One of our favorite acts is J. Marinelli. Morgantown’s one-man folk-punk band is back with another benefit show this Saturday, Aug. 25th. This time Cryptorchid Chipmunk and Space Bop (from Connecticut) join Marinelli for a radical book sale and spaghetti dinner at 213 Green St. Artspace in Magic Town. Check those bands out.

7 p.m., $4 cover. The book sale and $1 spaghetti dinner supports what they are calling political prisoners. We assume it’s the good kind of political prisoners, and not the bad kind, like people who conspire to overthrow the U.S. government.

That’s never good.

Well, Maybe it’s time that you started. Here at the Gatecrasher we are taking our game to “the next level” as so many people say. While we will focus on the Charleston area (and we still need help covering shows ’round here), we actively seek the support of our friends in Huntington and Morgantown.

If you go to shows and take pics, feel free to email them to us. We’ll make you famous (or at least give you credit).

Our role at Gatecrasher is to clue you in about shows. But people, when they say things like, “Ohhh…West Virginia sucks so hard when it comes to rock shows. I’m from out of state, so I am cooler than you, thusly!”

West By God and Satanic Bat open for Treasure Cat on Saturday, Aug. 18, as they release their full-length debut at 123 Pleasant St. in Morgantown.

We are expecting pics from this show. Hopefully we can keep bringing you this kind of wholesome goodness.

Rose City and The Ghosts of Now are two of the newer Charleston area rock bands. After starting their Myspace profiles with no music, they recently posted music and are ready to rock out.

They’ll merge forces to do a show at the Glass on Saturday, Aug. 18, with The Cherry Bombs.

This show will rock hard indeed. Don’t forget you can check out live Ghosts of Now footage over at Pop Cult.

When we saw this show we had to clue people into it. We’ve checked our official transcripts versus the current account and it’s pretty much true: These are some of the best bands in Huntington. And we really loved that movie, Clash of the Titans. We had the figures and everything.

Seriously: The Red Velvet, Black Knots, The Fontaine, Hybrid Zero, and Hyatari have all been picked up on our radar. Even if they had turned their transponders off.

The Gatecrasher blog: Chinese Elmo free since August 2007!

The Concept welcomes The Dig-Its to the Blue Parrot on Friday, Aug. 17 with B-Rude and Meuwl. Black Knots had been scheduled, so there was a last minute change.

Saturday, Ten Carp Lie joins The Concept at the Parrot. You should go. Put it on the ol’ expense account. It’s supposed to be Fall soon, so cooler temperatures are expected.

A show we really, really wanted to see was stopped at the last minute, which sucked.

The Concept and The Renfields (two of our favorite area punk bands) were set to play a show Saturday, 8/4 @ The Corner Pub in Smithers. Yes, SMITHERS!

Well, the cops forbade them from playing, the owner said, according to an e-mail from a well-placed, anonymous source inside The Concept. Okay, it’s M. Withrow, or Mike W., as we’ll call him.

This source informed us Saturday afternoon that the show was canned due to police omnipresence. The band was not pleased to say the least.

Seein’ as how we live near Smithers, we were crestfallen. The guys in these bands are not guilty of anything except of wanting to play an all-ages show in some armpit area of the state that nobody ever does. They weren’t selling alcohol or drugs at the show, they were just wanting to play loud.

That’s all they are guilty of.

Yeah, we’re not going to be able to make it, but the bands rock. If anyone goes and takes pics we know a blog that might feature them …

Looks like good things happen to people who hang out at the Transit Mall. We came across local rapper Burna (L) and Shorthrow singer-bassist Jody Ashley (R) sitting on a bench, waiting to be interviewed about their show this Saturday (8.4) at the Empty Glass.

—–
GAZZ: How did you guys come together on the remix of “Unforgiven” by Metallica?
Burna: I started to sing it but that didn’t work out. Then my boy Jeremy Beane hooked me up with Jody so he could do the chorus.

Jody: Metallica is pretty much the reason I’m in music now. It was a pleasure for me to take [James] Hetfield’s words and put them to Burna’s music.

—–
GAZZ: This is the first Shorthrow-Burna show at the Glass, right?
Burna: I haven’t done a show there in like two years. It should be fun though: it’s my birthday. They may have to carry me out of there at the end of the night. It’s gonna be good times.

Jody: Shorthrow has been together for six years but we’ve never played the Glass. This will be our first show together there.

—–
GAZZ: How did the all-ages show at the Labelle Theater 7.27 go?
Burna: It didn’t go. We had terrible weather; not a lot of people showed up, so they stopped the show early. So I went to the Blue Parrot and got drunk.

Jody: We were supposed to have two shows that night. It was the first time we played the Labelle and when we got there it was dead. So we went to the Parrot; the place was packed; Burna came up onstage with us and did “Unforgiven” and we gave the people what they wanted.

—–
GAZZ: Jody, how did the Fri. 7.27 Parrot show with Dog Soldier go, and how was Adamfest 7.28?
Jody: Dog Soldier is basically a reformation of a band that we played with when we started. I’ve been friends with all those guys forever. It’s nice to be back playing with them. They brought a lot of people and they did a hell of a good job playing. It was probably one of the most fun shows I’ve had in a while.

Adamfest was awesome. Adamfest is always probably the best cause going here in
Charleston if you don’t mind me saying so. Adam [Weaver] is an amazing guy; loves metal music and the local music scene. I’d do anything in the world for him. It’s been my pleasure to go up there and perform and hopefully raise a little money. A lot of good bands were there; decent weather, it was a little hot, but we had a good time.

—–
GAZZ: What are the logistics like onstage with you two? Does Jody sing with Burna or vice versa with Shorthrow on the remix?
Burna: It kind of depends, you know. Most of the time, Jody comes up during my set, or I just run up on their set.

—–
GAZZ: What has the response been like when you’ve shared the stage?
Jody: Man, people go crazy. I remember the first time we did it I was surprised at the reaction. I didn’t know if people would dig it. It’s probably one of the more popular songs on our Myspace page. People, whenever they see Burna walk into a Shorthrow show, they know what’s gonna happen and they can’t wait.

We support bands like Huntington’s Black Knots. They keep it 100% real. Their most recent Myspace blog We Are The Righteous, likely written by frontman Jerry Lee Queen, who studied journalism at Marshall, is worth checking out for two reasons.

1: he takes on anti-West Virginia attitudes and stereotypes, and
2: what rock and roll means to them.

Warning: once you click on the link to their blog, you are leaving the wholesome goodness of Gatecrasher.