Tag Archives: music

Sexy Salonen*

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I’ve been a busy bee: R.E.M. at the Hollywood Bowl, quickly followed by the LA Philharmonic playing Salonen’s Piano Concerto at the Walt Disney Concert Hall. Of the two nights, you’d think that I’d have enjoyed the Hollywood Bowl night of rock more, but perhaps as a sign of aging, I think the LA Phil gave me far more satisfaction. Since I reviewed the R.E.M. concert on my last.fm page, I thought I’d continue with the LA Phil review there.

I’m not sure how well this will work, but I’m going to try to blog these short and uninformed reviews to my last.fm page just ‘cos it’s so… empty. And link to it from here on the off-chance that anyone cares. To be honest, these little blurbs aren’t so much reviews as random thoughts from the evening that survive any alcohol damage.


* He’s looking a bit older these days, but back when he brought the LA Phil to Edinburgh for the Festival, I thought Esa-Pekka was possibly the sexiest male conductor around. His soon-to-be successor, Gustavo Dudamel, is currently challenging him for this title. In my head

R.E.M. at the Bowl

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R.E.M. played at the Hollywood Bowl this Thursday past. Fresh off the plane from the East Coast, P and I headed along with our ghetto “recycled” plastic bottles of wine. Yes, we resorted to pouring a bottle of wine into some “Honest Tea” drink bottles (irony intended) because this was a “lease event”, which meant no glass would be allowed, nor alcohol of any sort. Normally, the bottle of wine is what keeps us going from 2 hours before the concert all the way to the end of the 6 hour trip for us (the H’Bowl shuttle leaves SaMo 2h before; be on it or be stuck in traffic through the whole concert). I mixed up a lavender, honey and gin cocktail in another Honest Tea bottle because we have turned into right lushes from our week of lunchtime cocktails in D.C. that extended into late night drinking.

A brief review of the night is here on my last.fm page and copied below for the link-lazy.

Sticking my neck out here, but I think the show-stealers were The National. Their direct, un-fancy performance was befitting of a warm-up band, and they certainly got me in the mood for a night of rock. Finishing their set with
mr november was a stroke of genius. No doubt some non-fans finally cottoned on who they had been listening to.

I had low-to-middling expectations from Modest Mouse, and wasn’t entirely surprised when they didn’t sparkle. Don’t get me wrong; I think they make great music. But I think their talent lies in crafting perfect albums that need to be listened to in their entirety. Somehow, the experimental nature of their music is lost on a live stage, especially one as large as the Hollywood Bowl.

As for the headliners, R.E.M., my mistake was in not listening to their latest album, Accelerate, before the show. My bad. It was good, but since it was all new to me, not much sunk in. Of the older songs, I really enjoyed hearing Final Straw live. And I loved their super-fast take on Bad Day, possibly my favourite R.E.M. song, although that changes depending on my mood.

As a non-music aside, one of the big downers of the evening was the number of pot-smokers in the audience. Normally, at the Bowl, the smokers do us all a favour and smoke their stinky weed outside. This time, I had the misfortune to be sat behind 4 pot-heads, whose constant lighting up made my wine unpalatable and my evening a little sour. Talking through the performances also did not endear them to me. It’ll be an awful day should I ever stoop to reporting pot smokers to the equally unpleasant security people.

That aside, I enjoyed the music. Even if I didn’t know half the set-list. In fact, that was what made it better: that R.E.M. didn’t just play their best-known hits. Consummate professionals to the last man, they keep track of what they’ve played in each venue and try not to repeat songs over the years. Blimey, that’s organised!

muse ick

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It’s gonnae be a super-hectic weekend, which means I’ll have nae chance of making this blog feel loved. But I just had to put down something about the fabulous music I’ve been hearing: live, on the radio, on last.fm and in my head.

Last Friday saw us finally getting some tickets to the concert venue closest to our home in SaMo: McCabe’s Guitar Shop. I’ve been itching to see something there ever since popping my head in to buy some picks a few months back. It’s celebrating it’s 50th birthday this year, and in LA, I reckon that’s a pretty big deal since everything’s a temporary tattoo here. Anythehoo, McCabe’s has a back room where they host concerts every weekend. I have to confess to never having heard of most of the artists¹, but I overheard excited whispers regarding a certain Hansard fellow while picking my plectrums². Unsurprisingly, it was a sold-out concert and not for the likes of me³.

This Friday past, on the other hand, must have been the day off for my Ticket Tormentors4. Their slack resulted in us being blown away by the amazing Peter Mulvey, of Wisconsin. Milwaukee, Wisconsin. He’s a very engaging performer with an easy patter. His folk rock was part of his patter, or is it the other way round. Anecdote after anecdote, he charmed us all and really raised the bar for the main act, Patty Larkin.

She was amazing. The things she did with her pedals made her one-person show a full aural spectacle. And like Peter Mulvey, she was on fine form with the stories and explanations. We were left in no doubt that she’s mighty annoyed about her MySpace squatter (thus leading to an evening of puns, which you’ll be pleased to hear I won’t be repeating here). I think if I’d heard her music before the show, I would have enjoyed the experience a lot more. As it was, I sat captivated by the technique, the meshing of different sounds. And quite forgot to listen to the music.

How can Blink-whatever-number get so much airtime and a wonderful and truly gifted musician like Patty Larkin never be on the radio at work? Oh yes, I work in a lab filled with teenagers. Fortunately, when I remember to put batteries in, I have my trusty FM/AM/LW-bigger-than-an-iPod radio which allows me to drown out Kanye with KCRW. Which was most fortuitous this morning because I suspect a very sneaky Fran Healy leaked one of the band’s latest songs on Morning Becomes Eclectic.

Oh yes. Immediately after the latest Coldplay single (which, btw, sounds very Travis-rock-like), a two-chord riff jarred out of the earphones and a very familiar voice launched into J Smith5.

there’s a man on the street
and he looks at his feet from his window
and he swears at the sun
and he curses the moon for his shadow

take a leaf from his book
take a thread from his suit
he’s a new man
and he prays to his god
that he reaps his reward for his new plan

It’s a good song. It’s lean yet anthemic. A touch of Queen with the dramatic Latin/Italian chorus. And yet saved from becoming melodramatic with the chew and growl of the guitar, driven by a rough bass line, accented with perfect bursts of drum. It’s raw but smooth: like a freshly caught fish, sashimi-ed in front of your very eyes. If you’re not a sushi person, think Lagavulin: smoky and peaty, with a hint of acid that threatens but never emerges, leaving a rolling smoothness in your mouth. Only it’s aural not oral.

I’ve gone from feeling like my music tastes had stagnated to being overwhelmed with choice. Despite my complaints about Ticketmaster (it hates me, I’m sure of it), we have a list of summer events to make up for the end of the LA Philharmonic’s season. This weekend sees us back at the Walt Disney Concert Hall, but for the Kronos Quartet. Halfway between here and there, we’ll see KT Tunstall at the Wiltern. I’m off to be eaten by gators in Florida after, and then get lost in the Smithsonian in DC, but I’ll be back for REM and Modest Mouse at the Hollywood Bowl.

And maybe I’ll just stay at home in June. Maybe.

2nd May 2008 Update: My little delurk (see footnote 5 below) made the front page of the Travis website. Woot!

1 Not because they’re not good or famous. Just chalk it up as yet another thing in a bajillion that I know diddly squat about.

2 I settled for the variety pack by the counter, thank you very much for asking. And my favourite of the random pack is the Pickboy 100; a solid plectrum with dimples for grip. P likes the really thin own-brand pick. But plectrum or pick choice has not turned us into Turin Brakes. Maybe we need guitar straps?

3 There are many, many concerts that I am clearly unworthy for, as Ticketmaster often reminds me. They have very rightly screened the potential audience for plebs, and have informed me in no uncertain terms that I’m not good enough to see Flight of the Conchords or Radiohead live. But I thumb my nose at them, for I am one of the privileged few to have seen the f*lksome twosome when they were selling themselves as Figwit and friend at the Edinburgh Fringe. Surgeon’s Hall, if I remember correctly. The Fringe was always a little surreal for me: comedy in my lecture halls.

4 Like Dementors, only they suck out the joy and excitement you feel in anticipation of a concert and replace it with that bottomless dread of having to tell your fellow concert goers that you have failed in your mission to bring joy to their lives.

5 If interested, go to the Morning Becomes Eclectic page and listen to the 1st of May edition at 40 minutes into the show. Hearing it was enough to prompt a de-lurk on the Travis messageboard. Back under the rock now…

guitars in the air

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Why the sudden interest in air guitar? Is it a geek thing? Ah, no. It’s that bloody Guitar Hero game. That episode of South Park was hilarious1. And I thought this would be a geeky teenager sort of thing, but no… A couple of 30-something friends recently informed me that the game is awesome and a lot of fun. Next thing I know, the boss will be inviting us round to play Guitar Hero after the Christmas do. Blimey.

At any rate, I’ve been thinking of getting a real-live guitar for a while now. Or some other instrument to fill the small hole in my life that used to be plugged by bashing badly through some Mozart. It’s all very well going to concerts and enjoying listening to the truly talented. Somehow, that’s not as satisfying as playing your own crap, however sub-standard2. As much as I love the tinkle of the piano, it’s getting ridiculous: I have two pianos on two different continents. Do I seriously want a third that I can’t ship to wherever my next job is?

So, I’m thinking quite seriously of getting a slightly more portable instrument. In half-seriousness, I suggested a tuba to Mr P, but he has so far failed to respond positively. Don’t know why… Having spent an evening watching Evelyn Glennie’s mastery of the marimba, I was very tempted to give up science so I could play that beautiful instrument all day long instead. But cold logic prevailed. No marimbas3. Also left off the list are violins, violas, cellos and basses. Can’t do the circular breathing required for woodwinds and brasses4. Bongo drums might drive the neighbours bonkers. I would LOVE to play the timpani, but it only works in an orchestral setting. The current targets are the geetar and perhaps harmonica/s. Both can be fairly melodic and hopefully idiot-proof enough to entertain ourselves with. I’m planning to steal my dad’s new harmonica next time I see him. He doesn’t like it; says it’s too fancy, expensive and painful compared to the cheap ones of his childhood. So, assuming I see him in Bahrain in the next few months, that’s one instrument for the D&P band down. We’ll need another, slightly more rhythmic, sound-producer. The frontrunner is still the guitar.

Which leaves us with the dilemma of: acoustic or electric? Electric has one awesome advantage: less finger pain… And amps. I can finally own an amp. I’ve always wanted my own amp. Well. Somewhere on my long list of things I want anyway. Imagine the neighbours. Think of the poor neighbourhood dogs. Somehow, I think Mr P is going to sit on that idea for the sake of his sanity.


1 One of the few count-on-one-hand TV shows I’ve seen since the dog replaced TV in our lives. Watched it inna hotel-with-a-windmill in Solvang-the-fake-Danish-Californian-town, of all places. Weird life I lead.

2 A bashed-out Chopin or Mozart gives me a certain perverse pleasure. In fact, many of my happy music moments as a child were bastardising whatever music I’d been set to practice and rocking out on Mozart. Clearly, there was a rock/pop-deficiency that my subconscious was trying hard to fill.

3 Nobody tell Mr P, but his Xmas pressie, stuffed lovingly into his already overflowing suitcase is somewhat related. No fear of him reading this blog. In its entire life, he’s not even read a word. He doesn’t even look at the Flickr photos. That man really lives on his own island…

4 And yet I would like to try the tuba….

Cream and bastards rise

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Going through my RSS feeds in Thunderbird, I realised I read NOTHING in 2006. Yes, the whole of 2006. Not only did I read no blogs, I also read no books*. That may have been the first time in my life I didn’t read voraciously, constantly, indiscriminately. What should I do about the RSS feeds? Mark them all read so I can clear up the folder in what is also my main email software? Or laboriously go through the several thousands?

At any rate, I’ve started reading other blogs again. Starting with the ones that I read before I started my own. Which is how I came to be watching this awesome piece of lib dubbing, and craving me some of that music too. A search on iTunes proved unfruitful, and although myspace hosts a streaming version of Flagpole Sitta, it’s not downloadable. What to do without resorting to naughty illegal downloads or warming up the planet by having Amazon deliver it in a huge box? Last resort, the official website for Harvey Danger, where I don’t find the song, but instead end up bittorrenting their latest album little by little. For free. Clever ploy. I’m enjoying it, and probably will buy a hard copy.

Clever ploy.

*Soon to be rectified. My dad gave me The Language of God for Christmas, but I haven’t gotten round to getting it off the shelf yet. And I bought two Ray Bradbury books at the LA Book Fest today.

A bit annoyed; lost the post because one of the sites I was trying to buy stuff from decided to crash my Firefox. It’s one of those damn sites that seems to close after midnight for maintenance or something. Perhaps I should take the hint and stop buying stuff from them.