Kittens, pizza, and models: the Internet

Ricky Raw tells us all about the Internet” pizza and kitten adoption party he’s throwing at the Music Room this Fri.

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Ricky Raw tells us all about “the Internet” pizza and kitten adoption party he’s throwing at the Music Room this Fri., Dec. 19.

Chad Radford: Why call this party “the Internet?”

Ricky Raw: I had a party that I was calling “Pretty Dope.” It’s kind of a play on words: It was “pretty” because we were going to have models and art. “Dope” because there was going to be the music and you know, everywhere I go we was smoking weed and shit. And you know, “that’s pretty dope,” people use that term all the time. I constantly hear it now. So I started this party concept — “Pretty Dope” — I had art created for it with pictures of these girls that are just really artistic and cool. Basically, I asked a friend what he thought and he told me that he liked the idea but that there was this group of guys who do a party called “Pretty Sweet” and that he thought they might not like it. I felt like I was going to conquer the world, so I just hit those guys up. The guy I talked to was really nice and said: “I don’t have a problem with it. My partner feels like it’s a little competitive with our brand.” I wanted to pitch them a little bit but we didn’t have time. I had a tough decision to make: I could ride this out but I’m going to instantly make somebody upset. So I came up with a new concept — something where I could use art, women, and then I realized that Vesuvius was right there, and, like pizza! Then I was like, all these things are the Internet. And then the kittens came up as like a huge thing and I like to attach a fundraiser or a charity to a lot of my events. It adds a whole new dynamic and you get to feel good at the end of it. We decided to add on the kitty adoptions, and because of that interest from the artists grew. Treasure Fingers was like “I’m totally down to play this benefit for kittens.” So we gained a lot of momentum from pretty much just having a good idea.


What shelter will benefit from the show?

Good Mews, which is off of Johnson Ferry in Marietta. It’s off 285, it’s not terribly far out of the city. It took me 20 minutes to get there from East Atlanta. Essentially they’re going to come down, we’re going to offer free pizza and free entry from 7-9 p.m., and everywhere we’re going to be reminding people to make a donation. Like “have a slice of free pizza, put a dollar in the donation thing.” There will be stuff on the bar reminding people to donate, pictures of kittens that you can apply to adopt, and you can put a deposit down if you see a picture of a kitten that you really want. We’re not going to have kittens at the actual event, but if you see one that you like you can put $25 down and then go back and get them. They’re usually $125, but they’re doing a special where it’s $75 all month instead of $125. So if you come to my event, you put down $25, you should go up there in the next two or three days, give them the other $50 and boom, you can pick whatever kitten you want. All of the pictures of kittens that I put up have the phone number and email to adopt them. Treasure Fingers is going to perform, my boy Chris Grass who plays under a lot of monikers. Then at 10 p.m. we’ll get into some hip-hop with Mudfish and WIC, and A-Bomb is going to do a set, and then at 11:30 we’ll have HYDRABADD.

We’re doing DJ Nappy, I think it’s actually going to be his last show. Basically, I probably will not credit him fully correctly here because he does a ton of behind the scenes work that I don’t know about. He a regular contributor to the blog Do Androids Dance and curates a ton of music for a ton of different DJs. I know he’s been helping manage and brand some big names and essentially this guy “runs the Internet.” That’s why I booked him. We’re gonna fly him out. We’ll close it out with DJ Baels of FKi. It should be a crazy night. We’re hopefully going to raise up to $1,000. Good Mews has to buy a new building, so they need a $1,000,000 to essentially do everything that they need to do. They have already raised a lot, but when I talked to them they told me they really need money and exactly why and how much. That’s why I picked them.

So there are multiple layers to the party’s name.

Yeah, essentially it’s kittens, pizza, models, photographers, art. Those are probably like our top points.

Basically we had a handful of models go up to the shelter and take pictures with the cats. We posted the pictures of each of the girls, we’re going to blow up some of those and some other donated photography that we’re going to blow up prints and raffle/sell those to donate. So the models’ involvement is them donating their time, energy and art, you know giving us photos to blow up. With all of the art that’s sold, it would either be 100% donated to the kittens or 100% of the profit if there was some type of overhead like that. I told them I would donate at least $100 myself, and maybe we will make $1,000, I told them that was my goal. They appreciate it, they said they would be happy with $250. And they’re going to come out and have drinks and have some fun, it’s not going to be hard. Free pizza… what’s not to love.

The Internet: art & pizza party ft. Michael Abernathy, DJ NAPPY, Treasure Fingers, HYDRABADD, Baels, DJ QUICKTEMPER aka Chris Grass, A-Bomb, W.I.C., and Capeeton Mudfish. Fri., Dec. 19. Free 7-9 p.m. $8 (pre-sale) $10 (door). The Music Room. 327 Edgewood Ave SE. www.atlmusicroom.com.