InTraffikRadio’s Interview w/ Celeste Kim of SPARKALIZE (and Producers Nathan Jenkins and Taylor Martyr)
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Listen to the podcast of our interview (click here to listen) with Celeste Kim, whom you may also know from local L.A. Powerpop/Punk band Underwater City People, and her Producers Nathan Jenkins and Taylor Martyr (both of Action Go Now).
With a new EP that debuted January 15th, Kim is ready to make her mark in this new world of music that she has always been a fan of and she joined us in studio to discuss her shiny super-new project Sparkalize! Click here to listen!
Tracks by Lykke Li, Foster the People (“Pumped Up Kicks), Cloud Control ( “Ghost Story”), Ladyhawke (“Paris is Burning”), and The Bees (“Winter Rose”) were played during this episode as well as “Lucky Charm,” “Belong”, “Romance Not War,” and “Party Girl” (Title Track) all tracks from the Sparkalize Party Girl EP.
Here is a little more information on this new project:
“As a minor, getting into dance clubs and raves by way of fake id’s, tons of makeup, and stiletto heels helped her get her fix.”
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Sparkalize is a new electro-pop project via singer/songwriter Celeste Kim. Emerging from the Kiss or Kill LA underground rock and roll scene with indie pop punk band Underwater City People, she returns to her first crush: dance music. As a minor, getting into dance clubs and raves by way of fake id’s, tons of makeup, and stilleto heels helped her get her fix. The intoxication of the bass on the floor and the floating synths has had her hooked ever since. Sparkalize is her love affair.
Celeste has toured as keyboardist and as a back up singer with major artists such as Savage Garden, Coolio, and Rebekah Del Rio performing on stages all over the world, as well as on the Tonight show.
Recently she sang and played bass with 3 piece indie punk/rock group Underwater City People which allowed her to tour the US, gain national exposure on prime time TV shows and win an award for ‘Best Pop Single’ at the LA Music Awards.
Now, longing to focus on her love of dance music, Celeste has teamed up with producers Nathan Jenkins and Taylor Martyr (Action Go Now) and Jonathan Paul (redCola, Obtain) to record her debut solo EP “Sparkalize.”
East to West – From a Church of Rock ‘n’ Roll to the Hotel Cafe
Every night of the week you can find a million things to do, even on a weeknight…especially on a weeknight. Tonight is no different. Out of those millions of things to go to here’s where you might catch us tonight:
Hotel Cafe for Vermont based, singer-songwriter Kris Gruen (cover $8)
Gruen’s new album, “Part Of It All,” is set for release in the next month via Mother’s West. This record was produced by Charles Newman, who recently co-produced the new Magnetic Fields album, “Realism”, as well as our friend AM’s “Future Sons and Daughters.” While recording in both New York City and Los Angeles Gruen was able to collaborate and record with some great musicians and friends, including drummer Butch Norton (The Eels, Lucinda Williams, Rufus Wainright), bassist Sebastian Steinberg (Soul Coughing, Dixie Chicks), Nashville’s Jason Goforth on lapsteel, and drummer Nick Brown from New York City’s The Dig.
Tonight he shares the stage with Nina Storey.
and…
Old Towne Pub for Mike TV’s Church of Rock ‘n’ Roll (Cover $3)
A weekly event happening every Thursday at the Old Towne Pub (66 North Fair Oaks Avenue, Pasadena, CA 91103). Tonight the ever elusive Wormstew (whom you may recall Eric Summer spotlighted a few months ago) will be performing along with The Power Cords, Underwater City People, Get Set Go (speaking of Eric Summer you can catch him on Viola with Get Set Go), as well as an end of night All Band Jam (where else can you catch Indie Rockers/Power-Poppers/Mod Revivalists embarking on impromptu covers of 2 Live Crew’s “Me So Horny?“)
My Music Reality Show Idea
Tuned! Or Scored or F-Majored or whatever.
I have grown weary of television over the last few years. I’ve grown to despise the predictable, trite, formulaic crap the networks churn out. And I think I’ve never really been able to forgive television people for cancelling Firefly, so there’s a lot of television-directed anger swimming around in my amygdala. But, oddly, I’ve been watching a lot of cooking shows lately. Like, a LOT of cooking shows. Hell’s Kitchen, Top Chef, Chefs vs. City, The Best Thing I Ever Ate, Kitchen Nightmares, Top Chef: Masters… All these shows fascinate me. But the one I’ve been watching most of lately is called Chopped.
If you’re unfamiliar with this show, the premise is this: they get four chefs every week (something I’ve been wondering lately: what is the difference between an executive chef and a Master Chef? I can only imagine that they hold a secret tournament every year where executive chefs fight to the death with lime zesters and halibut de-scalers, and the one left standing is elevated to Master Chef status. Mario Batali must be a BADASS with a zester). They give them baskets containing odd ingredients, and they have to make food including those ingredients. For example, one round they might open their baskets to reveal polenta, starfruit, crab eyeballs, and the rare man-eating blood-saffron, and each one is given thirty minutes to incorporate those items into something delicious. There are three rounds–appetizer, entree, and dessert–and one chef is eliminated (“chopped,” if you hadn’t already guessed) after each round, leaving one victor with ten thousand dollars and all his or her limbs intact.
So I was watching this show, and I started thinking how great it would be to adapt it into a musical contest. I mean, let’s be as brutally metaphorical as possible: music-based reality shows are the oozing pus leaking out of the weeping sore infecting the malignant tumor of the wrinkled rectum of the television medium. There’s more to music than emotionally unstable attention whores singing pentatonic melismas to karaoke arrangements of “I Will Survive,” right?
RIGHT? (more…)
Notes From Vivace’s May Playlist
Lemon Sun: “Same Old Ground”
Dirty Kings: “Who’s Along for the Ride”
Ex-Gentlemen: “Oh Mona”
New London: “LA’s Orange Lights”
Mere Mortals: “Clear Sky Overdrive”
Silver Needle: “Tourniquet”
Underwater City People: “Jennifer”
The Rainman Suite: “Rich Boys”
Dusty Rhodes and the River Band: “Blind Lead the Blind”
Yellow Red Sparks: “A Play to End All Plays”
Random comments. If you read my blog on Great Northern, you know where I caught Lemon Sun’s set.
I saw Dirty Kings’ last ever set. I didn’t even know in advance that it was their last ever set. Rest in peace, Dirty Kings.
One of the band members from Ex-Gentlemen used to play for my all time favorite local band: Bang Sugar Bang. May they rest in peace, as well.
I caught Mere Mortals at Cinespace. The lead singer was super cool with me when I asked if they had a flier or card with their myspace info. They didn’t have anything so he just gave me a CD single for free.
Whenever I hear Underwater City People’s Jennifer, I always find myself reminiscing.
I caught the back end of Dusty Rhodes and the River Band’s set during the Local Natives residency at Silverlake Lounge. When they had their residency recently at Silverlake Lounge, I had to check them out. I’m happy I did.
The Dollyrots and The Action Design
Introduction. Let’s start this off by talking about books. I am currently reading a book titled “House of Cards: A Tale of Hubris and Wretched Excess on Wall Street” by William D. Cohan. This book describes the events surrounding the collapse of Bear Stearns – a Wall Street firm. It is 450 pages long and I am currently on page 131. I’m slowly reading through the book and hopefully as soon as the Lakers-Magic Championship Series ends, I’ll speed through the rest of the book rather quickly because it has grabbed my attention. I recently read a book titled “Bad Money: Reckless Finance, Failed Politics, and the Global Crisis of American Capitalism” by Kevin Phillips. This book also looks at our financial system. Kevin Phillips looks at the beginnings of our current economic crisis from a high level perspective while William D. Cohan focuses squarely on a specific Wall Street bank. Now why would I find reading books about our economic collapse so interesting? If you read my bio, you’ll notice I have a degree in economics so I rather enjoy reading about financial collapses and such. I can’t possibly spend all my reading time; however, reading about how depressing our current economic state is so I recently squeezed in Michael Crichton’s “Airframe,” a quick to read techno-thriller that he was so well known for – he also wrote books such as “Jurassic Park,” “Timeline.” (I use “was,” as Michael Crichton recently passed away.)
The Knitting Factory. The Knitting Factory holds a special place in my heart. I first got introduced to a number of cool local Los Angeles bands at this location: Bang Sugar Bang, Underwater City People, The Randies, Midway and Silver Needle to name just a few. (more…)