Reviews of albums, films, concerts, and more from the Bay Area Music and Movie Nerds
Monday night was supposed to be a night off for me. I was simply going to sit and relax at the Warfield, enjoying a quiet evening of acoustic Jethro Tull songs. I’d chat with my friend, drink some bourbon, and rock out to killer cuts from the Jethro Tull catalog. But something amazing happened that I wasn’t expecting, and I just had to share it with you. Continue reading “Show Review: Ian Anderson of Jethro Tull at The Warfield, 11/9/2009”
It’s been quite some time since the Fox Theater in Oakland had a show that generated such interest that it sold out within a month, and also multiplied itself to take place over an additional two nights. At the time of this writing, the first of those two extra nights is also completely sold out, and the second one is getting pretty close. What sort of band would have the magnitude to sell out the Fox Theater for three nights in a row? In May, the Allman Brothers Band did it; in mid-September it was Further, the new Grateful Dead project, and in a week, it will likely be all three nights of Widespread Panic. So, for this case, it must have been another famous jam band with thousands of followers. Right?
Wrong. Tonight, and for the next two nights, the Fox is owned by four Bostonians who helped write the book on modern alternative music: the Pixies, who are going to spend each night playing their landmark album Doolittle, along with its B-sides and an encore of their own devising.
Continue reading “Show Review: Pixies with Rain Machine at The Fox Oakland, 11/8/2009”
I love San Francisco. I love the weather, I love the variety and I love that sometimes you can just go hang out with friends at a bar and see a really good show. Not that I stumbled upon this show, I planned on going to see a friend perform, but I was very surprised with the overall quality of the performance. And I love the idea that I could have just happened to walk into this bar and ended up sweating the night away watching the amazing dance party that is the band Planet Booty. Continue reading “Show Review: Planet Booty at the Blue Macaw, 11/4/09”
When Vampire Weekend announced they were playing an all-California tour, and that tour would include the Town Hall Theater in Lafayette, CA, I immediately went to look up what this theater was. What I found was that it was a 200-seat local theater company’s home venue, and I knew right away that this show would sell out fast. Well thanks to my years of typing practice, I managed to get tickets when they went on sale a couple of months back. (There’s no magical press passes tonight — we had to sweat it out like the rest of you.) Imagine my surprise when we arrived to the theater to find that it was an all-seated show. Sit down for Vampire Weekend? Oh oh. Continue reading “Show Review: Vampire Weekend at The Town Hall Theater in Lafayette, 11/7/09”
This week was pretty much dominated by Puscifer, the traveling musical carnival and brainchild of Maynard James Keenan. A simple little tweet gave us a record traffic day on Friday, so there’s no surprise what will be at #1 on this week’s busiest posts. But why stop reading at number one when numbers two through five are also chock full of valuable musical information? Continue reading “Week in Review: Top 5 Posts from 10/30-11/5”
There are 3 prominent bands that exist in the punk rock world today who seek to bend the genres and performance styles of their music by adding instruments or melodies from folk- or worldly-sources to their one-two-three-go raucous sound. One of them is Irish/American collective Flogging Molly, who sings songs of olden times and forgotten friends; another is Gogol Bordello, the Russian/gypsy revivalists infused with New York punk attitude in their songs about revolution, celebration, and wandering the world.
The third band has a simpler message: we were rudely kicked over here, but we brought enough beer and whiskey to keep us entertained, so let’s stir things up a bit! This band, of course, is none other than Massachusetts’ own Dropkick Murphys, who came to stake their claim in this year’s set of magnificent punk rock shows at Oakland’s Fox Theater.
Continue reading “Show Review: Dropkick Murphys with Youth Brigade, The Flatliners and The Insurgence at The Fox Oakland, 11/6/2009”
Ten tracks. Less than 23 minutes. Three women. Oh, it’s that kind of album. Actually, not so much. This band got tired of waiting for Heavenly/Marine Research/Talulah Gosh to get back together (fundamentally impossible, I know — the new Tender Trap will be out soon, so hang in there) and decided to make their own music. Then, they’d get about two minutes into a song and realize, “Wow, this is harder than we thought. On to the next track!” Continue reading “Album Review: Brilliant Colors – Introducing”
Hey! Wait! That title looks awfully familiar. You mean to tell me that those troublemakers in Puscifer, the art/music/performance collective spearheaded by Maynard James Keenan of Tool/A Perfect Circle, were allowed into the Fox Theater for yet another night of mayhem, debauchery and… Wait, what’s that? Country music? No, Puscifer doesn’t play country music, they play industrial-experimental-electronic… What do you mean, the stage is built like the front of a Wild West house, complete with porch armchairs and old-style pop filter microphones?
Yes, Puscifer was back. Yes, they brought Uncle Scratch’s Gospel Revival back with them. But, no, it was not like the first night — as evidenced by the aforementioned set design, Puscifer had come back to play some old-fashioned country westerns. Well, old-fashioned is actually an incorrect term — after all, these were their own songs, although there’s probably some desolate corner of the world where these bastardized country ballads could be considered old-fashioned westerns.
Forget any expectations you have for the evening at hand. Leave them at the door, which, in the case of tonight’s show, is beset with a flock of confused, wary patrons, eyeing a man in an off-tan suit and taped-together sunglasses, who is armed with a megaphone. The man is Brother Ed of Uncle Scratch’s Gospel Revival, and he is begging, PLEADING for the patrons to not enter the Fox Theater tonight, to not forsake their own souls as the cost of attending this show which, according to him, can only be the work of the Devil himself.
Brother Ed should be scared. His rants, while facetious at their core, are somewhat justified. He and his band will be opening, tonight, for Puscifer.
I have returned from Florida, and I am back to control your life… Here are a few suggestions:
Continue reading “Spinning Platters Weekly Guide To Bay Area Concerts: November 4th-November 10th”