I’m Having Fun Now, the “debut” album by Jenny and Johnny (Jenny Lewis and Johnathan Rice), is being marketed as the first collaboration between indie lovebirds Lewis and Rice. This isn’t strictly the case, though; Lewis and Rice have been all over each other’s material (what the kids are calling it these days) for the last five years. Rice has been playing in Lewis’ touring band since 2006, and had a very strong presence on her underrated 2008 LP, Acid Tongue. In turn, Lewis co-wrote and sang on several tracks from Rice’s 2007 album, Further North. But now these kids have made it official and released a full-length duets album. Last night, they played the first of two nights at Great American Music Hall. How did it go?
[read the whole post]
Look how much your girlfriend is enjoying herself at The Mountain Winery in Saratoga. So many concerts! So much wine!
As July transitions into August, The Mountain Winery continues to generally kick the ass of every other Bay Area concert venue this week—and it’s actually kind of an off-week for them. Nobody likes a showoff, Mountain Winery! Other highlights this week include Joanna Newsom, a free concert by Rickie Lee Jones, and the final performance by local favorites Make Me before they take an indefinite hiatus. All that and more, after the jump…
[read the whole post]
Mya (who has since been name-usurped by M.I.A.), Bif Naked (clearly nonplussed), Sarah McLachlan, and Martina McBride sitting at a Lilith Fair press panel back in the day. Photo courtesy of Lilith Fair.
Welcome to our first Bay Area concert guide for the lovely (in the East Bay) month of July. After the jump, check out this week’s relatively low-key concert offerings (I guess concert promoters don’t think people enjoy live shows on Independence Day?), but with at least one major event: the long-awaited return of the greatest concert package tour of all time! Or at least of the ’90s. And at least of the concert packages that only featured female singers. Regardless: Lilith Fair is coming to town, y’all!
[read the whole post]
Photo by sascha10er
Sensitive gays from around the Bay Area flocked to Bottom of the Hill last night for the latest San Francisco appearance by outrageously cute twee-folk pin-up Jay Brannan.
[read the whole post]
Aaron Tveit and James Franco in HOWL
The 34th annual Frameline LGBT Film Festival, which remains the largest of its kind in the world, will take place in San Francisco from June 17-27. Packed into those eleven days will be hundreds of narrative films, documentaries, and shorts covering nearly every conceivable angle of the LGBT experience from just about every corner of the globe. After the jump, Spinning Platters helps you narrow it all down by picking three films from each of four main categories.
[read the whole post]
Photo by David Emery
Last night, supermodel/singer/rock-n-roll wife Karen Elson kicked off the opening night of her very first tour with a sold-out concert at Café Du Nord. When I learned that the show was sold out, I was intrigued. Why was the interest in Ms. Elson already so piqued? After all, she has but a single album to her name, The Ghost Who Walks (Third Man), which was produced by Elson’s husband, Jack White, and just came out on May 25. The buzz has been modestly positive, if not hyperbolic.
So who were all these fans and looky-loos? Were they committed White Stripes fans whose enthusiasm for the group extends even to its spouses? Or was it a decidedly stranger subculture of model-turned-singer fetishists resentful that Tyra Banks’ “Shake Your Body” and Naomi Campbell’s Baby Woman never took off stateside? Or maybe, like me, they were just your garden variety redheaded-girl-singer fans.
[read the whole post]
