This Friday night, August 12th, our friends at THIS los angeles will curate their first remote event at the new ACE Hotel gallery space in New York City. To commemorate this auspicious occasion we’ve created 100 limited-edition cotton canvas totes. First come, first served. Arrive early to grab a snazzy bag, stay late and maybe bag a fancy babe. Whooooaaaa! Here’s THIS los angeles co-curator Justin Van Hoy with a few choice words about the event:

“THIS los angeles presents it’s first out-of-Los Angeles gallery experience at The ACE New York. We normally don’t like to leave our little neck of the woods in LA, but The ACE is worthy of the trip. 25 of our favorite creative friends will be exhibited until the end of the month at the hotel”.

“How is that?”

Perfect.

We hope to see you there.

1. MWTX is FREE! Which means you’ll have enough loot left over to stuff your face at any of the mind blowing restaurants up and down E. 6th Street.
2. MWTX is all-ages, which means everyone (even kids!) can watch Big Freedia and Thee Oh Sees.
3. MWTX is outdoors, which means you’ll absorb Vitamin D through your eyeballs all day long.
4. MWTX happens at the East Side Drive-In directly across the street from Progress Coffee, (makers of arguably the best espresso in all of Austin, Texas).
5. MWTX is mellow. Stretch out, bring a blanket and sunscreen, and maybe a book and some earplugs. People watch. Pick up on fashion tips. Meet your future ex-boyfriend or girlfriend. Basically, relax and live a little.
6. MWTX brings together a mess of good bands and a pile of great people. With 24 performing artists and an estimated 10K attendees, you’ll wanna stick around for the whole thing.
7. MWTX5 RECYCLABLE TOTE BAGS! This year we’re teaming up with our friends at Altamont to create a limited edition 100% cotton canvas tote bag made especially for MWTX 5. Carry your groceries and school books, or maybe your pile of guitar cables and effects pedals.
   The first 500 folks to arrive at MWTX will receive these bags FREE!

We look forward to seeing you there.

We’d like to give our condolences to the friends and family of drummer Jerry Fuchs. He died tragically last weekend in Brooklyn, NY. To those who loved his music, Jerry was an incredibly talented musician and an absolute joy to watch. From his work in The Juan MacLean to Turing Machine, Maserati, !!! (Chk Chk Chk) and beyond, Fuchs was the consummate drummer’s drummer. He brought richness, humility, friendship, and passion to every project. Jerry was a good friend to many within the tightly knit independent music community, his playing and his life shall be sorely missed and immensely celebrated.

If you’re in the Bay Area on Friday night, November 20th, this is the show you ought to be at. These folks are gonna be serious about getting bodies on the dance floor. And while you’re at Mezzanine, raise a toast to Jerry. Proceeds of this event will go to benefit the Gerhardt Fuchs family. He truly was one of the good ones.

We could tell you about the mega square-foot warehouse space and its two floors oozing in mystery liquids; we could describe the inventive costumes, the sketchy lighting (i.e. none), the head crushing sound system, and the beautifully built (but quickly useless) booze-soaked mini-ramp.

We could gush endlessly about The Jesus Lizard’s genuinely mind-blowing performance. We could tell you about the overzealous security guards nearly shutting down the Bad Brains’ set. THE BAD BRAINS! We could say so much. But the Flickr photos show it all so much better.

Costumed party-goers waited an average of two hours just to get into the party. On a cold, drizzly night! Why? It was an honest to God blowout. Right after this we packed up and headed to Austin, Texas for the 4th Annual Fun Fun Fun Fest. It’s been a real whirlwind two weeks here at Incase Music & Events. Happy Boo(!)rthday Vice!

Attention all bike lovers/lurkers: This week, the internationally renown Bicycle Film Festival is hosting a huge variety of bicycle culture & community events all over the greater Los Angeles area.

On Wednesday, August 26th, we’re particularly excited about the Bikes Rock party at the Eagle Rock Center for the Arts with Atlanta’s finest shoegazing garage band Deerhunter and LA’s own Blank Blue. As a primary sponsor of this touring festival, there’s a pretty good chance we’ll be on hand doling out a few Incase products, getting deeply weird and zoning out with everyone else. Bring your bike, your earplugs and your enthusiasm.

And while you’re in the Eagle Rock hood, ride on over to Auntie Em’s Kitchen or Senor Fish (both on Eagle Rock Blvd). If you need a coffee, go to Swork (corner of Eagle Rock Blvd x Colorado Blvd). To get this week’s rager started right, you’re gonna want a full gut and some pep in your pedals.

Keep an eye on our BFF Flickr set. We recently added some photos from BFF Chicago.

Last week the BFF went to Austin. We added some photos to our Bicycle Film Festival Flickr set.

Tomorrow the BBF is starting in Chicago.

On Wednesday morning, July 15th, after more than three months of preparation for Incase’s activities at the Pitchfork Music Festival, I boarded a flight to Chicago’s O’Hare Airport. Apart from the Glastonbury & Reading Festivals in the UK, Pitchfork is arguably the most anticipated independent music festival of the summer season. With more than 55,000 attendees across three days, Incase’s sponsorship of the fest gave us the opportunity to work with many of our friends and favorite bands from around the US and Europe. Coming into the festival, our hope was to give fans and performers carrying solutions for their music & technology products; relevant tools they could really use, whether in a van on tour or heading across town to work or school.

With this idea in mind, we positioned four freestanding stations around the festival grounds, using our grabbelton bins to give away roughly 6,000 Slider Cases for iPhone & iPod, (as well as kazoos, rubber balls, and water balloons). Each time Leslie and Hannah (our staffers/Chicago & NYC pals) went around refilling the bins, they found themselves swarmed, knocked over and pushed out of the way as rabid crowds rushed in, hoping to find the exact case(s) they were looking for. The reaction was hilarious, wild fun. In the VIP area we gifted artists specialized product requests like nylon backpacks, skate messenger bags and 2-in-1 Wall & Car Chargers; and at the Pitchfork Recycling Store hustlers won neoprene sleeves and notebook hardshell cases in exchange for turning in plastic bottles, cups and other recyclable goods.

Like the festival itself, our Incase presence and sponsorship approach was relaxed. No lame pitches, no corny outfits or weird hoops to jump through. We put the products out there in an open and organic way, and for three days straight we received beaming smiles and genuine words of thanks in return.

As for the music, the festival’s promoters once again got it all right, excellently pairing established independent artists like Yeasayer, F*cked Up, Beirut, The Thermals, DJ/Rupture and Grizzly Bear with underdogs like Disappears, Waaves (“Psyche!”), The Very Best, and Frightened Rabbit. During Opening Night’s pitch perfect “Write The Night” sets, people went predictably bananas for indie rock legends Built To Spill and Yo La Tengo. BTS’ Doug Martsch (and his beard) has come a long way from his formative years fronting the frenetic Treepeople. Total 90’s nostalgia was in full swing.

Pitchfork’s greatest stroke of genius, however, came in booking hometown heroes The Jesus Lizard. David Yow and company absolutely owned this year’s festival, proving 10-years after their breakup why they remain the most entertaining band of outsiders on earth.

All in all, last weekend’s Pitchfork Music Festival turned out to be a real blog-slog down memory lane. Between all the friends, fans and bands, we must’ve run into two hundred people spanning the last fifteen years of our collective lives. Everywhere we turned it was one wonderful run-in after another, friends, food and weirdness galore.

And last (but definitely not least), I haven’t said anything yet about the night we found ourselves all of a sudden (4:30 AM) at a dance party on the Southside of Chicago with Drill Team’s Brooke Morris and Yeasayer’s Jay Tram. Walking in, we bumped into twin brothers/DJs Greg & Darin Bresnitz from Brooklyn’s Finger On The Pulse. Of course. In unison, they said, “Dude, have you been to the basement yet?” I replied, “No, why?” They replied, again in unison, “Dude, just do it. Go down there right now.”

So we walked downstairs to discover—NO JOKE—full blown, raging cage-match boxing action. I’m talking about rugged, brrrrrrutal, Fight Club-style pummeling…in a cage. Close your eyes. Picture a low ceiling covered in peeling lead paint, cig smoke so hectic you feel like you’re inhaling a thousand dirty mattresses, hundreds of crushed PBR cans, a dim lamp shade made out of a white plastic bucket and a raw 100 watt bulb, more crushed PBR cans, half a dozen crumpled couches and busted chairs, and a cage full of men and women annihilating one another while crazy bad G ‘n’ R and Rage Against The Machine jams blare through a crappy soundsystem…

Basically, I stumbled upon someone’s version of perfection—my version. Chicago + Pitchfork Music Festival + Southside Dance Party + Random Basement Rage Cage = AWESOME.

From the many great performances to the exceptional food vendors, (indeed, everything from the finest gourmet cuisines to the whackest, most delicious death lards), to the speakeasy run by the karaoke singing, WWII vet/bartender (what? yeah), to the $19.99 blowup pools and Scarface & Tweedy Bird beach towels to just the city itself—Chicago is a fantastic town full of interesting history, beautiful neighborhoods and smart, funny people.

Chicago thanks for showing us a supremely good time. We’ll see you at the Pitchfork Music Festival again next year.

We added some photos from San Francisco to the Bicycle Film Festival set on Flickr.

BFF is visiting Portland this weekend. Make sure to see some of the movies that are being shown. Specially the portrait of the legendary Italian Frame Builder Giovanni Pelizzoli aka “Ciocc”. Amazing film.

Anima D’Acciaio Trailer Ver5.1 from Cinecycle on Vimeo.

UPDATE: Amelia sent us some photos from the BFF in Oakland. Scraper Bikes!

Incase & Finger On The Pulse Presents:
Summer BBQ Blowout # 3
with Chef Sam Mason & Harlem Shakes
July 29th @ Hope Lounge
10 Hope Street, Brooklyn, NY
7-11PM

For some reason, this year, summer feels like it is flying by. Hard to believe Incase and Finger On The Pulse are already on our 3rd BBQ Blowout. Does anyone else out there feel like the season’s already halfway over? But doesn’t it also kinda feel like it hasn’t even really begun yet? Weird. Fortunately for the good citizens of Brooklyn, all signs suggest this month’s Finger On The Pulse BBQ will be amazing. Not, like, faux-amazing. Rather, actually amazing. As in, it just might kick summer into full swing.

Here’s why:

1. Entrance to the BBQ is free!
2. Sam Mason! Just $5 bucks gets you a heaping pile of BBQ created by brilliant chef Sam Mason, host of Dinner With The Band, and one of our favorite people. Mason is a seriously gifted chef. Ask anyone who scarfed down Mason’s BBQ at last year’s event, you’ll remember your BBQ experience for many, many years to come. Not kidding! Search high & low, far & wide— we guarantee this will be the best $5 meal in town.
3. We’ve asked The Harlem Shakes to DJ. This means more likely than not, your ears will be as happy as your taste buds.
4. The Hope Lounge has a good vibe. Not corny and not uncomfortable. Go there and relax.
5. And last but not least, in addition to all that nice stuff above, Incase will be doling out boat loads of free Slider Cases for your iPods & iPhones. Piles and piles of Slider Cases. In a veritable cornucopia of vibrant colors. Take as many as you like. They look good and work wonders.

For an evening mid-week lurk sesh, it doesn’t get much better than this. Guaranteed to be easy-breezy, inexpensive, and terrifyingly filling.

Save the date, we hope to see you there.