By Liz Gonzales

Every couple weeks dubsteppers from all over the city stream like ants to food for Bassface, a three-year old club, held at Space 613 downtown, that focuses on the bass-heavy British-born electronic subgenre. Since its birth the club has assumed a dominating place in the Los Angeles dubstep scene.

David L

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The event, put on by pioneering LA collective Pure Filth, has brought DJs to the city from all over world. DJ Sam XXL, the event's coordinator, explained the genesis of the club's name: "... I started noticing a common trait in people: Their faces would contort when the bassline dropped through the Pure Filth speakers, and somehow that became lovingly referred to as bassface."

Harry Smith, inventor of the mixtape

​The Hammer museum's Smith On Smith event last Thursday night paid tribute to the eccentric artist and music collector Harry Smith through exploits that Patti Smith recounted from her new book, Just Kids. Patti befriended Harry at the Chelsea Hotel during its heyday and ate many 55 cent auto-mat cheese and lettuce sandwiches by his side. She described his wirey beard and brought New York City, 1969, to life around him. Poverty never sounded so cool and avant-garde.

In her Just Kids excerpts, Patti Smith lives on a mat in her Chelsea Hotel room with Robert Mapplethorpe. She often wears a straw hat. She's a poet gathering diary material who doesn't yet know she'll godmother punk music. Mostly, she makes "drawlings." Once, Sam Shepard feeds her a lobster, and Allen Ginsberg buys her part of a sandwich with coffee thinking she is a pretty boy. Such nuggets from Smith's book let the audience brush shoulders with Jimi Hendrix and Grace Slick. After Patti recounted a tequila shot with Bob Neuwirth that led to writing her first song, Neuwirth appeared on the Hammer stage with a banjo and plucked his way through folk classic "Mole In The Ground."

View more photos in Timothy Norris' "The Residents @ Henry Fonda Theater" slideshow.

"Do they wear the big eyeballs to hide the fact that they're old?" asked my friend Kat as we were crossing Hollywood Blvd. on our way to the Henry Fonda, where San Francisco's (or is it Louisiana's?) best known musical eccentrics The Residents were presenting a rare show last Saturday. Seconds into their performance it became obvious that a) they were not wearing the distinctive eyeball headpieces that have concealed their facial features and birth-identities since the 1970s and b) the whole show was, in fact, a surreal nightmare about aging not very well.

Timothy Norris

A Resident, a mystery

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The new Residents show is called "Talking Light." Here's how they describe the concept:

The story of the Talking Light piece is basically that of an older man who questions, not only decisions he made as a teenager, but also if the events he remembers from that time happened at all. "A dead infant clutching a ring with an inscription the teenager cannot read" is the stuff of dreams. The following stories in the show may or may not shed light on the inscription. Questions remain unanswered. The Residents study death, not as a horrific end, but as the ultimate question that we all ask while wondering if any of it is even real.

So here is what you would have seen at the Fonda last Saturday: "Randy," the singer, wearing a grotesque, costume-shop old-man mask and a clown version of an don't-give-a-fuck anymore old-person's outfit (or maybe a realistic version of what a mentally disturbed old-person would wear) lounging about in a sad living room with a white-noisy TV. He was flanked by keyboardist "Chuck" and guitar player "Bob," both equally clad in spangly black tuxes and headgear that make them look like futuristic Rasta ants.

View more photos in Timothy Norris' "Timbaland @ House of Blues" slideshow.

"Do you all like my beats?," a deep voice wondered over the packed House of Blues din. "I SAID, do you all like my beats?" Climbing a banister was the only way to glimpse the wizard of Oz emerging from behind a huge, bright LCD screen on stage. You'd expect Timbaland to be short, having seen him on television standing eye to eye with Nelly Furtado. But TV could not possibly convey the proportions of his Pillsbury-strongman body. Tree-trunk thick arms extended out of his round short torso. With pecs as big as his face, Timbo can probably bench-press a house.

Timothy Norris

Timbaland at House of Blues

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Wearing snazzy headphones connected to a device in his pocket -- perhaps a tiny brainwave-controlled studio -- Timbaland offered to make some beats. He turned a dial or two before songs, but a band did most of the live work. The band's jam improv late in the show was actually one of the evening's highlights, besides Justin Timberlake's appearance, of course. There were times though, that music pumped from the speakers but no instrument was being played, and pre-recorded vocals outsang the special guests. Occasionally you could catch a live voice adding a few extra "ooh's."

Melissa Jun Rowley

Social Media Rock Stars: Digg's Kevin Rose and Mashable's Pete Cashmore

​For more than half a century the Grammy Awards have been the pinnacle institution of American music. (But that doesn't mean the tone of the show and the brand itself have to be institutional.) While the Grammys showcase a smorgasbord of chart-topping tweens, pop sensations, musical legends, and iconic performances, the award ceremony has for the most part projected an ostensibly parochial air -- one difficult for even the most die-hard music fans to penetrate in order to feel included.

This year, the people behind the Grammys wanted to set the record straight by spreading the message that "We're All Fans." Determined to prove the Grammys really are hipper than your grandparents, the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences, which administers the Grammys, launched a major push in social media outreach, including a sleek new open source Web site, community blogging, live streamed red carpet footage, a Grammy iPhone app, and a destination site for user-generated content called WereAllFans.com.

On Friday, the Academy parlayed the online buzz into offline dialogue and hosted the first Social Media Rock Stars Summit, a panel discussion on the convergence of music and the social Web. Moderated by CNN's Rick Sanchez, the panel featured actor/musician Jared Leto, Mashable CEO Pete Cashmore, Digg founder Kevin Rose, Senior Project Manager for YouTube Music Nikhil Chandhok, and Tumblr Founder David Karp.

Just as the recording industry learned to accept the Internet's omniscient power after a bloody tug-of-war match with the juggernaut file-sharing service Napster a decade ago, music moguls and artists are discovering that social media isn't going anywhere. With major artists such as Lady GaGa, John Mayor, Wyclef Jean, Alicia Keyes, and others using social media to communicate directly with their fans, the music industry can either dive into the Twitter stream and swim, or stand still and stagnant offline.

Mi Ami, Lucky Dragons, and Foot Village @ the Smell, January 23.

The Smell concluded its two-day anniversary celebration with a magic trick. Lucky Dragons made rainbows appear out of a projector, literally playing the light by waving blank CDs in front of the lens. This capped off a night in which rhythm got groped and Swedish-massaged by blood, sweat, and, finally, science.

Daiana Feuer

Foot Village at the Smell

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One drummer can make a lot of noise, but not as much as four feral witch doctors beating their drum kits. If you've ever crawled inside a trash can during a hailstorm, you know how a Foot Village performance feels. The intensity aims to unite rather than destroy, but they scream a lot, occasionally using a megaphone to mark territory and elicit more wailing from the human sweat lodge surrounding the musicians in a corner. The oscillating drum patterns suggest complete chaos -- every man (and woman) for himself! -- but the rhythms unite almost telepathically and improvisation plays little part in the brutal beat barrage. Beauty persists in their post-apocalyptic drum circle.

View more photos in Timothy Norris' "Black Lips, Nobunny @ El Rey" slideshow.

Saturday night at the El Rey Black Lips and Nobunny turned the art deco venue into a punk rock doo-wop dance party, complete with creaky blues-ghost howling. The two acts are a perfect pairing, and whipped the place into a stage diving, mosh pit hurricane.

Timothy Norris

Nobunny will fuck you up. Step back.

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Nobunny took the stage and launched into his dirty anti-hero set, a swirling mess of love, sex and uncontrollable urges, and the place went ape-shit. Why wouldn't they? Here is a grown man dressed in stained briefs and sporting a dirty fluffy bunny mask singing into the ears, hearts and bodies of pulsating teen-agers and twenty somethings. Their reaction? They kicked, punched and shoved each other into circles and crazy figure eights on the venue floor.

View more photos in Timothy Norris' "Cold Ward Kids @ Wiltern" slideshow.

Timothy Norris

​It all started with a WTF moment.

The stage lights set the Wiltern aglow in a lavender haze, four video screens blasted ambient images, but the Cold War Kids were nowhere to be seen. It wasn't one of those Sun 0))) moments, where mystique was the goal, instead technical problems made the Cold War Kids begin with a hiccup. Trudging on through the false start, Long Beach's finest (sorry, Sublime), rolled out a relatively reserved show for a band who used to really rock it.

Click here to view Timothy Norris's slide show from last night's Radiohead show at the Fonda.

Can we give the bassist some? Please? Let's give the bassist some. His name is Colin Greenwood, and he's not either of the two Radiohead guys that most people, such as your mom, know. He's not the striking one up front with the lazy eye and the miracle voice. And he's not the floppy-haired lead guitarist -- his flashier brother, Jonny -- rolling out those sick post-Beefheart guitar lines.

Timothy Norris

4/5ths of Radiohead. That's Colin Greenwood, unsung hero of rock & roll, on the left

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It's the guy in the back standing close to the rig and staring at the floor, which is where his bass frequencies roll around like errant canonballs. Colin looks like he's pushing them with brain and finger power, so heavy-duty is his concentration. Bassists have no time for crowd-watching and that whole center-stage thing that singer Thom Yorke does. That takes up energy needed to make the groove on which singer Yorke flies, the trampoline beneath the singer's feet, Colin and drummer Phil Selway pushing him higher.

Read Randall Roberts' review of last night's Radiohead show at the Fonda here. View Timothy Norris' slide show here.

Here is the set list for tonight's epic Radiohead show at the Music Box at the Henry Fonda Theater, which was a benefit for Oxfam International's work in Haiti. They made, according to Yorke (who prefaced the number with a shocked "fuck me!"): $572,754. We'll have a review up shortly, but figured you'd all like to see what the hell they played.

Timothy Norris

Thom Yorke and Jonny Greenwood of Radiohead

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Faust Arp
Fake Plastic Trees
Arpeggi
National Anthem
Nude
Karma Police
Kid A
Morning Bell
How To Disappear Completely
Wolf at the Door
The Bends
Reckoner
Lucky
Body Snatchers
Dollars & Cents
Airbag
Exit Music (For a Film)

encore #!
Everything In Its Right Place
You and Whose Army?
Pyramid Song
All I Need

encore #2
Lotus Flower
Paranoid Android
Street Spirit

Review to come. And there were a bunch of people taking videos, so we'll troll for those tonight, too. and put them here.