THE NIGHT STUFF
Indigo gets the weekly it deserves in Get Fresh!

By Derek Paiva
Advertiser Entertainment Writer

Rainbow Bernheim of Kaimuki and Tom Oglesby of Hawai'i Kai groove at Get Fresh! Photos by Rebecca Breyer • The Honolulu Advertiser

Deneitra Courchen, left, and Alicia Yost, both of 'Aiea, feel the beat.

Get Fresh! 10 p.m.-2 a.m. Fridays Indigo Eurasian Cuisine $7 21 and older 521-2900 Coming up @ Get Fresh!: • Quadraphonix tonight • Black Mask with DJ Spun (San Francisco), Still Will and DJ Speed (Los Angeles) • Total Science (Britain)

Few things in life are better than taking a crowd-avoiding midnight trip to Wal-Mart and finding seniors, baby boomers, entire families and my own thirtysomething peeps all looking for cheap toilet paper and Rubbermaid. It's communal. It's life-affirming. It's a small world after all.

A post-midnight trip to Get Fresh! at Indigo Eurasian Cuisine last Friday was kind of like that — with DJs, bartenders and mirror balls.

There were downtown office drones just in from Murphy's Bar & Grill down the street scowling at the price of a Samuel Adams. A quartet of Gen-X gays were riffing on Lynne Cheney. Volcom and Roxy Girl junkies rubbed up against former Wonder Lounge slaves without incident. And a guy who looked a lot like a post-breakdown Jack Torrance from "The Shining" slinked between the Green Room bar and dance floor for various perspectives on it all.

The one thing we all had in common? A weakness for Mary Jane Girls and the lure of a crowded dance floor.

Indigo has always been one of my favorite after-hours haunts. But I've never seen a weekly there draw as loyal and large a following as Get Fresh! has.

Much of the credit goes to a resident crew of turntablists able to read its crowd like a good novel, and the smarts of promoter Mark Chittom. Chittom — a Get Fresh! resident DJ and, in a past life, arguably the hands-down best night-scene writer this town has ever read — has crafted a weekly that delivers exactly what its moniker promises.

The last year has seen Chittom blend a tasty selection of out-of-town DJ talent (John Howard, Hollertronix, Jesse Saunders), local live acts (Quadraphonix, Microscopic Syllables) and vinyl styles into a fresh, pretension-free party that consistently surprises.

The formula has clearly worked. Even guest-free Get Fresh! parties held down by excellent resident crew Sovern T, Compose, Eskae and Chittom draw packed houses.

The Green Room's postage-stamp-sized floor got surprisingly ballistic at the opening keyboard and guitar lines of "I Can't Go For That (No Can Do)" and "Give Me the Night." (When did Hall & Oates and George Benson become cool again?)

House-overloaded Opium Den dwellers started drifting in soon after — the Mary Jane Girls have that effect on people — and stuck around for sublime old-school jams like Cherrelle and Alexander O'Neal's "Saturday Love."

Even Nu Shooz's "I Can't Wait" couldn't scare 'em away after that.

Reach Derek Paiva at 525-8005 or dpaiva@honoluluadvertiser.com.

NIGHTSPOTTING

• Ms. Angel and Haboh — whose Thursday-night "The So-Very Show" on KTUH-FM is a must-listen for house junkies — will host the last edition of Scenes on Saturday at Indigo Eurasian Cuisine. Guesting is L.A.-based turntablist Cory Wells, once a resident turntablist in Honolulu's early house music scene. Also on Scenes' tables: Ms. Angel, Haboh, Missy, Monkey, Konception, Marloca and Toki. From 10 p.m. to 2 a.m.; 21 and older. Entry is $10; free before 11 p.m. Catch "The So-Very Show" from 9 p.m. to midnight Thursdays on KTUH 90.3 FM.
• Ranked as one of the world's Top 30 DJs on DJMag's annual readers poll, DJ Max Graham spins two sets in Honolulu tonight. A cut-and-scratch veteran, Graham's fortÚ these days is a mix of trance and progressive house. Wonder Lounge hosts Graham's first set from 10:30 p.m. to 1 a.m. at the W Honolulu's Diamond Head Grill. From there, Graham heads for Wave Waikiki for a 1:30 to 4 a.m. slot. 21 and older, both venues.
• House of Breaks hosts its usual final-Tuesday-of-the-month residency at Wave Waikiki this week with New York City-based DJ Denovo and Las Vegas-based DJ Daddy's Girl. Also on the menu, House of Breaks' monthly tag-team turntablist breakbeat showcase. Residents Ikon, KSM, Rundown, Nalu, Sub-Zero and Jrama hold the rest of the night down. From 9 p.m. to 4 a.m. Tuesday at Wave Waikiki. 21 and older.
• Tickets are on sale for the Honolulu Symphony's Backstage Pass pre-concert private reception for Reel to Real — a screening of a Japanese silent film accompanied by a live orchestra performance. Introduced at September's symphony show with Cuban trumpeter Arturo Sandoval, Backstage Pass is a pre-concert food, music and mingling reception for music enthusiasts in their 20s and 30s. Sushi and sake rules at this one. Tickets are $50, which include the Nov. 5 concert and backstage Blaisdell Concert Hall reception. Call Julia Moran at 524-0815, ext. 237 for reservations.