun.  

Without further a due here are some stills of the night.  Brennan has got his character and moment down.  Stay tune for some audio.  

Parallax Beach @ PehrSpace Sean Carnage Monday Nights

Soft Forms,

Coming off the Epic Highways show, Parallax Beach is excited to present a much more appropriate, raw and dirty version of "Parallax Scroll".  We are honored to be performing at one of the last nights of Sean Carnage's influential Monday Nights in this City of Angels.

This show is poignant not only because of this, but because it will be the last time we will be performing "Parallax Scroll".  With the monumental departure of Brennan Lowe from the troupe we will move on to a new piece. 

I myself am excited and honored to be sharing the stage, for the second time, with Intimatchine. 

Hope to see you there.

Deciphering the roots,

-DBL

 

*flier by Wes Johansen

  Facebook Event Page

Heads: Performance Show

Viewers,

This Saturday, November 23, Members of PRESENT, BOW+ARROW & PARALLAX BEACH’s combined efforts will yet again crash their own party, and take others’ lives into their own hands. Improvisational video/puppetz/noise/synths/movement/blast beats/saxophones will scratch their own disc into bludgeoning skips while surrounding the crowd. Warehouse party.

 

Sneak Peak: Demo Track for Parallax Scroll

listeners,

Listen:

PARALLAX BEACH - "Parallax Scroll" promo demo - intro

PARALLAX BEACH: Parallax Scroll @ Highways

Friends,

Excited to invite you to PARALAX BEACH's debut of "Parallax Scroll".

-DBL

*     *     *     *     *

  

Severed moments of macrocosmic balance routinely underline human evolution. These moments intrigue, as modernity has alienated us from the immediacy of life. Perceptions of time become mercurial and subjective depending on perspective. Parallax Scroll will take the audience on a revisit through the emergence of life. A trip that re-exams light, language, and the development of society, ending in a space unresolved and recycled. All points can viewed when wading on a Parallax Beach.

PARALLAX BEACH's "Parallax Scroll" is a multi-media performance piece that bridges the abstract landscapes of sound, light, time, and movement. A collective of artists, each utilizing different mediums, come together to make this unique work. Wes Johansen creates a visual representation of abstract thought through digital video projection, edited live and synchronized to synthesizers. Mike Meanstreetz uses avant-garde percussion and composition techniques tangling the participants of this ritualistic performance in a web of synesthesia . These elements are accentuated as josie j conveys transformation to witnesses through ritualism/ meditative movement, influenced partly by Butoh training and a background in performance art. Also performing in this piece are Zachary Vidal (saxophone/sampled noise) providing textured mood, and Brennan Lowe (movement) setting the wheel of this cycle into motion.

Invoking the zeitgeist of the night's multi-disciplinary performance,
        elle mehrmand opens with a solo piece
divined of haunting sing-song and movement, foreshadowing what is to come.

Passing through the theater's entry way, the night's performances will be initiated both spatial and temporally by a traversable light and sound installation by the artist Lazer Blade.

Parallax Scroll- Repetition Makes the Group [excerpt] from DBL on Vimeo.

PRESENT: MATERNALWORLDGRIND (single)

Listener,

A latest global acquisition given to us by PRESENT, a Mike Meanstreetz lovingly hypnotic production. 

Included in this tasty track is PRESENT's new saxophone player. 

Angela Gleich - vocals
Holly Spirit - electric piano & synthesizers
Erin Worra - saxophone
Mike Meanstreetz - drums, midi, backing vocals

Recorded (with child) September 2013 @ Women of Crenshaw, Los Angeles

www.facebook.com/PRESENTbandLA
For booking, please contact viejobajo@yahoo.com

                                                            

released 11 November 2013

-DBL

*     *    *     *     *

Hell D3C0D3D

Recall,

On November 2 I realize Halloween at this point in my life has no meaning just like Christmas it has the stench of a sales man with nothing to sell, but an all consuming idea.  But I do feel I need a time to explicitly remember the dead and face death as a mortal that I am. 

On this day I was lucky to be part of Highways Performance Space Dia de los Muertos Celebration.  It was a performance that stemmed from a workshop conducted by La Pocha Noestra at Highways.

The Performance itself was a variety of talented performers showcasing a variety of styles.  Ranging from dance, singing, to performance, some including all three.  Sneak peek pictures coming soon.

After the show I was honored enough to be invited by Mike Meanstreetz to be part of a jam performance at a house in Echo Park.  It was a Zombie Day of the Dead Party.  I was happy enough to freak out some more and channel some ancestral wisdom to freak out the locals.  Didn't quite get enough at Highways I guess.  In the end it was a wonderful piece.  Lazer Blade on keys/ sound/ mythical puppet performance, Mike Meanstreetz on drums and triggers, Zac Vidal on sax, and a new one I just met (groove guy) ARCHITECT on sax...SAX, duo it was monstrous. 

Here are some lovely pics via Amy Darling.

Don't forget to water your Roots.

Much too Weird for your scene.

-DBL

Dia de los Muertos @ Highways

Friends,

On November 2nd, For Día de los Muertos, I along with other very talented performers will be performing at Highways Performance Space, in Santa Monica, Ca. 

I will be doing my solo piece "Research in Religious Self-Cybernetics: Pruning the Rose, Eating the Thorn".  A Neo-Shaman exploration in sound, movement, And self deconstruction.

I will also be part of a group collaboration that was the result of the La Pocha Nostra workshop that occurred at Highways. 

Michael Nannery :: DBRP :: Intimatchine @ AHC

Lovers,

The Show at Almost Holden Collective was intimate, tasty, and seductive.

Intimatchine was a lovely hypnotic landscape of dreams.  Michael Nannery was a memory trip of textures and primal awakenings.  AHC thank you for your hospitality. 

Everyone was open to the freakers we are.  Thanks for your support.

It was a treat to further explore this experiment of self deconstruction which is "Research in Religious Self-Cybernetics: Pruning the Rose, Eating the Thorn".  The ritual object which you see was finally named that night.  Pronounce in Spanish, Butó Flutó.  Thanks Wes.  My need for smirks and giggles in my work is much needed.

Enjoy this peek behind the veil... If you were not present.

Intimatchine

D.B.R.P.

*photos by Christopher Steven Wormald and Brian David. Video by Jacqueline Li and josie j