Nu Shooz Goes to Bagtown!

The Backstory of Bagtown

Valerie opened the utility room door and frowned.
"These bags are getting out of hand."
John rolled his eyes and said in a flat voice, "I know, I know. I'll put it all in the recycling."
It wasn't just the bags. Cardboard boxes were piling up too.
"I swear I'll get to it," he said two weeks later.

Then one night, as she made the morning coffee, Valerie noticed multi-colored lights flickering under the utility room door.
"Hmm."
She put her ear to it. A thumping sound came from the other side, like a drumbeat, a strange disco four-on-the-floor beat. Her hand hovered over the doorknob for a few seconds; then she flung it open, and...
The bags had built a city from the cardboard boxes, a vast city with bridges and nightclubs, trees and statues, and a train!

One of the bags motioned for her to get on the train.
And she did get on...as if a city growing in her utility room was no big deal.
"Come on. Don't be late," said the bag. He wore a neat little conductor's hat made from the same material as himself.
"Welcome aboard," he said. "Where ya headed?"
"Well...I don't..."
"That's O.K. Y'know, we all start out empty, folded flat, and then we open up, right? And we put stuff in our bag, and other people put stuff in, and before you know it, we're full!"

All this time, the train was rolling through a brown paper landscape alive with High-Lighter colors; Pink-Blue-Yellow-Orange.
The conductor went on.
"Your bag is full of everything you've collected over a lifetime. You like Surf Music. You don't like fish. You prefer Yellow to Teal. In other words, our 'Bag' is who we are.
And we decide what we want to put in it."

The drumbeat got louder as the train rolled into town. At last, they got to the source of the noise. There was a party going on. A band was playing.

"If you were you and it was now," they sang, "What would you do?"

"It's up to you," the conductor said, "what you put in your bag...what gifts it can hold. The possibilities are endless."
"Is it a Glad Bag or a Sad Sack," he said.

Time had no shape in the cardboard city. She didn't know how long she was there. Finally, the Conductor broke the spell.

"Uh-oh. Time to head back. The Number-Five is leaving right on away."
In a blink of Dreamtime, she was standing outside the Utility Room door again.

What just happened?
She swore she could still hear the faint sound of drums.
John came up behind her then.
"I swear, I'll recycle all that stuff today!"

"Oh," she said, "Why don't you wait a while."

The Bags of Bagtown

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The ‘Making Of’ Videos

In the winter of 2017, our son Malcolm worked hard on the miniature Bagtown set - creating incredible art for the soon to be built city.

Malcolm Smith went to work building the town. The project took seven months, burned up many hot-glue guns, and filled about 30 square feet of our studio. The result of his labor was fantastic and magical beyond our wildest expectations. Mike Wellins came in and shot it from every possible angle. Then it was time to take it down.

We were sad. “Can’t we leave it up for just one more day? Or a week?“

Mike to the rescue again. He happens to be the proprietor of the FreakyButTrue Peculiarium, one of those institutions dedicated to keeping Portland Weird. He offered us a home for our beloved ‘Bagtown’ set, and came up with this beautiful presentation. ‘Bagtown’ is now under attack from Godzilla and Sharknado!

All is right with the world.

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For more about the making of Bagtown and to listen to the
entire Bagtown CD, head over HERE on our website.

November News

Gettin' down to the end of 2015. What a year it's been! And the party's not over...

Last month we started cutting tracks for the 7th Nu Shooz album: BAGTOWN. (Songwriting began a year ago.) Our friend Sean Holmes was in our studio recording demo vocals over the last few weeks. Here's a little video of him cutting the backup vocals on the title track now...
 

We enlisted our son Malcolm Smith to do the cover art, and he did a fantastic job integrating the 'bag people' into his drawn world. It fits the music perfectly. And what is the music like? John says, "It's a cross between a 1979 Toyota and an American breakfast: two eggs, hashbrowns, and sausage patty...with a side of wry."

We're looking to serve that up around the 1st of May.

Watch as the artwork comes alive here...

In the meantime, if you're in the Phoenix area this month, we'll be at the Arizona State Fair with Lisa Lisa, Debbie Deb, Stevie B., and J.J. Fad. That's Saturday, November 7th. Should be a GREAT show.

That's all for now. For those of you who heard about Malcolm's car accident, we're happy to report that he's fine and fully recovered and suddenly has the ability to converse in fluent Croatian.

Just kidding.

Love,

Valerie and John

October News: The NU Record, Freestyle in El Paso & Another edition of Nu Shooz: On The Road

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(the BagTown gang hanging out in John’s studio control room aka the man-cave.)

We’ve FINALLY started RECORDING!
After a year of song writing, “Bag Town” is ready to roll into the studio. We actually started laying down some tracks TODAY. We’ll be sharing more of this adventure with you all as it progresses, so please stay tuned!

We have another mini-movie to share from our Nu Shooz On The Road series.

In this episode, we head to San Bernardino, CA, for a show with radio star Art Laboe and promoter Alan Beck featuring acts like The Manhattans, Heatwave, Zapp, and more. Every road trip is different, but this one even more so after we got a phone call that is every parent’s nightmare…(Spoiler Alert: Everything turned out OK...but MAN, that was WAY too close!)

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Super Freestyle Explosion in El Paso

Last but not least, we’re headed out on the road this weekend (10/10/15) for another Super Freestyle Explosion show in El Paso, TX. We’ve never been…and are looking forward to a little R&R after our last 'On The Road' adventure!