MEN
Feb. 3, 2011
Fingerprints
There's not much on the walls, and all the merch that aren't CDs or vinyl are nowhere to be found, but if you squint long and hard enough, you can see that the new Fingerprints location near the intersection of Fourth Street and Long Beach Boulevard is going to be an improvement over the cramped quarters of its former Second Street abode.
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The new digs include a stage that might or might not be permanent, which is where electro/dance/pop trio Men christened the new building last night. The group–led by Le Tigre member JD Samson–performed a 30-minute set to approximately 100 people in celebration of the release of Talk About Body on IAMSOUND Records. This amount would have made a few audience members claustrophobic at the old store, but the new set-up meant everyone had plenty of elbow room.
Men's preprogrammed music didn't sound as great coming out of Fingerprints' PA as it would a dance club, but the store just opened, and everyone in attendance was willing to cut it some slack. A tweak here and a twist there, and hopefully, the sound will improve, but for a first show, it wasn't so bad.
Also, if you are one of the four people who would go to Fingerprints to buy black music (hip-hop, jazz or the blues) or Americana/roots/country, don't do it during an in-store because those CDs are uncomfortably close to the stage. The last thing you need is a smack to the head because you asked some band's No. 1 fan to move so you can look for a Lee Morgan import.
There's a separate room for vinyl, which is sparse but cool, with some posters on a few walls and a painting of Rod Stewart to help create ambiance, but it's the exposed ceiling throughout and brick wall in the room where the stage is that really make the new Fingerprints stand out.
Sure, the new neighborhood ain't as posh as Belmont Shore's Second Street, but Fingerprints need not worry about someone smashing one of its glass windows at night because no one cares about CDs anymore.
Personal Bias: I think most electronic music created by the American Apparel set sounds like Taco singing “Puttin' On the Ritz” 2.0.
Crowd: Teenagers and 20-somethings who read Vice, but don't understand when the magazine is making fun of them.
Overheard In the Crowd: “I've been on a big Italian-jazz kick lately.”
Random Notebook Dump: Years ago, I was at the previous Fingerprints location and came across a Yoko Ono album in the Beatles section. I informed the employee I thought they had made a mistake by doing so, and he just looked at me like I was stoned. Because I was.
Editor's Note–GIVEAWAY!:
Want one of these nifty autographed posters for yourself? Leave a comment below (don't forget your e-mail address!), and we'll pick a winner at random.
