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It is always advisable to contact the venues directly if you want to make the most of these cultural and musical avenues during your stay in San Francisco. (Josh Taylor from a band Friends Forever, personal communication, 27 September 2012; see also Chippendale Citation2016). This led him to feel compelled to create a similar kind of community and alternative economic system when he moved to the Waffle house in Portland. The Church warehouse in Oakland, during a DIY show (14 December 2012). Did you know that with a free Taylor & Francis Online account you can gain access to the following benefits? Accordingly, my central question in this article is: how do American DIY participants manage the tensions and transitions between reciprocal and capitalist systems and worlds? Thats awesome! In this excerpt, Cometbus outlines the central discursive tension existing within American DIY scenes. Enjoy a day trip to Angel Island and learn about its history as the Ellis Island of the West at Immigration Station, as well as take in the islands stunning views on numerous nature trails. A place known to have shows go late into the night, welcoming artists who have finished shows at other venues, the Boom Boom Room is a laid-back venue that attracts a younger crowd looking to dance the night away. In the summer of 2012, I toured with a band from Portland called 3 Moons, playing shows around the West Coast and the Midwest. He has lived in San Francisco for over 9 years and has worked in Travel & Tourism for over 7 of those. We had this idea that it was a three-way tie [also the title of one of their albums] and not some hierarchy or aristocracy of guitar. I am immensely grateful to all of the participants of this research, for accepting me in their spaces and scenes, and for their invaluable insights on the matters discussed herein. Coming of age in the San Francisco Bay Area, famed singer/songwriter Stevie Nicks gained her first performing experience there in the 1960s with Lindsey Buckingham and his band. This zine is a business but its the idea of people running their own business, bands, labels, zines, etc. Much has been written about the historic jazz clubs from the 1950s and 60s Jazz Workshop, The Blackhawk, Basin Street West, Todd Barkans Keystone Kornerand the classic jazz albums recorded in the city, including Thelonious Monks 1959 albumAlone in San Francisco,the 1961 Miles Davis albumIn Person Friday and Saturday Nights at the Blackhawk,Complete, and Duke EllingtonsConcert of Sacred Musicat Grace Cathedral from 1965. 13 See, for example, Moore Citation2004b: 313; Oakes Citation2009; Wehr Citation2012: 14, 15; Worley Citation2017: 5261, 141, 174; Verbu Citation2021: 5, 8, 879, 136, 1401, 194. There are evidently numerous innovative practices existing within American DIY scenes that work persistently and continuously, on a daily basis, and in multiple interconnected locales, toward demystification and destabilisation of capitalist processes, both on discursive and material levels, but which they also simultaneously sustain the capitalist system in different ways. The Warfield brings in all kinds of performers and every style of music. They contain freely available discarded items that DIY participants desire to redirect into reuse by other DIY participants, who visit or pass by their houses. [19] An important departure in this new era of "album oriented radio" (AOR) was that show hosts felt free to play lengthy tracks or two or more tracks at a stretch from a good record album. McKay Citation1998. "[15] In San Francisco, musical influences came in from not only London, Liverpool and Manchester, but also included the bi-coastal American folk music revival of the 1950s and 1960s, the Chicago electric blues scene, the soul music scenes in Detroit, Memphis, and Muscle Shoals, jazz styles of various eras and regions. Powered by hocalwire.com, We use cookies for analytics, advertising and to improve our site. My argument draws on Arjun Appadurais theories of value and commodity (Citation1986), and other scholarship focused on the social implications of the co-existence of, and of contradictions between, different economic systems.Footnote2 Moreover, I ground my interpretations in the materialist, political-economy approach to the study of culture, which also seeks to understand the complexities within and between particular economic systems, and in their relation to the sphere of cultural production and aesthetics (Mige Citation1987; Ryan Citation1992; Hesmondhalgh Citation1997, Citation1999, Citation2018). The San Francisco bands' music was everything that AM-radio pop music wasn't. I start with a quote by a well-known American DIY zine writer Aaron Cometbus, who articulates some of the main issues and concerns regarding the alternative economic practices of American DIY communities: Bands [] when they are successful, its because of how talented they are, how much they care, how hard theyve worked. Working party at the Glitterdome house, in Portland, 2 April 2012. 5 Safe space policy, common within American DIY communities, usually refers to a spatial policy through which DIY participants endeavour to create spaces free of racism, sexism, homophobia, transphobia, classism, ableism, ageism, and any forms of violence or oppression. creativity], and could be one of the band [i.e. It is important to note here that any act of gift-giving (for instance, organising shows) is always also an act that ties individuals to community. A few blocks from Union Square, Le Colonial serves French-inspired Vietnamese cuisine against the backdrop of live jazz, Monday to Friday, featuring music from the Django Reinhardt-influenced group, Le Jazz Hot, and the sultry soul sounds of Lavay Smith & Her Red Hot Skillet Lickers. Pier 23 Cafe is a time-honored restaurant and bar located right on the Embarcadero and San Francisco Bay. Some stayed and became part of the scene. A number of key San Francisco rock musicians of the era cited John Coltrane and his circle of leading-edge jazz musicians as important influences. Figure 6. What is gained in this way is an experience of intimate and affective community (real interchange), creativity, active participation, and autonomy, and also a sense of active and productive opposition to a presumably non-effective and exploitative capitalist economic and social model existing in the larger society. The historical building is large enough to comfortably accommodate more than 1,000 guests but small enough to ensure an intimate experience no matter where you watch the show. Furthermore, alternative DIY socio-economic systems succeed in generating considerable symbolic, affective, material, and political value for DIY participants and scenes. [9] This questing bass quality has been wryly characterized as a "roving" (rather than the conventional "stay-at-home") style. For example, as explained by their bass player, Mike Watt, South Californian 1980s punk/DIY band Minutemen in this way adapted the ideas of collaborative equality to their music practice and sound: D. Boon [Minutemen guitarist] played really heavily with trebly new power chords and left all this room for the bass guitar [], and then worked with Georgie [the drummer] to make sure he had all these fills and parts to jam to and add movement to the songs. By closing this message, you are consenting to our use of cookies. Its really, its hard for a lot of people to understand it, but these bands are really satisfied just by people hearing their music. With a bar built in 1949, Club Deluxe harkens back to San Francisco's live music scene of the 1950s and 60s. Oakes Citation2009: 88; emphasis added), I would book a lot ofwouldnt say bad shows, but bad bands, cause I just wanted to have a rule of, like, any kind of music is allowed to be played here, because, when I was a teen in high school [] it was so hard to get a show. DIY performers therefore usually approach and sustain the DIY scenes through the practice of communal reciprocity, by playing for their own fun, and for the interests of the DIY community (horizontal approach), and not for their own individual interests in financial gain and mainstream success (vertical approach). While some houses (and DIY spaces) hosted festival shows, others provided shelter for out-of-town visitors and musicians (some guests erecting tents in the backyard of the Glitterdome house), and some collected and distributed donated or dumpster-dived food.Footnote8 Members from most of the DIY houses also either helped with cleaning, cooking for guests or with other small organisational tasks (see Figure 3), as well as actively participating as audiences at festival shows. 2 See for example Gibson-Graham Citation2008; Eriksen Citation2010: 160, 161, 201, 202, 216; Whiteley Citation2011; Giles Citation2014; Tausig Citation2014; Dean Citation2015; Otten Citation2015; Graham Citation2016; Kirsch Citation2017. participation]. Even if participants endeavour to detach DIY music making from the capitalist motives of larger society, traces of the dominant economy persist within DIY scenes. Off the beaten path in the Outer Richmond and only a few blocks from Lands End, saxophonist Danny Brown and his family operate one of the citys best record stores and art galleries that features live jazz and jam sessions every Sunday afternoon. Therefore, both the side of socio-economic factors, and the side of cultural practices and aesthetic expressions in this equation should be seen as diverse and multidimensional. A DIY culture of reciprocity and collective action can be found in most places around the US. According to Jai we have people over to eat all the time, we make a lot of food for people, we get a lot of free food too, people will come and donate (personal communication, 28 February 2012). (Aaron Scott, personal communication, 11 April 2012). The music regularly turns the bar into a dance party. Learn about our history and where to find it now, from festivals to clubs and bars. [12] Among these British acts, according to music journalist Chris Smith, writing in his book on the most influential albums in American popular music, the Beatles inspired the emergence of the San Francisco psychedelic scene following their incorporation of folk rock on the 1965 album Rubber Soul, which reflected the reciprocal influences shared between the group and Bob Dylan. While it is possible to see a connection in given examples between the DIY socio-economic relations of reciprocity and the DIY ideas and aesthetics of support that reject the dominant values of quality (good vs bad performers), it is also important to extend the analysis beyond the simplistic (homologic) interpretations of the cause-and-effect links between material (socio-economic) and cultural (aesthetic) levels (cf., Hesmondhalgh Citation1999: 36; Toynbee Citation2000: 1105). For example, multiple north (N) and northeast (NE) Portland DIY houses joined together as a local DIY community to co-organise the second Gathering of Goof Punx festival in April 2012. However, while capitalist commodities are seemingly transformed into non-market or DIY commodities, in a more tacit way they may be seen to co-constitute the capitalist economy. In jazz it had been exuberantly pioneered by numerous musicians. With the musicians perched high above the bar, you can hear live jazz nightly as you sip specialty cocktails along the 20-foot mahogany bar from 1907. Moreover, some venues and houses often collectively organised festivals and larger multi-venue events. In this article, I examine the alternative economics of reciprocity in American DIY (do-it-yourself) culture. "Rock & roll" was the point of departure for the new music. Registered in England & Wales No. When I give you $5 for a record, I am exchanging something of value (my money/effort) for something else of value (your record). (David, in Maximum Rockandroll Citation1987; emphases added). However, while the link between DIY practice and lo-fi sound exists, it is also important to recognise that lo-fi aesthetics can reflect other causal factors, such as advanced studio manipulation, market calculation, and/or nostalgia for pre-modern simplicity (Hesmondhalgh Citation1999: 56; Oakes Citation2009; Sanden Citation2013: chapter 4). The US DIY communities I encountered during my fieldwork, most of which at least partially identify as DIY communities and scenes, utilised a DIY approach partly for ideological purposes, as they strived for creative and social autonomy.