Secret Mountains, Dangerous Ponies @ Golden West Tonight

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We were sad to hear the news a few weeks ago that the Hexagon Space was closing. We’re sad to hear about any venue closing up, even if we don’t go there very often. Fletcher’s, The Supreme Imperial, even Hal Daddy’s; we may have gone there pretty seldom, but any venue is better than no venue in our eyes.

That said, we weren’t exactly losing sleep over it. The law of supply and demand has always governed underground music venues in Baltimore, and sometimes it almost seems as if one space needs to close before someone else will take the initiative to open a new one. Every time we hear about something like this, we’re sorry for it, but more than anything we’re excited to see what new thing the future holds.

Secret Mountains plays Golden West tonight.

So it is with the Hexagon. The way that City Paper article reads, the thing that takes the Hexagon’s place might even literally take its place, and another DIY venue is not out of the question for that address. The room is a great place to watch bands, but Joy Martin is right… there had to be more shows there in order to make the space live up to its potential. The last time we were there was actually more than a year before the closing.

In the meantime though, the shows must go on, and the scene is none the poorer for losing Hexagon. For instance, tonight the Golden West is hosting a show which is nearly the exact same bill as one of the better Hexagon shows in recent memory. Local favorites Secret Mountains are rejoined by their Philly friends and contemporaries Hop Along and Dangerous Ponies.

If you’re the type who likes taping shows or taking photos of them, this one would be a good choice to document. Three great bands for five bucks on a Wednesday, after all the real-job-having nine to five types have packed it in for the night. This show will be one of those little things that makes Summer so Summery, and if you’re serious about getting your Summertime fun on, this one’s not to be missed.

Highwaters and Sandals

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The Summer has officially begun in Baltimore. Memorial Day weekend marked its official start, and the holiday brought the stifling Summer heat right along with it. It breaks our Choppy little heart to think that for the next 3 months, most people in our fair city are going to forgo fashion altogether in favor of whatever they’ve got in their drawers with the fewest actual threads in it. We’re in for a long Summer of sleeveless tees, jorts and the rest of it.

Some of us haven’t given up though. We’ve said before that we do not favor shortpants on grown men, and that sandals are only to be worn in close proximity to water. However, if you followed our advice and bought a stylish pair of flip flops, you may be wondering exactly how the fuck you’re expected to wear them if not with shorts. For the answer, we look once again to Steve McQueen:

Sure, it's too hot to put much effort into your wardrobe. Good thing this look is effortless.

If you’re actually going to be near the water, there’s no better look than this one. Not even the fact that this photo was once misappropriated for a Gap ad can take away from this dead-on Summer style. Sandals are actually made for getting your feet wet, and so highwater pants are an appropriate match. In point of fact, this is the only time that highwater pants are actually acceptable.

We’ve also said before that we’re no great fan of the Sartorialist, and one of his recent photos illustrates how not to wear highwaters:

Like most everything on the Sartorialist, this is just way too fucking precious.

Scott Schuman publishes this kind of crap all the time. We only had to go back a couple of days to find this one. Our man here is exactly what Huckleberry Finn would look like if he moved to New York City and became a high-class rent boy.

Those pants are not only cuffed, they’re tailored that way to show off what we assume are artisanal calfskin ‘workman’s’ boots handmade in some Brooklyn studio, which must be stank as fuck being worn sockless the way they are. The rolled up short sleeves on the shirt (note McQueen’s long sleeves) and the willfully arcane suspenders suggest this lad belongs in the revival road cast of Newsies, but the $2000 briefcase carried without any other business attire reminds us that, yes, this guy probably does hand out lunchtime blowjobs to wall street executives for a living.

A comparison of these two photos illustrates not only the best way to wear cuffed pants, but also how to distinguish a timeless and effortless style from an incredibly expensive costume.

Don’t Break Your Neck Looking

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Just a quick post today, since it’s Memorial Day and everyone is outside cooking on grills and hanging around the beach and not reading blogs anyway.

We’ve already seen a little of it, but with today being the traditional start of Summer, the women of Baltimore are all simultaneously about to head to Cloud 9 and South Moon Under to stock up on short-shorts, spaghetti straps, sundresses, and all of those other Summer staples we like… a lot.

A visual approximation of the Chop in early Summer.

It’s lucky for us that we’re still in pretty decent shape, because otherwise we’d be spending Memorial Day at Patient First getting treated for neck sprains after all the times our head’s spun round this past week. And why not? We’re single, huh? It’s been a long winter, and it’s only a few more weeks before we go back to the Middle East, which is not exactly South Beach, you know?

So we’re going to enjoy stealing glances at Summer outfits while we can. Ladies, keep the skirts short, the shoulders bare and the tan lines even. Men of Baltimore, take a tip from us; get in a few long looks- but try not to break your neck.

Super Sam Fuld Cape Day @ Tropicana Field

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Wearing a cape is a true fashion statement. It either says 'I'm a superhero,' 'I'm retarded,' or 'I'm drunk.' Guess which one we are.

The Chop is not the type of baseball fan who needs a bunch of cheap gimmicks to get us in the gate. Cheap beer would be nice, but cheap gimmicks are totally unnecessary. Sure, we’ve got more than our share of Orioles T-shirts, and we might be more likely to show up if we know its bobblehead night or Miller Light Floppy Hat Day, which is pretty much a municipal holiday here in Charm City, but by and large we aren’t impressed by baseball swag.

With that said, we really kinda wish we could attend Super Sam Fuld Cape Day at the Trop.

The Rays might just be the Major League champions of promotional giveaways in 2011. We haven’t looked over the schedules for every team, but they’re definitely on to something with this whole ‘buy a ticket to the ballgame and stay for a concert’ deal, which they’re doing several times this year featuring artists who, while we’re not into them, are at least legitimately famous. They’re also giving away a variety of t-shirts and a few different bobbleheads, as well as a Joe Maddon coin bank which looks more like Phil Rizzuto and an Evan Longoria cereal bowl and spoon set. We can’t tell you how many times we’ve slurped down the last dregs of milk and been frustrated and disappointed not to see a big league 3rd baseman staring back at us. We’re definitely going to be eBay-ing that one.

But the Super Sam Fuld cape absolutely takes the cake. Sure, Fuld is having a great year, but ultimately we’re not sure he’ll ever be more than the answer to an obscure trivia question many years down the road. To us this may be something on the order of the Rollie Fingers wax mustache or the Dustin Pedroia temp-tramp-stamp tattoo. (Okay, we made both of those up, but they could be true.) To our mind, this is absolutely the greatest giveaway since last year’s vuvuzela night in Miami.

The only downside to this awesome, incredible giveaway? It’s only for kids 14 and under. Those little punks have all the fun.

Update: Thanks to Rick Vaughn in the Rays’ front offiice for reaching out and mailing the Chop a Super Sam cape of our very own!

Lovers @ 2640 Space Tonight

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…And now for something completely different. The Chop is on our way to the Red Emma’s Queer Music Explosion! at the 2640 Space tonight. That might surprise some regular readers of this blog, who are more used to us talking about pretty straightforward punk and post-punk bands. We’re not exactly known for being a fan of synth-driven dance music, let alone uber-queer Portland hippie synth-driven dance music, but believe us when we say that Lovers is one of our favorite bands of all time. Seriously. We’re talking like you can only bring five records to a desert island type of favorites. They’re that good.

Lovers plays 2640 tonight. 7:30 pm.

Our first introduction to Carolyn Berk had nothing to do with synthpop at all. It was in (circa) 2005 when Lovers was a very different band indeed. In fact, that night it was just Berk with a chair and a guitar, down in the basement at the Charm City Art Space. Even on that night, stripped down to the barest of elements, Lovers was a captivating band. We went home that night with a copy of the first record Star Lit Sunken Ship, and were blown away by the added textural layers that made the great songs we’d heard performed even better. It’s since become one of our favorite records, and has remained in heavy rotation here at the Chophouse.

Since then, Carolyn Berk has been one of those artists who spends at least as much time gathering inspiration as she has making and selling records. Moving from New England to Georgia before finally settling in Portland, Lovers’ discography has been as varied as their lineups and geography. A quick look and listen at their Myspace page will reveal not only the differences in style the band has embraced in the last 10 years, but also the similarities in mood, tone, feeling and subject matter. Any band that keeps writing the same record again and again will doom itself to irrelevance and cheapen the value of its earlier work. There is no danger of that here.

In the case of Lovers, the band’s musical growth has mirrored its frontwoman’s personal growth, and not since the Beatles has any band been able to depart so drastically from its starting point while maintaining such a consistent sense of purpose and vision. Berk and her bandmates are every bit as good with synths as they ever were with guitars. It’s this sort of evolution that will, for any band, bring in new fans while rewarding the old ones. Since the move to Portland, Berk and Lovers have been embraced by and immersed in the queer community, and fit very well on a bill like tonight’s, but don’t let that fool you. Carolyn’s lyrics have always been as personal and introspective as it is possible to be, and it’s precisely that which makes them universal. As she told Venus Zine in 2009:

“I am all those things, but I’m so much more,” she says. “I think it’s important to be loud and proud, and there’s a lot of pressure to feel marginalized, which is so old and tired. There are tons of straight, male Lovers fans, and I’m singing to everybody. I like to write about universal things because more than any of that I’m a humanist — I’m beyond humanist. I like animals. I’m a hippie. I’m a lover.”

We hope we can convince a few more of those straight, male fans to say “Dan Who-con? Future What-lands?” and come out to 2640 tonight to see what is without a doubt the best electronic band working today, anywhere.

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Queer Music Explosion also features Silence Kid, Saddle of Centaur, and The Degenerettes. 2640 Saint Paul Street is a dry venue, and this show is no alcohol, no BYOB. 7:30-11pm.