It was almost Cinco de Mayo and everyone at Amoeba was drunk! Well...OK, not really. But people were bidding as if they were drunk (on Tequila and agua de melon spiked with Cuervo).

On Saturday, May 4 we had a lighting-speed auctioneer, bestselling author Gustavo Arellano, hosting our Cuatro de Mayo charity auction to raise money for the Youth Orchestra of Los Angeles (YOLA). He was also available after the auction to sign copies of his book, Taco USA: How Mexican Food Conquered America.

In case you're not familiar, Gustavo is also a lecturer with the Chicana and Chicano Studies department at California State University, Fullerton. He writes “¡Ask a Mexican!,” a nationally syndicated column in which he answers any and all questions about America’s spiciest and largest minority. The column has a weekly circulation of over 2 million in 39 newspapers across the United States, won the 2006 and 2008 Association of Alternative Weeklies award for Best Column. In addition, Gustavo is a lifelong resident of Orange County and is the proud son of two Mexican immigrants (one of whom was illegal).

The recipient of Saturday's auction was Gustavo Dudamel's Youth Orchestra of Los Angeles (YOLA) program – inspired by Venezuela's revolutionary El Sistema. The LA Phil and its community partners provide free instruments, intensive music training, and academic support to students from underserved neighborhoods, enabling every child to contribute using their full potential. YOLA changes lives – one child, one family, one community at a time.

On Saturday, April 6th, we had comedian Dave Ross as our guest auctioneer for April's charity auction benefiting Silverlake Conservatory. He auctioned off a crazy array of items, from movie and music collectibles to concert tickets and gift certificates. And as always, Amoeba matched all individual bids.

Dave Ross is a stand-up comedian and storyteller in Los Angele. He is the creator of the wildly successful Holy F*ck comedy show and a MOTH GrandSlam winner. You might have seen him on Tosh.0 with his sketch group, WOMEN, or heard him telling stories on KCRW. But up on the podium at Amoeba's monthly charity aution is where he really shined. His extremely dry and droll sense of humor had the shoppers and onlookers chuckling under their collectives breaths and looking over at each other as if to say, "Wait, did he just say what I think he said?"

Silverlake Conservatory is a non-profit organization, created in 2001 to fill a void in the cultural landscape of the community. They offer the people in the area the opportunity to study music with exceptional teachers at a reasonable price, while also donating lessons and instruments to deserving children. They will also be the Hollywood store’s RECORD STORE DAY beneficiary for our prize wheel and the live silkscreening.

Dave Ross helped us raise a great amount of money, all going directly to music education for needy kids and families in Silver Lake and Echo Park, via Silverlake Conservatory!

On Saturday, March 2 we had the hilarious Kurt Braunohler all the way from New York host our charity auction at Amoeba Hollywood and he did a fabulous job with a very tough crowd. He drove home our reason for being there ("Hey guys, it's for Doctors Without Borders...C'MON! Doctors who have no sense of their own boundaries! "). The crowd was enjoying the show, but it was tough to get them to bid. Sometimes it's like that. You never know what the temperature of the crowd will be! But Kurt did a great job and we ended up having a very successful auction.

The concert tickets went well, as always, and thanks so much to our neighbors at Trader Joe's and Brew Coffee, as well as Goldenvoice, for getting us such cool prizes.

Here are some of the highlights:

• Brew Coffee gift card with Amoeba mug $25.00
• Tickets to Jim James at the Fonda $30.00
• Tickets to The Black Lips at the El Rey $25.00
• Tickets to Django Django at the Fonda $20.00
• Trader Joe's Gift Card and California Raisins lunchbox $50.00
• Passes to the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles $40.00
• Special VIP Amoeba in-store pass $66.00
• Sundance Theater passes 30.00
• Classic rock package featuring Doors documentary, Led Zeppelin and Doors t-shirts & more $70.00
• Limited edition Record Store Day package $60.00
• Tiny Furniture DVD signed by Lena Dunham $35.00
• Super DVD signed by the cast $15.00
• Ozzy and Sharon talking Beanie Babies with lunchbox and Black Sabbath pen $10.00
• Beatles package featuring totes, poster, mug and more $30.00

There was a grand total of bids of $485.00, and then with our matching that meant we raised $970.00 for Doctors Without Borders, an organization which has helped tremendously with Hurricane Sandy (in addition to their work in all corners of the world). This one was great. Thanks all for the help!

A record number of people came to celebrate Amoeba Hollywood’s annual Fat Tuesday celebration. This year saw The Dirty Dozen Brass Band perform live and lead the annual Second Line Parade down the aisles of Amoeba.

The band brought New Orleans cheer to the store, getting the family-friendly audience dancing in the aisles with their influential funk-infused jazz style. Some attendees showed up in Mardi Gras costume, including a quartet of girls in white dresses spattered with fake blood — maybe it’s a True Blood thing, I’m not sure.

While homemade floats, masks and beads floated around the audience, the extraordinary musicianship on display wasn’t lost on the audience. A sax solo introduced the band’s second song, breaking out into a drum solo before returning to the song and drawing huge applause. They got the audience clapping to what I thought was a standup bass but was actually DDBB’s tuba player playing a rubbery bassline. They thanked the audience and Amoeba as they capped off 36 years as a band before leading everyone through a parade while playing “When the Saints Go Marching In” up and down the aisles.

Amoeba is distributing The Congo Square Project Foundation: Sacred Ground Vols. 1 and 2, the first two of six planned volumes tracing the development of New Orleans music, with all proceeds of the sale benefiting New Orleans relief efforts. Additionally, a portion of all proceeds for the day (including sales on Amoeba.com) went to Tipitina’s Foundation, which seeks to preserve Louisiana and New Orleans’ musical heritage, and New Orleans Musicians’ Clinic, which is dedicated to providing affordable healthcare to New Orleans musicians. A total of $3,000 was donated from Amoeba's revenue Feb. 12, adding to the $1,400 raised through a charity auction held at Amoeba Hollywood Feb. 2 ($700 was raised from auction sales, with a $700 match from Amoeba), for a combined total of $4,400 sent to the two charities.

On Saturday, February 2 we kicked off "New Orleans Month" at Amoeba Hollywood with a rockin' auction hosted by the inimitable and charming Billy Calhoun. Billy's soothing and unflappable style not only inspired some major bidding, but he deftly and seamlessly dropped some science on all the onlookers about New Orleans and the two foundations we were focusing on (New Orleans Musicians Clinic and Tipitina's Foundation), as well as what we are doing on Amoeba.com and how long we have been doing the charity auctions. People learned a lot while they had fun bidding on really cool items. More than a few customers mentioned that they didn't realize we do these auctions every month, and that they learned a lot from all that Billy had to say. Billy educated folks on our Vinyl Vaults and Louis Armstrong digital restoration, as well as the exclusive release of the Congo Square Project which is an amazing collection of music available only on Amoeba.com.

We had several bidding wars, and Billy effortlessly kept the momentum going and kept people engaged. Here are some of the highlights for today's auction---one of the highest generating auctions we have had in a long while. Way to go Billy!!