Thursday, May 14, 2009

Whiplashed


I realized after this most recent photo shoot that it had been a solid year since I’d had a solo shoot. I have mixed feelings about most photographers, and I can get awfully choosy about who I want seeing me that close up. I want to love their photos, I want to like their style…I want it to feel right in intimate ways, kind of like a first date.

Eddie felt right. Eddie Pinto of Whiplash Studios fell into my lap at my first show back in North Carolina, when he took some stunning shots of me. I loved the sigh of antique gothdom heaved by his photos and wanted very much to be one of his strange, strange girls. I asked to have him all to myself for a few hours for a photo shoot of one’s own.

Eddie is stylish, impeccably so, but he’s kind and calm. He doesn’t have that unapproachable razor-sharp edge that sometimes protects self-proclaimed “creative” types like barbed wire. And he doesn’t give constant direction, which I love. When I work with photographers who tell me to move my elbow this way or lift my chin up, I get angry and self-conscious. Angry because, seriously, let me do my job and you do yours, ‘kay? And self-conscious because, no matter how I try and rationalize away the feeling, having someone direct the minutiae of my body’s movement and angles makes me feel like I’m not doing it right.

Eddie was perfect. He encouraged my desire to crawl around on the ground and pour soy milk on myself. He wasn’t afraid to trek the midday Raleigh streets with me (in a corset) to suss out the best spots and backgrounds. He was in it to win it, and I adore him. Not to mention the shots that came out of our afternoon adventure.

I love it when photographers get down n’ dirty with me like he did, sprawling out on the pavement to get just the right angle. It reminded me of the shoot I did many years ago with Paule Saviano in Dumbo, BK. I rolled around on cobblestone streets and got so dirty that immediately following the shoot I went and got in the water to wash off. You know you’re pretty nasty dirty when you think the East River is cleaner than you are.


Eddie took me to this little alley next to what can only be described as the jumpin’-ist little mom n’ pop hot dog joint I have ever seen. There was a line out the door and around the block, which may sometimes happen at Magnolia in the West Village, but something I ain’t never seen the likes of this side of the Mason-Dixon. Turns out they were waiting to get in to The Roast Grill, famous for grilled hot dogs since 1940. We parked our gear in the alley and began shooting, much to the interest and confusion of all the nice, certainly good Christian families waiting in line.

15 minutes into our shoot, the side door open and out stepped a man from the back of the restaurant. I expected him to shoo us away, worrying that such an unwholesome sight would be bad for business, but he kindly motioned for us to finish shooting, inviting us in for hot dogs when we were done.

Turns out this sweet man was none other than George, the proprietor of The Roast Grill, which I found out post-shoot while I sat on the vintage bar stools at their counter. I typically don’t eat hot dogs, but I had nothing but coffee for breakfast and had been strapped into a corset until 3:30pm. I don’t know if you’ve ever tried to pose for a 2 hour long photo shoot, on a street, in a corset, but it’s hard to breathe and you work up one hell of an appetite.

So, I sat down at the counter.

“How many hot dogs do you want?” he asked.

“Um, one?” I said.

He nodded. “Okay, but you’re going to want another one. What do you want on it?”

“Um, mustard? Ketchup?”

“No ketchup. Don’t need it ‘cause the chili’s so good. Best to get it with chili and slaw on it.”

“Okay then, I’ll do that.”

He fixed the hot dog and sat it down in front of me. “Want a Coke?”

I also never drink soft drinks, especially not of the non-diet ilk, but it just seemed like the right thing to do. When in Rome…

“Okay. Yes please.”


The hot dog was incredibly delicious. And the Coke was tiny and came in one of those old-school glass bottles. I happily stuffed my face while George told me about the place. That it had been around for quite awhile; that they only served hot dogs, but had never served any ketchup. “If you really need it,” he said, “you can bring your own.” I thought about those commercials from the 80’s where the woman pulls her own salad dressing out of her purse, and it made me giggle. While we chatted, a preacher came in to pick up an order of 22 hot dogs, which seems like an awful lot to carry, but nobody blinked an eye. Bulk orders must be common.

The day was about as brilliant as it could be, and it opened up a side of Raleigh that I hadn’t seen. One of the things I loved so much about my little Brooklyn neighborhood is that I could go exploring. Long walks each weekend uncovered some new little store or café that had opened up in an innocuous sidewalk nook. One of the things I was reluctant to come back to were the static, obvious layouts of certain Southern cities. There would be no mystery, no intrigue.

Now I know differently. I’m “discovering” all kinds of new faces to the cities of The Triangle that I thought I knew so well. And I like my face against that backdrop, not to mention the delicious hot dogs I get as a reward for my hard work afterwards.












Tuesday, April 21, 2009

tease.


Before I became a burlesque performer, I was an organizer; an activist that organized at a grassroots level. I still consider myself to be an organizer, and this burlesque thing is about as grassroots as it gets.

It’s a daunting task, to build a scene. You have to educate people, convince them that what you’re doing is worth taking a look at, worth spending their precious time and money to come see. You have to somehow transpose your passion onto them, let your internal love affair seep from your pores, enough to be infectious, but not so much as to be crazy.

And you have to enlist the help of people that love you. Or the people that love what you do. Or the people that are just adventurous enough to take a chance on you.

Like Scott Jennings and Ginny Skalski, both of whom covered The Carolina Heartbreakers on their blogs right at the moment of our birth. And Sean Baker, who volunteered his insane design skills to make us this gorgeous flyer for the show this weekend. He cranked it out one late night, and I’m so in love with it that I have a copy ready to be mounted for the wall in my apartment.

It’s these kindnesses that make it easier to do something that hasn’t really been done before. In New York City, things take off so quickly. Audiences have such a short attention span that the problem isn’t getting them, it’s keeping them. Durham is teaching me about building, laying on bricks and gradually becoming a part of something that I’ve helped to create. It feels more organic, and I’m learning the value of patience…and flyering. I’m definitely re-learning how to flyer.

With that said, come out this Saturday night to celebrate The Carolina Heartbreakers’ Durham debut! Not only do we have the genius of the J’Cougarz on hand, an all-vinyl, all-female DJ troupe for the dance party afterward, but it’s also my birthday!

tease.

Saturday, April 25th
9pm

The Pinhook
117 Main Street
Durham, NC

$5 suggested donation

Monday, March 16, 2009

Heartbreaking


I know a little something about heartbreak.

I live it, I've learned it, and I'm learning to live with it. I even have it tattooed on my hip, courtesy of a former heartbreak, thank you for the memories. It's so much a part of who I am that I have to make jokes about it, break out the gallows humor so that people don't start to feel too uncomfortable spending time with emo girl.

I'm not a sad person. People mistake heartbreak with sadness, but I promise, they aren't the same. My heart gets shattered like a dropped tray of ice because I let myself love so hard. Even when people hurt me, even when they aren't worth it, even when they have no idea what they held in their hands before they broke it beyond repair. And when I think of myself, draw a little mental composite sketch of me, my heart pumps red and bloody; my best and worst feature. But I'll never regret any heartbreak.

When it was time to name the burlesque troupe, I had no hesitation in naming us The Heartbreakers. Heartbreak is a right of passage, a badge of humanity, fodder for songs and poems and art. It's a gossamer thread that weaves a connection between us all, and no matter your age when it finds you, it never hurts any less.

I'd like to think that someday, just as a little bit of karma, I might break some hearts, too.

As for The Carolina Heartbreakers, well, we've put together our first show for you this weekend. Served up on a platter, smoking hot, with new faces, new numbers, and 5 new chances to fall in love...

Click here to visit the Facebook event page.

Introducing:
The Carolina Heartbreakers!

Saturday, March 21st
Local 506
506 West Franklin Street
Chapel Hill, NC

Doors at 8:30pm

$8 advance/ $10 door
Click here to purchase tickets: http://shortn.it/VdDj


Special Guest - Porcelain

Hosted by - Ronald Ray Gun

Thursday, January 29, 2009

Introducing...The Carolina Heartbreakers!


All photos by Mark @ RTP Photography

When I found out that I would be moving back to my homestate back in October, I started to do a little research. New York City, being the dynamic center of urban creativity that it is, has a thriving burlesque scene. Every night of the week, there is a burlesque show or two to be found somewhere on the stages of that city. As a performer, this is fortuitous, because if you do your booking properly, you can stay fairly busy.

North Carolina, on the other hand, has a much more subdued scene. There are shows popping up here and there, but The Triangle has no burlesque "scene" to speak of. I found this fact quite surprising, considering the wide range of creative, intellectual, and performer types that make their home in the RDU. That's typically a breeding ground for saucy ecdysiasts like us.



I was fortune enough, thanks to word of mouth, stumble across 3 talented and beautiful women who are also very skilled burlesque performers:

Miss Rachel Riot
Miss Mary Wanna
Miss Lila Lavender

A blonde, a brunette, and a redhead, all different beautiful body types, all different styles of performance. I was stoked, not only because it meant we could build a scene and have spaces to indulge in our tease, but also because it was something unique and thrilling that we could bring to an area already thriving with new ideas. Scandalous.



I am really excited that we create this in The Triangle, and we hope that you'll join us in all of the unadulterated fun we plan to have at our shows.

Below you'll find our email address, links to our Myspace and Facebook pages, and a badge which you can grab for eyecandy purposes on your blog or profile, should you feel so inclined. There's also a mailing list sign-up widget, which will help keep you in the loop about our shows and projects. We've already got 2 booked in the coming months, so make sure you're there for our big reveal!

So...you all ready to have your hearts broken? ;)

Hearts & Ammo,
Cherry Bomb


carolina.heartbreakers (at) gmail (dot) com

~~ The Carolina Heartbreakers on Myspace

~~ The Carolina Heartbreakers on Facebook



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Tuesday, October 28, 2008

I *Heart* Brooklyn Girls Launch Party

Here's a couple of snaps from the party, thanks to Vanessa Geiger...It was a bitchin' good time.

Check out www.iheartbrooklyngirls.com for more info...




Friday, October 17, 2008

Cherry Bomb's Last Stand




I'm leaving town.

After nearly 4 years of living and loving in Brooklyn, I'm trekking back down South to take a job that is perfect for me. I couldn't have asked for a more bittersweet situation.

Brooklyn has always been an amalgam of the best and worst of me. That's why I love it so much; I'm not just admiring its qualities, I empathize with its rough-around-the-edges glamour and attempts to stay below the radar. I feel comfortable among the grit and stray chicken bones of a not-wholly-gentrified-yet neighborhood, bridge columns standing in for the trunks of trees in the urban forest of my midnight walks. I know how to take my shell of a warehouse self and renovate and redecorate until people are raving about the original detailing of the façade. Me and Brooklyn, we are of the same mind. Constant works-in-progress with plenty of dark alleys to sneak into when you don’t feel like being found.

Going back to my home region is bittersweet. I’ll finally be able to have all the things I was so homesick for, all the people that I missed, but it feels like walking over trodden ground. I have lived that life already, and now it is up to me to reinvent myself completely in the same space. And that prospect is almost more terrifying than starting from scratch, because I’ve got to trust the people around me to allow the metamorphosis to happen…to let me be someone other than who they knew.

Along with the good comes the bad. This isn’t a time that I am interested in being unemployed any longer than I have been. And New York City is a hard place to stake your claim. I’ve been carving out my little niche here for four years now, and I’ve been really lucky to work with and know and love some amazing and talented people. And those bonds are something that the Mason-Dixon line can’t take away no how.

So now, let’s freakin’ celebrate this shit.

The wonderful people over at Monday Night Burlesque, Doc Wasabassco and the lovely ladies, have agree to host Cherry Bomb’s Last Stand. I’ll be opening and closing out the hour, so getcher ass out to come holler for me one more time. And then maybe buy me a drink and make out with me in the corner or something…just sayin’.

8-9pm is happy hour drinks and the show starts at 9, because I know some of you have to work in the morning. So don’t be late…

Friday, October 10, 2008

Charm City


Channeling my muse June Carter backstage before the show.


Although I asked around all weekend, no one could really tell me why Baltimore is called “Charm City.” Not that I needed an exact story; Baltimore is pretty damn charming. Lots of little neighborhoods and that grittiness that I find so attractive in places and people *ahemthatIdatecough*. Baltimore reminds me of Brooklyn in certain ways; formerly industrial, now with evolving urban spaces and an appreciation for art and creativity. Philly also struck me as that kind of place, smaller versions of Brooklyn that have been on my radar for awhile now…sleeper cities just on the verge.


Backstage dressing room.


Thanks to being hosted by one of my BFFs, I got a whirlwind tour of Baltimore’s offerings. I learned to “crab pick,” which really just means ripping the little guy apart limb-by-limb with your bare, Old Bay smeared hands, and there’s a photo around here somewhere of me drinking a 40 of National Bohemian beer, or “Natty Bo,” as it’s called locally. I drank about two sips of it, being the lightweight that I am, and had to hold it with both hands because I boast the physical stature of a 12-year-old. Rad.



The Charm City Kitty Club produced a show stuffed with talented queer performers. I really liked having a 2-night show run, because it gave me a chance to get to know the people involved, the space, the audience, to tweak my performances…It gave me some food for thought for future ventures, as well.


SJ has to help me hold the 40 because my tiny hands cannot wrap around it. Thanks, SJ!


Also included in the evening were performers like Susana Cook, whose piece I didn’t get to actually see but was so good that just hearing it backstage had me laughing hysterically. Susana, being a fellow Taurus, exudes this magnetic charm. She has that unidentifiable “thing” that is a mash-up of sex appeal, confidence, and stage presence. Reina Williams did this incredibly sexy rendition of “Father Figure,” which I think you can see a video of on her Myspace page, and the very powerful activist/artist Ignacio Rivera was present as well. Happily, Ignacio and I seem to book ourselves for the same shows on a regular basis, and I enjoy the performance familiarity.


Backstage mess. Guess which bag is mine...


One of my favorite things about doing queer shows is the sheer range of gender expression and the ways they are showcased. Most of the time when I’m doing a show, sexiness is performed with a heavy feminine slant: lots of gorgeous cleavage and fishnets and long hair. I adore all of my Burly-Q girlies, but I also really love the opportunity to perform within a spectrum of varied gender expression. I love the fusion, the overlap, and I feel like what I do is read more accurately. In other words, I feel like my drag queen presentation is more appreciated in queer spaces. Other times, I feel like my burlesque self is simply read as hyper-feminized.

Thankfully, I survived the Chinatown bus trip back. But don’t anyone ever call me unadventurous.