Grasshopper Juice Records: Press

This weekend, the folks from local indie label Grasshopper Juice Records are gearing up for its fifth annual Adjust Your Eyes Music & Art Festival. The eclectic, camping-friendly event — this year being held at the Branch Hill VFW Hall (6652 Epworth Road, Loveland) — has hosted all sorts of music and arts in its five years. The 2010 edition is no different, with visual art from local artists, over two hours worth of stand-up and sketch comedy and fun asides like a dunking booth, a basketball tournament (featuring members of several bands) and obstacle course races. AYE’s main draw, though, is its 30-plus musical acts performing on two stages — one outside and one indoors.

The fun begins Friday at 7 p.m. On the outdoor stage, Peter Adams & the Nocturnal Collective, SHADOWRAPTR, Andy Cook, Kumasi MC and Cane & Able perform. Inside Friday, you can catch Headband, The Ohms, Bubble Life, Vaudeville Freud, The Never Setting Suns and Joe Wolf. Friday and Saturday nights both end with a late-night dance party featuring DJ Stump, C-Los, Juan Cosby, DJ Effloresco and others.

If you choose to camp (it’s free!), you’ll be able to roll out of your tent around noon to start catching the entertainment. Scheduled to appear on the outdoor stage: No No Knots, Chick Pimp, Coke Dealer at a Bar, Kry Kids, Where They Landed, Fidel Catastrophe, Perfect Norm, Pie Party, Baoku & The Image Afrobeat Band, Lazy Ass Destroyer, Midnight Hours, Shiny Old Soul and Billy Wallace. Inside Saturday, you can see and hear The Skeetones, Pharaoh Loosey, Nine-Fold, Crazy Legs, Sassy Molasses, Zella Whelms, Just Like Monsters, Jason Anthony Harris, Jordin Golf, Miguel Morte Valentine and much more.

Admission is $20 ($10 tickets will be available on Saturday after 10 p.m., for the fashionably late). For the full rundown of events and performers (including the lineup and schedule for the celebrity dunking booth), head to www.grasshopperjuice.com.

Grasshopper Juice Records has been establishing itself as a band-friendly haven in the Cincinnati music scene, a place where collaboration trumps competition and artistic control is a given — although out of control might be a more appropriate descriptive in some cases.

Saturday, the label is taking over Southgate House in Newport, Ky., setting up bands in the Ballroom, Parlour and Lounge for a full night of Grasshopper Juice music. Eleven bands will perform, including label owners Chick Pimp, Coke Dealer At A Bar, which combines electronica, jazz, hip-hop and bluegrass influences.

Also performing will be Where They Landed, Sassy Molasses, The Skeetones, No No Knots, Vaudeville Freud, SHADOWRAPTR, Shotski, Future Trends, Fidel Catastrophe and Eagle to Squirrel Variety Hour. Music at 9 p.m., cover is $7 for 21 and over, $10 for ages 18-20. Southgate House is at 24 E. Thirdrd St.

Local indie label Grasshopper Juice Records — run by members of flagship band Chick Pimp, Coke Dealer at a Bar — is celebrating its first birthday with a concert blowout Saturday at the Southgate House. The Juice will be loose on all three Southgate stages. The concert showcases the label’s genre eclecticism (you’ll hear everything from Jazz and Hip Hop to Rock and Electronica) and features GHJ artists and friends like Chick Pimp, Where They Landed, The Skeetones, No No Knots, Future Trends, SHADOWRAPTR, Vaudeville Freud, Shotski, Pharaoh Loosey, Eagle to Squirrel and Fidel Catastrophe. Music starts at 10 p.m. (Get show details here.)

The folks behind local label Grasshopper Juice could hardly be accused of doing things conventionally. The label’s roster spans Indie, Hip Hop, Jazz, Electronica and Americana — and some GJ artists combine all of those elements (and then some) into one. For Thursday’s most unique New Year’s Eve blow-out, give GJ’s Party Bus/Music Festival in Clifton Heights, Northside and Columbia-Tusculum a go. The label’s “package deal” includes bus shuttles to participating venues Baba Budan’s, Mac’s Pizza Pub, Fries Café, Northside Tavern, Blue Rock Tavern and East End Café (the bus moves gradually to each neighborhood throughout the night starting at 10 p.m.).

But it’s the eclectic music lineup that’s the real draw. Mac’s features Rock and Jam music from Perfect Norm, Headband and Buckra; Fries has the Rumpke Mountain Boys; and Northside Tavern has let the Dance_MFers take over, with live music from Bad Veins and Lightning Love. The remaining venues have packed lineups — Blue Rock Tavern presents artists ranging from Indie Rock (Charlie Hustle, The Harlequins) to Punk (The Frankl Project) to Surf Rock (The Flux Capacitors), while East End Café has diverse artists like The Skeetones, Pharaoh Loosey and Kumasi MC. Baba Budan’s looks to be the “hot spot” for the night, as incredible Hip Hop/Jazz experimenters IsWhat?! celebrate the release of their new long-player, Big Appetite, and Business & Pleazure (a “rap duet of lampshades,” featuring Wonky Tonk and Chick Pimp’s Nick Mitchell) also releases a new one.

Get tickets, details and bus stops here.

The name “Grasshopper Juice” may not sound familiar to local music fans right now, but this up-and-coming record label already has a noticeable foothold in the Cincinnati music scene. The label is the driving force behind Adjust Your Eyes, an annual arts & music festival in its fourth year, and its roster includes CEA nominees Chick Pimp, Coke Dealer at a Bar, Wonky Tonk, and The Harlequins.

Grasshopper Juice Records was founded in 2008 with the goal to help bands that want to keep their artistic integrity but still successfully distribute their music, according to cofounder and CEO Nick Mitchell, also known as the lead singer of Chick Pimp. The idea to start a record label was conceived after Mitchell encountered frustration with another label.

“I just found that…I had been in a band before that had signed with a label and we ran into all kinds of stressful problems relating to it,” says Mitchell, referring to his previous band, The Terrors. “It ended up putting stress on the band and the band ended up breaking up.”

It was only years later after Chick Pimp, Coke Dealer at a Bar began releasing and distributing their own albums that Mitchell and drummer Cole Brokamp decided to make Grasshopper Juice a reality.

“The two of us did all the recordings ourselves at home at first, and then we realized if we did this, we want to make connections with other studios,” Mitchell explains. It was then that they contacted Ben Cochran at Soap Floats, a recording studio located on the West Side in a church built in the 1890s. Cameron Turner later joined the label as its mastering engineer.

Mitchell admits that when the label first reached out to bands in late 2008, it was more of a DIY approach.

“[We would] basically work out a bartering system. That’s how a lot of it started out, having friends who were down with the bartering system, like where we’d help them in certain ways, they’d help us in certain areas. We’d get to bring in a band for a few hours, you know, just like where everyone’s scratching each other’s backs the whole time.”

The label has since developed a business model similar to Marriage Records; the label’s artists and staff are all friends, and even collaborate with each other on a regular basis.

Says Mitchell, “I think the strength of our label isn’t in the parallel styles…we all work together on each other’s music, even if it’s different styles. It’s more like the unity of the people involved…is kind of our thing.”

However, while the label’s current roster consists mainly of Cincinnati bands, Mitchell insists that they would eventually like to branch out, and have already received submissions from all over the world, including a distribution deal from a label in Russia.

While the label itself is still constantly growing and changing, Mitchell is certain about one thing: he’ll always let the bands have full artistic control.

“I only sign a band that I like, and I trust enough that they’ll make the album that they want, where most labels are gonna have someone there [during the recording process], which from a business point, is understandable. But if you sign the artist, like, you should trust them enough to you know, let them get comfortable and do what they want to do.”

For more information on Grasshopper Juice’s artists and events, visit their website.