bringing together distinct artistic media, people, and generations within real grass roots underground culture, remaining nyc's most unpretentiously exciting party
Music
Quintron and Ms. Pussycat, Golden Triangle, James Chance, S-S-S-Spectres, Psychic TV, PTV3, Throbbing Gristle, Thee Majesty, Puddin' Tang, Kid Congo Powers, The Cramps, The Gun Club, Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds, Make-Up, Nation of Ulysses, Weird War, Electroputas, Backworld, Stu Spasm, Diako Diakoff, Ghost Exits, Stay High, Viva l'American Death Ray Music, Sorceress, Robot Death Squad
Movies
projected onto all of the walls
Heroes
Pussycat Caverns, Spellcaster Lodge, Club 57, New Wave Vaudeville, Exploding Plastic Inevitable, and all things that raw, subcultural, organic, wild, and multi-media
About me: A partnership between New York Night Train zine/label and Live With Animals art gallery at Glasslands, Animal Train is DJs, performance, projections, and dance in an entirely informally formalist environment designed, constructed, and lit entirely by local artists. Our event is a deliberate bras d’ honneur in the face of the mediocre, unimaginative, and economically exclusionary day-to-day mechanics of 21st Century New York art, music, and nightlife in general. Though fun is still priority #1...
Currently, our cast includes:
- Jonathan from New York Night Train - house DJ, conceptualist, event organizer, musical co-ordinator, and promoter
- Vashti from Live With Animals - visual and performance art co-ordinator, chief artist and designer, ladder climber, and Marmalady
- The Marmaladies - sexy, stylish, and soulful go go gals of Golden Triangle fame - The Mighty Robot AV Squad - wall-to-wall projections both ambient and representational
- Mikilandia Productions - daring, subversive, playful performance art
- Cam'ron Michel - resident artist, printer, technical co-ordinator, handyman, daredevil, and logistical advisor
- Ivan Sunshine - lighting
- Different musical guests and guest DJs every month who don't spin the typical contemporary dance music genres
discriminating ears and uninhibited feet...
Animal Train #9 - GET DOWN GALORE ON THE OCEAN FLOOR: a post-mermaid parade party, SAT, JUNE 21, 10PM, $7, GLASSLANDS GALLERY, 289 KENT (Williamsburg)
with DJs: GIBBY HAYNES (BUTTHOLE SURFERS), KING COFFEE (BUTTHOLE SURFERS), MR. JONATHAN TOUBIN of NEW YORK NIGHT TRAIN and live music: MC TRACHIOTOMY (New Orleans), SNAKE AND JET'S AMAZING BULLIT BAND (Copenhagen) and GO GO dancers THE MERMAIDLADIES (MARMALADIES AKA GOLDEN TRIANGLE gals) and wall-to-wall projections and visuals: MIGHTY ROBOT AV SQUAD and decor by LIVE WITH ANIMALS
Thousands of years since its submersion beneath the ocean that bears its name, the great lost city of Atlantis has been discovered by exploitative Brooklyn multimedia impresarios that go by the name of Animal Train Happening. This underground nightlife institution has robbed the fabled lost civilization of its finest artifacts and captured its inhabitants to put on display for profit at their semi-monthly “art party.” These savvy entrepreneurs have chosen to debut the curiosities of the Antediluvian Atlantian culture for one night only at Glasslands Gallery immediately following the Mermaid Parade. Come dance all night on the ocean floor tonight for tomorrow they may have to return the relics of the civilization to their rightful owners.
Before this description flies away into brave new tangents, some exciting news, already all over the blogosphere or whatevs - the reunion of the Butthole Surfers’ finest line-up for the first time since 1989, vocalist Gibby Haynes, guitarist Paul Leary, and drummer King Coffee will be joined by bassist Jeff Pinkus (1985 - 1994), and standup drummer Teresa Taylor (1983 -1989) for a handful of monumental east coast shows including Webster Hall in NYC (get tickets now - almost sold out!) - what is becoming widely regarded as one of the finest and most unusual rock bands of all time (see the photo!), back together just this once - and in our own town! The Butts will be rehearsing in New York getting ready this week and that is how we obtained such prestigious guests. One of our DJs, Gibby Haynes, who should need no introduction but... is also an internationally exhibited visual artist, experimental sound artist, character actor (Dead Man!, CB4, and don't forget his brilliant cameos in recent documentaries about Daniel Johnston, or the Flaming Lips), son of historic children's show host (and prestigious Hollywood character actor) Mr. Pepperment, brother of urban legend Andy Haynes, totally unrelated to director Todd Haynes, and, need I remind you, played in a band with Johnny Depp (P), sang lead on the Ministry hit "Jesus Built My Hot Rod," accidentally took a leak in Timothy Leary's bed when staying with the LSD guru, purposely figured out a successful ploy to have Jimmy Carter touch his pubic hair, and has one or two unreal Bobby Soxx (RIP) stories, still likes to mess with folks and open up their minds by playing what's not expected of him - but still getting people to shake it down to a variety of choice danceable cuts from across the musical spectrum, from garage and psyche to way way beyond and way way tripped-out. And, speaking of tripped-out, our other Butthole Surfer guest DJ, King Coffee, who also drummed in seminal Texas hardcore band Hugh Beaumont Experience, led his own band Drain, and ran the seminal Texas noise label Trance Syndicate for nearly a decade (putting out dozens of records by the likes of Painteens, Trail of Dead, Ed Hall, Cherubs, Crust, and many more), continues to play the hard stuff but has also become a renowned Texas' rare-groove funk DJ (seriously - he'll get ya down!). And, the NYC subterrain’s hardest-working 45rpm rock and soul DJ, New York Night Train’s Mr. Jonathan Toubin is, as always, onboard board to rock the boat.
Performance-wise the bill includes New Orleans underground freak-rap institution, frequent Quintron collaborator, and former Crash Worship vocalist, Katrina hero, king of the Pearl performance space for over 15 years, taco truck proprietor, and creator of the culinary specialty Eggs Poggi, MC Trachiotomy, also appearing on the Butthole Surfers tour, will lay down one of his notoriously theatrical and bizarre live sets. Crunchy Frog recording artists Snake and Jet’s Amazing Bullit Band, all the way from Copenhagen to record an album with Heavy Trash’s Matt Verta-Ray, are a couple of handsome Danish boys that make wild textured party music at once trashy and artful, contemporary and classic, and out-of-control yet deliberate – later you can tell everyone you saw ‘em back when. The gorgeous fabled Mermaid-ladies of Atlantis, and who bear an uncanny resemblance the Animal Train house go go dancers, The Marmaladies (AKA the ladies of Golden Triangle), shake it with style all night. The projectionist crew Mighty Robot AV Squad coats the room with spectacular dizzying collages of light while the heart of the new Williamsburg art scene, the prolific Live With Animals gallery, designs and implements the carnivalesque submarine disco environment.
"Let us rejoice and let us sing and dance and ring in the new. Hail Atlantis! Way down below the ocean where I wanna be..." - Donovan's well-documented testimonial for Animal Train Happening's Get Down Galore on the Ocean Floor party
check out this legendary Butthole Surfers video in which the band bbq's a child and serves him to his vacationing family and then rocks out
and this Snake and Jets Amazing Bullit Band video...
#7: March 1, 2008 - The Party - decor: socialist realist, flags, Eisenstein & Tziga Vertov
- costume: proletarian Party people from around the world & Castro
- guest DJs: Ian Svenonius (Weird War, Make-Up, Nation of Ulysses, etc) & Kid Congo Powers (Cramps, Gun Club, Bad Seeds, etc)
- musical guest: Services
- performance: Micki Pellerano
#6: December 1, 2007 - Quintron's Happy Garden - decor: giant paper flowers, astroturf, bees, etc.
- costume: flowers, insects, and all things of the garden
- guest DJs: Quintron
- musical guest: Golden Triangle
- performance: "Trixie and the Treetrunks" film by Ms. Pussycat, live composition for three Drum Buddies by Quintron
#4: September 28, 2007 - Zodiac - decor: planets, astrological animals, and holy mountains
- costume: astrological animals and celestial attire
- guest DJ: Brian DeGraw of Gang Gang Dance
- musical guest: the Ghost Exits
- performance: Micki Pellerano
#2: July 14, 2007 - Bastille Day - decor: we partied like 1789 a guillotine, a puppet theater, an Eiffel Tower more than a century ahead of its time, etc.
- costume: both noble and peasant fashion
- music: yeh yeh, French pop, French rock, French new wave, French electro, etc.
- guest DJs: Ian Svenonius of Make-Up, Nation of Ulysses, Weird War, etc., Jaiko Suzuki of Mon Mon Mon Amour, Maya the White Glove of Backworld, and Acja from Marquise Dancehall
- musical guest: the one and only Kid Congo Powers of Cramps, Bad Seeds, Gun Club, etc.
- performance: Micki Pellerano
June 29, 2007 - #1: Futureshock - decor: tinfoil and mylar robots, strobe lights, and other futuristic structures
- costume: space suits and assorted homemade futuristic concoctions
- music: 1970s intergalactic funk and space disco plus early 1980s robotic electro
- guest DJs: Chris from Ghost Exits, Sean from Stay High, Nick from Viva l'American Death Ray Music, Dr. Wizzard from Sorceress
- musical guests: Stu Spasm and Diako Diakoff
Who I'd like to meet: gypsies, tramps, and thieves - especially in costume
