Overheard at work today:
"The email bounced back to me and I'm not sure why...do you spell 'underscore' u-n-d-e-r-s-c-o-r-e?"
May 2004 Archives
As a fan of live improvisational music, I would think that the just-announced "end of an era, no, really, we mean it this time" by Phish should evoke more than a shrug from me...but it really doesn't. On one hand, I enormously respect what they've managed to do for themselves and similar music in general: prove that the live show is more important than radio play and much of the other nonsense that seems to orbit any musical group that manages to turn a profit. But on the other hand, I've never been to a show, I've never gotten a live recording of theirs for any reason other than it has John Popper sitting in, and I've really never had any interest in doing either. I do own two of their albums - Junta and A Picture of Nectar, which (disc two of Junta aside) are examples of tight songwriting and almost entirely devoid of the seemingly aimless meandering that characterizes the several Phish shows that I have taken the time to listen to.
Maybe it's my general distaste for the "event" scene in general. This may be a small distinction to the average music fan, but when I go to see a concert, I say I'm going to see a concert. People who don't know me think I'm going to the symphony or the opera, but to me, it's not a "show"; it's not an "event", it's a concert. I go see a band - not a "performer" or an "artist" - play music. Period. Stage props, costume changes, backdrops, even light shows...they're wasted on me. And not many people know this about me - hell, I think I needed my wife to tell me this before I figured it out - but I don't like crowds. I have a great deal of unease at being around large groups of people I don't know, especially when their inhibitions are lowered by alcohol, drugs or some combination of the foregoing. Maybe it's a remnant of my unhappy college social life, at always being the sober one at the few parties my friends dragged me to, but I've just got a pathological aversion to the whole parking lot scene at these event shows. I actually realized that before going to see Radiohead and REM last summer/fall, it had been five years since I saw a show at Great Woods (yes, I'm continuing to stick it to the corporations by turning them into Voldemort). I've never seen a show at the FleetCenter or the Boston Garden, I've been to Madison Square Garden once. And even though Phish is calling it quits, I have no urge to buy myself a ticket and go down to Great Woods this summer, or up to the woods of Vermont.
Instead, here I sit, two hours after the announcement, and I'm continuing to shrug. I feel bad for my friends who have already gone through this once back in 2000-2001, and are now going through it again, but I think we should all be so lucky as to have our favorite bands be able to celebrate their 20th anniversary and beyond...
We just bought a new shower curtain liner, which I installed over the weekend. About three liners ago, we discovered the wonder that is the suction-cup version, which allows you to secure the liner to the wall of your shower and prevent water from splashing out the sides and all over the floor. But for some reason, the suction cups on the new liner don't work all that well, and this morning I found myself SPLASHING WATER ON THE WALL to make them adhere better.
- Yes, I stole that title from George Carlin.
- Man, it's good to have Bill Simmons back from the evil clutches of the Jimmy Kimmel show. Life just wasn't the same without the Mail Bag and the regular Ramblings.
- My cats are scared of my new sneakers. You'd think that creatures who instinctually maul and batter things that squeak would have a field day with them, but instead, they cower and recoil like they were facing the giant bugs from Starship Troopers.
- Differing schools of thought on the smells of gardening: mulch = good. Animal excrement = bad. I walked to work the other day and must have checked the soles of my shoes a half-dozen times, to no avail.
- LatinoMusic.com on iTunes = animal excrement. I have a co-worker who listens to it all day long...it's the same 12 songs over and Over and OVER. Make it stop. Please. It's like an ice pick to the ear drum.
- It's stuff like this that validates my taping...I got an email from someone whose friends are getting married next week, desperately in search of a copy of Erin McKeown singing "Rhode Island is Famous for You", because the bride is a Rhode Islander. A half-hour later, the song was up on my web server so he could download it, and it'll be played at their wedding. Crisis averted.
- One more article about how taping and trading is a good thing. A Guster quote too!
- That's it...I'm not telling anyone which shows I'm going to anymore. Los Lonely Boys had to cancel their show at the Big Easy last night because Willie Nelson came down with carpal tunnel (they were opening for him but scheduled a headlining gig between opening gigs, then the entire tour was cancelled). Then today I find out that John Popper needs follow-up surgery to his gastric bypass and has to cancel the Blues Traveler show for next Saturday. And all of this in the wake of a collapsed speaker tower at WBOS's EarthFest last month. With that in mind, my apologies in advance to Bela Fleck and his family for whatever gruesome misfortune is about to befall him.
If you're ever driving around Cape Elizabeth Maine, headed towards Two Lights State Park, but hang a left and go to the end of the road, the first thing you'll notice - other than the Atlantic Ocean straight in front of you - is the lighthouse to your left (one of the "two lights"). The next thing you'll notice is the unassuming family restaurant at the top of the bluff to your right, saddled with the name of "The Lobster Shack". Though I don't recall anyone in my family ever having actually ordered and/or eaten lobster there, it's a local landmark that we used to patronize two or three times a summer when we were still in school (my brothers and I would always have the chicken fingers...so much for local seafood). The place is so small that there's invariably a line out the door, and we'd basically bum around until our number was called to be seated.
Fortunately for three young boys at loose ends, there were plenty of rocks to throw on the outcroppings below, so that's how we'd amuse ourselves until it was time to eat. As the leader of the troops, I'd pick out an unfortunate target boulder, and the three of us would proceed to pepper it with smaller stones until it was forced to surrender. Occasionally, the tide would be coming in as we were carrying out our assault, but since we were engaged in battle, it was our duty to not cede an inch until that obstinate rock gave up. On one particular occasion, my brother Matt got his idioms mixed up, and declared that we would "stand kaput" despite the incoming tide (at least until the chicken fingers were ready, anyway). We were so delighted by this juxtaposition that it became our eventual rallying cry whenever the tide threatened to carry us away - "we stand kaput!"
I hadn't thought of that little saying until today when the news came down that Viv and I would not be on the move as originally planned. So at the moment it looks like one more year that we'll be standing kaput, way up in the burbs...
A list, with links, of stuff I've taped/converted over the last month or so. As always, thanks to the artists and the Live Music Archive for hosting this stuff!
04-10-04 Ben Kweller, Avalon, Boston, MA (thanks and congrats to Faye for taping!)
04-24-04 Los Lonely Boys, Hatch Shell, Boston, MA
04-25-04 Guster, Salve Regina University, Newport, RI
04-29-04 Bob Schneider, Paradise Rock Club, Boston, MA
05-01-04 Matt Nathanson, RIT, Rochester, NY
Also, a bonus...
07-21-95 Guster, Wetlands Preserve, New York, NY (just for the heck of it)
Enjoy, and tell your friends!
Does it speak well of me or poorly of me that I'm all dorky proud over both emailing and getting responses from ESPN columnists Bill Simmons and Jayson Stark? And that I still have their responses in my email account somewhere?
Of course, public acknowledgment of emails in one of their columns is the next step...and still a rather large step below the recognition a friend of mine got - he's mentioned by name in the latest issue of Mac World magazine (for an audio tool he created, which I helped beta-test). Sort of a geek pride by proxy, I suppose.
From: abuse@gov.us
To: greenone@bluestraveler.net
Subject: Illegal Website
Date: 05/11/04 00:01
----------------------------------
Attachment: judge.zip
----------------------------------
You have visited illegal websites.
I have a big list of the websites you surfed.
++++ Attachment: No Virus found
++++ Norman AntiVirus - www.norman.com
Make that, part 2, take 2. Somehow the last draft didn't get saved... More lessons learned over the last two weeks:
- Open mic comedy night at the Milky Way...not good. Celebrated a special birthday with some bowling and some eats at the local hip bowling locale. One thing we weren't aware of was that it was amateur night for local comedians (literally, not just figuratively). But let me tell ya, you haven't eaten and bowled until you've tried to do it while being bellowed at in a gravelly voice by a red superhero-jumpsuited comic with a mullet, who had such thoughtful, detailed gems as "Hey! I'm sorry your CAT has ASS CANCER!" Andy Kaufman, watch your back.
- Pimpin' ain't easy, but it sure is fun. Not that I'm one to frequently quote the Notorious B.I.G., and the details are elsewhere on other blogs connected from mine, but suffice it to say that I looked like the pimp daddy on Tuesday night, chauffeuring four women to a movie and taking it in with them. Reminds me of the days of yore when I accompanied Viv and three of her friends to a comedy club when we were home for a visit. We arrived late, so the only seats available were right next to the stage. Needless to say, I got the business from both the opener and the main act. "What, did you win the lottery or something?" Ah, memories. And really, how can you turn down a wife-approved opportunity to ogle Jennifer Garner all evening?
- Sam, the Paradise lighting guy, is very cool. After a whole two days from music, it was off to the Paradise in Boston to catch Teitur and Alexi Murdoch. Quite an international billing - Teitur is from the Faroe Islands (halfway between Norway and Iceland) and Alexi is from Scotland but has a Greek father (he was sporting a beard and long scraggly hair, which elicited more than a few "Johnny Damon, you rock!' shouts from the audience). Both very low-key, but the crowd was extremely respectful throughout their short sets (50 and 70 minutes) and as a result the recordings sound great. Where the aforementioned Sam figures in, is that he chatted me up during the Teitur set and let me know that it was ok with him if I duct-taped my stand to the edge of the front-of-house booth and projected it out over the audience to avoid some of the chatter from the FOH area. The unanimous decision was that everyone preferred Teitur to Alexi - might be because it was really hot up in the balcony and we all started to drowse off halfway through Alexi's set. A pleasant, albeit brief, night of music.
- Bob Schneider - not much like what I'd heard from him before. Our friend Mel makes end-of-year CD compilations for her friends and occasionally makes them to celebrate random occasions as well. She has an extremely wide taste in music - usually I'll recognize a song or two on the average compilation, but with hers I'm lucky if I recognize an artist or two. The opening track on the first one she gave us was an acoustic number by Bob Schneider (formerly of Ugly Americans, the Scabs and a few other bands) called "Montana". Upbeat but simple, a fun tune. He plays with a full band (quite full, in fact) live, and had a couple of songs reminiscent of "Montana", but mixed in with that was the Latin-tinged boogie of "Tarantula", the rollicking "Beatomatic" (with classic lines like "I used to wear a cape and do the leotard bit/But now I wear all serious because I don't give a shit") and the most unexpected of the evening, a solemn Texan paean to young love, "Assknocker". Loads of fun. Looking up his song lyrics, it looks like we didn't get to hear some classics, like "Million And One Reasons for The Fucked Up Things That I Do", "The Headless Samurai of Oatmogie, OK" and "All I Want For Christmas Is My Methadone". Set was just a shade over two hours long - unfortunately the last tune got cut - but a helluva contrast from the previous night.
Been a while since I blogged...mostly because it's been a while since I had the time. Apologies to the public I've been neglecting...all both of you. Over that time I've learned some lessons...
- Sherlock Holmes had a brother named Mycroft. This question in particular was the most obscure one of a trivia session I attended in celebration of Beth's birthday party two weeks ago at Hennessey's, a bar in Boston. We got off to a poor start (Devil's Tower is in Wyoming, not Washington) but I was soon able to extract from the folds of my brain that the owl in Mr. Roger's Neighborhood was named "X", that the Kansas City Royals were the first American League expansion team to win the world series, and that the show "I Love Lucy" was the TV show that appeared in Weird Al Yankovic's parody of the Toni Basil hit "Mickey". For the record, I did get the Sherlock Holmes question right, but it was a total guess. And two minutes after getting home, I posed the question to Viv as she was sitting around the table with the five girls who live in our dorm. "Oh, Sherlock Holmes!" one of them volunteered almost immediately. Unfortunately she's a few years short of drinking age still...
- Even though it's a variable-voltage piece of equipment, the 12-volt version of the Lunatec V2 automatically shuts down if it's getting less than 11 volts as originally calibrated. I just changed my taping rig over to a 6-volt system because the new analog/digital converter I bought only runs on 6 volts and the 12-volt batteries would release the magic smoke in the ADC-20 (not good). I had heard that the V2 could run on 6 volts, no problem. Which it can, except that when calibrated for 12 volts, it has an auto-shutoff circuit to prevent overdischarge of your battery. I didn't know this, so when I plugged in the 6-volt battery and it flickered and died, I panicked, because I had a show in less than two hours. I placed a frantic call to Grace Designs and then realized that I didn't have a screwdriver to open the thing up. The guy (patience of Job, this one had) stayed on the line while I ran to get one, then put up with me putting the phone on the floor while I got enough leverage...to strip the last screw I needed to get out. So I took notes while he dictated the procedure, and after I hung up, I got the drill out with a screwdriver bit and blasted the thing out of its hole (needless to say, it's never going back in). Switched a couple of jumpers, dialed down a variable resistor, popped the top back on, and I was good to go, running like a champ. Hopped in the car, zoomed down to Somerville to eat dinner with Faye and Josh, and then took in Erin McKeown/Josh Ritter at the Somerville Theatre. My first show there since late 1999, and the sixth anniversary of my first show there ever (Guster, 4-23-98). Erin's set came out great, but I'd made the mistake of leaving the ADC-20 hooked up to the battery all afternoon and it conked out 40 minutes into Josh's set. Live and learn...another lesson.
- Large sheets of fabric tend to catch the wind just so. Saturday Viv had a lacrosse game in Andover...New Hampshire...so I decided to take advantage of the time alone to go out and tape the WBOS Festival for the Earth at the Hatch Shell in Boston. It's a big outdoor festival that they have every year at this beautiful concert shell on the banks of the Charles River. Not all of the artists were taper-friendly, but I'd been wanting to see Los Lonely Boys for a while, so I thought I'd go take in a free day of music in what's usually a hassle-less environment (taped the Spin Doctors there in 1999 and Blues Traveler in 2001). The BoDeans opened - a decent set marred by some obnoxious kid showing off for his girlfriend by standing under my mics and screaming "YEAH BODEANS!" a few times. He soon disappeared, but the big surprise was yet to come - between sets, a huge gust of wind caught the WBOS banner festooning the left speaker stack and brought a three-story scaffold crashing down on the VIP section. I didn't even realize the things held speakers until they cut the banner off the other one to reveal four speakers on the top 'shelf' and two on the middle one. It was another 45-50 minutes until they got stuff sorted out and decided to continue with the show. Third Eye Blind was next...eh. Pretty pedestrian stuff. Edie Brickell followed with a mellow set - some of her stuff was catchy but didn't do much for me. Then Los Lonely Boys came out, and it's a good thing there wasn't a roof on the place, because they would have blown it off. Totally played to the crowd, did all the guitar tricks you've ever seen and more, but bottom line, they can PLAY. Definitely go out and catch them if you can - Texican rock is how they bill themselves, sort of in the Los Lobos/Stevie Ray Vaughan vein. Due to all of the delays I ended up having to pack the rig and leave before Peter Wolf (erstwhile J. Geils Band frontman) took the stage, but the battery problem from the night before was solved as it lasted well over three hours in taping the four bands.
- Everything is expensive in Newport. I guess this shouldn't have come as a surprise, but it was a shock to see $20 entrees at a shack on a dock. I got a $6 bowl of clam chowder, which was more than filling and quite tasty. Of course, we weren't in town for the food, but for the Guster show at Salve Regina that night. I think the band has now hit every four-year institution of higher learning in New England. This one was in a tiny gym, laid out strangely - they had the stage against one of the longer walls, so we were extremely close to the stage. The sound was terrific that close...too bad the show was terrible. We'd picked up Mel, a friend from California, on the way to the show (she'd come out for a week's vacation before getting buried at work) and so we had a full car on the way down to Rhode Island. So three days in a row of music...and the week was just beginning.
