More from this series on the Bushwick Culture photostream.

This past Saturday I invited Anna over for a beer in my newly decked (thank you AB) backyard.  As we were enjoying the late summer coolness, and I had just remarked on the lovely pastoral quality of my thigh high corn patch, a rat as big as a granny cat audaciously slithered up the stairs to my kitchen door. Anna screamed like the shower girl from Psycho, but the rat moved not an inch.  The night got dirtier from there.

Bodega is a new-ish music venue next to Goodbye Blue Monday on Broadway. It has a basement with a dirt floor, rotting ceiling (so far it sounds a lot like my apartment, which I hate with a fervent passion), and a gritty excitement in the air I have not felt since I was fifteen (about the average age at this all-ages venue). Budweiser was three bucks and cold.

We got there just in time for No one and the Somebodies, an awesome band of brothers who have an enormous and inflatable sound and raw fury/fun that they spin magically into danceable punk rock/rock dance.  Dancers in the audience were going wild, taking full advantage of the huge space, and the flying dust, and the dramatic shadows from the clip lights. Human Host came on next, man and machine.  Human host is from Baltimore MD.  He sings over synth and electronic doodling, and throws himself through space both body and voice.  Pass Kontrol came on next, and the whole gang was there, including a gaggle of girls who were insisting on seeing dong.  Sweaty bra and panties landed on Tony’s synth.  Lady-screams of “Take off your pants” rose high above the lyrics.  Finally and bashfully, bassist Mikey Visser succumbed.  Maybe we should call them “Ass Kontrol.”  (a-tee-hee).

Both No One and the Somebodies and Pass Kontrol are on the Welcome to Bushwick Album (available for download in the lower right column).