Apartment613

For everyone who’s ever felt torn between going out to a rave and staying in to handcraft a plush monster, there’s a made-in-Ottawa solution to your dilemma. Local crafting/DJ pair Melanie Yugo and Jason Pelletier have been hosting Spins & Needles since 2005, a unique event which combines funky beats with not-for-grandma crafting. Spins has become a popular Ottawa export to creative hotspots in Toronto, Montreal, San Fransico and New York. Within the city limits the pair has also branched out to host a monthly Disco Bingo at Humphrey’s (683 Bank) and an occasional silkscreening workshop.

Apartment613 tracked down the duo a couple of weekends ago to find their secret to DIY good times in Ottawa.

Apartment613 – So what’s the connection between crafting and music?

Jason – Since the beginning we always use a lot of independent records, like independent record labels, independent music, independent producers and DJs and that kind of thing. So I guess there’s a DIY (Do It Yourself) link there because they’re not really big corporate best sellers. Small quantities of the music are sold and then played for people’s enjoyment. A lot of people practice DJing; it’s kinda like a hobby similar to crafting.

Mel – They are both creative outlets and I think they’re both really hands on things. I think a lot of young people are really into the hands-on aspect of crafting and people like to go out and listen to music.

Apartment613 – So they are like two fun things you can put together and make even more fun?

Mel – Yeah exactly. That’s the special thing about Spins and Needles is that you would never expect the two worlds to collide, but it actually does work. People come out and they enjoy the music and they enjoy making whatever project we have that month.

Apartment613 – What’s the best music to craft to?

Jason – Something funky for sure. It probably depends on what your mood is.

Mel – And what you’re making.

Jason – Certainly for us it’s a party atmosphere, so we try to keep it fun and funky. I spin funky house and people seem to enjoy that. It is accessible for all kinds of people.

Mel – I guess another thing is we try and keep our event light. We tell people not to get fussy, we don’t want you to create the most ecstatically pleasing product. Its all about the process, so just sit down, have a drink, listen to music and just make whatever you feel like. Its not a very serious atmosphere.

Jason – It’s a party.

Apartment613 – Do you pick a certain kind of music to go with a certain craft, or do you pick the music and come up with random crafts?

Mel – Jason’s been playing some funk, House, techno, so it’s really music that he wants to play. Normally crafting can often be associated with the whole DIY and indie rock movement and a lot of bands are really into DIY. Jason wanted to bring his own flavour to the event so he spins a lot of funky beats and he invites a lot of his friends that play the same type of music… we mix it up a little. We have had some requests for classical music. Some older people have asked for it. We told them that that it wasn’t the right atmosphere for the event.

Apartment613 – You mentioned older people. Who comes out?

Mel – It’s a really diverse crowd. So we get a lot of students, we get a lot young professionals and we get some older people too. And it’s not just girls, we get alot of guys who come out as well. It’s a really wide range of people, mainly 19 to 40.

Apartment613 – How did you get the idea to start doing the event?

Mel – Jason’s been a DJ for quite a while, over ten years, and I’ve been crafting and baking cakes. I didn’t necessarily label it as crafting back then. We’re a couple as you might know, and we both moved to Ottawa and we were looking for something to do and we thought “hey, why don’t we combine our interests and see what happens.” So we said OK lets do an event, and about 40-50 people showed up. We thought wow, people are interested so we continued to do it on a monthly basis and it just grew from that.

Apartment613 – What has been the best craft and the worst craft that you’ve done so far?

Mel – The best craft… that’s a tough one. Personally I think plush monsters was one that was a big hit. That’s basically taking some fabric or felt, cutting it out into a weird shape and decorating it to create a monster.

Apartment613 – Maybe you could describe a little bit of the growth path? I read in your press kit that you’ve done events in the States and you’re planning one for Europe. How did you get from Ottawa to Europe?

Jason – Well it’s pretty neat. The whole craft scene is really global. Especially down in the States, it’s really big down there partly because of the bigger population. We like to travel ourselves so we started traveling, meeting people, meeting people online and just expanding the networks and stuff like that.

Mel – Definitely online: the internet has helped us. We’re an independent event, we’re essentially non-profit so we spend a lot of our time promoting ourselves, coming up with projects ourselves and stuff like that. We promote online and whenever we go overseas or we go to different cities we try to make contact with people who sort of have the same interests as us so we can hook up and maybe do an event there.

Jason – It’s a really nice community. We did an event in San Francisco, one of the first ones we did in the States, which was a big festival. We met a whole bunch of cool people there who are also into the scene, and we got invited to do something in New York through that. And so you just meet people. In San Fran we did Maker Faire which is a big festival and this past year we did their other festival which is in Austin Texas.  We have an online presence, we’re on Myspace and Facebook, so people find us and we find them. That’s how it works.

Mel – People are really willing to take us in and host us. There’s a lot of support for what we do so it makes our life easier.

Jason – We have fans who come to multiple events in multiple cities, especially in Canada. Although in Ottawa, we have a lot of students who attend and some are transient.  They live in other cities or they’re from Toronto and Montreal. So when we do it in Toronto or Montreal they already have a big pool of their friends come out or their friends are like “we heard about the Ottawa one so we want to come check it out.” It works out nice.

Apartment613 – You know Ottawa and its reputation for being a bit boring,  do you think that reputation is deserved?

Jason – Well it’s changing, we’re trying to make it better by doing special events and stuff.

Mel – I think the people who are involved in the creative community or the sub-cultures of Ottawa know that you really have to dig to find what’s there because on the surface it looks like it’s a really boring government town. But there are people who are trying to make that not true. There’s a lot to be done, but people are trying to change it.

Jason – There’s something there. It’s a small scene for sure, but there’s stuff there. There’s bands, there’s punkottawa.com, there’s clubs… there’s a few clubs anyway. Then there’s our little thing that’s been going on for four years now.

Mel  – What we’ve seen after fours years is that people actually do want something. People are hungry for things to do.

Jason – It’s freaky because we sometimes get people who come to the event and we’re like “how did you hear about it” or “did you come before” and they are like “oh yeah, I came like three years ago” or “I’ve came two years ago”. And we’re like Wow! So there’s a sustainability factor there I guess. People will come, maybe when we’re at a different location. We’ve got our regulars, and we’ve got our yearly regulars.

Apartment613 – What’s your favorite cool thing to do in Ottawa, besides Spins and Needles?

Jason – We go to Montreal. Also I like going to some local music shows in Ottawa.

Apartment613 – Ouch!

Mel – We like to take in other local events, like gallery openings. For example, we were at a gallery last Tuesday and they invited us to participate in their outsider art fair. We want to support the community as well so we go out and help out in whatever way we can.

Jason – This summer we’re probably going to participate with Ottawa Folk Festival, do something with them, and sometimes there’s other kinds of events that contact us.

Apartment613 – If you were a street in Ottawa, what street in Ottawa would you like to be?

Jason – Richmond Road. I used to DJ on Richmond Road, and its a good street. York Street, George Street, Elgin. Kent where we have our event. In fact we’ve looked for apartments on Kent, we’re like “can we get closer to the venue.”

Mel – I say Bank Street’s another good street. It has a lot of character and a lot of amenities. There’s a lot of diversity on that street and Ottawa needs that.

Jason – I’ll go with Bank too. We have our Bingo on Bank street, at Humprey’s.

Aptarment613 – Which got closed temporarily, the liquor license or something.

Jason – Yeah, in Ottawa they really do try to make fun very difficult to happen. There’s a lot of By-Laws and stuff, but despite of all that people do go out and have fun.

You can check out the growing roster of Spins and Needles Events on their website at
www.spinsandneedles.com. After the Interview, Apartment613 was so pumped on DYI that we had a little merch-making session a la Spins & Needles, complete with funky beats. The Crafternoon was a hit: get your one-of-a-kind hand made magnet at the upcoming Capital Cupcake Camp at the Jack Purcell Center.

Written with a big assist from Karen.