Reports from the scene

Locals Only

Grande Ole Party guitarist John Paul Labno has confirmed for CityBeat that while the band has, in fact, broken up, he’s already started a new band, The Hot Moon, featuring members of The Black Heart Procession (Jason Hooper) and Mr. Tube and The Flying Objects (Jovi Butts and Brad Lee). Labno is playing guitar and saxophone while vocal and keyboard duties come courtesy of Sasha Psau. They already have some demos up on their MySpace page (www.myspace.com/thehotmoon). They’ll play their first show on Sept. 19 at Walk the Walk Presents Sight & Sound event in North Park, but then they’ll take a two-month break while Butts and Hooper are out of town.

The Nervous Wreckords, the new band from Louis XIV’s Brian Karscig and Anthony Saffery (Cornershop), have inked a deal with local indie label Hi-Speed Soul Records. The band has plans to hit the road and record this year and into next.
Sixteen-year old jazz pianist Chase Morrin will celebrate the release of his debut CD, A Minor Shade of Red, with a show at Dizzy’s on Saturday, Aug. 22.

The Powerchords will celebrate the release of a new 7-inch single, “Nightmare,” on Single Screen Records with a show on Friday, Aug. 21, at Soda Bar.

Also having a single-release show is Echo Revolution, who’ll be giving out free download cards for the song “Counterfeit Sunshine” at Soda Bar on Monday, Aug. 24.

According to the band’s website, bassist Troy Oftedal has left death-metal band Cattle Decapitation for “musical and personal differences.” Rashaan Davis will fill in for Oftedal on the band’s current tour.

Playmates and poker

“Come on, there’s hundreds of drunk Indians here that wanna fuck you in the ass,” said Gary to his girlfriend, Playboy 50th Anniversary Playmate and “World’s Sexiest DJ” Colleen Shannon.

The demure and baffled Shannon—wearing sparkling diamond hoop earrings so big you could fit a wine bottle through them—looked just as confused as I was.

“Are you talking about me,” I asked, thinking Gary might be referring to my rather guru-esque beard. “Because I’m closer to the type of Indian that scalps people.”

And with that, Gary whisked Shannon off while I was left wondering what he meant by his comment.

My night at Harrah’s Rincon Casino in Valley Center was filled with these kinds of moments. I realized later that Gary might have been referring to the fact that his girlfriend just DJed a casino owned by the Rincon Band of Mission Indians and that he’d been a little unsatisfied with how they run the operation.

“They’re lucky to have us,” he complained at one point, after some poor employee mistakenly carded Shannon.

But while her boyfriend seemed a bit too comfortable riding coattails, Shannon was lovely and patient. A DJ before becoming a Playmate, she was there for the month-long Beauty + Wax series at Harrah’s poolside club, Eclipse, that will feature some of the most, uh, talented female DJs.

“I like to cater to a club,” Shannon told me earlier in an upstairs banquet hall before her set. “I like to be able to walk into a club and play hip-hop, house and infuse it with electro. You cater to the people really.”
And what did the people think?

“My brother could do this,” exclaimed one clubgoer when I asked him what he thought of Shannon’s skills. “And my brother isn’t even a DJ.”

But that didn’t stop most people from having fun. In fact, Eclipse is a rather cool club with a pool that staff members will actually let you swim in. Lately, they’ve been trying hard to book some serious talent (Grandmaster Flash and

Samantha Ronson, to name two) to lure people into skipping Vegas. This Saturday, the club had just enough people to not seem packed, which might be great for anyone looking for an alternative to the Gaslamp.

Gary and Shannon might be used to the royal treatment at the ultra-exclusive clubs in Dubai and Hong Kong that jet her out to play, but here they were just being treated like the rest of us. And that works for me.