The Bus Bench

Two Boots Pizza Soon to Open in L.A.

Two Boots is eventually to open a joint in L.A. What is Two Boots? Well, lemme tell ya: it ain't just pizza. In LES (on E. 2nd), the basement served as a small cinema house and there is a video rental; along with the pizza it was one of my favourite hang-outs.

In last week's LA Weekly, there was a relatively inconspicuous advert (on page 40) with a picture of Andy Kaufman (or Jim Carey as Andy Kaufman) as a fat, aging lounge singer. The copy stated only "Tony Clifton is Coming" and the Web site. Sure enough, it was my beloved pizza joint.

But where in L.A. will Two Boots land? Your guess is as good as mine. I hope it will be somewhere in downtown.

I wish I had more than the video below, but as I have long found the glass-walled bathroom fascinating, well, that is all I have on hand. (Btw, that's 2nd Street that from which the looky-loo is looking)

-BusTard

A DASH of New York, now in L.A.

I make a weekly tour or two to pick up mail in Franklin Hills, and occasionally the DASH happens to be waiting at the curb as I exit the Red Line's Sunset/Vermont station. Last week I spied a development on the DASH that I noticed was remarkably similar to a mid-town (Manhattan) LED crawl while awaiting the downtown R last December.

First the new DASH:

Now the mid-town marque:

-BusTard

Will Detour be Detoured?

UPDATE: I spoke this afternoon with Goldenvoice event producer Phil Blaine—a downtown resident, I might add—and he stated that with the coöperation of the Secret Service, LAPD, LAFD and Clinton's people, the two events should pose no problems to the attendees. Clinton's fund-raiser will take place from 6 p.m. until 7:30 p.m. and will have reserved parking as well as offer egress in Harlem Place (the alley between the Edison and the cigar/art shoppe) whereas the main gate of Detour—half a block away—will not interfere with the Edison soiree. The security perimeter for Clinton will not intrude on Detour.

The Detour Fest will be this weekend, and Browne and I will once again be marching proudly and unpaid through the gates because, well, it's a street festival and we already paid when the taxman had his hand out.

Or so we hope. . .

Another September 11. . .

It is an odd day out there. Still overcast, unlike most every day this year before it.

This morning I exited the Library Tower round 10 a.m. and was struck by the slight resemblance of the Arco Towers (at 5th and Flower Streets) to World Trades 1 and 2 (at Vesey and Church Streets). Shorter, granted, but still a bit like the Plaza near Park Row and the church.

It reminded me of when I was nearly in the pit in lower Manhattan in 2002. I was near where the R at Cortlandt once was. The day before had been a normal Autumn day—as normal as it could be, one day short of what had happened exactly a year earlier. On the 12th, it was again back to "normal.

But in 2002 the 11th was a day of remarkable bluster. The oddly hot winds were kicking up a flurry of dust storms in and round the pit where once stood World Trades 1, 2 and 7. I still maintain that the meteorological event was the direct result of all the anger, confusion, hatred and desperation that was no less palpable a year after the attacks.

At least the stench was gone.

-BusTard

L.A. Unplugged

It is everywhere, but like a snake it is nowhere: copper. Most folk in Los Angeles drive, and to you I state: look at the berm of the bridge the next time you are on a Freeway. The iron grates that allow DWP to enter the circuit have most likely been breached, and there is a damn good chance that the cut copper wires are sticking out from the respective cement hole. Moreover, in some places the wire is jutting out in fashion that suggests that the perpetrator merely leaned over the cement divider and cut the wire as far down as possible after quickly tearing off one side of the plate.

 

Any engineer can divulge the immense municipal cost of such widespread theft. It is within feet—in many instance, INCHES—to thousands of Angelinos daily, yet the Los Angeles City Council is whinging about deficits and all manor of crap that is obvious. I could make a living documenting the daily copper transgressions—I walk most everywhere, and I walk A LOT, what with my one-metre, New York-driven stride, and one of my guns is a camera. 

The following video—shot but a few feet from the government building on Los Angeles and 5th Street—exhibits evidence that government officials have apparently visited this site (unless there is a band of transit vandals with spare rolls of yellow "caution" tape) yet done nothing more than mitigate potential liability. I cannot state that, despite the dramatic loss obvious from Freeway street lighting copper theft, nearly as much has been done.

-BusTard

OK, so New York is not always better. . .

When The Washington Post elects to get droll, it does so in a way that makes me want to endure the cold of this time over there that I may wander out to get a copy. (If there is a newsagent in Los Angeles that has something other than a photocopy of the previous day's edition, I would damn well like to know where it is!)

Danny Weizmann

The brilliant Danny Weizmann was back in Los Angeles after who knows how many years after not really being in Los Angeles.

He was for many years in New York, and now he lives in Israel. And if you have any knowledge of punk rock, fanzines, early alternative literature and Los Angeles spoken word, then you should know Danny Weizmann.

Here is a quick run-down: one of the first L.A. Weekly writers, one of the first punk fanzine publishers in Los Angeles (a few years after Flipside started in 1977, but 1981 was only the beginning of the end, anyhow), an early writer for Flipside (R.I.P. 1977-1999) one of the first to break away from the Beats bullshit (a boys' club of inheritance-enriched mama's boys, to be sure) and a writer whose work continues to impress.

If you are fortunate enough to possess—or at least have heard—one or both of his New Alliance albums (one of three record labels owned by former Black Flag founder, song-writer and guitarist Gregg Ginn), then surely you know what I mean. If not, I urge you to get a copy of at least one of them: "The Wet Dog Shakes" and "Hollywoodland."

In the meantime, enjoy this brief excerpt from the Golden River Concrete Gothic's inaugural event, where Mr. Weizmann did a rare performance. (Sorry for the dark video; the lighting was rather poor.)

 

 

Films to fuck your downtown state of mind. . .

For the first of three nights of five films to be screened at REDCAT, I missed what I had hoped to be a weekend of jaw-dropping, eye-opening, mind-blowing and highly controversial cinema and debate: All Power to The People: The History and Legacy of The Black Panther Party. (White guy that I am, I opted to see some friends ice-skate while former good friends Leather Hy-, er LISTING SHIP, performed at Pershing Square. From there things turned to a favourite chair that has long known my olde arse at the Biltmore, then quarrelling in the streets and making friends with fellow crazies along midnight on 6th Street halfway to any given mission between San Pedro and Central.)

Anyhow.

So what I missed Friday were three films: "Off The Pigs," "Repression" and "The Murder of Fred Hampton." Three scary films for anyone who understands how things were and, for the lack of daily riotous outbursts, how bad they may well become. Come Saturday and Sunday, however, (and amid all I have to do to get a particular theatre up and running by 21 January), I will be seated to see the rest of this too-brief series.

This could be an epic post, what with my perspectives on anti-statism, violence, mob mentality and rapid change of the world, but I will give it a rest.

-BusTard

Patti Smith, New York, and LA like doesn't suck.

PattiSmith

I met Dael Orlandersmith at the 100 poet reading at St Mark’s Church on the Lower Eastside of New York. Steve Cannon of Tribes introduced us. I’m assuming that was done to get me away from him, though that was a nice way to do it.

“Dael, here’s Browne, you guys should talk,” Steve Cannon running away.

So Dael is famous for writing Yellowman an award winning play and I was like “Oh wow!!” And things, but then she said she preferred San Francisco to LA and I found that a bit problematic.

The Thin Blue Line. NY style

NYPDonNewYears2008
Video sent by shametrainla

The cops in NY aren't as big of assholes as the cops in LA, but keep in mind they are still assholes.