#parade grounds

“Circus Here Today,” Montreal Gazette. June 11, 1919. Page 05. ---- Street Parade Billed to Start at 10.30 a.m. --- John Robinson’s circus is due here today for a two days’ engagement, on the grounds at the corner of Ontario street and Delorimier avenue. The street parade will leave the show grounds at 10.30 o’clock this morning, and take the following route: Ontario to St. Lawrence boulevard to St. Catherine to Peel to Windsor to St. James to Victoria square, to Craig, to Delorimier avenue, and to the grounds.

The performance will commence at 2 and 8 p.m., both days, the doors to the menageries opening one hour earlier.

I can now see that from the time I moved out of Ricardo's house in Park Slope (and moved in with Jared and Alex around the corner on 5th avenue) until the time I moved here in Ocean Hill, were the fecund years. For me, 2008-2011 were the most fast-paced days filled with organizational focus and charts. Sure, I was in the basement at 152 16th street, editing music for 6 -8 hours at a time, high on cocaine and worked toward the second JSE LP (and the b-sides, unbeknownst to me at the time, that would become the first JSE LP)  http://jaysharp.bandcamp.com/album/the-trouble-with-neith  and I worked on many of the tracks I began in 2003 and 2004 when I lived in Dyker Heights with Neil and John that would eventually become the first Pretentious Pretenses full-length, http://jaysharp.bandcamp.com/album/the-chronicles-of-na-na-na  but it wasn't until I moved around the corner did my attributes to intensive labor pay off with a product. Something finished, with artwork and all.  In addition, to the aforementioned, I created a Second Hand Coke album, out of thin air, in just a matter of days. I came home from All Points West with Nappy and was so inspired by the tepid sing-a-longs of Coldplay I decided to write my dark, twisted fantasy rapt of suicide, drug abuse, rehab tales, pedophilia, fat-shaming and depression. The Birth of E-Dittlez  http://jaysharp.bandcamp.com/album/the-birth-of-e-dittlez was recorded in the two weeks following the all-nighter I pulled in Sidecar writing lyrics on a hand-me-down laptop a friend had given me. I let the music playing in the bar inform the lyrics, and I let my friendly coke-dealer contribute a couple of phrases, as well as input from Philip, who was quite possibly my favorite bartender at the time. Meaningful lyrics, for me are the hardest part, the music can flow from me any time of day, like a switch, and before I knew it, I had about 14 new tunes to match my recently penned words to. 

The band I was in (their frontman was who I wrote the record about, as a birthday present) broke up, I got fired, and was asked to move out. All in a matter of a couple of months. I was so stoned and drunk all the time, it hadn't hit me to be scared or depressed. I soldiered on. I moved back in with Finnerty for about a week, set up my emac and mixer and drum mics around the kit in the basement and I began to work. I produced days and nights of sessions with the now departed Tony Davi, Andrew and Max on drums and Maury and I trading off bass and gtr duties. Actually, I listened more than I played. Oh, how could I forget Zach, everyone's Zeppelinesque shining star of the bunch. The aptly titled "best of" PLAYLIST was informed by the ever-growing importance and popularity of hip-hop artists to have a "mix-tape" and the growing number of torrents and lists available for free at the close of the first decade of the 00s.   http://jaysharp.bandcamp.com/album/playlist-consists-of-mostly-live-recordings-from-a-basement-in-astoria

It was a blessing to feel accepted. To be present from a production standpoint with "the kids" (I was 27/28 at the time and they were all 16/17/18) So by the time Seth came to get me to drive up North. I found myself opening up a little more and listening to the Dirty Projectors and Animal Collective.

Admittedly, I did feel like a bit of a hypocrite to be listening to this new music with fresh ears. You see, as a native new yorker, I took personal offense to being lumped in with the influx of hipsters migrating to Williamsburg. In general, I shunned that culture and that scene, which seemed to be out of reach and unfriendly to me. All too many trust fund kids with expensive cameras and macbooks who wouldn't know the value of a dollar if it bit them on the ass were treating my stomping grounds like it was a beer garden in Disneyland and they were obnoxious and loud and arrogant while doing so. The sense of entitlement made me reel. Nat and I would often watch NY Noise on NYC25. A 120 minutes of sorts for the hipster set. We saw some incredible videos by up and coming artists like Hot Chip, Yeasayer, TuNe-YaRds, Metronomy and Twin Shadow and we would squeal with delight when our favorites like Blonde Redhead would come on. Natalia also really liked the Klaxons, and that one video by Friendly Fire where they were glow-in-the-dark skeletons. It reminded me of Liars or Japandroid but it's already making me ill how much I know about this culture I despised. So, true to form, and like any critic, we hated it, but we loved to hate it. We tuned in often to make fun of acts like the Pains of Being Pure at Heart, Au Revoir Simone, Clap Your Hands and Say Yeah and Feist. I especially hated Bon Iver, who I wound up giving a real solid chance months later, and listened to his first couple of records on Seth's recommendation with headphones on. I rue the day.

Now, with my new friend Seth, on the way up to South Hadley, I stopped being so god-damned cynical and curbed my ego a bit- and basically, hung up my hat for awhile. I ceased to be a New Yorker. I embraced it. We had milkcrates of food grown by locavores delivered to the house. I started to wear thermals (Without anything over them!) I even sold my Rickenbacker 330. (Which at the time was the equivalent of a mid-life crisis guy selling his convertible) My tastes stopped being so obscure and I started to embrace this "new" hippy-ish "hipster culture". After all, it was moving all the units in Indie Rock. I felt inspired and ready. I wanted to move back and really give it the old College Try. It was with this open mind that Seth and I produced the follow-up to the first PP album, Papa Legba,http://jaysharp.bandcamp.com/album/papa-legba  inspired by Mike Koene's roots and culture of his native New Orleans. A man, whom I became bandmates with (in the barrens, a few years later)

As I mentioned elsewhere on this blog, I was happier up there. Several friends commented from my photos and livestreams that I looked the happiest I had ever been, and maybe I was. I worked on about 90 songs til completion, I started my annual borrowed blue series for Christmas http://jaysharp.bandcamp.com/album/borrowed-blue

A social worker helped me find my new home, on the first floor of a brownstone building from 1899 with an exposed brick wall in the kitchen. I would have my own yard and for the first time in my life, could get a dog.

The best thing was, I was only to pay 100 dollars more a month than I was paying when I lived in Park Slope- sharing with the two brothers in a constant sibling rivalry. (I.E. Not  Ideal)

It was right around this time Natalia told me about securing a residency at the Brooklyn Beauty Bar in Bushwick. I immediately began working on the first Thursday night lineups, from South Hadley and was so excited to debut some new recordings (at the insistence of Seth, to keep it quiet and acoustic) which became "songs in the key of jay sharp"

http://jaysharp.bandcamp.com/album/songs-in-the-key-of-jay-sharp-vol-1-ep

Seth Elalouf was the most supportive musical friend I ever had. He would cringe at the title, but his generosity and modest ways were not lost on me. Sure, I had gotten compliments along the way, and some encouragement of course, but the snarky Brooklyn kids' comments still lingered in the back of my mind. For every nice thing Seth said, or offered me- I had another "I'm over the whole riff-rock thing" , or "you have a voice suited for Broadway not for rock music" or "you're just not that good a guitarist" or blunt emails from old friends that read "I don't like your music" eating away at me. Inhibiting me. Turning me into a mess of wanting to share, but also being afraid of the rejection I had been getting when I would. 

People's own personal fears would also nag at me, Alex Diamonte, barely 30 told me he was "Way too old" to be on stage and perform anymore. Imagine how we all felt when he shared that with us!?

The music scene I had known in Brooklyn was definitely, "lacking" to say the least. One day when I went to rehearsal with Martin and Natalia, a bandmate was mad I couldn't stay an extra 20 minutes to mix up a track we had just recorded. He spit "Whatever. I know whatever I make will be better than your music" Here's his masterpiece http://paradegrounds.bandcamp.com/

let me know if you think the arrogance matches the output.  (he's also the guy who said he was "over the riff-rock" when we asked him to play 2nd gtr on the A Black Tie Affair EP) - oh and he also neglected to mention me or my band (in an interview), after we booked their FIRST SHOW at a premiere nyc venue called Southpaw on my birthday- even after being asked about their first gig. As a matter of fact, he asked Natalia and I to roadie for him - and he insisted on bringing a Fender Rhodes down the steep stairs from a 2nd floor walk-up. All the while, sipping aged whiskey and offering us not even a water or a soda. 

Go ahead, tell me what you think of his "better music"

http://paradegrounds.bandcamp.com/