On a snowless day in January, I moved to Jamaica Plain, Massachusetts. Since the previous summer I had been working to promote and prepare releases with an art collective called The Whitehaus Family Record. Through the group and other associated collectives, I saw most of my favorite shows of 2010 and the Whitehaus even had a hand in one of my favorite records of 2010.
My new apartment was just down the street from their four story house that is best explained as a living and breathing art project. Junk, toys and broken instruments dangle from every corner and every chandelier as an ongoing dumpster diving piece. The place houses anywhere from ten to fifteen people, stacked high on homemade bunk beds or sometimes even living behind a curtain under the stairs. They are any manner of artist including poets, musicians, and visual artists. On any given day, one could walk into the house and find them performing a number of rarities: from remixing the audio from children’s VHSs on a floor littered with pedals to eating extremely salty oysters and preparing a living beverage called Kombucha.
What makes the Whitehaus and also the other musicians in Boston all the more interesting is that they tend to share a collective ethic both musically and spiritually. At the Whitehaus they call it The Yes Wave, and it also serves as their genre to subvert categorization. Sure, it’s based around openness , inclusion, and anti-elitistism, but it’s really about addressing and accepting everything that comes your way. To welcome whoever or whatever comes to your door and wants to play in your living room, to be open to whatever someone is trying to show you.
