Tonga Hut Palm Springs kicks off the season with a special Shag Menu Signing Event!

Shag signs the new Tonga Hut Palm Springs menu
Friday, October 3
Signing at 6 PM Sharp
Mid-Century sounds from DJ Lee
Tonga Hut remains open until 2 AM

Tonga Hut Palm Springs
254 N Palm Canyon Dr,
Palm Springs, California 92262
(760) 322-4449
www.tongahut.com/tonga-hut-palm-springs.html

Price:
$25 includes a menu and drink coupon

Shag will be in the house signing his newly designed Tonga Hut drink menus. There will a limited amount available. Get there early; first come first served!

Tonga Hut Palm Springs is the offspring of the Tonga Hut North Hollywood, Opening its’ doors in 1958 during the heyday of tiki culture in Southern California, Tonga Hut is the oldest surviving tiki bar in Los Angeles.

Tonga Hut Palm Springs has been lovingly decorated by artist Tiki Diablo and Chase Marshall (Beauty Bar in L.A. and Cobra Lounge in NYC) with vintage items as well as contemporary contributions from many artists in the tiki community including Leroy Schmaltz from Oceanic Arts, Eric October, Bosko, Kirby, Nelson’s Tiki Hut and “Mad Dog” Mike Gilbert.

Tonga Hut’s menu offers classic Polynesian/Cantonese/American dishes, like you might have found at Don the Beachcomber on old Palm Canyon Drive in the Rat Pack era. The cocktail menu contains more than 40 drinks including classic cocktails, classic tiki drinks as well as numerous original drinks including some that are exclusive to the Palm Springs location.

DJ Lee Joseph heads up the “independent underground” label Dionysus Records, which has specialized in the retro sounds of surf, exotica, garage rock, rockabilly and psychedelia since the mid ‘80s, and has a weekly show called “Over Under Sideways Down” on the mid-century centric LuxuriaMusic.com internet radio station. He has held numerous club residences in Los Angeles, and DJs at the yearly Tiki Oasis event in San Diego. “DJ Lee” brings to Tonga Hut Palm Springs a deep knowledge and collection of era appropriate music from lounge and exotica to French Ye Ye, surf to soul and other “swinging” sounds from the 1950s -1970s, on vinyl of course!

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This Wednesday, August 15, 3 PM – 5 PM Pacific, tune in to Lee Joseph’s “Over Under Sideways Down”  on LuxuriaMusic.com for a special show featuring Tony Marsico of The Martini Kings who will be playing the Tiki Oasis main stage – Friday, August 17 at 6:40. Lee and Tony will discuss Mission: Tiki Oasis 12, The Martini Kings, their new Dionysus Records release “Palm Springs Serenade,” their new self-released CD and back catalog, and some of Tony’s fabulous history playing music with the likes of The Plugz, The Cruzados, Bob Dylan, and others!

The Martini Kings’ first vinyl LP, Palm Springs Serenade, will be released by Dionysus Records on July 10. The LP features cover art by SHAG. The band will play a record release party (and closing  for Brad “Tiki Shark” Parker’s art show) at La Luz de Jesus Gallery on July 29, details here.

With over eight self-released CDs and gigs-a-plenty, it’s about time that Los Angeles based jazzy-retro-exotica-bossa-nova-cocktail-lounge combo The Martini Kings make an appearance on the beloved vinyl format. In their professional existence, The Martini Kings have performed events for the likes of Clint Eastwood, Stephen King, The Getty Center, Mattel and Universal Studios, had their music in HBO’s “Entourage” and made an appearance during the Malibu cliff-top wedding scene in the ”Six Feet Under’‘ season curtain-raiser. The Martini Kings’ Marsico brothers have performed in backing groups with Bob Dylan, Neil Young and Marianne Faithful. Martini Kings bassist Tony Marsico was in East LA punk legends The Plugz and The Cruzados, and played bass behind Bob Dylan on David Letterman’s show.

Their pro-resume aside, The Martini Kings are also loved among tiki and retro aficionados and are a staple at the yearly Tiki Oasis weekender, numerous burlesque, lounge events and backyard tiki parties. They have the technique and sound down to a fine art and in the process inject equal amounts of heart and soul into their craft. The instrumentation is centered around vibes, stand-up bass and percussion with tasty arrangements including piano, guitar, wind and stringed instruments.

“Palm Springs Serenade” is a collection of the group’s favorite tracks from their CD releases and features a track recorded with lounge legend and former Rat Pack member Buddy Greco. The art of their pal SHAG adorns the album cover and visually fits the combo’s sound from top to bottom. And, the sound on this album which was cut on a vintage Scully lathe with the legendary Westrex B3 stereo cutting head is huge and open with lots of warm low-end. The album jacket is printed vintage style; front cover slick on thick board… this is not your ordinary one piece fabricated album jacket but the Martini Kings / SHAG combination deserves no less.  A coupon for a digital download is included in this package.

Black vinyl 180 gram LPs will be shipped to Dionysus Records’ distribuor, ILD (Independent Label Distribution). A limited edition of 100 CLEAR VINYL LPs will be avalible from the band and through Dionysus Records Mailorder only – on JULY 10! 

Tracks: So Danco Samba, Swingin’ Shepherd Blues, Girl Talk, Cuchy Frito Man, Kings Highway, Dance of the Virgins, Lost In Paradise, Patricia, Stardust, Return to Paradise, Rumble, Enchanted Lovers

For all our friends that didn’t catch the live streaming of the Stereophonic Space Sound Unlimited LP cutting session at History of Recorded Sound (HRS) last Thursday – here’s a couple of short videos of the first and last track on side two of “The Fluid Soundbox” being cut along with detail of scribing the catalog number and a couple of thank you’s in the “dead wax” area of the record.  Enjoy!

La Luz de Jesus 25, the milestone anniversary show and largest exhibition in the gallery’s history, launches its second half during the first weekend of November. The show runs through November 28. Following hard on the heels of October’s spectacular Part One, Part Two features more than 120 artists, including Shawn Barber, Gary Baseman, Tim Biskup, Al Farrow, Chris Mars, Elizabeth McGrath, Jason Mecier, Mark Mothersbaugh, Marion Peck, The Pizz, Mark Ryden, Shag, Peter Shire, Joe Sorren, Mark Todd and Eric White. For a full list of all artists showing in La Luz de Jesus 25 Part Two, click this link.

This exhibition is documented in the beautiful companion book, La Luz de Jesus 25: The Little Gallery That Could, featuring images of all the art in the show, a personal anecdote about Billy Shire and the gallery written by each artist, essays by gallery directors and a foreword by Shire. The book is much more than a simple record of this remarkable exhibition. Together, the images and essays present a history of La Luz de Jesus through the eyes of the artists whose careers are intertwined with Shire and his gallery.

Another Tiki Oasis has come and gone.

Having been to all 11 Tiki Oasis weekenders, I can without a doubt say that this year’s event was in many ways better than the previous 10, and that my friends is not an easy accomplishment. For instance, Tiki Oasis’ musical line-ups have always been magical but this one was that much more over-the-top. Some of the musical highlights from Tiki Oasis 11 include the legendary “Mr. Bongo,” Jack Costanzo‘s superb Latin Jazz ensemble who just freakin’ NAILED it, tight and tough instrumental insanity from Los Straightjackets who were joined by our pal Big Sandy for a round of rock ‘n’ roll songs en Espanol, an excellent set of Herb Albert tunes from the tribute group Herb, exotic and percussive Latin Jazz sounds from Orchestra Superstring featuring some truly amaazing play between the percussionists as well as DJ Bonebrake’s brilliant performance on the vibes, and the spooky exotic meets surf sounds of our own Creepxotica who played poolside, at the art show and wandered around the event dressed as Dia De Los Muertos mariachis with portable pig-nose amplifiers strapped to their outfits. To cap it all off, for the first time, Tiki Oasis extended through Sunday Night with a most entertaining show including two perfectly paced sets from exotica legends Don Tiki who filled the stage with exceptional musicians on their very first performance in California.  As stated, these were highlights for me – the rest of the music? Two thumbs up!

I’d have to write over a thousand words to truly cover the event from start to finish, so instead of going into detail about how great the symposiums, art,  debaucherous room crawls,  LuxuriaMusic.com and poolside DJs, the fabulous King Kukulele and Marina the Fire Eating Mermaid, marketplace, Otto’s muschache and Baby Doe’s circle skirt were, I’ll just load up this post with Tiki Oasis videos from our friends at Lost in Paradise and other various sources on YouTube so you can see for yourself the color and fun that this event represents and gives to its attendees. Don’t miss Tiki Oasis 12… Stay tuned for the scoop!

I shot a video of Creepxotica playing outside the elevators as the room crawl action was going full steam with my iPod Touch – will post as soon as I upload and edit as I’m still catching up on work here. As more Tiki Oasis 11 videos pop up on YouTube I’ll put those up as well.

Lee
(Photo: Marina the Fire Eating Mermaid –  by Scott Evanskey)

Tiki Oasis Flicker Photo Group

Tiki Oasis Facebook Group

Lost in Paradise videos

Jack Costanzo

Tiki Oasis 11 Car Show with Crazy Al Evans, Perk, SHAG, and the Hula Girls

Burlesque