Comments (0) Best Flat Full of Underground Musicians - 2006

The Home of Axolotl and the Skaters

Underground musicians live together because they're slobs who make noise, and only slobs who make noise can live together. It's that simple. And having said that, we insist that the San Francisco flat housing the best collection of "out there" musicians is a pad not far from that hip Mission District bar the Phone Booth. This is where Karl Bauer (performance moniker: Axolotl) and the Skaters (consisting of James Ferraro and Spencer Clark) all reside. (Donovan Quinn, aka Verdure, used to live there, too.) Now that's a serious lineup of unkempt yet hyper-productive freaks experimenting in celestial drone and geothermal psychedelia. In fact, you could easily own 20 releases either by or featuring one of these four — including a solo seven-inch by Ferraro titled Pan Dolphinic Dawn, a glowing, lo-fi vocal meditation. But if you have no loot for new jams, then make your way down to 25th Street and Van Ness and wait there for the cosmic vibrations to ripple through your spine.