WHASSUP: TO DO EDITION

fHappy Day, Fipsters! I hope this post finds you well. Have you reached your Hamptons quota for the season yet? Sat in enough traffic to consider selling your car? Consider, for a moment, taking my advice on some local outings that demand little forethought, or travel time. Save your road rage for another day and patronize our fair neighborhood and surrounding areas.

There’s great new stuff popping up all over the place, from eateries to performance venues, to roller-skating with a view. Hell, Gowanus is a couple churros and one good mascot away from turning into Disney World. Mickey Swamp Monster? I’ll work on it.

At this point you’re most likely wondering what is up? This is WHASSUP: 

Thursday, 7/31, Beetlejuice, Pier 1 Brooklyn Bidge Park: Beetlejuice, Beetlejuice—shut your mouth. Your favorite ghoulish playboy is about to conjured up in all his late 80’s glory. Come Mr. Tally Man, tally me banana…would you? FREE, 6pm

Thursday, 7/31, Journey to the Stars, Pier 1 Brooklyn Bridge Park: Come for the movie, stay for the celestial show. It’s out of this—ah, forget it. Bring your own telescope (nerd), or use one of theirs to snag a glimpse of that great big universe Neil deGrasse Tyson keeps showing down our throats. FREE, 8:30pm-10:30pm

Friday, 8/1, Mariache Flor De Tolache, Barbés: All. Female. Mariachi Band. This would make my subway rides far more pleasing. $10, 10pm

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WHASSUP: ROCK THE SLOPE EDITION

When’s the last time you went out and listened to a band? I’m not talking huge arenas where you shook it to Beyoncé, or watched that Hicksville hussy dry hump a wrecking ball. I’m talking quality tunes by local bands in venues small enough that you may just catch a rocker’s sweat droplet on the end of your nose—music the way it should be.

Leave work early, call a sitter, arrange a dog walker, and get out the house! We only walk this walk once as far as I know. Why not fill it with mellifluous tunes, good friends, hearts full of love, and evenings jam packed with shit I tell you to do.

Whassup kemosabes? This is WHASSUP:

Thursday, 7/24, Reformed Whores Present Cirque Du Ho-Leil, Union Hall: Ummmm, what? I know Cirque does a lot of pole work, but this is ridiculous. Though I’m not quite sure what to expect, I can just about guarantee you’re in store for something you’ve never seen before. $10, 7:30pm doors, 8pm show

Friday, 7/25, The DeLorean Sisters, Royal Palms Suffleboard Club: This throwback group takes the 80’s and the early 20^th century, puts them in a blender on high, and comes out with a sound that can only be described as Michael Jackson meets the Great Depression. Roll on over to Union—have they made a longboard style Hoverboard yet?   FREE ENTRY, 8pm

Friday, 7/25, All Boy/All Girl, The Bell House: There’s a special place in my heart for this band because a former voice student of mine—to whom I’d like to think I imparted great brilliance—is one of their vocalists.  Self-described as an “avant-pop collective”, the band takes pop music and spins it in a way only achieved by a string section and infusing a jazzy undercurrent. Oh yeah…and they’re opening for the Haden Triplets. Nice! $15, 8pm doors, 9pm Show

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WHASSUP: BOOZE AWAY THE HEAT EDITION

In the throws of summer, sometimes the only escape is drowning your sorrows. Smelly strangers, scalding subway stations, unrivaled humidity. What better way to circumvent the realities of your everyday than taking a trip to the old packy—if you know what I mean.

Each event this week can be wonderfully accompanied by the booze of your choice—a couple even feature the stuff. I’m not advocating over-drinking and showing up stupid outside someone’s window holding a boom box. I’m suggesting you take the edge off. It’ll get you through the tepid coughs of relief from window units and probably improve a lot of these events.

Whassup? This is WHASSUP:

Thursday, 7/17, Walking With Dinosaurs, Barclays Center: This has to pull the heartstrings of kids and inner kids alike. These fuckers are life-size, animatronic, lizards that have come to our rusty arena to amaze and scare the fossilized shit right out of you.  $45-$114, 7pm

Friday, 7/18, Doggy Fashion Show, Freddy’s: This. Is. Happening. On Friday a section of 5^th Ave. in South Slope will be closed to crazies and the furry friends they love to dress up. Be sure to click on the link. The poster says it all. FREE ENTRY, 6:30pm

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WHASSUP: Hotter Than Hell Edition

Summer is fully junk-punching us this week. The AC is flowing as if it were free, sweat is pooling in the streets, and the subway is like the sauna at the NYSC in Chelsea. How are we supposed to beat the heat when the rivers and waterways are abominable and public pools are like swimming in tea cups of urine? Drink lots of fluids and have a good, old fashioned water fight in the park.

I suggest rounding out your evening with some entertainment—something that'll take your mind off your pit stained work clothes. You know the Loius CK bit about butt sweat?

Hit me up with your favorite way to beat the heat. Rmember to include your favorite events from the past week to win...well, nothing. 

So, WHASSUP this week you stinker Slopers? Here's WHASSUP:

Thursday, 7/10, Illya Kuryaki & The Valderramas/Choc Quib Town/RVSB, Prospect Park Band Shell: Ever try to combine hip hop, rock, funk, and salsa? These fuckers do and it’s boner jamz all night long. FREE, 6pm doors

Friday, 7/11, The Kings of Karaoke, Union Hall: Do you like karaoke? If not, I’m barking up the wrong tree. I think it improves the human experience to throw back a few and sing ‘Summer Lovin’ with the first willing partner you can find. FREE, 12am

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WHASSUP: Independence Edition

Oh say can you see...the monumental shit I have for you this time around? As this is perhaps the most important week of national pride, I want you to get out there with your fellow Americans. Be social and save a spot for their blankets at that epic fireworks show we call life. 

No matter your taste, I have the event for you this week. There's music, there's comedy, there's cinema, there's story telling. I can sense your pulses rising just reading this. Get out there, Slopers! I challenge you to pick just one event and report back to me. Is that too much to ask? Game of Thrones is on hiatus and you've already blown through Orange is the New Black—there's just no more excuses.

Interests peaked? Here's WHASSUP:

Thursday, 7/3, Cashank Hootenanny, Freddy’s Bar and Backroom: Hootenanny? Don’t mind if I do! This shit-kicking catastrophe conjures images of pickup trucks on cinder blocks, wife beater tan lines, and an old man playing a jug. I’m in! FREE, 9pm

Friday, 7/4, July 4^th!!: Although America lost and we all fucking hate soccer again, I suggest you keep up our national pride and take part in commemorating the day we told the king he could stick his monarchy where the British empire don’t shine. The fireworks will be launched off the Brooklyn Bridge—bad idea—and from barges below. Grab a rooftop, pop a shandy, and let’s light the sky on fire.

Saturday, 7/5, The Notorious Mr. Bout, The Old American Can Factory: Viktor Bout did not subscribe to the confines of the law. An unlikely documentarian, this dude had his hand in all sorts of evil doing including arms trading, war profiting, genocide supporting, jaywalking—you get the picture. Be among the few to see his life through his lens. $13, 8pm

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