Saturday, May 14, 2011

Scenester Pick of the Day: The Donkeys at Replay / The Bourgeois Pig Is the 5th Greatest College Coffee Shop in America

It's a frigid summer weekend in Larryville, and we recommend you warm up tonight with the warm California sounds of The Donkeys at the Replay. They're a favorite of the scenesters down at Love Garden (and vice versa: the band praises Love Garden on their website). Pitchfork is only lukewarm on their latest release Born With Stripes (they give it a 6.3), but look at these two blurbs, which should prove very enticing to both scenesters and geeks, respectively:

"Pavement's influence provides the Donkeys with an overlooked portal through which to interpret all that classic rock [the Byrds, Flying Burrito Brothers, Buffalo Springfield, the Grateful Dead]"

"A couple of years ago, a producer for "Lost" heard the Donkeys and insisted they be cast as Geronimo Jackson, a fictional band of San Francisco-based, late-70s contemporaries of the Grateful Dead. One of their songs, "Exclesior Lady", was re-recorded as "Dharma Lady" just for the show, a cut that was said to have been featured on Geronimo Jackson's period-appropriate LP, Magna Carta."

Chip: "Their album cover is frustratingly lacking in donkeys."




















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Congrats to the Bourgeois Pig, which clocks in at an impressive #5 on the www.complex.com list of America's 50 best "college coffee shops." Here's the blurb from the site:

"As the first establishment in Lawrence to serve both booze and coffee, the Bourgeois Pig has a reputation for the radical. Still don't believe us? The Pig's first art show featured shotgun paintings by William S. Burroughs. And just as often as they have new art, they have smart-ass undergrads hotly debating in the cramped, beloved spot. So. Just how ironic is that name?"

Richard: "I wish the Pig were actually as pretentious as many believe. Nine times out of time you're NOT going to step into a hot debate on Nietzsche, and almost never is it full of 'smart-ass undergrads.'"

Chip: "I am, however, always vaguely worried that my presence there might land me on some sort of communist or socialist 'watch-list.'"

See the full list here

1 comment:

Capt Coffee Shop said...

Speaking of smart-ass students, I spent some time at the #9 selection on the list, Sip, during my graduate studies at Columbia. It's a semi-pretentious little bar, cramped as fuck (as in getting up every time the asshole sitting next to you has to take a leak) and boasts a haughty menu of vegetarian tidbits and imported cheeses, wines and lagers. The only reason this hole-in-the-wall made the list is because it serves FREE FOOD at happy hour. That's right. Free. Or rather, "free." Order a not-terribly-expensive cocktail and you'll be treated to an appetizer of decent proportion. Order as many drinks as possible between 5 and 7 and you'll likely fill yourself of some decent food. While sporting a solid buzz, at that. Only catch is that you are heavily "encouraged" to tip (i.e., charged) the amount that would normally be taxed on each dish. A meager surcharge in the larger picture. As for the coffee? Who the fuck cares. And as for the conversation? Better order another cocktail because the girl sitting next to you is going to bitch loudly on her phone about her 1500$/mo studio and how it's below her standard but her daddy wouldn't fork over more per month because he wants her to learn some "financial responsibility." Jesus Christ.