“First of all, there’s no such fucking thing as high art anymore,” says Joowan Kim, leader of the Ensemble Mik Nawooj—a group that melds hip-hop and classical music to create singular and postmodern songs.

Kim, who began pioneering this hybrid sound in his final years at the Berklee School of Music, says he wanted to exit the “crazy fucking cult” of entitled Eurocentricity in the classical, “art music” scene. And he found a way out after examining the work of pioneering hip-hop producer, J-Dilla.

“J-Dilla is on the same level as Thelonious Monk and probably Mozart,” Kim says of the late Detroit beatmaker, known for his meticulous sampling and repurposing of recorded jazz and soul music.

In the same way that Dilla meticulously combed through crates of old records—extracting riffs and rhythms, and using the disparate sonic scraps to build beats—Kim is using his classical training and an ensemble of chamber musicians and two emcees, to construct fully fledged hip-hop tracks.

An immigrant from South Korea, Kim doesn’t fit the typical hip-hop mold and readily admits he isn’t an authority on “the culture.” But his use of sampling fits squarely in the genre and the American melting-pot style of creation.

“What I’m sampling is the methodology of classical music,” he says. “The essence of hip-hop is disruption. And the quintessential element that makes hip-hop unique is you can take something that exists already, take it apart and put it together in your own way—creating your own thing. It’s accessible and rigorous at the same time. And it’s definitely not classical.”

Kim forsakes typical hip-hop arrangements for whatever pace tickles his fancy and fits his artistic vision. His tracks substitute the electro-enhancement of modern beats for the roundness of the 10-piece Mik Nawooj Ensemble, which includes a cellist, a flautist, a clarinetist and an opera-trained soprano. For the last Super Bowl, held at Levi’s Stadium in Santa Clara, Mik Nawooj were commissioned to reimagine the Marlena Shaw classic, “California Soul.”

Contrasting with the caramel-smoothness of the original, Kim’s version is set to a relentless, head-banging beat—broken up by haunting string interludes and laced with ghostly wails. The group’s two MCs, Do D.A.T. and Sandman, fill the track with a meticulous description of California’s history: namechecking everything from the state’s many indigenous tribes to its better known professional sports franchises and natural landmarks.

The group’s most powerful song comes in a the form of a reimagining of the Wu-Tang Clan’s “C.R.E.A.M.” While the original Wu track serves as a gritty examination of the danger and glamour of street life, Mik Nawooj transforms the track into a melancholy lament of modern greed. In the accompanying gray-scale music video, diverse and dejected Americans break the fourth wall, rapping along with the chorus: “Cash rules everything around me.” The familiar lyrics, along with the additional words provided by Do D.A.T. and Sandman highlight the callousness of the American financial system.

“You can’t top the classic,” Kim says. “So I took musical elements that I found to be essential and then I started tweaking it slowly. By the end, you can’t even recognize it, but it’s a logical progression. We don’t call it a cover, we call it deconstruction.”

Ultimately, the marriage of these two genres shouldn’t shock that much. Lin Manuel-Miranda’s hip-hop musical Hamilton shattered barometers of Broadway success. Nas, Kanye West and Kendrick Lamar have all done concerts accompanied by symphonies. And like those artists, Mik Nawooj aren’t a tongue-in-cheek experiment. Rather, they make a bold statement about rap’s place within our culture. Kim considers himself “a serious composer” who crafts the next wave of “indigenous American art music” by elevating hip-hop to its rightful place.

“Classical training made me think a certain way,” he says. “It’s a very logical way. It’s a beautiful system that I can rely on to make it cohere. And hip-hop is very much about expression. It’s a lot like jazz. There’s an exciting creativity. I learned to be rigorous from classical music. Hip-hop made me free.”

Ensemble Mik Nawooj
Jun 11, 7:30pm, $12-$15
SLG Art Boutiki, San Jose

WATCH: Kim Joowan explains the philosophy behind his genre bending group.

Prince Sole may have already hit radio waves with two songs from his latest mixtape, but he hasn’t gone national yet. Just don’t tell that to a very young fan of his.

“It’s funny—every time my girl’s daughter hears a Drake record on the radio, she thinks it’s me,” Sole jokes while working inside a home studio tucked deep in the East San Jose foothills, worlds away from distractions.

The studio rat will transition from the booth to the stage this Friday at Art Boutiki, where he’s set to co-headline a show with Fresno singer The Kid Ryan, his creative partner on their recently released Call Waiting mixtape. It’s been a long time coming.

Whether it was his sister playing pop, his parents spinning Earth, Wind and Fire, or the Jodeci CD his cousin gifted him, music has surrounded Sole from a very early age.

Born and raised in San Jose, Sole—née Nick Martinez—attended St. Lawrence Academy on an athletic scholarship. He began making beats when a friend on his traveling basketball team gave him a copy of the production program Fruity Loops. It wasn’t long before Sole was hooked on making beats.

A few years later, while he was studying at De Anza, one of his tracks started generating buzz on MySpace, and Slip-N-Slide Records—best known for signing Miami rapper Trick Daddy—came calling with a single deal. The extensive contract language scared Sole, so he decided to attend Musicians Institute in L.A. to ensure he understood it all in the future.

After returning from L.A., he connected with production partner Difi. Once the duo brought Cisco Cortez into the fold, Dreem Teem was born. Sole says he handles much of the arranging, while Difi and Cortez produce the raw beats.

Friends outside of the studio, Sole says his musical partners have helped him maintain focus as he has continued his slog through the notoriously challenging music industry. “I probably would’ve given up on music a long time ago if it wasn’t for these guys,” he says. “Without them, none of this would be where we’re at.”

The group has started to make serious headway recently. Two songs from Call Waiting, “Picture Me Rollin” and “Lately,” have been getting national radio play—on the likes of 106.1 KMEL and L.A.’s Power 106, as well as other stations in California, Arizona and Texas. Plus, members of the Dreem Teem have both individually and collectively produced projects by singers Molia and Callé, and rapper City Shawn. Cisco Cortez handled the lion’s share of production on Call Waiting. It’s fair to say that the group is helping define San Jose’s R&B and hip-hop sound at the moment.

The 15-song Call Waiting fits well with much of what’s currently on radio—especially album opener “Picture Me Rollin,” complete with bouncy synths and a sing-along ready hook. Calling the sound “very ’90s and upbeat,” he says the Call Waiting “just came together organically. This was the easiest project for me to do. It felt the most natural.”

Sharing the credit, Sole says Cisco Cortez “had a great ear for how me and Ryan sound well together.” Having previously worked with the two on Sole single “She Ain’t Fucking with Me,” he’d have beats chosen for them as soon as they entered the studio.

Though his new project just dropped, Sole has already begun work on the next. Nothing’s solidified yet—he’s waiting for feedback from Call Waiting before cementing anything.

He may not be on the top 40 airwaves yet, but Sole and Dreem Teem know they’re on the right track. Periodically, they get feedback from DJs praising them for their consistent sound quality. They’ve also been getting calls from people like the East Palo Alto-based Hoodstarz, who they once thought were unattainable.

“When people who you used to look up to want to work with you, it makes you feel like you’re doing something right,” he says. “If they see it, then you know something good is going on.”

Friday’s performance at Art Boutiki will also include performances from Molia and Craig White.

Prince Sole and The Kid Ryan are performing at SLG Art Boutiki on March 27. More info. 

For most bands, it takes years of gigging and building a local following before they’re ready to embark on their first tour. Berkeley’s psychedelic indie-folk band Big Tree went about this whole process in reverse order. For five years they jumped around from location to location, doing a lot of touring in-between, never really having a local scene. In 2011, they finally settled in the Bay Area for an actual home to call their own.

“Going back and forth and not really having a sense of identity geographically was just becoming exhausting. It’s really hard to finally get settled and have a community and then pack up and leave again. We love touring, but you can’t do it all the time,” says lead singer/pianist Kaila Mcintyre-Bader.

The band officially started in New York. Mcintyre-Bader and bassist Luke Bace (and later guitarist Danny Pirello) met in college and formed Big Tree with a group of musicians. Though their blend of psychedelic rock, folk, soul and sunny-pop wasn’t necessarily a bad fit for New York, they felt that they struggled to fit in personality-wise, particularly when they moved to the exceedingly hip Brooklyn.

“I kind of felt like our enthusiasm didn’t fit in, like we were way too excited and happy to be in a band and playing music. I feel like if we acted a little cooler, things would have worked out better for us there, but we were like, ‘Yeah! We’re so excited to be here!’ And everyone was like, ‘Really?’” Mcintyre-Bader says.

They ended up in Connecticut at one point, and even Marin, before they officially moved here. (Mcintyre-Bader grew up in Marin.) Even though one of the problems the band faced with Brooklyn was the high cost of living, somehow the equally expensive Bay Area felt different.

“I feel like if you look hard enough in the Bay Area, you can find a quality of life for the amount that you would pay in New York that is 10 times better. You get a lot more out of it. You can get a cute little apartment and ride your bike everywhere. It’s nice,” says Mcintrye-Bader. “I wanted to come back to the Bay Area. I told everybody, you don’t have to come with me, but this is where I want to be and I think we can all really thrive, where I think our music could do well too.”

Before the band left New York, they asked a girl they barely knew, Anna Ghezzi, if she wanted to join Big Tree, tour across the country and move to California. Surprisingly she said yes.

“I was totally expecting her to say, ‘Absolutely not!’ because that was insane. She was teaching at the time. She was like, ‘I’m ready to try the music thing, take it a little more seriously,’” Mcintrye-Bader recalls.

Their drummer, on the other hand, decided to quit on the way to California. Though he finished the tour out, Big Tree was going to be drummer-less as soon as they settled into their new Californian home. However, drummer Matt Schory saw Big Tree play—at the one California show their old drummer played before returning home—and was anxious to join.

“When we moved here, the hope was very much to be a part of a community. At the same time we had really no clue what that meant and what the community was. It just happened that our sound and the sound that a lot of people are going for out here are somewhat complementary,” Bace says.

Although the blend of indie-folk, psychedelic-pop and overall sunny sound fits right in with the Bay Area music scene, one element Big Tree are still adjusting to is how laid back everyone can be.

“Sometimes we play a show that I think is good, and has high energy, but people are so mellow in the Bay Area, it’s not apathetic, it’s a degree of mellowness. I kind of want to challenge people to be like, ‘Hey, get crazy and bump into each other a little bit!” says Bace.

Fri 4
Big Tree (with Curious Quail, Dogcatcher and the Plastic Arts)
Art Boutiki, San Jose
Fri, 7:30pm, $10

When Dan Vado first got word he would have to close his comic shop and local music venue SLG Art Boutiki on Market Street in San Jose, he figured he’d just move all the graphic novels to his garage and continue to run the publishing part of his business, Slave Labor Graphics.

But then he found a new location on 44 Race Street. He has transformed the new building into a space that is much cozier than the downtown location, plus it’s situated just off The Alameda where he’s getting more foot traffic than ever before.

“We would go days without seeing someone walk in the front door at the old place, whereas we have customers coming in here every day now,” Vado says.

The front room of the new building is now a small, but spacious, inviting retail store with graphic novels, comics, local music and oddball gifts. The back room doubles as a tiki-themed lounge and a live-music venue, which will be tested for the first time on June 29 with Art Boutiki favorites Picture Atlantic, Cartoon Bar Fight and Cold Eskimo.

Vado has already placed several couches in the lounge, and plans to install a coffee bar, as well as several shelves packed with comic books and graphic novels. “People can just come in here and buy some coffee and sit around and read comics all day if they wanted to,” Vado says.

As different as the new space is, there still remains the iconic wall of vinyl records, which is situated directly behind the stage. This time around, Vado has added a row of enlarged CD art by several of the local and national bands that played the Art Boutiki on a regular basis during the Market Street location’s four-year run as a music venue: Curious Quail, Cartoon Bar Fight, Drop Dead Sixty, Dogcatcher and Picture Atlantic. There’s even a fake jazz-style cover of Zen Zenith, singer of the now-defunct Please Do Not Fight, who was a big part of the club’s music scene.

The other side of Art Boutiki’s live-music scene is jazz. Vado brought in jazz musicians to perform during some First Fridays, which was the Art Boutiki’s busiest day of the month, and monthly jazz jams. With the new venue, he will continue to do jazz events, but he hopes to expand into even more musical genres as well.

“There’s not a lot of venues for rock music, but there’s really not a lot of venues for music beyond that,” Vado says. “Bluegrass? Country Western? Americana? Who’s booking that kind of stuff? I’d like to try to start to build an audience that will do stuff like that.”

This is just one of the many ideas Vado has floating around his head. He wants to continue to book only about three to four rock shows a month, like he did at the old location, but he’s considering adding comedy nights and shows for songwriters to play songs, and then do a Q&A with their audience explaining what inspired songs.

In 2009, when Vado started booking live music, he got a lot of different kinds of bands. He refined his booking to include mostly indie rock. The Art Boutiki really became a mainstay in the local indie-rock scene once Zenith and Picture Atlantic’s Nikolaus Bartunek started to curate the successful bi-monthly Rock Hop series, which started in 2011.

Though the Rock Hop is no more, Zenith and Bartunek are also floating around ideas for the new Art Boutiki space.

“We have a lot of plans of curating there, events that are music related, but don’t necessarily always have a band playing,” Bartunek says.

One new idea Vado has already implemented is Midtown Beat, held every fourth Friday with live jazz and local art—The Alameda’s answer to First Fridays in the SoFA District. This Friday, the second Midtown Beat will feature comic book artist Mick Gray’s work.

Vado is trying to talk the rest of the businesses in the area to participate in Midtown Beat. So far tattoo shop the Arsenal and clothing and boutique store the Usuals have joined in.

“It’s very difficult in today’s environment to sell anything because people can find it ultimately cheaper online,” Vado says. “What you need to be able to sell is an experience—a neat place to come to, a place that’s not going to chase you out, a place that wants people to come in and get into this stuff, music or comics or whatever. We’re trying to sell that experience.”

Picture Atlantic, Cartoon Bar Fight and Cold Eskimo
Art Boutiki San Jose
June 29 7:30pm
$10

Celebrated local venue and comic-book shop SLG Art Boutiki will throw two nights of packed programming before its South Market Street location closes for good to make way for a new residential development.

On March 15, SLG Art Boutiki hosts Drop Dead Sixty, Curious Quail, Fossil Tree, Brooke D and 8:19. March 16 features Picture Atlantic, Bent Knee, Little Red Lung, Rin Tin Tiger and Zen Zenith. As the venue’s last shows, the weekend includes some of the owner’s top groups.

“They’re all personal favorites of mine,” says Dan Vado’s, owner of SLG Art Boutiki. Vado says that no band turned the gig down. “People made the time,” he says. “They’re trying to make sure we end on a high note.”

Asked why the space holds a personal reverence for so many, Vado cites Art Boutiki’s willingness to let anyone shine onstage. “We took the same approach to giving bands a space as we did publishing comics—it’s all about what you can do with your art,” he explains. “If a musician takes themselves seriously, we’ll bring them back.”

Art Boutiki will be moving from its current space to a location on Race Street near The Alameda. Vado sees the move as an opportunity to get involved with a growing midtown scene that’s become populated with boutiques and specialty shops over the last few years.

Although he isn’t sure what the neighborhood reception will be for live music at the new location, his outlook remains confident: “I’m thinking we’ll be OK; we don’t run rowdy shows.”

While he’s sad to be leaving downtown, Vado said his landlord told him 11 years ago that there were plans to develop the building eventually. However, he says he wishes there was a way for it to be converted to something other than residential space.

“No one saw potential for that corner to be anything other than some middle- to high-rise development,” he says.

With San Jose turning downtown into what Vado calls a “bedroom community,” it’s hard for venues like Art Boutiki to compete with money gained through redevelopment.

Though Art Boutiki may have only hosted a small community, it was fervent. To Vado, that passion is worth something. He just wishes downtown saw value in helping develop that passion.

“It’s the little guy people really get behind,” Vado muses. Despite a tough location, Art Boutiki was able to create a scene that resonated with both bands and patrons. As the venue awaits its reception on Race Street, yet another live music space turns vacant downtown.

Read more about SLG Art Boutiki in Metro’s Archives.

Dan Vado, owner of comics and local music hub SLG Art Boutiki, announce that his shop and local music venue will move from its longtime home in the SoFA District to a new location near the Alameda, across from Mexico Lindo, next to Freebirds.

A select few who have the new location at at 44 Race Stree are excited for the potential to host live music, an issue that Vado was concerned with when he announced SLG would have to move from its current SoFA District location. Though no longer positioned in downtown San Jose to gain foot traffic from South First Fridays the new location is surrounded by businesses that complement the interests of people who already frequent SLG, such as The Usuals, Black & Brown, Current Tattooing and more.

The new location could host shows at the front of the venue spaces and the back area has potential green rooms, storage space, a kitchen, and load-in-load out areas, but Vado is holding off on discussing details until he gets closer to moving and reopening at the new location.

The current Art Boutiki on Market Street has two final shows on March 15th and the 16th (details TBA) before the move.

Dan Vado, owner of San Jose comic book hub and live music venue SLG Art Boutiki, announced this week that the business must relocate to make way for a new apartment building.

After 11 years at the current SoFA District location, Vado will have to find a new location to call home.

“The property is scheduled to be razed and have an apartment building built,” Vado says. “When that will happen, we’re not sure, but we were informed that we should be looking for a new place to do business.”

However, the relocation date for SLG Art Boutiki remains unclear as plans to redevelop the property are still being finalized. “Based on the estimate, we could probably stay until the end of the summer,” Vado says. “However, if something presents itself before that time, we’re going to go.”

Photo by Jessica Shirley-Donnelly.

The Art Boutiki has hosted regular all-ages concerts for the last three years. A fundraiser was held less than a month ago to replace  a violin stolen from Curious Quail’s violinist Alan Chen. Bands brought in their families and friends, and spread the word about the cause which, in turn, brought in other supporters who helped raise funds for a new instrument.

“It’s rare to see such strong community come together to help a fellow musician and it just gave me warm fuzzies,” says Zen Zenith, co-founder of the bimonthly concert series the Rock Hop. “I can’t imagine that it would happen anywhere other than Art Boutiki.”

The quirky décor of the performance space—tikis, comic books and t-shirts displayed for sale, a vinyl record stage backdrop and the infamous penguin always on stage—is also a favorite among many local bands.

“It’s one of the few venues where I can walk in and be able to say hi to everyone that works there,” says Daniel Hernandez Martinez, drummer of Picture Atlantic. “It feels more of a hangout spot then a venue, which sets it apart from most places where I’ve performed.”

The plans to move are inevitable but, for now, Vado is continuing to do business with the support of the building owners. “They’ve been very supportive of us as tenants as we’ve changed our business,” Vado says. “I value that relationship.”

In the meantime, Vado is searching for a new home that will accommodate all of his needs, and hopefully provide another all-ages venue.  “I am hoping to continue to do live music, but the places where I can do that are limited and difficult to get into,” Vado says.

People like to throw the word ‚”eclectic‚” around to describe many a band, but in the case of locals Contra Ville, I can think of no better word. Apparently, neither can they. Their new album, to be released at their show on Nov. 17 at SLG Art Boutiki, is called Electric Eclectic, which pretty much says it all.

Contra Ville won the award for best jazz band at Metro‘s recent SVSX awards, and jazz is definitely a major component of their sound, but so are indie rock, hip-hop, blues and world beat. The band’s earlier recordings tended to pull more from jazz fusion (in the vein of Weather Report and Return to Forever), but Electric Eclectic also takes a lot of inspiration from early swing jazz, evident on opening track “Bombastic Child,” the heavier “Before” and the toe-tapping “Honey” But these aren’t strictly swing songs; they are as stylistically mixed as anything Contra Ville has ever released.

A highlight to Contra Ville albums and shows is their frequent collaboration with local alternative rapper Lucid Optics. On his own recordings, Lucid Optics deploys a wide range of samples and backing instrumentation; when he joins forces with Contra Ville, that tactic makes for some downright unusual rap.

“Sand” opens with several minutes of Beach Boys-like vocal soundscapes, which are as natural for Lucid Optics to rap over as old school boom-bam beats are for other rappers. A special treat for longtime Contra Ville fans is an actual studio recording of the eerie “Contra Villains,” which has served as a sort of theme song for the band. The prior album contained a live recording of the song, but the studio version really captures the nuances. It is the perfect example of what is so great about Contra Ville. They seamlessly meld components like a driving piano part, jazz undertones, tribal rock & roll rhythms, offbeat vocals and a David Bowie reference.

Art Boutiki
Saturday, Nov 17, 7pm; $10

Before they broke up a decade ago, bizarro Bay Area folk duo Bobby Joe Ebola and the Children MacNuggits were getting regular national airplay on Dr. Demento’s show by shocking people with funny and politically incorrect lyrics. But it wasn’t their scene; they really just wanted to hang out with the punks.

“We realized that if we wanted to continue on the novelty circuit, we’d be playing for fat male virgins in Hawaiian shirts and kazoos. We were young. We liked girls,” says singer Corbett Redford.

But the legendary punk venue Gilman, for instance, said they weren’t punk enough, telling them they were “Beavis and Butthead playing silly folk music.” With songs like “All My Friends Are Drug Fiends” and “The Dog Ate My Baby” (the two that got the most airplay), it was easy to mistake them for some kind of unhinged comedy act.

“We never considered ourselves a ‘joke’ band and found we were kind of occasionally too surly, artful or political for the wacky folks,” says Redford.

The duo got their first chance to play Gilman in 1998 when Eggplant, a local East Bay scenester, vouched for them. They started to draw fans from different scenes.

“Ten or so U.S. tours and tons of regional trips have brought us punks, rockers, indie, theater, comedy and other weird fans,” Redford says.

But it seemed that the more people started actually taking them seriously, the more pressure they felt. Eventually, in 2000, it got to the point where it put a strain on their friendship and they broke up.

They got together unexpectedly nine years later. Initially, they were collaborating on what was supposed to be a pilot for an animated show called A Sausage Named Clarence. It was based off of an old rock opera they wrote. As they worked on it, they composed a few new songs, which inspired them to play a few shows. By 2010, they were going full throttle again. The new Bobby Joe Ebola and the Children MacNuggits were a bit more restrained, not as overtly offensive and more obviously satirical.

“I think the suburbs made us crazy, and age made us a little less so,” Redford says.