A Vid link to the Music from the Masquerade Ball!

http://www.courier-journal.com/videonetwork/2571263776001/FandomFest-2013-Masquerade-Ball

STEAMPUNK FANDOMFEST MUSIC –LIVE! ELI AUGUST~DRUNK & SAILOR~THE WAZZOO SOUND

Hello Time Travellers to the Retro Future! Fandomfest is here!! I'll will be posting even more bios and adventures with our Special Guest Panelists & Performers! Keep your eyes peeled!

I am excited to bring you a post of some of the music offerings at Fandomfest: Panel Discussion, Live Demos and Full on performances!!

Both Eli August and Drunk & Sailor are well loved established acts on the Steampunk Con Circuit and I am very excited to be to announce where they will be this weekend here in the Possibility City Louisville, Ky.!

Eli has a voice that takes you through the railroads of wonder whether backed by the amazing Abandoned Buildings or solo, we are excited to have him appear throughout the festival! (Specifics will be updated here and well everywhere from my on site up to hour coverage Follow me : Twitter @angelxstacy !)

Eli August

MUSIC PANEL: Music In Steampunk- Eli August & Angelique X Stacy Sat 12 Noon-Jasmine Room, 2nd Floor, Rivue Tower, Galt House:

A wide variety of genres of music is encompassed under the Umbrella of Steampunk, from tradition music of the Victorian Era, Americana and even Metal and Electronica! Two such Musicians from the far reaching coasts, Eli August (Baltimore , MD) and Angelique X Stacy (originally from San Francisco, Ca and now Louisville, Ky.) will talk about the role of music in the Genre and what they bring to the popular growing Genre that is many!  Get tips on how to get booked, inspiration and networking!

The Wazzoo Sound! Theremin by Angelique X Stacy

Drunk & Sailor

FANDOMFEST 2013!

LIVE PERFORMANCES:

Eli August will be performing throughout the Festival, please check in the Steampunk Area (2^nd Floor Rivue Tower, Galt House) for up to date times to catch him!

Angelique X Stacy- “The Wazzoo Sound” will be performing at the Dark After Midnight Masquerade Ball, Fountain Room at 10:30 pm. (and doing a teaching demo SUN @ 2PM in the Jasmine Room, Galt House. ) 

Drunk & Sailor – Will be performing Sea Shanties after The Wazzoo Sound also at the Ball!

Click on our names to go to their sites to see / hear more:

 ELI AUGUST:

About DRUNK & SAILOR:

About THE WAZZOO SOUND:

Angelique X Stacy 

Hope to see you there !!

Your ever enthusiastic reporter of the possibilities,

Angelique X Stacy 

STEAMPUNK FANDOMFEST Panelist: ALISHA MARTIN & The Proper Fit of Corsets!

Proper Fit of a Corset- Alisha Martin from The Bad Button. Sat. 8 pm Jasmine Room @ The Galt House, Rivue Tower

There is nothing like the hug of a properly fitted corset!  Contrary to popular belief, a corset can be the most comfortable piece of luxury clothing when it is made just for you. Join Alicia, custom corset maker for The Bad Button as she explains the how-to’s in properly fitting a corset. 

I feel so lucky and honoured that one of our vendors (Bonus you can be fitted at Fandomfest!) has come forward to teach how to properly fit for a corset.Visit her booth to find something special for our Masquerade Ball! (or your future wedding, cosplay, or just because!) Can't make it out? Take a look at her etsy or join her facebook page.

Perhaps you've tried one on before, you can't breath and you start to develop a headache! How did people wear these for hours on end you may wonder? Clothes , especially those made during the height of corset wearing was made to fit you! That is, whatever size you happen to be, a lot of thought and design went into what was best for your shape and not the current way of sized clothing that you must somehow fit into, even dieting to do so! Nothing is more personal then a shaping garment such as a corset which when properly fitted feels like a comforting hug, support for you back, a slimming silhouette and a confidence booster, all in one!

From The Bad Button Website :

"The Bad Button started in a museum.  That is to say, the idea of the company that would become The Bad Button was born in the world of vintage textiles and museum costume collections.  In the way that it is difficult to separate the painter from the painting, its difficult to distinguish where the aesthetics Alisha Martin brings to her work end, and the actual product begins.

​

Fascinated with textiles and museum artifacts from a young age thanks to a rather bohemian upbringing spent in the museums of Europe, Alisha found herself gravitating to jobs in museums.  Due to many serendipitous jobs in museums with great costume collections, she was able to pursue her passion as well as her profession. 

​

Before ever attempting her first corset, Alisha studied extant museum garments for years to gain a deeper knowledge and appreciation of historic construction techniques.  Interpreted through the lens of modern tools, her corsets echo the corsetry of the past while allowing for a range of modern bespoke finishing.  With such labor-intensive techniques as beading and hand-stitching, custom pieces can be confections of clothing or starkly elegant. 

Coupled with this emphasis on aesthetics is Alisha's initial training in human anatomy, focusing specifically on the skeletal system.  Academic training and lab work contributed to her understanding of the body.  By focusing on not only the desired shape, but the body's structure, she focuses on the maximum comfort as well as reduction.  By working with the clients physique, rather than against it, the skeleton isnt compressed and the conventional problems of historic corsetry can be alleviated resulting in a feeling best described as a comfortably tight embrace.

Finally, after six years of research and practice, The Bad Button came to be as a professional corsetry studio in 2010.  Catering to clients around the world, The Bad Button provides the custom garment experience. 

​

Contact The Bad Button to commission your piece today.

You can click on "etsy" and "facebook" above they are links to contact Alisha Martin.

Your grateful admirer of the sewing skills!!

Angelique X Stacy

​

FANDOMFEST STEAMPUNK PANELIST~ LADY G~ STEAMPUNK HOODOO WORKSHOPPE

Ever wanted to know real practical magic you can use to change your fate? Combining African, Native American and European folks magic, this workshop will teach you how to change your love life for the better via something you already have in your cupboard! Use your collection of skeleton keys for more than just decoration, Lady G will show you how!

Sat. 6 pm in the Jasmine Room in the Rivue Tower of the Galt House! *(please always check the schedule here, just in case of any changes!)

 From her bio,courtesy of Lady G:

"Who is Lady G?

Lady G is an enigma to many. She has been called a walking encyclopedia of practices,
myth and magic; she counsels with the spirit/divine leading her; she is old school in her
own right but modern enough to have young people sit at her feet with questions. She
follows one path but honors all and is able to help you with your own spiritual difficulties
by meeting you where you are at whether it be Wicca, Santeria, Luciferian, Christian,
Voudan, or one of the many other alternative religions or even Hoodoo (folk magick)
practices.
Lady G is a High Priestess and is recognized as having a strong energy and carrying a
golden or sometimes a light purple aura. She has a British/Celtic heritage and was
dedicated to the Goddess at the age of six months in the forests of her Mothers coven.
She educates and tries to correct misconceptions and the fear associated with many
paths. She teaches old Wicca ( actually the religion of witchcraft); she also teaches the
Gullah Tradition of Hoodoo but is able to help with Appalachian Hoodoo and Powwow (a
Germanic form of folk magick). She hasmany different spiritual and other types of
classes offered.
Lady G is known around the community of her shop as a root worker and is trusted by
many cultures in the community with making bags, mixing herbs for spellwork; making
oil combinations (she doesn’t trust store bought.) andmaking amulets and fetishes. She
also attracts clients that need reversals of a situation and since you cannot mix apples
and oranges she will help you reverse in the same path the misfortune was sent to you.
She always works towards the light and battles all enemies and is not afraid of the dark
( although not part of her practice)
So who is Lady G…Is she one of the ancient ones? Is she someone put here to help
battle against an unknown enemy? Is she an educator to help allay the fears of those
misinformed? …she leaves it up to you to decide."

And I Angelique , your fellow Passenger of the Portal, will vouch for the effectiveness of the teachings and products of Lady G. I searched the internet and Louisville high and low for a store where I could find find herbs for my various concoctions and oils in which to anoint and scent my gris gris, mojo bags and self with.

I found in Louisville "Matrix - A Place of Change" off Broadway on 650 S. Shelby in east of Downtown in Louisville. In Lady G I found in that rarity of a person that understands needs of a Spiritual Nature. A stalwart keeper of the community, many flock to Lady G for help on their not so mundane problems. I was relieved to find an open mind and a willingness to share, a boon companion for the navigating the strange and wonderously weird place of The Possibility City, Louisville, Ky!

As ever your Cultural "Anthropologist" to the Poss'bility Portal!

Angelique X Stacy

FANDOMFEST STEAMPUNK PANELIST: ALOYSIUS FOX

"Aloysius Fox is the chief mischief maker of the Pandora Society, a motley crew of rogues and bohemians who stage strange and beautiful events in and around Cincinnati, Ohio. This gentleman-provocateur British exile has been instigating Steampunk in the Mid-West and around the world since the year twenty o’eight starting locally with the League of Cincinnati Steampunks, and in twenty o’nine going global by founding the social media site Steampunk Empire. Fox has been spotted cropping up at many events and conventions, and some even consider him somewhat of an expert on the subject of Steampunk and histories that never were. Learn more about this ne’er-do-well chap at www.aloysiusfox.com  "

Long ago in a time before the turn of the century, I worked reception and was a book reviewer for West Coast Newspaper in Berkeley & Emeryville, Ca. , in which I first met the affable chap Mr. Fox. 

Little could I know that the friendly swell I passed my latest music effort unto would in the future, the designer of a tool I would come to understand a community that had swelled around  the concepts and ideas that had been gestating in every tinkerer DIY enthusiasts brain , the virtual meeting place of the ether, The Steampunk Empire. 

Last year, as I was about to make the biggest move of my life across country into the great Mid-West or some say Southern unknown, I was grateful and felt I was blessed to know that there were others that were paving the way and creating great and wondrous salons where I could be invited to perform my latest project. 

We are excited to be having to Aloysius Fox at Fandomfest at The Galt House here in Louisville to present: 

What is Steampunk?

Sat. 3 pm * (check www.fandomfest.com for most up to date schedule)

Roundtable discussions lead by Aloysius Fox, Event Coordinator of Pandora Productions Producers of Cincinnati’s Steampunk Symposium, about what makes Steampunk.

and

A Curiously Anachronistic History of Steampunk –   with Aloysius Fox and Friends

Fri. 10 pm*(check www.fandomfest.com for most up to date schedule)

These days many people know what Steampunk is, but from whence did it come? Join Fox and Friends for a marvelous journey into a woefully inaccurate lesson of a history that never was.  Learn all sorts of sophistry and tall tales about the beautiful antique tomorrow, and realize that the future will never be the same again.

Pssssttt.....

I have also heard the word is that Mr. Fox is known to have a hand in spontaneous Airship races ,Nerf Dueling and Men's legs contests! To those who are subject to swooning may want to loosen neck-tie cravats, find a convenient chaise lounge or carry a fan.   FYI! 

Till then,

Ever your enthusiastic Urban Cultural Anthropologist, 

Angelique X 

FANDOMFEST STEAMPUNK PANELISTS: Greyer Jane & Papa Oloyade present Steampunk Magic & Conjure!

Here to be presented in this blog are the bios of the amazing panelists who have answered my clarion call to be involved in the Galt house’s Steampunk portion of this year’s Fandomfest!  July 26-28th 2013. I will be unrolling each profile and tentative schedule. Please check www.fandomfest.com for the most up to date info, sometimes times have to be adjusted. There will be programs and maps available at the Galt House upon your arrival. 

 I love to thanks these wonderful folks for bring their talents and coming together to teach others how to appreciate and be a part of this creative subculture that has taken popular culture by storm.

Since I am a fan of Magic of all sorts I was lucky to find other folks in the community of Kentucky that are also involved. Stay tuned for more blogs on folks you should hear about! 

These are bio's that were sent so that you can hear in there words about what they do and where they are from, so you get the flavour of the presenter:

*Greyer Jane- Steampunk Magic and Conjure (with Papa Oloyade) Sunday 3-4 PM*

Greyer Jane grew up buying occult books with her allowance money, and has been A Practicing occultist for over 20 years..

One of the Founding member of Cavern or Ancient Wisdom, an egalitarian ritual working group, and longtime Hostess of the Local Witches Meetup, she was the Creator and a writer and for the popular Blog Cabinet of Enchantments, and Currently ManifestMagick.com, is a regular contributor to Goodreads, and willing to read and discuss anything with writing that crosses her field of vision. When not writing or reading Witchy, she Moonlights in a Day job that lets her fondle books.. Her Love of Steampunk started long ago, with the Wonderful Mr Holmes, and “The Adventure of the Dancing Men”, and she admits to enjoying to dress in that fashion any chance she gets.

Papa Oloyade

Papa Oloyade commonly called Papa O has been a Spiritualist his entire life, employing a variety of divinatory tools as a psychic medium. Papa Oloyade grew up in a Polish Roman Catholic family with a lineage of funeral directors, and he was destined to be 4th in the line of taking over the family funeral home. He grew up around funerals and cemeteries and he realized from a young age that funeral homes were loud with the voices of the dead, but cemeteries were quite peaceful. From a young age his grandmother always said that he would become a priest, because of his inner spirituality and peace he could bring to other people. Papa Oloyade started out as Spiritual Counselor in NJ and NYC, and was exposed to the Conjure community in the form of Santeria. He moved south to go to college and studied Slave Culture specializing in Yoruban Diaspora; which he followed all the way through his Masters Degree. Papa O started as an academic and became a follower of the Yoruban Pantheon. He was crowned with Oya and with the heart of Elegba. He helped to introduce the Yoruban Diaspora in the Western and South Central Kentucky Region. He worked for many years as a Spiritual Counselor at Cheryl’s Little House running everything from house visits to large festivals. Papa O moved to South Central Kentucky and was one of the founding members of the Cavern of Ancient Wisdom which was a group of eclectic pagans in the Barren River Area. Papa O in South Central Kentucky and met Mama Vanetta who taught him about African American Spiritualism and allowed him to study the African American Spiritual Culture, which helped him to develop his Yoruban Practice. Papa O does daily Augury on facebook to lift people up and give words that people can live by. He also personally advises everyone from doctors and lawyers to chefs and actresses. Papa Oloyade through a life of religious evolution has found himself in the American Orisha Tradition; a tradition that encompasses a life long spiritual practice. He is published in future editions of Denise Alvarado's Hoodoo and Conjure Quarterly, writing on “Ifa Love Spirits”, and “Vows of the American Rootworker”. Papa O has spoken at festivals all over Kentucky and Tennessee about 7 African Powers, Pomba Gira, and Steampunk Conjure. He writes weekly Conjure articles on Dancer's Grove, featuring his weekly Saint Sunday Blog. A well respected member of the Conjure Community, Papa Oloyade plans to be on Bayou Conjure City Radio in the upcoming year.

 We thank these fabulous Folks for joining us at Fandomfest, I can't wait for this class, with the ethos of tinkering and being a maker, it seems a logical step to learn about the ethers as well! See you there!!

May your poss'bilities be all that you dream!

Angelique X Stacy

Keep Louisville realllll weird! The Louisville Stigmatorium Oddities & Strange Collectables

Heading northwest into the industrial district of Louisville where the Victorian Mansions pass into the areas of yesterday's industry is a boat repair shop adorned with a ship, perched on top the building. 

It reminds me of the artist coop I used to live in Oakland, where I used to practice with my band while watching another ship being built, the tail end of a replica of the infamous Titanic for an oversea's historical recreation amusement ride. 

Something told me that there was a lot more to this plainspoken building with the precariously perched boat as its only sign. It like the port of Oakland I frequented, it had that similar feel... there is more then meets the eye hidden in secluded industrial setting.

After all these spaces are ripe for mixed use culture. You have the space to sculpt, create larger pieces,play music, metalwork.You can choreograph dance , rehearse a play ...

Or as Andy did, start your own museum.

The Louisville Stigmatorium Oddities & Strange Collectibles is the brainchild of Andy Harpole and is the brick and mortar counterpart to his fascinating , funny and curious facebook page.

I saw his posting on another page I've been following: The House in Old Louisville which local authour David Domine's is chronicling a riveting current true crime local story to become a book on one of the strangest stories to come out the Bluegrass, a 'Party Monster' style murder love triangle complete with victim buried in an old creepy Victorian Mansion basement.A real live American Horror Story Season 1 Mansion complete with a Sanitorium past with a mad doctor to boot.

Andy knew one of the defendants when they were kids, it has to be something short of the twilight zone feeling when you hear them involved in a murder case. Louisville is a large metro area with a small town feel. 

Through looking at facebook photos I spied this beauty, a Catholic Sick Call Kit , often referred to as a Last Rights kit. Priests would bring these, on call to patients and gravely ill.

I had quite the collection of antique embalming and postmortem makeup, collected after I was offered a position at the Skyview Mortuary in Pacifica, California in 2001 after I was asked to apply makeup to my best friend Heather Oswald. She had passed in a fatal car accident took her life a block from our old house that we shared with room mates in Oakland.

Andy doesn't just appreciate these stigmatized objects and gives them respect and a new home, he loves to hear the stories behind them and will even include them with the objects. It gives them history and history of an object is what can give them a stigma, a boon for oddity collectors. 

His collection of these objects took over his home and he started looking around his boat shop for a place in which he could share his collection with like minds. With successful sales on eBay and craigslist, he was actually contacted by the producers of the popular shows "Oddities" to be a guest on the show. Something he wasn't inclined to do once he found how scripted the "reality" show actually was. It is also said in collector circles of the truly weird that having the T.V. folks can inflate/deflate prices by their comments or focusing on an object which can be a slippery slope.

 I am sure my Buddhist friends are not so keen seeing sacred objects, such as sacred horns made from Monk femurs, trivialized on the shows like that so that some hipster can have a touch of culture on their coffee table, not that they won't take care of the objects well, its just that the culture appropriated is alive and well.This can be a sticky subject as you can imagine.  

Embalming Certificate

Electrical Medical Equipment for Electro-shock Therapy

Post mortem Photograph

Many of the items, if not most in the Stigmatorium are forgotten relics of the past,not something currently in use today , except perhaps in repurposed art and furniture. 

At his home for example, one of Andy's prized possessions is his coffee table made from a repurposed casket from a showroom in a funeral home. A salesperson's sample which until it had new life as a workable piece of furniture had just sat. The mid 19th century chestnut wood coffin or "Coffine table" as he calls it was one of the first things he decorated his home with after his divorce. 

I couldn't help but to the notice the similarities in our stories, in dealing with grief over a loss of a loved one, whether in divorce or a fatal car accident. We both learned to cope by exploring the themes surrounding loss head one with collecting objects to help us understand and accept loss. Another similarity I found with Andy is a sense of being a caretaker of the dead as we both found that we had a knack for visiting and cleaning overgrown forgotten cemeteries.   

Like a lot of us called "quirky & Unique" (and those are the nice interpretations of our similar character) Andy was always a little bit different from his peers. "These objects have a way of finding you" he said and I couldn't agree more when I considered my own collection of antique Catholic objects, each of them gifted to me by friends being the only "cradle Catholic" that still has fond memories of her days in Catholic School. His collection grew in the same way as he began to be the friend that his friends would call when they found something weird.

A trephine- a medical tool used to remove part of the skull, believe to relief head pressure. Owned by Dr. Samuel Mudd who treated John Wilkes Booth.

Even more amazing is his sense of radar to these objects, its as if he stumbles upon them, stopping by a roadside yard sale to fins a couple antique viewing coffins. You can say it has become sort of a passion for him to embrace the things stigmatized by others.

One of my postmortem makeup kits I brought in for trade. This was an "airbrush" used to apply make-up. Circa 1920's-30's

A coffin with an occupant!

Met wonderful people and pets at the Stigmatorium!

XRays on display and for sale

Grave rubbing of the Notorious Ed Gein

His afterlife is a happy one!

A fish jawbone from the Ohio River on display

Molar

Beetles cleaning specimens. They get to eat and then they are cleaned and articulated.

When Andy started his facebook page he had no idea what kind of reaction he would get, and it has been very positive. Folks are curious and more open minded then he expected, much to his relief. His page has helped like minds meet each other and he has had others come forward to help him put on B-Movie nights and music shows. 

He credits his recovery from divorce and alcohol for being able to feel again and rediscover his past loves of collecting and learning taxidermy. He is also organizing a cleanup of one of our local neglected cemeteries here in Louisville.I commend him for taking the time out to volunteer to help the folks from our past and for cleaning their resting places. To participate this weekend look here: Eastern cemetery Clean up event.

In our talk, he sage wisdom came through in which I took notes to apply to my own life. "Purge who you are 'supposed to be' and embrace who you are" is something that I feel is a key to happiness since money doesn't always provide that. As Andy is fascinated and embraces the Stigmatized objects, he feels that this philosophy could work on a larger level, a more "live and let live" stage of mind where folks leave thew politics and religion at the door that can hold one back from accepting others who are different. Let the curiosity take over and learn something new. 

And that , my dear friends, is how we live together peacefully and "Keep Louisville Weird". Not one person I have met in my new hometown exemplifies that more then Andy and The Louisville Stigmatorium Oddities and Strange Collectables! 

Thank you Andy and all who contribute to the Stigmatorium!

Welcome to the Possibility Portal!

Where does it go?

Welcome, Welcome one and all to The Possibility Portal! Today Marks one year and one day since my family made the trek across the country from San Francisco, "Gold In Peace, Iron in War", The Golden City,  eastward bound to The Possibility City, Louisville , Kentucky! 

This is where , your hopefully humble, enthusiastic narrator makes one of the biggest changes of their lives and discovers the world beyond the city and surrounding areas of the bay and write about what is discovered there. This is the story of the Possibility City, Louisville , Kentucky. A place rich in diversity, history , a portal through which the Victorian Era lives along side the present in a kind of a retro yet futuristic feel, where you can still feel the sacred in the forest and parks and the amazing people discovered here on walk-about. 

Old homes have been saved from Urban blight to become showcases of the past where you can stay the night!

Prepare to be amazed! To have your ideas about the Midwest, Northern most Southern state, Central East Coast or whatever or however it can be described , to be challenged!

In here will be chronicled the stories that I've heard and profiles of the storytellers, fascinating local personalities,  movers, shakers and dream makers and especially the folks that "Keep Louisville Weird"; as well as the fabulous folks visiting from the surrounding areas that add to the fabric in this crazy quilt of a city.

As an enthusiast of  historical costuming and the possibilities of "what -if?", where everyday is a chance to dress up , mix technology and create your own experience, I am finding Louisville is just the place where this is not only possible but encouraged! 

Come with me on a journey , if you will where time streams crossover and the past is alive along with the present!

When we lived in San Francisco, we learned the art of time travel from the lovely folks in the Art Deco Society of California whose wonderful events and chances to celebrate the past results in fantastic forays in a time in which by fate, we never got to experience and yet with our modern thinking and connection created a time which never was! 

I have found in the last decade or so, an older aesthetic was organically evolving from the collectors of ephemera such as myself where Victorian era, Art Nouveau  expressions, along with a knack from re-purposing older objects into practical and usable art have become a movement all in its own. Folks embraced this as "Steam Punk"  and this title became the moniker to best describe what many found to be a fresh approach to what they were already doing. (or a catchy name for it at least!)

In these missives , I shall chronicle this element as a theme I have found to be naturally occurring in this area and the folks whom, whether they are aware of it, embrace the idea of old being new again!

For example, the Craft  Beer industry , having a renaissance in this area, is using the same technology that was created in the Industrial Age and not to mention the Bourbon Distilling process! Tattooists most often use the same technology in their "electric pens" that was fashioned from the same parts as Victorian door bells! 

Louisville is a Maker's city from making crafts to Maker's Mark. Technology of old is used in new ways whether you are a Seamstress crafting costumes to a Barista making a steamed expresso drink with new flavours. 

Welcome to my Louisville, The Possibility Portal, I hope you find it as fascinating and awe inspiring as I do! 

Stay tuned for interviews, more pictures and Vlogs!

and most of all Thank You for reading!

Your narrator Angelique X Stacy