July is here and it's so hot out I am barely alive. Don't ask me how anyone is supposed to be in a good mood in this heat, but to help with morale we are dropping one of the wildest WLS releases we have ever done. This month we have Astronautalis with his selection of Andy the Doorbum, Art is Shit. Andy the Doorbum (who is now touring out of the West Coast instead) has been making quite a name for himself on the road not only for his incredible live performance, unbelievable art direction/appearance, but also the fact that he is genuinely one of the damn nicest people I've ever spoken to.
Here is what Astronautalis has to say about his selection:
"When we first pulled up to the World Famous Milestone in Charlotte, North Carolina, the doors were locked on the haunted looking house-turned-night-club, the streets were empty, and a little wreath sat on a stake out front, in memorial of a boy who was murdered on that spot the week before. Locals call it the “The Ghetto Fortress”, because the 50 year old punk club is covered inmore barbed wire than a supermax prison, and perhaps, because most of the staff is within arms reach of a pistol at all times.
It was there, in that haunted, filthy, sweaty, punk dive bar, in one of the worst neighborhoods in the American South, that I met Andy The Doorbum. Andy, was at the time, indeed, just the friendly bum working the door of the club when we loaded in. A smiling bearded face, with a charming southern growl, there to hold doors open, take the names for the guest list, and apply wrist-bands. The night that followed was a blur of clipping speakers, endless whiskey, and Carolina charm. At some point in the insanity, Andy must have slipped us a burnt CD labeled“Art Is Shit”, because when we came to the next day, it was in our car, sitting on the dashboard, waiting for us.
Someone tossed it glibly into the CD player, and we all prepared to skip through another garbage demo, from another nice guy, from another fun club, that would inevitably get mocked relentlessly, and given a burial at speed, when it was sailed out the passenger window at 70miles per hour on I-85. Instead, what we heard left us speechless, and we all rode in a reverent silence, as we basked in the ragged, homemade, black magic, spiritual folk masterpiece that was coming out of our speakers. I don’t think it left our CD player that whole tour. And it hasn’t left my mind since."
- Astronautalis
Andy the Doorbum
Art is Shit
- Burn Barrel
- The Setting of the Fourth Sun
- Frame of the Flowering Eyebrow
- Jack Ketch
- Headrush in Centralia
- Catching the Moon in a Mason Jar
- Faith Heal't
- Grandpa (#2)
- Salt, Blood, and Gasoline
- Male Calico
- Coffin Varnish
- Join the Great Majority
- Slobbery Jaws
- Love Song for Cigarettes
- Salvation Rancher
- Rock n' Roll is Dead
For our 2019 White Label Subscribers you can go to the WHITE LABEL DIGITAL DOWNLOAD page to download the digital.
Press Photo by Sarah Sitkin.
We have a small amount of White Label Series subscriptions available at this time, but please follow Andy the Doorbum on Bandcamp for a chance to purchase directly from him!
I hope you enjoy listening to the record as much as I enjoy having it in our White Label Series,
-Jonathan Lee Horne
