FTM loves TJ

Issue 3.5Summer 2014

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Poems of Love: Rumble Fest Style

“Throwing Your First Music Festival is a Gigantic Pain in the Ass or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love What Went Wrong” by Chad Deal

“Perihelios: n., pl.” by Conner Houghtby

“Oaxaca” by Alejandro Martinez

An issue dedicated to Rumble Fest and our general love for Tijuana.

Joachim Ixcalli Cvstvnxda (Spain), Moistrix (SD/El Paso), Federico Fernandez Guerra (Mexicali), Ugo Art (TJ), Dear (TJ), Volumen Volts (Mexicali), Azteco (TJ), Unknown

Katie Howard Illustration

Yvette Dibos Illustration

Caitlin PetersenIllustration

Free the Marquee is a local cultural arts and music nonprofit in San Diego. Collecting bright minds and creative souls, FTM hopes to broaden the scope of arts and music education throughout the County. FTM maximizes outreach and educational opportunities for all demographics of San Diego. Current ventures include the magazine Free the Marquee, art education, and mu-sic outreach events. Each of these programs facilitates discourse within the community, while promoting local art, music, writing, and culture.

Conner Houghtby Illustration

Tijuana Rumble Festby: Katie Howard

We walked over the border and caught a cab to the venue. The only way of identifying where Pepe’s abandoned factory was located was by name of an auto repair business on the side of that long road on the outskirts of the city. Once we were dropped off we walked up a dirt road to find remnants of old brick buildings, in an open landscape of a valley. I was so excited we had arrived, I or-dered myself a refillable michelada in a clay pot, and starting find-ing my friends; some of which who’s eyes were already glossed over. Two stages stood in the open space, around us were mountains, crumbling walls, and artwork was being made on the last standing walls as bands played. A Mexican rasta band was playing upon our arrival, the lead singer had long dreadlocks down his back and he was protesting aloud, “Fuck the border, there is no border, this is America.” We all scurried around the venue, in and out of rooms, around buildings, atop the hill to watch overhead like rats and we watched the sun go down as we listened to music from up and down the west coast. We lounged in big tires that were abandoned on the hillside. It was a surreal experience in a foreign place, where we can all do as we please: enjoy music, art, drugs, and friendship in peace. I brought a bundle of FTM issue 3 zines to pass around and that was my ice breaker to approach groups of people I did not know and ask them how they were doing. Everyone was friendly and happy to be there together.

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R-festby: Conner Houghtby

Home. Drive. House. Drive. Apartment, Drive. House. Drive—Park. Walk, Border; Walk, taxi. Scenic drive through Tijuana.Pay. Enter. Music!—band. Then, Disc Jockey. Yeahhh. Beer.Band. Band. Band. Beer. Beer. Beer. Beer.Hike. View: lights, mountains, fog, cars. People.Band. Band. Band. Tacos. So good, in the boonies.Trek back, bandband; assemble. . . Northwards! Abittersweet journey, as always;A net-zero transition to familiarity.

Rumble Fest Poem:by: Erica Miday

Brownie girlfollows Mexicowashes ceramic canvassesand paints the moon with her finger each night. 

But in between the barbed wire nosebleedsthe violent enemiesand the scabs she keeps picking to scars—she screams inside

laughs outside

then runs back to the pitythe pitythe pitiful cityfeeling both dead and alive

Throwing Your First Music Festival is a Gigantic Pain in the Ass or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love What Went Wrongby: Chad Deal

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I never really figured out how to make a buck in the music promotion game. I suspect that many people haven’t. Maybe it’s impossible. But probably not. The fact that shows continue to be booked, weird DIY mini-fests continue to sprout up, and musicians, in general, don’t abandon their art entirely leads me to believe that there must be a way to do it right. Everyone gets paid (or as a bare minimum gets endless free beer), no one feels slighted, and all the logistics (permits, location, parking, staff, securi-ty, sound, toilets, ambulances, generators, vendors, beverages, ad nauseam) at least break even. It was these sorts of things that the Tijuana Rumble Fest team took into consider-ation in the months leading up to our transborder pow wow in late May. The core crew consist-ed of Tijuana MMA fight gym owners/managers Javier and Brandon (Chakal Mx), a couple of their students (Pepe, the own-er of the festival site, and Dan-ger Dave, who booked several of the bands and brought the rest of the crew onboard), my room-mate Mateo (who gives nightlife tours as Tijuana Adventure), our buddy J-Mar (from Tijua-

na band Some Kind of Lizard), and me, a pinche gringo who occasionally books cross-border bands under the moniker Cali-blablabla. To be expected, we all had different motives for being involved and our own visions to contribute. The gym provid-ed the location – an amazingly dystopian outdoor abandoned factory in the hills of Tijuana – in addition to security, port-o-potty rentals, and a number of other crucial elements. The rest of us took to booking and organizing an ambitious lineup of about 25 bands from every-where between LA to Ensenada and TJ to Mexicali, as well as about 15 borderland street and graffiti artists to revamp the factory walls over the course of the 14-hour fest. The idea, at least on my end, was to get culture creators from both of the Californias together in a strange location and force them to bond by the most natural means possible – good old fashioned inebriation. As such, the beer was cheap, the cocktails were strong, entry was five dollars (or 50 pesos, which is like $3.85), and the attendance ratio was something I don’t believe Tijuana has seen

in many years: roughly half gringos and half locals. It would be a great meeting of minds, I imagined. The perfect storm of quixotic youth forming connec-tions which would obliterate the zillion dollar wall that separates the twin cities of Tijuana and San Diego not only physically, but – in a very real way – psy-chologically and culturally. Emboldened by Pacifico and heavy-handed palomas, we would bring the whole fucker tumbling down, at least in a symbolic sense, with kickass art and loud as hell music. Was it a success? Yes and no. We initially had no idea how many people to expect. There was a strong if-you-build-it-they-will-come vibe, and in the end it panned out pretty well, with maybe 750 attendees over the course of the day/night. On the production end, there were more than a few issues with sound which resulted in a totally botched schedule, but just about everyone was willing to be flexible. However, one Baja band that I respect immensely got cut from the lineup because of the sound issues – an ama-teurish flub that irks me to this day, despite their assurances that all’s gravy.

Because accessibility was key in getting gringos (many for the first time in years, or ever) down to Tijuana and out to the odd factory, Mateo set up a roundtrip bus from the border and I rented out all of Motel Flamingos a few blocks from the party site to host out-of-town bands and partiers. All of that went more or less smoothly, thanks to Mateo’s meticulous scheduling and the help of vol-unteers Arely and Zophie, our beautiful border greeters. The paint and projection artists did a killer job of turning the venue into a living museum of borderland visionaries and all the bands played wildly, despite the hired sound technician’s remarkable talent for mishan-dling levels. He’d also supplied problematic/non-functional monitors on one of the two stages, rendering it useless to many of the live bands. Regard-less, the party ended as planned at around 5am with a hyper-en-ergetic set from Tijuana legends San Pedro el Cortez, who were initially scheduled to play hours earlier. Maybe 60 diehards had stuck it out for the pre-dawn frenzy, which involved cos-tumes, crooning, and a whole lot of confetti.

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At the end of it all, I went into a post-fest depression for several days (I’ve since been told this is common for even seasoned festival organizers, for whatever reason). Was it worth blowing all my savings on a party just so one of Tijuana’s primary music blogs could lazily shit all over it as being a poorly planned gringopalooza? Did anyone actually forge connec-tions that would subvert the tax payer-funded culture grinder which splits the Californias in two? Was I just being an eva-sive asshole when I justified our general lack of organization as “punk” and “DIY”? Did any-one even GET IT, man?! These were some of the smaller doubts that lurked up on me, and it wasn’t until photo galleries and feedback started rolling in over the next few weeks that things began to make sense. It’s a universal tru-ism that there will always be unexpected problems on the production end of a party and that, more often than not, only the organizers will be aware of them. This was not the case at TRF. The glaring sound issues and scheduling tensions were sensed by many, and a few peo-ple left outright because of it.

But the vast majority were will-ing to forgive the short breaks between bands. They under-stood that it’s rare to get it right the first time and, what the hell, there’s tequila and friends and this place is rad, so who cares? Many even offered late night bar praise that felt genuine enough in the weeks that would follow. LA bands gave shout outs to TJ bands on their Facebook pages, Baja musicians hyped up SoCal acts, and a few of the artists made plans to collaborate in the future. In this regard, the fest was a complete success.So, for what it’s worth, my unsolicited advice to any as-piring mini-fest organizers out there is this: (1) Don’t expect to make money. Think of it more like paying your dues to the art and music community because, shit mercy, someone has to do it. I mean, more power to ya if you do, but for your own san-ity, don’t count on it. (2) Take criticism up to a point, but keep in mind that some people sim-ply don’t know how to operate outside of snark and negativity, so fuck those people (just kid-ding, love is the answer). And finally, (3) don’t be too hard on yourself. Things will go wrong. People will get pissed. And the

bleak satisfaction void at the end of the night will leave you feeling cob-webby and empty inside, exactly like the moments following awkward and drunken first-time sex in which neither party gets their rocks off. That’s just how it goes. But so what? It’s a hell of a lot of fun and your friends deserve neat new places to get

shitty and scream and throw paint at things, so take one for the team and go make some-thing happen! </rant>

Joachim Ixcalli Cvstvnxda (Spain), Moistrix (SD/El Paso), Federico Fernandez Guerra (Mexicali), Ugo Art (TJ), Dear (TJ), Volumen Volts (Mexicali), Azteco (TJ), Unknown

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“My Gluttony has prevailed once again; and this time, we are all its victims.” Yes, Grant’s unreasonable lust for carne asada quesadillas caused us to miss Tijuana en China at the Music Makers HackLab on Revolución. I’d tell you what it is, but I can’t, because we missed it. After we realized this, there was an uncomfortable Silence, which Grant broke with

a shit-eating grin, “So. . . more tacos?” Despite that small gas-trophillic snafu, our interview with ¾ of Perihelios (Oscar, Guitarra, is temporarily working in Mexico City) went really well. From San Ysidro we walked down Revolución to a street whose name escapes me, but which turned out to be an ar-cade lined with craft shops, mi-

Perihelios: n., pl. by: Conner Houghtby

cro-museums, and the backdoor to Mamut Cerveza. We found the band members sitting out front under the arcade’s tin roof, sipping beer from glass gob-lets and chatting with friends. After exchanging cursory and distracted greetings, we three Americans rushed inside the beer boutique for chemicals. (The red ale turned out to be superb.) With our proper neuro-chemical balance reestablished and our hands occupied enough to not be too distracting, we began to converse in earnest with the Mexicans. (Luckily for us, their English is excellent). We were most eager to hear any news about the EP they’ve been working on, which origi-nally had a projected May/June release date. Here’s the update: They had just (the day before) finished recording their parts; all that is left now is for Joaquin, their illustrious Chilean produc-er, to mix & master. They plan on releasing a sneak-peak later this month; be sure to keep an eye on Facebook.com/Perihelios for that. Speaking of Joaquin, I really did mean illustrious: He’s arranged for Marc Anthony, Luis Miguel, and other big acts

as well. The three musicians confessed ignorance as to why such a high-quality, high-profile soundman chose to work with their relatively obscure group. But I think they provided an answer while praising Joaquin’s musical intuition and percep-tion of sound, particularly their sound—that is, he likes their music. And who can blame him? Perihelios is a band that evokes thoughts on philosoph-ical topics from the meaning of art and music to social constructs and metaphysical relationships. Even their name causes a cosmic self-reflection: the Spanish plural of perihelion, the closest approach of a planet to its sun, includes all orbiting bodies in all systems in all of time. In order to convey all of this without any lyrics, the band relies on themes and complexity that one might expect from a symphony, as well as an ex-tremely tight execution. Perihe-lios’ sound is one that will, aided by exceptional production, lend itself very well to the studio format. As a crude example, listen to their song “Micromé-gas” as an overture to Voltaire’s short story “Micromégas”—the story which, incidentally, proved

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to be the genesis of the genre of science fiction. Perihelios’ sound, though spacey and psychedelic, is also very deliberate in its ex-perimental forays. This careful balance of antipodes shows in the way they create their music as well. Typically, Gaspar (keys) has an idea, which he will start to expound sonically. Oscar shows interest, asks some ques-tions, and starts to interweave a guitar part. Eric (bass) and Násmar (drums) join in on the jam. Next comes the part where they really shine: they work tirelessly cutting, pasting, and refining, refining, refining. “It’s like building a building,” some-one said, an analogy with which they all eagerly agreed. They are so particular, in fact, that it has taken them a full year to fully develop the five (I believe) tracks on their EP. While the tightness of their live shows might not be so shocking considering their ex-traordinary hard work and dedi-cation, what is surprising is the cohesiveness of the music they produce when one considers their individual musical back-grounds and interests. They all played in different bands before forming Perihelios, and they all

continue their involvement in a diverse range of other projects. Shall I list the ways? Mexican rock 70s rock cheese pop vid-eo game music Mexican folk symphonic composition and a budding acoustic solo set. In fact, in the beginning (Fall ’13), Násmar voiced his concern to Gaspar: “We are so different, I don’t know if this will work.” But it does! The band says that being such distinct individuals with different ideas keeps their playing diverse and interesting. How they manage to hammer the products of their wide-rang-ing personalities into such perfect harmony is beyond me; but to hear is to believe. Perihelios will be play-ing a handful of summer shows in Tijuana, as well as releasing their EP prefaced by a teas-er single. If you don’t get the chance to catch them in their hometown, do not despair! They’re planning a US West Coast tour for late this fall. I guarantee your time will be well spent in hearing what these fascinating and friendly blokes have to play.

https://www.facebook.com/Peri-helios

Oaxaca’s undying heat had left him in his room stoned and angry at the woman who laid on the bed beside his, her smooth legs teasing his every madness, conspicuously wig-gling her toes at the air, sighing at the little wind that passed thru the hostel’s window. They did not even know why they were mad at each other, and why in the five beds scattered

upon the room they chose to lay and think in different ones, only sleeping together and making love at night to pass the silent time, only again to wake in the morning with another sense-less argument that stemmed from nothing and an awful past created by drunk jealousies and foolish insecurities. They had put themselves in an indefinite hole! The madness of Love. Still,

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by: Alejandro Martinez, Junior3rd Avenue, Chula Vista

Oaxaca

she changed and clothed her-self freely in front of his eyes, inspecting her bug bites from the night before using a mirror she found in the communal bathroom. When asked if he thought taking it was a good idea, he answered doubtingly, saying it would be something the tenants of the place would be upset about, and upon hear-ing this, she told him to take

it back downstairs. He refused as he knew she was a woman and a woman needed her own mirror so that she could inspect her bug bites and other wom-anly processions. Yes, a woman needed many things throughout her day. Her brush most cer-tainly. Shampoo. Deodorant. An extra pillowcase, so that she could use it on a cold night as another warm garment. Wom-

an were cold things and could easily be cold, he thought with a small burst of laughter. He had realised this since he knew her. How often she wanted him to simply hold her in the night, absorbing his heat, every in-vigorating bit of warmness his body exalted, her body desired. It was but true love. He knew he felt this way about her too. In all his little imaginations and boy-like fantasies he demanded to know who his woman at his side would be, or rather, his partner in crime, and this was who she was. He had found her already, and she was here beside him, smoking carelessly a cigarette with her petite stomach over the bed and her youthful curving back, shining, gleaming, facing his small grinned eyes. He felt happy knowing she was who she was and felt even more terrible knowing the last few days had been spent in disruptive tur-moil. All that was pleasant were the mid afternoon strolls past el zocalo and down pedestrian-on-ly corridors that penetrated the city’s magnificent culture with a series of long sidewalks and wonderful crafts made from the hands in the city. She loved all these things. She too was a skilled artisan and had made

already many numerous ceram-ics, had painted canvases the image of his heaven, had made a conglomerate of beautiful things, that he had no place to put them in his room. Brown cups were next to glazed bowls of a color turquoise, deep sea blue, lavender nude, holy whites sprinkling, shining humbly. Random notes read in the little French she knew spilled cute short phrases she compiled from anything and everything love had ever meant to her. This was his room in his hometown and wherever you looked was her trace. He was her territory. He was hers and nothing could ever change that. There would be too much to erase. Too much to ignore. Too much had been invested. It would be a suicide of Love. He knew this too. Then why would they squabble and push buttons that so ignited each and own’s internal rage? They did not hate each other. It must be known to the reader they did not. Ever. Perhaps, in the beginning he hated her for knowing someone so available to love and ready to devote one’s love to him existed. But this was a shallow hatred, rootless and baseless as the feeling that delves into a romantic crush

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spurred by perfect imperfect momentary sight, and she had hated him for being a pig, a de-ceitful romantic and a liar. She had been raised by incompetent men who regarded their own ego as life’s altar of sacrifice. That their own ego was worthy of all truly wonderful things and family connection. “The Great Illusion of Men,” it must be said it was. She had been the subject of a certain kind of negligence, and for this her biological father supplied her with all the money she wanted. In return, she would give back to him sentiment and familiar correspondence. The boy battled this with her. He did not understand what she had been thru as he had grown in a quiet normal middle class family. His father had worked the yards his whole life. His mother cut hair for a living. A broken family hit his subjectiv-ity like a dull nail. Great pains bring great art and so there was no professed greatness foretold that would bloom within him. Tho throughout his life, how diligently his mother and father told him he could be great someday if only he overcame the struggle of doubt and fear. Yes, his parents made him believe great things were possible. They

had worked hard all their lives so that he would have a normal American life. How long it was taking him to understand this and how horrible he treated her. Why was it that she was a better person than he? He knew very well she was, in all aspects. How unspiteful she could be. How voluntary she insisted in being. How understanding of his own lifestyle she was. She wanted to change nothing of him. She sim-ply wanted him to acknowledge her and her marvelous complex-ities, to admire and adore them. To be worshipped.

She sat on the bed spilling purple and yellow tiny beads across the framed mirror, glueing them patiently around a clay ashing tray she had bought along the avenue. She thought of nothing else but the perfect attractive placement along the rim of the tray. He loved her. He loved her furiously, he thought, and how this made him cry.

Oaxaca de Juarez, OaxacaMexicoJune, 2013

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