The Killers @Webster Hall, Sept. 22nd

Ok, so I'm a Killers hata. I have not bought their first album, Hot Fuss, and haven't scoured the Net for a leak of their next album, Sam's Town. I liked "Somebody Told Me" a lot when it came out, and even found "Mr. Brightside" and "Jenny Was a Friend of Mine" acceptable. But what I couldn't tolerate was the way they blew up all over the place. And I deemed lead singer Brandon Flowers a pretty boy (c'mon, his last name is Flowers) arrogant wanker without ever giving the Killers a real chance.

I'll fess up -- I bought tickets to their show in next month at Theater at MSG without any serious intent of going. Merely cos I could. Merely cos I know I can dump these tickets with ease on Craigslist to some surly former fratboy or his annoying chirpy shorty girl. So when news broke that the Killers were coming to play Webster tonight, a smaller venue, for a cheaper price, I became vaguely interested. In actuality, I should have caught them when I could have two years ago at the smaller venues, just like I should have done with Bloc Party. And so the tickets went on sale on Ticketweb on Wednesday, and they went on sale, and they were still on sale -- it took about 4.5 hrs for them to sell out. And I didn't bite then, preferring to giggle at the Killers' overestimation of their fanbase. Where were the zealots? They couldn't really all be Jewish and/or under 18!

Anyway, I guess my resolve to cut back on going to gigs was not so strong. I had been doing well -- only had caught The Dears and Pete Yorn so far this month, and both last week, thinking that would be it for September. Then I buckled and grabbed a free pair of Gnarls Barkley for Tuesday. Then a few hours later, I found out I won Stereogum's Yo La Tengo Contest, so I musta gotten the bug again. I'm such a fuckin' concert addict. What a short-lived break. So since today was quiet at work -- hooray for Rosh Hashana -- I was able to scoop up a last minute ticket to the Killers' "secret" gig.

Ok, ok, so they were actually really good live. Brandon didn't talk a lot other than mentioning the song titles, so he didn't annoy me nearly as much as I thought he would. The rest of the band is quite ugly, so it's a good thing he's the pretty boy frontman.

They played for about an hour, which was kinda a gyp, but what can ya expect from a band with a short 1st album and a yet to be released 2nd one? The stage reminded me very much of the movie "Moulin Rouge" for some reason:


And, yes, I sang along to the 3 or 4 songs I knew. The entire crowd kept bouncing, so it was really hard to take any clear shots.

I have to give the Killers their props. They play solid music and are fun to listen to, as long as you filter out the stupid shit that Mr. Flowers likes to say -- comparing their music to Springsteen's? Are you kidding me??? Now I can cross them off my list. And you can bet your buns I'm selling those MSG tix!!! Bring on Yo La Tengo!

PS -- The Red Romance opened up for them. They were fine. Just not memorable.

PPS -- after the show caught up with Rad and a few of his friends, including Matt from The Music Slut, whom I had met during Radiohead in the summer. Sweet!

Pete Yorn @Mercury Lounge, Sept. 13th

Tonight met up with Andrea K. for Pete Yorn at the Mercury Lounge. (Bharat was supposed to join me, too, but he forgot his ID!) I felt like an interloper (not an antelope) for I am admittedly more familiar with Yorn's Richard Gere-ish looks than I am with his music, but I figured (a) it's the Mercury Lounge, (b) Yorn's from Jersey -- woo hoo!, (c) hot ticket, and (d) it'd drive Wawa mad that I got to go while he is traipsing across Europe for his beloved Pearl Jam. And while I was easily able to position myself within a few feet of the stage, I kinda regretted it slightly for we were standing in nutty fan central. Oh, I could see that Pete Yorn has his fair share of stalkers...ahhh, the uber fans...

Anyway, as for the music, I was pleasantly surprised...well, I guess I had no real expectations, so I wasn't really surprised, but maybe delighted. Yorn had a nice rapport with the audience, immediately starting off by saying, "Welcome to my basement!" cos the Mercury has that kind of feel to it. He and his band, which consisted of a bass, drums and keys alternating with 2nd guitar, stuck to the rocking tunes, playing old songs (songs that sounded somewhat familiar to me) along with new ones from his latest effort. He played a few covers including one of my favorite Smiths songs -- "There is a Light That Never Goes Out" -- and ended with Elvis Presley's "Suspicious Minds."

Pete Yorn played for a good 90 minutes easily. While his music may not be the most challenging or ground breaking, he's got a nice repertoire of solid rock with some country twinge (he played some blues as well as a song he did with Natalie of the Dixie Chicks). I really enjoyed the evening, especially since I preceded it with some pastrami at Katz's, a lemon cupcake from Sugar Sweet Sunshine, and a run in with the Grates on the sidewalk outside of Pianos ("Hallo, I saw you last night open for the Dears! You were G-R-R-REAT!!") It would have been perfect if Wawa could have been there, I suppose. Then he prolly would have been the recipient of Pete's harmonica rather than this married dude who stood right in front of Pete. And then the Wawa spazz attack would have made it all worthwhile. Did I tell you Eddie Vedder has tossed him not one, but two harmonicas this summer? I wonder what he'll bring back from Europe!

Anyway...time for bed! Thank God there was no opener!

The Dears @Bowery Ballroom, Sept. 12th

God help me, I fucking love the Dears. This was my 3rd time seeing them at Bowery Ballroom, and it only gets better each time. This time, they played a mix of their latest album, Gang of Losers (and why it's being released in the US two months after the rest of the world is beyond me, cos it's only gonna encourage pilfering from the Net and whatnot), and their last smash album, No Cities Left. I hear the song "22: The Death of All the Romance" and I just wanna break things and trash my apartment, melodrama at its finest. The Dears are all about passion and moodiness. Can't get enough!

I would have Murray's babies, I would!


And the Grates, a nice little band from Australia, opened for them. The lead singer had a little bit of the crazy girl PJ Harvey/Karen O. energy in her, but with a fun vibe -- I didn't feel like she'd eat me alive. I expect we'll hear more about the Grates in the future.


Julie1 came with me and dug the Grates, but she wasn't feeling the Dears this time as much as the last time we saw them last year, maybe cos she didn't know the new tunes. Ah well, not everyone's cup o' tea, I suppose!

Kanye West @The Nokia Theatre, Aug. 29th

I got a pair of free tickets from Amex's giveaway and briefly considered dumping the tickets since I didn't want to miss kung fu, it being a Tuesday, but lordy, am I glad I went! I took Fer along to the state of the art Nokia Theatre in Times Square, and despite our lateness in joining the line, we managed to get good positioning on the floor.

After making the crowd endure a long ass set by DJ AM (yes, the former flame of Nicole Ritchie), which wouldn't have been so bad if we weren't impatiently waiting for the main attraction, Kanye finally hit the stage just before 10:30pm, starting off with "Diamonds from Sierra Leone." He had both a male and a female backup singer, a full string section including harp, and DJ 8-track, who provided percussion samples and music samples.

The Britta had said to me that he thought hip hop could be crap live, so my expectations for this were set low, but Kanye proved that he was deserving of the hype. For the next 90 minutes, Kanye worked us hard. He came at us with hit after hit from both of his albums. His set was interrupted by a two song set by John Legend, who sang his hit "Ordinary People," a gorgeous song, and then remained on stage to sing backup on "Heard 'Em Say." Kanye was also joined by Common for a few cuts.

In singing "Gold Digger" Kanye joked how it was the only time white people felt comfortable saying "n*gga."

He then did a brief history of various songs he helped produce/write in the years before he made it big as an artist in his own right, including hits by Jay-Z and Alicia Keys.

Following that interlude, Kanye brought out Pharrell. To the audience's delight, they covered "Drop It Like It's Hot" (or was it "Beautiful"?) and "Frontin'."

To close out the show, Kanye went back to his first album for "Jesus Walks" (always stirring), "Never Let Me Down," and his first single "Through the Wire."

Throughout the show, Kanye proved himself to be charming, funny (we learned that he knows "Anchorman" verbatim), hard working, in touch with the audience -- for real. I came away astonished -- he blew me away.

Revenge of the Book Eaters @Beacon Theatre, Aug. 23rd

Met up with Fer, Dave and Stacey for Revenge of the Book Eaters, a fund raiser for 826NYC, "a nonprofit organization dedicated to supporting students ages 6 to 18 with their creative and expository writing skills, and to helping teachers to inspire their students to write." A group of fantastic humorists, including Jon Stewart, John Hodgman, Dave Eggers and Sarah Vowell were joined by musicians John Roderick (of The Long Winters), Sufjan Stevens and David Byrne.

I was lucky to land second row center seats the day they went on sale.

John Roderick played a short acoustic set.


Sufjan and a few of his band members played a handful of more recent Illinois(e) cuts.



David Byrne played a longer country set filled with covers and a few Talking Heads tunes, including a countryfied "Big Country."

As an encore, Sufjan joined David on stage for a cover song about Saginaw, Michigan, but not by Sufjan.

The evening reminded me how I used to make time in my life for volunteering, especially tutoring. I think this evening might cause me to explore some possibilities.

Michael Cerveris, et al. @Bowery Ballroom, Aug. 21st

Monday night, joined my fellow theater geek Wheatie for a fundraiser by the members of the cast of Sweeney Todd and friends, including Duncan Sheik and Nellie McKay. If you recall, Wheatie and I enjoyed seeing the amazing Broadway show in January. Tonight, a bunch of these amazingly talented people got together at my favorite venue to raise money for Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS.

The first portion of the evening featured a number of the actors from the show, including Johanna and Tobias:

They did not play Sweeney songs, but played a number of crazy covers and original pieces. (No, they did not cover "Crazy.")

Then, Nellie McKay, after joining in on some songs, played a short 3 song solo set -- pretty nutty and delightful, as usual:


It was during her set we spotted Patti Lupone, or I should say, Mrs. Lovett, seated in the balcony.

The next portion of the evening had Duncan Sheik play stripped down versions of some songs from his upcoming musical, Spring Awakening:


Finally, for the last part of the evening, we got to experience Mr. Sweeney Todd himself, Michael Cerveris, and his band rock out. One song, Powerlines, reminded me a lot of Bob Mould and Husker Du. His rock voice was surprisingly different from his stage voice -- more subtle and higher than his baritone that I was used to. Happily, he didn't spit a single drop, as he infamously does during Sweeney Todd. Julie1 told me that she saw Michael Cerveris as Hedwig years ago. I couldn't picture it till I heard him sing last night.



To close out the evening, Michael and his band were joined by Duncan and Nellie and Co.



So awesome, all of it!

Dog Voices @The Sea Shell, Aug. 19th

Okay, so this isn't a usual music blog entry, but it sort of is...

My best friend Christina is getting married soon, so this past weekend we headed down to the Jersey Shore for a 4 day bachelorette weekend. We stayed at this motel on the beach called the Sea Shell. Five girls crammed into a room, ready for a ton of fun. Our view from our balcony in the morning:

Our room was right over the tiki bar and had a view of the pool, so later on during the day, it really felt like we were on some MTV spring break show:


The best part was on Saturday when we caught this great cover band, Dog Voices. They came up on the roof in front of our balcony and played from there:


Because Christina was wearing a veil and a sash that said "Miss Bachelorette," people were super cool and bought us tons of drinks and shots and offered all kinds of advice re: marital life. We thought it'd be a great idea if we took turns wearing the veil all the time.

Later on in the evening, Dog Voices played the indoors restaurant/bar downstairs as well. The lead singer of Dog Voices, Monte, who hammed it up with Christina, thought that wearing the veil was a good idea, too:


I am so exhausted from all that silly partying, but we showed Christina a great time. I am so excited for her and her fiance, Chris!