Wednesday Dance Party!
FREE, $1 Drink specials starting at 9:00!

https://www.facebook.com/Aireeoke?fref=ts

Every Tuesday at The Shakedown:

Aireekah is wacky like a clown-car and sweet as cupcakes…and she really enjoys a megaphone or microphone (or both at the same time)…so there’s just no going wrong with her hosting karaoke. Clear your throats, maybe put something fancy in your hair (or on your face. Or in your pants. Aireekah will approve.), and get down here to sing your favorites on a real stage.

Show up early to get your pick of songs.

Just like the old days, one of our favorite Bellingham bar traditions is back for your drinking pleasure. Monday nights at the Shakedown: get a bourbon or a gimlet on the rocks + a complimentary filterless smoke for 3 bucks and Tom Waits music on the house, all night long.

Get tickets here.

Shakedown opening weekend - Rooftops

Rooftops
In the far northwest corner of Washington State, nestled in the trees, between the mountains and the bay, is the city of Bellingham and the home of Rooftops. With Drew Fitchette, Mark Detrick, and Jonathan McIntyre on guitar and Wendelin Wohlgemuth on drums, Rooftops craft intricate, mathy pop rock with reticular instrumentation and sparse vocals, heavily influenced by the Chicago and Pittsburg indie scenes of the mid to late 90’s.

http://www.rooftopsmusic.net/
http://www.last.fm/music/rooftops
http://www.twitter.com/rooftopsmusic
https://www.facebook.com/pages/Rooftops/55424297298?fref=ts

And And And (Portland)
Born in Portland, OR in the year of our Lord, 2009, And And And is a 5 piece band of thieves and gypsies that play rock music that could possibly be compared to The Kinks and Pavement thrown into a blender and left for several days in the sun.

http://andandandmusic.com/
https://twitter.com/#!/ANDANDANDmusic
http://www.explodinggreen.com/
https://www.facebook.com/andandandmusic

Navigator Communicator
https://www.facebook.com/Navigatorcommunicator?fref=ts

$5, door at 9, music at 10

Get tickets here.

Pierced Arrows
Pierced Arrows, the Portland-based trio comprised of legendary members Fred and Toody Cole of the seminal punk band Dead Moon, along with PAs drummer Kelly Halliburton, are on their way back to Bellingham.

During their defiant career, Dead Moon released a staggering 16 albums. Many of which were engineered and mastered direct to vinyl lacquers by Fred Cole on his 40-year old home lathe, the likes of which being infamous for cutting the original version of The Kingsmen’s “Louie Louie”. Since the late 1960s Fred and Toody also ran seminal music equipment stores and their own general store in their hometown of Clackamas, OR (Freedom Guitar, Captain Whizeagles, Tombstone Music), well known for outfitting generations of Portland musicians. Influencing many garage punk bands, Dead Moon are cited as a vital inspiration for the DIY movement, Dead Moon in part spawned an international phenomenon of focus on the Pacific Northwest music scene throughout the 90’s.

Following the disbandment of Dead Moon in 2006, Fred and Toody continued their endeavors, eventually tapping veteran Portland-based Kelly Halliburton (Severed Head of State, Defiance) to play drums for their next incarnation as Pierced Arrows. Coincidentally, Kelly’s father happened to play with Fred in his first band Albatross in 1972. In line with Fred and Toody’s ethical and cultural ideals, Kelly’s role in the band was set. Their debut LP Straight To The Heart in was released in 2008 on Tombstone Records, echoing the raw murky blues and country influence of Dead Moon as well as their first punk incarnation in the early 1980s as The Rats, the veterans (now in their 50’s) continued their tradition of powerful raucous live performances, touring heavily through the US and Europe for legions of Dead Moon fans eager to revisit the band’s new direction.

http://www.facebook.com/PiercedArrows?ref=ts&sk=wall
http://www.piercedarrows.com/

Shit Machine
https://www.facebook.com/pages/Shit-Machine/142038502487296?fref=ts

The BGB
https://www.facebook.com/bgbfrommv?ref=ts&fref=ts

Federation X
I want this band to play at my funeral. Federation X reveals an original and chaotically absolute way in the alternative rock scene. Conceiving fuming themes, amplified by folk, garage rock, and punk references, the Washington state trio ultimately delivers a set of extreme rock & roll. Assembled in the late ’90s, Federation X is guitarist Ben, drummer Beau, and vocalist and guitarist Bill.

The band has been compared to such heavy acts as Melvins, Karp, and Black Sabbath. If Bellingham had an unofficial Town Anthem, I’m pretty sure it’d be a Fed X song.

http://www.fedx.biz/
https://www.facebook.com/pages/Federation-X/10412627066

Lozen
Lozen , the namesake of the Tacoma power-sludge, guitar-drums duo of Hozoji Matheson-Margullis and Justine Valdez was a 19th century Apache leader and medicine woman who rode with Geronimo and was one of the most respected and feared warriors of the American West. If you found yourself on the wrong side of her on the battlefield, it was very likely your ass. Similarly, you should harbor no illusions about the two lovely ladies of Lozen the band: Their deliciously ugly, noisy, snarling assault like the best of the early Olympia riot grrrl years meets the best of the Amphetamine Reptile catalog will tear a hole in the sky and rain the fire of a thousand suns upon your head. Hard to think of a better way to go.
-MICHAEL ALAN GOLDBERG

https://www.facebook.com/lozenpower?fref=ts
http://lozenpower.bandcamp.com/.

Street Eaters (ex-Fleshies, Alternative Tentacles)
Street Eaters (Megan March and John No) live in the Berkeley/Oakland area. They tour and perform a lot, playing with the likes of Big Eyes, Neon Piss, Shellshag, Screaming Females, Forgetters, and other mutual badasses. Megan plays the drums and sings, John plays the bass and sings. There is no one else in the band, and there won’t be in the future.

“John No plays his bass like a lead guitar to Megan March’s vigorous, young Keith Moon-ish drumming, while the two share vocal duties equally through call-and-response, harmonizing, or just hyping backups. The songwriting is simply superb, infectiously memorable, and danceable with a slight new wave edge. This is definitely a band to watch for future greatness.”
- Josh Gabriel, Big Takeover Magazine, 2008

http://streeteaters.com/
https://www.facebook.com/streeteatersband
http://www.alternativetentacles.com/product.php?product=1830&sd=8ARO-e%40XWixDLAqwhdg

Rhombu$
https://www.facebook.com/pages/RHOMBU/325800774443?fref=ts

Get tickets here.

Rose Windows (Sub Pop)
“hard hitting hippies”
The notion that there is nothing new under the sun can be both a blessing and a curse to musicians. On the one hand, it absolves artists from any nagging sense that they have to reinvent the wheel with every new project. On the other, it makes innovation seem like a fool’s errand. Seattle songwriter Chris Cheveyo embraces this blessing, but with his compatriots in Rose Windows, he also defies the curse. The band follows standard Western traditions in their instrumentation, using the basic tools employed in past decades of American and British rock music. Elements of The Band’s folk-infused rock, The Doors organ-driven psychedelia, and Black Sabbath’s blues-based dirges can be heard in Rose Window’s debut album The Sun Dogs. But the septet’s curiosity goes much further than a few well-chosen classic rock records. The band devoured Persian, Indian, and Eastern European music, studying the beautiful and strange paths taken by visionaries and renegades in other corners of the globe, and incorporated the revelations learned in the process into their sound. In doing so, The Sun Dogs challenges the assumption that all creative territories have been mapped out and charted. While Rose Windows aren’t interested in making music of the future, one reviewer was wise enough to note “a sound like this would not be possible in any other time.”

https://www.facebook.com/rosewindows?fref=ts

La Luz
https://www.facebook.com/laluzusa?fref=ts
www.laluzband.tumblr.com
www.laluz.bandcamp.com

PRND
https://www.facebook.com/pages/PRND/153149174712561
http://soundcloud.com/prnd

Feral Fauna is the musical evolution of the audiafauna family (http://www.facebook.com/audiafauna ). while the band underwent changes inf congiuration, their production retained the vision of acoustic instrumentation coupled with live electronics. feral fauna is an experiment in reclaiming our own wild, or “feral,” roots.

By weaving sultry female vocals with acoustic instrumentation and electronic production, feral fauna create intriguing musical contrasts between acoustic & electronic, organic & digital, feminine & masculine. feral fauna bridges the genres of soul, pop, & electronica, and invoke a hybrid of Adele, Fiona Apple, The Black Keys, Emancipator and Moby.

ReignCity & Conquest present:
DESSA – Parts of Speech Tour at The Shakedown

From its first track, Dessa’s new full-length Parts of Speech (6.25.13, Doomtree Records) announces itself as something different. The Doomtree veteran and inveterate wordsmith — having proved her mettle in the fields of creative non-fiction, spoken-word and hip-hop — jettisons all genre expectations on “The Man I Knew” and croons a heartbreaking lament to a disintegrating relationship at an explosively-building clip.

From this moment on Dessa — oft–described as “Mos Def plus Dorothy Parker” for the wit and flow shown off on previous solo albums A Badly Broken Code and Castor, The Twin — proves she has truly coalesced as an artist, transcending the restrictions of genre to reveal an astonishing multi-platform voice.

“I wanted to investigate the idea that a cohesive record isn’t always made cohesive by having twelve songs that sound the same. I figured when you make a mixtape for a friend, you can get away with a range of genres and a lot of dynamic change. Why can’t I approach an album like that? The sequence has to be just right, and we worked hard to nail it, but the thing that holds this record together is the sensibility of the lyrics, rather than a uniform theme.”

Track two kicks off a stunning hat-trick of the record’s standout numbers. “Call Off Your Ghost” is an admittedly haunting dirge on the “struggle for grace in the wake of a long relationship.” An arena-sized chorus tucked into a melancholy lullaby, “Ghost” has that unique ability to perfectly soundtrack new love or bitter breakup at the same time.

Dessa then puts her fists up for “Warsaw.” The track boasts a beat like Azealia Banks playing Pacman, which provides a background for our emcee’s confident, hypnotic flow. Narrative takes a backseat to mood here, as Dessa spits impressionistic one-ups like “I sleep with both eyes open, standing up,” daring you to blink first.

“Skeleton Key” contains Parts of Speech’s mission statement: “I haven’t met a locked door yet.” An ode to female self-reliance that doesn’t waste ambiance for message, the track plays like a great, lost M. Night Shyamalan movie, calling forth an era out of time in the story of a woman, a key and a bottomless reserve of courage.

“This record involves multiple narratives. It explores the same themes of love, loss, connection and communion as a lot of my work, but the angle and lens through which they’re explored sets this album apart from my previous ones. The production techniques were new for me too — we spent a lot of time crafting a record that could include live players, Doomtree production, and sometimes a blend of the two.”

While the album is born of Dessa’s artistic vision, it benefits from the collaboration of her varied friends. Parts of Speech owes much of its impact to its diverse production. Dessa got her start as a member of Minneapolis hip-hop collective Doomtree — eventually going on to help manage the group’s business affairs as they launched their own label — and members Lazerbeak and Paper Tiger lend their production to several tracks.

The players in Dessa’s live ensemble all contributed to the record, as did several top-flight Minneapolis musicians working in rock, folk, and opera. She even enlisted a cellist she found on Pandora to make the gorgeously-layered foundation of penultimate track “It’s Only Me.”

Dessa, born and raised in Minneapolis after her parents met at a Duluth music store, was valedictorian of her high school, eventually skipping a year of college and graduating with honors before she could legally drink. Armed with a philosophy degree, the intrepid Midwesterner spent her nights as a waitress and days writing reference manuals used by doctors in the implantation of pacemakers.

“Language and verbal communication were important in my family. If I could argue my way into a later curfew, that argument was entertained. My parents may have regretted that policy later but it was a great motivator to help me develop a facility with words.”

A love of words is evident in both Parts of Speech’s title and its ethos, as Dessa’s philosophy training surfaces too. The rousing chorus of “Fighting Fish” references the Greek philosophical paradox of Zeno’s Arrow. “Beekeeper,” polished up from a starker appearance on Castor, finds Greek god Prometheus repossessing fire from the humans. “Sound the Bells” sings of Mercator, the cartographical genius who pioneered flat maps of a round world.

Parts of Speech could be made by no one but Dessa, but in its evolution and awareness it is the perfect culmination of the journey started with 2010’s A Badly Broken Code. Middle album Castor, The Twin was in many ways a blueprint for Speech. The earlier albums were praised widely for their focus and depth, but Speech shows a fantastic breadth.

By uniting a wealth of different tones and narratives under Dessa’s unmistakable poeticism, Parts of Speech greatly resembles Sherwood Anderson’s modernist fiction classic Winesburg, Ohio. Dessa creates a new world, populating it with complex characters, beautiful sonic landscapes and refreshing, assertive production.

An album that can boom out of a car window after its summer release, or soundtrack a November night in, Parts of Speech marks a highpoint in Dessa’s career and demonstrates the crossover power of the rising star’s burgeoning arsenal.

-Zack Rosen

https://www.facebook.com/dessadarling
http://www.doomtree.net/dessa/