Punk n Soul - My Days as a Rag-Tag DIY Flyer Designer

One of my favorite parts of DJing has always been designing the flyers for my events. The flyer really sets the tone for the event. Obviously it can also make or break your event by either drawing people in or repelling them away.

Back in the day prior to computer design becoming the norm in ALL graphic design, I revelled in the process of hand making my flyers. I poured over them, every minute detail. Often times I was the only one who appreciated those details, but it really didn't mater to me. It was all about the process.

Though I don't have the time to invest in such laborious projects these days, I really do miss that aspect of creating a DJ event. Something about making a flyer by hand really personalizes it to the audience (at least in my opinion). I like looking at those old flyers and really being able to see my personality dripping off of the page.

If time permits, I do still try to put some sort of "hand made" aspect into each one of my flyers whether it's personally taking the photo of the image used in the flyer or cutting out some of the lettering, gluing it onto the page and then rescanning it. There has to be some part of ME in that design, beyond what I arrange and digitally manipulate.

By and large though, I think our culture has really changed and the way people find out about shows and things is mostly by the internet.  People don't really even stop to look at flyers any more.  That is the MAIN reason I don't invest the time there like I used to.

Anyways, I thought it would be fun to share some of my old hand made, computer free, punk-soul flyers from the olden times of my dj "career".

This is my crude drawing featuring real sequins and glitter

There's a lot of detail on this one.  It's kind of hard to see in this scan.

I think this was my first dance with Michelle Noel (my DJ Hero!) in Olympia.  

It was also my first event flyer.

This one was round. I wasn't able to scan the entire flyer.  

I'm a big fan of odd shaped flyers.  

It really makes them stand out next to other flyers.

The background on this one is some really cool vintage op art fabric I was saving for just the right thing.

This one was crazy.  It looks a bit sloppy in retrospect.  It was a lot of work to hand draw all that lettering.  I also glued sequins to a lot of the individual copies of this one.

This is one of my favorites and yet it was one of the easiest to make.  I remember at the time thinking, "this was too easy."  Anyways, most of the lettering and accents are paper cut-outs.

This one was not easy at all.  It was my most intricate flyer.  I copied all the faces and cut them out, glued them to the page.  I hand drew the a lot of the lettering including "juke blues" which was a process in itself.  I then carved stamps for the "Chess", "23" and "Make your move" which were then stamped on each individual flyer.  Finally, I cut out the red chess pieces out fo velvet ribbon and glues them to each individual flyer.  IT IS TOTALLY INSANE IN RETROSPECT!

This was another flyer of unusual shape.  

I cut out all the flyers in the shape of a rocket.

Lucille Spann - I want to get to know you

After 20 years of self-education about vintage soul, blues and R&B I have realized that no matter how much knowledge I've gained about this subject, there will always be so much more to learn.  There's always some kick-ass artist from the classic era that I have yet to hear or learn about.  I'm generally an "old school" type of gal but I have to admit that the internet has made it infinitely easier to learn about music.  It has brought to light voices that most certainly would have been lost forever had we stuck with traditional means of information sharing.

Recently I landed on the voice of Lucille Spann on the internet.  She was the wife of Chicago blues legend Otis Spann.  In 20 years of research and deep digging how did I miss this voice?!  Well, now that I think about it, I guess it's easy to explain.  In the pre-internet days we had to rely on either physically finding original records OR the reissues releases of record labels.  Not surprisingly, record labels reissued a teeny tiny fraction of music by women in comparison to the boatloads of men's reissues, most especially in the genres of blues, soul & r&b.  This is why I know so very much about Otis Spann and pretty much nothing about Lucille Spann.  It's a tragedy and a travesty. 

Check out these clips....

Chick-A Boom Boom!

I have not been good about posting on this blog.  I suppose it's because very few people seem to read it.  But now I actually have some DJ news to report.  


Nearly a year ago I moved BACK to Portland for a variety of reasons not the least of which was the opportunity to collaborate on exciting art projects.  After a few bumps in the road this is finally coming to fruition.  I'm happy to announce that Nadia Buyse and are starting a new MONTHLY dance party in Portland.

If you don't know about Nadia I'm sad for you.  I'm sad because you are yet to discover one of the greatest voices in rock 'n' roll today.  A singer like Nadia comes along very rarely in this world.  We're lucky to have her.  But Nadia is not only a voice, she's an unstoppable force of nature, a fantastic dancer and a woman of exquisite  musical taste. All of these reasons and MORE make me extremely excited and proud to be working with her on this project.

I'm thrilled to have a platform to share all of the feminist soul and early 70s funk music I've been collecting for YEARS!  I hope people will find it as inspiring as I do.  It's also cool to be able to share some of the my favorite vintage lady music from non-soul genres.  It's gonna be liberating to STRETCH out a bit!

It feels like coming home, returning to my feminist artist activist roots!  I suppose I never really left them but in the past they've been more front and center than they have been in recent times.  I suppose it's the action of certain politicians over the past year that have reminded me that we can never take our hard-won rights for granted.  We must soldier on!

Please view the Chick-A Boom Boom mission below:

 If you've paid any attention to the news over the past few months you know that the US government as well as most state governments are in a "budget crisis". Instead of recovering unpaid taxes from corporations or wealthier citizens, many politicians have chosen to rob "the people" instead. You are witnessing a class war. Most likely, you are one of the people under siege. Women have been particularly targeted in this battle. Nadia and I believe that it's time to fight back. Fight back with your FEET on the dance floor!

While public funds are looted by the greedy, we have chosen to take action in a way that we feel best utilizes our talents. With Chick-A Boom Boom, our monthly dance party featuring all vintage records made by WOMEN, we hope to accomplish these goals:

1. To empower and inspire. It's easy to feel defeated and knocked down in these times of extreme struggle. We strive to lift you up.

2. To raise funds for organizations and causes benefiting women. Each week we plan to put out a tip jar. If you like what we're spinning you can put a couple of bucks in the tip jar. There's no cover charge for Chick-A Boom Boom and it's Happy Hour so the drinks are cheap. We're hoping you can toss a little of the money you'll be saving into the tip jar. All tip money will go towards a different women's organization/cause each week. It's a way to return some of those funds stolen from us. Keeping this in mind, Nadia and I will be working REALLY hard to earn your tips on the turntable!

3. To honor the ladies of the 50s, 60s, & 70s who fought so hard to pave the way for our voices to be heard.

4. To entertain you. As Nadia so brilliantly put it "I present you the world's wackiest, dance attackiest, ass shakin', glass breakin',make your momma cry with the jams we supply Happiest hour in town!!!" It's guaranteed to be a fun way to spend a Spring/Summer evening! There will be microphones and old school Dj rhyming involved! Not to be missed.

If you've known me for any period of time it should be no surprise to you that an all-girl record MONTHLY dance party is a dream come true for me. I've been wanting to do something like this ever since my old radio days: http://www.flickr.com/photos/29029041@N08/4029619688/in/set-72157622501372499

They say it can't be done. They say there won't be enough support for an all-girl record MONTHLY dance party. We say THEY ARE WRONG! WE say, YOU WILL PROVE THEM WRONG!