The Hive has resurrected a bit of Durango’s past. Longtime supporters of Durango’s skateboard community may remember the Shred Shed, the skate shop that existed around the 1100 block of Main Avenue in the early ’00s, moonlighting as an indoor skate park and sometimes music venue. When the Shred Shed went away, the skate park and venue disappeared as well, leaving a void in the indoor skate and music community.
That void is now gone. The Hive, the local organization that produces various activities for Durango youths, including skateboarding and art, has finally finished the last step in setting up its space with the completion of the indoor skate park in the building that used to house the Shred Shed. The Hive will celebrate the skate park’s completion with an event Saturday, as it hosts “A Dastardly Dance Party,” a concert featuring numerous local/regional bands. Bands performing Saturday include: Delicate Flower, Getting Familiar, Immediate Family, Military Wife and Your Bones.
The bulk of Saturday’s bands are of the skate-rock and punk variety; Delicate Flower, however, would be classified into the indie-folk and singer-songwriter category. The vehicle for musician Ryn Beamer, Delicate Flower is sometimes a band when Beamer is backed by other musicians, or in the case for Saturday, sometimes a solo act.
“It was just a decision that I made recently, that everything that I’m coming out with I just want to have under the name ‘Delicate Flower,’” Beamer said. “Just to be consistent and not have to make a new band name every time I move to a new place and start playing with new people.”
If you go
WHAT: Halloween show at The Hive with Delicate Flower, Getting Familiar, Immediate Family, Military Wife and Your Bones.
WHEN: 4 p.m. Saturday.
WHERE: The Hive, 1150 Main Ave.
TICKETS: $5.
MORE INFORMATION: Visit www.thehivedgo.org.
Beamer’s been a songwriter ever since learning to play Deep Purple’s “Smoke on the Water” on bass. Reared on a healthy dose of classic songwriters and indie-rock, names like Bob Dylan or Joni Mitchell inspire his sadder stuff, LCD Sound System, Queens of the Stone Age or The Violent Femmes inspire the more upbeat tunes. The music of Delicate Flower exists somewhere between traditional folk and upbeat indie rock, the solo shows taking on a band feel as Beamer bangs out a rhythm on tambourine and cajon while playing guitar. Its DIY and lo-fi.
“I think DIY is a good phrase for it. It just came from when I was living in San Diego for a while, for some reason I didn’t meet people that I really wanted to play with, and I really wanted to play the songs that I had written,” Beamer said. “So I decided to do a solo thing, and I had the cajon, I had the tambourine, and so I said, ‘I’ll just do this.’”
Lyrically, Delicate Flower is open and honest, particular and poignant. Beamer keeps eyes and ears open to the world, a songwriter unafraid of self-deprecation and also unafraid to criticize the world via song. It’s all done tongue in cheek and set to a bouncing melody with catchy hooks, a way to try to improve the world and keep yourself in check.
“I’ve found it pretty cathartic to just kind of poke fun in an honest and real way at my own feelings,” Beamer said. “I also just like poking fun at society at large.”
The bands on Saturday’s bill are a perfect match for the venue, as The Hive remains a DIY space that wants to share art. Musicians like Beamer share that concept, eager to play on a stage built next to a skate ramp, not a bar.
“It feels like there is a lot of excitement and stoke around their vision,” Beamer said. “It’s all just really cool.”
Bryant Liggett is a freelance writer and KDUR station manager. Reach him at liggett_b@fortlewis.edu.
