Capitol Ideas

All our love goes out to South Brooklyners who are trekking south to DC for the National Equality March tomorrow.  

If you are in the area and didn't know about it, you may just want to show up.

We hear Lady Ga Ga will be there.  After all, she loves the gays.

WTF is South Brooklyn?

OVERFLOW is explicitly a magazine for South Brooklyn.  That phrase, South Brooklyn, is all over our pages--we throw it around like gelt in December.  

I would say the most common question we get is "South Brooklyn, what the fuck?"  After all, geographically, significant portions of Brooklyn are further south than Prospect Park.

Well, as you may have noticed if you've taken a look at our publication, we get awfully excited over local lore and history--maybe overly obsessed with uncovering the truth behind that shiny brownstone facade.  

When we were first daydreaming about OVERFLOW, one of the first questions we had was just how to describe this little corner of our great borough.  Folks in real estate seem ever excited to carve up the nabe into mini-markets to help out-of-towners wrap their heads around the networks of streets and services.   Hence mutant hoods like "BoCoCa" pop up in our vocabularies.

We decided to take a longer term view, and go with the traditional name for the first major neighborhood that served the City of Breuklyn--namely that collection of shops and dwellings to the south of "downtown," which we imagine was comprised of a few two-story buildings, an apple cart, and about a thousand town-drunks.  This was truly among the first neighborhoods in the whole-tri-state-region, and we think its name, South Brooklyn, should remain on the tip of our collective tongue for some time to come.

For more on the history, see to this useful wiki: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/South_Brooklyn

And check out this bitchin' map from 1766.

Tonight, OVERFLOW courts their Mad Valentine

It's Saturday afternoon, you're probably just waking up from your post-brunch buzz nap, looking outside, and wondering to yourself, "How shall I spend my Saturday evening?"

If you're up for a trip to Tribeca, OVERFLOW whole-heartedly endorses a show by the inimitable Gowanus glam-rock/power-pop outfit Bryan Scary and the Shredding Tears.

They blew our minds at the OVERFLOW release show back in March, and they're returning with a whole new set to promote their new Mad Valentines EP, released tonight, but already receiving ridiculously good reviews.

BSST shows are uniformly fun, high-energy romps of psychedelic mayhem.  And, I hear there's an extra special surprise tonight for the audience at this EP release. . . . . . .

The show's at 92Y Tribeca tonight, Sat 10-10 @ 9PM.  

Deetz: http://www.92y.org/

Deluxa <3 Overflow

A little local love from our boutiquey friends in Carroll Gardens, Deluxa, who rave about Robert Dupree's Recession Special vintage suit spread in the Fall 2009 issue:

I was supremely delighted when I was reading my copy on the train on my way to the Manhattan Vintage Clothing Show and got to the article "Recession Special" by Robert Dupree. I think his piece on dressing in supremely dapper duds from vintage stores in the area was ingenious, and creates some rather stunning looks.

Full text: http://deluxanyc.blogspot.com/

9th Street Bridge

I'd never seen this before, glad I got caught.

We're so smart, and we want to show off

We were invited by our dear friends Vol. 1 Brooklyn to square off in a competition--a battle of wits--with our frenemies, the Greenpoint Gazette. It's panel trivia, North vs. South Brooklyn. Since North Brooklyn is basically where intellectuals go to get wasted and screw underage college girls, and South Brooklyn residents are more likely to use their library cards for more than cutting lines, I think we have it in the bag.

In any event, come by and cheer us on [yes there are cheering sections], drink some beer, and in general have a good time.

It's taking place next Monday, October 12th, at Public Assembly in the not-so neutral territory of Williamsburg. C'est la vie--good thing the G train runs past Smith/9th now.

Oh and it's for a good cause--your $2.00 donation to the pot will be won by us, and promptly turned over to Books Through Bars.

Deetz: http://vol1brooklyn.com/2009/10/02/battleofthenewyorknerds/

ISSUE THREE IS OUT

Issue three hit the streets in early September, and now we're psyched to launch the online version. CHECK IT OUT.

We have a blog

At OVERFLOW, we privilege the printed word. But we decided to do what everyone was doing in 2002--namely starting a blog and praying that people will care enough to read it.

So, this is the new OVERFLOW magazine blog. Neat stuff will go here that is timely and relevant to the world--especially so for people who live in South Brooklyn.