What's the scene like in central Illinois?

JustinHedrick
steve albini likes it
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Location: Urbana, Illinois

Re: What's the scene like in central Illinois?

Post by JustinHedrick » Tue May 18, 2004 3:04 pm

Champaign is cool.
The scene is inflated, kind of a stigma.
But yes, central Illinois has is good points and its bad points ie the winters are cold and the summers are like living in a broiler of a viking range. That being said, people come to shows, buy your cd's and such.

jzahos
gettin' sounds
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Re: What's the scene like in central Illinois?

Post by jzahos » Tue May 18, 2004 9:37 pm

Yeah, I think Hum recorded at least a couple albums there. The website is way out of date, (we're working on that...), so there's been more notable things done in addition to what's listed.

JZ

P.S. I'll be around here for a while... On the order of years.

JustinHedrick
steve albini likes it
Posts: 362
Joined: Tue May 18, 2004 3:01 pm
Location: Urbana, Illinois

Re: What's the scene like in central Illinois?

Post by JustinHedrick » Wed May 19, 2004 1:54 pm

Actually, hum is from champaign, so is the beauty shop, tummler, lovecup, the blackouts, solips ....and on and on

mritt
audio school
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Re: What's the scene like in central Illinois?

Post by mritt » Thu May 27, 2004 12:13 pm

Hey, I grew up in Bloomington-Normal and returned after college to work there for several years before blowing town in 1990. The Twin Cities are extremely comfortable in many ways but sleepy too, with not nearly the kind of great college-town ambience you get in C-U, despite the 18,000 students attending Illinois State University and Illinois Wesleyan. Disconcertingly Bible Belt and conservative under the surface, home to State Farm Insurance, sprawling new subdivisions and two malls, there's also always been a fair share of counterculture, cool little shops and good music to be found on the fringes. Downtown Bloomington has turned into a quaint arty district with lofts above the stores, with some nice coffee shops and bars. I would avoid settling for a townhouse near the airport, you will find it depressing...been there. My favorite part of town is in old Bloomington, off downtown, area called Franklin Park I think. Old houses, big trees, brick streets.

Musically -- obviously I'm not too informed on things but here's what I do know -- there's a pretty great core bunch of B-N "lifers" there my approximate age (30s-40s), who've all seemed to played in each others' bands and are fine musicians and real sweet people. Most of them played in a great, strange band called the Something Brothers, which was the toast of the B-N alternative scene for a few years in the mid-late '80s, and they stuck around and put down roots while continuing to have bands. Some of the people/bands from this interesting little scenelet include: The Spelunkers (broken up I think) featuring Tommy O'Donnell and bassist Clay Thompson, who also plays in something called The Colonel...Von Frickle, a King Krimsonesque combo with the excellent drummer John Ganser...Wiplot, a twisted pop combo fronted by Dean Carlson...The Thingies with Ed Pierce... and that's just a few of em. Lots more of these B-N good folks, and they're not hard to find. Go to Mother Murphy's the longstanding city-fathers-look-the-other-way head shop in downtown Normal, and ask if they have a local releases section... The one studio I know about is run by an engineer/Wiplot drummer Tony San Filipio, called Oxide Lounge (www.oxidelounge.com), 2" 24-track I think, looks like a nice facilty.

Obviously all this is coming from a dude who has no idea what the college kids have been doing there for the last 15 years, and no doubt there's plenty of that happening too.

Enjoy the B-N peace and quiet, there's plenty of it!

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