RND Nose Letter #4

(written July 22, 2007)

 

 

RND ENTERTAINMENT

 

When we first dreamed up the Red Nose District a year and a half ago, our mission was encapsulated in one simple phrase. We wanted to create Black Rock City's "premier entertainment destination". Our infrastructure, our luxuries, our lounges, and our social events provide support for our entertainers and visitors. But our core offering is the entertainment itself.

 

Last year we gave it our best shot, and it came off amazingly well. Then we went home, sat down and asked ourselves, "How can we make this even better?"

 

This year, it looks like everything we're doing is going to take one giant step forward. Our veteran members know exactly what we're up to now, and they're making improvements everywhere.

 

We've got a huge circus tent, a big stage, an amazing sound system, and a professional support crew. And great acts - just the sort of artists we've been dreaming of - are lining up to perform with us.

 

Cirque Berzerk will be taking the lead Wednesday and Friday evenings with their amazing acrobatics, fire performers, and theater of the bizarre. And on Thursday evening, Circus Metropolus will delight us will a five-hour musical circus extravaganza.

 

After the circus (and all night Saturday) The Fringe Arts Collective (our sister camp) will take over and entertain until dawn. The Fringe knows everybody in the music scene. They’ve been wooing and schmoozing and picking and choosing. They've put together a really fun line-up of bands and DJs to compliment our circus performances and keep our District hopping. They’re calling it Fringe Latenights in the Bigtop. While the artists play and the DJs spin, Fringe will be entertaining us with acrobatic art-making and dance performances. It’s quite a multi-media feast.

 

And now! Ladies and gentlemen! Androids and aliens! Here, without further ado, is the incredible, long-awaited  Red Nose night-time entertainment lineup!

 

 

THE LATE NIGHT LOW-DOWN

 

The Fringe booked their late nights with three goals in mind. 1: to get the best and most well-rounded entertainment on the playa. 2: To intersperse camp residents with guests, live music with produced, and performance art throughout. 3: To reward the people who are working hardest to keep the underground art scene thriving. Furthermore, in the interest of sanity, all music is scheduled to end no later than 7am.

 

Following the much-anticipated Cirque Berzerk / Fou Fou Ha! performance, Wednesday night will be based around the funk, with the guest of honor being Washington DC Nufunk producer Fort Knox Five. DJ Adrian, one of the leaders of the national bastard-pop movement and producer of San Francisco's wild "Bootie" party will share a mashup set with the Fringe's Big$. Other guests include Space Cowboys funkfreak Mancub and a sublime downtempo dancehall sunrise set by House of Lotus's Ben Maybe.

 

Thursday night will feature Boenobo's Circus Metropolus, centered around sets by Gooferman and a generous helping of circus and burlesque performance. Metropolus will be followed by funk-breakbeat wiz Smoove, then a live set by electronic trio BLVD (feat. MC Souleye and keyboardist Jordan Feinstein). Liquid drum-and-bass producer James Christopher of LowPro Lounge will lead into one of our most highly anticipated performances, KJ Sawka. The drum-and-breaks live drummer uses loops and electronics to create fresh music from scratch a-la Kid Beyond. His popularity is exploding nationally due to over 500,000 Youtube downloads.

 

Friday night is going to be off the frickin' hook - hang onto your klown pants!  First, we get Fou Fou Ha!, Cirque Berzerk AND Stilt Circus. Then we'll host several of the most important DJs in the underground, including L.A. Breakbeat Association champ Oskure, San Francisco scene hero and dubstep expert Adam Ohana, and playa heroes Bassnectar and Freq Nasty. Freq is no stranger to the circus tent, having played an epic 3-hour set under the big top in 2005. The Fringe's Mycho Cocoa will show off his dubstep styles and Motion Potion (of The Fringe and Mutaytor) will close it out with one of his patented eclectic sunrise sets, bringing the likes of the Beatles, Beasties, 5th Dimension, Roy Ayers, and Radiohead in to watch the orb ascend.

 

Saturday night is family night. The artists are all members of The Fringe or personal friends of the camp. Victor Vega, one of SF's rising stars, will play dirty electro post-Burn, followed by another set by live band BLVD with Souleye and the Ritual. Motion Potion will sit in with BLVD as well, then hold the fort before collaborating with Buck and Atom of Dubscience Soundsystem in a set that may end up being more Mutaytor than Dubsci. No one in Los Angeles has done more to support underground arts and music than Wolfie, and he will follow Dubsci with his patented "take no prisoners" breaks. Fringe eclecticist Tim Dietz will follow, leading into Mycho Cocoa for sunrise.

 

Who's getting excited?!

 

 

DREAMTIME CIRCUS

 

A new circus is coming to town.  Dreamtime Circus has joined the District, and will be performing with Circus Metropolus on Thursday evening. A bunch of them have already joined our ranks of campers, with more showing up every day.

 

Who are these masked entertainers, you ask? I've asked them the same question. And here, in the words of Psuachae The Dreamer of Fates, is their reply.

 

The Dreamtime Circus is a troupe of fire fairies, clowns, dancers, aerialists, jugglers, musicians, and all types of other magical and fantastical creatures who travel far and wide to share the uplifting experience of the circus with the peoples of the world.  We use fire and circus arts as mediums for fostering cross-cultural communication and open exchanges of cultural ideas and artistic expressions.  As offerings of good will and solidarity, we perform free circus performances for the communities we visit, focusing our efforts on serving those surviving military conflicts, dislocations, or natural disasters. 

 

We will be performing "Between Worlds" on Thursday night in the RND Big Top.  This story is a mystical journey into a realm of shadow and spirit that is governed by rules unlike our own.  In this story, a broken-down clown who once wished to be ringmaster has his dreams set aflame.  He is granted magical powers that lead him to face his own inner demons, treading the tightrope twixt the dream-fantasy of fate embraced and the demon-nightmare of deep-seated doubt.  The show includes over 25 performers, with fire staff, poi, hoops, juggling, breath, racket, ass, aerialists, opera, and more.

 

 

FOU FOU HA!

 

Actually, make that two new circuses coming to town. Fou Fou Ha!, organized by Maya Culbertson's Liminal Dance Theater, will be taking the stage on Wednesday and Friday evenings, in conjunction with Cirque Berzerk. They promise to be outrageous, with jaw-dropping dance numbers and over-the-top costumes. They'll be combining dance, acrobatics, theater, slapstick, buffoonery, drag queens, and cheap bourbon, to instill shits, giggles and bootie shakin' in us all!

 

 

CAMPING AT RND

 

We're committed to entertaining Black Rock City. We're also committed to making our camp comfortable and enjoyable. If we don't cater to our own members, who's going to make the circus happen?

 

Black Rock City is a noisy place, and sometimes it's hard to sleep. There's nothing we can do to quiet down the rest of the city. But there's a lot we can do to keep our wonderful sound system from keeping you awake. We're committed to keeping our own sound levels tolerable in our camping areas. And for those who want the quietest campsites, we're creating a sort of miniature Hushville in our Annex, out along B Street.

 

There's actually quite a lot we can do to keep our camping areas quiet.

Our speakers are aimed away from the city, out toward the open playa.

After hours, we'll be rolling down the circus tent walls to keep the sound in.

We'll have two big trucks parked between the speakers and our camping area.

We'll ask people with RVs to park them broadside to the speakers to block sound.

We'll regulate our speaker volume to make sure we aren't the loudest sound around.

 

When you arrive, make sure to tell our placement team if you’d like a quieter location.

 

 

PEEPSHOW MINIGOLF

 

Last year we were delighted to have PeepShow MiniGolf set up across the Esplanade from us. This year, after much cajoling, they’ve agreed to join us again, and to bring their wacky golf course to our side of the Esplanade. Here’s what they have to say for themselves.

Legendary in their own trousers, the Peepshow MiniGolf crew are on a mission to take you to the edge of sanity. Bringing together two of America's favorite pastimes for the first time in human history (since the last time they did it) - The Girly Peepshow and Miniature Golf!

ROCK OUT to their awesome soundtrack of arena rock, cartoon theme tunes, bluegrass and gangsta rap.
LUST after the clowns-gone-wrong (tm) as they shake it on our stage.
JUMP IN and play a round of golf, while being distracted by our hot-n-horny dancers (tm).
GASP as the puppets start to take over.
CHOKE as you chug down the clown hooch.
CRINGE as they spin the wheel and make you do stoopid stuff.
HEAVE as you realize that PeepShow Minigolf has transported you through a wormhole into another dimension where the lights are a little brighter, time goes a little slower, seeming coincidences take on meaning, strange things happen that you can't explain, clowns become BEAUTIFUL embodiments of the potential future for mankind, and you realize, for one sweet and perfect moment, that we can PLAY FOREVER... forever... forever... forever.....

Click here for video evidence of this phenomenon.
If you’re interested in signing up to our cult, and helping out with shifts of handing out poprocks, searching for lost balls, and dancing like nobody is watching, even if people are watching, then email us at bub@peepshowminigolf.com .

 

 

CAMP SOCIALS

 

Our own dear Jesster from EnHightened Beings is organizing Git-Ta-Nose-Ya-Better cocktail socials Sunday-Tuesday to help you meet your campmates. The RND cocktail socials will be held daily from 5-7pm at various locations around the District. The first few will be just us chickens. You'll be issued a red nose to wear, a cocktail to sip, and a whole lot of wonderful new friends to try on.

 

Our featured cocktails will include:

 

We have no liquor budget, so we're depending on you to help us stock the bar.  Please bring a (plastic) bottle of something to keep us afloat.

 

Please consider cleaning out the back corners of your liquor cabinet and donating your orphans. I just did, and came up with a full case of useful goodies!

 

And if you’d like to assist at the socials, please write to Jesster and tell her so.

 

 

SPARE TICKETS?

 

If you or someone you know has a cheap Burning Man ticket for sale, we need it.  Please write and tell us how much you want for it.

 

 

NEW BRC MAP

 

BMorg has just released the 2007 map of Black Rock City.  Check it out!

 

 

RND MEMBERSHIP

 

We currently have 85 members signed up. The trickle has turned into a steady stream. Soon it will turn into a flood. Then we’ll have to start turning people away.

 

Red Nose District is going to be the best place to live and work on the entire playa. We’re going to have the best gifts to offer, the most fun jobs to do, the most fun people to work and play with, and the most luxurious camp anywhere. Other camps charge the same membership dues, and offer much less.

 

What are you waiting for ???  Click  HERE  to go to the RND signup webpage now!

 

 

 

LINKS

 

If you have some kickass friends who might want to join RND, please forward this message to them.

Email me if you want to add or remove an email address from this distribution list.

 

Here are contact addresses for the RND managers.

EnHightened Beings - Jesster - canuckleheadadv@earthlink.net

The Nome - Dr Nome - Dr.Nome@speakeasy.net

TOTEM Massage & Chill - Chuck - tadmuck@comcast.net

Circus Metropolus - Boenobo - boenobo@circusmetropolus.com

Cirque Berzerk - Sue - suzanne@bernelphoto.com

The Green Chai Garden - Coco - coco_73@yahoo.com

Kitchen manager - Vicki - vicki@gradman.com

Green theme coordinator - Indigo - indigomoonstar@yahoo.com

 

For more information on RND, see our home page and our internal documents.



Honk!
Chuck Nichols
RND treasurer

tadmuck@comcast.net