Fellow Townspeople:
I won’t take up valuable RTH time to tell you how much Haiti needs your help. What I will tell you is that I and my recording studio have been working with some amazing, talented, generous musicians and other folks to put on a benefit show in Washington, DC on Feb. 2. If you’re in town, please join us — 100% of your $15 admission will go to Voice Of Haiti, a charity founded by a couple of DC-area film-makers who run an incredibly tight non-profit ship.
If you can’t make the show — there are still ways you can help. One: head out to Voice Of Haiti right now to make an online donation. Two: wait until after the show, then donate at Indie Music for Haiti, a site we’re building to host high-quality video files from the event for folks who couldn’t make it. Beyond that, here are some details:
The basics:
Feb. 2, DC9, 1940 9th St. NW, Washington DC
Doors open at 8:30
Show starts at 9:00
$15
Lineup:
- Tommy T (of Gogol Bordello) and the Abyssinia Roots Collective, in their debut public performance, delivering the Ethiopian jazz/dub goods
- Sitali — one of DC’s best-kept musical secrets, featuring Sitali Khumalo, a featured performer with the Thievery Corporation
- DC’s premier old-school ska orchestra, Eastern Standard Time
- DC’s fave retro-mod, garage-soul groovers, The Ambitions, featuring Caz Gardiner
- Spoonboy, the lead singer for the amazing Max Levine Ensemble, doing his agit-prop, solo Billy Bragg thing
…and here are a few details about Voice Of Haiti, for those of you who are healthily skeptical about charities with which you are unfamiliar: according to the IRS, Voice Of Haiti can honestly claim that 90% of all money raised actually goes to work “in country” — and they’ve been working through local volunteers there for many years. God bless the charities that are rushing to the scene to help in the country’s hour of need, but VOH has been there for years, focused on projects related to long-term agricultural/economic sustainability, trying to give Haitians a good reason *not* to live in the squalor of Port-au-prince.
Jim, thanks again for the soap-box.
Your pal,
HVB
Bakshi, I can’t be there, and I’ve made my online donation to another organization, but I applaud you for doing this. One only wishes music could do more than it can.
I’ll see if I can get down there for the show. Regardless, I will donate to VOH. On behalf of the Hall, thanks for taking a break from analyzing the hair styles of suddenly socially relevant artists and actually taking time to organize this!
Hey Fritz,
I already donated elsewhere but want to acknowlege the following:
1. This is a really good thing you’re doing.
2. Even benevolent acts have unfortunate unintended consequences. While checking out the Asparagus Media Facebook page, I stumbled across a link to your beloved Upper Crust and I’ve spent the lion’s share of two otherwise unproductive days watching Crust videos on youtube.
Hey HVB. Maybe too late for this but if you need help with the website… Let me know.
Townspeeps in the DC area, this event takes place tomorrow – Tuesday – night!
How did it go, Hrrundi? Is the website now up, where we can make post-show donations?
Just wanted folks to know that we had a good showing last night, despite the snowstorm. When all was said and done, we raised almost $5,000 for Voice Of Haiti. If any of you still feel like doing a little something — and you should — head out to http://www.voiceofhaiti.org and make your presence known!
Thanks again, Mr. Mod, for lending me this bully pulpit.
HVB
The official “post-show” web site — actually something much more significant than that — is about a week away. I’ll keep you guys posted, for sure.