The Disassociation are shows sold out, thank you.

Losing is a Luxury is the debut album by The Disassociation. Their first ever live show was Presented by Dirty Opera Saturday April 25th at The Folk Music Center in Claremont, California. after noon today. The band played a second show on Sunday at a private Glendale house party at 4pm.

From the mysterious expanses of southern California’s Inland Empire emerges … The Disassociation! This new group is a powerful joining of forces, an impressive melding of minds, bringing together long-running lo-fi indie pioneers Refrigerator (a band that today continues to be underrated, even by the cognoscenti), Amy Maloof of Falcon Eddy, artist/musician/DJ Sam Sousa and the brilliant author Jonathan Lethem. These disparate talents make a wry, shambolic romp.

-Aquarium Drunkard

Richard Brown Lethem’s “The Enormous Room” Bamboo Dart Press book issued

The fifty-two new poems in The Enormous Room by painter and poet Richard Brown Lethem were written during the last two years as the author re-settled in Northern Maine after his Covid hiatus in Southern California.
This collection documents that transition, in particular, the radical quality of color in nature as an emotionally charged element as well as the inner movements in aging during this period. Lethem’s previous book on Bamboo Dart Press was a seventy year overview of his poetry and paintings. The Enormous Room is a reflective collection of new works that mirror and shadow one another, adding new shades and depths with each read.

The Enormous Room is out now. Check out the short film featuring the Lethem’s poem The Dream directed and scored by Dennis Callaci.

Peter Wortsman’s Laboratory of Time is now a full length record!

At the begin of the year Bamboo Dart Press released Peter Wortsman’s The Laboratory of Time book of cut up poetry which has garnered praise from more corners than there are around the entirety of yer town.

Now, that book has come to life as a 31 minute piece of music employing the poems from the book and utilizing the same dada method with music.  Berlin-based trumpet player and composer Paul Brody joined creative forces and shares composition credit with vocalist, composer and sound designer Gunnar Brandt-Sigurdsson, based in Oldenburg, to put together this piece that will have you blendering your mind as it calls to all the artists that hide in your record collection. All three Monks (Meredith, Thelonious & the band), Comedian Harmonists, Dorothy Ashby, Los Angeles Free Music Society, David Fulton, Terry Riley, Alan Watts, Jimmy Garrison, Ellen Fullman, Bonzo Dog Band, The Iveys and on and on. Wortsman will be in Berlin May sixteenth through twenty fourth on a book tour. What a thrill to have this lovely work to bookend with Peter’s amazing book. Listen to this excerpt now, and then again.

The Disassociation join Mike Watt

Why is everyone all smiles in this combined photo? Because we need some joy in our lives. Mike Watt, he gets the joke and the cut of this bands jib. Click on the link below to hear Members of The Disassociation Sam Sousa, Jonathan Lethem & Dennis Callaci do the back and forth with Watt.

https://www.twfps.com/past-episodes/on-air-guests-the-disassociation-from-claremont-ca-via-discord

Magnet premieres second video from The Disassociation. Live dates announced!

The Disassociation is a group made up of Amy Maloof of the band Falcon Eddy, author/bassist Jonathan Lethem, all five members of Refrigerator, and artist/musician Sam Sousa. Their first record is called Losing Is A Luxury.

Check out the second song/video from the album Take it all Away that has just premiered on Magnet. The record is out March 20th and is available for preorder here and here.

MAGNET Exclusive: Premiere Of The Disassociation’s “Take It All Away” Video

The band has announced the first in a series of shows, these two in Southern California.

The Folk Music Center Saturday April 25th. Tickets on sale March 10th at noon via phone or at Folk Music Center.

Glendale House Party Sunday April 26th, Tickets on sale now.

Stephanie Barbé Hammer’s “The Warbler School Chronicles” book is out today on Bamboo Dart Press

Stephanie Barbé Hammer is an award-winning novelist, short fiction writer, and poet. Her most recent novel is the Foreword Indie recognized magical realist mystery Journey to Merveilleux City (Picture Show Press). Her other titles for Bamboo Dart Press are City Slicker: encounters with the outside and Rescue Plan. A former New Yorker, Stephanie moved to California in 1986 and has (mostly) been there ever since. In her latest book, The Warbler School Chronicles, Hammer returns to the New York of the 1960’s, an all girls prep school to be specific, where magical realism collides with the reality of adolescence and the oppressive nature of such a place. It is as perfect a collection/reflection of that time in ones life as I have ever read. The book is available worldwide and at finer book stores, as well as direct from us.

Stephanie Barbé Hammer turns the strict, cloistered world of a private, all-girl school in New York on its head to make it dance for us. She elevates routine class activities into Aimee Bender-like magical epiphanies. The author is in total command, and can access the time in youth when a new friend might just save your lonely, starving life. The Warbler School Chronicles is lyrical, poetic, and at times, surreal.

—Max Talley, author of Peace, Love & Haight

Anyone who has ever felt like an outsider in their own life will relate to this book. Scratch that. Everyone will find something relatable, even if they never attended a fancy private school, contemplated a chair’s “chairness”, or admired someone’s floor-length hairpiece. As I read these vividly embodied stories, my own childhood couldn’t help but rise up like a zombie at recess. Shine up those saddle shoes. The Warbler School Chronicles will take you on a walk down memory lane.

—Cati Porter, author of Small Mammals and Novel

The Disassociation announce two Southern California shows

The debut record by The Disassociation Losing is a Luxury is out March 20th on Shrimper. The Disassociation is Amy Maloof of Falcon Eddy, Author Jonathan Lethem, Sam Sousa and all five members of Refrigerator.

Dirty Opera is presenting the first live show by the band at Folk Music Center on Saturday, April 25th. Those tickets go on sale Tuesday March 10th at noon via phone or at The Folk Music Center. The band is playing a second show at a house party in Glendale on Sunday, April 26th, those tickets are on sale now. Click the links for ticket info.

Trailer for Stephanie Barbé Hammer’s “Warbler School Chronicles” Bamboo Dart Press book premieres

An unnamed narrator attends an elite but perennially freezing private girls’ school in New York City during the 1960’s. At first almost invisible, she evolves from seven-year-old witness to fifteen-year-old actor as she navigates a Halloween party, observes a classmate’s sudden hair growth, and encounters two eccentric teachers. Zombies, fetal pigs, Shakespeare, and cigarettes make appearances in this linked set of flash fiction stories which weave in and out of magical realism and affirm the possibility of survival even under the most peculiar conditions. Includes illustrations by Dennis Callaci. Check out the trailer with a reading by author.

Stephanie Barbé Hammer’s eleven stories of magical realism are brilliant bijou-parables: A girl—once invisible—when dressed as a boy, becomes visible. Obedience to rules—when exposed as arbitrary—reveals the role of language in defining reality. In “Risers” a stage curtain hides the memory of Anne Frank, the teenage Jewish diarist who was arrested by the Gestapo and died in the holocaust. Although written as fiction The Warbler School Chronicles are true postmodern masterpieces.

—Ben Stoltzfus, author of Romoland and The Nine Lives of Big JP

The Disassociation announce Record, Aquarium Drunkard video premiere

The Disassociation is an eight-piece band featuring Amy Maloof, Jonathan Lethem, Sam Sousa, and all five members of Refrigerator. Author Jonathan Lethem penned lyrics during late 2020 for Dennis Callaci to write music to (Lethem had previously written lyrics for Lee Ranaldo and Walter Salas-Humara among others). The intention was to start a band with Amy Maloof of Falcon Eddy, all of Refrigerator as well as Lethem and his radio cohort on KSPC’s Radio Free Aftermath Sam Sousa, but that would have to wait until 2023. With a wealth of songs (every member of the band ended up writing music and some lyrics, Jonathan even learned to play the bass guitar), The Disassociation got together over a long weekend to record the album Losing is a Luxury. Steve Folta engineered the LP (and took to whistling on a track). Some songs are stark, featuring only one band member, others are full-blown live 10 piece recordings with a choir. Everybody plays and sings on the record which was lovingly mastered by Al Jones at Laminal Audio,

The Disassociation will be playing three shows in Southern California in April and late summer dates to be announced soon. Today, Aquarium Drunkard is premiering the first song and video off the record, the title track Losing is a Luxury. Prebuy the record here, here and here.

Dirty Opera presents Souled American at Folk Music Center in Claremont

The Legendary Souled American has announced their first tour in thirty-five years, and Dirty Opera has secured a show for them in Southern California at our favorite venue, The Folk Music Center. The show at The Folk Music Center is on Saturday, May 16th at 7:30 PM, doors at 7.

This is an intimate evening and the event will sell out. Tickets are only available directly from The Folk Music Center over the phone 909-624-2928. The band is issuing their first new record in decades, Sanctions, and it is a hell of a return. Nice to see them back in action and coming to Claremont for the first time ever.