Reacting to this tragedy, nearly 150 people gathered Thursday in front of the New Brunswick City Hall in protest against police violence.  Most were friends of Mr. Deloatch, and identified the shooting as part of a long-term and ongoing attack on New Brunswick’s African American and Hispanic communities. I came by to see what was going on. Here is what I heard from members of the community affected by the tragedy, in their own words.

The sign reads: ASSASSINATED: Shawn Pox, Sissy Adams (Tanya Lanham’s drill team coach), Barry Deloatch, Silvia Parson and André Showell

Cedric Goodman, Middlesex Country Democratic Committee person, and friend of Mr. Deloatch, called for an independent and outside investigation into the matter. He claimed that the NBPD has a long history of racist and brutal behavior.

Nina Webb feels for the Deloatch family: “We went through the same thing. My brother got shot in the back seven times. He was twenty years old. I want justice for my mother, and I want justice for the Deloatch family.” Commenting on the New Brunswick Police, she said “You don’t have to draw your gun all the time. You’re trained to apprehend people by other means instead of deadly force. He was a nice man and I feel for his family.”

Several agreed that there needs to be an effort to include the police in the community. Protester Sarah Lee is tired of the police circumventing their own protocol: “Cops should be from here, from our community. They need to live here for three years in order to join NBPD but they keep faking their addresses and moving away as soon as they can.” Publisher and community activist Tanya Lanham is sad to see that the police make no effort to connect to youth from her area: “The police officers don’t visit the schools and the mayor doesn’t visit the schools. My son is 23 years old and he has never seen the people he is supposed to vote for.”

Her son has however had encounters with the police, having been searched twice, once when he was 13 and again last August.” According to Ms. Lanham, both searches were unlawful. She also says her sister’s husband has been pulled over with a frequency of “once a week” on Remsen Avenue for “the last five years.” She concludes, “I am scared to come outside.”

The family of Mr. Deloatch was also present at the protest, and could be singled out by that raw, dazed, and wounded aura that clings to those who have recently lost of someone dear. Mr. Deloatch’s brother, Bennie, is appalled that he never got a proper courtesy call from the police. “We were never notified,” he says. “I had a friend call me telling me he saw my brother get shot. I got out of bed and I rushed to the hospital as fast as I could, but he was already dead.” To him, the pieces don’t match up. Nate, his other brother, kept repeating “My brother should still be alive right now.”

This is not the first time the NBPD has faced criticism for its alleged use of excessive force, let alone the first time this year. One protester said his brother’s jaw was broken during an interrogation, and that frequent searches have become routine. Last February, Rutgers students Jake Kostman and Kareem Najjar sued for police violence after being beaten during a search on their Somerset student home (which can be seen here).

New Brunswick Mayor Jim Cahill had this to say: “It’s fully understandable that people want, demand answers to numerous questions that arise. I think that we need to be patient to make sure the answers that are given are accurate.”

Neither the Mayor nor the NBPD have commented further since…

_________________________

Photos by Ms. Kine Martinussen.

The Alamo has all the typical college basement trimmings – washing machines, water pipes dangling from the ceiling, spray painted mattresses leaning against the walls – but the small space brings the band and audience closer together. Erin, the singer/drummer/guitarist in Sun Puddles catches the eye of someone two feet in front of her and beams a smile as she digs into a 70s punk beat at hyperspeed. When the reverb-soaked wall-of-sound guitars start chugging, the smiles become contagious and the crowd instantly turns into a collection of life-sized bobble head dolls.

Given the poor quality of the PA systems at most DIY shows, singing is usually left by the wayside. But for Sun Puddles, Erin’s voice is their trump card. Songs like “Coffee Cup” make me think of indie pop bands like Velocity Girl or Best Coast where the vocals are pretty and melodious but with an emotional perspective that’s hard to place. At other times, her atonal howling brings to mind the raw emotive power of the Screaming Females, making you feel the frustration of unrequited love rather than think about what it means. When she trades places with the guitar player, the lyrics become sparser to make room for more intricate song structure and a heavier hitting drum sound. Even when she does very little singing on songs like “Congratulations . . . Sorry”, Erin’s stage presence is such that when the mic stand starts to collapse mid-song, people rush the stage to fix it in fear of missing a single word.

When the next band, Real Good, is ready to start all the lights go out except for a single red bulb in the corner shining on the drummer. As he sparks a cigarette and nods toward the emaciated shirtless bass player, I make some earplugs out of pieces of a paper towel in anticipation of demonic hard rock. What I get instead is closer to a mix between the twisted pop hooks of the Velvet Underground and Pavement’s artfully dissonant vocal style.

Though the bass player jumps around like Flea at an early 90s Chili Peppers concert, Real Good makes you feel like singing along more than headbanging. At the end of the song “Three Points”, front man John Terry repeats the chorus line “there is no wisdom without risk” but it’s done with the appropriate amount of Lo-Fi shamble to come off as playfully ironic instead of pretentiously nagging. Other songs like “May 21st” show the band’s strength at manipulating tension-and-release. The familiar feeling you get hearing dreamy psychedelic guitar tones at the beginning of the song is later betrayed when the beat gets turned around and the vocals strain to belt out a daft, unsettling sense of helplessness.

Toward the end of Real Good’s set, someone trips on an extension cord somewhere and the whole basement goes pitch black. Suddenly, people in the front row start shining their cell phones on the hands of the guitarist and bass player like pilgrims who bring candles to a vigil. It’s moments like these that make basement shows feel more like a spiritual community than a concert. But with bands like Sun Puddles and Real Good residing at the pulpit, the only Good News anyone is trying to lay on you is a flyer telling you about the next show.

My birthday happened to coincide with the first night of Labor Day weekend, after the weekend before was foiled by Hurricane Irene. Herds of freshmen roamed the streets: females wobbling in shoes too high and skirts too short and too tight and males just trying to look cool. They were drunk and excited, trying to find a party in unfamiliar territory– “Hey man, where’s Ray Street?” I took part in that ritual during my freshman year, around the time of my nineteenth birthday, though it made me uncomfortable. The idea of ratios revolted me, and the parties my friends and I were able to get into weren’t very fun. A lot has changed since then. I have retreated inward, into a smaller circle of friends who have my same values. I have found a place where my jokes are funny and where my opinions are valuable– a place to be myself. This place, this circle, has given me little reason to interact with Friday night on Easton Ave, and consequently I forgot about its existence. I have no real use for my freshman year memories now, but they all came flooding back in the minutes leading to my twenty first.

It was deja vu- surrounded by the people I didn’t understand, participating in rituals that confused me, situations that rattled me to my core. Two of my best friends and I walked the New Brunswick streets, overhearing conversations of little substance, forced to interact with the black out drunk as they demanded directions. I felt the situation and consequently felt myself slipping further and further out of control.

Earlier in the evening, the waitress at Stuff Yer Face showed me humanity when she smuggled me an orange wristband. After a beer that tasted exactly like pumpkin pie and a flat Blue Moon on tap, we left to pursue other options. We had no such luck. When a bouncer at the Ale n Witch let me in, I thought I had found the same humanity, but my hopes were dashed. I felt ashamed and humiliated as he ushered me out, especially as I was in the midst of embracing an acquaintance. In the bouncer’s eyes and in the eyes of the law, I was one hour and five minutes too young to drink. The absurdity of the situation was too much to handle. I had a conversation with the bouncer at Kelly’s when I was a half an hour older:

“Here’s my ID. I turn 21 at midnight, and I’m just wondering if you’ll let me in.”

“Well, if you come back in twenty minutes, I can let you in a few minutes early, but really there is nothing I can do.”

“I’m going to spend those twenty minutes wisely, I assure you. I’m going to spend the next twenty minutes growing as a human being to make me deserving of that legal sip of alcohol, don’t you worry. And when I come back, it will be as a changed human being. Someone worthy of a beer.”

“It sucks, I know, but there’s nothing I can do.”

I never did go back to Kellys or any other bar. I spent the last twenty minutes underage in an existential crisis. I began to feel an intense claustrophobia, though at the same time I felt lost and confused. As the drunk conversations grew louder around me — “I was, like, going to dye my hair red….” “Oh my god! My sister dyed her hair red!” — and stupider by the second, I completely lost it. I dissolved into a puddle, a mess I couldn’t clean up by myself. I felt the absurdity of a law that I disagree with and have been spending the past few years of my life trying to get around at all costs. I felt the pointlessness of trying to celebrate my birthday in the midst of these crowds of people I try my best to avoid.

In the end, I turned twenty one at home, surrounded by those two best friends, who helped me piece myself back together again. I didn’t have a drink until the next evening, when I invited the people I care about most to my house for a party, which wasn’t too much different than my last birthday party. And that night, with my crisis behind me, I celebrated my twenty first birthday and had the most fun I’ve had in a long, long time.

_________________________

Photo courtesy of www.whicheb5.com/blog

(http://www.whicheb5.com/blog/2010/03/18/why-it-is-important-to-apply-for-the-eb-5-visa-before-children-turn-21/)

Original songs like “Summer Vacation” are what the band does best – a mixture of compelling chords and grungy breakdowns that’s reminiscent of garage rock revival bands like Cage the Elephant. But despite Harpoon Forever’s tendency to keep songs under 3 minutes, the quartet also has enough classic rock influence to dig into longer jams. Case in point: the epic show closer, “Paddle to the Sea”, which starts out with bouncy alt-country strumming but then dissolves into building repetitions of krautrock drumbeats structuring Sonic Youth-style guitar mayhem. Sure, you can’t hear the lyrics over the P.A. but the sweaty exuberance of the singer and his hipster cowboy style say enough.

After the show, I walk a few blocks to another house, Titan’s Rest, where southern Connecticut band Fugue is making a stop on their 2-week tour. Outside, people are sitting on the driveway peering into the basement windows like stray cats. It’s not a packed house but it’s so hot inside that the girl drummer Alexa remarks, “I’m gonna pass out” with a look like she means it.

After a short break and some water, Alexa nods her head and kicks off the next song with an aggressive prog rock beat that sounds like early The Mars Volta. When the three guitars begin to fade in with lyrical melodies and the singer triggers a sample of birdcalls, it’s only to lure the audience into a false sense of security. Songs like “What the Tortoise Said to Achilles” prove that this band is all about contrast: clean tones are juxtaposed with distorted ones, soft sections suddenly burst into raucous thrashing, and the lead lines play tug-of-war with the rhythm section. With a name like Fugue it’s no surprise that most of the band’s catalogue is instrumental, but some songs feature vocals that provide emotional context and sound like tribal yells laced with Portishead-style effects.

When the band finishes their set and I walk back out into the sultry night of late July, it feels like air conditioning compared to the sauna I was just in. Summer basement shows in New Brunswick are not for the faint hearted, but with bands like Fugue and Harpoon Forever on the scene it seems like things are only going to get hotter.

_____________________________________

To listen to these bands, check out the links below:

NEW BRUNSWICK, NJ – coLAB Arts is pleased to present Waving to Solidarity, a one-month exhibition featuring the work of the emerging artists, Dave Peters and John Leschak, curated by Theresa Francisco. Our Opening and Second-Look Reception will take place on Thursday August 18th and September 15th from 7-10 PM at coLAB Arts (49 Bayard Street, 3rd Floor, New Brunswick, NJ 08901). These free receptions will feature complimentary wine, food, and live music. Custom made, interior design elements added by kliasi style.

Waving to Solidarity offers the viewer a glance at both meditative solitude and painful alienation through the artists’ formal conflicts with and emotional connections to, their environment and community. Dave Peters and John Leschak both work in a similar vein but their individual messages are quite opposite.

Dave Peters focuses on serene, biomorphic forms and quiet landscapes that are cerebral, captivating, and dream-like. Peters opens his subconscious and paints what comes naturally. This method often conjures up the repetition of imagery, creating both common, visual elements and narratives in many of his paintings. Even though Peters is very detail oriented, he wishes to keep his paintings ambiguous and open for personal interpretations. Dave Peters graduated from Rutgers University with a B.A. in Spanish Literature. Though colorblind, Peters is a self-taught painter and is working towards a full-time career in the arts.

John Leschak uses heavy symbolism to make a direct commentary on modern society. He contextualizes human passions, vices, and fears to illustrate their effects on relationships and the community at large. Though often depicting scenes of individual despair and powerlessness, Leschak believes his images can bring about a need for action and empowerment. John Leschak is a practicing labor law attorney at Weissman & Mintz and immigrant rights activist.

________________________________________________

CoLAB Arts is a non-profit organization located in New Brunswick, NJ, dedicated to the development and presentation of emerging local artists. coLAB Arts’ mission is to cultivate a hip, mindful, and inclusive Hub City community of artists, audiences, and critics, empowered to create inspired and inspiring art.

CoLAB is representative of the kind of organization that is so valuable to the promotion of the arts in an area that to many would seem bereft of cultural pursuits. They are a beacon of hope that enables otherwise unknown or unheard artists to connect with a wide audience. Like the Johnsonville Press, the people who are involved in the organization do it because they want to, because they are passionate about the arts, and because they want to give local artists the chance to be known and to promote themselves. They are making an incredibly valuable contribution to the growing cultural scene in New Brunswick.

I am proud of what they are doing for this community. It is my hope that they continue to gain support so that they, in turn, can continue to promote the arts with the same vigor and enthusiasm that I have already witnessed from them. I encourage the reader to visit their website to learn more about the organization and their mission. And please continue to check in with the Johnsonville Press for announcements of upcoming events. To the folks over at coLAB: keep up the good work! Cheers to you guys!

1.
This, my cluttered kitchen,
acts as pitiable throne room
for a semi-widowed queen,
whose king sits voluntarily dungeon-bound
in the well-lit basement,
with plasma screen television casting
manifold halos in the darkened times

which seem, dear Filia, to be all times –
every minute soot-black and dead.

2.
Filia, who was conceived first
and loved most, as far as our
emaciated love can go;
Filia, who was brought into being
in my belly on the night that he,
awestruck by my denial in the late bloom
of streetlights in summertimes,
threw himself to rest in the Raritan
(and we, his kith and kin, will never
know if it was by accident or self-decreed);
Filia, who was married and carried away
by a man who could give a full-bodied love
of more flesh than bone;

Filia, I consecrate you
(if that power is still mine)
high priestess of our dirty people.
With your head back, with your stomach
all awash in boxed wine, I can see you now,
saying, “No more and never again.”
But you cannot understand what still
needs to be said and these are things
which only you can say.

3.
Concerning the broken branch of our genealogy —
lopped off while still green, and green she remains
in unceremonious decay: My belly could not love her enough.
She’s swaddled soft in a hole in the earth. Perpetual reverse:
her tiny limbs spindling away.

She’s buried where you’d never think to look.
Take the long and crooked street through
our fallen kingdom’s awful heart.
That darling baby sister whose brow you never once kissed —
I birthed her straight to hell; from womb to Charon’s ferry.

Exhibition duration: June 3 –24, 2011
Opening Reception: Friday, June 10 @ 6:30-10:30pm
Open Studio: Thursday, June 16 @ 7 pm
Curator: Jewel Lim
Multiciplinary Event: TBA

The Alfa Art Gallery is proud to present “Abstraction and the Creative Unconscious,” the joint exhibition of Peter Arakawa and Rita Herzfeld. The works of Arakawa and Herzfeld create a world of the nonrepresentational, often conceived in moments of instinct and uncertainty. Each piece in this exhibition began as a mystery with the first brushstroke and stresses the artist’s journey to reach a conclusion. The title of this show “Abstraction and the Creative Unconscious” highlights the process in which creativity fosters and is fostered by artists from all walks of life. For Arakawa and Herzfeld, the end results of these processes are phenomenal. Arakawa, who paints from his observations of daily life, successfully combines patterns and shapes that are unlikely together. In her work, Herzfeld’s brushstrokes are dominant players, suspended in a state of movement in a stationary painting. The works in this exhibition present themselves as if conceived in the midst of fresh inspiration, whether from the moving strokes or the busy arrangements within them. What this exhibition states is that there is ultimately no conclusion to the artist’s journey: the paintings, with theiruncontained “moving strokes” and busy environments, exhibit that solutions only create new mysteries so that new works can be given birth to.

About the Artists

Peter Arakawa obtained his MFA from Mason Gross School of the Arts at Rutgers University. He became an artist through the influences of creative family members. Arakawa has been a professional artist for over twenty-five years. His works are held in many institutions and museums, including the Zimmerli Art Museum, Newark Public Library, Jersey City Museum, the State Museum, Hunterdon Art Museum and Johnson & Johnson Corporation.

Rita Herzfeld attended the School of Visual Arts and City College of N.Y. and obtained her BA from Rutgers University. Inspired by her artistic mother, Herzfeld became an artist who grew up believing in the power that comes with creation and its processes from simple tools such as pencil and paper. Her works are held in the Hunterdon Museum of Art, the Zimmerli Art Museum and various private collections.

(click here to learn more about this event)

This program is sponsored in part by:

New Brunswick City Market

NJ State Council on the Arts

Big Fat Marker is an indie rock band from South Jersey who operate out of the greater Philadelphia area. While “indie rock” may be the easiest classification for their sound, it is not entirely accurate. They describe themselves as a folk rock band and I am inclined to agree. The combination of great vocal harmonies, well composed lyrics, and gripping melodies makes me want to hear more and more. The songs “Morning Man,” “N’After” and “Sun Salutation” particularly exemplify those characteristics which makes this band so much fun to listen to.

I encourage, no–I implore the Johnsonville readers to listen to this band. If you like what you hear, then download their EP! I would also urge you, the reader, to go see a live performance. Based on my own experience seeing them play, I can confidently say that they put on a great show. On that note, in the coming weeks be sure to check back with the Johnsonville Press to watch our video with an interview with the band and a JVP exclusive performance!

To check out and download their music, please visit their website:
Big Fat Marker

Also find them on Facebook to stay up-to-date on upcoming performances!

Happy Listening!

____________________

Photo taken by Mr. Jonathan Schoonover. All rights reserved.