^^ Bunky ^^
North By North Park is a strange and maddening beast. Boasting over a hundred musical acts spread across fourteen different venues in just over five hours, it is a bold attempt to showcase local music, but it sags and ultimately collapses under the weight of its own bloated excess.
As the event’s name implies, most of the bars and cafes that take part in the festivities are in North Park, though venues in other neighborhoods like South Park, Normal Heights, and Kensington are also included. To help concertgoers move between venues without tempting the DUI gods, shuttle service is included in the price of admission, but exactly where or how often these shuttles can be expected to show up is apparently closely guarded information.
Continue reading ‘Review: North By North Park; Lanterns, The Glossines, & Bunky; August 2, 2008′
It was Sunday night at Canes and indie rock heroes Wolf Parade were about to perform, yet the crowd didn’t seem excited at all. The stripped down guitar and tribal trashcan percussion of opening duo Listening Party had been received with polite but moderate enthusiasm by an audience where those wearing backwards hats and polo shirts vastly outnumbered the people with the tight jeans and flat-ironed hair. As the crowd quietly milled about the venue between sets, it seemed as though Wolf Parade could expect a similarly tepid reaction. But when the Montreal quintet finally took the stage and the first notes rang out from the amps, they were met with a fanatical and frenzied reception that was anything but lukewarm.
Beginning their set with “You Are A Runner And I Am My Father’s Son” and “Soldier’s Grin”, the opening tracks off 2005’s Apologies To The Queen Mary and 2008’s At Mount Zoomer, respectively, Wolf Parade were a well-oiled machine, nimbly maneuvering their songs’ wild mood swings and ever-changing time signatures without missing a beat.
Continue reading ‘Review: Wolf Parade; July 20, 2008 at Canes; San Diego’
Saturday’s “Hipsters Revisited” at Bar Pink Elephant was a ‘60s themed event that promised music of the garage, psychedelic, and freakbeat varieties, all while making assurances that there would be “no weird shit or flutes”. They made good on these promises with some trippy mood-lighting and an assortment of DJs spinning appropriately obscure tracks from the period, but the real draw was a live performance by local retro-rock band The Loons.
Long blond hair hanging in his face, Loons lead singer Mike Stax commanded the stage with all the raw power of an anachronistic Iggy Pop as the band blazed through a set that recalled garage acts Love, The Sonics, and The Thirteenth Floor Elevators. After grabbing everyone’s attention with “Red Dissolving Rays”, Stax joked that, in honor of Gay Pride week, he was dedicating the song “My Time” to Texas, “the gayest state of all”.
Continue reading ‘Review: The Loons; July 19, 2008 at Bar Pink; San Diego’
“I’m like a fucking race horse.”
–Tom Waits, Jacksonville
Tom Waits’ tours are fairly infrequent, so when I heard he was headed to Jacksonville two hours away from my house, I splurged. Jacksonville? Why Jacksonville? It’s not really the red dirt, bluesy part of the south Waits wanted to see. Jacksonville is South Beach’s conservative opposite, militarized vanilla beach Florida, which tolerates the small, local counterculture because it’s essentially irrelevant. Jacksonville is by some definitions lovely, but it’s not, well, cool. When, early in the concert, Waits mused about why he’d never been to this attractive city beside a sparkling river and the Atlantic Ocean, he said his friends had always told him, “You’re not old enough.” I don’t know whether he’s finally old enough now or if the prospect of hauling the tour bus and three semis ten hours south and back north was too much for his pocketbook or his carbon footprint, but he arrived with a copious supply of merchandise–including vinyls, a chapbook in which he interviews himself, and t-shirts with pictures of oil stains he thought were cool–as well as a sweet stage set that could evoke alley-cat twilight austerity, late-night honkytonk, or red-devil cartoon hell.
Continue reading ‘Review: Tom Waits; July 1, 2008; Jacksonville, FL’
The Hideout is a great place to see a show. I arrived about 7:30, just as a major storm was moving into the Chicago. Luckily, the Hideout is in an industrial part of the city and there were some good spaces right outside, which I found to be a good sign of things to come.
Continue reading ‘Review: Red Red Meat; July 10, 2008; Hideout, Chicago’
Frightened Rabbit is one of the best bands out there that you can still see in a small club. They’re comprised of two brothers and two multi-instrumentalists: singer/songwriter/guitarist/whisky sipper Scott Hutchison, his brother Grant (who destroys drumsticks and provides vocal harmonies), and Billy Kennedy and Andy “Medusa” Monaghan who both alternate on keys, guitar, and bass.
Legend has it that as a kid, Scott was compared to a Frightened Rabbit for his lack of social skills, but you wouldn’t know it from this show. Hutchison’s between-song banter was often hilarious and he showed no shortage of the fabled Scottish charm; he even exuded silliness as he discussed a “plectrum” (pick) that someone had given him.
Continue reading ‘Review: Frightened Rabbit; June 23, 2008; Casbah, San Diego’
A fever descended upon the sold-out Casbah as the Kills took the stage, seducing the crowd with their unique blend of blues, punk, and sex. The band drew mainly from their new album Midnight Boom, tearing into renditions of “U.R.A. Fever,” “Tape Song,” and “Sour Cherry,” but still touched upon old favorites like “Fried My Little Brains,” “Wait,” and “Love Is A Deserter.”
Backed only by a drum machine, Alison “VV” Mosshart and Jamie “Hotel” Hince shared vocal duties, with Hotel playing the lion’s share of guitar. The songs dripped with danger and excitement, such as on “No Wow,” where the pair used their palpable on-stage chemistry to carry the song from its ominous, simmering beginning to an explosive conclusion that was equal parts sexual tension and musical release.
Continue reading ‘Review: The Kills; May 19, 2008 at The Casbah; San Diego’
Grizzly Bear and the LA Philharmonic split a bill at the impressively designed Walt Disney Concert Hall. You must see this monstrosity designed by Frank Gehry. I swear there is not a single right angle inside or outside, and I’m willing to wager that it was constructed with stealth technology.The LA Philharmonic played the first set, and the clarity delivered by the venue is phenomenal. It’s easy to realize that no medium (be it vinyl, CD, or reel-to-reel) really does a symphony justice. Selections of their performance were pieces chosen as influences by Grizzly Bear.
Continue reading ‘Review: Grizzly Bear/LA Philharmonic; March 1, 2008 at Walt Disney Concert Hall; Los Angeles’
Photo by Maureen Sill
As always, a good venue. The openers were Explosions in the Sky and while I don’t know the names of any of their songs, I fully enjoyed their non-stop set. They might have said “hello” and “thank you,” but that was about it. And then it was time for the Smashing Pumpkins.
Continue reading ‘Review: Smashing Pumpkins; October 11, 2007; L.C. Pavilion; Columbus, Ohio’
photo by Vicky Lim
First off, I’d like to say that I love how the Wexner center puts together these “black box” events. Basically, they pull a curtain across the front of the main stage in and set up a second stage in the wing. The audience then stands on the main stage to watch the show. It really is a great use of the space for smaller shows and sounds great.
Continue reading ‘Review: The Blow; October 2, 2007 at Mershon Auditorium; Columbus, OH’
After a hassle with misappropriated tickets and a trip back to the car to return what is apparently my “professional rig” camera, we got into 4th and B, got drinks, and found seats. A friend’s description of the venue pretty much proved true: outside, it looks like a skyscraper; when you first walk inside, it looks like someone’s dilapidated barn; when you get into the actual venue, it looks like a pretty decent place.
Continue reading ‘Review: Iron & Wine with Califone; Tuesday, November 27, 2007; 4th & B, San Diego’
