For our third installment of Spinning Platters “Midnght” Music Movies (this one starts at 10:30) at The New Parkway, we are thrilled to be able to present to you the first 22 chapters of R Kelly’s magnum opus Trapped In The Closet. Tickets are moving awfully fast (not just marketing speak), and you should buy them right away!
This started with a Facebook post I made on my personal wall:
The cheap seats are $171 for The Rolling Stones at Oracle. $660 for the top price level (not including VIP which costs GKHM). Makes Prince look like a bargain.
To that, my friend and fellow blogger John Marcher of A Beast in a Jungle responded with a long post that started with the line, “Gordon, I want to debate this with you.” So over the next few days, we sent some emails back and forth doing just that, and getting into deep topics like whether career artists are truly artists. I promised him the last word, and he’ll have it between us. We do invite you, however, to post your thoughts in the comments.
John Marcher:
Gordon, I want to debate this with you. The prices are what they are, and they are fair. Is $250 too much to see Prince in a small venue? Absolutely not. He and his band deserve to paid for the show. The people setting up and tearing down the show deserve to get paid. They have to eat on the road and stay in hotels- and do you think Prince and his band are going to eat at fucking Mel’s Diner and stay at the Holiday Inn? Continue reading “Is It OK For Artists to Charge High Prices For Their Concert Tickets?”
The announcement sent panic waves throughout the indie rockers of San Francisco: Phoenix at The Independent on April Fool’s Day. And this was not a hoax. What it was, though, was an impossible ticket. A representative of The Independent was quoted in the paper as saying the show sold out “immediately.” It sent everyone I know scrambling for tickets, wanting to be at what was officially the welcome back party for Steve Masters of Live 105, and would also serve as the unofficial kickoff to Fauxchella. Continue reading “Show Review: Phoenix with Mac DeMarco at The Independent, 4/1/2013”
Having been dubbed a “crafty veteran” by one local bystander, there are a few certain truths that I have discovered seven years deep into South By South West culture. 1) Always carry your phone charger because the battery will die; the ABC’s (Always Be Chargin’) as we here at Spinning Platters like to call it. 2) Delicious food is only a food truck away when you need to take a break and refuel in-between day parties and evening showcases. And 3) there will be both bad, and good bands at aforementioned showcases. The payout for waiting through a not-so-awesome band, however, can be an amazing, week-altering experience that leads to months of fan-girl-ing out, post-South By. However, this is all contingent on actually being granted admission to that one thing one wanted to see the most. There are still things to be learned and sometimes learned the hard way.
Appearing this April Fool’s Day at Bottom Of The Hill!
Hello there, Bay Area live music lover. As we reach April, we know that the next 30 days will be quite busy. We haven’t even started with the Coachella bands coming to town, and, well, I’m already exhausted just looking at this thing!
Just Mika, lit only by a single white globe that appeared to be floating in air, and those darned camera phones.
Mika burst on to the scene a few years ago with a sugary pop masterpiece, Life in Cartoon Motion, and his joyful and colorful live shows, chock full of balloons, confetti, streamers and a giant pop band behind him. Now, he’s on tour supporting his newest album, The Origin of Love, and he’s taking a markedly different approach. This show, billed as “An intimate evening with” saw him behind a piano for the lion’s share of the evening, joined only by Max Taylor and Curtis Stansfield on a variety of instruments. It was stripped down, and it was wonderful. Continue reading “Show Review: An Intimate Evening with Mika at Great American Music Hall, 3/25/2013”
Now that we’ve all had time to recover from a week’s worth of sun damage, get our voices back, and forget about the hours spent driving through the lonely west Texas desert, it’s time to reflect upon another year of SXSW. While everyone’s experience is different under the Austin sun, these are my recollections as to the best and worst of SXSW 2013.
