Friday, June 23, 2006

moe., 6/13/06, rumsey playfield, central park, nyc

mmkay! officially killling time at work and officially tackling this overdue review.

it was an early start, i walked into the park with melissa and mintz (a moe. virgin!) and immediately ran into mattypie, etc. standing right next to erika! that's what happens when your friends are alcoholics- you can always find them right next to the beer tent. we found lauren later on- she couldn't sneak out of work as early as i did. "but i'm leaving at 5... no... but i've been saying for 2 months that i'm leaving at 5pm today... i'm leaving at 5... really... i won't be here after 5." (didn't leave til 5:30pm, but still... principle of the thing).

the boys hit the stage at 6:31pm with some tuning and then she sends me. i was able to text message with hern, etc. but they had made their way up to the front on al.side immediately and i wasn't going to deal with that clusterfuck (just yet). this was a great outdoor show to officially kickoff outdoor concert season. very exciting. the first set was pretty good, but i felt they were holding back a wee bit. i was standing up front on chuck-side for a portion of it, but the monitor was really hot and popping every couple of seconds. *pop**pop**pop**pop**pop* my ears and brain couldn't take it anymore so i went and hung out in the back with my running crew.

set break, lovely. sun down. this is more like it. sundown in central park and moe.- can't go wrong. it was a romantic nyc moment. set II started off ROCKING, they were really busting out the harder jams and getting into it. i needed to pee. mintz scored a vip pass for us in the most random of ways so i got to use the vip portapotty. still gross, but no line. :) well, after that i went up to al.side and spotted babitz in all his jewness and that was happy- cuz then i got to see hern, 4dice, lisa... and rob... heh. well, the view from backstage kinda sucked my ballz, and i felt completely removed from my friends... so i decided to do something about it.

i climbed over the 4 1/2 fence. i almost didn't do it! i really almost didn't... i was like, no no, i'll walk around... i'll be good... then i was like, "what the FUCK am i talking about??? WALK AROUND??? who the fuck am i??? I AM LYNNFUCKINGGUPPY and if i can't climb over this fucking fence, then i'm officially OLD!!! AND I AM NOT TOO OLD TO CLIMB OVER THIS FUCKING FENCE!!!" so i climbed over it. hern and babitz originally tried to lift me over but i knew that was asking for trouble so i told them not to touch me- i hiked up the pants and went for it. and it worked out nicely! front row! and a perfect view of rob rippin' shit up. it's really not a moe. show for me until i can get my unobstructed view of rob laying it all down... dreamy. i know you're all about to vomit, but i couldn't ask for more!!!

though, there was a woman there with her 8-10 year old child who was obviously NOT enjoying himself- he was covering his ears and looking sad, and that was really sad. if you're gonna bring your kid to a show, buy them some fucking earplugs. if you're old enough to make the conscious decision to fuck up your own hearing, do what you want- but your child didn't ask to be there and have permanent hearing loss, and you're an inept fucking parent, you goddamn scumbag! oh, also very drunk girls swaying their arms around and being altogether obnoxious- we were relieved when we thought one of them had passed out on the barrier- but she hadn't, she was just resting. there's some in every crowd.

anywhoosits- awesome fucking show- AMAZING 2nd set- really- much better than the 1st (1st wasn't bad- 2nd set was way more ballz-out rockin' goodness). altogether, factoring in getting to see all my friends and enjoying the show with people i love: 9 HUZZAHS!!!

to download the show, go here: http://www.archive.org/details/moe2006-06-13.km184.flac16

Saturday, June 17, 2006

lo faber, ace of clubs, nyc, 6/9/06

catching up before this gets out of hand...

it was pretty sweet, i got out of work in time to meet a friend and head into the ace of clubs on the lower east side. i had no idea it was the old acme underground, i once saw monopuff there. it was a bizarre night full of smoke and comedians who would get up and read monologues or spoken word over the music- the theme was "colors". it was absolute madness and i stood next to andy richter (glowing).

but back to last friday. lo faber! the set started at 8pm sharp, so we walked downstairs at about 10 of and the place was packed!!! wall to wall air! if you're a gsw fan and you live in nyc, you should be fucking ashamed of yourself for not getting off your ass and heading to this gig. show some fucking love. it's lo and he's awesome. so, we walk in and there are 3 other people in the room: the bartender, the sound guy, and lo... at the bar looking at his song options. "lo!" / "sweetheart!" (for those of you who don't know, lo is quite possibly my favorite person on the face of the earth). he hands me his song list- it's got about 40 songs to choose from in two columns, the paper folded in half and his setlist written on the bottom out of my view. "here, pick a song..." i immediately saw bbtn and shrieked. on the drive downtown i was thinking, "i wonder if he remembers bring back the news?". so, i chose that one... and like 4 others... and then asked him to play new eyes which will never happen but i love asking just to get "the look" and the explanation. and then 2 more people showed up!!! very exciting! so we talked about emergency contraception and frank zappa until...

the clock struck 8pm and lo walked up to the stage, we set up some tables and chairs in front of him and sat down to be entertained. he opened with bbtn which made me smile ear to ear, but the mic was shorting out so that was sad, but he played it strong and it sounded amazing. my friend had never heard lo or gsw before and he enjoyed himself and i think may have been taken aback at how good it was. cuz when you say, "i have a friend doing an acoustic set for an hour downtown..." i mean really-- that could be absolutely HORRIBLE. but it wasn't, it was lo. he played some lennon tunes, borderline, everyone's favorite rockstar, you know me best (quickly becoming one of my new favorites), nightingale, drive west... he forgot the lyrics to borderline:
"now a prophet without honor speaks and whiles away the lonely weeks, and knows that all his fellow men are laughing. so you wanna be a movie star, and drive a big red fancy car, and weave between the falling statues crashing..."
which is hysterical to me because i have a distinct memory of being at the red record release party at the tower records on 4th and b'way, and during the performance lo forgot the same fucking lyrics and came over to me and asked what they were. so, you see, he's still great.

anyways, it was just lovely. :) he finished up the show to the opening band's dismay (they told him to keep playing) and we hung out for a few minutes and said goodbye.

to learn more about lo faber and download some of his music, go to: www.lofaber.com

i give this show: 9.5 HUZZAHS. lo is my favorite rockstar and he changed my life. he rocks the acoustic guitar.

Friday, June 16, 2006

pearl jam, 6/1/06, brendan byrne (aka continental) arena, rutherford, nj

mmkay, so to keep my brain from becoming less mushy i am going to start reviewing the concerts that i've seen... just like the good old days when i'd post to various mailing lists and start fights for saying things like, "man, that show kinda sucked!". and of course i made this decision a couple of weeks ago and got way too busy at work to actually keep up with it- so i'm 3 concerts behind and will post these reviews belated but separately.

what's different these days (ahh, the yesteryears...) is that i now bring musician's filters to shows because the ringing in my ears does not stop anymore. the first time my ears rang for 3 days was after a nirvana concert in DC when i was 15 years old ('93). it's gotten considerably worse since then, but i am pretty sure that i lost the most hearing at the 2004 mtvn non-denominational-holiday-party, cuz the ringing from that night definitely did not stop, and it's louder than the previous ringing. anyways, so back to the filters- i got these awesome custom filters and highly recommend them. they filter out exactly 15db from every frequency of the sound spectrum and they are fitted to my ears (they took a mold). they are about $150 and worth every fucking penny.

now... pearl jam, 6/1/06, brendan byrne arena, rutherford, nj.

so, not holding the traffic or weather or parking against the band. i missed the opener, "my morning jacket", which isn't too horrible cuz i think i've seen them open for 3 bands in the past year. i walked in during pearl jam's fourth song and they were definitely rockin' out (i don't have a setlist). i walked directly into some friends from my hometown (pr REPRESENT) and they were lovely enough to buy me a beer right before we walked up to the nosebleeds and chilled for a while. then i wandered down to a section behind the stage to find lowell and keren and watched the rest of the show.

the old tunes rocked, the new tunes rocked... eddie was sporting a giant bottle of wine... the pearl jam crowd kind of scares me. there was a lot of singing along and waving of the arms, and i wonder if this is what people think of me and my friends when they go see moe.? like, "who the fuck are these moe.rons"? i think the big difference is that the pearl jam fans kinda treat vedder like some sort of god... and moe.rons... well, when al. fell flat on his face at snoe.down while trying to look like a metal-god--- everyone laughed their asses off... pearl jam's fans just kinda felt more cult-like. at one point eddie picked up his electric guitar (he can't just be a lead singer, he's gotta play guitar a little too) and held it up above his head. the light engineer then focused and bounced one of the lights off of the electric guitar--- so the light was reflected perpendicularly onto the crowd. eddie proceeded to angle the guitar and rotate around 360' to "paint" the crowd in the light. as he did people reached in the air and tried to "grab" the light. people were really getting off on this shit and i couldn't help it but my immediate reaction was laughter. in fact i was laughing so hard i think i might have snorted and put myself in ten-club danger!!! DAAANGER!!!

they did stick it to the man and play about 25-30 minutes past the curfew- a few cover songs including 'teenage wasteland'. drunk eddie flailed and fell on his ass... and then limped for the rest of the show ("i think he really hurt himself" -dr. lowell gurey). it was fun seeing pearl jam in action. the arena eventually turned the lights on, but they did not turn the sound off. i'm sure the extra time cost them a pretty penny (if not substantially more--- i tried looking up how much continental charges for every minute past curfew but had no luck- anyone out there know a website that supplies this info? it can be up to $10,000+ for every minute over). stone gossard: STILL FUCKING HOT... the short hair--- yummy.

yes, i know many of my friends are devoted ten club pearl jam fanatics and it was a great show that they lost their shit at. i would have been happy paying $40 to see it... i paid more, but still, always awesome to see a great rock band play a great rock show. so- conclusion... out of 10 HUZZAHS (10 being the most HUZZAH-WORTHY): 6.5 HUZZAHS!