06.29.2007 The National

Admittedly, I was sort of back and forth on this show. I didn't really make an effort to get tickets until they were sold out and people were trying to sell tickets on craigslist for $45-50 a pop ($20 face). On a whim, I went down to Richards with low expectations and got into the "no tickets people" line and hoped they would sell more than 15 at the door. Well they did and I got in...

..to find that a band was already on stage tweaking their sound. Now I'm not exactly the National's biggest fan, but I could probably pick out their lead singer out of a line-up of 3-4 other people if they all had distinct faces, and the singer onstage looked like him. Interesting.... At this point I'm thinking that was the National (possibly) on stage, the opener couldn't make it over the border (also possible we found out later that that did happen, and almost arrested apparently too) and that the National would play an extended set starting now:



oops looks I like missed the part when he said "we'll play part of a song." Yep just a late sound check. Still kind of cool I guess.





Well I don't really have much new information to report, aside from the guitarist mentioning that they would be back in September. As other people have suggested during their tour w/ CYHASY, they're much much better live than on album. Lots of energy that you wouldn't expect from hearing their album. They even had a jam-out noise-indulgence thing during the last song where the guitarist broke a string or two.









$20/$20

Priestess - I am the Night, Colour Me Black (live 02.25.2006)

06.09.2007 Land of Talk/Love and Mathematics

The Rosebuds were headlining, but I was too sick to check it out. About a week ago Land of Talk mysteriously disappeared off both The Rosebuds' and the promoter's website. At that point I was rather relieved as I didn't buy a ticket yet and wasn't really that into the Rosebuds. Fastforward to the day of the show and I'm sick with an annoying (and probably somewhat contagious because i know who i got it from) cold; sore throat, runny nose and all that fun stuff. So a couple hours before the show, I'm surfing the net and I come across a new post from Quinn's blog (blog tag), essentially saying Liz from LoT will be playing solo due to more border crossing problems. Damn, sometimes Vancouver's geographical location brings about some interesting shows (ie final show of the tour, festival off-dates). Sick or not, I can't pass this one up.

Love and Mathematics. In terms of local bands, I like this one. They aren't really heavy, and they're not really that poppy either. They have a post-rock meets indie pop sort of sound. When I say post rock, i mean like explosions in the sky without the distortion and thus without the "blowing up"/air plane taking off.... well if you listen to mogwai/mono/godspeed you know what i mean.

I've heard of Liz from Land of Talk doing solo shows before when LoT was touring with The Slip, but I never thought I'd get to see one. It turns out it's somewhat of a bittersweet experience. She admits it herself, it's not like she's doing her own songs, it's just her doing Land of Talk songs without the rest of band. So you don't get the rock'n out vibe you would normally get unfortunately. However, we did get a taste of how awesome the new songs will be. The new songs are great, I can only imagine how good they'll be with the rest of the band playing.

Setlist

Young bridge (New Song)
New Song (a slow little number, similar to Street Wheels)
Breaxxbaxx
Magnetic Hill
Summer Special
Yuppie Food (or Yuppie Floo/Foo/Flu I couldn't really tell)
Sea Foam






$15/$15 (i feel like i should say $10, but who am i kidding, 10 times out of 10 i'd do it again and pay $15 for a 30 min. solo set)

05.31.2007 Secret Chiefs 3 / Faun Fables

Secret Chiefs 3 is probably a band that is most likely not well known to those not familar with Bungle/Patton/FNM projects. After finding a hard time trying to wrap my head around a Tomahawk or Fantomas albums, I almost dismissed SC3 with the rest of the band's cohorts. However, as luck would have, a certain video clip from youtube, changed my mind; it had in fact made me almost anxious to see them live. Which leads to Thursday night.

Faun Fables, which is really just Dawn McCarthy, opened the show. For most of the set, it was just her and her acoustic guitar. On other songs, she would be joined by members of SC3 for additional instrumentation. Her music consisted of folk tunes with varying themes. Oddly enough a portion of her set consisted of a couple of songs themed around the kitchen. She seemed quite proud of that fact. Her last number, was a dancy (in a hippie dancing kind of way) number in which she showed the audience a dance that she came up with - which was vaguely reminescent of the Macarena. The hippies seemed to eat it up. Did I mention there were a lot of hippies at this show - The I don't know personal space / I'm casting a spell dancing hippies were all there.

After a short break, SC3 came out on stage. Dressed in black robes decorated with Masonary insignias, the band seemed to play up on the almost esoteric nature of their music. Boasting a band that would make both Godspeed you! Black Emperor and Do Make Say Think proud, they consisted a sitar player, 2 drummers, a guiatrist, bassist, a keyboardist and a violinist. Playing music that spanned their many albums, SC3 seemed to shift through many genres of music almost seemlessly. Middle Eastern, Mediterranian, Surf Rock, Death Metal and Motion picture type music were represented effortlessly. The evening was divided into two 45 minute sets and a two song encore. Despite the volume of music, it never seemed boring or pretentious which is can be a common complaint for bands with such wide influences. Even the smaller sized audience (the balcony was closed off), didnt seem to detract from the overall show or performance- some would argue it created a more intimate show. In truth, I doubt anyone would have complained if the show had lasted another 2 hours.

$20/$20