more Versus Mp3s / Tuesday Miscellany
Posted on March 15, 2005 at 4:34 pm | No Comments
As promised, here’s the remaining six songs from the Versus set at the Teenbeat Records 20th Anniversary show down in D.C. a few weeks back…
Versus
live at Teenbeat’s 20th
The Black Cat, Washington, D.C.
February 25th, 2005Versus – ‘Deseret‘ (live)
Versus – ‘Blade of Grass‘ (live)
Versus – ‘Janet‘ (live)
Versus – ‘Solar Democrat‘ (live)
Versus – ‘Wind Me Up‘ (live)
Versus – ‘I’ll Be You‘ (live)
The first six songs and some words about that third night are here, and pictures from all three nights can be found here.
So my first show as part of Boston band Charlene went pretty damn well, if I do say so myself (and I do). Thanks for all the encouraging email and comment notes about the show, they were appreciated. Even with such a short time to prepare, it felt really good to get up on stage and behind the drum kit again after so long (I think it had been a year or so?)…
… but you may notice that I’m not exactly behind the drums in that picture. Why? Well, that’s because I’m up at the keyboard. This, despite the fact that I actually don’t play the keyboard. F’in nerve-racking, but Amie’s reaction was priceless. She had no idea I’d be doing it… I’m supposed to be hiding at the back of the stage, not walking up to the front and freakin’ center. Little did I know when I joined and thought “it’ll be fun to finally be in a band with keyboards” that I’d be playing them. Yikes. And don’t worry, I won’t be calling myself a keyboardist now… hell, I’ve never even been comfortable calling myself a drummer.
We played in between the multi-layered and better-than-ever Broken River Prophet and Hood, all the way from Leeds, on the fourth date of a North American tour that will take them all the way to Seattle and down to LA. Well worth checking them out if they come near you. Here’s both a BRP and a Hood pic for ya…
Fellow devotees to HBO’s The Wire (the, ahem, best drama on TV, when it’s on TV that is), here’s the latest news on a possible fourth season…
Question: Any new info on the fourth season of The Wire? � M
(TV Guide’s) Ausiello: HBO tells me a decision is expected within a week.
So the news is that… there will soon be news. I’ll take what I can get.
Everyone’s seen this pop-lockin’ magic but me… but I’ll take the chance that there’s one more of ya out there. First, watch this video, and pay special attention to the third locker to grace the stage. Unbelievable. Ok, now watch the new GTI commercial. Yes, that’s the same guy, aka Elsewhere, performing as a modern day Gene Kelly. Here’s an interview with him, and his own site. Mind-blowing abilities, but damn, who else thinks his skeleton is going to be all sortsa tweaked by the time he hits, like, 40? I can’t imagine his parents ever told him that cracking his knuckles was bad for him.
Thanks so much to Cushie for alerting me that the Trembling Blue Stars are going to be appearing on Rocket Science this weekend. That’s 1pm London time, 8am (ouch!) Eastern time on Saturday.
Akira fans take note: Director Katsuhiro �tomo’s latest anime action flick, Steamboy, finally gets a North American release in only three dozen or so theaters this Friday. Lucky me, Boston’s Kendall Square Cinema is one of them. I’ll be in line for that one, yessir.
So y’know how I was whining about Blogger.com’s frequent server errors and publishing failures last week? Well, they finally acknowledged it on their status page. Let’s hope things really do improve. I’ve already run into trouble trying to compose this post, of course.
I’ve only been passively paying attention to ex-Replacements frontman Paul Westerberg over the past few years, but the fact that he’s returning to Boston with a full band has got me kinda excited. That’s Monday, April 4th at the Avalon Ballroom. Tickets are on sale this Friday at 10:00 am for that show, and other dates are listed here.
Yes, old school Red Sox fans, that is a bearded Bill ‘The Spaceman’ Lee in the upper right hand corner there (and here), taken with my camera phone. He said “Whoa… it’s true… you can really take pictures with those things now. I’m not so sure how I feel about that.” Saw him a couple weeks ago when he did a signing for his new book, which I’m pretty psyched to read.
I keep forgettin’ to post this picture. During my recent D.C. trip, Colin & I had the good fortune of hangin’ with CK, Megan, and Kyle (Mr. Information Leafblower himself). Was cool to meet Kyle after bein’ blog buds for awhile, and I sure do miss seein’ Mr. & Mrs. Kelly on a regular basis …
colin, kyle, megan, & chris
And finally, if you’re in a live music mood in Boston tonight, do yourself a favor and check out my friends Dialogue for Three, who will be at the Middle East Upstairs this evening. They’re on first at 9:15, opening for Colin Steel & The Sports, Selfonix, and The Medicine Line. Listen to a couple of their mp3s by clicking on the words ‘take it’ and ‘pop song’ over at their site.
Friday Afternoon Purge
Posted on March 11, 2005 at 1:57 pm | No Comments
Time to clear the cache of all the things I wanted to mention while I was writing about Teenbeat…
Set the TiVo: Low will be appearing on Last Call tonight. Behold the power of Sub Pop.
Some proof that wishful blogging can really work…
In my best-of-2004 music post, I wrote about things I was looking forward to in ’05, and I half-jokingly hoped for the reappearance of the criminally underrated and long-dormant Minneapolis trio Arcwelder. I love ’em, I miss ’em. So a few days ago I read that Shellac is playing a few dates in April, and opening up the first show is… freakin’ Arcwelder. Hell yeah. I figure if I mention that I’m hoping for more Arcwelder shows and maybe some recordings that it might actually happen, right? Consider it wished for.
Fabchannel is, um, fab. High-quality streaming broadcasts of live shows that get archived for later viewing. Not only can you check out stored shows by Low, British Sea Power, Guided By Voices, Nada Surf and tons more, but this afternoon you can watch the Arcade Fire on stage in Amsterdam, and on April 4th they’ve got a Wedding Present gig scheduled. The site is pretty well-designed, and even has a feature that will send you an email reminder before a broadcast. Nice.
Billy Bragg continues to sell official live recordings through his website, with #4, recorded last year at the Barbican in London, on deck for release ‘any day now’. If you’re not in a paying mood, you can grab a few tracks from the 33 song set for free on his main page, or get three previous songs right here. (thanks, hold my life)
Jon Spencer (Pussy Galore / Blues Explosion) and Matt Verta-Ray (Speedball Baby) have teamed up to become Heavy Trash. Their self-titled debut is out in April, and you can check out the preview track ‘Justine Alright‘ here.
Well, this is a pretty novel event: Morrissey on the big screen. Yes, his upcoming live DVD ‘Who Put The “M” In Manchester?‘ will debut in select cities around the U.S. on March 28th at 8:30pm, including a showing here in Boston. According to the press release, the screening will include a performance of ‘How Soon Is Now?‘ that’s not on the DVD. Tickets are $10 and will be available ‘soon’, according to this site.
I love opening up my RSS reader and seeing a new post titled “EXCLUSIVE COLIN CLARY INTERVIEW!“. Hell, I love seeing Colin’s name anywhere online, but this new interview at Heraclitus Sayz is one of the best, no the best, chat with Mr. Clary I’ve ever read. Lots of insight into his songwriting and attitudes towards creating and recording music. Plus, a pretty comprehensive look at the bands he’s in and has been in. Yes, even the Flaming Hetts are mentioned. Hetts rule!
Things that everyone and their blogger brother has already mentioned but I can’t not link to…
Excellent new Sin City trailer. Not sure I could be more excited for this film. The V for Vendetta website is up. The Watchmen movie site has been updated a bit. Battlestar Galactica podcasts to listen to as you watch new episodes. The best use of podcasting power yet. Sorry, I mean ‘blogcasting‘. We really need to get the apple out of that buzzword. It ain’t just for ipods, people. The new Star Wars Episode III trailer is now available via bittorrent. Neil Gaiman’s Neverwhere is being adapted into a 9-issue Vertigo comic series by Mike Carey and Glenn Fabry. It’s not out until June, but an 8-page preview will be in next month’s issue of Bill Willingham’s fantastic Fables series. Speaking of which, the fifth Fables trade paperback collection, ‘The Mean Seasons‘, is just out, and I’m so picking it up after work.
This show is already listed on the left, but it’s worth pointing out… The Lucksmiths are returning to Boston, playing PA’s Lounge in Somerville on May 7th with Ladybug Transistor. Cannot wait to see those Aussies again.
Boston-based mystery author Robert B. Parker will be making a rare reading appearance at the Brattle Theater on March 24th. Check out Exploit Boston! for details.
On my teevee screen lately…
The small-town football film Friday Night Lights, which was far better than I expected. Rent it just for the perfectly utilized score by Explosions in the Sky. Wow. Wong-Kar Wai’s In the Mood for Love. Restrained, deliberately slow paced, and entirely mesmerizing. Pure genius. Carnivale’s stellar second season on HBO is building to what may be a second climax, after the already huge payoff a couple episodes back. Anyone who stopped watching after the semi-frustrating unanswered questions of the first season is really missing out on some killer storytelling. I’m completely sucked in. I just finished watching the entire seven season run of Deep Space Nine in syndication on Spike TV, and it’s easily become my favorite of all the Trek incarnations. Ron Moore proved why he was the perfect guy to spearhead the revamping of Battlestar Galactica. The last couple seasons of DS9 proved just how lacking Enterprise has been (despite it’s near-non-suckness in the past few months… too little, too late). If you’ve got a TiVo and missed out on DS9, they just started showing it again from the very beginning.
Hey, Bostonites… I’ve got a bunch of extra passes to an April 6th preview of Stephen Chow’s new flick Kung Fu Hustle. The guy’s nuts, his films are pretty out there, usually damn entertaining. I loved God of Cookery, but missed out on Shaolin Soccer (it’s in the Netflix queue), so I’m psyched for this. If you wanna join me, drop a comment.
Speaking of Netflix, are there any Almanac readers out there who use it and love it? Let me know in the comments, and I’ll add you to my Netflix Friends page. I’m always into seeing what other people are renting.
Wow, has Blogger been biting the big one lately, or what? Terrible performance over the past couple days, intermittent trouble over the past couple months. Not sure if their user growth is outpacing their server space, but yeesh it’s been frustrating. My last Teenbeat post was delayed about a day, and the glitches have forced me to never click ‘publish’ or ‘save’ without first copying all my post text into a notepad document. Otherwise, I’d have lost way too many words. I think Google needs to throw some of the extra stock-funded cash toward a bunch of new servers, some extra techs, or at least some customer service to keep users updated. The Blogger status page is completely worthless. (perfect irony: as of right now, the status page isn’t even up!) I’ll be lucky if I’m able to post this entry before I leave work today.
And last, but very far from least, I’m obliged to do some personal plugging so you can plan your weekend accordingly…
I’m making my long-awaited (well, by me anyway) return to my seat behind the drum kit on Sunday night, playing in the band Charlene at TTs. It’s been a hectic couple of weeks getting ready for this thing while I test my new bandmates’ patience learning songs that they already know by heart. I think I’m almost ready, though… just in the nick of time.
We’re on at 10 o’clock, that’s Sunday, March 13th, playing just after the wonderful Broken River Prophet (who have a brand new website. arrive early, don’t miss ’em!), and just before Hood, on tour from the UK. If you end up going, say hello. I’ll be the nervous guy drinking hopefully just the right number of beers.