Event Review: Space Cowboys at The EndUp

Saturday night the boyfriend and I assembled a small crew to check out The Space Cowboys putting on this month’s The Show at The Endup. We were fairly excited at the prospect of a night with a Burner vibe and some kick-ass breaks, but by the time the breaks actually got going, we’d had enough of the electrohouse mush that proceeded it, along with a vibe that was more like a frat party (albeit a very cool one), that we decided to cut out before we spent any more money on The Endup’s now astronomically expensive drinks.

In my experience, there are two sides to the Space Cowboys. On the one side you’ve got, next to Evil Breaks, one of the very best crews for putting out, and popularizing, kick-ass breaks to the general party populace. And then, on the other side, there’s this tendency to take it all down to the lowest common denominator of all-out booty. In this case, booty definitely won out. At first it was nice to arrive and hear some pretty easy-going dance music that was a bit out of the normal vibe of ubiquitous EndUp house, but after going back and forth from Latin club to a Daft Punk remix to something that made me think I was back at a mid-90s acid house party, it was becoming more and more difficult to find any consistent vibe to hang onto. There were plenty of folks shaking it on the dancefloor, and I’m sure many of the girls who showed up in their playawear got freaky with it later, but I’d come wanting to hear breaks, not the kitchen sink of electronic dance music. This was what put me in mind of a frat party; lots of people out to get fucked up and freaky, with the DJ going for the easiest party pleasers in his bag.

Since the DJ who took over at 1 finally started playing breaks, and the party itself had several more hours of life left in it, I might have been willing to stay a little longer, but the prospect of spending any more money on drinks was starting to make my wallet hurt. When I ordered my first vodka tonic, it came back as costing $7.50. Well or call seemed to make no difference, the bartender always charged me $7.50. Drop another dollar for tip, and figure on 4 or 5 drinks over the course of the night (not that crazy if you show up early, as we usually do, and then even switch over to water when the bar closes), and suddenly you’ve dropped a huge wad of money.

This has become something of a problem with almost every time I go to The EndUp. Everybody knows that the place really gets going after 2AM, and so the whole night becomes back-loaded. It seems like every time I go there, mostly for Kontrol, I spend the first couple hours waiting for them to get around to the music I came to hear, and wind up spending too much money on drinks, so that by the time things really get going, it’s getting to be later than I want to be out without the substantial chemical assistance that will keep my fellow clubbers going until 6AM and later. Of course you can come later, but then you get to pay $15 - $20 on top of what you’ll spend for booze. The EndUp is a classic spot, with much going for it from ambience to soundsystem, but if I’m going to go there and spend the kind of money that a night out there seems to require, then I want the first couple hours I’m there to be just as intense, and interesting, as the early morning ones.

Upcoming Event: Fundraiser for Steampunk Treehouse with the Space Cowboys, Saturday June 9

ROOTS TO ROOF, a fundraiser for the Steampunk Treehouse Project

Featuring: Loop!Station, Mark Growden, Kinetic Steam Works, Exxothermia, Orion Fredericks, THERM, Copper Lantern Fire Theater, Dept. of Spontaneous Combustion, Jamie Vaida and the "Goes Around Comes Around," Spy Girl Friday, Jeremy Krentz & His Tesla Coil, One Man Banjo, DJ Delachaux, DJ Halon, DJ D. Vennerbeck & His Steam Powered Mixological Arts

Plus THE UNIMOG
with Space Cowboy DJs Mancub, Kaptn Kirk, The Geometrist and 8ball will collaborate on beats later in the evening

Art by Michael Christian, Ben Carpenter, Jamie Vaida, Steven Rademaker
Sponsored by The Crucible
Lighting by reFRACTion
Admission: $15- $15,000 (sliding scale)
Location: NIMBY Warehouse // 1649 28th St., Emeryville, CA 94608 //
(between Mandela Parkway & Peralta)
http://www.steamtreehouse.com/

Mix to Download: 8ball of the Space Cowboys

Space Cowboy extraordinaire 8ball whips up a new mix of minimal/electro for your listening pleasure:

http://spacecowboys.org/pages/8ball-mixes

Mix to Download: Kap'n Kirk of the Space Cowboys

The Space Cowboys are probably the favorite breaks crew of San Francisco Burners, and Kap'n Kirk has a new mix that attempts to demonstrate how they got that status.

Your Saturday Guide for April 28, 2007

A couple interesting events out of the ordinary this Saturday, though both present unknown qualities. If you go to either, please hit us back with a report.

UPDATE NUMBER TWO: New stuff just keeps popping up, this time a Burning Man fundraiser at the Porn Palace, but it's on the pricey side:

MONKEY: a banana peelin’, vine swingin’, primal primate throwdown featuring two rooms of boom to shake your prehensile tail ‘til the early morn’! 100% of Proceeds to Benefit “Homouroboros”; Peter Hudson’s next playa masterwork. Everyone involved has volunteered to support the production of Peter’s next stroboscopic zoetrope.

In the Art Barn, you’ll view Peter’s past work and speculate on the scope of homouroboros. You can also buy limited edition homouroboros tees, bandannas, panties and more. Plus, preserve your posterior for posterity. Live ass-casting is back! And with all our favorite Playa sound camps and DJ’s under one roof, this is a rare opportunity for those allergic to playa dust to hear some Black Rock legends.

Monkey Room
Laird, Fred Funk, Shissla, Cut la’What v. Tyler T, An-ten-nae, J9 v. ViaJay, Jive v. Smoove, Ernie Trevino v. Ethan Miller

Guerrilla Lounge
Laird, Aaron Pope, Radio Active, El Papa Chango, Tamo

The Porn Palace 415 Jessie St. (@ 6th)
9PM – Very late
$20 Donation
Burning Man Ticket Raffle! (At Midnight)
COSTUMES encouraged/rewarded: Show me the MONKEY!!!


UPDATE: Just found out about this intriguing party at The Transfer with, of all people, Jeno. The crew behind this party, known collectively as Staple, used to promote parties from 1999 - 2001 at The EndUp under the name of Refuge. These kids have serious House cred, so it's interesting to see them starting up again and incorporating techno into their concept of "deepness." Since The Transfer is only about three blocks from my pad, this is probably the party I'll check out.

Refuge: Future House and Deep Techno
with
Jeno
Fil Latorre
DJ Javaight
at The Transfer, 198 Church Street, x Church and Market
$5 after 11.30
No cover with rsvp: rsvp@staplemusic.net

filterSF presents Fumiya Tanaka at Fat City (formerly known as Studio Z)
The same crew involved with FUK Werk Fridays and the Tabu Sky Bar presents Japanese techno producer Fumiya Tanaka in his first ever live US performance. Sounds cool, I just wish the filterSF kids would stop putting boobies on their flyers - that's so 1999, ya know? Are these parties just about hot babes and those who lust for them, or can anybody come? Really, you'd think they were promoting a gay party.
Deets:
11th Street at Folsom
Limited RSVP $10 guest list before 11:00 PM
info@babd.org or filter1@babd.org
$15 before 11 PM
$20 at the door
$10 after 2:00 AM
Note that this party runs until 8AM Sunday

Aural Therapy 2.0
This just popped up on the old radar, afterhours at an underground location with a host of techno/tech house DJs including Kontrol's Alland Byallo. Starts at 2AM (that's 2AM in the morning on Sunday), location will be emailed by Saturday afternoon after you've bought a ticket online. Says that it's at "the compound."
Deets:
$12 + $2.22 service charge (tix online only)
Doors open 2AM, close 10AM (both Sunday morning)

Drunk and Horny
The reliable, sloppy, gay version of a high school party. Check out my review.
$5 Cover, Underground SF (424 Haight Street x Webster), 9PM - 2AM, DJs Big Red and Sparky.

Upcoming: Space Cowboys at Fresh + Fresh Mixes

Courtesy of the Space Cowboys mailing list comes these party announcements for this weekend (including an underground), along with links to mixes by two of their crew:

Friday, April 6th– FRESH presented by Cheeks
Cheeks is about to skip town for an undisclosed length of time, so this is the big send off before she heads out for the undiscovered country.
Partial proceeds to benefit Leukemia & Lymphoma Research. Expect a night of ass-shaking house from:

Brad Robinson (Space Cowboys), Moody Eva (GoodBeats, Big Popsicle), evan james (evanandrews.com)
Shine (1337 Mission St btw 9th & 10th) 9pm – 2am – $5

Saturday, April 7 - Aries Underground
All Aries DJ lineup with:
Solar (Sunset), J-Bird (Sunset), Seven (NK7), Sol (NK7), Fred Funk (Brass Tax), Mancub (Space Cowboys), Dfunkt (WISH), Sunwoo (Vessel), Eric Sharp (Rockit Science), Lyndon Hill (Los Angeles)

Sound by Soren, Visuals by Phil and Will, Door by Shioban and Isaac, Host David Soto

11pm-6am, $15 cover.
2 Rooms of house, breaks and dirty late night bizness!
Underground location.
Call the NK7 voicemail night of the party: 415 520 9188
www.nk7productions.com

Mix Links (Breaks):

From the Evil Breakster hissself, Aaron Jae's latest mix:
http://aaronjae.com/index.php?go=disc&d=17

And The Geometrist's live mix from Breakfast of Champions is on his Podomatic page:
http://thegeometrist.podomatic.com/

Upcoming: Battling Breaks on Friday!

Two big breaks parties coming up this Friday, one at Mighty, the other at Wish. Note that the Evil Breaks kids will be putting on a Matt Jakes ghetto-tech tribute as part of their party at Wish.

Evil Breaks 3 Year Anniversary Bash!!!!! Friday, March 30th, 2007
FREE before 1130 w/Guestlist & only $10 after
door is $15 if you didn't make the guest list
Located @ Whisper (535 Florida st @ Mariposa)
10pm - 4am
21+ w/ID
Guest List: http://www.evilbreaks.com
Line-up:

Deekline with MC Ivory (UK) - headliner
Aaron Jae
Bam
M.O.D.
Athena
Mozaic
Kapt'n Kirk vs Evinrude
Melyss
Komega - Live PA
Redstickman vs Actual Rafiq (Matt Jakes Ghetto-tech Tribute)
Jay Vigor vs Influence

Sunset Promotions presents
Kraak and Smaak Live (a full six-piece live band set)
at Mighty (119 Utah Street at Alameda)
with lotsa Space Cowboys and others providing support

SF Bloggeratti

Thanks to an invite from Ted Strawser of the San Francisco Party Party I found myself in the company of bloggers from SFist, BeyondChron, and other San Francisco mini-media empires at Zeitgeist last night, where I discovered that bloggers are much like their old-media journalistic counterparts when it comes to liver capacity. I had some great conversation with folks like E. Doctor Smith (who plays an interesting electronic instrument of his own invention) and Joe Eskenazi of BeyondChron, and got an editor of a major San Francisco weekly stoned. As we passed the pipe he introduced me to a friend of his who turned out to be DJ Smoove of the Space Cowboys (among other affiliations). We wound up having a discussion about whether or not another DJ who was a friend of theirs had recently turned into a "trance bitch," which of course got me going since I considered said DJ to be more of a progressive house DJ, based on the couple times I've heard him. The crux of the matter was whether or not progressive house was the same as progressive trance, and you can guess where I came down on that. Things concluded with the the acknowledgement that "progressive" could be applied to any kind of dance music (including breaks, kids, let's not forget about what breaks would be like without builds and breaks), and that there really was a difference between progressive house and progressive trance. This is what happens when you get into stoned conversations with a breaks DJ on one side and a techno/trance DJ on the other - lots of pissing to mark territory. The entire affair put me in a mischievious mood, hanging out with all these alternative media types and getting soused on a school night, and I look forward to the next gathering of the SF Bloggeratti.