Dr. Sketchy's Baltimore

November 30, 2013November 30, 2013

Razor-tongued.

Sophia Sunday’s April session was, yet again, another of my favorites.

I know, I know—I say that a lot. I just said it about the previous session with Sucre à la Crème. I mean it, though. Watch the video.

That’s how you do it folks. The only way that could get any better is if she handed everyone a thousand bucks at the end. Or maybe some dinosaurs riding some robots. I dunno.

It’s also one of my favorite videos. To have a good video several things need to go right. One, the performer, obviously, has to be amazing. That is about 25%. Two, my dumb ass needs to have remembered to make sure the lights on the stage are bright enough so the hi-res works. Sadly, this doesn’t always happen. That’s about 40%. The performer can be stunning and it just plain doesn’t matter if you can’t see them. Three, we have to find a good song that we can use without getting sued—this can turn into a nightmare pretty quick. That’s about 25%. Four, Russell needs to have eaten a bunch of sugar that day. That’s 5%. Five, lots of neat, weird things need to happen to make for interesting shots. That’s 25%. Six, folks need to send in their drawings. That’s 128%.

And before you ask, yes, I was a math major.

In any case, the performer being amazing and the video being amazing are not directly connected. When they both happen at the same time, though . . . watch the fuck out.

As a side note, I’m a sucker for anything magic and sideshow related. If we ever decided to put on a Dr. Sketchy’s Showcase show, you better believe Sophia’s razor-swallowing act would be in it.

And look at all those good drawings! Alexis and I started doing all this so we could sit down and draw too—unfortunately, that doesn’t really work. This session is definitely one where we wish we’d been in the audience.

Of course, we had a couple drawing contests for questionable concoctions from Russell at the bar and some fancy books from our generous sponsor Baby Tattoo Books, who runs the LA branch of Dr. Sketchy’s, in case you’re ever out that way.

Special thanks to Sophia Sunday who did a stunning job; thanks to our generous sponsor for this session, Baby Tattoo Books; thanks to Russell for slinging booze and tunes; thanks to Jeff Schock for taking some of the lovely photos below; thanks to Maeve and also to Fred, who was in town visiting, for help with the door and all the various setup stuff; and of course thanks to Alexis for doing all those microphone things she does.

Thanks as well to all the folks who sent in the wonderful drawings you can see in the video above too. Y’all rock.

November 30, 2013

“It’s dangerous to go alone! Take this.”

We’re a little behind. Obviously.

If you didn’t know, Alexis and I got married in September and, well, the six months leading up to the wedding got pretty damn hectic. It may not look like it, but these blogs can take a little bit of time to put together, what with the photos to edit, videos to assemble, and, you know, fancy schmancy word poems to, I dunno, glue together. We were able to keep the actual sessions on track, and the videos (we had to—our computers only have so much memory), but sadly, the blogs took the hit.

But as I write this, it’s Thanksgiving, and I’ve got a belly full of turkey and some time on my hands, so let’s see if we can catch up.

Sucre à la Crème.

Her session back in March was one of the best Dr. Sketchy’s Baltimore has ever had. I’m going to take a risk and say it honestly might be the best. I won’t say it outright, I don’t want to get knifed by a model when I step off a train back into Baltimore in a few days, but, well, it might just be. Her Legend of Zelda routine is also one of my all time favorites.

If you haven’t watched the video sometime in the last few months, take a look.

One thing I can say for sure: that is the best video we have of a session. A bazillion different things contributed to that, some of which was luck, but when someone asks what a session is like, this is one of the videos we show them.

Paco Fish was originally supposed to model for this session, but at the last minute, he offered to give his session up for Sucre, who was visiting Baltimore from Montreal (which has its own amazing branch, by the way). I don’t think you can quite spot him in the video, but Paco was there at the bar shooting the breeze with us while folks were drawing. A week after that, he set off across the country on tour, which, unless he’s been arrested in the last twenty-four hours or so, he’s still on.

Anyway, we’re pretty damn jealous of Montreal. If they hadn’t taken us out for beers when we were up there a year or two ago, we’d probably be plotting to kill them right now.

We had some drawing contests for weird shots from Russell and a book from our generous sponsor, Baby Tattoo Books out in LA, who runs their own Sketchy’s out there as well.

Since a bit of time has rolled past, our memories are a little hazy, but we’ll do our best to thank everyone involved. Special thanks to Sucre à la Crème who, I’m sure you can see, did an absolutely stunning job; thanks to Paco Fish for recommending her and for keeping us company that night; thanks to Russell of the Windup Space for slinging drinks and tunes; thanks to old door hand Styger who happened to be in town and helped us do set up and breakdown; thanks to Maeve for helping with door and all that set up and breakdown stuff too; thanks to our generous sponsor Baby Tattoo Books; and of course thanks to Alexis for the beautiful photos you see below and for helming the ship on stage that night.

By the way, you can see the sketches folks sent in from that night in the video above.

April 28, 2013

Original Sin

This may very well be the last time the lovely Roma Mafia poses for Dr. Sketchy’s Baltimore, as I write, she’s preparing to move to San Francisco, if she’s not on the road already. Who knows though, maybe she’ll come back to visit and we’ll get lucky–you never know. She went out with a bang though. Take a look, Lord knows, words can’t do her session justice.

We gave away a copy of Idle Hands: The Art of Coop from Baby Tattoo Books. You should check the out.

Thank you to Craig Hankin, Fred Oakes, Joan Cox, Liza Figueroa, Patrick Kluga, Stewart White, and Tim Kelly for emailing or posting to Facebook the photos you see below.

Many, many thanks to Roma Mafia and Cuddles the Snake for being our muses for the evening; thanks to our sponsor Baby Tattoo Books; thanks to Russell of the Windup Space for slinging drinks & tunes; thanks to Jeff for the photos you see below; thanks to Maeve for helping set everything up, take it down, and help Alexis on the stage; and of course thanks to Alexis for keeping the mic in line all evening.