I promised a post on the happenings of last weekend. What better time than now to blog it out!
So, it all started up with Friday's trip to lovely Aragon Ballroom in Chicago to check out Death Cab for Cutie. This would be the first time the better half and I could see them for a full show. We did see them last year at a short set private event that was outstanding, as chronicled here. The place was sold out but we were able to get a spot with a decent view and saw a nice show. The lead singer was very energetic and they sounded great, although they only played about 90 minutes or so. Highlights included a bass-thumping extended version of I Will Possess Your Heart and a moving I Will Follow You Into the Dark. Lowlights included "that guy" and his special lady friend who spent the entire show cool-kidding it with their iPhones. Really? You had to go to a concert for that? Money well-spent my friend!
The next day was opening day of the soccer season, with a game bright and early at 9 am. The weather could not have been better, probably in the 60s at that early hour. Definitely better than last year's freeze fest in the galing winds. And the 5 year olds are a little further along that the 4 year olds from last year, although we still had a few tears and kids clinging to mom or dad. Must have been the hockey mask I was wearing. Tomorrow promises even better weather, what a good workout.
After soccer, we had a brief respite at home before embarking on another soccer adventure for kid #1. These were the first graders and they got annihilated. But it was a lot of running and more good exercise for me chasing them around. After the game, we headed over to C's 1st bday party, arriving a fashionable hour plus late. Happy bday bro, keep throwing that frosting on mom and dad. Directly after that, I packed up the monkeys and headed for home while the better half headed back to Chicago to House of Blues to check out Rocco DeLuca and the Burden. Apparently the crowd wasn't that great but the music was. Rocco is an artist on Jack Bauer's, pardon me, Kiefer Sutherland's record label and according to JTB the boy can shred the six string.
While that was going on, it was decided that hosting a sleepover with a few of the kids and a poker extravaganza with several of the fellas was a good idea. So we played until about 3 in the morning or so while the kids passed out from too much booze by 11 or so. Unfortunately, I got the unenviable task of getting up with all the rascals at 6:30 (the kids, not the poker players). After a long morning of fighting over Wii controllers, we packed up and headed to #2's 5th bday party at the neighborhood civic center. It was a lot of fun and included lots of gymnastics, rope climbing and riding down a hill in a padded barrel, and I'm not even making any of that up. We wrapped up by jacking the kids full of sugar with cake and fruit punch and a spirited game of duck duck goose.
Afterwards I grabbed a snooze and finished up my paper that I turned in on Monday night. Then dinner for #2's bday and followed that up with my trip out to Cali, complete with a lovely 4 hour delay on the return trip, sweet! And with that, here I sit, ready to start it all over again with soccer tomorrow and more homework. Greatly looking forward to next week's trip to see Flight of The Conchords and other upcoming shows I'll be sure to chronicle at some future date.
Other music notes - songs the better half and I are glued on right now include Pale Bride from Von Bondies (just missed their show a couple weeks back because of class!), Wolf Like Me by TV On the Radio although the whole fam agrees Scott Lucas' cover is better, the new Silversun Pickups CD, and Carolina Liar's I'm Not Over. And, oh yeah, I'm so freaking sick of U2, can you say overexposed? Sheesh.
Song lyric of the day "Wasn't all that great/back in the summer of boats" Local H
Until next time.
Ace
Showing posts with label Death Cab for Cutie. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Death Cab for Cutie. Show all posts
Friday, April 24, 2009
Thursday, May 15, 2008
Death Cab for Cutie, Flight of the Conchords Trip Report 5-15-08
I posted recently about an upcoming doubleheader. Well, it was last night.
I won tickets from a local radio station to see a small club show with Death Cab for Cutie. I really don't know much about this band but I had heard a couple of songs on XM and really liked the songs. But, I hadn't gone out of my way to track them down any further than that. When the contest came up, I decided "What the heck, I like what I've heard". Now I feel a little bad for winning because I'm sure there are some huge fans that didn't get a chance to go because I won tickets. But, I can't give the things away so the better half and I were going!
Leading up to the show, I received a copy of their platinum record Plans. That was this past weekend. I listened to it a few times and it just so happens that the band performed on Letterman Monday night, so I checked that out too. On Letterman, they performed the first release from the CD just out this week. The song is called I Will Possess Your Heart and the CD is Narrow Stairs. So, with that little backdrop, I wasn't quite sure what we were getting ourselves into.
I would first like to point out that without really knowing exactly where we were going, we were able to find street parking less than a half block from the venue. This was of course due to my superior navigational and strategic driving talents, or perhaps dumb luck. Woohoo! It helps that it was a very early show, with doors at 5 and the show starting about 5:20. There was a VERY long line to get into the place but it moved quick once they started letting people in.
Surprisingly, once the doors opened, not that many people went up close to the stage, choosing to hang back by the bar instead. However, the place was pretty small, maybe holding 200 people at most. So everyone was pretty close. But we were right in the center and one person from the front, very nice! The band came out and did 3 songs. The first song I didn't know, the second song was a new one called Talking Bird and then they did Soul Meets Body (one of the few songs I knew, probably the band's biggest hit, and a great, great song). They then paused for a short interview with the local radio station DJ. This show will later be broadcast on the station, WXRT in Chicago. The interview kind of sucked, the DJ knew a lot about the band but didn't know much about asking meaningful questions. Anyhow, they played two more songs, Brothers on a Hotel Bed and I Will Possess Your Heart.
Overall, these guys sounded great live. I sincerely doubt that I will ever get a chance to see them again in such an intimate setting or so close to the stage. In some ways, that's a little sad since I don't know much of their music and probably didn't have a full appreciation of what I was experiencing. But, I know that I'm definitely going to check out a lot more of their music. This is definitely one of those bands the hipsters love, which kind of sucks, but whatever, I can't let that keep me from enjoying the music if I think it's good.
Shortly after the set, we were off, heading south on Lake Shore Drive, driving into town. We were off to see Flight of the Conchords. I've raved about them before so I won't bother with the superlatives to set the show up. But I will say that there was great anticipation on our part headed over to the show. After once again finding street parking (yes, I am a rock star), we cruised to the venue, Chicago Theatre, which is a great place to see a show. On the way, we stopped by for a delicioso visit to Potbelly's. Right across from the theater, the place was packed! It took a bit to get our food. But more interestingly, we had a great view of the crowd swelling around the venue. There was a line that was so long you couldn't see the end of it and a throng of people around the front entrance. People were all over the place and they were really excited. There was the cliche couple getting their picture taken with the marquee sign in the background and the better half swears that the dude jumping out of one of the cabs was comedian Eddie Izzard. We have not received positive confirmation of this.
By the time we finished eating, the line had moved and we were able to walk right in. The seats were really good, a little left of center but on the aisle and quite close. A pleasant surprise was the brief opening stand up of Arj Barker. He plays the role of Dave on the HBO series Flight of the Conchords and was quite funny. After his short opener, Bret and Jemaine came out and did a great set. They played many of the favorite songs from the show. That was ok but to me the highlights of the show included a few new songs, including one so new that Jemaine forgot the words and they had to start over. The "banter" between songs was also quite good, including a five minute reverie of Jemaine's discussing time travel acid and a discussion he had with 1970's Tina Turner and 2008 Tina Turner and Jemaine's relationship advice to the forlorn '70s version of the singer. High quality! And the guys actually stayed on stage for about 2 hours, which I suppose is pretty long for a comedy act. Wish they would have played Boom King but you can't always get what you want. As a little frame of reference for our song lyric of the day below, I will never think of rain in the same way again.
By night's end, I think I actually enjoyed the Death Cab portion of the evening even better than FOTC, which is saying something. A fun time was had by all. In closing, I will leave you with some deep and meaningful lyrics from FOTC in their final song of the evening.
Song lyric of the day: "There are angels / In the clouds / Doin' it" Angels, Flight of the Conchords
Until next time.
Ace
I won tickets from a local radio station to see a small club show with Death Cab for Cutie. I really don't know much about this band but I had heard a couple of songs on XM and really liked the songs. But, I hadn't gone out of my way to track them down any further than that. When the contest came up, I decided "What the heck, I like what I've heard". Now I feel a little bad for winning because I'm sure there are some huge fans that didn't get a chance to go because I won tickets. But, I can't give the things away so the better half and I were going!
Leading up to the show, I received a copy of their platinum record Plans. That was this past weekend. I listened to it a few times and it just so happens that the band performed on Letterman Monday night, so I checked that out too. On Letterman, they performed the first release from the CD just out this week. The song is called I Will Possess Your Heart and the CD is Narrow Stairs. So, with that little backdrop, I wasn't quite sure what we were getting ourselves into.
I would first like to point out that without really knowing exactly where we were going, we were able to find street parking less than a half block from the venue. This was of course due to my superior navigational and strategic driving talents, or perhaps dumb luck. Woohoo! It helps that it was a very early show, with doors at 5 and the show starting about 5:20. There was a VERY long line to get into the place but it moved quick once they started letting people in.
Surprisingly, once the doors opened, not that many people went up close to the stage, choosing to hang back by the bar instead. However, the place was pretty small, maybe holding 200 people at most. So everyone was pretty close. But we were right in the center and one person from the front, very nice! The band came out and did 3 songs. The first song I didn't know, the second song was a new one called Talking Bird and then they did Soul Meets Body (one of the few songs I knew, probably the band's biggest hit, and a great, great song). They then paused for a short interview with the local radio station DJ. This show will later be broadcast on the station, WXRT in Chicago. The interview kind of sucked, the DJ knew a lot about the band but didn't know much about asking meaningful questions. Anyhow, they played two more songs, Brothers on a Hotel Bed and I Will Possess Your Heart.
Overall, these guys sounded great live. I sincerely doubt that I will ever get a chance to see them again in such an intimate setting or so close to the stage. In some ways, that's a little sad since I don't know much of their music and probably didn't have a full appreciation of what I was experiencing. But, I know that I'm definitely going to check out a lot more of their music. This is definitely one of those bands the hipsters love, which kind of sucks, but whatever, I can't let that keep me from enjoying the music if I think it's good.
Shortly after the set, we were off, heading south on Lake Shore Drive, driving into town. We were off to see Flight of the Conchords. I've raved about them before so I won't bother with the superlatives to set the show up. But I will say that there was great anticipation on our part headed over to the show. After once again finding street parking (yes, I am a rock star), we cruised to the venue, Chicago Theatre, which is a great place to see a show. On the way, we stopped by for a delicioso visit to Potbelly's. Right across from the theater, the place was packed! It took a bit to get our food. But more interestingly, we had a great view of the crowd swelling around the venue. There was a line that was so long you couldn't see the end of it and a throng of people around the front entrance. People were all over the place and they were really excited. There was the cliche couple getting their picture taken with the marquee sign in the background and the better half swears that the dude jumping out of one of the cabs was comedian Eddie Izzard. We have not received positive confirmation of this.
By the time we finished eating, the line had moved and we were able to walk right in. The seats were really good, a little left of center but on the aisle and quite close. A pleasant surprise was the brief opening stand up of Arj Barker. He plays the role of Dave on the HBO series Flight of the Conchords and was quite funny. After his short opener, Bret and Jemaine came out and did a great set. They played many of the favorite songs from the show. That was ok but to me the highlights of the show included a few new songs, including one so new that Jemaine forgot the words and they had to start over. The "banter" between songs was also quite good, including a five minute reverie of Jemaine's discussing time travel acid and a discussion he had with 1970's Tina Turner and 2008 Tina Turner and Jemaine's relationship advice to the forlorn '70s version of the singer. High quality! And the guys actually stayed on stage for about 2 hours, which I suppose is pretty long for a comedy act. Wish they would have played Boom King but you can't always get what you want. As a little frame of reference for our song lyric of the day below, I will never think of rain in the same way again.
By night's end, I think I actually enjoyed the Death Cab portion of the evening even better than FOTC, which is saying something. A fun time was had by all. In closing, I will leave you with some deep and meaningful lyrics from FOTC in their final song of the evening.
Song lyric of the day: "There are angels / In the clouds / Doin' it" Angels, Flight of the Conchords
Until next time.
Ace
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