Dr. Dog @ Prospect Park 6/27/09 (pics, vids, etc.)

Last night I made my way to Prospect Park for the free Celebrate Brooklyn performances by Phosphorescent and Dr. Dog. I'd never been to one of these shows before and have to say it was well put on; plenty of space even with a good sized crowd, easy access to beers, and the best price in town, FREE. The only down side being that the show had to end promptly at 10:30pm. Fun show with a bunch of Dr. Dog faves; The Ark, From, Hang On, The Breeze...to name a few. Take in some of the multimedia below.

Dr. Dog - The Ark @ Prospect Park 6/27/09 from Jim Longstreet on Vimeo.

Dr. Dog - Hang On @ Prospect Park 6/27/09 from Jim Longstreet on Vimeo.

Digg this | Post to del.icio.us | Facebook

The Show That Wasn't: X @ Double Door, CHI 6/19/09

We’ve all heard the phrase ‘sh!t happens when you party naked’, right?. Well going to concerts is no exception to that rule. All kinds of things can go wrong to F up your night. Some of these things can put a serious damper on the concert experience. ‘The Show That Wasn’t’ feature lets us shed some light on what happened to these nights and where we went wrong…and hopefully gives us a chance to laugh at ourselves a little bit. Here's our first installment.


The Show That Wasn't: X @ Double Door, CHI 6/19/09

Riley and I live in different cities. We don’t go to many shows together. So, when we made plans to go to Phish shows on 6/20 and 6/21 we figured, BRILLIANT! We’ll go see X play the Friday before in Chicago. Not a bad idea. We’d both been wanting to see them on this request tour they’ve been playing.

The trouble really comes in when we get the invite to a going way party for a friend who’s moving to NY. We figure the party starts at 8 and the concert is at 9, so we’ll go to the party at 9 and there’s no way X is gonna go on before 11. I think doors were at 830 or 9 and Steve Soto and The Twisted Hearts were opening. 10:30 at the earliest they’d come on.

Back at our going away party things seemed on schedule. We even turned down the all you can drink deal. ‘No we’re leaving soon for a concert.’ But the beers started flowing, tequila was poured, and poured again, more people arrived… Finally we had to leave. It was after 11, but not by much. We were at Double Door by 11:15. We walked in grab a couple PBR bottles and settled into our stage right position. Just in time for them to finish a song and exclaim, “THANK YOU, CHICAGO!!!”
We were miffed. I mean yeah the band’s a little older now and sure they’re from California, but F@ck. This is a punk band right? They play ‘til 11:15 on a Friday?
We watched the encore still kind of amazed that we’d missed basically the entire show. They did play my favorite tune “Burnin’ House Of Love.” That was cool. We got to catch at least a few of Billy Zoom’s licks. But we finished our beers and by 11:30 it was all over. They were done and we missed almost all of it.
Oh well, back to the party I guess…oh tequila…...

Digg this | Post to del.icio.us | Facebook

Wilco @ The Wiltern, Los Angeles 6/24/09 (Review, Setlist, Video)

Special thanks to guest contributor and West Coast Genius, JB, for the submission.

Wilco at The Wiltern from Dragoncito on Vimeo.

I've seen Wilco four times in the last four years and I have to say that last night was the best show I've seen yet. I've been twice at the Greek Theatre LA, once at Austin City Limits and last night at the enclosed and intimate Wiltern Theatre in LA. I knew seeing them at an indoor venue with great acoustics would be a good start, but I hadn't anticipated the amazing energy of the band, a rocking setlist, and a great crowd. Let's start with the crowd because Wilco definitely attracts the strangest crowd of any band I go see. I saw Phish at Jones Beach three weeks ago and while there are a lot of weird people at a Phish show, it's mostly people in the early 20's who are acting out, trying to be different or going through a phase. One exception were the two 30 year old guys dressed in full snorkel gear in my aisle, but that's a different story.

Suffice it to say that Wilco is a bonafide rock band still making the music that exemplifies a band in its prime, the average age at a Wilco show is...I'm going to say 29. Fitting staunchly into the age demo at a rock concert is rare for me, and the strangest thing about this crowd is that everyone is seems normal at first glance, but there is an intangible quality to the crowds' demeanor as if we've all been released from the pysch ward a few days ago, given our older brothers hand me downs to wear, and told to act as normal as possible in public. There are no band t-shirts, drunks, puking, coke snorting in the bathrooms, teenie boppers who decided an aging alt rock band is cool (as you find at Phish), or general acting out. Just a bunch of people in their late 20's to early 40's who knocked off worked a bit early, changed their shoes in the car, and came out to see a great band. Wilco plays some laid back country rock and straight up ballads, but they also have a bunch of rocking tunes that the kids at the phish show would be spinning through the aisles to. Not Wilco fans -- a barely discernible head bob or clapping to keep the band in rythm to "Spiders" is the most you'll get out of them. Reacting to a fan that had yelled "Thank you!" after a particular song, Tweedy quipped, "Why don't you all just yell thank you instead of clapping at the end of songs...has any one thought of that?" And when a fan typed Thank You on his iphone and showed it to Tweedy after the next song he said, "oh look at that, you wouldn't even have to say thank you." Strangely this scenario doesn't seem too far fetched for a Wilco crowd. Despite all this, the show last night had incredible energy. The band ripped through old standbys such as "I am Trying to Break your Heart," "Via Chicago," "Heavy Metal Drummer" and "California Stars" with passion and verve adding multi layered intros to each song, and pleased with new songs such as the title track "Wilco" on the new album and "Impossibe Germany" from Sky Blue Sky. And the crowd stayed glued to every guitar riff and syncopatic digression as if dancing, talking or doing anything but the aforementioned head bob would distract from their full appreciation of this incredibly talented and tight band.

Thanks again to JB for sharing. Check out his blog at joebrundige.com

Wilco @ The Wiltern, Los Angeles, CA 6/24/09

Via Chicago
Company In My Back
Wilco (The Song)
I Am Trying to Break Your Heart
One Wing
A Shot in the Arm
Side With The Seeds
Bull Black Nova
Jesus, Etc.
Impossible Germany
Forget The Flowers
Deeper Down
California Stars (ft. Jonathan Wilson on guitar)
Nothing'severgonnastandinmyway (again)
Heavy Metal Drummer
A Magazine Called Sunset
You Never Know


First Encore:

Poor Places
Reservations
Spiders (Kidsmoke)


Second encore:

The Late Greats
Hate It Here
Walken
I'm The Man Who Loves You
I'm A Wheel


Digg this | Post to del.icio.us | Facebook

TGIF JAMS!

We lead off this week's TGIF Jams with a track from the King of Pop. Rest In Peace. Obligatory moment of silence...now enjoy the jams and have a good weekend.

Michael Jackson - Don't Stop 'Til You Get Enough

My Morning Jacket - Loving Cup (Bonnaroo '06)

The Roadside Graves - Far and Wide

Heartless Bastards - Hold Your Head High

Horse Feathers - Heathen's Kiss


Digg this | Post to del.icio.us | Facebook

Yim Yames Of My Morning Jacket Announces A Tribute to George Harrison

We all miss the live performances from My Morning Jacket that we were treated to in 2008, but it's good to see our appetites for the vocals of Jim James will be sated with his upcoming release of a tribute album to George Harrison (We've got Monsters of Folk to look forward to as well). The full album will be released July 7th. In the meantime have a listen to one of the tracks below.

Digg this | Post to del.icio.us | Facebook

Phish @ Alpine Valley 6/21/09 (pics & setlist)

Day 2 b!tches. A few differences for today's show; 1) plenty more lot time before the show, and 2) Our favorite bizarro Trey, DANK was in the house, and 3) we had glo sticks. Coming back full circle to have 3/4's of our crew from the 8/9/97 show meant that this was going to be a big day. No disappointments there. Great times...until the late night drive home, but that doesn't overshadow what was another great F-ing night at Alpine.

On a quick sidenote pretty cool that all the guys brought out their kids prior to the show in honor of it being Father's Day. They're all grows up...kinda. Fun versions of 'I Didn't Know' and 'Grind' in there and some jams in the last three before the encore; 'Velvet Sea', 'Boogie On', 'Slave'? Man...boy...

Phish
6/21/09 Alpine Valley Music Theatre , East Troy, WI

SET ONE
Brother (5:42)
Wolfman's Brother (9:04)
Funky Bitch (5:03)
The Divided Sky (15:31)
Joy (5:22)
Back on the Train (7:41)
Taste (8:54)
Poor Heart (2:26)
The Horse (1:06)
Silent In The Morning (4:50)
The Man Who Stepped into Yesterday (2:44)
Avenu Malkanu (3:13)
The Man Who Stepped into Yesterday (1:43)
Time Turns Elastic (16:51)

SET TWO
Crosseyed and Painless (5:53)
Alpine Jam (9:16)
Down with Disease (13:18)
Bug (8:04)
Piper (12:50)
Wading in the Velvet Sea (6:15)
Boogie On Reggae Woman (5:48)
Slave to the Traffic Light (13:54)

ENCORE
Grind (2:33)
Frankenstein (5:46)


More pics under the fold...




I think that's actually me. Probably had too much fun with the glo-sticks.

Wish I knew what tune had us all hunched over like this. Divided Sky maybe?

I wonder if it's his first Phish show! Check the baby's headphones out.

What a night. What a weekend. Anybody want to go to Red Rocks?

Digg this | Post to del.icio.us | Facebook

Phish @ Alpine Valley 6/20/09 (Pics & Setlist)

I don't know what to say about the Phish shows from this past weekend. I'm still a little sleep deprived and dehydrated and haven't totally processed the whole thing, but I know this; there were a lot of people (37,000+) that had a keeeeck ahhhhsss time dancing around southeastern Wisconsin. Maybe the coolest thing on the weekend was the anticipation and absolute joy that was shared by the crowd as the first notes of 'Punch You In The Eye' were played at 7:48 PM on Saturday night. Anyone looking around the crowd would have seem smile after smile and a lotta high fives as fans were treated to the first live Phish at Alpine since '04. The band always has haters and everyone has a right to their opinion, but I'm not sure that any band's music makes its crowds that HAPPY! Everyone was cheesing as the guys went into 'Runaway Jim' and then 'Stash'.
That's an F-ing start. They wouldn't let up. It was a serious greatest hits concert with a little something for everybody. Check it. The Makisupa alternate lyrics were pretty funny as Trey changed it up a little bit and poked fun at his clean living these days:

"Woke up this morning,
Pissin' in jah cup.
Woke up this afternoon,
Called my probation officer."

Phish
6/20/09 Alpine Valley Music Theatre , East Troy, WI

SET ONE
Punch You in the Eye (9:17)
Runaway Jim (9:32)
Stash (12:08)
Ya Mar (7:14)
Bathtub Gin (13:05)
Kill Devil Falls (8:20)
Train Song (2:47)
Farmhouse (4:55)
Sparkle (3:47)
Run Like an Antelope (10:25)

SET TWO
Waves (8:23)
Sample in a Jar (5:20)
Maze (11:37)
Makisupa Policeman (5:13)
Ghost (11:58)
The Lizards (10:31)
You Enjoy Myself (12:27)
NICU (4:56)
Prince Caspian (6:49)
Waste (5:32)
Fire (5:15)

ENCORE
Character Zero (7:37)


We still got tomorrow? Man, sh!t... Favorite tunes of the night? Leave us a comment.

More pics below.





I-I see the man mulcahey!

Digg this | Post to del.icio.us | Facebook

TGIF JAMS

Couldn't be more eager to get out of work today. X tonight @ the Double Door, and then two glorious nights of PHISH @ Alpine. Ping Pang!

Phish - Maze

Booker T - Warped Sister

Dirty Projectors - Stillness Is The Move

Generationals - When They Fight, They Fight

Lupe Fiasco - Shining Down ft. Matthew Santos


Digg this | Post to del.icio.us | Facebook

Andrew Bird @ Radio City Music Hall, NY 6/18/09 (review & setlist)

A little bit of an aye-aye-aye day kept me at work til past 8PM today and fearing I was going to miss this show. My co-worker who was to join me was a casualty of the unexpected lengthening of the work day, so it was a solo mission tonight. I missed Calexico who was opening, but made it for Andrew Bird and the main event albeit in work clothes and sans camera. At least I had my tickets with me.
I was glad I made it. The show was a good finish to what has been a busy couple weeks for me. I was able to settle in with a couple cocktails and enjoy Bird's layers upon layers of sound with loops of the violin, xylophone, etc. He played a few tracks from his recent Noble Beast and some faves from older albums. I was sorry I didn't have the camera. The stage lighting and effects were impressive and photo ops were aplenty. Good times. I love me some 'Effigy' and 'Why?'. Bird's lyricism and obvious musical multi-talents shines through on most all the tunes.
Anybody else at the show take some pics? Have a link you'd like to share. Leave us a comment.

Andrew Bird @ Radio City Music Hall, New York 6/18/09 Setlist:
Sweetbreads
Fiery Crash
Opposite Day
Fitz and the Dizzyspells
Masterswarm
Oh No
Effigy
Anonanimal
Imitosis
Cataracts
Skin Is, My (w/ Calexico)
Scythian Empires (w/ Calexico)
Tables and Chairs (w/ Calexico)

ENCORE:
Why?
Don't Be Scared
Fake Palindromes

Digg this | Post to del.icio.us | Facebook

Lollapalooza '09 Schedule Released, Potential Tough Decisions?

Today the schedule for August 7-9th's 2009 version of Lollapalooza in Chicago was released. Anyone going to the weekend's festivities is guaranteed plenty of good music but we wanted to take a look at the potential tough decisions of the weekend that are forced upon any concert attendee.

Let me start with the first tough decision I see on the docket and go from there.

Friday, 3:00-4:00PM
Bon Iver (Playstation Stage)
vs.
Heartless Bastards (VitaminWater Stage)
*This is a tough one and there's no perfect solution with their identical time slots, but I think I gotta go to Bon Iver and then try to catch Heartless Bastards a little later in the FYE Autograph tent at 4:20.*

More tough calls below...

Friday, 7-8/8:15PM
Andrew Bird (Playstation Stage)
vs.
Of Montreal (VitaminWater Stage)
*I'm seeing A. Bird tomorrow and have never seen Of Montreal, so I might lean towards the latter...*

Friday, 8/8:15-10PM
Kings Of Leon (Budweiser Stage)
vs.
Depeche Mode (South Stage)
*KOL killed when I saw them in Jan., but I think DM would be pretty kick ass too. Maybe the toughest call of the day, but I'd go to KOL.*

Saturday looks to be a hectic day of running around, but my big decision comes at the end of the evening and maybe depends on your mood.
Beastie Boys (Budweiser Stage)
vs.
Tool (South Stage)
*Never seen either live. Want to see both. Each has the potential to be a very good finish to the night. I gotta lean towards the Beasties just because Ill Communication was the soundtrack to my formative years.*

Those seem like my biggest decisions on the weekend, but mine are all hypothetical. I won't be there, have to work all wknd. Any others weighing on you? Let us know in the comments.
A few bands I wouldn't miss:
Delta Spirit (Sat. 12:30-1:30)
Blind Pilot (Sat. 4:15-5:00)
Alberta Cross (Sun. 11:45-12:30)
The Airborne Toxic Event (Sun. 2:30-3:30)

Other recommendations? Have a good time to all attending. We'll be expecting reports back.

Digg this | Post to del.icio.us | Facebook

Little Joy @ Double Door, Chicago 6/15/09

I'm going to see these guys at the bowery next week, but this past Monday night Little Joy played at the Double Door in Chicago and KZ was nice enough to pass along a little recap and a couple pics from her night at the show. Thanks for sending KZ! Anybody else have a chance to see the show in CHI?



"Katy T and I went to Little Joy Monday night at the Double Door. They had an opening band...the Ragtones. Not bad. Little Joy came on around 930. Rodrigo Amarante, lead singer, opened up the set solo on stage. He played a Brazilian song with the acoustic guitar. It was amazing. His voice is amazing. He was then joined by Binki Shapiro and the rest of the band. They played most of their songs from the album. They talked and joked ALOT with the audience. Rodriogo explained, "We talk alot because we don't have many songs." We appreciated the honesty. Binki sang a few songs solo. That girl needs to be RHOTW. Her voice, as Katy described, is hauntingly beautiful. Overall GREAT time."



Digg this | Post to del.icio.us | Facebook