The Wit of the Staircase

"INDEPENDENT FIREWORKS" TOMORROW!! ROCK AND ROLL BENEFIT FOR ST. MARK'S CHURCH IN THE BOWERY

Tomorrow Beginning At 7pm!
July 3rd, 2007

A-Ron and BrendanFowler/EthanSwan

In Association With Supreme/RVCA Clothing
present:

A GIANT BENEFIT for historic
St Mark's Church-in-the-Bowery
at 2nd Ave at 10th St, NYC 

7pm to 4am

Food/Drinks

$5 Entry!!!!

LIMITED EDITION PRINT BY DASH SNOW!!!

***All funds-raised will go toward restoring the façade of historic St. Mark's Church In The Bowery***

Originally a church of Manhattan's elite, St. Mark's became a progressive force in the neighborhood both socially and culturally. Supportive of immigrant, labor and civil rights, the church was a meeting place for Black Panthers and Young Lords, and launched the first lesbian healthcare clinic.

Poets like W.H. Auden (who was a parishoner), William Carlos Williams, Edna St. Vincent Millay, Amy Lowell, Carl Sandburg, Kahlil Gibran, Allen Ginsberg, Patti Smith and Jim Carroll have all read here; since 1966, the St Marks Poetry Project has organized poetry events. The Danspace project has featured dance legends like Isadora Duncan, Martha Graham and Merce Cunningham. Sam Shepherd's first two plays were produced here, and Andy Warhol screened his early films in the sanctuary....

July 3rd's Event Features:

TheVirgins/CarClutch(BARR)/LissyTrullie/KriaBrekkan(MUM/AnimalCollective)

and EffiBriest/ModRocket/YoungLords/RubNTug

PLUS: DjMikeFellows+SECRETSPECIALOGUESTS !!!!

Please come...you can sleep all day the next day (the 4th) and wake up to see the fireworks...

For You From Wit: The Online Mix Tape Generator

Link: Cassette Generator.

Country Girl, Part II

Get Into Jack And Meg's Head

"The White Stripes' much-ballyhooed sixth album, Icky Thump, lands today. But serious fans will be skipping the record store and iTunes and logging on to the group's Web site instead for these limited-edition Jack and Meg USB flash drives. The collector's items—featuring the musicians in the custom-made "Pearly King and Queen" garb they wear on the new release's cover—come loaded with the complete album and 512 megabytes of memory. So grab one, or the set, and rock on."

White Stripes Icky Thump Meg or Jack 512-MB limited-edition USB flash drive, $57.50 each or $99 for both, available at www.whitestripes.com.

Link: White Stripes Icky Thump USB Flash Drive: Item of the Week on Style.com.

The Queen Is Dead, Boys

We can go for a walk where it's quiet and dry
And talk about precious things
But when you're tied to your Mother's apron
No-one talks about castration
Oh ...

We can go for a walk where it's quiet and dry
And talk about precious things
Like love and law and poverty
Oh, these are the things that kill me....

--Morrissey, The Queen Is Dead

We of Wit are delighted to see that Morrissey is working to right the Oedipal flow, which has lately been so cannily reversed by crazy old people who use America's military might and the pig-trough misappropriation of Homeland Security funds to soothe the envious tantrums of their Post Traumatic Stress Disorder addled-offspring.

Fuck these old ladies and sawed off psycopathic patriarchs and their revanchist crypto-royalist spawn. The Queen is Dead, boys, and it's not so lonely on a limb...

"Morrissey charmed a massive crowd at the sold-out Hollywood Bowl last night (June 8), running through several hits spanning his three-decade long career.

Playing for an 18,000-strong audience, Morrissey began his set with the classic Smith's tune, 'The Queen Is Dead', which garnered huge cheers from the crowd.

He occasionally got political, changing the chorus of 'I Will See You In Far Off Places' to 'If George W Bush doesn't kill you, I will see you in far off places'...."

Link: Morrissey wins over LA crowd with career-spanning hits | News | NME.COM.

Your Smile Is Like A Breath Of Spring, Your Voice Is Soft Like Summer Rain

Duelling versions of Dolly Parton's "Jolene" a longtime Wit favorite, to celebrate Ms. Parton's being named an an honorary girl scout.

Dolly Parton clip and Girl Scout info via Professor Hex.

The Movement Spreads

Wit loves the new Bright Eyes album, Cassadaga....

"Corporate or Colonial
The Movement is unstoppable
Like the body of a centerfold it spreads
To the counter-culture copyright
Get your revolution at a lower price
Or make believe and throw the fight, play dead
It's exploding bags, aerosol cans
Southbound buses, Peter Pan
They left it up to us again
I thought you knew the drill
It's kill or be killed...."

--Bright Eyes, Clairaudients

Link: Amazon.com: Cassadaga: Music: Bright Eyes.

Hissing Lawns (Happy Memorial Day!)

Wit will be travelling until Monday, so posting may be slower than usual (though we hope not.)

"The Hissing of Summer Lawns is an album by Joni Mitchell from 1975.

The title track is about a woman who is being treated as part of her husband's portfolio, with the central image an imagining that the sprinklers on suburban lawns are in some way expressing disapproval at the materialistic culture contained in those houses...."

Link: The Hissing of Summer Lawns - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

A Crack Pipe Burns In Spago

Rather an exploitive tale, this one, but we like the Rodney Dangerfield at the Country Club vibe of the interruption of street life into Spago.

"Last year, I was taken to the Los Angeles restaurant Spago for a movie industry lunch. The conversation turned to the question of Sly Stone's whereabouts. Someone mentioned that Sly had wandered into this very eating establishment a few months previous, smoking what appeared to be a crack pipe.

Someone else happened to mention they knew someone who knew someone who was in the process of selling their entire collection of music memorabilia, including a hat worn on stage by Sly in 1970: a very fetching Davy Crockett-style number with a giant brooch attached. Without delay, a call was made to the seller and I was informed that only sealed bids would be considered. I duly scraped together all the cash I could muster (a princely 6400 pounds) and pitched my bid with what can only be described as a sense of burning hope...."

Link: Guardian Unlimited: Arts blog - music: My quest to buy Sly Stone's hat.

Bomb. Repeat. Bomb.