There were strange crack/rolling sounds from alternating sides of the building during the quake, which felt like a gentle swirling than anything else. The quake took place hundreds of miles away. Per Wikipedia:
The Ritz-Carlton/JW Marriott hotel building, a part of the LA Live development in Los Angeles, California, is the first building in Los Angeles that uses an advanced steel plate shear wall system to resist the lateral loads of strong earthquakes and winds.
20 minutes later they came on the loudspeaker to say they were investigating any possibile structural damage to the building.
Hidden Los Angeles posted a simple “what are you doing” query to its fan page in the 5 o’clock hour on a Friday and started an avalanche of commenting from like-minded people who were likely wondering the same thing.
“Hidden Los Angeles wants to hear all about he awesome local LA stuff you’re doing this weekend! Do tell…”
153 comments in 43 minutes. Of course, HLA is an exceptionally well run Facebook page. I seem to remember it only having 1,000 or so fans about a month ago. Today it’s up over 140,000. That’s a lot of Facebook News Feeds to capitalize on.
What we see here is just how vital Facebook is to building a following and creating a community. The HiddenLA website is only 8 months old and up until January, only attracted 1-3,000 unique visitors per month. Will be interesting to see how the growth of its fan page affected it’s web traffic in February.
We were lucky to be among a few hundred people to catch Broken Bells’ first-ever live performance Friday night at the Bootleg Theater in Echo Park. Broken Bells — if you haven’t heard yet — is a collaboration between James Mercer (of The Shins) and Brian Burton (aka Danger Mouse).
Try to imagine what that might sound like and your expectations would be met and likely exceeded by the first single — “The High Road” — alone (video after the jump). Stack that on top of Burton’s track record as a multi-instrumentalist and producer over the past decade (The Grey Album, Gorillaz, Gnarls Barkley, MF Doom, Beck) plus the mystery of it being Broken Bells first live performance and the Bootleg was buzzing with anticipation.
The crowd was a good mix of industry, critics, serious music freaks, and fans (we scored tickets out of the lot that went up for sale after 10am Friday for $15 each – and were gone by 10:30am, according to the Fold’s website).
After a spirited set by the house DJ’s, Broken Bells took the stage as a 6-piece band (two guitars, two keyboards, bass, drums). The band seemed well-rehearsed and the onstage demeanor was rather serious for a “surprise” show — the only announced Broken Bells concerts to date are London and Paris and as part of a SXSW showcase next month. A couple people mentioned that it was Burton’s first time playing drums onstage (he played keys on one or two tracks with prerecorded supporting beats). On the record — much like with the Gnarls Barkley collabs with Cee-Lo — Burton handled all the instrumentation as well as production, James Mercer wrote the songs and played guitar.
Mercer’s voice was strong and rose above Burton’s shuffling timekeeping. Several songs had a lilting bass groove reminiscent of the Manchester sound of 20 years ago — Stone Roses, Happy Mondays. It was also apparent that these musicians were influenced by the likes of Damon Albarn and Beck — not necessarily a bad thing. Add four- and five-part harmonies and some ace songwriting by Mercer and the live experience had a wall of sound, Floydian feel, melodies grinding through spiral video projected on the stage.
After each song everybody seemed to turn and look at each other with eyebrows raised as if to say, “wow, that actually sounded really good.” After ten songs the band left the stage briefly and then returned with the two greatest surprises of the night. First, the duo of Mercer and Burton rattled off a beautiful version of Neutral Milk Hotel’s “In the Aeroplane Over the Sea” and then the rest of the band returned for a spot-on cover of Tommy James and the Shondells’ “Crimson and Clover.” Mercer led into it saying gingerly (to the crowd, the band or both?) “I don’t know if you’re ready for this but here it goes.”
Lights up. The house DJ cued The Turtles’ “Happy Together” and the crowd filed out, smiles all around.
Over the years Twiistup has evolved from a blowout meet ‘n’ greet for startups, entrepreneurs, and investors to a can’t-miss, day-and-a-half of panel discussions, showcases, and mixers featuring the top tech and media innovators and venture capitalists from LA, Silicon Valley and beyond.
Billed “LA’s biggest technology EVENT,” the agenda and guest list is a stacked who’s-who of elite tech talent. But don’t let the mature, sit-down nature of Twiistup 7 fool you, as Hollywood’s penchant for partying is not forgotten with a 007-themed after party and a hosted pre-party included with each event pass.
twiistup.com
Registration: $397 before 3pm 1/27, $497 after. Weds January 27th: 6-9 Korn Hall, UCLA; 9-midnight W Hotel Westwood. Thurs 1/28: 8-5:30 showoffs and panels at Skirball Center; 7:30-midnight Casino Royale party at Skirball.
