u/edasto42

For people coming in from out of town, welcome to Long Beach. It’s a pretty cool town with lots of diversity and a strong independent vibe. It’s also one of the queerest cities in the country. I just want to give you some cool places to support if you’re staying in town.

Coffee: there’s a bunch of mom n pop coffee shops, and most are pretty decent. My personal favorites are Black Dog, The Merchant, Wood, and Dedo. Black Dog has some amazing beans they roast in house, so if you go, pick up a bag of beans.

Donuts: you’ll also see there’s a ton of donut shops. They’re all pretty decent, but there’s a few standouts. Sweet Retreat (fantastic vegan selection and others), Moon Bridge (very creative flavors and designs in a Wes Anderson inspired shop), and Simone’s who get bonus points for being open 24/7.

Breakfast: there’s a bunch of great cafes. I’ve always had good food at The Breakfast Bar. Blackbird cafe is also delicious-they had one of the best breakfasts I’ve ever eaten with their Cubano Benedict.

Late night after fest eats: your best bet will be street vendors. There’s taco stands all over. El Sauz will probably have their takeout window open. Plus I’m sure there will be hot dog vendors on the way out of the fest.

Other food: For burgers, I do really like the Win-Dow, and also Eat Fantastic. Ali Baba is fantastic for middle eastern food. Pickle Bahn Mi are some of the best Bahn Mi I’ve ever had. Pho America for pho. Sushi- my favorite is Sushi Mafia. For poké, I like Poké Pola. And desserts Sweet Jill’s is a local legend, but also Snoballs is to die for.

Record stores: Fingerprints is our big store that gets all the in store appearances and signings. Great selection. I also love Toxic Toast Records. They specialize in punk, goth, ska, and Japanese city pop. The owner goes to Japan a couple times a year and brings back crates of imports.

Breweries: I’m not much of a beer drinker but I know people like Trademark a lot. I’ve enjoyed Long Beach Beer Lab because they have a bunch of pinball machines. I’ll also shoutout Syncopated brewery too.

Cocktails: we have a couple fancy cocktail bars in town. My favorite is Wicked Wolf. Great cocktails and Mocktails. Also Baby G has a great cocktail list.

Dispensaries (if you indulge): the best deals consistently are from Catalyst. They have a bunch of locations in town. Haven has decent first time customer discounts.

But if anyone has any questions or recommendations, feel free to ask. I’ll be at the fest all weekend, and hope to have some fun. Also any other locals, feel free to add.

Edit to add: another dessert spot-long beach creamery for some damn fine ice cream with sophisticated flavors

2nd edition to add: clothing-if you’re looking for some punk and goth style clothes check out Dead Rockers on 4th, and also Eclipsed Emporium. Eclipsed Emporium is definitely the more goth leaning. Both are great though. Also if you want some Long Beach themed clothes, check out Long Beach Clothing Co-just down the street from EClipsed Emporium.

Pizza- if you catch 4th Horseman on a good day, they have some really creative pizzas. Also Thunderbolt pizza has some absolutely delicious wood fired pizzas. A local delicacy is Thai Curry Pizza-it’s literally a pizza with the ingredients and flavors of Thai curry. You’d think it wouldn’t work, but it’s really good.

I’m an old school player that started playing in 96. I love the original format and would love to find others that want to have some fun playing 60 card games.

So we all saw how this pride festival went this past weekend. Ultimately the public possibly got a better experience with the free events than what would’ve been at the $40 ticketed event. But with that, as a performer we were left a little high and dry.

Me and my band were scheduled to perform on Sunday of the festival. Contracts were signed, and everything was cool, kind of. Leading up to the event, and hearing there were only about 400 tickets sold at the first of the month had me concerned. But there wasn’t any naysayers coming from the organizers, so we thought everything was going to be fine.

Then Friday evening came.

As performers we were not notified of anything until we saw the AI shitpost the organizers put up. Then we started to send messages, phone calls, emails to our contact and the fest organizers in general. Eventually we got in touch and had it confirmed that it was indeed cancelled. Ok this sucks, so let’s check our contract to see what it says in the event of cancellation.

There was nothing. There wasn’t even anything about an act of nature causing a cancellation of the event, a ‘force majeur’ section, which is pretty standard for most contracts like this. We as performers didn’t question that at the time, and honestly didn’t even register it. But in retrospect, stuff like that kind of gives away how clown shows this whole thing is.

So now we are digging more, and are finding out that they are getting an insurance payout for the cancellation, which pushed us to push for some kind of payment. After pushing we finally got word that we are going to get some kind of compensation, but no amount has been stated. Our original fee for our performance was $1500. So we will see what happens there.

I’m making this post in the hopes that any other performers that were contracted in to push to get some kind of payment. They’re getting insurance money, and they need not to grift it all away.

I also want to put a light on an instagram creator I stumbled on that’s been doing a breakdown of the organization and how it’s been losing money for years with questionable spending and other ‘investments.’ Go watch the first few non pinned videos of the Common Sense Gay as goes into some interesting info.

Anyway, I hope folks enjoyed what came of the weekend, and let’s hope the origination gets new leadership and digs into the books some.

Although Jawbreaker has become cult favorites now headlining big outdoor festivals, but in 1994 they were playing to a couple hundred kids at an all ages venue in the far suburbs of Chicago. 17 year old me is somewhere in that crowd. But this show was pretty pivotal in my upbringing.

And this venue was a little legendary in our area. I saw so many punk bands there. A few before they were famous ones. Besides Jawbreaker, I saw Sleater Kinney there, and Stabbing Westward all when they were nobodies.

This post is kind of a response to something I saw on here yesterday that involved a one size fits all marketing ideas for all artists.

I’ve learned a lot by participating and watching local music scenes over the many years I’ve been in this business. A big thing is that there really is no universal blueprint for marketing and building an audience. Different genres, personalities, scenes, and goals call for different approaches. What may work for a pop punk band may not work at all for a more niche, or artistically distant project, which may not work for an r&b group etc.

I also want to encourage newer musicians to be careful around anyone telling you theres one size fits all music marketing advice. There are a lot of people in this industry trying to separate artists from their money by packaging common sense or highly specific strategies as a universal truth. If someone claims they have the guaranteed formula, especially in an art form as subjective and commodified as music, it’s worth being skeptical and don’t be afraid to pushback on their claims, I guarantee they will probably fall apart under scrutiny.

Ultimately, be kind to people, make good art/music, build your skillset, and build something genuine. Beyond that, there’s no correct way to be an artist.

I am in the process of trying to open a third space/cafe/venue. The venue is going to be my baby, and I want to use my experience in all the various roles I’ve had in the industry to make it a space people want to go to and artists want to play. With that in mind I’ve started to outline my ideas for booking.

This is going to be a curated space. I’m not trying just to set up a place that’s a default stop. Every show is booked with intention to make it a full experience, not just a placeholder on a calendar.

I’m looking to book artists that prioritize the audience experience. How to hold a room, craft a set list, and connect with not just their audience, but anyone else that may be in attendance.

I’d definitely welcome experimental and outsider music, but it has to translate to a live setting and be entertaining and/or engaging with an audience.

I will value the local scene for sure, but being local isn’t a qualifier for booking. I want to focus on artists that are contributing something larger than repetition in the same audience loop.

Essentially what I want to establish is the venue being a brand. Be a venue that people will trust to have good taste to curate an entire experience. This way it would hopefully gain the reputation of ‘let’s go see what’s playing at _____, they always have something good going on.’

What I’m also trying to do is push the local scene to elevate itself. I’d love for the bar to be a little higher for local artists to strive for.

In exchange for these qualifiers, I’d make sure that the artists are treated well. Fair payment dynamics, a good and thought out sound system, and amenities (including but not limited to, discounted food for local artists and a free meal for touring artists, some kind of dressing room/green room, if possible a washer and dryer for touring artists to use, possible lodgings for touring artists if needed, etc). I’d also be sure that artists are treated not as an afterthought or as an inconvenience. Basically treat them as professionals, and I’d hope that sentiment goes both ways.

Anyway, thoughts?