Concerts
debby -- Sunday, June 08, 2003 -- 10:27:16 AM(All users will see what tags exist for a thread. Please tag carefully!)
On Saturday night B and I went to one of the most interesting salon-type of concerts I have had the luxury of attending.
A vague music acquaintance of Brian is periodically putting on small concerts on his grand piano, in the living room of his apartment. Cost is $5, seating is limited to seven, and you get to hear him performing the music he is currently working on, including some of his own compositions. The link is to the program we saw, with two of his own compositions (the first is stunningly beautiful) and three pieces by Chopin, three by Brahms.
Hearing a grand piano from the remove of about six feet is an amazing experience, and hearing someone who, while not technically absolutely virtuosic, obviously spends a great deal of time on how he wants the piece to be performed was a pleasure I wasn't expecting. I thought Chopin had been done to death, but Cantrell had some of the most interesting voicings I've ever heard. The Brahms selections were beautiful and heartfelt.
And the company was interesting and friendly. As Paul notes in the blog entry I linked above, he took apart his piano, to show us the workings of the keyboard and how he has calibrated the soft pedal to accommodate his personal style, along with other interesting tidbits.
All in all, I felt slightly like Gertrude Stein (although, of course, I wasn't hosting, just attending), and it was intimate and engaging to have such a salon experience.
FWIW, that "stunningly beautiful" composition Jane Plane mentioned, Three Places, is available online.
Jane, that sounds like fun.
I've played piano on-and-off all my life, and started taking lessons again as an adult. My teacher had some success on the "tour" as a young man. I was very diligent in practicing when I first started, but was also in grad school. As my grad program became more difficult, my practicing slacked off. On days when I hadn't practiced much, my teacher would perform for me. This was cool the first few times, but at $30 a pop, I just couldn't afford it forever, and gave up the piano lessons.
anne, that's really neat.
melquiades, thanks - and thanks for the mention on your blog. I hope you don't mind the link.
I saw the Beastie Boys on Saturday night at Madison Square Garden. It was my 3rd time seeing them live.
They were awesome, great mix of old ("Hello Brooklyn"!!) & new, and for the 2nd set they wore red t-shirts with game names on them - Scrabble, Mah-Jong, Critter, and, my favorite (on MMM) Electronic Battleship. The energy was unbelievable.
For the encore, they came into the crowd as they have been doing for this tour. TO THE SECTION RIGHT BEHIND ME. I could see the lights, and realized they were somewhere behind me. My husband pointed between the people behind us at a red shirt. Yeah! A glimpse of a Beastie Boy. Then, they stopped RIGHT THERE. They were performing "Intergalactic", and I didn't hear a single lyric. I was on my seat, screaming and jumping. Mike D (my favorite) stood on the railing of the section about 10 FEET AWAY FROM ME!! I could see his wrinkles and blue eyes. Adam and Adam were right in front of me but I could only catch peeks as the crowd would shift. I saw Adam H. has a new (newish anyway) tattoo on his right forearm. I think it's an NYC tribute.
It was the highlight of my entire year. I was so pumped for hours after. While I was watching the performance early on, I was thinking, "I am in the same room as the Beastie Boys!", and then they were just feet away from me.
On Saturday night we went to see PJ Harvey perform. Now this was the first live event we'd been to since we saw David Byrne perform nearly three years ago, so we itching to get out. But we'd also been wanting to see PJ live for years and years. Finally we lived in a town where her tour stopped. The tickets stated that the show started at 7pm, but we were dubious about this claim since it has never been our experience that things of a non-art nature start even close to the hour stated on the tickets. But we called, and indeed yes it was an early show because the club venue (Avalon, for the Boston people) does DJ club stuff afterwards. Anyway, we got there around 7:30 and the opener (Morris Tepper) had already started, but we still found a comfy place to perch and hang out until PJ took to the stage.
I'd never heard of Morris Tepper before, but apparently he's performed with Tom Waits and Captain Beefheart before. Anyway, he was a solo act, mostly guitar with some electronic enhancements. My husband thought he sounded a bit like early Sabbath, and the guy sitting next to us thought he was more Neil Young on acid.
PJ and her band came on the stage at 8:30 and she played for a straight 45 minutes, said thank you! and they headed off stage until the crowd demanded encours. It was her birthday so many people were shouting out "Happy Birthday, Polly!", and she gamely donned a birthday hat on her encore return. Many favorites were played plus several works from her last album. "C'mon Billy" was just her and her guitar, and I again boggled at the sheer power coming from this teeny-tiny person.
We were out by 9:30, ears not ringing and clothes not reeking of smoke. We'll definately go to that venue again.
I'm not as in love with PJ Harvey as I once was but man, I would love to see her live. That's cool.
I went to see Lunasa this weekend. I'd enjoyed their cds, but they were fantastic live, and it was a treat to watch them play. Flutist Kevin Crawford and violinist Sean Smyth entertained the crowd between songs with stories about how various songs were written and much affectionate teasing of bandmates.
If you enjoy traditional Irish music, do not miss a chance to see them.
Kaye mentioned The Pixies show in the WILTRN thread, so I thought I'd post about it.
The Pixies played three nights in Detroit, we got tickets to the first show Nov. 18. Mr. Iggy is a huge Pixies fan, so this show was one of those "got to see this band before I die" kind of show for him.
We arrived late, around 9p.m., and I heard the Pixies started at 8:45. We missed the opening band, The Datsuns. The Pixies sounded pretty tight, although I noticed Kim Deal missed a few cues. There was very little interaction with the crowd - no talking between songs. I don't mind this - I want live music at a show, not a monologue. Frank Black's voice sounded incredible - much better than I expected live. Kim Deal had the high little girl voice when singing most of the time and that irritated me. They played only one song during the encore - Gigantic.
The set list:
I Bleed
Head On
U-Mass
Monkey Gone to Heaven
Caribou
No. 13 Baby
Broken Face
Crackity Jones
Isla De Encanta
Something Against You
Hey
Mr. Grieves
Velouria
Dead
Gouge Away
Tame
Debaser
Wave of Mutilation
In Heaven
Here Comes Your Man
Where Is My Mind
Holiday Song
Nimrod's Son
Vamos
Gigantic
It was a pretty great show. DiscLive was there, so Mr. Iggy ordered a CD online (the line at the show was hideous). I'm curious to hear the sound quality.
I noticed there were signs up Thursday that offered a 50% discount for a ticket to the Sunday show if you presented a stub from the first or second night. It certainly sounded like they overscheduled some shows, at least here.
Thanks for that Iggy. I obviously don't check into the WILTRN thread often enough (and I should avoid off-hand chatty comments in a non-chatty thread).
We have the live disc from the Winnipeg concert. My husband's brother, who did get a ticket, picked one up for us (along with a t-shirt). Winnipeg's concert sold out in 3 minutes. People who lined up for hours didn't get tickets - in fact most of them were gone by the time the second or third person made it to the ticket box. We tried to buy on-line and had no luck. I was pre-prepped, with a DSL connection, and fingers hovering minutes before the tickets opened and was still booted out. It was a small venue, and since this was supposed to be the first stop on their tour many tickets were reserved for critics, reports etc. My husband still looks like he was punched in the stomach everytime the concert is mentioned. Needless to say, we've listened the LiveDisc many, many, many times.
The Austin City Limits Festival lineup is posted.
Apparently they're going limit the number of attendees since it was so huge last year. That would be nice. Last year was ridiculous.
$95 for a three-day pass. I'm thinking no.
Of course, like with SXSW, I just might give in anyway.
Last Friday I went with three friends to see The Killers at the Jones Beach theater:
British Sea Power was opening but we weren't going by car, and we were coming from work in Manhattan, so after the 45 minute train ride (here's a tip, kids: DON'T suggest that you meet your party "by the LIRR ticket window at Penn Station" unless you want a lot of agita, some frantic cell phone paging, an extended cell phone conversation at 2 minutes before the train is due to leave consisting of "WHERE ARE YOU? Well, what are you in front of? WHICH ticket window? WHICH KFC?ARRRRGGGGGGGGGGHHHH" over and over), the half hour wait for a bus (the line was so long they just kept sending buses, filling them, sending more, while we barely even moved), and the half hour bus ride, and then buying dinner at the food court, we only got to see a song and a half of BSP.
The theater is incredible. It's a full arena, with a huge stage, but it's on the beach so as you can see from the photo the seats go up to the water and the stage is actually over the water. There's no roof, so you can look up and see the stars. Our seats were good, right in the center and there were no seats directly in front of two of us, but we could have been closer. We could see the stage fine but not make out anyone's facial expressions; luckily there are two huge screens on either side. I ended up watching those a lot.
What we did see of BSP we liked and I could definitely get why they'd pair up with the Killers. Their stuff was very similar to the slower, dreamier Killers stuff. Their final moments were, um, interesting. The singer stood on his head and opened his legs, a guitarist or bassist came over and embraced him in a sort of 69 kind of position, then they proceeded to attempt a few somersaults like this. Alrighty!
The Killers came on and started with "Jenny is a Friend of Mine". I said something about how nice it was to see a band with only one album out, because you know you'll hear all the songs you like, and it turns out my friend S is quite the little fanboy so he was explaining how in addition to all the songs on their US album they have two songs on the UK album and then another one or two on some Korean album or something. I don't know, it was loud there. S was saying they could do those, they do a Morrissey cover, they do a Johnny Cash song, so you never know. Plus, S explained, they never sing "Everything Will Be Alright" in concert. After a few more songs from Hot Fuss Brandon (who did almost no patter, which is just as well as far as I'm concerned since singing in a British accent when you're from Las Vegas is one thing but talking with a British accent when you're from Las Vegas is Chuck Us A Packet Of Crisps, Luv, I'm Madge Now Not Madonna territory) explained this was the end of the Hot Fuss tour so they were doing EVERYTHING. S and I took this to mean every song they've ever done, but it turned out he meant everything from the US Hot Fuss. In the body of the set they did a couple songs I didn't recognize but S knew. One was "Indie Rock and Roll", I forget the other one. I think they were from the UK version; I liked them both a lot. Big audience responses came for "Somebody Told Me" and "Midnight Show". Brandon was in good voice and the sound was surprisingly good considering what must have been serious problems for the sound engineers, with the no roof and the on the water things. The renditions were mostly very true to the recordings and while no one was doing 69 style somersaults they were definitely into their performance. They ended with "Mr. Brightside" which, no surprise, was a big audience favorite.
After they came back for the encore Brandon sounded a little croaky, but they did "Everything Will Be Alright" (shows what you know, S), a David Bowie cover ("Moonage Daydream") which was fantastic, and ended up with -- my favorite so I was thrilled it was last -- "All These Things That I've Done". At the "I got soul but I'm not a soldier" part Brandon said "let's hear you guys" and held out the mic. The audience didn't really get too loud; I think maybe people were just waiting for Brandon. He pulled back the mic and said "that's it, we're going back to clubs from now on", then he started doing it and the whole audience joined in. Better late than never. It was a great ending to a great show, but we did feel a bit let down in terms of time. My friend P who's a Springsteen fan was very dismissive of a mere 1 hour 20 minute concert and I had to agree I'd have liked a bit more. Certainly the J. Cash cover; I don't even know what song they do but I wish I could have heard it. Still, it was a wonderful, fun night and a wake up call to me that I spend far too little time jumping up and down, pumping my fist and singing along to great bands under the stars on an oceanside beach. So, clearly I need to do more of this next summer.
Great review.
Jones Beach is a great venue. I need to get out there more often.
Carene, you know I was thinking of you when I was considering the engineers' plight!
I want to get back there early next season, when the days are longer, in hopes of catching the sunset. It was pitch black by the time we arrived.
Also, next time I'll know to drink before going. We were like, "why does everyone on this bus have an open 40?" Who knew there were places to see live music where they don't serve alcohol? What is this, the Pancreatitis Venue? My friend P, the Springsteen fan who's not into the Killers, just came along for the ride, was Not Pleased to hear that he'd be getting no beer with his music.
I'm not particularly a Killers fan and artie makes me want to go see them. I do need to listen to BSP again as I don't remember the show I saw at all.
In other concert news, ten days until Gang of Four!
Fuck, yeah! The original lineup that hasn't been together since 1981. I can't wait. New album comes out next Tuesday and I see them Wednesday.
speaking of....
Gang of Four was fabulous. They played nearly all of Entertainment! and of course they played "Anthrax", "Not Great Men" and "At Home He's a Tourist" and the encore was "Damaged Goods" which of course had everyone singing along. Great, great show and reunion shows can go either way. After seeing New Model Army last week (blah), another 25 year old British punk/post punk band, the greatness of the Gang of Four show was even more obvious. I haven't been so excited about a show in a long time let alone worked my way as close to the stage as I could get but this was so worth it. Everyone I talked to afterwards was just as giddy and thrilled, even the most jaded of hipsters, and getting pushed around and stepped on by sweaty men and the guy intent on causing trouble with everyone was completely worth it. Excellent show.
God, it was. And it totally made up for me having a bit too much to drink and not really remembering much of the Mission of Burma show a couple months ago...oops.
That sounds great, bessy. (Hopping Mad always loved New Model Army.)
We're taking the kids to see Franz Ferdinand at the Garden next Monday. I hope I don't punk out again.
I really could not get into New Model Army at all. I really wanted to and I might check out some albums but live-not good. Made us want to tell them to give it up.
I really hope you can make it to Franz Ferdinand. I saw them last year at ACL and it was a great performance.
Seriously. I think my first concert was either New Kids or the Judds when I was 8. And then I didn't see another one until the Cure in 1996.
Cordelia was disappointed last year when Franz F. only played clubs she wasn't old enough to get into. I wish I'd gotten off my ass and gotten Green Day tickets--Julian would really like to see them and so would I.
Green Day opened Lollapalooza one year and I heard them while I was outside with my friends. We didn't feel the need to rush in and see them at the time. I wish we had.
Man, your kids are lucky, Harri. I think I was in high school the first time I went to a concert, and it was Paul Simon!
And you were VERY, VERY lucky. The first concert I went to was a Dirty Dancing concert (it was my sister's idea). Eric Carmen was the "headliner" and he didn't show. All of the other "stars" were so talentless that they faded into well-deserve obscurity minutes after they left the stage.
So we brought the kids to see Franz Ferdinand at the Theater at Madison Square Garden last night. Opening for them was an Australian band I'd never heard of, Cut Copy. (Though I'm pretty sure I'd heard the last song they did on the radio.) They were really great! They had a very 80s New Orderish sound that, as my husband put it, goes straight to my demographic. I'm going to get their CD.
Next was a group called TV on the Radio. They had a kind of soul vibe married to a Wall of Sound-ish kind of Jesus and Mary Chain meets My Bloody Valentine thing. I kind of wished they'd stop singing so I could just hear the feedback.
Finally, Franz! They were so excellent live! They sounded just enough like their recordings not to piss me off, and different enough not to piss my husband off. Great, happy, fun stage presence and those cute Scottish accents. The audience featured the Awkward White Boy Hipster dancers. They made me look like a good dancer by comparison. Anyway, a good time.
That's a good line-up. Cut Copy is pretty decent. TV on the Radio is from Brooklyn, I believe.
I'm really glad you felt well enough to go, Harri.
Thanks. Trying to decide whether to go see Depeche Mode in December or not. They announced the shows on the radio last night, and Cordelia said "Let's go!" I said "Do you even know who they are?" She said no, she just likes concerts!
Then I started thinking it sounded fun. Haven't seen them since 1986.