Monday, December 19, 2011

nightswimming

hi


not every girl is a riot girl

interview with the lovely anders from battle helm

Tuesday, November 15, 2011

scorpios + solidarity = show saturday

We are playing a show on Saturday November 19 and it is a partial benefit for the Colima Community in El Salvador!

The Mitten • 49th and Kingsessing in West Philly • 8pm for realz • with Des Ark, Lovers, Bore War and Trophy Wife.

For more information about the show or about the benefit, email me at trophywifetheband(at)gmail.com.

Here is some information from Emily, a friend of mine who has been working with this community of strong and inspiring women in El Salvador for a long time:

As many of you may or may not have heard/seen (esp. since it has received very little U.S. coverage), last month, Nicaragua and El Salvador have been blasted by hurricanes, flooding and tropical storms. The rain was catastrophic: flooding, landslides, immense damage to roads, homes, and bridges, leaving tens of thousands displaced. Nearly 70% of this year’s crops across the country were washed away. Many scientists have commented that because of its geographic position, El Salvador is currently receiving the full force of climate change effects that will also shortly be seen and experienced by many of us elsewhere.

Further, since Colima lies directly on the banks of the Acelhuate River, it has been particularly devastated by these recent inundations. This particular river was completely reshaped some thirty years ago by the introduction of massive hydroelectric dams along its route (whose power-production is aimed not at residents but heavily polluting export industries) that have left the marginalized communities on its banks as the victims of intense toxic contamination/exposure and frequent wash-outs.

This follows on the heels of disastrous flooding which occurred only a little over year ago, that likewise wiped out the crops and harvests of nearly 3/4s of Colima’s residents. In both cases, it should be understood that this represents a loss of not only whatever self-produced food security folks might have access to, but also all hope of future income from labor in harvesting or working the fields of some of the larger local landplots. In other words, it means the crippling loss for poor families of an already barely survivable nutritive and economic base simultaneously.

Two women, Noemy and Morena, are the single openly queer couple in Colima. Further, the neighborhood they live in, Los Potreritos, is made up almost entirely of households headed by single women with children. Two companions and I here in the U.S. have been generally trying across the year to provide emergency support as able, but the scale of the current disaster requires a much larger community effort. What little resources myself and others have been able to send Colima’s way in this past set of days has been immediately redistributed in the form of food, water and basic necessities throughout the entire neighborhood and then further afield. The women in this neighborhood (and Noemy and Morena in particular) are a source of constant inspiration for me in terms of their capacity for self-organization, collective caretaking and the ability to make very few materials make a very significant impact. In these current hours, the necessity for just that simply couldn’t be higher.

Most of you [reading] this are yourselves members of variously queer, poor and marginalized communities here in the United States, and as such, many of us are intimately familiar with the struggle, gift and necessity of forging alternative family and support structures in those moments when neither the state nor other institutions either can (or can be bothered to) provide access points to basic survival needs. Increments of $5,$10,$25,$50 will make a huge difference right now in terms of helping folks there in Colima to make it through this acute stage until the waters recede.

I am all too aware in writing this that there are hundreds, even thousands, of acute situations going on throughout the world that likewise would benefit from our attentions – many of them occurring mere feet away from our doorsteps, if not within our own households. However, to that reality I can only respond that we have to, as always, practice the solidarity of which we are capable where and as and whenever we are able.

If you can donate, in whatever increment, please do. You can either mail it to me or drop it off (at 5001 Chester Ave #1R, Philadelphia, PA 19143) or donate online via paypal by clicking here: donate. In every case, whatever comes in I will just bundle together and send via Western Union in their directions. In the words of Noemy and Morena: “Please give our greetings to your friends and family on the part of all the people here in Colima. Many hugs and kisses. Take good care. Con carino.”

And please accept not only their greetings, but also my own. As so many are shouting right now from the various corners across the globe, “Another world is not only possible, it is necessary.” Here’s to all the many creative, difficult, various, tendrilled and amazing ways in which we shall also necessarily have to build it.

Thursday, November 10, 2011

doylestown newspaper

interview.review from recent show in doylestown

Monday, November 7, 2011

birthdays

so my birthday is coming up. and it made me think of this thing i wrote for someone on their 33rd birthday. thought id share.

33 you are
woman child cub
like the record
33 times around
like the music
to make sound
fingertips feel 33 years
of raw life
a year as a record
of an event
of fall winter
spring summer
one time around
oh how much sound
explodes into the air
into open arms yet
sometimes on deaf ears
so it bounces back hard
hurts but reminds
you of you
save some sound for you
as a salve
on tired bursting heart
and cracked worn fingers
mother to sound and thought
painful delirious birth
33 times around
sing your desire
for then you will
sing your life
fully wholly in its possibility

Monday, October 24, 2011

recent show

we had a chance to play at ras cafe in DC a few weeks back as part of Uptown Friday Nights with the amazing DC band Laughing Man and incredible spoken word artist natalie illum. It was a benefit for Life Pieces to Masterpieces.

a new dc friend of ours captured a video of one of our new songs which will be on our next record to be coming out in the near future. check that here.

thanks a million to art under pressure for helping work with us on the show. if you need music, clothing, skateboarding stuff, custom graphics, art supplies and you are anywhere near washington, dc, go there.

Sunday, September 25, 2011

john cage- how to get started

I did a project modeled after John Cage's "How to Get Started" piece about our band. I chose ten words to describe my collaborative creative process and relationship with Diane. Discussion on those themes is layered on top of each other, as Cage did, on the subject of how one gets started in the creative process. I wanted to share it here.
-ko

Friday, September 2, 2011

new record

so my band is going to the studio this weekend to make our second record. well, we're starting the process. at this moment, im feeling the weight of expectations, for which im totally responsible... but it also does come from hoping we make something exciting, relevant and interesting, something that contributes to cultural creation in general but also to culture in the context of social change.

for me, recording is exciting and cathartic. at the end there will be this tangible object- thoughts, emotions and heart embodied in something that i can hold in my hands. but the birthing process is demanding and intense and in the middle of it i wonder if its all worth it. for katy and i, our songs are very wrapped up in our separate and mutual emotional, physical and mental struggles so that while recording, there is a reliving of all the shit we've navigated by writing these songs; its impossible not to unearth some of what we have buried in them. there is also this desire to have one of the more permanent manifestations of all that struggle and intensity and growth be what you want it to be, to sound like you want it to. to be a good representation of where and what it comes from. i guess thats why we named the record sing what scares you.

Wednesday, August 24, 2011

quakes

a dear friend shared this article with me post-earthquake yesterday.

What Coverage of the Earthquake can teach us about the LGBT Movement by Reverend Emily Martin, from Mineral, VA

Monday, August 22, 2011

trophy wife teeshirts


buy our shirts and hoodies online! tees are 10 bucks and 15-20 for a hoodie plus a few extra for shipping. get in touch if you are interested. i also could probably make you something with custom color/size if you wanted.

trophywifetheband(at)gmail.com

Friday, July 8, 2011

active, apparent, clear, live, manifest, obvious, open, public

we will combat latent inequality together tonight in dc at c.l.i.t. fest.

article in washington city paper here

st stephens 1525 newton street nw 6pm

Monday, May 2, 2011

euro tour

we leave on sunday the 8th! in less than 1 week. check here for more info! http://lamoustache.org/booking-trophy-wife-may-june/

10.05. Amsterdam (NL) – OT301
11.05. Utrecht (NL) – dB’s (w/ Wooden Horse Toy)
12.05. Köln (D) – Tsunami Club (w/ Soldout)
13.05. NEED HELP!
14.05. Malmö (S) – Rex
15.05. Lund (S) – Hemgården (w/ Young Animal Presents)
16.05. NEED HELP!
17.05. Aalborg (DK) – 1000 Fryd (w/ Witches)
18.05. Hamburg (D) – Rote Flora
19.05. Potsdam (D) – Black Fleck (w/ Sissters)
20.05. Berlin (D) – Bei Roy (w/ Ex Best Friends)
21.05. Leipzig (D) – Ladyfest @ Zoro
22.05. Chemnitz (D) – Oberstübchen
23.05. Linz (A) – Stadtwerkstatt
25.05. Tabor (CZ) – Musik Club Orion
26.05. Würzburg (D) – Cairo (w/ Parts & Labor)
27.05. Nürnberg (D) – K4 (w/ Forgetters, Witches)
28.05. Darmstadt (D) – Oetinger Villa (w/ Grand Griffon + Caleya + Cannon For Cordoba)
29.05. München (D) – Kafe Kult
30.05. Zürich (CH) – Binz Squat
31.05. Lyon (F) – Sonic (w/ Kellies)
01.06. Winterthur (CH) – GGS31
02.06. Basel (CH) – Villa Rosenau
03.06. Dijon (F) – Les Tanneries
04.06. Milano (I) – Villa Vegan
05.06. NEED HELP!
06.06. NEED HELP!
07.06. Toulouse (F) – La Dynamo (w/ hooker)
08.06. Le Mans (F) – Le 80
09.06. Strasbourg (F) – Mudd Club
10.06. Nancy (F) – SoapBoxClub
11.06. Göttingen – Antifee Festival

Thursday, February 24, 2011

video from recent shows

this is a new song: the gunpowder is at your house.

Brooklyn DIY: Trophy Wife 2.19.11

this is a new song: dead composers dance alone.

(((unartig))): Trophy Wife 1.22.11

Tuesday, January 25, 2011

lyrics

lyrics to the songs on our record are now posted at the bottom of the page, just fyi.

Friday, January 21, 2011

Shoooows

tonight!
friday january 21
cake shop (lower east side NYC)
w/ tournament, universal order of armageddon
8pm

sunday january 23
barbary (phila)
w/ northernmost, universal order of armageddon
7pm

thursday january 27
starlight ballroom (phila)
w/ cymbals eat guitars, dismemberment plan
8pm

new interview at philly city paper HERE


first there, it proves to still be here.
distant as seen, it comes then to be near.
i found it here and there unclear.

what if my hand had only been
extension of an outside reaching in
to work with common means to change me then?

all things are matter, yet these seem
caught in the impatience of a dream,
locked in the awkwardness they mean.

robert creeley- the tools
(thanks bethany)