The Arthouse Photobook

Good friends Inga and Audra, the masterminds behind www.bandphotosrock.com, are putting together an Arthouse photobook to coincide with the ending of our favourite pub. Although they have a wealth of photos from the last 6 years, help is needed to fill in the blanks.

They've put out a call to all patrons to dig out their photo albums and see what they can contribute to this awesome project.

Check out their page.

Poison City Weekender doco

Time flies when you're having fun. Loads has happened since May this year and many beers have been had at the Arthouse.

The Poison City Weekender happened back in September and the good folks at DI Wireless have put together a doco about it all.

It's super inspiring to this doco to see all the great stuff that came out of just one weekend.

Check it out.

THE WEEKENDER 2010 - Part 1 from Poison City on Vimeo.

Gibbo and Chuck having a sing

Gibbo and Chuck - This Company from Sean Callanan on Vimeo.

What an amazing last Birthday weekend!

We had the cameras out in force this weekend, Saturday night was the 19th Birthday show with MYC, The Nation Blue, Kimbo and The Hawaiian Islands. Sunday night, the Revival tour brought us Chuck Ragan (HWM), Frank Turner, Tim Barry (Avail) and Ben Nichols (Lucero) with Jon Gaunt on fiddle and Todd Beene on pedal steel AND special appearances from our Arty local Darren Gibson and Jen Buxton from Like...Alaska.

Saturday nights birthday show was all recorded via the studio upstairs to give us some dynamite sound for the 4 cameras we shot it on. Big thanks to Matt Bodiam for locking himself away in the studio for a lot of the night to keep the recording going. Thanks also to Bec Mercer for the great work behind the camera (and for the actual camera!) and to Matt Weston from the Nation Blue for the camera too, those cameras made all the difference! It was an amazing, sold out night to celebrate another birthday for our favourite place.

On Sunday we filmed a great chat with Tim and Chuck about their experiences at the Arty and the importance a venue like it has on the people involved. It was great to get some outsiders opinions on the place and having some "big names" involved will hopefully come in handy down the track. The show itself was amazing, sing-a-longs galore, all the guys on stage were super stoked about finishing their tour at the Arthouse. Thanks to Tom Jenkins we had another nice camera to shoot with and got plenty of great footage, some Arthouse shout-outs, a duet with Chuck and Gibbo and an amazing song from Jen Buxton.

Check out some screenshots of our Sunday footage!

The Revival Show!

Gibbo and Chuck practicing "This Company"

Gibbo and Chuck practicing "This Company"

Frank Turner on stage

Our interview with Chuck

Our interview with Chuck

Tim Barry on stage

Our interview with Tim

Jen Buxton breaking hearts

Outsider opinions

Lately the idea for the doc has been morphing into something with a broader appeal, something which doesn't cover only the Arthouse but speaks of the importance of all the venues like it. Using the example of the Arthouse, the doc will demonstrate how communities can grow in a venue and become a scene all of their own. Supporting positive ideas and relationships and creating an amazing music scene.

With that in mind....

The Revival Tour is coming to Melbourne for a show at the Corner Hotel on Friday night and of course an Arty show on Sunday. When I first heard of the Arthouse show, the idea came to me that it would be great to speak to the guys on the Revival Tour (Chuck Ragan, Frank Turner, Tim Barry and Ben Nichols) about the venues where they started their bands, the friends they met there and the impact their "home away from home" had on their lives.

I'll be working as the monitor guy on the Corner Hotel show and through this contact I have the email address for the tour manager of the Revival Tour. I sent an email last night with the idea to do some interviews and hope to hear back soon about whether it will be possible.

Stay posted....
Sean

The Birthday weekend is coming....

It's Tuesday morning (for another minute at least) and the Arthouse 19th Birthday show is on Saturday night.
The time has come to really start this thing. I still have no video camera of my own, very little money, no house of my own and minimal documentary making skills BUT I do have a text book and a CAN DO attitude!

I'm meeting a fella today called Stuart Simpson to have a chat about the doc. He is a long time Arthouse friend and brother of Adam from ADITF who also happens to be a film maker, director, writer, producer. He has offered to meet up and chat about how exactly one goes about making a documentary film. It's people like this who will make this whole thing come together. I feel that with the right guidance from experienced people we can't possibly fail!

Keep it unreal
Sean

Undertone

More brainstorming sessions, reading, lots of reading, the idea is progressing nicely. I want to make a real documentary that will make people who've never been to the Arthouse realize how powerful a venue like it can be in shaping the lives of individuals as well as an entire community and music scene.

My favorite thought right now is that the doc can show how there have been and still are, venues and communities like this right around the world nurturing positive relationships and artistic creation.

On the 1st of May, the Arty celebrates it's 19th birthday with an incredible lineup (MYC, The Nation Blue, Kimbo and The Hawaiian Islands). This will be a great night experimenting with cameras and sound recording, it will surely give us some great footage for a starting point and I can't wait to play with some footage.

See you at the Arty

Sean

Progress

It's been nearly a week since the launch of the Facebook page and we're creeping up on 1100 members. Amazing. Emails are still rolling in pretty regularly, offers of great old footage and help with the production.

I've been researching in the last few days, getting some tips on putting together the doc. So far so good, it was super helpful watching some good documentaries and taking notes on the structure of the things. There is definitely a lot of potentially cool ways of doing this, it's just going to be a big challenge deciding which one is going to suit the best. There are so many different styles and compositions, I'd never noticed so much until I really started analyzing them.

Been doing more camera research and that has put somewhat of a spanner in the works. I had my heart set on an EOS 5D mark 2 but all the advice I've been given is to steer more towards a dedicated broadcast video camera. The problem is they cost nearly double the amount. I've been in touch with Canon about trying to get a deal of some kind. Hopefully I can get some sort of discount on whatever I end up getting in exchange for a bit of cheeky Canon product placement and whatnot. That's maybe a bit of a long shot.

The outline is coming together, quite a few interviewees have been spoken to, I've started doing a bit of grant research. I'm still open to any suggestions people have, if you have any kinds of ideas, drop me a line! Seanjcallanan@gmail.com

Keep it unreal,

Sean

Launched!

So the facebook group has been successfully launched and support is rolling in for this project. After not even one day the group has nearly 400 members which far exceeded my expectations. People have been in contact about helping out with interviews, cameras, old footage and photos. This blog is going to be the place to keep track of the progression of this whole project. I plan on posting photos, ideas and whatever else on here so people can see what's happening.

So far the goal is to start shooting some footage in May at the 19th birthday celebrations. This gives me/us about 6 weeks to make preparations in terms of scripts, interview plans, cameras, sound recording etc. I plan on buying myself a video camera (it must be tough to be a film maker without one) and soon after, start conducting some interviews with relevant people and get a solid outline for the basis of the doc.

If anyone has advice on good quality, reasonably priced HD video cameras, drop me a line seanjcallanan@gmail.com or on my facebook page. The Canon EOS 550D seems like a good option as it gives the image quality of the DSLR lenses and shoots HD video. Open to suggestions!

Keep it unreal

Sean

The Idea....

My name is Sean Callanan and I've spent the last year of my life living in Toronto, Canada.

I grew up in Melbourne, have always played in bands and have always called The Arthouse my second home.

In January 2010 I caught wind of Melbourne's new liquor licensing laws and the subsequent closure of The Tote. I never spent much time at The Tote but definitely appreciate that many generations of bands have got their start there and adore the place as I adore The Arty. The thought of coming home to a Melbourne with no Tote was definitely a strange one. Around this time, many articles began to spring up in newspapers speaking of live music venue closures - including the closure of The Arthouse.

The closure of The Arthouse, to those who've spent much time at the place, comes as no surprise. Many of us know the basic story of the place - getting a 20 year lease, fighting to stay in the building etc - but seeing an actual closing date printed in one of the newspapers was definitely shocking. It made me, and I'm sure many others, realise that the countdown has begun and our beloved Arty will soon have to shut it's doors.

I know that saving The Arty is near impossible but what is much more achievable is to make the absolute most of this last year and document the whole thing so we can remember this occasion not as a death in the family (pun definitely intended) but a celebration of the place our little community loves so dearly.

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I was 16 when I started going to the Arthouse circa 2002, back when all ages shows were still rampant. Not til 2004 was I able to actually drink there and spend some quality time late at night. This leaves over 10 years of stories, photos, videos, yarns, anecdotes etc, that I've never heard about.

This documentary can definitely come together, but it will require the collaboration of the whole community! If you have some old photos and/or stories of The Arty, if you own a decent video camera, if you know how to make movies, if you know anything about documentary making, video editing, writing etc, please drop me a line.

Seanjcallanan@gmail.com

I look forward to hearing from everyone.

Check the gig guide and go have a beer!

http://www.thearthouse.com/