Tuesday, September 9, 2008

Support Evicted Market Drummers AGAIN

Last time we won! In January, Santa Cruz Police tried to evict the ever-present market drum circle from their spot under the tree, and with the help of Trash Orchestra, the drums drove the cops away. And they stayed away... until now.

Last week the drummers were evicted AGAIN by police using the ridiculous 15-minute law (persons cannot be in any city parking lot longer than 15 minutes). Join us to protest that eviction and reclaim that public space!

Support for Market Drummers
Wed Sep 10th 3:30pm
Santa Cruz Farmer's Market
(Bring percussion - resonant trash or a drum)

The City of Santa Cruz's parking lot panic law is in effect and being enforced. For those unfamiliar the law restricts the use of downtown parking lots and garages to parking and retrieving of vehicles (the person must be in and out in 15 minutes), and for pedestrians passing directly through from one sidewalk to another or a bordering store. Anything else (waiting in your car for a friend, eating lunch, talking to friends, playing music...) is trespassing, illegal, will get you hassled by Santa Cruz's finest, and, ultimately, fined.

Ostensibly to create a safer downtown, this absurd law is a further attempt to create a sterile downtown for smooth undistracted shopping. It criminalizes creative uses of public space for art and recreation.

From this article on Indybay:

On two successive Wednesdays, police have ordered the peaceful drum circle to leave their traditional spot in the public parking lot [alongside the Farmer's Market] using Mayor Coonerty's Ban on Public Assemblies in parking lots. The new merchant-backed law prohibits lingering in a parking lot or garage unless you have a vehicle there (and then only for fifteen minutes). It removed ten blocks of public space from public use.

A twisted and unjust law, but only words on paper until enforced. Uniformed fascists (some very friendly and decent, of course, as they oppress you) will try to enforce it with what they believe to be legitimate power. But we are really the ones that make the choice whether to legitimate that power or not. We choose not to go along with the program.

This is merely the newest battle of a war in Santa Cruz. A war against dissent, against the poor, against the homeless, and now against people making music. We challenge these laws and the police crackdown on undesirables -- an effort to "clean up" the streets of Santa Cruz of the young, the very old, immigrants, the unemployed, homeless, the insane, and anyone who resists.

Join us in solidarity with other musicians and friends playing music together.

References:

Monday, August 4, 2008

Trash on the Black Rock Playa

Like Burning Man back in the day, back when we started going in '93. The infinite desert, explosives, and bone-shaking trash percussion. Including a performance at the burning of the desert town of Dismal.


Our camp out on the open playa


Sometimes, accidentally propane cylinders fell into our fire


Playing around in the junk at the shooting range








Fire Practice




Performance at Dismal before the town tragically burnt to the ground






As Hank said:
it was great to see all of you, and to meet even more wonderful people.
so sweet, so short.

I'd like to meet again. What are you doing in around 360 days?
same place, same time?
More photos on Flickr



Long-Haul Infoshop 15th Birthday Party in Berkeley


Long-Haul Infoshop 15th Birthday
3124 Shattuck Ave
Friday Aug 8th 8pm
Berkeley, CA
The Long Haul has served as a resource center and community space for radical grassroots activists for 15 years. Trash Orchestra will be there to help celebrate. Vegan birthday cake, music, dancing, refreshments, and a general good time. Starts immediately after the Berkeley Critical Mass ride. Website.

Come join us as we help celebrate this long-running awesome radical project.

Wes

Sunday, July 13, 2008

Trash Orchestra at Fire Arts Festival

Photography by Insurgent Photo insurgentphoto[at]yahoo.com


Flag


Gazing


Lounging


Canstrament


Cuddly Kitten Time


On Stage


Full Stage


The Nicest Guy You'll Ever Meet


Ladies and Gentlemen!


Introduction


"Found With a Match in Her Hand"


Monkey Boy


100% Mustache


Sharing Instruments


Circus Waltz


Flaming Drumsticks


Disarming Smile


Fire Staff


"Things! Break! Down!"


Trash Pile


Extinguishing the Orchestra


So Long Folks


Tuesday, July 8, 2008

The Crucible's Fire Arts Festival Friday July 11th


Join us as we light ourselves and maybe others on fire at the Crucible's Fire Arts Festival in West Oakland on July 11th. The festival runs Wednesday to Saturday. We're opening on Friday night. We're unsure looking at this photo if this stage is really big or grand enough for us. Catch us at this performance while we are still playing small, intimate gigs.

Fire Arts Festival
Kirkham Street and 5th Street
Friday July 11th 8pm
Oakland, CA
The Crucible’s Fire Arts Festival celebrates creativity through fire and light with a spectacular open-air exhibition of interactive fire art, performance and the largest collection of outdoor fire sculpture on the West Coast. Website.

Fire Arts Festival website and tickets: http://www.thecrucible.org/fireartsfestival/

Wednesday, June 18, 2008

Return to Modesto!

Report back from Modesto DIY Fest from Wingnut Willy:

The night ended with Trash Orchestra performance in Modesto's center plaza downtown.

Again (1 year later), Santa Cruz folks took the public into the trash orchestrated post apocalyptic vision quest! Smashing on car hubcaps, plastic buckets, symbols & kicking over garbage cans, followed by a Trash Orchestrated Dogpile, set the public's mood on fire!



















The end of Orchestra ( too late coppers...WE'RE DONE!) resulted in a debate between Modesto police & one T.O. member, with police claiming there were complaints from local merchants (who later denied it adamantly. But police just seemed more interested in trying to prove they were arrogantly right & boasting their authority -- but whats new?!

Again, from Modesto police, "We're not impressed. "





Wednesday, May 28, 2008

Santa Cruz LGBT Pride Parade

Trash Orchestra joins the annual pride parade, a celebration of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgendered, intersex and questioning community. Come support your queer friends, family, and neighbors.

The Santa Cruz LGBT Pride Parade 2008 will gather at Pacific Avenue and Cathcart Street at 10 am on Sunday, June 1, and will step off at 11 am.

The Festival happens directly after the parade in San Lorenzo Park. Attendance will likely be over 5,000. This year the festival starts at NOON and goes to 6PM on June 1st, 2008. The festival will have a Stage with performers of all types.

Monday, May 19, 2008

Your Support Helps Fight Tyranny

In March, we returned from a trip into the Great White North, a fabulous 1500-mile voyage to Seattle, via Eugene and Portland. Check out the harrowing and titillating details of our journey right here on the Trash Orchestra Blog.

It included 12 performances in 5 days, in Eugene, Portland, and Seattle. It included an anti-war student walkout march in Portland and a street takeover in Georgetown, Seattle. We made connections up and down the coast and at Honk Fest West, across the country.

The trip cost the band about a thousand dollars. Would you be willing to kick-in $100 to help with the journey? Trash Orchestra is a grassroots shoestring endeavor. Your cash will help fight tyranny.


Monday, May 12, 2008

Free Food and Music at the River Arts Festival


Trash Orchestra Performance
at the River Arts Festival

Sundays May 18th 11:30
at the Duck Pond
San Lorenzo Park
Santa Cruz, CA

According to the website, this is an exciting new annual festival celebrating the Monterey Bay's rich cultural and natural resources. The park's bench lands will be transformed into the "Piazza di San Lorenzo", an aesthetic contemporary arts and crafts marketplace.

We will be celebrating the "diversity of our town's tremendous cultural riches and creativity" in the very same park in which Santa Cruz police daily chase out modern day hobos and troubadours. So we hope to bring an illuminating vibe to the celebration.

We invite those who are down-and-out, itinerant, penniless, on the bum, dispossessed, destitute, homeless, broke down, busted, hard-up, on the skids, or just your punks or traveling kids to come enjoy a sunny day with food, music, and friends.

Food Not Bombs will be serving at the same time that Trash Orchestra starts.

We'll make a joyful noise and play for a time when the river will be unbounded by parks and levies and we'll all run wilder and freer.