In the corner of a quaint neighborhood in East Austin stands a bright red and yellow building. What was once a church and former home of Church of the Friendly Ghost, now is home to Esquina Tango, a nonprofit organization that offers a variety of Latin American cultural activities.

As implied by the name, Esquina Tango started in 2008 as a simple solution for the lack of places in Austin that offered tango classes.

"There's no place where the heart is tango," said Monica Caivano, one of the owners of Esquina Tango (pictured below).

Caivano, with her proclaimed partner in crime, Gustavo Simplis, chose the church on East 3rd and Pedernales to open a place for Austinites to learn tango. Caivano has taught the sensual Argentine dance style in Austin since 1997, while tango has always been a part of Simplis' life.

As Esquina Tango started drawing more people, it quickly evolved beyond dance, as more classes and programs were added such as yoga, conversational Spanish and movie nights.

"We started with the concept of a nonprofit tying the community and culture. Making things accessible for neighbors, children, everybody," said Caivano.

And Esquina Tango seems to do just that. The nonprofit hosts weekly and nightly programs that offer something for everyone of all statuses. The free summer youth programs, which teach children and teens different types of dances, such as cumbia, salsa, polka and tango, has brought in parents and students from a wide span of Austin.

"We have neighbors from down the street. We have people that come from 360," Caivano said.

Karly Brown, a member and a volunteer for Esquina Tango, noticed the diversity within the organization from what she's seen in some of her dance classes.

"It's very interesting to me because it really fills the generation gap. I danced with an 80-year-old man," Branch said.

Esquina's programs run for little to no cost or by donations. However, if prices are discouraging, one can volunteer their time helping with events or in the office in exchange for dance lessons.

Caivano and Simplis also rely on grants and membership fees to help cover the costs that is required for the programs to function.

"We try to keep it small. We try to keep it like a cultural center," Simplis said. "Our classes and events depend on what the people need."

Keep up with Esquina Tango events on Do512 and their official website.

For non-art aficionados, the paintings from local artist Miguel Angel Santana's collection "Dimensiones" look like random colors of paint splattered on a canvas. But, Santana says, there's more to these paintings after the first glance. The overlapping vibrant colors reveal an emotion on each piece such as nostalgia and revival.

"Those are stages. Those are emotions; that is how it's built or the way we are. Every single human," Santana said.

Santana, from Monterrey, Mexico, has been an artist since an early age. Since attending his first workshop when he was six years old, he's participated in local- and national-stage-level contests in Mexico. He has a bachelor's degree in advertising at the Universidad Autonoma de Nuevo Leon. Professionally, Santana has worked in various endeavors as an illustrator and graphic designer.

His "Dimensiones" exhibit is currently up until July 2 at La Peña, a museum located on the downtown corner of 2nd Street and Congress Avenue in Austin. He currently teaches pastel drawing classes at La Peña on Saturdays.

As cliche as it sounds, life is never simple. There are many different layers within a person that the different experiences and perspectives that add to someone's life. "Dimensiones" is Santana's personal reflection of these layers or dimensions. The colors Santana has chosen correlate with the theme he's trying to convey. He sticks with an earthy palette in "Urbana." In "Renacer," bright yellow and white are dominant within the painting.

"To the different layers on my work, you can get through the layers, the different stages and that is, for me, meaning different dimensions in life," said Santana.

"Dimensiones" is on display until July 2 at La Peña, located at 227 Congress Ave.

Austin Vida's indie showcase is this Saturday, Feb. 20, at Mi Casa, so we thought we'd give you some insight into the young bands we're featuring with a pair of Q&As. You can read Ian Morales' interview with In Situ Sound here. I spoke with the other half our bill: Hydra Melody, a progressive/alternative sextet from Helotes, Texas.

The band started as a middle-school pop-punk band, but evolved into the band we see now, a lineup that features keyboards and an auxiliary percussionist in addition to the standard guitar/bass/drums core. The setup provides an eclectic style of progressive melodic rock with hints of their Latin roots intertwined within the tunes.

Keyboardist Justin Berlanga recently chatted with me over the phone to provide an introductory overview of this headlining act for our first-ever indie showcase.

So, how did Hydra Melody form?

Justin: Basically, there was a band [in middle school] called Ready to Fail around for a couple of years, which mainly consisted of my brother Jordan and the guitar player, Robert. They'd been going for a while, had a bunch of lineup changes. I joined the band probably six years ago. It was at that point we started writing really really different music and found a lineup that we really liked. We decided to take a year and a half off from playing shows and all that stuff, and pretty much wrote a bunch of music and formed the band we are now. We've been doing it for four or five years.

How would you describe the band's sound?

Justin: I would definitely describe us as just rock music. We play what we feel. We do have a lot of Latin influences. Growing up in South Texas, it's kind of hard not to have Latin influences. I grew up playing classical music. There's so much different stuff in there. I wouldn't even know where to begin to classify it. People compare us to a lot of bands that I go listen to; I'm like "How do you even get that from this?" I guess if I had to pick a genre, it would be "eclectic rock." Just rock with a lot of different stuff to it.

That seems to be like the state of music now. It just seems like a lot of music out there now isn't just one genre anymore. Just like a hybrid of all kinds of genres.

Justin: I know; I love it. I like to call it "anti-genre." I think the worst thing you can do for your band is to say, "Oh, we're a punk band" or "We're a ska band," if we're going to stick to making this kind of music. Nothing against punk or ska; that's what I grew up with. I think it's just a shame, and you might limit yourself musically when there's a whole world out there. You can delve into. So to the original question, the anti-genre. That's what we are.

Hydra Melody is from Helotes, just outside of San Antonio. How would you compare the Austin scene with the San Antonio music scene?

Justin: I love Austin. I used to live in Austin. I definitely say San Antonio has a tighter scene, has a better scene because... This is the way I figure it, okay? If you live in Austin, chances are you go to school in Austin. So you have a new cast of characters every four years coming in and out of Austin so you can't really build a solid scene there. I've played shows [in San Antonio] for kids that I've known 10 or 12 years that have been around our shows, going to shows and stuff. So I'd say that the scene in San Antonio definitely goes a lot deeper than the scene in Austin.

You guys just recently finished a West Coast tour. How did that go?

Justin: It was really cool. We played some really good shows. We made some really cool friends. Experienced some good things. The weather was horrible, but overall I say it was a success.

Was it cold?

Justin: It was really cold. We hit a snowstorm in southern Arizona. What the hell is that about? We saw snow from El Paso, like all the way, like 100 miles into Texas. Like fucking snow all over the ground! It looked like a fucking Arctic tundra or some shit. A lot of dust storms. Like blinding dust storms. We were hitting winds so bad that they were literally knocking 18-wheelers on their ass like on the side of the highway and stuff.

Where were you driving when that happened?

Justin: Well, we were driving in the really hard winds, but I think we missed those gusts that did that because it was probably about 10 miles after the winds kinda calmed down. We were driving and saw these 18 wheelers just flipped over. It was like right getting into California where those Santa Anna winds get real bad.

Are you currently working on a full-length album?

Justin: Yes, we are in the writing process right now. We're also in the process of trying to figure out where we want to do it and what route we want to go. We've been working with some producers on pretty much everything we've put out as The Hydra Melody. One of them is my cousin. His name's Anthony and another guy, Mack Damon, here in San Antonio. They're just awesome producers. We really like working with them, so we're kind of debating on whether to work with them right now or whether to try something different.

I know you're in the writing process of this album, but how would you compare the new material to your last albums?

Justin: I would almost compare "Maybe One Day" as even like a continuation of "Day of the Dukes," which was an album we did right before that. They could be an A-and-B type thing if you ask me. I think, in the past, all of our songs have really had a different feel to them from song to song. I think that even accentuates more with this new album. I think you're going to get something different out of every song. Like we said genre-wise, we might move from one to another, like really quick. And I think you can expect a lot more vocally going on as far as from the other members: myself and Robert. Maybe even Bobby. Bobby's kind of stepping himself up right now showing that he's got some want.

Why did the band choose the name Hydra Melody?

Justin: This is how it got started: our guitar player, Robert, was reading some kind of medieval dictionary or something like that, and ran across the word "hydra" and delved into it. It's this multi-headed sea serpent from mythological times that would just go around like wrecking ships and fucking shit up, basically. We kind of related our music like that because, back then, we were in a real experimental, almost a jam-band, type phase. It was basically five or six people soloing over each other, all at the same time. So we related it to a hydra of melodies so it became The Hydra Melody.

That fits you pretty well.

Justin: Thank you. I appreciate that.

What else is in the future for Hydra Melody?

Justin: I can only hope good things. I guess there's no way of really knowing what's in the future. As far as our plans, it's definitely to stick on the road, but we're going back up the Midwest in April. Probably late April, early May, so we'll get to go visit some friends in Chicago. We'll get to go hit up Buffalo, which both of those I would call our home away from home. So I think from April on to the rest of the year, we'll probably be doing a lot of touring and trying to get that full-length recorded sometime in between. We just have a lot of work to be doing right now, really.

You can catch Hydra Melody at Mi Casa on Sixth Street this Saturday at 10 p.m.

The Mohawk was packed as fans of vintage fashion (and those of us with a budget looking for inspiration) gathered around for the third annual Fashion Freakout. Three locally owned vintage stores showcased their styles: Buffalo Exchange, New Bohemia and Prototype Vintage Design. Host Matt Bearden amusingly entertained the crowd while the models were preparing their looks backstage.

Buffalo Exchange first went for '80s glam fashion, featuring a lot of lace and velvet to accentuate the vibrant colors in each outfit. With its second collection, the store went with a more modernized, glitzy biker style. New Bohemia's models wore a variety of outfits that highlighted two different styles, whether it was '70s country western or '60s mod. Prototype Vintage was the final store, with thier models clothed in revamped disco fashion and Madonna-inspired style. But overall, the looks of the night seemed to have one theme in common: lots and lots of accessories.

The evening's performing act, The Carrots, brought back '50s doo-wop as they performed covers and originals during intermission and at the end of the night. For someone like me who isn't normally fashion conscience, Fashion Freakout 3 was enjoyable to even the more clueless amateur.

Fashion Freakout took place at The Mohawk on Feb. 5, 2010. All photos by Mari Hernandez.

          Prototype Vintage models at Fashion Freakout [Feb. 5, 2010]Photo by Mari Hernandez           Prototype Vintage models at Fashion Freakout [Feb. 5, 2010]Photo by Mari Hernandez           Prototype Vintage models at Fashion Freakout [Feb. 5, 2010]Photo by Mari Hernandez           Prototype Vintage models at Fashion Freakout [Feb. 5, 2010]Photo by Mari Hernandez           Prototype Vintage models at Fashion Freakout [Feb. 5, 2010]Photo by Mari Hernandez           Prototype Vintage models at Fashion Freakout [Feb. 5, 2010]Photo by Mari Hernandez           Prototype Vintage models at Fashion Freakout [Feb. 5, 2010]Photo by Mari Hernandez           Prototype Vintage models at Fashion Freakout [Feb. 5, 2010]Photo by Mari Hernandez Prototype Vintage models at Fashion Freakout [Feb. 5, 2010]Photo by Mari Hernandez

          New Bohemia models at Fashion Freakout [Feb. 5, 2010]Photo by Mari Hernandez           New Bohemia models at Fashion Freakout [Feb. 5, 2010]Photo by Mari Hernandez           New Bohemia models at Fashion Freakout [Feb. 5, 2010]Photo by Mari Hernandez           New Bohemia models at Fashion Freakout [Feb. 5, 2010]Photo by Mari Hernandez           New Bohemia models at Fashion Freakout [Feb. 5, 2010]Photo by Mari Hernandez           New Bohemia models at Fashion Freakout [Feb. 5, 2010]Photo by Mari Hernandez           New Bohemia models at Fashion Freakout [Feb. 5, 2010]Photo by Mari Hernandez           New Bohemia models at Fashion Freakout [Feb. 5, 2010]Photo by Mari Hernandez New Bohemia models at Fashion Freakout [Feb. 5, 2010]Photo by Mari Hernandez

          Buffalo Exchange models at Fashion Freakout [Feb. 5, 2010]Photo by Mari Hernandez           Buffalo Exchange models at Fashion Freakout [Feb. 5, 2010]Photo by Mari Hernandez           Buffalo Exchange models at Fashion Freakout [Feb. 5, 2010]Photo by Mari Hernandez           Buffalo Exchange models at Fashion Freakout [Feb. 5, 2010]Photo by Mari Hernandez           Buffalo Exchange models at Fashion Freakout [Feb. 5, 2010]Photo by Mari Hernandez           Buffalo Exchange models at Fashion Freakout [Feb. 5, 2010]Photo by Mari Hernandez           Buffalo Exchange models at Fashion Freakout [Feb. 5, 2010]Photo by Mari Hernandez           Buffalo Exchange models at Fashion Freakout [Feb. 5, 2010]Photo by Mari Hernandez Buffalo Exchange models at Fashion Freakout [Feb. 5, 2010]Photo by Mari Hernandez

Alonso Reyes was raised around art his whole life. The Lima, Peru native's mother was an artist, but she discouraged him from following in her footsteps.

“She said ‘Don't be an artist because nobody's going to marry you. I'm an artist because your father's a doctor,’” explained Reyes.

Not taking her advice, he studied art at La Escuela Nacional de Bellas Artes del Peru. However, after he lost his kidney and had to complete dialysis treatment, he was confined at home for a period of 10 years where he used this time to teach himself more about his own technique.

Reyes has been an Austin-based artist for 14 years now.

When you first step into Reyes' small studio, the most obvious thing that grabs your attention is the paintings covering every inch of the wall with naked women. At first glance, the completely or half-naked women featured on the murky images seem to be eerie portrayals of Reyes’ wicked dreams (or nightmares). However, Reyes explains that these paintings are his psychological reflections from the past 20 years of his life.

“I paint about psychological things about my life. I use different periods of my life like my addiction times when I was in school,” said Reyes.

I was invited to Reyes’ home to get a walk through of his collection of work and talk about the actual experiences that influenced the risqué paintings.

Paintings from Alonso Reyes' gallery in Austin. All photos by Sarah Vasquez.

So are these paintings I'm seeing from the current period of your life?

Alonso: Yeah, this is 2005. I paint everything from dialysis to rehabilitation, drug addition, divorce—everything that happened in my life. Sometimes I use friends’ situations, like my new painting, “The Broken Doll.” That's a friend of mine that is troubling right now with alcoholism. I use their struggles help me to resolve my pain so I can identify because I come from the same kind of problem.

What do these paintings say to you?

Alonso: A lot of my paintings can be therapy. Life is heavy for me, so I like to put that heavy part in the painting. I use my paintings as therapy and therapy of myself. I learn during the time from my actions, like if I see more inside to outside, I can accomplish more in my dreams. If I focus more and listen to inside—you know, what's going on outside—life is more peaceful and like that, everything is spiritual and now, so ask me a question.

How long have you been doing art painting? Like you said, you went to art school, but when did you first pick up that pencil?

Alonso: My dad was a doctor and my mom was an artist. So I saw painting since I was five years old, and I love all those classic books. I was always fascinated with the paintings that were more shocking. For some reason I loved it. I was never scared. I always went back to them all the time. You know Saturn eating the Sun, or David with the head of Goliath. Stuff like that always made me dream a lot and I loved to see those paintings and how it was made. I always wanted to paint in oil, but my mom wouldn’t let me paint with oils. I painted in different materials until I went to the fine arts school when they start practicing with the oils. So I’ve been around art all my life practically. Since I went to the fine arts school is when I started to understand about oil and about composition and theory of color. I can tell you those basic things are really important. The academic part is really important. I can see in artists that don't have that part and you can recognize it immediately. They have a lack of that basic thing because to develop your own technique takes years—10, 20, 30 years—but that solid beginning helps you to build that journey. Without that solid beginning is really, really difficult. Just really good artists with a lot of time can be a self-taught artist without formal training.

How long does one of these large paintings take to paint to finish?

Alonso: This new technique Arturo Rivera taught me takes from one to two months for each painting. Now, what I try is to do is reduce the time. Maybe two weeks. It’s really hard because it's time consuming. It's a lot of concentration.

They're very detailed.

Alonso: When I was painting expressionistic paintings, I could finish a painting in four hours, but now when I do this new technique, the time of concentration make it a lot longer. I use varnish and it takes time to dry, and you work by layers. You have to brush several times in order to get that finish.

What is the waiting time for the drying process? Do you ever find yourself wanting it to hurry up and dry so you can get the inspiration out?

Alonso: Well not normally. In that time, I'm always thinking for the next painting. So my mind never stops. Sometimes I wake up in the middle of the night and I need to get a pencil and draw a dream really quickly. That happens at anytime so I need to have some paper and a pen and then do the drawing because I'll forget. So good ideas can come at anytime: in the middle of the night, in your shower, washing dishes, at a party dancing, talking with somebody and—pop!—an idea comes from a conversation. I love it. It's real interesting.

I have the same problem with writing. Like I'll be washing dishes and I'm like Oh my god, I gotta write this down.

Alonso: Yeah, exactly. I think in all of the arts. I think all of the professions have the same basic roots. Imagination's really important and can come anytime. So you need to be prepared. You need to be alert and you need to always be thinking about what you love to do.

For the new painting that you're working on, when did you start?

Alonso: The new painting, I started like two months, one month and a half. It's almost ready. I need a couple more weeks to make the final layers. It's like in most of my paintings, there is always like a psychological theme. I love females, but a lot of people get confused. A lot of people see my paintings and they (the females) are sharp, they look strong. I don't use regular nudes. Most of the time, the girls are without shoes in a resting post. Partly because it's what the beauty is now. The other is something really important that needs to be behind that. That's not the painting, you know. That's because I need to explain my paintings because if you see just the surface, you just see a nude—a girl in lingerie in high shoes—but it's something bigger than that. I'm always thinking like I'm not painting for today. I'm painting for the future. I'm going to die. I don't know, but you're going to die soon but the painting is going to stay, so they need to know what's going on at this time.

Kind of like when we we're in school and we're looking at paintings from like the 1500s and stuff. How that showed that period.

Alonso: Exactly. I always have those dreams. I think I'm not going to be here, but my paintings are going to stay here so I need to take up this time and...

And show how it's going to show the future people how we were.

Alonso: Yeah, exactly. That's something that always talks to me in my mind. You don't paint for today, so don't worry about the painters. They paint landscapes and flowers to sell. It's ok. Good for them. They can provide for their families. You have a different profession. God gave you a different profession. You need to paint from your heart. This is what you need to do because I told you, I come from a rough life—addiction, dialysis. I almost died. Many times, I almost died for this crazy life. So if I survive, it's not to paint flowers. If I survive all those things, it's not to try to sell a painting today just to get noticed in the newspaper. That's not important. Sometimes I want to be in the newspaper. I get jealous for five seconds when I see a friend in some magazine but after that, I need to keep doing what I need to do. I need to be in contact with somebody higher than the earth. When I'm thinking about that, I just need to keep painting. I just need to keep painting for my life. I know somebody's going to identify. I know somebody's going to feel it. Maybe not today. Tomorrow. I don't know. But if I'm wrong, I don't know. I don't feel wrong, you know. I don't feel it. Many things happens in my life that tell me to just keep painting and everything's going to be fine, but paint from your heart.

Anything else you wanna add?

Alonso: Well, just thank you so much for coming here to interview me. I just want to say if somebody has a dream, they need to follow that dream and work hard in that. That is going to give you everything that you need. Most importantly, they give you a piece of mind.

From the moment the first note of Quiero Club's Nueva America plays, I'm instantly lost in an episode of the latest Gossip Girl episode. Cue the Kristen Bell voiceover with images of Blair and Serena living in the high society and Quiero Club belongs to the club of bands that provide the soundtrack to this popular CW TV show.

Upon listening to more of this sophomore album, it becomes more apparent that Quiero Club offers more than just catchy techno beats to be pigeonholed as providing tunes to guilty pleasure teen dramas. “Fin de Semana Sin Fin” add a playful air with this whimsical track. The inclusion of melodic synthesizer and vocals that resemble a J-pop band provides one of the few exuberant songs of the album. However, the rest of the songs are less bouncy and more laid-back atmospherics such as the dreamy “Maybe.” While most do get the foot tapping, they aren't animated enough to distract you doing what you need to do while jamming out.

Whether it be the Caribbean self-titled track or Garbage reminiscence “Darwin Mustard,” the bottom line is that this bilingual album provides the tunes for those moments when you need a break from partying and just want to hang out or get some work done.

Quiero Club links: MySpace | Official Website | Happy-Fi

Martinez is only 25 years old and her powerful voice has given her many opportunities since she sang her first note at the age of 12. Appearing on Star Search and becoming a regional finalist for the first season of American Idol, she has received praise and recognition from celebrities like Wynonna Judd and Kathy Najimy (King of the Hill, Sister Act).

She doesn't have any label support though, as she's not willing to compromise who she is to get herself to the next level. However, she is proof that musicians don't always need the backing of a label because she's opened for various musical legends, such as Sting, Etta James and Jonny Lang.

Martinez sat down with me before her set at Momo's while she reflected on her musical career, shared what motivated her to become a singer and why she loves performing in Austin.

How long have you been doing music?

Vicci: I think I started playing guitar and trying to write my own music when I was about 12 to 13 years old. When you're that teenager, going through what you think is your mid-life crisis, but it's just a bunch of being a baby. That's when I started.

What made you decide to write music? Was there a song? An album?

Vicci: Oh, I actually had a choir teacher that forced me to sing in class because my sister, who was her student prior to me, had a great voice. She just wanted to see if I had the same talent and it ended up that I did. I was able to do what she asked. Then she started giving me voice lessons and breathing techniques. Ever since, I was able to sing. Then when I realized that I could play and sing at the same time, I just got really into it. I think it was around the Sarah McLaughlin time when she started to do the Lillith Fair tour. And to see all these women rise up to the occasion and put on this festival was really empowering. Even at that age for me, it was kind of like oh, I have an opportunity to do this myself and this looks like something that could be within my reach. I wanted to play basketball when I was younger. I was like Uh, okay, I'm too small. I can't do that. So this just felt like something that was right. It came natural. My family was very supportive because my dad realized that oh, this is a natural talent for her. If it makes her happy and she's good at it, then okay we'll support her with that. They weren't supportive of the basketball.

Well, that's different. Normally parents are reversed.

Vicci: Yeah, my parents were. They had six kids. I think with the first three kids, they were that way where it was more like get an education and get a job that you're going to be able to survive with and this is such a risky business to have that. But I think my father loved music so much. He was the musical one in the family that if his parents would have been that way, I know he would have pursued his music, but instead he just allowed himself to do that with one of his kids. He understood where I was coming from.

You're 25 years old and you've gone through so much. Does it ever seem surreal for you with everything you've experienced with your music career?

Vicci: What's funny is when I think about it, I definitely let myself be thankful about it. But when I'm not thinking about the things that I've done, it's almost like okay, I need to do more. What's going to be the next thing? It's kind of bad because sometimes you're not allowing yourself to live in the present and just enjoy the moment. Today here, I am in Austin, Texas. I'm getting a lot better at just being there in the moment and I'm super stoked to be here. But yesterday, I was in Dallas, Texas, and I've already been to Austin. I was like I want Dallas to hurry up so I can get to Austin and enjoy people that really, really love music. That's what I really love about this place and everyone's just so into it.

How many times have you been to Austin before?

Vicci: I've only been here once.

When was the first time you came?

Vicci: First time was last year, last summer, and I came for a different reason. There's an organization called the Amala Foundation and they hold a Global Youth Summit at the John Knox Ranch. I went and helped out there for a few days. Then out of that, I met some people that were musicians and got a few gigs but fell in love right away. I love the people here. It's great. Great energy.

Normally when bands come to Austin, it's usually for South By Southwest or ACL, which is totally a different world of Austin so you got to see Austin the way it is. How would you compare the Austin music scene to Seattle?

Vicci: The friend I came to Austin with the first time had gotten here before I did. She's like you got to get over here. It's like Seattle and Mexico having a baby and there came Austin. It's true because in Seattle, we're a lot more closed in. You don't see too many outdoor kind of venues unless it's in the summer. That's what I like when I came last time, there's music outside all the time and there's a lot of music lovers there. I think here people, like in Mexico, are so relaxed and just happy to be where they are and just living in the moment. So I feel like this place has that balance. There's the city and definitely the economy and all that good stuff or whatever but then there's those people that are just happy to be here. There's yoga everywhere. There is all this stuff to keep you sane. That's cool. I love that.

That's so funny because I take yoga.

Vicci: When I was driving around, there was like yoga on every corner and there in Seattle, it's like maybe a few places. I actually live in Tacoma, which is 30 minutes south of Seattle but there's not as much but it's definitely growing.

And you just had an album release in March that you recorded at Pacific Studio. What was it like recording that album? What was your mindset going into the recording studio?

Vicci: I definitely in the past have not liked recording in the studio. I like to play live. I feel like the energy of our band is definitely comes across better at a live show. So when I went into this one, I wanted to get it done. I didn't have a lot of money. I just brought them in for a couple of days and we just recorded a bunch of songs live. Because I wanted to distribute something that sounded like what we've been doing lately, I started working on it more. This is the first album that I worked on that I enjoyed the process. We didn't do much but what we were doing I was just into it a lot more than I had been in the past where I was like I wanna get out of this building that has no windows. It's dark all day. I don't want to be in here. So I got over that and now I've been recording a lot at my house. So I think that boosted me into being in the recording process and making a song a song. Adding layers and doing all that.

And since you've played and opened for a lot of great musicians...

Vicci: Yeah, luckily.

Who would you say is the most memorable? That you got the most starstruck and you're like oh my god, I'm opening for them?

Vicci: I think it must have been B.B. King for me because that's a legend right there and he was so welcoming. He had us come in his green room after the show. He wanted to meet my mom, my sister, and everyone I brought. He let them sit on his lap just was hugging. He gave me some good advice and he just told me to stuck with it. He's like it's like chopping wood; as long as you have wood to chop, be happy. Enjoy yourself while you're doing it and you'll be successful. So he was a great guy. That was my favorite.

You've gotten a lot of compliments from names like B.B. King and Winona Judd. How do you react to something like that?

Vicci: I guess I've always been bad with compliments. I'm trying to be better at that. Like I'm oh no, no. People say but you're such a great singer. You're a great musician. I just no, no, I'm not.

But you seem so down to earth. You're not like oh, yeah. I know.

Vicci: Well, it's like a lot of people love music, but we're all here. We all have our own purpose and it's an equal thing. I feel lucky to be able to do this. So when you get a compliment, it's great but it's like yeah ok you know? I love the guy that came in and put in our shower at our place the other day. He did a great job. It's amazing. So we all do our best at whatever we do. That was always my mom's advice. Whatever you did, just do your best. You don't wanna be embarrassed for doing a bad job whatever it is that you do.

You're currently a DIY kind of thing like you don't have a label and you've turned down labels and so forth.

Vicci: Yeah, there's been stuff that's happened that they've offered to get you into that next step but it's like but could you change it a little bit so we could make you more marketable or...

More radio friendly or whatever.

Vicci: Yeah, and it's like what B.B. King said: You're only gonna be successful if you're happy. Why would I do something that that's going to mess with my integrity? Because my whole thing is like if I'm able to be in a position to be on stage and talk to people, I really want to hit little kids that get can get so insecure and caught up with society. I guess it goes for adults too that just don't allow themselves to do what makes them happy and be themselves and just ego aside just really do whatever give them that tingle inside. I can't say that if I'm out there you know being phony.

All glammed up and doing choreography in your videos.

Vicci: Yes, exactly.

Okay, what else do you have in the future for you?

Vicci: Um, I'm going to the east coast. I'm doing a cruise. I came to southwest. Then I'll head to Tampa and I'm going to do a cruise and play on the cruise and get to vacation a little bit. Then east coast and just hopefully do more of this. You know, come in to places and really hit up spots that love music like Austin. San Francisco is a place I want to get to. Just good music spots that are going to appreciate it. Of course the bigger picture is to play for a bunch of people one day.

Anything else you want to add?

Vicci: Thank you for hanging out with me and coming out and doing this. Help and support local music. Well, I'm not local music but little people music.

Photos provided by Vicci Martinez. Visit her on MySpace.

Vocalists Ram Vela and Ryan Ermis appeared timid and unsure of their voices. On their first release, 2005's Anhedonia Falling, both guys held back, which made their voices sound strained. However, the potential that this could be a great band was evident.

Shortly after Torch Songs was released in 2008, seeing them live was like watching a brand new band. It was like the guys took the original Whitman sound and intensified it. The new Whitman was getting comfortable playing on stage, and with each other. The liveliness of the songs obviously showed they were having a great time being rock stars.

Vela conveyed his vibrant personality that everyone knows and loves into the delivery of his vocals, which gave him an approachable frontman stage presence. The biggest shocker, however, was the normally a quiet guy Ermis belting out his high notes in “For Heaven Sake” with such an excited grin on his face. Even now, he still keeps to himself off stage. But once he's on stage, he lets his inhibitions run free.

Five tours and three album releases later, Whitman is a solid indie-rock band that has really come a long way since that first show. The band's lineup has changed; substance abuse issues left the band looking for a new drummer to record a recent EP. After a session drummer helped out in the studio, the guys still needed to find a full-time replacement for playing live. But all the elements have come together for Whitman recently.

I got together with the band to chat about the last couple of years since I gave them their first interview. It was just like old times, full of laughter and silliness. Nevertheless, we did get down to business and talked about the recording of their upcoming release Culdesac and how far these guys think they've really come as a band.

We'll start with Eric, the new drummer. How did you come into the band?

Eric: I moved to Austin about a year ago, and I was intensely looking for a band. I'm from Ohio. I was looking at bands on Craigslist and I eventually lost my faith in that. Then I had some close friends tell me not to give up on it so I tried it one more time. I found these three.

Ram: We posted a listing on Craigslist and we tried out about five or six drummers and was down to two really nice guys. We chose him because we knew he was a better fit for our style of music. It worked out really well. Plus, your kit sounds amazing.

Eric: Aw, shucks.

Kyle: He's been an awesome addition to the band. It's been a long time since we played. The three of us have been the core members since we started Whitman. It's been a long time since we had a fourth member that really felt like they're a part of the band. We've been going through the alternating drummer thing and we were really lucky to find Eric. We clicked on a personal level really quick.

Ram: Yeah, I'll never forget at that first tryout he came to. I immediately wanted to go over to his house afterwards and just hang out with him and just shoot the shit with him. After all, we do the same thing as our day jobs. That was just kind of weird. He's a teaching assistant for a special ed class, and I'm as well teaching a special ed class. I just wanted to talk to him. We hit it off really well.

Eric: Now we're friends.

So how recently was it when you joined?

Eric: It was late May. I started auditioning in the middle of May somewhere.

Ram: So we drilled him for about a month to a month and a half before he actually played his first show on July 8th.

Kyle: Boot camp.

Ram: And it was a really successful show.

Kyle: And he's held it down ever since. It was like he was born to be in this band.

Eric: It's natural. It's just the chemistry. Even in bands I've been in before, I hadn't had the chemistry that I have now with these three guys. So far so good.

Ram: Sometimes we have sleepovers.

Eric: We pop popcorn.

Ram: We pop popcorn. We stay up all night watching movies.

Kyle: We watch old movies. Casablanca.

Ram: Gone with the Winds. You have to put this in the interview by the way. I'll never forget. Our first tryout with him, Kyle asked this question. “So Eric, uh, how's your situation with alcohol? You an alcoholic? You do a few pill poppin?” He's like “Well, I'll be honest with you. No, I don't but if you have weed, I'll smoke it and if you have beers, I'll drink them.”

Kyle: We were blown away. Carried us away.

Eric: It was like a moment of silence.

Kyle: Lifted off our feet.

Ram: It was like “If you have beers, hey I have some beers. Let's drink them.” So yeah, it's good times.

Kyle: Obviously, we've had problems in the past with drummers with substance abuse.

Ram: Yeah. I don't see that happening in the foreseeable future with this kid. Not this one. He's not going to blow up anytime soon.

Kyle: Apple of our eye. All right. That was fun.

Whitman has been on five tours across the country. How were you able to do those five tours and still have jobs?

Kyle laughs.

Ryan: Well...

Kyle: You take that one.

Ryan: We worked really shitty jobs that weren't too important and we could take time off.

Kyle: It's a matter of priorities.

Ryan: Yeah, exactly.

Kyle: We did what we needed to do.

Ram: Flexibility is key.

Kyle: When you wake up in the morning, you just got to ask if you want to go to work or if you want to go on tour. At the time, for the people that were in the band, tour was the answer.

Eric: I've yet to do the first tour.

Kyle: You've been to San Marcos.

Eric: I've been to San Marcos. That's true.

Ram: And about in a week and a half, he's going to Rio Grande Valley. That's 300 miles away.

Kyle: Get his first taste.

Ram: First taste of road.

Eric: First mini-taste. Yeah.

Kyle: He's itching. He needs to go on tour.

Eric: I'm itching. That's right.

Kyle: Burning.

Eric: It's just eating away at me.

Ram: Yeah, we're gonna eat some Mexican food. We're gonna get all fucked up. Awesome.

You just recorded your EP. Who did you record with? What was the process like?

Kyle: It was recorded at Jacketweather Studio under David Dreesen, the same producer who put out Torch Songs and we actually went into the studio to record demos. The entire EP is called Culdesac. It is recorded live. The only rule we had in the recording process is if it could be done pre-1972, we could do it. Those were our rules. So we did everything analog. We did everything live all together in the same room. We did it just to have demos but we really felt that it captured a side of us that we hadn't recorded and captured before. We were really impressed with the results so we decided under lots of fans' demands to put it out.

Ram: It was a 72 hour session, just a weekend in the studio and we recorded it live. We're pretty happy with it. Pretty happy with it. Ryan, you wanted to put an overdub on something, Dreesen would be like, “No, we're not doing that.”

Ryan: It was very strict. On one little part, I wanted to add a 3rd harmony but since we wouldn't do it like that live, it just got shot down right away. So there's nothing more than two part harmonies but we're really happy with the results.

Ram: We like to capture our live show, our energy that we possess live on that EP. I hope it shows.

Kyle: I think it changed our recording philosophy a lot. I mean Torch Songs was a labor of love and I think we're all very proud of it, but I think Culdesac really showed us a different side of ourselves that we were really impressed to find and really excited about. Which is one reason why we want to put it on vinyl. Cause it's the perfect record to be put on vinyl.

Ram: Yes, we discovered the G chord.

Kyle: So if anyone wants to help us put it out on vinyl, speak now.

Ram, I read on MySpace you jammed with Weezer.

Ram: Yeah. I won a contest on 101X.  

Kyle: Yeah.

No big deal.

Ram: Yeah. It was fun.

What song did you do?

Ram: Well, 101X had this contest. Weezer came through town and that was just an opportunity for some of their fans to just come on on stage and jam with them. All I had to do was jam “Beverly Hills” and “Island in the Sun” and yeah, I got to meet Brian Bell.

Kyle: But to win the contest you had to cover some songs.

Ram: Oh yeah, to win the contest, I had to... it was weird. I was on my way to Central Market and a girl was like “You got to prove to me you play guitar. You gotta play 'El Scorcho' or 'Beverly Hills' or 'Island in the Sun.'” Well fuck, do you think you can wait until 9:30 because I'm gonna get some green chili sauce for the green chili enchiladas I'm going to make for my kids tomorrow so I gotta be home in a certain hour. Can you wait that long? “Yeah, just call me back before 10.” So I called back the DJ at 9:30, played a little “El Scorcho.” “You're on the list.” I'm like fuck yeah, this is an awesome opportunity to promote Whitman. Gave Weezer a Whitman CD. So I gave Brian Bell a Whitman CD. I gave Pat Wilson a Whitman CD. I touched River Cuomo's leg.

Kyle: There's an awesome picture of it.

Ram: Awesome picture. The guy is a creepy looking dude.

Kyle: None of us could afford to go watch Ram.

Ram: It's on YouTube. It was really fun. I'm glad they got a copy of Torch Songs.

Anything come out from giving them CDs?

Ram: No.

They didn't say anything?

Ram: Well, I wasn't the one doing that. Of course, the guys that got picked had their demos. Oh fuck, it's like being a trail donkey to one of them. I was like second on the list from some guy. “Here Brian, I want you to have this.” Fuck, I'm right behind him. So I'm like "Here Brian, I want you to have this." So it's right after another band, but then I was like he didn't even give him a t-shirt. I had a Whitman t-shirt so I was like "Have a Whitman t-shirt too." He's like “Oh, thanks.”

Kyle: You know, what came out of it was two weeks later, when Brian Bell came back from tour, his little six year old son listened to Torch Songs and spent the next three months running around going “It's bacon when I'm hungry. Whiskey when I'm dry.” Guarantee it. I don't know that for a fact.

Ram: Overall, it was a fun time, man. Playing with one of the first bands I started listening to as a kid.

What else are you up to? Any new tours in the future or are you going to wait for the new EP to be released?

Kyle: We're gonna wait for the new EP to come out. We're writing songs and we're kind of planning on laying low until we get enough material for another record.

Ram: Yeah, focusing on playing local shows. This is actually the probably the best time to be playing local shows. These are the best local shows we've ever played. We're playing to very big crowds as of late, which is great. People are coming to the shows. It seems like our fan base more than doubled since our last tour. It's just great to see everybody's happy faces from the stage, you know. It's good times.

Kyle: I think when Torch Songs came out, we all decided that Austin was a hard city to make things happen. So we intentionally left, to go out into the world and find a fan base and we did. We literally have fans all over the country. A lot of independent bands who were in our position can't say that. I think we came back home to a really warm welcome that we didn't expect and that's been really awesome. I guess you don't realize what you have until it's gone.

Ram: Please. Oh my god. Did you just quote Cinderella?

Kyle: I did.

Ram: *starts singing* “You don't know what you got until it's gone.” I've been saying that the last couple of days. It's so true though. Shit, man. Power balladry. Thing of brilliance and cheese.

Ryan, I had a question for you.

Ryan: What's that?

I remember the first time you sang at that first show , you were really timid and shy, and kind of nervous. When I heard you recently, you're belting it out. How did it progress? Did you take lessons?

Ryan: No.

Did you just kept screaming and yelling until you got comfortable?

Ryan: I think it's just figuring out our sound and getting more comfortable as a band. Getting more comfortable to what I need to be singing and how I need to be singing it. Same thing with Ram. He's changed a lot too.

Ram: If you listen to Anhedonia Falling and you listen to Torch Songs, it's like whoa, this is different. That's because when you start out, you don't know how... I personally didn't know how to sing. I didn't.

Ryan: We're just getting more comfortable with how our voices fit in with the band, where we need to be singing and what we need to be singing. It's just a learning process. Every instrument, not just the voices, but every instrument had to find it's place.

Kyle: Absolutely.

Ram: And five years down the road, we found our place vocally.

Ryan: You know, you can really hear the evolution on the records too. Torch Songs is a million miles from Anhedonia Falling.

The first time I heard it, I was like “Are these the same guys?”

Kyle: You'll have the  same moment when you get the EP.

Ram: And if you come to a show, you'll have the same moment as well.

Kyle: Life's about changing, man.

Ryan: We've grown a lot as musicians together. One thing about this band, it seems to always be getting better. It hasn't gotten stale. The song writing hasn't gotten stale. It's just always on the up and up. We're fortunate.

Kyle: If it ever did, I think that we would realize it, especially between me, Ram and Ryan. It's been a relationship that is just forever accelerating with one another musically. There's really no idea or turn we could take in a song in music that we wouldn't follow each other down. I think that's become a very important part of how we work together.

Whitman will release Culdesac on December 19th exclusively on vinyl.

2Mex is one of the hardest-working rappers in the underground scene. With his earliest recordings released in the mid-1990s, 2Mex—also known as SunGodSun—has been sharing his words and wisdom with his solo projects and other groups for more than 15 years. His discography is impressive, as he's partnered up with hip hop groups such Visionaries, Afterlife, the Shapeshifters and Look Daggers.

Currently, 2Mex is signed to Sage Francis' Strange Famous Records where he is working on releasing a new album called My Fanbase Will Destroy You.

2Mex sat down with me before his set at Hella Broke, a skate-deck art/hip hop fusion showcase hosted at Red7. We discussed how he manages all his projects, what advice he gives inspiring rappers and why Homeland Security thought he might have been a terrorist.

Introduce yourself.

2Mex: My name is Alex. They call me 2Mex. I'm from Los Angeles.

2Mex: I think Sage reached out to me and asked me about coming out. I wanted to spend a week out in Texas, hanging out with some friends. So I think I just sent out a bulletin like “Yo, Texas, I want to be out there.” When I'm on tour, I just send an email and be like “Uh, Arizona” and then somebody's like “Sure, want to play a house party?” or whatever.

That's cool. I was reading about you and you seem to have a lot of history. You've been doing this for quite a while with different kind of projects. How long have you've been doing hip hop?

2Mex: I've been rapping for like 17 years. You just blink and it goes by. We're always working on records. I haven't had a job in a decade. I've just been working on hip hop for a while now. So for me, I just click up and make different groups with my friends. I have a couple of different groups that are running right now.

 2Mex: Right now, for the most part I have a band called Look Daggers with my friend Ikey Owens. He's the keyboard player for The Mars Volta. It's a side group that we have. We made one record called Suffer in Style. Then I am just as myself as 2Mex and then I have another side group called The Returners with my homeboy Deeskee. He does the production and this other rapper named Die Young from the Shapeshifters. It's kind of a themed record. It's pretty cool.

How do you time-manage all these groups you record with, perform with and tour with?

2Mex: Not very well. There's no time. It's at the point now where you and some friends start talking and we're like yeah, we want to do some stuff—this and that. You look at your schedule loosely and you say alright, November. Since no one's really waiting for it because these are all new groups, you just work on it until it's done. When it's done, you either put it out or you just let it just exist. You know what I mean, just kind of like exist.

Go with the flow.

2Mex: Yeah, you put it out. Every now and then, some records you got to put them out because you feel like you want to put them out or you're funded. I've been getting funded by this label—by Grimm Image—so you want to put this stuff out.

Out of all the places you've toured, what's your favorite place to perform?

2Mex: Um, you know what? Austin is probably one of my favorite places. We've always had fun playing in Austin. Probably Austin comes #1 and then #2 I would say, I really like El Paso. Actually El Paso is really fresh. I like El Paso. I like Seattle a lot too. Seattle's really fresh.

Is it the crowd?

2Mex: Just the years of going over and over. Just started having friends there and there's like a little niche of people sometimes that support. It's like it's the kind of place where you like to get away. We play all the shows that get offered to us basically so a lot of times I'm like what am I doing here? Some were like damn, I'm really here for ten people or five people. Austin's the kind of place that is a cool vibe where you can actually play and have fun, you know?

Yeah. Austin loves music.

2Mex: Austin's a pro at it. So it's all good.

What kind of advice do you give to someone who's trying to break out in the hip hop scene?

2Mex: I think it's much harder these days for a new artist to break out. It's a whole different thing now because everybody raps. Everybody makes hip hop. Everybody makes music, which is a great thing, but it's so difficult to sprout out. Nowadays for the new artists, my advice would be to do it because you love it and try to take the equation of trying to make money out of it. Do it because you love it. My only other advice is, honestly, no matter who you're down with, no matter who your friends are, no matter who did what, nothing matters but what's on that CD. You got to put in hours into the studio or the hours that you graphed. I would say invest in yourself. When you get paid Friday, don't go buy shoes, go buy some equipment. Go make some fliers of your group. Go do shit for yourself. That's the only way it works out. You have to really invest in yourself and go and sprout out. That's my advice.

What else is coming up for you in the future that people should look out for?

2Mex: I basically signed to this label called Strange Famous, which is a Sage Francis record label. He's a cool dude. So we're putting out a record next year that we've been working on for two years. It's called My Fanbase Will Destroy You and it's really awesome, man. It's produced by Busdriver, and produced by Ikey. It's really fresh. It's a really good record.

Tell me about the time the fed's thought your tour was a terrorist threat.

2Mex: Oh, yeah. Two years ago, we did this 47-cities tour called We Book Our Own Tour. We booked it on MySpace, like the whole 47 cities. It was really crazy and really tough. Somewhere basically on 9/11 of two years ago, I had a couple of days off and I went to St. Louis. We were in St. Louis and I told the guys, "Go forward. I'm gonna rest for two days." I had a friend come and visit. So basically I went to the airport to pick a friend up on 9/11. After the Detroit show, driving to the next city, we got pulled over by three different kinds of police: We got pulled over by Homeland Security, we got pulled over by the state cops and we got pulled over by the local police—all in the same shot. Long story short: Basically, the local cops were like “Who's Alex?” I was like, me. They're like, “Oh they've been following you for days.” I don't know if it's my hipster Palestinian beard or whatever, but they were just following us. Once they found out that we were just rappers or whatever, they were pretty much like, oh. So I think that's my story. We must have straight-up fans or they're following us, because we see them all over, all over the United States all the times at our shows.

Wow, that's weird.

2Mex: Yeah, weird. I don't really say anything that bad, but it's all good.

Anything else you want to add?

2Mex: Yeah, just tell people that in this time where everything's free, just the one thing I want to tell musicians is that you need to come out and support these groups that are out here because if you don't, no one is going to ever buy your shit. So if you're sitting at home downloading everything under the sun, I'm going to see you in five years when you put your record out there that you've been working on for forever. Everything you and your homies worked for gets jacked, so I'm just giving them a precursor because no one's going to support you if you create the trend at a young age that you're not going to support the arts. Then no one's going to support your art.

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Blood dripping down a guy's face. Half-naked women and men putting on corsets and applying make up. These are some of the sights you'll see at artists Otis Ike and Ivete Lucas' new installation, Libres y Lokas, featuring the underground world of luche libre wrestling and transgendered queen culture in Monterrey, Mexico.

Ike and Lucas only had two weeks to prepare and set up for the opening night on Aug. 1. Even though they weren't set up until five minutes after the opening officially started, patrons piled in the small Domy Bookstore in East Austin and enjoyed the variety of colorful photos of these two parallel lifestyles. There is also a small house built inside the bookstore where a dual-screen documentary of the entertainers can be viewed. The 18-minute film shows these captured photographs in action, giving observers a sense of what it was like to witness these events. Later on that night, local transgendered queens Jame Perry, Kelley Kline and Christeene performed to Mexican music to bring the Monterrey culture to Austin.

The two artists invited me over for dinner and talked to me about what made them want to share these two subcultures with the East Austin community.

How did the opening go for you?

Otis: Ivete and I wanted the opening to feel like a punk-rock show. So we had some drag queen performers signed up to do Latin American songs because all the songs that we were seeing in Monterrey were Spanish language songs. So if you saw our show, we wanted you to feel what it was like to be in a Latin drag show. So what happened is a lot of queens that we had booked would disappear for a week or they would say “you gotta come pick me up in Round Rock” and we're like building this show. We finished (setting up the show) five minutes late. Christeene performed two songs with her back up dancers. They basically were in g-strings and crawling all over each other. It was complete chaos. The only reason I'm saying that is because it was like a chaotic GG Allin drag punk show at the opening. It was our dream come true.

Was it like what you experienced when you took the photos and videos in Monterrey?

Ivete: It was different. Christeene is from here. She's not hispanic. Then the Mexican drag queens performances are different from the drag queens from Austin, even the hispanic drag queens. In Mexico, they're more emotional. It's a different scene. That's why it's called “El Espetaculo de la Pobreza” which means the “Spectacle of the Poor.” It's more about performers and poverty. Most of these neighborhoods we were going to were really poor neighborhoods. I guess what we have to understand is that it is very different in Monterrey, Mexico and in Austin. In Austin, we have this big middle class and everybody interacts with each other at some point. In Monterrey, it's very steeply divided with the high class and the low income class. They both live in different bubbles and they interact very little. There's a different type of expression in these poor parts. It's difficult to describe.

Otis: Basically in Austin, it's a very liberal community, very open, very accepting and loving. I think most people in Austin, when they see a drag queen, they're excited. Maybe they want to get their picture taken with the queen. In Mexico, it's very dangerous to be a drag queen or to be gay. So in Austin, you can show up to an event as a drag queen. In Mexico, you show up to the event as an overweight bald guy who works a construction job and lives with his parents. You go back stage and you come out this elegant beautiful goddess. That's the big difference. There's a real transformation in Mexico that takes place backstage and that's why a lot of our pictures and videos are backstage. There's a transformation. At our opening, the performers showed up in their character because there's so much freedom here. That's what was really strikingly different about our opening performances and what we saw in Monterrey. It's not accepted to be gay and to be out down there.

Is that because it's mostly a Catholic upbringing out there?

Ivete: Yeah, it's very conservative. If they walk around from a bar to another bar and they're dressed in drag, they get abused from the police and all kinds of stuff. So it is dangerous in Mexico to do that. Maybe the two most important factors are Catholicism and then the division between the rich and poor. I think the other thing that happens is that these drag queens have relationships with men that aren't really comfortable with their own sexuality. They're not completely out. So they have a lot of relationship problems and they translate it into their performance in the music they choose to perform. Well I see like here (Austin), they like drag queens perform like happy music.

It's entertainment.

Ivete: Uh huh and it's like a party. Watch me dance. That kind of stuff while there it's like broken-hearted, tormentous relationships and they cry on stage. It's raw, but here it was a party and it was raw.

Otis: Yeah, Christeene was raw. You'll see in the pictures. We're very grateful to Christeene. If you get a chance to watch her videos, she performs an impoverished singing tranny prostitute basically. I maybe getting that wrong but it was really raw in the same way that a lot of the performances were raw down there and that they were like really trying to emote. Christeene emoted at our opening. These performances we saw down there were just incredible. They didn't start until one in the morning and we were at these clubs until five a.m. We were fixated on these performances because there was so much struggle, strife and beauty in what they were doing. Like we talked about in the Chronicle, it's like there was something in that that we were really missing in when we went to see music or punk rock music. There was something in these performances down there that really got us hooked to sit there until five a.m. It was insanity.

What inspired you go to Monterrey to film these queens and wrestlers?

Ivete: I was raised in Monterrey. My dad is from Monterrey. My mom is from Brazil. I was born in Brazil. We moved to Monterrey so I grew up there. I already had interest in these subcultures.

So you already knew about the subcultures?

Ivete: Yeah, a little bit. I was tapping into them with my own stuff. Then when I met Patrick down in Monterrey, he told me that he'd been photographing wrestling matches all around the U.S. for years. So I said “well, I'll take you to a Mexican one,” which is really different. So we went. When we were there, we saw this tranny clown in the wrestling audience. That was really interesting. We started going to these places and we saw that there was a lot in common in both worlds. So I don't know. Maybe Patrick can give you an American perspective.

Otis: Well, Ivete and I had been dating long distance for a long time because she lived in Mexico and I lived here in Austin. So I was going down there and I loved photography. Like she said, we met this clown at a wrestling match who was a tranny and we happened to be driving around after going to a wrestling match. We saw this kind of odd tranny bar and we went in and we took pictures. We had a great time. When we were looking at our photographs, they were next to each other, the wrestlers and the trannies and there was this glitter. There were these masks like men changed into woman and the wrestlers were hiding their identities so there was this sense of we can't show our real identity. We're glittered. We're performing. We're emoting.

Ivete: We're putting on these intense shows.

Otis: Yeah and they seemed so similar. Then at one of the tranny bars, our waiter was a wrestler. We were at this tranny bar on an off night watching the performances practice. At the tranny bars, they only make money on Friday and Saturday. So Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday is all practice. The queens go in and they practice songs. We go in while they're practicing, hang out, get to know the bar owner, make sure it was OK that we could take pictures and promise we'll give them some of our pictures. So this one fellow who's gay, he turned out to be a wrestler. He took us from the tranny bar world into the underground wrestling world and started pointing out wrestlers and going “Oh he's gay, he's gay, he's gay and he's gay.” We said “Well wow, that's shocking I didn't know there was such a crossover between the Monterrey gay scene and the wrestling scene.” He said “Oh yeah. Well a lot of the promoters of wrestling are gay and they go to strip clubs. I was a stripper before I was a bartender here. I got recruited out of being a stripper into being a wrestler.” So all the sudden these two worlds that were just two photographs to us became intertwined through this guy. That's where we went from there. Poncho took us into the underground wrestling community in San Nicholas.

Ivete: San Bernabe. It's close. It's next to San Nicholas.

Otis: Ok, in San Bernabe is where these underground wrestling matches take place for very little money. People cut each other but the matches start out with little kid wrestlers. There'll be two ten year olds that wrestle. Then there will be this big match with six little girls.

Ivete: 14-year-old girls.

Otis: 14-year-old girls that wrestle. Then it would build up to older people. The last match is a complete bloodbath. What they do is that the wrestlers have a little piece of glass on them and they'll carve into the forehead of each other. You can see that in the photographs. When they get the cut, they'll pound on the head.

Ivete: They'll hold the other guy's breath so that the blood will comes out faster.

Otis: It turns into this spectacle where in the audience, there's little kids sleeping in the corner. There's old ladies. There's trannies. there's like drunk guys and it's a neighborhood where all the taxi drivers live so it's like the kids of taxi drivers.

Ivete: Some people come from the other side of Monterrey. They go in public transportation, which in Mexico, public transportation kind of sucks. It takes them like three hours to get there but they do it because it's so amazing, especially in that neighborhood. I think both of these worlds also have that it's an emotional catharsis where you get to rip everything, all those emotions off of your body. In this underground wrestling it's this aggression, the anger. So you see those little kids saying the craziest stuff, like the craziest curse words to the wrestlers and it's OK. Their parents are saying it too and their grandmothers are saying the same thing. Then the wrestler is saying the meanest, the most demeaning stuff back to the grandmother in the audience and even goes and pushes her. It 's like really a blood bath party where everybody gets to like take the anger out on people.

This is all in fun.

Ivete: Yeah. It's allowed. It's allowed for you to say that.

Otis: What's great about these matches is that when I went to shows as a kid, when I was 16, I went to punk shows and the bands sucked, I heckled them to death. I let them know they sucked. I let them know they were ripping somebody off. I let them know that they looked like a bunch of Pearl Jam wannabes. We've lost that in music. When I saw these wrestling matches, it was like a grandmother yelling at the wrestler, “You fat stupid piece of shit” and then the wrestler yelling back at the grandmother “I'm gonna rape you” seriously.

Ivete: Things like that seriously.

Otis: Yeah and that's horrible at this table here but at a wrestling match, it's just ridiculous and outrageous.

Ivete: For them, it's hilarious as well. They enjoy it.

Otis: They're having fun. That was the whole thing about going to punk shows is that it was fun. Yelling at them. Yelling stupid stuff after a song. They can go and they can get out that frustration. They can see something ridiculous. These wrestlers got their frustrations in it and everyone leaves happy.

Ivete: Same way in the tranny shows. They're all frustrated with these bad relationships. The other thing is this repression for being gay. I'm just so amazed at being in Austin, the U.S., it's just too amazing to me how the gay community and the queer community are such a different world than the people in Mexico. My friends literally had to move away from Monterrey so they could be gay and they're educated people. these people, can kind of be gay in the poor communities but still they can't fully be out of the closet because of the machismo. So Adriana was one of the people that we photographed a lot. Her boyfriend of four years got married to a woman. She's like “you know, if you're going to be married to a woman, I'm not going to be dating you still” The woman doesn't know that he's gay. All that kind of stuff, that's really a lot of tension to them. So they go to this bar and they perform these songs that are all about these torn, tortured relationships. They get to cry together. They perform all these women mariachi songs. They are also very strong women and it's all about relationships. They get to take those frustrations out too. So they also leave happy and drink a lot of alcohol. It is in that sense to us that it brought us that feeling that we had when we went to shows when we were younger. It brought that back because it's real. It's not just a bunch of people, trying to be rock stars, it's what being a rock star is versus the core of what the movement is and where it emerges. It has a reason to emerge and these people are very close to their core.

Have the people you photographed seen the art show or the photos?

Otis: No, what's amazing is that we would take pictures of people and we said “Could we have your email address so that we can send you a copy?” and they didn't have email addresses. Only a few people had email addresses.

Ivete: We gave them some CDs with some photos so they could have it.

Otis: Yeah, we gave them CDs with the pictures. They've seen a lot of the pictures, but they haven't seen the art show. Ivete got into a film festival, the Monterrey Film Festival. She's going down there and she'll bring them some of the pictures and show them on her laptop.

Ivete: The other thing is we wanted to bring some of them to perform in the show but they don't have visas and it's hard to get a visa being a performer. They don't have these steady jobs that, I mean, most of the wrestlers have a day job but the trannies don't. Like they just...

That's what they do.

Ivete: Yeah, they live for that and that's it. So and they don't have, when you get a visa, when you're a mexican person or a person from another country, and you get a visa, you have to like show your bank statements and show your income and all that stuff and they don't have that. So we really wanted to bring them.

Otis: I think something really important about this show is that Domy is on Cesar Chavez St., just barely in East Austin. We have been to shows at Domy and Art Palace that did not engage the community at all in East Austin. We go to openings and it was just hipsters smoking cigarettes and drinking beer. We have a lot of other projects that we could of done there. We made this project the month before the opening because we wanted to engage the people in the neighborhood.

Ivete: We wanted to bring a little piece of Monterrey for them to have close by their house.

Otis: We wanted to make an art show for people from Mexico who live in America illegally or legally. We wanted to bring an art show of images and a flavor of Mexico to someone who may not be able to get down there all the time so that you can connect and get a feeling for the rawness and the excitement and things that are going on in Mexico. That's why we have all the signage. Mexico is all about hand painted signs. We wanted hand painted signs all over the outside of the building. Another thing, there was a governor race and all of Monterrey while we were shooting this show was political advertisements. It's disgusting. We really wanted to take a piss on the politicians in Mexico because they are such awful people. They just flood these neighborhoods with their face. They give away makeup. They give away anything so that they can to get into office. We wanted to take down their signs. We wanted to turn them into trannies. So we thought that people who lived in Austin and who were from Mexico would appreciate that. That was one of the big goals of this show. To give people in East Austin art from Mexico and kind of take a shit on the politicians for them.

Ivete: I think two things that I thought of and are important while Patrick was talking. One of them is people from Monterrey are not so concerned with making art about Monterrey. They're very concerned with traveling and trying to make international art. Some people kind of emulate movements that originate outside of Monterrey and nobody's looking inward. They're looking outside the whole time. So for me, it was very important being from Monterrey to concentrate in the real deal that's going on in my hometown and the real artists that are in this impoverished communities. They're doing everything they can to express themselves so I thought that was very important. When we brought it here, there was a lot of people at the opening and we were able to share that with people and there were people from Monterrey. There were people from Mexico. Everybody was so amazed at what they saw. It felt really nice to show the world what's going on in Monterrey. The other thing I think is really important about us is that we actually made friends with our subjects or the people we photograph. We made relationships with them. We don't just go and take photos and leave. That is important to us because we want to do justice to them as human beings. I think that's part of also bringing that to people here. It's like a human connection between the Mexican culture here in the U.S. where it's a different Mexican culture but still Mexican and the Mexican culture over there. It's all made of people and people's expression. Other people that are not Mexican can also be drawn to it and understand it and all that, but it's great to make those human connections.

Otis: We did risk our lives to make this show.

Ivete: We did.

Otis: If we went to Charlies or Bout Time here in Austin, which are two tranny show places, we wouldn't have been taking any risks. We would just go and take pictures.

Show up and snap away.

Ivete: Yeah, people are nice.

Otis: When we were taking pictures, there was prostitution, drugs, people having sex in bathrooms. It was very uncomfortable at times. It was very dangerous.

Ivete: Everybody would tell us not to go to those places. At least it was like “don't go, don't go” or “At least, don't take pictures.” because if they see you, they might get angry because they're in the closet. Basically if there's a problem, they'll just make a mob and attack you. All those things that people told us that could happen, but we didn't listen.

You've answered all I wanted to ask. Anything else you wanted to add to that?

Otis: Yeah. We really want Mexican people to enjoy the art show because what we saw in the poor communities in Mexico was that people were very tolerant of the trannies. We go to these wrestling matches and they would be openly gay couples in the audience. There was complete acceptance of these people. So we really want people from East Austin to feel that they can see artwork and they can see the show and there's no pressure to buy stuff. There's a lot of artists in the Mexican community. People hand-make signs. They make pinatas. They do mariachi costumes. There's a lot of very artistic people in the Mexican community. We want them to engage the art so that's our goal.

Ivete: As for me, I think the show is something that is from our hearts. All cultural people and people who have a college education, basically, they're just walking around with their nose up in the air and being malinchistas that they call. A malinchista person is somebody that likes things from outside of Mexico much better than the things that are going on in Mexico. They put down what's going on in their own city. I grew up there and I would see all these things happening. I'll be so amazed and I would see the expression. The houses there are aqua colored houses, all these bright colored houses, all these things that these high class people are saying that are ugly and I thought it was amazing so to me. To us it's very, very important to do this and to bring that piece of Mexico to Austin.

You still have time to see the exhibit at Domy Books. But get there soon, it will only be up until September 3rd.