Oh yes, I have heard it. All of it. Did you really think we would leave you high-and-dry like that? From little love notes on the gallery door, to people calling, and mumbling under their breath, believe me, I know you’ve all been waiting to find out “What the heck is going on with NakedCity?” Admittedly, I wanted to see just how much hubbub I would actually witness if I just sort of kept things hush-hush for a month or three. And I can tell you that I am relieved that it has been A LOT! I gave you a little teaser on my Facebook status back in October of 2011 letting you know I was dreaming of what to create for you next. I wasn’t kidding. And although we had planned to have this new-and-improved NakedCity in your hands by January 1, it has taken my team and I a bit longer to put this book together. Here is what you have to look forward to because of it:

1. NakedCity Magazine will now be published 6 times per year
2. NakedCity Magazine will now be 64 pages plus a beautiful spot-varnished cover
3. NakedCity now has 6, brand new categories
4. NakedCity will now print and distribute 15,000 magazines, up from the 10,000 we did in the past
5. NakedCity will now be a larger format than before….bigger photos, bigger articles, bigger ads, bigger, bigger, bigger!

Basically, it’s NakedCity on steroids. We will still have the same awesome coverage of local music, concerts, artists, theater, and urban life in Wichita written by the author’s you’ve grown to love, only now there is even more.

To celebrate our new changes, I would like to offer all businesses* that have considered advertising with NakedCity a chance to test the waters and allow us to make you a believer! For one issue only, if you call me TODAY, Friday, January 13, 2012, I will let you make me an offer. You tell me what ad size you want and what you are willing to pay for it. I want you in this first beautiful book. Give me a call today at 316.708.6090. Yes, I’m posting  my personal phone number for you to call me directly. Let’s chat. Let me help you reach the hippest, smartest, most active audience in Wichita….and you name the price. Space is limited though, so don’t waste time. Once it’s sold out, there will be no more. Geeez, I sound like a really bad infomercial.

I can’t wait to hear from you today! HAPPY FRIDAY!!!!!

~xoxo

*new advertisers only

I wrote a few years back about what I felt could be done to better Wichita’s ever-growing music scene. I wasn’t trying to preach some unifying theme. I am aware of how diverse this town can be, even based on its per capita ratio. I just like the fact that people are going to shows and enjoying live music, even if I think the band you are venturing out to see is a musical abomination. But it would seem still that more could be done. One simple way to help better things is for promoters to actually promote their shows. I know I am not going to make a lot of friends with that statement, and that’s fine. If you ever see me out and want to chat about what you are doing and how hard it is to do shows as a promoter in this town, then by all means, let’s chat. But what I will say, is relying on Facebook, Twitter and electronic media only to get the word out, is not going to get the job done or people out to see touring bands.

I am so sick finding out a band was in town and I missed it because someone I don’t know booked the show and thought the 300 friends they have on Facebook should be the only ones in the know. Exclusivity helps no one, especially the bands on tour. When bands are on tour they’re hopeful that the promoter did his job and the audience did theirs by remembering to show up. Not every show has to be a sell-out, but I can certainly say, that in the past 3 months I missed four out of six shows because I was completely unaware or it was not visible enough to help remind me.

Visibility is the key. We are so inundated with messages all the time, that it is easy to miss something, but there are still simple and effective ways to get across to people. I deeply miss seeing fliers. Yep. Fliers. Pieces of brightly colored paper with everything from professionally done design to hand-written-cut-and-paste punk rock Xerox jobs. What they do, that Facebook or Twitter don’t, is be the best kind of eye-sore and they are more effective than a buzzing update on your smart phone. I love walking into my local watering hole, bookstore and pizza joint and seeing something new for me to pay attention to. There are a thousand places to get the message out with fliers in town, and most business owners welcome it. If you’re only printing a couple dozen fliers and hoping 200 kids show up, you shouldn’t be surprised when they don’t. It takes far more to spread the good word around town. Put them in all of the places you think your target listener might hang out. Don’t forget the insides of stall doors…you’ll truly have a captive audience.

Additionally, give your fellow promoters and local businesses a hand. If you see a flyer promoting an event that has expired, take it down. It takes a village folks. If we help one another out by keeping the business-owners real estate looking nice and tidy, they will be happy to allow you and others to continue to promote with them.

I think this is just one thing that can be done to keep old jerks, like myself, and others in the know. It’s not really that big of an idea, but it is something that I’d like to see more of.

The White Ghost Shivers have been called the most amazing band on Earth. That might be a bold statement but the Shivers’ live performance is definitely one of a kind and not rivaled by many. This Austin based band is difficult to classify because they draw influences from a wide variety of genres. They have a kind of Dixieland-meets-hillbilly-meets-ragtime sound. But musical talent is not all that this energetic troupe has to offer. Their cabaret-like performance is enhanced by each member’s outrageous and entertaining personality. Songs with titles like Toot Yer Whistle, Blow My Horn, Weed Smoker’s Dream, and Chinatown feature taboo lyrics abundant with innuendos that tiptoe on the line of appropriateness, which is half the fun. Seven plus foot monster of a man, Shorty Borgasm is typically front and center playing banjo and sporting a ridiculous mustache. Lead guitarist, Smokebreak Slemenda rocks his old acoustic like he’s in a metal band. Beautiful Cella Blue mixes sultry vocals and flirtatious antics to capture the audience’s attention. The rest of the troupe includes a variety of musicians playing instruments such as the clarinet, standup bass, fiddle, piano, ukulele, mandolin, horns, accordion, and kazoo. Notice that there is no percussion included in this list.

Throughout the past few years they have performed in Wichita just over a handful of times.  The Shivers busted into Wichita’s scene opening for local alt-bluegrass favorites Split Lip Rayfield at the Cotillion in late 2006.  Since then they have played a variety of venues including The Roadhouse Blues, Rack Em’ Up, Barleycorns, Rock Island Live, Abode Venue, and next up is Naked City Gallery on November 19^th. Every experience with White Ghost Shivers is a unique one, whether it’s a change in their 1920’s era garb or someone else added to the lineup playing a new instrument. Regardless, their live show is always fresh and exciting.

The Shivers recently released their first full-length album since “Everyone’s Got Em” five years ago. Their newest creation “Nobody Loves You Like We Do” was recorded 99% live in Austin’s Tequila Mockingbird Studio and features their newest member (and ex- Squirrel Nut Zipper) stride piano maestro, Reese Gray.  Smokebreak says, “Nobody Loves You Like We Do is definitely our best album to date and still self- released.” Kansas’ own artist and musician Joshua Finley (JoshuaFinleyArt.com) created the original artwork for the new album and CD release tour poster. They will be playing in Emporia, Manhattan and Lawrence before finishing up their Kansas release tour in Wichita with the Kansas City Bear Fighters. The Shivers will be bringing their new album on the road with them available on CD and vinyl (for all the dedicated fans, record nerds and hipsters out there).

Catch this one of a kind act at Naked City Gallery (121 N. Mead) on Saturday November 19^th at 8:00 pm. Tickets are available online at parson.ticketleap.com/whiteghostshivers for $15. Come prepared to sing, dance and drink the night away and leave with a lifetime worth of golden memories and fun!

{links}
www.whiteghostshivers.com
www.KCbearfighters.com

For a band that has been together for as long as I have been alive, produced numerous albums and still tours, that is something to tip your hat to. Especially in a time and place where young pups who don’t even know they are biting their style are fighting for the same attention and praise Anthrax has already garnered over the past three decades.

Anthrax will be stopping in Wichita, October 18th at the Cotillion with legendary thrashers Testament and Death Angel helping to fill out the decibel overload. Though this won’t be Anthrax’s first stop in Wichita, it could be a first for many of you, such as myself to show praise for one of the Big Four. For those of you unfamiliar, the Big Four is the label for the forefathers of thrash metal in America: Metallica, Megadeth, Slayer and Anthrax. A quadruple threat that changed the sound, shape and face of metal at a time when you either went spandex and aqua-net or hell-bent on aggression and speed.

Anthrax isn’t just influential, but sustainable. Metal is alive and well throughout the world, and many bands who owe their influence and sound to Anthrax have been able to watch the band progress and show how it’s done, hiccups and all. There’ve been members who’ve come and gone in every band out there, but to be able to hold the reigns of a pulverizing machine like Anthrax and keep it going for 30-plus years at the same time isn’t just remarkable, it’s astounding.

Anthrax’s newest release since the early double-0’s, Worship Music, is a sign that the band has not been losing speed or creativity, and the return of Joey Belladonna to vocals is a welcome one. Anthrax doesn’t just go through the motions and hope that you weren’t paying attention at some point, and just posture themselves or rely on their own name, they are here to kick ass and chew bubble-gum, and they are just about all out of bubble gum.

I look forward to my first time with Anthrax. I don’t think they’ll be gentle, but I am sure they’ll be awesome.

When young people hear “financial literacy,” it’s probably safe to say that the first thing they think of isn’t rock n’ roll. This is understandable. The entertainment world is a wasteland of excess, instant gratification, and tales of once famous but now struggling rock stars, movie stars, and athletes.

Nick Cage earns $20m a film yet still managed to lose his home. Britney Spears pulls in $737k a month and can’t save a dime of it. Six out of ten NBA stars are broke within five years of the end of their contract. Punch in “rock stars that went broke” into Google and get ready for an evening of sad but incredibly entertaining cautionary tales.

Much like lottery winners who gain millions only to end up with nothing, very few people who come into a windfall ever invest enough for a sustainable future. Income goes up, and we let this new purchasing power overtake all rational thought.

Those of us trying to “make it” in the entertainment realm tend to hyperbolize everything we do. Everything has to be larger than life (especially out here where I live: The City of Angels).  The stars that teenagers watch on television don’t talk about the day to day it takes to achieve a dream, or that when we get a large sum of money it may have to last us the rest of our lives. We prefer the lights and the smoke to make everything look as sexy as possible.

I have been very lucky over the last couple years to have an opportunity to tell kids at Junior and Senior High Schools around the country that the lights and smoke are a façade, and that the notion of “Financial Literacy” is actually a lot sexier than one might think. I was honored to work with Quincy Jones and John Hope Bryant’s “Operation Hope” in Los Angeles to tell kids that there are a myriad of other jobs in the music business besides being the “Front Man”, and that artists with staying power have a firm grip on the inner-workings of their organization, including how (and how much) money is being spent. I told the kids that my study of licensing, publishing, and business in general has been every bit as crucial in my career as figuring out how to rip off guitar licks by Jimi Hendrix or try to sing like Bono.

USD259 Wichita (my alma matter and where I started my band in the 90’s) is now in the process of making financial literacy a requirement in the schools, and my band and I couldn’t agree more with the decision. We recently played two shows for Goddard high school backed by Wichita’s Emprise bank and are looking forward to continuing these free shows at the schools throughout the fall of 2011 and Spring of 2012. Wichita has been the backbone of everything we have done in music, and we are excited to talk face to face with kids who are starting out exactly where we were.

I tell the students a little bit about my history; about starting a recording studio out of my mom’s basement at 14, selling my tapes and CD’s at school and saying yes to every show we were offered.  It’s not all glitz and glamour.  I tell them about living out of a van on the road for over a decade, cooking ramen in coffee pots in every run down motel in the Midwest, our van catching fire, gear getting stolen, late-night gigs and all-night drives. Since our start we’ve played 700 shows in 140 cities in 48 states, including 15 Army, Marine and Navy bases, Walter Reed Hospital, The Conference on World Affairs in Boulder, and received a private tour of the White House.

It has taken us years of working for next to nothing, but through every trial and tribulation we have kept our eyes on our finances and our future. Slowly but surely we built our own network and our own career path and we have done it without a major label or corporate sponsor. After a very long road, I am proud to say that you can make a decent and consistent living recording, performing and licensing the music you want to create. Understanding finance and not leaving the business up to someone else has allowed us to avoid several pitfalls that I enjoy talking to the schools about. We are too busy to even consider getting into drugs, we haven’t signed a bad record contract where someone else is keeping 99% of the profits, and we are poised to take advantage of future earnings as our career builds. Maybe most significantly, we are not told what to record, what to wear, and where we have to play. We are living by our own terms, a form of freedom that in the western world only comes from keeping your eyes on your budget.

If I would of paid even more attention to my day to day finances growing up, instead of thinking that elusive record deal could somehow solve all our problems, I would have created even more chances to support the causes and people that I believe in today.

If you have any comments or ideas about how I can move this program forward,  please reach out anytime at gooding@goodingmusic.com, or facebook.com/goodingmusic

words > PIPELINE PRODUCTIONS

1.
This TV On The Radio album, Nine Types of Light (Interscope), is a lush and beautiful album that stands apart from the group’s previous work. If their other albums had shades of dystopia and distress, this album, sung by Tunde Adebimpe and Kyp Malone, is filled with songs about longing and love. “I like love songs. There’s nothing particularly interesting going on with me in my life to bear this work. I like the forms of love songs, the poetry.” Kyp adds that though there might be more “positivity” on this album, it wasn’t an overall conceit they set out to do. “We’ve attempted to work on themes before but they fall apart very quickly. More organic versions arise because we’re sharing time or space or communication.”

Though Nine Types of Light will sound like an album full of love songs, often the true meaning of the songs lie deeper. On “You,” Tunde sings a haunted refrain; you’re the only one I have ever loved. The sincerity of his voice sells the idea of absolute adoration. But Tunde explains, “It’s a song about the feeling you get sometimes when you’re expressing how much you care about someone but resorting to these beautiful sounding lies. You’re the only one I ever loved? It’s a terrible thing to say to someone because it’s most likely not true.”

2.
Nine Types of Light is the fourth album from TV on the Radio. You will want to refer to it as the “fourth proper studio album” from TV On The Radio; those albums were preceded by an EP, Young Liars, and an 18-track handmade CD called OK Calculator, that is considered more like a demo tape (because it was “released” by being hidden in random sofa cushions of New York coffee shops). Enhancing nearly every aspect of their Shortlist Prize-winning Desperate Youth, Blood Thirsty Babes, 2006’s Return to Cookie Mountain was released to crazy universal acclaim. Rolling Stone said “It might be the most oddly beautiful, psychedelic and ambitious album of the year,” with The New York Times agreeing: “It’s more experimental yet catchier, more introspective yet more assertive, by turns gloomier and funnier, and above all richer in both sound and implication. ‘Return to Cookie Mountain’ is simply one of this year’s best albums.”

Nine Types of Light is the follow-up to the band’s gorgeous, glorious 2008 release, Dear Science, and proved to be its breakout release. It was named album of the year by Rolling Stone, Spin, Pitchfork, Entertainment Weekly and MTV; and touring behind the album, the group sold out a year’s worth of live shows across the world. This, however, did not prevent everyone from referring to TV On The Radio as a Brooklyn band. That is not a bad thing. The group – Tunde Adebimpe, Kyp Malone, Dave Sitek, Jaleel Bunton, Gerard Smith – are indeed from Brooklyn.

3.
But sometimes it’s ok to leave. The band recorded Nine Types of Light in Los Angeles, the first time they have recorded outside of Brooklyn. In 2010, the group’s multi-instrumentalist, producer and sometimes beat-boxer, Dave Sitek, moved to Los Angeles because that’s where the money he wanted a change of scenery. Nine Types of Light was recorded at his home studio. The experience of recording away from the friendly confines of Greenpoint and Williamsburg wasn’t such a pleasant one, however, but not because of any reactionary dislike of LA that sometimes comes from New Yorkers. “I actually like Los Angeles a lot,” says Jaleel. “But if there’s a bohemian part of the city, a place that can be a creative sanctuary, we were staying in a place that was the opposite.”

“It was in a high-end mall down the street from Rodeo Drive, and a few blocks from the Modern Instituted of Plastic Surgery,” says Tunde. “And they were doing construction on our floor the whole time we were there. It wasn’t so much squalor as it was…if I were a door-to-door salesman, it’s where I would kill myself.”

Nine Types of Light was written and recorded in about three months – slightly quicker than they’ve recorded any previous album.

4.
TV On The Radio do not write traditional pop songs. Often, they change direction two or three times in one song. Distorted guitars, sauntering and reverberating bass,

TVOTR tunes are just-barely containing an explosive amount of energy underneath itself – and that tension is nothing less than thrilling. It has become somewhat of a signature of the band, particularly matched with Tunde’s serene and poetic vocals. On this album, the group takes an admittedly simpler approach to some of their songs. “Will Do,” starts out with wind chimes before giving away to that trademark buzz, with Tunde singing about the yearning for his ungovernable, unrequited love of another. “I think the songs on this album, to me, maybe sound simpler,” Tunde says. “But it just might be that we have gotten better at what we do.”

Other songs on Nine Types Of Light include more up-tempo post-rock jams like “No Future Shock” (vocals by Kyp) and the ’80s-rap-beat “Caffeinated Consciousness,” which sounds like it was influenced by Big Audio Dynamite. There are two songs, “All Falls Down” and “The Troubles,” that will be available on the Deluxe Edition of the album.

5.
Nine Types of Light might sound like a peculiar name for an album. Perhaps a reference to a core scientific principle on the refraction of sunlight. Or a grand ideology of film or photography techniques. But the album title actually isn’t a reference to anything specific, the band says. It holds no cryptic meaning. “It’s something that kept circling around in my head,” Tunde says. “It struck me as odd that that phrase, when you keep it to just nine types of light, it’s excluding a billion other types of light. I like how it’s a little slippery.” Thus, no one should ask Tunde to actually list the nine types of light he is referring to.

6.
There is a cycle that a band goes through with each release that involves recording an album, releasing it and then touring behind it. For a group with a loyal and growing fan-base like TV On The Radio, that cycle can last about two years, which is an awful lot of time to spend with people in a highly-creative environment. This is what happened after Dear Science. “After the last show (for Dear Science), I just wanted to do anything that wasn’t this,” Tunde explains. “It was such an intense experience – not bad or good necessarily, just intense. I spent a lot of time after that writing and drawing pictures.” Says Gerard Smith, “It allows us to do the other things we want to do, or to just decompress, and then come back to the band with some focus. We don’t ever want to feel like we have to do this, that it’s a job, necessarily.”

7.
As celebrated and wonderful as TV On The Radio is, the entity is not enough to contain the entire creative thirst of its members, and the band’s five members accomplished in the time between albums. Tunde and Gerard wrote and composed music for “The Lottery,” a documentary that looks at public education through the eyes of Harlem’s Success Academy annual intake lottery. Tunde also worked on a series of short film that he says may or may not ever see the light of day. He, of course, also starred in the Oscar-nominated film, Rachel Getting Married. Gerard spent time making music on his own, producing new music from the NYC-based Midnight Masses. Jaleel spent the period in between records moving out from behind the drums to playing guitar again, his first instrument. He also played in the blues and gospel band, Reverend Vince Anderson & His Love Choir (“One of my favorite gigs ever,” he says.), and continued to periodically tend bar at legendary Lower East Side bar, Max Fish.

Dave Sitek released his own solo album, under the name, Maximum Balloon (DGC/Interscope), which featured friends like Karen O, Theophilus London and David Byrne. He played with, collaborated with and produced artists like the Yeah Yeah Yeahs, Wale and Holly Miranda. Recently he announced he would be producing and playing bass on the new album from Jane’s Addiction. Kyp released his solo album under the name Rain Machine, and embarked on a couple of brief tours, including a recent one with his friend from San Francisco, singer-songwriter, Jolie Holland. One would think the last thing they’d want to do during a break would be more recording and touring, but Kyp felt differently. He says, “I feel like every concentrated experience of making a record, touring a record, and playing with different people, dealing with different social dynamics potentially increases my musicianship and how I understand music.”

8.
TV On The Radio plan an extensive tour beginning just before the release of Nine Types of Light. They will headline Radio City Music Hall in New York on April 13, the day after the album’s release.

www.tvontheradio.com

www.interscope.com

www.tvontheradio.com

No Remorse

Demo

Self Released

Local hardcore band No Remorse is a young group that is proving its worth from its infancy. Though they still have more to accomplish, they are proving that hard work and drive is the key. Their most recent demo, though rough in production at times, gives an abstract of aggression, desolation, and power. If you’re a fan of early Metallica and Terror, No Remorse is right up your alley.

Chelsea Wolfe

Ἀποκάλυψις (Apokalypsis)

Pendu Sound Recordings

Chelsea Wolfe is the soundtrack to a desert on fire. The LA-based artist is somewhere between folk artist and doom impresario. The result is a minimalistic barrage of sound that is frighteningly beautiful and makes the hair on your neck stand on end. Tracks like “Mer”, “Moses” and “Wasteland” show her depth, but also how concise and related the release is as a whole. Chelsea Wolfe is Stevie Nicks in a creepy David Lynch movie.

Washed Out

Within and Without

Sub Pop

Washed Out is that project/band that will have 30+ somethings remember their youth as college radio and mix tapes, and young hipsters of now finally dancing without a care as to who is looking or who they are impressing. Washed Out is chill wave artist Ernest Greene’s heartfelt synth heavy portrayal of magnetic beauty and simplicity. Within and Without isn’t 100% but there are more pluses than minuses in this release. Tracks like “Eyes Be Closed” and “Amor Fati” shine bright on this new rough cut diamond.

Wugazi

13 Chambers

Cecil Otter & Swiss Andy

Seriously. It was only a matter of time before someone did it. And thankfully the right producers were behind it. Cecil Otter and Swiss Andy’s brass ball audacity to take hip-hop legends Wu-Tang Clan and celebrated indie-rockers Fugazi and have them collide in some sort of chocolate and peanut butter moment is commendable at least. Luckily the mashup between the two forefathers of innovations leaves this album mostly full with A-hah moments and pleasant surprises. Definitely worth a listen for fans of both groups.

Weekend Nachos

Worthless

Relapse Records

The name gets you to giggle, but don’t be fooled. Weekend Nachos is not a cheesy band. It’s sound is brash and punishing, full thrashy and pulverising riffs that run like stop and go traffic on the autobahn. From perverse amounts of speed to dirges sludge that change at the drop of a hat. Worthless is just another release that shines and has whatever mood you’re in amplified to 11.

Life happens. It isn’t always possible to make, do and see everything. It pains me to have to click on “maybes” for facebook events/concerts as they are white lies alluding to my intentions of possibly being there, but probably wont make it. An instance of that occurring this past year was when Santa Barbara, CA band Gardens & Villa came through and I just missed them by a nose. That won’t happen again this time when they come to Rock Island Live, Aug 8th.

Gardens & Villa is a band a little tough to put your finger on. I mean there is an obvious allusion to the band Talking Heads once you give them a good long listen, and there is nothing wrong with that. The thing that is puzzling is the emotion that is evoked in one after they hear them. G&V’s willingness to experiment within its instrumentation is somewhere between 60’s AM gold and Gang Of Four, which should be a bit of a conundrum.

Vocalist Chris Lynch’s ability to stretch and bend his voice in ways that is dark to goofy helps hold an already well structured pop-hybrid together. Jams from their newest self-titled release are full of whimsy, bounce and synth-laden hooks, but they don’t take you to some post-wavey-whatnot genre that is full of itself.

G&V has a certain flow and undulating structure that makes you do that ridiculous awkward swaying thing when you hear them, and makes you hope you wont get stuck next to that one hippie girl who dances with her hands way too much. Even if you do though, G&V’s lack of pretentious attitude makes you more susceptible to do the same with yourself.

It wasn’t until my freshman year of high school that I became exposed to the music and art scene here. Since I first started frequenting Final Friday shows three years ago, I’ve met tons of very talented artists that live here in Wichita. One group in particular stands out among many of Wichita’s talented musicians, and they are Pretending We’re Pictures. This three-piece group has only been performing since January, and in a short amount of time has gained a loyal following and produced very creative and interesting music. I know this can be said of a lot of local bands, but what makes Pretending We’re Pictures stand out is their age. PWP is comprised of three high school students, Ben Snook, 16, a junior at Maize South High School; Will Erickson, 16, a junior at Northwest High School, and Aaron Gable, 17, a senior at Northwest High School. They provide lead vocals and guitar, drums, and bass respectively. PWP’s music is very melodic and full. In Will’s words, “[they’re] a blend of Modest Mouse, Animal Collective, and Explosions in the Sky,” which are a few of each one’s most influential groups. Ben’s chord-based guitar parts and low, gentle vocals are accompanied well by Aaron’s light and catchy counter melodies; Will’s open and washy style helps to accent the melodic lead parts of their songs.

Each of PWP’s members is very creative, and capable of coming up with an idea for a song in a matter of minutes. Their song writing process is also very collaborative, and they work very well together. Both Will and Aaron will admit that a lot of their process comes from an idea from Ben that they will build on, but each will independently work on their own parts and bring them together, and “hope it doesn’t terribly clash.” They also have songs written spontaneously from jam sessions where they all work off of each other’s vibes.

Ben writes “mostly about dreams, or being in the dreamstate, as well as how beautiful nature can be.” Each of PWP’s songs has only a few words, normally one verse and a chorus, which are repeated with variation that enriches each song’s tone. The poetics of Ben’s writing helps bring the songs to life.

Pretending We’re Pictures was first formed when Ben and Will met and started writing a few songs in October of last year. After a while they booked a few shows with no bass player, and Aaron joined two weeks before their first show. Since then they have been playing shows all over Wichita, their most recent appearance at The Vertical Violet’s Pond Party 2011. On a more unfortunate note, PWP has stated that they are going to be broken up by this time next year, as Aaron plans on going to art school in Portland after graduating. But disregarding the future, the group is taking a break from performances for about three months to write a lot of new material and look into recording an LP. While they may be off the radar for a short while, Wichita will have a lot to look forward to when Pretending We’re Pictures makes their return.

I didn’t know what barbershop hats were technically called until I just looked it up. They are “boaters”, and most of the references I found took me to costume and novelty shops. It seems that they have seen their popularity come and go. With only outside knowledge of barbershop music, it could be pretty easy to assume that it has followed the boater into the realm of Halloween costumes, prank TV shows and themed bar crawls. But, funnily enough, show up at the right bar at the right time and you’ll see that it’s still got a pulse. The gentlemen I ran into on such an occasion were hanging out, practicing their songs, and inviting whoever noticed to join in. That’s how I found out about the Air Capital Chorus.

The Air Capital Chorus is the local chapter of the Barbershop Harmony Society and is made up of about 20 men of all ages who get together and rehearse every Tuesday evening at the Scottish Rite Center. There’s a large amount of variety to be found in the singers, from young to old, large to small, and novice to expert. Maybe the most entertaining thing about seeing them rehearse is placing the voice with the man. There are gruff and grizzled men with smooth baritone voices, and there are clean cut guys with deep, chest-cavity-rattling basses. And somehow, there are guys that just don’t fit any specific bill. They can cover the whole range, which is personally mind boggling. I tried singing Motley Crue at karaoke last week and just about blew out my vocal chords. I guess these guys aren’t singing hair metal song,s though. They sing stuff with titles like “Gee Gum”, “Java Jive”, and “I Didn’t Want to Fall (in Love)”. These are songs that have lasted for a good 50 years minimum. The direct nature of the lyrics in a lot of these songs allows them to have a consistent meaning regardless of time, place or situation. It also allows for them to be easily lampooned. Modern pop culture has picked up on this and used it for comedic purposes in things such TV shows as Family Guy and Arrested Development. I’m not sure if authentic barbershop singers are totally okay with this, but something tells me that if they aren’t, they’ll find a barbershop way of getting back.

That’s probably why the Air Capital Chorus still takes their rehearsals seriously. They know they have got to be better than a joke, which the casual on-looker may take them to be, at first glance anyway. Mary Halsig, the group’s director and lone female representative (God help her) isn’t a cruel taskmaster by any means, but she didn’t hesitate to call out mistakes. The competitions they have competed and been successful in no doubt show the value of all of this. So go check them out. Their website will have up to date show listings, and any information about joining the group, if you are interested. You will have fun if you do, and I offer as proof the fact that I didn’t have to use Glee to convince you.