Ahead of what is poised to be an amazing night Tuesday August 30th at Garage B in Allston, Boston Hassle sat down with Content Brakes’ own Tyler & Teena Hallett, some of the event organizers to discuss the event as well as Content Brakes’ new non-profit distro.
Industry Night Event Details:
-Tuesday August 30th, at Garage B at 525 Western Ave Brighton.
-30 + Vendors including Records, art, vintage & mutual aid efforts.
-Unhoused supply drive / food donations / charity raffle .
-All ages, free, & 4-11PM
– Vinyl DJs KB-Sweets and Al – B spinning records from 9-11PM and with projections by Content Brakes
-Food , beer and liquor vendors on site.
-Sponsored by Topo Chico & Ethos
Boston Hassle: Can you provide us some info on your non-profit distro and how it relates to harm reduction?
Tyler & Teena Hallett: Content Brakes Distro is something we have been wanting to put together for a while now.
As far as each of our roles in the distro go, Tyler will organize the fluctuating inventory of cassettes that will be released in drops throughout the year. They will be concentrated on artists Content Brakes brings into town as well as the ones we work closely with locally. All profits from the cassettes will go back into the Boston drug user community as well as the unhoused population living in the Mass & Cass neighborhood. It also allows us to further support the artists we host. Down the line we plan to expand prints, vinyl & clothing.
Teena will organize and keep an up to date Harm Reduction library filled with zines about a variety of drugs/substance use topics, mental health, eating disorders, overdose prevention, grief resources, sex work & safer sex practice, and more all available by donation. She has some original zines (we are constantly creating new stuff) as well as zines collected from members of the international harm reduction community. Everything is printed and shared with permission from original artists/programs. There is an accompanying G Drive she has created that will be free to anyone to access and share as they wish. Many resources are also available in Spanish. Donations are cool, but resources are & will always be free! We encourage folks to make copies and distribute them to their community members as well.
As always we will carry narcan, & fentanyl test strips and encourage conversation and questions.
BH: Will there be a physical location for the library? If not, any plans for the future?
T&TH: For the time being the physical library will exist wherever we are. We hope to find a permanent home one day, but for the time being, it will travel with us from market to market. We are both very social people who attend lots of shows and if anyone is curious about seeing anything featured in it we can be reached by email or DMs and can always bring stuff around town with us per request. Otherwise Teena has organized a really nice google drive folder that we are happy to share with anyone and will include here.
BH: What inspired you to start this Distro project? What need do you think it meets within the Greater Boston community?
T&TH: The distro is something we have wanted to put together for a while. Selfishly it combines both of our peak interests, harm reduction & music, into one collective idea. Booking lots of shows in the area means coming in brief contact with a lot of artists and friends we only get to see when their bands pass through town. It also allows us to build a unique inventory catered to underground music that people may not come across unless they were to see these artists perform. In turn we get to both support the artists we love and by remaining non profit we can also help the drug user community we love and live in.
As far as our standing in the greater Boston Community, I think the primary and most obvious answer is that all money we make will go directly back into it. Having an opportunity to engage with people at markets and events in our immediate social scene while also having resources folks can take with them for free or donation will help promote safer drug use and harm reduction in our own community. Our goal is to help reduce stigma and provide greater education about the unhoused drug user community in the city that we live in.
Boston’s markets & record stores are fairly saturated with punk, hardcore & metal, and though we love and won’t stray away from these genres, our distro allows us to fill a hole where elctronic & experimental music are lacking.
BH: Thinking longer term, what are some of the most important steps to be taken to lessen the severity of the opioid epidemic? The housing crisis?
T&TH: Longer term, the most important thing that can be done would be to legalize and regulate drugs. Honestly, this shouldn’t even be a long term goal- it needs to happen immediately. We are so far past the concept of the “opioid epidemic” at this point because the street supply we’re dealing with now is totally out of control. Synthetic benzodiazepines, veterinary tranquilizers such as xylazine, numerous fentanyl analogues + precursors, and cathinones are all routinely found in various samples from the street supply in Boston. It’s fucked. Everything is contaminated. So really, what we’re dealing with is an overdose epidemic. So we need a safe supply NOW, anything less is murder and a complete violation of human rights. If we’re able to go into a bar and comfortably order a drink without having to worry about it suddenly killing us, our siblings that enjoy other substances should be able to do the same. Everyone deserves safety, autonomy, and freedom no matter what.
The first proactive and most important step you as an individual can take is to carry Narcan (naloxone) on you and educate yourself on how to use it. We have to protect each other and help keep each other alive. You can get Narcan without a prescription at any pharmacy in the state of Massachusetts, and it’s free with MassHealth! There are also a number of needle exchange programs/community health centers that provide Narcan kits to individuals that use drugs and their families/loved ones free of charge. Here is an interactive map of programs across the state that distribute Narcan to eligible community members.
We will also have Narcan kits available for free at tabling events, and we often have extra kits with us at shows. Just ask 🙂
BH: Where does an industry night for diy artists and harm reduction interact, if at all? What do you wish more people in the Boston artist community knew about harm reduction and the opiod epidemic? Any resources for us to check out?
T&TH: It intersects a ton. We can’t think of anyone we know that doesn’t know someone who has died of an overdose. Art and intoxication go hand in hand a lot of the time, so the consumption of alcohol and other drugs is extremely relevant within the artist community in this city. The google drive pasted above is full of resources!
Here is what Content Brakes has coming up in the future:
Saturday – 08/27 – SPLINTERED Dance Party Featuring: Octonomy / Khadija / Solid State Entity / Biproduct @ O’Briens Pub Allston
Tuesday – 08/30 – Content Brakes & iBookThings Present a Boston Vinyl & Variety Joint @ GARAGE B – Brighton.
Saturday 09/03 – Black Mold Market @ Old Salem Town Hall in Salem Center – Tabeling
Tuesday 09/20 – Content Brakes Presents: Nuxx Vomica / Lunacy / Midnight Climax / Prayer Position / Octalisk (DJ Set)
Wednesday 09/21 – Content Brakes & iBookThings Present Industry Night @ O’Briens
Thursday 10/20 – Content Brakes Presents Lovelorn @ O’Briens
Wednesday 10/26 – Content Brakes Presents Duma @ O’Briens
Friday 10/28 – a SPLINTERED Halloween W/ Xen Chron / Biproduct / Octalisk / TBA
Tuesday 11/15 – Black Mold Market @ Kotos in Salem
In addition to these local Events Content Brakes has produced its first tour, which will run 10 days in mid September through the North East. View our instagram for full details.
Links:
Industry Night FB Event PageContent Brakes on IG
Content Brakes Site
Boston Vinyl & Variety on IG
Salem Black Mold Market on 9/3
Lunacy / Nux Vomica / Midnight Climax / Prayer Position & Octalisk 9/20
